Banjo Frenzy is the pilot episode of Happy Tree Friends, created in 1999. The animation and writing are fairly primitive and poorly designed compared to what the series would later become.
Episode Description[]
Before there was Cuddles, Giggles, Toothy, and Lumpy, three cute creatures sat around a campfire with a banjo playing dinosaur that doesn't take well to criticism, notably his banjo skills. Watch Banjo Frenzy, the seed that blossomed into the bloody good time we all come to know and love! Amazing isn't it?
Plot[]
A blue dinosaur is playing his banjo in front of three colorful woodland animals around a campfire with a banjo. While playing, a string on the banjo suddenly snaps, ruining his performance and earning him a laugh from the critters. The dinosaur does not take this well and unleashes his anger at them. Using his banjo, he decapitates the squirrel's head which ends up falling into the camp fire, cuts the rabbit in half, and decapitates the beaver as well. He continues butchering the beaver's body while laughing maniacally. The beaver, though only a mere head, is still alive and bites the dinosaur's leg, causing him to scream in pain.
Deaths[]
- The squirrel is decapitated and thrown into a fire.
- The rabbit is sliced vertically in half.
- The beaver is decapitated and dismembered, but his head is somehow still "alive" because it bites the dinosaur soon after (Debatable, confirmed by Warren Graff via a Twitter reply).
- The dinosaur's foot is bitten by the beaver's decapitated head. (Debatable)
Survival Rate[]
- Amount of surviving main characters: 2 (1 including Debatable deaths)
- Amount of dead main characters: 2 (3 including Debatable deaths)
- Total Rate: 50% (25% including Debatable deaths)
Destruction[]
- Several strings break on the dinosaur's banjo: one while playing the song to the three animals at the start of the episode, and then two more when he is killing them.
- The squirrel's bow burns in a fire.
- There's a cut on the log after the dinosaur slices the rabbit in half, then another after he cuts off the beaver's arm.
Goofs[]
- Lumpy's nostrils disappears several times, including when he slices Cuddles' body in half, before he smashes Giggles' head off, after decapitating Toothy, and when he cuts off Toothy's right arm.
- Just before Lumpy decapitates Giggles, the banjo string that should have been broken is repaired for a moment.
Lumpy might have gone just a little bit out of control. Goof: Lumpy doesn't have a nose. This is the first goof in Happy Tree Friends.
- When Cuddles is sliced in half, his eyes face inward.
- Cuddles' left half falls behind Toothy, but not above him.
- Cuddles' right half falls in front of Giggles' corpse, but not above her.
- The green oval on Lumpy's stomach disappears while he is smashing Toothy into bits. It is also absent when he laughs maniacally.
- When Lumpy smashes Toothy to bits with the banjo, both of Toothy's legs fly behind Lumpy, but when Toothy's head bites Lumpy's foot, the camera shows one of the legs behind the log he was sitting on.
- When Toothy is being smashed to scraps by Lumpy, his brain and both of his eyes fly behind Lumpy. However, his head is seen with both eyes in and his brain inside it when he attacks Lumpy.
- When Lumpy decapitates Toothy, his head flies behind the dinosaur. However, when he laughs crazily, Toothy's head is right next to him.
