The Bureau of Overthinking Things

Originally published January 1, 1999, in Comics Buyer’s Guide #1311

People often ask, “Where do you get your ideas for the weekly grind of But I Digress?” That’s not the most often-asked question I get. The most often-asked is, “Who the hell do you think you are?” But a close second would be the one stated above. The answer is: lots of places. One of those places would be the Bureau of Overthinking Things, a think-tank in Oyster Bay which specializes in dwelling upon matters that are of little to no consequence. They then send out news releases to subscribers, and we in turn make what use of it we desire.

I’m ashamed to say that I’ve used these reports from time to time if I can’t come up with anything on my own, and then passed that work off as something that I myself had developed. But the guilt has become overwhelming, and I’m afraid I have to confess to it. And before you hold me in too much contempt: Hey, at least I’m coming clean about it. Certain comedians have built entire careers on the Bureau’s releases (right, Seinfeld?)

And so, whenever the Bureau sends out something that I think might be of interest to our rather skewed little sensibilities here at BID, I’ll simply run the release as is, properly credited, so I no longer feel like such a hypocrite.

REPORT FROM: The Bureau of Overthinking Things

SUBJECT MATTER: Rugrats

OVERTHOUGHT TOPIC: The Aging of Tommy Pickles

CATALYST: The Rugrats Movie

PROBLEM: The internal continuity of Rugrats is horrific. The first episode of Rugrats, aired some years ago on Nickelodeon, was “Tommy’s First Birthday” (hereinafter referred to as TFB). For the purpose of this overthinking, we will posit that TFB was the first adventure of the children as explored in the series, due to the highly introductory nature of the storyline, and the fact that subsequent episodes have dealt with further exploration of childhood development.

In the subsequent run of the series, at least a year’s worth of time, if not more, passes, as indicated by several episodes dealing with watermarks of child development, as well as episodes depicting such calendar specific times as Passover, Chanukah, and Christmas. Furthermore, Tommy’s mother has conceived a child by the last “new episode” of the current series run. Assuming a normal nine month pregnancy (resulting in the birth of baby Dill in the theatrical film) it is safe to say that approximately two years has gone by since the characters’ introduction.

Yet Tommy has not aged. He remains developmentally no different than he was at age one. Chucky has had marginally better luck. Established as being two years old, he has become potty trained, moved out of his crib, etc., in the intervening time. But Angelica, who was established as aged four, was and is capable of conversing with adults, a talent that eludes the others because of their youth. By the time of the film, Angelica should be six, Chucky four (and therefore able to communicate with the grown-ups as well) and Tommy at least three. He should be out of diapers, have more hair, more teeth, and walking properly. And we won’t even get started on Phil and Lil.

Granted, we have discussed bizarre age depiction before (See: “What’s Up With DeeDee’s Parents? What Generation is She Supposed to Be? What is DeeDee, in her mid sixties, that she has Parents Who talk and Act Like They Just Moved out of the Ukraine?”) But Tommy’s stunted development is truly odd, particularly when compared with the hypersonic maturation of Dill. Barely a few weeks out of the womb, when most infants have not yet found their hands or are truly aware of themselves as entities separate from their mothers, Dill is capable of: Sitting Up; Steering a Motorized Vehicle; Utilizing a gripping reflex that is capable of defying the best efforts of his older sibling to break; Displaying not only awareness of his own bowel movements, but the ability to announce its production with the word, “Poopies.” If Tommy displayed the proportionate degree of maturation, by this point he should be capable of taking the SATs.

SUGGESTED RESOLUTIONS: (1) The Pickles children are genetically screwed up, possibly due to some leaking radiation or similar mishap thanks to their fairly incompetent toy-making father, and therefore should be pitied and perhaps even feared; (2) a letter writing campaign should be commenced at once to force the producers to have greater respect for continuity; (3) we should ignore it as we have in other similar cases of strange non-aging (See: Peanuts; Dennis the Menace; Franklin Richards; Dick Clark.)

 

REPORT FROM: The Bureau of Overthinking Things

SUBJECT MATTER: Peter Pan and Tinkerbell

OVERTHOUGHT TOPIC: “Clap if You Believe in Fairies” Act Two Climax

CATALYST: Peter Pan production currently starring Cathy Rigby

PROBLEM: The production itself, presently running on Broadway, is sensational. Cathy Rigby is, quite simply, the best Peter Pan this Bureau has ever seen, and that includes Mary Martin and Sandy Duncan (heretical as that may sound.). The comfortable physicality of flying and tumbling is to be expected, but it’s also a superb acting job, from her boyish behavior to the Artful Dodger-ish accent she displays. Furthermore, changes have been made to streamline and improve the book. For example, the endless and show-stopping (as in, causing it to grind to a halt) “Oh My Mysterious Lady” duet has been replaced by the dramatic and accurate-to-the-book confrontation on Marooned Rock, right down to Pan’s being stabbed and contemplating death as a great adventure.

Nothing, however, has been done to rectify the clunky and improbable Act Two Climax.

Peter Pan is asleep in the hiding place of the Lost Boys. Captain Hook has gained entrance. He has his enemy at his mercy–a quality that he is sorely lacking. Instead of killing him, however, Hook instead leaves poison (disguised as medicine) for Peter to ingest, wasting a golden opportunity. After his departure, Tinkerbell alerts Peter to the plight of Wendy and the Lost Boys, who have been captured by the pirates. Pan believes her, and prepares to head after them. But first he stops to drink his medicine. When Miss Bell informs him that it is, in fact, poison left by Hook, Pan suddenly finds her untrustworthy, even though a moment earlier he believed her story about the Boys’ capture.

With time of the essence, the sane, rational, logical thing for Miss Bell to do is knock the bottle over, spilling the poison so that Pan cannot drink it, and head out. With Pan’s memory, he’d probably forget about it in the crush of subsequent events anyway. Instead, Miss Bell—in a burst of total insanity—consumes the poison, nearly killing herself. The last time we saw a Fairy this nuts was when we watched “Sweatin’ to the Oldies.”

(But I Digress apologizes to any offended by the Bureau’s above remark. This is actually the sort of comment we delete when we process it for the column, but in the interests of accuracy, we are presented unexpurgated reports. Sorry for any inconvenience.)

Miss Bell is subsequently resuscitated by, basically, a massive Clap. There is an ironic subtext of being saved from poison by the Clap, but that we will save for another investigation. Truthfully, it seems as if the contrived development was created specifically so that the second act could end on an artificially created, manipulative emotional high of applause.

SUGGESTED RESOLUTIONS: (1) Restructure the play so that it’s a standard two-act play instead of a three act, thereby eliminating any artificial need for a rousing send-off. (2) Have Hook attempt to kill Peter in his sleep. Tinkerbell intercepts the strike of Hook’s hook, the brouhaha awakens Pan, Hook flees, and Miss Bell is left mortally wounded. The applause scenario can then be maintained.

(Peter David, writer of stuff, can be written to at Second Age, Inc., PO Box 239, Bayport, NY 11705.)