The Joy

It was a wasted chance not to make a sequel for that episode, they just ended with the cliffhanger

As the joy virus spread outside the school throughout Elmore, we see 2 familiar individuals wearing a white shirt with a red tie, and a green shirt with trees on it.

"Don't hug me! I don't wanna get the jo- wait a second, that doesn't make sense! You get hugged by a hugger you get the joy? I mean you can't just drool rainbows!"

"I don't know, perhaps the disease infects you're saliva as well?"

"Infects my sali- are you insinuating that my saliva can get sick? That's scarier then these huggers laughin-"

(a hugger infects him)

"HAH HA HA HA HA!"

"Well I suppose I didn't really think that through-"

(the man with the red tie infects him)

"HA HA HA HA!"

Tobias: Ladies, contaminate me.

Tobias: Ugh, flower boy typical. Hmm?

Tobias: Boys! Contaminate me!

Tobias: What does it take to get on the new trend these days?

Simian: Tobias what are you doing?! You should be evacuating! The disease has taken over the school!

Tobias: The people infected don't seem to like me.

Simian: Why wouldn't the infected want to infec-.... Wait a second!

Tobias: What?

Simian: You're multicolored pattern! The joy infected already think you're happy! You're immune!

Tobias: I am?

Simian: Listen, you need to get this tape to the PA system and play it over the intercom, it's the only way to cure the dise- (gumball and Darwin hug her) GAGH!!!

Tobias: Why? What's in the tape?!

Simian:

It's sad music, you have to play it.... To make everyone sad again. Don't let this story come to a-..... happy...... ENDING!!!

Tobias: That depends, do I want everybody to be sad....?

Huggers: (deranged laughing)

Tobias: Their creepy smiles and psychotic laughing sure are creepy.

Carrie: Tobias! What are you still doing here?! We need to leave!

Tobias: But Simian told me I'm the only one who can cure the joy!

Carrie: Who is someone like you gonna cure- (she gets hugged by Ocho) Oh crud- Ha ha ha ha HA HA HA!

Tobias:

Tobias: NO! Not Carrie! That's it! That's the LAST STRAW! You joy zombies are going down!

Tobias: Forget it, this dumbbell is way too heavy for me.

Tobias: I need to get into Brown's office, hmm....

Tobias: Hugs and kisses, rainbows and cotton candy... Heh he he....

(he gets into brown's office)

Tobias: Ok, just got to play this over the intercom and this should all blow ove-

Clare: (laughing and drooling rainbows)

Tobias: Clare! They got you too?!

Clare: (tries to kiss Tobias)

Tobias: I need to cure the joy, but I could never pass up on a relationship with Clare....

Clare: (gets closer)

Tobias: (sweating)

Clare: (pukes rainbows that spill on the floor)

Tobias: YIKES, I'm not kissing that! (kicks away Clare) Boop! (plays the tape)

(the sad music fills the school, turning everybody back to normal)

Bobert: (realizes he is hugging a vacuum cleaner) Well this is awkward...

Banana Joe: (wakes up with his peel unzipped) AGH! It won't happen again! I- Oh, she's not here....

Anais: (wakes up inside a locker) What am I doing here?! Did I get bullied or something?! Sigh, I should have known they would target me.

Gumball: Ugh, what happened?

Darwin: Why are we hugging Simian?

Gumball: (shrugs)

Simian: Yes! It worked! All the effects of the joy have been reversed! (sees the rainbow drool everywhere in the school) Almost......

The episode starts with Gumball and Darwin upset because it's Monday, so Richard decides to give them a "wonder hug." A hug filled with all the love and happiness in the world. The hug works, alarmingly well. The boys smile uncontrollably, heel click, sing in auto tune, hallucinate and laugh insanely. Miss Simian believes them to be diseased but the other staff scoff and believe she's crazy. To their horror she is actually right, the boys eventually start infecting everyone in the school with "the joy" and Miss Simian fails to neutralize the disease and gets infected with everyone else.

But there is just something unnerving about this episode, something that makes it more disturbing then any other dark episode of Gumball, more disturbing then episodes like "the puppets" or "the vacation". Near the beginning of the episode, When Gumball is singing in auto tune, he explains that he wants to stop smiling, but his 'heart' won't let him and tells him to keep smiling. When he laughs insanely in front of Miss Simian, for a split second he has a look on his face that gives off a sense of suffering, like he wants to stop but can't. Then later in the infirmary when Simian tells him to stop smiling, it takes him forcibly removing his mouth and placing it back on upside down for him to stop, and even then his face distorts his mouth back to the original position and he keeps smiling. What these "huggers" are going through, is an absolutely horrifying experience. Those who are infected with "the joy" are forced to be happy against their will. Unable to talk, unable to frown, to cry. The only way to cure victims of "the joy" is through sad music, but you know what happened when Simian tried that.

What makes this episode so horrifying is that the "huggers" aren't you're typical mindless zombies you see in horror movies like "night of the living dead" or "28 days later". they laugh..... HYSTERICALLY, as if they can't stop. Most zombie media always portray them as lifeless, emotionless husks, and the little emotion they have of their former selves is just a feral animal that's hungry. These zombies do maintain memories of their past lives, as seen with Gumball hugging Penny and kicking away Joe to infect her himself.

Or Banana joe walking down the hallway with his peel unwrapped until Simian enforces the dress code like in the beginning of the episode.

These zombies are fully aware of their condition and what's happening to them, and they are IN PAIN. Imagine living in a world where a disease has forced almost everyone to be happy against their will, imagine running away from a group of people laughing mad while chasing you through a ruined streets, then imagine getting infected, unable to stop smiling, unable to stop laughing, unable to beg for help from anyone uninfected, then imagine seeing you're uninfected family or friends running away from you as you subject them to the same horrible fate as you. This is why the joy is the most terrifying episode of Gumball. If not, the most terrifying cartoon of all time..... SWEET DREAMS.......

DID NOBODY EVER TEACH YOU ANIMALS TO SHARE?!

If I had a nickel for every time Richard Watterson caused a zombie apocalypse by turning his own family into patient zero I'd have 2 nickels..... Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice.

Teri: is behind Simian

Simian: runs the other direction

Teri: Appears in front of her

That moment when you try to cure the school of the joy.

Only to be cornered by you're own students.

Getting infected and ending the episode on a cliffhanger that will likely never be resolved.

This post was made by the joy part 2 waiters.

Brown: Miss simian, do you realize what this means?

Patrick:

It’s the scene where Miss Simian is destroying the office and discovers that the music is the cure. Look at the bottom right corner.

Anyone have thoughts on this?

Mine's The Joy!

Tompaki Lion Eat Lunch Snack and Candy Ice Cream Menu Eating Metting Food Clad Now Proken You Coming Agress You Dlay Again

Bio Robot You Gaylord Robinsons Causing House

You Outside Metting You Coming Pland

Temt Coming

Hey Guys I made some art of one of my favourite Gumball episodes The Joy

If you want here’s the one not blacked out

Need I say more?

I finally finished one of @Matlis777 ’s request, “The Joy”

Now I’ll be working on “The Job”

Hope y’all like it ?