The thirteenth and final episode of the first season of Rugrats (1991).
Graham Canyon
Tommy, his parents, and Angelica go on a trip to the Grand Canyon, but when the parents get lost due to Angelica coloring on their road map, they encounter two con-men disguised as mechanics, and Tommy and Angelica unknowingly foil their plot.
Stu-Maker's Elves
While going into the basement to retrieve Tommy's glider, Tommy and Chuckie unknowingly fix Stu's Patty Pants doll-making machine.
"Graham Canyon" provides examples of:
- Adults Are Useless: A waitress accidentally drops a pie onto Didi's shirt, and takes her away to have it cleaned. Didi asks Stu to look after Tommy and Angelica for her, but Stu is so distracted with trying to decide what he wants to have for lunch that he doesn't even notice that Tommy and Angelica have run off.
- An Aesop:
- Always keep track of where you’re going.
- Never fall for impostor mechanics. Make sure they are trained ones.
- Closest Thing We Got: On their way to the Grand Canyon, Angelica decides that she and Tommy should color with markers. However, Tommy points out that they don't have a coloring book, so Angelica takes Stu and Didi's road map and colors on it, setting this episode's plot in motion.
- Companion Cube: This episode marks the first appearance of Cynthia, Angelica's Barbie-like doll.
- Contrived Coincidence: While Ace and Eddie attempt to scam Stu and Didi out of their money by tampering with their car, Angelica climbs into it and accidentally turns it on while looking for Cynthia. This leads Ace and Eddie to believe that the car is haunted, and they give Stu and Didi a free repair job.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: Angelica is much more abusive toward Cynthia, doing things such as throwing her on the floor or sticking her head in ice cream.
- Fat and Skinny: Ace is the fat con man, and Eddie is the skinny one.
- Laser-Guided Karma:
- Early in the episode, Angelica taunts Tommy because she has chewing gum and Tommy can't have any because he's too young. She teases him with "You're too little. You'd just swallow it." Then the car hits a bump, and Angelica accidentally swallows her gum.
- Ace and Eddie attempt to scam Stu and Didi out of their money by attempting to install a new engine, when all was really wrong with it was a loose distributor cap. When Angelica climbs into the car to look for Cynthia, she accidentally turns it on, causing Ace and Eddie to believe the car is haunted and give Stu and Didi a free repair job.
- Malaproper: Tommy pronounces Grand Canyon as "Graham Canyon", hence this episode's title. Angelica constantly reminds him that it's pronounced "Grand Canyon".
- Not Where They Thought: Tommy and Angelica wander into a garage near the diner where Stu and Didi are having lunch, and when the two toddlers reach the garage, they mistake it for the Grand Canyon.
- Read the Map Upside Down: Because of Angelica drawing on the map with a purple marker, Stu and Didi make a wrong turn due to the route to the Grand Canyon also being purple.
- Troll: After suggesting that she and Tommy color, Angelica very purposely places a single marker just out of Tommy's reach on the seat between them. After some straining, Tommy looks like he's about to actually get it when Angelica suddenly "decides" she wants that marker and snatches it away from him.
- Vacation Episode: Tommy, Angelica, Stu, and Didi attempt to take a vacation at the Grand Canyon. They never actually make it there, and at the end of the episode, they decide to go to the Clam Canyon resort instead, since it's much closer.
"Stu-Maker's Elves" provides examples of:
- An Aesop: Always keep an eye on your toys and be careful with them so you won’t lose them.
- Call-Back: A double is mentioned when Stu says that Mucklehoney Toys has commissioned him to make fifteen thousand of his Patty Pants dolls.
- Contrived Coincidence: While wandering into the basement to look for Tommy's glider, Tommy and Chuckie accidentally set Stu's machine to FORWARD, getting it to work properly.
- Failed a Spot Check: As mentioned down below, Stu failed to realize the reason his machine wasn't working properly was due to being set in reverse.
- Here We Go Again!: The episode ends with Chuckie tossing Tommy's glider, causing it to accidentally fly into the basement again. Tommy and Chuckie then simultaneously say "Uh-oh!" as the screen fades to black.
- Inventional Wisdom: Early in the episode, when Stu turns on his machine, it creates a mangled version of his Patty Pants doll, with the legs in the ears and the head on top of the upside-down body. Near the end of the episode, it is revealed that the machine has a reverse switch, and Tommy and Chuckie accidentally set it to FORWARD, causing the machine to work properly. It begs the question of why Stu never noticed this error, let alone put a reverse switch on the machine in the first place.
- Murphy's Bed: Chuckie bounces up and down on a mattress and has fun, but then bounces so much, that the mattress closes on him, leaving his head sticking out.
- Shout-Out: At one point, Tommy cries out "The plane! The plane!".
- Throw the Dog a Bone: Tommy and Chuckie inadvertently fix Stu's machine, and as a result, Stu is able to successfully mass-produce his line of Patty Pants dolls as planned.Stu: My Patty Pants machine! It works! It works!
- Vocal Evolution: Tommy's voice sounds less raspy and closer to what his voice would sound like for the rest of the series.
