The Box of Dirty Tricks (The Smurfs, 1981)

The Box of Dirty Tricks is a Season 2 episode of The Smurfs. It originally aired December 4, 1982 on NBC.

Summary
The Smurfs find a magic box and wonder if they should open it.

Why It Sucks

 * 1) Most of the Smurfs are out-of-character. While they make odd choices sometimes, they would never actually make a choice like this, which is opening a box and being caught by Gargamel.
 * 2) * They were all caught by Gargamel again in A Gift for Papa's Day, except they were trying to retrieve the hat Papa had to ambush rather than having a nonsensical food fight with no one to stop them and tell them off.
 * 3) The beginning is very rushed, as Gargamel and Azrael show up out of nowhere and discovered the old man of the mountain, get the box that belonged to him, and loses it very quickly.
 * 4) Many mean-spirited moments, particularly in the scene where everyone begins fighting (unaware that a Dirty Tricks cloud caused all this and got off scot-free without the Smurfs' acknowledgment).
 * 5) Animation Errors:
 * 6) *When the Smurfs argue to who should open the box, Greedy is seen wearing a regular Smurf hat instead of his baker hat and napkin, as he was seconds earlier and seconds later.
 * 7) *When the Smurfs help Hefty open the box, Brainy is not wearing his glasses.
 * 8) *When the Smurfs discover the box is empty, Vanity's mouth disappears.
 * 9) *There were eight Smurfs in Gargamel's pot, but when Papa rescues them, there are 13 of them (not including Papa).
 * 10) *Brainy was not seen in the pot, however he was heard at the end of the episode.
 * 11) The writers were still uncredited as usual in this season.
 * 12) A continuity error that is impossible in later seasons: in this episode, Clumsy angrily reacts to being pelted by smurfberries. But in later episodes (such as "The Masked Pie Smurfer"), he is creamed with a pie and reacts with confusion instead.
 * 13) The scene where Brainy Smurf got thrown out of the village came out of nowhere, with no explanation how he got punished. Instead, the episode cuts to Gargamel and Azrael walking through the forest and spot Brainy being thrown out of the village.
 * 14) Wasted potential, where it would've set up the climax where only one or two Smurfs escape from Gargamel's clutches, be aware of the Pink Cloud and tell Papa Smurf about what happened to the others the next morning. Instead, all the Smurfs were captured by Gargamel after they acted like complete fools and Papa Smurf wound up saving them from the evil wizard.
 * 15) The ending felt rushed, where neither of the other Smurfs actually apologize for their mistakes when learning about the dangers of the box and then we cut to the dirty cloud chasing Gargamel. The reason why it's rushed because it is structured incorrectly.
 * 16) *"I hope you learned a valuable lesson."
 * 17) *"Oh, we have, Papa Smurf!"
 * 18) *"Good! And I sure hope Gargamel has learned his lesson."

Redeeming Qualities

 * 1) Good animation and voice acting as usual.
 * 2) Papa Smurf is likeable, as he saves his little Smurfs from Gargamel.
 * 3) The other Smurfs dreaming about their favorite things through cloud bubbles is pretty creative.
 * 4) Brainy gets some comeuppance for his actions, despite their being no logical explanation.

Trivia

 * One of the most rushed Smurfs episodes, where it could've been expanded into a 22 minute episode. Other episodes that involve this problem include TBA, TBA and TBA.