'Toon Reviews 7: Hey Arnold Season 2 Episode 10

Helga’s Love Potion

Out of all the characters in the cast, most fans of this show would tell you that Helga is the most interesting and multi-layered, and I agree with those statements.  She may seem like a typical grade-school bully at first, but through the cartoons focused on her, it’s not hard to discover that there’s a lot more to her.  This is a character who has to put up with parents who barely notice her or take proper care of her which causes her a lot of stress to get the respect in public that she can’t get at home.  Her only source of happiness is her love for Arnold as shown through many shrines, poems, and other obsessive acts dedicated to him, yet she always directs her biggest displays of stress and anger at him out of fear of humiliation and lack of respect thus preventing him from seeing the real her.  These heavy character traits of Helga’s are what make her cartoons worth looking forward to, and this cartoon is no exception.  One big strength for the plot is that it actually has Helga regret her mean demeanor she directs at Arnold as opposed to telling him how she really feels, further showing the depths of her bully nature, and her regrets are further fueled by everything reminding her of him everywhere she goes.  She gets the idea that the only way to stop her from tormenting Arnold is to fall out of love with him, and finds her chance at that by purchasing a potion for the job, which unknown to her, is just a scam.  Even if we the audience are aware of the truth, it’s a ton of fun watch her mind at work when she consumes what could allegedly rid her of her obsession.  We get a look at the inside of her mind which consists of creative images like her running through a tunnel of hearts with a vision of her heart-shaped locket at the end, and everything crumbling when she touches it sending her falling into an Arnold-themed abyss.  It’s a powerful visual cue of how huge her obsession is and how much she believes the potion is working.  As a result of taking the potion, noticeable change seems to be made with Helga acting extremely passive around Arnold which includes avoiding bullying him.  In an interesting turn though, Helga doesn’t like being without her obsession and decides she needs it to know what she wants to do with herself.  This may sound like the cartoon is encouraging obsession which is problematic, but if you think about it, what Helga concludes is ideal for being true to yourself, meaning that something that poses as a problem can have some good to it.  Plus, when she learns the potion was bogus, it’s revealed she never abandoned who she loves at all.  Even if she does go back to bullying Arnold, it’s satisfying that she’s rediscovered her identity.  With creative visuals and sequences, insightful messages, and a dynamic character at the center, you don’t need a potion to love this cartoon. 10/10

Gerald’s Secret

There are certain skills in life that appear like everyone should know at a certain age.  However, I’ve constantly been told that everyone learns things at their own pace, so even if seems embarrassing to not know skills other people your age know, there’s no shame in still needing to learn them.  This concept is what makes this cartoon relatable.  The skill in question is riding a bike, and Gerald, who’s proven to be cool and highly skilled in a lot of things at his age, can’t do it.  It’s easy to see the embarrassment in this reveal since riding a bike is something a lot of kids, especially those around Gerald’s age, are capable of, and given Gerald’s reputation among the group, him not being one of these kids makes him feel like an outsider.  Plus, the reveal goes beyond Gerald simply not knowing how to ride a bike.  There’s also a bad bike-riding experience he had when he was younger when he rode his bike down a big hill too fast, and something bad must’ve happened to him since we never see him after the bike crashed.  It gives Gerald’s inability more depth and makes it more interesting.  Now, with a bike-a-thon all the kids are taking part in coming, Arnold believes that Gerald can easily relearn bike-riding, so he puts him through a routine that starts him on a pink bike with training wheels.  This leads to a lot of ridicule from the other kids posing as something for Gerald to fight through as his training continues.  It is however, a weak point for the cartoon since it involves incessant grating taunting from Harold which doesn’t do him justice given the depth from him we’ve seen in the past.  As for the rest of Gerald’s training, while he does get good enough to ride a mountain bike and makes some notable progress, he can’t avoid crashing into things and still lacks confidence after the childhood incident.  The only time he perfects his skills is when, under his own power, he wakes up at night and faces the hill that severed his bike-riding skills in the first place.  The process of Gerald riding down the hill is especially effective through showing the power of him confronting his fears without any dialog all the way through.  Then, in the cartoon’s last minutes, we get the climactic bike-a-thon that lives up to the hype previously built-up.  It’s fast-paced, has great music to it, and displays the high point of Gerald’s bike skills.  He easily gets to the front, only stops at the hill to go down it with his friend, gets Harold back with the help of the fact that he never checked his tires, and wins the whole race.  With this climax, this cartoon effectively portrays the great journey of learning a skill, showing that even if you don’t learn it as fast as others, the results are more than worth it.  It’s a valuable entry in the series anyone can relate to. 9.5/10

The Ranking

1. Harold’s Kitty
2. Helga’s Love Potion
3. Monkey Business
4. Eugene’s Pet
5. Freeze Frame
6. Gerald’s Secret
7. Save the Tree
8. Phoebe Cheats
9. Gerald Moves Out
10. New Teacher
11. Mudbowl
12. Ms. Perfect
13. Big Caesar
14. Ransom
15. The Big Scoop
16. Best Friends
17. The High Life
18. Hooky
19. Arnold Saves Sid
20. Longest Monday

Be sure to stay tuned for the review of the next episode where we learn that Grandpa was once called "Steely Phil," and Helga finds herself roped into "Quantity Time" with her dead-beat dad.

If you would like to check out other Hey Arnold reviews on this blog, click here for the guide made especially for them.