| In the Dreamtime | Gallery | Transcript |
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| Season 3 Episode 18a | |
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| In the Dreamtime | |
| Original Airdate | February 20, 1994 |
| VHS release | Bedtime Bash |
| DVD release | Season 3 Complete Series |
| Previous Episode | Chuckie's Wonderful Life |
| Next Episode | The Unfair Pair |
"In the Dreamtime" is an episode of Rugrats from Season 3.
Characters Present[]
Synopsis[]
Chuckie is having trouble distinguishing fantasy from reality after having vivid dreams at night. This almost results in disaster when he sleepwalks into his neighbors yard, where a bulldog is keeping watch.
- Description from Klasky Csupo
Recap[]
The episode begins on what appears to be a normal day in the sandbox at Tommy Pickles's house. After the babies watch ants float atop a tiny stream of water, Lil asks what they're going to do next. Tommy suggests that they go to Spike's doghouse. While along the way, Chuckie notices some strange things happening: walking flowers, doughnut-shaped clouds, dancing scarecrows, waving snowmen, flying toaster planes, flying fish, flying frying pans, and a man clad only in a bush. When the babies make it, Chuckie notices that the doghouse is a big mansion. Inside, Spike talks with a Cockney English accent, drinking some tea. Chuckie realizes that Spike isn't supposed to talk and asks Tommy what is going on, only for Tommy to turn around, with a silly clown face and a different voice. Tommy says, "I'm not Tommy!" and then giggles. Chuckie wakes up in his room, scared—it was all a dream.
Chas comes into the room, asking Chuckie if he had a bad dream. Chas assures Chuckie that he doesn't have to be scared of dreams, saying that nothing in a dream can hurt him, "because it isn't real." Chas gives Chuckie a kiss, and he goes back to sleep.
The next day (or so it seems), Chuckie tells the babies about his dream while rolling the ball in Tommy's playpen. Tommy tells the others to come up to his grandpa's room. While going up the stairs, Chuckie notices that the stairs are not like they usually are; they're an extremely long spiral, balanced on stilts, and at the top, the walls are adorned with abstract pictures of Tommy. The babies go into Grandpa Lou's room, a galaxy of planets and stars, and have fun in it. Chuckie attempts to go in, only to fall...back into his room. It was just a dream, too.
The next day, while the babies are watching worms' race and ants float, Chuckie tells everyone about his dreams. After Phil and Lil wish that Tommy was a clown in real life, Chuckie thinks he's dreaming all over again (as the babies' conversation is following the exact same script as in his dream.) The babies try to convince Chuckie that he isn't dreaming, only for Chuckie to deny that the babies are really his friends; they're just "dream babies".
After the babies go into Spike's doghouse, Chuckie is not impressed, as the doghouse looks nothing like it did in his dream, and Spike isn't talking. He says that he's going into the next yard to talk to the neighbor's dog, a bulldog, which he does. After talking to the dog, Chuckie falls on his bottom, saying that it hurts. He is confused by this, because of what his dad said about dreams not hurting. Tommy saves Chuckie's life by distracting the dog into fetching a stick. Chuckie, realizing that he's awake, and his brush with the bulldog really happened, faints after going into the next yard.
Later that night, Chas puts Chuckie into bed, and Chuckie goes to sleep. As soon as Chas enters the next room, he notices Stu in there. Chas says he didn't know Stu was coming over, only for the latter to turn around, with a clown face on. Stu says, "I'm not Stu!" in a weird, silly voice and giggles, very similar to Chuckie's dream at the beginning of the episode. Chas wakes up, screaming with fright—it was all a dream, ending the episode (revealing that possibly everything that had happened in the episode from beginning to end was all a dream Chas was having instead of Chuckie).
Trivia[]
- The creamy yellow sky foreshadows that Chuckie is in a dream.
- This is one of the only episodes where Spike actually talks (albeit only in Chuckie's dream), aside from the movie Rugrats Go Wild. In this episode, Spike's voice is provided by Michael Bell, who also voices Chas, Drew, Boris, and Spike's barking.
- The "I'm not Tommy!" and "I'm not Stu!" clown scenes would later be parodied in YouTube Poop videos. Also, these scenes are popular on YouTube.
- The "I'm not Tommy!" and "I'm not Stu!" clown scenes could be an allusion to Large Marge from the 1985 film Pee-wee's Big Adventure.
- This episode has the intro that was used in this season from episodes 40 to episode 54. This is the last time this intro is used.
- In the hall before "grandpa's bedroom", there's a picture of Tommy looking like Krumm from Aaahh!!! Real Monsters.
- The episode's ending makes it unclear if the whole episode was Chas' dream, or just the "I'm not Stu" scene.
- Chas explained to Chuckie that during dreams, no one can get hurt and later Chuckie tells the babies that he doesn't like his dreams. Nevertheless, both of Chuckie's dreams looks more like nightmares instead of dreams.
- Nightmares are technically dreams; they are just unpleasant ones.
- The description from Klasky Csupo is inaccurate, in which it says that Chuckie sleepwalks into the yard with the bulldog; in the actual episode, Chuckie is awake when he is doing this.
- A similar plot would later be used in the Ed, Edd n Eddy episode, "Rock-A-Bye Ed".
- This episode shares some similarities with the science-fiction film Inception, as both have a character or two trying to distinguish what is real, or what is a dream.
- The title of this episode, "In The Dreamtime", might be a reference to the term used by early anthropologists to refer to the religion-cultural worldview attributed to Australian Aboriginal beliefs.
- Moral: Understand the difference between fiction and reality and avoid daydreaming in dangerous situations.
