Arthur : Season 12 and 13 : I Owe You One/ Arthur's Number Nightmare

Arthur PBS 

   In our January journey looking at Arthur we have skipped a head from season 5 to Seasons 12 and 13 mostly to keep us from sticking to a cluster of seasons.  Let's take a look at an episode from season 12 first, called "I owe you one" .

  This episode aired on April 21st, 2009 it is 7B of the season paired with "War of Worms".

  Monologue: This time done with Muffy because why not?  Muffy is playing as Suze Orman on her old CNBC show and trying to give money advice. Different Elwood  City characters call in.  So What Muffy says that when you ask a favor or borrow money you in their debt, and you shouldn't say "I Owe you One" ( Sorry, I owe you one).  It never ends up being one, and she decides to tell a story which happens to be our episode.


    The episode:  Buster's mom tells him to rake the leaves by 5 O'Clock, and he forgets to do so because he focused on a video game.  Arthur is called to help and he tells Arthur he owes him one. Francine asks him what he's going to do and Buster says he doesn't know. Then they find out that Buster owes Arthur alot.  They tell him that he also owes interest while telling everyone that credit cards are dangerous.  Buster gets a call from Arthur asking him to come over and help him out. Apparently, two aliens  wanted to abduct Arthur  and since Buster owes him some favors it was time for Buster to pay up.
 

This is the best payback/ Copyright WGBH 

    Oh, it was a dream, I was thinking this episode got dark. Buster starts trying to do stuff for Arthur. He starts talking to Binky and Binky happens to tell him that Arthur owes him a few things. This makes Buster help Arthur pay back his debts first, by doing stuff for Binky. Arthur calls Buster but then Francine decides to come over and ask if Buster can pay off some of Arthur's debt to her , then others come by as well to the same. (Well then)  It's apparently been two weeks Since Arthur spent time together and Arthur thinks that Buster is mad at him.  Buster tells him that he paying back Arthur.

         Arthur tells him that Buster owes him no more favors. Then Arthur tell Muffy that is his show.

This is my show and you can't stop me/ Copyright WGBH 

    The message of the episode is to be careful with taking favors because you don't want to take advantage of people. I really kind of like that it wasn't Arthur who was like "where's my favors, man?" but more Buster thinking he has to pay Arthur back to make sure things are square. I found it a genuinely alright episode with some charm to it. 

More after the jump



         Now to season 13 and Arthur's number nightmare.  This episode aired on October 14th 2009 (again going by US dates) This is episode 3a of the season paired with  "Brian gets Hooked" (which have have covered before)

  Monologue:  D.W wins a game and Arthur says what's important about being number 1? He wonders about numbers why is everything having numbers. Numbers everywhere!

  Episode : A Piece of paper flies from Mr.Haney's office (the principal) and it lands by Buster and it has their names with members of their class and numbers. They end up thinking it's some of classic ranking. Buster's number is 11 and he thinks that's his lucky number.  Francine doesn't like the class ranking thing and has a fantasy that Mr. Haney ruins her ranking and has to end up cleaning up gum so, she decides to leave but he catches her and makes her part of the Harvest day festival. (whatever that is)  Arthur who was number 2, fantasies about going into space. They tell Brain about the list because the capital of Denmark is not Capetown (it's Copenhagen).  Muffy  tells Francine that couldn't be a list because he's 12 and Crosswires aren't average. (Whatever that means)

This is actually their list to find out who gets eaten first/Copyright WGBH 

      Francine ends up being a pumpkin at the Harvest festival. While Buster is 1l obsessed. Eventually, they dropped the paper and Mr.Haney finds it and it ends up with them finding out it was a seating arrangement sheet.
     

Yeah we can't rank you this is Arthur's show he ranks you/ Copyright WGBH 

    It's a simple episode, where I could fit most of the plot into one paragraph. It's not heavy in sort of action or things happening. "Arthur" does have episodes that just play to it's slice of life style of series.  It does a good job at showing how a thought like where you could be ranked or something could screw up your mind.  Buster going off of depending on 11, Arthur being so confident at being number 2 that doesn't help him with his test and then feel crushed when he doesn't do well, and Francine who saw herself at the last place felt miserable and ended up doing something she wasn't interested in doing. We kind of can see that in our society even today like with social media looking Twitter Retweets, likes, followers, Facebook likes, and etc that could affect people in different ways seeing those numbers.   A kind of relateable episode with a simpleness that works for it.