The Red Cat

This is the eighth episode in the 80's series and was first broadcast in Japan on November 19, 1980.

Daddy Walrus and Astro are taking a walk in a part of the city unaffected by human activity, Green River Planes. However, it should soon become a business center.

They meet an old lady who's being asked for 13, Thirteen Street for the fourth time. There, Astro and Daddy Walrus find it to be abandoned, and meet with five boys who had received a note summoning them there, signed “The Red Cat”. They are all sons of businessmen who are planning on developing the area. They all search through the house. One by one, the boys disappear. A red cat attacks Astro, who pushes it away. When Astro and Daddy Walrus chase it, they find a skeleton.

The police determines the skeleton to be the Professor Leopold's, a former colleague of Dr. Elefun in college, who had a special interest in preservation of nature, and who had disappeared 9 months earlier. He owned a red cat called Chilly.

Meanwhile, Astro and Daddy Walrus wonder aloud where the boys are. The mysterious red cat appears with a speaker unit on his collar. A voice warns that if they want the kids back, they must tell the ministry of construction to stop the development of the Springfield Valley. In a building, as Daddy Walrus heads to the ministry, a mysterious individual collides with him and uses the opportunity to sneak a microphone in his hat.

There, Daddy Walrus is told that Professor Leopold used to come to the ministry every day with his cat to ask for the development to be stopped, but the projects couldn't be cancelled. Outside, the mysterious individual who had collided with Daddy Walrus listens to the conversation and is overheard by Astro and Alvin. They follow him into the forest and manage to take out his hat. The individual turns out to look like the red cat. Scared by the cat, Alvin tries to run away with Astro, but they both fall into a trap in the forest. Using his magnified hearing, Astro hears animals not far away. Behind a door, Astro and Alvin see many animals and, in a cage in the middle, the missing kids.

As Astro frees the boys, the Red Cat appears and threaten them with a gun, meaning to take them hostages too. Astro uses the jets in his hands to disarmed him. While pushed back, the cat lose his mask, and turns out to be Professor Leopold. The police wants to arrest him, but Dr. Elefun wants to talk to him first.

Professor Leopold claims that the spirit of nature calls him to put an end to the madness of the development. When Dr. Elefun mentions that he has hurt innocent people, he replies that people are hurting innocent animals, and that if the development is not stopped, something terrible will happen on the last day of the month. Dr. Elefun tries to convince the ministry to stop the development, but fails as well.

The last day of the month starts just like any other. Around noon, all the animals seem to get crazy. They escape from their cage or their master and invade the city. Cats, dogs, horses, beefs, frogs, snakes, lions, elephants, pigs and birds all seem to rebel against humans, chasing them and causing multiple accidents. Astro and his classmates are trapped in their school. Astro tries to bring the younger children back home, but is attacked by birds and as a result suffers from a short-circuit. He ends up unconscious and stuck into a wall of the school. With great efforts, Alvin manages to free him and they are both picked just at the right moment by Dr. Elefun, before falling to the ground.

Dr. Elefun believes that Professor Leopold is using a device to hypnotize all the animals. He inserts a device in Astro to make him capable of detecting where Professor Leopold is hiding. Astro can't be touched by humans while carrying the device because they would be electrocuted. Astro finds Professor Leopold and destroys his machine. The cat attacks Astro and dies immediately. Desperate, Professor Leopold attacks Astro as well. Astro warns him not to touch him because he'll be killed as well, but Professor Leopold is electrocuted before Astro can finish his sentence.

Astro feels guilty, but Dr. Elefun reassures him that it wasn't his fault. Professor Leopold wakes up at the hospital and is told by Dr. Elefun that the development will be stopped at last. He dies a short time later, after asking to be buried in the forest.