The BEST episodes of The Magic School Bus season 3

Every episode of The Magic School Bus season 3, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of The Magic School Bus season 3!

A classroom taught by Ms. Valerie Frizzle is always fun and exciting. The colorful teacher owns a Magic School Bus which can transform into different things like a spaceship, a battery, or even an alligator! These things can help Ms. Frizzle with visual teaching methods as she reveals information about anything in science. The students include Carlos, Phoebe, Keesha, Dorothy Ann, Tim, Ralphie, Arnold, and Wanda. Originally, The Magic School Bus aired on PBS. But when production ceased after four years, The Magic School Bus's run on PBS ended with it.

Last Updated: 3/22/2024Network: PBSStatus: Ended
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Holiday Special
star
8.90
21 votes

#1 - Holiday Special

Season 3 - Episode 13 - Aired 12/25/1996

It's the last day of school before the winter holidays and Wanda plans to see the Nutcracker ballet. But during a trip to a recycling plant that belongs to Murph (Dolly Parton), the toy soldier she needs to get into the theatre accidentally gets recycled! Devastated, Wanda wishes for a world without recycling. Ms. Frizzle activates the bus's un-recycler, taking the class and Murph on a song-filled field trip. The importance of recycling hits home when the bus's magic unrecycles everything in Walkerville — including the bus itself, as it too was made from recycled objects! Will the kids find a way to reconstruct the bus in time for Wanda to get back to see the Nutcracker? (Dolly Parton sings an original song plus four special carols written by Peter Lurye, composer of the rollicking MAGIC SCHOOL BUS theme song.)

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Gets a Bright Idea
star
7.59
73 votes

#2 - Gets a Bright Idea

Season 3 - Episode 5 - Aired 10/12/1996

After the illuminating light show at Walkerville's old theatre, Arnold's bossy cousin Janet claims she could put on a much better show. Nobody believes her until Janet and Arnold mysteriously disappear. Ms. Frizzle leads her class into the darkened theatre to look for them. To shed some light on the problem, the kids become beams of light. Then, to their great shock, they see Arnold's ghostly image floating high above the empty stage! Is the theatre haunted? Is this just one of Janet's tricks? Or have they all been ""Frizzled""?

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In the Rainforest
star
7.41
46 votes

#3 - In the Rainforest

Season 3 - Episode 11 - Aired 11/23/1996

The kids rent a rain-forest cocoa tree as an Earth Day present for Ms. Frizzle. But when the harvest arrives, there's only one shriveled cocoa bean and a note from Inspector 47 (Matt Frewer) reporting that, for reasons unknown, the tree isn't producing beans! DA and Tim become detectives as Ms. Frizzle takes the class to the rain forest to meet the impeccable inspector, who keeps a tidy, mud-free cocoa grove. What has Inspector 47 done to the rain forest's intricate web of life that is keeping the tree from making pods?

Writer: Brian Meehl
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In a Beehive
star
7.32
84 votes

#4 - In a Beehive

Season 3 - Episode 1 - Aired 9/14/1996

When Tim delivers the last of the season's honey to his grandfather's customers, the jars get broken. Tim's solution is simple: get more honey from some bees. But Ms. Frizzle sweetens the idea by turning her class into bees and showing them a beehive up close and personal. When a bear steals the bees' hard-earned supply of honey, the bee-kids discover one last field of nectar-filled flowers. How will the bee-kids communicate this information to the bees in time for them to harvest enough honey before the flowers are killed by the impending frost? Season Three premiere episode!

Writer: Doug Booth
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Spins a Web
star
7.32
79 votes

#5 - Spins a Web

Season 3 - Episode 3 - Aired 9/28/1996

What do you do when a 50-foot praying mantis menaces your town? Run like the wind... unless you're in Ms. Frizzle's class and she's taken you on a field trip inside a 1950s sci-fi film. The movie's main character, the power-mad General Araneus (Ed Asner) is determined to destroy the mantis, but Phoebe wants to trap it and save it! Shrinking to the size of real spiders, the kids discover how spiders construct a variety of silky snares, making them world-champion trappers. Can the kids save the mantis — and stop Araneus before it's too late?

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Works Out
star
7.31
75 votes

#6 - Works Out

Season 3 - Episode 9 - Aired 11/9/1996

At this year's Teacherathalon, Ms. Frizzle squares off with Mr. Sinew (Dan Marino), a muscle-bound gym teacher. Sinew easily wins the first of the three events. Thinking there's a problem, the kids go inside Ms. Frizzle to check her out. The bus takes them through her lungs to the bloodstream, where they get pumped through her heart to her calf muscle. But when Frizzle's leg muscle collapses from the strain of winning the second event, the kids discover that her red blood cells can't get oxygen to her muscles fast enough! Can the kids help Frizzle recover in time to win the final race?

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Gets Planted
star
7.28
72 votes

#7 - Gets Planted

Season 3 - Episode 10 - Aired 11/16/1996

When Phoebe tries to grow a big vine for her school's production of Jack and the Beanstalk, all she ends up with is a stunted little sprout. To help out, Ms. Frizzle turns her into a real vine. But to grow tall, Phoebe needs to figure out how plants eat - fast! To unearth the amazing ways plants make their own food, the Friz and the kids shrink down and dig deep in a quest to root out the facts!

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Rocks and Rolls
star
7.16
44 votes

#8 - Rocks and Rolls

Season 3 - Episode 12 - Aired 11/30/1996

To celebrate the founding of Walkerville, Ms. Frizzle's class sculpts a stone likeness of its founding father, Captain Walker. But as they add the finishing touches, the statue tumbles down the mountain. Ms. Frizzle turns the bus into a giant boulder and the kids into rock kids. They bump down the mountain in a desperate attempt to save the statue. By the time they reach the celebration at the base of the mountain, they've been pushed, tossed, sanded, polished, and eroded by water, as has the statue now the size of a soccer ball. The kids are sure they've let everyone down until they look back at the mountain for the surprise of their lives! With Jessica Walter as "Ashley Walker-Club-Dupree."

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In the Arctic
star
7.15
75 votes

#9 - In the Arctic

Season 3 - Episode 2 - Aired 9/21/1996

""Where did the hot go?"" wonders Arnold when he finds that his hot cocoa has cooled. In response, Ms. Frizzle whisks the class to the Arctic! What's the freezing Arctic got to do with heat? While the kids try to find out, the bus's engine freezes and the bus floats away on an ice floe with Ralphie and Phoebe inside! As the bus moves away, so does the heat from everyone's body. How can Ms. Frizzle's kids insulate their body to keep the heat in? Can they rescue Ralphie and Phoebe before they all become the Ice Cube Kids?

Writer: Brian Meehl
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Makes a Rainbow
star
6.96
79 votes

#10 - Makes a Rainbow

Season 3 - Episode 7 - Aired 10/26/1996

There's something dazzling in Ms. Frizzle's closet: a magical, light-powered pinball machine! To win at this game, the kids have to light up all six colours of the rainbow. Now the race is on, as the class shrinks down and zooms into the pinball machine. Catch an eye-full of fun as they try to crack the secret code of what makes colour so....colourful!

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Under Construction
star
6.68
71 votes

#11 - Under Construction

Season 3 - Episode 4 - Aired 10/5/1996

Two inches tall, and trapped in a bathroom at Wanda's house, the kids have to get out before Wanda's mother (Rosalind Chao) discovers them. Gathering building materials such as spiky hair curlers, sticky Band-Aids, dental floss, and Q-tips, the kids use what they've learned about structures to construct a series of towers and bridges across the bathroom to an open window! They get across the toilet OK — but will they get past the alligator in the bathtub?

Writer: Libby Hinson
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Shows & Tells
star
5.97
72 votes

#12 - Shows & Tells

Season 3 - Episode 6 - Aired 10/19/1996

It's the International Show-and-Tell Competition and Arnold and DA are representing Ms. Frizzle's class. Arnold brings a webbed hoop, left behind by his great-aunt Arizona Joan, the famous archaeologist, but he has no idea what it is! Using clues from the hoop and Joan's journal, the kids make educated guesses about its uses. To test their hypotheses, Ms. Frizzle turns the bus into a "Supposatron," a magical device designed to evaluate guesses. Can the kids solve the puzzle before Arnold and DA take the stage? With Alex Trebek as the "Sportscaster."

Writer: John May
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Goes Upstream
star
5.93
71 votes

#13 - Goes Upstream

Season 3 - Episode 8 - Aired 11/2/1996

Ralphie wants to catch salmon to serve at the annual school picnic, but he can't find any at his favourite fishing spot. Where could all the salmon have gone? The kids are soon "Frizzled" inside a salmon bus that has an uncontrollable urge to head upriver. "Wait!" Ralphie cries. "We'll be late for the picnic!" But the salmon bus won't stop. Using its sense of taste and smell, it swims the long journey to a shallow freshwater stream miles away. Why has the bus, which thinks it's a salmon ,gone to all this trouble?

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