If You Give a Mouse a Cookie is an Animated Adaptation of the 1985 children's picture book written by Laura Numeroff and illustrated by Felicia Bond. It is released on Prime Video.
The series started as a 2015 animated special based on the original book. It was written, developed and executive produced by Ken Scarborough, known for Arthur and Doug. The cartoon features the human boy (now named Oliver instead of being nameless) and mouse from the original picture book, with the cast rounded out by the animals from the other books, such as the pig, the moose, the cat, and the dog.
Originally only one special was produced, but in September 2017, Amazon announced
an actual television series, which premiered on November 7, 2017 as a production with Canada's Mercury Filmworks. The author and illustrator of the original books are both executive producers on the show.
What Amazon describes as the second part of the first season was released on June 26th, 2018. A Valentine's Day special was released in February 2020, and more new episodes were released in 2021.
This show provides examples of:
- Baths Are Fun: This is the lesson of "If You Give a Dog a Bath", in which both Henry and Dog don't want to come inside to have a bath because they think it means they have to stop playing and having fun. Then they learn that they can have fun in the bath.
- Bedsheet Ghost:
- All of the "ghosts" seen in the Halloween Episode "If You Give a Mouse a Pumpkin" are this. In particular, Cat has eight ghost decorations for his Halloween Spooktacular event and Moose dresses up in this costume for Halloween.
- In "The Haunted Toolshed," Mouse, Dog, Henry and Esme Louise all believe that there's a ghost in the toolshed, even though it's actually just Moose playing music and otherwise making racket. They finally decide to confront the ghost, but figure the ghost for sure will see them coming. They therefore all dress up as bedsheet ghosts and make ghostly moaning noises to disguise themselves.
- Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs:
- In "If You Give a Dog a Bath," Henry, Dog and Mouse want to play either Red Light, Green Light or Hide-and-Go-Seek and decide to play Red Light, Green Light Hide-and-Go-Seek, though once the seeker finds the first hider, it seems to basically just devolve into a game of chase with the rules of Red Light, Green Light in effect.
- In "The Haunted Toolshed," the characters hear a strange noise coming from a toolshed, which is actually just Moose making music with a jug. Dog declares it to be a ghost, or a monster. Henry says it could be a vampire or an alien. Dog suggests it could be a monster alien vampire ghost. Mouse says there's no such thing as any of them.
- Casting Gag: Cat is not the first character Lara Jill Miller voiced who's a super genius .
- Catchphrase: "What do you think will happen next?" It's usually said by Oliver, the boy with the mouse, though occasionally by one of the other human characters that's a companion to one of the animals. It's present in song as well. At the end of each story, one of the characters will say "If you (give something to / do something with an animal) what do you think will happen next?", making it a Signing Off Catchphrase as well. Also, see Here We Go Again! below.
- Christmas Special: The first special was followed up with a Christmas special in the same style, If You Give a Mouse a Christmas Cookie.
- Delicious Distraction: Averted in "Masked Mouse: The Ultimate Challenge." Dog is playing superhero as "Dog In a Cape" and is trying to save Mouse, who has been blown away on a kite. He rides a skateboard, but then spots a man with a tasty donut. Then, he remembers Superhero Rule #3 - "Focus. No distractions."
- A Dog Named "Dog": Everyone who's an animal character is this - Mouse, Dog, Cat, Pig, and Moose.
- Expressive Ears: Mouse's ears are very expressive of his moods, particularly dropping about halfway when sad or bothered by something, but perking back up when he's excited or happy.
- Fictional Holiday: In "Summerfuntastic Day," Cat has a bad case of the "between-holidays blues," so the other characters create "Summerfuntastic Day" to cheer him up and break him of his newfound habit of staring at things lacking their holiday decorations and sighing.
- Free Prize at the Bottom: In "The Masked Mouse Rides Again," Oliver and Mouse find a tiny toy telescope at the bottom of their cereal box. Oliver gives it to Mouse, who is inspired to create a pretend galaxy.
- Gadgeteer Genius: Cat regularly builds robots or other contraptions. These often become part of the plot.
- Gadgeteer's House: Esme Louise’s house has robotic arms throughout that handle all the cleaning, courtesy of Cat.
- Here We Go Again!: Each episode ends with Mouse (or whichever animal the episode was focused on) asking for the same item they requested at the beginning of the episode.
- I Can't Hear You: In "Parade Day," Mouse tells Oliver that their new float is really noisy.Oliver: What?!Mouse: I said "Our new float is really noisy!"Oliver: Oh. Yeah.
- Immediate Self-Contradiction: In "Mouse and the Toy Factory," Mouse is invited to test toys at a toy factory by the owner and is allowed to bring his friends along as well. As they're headed there, he gushes about it, but Pig tells him not to get too excited and starts to say "It's probably just a—" but then cuts herself off as they arrive at the toy factory.Pig: (breathless) Oh my gosh this is the coolest thing I've ever seen!
- Interspecies Friendship: Oliver and the mouse are the primary ones though they're also friends with a dog, a cat, a pig and a moose.
- I've Heard of That — What Is It?: In "Looking After Lovey," Mouse tells Moose that the can be a reliable Lovey-sitter for him. He then says that if he's going to be a reliable Lovey-sitter for Moose, he first needs to know what "reliable" means. Oliver tells him that "reliable means that you're someone Moose can trust to keep Lovey safe."
- Moose Are Idiots: Moose doesn't really seem all that dumb, but still has the typical stupid-sounding voice associated with a dumb moose.
- Mundane Ghost Story: In "Sweet Dreams," Dog is scared to sleep after having a bad dream. His friends try to help him out and also relate their own bad dreams. These include Pig's dream about a being forced to sign way too many autographs after a ballet performance until she becomes exhausted, and Moose's dreams about being unable to find matching color antler mittens and not having enough honey for his blueberry corn muffin.
- Mundane Utility: In "Runaway Robot," it's revealed that Cat has invented a mobile robot with a vaguely human-like appearance, which is powered by cupcakes and can be controlled by remote control. It... makes breakfast, then washes the dishes, and can also dance.
- Oh Wait, This Is My Grocery List: In "Pig Puts on a Show," Moose is made the director of a play of The Three Little Pigs. After assigning who will play the pigs, he pulls out a piece of paper and declares "And The Big Bad Wolf will be played by... Tomato!"Moose: Oh, sorry, that's my shopping list.
- Race Lift: Leo, Henry, and Esme Louise were white in the books. In the show, they are black, Asian, and Latino, respectively.
- Running Gag: In some of the later installments of the television series, Oliver giving Mouse whatever object it is that kicks off the events the episode (for example, a piece of chalk), only to admit that he doesn't know what will happen next if he gives it to him and asking what he wants it for.
- Santa Claus: He appears at the end of the animated If You Give a Mouse a Christmas Cookie, just after Mouse sneaks a bite of the cookie left out for him. He leaves Mouse and Oliver's presents, and then Mouse hands him the cookie.Oliver: (narrating) And if you give Santa a cookie, then...Santa: Thirsty.Oliver: He's going to want a glass of milk to go with.Santa: Merry Christmas, Mouse.
- Scenery Porn: The animated series looks like a picture book brought to life and in particular has some very gorgeous backgrounds, like of sunsets or the starry night sky. There's also plenty of colorful detail to be observed on things such as tents and flowers.
- Suspiciously Specific Denial:
- In the If You Give a Mouse a Christmas Cookie animated special, Mouse and his friends accidentally wreck the decorations for a play that Mouse's boy, Oliver, has a big role in. Later, when Pig encounters Oliver, wondering where he can find Mouse, she tells him that Mouse is getting a haircut so that he'll look good when he sees him in the theater, which definitely hasn't had anything bad happen to it.
- In "Chalk-Tastrophe," Mouse and Pig lose Dog's favorite pink chalk down a drain. As they're trying to replace it, he shows up and asks about it. Mouse tells him that is chalk is fine and definitely not lost down a drain.
- Talking Animal: Mouse and the other animals all speak perfect English.
- Title Theme Tune and Theme Tune Roll Call: The animated series has this.If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, then he'll ask for a glass of milk... And then one thing will lead to another, and you never know what's next! Let's go to unexpected places, they'll leave a smile on our faces. With Moose, Pig, Cat and Dog, so come on, come along. If you give a mouse a cookie, you never know what you'll get. If you give a mouse a cookie, what do you think will happen next?
- Trademark Favorite Food: While the books were all about each particular animal being given a particular type of treat, this is only carried for Mouse in the Animated Adaptation on Amazon, in which he is still very big on cookies, particularly chocolate chip. Though in the show, he doesn't seem to require milk, though he does like to have it with the cookie if it's around. He's even something of an advocate for cookies. In the story "Sick Day," in which all of the other animal characters get a cold, he invents a whistling system for them - one whistle for a glass of water, two whistles for hot soup and three if they want a cookie. They all say they're too sick to want a cookie, but he says they never know.
- Wrench Wench: Pig is a female pig who likes to work on her scooter.
