MXSTL #213: "Breakout"
Three of N-Tek's worst nemeses--Biokahn, Psycho, and John Dread--join forces. During a prison transfer aboard a sub, Smiley and the snake break Dread out. Max tries to stop them, but has to stop to save Kat from drowning. Dread and his goons invade N-Tek and scheme to use one of their satellites to blow up a summit of world leaders and implicate them in a national incident.Max is blown up in his ship and thought dead, but escapes ("So you're explosion-proof now?" Kat asks sardonically). Jeff, Berto, Kat and the newly-resurrected Max mop up the three stooges. Great line: "Dread, the only thing bigger than your ego is your mouth!" Watch the bit where Dread uses a computerized com-link implanted in a fake tooth.
I've noted that the CGI's quality has improved a bit from season one to season two...so what's with the rumor I hear about Max Steel going to 2-D animation come fall? I thought the whole 3-D gimmick was their edge on the competition.

X-MEN: "Grim Reminder"
Finally, an episode focusing on *my* favorite X-Man, Wolverine. In fact, this is one of the better episodes becasue it isn't cluttered with teen angst and weepy "Dawson's Creek"-ish twenty-something soap opera melodrama. Still, Wolverine's backstory was better handled in the Fox version--this story makes no mention of the Canadian couple who found Logan in the woods, nearly naked, slavering, and half-crazed.
A news report on a disturbance near a Canadian mountain range, as well as nightmarish half-remembered bits of the past, sends Logan running to the site. Meanwhile Kitty, looking for privacy to write home to her parents in peace, is hiding in the Blackbird's cargo hatch. An uninvited Nightcrawler joins her. The two end up unwitting passengers in Wolverine's great north junket.
It turns out the man responsible for Wolverine's condition--a hideous bald-headed troll of a scientist--implanted a chip in Wolverine's skull years ago and is now calling him home. It's vaguely suggested that he and Sabretooth ("Bigfoot", as Dr. Demento calls him) were created as mutant assassins...and are ordered to kill Kitty and Nightcrawler. Some good pathos as Wolverine thinks he murdered the girl on a cliff face, but she's safe, thanks to her talent for going ghosty. Wolverine confronts his tormentor, and there's a horrible explosion.
He wakes up days later at the institute with his head bandaged, the chip having been removed (the prof is also a skilled surgeon, it seems), and immediately asks about Kitty. She's safe--quartered in the dining room, thanks to Nightcrawler, who has learned a lesson about giving others personal space.
Dig Rogue's hair first thing in the morning. Yowza!
Note that Kitty calls him "Mr. Logan" all through the ep. It's odd because I don't think she'd ever done it before, and no one really knows if Logan is his first or last name. Kitty's no Jubilee--sigh!--but I must admit I'm warming to her. Even her valley girl accent, which isn't as bad as it was in the first few episodes, doesn't irk me as much. I don't know, maybe I just have a thing for diminutive brunettes.

POK JJ #345: "Hour of the Houndour"
My worst nightamre come to life--fire-breathing Dobermans.
Ash finds his backpack has been stolen, and with it all his Pokeballs, Pokedex, and the bread for their lunch. Brock finds a single piece of evidence: a track, which he can't identify (though even the most rudimentary zoologist can tell you it's a canine footprint. Some Pokemon expert he is.)
Meantime, Team Rocket is scheming to heist a ham from Nurse Joy's shopping bag--for three hams like them, that's practically cannibalism. Unfortunately their fishing line is hijacked by a shadowy figure, who leaves the trio con brio hungry and about to be nabbed with the empty ham wrapper. No crook wants to be caught, especially if he doesn't get to reap the spoils of his theft, so they run.
Ash and company, using a wooden weiner (oh, don't ask), discover a pack of Houndour, the vicious Doberman Pokemon. Like wolves, they travel in packs, tend to be predatory, and jealously protect the young and injured. Ash's first move is to...get right up in the leader's face and make direct contact. WTF? Did Mrs. Ketchum never teach her son not to pet strange dogs?
The Houndour leader--you can always tell which Pokemon are the leaders of their packs, because they have the most hideous facial scars--is more interested in the feeding and care of an injured comrade, though, to bite Ash's face off. So Brock plays nursemaid with some antibiotic spray. This upsets the other pack members immensely, but a couple of comforting words from Ash, backed up by one glance from Pikachu, Chikorita, and Cyndaquil lets them know that all will be fine, but if they try something funny there will be more hurt Houndour to deal with. Understanding, they back off and stop growling.
Altruistic Ash decides to haul the hurt dog all the way to the Pokemon center--a notion I admire, but there has to be a better, less taxing way to do it. For the last leg of the journey, the scarred old leader carries his comrade on his back. He arrives at the center and is nursed back to health.
Team Rocket show up, figuring if they can't have the ham, they can make off with the Houndour...but with a bit of help from the leader of the pack, Pikachu pops their plans, and their balloon. They wind up hanging on a branch over a cliff someplace.
Surprisingly, none of the Houndour decided to go with Ash on his journey, although a good dog Pokemon would be invaluable to a Pokemon master. I wonder if there are any beagle Pokemon (perfect for hunting rabbit Pokemon)...or perhaps Labrador Pokemon, a water-loving breed that could catch Psyducks or Farfetch'd.

ZETA #4: "Crime Waves"
While catching some rays at the beach, Zeta and Ro meet up with a spoiled rich kid who constantly abuses and mistreats his robot servants. He is harrassed by some biker punks, who are run off by his incompetent bodyguard.
Disgusted, Ro and and Zeta leave the little brat to his folly...but are shocked when he turns up missing and they are the prime suspects. After running afoul of the local police (here Zeta disguises himself as a three-handed Jamaican bongo player. You know, despite his talent for morphing, Zeta expends a lot of time and energy running--and the girl *still* never bothers to don a disguise in public!) They try to clear their good name by finding the boy, who it turns out was kidnapped by his bodyguard and the thugs he paid off on the sly. Junior apparently doesn't think much of humans either and has made a lot of enemies--little wonder his protector decided to cash in on his disapearance.
Long story short, the kid is saved, the bodyguard persecuted, and the por little rich boy learns a whole new respect for robots, having been rescued by one. It seems odd that all of Zeta's altruistic exploits never seem to reach Bennett's ears, or they do and he doesn't give a frig.

MIB #407: The Loose Ball Foul Syndrome"
Notice the new frames added to the opening theme? The coffee worms, Frank the Pug (in the alien criminal lineup)Zaltor, and Agent X have been spliced in, though the music hasn't changed.
This was a pretty interesting episode. The Fmecks have stolen a small planet, encased in a shell. J chases one of the culprits down, but winds up out of commission--I've heard of a hardened criminal, but a hardened officer?
The planet in the ball is one of a pair, and breaking their orbits causes their temperatures to go in flux--the big one freezes over, and the little one heats up. And you thought California had it bad because of the oil shortages. J is still stiff, so K has to go in alone--meaning he has to be shrunk and beamed planetside.
Great bit: Zaltor discovers that coffee will dissolve the shell on J and askes one of the worms which is more important, coffee or J's life. The little grub ponders on that *much* too long.
The Fmecks subsitute a baseball for the orb. The worms find the orb and decide to play with it. J hits it out of the park. The planet goes total meltdown in less than ninety minutes. J runs halfway through the city playing follow the bouncing ball. Frank gets his paw on it, turns it over to Jeebs, and the Fmecks take it from him. K sends J a signal by blowing up his ship and cracking the orb' shell, and J cools things off by making it rain rocky road ice cream. (Again, don't ask.)
Good bit in the end where J suggests an interplanetary baseball league and gets dirty looks from the others. Pity we didn't see L and X in this one, though.

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