The Cave

"The Cave" is the second half of the 4th episode of season 5 of the animated children's series Arthur. It originally aired on September 25th, 2000. It was written by Joseph Purdy and the storyboards were done by Nick Vallinakis and Zoran Vanjaka.

Summary
Arthur and his classmates take a field trip to some caves in Palisades Park. Arthur's afraid of going into the caves, but inside, he's not the only one that's spooked the most. He uses what his dad told him before at home and he gets everyone out of the cave calmly.

Plot
Arthur and his classmates are preparing for a field trip to some caves in Palisades Park after making replicas of caves for homework. During class, Francine teases Arthur of being scared of going inside a cave, which annoys Arthur. Upon learning this from him at home, D.W. tries to make Arthur admit to being so scared going into the caves, even going so far by trying to pull scary tricks on him, though Arthur isn't actually moved by them at all, much to D.W.'s anger. After a bad nightmare of being trapped inside a cave, Arthur feels a little afraid of going into the caves, but when the day of the field trip comes, he's not the one that's spooked the most. When he and his classmates go down through a underground tunnel, they spot a swarm of bats sleeping, and Mr. Ratburn and Francine start to panic, scaring the bats away, while Arthur and the other kids, as well as their tour guide, remain calm. In order to help the tour guide to get Mr. Ratburn and Francine out of the cave calmly, Arthur suggests whistling a familiar tune (an advice he got from his father earlier), to which everyone does so. After Arthur and his classmates get out of the cave calmly, Mr. Ratburn apologizes to everyone for his panic attack, thanking the guide for helping him and Francine out of the cave, as well as thanking Arthur for his helpful 'whistling' tip. Francine, on the other hand, refuses to admit that she was that scared, though Binky proves this wrong by having taken two pictures of Francine and Mr. Ratburn being scared while seeing the bats, as well as pulling a trick on Francine to make her believe that she's getting attacked by a bat, leaving Arthur and the others to laugh at her for falling suck a silly trick. Annoyed, Francine chases after Binky, swearing that he'll be sorry for taking those pictures.