S2, E21: "Save the Tree" / "New Teacher"

Good evening, and welcome to season 2! I actually surprised myself this morning when beginning this review to the realization that we've gotten through the entirety of the first season of Hey Arnold! My, my, does time fly!

I was going back and forth wondering if I should just do an overview of season 1, or close out season 1 with the original Hey Arnold! pilot. Considering that Hey Arnold! doesn't have an ongoing story arc, it wouldn't make much sense to do an overview of the season itself. And because the pilot is basically "24 Hours to Live" but with horrible color choices and shoddy animation, I feel that a light review of that would best be saved for the end of the blog as a bonus post.

So, here we are, jumping into season 2 without a parachute. Here we go.



"Save the Tree"

We're introduced to Mighty Pete--the oldest tree in the neighborhood which also happens to hold up a really elaborate-looking treehouse that the kids just put the finishing touches on.

Arnold mentions that not only is Mighty Pete older than Jesus, but that it's the only tree left in the neighborhood. Ahem, uh, what? Roll back to the opening credits, please:

Without even counting, I see approximately ten trees in just this three-block radius of the city. I count fourteen total. I suppose we're all supposed to believe those splotches of green are supposed to be giant bushes or mutant broccoli heads out to enslave humanity? I didn't think so, either.

Anyway, just as Arnold says that this tree will last forever, the camera pans over to Big Bob and his business partner, Nick Vermicelli, who announce to the invisible audience that Mighty Pete is coming down. To expand his business, Bob wants to knock down the tree to make room for his new beeper store (though I don't think it's legal to build a commercial business in the backyard of an apartment building. Eh, I don't know zoning laws). Immediately, a construction crew begins surrounding the tree and setting up in preparation for the demolition on Friday the 16th. Naturally, the kids go to investigate and are upset that Big Bob wants to take their favorite old man tree away from them.

It's interesting to note that unlike other kids' shows, the kids here feel so weak and powerless that they (sans Arnold) believe it's a waste of time to try to fight for their tree. So, they walk away defeated.

Helga appears from behind the tree, having heard Arnold's speech about how they must save it, and launches into another soliloquy about how Arnold is so altruistic and courageous. But hey, at least she got a new photo of Arnold's head that actually looks like him:

Should I even ask how she got a hold of that photo?

Helga goes home and confronts Big Bob, who confirms that he is, indeed, going to knock down the tree to build his new emporium. Helga tries to convince her father to build it somewhere else (not for her sake, but for you-know-whose), but his unchanging reason being that people are always hanging around that tree, which means it's the "perfect" spot for an overpriced Radio Shack.

If you look up "capitalism" in the dictionary, Big Bob's picture will be there. 

But you know, if Big Bob wants to knock a tree down so badly to build up a new store, there are thirteen other trees in that area alone for him to choose from. I know because I counted.

Upon failing to change her father's mind, Helga walks away just as defeated as the other kids. Man, she really hates seeing Arnold so sad.

Arnold reveals the news of Mighty Pete's violent death to his grandparents, and they drop what they are doing in shock. Grandpa goes on a rant about how that tree meant the world to him as a child and how he had his honeymoon in the treehouse (?!?!) meanwhile Grandma stands with Arnold in the quest to save Mighty Pete.

"[Mighty Pete] is over 700 years old!" - Grandma
"Nyah, so are you, but who's counting?" - Grandpa

The next day, Grandma takes Arnold to City Hall to get the government involved in the preservation of Mighty Pete. Unfortunately, thanks to red tape and bureaucracy bullshit, City Hall doesn't give a flying fladoodle about some dumb old tree, and even laughs at how long it's going to take for Arnold and Grandma to write a formal complaint. People like that are the reason why we have so many environmental problems.

So, Grandma and Arnold decide to handle this themselves, by making and handing out flyers and dressing up in goofy costumes to show their resistance to big corporations for taking away what's not theirs.

I would take this cause much more seriously if Arnold wasn't dressed like garlic-roasted broccoli.

Okay, this is just funny, as wrong as it is:

They just plop that right down in front of a hysteric Grandma.

Grandma and the kids realize that Big Bob is behind this demolition, so they start picketing outside his house. It's adorable how they think this is going to change his mind. When faced with the prospect off oodles of money, there's no backing down. Big Bob takes a wrench he just happens to have with him in his pocket, and unscrews the bolt to a fire hydrant to spray everyone away. What are they, cats?

That night, Grandma reassures Arnold that they can try fighting the demolition the next day (the day the tree is scheduled to come down), but by this point, Arnold has lost all hope. Poor kid. With some smooth jazz filling the background, Arnold sneaks out of the boarding house and walks a few blocks to Mighty Pete--just for one last look. Some of the other kids had the same idea, too. As they ascend the ladder to play some cards, they hear the roaring of a bulldozer charging down the street, heading right for none other than Mighty Pete. Oh, no!

Damn, Bob and Nick didn't want to waste a single minute of Friday keeping that tree standing, did they? Being that it's 12:01 in the morning, that's some serious dedication to knock down an "eyesore." Ick. You're an eyesore, Bob.

Bob demands for everyone to get out of his way so he can knock down the tree, but Arnold especially refuses. Then Helga comes to defend the tree (again, for Arnold's sake), and then Bob loses his shit. Nick takes control of the bulldozer again and drives it forward despite the fact that he would essentially be murdering six nine year-olds along with the tree. What a homicidal prick!

I can at least give some credit to Bob for calling Nick out on attempting to knock the tree down with children in it. Bob at least told them to move out of the way. Nick's gotta be part of the mafia or something because that's just sick what he's doing.

As Nick drives closer and closer, Helga takes this opportunity to literally jump into Arnold's arms for "safety."

I just love how Arnold doesn't care, either. He's basically like, "Oh, I'm holding Helga now. Okay, I guess. Whatever." And then Helga sniffs him, because why not?

Bob and Nick fight over the controls. They end up falling right out and beating each other up in the street, not realizing that the bulldozer is driving itself right into the tree.

So, the kids start throwing things from the treehouse in the path of the bulldozer, hoping that it'll slow it down or shut it off or break it. Nothing works, and they end up throwing everything "but the kitchen sink" at it. Ha. Nice pun. Except, they literally throw the kitchen sink at it, too.

Arnold runs back inside the treehouse for anything left to throw and--hey! I clearly saw them throw the kitchen sink at the bulldozer. Why is it still there? And more importantly, how did they install plumbing in that tree?

Arnold finds a small red cup and tries to throw it at the break lever of the bulldozer. Of course he misses. All hope is lost, until Jane from Tarzan shows up and saves the day:

Thank goodness for schizophrenic Grandma!

So, it looks like Bob isn't going to knock down Mighty Pete after all, considering Grandma took his bulldozer.

Again, not that I'm defending Bob, but couldn't he just rent another one? Anyway, Bob starts to appreciate the tree a little bit more, seeing how the kids risked their lives to protect it, and even seems a little bit happy that he didn't knock it down. You know, I think Big Bob needs to spend a week in the wilderness--without his fancy RV.

And just when you think Bob is going to abandon his project, he decides he's going to build his emporium in Gerald Field. Oh, boy. Here we go again!




"New Teacher"

Principal Wartz announces to Arnold's class that Ms. Slovak quit teaching to become a professional golfer, to the enthusiastic delight of everyone. Damn, was she really that shitty of a teacher? Even Arnold is happy she's gone.

So, who's this new teacher who's going to replace the old bag? Meet Mr. Simmons!

I find it funny that Mr. Simmons looks a hell of a lot like my 12th grade English teacher. Though it would have been even funnier if they acted alike, too. Don't ask how I remember such things. I have a strange memory train. I can remember a conversation from when I was 7, but can't remember if I went to the store yesterday or not.

Anyway, the class greets him monotonously, and Mr. Simmons jumps right into his new-agey teaching methods by attempting to get the class to say hello in their own "individual" ways. They remain silent, which is kind of disappointing because I would have liked to hear how some of them say "Hello." Hmm... I wonder:

Mr. Simmons: "Hello, class!"
Arnold: "Good morning, Mr. Simmons."
Phoebe: "Welcome to P.S. 118, Mr. Simmons! I'm Phoebe, by the way."
Harold: "And I'm Harold. Can we go to lunch early? I'm starving."
Helga: "You just finished an egg and cheese sandwich not five minutes ago."
Harold: "So? I was hungry!"
Gerald: "Hey, cool it, big boy. Let's give the new teacher some room to breathe."
Helga: "Don't give him too much air or he'll start eating that, too."
Harold: "That doesn't even make any sense!"
Curly: FIGHT!!!

I'll just stop it right there before I totally run away with this.

So, the first thing Mr. Simmons does is rearrange the desks into a circle to allow for better communication, and then pulls out a "truth crown" for a communication exercise.

The exercise is that Mr. Simmons places the crown on someone's head, and the crowned person must state one thing they like about the person sitting directly across from them. He places the crown on Helga's head, and, naturally, Arnold is sitting directly across from her. Helga makes a snarky comment about the shape of his head, making the whole class laugh.

During recess, everyone (except for Arnold, I'm sure) is in agreement that this new teacher needs to be broken in, so they plot their hazing ritual to piss him off. Why they decide to do this, I'm not sure. Perhaps they see Mr. Simmons as a pansy, a softy, someone who can easily be walked all over. I wonder if they did this with Ms. Slovak. Though she wasn't new-agey hippie.

What's most surprising is that even the good students are in on this, like Gerald and Phoebe. Why do they have to ruin Mr. Simmons's vibe? It's out-of-character for them. Must be peer pressure.

At 11:30, they start off by simultaneously dropping their pencils. That's an eyebrow-raiser at best.

The class continues on with the pranks, but they only delight Mr. Simmons more because they give him nostalgic thoughts that remind him of his own elementary school days.

Mr. Simmons then cracks open a poetry book to continue where the students left off, and reads them a free verse poem about tomatoes. While Mr. Simmons's back is turned, Harold reaches over and nabs Mr. Simmons's bagged lunch, and eats his sandwich. Now that's just mean!

The kids go from doing silly pranks to just being downright rude. Jeering at him, pounding their fists, and just acting as uncivilized as the kids from Lord of the Flies. Great story, horribly written.

And I am actually flabbergasted that Arnold is actually taking part in this. For being such an unrealistic saint of a child, he's joining in the revelries that is the dark side of humanity. Mr. Simmons finally cracks when he realizes Harold has eaten his sandwich, the one thing he was really looking forward to, and watches in horror as his new class runs out of the room like a "pack of wild animals." Oh, for fuck's sake--these kids need to be spanked so hard that their bruises will be passed down to their future children--that is if anyone wants to marry someone who helped drive their teacher to quit.

You know, something like this actually happened to me. My 6th grade class drove our art teacher out and into the high school, who she said were more "well-behaved." I can honestly say I had no part in driving her out. Now that I think about it, if I were to go back in time, I would have stood up and yelled at my class for being a big bag of dicks to the poor woman.

The next day, the class gets a new teacher-slash-drill sergeant: Lieutenant Major Goose.

Is it even possible to be a lieutenant major? Or is Major his first name?

So, instead of a touchy-feely hippie teacher, the class gets the other extreme--and they are not happy about it.

Lieutenant Major Goose plans to rectify the discipline problem, though it might be a bit of a challenge at first since Curly has no conscience or fear whatsoever. With a big, plastered smile on his face, he purposely drops his pencil on the floor, and Lieutenant Major Goose makes him stand in the corner.

 "What is your name?"
"Curly!"
"Your hair's not curly, boy! What's your real name?"
 "Thaddeus."
"Curly, go stand in that corner facing that wall!"

Lieutenant Major Goose then assigns three other students to the corner (symmetry) and then makes them do times table drills. At recess, everyone starts complaining about their new new teacher, this time for the opposite reason, and then they plot to bring Mr. Simmons back.

When they go to Mr. Simmons's house (how did they find out where he lives?), they straight-up tell him that they want him back because their drill sergeant "teacher" doesn't let them get away with shit like they did with him, but Mr. Simmons declines. So, the students bribe him with presents, poetry, and a new sandwich to show him that they do want him back as their teacher and aren't just a pack of wild animals. I still want to know how they found his house.

Mr. Simmons is impressed with the effort the students put in to win him over again that he agrees to come back and teach again. But that means that the students must find a way to run Lieutenant Major Goose out of the class.

Why do I feel like Mr. Simmons never actually left in the first place? Wouldn't there have to be a whole formal meeting to call or something in order for Mr. Simmons to resign? Here's what I think happened: At the end of the day, Mr. Simmons went to Principal Wartz's office and told him what happened. Instead of moving him to a different class, Principal Wartz set up this plan to hire his friend/old college roommate sergeant to come and scare the kids shitless so that they'll want the freedom they had with Mr. Simmons and never misbehave like that again. It sounds much more plausible than Mr. Wartz finding another teacher to interview and hire after just one day.

The next day, the students attempt to break down Lieutenant Major Goose by abusing Mr. Simmons's "Always ask why" mantra in order to drive him crazy. They ask him so many questions that they drive him to kneel onto the floor and cover his ears. Really? Really now?

All he had to do was yell really loud and assign everyone detention, and the kids would have shut up. Man, this guy's weak. No wonder he's not in the army. He probably ran out screaming when someone asked him one too many questions. And then he looks up and sees the kids as the clowns that they are.

Principal Wartz opens the door and asks what the hell is going on. Lieutenant Major Goose asks to quit and then runs screaming out of the room, literally. Damn!

And then Mr. Simmons returns, this time to a cheering class, and decides that instead of a math quiz, he will take the class on an educational outdoor picnic.

Lessons Learned From These Episodes: in order to stop big business from ruining your fun, take away their tools; stand up for what is right; don't take advantage of new-agey teachers