DR. BELCH
05-18-2002, 02:53 PM
JCA#236: "The Good, The Bad, the Blind, the Deaf, and the Mute"
I used to think those "hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil" monkeys were just a novelty from the old Harman-Ising cartoons or from those mail order catalogues that sell all sorts of novelties...but it seems they are actual giant statues somewhere in Asia buit to hold dark chi by the ancients. Furthermore, Uncle's old nemesis Dao has gotten hold of a spell to awaken the evil within.
Dao is able to curse Jackie, Jade and Tohru by robbing them of speech, hearing, and sight respectively, but requires the power of good chi to enable the monkey statues to bewitch large populations. He sends his minions to capture Uncle and magically seal him in the rock, then goes flying over a Chinese village, plagueing the people.
The most humorous bit is how the Chans and Tohru try to follow Uncle's advice and let their other senses take over for the lost ones. Coping isn't easy--especially when Tohru keeps stumbling and falling down hills or Jade shouts as if everybody else has gone deaf in sympathy. Also, a great line from Uncle to Jackie, "I can't read your lips! Your accent is too heavy!"
Once they manage to get their act together, they stop Dao from casting the monkey spell...unfortunately reversing the effect onto him, rendering him completely blind, deaf, and unable to speak.
When Uncle communed with his late mentor, I half expected to see his spirit appear like Anakin, Yoda, and Obi-Wan at the end of Return of the Jedi.
Also, watch for a sort of Wile E. Coyote-esque moment or two when Jackie tries unsuccessfully to get Tohru to throw him up to the floating statues but comes plummeting down to earth twice.
ZETA#: "The Eye of the Storm"
Did the two brothers, Dex and Carl, remind anyone else of the Weather Wizard and his brother from the Superman ep guest-starring Flash?
There's not really much you can do with tornados without hitting every cliche i nthe book, from Wizard of Oz[/] to [i]Pinky and the Brain's "Brain Storm" to the twister flick with the flying cow, but thankfully there were relatively flew outside of a couple of flying barns.
Carl is the brains of the team, who invented a vehicle to stop tornados by using negative polarity to break them up fro m within...but he resents his brother's hotdogging and glory-sucking. When Dex becomes a media darling after evaporating a twister, Carl becomes jealous and decides to go out on his own. Very quickly he realizes he's in over his head, and Z has to go into the storm, risking getting ripped to scrap, to bail him out. Carl's invention works, however, saving a school and an entire town from being destroyed by bare inches. The two brothers decide that they need each other more than they realize and decide to cooperate.
Fairly basic premise, with the tin man saving the day a few times and at some point having to reveal himself to civilians, then ducking the media cameras...and Ro afraid for his safety.
Amusing how good-ol'-boy Dex keeps making passes at Ro and she is not the least bit impressed...and how he misinterprets her use of the expression "save your can". I guess a guy has to be steel-plated to win her over.... :D
Nit: when their car is totaled and someone mentions bringing the state police to give them a ride, why didn't Ro seem concerned?
Where was this ep set? I thought I heard the waitress from the diner speak with a slight Texas accent, but is the Lone Star State known for being a major tornado area?
Note the pregnant woman in the shelter. I thought circumstances would necessitate Z deliver a baby at some point, but thankfully we were spared that. Although I have to wonder what he'd make of such a thing....
POK:JLC#444: "Doin' What Comes Natu-rally"
Another fairly standard outing--reminded me in places of the Pokemon swap meet ep, including an appearance from the shyster who keeps trying to sell James a Magikarp scam. And the poor dense little bugger keeps falling for it too--although at the last moment he recognizes the guy, even if Jessy restrains him before he can go psycho and tear him a new one.
Also, it seems most rubes think "future sight" is divination...but as we learn from the Girafarig ep, it's little more than a psychic attack that takes a few minutes to work....like the Pokemon version of a time-release cold pill. They seem pretty taken with the magician's patter and the easily-interpreted "futures"--I've seen better on a fortune cookie at Great Wall.
Much of the story involves a troupe of performing carny Pokemon, a boy named Mackenzie and his pet Natu, Naughty. Mackenzie knows his father's psychic routines but craps bricks when he's in front of crowds. So Ash and Brock and Misty convince him to wear a Wooper mask onstage when he performs, which seems to help. A little brushing up on future sight and a few alterations to the act to make it his, and the kid does well...until Team Rocket, looking to be talent agents, crashes the party and swipes Naughty and most of the performers.
With the help of a Machoke who escapes Jessy and James' net, Team Twerp catches up to the crooks and forces them to relinquish their capture, bringing their balloon down with help from Bayleef's razor leaf attack. There's a Pokemon battle after they land in front of a grade school--which leads to a great line from James when Victoreebell tries to swallow his head: "Not in front of the children!" Oh, the implications had me roaring with mirth.
The Rockets' scheme is a bust, and Mackenzie puts on an impromptu show for the kiddies right there...gradually losing his fear of performing, and the mask.
Nothing much else to note, except James' strange obsession with instant food in this episode...and the query of whether a Poke-paw print on a contract is binding in a court of law?
We see on Digimon the beginning of redemption for Beelzemon, as he is totally creeped about hearing his victim's voice come out of the blob...and when he ries to save Jerri, she seems reluctant to go to him, saying, "You're not Leomon." It seems her eyes were playing tricks on her, as the move he used was presumably similar to her partner's...and her hesitation may have cost her a way out of the bubble.
Also, the parents are realizing the kids can now biomerge...and Suzie performs a perfect digivolve, her first. She may be a bit young to merge, though, but maybe when she's older, in season four?
Strange edit--Rika hollers something to the Chaos to the effect of "Incorporate(?) this!" but doesn't follow it up. Did she gesture obscenely or something in the original?
Today's House of Mouse featured classic black-and-white characters alongside the technicolor ones, a la "Fields of Honey" or "Two-Tone Town". They showed an actual short from 1933 called "The Whoopee Party", followed by a contemporary short, "Goat Man", done in a b/w style similar to the Yakko, Wakko, and Dot "theatricals" on A! (complete with lines and scratches to make the film look old). Also, Donald meets up with a prototype duck character presumably from early Disney shorts, with a weird obsession for sandwiches...trippy. "He's the president of your fan club. As well as the vice president, and the secretary, and the treasurer...actually, he's the only member." :D
I used to think those "hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil" monkeys were just a novelty from the old Harman-Ising cartoons or from those mail order catalogues that sell all sorts of novelties...but it seems they are actual giant statues somewhere in Asia buit to hold dark chi by the ancients. Furthermore, Uncle's old nemesis Dao has gotten hold of a spell to awaken the evil within.
Dao is able to curse Jackie, Jade and Tohru by robbing them of speech, hearing, and sight respectively, but requires the power of good chi to enable the monkey statues to bewitch large populations. He sends his minions to capture Uncle and magically seal him in the rock, then goes flying over a Chinese village, plagueing the people.
The most humorous bit is how the Chans and Tohru try to follow Uncle's advice and let their other senses take over for the lost ones. Coping isn't easy--especially when Tohru keeps stumbling and falling down hills or Jade shouts as if everybody else has gone deaf in sympathy. Also, a great line from Uncle to Jackie, "I can't read your lips! Your accent is too heavy!"
Once they manage to get their act together, they stop Dao from casting the monkey spell...unfortunately reversing the effect onto him, rendering him completely blind, deaf, and unable to speak.
When Uncle communed with his late mentor, I half expected to see his spirit appear like Anakin, Yoda, and Obi-Wan at the end of Return of the Jedi.
Also, watch for a sort of Wile E. Coyote-esque moment or two when Jackie tries unsuccessfully to get Tohru to throw him up to the floating statues but comes plummeting down to earth twice.
ZETA#: "The Eye of the Storm"
Did the two brothers, Dex and Carl, remind anyone else of the Weather Wizard and his brother from the Superman ep guest-starring Flash?
There's not really much you can do with tornados without hitting every cliche i nthe book, from Wizard of Oz[/] to [i]Pinky and the Brain's "Brain Storm" to the twister flick with the flying cow, but thankfully there were relatively flew outside of a couple of flying barns.
Carl is the brains of the team, who invented a vehicle to stop tornados by using negative polarity to break them up fro m within...but he resents his brother's hotdogging and glory-sucking. When Dex becomes a media darling after evaporating a twister, Carl becomes jealous and decides to go out on his own. Very quickly he realizes he's in over his head, and Z has to go into the storm, risking getting ripped to scrap, to bail him out. Carl's invention works, however, saving a school and an entire town from being destroyed by bare inches. The two brothers decide that they need each other more than they realize and decide to cooperate.
Fairly basic premise, with the tin man saving the day a few times and at some point having to reveal himself to civilians, then ducking the media cameras...and Ro afraid for his safety.
Amusing how good-ol'-boy Dex keeps making passes at Ro and she is not the least bit impressed...and how he misinterprets her use of the expression "save your can". I guess a guy has to be steel-plated to win her over.... :D
Nit: when their car is totaled and someone mentions bringing the state police to give them a ride, why didn't Ro seem concerned?
Where was this ep set? I thought I heard the waitress from the diner speak with a slight Texas accent, but is the Lone Star State known for being a major tornado area?
Note the pregnant woman in the shelter. I thought circumstances would necessitate Z deliver a baby at some point, but thankfully we were spared that. Although I have to wonder what he'd make of such a thing....
POK:JLC#444: "Doin' What Comes Natu-rally"
Another fairly standard outing--reminded me in places of the Pokemon swap meet ep, including an appearance from the shyster who keeps trying to sell James a Magikarp scam. And the poor dense little bugger keeps falling for it too--although at the last moment he recognizes the guy, even if Jessy restrains him before he can go psycho and tear him a new one.
Also, it seems most rubes think "future sight" is divination...but as we learn from the Girafarig ep, it's little more than a psychic attack that takes a few minutes to work....like the Pokemon version of a time-release cold pill. They seem pretty taken with the magician's patter and the easily-interpreted "futures"--I've seen better on a fortune cookie at Great Wall.
Much of the story involves a troupe of performing carny Pokemon, a boy named Mackenzie and his pet Natu, Naughty. Mackenzie knows his father's psychic routines but craps bricks when he's in front of crowds. So Ash and Brock and Misty convince him to wear a Wooper mask onstage when he performs, which seems to help. A little brushing up on future sight and a few alterations to the act to make it his, and the kid does well...until Team Rocket, looking to be talent agents, crashes the party and swipes Naughty and most of the performers.
With the help of a Machoke who escapes Jessy and James' net, Team Twerp catches up to the crooks and forces them to relinquish their capture, bringing their balloon down with help from Bayleef's razor leaf attack. There's a Pokemon battle after they land in front of a grade school--which leads to a great line from James when Victoreebell tries to swallow his head: "Not in front of the children!" Oh, the implications had me roaring with mirth.
The Rockets' scheme is a bust, and Mackenzie puts on an impromptu show for the kiddies right there...gradually losing his fear of performing, and the mask.
Nothing much else to note, except James' strange obsession with instant food in this episode...and the query of whether a Poke-paw print on a contract is binding in a court of law?
We see on Digimon the beginning of redemption for Beelzemon, as he is totally creeped about hearing his victim's voice come out of the blob...and when he ries to save Jerri, she seems reluctant to go to him, saying, "You're not Leomon." It seems her eyes were playing tricks on her, as the move he used was presumably similar to her partner's...and her hesitation may have cost her a way out of the bubble.
Also, the parents are realizing the kids can now biomerge...and Suzie performs a perfect digivolve, her first. She may be a bit young to merge, though, but maybe when she's older, in season four?
Strange edit--Rika hollers something to the Chaos to the effect of "Incorporate(?) this!" but doesn't follow it up. Did she gesture obscenely or something in the original?
Today's House of Mouse featured classic black-and-white characters alongside the technicolor ones, a la "Fields of Honey" or "Two-Tone Town". They showed an actual short from 1933 called "The Whoopee Party", followed by a contemporary short, "Goat Man", done in a b/w style similar to the Yakko, Wakko, and Dot "theatricals" on A! (complete with lines and scratches to make the film look old). Also, Donald meets up with a prototype duck character presumably from early Disney shorts, with a weird obsession for sandwiches...trippy. "He's the president of your fan club. As well as the vice president, and the secretary, and the treasurer...actually, he's the only member." :D