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Where is Candace's Bike?
19 Plays10 months ago
Join Ali as she introduces your co-host, Maria, to the wacky world of Phineas and Ferb! In this episode, We'll both revisit the pilot, "Rollercoaster," and the classic "Candace's Birthday." Get ready for laughs, gasps, and a whole lot of "What the heck?!" as your co-host experiences the show for the very first time. We'll discuss Perry the Platypus' secret agent identity, Dr. Doofenshmirtz's evil schemes, and of course, Candace's eternal quest to bust her brothers.
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Transcript
Introduction and Podcast Origins
00:00:15
Speaker
Here's the problem I'm having. I don't know how to start this podcast. I don't know how to start this episode. So I guess I'm just going to start.
00:00:26
Speaker
by saying welcome to the first episode of the Tri-State Area Takeover, a Phineas and Ferb podcast. I'm one of the hosts. I'm Ali, and I have a co-host with me, my friend Maria. Do you want to say hi? Hi, I'm Maria. We've been friends since college. That's been almost three, four years now? Yeah, it's been a while.
00:00:51
Speaker
We talked on and off and I kind of roped
Phineas and Ferb: A Comfort Show
00:00:54
Speaker
her in. Well, not really roped her in. I suggested that perhaps we could start a podcast together. It had been on and off for some time.
00:01:03
Speaker
And I really love Phineas and Verb. And with them coming out with a new season, I got really excited. So I really wanted to do a deep dive and rewatch the show. It's a comfort show of mine. So I rewatch it whenever I get nostalgic for summertime or whenever I have one of the many catchy songs stuck in my head. So I decided what better time to start a Phineas and Verb podcast than just before they're about to release the new season.
00:01:32
Speaker
and not to brag, but I did see a little sneak preview of it at D23 and it looks great. I was also able to see them and by them I mean the creators of the show, Dan Pabenmeyer and Jeff Swampy Marsh. Before we get into all that and we get into the first episode, I want to ask Maria if she has any background on Phineas and Ferb if she watched Disney Channel as a kid or if she was familiar with anything on the Disney Channel at the time the show came out. The show came out in 2007 so I just want to get a baseline of where you were at the time.
Disney Channel Memories
00:02:09
Speaker
So I didn't watch the show but my sister watched it but she only would watch it on YouTube like like years later because we did not grow up with Disney Channel.
00:02:24
Speaker
um like other Disney Channel shows I would watch there was one time where they would have some Hannah Montana some uh I think some the the show with Cusco where he goes to school I don't remember the name um they would sometimes play it on um the local channels on Saturday mornings So I would watch those shows like that. um And then much later I would watch, once YouTube was becoming more of a thing, I would watch clips and bits of episodes. As for me, so I did and didn't grow up with the Disney Channel. And I say that because around 2007, my family split up and
00:03:16
Speaker
We never had a cable, so we only watch PBS and stuff like that. um Stuff like what was on Channel 8 in the morning on Saturdays. When I visited my cousins, they had the luxury of having cable. And that's how ah we were able to watch a lot of Hannah Montana as it was coming out and Zack and Cody and that's a raven as it was kind of gearing towards
Overview of Phineas and Ferb
00:03:41
Speaker
its end. But we got to see a lot of those shows because we visited our cousins so often.
00:03:46
Speaker
that summer, especially the summer when Phineas and Ferb had to come out, it premiered. It actually it had a preview episode right after High School Musical 2 had to come out. Then when we would visit our dad, who did have cable then,
00:04:04
Speaker
we would watch TV and that's how we were able to keep up with like Hannah Montana storylines and episodes of Phineas and Ferb and you know Disney Channel original movies and things like that. I remember that the preview episode after High School Musical too vividly because they consistently showed off the fact that one of the stars of High School Musical, Ashley Tisdale, she was the voice of one of the characters on Phineas and Ferb.
00:04:31
Speaker
so well according to disney plus it actually ran from 2007 to 2012 which i'm pretty sure is wrong because i again remember vividly that the show ended my senior year so my senior year was in 2015 so it actually ran from about 2007 to about 2015 and i was about well i was between 10 and 12 when the first season came out And I was going into college when the series ended. And it's crazy that it took that much of that much time. I basically grew up with the show. Like that's a good like 10, I want to say 10 years of my life. So a quick description if there are any people out there who don't know Phineas and Ferb, which I assume if people are listening you have a general idea.
00:05:22
Speaker
The show is about two siblings, stepbrothers Phineas and Ferb, and they're on summer vacation and their quest is to have the best day every single day. They have something to do every single day and that kind of just gets on the nerves of their older sister Candace.
00:05:38
Speaker
who's constantly trying to make sure that they get in trouble for doing all these like shenanigans. And the brothers have a pet platypus, Harry the Platypus, who's actually a secret agent who is trying to thwart the takeover of the Tri-State area by Dr.
The Impact of the Theme Song
00:05:54
Speaker
Dufinchmertz. And hygiene ensues with them, and that later coincides with whatever the boys are doing.
00:06:00
Speaker
season one ran from about february 2008 but like i said they had a sneak preview uh after high school musical 2 premiered it was the first episode was the roller coaster episode and because finis and ferb is a 15 minute episode so it's two 15 minute episodes oftentimes what they would do on the disney channel is they would uh they would need an extra 15 minutes to finish finish out the hour so they would use half an episode of Phineas and Ferb so that's what they were doing in this case they were using half of an episode of Phineas and Ferb to finish out what was like high school musical two summer for the die-hard fans i thought i was going crazy when i did a re-watch of this like years ago when
00:06:45
Speaker
Disney Plus was first coming out. I was so confused as to why the roller coaster episode was paired with this episode that we're going to be talking about, which is Candace's birthday. And I found out later that I was right. In fact, those episodes weren't initially paired together. The episodes that were initially paired together was the roller coaster and the backyard beach, which is actually part of episode two now.
00:07:09
Speaker
And I think that's that's a much better pairing. And I wish they would stick with that. Like, I like that pairing together better than this pairing of Candace's birthday and the roller coaster. But the reason these two are attached together is because they are the first two episodes in production. And that's why it's attached like this. And I'm not if you like I said, I'm not a huge fan of how these two episodes are attached, but we'll get into that.
00:07:37
Speaker
more later on.
Musical Highlights
00:07:39
Speaker
But before we can talk about the episode, we're going to talk about the theme song because theme song and the music as a whole is a big part of the show. The theme song is of course like performed by Bowling for Soup, a band before me and Maria's time. Great, great band theme.
00:07:55
Speaker
It is a great band name. And as a matter of fact, they are Texas natives. I believe they're from Wichita Falls as are we. Well, we're not from like me and Maria aren't from Wichita Falls. We're actually Texas natives. Just a little geography, but that's as much as we're willing to disclose. I believe their most popular song is the song 1985, which again, before our time. And as a a matter of fact, I'd seen a TikTok that someone did a parody of 1985, but instead used 2005, just because that's how like the, I believe the the year gap between when they came out with the song 1985 and that year that that song came out, that same chunk of time would coincide
The Roller Coaster Episode
00:08:44
Speaker
with
00:08:46
Speaker
someone now performing a song. looking back at the year 2005. I don't know if that makes sense. Don't quote me on that, ah but that is as much as I know. And it is a banger of a song. I cannot believe just how popular the song got, that even an orchestra was able to perform it for its final piece at one point. um I don't know where that orchestra is. I know that that clip exists somewhere out on TikTok or somewhere. um But it's played with such enthusiasm and the conductor's just so into it and I love it.
00:09:16
Speaker
So just for a little color commentary, I actually rang in the 2024 new year with the song because Bowling for Soup was actually performing in Dallas at the time. And me and my siblings were just rocking out to today is going to be a great day while they played it on TV.
00:09:33
Speaker
And there's just no other better way to start 2024 than with that song. And that was such a great memory for me. But I've talked for a while. I want to get Maria's take on what you she thinks of the song, hearing it for maybe the first time. But just from a different perspective, because again, um you're not familiar or you're not too familiar with the show, right?
00:09:54
Speaker
So I know the theme song because my sister would sing it and would play it often. So I knew way more about theme song than the show itself. um So yeah, I've heard this theme song for years now. But do you feel like it's a good indicator as to what you're getting into with the show? Yes, it's fun. It's silly. I like the lyrics. Not too serious, not too goofy. It's just the perfect amount of fun. So the theme song is actually a good indicator of what the whole series is about. Because although the first two episodes are not big on music, it will become a huge part of the show as we move forward. So these first two episodes don't have big musical numbers, but the following episodes after that will
00:10:38
Speaker
And I'm really interested to hear your takes on that because there are some bangers throughout the series. I took a three hour road trip with my sister and I don't know why, but I ah he was just like, I don't want to listen to the radio. I i just kind of put on a random Phineas and Ferb playlist that I found on Spotify.
00:10:59
Speaker
I played that for all three hours. We sang every single one of those songs and it was just banger after banger. You cannot tell me there is not a single catchy song in this show. Just so you know, Maria, just for a little tidbit, they do redo this episode, this first episode. ah They redo it as a musical and they add musical elements throughout the episode, of making this 15 minute episode into a 30 minute episode.
00:11:24
Speaker
One of the few rare times that it does it and it's a lot of fun. I love all of the songs in that episode and that's gotta be probably hands down one of my favorite episodes. Well now I'm excited. Something to look forward. I've been teasing for a while.
00:11:41
Speaker
We're going to get into the roller coaster episode and it begins as most of these episodes begin with Phineas and Ferb sitting underneath their tree. Phineas always posing the question as to what they're going to do today. And he kind of goes into this monologue on how when they get back to school, the first thing they're going to ask is what they did over the summer.
00:12:04
Speaker
And let me tell you, that was a fear I had as a kid when the class would go around saying what they did all over the summer. It was probably ah the biggest fear I had in elementary school, not so much in high school. There was nowhere for us to go within a five mile radius.
00:12:23
Speaker
Like my parents were working obviously they couldn't take a week off to take us somewhere So it was television that was kind of like our best friend So watching episodes of Phineas and Ferb when we went to our dads watching PBS the entire day because that's all we had but I Want to say that Maria you and I have similar summer experiences where there wasn't much to do, right?
00:12:46
Speaker
ah Yeah, for sure. Nothing to do just to stay at home. So Phineas iterates that there's with so many days of summer their lives should be a roller coaster, but a good roller coaster, not like the one that they rode at the State Fair. And as a matter of fact, the Texas State Fair is going on. And I will tell you that there are roller coasters like that at the State Fair.
00:13:07
Speaker
And they are just as disappointing. And it's not even worth the amount of tickets that you spend on that. But have you ever ridden one of those like little danky little roller coasters like at a fair or something like that? Oh, for sure. Because I'm scared of like the actual roller coasters that are, you know, do crazy like stuff. So I just rode the small ones. But still, they they weren't worth it for the less of a minute of a ride it was. Phineas then gets the idea that they're going to build a roller coaster. I feel like I should tell you who these voice actors are because these voice actors are incredible. So Phineas and Ferb are voiced by Vincent Martella and I don't know if I'm pronouncing that name right so please correct me if I'm wrong.
00:13:56
Speaker
And Ferb, though he doesn't have many lines, he is voiced by Thomas Sansgeder. Vincent is actually well known for his role in Everybody Hates Chris. Ferb, I believe Thomas, he's I think he's known mostly for the Maze Runner series, and there might be another series, but that's where I know him from as a Maze Runner. So Vincent and Thomas are actually gonna be the two main actors who will hear throughout the run of the show.
00:14:24
Speaker
And after the after the the boys decide that they're going to build the roller coaster, Mom comes into the backyard. Mom's name is Linda Finn Flynn Fletcher. She's voiced by um Caroline Ray, who I believe is most notably known for her character on Sabrina the Teenage Witch.
00:14:41
Speaker
But I actually know her from one of my favorite movies, The Perfect Man, where she plays like a secondary character in that. And then we also get Ashley Tisdale. Like I said, they were really riding on Ashley Tisdale's star power, and she voices on Candace Flynn. She's supposed to be about 15, 16, I believe, throughout the run of the show. And this is where mom tells the boys that she's going to run some errands. And Candace takes the opportunity to frantically exclaim that she wants to be in charge.
00:15:11
Speaker
And that's like her whole stick. The entire run of the show is that she wants to be in charge of Phineas and Ferb. You and I are older siblings, not of each other. We're the oldest in our family.
Perry's Secret Agent Adventures
00:15:22
Speaker
Being in charge is not all it's cracked up to be to the point where I'm.
00:15:27
Speaker
Now that I'm like an adult, I don't know why Candace was fighting for this so hard, CORE. Just like, I have to be in charge of these boys. Like, to get the authority over these two young children, like, where's the fun in it? Why do you want it so badly? But that's besides the point. Candace somehow convinces her mom to be in charge. Well, only conditionally. She then runs to the backyard telling Phineas and Ferb that she's in charge. And Phineas and Ferb have already set out the drawing tables. They're already knee deep into this planning phase.
00:15:57
Speaker
of building like the great roller coaster that they have planned. And so Candace runs back inside the house. So while Candace is talking to her friend Stacy, we kind of get the visual gag. I love this. This is one of the running gags of the show where Candace is kind of oblivious as to what the boys are doing.
00:16:15
Speaker
because she's just busy doing something else. So we get the boys running back and forth with different things. There's a there's a line at one point, which is hilarious. I think later that that line becomes the baby head. That's the other running gag that they have is just a random baby head. Candice isn't told by Stacy that she can see whatever her brothers are doing from her house. She runs outside and she sees them already like,
00:16:43
Speaker
Not even mid-build, it's more like they've they're more like a twelfth of the way there. Candace runs and proceeds to ride her bike to get her mom to see what the boys are doing, which I cannot believe how commutable the city of Danville is because she's able to ride her bike all the way to the grocery store to get her mom.
00:17:01
Speaker
Again, we live in Texas and that depending on where you live, that is sometimes not plausible because there are so many big streets to get across and to get to a grocery store. I don't know how plausible it is for you, Maria, but I know for me, it's just, I can't bike to the store.
00:17:20
Speaker
Yeah, I can't do that. Also, Candace, she's not being a good um the caretaker because she just left the boys by themselves just to go tell mom ah about what the boys were doing. Well, now they're alone. That is a good point. You just left two unsupervised children like that alone with power tools.
00:17:44
Speaker
Now we learned throughout the course of the show that these boys are actually way more intelligent than your average nine or 10 year old. But nonetheless, it is funny to me that she dropped everything to ride her bike all the way to the grocery store.
00:17:58
Speaker
This could have been a phone call, but as it established later in the show, she always calls her mom when the boys are doing something, quote, bustable. But right as Candace leaves, we get introduced to another main character, Isabella Garcia Shapiro, played by Alison Stoner.
00:18:15
Speaker
And they are known for ah their character that they played in Cheaper by the Dozen. They're also known for the Missy Elliott video. I knew them from Cheaper by the Dozen. But they also guest starred on a couple of episodes of The Suite Life of Zack and Cody. And they were also on Camp Rock. I don't know if Camp Rock had come out at that point. But anyways, Isabella, technically, I want to say is a love interest but it's kind of a one-sided love interest because right as she walks into the backyard her pupils turn into hearts which i don't think is physically possible but nonetheless it's an animated show we do not question it
00:18:55
Speaker
That girl is too obsessed with this young boy. She is. She really is. And she's doing the most for him. And I don't even think he gives her the time of day that often. And I think Phineas keeps thinking of her as the friendly next door neighbor because she does live across the street. And so this is your typical like boy slash girl next door romance trope. It is a cute relationship, though.
00:19:24
Speaker
So not long after that, we do get the mention that Ferb doesn't talk much. And that's kind of a running gag that Ferb only gets, I believe one line in episode, if maybe that, but they mentioned that he's more of a man of action, which will ring true as we move forward.
00:19:42
Speaker
Marie and I, were're we're we were film majors in college. So this is what would be called the B-plot of a storyline. So the B-plot of the storyline here is their pet platypus. Perry is actually a secret agent for the Organization Without a Cool Acronym, or AUKA. We are introduced to the fact that he's a secret agent and he has a layer underneath the house. So Perry actually is voiced by DD Bradley Baker.
00:20:11
Speaker
He voices a variety of characters. He voices for the Simpsons, I believe, right? Yeah, he did. He did voices for SpongeBob, Avatar the Last Airbender. He did Star Wars, but he's primarily known for Phineas and Ferb and being
Doofenshmirtz's Eccentric Schemes
00:20:27
Speaker
Perry the Platypus. But he also did Clone Wars and I think American Dad and Ben 10. Oh, I know him from from American Dad because I've seen plenty of American Dad.
00:20:39
Speaker
nice clow yeah But in this scene, we are also introduced to a secondary character, Major Monogram, voiced by one of the creators of the show, and that would be Jeff Swampy Marsh. Swampy and Dan are often known for voicing secondary or random side characters throughout the series, and I have tried throughout the years to see if I can catch their voices and characters other than Major Monogram and Dr. Dufenshmirtz.
00:21:04
Speaker
and I've always seemed to catch Dan's secondary voices. I can never catch Swampy's voice, but hopefully I can get better at identifying their voices during this rewatch. So in the sec- in the secret layer where Major Monogram is giving Perry the Platypus to Spheal about what Dr. Stufenshmirtz is up to,
00:21:25
Speaker
listing out like outrageous things that he's either buying in bulk or in this case he bought up 80% of the country's tin foil and it's up to Perry of the Platypus to stop him. So we get him flying out of out of a random rock into what looks like a kind of car rocket powered car kind of a thing and he just hovers over Finney as building that first incline.
00:21:50
Speaker
Can I say that the little ah song theme song that is played when he jumps into the car and he flies through the tunnel, I love that little piece of music there. I think it's so funny to add a little bit of like, you know, musical gags to it. um I love the fact that when he flies by Phineas and Ferb,
00:22:20
Speaker
He just does like a little tip of the hat kind of covering his face It's so funny. I love visual gags like that. There's it's just Yeah, they're not gonna notice a flying car passing through them Just, yeah, just hide your face, man. Yep. Cause that works. Yeah. It's kind of like the whole spiel of how Marvel characters just randomly are in baseball hats in public. And I'm like, they're going to, they're going to spot you at some point, but it's just a funny gag that they have. And I don't know how that's possible. Let it be known that I questioned this all the time, but also if I questioned this too hard, I lose my enjoyment for the show. Then we get a cut to Candace finally arriving to the grocery store.
00:23:05
Speaker
telling her mom that Phineas and Ferb are doing something outrageous. And as always, this will always be the running gag is that Candace runs to mom, telling her that the boys are doing something incredible that's completely implausible. To the point where even the mom is just like, isn't Phineas a little bit young to be a roller coaster engineer? And I love that gag that they they cut to right afterwards.
00:23:29
Speaker
to, I don't know if this is a salvage yard or like a garage of some kind, but they literally cut to an adult, voiced by Dan Pabenmeyer, by the way, also posing the same question, aren't you a little bit young to be a rollercoaster engineer? And Phineas with no hesitation just says, yes, yes, I am.
00:23:51
Speaker
and that's literally the answer he gives whenever they ask him if he's too young to be doing xyz and what's funny about this is also that he has all his building permanents he knows what these are and has filled them out completely he filled them out in crayon though which i feel like i should have been a red flag you couldn't even find a pen to fill this out with or was like crayon more permanent I love his little hard hat on the little piece of hair that he has. I think it's so funny. Yeah, like at least these boys are being safe. That's what's funny about it is that
00:24:30
Speaker
These boys know what they're doing is something dangerous but they're being safe about it. Even Verve in the background has the whole like welders mask and he's welding like and at an advanced level I'm pretty sure they don't even teach you how to do something like that until at least high school.
00:24:48
Speaker
But the boys get their permission to build and they even get a robotic arm to lay out the rest of the pieces of the track. And I think this is the first time I ever seen a work smarter, not harder approach on like an animated show.
00:25:03
Speaker
because these boys build the track and then they're on a rollercoaster cart as a robotic arm puts the next piece of the track down. This is the definition of work smarter not harder and seeing it at play in this animated cartoon is just so much fun.
00:25:20
Speaker
And we so we cut to Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated, and we are introduced to Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz. And he's voiced by Dan Pabenmeyer, one of the creators. And the whole gag in this is that he's going to trap Perry the Platypus. He's going to go on this monologue about what he's going to do and what his big plan is.
00:25:43
Speaker
And in this one, he doesn't tell us why he's doing it because this idea is kind of a half-baked one. But in later episodes, he will give us like a whole backstory as to why he's building this evil contraption. But as I said, this one um is kind of half-baked to the point where even he doesn't know what he's going to do.
00:26:05
Speaker
He has covered the entire so eastern seaboard in aluminum foil, and then with a giant magnet and a magnificinator, he's going to pull the eastern seaboard in a westerly direction, thereby reversing rosation of the earth.
00:26:17
Speaker
And I'm like, how? Why? You're an evil scientist, and I don't even think it's possible to ro to reverse the rotation of the Earth. The only person who has successfully rotated the Earth backwards, it was probably the Flash. And it doesn't make any sense. But even him, he's like, I'm going to do this, and then maybe I'm going to buy up real estate, and then I can sell it and make millions. It's an interesting concept. But again, I promise that these wacky inventions will get better.
00:26:46
Speaker
And I can't wait for you to hear his
Candace's Birthday and Mount Rushmore
00:26:49
Speaker
backstories. I'm excited to hear what your take on is on this, Maria. I'm excited for it. Even as he's trapped, Perry already has an escape route planned, which I find it just oddly just funny that it's so easy for him to escape out of these like mindless traps. ah But then we cut to cut back to the grocery store and Candace is insisting that Phineas and Ferb are building this giant roller coaster in their backyard. Mom's still not believing her and Ferb puts this poster up in the grocery store where there's a bunch of kids where a bunch of kids find it.
00:27:24
Speaker
And the kids are like, do you think we'll get in for free if we bring the flyer? And they're like, we better bring it just in case. And so we finally come back to the house and find out that Phineas and Ferb have built the coolest coaster ever. I love that Ferb is both the drum soloist. He's got a bass. He's got a little disco light on his head. I think it's just funny that Ferb is over here doing the most.
00:27:46
Speaker
And it's just really trying to amp up this whole reveal of this big roller coaster. And I have to ask, would you have ridden this roller coaster? If this was like in your town, like if they built this roller coaster, would you have ridden it? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. So like what deterred you? Is it the snakes? Is it the mud?
00:28:06
Speaker
all of it that that was crazy and it goes through up in the sky through traffic through buildings it's crazy me personally as a nine or ten year old i would have definitely ridden this ride i would have been front row back row whichever one you want to recommend to me i would have been there as an adult though i'm like no i have back issues now i cannot ride this roller coaster to the point where I even rode the Incredicoaster at Disneyland and I was like, I had to close my eyes on the loop-de-loop. And my sister made the mistake of not closing her eyes and she got vertigo for the rest of the day. So this roller coaster sequence has a lot of fun visual gags. The hey, Ferb, here comes the ah moment. The little bumps look like the letter A and it has an exclamation point ah at the end on a building.
00:29:00
Speaker
They go through a car wash so they get clean. They go around like the building. Maybe the car wash would have been fun. That would have been. Yeah, the car wash would have been fun. I feel like every kid has that idea of going through a car wash. But also you ponder the idea of what would happen if you roll down the window in a car wash.
00:29:20
Speaker
The roller coaster goes around. Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated. Then we cut to Perry eventually being able to break free of the trap and the cartoonish fight begins. This is where the beginning of Dr. Doofenshmirtz plan starts to fall apart to the fact where the only thing that managed to be pulled was the tinfoil and it formed a ball and it is coming hurling towards them.
00:29:46
Speaker
and Perry thinking on his feet as he disconnects the magnet from the magnificinator and at the same time we cut to Candace at the grocery store. Her mom is paying for the groceries which I gotta say this is a long grocery store trip.
00:30:00
Speaker
Mind you, the boys had the time to build a roller coaster, ride said roller coaster, and she's still not done grocery shopping. They're a family of five. How much time do you need to look at food? I feel like if Candace had not run all the way to the store, had Candace just stayed at home, let the boys do what they were doing, the mom wouldn't have taken so long doing the doing this grocery store trip.
00:30:24
Speaker
they would have paid She would have picked up a few things. She would have been back. Probably would have caught the boys. a All if Candice had just stayed out of it. We get a really fast cut of Candice trying to get her mom, Perry saving himself from the giant tin foil, then uprooting the roller coaster and the mom not seeing it again. I do have to say that the mom has some of the best lines in this. My favorite lines of hers in this is, time to go. I've got frozen.
00:30:54
Speaker
It's just one of my favorite lines to this day. I say it to myself when I try to lollygag at Walmart or whatever, I tell myself I've got frozen so I don't waste my day grocery shopping. But then we get Barry on the roller coaster, which is so fun because he leaves his hat on Isabella. And ah this is a point where the roller coaster kind of goes haywire. It goes around like this, I don't know, what would you call this? Like a crane kind of a thing? Like a construction crane, yeah.
00:31:24
Speaker
Yeah it gets furled about and ends up on the back of an airplane. Oh so the fact that she can see them from from the ground she can see them up in the sky hooked on the airplane is crazy. Yeah either they live really close to an airport of some kind or that airplane is flying too low.
00:31:45
Speaker
There's no cloud cover and only when there's cloud cover cover are planes allowed to fly a little lower, if I'm correct. But then you shouldn't be able to see the tail of the plane. But once again, if we keep picking at the show, it falls apart if you look way too much into it. At this point, Candice gets really excited about the boys not being there.
00:32:07
Speaker
I love her little giggles. It's so funny. But either way, they make their way to Mount Rushmore. The roller coaster flings all the way to the Empire State Building in New York. Well, first, first they go to the Statue of Liberty. I wrote it all down. They go to the Statue of Liberty. They go to Mount Rushmore and then to a forest to the Eiffel Tower and then up to space. Which is crazy. There's no gravity.
00:32:36
Speaker
Also, you know, I love this gag that they're floating in space and they see the satellite. And Phineas just says, if that thing falls into Earth, Candace is in charge. We get a cool shot of this. What I think is one of the very few times where you actually see some live action footage in the show. I think that looks like Los Angeles or something like that somewhere where there's nothing but industrial buildings.
00:33:05
Speaker
But someone correct me if I'm wrong, if that's Los Angeles or not. I mean, I'm not here to judge. Texas pretty much looks exactly the same way. Just dried out land. But they finally get home. Candace is eager to tell her mom that they're not there. Lo and behold, they show up in the tree next to next to the platypus. I love that she thinks she wins.
00:33:24
Speaker
And then as soon as she turns around, she doesn't win. And we finally get to the end of the episode and we get Ferb's famous line about how platypuses are the only mammals to lay eggs. And that's it. And then Isabella just tells them that it was a really great day and they make a really good tea. It shocked me to hear Ferb speak in a British accent. I did not expect that.
00:33:51
Speaker
I love British accents. British accents are one of my favorites. I really love the idea that Ferb is British. His father's British too, so that's where it kind of coincides. And then we cut to another great visual gag of the tree just bursting into flames. And Candace once again insisting that this was the boy's doing.
Humorous Rivalries and Chaos
00:34:10
Speaker
And the mom's just not having it.
00:34:13
Speaker
Also, how did you not hear the, cause it made the, the cars beep in the neighborhood. How can you not hear that? She's doing her own thing. She's busy. She's a busy woman. Any final words on this episode? Okay. I wanted you, I noticed something and I wanted to see if you noticed, where did Candace's bike go?
00:34:36
Speaker
I was just thinking that. And then I completely forgot to mention it. Because she wrote it to the grocery store and then she came back home in the car. Girl, where is your bike? That's a good bike too.
00:34:51
Speaker
It's got like a little basket and everything. It's pink. I would not be leaving that just thrown and anywhere. But we don't know where Candace's bike is. It doesn't appear later in the series, so it does make it back to the Flamin' Fletcher household. Maybe it's just in the back of Mom's station wagon. Who knows? With that, we are going to get into part two, Candace's birthday. And like I said earlier, these two episodes were not originally paired together.
00:35:18
Speaker
I would really love if Disney would put the Backyard Reach and the roller coaster episodes together again because it doesn't make any sense. If in the first episode it was the beginning of summer and now we're in July.
00:35:31
Speaker
Candace's birthday is on July 11th. And I don't think I've ever heard of anyone starting summer in July. Did you start summer in July or were you already out of school? No, I think it was the latest. It was um early June, we would get out of school and then like mid June was when ah ah summer started.
00:35:56
Speaker
But I don't know if anyone else feels as strongly as I do about this episode pairing, but we're going to continue on. The episode begins with Phineas waking up for telling him that it's Candace's birthday and that they have to come up with something better than a gorilla popping out of a cake, which why would they get a gorilla popping out of a cake for what I assume would have been her 14th or 15th birthday? Because I want to say she's about 15 or 16 now.
00:36:23
Speaker
I don't know how those two would correlate, but then again, they are boys, so what they think is cool is obviously not what Candace would think is cool. So I think that's why there's always a disconnect between them all the time.
00:36:35
Speaker
For the longest time when I was younger, I literally thought this next sequence of Candace being serenaded was actually what Phineas and Ferb planned. And it took me a few years to realize that this is actually a dream that Candace is having. And she's only kind of jarred awake by it, by Perry sitting on top of her chest, kind of like purring. I don't know what you would call the sound that Perry makes. If that would classify as purring, would you call that purring?
00:37:02
Speaker
So this song is not as catchy as some of the other songs, but we learned some fun facts about Candace, like how she only wears designer sweaters and she's allergic to dairy. it's just It's a fun song, just not as catchy. Then Mom brings Candace her birthday breakfast, and we are introduced to one of my favorite secondary characters in the show, Florence Fletcher, the dad, voiced by Richard O'Brien.
00:37:27
Speaker
He's best known
Reflections and Farewell
00:37:28
Speaker
for the Rocky Horror Picture Show. I love this man. He's so much fun. Later on in the show, I think he's the only parental figure who's aware of Phineas and Ferb shenanigans, and he's fine with it. He does do the responsible thing, though. He does tell Linda, hey, did you give the boys permission to do this? And he gets the okay from the mom and all is well.
00:37:50
Speaker
He does his parenting part and afterwards he just enjoys whatever invention the kids have done that day. He gives off professor vibes. He does give professor vibes, definitely. So they drive to Mount Rushmore, which this is where my theory that Danville is actually in Texas falls apart. Why? Because here's a little backstory.
00:38:14
Speaker
There is a TikTok somewhere out there where Dan, again, one of the creators, he posted a TikTok of the Dallas skyline with the Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated jingle in the background. He literally looks at the camera and says, yep, that's Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated. And I did my research and the building he's referring to is called the Chase Building. It's actually going to get renamed, though, sometime either this year or next year. But for now, it is called the Chase Tower Building. And it does look an awful lot like Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated.
00:38:44
Speaker
However, that proves my theory that Danville is not in fact in the Metroplex area because they they had to have been able to drive from Danville to Mount Rushmore. So there goes my theory. Unfortunately, I'll be a little sad about it for a minute and then we'll move on. Well, can you say that they drove from Texas? I mean, you could say that, but I don't think so. It takes like eight hours to get across Texas. You never know.
00:39:14
Speaker
Yeah, I don't think they're gonna be taking like a whole like two-day trip just to get to Mount Rushmore. The geography wouldn't make any sense, but anyhow, they get to the entrance of Mount Rushmore, and that's when Candace finds out that that's where they're going for her birthday. And she's not really upset. She's kind of just irate about it, I guess, because Phineas and Ferb suggested that they go to Mount Rushmore.
00:39:37
Speaker
I feel like she was just expecting something else, you know, something more, more up to her taste. Yeah, she's a teenage girl. A trip to the mall would have totally satisfied her. I feel like that would have been something she would have been more pleased with than a trip to Mount Rushmore. But that's when the mom takes Candace to the gift shop and says she can pick out anything you like.
00:40:00
Speaker
And I am beside myself at Candace because she's definitely not taking advantage of this. Me as a fellow history nerd, I would have ate this up. I legit would have taken full advantage of the gift shop and the fact that my parents were going to buy me anything I wanted from it.
00:40:15
Speaker
I would have bought in every single thing that she mentions. The me lingon, the bobble heads. I would have no place for it, but I would definitely insist on buying them. The Teddy Roosevelt big stick. Again, I don't know what I would use it for, but I need all of this. But Maria, I was wondering if you would get anything from this gift shop or if you went to like a museum or a national monument, would you have gotten anything from the gift shop?
00:40:40
Speaker
Um, I feel like I would just get like a little, maybe like a little mug with the Mount Rushmore on it. Something small, maybe a magnet. I would, I would get something every time I've gone visit, I've gone to visit something, a monument or something like that. I always get a little thing postcard, maybe even a postcard. Those are not expensive. Those would have been fine. A little bit, a little gift.
00:41:06
Speaker
You would have had a lot more strength than I did. I had no restraint. I went to the Alamo earlier this year. I went twice. The first time was an impulse. And the only reason I went was because the Travis letter, the infamous Travis letter that William Travis wrote from the Alamo asking for help was being displayed for the first time at the Alamo in a couple years, so that was crazy. When I went the second time, the merchandise for the Travis Letter was on sale, so I got a copy of the Travis Letter because I was not going to waste the opportunity to have this photocopy of the Travis Letter. But yeah, I would not be remissed if I went to any museum and didn't take something home with me.
00:41:48
Speaker
but the souvenir it's you know you have you have to like invest in something you know it you're gonna remember the trip by looking at that at that souvenir that you have like how else am I gonna remember this trip but Candace decides that she's not interested in anything in the gift shop that is until we are introduced to her love interest Jeremy Johnson voiced by Mitchell Musso of Hannah Montana fame, of course. And Candace gets very excited because I'm guessing she hasn't seen him since school let out. So this might be her first interaction with him in a while. And once again, we get the visual gag of the window being right there and the boys just walking back and forth with Perry carrying their supplies to whatever they're doing today. This might be one of the first times that we don't actually get to see them sitting underneath the tree and asking what they're going to do today.
00:42:45
Speaker
And it might be the first time that we don't know what they're doing for that day, which is always interesting when an episode starts in a different way. Granted, this is the only the second episode, so it doesn't set a precedent for it, but it will later on.
00:43:00
Speaker
Then we see the Fireside Girls, who are the equivalent of Girl Scouts. um They're there with Isabella, and she very subtly asks the mom where Phineas is. We come back to Phineas and Ferb looking at the monument, deciding where to begin. And then Perry transforms into Perry the Platypus, and he goes down the tunnel system to get to his hideout.
00:43:22
Speaker
This is another thing that the episode introduces, the fact that there are multiple animal agents in this organization because we pass a raccoon with a hat and who would have a raccoon as a pet? Like where in the United States would you willingly have a raccoon as a pet?
00:43:41
Speaker
You'll be surprised. I've seen a couple videos, TikToks, of people feeding their pet raccoons multiple raccoons and do not they do not look like they're They look like pets. And then Harry makes it to his lair. He gets the mission from major monogram. He's kind of has the best, like, are you kidding me face? Because he's told that Dr. Doofenshmirtz's lair is underneath Mount Rushmore, which was where he just was. That would have pissed me off. The fact that I was just there.
00:44:18
Speaker
Yeah, the look he gives Major Monogram is priceless, but he's a faithful agent and he's going to get back into the tunnel system to get back to Mount Rushmore. no Not long after that, we get Candace noticing Phineas Infirm climbing up George Washington's nose and she tries to get her mom to catch the boys in the act, but old, reliable geyser erupts and that kind of gets in the way of mom seeing the boys, which I do have a note about this.
00:44:46
Speaker
There's actually no geysers in the Dakotas, and there is no geyser named Old Reliable. I believe what the show was attempting to reference was Old Faithful, which is actually in Wyoming. We come back to Perry the Platypus. I believe he's on top of one of the president's heads, and he drills himself down to Dufenshmirtz's lair.
00:45:05
Speaker
And this is one of my favorite Dr. Doofenshmirtzisms, where he's like, oh, Peruloplatypus, what an unexpected surprise. And by unexpected, I mean completely expected. I love it so much to the point where if me and my sister ever say the word expected in a sentence, it will always be followed by with an unexpected surprise. And we laugh at that line every single time.
00:45:30
Speaker
So Dufin Schmerz traps Perry behind this giant glass wall and he gives the whole spiel of what he's going to do. He's going to dig a tunnel to China and build a toll highway and make millions. And I think this might be the first time I'm like, you know,
00:45:46
Speaker
Why don't we let him build a tunnel to China because it just makes sense. It makes all the sense in the world I just remember as a child I did do this during recess when I was in third or second grade We would be digging a hole in the corner of the swing set and we said it was to China It was not plausible, as we see later on, that you would hit the Earth's core. So I don't think it's possible to dig a hole to China, but I like to dream that it was possible. Did you ever try that? Was that ever like a lure in your playground at school that you could dig a hole to China?
00:46:23
Speaker
No, this I mean, I feel I feel like kids would like dig up holes, but never like to a place. They would just want to dig up holes because they were just wanted to play with the dirt. And so I think I might have been the only one who was digging a hole willingly to China. But hey, I feel like that's commitment. You had a certain goal, you know. So then Perry chases Dr. Dufenschmirtz down.
00:46:51
Speaker
Wait, you just, you just skipped over the fact that Dr. Diffen-Schmartz says, as they say in China, a Rivaderchi. He does that a lot. Okay. I was, I was just in shock. I was like, Oh, I mean, somebody could say that in China. That just caught me off guard.
00:47:14
Speaker
That line is so funny and they do mention it from time to time. Um, they reuse that line. And then, but instead of saying like a Riva Denshi, he says something else, like in another language, which is funny. And to the point where he, I think he's even done Spanish before. And. There's one, point there's at one point in the show, different schmurtz says, como sedice awkward. And that just had me thinking, huh, what is awkward in Spanish?
00:47:42
Speaker
I asked my mom and even when she didn't know and we looked it up and there's no accurate word for awkward so he is correct in the whole like come on said he say awkward now you got me thinking about it awkward in Spanish. So ask your mom we'll meet back next week and so you can tell me if there is a word for awkward. And once again we get Isabella doing the most. She offers herself to be the volunteer lookout and she climbs up the tree with no hesitation. I would have taken at least 30 minutes to climb up that tree but her dedication to Phineas is deep.
00:48:18
Speaker
I could never. Me neither. And then we get back to the mom ah trying to handle the big stick and once again Candace is trying so hard to get her mom to see what the boys are doing and it's not working. We then get this park ranger posing the question of the boys being a little too young to be restoring the national monument And the guy just just has the best response of, well, it's good to see that young people are taking an interest in our national heritage. And right there for a second, you think that Ferb is going to be the one speaking through like the megaphone, but
00:48:56
Speaker
It turns out that he just turns it on so that Phineas can speak, which I find so funny because that is the equivalent of an introvert hiding behind their extroverted friend. And we're taken back to Perry and Perry has no choice but to follow Dr. Dufenschmerz.
00:49:13
Speaker
The lava somehow follows them. Again, it doesn't make any sense, but like I've said before, if you look at this show too deeply, it's going to fall apart. We come back to Isabella being lookout and we get a quick montage as to what they're doing, but we don't actually see what they're building. We know that they're working on Mount Rushmore and then there's this whole bit where um They're blowing into one of the president's nose and I think that's just hilarious. I love that the fireside girls had this pre-painted picture of Mount Rushmore to stall.
00:49:49
Speaker
They just had the time to paint a picture of Mount Rushmore. Anyhow, Candice gets mom up onto the viewing platform just in time to see the fireside girls painting, to which she simply states, I guess some things look better in photos. Mom turns to walk away, presumably to talk to the dad who just found a brilliant parking space. And I feel like this is another running gag from a previous episode where the bird flies into the roller coaster But this time it flies into the painting, knocking it over. And then we get this big reveal that the boys have carved Candice into Mount Rushmore. And Candice is completely surprised by it that she starts happy crying. And I got to say it does look pretty good. It is a very cute gesture.
00:50:34
Speaker
It's a really cute gesture, for sure. I think this might be the first time where Candace isn't trying to get her mom to get the boys in trouble. She's trying to show her what her brothers did for her. And then another iconic mom joke, I'm already down half a dress size. That's, that's just so funny. We get Dr. Dufendramerton Perry, the platypus, shooting out of Candace's head.
00:50:59
Speaker
on Mount Rushmore and it kind of destroys the monument they just made of her. It kind of looks like pimples are coming out of her, which is so gross. When you think about it, as a teenager seeing like little red spots on your face. I feel like her insecurities were just wasting her there. Then we get the boys grilling hot dogs after that happens and the orchestra is playing in the background. Another great gag. Get a little cut to the orchestra. hu there Love that.
00:51:29
Speaker
It's very titanic. Meanwhile, Harry manages to escape the chaos using his parachute, and Doof Insurance lands on Old Reliable and is immediately ejected. And then the water from Old Reliable Geyser cools the lava over, and we finally get to see the real Mount Rushmore without the canvas. Candace is frustrated by the fact that she didn't get to show anyone this gift that the boys made her, and Verve says that this was definitely better than the gorilla cake.
00:51:57
Speaker
And I gotta say, this is where Jeremy is earning his gold stars as Candace's future boyfriend slash love interest because he didn't have to buy her the Mount Rushmore bobbleheads, you know? He just noticed that she was looking at it and he buys it for her and and gives it to her as a gift and that's just such a sweet gesture.
00:52:16
Speaker
That is very cute. Very cute. So any final thoughts on this episode or the episode before it? um Ashley Tazelle is a great voice actor. I love her voice acting. And and this just one episode. She's very good.
00:52:35
Speaker
That is one of the things that we do not do enough of. We don't sing the praises of Ashley Tisdale as Candace enough. The amount of times that she yells mom in every episode, it's got to be more than a couple dozen. And each one has its own different inflection, to which I wonder, do they make her yell out mom in every recording session or do they just have one giant recording session where she's only saying mom with different inflections?
00:53:06
Speaker
If not Ashley Tisdale, I definitely think that Dan Pabenmeyer as Dr. Doofenshmirtz, he's the most recognizable out of all of them just because he just has such an interesting voice. Like it's such an interesting choice. It's not quite German and it's not quite European. It's somewhere in between. It just feels, it just feels like it's comes natural to him. So maybe he just wanted to do this natural voice to him.
00:53:36
Speaker
that is just easy for him to to just do randomly. But any other thoughts, anything else that you want to add or anything that you liked about this episode or just random notes? I just think that this too little mini ah stories are a good introduction into the show and I'm excited to see what's to come. That's what I was going to ask you. I was going to ask if we weren't doing this podcast, would you still go forward with all the episodes of Phineas and Fur? Would you continue watching this? I think so, yeah. I just I want to see what more adventures these two boys get up to.
00:54:23
Speaker
And I will let you know right now that there is way more than 104. And that is the running gag throughout the entire series. I feel that every fan knows that there is more than 104 days of summer and way more than 104 inventions that the boys get into. And that's like a running gag throughout the entire series. And I feel like all the fans know that there are more than 104 days of summer and there's way more than 104 inventions the boys make.
00:54:52
Speaker
And the number of inventions that they do make surpasses the amount of summer vacation days they have. But yeah, I don't have much to say. Again, like these first two episodes, this is just the first episode of the Tri-State Area takeover. I really hope that we continue on with this. And my hope is that we do get to the movies and the spin-off shows like Milo Murphy's Law and Hamster and Gretel. I mean, there's no guarantee that we'll get to them, but I really hope we do.
00:55:19
Speaker
um And I hope everyone listening gives us a chance and continues on with us on this journey. This first episode might be a little rough, so we might get better in the future. Oh, and I completely forgot to mention that we do have socials. We are at Tri-State Area Takeover or Tri-State Area Pod on most platforms. And you can email us at tristateareatakeoveratgmail.com. If you have any thoughts, any insights, anything you would like to share, we'd be happy to share it on the podcast. And as a final note, I will just say thank you so much for listening and I will leave you with time to go. I've got frozen. Bye.