"Spats" is the fifty-third episodenote of Lilo & Stitch: The Series. It first aired on August 12, 2005, and is a crossover with The Proud Family.
The plot synopsis below includes content originally written on Lilo & Stitch Wiki on Fandom,
which is available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike License 3.0 (Unported).
The Proud Family comes to visit Hawaii and stay in the reopened "Jumba & Pleakley's Bed & Not Breakfast" for their vacation, along with Mr. Cooper, an curmudgeonly hotel reviewer that Pleakley is trying to appease. While Jumba and Pleakley give Oscar, Trudy, Suga Mama, BeBe and CeCe a ride to Wizard Kelly's professional wrestling event, "Wizard Kelly's Smack-up Throw-Down: Hawaiian Style, Y'all", Lilo decides to help Penny with her school report and lets Penny get more acquainted with Stitch.
In the meantime, a squirrel appears inside a window of the "hotel" and takes an interest in Experiment 397's pod. Mistaking the pod for a nut, the squirrel attempts to eat it, but is unable to. The squirrel then throws 397's pod into a bowl of bath bombs. Suga Mama, while soaking in a hot tub, reaches for 397's pod, mistaking it for a bath bomb. Suga Mama then drops the pod into the bathtub, activating 397 (named Spats). Upon activation, Spats zaps the squirrel and Puff (who was sleeping on a throw rug), causing both animals to brawl with each other. Spats then zaps BeBe and CeCe, causing the twins to clash with each other, followed by Oscar and Trudy Proud and then Jumba and Mr. Cooper, who fight as well.
As Pleakley tries in vain to get Mr. Cooper, and the Prouds to enjoy their vacation, Lilo and Penny later notice Spats on the loose and decide to capture him before Gantu does. However, Lilo and Penny get zapped and start fighting with each other. Stitch tries to break up the girls' conflict, even spinning Penny like a top, but they continue to argue. Stitch grabs the X-Buggy, tosses Penny and Lilo in and then straps them in, squishing them together. Later that night, Stitch and the girls arrive at the Birds of Paradise Hotel, where Wizard Kelly is hosting his wrestling event.
As the girls, the Prouds, Jumba, and Mr. Cooper keep arguing, Spats keeps zapping people, including the wrestlers, and Stitch tries to catch Spats. Meanwhile, Penny begins to sulk about her vacation and finds a way to dissolve Spats' effects, by counting to ten (which Trudy told everyone to earlier, when the Prouds' luggage got lost). When she is about to go tell Lilo, one of the wrestlers flies out of the ring, missing Penny by two inches, followed by his shoe and Spats. Penny catches him and scolds him for his mischief. But, after seeing his cuteness, Penny becomes smitten by him.
Gantu then shows up and threatens to take him away from Penny. Suga Mama shows up to defend her granddaughter and the alien experiment. Spats zaps Suga Mama and Gantu and they take their argument into the ring. Meanwhile, Lilo, still under Spats' effects, is still not talking to Penny, but Penny gets Lilo to count to ten, reliving the Hawaiian girl of Spats' effects. Soon enough, Lilo, Penny, and Stitch get everybody else at the event to count to ten and they are back to normal, although Mr. Cooper leaves KauaŹ»i and heads home to relax, completely dissatisfied with his entire trip. The next day, Lilo and Stitch find Spats' one true place, giving him to Wizard Kelly to have the experiment train Kelly's pro wrestlers to fight more convincingly.
Pleakley finds that Mr. Cooper gave a terrible review, supposedly killing off any further chances of success for his and Jumba's "hotel". However, the girls and Stitch come in through the door and Lilo gives Pleakley the latest issue of The Kokaua Town Gazette. Penny managed to get her school article finished and titled it: "My Hawaiian Alien Adventure". Lilo excitedly says that it was so good that she and Penny took the article to the local newspaper and got it printed in its latest issue. She says that it would bring in more guests and ones that want to look for aliens too, and all is well.
Experiments who appeared or were mentioned in this episode:
- Spats (X-397): This episode's Monster of the Week; a yellow-furred squirrel-like experiment who is designed to cause local populations to argue with each other so they do not notice someone taking over their planet. He fires beams from his tail at any two given individuals so they would constantly argue with each other.
- Reuben (X-625): Mocks Gantu's workout routine and argues with him (on their own, not by Spats) that Gantu would not be able capture 397.
Tropes featured in this episode include:
- Bittersweet Ending: Lilo and Penny have managed to stop Spats, but thanks to him, Jumba and Pleakley's hotel has gotten a horrible review from Mr. Cooper and their business has flopped.
- Caustic Critic: Mr. Cooper is a really uptight hotel critic and gives poor Pleakley a hard time, constantly writing about every bad experience he goes through. Him dealing with the loud Prouds and arguing with Jumba during the critic's trip (due to Spats) doesn't help.
- Crossover: With The Proud Family.
- Chekhov's Gun: When the Prouds realize they lost their luggage, causing Penny to worry as she lost her notebook and Oscar to demand a refund (for a free trip, as Suga Mama pointed out), Trudy tells everyone to settle down by taking a deep breath and counting to ten. Later, Penny uses her mom's suggestion to calm down after arguing with Lilo and is relieved, which causes her to realize that's the key to reversing Spats' effects.
- "Eureka!" Moment: After Penny calms down after counting to ten, she realizes that's the antidote to countering Spats' effects on everyone.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Though he's the type of guy who will buy off anything, Wizard Kelly adopts Spats as a possible way to make his wrestlers fight harder. That aside, it seems Spats has found a potentially loving owner.
