Due to the nature of being a sequel to The Wrong Trousers, all spoilers pertaining to that short is left unmarked. You Have Been Warned!

The One With… the Gnomes.

Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl is a 2024 British stop-motion Made-for-TV Movie and the sixth film in the Wallace & Gromit series from Aardman Animations, as well as the second feature-length film after The Curse of the Were-Rabbit two installments prior. Vengeance Most Fowl serves as a direct sequel to the pair's 1993 outing The Wrong Trousers. It is directed by franchise creator Nick Park and Merlin Crossingham, and stars the voices of Ben Whitehead, Lauren Patel, Peter Kay, and Reece Shearsmith.

The film begins with Wallace coming up with another invention: a smart robotic gnome named "Norbot" who's not only great for garden work, but can also do almost anything his master requires. Wallace is delighted with Norbot's productivity and even starts a business hiring him out to the neighbours, even as Gromit becomes exasperated at Wallace’s favouritism towards the gnome and its tendency to ride roughshod over Gromit's preferred way of doing things. But unbeknownst to our duo, their imprisoned nemesis Feathers McGraw manages to remotely tamper with Norbot's programming as part of a scheme to break out, steal the blue diamond he failed to get away with before, and take revenge by pinning all of his crimes on Wallace! Now Gromit needs to stop Feathers' evil plot before it leaves Wallace in prison — or worse, forever barred from inventing!

The film premiered in the UK on BBC One 25 December 2024 (as is tradition for the series), and was released globally on Netflix January 3, 2025.

Previews: Teaser, Clip, Trailer, Trailer 2

Vengeance Most Fowl contains examples of:

• Absurdly Spacious Sewer: Feathers' escape plan relies on the sewers of Lancashire being so spacious that a large submarine could easily navigate underneath the city streets and right into his prison/zoo enclosure.
• Actor Allusion: The coatrack in West Wallaby Street has a flat cap and coat that resemble the ones worn by Peter Sallis, Wallace's original voice actor, as Clegg on Last of the Summer Wine.
• Affectionate Gesture to the Head: One of the multiple inventions Wallace has made at the start is an automatic head-patting machine for Gromit, unaware that the dog would rather have Wallace pet him. At the end of the film, Wallace repurposes the head-patting machine and pats Gromit himself, saying he's learned there are some things a machine can't do. This quickly turns into an affectionate head rub. Feathers McGraw also does this to a baby seal who served as his Right-Hand Cat.
• Affectionate Parody: On par with the other Wallace and Gromit films, Vengeance Most Fowl continues to pay tribute to Alfred Hitchcock movies while also able to parody technology uprising sci-fi stories.
• A.I.-cronym: Wallace's invention is called the Nifty Odd-jobbing RoBot. Norbot for short.
• A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Subverted. It looks like Norbot has gone rogue and wicked due to a faulty oversight by Wallace, which is what Gromit initially believes. But it's really Feathers McGraw hijacking the programming of Norbot and turning him evil, which can be erased by a simple system reboot. The reason it's not a full aversion is that in Wallace's Inventional Wisdom, he gave Norbot a Morality Dial that goes from "Good" all the way to "Evil".
• Ambiguous Syntax: Wallace trips himself up this way when the police search his house. Mukherjee tells him that "We have reason to believe you are guilty of theft by gnome" and Wallace incredulously repeats "I'm guilty of theft by gnome?", which Mackintosh and Mukherjee interpret as a confession.
• Ambiguous Time Period: The background technology in the movie is largely anachronistic. The computers are CRT models with table-mounted CPUs, some of the computers have green phosphor displays, the televisions still have dials and antennae, Wallace still uses reel-to-reel tape recording storage, everyone's phones are still rotary models (with no cellphones in sight), and the internet interface looks like something akin to Classic Mac OS (with some elements similar to Windows 98). Any of these would be a very rare sight by the time of the film's release in 2024. However, at one point, a reCAPTCHA shows up, which wouldn't become commonplace until the 2010s, so technology from over the course of several decades pops up. A Freeze-Frame Bonus on Norbot's specifications states that the "Date+Time" is "vaguely in past".
• And Starring: "and Reece Shearsmith"
• Answer Cut:
  Wallace: What could possibly go wrong?
  Norbots ransack the town for metallic objects to carry out Feathers McGraw's plan
• Anti-Sneeze Finger: Feathers' extending hand device does this to prevent the zoo warden from waking up with her own sneeze.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: During the trailer's montage of the hijacked Norbot's crime wave, the townsfolk ask, in order, "Where's me tools?" "Where's me shed?" "And where's me glasses?" The Mayor, who asked the third one quickly finds the answer on his head.
• Artificial Stupidity: In the climax of the movie, a recently rebooted Norbot fails to see that Wallace and Gromit are tied up in the closet, electing to grab the vacuum cleaner to continue cleaning the house, drowning out Wallace's demands to release them.
• Ascended Extra: PC^note Now Chief Inspector Mackintosh has a much larger role than in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, and though still mainly used as a punchline, he is much more plot relevant.
• Aside Glance: Gromit glances at the audience when Wallace tells him the smart gnome is voice activated.
• Astonishingly Appropriate Interruption:
  • When Wallace fast fowards through requests on his answering machine for his new gardening service:
    Customer 1: Gnome imporvments? I saw you on the telly. Could Norbot come and mow my-
    Customer 2: ...new lily pond-
    Customer 3: ...with a stump grinder-
    Customer 4: ...and put well rotted manure-
    Customer 4: ...inside my conservatory.
  • Wallace opens his front door to find a mob of angry neighbors:
    Wallace: Everything will be right as rain before you can say-
    Old Woman: Nasty, crooked, thieving little toerag!
• Bad Boss: Despite the fact that he drinks tea out of a (presumably stolen) "World's Best Boss" mug, Feathers is actually one of these as far as his Norbot minions are concerned— he punches the bagpipe-playing one overboard, and sends the original on what is to all intents and purposes a suicide mission to stop Gromit.
• Bad Habits: Feathers briefly improvises a disguise as a nun, which is enough to fool the police.
• Bait-and-Switch:
  • "Up North News" introduces itself as being presented by Ant and Dec, only to cut to a news presenter who clearly isn't Ant or Dec, then his name "Anton Deck" flashes onscreen.
  • During the montage of the Norbots going around town, the police are giving what seems to be an ultimatum in a Hostage Situation. It's then revealed to be a Cat Up a Tree that they're talking to.
  • When PC Mukherjee first suggests that the evidence points to Wallace being involved in the garden thefts, Inspector Mackintosh points out that Wallace is the hero who stopped Feathers McGraw... then immediately says that this doesn't mean he can't also be a thief and sticks to this position even when Mukherjee begins doubting this herself.
  • When Feathers constructs an extendable arm out of trash, it first seems he's going to use them to grab the keys to his cell dangling on the wall, but then the arm extends far beyond the keys to access the (sleeping) guard's computer instead.
  • Gromit pursues Feathers and his Norbot army to the re-opening of the Blue Diamond exhibition, only for Feathers to pass it by as he knows that the diamond is actually hidden in Wallace's old teapot.
  • The original Norbot opens and enters the cupboard that Wallace and Gromit are trapped in, seemingly to save them. But it's only to put the leaf blower inside and get the vacuum cleaner to clean up the house.
• Bait-and-Switch Character Intro: Inspector Mackintosh is shown via an establishing shot of the police station declaring "It's a crime!". We then cut to inside, where he's instead talking about the fact he can't be with the subject of a photo… who turns out to be his boat, the Dun-Nickin.
• Bait-and-Switch Silhouette: As Gromit is tracking down the Norbot army, we see a faint collection of triangular objects which appears to be the outlines of the Norbots' pointy hats, but it turns out to just be a truck carrying traffic cones.
• Banana Peel: A load of these conveniently placed outside a banana warehouse foils Feathers's escape by sending the Norbots into a Slippery Skid.
• Batman Gambit: Feathers' swapping the Blue Diamond with a turnip and then hiding the diamond inside Wallace's teapot before his arrest relied on three major assumptions: that it would not go back on public display, that the police wouldn't check inside the bag supposedly containing the diamond before resealing it inside a vault, and that neither Wallace nor Gromit would use the teapot at any point even once. Sure enough, the diamond (or rather, the bag containing what everyone thinks is the diamond) goes straight into a secure vault, PC Mackintosh was too self-assured to bother checking the contents of the bag before closing the vault, and Wallace became too reliant on his inventions to brew tea for him to touch the teapot.^note In Feathers' defense, the last time they met, Wallace bought a robotic pair of trousers to do his chores. This assumption was fairly reasonable.
• Behind the Black: One of the Norbot army's customers opens the door to her garden shed, then the camera quickly zooms out—and only then she notices they stole her entire shed.
• Big Damn Heroes: The Norbots save Gromit from falling to his death, grabbing him by his foot just as he is about to hit the ground.
• Big "NO!": Wallace issues a classic example, complete with a Futile Hand Reach when Gromit is seemingly falling to his death.
• Bittersweet Ending: On the very sweet end of the spectrum. The only downer part of the ending is Feathers remaining at large, with the Crown Jewels apparently on high alert; however, he didn't get the Blue Diamond, and PC Mukherjee is enjoying having a big case of her own to work on in pursuing him. Mackintosh is able to retire to his canal boat, the Norbots become firmly good and help restore Gromit's garden, Wallace has his name cleared and is able to invent again, and Gromit both gets his garden back and finally has Wallace's complete appreciation and love.
• Black Eyes of Evil: Norbot exhibits these once he falls under Feathers' control. His duplicates, which he builds while under Feathers' control, also have these.
• Boomerang Comeback: While the Norbots on Feathers' canal-boat are able to dodge the boots that Wallace launches at them from the front, they then fly back at the boat like boomerangs - and during the return trip they hit the Norbots on their back-mounted power buttons, resetting their Morality Dials back to "Good".
• "Both Sides Have a Point" Remark: Norbot encapsulates the conflict between Wallace and Gromit; Wallace loves inventing things, but Norbot ends up driving Gromit to his wits' end by ruining the garden the dog wanted to manually tend to, being the second in the Name and Name for Wallace's lawn care service, and keeping him awake all night. Over the course of the film, the titular duo see technology for both its bad sides (Feathers hacking Wallace's computer to make the Norbot create an evil robot army, and Wallace discovering he's nearly unable to function without the devices he installed throughout his house) and good sides (Wallace, with Gromit's encouragement, builds a boot-flinging contraption to turn the Norbots good again, and the Norbots in turn save Gromit from falling to his death), reflecting that technology still has good use in moderation. By the end of the film, Gromit accepts Norbot and Wallace is still using his devices, but to a healthier, more practical degree, while remarking that some things (like petting dogs) still should be done by hand.
• Breaking Old Trends: This is the first film since The Wrong Trousers not to have a love interest for Wallace. Additionally, this is also the first film in the series to be a direct sequel to a previous instalment, with several major character and plot point returns, the films before having only brief cameos and call-backs at best.
• Breaking Out the Boss: Part of Feathers' scheme involves the reprogrammed gnomes breaking him out of captivity using a submarine.
• Brick Break: One gnome karate chops a slab of cement to make square tiles for a garden.
• Brick Joke: PC Mukherjee is introduced excitedly telling Mackintosh about her leads in the case of the stolen bike saddles, only to be brushed off. Later, as the two are heading off to arrest Wallace, Mackintosh and Mukherjee have to ride the same bike together and Mackintosh complains about his bike saddle getting nicked. Mukherjee reminds him that he took her off that case.
• Broad Strokes: Mackintosh brings up how Wallace and Gromit caught Feathers McGraw but makes no mention of their involvement with the Were-Rabbit. Fluffles is also nowhere to be seen despite joining the pair at the end of A Matter of Loaf and Death.
  • Given what a spotlight hound Mackintosh is, plus the fact that (so far as is publicly known) all Wallace and Gromit did was initially fail to catch the Were Rabbit and then briefly intervene in its rampage at the Vegetable Competition, it's probably no surprise he doesn't give them the credit they deserve.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Despite being a slightly ditzy rookie officer, PC Mukherjee manages to play an integral part in taking down Feathers within her first few days on the force.
• The Bus Came Back: With the exception of spin-offs, this is the first film to bring back a supporting character from a previous instalment:
  • This movie marks the return of Feathers McGraw following his debut in The Wrong Trousers 31 years prior (barring some brief cameos in other Wallace and Gromit and Aardman productions).
  • PC Mackintosh returns for the first time since The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, 19 years before. He's now promoted to Chief Inspector and on his way to retirement. A few background characters also return from Were-Rabbit.
  • Except for a background glimpse in A Matter of Loaf and Death, Wallace and Gromit's motorcycle-and-sidecar returns for the first time since A Close Shave 29 years ago, with the sidecar restored.
• Call-Back:
  • The jam contraption from The Wrong Trousers has now been expanded to be also capable of flinging marmalade and marmite. Or rather, cheesymite.
  • Feathers McGraw attempting to hack into Norbot with the robo-glove is a direct reference to his attempt sequence to steal the blue diamond by controlling Wallace on his robo-trousers in The Wrong Trousers, including Feathers sweating a lot.
  • When encountering the army of Norbot clones for the first time, and all walking ominously towards him, Gromit does the same reaction he did when the Techno-Trousers were introduced in nearly the same way.
  • Feathers suddenly turns to face Gromit while Gromit is spying on him just like in The Wrong Trousers, except this time Feathers does spot Gromit for real and orders Norbot to take care of him.
  • Feathers "reveals" himself to the duo much like how he did in The Wrong Trousers, with Wallace also reacting similarly.
    Wallace: Good grief, it's you! Again!
  • A cheese knife just like Wallace's from the opening of A Close Shave is used by Feathers to cut a rope.
  • "Snoozy Choc" hot chocolate, which was glimpsed on an advertising poster in The Wrong Trousers and featured in a deleted scene of The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, gets fed to Wallace to make him sleepy.
  • Wallace's computer has a ReCAPTCHA screen that asks the user to select all the pictures with cheese in. One of the pictures that needs to be selected is a picture of the Moon, which A Grand Day Out confirmed is made of cheese.
  • A photo of a younger Wallace with puppy Gromit in Curse of the Were-Rabbit shows he had a full head of bushy hair and a bushy mustache. A new photo here with Wallace and a slightly-older Gromit at a sack race shows him still with the mustache, but his hair is now a comb-over.
  • As with A Matter of Loaf and Death, the Yorkshire border factors into the climax.
• The Cameo: The Farmer from Shaun the Sheep appears for a Fruit Cart incident during the climactic chase scene, becoming the first character from the spin-off to appear in the mainline series. He can also be glimpsed earlier at two different points in the film, being part of the mob that forms around Wallace's house after the Norbots go on a crime wave, and being part of the crowd at the (planned) unveiling of the Blue Diamond at the museum.
• Can't Live With Them, Can't Live Without Them: Despite Gromit's exasperation with Wallace's excess of gadgets, as Feathers' frame up plan un-folds, Gromit finds himself meeting countless roadblocks because the police and the Norbots have taken all of Wallace's inventions that Gromit often weaponises to save the day, and has to find ways to retrieve them. This culminates in the final standoff, where he pushes Wallace to make an improvised gadget to reboot the Norbots, who ultimately save Gromit's life in Feathers' Villain Last Stand.
• Casting Gag: Lenny Henry, who infamously parodied the Wallace & Gromit series in his 1995 Christmas special, has a small role as one of the townspeople.
• Chain of People: Or robots; the recently reset Norbots form one to stop Gromit falling to his doom in the climax and pull him back up to the bridge.
• Chair Reveal: As Gromit investigates the zoo, he spots a black chair sitting in one of the enclosures. A few seconds later, the chair spins round to reveal Feathers McGraw. A variation in that Feathers is turning to greet the returning Norbot army, and only realizes Gromit's there after he's already turned round.
• Chase Scene: Per tradition. This time, on slow-moving narrowboats through a canal as Feathers tries to escape Lancashire with the diamond.
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • Wallace and Gromit’s old teapot that hasn't been used in a long time, so much so that Wallace has forgotten how to use it after all of his tech is confiscated, is revealed in the climax to have stored the Blue Diamond all along after Feathers stashed it inside during his original arrest and has now returned to take it back.
  • When Norbot is being reprogrammed by Feathers, his circuitry glows, showing a power button on his back. This button later being accidentally pushed leads to him being rebooted back to his good settings, which plays into Wallace and Gromit doing the same for his duplicates.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Fluffles, who joined the duo in the previous instalment, is nowhere to be seen or mentioned.
• Collector of the Strange: Mackintosh has a vintage boot collection, which he despairs at seeing turned into ammo for Wallace's Norbot-Rebooting device. Fortunately, during the credits, Wallace and Gromit are shown fishing them out of the river.
• Colour-Coded for Your Convenience: The original Norbot is green and red, while the following Norbots are all blue. This is necessary to tell them apart, because they otherwise look and act identically, though the original green Norbot serves as Feathers' Elite Mook during its time under "Evil" programming.
• Comical Coffee Cup: Feathers sips from a "World's Best Boss" mug while checking on the Norbot crew charting the submarine's course.
• Comic-Book Time: Zig-zagged. The flashback to Feathers' arrest is merely stated to be "many years ago", with no indication of when it took place. But in the present, Mackintosh has visibly aged since his previous appearance, while the titular duo have not.
• Company Cross-References: In the climax, Gromit is saved by the Norbots forming a 'human chain' to catch him, which is exactly how the Pirate Captain was saved by his crew at the end of The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists.
• Composite Character: In terms of the story being a partial retelling of The Wrong Trousers, Norbot combines both the Techno Trousers in that they represent Gromit's frustration with Wallace's technology obsession and Feathers McGraw in the way both make Gromit feel neglected and uncomfortable in his own home. Series-wide, Norbot being an actual character also leads him to play the part of the Sidekick Creature Nuisance who later redeems himself and saves Gromit, much akin to Shaun and Hutch in their respective films.
• Continuity Nod:
  • Gromit's yellow raincoat and hat from The Wrong Trousers can be seen hanging on the coatrack in West Wallaby Street.
  • When a flashback occurs showing how Feathers swapped the Blue Diamond in the bag with a turnip shortly before his arrest, Feathers can be seen still surrounded by the train cars that Gromit crashed into the kitchen cabinet with. Plus, the empty milk bottle that trapped Feathers is also next to him, as he's now tied up in ropes before getting taken to the police station.
  • The fish-themed wallpaper Feathers replaced Gromit's bedroom wallpaper with appears in the end credits.
• Convenient Escape Boat: Feathers happens upon a narrowboat for hire promising "the perfect getaway" once his previous mode of escape is compromised. Wallace & Gromit follow in Mackintosh's own narrowboat, the 'Dun Nickin', moored nearby.
• Contrived Coincidence: Feathers is only able to access Norbot because Gromit couldn't stand the annoying sounds and lights that he emits while charging in his room (as opposed to literally any other room in the house) and plugged him into the computer in the basement to charge instead. Because of this, Feathers is able to use the internet to access Norbot's programming and turn him evil without even having to leave his cell.
• The Cracker: For a penguin with a record of burglary and armed robbery, Feathers has impressive computer skills. He hacks into Wallace's computer from one of the zoo guards' PC, guesses Wallace's password, and reprograms a gardening robot to become his faithful and effective minion.
• Creative Sterility: Norbot by virtue of his programming to make things, "neat and tidy," turns Gromit's colourful and vibrant garden into something much more stark and geometric, much to the latter's dismay. At the end where Gromit accepts the Norbots, the garden is shown to be a more organic combination between the two, with Gromit's original colourful arrangements everywhere and the Norbots shaving the new layout's trees to be rounded.
• Crystal-Ball Scheduling: At one point, the TV shows an old black-and-white B-movie about evil robots taking over the world, mirroring the Norbot army, who promptly turn it off.
• Cue the Sun: The final pursuit for Feathers McGraw begins at the dark of dawn, and the sky remains fairly overcast throughout, but by the time everyone reaches the aqueduct and the Yorkshire / Lancashire, border, the sun's risen high enough to shine upon the valley.
• Cut Apart: Used to brilliant effect at the start of the climax. Following Feathers' escape from the zoo, he and his Norbot army are shown navigating their submarine and preparing to surface, while Mackintosh is opening the vault to retrieve the Blue Diamond's sack, giving the impression that Feathers intends to burst up into the museum and steal the Blue Diamond during the exhibition. It then turns out that what was thought to be the Blue Diamond was actually a turnip (Mackintosh had locked the bag away without confirming the diamond was in it). Meanwhile, Feathers' sub is returning to Wallace and Gromit's house, where he had hidden the diamond in an old teapot the night of his arrest.
• Dark Reprise: When the hacked Norbot shows the mass-produced army to Wallace, an ominous rendition of the Wallace & Gromit theme plays.
• Deathly Dies Irae: The four notes are used as a Leitmotif for Feathers McGraw and his villainous machinations throughout the film, alongside a few quotations of his original theme from The Wrong Trousers.
• Decon-Recon Switch: The film takes this attitude to Wallace's love of inventing, presenting it less as an amusing eccentricity and more as a concerning addiction, with his habit of building inventions to fulfil minor tasks for himself growing to the point where he has so many that does practically nothing for himself anymore (not even feeding himself or patting Gromit on the head) other than building new inventions. His dependency on them is shown to be very overbearing towards Gromit (in particular their habit of going wrong that he has to bear the brunt of), it's acknowledged they are the main reason for the duo's constant financial woes despite their multiple successful businesses and when the police confiscate them it becomes clear Wallace has flat out forgotten how to perform basic functions and struggles even to dress himself. However, the third act nevertheless reaffirms that Wallace's love of inventing does come from a sincere place of wanting to do good with his talents and makes clear that for all their drawbacks, when used correctly Wallace's inventions have the potential to be very useful, with them playing a key role in saving the day. Likewise, by the climax it's clear Wallace has learned his lesson about letting himself grow dependent on technology, becoming capable on his own without giving up his love of inventing and committing to having a more healthy relationship from now on.
• Description Cut: While pursuing Wallace during the canal-boat chase, Mukherjee states her belief that Wallace has been unfairly portrayed as a crazed inventor. Cut to Wallace, cackling madly as he rises out of the roof of the "Dun-Knickin" on his jerry-rigged boot-throwing machine.
  PC Mukherjee: (Shrugs) ...to a certain extent.
• Didn't Think This Through: The original Norbot, when tasked with getting rid of Gromit in a tree outside the zoo, saws off the branch both of them are standing on.
  Norbot: (looks down) ...Ah. (falls)
• Diegetic Soundtrack Usage: A depressed Wallace plunks out the first notes of the theme song on his out-of-tune piano.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?:
  • The second time the sleeping zoo warden is about to sneeze, Feathers' extending hand device prevents it by putting the warden's handkerchief over her face in the manner of an Instant Sedation by chloroform.
  • While recharging, the original Norbot makes a face reminiscent of someone experiencing pleasure during sex.
  • The Norbots offer and gradually force-feed a cup of overloaded hot cocoa to Wallace in order to knock him out. Wallace acts delirious while Gromit tries to wake him up and has unmixed cocoa powder on his nose.
• Door Slams You: Mackintosh is unfortunate enough to be on the other side of Wallace's front door as Wallace, Gromit and Norbot burst though on a leaf blower powered chair slamming him into the ground. PC Mukherjee then 'opens' the door to reveal Mackintosh has been forced into a Mackintosh shaped hole in the pavement.
• Double Entendre: When Wallace is confronted by an angry mob who believe his Norbots have stolen their belongings, one villager angrily demands, “Where’s my big butt?” While she is referring to a large barrel (a “butt” being an old term for a cask), the phrasing also carries a modern anatomical meaning.
• Double Take: Two, both involving the normally implacable Feathers in the climax:
  • He glances casually at Wallace and Gromit still trussed up and leaf-blowing their office chair up alongside the van, then blinks in surprise and properly registers what he's seeing.
  • An even wilder one when he grabs what he thinks is the Blue Diamond out of his bag after escaping from the police; he looks at it fondly before looking back at them — and realizes what he stole was actually a turnip.
• Dramatically Missing the Point: While mixed in with Comically Missing the Point, Wallace creates Norbot intending to help Gromit both with his garden and their shared financial troubles, not realising it's directly feeding into the latter's insecurities and fears of being replaced (while also wrecking his garden to boot).
• Dramatic Shattering: Feathers smashes Wallace's old teapot, revealing that the Blue Diamond was hidden inside.
• Dusting Off Your Hands: Gromit irritably dusts his paws after shoving Norbot into the basement and hooking him up to the computer there so he can sleep without being disturbed by the gnome's charging cycle.
• Eager Rookie: Recently-recruited PC Mukherjee; assigned to investigate the theft of a bicycle saddle, she compiles a heap of paperwork complete with forensic work.
• Elite Mook: The original Norbot is coloured differently from his duplicates, and serves as The Dragon to Feathers for the duration he is in "Evil" mode, commanding the others in the latter's absense.
• The End: Norbot makes a topiary into the words "The End".
  Norbot: DADA!
• Epic Fail: Because he never bothered to check inside the sack, Mackintosh doesn't find out that Feathers swapped the diamond with a turnip until the moment he pulls the turnip out in front of everybody at the grand opening of the museum exhibit.
• Et Tu, Brute?: Wallace refuses to believe about the Norbots' thievery which lead to all of his inventions taken from him by the police. He asks Gromit that if he believes him about the robots' innocence however seeing the complete hesitance in Gromit's face causes the normally jolly Wallace to frown and realize that his dog never liked the Norbots at all.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: In what little we see of them together, Feathers acts affectionately towards the seal pup he uses as his Right-Hand Cat, and from the way the pup responds, the feeling is clearly mutual.
• Every Car Is a Pinto: Feathers' stolen barge is a variant of this, exploding after it falls from a great height.
• Everything Is Online: Wallace's top secret inventing files can be accessed just by entering his street address into a search engine. To be fair, they're password protected. (The password is "CHEESE".)
• Everything's Louder with Bagpipes: When Feathers boards the submarine he had the Norbots build for him to escape his prison, one of them is playing Amazing Freaking Grace on a set of bagpipes to salute him (a variant of the way in which senior officers are piped on board warships). Feathers promptly punches the Norbot into the water below to shut him up. Bagpipes also briefly play the theme song during the credits.
• Exactly What I Aimed At: When Wallace catapults the boots at the Norbots, they jump over them taunting him with "Missed!", but then, they boomerang back and kick their reset buttons.
• Face–Heel Turn: Feathers McGraw turns Norbot from good to evil by hacking into him and changing his Morality Dial.
• Failed a Spot Check:
  • Gromit goes out to the garage, climbs into the car, and tries to start it, but the engine won't turn over. He climbs back out, pops open the hood, and finds the Norbots stole the entire engine. Only then does he notice that the Norbots also took all four wheels, and left the car resting on cinder blocks.
  • At one point, Mackintosh gives a speech to Mukherjee about how constant vigilance is a necessary part of being a police officer — while Gromit is shown hauling Wallace's gnome detection device out of the police station behind both of them without either noticing him.
  • Mackintosh only learns when opening the safe that he has been guarding a turnip for the last several years rather than the Blue Diamond, as he never actually opened the sack to confirm it held the Blue Diamond, which had been hidden in Wallace's teapot by Feathers.
• Fakin' MacGuffin: Done by both the villain and the hero. Before he was taken away by the police, Feathers swapped out the Blue Diamond with a turnip and hid the diamond inside an old teapot in Wallace and Gromit's home. During the climax, Gromit does the same thing, so that, while Feathers escapes, he only got away with a worthless turnip.
• Flashback with the Other Darrin: The film opens with a flashback with a new scene set during the ending of The Wrong Trousers (after Gromit captures Feathers in the milk bottle and before the Techno-Trousers are used to wheel him into the police station), in which Wallace calls up the police to inform them of their capture of McGraw. The scene has Wallace voiced by Ben Whitehead, who had replaced Peter Sallis after his retirement and death.
• Flintstone Theming: As part of the series' traditional gag where book titles or their authors' names are all dog or cheese-related puns, Gromit is seen reading works by Virginia Woof and John Stilton.
• Foreshadowing:
  • The opening shot — of two gnomes in Wallace's front garden.
  • One of their photos in the opening shows Wallace and Gromit catching a boot while fishing.
• Frame-Up: The trouble caused by the smart gnome has landed Wallace in trouble with the public, and Wallace can't believe he could've caused such an act, which leads him and Gromit to try and work out who the real culprit is — Feathers McGraw, who's reprogrammed the smart gnome to become evil and follow his bidding. More elaborately, Feathers tries to frame Wallace for the theft of the Blue Diamond by hiding it in his teapot before the former's arrests and intends to run away with the diamond in his possession.
  Onya Doorstep: I'm live outside the West Wallaby Street house of the evil inventor, Mr. Wallace!
  Wallace: Evil?!
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: Loads.
  • There's plenty when Feathers hacks into Wallace's computer to reprogram Norbot.
    • Wallace's desktop is a cluttered mess of numerous unnamed folders, except for one named "Cheese Pics".
    • On the "Norbot System Admin" screen, Norbot's motor functions are listed as "head, shoulders, knees, toes, knees, toes, eyes, ears, mouth, nose, H / S / K / T / K / T". His performance setup controls, meanwhile, include brightness ("2 clever by 1/2"), chips ("w/everything"), input, output and "shake-it-all-about-put".
    • Norbot's operating centre (basically, his brain) consists of three parts — Memory Centre, Language Centre and Garden Centre ^note  in British English, a large store, usually with an outdoor part, that sells plants and other products for the garden, such as tools, furniture, etc .
    • The other settings on Norbot's Morality Dial include "Pleasant" and "Boorish".
  • The Yorkshire border sign says: "KEEP OUT". On the reverse, briefly glimpsed when Feathers is on the train, the Lancashire border sign says: "NO, YOU KEEP OUT".
  • Norbot's field of view shows a lot of information about his surroundings that only flashes on-screen for a few frames at a time. For instance, when he scans Gromit's garden, it classifies "organic matter: TREE" as "root-based organism" and "shade provider", and the "asymmetrical wooden structure: GARDEN SHED" as "permanent arachnid dwelling" and "nonsystematic storage facility".
  • Mukherjee's bulletin board has pictures of several of Feathers's other disguises, and a newspaper clipping which speculates that Feathers might be going after the Crown Jewels next.
• Friend-or-Idol Decision: In the climax, Gromit ends up hanging off a boat that is tilting off an aqueduct and Feathers demands the Blue Diamond in exchange for letting him live. If Gromit gives up the diamond, Wallace won't be able to give it back to the police and will probably never have his name cleared. If Gromit doesn't give up the diamond, Wallace theoretically still has a chance of returning it, but having his name cleared will come at the cost of losing his best friend. Wallace pleads with Gromit to give Feathers the diamond, saying it isn't worth it over his best pal ...and is rewarded when it turns out that Gromit pulled a switcheroo, leaving Feathers with a turnip.
• Fright Beside Them: Gromit comes home from pursuing the villains and Wallace calls him into the next room. However, when the dog comes in, he finds Wallace bound and gagged, making it clear that he didn't call. Immediately afterwards, the evil gnomes demonstrate that they can mimic voices, before tying Gromit up as well.
• Fruit Cart: During the climactic chase Wallace is pulled through the farm of the farmer from Shaun the Sheep, plowing right through his vegetable cart.
• Genius Book Club: Gromit is seen reading "A Room of One's Own" by Virginia Woof Just before Norbot tries to move into his room.
• Gift-Giving Gaffe: Wallace makes Norbot (Nifty Odd-jobbing RoBot) to help Gromit with day-to-day things, including gardening. Wallace prefers to have technology do things for him as much as possible and doesn't realize that Gromit prefers a less extreme approach or that the robot's method of gardening is a little too sterile for the dog. (About the latter, it doesn't help that the neighbours also approve of the result.) The final nail in the coffin, of course, is that Norbot is voice-activated, and so Gromit can't use or stop the robot even if he wants to.
• Glove Snap: Twice:
  • After Feathers McGraw reveals he stole one of the zookeeper's red rubber gloves, he stretches it out and snaps it.
  • Mackintosh dramatically snaps on his rubber gloves before opening the safe that supposedly contains the Blue Diamond.
• Gone Horribly Right: A more literal case in Feathers' case. He manages to successfully reprogram Norbot and instruct him to make an army of perfect duplicates. Norbot does this to a fault, retaining the 'Inventor Setting' reset function for each of them, allowing Wallace to reset all of them to "Good" mode along with the original Norbot during the climax. They consequently sabotage Feathers' attempt on Gromit's life as he makes his escape.
• Grappling-Hook Gun: Gromit uses his retractable lead as one to spy on Feathers.
• Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress: At one point, after being turned evil, Norbot saws off a tree branch Gromit is standing on sending him falling into a lion pening. A few seconds later, Norbot realizes he's sitting on the same branch he just chopped off, and then he falls too.
• Gut Feeling: Instinct, or as Mackintosh calls it, the "copper's gut," is a recurring theme. He repeatedly tells PC Mukherjee that she needs it to be a good police officer, rather than relying on "modern academy techniques" like crime mapping and evidence. She's the first to suggest that Wallace may indeed be innocent, owing it to a gut feeling—and when she's sure of it, she yells out, "Sorry, Chief, I'm using me gut!"
• Have You Tried Rebooting?: A button in the middle of Norbot's back resets him, turning him back to his default "good" setting.
• Heel–Face Turn: The original Norbot, followed by all of his copies, are turned back to being good by simply reverting them back to factory settings, which can be done by pressing the button on their backs.
• Homage: Feathers McGraw plotting his vengeance while working out in prison is a reference to Max Cady doing the same in the opening scene of Cape Fear (1991), right down to the similar-sounding music. In addition, both films share the premise of a criminal seeking revenge on the person who put him behind bars, and both feature a climactic fight with the villain on a boat.
• "I Can't Look!" Gesture: As Wallace gets sent from the bathtub and through transparent slide tubes, Gromit shields his eyes from seeing naked Wallace.
• Idea Bulb: After Wallace gets the idea to sell the Norbot's services, a lorry with a light bulb insignia drives behind him as a Visual Pun.
• Impact Silhouette: Inverted. When Gromit gets locked in a garden shed, he escapes by cutting through one of the metal walls with a can opener—cutting a hole shaped like his exact silhouette which he leaps through, briefly fitting exactly in the shape.
• Improbable Aiming Skills: Boots launched at the Norbots, which then come twirling back and hit each one squarely on its reset button.
• Internal Deconstruction: While the concept of another character coming in between Wallace and Gromit has been used in nearly every film since The Wrong Trousers, any personal tension it causes between the two is usually dropped quickly, either from the character turning out to be a villain or being the other way round and ingratiating themselves into the duo's dynamic after a short while. By contrast, Norbot not only inconvinences Gromit but embodies his increased annoyances with Wallace and his overfixation of technology (as well at least some level of jealousy on his part since Wallace hands Norbot a lot of Gromit's jobs). While Norbot does turn villainous, it is only by the true Big Bad's manipulation (something that is part the fault of both of the two leads in their complacency and rejection of Norbot respectively), and Gromit's decision to help revert and rescue Norbot and his brethren, and them later returning the favour by rescuing him, represents Wallace and Gromit's restrengthened bond and understanding of one another. Adding to this, said Big Bad is for once a returning villain, Feathers McGraw, the very first character to prey upon Wallace and Gromit's bond, and since there is no way they'd fall for his act a second time, he has to do most of his work behind the curtains or rely on Paper Thin Disguises.
• Ironic Echo:
  • Feathers tried using Wallace's model train set in The Wrong Trousers to escape with the diamond, only to get captured but managed to swap the diamond with a turnip and hid it in Wallace's teapot for him to snatch later when he's inevitably breaking out of the zoo. Here, he boards a real railroad train to make his escape again and succeeds, but loses the diamond by Gromit switching the bag's content just like Feathers had done before.
  • For all the times Mackintosh repeatedly tells her to use her gut, Mukherjee does - letting him be hit by a boot and continuing on without him to pursue Feathers, not Wallace.
• Irony: Inspector Mackintosh refers to himself as an "un-informed" police officer (he meant to say "uniformed") when he misreads his speech, but hits the nail right on the head.
• It Was Here, I Swear!: Twice in quick succession. After Gromit stumbles across the Norbot army building something in the basement, he tries to warn Wallace, but when they get there, the basement is completely spick and span, with no sign of the construction work that had been taking place just a moment before. Gromit's expression just screams this trope. A moment later, the police arrive to arrest Wallace for "theft by gnome" - when he leads them to the basement to show them that the Norbots are incapable of such deeds, they've all vanished.
• It's All About Me:
  • Downplayed. Wallace loves having inventions on hand to cater to him and he's gleeful from all the praises he garners for his Norbots, particularly relishing Onya Doorstep referring to him as "smart-thinking". However, he wants what he makes to benefit others as much as himself.
  • Mackintosh spends the entire film prioritizing in looking good for the new Blue Diamond exhibit rather than investigating a serious crime spree occurring across the town. When he finally does come around, it is mainly due to the trouble he is in for guarding a turnip and letting the actual Blue Diamond be lost for years.
• Job Song: The Norbots sings a jolly work song as they landscape gardens. They reprise it in the credits. It also serves as the Norbots' Leitmotif.
• Job-Stealing Robot: Gromit's initial apprehension against Norbot (besides ruining his flower garden) is the gnome taking his place in the partnership between him and Wallace, down to the sign for their new garden service being "Wallace and Norbot".
• Karma Houdini: Downplayed. Feathers escapes custody once all is said and done, but at the same time he doesn't get the Blue Diamond with Gromit outplaying him, and it is heavily implied he will end up being caught in the future.
• Karmic Jackpot: Despite Gromit's disdain for the Norbots, he saves the original from the lion's pen at the Zoo, and later fishes out his duplicates from the canal during the chase. This allows them to save Gromit from falling to his death when the boat topples off a bridge.
• Lighter and Softer: The film is much lighter in tone than A Matter of Loaf and Death, where it features Feathers McGraw's plot for revenge rather than having a Serial Killer target the main cast.
• Low-Speed Chase: After some dramatic scenes of the Dun-Nickin's engine cranking up and dials going up to maximum, the two canal boats set off at the usual speed of canal boats, and are overtaken by an old lady walking a dog on the towpath. The Norbot hanging horizontally on the rear pole lets out a sheepish giggle since the boat's not actually that fast. Subverted when Feathers slaps on a pair of additional outboard motors, causing his stolen vessel to zoom like a speedboat.
• MacGyvering: Feathers is finally able to enact his master plan when he filches his famous rubber glove from the warden, allowing him to make an extending hand device and hack into the prison computer.
• Made of Explodium: The barge disintegrates into a fireball when it hits the ground.
• Meaningless Villain Victory: Feathers manages to elude the police and escape on the train with his ill-gotten gains...which turn out to be worthless, as Gromit had swapped out the diamond for a turnip. We last seen him collapsing in despair after realising how Gromit outwitted him.
• Might as Well Not Be in Prison at All: Feathers is placed in a supposedly inescapable zoo exhibit, as seen at the end of The Wrong Trousers, but it's shown he could've easily escaped any time he wanted and it does nothing to stop his latest evil scheme, due to simply using the guard's computer to access technology in the outside world. The only reason he stays inside at all seems to be less that he wants to escape, more that he wants revenge at the same time.
• Mirror Character: Wallace and Gromit shares several similarities with Mackintosh and Mukherjee.
  • Wallace and Mackintosh are the alleged bosses of their respective duos but are selfish, stubborn and are almost completely incompetent at their jobs. However, their incompetence stems from different sources: Wallace is Innocently Insensitive and a classic Absent-Minded Professor type, whereas Mackintosh is much more prideful (and wants to get to his retirement).
  • Gromit and Mukherjee are the Hypercompetent Sidekicks to their respective bosses. Gromit's a bit more obvious in this regard than Mukherjee; the latter's competence stems more from her enthusiasm for her job than taking everything seriously.
• Morality Dial: Norbot, and all of his duplicates, have inbuilt settings on a scale from 'Good' at one end to 'Evil' at the other, with a lot of comedy options such as "Pleasant" and "Boorish" in the middle.
• Mundane Solution: Simply resetting the Norbots to factory settings by pressing their "ON" button, like any normal electronic device, will revert their Morality Dial from 'evil' to 'good'.
• Musicalis Interruptus: As Feathers boards the submarine to the salutes of his Norbot army, he punches the one playing bagpipes overboard.
• Mythology Gag: A submarine partially made out of bathtubs, traveling through the sewers, previously appeared◊ in the Wallace & Gromit comic book Catch of the Day.
• Negatives as a Positive: After the film thoroughly showcased the follies of Wallace's technology affinity, it ends up acknowledged as quite vital during the climax, where he is quickly able to invent a makeshift catapult to reboot the Norbots. Norbot in turn is vindicated when he and his clones rescue Gromit from certain death, showing that their overdiligence is quite handy in a jam. In the end, both the Norbots and the Pat-O-Matic are reemployed into better moderated roles in the duo's lives, demonstrating Wallace's inventions are indeed quite useful when utilised more healthily.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero!: For some reason, Wallace built Norbot with a totally unnecessary Morality Dial, which Feathers exploits. Gromit is guilty of this too, as he plugs Norbot into the computer to get the robot out of his room because Norbot's noisy recharging kept him awake, which enables Feathers to reprogram Norbot when he hacks into the computer.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain!:
  • When Gromit tries to stakeout the zoo and Feathers with his submarine and army of Norbots, Feathers commands Norbot to cut the tree branch Gromit's on to get rid of him. In the process, the robot falls on its back, which reboots him back to his original programming.
  • The original Norbot, when corrupted and building his duplicate army, created exact functional duplicates, with all programming and hardware intact. While they're all set to "evil" upon creation, they all have the reset button and moral functionality of the original and can be set back to "good" as their default, meaning when Wallace finds a way to reboot them, they recognise him as their master and Heel–Face Turn.
• Not Evil, Just Misunderstood: Practically lampshaded as that is the sub-headline on the Morning Post's report on Wallace's exoneration.
• Not Helping Your Case: Mukherjee attempts to tell Mackintosh that Wallace is not a crazed inventor, but then Wallace emerges from the houseboat wearing goggles in his underpants and doing a crazy laugh.
• Old Cop, Young Cop: Chief Inspector Mackintosh and PC Mukherjee.
• Ominous Pipe Organ: Naturally, Toccata and Fugue in D minor is played on an organ by Feathers.
• Once More, with Clarity: The audience is initially shown the process of Feathers' arrest and a bag apparently containing the Blue Diamond being returned to its vault. Later, it's revealed that offscreen during the first sequence, Feathers switched the Blue Diamond for a turnip placed in the bag and sequestered the actual jewel in Wallace's dusty old teapot.
• Open Mouth, Insert Foot: When Mackintosh gives Mukherjee the talk about a police officer's most valuable asset being their gut, and remarks that he has quite an officer's gut himself, Mukherjee responds that she can see that — referring to his pot belly.^note To be fair, he did pat it as he was speaking. She gets flustered and backtracks when he gives her a look.
• Open the Door and See All the People: Wallace does, only to be met with a baying mob of neighbours.
• Our Gnomes Are Weirder: Norbot (and later, his army of duplicates) are explicitly modeled after lawn gnomes.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Feathers McGraw wouldn't be Feathers McGraw without it. His iconic rubber glove hat to imitate a chicken's comb reappears, and once again fools Wallace. He also later dresses up as a nun using a sock and a black rag, which fools Chief Inspector Mackintosh and PC Mukherjee.
• Parasol Parachute: Feathers escapes the canalboat wreck atop the aquaduct by floating away with an umbrella.
• The Password Is Always "Swordfish":
  • The padlock combination for the police safe is 999.^note For anyone not in the know, that's the phone number for emergency services in the UK.
  • Wallace's computer password is "CHEESE". Ironically, Feathers eventually guesses this after failing with two much-more sensible passwords.
• Pet the Dog: As Feathers' makes his escape, he gives the seal pup he was using for his Right-Hand Cat bit one last affectionate head pat. Though in case you were worried he was going soft, not one minute later he shoves the Norbot playing the bagpipes into the water.
  • And, of course, literally done by Wallace at the end after he realizes that Gromit would much prefer to be patted on the head by his master than by a machine.
• Planning with Props: As Feathers is homing in on the blue diamond, the gnomes are mapping their location using a map of the city with a small diamond standee representing the blue diamond and a potato with a straw in it representing the submarine.
• Police Are Useless: Mackintosh manages to be even worse here than he was in his debut. Mukherjee is only mildly better, although she does eventually catch on that Feathers, not Wallace, is the real bad guy.
• Prison: The zoo where Feathers is held is presented as a prison, and indeed as The Alcatraz. (The capable Feathers nonetheless engineers an escape, though it's evidently, if not roughly, taken him a few years.)
• Prisons Are Gymnasiums: Feathers uses one of the drain pipes in his cell as a makeshift pull-up bar.
• Pun-Based Title: The title is a pun on "foul/fowl" because Feathers is a villainous penguin, paired with the return of his rubber glove that made him resemble a chicken in The Wrong Trousers.
• Punny Name:
  • Mackintosh's retirement canal-boat is named the Dun-Nickin'.
  • The newsreader for "Up North News" is named Anton Deck, and the on-the-scene reporter is named Onya Doorstep.
  • In the credits, Bach's "Toccata and Fugue in D minor" is credited as being performed by "Wesley Dale."
  • A can of WG-40 lubricant is glimpsed in one scene, instead of WD-40.
• Pyrrhic Victory: Feathers McGraw manages to escape Wallace, Gromit, and the police... without his coveted Blue Diamond, with his Revenge plot against the duo completely undone, his entire Norbot army rebooted to "Good", and with the now-promoted Officer Mukherjee on his tail.
• Rank Up: Since we last saw him, PC Mackintosh has been promoted to Chief Inspector. After he retires, PC Mukherjee tries his cap on, although it's unclear as to whether she's been (very) rapidly promoted or just imagining her future career.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: PC Mukherjee does everything by the book. She suggests Wallace might be a suspect in the burglaries based on what little evidence she has at that moment, but changes her mind after examining his inventions and finding nothing, and later sets her sights on Feathers once it becomes clear that he's the culprit.
• Recursive Creators: Norbot (under the malign influence of Feathers) builds an army of new gnomes to assist him.
• Red Herring: In the first act, Chief Inspector Mackintosh boasts about the museum being perfectly guarded, only for PC Mukherjee to point out multiple security flaws which Mackintosh elects to brush off, making it seem like Feathers will use those security flaws to his advantage to steal the Blue Diamond again. Instead, Feathers turns out to have hidden the Blue Diamond in Wallace's teapot all those years ago, removing any reason for him to try and steal it from the museum again in the first place.
• Reforged into a Minion: Feathers hacks into Norbot's systems to turn him evil, giving him Black Eyes of Evil and making him assist him in his plan for Revenge.
• Refuse to Rescue the Disliked: Averted. Despite not having the best opinion of the Norbots, Gromit doesn't hesitate in saving the original Norbot from the lion enclosure, or fishing out the ones who were made to serve Feathers from the canal, when they're all reset to good. This allows the Norbots to save Gromit's life when he's falling to his death.
• Returning Big Bad: Feathers McGraw returns as the main antagonist after 31 years. Or, if one were to count Wallace & Gromit in Project Zoo, 21 years.
• Revenge: As the title suggests, getting revenge for being locked away back during his last film appearance is Feathers' motivation here.
• Ridiculously Fast Construction: Done repeatedly. Norbot is able to completely renovate Wallace and Gromit's backyard in the span of about thirty seconds, the Norbots are able to build an entire submarine from scrap in one day, Feathers is able to engineer an extendable arm out of garbage in what is, at most, a few hours, Wallace is able to build a boot-flinging turret contraption in a few minutes, and Feathers is able to refit his canal boat with some faster outboard motors mid-chase.
• Right-Hand Cat: When Gromit spies on Feathers at the zoo, the penguin is stroking a white baby seal that's seated on his lap.
• Run for the Border: In this case, the Lancashire/Yorkshire border.
• Same Plot Sequel: Downplayed, but the story shares a lot of similarities to The Wrong Trousers, which the movie is a direct continuation of. The plot is kicked off by Wallace trying to alleviate the pair's unpaid bills in some way, Wallace's new technological invention makes Gromit feel undervalued, Feathers secretly reprograms Wallace's new invention to help him steal the Blue Diamond, Gromit is the first one to realize something very suspicious is going on and conducts his own investigation, Feathers captures the pair and locks them in a closet, only for them to escape using Wallace's new invention, then the climax involves a very unconventional and wacky vehicle chase, and the last shot involves the invention.
• Sand in My Eyes: When the thing in the sack is revealed to be a turnip instead of the Blue Diamond, Mukherjee notices Mackintosh is starting to cry because his reputation as a policeman is in tatters, but he claims to merely be allergic to turnips.
• Satire: The Special is a satire of Smart-home and IoT devices (such as Alexa, Siri, Google Home etc.), which are constantly connected online and are powered by AI, with the purpose of making the lives of the customer easier. Wallace's dialogue when talking about Norbot are direct quotes from people who defend the use of such devices (AI will make our lives easier, for example). That said, the special ends up pointing out that technology is still good in moderation when Wallace is forced to go cold turkey without any inventions in his life for a day.
• Say My Name: Wallace screams out Gromit's name in slow-motion as he falls from the bridge.
• Sequel Episode: The movie's plot is a direct continuation to The Wrong Trousers, with the Big Bad returning from that film and following many similar plot beats, but it does include references to the other installments throughout.
• Sequel Hook: While the heroes once again manage to prevent the Blue Diamond from being stolen, Feathers escapes to likely continue his crime spree and possibly seek revenge against Wallace and Gromit again.
• Serial Escalation: Wallace's Norbot invention is a culmination of two things—one, it's a huge step up from previous devices seen built into unassuming garden gnomes, and by virtue of being an autonomous intelligence with superhuman capabilities, is also the most advanced and dangerous thing he's ever devised.
• Series Continuity Error: It's revealed that the Blue Diamond was hidden in Wallace and Gromit's old teapot all this time since, yet they've used similar teapots throughout the series before and after The Wrong Trousers without the Blue Diamond somehow being found in them. Though it's more likely that the one teapot that Gromit used at the beginning of that film is the exact same one as the teapot in this movie and that it hasn't been used since when he and Wallace use another teapot towards the end of the former film.
• Series Fauxnale: In many ways, one could watch the film and interpret it as a Grand Finale to the Wallace and Gromit films due to the return of Feathers McGraw and PC Mackintosh, various easter eggs and references to the previous films in the series and even to Shaun the Sheep, an aspect of Wallace's character arc revolving on his struggle to ever invent again, and the climax being big-scale and emotionally charged in a way that could be seen as wrapping up Wallace and Gromit's entire storyline. Despite all of these elements, whether this is really the final Wallace and Gromit film is unconfirmed, with several producers hinting at future adventures for the duo.
• Shoe Slap: During the climactic chase sequence, Wallace cobbles together a contraption that launches boots at Feathers' vehicle.
• "Silly Me" Gesture: Feathers McGraw gives himself one for not correctly figuring out Wallace's computer password after two wrong guesses. It's so simple he has to blame himself for overestimating Wallace's intelligence.
• Slipping a Mickey: The Norbots feed Wallace a huge dose of "Snoozy Choc" hot cocoa to put him to sleep. In The Wrong Trousers it was shown that Wallace is already normally a very sound sleeper, so it takes some effort for Gromit to wake him up again.
• Slow "NO!": Wallace does this as Gromit seemingly falls from the aqueduct to his death, before being saved by the Norbots.
• Stealth Pun:
  • Gromit goes after the gnomes with a net similar to those used by animal control officers. He's a dogcatcher.
  • The Norbots are 'rebooted' by getting hit with boots.
  • As Gromit hugs Norbot, Wallace remarks that he knew he would 'embrace' techonology in the end.
• Stealing the Credit: Despite the fact that he's not fooling anyone, Inspector Mackintosh severely overplays his role in the capture of Feathers, to the point he sees it as his greatest achievement. All he really did was answer the phone on the night it happened, muscle into the press photos during the ensuing media storm, and lock the bag in a vault without even checking to make sure the diamond was in it first.
• Stolen MacGuffin Reveal: In the climax, Feathers leaves Gromit hanging from a canal boat teetering on the edge of an aqueduct and demands the bag with the Blue Diamond in return for his life. While Gromit gives Feathers what he wants and is met with Feathers leaving him for dead anyway, it doesn't matter as Gromit swapped the Blue Diamond in the bag for a turnip, leaving Feathers empty-flippered.
• String Theory: Constable Mukherjee resorts to a board and red strings when investigating the crime wave. She uses these to prove that Wallace is at or near the centre of the mystery, which is correct on its own but leads her to the mistaken hypothesis that he's the criminal.
• Super Drowning Skills: Smart, agile and hardworking Norbots, although waterproof, are completely helpless if they find themselves in the water.
  • Wallace is shown not much better than them when he falls overboard.
• Super-Powered Robot Meter Maids: One of the Norbots has a flamethrower concealed inside his arm (sounds familiar), which he uses to light Wallace's fireplace.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: All of Wallace's inventing is revealed to be the cause of him and Gromit having so many Shockingly Expensive Bills^note and subsequently why they go into various business ventures. As he puts it, "Inventions don't come cheap".
• Surveillance Station Slacker: Feathers' prison/zoo warden falls asleep at her desk, allowing the former to hack into the Norbot mainframe.
• Tally Marks on the Prison Wall: Feathers' cell walls are covered in five-bar-gate tally marks.
• Take It to the Bridge: The final chase comes to a head on a staggeringly-high aqueduct, where the police cut off the canal and Feathers crashes his narrowboat, leading to Gromit dangling above certain doom at the far end. Once he gives up the Blue Diamond to Feathers at Wallace's pleading, Feathers jumps off and escapes by sailing to safe ground on an umbrella. The narrowboat, without Feathers' weight to balance it out, slides off the edge to its fiery destruction below. It would've taken Gromit it with it if not for the Norbots.
• Teetering on the Edge: In the chase scene, Gromit hangs on for dear life at the end of a canal boat teetering on the edge of an aqueduct, with Feathers at the other end being the only thing that keeps it from overbalancing.
• Time Skip: Years have passed since The Wrong Trousers. While Wallace and Gromit themselves haven't changed, Chief Mackintosh is older and on the verge of retiring, and there are subtle advances in technology.
• Title Drop: When Wallace and Gromit are tied up by Feathers, Wallace states that the whole thing is vengeance most fowl.
• Toilet Humour:
  • The submarine's surfacing system is activated by pulling an old-fashioned toilet flushing-chain, followed by the flushing noise.
  • During the chase, Wallace — who has has ended up water-skiiing behind the second barge — veers onto dry land and goes through a campsite. While doing so, he inadvertently removes a toilet tent, exposing the man sitting down within, with his trousers around his ankles and who farts in alarm as his toilet paper is whisked away. For added hilarity, he's reading a newspaper, the headline of which is: "BOG MAN FOUND" ^note  "bog" is one of many British slang words for "toilet" .
• Uncanny Valley: The Norbots are already meant to look a little janky in a harmless way◊, but when following their "evil" programming, their eyes turn to inky voids with a faint iridescent blue glow from within, while still keeping their big beaming smiles. Gromit's first reaction at seeing the hacked Norbot staring at him is perplexed shock and slight fear.
• Underestimating Intelligence: The zoo warden openly mocks Feather McGraw as a dumb bird, wondering why anyone would've ever thought him to be a clever criminal. Of course, she says this not realising that Feathers has stolen back his rubber glove while she wasn't looking, and then later uses that and all the garbage he's collected to build an extending-hand device so he can use the police computer to hack into Wallace's technology while she's asleep (and could've also easily snagged the keys to his cell if he wanted to).
• Unwanted Assistance: Gromit's favourite hobby is tending to the flowers in the backyard. However, Wallace incorrectly assumes it to be unpleasant drudgery and tasks his newly-invented Norbot to "help" Gromit with the garden. Norbot proceeds to mow down everything and replace it all with a bland, monoculture hedge garden. Gromit is horrified, but Wallace and the neighbours think it's a huge improvement.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Annoyed at Norbot choosing to charge rather loudly in his room, Gromit drags him to the basement and plugs him into Wallace's desktop instead. This is what allows Feathers to hack him and begin his plan for revenge.
• Visual Pun: The traditional habits worn by nuns are often derogatorily called "penguin suits". Feathers resorts to dressing up as a nun to fool Chief Mackintosh, which it does.
• Voice Changeling: The Norbots mimic Wallace's voice while he's bound and gagged to lure Gromit into the living room.
• Wacky Wake Up Gadget: Similar to the one seen in the previous films and shorts, but now some elements are added. Wallace asks Gromit to wake him up through a talking picture of himself and Gromit, and before dropping him into the dining table, the bed tips him into the bath for a wash before dressing him and finally dropping him into breakfast.
• Water Wake-up: Gromit sees the Norbots building something huge and goes to fetch Wallace, who's sound asleep in a chair. At one point, he throws a vaseful of water at him, but that still doesn't wake him up. Gromit ultimately has to make the Pat-O-Matic pat him hard and even smack him.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Both the original and duplicate Norbots can be turned good again by simply pressing the "ON" button on their backs, reverting them to factory settings.
• We Win, Because You Didn't: A variant; Gromit doesn't mind much about Feathers' escape at the end. Stopping him from escaping with the Blue Diamond, and being fully reassured that Wallace is always Gromit's truest pal, are more than enough.
• Wham Shot: Macintosh and Mukherjee access the vault to retrieve the Blue Diamond. When Macintosh opens the sack to pull out what he thinks is the Blue Diamond, everyone, including Mukherjee and Gromit are aghast. Puzzled, Macintosh turns his head and sees that he is holding a turnip instead.
• What Could Possibly Go Wrong?: Uttered verbatim and in earnest by Wallace when the Norbot army goes out to work.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: The Techno-Trousers, which were the title "character" in Feathers' debut film and a central part in the original theft of the Blue Diamond in The Wrong Trousers, are not shown or mentioned at all in the flashbacks.
• Windows of the Soul: When the Norbots are in "evil" mode, they have notable Black Eyes of Evil. They lose them when they are reset.
• Your Television Hates You: Used for a quick gag: one of the Norbots, trying to cover up their thefts from Wallace, switches the TV channel away from a news report covering all the recent robberies in the area, only to land on an old B-movie about an army of evil robots. The Norbot immediately switches the TV off.