S2, E29: "Freeze Frame" / "Phoebe Cheats"

"Freeze Frame"

Arnold and Gerald's super genius skills strike again this episode. They hook a camera up to focus on several areas of the neighborhood park and record (and spy on!) the people who happen to pass by. The boys notice in the background a shady-looking man with a pork-pie hat sticking an envelope into a hole in a tree, and then Arnold hooks up his 90s camcorder into his computer to get a closer look at the suspicious activity.

What the hell is this, Home Alone 3?! At nine years old, I was recording myself making stupid faces through the family computer's camera. I sure as hell didn't set up my own Spy-o-vision, or even know how to, for that matter. Then again, why am I so surprised by Arnold and Gerald's abilities when a previous episode showed them inadvertently tapping into the city's radio broadcasting system through their own complex contraption?

I'd just hate to see them go too far with this, like set up cameras in the girls' locker room in high school.

Anyway, Arnold and Gerald turn on their camcorder to go investigate the tree, because they can't mind their own business, can they? Arnold pulls out the envelope and reads the note inside:

Why does every note on TV have to have that font that looks like someone cut text out of a magazine and pasted them together?

I don't know what they were expecting to find in that tree. Money? Cocaine? This would have been a hilarious "mind your own business" moral-type episode moonlighting as an anti-drug "special" episode. Arnold and Gerald try cocaine for the first time, fuck themselves up, and end up learning that it's not okay to play detective with other peoples' personal business.

Arnold and Gerald try to figure out what the note is referring to--porpoises, as in the ones at the aquarium? No... they deduce that they have to be the porpoises down by the amusement park next to the wharf. And thus comes one of the darkest lines of the series thus far:

"Man! *Sniff sniff* Whose idea was it to put a merry-go-round next to a slaughterhouse?" - Gerald

The mysterious pork-pie hat guy walks past them (how convenient!) and meets up with one of his buddies on a porpoise-themed merry-go-round (???) to discuss some top-secret plan involving a gun, a knife, and rope.

Okay, first of all... I have many questions, mostly beginning with "What in the hell..." and ending with "...This seems illegal." No way would this pass on Nickelodeon today.

Okay, so I get that this is so suspiciously bizarre for a reason, but why are these two grown men discussing a top-secret plan on a merry-go-round? They couldn't go to a coffee shop or someone's house? Do these guys plan business deals on Ferris wheels? Are they planning on proposing to their girlfriends via bumper cars?

Even more bizarre is the fact that as soon as they get off the ride, they get inside a taxi and are driven off somewhere. I wonder what that taxi driver was thinking waiting for these two buffoons: "Oh, I'm so charging them extra for making me wait for them to get off the damn carousel."

This might be a bit of a stretch, but I noticed that the taxi was marked #16--as in Slenderman's door. Could this possibly be a nod to that mysterious, faceless man in the boarding house who gets his meals delivered via space vacuum tube?

Arnold and Gerald head down to the cab company's office and try to get the dispatcher to tell them where car #16 took the pork-pie hat guy and his overweight friend. The dispatcher, Sabrina, tells them no can do since that information is classified, but a window of opportunity pops up when Sabrina leaves the desk to go on a bathroom break.

And she leaves the door wide open, with no one to cover for her, which means Arnold and Gerald are able to sneak in to get information from the cab driver. How irresponsible! I hope there are cameras in that place so Sabrina could be fired. Don't worry; Arnold and Gerald can set up some nifty security cameras if the cab company doesn't have them.

Arnold poorly imitates Sabrina's voice when he asks the cab driver via dispatcher radio where he took the two guys, and Arnold and Gerald get their information right before Sabrina returns.

Arnold and Gerald catch up with the two shady guys, hiding behind a garbage can and recording their conversation. It's clear that the way their conversation is going, we're supposed to believe that these guys are planning to kill some guy named Marty at 7:00 tonight. And because that's what we're told to believe, it's definitely a misunderstanding. It's one of the rules of comedy.

Oh, and what's up with the clown masks?

The two shady guys notice Arnold and Gerald have been following them all day, and then spot the camera in their hands. They piece together that Arnold and Gerald are in cahoots with Marty and will blow their whole plan, so they chase after them to stop them.

Arnold and Gerald run to the police with their hypothesis, but are laughed right out of the precinct. Say what?!  Is it because Arnold and Gerald are kids? Or that they have zero evidence? Regardless, what shitty cops. If someone tells you they think a murder is going to happen tonight, you get your ass into that police car and chase those motherfuckers down. No wonder why that city is so full of crime; the cops are useless.

As Arnold and Gerald walk home, they run into Mr. Green, who's all dressed up for tonight. Hmm...

That evening, Arnold replays their evidence over and over, despite not being able to figure out what the two men's plan is. Gerald sarcastically says that they should just call pork-pie hat guy and ask him what he's doing, which gives Arnold an idea:

That's right. Arnold uses his video-editing software to listen carefully to the number pork-pie hat guy is calling. Magically, this program is able to recognize the number tones and posts the entire phone number up on the right-hand side of the screen. Damn! What is this program?! Sounds like something the military would use.

Arnold hands the phone off to Gerald to call the number and find out where the murder is taking place. The slaughterhouse, right where they started.

Arnold and Gerald find Mr. Green wandering around the wharf in his suit, and it's revealed that Mr. Green is the Marty--Marty Green. Arnold and Gerald warn Mr. Green not to go into the slaughterhouse unless he wants to become slaughtered himself, but Mr. Green goes in anyway because he knows what fate lies inside for him...

A birthday party!

It all turned out to be a surprise birthday party for Mr. Green, hosted by the city butchers. What a twist!

Arnold and Gerald are relieved that no one is getting murdered.

As the boys playback the party on Arnold's computer, they realize they inadvertently captured the two guys talking again, this time about how they're really going to get Mr. Green in another three weeks at some kind of butcher's convention. *Sigh,* here we go again.



"Phoebe Cheats"

The class brain cheats?! So she is human after all!

After not getting special recognition for her Abraham Lincoln paper or the Citizens of the Month mention, Phoebe starts to believe that her performance is starting to slip. Or she can't help it when someone else gets a round of applause for superior academic/altruistic achievement. You're not fooling us, Phoebe. You can say all you want that it doesn't bother you, but I can clearly see the look of betrayal on your face like you just found out your man has a side ho.

Mr. Simmons announces that it's time for the upcoming poetry contest, and the winner will get a cool lifelike Emily Dickinson trophy.

Phoebe decides that she must win this trophy, because winning is the most important thing. Winning is the only thing that motivates her. Win! Win! Win!

That night, she struggles to write a decent poem because she's too used to writing academically and logically. You know, just because someone is an academic goldmine doesn't automatically mean they suck when it comes to anything creative. This trope has been beaten into the dirt so many times on TV that I'm dying for some human calculator to come along with some effing outstanding work of art. Just once. They can be a total dick of a person, too. Just once, please. Show me someone who's both academic and creative.

Meanwhile, Helga uses Arnold as inspiration for her poem (of course):

Cowlicks like fields of yellow corn
All the days of my week,
I write the name I dare not speak.
The boy with the cornflower hair,
My beloved, and my despair.

*Faints*

"That's a keeper." - Helga

Phoebe decides to use a book of poetry for inspiration since coming up with something creative on her own is like squeezing blood from a stone--Phoebe would probably criticize that, too, since it is physically is impossible to squeeze organic fluids from an inanimate object.

She finds a simple poem and is hopelessly defeated that she doesn't have the writing chops to come up with something that good. Personally, I don't see what's so great about:

I hear your 
name like 
a bell ringing, 
ringing in my 
heart.

However you feel about this poem, Phoebe finds it good enough to plagiarize--so good that she actually has to shut her curtains and turn off all the lights except her desk lamp. Oh, no! It's always the quiet ones who turn on us.

I thought Helga's poem was much better, though I don't understand the cornflower part--isn't a cornflower blue? Or is she referring to the texture of it? Or its beauty? Perhaps that's why Helga doesn't win the contest, but Phoebe does instead. Phoebe was just very lucky that Mr. Simmons didn't recognize that particular poem, otherwise Phoebe would be in deep shit right now.

Helga gets second place, though, and along with Phoebe's poem, Mr. Simmons decides to read it loud to the class. Good thing Helga always chooses to remain anonymous on all her poetry assignments.

Later that night, Phoebe's parents make a toast to Phoebe for winning the trophy. And yes, that is Star Trek's George Takei as the voice of Phoebe's father.

Phoebe is so consumed with guilt for cheating that she has trouble sleeping that night. Man, Phoebe really can't stand not being the best! I bet if she just tried her best to write a poem, she could have came up with something great. Perhaps the fear of imperfection would be a good topic. She could have written something like this:

Time, time, time,
Ticking away, the hours run thin.
Eyes, eyes, eyes,
Stay open, for I must win.

The further I slip behind,
The deeper I fall
Into a cycle I won't escape
So I must risk it all.

It doesn't even have to rhyme, because that's the nature of poetry--it's freeing.

What I don't understand is how Phoebe knew that using a published poem would guarantee her the winner's trophy. What if Mr. Simmons liked Gerald's poem better? Or what if he decided last-minute that Helga's poem was the real gem? If Mr. Simmons chose another student's poem instead, then Phoebe cheated for nothing. I wonder if she would feel as bad as she does now.

The next day, as Phoebe attempts to tell Mr. Simmons that she plagiarized someone else's work, Principal Wartz comes in and asks Mr. Simmons for advice on how to boost student morale for next week's open house. Mr. Simmons suggests having a student from each class open up with a reading. And then he uses Phoebe as an example, who "wrote a wonderful poem." It's like pushing someone's already bruised face into the wall over and over again.

"Is that true, young lady? Did you really write a wonderful poem?"
"Oh, sir, I can't write..."
"Oh, nonsense. We're proud of our multicultural students here at P.S. 118. Where do you come from, Phoebe?"
"Kentucky, sir."

While fencing with George Takei, Phoebe takes her anger and frustrations about her honesty on him, and storms out to take a bath in her clothes. I must say, Phoebe's got a nice house! They've got a fencing room and a traditional Japanese bathroom. I mean, come on! Who wouldn't want that awesome tub?!

That night, Phoebe's guilt reaches an all-time high when she hallucinates the trophy being sentient and calling her a cheater, and this scene is reminiscent of Edgar Allan Poe's short story, "The Tell-tale Heart." Except Phoebe didn't chop the limbs off of some geezer who was still alive and bury him under the floorboards--but the guilt exists in both tales. I just find it strange how Phoebe is writhing in agony over this to the point where she has to grab her little bonsai tree and hurl it at the sass-mouthed trophy. Yeah, because that'll definitely shut your conscience up.

Wouldn't it be hilarious if it just kept "talking"?

"Silly mongoose, you cannot silence me."
"Oh, yes I can! Just watch me!" *Smashes the trophy to bits*
"Nope, still here."
"Shut up! Shut up!"
"...cheater."
"I said shut up!"
(From outside Phoebe's bedroom): "Phoebe, what are you doing in there?"
"I hear your name like a bell. Cheating, cheating, in my heart."
"AHHH!"

How flimsy is that tree for it to break in half?

The next day, Phoebe buries the trophy in a sandbox, but when she walks away, some kid knocks it out of the box and it rolls in front of Arnold and Gerald, who, naturally bring it back to Phoebe's house where one of her parents put it back in her room. The sight of the trophy later that day scares the shit out of Phoebe, because how does a seemingly inanimate object just find its way back to its victim's sleeping quarters?

So, at open house, Phoebe brings the statue to Mr. Simmons and reveals the truth, clearing her conscience once and for all.

Mr. Simmons asks Phoebe why it's so important for her to rub her accomplishments in everyone's face all the time, to which Phoebe replies that it's who she is: a Jack-of-all-trades-except-poetry know-it-all. Mr. Simmons says that he knows there's more to Phoebe than being the best at everything, and that she should write a poem about her obsessive desire to be like that. Hey, that's what I suggested!

So, instead of Phoebe reading her (copied) poem for open house, Phoebe decides to read Helga's wet dream poem aloud to all the students and their parents. Beautiful.



Lessons Learned From These Episodes: mind your own business (then again, don't); it's wrong to cheat;