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Recap / Odd Squad S 1 E 19 Hold The Door Flatastrophe

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Curious George, eat your heart out.
Hold the Door

Airdates: January 20, 2015 note , March 9, 2015 note , May 3, 2015 note 

When a young agent-in-training named Ori keeps running into dangerous rooms throughout headquarters, Olive and Otto must catch him before Ms. O finds out.


Tropes:

  • Acting Unnatural: When Ms. O comes across the rest of the Main 4 (who are peeking inside of the Dinosaur Room), she gives a suspicious "Agents..." The others respond in kind by giving an in-unison, completely unnatural "Ms. Ooooo?!" It only gets worse from there, but Ms. O manages to fall for it.
  • Babysitting Episode: Olive and Otto are tasked with showing an agent-in-training named Ori around headquarters. However, every time they take their eyes off of him, he runs off to somewhere else out of their sight. Eventually, they recruit Oscar and Dr. O to help, but not even the four of them can catch up to Ori. It takes a near-death experience with robot princesses before the group is able to capture the agent-in-training, but by that point they are sniffed out by Ms. O.
  • Berate and Switch: Ms. O does this when the group eventually gets caught.
    Ms. O: You exposed an agent-in-training to a volcano, dinosaurs, and robot princesses?
    [small pause]
    Ms. O: [sweetly] Good job.
    Everyone (except Ori): What?!
  • Beauty Is Never Tarnished: Inverted, if past episodes such as "Recipe for Disaster" are taken into consideration. Oscar heads into the Dinosaur Room to rescue Ori, and doesn't suffer so much as a dirtied lab coat and slightly ruffled hair. Meanwhile, Olive has had more unkempt appearances in past episodes.
  • Beyond the Impossible: Olive and Otto manage to find a woman's snowman. In what appears to be spring or summer. With all of his parts. And they even managed to catch him in a bucket!
  • Big "SHUT UP!": Olive gives an exasperated "Ori, stop!" when Ori begins to run away.
  • Caught on Tape: Ms. O reveals that she saw everything go down — starting from when Olive and Otto lost Ori in the Volcano Room — via the Security cameras.
  • Chase Scene: One occurs with the Main 4 (bar Ms. O, obviously) and Dr. O chasing after Ori. Every time they reach a new location, he's somewhere else, and so on. By the time the group reaches the balcony they are out of breath and Olive believes he'll pop up behind them. Unfortunately, she could not be more wrong.
  • "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: Ms. O leads her own group of agents-in-training away by using something similar to a cotton gait belt, with loops for the agents-in-training to grab onto. Had Olive and Otto used that method with Ori on their own tour, they likely could have kept better tabs on him.
  • Curious as a Monkey: Ori. Whoo boy, Ori. He likes to fiddle with things, press buttons, and explore all sorts of rooms inside headquarters. And when he isn't running off everywhere, he's asking questions. His curiosity is peaked even as he's being dragged away from robot princesses who want to kill him.
  • Dangerous Workplace: Deconstructed, as much of this episode is spent exploring the more dangerous rooms of Odd Squad, with Ori entering every one of them and being at risk of death. Ms. O even outright admits that Odd Squad Headquarters is a dangerous place where agents can get, at worst, killed while on the job. While most agents are well aware of this and take steps to keep themselves safe while knowing the risk Odd Squad as an organization poses, other agents do not — and they often wind up in situations that leave them injured, if not dead.
  • Eating Lunch Alone: Oscar uses the excuse of Ori eating alone in the bathroom for why he isn't with him, Olive and Otto; he combines the two agents' botched excuses into one. Ms. O buys it.
    Ms. O: Well I'm glad someone's finally using the bathroom lunch table.
  • Face Palm: True to her Character Tic, Olive does this repeatedly throughout the episode.
  • Hammerspace: Apparently the agents don't only have this in their spines; their pockets count as this.
  • Offscreen Teleportation: Ori uses this as though it's an art form; he's able to retrieve a rather large gadget from Otto's pocket without him noticing.
    Ori: Cool gadget!
    Otto: [panicked] Where'd you get that?
    Ori: Your pocket!
    Otto: [checking his pocket while Olive does a Face Palm] What?
  • Insane Troll Logic: When Olive argues that the Lab is a good foundation for every new agent and it's where the pair should take Ori next, Otto defends his own argument of starting off at the Donut Room by stating that donuts are a good foundation for life. His actual goal was to eat some donuts of his own.
  • Instantly Proven Wrong: Otto laughs off Oscar's (intentionally quiet) remark that the Princess Room is the most dangerous room in Odd Squad headquarters. Not a second later and four robot princesses approach Ori, shooting rainbow-colored lasers at him.
    Otto: Now I believe you.
  • Key Confusion: Subverted. Olive and Otto come across numerous keypads that contain various numbers, and each code adds up to 11. The two agents are forced to figure out combinations of numbers that add up to 11 in order to open the doors and rescue Ori from whatever peril he's found himself in.
  • Literal-Minded:
    Oscar: They don't call her "Doctor" for nothin', heh heh!
    Dr. O: No. They call me the doctor because of eight years of medical school and countless hours of hard work and studying.
  • Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Both Olive and Dr. O are revealed to carry shields with their ranks' symbols on it, which they use to deflect the robot princesses' attacks while Otto and Oscar make a break for it with Ori in tow.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Owen told Ori the code to the Volcano Room because, to him, Ori seemed like a nice kid. Olive and Otto give him a nonverbal taste of What the Hell, Hero?.
  • No One Gets Left Behind: While fending off attacks from the robot princesses. Olive and Dr. O are conversing about who should go next. Olive insists that Dr. O go, only for Dr. O to insist that Olive go instead. Eventually it's decided that the two go together, and they manage to make a break for it.
  • One-Word Vocabulary: The robot princesses only know a total of 5 phrases, and they repeat them incessantly. All of them are stereotypical princess-related phrases. They also have a tendency to harmonize "la la la" over and over.
  • Princess Classic: The robot princesses are intentionally written as these, as they embody stereotypical traits commonly associated with princesses (having an affinity for braiding hair, liking tea parties, etc.).
  • Princess Phase: Averted for both Olive and Dr. O, who explicitly state that they never liked princesses. Doubles as a Stereotype Flip subversion.
  • Projected Man: Ori initially believes Olive and Otto are this, being holograms and not actual Odd Squad agents. Otto responds by demonstrating that he knows kung faux.
  • Requisite Royal Regalia: Despite being robotic, the robot princesses wear dresses, High-Class Gloves, and tiaras, which have the ability to shoot rainbow-colored lasers that destroy anything (or anyone) they hit.
  • Rousing Speech: Olive starts to give one to Ori about Odd Squad, but is cut off when Ori slips away. Once she gets him back, she starts again, but is interrupted by Ori holding a gadget.
  • Say My Name: Ori's name is said so often in this episode, you could turn it into a Drinking Game.
  • Stealth Hi/Bye: Oh boy, oh boy... Ori does this enough to give even Ms. O a run for her money. He manages to disappear when Olive and Otto take their eyes off of him for even a split-second.
    Otto: [not even bothering to look to his right] He's gone, isn't he?
    Olive: Yup.
  • Tempting Fate: In one of the more quicker instances of this trope taking effect, Otto has this to say when Ori makes his way into the Volcano Room and he and Olive can't open it.
    Otto: It's okay, what are the chances that the volcano's gonna erupt?
    [volcano erupts; Olive and Otto yell]
  • Tranquil Fury: Otto, of all people, has to bite his tongue back when Owen admits he was the one who let Ori into the Volcano Room.
  • What Does This Button Do?: Ori nearly asks this verbatim while pressing a red button connected to the quarantine unit, which causes the glass wall to develop cracks.
  • What the Fu Are You Doing?: Otto attempts to throw a few punches (and a headbutt) to convince Ori that he and Olive aren't holograms, complete with Funny Bruce Lee Noises. And he's an absolute klutz, as Olive can attest to. Really, this image should say enough about the situation.

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Olive's efforts to save Polly Graph fell a little flat.

Flatastrophe

Airdates: January 20, 2015 note , March 9, 2015 note , May 3, 2015 note 

Otto must stop Fladam, a villain with a vendetta against cubes, after he turns Olive and the town's cubes flat.


Tropes:

  • #1 Dime: Oscar has a cube in which he keeps his retainer in. Said retainer was his 14th-great-grandmother's.
  • Absurd Phobia: If the end of the episode is any indication, Fladam doesn't just outright hate cubes, he's afraid of them.
  • Arbitrary Skepticism: Otto — an agent of an organization full of employees with only O names — thinks Fladam's name is weird.
  • Bait-and-Switch Comment: Ms. O calls Olive and Otto's name in her usual stern tone of voice...to tell them to go on a vacation. Both agents are rightfully skeptical, before she says that she wants to see them in her office.
  • Big "NO!": Polly gives one just before Olive and Otto arrive on the scene, stopping Fladam from flattening the seats.
  • Body Horror: It's downplayed due to the fact that Olive is in a flat form (and is ultimately unharmed after she turns back to normal), but Otto folding her up and twisting her body as though he were making a pretzel, with her showing no signs of pain, and her face ending up frozen in a mixture of pain and fear, is pretty horrifying to watch.
  • Brick Joke: Mr. Franks sells hot dogs out of his pockets since his cart has been flattened. When Otto goes to reach for one, Olive stops him. The end of the episode has the Main 4 all indulging in Mr. Franks's hot dogs...which were bought by Ms. O and kept in her pockets.
  • Chase-Scene Obstacle Course: Otto is forced to chase Fladam through a playground, while transporting Olive. The villain proves to be more agile than the agent.
  • Chekhov's Skill: At the beginning of the episode, Otto is shown making paper airplanes, showing how he's improved over the course of a day. Sure enough, this skill is what enables him to stop Fladam in his tracks.
  • Comic-Book Fantasy Casting: Fladam bears quite a striking resemblance to will.i.am.
  • Compressed Vice: Ms. O becomes quite narcissistic in this episode. She has a cube with her favorite "memories" on it, which is mainly comprised of her various face expressions, and when Otto takes her jackalope artwork, she complains that she has nothing beautiful to look at before looking at herself in the mirror. While Ms. O has been known to be selfish before, she's primarily portrayed as being a Jerk with a Heart of Gold who is tough but fair on her agents, and rarely displays any "It's All About Me" traits.
  • Continuity Nod: The repeated "whaaaaat" from "Rise of the Hydraclops" returns, and is quickly becoming a new Catchphrase for both Olive and Otto.
    • The Shapeshifter is mentioned as one of the villains behind Mr. Franks's cart being flattened.
  • Didn't Think This Through: Otto decides to use Olive's skill of turning herself to the side (which causes her to disappear, due to her having no thickness) against Fladam, as an ambush move. However, he forgets that Olive is unable to move in her flat form, which allows Fladam to make his escape.
  • Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse: Downplayed. Fladam has a hatred of cubes due to hurting his foot on the corner of one as a child. He explains that if the cube had been flat, he wouldn't have hurt this foot. While understanding, Olive asks him regardless:
    Olive: Are you sure it was the cube's fault? 'Cause it kinda sounds like you're clumsy-
    Fladam: [defensively] I am...not!!
  • Heel–Face Revolving Door: Fladam is shown getting treatment for his hatred of cubes at the end of the episode. However, later episodes show him getting back to villainy.
  • Heroic Sacrifice: Olive lunges for Polly's seats to protect them from being turned to cubes, and gets flattened in their place as a result.
  • Offscreen Teleportation: Fladam appears on the other side of the cube Otto created mere seconds after it was finished being put together.
  • Paper People: Olive becomes flattened while protecting Polly Graph's chairs from Fladam's attack, with the only way to turn her back being Fladam's glasses (which can fire beams that flatten people and objects). While she is mostly paralyzed, she can still speak, move her eyes, and turn herself to the side.
  • Pre-Mortem One-Liner: "Make like those ice cubes and freeze!"
  • Pubescent Braces: It's implied that Oscar wore braces when he was younger, as he has a retainer that he wears only at night.
  • Start of Darkness: Invoked by Fladam, who begins to launch into his backstory when Otto comments on his name. However, he's interrupted by Olive before he can delve into it.
    Olive: Is this gonna be real long?
    Polly: You're lucky. This is my second time hearing it.
  • Rejected Apology: Played for laughs when Otto apologizes to Ms. O about throwing paper airplanes in headquarters. Ms. O responds by saying that it's allowed, since it's Odd Squad. Otto is clearly thrilled about this prospect, while Olive gives a "yeah, sure, why not" shrug.
  • Shout-Out: Ms. O's jackalope artwork is a reference to Andy Warhol's "Marilyn Diptych" artwork.
  • Sinister Geometry: Fladam is a villain who has the ability to flatten cubes using his sunglasses. He later finds out that he has the ability to flatten humans, as well, albeit at Olive's expense. The only way to turn the cubes and humans back to normal is with the use of the sunglasses, which Otto is tasked with obtaining.
  • We Will Not Use Photoshop in the Future: Averted. While Mr. Franks's photo is clearly Photoshopped, everyone buys it.
  • Weaksauce Weakness: In what is one of the biggest examples of this trope when applied to this show, Fladam is defeated by a knock to the neck. Given to him by a paper Olive folded into a shape similar to a paper airplane. It manages to knock him down to the ground and leave him dizzy long enough for Otto to grab the glasses.

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