Rocket Power: The Big Day

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The Big Day is an hour-long final episode of the Rocket Power animated television series, transmitted on Nickelodeon on August 2, 2002 and is the last new episode to be transmitted (as of Nov 2004).

The plotline of this episode picks up from that of the previous one, and mostly concerns Ray Rocket's preparations for a wedding to Tito's cousin Noelani (voice of Kim Mai Guest), whom he had just met on Oahu for the second significant time (Tito's mother, voiced by Brookes Almy, has also come over), and Otto's attempts to postpone the planned wedding so that the gang can compete in a skating contest (coinciding with the opening of a new skate park in the neighborhood, the Zero Gravity Zone), with a prize of two weeks' training with young pro-skater Shaun White (cameoing as himself as the contest moderator).

At face value, one might think that Otto just wants to compete for a chance to play with the pros, after missing out on a roller hockey exhibition game with Jeremy Roenick, Martin Brodeur, and Luc Robitaille in "Power Play" (US tx: April 12, 2002), and especially with Lars being their main competition. However, some fans believe that there was an ulterior motive to postponing this wedding: basically, that Otto and Reggie, after such a long time growing up from toddlerhood to adolescence without mama Danielle around, weren't prepared just then to accept a stepmother (despite this issue, however, Danielle wasn't mentioned in this episode).

[edit] What about Breezy?

Until about October 2003, Rocket Power fans had speculated that Ray was going to be marrying travelling saleswoman Breezy Copeley, who had appeared in an episode of the show ("There's Something About Breezy") in April 2002 (she would appear again in March 2004 in "Summer Breezy"). That month, Klasky Csupo announced in their newsletter the then upcoming "Island of the Menehune" telefilm with Ray getting a new girlfriend, thereby apparently putting Breezy out of the picture.

Although Breezy was not in "Island", in the wedding party scene at the end of this episode, she could be seen sitting next to schoolteacher / Madtown Skatepark manager Conroy Blanc.

[edit] Trivia

  • 12-year-old cancer survivor Daniel Stark appeared in this episode, courtesy of the Make-A-Wish Foundation. His part was only 30 seconds long, and it shows Stark snowboarding through a snowboarding course at the tournament and talking to Otto et al.
  • One of the bands that were shown as possibilities to be at the wedding was called "the Merryland Mansions". This group, both due to its name and to its looks, is an obvious spoof of Marilyn Manson.
  • Although this was the last episode to be transmitted, one episode that takes place after this episode and features Noelani as the new stepmom had been shown a month earlier ("New Girl In Town" and "After Shocked", US tx: June 16, 2004, the former of which actually mentions the fact, and the latter of which has some scenes at the new skate park).
  • A THQ Rocket Power video game, Zero Gravity Zone, was released some months prior to this ep; people who've played the game will recognize parts of the new skate park in this episode and in "After Shocked".
  • An episode of another Klasky Csupo Nicktoon with a similar storyline had aired just two weeks previous (All Grown Up!, "Runaround Susie", US tx: July 17, 2004).