Disney Channel's Latest "Kiff" Coins New Terms as Table Town School Descends Into Media-Induced Chaos
The latest Kiff coins a new term that I, for one, will be using on a daily basis before the Table Town school launches into a televised morning announcement program against better judgement.
OTDR
Kiff’s family - plus Barry - are getting ready for a fancy gala in the heart of Table Town and as Barry and Kiff are ready to go out the door, Barry announces that they are, “OTDR", an acronym-term that he just crafted that means “Out The Door Ready." You see, most people who say they are ready are, in fact, NOT ready. They usually need to grab their keys or put a jacket on, or one final step before they head out the door.
Since Kiff and Barry haven’t any other steps in their getting ready process, they are, in fact, OTDR.
As Beryl comes downstairs, it seems that she too is OTDR, but it’s when Martin comes down declaring that he too is OTDR that the problems begin.
Kiff’s dad is most definitely not OTDR as he is missing a cufflink and needs to go find it. While they wait, Beryl decides to be productive and put the dishes away. Barry realizes that this might take a minute and instead of waiting by the door in silence, takes a seat on the couch and starts watching TV. All of this to the great frustration of Kiff, of course.
The situation is made worse when Beryl accidentally breaks a dish, needing to clean it up before the leave. She heads into the garage to look for the broom when Martin comes back downstairs having found his cuff link.
Now that he is done and Beryl is looking for the broom, he joins Barry on the couch to watch more of his favorite show, “Smoldering Cove" (Another call back in the great pantheon of call backs as the world of Kiff expands further into its second season).
Beryl can’t seem to find the broom, and the TV show is interrupted by a special report calling for severe weather in Table Town, and the gala is an indoor/outdoor event. As such, umbrellas are needed but only three of them are readily accessible. Since Barry needs one, Martin goes down into the basement to find a fourth. Beryl comes back from the garage sans broom, and heads upstairs to put gloves on so she can pick up the parts of the broken dish by hand without hurting herself.
While she is upstairs, Martin comes back from the basement. At this point, Kiff (and likely the audience) are quite frustrated as everyone is doing random tasks that further delay their departure to the gala. As everyone is finally ready to leave, the Chatterley’s land line phone rings and it’s Glarbin - who immediately puts Kiff on hold. Despite Kiff’s instructions telling her family not to move, Martin is now heading back upstairs to apply deodorant, Beryl returns to the kitchen to finish putting away the dishes, and Barry turns the TV back on. It’s this moment that cause the next level of frustration as Barry sees a home-shopping ad for Chubbles Wubbington collector’s coins and picks up the land line phone to order them. Of course, anyone old enough to have ever used a land line phone knows that this won’t work, and he only dials into the already existing call between Kiff and Glarbin, whom she is still on hold with.
To make matters worse, Martin has accidentally locked himself in the bathroom (again?) and Beryl needs to head back to the garage to get a screwdriver to let him out. Finally, Glarbin picks up his end of the phone and explains to Kiff that the Chatterley’s have one of the two last land line phones in town and wants to them for retaining that service.
Kiff, realizing that the call that detained them further was absolutely pointless, and rips the phone from the wall.
Beryl can’t find the screwdriver in the garage but it’s okay - Barry has remembered that he was using the broom and screwdriver earlier that day to help a bird adjust their glasses and they’re all up in Kiff’s room.
Finally, Beryl can take care of the dishes and free Martin from the bathroom and the gang is ready to leave again. But Barry has noticed that Kiff has a tear in her dress.
This serves as the breaking point for our lead character, who launches into a squirrel attack mode, moving the couch to pin her family and friend to the wall so that they cannot move, now losing their “walking around privileges" while she fixes her dress herself.
Finally, they are ready to leave but Martin refuses to go outside. Why? The Pone and his new girlfriend are out there, and he refuses to make any kind of small talk with them. Kiff, even more irritated reveals who the second of the last two land line users is when she calls The Pone’s house, prompting the pair to go inside so that they can all, at long last, leave the house.
As they depart, the camera makes some dramatic moves throughout the house and over to the fridge, showing all the viewers at home that they have left without their tickets to the gala. So despite all that, nobody was truly OTDR after all.
Good Morning Table Town School
It’s another morning at Table Town School, and the classes have gathered for Principal Secretary’s rather drab morning announcements, which come complete with vintage radio-style xylophone chime. While Kiff and Barry mention how boring that they can be, it’s a nearby Sweepy Steve (AKA Sweeps) who informs the duo that they didn’t used to be this way.
He takes the pair into his large storage closet and shows them an old video of a televised version of the morning announcements that was run by the students. As Kiff and Barry share excitement that this once existed and should exist once again, Sweepy Steve kicks on the lights and illuminates that this rather large storage closet was actually the set that the kids used for their news show way back when.
Obviously we cut to Kiff and Barry begging Principal Secretary to launch the program again, but he is hesitant to do so. The last time the news show aired, it devolved the school and the students into chaos. After a bit of convincing and reluctance, he agrees to let the kids do the show once more, but on the condition that they keep the show rather mundane and low-key.
Of course, this is where our song kicks in - very musical theater in nature, especially when compared to other Kiff fare - about them setting up the show and featuring some of the big news stories. After this musical number is over, we see some rather monotone reporting from Candle and Trevor while Kiff produces/directs the broadcast and she wonders… is this news boring too?
Fortunately, Sweeps has some equipment to read the ratings of the show nearby and Kiff can watch in real time how many viewers are becoming disinterested in the morning news show. It’s only when Candle makes an announcement about the Ultimate Frisbee team that prompts some commentary from Renee saying it’s not a real sport that Kiff sees the ratings spike after the two begin to argue live on air. Trevor and Reggie get involved too, and the show (at the direction of Kiff) becomes a full panel show debating various topics each day.
Each argument is sensationalized, and retains the attention of the school, students and teachers included. It’s only after one student, who was so enthralled with the program, was watching and walked into an open ditch in the hallway that SHOULD have been reported on their news program but instead was bumped in lieu of more ratings-grabbing debates that Kiff starts to question what they are really doing with the show.
However, the report about the open ditch quickly became a debate as to who’s fault it was that the student fell into the ditch in the first place. Candle immediately inadvertently changes the debate topic when she suggests that the student wear a hat so he’s easier to look out, prompting the rest of the panel (and school) to debate what hat would look best on him and what exactly constitutes a hat.
Kiff realizes that this is the chaos that Principal Secretary had warned her about and the school, both middle and high school parts of, descend into chaos because of the show. Kiff attempts to (quite literally) pull the plug on the show, but the Ultimate Frisbee team, doing a solid for Reggie (who earlier defended their sport) plugs the show back in to resume the broadcast and keep Reggie and his side on-air.
Calling back to an earlier argument, Renee demands sodas - not colas - for the panel after Kiff asks them to calm the viewers down, and while at the nearby soda fountain, Kiff realizes the school needs facts - regardless of how boring - instead of opinions.
Rushing back to the school, Kiff immediately goes into Principal Secretary’s office and has him play the boring xylophone chimes - which he refers to as “the most boring series of notes in music" - and restore the morning news back to normal and in his usual drab way of doing so.
This episode of Kiff is now available on Disney Channel and the DisneyNOW website. Season Two episodes of the series are set to arrive on Disney+ this summer.