Mrs. Clusky assigns her class to choose a project that illustrates what they've learned about astronomy. On their way home from school, Helen says she plans to build a model of the solar system, but T.D. reveals he plans to go to space, using a jetpack O.G. built. He straps it on in front of a crowd of kids and tries to take off, but forgets to fasten the straps, so the jetpack flies off his back without him.
While Helen searches for things to build her model with, T.D. is in a funk as he doesn't know what to do for his project. Helen accidentally spills a box of Danny's old comics, and T.D. takes interest and wants to borrow them. She lets him, so he goes home and reads them.
Later, Helen is building her model and explaining to Martha what a star is, when T.D. shows up at the window with a comic. She lets him in, and he reveals that he still doesn't know what to do for his project. However, he's more concerned that the last of the comics he read ends on a cliffhanger. Daniel walks in, and T.D. asks him what happens next, but it turns out that there's no answer, since the comics' company went out of business after the issue was printed.
Martha suggests making up and ending and drawing an unofficial last comic as his school project. While Helen paints her model, T.D. draws a comic. In the comic, the protagonist, Chuck Nebula, lands on a planet populated by dogs that look like Martha (which was her idea). Martha then adds that the dogs have discovered the "secret of the universe": a giant steak. She then tries to end it, but T.D. changes it so that the dogs are under attack by evil space cats who launch radioactive hairballs.
T.D. continues writing the comic, having Nebula escape with one of the dogs and plan to hide on one of the planet's eight moons. However, the spaceship is out of fuel because it runs on milk and the cats have punctured it and are lapping it up. Helen joins in and adds herself as a woman who comes to help. She ties some pieces of cloth together, dangles the makeshift rope down, and pulls up Captain Nebula and the dog onto her ship (which T.D. drew as shaped like a laundry basket as he likes to pretend the Kennelly laundry basket is a spaceship).
Helen's character introduces herself as Commander Helen, and says she's on a mission to collect socks that have fallen into rifts in the space-time continuum from clothes dryers. T.D. then adds space pirates, who want to steal the socks to turn into evil sock puppets. They try to do so with a giant vacuum, but accidentally suck up one of Jupiter's moons, blocking the hose and making them crash-land on a chunk of land.
T.D. then presents his comic to his class, and Mrs. Clusky is impressed with the comic, but still finds it unrealistic. Then, the jetpack falls from the sky and lands outside the school and she gives him a B+. That night, Danny reads T.D.'s comic in bed.
This episode provides examples of
- Alliterative Title: Conversed when Daniel reveals that when he was a little boy, his favourite comic was called Pinkie the Pony.
- Animal Jingoism: In T.D.'s comic, he makes dogs the good guys and cats the bad guys.
- Barefoot Cartoon Animal: The dogs and cats on the planet in T.D.'s comic wear onesies and no shoes.
- Bizarre Beverage Use: In T.D.'s comic, the spaceship runs on milk.
- Brick Joke: At the beginning, T.D. accidentally launches a jetpack into the sky without him. At the end, the jetpack crashes down again.
- But You Were There, and You, and You: T.D. imagines himself as Chuck Nebula and draws the dogs on the planet as looking like a pack of Marthas (which was the actual Martha's idea).
- Cats Are Mean: In T.D.'s comic, he casts the cats as the villains, who attack the dogs with radioactive hairballs.
- Cheesy Moon: Discussed when T.D. jokingly asks what kind of cheese the moon is made of.
- Civilised Animal:
- The dogs in the comic can talk, and unlike Martha they wear clothes. However, they still behave very much like dogs, liking steak and walking on all fours.
- Likewise, the cats wear clothes and use weapons, but they also walk on all fours, cough up hairballs to load up said weapons, and lap up milk.
- Continuation: In-Universe; T.D. draws a comic to add an ending to a series without one.
- Continuity Nod: The fact that Danny used to read comics, which was first brought up in "Skits Monkeys Around", is mentioned again when Helen knocks over a box of his old comics.
- Creating Life: In T.D.'s comic, the space pirates want to turn the socks into living, evil sock puppets.
- Cyclops: A one-eyed alien is seen in one of the comics.
- Dramatic Irony: Mrs. Clusky never realises how the jetpack landed outside the school, when the viewers do.
- Flying Saucer: Some of the spaceships in the comics are saucer-shaped.
- Giant Food: The steak in T.D.'s comic is about the size of a house.
- Hairball Humor: The cats in T.D.'s comic launch radioactive hairballs.
- Happy Dance: In the comic, Commander Helen and Captain Nebula dance when the space pirates' vacuum gets blocked by one of Jupiter's moons.
- Her Codename Was Mary Sue: Helen adds herself into the comic as a space heroine who saves Captain Nebula and a dog.
- Jolly Roger: The space pirates in the comic have a black flag with a skull and crossbones.
- Living Toys: In the comic, the pirates want to make evil sock puppets.
- Meaningful Name: The comics feature an astronaut whose last name is Nebula.
- No Ending: The comic series Danny and T.D. read ends on an unresolved cliffhanger, due to the company going out of business.
- Skewed Priorities: T.D. is more concerned about the comic ending on a cliffhanger than about his class project.
- Space Episode: Subverted. T.D. tries to go to space with a jetpack, but fails.
- Stock Animal Diet:
- According to the dogs in T.D.'s comic, the secret of the universe is a giant steak.
- Martha asks T.D. to draw a bone-shaped spaceship.
- The cats in the comic puncture the spaceship's fuel tank so they can drink the milk within.
- Trivial Tragedy: Danny says that the unresolved cliffhanger on his comic left him "depressed". He's probably not speaking of literal depression, but he still says it took years for him to get over it.
