This article is written from a real world point of view and so is not considered part of The Worst Witch universe.
| Tortoise Trouble | |
|---|---|
| Season 2, Episode 1 | |
| |
| Air date | January 8, 2018 |
| Episode guide | |
| Previous The Worst Headmistress |
Next The Friendship Trap |
Tortoise Trouble is the first episode of the second series of The Worst Witch (2017 TV Series). It was broadcast on CBBC and CBBC HD on 8 January 2018. It is preceded by The Worst Headmistress, the thirteenth and final episode of the first series and will be followed by The Friendship Trap.
The plot is loosely based upon the book The Worst Witch To The Rescue.
The episode marks the first appearance of several characters in the BBC adaptation, including Sybil Hallow and Clarice Twig (Clarice Crow in the books and 1998 TV series).
Synopsis[]
It's the first day of term and Mildred is feeling positive... until she has a hand in a wing of the school falling down. Enthusiastic new first years arrive and nervous Sybil Hallow is terrified. Mildred stumbles upon something very important - the founding stone of the school.
Plot[]
It's the start of a new school year and Mildred leaves for Cackle's Academy on her broomstick. She catches up with Maud and Enid on the way and carefully dodges a tree. Mildred's summer project flies out of her bag - she tells her friends to go ahead while she goes back for it. Ethel and a very nervous Sybil Hallow are flying over Cackle's roof when Mildred's summer project hits Ethel in the face, knocking her off her broom. Luckily, she lands on the roof.
Meanwhile Beatrice Bunch and Clarice Twigg meet again (having first met on Selection Day), and Miss Cackle tells Miss Hardbroom how the new term can't possibly be worse than last term.
Mildred flies over to Ethel and Sybil on the roof. She apologises to Ethel and then offers to help her up, but slips on a loose tile on the roof and ends up hanging off a large metal flagpole on the side of the castle wall. The whole school standing on the grass below turn round and look up at her.
Ethel is reading Mildred's project and does nothing to help, but Sybil sends Mildred her broom, and she manages to get onto the broom and casts a spell to free her cloak from the flagpole. The spell disintegrates the flagpole and causes cracks to start forming on the wall.
Mildred joins the others back on the grass, and Miss Cackle continues addressing the students. More severe cracks appear in the wall - it is not long before the entire East Wing of the castle collapses behind them. Miss Cackle starts examining the damage with Miss Hardbroom and Miss Drill. Mr Rowan-Webb tells her he's cast a binding spell on the walls to prevent another collapse. In Ada's office the staff establish that the collapse was caused by "leftover bad magic, from Agatha's annihilation spell".
Beatrice and Clarice move into Sybil's room with her as their dorms have been destroyed in the castle collapse. Sybil mentions that her sister Esmerelda Hallow was unable to get her magic back after Agatha tricked her into giving it to her. In her room, Mildred hides her talking tortoise Einstein under her bed. Felicity Foxglove and another student go to talk to Ethel, mentioning that Drusilla has transferred to Pentangle's. Ethel realises she has forgotten her holiday project.
Mildred, Maud and Enid talk about Maud's new face; the result of a game of magical hide-and-seek with her cousin Henry. Beatrice gives Sybil a 'confidence potion' made by her father. As a result, when Ethel accuses Sybil of forgetting to pack her project, Sybil stands up to her and tells her it was her own fault.
Mildred has a mirror call with her mum, while Ethel goes up to Mildred's room and discovers Einstein the talking tortoise and Mildred's successful holiday project. The Second years arrive in Miss Hardbroom's class and present their holiday projects. Maud shrinks her broomstick, Enid presents a lightbulb which generates great ideas, and Felicity a colour-changing rainbow potion for her hair.
Ethel then presents Cyril, a crow who she has made talk using Mildred's spell, which Ethel claims is hers. Mildred says that this is her spell, and attempts to prove it by showing Miss Hardbroom her project folder (which Ethel has emptied) and then by showing her Einstein, who has disappeared and been replaced with a boot.
Mildred resorts to casting the spell on some animals in jars in HB's classroom. She is successful but Miss Hardbroom believes her to have copied Ethel, so magically transports her to Miss Cackle.
Meanwhile Sybil and Clarice go looking for Beatrice who disappeared when she sneezed while they were waiting to get their familiars. They spot Einstein up a tall tree and Sybil, still being under the influence of the "confidence potion", flies her broomstick to the top of the tree to rescue him. Beatrice joins Clarice on the ground, and explains that she has a kind of asthma that makes her disappear when she sneezes.
Mildred appears lying down in the ruins of the East Wing where Miss Cackle, Miss Drill and Mr Rowan-Webb are checking the bricks for bad magic. Mildred swears that she didn't copy Ethel, and when she stands up Mr Rowen-Webb spots something glowing under the floor and pulls it out.
Meanwhile, Ethel is awarded the prize for best holiday project. Maud uses Enid's idea generating light bulb to think of a way to help Mildred prove the project is hers. They use a tracking spell to detect Einstein and demand that Sybil, Bea and Clarice (who rescued Einstein and are smuggling him back into the school) give him back.
Miss Cackle calls the whole school to see what that they have discovered in the ruins - the Founding Stone of the school. Einstein says it doesn't look like much, causing offence, and Maud presents Einstein. Seeing the talking tortoise, Miss Hardbroom and Miss Cackle listen to his account of what Ethel did, and Ethel ends up having to search through the kitchen bins where she dumped Mildred's project. After they find it, Ethel is is sent to write lines in detention as punishment for plagiarising.
Miss Hardbroom admits that as the talking animal spell was Mildred's, that makes her the winner of the prize for the holiday project competition- a jar of toadstools in crow saliva.
Cast[]
Main[]
- Bella Ramsey as Mildred Hubble
- Megan Hughes as Maud Spellbody
- Tamara Smart as Enid Nightshade
- Philip Martin Brown as Mr Rowan Webb
- Wendy Craig as Miss Bat
- Raquel Cassidy as Miss Hardbroom
- Jenny Richardson as Ethel Hallow
- Trixie Hyde as Sybil Hallow
- Kitty Slack as Clarice Twigg
- Ynez Williams as Beatrice Bunch
- Shauna Shim as Miss Drill
- Clare Higgins as Miss Cackle
- Dagny Rollins as Felicity Foxglove
Recurring & Guest[]
- Emmanuel Ighodaro as Einstein
- Nicola Stephenson as Julie Hubble
- Julian Kay as Cyril
- Philippa Howell as Frog 1
- Charlotte West-Oram as Frog 2
Quotes[]
Miss Cackle: Here they come. The future of witchcraft.
Miss Hardbroom: I admire your positivity after last year.
Miss Cackle: Precisely. We couldn't possibly have a debacle like that again.
Miss Cackle: We clearly got some work to do on the roof. Apart from that, I'm certain you really couldn't be more protected than here at Cackle's.
(Screams)
Miss Cackle: The school just collapsed. Didn't it, Miss Hardbroom?
Miss Hardbroom: I believe it did, Miss Cackle.
Sybil: This place is really scary.
Clarice: Go home, then.
Sybil: I can't. My mum's even scarier.
Enid: I just went on a world tour with Mum and Dad! It was like watching pondweed dry.
Maud: We visited the Natural Witchery Museum.
Enid: Very educational.
Maud: Followed by a broomstick whisking trip over Niagara Falls.
Mildred: Nice.
Enid: What about you?
Mildred: Caravan holiday.
Enid: As in camels? Across the Sahara?
Mildred: As in Wales, across the A48.
Enid: Really? How did you get there?
Mildred: On a bus.
Enid: An actual bus?
Mildred: Yep. Just a normal, actual bus.
Maud: That settles it. Next break, we're staying with you.
Sybil: I stood up to my sister.
Beatrice: Yep.
Sybil: I flew to the top of the tallest tree I've... ever seen.
Beatrice: Yes. And you didn't need magic to do any of it. You did it all by yourself. Isn't that amazing?
Sybil: No.
Beatrice: No?
Sybil: No. It's not amazing. It's... petrifying.
Ethel: How many lines?
Crow: 250,000. To start off with.
Miss Drill: You made him speak.
Crow: Chop chop.
Miss Drill: “I must not steal other people's ideas.”
Mildred: I won?
Miss Hardbroom: I re-marked the holiday projects in light of recent events. So, yes, you are now... the winner. Do not let it go to your head.
Gallery[]
Errors[]
- Beatrice "Bea" Bunch magically transports herself (inadvertently) to other places when she sneezes. She says this is due to her asthma, but asthma is a respiratory problem usually resulting in breathlessness that is completely unrelated to sneezing. Whilst some asthma "triggers" such as pollen and fur also cause sneezing, this sensitivity is likely to be related to hay-fever or an allergy and is not a result of asthma. It is revealed in The Extraordinary Esper Vespertilio that Beatrice is allergic to cats.