Shalini's Review- "Arnold's Hat"/ "Stoop Kid"

"Arnold's Hat"                                                                

Arnold wakes up and gets ready for the day. When he goes down for breakfast, Grandma tells him   to take off his hat and tries to flip it off with her spatula. Arnold protests and says, "I never take off my hat!"

He heads to the the park to meet Gerald and they try to fly Arnold's kite. "Try" being the operative word- it doesn't seem to want to go up. As they discuss ways to improve the kite, Arnold takes out a wad of bubblegum from his mouth and sticks it underneath the park bench. Helga pops out from behind the bushes when they walk away and takes the gum back home with her.

Why does Helga need a piece of chewed gum? So she can stick it onto the statue of Arnold she made out of bubblegum! She's basically created a shrine to him in her closet (there are lights and candles surrounding the bubblegum statue). 

However, Helga realizes that the statue looks incomplete without Arnold's hat. So she sets out to rectify this by pretending to be a gargoyle statue and snatching it off his head (this fails).

                                                  Helga is fantastic at doing impressions
Then, she tries using a fishing pole to get it. Hilariously, the hook snags onto the back fender of a truck and drags her across the roof. She winds up in a bird shed, covered in bird poop. Dejected, she starts weeping in frustration. All is not lost, however. A gust of wind carries Arnold's hat away and it lands at her feet.

                         
She is ecstatic and races home to put the hat on the statue. Then, she puts on some romantic music and slow dances with the bubblegum shrine. Arnold, in contrast, feels dejected about losing his hat and has a flashback to his parents giving him the hat when he was a baby. He's so down in the dumps that he refuses to come outside when the Jolly Olly Man gives away free ice cream. Helga feels guilty about taking his hat when she overhears this and goes back home to get it.

To her horror, her mother has thrown away the shrine. While Helga is screaming her head off, Grandpa dispenses some words of wisdom to Arnold- it's what's on the inside that counts, not the outside. It works. Arnold feels better and starts going outside again.

Back at the dump, Helga gets lucky again and finds a bird wearing the hat. She then bumps into Arnold who is so overjoyed about having his hat back, he hugs Helga! She pretends to be disgusted by this, but is secretly pleased.

Extra Stuff

• The flashback to Arnold's parents giving him the hat is particularly poignant. Apart from Grandma and Grandpa, the hat is his one other connection to his parents. I'm surprised they didn't play up the angst by  focusing on this more. But maybe they didn't construct Arnold's backstory at this point.
• The fact that Helga's mother didn't ask her any questions about the shrine (which is really weird thing to find in your kid's closet) is an early clue about Miriam's neglect/flakiness.

"Stoop Kid"

                                                                    

Arnold and his friends are playing football in the street. Arnold kicks the football so hard that it lands on the stoop of  the infamous Stoop Kid. Gerald explains that Stoop Kid was left on the stoop as a baby (possibly by aliens) and left to fend for himself. He's really protective of his stoop (which he never leaves) and lashes out anyone who comes near his stoop. All of the kids are too afraid of him to get the football off the stoop. Arnold makes an attempt to retrieve it, is too afraid to go through with it. Instead, he decides sit in an empty garbage can (which is conveniently located across the stoop) and wait until Stoop Kid leaves to snatch the football.

                                                                                                                     

The only problem is that Stoop Kid never seems to leave. Arnold realizes that if Stoop Kid never leaves his stoop, then he can't chase him if he decides to take the football. He snatches the football and while Stoop Kid yells at  him ( "Come back and face me like a man!"), his hypothesis is proven correct; Stoop Kid is afraid to leave his stoop. All of the kids laugh and jeer at him.

                                                                   

Later, Arnold hears Stoop Kid crying and offers to help him leave the stoop. After various methods fail, Arnold shows Stoop Kid pictures of all the other stoops in the world and tells him that he could see all of them, if only he could get off of his stoop. This seems to work- Stoop Kid loudly declares that he will get off of his stoop.

The mailman overhears his declaration and tells everyone else. The media swarms to the stoop and a huge crowd gathers, cheering Stoop Kid on. Encouraged, Stoop Kid finally gets off the stoop!

However, Stoop Kid decides not to leave the stoop since it his entire identity. He thanks Arnold for teaching him that he can harass people on and off the stoop. Right at that moment, Harold begins  mocking him and gets a nasty surprise when Stoop Kid jumps off the stoop and chases after him.

Extra Stuff 

• How old is Stoop Kid anyway? He seems older than Arnold, but his favorite book is The Little Engine That Could
• Stoop Kid is mean and annoying, but I like how this episode makes us feel sympathetic towards him. He may have an unpleasant personality, but he's also isolated and (until the end of the episode) afraid. The thing I like about this show is that it's willing to look more deeply into unpleasant characters ( like Helga or Harold) and is not afraid to paint them in a more sympathetic light.