Do you think he'll still be selling beepers in the movie?

Do you think he'll still be selling beepers in the movie?

what fucking movie

The Hey Arnold Jungle Movie coming out. They're giving Hey Arnold an ending.

he was already selling cell phones in the show, probably making bank on that

I hope he's a medical professional store. The only clientele that still uses beepers are emergency and medical professions. It'd be fun if he followed the last clientele and changed into servicing all the needs of the working medical (and emergency) professional. Beepers, doctor/nurse clothing, work boots, w/e.

Big Bob evolved with the times and it's now just Big Bob's Electronics.
But in the back there remains unsold inventory with a crown and a cape and Bob waits for the return of the King

Nah. Bob's Beeper's is going to fold and he'll be stuck managing a failing Radio Shack.

You know hospitals still use beepers, right? they are more reliable than phones.

Do beepers even cause brain cancer like phones do?

The one we've known about for ages now

It's not like Big Bob sold only beepers, he was shown selling cell phones too. They were considered more of a niche luxury item at the time though.

He still calls it "Bob's Beepers" but he mostly just sells cell phones now.

I'm kind of hoping they keep the setting in the 90s because it better be fucking beepers

Even though I was alive for this and even distinctly remember it, I keep forgetting there was a time even relatively recently were cellphones were neither commonplace nor a mainstay.

I see Big Bob Pataki as a very complex character.

To me, I get the impression that he didnt come from a completely stable home life. He is most likely the son of first or second generation eastern European immigrants who never had much wealth in terms of making it in a big city. His parents may or may not have been well-meaning people, but they just didn't have the drive or ambition to make something of themselves. Bob on the other hand quickly learned the value of hard work and sacrifice, founding his own successful business and he clearly carries the air of the self-made man as opposed to an entitled brat. He treats most others with disrespect because he believes that respect, like everything else in life, must be earned. He lets his wife (who its implied came from a more privelidged, sheltered background than he did) stutter around in an alcoholic daze because he clearly doesn't trust her to be able to handle responsibility like he can. He heaps pressure on his eldest daughter because he wants her to understand firsthand the value of hard work and sacrifice and wants her to have a father who cares and provides for her in a way that his parents perhaps didn't. Caught in the middle of all this is Helga, who Bob puts plenty of pressure on in the earlier episodes (Spelling Bee ect) but soon seems to give up when she doesn't respond in the same positive manner as Olga, and he seems to simply run out of ideas after the ones that served him so well in the past just don't work.

tl dr: Bob is a complex interesting character. He's a jerk and a shitty father, but still a human being.

I got the rest if you want.

His wife ran the business better than him when he was ill, he seems to be the type to need work or lose purpose.

>I keep forgetting there was a time even relatively recently were cellphones were neither commonplace nor a mainstay.

I remember when my dad had a car phone and we thought that was the coolest shit ever.

The spinoff should've happened.

I take that as a yes.

I never paid much attention to Miriam when I was growing up. I didn't find her boring or anything, knowing full well that she had some manner of deficiency (most likely alcoholism). But I just found other characters that caught my interest.

Now that I look back on the show, I can see a lot of character in her. What I find most interesting is the fact that she is untapped potential personified. But I have to wonder what brought about this sort of behavior. The OP states that it comes from a more well-to-do, bourgeois upbringing, which makes all the sense to me. Miriam never had to work for her place in life. Her parents probably had all the hard work done and wanted to make sure she lived an easy life.

But this doesn't mean that she didn't try her best at what she did. She did quite well in school and even did well enough to get into a nice college. But while there, she began to slack off as she came to the slow realization that her parents would support her, regardless of her performance. She discovered booze and went on weekend binges with the other partyers on campus and even took to hitting the sauce when everyone else was away studying for finals. This led to her alchoholism in later life.

The bad grades in college made it hard to find a job that she felt her parents would be proud of, so she instead found and married Bob, an up-and-coming businessman. He normally wouldn't have gone for a girl with so little work ethic, but upon seeing her family, he must have immediately connected it with a respectable lifestyle.

When Olga was born and Bob was pushing her to do her best, Miriam's drinking was stopped. Olga was the little light of her life and seeing her succeed was like her untapped potential coming out. To this day, Olga is the one of the few things that will keep her off of her 'smoothies'.

tl;dr Miriam would have been just as industrious as Bob if her parents hadn't pampered her.

It'll still be set in the 90s so yeah.

I never paid much attention to Brainy growing up, but I now see that he is a very complex character.

Hahahah, just kidding. Enjoy the first two paragraphs of Moby Dick: Call me Ishmael. Some years ago—never mind how long precisely—having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and regulating the circulation. Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people’s hats off—then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball. With a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship. There is nothing surprising in this. If they but knew it, almost all men in their degree, some time or other, cherish very nearly the same feelings towards the ocean with me.

There now is your insular city of the Manhattoes, belted round by wharves as Indian isles by coral reefs--commerce surrounds it with her surf. Right and left, the streets take you waterward. Its extreme downtown is the battery, where that noble mole is washed by waves, and cooled by breezes, which a few hours previous were out of sight of land. Look at the crowds of water-gazers there.

I saw Miriam's problem as being directly related to Bob- she married someone who was successful and a good provider, but he also has such a dominant and assertive personality that he pretty much takes over anything he's involved in. So he's the loud, barking voice of authority in the house and Miriam's just kind of resigned herself to being Bob's housefrau. She may have even had her own career and aspirations that were derailed when she had to become a stay at home mom.

That's how I saw it too. She's married to Bob King Big Shit Pataki. That alone explains her drinking problem.

Olga was forced into being the best by her father. While this turned her into the successful little ball of sunshine that she is, it wasn't exactly balanced.

While Bob was pressured into being successful, she still had the close-knit connection that is lost on many American families. Unfortunately, climbing the corporate ladder only bolstered the idea that success is everything and respect comes with milage. This carried into how he reared his children.

While he never did anything cruel to Olga or Helga, he held a great amount of pressure on their success. He didn't do it intentionally, but he remained distant but firm until his standards were met. While Helga learned to deal with it in her own way, Olga took it as the way the world would treat her.

This is why whenever anything in her life diverts from how she hopes or expects, she goes to pieces. She cries in her room for days (with make-up that lasts just as long) if she doesn't excel in her classes. And she becomes incredibly nervous and loses confidence when she takes an alternative route in life.

But otherwise, she is quite happy and peppy. She's a joy to be around, in a sickeningly sweet way.

that be whack

His words, not mine.

I always thought of Arnold as being the ultimate litigator. He never gave up on peaceful solutions or reason and we very rarely saw him lose his temper. The rest of the cast even look to him to be this way, seeing his attitude towards the world to be something that is really unique. Helga even seems to find this trait attractive.

With most of the characters being being flawed in one way or another, Arnold being this way is simply... odd. Living in the middle of a big city with so many strange people just a couple doors down and a school with people like Harold, Rhonda, and (of course) Helga. All that could really ware on a young person's sense of morality. Somehow though, Arnold perseveres through it and remains the voice of reason.

But what I like about the show is how he isn't treated as a mary sue character when there's so much potential for it. Smart, presumed orphan, awesome room (seriously, who wouldn't have killed for a room like that?), and always in the right. Arnold had the world go against him multiple times and things didn't always work out for him. But he accepted it and rolled with the punches. That, and he always had friends to help him out in such situations. I can only assume that it's his positive attitude and ability to see the good in people that earned him these friends. I guess his attitude just came full circle back to him and has reinforced it enough that it will remain a part of his character.

Big Patty.

Feared as a school bully by many, but seen more and more as one of the group as she continues to appear in the show. Regardless, she is still known as a tough girl with little social life.

What we learn about her is that she has a tough exterior, but wants to do what's best. But she has a reputation to uphold, which is where she and Helga relate and upon which they forge a common understanding.

My guess with her is that she was once much like Arnold. She was a reasonable litigator and played the roll of a peacekeeper. But as she got older, she began to grow into how we see her today and became ostracized because of her size. With this keeping her on the outside of the social circle, she lost that moral conviction that she had. But along with her size came strength, which she used as a way to act out. Her parents, while talking to her, seemed to hint at her bullying had caused problems before.

Without many friends, she taught herself to become self-reliant. This is evidenced in the arm wrestling episode with Harold, where she teaches him to buckle down and dedicate himself to something. I think this is a trait that she had to teach herself while living as a nice girl with the reputation of a bully.

While she is more accepted in later episodes, even going to school social events with no problems (probably pushed into going by her parents), she still keeps a strong sense of right and wrong and is willing to use violence to institute it.

Fortunately, I think her run-in with Helga taught her to not judge too quickly. She won't go around punching people's lights out, but most people wouldn't dare get on her bad side anyway.

Rhonda Wellington Lloyd was a snobby rich girl, but good at heart.

Like most rich characters in shows, she kept her nose high out of not knowing any better; not because she thought less of her friends. She came from a privileged family and was taught to have a certain demeanor and decorum in everyday life. When she sees her classmates act in a less reserved or more casual way, she accepts it but would never DREAM of acting in such a way.

This is why she is always seen with Nadine in tow. While Nadine has an acute interest in bugs and science in general, her personality is reserved enough that Rhonda can remain comfortable in social situations. While she kind of treats her as a lap dog, it's never been a wall in the relationship. Nadine is the kind of person that will bend over backwards for a friend. (Remember how she sacrificed a good portion of her roach collection to get Helga out of the restaurant?)

I'd imagine she had always gone to a public school, her parents sending her there to give her a worldview that they never received in their posh public school. While at PS 118, she quickly gained a reputation as "the rich girl". But since she was genuinely kind and was willing to be of help to people (to the point of risking her social status), she was never really ostracized for it.

I think once she reaches about middle or high school, she'll get someone calling her on the occasional condescending comment and will initially be taken aback. But she isn't an unreasonable person and will learn to keep her posh attitude in check. This will more than likely bring her closer to friends and will even begin to loosen up.

What was the name of the boy that arnold helped him with math?.
I liked that episode.

Torvald.
Fun fact: When Arnold went into his neighborhood, gunshots and police sirens could be heard in the background. A woman even screamed.

Stoop Kid was originally in a family that was very poor. So poor that every dollar they could muster went into the rent, utilities, and food. So whenever anything was given to stoop kid, every few christmases or birthdays, he held onto it for dear life. This is where his "Little Engine That Could" book came from.

But the impoverished life left his parents in a very hostile way. Fights over money were common and would occasionally grow violent. From a time when Stoop Kid was very young, he would take a long time coming home, usually stopping at the stoop that would become his home. He would stay there until just after the streetlights came on. This is why all the kids in the neighborhood never saw him away from his stoop.

Eventually, he began to realize that he was being noticed less and at home with the bills stacking up higher and higher. One night, he just never came home, remaining on his stoop.

Stoop Kid gathered items like chairs and blankets from the garbage and built himself a shelter to live in. He would spend most of his days looking for food. But after he returned to his home to find that the objects he acquired had been stolen or vandalized, he became less and less eager to leave his Stoop. I think it may have been something traumatic like a violent mugging that pushed him far enough to never want to leave his stoop again. He fought away any passers-by the next day that wanted to help him or take him to the hospital, fearing that his home would be damaged or gone again. From that day forward, he became violent towards any that even walked by his home. He held onto it like any item he had received in life. It wasn't until Arnold's involvement that he managed to leave his shelter.

These days, he's able to walk around, but he doesn't like being too far. He prefers to stay within eyesight of his home.

I think I may need to do this in parts for Helga. Let's start with her home life and go from there.

Helga grew up in a household that had diverted any sort of significant attention to her older sister. I think it was something that happened somewhat suddenly, since we see her going to her parents and expected them to pack her lunch and take her to pweschool. My guess is that she tended to keep to herself, even as a younger child. This time was spent working on arts and crafts, where her artistic touch originated. With her out of sight from her parents most of the time, her going off to school was something sudden and took some getting used to. Odds are that wasn't the only walk to school that Helga had to make.

Helga mostly takes after her father, having his aggression and no nonsense exterior. In the episode where he was left to look after her while Miriam was away, we see that they both potentially share common interests and attitudes. But this was something they had never really explored. I think that they would have had a great relationship if Bob had given her some of the attention he gave Olga. Instead, by the time his attention shifted to his younger daughter, a standard had been made. Unfortunately for the two of them, Helga's interests were elsewhere by then, and had given up on taking the same path that Olga had.
Miriam's side of the family is where Olga got her knack for writing. Miriam probably had excelled in poetry and prose in her younger years, which had been passed to Helga, who put it to use in her isolated weekends. She learned to spell well ahead of the rest of her class and was reading a high school level in fourth grade.

Whenever she wasn't concocting new work based on her love for "football head", she was reading up on some of the long untouched books on her mother's shelf. Miriam never seemed to mind and they made for a great read.

Olga was the focus of all of Helga's scorn at home. She didn't focus much on her disdain for her parents, seeing Miriam as useless or unresponsive and Big Bob as too thick headed to really be worth the effort. What really sickened her about her sister was that after all the praise and affection that her older sister received, all she wanted to do was hate her. But that hate was never recognized or returned. Instead, Olga only reply to the glares and mumbles was a perky kiss on the cheek and a sweet smile. Her disdain for the way her family acted was not seen by the one person she assumed would be smart enough to recognize it. So, instead, she took it out on her peers.

It's hard to analyze Helga without bringing up Arnold. Her obsession with him is next.
Arnold was seen as the person who could always be depended on to be kind. And for Helga, this rang true more to her than most anyone. Since her first encounter with him, with simply lending of his umbrella and compliment to her bow, she had grown into her obsession with him. It started off as simple drawings and simple love notes that she was too nervous to give to him.

This became all the more difficult for her as she established herself as the tough girl. She used it as both a defense mechanism for her emotions for her feelings for Arnold and a vent for her home life. It started off as a way to keep bullies like Harold out of her business and off of her back, but soon became the only way that her peers saw her. The reason she couldn't talk to Arnold, or even show him any sort of affection was that she was afraid of what would happen if she were to let that wall she had built up fall. Her fear for how the world would treat an emotional Helga was overpowering her love for the boy that had shown her kindness. If she had refrained from an aggressive attitude, she more than likely would have easily gotten along with the other kids at school.

As she aged, the adoration for Arnold not only remained, it grew. She only had her writings and artistry to express it. She certainly wouldn't want to share it with anyone at school. Even her best friend, Phoebe, wasn't aware of it for the longest time. At home, Bob only seemed to care about what kind of grades she brought home and Miriam was usually somewhere in her own head and unresponsive to much of anything said. So with her private expression as the only way to show her love, it was never truly dealt with in her mind. It remained with her for as long as she kept it to herself.

I think that the episode where Helga visited a psychologist provided some excellent insight into this. When she finally admitted to someone that she was in love with Arnold, it was loud and desperate. She obviously wanted to say it, but never had the opportunity. And to have that accepted as something natural, although not normal (animal sacrifices?), was probably exactly what she needed. From that point on in her life, she was likely far more confident in herself and even provided a mental leg-up when confronting her emotions.

Unfortunately, I don't think it would have lasted forever. Arnold, being a nonviolent litigator, probably would not have been able to put up with the tough side of his girlfriend forever. He more than likely dumped her, knowing that he wouldn't want to dare change someone like Helga. He saw her good sides and loved them, but her bad sides were what kept him from loving her fully.

Needless to say, this hit Helga hard. She had finally attained what she had waited years for, and it was gone. But, as time progressed, she would get over it. But she would always keep a part of her heart for her first love.

Last one.

Phoebe was instilled with the idea that a reserved personality is something to be desired. From an early age, her parents taught her not to brag or to be too prideful of her successes, but to silently accept them with dignity. She does not mind it. In fact, she finds that the silent attitude while excelling both academically and physically (fencing and all that), is something that gains a silent respect for her.

Unfortunately, she still has a great amount of emotion bottled up in her, which leads to incidents like her silent fanning for Ronny Matthews. Much like Helga, she has a side of herself that she thinks needs to be hidden. I think that an obsession like this is her way of siphoning off emotions that would interfere with her life. She keeps her self expression as something separate from the rest of her life.

This works for her quite well until she gets to college or starts living on her own. She no longer lives with her parents and has a blank slate in terms of reputation. She takes this opportunity as a way to start living her life in a less dignified way. She gets into trouble with drink, lovers, and sometimes even the law after some particularly risky decisions. After a few too many negative encounters, she finds that discipline in her life is something that will keep it in control. And so, she finds a way to keep both sides of her personality, the reserved and free side, in check.

It is because of this duality that she able have such a friendship with Helga. I imagine that their friendship started on the Friday of a weekend where they have a project they were paired up to do. Helga, knowing that Olga will be in town for the weekend asks if she can (almost states that she will) stay over for the night. Being the submissive that she is, Phoebe ignores the rude gesture. As the night progresses, they do the typical sleepover board games, movies, and truth or dare games. Through this, they slowly learn about one another. Helga, feeling comfortable enough, is able to let down her tough girl act and Phoebe empathizes with it. Knowing the emotional girl lies somewhere beneath the mean exterior, she remains Helga's obedient, but silently appreciated, lapdog of a friend.

Phoebe's crush on Gerald is a reflection of her subconscious desire to be emotionally free. Gerald is cool. Gerald is smooth. Gerald is who he wants to be. Phoebe finds that very attractive, to put it simply.

Beeper App.

That's still the coolest shit ever.

Had fun reading you user, nice overview. Makes me wish I had something to add but it's 4 AM here and I'm reading about fictional characters on a malaysian forum, can't really rev up this brain for critical thinking atm.

Still, good job.