Arthur's New Puppy
Arthur is playing with his new puppy and wondering what to name him. Later, in the kitchen, D.W. is getting a drink and notices that Arthur is naming the dog Pal (based on a comment about him being his pal earlier). D.W. thinks Frederick would be a better name, but Arthur tries to prove Pal already knows his current name by calling him... but it doesn't work. D.W. annoys Arthur by calling Pal stupid, and then Pal pees on the rug.
Later, Arthur is walking Pal and meets Francine, who teasingly asks if Pal can do anything besides chew on his leash. When Arthur mentions that he's the one training Pal, Francine scares Arthur by revealing that she has a cousin whose dog got sent to a farm due to taking too long to train.
At home, Arthur tries teaching Pal the commands "sit" and "stay", but it doesn't work. To make matters worse, D.W. starts teasing Arthur about Pal being dumb again, and Pal then pees on the rug again. Later, Arthur thinks he's taught Pal the commands "speak", "sit", and "come", but when he tries to show his family, Pal doesn't obey.
That night, Arthur tries to put Pal to sleep in the garage, but Pal is afraid, so Arthur convinces Mr. Read to let Pal sleep indoors. However, he bites D.W.'s shoe, so they gate off an area in the kitchen and have him sleep there. He howls in the middle of the night, waking the Reads up, and Arthur decides to sleep next to him. However, he leaves the baby gate open and Pal escapes and makes a huge mess — chewing on many things, peeing and pooping on the floor, and tearing up Mr. Read's cookbook.
Arthur tells Buster and Francine about the mess, and Buster reveals he once had a dog that was sent away due to troublemaking, scaring Arthur. The parents then decide to have Pal live in the garage until he is trained, but they can't find their key, so Pal has to sleep in the house again. Before bed, Arthur begs him to be good so that he won't be sent away.
Arthur then trains Pal over a few days and shows off his new obedience to his family. Mr. and Mrs. Read decide that Pal is adequately trained now, and Pal brings back the garage key, revealing that he'd hidden it. This makes D.W. finally admit that Pal is smart after all.
Tropes for this episode include:
- The Bet: Subverted. D.W. offers to bet "a million dollars" and then "12 million dollars" that Pal won't be trained until she's in college. Arthur doesn't even dignify that with a response, and ignores D.W. when she claims he owes her that much money.
- Child Prodigy: Discussed when Arthur thinks Pal, who's still just a puppy, is a genius.
- Crazy-Prepared: D.W brings a pile of newspapers for Pal, that's as tall as her, on her wagon. She snarks that she hopes this is enough for housebreaking. Arthur advises Pal not to listen to her.
- Gender-Blender Name: Discussed when Arthur refuses to name Pal, a male puppy, "Francine".
- Go to the Euphemism:
- When Pal is antsy, Arthur thinks that he's excited, when actually he has to pee. When he then pees on the rug, D.W. jokingly calls the pee "excitement".
- When Arthur is begging Pal not to pee or poop on the carpet, he refers to this as "hurting" it.
- No Animals Allowed: Arthur and Pal encounter a "no dogs" sign during the Training Montage.
- Obfuscating Stupidity: Discussed — D.W. comments that Pal acts so dumb that if Arthur's comment about him being a genius is correct, he must be hiding it.
- Off Screen Crash: After D.W. and Pal engage in a tug-of-war over a shoe, Pal lets go and sends the shoe flying, to which we hear it smash D.W.'s lamp and drinking glass off-screen (as indicated by the light in the room suddenly going out).
- Potty Dance: Played with — Pal runs around when he has to pee, which Arthur mistakes as being excited.
- Pragmatic Adaptation: The picture book had Pal being averse to walks and his leash. The show avoided this to show responsible dog training.
- Road Apples: During Pal's night time rampage, he poops on the floor, to the point where D.W. says Arthur will need a snow shovel to scoop up the poop.
- Running Gag: D.W. keeps coming up with different names for Pal, starting off with a sincere effort but then just joke names based on his toilet troubles. She goes from Frederick, to Puddles and then to Lake.
- Smarter Than You Look: Pal is definitely untrained as shown with his relieving himself on the living room rug, and biting off D.W.'s shoe. We find, however, that he can tell when the baby gate is unlocked, and just where to hide the garage key so he's not moved back there.
- Toilet Humor: Pal, being a puppy, does his business in the house several times throughout the episode.
- Training Montage: Arthur and Pal undergo one as he teaches his dog how to behave and follow him on the leash. Soon, Pal goes from refusing to jump through literal hoops to following Arthur without needing a leash.
- Training the Pet: The episode focuses on Arthur having to housebreak Pal, teach him to walk on a leash, and teach him not to chew things or wake the Reads up, lest Mr. and Mrs. Read send him away.
- Unsuccessful Pet Adoption: Both Francine's cousin and Buster have apparently once had dogs that were sent away due to bad behaviour.
- Urine Trouble: Truth in Television: Pal gravitates towards the living room rug to pee. Arthur eventually helps Pal learn to either go outside or on a newspaper.
- We Named the Monkey "Jack": Defied — Arthur refuses to name Pal Buster, Francine, or Binky.
- Woken Up at an Ungodly Hour: All the Reads except Arthur are annoyed by Pal's howling at night.
Arthur Bounces Back
Arthur is jumping up and down in Mrs. Tibble's yard, and commenting that he has wanted things in the past but lost interest when he had them, but he's sure this time it will be different. Mrs. Tibble then yells at him to stop "lollygagging".
Mrs. Read takes Arthur and D.W. to the mall to get new coats, but Arthur is bored. He goes off to the toy store, where he meets Mr. Crosswire, who's buying Muffy some new toys, and then sees a pair of "moon boots"; boots that make you jump higher.
Arthur begs his parents for the moon boots, but they tell him he has to buy them himself. He searches for money, but has none in his piggy bank and can only find one penny. He tries giving Grandma Thora some flowers, but his parents already told her not to pay him for flowers. Mrs. Read suggests earning money by doing chores.
So Arthur tries making a lemonade stand, but a dog steals the lemons, then he tries a kissing booth but the girls just laugh, then he tries being a fortune teller, but it rains. D.W. offers to give him some money she got for her birthday if he acts as her servant for a year in return, but he declines. Mrs. Read suggests cleaning the garage, and Arthur accepts.
While cleaning, Mrs. Tibble mistakes it for a garage sale and offers him ten dollars for a necklace. He accepts and buys the moon boots, but then feels guilty for already buying them before being paid for cleaning the garage. Mr. Read then reveals that he'd bought the necklace for Mrs. Read's birthday, so Arthur runs to Mrs. Tibble's house and promises to repay her once he returns the moon boots if she gives the necklace back. However, he then sees a tree in her yard shedding leaves, and gets the idea to instead keep the moon boots and earn the necklace back by raking her leaves.
Tropes for this episode include:
- The Conscience: Pal gives Arthur a look when David tells them the missing necklace (which, unbeknownst to him, his son sold) was a special gift for Jane. Arthur asks him if he thinks David will forget about the necklace. Pal asserts no in dog-speak (or at least Arthur interprets his bark as a no), and this motivates Arthur to go to Mrs. Tibble and explain the situation.
- Cue the Rain: It rains right after two failed money-making attempts.
- Failure Montage: We see one of Arthur trying to raise money to buy the moon boots with a curbside business outside his house. First he tries a lemonade stand, but a stray dog steals his lemons; next he tries a kissing booth, but the neighborhood girls make fun of him for that; then he tries a fortune-telling booth, but it ends up raining on him. Lampshaded when Arthur's mom gives him a sympathy kiss..."Why couldn't you have done that when I had the kissing booth?"
- Manipulative Bastard: Heavily downplayed with Arthur, but Arthur eventually realizes that Grandma Thora often gives him money when he brings her flowers and decides to use this to his advantage to earn the money for the moon boots. But it turns out Arthur's parents had anticipated this, and not wanting him to get the impression that it's okay to take advantage of the good nature of others, they call Grandma Thora in advance and tell her not to give him any money at all if he brings her flowers.
- Not What It Looks Like: Jane tells Arthur that if he cleans the garage, she'll give him a few dollars. As Arthur is doing so, Mrs. Tibble is taking a stroll and mistakes it for a sale. she then offers ten dollars for a necklace. Arthur can't resist and sells it.
- Shout-Out:
- Arthur sees a toy truck that can change shape, referencing Transformers.
- Toys resembling Ernie and Bert from Sesame Street can be seen.
- Spoiled Brat: Downplayed with Muffy; she's civil to Arthur on seeing him at the toy store. Arthur notes that her dad is able to buy her practically the whole toy store if she asks, which he saw her doing. Mr. Crosswire is quite happy to carry everything rather than delegate it to a courier or ask for delivery.
- Sweet and Sour Grapes: At first, it seems as though Arthur's going to have to return his new Moon Boots in order to get back his mother's necklace from the Tibble Twins' grandmother. But she thankfully thinks up a compromise that will help him get the necklace and keep the Moon Boots; she says she needs help raking leaves in her yard. He'll earn the necklace on raking her leaves using the Moon Boots.
