What’s Up With Hey Arnold’s Intro?

What’s good? I hope you’re all doing okay during the midst of… all this. I thought the current global goings-on would give me more time to write.

It hasn’t.

It has, however, taught me that I have to make the time to write even if I’d rather be doing other things. It’s a discipline.

But enough about my lazy ass! Let’s talk about today’s topic: Hey Arnold. Specifically, its intro.

I sure am.

For the uninitiated, Hey Arnold is a cartoon that ran on Nickelodeon from the late 90s through the early 2000s. It dealt with a football-headed boy named Arnold as he and his friends experienced childhood through an urban, inner-city lens. I consider it to be one of Nickelodeon’s best shows and it is definitely worth checking out.

But I’m here to talk about its intro, which is, to put it bluntly, weird.

Think about most cartoon intros. Generally, their purpose is to sell the viewer on the premise of the cartoon. The Powerpuff Girls? A professor made three super children. They beat the shit out of people.

Rugrats? Babies do baby things. Tommy once again wrestles with abstract concepts beyond his understanding, but dammit does he try.

And if we return to Hey Arnold, it can be argued that its intro accomplishes the goal of setting up the show’s premise. I’m not even saying that the intro is bad by any stretch – it’s atmospheric, it establishes many of the main characters, and the theme song is a funky instrumental jam.

So what’s the deal? What makes this intro worth (quite literally) writing home about? It’s not just one detail, but rather a series of design choices that beg further analysis.

Let’s start at the beginning. Like, the very first frame.

Rhonda, So-And-So, What’s Her Face, and The Ugly One are all having a grand old time playing jump rope.

At night.

Obviously it’s not unheard of for children to be playing outside this late, but it’s was established fairly early into the show’s run that Arnold’s neighborhood isn’t exactly the safest place to hang around. People get mugged. Shady characters hang around. It’s enough to make you never want to leave your stoop.

Moving ahead a little, we see our titular character heading out into the night, armed with a flashlight.

Arnold isn’t even sneaking out or anything. He has the full backing of his grandparents, who blankly watch Arnold venture out alone.

Then again, Phil and Gertie were never the strictest guardians.

What’s Arnold looking for? What does he expect to find?

Not long after, Arnold comes across Gerald and Stinky playing ball in the alley, a nice parallel to the girls jump-roping. It sets up the ending of the intro, which we’ll get to.

Believe me.

And then Harold and that mouth-breather kid show up.

The audience is led to believe that Arnold was initially just looking for Gerald and maybe Stinky, but he will gladly welcome the extra manpower for the trial that awaits him.

Arnold’s squad is a loyal bunch. They are ready, no, eager to risk life and limb for their captain. But even with a faithful army at his beck and call, Arnold is haunted by something unseen by his peers. A specter, perhaps.

Helga taunts our protagonist, goading him and his soldiers to the battlefield. But Helga isn’t alone. No, for she too has also enlisted her own grand army!

And this right here is the most confusing part of the intro. Like, we’ve basically got two factions of children who have beef with each other, but the conflict is never established. Let’s skip ahead to the end and see how this resolves itself, then we can-

What the hell was that? Arnold and Helga both spent all night getting their crews together, just so Helga could ask Arnold to step out of the way?

Did Arnold know what was gonna happen? Did his buddies? What about Helga’s crew? Why was Helga following Arnold around all night calling his name?

I don’t have an ending to this piece. I’ll see you next time I watch some cartoon for children and get all riled up for no real reason.