"It's a Wishful Life" is the tenth episode in the fifth season of The Fairly OddParents, and the one hundred twelfth overall. It's a parody of the 1946 American Christmas movie It's a Wonderful Life (hence the title).
| "It's a Wishful Life" | ||||||||||||||||
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 Why would an average kid that no one understands wish he was never born to make a better life for everyone?
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Summary
Timmy tries to do many good deeds for people, but nobody appreciates his work. Angry, he wishes that he had never been born, but then he finds out that everybody will love their life without him.
Plot
The episode opens with Timmy Turner doing good deeds for various people hoping to get praise, including painting scenery for one of Mr. Bickles' stage plays, giving A.J. a new high tech computer, cleaning Mr. Turner's and Mrs. Turner's garden and cleaning Cosmo's and Wanda's fish bowl.
Instead of praising him, or even thanking him, every person complains that it's not good enough and in fact several times heavily criticize the job he's done, with the fishbowl actually justified as it's still very dirty indicating laziness.
Angry over the treatment, Timmy wishes he was never born. Wanda reluctantly grants the wish, sending Timmy to an alternate timeline without him.
Jorgen Von Strangle appears in this alternate timeline and shows Timmy that everyone is indeed better off without him.
For example, Chester now lives in a triple-wide trailer and has Cosmo and Wanda as his fairy godparents (and uses their magic for many selfless acts, unlike Timmy), A.J. has a full head of hair, and graduated from high school at the age of 5 (mainly because Timmy is not there to drag him down), the Turners had a daughter who is better than Timmy alongside wealth, Vicky has a job supplying laughing gas to Dr. Bender's patients, Mr. Crocker is not obsessed with fairies, became Harvard's most valuable professor, has a full head of hair and a muscular body (while his ear is still on his neck), and Francis is no longer a grey-skinned bully, but a tan skinned football player who actually helps weaker kids instead of bullying them.
Jorgen tells Timmy that unless he can find someone whose life is worse off without him, Timmy will have to go to "a place where all kids who wished they were never born" go. Timmy at first tricks Jorgen to throw him in (even though Jorgen wishes to further humiliate Timmy by showing him other people better off, even Elmer, who no longer has his boil), but Timmy returns with Vicky's laughing gas and makes Jorgen laugh so hard he falls into the pit.
Timmy is able to grab Jorgen's wand, however, upon reflection, he does decide that everyone is better off without him, and offers to voluntarily go to the place Jorgen describes. It is then that Jorgen reveals this has all been a test, or rather a lesson, to teach Timmy that good deeds are not done for praise, but because it's the right thing to do.
Jorgen, then, returns Timmy to the correct timeline with Timmy taking Cosmo and Wanda's fishbowl to clean it up. Cosmo and Wanda note that his attitude seems to have changed for the better.
Why We Wish That This Episode Never Existed
- This episode is infamous for being very mean-spirited towards Timmy Turner, as he learns that everyone would be better off without him.
- At the beginning when Timmy tries to do good deeds for his friends and family, they criticize him for stupid reasons, causing him to wish that he was never born.
- The episode tries to paint Timmy as an unlikable and selfish character by wanting to do good deeds for appreciation (which isn't even THAT selfish in the first place), which it's pretty much clear he isn't.
- It's obviously a parody of It's a Wonderful Life, but this episode instead teaches the opposite of the movie's message.
- TERRIBLE Moral: The message this episode says is that if you are feeling unappreciated, then it means that your life has no meaning and everybody's lives would be better off without you, which is extremely nihilistic and a very dangerous message to teach unappreciated and badly treated kids in real life.
- Broken Moral: Timmy learns that good deeds should not be done in expectance of thanks but because it is the right thing to do but the problem with this moral is that Timmy was repaid for his good deeds and kindness not with thanks but with very rude and ungrateful behavior from those he helped as Timmy’s parents berated him for selling things at the worst yard sale day and AJ declared that a computer Timmy gave him just went obsolete mere seconds before Timmy gave it to him. These moments are just completely contrived and just exist to make the plot “work”. The episode never even delves into how Timmy’s good deeds would actually benefit those he helped and basically stated that everyone’s lives would be better off without Timmy. This basically makes the moral very hollow and nihilistic.
- The secondary moral is that you shouldn't do good deeds for appreciation, but because they're the right thing to do. But that massively fails as well because that was what Timmy was originally doing in the first place.
- Jack Thomas (the writer) made the dimension of kids who improved the world by wishing they were never born literally look like badness.
- Speaking of which, why does such a place exist?
- Apparently, Timmy's existence is the reason AJ is bald, Vicky is torturing kids, Francis is a bully, his parents are poor and live in a suburban house, Chester lives in a run-down trailer, Elmer has a boil, and the Chicago Cubs haven't won the World Series since 1908 (they eventually did in 2016, but still). How does his existence affect someone's lack of hair, make someone an abusive person, let someone bully others, cause someone to live in either a suburban house or a trailer, having a boil, or even affect a baseball team's perpetually poor performance? Not to mention, Timmy was born decades after 1908, so that one is the most confusing. He may have cost them a recent World Series, though, like the one in 2003.
- Puzzlingly, none of Timmy's love interests, like Trixie Tang, Veronica or Tootie and even his alien friend Mark Chang (the latter two of whom are characters who would've been miserable if it wasn't for Timmy), make an appearance.
- Jorgen is extremely unlikeable here, as he encourages Timmy to literally kill himself, which is extremely out of character for Jorgen to do, as much of a sadist as he is.
Redeeming Qualities
- In the end, Timmy learns that good deeds aren't done for appreciation; they are done because they're the right thing to do, which is a positive message, despite the poor execution.
- The scene where Cosmo mistook Jorgen Von Strangle for a cactus was pretty hilarious.
- Some allege that due to some inconsistencies, the episode's events don't really represent how life would be if Timmy had never been born, but it serves more as a method to teach a lesson to Timmy and not to be taken seriously.
- Timmy is the only likable character in this episode, and it's easy to feel bad for him after what he has gone through in this episode.
- The concept of The Fairly OddParents doing one of those It's a Wonderful Life plots like shows like Rugrats did is an interesting concept but the same can't be said for the execution.
Reception
This was one of the most hated episodes of the series for it implies that everybody's lives are miserable and bleak due to Timmy. As a result of the negative reception revolving this episode and its implications, series creator Butch Hartman and his staff have since apologized for the unfortunate implications of the episode. This might be why this episode rarely airs in reruns.
It was also was heavily panned by many Fairly OddParents fans and critics alike and is considered the worst episode of the classic era and one of the worst episodes of the show (if not the worst.) It received a 4.9 on IMDb.
Even if this episode was very bad, it's not the worst in the series, the worst episode of the series is The Big Fairy Share Scare!, the first episode of season 10 with a rating of 3.1/10 on IMDb.
Videos
Trivia
- The episode was so bad that even Butch Hartman, the creator of the show, admitted he hated this episode.
- NyxWuff, a YouTube reviewer, thought this episode was the worst episode in animation history.
- Mrs. Turner goes to her own shrub-bush replica of herself made by Timmy, approaching it with a pair of pruning shears and complains by saying "and my butt is not that big!" as she frantically trims it down. This is a quick jab at her hip/butt area changing size is every episode from slim to curvy.
- It is revealed that laughing gas has no effect on Jorgen, likely because fairies don't need to breathe. Jorgen mentioned to Timmy that laughing gas couldn't make him laugh, only pain can do that (he had faked being affected when Timmy sprayed it in his face). *This is why Jorgen was already back to normal by the time Timmy had changed everything to how it was before he made his wish.
- Interestingly enough, the episode never shows how the lives of three of Timmy's potential love interests, Tootie, Trixie Tang, or Veronica are affected by his never being born. This may imply that the main assertion in the episode, that the world would be better off without Timmy, is simply a method to teach a lesson and not to be taken as being true.
- Mrs. Turner is wearing the same formal gown from Parent Hoods, but it is blue instead of pink.
- On April 1, 2005, this episode aired on Nickelodeon US, but as part of a april fools prank. Every time a character said 'Timmy' or 'Timmy Turner', it would cut to this commercial. A month later on May 10, the episode officially premiered.
Comments
- Bad media
- Bad episodes
- Nickelodeon shows
- Episodes
- Torture episodes
- Bad episodes of good shows
- 2000s programs
- The Fairly OddParents episodes
- Aware of how bad they are
- Banned episodes
- Creator regrets
- Episodes with bad morals
- Rehash episodes
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- Bad episodes with good endings
- 2000s episodes
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- Shows reviewed by NyxWuff
- Suicide episodes
- Hated episodes
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