The seventeenth episode of the third season of Rugrats.
Mommy's Little Assets:
When Charlotte's forced to bring Angelica and Tommy to work with her, they nearly ruin an important business meeting.
Chuckie's Wonderful Life:
When Angelica tells Chuckie how much better the world would be without him, Chuckie decides to run away. Chuckie's guardian angel shows him how much worse the world is without him.
"Mommy's Little Assets" provides examples of:
- Analogy Backfire: Charlotte realizes her comparison of a child misbehaving to an employee acting up on the job is a little harsh when Angelica tearfully asks "Are you gonna fire me, Mommy?"
- Babysitter's Nightmare: Discussed; Charlotte and Drew both have important business meetings to go to, and need someone to look after Tommy and Angelicanote . When Charlotte asks Drew if they know any babysitters, Drew tells her they do, but they can never get any of them to look after Angelica a second time.
- Bland-Name Product: Famous Ethel's is a spoof of Famous Amos.
- Brick Joke:
- When Tommy and Angelica wreck Charlotte's office, Charlotte asks Jonathan if they have a daycare center, to which Jonathan reminds her that she nixed it. Without any hesitation, she un-nixes it. At the end of the episode, as a reward for bringing an impressed Ethel and Abe to her house, Charlotte re-hires Jonathan as the supervisor for the employee daycare center, starting with looking after Tommy and Angelica while she and Drew go out to dinner with Ethel and Abe.
- When Angelica climbs on top of a statue in Charlotte's office, she breaks a fish tank that houses two fish named Vesko and Boski. Charlotte tells Jonathan to find somewhere to put the fish, and in a later scene, Vesko and Boski are seen swimming around in a water cooler.
- Butt-Monkey: Jonathan. The elevator door closes on him when he tries to get Charlotte's briefcase from it, Angelica having left it there by mistake, he gets fired despite his best attempts to look after Tommy and Angelica and make sure Merge Corp's acquisition of Famous Ethel's Cookie Company proceeds as planned, and when Charlotte does re-hire him at the end of the episode, she makes him the supervisor of the employee daycare center, making him look after Tommy and Angelica.
- Daddy's Girl: Discussed; When Charlotte scolds Angelica for playing with her office equipment and asks how to behave when she tells her "No", Angelica's first suggestion is, "Ask Daddy?", indicating that Charlotte, when properly focused on her parenting, is actually more stern and capable of disciplining Angelica, while Drew is frequently an Extreme Doormat who struggles to draw the line.
- A Day in the Limelight: This episode marks the first time Charlotte is looking after the kids, and thus has a more pivotal role.
- Disappointing Promotion: After Jonathan gets fired, he brings Ethel to Charlotte's house at the latter's insistence so she can tell Charlotte that she's interested in selling her company to Merge Corp based on her maternal instincts. Upon hearing this, Charlotte re-hires Jonathan and gives him a promotion. Jonathan hopes it's vice-president, but to his dismay, it's the supervisor of her new daycare center, starting with looking after Tommy and Angelica while she and Drew go out to dinner with Ethel and Abe.
- Disaster Dominoes: As Charlotte tells Angelica what MergeCorp does, Tommy climbs a bookshelf and knocks over a stack of books like dominoes, which leads to a trophy getting knocked down and shattered.
- Elevator Buttons Mash: Angelica does this in the elevator on the way to the top floor of MergeCorp-Headquarters, causing the elevator to stop at every floor rather than go straight to the top as intended.
- "Eureka!" Moment: When Angelica and Tommy go missing, Charlotte realizes that they must be at the Cookie World model because Angelica wanted to play with it earlier.
- Fun with Alphabet Soup: This episode begins with a close-up of Angelica's alphabet cereal floating in milk. The letters that pass by the camera are SOS. Angelica then scoops up some of her alphabet cereal and spreads it onto Drew's tie, spelling her name as "ANXGF".
- George Jetson Job Security: Charlotte is forced to take Tommy and Angelica to work with her, as the other adults are all gone and apparently, no one will ever agree to babysit Angelica more than once. Jonathan, Charlotte's assistant, neglects to keep an eye on the kids (which all the adults do at least once an episode), and Tommy and Angelica get away and roam the building. Charlotte immediately fires him after she finds the children, even going as far as to tell Jonathan to call security on himself. He's re-hired at the end of the episode, with a promotion. To Jonathan's dismay, it's not a Vice President position—it's supervisor of MergeCorp's daycare center, starting with watching Angelica.Angelica: (grabs Jonathan's hand and smiles evilly) Boy, Jonathan, are we gonna have fun...
- Hypocritical Humor: When trying to go over who could watch the kids, Charlotte dryly comments that Betty and Howard spoil the twins when her daughter is noted as being very spoiled herself.
- MegaCorp: Charlotte's company, called "MergeCorp" in this episode, apparently specializes in company takeovers, both hostile and benign. When Angelica asks her mom about what she does at her job, Charlotte explains it to her like this, "A corporation is like a big, hungry monster. My job is to find smaller, weaker monsters for it to eat."
- Never My Fault: Angelica tries to blame Tommy for ruining the Cookie World model after Charlotte catches her doing so. Charlotte lampshades this while disciplining her, saying what she did sets a bad example for Tommy.
- New Technology Is Evil: Famous Ethel, the owner of Famous Ethel's cookie company, and her husband, Abe, think television is evil, and also don't trust computers, as they want MergeCorp's memo rewritten by hand.
- Noodle Incident: When Charlotte reaches the top floor later than expected, Jonathan asks her if she had been abducted by ecoterrorists again. After Charlotte introduces Tommy to him, he is shocked to see Angelica, who tells him, "I told you I'd be back!"
- Pushover Parents: Averted with Charlotte who, while busy with several things at once, still manages to properly discipline Angelica when she gets in trouble. She's not harsh when Angelica starts crying (real tears for once since she thought she upset her mother) but she doesn't let Angelica walk all over her the same way she does with Drew.
- Shout-Out:
- Charlotte's two fish are named Vesko and Boski, named for Robert Vesco and Ivan Boesky, notable white collar financial criminals from the 1980s.
- When Angelica tricks Jonathan into leaving to get her a glass of water, she decides to leave to find the model, believing it to be a toy, and tells Tommy, "Now let's make like a tree and get out of here!".
- Jonathan's line, "Just the facts, ma'am" is the catchphrase of Joe Friday, the protagonist of the television series, Dragnet.
- Souvenir Land: Following MergeCorp's acquisition of Famous Ethel's Cookie Company, Charlotte plans to raze a town and build a theme park over it called Cookie World, "The Cookiest Place on Earth". She has Jonathan build scale models of the town in its current condition and Cookie World post-construciton. Angelica mistakes both for toy playsets.
- Unseen No More: Jonathan, Charlotte's assistant, makes his first physical appearance in this episode, having only been mentioned by Charlotte many times prior to it.
"Chuckie's Wonderful Life" provides examples of:
- Adipose Rex: In the world where Chuckie doesn't exist, Angelica has taken total control of Tommy's house and enslaves his parents. A Jabba the Hutt-esque Angelica sits on her throne wearing a crown, obviously fattened from the many sweets she had Stu and Didi make for her.
- All Just a Dream: Chuckie returns to his real timeline, the whole "world without him" thing with the Angel seems to have been a dream. But then the final shot of the episode shows Chuckie looking out the window and sees his guardian angel on a motorcycle. They wave goodbye as he rides into the sun and disappears.
- An Aesop:
- Solve your problems either by yourself or with help from families or friends, not by running away from them.
- Don’t steal things from others; because stealing is a crime no matter the circumstances.
- Big "WHAT?!": Angelica's mortified reaction to her punishment for stealing Chas' CD; no dessert for a week.
- Bindle Stick: When Chuckie decides to run away, he makes one from his ball popper.
- The Complainer Is Always Wrong: Tommy, Phil, and Lil all want to play with Chas' Latvian Folk Dance CD, believing it to be a shiny toy. Chuckie tells them it isn't such a good idea, but they talk him into playing with it. When Angelica steals the CD, Chuckie draws the line and blames Tommy, Phil, and Lil for talking him into playing with it. Feeling bad for Chuckie, Tommy, Phil, and Lil give him their parents' CDs the next day.
- Continuity Nod: Several of the toddlers from "The Big House" make cameo appearances in this episode, including Big Justin, Doughboy, and Crybaby.
- Crapsack World: The world, for the main characters at least, is horrible as a result of Chuckie no longer existing.
- Darker and Edgier: For a show involving talking babies, this episode has a surprisingly dark, almost disturbing tone. Even if you just included what happened to Chuckie's father, it's rather bleak. He ends up unemployed, sitting alone in his house, surrounded by tons of empty pizza boxes he's been hoarding, with a sock puppet as his only friend. Meanwhile, Phil and Lil are making their parents' lives a living hell because Chuckie wasn't there to tell them right from wrong and Tommy's living on the streets and going through garbage for food because Angelica enslaved his parents and threw him out of the house because Chuckie wasn't there to back him up.
- Denied Food as Punishment: Angelica steals Chas' Latvian Folk Dance CD, and makes Chuckie think it was his fault that it disappeared. Drew eventually finds the CD, and after returning it to Chas, informs him that Angelica won't have dessert for a whole week.
- Didn't Think This Through: Angelica, as usual. Seeing an opportunity to be mean to the babies, she steals Chas' Latvian Folk Dance CD that they were playing with. She wanted it simply because they had it, and it never occurs to her that the CD wasn't theirs to play with in the first place. This gets her in trouble with her father when he discovers that she stole the CD from Chas.
- Everybody Cries: Howard and Betty are crying their eyes out at seeing Phil and Lil wrecking the house when Chas drops by to say that he wishes he had a kid, even one that acted up like Phil and Lil. Then when Chas realizes that he's all alone, with only his sock puppet to talk to, he, Howard, and Betty all burst into tears.
- For the Evulz: Being an Imagine Spot for Chuckie, Angelica is conveyed as especially malicious in this episode:
- Angelica simply stole Chas' CD just because she wanted to. She then pretends to be a supporting shoulder for Chuckie, manipulating him into thinking the world would be better off without him.
- In Chuckie's Bad Future, Angelica is exaggerated into a gluttonous tyrant who kicks Tommy out of his own home, leaving him on the streets. She later refuses him food and snatches his broken rattle (his only remaining toy) before throwing it into a nearby pile, clearly only wanting it out of spite.
- Hand Puppet: In the world where Chuckie doesn't exist, Chas' only friend is a sock puppet.
- It's a Wonderful Plot: Chuckie's guardian angel shows Chuckie how much worse the world is without him.
- Kick the Dog: Angelica pretty much serves as this rendition's Mr Potter through and through. Her telling Chuckie that the whole world would be better off without him is easily one of her cruelest moments.
- Laser-Guided Karma: After stealing Chas' CD and then allowing Chuckie to think it was his fault, Angelica gets hit with this big time. Drew catches Angelica with the CD, figures out it belongs to Chas, brings Angelica to his house and orders her to apologize. Drew then kicks it further by saying Angelica gets no dessert for a whole week (a contrast to the vision of an overweight Angelica gorging on sweets).
- Living Emotional Crutch: Chuckie serves as this to Chas, and it's perhaps best exemplified in this episode. In the world where Chuckie doesn't exist, Chas goes insane, hoarding empty pizza boxes and talking to a sock puppet. Considering that Chas had already lost his wife and Chuckie is their child, it's very much justified and heartbreaking.
- Look Behind You: Angelica tricks the babies into thinking that Spike is being chased by monsters with nets outside to distract them so she can steal Chas' Latvian Folk Dance CD.
- Morality Chain: Chuckie's guardian angel shows Chuckie that without him, the entire neighborhood has been reduced to a warzone of misbehaving babies, because "nobody was around to tell them it's not such a good idea."
- My God, What Have I Done?: When Chuckie loses Chas' Latvian Folk Dance CD, he gets mad at Tommy, Phil, and Lil for talking him into playing with it, and feels bad for upsetting his friends.
- Noodle Incident: When Chuckie meets his guardian angel, he asks him where he was the time he got his tongue stuck to an ice cube, got his head caught in the back of a weird-looking chair, or when he trapped himself in a birdcage.
- Not His Sled: Despite being the Potter of this It's a Wonderful Plot, Angelica isn't a Karma Houdini for stealing Chas' CD, as Drew catches her with it and forces her to return it to Chas while also refusing to let her have dessert for a week as punishment.
- Parental Neglect: A surprisingly dark example in this episode; Angelica enslaves Stu and Didi, causing them to neglect Tommy, who's living on the streets and going through garbage for food.
- Pushover Parents:
- In the world where Chuckie doesn't exist, Phil and Lil wreck their parents' house. Betty and Howard are nervous wrecks who do not punish them, instead hoping for a mature yet somewhat cowardly toddler to set a good example and tell them it's wrong.
- In the same world, Angelica takes over Tommy's house and enslaves Stu and Didi, who give into her demands and neglect Tommy, their own son.
- Averted with Drew, who usually gives into his daughter's demands, in this episode. When he catches Angelica with Chas' Latvian Folk Dance CD, he is furious. And not only does he make her apologize to Chas for taking it, but he also punishes her by telling her she won't have dessert for an entire week.
- The Runaway: Chuckie decides to run away when he feels like he let everybody down. It takes his guardian angel showing him how much worse the world is without him to get him to reconsider.
- Sanity Slippage: In the world without Chuckie, his father Chas has gone insane. In one scene, Betty even comments that "he's getting worse." Taking the death of his wife into account actually makes this even Harsher in Hindsight.
- Tranquil Fury: Drew is understatedly furious with Angelica after finding out she stole Chas' CD, holding her firmly by hand and forcing her to apologise to Chas, and making clear she is in big trouble without once raising his voice. Angelica, for once, is believably cowed the entire scene.
- Villainous Glutton: Angelica is shown to be this in the world where Chuckie doesn't exist, manipulating Stu and Didi into abandoning Tommy and endlessly making junk food for her to eat.
