Recap / Captain Planet And The Planeteers S 3 E 10 Hog Tide

During a stormy day on Hope Island, Gaia entertains the Planeteers with a tale from the 1940s of when a past generation of Planeteers helped stop Hoggish Greedly's grandfather, Don Porkaloin, and Dr. Blight's grandmother, Betty, from destroying a beach.

This episode includes examples of the following tropes:

• Arbitrary Skepticism: Despite wielding a magic ring and interacting with two powerful nature spirits on a regular basis, Wheeler questions quite a few elements of Gaia's tale. She eventually gets a little exasperated with him.
  Gaia: Wheeler, who's telling this story, you or me?
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: Captain Planet sings his own theme song.
• Cement Shoes: Three of the proto-Planeteers – Wally, Niko and Li – get captured and tied up with their feet in cement.
• Framing Device: The actual plot of the episode is the story that Gaia tells to entertain the Planeteers when they're stuck inside during a storm.
• Identical Grandson: Three times. Don Porkaloin, Rex Rigger I, and Betty Blight all look the same as their respective grandchildren, save for small details like Don's mustache.
• Ship Tease: Between Niko and Lydia, Wheeler's and Linka's respective counterparts. Wheeler eventually asks enthusiastically if the two ended up marrying each other, but Gaia refuses to elaborate on this.
  Gaia: Now, stop pestering me for details. The storm's over, so go out; enjoy the sun.
• Similar Squad: The "proto-Planeteers" from Gaia's tale are shown on screen as the present-time team – Wally is Kwame's counterpart, Niko is Wheeler's, and so on. Gaia justifies it by saying that the Planeteers remind her of those people from the 1940s.
• Unreliable Narrator: It's not clear whether or not the story told by Gaia is completely true. At the end of the episode, Wheeler even says that she probably was "pulling [their] legs". Linka believes that it's not really important, though.
  Linka: You missed the point of her story. [...] It is not smart to build so close to the water.
• You Remind Me of X: Whenever Gaia introduces a new proto-Planeteer into her tale, she says that the character in question was a lot like one of her Planeteers. In order of appearance: Niko^note Wheeler, Lydia^note Linka, Wally^note Kwame, Li^note Gi and Asi^note Ma-Ti.