To Beat or Not to Beat

To Beat or Not to Beat is the second half of the 7th episode of Season 4. It first aired on October 18, 1999 with Binky Barnes, Wingman!.

Summary
When Francine enters the talent show, her friends try to tell her she is horrible when she sings and drums at the same time, even though she is a good drummer. After she hears a recording of herself, she realizes her friends had been right, but at the talent show, she surprises them without her drum set as she sings very well.

Plot
The intro begins with Arthur climbing on the monkey bars and he tells the viewers that his friend Francine Frensky can do alot of things great such as hitting farther than anyone Arthur knows, (a flashback is seen to a baseball game against Mighty Mountain and Francine hits the ball really hard and wins the game) and she can argue with anyone better than anyone Arthur knows, (in a flashback Francine is seen arguing and shouting with Binky that a tomatoe is a fruit not a vegetable to which Binky frightenly agrees with her and tells her that she wins). Back in the present day Arthur tells the viewers that today Francine wants to try something she probably shouldn't which is flying. Buster tells Arthur to tell Francine to stop because she could hurt herself to which Arthur does and Francine lands in a pile of leaves to which Arthur asks the viewers if they hate it when they have to burst somebody's bubble.

The title is said in Buster's voice and the episode begins in Mr. Ratburn's class where he tells the class that he knows they've been concentrating on Friday's Spring Talent Show and that he's giving them extra homework so they won't forget what's really important to which the class groans over. After school Arthur, Buster, and the Brain walk home together and Buster tells them that he's telling jokes and asks What's orange and sounds like a parrot? A carrot. Arthur then spots Francine getting on her bike and asks her what she's doing for the talent show to which she tells him and the others that she's not telling them and that they'll be surprised like everyone else. Buster asks Arthur what he's doing for the talent show and Arthur says that he's been practicing tricks with Pal (in a flashback Arthur and Pal are doing tricks for D.W. and Kate and Arthur tells Pal to sit to which Pal does and Arthur tells Pal to shake his tail to which he has to help Pal with and D.W. sighs with bordom and says Oh brother). Back in present day Arthur says that he and Pal aren't quite ready yet but Pal is smart. Buster then asks Brain what he's doing for the talent show to which Brain says that he will be correcto the human calculator and that the audience will shout out math problems and he will do them instantly in his head. When Arthur asks what will happen if Ratburn asks a question Brain has a thought about himself standing up on stage and Mr. Ratburn asking a really difficult question which is If a train carrying 1,873 scoops of ice cream leaves Chicago at 7:00 a.m. and the freezer stops working how fast would it have to travel to reach New York before half the ice cream melts factoring in a melting rate of 6 scoops per minute. After finishing the thought Brain tells Arthur that he might juggle instead. They then hear a horrible sound and wonder what it is and walk in the direction that it's coming from to which Buster thinks it might be a sound that a exterminator uses to get rid of termites in houses (in Buster's imagination an exterminator uses a machine with the sound in it to get rid of all the termites in a house. Brain thinks the sound belongs to an engine to which Arthur says it have to be one giant engine.