The twelfth episode of the fourth season of Rocko's Modern Life.
Hypno-Puppy Luv
Rocko is hypnotized into acting like a dog, and ends up becoming Mrs. Bighead's new pet before his friends can snap him out of it.
Driving Mrs. Wolfe
Rocko finds himself shanghaied into teaching Virginia how to drive... in George's shiny new sports car.
"Hypno-Puppy Luv" provides examples of:
- Brainwashed and Crazy: Heffer uses his hypnotism kit to make Rocko act like a dog. Unfortunately, he can't reverse the spell right away because the instructions for that are in Book #2, which he has to send away for.
- Brick Joke: When Heffer orders Book #2 to reverse the hypnotism spell, he also orders a pair of X-Ray specs. At the end of the episode, he wears and uses them on his friends, much to their horror.
- Clothing Damage: When Rocko gets run over by a street sweeper, it frizzes his fur, making him look like a shaggy dog. His shirt becomes damaged and falls off, leaving him naked. When Heffer and Filburt later find Rocko's shirt with a tire track on it, they assume that Rocko has been run over.
- Continuity Nod:
- This episode begins with Heffer reading a Bunnyman comic book.
- When Mrs. Bighead first meets the hypnotized Rocko, she finds him eating out of Mr. Bighead's salmon bushes.
- Crying a River: Mrs. Bighead befriends a hypnotized Rocko, whom she believes is a dog. When he runs away (really Heffer and Filbert saving him), Mrs. Bighead is so distraught that the water from her tears breaks the windows and floods her bedroom. Mr. Bighead has to use a boat to reach her and give her a goldfish to calm her down; it wasn't the dog she loved, but it won her heart all the same.
- Drowning My Sorrows: When Heffer and Filburt find Rocko's flattened shirt, they assume Rocko is dead and go to a diner to drown their sorrows in soft drinks. Eventually, the manager tells them that they're going to have to leave, as his shift's over.
- Hand-or-Object Underwear: At the end of the episode, when Rocko is back to his normal self, he is horrified to find that he is both shaved and naked. He then uses Heffer's turban to cover his body, which Mrs. Bighead thinks makes him look attractive.
- Hypno Fool: Heffer hypnotizes Rocko into being a dog, but can't snap him out of it until he orders the second volume of the instruction book.
- Inelegant Blubbering: Heffer and Filburt do this when Mrs. Bighead finds them and asks them what they're doing out so late.
- Iris Out: This episode ends with one on Heffer after he, wearing the X-Ray specs he ordered, says, "I can see all of you!" to the viewers.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Mr. Bighead isn't fond of "Fluffy", and when Mrs. Bighead assumes that he ran away because he left the door open (Heffer and Filburt were really saving him), he is at first thrilled that Fluffy left, but this makes Mrs. Bighead so upset, she floods her house with her tears. He brings her a goldfish to cheer her up, and while it wasn't the dog she loved, it still won her heart all the same (especially when the fish gave her big Puppy-Dog Eyes).
- Mistaken for Dog: When Rocko is hypnotized by Heffer into acting like a dog, he is run over by a street sweeper, giving him the appearance of a shaggy dog. When Mrs. Bighead sees him, she mistakes him for a dog and adopts him as her pet, naming him "Fluffy".
- Never Say "Die": When Heffer and Filburt find Rocko's shirt with a tire track on it, Heffer says that Rocko is a road waffle.
- Puppy-Dog Eyes: Rocko, thinking he's a dog, gives these to Bev Bighead when told to get out of the salmon bushes, persuading her to adopt Rocko and name him Fluffy. Later after Heffer and Filburt take back Rocko and Bev gets really upset, Ed brings Bev a goldfish also named Fluffy, and initially Bev is not thrilled, until the fish gives Bev the same big eyes "Fluffy" gave Bev earlier, and thus instantly wins her heart.
- Time-Passes Montage: One is shown when Heffer mails his order for a hypnotism kit, and waits by his mailbox for a whole day before getting it.
"Driving Mrs. Wolfe" provides examples of:
- Accidental Art: Virginia and Rocko just avoid being part of a huge pile-up in the demolition derby. When Virginia looks up at the totaled cars balance on top of each other, she comments, "Well, look at that? It's very artistic."
- Action Prologue: The episode opens right on the demolition derby, with Virginia and Rocko driving right towards The Thrasher. But just as Rocko is screaming, the action freezes and Rocko walks up "on stage" briefly explaining the scenario, and then proceeds to go into a flashback on how it all began, with when George Wolfe had bought the new car.
- The Alleged Car: Rocko's car becomes this as a result of Virginia's terrible driving. After Rocko and Virginia get out, the bumper and wheels fall off and it bursts into flames, then gets hit by a meteor.
- Bait-and-Switch: This episode begins with what looks like George driving Virginia in his new sports car, saying there's nothing like owning a new car. Peter then walks up to them and says "Yeah, except maybe driving it.", revealing that George's new car is parked in his driveway.
- The Cameo: Ralph Bighead appears at the demolition derby as part of the audience. He can be seen sitting behind Cindy and to the left of the Wild Pig.
- Drives Like Crazy: Because Virginia never learned how to drive, she has to take driving lessons from Rocko. When Rocko teaches her how to drive around lamp posts, she drives right into them and pushes them aside. While she successfully makes it through speeding traffic, she drives into a fire hydrant. When Rocko teaches her how to parallel park, she drives on top of the cars (and a building), eventually landing in the designated space upside down. She later drives onto a railroad crossing as the warning lights are flashing, resulting in a train hitting Rocko's car, and by the end of the lesson, Rocko's car has become The Alleged Car. Her driving thankfully improves when she decides to take George's new car to get Rocko home, but that's not saying much, as she drives into a demolition derby that the rest of the Wolfe family are attending.
- Failed a Spot Check: George builds a high-tech security system to keep the key to his new car in to keep anyone but him from driving the new car. Virginia is able to easily disable it simply by pulling out the plug.
- Goo Goo Getup: When George is horrified to find that Virginia has driven his new car into the demolition derby, he at one point dresses in a diaper and a bonnet while sucking his thumb and hugging a teddy bear.
- Hidden Depths: To keep anyone but him from driving his new car, George builds a high-tech security system to put the key in. Virginia asks George when he built it, and George tells her he did last night.Peter: Dad's got too much free time.
- How We Got Here: The episode begins at the demolition derby with Virginia and Rocko charging at the Thrasher followed by a freeze frame and Rocko telling the audience "Yeah that's me, speeding headlong towards certain destruction with Heff's mom at the wheel. How did I get into improbable situation? It all started a few days ago, you see Heff's dad had finally bought a new car." Cue flashback.
- Hydrant Geyser: A Running Gag throughout the episode: when Mrs. Wolfe drives into a hydrant after driving through some fast-moving traffic, the water from it floods Rocko's car. This happens again in a later scene when Rocko and Virginia come to a street sign with a hydrant on it, and near the end of the episode, this happens to The Thrasher when he drives into it at the demolition derby.
- Losing a Shoe in the Struggle: When Rocko offers to teach Virginia how to drive, Virginia pulls Rocko out of his clothes, then reaches from offscreen to grab them.
- No One Should Survive That!: Rocko and Virginia were able to easily survive being struck by a speeding train without even a scratch on their bodies, thanks to wearing their seatbelts. (In real life, even if you had your seatbelt on you can still be injured or even killed if you were in a vehicle being hit by a train.) And despite what Virginia said, Rocko's car did not fair the collision very well.
- Parallel Parking: When Rocko teaches Virginia how to do this, she doesn't do such a great job. She parks on top of other cars and the roof of a building, and while she eventually lands in the designated space, she does it upside down.
- The Precious, Precious Car: George really loves his new car, so much he won't let anyone else drive it. So of course, Virginia takes it and ends up in a demolition derby. Amazingly, it doesn't get a lick of damage... until it's back inside the garage and all the shelves give way.
- Railroad Tracks of Doom: When Rocko teaches Virginia how to drive, Virginia ends up stopping on a railroad crossing just as a speeding train is coming. Fortunately, they were wearing their seatbelts. What made it even worse is that Virginia refused to move the car off the tracks because Rocko was yelling at her that the train was coming.
- Reveal Shot: When the rest of the Wolfe family all talk about driving George's new car over dinner, Hiram wants to drive it as well. When Peter says, "Yeah, right, Grandpa.", only Hiram's head is in the shot. In the next scene, Hiram is revealed to be in an iron lung, revealing he's in no condition to drive.Hiram: I'll steer with my gums!
- Sanity Slippage: Among seeing that Virginia has driven his new car into the demolition derby, George gets horrified and descends into this in the most comical manner, getting worse each time: at one point he's dressed in Goo Goo Getup while sucking his thumb, and then later he's shown in a straitjacket and chuckling dementedly. When Virginia and the the Thrasher are driving towards each other, George is lying in a hospital bed hooked up to life support. By the time Virginia and Rocko win the demolition derby, George has faked his own death, but springs back to normal out of his casket among hearing the good news, startling the undertakers closing his casket in the process.
- Seesaw Catapult: At the demolition derby, a man complains that he can't see in front of the elephant with a guzzler helmet in front of him. ("Hey, you in the hat! I can't see!") A car lands on the other end of the bench the elephant is sitting on, launching the elephant into the air. When a man complains that the car is now obstructing his view ("Hey, you in the car! I can't see!"), the elephant falls back down, launching the car into the air.
- "Shaggy Dog" Story: George buys a new car and forbids anyone else from driving it. Virginia, who had been taking driving lessons from Rocko, borrows it and ends up in a demolition derby, which George happens to be attending. Not only does she win the derby, she does so without getting so much as a single scratch on the car. A relieved George puts the car back in the garage and closes the door... wherein all the shelves give way and dump everything on top of the car, damaging it.
- Shout-Out: This episode's title is a reference to the 1989 film, Driving Miss Daisy.
- Shown Their Work: During the railroad crossing scene, the train appears to be moving quite slowly as it approaches the crossing, but then when we see it actually hit Rocko's car, it's revealed the train is going very fast. This is Truth in Television, as it's a common optical illusion where an approaching speeding vehicle of any sort (cars, trains, planes, etc.) initially appears to be moving slower than it actually is, thus making it nearly impossible to accurately judge an approaching train's speed and distance (and has caused quite a few real-life crossing accidents this way.)
- Too Dumb to Live:
- At the railroad crossing scene; Rocko is so terrified when they are stopped on the tracks and a train's approaching that he's yelling for Virginia to move the car, to which she won't do anything due to being flustered by his yelling. It never crosses their minds that they could've just gotten out of the car and away from the tracks, which is what's recommended if your car is stuck on a crossing and a train is coming with no time to stop.
- Either Virginia needs new eyeglasses, or she doesn't even realize that she drove George's new car right into a demolition derby. She even mistakes the competing cars for bad traffic.
- Vehicular Combat: Near the end of the episode, Virginia drives George's new car into a demolition derby that the rest of the Wolfe Family attends. George is horrified when he finds out. Fortunately for him, Virginia manages to win the derby without getting even a single scratch on the car.
- Visual Pun: When Rocko and Virginia come to a street sign that says SLOW CHILDREN PLAYING, two children in front of them slowly pass a ball to each other (with even the ball moving at a slow speed and not falling to the ground).
