The twenty-fourth episode of the third season of Rugrats (1991).
Kid TV
After Stu breaks the TV, the babies cut a hole in a box and pretend to have their own TV shows.
The Sky Is Falling
Angelica convinces the babies that the world is ending, and that they have to do what she says in order to be safe.
"Kid TV" provides examples of:
- Always Someone Better: Stu is chagrined that his competitor has come up with a better version of his Transformo toy.
- Brick Joke: When the box that Stu tries to put the TV in is just barely too small, he tosses it on the floor. Didi scolds him for it, saying that he might set a bad example for the children by hitting something and break it, unaware that he had already done that by accidentally breaking the television. When Chuckie competes on the "Getting in Trouble" game show, he's worried that he might accidentally break something if he throws the ball Tommy gives him. Tommy tells him it won't be his fault, since Stu set a bad example.
- Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: When Stu and Didi find the babies having a lot of fun playing with the box, this exchange occurs.
- Hypocritical Humor: When the TV breaks, Didi asks Stu what's wrong. Angelica tries to tell Didi what happened, when Stu interrupts her to tell her that Didi was talking to him and that it's impolite to interrupt. It's not lost on Angelica, who just grins in a cheeky manner.
- Imagine Spot: Shown when the babies imagine their own TV shows.
- Incest Subtext: Phil and Lil pretend they're lovers in a soap opera. Acting out a big dramatic scene, too.
- Kids Prefer Boxes: Stu throws his half-finished invention at the TV after seeing a commercial from a competitor, breaking the TV as a result. The biggest box he has is just barely too small to fit the TV, so the babies make a TV out of the cardboard box and make their own shows, including a game show, a news program, and a soap opera.
- Literal-Minded: Angelica, not realizing what a soap opera is (she assumes that it's like a regular opera), comes on wearing a Viking outfit and singing about how if it's an opera, they have to sing.
- Shoot the Television: A variant; when Stu sees a commercial for Miracular, a toy from his competitor, he throws Transformo, his similar but half-finished invention, at the television in frustration, destroying them both.
- Toilet Humor: During Chuckie's "Evening News with Chuck Finster" sketch, Phil whispers in Chuckie's ear that Lil had her diapers changed seven times in one day.
"The Sky Is Falling" provides examples of:
- An Aesop: Don't believe everything you hear or see.
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Angelica's description of the End of the World to the babies;Angelica: First the sky fell, then rivers overflowed, mountains crumbled, and finally... all the TV shows were cancelled.
Babies: [gasp] - Artistic License – Physics: Angelica leads the babies into thinking the sky will someday fall. Scientifically speaking, this is impossible, as the “sky” is simply the air that makes up the Earth’s atmosphere. Its blue color is simply the result of blue light becoming more scattered due to being a bit shorter wavelengths than the other colors.
- Believing Their Own Lies: Angelica talks the babies thinking that the sky is going to fall someday, only to believe it herself when a tennis ball hit by Stu falls on her head.
- Big Brother Instinct: A twin sister variant; When Angelica builds a fallout shelter, she chooses Tommy, Chuckie, and Lil to join her in it, but not Phil. Lil decides that if Phil isn't allowed in Angelica's shelter, she doesn't want to be in it, either. This also convinces Tommy and Chuckie to leave as well. Angelica reconsiders and lets all four of the babies in.
- Broken Glass Penalty: Averted. Stu and Chas break many of the DeVille's windows playing tennis, but it's never mentioned what retribution they get for doing so.
- Call-Back: When Angelica describes to the babies what the future will be like for them, they come to the ruins of the Toy Palace from the episode of the same name.
- Contrived Coincidence: The babies believe the sky is falling when Angelica gets hit by a tennis ball. They soon believe the sky to have fallen when another tennis ball hits Spike, causing him to knock over the trash cans and cause an apple tree to rain apples on their shelter.
- Dog Food Diet: While looking through the kitchen for delicious food, Chuckie eats from a box of dog biscuits.
- The End of the World as We Know It: The babies believe the world is coming to an end due to thinking the sky was falling.
- Laser-Guided Karma: When Angelica believes the world to have ended, she decides to build an indoor swimming pool in Tommy's living room by having Phil and Lil bring in the garden hose. She and the babies then search the kitchen for delicious food, making a mess of it. When Stu and Chas go back into Tommy's house, they are shocked to find the state of the kitchen and living room, and make Angelica help them clean up the mess she and the babies made.
- Mistaken for Apocalypse: Angelica tries to convince the babies that the sky is going to fall, but soon starts to believe it when Stu accidentally hits her with a tennis ball.
- Screams Like a Little Girl: Stu when he notices the mess Angelica made in the house.
- Shout-Out: Angelica's fantasy sequence of the apocalypse parodies Mad Max. In 2015, the Nick Rewind YouTube channel posted this sequence to coincide with the release of Mad Max: Fury Road.
- That Poor Cat: When Chas plays tennis with Stu by bouncing the tennis ball against the garage door, the ball flies offscreen and a cat yowls.
