The Day That Bluey Let Me Down
The Sign hits different when you're about to move your own kids again for the 5th time in 8 years
It seemed like a fairly typical Monday afternoon. When my kids got home from school, we had laundry to fold, which we usually do together as a competitive group sport. I had to make dinner early because my oldest has art class on Monday nights and we have to be out the door by 5:15pm. And since Monday is also grocery shopping day (I do it while she’s in class), I like to be fed before I leave the house for over 2 hrs or I am a cranky bitch to everyone who crosses my path.
But it was no ordinary Monday afternoon because as it turned out, there were 2 new episodes of Bluey on Disney+ and one of those episodes was a whopping 28 minutes long, 4x the normal length of a Bluey episode.
Naturally my kids wanted to watch these 2 episodes while folding laundry because Bluey makes everything better, including laundry folding.
New episodes of Bluey are like watching the superbowl in my house. It’s a huge event. It’s one of the few shows that all 5 of us can agree on watching because we all love it.
To say that Bluey has impacted our lives in the past 4 years is a bit of an understatement. Keepy Uppy, Featherwand, and Shadowlands are beloved games in our household. My kids have played some of the other imaginary games from Bluey with me and their dad — although we’re not quite as gifted at playing along as Bandit and Chilli, the parents of Bluey and her sister Bingo.
My youngest says, “oh yeah” and sounds exactly like Bingo when she says it, which I’m fairly certain she does on purpose. My husband has implemented tactical pees for our younger 2 kids, not just at bedtime but anytime we’re about to leave the house. When I give the kids their allowance it’s in dollar bucks. When my youngest was a bit littler, I’d tell my her to use her big girl bark so I could hear her and understand her better. Whenever my husband or I talk about our childhoods, we throw up our hands and say, “it was the 80’s” like Bandit does in the episode “Fairytale.”
I could go on.
Bluey is one of those fantastic shows that is geared towards kids but written for their adults, with jokes that kids and adults alike will laugh at, as well as parenting advice that feels totally achievable. Tucked into every episode is a little bit of wisdom that I can carry with me through my day. At least half of the episodes have made me tear up. Plus, the music is delightful.
On my better days, I aspire to be as playful and easygoing as the Heeler parents. In fact, Chilli Heeler is one of the moms I tend to measure myself against as mother. “What would Chili do” is a question I ask myself often. Chilli is my type of momfluencer, more so than any of the famous moms on IG (like Hannah Neeleman of Ballerina Farm, or any of the other momfluencers
writes about in her excellent book, Momfluenced).On top of all of that, a few of my fellow military spouses said this episode in particular hit them and their kids in all of the feels.
So needless to say, I was excited for these most recent 2 episodes.
If you haven’t seen the episode and don’t want spoilers, stop reading now.
The first episode begins with what seems like a game of Bandit trying to sell their house to a prospective buyer, played by Chilli. The residents of the house are Janet and Rita, the elderly alter egos of Bluey and Bingo. The old ladies don’t want to move, so they pretend the house is haunted by a ghost inhabiting a laundry basket. In the end, Janet and Rita get to stay but Bandit comments, “it can’t be like this every time.” The screen pans out until you see a “For Sale” sign in front of their house.
For real life.
In this moment, I feel a mix of emotions.
We’re watching this episode of Bluey in our living room, which is currently filled with boxes. Some of those boxes are packed and taped up, while others are waiting to be put together and packed with stuff. Our stuff.
In 6 weeks, we’re moving again.
This isn’t unexpected. We’re a military family. Moving is part of the drill. And while I love the adventure of living in different parts of the country, it’s bittersweet. Every time we move, we leave behind friends and community. (I wrote a whole post about it on Instagram since April happens to be the month of the military child).
As my kids get older, moving every 3 years gets harder. They didn’t choose this life. They don’t get a say in when we move or where — I don’t usually, either. But I’m also 43.
I’m not starting at a brand new school for 6th grade and not knowing a single kid there, like my oldest.
I’m not leaving behind a neighborhood full of kids whose houses I hung out at every day after school for 3 years and who I’ve known since starting kindergarten, like my son.
I’m not leaving my very best friend, who I’ve known since I was 2, like my youngest.
So as we start the final episode, called “The Sign”, I’m thinking that this could be perfect for my kids. They can see Bluey and Bingo leave their friends, their school, their neighbors, their community, and start over somewhere else. And they can see them struggle but find their way through and even thrive in a new community.
But that’s not what happens.
At the start of the episode, we learn that the Heelers are moving because Bandit got a new job in a different city. It’s a better paying job which could offer a better future for his kids. The kids don’t want to leave and it’s pretty clear that Chilli doesn’t either, although she’s putting on a brave face for Bluey and Bingo.
The other big thing happening in this episode is a wedding between Uncle Rad (Bandit’s older brother) and Frisky (Chilli’s bestie and the kids godmother). The wedding is at risk of not happening because Rad and Frisky never talked about where they were going to live together after getting hitched…which is just…really? Are they even adults? How did they not talk about that?
Anyway….moving on, the episode is a wild ride, complete with a car chase to find a runaway bride. There are hijinks and big emotions, from the kids and the adults. There are silly moments and “signs from the universe” that lead to the episode getting tied up very neatly and happily. Frisky and Rad reunite. They get married and make an announcement that they are staying in Brisbane (where Frisky and the Heelers live) instead of moving away to where Rad lives. And after packing everything into a moving van and getting in the car to drive away, the buyers back out of buying the Heeler’s house, having found one they like better.
The episode ends with Bandit pulling the For Sale sign from the ground and tossing it aside. The family sits in their empty house, eating together and playing and smiling. So enormously happy to be staying right where they belong.
And in that moment, for the first ever, Bluey let me down.
I was sitting with my kids on the couch. All 4 of us were crying, even my son who was trying to pretend he wasn’t.
Yes, the ending was beautiful. And it was also a little too easy.
The thing that bothers me about this episode and how it ends is that it feels like a missed opportunity. Bluey is a kids show that doesn’t shy away from the hard stuff. In fact, Bluey tends to dive headfirst into issues that are complex and tricky and don’t always have easy solutions.
Like most kids shows, nearly every episode has a lesson for kids (and their adults) to understand through the story. But unlike most other kids shows, the lesson is that life is complicated. Sometimes we have to do hard things, uncomfortable things, in order to grow. Usually this lesson is presented through the games they play or the parents explaining things and so they’re also taught that while this might be difficult, we’ll get through this together.
But none of that happens in “The Sign.”
They teeter on the edge of this very hard thing, nearly crossing over into unknown territory. Moving to a brand new city is something that would absolutely change their lives and probably be very difficult, but also something they would get through together. They would learn from it and grow, together.
It could have been so powerful, particularly for kids like mine who don’t often get to see that represented in kids shows. They could have seen Bluey and Bingo wave goodbye to their old house, then arrive at a new house in their new city. They could have seen Bluey adjusting to her new neighborhood and find magic in some funky old tree at the end of the block. They could have seen her meet a new friend who lives in the house, next to that tree.
But instead they see the easy thing. The Heelers don’t have to leave their beloved house or their wonderful neighbors or their school full of their friends. And while I sort of get why they made that decision, it doesn’t feel like a very “Bluey” ending. The lesson was “don’t worry, everything gets to stay the same and that’s perfect.”
And that let me down.
I don’t think any of my kids really noticed that the Heelers happy ending contrasted with their own, upcoming experience of moving. They were more worried about the fact that this would be the last new episode of Bluey — at least for awhile.
I sat with my own sadness around this for the rest of the day. I don’t get to give my kids a happy ending like this, pretty much ever. My kids will spend their entire childhood saying goodbye to friends and neighbors.
Lots of people, former military kids included, often say this makes military kids more resilient. They’re better at making friends and adapting to new situations. They get to see more of the world than their non-military friends do. And all of that is true.
But they also don’t get the same sense of stability that I had as a kid. They don’t get the familiarity of a home that is consistent or neighbors that watch them grow up. They don’t get to grow up within a group of friends, knowing someone from the time that you’re in preschool until you head off to college.
There are beautiful, fun, exciting parts of this lifestyle.
But it’s really hard on the kids.
And even though I am personally thrilled that we are leaving the place we’ve been stationed for the past 3 years, I’m also heartbroken that I can’t give my kids the same happy ending as Bluey and Bingo.
Still, the lessons I’ve personally learned from this show, give me and my kids, enormous support and joy.
Last night, as I was helping my younger 2 kids get ready for bed, my youngest was struggling as she got out of the bath. She was cold and cranky about it. I was tired and just wanted to move her through her nighttime routine as quickly as possible, knowing I still had so much to do after my kids fell asleep.
At the end of my rope, I dug into my Bluey toolkit and decided to pretend to be Janet — remember, Bluey’s grannie alter ego? My daughter, who was mid-tantrum, paused and then smiled. “What’s that love?” she asked me, putting her towel over her head like Rita, Bingo’s grannie alter ego, who is both hard of hearing and comically flatulent.
We played Grannies for the next 5 minutes or so while she got dressed and brushed her teeth. Then my son got out of the tub and joined in. My oldest, about to run her own bath, giggled at all of it (but declined to be a grannie herself).
And as usual, Bluey made everything a little bit better.
Love this piece. ❤️As big Bluey fans in our home, I appreciated your point how this episode didn’t show the messiness of moving (since, well, they didn’t have to move). I do like how the Heelers address emotions and other relational topics though. Great article!
Good piece! Felt this too as an expat! I read the ending as a fantasy that wasn’t real (as much as the show is “real”) like a decision not to have the character wake up at the end of Oz - so one that parents would understand as fake but kids wouldn’t process with the same level of scrutiny