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The Adventures Of Teddy Ruxpin: The New MAVO Member
Reviewed: 09/29/2018
The Beginning of The Tweeg/Quellor "Feud"!
Well; it's time for Tweeg to go to MAVO and win his membership as MAVO thinks it has all the crystals (they don't). Meanwhile; Teddy and company try to find a way to get the five crystals back that Tweeg stole . How does this episode fare? So; let's rant on shall we...?
Interesting Moment #1: They actually did a recap of the previous episode. Now; I'm all for this, but it's clear that this was done because the episode was going to run short if it didn't exist since it wasn't until in later arcs that the final episode would have extra scenes in it in order to pad the running time. Oh; and Teddy Ruxpin lies again, claiming that Grubby was intentionally trying to make a big wave; instead of what really happened in storyline where Grubby was trying to make his surfboard. Also keep in mind; we never see Teddy speak, therefore, there's no problem with mouth flaps. Geez; no wonder people think Teddy is a horror doll character, because he sure likes to lie on previews.
We begin this one with the wagon as LB and Tweeg's eyes look like the stereotypcial evil eyes now. And Tweeg is doing his victory speech prematurely, like the insecure whiny heel that he is. LB is laughing off Tweeg's assertion that he is an evil genius. To be fair; Tweeg being an evil genius is more plausible than Donald Trump being a "biggly stable genuis". Ponder that one for a moment. Tweeg still has dellusions of grandeur about being the Surpeme Oppressor again as LB bounces the wheels off of rocks for fun as Tweeg is taking bumps. The artwork is completely inconsistant in this episode so far; although the animation is not awful by any means. LB is really laying the insult names thick in this sequence, including the future Pokemon insult, Twerp. LB boots a rock backwards to let the wagon bounce off of it and Tweeg bumps again as LB claims that he shouldn't flatter himself. Let me finish the punchline here: His mommy would flatten his allowance even more than it already is. Cue Vinny laugh and Tweeg is struggling and protesting this outrage as they go out of sight away from the hard camera. Pan northwest to the Airship following them. Gimmick is looking on with his telescope while Grubby is on propeller duty. Gimmick is still not impressed as Teddy is carving the salt crystals into one of the six crystals with a paring knife. Geez; the artwork and jump cuts to closeups is jarring here when Gimmick is inspecting the crystals. Grubby is worried about losing the scent to MAVO; but Gimmick isn't worried because Tweeg is doing the work for them. So, we head back with a sky shot of the wagon as LB is pulling and asking if Tweeg wants to go see Elinore, in which the entrance has thorn vines surrounding it. This looks like an obvious sight gag that came out of nowhere and went the same place. Tweeg no sells the deal; because Elinore is too toxic even for Tweeg. So, the heels press on as we fade to black and we return as the heels have reached Iggly who is guarding the bridge and then when he sees the two losers, Iggly runs and guards the door.
Iggly also does the same sweet talk routine he did to Elinore two episodes ago. Page 4, Paragraph 1: Only MAVO members can enter MAVO. I see where Peg stole that routine from. Tweeg and LB's reaction was completely awkward and not on purpose I might add. So, Tweeg and Iggly have this whizzing contest on each other as Tweeg even remembers Quellor's words of getting in the way of someone with the crystals would mean suffering to the offender and Iggly no sells. Just show him the bag of crystals you stupid idiot! Iggly goes on a tangent about the dreaded Drool Beast, which I don't believe we ever saw, so that angle didn't go anywhere. So, Iggly finally gets it as Tweeg shows off the bag of crystals and it's clear that Tweeg clearly knew what Iggly's name was because he overshot the last name before catching himself and then went for the insulting last name. That was funny. Iggly relents and we head to Quellor's throne room as Quellor has one of the crystals in his hands and is happy to see it. Then he asks if Tweeg stole the crystals or was it treachery. Which is carny talk for: Did one of Teddy's friends turn on Teddy and give the crystals to Tweeg outright. Don't worry Quellor; he stole them, we have the tapes to prove it. Sure; LB helped, but that would make LB a MAVO member by proxy, so who cares? Tweeg just says yes, and Quellor takes it as a good answer, which is carny talk for "both answers are good; separate or combined". Quellor proclaims that it's time to celebrate this great happening and officially induct Tweeg as a MAVO apprentice as Tweeg has a piece of paper rolled up in his hand and he's stammering like a stupid idiot. He has zero idea what he has gotten himself into as Quellor summons all of his brown dragon/bat like creatures (which also change artwork literally from shot to shot) and they all fly out of MAVO through the vent and their job is to summon all monsters and villain to come to their feast because they have all the crystals now. The Airship has also arrived as Gimmick doesn't care much about those winged creatures and orders the Airship to land on a mountain top. Okay, then.
One of the bat flies southeast and we head to Elinore's house as the bat is perched on the window sill as Elinore is sitting at her mirror, basically calling Tweeg an absolute traitor for going over her head and heading straight to MAVO, rather than visiting his own mother and submitting to her will. Apparently; Tweeg was a rotten traitor less than three weeks after he was born and she fed him one or twice in his entire life. And Tweeg somehow still loves her? Elinore is the ultimate poster person for child abuse in the 1980's. How Teddy didn't call the police on her in storyline is a mystery to me. Oh; and she padlocks her door despite claiming that her door is always open to him. Elinore goes to the window -- which shoos the bat away -- and accepts the invite, probably to spite Tweeg's face. So, we head back to MAVO on the mountain top as the trio is kneeling at the cliff watching exactly two flying machines coming in and they look awful in terms of artwork, and this is extrapolated into many monsters. Grubby basically proclaims that this is going to be impossible to get in and Gimmick should be worried about the heels spotting the airship, unless we can make the airship pocket sized. Gimmick calls this an excellent idea and Teddy praises Grubby for it. Of course! Scene change as Gimmick brings out a machine that looks nothing like the Portable Reducing Machine, but sure acts like it. If you ever want an example of why animation in the 1980's was hot garbage, it's things like this. Gimmick pushes the button and shoots the yellow beam; causing Teddy and Grubby to scatter as the Airship has been reduced to a toy size. This gives Teddy inspiration: Shrink themselves down and they can get into MAVO easier. Gimmick ponders this over; and it sounds great. But there's a problem: How do they get back to normal size because they couldn't use the PRM back in Grubby's Romance and required Karen to save the day and she's disappeared from canon forever. Then, Gimmick has a Krackpotkin idea and Grubby is already not liking this as Gimmick wants to enlarge the Airship again. Well; that was pointless.
So we scene change to the Airship being big again as the PRM is put on a rock ledge somewhere, which cannot be the smartest thing to do. Gimmick comes from the Airship and places a pocket mirror on top of a giant rock. Gimmick takes the PRM and gets back on the Airship with Teddy and Grubby as he explains that the mirror will reflect the beam off and hit the Airship, them and the PRM. So yes; the PRM beam does not bypass reflective surfaces, much like the Reflect status in Final Fantasy. So, Gimmick fires the PRM beam into the mirror; it bounces off the mirror, hits everyone and everything in the Airship and it shrinks into pocket sized. Grubby sees giant berries; but lunch will have to wait because there are crystals to rescue. So, we take off with the usual routine as Teddy wants Grubby to go two degrees to starboard because he sees a way in that we don't see at all. Grubby of course has lobster courage on wanting to get in even in spite of excessive shrinkage and that ends the segment about nine minutes in. Wow; that was awfully short and the animation is better than the artwork in this one, that is for sure.
After the commercial break; we head inside toward the war room as Iggly is naming the most absurd monster names of all time. Blocksmere Rogall is the inventor of the slime pie and I do believe he is the brown horned troll with the green hood, dark green cloak and light green tunic that walks to his position when we see the war room in full. Then comes in an orange dinosaur like monster in lavander as his name is Porkman Steton. None of these names matter since they are incidental characters that no one cares about. Iggly is guarding as we see the Airship rises up and Grubby is complaining about needing more limbs. So, apparently he wants to be a centipede now as the Airship flies up towards the ceiling. A lot of smoke is in the area for no reason as we pan over to an are where Tweeg, LB and Elinore are and Elinore is already protesting this outrage because she is seated right next to Tweeg instead of near Quellor, or something. LB pretty much doesn't like it either; but Tweeg don't care because SPEECH~! Tweeg apparently has a public speaking problem as Iggly addresses the crowd and up from the middle of the stone table comes Quellor and in comes the Great Understander of Legends, aka Gaslighter Ghoul with five legit crystals and one salt crystal on a pillow as the trio in the pocket Airship notices right away. Quellor addresses the crowd as the pulley chair comes down and apparently; they took all the padding from said chair. OUCH! GUOL gets into the chair and is pulled up as she repeats her gaslighting assertions that Illiops oppress them with their goodness; so she pretty much confirms my theory that she thinks Illiops want to turn them babyface, in the same way bigots think gay people turn them gay if gays are free. Elinore goes into the whole disrespecting their elders thing; which is so stupid when babyfaces demand it; but is so fitting to say that as a heel as LB is fake crying this whole thing. Quellor formally accepts Tweeg into MAVO as an apprentice and it's time for the MAVO celebration as we see the MAVO song of doom. This would have been awesome if Jim Cummings was singing this; but as is, it's a pretty impressive song.
Also; the monsters are clearly drinking beer and alcohol in mugs while singing the MAVO song and the only one unimpressed by this is GOUL who comes down and refuses to sing. So the Airship is flying around the area and of course, the crystals have the same color as the wall now. So, the Krackpotkin plan is to use the PRM to shrink the real crystals and then catch them with a butterfly net. Sounds so simple, eh? Haaaaaaaaaaa~! Grubby proclaims that the monsters will never be able to tell the difference. He was right; until about 20 episodes later. So, we proceed with the plan as the monsters are banging mugs and singing and having a great time. I'm shocked none of them have done heelish stuff on each other yet. So, the second half of the plan involves the infamous Root Stew; which everyone knows is the secret weapon in making Teddy Ruxpin lie and probably was spoon fed to him during the recap of the previous episode. Basically; they take root stew, slingshot it into place, put the crystal in the slot and then use the PRM to enlarge the crystal. Rinse, lather, repeat. Only the first crystal slot is ignored because it already has a salt crystal. At least in theory. Grubby tells Teddy to not look down when placing the crystal and the root stew is very green today. Oh; and the PRM is now in it's original artwork, completely ignoring the first half of this very episode. The PRM also makes the root stew splatter disappear. Wow; the crystals look even smaller than usual when put in the bag. So, we cut to LB getting up and claiming that he can beat Tweeg in arm wrestling. And how I would love to pay to see that happen! The propotions on the smaller crystals gets better as time goes along as LB thanks him for being green and doing something right as Grubby slingshots root stew into one of the bat and it flies away as a second shot hits the slot. That would be Crystal #3 for those who are keeping count. Keep dreaming about being paid, LB. Then we get a gapping logic break: They have five crystals to install and they are just installing crystal #3. Well; guess what, Teddy is claiming that this is the final crystal. Wait, what?! You have TWO more crystals to install after this!
So crystal #4 and crystal #5 have been out of the running as #6 is being installed now. If this were today and the pacing was increased, they would get all five crystals in, in one go. Of course; here comes one of Quellor's underling bats for revenge on the babyface heelishly throwing root stew into his eyes, which might as well be acid. Teddy bounces back into the Airship as the bat bounces the balloon of the Airship and pushes it into the middle of the room while banging the back of it's head into the stone wall and knocking itself out. So, Grubby thinks that that have been had; but Teddy has an idea: Just shoot the crystal into the slot with a slingshot and then use the PRM on it to enlarge it, which they probably could have done from the very start and get all five crystals in. Iggly proclaims that it's time to let the feast begin and this somehow causes the PRM to go back to the model used when they were big. Trust me; Wooly's Graduation ceremony was far, far worse than this. Gimmick praises Teddy for his plan; Teddy praises everyone for helping him with said plan and Grubby has a plan of his on: GET OUT OF HERE~! Not a bad plan from Grubby either, because the monster heels are drinking, chugging and popping cork off their "We know it's alcohol, but we aren't telling anyone" bottles. One of the corks hits the Airship and now this plan has been compromised as the Airship sways back and forth. Once again; the animators cannot keep Teddy's feet straight and now even Grubby's feet have been TMS'ed. A second cork hits the Airship as Teddy rolls over and the crystal bag goes flying towards Grubby. Grubby catches the bag and flies overboard and somehow Grubby was able to push it into the Airship before falling overboard. Grubby free falls and land into some monster's salad. I assume it's Blocksmere Rogall's salad. So, the green skinned troll brings the fork and starts eating leaves as Grubby protests this outrage and then the monster notices him and protests this outrage because he hates bug. Geez; that's bad babyface talk there, sir. Teddy and Gimmick are worried big time as I believe the real Blocksmere enters and claims that he loves bugs and starts eating away.
Grubby is swearing in dubbed anime style and protesting some more as he bails into the leaves as Teddy is panicking and Gimmick doesn't know what to do. So, Teddy brings out the PRM and wants him to push the green button. I swear the green button shrinks and the red button expands. So, even this new artwork has Teddy confused. Also; in the artwork; there is no green button nor red button anyway. Teddy aims the PRM at the salad bowl and fires and this whole thing turns into a Super Smash Brothers fight now; only the salad bowl with Grubby in it has ate a Super Mushroom and the stone table crumbles. There is a lot of chasing; but no violence ensues, sadly. Teddy's animation of bringing the rope down was horrible by the way as Teddy is telling Grubby to grab the rope and of course the rope somehow grows when it comes down as Grubby wants to threaten one more roar and make the monster bail, which Teddy grants. Jerk. So, Blocksmere is out as Grubby holds onto the rope and he is turned back small. It also tickles him of course as he swings like Tarzan. Apparently; Blocksmear (I think that is what they were shooting for here) wakes up and stole LB's laugh during the no-fight.
He tries to grab Grubby; but he misses with ease as Grubby climbs up as adventuring is hard work and I think he admitted that he doesn't like heights either judging by the dialogue. The rest of the monster heels all wake up and are generally confused as Elinore blows Iggly off for allowing a bunch of party crashers crash the party. Of course! LB asks how does it make Tweeg feel about this glorious moment. If this were today; Tweeg would try to respond, but LB would cut him off by yelling "It doesn't matter how it makes you feel!" and then run around MAVO yelling "LB" over and over again. Like this for example. Tweeg doesn't know what to say; so Elinore says it's a miracle, that it's less embarrassing and she even calls him a son and Tweeg over sells this like Elinore has apologized to him. Yeah, I'll bet. LB is not impressed by this and hops to Iggly telling him to keep in touch with LB and Iggly agrees to it and then orders everyone out while blowing off the party as the Airship flies out of MAVO's cave (which looks awfully generic) and that is that. So, we head back to the Airship as Gimmick is exmaining one of the crystals proclaiming that he's going to study them and find out what all six crystals do. From episode #6 onwards; it took 58 episodes before they found out what all six of them did, and even the mysterious crystal #7 which wasn't introduced until the end of the Death of Innocence arc. Teddy is still confused about what GOUL said; but Grubby don't care because he wants food and as the sun sets slowly in the west and the Airship magically returns to normal size, Gimmick and Teddy laugh as the episode ends at 19:41. The episode itself was booked all right outside of one boggling decision to skip the collecting of two crystals; but the animation was beyond horrible here and looked like a Z-grade show in places. Still; Tweeg is a member of MAVO and it was booked really good, so call it *** (60%); because I'm generous today.
THE REVIEW LINE
Well; the story of this episode was really good for the most part and they didn't mess up Tweeg's introduction into MAVO, so this was a fine episode. I will say that while I think Grundo Graduation was far, far worse than this animation and artwork wise; there are still huge problems with it. It's clear two different animation teams on different planets did the artwork and the animation, judging by the changing artwork of the Portable Reducing machine and a lot of short cuts in animation (See when Teddy gives the rope to Grubby) that make it look like it was done by the same guys who worked on Knack Animation. There was only one mind boggling logic break in the whole thing, which was the removal of the installion and capture of the fourth and fifth crystals as only three of the crystals were grabbed and clearly shown. And; we never saw the Troll Nephews once in this episode, nor Miss Maggotheart, even for one second! Animation wise; this was an absolute dumpster fire, story wise, it was fine. So, that ends the Tweeg MAVO Introduction arc and next up in October, I'm going to do the Tweeg On Trial arc which covers Tweeg's court appearance in MAVO, Grunge baseball, The Crystal Book angle (some of it at least), Uncle Grubby and his motherhood with baby fobs and it ends with the entire facade of the crystals turning to salt water in MAVO when it rains; ruining Tweeg as a MAVO member for good and the beginning of the Teddy/Quellor feud which would lead to the Death of Innocence arc in which it almost kills Teddy Ruxpin legit . So...
Thumbs in the middle for this episode and I'll see you all next time.