"If You Give a Frog a Cookie" is the second segment of the eighth episode of the third season of Amphibia, and the ninetieth episode overall.
It premiered on November 20, 2021, alongside "Hollywood Hop Pop".[1]
Synopsis
Anne trusts a questionable scientist who may have found a way to get them to Amphibia.[1]
Plot
The Plantars missing home.
At the Boonchuy residence, the Plantars are very clearly homesick for Amphibia, and Anne is baking them cookies with bugs while they are outside in their makeshift swamp in the backyard, but it's not cheering them up. While they go back to their miniature village of Wartwood Swamp they built in the bushes, Anne receives a call from Dr. Jan saying she has found a scientist who has been working with string theory and may have some work to show about getting the Plantars back to Amphibia. Most importantly, she mentioned that she still needs to vet this scientist to make sure she can be trusted, so she asks Anne to not tell the Plantars just yet. Thanks to a bit of a guilt trip however, Anne breaks and tells the family everything, and they soon find themselves at Dr. Frakes' children's museum.
Dr. Frakes is almost pulled into the portal.
While there, the group poses as reporters interested to a scientist in her real studies, not just the kids' experiments. After some bartering they are let in, where Dr. Frakes explains that only recently did her studies lunge forward when an energy event opened a portal in her equipment, and we see the flashback of Anne, Sasha, and Marcy opening the Calamity Box in the playground and being sucked into Amphibia, but also at Frakes' lab, where Frakes' Skip Man was sucked into the energy field.
Dr. Frakes explains that she can keep the portal open for a short time, but the magnetic interference doesn't allow her to get any clean images of it, but is ready to prove otherwise, but her scientist assistant, Terri, doesn't think it's a good idea, seeing it as too dangerous, but Dr. Frakes doesn’t care.
The group thinks they see Amphibia in the images and try to take a look, so Dr. Frakes opens up the portal but when it collapses, it creates such an energy burst (seeing that the portal only holds for five seconds) that it knocks off the disguises on the Plantars, revealing their true frog identities to the doctor.
Chaos ensues as Dr. Frakes now has proof of the other worlds the portal can access and tries to kidnap the Plantars and dissect them to learn more. Terri then thinks this has gone too far and deems it wrong to hurt sentient beings, teaming up with Anne to help the Plantars at the cost of Terri's job.
The gang eventually escapes, and Terri drives them all home, with Anne telling the Plantars to stop guilting her since it nearly got them killed and they got Terri fired, but Terri adds that they had actually done a favor and that science is for helping others. With everything Terri learned while working for Dr. Frakes, Terri then suggests to build a portal to help them return to Amphibia.
Terri agrees to help get the Plantars home.
Sprig then asks Terri, using his guilting technique, if he could drive, which Terri agrees, but he nearly causes the car to crash.
Cast
- Brenda Song as Anne Boonchuy
- Justin Felbinger as Sprig Plantar
- Bill Farmer as Hop Pop Plantar
- Amanda Leighton as Polly Plantar
- On Braly as Mrs. Boonchuy
- Brian Sounalath as Mr. Boonchuy
- Kate Micucci as Terri
- Cree Summer as Dr. Frakes
- Anika Noni Rose as Dr. Jan
Additional voices
- Eden Riegel as Gaming Boy, Screaming Girl
- Troy Baker as Science Teacher, Documentary Narrator
- Cree Summer as Crazed Candy Boy
- Kari Wahlgren as Crazed Candy Girl, Calm Candy Girl, Crazed Candy Glasses Boy
Non-speaking cameo
- Marcy Wu (flashback)
- Sasha Waybright (flashback)
Mentioned
- Mr. X (indirectly)
Other characters
- Wally Ribbiton (imitation)
- Leopold Loggle (imitation)
- Sadie Croaker (imitation)
- Mayor Toadstool (imitation)
- Toadie (imitation)
- Sylvia Sundew (imitation)
- Bessie (imitation)
Title in other languages
| Language | Title | Translation | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
 Latin American Spanish
|
La solución es una galleta | The solution is a cookie | |
 Bulgarian
|
Да дадеш бисквитка на жаба | If You Give a Frog a Cookie | |
 German
|
Cookies helfen immer | Cookies always help | |
 Japanese
|
クッキーですべて解決 | Cookies Solve Everything | |
 Polish
|
I daj tu żabie ciastko | And give a frog a cookie here | |
 Thai
|
เมื่อกบได้คุกกี้ |
Transcript
| For a full transcript of "If You Give a Frog a Cookie", click here. |
Gallery
Click here to view the gallery.
Trivia
- Viewership: This episode was watched by 0.31 viewers on its premiere.[3]
- This is the first episode to be boarded by Cheyenne Curtis since the Season 1 finale.
- This is the last episode in which King Andrias is completely absent.
- Running gag: The Plantars giving Anne guilt trip looks.
Revelations and significant events
- The Plantars have built a tiny version of Wartwood in Anne's backyard because of their homesickness.
- On the night when Anne, Marcy, and Sasha got teleported to Amphibia, the Calamity Box caused a blackout once it was opened; the power output was detected by Dr. Frakes, which led her to start developing a portal to other realities.
- One dimension to which the original portal opened is the Boiling Isles, the main setting of The Owl House, implying that the two series share the same universe. This would later be followed up in The Owl House's second season finale "King's Tide" in which Camila Noceda reads a news article documenting Anne's disappearance.
- Terri becomes an ally besides Dr. Jan, the I.T. Gals, and the Thai Community.
Continuity
- The flashback of Anne, Marcy and Sasha being teleported is reused from the opening sequence of the first two seasons.
- This flashback was previously elaborated in "Best Fronds" and "The Second Temple".
- This is the final appearance of this scene.
- This is also the last episode to flashback to Anne's thirteenth birthday and the third (after "Best Fronds" and "The Second Temple") to not be a season finale.
- The Skip Man in "Wax Museum" belonged to Dr. Frakes and was sucked into a portal during the Calamity Box event before being collected by Curator Ponds sometime before the episode, then into the hands of Anne.
- Anne's line, "Now stay close, the government's still on our tail", is a reference to the events of "Hollywood Hop Pop".
Allusions
- If You Give a Mouse a Cookie - The episode's title is based on the children's book of the same name. Both contain the moral of when being too giving becomes problematic.
- The Owl House - One of the blurred realities on Dr. Frakes's monitors is the series' titular location.
- Phineas and Ferb - Terri asks Anne "Aren't you a little young to be reporters?", this is the type of questions that the titular characters get asked constantly throughout the Series; though Frake's burst from behind interrupts Terri before she received the answer.
- Dr. Eggman and Professor Elvin Gadd - The mug behind Dr. Frakes during the portal flashback resembles Dr. Eggman from the Sonic the Hedgehog series and Professor Elvin Gadd from the Luigi's Mansion series combined. That and Doc Brown from Back to the Future.
- Yume Nikki - There is a girl inside the Brainasium who looks like the main protagonist Madotsuki.
Errors
- Possible continuity error: Terri is referred to with she/her pronouns in this episode,[4] despite going by they/them pronouns later in Marcy's Journal: A Guide to Amphibia. It's possible that Terri goes by both sets of pronouns.
Memorable quotes
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 November 2021 Programming Highlights. Disney General Entertainment Content (October 22, 2021). Archived from the original on October 22, 2021. Retrieved on October 24, 2021.
- ↑ De La Fuente Sibert, Alex. "Amphibia (inspect code elements to find the original file headings)".
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Metcalf, Mitch (November 23, 2021). Saturday 11.20.2021 Top 150 Cable Originals & Network Finals. Showbuzz Daily. Archived from the original on November 23, 2021. Retrieved on November 23, 2021.
- ↑ Todd McClintock (writer) and Joe Johnston (director) (November 20, 2021). "If You Give a Frog a Cookie". Amphibia. Season 3. Episode 8B. Disney Channel. - Anne: "Yeah, but you cost this poor lady [Terri] her job and nearly got dissected."