'Toon Reviews 16: Hey Arnold Season 3 Episode 12: Best Man/Cool Party

Best Man

The overly competitive Coach Wittenberg is back in this cartoon, and while in many ways, he’s still holding onto his old habits, he’s still fairly enjoyable and thankfully has more respect for Arnold than before. 

Remembering all the help Arnold gave him in his past coaching jobs, the coach appoints him to be his best man at his wedding.  Actually, interestingly enough, it’s a remarriage to his wife, Tish.  It’s a bit confusing as to how this remarriage even works since we never saw them divorce or anything like that.  It could relate to the fact that Tish did kick Coach Wittenberg out for constantly losing jobs in a previous cartoon, but I personally don’t get how you get having another wedding out of deciding to let him come back.  Maybe it’s just my lack of knowledge on how these things work. 

Anyway, while Arnold goes along with Coach Wittenberg’s occasionally cheap, but clearly devoted plans for the wedding, we get some background on his relationship with his wife herself.  Although their only major appearance together featured them as a tense couple with Coach Wittenberg having a hard time maintaining a job and he and Tish coaching different teams for the sole purpose of one-upping each other, as Tish explains, they both value each other over anything else.  As she explains to Helga, her bridesmaid, her husband may value winning a lot, but one time when he let her win at something proved to her that she truly loves him, and her belief in this is genuine enough to make where she’s coming from clear.  It should also be noted that these scenes are also aided in engagement by Helga fantasizing her own wedding to Arnold, humorously doing so out loud and being quick to cover her romantic emotions. 

Regarding Coach Wittenberg, given his inability to truly offer the best amenities for the wedding and constant talks of winning and being number one, that’s an indication that maybe what Tish says about him isn’t really true.  The final straw comes when Tish overhears him having a hard time deciding whether her or winning is the most important to him, and given how sure she was of him loving her the most, she’s easily sympathetic in this case.  Understandably, things slowly get tense between Coach Wittenberg and Tish.  Following wedding practice, they both get engrossed in random frivolous competitions with Coach Wittenberg desperate to be the best, and his attitude leads to them calling off the remarriage, and instead going for an air hockey match to decide who’s really Number 1.  It’s a clear test in morality here which hinders a potentially nice couple, though it does feel concerning that Coach Wittenberg’s ego would be this big when his family’s on the line.  Thankfully, his good side wins out in the end. 

During the following day’s air hockey match, after much suspense of the match that ends up attracting everyone, even kids we didn’t see participate in the wedding practice, Coach Wittenberg heeds Arnold’s earlier advice and lets Tish win, proving that he truly does love his wife more than being the best.  It further sells the heart of this couple which is nice, and also imaginative that this flashy arcade game leads us to the wedding built up through the runtime.  True, it’s followed by them immediately going back for a real competition when Tish guesses that Coach Wittenberg lost on purpose, but since their love has proven itself, it’s fine to accept the competitiveness as part of their chemistry. 

It makes the cartoon a strong performance for the Wittenberg couple playing to their strengths and development. 9/10

Cool Party

This cartoon is especially great for two reasons.  It follows the high-spirited convention of getting a lot of distinct characters together for a party which is always a ton of fun.  Also, it provides an interesting commentary on discrimination. 

Throughout history people have been excluded from certain things for a variety of reasons like skin color, religious beliefs, sexuality, etc.  Fortunately, in every era, even if it’s not all gone, more people realize the problems with discrimination and become more inclusive, including presenting them more in TV shows.  Regarding this cartoon, it features discrimination to a smaller extent, but is still poignant with it as a theme. 

The character initiating the plot is Rhonda, a rich big-shot who’s judgmental about anyone in a lower social class.  Behavior like this would make her one I normally wouldn’t like, but since her stuck-up ways always lead to karma getting her to see sense, I’m able to enjoy Rhonda just fine.  She’s throwing a party and only invites kids she deems “cool,” and Arnold is one of them.  Everyone else is deemed a geek in her eyes for their weird fashion sense, oddball personalities, and in Gerald’s case, beating her at something.  In other words, any kid deemed a geek is being discriminated against.  What Rhonda does demeans others for being who they are, and that is simply not right, one of the biggest flaws of the real world, and the kids’ constant complaints about not being invited illustrate this.  In addition, Rhonda’s party turns out to be completely dull with nothing to do except eat and listen to Rhonda talk about stuff.  The discrimination shows itself again when after Arnold decides to leave the party, Rhonda labels him as a geek for that, another take on an unfortunate element of society regarding conformity. 

With Arnold now out of that party, the cartoon gets really fun when he convinces his friends who are still ticked at being called geeks to use their pent up hurt feelings to have a party of their own on the boarding house roof.  The remainder is nothing but a wildly fun party with distinct characters all hanging out together.  Nearly every shot of the party has something brimming with animated energy with characters dancing and doing something fun all set to incredibly catchy background music.  The party also shines for being an accepting place where everyone can be themselves, contrasting to Rhonda’s rigid party built on conformity especially as more people are drawn to join the "geeks", including those at the “cool” party.  This leaves Rhonda to ponder that her calling everyone else a geek for not sticking with her has left her all alone, and that her customs weren’t the right ones to follow. 

Thankfully, she does something about this in the end when she lets go of her discrimination and declares herself a geek to join the rest of Arnold’s party, the moment staged as a big moment with the party stopping just for Rhonda to do so and starting again when she does.  It ends up being another example of Rhonda’s behavior putting her in an unfortunate position that gets her to see sense, enhancing her appeal, which is especially big for how it also shows how wrong discriminating is.  For this much power in its message, this is one party you don’t want to miss out on.

Now let’s free the animals from the zoo! 10/10

The Ranking

1. Helga Blabs it All
2. Harold the Butcher
3. Cool Party
4. Crabby Author
5. Mr. Hyunh Goes Country
6. Helga Vs. Big Patty
7. Hey Harold!
8. Curly Snaps
9. The Aptitude Test
10. Pre-Teen Scream
11. The Pig War
12. Olga Gets Engaged
13. Oskar Gets a Job
14. Phoebe Takes the Fall
15. Best Man
16. Career Day
17. Gerald’s Tonsils
18. Rich Kid
19. Dangerous Lumber
20. Casa Paradiso
21. Arnold’s Room
22. Helga and the Nanny
23. Stinky Goes Hollywood
24. Arnold Betrays Iggy

The next Hey Arnold review shows how Sid isn't always that great as a lead when he thinks he killed Principal Wartz, and straight man Arnold gets stuck with overly-optimistic Eugene on top of a roller coaster.

Next time on MC Toon Reviews is another Steven Universe review, this one covering "Historical Friction."

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

'Toon Reviews 1: Hey Arnold Season 1 Episode 23

Coach Wittenberg

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First of all, it’s strange that this cartoon acts as an introduction to Coach Wittenberg even though we’ve seen him in a previous cartoon which we get an acknowledgement of here.  Other than that, what we get here is still very enjoyable.  Much of the enjoyment comes from what we learn about what Coach Wittenberg got up to after being a basketball coach.  That job ended for him when he got a lot of complaints about being a harsh coach that resulted in not only him getting fired, but also getting kicked out of his house since he’s lost jobs so many times already.  Now, the only thing he can get for a job is a janitor at the local bowling alley.  However, when Arnold’s bowling team needs a coach, he gets a chance to get back to the job he originally had.  With this interesting information about him out of the way, we witness the behavior that got him fired on display as the first day with him as bowling coach is filled with moments of him being a tough jerk who overworks the team every time they fail to get a strike.  Thankfully, unlike in “Benchwarmer” where Coach Wittenberg’s flaws were so overbearing that they made him unlikable, this cartoon shows that despite resorting to teaching all there is to know by being mean, he does have a sense of morality.  When Arnold comes to give him advice on how to be a better coach, he’s open to learning it.  As a result, thanks to a lesson in “psycho-cology” he earns the team’s respect as a coach as shown when they start to have fun with what they’re practicing, and even do a lot better.  This shows that Coach Wittenberg has improved a lot, but in a smart move of humanization, we see that this lesson has not completely changed him.  When the bowling match arrives, he realizes that the team he’s coaching is playing against a team coached by his wife.  The following sequence of the match going on ties into Coach Wittenberg’s desire to win.  He starts to lose his cool and become an unlikable coach again when his wife’s team starts winning, and in that case, it’s believable that he’d lose his act.  In the end though, he’s able to put the thoughts of the team ahead of his personal desires, and goes on to emphasize the kids having fun instead of winning…even though this tactic has them win anyway, not that I see a problem with that.  What’s important though is that what goes on here help make the title character a flawed, yet believable character who is fully capable of learning what’s right.  He may be a tough coach, but he’s worth spending a cartoon with.  In his honor, I end this review with his two words on getting through life: strained beets. 9/10

Four-Eyed Jack

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For this cartoon, we’ve got another urban legend-focused story and those are always fun.  They’ve got creative premises, make for some interesting character interactions, and take every opportunity to build a scary atmosphere which most people associated with family shows rarely do.  Anyway, in the case of this cartoon, it features Arnold and Gerald coming across an old pair of glasses.  Grandpa tells them that they belonged to an old boarder nicknamed Four-Eyed Jack.  Jack’s story is that he spent all his time in the boarding house basement coming up with bean experiments.  One night, he got caught in an explosion of one of his experiments, and ever since then, his spirit has haunted the boarding house and continues to do so until he finds his glasses.  That, to say the least, is an interesting backstory for this ghostly figure, so it’s easy to get behind the ultimate decision to try and track down Four-Eyed Jack to learn more about him.  During Arnold and Gerald’s pursuit of the ghost, the rest of the boarders join in and they add their own charm to the pursuit.  We have Oskar being superstitious of the ghost as he holds onto a horseshoe all throughout, Ernie messing with the boys’ beliefs in the spirits, and Mr. Hyunh just happily going along for the hunt while pointing out how ghosts are “very creepy” in his own foreign way.  These character moments are highly enjoyable, as is the greatly crafted spooky atmosphere, particularly with how the halls in the boarding house in the dark are drawn, not to mention one moment where papers start blowing around for no plausible reason.  That moment is really the only time Four-Eyed Jack’s presence is believable because most of the ghost hunt consists of Arnold hearing noises only for them to turn out to be something else.  The atmosphere makes his belief in it being the ghost understandable, but since the noises constantly turn out to be something else, it’s easy to predict that the ghost hunt will lead to nothing of substance.  Sure enough, the only thing everyone learns in the end of the hunt is that the boarding house has another bathroom.  However, the cartoon is nice enough not to make the ghost story pointless by throwing in an obligatory ending that suggests that maybe Four-Eyed Jack isn’t as fake as he seems which in turn further shows off the atmosphere.  Ultimately, this may not be the best urban legend-centered cartoon, but there’s a lot of memorable moments from the characters and the dark atmosphere that make it well worth a watch. 9.5/10

The Rankings

1.      Pigeon Man

2.      Arnold’s Christmas

3.      Harold’s Bar Mitzvah

4.      Haunted Train

5.      Stoop Kid

6.      Arnold’s Hat

7.      Wheezin’ Ed

8.      Spelling Bee

9.      Helga’s Makeover

10.  Mugged

11.  False Alarm

12.  Magic Show

13.  Tutoring Torvald

14.  The Baseball

15.  Olga Comes Home

16.  Four-Eyed Jack

17.  The List

18.  Das Subway

19.  The Vacant Lot

20.  Downtown as Fruits

21.  The Old Building

22.  Field Trip

23.  The Sewer King

24.  Coach Wittenberg

25.  Hall Monitor

26.  Sally’s Comet

27.  Roughin’ It

28.  Gerald Comes Over

29.  Crush on Teacher

30.  6^th Grade Girls

31.  The Little Pink Book

32.  24 Hours to Live

33.  Abner Come Home

34.  Arnold as Cupid

35.  Snow

36.  Eugene’s Bike

37.  Biosquare

38.  Door #16

39.  Heat

40.  Helga’s Boyfriend

41.  Part Time Friends

42.  Benchwarmer

43.  Operation Ruthless

44.  World Records

45.  Cool Jerk

Be sure to stay tuned for the review of the 24th episode of the season: "Tour de Pond/Teacher's Strike."