Leave It to Beaver (TV Series) Beaver Plays Hooky (1959) User Reviews

More Bad Advice From The Devil, Er, Larry

[ccthemovieman-1 · 8/10 · 16 January 2007]

Here is yet another episode this season in which Larry Mondello talks Beaver into doing the wrong thing. Larry Mondello must be the Devil, and Beaver is so stupid he's powerless under Larry's spell. Whatever bad things he suggests, Beaver always goes along...and then pays for it later on. This time, the two skip school. "It's always better to get yelled at later than now," says Larry, as the two boys are late for school for the third time and don't want to get yelled at by authorities (Miss Landers and Mr. Bloomgarden).

Meanwhile, Wally gets sent home from school by the nurse. That's fine with him. Earlier, Wally wanted to get a tattoo. June was horrified but Ward explained, "Every boy wants to get a tattoo, but I've never met one that got one." Wow, have times changed!

One segment was very funny. Wally asks to watch TV for an hour while he's waiting for the doctor to arrive at home (times have changed there, too). While watching TV, he and his mom see Beaver and Larry on television! (How they got there, you'll have to watch the show). Anyway, Wally is laughing his butt off and June is horrified.

In the end, Miss Landers provides the words of wisdom to Beaver.

Today Miss Landers would be yelled at.

[pensman · 8/10 · 23 July 2017]

Ward and Wally are ready for the day but Beaver is running late; but there is Larry Mondello waiting to walk with Beaver to school. There is a warning from June, no more dawdling to school but there is; the boys stop to look at an excavation. While watching, a truck rolls over their books and lunch pails. Once again they arrive at school and everyone is inside.

Beaver says we better get in anyway, but Larry suggests they just cut for the whole day. Wally gets sent home early by the school nurse and June calls the doctor just in case. Larry and the Beaver are hiding behind a billboard bored and hungry. Both boys figure they are starving to death. Should they try a policeman; not when you're playing hooky. Maybe try a supermarket, sometimes they have free samples.

The boys get in a line for free samples not knowing they will be on a TV show, the Marshall Moran show. Just the show Wally wants to watch as long as he is home sick, as sometimes they show Westerns.

Not only are the boys on TV, they get interviewed by the host. Both Wally and June happen to be watching the interview and realize Larry and Beaver are playing hooky. And even on TV they are terrible liars trying to explain why they aren't in school. June wants to go get the boys but she has to wait for the doctor. June decides Ward can leave the office; and she wants him to get to the supermarket to get the boys; and pick up some clothes pins.

The boys have left and are behind the billboard again. Beaver wonders if anyone saw them. Larry as usual looks at Beaver and says, well it was a pretty stupid idea of yours to ditch school. This time Beaver says no way, it was Larry's idea.

Ward found Beaver wandering around and took him to the school; and told him to march right in and tell Miss Landers what he did. Wishy-washy June worries that might have been too harsh a punishment. We can only wonder what she wouldn't have done if she found the boys.

June can't believe Beaver didn't have the good judgment not to miss school. Beaver shows up in Miss Landers room and tries to explain his reasons why he wasn't in school. Miss Landers isn't buying the explanation. She explains that Beaver showed he doesn't respect his teacher or his school. Beaver says he sorry and won't do it again.

Next day Beaver claims he and Larry won't be late again. When Ward asks if the Mondellos know what happened, Beaver says they do. Did Larry volunteer the information. Yes sir says Beaver, just as soon as his father started walloping him.

There is a short scene where Wally asks if he can get a tattoo. June says no and that's it. Times change. I have seen children as young as third graders with tattoos. Yes, real tattoos even though it is illegal to tattoo a minor. Their parents didn't want to argue with them. Same in middle school, and high school today is what it is.

Also, I am interested in the changing views toward missing school. You have no idea how many parents see no problem with their kids missing a day or even a week. The parents believe it is the teachers who should stay after school and provide any missing assignments. It's truly for far too many, a world without consequences. In many schools, teachers cannot say the word punishment or even correct an assignment using a red pen. Both are deemed hurtful to the child. As I said, times change.

Beaver wastes time

[AlsExGal · 8/10 · 20 January 2024]

On the way to school, Beaver and Larry Mondello get distracted by an excavation crew. When they realize what time it is - because one of the trucks involved runs over their lunches - they also realize they will get in big trouble at school since it will be their third time to be late. Larry convinces Beaver to skip school entirely instead.

Hunger eventually drives them to the live TV show of a Buffalo Bob like character because the sign outside says they are giving away boxes of chocolate bars. When the boys end up being interviewed on live TV the jig is up in a way that would not have been possible ten years before.

Larry Mondello seemed to be the instigator for 90% of the trouble that Beaver got into. And yet, oddly enough, Ward and June never think about removing this troublesome influence from their son's life. With them seeing each other at school every day, though, perhaps this was just not practical.

Having nothing really to do with the plot, in the beginning of the episode, Wally wants to get a tattoo. Ward blows the whole thing off as something all boys want but never actually get. Ward and June would sure get a shock to see things 65 years later. People today have tattoos so large they look like the prologue to Star Wars.

Beaver on Television

[MichaelMartinDeSapio · 10/10 · 16 December 2015]

Everybody commits a little indiscretion now and then, but what would you do if you found your misdeed broadcast on TV for all to see? This is what happens to Beaver and Larry in this iconic second-season episode. It's typical that the misdeed starts out small and grows to huge proportions: the boys linger too long watching the construction workers before going to school and miss the beginning of class, forcing them to play hooky. Then, when they wander into a supermarket to get something for lunch, they unwittingly find themselves on a TV show! Larry compounds matters by telling some on-air fibs about why they are there. Beaver must then second Larry's fib, and...you get the picture. Once you eat of the forbidden tree, it becomes a domino effect and a labyrinth you can't get out of (to mix my metaphors).

As luck would have it, Wally was home sick at the time and was watching TV in bed just as Beaver and Larry appeared on the show. At the end, Beaver is given a talking-to by Miss Landers; stuff about not throwing away a day of your life and all that sort of thing. Beaver departs properly edified and we depart richly entertained.

Anyone notice the billboard that Beaver and Larry hide behind while playing hooky? It is a travel advertisement and reads, tellingly: "Get away from it all!"

BEAVE AND LARRY'S FERRIS BUELLER DAY OFF!

[tcchelsey · 10/10 · 21 December 2023]

You have to love this episode, which "may" have inspired the ever famous FERRIS BUELLER, some 20 plus years later! There are similarities. Ferris was the adventurous young man, and the same could be said about Beave and Larry, minus the sensationalism.

Without fail, Larry suggests they take a day off, especially when they arrive late at school and everyone is inside. And that's one of the worst situations to experience if you are a kid! Of all the lopsided things to happen... they end up on a "live" tv show, hosted by gregarious Marshal Moran (played by veteran actor Richard Lane). Moran actually stokes the fire, going out of his way to showcase these two little guys. They are sitting ducks!

You have to admit, there's a bit of realism to this story. Had Beave and Larry been hanging around on a weekend, with absolutely nothing to do, they would have NEVER been in a tv show! Nothing even close! Bottom line, strange things always seem to happen when you are having a strange day, and that goes double for adults! That is fact.

More over, Wally comes home sick and just happens to be watching tv with June --and see Beaver and Larry on tv! What are the odds of that? If Beave and Larry were in school, Wally, in all probability, would have been sick in bed and June too busy getting medicine and doing housework. Again, strange happenings that are not outside the realm of possibility.

Credit the always resourceful, if not prophetic Dick Conway, who wrote 72 imaginative stories for the series. Interestingly, Richard Lane was best known for playing detectives in scores of movies. This is quite a different role for him, though just as loud as ever, and fun to watch.

An episode to marvel, and to remember our own hooky days! Hands down. SEASON 2 EPISODE 17 remastered Universal dvd box set,

Some posters, geez....

[pmike-11312 · 9/10 · 13 July 2023]

I'm getting tired of reading how awful some of the Cleaver boys' friends are, that they are the devil - and how stupid Beaver is. Good grief. Must be millenials and Gen-Zers who were never allowed outside and had supervised "play dates" (which is why they are what they are). Who among us didn't have friends who were mischief-makers who could talk their friends into doing things "against the rules"? It always sounded exciting and fun to those of us who generally behaved.

Larry and Eddie were present in virtually every neighborhood, and the rest of us grew up and learned not to follow them (after getting in trouble a few too many times). Incidentally, some of the trouble-makers grew up to be some of the finest people you could imagine - I know a couple. These later generations are such feeble and useless people (generally). Sad.

Wally Wants To Get Tattooed

[StrictlyConfidential · 5/10 · 3 November 2020]

Being a really bad influence on Beaver, Larry Mondello convinces his gullible pal to skip school with him. (How many kids in 3rd grade would ever dare to do something as bold as this?)

Out of sheer starvation (ha!) Beaver and Larry end up at C & J Supermarket where irksome TV personality, Marshall Moran is plugging chocolate Rocket Bars. ("They're powerful good!")

As it turns out - This visit of Moran's to C & J is being televised which (as expected) exposes Beaver and Larry to a wide audience of television viewers (including Beaver's brother and mother).

Anyway - Things for Beaver turn out even worse than he had at first anticipated.