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In order to get free concert tickets, Judy takes on a cause, which leads to her accidentally setting her school's frogs free. The frogs start to take orders from an unknown creature and begin wreaking havoc on the town.

Cold Open[]

A news report plays detailing a judge giving a life sentence to an allegedly abusive father, with pedophiliac undertones exhibited. However, Jody the only one to pick up on them, with the rest making assumptions based on their own philosophies.

Plot[]

Judy, Christine, Colleen, Ashley and Fiona are dancing to a song by the politically-charged alternative rock band Actimis. Jody comes in and hearing the band, mocks them for their supposed lack of authenticity. They argue tooth and nail over how signing a multi-million dollar record deal and sticking with it had an effect on how the band's perceived, and that they only express political views for recognition. Judy expresses no interest in the debate, as she wants to buy tickets to a concert they're performing at in Detroit. The tickets prove to be expensive, and even their combined funds wouldn't get them one ticket. Judy decides to contact Actimis through e-mail in the hopes they'd get tickets, but she is rebuffed and infuriated that Jody was right in that they only cared about excess rather than their message. Desperate to prove Jody wrong, Judy decides to perform a cause in the hopes of impressing Actimis, aiming for her school and a gruesome dodgeball game the kids are forced to take part in.

During gym at school the next day, Judy arrives with a mob in tow. She manages to get her word out, but it's considered hollow as she had got the mafia involved. Nevertheless, the kids are relieved they don't have to play dodgeball. Ms. Chapley and Cosmo go over alternatives, with Hope opting for a dissection project in order to recoup through sponsorship money provided. Cosmo reluctantly agrees for a lack of other ideas. In class, Ms. Chapley announces that the removal of dodgeball has hurt the school on a financial level leading to needed cutbacks. To remedy this, Ms. Chapley agreed to take on a dissection assignment to take advantage of a sponsorship by a local lab. The project is presided over by a drill instructor and their gym teacher, Sergeant Grover Glover. None of the kids are willing to dissect their frogs, and Grover threatens to fail them, as the assignment takes up a grand chunk of their GPA.

At recess, the kids fear failure due to their unwillingness to do the assignment, and Judy is tasked with helping them do so to make up for getting them in this situation. Perhaps seeing another opportunity to get in Actimis' good graces, she obliges. The kids managed to break into the school, owed to budget cuts weakening any obstacles, and manage to find the frogs by pure accident, but they escape before Judy can take the credit. Suddenly, four obnoxious kids Jody messed with hours ago arrive and consume an experiment Ashley worked on, turning them into monstrous bugs.

In the morning, the neighborhood finds themselves infested with frogs. They take refuge in Burt's house, but cabin fever sets in quickly and Jody and Judy flee when the power goes out. They opt to hide out at the school, encountering Grover who points out the frogs are being controlled, hence them not leaving the area and being hostile toward people. He claims responsibility lies on a mythical frog monster, something Jody and Judy balk at. Upon taking them to the reported location, it emerges and prepares to kill the three. Judy lets slip she was responsible for freeing the frogs and is forced to kill the giant frog. She is promptly eaten, but the frog keels over dead, with her emerging from its stomach. Later on, it's revealed Actimis broke up to save face amid news of Judy's involvement coming out, and Jody informs her that activism always holds consequences no matter what.

Judy and Colleen get punished for either involvement, and the girls reconcile, though forget about the bug monsters; Cosmo and Hope accidentally run them over. Throughout the episode, Cosmo has taken hush money from a pedophiliac judge who molested his son, but due to the judge leaving finances in the hands of the now-defunct Chemical Bank and a managerial shift not taking up the deal, Cosmo calls off the deal and turns him in to the police. Cosmo uses settlement money to put toward the school and calls off the dissection program. The episode concludes with the judge getting executed by the fathers he had sent away long ago.

During the credits, we see Actimis going over voice messages left by Judy, gradually getting angrier and angrier.

Production[]

Die-Section was the first episode produced for the Halloween Kids series. It was preceded by a collection of pilots and shorts made between 1996 and 1998. The episode was based on the debut episode of The Halloween Gang's syndicated season Planet of the Frogs, written by Elliot Strange and Chuck Menville. The episode was intended to test the working relationship between Strange and writers/developers Andrew Gottlieb, Wallace Wolodarsky, Heide Perlman and Andy Ackerman. Ackerman agreed to direct the episode, treating it as an experiment due to its general distance from contemporary sitcoms.

CBS held Strange to a deadline and the episode was outsourced to South Korea for animation services; Anivision produced the episode. The initial cut came out to around 17 minutes. That, along with the network wanting an episode to properly introduce the protagonists led this episode to be held over as new scenes were produced for it.

Trivia[]

  • Grover is a parody of Dwight T. Barnes from Half Life Special Ops.
  • The episode features a dedication to actor Larry Linville, who would voice Leland in the initial cut of the pilot before getting replaced by Charles Rocket, also appearing in The Larry Miller Show, another project Strange was involved with. Linville would pass away once the series made it to air.
    • Coincidentally, another passed over actor would pass the same year, Justin Pierce as Jody.
  • The radio scene features a station bumper playing along to P.L.U.C.K. by System of a Down.
  • There is a Fox affiliate in Michigan known as Fox 17, which represents Great Rapids as well as a majority of Western Michigan, where the show takes place.
  • There is a low-power radio station in Coquille, Oregon with the same callsign as KRWL.
  • References are made to the 1972 film frogs, where the giant frog is located at an old mansion. The film centered on frogs attacking a family inhabiting a southern mansion.
  • Francis Salvadore is based on a character featured in the Rugrats episode Pickles Vs. Pickles.
  • Only episode where Cosmo is played by Arnold Stang. His replacement, Howard Morris, would be brought on to voice the character in scenes added to extend the length of the episode.
  • When Jody says "Say hi to Danny for me." after intervening on a fake gaming session, this is a reference to a character from Rumble in the Bronx, involved in a notable scene where he plays a Game Gear without a cartridge in the slot.
  • If one looks closely at Brianna's toy box, they will find a coloring book with a picture of CatDog on it. Andrew Gottlieb, co-creator, had written episodes for CatDog.
    • In addition, a Bart Simpson doll can be seen, Wallace Wolodarsky, another co-developer was a writer for early episodes of The Simpsons.
  • Only episode to feature a 1999 copyright date. This episode was created first, but held over due to CBS wanting to release a proper pilot.
  • On initial airings of this episode and the first on CBS, No Way by Pearl Jam was used as the opening theme. This was owed to clearance issues with the previously selected Rivals due to concerns arising over Rivals' focus on the Columbine massacre. However, this was later resolved and Rivals served as the opening theme for the remainder of the series.
  • Judy requests to see Chino Moreno, the lead vocalist of Deftones, in one of her voice messages.
  • Only episode to feature copyright attribution to Global Entertainment Productions GmbH; other episodes directly refer to Adelaide Productions.
    • By extent, this is one of two episodes to feature the video-taped version of the Columbia Tristar Television logo.
  • Before Francis is shot, the horn intro to The Unforgiven by Metallica is heard, cutting out half way into the snare drum.

Stinger[]

  • Mary: Too corny?
  • Jason: No I like that.

Credits[]

Starring

  • Will Estes
  • Kirsten Storms
  • Charles Rocket
  • Rhea Perlman
  • Linda Cardellini

Special Guest Star

  • Steve Blum
  • Ken Foree
  • Neil Ross

Also Starring

  • Robbie Rist
  • Dustin Diamond
  • Olivia Hack
  • Cathy Cavadini
  • Andi McAfee
  • Eliza Schneider
  • Mona Marshall
  • Mischa Barton
  • Penny Marshall
  • Jay Mohr
  • Olivia D’Abo
  • Scott Drier
  • Arnold Stang
  • Julia Newmar
  • Howard Morris
  • Larry Drake
  • Katie Leigh
  • Sherry Lynn
  • Carolyn Hennessy
  • Michael Gross
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