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Garbage day is a very dangerous day.
―Rocko

"Trash-O-Madness" is the pilot episode of Rocko's Modern Life, later released as the second segment of the show's tenth episode.

Synopsis[]

One morning in O-Town, Rocko wakes up and reminisces to his dog Spunky about their life back in Australia. Just then, he notices a garbage truck outside and realizes that it's garbage day, and that the garbage men must have gotten their license reinstated. Rocko starts grabbing all the garbage that has been piling up in his house over the past six months, and tells Spunky to do the same.

Downstairs, Rocko puts multiple piles of garbage together and then vacuums them up with his vacuum cleaner, but accidentally vacuums Spunky as well. After hitting reverse on the vacuum to get Spunky out, Rocko cleans out his refrigerator, finding a container full of green slime. He empties the container, and Spunky starts playing with the ball of slime, which squirts black ink at him. Seeing that the garbage truck is getting closer to his house, Rocko puts all of his trash in his trash compactor, the Compact-O-Matic, and has the trash compacted to the size of a take-out box. Unbeknownst to him, though, Spunky crawls into the garbage pile right before it gets compacted, resulting in the dog getting compacted along with the trash.

When Rocko hurries to the door to put out his now cube-shaped garbage, he finds Earl, a ferocious dog who escaped from the science lab, waiting for him at his front door and threatening to attack. Rocko goes to the roof of his house, tying the compacted trash cube (still unaware that Spunky is trapped in it) to a fishing pole and casting it out to the garbage truck. However, as his trash is getting crushed into the back of the truck, Rocko finally realizes his beloved dog got compacted into the trash box and quickly reels it back. Unfortunately, Earl eats the trash cube and Spunky. Rocko approaches the ferocious canine and repeatedly demands he let Spunky loose, eventually socking Earl right into the snout. This enrages Earl, who promptly spits out Spunky and beats Rocko to a pulp.

Shortly after, Rocko, having survived the attack, comes back inside, removes the flattened Spunky from the trash cube, and re-inflates him with an air pump. Later that night, as Rocko is taking a bath, he admits to Spunky that, with Spunky being the only family he has right now, he'd do anything to keep him safe. However, he then notices Spunky is still carrying the same ball of slime he was supposed to get rid of earlier. Rocko tells him again to get rid of it, but Spunky ends up dropping it in the bathtub, causing the slime to burst everywhere as Rocko screams in fear.

Home video releases[]

VHS
  • Rocko's Modern Life: Machine Madness (both releases)
DVD
  • The Best of Rocko's Modern Life - Volume 1 (series version)
  • Rocko's Modern Life: Season 1 (series version)
  • Rocko's Modern Life: Season 2 (original pilot version)

Trivia[]

  • Audio of Rocko saying, "Heh heh, good as new," and yelling "SPUNKY!!!" from this episode were used in the original version of the theme song.
  • The second level of Spunky's Dangerous Day was named after this episode.
  • This was the only Rocko's Modern Life episode to be animated in-house at Joe Murray Studios, with ink and paint work being sub-contracted to Karen Johnson Productions, an ink and paint and animation studio located in Racine, Wisconsin.

External links[]

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