Awakening from a century-long slumber, Gaia is dismayed to find that pollution has worsened while she slept. Deciding that it's time, she sends five rings to five chosen young people and creates the Planeteers.
This episode includes examples of the following tropes:
- Accent Interest: Upon meeting Linka, Wheeler says "Love your accent, babe. You Russian?". Linka gets upset at being called Russian (she is Russian, but prefers to be called a "Soviet").
- Actually Pretty Funny: When Gaia welcomes the team to Hope Island after first summoning them, Wheeler immediately calls her "lady" and casually demands an explanation. Despite acknowledging that it took the drama out of the moment, Gaia is more amused than irritated by his insouciance.
- All Animals Are Dogs: When Linka mentions non-monetary benefits of helping the environment, the oil-soaked walrus Wheeler is cleaning starts licking his face like a happy dog, getting him to concede her point. It also accepts Wheeler hugging it, something a dog might do but not a wild animal.
- Avengers Assemble: When Gaia sends out the rings, the viewer sees a brief montage of how the future team members find them, presumably from her perspective, which doubles as a shorthand to introduce the Planeteers' personalities and interests to the viewer.
- Kwame, who wields the power of Earth, accidentally puts his staff through his ring while planting saplings in Africa, establishing his passion for preventing deforestation.
- Wheeler, who wields the power of Fire, gets his catapulted into his hand by a Trashcan Bonfire after saving a man from a mugger, showing his more confrontational personality and fundamentally heroic nature.
- Linka, who wields the power of Wind, gets her ring delivered by a bird while mimicking its song on her keyboard, foreshadowing her status as a friend to all flying things.
- Gi, who wields the power of Water, receives her ring from a dolphin with which she's playing catch, establishing the love for creatures of the ocean that drives her for most of the series.
- Ma-Ti, who wields the power of Heart, gets his ring handed to him by his future pet Suchi after protecting him from a jaguar, establishing his status as a Friend to All Living Things.
- Bring It: After yanking the chain out of a mugger's hand, Wheeler holds out a fist and grins confidently at the now-disarmed thug, sending him scurrying back whence he came.
- Complaining About Rescues They Don't Like: Wheeler isn't happy when Gi utterly soaks everyone except Gaia while using her powers for the first time to put out a fire his powers accidentally started.
- Dug Too Deep: Inverted. When Hoggish Greedly and Rigger use a titanic machine to drill for oil along the shore, their drill goes so deep into the Earth it causes Gaia, the sleeping Spirit of Earth, to wake up and take action.
- Early-Installment Weirdness:
- The Planeteers' accents are all noticeably heavier than they will be later in the show, and Gi actually has a soft accent as opposed to later when she speaks unaccented English.
- Gi, not Linka, calls Wheeler "Yankee" when getting exasperated with him.
- Captain Planet is missing his boots. He won't get them for good until the eighth episode.
- Giant Foot of Stomping: Greedly tries to crush Captain Planet with his mecha after incapacitating him with waste, but unfortunately for him, Wheeler, Kwame and Ma-Ti collaborate to shove a boulder underneath.
- Grin of Audacity: As part of his Establishing Character Moment, Wheeler breaks up a mugging with a confident smile that immediately makes the thug much less sure of himself.
- Humongous Mecha: Hoggish Greedly and Rigger plan to obtain colossal amounts of crude oil in a very short amount of time with a mobile oil rig. It towers over the trees and almost smashes a rabbit who is ant-sized in comparison, but it still proves to be no match for Captain Planet.
- Insistent Terminology:
- Wheeler: Love your accent, babe! You Russian?Linka: Soviet. Please, go away!
- Kidnapped by the Call: Though the Planeteers quickly accept their mission once Gaia explains what's going on, they get to Hope Island in the first place when Gaia summons them without more warning than a strange ring appearing in their part of the world while they're doing ordinary things.
- Love at First Sight: Wheeler's years-long quest to win Linka over starts when he gets his first good look at her.
- Mother Nature: Gaia laments about what she as a mother is supposed to do after waking up and beginning to discover the damage done to the world while she was sleeping.
- Mundane Solution: When Captain Planet is downed, Gi tries to use her ring to wash him off, only to discover it doesn't work while the Captain has her powers. Linka drags her to the ocean to retrieve some water in her vest.
- Mundane Utility: Wheeler uses his ring to heat up a bucket of water he's using to wash a walrus.
- National Geographic Nudity: A non-fanservice example; Ma-Ti is dressed in nothing but a pair of blue shorts, a tribal necklace and a few armbands before Gaia summons the team to Hope Island and gives them uniforms (of sorts).
- Outside-Context Problem: Rigger is utterly flummoxed when Captain Planet shows up for the first time, questioning what he is. Greedly recognizes him as "trouble" and tries to escape. A later episode would establish Greedly's grandfather had encountered Captain Planet in the past so he might have heard stories explaining how he's not as taken aback and immediately knows Planet is probably going to try to bust them.
- Recruit Teenagers with Attitude: Gaia recruits five teenagers with next to no previous experience fighting evil (unless one counts Wheeler and Ma-Ti, who are seen scaring off a mugger and a jaguar in their first scenes). On the good side, they were able to summon a superhero when things got too tough. The Planeteers were the generation that was going to grow up to inherit a polluted planet, like the intended audience, so it made sense for Gaia to teach people of that generation to take care of it.
- The Scottish Trope: Wheeler casually uses the word "fire", causing his ring to activate. Ma-Ti then tells him he shouldn't say "fire" unless he intends to use his powers.
- The Soft-Hearted Warrior: Wheeler makes his entrance yanking the chain out of a thug's hand as said thug tries to attack a bystander and then making a Bring It pose when the thug turns around to see what happened. However, once the thug flees the scene, Wheeler doesn't see any reason to chase him, instead laughing and placing himself in front of the intended victim before getting distracted by the ring dropping into his hand.
- Universal Driver's License: Gi does have a driver's license, but it's unlikely it would cover aircrafts such as the Geo-Cruiser. Despite this, she has absolutely no problem flying and landing the machine.
- Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Downplayed; Wheeler does ask for an explanation immediately after being welcomed to Hope Island, but his tone is still unusually casual for someone who's just been magically summoned by an earth spirit to an island that doesn't appear on any maps.Gaia [chuckling]: So much for drama.
- Vine Swing: As a jaguar encroaches on Suchi, who is struggling desperately to escape from a tangle of vines, Ma-Ti swings in on another vine and drops down in front of the cat, scaring it away.
- We Will Meet Again: Greedly escapes, cursing out Captain Planet and promising to return.
- Wounded Hero, Weaker Helper: During their first encounter, Greedly splatters Captain Planet with some oil, downing him. The boys stand guard and keep Greedly from finishing him off while Linka and Gi run for water.
