Right! Well, these aren't the types of articles you wake up and expect to be writing, but then again the world is kind of a funny place like that.
One minute you're living your life, and then next you're writing about how Hey Arnold! was about depression and the economy.
Helga and Olga's mom, Miriam Pataki is a total drunk. When she isn't shuffling over to the kitchen to make some "smoothies" (margaritas, perhaps?) then she's walking around the house, slurring her words.
Which is a pretty good sign either she has it or thinks her daughter does (possibly because she is drunk). Also, there's one episode where she doesn't have her license.
Probably because of a DUI.
Alright, so the kids are introduced to this new girl who is really cool.
Helga and the other gals get jealous, so they play a really mean prank on Lila, which depresses her enough to skip school.
Their house is a total mess and they live in one of the worst parts of the neighborhood.
It's the reason he has a distaste towards Christmas. Because one year on the holiest of holidays, he was forced to give up his infant daughter to the American military as war raged all around him.
Ever since they left him as a baby, Arnold has been internally obsessed with them.
There's only one bit of proof I need here: he's been wearing the cap they gave him since birth.
Someone actually did the math on this one: two (Torvald and Harold) of Arnold's classmates are 13 years old... in the fourth grade.
Going by that measure, that means around 12.5% is being held back grades.
Even if you ignore the fact that the mom may be a drunk, the way they treat Helga is just brutal.
Remember the below scene where she gets totally ignored by them? How heartbreaking is that?
But all that neglect might be good for Helga because when Olga came home from college that one time and found out she got a B+ she just shut down.
Imagine when something even more traumatic comes around?
At first, when she goes broke, she makes up sensationalized stories about the strange things poor people get up too.
Then, when she does eventually have to live the life of a poor person, she complains the whole time!
Yes, he is a bully. Yes, he picks on people who are smaller than him.
But there are times in the show when you feel for Harold, like when full-grown adults make fun of his weight.
There's this episode where when he's walking home, Arnold gets mugged by some teenager. He's pretty badly beaten too. The city he lives in is going to hell, and it's taking Arnold with it.
Get out of there, Arnold!
Chocolate Boy, in general, is mostly sad because he's an allegory for drug addicts.
You see dear reader, this may be a controversial thing to say but chocolate boy... loves chocolate.
In the same way that a crack addict likes crack a little too much.
Chocolate Boy degrades himself for chocolate, goes through withdrawal symptoms when he doesn't have any, and has addictive tendencies.
