Magic School Bus Episode Guide

This is an episode guide for The Magic School Bus cartoon series. See the main Magic School Bus page for more informtaion on characters and related information.

Season 1

• The Magic School Bus Gets Lost In Space (1994)
  • Topic: the solar system
  • Arnold's know-it-all cousin Janet, is coming on the field trip this time. They are going to the planetarium to see a show about the solar system, but it's closed for repairs. On the way back to school, they start to blast off and fly into outer space. They visit all the planets and learn about them, but in the asteroid belt, they lose Ms Frizzle and find themselves lost in space. This episode is a cartoon version of the book The Magic School Bus Lost in the Solar System.

• The Magic School Bus For Lunch (1994)
  • Topic: the digestive system
  • Arnold finally gets his wish by staying at school while Ms Frizzle takes the class on another weird field trip. What he doesn't realise is that it's a trip inside him!

• The Magic School Bus Inside Ralphie (1994)
  • Topic: the immune system
  • It's broadcast day and the class needs Ralphie. The trouble is that he's sick, so his mother, a doctor, won't let him go to school. When Ms Frizzle says that there is an amazing battle going on inside him, the class decides broadcast day should be about whatever is making Ralphie sick. The bus shrinks and travels inside Ralphie in order to solve the mystery.

• The Magic School Bus Gets Eaten (1994)
  • Topic: food chains
  • Arnold and Keesha were supposed to do a "Two-Beach-Things-That-Go-Together-Report," but they both completely forgot about it. Keesha only brings a tuna fish sandwich, and all Arnold brings is "scum" he got on his shoe when he stepped in a puddle. The two don't have anything in common, do they?

• The Magic School Bus Hops Home (1994)
  • Topic: habitats
  • Members of the class are bringing animals to school and Wanda has brought her frog named Bella. But, thanks to Arnold, Bella escapes. Wanda is now bent on getting her frog back. Ms Frizzle takes the class to several different places, until they find a perfect frog habitat.

• The Magic School Bus Meets The Rot Squad (1994)
  • Topic: decomposition
  • Wanda won a tree in a game Ms Frizzle invented. She decides to plant it in a lot with a rotten log. First, she decided that she would have to get rid of the log, so she calls a lumberjack to remove it. When she says, "It's dead, it's useless, I mean look at it!" to Arnold who isn't convinced that the lot should be cleared out, Ms Frizzle decides to give them a closer look at it. She shrinks the bus to take them on a field trip exploring the log.

• The Magic School Bus All Dried Up (1994)
  • Topic: the desert and animal adaptations
  • Phoebe is worried about all the poor animals living in the desert. How will they ever survive? She decides to go to the desert in order to do something about it, and for once Arnold isn't complaining. He has a field trip survival guide.

• The Magic School Bus In The Haunted House (1994)
  • Topic: sound
  • Carlos has invented a new instrument, but it sounds awful. The class is on their way to the sound museum for a performance when the bus breaks down, but they spot an old house. The class enters to look for a phone, but the door locks behind them, forcing the kids to stay the night.

• The Magic School Bus Gets Ready, Set, Dough (1994)
  • Topic: chemistry
  • It's Ms Frizzle's birthday and the class wants to throw a surprise party for her, but they don't have a cake. The bus is acting up on their field trip to the bakery, and it shrinks. How will they make Ms Frizzle a cake when they're around a millimetre tall? Note: this episode is called The Magic School Bus Gets Baked In Cake in the TV-Tie-in-Book.

• The Magic School Bus Plays Ball (1994)
  • Topic: friction
  • Dorothy Ann has brought a book about physics, but everyone else thinks it's boring. Ralphie borrows it from her to use it as a replacement for home base. D A doesn't learn of this until they set off on a field trip. Ms Frizzle decides to back up and get the book, but the bus shrinks and lands on page 97 which has a friction-less baseball field. The class soon learns that friction is needed for the simplest actions, from playing baseball to walking. However, when they are about to leave, the wind blows the book shut, trapping the kids and Ms Friz in the book.

• The Magic School Bus Goes To Seed (1994)
  • Topic: flowers
  • The class is planting a garden, but Phoebe's plant is at her old school. The students decide to go there, but Phoebe is worried about Ms Frizzle embarrassing her.

• The Magic School Bus Gets Ants In Its Pants (1994)
  • Topic: ants
  • The class is going to make a movie about ants and Keesha is the director. The trouble is, they can't find a star.

• The Magic School Bus Kicks Up A Storm (1994)
  • Topic: weather
  • Ralphie thinks he's Weather Man, but Keesha is trying to convince everyone he's not. He decides to prove his worth by leading the class on a field trip to make a thunder storm.

Season 2

• The Magic School Bus Blows Its Top (1995)
  • Topic: volcanos
  • According to Ms Frizzle, there is an island so new it hasn't been discovered yet. Carlos wants to name it "Carlos Island," but Dorothy Ann has decided to get a name by looking in a book. However when they arrive, there is no island. Ms Frizzle says it's because the island hasn't arrived yet. In the end, it turns out that the island was created by an underwater volcano.

• The Magic School Bus Flexes Its Muscles (1995)
  • Topic: how bones and muscles work together
  • The bus is acting up, so Ms Frizzle decides to take it R U Humerus' Body Shop for repairs. Meanwhile, Ralphie has been dreaming what it would be like if he had a robot to do all his chores. So he and the rest of the class (minus Keesha) want to try building one using all the gadgets in the body shop. First, they'll have to understand how bones and muscles work, though.

• The Magic School Bus: The Busasaurus (1995)
  • Topic: dinosaurs
  • This is the cartoon version of The Magic School Bus in the Age of Dinosaurs. This episode's main aim is to show that dinosaurs weren't all terrifying monsters, like movies often make them out to be. The only period seen is the Cretaceous Period (all periods all visited in the book,) which is obviously due to time constants.

• The Magic School Bus Going Batty(1995)
  • Topic: bats
  • Ralphie is convinced that Ms Frizzle is a vampire. She moves like a vampire and talks like a vampire! In any decent movie, she would be the vampire. The Friz is now taking all the kids' parents on a little field trip and Ralphie is convinced she is going to do something horrible to them. This episode teaches that bats aren't a vampire, and that they are fascinating creatures.

• The Magic School Bus: Butterfly And The Bog Beast(1995)
  • Topic: butterflies
  • The class needs a new mascot for their soccer team, the old mascot being so old that nobody even knows what it is anymore. Phoebe is convinced it should be the butterfly but obviously, the rest of the class doesn't agree with this. Janet (from The Magic School Bus Lost in Space) shows up again and convinces the class that their mascot should be the "Bog Beast." Since nobody seems to know what a bog beast is (that's probably because they don't exist), the Friz takes the class on a trip to the swamp to find out. Somehow they learn a lot about butterflies.

• The Magic School Bus Wet All Over(1995)
  • Topic: the water cycle and the waterworks
  • The class is excited about going to Water Land. Wanda and Arnold are working on a project together and somehow Wanda convinces him to go to the Girls' Bathroom with her to get water. He accidentally leaves Ms Frizzle keys and Liz in the bathroom. When they leave to go to Water Land, Ms Frizzle instead uses a spare key which turns the bus, class and the Friz into water. They go through the water cycle.

• The Magic School Bus In A Pickle (1995)
  • Topic: microbes
  • The kids have just come back from vacation and found that the vegetables that won some sort of contest have rotted. Keesha is particularly distressed, not because her first prize cucumber has rotted, but because it's gone and has been replaced with pickle. Keesha reasons that the door to the classroom was locked over vacation and Ms Frizzle had the key. To everyone's surprise Ms Frizzle admitted that she had done something to Keesha's cucumber. The kids put Ms Frizzle on trial and make Liz the judge. It is a bit shocking that Arnold chooses to be Ms Frizzle's lawyer. The Friz claims that Keesha?s cucumber was turned to a pickle by the "Mike Robe Gang" and takes the class on a field trip to prove it.

• The Magic School Bus Revving Up(1995)
  • Topic: how vehicle's engines work
  • Mr Junkett, a vehicle maintenance inspector, wasn't pleased when he inspected the magic school bus. In fact, he decides to take it to the junkyard to smash it! The Friz and the class have to do something to save their bus. Naturally, they have decided to shrink and go inside it. All the problems seem to be caused by peanut butter, as Mr Junkett was eating a peanut butter sandwich while inspecting the bus.

• The Magic School Bus Taking Flight
  • Topic: flight
  • Wanda and Tim have built a model airplane together for a model show. Ms. Frizzle decides to shrink the class, so they can fly in it. Tim, Pheobe and Liz stay on the ground to operate the remote control, at least until it gets smashed. The class learns all about flight. Meanwhille, Tim, Pheobe and Liz turn the bus into an airplane to go rescue them.

• The Magic School Bus Getting Energised (1995)
  • Topic: energy
  • At the Walkerville carnival the kids are running the ferris wheel, however it doesn't work for some reason. Mikey, Carlos' little brother who is wheelchair bound comes to the rescue. Since electric power doesn't work they decide to use the energy of falling rocks. If the people ride in one side of the ferris wheel and the rocks land on the other, than it will cause the wheel to turn without hurting anyone. The problem is how to get the rocks to the ferris wheel.

• The Magic School Bus Out Of This World (1995)
  • Topic: space objects(asteroids, comets and meteors)
  • Dorothy Ann has spotted an asteroid that will hit earth and destroy their school. The class has decided "to find it, follow it and finish it off." They also encounter a meteor and comet in this episode. This episode was influenced by science fiction television, for example, this bus' space ship form resembles the Millennium Falcon from Star Wars and Ms Frizzle has a Princess-Leia-styled haircut.

• The Magic School Bus Gets Cold Feet(1995)
  • Topic: reptiles
  • Liz has disappeared and the trail leads to Herp Haven, which is some kind of spa for reptiles, where they saw a woman have a turtle "toasted and stuffed, just like the last one." The class has decided to lead a rescue mission to find Liz, on which they learn about reptiles and how they need to move from place to place to get comfortable because they are cold blooded, which comes in handy, as Ms Frizzle turned them into some.

• The Magic School Bus: Ups And Downs (1995)
  • Topic: sinking and floating
  • The reporter Gerri Poveri is reporting that there is a monster in Walker Lake (apparently based on the Loch Ness Monster, as it is also plesiosaur-like) The class is very eager (especially Wanda) to find it. Phoebe also wants to find the monster so she can feed it. However, the bus' automatic sinking button is broken. So they will have to find some other way to get it to sink. They succeed by adding weight and "crumpling" the bus. However, at the bottom, they discover that the monster was a fake, Geri Poveri made it up to increase her ratings. Now they will have to make the bus float again, so they can tell the truth to the public.

Season 3

• The Magic School Bus In A Beehive (1996)
  • Topic: bees
  • When Wanda and Tim were delivering honey from Tim's grandfather's bee farm, all the honey went down the gutter in an accident. Tim managed to convince the Friz to take them to get more honey, but on the way there Ms Frizzle drives down a road other than the one that leads to Tim's grandfather's bee farm. When Tim points this out, Ms Frizzle says, "Who said anything about going to your grandfather's bee farm?"

• The Magic School Bus In The Arctic (1996)
  • Topic: heat
  • Arnold wants to know what happened to the heat from his hot cocoa. Ms Frizzle thinks it is fitting to learn about heat in the land of ice and cold, so she takes the class to the Arctic. However, she accidentally drives the bus in the water, and the bus freezes. To make matters worse, the bus has been trapped on an ice flow with Pheobe, Ralphie and Liz. The class will have to get to the bus and heat it up to escape.

• The Magic School Bus Spins A Web (1996)
  • Topic: spiders
  • The class has gone to drive-in movie, where the movie featured is Stand by Your Mantis(1953), about General Araneus, who is atempting to destroy a giant praying mantis. Two members of the class aren't enjoying it, Carlos and Pheobe. Carlos dosen't like insects and Pheobe is upset and declares that if she were in that movie, she'd trap the mantis, and take it somewhere else and free it. Naturally, this gives Ms. Frizzle an idea. So she drives the bus into the movie. General Araneus takes over the bus, and kidnappes Liz and pushes a button that makes the class go back out of the movie and shrink. He wants to use Liz as bait for the praying mantis! Outside the movie, the class encounters spiders a lot, and when Liz pushes a button that pulls them back in the movie, they apply what they've learned about spiders to stopping the General from using Liz as praying mantis bait. Note: Stand by Your Mantis is an entirly fictional film.

• The Magic School Bus Under Construction (1996)
  • Topic: how structures stand
  • The class is going on a field trip to the new suspension bridge their building. However, there is a problem, Ms. Li (Wanda's mother) needs Wanda to watch Wanda's little brother Willaim until she gets off her bussiness call. The class decided to watch William together. William, only a toddler, accidentally shrinks the entire class (sans Liz) and the bus and locks the class in the bathroom. The class uses the materials available to them, to build structures to escape. This is the only episode where the bus dosen't turn into anything.

• The Magic School Bus Gets A Bright Idea (1996)
  • Topic: light
  • Janet(from The Magic School Bus Lost in Space and The Magic School Bus: Butterfly And The Bog Beast) was disapointed by the all-school field trip to a light show. She tells the class she could do something magic with light that would knock their socks off. She tells them she can't because of the ghost that haunts the theater. When the class leaves the theater they find Arnold missing. When the enter the theater again, the see Arnold's ghost. Keesha, the sketptic, is conviced that it is really trick done by Janet to scare them.

• The Magic School Bus Shows And Tells (1996)
  • Topic: archeology
  • The class is on some kind of show and tell game show, one person shows and the other tells. Arnold will be bringing his rock collection and Dorothy Ann will be doing the "tell" part. However, Arnold arives without his rock collection. He found a strange object, that he thinks would work much better, but nobody even knows what it is. Ms. Frizzle then takes the class on field trip to found out. She turns the bus into Suppose-O-Tron, that can test their hypthosises.

• The Magic School Bus Makes A Rainbow (1996)
  • Topic: color and light
  • Ms. Frizzle and Liz have invented a magical pinball machine that uses light instead of balls(the light travels much slower than in the real world.) The light goes through a prism and the player attempts to bounce the different colored beams of light into the appropriate eye, in order to "make the rainbow." Ms. Frizzle says if she fails to win the game, it will be taken away. The class decides to help, and they shrink the bus and go inside the machine. Mr. Ruhle, the principal, shows up, and Arnold tries to stall him.

• The Magic School Bus Goes Upstream (1996)
  • Topic: salmon migration
  • Ralphie is wondering what happened to all the salmon. They need them for the school fish frey, but they aren't here. The Friz has decided to take the class on a field trip to find out. She turns the bus into a salmon and puts a compact disk in the bus that makes it think like a real salmon, so it will go wherever Ralphie's salmon went. However, when the bus starts migrating, Ralphie changes his mind about doing anything to find out what happened to the salmon. He and some kids in the class atempt to stop it, but to no avail.

• The Magic School Bus Works Out (1996)
  • Topic: the respiratory and circulatory systems
  • At this years Teacherathalon Ms. Frizzle is competing aganist Mr. Sinew, the gym teacher with giant muscles. Janet(from The Magic School Bus Lost in Space, The Magic School Bus: Butterfly And The Bog Beast and The Magic School Bus Gets A Bright Idea)shows up again, and supports Mr. Sinew, convinced there is no way Ms. Frizzle can beat someone who can destroy shirts simply by stretching his muscles. Ralphie wants to know what lungs have to do with how your muscles work, so they go on a field trip inside the Friz, herself!

• The Magic School Bus Gets Planted (1996)
  • Topic: photosynthesis
  • The class is performing a play on Jack and the Beanstalk. As Pheobe gets stage fright, she decide to make the props. However, there is problem with the beanstalk. She tried to grow a real one, but it didn't work. So she tried to build one but that didn't work either. Natually, the Friz turns her into bean plant. However, no one is sure how plants get food.

• The Magic School Bus In The Rain Forest (1996)
  • Topic: the web of light
  • The class has decided to give the Friz a present for Earth Day, a coca bean tree in the Amazon(as coca beans are used to make chocolate.) The day just happens to be the day the first shipment rechease them, but for some reason, the tree has produced no coca beans. They go to the rainforest to find the reason and Ms. Frizzle makes Tim and Dorothy Ann "RFI"s(Rainforest Investigators.) Ms. Frizzle tree is in a patch of the rainforest controlled by Inseptor 47, who talks with a strong accent and runs around the rainforest in a white suit. He is very proud that he got rid the mud in his patch of the rainforest, however they class finds out at the end that that was what caused the absence of coca beans. The mud holoes was where the insects that pollunated the coca pods lived and it is revealed that Inspector 47 covered the rainforest floor with artificial gerp. They explain this to him and he decides to "rip up zis filthy artificial gerp with my bare hands." This is the only episode with narration. It is narrated by Dorothy Ann to give it more "mystery" feel.

• The Magic School Bus Rocks And Rolls (1996)
  • Topic: erosion
  • The class is building a statue of Captain Walker, their city's founder. Captain Walker left instructions on how wanted this statue maded in the form of a poem. Ms. Frizzle's class interpets it to meaning he wants it made without the use of hands. However, the statue breaks off the top of the mountain, and falls down. The Friz turns the bus into a rock and follows. Water erosion reduces the satue to a head by the time they reach the bottom. Desprate to get to the caramony, the bus cracks open a dam of rocks that has formed and slides down the mountain. However, the found that somehow they made the mountain into a statue of Captain Walker's head and relize that Captain Walker wanted his statue made through erosion.

• The Magic School Bus Holiday Special (1996)
  • Topic: recycling
  • It is the day before the winter holidays, and the class is taking stuff to the recycling center(which is run by Murph, one of Ms. Frizzle's relatives.) Wanda is going to see The Nutcracker, and is bringing a toy soilder, as instead of taking money, they are taking toys to give to homeless children. As usual, something goes wrong. Arnold mistakes the soilder for something there taking to the recycling plant and Wanda's soilder is turned into plastic pellets. Wanda declares she wishes recycling had never been invented. Naturally, this gives the Friz an idea. She turn the bus into an anti-recycling machine, which changes the city to the way it would be without recycling. It cuts down the forest, and turns recycling trucks into garbage trucks. The kids are confussed when it turn the swing set in the part into aluminium cans, etc. Wanda is still pleased, if recycling hadn't been invented, then her soilder is still waiting for them in school. However the bus turns the school into garbage dump when they get there. Finally, the bus un-recycles itself! The kids recreate the bus, and the Friz changes the bus so it changes everything back. This episode features Chanukah rather than Christmas.

Season 4

• The Magic School Bus Meets Molly Cule
  • Topic: molecules
  • Wanda's favorite music star, Molly Cule, is coming to Walkerville. Wanda wants to have the great honor of washing her car. The class set up car wash. Molly Cule, miraculous chooses theirs over automatic car washes. The reason for this is explained, when Molly Cule says that she can't afford to have her hood orinment get wet. When Arnold askes what it's made of, she says, "That's my little secret, Sugar." She countinues to call Arnold "Sugar" for the remander of the episode. After they clean the car, she found a tiny blot of tar on the car using a "megameganfier." The class shrinks down to the size of molecules to find it, and clean it off. However, when they get back Wanda accidentally knocks Molly's hood orniment into a bucket of water. It occures to Arnold that her hood orniment is made from sugar, from what she said when he asked her what it was made from. The class shrinks down to the size of molecules to rebuilt the hood orniment. After they start, they began to crystalize. The class gets to partistipat in Molly's concert.

• The Magic School Bus Cracks A Yolk
  • Topic: chicken eggs
  • Mr. Ruhle(from The Magic School Bus Makes A Rainbow) gave the class the task of caring of Giblets, his pet chicken. However, Giblets "flies the coop" and the class decides to get a new Rhode Island Red to replace Giblets. Naturally, they decide hatch one from an egg. They learn on their trip that both a male and female chicken are needed to produce a chicken (though it is never explained why, being a children's show.) At the last minture Giblets returns. "I guess he who flies the coop, can always fly back again," says Ms. Frizzle.

• The Magic School Bus Goes To Mussel Beach
  • Topic: tidal zones
  • The class has gone to the beach, but Ralphie insists on keeping the class in one spot, which the rest of the class think is the most rotten spot on the beach, being crowded with other people. Ralphie, however, insists that this is where they want to be. Ms. Frizzle hears that "Uncle Shelby" needs a special spot saved. Eager to get away from Ralphie's spot, the rest of the class agrees. However, they find the inhabitant of this spot is not human - it is a mussel. They decide the middle tide zone is too crowded so they decide to find a spot. However, they find worse problems in the low tide zone and the high tide zone, so they eventually come back. When they get back to Ralphie, they try to apply what they've learned to convince him to change spots, but they discover he did have his reasons for picking the spot - the ice cream truck stops there.

• The Magic School Bus Goes On Air
  • Topic: air pressure
  • For the Walkerville space capsule, Ms. Frizzle's class has to put in something on air. Keesha beings an "empty" pickle jar though, "it's not empty; it's filled with air." The rest of the class beileves this is extremely pathetic and Ms. Frizzle "accidently" get the entire class stuck inside the pickel jar. Conveniently, they have to use air to get out the jar in time for the space capsule's liftoff.

• The Magic School Bus Gets wetlands
  • Walkerville is debating whether to build a mall where the swamp is now, or to built to somewhere else. With the flip of a coin, Ms. Frizzle's class finds themselves defending the swamp and Janet(from The Magic School Bus Lost in Space, The Magic School Bus: Butterfly And The Bog Beast, The Magic School Bus Gets A Bright Idea and The Magic School Bus Works Out) arguing against them. However, the class finds out that the swamp is home to several organisms, but Janet finds this arguement little more than a joke and the city agrees. That is until a tree gets knocked over by lightning, blocking off the swamp and flooding the city. After the crisis is resolved, the city realizes that if they were the build a mall on the swamp, it would be washed away.

• The Magic School Bus Goes Cell-Ular
  • Topic: cells
  • Arnold is about to have the honor being the first kid to receive one of the Rocky Awards at the annual Granite Awards. However, he has an embarrassing prediciment. For reasons that are never exactly explaiend, Arnold has eaten only Seaweedies for a month and has consequently turned orange. ("It's my favorite color; except when it's own my skin.") The class has to learn about cells and how they get energy to solve the mystery before Arnold is forced to accept the award. It turns out the Seaweedies are high on carotene and Arnold's exclusively eating of them has pigmented his skin.

• The Magic School Bus Sees Stars
  • Topic: stars
  • It's Dorothy Ann's birthday, but unfortunatly she's sick and has to stay home. The class doesn't know what to get D.A. as a present until they see Horace Scope on S.S.N. (the Star Shopping Network) who's selling the stars for seven dollars each. Tim reasons that if every student puts in a dollar, they will be able to buy Dorothy Ann a star and name it after her. However, Keesha refuses to put in her dollar, as her grandmother was once duped by a similar organization (the Home Mopping Network.) Therefore Ms. Frizzle takes the class on field trip to see the three stars being sold by Horace Scope for themselves.

• The Magic School Bus Gains Weight
  • Topic: gravity
• The Magic School Bus Makes A Stink
  • Topic: smell
• The Magic School Bus Gets Charged
  • Topic: electricity
• The Magic School Bus Gets Programmed
  • Topic: computers
• The Magic School Bus In The City
  • Topic: animals that live in the city
• The Magic School Bus Takes A Dive
  • Topic: symbiosis