"Jannanigans" is the thirtieth episode of the fourth season of Star vs. the Forces of Evil.
It premiered on May 5, 2019 alongside "Sad Teen Hotline".
Synopsis[]
Star and Marco need Janna's help to return to Mewni.
Plot[]
On the morning after the end of the previous episode, Star wakes up Marco and Tom with an idea on how to get back to Mewni. She suggests that they ask Janna, remembering that she showed up on Mewni without a dimensional portal in "Out of Business". But when they can call Janna and ask her how she got to Mewni, she says she doesn't know and immediately hangs up.
Star, Marco, and Tom go to Janna's house and wait for her to come home so they can talk with her more. When Janna finally gets home with a bunch of junk she collected, Star, Marco, and Tom follow her to her room, with Star warning Marco and Tom not to get distractions by Janna's weird quirks (or "Jannanigans", as she calls them). They ask Janna again how she got to Mewni before, and she says she doesn't remember. When the only detail she can remember about that day is that it was a "normal Thursday", Star suggests they go through Janna's typical Thursday routine to try and jog her memory.
A typical Thursday for Janna involves her feeding wild possums in her neighbor's garage, getting her hat ripped up to shreds, and trading for a new hat with Needles, a high-profile figure in the knitting underworld. In order to make payment for Janna's new hat, she and her friends collect tennis balls from a local tennis court. While collecting tennis balls, Tom mentions to Marco that he's okay with Marco pursuing a relationship with Star now that he and Star have broken up.
Getting frustrated with Janna seemingly wasting their time, Star, Marco, and Tom put pressure on her to remember how she got to Mewni, but Janna insists she has no memory of it. In a rare moment of emotional fragility, Janna admits that having no memory of that day is really upsetting for her, and she apologizes for not being able to help. Apologetic, they decide to take a break from collecting tennis balls to have lunch at Britta's Tacos, and when Janna takes off her jacket to cool off, Marco realizes she's wearing the promotional Britta's Tacos T-shirt that was stolen in "Britta's Tacos".
This revelation jogs Janna's memory. On the day she went to Mewni, she stopped at Britta's Tacos after collecting tennis balls for Needles and saw a promotion for the restaurant's mystery prize. Having already eaten the amount of tacos required to win the prize over the course of her whole life, she demanded the prize be given to her. When restaurant management refused, she snuck in the back of the restaurant and stole it from the supply closet.
In the restaurant's supply closet, Star, Marco, Tom, and Janna discover a ladder leading down into an underground cavern that Janna vaguely recognizes. There, they find tennis balls on the ground, a wire hanger that the T-shirt was hanging from, and strange hieroglyphics on a stone wall depicting Mewmans and Glossaryck. When Janna accidentally falls into a well of gold liquid, Star discovers handprints on the inside of the well cover and realizes her mother left them back when she and Star were exploring different dimensions from the Realm of Magic during the events of "Conquer".
As her memories come back to her, Janna remembers that this well — which connects Earth to Mewni via the Realm of Magic — is how she ended up in Mewni without using a portal.
Characters[]
Major characters[]
Minor characters[]
- Mr. Ordonia
- Tala Ordonia
- Needles
- Pickles
- Oskar Greason
- Sensei Brantley
- Cloudy
- Moon Butterfly (flashback)
- Glossaryck (mentioned/depicted)
Title in other languages[]
| Language | Title | Translation |
|---|---|---|
| Korean | 그날의 기억 | Memory of That Day |
| Portuguese (Portugal) | Jannazices | Jannanigans |
Transcript
View the episode transcript here.
Gallery
Click here to view the gallery.
Production notes[]
Songs[]
Trivia[]
- This episode's title is a portmanteau of Janna's name and the word "shenanigans".
- Star uses this term in the episode to describe Janna's eccentricities.
- Eugene Cordero and Tania Gunadi guest-star as Janna's parents.
- Daniel "Desus Nice" Baker and Joel "The Kid Mero" Martinez, YouTube personalities and co-hosts of the Showtime late-night talk show Desus & Mero, guest-star as Pickles and Needles.
- Janna's claim to Oskar that her name is "Banana" is likely a reference to Star's nickname for her, "Janna Banana", heard in "Bon Bon the Birthday Clown" and "Face the Music".
- This episode features recycled footage from "Conquer".
Revelations and continuity[]
- This episode takes place the very next morning after "Sad Teen Hotline".
- According to Tom, this episode takes place at least a week after the events of "Doop-Doop".
- This episode marks the first appearance of Janna's parents and home, though her mother has off-screen dialogue in "Bon Bon the Birthday Clown".
- Janna's parents have noticeable Filipino accents.
- Janna feeding the possums might be a reference to her line "You guys want to see a dead possum?" from the episode "Mewberty".
- In the episode, Janna reveals that she's hidden a camera on Marco.
- The events of the episode "Curse of the Blood Moon" are mentioned.
- Tom tells Marco that he's okay with him pursuing a relationship with Star despite the Blood Moon Curse being lifted, as he believes the feelings they had for each other was more than just the effect of the curse.
- The events of the episode "Britta's Tacos" are mentioned.
- The Well of Magic that Star and Moon briefly visited in "Conquer" is revealed to be connected to a cavern underneath Britta's Tacos on Earth.
- This is how Janna traveled to Mewni without a portal in "Out of Business".
- Tom's tail is seen again since "Is Another Mystery".
- This is one of the few episodes where it shows Janna without her jacket.