CSBS – Fillmore! Episode 6: Next Stop, Armageddon

Plot: After messing up Principal Folsom’s birthday party, Fillmore and Ingrid are assigned to model train convention duty. While everything is calm for a while, a horrible accident causes the entire convention to be destroyed. Seeing the remote control for a model car in the rubble peaks Fillmore’s interest since model train enthusiasts and RC car racers are notorious enemies. What and who has caused this derailment?

Breakdown: One of my favorite aspects of Fillmore is how it takes some mundane thing and makes it something extremely important or popular. I know model train enthusiasts are still a thing, and many of them can be very intense, but to have this huge train convention at school and have this many students obsessed with model trains? With all of the various and off-color extracurricular activities at this school, I always wanted to be a student at X.

Exaggerating the topics typically gives the episodes some good moments for comedy, and this one is no exception. From O’farrell getting sick over the ‘carnage’ of the train crash to the reporter speaking in a 1920’s journalist voice and flying an RC helicopter over the wreck, this episode is one of the best Fillmore episodes for exaggerated comedy.

Plot B involves Fillmore losing his pet fish, Felonious. He had him for over three years, and was particularly attached to him because he was his only friend through his juvenile delinquent days. Everyone tries to cheer Fillmore up by buying him a pet fish, but he doesn’t want them. While this plot is kinda jammed alongside the episode for the most part, it does come full circle into the case.

Moreover, they don’t solve this problem by buying Fillmore a new fish….kinda. Ingrid understands that the reason he can’t just move on and buy a new fish is because he’s not really allowing himself to say goodbye and grieve. She buys him a therapy book on grief in children, and Fillmore accepts it without a fight or judgment. Reading the book not only helps him get over his grief and get a new fish, but it also helps him figure out who the perp is.

It was a very healthy and believable way this situation would’ve been handled in the real world, and I applaud the writers for that.

However, I do have some gripes. First, it’s completely obvious who the perp is this time. I knew it from the instant he came on screen.

Second, his reasons for committing the crime were weak. The perp today is a celebrity in the model train world, Oscar. He is moving away because his parents own a model train business and they’re not getting as much work in the area as they used to so they’re moving to a place where model trains are more popular.

Oscar didn’t want to move, so he sabotaged the entire convention to have everyone’s best stuff be destroyed, forcing them to buy more supplies from his parent’s store and preventing them from moving. I get the plan, but one or two days of good business doesn’t change the fact that the hobby is dying in that area. They’d have to move either way. He is just a kid, so maybe he’s just not getting the big picture, though.

Also, this isn’t really a gripe, but I am just now realizing that whenever Fillmore and Ingrid confront a suspect, most of the time they throw something in their faces and run away. The running part I’m fine with, even though I have mentioned how pointless that is, given school grounds and such, but why do they always feel the need to throw something at them? Distractions I get, but every single person does this. It’s hard to ignore at this point.

All in all, I loved this episode. The mystery was weak this time around, but that’s about it. Everything else is very solid, well-written and very funny.

Next Episode, a beloved digital pet gets kidnapped!

…Previous Episode

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Kouryu Densetsu Villgust Review

Plot: Villgust is as a peaceful land in a world parallel to ours. However, many years of peace were suddenly interrupted when an evil deity appeared and cast a dark shadow over the land. Many monsters laid waste to the countrysides, and the people prayed to their god, Windina, for help. She answered their prayers and created eight warriors to rid Villgust of the evil deity and return peace to the world.

Breakdown: I tend to get excited when I start watching old mostly unknown OVAs. Even if they’re a product of a much different and, arguably, crazier time in anime, their style, stories and characters usually draw me in.

This is, sadly, not one of those times.

Kouryu Densetsu Villgust is a two episode OVA made in 1992 to 93. It’s based off of a Famicom game of the same name that was never released outside of Japan and I’ve never played, obviously. Not that…it matters? Because it sounds like the plot isn’t the same as the OVA’s.

Wiki: “The object of the game is to rescue your girlfriend and to return to modern Japan from a parallel medieval world. The player controls five people as they fight apes and skeletons for experience points.”

As you can tell from the plot synopsis, none of this seems to mesh. There’s no girlfriend in another world. In fact, as far as I can tell, all of the characters are from Villgust, and the main characters are eight people, not five.

However, I can’t vouch for this as an adaptation, so let’s go over this anime on its merits as a standalone.

First, the plot. That is some grade-A cliché plot right there. For the love of Windina, this is basically the plot to Captain Planet. This has to be one of the oldest plots to ever see written word. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing if the story and execution are good enough, though….And they’re really not.

This show is aiming to be equal parts action-fantasy and comedy. This is obvious from the fact that all of the human characters are done in mid-chibi style. Ya know, where the characters are adults but clearly smaller and made cuter, but not so extreme as to be real chibi.

Put it this way – if normal characters are drawn eight heads high and chibi characters are about three, this style is about five.

Problem is, the action’s not that good and neither is the comedy. The action is hard to take seriously since there’s the lingering contrast of the comedy and the complete lack of a villain you can take seriously.

In addition to the main baddie being the oh-so-creatively named ‘evil entity’, he’s not even the one they’re fighting. The baddie for this series is Gavady – a follower of the evil entity who is impossible to take seriously because, in order to add comedy to him, they have him baby a pet frog named Antoinette. He pets him like a cat, talks to him and makes kissy faces – the fear is not happening.

The evil entity….is confusing. In the opening narration, the evil entity is created, unleashes swarms of monsters to cause destruction and terror, Windina makes the warriors, but the warriors never defeat the entity.

In fact, at the start of the series, for the most part, they don’t even know each other. They’re separated into two groups of four and only meet at the ending of episode one. They’ve never met before this and obviously never defeated the evil entity, but dialogue indicates that the evil entity was defeated somehow and his henchmen are trying their damnedest to bring him back to life.

I don’t get it. At all. I watched the opening narration four times just to see if I missed somewhere where they might have said he was sealed away by Windina or something, but no. She just creates the warriors and never says a word or even appears over the course of the entire series.

However, the evil entity is never revived. The final battle is of Gavady’s ‘true form’, which is a weird…worm….turtle….goblin…thing? The series ends on the ‘we can’t let the evil entity be revived’ note.

For a good chunk of the OVA, the enemy isn’t even Gavady – it’s his henchmen. Yup, even the henchman to the guy who is supposed to be the main baddie isn’t our main baddie.

He hatches a plan to have the warriors meet and trick them into fighting each other until they’re so tired that they can’t fight back….Let me point out that this henchmen states later that one of the reasons the followers of the evil entity had enjoyed their time of terror so far has been mostly due to the fact that the warriors had yet to all meet up… He’s even so nice as to reveal to them that they’re all the warriors of Windina….Good job.

That plot, by the way, takes up half of episode one and half of episode two. We don’t get to the point of fighting Gavady until the very end of episode two.

This includes having those frustrating super villain moments where you’re sitting there gnashing your teeth asking why, when given a perfect opportunity, do the bad guys not kill the warriors?

One of the characters triggers a huge expulsion of energy, which knocks out the warriors after having exhausted themselves from fighting each other. The bad guys have nearly all of the warriors unconscious right in front of them, exhausted beyond belief, and what do they do? They jail them, let them wake up, explain their plans, and set up an elaborate execution later on, not even questioning where the other two warriors are.

Again, good job.

I will give the ending battle this – it’s a pretty decent battle, even if he is one of those irritating grab bag of powers villains. He can make super powerful gusts of wind, has a Venus fly trap turtle shell thing, can shoot a multitude of tentacles from his mouth, turn people to stone, shoot huge bursts of fire and has three….giant facehugger worms (?) on his body. But, of course, it’s pretty predictable. They all combine their efforts together….except Bostov….to defeat him.

It’s an alright, albeit bland, story, but the plot about meticulously tricking them into fighting each other takes up way too much time. No one’s going to believe that they’re going to destroy each other or won’t figure out the trap. It’s pointless. They would’ve been better off having the entire group together at the start and building off of that.

Second, the characters. They’re a mixed bag to say the least.

Group A: First up we have Kui, who is a knight from a distant land, I think. He is sworn to protect the princess, Chris, and is her love interest. Outside of that, he’s your very typical knight character. He’s brave, noble and honorable.

Next we have Chris, the aforementioned princess, who flip flops between also being a brave warrior and being a stereotypical girl character, fawning over Kui. One minute she’s all “I’m fighting because I’m a warrior too!” and the next she’s “Ohhh, news of a bad guy nearby! Oooh I’m so scared. Hold me, Kui!”

Then we have Youta, who is a little pervy and goofy.

Finally, there’s Fanna, the only archer of the group (everyone else uses swords.) Fanna seemed alright for a while, helping out in battle and taking no shit from Youta, but she quickly becomes very irritating and another stereotypical girl character.

In her shining moment of idiocy, she’s taking a bath while the others chase some cat girl I’ll definitely get to in a minute. Because she’s alone and vulnerable, the enemy tries to sneak attack, but they’re pushed through the wall of the bath. Fanna freaks out, we cut away, and when the others arrive at the bath they see that Fanna knocked the two intruders out with rocks. That would be fine and dandy if she stayed where she was, but no.

She’s so freaked out over these two monsters seeing her naked that she does the only logical thing….she runs off alone into the forest, still naked, freaking out over them seeing her naked.

None of this particular action makes any sense. ‘Bad guys attacked me because I was alone and vulnerable. Better run off into the woods alone and naked without my bow so I’ll be as vulnerable as humanly possible. Monsters saw me naked! Better run off naked into a forest where tons of living beings, people and monsters alike, can see me naked.’

Then she collapses in the forest crying out that she’s lost….Dumb…ass.

Fanna later becomes entirely useless and is relegated to being Ryuquir’s bitch girl. Fun.

Group B: First up for Group B is Murobo, who is essentially Kui if he was much more gullible, wielded an axe, and was an anthropomorphic Red XIII from Final Fantasy.

Murobo was my favorite character, but that’s not saying much.

Second, we have Bostov, who is a slimy, perverted sack of crap. He wields a boomerang.

Next, we have Remi, the lone mage of the warriors, but don’t expect her to do much. Her one moment of usefulness is healing Kui and Murobo so they can do some actual damage to Gavady. She has no personality outside of being kind and insecure about her age and lack of physical development, which is only brought up once in a petty argument with Chris.

Finally, we have Chinese water torture incarnate, also known as Ryuquir. She is the aforementioned catgirl and one of the most annoying anime characters I’ve ever seen.

She’s a catgirl who actually acts, in all ways, like a cat. She even chases a mouse once. She’s incredibly hyper, inconsiderate, has an ungodly grating voice, and has the personality of a three year old if you gave her cat-like abilities, 30 pounds of sugar and a few hits of crack. Even her theme music is way too fast and makes me want to put a blow torch to my ear.

Not only is she annoying in every way, shape and form, but the very first time we meet her, she’s gorging herself on the village elder’s food supply without his consent – In a village where everyone is starving because they keep getting attacked by monsters.

The one positive thing I can say about Ryuquir is that she’s a good friend and brave, but friendship doesn’t not trump annoyingness.

One of the main worst aspects of Ryuquir is that she’s treated like she’s the main character on several occasions. She saves the others from peril in a big display twice, and she easily knocks away huge groups of enemies without batting an eyelash. You almost wonder if Windina really needed to create eight warriors when the seven seem like they can’t do much and Ryuquir seems like she can win this whole war on her own.

She even sings the ED of the first episode….

None of these characters get any backstory whatsoever, outside of the brief flash we get in dialogue of Chris and Kui’s story, which might be relevant to the games? None of them have any moment of character development nor do we get much bonding between them.

The two groups separately are meant to be close by default, I suppose, but outside of Murobo and Kui, who obviously bond through their fight together, the others seem kinda shoved together – literally with Fanna and Ryuquir. Youta and Bostov bond over being pervs, and – are we meant to believe Remi and Chris bonded over insulting each others ages and boob sizes?

Bottom Line: Villgust does a lot of things wrong, but I’d be hardpressed to say this was a chore to sit through. It just wasn’t very entertaining. Almost all of the comedy relies on slapstick, which is seriously getting old, even back then. You really need to do something creative with slapstick if you want to get any laughs.

The action wasn’t great, with the biggest highlight being the final battle with Gavady, and even that’s not fantastic. It’s also very hard to get invested in the action when the stakes never feel real due to the comedy.

The characters are not fleshed out enough to feel much concern about them, but there is a little something there. Ryuquir is way too annoying to ignore, though.

The art and animation is decent at best and cheap at worst. The music pretty alright, but forgettable.

I’d like to see a longer series of this with a better arrangement in regards to story, and I’d like to see them actually combat the evil entity, but that’ll probably never happen.

Additional Information and Notes: Kouryu Densetsu Villgust was directed by Katsuhiko Nishijima, who also directed Project A-Ko, and was produced by animate Film. It is not currently licensed in English.

Episodes: 2

Year: 1993

Recommended Audience: Outside of some typical anime pervness and fantasy violence, there’s a tiny splat of blood. 6+

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Episode One-Derland (Cartoons) Motorcity

Plot: A man named Kane took over the city of Detroit, promising to turn it into a utopia only to build an entirely new city on top of it called Detroit Deluxe and strip the citizens of their freedom. In the old Detroit, now called Motorcity, people live in rough conditions, but at least they have their freedom. A team of rebels called the Burners are at war with Kane to reclaim Detroit and free the citizens above. Lead by the former Kane cadet, Mike, along with Julie, Chuck, Dutch and Texas, they have to utilize fast cars, futuristic weapons and high tech gadgets to win the war for Motorcity.

Breakdown: Hm, I sure have been reading a lot about networks screwing over their shows lately. I should take a break and watch a fun cartoon.

*one episode later*

Wow, that was a lot of fun! Hm…I wonder why it only has 20 episodes.

*one depressing article read later*

Dammit!

Why do networks do this? Why do they even pick up certain shows if they’re just going to screw them over, sending them on a crash course towards failure?

Networks seem to do this to varying levels, and I don’t get it. You don’t want a show? Don’t pick it up. Why bother going through with production and airing if you’re just going to treat the show like garbage?

Here, wander down the rabbit hole. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ScrewedByTheNetwork

But for now let’s focus on the topic at hand, Motorcity.

Motorcity is no masterpiece. It has a pretty worn out plot, and even has a lot of cliché character archetypes at work (Except Texas, because Texas is awesome) but it’s a refreshing visual experience with a lot of style. It doesn’t seem to aim to be more than a really, really fun action show about cars.

And that’s fine. This is entertainment. It’s meant to be fun.

I had fun with this episode, and it does a decent enough job establishing all of the necessities such as the world they live in, most of the characters (I think they need to flesh out Dutch and Chuck more because they seem to both have the same job and personality quirks at this point.) the antagonist, the conflict and, right at the forefront, the style.

This is one of the more stylized shows I’ve seen in a long time. It’s simultaneously rough and very polished. It has a sort of ‘animated short’ feel to it, if that makes any sense.

The only problem I had with the style is sometimes the bright lights and lack of contrast in certain scenes makes it difficult to make out what’s going on in action scenes.

Oh and did I mention that Brendan Small of Home Movies and Metalopcalypse did the music for the show? And that Kel Mitchell came out of the woodwork to voice Dutch? AND that Mark Hamill voiced Kane? How can you cancel a show where Mark Hamill plays a villain? That’s blasphemy!

So what did Disney do to screw over this show?

I direct your eyeballs to this article.

http://www.toonbarn.com/other-cartoons/happened-disney-xds-motorcity/

To sum up – Motorcity got canned, before it even finished its first season, because of bad ratings. Understandable. But why did it have poor ratings?

Let’s go down the article’s list.

1) The timeslot was moved around frequently.

Want to make it very difficult for people to follow a show they like? Screw with the time slot. How many times have you enjoyed a show and then tried to watch it on the time and day you thought it was on only to see something completely different and then have to look up the new timeslot because the network is too stupid, lazy or conniving to properly advertise the change?

Frequent time slot changes are also a sign that the network just doesn’t give a crap about the show. For a series where the first season wasn’t even followed through all the way, there’s no excuse to keep changing the time slot.

Also, this is something mentioned in the TV Tropes listing, but they also didn’t air reruns of the show until 2015 for no reason. The show initially ran in 2012.

2) The show went on hiatus right as it was gaining a fan base.

I have no idea what this hiatus was about, but that explains why it took nearly a full year to air a twenty episode long season. Hiatuses in a show’s infancy are incredibly damaging. You don’t want to pour water on a fire before the spark even catches.

3) The episodes were aired out of order.

This one is just bullshit. There’s no excuse for this. Why the hell would you air the episodes out of order? It’s confusing for the viewer and makes for a miserable experience trying to follow the story.

4) Most of the episodes were leaked, and when the hiatus ended, they restarted on the episodes that were leaked.

This one is something I found on the Motorcity Wikia’s petition page. I couldn’t find much info on this, and it’s so bizarre, so I thought I’d add it as a subset.

Is this implying that Disney knowingly leaked these episodes to damage ratings upon airing and then purposely aired all of the leaked episodes after the hiatus was over to further damage the numbers, because why bother watching something that was leaked online?

If that has any sort of credibility, wow….just wow. That is some evil schemeness.

5) Very little advertising or marketing for the show.

I remember seeing some advertising for the show, but it wasn’t as promoted as most new shows. Also, I don’t see how this show couldn’t be marketable. Cars, weapons, cool stylized gadgets, the works. I get the feeling like the Disney didn’t like the tone or theme of this show and didn’t want to associate themselves with it, which why it reportedly took ten years for Titmouse, the production studio, to get the idea through Disney.

It makes sense. Disney is far from gritty, grungy or edgy. Doesn’t make it right at all, though. Again, you don’t want something? Don’t take it.

The saddest aspect of this whole situation is that Disney still owns the IP of Motorcity, so even if Titmouse tried to revive it, they wouldn’t be able to. Reminds me of the fiasco with Making Friends and Nickelodeon.

Apparently, in 2013, Titmouse tried to have both Motorcity and another of their properties that was shafted thanks to network bullshit, Megas XLR (which was canned because the president of Cartoon Network didn’t ‘get it’. They also purposely ignored any efforts to have it revived, even on Adult Swim, because they felt it was a complete waste of money.) but that, evidently, didn’t work.

I absolutely hate when networks treat a property like shit and then chain themselves to the IP so they can keep it in their back pocket in case they can make money on it some day. Or just to be assholes. They take someone’s ideas and hard work and ensure that no one can ever do anything with it ever again, as long as they deem it so. That is so selfish and disrespectful of the creators I could scream.

Verdict:

Motorcity is a lot of fun and can be pretty funny sometimes, especially Texas. It has a lot of potential to be more than just a fun action show, and, for all I know, the next 19 episodes could prove to go above and beyond, but it was yet another victim in a sea of network sharks.

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My Poke-Pinions: 010 – 012 – The Caterpie Line

Caterpie

Name: Caterpie is obviously an off-shoot of ‘caterpillar,’ and damn the Wiki writers for calling it a ‘corruption’ of the word. It’s a ‘cute….uption.’ I really like Caterpie’s name. It’s snappy and adorable.

It’s also its original Japanese name as well, so my work’s done here.

Design: Let me preface all Bug type analyses in the future by saying I hate bugs in real life. I shouldn’t say I hate them so much as….I am afraid of most of them. I like ladybugs, butterflies, dragonflies, daddy long legs and, yes, even caterpillars, but I get freaked out over even things like moths or ants. I don’t like them touching me. I am interested in studying them from afar, because insects can be quite amazing. but don’t friggin’ touch me.

It’s also difficult to say any bugs are really ‘cute.’ They can be kinda pretty, but I’m not sure ‘cute’ is the word for any of them. Pokemon has a great talent of changing this opinion, however, because Bug types tend to either be cute or badass in design.

That being said, I love Caterpie’s design. It’s adorable. It has large expressive eyes, cute little feet and cuddly little body. I also like the choice of colors. It’s nothing very creative, but it’s pleasing to the eye and fitting for the Pokemon. The design of its antennae was also cute and added a nice splash of contrasting color.

In terms of sprites, Caterpie hasn’t changed much at all over the years. It only tends to change angle slightly.

Emerald’s sprite is kinda cute with its animation because it’s curled up like a baby.

I don’t have any other notes for any other generation, except maybe that B/W looks weird with how it bobs up and down. It kinda looks drunk.

Shiny: I really like Caterpie’s shiny version. I love the golden hue, though some versions are a little too yellow for my tastes. Since caterpillars commonly have yellow on them, this shiny suits it very well.

Cry/Voice: The initial note of Caterpie’s game cry is a bit too high pitched. It’s slightly irritating. Other than that, it’s cute and fitting.

The anime’s voice is awkward. It can be cute, but it very obviously sounds like a person trying to do garbly animal noises.

Dex Entries and Backstory: Being such a ‘beginner Pokemon,’ Caterpie’s Dex entries are kinda boring. It has suction cups on its feet to climb up surfaces, emits a terrible odor from its antennae to repel predators and eats a lot.

Its design origins are equally uninteresting. It’s based on the Asian Swallowtail caterpillar, and the end of its tail might be based on the horns of hawk moth larvae.

Metapod

Name: Metapod sounds like a transformer. And I’m just fine with that. It’s a combination of the words ‘metamorphosis,’ since it’s currently in a transformative state within its cocoon, and ‘pod,’ because…it’s…a pod…

It’s Japanese name is Transel and I hate it. Transel is a combination of ‘transform’ and ‘cell’ or ‘shell.’ It sounds weird, it doesn’t fit the Pokemon, in my opinion, and it is not catchy at all.

Fun Fact: In French, it’s call Crysacier, which is a billion times more awesome.

Design: Uhm….it’s a cocoon with eyes…It’s hard to either like or dislike it. It never seems like it has an expression besides Eeyore and super pissed. I will say that, despite how it looks, I actually found it incredibly difficult to draw when I was doing my series of Pokemon drawings. The shape is just awkward.

It has an okay shade of green to it, and that’s about it.

For sprites, again, there’s not much to say considering it’s a mostly inanimate cocoon. It’s not like it can have interesting animations or dynamic poses.

The only note I have here is, holy crap, the back sprite for RBG is HORRIFYING. It’s like something out of a horror movie.

Shiny: I really love Metapod’s shiny. It’s such a unique and pretty shade of orange. Combined with its original form, it’s like an autumn version of Metapod.

Cry/Voice: Metapod’s cry is alright. It’s nothing special, but I don’t really expect it to be.

I honestly forgot if Metapod even had an anime voice. It’s mostly quiet, but when I looked back, it does indeed have a voice and it sounds kinda awful. It sounds like someone pinching their nose and saying ‘Metapod’ with no inflection whatsoever.

Dex Entries and Backstory: As you can probably guess, Metapod’s Dex entries and backstory are fairly bland. It’s just an intermediary stage for Caterpie to reach Butterfree. It has a shell as hard as steel, and its only move is Harden. And millions of small children and 30-somethings everywhere giggled.

It also has the fastest evolution rate of any Pokemon known in Gen I, which isn’t true because Weedle evolves into Kakuna at the same level.

Metapod as a Pokemon is based on the chrysalis of the caterpillar that Caterpie is based on, the Black Swallowtail, with protrusions that mimic either the Polydamas or Pipevine Swallowtail chrysalis.

Butterfree

Name: I adore Butterfree’s name. It’s a mix of ‘butterfly’ and ‘free,’ Though, in Japanese, the tail end of the name includes the sound ‘furu,’ which can mean ‘to flap’ like Butterfree’s wings.

The name rolls off the tongue, is very cute and suits it beautifully.

Butterfree’s name is the same in Japanese.

Fun Fact: In French, it’s called Papilusion, which is beautiful.

And in German, it’s Smettbo…..Smettbo……That is the funniest word I’ve heard all week.

Design: Butterfree’s so adorable! Look at its cute widdle hands! Its big eyes! Its cute widdle mouth! Its pretty wings! Its cute widdle feet! Its adorable antennae!

Sprite-wise, they’ve done pretty well with Butterfree over the years.

Red’s the tiniest bit doofy, but Yellow’s is adorable.

Green’s is a little odd because it seems like they altered the shape of the wings before releasing overseas.

N’aw the animation for Crystal!

N’aw the animation for Emerald!

N’aw the animations for DPP and HG/SS!

IT’S CONSTANTLY ANIMATED IN BW/BW2!

Stop! My heart can’t take much more of this.

The female versions have a little black splotch on their lower wings. It’s a fine addition, I guess. Better than adding hearts to it.

Shiny: I’ll be honest, I don’t much care for Butterfree’s shiny. I really like the green eyes, and there are some nice versions of its pink wings, but the pink hands and feet just clash to me. It’s too much all together, and it makes it look unappealing.

Cry/Voice: Butterfree’s cry is cute, but, again, I think the first note it just a bit too high pitched, which makes it a little irritating.

Butterfree’s anime voice is really cute…in small doses. It can get majorly annoying very quickly.

Dex Entries and Backstory: Butterfree’s Dex entries surprised me a bit because almost all of them focus on its ability to collect honey from flowers….I don’t know if it’s the same in the Pokemon world, but you don’t collect honey from flowers.

Bees collect nectar from flowers and they store it in a special organ called a honey stomach. Then they regurgitate it and pass it to another bee, who chews on it. It gets passed back and forth like this for a half hour until it turns to honey due to an enzyme in the bee’s mouth. Then they store the honey in cells on a honeycomb, which is also made of gunk excreted from a bee’s pores. Num num num.

Only in Ultra Moon do they finally say ‘nectar.’

Other than that, Butterfree’s wings are also covered in poisonous spores that keep it dry in rain and help it evade predators, which sounds more fitted for Venomoth’s Dex entries.

It’s weird. I could’ve sworn I read something about Butterfree having some sort of mysterious psychic abilities, considering it can use some Psychic moves. Hm.

The origins of Butterfree as a Pokemon are based on the Black-Veined Butterfly, which is a bit of a boring-looking butterfly, but kinda cute.

Next up, the Weedle line.

Previously, the Squirtle line.

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Aardman’s Clay: Flushed Away (2006) Review

Plot: Roddy the rat seemingly lives the high life. He has a mansion of a cage in his mansion of a house, he eats well, pampers himself and never misses an opportunity to have some fun. The one problem is that he is terribly lonely. When his owner isn’t around, he pretends that he has a lavish social life, but ultimately realizes that he’s all alone most of the time.

A sewer rat named Sid suddenly invades his house through the pipes. He’s loud, gross and forcibly makes himself at home while simultaneously destroying the house. While Roddy is lonely, he’s not lonely enough to want him for company, so he tries to trick him back into the sewer through the toilet only to be knocked into the bowl and flushed away by Sid.

Now lost in a sewer, Roddy finds himself in a massive underground city for rats. He wants nothing more than to get back home. In his efforts to do so, he meets Rita, a rough and tumble rat who is being harassed by The Toad, who wants to steal her father’s precious ruby. However, he has much more nefarious plans outside of a little ruby.

Breakdown: Flushed Away tends to get shit on a lot. That’s my lone potty humor joke of the review. I’m sorry.

However, I have noticed that most of the time when this movie gets slighted, it’s in passing. Some reviewer will bring this movie up randomly as being terrible when talking about something else. Because of that, I was dreading this review. However, I realized that I’ve never bothered to go and read a full review of this movie, which I didn’t bother to do until I had nearly finished the movie because I enjoyed it a hell of a lot more than I expected, so I was wondering why the movie got such a bad rep.

What I found was mixed but mostly positive, with the main issue the reviewers were having with the movie being the exact same one I had.

I’d almost believe this movie was a punchline for many people based solely on the main plot and the title yet didn’t actually watch this movie or give it a chance.

Let me start off with the positive. The humor in this movie is top-notch. Despite the title, there’s very little in regards to toilet humor, and so many of the gags, even the running ones, work so well that I found myself laughing out loud numerous times, which is a difficult goal to accomplish with me.

I particularly enjoyed the running gag of the slugs, which easily could’ve been one of the most annoying things in this movie, but were hilarious every time they were on screen. I also loved the legion of frogs under Le Frog’s command. The mime frog in particular was a riot.

There are some groan-worthy jokes, and some slightly offensive-ish jokes like the French frogs immediately surrendering or the American rat being gross and rowdy, not understanding that the World Cup is soccer not American football, but these were few and far between.

Also, despite the fact that Aardman switched to a CGI format for this movie, it still very clearly holds the traditional Aardman claymation aesthetics. And yes, you get the unreasonably large always-grinning mouths. The animation really doesn’t suffer due to this change of format. In fact, it kinda benefits in the area of freedom of movement. Considering the massive world they had to animate, plus the added complication of water, I fully understand why they went this route. Plus, with movies like Arthur Christmas under their belt now, we know that Aardman definitely has talent in the CGI world.

The voice work was also quite good with Hugh Jackman voicing Roddy, Kate Winslet voicing Rita and Ian McKellen voicing The Toad.

Now onto the negatives. While the villain characters had their funny quirks, the protagonists are rather cut and dry.

You have Roddy, our main lead, who is basically any fish out of water (or rat out of cage?) story. He’s miserable in his current life, is thrown into a new one that he initially dislikes, he longs to go home, but his adventure getting back shows him that a life in the other place is much better and chooses to live there forever.

Reviewers kept bringing up that Roddy was meant to be parodying James Bond, and, I’m sorry, I don’t get it. He does dress up in a tuxedo, briefly parody James Bond and watch a spy movie at the start, but that’s it. Outside of having a villain to fight and going on an action adventure, there’s nothing else to imply a connection to James Bond.

Then you have Rita, the ‘I’m defying gender stereotypes’ clear love interest. She does more to move the plot along than Roddy does, and she’s kinda badass, but she doesn’t do much to differentiate herself from a trope that, ironically, is trying to escape a trope.

Being fair, neither character is unlikable in the slightest, which is an easy pitfall for characters like this. Rita starts out as a bit abrasive, and Roddy has his selfish and kinda jerkish moments, but these are usually justified in some way.

Sid is somehow turned into a good guy out of nowhere in the third act, even though he started as one of the grossest, dumbest, rowdiest dill holes I’ve ever seen. Also, he tried to kill Roddy in the first act, so what the hell?

The weakest area of this movie, however, is in the story. It’s just….not all that good. It’s boringly cliché at best and stupid at worst. This is definitely one of those movies that’s good because of its parts not the sum of its whole.

While we have a ton of great quick gags that more than make the movie worth watching, as well as a bunch of action that is fun to watch, when the movie slows down and reminds you of the plot, it loses your attention badly. The plot with Roddy is so predictable it practically hurts. Just by reading the synopsis, you can tell EXACTLY what will happen.

The one facet of his story that I was wondering about is if he’d really be willing to leave his owner, because even though we only get little snippets of his owner, a little girl named Tabitha, she takes great care of him and seems to love him a lot. I’d feel bad for her knowing Roddy would just up and leave her for a life in the sewers.

This is where Sid comes in because after he suddenly heel turns in the third act, Roddy leaves him to be Tabitha’s new pet. Sid promises he’ll be good to her, but you can’t trust this guy. He tried to kill Roddy earlier. He also basically destroyed the house by making a massive mess. Not to mention, this is a damn sewer rat. A filthy, stinky, fat sewer rat.

Do you honestly believe 1) She’d be fooled into thinking this is Roddy? (Spoiler alert: She is, somehow. So either she’s an idiot (she even ignores the massive mess around him) or she really cares so little about Roddy that she can’t tell him apart from any other rat, which doesn’t mesh from what little we know about her.)

2) If she doesn’t, that she’d be cool with losing Roddy forever and just adopting this new rat?

And 3) that her rich, pristine parents or even Tabitha herself would be cool with her adopting a disgusting, smelly sewer rat that infiltrated their house while they were away?

He does kinda get comeuppance in the end, but eh. I’m quite certain nothing actually bad would happen to him, but….again, eh.

On the…I guess we’ll call it the ‘James Bond’ plot, we have a story that’s both kinda dark and silly/immature at the same time.

The main villain here is The Toad, and I’m not being lazy, that’s his name. His big plan is to commit genocide against all the rats in the city by opening the sewer flood gates during half time of the World Cup, which is when thousands of people will all flush at the same time. All of the rats will drown in a tidal wave of piss water while the frogs and toads take over the city and he can repopulate with a massive collection of tadpoles that he…somehow created by himself?

See what I meant about being dark but also really silly/immature? Roddy and Rita got tangled in this mess when they both got captured by his men in an effort to retrieve a ruby Rita’s father passed down to her. The Toad believed it was his, she stole it back, so he hunted her down and took it back. In their escape from The Toad, they steal the master cable, which is necessary for this plan to work, so then he starts chasing them for that.

I will mention that, while the ruby is ultimately not very important to the overall plot, it did lead to the one story element that actually surprised me a good deal, but I won’t spoil it.

Overall, this movie is a truckload of really good gags with a decent amount of solid action piled on top of two stories that just don’t hold up very well. It could be a lot worse, it’s more like all the good stuff is sitting on cheap plywood more than wet toilet paper, but I was certainly waiting for the next gag to come along whenever the plot started to slow down. The first act in particular was a bit of a chore to get through.

Not to mention, they felt the need to include a small bit where Roddy lies about his situation to Rita and tries to pretend his life is fine, which was painful to watch for all the wrong reasons. I truly, sincerely hate awkwardness and lying plotlines. They never cease to suck all of the enjoyment out of a scene or movie. Luckily, this was shortlived.

There were some serious moments that I thought were really good, like Roddy being so happy that there was someone else to say ‘goodnight’ back to him that he kept saying it over and over to Rita, and Roddy making good on his promise to give Rita not only a ruby but also an emerald to help replace something she lost.

This is also one of those movies that I imagine would get better on repeat viewings due to little background jokes you might have missed the first time out.

Also, very minor, but I hate that this is one of those movies that ends on a dance party. That trope needs to die.

Recommended Audience: While there is some potty humor here and there, it doesn’t fare nearly as badly as you might expect from the title. There’s some kinda dark humor and mild violence, but nothing terrible. I was actually somewhat insulted that this movie essentially got a free pass by Common Sense Media for being kinda crass, yet a fun, good kids movie when they absolutely trashed Monster House. Ya know, the movie that doesn’t include a plot about goddamn genocide by piss water. Fairness is fun. 6+

Images courtesy of AnimationScreencaps.com.

Final Notes: Supposedly, Dreamworks meddled a lot with this movie after the US failure of Wallace and Gromit. Aardman is a company that works best when left to their own devices, and even though the details of what exactly went on behind the scenes are unclear, the tension between the companies was enough for this movie to be their final venture with each other. Aardman left Dreamworks and never looked back.

Aardman had a brief relationship with Sony Pictures Animation, but have been bouncing between studios for newer projects since 2012.

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SSBS – Tokyo Mew Mew: Episode 39 – Sweet Trap of the Lavender

Plot: Ichigo is on top of the world. Aoyama knows her secret, their relationship is going great, and he’s even keeping his promise of hiding her ears when she gets excited.

Her fun times are put on hold, however, when Taruto and Pai initiate their newest plan – using a new Chimera Animal to infiltrate the dreams of the Mew Mews. They’ve been continuously chastised by Deep Blue for their failures in defeating the Mews, and they’ve had to basically abandon a still wounded Kisshu in order to stay loyal to him, so they’re more determined now than ever to take them down.

The Chimera Animal puts Ichigo to sleep, becomes her and takes over her life. As fake Ichigo enjoys some sweets with the other Mews back at the café, she manages to lure them all into Ichigo’s dream. Taruto reveals that, as long as Ichigo’s asleep, they’ll be stuck in the dream forever and he and Pai will be able to go about their business uninterrupted.

The girls transform and battle the Chimera Animal, but find that their attacks are ineffective in this dream world since the Chimera Animal can control much of what happens within the space.

Pai and Taruto can destroy all of the Mews the instant they kill Ichigo since the others are trapped in her dream, but they decide to torment her friends within her dream as revenge for Kisshu.

A still badly wounded Kisshu stops Pai from finishing off Ichigo and, by extension, the other Mews, claiming he’ll be the one to destroy her since he blames her for everything going wrong with his plans. Surprisingly, however, this results in Kisshu forcibly waking Ichigo up, allowing the other Mews to escape from her dream.

Ichigo transforms and she and the Mews take the opportunity to attack the Chimera Animal. Now, outside of Ichigo’s dream world, the Chimera Animal has no control and is easily felled by the assault. However, the fight’s not over yet. Kisshu brandishes his sai and gives Ichigo an ultimatum – become his or die.

Ichigo easily bats away the attack since Kisshu’s so weak and he falls onto the ground, perpetually confused as to why Ichigo won’t listen to him or accept his offer.

Taruto and Pai continue to be confounded by Kisshu’s feelings for Ichigo, and Ichigo angrily confronts them about attacking her friends. They counter by saying she attacked and wounded Kisshu as well, and they fight for the people they care about just as much as she does. They collect Kisshu and leave the scene, leaving Ichigo and the other Mews in a state of shock as they realize that the aliens have feelings as they do.

Breakdown:

– Gotta feel bad for Kisshu. Poor guy’s just trying his best for his people and getting wrapped up in love in the process…..He’s still trying to kill people…….but still.

Also, how long has it been since he got wounded? He’s sitting on a building with blood dripping down his body, clutching his chest. He didn’t even try to patch himself up if Pai and Taruto weren’t able/allowed to?

– I can’t believe how much I’m getting into the adorableness of Aoyama and Ichigo. I’ve watched this series like three times now and I don’t remember getting that much into them and now I’m practically pausing at their moments to say ‘awwwww!!’ Dear god, I think age is turning me into a sucker for fluff.

– This Chimera Animal looks weird as hell.

– Taruto: “We won’t kill you yet.” The motto of every super villain that regularly loses.

– How, exactly, does dream stealing equate to becoming another person and pretending to be them?

– Ya know, a great way to stop the Mews might be to just….take their pendants away. They can’t transform otherwise, and they’ve had many chances to just swipe them.

– I’m not saying this to be an anti-shipper, I am very much supportive of all ships, and Kisshu/Ichigo can be quite cute…..but…Kisshu literally just told Ichigo to become his girlfriend or he’ll KILL HER…..It’s hard to overlook that.

– I like how they’re keeping the morality somewhat gray-ish when Ichigo chastises the aliens for hurting her friends and Taruto and Pai chastise her for hurting Kisshu. It’s still easier to sympathize with the Mews/humans, but this coupled with the earlier reminder of what the aliens are fighting for makes for an interesting dynamic.

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Overall, this episode was pretty darn good. The dream world aspect was interesting, and they had a plan that nearly worked had Kisshu not interfered. The beginning with Aoyama and Ichigo was pointless but incredibly adorable. And the conflict between the aliens and the Mews reaching a point where they realize that the situation isn’t as black and white as they once thought is very compelling.

The animation was a little off here and there, but nothing much worse than normal. It’s like this episode kept flitting back and forth between ‘budget episode’ and ‘we saved our budget for this episode’ It’s weird.

I like that they kept Kisshu wounded, too. So many times in shows like these we have one-off wounds that disappear in an episode, making tension dissipate and making it seem like nothing has weight, but here Kisshu is barely able to walk and is covered in blood. (4Kids would’ve been in a digital paint nightmare….Hey, we came full circle with the dream motif, yay. Also, strange that his blood’s only just now appearing…)

Next episode, speaking of shipping, we get some adorable Taruto and Pudding goodness!

……Previous Episode

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Digimon Tamers Sub/Dub Comparison Episode 1: Guilmon is Born! The Digimon I Created

Plot: In a world where Digimon is merely a card game (and maybe TV show?) a boy named Takato stands as one of its biggest fans. He spends most of his time playing Digimon the trading card game and drawing Digimon in his notepad.

One day a mysterious blue card is scanned through his Digimon card reader and transforms it into a Digivice. Not only that, but the new Digivice scans drawings that Takato made of a Digimon that he made up called Guilmon and brings him to life. Takato is thrilled to see a real Digimon but soon realizes that they may be more dangerous than he imagines. Is Guilmon to be trusted—OH OF COURSE HE IS! WOOK AT DAT FACE! SUCH A CUTIE!

Preface: I really like this season, even more than Adventure 02. (Whether or not it’s my favorite Digimon series…….I’d have to get back to you.) The cast for the Digidestined is better, the story is better, the relationships between the kids and their Digimon are better, and they’re delving into a darker atmosphere this time. It’s not without its problems, but I still really love it.

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Our opener this season is even more changed from the original than Adventure 02’s. In fact, I’d say only about 10% of the clips from the original, if that, are kept in the dub’s version, which is sad because they have some creative and nice looking shots.

A couple of the shots that they kept, namely the scene where we see Calumon in the forest and the title card are altered. The scene with Calumon in the forest is reversed so we zoom in on him instead of zooming out. The title card is obviously changed to be English, but they also sloppily animate (and by that I mean have a paper cutout flying around) Calumon flying near the ground to make room for the logo, and the scene itself has been shortened dramatically.

The music is completely different from the original, no surprise there. This season also features the same theme song as the previous two seasons only with more emphasis on electric guitar and the inclusion of “Digimodify!” The original theme is okay. It reminds me of Blood +’s first opener for some reason. Just the chorus.

One of my main issues with the series is Calumon. I hate this thing. I just do. Maybe he’s less annoying in the original, I don’t know yet, but I hate his guts in the dub. I blame his voice for the most part and the fact that he never shuts up. He never does anything particularly wrong but he’s so damn annoying.

Also, I find his sheer existence to be pointless. Why is there a Digimon who needs to spur Digivolution? Why do they have such difficulty doing it on their own? Isn’t that what their Digivices are for? And doesn’t this become a moot point later or does Calumon always just happen to be near the fighting? I remember him being kidnapped with Jeri at one point, and I don’t remember them having any problem Digivolving then.

Name Change…Kinda?: Calumon is originally Culumon. Saban didn’t technically do this, though. The Digimon Collectors series altered its name like this, and it was applied to all English media as such.

Culumon in the original has a speech quirk where he constantly says “culu” at the end of his sentences. That better be adorable and not annoying as time goes on…

The title screens are, as the last two series, removed in lieu of just putting the title over the beginning scenes. The title isn’t changed for the most part, but here’s this week’s title card.

Title Card:

Title Change: Guilmon is Born! The Digimon I Created is changed to Guilmon Comes Alive, which is basically the same just shortened.

Sadly, it seems the title card art for the most part is pretty weak in this series.

In this world, Digimon is just a card game. We’re supposedly not building on the series canon from the previous two series. If we were, Digimon would be incredibly common parts of everyday life. Here, it’s just a card game. The cards are used in the series by means of a scanner on their Digivices. Certain cards give their Digimon special boosts and abilities like super speed, weapons, flight and more. They’re basically phased out by the end of the series, though, except when using the blue card.

A lot of people believe this was a marketing ploy to get Digimon cards to compete against Pokemon cards, while others believe it was a poke at Yu-Gi-Oh, and still others believe it was yet another pointless add-on to the series like Calumon. I dunno. I don’t really mind the aspect of the cards. I never quite understood how exactly they work in tying into the Digital World, but they seemed like a fun addition.

In terms of the real life card game, I have some of the cards but I never collected them like I did Pokemon or Yu-Gi-Oh cards (I have way more Yu-Gi-Oh cards than either Pokemon or Digimon) Neither Pokemon nor Digimon as a game interested me very much. I liked collecting the cards but I got bored of it after a while especially when trading for them died down.

Name Change: Hirokazu is shortened to just Kazu.

Ms. Asaji, Takato’s teacher, has the exact same voice actress as Kari from the previous seasons in the dub, Lara Jill Miller. I have to say, it is insanely distracting. She doesn’t do a damn thing to differentiate her voice from Kari’s except maybe make it a tiny bit deeper/more serious and it really doesn’t help that Ms. Asaji looks quite a bit like adult Kari too.

I love how Takato compares Guilmon to Agumon and not Veemon in both versions. Like, yeah we know Agumon’s better.

In the original, Ms. Asaji (without Takato realizing that it’s her) asks if Takato’s designing a monster and he corrects her and says it’s a Digimon. In the dub, Ms. Asaji asks if Takato’s designing a Halloween costume and he says “No, it’s a Digimon. Don’t you know anything?” Wow, Takato. That’s pretty damn rude.

He’s slightly snotty about it in the original too, but he doesn’t insult Ms. Asaji. Either way, there’s no reason to be rude. In the original, does Takato forget that Digimon is short for Digital Monster? So technically she’s right, especially since there’s no way to tell if it’s a digital monster from a little drawing.

Original!Takato tells us that Guilmon’s a virus type reptile Digimon while dub!Takato doesn’t mention that.

One of the people who works at Hypnos, the organization Yamaki runs, named Riley/Reika says that there’s an irregular packet detected. In the dub, she says she sees an irregular germination pattern. *shrug* Also, this woman, the one with the long red hair, is voiced by Yolei’s dub voice actress, Tifanie Christun, otherwise known as “I really really really don’t want to write my name like any other person.” It’s not as distracting as Kari’s VA in Ms. Asaji, but there it is.

If we’re going to delve into voice actors here, the other main worker at Hypnos besides Riley is a woman with short blond hair voiced by Peggy O’neal who voiced Davis’ older sister, Jun, in Adventure 02 and also voices Henry’s little sister, Suzie, in this series.

I’m a tad bit confused as to how Takato even knows what a Digivice is. I mean, is it a part of the card game? I think there might’ve been a Digivice card, but it was the first season designs not these completely new ones.

I have a theory that maybe this is supposed to be like our world and Digimon is not only a card game but a TV series as well. That would explain how Takato and the others know these things that I don’t remember being part of the card game, and why Takato would think that all Digidestined leaders, even though he didn’t know any other Digidestined at the time, wear goggles. Even if the Digivice is a card, there’s no way the thing about the goggles would be a part of that.

Takato’s mom originally tells him to take a shower before dinner. In the dub, she says dinner’s ready.

I will never really understand how exactly that whole thing with Guilmon’s creation worked. It was just a drawing with some stats and info. Unlike the real cards with something to actually scan, these were just pages from a note pad. Also, why did Takato believe scanning his notebook would work anyway? I know it did but why did he think that?

If scanning those pages created a Digiegg, why did Guilmon appear as Guilmon? Shouldn’t he have been Baby or Baby II level instead of Child? Also, how does Guilmon even have Baby or Baby II levels if Takato never seemed to draw them? Then again, I don’t think he ever drew some of Guilmon’s other Digivolutions. In fact, I think he only drew Growlmon, didn’t he? I really don’t get Guilmon’s existence entirely I guess.

The commercial break eyecatches are removed. They’re a little weird actually. The Digimon this time take the form of lego-like characters.

Dub!Takato: (in his sleep) “Guilmon…..Digiarmor….Energize….”…..Digiarmor Energize? Did they forget what series it was? How could that possibly be part of the card game? Did they ever introduce Armor Digivolving to the card game? And if so did people really say that?

Name Change: Ruki Mukino is changed to Rika Nonaka….because that’s…..less Japanese…right?

Ruki originally gives Lynxmon’s level while Rika just says “Lynxmon vs. Renamon” Also, Lynxmon is Armor level? It has no armor….

Using the Digimon cards for actual Digimon battles is called Card Slash. In the dub it’s Digimodifying.

The card that Ruki uses for a speed boost in Renamon is originally called High-Speed Plug-In B. In the dub she just says “Speed activate!” Rika! You shouldn’t promote drug use! That’s awful!

Also, lets say that the first two series of Digimon really are a TV show as well in this series. If it is, why are the Digidestined this season called Digimon Tamers and not Digidestined/Chosen Children? Takato in both versions calls Ruki/Rika a tamer. Is that what all people who play Digimon the TCG are called?

Attack Name Change: Koyousetsu is changed to Diamond Storm.

Originally as Takato wakes up from his dream/vision he says that it was just a dream. In the dub he says “I’m alive. Good game!” Well, you were never in the line of fire so dunno why you’re surprised that you’re alive. Also, from an enjoyment standpoint, it wasn’t really a good battle. It was entirely one-sided.

Dub!Takato actually proves my theory by saying “What if it wasn’t just a TV show or a game?” However this, again, isn’t mirrored in the original. Original!Takato just says “What if it wasn’t just a game?”

Culumon asks a bunch of questions about the people he’s seeing like why are they walking in similar patterns and why aren’t they fighting. In the dub, Calumon asks why the ‘metal Digimon’ (cars) are spitting out all those people and claims they must be really good fighters or have awful indigestion.

Ya know, if Takato really wanted to have the best chance of his friends believing him, he’d show them his Digivice. Yeah, they’d probably claim it’s a toy or something but it’d be somewhat proof.

They forget to re-add the sound effect of Takato hitting his head in the sewer so it just looks like he’s holding his head and groaning for no reason.

Name Change: Reika Ohtori is changed to Riley Ohtori.

Due to a commercial break, they had to rearrange a couple shots. In the original, we see Takato walking down the stairs before we see the team at Hypnos detecting Guilmon. In the dub, we repeat a shot of the light and show Hypnos before Takato walking down the stairs. They also remove the part where Reika says the location of the Digimon from the scene and place it after Takato walks down the stairs.

Also in the original when a Digimon appears in the real world they call it “realizing.” In the dub it’s Bioemerging or breaching.

Riley makes a mistake. She says the Digimon is appearing in West Shijuku. It’s called ShiNjuku, Riley.

Davis’ VA is our narrator for this season. What, did all of the VAs from the previous series have a contract with Saban to be in all of the Digimon series or something? Just to see, I looked up if TK’s voice actress, Wendee Lee, was in Tamers. She is, technically, as a kid named Mako who was one of the kids who was intended to be Impmon’s Tamer alongside Ai.

While we’re talking about Impmon, he’s voiced by Derek Stephen Prince who was Ken’s VA. Finally, Terriermon’s voiced by Izzy’s VA, Mona Marshall. I know it’s no big shock that a dubbing company reuses the same VAs for various projects, just look at Funimation or 4Kids, but that really sticks with me for some reason.

The ending theme is completely removed as is the next episode preview. Instead we just get a rehash of the opening theme as our closer, which is a shame because the ending theme in the original is really nice.

Next time, we’ll be meeting Henry and Terriermon and getting some hijinks from Guilmon.

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