| Passover | Gallery | Transcript |
|---|
| Season 3 Episode 26 | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Passover | |
| Original Airdate | April 13, 1995 |
| VHS release | A Rugrats Passover |
| DVD release | Season 3 It's All Relatives Holiday Celebration Complete Series |
| Previous Episode | Moving Away |
| Next Episode | Chanukah |
"Passover" is the Season 3 finale of Rugrats, and one of two Jewish holiday specials for the show (the other being "Chanukah").
Characters Present[]
- Tommy/Moses
- Chuckie/Hebrew Slave
- Angelica/Pharaoh Ramses II
- Phil/Hebrew Slave (imagination sequence)
- Lil/Hebrew Slave (imagination sequence)
- Stu
- Didi
- Drew
- Charlotte
- Chas
- Susie/Ethiopian Ambassador (imagination sequence)
- Edwin/Ethiopian Ambassador (imagination sequence)
- Boris
- Minka
Character Introduced[]
- Taskmaster Baby (imagination sequence)
Synopsis[]
After accidentally locking himself in the attic with the Rugrats, Boris begins to recount the story of Passover. As he does, Angelica imagines herself as the pharaoh of Egypt, Tommy as Moses and the rest of the babies as the children of Israel. - Description from Klasky-Csupo
Plot[]
As the episode opens, Tommy and Angelica and their parents are driving to celebrate the Passover Seder at the home of Didi's parents, Boris and Minka. Angelica questions why she and her parents should be at the Seder at all, especially considering Boris and Minka aren't actually her grandparents. Drew tells Angelica she might end up having fun, and that Passover is a meaningful holiday. Upon hearing the word "holiday", Angelica gets hopeful that this means there will be presents, and is disappointed when Drew says there won't be. Charlotte says that Passover is about freedom-- something more important than presents. Angelica is now excited, thinking that partaking in the celebration of Passover means she is "free", and can therefore do whatever she wants. Stu is also having reservations about celebrating Passover, believing it is boring, and questioning how meaningful it is when there are no presents involved. Didi says that for thousands of years, Passover has been a time for Jewish families to gather and reflect on the history of their people. Stu still thinks it will be boring.
Following an argument with Minka about what type of wine glasses they should use (either the glasses that belonged to Minka's mother or the ones that belonged to Boris's father), Boris storms out of the room; the two families arrive and Didi tries comforting her mom, who believes Boris has run away. Stu is hopeful that this means he won't have to go through with the Seder, but Didi insists it will still happen, and that Boris can join them whenever he decides to come back.
Boris hasn't reappeared by the time Tommy's best friend, Chuckie, and his dad, Chas, arrive to join the celebration; when the Seder begins, the children set off to search for Boris, eventually finding him in the attic. Boris explains that he felt bad about yelling at Minka and had gone to look for her mother's wine glasses but had become locked inside when the door closed behind him (it can't open from the inside). Angelica tests the door, and inadvertently locks them all in again.
Angelica tells Boris that he's not really missing anything and admits that she thinks that Passover's a dumb holiday. Boris tries convincing her otherwise by telling her and the boys the story of the Exodus, hoping to improve their understanding of Passover. As he talks, Angelica imagines herself as the Pharaoh of Egypt, who commands the Hebrew slaves (imagined as the other Rugrats and numerous other babies) to throw their newborn sons into the Nile River. One Hebrew slave defies the order by putting her infant son, Moses (imagined as Tommy), into a basket and setting the basket afloat in the river. The basket and baby are discovered by Pharaoh Angelica, who shows Moses around her palace and kingdom, and decides to make him her partner.
As Boris explains that the Pharaoh was unaware that Moses himself was actually a Hebrew, Chas enters the attic, looking for the children, and becomes locked in with the rest of them. He sits down and listens as Boris continues. Years later, Boris says, Moses stood up for an abused Hebrew slave (imagined as Chuckie) and was outed as a Hebrew. The episode then pictures Tommy as Moses fleeing to the desert, where he becomes a shepherd and forgets about Egypt and the Pharaoh, until the voice of God calls to him from a burning bush, telling him that he must free the Hebrews from slavery.
Moses confronts the Pharaoh and demands that she free the Hebrews. She refuses and calls her guards (one of them voiced by Dana Hill) to drag Moses away; he curses her kingdom with terrible plagues until she relents and allows Moses to leave with the enslaved Hebrews. As Boris is explaining how the Pharaoh deceives the Hebrews and prevents them from leaving, Drew and Charlotte arrive and they get locked in with the others.
Boris resumes the story: the Pharaoh's treachery causes Moses to curse her once more, this time with a plague on the first-born children of Egypt. The Pharaoh, after realizing that she herself is a first-born child, runs to Moose's home and bargains with Moses: he can leave if he calls off this final plague. Moses hesitates at first, reminding her the last time they made a deal, she changed her mind, but she nervously pretends that it was a joke, which allows him to comply and lead the Hebrews out of Egypt.
Meanwhile, Stu gets fed up with the Seder and accidentally makes Minka cry by admitting he is not Boris, until they realize that almost everyone had gone. (She even threw the baby out with the bathwater.)
Once the Hebrews start to flee Egypt, the Pharaoh reneges on her promise (after realizing that she set all of the Hebrews free) and leads out her remaining army to pursue them.
Minka, Didi and Stu arrive in the attic to find the group enthralled by the end of Boris's story: Moses, cornered, calls down the power of God to part the Red Sea, which the Hebrews are approaching. They pass through the parted waters, which then crash back together behind them, engulfing the Pharaoh and her army. With the story over, the family gets up to finish the Seder, but this time, since Boris told the whole story of the Passover, they should just eat after all. Boris likes Minka's matzo soup, making her flush, but suddenly, the wind blows the door shut, locking them all in. Boris decides to tell them another story, which Chas at first thinks is about how the Hebrews wandered the desert for forty years before finally reaching the Promised Land. But Boris reveals it's actually a story about how an aunt and uncle of his met at Passover Seder back in Russia.
Trivia[]
- When Pharaoh Angelica realizes that she herself is a first-born child, she calls her parents and asks them if they had any other kids before her; they forgot to mention to her, Drew explains, that Angelica is his and Charlotte's first and only child.
- Angelica is the only Rugrat to remain an only child throughout the entire series, as Tommy gains a younger brother at the beginning of the first movie and Chuckie gains a younger step-sister (and a step-mother) at the end of the second movie.
- Big Justin from the episode "The Big House" makes a cameo as one of the slaves.
- This is the third half-an-hour episode of the series after "Tommy's First Birthday" and "The Santa Experience".
- Didi and her parents' Jewish beliefs are based on Arlene Klasky and her parents.
- This special marks the last episode for the "original era".
- This is also the last episode to use the original cel style, which had been used since the unaired pilot episode.
- It is also the final episode in which the episode title is written in red. It is written in black in all future episodes that use the title card.
- It is also the last episode to have Denis M. Hannigan as co-composer with Mark Mothersbaugh. Starting with Chanukah, Mark's brother Bob (and occasionally Rusty Andrews) fills in as co-composer.
- Susie and her older brother, Edwin, are the only members of the Carmichael family seen, though it is a cameo appearance.
- This was actually the 62nd episode of the series production wise, but it remained unaired until April 13, 1995, when the series was on hiatus. With this and the Chanukah special that aired on December 9, 1996, the series was revived in 1997 and continued airing until 2004.
- This one of the few episodes where Angelica doesn't antagonize the other Rugrats (even though her imaginary counterpart as the Pharaoh behaves exactly as she does most other episode).
- Angelica even explains that the reason she is being nice is because to her knowledge, Passover is about freedom.
- On the Season 3 DVD, the original airings and the foreign versions, the title card sequence is used twice in this 30-minute episode. However on some reruns as well as the PAL DVD releases, it is used once in this 30-minute episode like "Tommy's First Birthday" and "The Santa Experience".
- This is Grandpa Boris' last appearance where he has black dotted eyes; in his later appearances, he is given white sclerae.
- The episode was in 59th place in "Top 100 Greatest Nicktoon Episodes".
- This is the only Nickelodeon cartoon episode in which a reference to a Biblical story is used, since it is a parody of Moses leading Israel out of Egypt.
- The episode was nominated for "Outstanding Animated Program" at the Primetime Emmy Awards in 1995 but it lost to The Simpsons episode "Lisa's Wedding." It was also nominated for "Best Individual Achievement for Writing in the Field of Animation" at the 23rd Annie Awards but it lost to The Tick's "The Tick vs. Arthur's Bank Account".
- This is one of the only original episodes which was nominated for "Outstanding Animated Program" at the Primetime Emmy Awards; the other being "Mother's Day".
- Running Gags:
- Every time the adults (or Angelica) say Boris' name, Minka says "BORIS?!?" and cries. Actually, once, she doesn't say his name when Chas brings it up.
- "Don't close the—" (Slam!) "Door."
- When Moses (Tommy) threatens Pharaoh (Angelica) with the plagues, Pharaoh does an imitation of Clint Eastwood as Dirty Harry in Sudden Impact ("Go ahead, make my day").
- For timing purposes, and also to avoid scaring children, the plagues of blood, pestilence, boils, and hail are left out. For the same reason, the plague of slaying of the first born is simply stated as the first born being "taken away".
- Animation Error: Angelica’s nose disappears when she thinks and after Boris explains how Moses and Pharaoh.
Videos[]
