"A Allan Adventure" is the third episode of Season Two of Smiling Friends.
Synopsis[]
Allan is tasked with finding more paper clips for the office. *Spits on you*
Plot[]
Allan wakes up at 6 AM in his apartment and goes through his morning routine. He nonchalantly greets a very satisfied woman who he had spent the night with, before opening the door to meet his landlord. His landlord, clearly mentally unstable, asks Allan if he'd like to hang out with him so they can smoke weed, fill their stomachs with diet soda and play Burnout Revenge for the PlayStation 2 together. Allan declines his offer and heads to work.
Mr. Boss has given Charlie and Pim their latest mission, which they believe to be their most exciting mission to date. They run off as Allan enters. Mr. Boss gives Allan the task of getting more paperclips for the office, even promising a special reward in the process. Allan first tries the city's office supply store and gets into a confrontation with Armzo whilst he's stacking shelves. Armzo's boss overhears the commotion and yells at his employee, before telling Allan that they've sold out of paperclips, with the only place that might still have them being Plilford's Electro Shack in Crimeville.
Heading there, Allan tries to buy the paperclips off of Plilford, but he explains that this is his last box of paperclips, and their unique shape is "perfect for tinkering with any device". Allan points out how this shape is identical to Plilford's nose. When Plilford tries it out, he finds it even more effective than the paperclips, and gives Allan the box for free in gratitude.
As Allan leaves, the box of paperclips is swiped by DJ Spit. DJ Spit commandeers a helicopter and Alan grabs onto the railing. He tries to get DJ Spit to stop, but the SoundCloud rapper plans to head to Tijuana. Military personnel see the two fly through a no-fly zone and launch two fighters to target them. DJ Spit tries to fend them off, but one of them shoots them down with a missile, crashing them into a forest.
Allan manages to make it out of the wreckage alive (Spit isn't so lucky), only for the paperclips to be stolen by a sasquatch. As the sasquatch takes a loud pee, Allan sneaks into his den and tries to grab the clips, only to drop them onto a pile of bones. The bones reanimate as a skeleton pirate captain, who decapitates the sasquatch and makes a run for it with the paperclips, summoning his ghost ship. Allan makes chase, first in his own boat and then via makeshift waterski, but both Allan and the ship are devoured by a sea monster. Grabbing the cutlass from the dying (again) pirate captain, he stabs the inside of the sea monster in frustration, which launches him out into the ocean. Washing up on shore, Allan finds the paperclip box. However, he opens it and finds a ransom note, telling him to come to his apartment complex.
Arriving at the specified apartment, he encounters his landlord again, who tells him that the day's events were entirely orchestrated by him (including the crash and the sasquatch). Allan threatens to attack him for the paperclips, but the landlord reveals a bomb vest and says he'll do it only if he fulfills his earlier demand, else he'll blow up the entire city. Allan begrudgingly agrees. The two are shown playing Burnout Revenge, with the Landlord mocking Allan's abilities and being a bad sport. As Allan thinks about how to escape the situation, Plilford appears, repeating his remark about how the paperclips are good for tinkering with electronics. Plilford then clarifies that this isn't a memory and it's his actual spirit; he died shortly after Allan left, and his spirit promptly returns to Hell. Grabbing a paperclip, Allan deactivates the Landlord's explosive vest. Declaring that he has brought shame to his ancestors, the landlord commits seppuku.
Back at Smiling Friends HQ, Charlie and Pim remark that their latest adventure was the best one they had yet. Allan drops off the paperclips and his reward is revealed to be a miniature version of Mr. Boss. Disappointed with the reward, Allan gives it to Charlie. This hurts Mr. Boss’s feelings but he ultimately concedes with Allan’s decision not to keep it.
In a post-credits scene, the Landlord awakens at a morgue, vowing that he will get Allan to hang out with him again.
Characters[]
- Allan
- Mr. Landlord (Debut)
- Allan's Partner
- Pim
- Charlie
- Mr. Boss
- Glep (non-speaking)
- Plilford (Debut)
- DJ Spit
- Smormu (Cameo)
- Armzo (Debut)
- OfficeCrap Manager (Debut)
- Sasquatch (Debut)
- Skeleton Pirates (Debut)
- Leviathan (Debut)
Title in other languages[]
| Language | Title | Translation |
|---|---|---|
| Czech | Díl o Allanovi | The Allan Episode |
| French | L'Épopée d'Allan | The Epic of Allan |
| German | Ein Allan-Abenteuer | An Allan Adventure |
| Polish | Przygoda Allana | Allan's Adventure |
| Portuguese (Brazil) | A Aventura do Allan | The Adventure of Allan |
| Spanish (Latin America) | La aventura de Allan | Allan's Adventure |
| Spanish (Spain) | Una aventura de Allan | An Allan Adventure |
Transcript[]
To view this episode's transcript, click here.
Gallery[]
To view this episode's gallery, click here.
Trivia[]
General[]
- The synopsis for the episode, with the asterisks, is a reference to a recurring bit on OneyPlays where the cast say actions surrounded by spoken asterisks (i.e. "spits on you") to pretend as though they are doing an internet roleplay.
- Pim and Charlie's job for this episode remains a mystery.
- What's also a mystery is the cause of Plilford's death and the reason he ended up in Hell.
- This episode has been nominated for an award at Annecy 2024.
- The title is intentionally spelled with a grammatical error, as normal grammatical conventions suggest it should instead be "An Allan Adventure."
- It was initially erroneously listed as "A Allen Adventure," with Allan's name spelt with an "e" instead of an "a".
- This episode reveals that Allan travels using an electric scooter.
- The Skeleton Pirates were animated by RadioTV [1], a studio located in Los Angeles, California. The lead animator on the scene was Kevin Bissell [2].
- The studio also produced a stop-motion Smiling Friends bumper for Adult Swim, consisting of Charlie getting a dental exam.
- The sea monster seen in the episode was designed by Justin Noel, animated by Sade and cleaned up by Smallbu Animation [3].
- On the back of the ransom note, one can notice the following sketches:
- Three Cool S signs, one of which is extra detailed.
- The cover art for Burnout Revenge, with a person added in the right car.
- Erotic artwork of two critters (obscured by cut up letters).
- Though entirely speculative, the episode was likely made in response to numerous complaints about Allan’s lack of screen time throughout most of the first season of Smiling Friends despite making such a strong impression in the pilot episode. As such, this is the first episode in the series to focus solely on another character. His further inclusion in "Gwimbly: Definitive Remastered Enhanced Extended Edition DX 4K (Anniversary Director’s Cut)" as accompanying Pim instead of Charlie has shown a level of awareness towards his popularity.
- This marks the only time both Pim and Charlie are minor characters in an episode.
- This episode was co-storyboarded by Australian comic book artist Sheldon Vella.
Episode references[]
- This marks the second appearance of Crimeville, the first was in "Frowning Friends."
Cultural references[]
- Allan has a green towel in the opening scene, serving as an unintentional reference to a story told on “The Very Positive Stream," about Zach and Michael's friend Adam Paloian getting his green towel back from his ex-girlfriend.
- Zach has confirmed the reference was completely unintentional and the color was picked due to the shot containing a lot of blue and red [4].
- The game Mr. Landlord wants Allan to play with him is Burnout Revenge, a racing game published by Electronic Arts in 2005 for the Xbox, PlayStation 2, and Xbox 360. In the end credits, EA are credited for giving permission to use Burnout Revenge footage.
- The cover shown is the actual North American cover of the game, though the EA logo on the front cover was airbrushed out.
- The gameplay footage used in the episode was recorded by Joshua Tomar[5]. It was likely played on an emulator, as it features a black skybox, which is a known issue when playing the game on older PS2 emulators in hardware mode [6].
- Shortly after this episode aired, Iran announced that their president, Ebrahim Raisi, had died in a helicopter accident. As DJ Spit also perished in a helicopter accident, this is the second episode in a row that oddly tied into current events in a way the creators wouldn't and couldn’t have intended.
- The first was "Mr. President," the previous episode, due to a worm being found lodged inside Robert Fitzgerald Kennedy's brain.
- The OfficeCrap manager’s design is very similar to the work of cartoonist John Callahan, creator of Pelswick and Quads. Callahan, who was a quadriplegic, would draw and write many cartoons and strips that made light of his affliction to help others with similar disabilities. Incidentally, the manager has no arms.
Videos[]
References[]
- ↑ https://www.radiotv.tv/
- ↑ https://x.com/kevins_computer/status/1792409092121673867
- ↑ https://x.com/SmallBuStudio/status/1792733359455789433
- ↑ https://www.reddit.com/r/SmilingFriends/comments/1cwu77c/comment/l4ylg5x/
- ↑ https://x.com/tomamoto/status/1792729134327824860
- ↑ https://wiki.pcsx2.net/Burnout_Revenge