C.J. and Friends: Taking the Fifth Grade

## No More School

The first episode begins with The Recess Gang starting the fifth grade. At first thought to be the best year ever, they soon discovered otherwise. First, Mr Boyd becomes the fifth grade teacher instead of the desired Mrs. Chocolaty, who had transferred. This is combined with their lockers being taken away, the cafeteria food being substandard, and the playground being removed.

In response to these atrocities, C.J. goes to see Principal Prickly, who says that he couldn't do anything because it was the school board's policy. Consequently, C.J. claims that she would stay in her room and never go to school again. Word soon gets out, compelling every student at 98th Street to gather at C.J.'s house. Prickly tries to compel C.J. to come down, but the school board finds out and dispatches Mr. Black (from the episode "The Story of A-Wors").

Mr. Black claims that he will allow C.J. to remain in her room, but promises that her friends will suffer for it. C.J. then seemingly concedes, allowing Mr. Black in her room, only to find that C.J. climbed on top of the roof. Unfortunately, C.J. almost falls off the roof, but Prickly saves her. It is then that Prickly decides to join C.J.'s protest, admitting that he too hated the policies.

Amazed to see that Prickly is standing up for C.J., the board members find out that they too hated the policies, but they were just things that each of them was too afraid to stand up to. Realizing their mistake, the board members vote to alleviate the policies for good, much to the dismay of Mr. Black, having been beaten by a kid a second time. Afterwards, things at 98th Street are returned to normal, aside from having Mr Boyd as a teacher.

## The Fifth and Sixth Graders' Club

In the second episode of the movie, the gang is introduced to the Fifth and Sixth Graders' Club, where both grades can cooperate. At first C.J. and the gang think that they are going to like it (in part because Rachel is banned for being a snitch), but they soon find their enthusiasm fading.

However, Mickey and Rus still like to hang out with the other fifth graders. C.J., Rigalli, Greta, and Vance begin to lose patience with the general negative attitude the club encourages towards younger students. In response, they get Queen Barb (the former Queen) to sneak them into the Fifth and Sixth Graders' Club before everyone else arrives. But C.J. and the gang bring along two first graders, Chubby and Harold, who were Mickey and Rus' respective friends.

Whilst harmony is restored their actions are not without consequence as Queen Florence II bans them from the Fifth and Sixth Graders' Club.

## A C.J. and Friends Halloween

In the third and final episode of the movie, Rigalli and her parents go to a pumpkin patch where Rigalli picks an ugly pumpkin for Halloween. Dawson and his gang are also at the patch, telling Rigalli that she is too old for Halloween and that they are only there to throw the pumpkins, not make them into lanterns. She too believes that she is too old for Halloween, and consequently asks her parents to leave. However, her parents tell her that they have to get a picture of her sitting on a giant pumpkin like they have done since she was a baby. Meanwhile, a little girl cries while sitting on the pumpkin for her photo. Guilted into it by the baby pictures, Rigalli sits on the pumpkin, but it gives way and bursts under her weight, and so Mrs. Rigalli never takes the photo. Seeing this, Dawson and his posse begin to laugh at Rigalli, while littler kids play in the pumpkin's contents. Mr. Rigalli comes to the conclusion that Rigalli really is growing up (physically).

Back at school, where Mr Boyd is dressed as a fairy princess (and coincidentally, Rachel dresses up as a fairy prince, though it does not impress Mr Boyd) and offers up yam cupcakes with prune icing, he starts up a song about a sweet-toothed vampire. At lunch, C.J. and the gang are talking about Halloween, Rus stuck on what he is going to wear, as Principal Prickly is dressed up as the former was planning to dress up as. Rigalli comes in and says that she is too old for Halloween, eating a lunch from home and going away. The gang remembers all the good times they had with her on Halloween.

Halloween finally comes and Rigalli's parents are going out while she is staying home. While she is watching a movie, the diggers knock on the door, see her expression, and tell her that they will tell the other kids to skip her house because she is not in the Halloween spirit. However, she tells them not to warn the other kids so that she can pretend she is scared. When the next lot of kids come and she pretends to be scared, the kids are not meant to be scary. In return, she scares them by wearing a scary mask and screaming "Take candy and go to the next house". She then closes the door smiling. When the next group of kids comes, she gives them tips for being dinosaurs by putting ketchup over their suits and telling them to roar from the stomach. The next trick-or-treater is a werewolf who howls and actually scares Rigalli. However, the werewolf takes off its mask and it is actually Mr Boyd, as this is his replacement costume when the moon comes out. He comes in looking for Rigalli's parents, giving her advice about Halloween and that some people, like her, never get too old for it. He then gives Rigalli her phone number in case her parents come home early, and then goes out trick-or-treating.

Meanwhile, C.J. and the gang are out trick-or-treating, Rus wearing toilet paper as a mummy costume. Their worries over Rigalli have ruined the magic of Halloween, along with the discoveries that someone (who turns out to be a dentist) is giving out sugar-free sweets, a building they thought was a haunted jail is really a closed down DMV, a zombie is really a robot, and gravestones are really just wood. They go home disappointed until Rigalli finds them and brings them to a home which they used to believe vampires inhabited. She persuades them to go in and the door locks behind them. Rigalli then goes into a door and screams while various monsters advance on C.J. and gang. One of them is the werewolf, who is once again Mr Boyd in disguise and the other monsters are all the other teachers. They give the gang a heap of candy and the gang's Halloween spirit is restored, while outside Dawson and his gang are scared off by Mr Boyd's wolf howl.

### Closing

The film cuts later to another day of school where C.J. and the gang play a calm game of kicking the ball to each other during recess until the bell rings. As C.J. and his friends, along with Mr Boyd and the other children, go inside the school to their classes, C.J. narrates that even though things change as they grow up, sticking to what they believe and staying true to themselves will make everything okay.

And as Mr Boyd is about to close the doors, C.J. waves to the audience saying she got a feeling that it will be the best school year yet, and that she really means it. Mr Boyd then sighs, and as C.J. moves to her class, Mr Boyd gently shuts the doors, thus ending the film and the series.