- Roddy MacStew
"On Christmas Day?"
- Mrs. Douglas
I have to try to control myself for this entry. Many people like to quote out loud from their favorite animated series, most notably The Simpsons and Family Guy. For myself, it would be Steven Spielberg's Freakazoid!, except I can't really do it due to the show's cult reputation and the fact it would make me appear even further insane. I love all of Spielberg's produced animated shows but this was my favorite. Instead of easy pop-culture jokes and very risque adult humor as presented in Tiny Toon Adventures and Animaniacs, Freakazoid! was so off-putting and surreal in its inner nerd, filled to the brim with deep in-jokes and parodies that wouldn't register with normal viewers. This is very much present in its not one but two Christmas episodes: the origin story two-parter "The Chip" and a normal segment called "In Arm's Way". Due to my own guidelines, I will sadly be unable to discuss "Arm's" second segment, the absolutely hilarious "The Cloud" ("NOOOO!!! NOT THE BOATS!!!")
"The Chip" starts with something that should be mandatory for all Christmas-related episodes, a personal introduction by MPAA President Jack Valenti. After showing off his marvelous cheeks, Valenti sets up the viewer that they are about to treated to an adventurous origin story, complete with "a scene with a man wrestling a bear for no reason." It opens on corporate giant Apex Microchips, where head programmer and very blunt Scotsman Roddy MacStew, voiced by future late show host Craig Ferguson, addresses the flaws of their recent product. The product, the Pinnacle chip, allows a computer user to enter the internet and receive super-powers and a new deranged mental state by entering a complex code, namely "@[=g3,8d]\&fbb=-q]/hk%fg", followed by the delete button. CEO head Armando Guitierrez, voiced by the late great Ricardo Montalban, says its bad for their business to address it to the world and for everyone's Christmas bonuses. After Guitierrez pushes Roddy through a glass window ("Ha Ha Ha. Laugh with me!"), we cut to the home of the Douglas family. There, the young Dexter Douglas opens his gift in front of his family and receives a Pinnacle chip! (Valenti: "Bum Bum BUM!!!"). One installation and numerous presses of the keyboard by his fat cat later, Dexter goes to press Delete.
Oh, yeah. Sorry, I was just building up dramatic tension. Thank you. And so, Dexter becomes Freakazoid and rough-houses with his older brother. Roddy tracks him down to warn him only to have everyone carted off by Guitierrez's goons. Guitierrez wants the code to become a super-being and is easily willing to torture Dexter's family with "The Best of Marty Ingels" for it. The rest of the show then becomes a race against time to stop Guitierrez and Freakazoid's first introduction to Sgt. Cosgrove.
I was straight-forward with the plot description because I wanted to discuss one of the great elements and the main charm of the show, the extensive cut-away jokes. During this and other episodes, the story would just stop to have numerous fourth-wall breaking, critiques on its own animation, narrator interruptions and exclamations, and goofy throwaway gags. In "The Chip", you get to see a way-too-happy chiropractor, Freakazoid traveling to Tibet to yell at a monk's raking, stock footage of Frank "Cannonball" Richards, and Wrath of Khan in-jokes and monologues. My favorite joke has to Jake Valenti's need to educate the audience with how the MPAA ratings work. Back then, he taught me that I couldn't see a NC-17 rated film but my grandpa and the "dumb dog" Sgt. Scruffy can. Another highlight is that Guiterrez interrogates Dexter's cat, named Mr. Chubbikins, by having an animal psychologist communicate with him ("He said he's very sad").
Christmas-wise, the show doesn't have any main messages or themes to address. They don't even try to make any subtle allusions to Jesus by having Freakazoid being born on Christmas. Instead, the creators simply wanted to make a big parody of social and holiday conventions. For instance, except for the 90's looking Dexter, the so-called peaceful Douglas family is drawn as the stereotypical nuclear family. They even have the expected voices and personalities associated with them, with the best being Tress MacNeille's clueless domesticated mom. Their Christmas celebration consists of holiday traditions and gifts matching their generic personalites, such as Duncan's new weight set and Dad's video-taping the openings of presents. Also, by having the action and family danger on Christmas, the episode seems to be spoofing the comic book ideals and tropes. Freakazoid doesn't want to have great responsibility with his great power, causing the Douglas family to suffer the terrible torture of a third-rate comedian. Of course, they are able to survive and move on from it thanks to their dumb mental states, believing Dexter got in trouble due to his bad driving skills.
As for "In Arm's Way", shown three episodes later after "The Chip", there really isn't much to say other than that it continues the throw-away jokes and the spoofing of Christmas conventions. The short segment follows Freakazoid, presumed to be one year later, as he is trying to buy a Christmas gift for his girlfriend Steph. He's so distracted by Christmas shopping that he neglects the reign of terror bestowed by racketeer Arms Akimbo, a mafia thug forever frozen in a "jaunty pose" due to his former child modeling and a vicious salesman of "oops insurance." As Arms destroys a hot-dog stand and blows up a stock footage building, Freakazoid is interested only in a Barney the Dinosaur golf hat, Lincoln Logs, a three foot chocolate moose, and dolls that shoot jam out of their ears. The two plots finally converge at a department store cleverly named Chochkey's. The segment takes aim at the stupidity of Christmas searches for the perfect gift and the extensive amount of crap created for materialism. The only other nod to Christmas is a brief scene where Freakazoid has an easy-going conversation with his recurring enemy The Lobe, showing that Christmas is a peace agreement for heroes and villains and even a gift exchange ("I hope he got me troubadour pants"). The segment is followed by a musical interlude by Freakazoid, where he massacres "Jingle Bells" on the piano.
I simply just love this show and I always still get some great chuckles from these two stories. There are the perfect Christmas remedy for me from all of the crappy Hallmark productions and spreading of consumerist tripe such as The Christmas Shoes. After all, how many Christmas entities features mind-controlling brain eels and a superhero sitting on Santa? So, there you go. Wait a moment.
Now, we're done.
TOMORROW'S ENTRY: We look at a popular comic-book superhero who is often associated with Christmas.
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