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Interrupting Chicken

father chicken reads to kid chickens - Interrupting Chicken

Credits

Cast

Network

Reviewer

Paul Asay

TV Series Review

Once upon a time, there was a TV reviewer. And he had this terrible paper cut on his fing—

No, no. That’s a terrible start to a TV review. No one wants to hear about a paper cut. They want to read about the show the reviewer is reviewing, right? But how to start? How to keep readers engaged? How to come up with surprising plot twists and engaging characters, all within the context of a TV review?

If only Interrupting Chicken was here, she’d be able to help a poor TV reviewer out.

Original Recipe

Her name isn’t really Interrupting Chicken, of course. Her parents would’ve had both curious foresight and a nasty sense of humor to name her that. No, her name is Piper, and she loves stories like Julia Child loves eggs. That is, she loves them so much that she sometimes needs to scramble ‘em to make them better.

Sure, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. But if Piper was around, she’d make sure that all the king’s horses and all the king’s men picked up the pieces and made everything better. Maybe the Big Bad Wolf from the Three Little Pigs just needed a little character tweak to keep him from blowing houses down all the time.

There’s never been a story that Piper couldn’t put a special chicken twist to—or a story moral that she couldn’t apply to her own life. And with a little help from the adults in her own story—Papa, Mom and kindly preschool teacher Mrs. Slothworth—Piper is sure to give every story, and every day, a happy ending.

The Cluck Stops Here

Interrupting Chicken may be one of the only television shows to be based on a knock-knock joke.

According to David Ezra Stein, author of the original 2010 book Interrupting Chicken, the joke went like this: “Knock knock.” “Who’s there?” “Interrupting Chicket.” “Interrupting Chicken wh—?” “BAWK-BAWK-BAWK-BAWK—”

In Stein’s original Caldecott-winning book, the chicken (called, simply, Little Red Chicken) does indeed interrupt her father’s bedtime stories. When Papa tries to tell her about Hansel and Gretel, Little Red Chicken hollers, “Don’t go in! She’s a witch! So Hansel and Gretel didn’t. The end.” And while Papa strikes the reader as wanting to just get through a story so they can both go to bed, he’s also quite patient.

The Apple TV+ version takes that silly conceit and pushes it into the realm of truly educational TV.

Piper’s cast of surrounding characters has grown: Papa is joined by Mom and a kid brother (who’s a little too active for his own good). She goes to a school filled with playmates and another patient caregiver, Mrs. Slothworth. And the adults, instead of rolling their eyes when Piper interrupts, use those interruptions as teaching tools.

In the Humpty Dumpty story, for instance, Piper and her pals might learn the importance of focusing on one particular task. Another, featuring the mouse that plucked a thorn out of a lion’s paw, teaches Piper that braving a little discomfort at the doctor’s office can save a whole lot of problems down the road.

The show (with each 24-minute episode broken into two separate stories) teaches Piper about the elements of good story writing and storytelling, too. Characters need to face obstacles, for instance, to make a story compelling. A good story needs a few twists and turns, the term for which Piper initially misinterprets as the “elephant of surprise”.

It’s not as subversive as Stein’s original books, but the episodes are sweet and gentle and educational and, dare I say it, fun. And, at least through the first few episodes, there’s nary a content problem in the plot. Nothing that parents would (ahem) bawk at.

Why, if I watch a few more episodes, I might even find a way to make a good story out of my paper cut.

Episode Reviews

Nov. 18, 2022—S1, Ep1: “Not So Bad Wolf/Chicken of the Sea”

In the first part of the episode, little brother Benjamin knocks over Piper’s book castle, and Papa reads them the story of the Three Little Pigs. While listening to the story, Piper rewrites it—trying to give the wolf other things to do so he won’t blow down the pigs’ houses. But she discovers the wolf needs more than just other activities: He needs a character tweak before it’ll all work out.

The Big Bad Wolf in the first story is indeed destructive, and it doesn’t end with houses. When Piper gives him a love of pizza, the wolf makes a mess of the restaurant. When she instills in him a desire to play the tuba, the wolf steals a tuba and annoys the whole town with his music. Eventually, wolf’s antics knock over a statue, which in turn knocks over a bell tower made of straw. (“They should’ve built it with brick,” a pig grouses. It’s only when Piper gives the wolf a desire to help others that things turn around. And by the end of the story, Benjamin wants to help Piper rebuild her castle, too.

In the second part, Piper’s friend Theodore loses a sticker in school, and Mrs. Slothworth reads them a story of a little sea turtle that needs to make his way to the ocean. Piper interrupts and tries to help, but she and the turtle find themselves on a pirate ship instead.

The pirates in the second story won’t let Piper and the turtle go until Piper tricks them. The turtle and Piper also get into some minor peril as they try to scale walls of wood (and ultimately slingshot themselves across).

The wolf is seen in a tutu once for comic effect.

Nov. 18, 2022—S1, Ep2: “The Elephant of Surprise/The Chicken and the Egg”

In the first part of the episode, Theodore does the same magic trick over and over, and his friends get a little bored with it. But Mrs. Slothworth and Papa tag team to teach Piper about the element of surprise. And when Piper uses that element in the story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff, Theodore knows just what he needs to spice up his magic act.

Humpty Dumpty—an egg—breaks into several pieces. He’s unhappy but essentially unhurt, still talking to Piper and others through his mostly intact top. Piper and the king’s knights and horses must navigate the “obstacle course of doom” (which includes flaming lava and a pit of alligators) to retrieve the glue necessary to put Humpty Dumpty back together. We hear one of the knights exclaim “Fiddle faddle!” along the way.

In the second part, Piper gets frazzled while trying to clean after an art project. Her mom reads her the story of Humpty Dumpty. Piper interrupts and gets the king’s knights and horses to act in a more organized fashion—and in so doing realizes what she needs to do to clean up.

The troll from Three Billy Goats Gruff is not very nice at all. He drinks from a mug (which could be interpreted as some sort of trollish beer) and refuses to let the goats cross into the nice meadow beyond. The goats, with the help of Piper and her “elephant of surprise,” trick the troll and build their own bridge.

Nov. 18, 2022—S1, Ep3: “Hercul-easy/The Lion, the Mouse and the Chicken”

In the first part of the episode, one of Piper’s friends, Duckston, lowers the basketball hoop to waist-level to make it easier for players to score points. But when Mrs. Slothworth shows the kids a Grecian urn and tells them a little about Hercules, Piper realizes that real heroes need difficult obstacles to overcome.

Hercules is a demigod from Greek mythology. But while we see plenty of Hercules and meet his father (the Greek god Zeus), both are simply referred to as heroes here. (We also hear a reference to the Parthenon, a Greek temple of antiquity.) Hercules is supposed to push a giant rock through loads of obstacles and get to the top of Mount Olympus (traditionally the home of the gods, but here just a tall hill), but Piper clears the way for him. Alas, the citizens are not impressed. It’s only when Piper and Hercules must stop the boulder—now rolling down the hill—from crushing the town below that Hercules is praised as a hero.

In the second part, Piper’s hurt her wing and is scared to have the doctor look at it. Papa reads her the story of the mouse who pulls the thorn out of the lion’s paw—but Piper’s rewrites keep the mouse from doing its job, making the lion’s paw hurt worse than ever (and keeping Piper from the story’s moral).

We see the lion in pain, and his paw gets more red and swollen as the story goes on. He misses all sorts of activities because there’s no mouse to pull the thorn. “So I guess the moral of the story is … if you have a hurt paw you can’t do anything?” Eventually, with a little help from Papa, she gets to the right place and is seen by the doctor (who discovers Piper has a sprained wing).

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Paul Asay

Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.

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