A Message in a Bottle
"A message in a bottle!"
Huckle discovers a message in a bottle with an SOS.This episode includes examples of:
- Conveniently Interrupted Document: The letter the kids find in a bottle is damaged to the point where they can’t make out the full message but think it’s referring to a shipwreck.
- "Everybody Laughs" Ending: The episode ends with everybody laughing after Sailor Shane makes a joke about burying Mrs. Cat’s apple pie in his stomach.
- Message in a Bottle: Huckle and his friends are playing pirates when they find a bottle with a message in it floating in the water.
- Nobody Calls Me "Chicken"!: Huckle is able to dissuade his friends from telling the coast guard about the shipwrecked sailor and convinces them to join him in going to rescue him themselves by accusing them of not being “brave pirates”.
- Not Now, Kiddo: Huckle tries to tell his parents about the message for help that he found, but they think he’s just playing a game and rush off to make it to the post office before it closes. They do apologize later for not listening.
- Pirate Episode: In this episode, Huckle, Hilda, Billy, and Lowly all pretend to be pirates and, when they find a message in a bottle, they even get to visit a real shipwreck.
- "Reading Is Cool" Aesop: The kids need to figure out what the rest of the message says before they can help the shipwrecked sailor, so they go to the library and use what they learn in the books they find there to piece the clues together.Huckle: I’m sure glad that we can read and spell! If we couldn’t, we’d never be able to figure out what the message says.
- Robinsonade: This episode focuses on the kids receiving a message in a bottle from a sailor that’s shipwrecked on an island. When they go off to rescue him, their raft pops and they get stranded as well.
- Stating the Simple Solution: Hilda suggests that they tell the coast guard about the shipwreck so that she can save him, but Huckle wants them to be the heroes.
- Talk Like a Pirate: Sailor Shane speaks like this, despite being a sailor instead of a pirate.
Santa Needs Help
"Now they're both broken!"
Hilda writes her own Christmas story.This episode includes examples of:
- Christmas Episode: This episode takes place during Christmas time and focuses on a story Hilda wrote about a girl who helps Santa on Christmas Eve.
- Cutting Back to Reality: The scenes cut back to Hilda reading her story to her friends every time one of them has a question or comment, which is often in Lowly’s case.
- Dreaming of a White Christmas: Not only is Busytown covered in snow to fit the episode’s holiday theme, it’s also snowing in Sleepytown where Hilda’s story takes place. In fact, this is what causes Santa trouble on Christmas Eve.
- "Eureka!" Moment: Hilda realizes she can help Santa with the broken runners on his sleigh when she spots her skis leaning up by her front door.
- Exhaustion-Induced Idiocy: Mr. Fixit is so tired when Sergeant Murphy wakes him up in the middle of the night to help Santa, that he actually breaks off the other runner on his sleigh instead of fixing the broken one.
- Her Code Name Was "Mary Sue": Hilda ends her story by pointing out all the wonderful characteristics of her self-insert character.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Hilda, who’s so excited for the skiing party she’s throwing on Christmas day, selflessly gives up her skis to fix the runners on Santa’s sleigh and save the holiday.
- It's the Best Whatever, Ever!: The episode ends with the kids telling Hilda that her story was the “best Christmas story ever!”
- Self-Insert Fic: The main character in Hilda’s story just so happens to also be a hippo named Hilda.
- Sweet and Sour Grapes: In order to save Christmas for the rest of Busytown, Hilda gives up the skis she was very excited to use at the skiing party she’s hosting the next day. She sadly accepts that she just won’t be able to go to her own party. She’s very excited to find on Christmas morning that Santa has gifted her a brand new pair of skis as a thank you.
- Title Drop: The title of the episode is what Hilda’s story is titled as well.
There Really Is an Easter Bunny
"Okay, don't let them see you."
Everyone is excited for the Easter egg hunt except for Huckle, Billy, and Lowly.This episode includes examples of:
- Catch a Falling Star: Billy catches Lowly when he falls from the sky after being shot by the rocket launcher.
- Easter Bunny: Huckle and Lowly become disillusioned with Easter when Billy tells them that the Easter Bunny doesn’t exist and that egg hunts are for little kids.
- Easter Episode: This episode takes place on Easter as Busytown gets ready for its annual egg hunt.
- Five-Second Foreshadowing: While they’re dying eggs, Mrs. Cat points out that one bowl has boiled eggs and the other has raw eggs. The bowl Sally ends up picking from for the eggs she’s going to sneak into the boys’ pockets to convince them the Easter Bunny is real of course ends up being the one with raw eggs.
- Losing a Shoe in the Struggle: When Lowly accidentally gets shot into the sky by the toy rocket launcher, his shoe flies off him which Bridget promptly puts an egg in.
- The Man in the Moon: Discussed. Billy makes a comment that the Easter Bunny isn’t real just like the Man in the Moon. Lowly then reacts in surprise that the Man in the Moon doesn’t exist.
- Not Me This Time: The boys find even more eggs in their pockets and hats and assume that it was Sally and her friends doing it again. However, they realize Sally, Bridget, and Robbie were off getting veggies to lure the Easter Bunny and they couldn’t have planted the eggs.
- Real After All: At the end of the episode, the kids see the real Easter Bunny as she leaves them eggs and eats the carrots Sally left for her.
