Hair Licked is episode 23a of Rocko's Modern Life. In this episode Rocko is having a very bad hair day on the day he is supposed to pose for a newspaper photograph.
Plot
At Kind of a Lot-O-Comics, Rocko is having trouble getting the copy machine to work. By the time he gets it fixed, he gets caught inside it as he presses the 'Start' button and turns into paper form. Just then, Mr. Smitty walks in and tests the copy machine to see how well Rocko fixed it. As Mr. Smitty leaves, Rocko reminds him about his raise. Mr. Smitty suggests that instead, he will make Rocko employee of the month and get his picture on the newspaper.
At Rocko's house, he looks in his photo album for his best photo to have on the paper. But every last one of them are horrible and Rocko refuses to put any one of them on the paper. He then gets a call from Filburt, who has a new career as a photographer and offers Rocko a visit to get his picture taken, much to the wallaby's delight. So Rocko decides to get some sleep to prepare for tomorrow.
The next morning, he wakes up and goes to the bathroom, and to his horror, his hair is shown in the mirror a horrified mess. Heffer comes over and notices this. He endeavors to give Rocko a new hairstyle, but it ends in failure. So Heffer asks Rocko if he would like to choose paper or plastic.
As Heffer is driving with Rocko, the wallaby had chosen paper and Heffer apologizes to Rocko for exacerbating his hair. They enter a hair shop called Ooh, That Hair, which is owned by Chuck and Leon. They give Rocko a number of hairstyles before finally giving him a hairstyle similar to Heffer's.
At Filburt's trailer home, Rocko poses the "classic windswept look" while Filburt snaps pictures of him. But he forgot to reload the camera and hasn't got a single photo of Rocko. So Rocko has to start over and is eager to take his next picture. But his luck soon runs out when Heffer inadvertently tips a fan over, which causes the rotating blade to fall directly onto Rocko's head, cutting his hair in the process as the picture is snapped.
At Kind of a Lot-O-Comics, Rocko has trouble keeping his now-ruined hair in place. Heffer enters the store and apologizes to Rocko for what happened the other day. When he sees a copy machine, he grabs Rocko and photo copies his face. The picture comes out and Rocko, pleased by his new look, decides to put it on the newspaper.
At Rocko's house, he and Heffer are eating breakfast and get a newspaper with Rocko's blurry face (which the two mistake for his hair) on the front page. Little do they know, the other citizens who look at it make fun of the picture.
Characters
Trivia
- The title card is a parody of the logo for the original Broadway production of Hair. In the title card, the music is a "Rocko" version of the song "Aquarius" from the show.
- Another Python reference is made on the newspaper at the end. One of the headlines mentions a big puddle found by "Eric Half-a-Bee", a reference to a song from the album Monty Python's Previous Record.
Cultural References
- When we see the various photos of Rocko during his photo-shoot, one of the photos makes Rocko look like "Popeye," the famous comic strip/cartoon character. Another picture resembles the famous shot of Marilyn Monroe in The Seven Year Itch.
- As the Chameleon Brothers style Rocko's hair, one style they refer to as "too Gidget" (in reference not to the original movie but the 1966 TV series starring Sally Field); they also mention it as similar to That Girl, due to it's similarity to star Marlo Thomas.