Tear Jerker / Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie

Per wiki policy, Spoilers Off applies here and all spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned.

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"Separation Anxiety" is an accurate title.

The Movie

• After George and Harold display their Captain Underpants origin comic at the beginning of the movie, it cuts to Mr. Krupp ripping it apart right in front of them. Even worse is that this actually happened to Dav Pilkey when he first created Captain Underpants as a kid in school.
• Rewatch the moment right before George threatens to hypnotize Krupp. As Krupp is close to finalizing the separation paperwork, look at George and Harold's faces. George looks understandably scared. Harold, on the other hand, looks like he's about to go into a panic attack, and begs George to do something. That's how terrified he is of losing his best friend.
• When the boys snoop around Mr. Krupp's house and discover how lonely and sad he is. His fridge contains nothing but a bottle of ketchup and his pantry only has a box of Not-So-Cheery-O’s cereal, and the towels in his bathroom are labeled “His” and “Also His.”
  George: I have to say, this has not been the funnest snoop.
  Harold: Yeah, really sad snoop. Kinda regretting it actually.
  • How the discovery goes to reinforce their fears about being separated:
    Harold: I hope we never end up like him. All alone...
    George: (scoffs) That's impossible. That will never happen!
    Harold: Heh, yeah. (pause) Unless he puts us in separate classes...
• It's quite easy to feel sorry for Professor Poopypants, especially after the flashback to the Nobel Prize ceremony where he had a meltdown over people laughing at his name and not taking him seriously.
• When George and Harold are briefly put in separate classes. The boys are heartbroken. However, Harold is shown taking it especially hard, having a dramatic but no less heart wrenching Imagine Spot of him and George drifting apart to opposite ends of the universe, desperately but futilely calling out to each other to illustrate the utter helplessness he feels being apart from his best friend. If you take into account the aspects of Harold's character from the books before he met George...
  • Thomas Middleditch's heart-rending performance during this scene makes it all the more poignant:
    Harold: No! No no no no! Wait! Wait! STOP! George! GEOOOOOORGE!!!
  • Let’s not forget the title of the score for this scene on the movie’s soundtrack: Separation Anxiety. It perfectly and heartbreakingly sums up the feeling of the entire scene.
  • The precursor scene to this is just plain depressing. Captain Underpants ordered a carnival for the students to enjoy and to help George and Harold's efforts to "bring back fun", but it goes south when Captain Underpants keeps putting himself in the crossfire for fun where it involves him getting wet, which reverts him back into Krupp. As much as the boys try to rein him in and keep things under control, the end result is the carnival being train wrecked, with the school suffering damages as well, plus it starts to rain, making the two unable to simply snap their fingers to quickly switch Krupp back to the Captain as they could before, so there's no escape from being separated.
  Mr. Krupp: You two... your friendship is... NO MORE.
  • Following this, Mr. Krupp is seen chortling away after sending George and Harold off... only to see the casserole Edith made. He immediately goes from petty and snickering to lonely and sad.
  • Both Imagine Spots about the two being separated are exclusively from Harold's POV. While it certainly affects both boys, it goes to show it really hits Harold hard on a deep, emotional level.
  • As blown out of proportion as the two took the idea of being put in separate classes was, seeing them fret about the prospect of their friendship being "annihilated" is still sad to see as a whole.
• Funny as it is, the sock puppet scene is still Harold envisioning how being in "separate classes leads to separate lives", and that he and George will inevitably grow apart to the point George will forget about him entirely:
  Harold: Oh, hey George.
  George: Hey, d-do I know you?
• Melvin's a Jerkass no doubt, but it's rather depressing to consider that the reason he's so antisocial and insufferable is that he was literally born without any sense of humour or levity.
  • This becomes even more so when Poopypants first uses the Anti-Humor beam on the students of Jerome Horwitz Elementary. The first thing Melvin says when he realizes it works? “Finally! You’re speaking my language!” And it’s not just that, it’s the way that he says it; for that brief moment, he’s not the Insufferable Genius tattletale... he’s just a kid who’s finally happy that for once, he’s not the only one who doesn’t get a joke. Ouch...
• When the boys briefly succumb to the Anti-Humor machine. If seeing these lovable boys be reduced to humourless shells wasn't bad enough, George sees Harold succumb to it first, then you're treated to see him panic over the fact and frantically plead for his best friend to snap out of it before it gets him too.
  • Harold's face as he succumbs to the effects of the ray as George watches on. It's worth mentioning that he's also looking at the viewer as he gives in. Given that it's also coming from George's POV but still, it's not a pretty sight.
  • For those careful listeners; before George succumbs to the effects of the ray, you can hear him sadly call out to a now-brainwashed Harold before passing out.
    • Heck, when the movie was digitally released, the closed-captions say that George said Harold's name.
  • This is taken a step further when it shows their brains communicating with each other, frantically trying to come up with a way out of their dilemma as their "Haha-Guffaw-Chucklotamuses" shrink smaller and smaller.
  George's Brain: Don't you leave me!
  • Then this scene is followed by George and Harold (who are still emotionless) now facing away from each other. Earlier while they were laughing together, they also appear to be enjoying each other's company, but after succumbing to the beam's effects, they've turned away from each other and have become aloof or even oblivious of their presence. So not only did Poopypants rid them of their laughter, he rid them of their companionship. To put it this way, George and Harold have been separated twice in the movie; literally by Krupp (i.e separate classes) and metaphorically by Poopypants (i.e by brainwashing). What makes this slightly harsher is that they just reunited after Krupp separated the two.
  • In an earlier scene, Harold mentions that losing their sense of humour would destroy who they are! This is no exaggeration. It isn't just the ability to laugh they risk losing, but arguably the most crucial piece of their personalities they treasure most, because their creativity, imagination, and individualities are all centered around their sense of humour! Poopypants intends to eradicate the core of what makes these two the characters we know and love, and use the Anti-Humor machine to deprive everyone else in the world of all these traits as well.
    • Particularly in how George and Harold's larger-than-normal "Haha-Guffaw-Chucklotamuses" come across as a representation of their neurodivergance (their ADHD and subsequent higher creativity typically associated with those who are diagnosed with it, in this case), this can especially hit close to home for those who share the same or similar disorders and those with similar values on the aforementioned listed traits.
• The scene where George and Harold realize that they have to change Captain Underpants back after they defeated Poopypants, the heartbroken look on their faces says it all. It doesn't stick but it's still sad.
  • It doesn't help that the presumed last thing they say to each other is final goodbyes.
    Captain Underpants: Farewell, my dear sidekicks!
    George: Goodbye, Captain Underpants...
    Harold: Goodbye...
  • Worse still, they destroy the Hypno-Ring with the intent to destroy the Captain Underpants persona permanently. The Captain Underpants character is introduced as their greatest creation George and Harold made together. It's made clear how much they pride themselves on what they create together with their comics, which we see outright destroyed by their principal in one of the opening scenes and how upsetting it was to them. Now they themselves end up presumably having to destroy their own creation, only instead of a comic book, it's an identity in a living, breathing person. Also, the Captain would've "died" by the hands of his own sidekicks and would've never realized it. Mull over that a moment.
  • Saying goodbye to Captain Underpants was probably even harder for Harold, especially if you consider the likely possibility that Captain was probably one of the closest things Harold had to a father figure since his own dad left...
• Speaking of the above, in one scene the boys observe Mr. Krupp and Edith's interactions in the office on their way to steal the Tattle Turtle.
  George: Ewwwwww! They like each other!
  Harold: Oh no, George, I think it's much worse. They like-like each other.
  George: What are you talking about? Adults don't like-like other adults.
  Harold: Well, you probably haven't seen it at your home since your parents are married. In my studies, like-liking seems to end with marriage.
  • On its face, it's a tongue-in-cheek comment about how marriage supposedly ruins romance in adult relationships...but it takes on an extra sting when you remember that, as revealed in the ninth book, Harold's parents divorced when he was six and his dad moved to Nevada shortly thereafter.

Other

• In an earlier draft of the film, there was going to be a subplot where Harold starts hanging out with the cool kids, which begins to form a rift between him and George. And according to these storyboards, it would've all reached its boiling point at Jerome Horwitz Elementary's first ever School Dance. George sneaks into the dance, planning to pull a prank with water balloons, but sees Harold hanging out with the cool kids. Harold makes a comment about how George is "hanging on to his youth", not knowing that he just overheard it. George retaliates by launching the water balloons he brought on the entire dance, the cool kids especially. After all is said and done, he walks out holding a boombox over his head playing Queen's "We Are the Champions". Harold, who actually misses pulling pranks with his best friend, unfortunately gives in to peer pressure and calls him a "baby" for pulling something so immature. Even when only in storyboard form, the hurt on George's face speaks volumes. It's honestly a good thing this subplot was ultimately cut, because the idea of George and Harold having such a confrontation is just heartbreaking.
  Cool Girl: That was totally lame.
  Kid 1: Totally…
  Kid 2: Lamest thing ever.
  Kid 3: What are you, in nursery school?
  Harold: (nervously looks at the crowd, then at George) Yeah… what are you… a… baby??
  George: (looks shocked and hurt for a moment, then angrily throws down the boombox) You're the baby— (gets right up in Harold's face) —BABY!!!

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