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View Full Version : Belch's Brief Reviews--Dec 8, 2001



DR. BELCH
12-08-2001, 02:23 PM
JCA#224: "Scout's Honor"
"Tch. Like I'm a scout." Jade's little wittiscism comes back to haunt her after Jackie, responding to Uncle's concern that she watches too much TV, enrolls her in the Buttercup Scouts. He, however, ends up a Buttercup den mother, in all its flowery glory. Tohru ends up addicted to their pseudo-Girl Scout cookies.
Jackie had just been in Italy, looking for the Eye of Aurora--a necklace that can transpot a person anyplace on the globe if they utter the words "take me to"--and met up with a low-class Madonna lookalike crook (hardly the classy caliber of Viper). Jackie unwittingly transports himself to Uncle's shop during a struggle on a gondola, but the Immaterial Girl uses his wallet, which was in his shirt that he lost during the fight, to trace him to 'Frisco.
Jade dicovers the Eye's power by accident when she mentions Siberia and ends up there, being chased by wolves (which she mistakes for dogs). Meanwhile, the Evita wannabe finds Jackie--trussed up in bandages after the girls' first-aid display, and demands the Eye. Jade shows up just then, and the lady thief and Jackie start a global struggle for control of the necklace. Just as they return to the campsite, she realizes it has snapped and each of them have a piece. Jackie tries to trick her into uttering the magic words and transport herself to a remote Chilean island, which works--but the girls jump on her just as she winks out. Jackie, being the first den mother to lose a whole troop, panicks and travels to South America. He finds the girls have things well in hand, however, with Miss Vogue all tied up. Tohru appears jsut then with a boat headed for home, proving he will literally go to the ends of the earth for Buttercup cookies. Jackie promises him all he can eat--and judging from his physique, it'll take the treasure of the ancients Chandu promised Valmont to pay the bill.
Speaking of Chandu/Valmont, this is the second week in a row they and the Dark Hand have been absent. I guess after the whole moon demon fiasco they're laying low--after all, swiping a government rocket is some pretty heavy stuff.
It seeems Jade's TV watching paid off--she claims to have learned survival skills from the movies. I suppose the girls had cookies with them to subsist on, so they didn't have to fry rats over a fire on twigs.
And Jade did look adorable in her uniform, esp. with the flowered cap.

POK:JLC#426: "Trouble Brewing"
Ash and company, fresh from victory at Ecratique and at an equal distance between two towns, are having trouble deciding where to go next. upon finding a wandering Evee and meeting its owner Sakura (I almost let that pass, being a common name over there, like "Jane" in America...though I also noted one of her sisters is named "Tomoyo", so there may just be an intended ref to its sister anime Cardcaptor Sakura). They decide to attend an old-fashioned Japanese tea ceremony, hosted by Sakura and her sisters.
Brock meets a pretty hostess and does a Fred Sanford, grabbing his heart and all but saying, "Elizabeth, I'm comin' to join you, honey!" Then he makes what I'm sure are leering and off-color comments, somewhat softened by the dub, to her. He does this three more times to three more hostesses, and then figures out--a little slow on the draw there, but then again there's virtually no blood in his brain at this point--that those are Sakura's sisters. At one point Misty hauls him away--by the nose this time, which shows she's got a bit more of a sadistic streak in her, or that Brock really said something dirty to the last girl.
Team Rocket is also at the event...and really, their only crime here is poor manners, so maybe Ash was a bit out of line in challenging them. I find it funny that James, a rich boy who no doubt attended parties like this growing up, has no clue what to do...or that he would ask Jessy, a poor brat with a gutter mouth (I'm sure) on her, for advice on etiquette. The Rude Rockets are blasted off again.
Each girl has an Eevee in a different state of evolution--Jolteon, Vaporeon, Umbrion, and so forth. Perhaps they'd be interested in being set up with the Eevee Bros. from season one?
Both Misty and Sakura are the runts of a litter of girls, and have a lot in common, so they immediately hit it off. Sakura has itchy feet and wants to travel with them. Misty's all for it because she's no longer wallowing in a sea of testoterone, and Brock's all for it because, once the lasses are of age, he probably plans to suggest a kind of three-way thing. Ash just nods his head and smiles because he doesn't want to be stuck in a disagreeable minority.
Sakura asks her sisters for permission to leave, and they don't approve, but are willing to give her the benefit of a doubt and test her mettle in battle. It's a three-person one-on-one. Misty's Polliwhirl loses to Vaporeon in round one, then Pikachu beats Jolteon.
Surprisingly the Rockets reappear with custom cages for each sisters' pet, but after a battle end up trapped in them themselves. There's one great scene I can't let pass--James' Victreebell bites him on the bum, and the noises of pain he makes are suggestively hilarious. Dodgy, dodgy, dodgy. The Rockets are blasted off a second time, pouting, "Not again!"
Sakura decides that she isn't ready to hit the road because she's too inexperienced and indecisive, and asks her sisters to help train her (though personally I think they don't know much more besides "one lump or two"). Both Brock and Misty are disappointed, but try to look happy for her. Ash just smiles and nods.
DYN that although Wobafett was heard when the Rockets blasted off, he wasn't seen once?
DYN that Brock admits he doesn't look "trustworthy"? I'm not sure if that was dubbed properly, or was meant to cast aspersions on squinty guys with deep tans, or what. Although it could refer to his dirty come-ons earlier--maybe he was apologizing for his behavior.

Captain Caps
12-08-2001, 04:40 PM
a low-class Madonna lookalike crook-sayeth Dr. Belch
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SHERYL (from the fanfics): Hey, don't knock our brethren!

MIKEY: It was a character on that show. Look, maybe you're still bitter over the failure of "Team Ninja"...C'mon, let's get some coffee. You'll feel better.

SHERYL: Good, anything to get away from those ninja goons!

(Cut to the Warners and Jackie)

YAKKO: You know, I almost agree with her.

JACKIE: But I'm the exception, right?

DOT: (Sarcastically) Our boy is smart!
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It's just that you mentioned Madonna...

Sincerely,

John "Captain Caps" Kilduff

RockItShipper
12-09-2001, 05:28 PM
Sakura means "cherry blossom", a name signifying female youth, mortality, and the rejunevating power of nature.... This is one of the episodes I must have missed when I went from rental to tv taped episodes this spring... So, I don't know if that's the original name. I doubt it, though. One of "Misty's" sisters is called Sakura in the original.

DR. BELCH
12-13-2001, 10:45 AM
I've noted the semblance of the name and the recurring images of cherry blossoms in Cardcaptors. In yesterday's ep Sakura travels back in time and watches Clow Reed bring a dead cherry tree to life with his magic, then realizes that's what she keeps seeing in her dreams--the fluttering petals, the autumn leaves, the tall man with the benevolent face.
She's starting to realize the connection between Clow and Eli after noting his magical "scent" whenever strange things happen. The last few episodes have been the most revealing--Clow even wiped her mind in one after he felt she was getting too close too soon. The chair in Eli's parlor, however, is the biggest tip-off, unless she dismisses it as a case of a kid who likes to go antiquing and just happened to buy something belonging to the greatest magician of the age.
Clow Reed is a very strange contrast of a man--at once calm and caring yet very capable of so much mischevious malevolence (as Eli). It makes me wonder if he didn't keep a few "dark" cards tucked away for dealing with his enemies, like the Leprosy Card or the Explosive Diarrhea Card. Then again, maybe he just called upon the Power Card and crushed their skulls in his hands like eggshells.