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Hey Arnold! is an American animated television series that aired from October 7, 1996 until June 8, 2004 on Nickelodeon.

PremiseEdit

The show stars 4th-grader Arnold, who lives with his grandparents Phil and Gertie, proprietors of the Sunset Arms boarding house. In each episode, Arnold will often help a schoolmate solve a personal problem, or he will encounter a predicament of his own.

SettingEdit

Hey Arnold! takes place in the fictional American city of Hillwood.

Craig Bartlett stated in an interview that the city the show is based on is actually Seattle, with many features borrowed from other big northern cities, such as Portland and Brooklyn. Bartlett, having grown up in Seattle, bases many of the show's events on his own experience growing up in the city. The Pig War mentioned in the episode with the same title took place on the boundary between what is now the State of Washington and British Columbia.

The overpass above the Sunset Arms is the Alaskan Way Viaduct, located in Seattle. In many first-season episodes and later, the Brooklyn Bridge is seen as a prominent landmark in the city. Other episodes show an overview of Arnold's Neighborhood, with the New York City skyline in the horizon, complete with the Empire State Building, Central park and World Trade Center, suggesting that Hillwood could be a neighborhood in Brooklyn, or Queens. Also according to a List of public elementary schools in New York City PS 118 is a school in St. Albans, which is a residential community in the New York City borough of Queens.

Also, in the episode "Eugene's Bike", Arnold and Eugene visit Quigley Stadium which is in West Haven, Connecticut and was home to the West Haven Yankees from 1972-1979. West Haven is just north of New York. However, the stadium used in the series bears no resemblance to the actual Quigley Stadium.

BackgroundEdit

Hey Arnold! was created by Craig Bartlett and is based on his comics starring Arnold, which he created in 1986. Using the Will Vinton facilities Walkabout Program (a student production lab), Craig Bartlett created his Arnold Escapes From Church short film which later generated two more clay-animated short films, The Arnold Waltz (1990) and Arnold Rides His Chair (1991) which eventually aired on an early-1990s episode of Sesame Street. The familiar, cel-animated Arnold came about in the mid-1990s when Nickelodeon picked up the new series. Apart from the animation style, Nick's Arnold now wears a sweater, with his plaid shirt untucked (resembling a kilt). Only Arnold's cap remains from his original clay-animation wardrobe. "Arnold" comic strips also appeared in Simpsons Illustrated magazine (Matt Groening, the creator of The Simpsons is Craig Bartlett's brother-in-law).

Hey Arnold! debuted as an animated short for the Nickelodeon film Harriet the Spy in 1996.

The show also aired on "Nick on CBS" from 2002 up until September 2004. As of July 2008, the show has been off the air, but it returned to the Nicktoons Network channel in August 2008. It aired on Nickelodeon one time on Thanksgiving 2007 at 12:30 PM. In Europe and Asia, it returns temporarily as part of Nick's Non-Stop Play Weekend.

For a brief period, a spin-off series called The Patakis was planned. The premise was to focus on Helga Pataki in her teenage years, and her family.

The first season is available on iTunes for download.

CanonEdit

Main article: Canon

The canon of Hey Arnold includes:

100 episodes
9 books (4 are novelizations of episodes, and 1 is the novelization of Hey Arnold!: The Movie)
The Movie
Several сomic strips

EpisodesEdit

Main article: List of episodes

FilmEdit

Main article: Hey Arnold!: The Movie

In the 2002 theatrically released film, Arnold, Helga and Gerald set out on their quest to save their neighborhood from a greedy developer who plans on converting it into a huge shopping mall. This film featured the voice talents of Jennifer Jason Leigh, Paul Sorvino, and Christopher Lloyd.

Another planned movie is known as The Jungle Movie.

CharactersEdit

Main article: List of characters

Main voice castEdit

Character	Voice actor(s)
Arnold	Toran Caudell, Phillip Van Dyke, Spencer Klein, Alex D. Linz
Helga G. Pataki	Francesca Smith
Gerald Johanssen	Jamil Walker Smith
Grandpa Phil	Dan Castellaneta
Grandma Gertie	Tress MacNeille

DVD ReleaseEdit

Nick DVD name	Release date	Discs	Episodes
Season 1 (1996-97)	August 21, 2008	3	20
Season 2 (1997-98)	August 21, 2008	3	19
Season 3 (1998-99)	N/A	3	13
Season 4 (1999-2000)	2010	3	19
Season 5 (2001-04)	2010	3	15

Amazon.com released seasons 1 and 2 on DVD through its CreateSpace program in August 2008. The DVDs are sold as "burn on demand" items. Some episodes have also been released on iTunes.

ReferencesEdit

External linksEdit

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