The Boys Are Back in Town

"The Boys Are Back in Town" is the 17th episode the fifth season and the 101st episode overall. It aired on November 6, 2003.

Plot[]

The girls encounter the return of their old male counterpart enemies, the Rowdyruff Boys, courtesy of Him.

Synopsis[]

Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup, as they appear in this episode.

Him is angrily watching videos of the Powerpuff Girls defeating different villains. He gets excited when he sees something on one of the videos. The next day, the girls are fighting monsters and have just defeated them when a large outcropping emerges from the ground, and on it are the Rowdyruff Boys! The girls are shocked to see that they are alive but they mock the boys' new hairstyles. They then start to fight, individually with their counterparts, and then as a group. Throughout the fight, they prove to be at a standoff. Recalling how the situation ended last time, Blossom suggests that same strategy: showing affection by kissing them. Having tried this once, there were no results. But as the girls have tried this multiple times, to their horror, they soon discover that the boys are actually feeding on their affection, which only increases their size and makes them even more powerful. HIM then appears and tells them that since he knew the boys' weakness and that the girls would use that method on them again, he gave the boys a cootie vaccination, which explains their immunity to the girls' kisses, and he then leaves the girls intimidated by the boys, now 10 times their normal size!

The boys start to try and gross-out the girls by cracking their knuckles, picking scabs, and spitting. They then attack them leaving them battered and bruised and they squash them into a hockey puck. They play hockey with them until Boomer hits them into an indoor car park. The girls go up to the top of the building with not much of a plan. Blossom believes that the boys are too powerful for them to beat this time and that they've met their match. This infuriates Buttercup as she still thinks the boys can be defeated, as well as insulting them. Not too long after, the boys spot the girls on top of the building, leading to another game called Ultimate Fight. After a montage of continuous beating, the girls are completely overwhelmed, as the boys laugh evilly as they look down on them. Butch places a slug up Bubbles' back as they all laugh at her humiliation. Once Buttercup regains consciousness, she notices Bubbles being teased by the boys, as well as Butch sticking his tongue out. Fed up with this, Buttercup swoops in to attack Butch and make him bite his tongue, causing him to shrink after being laughed at by the other two boys. Blossom realizes this and gives her sisters the idea of embarrassing the boys to make them shrink, a.k.a threatening their masculinity. The girls do all kinds of things to embarrass the boys (babying them, putting makeup, pulling down pants) and make them shrink down until they are smaller than the buckles of the girls' shoes, having turned the tables. HIM then appears again and reprimanded the boys for not defeating the girls and he makes them disappear. He then tells the girls that they may have won this time by mere coincidence, but they will not be so lucky in the future, because "the boys are back in town". This leaves the girls shocked, even the narrator points out that the battle of the sexes has just begun

Quotes[]

[The Rowdyruff Boys suddenly appear which astonishes the girls]
Blossom: "The Rowdyruff Boys?"
Buttercup: "But that's impossible!"
Bubbles: "We blew you guys up!"
Brick: "Yeah, well you can't stop a good thing babe!"

Brick: "You girls just got lucky last time. This time there's no way you're gonna beat my boys:"
Butch: "Butch!"
Boomer: "Boomer!"
Brick: "And me, Brick!"

[Last lines of the episode as the girls smile smugly at one another when HIM looms over them after taking the shrunken Rowdyruff Boys away]
HIM: Oh, don't look so smug, girls. Though you may have won this time, it was a lucky victory and you know it! In time, you will fall and we will defeat you. So keep on your toes, stay alert and watch your back, because the boys are back in town! (cackles and disappears in a spiral cloud of smoke, leaving the girls trepidated)
Blossom: Oh, boy.
Narrator: "Oh, boy" is right. It seems the battle of the sexes has begun. Let's just hope that the day is saved, thanks to The Powerpuff Girls!

Characters[]

Major Characters[]

The Powerpuff Girls
The Rowdyruff Boys
- Brick
- Boomer
- Butch
HIM

Minor Characters[]

Trivia[]

This episode marks the return of The Rowdyruff Boys, promoting them from one-time villains to recurring ones.
The episode's name is a reference to a Thin Lizzy song of the same title.
Although though most episodes premiered on Fridays, this episode (along with "Pee Pee G's" and "Boy Toys" premiered on a Thursday, as part of Cartoon Network's "November Premieres" block, where a new episode of a Cartoon Cartoon would premiere on a random weekday throughout the month.
Boomer’s line: "You girls are gonna eat your words, spit 'em out, then eat 'em again!" Is misheard as “You girls are gonna yeet your words, spit ‘em out and yeet ‘em again!” This confuses some viewers.
This is the second and last time The Rowdyruff Boys appear in a 22-minute episode.
This marks the second time that an episode’s title has been used in the dialogue, in this case by Him. The first was The Bare Facts.
This is the second time the girls use baby talk, after in "Burglar Alarmed."
HIM's lair features clips from past episodes of the series, clips from Jewel of the Aisle, Fuzzy Logic, Stuck Up, Up, and Away, Supper Villain, Buttercrush, Mommy Fearest, Beat Your Greens, and Geshundfight are shown. Also, stock footages from the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s can be shown in the background since "Dream Scheme".
The boys' energy color and light shape in flying are different from the first appearance, and the flying sound is the same as the girls, while it is different and unique in their first appearance.
Bubbles fighting Fuzzy Lumpkins in the start of the episode could be a reference to the intro where she beats him in said intro.
This episode is referenced in Custody Battle.
When the boys are playing Hockey when Boomer celebrates scoring, his hair changes to his design from The Rowdyruff Boys episode.
When Blossom goes behind Brick, she yanks the waistband of his pants causing them to drop, complete with full rear exposure. This is the first and only time one of the Rowdyruff Boys' rears has been shown.
This episodes features the girls with the most injuries as they gain messy hair, torn clothes, broken teeth, black eyes, and bruises.
This is another episode where the girls are defeated in combat
- This is the second time The Rowdyruff Boys beat the girls in a fight.

Goofs[]

HIM can be seen ripping apart some of his couch. A few moments later it is still intact.
When Bubbles says "Hee Hee Hee!" her mouth does not move.
When the boys reintroduce themselves, Butch and Boomer's mouths do not move when they mention their names, but Brick does.
- However, it's possible that Brick was actually saying all their names. But likely not, since the pitch of the voices changes every time.
In one scene when the boys are playing Ultimate Fight and Brick is talking with his eyes closed, his eyelids are purple instead of light peach.
When the girls find out about the boys' weakness, all of the injuries they suffered disappear, almost as if they were never hit. Also, the slug on Bubbles' back disappears.
At the beginning of the episode, when the girls arrest Fuzzy Lumpkins, Fuzzy's eyes turn blue for a split second.
When Brick tells Boomer to "Pay attention", his mouth moves differently, out of sync with his voice.
When HIM appears out of the swirling cloud of pink smoke, His eyes are the same color as his skin instead of the usual lime green and then they turn back to normal.
- This may be because he is furious with The Rowdyruff Boys.

References[]

This episode's title is a parody of the Thin Lizzy song "The Boy Are Back in Town" from their sophomore album of the same name.
Boomer's insult to the girls, "I know you are, but what am I?" is a reference to the banter between Pee-wee Herman and Francis Buxton in the 1985 comedy film, "Pee-wee's Big Adventure."
- Coincidentally, Buttercup's voice actress, E. G. Daily, starred in "Pee-wee's Big Adventure" as Dottie, a bike shop employee with an unreciprocated crush on Pee-wee Herman.