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"Tommy's First Birthday" is the first official episode of Rugrats, after the show's pilot episode "Tommy Pickles and the Great White Thing", and the first episode of Season 1.
Characters Present[]
Characters Introduced[]
Summary[]
Stu and Didi strive to make Tommy's first birthday a memorable one. They did, but under the wrong circumstances. Meanwhile, Tommy wants to eat dog food so he can be just like Spike, eventually selling the other Rugrats on the idea.
- Description from Klasky Csupo
Plot[]
One morning, Tommy Pickles is woken up by his parents, who wish him a happy birthday (his very first, in fact). Once he's changed and dressed in his special birthday outfit (which consists of a red T-shirt with overalls), Didi takes him downstairs for breakfast before his party begins.
Didi and Stu want to be thoroughly prepared for this special occasion, so they consult Lipschitz and create a birthday checklist. The adults don't notice that Tommy is watching a dog food commercial on TV. Feeling inspired by the ad, which said that you will find yourself almost wishing you were a dog, Tommy breaks out of his highchair and crawls over to his dog Spike's food bowl (full of canned dog food). At the last minute, Grandpa Lou catches Tommy and tells him he doesn't want dog food; he wants his baby food breakfast. But when Lou looks at Tommy's baby food, he admits that dog food does look more appetizing by comparison.
The day rolls on, and Betty and Howard DeVille arrive for the party with their twins, Phil and Lil, as well as Chuckie Finster, the neighbor's son. When the babies are all gathered in the playpen, Tommy tells them about the dog food commercial, and his belief that if they eat dog food, they'll turn into dogs. The other babies find this appealing and decide they want to be dogs, too. But before they can leave the playpen, the grownups put party hats on the babies and snap pictures, though the babies aren't thrilled by either one of these things.
Soon, Stu's older brother, Drew, arrives with his daughter Angelica (who, not unlike Tommy, is wearing a special birthday party dress for the occasion). Angelica gleefully poses for pictures with the babies, though roughly. Tommy tells Angelica about the dog food; she enjoys the idea of biting the mailman and agrees to go along with Tommy's plan to get dog food. But before they can do anything with the dog food, Didi's parents, Minka and Boris Kropotkin, arrive. They hug and kiss Tommy, and then it's time to open presents. Drew gives Tommy his present: a toy fire engine that Phil and Lil start fighting over. Angelica is greedy and wants Tommy's presents for herself. Stu made Tommy's present himself: a remote-control flying saucer he calls the Hoverama. Didi and Grandpa Lou both doubt that even a grownup could fly it, but Stu insists Tommy can figure it out. Howard gives his present to Tommy: Two-way radios, which are meant to work as baby monitors. The men are fascinated with these and treat them like walkie-talkies. They go outside to test them out. Meanwhile, Tommy sneaks over to the kitchen and reaches the dog food. Before Tommy can get any of it, Didi drags him away and insists he open more of his presents. Tommy grows distressed, because he doesn't want to open his presents; he just wants to eat the dog food. Tommy then starts to cry on the spot, much to the babies and Angelica's bewilderment and Didi's dismay. Didi pats Tommy on his back to console him and feels worried that his birthday party is a disaster, and that she never lives up to being the kind of mother seen on television. Betty dismisses this by saying that "TV's TV" and "We're real!"
The doorbell rings, signaling the arrival of the puppet stand and puppets that the Pickles had booked for the party. But there are no professional puppeteers to go with the stand, leaving Stu and Drew to perform as puppeteers themselves (and Didi continuing to worry that her son's first birthday won't be perfect). They decide to perform the climax of Little Red Riding Hood, but they immediately begin to argue over how the lines go. Soon enough, they end up arguing over disagreements and grudges they've held since childhood. Lou then butts in and tells them to quit it or else (with a puppet of his own), but to no avail as Stu and Drew continue to bicker.
With the adults distracted, first Tommy, then the rest of the gang, go to the kitchen, but find Spike's bowl licked clean and empty. They find another can of dog food on the counter shelves but have difficulties getting it down on their own. Tommy and Angelica try to reach it but are unsuccessful. Chuckie decides to use the Hoverama, and, using the remote control, he positions the Hoverama nearly in place to bring down the can of dog food. Phil pulls on the remote control's lever, causing the Hoverama to lose control. It knocks the can over, but then its antenna gets bent, and latches onto Tommy's overall suspenders, causing Angelica to almost fall before she holds onto Tommy's feet. Tommy and his Hoverama wreck the kitchen while Angelica still hang onto him and she lands into a big bag of flour, as Chuckie, Phil and Lil struggle with the Hoverama to bring Tommy down. Tommy ends up flying out into the living room. Soon, the Hoverama's antenna breaks, and Tommy falls off; fortunately, he is saved by landing on Spike. The Hoverama ends up crashing into the cake. Didi is horrified that Tommy's birthday party is ruined with her cake damaged and the puppet show being a disaster. Grandpa Boris, Didi's father, takes a taste of the cake and complains about the cake she baked. Didi baked a carrot cake, and Boris says a chocolate cake is more suitable for a birthday party, claiming that chocolate cake is international. Fortunately for the babies, Lou opens the can of dog food for Spike. However, Spike isn't interested in eating it right now, so the babies eagerly help themselves instead; they quickly spit it out in disgust, except for Lil.
Nothing happens at first, but then Tommy says he feels something; he starts to bark and crawl around. Phil and Lil say they have fleas; Chuckie hopes he can grow fur, and Angelica hopes the mailman comes soon. All of them start acting like dogs, which attracts the notice of the adults. They feel happy seeing this moment, because even though the day was far from perfect, they're all having a good time. A picture of this is taken, which is forever included on the pages of the Pickles family photo album documenting Tommy's first birthday.
Trivia[]
- This episode debuted on the same date as the other two original Nicktoons shows, Doug and The Ren & Stimpy Show. Doug was the first to air, followed by Rugrats, and then Ren & Stimpy.
- This is the first half-an-hour episode of the series.
- This episode, along with "Chuckie vs. the Potty" has the text in the title card fades in late after the title splash appears and fades out before the splash disappears.
- This episode is also the only one to have the fading effects of the text in the title card being slower rather than normal.
- In this episode, Tommy is wearing a red shirt, though almost all of the time, he wears a blue shirt further in the series.
- This is also the only episode in which Tommy wears blue overalls and Angelica is wearing her red party dress.
- However, Tommy would wear a red shirt and blue overalls again as well as shoes in Reptar's Revenge.
- This is the first episode where E.G. Daily voices Tommy Pickles (Tami Holbrook voiced Tommy in the unaired pilot episode, "Tommy Pickles and the Great White Thing)."
- This is presumably the first-time characters other than the Pickles see Spike, considering the fact they believe him to be Tommy after eating dog food.
- Tommy was named after co-creator Paul Germain's son, who turned one year old when his father was writing this episode.
- This episode marks the first appearances of Chuckie, Angelica, Angelica's dad and Stu's older brother, Drew; Didi's parents and Tommy's maternal grandparents, Boris and Minka; and Phil and Lil's parents, Howard and Betty. However, it is not the first appearances for some other main characters such as Tommy, Lil, Phil, Didi, Stu, Lou, and Spike, who all appeared previously in the unaired pilot.
- Angelica somehow exhibits cartoon physics, as she stretches out her arms elastically to get Tommy and Chuckie into the picture with her.
- On the receipt for the Puppet Stage and the Puppets, Stu and Didi's address is seen: 1258 N. Highland. From 1988 to 1995, this was the address of Klasky Csupo.
- This episode shows the entire original cast of Rugrats except for Chas Finster, who wasn't introduced until the next episode "Barbecue Story". Charlotte and the Carmichaels weren't created until a little later during the next season of the series.
- From this episode until "Moving Away", episodes of the series would typically air at 2:00 PM EST on Sunday afternoons.
- Behind Boris and Minka in the doorway is a green solid object that is not grass, because it fills the whole space up.
- The title card and Stu's first line, "Good morning, Champ," are cut out from digital copies of the episode. The title card is, however, left intact on Paramount+.
- This is one of the few episodes where Angelica works together and teams up with the babies.
- Angelica and Drew Pickles do not appear until seven minutes into the episode.
Goofs[]
- When the Rugrats are acting like dogs, Angelica's party dress is briefly replaced by her casual outfit.
- In the first act, Stu's party hat is magenta colored with yellow spots. But for much of the second act, his party hat is colored purple with orange spots, though once in a while it reverts back to its original magenta-and-yellow color (such as when Stu removes his hat in disappointment among realizing he forgot to put batteries in his invention's remote control, and when he asks Didi "We're out of batteries?").
- When Didi opens the door for Boris and Minka, we see her right hand raised, frozen and waving. Her left hand rubs the area below her chin and is easily twice as small as the right hand.
- Towards the end of the episode, right after the babies eat the dog food, you see Lil smile and lick her lips, while Phil and the rest of the babies spit it out. Yet in the following scene, Phil says the dog food tasted good, while Lil and the rest of the babies didn't like it.
- When Angelica grabs Tommy and Chuckie to take the picture, her arms are extra-long.
- There are a lot of extra shelves and bookcases in the Pickles' kitchen that do not appear again.
- Lil sounds like Phil when she says, "And howl at the moon?"
- When the "Huskie's Choice" commercial ends and Tommy looks at Spike eating his dog food tommy has a set of top teeth.
