See You Later, Elevator

See You Later, Elevator is an episode of the Happy Tree Friends internet series, the fourteenth of season three, and sixty-eighth overall. It was the final episode to be released before a year-and-a-half-long hiatus of new episodes, and numerous HTF Break shorts indicating that the series was "dead".

Plot
Mime, Giggles, Cuddles, and Sniffles are in an elevator waiting to descend when Handy comes running to join them. Because he has no hands, however, he cannot stop the lift from closing in time and growls in anger. A few floors below, Pop presses the elevator call button as he and Cub wait. Pop then lights his pipe with a match and carelessly throws the still lit match out the window. The wind blows the match one floor below, where an exhausted Toothy is finishing papers with a typewriter. The match lands on the papers, causing Toothy and the whole room to go up in flames.

As the fire alarm rings, the elevator abruptly stops, panicking the four passengers. A fire engine bell rings and Lumpy the fireman rushes in to save those trapped in the elevator. He presses the call button and waits while the flames in the elevator shaft short out the electrical wires controlling the lift, sending it spiraling downwards causing the four passengers to slam into the ceiling. Lumpy, still waiting for the elevator, gives up and goes to the stairs. However, Lumpy has to climb many flights of stairs in order to get to those trapped in the lift.

Suddenly, the elevator stops on a floor and the doors open. Sniffles happily proceeds out, but is cut in half when the doors close on him, horrifying Mime, Giggles, and Cuddles. The elevator then spirals downwards again. Meanwhile, we see a panting and sweaty Lumpy think he's gotten to the top of the stairs, only to see he has not even climbed up three steps. The lazy Lumpy sees this himself and sighs at how far he has to go.

The elevator stops just below another floor and the doors open up again. This time Cuddles tries to climb up and out of the elevator to safety. Halfway out, the doors close again and the lift proceeds down, slicing Cuddles in half with his intestines the only thing keeping the two halves of his body together. Finally, the panting Lumpy makes it up several floors only to vomit on the floor from the strenuous activity. He soon hears Mime pounding on the door of the elevator which has stopped on that level. Lumpy raises his axe to chop the doors down, but they open up and Lumpy accidentally chops Mime's head in half. Lumpy screams in horror and pulls his axe out as the doors close again and the elevator descends downwards again.

Lumpy opens up the doors, grabs Cuddles intestines, and slides down them onto the top of the elevator, opening up the top. Inside, Giggles is crying in fear (or possibly grief at seeing Cuddles and Mime get killed) only to look up and notice Lumpy. Later, as the building burns down even more, Lumpy carries Giggles outside to a stretcher, charred, but alive. He leaves her and goes back in to rescue more people.

Suddenly, the building explodes, causing the burned and blackened bodies of Handy and Pop to land near Giggles. She gasps at the sight, only to be crushed by the falling elevator. The doors open and Lumpy rushes out carrying the lower body of Cuddles. Lumpy tries in vain to revive the lower half by blowing air into the intestines, causing Cuddles' lower body to fill up with air, eventually exploding.

Moral
"There is no elevator to success. You have to take the stairs."

Blurb
The Blurb video was released on September 10, 2014. And it contains these annotations:


 * BlurB!
 * This episode was originally called "See You Later, Lift" for our British fans
 * But it didn't have the same ring to it.
 * Fun Fact: This sandwich looks disgusting
 * HTF Hypothesis: When there are 5 characters crammed into a title screen, I bet all 5 die.
 * Let's find out.
 * Second largest building in the HTF town
 * The largest is the Empire State Building
 * Handy wasn't in the opening credits,
 * So he'll be fine.
 * They were all in the opening credits
 * I don't like their chances
 * Pop and Cub.
 * not in the opening
 * looks like they survive
 * Some winds can blow a match around
 * but not out
 * Bob Dylan wrote that
 * Toothy was in the credits
 * 1 for 1
 * Fire Safety Tip#1
 * The safest place to be during a fire is in an elevator
 * in another building
 * Animal Fact: Moose are nature's firemen
 * We filmed this scene using NASA's McDonnell Douglas C-9B Skytrain II
 * better know as a vomit comet
 * Kenn animated pretty well in zero gravity
 * Animal Fact #2: Moose see things crooked
 * with explains a lot about Lumpy.
 * They've been falling in a long time
 * Elevator doors kill people more than escalator doors
 * escalator doors save lives!
 * Stairs are death traps
 * Wow, who do these elevator doors think they are
 * ...stairs?
 * Animal Fact #3: Moose are out of shape
 * Seriously out of shape
 * Gross
 * Lumpy is so heroic!
 * Well, it's the thought that counts
 * This was inspired by the movie Die Hard
 * The part of Die Hard where Bruce Willis slid down the entrails of the terrorists
 * it's a "blink and you miss it" scene
 * I forgot about the "Opening Credits Hypothesis."  
 * Toothy, Sniffles, Cuddles and Mime are all dead.
 * One more to go!
 * Argh! The one time Lumpy saves somebody.
 * Oh well, looks like I was wrong.
 * YES!!! 
 * I mean.. for science
 * Fun Fact: Chickens can stay alive without their heads for a period of time
 * Cuddles is not a chicken.
 * Medical Term: Blowing into a person's large intestine to try and revive them is referred to as performing "The Lumpy Maneuver."
 * It's considered 100% ineffective
 * and 100% fatal

Blurb Gallery

Deaths

 * 1) Sniffles is split in half vertically by the closing elevator doors.
 * 2) Mime's head is chopped in half by Lumpy's axe.
 * 3) Toothy is set aflame by Pop's match, and either dies from the burn or the building explosion. (Death not seen)
 * 4) Cuddles either dies from blood loss after being cut in half by the elevator, or dies in the explosion. (Death not seen)
 * 5) Pop and Handy are either burned to death in the fire or killed in the explosion, as their bodies can be seen when they land.
 * 6) Cub's dead body is not seen, but assuming he was with Pop he also died from the explosion. (Death not seen)
 * 7) Giggles is crushed by the elevator.
 * 8) Multiple Generic Tree Friends possibly die from the explosion. (Deaths not seen)

Injuries

 * 1) Toothy gets set on fire after Pop's lit match gets blown into his office.
 * 2) Cuddles gets cut in half when he attempts to escape from the malfunctioning elevator.
 * 3) Giggles gets charred (off-screen) when Lumpy brings her out of the burning building.
 * 4) Lumpy ends up vomiting after climbing many stairs, gets charred (off-screen) after getting Giggles out of the fire.

Goofs

 * 1) Lumpy's antlers change directions sometimes.
 * 2) Before the elevator closed in front of Handy, Sniffles' snout seemed larger than normal, similar to his season 1/2 design.
 * 3) It is unknown why the match caused an explosion when it should just have burned the stack of paper.
 * 4) Sniffles remains seems to disappear from the elevator and reappear before Giggles is "rescued".
 * 5) There is no blood on Lumpy's axe after he accidentally chops Mime's head in half.
 * 6) When Pop throws the match out of the window it can clearly be seen that the match flies into the window below, but when we see Toothy the match is nowhere to be found.
 * 7) Considering how this is a modern building, it is strange that there are no proper fire alarms or sprinklers (though this may be the result of poor planning).
 * 8) Technically, the elevator should not have closed while Sniffles and Cuddles were coming out of it, as in reality, elevators stay open as long as people are coming in or out of it. This may be explained as the elevator malfunctioning through the episode.
 * 9) The wrong font is used for Lumpy's starring role page.
 * 10) Elevator doors are not quick and sharp to the point of killing Sniffles the way they did.
 * 11) In a related note, the elevator doors cut Sniffles completely, but when it was Cuddles' turn, they left his intestine intact.
 * 12) There should have been an elevator emergency stop button. It is possible that it was not working due to the elevator malfunctioning, or that there was no button at all.
 * 13) Since the elevator's wires were cut or malfunctioning, it should have fell into free fall with no possible way of stopping it.
 * 14) Handy is clearly visible attempting to use the elevator, but nobody helps him do so. This was probably done to give a reason for his signature frustrated look or for comedic effect.
 * 15) It seems like Mime has no reflexes here, as Lumpy was carrying the axe to chop down the door, and the elevator door was open for two seconds, which should have been enough for him to dodge or for Giggles to warn Lumpy, considering she was paying attention. In fact, when Mime sees Lumpy, he smiles.
 * 16) Considering the speed in which the elevator was falling, and the speed of Lumpy taking the stairs, they should have met at the second or third floor, being at the ground floor when Lumpy saved Giggles. This would be impossible since the elevator flung out of the building since the fire and the explosion were at the top and the elevator stopped at the bottom.
 * 17) After Sniffles dies, the elevator does not continue to fall. In next shot however, the elevator continues to fall again. (This may have occurred offscreen.)
 * 18) After their deaths, Mime and Sniffles' brains both appear to be hollow, unlike real brains or any other sliced brains that have been seen in other episodes.
 * 19) Lumpy is not very athletic in this episode, as is seen when he vomits after climbing all the stairs. However, he was able to swim competively in By The Seat Of Your Pants and run up a mountain without stopping in Letter Late than Never.

Trivia

 * Following this episode, the show was put on a year-long hiatus. Several shorts which had the message "Happy Tree Friends is dead" started fan rumors that the series had ended. This was later revealed to be a joke and, after the end of the hiatus, a HTF short (Tunnel Vision) confirmed the making of a new full-length episode, later revealed to be Clause For Concern.
 * The theme for this episode is similar to that of the film Devil, which was released close to when this episode was aired.
 * Truffles makes a cameo appearance behind a tree when the elevator falls on Giggles.


 * Pop is the other character who falls with Handy; if one looks closely, one can see the character wear Pop's burned hat. Also, Pop and Handy die with exactly same look,and that look is similar to Flaky in her smoochie.


 * When the building explodes, The Cursed Idol appears for a split second, similar to its appearance in Swelter Skelter and Wrath of Con.
 * A joke can be found in the credits, which state that the animation was made by Binky Chuckles and Wiggles.
 * The clothes that Lumpy is wearing are similar to his clothing on the box cover for the False Alarm video game.
 * Mime is the only character Pop did not indirectly kill in this episode.
 * Cuddles' injury is similar to his injury in the episode I Get a Trick Out of You. Furthermore, Lumpy used Cuddles' organs as a rope in both episodes.
 * On Happy Tree Friends Social, Kenn Navarro revealed screenshots from this episode which apparently had clown noses in it. The clown noses were later revealed to be a joke, as the trailer for the episode itself had the Happy Tree Friends with normal noses.
 * Since Pop started the fire, he is indirectly responsible for every death in this episode.
 * Sniffles and Cuddles' deaths are somewhat similar to Nutty's death in Icy You.
 * This is one of very few instances in the series where a character dies in a cartoonish fashion. (Sniffles still smiles after his death.)
 * It is possible that the elevator in the building is an older model elevator. The way it displays floors is either on a light or a dial; modern elevators use a dot-matrix display or a LCD screen to tell which floor it is currently on.
 * Sniffles' death is similar to Handy's death in The Wrong Side of the Tracks.
 * When Cuddles' head gets stuck in the elevator doors, his injury is similar to the death of Nora Carpenter, a character from "Final Destination 2."
 * After this episode, Pop would not have a regular episode death until three years later, in A Vicious Cycle.
 * The YouTube thumbnails for both the original and the Blurb spoil Cuddles' injury of getting sliced in half.
 * Mime and Sniffles both break the fourth wall by looking at the screen in shock when the elevator starts malfunctioning.
 * Mime's death in this episode is similar to Petunia's death in Who's to Flame? and Giggles' death in Kringle Tree.
 * In the blurb version, the line "Wow, who do these elevators think they are...stairs?" could possibly be a reference to the episode Sweet Ride. This is shown in the thumbnail for the blurb version on YouTube.