Gorilla Experiment
| The Gorilla Experiment | |
| Writers | Chuck Lorre (Story), Richard Rosenstock (Story), Steve Holland (Story), Bill Prady (Teleplay), Steven Molaro (Teleplay), Maria Ferrari (Teleplay) |
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| Director | Mark Cendrowski |
| Starring | Carol Ann Susi as Mrs. Wolowitz, Melissa Rauch as Bernadette |
| Air Date | 7th December 2009 |
| Vanity | Card #270 |
| Guide | Episode #310 |
| Quotes | Episode #310 |
| Forums | Discuss Episode |
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| Vengeance Formulation . . . << Gorilla Experiment >> . . . Maternal Congruence |
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"It's a warm summer evening in ancient Greece ..."
Contents |
Summary
Sheldon attempts to help Penny understand Leonard's work, and Wolowitz becomes jealous when Leonard starts hanging out with his new girlfriend.
Bernadette is now Howard's girlfriend. While hanging around with the group, she chats with Leonard about his work, much to Penny's surprise. Later, Penny asks Sheldon to teach her her "a little physics" so she can talk to Leonard about his job. He asks if she took any science classes in school and she says that yes, she took "the one with the frogs". He is reluctant, but she tells him it would be a challenge and he could consider it an experiment. He agrees. His lecture begins with a tale about people in ancient Greece noticing that some of the stars move and name them planets. Sheldon quickly overwhelms Penny with facts and figures and she ends up in tears.
In the cafeteria, Howard and Bernadette run into Leonard, who invites Bernadette to come see his experiment. She thinks it sounds great, but Howard is seriously affronted, thinking that Leonard is trying to hit on his girlfriend. When she steps away, Howard demands that Leonard stay away from Bernadette. Later, when they're making out in Howard's room, Bernadette discovers from a text message that Howard thinks she needs to get his permission to be friends with Leonard. She leaves in a huff.
Eventually Howard asks for forgiveness from Bernadette and admits that he's just very insecure, Penny finds a chance to repeat some carefully-memorised physics stuff to impress Leonard, and life goes on.
Episode Outline
I. Living room
- The guys and Penny have dinner, when Howard turns up with Bernadette.
Title and opening theme
II. Living room
- During the dinner Bernadette asks Leonard about his work. Penny and Howard are confused.
III. Living room
IV. Cafeteria
- Howard parades his "girlfriend Bernadette". When she gets once again interested in Leonard's work, Howard gets very jealous.
V. Living room
VI. Howard's bedroom
- Bernadette and Howard are making out when she receives a text message from Leonard. Howard reacts very jealous and she leaves.
VII. Living room
VIII. research lab in the Physics department
- An angry, jealous Howard confronts Leonard, when Bernadette turns up. Howard apologises, while Leonard listens and comments.
IX. Living room
- They guys, Penny and Bernadette have dinner together when Penny presents her newly gained knowledge about Leonard's work.
Resources
List of entries from this episode
David Saltzberg's blog about this episode
Notes and Trivia
Previous title: The Athens Recurrence
Timeline
Still to come
Title
When Sheldon agrees to teach Penny physics, he likens it to the effort to teach sign language to Koko the gorilla. He keeps a journal of the training and calls the whole thing "Project Gorilla".
