Special #3: Strawberry Shortcake: Pets On Parade!
It's morning and Mr. Sun narrates to us, "Hello! Or should I go, 'Woof' or Meow?" You're a sun, you don't need to make these animal noises. You speaking the English language is enough. The reason he did this is because today is the Second Annual Grand Ole' Petabble Pet Show and Grand Parade in Sunflower Market this year. Custard's pissed because she can't enter this year's contest because she won last year, but she and Strawberry are the judges this year who are entrusted with a special prize - a tricycle with a special seat for the pet.
The Peculiar Purple Pieman of Porcupine Peak for some really stupid reason, he wants the tricycle. First a gazebo and now a tricycle? What's next, a flokati rug? He's also getting annoyed of Strawberry's berry talk in the same way I'm getting sick of that dance of his. He decides to try and steal the tricycle, but Strawberry seems to have eagle eye vision and spots him trying to attempt the theft. With Custard's help, they put a birdbath in the way and he snags it. He then unknowingly pulls it up and the string wraps around him and ties him to the spoon walkway he was standing on, and the birdbath crushes him on the head. Fairly amusing...
They then leave and take the grand prize with them. The Pieman already has another plan to stop her, he throws down some pies which are supposed to have sticky properties on the road and hides as a bump in the grass to watch. Unfortunately, Strawberry decides to take a shortcut and unknowingly runs him over. He then decides to enter the contest through legit means, and enters Captain Cackle, the leader of the Berry Birds, as an entrant. He also foolishly dances into his own gooey trap set earlier. What an Idiot!
Strawberry greets Mr. Sun and we get to the opening credits with another sappy song. She's riding the tricycle to Sunflower Market where the contest is held. During this time, you'll see posters of the entrants with their pets, such as Orange Blossom and her butterfly and Blueberry Muffin and her mouse.
The Pieman's plan is to steal the other pets at the contest so his pet will win by default. He decides to travel by trolley, but another trolley comes on the tracks and knocks him off. This is the second villain, Sour Grapes, the Pieman's old partner in crime. She also has a very annoying singing voice. Seriously, that could shatter someone's eardrums. She also has a pet snake named Dregs and decides to enter the contest with him to get rid of Strawberry. Oh, and he hates Snakes as much as he does berry talk. But given how annoyed it is at Strawberry doing it all the time, this is clearly the lesser of two evils.
We then head to Sunflower Market where the contest is being held. It's there that Strawberry sees a new person in the bleachers named Angel Cake, and she's sad and lonely because she doesn't have a pet. She's also ridiculously polite. Like, Wilt from Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends polite. Seriously, she says things like "thank you please" and "I beg your pardon" so much it's ridiculous. There's being polite, and then there's taking it to an excessive level. Strawberry promises to find a pet for her after lunch, but Angel remarks she can't have lunch because she's on a diet. Strawberry notes the candy cane Angel has in her hand and says, If you think about it, the calories don't count. Trust me, they do. I'm amazed she didn't become fat and lethargic from eating these sweets.
The Pieman and Grapes are preparing their scheme which somehow involves Strawberry's phonograph. Grapes takes credit for the plan and they begin to argue. Grapes brags about turning the vineyards sour and pulling off the first million berry bank robbery, while the Pieman brags about flooding Strawberryland and capturing Strawberry with a butterfly. No offense, dude, but she's got you beat as far as crimes go. Flooding Strawberryland was decent, albeit somewhat ridiculous, but everything else was small time. Yes, even the cheating. We are then treated to the first Villain Song in the series, and it's basically about who's more evil. Eventually Pieman concedes defeat and admits she's the better villain.
Told you! =P
Back at the contest, we see Custard meeting a new animal friend, a skunk. Oh, this is the first time Custard talks, as does the skunk, who names himself Yowie A. Skunk. Why? because whenever people see him, they go "Yowie! A skunk! This is only time I've seen Custard talk so far. In the 2003 series, she talks to her owner and the other characters, and is a Deadpan Snarker. Plus, Custard almost sounds like a boy. Vocal Dissonance much?
The parade goes on as planned and we see the contestants with their pets. During this time, the Pieman slips Strawberry's phonograph under the stage. Mr. Sun asks how it's possible for Strawberry to be hurt by her own phonograph. Well, if it's anything like Sour Grapes singing, it'll subject everyone to eardrum rape.
The contest finally starts and the Pieman arrives in a Paper-Thin Disguise giving Strawberry a package and quickly asks her to sign it. She does, but decides to wait until later to open the package and begins the contest, starting with Huckleberry Pie's dog, Pupcake. He does the standard dog tricks, like roll over, sit up and speak. Also, the skunk decides to do it while watching the show, just because. Strawberry gives him an 8, and Custard gives him a 0 out of spite, but Strawberry scolds her and changes it to 6. The villains leave to execute the rest of their plan.
To contest goes on throughout the day and just as it's about to end, the Pieman and Grapes enter their pets as last minute entries. Custard immediately knows something is wrong, but Strawberry says that they deserve a chance. Dregs and Captain Cackle preform a duet of all things, and Strawberry gives it a 10, though she says it sound familiar. Angel Cake wants an encore, and they preform again just in time for the record to skip. Strawberry eventually sees the phonograph with her record, and the Pieman accuses her of cheating to help them win the contest. Oh yeah, remember that package they left for her earlier? They tell her to open it. It has a picture of the Pieman with a note attached, which the Pieman reads.
- "Thank you for helping us cheat. Signed, Purpie and Sour. P.S. This is a bribe."
Everyone believes Strawberry is a cheater and she runs off in tears. The skunk -
No, no, wait a fucking moment. I need to get this off of my chest right now. This is the third time she cried! Is she always going to do this when things are at her worst? In the first one, she thought nobody wanted to hang out with her. I personally think she was overreacting, considering it's just a damn lunch date, but I can at least see the rationale to an extent. It's hard to plan something with somebody only to have something else come up, especially since it happens to her multiple times. They should've just had Strawberry remember it's her birthday and her friends "pretend" to forget while they plan the surprise party. That would've made more sense. In the second special, this happens twice. Again, I can see how upset Strawberry can get at making a hotel reservation only to have the Pieman (Unknown to her anyway) sabotage her, and her "losing" the contest when he blatantly cheats.
But this is just Idiot Plot cranked Up to Eleven. Even by the standards of kids shows and girl's shows (And the sad thing is that there's far worse writing in shows like these). Strawberry has no fucking backbone whatsoever in these specials. In fact, why would she even take a gift from someone she doesn't know? Couldn't she have been suspicious of the gift that was even addressed to her? And while we're at it, why would her friends even trust the Pieman and Grapes in the first place? They're Obviously Evil, and yet they take their claims at face value? Yes, let's trust some cranky old coot and some middle-aged yodeling bitch that our best friend is a cheater, never mind the fact that he tried to screw us over several times in the past. This is just disgraceful.
Where was I? Oh yeah, so the skunk runs after Strawberry and actually talks to her. Okay, so I'm assuming that most of the animals are capable of speaking to humans, I mean, we just saw her talking to a snail and a butterfly on the previous special. He basically cheers Strawberry up and tells her that he used to run away a lot too, but he has decided to face his problems head on and says that she should do the same. In fact, they sing about it and march back to town together.
The Pieman brags about Strawberry always cheats and while he's an easy suspect, he says it's a condition like heartburn. Strawberry comes back to shut up his sob story. She tells to to confess that he and Sour Grapes framed her, not with her fists, but his own Weaksauce Weakness - berry talk. Personally, I'd rather have her beat his brains out then subject him to berry talk afterwards, but whatever works. She vows to haunt him with berry talk for the rest of his life until breaks down and admits she was framed, starting right now. He spills the beans after about 30 seconds of berry talk and says it was Sour Grapes idea. Pissed, she hounds him with that annoying yodeling voice of hers. Good riddance. All is well again, and Strawberry celebrates rhyming like the Pieman and doing that dumb dance of his.
Strawberry tells everyone how the skunk helped her, and everyone gives it a 10. But Angel Cake points that the the skunk doesn't have an owner, so she decides to take it and her own and names it Soufflé. Also, I think Angel's starting to sound like a boy here. Seriously, what's the the Vocal Dissonance? After Angel and Soufflé wins the prize, Mr. Sun goes down for the night and like always, we're treated to one more quick song before the credits.
Well... this is the worst one I've seen so far. I'm not kidding. All because her friends are complete idiots. Could this get any worse? On the plus side, I'm halfway done, so it won't be long until we reach the 2003 version.
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