It's hard to state to someone how big "Rugrats" was as series unless you were around that time. The 10th anniversary of the series on Nickelodeon was big, they went out doing multiple marathons and events and programming.
They really ramped up the events in summer of 2001, and they started promoting one big event special. The plot of the special is what if the Rugrats characters you know and love were 10 years older? (like Chuckie would be 12) Like what if the characters aged up like if the show went real time? This is something that some fans probably wondered themselves and did their own takes but the show doing it is kind of fun.
Rugrats in history for Nickelodeon was its most popular animated and possibly over all series, though by 2001, SpongeBob was coming in to its own. Rugrats originally ran for 3 seasons between 1991-1994, but had gained love and attention , and viewers to enough to gain two specials then come back for a new season in 1997. They gave it a movie in 1998, where they introduced a new character named Dil. Dil was added to series in the next season. Then it gets a 2nd theatrical movie in 2000, and they give Chuckie a step mom and sister.
The series had gone a long way in 10-years and this is when animated series didn't last 10 years, it wasn't a thing. Shows did 65 to 100 episodes were happy to do that, since that was the way television for kids was, and it makes sense since you do enough episodes where the audience ages out and you have room and budget for new series , and the reruns feel new to the new audience. Rugrats reaching 10 years is big.
Coming from me, I'm a big Rugrats fan, it has managed to stay on top as my favorite Nicktoon series and this special was exciting. Fun fact "All Growed Up" is still Nickelodeon's most watched broadcast. (source)
So let's take a look at this special.
This special was heavily marketed and the main idea was that we get to see Rugrats being 10 years older, walking and talking... uh.... I mean walking and talking as older kids. It starts with a plot device movie the Rugrats are watching, about some guy making a time machine to go to the future. This movie is interesting, they should have made this. Tommy is interested in the movie's plot and wonders what it would be like to go the future. Chuckie (my favorite Rugrat) once again says something that always hits right, this time what if the future is scarier than now? He knows all.
Angelica shows up and wants to torture us , and I mean us with her bad singing. She has the other plot device, her a karaoke machine. (I curse the day Drew and Charlotte got together, curse it) She doesn't want the others to play with it because Angelica. She uses the fact that apparently everyone forgets that she's evil to make it where the other's get blamed for her mess. (I curse the day Drew and Charlotte got together, curse it!)
Having Angelica sing should be considered torture/ Copyright Paramount
Tommy decides to play with Angelica's machine because he's tired of Angelica. He refuses to give it back to her in a power move. This causes our plot to get into action, where the others use a 'time machine' to go to the future. (Good thing Tommy didn't watch a different movie, that'd cause different results)
Now it gets to what the audience came to see, older Rugrats. They did give Tommy hair, the same color as his father's, I wonder what color that is considered in their world? (Tommy didn't have a shaved head, that could have worked too) It shows our favorite characters exiting the same closet they ran into from Angelica to meet older Angelica. They also have Dil having the same hair color as Didi which is also a nice touch.
Me when Angelica says she's going to sing/ Copyright Paramount
The designs of our older Rugrats are fun, Angelica has the same colors she wore as a 3-year-old , Tommy still has his blue in a baseball tee, Chuckie hasn't changed much, his shirt still has Saturn on it, it's just been switched to a button up shirt, he has green pants, and his shoes are still red, there's a nice egg of showing one shoe is untied. Phil has the duck shirt, so does Lil, she also has a bow. Kimi has her same hair style, same colors. Dil had has the same colors as his onesie. This is nice little touch to show that, and yeah it might be how realistically they would dress up in the future, though I think they still would be friends.
They live in the same neighborhood, close in age, it's economics/Copyright Paramount
So there is a plot here, the kids are getting ready to see a Emica concert with the goal of being called on stage to sing with her. There's also Stu who is dressed like disco man, which is kind of fun call back of that one episode where the Rugrats sold all of Stu and Didi's stuff; and that includes a disco suit. (Disco Stu, one could say) He's wearing a lucky zodiac necklace to a disco dance. This will be important too.
More after the jump
