"What's the Big Idea?" is the 23rd and final episode of the 6th season of The Powerpuff Girls. The episode premiered on Cartoon Network in the United States on August 27, 2004. It is the 137th and final episode overall of the original 1998 series, and thus the original series finale. Although in the United States, four previously unaired season 5 episodes were burnt out half a year later.
Plot[]
Mojo Jojo turns the girls into giants so that they can’t stop his crimes without causing massive collateral damage and it's up to the Professor to save the day.
Synopsis[]
The episode starts with Mojo Jojo making a scale model of Townsville in 1:87th scale in his volcano observatory. Then, while he was thinking about what to do, he put his figure in front of the jewel shop. However, he thought of another plan and took the figure to the Art Museum. Unfortunately, he was spiked by the tower and jumped on the electric poles. Then the poles wrapped around him and destroyed his scale model. He then has the perfect idea for the Powerpuff Girls.
The Powerpuff Girls were oblivious to Mojo Jojo's plans. They were playing near his volcano. When they started arguing, Mojo walked between them. The Girls ask "What's the Big Idea?." Mojo replied "Exactly." He showed his newest creation (a piece of equipment that consists of a bicycle pump connected to a small transmitter), which is a growth ray and along with its introduction, etc., and he used it to transform the 2' 3" and 61 lbs Powerpuff Girls into 50 feet (15.24 m) tall and 30 tons (60,000 pounds) giants. As giants, the larger size causes their body proportions to appear greatly exaggerated especially right next to their feet like Mojo. At first, the giant girls are confused at his plan and burst out laughing hysterically at Mojo as they loom over him. The intensity and echoes of the sound waves of their giant laughs are enough to cause a small earthquake in the area. The now towering Blossom, who is now happy with her and her sisters' newfound size begins to mock Mojo, calling him an idiot, and at how huge they are compared to him now and that the giant girls will proudly crush Mojo.
Blossom's voice sends heavy rumbles and echoes through the air whenever she or her sisters speak as giants. The sight and threats of the rather intimidating and much heavier girls don't phase Mojo at all as he stands leaning nonchalantly against the giant foot of Blossom not worried about the crushing hazard she poses. So, an unimpressed Mojo dares Blossom to crush him and the cocky giant Blossom proceeds with her eyes closed as she lifts her foot and swings it over on top of the tiny Mojo to squash him. Pieces of debris and dirt begin dropping from under the gigantic foot of Blossom as it hovers above Mojo. But, Blossom was ponderous due to her enormous size and mass which gave Mojo enough time to dodge before she dropped her whole foot on top of him. The pressure of her foot stomp was so intense that it created a heavy ground tremor and a giant, deep pothole with parts of the ground broken and lifted up around Blossom's feet from the impact. The impact caused ground fissures and pieces of the surface around her feet to scatter and be flung around violently. The ground tremor also caused the nearby buildings to crack as they struggled to support Blossom's heaviness. A now frustrated Blossom begins stomping aggressively around the park even more to squish Mojo which creates even more large potholes and fissures in the ground. Mojo ends up easily dodging every stomp, Blossom then tries to lean down over a skyscraper with a spire to grab him while saying "Hold it right there and… let me…get you!" but the sharp spire pokes her in the armpit, she yells in pain and violently pulls her arm away, taking the top of the structure with it.
And because of their gigantic size, the girls stepped on the electric poles, destroyed buildings, and caused more chaos. The girls had an idea of being more careful such as using the tiptoe attack. Their plan was proven wrong as the Powerpuff Girls were standing at a colossal 50 feet tall and weighing over 334 tons (670,000 pounds)! Which was still enough to set the city shaking; a new fissure formed in the street, and the protesters started booing again. The citizens tell them they are making things worse, causing Bubbles to cry, which results in her huge tears almost flooding Townsville. Blossom tells her to knock it off, Bubbles apologizes then tries to wipe off her tears, unfortunately, one of her lashes comes loose and falls on top of a newly cleaned car of a man. The single strand of her giant lash is heavy enough to crush the car causing fissures in which the car gets buried. Mojo then taunts the girls by confessing that he deliberately enlarged them in size so they can't stop him without causing any damage, right before he happily goes off to do a crime spree. Realizing this too late, the girls went to their home flying but causing fires in Townsville.
While they went to see the Professor, Mojo was stealing DVDs, jewels, and money. The Professor ran out of his house and ran into the large leg of Blossom, she explains that Mojo turned the girls into giants with his device that she accidentally stepped on. The Professor agrees to fix up the device in hopes to reversing the process. The wind reacts to the colossal and heavy arms of Blossom as she waves them which causes loud and rumbling sounds of wind gust. The Professor tried to repair the device while the Powerpuff Girls searched for Mojo. Heavy ground trembles would be felt all over Townsville as the giant girls split up and roam desperately.
Blossom moves across the buildings with her ponytail heavily scraping away the brickwork behind her, and her body rubs across the windows as she moves between two buildings causing them to shatter and break from her pressure. Buttercup grinds her teeth, eases around a corner, and leaves a trail of fresh potholes as she goes, and a sad Bubbles sets an entire row of buildings trembling when she passes them. Now Blossom stands next to an elevated train track that parallels a busy street. She leans down to look at ground level, then carelessly collapses her gigantic head on the road to take a better look under a bridge, burying her face into the pothole of the road as it struggles to support her and the earthquake causing all the cars to fly over due to impact of her heavy head. Bubbles sucks in her gut to avoid skinning the structures at a corner, but her back rips the façades away and her feet dent the streets. Buttercup gets around a corner as best she can, but the sound of crunching metal and glass that rises to her tells just how badly her luck has turned. Blossom discovers and stares at Mojo coming out of a warehouse but was too late to grab him as he escaped into a subway tunnel. They continue their search, Bubbles peeks by a building to call for Mojo, and a back view is shown of Blossom as she is slowly and carefully walking down an empty city street paved road with sidewalks and buildings (Modern, high-rise buildings with window grids) on both sides of the road, creating tremors and potholes where Blossom's feet have stepped as the road struggles to support her giant weight as it shatters under her footsteps whereas the rhythmical swinging motion of the pointy ends of her gigantic ponytail from right to left as she walks manages to chip off a chunk of the building's upper portion as her ponytail accidentally hits it. Meanwhile, Buttercup accidentally knocks down a building and hides it under the grass of a park. Whereas, Blossom accidentally knocks over a tower with her hair bow and fixes it by chewing up a bubble gum truck and using it as glue. The Professor finished the device and seemingly shrunk the girls back to normal size. After Mojo is beaten up by the girls, he goes to jail as usual. He then tries to think how the girls got smaller as the device cannot reverse the process. The narrator shows that the device caused Townsville to actually get bigger than the planet Earth and the girls did NOT get small (which doesn't explain how Townsville got back to normal in The Powerpuff Girls Rule!!!). The Narrator shows how the episode ends as "The day is saved by Powerpuff Girls! Don't step on me!"
Characters[]
Major Characters[]
Minor Characters[]
- Don Shank (animated)
Trivia/Goofs[]
- As the girls were grown up to several feet tall (most probably 50 feet tall) then it would make them each weigh more than 334 tons or 670,000 pounds! Which makes more than sense as Bubbles' one single giant eyelash was able to literally crush a car under its weight. Blossom stomping and causing nearby buildings to start cracking and how a combined giant tip toe attack of the girls (1002 tons) caused a massive earthquake and ground fissures.
- This episode depicts a great attention to detail in weight and wind physics of a giant. For example: The ground and buildings crumbling with every step and colliding. The echoey voices of the girls. The wind reacting to the colossal and heavy arms of Blossom as she waves them which causes loud and deep sounds of wind gust.
- This is the only episode to have question as its title; the only one to have question mark (?) in its title.
- This episode, along with Roughing It Up premiered on the same day Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends episode The Trouble with Scribbles premiered, making it the second and final time Foster's and PPG had premieres side-by-side.
- Bubbles' eyelashes can be seen making it the second or fourth time in general since the girls' lashes have been shown onscreen, first being The Rowdyruff Boys (episode), second being City of Clipsville (non-canon) and the third being A Made Up Story.
- Running gag: Characters ending their sentences with sorry.
- When Mojo Jojo walks out of the train, he is humming the music from the series' theme song.
- This is the third time a character sings the Powerpuff Girls theme song. First was Bubbles and Buttercup in "The Powerpuff Girls' Best Rainy Day Adventure Ever," and the second was Blossom in "Night Mayor."
- This episode was disliked by the majority because of the way the citizens treated the girls.
Cultural References[]
- At some point in this episode The Powerpuff Girls say "Zoinks!", which is Shaggy's catchphrase from the Scooby Doo franchise.
Connections[]
- This is the third episode where the girls changed size, the first one being "Nano of the North" and second being "Nuthin' Special".
- If in "Nano of the North" were to be considered canon, Professor Utonium could have just easily shrunk the girls back to normal size by using his Micro-Stabilizer without having to even worry about fixing Mojo's device.
- The final time the girls earn the ire of the citizens, the first three being, "The Powerpuff Girls Movie" (they were referred to as "freaky bug-eyed weirdo girls" at that time), "Tough Love" (it was HIM that caused that actually), and "Sweet 'N Sour".
Production Notes[]
- This is the final episode of the original 1998 series, though a handful of season 5 episodes ("Nuthin' Special", "Neighbor Hood", "I See A Funny Cartoon in Your Future", and "Octi Gone") wouldn't air in the United States until March 25, 2005.
- Production wrapped on this episode on June 30, 2004, and thus the series as a whole.[1]