My intention is to review a whole series at a time. It doesn't help that I've been skipping around a bit. But I recently stumbled across an old favorite from 2004. The original short in Cartoon Network's CartoonCartoon show was titled "Lowbrow", which isn't quite the insulting name one might think it is, if you know anything about "Kustom Kar Kulture". Generally it refers to admittedly some of the tackier, but Iconic stuff, like 8-balls, mudflap chicks and flames and so on. The short opens with Coop, a huge bellied car and video game junkie revealing his latest creation to his slacker buddy Jamie. It looks like an ordinary custom car, and Jamie is unimpressed, until Coop flips a hydraulic valve and jacks up a huge giant robot (Destroying the garage in the process) of which the car is the HEAD. The difference between the two is immediately apparent when Jamie says "D'you know what we could do with this?" and he envisions smashing Fort Knox to seal the gold, abducting a cute Goth girl from her apartment King-Kong style, and presiding over a Gladiatorial Death Match. Coop, absurdly envisions smashing a hamburger plant to steal the hamburgers, abducting a T-bucket hot rod from the same bedroom (?!?) and watching a pro wrestling match from over the stadium's rim perched on the robot's shoulder. He doesn't have huge ambitions, he just wants to cruise around, be cool, and smash stuff. A running gag throughout the series gets its start here, Without the robot's head, and having no idea what he's got, Coop jury rigged the thing with vast arrays of buttons, and video game controllers. But he doesn't know what most of it does. When Jamie asks "Can you drive this thing?" Coop replies, "Sure. Now where's first gear?" The first thing he does is accidentally trigger a intergalactic car alarm. Enter Kiva, robot pilot from the future with her own robot and two drone units in tow. She demands back the "Megas Prototype", and Coop refuses, a fight ensues, and Coop manages to destroy Kiva's Robots, causing incredible mayhem in the process (Children cheer as their school is crushed.) Massive destruction is another of the running gags through the show, as well as Coop's penchant for accidental success, and being a great fighter purely through his video game skills. In fact, after Kiva asks him how he got to be such a great pilot, he has a brief montage of his growing up in front of the TV playing games, until the appearance of Jamie in the montage mentions to him that she's trying to steal his robot. Of course, with all his changes, she's helpless to do so. It looks like her mission has failed, Earth a thousand years in the future is doomed. Then she realizes that she's just going to have to train Coop to be the pilot she needs. Coop then accidentally triggers the "Tachyon Beacon" which now introduces Earth's enemy from 1000 years hence, The Glorft. Coop opens fire with a gigantic missile, which zooms in on the Glorft's leading mech, and then abruptly turns skyward never to be seen again. But that doesn't matter, with a combination of moves including many homages to video games and pro wrestling, as well as Anime (At one point, she shoots a "Kamehameha" blast, which comes out as a flaming 8-ball, and he took out Kiva's drones with a button that made the bow of the Yamato emerge from the robot's chest), he makes short work of thousands of Glorft Mechs. Until they pull out a technique of combining and recombining their mechs into one gigantic robot so big, Megas only comes up to its ankle. Just as they're about to be pancaked, a giant Russian space station smashes in the mech's head, with the first missile embedded in it. All this happens in the original short. It sets the tone, sets the characterizations, introduces the enemy, and the long-term threat, and the running story elements like Coop's accidental luck, Video game prowess, wanton destruction ("Nobody gets to smash my town.... but me.") and appetite. It introduces his "Now I'm mad" speeches, where he lists off the offenses before going full-on at the bad guy (although these are usually subverted). The first real episode re-tells the story, but fleshes out the background and updates the animation. But here's the funny thing, after all that set-up, in the second episode, instead of getting started in the long term battle against the Glorft and re-destroying Jersey City, the series takes a right turn and the gang is invited by some intergalactic fight promoter named Magnanimous (voiced by Bruce Campbell) to take part in championship tournament. And from there, it gets even more versatile. And even better, as the seasons progress, they don't remain static, Coop does become a better pilot. Kiva comes to accept that it's going to take longer to get what she wants (especially since it turns out that the time drive which got her, Megas, and the Glorft back to the 21st century is missing a controller that Coop smashed as being worthless) and she even comes to appreciate some of what she's trying to save, which is missing from her bleak post-invasion future. Jamie, well, he remains a feckless coward, but even he picks up a girl at one point. There are interesting plots, like one where an interstellar Bounty Hunter comes after them, but she's not after Coop and Megas, she wants Kiva, to sell her knowledge of the future. There's also a Voltron/Gatchaman/Power Rangers parody, as well as Sailor Moon. They did a lot of good and funny stuff in the two seasons before CN pulled the plug. And annoyingly, they never released it on DVD (And yet, look at the crap they DID put on DVD!). I'd still buy it if they'd only release it. As a real bonus, the torrent included the soundtrack. There is a LOT of good music here. 90% of which makes me wish I made films or animations or video game cutscenes because it would be perfect for it.

Posted by: Mauser at 10:13 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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