One of the Guys

One of the Guys
Season 02, Episode 32
Air Date	November 21, 2003
Written By	Jeremy J. Bargiel & Nina G. Bargiel
Directed By	Steve De Jarnatt
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One of the Guys is the thirty second episode of Lizzie McGuire's second season.

Summary

After setting a new school record in gym and then beating Ethan Craft in arm-wrestling, Lizzie is invited to play touch football with the "cute guys". But Lizzie is worried when Ethan calls her a "dude", and she feels that she is losing her feminity by playing football. The gym teacher, Coach Kelly, reassures her, and also reveals that Ethan calls everybody a "dude". Unknown to Matt, Fredo the chimp completes his math homework, which gets him good grades in school and praise from his parents.

Plot

The scene opens with the American flag, and it gives way to a scene in Lizzie's gym class. Turns out they have this sort of Presidential Fitness Test. Their first task is hanging on a bar. Miranda, Lizzie, Gordo and Ethan are called to be first. Close-ups of the four are shown, and they are talking while hanging on the bar. Miranda slips first, followed by Gordo, which leaves Ethan and Lizzie. Coach Kelly tells them that there's only 10 more seconds left till they break the school record for hanging on a bar. Ethan and Lizzie talk -- and somehow, Ethan finds himself slipping from the bars and he falls down. Meanwhile, Lizzie rambles on, about how it would be cool to see both their names as the ones who broke the record. Of course, when she looks to her right, Ethan's gone (he's already on the floor). Lizzie jumps down and she gets congratulated by everyone for her feat.

Next, Miranda, Gordo and Lizzie at lunch and they talk about how cool it was that Lizzie actually beat the record, as well as Ethan Craft! Ethan then approaches with his quarterback friend, THomas and they also compliment Lizzie about gym class. Gordo butts in and rants about how some guys would normally go all egoistic about some girl beating him at a supposedly guys' activity. Somehow, it leads to the quarterback proposing an arm wrestling match between Ethan and Lizzie. Miranda urges Lizzie to say yes, and she does. Everybody gathers round the two as they start the match. At first, it looks like Ethan is winning, but Lizzie emerges as the winner. Soon, she gets invited to play flag football with the guys, and she says she'll be there.

Lizzie shows up on the field the next day, in a sporty outfit. Although she looks a little unsure, because she doesn't know anything about the game, but Miranda and Gordo are there to support her. Soon the game starts and Ethan gives Lizzie all these pointers which she totally does not understand. But she had no choice! The game ended with Lizzie jumping on this guy to get the ball and ending up in a puddle of mud. The guy whom she jumped on seemed a little angry at her and tells her this is just flag football, meaning no hard physical contact. Lizzie apologizes, but seems happy even if she's very dirty. Ethan and his quarterback-friend approach her and tell her how cool that was, and invites her for another game the next day. The quarterback-friend calls her a total monster - on the field, and Ethan tells her that she's a total dude. Miranda and Gordo come over and tell her that she did great. Miranda even tells her that this was awesome -- she's the only girl around so many cute guys! Lizzie is ecstatic that Ethan called her a total dude, when suddenly Kate butts in and makes fun of her for being a dude and a guy-girl.

Lizzie then has a nightmare where Ethan, his friend and Kate haunt her. She wakes up and calls up Miranda (5:30 AM) and explains to her her dilemma. She worries about being called a guy-girl, and guys noticing her because she's one of them, and guys not asking her out/seeing her as date-material. Miranda advises her to try and be more girly, which Lizzie does. She goes through a whole bunch of outfits and decides on a pink crocheted top with a ribbon. She also takes time to do her make-up and she's seen putting on lip gloss. She goes to school, wearing the top and jeans and doting a girly bag. She meets Ethan and his friend along the corridor and they ask her if she's gonna play later on in the game. She tells them she can't, but she'll be there to cheer them on. The two wonder why the sudden change.

Lizzie, Miranda and Gordo talk about it over lunch. Lizzie complains that she took much much longer doing her hair and putting on make-up than before and she changed her clothes 6 times before she finally chose an outfit. Her two friends comment that there seems to be no difference, which stumps Lizzie more.

She seeks advice from Coach Kelly about the whole thing. The coach tells her that there's nothing wrong with being able to do guy-stuff, because you can do it simultaneously with girly stuff as well. She gives herself as an example, that she may do all these gym stuff, but she still goes swing dancing with Mr. Lang, and she even sews her own dresses, because she can't find any that fit her arms. Lizzie tells her that Ethan calls her a dude, his friend calls her a monster and Kate is totally dissing her for being a guy-girl. Coach Kelly reveals that Ethan calls everyone a dude for he doesn't have much in his vocabulary, explains that to boys, being called a monster is a compliment, and Kate's probably just jealous that Lizzie gets to spend a lot of time with the cute guys. This changes the way Lizzie looks at things, and soon she's off to the field to play.

She throws a few footballs and then we hear the song "Girls Can Do Anything" sung by the Kirkwood Gang; the singer of the song is Elli Felico.

She bumps into Kate who insults her yet again, but she responds with a "Nobody likes you, Kate." She tells Ethan's friend that she wants in, she doesn't care if she breaks all her nails -- she wants to play. Ethan succumbs and he gets himself out of the game to make way for Lizzie. This is where Kate tries to talk to him, and he tells her off saying "Dude, I'm trying to watch the game!" and Kate, flabbergasted, says "I am NOT a dude!" and walks off. In the end, Lizzie ends up scoring a touchdown.

Trivia

• The episode first aired in Australia on May 5, 2003 and in Canada on September 12, 2003.
• The clapboard seen on the blooper reel at the end of the show gives the date of production as April 3, 2002 which means over nineteen months passed between the filming and broadcasting of this episode.
• For several months before its premiere, a brief clip from this episode showing Lizzie and Ethan arm-wrestling has been broadcast as part of a promo on ABC for their "ABC Kids" Saturday morning lineup.
• A brief clip where Lizzie holds onto Timmy on these Friday Night Nicktoons bumpers with Zim.
• Fredo the chimp makes his fourth appearance in this episode. The other episodes were "Mom's Best Friend," "Over The Hill" and "The Greatest Crush of All."
• While speaking to Matt in their classroom, Melina can be seen wearing a retainer.
• When Matt is sleeping in his bed, all of a sudden he wakes up and yells, "No more gravy!" He also yells the same words in "Bad Girl McGuire."
• The layout of Matt's room seems to change from episode to episode. In this one, he has two sets of windows on different walls which would lead one to believe his room is on the corner of the house, but his room is situated between Lizzie's and his parents, so he can't be on the corner.
• When Fredo first does Matt's homework, long marks can be seen on the paper which look more like scribbling.
• This is the fourth episode where lizzie does not talk to her parents.

Goofs

• In all of the shots of the clock in the gym, it reads 11:10.
• Right before Gordo falls off the bar, you can see Lizzie's grip loosen on the bar with both hands, but she doesn't fall any lower.
• The first time that Lizzie is playing football, Gordo and Miranda are sitting on the bleachers, but in two later shots, they appear to move to opposite ends of the bleachers.
• When Ethan and Thomas come up to Lizzie in the courtyard, Lizzie yells at Miranda, by saying, "Miranda" but the closed-caption says "Amanda."

Music

• Rock & Roll, Pt. 2 by Gary Glitter (when Lizzie is playing flag football with the guys)
• Supergirl! by Krystal (when Lizzie is "girling up" in the morning for school)
• Girls Can Do Anything by the Kirkwood Gang (when Lizzie is playing flag football and scores a touchdown at the end of the episode)