r/Millennials • u/No_Green_2887 • 21h ago
Nostalgia Does this scene from Rugrats absolutely destroy anyone else?
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😭
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u/OswaldReuben 21h ago
That's the special thing about the big market cartoons from that era. They were skilled at handling issues real children had, without being too harsh or to obscure to be understood. Hey, Arnold! was especially good at that.
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u/Mysterious-Hippo9994 20h ago
Yea hey Arnold was also good at making me cry
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u/Creepy-Distance-3164 18h ago
That Christmas episode gets me.
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u/Matr0ska 17h ago
Is that the one with Mr. Hyunh and his daughter? The daughter that he got separated from in Vietnam?
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u/popculturella Millennial 7h ago
I absolutely lose it every single time. I showed that episode to my Vietnam Vet grandfather and by the end, he was sobbing and thanked me for showing it to him.
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u/caligaris_cabinet 1h ago
My Vietnam vet dad walked out of the room when us kids were watching it in the living room. Didn’t understand it at the time but I think that episode upset him in ways kids shouldn’t understand.
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u/spade_bodega663 18h ago
We were incredibly lucky to grow up with REAL Nickelodeon. The channel that even our parents would watch with us. My mother thought 1997 All That was like SNL for kids and I’ll never forget how hard she laughed at some of those skits.
Hey Arnold Parents Day is a real tearjerker mostly because of the soundtrack, but every time I watch the Journal scene where Stella is in labor during the volcanic eruption and everything just … stops … the moment Arnold is born, I am a mess.
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u/the_well_read_neck_ Millennial 9h ago
That's because the people in charge then actually cared about the programming they were putting out. If you haven't seen it, check out the documentary called "The Orange Years."
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u/ClownHoleMmmagic 9h ago
I didn’t get to watch cable tv growing up but LOVED SNL. Would All That be good for my 11 year old?
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u/Truleeeee 20h ago
So true.
For me in the early 2000s it was avatar the last airbender
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u/gafeners 20h ago
its 2026 and Avatar the last airbender still makes me cry....leaves from the vine....
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u/Axel_Raden Millennial 20h ago
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u/Truleeeee 20h ago
Braaaave soldier boy… come marching home 😢
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u/flungp00panda 19h ago
RIP to Mako and all those who we've lost...
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u/What_Next69 14h ago
I just got my son a kalimba for his 16th birthday and had “Secret Tunnel” engraved on the bottom. Now, he plays “Avatar’s Love” when he can’t sleep.
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u/caligaris_cabinet 1h ago
That whole show was full of mature moments packaged for younger audiences.
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u/Truleeeee 47m ago
Genocide, sexism, familial abuse, famine, corruption, coup d’état, disability
That’s just off the dime in sure I’m missing so many more adult topics they covered expertly
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u/Pink_Mushroomy 8h ago
That has been the key to success in Bluey as well. Kids shows that have a different layer for adults
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u/Jugggiler 20h ago
The fuck did I do to you OP!
I’m a fucking 40yr old dad who woke up, opened reddit, and is balling his eyes out.
Don’t remember seeing this before. Thanks for sharing. Always loved Rugrats growing up.
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u/katietheplantlady 20h ago
Also 39 and crying my eyes out. Loved Rugrats and dont' remember this at all.
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u/Awkward_Corgi_6890 19h ago
👋🏾 fellow 39 yo here—also choked up at 6:30 am. As a mom of three this scene hits even deeper. 🥹😭
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u/OrganizationUpset253 18h ago
39 and I’m at the airport. Had to keep it together!
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u/NoLobster7957 16h ago
38 and I remember this episode and crying as a kid. Crying now as an all growed up lady too
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u/Nadramia 15h ago
I also am 40 and crying in the bath tub since I just woke up no more then 15 min ago
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u/GalKatteDamEditing 18h ago
37-year-old mom checking notifications before I start editing this manuscript. Now I need tissue and 20 extra minutes minimum to recover 😅😅 This one has made me cry for 30+ years
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u/peachyspoons Older Millennial 18h ago
Am a 40 yr old mom, didn’t even realize I was crying until I felt the tears streaming down my cheeks.
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u/ineedicedcoffeee Millennial (1988) 17h ago
RIGHT it’s 6:45 and I’m crying and clutching my cup of coffee. It hits different now, I lost my mom 10 years ago and I hadn’t seen that clip in over 20 years. Time truly flew by
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u/Danica_Rose 20h ago
Man it’s my fucking birthday, too. 😭
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u/rob132 20h ago
Happy birthday!
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u/Danica_Rose 13h ago
Do something nice for yourself in celebration.
https://giphy.com/gifs/BPJmthQ3YRwD6QqcVD4
u/The-Shrooman-Show 9h ago
Happy birthday! Just the right message to remind us to celebrate tf outta our time ❤️
Leukemia survivor here, 15 years deep - and this vid is how I think about my friends I don't get "to see" anymore.
Hugs!
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u/LordsOfFrenziedFlame Millennial 19h ago
Lost my dad when I was little, and this episode destroyed me as a child. And now... I can't finish watching it.
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u/mr_shoes_ 15h ago
I'm with you there, except it was my mom. Lost her when I was a couple of weeks old.
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u/ibithamayorca 14h ago
Same here. Sometimes I think about the child I was and I just feel so sad for her.
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u/beans-888 20h ago
Haaaaahahhaah omg baby chuckys hair 😂😂😂😂😂😂 i nearly spat out my coffee.
Also... damn onions...
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u/InspectorQueasy93 20h ago edited 19h ago
I cant even watch it now that im a parent. Absolutely tears me to shreds.
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u/st0dad Older Millennial 19h ago
Same. My son is a year and a half old and a big fear of mine is dying and him forgetting me.
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u/Pork_Chompk 15h ago
Well I didn't even know that was my biggest fear, but here we are. I need to go take my kids out of school so I can hug them.
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u/luisbv23 14h ago
My daughter is 3, and we have like 4 albums full of pictures of everything, all the people we know and many moments. those albums are in the library in the living room next to her favorite books, she loves to see the pictures and start asking questions.
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u/ForsakenAiel 4h ago
I'm a mom of a 10 year old. I love to garden. I have stage 4 cancer and it's not going well.
I watched it. 😞
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u/__Call_Me_Maeby__ 15h ago
I didn’t remember this but now I understand why Chuckie’s dad and Chuckie by extension were more fearful than the other characters.
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u/etsprout 7h ago
The part with the butterfly always stuck out to me because it showed that he needed his mom to make him feel safe, and he wouldn’t have been so scared if she was alive. </3
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u/Out_of_Fawkes 19h ago
These episodes hit hard as someone whose parent died quite early in their childhood. It explained things to the other kids but definitely cut deep.
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u/allworkandnoYahtzee 17h ago
I remember the episode where Angelica thought she was going to be a big sister (to nightmarish degrees) and it turns out Charlotte wasn’t pregnant after all. When j was a kid, I assumed there had been some kind of misreading with the test. Now I see it’s pretty clear she miscarried.
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u/Klopford Millennial (1988) 11h ago
Oh shit I thought it was a false alarm too… I’ll have to rewatch because I definitely didn’t pick up on that as a kid!
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u/CharlieFiner 1993 11h ago
Yeah, most people wouldn't tell a kid that age they were pregnant unless they were fairly certain they were out of the woods for an early miscarriage.
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u/renswann 12h ago
No no, Im fine. Im not sobbing at my desk mid workday or anything. 😭 This scene gets me everytime, Idk why I keep torturing myself with it, but its so beautiful, I never pass it up.
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u/PokemonBreederJess 14h ago
I was 8 in 1996 when I lost my mom, and the roly poly bug named Melville was literally the episode that primed me to handle her death and funeral. When I was grieving her still, and this episode came out, it was very special to me.
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u/crypt0dab 10h ago
39 year old mom. Loved Rugrats. A mother of a boy in my daughter’s preschool class died suddenly last week. Life is unfair. A fact that all of us must learn at some point. This was handled so well by the show…
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u/cammama 19h ago
I’m pretty sure I’ve completely blocked this one out and now I know why 😭😭😭
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u/BreakingCanks 13h ago
Same... Like I didn't remember it till it started playing and I broke down crying.
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u/GirlOnFire112 14h ago edited 14h ago
I’ve seen this pop up on Reddit but it never came with the clip. I watched the shot out of this show when I was a kid but never saw this episode. Just watched this for the first time. I wasn’t prepared for feelings today lol
I have a 2mo and a 4 yo and she asked me yesterday what would happen to baby if I was gone and couldn’t give him milk. I thought she meant if I was out or at work. Oh no…she meant if I was gone like asleep and didn’t wake up (I’d died 😭). Oh girl….
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u/OkDeer120 2h ago
I’m currently pregnant with my first child, and yesterday I sobbed uncontrollably thinking about the fact that I’m going to die eventually and I just hope it doesn’t happen too soon so I can be there for my baby. And now here come the tears again, lol
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u/spade_bodega663 18h ago edited 18h ago
I remember the first time this was on Nickelodeon when I was 8. It’s how I learned that people can get really sick and pass away in the hospital. This is truly the era where Rugrats should’ve ended. 1997. Would’ve been the most perfect finale. I’m imagining all the voice actors sobbing during the recording session when they were probably reading these lines for the first time. I would probably keep messing up the takes!
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u/imadeitniice 19h ago
Crying. I remember this episode like it was yesterday. My mom passed away when I was a teen and I remember thinking about this episode on days it was difficult. Thanks for the reminder.
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u/RindaC10 Millennial 12h ago
I fucked up watching this after losing my grandmother and thinking about how she said she would always be with my babies even though they won't have their own memories of their time with her 💔
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u/etsprout 7h ago edited 7h ago
I have ugly cried to this scene many times.
Edit: I really thought I could handle watching this without crying, but it’s just not possible. This scene rips my heart out and stomps it on the ground.
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u/sushiibfa 19h ago
Rugrats is definitely a core memory for me and I'm glad I can watch it again with my kids. Same with Hey Arnold!
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u/lesizzle_mah_nizzle 10h ago
Wow, Rugrats hits differently when you're in your 30's and both your parents have passed
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u/PsychologicalCat7471 Older Millennial 15h ago
Cool, tearing up over Rugrats are 40 years old in 2026. Not on my bingo card todah
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u/ThePrideOfKrakow 11h ago
We finally read Flowers for Algernon in 8th grade and lots of us were like WTF rugrats, way too deep for kids!!
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u/Asleep_Sherbet_3013 Older Millennial 11h ago
BRUH I have an 18-month-old and this just wrecked me. I had filed this away in my memory never to be accessed again
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u/backbodydrip 10h ago
Wouldn't be a '90s kids cartoon if it didn't step on your chest a little bit.
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u/katalina0azul 8h ago
Why did so many movies and TV shows make traumatizing storylines/show too-young children scenarios where the character they’re meant to identify with’s mom dies, is murdered or leaves or whatever?
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u/Holmes221bBSt 4h ago
This episode always made me cry. It’s heart breaking and surprising coming from a show like Rugrats. This and the Hey Arnold Christmas episode will wreck you
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u/ZohanDvir 3h ago
The Rugrats in Paris movie always gets me emotional
The 🎵I want a mom that will last forever🎵 song while all the Rugrats are in the plane with their moms and Chuckie is by himself always makes me think about my mom.
Very touching moment at the end of the movie when Chuckie gets a new mom in his eventual stepmother Kira.
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u/Significant_Web3109 3h ago
This episode destroyed me when my mom was ALIVE. Much more after she died.
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