In spite of appearing in one of the strongest episodes of the previous season, Hexadecimal has sadly been sidelined since that episode. Sure, she made a brief appearance in Infected (where we find out there's some kind of family link between her and Megabyte, although it's not established what that is), but she's not been the full focus of an episode for a very long time. This changes with this weeks episode, as she makes her long awaited return, and she's back with a bang.
Much like last week, we start with a long tracking shot that stops at the Principle Office. However, this time we start at Hexadecimal's Lair and stop at the entrance to the archives. Hexadecimal's theme plays in the background, setting up that Hexadecimal is going to play a major role in this episode. Outside the archives, three CPU's are discussing The Web. Apparently it’s gone out of control and started to invade systems. One of the CPU's asks the question that we're all thinking, 'What’s The Web?', prompting the other two binomes to burst into laughter. However, this euphoric mood is quelled once Hexadecimal appears outside the archives.
Meanwhile, Dot is leading a jog round the park with several binomes and a very worn out Number 8 who points out how much he '8's exercise'. At the Diner, Bob is in the process of purchasing a new bike from the biker binome we saw last episode. This gets interrupted by a very bright light, the source of which is coming from a brush painting a sun in the sky. Several binomes stop in amazement to observe this phenomenon. Bob contacts Phong, who tells him that Hexadecimal has infiltrated the archives and hijacked the system's paint program. She’s currently running it from an alias in her lair. As Phong explains the situation, we cut to a CPU informing Dot that she’s also destroyed the archive's security system. When Dot enquires what happened to the guards, he tries to tell her that they’ve been kidnapped by Hexadecimal, but finds himself trapped in a painting within her lair mid sentence.
Hexadecimal monologues about being an artist searching for recognition. She then begins to wreck havoc on Mainframe with her painting, causing several buildings to melt into tidal waves of paint that engulfs all binomes it catches up to. Hex then decides to spice up Silicon Tor, turning it into a plant pot and placing giant sunflowers inside. Megabyte is visibly displeased about this, and Hex responds by sealing his mouth shut, painting him up like a jester and suspending him in the sky.
Back at the Diner, Enzo shows up to tell Bob what happened. Phong tells Bob that the changes Hexadecimal makes will become permanent once the scheduled system back up occurs, and while he can break the link from the archives, he needs Bob to go to Hex's lair and undo her creations. As he's explaining this, Hexadecimal removes Phong's head and replaces it with an apple.
Hex then places Phong in the sky by the Tor and Megabyte. Bob and Enzo decide to contact Dot and see if she can break the link. They aren’t able to do so since Glitch gets melted and the vid windows get painted over. Then Hexadecimal takes out both all the zip boards and Bob's new bike (much to his displeasure). Bob reaches the conclusion that Hexadecimal has a plan of some kind, something which is very uncharacteristic for her. He tasks Enzo with finding Dot, getting her to break the link. He also points out that they aren’t to break the link until they get Bob's signal. He’s not sure what this signal will be, but assures Enzo that they’ll recognise it when they see it. Enzo and Frisket then head off.
Elsewhere, Mike the TV is filming a documentary on Hexadecimal's works. This gets interrupted by Bob showing up and taking the camera. He takes Mike with him, saying he’s part of Bob's plan. Meanwhile, Enzo and Frisket are walking through Hexadecimal's warped version Mainframe, eventually stopping when they see Dot falling down a slide and Frisket gets shrunk to pocket size. Enzo places him on his hat and follows Dot down the slide. This slide leads to the archive entrance where we see that the security system is completely wrecked, something Dot points out that not even Megabyte would be capable of achieving. Once she’s joined by Enzo, the two of them set off inside the archives.
At Los Angles, Bob and Mike the TV encounter several nulls wearing warped masks of Bob's face. Then they discover that cardboard cut outs of Bob are appearing after every step he makes. After realising this, Bob aims his camera to make one more, then knocks the rest of them down like dominoes. Inside the archives, Enzo passes on his message from Dot, then proceeds to jump on a constantly spinning spiral staircase. Eventually, he falls off, hitting several vid windows that trap him inside with each part of him now being made up of several vid windows.
Back at Los Angles, Bob and Mike run into Skuzzy guarding Hexadecimal's lair. They laugh about this at first, but their laughter dies down once they realise that Scuzzy has been enlarged. They flee in terror from the giant Scuzzy, eventually splitting up. This doesn’t help matters since Scuzzy is able to split in two. Back at the archives, Enzo finds out he can manipulate the vid windows, allowing Dot to safely traverse across the archives and find the link.
Eventually, Bob and Mike get cornered by Scuzzy, but before Scuzzy can reach them, Hex cuts him off, reminding him that 'The Guardian is mine'. Hex initially accuses Bob of trying to spoil her fun, to which he says that him and Mike are here to interview her. She’s pleased by this, and then goes back to her lair, using the paint program to transport both Bob and Mike inside.
At the archives, Dot eventually spots the link and directs Enzo over there. Enzo asks if Bob will be okay, and Dot responds that he wouldn’t have gone to meet Hexadecimal without a good plan. This is when we cut to Mike the TV and Bob, the former of whom is not too happy with this plan. Before they can discuss it further, Hex joins them and the interview begins. Shortly after this, Hex asks for a close up, but then discovers that Bob, who she assumed was filming the interview, was in fact the cardboard cut out from earlier.
Hexadecimal is obviously distressed about this, and has a massive meltdown. Bob uses this opportunity to undo her artwork, returning everything in the system to normal. This includes the archives, which Dot interprets as Bob's signal. She gets Enzo to rush her over to the link before this happens. At Hex's lair, an angry Hex eventually finds Bob. Filled with panic, Bob uses the paint program to remove her face, placing it in a blank vid window. This causes energy to burst out of her face. The masks on the vid window tell Bob that he’s removed the one thing keeping her power in place, and without the masks, Hexadecimal will be destroyed. Before Bob can undo the program, Dot breaks the link to the lair. With no other choice, Bob sends Glitch over, and then uses it to cut and paste Hex's face back onto her body. Bob then leaves Los Angles, informing Dot and Enzo that everything's back to normal and that Hex will be okay, adding that he’s provided her with help. We cut back to the lair and see that Bob has tasked Mike the TV with keeping Hexadecimal sane.
Much like Bad Bob, this is one of the most memorable episodes of the show. Seeing Mainframe completely warped by Hexadecimal's handiwork makes for some incredibly fascinating visuals including several references to famous paintings such as the Screaming Man and the Mona Lisa. However, this is far from a case of style over substance since it has the story to back up the unforgettable imagery presented throughout. The fact that this episode ended up having to be animated twice speaks to the overall quality of this episode.
Of course, this episode's star is Hexadecimal herself. After her notable absence from the majority of the previous season, in this episode she's back with a vengeance. Much like in Medusa Bug, we get to see how much power Hexadecimal has in comparison to Megabyte. Within the first minutes of the episode, she manages to successfully infiltrate the archives and destroy the security system, something which Megabyte was only just able to achieve a couple of episodes back, and even then, he required energy from the Game Cubes acquired through an elaborate scheme in order to even access the archives.
In this episode, she turns Mainframe on it's head much like Megabyte did in Infected. While a little less apocalyptic than Megabyte's scheme, she does successfully manage to recreate Mainframe in her image through her work with the paint program. Unlike with Megabyte, though, she's not trying to take over the system; she's simply causing chaos for the fun of it and wants to show it off in a very grand gesture.
We also find out the purpose of Hex's masks. Not merely a means for her to express her emotions, they're there in order to keep her power contained within her, and if removed, she will die. It's an interesting concept, for sure, and something that gets touched on a little bit in the next season.
As well as this, Bob gets separated from Glitch once again, this time through Hexadecimal melting it with her paint effects. Again, this means that Bob needs to use his initiative to reverse the effects of Hexadecimal's damage. However, with Hex being as powerful as she is, it's likely that even with Glitch to hand, Bob would still struggle against Hexadecimal. Of course, Bob uses Glitch at the end in order to restore the masks to Hexadecimal, but it's something that only Glitch would be able to fix with the paint program being back at the archives.
This is definitely one of the best episodes of not just this season, but the entire series. Coming right after the glorious Bad Bob, the show is clearly getting into a groove with each episode being of such high quality. Of course, Hexadecimal is traumatised by the end of everything, so it could be a while until she's causing havoc within Mainframe again. Luckily she's in the good hands of Mike the TV, and nothing bad will happen as a result of this...
Next week: A new permanent addition to the main cast makes her debut in 'AndrAIa'
No comments:
Post a Comment