That Darn Katz!

In the episode, Amy's rejected doctoral dissertation—a device to harness the Earth's rotational energy—is used by evil invading space cats to fix their own slowing planet.

This was the first episode since "Rebirth" to use the full intro sequence, and as a result, includes a classic cartoon before the opening credits.

was generally well received by critics, who enjoyed another unexpected pairing, this time between Amy and Nibbler, and the character development for both that arose from it.

Amy prepares to defend her doctoral dissertation in Applied Physics: a machine capable of harnessing the Earth's rotation and magnetic field to produce energy.

Katz transfers the stored rotational energy to Thuban 9 and departs, leaving the Earth in disarray and freeing the crew from their hypnosis.

The plan works and the machine reclaims Earth's rotational energy from Thuban 9, now spinning in the opposite direction.

Weinstein had previously worked as a show runner for The Simpsons along with his writing partner Bill Oakley during seasons seven and eight.

[4] Handlen felt the episode was "a return to pure wackiness" and found it a nice change of pace from the more emotional issues of the season.

[4] He particularly praised the season's continuation of unlikely pair-ups in Nibbler and Amy, feeling that both received good character development from the episode.

"[6] Sean Gandert of Paste rated the episode 9.3/10 and called it an "instant classic", particularly praising the character development for Amy and Nibbler.