Prunella's Special Edition

"Prunella's Special Edition"
Season/Series:	6
Number in season:	3A
Original Airdate:	October 8, 2001;
	Credits
Written by:	Matthew Lane
Storyboard by:	Robert Yap
	Episodes
Previous; "Buster's Sweet Success"	Next; "The Secret Life of Dogs and Babies"
	Read transcript

"Prunella's Special Edition" is the first half of the third episode in the sixth season of Arthur.

Summary[edit]

While the townspeople lines at the bookstore for the latest Henry Skreever book, Prunella orders a special monogrammed limited edition from England—and gets a Braille one by mistake.

Plot[edit]

The episode starts out in a fantasy sequence with Prunella. She takes 100 steps, trying to find some sort of special book. Straight ahead of her, she spots a bookshelf and heads towards it. She sees three books, all written by famous authors. She reads the titles of the books aloud and she notices they all have something in common; they are all about birds. The books fly off of the bookshelf making bird noises, and they corner her. She casts a spell so she can make a door and escape. She runs into the doorway, it opens, and the books are all on the other side of the door so she is away from harm. She then falls down a trap door into an abyss. She finds a rock to hold onto, but her wand falls. She then remembers of having a magic carpet and unfolds it. She hops on it and is saved. She finds the book she was looking for, only to discover that all of the pages are blank. Then the five wizards in the portrait laugh at her.

---Title Card---

After the intertitle, we see Arthur, Buster, and Alan in front of a bookstore in a line waiting to buy the next Henry Skreever book. They notice Prunella isn't there and they think that she already has the book.

After that, it switches to Prunella's house where she is trying on a costume.

Everyone is walking into the school with Prunella looking at it thinking she will get the book in five hours. She casts an imaginary magic spell "Piggity, Piggity, Poggity, P, Lakewood School, I transform ye!" It switches to a flashback event and Arthur breaks it up by walking in front of Prunella and asking her what page she was on. Prunella brags of getting a monogrammed copy of it from England. But of course, Muffy has three copies of it.

It then goes back to Prunella's house and her sister, Rubella, tells her that she has a package. She opens it and looks through the pages, only to find out that it's a Braille edition. She contacts the book company, but they say the book she ordered in print will arrive in three weeks. She rides her bike, about to buy the book, and she sees Muffy and Francine coming out of the bookstore. She asks Muffy if she can borrow her copy of it, but she refuses and walks off with Francine, laughing at Prunella.

Prunella observes everyone reading their copies of the book, and becomes more eager to read it. She goes to the library, but they don't have a copy of it, either. She goes on the Internet to try to find one, but fails.

When all else fails, Prunella borrows a big, red book from the library titled "How to Read Braille". She falls asleep while reading it and is awakened by Sue Ellen, who offers help.

When Sue Ellen leaves, Prunella bumps into a blind girl named Marina Datillo. She picks up the book and discovers that it's Braille. She asks if she can borrow it, and Prunella says that she can keep it, but then says, "This one has your name on it!" Marina then reads it to Prunella.

Characters[edit]

Major[edit]

Minor[edit]

Cameo[edit]

Trivia[edit]

This is the first episode Marina appears in.
As with all season six episodes, the end credits originally featured a remixed version of Believe in Yourself. Beginning in 2015, the credits were reformatted for reruns and now include the standard version of the song.
In 2002, this episode was voted as a fan-favorite during the PBS Kids Vote-a-rama event.

Cultural references[edit]

The magical library contains the titles The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe, The Seagull by Anton Chekov and “The Wild Duck” by Henrik Ibsen.
Henry Skreever is a parody of Harry Potter, Pigblisters a parody of Hogwarts, the Mangling Maple a parody of the Whomping Willow, and Soupitch of Quidditch.
When Rubella visits Prunella, the latter is dressed as a fat lady in a pink dress and asks for a password. This alludes to the Fat Lady-portrait in Harry Potter.
Ask Frank, the site Prunella uses to try and find copies of the new book, is a parody of Ask Jeeves, now called ask.com.
Prunella mispronouncing "Persephone" alludes to Harry Potter fans mispronouncing "Hermione"^[2]. Both names are taken from Greek mythology.