Synopsis: Steve Whitmire loses a frog and then is totally unreasonable about it.
Air date: March 24, 1986
Alright, that synopsis is the only time I’m going to make that comparison, but it’s all I could think about this entire episode.
It’s Gobo’s birthday! Happy Birthday, Gobo! How do Fraggles age? How old is Gobo, anyway? He lives with a roommate, so is he in his 20’s? Or could he be in his mid to late 90’s and Fraggles just age super slowly? Why isn’t anyone talking about this? Oh, because it isn’t important? Right, right…
Gobo’s throwing himself a surprise party, which is a surprise because he hasn’t told anyone else about it. It’s like one of those surprise weddings, which is always fun and not at all infuriating that your best friend Josh wouldn’t tell you beforehand even though you’ve known each other for 20 years and you’ve had no time to prepare the speech he just asked you to make, and so you continue to bring it up for the next 3.5 years and one time during a different wedding speech you made an entire crowd boo him for it even though 99% of them didn’t know him. Not that I’m speaking from experience…
Good ol’ Uncle Travelling Matt is back, announcing that he unfortunately cannot make Gobo’s birthday as he has to head to Outer Space. Secretly though this is a cover and Matt has brought Gobo a real life frog! And it really IS a real life frog! This isn’t a puppet frog (who would think of such a ridiculous idea), but a real green wet slimy froggy in a jar. Matt gives it to Wembley to look after until the party, and Wembley panics and recruits Boober to help.
In a wacky set of circumstances, the frog gets loose, hopping around Fraggle Rock and sending Wembley and Boober into a wild panic. First Wembley blames Boober, then runs around like a mad man trying to find it. He dresses like a fly, starting a trend of other Fraggles dressing as bugs and dancing around the Great Hall. Eventually they get the frog back, Gobo gets a real surprise, and we all live happily ever after.
This is a fun episode! Much better than that wet mop of an episode I reviewed a little while back. I like Fraggle Rock when it gets to be fun. Sure, I like a quiet moment, like when Fraggles think they’re about to die and think about their mortality, but I really like it when they’re wild and silly and running around. This is a really good example of Fraggle Rock at its best. It’s good character driven comedy, with wonderful puppetry contrasted by a real frog. I think had they gone with a puppet here instead, the effect would almost have been lost. A real frog bouncing around lost feels like a mishap. A puppet frog bouncing around lost feels like it’d be too ‘cheeky’, like it was doing it on purpose. It was a good call to have a real animal.
Also Doc and Sprocket are there. Sprocket ruins Ned Shimmelfinney’s sweater, so a panicked Doc tries to fix it. He later finds out that it’s Ned’s favorite sweater because it’s the one he loans out to friends and always comes back damaged with holes or stains. Which begs the question – why did Doc even accept a stained damaged sweater to begin with? Have some self respect. Maybe Ned is just a bad friend. He seems the type who’d get married by surprise and not tell you…
Strongest Moment: The frog in a Doozer’s cart was pretty funny. Especially when Wembley and Boober ask if he’s seen a little green thing about ‘this small’ and he responds ‘Yeah, my mother in law’. Ha. Comedy.
MVF (Most Valuable Fraggle): I usually give this to Uncle Travelling Matt, but today it’s going to Boober. What a guy.
Most Classic Moment: I feel like most Fraggle fans remember there was a real frog in an episode. It’s this one. It’s this episode.
Fraggle Lore: Fraggle’s have birthdays. Has a Fraggle had a birthday before this? Not in general, I mean in the show. I assume Gobo didn’t, like, INVENT birthdays in Fraggle Rock.
One More Thing…: A shout out to puppeteer Rob Mills who performs Gobo in this episode to a track by Jerry Nelson. He did a stellar job.
Okay, One More Thing…: In Australia, there is a singer and actor called Rob Mills. We call him Millsy. One time he had a fling with Paris Hilton. It is not the same Rob Mills as the Fraggle one.
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By Jarrod Fairclough – [email protected]
