D.W.'s Imaginary Friend

Summary
D.W. has a new imaginary friend named Nadine who goes with her everywhere. When Arthur and Buster find out about a new amusement ride, they don't want D.W. to come along and embarrass them because she would bring Nadine along, too.

Plot
Arthur and his family are having spaghetti with cauliflower. Jane and David get things prepared, including burning rolls. D.W. shares her cauliflower with her imaginary friend, Nadine.

David comes in with a stack of trays until D.W. sees him standing on Nadine's tail. Her father begins shaking about and, in reaction, D.W. stands up, but begins to lose balance. David grabs her foot to help and D.W. accidentally throws her bowl of spaghetti high into the air.

It begins to land on Arthur, but it stops in midair before it hits. At this moment, Arthur explains to the viewers that if they don't have a younger sibling, it would probably be nice.

Arthur explains how D.W. sometimes gives tours of his room to her friends and talks about his stuffed bear, Stanley, and his secret box. Arthur claims that now she has an invisible friend, it's much worse. Just then, the bowl of spaghetti lands on his head. D.W. scolds Nadine for what she did to him.

---D.W.'S IMAGINARY FRIEND---

After the mess is cleaned, D.W. tells her father that Nadine apologizes for what happened. Her father forgets about it and has her finish dinner. After he leaves, Nadine appears and thinks she shouldn't come anymore, for she thinks Arthur hates her.

D.W. denies this and tells her friend that Arthur likes her and that he hung a picture of her on his wall. This turns out to be wrong, for Arthur tears up the picture of Nadine and cleans the spaghetti off his head.

But before he finishes, the telephone rings which causes Arthur to frantically dash down the stairs and answer it. It's Buster who tells him to quickly go to channel 4 on the TV.

He does so and sees a commercial about a new Wonder World ride called the Hurl-a-Whirl with motion sickness bags provided. Arthur is excited and begs his father if they could go to the opening. At first, David isn't sure about it, but he is determined and D.W. wants to go too.

Eventually, David agrees. D.W. asks if Nadine can come too. He agrees to that also which shocks Arthur. At the cafeteria the next day, Buster claims that it's bad enough that D.W. is going, but with Nadine it will be much more terrible.

Arthur imagines him and D.W. going on a horror ride. D.W. says that Nadine is frightened and screams to have the ride stop. The ride does stop and the top of the chair she was sitting in flies off, it then bumps into the decorations of the ride which causes a chain reaction.

D.W. scolds Nadine of what happened. Francine and Muffy, who are behind them and see that D.W. has an imaginary friend, call Arthur a baby and think Arthur's acting like a baby and is a baby. Back at the cafeteria, Buster offers his library card to Prunella for half of her piece of cake, he then shares his chocolate swirls with Arthur. This gives Buster an idea.

After school, they train D.W. on the school merry-go-round by spinning it around as fast as the boys can. This doesn't seem to affect D.W., but it affects Buster. D.W. then tries to go down the slide a hundred times and even tries to do some headfirst, while Arthur tries to recover Buster from his dizziness.

They train D.W. more by having her hang upside down on the jungle gym. D.W. notices it's getting late and reminds Buster that he has to go home. Walking home, D.W. thanks Arthur for training him and that she's ready for the new ride, which she mispronounces as 'Twirly Whirl'.

Arthur asks how she could ride on something if she can't even say it correctly, yet she is tough and tells her brother that she is trained enough. Arthur admits that she can come. D.W. claims that Nadine will be so scared that they will stop the ride for her, which worries Arthur.

On Saturday morning, Buster calls Arthur and thinks D.W. might forget about it. Arthur sees that this is false, for he sees D.W. outside lying on a chair, waiting to go to Wonder World. Buster then tells him that what he can do left is to pretend to be sick, yet the other kids might think that he's scared, but Arthur has a different idea.

While waiting to go, D.W. has Nadine spin around and around for practice. Arthur comes up, but D.W. warns him not to "try anything funny", for she will go no matter what.

Arthur asks D.W. if Nadine looks funny to her, but D.W. tells him, "That's a chair. Nadine's over there, spinning". Arthur then wonders if Nadine has spots all over her face and claims that it's the chicken pox. D.W. worries and takes Nadine inside. Arthur says he won't mind if D.W. wants to stay home with her friend, but she denies this.

Arthur's family is finally at Wonder World, but at the parking lot, D.W. begins to worry about Nadine, yet Arthur rebukes this and says that he lied about that he could see Nadine. D.W. realizes that Nadine is not sick and demands that they go home to get her.

Arthur disagrees and thinks that only babies have imaginary friends. D.W. complains to David about what he said, and Arthur complains to him that they shouldn't go back. Just then, their father gets an idea and pretends he hears something from the back of their car.

He opens and says that it's Nadine. This brightens D.W.'s day, but slightly disappoints Arthur. Their mom arrives and gives Arthur tickets for the Hurl-a-Whirl, yet she warns him to use them carefully.

After meeting up with Buster, the boys go and enter the Hurl-a-Whirl. Before the ride starts, they are handed a pair of barf bags, which they seem to adore. The ride begins and they pick the maximum speed known as liquify.

The ride begins to whirl, twist, spin, and turn in a crazy formation, having the boys screaming. After the ride's over, they throw their filled bags into the trash can. They decide to go on it again and end up with the same results.

Just then Francine arrives and asks if Arthur wants to go on the Hurl-a-Whirl with her. But Arthur is disappointed for they ran out of orange tickets for the ride and only have green tickets left, which are for rides such as the merry-go-round.

D.W., Jane, and David arrive and Buster runs away. D.W. says that Nadine has something for Arthur, but Arthur tries to avoid embarrassment by wanting to go on the merry-go-round. But Francine asks who Nadine is, although Arthur still tries to have Francine and himself leave. Finally, Francine turns to Arthur and asks him what's wrong with him. D.W. shows Arthur orange tickets that they found on the ground and she says that Nadine wanted to give them to Arthur, for she wants to be his friend.

Arthur is touched by this and invites D.W. to ride the Hurl-a-Whirl with them. D.W. already knows she's ready, but admits that Nadine will probably get scared. She also says that they might find tickets for the merry-go-round, for she saw that he wanted to go on it.

Before leaving, he tells her sister that when he gets back, he'll go on any ride with her as she wants. The ride she chose turns out to be the bumper cars and Arthur ends up getting bumped all around.

D.W. is proud of Nadine for being so good and promises her a tour of Arthur's room when they get home. She and Buster both ram Arthur's car simultaneously, which annoys Arthur.

Major

 * D.W. Read
 * Nadine Flumberghast (debut)
 * Arthur Read
 * Buster Baxter
 * David Read
 * Francine Frensky

Minor

 * Jane Read
 * Muffy Crosswire
 * Prunella Deegan

Cameo

 * Fern Walters
 * The Brain
 * George Lundgren
 * Binky Barnes
 * Jenna Morgan
 * 3rd Grade Male Dog (Number 2)
 * Helen
 * Nancy
 * John
 * Maria Pappas
 * Billy
 * Alex
 * Brian
 * Luke
 * Patrick
 * Unnamed crocodile (debut)
 * Otis
 * Unknown Male Adult Rabbit (Number 3)
 * Unknown Female Adult Rabbit (Number 4)
 * Maria lookalike (debut)
 * Unknown Male Rabbit (debut)

Trivia

 * The friends that D.W. gives a tour to are in Arthur's school. The two girls (Helen and Nancy) are 4th Graders while the boy (3rd Grade Male Dog) wearing the red cap is a 3rd Grader.
 * This is the first time Stanley's name is mentioned and the first appearance of Wonder World and Nadine.
 * D.W. mispronounces spaghetti as pasghetti.
 * This is the first episode to be written by Ken Scarborough.
 * The episode title is not voiced in the title card scene, but it is when it aired on TV.
 * The male bear kid seen riding the Hurl-A-Whirl in the commercial appears in the Lakewood cafeteria during lunch.
 * The D.W. Chases Toady title card is first used in this episode.
 * Running Gag: D.W. talking about Nadine.
 * Moral: Don't overreact just because someone is talking to imaginary friends for your own benefits.

Episode connections

 * During a flashback, Muffy wonders who D.W. is talking to, similar to her asking that in The Friend Who Wasn't There.
 * Arthur lies to D.W. about Nadine getting the chicken pox, which is what he gets himself in Arthur's Chicken Pox.
 * From the moment they see the Hurl-A-Whirl ad, Arthur and Buster are excited about the barf bags. But when they get on the ride and the attendant gives Buster a barf bag, he has to ask what it is. Buster's lack of intelligence is featured in many other episodes like Buster Makes the Grade.

Errors

 * When D.W. is outside watching Nadine spin, David's catering van is blue, but in all other episodes (including an earlier appearance in this episode) it is yellow.
 * The cap D.W. wears at Wonder World is blue, but when she says they might find more green tickets, it turns green.
 * It is briefly shown when Arthur and Buster are upside down on the Hurl-a-Whirl, Buster's ears stick outside of the glass.
 * At the end when Arthur moans, his lips don't move.

Home video
DVD: VHS
 * Arthur: The Complete Series One
 * Arthur's Lost Library Book (DVD)
 * Arthur's Lost Library Book (VHS)