Take a Hike

"Take a Hike" is episode number 5.3 of the Happy Tree Friends television series. This episode was the first episode to have a Danish animator, Stefan A. Fjedmark's role as a storyboard artist.

The term "take a hike" means to leave, usually by punishment.

HTF Episode Description
Scoutmaster Lumpy leads the troop on a death-hike through the woods. (DVD)

Plot
A small group consisting of Cuddles, Petunia, Toothy, Sniffles, and Nutty, all led by Lumpy, ends their hike for the day and begins setting up camp. While walking through the woods, Flaky sees a baby bird lying on the ground, having fallen out of nest. She tries to place the bird back in the nest atop a high tree branch, but the nest falls off, crushing the bird and breaking several eggs. Flaky laughs nervously and tries to cover up the mess, but she ends up getting attacked by the nest's owner who happens to be a giant, angry blue eagle.

Back at camp, Toothy attempts putting up a tent by tying what he thinks is a rope around a stake in the ground. It turns out he's been tying a cobra around the stake, and the angry snake bites Toothy in the arm before slithering off. Shaving his face and using up the remainder of water in his canteen, Lumpy hears Toothy's cries of pain and reluctantly runs over to see what the problem is. He passes by Sniffles, who attempts to start a fire but gets set ablaze while blowing on the flame.

Now Lumpy sees Toothy's hurt arm and begins sucking the venom out. Not looking behind him, he accidentally spits the venom into Cuddles' eyes. Cuddles' eyes immediately begin to burn/melt and he screams in pain, leaving Lumpy at a loss for who to help first. He makes a decision when the flaming Sniffles runs by him, screaming in pain. Lumpy tackles Sniffles and begins dunking his head in the lake, unknowingly piercing Sniffles' head on a sharp rock beneath the water.

Lumpy piles the three injured campers on a stretcher and drags them along, flies buzzing around them, while Petunia and Nutty walk behind. The group soon enters a vast, scorching desert with no water in their canteens. Petunia spots a small puddle of polluted water and, extremely thirsty, begins gulping the water down. Initially she is relieved, but soon she lies on the stretcher after getting sick from the contaminated liquid.

As the group once again moves forwards, Toothy's bitten and swollen arm falls off. A liquid drops down on Nutty's head, and upon tasting it, he looks up, where, much to his delight, he finds a beehive. Meanwhile, Lumpy spots another baby bird that fell from its nest and picks it up. Nutty, on the other hand, starts sucking honey from the beehive through a straw until honey squirts all over his face, covering his eyes. He climbs down from the tree and blindly waddles over to a large mound of fur, and he tears off a piece of fur and begins wiping his face.

Lumpy climbs a tree to put the baby bird in the nest, but upon reaching the branch the nest is on, he discovers the nest is made out of Flaky's skin. He screams and falls out of the tree, dropping the bird back in the nest. Elsewhere, Nutty finishes cleaning off his face when he suddenly notices that the patch of fur he tore off came from a large, angry grizzly bear. Nutty tries replacing the fur on the bear's stomach, but unfortunately for him, the fur fails to stick back on. Infuriated, the bear swipes its sharp claws at Nutty and as the squirrel makes a run for it, slices of his body break away until only his legs and tail continue running forward.

As Lumpy gets up, Nutty's legs run up and crash into the tree. The bear begins chasing Lumpy, who pushes the stretcher onto an old rope bridge as he runs. The friction from the stretcher begins burning the rope until the bridge breaks, sending everyone on it down a deep canyon. Everyone is impaled on the rocks below, with the exception of Lumpy who survives his fall to the ground.

Lumpy climbs up one of the ropes of the bridge to the cliff opposite of the one he entered the bridge on. Unfortunately, the bear is waiting at the top and begins brutally mauling Lumpy, tearing him to pieces. The bear then walks back over a sturdier wooden bridge a few feet away from the rope bridge. Back at the bird's nest, Flaky's body falls out of the tree, and the baby bird begins playing with one of the nerve fibers poking out of one of Flaky's eye sockets as the closing iris closes on the bird playing with the fibers.

Moral
"Walk a mile in someone else's shoes!"

Blurb
A BlurB video was released on February 8th, 2013. It contains these annotations:


 *  BlurB! 
 *  Fun Fact: This episode will be the first TV series, 7 minute episode to receive the Blurb treatment. 
 *  Lumpy doesn't like wearing a shirt under his Lederhosen. 
 *  It clashes with his walking stick. 
 *  Hey, Where's everybody going? 
 *  Hike Master's Tip: Let children explore the woods alone and unattended. 
 *  They will learn cruical survival techiniques... if they live. 
 *  Little does Flaky know, this is actually a rare species of bird that prefers to nest on the ground. 
 *  See, we told you! 
 *  I'm getting the feeling that you don't believe me. 
 *  Frankly, I'm getting a little TAKEN for granted. 
 *  I'm all TIED UP in KNOTS about it... 
 *  ...and that really BITES! 
 *  There's only one way to SHAVE our friendship now... 
 *  We need to look in the MIRROR and think what we both want out of this relationship... 
 *  ...and REKINDLE that old SPARK back. 
 *  It would be POISONOUS to let things fester. 
 *  And I hope you don't SPIT my words back in my face. 
 *  Don't PANIC. We can get through this. 
 *  We just have to keep our HEAD ABOVE WATER and think rationally. 
 *  Ok. Let's try this again... 
 *  Fun Facts: Three dead bodies weigh as much as four live people. 
 *  I can feel your doubting eyes... 
 *  ...but we'll keep trudging along. 
 *  Lumpy has a canteen with a disapearing strap. 
 *  Eew! He's been drinking spider water! 
 *  Hiking Tip: Green slime is the ideal fluid to counter dehydration. 
 *  Oops! Ok, maybe, it's not. 
 *  I should really watch these episodes before I Blurb about them. 
 *  Ok, that was my bad. 
 *  I'm big enough to admit when I'm wrong. 
 *  I understand if you want me to just leave you alone. 
 *  You'll miss out on some amazing insights though. 
 *  Maybe, even information that could save your life someday. 
 *  If I didn't say anything, how would you know NOT to tear an angry bear's fur off? 
 *  This is really more like a public service. 
 *  KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON 
 *  See, I can be clever and funny too, you know! 
 *  I did say I'd leave you alone so, alone is how I'll leave you. 
 *  I am a Blurb of my word, after all. 
 *  (whistles) 
 *  Ooo! I love this part! 
 *  C'mon, admit it. You miss me, don't you? 
 *  Ok. Fine. 
 *  I'm sorry. 
 *  We still have about a minute and a half left on this episode... 
 *  ...and I don't want to leave it weird between us. 
 *  You're all I've got! 
 *  (sobbing) 
 *  When this is over, you'll come back and watch me again, right? 
 *  There's nothing to do here but upload cat videos. 
 *  Ok. Sniff... Keep it together, Blurb! You can do this! 
 *  Let's finish this with some dignity. 
 *  (fart) 
 *  Whoopsie! Heh heh... Escuse me. 
 *  I had a burrito for lunch. 
 *  Fun Fact: Bears can see in color! 
 *  Especially Blue Moose! 
 *  Statistically, you're 12 times more likely to die of a bee sting than a bear attack. 
 *  What do bears and bees have in common? 
 *  Honey! 
 *  So stay away from those delicious jars of sweet death! 
 *  Whew! We made it! I'm so proud of us! 
 *  Watch me again. Every minute that you don't I'll upload another cat video on the internet. 

Deaths

 * 1) Flaky is killed and used as a nest by The Eagle.
 * 2) Petunia either dies when she gets impaled on rocks or after she drinks contaminated water.
 * 3) Nutty is sliced to pieces by The Grizzly Bear. His legs and tail are later crushed by a rock.
 * 4) Toothy, Cuddles, Sniffles, and Petunia are impaled on rocks.
 * 5) Lumpy is brutally mauled by The Grizzly Bear.

Injuries

 * 1) Toothy's arm is bitten by a cobra and later pops off after badly swelling up.
 * 2) Lumpy spits venom into Cuddles' eyes, burning and severely swelling them.
 * 3) Lumpy pierces Sniffles' head on sharp rocks beneath the water.
 * 4) Petunia drinks polluted water.
 * 5) Toothy, Cuddles, and Petunia fall on numerous rocks.
 * 6) Lumpy is impaled in the back by a plank of wood.

Goofs

 * 1) The directions of Lumpy's antlers change numerous times, sometimes during continuous shots.
 * 2) The candy on Nutty's body change positions numerous times, sometimes during continuous shots.
 * 3) Nutty's lazy eye also frequently changes positions, sometimes during continuous shots.
 * 4) The lollipop and all day sucker on Nutty's head and the candy cane on his chest disappear as he drinks the honey from the beehive.
 * 5) When Nutty rips the fur off of a grizzly bear, the beehive on the tree is gone.
 * 6) Although Nutty's head is severed from his body, his legs emit a cry after his remains hit a tree (prior to Lumpy being chased by the bear).
 * 7) After Toothy is bitten, the green cloth and other pegs disappear. Similarly, Toothy's axe and the peg he was hammering disappeared when Lumpy began to suck the venom out.
 * 8) Even though Toothy's swollen arm falls off, it is visible when Lumpy begins running away from the bear.
 * 9) For most of the episode, Sniffles' mouth is under his snout, rather than on the tip of it.
 * 10) Toothy's teeth turn into normal buck teeth several times in the episode.
 * 11) Toothy's head is caved in when it hit the rocks, but it returns to normal when he gets impaled.
 * 12) Lumpy's arm is gone when the bear leaves him, but in slow-motion, he has both arms just before the bear rips his intestines out and the bear never touches his arm.
 * 13) Some of the Blurb's annotations have typos.
 * 14) Lumpy's canteen strap is only shown in the beginning of the episode (this is also hinted by the Blurb).

Trivia

 * This is the first and so far only TV episode to have a BlurB version.
 * The group in this episode (with the exception of Nutty) is the same group that went to the zoo in From A to Zoo. In that episode, Sniffles was the first of the children to die and Flaky was the last. But in this episode Flaky was the first and Sniffles was the last to die. Similarly, the characters sing the Happy Tree Friends theme song at the beginning, something they previously did in From A to Zoo.
 * Referring to the last sentence of the above paragraph, characters previously sung the show's theme in This Is Your Knife (Cuddles, Flaky, and Giggles), and most of the cast in both parts of Happy Trails.
 * This is one of the few episodes in which there is a fairly large cast and everybody dies.
 * Unlike other Blurb episodes, which include Binary Codes, this one doesn't.
 * The bear's roars are similar to the bear's roars in the 1981 film "The Fox and the Hound".
 * When everyone (except Lumpy) is impaled by the sharp rocks, Petunia is the only one whose death isn't shown (although she may have already died after drinking the toxic water or was killed like the others when they all fell down and got impaled by rocks).
 * This is one of four episodes in the TV series where Lumpy is killed by animals (the other three are Doggone It, Mime to Five, and Letter Late Than Never).
 * This is one of the most violent episodes and one of the few where characters suffer throughout the duration of the episode.
 * This is one of the three TV episodes that Petunia appears in but Giggles doesn't, the other two being A Hole Lotta Love and Wishy Washy.
 * When this episode aired along with Every Litter Bit Hurts and As You Wish on YouTube, the alternate title for the conglomeration of the segments was named "Marooned Five" (a pun on the band name Maroon 5) which was originally named "The Fifth Grade". Lumpy starred in all three episodes and died twice while Sniffles died in all three episodes.
 * Although Lumpy is indeed an original character, in the description of the episode "Marooned Five" it said "we end up deep in the woods when the Scoutmaster Lumpy takes the troop for a hike". The name "Scoutmaster Lumpy" may be a reference to the character "Scoutmaster Lumpus", a character from the TV show, "Camp Lazlo", who is also a moose.
 * When Flaky places the baby bird back in its nest, her satisfied "Aha" is similar to Pop and Lumpy's "Mm-hmm.".
 * Nutty was indirectly responsible for most of the deaths in this episode, including his own, since he provoked the grizzly bear to attack. It was also Nutty's dismembered legs that led the bear towards Lumpy and the rest of the group that were still alive.
 * Toothy, Cuddles, Petunia and Sniffles' deaths are similiar to Saddam Hussein's death in the movie "South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut".