The Phantom of the Theme Park

Spoiler warning!
alertThis article contains major plot details for **BOTH SEASONS** of Dead End: Paranormal Park. If you haven't seen the series yet, and don't want to know anything, stop reading now.

> Norma, you said distraction! Well, this is my reaction!
>
> Pugsley, to Norma

### Writer

* Hamish Steele
* Jen Bardekoff

### Director

Liz Whitaker

**The Phantom of the Theme Park** is the ninth and penultimate episode of the first season of the Netflix animated series, *Dead End: Paranormal Park*, and is the ninth episode overall.

## Summary

With the help of Pugsley's musical spell, Barney and Norma try to stop Pauline's plan. Meanwhile, Courtney wrestles with a dilemma.

## Plot

Pugsley casts a musical spell to help Barney and Norma sneak into the park. While sneaking into the museum, they get caught by Barborah, and she shows them the auditions for Pauline's next body.

Norma offers to audition, get possessed and get exorcised out. With the help of a spell that disguises her in a body like Pauline's, she wins the audition. But when Barney goes to exorcise Pauline out, Courtney interferes and gets Barney and Pugsley locked up. Searching for a way out, Logs being the guard, Barney confesses his love for Logs in a song, ultimately asking him out.

Meanwhile, Pauline's show starts and Courtney begins to perform the spell to seal Pauline into Norma's body. Barney and Pugsley stop her and explain that Pauline is lying about being able to send Courtney home. Courtney get angry with Pauline and goes to battle her, but Pugsley stops her because she's actually Norma, then Pugsley gets re-possessed by Temeluchus again, and they have a song about whether Pugsley should let him take over.

In the end, Temeluchus exorcises Pauline out of Norma, and summons his sister Zagan and she turns the park's guests to stone. Temeluchus and Zagan go to the parks Camelot Creek and episode ends there.

## Features

### Characters

* Employees of Phoenix Parks
	+ Barney Guttman
	+ Norma Khan
	+ Logan Nguyen
	+ Badyah Hassan
	+ Josh
	+ "Smoothie" *(Cameo)*
	+ "Burgers" *(Cameo)*
	+ Barborah Winslow
* Pugsley Guttman
* Courtney Cahatel
* Pauline Phoenix
* The Demonic Royal Family
	+ Temeluchus
	+ Zagan
* African-American couple *(Cameo)*
* Vince *(Cameo)*
* Guttman Family *(Cameo)*
	+ Roxie Guttman
	+ Saul Guttman
	+ Patrick Guttman
* Beelzebub *(Mentioned)*

### Locations

* Phoenix Parks
	+ Main Street
	+ Dead End
		- Elevator
		- Basement
	+ The Pauline Phoenix Experience
		- Hall of Ex-Husbands
* Hell (mentioned)

### Songs

* At Dead End
* Down There
* My Frankenstein
* Phantom of the Theme Park
* Just Some Guy
* Phantom of the Theme Park (Reprise)
* Driver's Seat
* Driver's Seat (Reprise)/Down There (Reprise 1)
* At Dead End (Reprise)/Down There (Reprise 2)

### Transcript

*Read the **transcript** for this episode here!*

## Trivia

* This is the first and, so far, only musical episode of the entire series.
	+ This is also one of three episodes to have a different ending credits theme, as the original is replaced by an orchestral cover of *Down There,* the other episodes being "The Trials of Barney" with *Fight Like A Demon* and "The Watcher's Test" with *I'm Just A Dog*.
* This is Courtney's first and only time to have the role of a major supporting antagonist.
* Courtney is tied with Norma as the character who sung the most times.
	+ Courtney participated in "*Down There*," "*Phantom of the Theme Park*," "*Driver's Seat (Reprise)*," and "*Down There (Reprise)."*
	+ Norma participated in "*At Dead End*," "*My Frankenstein*," "*Phantom of the Theme Park*," and "*At Dead End (Reprise)*."
* It is hinted that the African-American couple from "Wait Time: 22 Minutes" are the mothers of Vince.
* It's revealed that Pauline has a birthmark of a phoenix that is hidden by her bangs. It is also insinuated that this is what inspired her stage name's surname.
	+ And that her middle name is "Norma." Whether or not this is the middle name of her stage name or birth name is left unclear.
* Phantom of the Theme Park is the longest song of the series and has the most participants, with a total of 7.
* Pugsley originally had an opening song at the beginning of the episode, but this was cut as it was seen better to ease into the musically for comedic effect.
	+ When Alex Brightman was cast as Pugsley, they needed to add a song for him, which is when "Driver's Seat" was made.
* This episode confirms that Barney is Jewish, as opposed to just the insinuation in Pugsley's dialogue in "The Nightmare Before Christmas in July," wherein Pugsley prepares a glass wrapped in cloth that Barney steps on during his imaginary wedding scene with Logan - a Jewish ritual representing the moment of remembrance for the destruction of Jewish temples.
	+ This is also evident by the hats that he and Pugsley wears during the wedding sequence.
* It's revealed that the golden cuffs Courtney wears were actually put on her by angels, and that she was not aware of it herself.
* This is the first episode we get to see a concept of what all of the thirteen planes look like.

### Cultural References

* The title of the episode, the titular song, and the episode itself being a musical is a reference to the real-life musical, *The Phantom of the Opera*.
	+ The instrumental music in the song "*Phantom of the Theme Park"* is heavily reminiscent of that from the song "*The Phantom of the Opera*" from the musical.
* The fourth woman auditioning as Pauline's impersonator may have been trying to sing the iconic song "Let It Go" from Disney's *Frozen*, as Pauline herself even continues the former's line when she cuts her off.

## Continuity

* One of the pictures in the first page of Barney's scrapbook is taken during the episode "Trust Me."
	+ One of the pictures in the second page of Barney's scrapbook is a callback to the episode, "Wait Time: 22 Minutes."
* The Barney-lookalike dummy from "Norma Khan: Paranormal Detective" is a part of Courtney's solo.
* Norma recalls her and Barney exorcising (most of) Temeluchus from Pugsley in the first episode.
	+ In "Driver's Seat", Pugsley mentions that Temeluchus tried to kill them in the same episode ("Last time you tried to kill us!").
* This episode is a direct continuation from the previous episode.
	+ Additionally, Courtney recalls the trio gatekeeping her when she unknowingly was being insensitive to Norma's feelings.
* The sealing spell from the first episode is performed again.

## Errors

* In the scene where Courtney was singing on the roof during her song "Down There," her suitcase disappears in one shot.
* Unless it was a reenactment or a drawing of the scene in the episode "Wait Time: 22 Minutes," the image of Barney having a cotton candy beard should not have been in the scrapbook, as he and Logan were still on awkward acquaintances terms with each other.