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"Thanksgiving Dad" is the 17th episode of the first season of Pepper Ann. It aired on November 22, 1997.

Plot[]

Lydia and Janie make every effort to make their Thanksgiving dinner a success, while Pepper Ann thinks her divorced father will come to visit instead of calling like he usually does, as he said he had a surprise for her on Thanksgiving.

Synopsis[]

On Halloween Day, Lydia and Janie prepare for this year's Thanksgiving as last year was considered a failure. Pepper Ann and Moose speak on the phone with their father, Chuck, whom they have not seen in years. Before hanging up, he tells Pepper Ann that he has a big surprise for her this Thanksgiving and begins trying to deduce what it is. On November 11, Lydia and Janie go shopping for Thanksgiving groceries using a variety of tactics to get the best ingredients and canned food. Pepper Ann finally figures that Chuck's big surprise is that he will actually come home and not just call as he has done in the past.

Thanksgiving rolls around, November 27, and Lydia and Janie are quickly finishing up the food. Janie deters her son Ned from eating anything and Lydia tries to qualm him with gum. When that runs out, he ends up eating all the canned yam, forcing Janie to rush to the store to buy more ingredients. Pepper Ann continues to believe that her father is coming and imagines several scenarios explaining his late arrival. She is all the more disappointed with the arrival of her other relatives and Milo (who apparently is spending Thanksgiving with everyone) also believes that Pepper Ann is in denial.

Janie rushes to find yams, but all she can get is butterscotch pudding because "you can't tell the difference". Pepper Ann's relatives proceed to cause a fuss at home with several of their clashing personalities leading to arguments and a couple of her cousins giving Moose a hard time. Milo, who also lives with divorced parents, explains to Pepper Ann that Chuck is most likely having another life and that she should not let that bother her (since he does not have a tight family, he just goes from house to house to experience other Thanksgivings). Moose comforts her by saying that he would never forget her. Lydia surprises Pepper Ann by revealing that she can now sit at the adult table which Pepper Ann is only mildly happy for.

Everyone rushes into the kitchen to discover that the turkey has been entirely burnt. As everyone complains and argues, Pepper Ann answers the phone and discovers that it is Chuck who tells her and Moose to watch the parade. They turn on the TV and discover that he is driving the parade blimp and is being interviewed by the news (though his face is still covered). He wishes Pepper Ann and Moose a happy Thanksgiving and that he will come by next visitation. Pepper Ann begins receiving phone calls from her friends, as well as her crush Craig Bean, congratulating her and her father and she asks Milo if he would rather stay for this Thanksgiving and he agrees. Pepper Ann and her family all end up spending Thanksgiving by eating pizza.

Cast[]

Desk Gag[]

"Wow, a dreidel!"

Trivia[]

  • This episode marks the first and only major appearance of a lot of Pepper Ann's relatives. Aunt Fanny and Uncle Harry make cameos in various other episodes, usually in the distant background, but this is the only appearance of Damian and Damiana.
  • This is the first time Halloween occurs in the series, the second being "A 'Tween Halloween".
  • This is the only full-length episode in the series that Nicky does not appear in though she is "heard" over the phone.
    • Additionally, Tessa and Vanessa James are also "heard" in this episode while Craig's voice is loudly present as well.
  • At the beginning of this episode, Pepper Ann tells her father that she's too old to go Trick-or-Treating, but that Lydia is making her take Moose. In "A 'Tween Halloween", however, she wrestles with the idea that she may in fact be too old to go out. Being that Pepper Ann is twelve for both episodes and the entire series, this seems to be a major continuity error.
  • Strangely, no one is credited for voicing Uncle Remo, even though it is clearly Maurice LaMarche.
  • Janie distracts a shopper by falsely pointing out Desmond Tutu, a famous South African priest.
  • Lydia's code names for Pepper Ann and Moose are Tundra Woman and Madame Curie. The former is a fictional character within the show that Moose is a fan of while the latter is a famous Polish French radiobiologist.
  • According to Milo, Pepper Ann's parents have been divorced for four years.
  • Damian and Damiana are parodies of the twins from The Shining.
  • Pepper Ann seemed oddly annoyed when Uncle Remo paid her for giving him a drink.
  • Even though they set up a table for the kids, Moose, Damian and Damiana still sit at the adult table with Pepper Ann.

External links[]


v - e - d
Pepperannlogo
Media
Pepper AnnPepper Ann Main ThemePepper Ann (song)
Characters
Pepper Ann PearsonPepper Ann's reflectionNicky LittleMilo KamalaniMoose PearsonBecky LittleTrinket St. BlairCissy RooneyDieter LederhosenTessa and Vanessa JamesConstance GoldmanStewart WalldingerGwen MezzrowAlice KanePink-Eye PeteShelf McClainBrendaSketchCraig BeanCrashLydia PearsonChuck PearsonJanie DiggetyJoJo DiggetyNed DiggetyEffie ShruggAbriola StarkCarlotta SneedRoland CarterCoach DooganBronte BladdarSherman FinkyVera Groober-SchwartzPrincipal Hickey
Episodes
Season 1: "Ziterella" • "Romeo and Juliet" / "Food Barn" • "Old Best Friend" / "Crunch Pod" • "Psychic Moose" / "Doll and Chain" • "Megablades of Grass" / "Family Vacation" • "The Big Pencil" / "Sani-Paper" • "Uniform, Uniformity" / "Snot Your Mother's Music" • "The Environ-Mentals" • "Crush and Burn" / "Soccer Season" • "Thanksgiving Dad" • "Sketch 22" / "Manly Milo" • "Have You Ever Been Unsupervised" / "The Unusual Suspects" • "Nicky Gone Bad" / "In Support of"

Season 2: "Quiz Bowl" / "License to Drive" • "Cocoon Gables" / "Green-Eyed Monster" • "Hazelnut's Finest" / "Cat Scan" • "An OtterBiography" / "GreenSleeves" • "Vanessa Less Tessa" / "Peer Counselor P.A." • "A 'Tween Halloween" / "Mash into Me" • "Presenting Stewart Waldinger" / "P.A.'s Life in a Nutshell" • "Like Riding a Bike" • "Radio Freak Hazelnut" / "Framed" • "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Milo" / "The Sisterhood" • "Impractical Jokes" / "Cold Feet" • "Doppelganger Didi" / "Pepper Ann's Day Off-Kilter" • "A No Hair Day" / "That's My Dad"
Season 3: "You Oughta Be in Musicals!" • "Dances with Ignorance" / "Girl Power" • "Beyond Good and Evel" / "One of the Guys" • "The Wash-Out" / "Def Comedy Mom" • "The First Date Club" / "Unicycle of Life" • "A Kosher Christmas" • "Effie Shrugged" / "Mom Knows What P.A. Did Two Nights Ago" • "The Spanish Imposition" / "Single Unemployed Mother"
Season 4: "Burn, Hazelnut, Burn" / "Career Daze" • "G.I. Janie" / "Miss Moose" • "Pepper Shaker" / "Flaw and Order" • "Baggy Bean Buddies" / "The Beans of Wrath" • "The Velvet Room" • "One Angry Woman" • "The Sellout" / "The Telltale Fuzzy" • "A Valentine's Day Tune" • "Sammy's Song" / "Permanent Record" • "Live and Let Dye" • "Remote Possibilities" / "Considering Constance" • "To Germany with Love" • "Bye, Bye Trinket" / "P.A.'s Pop Fly" • "My Mother, Myself" • "The Amazing Becky Little" • "The Untitled Milo Kamalani Project" / "Guess Who's Coming to the Theater" • "The Great Beyond" / "Jaybirds of a Feather" • "The Way They Were"
Season 5: "The One with Mr. Reason" / "Sense and Senselessness" • "Forging Ahead" / "Reality Bytes" • "Carmello" / "Strike it or Not" • "Complimentary Colors" • "The Merry Lives of Pepper Ann" • "A is for Average" / "Alice Kane Went Down to Calcutta" • "Spice of Life" / "T.G.I.F." • "Dear Debby" / "Too Cool to Be Mom" • "Moose in Love" / "Two's Company" • "Zen and the Art of Milo" / "That's My Mama Destructo" • "Unhappy Campers" / "Searching for Pepper Ann Pearson" • "The Word" / "The Perfect Couple" • "The Finale"

Locations
Hazelnut Middle SchoolPepper Ann's House
See also
House of Mouse
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