Men Will Be Boys

Men II Boyz; or

I Just Can’t Quit You, David Rose

(a recap by Will Kaiser)

Title: Men Will Be Boys

Airdate: November 13, 1978

Written by Don Balluck

Directed by William F. Claxton

SUMMARY IN A NUTSHELL: As a prank/lesson, Charles and Garvey send their sons on a camping adventure; but they’re the ones who wind up punked.

RECAP: 

ALEXANDER: So, still doing Little H on the P, huh?

Still doing Little H on the P. This time we had Alexander back from college. Dags was out, but Amelia was here too. Let’s go!

We open with some doofy march music from the Rose. 

I think this is a new tune, but it sounds awfully familiar. I’ll go back and check if it was previously used in “The Winoka Warriors.” [UPDATE: It wasn’t. – WK]

(I’ll admit my brain is overstuffed with Little House data at this point and I’m having trouble keeping track of it all.)

Anyways, this music accompanies Andrew Garvey and Albert, who are tromping through a field carrying a saw and an ax, respectively.

They’re walking parallel to a stone fence that I think we’ve never seen. I’ll go back and check if it was the place where the dogs chased the sheep in “The Wolves.” [UPDATE: It wasn’t. – WK]

ALEXANDER: Are those tire tracks?

WILL: Yeah. The Little House tour bus just came by so people could gawk at the actors.

They come to a barnyard, and inside the barn we see a familiar face. Well, we see his ass first. (Not as familiar.)

The ass guy is a-workin’ on a yellow wheel of the sort normally attached to Yellow-Wheeled Buckboards. Perhaps he is their manufacturer?

Albert and Andy report that they’ve finished chopping wood, and when the man looks up we see it’s Miles Caulder, the farmer whose wife suddenly aged fifty years because Charles Ingalls left town.

Farmer Caulder said they did such a good job, he’ll pay them to come back and help him clear a field. They’re always clearing fields on this show, aren’t they? I mean, not as often as they plow them, but it’s a close second.

Caulder’s pay rate is apparently 20 cents a day.

ALEXANDER: They’re getting screwed. Twenty cents a day? 

AMELIA: How much was that?

WILL: About six dollars.

ALEXANDER: They’re getting screwed.

Caulder smiles and pays them for their work. He seems to have recovered nicely from his depression. 

I’m sure his wife has regained her youth and beauty as well. In fact, that’s probably who “Mrs. Lavish” was!

David Rose lightens his touch considerably as the kids walk home (though if you listen closely you’ll notice it’s just a mellower arrangement of the same march tune).

Albert, who you may have forgotten is a math savant a la Spotted Eagle or Mary Ingalls, says if they keep doing odd jobs for people, they’ll have saved $10 ($300) or $12 ($375) by the end of the summer.

The boys say they don’t have any plans for spending it, they’re just going to hoard cash like Ebenezer Sprague before his conversion to philanthropist and city benefactor.

(They don’t actually bring Sprague up, I just thought it was a good simile.) 

Since Albert implies it’s the beginning of summer, and since we were explicitly told Mary’s wedding was in August, that means we must be in late May or early June of 1884-H. 1884 is the furthest out we’ve gotten in any of the timelines.

Over at Casa dell’Ingalls, Laura is complaining Albert isn’t keeping up with his chores when the kid himself comes strutting in.

AMELIA: Albert’s taken over the show, huh?

WILL: Yup.

Pa says Albert’s half of the loft apartment is a mess.

ALEXANDER: We saw that baby in Walnut Grove, right?

WILL: Yeah. Well, one of her. She was played by twins, like the Carries. I can’t tell which one is which, though.

ALEXANDER: Yeah. It’s hard to tell babies apart.

It was Wendi Lou Lee (Turnbaugh) we saw whilst visiting the Grove. Can anybody out there tell the Turnbaughs apart? As babies, I mean, not now.

Laura says Albert’s side of the room also stinks. Anyone who has raised sons will not have trouble imagining this.

Pa takes Albert outside, saying the chicken coop looks like shit, or more than is desirable anyways, because he hasn’t been cleaning it.

Albert says he’s got a full-time job now, so he thinks he should get a break on the chores, old man.

Pa throws his hands up and says (rather unbelievably) he can’t believe anyone would want to work during “summer vacation.”

AMELIA: Was that even a concept in rural America at this time? Summer vacation?

ALEXANDER: Yeah, I thought they just sent kids off to work in the mines.

Albert says Charles doesn’t do any work at the end of the day, and Charles says “Of course I don’t!” 

WILL: Who wrote this one? Pa’s always working evenings and weekends! Making wagon wheels, carving bassinets, inventing that Pelaton of his . . . 

The writer was Don Balluck, who also wrote “The Aftermath” and “The High Cost of Being Right” – two other stories that featured out-of-character behavior from some of our protagonists.

Albert demands to know why he and Pa should be treated differently, and Charles, who always has to play the town liberal, sputters helplessly rather than just saying because I’m the dad that’s why (as my dad would) or giving him a beating (as Nels would).

To be fair, Albert is an excellent debater.

AMELIA: He’s holding his own against THE Charles Ingalls. That’s impressive.

But no, Charles just tells Albert to clean the chicken coop, then keeps muttering to himself.

WILL: This is a Comedy Charles one.

Over at the Old Sanderson Place, Sexy Bandana Alice Garvey (that’s what her action figure in this outfit would be called) is telling Andrew she doesn’t want him working. I don’t understand, these families are always strapped for cash, but suddenly they don’t want their kids to earn extra money?

Even Carrie took a job potato-picking once.

Jonathan Garvey says he doesn’t understand what the problem is either.

Alice’s objection is apparently that Andy might find the working world so appealing, he won’t go back to school in the fall.

Andy says actually, he wanted to talk about that. 

He says Jonathan didn’t have formal schooling and he wound up fine, so he “don’t see no need” to continue his own education.

“ANY need!” Alice snips. I have a pedantic streak myself, but I hate when people correct/ridicule other people’s grammar or spelling to suggest they’re less intelligent and shouldn’t be listened to. 

It happens all the time on social media; but in my view, bad ideas are worse than bad grammar.

Besides, while Alice’s speech isn’t as colloquial as her husband’s, she does say “telegraph” when she means telegram, and “scaring” when she means frightening, so she’s not perfect herself.

Jonathan quickly clarifies to Alice that Andy’s idea was nothing he suggested. He says when he was a kid, “there weren’t no school” but he definitely would have gone if there were.

AMELIA: School didn’t exist?

I think schools had actually been invented by 1859, when Garvey would have been thirteen.

WILL: Garvey doesn’t seem that undereducated. I mean, he does say “They’s wolves!”, but he’s more educated than Mr. Edwards. He can read, Doc says he knows more about animals than anybody he’s ever met. 

In fact, he and Charles are more believable as friends because they’re of the same social class. Mr. Ed was a drunk illiterate hillbilly. (No offense to all the drunk illiterate hillbillies out there trying to read this.) 

But Charles and Garvey are true peers.

The Garveys never had a proper introduction story, so we don’t know anything about Jonathan’s background, or about where any of them came from, in fact; so who knows. Maybe he was raised by wolves himself.

Anyways, Andrew responds to his father’s reminiscences by saying “So?” and Alice snaps, “Oh, sew buttons on your shirt!” 

(This saying is more commonly phrased as “Sew buttons on your underwear”; my own mom used to say, “Sew buttons on your underwear, Joe!” It was popular in the 1970s and probably didn’t go as far back as the 1880s. But I couldn’t find clear evidence of its origin.)

Alice then sends Andy to his room. Seems harsh, considering this has just been a theoretical conversation.

David gives us a sad French horn, which is fine; but it’s playing Albert’s theme, which isn’t. (Albert is nowhere to be seen.)

Jonathan Garvey quietly tells Alice that he accepts her judgment, but he don’t look happy about it. 

(An airplane contrail is briefly visible during this scene.)

That night, in Chuck’s barn, Garvey and Charles discuss what to do about Andrew and Albert. I’m not sure why. What we’ve seen so far isn’t really a problem. It’s scarcely even a situation. 

But the dads are taking it quite seriously.

They say the kids don’t realize they just aren’t ready for adulthood yet.

Garvey says when he was young, an “old trapper” he knew got kicked in the face by a mule (ow), and so Young Jonathan took a gig checking and setting traps for him.

The job entailed spending three whole days in the woods alone, which Garvey says was much harder than he expected.

AMELIA: Is something the matter with him? Why’s he talking so low?

WILL: Yeah, I don’t know that he’s ever spoken this quietly.

Garvey concludes by saying he later learned his father had followed him to make sure he was all right.

Charles stops varnishing the chair he’s been working on (because, you know, he never does any work on his own time) and says they should repeat that exercise with the two boys.

He says the road between Walnut Grove and Sleepy Eye “winds around some of the roughest country in the state.” 

WILL: No it doesn’t.

Charles proposes they tell the boys to walk to Sleepy Eye on some pretext and they can follow along and laugh at them.

Garvey chuckles, which gets Charles whinnying/screaming with laughter, of course.

ALEXANDER [shaking his head]: Charles’s laugh.

AMELIA: Yeah, oh my God.

(This is I think the first time we’ve gotten a good look at Charles’s fillings. Who’s the dentist in Walnut Grove, I wonder?)

We cut to the fathers and sons walking on a road through the woods. The men give the boys some beef jerky, saying they can supplement it by fishing and catching rabbits along the way.

Charles says he’s sent a letter along to Sleepy Eye via Mustache Man Express, which the boys need to bring back to prove they made it. I wonder why Sleepy Eye was specifically chosen? Springfield is fifteen miles closer along the same road.

Albert asks if when they get back they can make their own decisions from now on, and Charles says they can, employing an unfortunate racist expression meaning “I’m not shitting you” that was actually in use in the 1880s.

Albert and Andrew say they’ll be back in about a week, and begin their adventure. [UPDATE: Reader Leslie nicely pointed out that I originally said Albert and PATRICK say they’ll be back in about a week, etc., just like Hersha Parady does in a famous outtake from “The High Cost of Being Right.” Thanks for the correction – Walnut Groovy regrets the error! – WK]

WILL: I don’t get this marching music. This might get the Groovy for worst music of the season. 

ALEXANDER: Yeah. Is this a Landon episode?

WILL: No, it’s Clax.

ALEXANDER: Yeah. You can tell it’s the other guy. Landon never would have accepted this music.

WILL: . . . Wait, are you making fun of me?

Pa and Garvey laugh that the kids will surely get frustrated and turn back after a few hours.

Meanwhile, Albert (very sensibly) suggests they catch a ride with a passing wagon rather than walking the whole way.

ALEXANDER: This kid’s awesome.

AMELIA: Yeah. Charles doesn’t understand he’s up against somebody who’s lived on the streets and is smart.

But dull Andrew says that would be cheating – a compunction he’ll have lost by our very next story, but never mind that now.

ALEXANDER: What a loser!

Either way, I don’t understand why they’re walking through the brush when surely the road would be faster, even if they didn’t hitch a ride.

They bicker for a while, which has the ring of truth because of course they’re really brothers, then continue on through the woods.

David fires up the marching tune, but I have to give him credit, because this time he brings in the Albert melody on top of everything, quite nicely. He always wins me back.

The boys hear a running river and decide to stop for a bit. 

Stalking along behind them, the dads hear the kids shrieking and rush to see what’s happened.

AMELIA: Which one of them is screaming like a girl?

WILL: I think Albert.

But when they reach an overlook, they see the boys have just decided to go swimming and are splashing each other.

Darkness falls, and we see Albert frying up some fish over a cookfire.

ALEXANDER: They really shouldn’t have that fire. People will see it.

WILL: I don’t think they have to worry about that. It isn’t a zombie armageddon.

A ways off, Charles and Garvey sit on the forest floor envying the kids their food.

Garvey says he thought the boys were supposed to have given up by now, and Charles bites his head off.

At the campfire, the boys are in better spirits, Andrew having conducted a brief botanical survey of the area.

But as street-smart at Albert is, he doesn’t know how to cook, and he ruins their fish dinner.

ALEXANDER: “Oh, damn.”

Andy shrugs it off, though, and Albert says he doesn’t even like fish. He says he’s never bought the claim that fish is “brain food.”

I couldn’t find whether this notion (which it seems is at least partly true) was around in the Nineteenth Century. It certainly was by the time of P.G. Wodehouse’s Jeeves and Bertie stories, Bertie often attributing Jeeves’s genius to a fish-based diet. 

Wodehouse, the funniest author in the history of our species, was writing in the 1920s and 1930s (and 1940s, and 1950s, and 1960s, and 1970s), so the concept definitely existed by then.

Anyways, an owl hoots, which I mention in case we have any owl obsessives out there. My sister is one. She once dreamed her late father-in-law visited her in the form of an owl, but that’s another story.

Back at the other camp, Charles and Garvey can’t sleep because it’s so cold.

ALEXANDER: Didn’t they say it was summer?

AMELIA: Maybe they’ve been gone longer than we thought and it’s now fall.

Charles says he never should have listened to Garvey’s stupid childhood stories in the first place.

After the break, we see the generic sunrise/sunset shot they’ve used a couple times now.

Garvey and Charles are snuggled up.

ALEXANDER: They’re spooning?

AMELIA: Well, for warmth.

They rise, and fortunately the show doesn’t make any gay jokes (this time).

Garvey says since there “ain’t no more fishin’ between here and Sleepy Eye,” the boys won’t do so well today. 

I had assumed the river they stopped at was the Cottonwood, of which Plum Creek itself is a tributary; but if it really was the last place to fish, it’s probably Coal Mine Creek – meaning the boys covered about twenty miles their first day. Not bad.

Meanwhile, the boys wake to a horrible screeching: They’ve caught a rabbit in a snare!

AMELIA: Oh no, Bigwig!!!

Andrew grabs the rabbit (a big yellowish one, obviously from a pet store) and gets it out of the trap. 

WILL [as BIGWIG, slurring on blood]: “I’ll kill him.”

But both boys are too squeamish to slaughter Bigwig, and they let him go.

Later that day, they come to a nice meadow with the forest sort of spooning it, Garvey-style.

They have a brief discussion about how hungry they are.

WILL: Are they going to eat their boots, like Captain John Franklin?

ALEXANDER [singing]: “. . . and I’ll take the Northwest Passaaaaaage . . .”

Albert and Andrew decide to turn back.

AMELIA: Now what is THIS music?

The men are delighted to see their sons giving up.

Andy then finds a bush of blackberries or boysenberries. (Unlikely in June.)

They pick the berries, some for eating, some for keeping.

WILL: I don’t know that there’s much nourishment in those. Man shall not live by boysenberry alone.

This windfall changes their minds, and they press on towards Sleepy Eye.

Charles and Garvey try to grab some berries for themselves, but the bush is bare.

Commercial.

A storm blows up, and Garvey says they’re nearly to Sleepy Eye. This means they’ve covered the forty miles from Walnut Grove in just two days, which is pretty fast for eleven-year-olds.

Indeed, it begins pouring, and the boys arrive at the Sleepy Eye Post Office just as it’s closing.

The Postmaster-General, a bland Postmaster-General type, gives them the letter Charles sent. (No ID required.)

He’s played by Will Hunt, who was on Highway to Heaven, Alice, Gimme A Break!, The A-Team, and General Hospital. (And in The Karate Kid Part II, in which he also played a postman.)

The P-G says the letter “come in quite a few days ago,” suggesting there was a considerable interim between Charles and Garvey coming up with this scheme and the boys actually starting the trip.

Albert and Andrew ask where they could find lodgings, and P-G says “the only rooming house around is Mrs. Channing’s.” 

This directly contradicts information given by Nels in “Here Come the Brides” that there are two accommodations, a “proper” hotel and a boarding house run by a Mrs. Leary.

But if Sleepy Eye was also affected by the “railroad war,” I suppose it’s possible those establishments closed, and this Mrs. Channing stepped up to fill the gap when things recovered. I’m fine with it.

On the way out the door, Andy worries that they have no money, but Albert says he has a plan.

AMELIA: Albert looks like Winona Ryder.

Over at Mrs. Channing’s, two old men are eating dinner.

ALEXANDER: I’d love to stay at a place like this. Eating dinner with a bunch of old bearded strangers.

Identified as “Spokes” and “Lundstrom” in the credits, these guys are familiar bit players from many, many things.

Lundstrom is Jack Perkins (a Wisconsin native, hey), who was in the movies Spartacus, Blazing Saddles, and the Cliff Emmich vehicle Invasion of the Bee Girls.

He was also in The Love Bug and Herbie Goes Bananas, if anybody else remembers that series.

On TV, he did Father Murphy, Bonanza, Gunsmoke, Star Trek, The Twilight Zone, Batman, Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley, CHiPs, and many others.

He also played “Drunk in Men’s Room” on an episode of Love Boat.

(I don’t know if this Lundstrom is any relation to the neglected lordling Peter Lundstrom and his father Count Olaf, or to Mary’s old enemy/boyfriend Lice-Infested Arnold Lundstrom.)

And Patrick Cranshaw is Spokes. He played a hobo in Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure and was in some other class movies, including Bonnie and Clyde, Bedknobs and Broomsticks (yeah!), Ed Wood, and Best in Show.

He was also in some non-class movies, including Mars Needs Women , Yes, Giorgio, and, in an odd coincidence, Herbie: Fully Loaded.

His TV shows are too numerous to list. Highway to Heaven, Father Murphy, Green Acres, Sanford and Son, The Bob Newhart Show, Wonder Woman, The Dukes of Hazzard, Mork & Mindy, Diff’rent Strokes, It’s a Living, Too Close for Comfort, Night Court, Quantum Leap, and 7th Heaven barely scratch the surface. 

The landlady comes in. She’s a very successful Little House creation.

“My land, what a sight!” she says, as she watches Spokes gobble mashed potatoes. “Not a tooth in his mouth, and he eats anything I serve up!”

“Yep,” says Lundstrom. “That’s ol’ Warren, all right.”

ALEXANDER [snorting]: This one’s pretty comical.

Mrs. Channing is a classic True Grit-style landlady. In fact, at first I thought she was the same actor who played the landlady in the Coen Brothers version, but she would have to have been over 100 to do so.

Mrs. Channing is really played by Dorothy Konrad, who was on My Three Sons, Petticoat Junction and Mayberry R.F.D., The Jeffersons . . . and The Love Boat, in which she played “Heavy Woman.”

And she was in Herbie Rides Again! What are the chances? I suppose maybe Michael Landon lurked around the set of the Love Bug movies recruiting top-notch talent. We can only hope Herbie himself will show up on the series at some point!

The bell rings, and Mrs. Channing finds the two boys at the door. She invites them out of the rain.

Sly Albert lays on the charm, giving Mrs. C a sob story about how they’re orphaned survivors of a terrible fire.

“Land sakes!” Mrs. Channing says, four or five times.

WILL: Divine would also have been good in this part.

Albert says they heard there was work available “up in Lafayette.” Lafayette is a real place, about 25 miles northeast of Sleepy Eye. It’s pretty small; I had never heard of it.

Mrs. Channing won’t hear of the boys going back into the storm. “Supper’s on the table, and I’ll get some towels,” she says.

AMELIA [as MRS. CHANNING, singing]: “Supper’s on the table and breakfast cookin’, Old Dan Tucker just stand there lookin’.”

And the next thing you know she’s bringing the “two little men” milk as they snarf their dinners.

ALEXANDER: Oh, THEY get to have milk.

I don’t think I’ve ever told this story, but it’s a family favorite. Once when Alexander and Roman were little, the household ran out of milk, and apparently when they said they needed it for their cereal, Dags turned to them and said savagely, “Just – use – WATER!”

At least, that’s the way they tell it. Dagny’s version is a little different, of course.

Mrs. C, who has taken a great interest in the boys’ welfare, offers them “rice puddin’” for dessert.

“Please, you’ve been too kind,” says Albert. 

But his face indicates he doesn’t like rice puddin’. (Albert is a picky eater; not only does he dislike fish, he also sneered at Ma’s Famous Mush.)

(It’s kind of funny, considering he grew up eating out of Winoka garbage cans.)

So Albert says she’s already given them too much, adding, “Next thing, you’ll offer us some of that chocolate cake over there!”

“And you’ll take it with no argument!” the landlady replies.

(I have to say, I find Matthew Labyorteaux a terrific child actor. His line readings are always perfectly considered.)

Albert gives an angelic smile and says, “So much like Ma, ain’t she, Andy?”

Outside, it’s still pouring . . . and we see Charles and Garvey are lurking in the bushes, watching the boys eat.

They begin to fantasize about the boys being taken to jail when the landlady learns they can’t pay.

Garvey says they should get some food for themselves, but they realize neither of them brought money.

They start arguing, when a pug-faced chap with a shotgun appears – the local constable.

There follows a scene where they tell the constable they’ve been following “two little boys,” and he thinks they’re pedophiles. (It’s quite funny, actually.)

“You don’t understand,” Charles says, and the constable says gravely, “I hope to St. Francis I don’t.”

ALEXANDER: This constable is good.

He is. He’s Charles Cooper, who played the sheriff on Father Murphy and who also appeared on the Victor French vehicle Carter Country. (And in You Are There, The Wrong Man, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Gunsmoke, Perry Mason, Dallas, and Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Charles and Garvey tell him it’s all a hilarious misunderstanding. Giving them the benefit of the doubt, the Constable says why don’t they just go and see if the boys recognize them.

But they say no, no, we can’t let the boys know we’re following them. This scene goes on for a while, but it’s a hoot.

Long story short, the Constable doesn’t believe them and tells them to get the hell out of Sleepy Eye.

The storm rages on, and Charles and Garvey seek shelter in the local livery.

Unfortunately, it’s also occupied by a gunman – presumably the blacksmith. (This episode has a surprisingly large cast.)

Garvey starts to explain that “we were following our two little boys,” but Charles elbows him to shut up.

The blacksmith is a badger-bearded man with a drawling accent that suggests the Deep South, or possibly Maine.

AMELIA: He talks like Major Knox.

Badger Beard is apparently named “Cooper,” and actor Gus Peters’s resume is extremely colorful, including horror films like Brain of Blood and Horror of the Blood Monsters (great titles, but I haven’t seen ’em) and sexploitation films like Angels’ Wild Women, Running Hot, and Superchick (in which he played a flasher).

He also was in the eighties film version of Flowers in the Attic – a favorite of Dagny’s that she describes as “awesome, but fucked-up.”

Badger Beard insults the “no-account drifters,” but says he’ll let them sleep in the auld byre – provided they muck it out first.

Charles turns to Garvey and mocks the guy’s accent, kind of bitchily.

AMELIA: Don’t goof on a guy who’s pointing a gun at your face, Charles.

Meanwhile, in Mrs. Channing’s comfy boarding house, the landlady is tucking the kids into bed.

WILL: She should sing to them. “I’m Called Little Buttercup” or something.

The bedroom is decorated with the same portrait of John Wilkes Booth that adorned both Mrs. Whipple’s and the Novack/Kovack family’s walls. I’m starting to think these pictures are part of some subliminal messaging.

Mrs. C gets one more “Regular little men!” in before closing the door.

AMELIA: That’s how you talk to the cat, Dad.

The next day finds the boys journeying back, in better weather. Mrs. Channing apparently sent them along with provisions to spare.

Meanwhile, Charles and Garvey trudge along wearily behind them.

ALEXANDER: Can Charles and Garvey afford to do this? Abandon their farms for six days?

That night, Albert and Andy relax by a cozy campfire.

WILL: I’m not sure the flute and harpsichord really works in the forest.

ALEXANDER: Sure it does. It’s the music of the elves.

AMELIA: Or the Gelflings.

Charles and Garvey, on the other hand, have to forage for roots.

ALEXANDER: Are those chives?

Albert and Andy come upon Coal Mine Creek again, but can’t find a place to cross.

WILL: Why don’t they just cross where they did before?

ALEXANDER: The river’s higher from all the rain.

WILL: Ooh, that’s a really good theory.

ALEXANDER: They just said it in the dialogue!

WILL: Oh. I was talking.

The boys manage to find a log to cross; only when Charles and Garvey try to do the same, they fall in.

Actually, Garvey falls and pulls Charles down with him. When I was a kid, the exact same thing happened to my sister Peggy and me on the playground. We were sitting on a balance beam, and Peg fell and, quite idiotically, pulled me off right on top of her, dislocating her shoulder. Peggy’s version is a little different, of course.

The river sweeps them away, and when they wash up on the bank, Charles looks at Garvey coldly and says, “You owe me a hat.”

That night, the tone shifts dramatically, as another peaceful evening at the boys’ campfire is interrupted . . . by an insane bearded tramp who emerges cackling from the forest!

AMELIA: Mr. Edwards???

It’s not Mr. Edwards. Sadly, the actor playing the tramp doesn’t get a credit.

The boys take off in terror, but all the tramp wants is their food.

ALEXANDER: Is Charles going to meet the hobo and try to adopt him?

The kids realize they left Charles’s letter behind at the campsite, but they choose to press on for home rather than face the scary guy again.

Later, Charles and Garvey find the campsite deserted, with the letter abandoned, and start calling for the boys in alarm.

The men race for home to gather a “‘My Ellen’“-type search party.

Charles and Garvey show up at the Little House, which is on the way to town from where they’re coming, but the timing is unclear. It’s still dark, so you might assume they marched all night to get home to Walnut Grove.

But when they get there, everybody is up, and in fact Alice Garvey is visiting, which you wouldn’t expect if it’s 3 in the morning.

Then again, it could hardly be the next night, because if they had a full day left to walk they would have stopped at Lamberton for help rather than go all the way home.

Oh well. Pa says they need to gather a search party – he doesn’t seem too upset, actually – but Ma interrupts him and says the boys got back safely “hours” ago.

Albert and Andrew say they’ll never believe it, but they claimed the letter, then lost it.

But the dads already know all. Everything gets explained, and for no good reason the boys say they’re quite happy to go back to being kids who get told what to do.

Voiceover Laura takes the reins at this point. She doesn’t tell us anything we couldn’t figure out for ourselves, though.

WILL: This is strange. Laura had literally nothing to do with this story.

AMELIA: Little House isn’t Little House until we get dubbed-over Laura.

The last thing we see is both men and boys going fishing together.

WILL: Look at that dead grass.

AMELIA: That’s what the real Minnesota will look like in twenty years.

ALEXANDER: Yeah. Plus overrun with feral pigs.

Bum-Bum-Ba-Dum!

STYLE WATCH:

ALEXANDER: Garvey’s jacket is awesome.

WILL: Canadian dinner jacket.

The Sleepy Eye Postmaster-General wears a cool raincoat.

Amelia liked Mrs. Channing’s dress.

Charles appears to go commando again.

THE VERDICT: 

ALEXANDER: That was funny. I liked that one.

WILL: Yeah. Would have been funnier if they brought Willie along, though.

Dumb, but delightfully so. Both Labyorteaux brothers give fun performances, and there are a lot of good character parts in the background. It is a little long, though.

UP NEXT: The Cheaters