Changes: Tommy Pickles and the Great White Thing

Revision as of 00:36, 15 September 2014

Season 0 Episode 1

Tommy Pickles and the Great White Thing
Original Airdate	November 22, 1989
VHS release	Decade in Diapers Vol. 1
DVD release	Decade in Diapers
Previous Episode	None
Next Episode	Tommy's First Birthday (August 11, 1991)

Tommy Pickles and the Great White Thing is the original unaired pilot episode of the Rugrats series. The first official episode of the series, Tommy's First Birthday, followed this episode. This episode can only be watched on the Decade in Diapers DVD.

Characters Present

Tommy
Phil
Lil
Spike
Grandpa Lou
Didi
Stu
Betty

Synopsis

After watching his grandfather enter the bathroom, Tommy Pickles is determined to find out what the large white thing (toilet) located inside the bathroom is.

Recap

Grandpa Lou is getting ready in the Pickles' bathroom, whilst Tommy stares in awe at the toilet. Tommy crawls up to the toilet, and slowly reaches out to touch it, but is prevented from doing so when Grandpa picks him up, telling him that the bathroom is no place for him, before walking out with Tommy in his arms. Tommy is put into the play pen where he tells Phil and Lil that he heard a noise from the bathroom, and went inside and saw a "big white thing". The gang try to figure out what the big white thing is (suggestions ranging from a giant dog bowl to a fish bowl). Tommy believes that it is alive, and that the burping sound (the flush) was its attempt to speak to him. He then plans to go and talk to it during the night.

After being put to bed by his parents, Tommy pretends to fall asleep, and waits for Stu and Didi to leave. After they do, he moves his teddy bear, revealing a screwdriver that he uses to sneak out of his crib, where he then ventures to the bathroom, as the door has been left open. Tommy looks at the toilet in awe, before walking up to it and knocking on it, asking if anybody is home. Naturally, he doesn't get an answer. Tommy, dissatisfied, sees the toilet flusher and climbs a sink plunger to reach it, he jumps on the toilet bowl, but upon seeing his reflection in the water, he screams in shock. Because of this, Tommy nearly falls in, accidentally flushes the toilet, and tries to use the shower curtain to steady himself, unintentionally pulling it down and into the toilet. Still trying to regain balance, Tommy jumps onto the toilet paper roll, which unravels it all over the floor, he then jumps onto the plunger, and swings around on it, he tries to grab onto the sink, but turns the tap on instead, frightening him once again, making him swing back on the plunger, which gets him covered in the still-unraveling toilet paper. He then swings over and grabs onto the sink, climbing up onto it, but due to the toilet paper covering his eyes, he unintentionally grabs and squeezes a toothpaste tube, causing the cap to launch off, bounce off the wall, and hit a small tub of bubble mixture, which foams up the entire sink. Tommy gets foam in his mouth, and drops the toothpaste tube, which splatters onto the ground.

Spike comes into the bathroom, and sniffs the toothpaste, Tommy drops onto his back, and after a quick drink from the toilet bowl, Spike walks down to the living room, and stops where Lou is watching TV. Spike sits down to watch TV with Tommy, and Lou, unaware of Tommy's presence, scratches Spike on the head, and gets up to go to the bathroom while the commercials are on. Tommy and Spike watch TV while Grandpa Lou goes to the bathroom, who is shocked when he notices the mess. An uproar of yelling ensues as Stu and Didi blame Lou for the mess, as he tries to explain that he didn't do anything. As they argue, Tommy changes the channel to one playing music, and both Spike and him swing along to it.

Quotes

Grandpa Lou: Jumpin' Jehoshaphat! Stu, Didi, call the plumber, quick! Oh look at that, look at that!

Stu: Dad, dad what is that?

Didi: Oh my!

Stu: Where's that coming from?

Didi: Calm down now!

Stu: Wait a minute, I closed that door!

Inaudible speech as the three continue to argue, whilst the music plays over them. Their arguing fades out, and the main theme song starts to play.

The yelling comes back near the end of the credits.

Stu: Go downstairs!

Lou: I never touched it! I never-

Stu: Let us handle this!

Lou: I never touched that-

Stu: Let us handle this!!

Lou: I never touched that bowl.

Trivia

This episode features the regular Rugrats theme tune.
Tommy is voiced by Tami Holbrook rather than E.G. Daily in this episode, thus giving Tommy a completely different voice.
Chuckie and Angelica do not appear in the pilot, and are not mentioned or seen in an image either, implying that their characters were added after the show was picked up by Nickelodeon.
The only characters that have the same design and voice are Didi, Phil and Lil.
At the beginning of the episode, the title card is shown under the Rugrats logo. The logo is different from the logo used after this episode.
It is possible that the ending was used in a Nickelodeon promo.
Tommy and Spike dancing in this episode is shown as a flashback segment of the episode All Growed Up, and used it as a promo for Nickelodeon's channel, despite the fact that this episode never aired on the channel.
E.G. Daily, Christine Cavanaugh, and Cheryl Chase are the only main cast members from the series who did not lend their voices in the pilot.
Apart from exhibitions at animation festivals and conventions, this episode was never seen by the public until August of 2001, when it appeared on Volume 1 of the Decade In Diapers video as a bonus feature, which was released as part of the Rugrats' 10th anniversary on Nickelodeon.
In this episode, Tommy wears his trademark blue shirt in the beginning, but towards the end, he wears an orange shirt, probably a nod to Nickelodeon.
Around 1992, Klasky-Csupo had plans to extend this pilot into 11 minutes and have it televised on Nickelodeon by 1993. Sadly, this never got aired or possibly even produced.

Goofs

When Tommy, Phil and Lil are waiting for Lou to leave, Tommy is seen next to them, but after Lou leaves, he is seen emerging from behind his ball.
When Tommy first rolls on his ball, he is shown to be bigger than it, but after coming out from behind it, he is shown to be smaller than it.
When Tommy is put to bed, his crib is empty, even though his teddy bear is seen after he gets up to exit.
As Tommy and Spike dance, the camera zooms out past the background frame.
It is unknown why Tommy's shirt is blue, but near the end of the episode, it is an orange color. This may be because of the dark lighting during the night-time scene.

@@ Line 23: / Line 23: @@
 [[Lou Pickles|Grandpa Lou]] is getting ready in the Pickles' bathroom, whilst [[Tommy Pickles|Tommy]] stares in awe at the toilet. Tommy crawls up to the toilet, and slowly reaches out to touch it, but is prevented from doing so when Grandpa picks him up, telling him that the bathroom is no place for him, before walking out with Tommy in his arms. Tommy is put into the play pen where he tells [[Phil DeVille|Phil]] and [[Lil DeVille|Lil]] that he heard a noise from the bathroom, and went inside and saw a "big white thing". The gang try to figure out what the big white thing is (suggestions ranging from a giant dog bowl to a fish bowl). Tommy believes that it is alive, and that the burping sound (the flush) was its attempt to speak to him. He then plans to go and talk to it during the night.
-After being put to bed by his parents, Tommy pretends to fall asleep, and waits for [[Stuart Pickles|Stu]] and Didi to leave. After they do, he moves his teddy bear, revealing a screwdriver that he uses to sneak out of his crib, where he then ventures to the bathroom, as the door has been left open. Tommy looks at the toilet in awe, before walking up to it and knocking on it, asking if anybody is home. Naturally, he doesn't get an answer. Tommy, dissatisfied, sees the toilet flusher and climbs a sink plunger to reach it, he jumps on the toilet bowl, but upon seeing his reflection in the water, he screams in shock. Because of this, Tommy nearly falls in, accidentally flushes the toilet, and tries to use the shower curtain to steady himself, unintentionally pulling it down and into the toilet. Still trying to regain balance, Tommy jumps onto the toilet paper roll, which unravels it all over the floor, he then jumps onto the plunger, and swings around on it, he tries to grab onto the sink, but turns the tap on instead, frightening him once again, making him swing back on the plunger, which gets him covered in the still-unraveling toilet paper. He then swings over and grabs onto the sink, climbing up onto it, but due to the toilet paper covering his eyes, he unintentionally grabs and squeezes a toothpaste tube, causing the cap to launch off, bounce off the wall, and hit a small tub of bubble mixture, which foams up the entire sink. Tommy gets foam in his mouth, and drops the toothpaste tube, which splatters onto the ground.
+After being put to bed by his parents, Tommy pretends to fall asleep, and waits for [[Stuart Pickles|Stu]] and [[Didi]] to leave. After they do, he moves his teddy bear, revealing a screwdriver that he uses to sneak out of his crib, where he then ventures to the bathroom, as the door has been left open. Tommy looks at the toilet in awe, before walking up to it and knocking on it, asking if anybody is home. Naturally, he doesn't get an answer. Tommy, dissatisfied, sees the toilet flusher and climbs a sink plunger to reach it, he jumps on the toilet bowl, but upon seeing his reflection in the water, he screams in shock. Because of this, Tommy nearly falls in, accidentally flushes the toilet, and tries to use the shower curtain to steady himself, unintentionally pulling it down and into the toilet. Still trying to regain balance, Tommy jumps onto the toilet paper roll, which unravels it all over the floor, he then jumps onto the plunger, and swings around on it, he tries to grab onto the sink, but turns the tap on instead, frightening him once again, making him swing back on the plunger, which gets him covered in the still-unraveling toilet paper. He then swings over and grabs onto the sink, climbing up onto it, but due to the toilet paper covering his eyes, he unintentionally grabs and squeezes a toothpaste tube, causing the cap to launch off, bounce off the wall, and hit a small tub of bubble mixture, which foams up the entire sink. Tommy gets foam in his mouth, and drops the toothpaste tube, which splatters onto the ground.
 [[Spike]] comes into the bathroom, and sniffs the toothpaste, Tommy drops onto his back, and after a quick drink from the toilet bowl, Spike walks down to the living room, and stops where Lou is watching TV. Spike sits down to watch TV with Tommy, and Lou, unaware of Tommy's presence, scratches Spike on the head, and gets up to go to the bathroom while the commercials are on. Tommy and Spike watch TV while Grandpa Lou goes to the bathroom, who is shocked when he notices the mess. An uproar of yelling ensues as Stu and Didi blame Lou for the mess, as he tries to explain that he didn't do anything. As they argue, Tommy changes the channel to one playing music, and both Spike and him swing along to it.