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E
- Early-Installment Weirdness: This could be seen in season 1, as episodes would have characters wielding guns and some of the fights would have small instances of blood in them.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: Does so with "The City of Frownsville".
- Eating the Enemy: "You gotta eat 'em to beat 'em!"
- Edutainment Show: Parodied in "Seed No Evil":Museum tour guide: I'm going to show you how prehistoric man used woolly mammoths as dishwashers, and pterodactyls as record players.
Narrator: Not wanting to overshoot this episode's educational quota, let's fast-forward[.] - Either/Or Title: Present in "I See a Funny Cartoon In Your Future", in homage to Rocky and Bullwinkle:Narrator: Find out in the next exciting chapter called, "Who Do Voodoo?" or "Don't Scrye for Me, Argentina"!
- Election Day Episode: Mayor began campaigning for re-election, though Ms. Bellum said he was wasting his time since nobody was running against him... that is, until Fuzzy Lumpkins gets elected simply by yelling, "Shut up!" at Mayor for repeatedly proclaiming, "Vote for Mayor for mayor! Vote for Mayor for mayor!" and it catches on to the citizens of Townsville. After Fuzzy literally turns the mayoral office into a pig stye, Ms. Bellum and the Powerpuff Girls work to help the disgraced Mayor get his job back.
- Elephants Are Scared of Mice: Taken to ridiculous lengths in an episode where a rivaling villain reanimates a mammoth (which appears as comically large as any city-destroying monster) to cause destruction in Townsville. To stop it, Mojo Jojo instructs the girls to leave a large hunk of cheese to attract the town's mice and scare the mammoth off. It works.
- Emergency Taxi: In the episode "Him Diddle Riddle", one of the challenges is to defeat a large monster without superpowers. The girls do this by tripping the monster over, Buttercup calling a taxi which shows up just in time for the monster to land on it, and having the taxi drive the monster away.
- Enemy Mime: Rainbow The Clown's alternate personality in "Mime for a Change".
- Enemy Mine: The girls have occasionally teamed up with their enemies, such as in "Forced Kin", where they teamed up with Mojo Jojo to defeat the giant alien, and "Aspirations", where the Gangreen Gang sided with them against Sedusa.
- Episode Title Card
- Epileptic Flashing Lights: In "Bubblevicious", it's probably not wise to see the scenes where Mojo kidnaps Bubbles and where she gets zapped by the laser on level 11 if you have epilepsy.
- Even Evil Has Standards: According to the comic book, Him wouldn't stoop to stealing from a charity.
- Everybody Cries:
- In the episode, "City of Frownsville," Lou Gubrious does this to everyone in Townsville.
- In "Coupe d'Etat", the girls and professor cry after hearing the sad tale of the professor's talking car.
- The Rowdyruff Boys cry in "The Boys are Back in Town" after the Powerpuff Girls shrink them by embarrassing them.
- Every Episode Ending: Nearly every episode ended with a shot of the titular protagonists and the narrator exclaiming, "And So Once Again, the Day Is Saved, thanks to... the Powerpuff Girls!" This was subverted more and more as the series went on.
- Whenever a hero other than the Powerpuff Girls are the focus, they're the ones who saved the day, although in the Daylight Savings episode, the Narrator says the day was saved thanks to Benjamin Franklin's suggestion of setting clocks back during the winter for extra daylight to conserve economic spending on candles... and the Powerpuff Girls.
- When the day didn't actually need saving: "And so... uh... hmm..."
- When the girls get fed up with the people of Townsville's sheep attitude and force them to destroy a monster without the girls' help: "... the day is saved with no thanks to the Powerpuff Girls. Hey, I did it all by myself!"
- When the Time Travel episode reveals Mojo Jojo's caused the Stable Time Loop that led to the girls' existence: "And So Once Again, the Day Is Saved, thanks to the Powerpuff Girls... but thanks originally to Mojo Jojo who, once again, had a hand in creating the Powerpuff Girls!"
- When the episode centered around a couple of elderly heroes who were out to fight their out-of-retirement, equally elderly foes, and Blossom refused to allow the girls to intervene. The episode ends with all the old men falling over and breaking various limbs. Instead of the narrator, an in-story newscaster says over the end card "In this reporter's opinion, all this could have been averted if the Powerpuff Girls have just saved the day."
- When Mojo Jojo and HIM get into an Eviler than Thou contest to decide who is a better father for the Rowdyruff Boys: "The day is doomed, thanks to the Rowdyruff Boys." It also changes the usual pink-and-hot pink heart background for a black-and-white crossbones and skull one.
- Many comic book stories end with the standard hearts-and-stars with the girls posing in front, but like in the show, it can be averted and subverted once in awhile. Among them was "Monkey Business" (issue #67), where Mojo's attempt to go straight and open his own restaurant keeps getting sabotaged by the girls, skeptical of his intentions. The last straw was when Blossom mistakes everybody farting (from Mojo's chili) as a gas leak, causing a frantic evacuation. Frustrated, Mojo goes back to crime, and it ends with the narrator chiding the girls in the hearts/stars panel for making Mojo evil again.
- In "Telephonies", after the Gangreen Gang continuously harass Mojo Jojo, Fuzzy Lumpkins, and Him by making a string of very convincing crank calls that convinced the girls that the three were terrorizing Townsville, but were instead, enjoying a day off, Mojo Jojo, Him, and Fuzzy; furious over the crank calls; form a temporary Power Trio and proceeding to give the Gangreen Gang the worst No-Holds-Barred Beatdown of their careers, and thus promptly saving the day, making the narrator say the following line in total bewilderment:Narrator: So, once again, the day...is saved! Thanks to... (Mojo, Fuzzy, and Him appear on screen while the music skips and slows down) ...Mojo...Fuzzy...and Him...?
- In the episode where Mojo kidnaps the Narrator; he does the usual bit...then asks them for a ride home.
- "I See A Funny Cartoon In Your Future": The day is saved, thanks to the Powerpuff grill.
- "That's Not My Baby": The diaper is changed... Hold the chili.
- Everyone Has Standards: In the episode "Curses", the Powerpuff Girls fight a giant monster that is both figuratively and literally a potty-mouth (as in, he has a toilet for a head and his dialogue consists mostly of swearing). While the monster's swearing is depicted as grumbling gibberish, everyone who hears him is offended, even people you wouldn't expect to have a problem with cursing, like a pair of bikers and a convict.
- Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: The girls never act the way they're "supposed to" for HIM's plans.
- Evil Redhead:
- Princess Morbucks.
- Brick, Blossom's Spear Counterpart.
- Berserk, Blossom's alternate universe counterpart (comic book story Deja View).
- Big Billy of the Gangreen Gang.
- Evil Laugh: Just about every villain in the show does this.
- Evil Sounds Deep:
- Mojo Jojo of course, it does wonders to his ham factor and Evil Laugh.
- HIM alternates between a syrupy-sweet falsetto and a gargles-with-gravel basso.
- The Boogie Man plays this more straight.
- Subverted in both aspects with Mr. Green from the episode "Substitute Creature". The "deep" part is subverted when it turns out that Mr. Green was struggling with a cold, and he talks in a normal voice after this is revealed. The "evil" part is subverted because it turns out that despite his appearance, Mr. Green was actually a good guy all along.
- Evil vs. Evil: The villains don't just battle the powerpuff girls. In Telephonies Him, Mojo and Fuzzy Lumpkins beat up the Gangreen gang after their prank calling sends the PPG after them, Mojo and Him argue over who has the rights to the Rowdyruff Boys, and an evil gnome beats up all the other villians.
- Eviler than Thou:
- Mojo Jojo and HIM attempt to show themselves who is the better father of the Rowdyruff Boys in "Custody Battle".
- "Forced Kin" had Mojo Jojo going up against an Alien Force, who not only performed acts of villainy that Mojo initially planned and wanted to do, but even counteracting Mojo and the girls attempts at counteracting those plans, to the point of breaking Mojo Jojo completely.
- Expository Theme Tune: Atypically, played during the Closing Credits. The first part serves as a Theme Tune Roll Call.
- Exact Words: In the episode, "Him Diddle Riddle," Him tells the girls that if they cannot solve all of his riddles within the allotted time, "the Professor will pay." They fail, but it is revealed that the Professor just has to "pay" for breakfast at Him's diner. He'd have gotten a free meal if they'd have succeeded.
- Exploiting the Fourth Wall: In one episode Mojo Jojo kidnapped the Narrator so that he could narrate the episode instead, his narration forcing the Powerpuff Girls to do everything he described them doing.
- Expy:
- The episode "Jewel of the Aisle" features a breakfast cereal mascot known as Lucky Captain Rabbit King, who is a pastiche of Captain Crunch, Lucky Charms' Lucky the Leprechaun, the Trix Rabbit, and the rather obscure King Vitaman all rolled into one.
- When the invading alien from "Forced Kin" finally reveals himself, he's very obviously intended to be a monochrome Galactus.
- Eye Beams: Hilariously in one episode, a very thick pair of glasses upgrades Bubbles' to Wave-Motion Gun levels of power.
- Eyelash Fluttering: After the girls realize they may have met their match in the Rowdyruff Boys, Ms. Bellum advises them to "try being nice" i.e. flirt with them and exploit the fact that they are, at the end of the day, young boys who likely believe Girls Have Cooties. So the girls casually flirt with the boys, which includes fluttering their heavily lashed eyelids at them and giving each boy a kiss on the cheek. Astonishingly, this works, causing the boys to Freak Out and explode.
F
- F--: In the episode "Mo' Linguish", Mojo Jojo mentions that if he had control of the grading system, he would make the lowest grade a "Z" rather than an "F".
- The Faceless: Ms. Sara Bellum always has her face off-camera or hidden by either an object placed in front of her or her own hair. However, her face can be seen for a split-second in the 2009 special The Powerpuff Girls Rule.
- Failed a Spot Check: The Girls failed to notice a tank following them in "The Powerpuff Girls Rule".
- Faint in Shock:
- The museum curator faints in a cop's arms "Monkey See, Doggy Do" after the girls make a huge mess in the museum while trying to look for the one who stole the Anubial Jewels.
- In "Little Miss Interprets", Professor Utonium gives three cakes to Roger McDongle. Roger asks if he can eat the cakes and the Professor says yes. Since the Girls have mistaken the Professor's complaining about the cakes for being about them, Bubbles faints upon hearing this.
- Fake Ultimate Hero: Major Man makes himself come off as being a better crime-fighter than the Powerpuff Girls because he appears to solve crimes as swiftly as they appear. It turns out that he was actually staging the crimes themselves and was only being a superhero for the glory.
- Family-Friendly Firearms: Surprisingly averted - in a number of episodes, guns wielded by standard generic criminals tend to have goofy colors, but fire actual bullets.
- And in the earlier seasons, they weren't silly at all. The guns were almost always colored gunmetal gray or brown.
- Family Theme Naming: Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup all have cutesy names that start with B and contain a double consonant. When they create a temporary fourth Powerpuff girl, she also fits the pattern, being named Bunny.
- Family-Unfriendly Violence: Taken to ridiculous levels. See Gross-Up Close-Up.
- Fangs Are Evil:
- Ace, Sedusa, and a number of monsters of the day.
- HIM's teeth usually become sharp when he goes into nightmarishly scary evil mode.
- Mojo's teeth are all little fangs. A case of Art Evolution as he used to have square teeth that turned to fangs when he was angry/being evil.
- Fastball Special: Buttercup and Bubbles do this in "Film Flam", also done by Blossom and Bubbles in "Stuck up, up and away". They even CALLS IT the trope name.
- Fat Bastard:
- Big Billy of the Gangreen Gang.
- The maid in the episode "Hot Air Buffon" towards the Mayor. She berates him for not saving the the world like the girls do.
- Mike Brickowski, a former cop who tries to kill the girls because he thinks they're stealing all the work from other hard-working cops, when all he did was sleep and eat doughnuts.
- Lenny Baxter, a comic-book geek who obsesses over the Powerpuff girls and keeps them in tight packaging to satisfy his "collection".
- Lou Gubrious, a miserable scientist and villain from "The City of Frownsville". He made all citizens of Townsville cry, but failed.
- Faux Affably Evil: HIM is the most notable one, but it can happen to any number of the villains Depending on the Writer.
- Fear-Induced Idiocy:
- In "Power-Noia", Blossom is trapped in a nightmare where demonic versions of Ms. Keane and the students are asking her math questions. She's so overcome by stress that she keeps blurting out random numbers.
- In "Cootie Gras", the Powerpuff Girls get trapped in a ditch with Harry Pitt. Since they are terrified of him due to the rumor that he has "cooties", they just run in circles and never think of flying out of the pit until they realize he isn't cootie-infested after all.
- Fear Is Normal:
- In "Power-Noia", all three Powerpuff Girls are trapped in a shared nightmare. Buttercup gets startled by a Giant Spider and Blossom explains that it's her worst fear. Buttercup initially attempts to deny it, but Blossom says that everyone gets scared sometimes and that she just has to learn to fight it. Buttercup is still reluctant until Blossom accuses her of being a wimp to give her the drive to prove her wrong.
- In "Boogie Frights", Buttercup says Bubbles shouldn't be such a wimp when it comes to the Boogie Man. The Professor comes in and explains that being scared doesn't make you a baby as long as you can get over it and face what frightens you the most.
- Femme Fatale: Not exactly an example, but there was a villain named Femme Fatale
. - Film Felons: One episode had a con man pretending to make a movie about the Powerpuff Girls as a scam to rob Townsville blind.
- Fingerless Hands: The former Trope Namer. Lampshaded in "Criss Cross Crisis" when Buttercup switches bodies with Professor Utonium. When she tries to pick up the phone, she can't figure out how his fingers are supposed to work.
- Finishing Each Other's Sentences: The girls will do this every now and then.
- Flag Drop: Occurs in "Collect Her", when Professor Utonium tells Lenny Baxter to set the girls free.
- Flaming Devil: HIM is essentially the series' version of Satan and is also a transvestite with an effeminate voice.
- Flanderization: Some fans believe that almost everyone suffered this (if they didn't have Chuck Cunningham Syndrome) in the later episodes. Even more in the 2014 Dance Pantsed special.
- Flat "What": Both the girls and the narrator have this reaction to the end "Him Riddle Diddle"
- Flying Brick:
- Cute bricks, to be sure, but the girls' basic powerset is this.
- The Rowdyruff Boys possess the same basic powerset, and Blossom's male counterpart there is named Brick.
- Food-Based Superpowers: The aptly named "Power Lunch" has the Gangrene Gang inadvertently gain superpowers when the girls zap them with heat vision after they had raid a convenience store, giving them the properties of what they eat. Ace gets ice due to eating ice cream, Snake stretching power from eating taffy, Arturo super speed due to drinking coffee, Grubber belching power from drinking soda and Billy a rock due to eating rock candy. However, it only lasts until they get a collective stomachache and have to use the toilet. As they had -ahem- "emptied" the contents of their stomachs, they likewise lost the powers.
- Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: Bubbles and Blossom.
- Forgot Flanders Could Do That: The Mayor of Townsville started out as a kindly man who was slightly dim-witted, but he eventually devolved into being an unbearably moronic manchild. This was rectified in the 2014 special Dance Pantsed. The Mayor encourages Professor Utonium not to give up on his girls when Mojo Jojo takes control of them and also expresses remorse for snapping at Ms. Bellum for not believing her when she told him about a giant robot attacking Townsville, even apologizing to her near the end.
- Four Eyes, Zero Soul: Lenny Baxter and Dick Hardly both wear glasses and have zero redeeming qualities.
- Freak Lab Accident: Hilariously lampshaded} when, in an attempt to create a fourth Powerpuff Girl, the sisters re-create the circumstances of their origin by elaborately pretending that they're adding the Chemical X to the pot by sheer accident, complete with awkward dialogue delivery.
- "Freaky Friday" Flip: "Criss Cross Crisis", which even gives a Shout-Out to the original movie by showing that "Freakin' Friday" is playing at the movie theater.
- Friction Burn: In one episode, Buttercup creates a fireball by rubbing her hands together rapidly and throws it at a monster.
- Friendly Tickle Torture: In the episode "Powerprof", the Professor briefly does this to the girls, who then do it to him.
- Fun with Flushing: The class hamster gets flushed down by Mitch, the schoolyard bully. In the sewer, the hamster gets exposed to chemical waste and comes back a mutated monster out for revenge.
- Funny Background Event:
- At the beginning of "Boogie Frights" while Buttercup brings up monsters under the bed, Blossom can be seen nervously glancing towards the underside of the bed.
- While Buttercup comments on The Rowdyruff Boys' "scary new hairdos" in "The Boys Are Back In Town", in the background Boomer is shown to be proudly stroking his hair.
G
- Gagging on Your Words: Buttercup has this problem when she tries to apologize.
- Subverted in "Moral Decay": Buttercup apologizes profusely to Bubbles after accidentally knocking out one of her baby teeth.
- Gassy Gastronomy:
- Implied in "The Rowdyruff Boys". The Rowdyruff Boys unleash a multicolored smokescreen to disorient the Powerpuff Girls. Butch then states he's glad they had burritos beforehand.
- This jumpstarts the plot in "Reeking Havoc". Professor Utonium wins a chili cook-off thanks to the Powerpuff Girls spiking his cuisine with Chemical X. We then see various citizens experiencing intestinal distress, and green clouds come out of a few houses' windows. This green cloud then becomes a methane monster. Later, a guy notices the stench cloud and asks his friend if he had cabbage borscht earlier.
- In "Power Lunch", when the Gangrene Gang raid a convenience store, Grubber guzzles down mass quantities of soda. After the girls accidentally give the Gang superpowers, Grubber gains the ability to emit super-loud belches (implied to be due to all the soda he drank).
- Genre Shift: The show shifted from an action-comedy spoof of superhero shows to a downright bizarre Gag Series late in its run. It was unsurprisingly not well received, and it wasn't long before it was cancelled.
- Getting Smilies Painted on Your Soul: Attempted in "Super Zeroes":Bubbles/Harmony Bunny: There! Now you're covered with Happy Stickers! Their good, sweet powers will take hold of you and make you smile!
- Girls Have Cooties:
- In the episode "Cootie Gras" our kindergartner heroines are terrified of a boy said to have Cooties. A fact Mojo Jojo uses to keep them at bay until they get over it. Once they do, however, they leave the boy Covered in Kisses, then go kick Mojo's butt.
- Also, used in the first episode featuring the Rowdyruff Boys — the girls' key to defeat them is to look prettily at them and actually kiss them. It worked so well the guys explode in horror. Lampshaded right after this, when Bubbles and Blossom think kissing isn't that bad, but Buttercup is shown coughing and almost throwing up in disgust.
- Given Name Reveal: Averted in "Get Back Jojo" (the episode where Mojo Jojo travels back in time to Professor Utonium's childhood), where Professor Utonium's teacher always calls him "Mr. Utonium".
- Gone to the Future: The plot of "Speed Demon". The girls' absence hasn't been great for Townsville.
- Good Policing, Evil Policing: In "Cop Out", Mike Brikowski is introduced as the worst cop in Townsville's police department, who prefers to eat donuts all day and sleep in his car while complaining about the Powerpuff Girls taking the spotlight from the police instead of fighting crime. He turns quickly into villainy and antagonizes the girls after being fired for sleeping during a bank robbery and refusing to take the blame on himself. The rest of the department, including Brikowski's former partner Perez, however, is depicted as competent, quickly figuring out Brikowski's true nature and petty revenge against the girls.
- Good Smoking, Evil Smoking: Professor Utonium falls under the Wise and Fatherly exception for this trope. Though we never actually see him smoke his pipe, so he may just have it around to look cool.
- Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Parodied in "Bubblevicious".Bubbles: *being zapped by a laser at a low level* I'm not... gonna... cry... you... dumb... doo-doo-brain!
Mojo Jojo: "Doo-doo-brain"? That's it! I've had it with your sassy mouth! - Go-to-Sleep Ending: Happens at the end of two episodes, although at both times it is technically morning and they should really be starting the day. The first was "Boogie Frights" and the second was "Dream Scheme".
- Grand Finale: The 10th anniversary special "The Powerpuff Girls Rule" served as a finale for the series, though another special entitled "Dance Pantsed" aired in 2014.
- G-Rated Drug:
- "Candy is Dandy" has the girls acting like they are taking wild drugs when the Mayor rewards them with candy.
- Chemical X (or something similar) for the normal kids in "Mojo Jonesin'".
- Gratuitous Disco Sequence: The episode "Boogie Frights" has this to go with the Boogieman's disco theme.
- Greater-Scope Villain: The Gnome gets his vast powers from four otherworldly beings.
- Great Gazoo: Issue #65 of the comic introduced the Micro-Puffs, tiny sprite versions of the girls from another dimension who show up to merely yank the girls' chains. One story has Blossom actually getting help from Mojo Jojo in defeating them. Considered canon in that all Micro-Puffs stories were written by Amy Rogers, head writer for the show.
- Grievous Harm with a Body: Him uses Ace's body as a baseball bat to hit Lil Arturo in one episode.
- Groin Attack: Easy to miss, but in the episode "The Rowdyruff Boys" Buttercup delivers multiple rapidfire punches to Brick's groin when they first meet. While not many people would be saying "Poor Brick" to this, it was probably overkill: [1]
- Grossout Fakeout: In "Pee Pee G's", the girls think that one of them is wetting the bed, but it turns out that Mojo Jojo poured water in their bed as a prank. Then, he laughs and appears to wet himself, but he claims he broke his water bottle. He did sound as though he was lying, though.
- Gross-Up Close-Up: Many times, but most commonly Mojo Jojo plopping to the ground, beaten to a pulp with breaks in his helmet exposing his oversized brain, missing teeth, black eyes and obviouly broken fingers.
- "Sun Scream" has this quite a bit, most notably when Blossom attempts to get out of the bed all sunburned, and when their sunburned skin peels off in a very graphic manner.
H
- Half-Witted Hillbilly: Fuzzy Lumpkins is a hillbilly, and no one can accuse him of being the brains of any operation.
- Hammy Villain, Serious Hero: All three girls of the titular PowerPuff Girls can be emotional, especially Bubbles, but they can be more serious than many of the hammy villains they face off against.
- Hands Looking Wrong: In "Criss Cross Crisis", after everyone in Townsville swapped bodies, it becomes apparent when Buttercup sees Professor Utonium in her body and is further cemented from starring at her hands that are now a normal human man's rather than her usual Fingerless Hands.
- Hard Truth Aesop: In a society where children are told to cooperate, we have the episode "Monstra-City". An episode that shows the complications of immigration/integration. In the end the only thing they learned was that not everyone is able to live together.
- Hartman Hips: Nearly every female in the series. Most notably: Miss Bellum, Miss Keane (especially in "Keen on Keane"), Sedusa, Femme Fatale.
- Hate Sink: Stan and Sandra Practice from "Girls Gone Mild" are not remotely likeable and are obvious strawmen, but their Smug Snake attitude when they threaten to sue the Professor is what clinches it.
- Hates Baths: Buttercup in "Down 'N' Dirty", which causes her to get chased out of town until she finally agrees to just bathe so she can fight monsters again.
- Helping Granny Cross the Street: It's occasionally mentioned that the girls do this, but it's not usually shown - it's usually listed as another one of their many good deeds.
- Helpless with Laughter: In "The Mane Event", Blossom (who's suffered from a Traumatic Haircut) unleashes a Hurricane of Puns against a giant Faceless Eye. The eye stops destroying the city and can't do anything but laugh at her appearance and puns, so Blossom takes this chance to whack it into outer space using a girder.
- Here We Go Again!: The ending of "Mommy Fearest" has the Professor fall in love with a woman again and once again stuttering "I...I...I". Lampshaded by the narrator.
- Hero Insurance: Available in Townsville, but not in Citiesville.
- Heroic RRoD: Bunny ends up exploding after she saves the girls.
- Hoist by His Own Petard:
- Dick Hardley sets such a contrast to the Professor's love that his own Powerpuff Girls turn against him.
- The Rose Gnome from "See Me, Feel Me, Gnomey" accidentally violates the terms of his own agreement.
- Princess Morbucks in "Bought and Scold", as mentioned before under Didn't Think This Through.
- Holding in Laughter: In "The Mane Event", after Blossom gets a terrible haircut, Bubbles and Buttercup bite their lips to keep from laughing at her. Once Blossom leaves, they burst out laughing.
- Holding Out for a Hero:
- Pretty much every townsperson and the highly co-dependent Mayor are Sheep. Explicitly lampshaded in one episode, when the girls get sick of being called on to fix every little problem. They go sit on a cloud and encourage the people to work out a solution to the Monster of the Week, but keep having to beat them over the heads with hints, in what is probably a direct Shout-Out to the "Burn the witch" scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
- One episode was devoted to showing how the citizens of Townsville have become so used to the girls taking care of everything from invading monsters to fires to getting cats out trees that every problem is shrugged off with, "Oh, the Powerpuff Girls will take care of it". This causes the girls to go on strike.
- Reversed in "Collect Her", which had an obsessive collector of Powerpuff Girl merchandise capture the girls themselves to add to his collection. The people of Townsville paid the girls back for helping them by going to the collector's house and ripping up all his merchandise, freeing the girls in the process. Since he was a fat, bald, overweight Otaku with no powers, there wasn't much he could do to stop them.
- Hollywood Science: For starters, mixing together sugar, spice, and everything nice, even if Chemical X existed and was added to the mix, would not create a trio of five-year-old girls.
- Holy Pipe Organ: In the episode "The City of Clipsville" during the wedding flashback, the church organ slowly plays the variation of The Powerpuff Girls theme as the Professor Utonium is getting married to Sara Bellum, who turns out to be Mojo Jojo in disguise.
- Homage: "I See a Funny Cartoon in Your Future" is done in the style of The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle.
- Honesty Aesop: In the episode "Lyin' Around the House", the Girls continually tell white lies, and eventually, a white creature that is the embodiment of their lies grows to a rather huge size and begins to destroy everything. The girls (and the Professor, who had been fibbing about needing to work) learn that lying is wrong.
- Horrible Judge of Character: In one episode in which the Gangreen Gang are forced to attend Pokey Oaks by a truant officer, Ms. Keane accepts them with open arms, and when the Powerpuff Girls counter their antics and attempts to torment the kids, Ms. Keane only sees the Girls assault them and punishes the girls while letting the Gangreen Gang get away with it. It's only when they brutally injure the other kids in a game of dodgeball that Ms. Keane realizes that the PPG were right about the Gangreen Gang all along.
- Humiliation Conga: Blossom at the end of "A Made Up Story", after she bragged about not falling victim to Mask Scara's attacks.
- Humongous Mecha: The D.Y.N.A.M.O. was a giant mecha resembling an amalgam of the girls.
- Hurricane of Puns:
- "Meet the Beat-alls" is full of references to The Beatles.
- "I See A Funny Cartoon In Your Future" is loaded with puns, being one long homage to Rocky and Bullwinkle.
- Hyperspace Is a Scary Place: Travel through the fifth dimension.
- Hypocritical Humor:
- Mojo Jojo: I do not talk like that! The way I communicate is much different. I do not reiterate, repeat, reinstate the same thing over and over again. I am clear, concise, to the point!
- In the episode "Paste Makes Waste", the Girls' classmate and Paste Eater Elmer is teased by the other students with one calling him gross as flies circle around him, another one commenting that he looks a dummy while she has buck teeth and a pig-like nose, and the third laughing that it's a "sick habit" while picking his nose.
I
- I Can See My House from Here: Sometimes stated by the girls as they are flying.
- I Owe You My Life: Gangreen Gang member Big Billy to the Powerpuff Girls in "Slave The Day" after they save him from being hit by a train. It didn’t work out well.
- I Take Offense to That Last One: During the episode "Down 'n' Dirty", where Buttercup tries to give up bathing:Buttercup: Don't you know only big, fat sissies take baths?!
Bubbles: (hurt) I'm not fat. - Image Song: The "Heroes and Villains" CD.
- Imaginary Friend: In "Imaginary Fiend", the girls had to fight an imaginary friend who was causing trouble at school. They defeat him by imagining a friend of their own to beat the snot out of him. It's said that this episode served as the inspiration foundation for Craig McCracken's later show Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, with Mike Believe (the creator of the troublesome imaginary friend) being the template for Mac.
- Imagine Spot: Keeps coming up in "Live and Let Dynamo", as the girls try to figure out which villain has their Humongous Mecha, the Powerpuff Dynamo, and keep imagining what the recurring villains would really do if they got control of the Dynamo — the Rowdyruff Boys would force her into demeaning acts such as picking her nose, Mojo Jojo would just criticize her cockpit and leave, the Gangreen Gang would just make prank calls from within the Dynamo, the Amoeba Boys wouldn't know what to do, Fuzzy Lumpkins would make Dynamo play a banjo, and HIM would give it an extreme makeover.
- Imperfect Ritual: The girls perform an imperfect ritual when they try to create more power puffs to lighten their work load. Instead of using sugar, spice and everything nice, they use artificial sweetener, twigs, and random stuff that they like. The result is a giant sized, mentally handicapped powerpuff girl Bunny, who later explodes because she's unstable.
- Impossible Pickle Jar: A recurring gag involves The Mayor calling the Powerpuff Girls to open his pickle jar for him.
- Improbable Age: The girls are supposedly 5 years old, but they often act rather unlike their age. Blossom even managed to somehow get a job in the episode "Not So Awesome Blossom".
- Inelegant Blubbering:
- Bubbles does this in "All Chalked Up" after her chalk is destroyed.
- Bubbles gets this again in "Little Miss Interprets" when she thinks the Professor doesn't love her anymore.
- Mitch did this in "Gettin' Twiggy With It" to convince the Girls not to take Twiggy away from him.
- Professor Utonium during a flashback in "Reeking Havoc" when he lost a chili cook-off.
- The entire City Of Townsville is subject to this due to Lou Gubrious invoked this on them with his Miser-Ray.
- Buttercup suffers this in "Cover Up" when her blanket was lost.
- Inconsistent Spelling: Fuzzy Lumpkins is spelled in the credits, closed captions, and even one of the pilots as Fuzzy Lumkins, without the P, in his earlier appearances. Meet The Beat-Alls would give him the Lumpkins spelling, and it stuck.
- Innocent Swearing: In the episode "Curses", the girls overhear Professor Utonium using a naughty word and start using it themselves. Many Sound Effect Bleeps ensue.
- Instant Wristwatch: Mojo Jojo wears a watch while waiting for his at the end of the Everybody Wants To Rule The World scene from the final episode: ''The Powerpuff Girls Rule".
- Institutional Apparel: Strangely, Townsville Jail uses the striped suits version and the orange suits version.
- Intentional Engrish for Funny: Bubbles's narration of a Japanese manga in "Super Zeroes", despite being an Omniglot. "I am filled with solutions!".
- Intentional Mess Making:
- In the episode "Just Desserts", the Smiths get revenge on the Powerpuff Girls for getting Harold arrested (although mostly for ruining Marianne's dinner) by destroying the inside of their house. Much to Marianne's ire, however, that doesn't tear apart their familial bond.
- In "Mommy Fearest", Professor Utonium falls in love with Ms. Ima Goodlady who is later revealed to be a disguised Sedusa. When Ms. Goodlady starts taking charge as the girls' mother figure, she tells the girls they can't fight crime until after they cleaned up the mess they made last night. The girls do so really fast, then Ms. Goodlady deliberately messes the house up and forces the girls to clean up the mess without using their superpowers.
- Interactive Narrator: Especially in "Simian Says", where Mojo Jojo kidnaps the narrator and takes his place.
- Invisible Means Undodgeable: Him's Magic. The Girls go toe to toe with him whenever he uses projectiles and beams. However, the moment he changes to his invisible Thought-Controlled Power, they're helpless.
- Isle of Giant Horrors: There is a Monster Island, source of all the Kaiju that attack Townsville from time to time. Turns out they do it for the honor of fighting the Girls.
