Misfortune Teller

"Misfortune Teller" is the second half of the 23rd episode of season 1 of the animated children's series Arthur. It originally aired on February 24th, 1997.

Plot

For her half-birthday, Prunella's older sister, Rubella, gives her a cootie catcher. Rubella claims that it can tell the future and the answers it gives do come true. Arthur and his friends begin following the advice of the cootie catcher. When the cootie catcher goes missing and turns up ruined by the washing machine, Arthur and his friends realize that they don't need the cootie catcher to run their lives.

Trivia

Notes

• At the end, Prunella discarded the cootie catcher in which she and her friends don't need to use it anymore; although Prunella still uses the cootie catcher in later seasons, but only occasionally.
• Although Prunella is the central character, the title card used the one where Francine hits the gong that was mainly used for shorts where Francine was the central character. The title card where Prunella is gazing into the crystal ball for fortunes wasn't created until the next few seasons; although the use of the title card for this short is likely due to that Francine has one of the major roles here besides the central Prunella.

Goofs

• At Prunella's 9 1/2 birthday party, D.W. was shown three times in the crowd; but in other scenes there, she actually wasn't at the party.
• The cootie catcher's colors are not properly aligned.

• Giving someone half of a crunch bar once it has been chewed off would transmit bacteria.

• When Arthur, Francine, and Muffy go to Prunella's house for another fortune, Francine knocked on the door and was ahead of the two; but later in that scene, she was standing behind them.

• Using a cootie catcher once it has been mangled in the washing machine would never be worth using again.

• Also, the cootie catcher would still never answer anyone's questions or fortunes anymore once it is taken out of the garbage pail.
• Out of all the people who attended Prunella's 9 1/2 birthday party, Buster was the only one dressed formally besides party host Prunella, while everyone else who attended were dressed casually.
• In the final scenes, Francine was wearing a blue shirt with the number 2 on it; but after she and the others went inside Arthur's house to watch Turtles, Turtles, Turtles, she was wearing her usual red shirt.