Brake the Cycle

Overview

Gallery

Trivia

Season:	Internet Season 3
Episode:	72
Title Reference / Pun:	Break the cycle
Aired:	June 8, 2012
Production Number:	318
Writers:	Ken Pontac Warren Graff Kenn Navarro
Director:	Kenn Navarro
Starring Roles	Toothy
Featuring	Lumpy
Appearances	Mime Cro-Marmot Truffles Handy (mentioned in Blurb)
Videos	Blurb
Previous Episode	Royal Flush
Next Episode	Random Acts of Silence

Brake The Cycle is an episode of the Happy Tree Friends internet series, the eighteenth of season three, and seventy-second overall.

Plot

The scene opens to Toothy fixing his bike, when an orange bird flies down and steals one of his bolts. Toothy notices that it is missing, but does not care. Toothy happily cycles until his bike cycles down a slope. He then slams hard on the brakes, so much that the back wheel of his bike sets on fire. He then hits a log and slowly flies through the sky. The bike seat falls off due to the missing bolt and Toothy lands back on the exposed metal where the seat is supposed to be, causing him to scream in pain.

Lumpy, dressed in a daredevil jumpsuit and helmet, gets ready to do a stunt on his motorbike. He pours in a large amount of gasoline, spilling most of it onto the ground. He gets ready to go up a ramp and over a gorge but Toothy speeds by and his flaming bike wheel sets the spilled gasoline ablaze, setting Lumpy and his motorbike on fire.

Toothy flies over the gorge and falls off the bike when he lands, severely scratching his face on the tarmac. As he starts crying in pain, he discovers, much to his horror, that the gears and pedals of his now destroyed bike are lodged in his intestines. Part of his bike starts falling off the cliff, causing his intestines to unroll. To prevent the loss of his intestines, Toothy begins pedaling them back in. The orange bird returns again and takes out a bolt holding the intestine in a knot, causing the remaining intestines to fall off the edge.

Down below, Mime, having a picnic with Cro-Marmot, finishes slicing an apple when the wheel falls down and slices his head in multiple pieces.

Toothy, having apparently finished enduring his gruesome injury, begins crying when Lumpy, who is now burnt to a skeleton, and his bike flies towards him, crushing his body.

The bird flies back to its nest of bolts and puts the latest one it stole into the nest. An egg hatches, revealing a spanner.

Moral

"Life is like riding a bicycle. In order to keep your balance, you must keep moving."

Blurb

A blurb video was released on July 11, 2013 containing these annotations:

• BlurB!
• Beavers brush their teeth 3 times a day
• Moose go down a slide 3 times a day
• Toothy is very handy
• more so than Handy
• because he has hands
• Fun Fact: Birds like to build their nests out of hard metal objects
• Toothy once finished 12th in the Tour de France
• He was later disqualified for unknown reasons
• Brakes are great for stopping bikes
• Or starting fires
• Slow motion, tool of the lazy director
• Prepare to wince in
  • 3
  • 2
  • 1
• Seeing that it's Lumpy, the fact he's TRYING to pour it in the right hole should be considered a victory
• Fun Fact: This ramp is actually a finished bridge
• built by Handy
• See, we told you he wasn't very handy.
• Didn't see that coming
• Toothy is excellent at flying
• Usually in First Class though
• The Tour de France will disqualify you if you use beaver intestines as a bike chain
• Remember what I said about birds?
• Prepare for ironic death in
  • 3
  • 2
  • 1
• That hurts Cro-Marmot on the inside
• Prepare to be sued by Marvel in
  • 3
  • 2
  • 1
• See, I told you
• Don't understand the wrench though
• Maybe Kenn can explain it

Deaths

1. Mime is instantly killed when his head is sliced by Toothy's bike wheel like an apple.
2. Lumpy is burned to death.
3. Toothy's head is crushed by Lumpy's bike.

Injuries

1. Toothy's backside is impaled on his seat stick.
2. Toothy receives multiple cuts on his face from the fall.
3. Toothy gets his intestines pulled out.
4. Lumpy is set on fire when the gasoline spilled from filling up his motorcycle fuel tank is ignited by Toothy's flaming bike wheel.

Goofs

1. It should not be possible to set rubber bicycle wheels on fire by using hand brakes.
2. When Toothy is flying, he is launched in front of his bike. But when the bike lands on the ground, Toothy lands on the seat stick.
3. It should be almost impossible for Lumpy to put his helmet on, due to his large antlers.
4. Pouring noises are still heard when Lumpy nods.
5. When Lumpy is set on fire, his jumpsuit is shown to have many rips and tears, but when he is a skeleton, the rips and tears are gone.
   1. In the same scene where Lumpy is a skeleton, his clothes are not burned away.
6. In the scene where Toothy is winding his intestines back in, the bike does not have a wheel. When the bike and part of his insides fall off the cliff, the wheel is back.
7. The title for the original version has "brake" spelled wrong. It is spelled as "break".

Trivia

• Despite the episode having "brake" in the title, the brakes only appear in the scene where they are necessary to the plot.
• This episode was confirmed by the HTF crew on Facebook. Its name was later revealed by a teaser.
• Toothy is responsible for every death in this episode.
  • If one considers the bird a character, it can also be held responsible.
• Like with Royal Flush, Mondo Media posted a behind-the-scenes teaser video for this episode on happytreefriends.com, but unlike the previous episode, a Sneak Peak was not posted of this one.
• This is the second time that Mime and Cro-Marmot are the only characters with appearance roles in an episode (not counting Truffles). The first episode where this happened was In a Jam.
• There are no female characters in this episode.
• This is Toothy's first actual starring role since Keepin' it Reel.
• The moral of this episode is the longest one so far.
• According to the storyboard, Russell was originally going to be featured in this episode, but he was later replaced by Lumpy.
• Lumpy's suit's design in this episode may have been based on the late Evel Knievel's.
• Lumpy's skeleton being on fire while he is riding his bike might be a reference to the famous "Ghost Rider".
  • This is mentioned in the Blurb, saying "Get ready to be sued by Marvel," which references the fact that Ghost Rider is property of Marvel.
• This is one of three times where a character has a death/injury involving their crotch. The others are Nutty in his Smoochie and Giggles in Home is Where The Hurt Is.
• Truffles can be seen behind a tree when Lumpy is set on fire.
• This is Toothy's most torturous death since Eye Candy. Coincidentally, birds were involved in both cases (in the previous case, The Woodpecker).
• This is one of six instances where a character cries during his/her death due to the degree of pain. The other five instances are Toothy in Eye Candy, Lumpy in The Chokes on You, Petunia in Read 'em and Weep, Flaky in Ski Ya, Wouldn't Wanna be Ya!, and Sniffles in Tongue in Cheek.
• This is the only Internet Season 3 episode to have just one featuring character.
• Toothy is responsible for Lumpy's death and, likewise, Lumpy is responsible for Toothy's death.
• Mime's death is similar to Giggles' death in the HTF Comics #3.
  
  • It is also similar to Cuddles' death in A Hole Lotta Love.
• Ironically, Mime was sliced right after he sliced an apple, and in the same manner.
• Since Lumpy spilled the gasoline, he is indirectly responsible for his own death.
• Despite Handy not appearing in this episode, the Blurb version mentions him twice.
• This is one of the only two episodes to only have one featuring character. The other episode is I've Got You Under My Skin.
• Lumpy's scream when he is set aflame is the same scream as the one he makes in Take a Hike when he is chased by The Grizzly Bear.
• The YouTube thumbnail spoils Mime's death.