Better Off Bread

"Better Off Bread" is an episode of the Happy Tree Friends internet series, the twelfth of the second season, and thirty-ninth overall.

HTF's Episode Description
Super Squirrel to the rescue again! Splendid's domestic duties are interrupted so that he can once again save Happy Tree Friends from total disaster. This time, he pulls out a true superhero trick... some of you will recognize the reference. Let us know what you think!

Plot
While listening to his radio, Splendid happily begins baking bread in his oven. Elsewhere, Giggles is laughing and frolicking through a flowery meadow. She begins falling, however, as we see that the flowers she was running through extend over the edge of a high cliff.

Splendid's super hearing picks up Giggles' screams, and he flies off to rescue her. As Splendid flies upwards to catch the falling Giggles, he accidentally (and unknowingly) breaks her back. Splendid stops after hearing something else and flies away.

Several seagulls and a baby seal lie covered in oil, where a nearby tanker has begun leaking after running into some rocks. Splendid flies at an increased speed towards the accident, forcing Giggles' eyes to detach from their sockets. After considering for a few seconds, Splendid fixes the hole in the ship by using his laser eyes to weld the hole shut.

Splendid hears another yell. Feeling annoyed, he flies out to investigate. After he flies away the heat from part of the ship he welded shut ignites the oil, burning all of the oil-covered animals to death.

Meanwhile, Toothy starts yelling for help while pointing upwards toward the sky. We find that he's pointing to a meteorite that is headed straight for Earth. Splendid flies past Toothy and prepares to attack the meteorite head on. As Splendid flies upwards, the skin on Giggles' face begins to peel back, exposing the nerves of her face.

Splendid hits, and destroys, the meteorite. Toothy smiles at the glow of the destroyed meteorite and cheers Splendid upon his return to Earth. Splendid places Giggles down next to Toothy and pats her on the head, unaware the she has died from the ordeal. Toothy waves goodbye and thanks Splendid as he flies away, but Toothy is soon killed by one of the many small meteorites that have formed due to the destruction of the large meteorite.

Splendid returns home, only to find that his bread is burnt, having been in the oven too long. He gasps and then faces up at the ceiling, screaming in grief and despair over the loss of his bread and flies out of his Acorn Fortress in anger and up into outer space. He begins flying around Earth many times in the opposite direction that Earth is rotating.

This makes the Earth rotate backwards, causing time to go reverse to before the meteorite approached Earth, before the animals were burned by the flaming oil, and before Giggles fell off the cliff. Splendid flies back to his fortress and opens and closes his oven door to see that he has just put his bread into the oven. Again, he hears Giggles screaming. This time he thinks for a second and decides to turn up the volume on his radio, pretending he doesn't hear Giggles' distress.

Moral
"Time heals all wounds!"

Deaths

 * 1) Giggles dies after having her head skinned by Splendid's fast flying. After Splendid turns back time, he ignores her screams as she falls off the cliff to her death. Probably after she fell to her death, she broke all her bones.
 * 2) Multiple animals are killed when the heat from Splendid's laser eyes set the oil they are stuck in ablaze. After Splendid turns back time, the animals probably die from being covered in oil. Or it doesn't happen, and the animals are alive.
 * 3) Toothy is killed by one of the many small meteorites that forms after Splendid destroys the large meteorite that is headed for Earth. After Splendid turns back time, Toothy (and possibly others) more than likely dies from getting hit by the large meteorite.
 * 4) Unless they noticed and found shelter.

Credits

 * Executive Producer: John Evershed
 * Producer: Julie Stroud
 * Writers: Warren Graff, Jeff Biancalana, Kenn Navarro, Rhode Montijo and David Winn
 * Art & Direction: Rhode Montijo
 * Animation Direction: Kenn Navarro
 * Animators: Marius Alecse, Andy Arett, Lyla Warren, Jeff Biancalana, David Winn, Alan Lau, Brad Rau, Roque Ballesteros, Matt Danner
 * Color Stylist: Jennifer Hansen
 * Technical Direction: Julie Stroud
 * Sound: Jim Lively
 * Music: rj Eleven
 * Voices: Rhode Montijo, Warren Graff, Dana Belben

Goofs

 * 1) When Giggles passes through the flower field (in the first shot before she falls) there is more space in front of her than there is in the second shot when she falls.
 * 2) Toothy has normal buckteeth throughout the episode.
 * 3) When Splendid flies away, his chef hat and gloves fall off in a slideshow type of way rather than an animation type of way.
 * 4) Just before Splendid flies away for Giggles, his mouth appears over his chest for a brief second (animation error.)
 * 5) Giggles' eyelashes are missing throughout the entire episode.
 * 6) If you look very closely when Giggles was frolicking in the flower field, her right leg was in front every time she jumped.

Trivia

 * Splendid turning back time by causing the Earth to rotate in the opposite direction, to prevent his bread from burning, is a reference/parody to the movie Superman.
 * Giggles's death is similar to Mime's injury in Wingin' It
 * There was a deleted scene where Giggles, Toothy, and the other animals died on screen after Splendid turns back in time. It was cut for an unknown reason.
 * The moral of this episode is the same as in Blast from the Past.
 * This was Rhode Montijo's last time voicing Splendid.
 * The title is a play on the 1985 film Better Off Dead.
 * A bee is seen when Giggles is frolicking in the flower field.