Buster and the Daredevils

"Buster and the Daredevils" is the second half of the 3rd episode of Season 2 of the animated children's series Arthur. Together with D.W., the Picky Eater, it first aired on October 6th, 1997.

Summary
Buster begins keeping bad company in his eagerness to learn his new "friends'" skating tricks. Arthur realizes that they are just having Buster make a fool of himself for their own amusement.

Plot
Buster is in the park with his two new friends Toby and Slink, who announce to the kids that Buster the Brave is about to do something amazing right in front of them. Arthur stops the episode (Apparently stopping everyone around him as if they were statues too) and says that this is all wrong.

He remarks that Buster is not brave, and recalls how on Halloween Buster couldn't distinguish costumes from real pirates, aliens, etc., and kept getting freaked out by them. Arthur then remarks how Buster looks nervous, and finds something terrible in the paper bag Slink is holding.

--- Title Card---

Arthur and Buster are found playing in the park with Cyber Toy action figures. They battle each other as their action figures transform into starfighters. They then see two boys, Toby and Slink performing skate tricks around the park, which leaves them in awe.

Thy ask if they can learn them, but Toby and Slink say they're too young, since they just happened to be playing in the sandbox. Arthur pretends that he was finding something, but Toby and Slink run off. The boys later come back to the park with their skateboards and strap-on skates.

They try to imitate the tricks Toby and Slink did, but fail miserably. Toby and Slink come back and make fun of them, but soon run off to go to Comic-mania. Buster decides to go t Comic-mania, and Arthur tags along.

There, they find the issue of Bionic Bunny vs. Techno Turtle, but Toby and Slink say it's a baby comic, and recommend Peabrain and Nuthead instead. Arthur and Buster don't get the comic, but pretend to like it.

Buster and Arthur later track Toby and Slink to a local restaurant, where they attempt to dress and talk like cool kids. They then ask the boys if they'd be willing to teach them skate tricks, but are turned down flat.

Just as they turn to leave, Slink comes up with an idea and says the boys can hang out with them, but Toby remarks that they have to do a little dare first. The two boys are dared to sing in public out on the street, but Arthur realizes that Toby and Slink may be merely making fun of them.

He then sees his mom and D.W. shopping and goes with them instead, just in time to watch Buster sing Mary Had a Little Lamb in front of the entire town. Everyone is shocked at this humiliating move. Later, the gang goes to the Sugar Bowl but Buster is still hanging out with Toby and Slink.

He is dared to got to Binky and send him a little message. He tells Binky that his mother eats gym shorts, which outrages Binky. He throws his strawberry sundae at Buster's face, but Buster doesn't mind. Later, Arthur's baseball team faces off against Mighty Mountain, which happens to be Toby and Slink's team too.

When Buster is out on base, Slink dares Buster once more. Buster asks Francine out for advice, and then kisses her! Enraged, Francine chases Buster out of the ballpark, costing Lakewood a potential run. Arthur is fed up with this nonsense and goes to talk to Buster.

This time, Buster has been dared not to talk for the entire day. Arthur points out that if Toby and Slink wanted to be his friends, they wouldn't do these things to him.

Buster agrees and tells Toby and Slink he has had enough, but they coax him in again by telling him they would share with him their sacred knowledge on skate tricks, and that he could join the secret "Brotherhood of Daredevils".

However, he had to do one more dare before he could join. At the park, Arthur and the Brain are playing with their Cyber Toys when Buster shows up with Toby and Slink. They announce that Buster the Brave will do something shocking for them...Slink pulls a jar out of a paper bag, and declares Buster will eat a bug!

Buster takes it but cannot bring himself to do it, and after Arthur says for him not to do it, Buster tells Slink to eat it! Toby says Slink isn't dumb enough to do that, and Buster realizes that it's stupid to do something just because he was dared.

At that, he ditches Toby and Slink and runs off. Slink blames Toby for ruining everything and the two of them begin fighting over who should eat the bug. Buster goes back to playing with his real friends, and no longer wants to accept anymore dares.

Trivia

 * Slink often reappears in later seasons as a member of the Tough Customers, even though he's from Mighty Mountain. Toby reappears a lot less frequently.
 * Cyber Toys made their first appearance in this episode. However, in a much later episode Buster stole a Cyber Toy because he did not have any of his own. These probably weren't known as Cyber Toys when this episode premiered, and the episodes are rarely ever in chronological order.
 * The issue over accepting dares arises again in a later episode when Arthur, Brain, Francine, and Buster dared each other to skip school. However, in that episode, they all foolishly accepted the dare even though in this episode they learned that they should not do so. Again, these two episodes may not have been in chronological order.
 * Peabrain and Nuthead is a parody of Beavis and Butthead.

Goofs

 * Buster says he found Arthur's penny in the sand box but the penny is silver instead of bronze.
 * Wouldn't Buster get in trouble with Oliver Frensky (Francine's dad and coach of the Lakewood Baseball team, who was there during the incident), for kissing Francine on the lips?
 * In Comic Mania, Toby gets upset with Arthur for thinking that Nuthead was a peanut; Toby says that Nuthead is a pecan. If you look at the background surrounding Toby, you see the Elwood City Playground, not Comic Mania.
 * Buster has a cybertoy in this episode but in Nerves of Steal, he doesn't have one and steals one from Jim's Drug Store.

Home Video
DVD:
 * Hooray for Health