114: My Treehouse (prod 113)

 

Filming in June 2004. Super in character for Trixie.

Original airdate: November 11, 2004

Story by Magnus Scheving

Written by Noah Zachary, Cole Louie, Magnus Scheving

Directed by Magnus Scheving

Executive producers - Magnus Scheving, Ragnheidur Melsted, Raymond P. Le Gue, Mark Read, Brown Johnson, Kay Wilson Stallings

Starring Magnus Scheving, Stefan Karl Steffanson, Julianna Rose Mauriello

Puppeteers - Ronald Binion, Gudmondor Thor Karason, Jodi Eichelberger, David Matthew Feldman, Julie Westwood, Amanda Maddock, Sarah Burgess

My Treehouse is the last episode of LazyTown to air in 2004. From here and the rest of the season you can see a slight increase in quality.

The episode begins with Sportacus timing how long it takes for him to cartwheel and flip into the skutla - approx. 14 seconds. He says that this is too slow for saving people, so he tries again. Twelve seconds. Not much of an upgrade, but it’s improvement.

Sportacus visits town to see what the kids are doing, and they’re hiding in a treehouse - Ziggy, Stephanie, Trixie & Pixel. They’ve started a secret treehouse in fear that Stingy will hear about it and try and take it all for himself. He’s a young little boy, he can’t just take a treehouse.. then he takes the treehouse.

He doesn’t go far because Sportacus grabs hold of the rope he’s using to steal the treehouse because ‘if they don’t want me in the club, I’ll just take the club!…house’. So they change their minds, not because they want to, because they don’t want to piss Stingy off, and let him join the club. Milford is making an announcement on the loud-speakers and Robbie.. is sleeping. Outside. After two episodes of doing the same goddamn thing he hasn’t learned his mistake.

Anyways, Milford announces a big treehouse building contest with big 'prizes’. Robbie wakes up and decides to listen to the Mayor. I’d just not join, I’m hopeless with building houses. I can’t do it in a video game, what makes me think I can do it in real life? Anyways, he announces that they have to be in teams, the best treehouse in town wins, and they get a HUGE trophy.

Watch the episode yourself to see what it looks like. Might not be as astonishing as you think. Anyways, everyone thinks the trophy is really cool, especially Stingy, who wants it the most. The president has ordered one person to help all teams, and for LazyTown, that person is Sportacus.

Robbie is of course, amazed by the trophy and attempts to steal it, but Bessie yells at him (LOL) and he goes away. The kids start building their treehouse, but Ziggy has a bunch of lollipops in his mouth, and Stingy is too busy looking at the trophy.

Other then that, he is hogging all the supplies for the tree house (does he WANT that trophy?). Well, at least he’s working on the treehouse. Bessie is getting Milford to build it for him while she relaxes (this is just ridiculous now) and Milford almost falls and drops all the wood, but Sportacus pushes a wheelbarrow so Milford doesn’t fall on the ground.

Robbie is also trying hard for that trophy. He is trying his best to build a treehouse but he has no expierence and hurts himself multiple times in the process (smashing a piece of wood with a hammer, making that piece of wood fling onto him, and hitting his hand with a hammer).

He realizes what a waste of time this is (he should have some kinda invention for this task, but he doesn’t think so) and decides to cut the kids tree with an axe. But the axe is rubber and it starts shaking, so he scraps that idea. Then Stingy’s hammer flies away and instead of moving away, Robbie covers his head. Luckily, Sportacus is there and he catches the hammer. There are two more minutes remaining and the treehouse looks pretty good, the kids perform Teamwork, and Bessie is reading the headline of Lazy Town News: “LAZYTOWN SPRING IN THE AIR”. What a boring newspaper. I genuinely don’t know why she’s always reading the newspaper in this season.

The time is finally up and what’s left to do is to send the photos in to the president and see who wins the day after. Sportacus is the man taking the photos and he’s wearing a red cloth on his face. Maybe to divert attention? Or to not get hit by the flames?

Bessie does a closeup to the camera, so you can’t even see all the hard work that Milford did. Not to mention the photos are black and white (I’m no color expert, but I am pretty sure color photos existed in 2004), so the painting of the treehouse was useless. And Robbie says 'Cheddar’ when Sportacus tells him to say 'Cheese’. LOL!

Despite how terrible his treehouse, Robbie still thinks he will win, and he mails the letter in along with everyone else. Anyways, Stingy can’t handle the idea of someone getting given the trophy (jeez, it’s like there’s the secret to life in this trophy) and he rips up the photo so only him and the treehouse can be seen.

More proof that if Stingy is your favourite character, you’re a 'fan’ who discovered the show in 2017 after We are Number One and The Mine Song and have only watched 3 episodes. Anyways, the winner 'Stingy’ is announced the next day and Robbie is on the verge of crying. He did put in a lot of effort and Stingy did almost nothing.

Everyone is unhappy with Stingy (well, maybe not the Mayor considering he doesn’t know what Stingy did until Trixie tells everybody), but he is just happy he got the damn trophy. I respect the grind, but I don’t respect lying about it.

He goes to the treehouse with the trophy, and they want answers. He says that it’s his treehouse because he 'owns’ everything used to build it, excluding Stephanie’s flower pot, which he throws out. (What a jerky move) So they leave him alone.

To take Stingy off their minds, they play a game of basketball and some of Pixel’s video games while Stingy plays ping pong, rock paper scissors, and chess.. alone. He lures Ziggy into visiting the treehouse (Siggi Sæti from 'Let’s Go, LazyTown!’ (1997) is background music) with candy which is pretty smart. He says he can have tons of candy if he plays with him, but Ziggy declines so Stingy turns the handle and breaks it.

I like how we can see he feels remorse for his actions but doesn’t want to show it. It’s good writing. Robbie is watching and he sees the trophy and decides to steal it in the mailbox costume and Stingy eventually decides to leave the treehouse (to go apologize), but he nearly falls off and now he’s in trouble.

Stephanie hears his yells and convinces Trixie to save him. What character development! She climbs up the tree and tries to grab his hand, but the trophy distracts her and she almost falls until Stingy grabs her hand.

Robbie finally sees his chance to get the trophy (which is in multiple broken parts, but to each their own) but he falls over a leftover piece of wood, and Sportacus has just came to save the two.

Sportacus has saved the two (hip hip hooray), but Robbie is still lying on the ground in his mailbox, and the treehouse is about to fall on him. Thus comes more proof of the power of Sports Candy.

THAT’S RIGHT. HE HOLDS AN ENTIRE TREE HOUSE UP. Anyways, the gang make up, they sing Bing Bang and Robbie is in the lair with the trophy. He polishes it and takes care of it.. then he falls apart.

THE END.

8/10. Amazing lesson.

 

113: Cry Dinosaur (prod 115)

 

Filming in July 2007. Glad to know Stefan was in the costume!

Original airdate: October 25, 2004

Story by Magnus Scheving

Written by Noah Zachary, Cole Louie, Magnus Scheving

Directed by Raymond P. Le Gue, Magnus Scheving

Executive producers - Magnus Scheving, Ragnheidur Melsted, Raymond P. Le Gue, Mark Read, Brown Johnson, Kay Wilson Stallings

Starring Magnus Scheving, Stefan Karl Steffanson, Julianna Rose Mauriello

Puppeteers - Ronald Binion, Gudmondor Thor Karason, Jodi Eichelberger, David Matthew Feldman, Julie Westwood, Sarah Burgess

Cry Dinosaur - This episode used to dissapoint me and I really used to hate it. A lot. And I don’t know why.. I really REALLY do not. So, considering it’s been two years since I watched the full episode and not that crappy PBS Kids Sprout cut, so maybe I’ll revisit it today.

The episode begins with Sportacus challenging himself to step or touch all the buttons on the floor of his airship in a small amount of time. He manages to do so in 18 seconds. AWESOME!!

It’s a sunny day in LazyTown, so Sportacus decides to open his door and look outside. However, someone has drawn a dinosaur face on a balloon and it freaks Sportacus out. A superhero who has risked his life a number of times and literally lives in the sky is afraid of something that expired millions of years ago??

Anyways, Stingy, Stephanie and Ziggy are messing around in a tent trying to decide where to move it. Sportacus jumps from the door of his airship. He’s afraid of an extinct creature but not jumping thousands of feet in the air? Anyways, Sportacus shows Ziggy the balloon and he runs away until Sportacus tells him he brought it back.

Meanwhile, Robbie is peeking in his lair and he is even more freaked out then Ziggy. His heart is beating - LITERALLY! While Ziggy is thanking Sportacus he loses hold of the balloon and it goes back in the air.. ready to pop in a few seconds. Stephanie tells Sportacus they’re having a campout and that they’re going to

-stay up all night

-tell ghost stories

-eat hotdogs

-tell ghost stories

-sleep on sleeping bags

-m m m m h h h n n g

-and tell ghost stories.

Sportacus can tell Ziggy is afraid of the dark, so he tells him that everyone is scared of something. Ziggy asks if Sportacus is, and he says no. One of the most hilarious things I have ever heard a character from a show targeted at six year olds say is ‘no’. Then Ziggy proceeds to ask him if he is afraid of a bunch of scary creatures and common phobias, then Sportacus reveals he is afraid of dinos. Robbie is eavesdropping, and…well, you can guess what happens next, right?

So, he puts on his dinosaur head and tries to walk around his lair, but he keeps bumping into stuff. He takes it off and thus concludes that the reason dinosaurs are extinct are because they keep bumping into things. Props to Robbie for actually knowing dinos are extinct.

Anyways, it’s night time in the town and the kids are in the tent. It’s time to get to bed but Ziggy wants to stay up and eat candy. The kids finally convince him that they are safe in the dark, but then they completely ruin it by singing ’The Spooky Song’, a pretty nice song, but it’s just mean.

Anyways, Robbie is roaming LazyTown in the Cry Dinosaur costume, and Ziggy sees the shadows of the costume. Sportacus has come to save them from the dinosaur, and he puts his hand in the tent and takes the kids out.

The 'dinosaur’ is behind them and Stephanie hits it with her pillow. Except it wasn’t a dinosaur. Or Robbie. It was the mayor. Stephanie’s uncle, who was coming to offer the kids some licorice. This show is so.. so.. so.. coincidental??

So they decide to keep on camping out.. inside. The house. Ziggy is STILL too scared of the dark, so he decides to put on the lights, but the two are pretty annoyed. So he turns it off. Friendship goals, am I right?

But Stephanie decides to turn on her lamp. What a kind person! So they finally go to bed, but Robbie is still in his disguise, and he steps on a skateboard then falls over a wall. Ziggy hears the sound, but the kids ignore it. Now, come on, even I am not scared of creatures in the dark, but if I heard a loud noise I’d check it out too.

He sees Robbie trip over the wall (AGAIN, LOL) and starts freaking out. Stephanie checks it out but she doesn’t see it, so Stingy and Stephanie go out to prove it once and for all. The two split up and Stingy’s kinda freaked out but won’t prove it. Then Robbie pops up outside the window of Milford’s house.

Then he walks in the room while Ziggy’s all alone and Ziggy starts shaking the tent in fear. I’d do the same too, who revived those huge monsters? So anyways, Robbie goes in the hallway, Stephanie and Stingy come back, Ziggy says the dinosaur is in the hallway, Stephanie says 'there is no’ and then she opens the door and yells 'DINOSAUR!!!!111!!11!!!!1!!!’ in classic comic cartoon form.

Stingy dives into the tent (literally, I think someone just threw his puppet in the tent! LOL!) and Stephanie hides under her bed and throws the blanket on his head. The next three minutes of the episode are just the kids yelling and running away from the dinosaur until Ziggy grabs its legs and the dino head flys off Robbie’s head. The dino head goes flying onto Stingy’s head and he completely freaks out. LOL!!

Stingy is asking Stephanie for help but she is running away from him. She climbs a ladder but Stingy bumps into it and Stephanie nearly falls off (serves her right for not helping Stingy) until Sportacus wraps a rope around the ladder and brings her to safety.

Then they sing the Bing Bang song. Robbie still has his dino head on and he’s trying to watch TV and drink soda, but he can’t get the costume off. Thus marks the end of the episode.

Definitely better then the last time I watched it.

7/10

 

112: Rottenbeard (prod 119)

Filming in July 2004. JRM's ready to illegally download the show she acts in!

 Original airdate: October 4, 2004

Story by Magnus Scheving

Written by Noah Zachary, Cole Louie, Ken Pontac, Magnus Scheving

Directed by Magnus Scheving, Raymond P. Le Gue

Executive producers - Magnus Scheving, Ragnheidur Melsted, Raymond P. Le Gue, Mark Read, Brown Johnson, Kay Wilson Stallings

Starring Magnus Scheving, Stefan Karl Steffanson, Julianna Rose Mauriello

Puppeteers - Ronald Binion, Gudmondor Thor Karason, Jodi Eichelberger, David Matthew Feldman, Julie Westwood, Sarah Burgess

YOU ARE A PIRATE! The famous song featured in today’s episode of LazyTown, but is it good enough to get me to pirate it?

The episode begins with Sportacus eating his ‘Sportacus Club Special’ which is just a regular boring ass lettuce and tomato sandwich. Come on bruh. Put some meat on that thing.

While this opening sequence reminds me that this show never talks about meat other then Let’s Go, LazyTown! (1997), it does at least technically put eating wheat based foods in a positive light.

It’s a beautiful perfect sunny day in LazyTown, and Sportacus decides to take a look at what the kids are doing. Stephanie is in a pirate costume and yelling for help.

Sportacus thinks she is in trouble (why didn’t the crystal beep.. hmm??) and goes to town to save her. He cartwheels over those weird yellow walls and jumps over signs to save her. But Ziggy tells him he is in the water and he has stepped on Stingy’s fish.

Trixie then tells him that they are playing pirates and Steph is walking off the plank. Cue a hilarious argument between Stingy and Trixie about who’s captain. Stingy wants to elect himself because he has the piggy-parrot, but Trixie has promoted herself because she has a hook. There’s no challenge here. Sportacus says goodbye and runs back to the ship (nobody’s gonna steal it man), then Stephanie walks the plank. Meanwhile, Robbie is in the lair talking about those 'rotten kids’ and how they do nothing but make noise. Remind you of someone? Robbie then grabs his largest pair of noise cancelling headphones but he can still hear them. LOL. Now Ziggy has a sword.

Pirate Ziggy is talking about how you should give him your loot, and by loot he means caanddyy. AAAHRGH! LOOK AT THAT BALLOON SWORD! TAKE ALL MY FUIT GUMIES!!1!1!!! Anyways, Ziggy dives to the floor once he sees Mayor Milford and sneak attacks, 'ballooning’ his face.

Milford politely asks him to stop it and Ziggy tells them they’re playing pirates. Then he takes the kids to his office to tell them all about LazyTown’s very own real pirate named Rottenbeard who spread his meanness all across the town and took everything he wanted. Stingy is excited mainly at the word 'took’.

Rottenbeard took a lot of things, except the famous 'LazyTown stone’, which is the secret to living in LazyTown. I think the secret is 'balance’, guessing that’s what the whole show is about. Anyways, they all walk outside to find it, and the stone says 'LAZyToWN SHOULD ALWAyS BE’.

Now everyone is kerfuffled (it’s so simple, the secret to living in LazyTown is ) about what the secret is, and Milford says Rottenstein broke it and stole a piece.

Robbie is watching and he has another amazing idea - to make a fake stone, knowing that they’ll have to do whatever it says on it. He quickly crafts a new stone (HOW DOES HE DO IT!!!!???) and tries to replicate the broken piece. He carries the stone, but it is deemed too heavy for him and he falls down. Then he gets an EXACT REPLICA of the broken piece in his hand. HOW????

Meanwhile, Milford is reading the kids a chapter about a hero who stopped Rottenbeard’s Lazyways. Does this remind you of anyone..? No.. okay. He jumped off a wall and landed on the ground, somersaulted behind Rottenbeard, crawled between his legs, and defeated him.

Rottenbeard promised to himself one day he will return (a new generation of him will). The kids decide to dig for buried treasure chests, and while they’re having fun to pretend being pirates, a new friend joins them - Robbie Rotten in his newest disguise as Rottenbeard.

He’s talking to them about a buncha stuff about pirate business, I don’t know, it was about 30 seconds, I skipped it. So, Rottenbeard gives Stephanie a piece of paper and it reads Robbie’s grocery list. LOL! He takes it back and gives her a map of where to find the 'precious booty’.

Then they all get on his boat and perform ’You are a Pirate’, which I didn’t really care for excluding Stephanie’s verses. Meanwhile, the kids have been digging for what seems like forever, and Ziggy is right in front of the X. Robbie tries hinting to dig down by saying 'you have to look under your nose sometimes, look down’ and he doesn’t get the hint.. gosh. Then Ziggy finally sees the X (Are we talking about THOSE films or the letter..?) and Trixie gives Stephanie a toy shovel to dig with.

She finally finds the treasure chest and opens it. It is the fake missing piece Rottenbeard has made. Nobody has noticed what it says though (the characters in this show have some very strange brain capacity), but Stephanie so happy she sends some mail to Sportacus.

The letter reads 'We found the LazyTown stone. -Stephanie’ and Sportacus instantly knows what she is talking about. He takes two tennis rackets and rides to town. Milford deems this a historical day in history (no, I didn’t stuff that sentence up, LOL!!). Sportacus blows the dust off the missing piece, and it now reads 'LAZyToWN SHOULD ALWAyS BE LAZy’. Everyone is pretty disappointed and sad that they have to lie around and do nothing now. But, this is exactly how they were like years.. before Stephanie came

Trixie is flipping through the 'History of LazyTown’ while Stephanie is over at the stone, sulking about how she has to spend her summer doing nothing 'all because of some stupid st-’, just when she leans on it and the desk it is on falls over. Then she finds another treasure map and shows the kids.

So, while Ziggy and Stephanie are the only ones digging, Trixie is reminicising how she is the captain because she has a hook AND the map, and Stingy is singing Wonders on the Sea.

Robbie hears their racket and goes back to stop them from finding the real piece. For the laziest guy in town, he puts on his disguise pretty fast. But it’s too late, they’ve already found the treasure chest.

Rottenbeard says it’s impossible to find treasure when you’re tied to a tree.. then he ties them to a tree. LOL!! Sportacus does an astonishing frontflip onto the treasure chest. Oh, boy, get ready for this awesome G-rated fight scene directed by amazing action movie legend, Magnus Scheving!!

Rottenbeard steals Stephanie’s sword and he swings it over his legs, but Sportacus dodges the attack with a jump. Reminds me of when Bruce Lee did the same move in 'Fist of Fury’. Robbie swings again, but he flips onto the ground. Rottenbeard swings forward and Sportacus rotates his leg. Sportacus retalliates by.. throwing the treasure chests in Rottenbeard’s hands..? It works, because he falls to the ground. LOL!!

Stephanie manages to read the books with her leg, and Trixie tells Sportacus to grab a sword. He grabs his tennis rackets and whacks him straight on the butt. LOL!! Then he steals Trixie’s sword. The two circle each other and Sportacus twirls his tennis rackets. Rottenbeard twirls his balloon swords, but they decrease in size all times (LOL!!) until he gets it juuuusssstttt riiiiiigggghhhhhttttt..

Sportacus jumps on the wall like the hero in the book did (who strangly looks like the “Robbie Rotten Comes to LazyTown” (1999) counterpart of Sportacus) and Robbie nearly falls into the hole the kids dug. Then he charges at Sportacus, and Sportacus steps to the side. Then he falls over the wall.

Sportacus flips over Rottenbeard and whacks him on the butt again! Then he slides over his legs, reluctantly “gives him a little push” (softly kicks him), and Rottenbeard has fell into the kids’ dug hole. Jacky Chan who? This is the epitome of foreign fight scenes. Then Robbie’s disguise is revealed and he has a bunch of dirt in his mouth (haha!).

Sportacus unties the kids and he takes the treasure chest over to the rest of the LazyTown stone. He blows the dust off the REAL missing piece and it says.. “LAZyToWN SHOULD ALWAys BE.. FOLLOWING THE LAZyRANTS TUMBLR ACCOUNT”.. nah, just kidding. It actually says that 'LAZyToWN SHOULD ALWAyS BE HAPPy’.

And everyone is supper happy about that! Milford says it’ll be especially easy because they just have to smile. Then they perform Bing Bang.

Meanwhile, Robbie is in his lair, trying to take Milford’s advice to smile, but the mirror breaks. A little bit harsh, but kinda funny.

THE END.

10/10 episode if I must say. Stephanie’s verse is pretty cool in the featured song, and it also features the closest thing we’ll ever get to a LazyTown fight scene.