Arthur's Tooth

At one time, this was the longest summary on this site.

Dad and Mom are in the living room working on a card house with D.W. and they're almost finished. But there's a disturbing banging noise coming from the ceiling.

Arthur's dad manages to protect the card house from the vibration, but after several bangs, the house falls down -- like a house of cards!

Arthur's trying to pull a tooth out by tying a string to his tooth, attaching the free end to the bathroom door handle, and repeatedly slamming the bathroom door.

His parents tell him to stop worrying, since the tooth'll fall out when it's ready.

It's time for bed, Arthur's dad tells him to go to bed.

Dad: "And no more horsing around; I mean it."

(I don't know if Arthur's dad knows the bathroom door handle is now busted.)

The next morning, Arthur comes barging into his parent's room.

Arthur: "Mom, Dad, you guys awake?"

Groggy parents: "We are now."

Arthur's parents are looking awfully tired, and annoyed, but Arthur has some important news for them. One of his teeth is loose.

"That's good," says his mom, "That means it will fall out soon."

The next day, Arthur's in school with his buddies.

Francine sneezes a tooth out. (ok... right...)

"How many of you have lost a baby tooth? asks Mr. Ratburn.

Everyone raises their hands and makes a lot of noise. Everyone except Arthur, as Mr. Ratburn notes.

"Baby!" shouts out Francine, which gets a few laughs from the class.

Mr. Ratburn puts on a video for the class about oral hygene.

(It must be tooth day or something...)

• "All was quiet in Toothtown..." which is the inside of a large mouth.
• A cheap-nasty dinosaur (with a colour scheme like that of Barney but with more spikes) annouces itself to be a plaque monster. It thinks that Toothtown would be a nice place to live, but first, it has to get rid of the "pesky teeth".
• It takes out a jackhammer, and starts to hammer away at some nearby teeth.
• Suddenly, four Power Ranger wannabes appear on the scene and announce themselves to be the "Flighty Fluoride Scour Rangers."
• They attack the plaque monster with small scouring brushes, but it's no good.
• They throw their small brushes up into the air and the brushes combine into one big toothbrush.
• The big brush flies towards the monster and the plaque monster tries to run away.
• The Scour Rangers get out a large container of dental floss, make a lasso out of it, and capture the plaque monster. They tell him to try the floss "on for size".
• Then they fling it down a tunnel, presumably someone's esophagus.
• Then an announcer says "...between 4 and 7, most children lose will start to lose their teeth."

Francine sticks her head up in front of the TV. "Except Arthur!" quips Francine, which ellicts a couple of more laughs.

Next, we're in the cafeteria. Francine's showing off the new gap in her teeth. She demonstrates her amazing abilities including whistling, and being able to suck up jelly through the gap.

Then outside on the playground equipment, Francine and a couple of the usual suspects are standing around drinking juice boxes.

Francine: "Hey guys, check this out."

Everyone is suitably impressed. They then procede to have a squirting contest. Since everyone conveniently has a single missing tooth, they all can do it.

• Buster does it.
• Sue Ellen shoots a little bit further.
• Muffy can shoot it upwards in a parabolic arc. (but then she's got buck teeth, so she'd have had more practice)
• Binky can shoot juice too.

Everyone laughs at Arthur.

Francine comes out with this gem:

"Does anyone have a bib for the baby?"

That night, Arthur's getting changed out of his dirty sweater. He makes some special requests for dinner, and his dad says ok.

Arthur's designed a meal which should get that loose tooth out:

• Extra well done steak for dinner. Arthur cuts his steak into two pieces and stuffs one half in in one mouthful.
• Then he has some corn on the cob,
• and for desert, peanut brittle and rock candy.

But no luck. Arthur's tooth still hasn't come out.

That night, Arthur's upstairs and he's unhappy. Then he's visited by D.W.

"Hey Arthur, I know how you can get rid of that tooth in a flash"

This perks Arthur up. D.W.'s idea though is that Arthur turn into a shark.

D.W. has a shark tooth with a hole in it threaded onto a necklace.

"Their teeth always fall out, and they grow new ones. I learned that at the Aquarium."

* * *

The next day in the hallway in school, Arthur's talking in a funny voice (like he's trying to keep his mouth closed) and claims he's lost a tooth.

Francine wants some proof.

Arthur carefully moves his thumb away from his fist and reveals the end of a tooth.

Sue Ellen: "It's a tooth alright"

Binky: "Seems awful big though"

Francine forces Arthur to reveal his subterfuge. Arthur's lost tooth is D.W.'s shark tooth necklace!

Francine: "He must have really liked that tooth -- to make a necklace out of it!"

Everyone laughs.

Next, we're in the art room. Arthur's wearing the same painting outfit he wore in #11801 - "Arthur's Chicken Pox" -- sweater with a circled B... Arthur's now resorting to desperate measures to get his loose tooth out.

Arthur: "Buster, if you were a real pal, you'd punch me in the mouth."

After a little more cajoling, Buster agrees. He covers his eyes, winds up, and runs forward to punch -- an easel beside Arthur!

Next, it's Gym class. Arthur tries to convince Binky to punch him. (It's a lot easier to convince Binky than Buster.)

"This is gonna hurt" says Binky.

Only Binky can't do it!

Binky: "I can't do it!"

Binky whimpers a bit and runs out.
(Some bully... only we shouldn't be too surprised, I suppose.)

Next, we're at the Brain's house. Brain's make a tooth extraction machine, and he's about to demonstrate it to (and then on, I suppose) Arthur.

The machine is basically a metal box, about the size of a small kitchen table with four hinged legs with feet which stick out from the corners of the box. There's some computery junk on top of the box, and a metal frame with a space for a head to go in. Above the frame is a black medium sized weight with 16 TONS marked on it.

Brain starts the demonstration. He sticks a melon into the space where Arthur's head will go, and turns on the machine using a remote control.

A lightbulb lights up, and the weight drops, and crushes the melon into a white paste.

Then the machine starts to jump around. It runs upstairs and out the door.

Brain: "Self destruct, self destruct!"

He presses a button, and there's a blinding flash from outside.

Brain: "No machine is perfect..."

The next morning, Arthur's mom has a talk with her son. (She must have heard some of the details about Arthur's self-directed dentistry...)

Arthur's Mom: "That's it, you need professional help -- You're going to the dentist today."

Next, we're in Arthur's class. Mr. Ratburn reads a note excusing Arthur from class later that day to go to the dentist.

Francine chimes in again.

"If they don't fall out, They have to yank 'em out."

Arthur imagines a monster dentist yanking out Arthur's teeth with a shiny pair of pliers in a dungeon-like dentist's office.

However, as it turns out, the real dentist's office isn't medieval in the least.

Arthur is seen by Dr. Sozio, who's a bear, not a monster.

Arthur discusses his concern over his teeth with Dr. Sozio.

Arthur: "I think something's wrong because I'm eight years old, and I have all my baby teeth."

Dr. Sozio: "Having baby teeth doesn't make you a baby."

Dr. Sozio explains that people's teeth fall out of their own accord, and you can't rush them. Dr. Sozio's teeth didn't start to fall out until he was nearly nine! Everyone is different.

The next day, Arthur goes over to his friends at recess to explain his new philosophy on teeth.

Francine: "Well, if it isn't Arthur the baby."

However, after listening to Arthur, everyone seems to be siding with Arthur, and although it's not said out loud, they're not going to tease him any more.

Only Francine won't give it a rest.
She picks up a soccer ball.

Francine: "Listen up, I have a new game. I'm the tooth fairy. Whoever I throw the ball to loses a tooth. Except Arthur can't play because he's a baby."

Brain: "If you ask me, now you're being the baby."

Everyone crowds around the fallen Arthur.

Arthur's not mad though, he's happy. His tooth is out!

He hands it to Francine. He tells her since she claims she's the tooth fairy, she owes him 25 cents. It sounds like they're still friends.

END.

It IS quite a coincidence that Ratburn just happens to have planned a film on dental hygiene immediately after Francine (bloodlessly) loses a tooth. The film's obviously low production values (eyeholes in the costumes) and cheesy parody of POWER RANGERS is very funny.

The Rat showed an extraordinary lack of sensitivity in singling out Arthur as the only one not to have lost a baby tooth.

Here's a cheesy comment -- to me, it looks like Arthur only has one tooth in his mouth, instead of having just one loose tooth -- I know, I know... it would be too hard to draw. Plus, the fact that the kids have teeth isn't emphasized in most episodes... they'd look weird.

Francine's way out of character in this one, especially if she's Arthur's girlfriend -- see the next comment.

As Ben pointed out to me, this story (#12401) must have happened before #10601 - "Locked in the Library!" since Arthur cites this escapade as an example of Francine's bad behavior in that episode. However, the episodes aren't numbered this way.

If you ask me, someone should have given the "everyone's different speech" way earlier.

For more episodes related to getting teased for being less than grown up:

#20101 - "Arthur Meets Mister Rogers"

Arthur's afraid to tell anyone that Mr. Rogers (of "Mr. Roger's Neighbourhood") is staying at his house, since "Mr. Roger's Neighbourhood" is "a baby show".

#20702 - "Night Fright"

Binky has a nightlite, and doesn't want anyone to know about it.

#21301 - "Water and the Brain"

Brain almost loses his friends since he won't let them know he's afraid of water.

#41002 - "That's a Baby Show!"

Arthur likes to watch the "baby show" "Love Ducks"

Oh yeah, and I forgot to say -- I didn't like this one. Francine acts WAY out of character in this one.