The Forest Attacks!

The Forest Attacks! is episode 1 of The Mysteries of Alfred Hedgehog.

Premise[]

A big race is going to be held in Gnarly Woods and Milo decides to get some more practice in before it starts. But while out on the path he is suddenly attacked by an unknown source!

Was it one of the other competitors trying to sabotage him or someone else?

Summary[]

Spoiler warning!
Warning! Following text contains plot details and may spoil the storyline.

It's a bright, sunny day in Gnarly Woods and together Alfred and Camille are decorating the area for the upcoming race. Milo is one of the competitors and Camille reminds Alfred that their principal gave her the job of setting everything up, so everything has to be perfect. As Alfred hangs one of the banners, he turns to find Milo running at him and they collide. Milo apologizes after being scolded by his friends, and he helps clean up while explaining that he was really excited. He got a lot of equipment to help him for the race and he thinks it will improve his chances.

It's then someone starts making fun of him, Cynthia Payne. She assures Milo that his fancy new equipment won't help much, but her words encourage him to work even harder. He runs off for more training, only to realize he ran the wrong way and quickly turn around. Milo heads deeper into the forest until he hears a strange sound that distracts him, and he starts to worry when something suddenly flies out at him. He runs back after being hit by several more small objects to inform Alfred and Camille of what happened.

Alfred is concerned as he spots something in his hair, and he plucks it out. He can't identify it but believes it will be a clue in determining what happened. Camilla blames Cynthia, since she is competing against Milo and is probably trying to sabotage him. Alfred scolds Camille for throwing around accusations without proof, then he asks Milo to lead them back to where he was.

Just as something flies out, Camille uses the parasol she brought along to protect them from being hit, and once things calm down they notice the strange, popping sound Milo heard. Alfred makes a recording of the sound, and by now Milo is beginning to think Cynthia is involved, trying to scare him out of the competition. But they still lack concrete evidence, so Alfred suggests they return to the Hedgequarters for a review. There they replay the audio recording of the sound and note that it sounds like popcorn- but that doesn't make a lot of sense. So then they decide to talk to Cynthia at her place.

They find her on a treadmill and try to ask her some questions, but she brushes them off as Mrs. Payne comes by, providing an alibi for her daughter. They were out shopping at the nearby bazaar earlier, which means Cynthia couldn't have been where Milo was attacked. Cynthia demands they leave her property so that she can resume training.

By now, Camille is beginning to worry over the idea of having to cancel the race now. They don't want anyone to get hurt, but it's going to make the Principal lose faith in her if they have to do that. Alfred quickly calms Camille down and suggests they return to the scene of the crime again for another look. Before going, they bring along Winston Moose for help shielding them against the attacker, but this time they find a small plant pod on the ground.

After grabbing it, they return to Hedgequarters to re-examine each clue and in the process, realize the plant pod and seed fit together. Alfred looks up the plant on his computer to determine the seed came from a coarse bush- a thorny plant that bursts open when it overheats. Multiple seeds are released when this happens, and Milo just happened to be there when it happened. Which means there was no attacker.

Alfred returns to the scene of the crime with his friends and proves his theory after he locates a missing scrap of fabric from Milo's shirt when he fell into one of the bushes earlier. They express relief knowing they won't have to cancel the race now and return to the starting point to find everyone else preparing to begin. It starts and Milo quickly becomes neck-and-neck with Cynthia. But when they get to the coarse bushes, Milo tries to warn Cynthia to ignore the plants knowing they might burst again, but she ignores him thinking its a trick to distract her. The bushes burst open and she is assaulted by the seeds, causing her to panic and fall into a bush trying to defend herself.

Milo reaches the goal first, followed by the other racers. Everyone celebrates until a distressed, dirtied Cynthia shows up to claim she was attacked. The trio start to laugh knowingly.

Quotes[]

Milo: "Oh! I can't see anything. I can't see anything!"
Camille: "Open your eyes, Milo."

----

Milo (after falsely accusing Cynthia): "My mistake..."
Cynthia: "The mistake you made was entering the race! Ha Ha!"
- Mon erreur...
- L'erreur que vous avez faite était d'entrer dans la course!

----

Alfred: "It looks like... Small rabbit droppings..."
Milo: "What?! I was attacked by rabbit droppings?!"

----

Camille: "Canceling the race is out of the question. If I canceled it now then Mr. Thomas will think I'm incompetent and will never let me organize another event again!"
- Annuler la course est hors de question. Si je l'annule maintenant, M. Thomas va penser que je suis incompétent et ne me laissera plus jamais organiser un autre événement!

Trivia[]

As this was the very first episode, some noticeable differences include:

Facial expressions appear to be more exaggerated than in later episodes.
Tina, Louise and Gabby's voices sound different.
Winston looks a bit different.
Alfred pronounces Mysterious as "Mah-sterious".
Cynthia and her mother had a habit of mimicking each other, something they don't do in other episodes.
Milo scolds Camille for thinking about food, something she would go to do to him several times later in the series.

It is revealed in this episode that the bird characters like Cynthia have feathers for skin.
This is the first time Camille was seen with a phone. She would only be shown with her personal phone again during "The Phantom Footprints" and "The Mysterious Red Spots".
This is the first episode to have characters in alternate clothing.
- Milo's normal attire isn't shown until the next episode.
When the three return to the crime scene and Camille takes a drink from Milo's backpack, she suddenly spits it out. But there was no explanation as to why that was.

Goofs:[]

When Alfred points out their first clue, his hair line and eyebrows are oddly drawn.
Cynthia's running uniform is just a top and skirt, but when shown overhead during the race, leggings are visible.
After her "attack", Cynthia's number 4 is missing from her shirt.
Milo's shoes are dark blue, but during a few of the investigative scenes, his shoes are almost entirely orange.
Milo runs through a muddy puddle at the beginning, but he isn't dirty afterwards.
Orange detail is visible on Milo's shoe during the close up shot of them, but when he holds them up there is no visible orange.
Milo got attacked and his clothing was ripped up, but when they go to investigate the crime scene his clothes are fixed.
- Later Alfred finds the ripped off piece of the shirt.
If one looks closely, when the race is starting the placement of watchers change from scene to scene and it looks like some of the characters are duplicated.