Review: Big City Greens “Quiet Please; Chipwrecked”

Overview (Spoilers Below)
“Quiet Please”
The Green family heads to Big City Library in an attempt to get Cricket interested in reading. But can our favorite yellow-hued youngster stay quiet long enough to avoid the ire of the intense, sharp eared librarians?

“Chipwrecked”
Chip Whistler is back with titanium teeth and a new plan to take down the Greens. But when Cricket points out that all his past schemes have failed, he tries a new tack: doing his job as CEO of Wholesome Foods.

Our Take

An animated take on A Quiet Place, complete with a pun-tastic title, followed by a Chip-centric episode make this week’s offerings especially impressive.

I always love library episodes of shows, and this version is particularly hilarious. Although as some who moonlights as a mere library worker, I’m still not allowed to slither up to patrons like that quite yet (gotta finish that master’s degree, dang it!) Horror vibes are an unexpected approach for this show, but they work exceptionally well to add a sense of intensity to the family’s attempt to find Cricket reading material interesting enough to hold his focus. The quick, shadowy animation of the librarian’s movement combines perfectly with the intense, whispered growl from Linda Hamilton, yes, THAT Linda Hamilton, aka iconic badass Sarah Connor from the Terminator franchise. The overall result is an honest recreation of its source material, including the iconic scenes with the rocket toy and nail on the stairs (recreated here with the help of a copyright safe Belgo Block) that still manages to explore the world of Big City and family struggles such as trying to find a hyperactive kid something he’ll actually sit down and read.

“Chipwrecked” opens with Cricket attempting to Tom Sawyer his way out of work by giving the rest of the family a “hands on experience” during “Bring Your Family to Work Day!” Meanwhile, a titanium-toothed Chip has gone all out on his A Beautiful Mind style conspiracy board for analyzing his attempts to bring down the Greens, and how each has failed (spoiler alert: it’s usually due to structurally insecure billboards.) He plans his next move to take down his enemy family by forcing Cricket to get a new job, and rolls up to Big Coffee in a Mad Max style Wholesome Coffee Truck, with a post-apocalyptic outfit to match. Cricket assures his boss that it’ll work out for Chip the same as every time before: it’ll fail and he’ll chip his tooth. Chip claims that he can’t chip his titanium teeth, but just as he’s bragging about their indestructible properties, he manages to lose one anyways. After a pep talk from his Dad, he returns to full CEO form rather than ignoring his company to pursue revenge, and, at least at the end of the cliffhanger episode, it seems like this plan might finally be the one that pans out. Barring any billboard incidents, of course.

Favorite jokes from this week surprisingly both come from the first few minutes of “Quiet Please”. The first is Tilly jolting out of her fantasy novel binge confused and bleary-eyed (#relatable), and the second being Cricket’s explanation of his mental situation, “Monkeys running the zoo, know what I mean?” Honorable mentions go to the “I want you to shut up” library poster and “Murder She Did” mystery novel.

Both episodes this week are excellent examples of this show’s ability to pull from pop culture without simply rehashing it. Plus, the cliffhanger “to be continued” ending of “Chipwrecked” has me eager to see what next week holds!