So, the last space mouse-centric episode didn't go so well for me. Urgh. Let's see how this one goes. . .
The Mighty Space Mouse
We open with a unique angle on the castle and Pidge's voiceover--they don't need no reinforcements from Galaxy Garrison, they've got the space mice led by Cheesy. Who promptly leads the mice on the back of the sleeping blue cat. The other three mice hide behind a rock as Cheesy jabs the cat with a toothpick. Then he hammers the toothpick in with a rock. Yeah, blue sabre-toothed space cats don't generally take kindly to that.
The team is sitting around the table and Nanny is putting Hunk on a diet. Then the three mice without Cheesy enter and Cheddar tells Allura the blue cat's been chasing them, which means Haggar's up to something. The blue cat has been chasing the mouse, who drives him off just as the team arrives. Haggar is comforting her poor injured cat. Zarkon mocks her over the crystal ball. They discuss the robeast that's doing something underground--and Zarkon wants Lotor to only watch, not to actually be involved.
In the mousehole, Cheesy is leading the mice through what looks like suburi--with toothpicks. Urgh.
Pidge and Allura watch the mice--Allura explains that they hear things underground no one else is hearing. Allura convinces Pidge to support Cheesy's training, and Pidge decides to build them a version of a lion, while Keith . . . takes charge of their physical training. This involves them running around an obstacle course until Pidge rolls out the mechamouse. The mice, now dressed in miniature Voltron Force uniforms, do some mechamouse testing. The weapons include a cannon, flamethrowers, and water spouts. Just what anyone wants their mouse infestation to be armed with. Of course, the mouse is propelled all Flintstone-style, so when they try to launch, the mice get tired and it crashes. And Cheesy proceeds to abuse the mouselings.
In Castel Control, Coran has been tracking seismic disturbances. He gets an image of the ground cracking apart in some kind of fault line. Haggar is watching, and apparently knows they're watching her watch the earthquake, because she taunts them. They launch in the lions.
The lions arrive at the man-made crack (ehheheheheh!) and Hunk investigates. Rocks fall on yellow lion. Then the fissure closes just as yellow lion escapes. Allura surmises that someone is controlling the crack. Haggar appears and taunts them some more, then chains shoot out of the ground and catch all the lions but the black lion. Black lion frees them with his lion knife, and they form Voltron.
Voltron lands in the crack and does some posing. A scorpion-tail emerges from the rock wall and fires energy beams, but it gets severed. Then chains catch all four of Voltron's limbs and circular saw blades come out of opposite sides of the chasm. Haggar calls Lotor on the crystal ball (no, really) and apprises him of the situation. The mice, however, are ranging in on Haggar, and they shoot the mechamouse cannon at her, causing her to drop the crystal ball. It shatters. She sends the cat after them. Cheesy and Cheddar were celebrating outside the mecha, and the cat knocks cheesy right to the edge of the chasm, over Voltron. The other mice fire on the cat while the robeast starts cutting through Voltron. They can't form blazing sword because it would knock Cheesy off the cliff. Oh, no, what will they do?!
Cheesy falls, and the mousemecha scrambles to catch him with a net. They clear the area, and Keith orders, um, Magnum Energy Fusion, which makes Voltron glow white and vaporizes the chains. Then the blazing sword is formed. First they slice off the buzzsaws, then Haggar orders the robeast to emerge and attack. Yeah, it's some scorpion-looking thing. It shoots chains and energy at Voltron, who paralyzes it with, um energy beams from the sword. Then they chop it apart and it explodes.
Lotor sits in his flagship and mocks the injury to Haggar's cat. Zarkon yells at the witch, and throws a goblet at her while Lotor laughs at the whole thing. Then the closing scene has Pidge doing some maintenance on the mousemecha and hilarity ensues when Cheddar knocks him over with another toothpick.
I guess after the manic pace of the last episode, they needed a bit of a break. Or maybe they all just got into the acid and thought a thwacked-out Disney movie would be a good idea.
Fight Back, Space Mice
So things proceed about the same as in Voltron, just without Pidge's weird voiceover attempts to justify what's going on. And the space mice can talk. However, there are no mass deaths at the hands of Galra cruelty, no crying over graves, no lamenting loss, no torturing slaves. . . This episode is basically Tom and Jerry, so there wasn't a whole lot that WEP need to trim. There's also not an intricate plot or weird psuedo-scientific explanation of things for them to mistranslate.
However, there is the bit where Platte tells Fala that the mouse family has been "in the service" of the Altean royal family since ancient times, and this is now their time to repay the debt. The idea of something lowly like mice owing a debt to a benevolent ruler takes me right back to the Chinese folk tale feel. Even though it's done it a rather silly way here. And, mousemecha.
WEP did cut Jaga getting half his fur burnt off by the mechamouse. Yeah, that woulda totally traumatized me as a kid.
Seriously, though, there are two episodes I sorta transposed--this one I was sure had been in the "second" season, the one with US-only episodes. and I was positive Stride the Tiger Fighter, who was totally badass, had appeared among the original Golion episodes. Of course, I managed to repress the memory of the mouse mecha entirely. Probably because I just didn't pay attention when it was on.
The beastman is designated Mecha Beastman Chi Granz. And Golion uses the "Jyuoken Lightning Strike" for the first time.
This episode was apparently supposed to highlight the growing rift between Daibazaal and Sincline, as this operation was Daibazaal's thing. Um, how did he conquer the Great Dark Nebula again?
Oh, and Chuchule clobbers Platte with a mouse-sized Naginata. At least, I think that's what it's supposed to be.
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