The Magic School Bus Rides Again

Tim, as the world's biggest fan of Nicki Ray, host of the hit TV game show Puzzlepalooza, couldn't be more thrilled when the class gets invited to be on the show, where he vows to win - and impress Nicki. The theme of this week's contest is 'fossils', and Tim must solve a brain-bender of a puzzle: how did matching fossils wind up on opposite sides of the world?

Crisis! A burglar has ransacked the science classroom, and detectives Keesha and Carlos must find out whodunit. Their prime suspect? Wanda's best bird friend, Magpie Marty, who Wanda just knows is innocent. To solve the crime, the kids must investigate clues, especially the beak marks and foot prints the culprit left behind.

Wanda proudly hosts this year's school harvest feast, but she was so busy promoting it she forget to get the food! Ralphie happens to know of a farm that grows the finest produce around, but there's a hitch: he thinks it's haunted! Wanda's desperation means the class visits anyway, and what they find there is beyond spooky: tractors driven by ghosts, plants that climb walls, and robots!

Jyoti always wants to make her Grandma's birthday special, even if she does live across the ocean. This year, Jyoti planned to email her a 'virtual hug', but Arnold got in the way, digitized himself, and now races across the Internet at nearly the speed of light! Jyoti and the class digitize themselves, too, and the chase is on!

Arnold messed up, big time. Ratney, Carlos's pet rodent, escaped when Arnold was rat-sitting. Even worse, when they finally caught him, Arnold pressed the wrong buttons on the bus and made the critter not only giant-sized, but invisible!

Carlos and his super-competitive, wheelchair-piloting brother Mikey always seek new challenges, and what could be better than a race up a mountain? But since mountains are scarce in the area, Ms Frizzle uses the bus's magic to shrink the kids onto a western plain made of noodles - a display in Ralphie's family restaurant.

To stay on the baseball team, Ralphie need to pull up his grades - fast. And the perfect way to do it is with The Gem of Geniusness, keeper of all knowledge! He'll never fail a test again! But according to his sci-fi magazine, the gem is buried on a faraway planet, with terrain too tough for even the bus to handle.

Jyoti can't wait to show off her new high tech invention to potential investors: an auto-umbrella that senses rain. But to demonstrate it properly, she needs precipitation, and the skies are clear. So off the class goes aboard the bus to track down some clouds. But who knew there were so many kinds of clouds, and only certain kinds produce rain?

When the famous Flying Tennellis trapeze troupe - comprised of Ralphie's cousins - need a quick replacement for an injured performer, they recruit Ralphie to fill in. He's thrilled - what better way to get out of a math quiz? But when Ralphie needs to learn the routine, he discovers that trapeze stunts require more calculating and measuring than he expected.

Tim's latest creation is a beautiful, hand-made pop-up book telling a fabulous tale of trees talking in a forest. But Ralphie isn't buying the premise - trees simply don't talk! The kids in class take sides, and they all argue until communication breaks down completely.

For this year's big school musical, Dorothy Ann plans to drape the stage in beautiful flowers. But her plants are dying, despite their extra clean soil. DA's famous inventor uncle explains why: the plants need 'Brown Gold', a special nutrient to help them thrive. But when the class discovers what the substance actually is - poop - they refuse to help collect enough to save her plants.

Carlos and Janet have been paired up to read stories to a kindergarten class, but Janet gets nervous and irritable in front of crowds. To make her more friendly, Carlos and the class shrink, go inside Janet, and look for her 'Nervous Gene' so they can disable it before the reading.

The last field trip of the year is also the most important: the class must go to the center of the Sun to recharge the bus's Magic Battery, the source of the bus's magic. But when Mr. Ruhle, principal, safety nut, and amateur sun enthusiast, tags along, Arnold must preserve the secret of the field trips to prevent him from cancelling them altogether.