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And the nostalgia train keeps on rolling.
As we'd noted on Thursday, Rocko's Modern Life is getting new life in an upcoming TV movie—over 20 years (!) after the series had gone off the air. Now we're getting a new clip of Hey Arnold!, which is also being revived with a TV flick called Hey Arnold!: The Jungle Movie (it was first announced in 2016).
Nostalgia aside, there's something very interesting going on in this clip, which was unveiled at Comic-Con on Friday. It's a very contrived scene in which Gerald (Arnold's best bud) presents one of his famous "urban legends." This time around, it's Arnold who's the subject of Gerald's raconteur story-weaving, and the audience is none other than, well, pretty much everyone who's ever been on the show. There's Stoop Kid, who apparently still suffers from his tragic obsessive-compulsive disorder. There's the Pigeon Man, who's still hanging out with pigeons. And a keen eye will spot Ruth, who Arnold had pined for throughout the series' run from 1996 to 2004, also in attendance.
The point of this cobbled-together clip, then, is to reintroduce us to the Hey Arnold! universe and the varied denizens that populate it. We cover the broad topics (like Arnold's altruistic tendencies) and go on a deeper dive to remember such items as Chocolate Boy and Harold's one jutting tooth.
What the clip doesn't touch on, however, is the crux of the upcoming movie—in fact, it references absolutely nothing about it. This might be a bit disappointing for Hey Arnold! fans, especially since The Jungle Movie is expected to unveil more details about the mysterious disappearance of Arnold's parents (who, as depicted in the series, were explorers who vanished after embarking on a rescue mission). This topic was touched upon in the 2002 theatrical release Hey Arnold! The Film, which offered a cliffhanger where Arnold finds a map that he thinks may point to his parents' whereabouts. This storyline, however, never got the chance to unfurl. Craig Bartlett, the show's creator, told Polygon that Nickeldeon straight-up canceled the series before he could make the grand reveal. “There I was, ready to reveal what happened to his parents, and the show got canceled,” Bartlett said. “Me ending the movie with ‘Grandma, Grandpa I found a map!’ was me throwing down a dare directed at Paramount. I dare you to cancel this movie. Look, he found the map. How could we not make this movie?”
Well, Bartlett now has his chance once more, thanks to millennials' insatiable hunger for all things pertaining to the '90s and early aughts. As noted at Collider, much of the original voice-acting cast will reprise their roles. While Arnold and Gerald will be voiced by newcomers, the characters of Harold, Rhonda, Grandpa (voiced by Dan Castellaneta of Homer Simpson fame), Grandma, and Bob Pataki, among others, will be helmed by their original voice actors.
Hey Arnold!: The Jungle Movie is expected to drop November 23 on Nickelodeon, according to Polygon.
