POK JJ #339 "Getting the Bugs Out"
No, that's not the title of the new song by the Baja Men...it's a Pokemon Gym episode. Ash and company arrive at the Azalea Gym and meet Bugsy the gym leader, a boy with a bug Pokemon fetish (which just *thrills* Misty), a little Lord Fauntleroy haircut, and apparently the same taste in shorts. I thought Ash would use Heracross the Perpetually-Nursing Pokemon here, but he went with Cyndaquil the Fire-Flatulating Pokemon instead.
Cyndy's a little show to warm up, so Ash calls it back and sends in Chikorita the Leg-Mounting Pokemon. Chikorita handily defeats Spinarak, but proves inadequate against Scyther.
Actually, Ash should have drawn upon his visit to Dark City as inspiration and put something red in Scyther's face. That tends to drive them buggy (no pun intended) and throw them off their game. Admittedly, the boy's memory isn't the sharpest; he can barely remember yesterday's breakfast, much less a fight from three seasons ago.
Anyway, with Cyndy held back and Chikorita down, it's one against one. Pikachu steps up and does well for a while, but ends badly when Scyther starts doing the classic illusion maneuver. Cyndy comes back, and Scyther whips out its fan dance. Then we see some very interesting strategy--frontal attacks fail, so death from above! Ash must know a little bit about geometry, to his credit--it takes some planning to get those angles calculated just right. Cyndy barbecues the big bug, and Ash gets his 14th gym badge.
Watch for the bit where Jessy, James and Meowth scat their motto for a change. !!!
When Misty says she feels she's forgotten something, I thought she was going to ask why they haven't kicked around Team Rocket in this script. But she instead inquires about Kurt's new Pokeballs. Right on cue the pokeball maker's cherry-cheeked granddaughter pops up with the goods.
Not much TR in this episode--they spend a lot of it underground. They plan to dig under the gym floor and nab Pikachu from below, but end up miscalculating the angles (again, geometry) and ending up smack in the middle of a Kafkaian nightmare.

JCA #13:
Chandu is large and in charge, and he plans to smite the decendants of the peasants who trapped him in that rock centuries ago...meaning he's going to trash the entire city of Hong Kong. Here we see Jade get sentimental, a rare sight indeed, at the thought of her parents masacred by evil incarnate.
The only way to defeat Chandu is to get the talismans out of his body, and Jackie (with his magic fingers) has to perform the operation. Now the key is the reanimation talisman (rat), but Chandu doesn't come with a handy diagram like the lid on a box of asorted chocolates, so it's basically trial-and-error. It's a pretty hilarious sequence--two high points are when Jackie pulls the sheep talisman and astral projects, and when he yanks the monkey talisman and turns Chandu into a rabbit. Was anyone else thinking of the killer bunny in "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" during that bit?
"Little Jade Horner, sat in a corner..." When she pulls the right one out of Chandu's guts, he reverts to a statue, then she blows him to pebbles. Problem: Uncle says that act threw the world off-balance somehow, and now greater evil will come. Hence the story arc for the next season.
Interesting developments: Valmont's goons make off with the talismans in lieu of the treasure Chandu cheated them out of, and Tohru becomes an odd ally of the Chans. Watch the bit where diminutive Uncle slaps the big ape like a naughty puppy...priceless!
Watch also the bit where Valmont pulls an electronic tooth out of his mouth and uses it to make his escape. I've read that Harry Houdini often kept keys hidden in his dentures, but I think Big V even outdoes the great escape artist himself.

POK JJ #339: "A Farfetc'd Tale"
You might remember Farfetch'd from a couple seasons back--a wild duck that perpetually carries a leek. It's rare, and a delicacy--the only Pokemon I've heard spoken of as edible, and it provides it's own garnish. What's next, a pig Pokemon who brings its own lettuce leaf and a tomato slice? BLT on the hoof?
Anyway, the Farfetch'd's trainer looks a lot like Ash, and even sounds similar to the way he did in the first half-dozen eps--a bit constipated. Seperated at birth, maybe?
His old man is a charcoal maker and a verbally abusive disciplinarian who constantly harrangues the boy because he can't do anything right and his Pokemon isn't trained properly. The kid has trouble with even simple attacks, and Ash, recalling what a frig-up he was in the beginning, has found a kindred spirit.
Mantime, Jessy and James and Meowth are walking hollow-eyed and hungry through the woods when they come upon the boy's Farfetch'd (it's gone AWOL because it's fed up with it's trainer's incompetance). Jessy wants to sell the bird for grocery money (though if it's such a delicacy, why not roast the bird and eat it right on the spot?) After a struggle, Jessy disarms the bird (that's not what they mean when they say "take a leak in the woods", sister) and nets it.
The problem is that the bird is worthless without its leek, and everybody is trying to claim it (James even noshes on it at one point--quite Freudian, actually).
Team Twerp calls out all its Pokemon in the search for the missing Farfetc'd. Watch Squirtle and Bulbasaur--why are they wrestling about in that scene, and why isn't Heracross trying to nurse? Misty comments that Ash's Pokemon are slow and stubborn, then has to eat her words when she notices Pyduck, big snot bubble coming out of its nose, sleeping. [Insert Nelson Muntz-ish "ha ha" here.]
The kid does get his commands straight, and Farfetch'd defeats Team Rocket, then cuts a few cords of wood to top it all off, using nothing but its bare wings and a green onion. Remarkable bird.
This is the first time in a while I've seen two straight episodes in which Brock didn't make an a** out of himself with a girl and Misty didn't haul him off by the pinna. You think Brocko's losing his touch?

Also a rerun of the X-Men ep "Spykecam", which was a mutant version of "the Real World" spliced together by another appearance by Sabretooth. Anyone else think he looks a little like the drooling maniac in TTA's "How I Spent My Summer Vacation" with a blonde dye job?
Freeze frame moment: the lettering on the sign on the gate Sabretooth rips apart--"BS&P." Heh heh.
Did anyone else find it odd that after Rogue touched Sabretooth, her body hair grew in brown? Are those red locks a dye job? And does the carpet match the drapes, I wonder? >8D The little lady's going to need a bikini wax that'll cost about as much as the gross national product of Uruguay.
Plus part two of "Batman Beyond's "The Call". Starro the Conquerer may be a scourge of a thousand worlds, but to me he'll always be a brainless echinoderm. What formidable foe will the JLU face next--giant mutant shrimp? "The stalemate raged for three straight days. Then Superman had a brainstorm. He lured the alien shrimp to a mesa in the desert, coated it with vegetable oil, added several metric tons of rice and vegetables, poured on a few tankers of soy sauce, and made a stir-fry that fed the whole eastern seaboard." >8D

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