The Tenant Disassociation Season 11, Episode 19 -  Aired April 5, 2018

The Tenant Disassociation

After Leonard finds out that Sheldon is the president of the building's tenants' association, he and Penny attempt to overthrow him. When Howard and Raj find a crashed drone in the backyard, Bernadette encourages them to locate the owner.

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Guest Stars: Kevin Sussman as Stuart, Michelle Arthur as Mrs. Petrescu, Parvesh Cheena as Marcus, Bob Stephenson as Wendell, Megan McGown as Cynthia

Writers: Steve Holland (Story), Jeremy Howe (Story), Trevor Alper (Story), Dave Goetsch (Teleplay), Eric Kaplan (Teleplay), Maria Ferrari (Teleplay)

Director: Mark Cendrowski

Available on iTunes

Episode Notes

  • The title refers to Leonard and Penny's attempts to unseat Sheldon as the president of the building's tenants' association.

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Sheldon is annoyed when Penny eats a pastrami sandwich from a food truck opposite the building on Friday instead of their customary Chinese food.

Episode Quotes

Amy: Sheldon, I have an advanced degree in the study of the human brain, so if my fiancé is a raving lunatic, it's kind of a ding on my reputation.
Sheldon: If leaders just stepped aside every time they didn't have the consent of the governed, what would we have?
Amy: Democracy.
Sheldon: Not on my watch.

Penny: The pastrami truck moved.
Leonard: That is the danger of a restaurant on wheels.

Sheldon: Instead of being in charge, I can be the vocal opposition, criticizing and badgering the president at every turn.
Amy: I think you'll be really good at that.
Sheldon: Me, too.
Leonard: I think I made a huge mistake.
Penny: Me, too.

Sheldon: I can smell that food truck from up here.
Amy: Just close the window if you don't like the smell.
Sheldon: Of course I like the smell. It's salt and fat. My brain may be evolved, but my tongue still wants to pick up a club and drag that truck back to my cave.

Amy: Sheldon, it's the American way, the peaceful transfer of power.
Sheldon: I don't know.
Leonard: Think about Ant-Man.
Sheldon: I'm always thinking about Ant-Man.
Leonard: Michael Douglas had the suit and then he passed it on to Paul Rudd.
Sheldon: Maybe you're right.
Amy: Really? The Ant-Man thing? That's what won you over?
Sheldon: Yes. He got the details right. That's how you use a superhero.

News Stories

Title Date Posted
1119 'The Tenant Disassociation' Press Release March 16, 2018

CBS has issued the press release for the April 5 episode of The Big Bang Theory, "The Tenant Disassociation".  Full story

Recap

As the group eat dinner in the apartment, Penny returns home with a pastrami sandwich from a truck parked outside the building. Although everybody else thinks her food smells good, Sheldon is upset that Penny is deviating from their regular schedule of Chinese food on Friday nights. As Amy argues that the Chinese may have actually invented the sandwich, Howard decides to go out and get one. With Sheldon and Amy bickering over the true origin of the sandwich, the rest of the gang file out to get one, meaning nobody is there to hear when Sheldon concedes to Amy that she might be right.

In their apartment, Sheldon is complaining about being able to smell the food truck. Sheldon he can’t concentrate on his work when all he can think about is how much he wants a sandwich. Amy wonders why he doesn’t just go get one, but Sheldon says he can’t just give into any urge he has. When Amy offers to go down to the food truck and ask them to move, she takes some cash with her.

When Raj joins Howard in his hot tub, his comments don’t create a particularly relaxing environment for Howard. After Howard gets out of the hot tub, they spot a drone that’s crashed in the garden and decide to try fix it up. Elsewhere, Penny arrives back at her apartment to tell Leonard that the sandwich truck has moved after somebody complained to the tenants association about it. Realizing it will have been Sheldon, they go across the hall to confront him. After Penny says she’s sending an email to the tenants association to complain about Sheldon complaining to them, Sheldon’s phone pings. They quickly realize he is the tenants association.

Back at Howard’s house, he tells Raj he thinks he’s got the drone working again. As they play around with it, Bernadette comes out to see what they’re doing. After they tell her they found the drone in the garden, Bernadette wonders if they did all they could to try find the owner. She suggests they check the drone’s video footage to see where it set off from.

In Sheldon’s apartment, Penny and Leonard are quizzing him on his position on the tenants association. When Amy arrives home, they ask if she knew he was the entire tenants association. She didn’t but she’s not surprised. After Sheldon explains he voted himself in when he was the only one to attend a meeting, Leonard and Penny want to vote him out at the next meeting. After Sheldon says the meeting is today, Leonard and Penny move for a vote of no confidence leaving Amy with the deciding vote. When Sheldon offers to let her attend the next meeting he has in the shower, Amy sides with him.

After an angry Leonard and Penny return to their apartment after failing to dislodge Sheldon, Amy comes over to say she couldn’t vote against Sheldon. She tells them they should find another tenant who would be willing to vote against Sheldon, so she doesn’t need to betray him. As she told Sheldon she was going to the market, Amy raids their fridge for food before she returns home.

In Howard and Bernadette’s kitchen, he has hooked up the drone to his laptop to play the video back. After the video shows a woman placing the drone in a park, Raj now determined to return the drone to the cute woman. When Howard asks for her help, Bernadette notices the woman is wearing a pin from the comic book store.

When Leonard and Penny go to the floor above to talk to a tenant, he’s upset that they don’t remember meeting him. He invited them to a housewarming party when he moved in two years ago and, despite saying they would stop by, they didn’t attend. The guy sarcastically says he will attend the meeting the next day, so they should buy a lot of food as he did for his party. The next tenant can’t help them as Sheldon took out a restraining order against him after he trapped Sheldon on the roof - three times. They turn to Mrs. Petrescu, but she doesn’t understand their instruction to vote for Leonard and against Sheldon.

At the comic book store, Howard and Raj show Stuart the footage to see if he recognizes the woman as a customer. After he tells them that’s Cynthia, Stuart gives them her contact information so Raj can return the drone. Elsewhere, when Amy returns to the apartment, she finds an angry Sheldon making posters for new building rules that will inconvenience Leonard and Penny. Amy tries to argue Sheldon should just peacefully handover power, but he’s not moved.

When Raj goes to Cynthia’s house with the drone, she feels like she should give him a reward. After Raj suggests she give him her phone number, she takes his phone and adds her number.

As Sheldon and Amy eat in their apartment, Leonard and Penny arrive with the lease for Apartment 4B. They show him that since Amy is named on the lease, not him, he isn’t technically a tenant. After Leonard nominates himself for president and Penny seconds it, Sheldon points out that under California law he is a tenant at will. Amy interrupts him to say she is voting for Leonard, telling Sheldon that he couldn’t handle the responsibility of the position. After Leonard uses Ant-Man to argue for the peaceful transfer of power, Sheldon concedes and agrees to pass the job onto Leonard. When Sheldon says he can now be the vocal opposition, criticizing and badgering the president at every turn, Leonard realizes he made a huge mistake.

In Howard and Bernadette’s kitchen, Howard can’t believe Raj got Cynthia’s number. Raj is excited for where the relationship might go and says he has a good feeling about it. Meanwhile, Cynthia plays back the drone footage from when Howard and Raj were playing with it. His creepy comments scare her right off.