The sixth episode of the third season of Hey Arnold!.
Curly Snaps
Curly is outraged when Sid is chosen to be the ball monitor instead of him, so he snaps, steals all of the school's dodgeballs, and takes over Principal Wartz's office, refusing to come out unless his demands are met, and pelting anyone who tries to stop him with dodgeballs.
Pre-teen Scream
When Phoebe wins a chance to meet Ronnie Matthews, her favorite songwriter, she finds out that he doesn't write or sing his own songs and is little more than a self-centered pretty face.
"Curly Snaps" provides examples of:
- Counting to Three: Principal Wartz counts to three in an unsuccessful attempt to get Curly to leave his office. At first glance it appears to have worked, as the doorknob turns, but as it turns out, Curly had lured Wartz into a false sense of security and instead tossed dodgeballs at everyone.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Curly takes the school's dodgeballs and takes over Principal Wartz's office all because Mr. Simmons accidentally skipped over his turn for ball monitor.
- Dodgeball Is Hell: A variant; when Curly finds out that Sid has been chosen to be the ball monitor instead of him, he takes all of the school's dodgeballs and takes over Principal Wartz's office, refusing to come out unless his demands are met, and pelting anyone who tries to stop him with dodgeballs.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: Curly locking himself in Principal Wartz's office with the school's dodgeballs until his demands are met play out very much like a hostage situation, complete with Arnold as the negotiator. Stinky even refers to it as such.
- Dramatic Thunder: A thunderstorm breaks out when Curly takes over Principal Wartz's office.
- Evil Is Petty: Curly goes bananas over Mr. Simmons accidentally giving Sid the ball monitor position instead of him.
- "Here's Johnny!" Homage: Curly shouts "Here's Curly!" as he pelts Principal Wartz with a dodgeball.
- Serious Business: Curly was obsessed over being "ball monitor" (the kid whose job is to hand out and collect all the kickballs before and after recess) for a week. While every other kid thought it was a mediocre or boring chore, Curly thought it was an admirable and highly respected position. He ends up going crazy and locking himself in the principal's office in protest just because Mr. Simmons accidentally skipped his turn.
- Shout-Out: When Curly locks himself in Principal Wartz's office and refuses to come out, he paraphrases Howard Beale in Network by saying "I'm mad as Heck, and I'm not going to take it anymore!"
- Spoof Aesop: This exchange:Mr. Simmons: I think we all learned a valuable lesson here today.
Helga: Yep. Don't ever trust the quiet ones. They'll go bonkers and hole up in the principal's office. - Villain Has a Point: It goes without saying that Curly is going overboard trying to rectify what he deems an injustice. However, during negotiations, Mr. Simmons discovers that indeed he did make an error in judgment when he accidentally skipped Curly and made Sid the monitor instead.
"Pre-teen Scream" provides examples of:
- Accidental Misnaming: Ronnie Matthews constantly refers to Helga and Phoebe as "Elga" and "Phoby", respectively.
- Both Sides Have a Point: This exchange between Helga and Phoebe when the former finds the latter unhappy after the concert:Helga: Hey, Phoebs, come on, what's eatin' you?
Phoebe: What's eating me? You really want to know? All week, you make fun of me for liking Ronnie Matthews and wanting to go to his concert, and the only reason you even go with me is to get free food, and then you meet him and suddenly, he's the greatest thing in the world because he's rich and has, like, a million cars, and then you two are old pals, laughing and... and dancing!
Helga: Hey! Hey-hey-hey-hey-hey! You were the one begging me to go with you! You said he was the voice of our generation, not me!
Phoebe: Well, I thought he was!
Helga: Well, that's not my fault, is it?
Phoebe: (Diffused) No, it's not. It's just... that music, those lyrics. They were so beautiful. How could I have been so stupid?
Helga: Oh, come on, Phoebe, you're not stupid. So he wasn't the guy you thought he was. Anybody could be fooled by a handsome face, even someone as smart as you.
Phoebe: You're right. I guess you should never meet your heroes.
Helga: Yeah, I guess when you stop and think about it, Ronnie was kind of dorky, wasn't he?
Phoebe: He kept calling me Phoby. - Broken Pedestal: In this episode, Phoebe gets to meet pop singer Ronnie Matthews, whom she idolizes for his lyrics which she thinks are deep and meaningful. She's devastated when it turns out he doesn't write or even sing his own music—he just gets paid to lip-sync and pretend to play the guitar. Simultaneously inverts the trope, as this causes Helga to admire him due to how he's managed to make so much money scamming people.
- Costume-Test Montage: Phoebe goes through one while trying to decide what to wear to the Ronnie Matthews concert. The costumes she tries on are a country music singer, a karate instructor, a hippie, and a pageant princess, before eventually settling on a red sweater.
- Food as Bribe: Phoebe manages to get a reluctant Helga to come with her to the Ronnie Matthews concert by telling her there'll be free food for them.
- Hidden Depths: Principal Wartz is revealed to be a fan of Ronnie Matthews, and even writes his and mails his own entry for the contest, whispering to himself that he hopes that he wins.
- Hourglass Plot: This episode begins with Phoebe seeing Ronnie Matthews as her idol and Helga disliking him. When Ronnie reveals his true nature to them, Phoebe is disappointed that he was not who she thought he was, but Helga is impressed at how rich and famous he has become from scamming people.
- Jerkass Has a Point: When Phoebe invites Helga to join her at the Ronnie Matthews concert, Helga refuses to come, calling Ronnie a lame, no-talent guitar player despite Phoebe's insistence that Ronnie's an accomplished guitarist who writes uniquely intelligent lyrics. It turns out that Helga was right about Ronnie.
- "Meet the Celebrity" Contest: Phoebe wins an evening with pop star Ronnie Matthews, only to be disappointed when she finds out that he’s a vain, egotistical fraud who not only doesn’t write his own songs, but can’t even really sing.
- Not So Above It All: More-or-less the underlying moral of the story. Phoebe tries to pretend that she's not so interested in Ronnie Matthews in front of all the other kids, hiding her interest in him like a guilty pleasure. When it's announced that she was chosen for the "Meet the Celebrity" Contest, she pretends that it was simply good fortune in front of her friends. ...and is over the moon at the news! However, after she learns that Ronnie's a dishonest fraud, she beats herself up for believing Ronnie was a talented musician because he looked the part. Helga has to spell it out for Phoebe that she's not stupid for falling head over heels for Ronnie. If anything, Helga lampshades that it's more to do with this trope: anyone is capable of being deceived by good looks, even intelligent people.
- Signs of Disrepair: Ronnie stops at Joe's Eats for dinner. On the restaurant is a sign that says "GOOD FOD", since one of the Os in "FOOD" fell off it.
- That Syncing Feeling: Ronnie reveals to Phoebe and Helga that he lip-syncs all of his songs to a recording of someone else singing them.
- You Are Better Than You Think You Are: Towards the end, Phoebe's hard on herself for believing Ronnie Matthews was truly talented and his songs were meaningful. She thinks she's stupid for falling for him, but Helga begs to differ. The way she sees it, Phoebe falling under Ronnie's spell had less to do with being unintelligent and more to do with being like everyone else.
