(Hello and welcome back to Retro-Scrutiny, the show we’re we discuss the merits of an animated television show about a teenage boy and a handful of colorful robot monkeys fighting evil and having all sorts of weird adventures. My name is Alexia.)
And my name is Kendall. This week we have quite a change of pace from the usual. The episode is quite the classic mind poker, so get ready to ask some semi-familiar questions as we take a look at the Ghost in the Machinder.
The episode begins with the Super Robot surprising the team by unexpectedly changing flight course in front of their eyes. The team checks the systems, only to learn that the Robot is overriding their commands- thinking for itself. Sparks and Gibson say that the robot can’t be alive and that machines don’t have souls. Antauri disagrees with this just in time for the Plot Alarm to start blaring loudly.
(Ah, the Plot Alarm. Such a useful tool…)
The Super Robot gets sucked into the tractor beam of a fully automated (incredibly creepy) ship. Chiro makes contact with the ship and they meet VX8 Modular Computer Tracking Probe from the Tallas Star System.
(And the thing has a face that only a mother could love. Seriously, this thing is creepy…)
He captured them because they are from Shuggazoom.
(RACIST!)
As they are pulled through the ship’s junky interior, they spot Skeleton King’s droid, TV Monster handing around and decide that it was picked up while floating around in space.
(They completely miss how the screen lights up momentarily, but that’s okay. It doesn’t mean anything.)
Meeting the Probe face to face, the team learns it is the last survivor of a race of mechanical life that was wiped out by an undead entity that could only be Skeleton King. It is now on a mission to neutralize everything that comes from Shuggazoom, as “all organic life that has come into contact with Skeleton King is corrupt and must be eliminated.”
The Robot is attacked by clamps and soon overpowered. The team is forcefully pulled out and watch as the Robot is pulled apart. The Probe scans them, deciding that they are too organic to be of any real use and sends them down a garbage chute to the waste disposal unit.
(However, he keeps Antauri, who is wholly machine and may be of some use to him. Also, don’t the monkeys have jet packs?)
The Probe informs the rest of the team that they will be turned into organic fuel. Otto can’t cut through the can, making Nova wish Antauri was around. Sparks retorts that Antauri didn’t seem to fight back when getting captured and has probably joined forces with the Probe. Chiro disagrees with this.
(The team meet a small, friendly robot, who informs them of the only way out: the large wall fan they somehow managed to miss that turns on and sucks their new friend in.)
Antauri tries to talk the Probe out of destroying his friends and ends up learning that the Probe is infected with some sort of virus and deducts that its systems are being corrupted by TV Monster. The Probe shows the silver monkey that the TV Monster is deactivated, but the monkey disagrees, saying that it still lives. According to the Probe: ‘Machines do not live. We are simple servants to our programming.’ It then starts to assimilate its captive into its core central unit.
The team is still trying to escape the fan.
They can’t make contact with their teammate, but Otto does make contact with the Super Robot (WHOOHOO!) who somehow pulls itself together and starts fighting the security with some new weaponry. It fights some smaller bots before one much larger comes in and knocks it around.
Chiro tries to use the Inner Primate as the Super Robot pulls a large gun from its back and blasts the other robot’s head off, surprising the Probe into contemplating is the Super Robot is possibly alive.
Back with the Hyperforce, the Inner Primate has failed. Sparks take this time to apologize to Gibson for (most of) the mean things he’s ever said to him and starts saying something to Nova before the Super Robot rescues them.
(He then flies out to rescue Antauri. See, I told you they had jetpacks! Anyway, Sparks frees his second-in-command, but gets blasted. So Antauri… does something, and that causes a system crash as they fly back to the Super Robot.)
The Probe’s brain escapes, setting the self-destruct timer for four seconds, and the team makes their escape.
After checking the Super Robot for malfunctions and protective programming and coming up empty-handed, Otto and Gibson state that the Robot never flew off course, but simply knew they were headed in the wrong direction. This prompts Chiro to wonder more about the Super Robot.
The episode ends with the Probe brain floating in space and pulling metal objects towards it. It grabs the TV Monster, which invades it apparently kills the original host while transforming into a new design with a new objective: Hunt down and destroy the Hyperforce.
NEW CHARACTER(S):
THE PROBE (Scott Bullock):
Calm and calculating, the Probe is easily the most interesting villain the team has faced this so far. The thing that makes a good villain terrifying is their control over themselves, and this guy has so much of it. I do wish there was more information on him and his people. And I’m sorry he was destroyed in the end, because he could have been an awesome secondary villain for the team to face.
(The same could be said about Mandarin, and look where he ended up.)
Shut up.
(The Probe, in my opinion, is creepy. I agree with what Kendall says, however. Mostly because it’s true and partially because she took all the good things to say about it.)
SKELETON KING DROID (Mark Hamill):
(…it’s an upgraded form of the TV Monster. That’s it for now.)
UNANSWERED QUESTION(S):
- How long has the Probe been on the hunt for Skeleton King?
- When did the TV Monster end up in space and get captured?
- What do the others think of Antauri being fully robotic?
- Will we learn more about the Super Robot?
- What were the other’s opinions on machines having souls?
FINAL OPINIONS:
This episode is amazing! I personally think it is one of the best in the entire series. The idea of machines being alive and artificial intelligence working against actual life is a classic science fiction story that works immensely well. And it works here because most of our main characters are robotic. In fact, one of them is fully robotic.
(However, in terms of characters, there’s something I want to address- Sparks. Is it me or did he seem too quick to judge Antauri before suddenly getting defensive of him when he sees him getting hurt? Also, why don’t he and Gibson believe machines can’t be alive or have souls at the beginning of the episode? They’re machines too! Does the Power Primate not count? Then what the heck did Chiro do in the middle of the ‘I, Chiro’ saga? Start up a bakery?
Antauri is another big character. This episode informs us here that he’s fully machine. And it makes sense, seeing as how we all saw his transformation in the season two finale. And it works for me. I see Antauri as the most powerful of the team and now that he’s fully robotic, it helps that idea. He probably doesn’t need to eat or get tired out as quickly, which means he can be a more effective hero.)
But that leads us to the biggest question of all- how does Antauri take this? Is he alright with it? Does he not care and is just happy to be back with his team? What does this mean for him in the future?
One last thing I want to mention is the title of the episode, ‘Ghost of the Machinder’. In the early episodes of the show, we learned that the Super Robot has two modes- vehicle mode, which lets it disengage into six different vehicles, and machinder mode, which is its more human body form. The ‘ghost of the machinder’ could be the soul of the Super Robot machinder mode that’s argued throughout the episode.
And that’s all of the really good, so let’s get to the somewhat bad. The episode’s biggest failing is that it makes for a good one-shot episode. Most of it doesn’t affect the plot of the season, so it feels like well-made filler.
And with that, we have completed another episode of Retro-Scrutiny. Thank you all for sticking with us, and we hope to see you all again come next episode. This is Kendall, signing out.
(And this is Alexia, wondering what the Probe’s fascination was with bugs. Seriously, his ship was shaped like a bug, he had bugs inside of his ship, and he stuck one inside of Antauri’s head!)
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