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It Girl
When it comes to getting fame and fortune, most people would
be ecstatic about making a big name of themselves. There are many ways to achieve this through
big artistic accomplishments, making earth-shattering discoveries, or just
looking hot. The latter is the huge
opportunity for fame PS 118 gets in this cartoon, but there’s an interesting
perspective on the whole modeling affair.
That is to say, it’s about a kid becoming a model and not being happy
with the fame it comes with.
When all
other kids looking beautiful and acting nice for fashion designer, Johnny
Stitches, he rejects them all, but finds appeal in Helga. Unlike all the other applicants, she looks
simple in appearance and acts mean, but this change in venue is exactly what
Johnny wants. Helga wants no part of his
plan showing clear disgust over what models typically go through, but is swayed
by the one promise of free stuff.
Instantly, she goes from simple grade school girl with a tough
reputation to living the life of a total model, or “it girl” as the public
calls her. She’s on magazines, appears
on talk shows complete with celebrity caricatures, and is all over the news.
Now, Helga forced down a path she didn’t want
to take is usually set up for her to realize she was wrong about what she
looked down upon. This makes for an
interesting subversion to the setup as the cartoon proves that Helga was
actually right about everything wrong with being a model. Because her appearance and mannerisms are
pushed as the next big thing, everyone is copying her as if she’s started a
trend. She also hates that every little
thing she does is immediately publicized as if it’s a stunning pose when it’s
never intended to be viewed as that.
Honestly speaking, the things Helga is put through feel very believable
to the nature of models. With how much
Johnny Stitches and his press are in her face and how much she’s copied, Helga
basically has no moments of peace or individuality. Both are things I strongly push for to live a
healthy life, and Helga deprived of these things is a bigger problem than most
may notice. She can’t even be a jerk to
get out of this deal because jerkiness is what’s getting her this fame, and
she’s stuck doing this for three years since she signed a contract.
That said, the way Helga does get out of this
has intriguing merit to it. Arnold, once
again showing interest in her well-being without being told of her problem
beforehand, hears Helga vent about all her frustrations as a model. He suggests that if she gets attention for
being mean, she should act nice to lose it.
That’s just what Helga does at her next fashion show. She puts on a hammy nice act, subverting the
audience’s expectations by giving them the opposite of what they want. Even with how phony and over-the-top Helga’s
nice act is, it’s apparently enough for her to be booed off the stage and let
out of her contract. It’s also a funny
kind of satisfying for the cartoon to end with Helga happy that everyone’s
copying another average girl-turned model.
That said, Helga’s feelings on modeling proving correct does make for a
lack of character growth. It’s still
interesting that the major cons of fashion models is addressed, but her
starting and ending the cartoon with the same mindset isn’t all that
interesting. For making impactful points
anyway, this cartoon is a work I don’t mind giving attention to.
A
Deconstructing
Arnold
Some of my least favorite stories involve all the good traits
of a character being devalued for unwarranted reasons. This setup works against the appeal of this
cartoon.
Regarding Arnold, at this
point, he’s evolved into such a sane and mature kid in an eccentric city who
helps everyone and gives great advice. This
makes what he’s put through here quite frustrating. The opening features Arnold overhear three
reckless acts some of the kids are doing, and he objects to them. However, the kids are easily swayed by Helga
who calls Arnold out for being a wet blanket meddling on the fun.
The thing is, they’re all very shallow for going
along with shaming Arnold. They’d have a
point if his advice was unhelpful, but that couldn’t be further from the
truth. They should respect Arnold’s help
and already know they shouldn’t listen to Helga. What’s more, in my memory, Arnold doesn’t
even meddle on their problems that much.
They usually confide their problems to him on their own accord to get
advice. To conveniently ignore that adds
further frustration for this story to work.
As you can tell, there’s already a lot working against the story,
especially when you consider their plans.
Two acts with Rhonda writing Curly a fake secret admirer note to get him
off her back, and Harold and Stinky messing with Eugene’s bike are destined to
backfire. With the note, it’s hard to
buy that there’s completely no chance of Curly thinking Rhonda wrote it, and
with the bike, of course Eugene can get hurt.
How can they possibly think these are good ideas? The only act that can
be seen as harmless is Sid stealing Lorenzo’s cell phone to make prank calls
which can be easily covered, even if it is wrong to steal. It only backfires when Sid drops the phone
and breaks it, meaning what he did wouldn’t have been known if he didn’t mess
up like that. The other acts backfire as
well, but those were much easier to see coming.
With the kids now in trouble from their idiocy, the cartoon shows karma
as Arnold takes offense of what they said about his advice and rightfully
leaves them on their own. However,
idiocy continues as they have Helga give advice, boiling down to blaming, and
attempting to turn someone off by…giving him what he wants. This only brings even bigger backfires,
culminating with an already bandaged Eugene spectacularly getting hurt even
more. In the end, Arnold does turn
around and give advice again to straighten things out, but it’s pretty shallow
through just telling everyone to apologize. It’s more likely to take more than
that to fix everything.
Speaking of
apologies, it’s a bit unsettling that none of the kids do so for rudely calling
out Arnold’s advice they clearly need in the first place. It is nice that Helga’s the one to convince
Arnold to return to giving advice given her feelings for him and the
interesting ways they support each other.
At the same time, the fact that these kids need someone like Arnold to
be their crutch in making good decisions is kind of sad. It’s as if they’re so shallow that they can
never make smart, healthy decisions without someone telling them what to
do. What will happen when Arnold can’t
be there for them?
In all, through confusing implications and a
devaluing tone, while it’s not the worst of the show, take my advice and check
out better cartoons than this.
D+
The Ranking
- Headless Cabbie
- Helga’s Parrot
- Oskar Can’t Read?
- Dinner for Four
- The Beeper Queen
- Stinky’s Pumpkin
- It Girl
- Weighing Harold
- Big Gino
- Chocolate Turtles
- Friday the 13th
- Phoebe Skips
- Eugene’s Birthday
- Student Teacher
- Love and Cheese
- Jamie O in Love
- Deconstructing Arnold
- Full Moon
The next Hey Arnold review features Grandpa take up golf, and Rhonda get sent to a polishing academy with Big Patty.
Next time on MC Toon Reviews is the fourth part of the "Time is Money" arc from DuckTales.
If you would like to check out other Hey Arnold reviews on this blog, click here for the guide made especially for them.
Rhonda should've just used a different-colored pen to write her secret admirer's letter.
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