As we've established, Rugrats was a far freakier, more warped and more delectably grotesque show than people tend to give it credit for, and that's something that I intend to make the case for in a lot more detail over the coming months. We'll start by going straight for the biggest formula milk-induced nightmare of them all - "What The Big People Do". Contrary to what some Rugrats viewers might tell you, the single most terrifying episode of Rugrats was not the one where Tommy goes for a wander around a mail sorting office and happens upon the skeletal remains of a postal worker who got lost in the system (although we will get to that), but the one where he and Chuckie fantasise about what life would be like if they were adults.
Where really Rugrats excelled was in how it tackled the subject of irrational childhood fear, which comes in many different forms and guises. The fear that something seriously unholy is lurking beneath your bed and gearing up devour your hide the second you close your eyes. The fear that your parents have been replaced by robots. The fear that the dog groomer is plotting to destroy your beloved pet. Then there's the most diabolical fear of them all, perhaps because it's not quite so irrational as the others - namely, the fear that your body is gradually warping and changing beyond all recognition, to the extent that, eventually, you're destined to become one of those adults whose behaviour so baffles and alarms you. "What The Big People Do" takes a look at this terrifying prospect, weighing up the pros and cons of adulthood from the perspective of two tykes with an overly-active imagination and a naive, yet not entirely innocent inkling of what adult life is like, leading to several nightmarish twists and turns along the way. Of course, what makes "What The Big People Do" so terrifying is that it contains easily the most abrupt, unsettling and downright inexplicable ending to any episode of Rugrats, ever - even today, I can't entirely make of sense of it.
What prompts Tommy and Chuckie into fantasising about the ins and outs of adulthood is their frustration at not being able to play with Didi's lipstick "crayon". Angelica, ever the sneak, had given it to them purely so that she could enjoy the satisfaction of seeing Didi confiscate it and tell them that lipstick is strictly "for big people" (Angelica then proceeds to taunt the babies in a manner so flagrant that I'm amazed that Didi tolerates it, but then Didi is a bit of a dope for not figuring out how her lipstick ended up in the babies' hands in the first place). Chuckie comments on the injustice of being denied something jut because they're babies. Tommy proclaims that if they were big people they could do anything they wanted, although Chuckie finds the notion of unlimited freedom to be a tad overwhelming, particularly Tommy's suggestion that they could take baths standing up. Tommy attempts to expand Chuckie's insight into what being a grown up entails, by getting him to imagine waking up and starting the day off in a new, adult body, and thus the fantasty begins. The first item of note is that, in imagining themselves as adults, Tommy and Chuckie simply implant their baby heads into adult bodies, meaning that their bodily proportions look really, eerily off and, as result, the fantasy takes on an even more deliciously surreal vibe. Chuckie notices that he's wearing a bow tie and attempts to take it off, prompting Tommy to cry out in alarm that for an adult to remove their tie will result in their head falling off. Okay, well that's a seriously fucked up image right there. I mean, it's hilarious that Tommy has apparently drawn the conclusion that ties are there to keep adults' heads from falling off, but I do remember being incredibly freaked out by that whole notion as a kid, even if I was certainly old enough to know that it was bunk. Chuckie comments (not unreasonably) that being an adult is a terrifying business, so Tommy attempts to win him over by reminding him of the lack of rules and boundaries in their newfound grown up lives - adults can throw their toys, squirt their milk and draw all over the walls to their hearts' content. Tommy is, unwittingly, hitting upon that universal paradox of coming of age - growing up means more autonomy, but sadly losing a lot of the zest for life which always made that autonomy seem so appealing in the first place. "What The Big People Do" explores that paradox to an extent, but it's not really the focus of the episode.
Chuckie and Tommy then attempt to prepare themselves an adult breakfast consisting of Reptar cereal and a cup of joe (aka mud - a small quirk, but after drinking the mud-coffee, Chuckie obtains a mud-mustache which he retains for the rest of the fantasy). Tommy then looks down at his wrist (although he does not actually incorporate a wristwatch into his fantasy because, being a baby, Tommy is still too young to understand the concept of time) and realises that he and Chuckie have to go to Work. Chuckie is reluctant, but Tommy insists that Work is fun and besides, he's eager to try out driving a car. Chuckie, ever the sensible one, points out that Tommy doesn't know how to drive, but overlooks the fact that in fantasy land, anything goes. Before he knows it, he's in the passenger seat next to Tommy, who's weaving about recklessly all over the road, causing a few crashes and possibly a few fatalities in the process. Tommy insists that he's driving badly on purpose because he wants to get a ticket - being the naive little infant that he is, Tommy can't distinguish between a ticket to an event and a ticket for traffic violations, so he's pretty chuffed when a cop ("played" by Angelica) pulls him over and gives him a ticket to see Reptar on Ice. Although I do enjoy the sheer ridiculousness of this sequence (particularly cop Angelica informing the babies that they were going "a thousand miles an hour"), I do have a slight quibble with this portion of the fantasy which I'll get to later on. There's also a sight gag in which cop Angelica appears to be smoking a cigarette that's later revealed to be a sucker, which I suspect wouldn't get past the censors so easily today.
Tommy and Chuckie arrive at Work, which they envision as a surreal playground where big people fly kites and zip around on skateboards with caged canaries all day. Chuckie, who always had a somewhat more grounded notion of what "work" meant, comments that he thought that it would be a bit harder, although Tommy insists that that's just a ruse adults insist on. Chuckie recalls that his dad talks about "pushing paper" at Work, so he and Tommy imagine a room in which the adults are running around pushing heaps of paper with brooms for the fun of it. There, they run into the grown up Phil and Lil and have a jolly good time for a while, but Lil warns them not to get too complacent - Work might look like it's all fun and games, but there's always the risk of winding up on the wrong side of The Boss. Right on cue, a voice rings out from the intercom demanding that Tommy and Chuckie report to The Boss's office.
It's here that the fantasy takes a more overtly nightmarish turn, as Tommy and Chuckie wander down an ominous dark corridor adorned with portraits depicting numerous different boss archetypes, whose eyes (eerily) follow the two adult babies as they go. Chuckie recalls that his dad voices a persistent fear every morning that The Boss is going to fire him - neither baby has any idea what "fire" actually means, in this context, but they've picked up that it's something absolutely heinous (note: we don't actually see Chas in this episode, but from the small number of references made to him we can discern that he leads a pretty miserable life). They envision The Boss's office as big, dark and with a literal fire motif going on, giving the scene a wonderfully, chillingly hellish aura. Anyway, wanna take a wild guess as to which rugrat is the evil Boss in Tommy and Chuckie's fantasy? It's here that I'm going to lay down my only real criticism of this episode - namely, that since Angelica's already appeared earlier on in the fantasy as cop, it does lessen the impact somewhat when she reappears at the climax as Tommy and Chuckie's boss. It's possible that they purposely chose to have all the authoritative roles in the fantasy be played by Angelica, so as to emphasise her as a kind of omnipresent tyrant in the babies' lives, but to me it speaks more about the paucity of characters they had to work with (note that this episode pre-dates Susie's addition to the cast).
If you didn't already see the Hell allusion then it becomes pretty unmissable when we meet Boss Angelica, with her pigtails turned upwards like devil horns. Angelica is literally Satan in this fantasy - but, more than anything, she appears to be the voice of Tommy and Chuckie's insecurities about their ability to cut it in the adult world, taunting them by reminding them that they're not really big...just big babies. Tommy argues that this isn't true and that she shouldn't be so mean to them, but Angelica demands that she can do and say whatever she wants and the babies are powerless to stop her because she's The Boss. She declares that she could even have them fired, causing the office to erupt in flames as Angelica erupts in demonic laughter. The message is clear, and not a particularly comforting one for the young viewers at home - you'll encounter bullies and tyrants at all stages of life, and being "big" does not necessarily make you any less defenceless to their cruelty.
Chuckie finally decides that he's had enough of the fantasy and beats a retreat for the safety of the elevator, insisting that he wants to be a little kid again. Tommy follows, narrowly avoiding the hands of the various portrait bosses as they reach out and attempt to crush him. Tommy assures Chuckie that now that they've made it back to the elevator they are safe, only for Angelica to show up with legions of bloodthirsty robot businessmen at her disposal. I have no idea where those robot businessmen came from - unlike the portrait bosses, their existence was not established earlier on - but the second they show up the fantasy tips over full-scale from a slice of increasingly capricious freakiness into the stuff of your very worst nightmare. It becomes downright gut-wrenching to watch Tommy and Chuckie as they attempt to flee the robot workforce, only to find their every escape route blocked and the building exit locked. The entire sequence is so well staged, you can practically feel the panic and desperation leaking from every claustrophobic moment. As Angelica and the robots close in on them, Tommy happens upon a potential escape clause - if the two of them can "punch the clock" (an act which the babies again envision all too literally) they can eject themselves from the fantasy.
Tommy and Chuckie find themselves back in their playpen, as babies, with Chuckie having been left so traumatised by the fantasy that he vows never to grow up. Of course, the episode can't fade out by leaving its young audience with such a negative view of where they're ultimately headed, so Tommy tries to assure Chuckie that there are additional perks to being an adult which their fantasy didn't have time to cover - namely, that when you grow up you can get married and enjoy the excitement of starting a family of your own (actually, the way Tommy phrases it he makes it sound as if he considers the likelihood of getting married to be less than that of just having babies). Chuckie feels reassured and admits that it might be nice to get married. And then...
...and then we get that horrible, baffling, psychologically scarring cold sweat of an ending. Angelica pops out from behind the curtain, Cynthia doll in one hand, toy alien in another, and shrieks, "Oh boys...time to play HOUSE!!", her pigtails suddenly curling upwards into the devil horns of her fantasy counterpart. The episode concludes with Angelica laughing as if she's demonically possessed while Tommy and Chuckie scream and clutch one another in terror. The end. Roll the inappropriately upbeat credits.
Honestly, I don't think I've been more baffled by the ending to any cartoon I've ever seen in my life (except maybe the Sky 1 edit of that Simpsons episode I covered a while ago, which probably doesn't count as I later discovered that it had been truncated beyond all comprehension). Really, what is going on with Angelica at the end and why does the episode choose to round off on such an intensely unsettling note? As a kid, it left me confused and incredibly unnerved; as an adult, it still leaves me confused and unnerved, although I'm better able to take a stab at what the writers were going for. I think the clue is in Angelica proposing that the babies play "house", undermining Tommy's prior assurances about the benign safety of family life compared to the horrors of the work environment. In other words, getting married would be a horrifying notion if your spouse ends up being anything like Angelica. Arguably, there is a slightly misogynistic subtext to be had in there, so alternatively you can think of this ending as constituting one final, particularly intense scare following a fake out in which the babies thought they were safe - Tommy and Chuckie escape the horrors of their imagined adulthood only to realise that they're stuck in a neverending waking nightmare in the present. In other words, life is hell no matter which stage of it you're at. Again, not the most reassuring of messages to bow out on, but you do have to love Rugrats for insisting on that disturbance.
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