The Worst (The Amazing World of Gumball)

The Worst is a Season 5 episode from British-American animated series mh:besttvshows:The Amazing World of Gumball.

Summary
The Wattersons compete over who has the worst life.

Why It’s The Worst

 * 1) It has a ton of stereotypes of bad things that happen in life:
 * 2) * Gumball and Darwin pretend to be “women”, and everyone starts acting chivalrous (in a similar vein to The Dress), even though sadly, chivalry is dead.
 * 3) * Anais says that adults have no imagination. This is coming from one of the most creative shows in history, which was created and written by adults!
 * 4) ** Her entire subplot is downright insulting to all the writers of Cartoon Network (and not just Cartoon Network, but also other networks, etc.) that put effort into writing for their shows and treating their viewers with respect, intelligence, and heart. As it's basically a giant slap in the face to them and their efforts to make the shows they write for as good as possible.
 * 5) * Anais also says that she is happy to not be a grown-up, but she will turn old in years. (She even facepalms herself after she realized what she said)
 * 6) * Nicole says that men can't ask for directions, which is obviously not true.
 * 7) * Richard comments that when you turn 40, random parts of your body start to hurt horribly for no reason and there is no cure. And while it's true that as you age, the ligaments and tendons that hold your joints together become stiffer, and osteoarthritis can cause the cartilage in a joint to wear away, and both processes end up leading to aching, soreness, and pain, random parts of your body don't just ache for no reason. Nor is there no cure for said pain, as there are treatments for them.
 * 8) Nobody seems to genuinely learn their lesson by the end, as in the end Nicole still complains about how crappy her life is.
 * 9) It’s just a nonsensical torture episode for everyone.
 * 10) The Flashbacks:
 * 11) * Gumball and Darwin's flashback has Tobias, Ocho, and Banana Joe bullying them for using a shower gel called Roses of the Meadow. Which is unpleasant to watch for, obvious reasons.
 * 12) * Nicole's flashback is even worse as it shows her not being employee of the month because her boss, Mr. Yoshida says that if they had a picture of a woman, it would distract all the men. Then when he looks like he's about to shake her hand for a promotion, he actually shakes a plant and gives it the promotion and also gives it to Jim and tells Nicole to smile more, making her angry. How is this funny?
 * 13) * And on top of that the reason why Richard is angry is because Larry told him to grow up, GROW UP! How petty is that?!
 * 14) Plot Hole: If Grown ups and women are the same, why would Richard complain about being a grown-up?
 * 15) Awful Ending: All the Wattersons return home after the day's activities none the happier, though glad to be back to their old selves. Gumball concludes that everybody has it equally bad, only for Nicole to cut him off and continue to complain about how her life is still worse than the others' (as previously mentioned in WITW#2).

Redeeming Qualities

 * 1) Banana Joe gets his comeuppance at the beginning of this episode.
 * 2) * Tobias and Ocho get their comeuppance for bullying Gumball and Darwin in The Pact.
 * 3) As stated above, Nicole becomes Employee Of The Month in the next episode, The Deal, which is a nice touch.
 * 4) One may find the title ironically funny as you could say the title is very fitting for a bad episode, although (also ironically) it’s not considered the worst episode of the show.

Reception
Despite receiving a decent 7.6/10 score on IMDb, The Worst received overwhelmingly negative reviews from critics, audiences, and fans alike. Phantomstrider puts this episode in #2 worst in his list. It is consider to be one of the worst (pun not even intended) episodes in the entire series. Ironically however it is not considered to be the worst episode of the show with that dubious honor going to the episodes The Hero and The Girlfriend.

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