(Old review) The "Growed" Special

Old review from around 2016.

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Part 1: All Growed Up

In 2001, the creators of Rugrats began to experiment with potential ideas for spinoffs for the main series. As the show went on, it introduced more characters and plot lines, and in a way, got a little stale over the years. If they didn’t come up with something new right away, the show would suffer a slow and painful death, or maybe it would just stay on and ostracize its fanbase in some ways a la Spongebob Squarepants and Fairly Odd Parents.

All Growed Up fancied the idea of the Rugrats characters entering a new milestone in their lives, and was the creators’ first attempt at coming up with something new for the series. It was the highest rated children’s special, at least according to Spongebob Squarepants. Two years after the special came out, it earned its own series and… it really wasn’t too good. But hey, it was a hell of a lot better than Preschool Daze. The show itself was generic as fuck, and it pretty much ate away at the characters’ likability. But that’s a story for another day, let’s look at the special that started it all.

(The Premise)

The episode starts with the babies watching a show involving time travel, then we get the obligatory Angelica comes in and fucks things up gag. This time, she has a karaoke machine and she proceeds to make everyone’s ears bleed (to be fair, she does get better when she gets older, both for her singing and her behavior). Some filler later, the babies attempt to play with the machine and Angelica attempts to stop them, forcing the babies to barricade themselves in the closet. With no other options, they use their imagination to travel to the future to, in their own words, become bigger and not put up with Angelica.

Alright, enough summarizing. They wind up in the future, where everyone including the babies have matured. Um… time travelers don’t age. At all. Enough said. We go through some generic teen tropes and don’t worry, once they get to the plot it doesn’t make any difference. Before that, I’m left wondering how characters like Lou and Spike could still be alive, and maintain the same traits they did years ago. Granted, a few years isn’t that far off, but Lou at least looks as if he hasn’t changed by much, save for Spike, but he looks as if he still has a long way to go. The main characters haven’t evolved by much in terms of personality, but Lil’s bitchiness and subtle pretentious attitude reaffirms my disfavor for the character. I’d explain more, but I’d risk making one of the longest blogposts on this site.

On to the plot (or lack thereof), the kids are anticipating a concert for teen star #513931E, aka Emica. Angelica (who has admittedly improved to a degree) claims that she’s going to the concert, and not only that, she’ll be wearing a medallion that’s similar to the one Emica’s wearing. Some fat cutting later, Angelica convinces Tommy to retrieve the medallion for her, because Stu Pickles conveniently has the same one, but it’s his good luck charm and he just so happens to need it for an upcoming dance contest, oh the drama! Tommy follows through with the deal, on the condition that Angelica helps Chuckie get with a girl he’s fawning over. Yeah, there’s a very minor subplot in this, but since it’s minor, it only needs a very small mention because it’s hardly that significant to the plot that makes up the size of a dime.

Tommy makes a fake medallion using a dog biscuit and he swaps it with Stu’s medallion. To be fair, it’s kinda explained why Tommy’s switching the medallions, but…

1: Angelica only needs to borrow the medallion for one night, and even if her friend finds out that it’s fake, by then she would have likely gotten away with it.

2: This only exists to elicit more unneeded drama to keep the plot going.

Naturally, Spike eats the fake medallion, Tommy gets singled out for switching both and losing the real one and Tommy’s punished for it, but before that, we get some melodrama in regards to Didi tearfully grounding him to the point that Degrasi and Moody’s Point collectively groan.

At this point, you’ve noticed that Tommy and Angelica are the main forces in this special, Chuckie’s doing his own thing in his very minimal subplot, Phil and Lill and Kimi are essentially just there, and Dil has yet to receive his very own personality and attributes. Question is, when will Susie make an appearance? Surely enough, when Lou is unable to stay home to watch Tommy, Didi hires Susie to babysit him. To be fair, this is before she was made into a grating character that breaks out into song whenever the situation requires it, but at the same time, there’s nothing more to say about here here.

More fat trimming later, the gang finds the real medallion and they attempt to sneak out of the house, only to get caught by Susie who just so happens to know what they’re up to, and to think people harp on Chloe Carmichael for being a Mary-Su (the ability to do anything runs in the family I guess). She lets them go on the condition that she goes with them. At this point it’s just some random filler, so I’ll just summarize the interesting bits through the power of bullets:

• Angelica is forced to admit she lied about having a medallion of her own.
• Tommy gets the medallion back to Stu.
• Lou just so happens to have an extra ticket for Angelica after she admits to not getting one.

At the concert, Tommy and Angelica get called up to the stage to join in on one of Emica’s songs. The song itself sounds like something you’d hear on the radio right now, but Emica has nothing on the likes of Third Eye Blind, Nickelback, Creed, 3 Doors Down, Matchbox Twenty, Vertical Horizon, Puddle of Mudd, Staind, 98 Degrees, Chevelle, Incubus, and just about any other band popular in 2001, related or not.

Intercut with the performance is flashbacks to earlier episodes of the series. This would work fine if this served as a finale to the series. The gang is all grown up and their past adventures are nothing more than pleasant memories that many will continue to hold for many years to come. But no, the series was still going until around 2004, and the performance is ruined by Tommy and Angelica arguing over fronting the song. The premise concludes as the Rugrats return to their main continuity, and we pretty much get what we got in the beginning.

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And that was… something? The plot was paper thin and non existent at times, the characters were lifeless and some were pushed aside almost entirely, there was too much melodrama in the scenes that embody it the most and overall, it just wasn’t painfully significant. If you want a good teen drama from the people behind Rugrats, As Told by Ginger was still going at the time. I may never know the appeal of All Grown Up, but I stand by my views. This is Channeleven and u-

*a note falls from the sky*

“This isn’t enough to make up for your absence. Stretch a little.”

Ok, were there any other specials where the characters get older or maybe younger? Let’s see here… Recess: All Growed Down? A double threat if I ever saw one. A plot similar to All Growed Up and it’s based on the show who’s movie I shat upon without reason. Sign me and my overly spread out user base up!

Part 2: Recess: All Growed Down

In 2003, Paul Germain said this to Joe Ansolabehere.

Paul: “Hey, Joe, you know that Rugrats special that came out in 2001?”

Joe: “Yeah?”

Paul: “Let’s take it, reverse it, and release it straight to DVD.”

Joe: “Well, we’ve borrowed a shit ton of assets from Hey Arnold, let’s fucking do it!”

After the first movie was release, it marked a turning point in the series. Three direct to video movies came out over the years with the same formula. A few minutes of new animation, mixed with full episodes that somehow tie in with the plot of said movie. What makes All Growed Down so special? Aside from the suspiciously familiar title, and it coming out two years after All Growed Up appeared on television, and said special being worked on by one third of the creators of Rugrats who just so happened to be one of two creators of Recess, it seems as if this is them declaring creative bankruptcy. What else is new? This won’t be long, so I’ll just summarize here.

• The kids get kidnapped by kindergartners (who’re portrayed as a primitive tribe for some reason, really flowing those creative juices) due to a leadership change, and the kids attempt to convince them to free them through the power of flashbacks.
• The flashbacks do nothing more than clash with the animation in the movie. The new animation looks clean, but when mixed with the outright gaudy appearance in the older episodes, it just looks disorienting.
• The only time a flashback occurs that isn’t just a replay of an older episode defies all continuity. Gus recalls a period where he attended 3rd Street School in kindergarten, even though it was established in an older episode that he came when he was his established age. It serves as a Gary-Stu power trip where he made it a standard for kindergartners to act like savage monsters. People like this again because?
• It ends with the kindergartners turning against their new leader and the main kids getting freed, with an extra middle finger to what should’ve been well structured continuity given when it was hinted that Gus’ power trip actually happened.

What could be said about All Growed Down, and just about any Recess movie after School’s Out? Cash in, plain and simple. It’s a shame really, given that Disney maintained a spotless track record (especially after the Dark Ages). I’d have to ask, what was the appeal of Recess, and why couldn’t we turn to Hey Arnold or Pepper Ann to see that particular appeal?

This is Channeleven, and until we meet again, good day.