'Toon Reviews 16: Hey Arnold Season 3 Episode 14: Grandpa's Birthday/Road Trip

Grandpa’s Birthday

This cartoon has a pretty interesting premise given the title.  Rather than focusing on a mere birthday, more emphasis is put on what the birthday means for the person in question, and it really pays off as funny and heartfelt watch. 

With his birthday coming up, Grandpa is in a particularly bad mood, getting tense with every little thing that happens.  I find these moments enjoyable for how exaggerated they are, not to mention when Arnold investigates Grandpa’s behavior, it turns out that there’s a legitimate reason for it.  His upcoming birthday is his 81^st, and no one in his family has ever lived past 81 creating a family curse, so he’s preparing to “buy the farm.”  He may not seem sickly, but considering how old he already is and his background, it does make some sense for Grandpa to feel the way he does.  He has a lot of energy when he’s berating others, and does incredibly well at his physical, but even this isn't enough to convince Grandpa to not worry so much.  To him, age 81 is when his time is done, and no amount of good strength is enough to change that. 

Now while Grandpa’s beliefs in the family curse mostly consist of comedic outbursts towards difficult people, there’s also time for heartfelt moments.  One of them is one of the quieter moments of the cartoon where Grandpa discusses to Arnold some of his most pleasing memories in which he sounds like he’s talking from the heart to someone he has a good relationship with while still holding onto the death anxieties that drive his angst.  His memories come into play when Arnold tries to take Grandpa’s mind off of the family curse by taking him on a day of fun to give Grandpa a chance to relive his glory days.  It’s a very pleasing montage of any fun thing imaginable set to an old-time music piece that instantly makes you think of being with a grandparent.  It could be said that this turns out to be a great way for Grandpa to spend what’s apparently his last day on Earth, especially since despite having a good time, he hasn’t forgotten that he’s supposed to croak in accordance with the family curse. 

So, you can imagine the mood whiplash when after such a nice montage, we cut to the whole boarding house come to watch Grandpa pass at the stroke of midnight.  The eerie mood of everyone watching with an organ playing and a storm outside is perfectly fitting for the drama of the moment capped off with a bell tolling for every individual reaction just as a bedside candle blows out with Grandpa’s last breath.  It’s a chilling yet greatly constructed way to bring about a death…at least until Grandpa suddenly gets up, hilariously shocked that he’s still in the boarding house.  It turns out there was a simple mathematical error in the family curse (he was 10 years off in fact) which leads to a great cause for celebration and annoyances from the boarders who stayed up so late for nothing. 

It does leave a mystery if the family curse is real and if Grandpa will buy the farm at age 91, but through his range of feelings on the matter and resulting memorable moments, what we have is a great way for him to appreciate the good health he has at such an old age.  With all this said, we’re left with a birthday cartoon unlike any other. 10/10

Road Trip

Cartoons focusing on Helga’s family life are worth looking forward towards.  They give interesting background on Helga’s mean behavior, and show potential for development from her parents beyond just being neglectful, and in this regard, this cartoon is no exception. 

Helga is roped into going on a cross-country road trip with her mother, Miriam.  Now, Miriam’s usual neglect is being driven to make and drink “smoothies” which make her lackadaisical resulting in her being anti-social, passing out a lot, and especially not providing her own daughter the care she needs.  It’s no wonder why Helga has many problems with Miriam and is not pleased with being trapped in a car with her. 

During the road trip however, Miriam does prove to have some likable qualities.  She makes genuine attempts to socialize with her daughter such as recounting stories of her past, and attempting to show she enjoys being with Helga.  These moments show that even if Helga’s parents are bad at being parents, they’re not neglectful on purpose and can show effort at being good parents, and this is easily seen in Miriam.  Still her faults are on full display as Miriam is very careless through dropping and spilling things, leaving her purse on top of the car causing it to fall off and get run over, and losing the directions.  To top it all, Miriam fails to pay attention to the road, and through veering out of the way of a huge truck, she drives off the road, through a field, into mud, and what an awesome crash scene it is.  Even if she means well, it’s clear that Miriam’s neglect is very prominent in everything she does, allowing the cartoon to be blunt about how unqualified she is to be a parent. 

At the same time, Helga is presented very well.  She’s clearly annoyed by everything her mom does which understandably prevents her from seeing Miriam’s attempts to bond with her, yet doesn’t go too far with her angst.  Even when they’re at their lowest point with a broken down car, no money to fix it, and being stranded in the middle of nowhere, she restrains herself from getting too mad or hurtful and is simply blunt with the hard truth that Miriam is a lousy mom.  However, because of her earlier good efforts, it’s easy to care when Miriam finds a way to redeem herself.  In an interesting turn of events, she finds an ad for a mechanical bull riding contest and enters it to get the money needed to fix the car.  It makes sense that Helga wouldn’t think her mom could do it after all the trouble she caused and can’t bring herself to watch Miriam.  The scene of Helga walking out on the competition is particularly touching, with no dialog and only a simple music piece to take in the lonely and hopeless feel of what’s happened and how she has to take on the responsibilities her mother can’t.  It’s truly one of Helga’s most sympathetic moments.  Then comes a surprise when Miriam ends up with the best mechanical bull riding time and wins the cash, proving she CAN do something right after all, and it even makes for a nice ending as she and Helga have a nice civil conversation all the way home. 

The only problem with this is that Miriam’s shining moment is hardly expanded upon after this with her going right back to her old habits in her next major appearance.  Fortunately, this cartoon by itself is a great heartfelt character-driven adventure. 9.5/10

The Ranking

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

The next Hey Arnold review covers the start of a running trope of Arnold crushing on the cute girl, Lila, along with a more slice-of-life driven cartoon about a grand prix.

Next time on MC Toon Reviews is the Steven Universe episode "Sadie's Song."

If you want to stay updated for more reviews, become a follower of this blog, click here to like the official Facebook page, and click here to follow me on Twitter.

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 16: Hey Arnold Season 3 Episode 10: Casa Paradiso/Gerald's Tonsils

Casa Paradiso

Running a place like a boarding house cannot be easy.  You have to deal with so many different people and attend to their needs at once.  The wise thing to do is attend to one request at a time, but the boarders aren’t always going to be patient enough to realize they’re not the only ones who need help. 

It’s for these reasons that get you to sympathize with Grandpa at the start of this cartoon.  There’s particular emphasis on the boarders continuously bothering him to help them with certain things when he’s in the middle of other complicated chores.  Along with them all arguing with each other, and problems with the boarding house like leaky ceilings, the opening perfectly captures the hardships of dealing with different people living in the same house.  These annoyances are the major driving force for the plot as Grandpa opts to escape running the boarding house.

He sees an ad for a tropical resort in Florida called Casa Paradiso and plans to move there with Grandma and Arnold by selling the boarding house.  His feelings are understandable and all given the emphasis on the unruly behavior of the boarders, but it becomes a big problem that Grandpa never considers that selling the boarding house means that all these people won’t have a place to live.  This is certainly not good because even if people in boarding houses are difficult, they still need a home, especially if the home they have is all they can afford, and impatience, while a negative trait, does not warrant being homeless. 

Thankfully, this is seen as a problem by everyone else, and the cartoon focuses on Arnold helping the boarders convince Grandpa to not sell the boarding house and that they can behave and get along as a family.  This is a pleasing part to the cartoon where all their attempts to stay lead to them bonding more.  They first put up a façade of being a happy family helping each other out with the tasks they needed to be completed, but through sensing the seriousness of Grandpa’s decision and more genuine attempts like poems apologizing for their faults, the boarders see the good in each other, and treat losing the boarding house like being separated as a family.  It’s the strongest plot point to make it clear that even the most difficult people have good in them and can even have good civil moments in even the tensest relationships with people they have to live with. 

However, the strengths of the boarders’ moments make all the moments of Grandpa’s determination to sell the boarding house even more frustrating.  He doesn’t care about how they feel about the matter.  Even when they start getting genuine with their feelings all he can think about is Casa Paradiso.  Yes, he’s old and stressed by the boarders’ weak points, but it’s not like him to be this selfish.  What does get him to come around is Arnold refusing to go and stay with the boarders who consider themselves to be his family.  Even then though, it takes a lot of time to see sense and he’s as determined to sell the boarding house as ever, so Grandpa coming around feels abrupt and nowhere near as genuine as the boarders growing to love each other as a family.  In fact, their family bonds feel so genuine, it’s not a sting that they fight again as the cartoon ends.  Besides, it’s more believable from families.  

Even if Grandpa’s immense irrationality holds it back, this cartoon shines for its believable look at different people living together. 8/10

Gerald’s Tonsils

Some animated shows and movies give kid characters a voice by an adult imitating a kid’s voice.  I personally find it more authentic for kids to be voiced by actual kids, and there known instances of this scenario at play, and some of the shows I’ve done review sets on follow it.  This includes Hey Arnold in which all the kid characters are voiced by actual kid actors some even able to voice them all the way up to The Jungle Movie which at this point isn’t even a year old. 

However, some characters like Arnold himself, needed new voice actors throughout the series because the actors’ voices kept changing so much they couldn’t sound youthful enough anymore.  At this point in the series, the very thing seemed to happen to Gerald’s voice actor, Jamil W. Smith, yet rather than get a new voice for him, a more interesting decision was made to make a whole cartoon about Gerald’s voice changing to justify his voice sounding deeper from now on. 

Gerald’s voice is the main subject of the cartoon in which Arnold’s class is performing in the spring concert, and Gerald is the only kid talented enough to hit the high notes of the song, “Moonlight Bay.”  All seems well with Gerald set to be the star of the concert, but then he’s suddenly subject for a tonsillectomy, emphasis on suddenly.  It’s distracting that there’s no proper transition from Gerald’s voice being praised to him needing his tonsils out.  Along with what happens later, the tonsillectomy being sprung on Gerald like this feels needlessly harsh and makes the sequence feel incomplete.  I mean, how awkward can you get by going to a major plot point without a scene of actually getting there? 

Anyway, Gerald losing his tonsils is treated like how any big change would be approached.  Gerald’s voice sounds completely strange to him and everyone who hears him talk making it hard for him to adjust to the change.  It’s so different that nearly everyone finds the voice funny, and while some simply laugh because they can’t help it, there being so much laughter pointed at something Gerald can’t control feels too overbearing and mean.  It’s unfortunate enough that his condition is threatening his solo and everything he tries doesn’t help, but to be teased and laughed at, while believable to come from kids his age, goes on way too long. 

Fortunately, it’s lightened a bit by a funny running gag of Stinky, with a naturally raspy voice, insisting on getting Gerald’s solo.  Also, there’s some nice development for the usual background character, Harvey the mailman.  He’s said to have gotten his tonsils taken out too and, like Gerald, found it hard to adjust at first, but was inspired to settle in by his favorite blues singers who also had raspy voices.  It may not be a lot of development, but Harvey helping Gerald does give him some endearment with how good he is with kids.  What’s more, his advice pays off when Gerald turns out a great solo despite everything by just using a low voice as opposed to a high voice.  It’s a strong payoff to all the harshness he endured and offers a great sense of hope for anyone losing something in an operation. 

In the end, we’re left with a solid cartoon built around a voice actor’s voice changing and the whole show adjusting to it (though Gerald’s change in voice isn’t fully apparent until the following seasons).  At times the story can be rushed and overly harsh, but the inspirational and musical payoff makes everything work. 9/10

The Ranking

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

The next Hey Arnold review will cover more of Helga and Phoebe's friendship looking into the possibility of the former going so far as to have the latter lose a competition on purpose, and a cartoon inspired by a real-life pig war.

Next time on MC Toon Reviews we'll be covering the Steven Universe episode "Cry for Help."

If you want to stay updated for more reviews, become a follower of this blog, click here to like the official Facebook page, and click here to follow me on Twitter.

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 16: Hey Arnold Season 3 Episode 5: Helga Blabs it All/Harold the Butcher

Helga Blabs it All

The thing that makes Helga such a dynamic and complex character is how she acts like a bully, but is really a decent human being and hopeless romantic.  We know how deep her love for Arnold is, and considering her neglectful and overachieving family, I’d say she can gush over him as much as she pleases.  Even more interesting is how Helga is aware of the downsides of her near-obsessive love and uses her mean behavior picked up from the stress at home to cover it.  The lengths she goes through to hide her feelings show how strong her love is and are entertaining to watch.  The things she does to keep her secret safe in this case are especially entertaining right down to the creative way it’s put at risk. 

While getting a cavity filled at the dentist, Helga is subjected to a large quantity of laughing gas.  The gas does what it’s meant to do, but it also has an effect commonly associated with most drugs by making Helga feel unusually happy and light-hearted, leading her to discuss in detail about Arnold.  It even offers a little background on her love when she states that she’s known him for six years. This is expanded upon in the following season.  Anyway, Helga becomes so positive from the gas that she calls Arnold, and gives a long, passionate soliloquy expressing her true feelings, in front of a crowd of patients, which ends up on the boarding house’s answering machine.  It’s only after Helga sends the message when the laughing gas wears off and she realizes what she just did. To prevent humiliation, she takes action to get rid of the answering machine's tape. 

Being a cartoon, this is the perfect place to unleash wild imagination for the insane things Helga has to do to simply retrieve a tape. In animation, there’s nothing stopping you from bringing completely anything to entertaining life.  We start with Helga ambushing a Campfire Lass and stealing her uniform to get into the boarding house, and making up excuses to people and hiding anywhere close by just when she’s about to get the tape.  It doesn’t sound exciting at first, but then there’s exactly where Helga ends up hiding.  It’s in the air vents of the boarding house, a place you don’t usually see people hide in, which is a major example of a ridiculous situation made believable by the animation medium.  It’s staged believably too with Helga looking cramped while hiding in the small vent as she watches over the answering machine and people passing it.  Adding to the suspense is a close call where it seems like her secret will be revealed, but she’s saved by Arnold’s grandma humorously mishearing the message.  The crazy creativity expands even more when after Helga gets the tape, her escape leads her through the pipe and rafter-filled walls of the boarding house which is another place we hardly see in shows and real life for that matter.  Then it’s all capped off in with hilarity where she ends up in Arnold’s room and walks out in front of him and his friends…and no one cares.  So, Helga’s secret is safe and the mission is all over but the consequences for stealing that uniform. 

It all results in an intense and highly creative mission to prevent a potentially embarrassing discovery with one exciting moment after another and a great multi-layered character like Helga to follow. 10/10

Harold the Butcher

One of the more fascinating characters in the show is Harold.  He may look and act like a one-dimensional bully character, but a frequent trope with him is that he’s a vulnerable, misguided individual.  This cartoon offers more of this trope as he finds his true calling. 

It starts off with his typical misguidedness when his hunger leads him to steal a ham from Mr. Green the butcher.  It’s interesting enough that Harold would be dumb enough to go this far with getting food, but the story goes the extra route by adding to the seriousness of his act when Harold’s religion gets involved.  When he’s sent to the rabbi, Harold learns that in addition to it simply being wrong to steal, him stealing a ham is even worse because it’s a forbidden food to Jewish people (though I’m sure there are Jews out there who eat ham anyway).  However you look at it, this is still a thought-provoking observation on Harold’s crime, more detailed and fleshed out than how most thievery is portrayed and a strong way to bring on the bulk of the plot. 

To teach Harold a lesson , it’s decided that he should work at Green Meats for a week.  There’s a natural progression to how Harold feels about the job.  At first, he dreads working despite bringing it on himself like what one would expect from kids with Harold's maturity being punished, and is a major pain for Mr. Green to deal with.  As the days go by, Harold complains and messes up less, and learns interesting things about meat, sharing what he learns wherever he goes.  When the week is nearly over, Harold is already researching how to become a butcher on his own and fantasizes about being one.  It’s all a natural and believable progress anyone deciding what to do in life can go through starting on rough terms but then growing to love the trade, and given Harold’s primary traits, this is strong development for him uncovering a hidden talent. 

His newfound love of meat is so strong, it’s easy to feel for him when the week is up and Mr. Green allows Harold to go.  Harold goes to many lengths to get Mr. Green to let him keep his job, even by stealing another form of meat for the sole purpose of working in the shop again, but even that doesn’t change Mr. Green’s mind, and through it all, Harold is fully sympathetic.  It’s clear that he’s passionate about meat and just wants to do more with it.  Fortunately for him, and even Mr. Green, Harold gets a chance to use his knowledge of preparing and serving meat when he helps Mr. Green through a huge meat sale, and it goes by faster and easier than it would if Mr. Green was all by himself.  Also, after so much time of getting annoyed with Harold even after he improved, Mr. Green realizes Harold’s talents and makes him his apprentice butcher, making for an admirable ending that gives hope for even people like Harold to find their true purpose.  It would be great if we see more of Harold being a butcher after this cartoon, but at least nothing ever implies that it isn’t happening off screen. 

As it stands, we’re left with one of Harold’s best starring roles which ends up being inspirational, insightful, and relatable. 10/10

The Ranking

1. Helga Blabs it All
2. Harold the Butcher
3. Crabby Author
4. Curly Snaps
5. The Aptitude Test
6. Pre-Teen Scream
7. Olga Gets Engaged
8. Oskar Gets a Job
9. Rich Kid
10. Stinky Goes Hollywood

After talking about two great Hey Arnold cartoons, the next review is going to cover a really low point of the series, "Arnold Betrays Iggy." On the plus side, it comes with a slightly better review of a cartoon about Helga getting a nanny who forces many customs on her despite her good intentions.

Next time on MC Toon Reviews is a high point of Voltron: Legendary Defender Season 2, "Shiro's Escape."

If you want to stay updated for more reviews, become a follower of this blog, click here to like the official Facebook page, and click here to follow me on Twitter.

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 7: Hey Arnold Season 2 Episode 8

Mudbowl

You know a cartoon is good when it can get you invested in the characters playing a sport even if you’re not into sports.  That’s the case with this cartoon which turns out to be highly entertaining and well-told because of what the characters involved get up to.  Arnold and his friends run into Wolfgang and his gang of 5^th graders again who crash the park they’re using to play football and challenge them to a game in exchange for it.  Rather than focus on the game itself which would limit the cartoon’s appeal just to sports fans, the focus instead goes for the idea of using strength or wits against those who are bigger than you.  I’d like to think that a strong, relatable theme is what people with all interests can get behind.  Anyway, at first the kids believe that strength is what’s needed to beat a group of kids who are considerably bigger and stronger than them, so they’re easily roped into Helga’s training methods that include grueling exercises and eating a bunch of protein shakes every day.  Not only do her methods make everyone miserable, but they don’t make any improvements to their strength.  Things get so bad that they have to resort to using Torvald, a 4^th grader who was held back making this his only other major appearance apart from his starring role in Season 1, to get through the eventual game…only for him to immediately hurt himself.  By the time the 5^th graders give the 4^th graders a major thrashing during the game, building on the unfortunate implications that all 5^th graders are psychotic bullies from “Longest Monday,” it becomes clear that feats of strength are not always the way to deal with stronger enemies.  However, when Arnold takes over as quarterback and leads the team with his smart, strategic plays he’s had for the whole cartoon, they put up a better fight.  This is especially true when it starts raining, and they still come up with a strategy that gets them a satisfying victory as well as give a good reason why this cartoon is called “Mudbowl.”  Given that we have to put up with the one-dimensional behavior from the 5^th graders as well as their aforementioned unfortunate implications for much of the cartoon, the 4^th graders winning makes their weak and annoying personas work here, unlike in “Longest Monday” where they were the victorious ones in the end.  Even if they still have problems, the strength and appeal of the cartoon as a whole lie within the inspiring theme that smarts and wit can be just as good as brute strength when surviving in this world. 9/10

Gerald Moves Out

Getting your own place to live is something anyone, young or old, can want to achieve.  I know want that to happen to me someday.  However, in life you have to learn that even when you get your own space, you have to take caution that things might not be as easy as you think.  This cartoon is a good tool to get this point across.  We open with a long sequence that gets Gerald to long for his own place which honestly presents little good from the life he lives.  His older brother, Jamie O, comes out of nowhere to tackle him when he least expects, his younger sister, Timberley, is always destroying his stuff, his dad never shuts up about the electricity bill, and his mom doesn’t seem to listen to his problems.  That’s got to be a hard life for him to put up with, and with his concerns being ignored, Gerald really has all the reasons he needs to want to move out.  He has an idealistic view of what life on his own will be like with a nice room, a maid and butler serving him, and eating nothing but his favorite foods for all his meals.  That’s a believable childlike view of what one might think getting your own place is like which slowly becomes fabricated as you get older and develop a more realistic mindset.  This slowly connects to Gerald’s conflict when he jumps on an opportunity to rent a room in Arnold’s boarding house.  Since Gerald’s been there before, and it’s where his best friend lives, you’d think he’s found the perfect home.  However, just as Gerald settles into the newly rented room, he starts discovering that hardships of your home can occur even if you live on your own.  His room is dilapidated and can’t keep out noises, the food isn’t as good as he expected, he has to take a number to use the bathroom, and most of all, he has to do his own laundry which he has no skill of which gets him involved in some memorable humorous moments of Mr. Hyunh complaining about cleaning his lint.  Even though Gerald does try to tough all these issues out, he slowly admits that he wants to go home though he’s hesitant to tell his family that.  So, when they come and he’s expecting them to ask him to come home, he feels dejected and bad for what he started when they just come, make small talk, and leave.  Gerald is then left to ponder that even if it’s not what he expected, he’s still living the life that he wanted and is forced to deal with it.  Thankfully, he gets out of it by finally swallowing his pride and admits he wants to go home in front of his family, and they gladly take him back, especially since letting Gerald live on his own was part of their plan to teach him a lesson.  This is a believable, thought-provoking cartoon anyone of any age should see to remind them that for all its strong points and weak points, there really is no place like home. 9/10

The Ranking

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

Be sure to stay tuned for the review of the next episode where Arnold and Gerald's movie-making gets them involved in a supposed murder plot in "Freeze Frame" and we learn that even the smart ones can break the rules every now and then when "Phoebe Cheats."

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