The Parking

"The Parking" is the tenth episode of Season 4 of The Amazing World of Gumball. It is the 126th overall.

Synopsis
The Wattersons struggle to find a space in the mall parking lot.

Plot
The episode starts with the Watterson family driving towards Elmore Mall for a family day out. As Nicole parked the car in the parking lot, Richard yells at her to stop and take the space that is closer to the entrance. Once she left the space for the other one, a car comes and occupies it. When she turns around, another car takes away the space she previously took. Frustrated at the prospect of searching for a new parking space, Gumball points at a old woman going back to her car which promotes them to stalk her until she reaches her car. After waiting for a long time for her to move past one car, Anais suggests they should have more details before following someone. She points out 3 shoppers who were returning to their cars. Shopper no.1 is a family man who was forced to return to his car while his wife went ahead with more shopping, leaving him to wait for hours. Shopper no.2 is unmarried but is forgetful and may have forgotten where he parked his car. Finally shopper no.3 is had already left the space open while Anais was profiling and some other shopper has taken his space. Gumball then reminds everyone that the old lady has reached her car but to their disappointment she only stopped to catch her breath. Gumball then tries to deceive the milk guy into parking the car for them but even that failed miserably.

The Watterson's then tried parking in the Mall's parking garage but even that was full. Richard then spotted a spray can man and decided to use him to create their own parking space, but accidently placed in the middle of the driving path. The milk guy spotted him and chased him towards the edge of the building where Richard accidently dropped the spray can man over the edge and the milk guy sees that Richard unwittingly sprayed a path toward the edge causing a long line of cars to drive towards the edge, causing a pileup of cars. Richard smiled sheepishly at the milk guy as he returns with his family. As the cars continue to pileup, the Watterson believe to have found a parking are with no cars; a true parking paradise. But to their dismay, they discovered that it was a sign for a future carpark. They kids then began to sing a song to spend the time slowly degrading Nicole's sanity in the process. Once they finished Nicole suggested that they play a game of I Spy only to lose another empty parking space.

The family decided to leave the garage which still has a growing pile of cars next to it. They finally discover an empty space but they were challenged by another shopper who wanted it. A little standoff occurred followed by a race toward the space but the Wattersons lost due to their car losing fuel and Richard forgot to stay in the driving seat. Nicole was so furious that she resorted to defacing his car but Darwin points out that this was a reserved parking for disabled citizens. Nicole defends herself that she was merely putting artwork on it and quickly turns her defacement into a drawing and runs away.

Characters

 * Gumball
 * Darwin
 * Anais
 * Richard
 * Nicole

Minor Characters

 * Doughnut Sheriff
 * Milk Guy (debut)
 * Cowboy
 * Pantsbully
 * Betty
 * Hot Dog Guy
 * Mr. Pepperoni
 * Hank
 * Banana Bob
 * Spraypaint Can
 * Larry
 * Principal Brown
 * Mr. Small
 * George
 * Newspaper Employee
 * Crocodile Woman
 * Jeff
 * Susan
 * Harold
 * Marvin
 * Manly Warrior
 * Goblin
 * Prisoners
 * School Nurse
 * Elderly Doctor
 * Green Bear
 * Shooting Star
 * Melted Cheese Guy
 * Gary
 * Jackie
 * Siciliana
 * Karen
 * Librarian
 * Felicity
 * Shape People
 * Carmen
 * Egg Man
 * Louie
 * Bomb Guy
 * Charlie
 * Neck Beard
 * Exercise Bacon
 * Hexagon Lady
 * Clipboard Man
 * Hobo
 * Orange Guard
 * Sphere Citizens
 * Cupcake Woman
 * Blue Elephant

Trivia

 * Running gag: After Richard uses the spraypaint can guy to try to draw a parking space for the family, he runs and makes a line leading out the mall parking space. After this, cars keep following this line and driving out of the parking space for the rest of the episode.

Continuity

 * This is the second episode in which I Spy is played. The first was in "The Password".
 * The poster on the bus advertises the shampoo from "The Downer," complete with the woman from the shampoo's commercial in said episode.

Cultural References

 * The song "99 Bottles of Age-Appropriate Bevarage On The Wall" is an obvious parody of 99 Bottles Of Beer On The Wall.

Goofs/Errors

 * Both the Cowboy and Pantsbully get spots early in the episode. However, they are seen driving off of the parking lot later in the episode.
 * When the cars start driving off of the parking lot, Jeff is in front of Susan. In the next scene, Susan is in front of Jeff.
 * The animation of Anais and Nicole cheering behaved differently when the camera zooms out at the end of the episode.