Harley, Ivy, and Clayface infiltrate Riddle U to find out how the Riddler is getting power and clean water.
Tropes:
- Actor Allusion: Once more, Jim Rash plays the dean of a not-exactly-up-to-standard college.
- All for Nothing: Dr. Psycho and King Shark's mission to get a water purifier ends up being this once Harley gets Riddler to power her crew's mall. Harley even breaks the purifier to rub it in.
- Animation Bump: Clayface's shapeshifting and fight animations are noticeably fluid in this episode, with the final standoff against the Riddler's goons being a stand-out.
- Blatant Lies:
- When Gordon walks in on Barbara as Ivy has her wrapped in a vine, she claims to be "vining" and that he wouldn't get it.
- Harley and Ivy tell Barbara that they'll drop Riddler off at the Arkham drive-thru.
- Doctor Psycho claims not to have made candles from the fat of dead zebras while wearing a zebra skin hat.
- Brick Joke: Harley mistakenly beats up a student dressed up like the Riddler. The fraternity party she and Ivy sneak into later is a fundraiser for the injured guy.
- Canon Character All Along: The unnamed tour guide is revealed to be Barbara Gordon after the chase scene. At the end of the episode, she becomes Batgirl.
- Cool Car: Dr. Psycho and King Shark build a Weaponized Car with a Gatling gun on top to escape Two Face's goons. The car is sadly torn to pieces by Bane's goons.
- Create Your Own Hero: Riddler taking over the university is what inspires Barbara to try to take him down. And teaming up with Harley and Ivy inspires her to become Batgirl at the end of the episode. Harley even lampshades it when Ivy speculates it'll just be a phase. And Harley being right on that makes sense seeing as Ivy's mostly a misanthrope and Harley's a psychiatrist...
- Disco Dan: Downplayed, but Harley and Ivy's college disguises amount to them pulling out the clothes that they wore in college (as they are both in their early 30's at best, though they have enhanced physiologies on their side). The other students don't comment on their attire, but the Riddler calls them out on it. Ivy's pigtails and Daria-inspired look particularly stand out.
- Didn't Think This Through: While Harley and Ivy did put effort into their makeup and outfits, clearly they didn't create names to go with their disguises, so Harley comes up with names on the spot when Barbara the tour guide asks.
- Enemy Mine: To the extent that they're enemies, being on opposite sides of the law, Barbara is willing to team up with Harley and Ivy to take down the Riddler.
- Exposition Already Covered: After Harley and Ivy get captured by Riddler's goons and then they took them out, when Harley is about to reveal herself and Ivy to Riddler, he cuts them off and tells them he already knows. He points out their disguises don't help them blend in with the current college students, and reluctantly they agree with him.
- Fan Disservice: Gordon walking around in a towel/his boxers throughout the episode. Divorce, along with everything else, has not been kind to him.
- Hamster-Wheel Power: Riddler can power his entire university by kidnapping his college students and making them run in giant hamster wheels. If any of them die, he replaces them with new students. After defeating him, Ivy and Harley place him in one at the mall.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Riddler's taser cane ends up destroying his generator when Barbara causes him to fall back and hit the off switch with the cane.
- Immune to Bullets:
- King Shark's skin is tough enough that despite getting shot numerous times by Tommy guns, there isn't a scratch on him.
- Bane's goons, after using Venom, shrug off being shot by a Gatling gun.
- Laser-Guided Karma: After kidnapping and killing several college students by forcing them to run in giant hamster wheels, Riddler is forced by Harley and Ivy to run in one to power the mall.
- Lost in Character: Clayface is so committed to his performance that he doesn't even bother to change back to his own self when trapped in a human hamster wheel.
- Mythology Gag:
- This isn't the first time Riddler got trapped in one of his own devices and was forced to run continuously while in a dystopian version of Gotham isolated from the rest of America.
- An episode of Gotham also had a woman hit Clayface in annoyance/anger, causing his disguised face to deform.
- "Not So Different" Remark: Harley and Ivy comment that Barbara's Batman phase will go away in time...and then they both sigh with infatuation at the phase they apparently went through themselves.
- Not-So-Harmless Villain: Bane is technically this due to his goons proving far more dangerous than the ones from any of the other gangs encountered so far thanks to them injecting themselves with Venom. Given that he's largely been treated as a joke, his gang actually proving a threat was unexpected.
- Offscreen Moment of Awesome:
- Dr. Psycho and King Shark were facing off with Bane's Venom-enhanced goons, who tore their car to pieces. By the end of the episode, we see that they managed to escape despite that.
- Clayface had already been using his Steph persona at Riddler U long enough that Steph's known and well-liked by just about everyone on campus.
- Overshadowed by Awesome: Barbara is incredibly skilled at parkour and probably knows a few tricks being a cop's kid, but it's obvious she's rarely been in a fight. She struggles to take down two goons while Harley, Ivy, and Clayface wipe the floor with the rest of Riddler's guards.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: As Riddler lampshades, Harley and Ivy barely pass for college students, and it's obvious who they are to anyone familiar with them. Gets even more jarring when we consider that the Riddler is probably the smartest supervillain in Gotham, and also that Clayface actually seemed to succeed with his disguise.
- Smitten Teenage Girl: Discussed; Ivy hopes that Barbara grows out of her "Batman phase" like she and Harley did. The two of them sigh dreamily.
- Stepford Smiler: Every student in Riddler U.
- Take That!: One of the students protests the curriculum, demanding that the university bring back degrees that result in "gainful employment like art history."
- Tempting Fate: Dr. Psycho sees a trio of Bane's goons coming for him and King Shark. The two have a Weaponized Car, so he dismisses the goons as harmless. They proceed to inject themselves with Venom, which makes them Immune to Bullets and rip the car to pieces.
- Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: Harley, the Trope Namer, lampshades Barbara's idea to use a gun to shoot the switch and not Riddler.Harley: When someone says, "What are you gonna do? Shoot all of us?" You say, "No! Just You!" Not the switch!
- And then Barbara resorts to throwing the gun at Riddler, causing him to fall back and his taser cane to destroy the said generator.
