That episode where Skips killed Rigby.note
Written by Benton Connor & Calvin Wong
Rigby resorts to cheating to beat Skips at arm-wrestling and pays the price big time when an angry Skips kills him in blind rage. And now Skips must arm wrestle Death to get Rigby's soul back.
This episode provides examples of:
- Absurdly High-Stakes Game: Arm wrestling for Rigby's soul.
- Accidental Murder: When Skips finally arm wrestles Rigby without the Armboy, he smashes him trough the table. Seeing as how the table is very solid, Skips is very strong, and Rigby is very tiny, Rigby does not survive. He gets better.
- Bowdlerization: In the UK, the following scenes are edited/altered:
- The beginning, where Benson, Mordecai, Pops, and Skips are in the hospital as Rigby is pronounced dead, was cut.
- The restaurant "McHooligan's" has its sign digitally removed, as a hooligan in the UK is associated with causing violence during soccer games and, much like changing the title to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in the 1980s, it was done so as not to condone or glorify violence — though there's also the matter of the fact that McHooligan's is a bar and the UK censors didn't want younger viewers to know what it was explicitlynote . In addition, Muscle Man's "McHooligan's, round two!" was redubbed as "Family restaurant, round two!"
- High Five Ghost's "Shotgun!" was cut (even though he wasn't talking about an actual shotgun. It refers to riding "shotgun," or on the front passenger's side, of a vehicle, though this could also be a cultural thing, as the front passenger's seat in UK cars is not to the right of the driver's seat as seen with American cars).
- Death spitting in Rigby's mouth to revive him was changed to reviving him by shooting a beam of light at him with his finger.
- Bread, Eggs, Milk, Squick: The steps to using the PlayCo Armboy: 1) Put on the PlayCo Armboy. 2) Conceal the PlayCo Armboy. And 3) Sign the official PlayCo Armboy waiver.
- Break the Haughty: Happens to Rigby after Skips yanks the Playco Armboy out of his body.
- Bullying a Dragon: Rigby for playing with Skips' emotions through the arm-wrestle cheating equipment.
- Cheaters Never Prosper: Zig-Zagged. Rigby cheats against Skips in an arm wrestling contest with a Playco Armboy and once outted gets fatally smashed through a table for his troubles, but then later in the episode Skips uses the Armboy to defeat Death in an arm wrestling competition for Rigby's soul. Then he explains to Rigby that he shouldn't cheat and that he only resorted to using an Armboy against Death to save Rigby's life.
- Chekhov's Gun: The "PlayCo Armboy" that Rigby used to beat Skips is later used by Skips to beat Death.
- Chess with Death: Well, arm wresting with Death to get Rigby's soul back.
- Did You Just Scam Cthulhu?: Skips beats Death the same way Rigby beats Skips which means Skips literally cheated Death.
- Do Not Taunt Cthulhu: Rigby learns this the hard way after beating Skips at arm wrestling through cheating with the PlayCo Armboy.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Skips is so enraged by Rigby cheating to beat him and gloating about it that, after removing Rigby's edge, he starts the arm wrestling match by outright slamming him through the table. This ends up killing Rigby, whereby Skips feels intense remorse.
- Easily Forgiven: Rigby doesn't hold anything against Skips for killing him. Though justified, considering that Rigby wasn't exactly a saint either, and has seemed to have learned his lesson the hard way.Rigby: (to Skips) You know what? Water under the bridge.
- Eye Twitch: Skips gets one when the sees the ad for "PlayCo Armboy" and realizes that Rigby has been cheating to beat him.
- Foreshadowing: When Skips destroys Mordecai and Rigby's game console because Rigby refuses to rematch him, Mordecai gets mad at Rigby instead, when one would expect him to direct his anger at Skips instead for overreacting. Turns out Rigby cheated and Mordecai knew it.
- How We Got Here: The episode starts with showing Rigby dead and everyone else sad, then Mordecai blames Skips and everyone else leaves. The episode flashes back to several days before to show how Rigby died.
- Hypocrite Has a Point: Skips beats Death by using the PlayCo Armboy after admonishing Rigby for using it. As Skips explains, he only used it because both of their lives were at stake.
- Hypocritical Humor: Everybody laughs when Rigby challenges Skips to an arm wrestle, even though every one of them just lost to Skips. If nobody stood a chance against him, Rigby especially doesn't.
- Ironic Echo: Skips repeats Mordecai's line in the second act ("Two words: PlayCo Armboy") as he arm wrestles Death.
- This Cannot Be!: Death declares "this can't be!" in shock after he loses the arm wrestling match to Skips.
- Jerkass Ball:
- Rigby constantly rubs it in Skips' face after beating the latter at arm wrestling (through cheating). Rigby ends up paying for this, though.
- Skips, who's usually a mature Nice Guy, becomes extremely temperamental after getting beaten by Rigby, tossing his game console at the wall when he refused a rematch and later trashing his room trying to find out out he got so strong. And while he didn't mean to kill Rigby for cheating, he was very obviously trying to seriously hurt him.
- Jerkass Realization: Implied. Rigby doesn't hold it against Skips for accidentally killing him, possibly because he realized he wasn't innocent either with his cheating and constant mocking.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Rigby constantly gloats and taunts Skips over his victories on the latter in arm wrestling (with the aid of PlayCo Armboy anyways), so while it was wrong for Skips to kill him, it feels rather deserved on Rigby's part.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Thanks to Mordecai admitting to Skips of the "Playco Armboy", this is how he kills Rigby.
- Oh, Crap!: Rigby has this reaction when Skips removes the PlayCo Armboy during the rematch.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: After learning the truth about Rigby pranking him and training for his rematch, just before Skips leaves, he destroys his punching bag with one punch and starts walking out.
- Shout-Out:
- The episode's title references a Sylvester Stallone film of the same name that is also about arm wrestling.
- Death saying "Your soul is mine!" is likely a reference to Shang Tsung from Mortal Kombat, especially Mortal Kombat: The Movie, with streams of soul energy coming from his eyes.
- Smug Snake: Rigby was overly confident when he beats Skips twice in arm wrestling and thinks he can reign his superiority over him, but as soon as Skips takes off his only means of winning when he challenges him for the third time, Rigby instantly loses his smugness and becomes nervous.
- Take Me Instead: Skips demands that regardless of the outcome of the arm wrestle match between him and Death, Rigby is brought back to life and should Skips lose, it is Skips himself that will take Rigby's place.
- This Is Gonna Suck: When Skips arrives for another rematch with Rigby he tears off the "Playco Armboy" so Rigby can't cheat. Rigby visibly sweats and shakes as he gives Skips his arm.
- Too Dumb to Live: Rigby messing with Skips was a terrible idea, as this gets him killed.
- Unsportsmanlike Gloating: Rigby belittles Skips when the latter keeps losing to him in arm wrestling. However, when Skips finds out he cheated and rips out the PlayCo Armboy from his body, Rigby immediately loses his overconfidence and becomes terrified.
- We Will Meet Again: After Skips beats Death, Death returns Rigby's soul but vows that some day he will possess Skips' immortal soul.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Mordecai gives this to Skips at the beginning of the episode after killing Rigby.Mordecai: (to Skips) You couldn't let it go. I hope you got what you wanted.
