I don’t see a thread for this episode, so I’m starting one.
Wow, Penny really let Howard have it!
Kripke’s on-again, off-again speech impediment bothered me.
Sheldon’s trash talk was very funny- and he was wearing a 1920’s Style Death Ray t-shirt!
Some lines I liked:
“Die, toaster, die!”
“Excuse me, Penny, but in this room, you’re the one who’s a little peculiar!”
Either Howard kept trying to kiss her, or Penny has one hell of a punch. That looked like 2 black eyes and a severely torqued nose he was sporting in the final scene.
Yeah, she went into “Hulk” mode on him!
Her initial verbal assault on Howard was almost cruel!
I cringed, but sometimes, when a person is that clueless, you have no choice but to let him have it with both barrels. Penny was right later…when he’s not being some Nerdy Lothario Wannabe, Howard can be funny and witty. He’s trying too hard.
I wonder how much of her Hulk mode on Howard was a carryover from when she was playing that online video game and got so addicted that she actually accepted an online date with Howard? Maybe part of her “you’re a loser and will die alone” speech was part of her horror in realizing how far she’d fallen.
I love Monty. And it was nice to see Sheldon realize maybe mechanical engineers aren’t something to be sneered at.
Almost? Cripes, she stepped on him and ground him into the dirt. If, as a sort-of pretty girl, she hasn’t figured out how to turn away persistent guys nicely, she’s dumber than they make her out to be.
OK, maybe I’m a bit sensitive. I don’t think it’s ever necessary to be that mean in this kind of situation.
Sure, Howard’s completely clueless (as evidenced by the last line) but all she has to do is keep laughing and saying no, and she’s fine. Why should she care if he harbors harmless fantasies about their non-existent relationship?
Penny’s a jerk.
Roddy
No, Howard’s a creep. Nerd or not, he deserved the stomping he got. Sometimes people need to get hit with a clue-by-four before they get a grip on reality. Howard still needs another application, obviously. 
Maybe someday they’ll have a plot-line about Howard getting relentlessly hit on by an unwanted suitor.
I had some envy going for that 1920’s Style Death Ray shirt.
I was frustrated by the episode because they left out a crucial line - “I’m telling him this for his own good.”
Howard could have actually learned something from Penny if she just reasoned with him. “Look, Howard, I know what you’re trying to do but it doesn’t work. You are only turning women off by acting like that. You actually are a nice guy but your ‘I got game’ schtick doesn’t work. Be more sensitive and be yourself, and you’ll end up with someone nice.”
Or when Leonard came to her to ask her to apologize, she could have explained to him why she was so mean to Howard.
It was a funny episode as usual but I got very frustrated at the way they handled the situation. It seemed obvious that both parties were being obstinate just for the sake of drawing the story out to 22 minutes.
Nice surprise, wasn’t expecting a new episode.
I like how the guys pointed out to Penny that she was the weird one! They really are lucky to have her as a neighbor though, somebody that hot and that nice doesn’t come along too often.
I was hoping against hope that Howard would get lucky. 
For those that like the theme song, here’s the full Barenaked Ladies song.
[Bolding mine]
Apparently, she’s not always nice- like when she’s channeling Lou Ferrigno!
I think her unrepentant attitude bothered me as much as her attack on Howard. She only apologized because Leonard basically coerced her into it.
Part of me thinks Howard didn’t even deserve that. He is a little weasel and he deserved everything she said to him.
Beyond that, he’s an annoying character when he’s in full-on nerd lothario mode. Toned down Howard is a lot funnier.
I can understand why Penny got angry; Howard is certainly a creep and a jerk. The
“I am saying it is not a compliment to call me do-able. It is not sexy to stare at my ass and say 'Oooh, it must be jelly ‘cause jam don’t shake like that.’ And most of all, we are NOT dancing a tango, we’re NOT to-ing and fro-ing, nothing’s going to happen between us! EVER!”
lines were deserved.
I just thought the
“Flirting? You think I’m flirting with you?!? No woman is ever going to flirt with you! You’re just going to grow old and die alone!” and telling him to “go home and live your creepy and pathetic life.”
was going a little too far.
And I do realize we’re talking about characters in a sit-com here!
You can get it (or one pretty close to it, anyway) at Palmer Cash, apparently.
This website lists the shirts Sheldon and Leonard wear, and provides links to purchase them, if they’re available (some are discontinued). The site also lists Howard’s belt buckles.
Considering what we’ve heard from Howard’s mother, it’s amazing that he is functioning at so high a level. What I do not understand is why he doesn’t move out of that house and get his own apartment. Even a single room would be better for him than that screaming harpy.
Yes - and he’d probably have more success dating, too, if he had his own place. There’s some sort of codependency keeping Howard at home, I guess.
I checked IMDB today and was surprised to see that there is an actress credited as playing Howard’s mother - I had assumed that the actor who played Howard also did the voice of Howard’s mother (we’ve never actually seen her, have we?).
Yeah - I can easily sympathize with Penny’s outburst after yet another crass comment (in what must seem like an infinite series of them).
However, her crack to Sheldon about the robot was thoughtless - I’m sure she has some inaminate object (a stuffed animal or some such) that she’d mourn if it were destroyed.
I felt sort of sorry for Howard- sure, Penny told him the truth but in a pretty cruel way (in front of his friends and bluntly)- until he said “Don’t get the wrong idea; the way I see it, I’m halfway to pity sex.”
There’s a fine line between optimistic and just not getting it. Crossing it makes you creepy. Howard flirted with crossing it when he tried to kiss Penny, but it was a predictable plot point due to precedence. (Woo, unintentional alliteration!) That comment jumped over the optimism line into the land of Creeper. When someone punches you that hard for trying to get a kiss, has repeatedly told you that your approach does not work, and has to be talked into coming over to make sure you’re okay after you skip out on your job for several days* due to something that she said about you, they are not going to have sex with you, they don’t want to have sex with you, and pushing the issue just gets creepy.
I don’t understand Wolowitz. If he’s so confident that his stupid pick-up techniques will work, why can’t he channel that confidence into just asking a girl out?
*I’m guessing on “several days” because I can’t remember what day of the week this started, nor how long he was in his room. Maybe he just lost a weekend.
Must have been at least one weekday - his Mom wanted to know why he “missed SCHOOL” that day
Nifty. Thanks for the links.
Oh yeah… durh. I’d just been thinking about that conversation right before I made the footnote, too.