Episode 22 - Trust No One

While the show definitely had a relatively strong fanbase at the time (particularly in Canada), nowadays, ReBoot is somewhat a more obscure, cult show. However, back in the day, it was able to gain a couple of noteworthy fans. Actor Joe Mantegna's daughter was a fan at a young age (which surprised Bob's voice actor Michael Benyaer when he worked with the actor in 1996's Underworld, not to be confused with the 2003 vampire film) and former US President Bill Clinton was apparently a fan. However, the most interesting of these was X Files star Gillian Anderson.

At the time, Anderson was married to one of Mainframe Entertainment's production designers. Upon hearing that she was a fan of the show, Mainframe invited her for a tour of their production studio. Since The X Files was filmed in Vancouver anyway, it wasn't an issue for her to find time in her schedule to visit. A lot of the team working at Mainframe were fans of the show, so obviously there were several X Files posters dotted around the building. Upon passing one, Gillian would get out a pen and sign it. One animator asked her for a photo, and she proceeded to sit on his lap to get into position for the photo. While she was there, the showrunners asked her if she'd be interested in appearing in an episode, which she definitely was. As a result, Gavin, Ian, and Phil were tasked with finding a way to get Mulder and Scully into Mainframe, and the end result is the penultimate episode of the four part season finale arc.

Starting with a typical shot of the Principle Office, the camera then transports us all the way down to Mainframe's underbelly, stopping at the back alley of Al's. Al's Waiter is taking out the trash, but then we cut to the point of view of an unseen being, who is Al's Waiter from above. When he's least expecting it, whatever this being is makes it's way towards him and we cut to the title card for this episode, written in a green X Files esque font. We then see his unconscious body getting dragged away.

We then see Mouse enter Dot's Diner. Bob is already seated inside, and he invites Mouse to sit with him. Bob then orders two drinks from Cecil, but this just causes Cecil to rant about how he's in charge of the place while Dot is away. Bob asks Mouse what she's still doing in Mainframe, and she says she's got a couple of things to take care of before she leaves. A couple of CPU's then enter, telling their commander who is already seated inside that there's been another abduction, and that this time it's Al's Waiter. This then leads to a subtle joke where the commander says 'What?!' in a similar vein to Al himself. Bob isn't aware of these abductions, and the commander is about to fill him in when Enzo arrives to say that Dot's missing. This is confirmed by Ms Brody, Enzo's teacher, who says that since Dot failed to pick Enzo and AndrAIa from school, she felt the need to escort them home because of the abductions. The commander then tells Bob that there's been a string of disappearances down at Level 31, with Al's Waiter being the latest abductee. Cecil chips in to say that Dot was due to have a meeting with Al, so Bob heads off to find her, asking Mouse to escort Enzo and AndrAIa to the Principle Office. Soon after Bob leaves, she tasks Ms Brody and the CPU's to escort them instead since she has some unfinished business to attend to.

Bob enters the diner and starts to interrogate a waiter. The waiter tells him that Dot was due to meet Al but never showed up, but doesn't know any more than this. Bob's investigating gets the attention of two binomes, CGI agents Fax Modem and Data Nully. They say that Phong hired them to investigate the disappearances on Level 31. Meanwhile, outside, Mike the TV is investigating the area for the purposes of a news report on the abductions. We see that Mouse is observing Mike and his crew, and she contacts someone called Turbo on her communicator. As she's talking to him, Number 5 walks through the alleyway, and she signs off, telling this mysterious character that it appears she's found another victim.

Back inside Al's, Modem and Nully are telling Bob that they suspect Mouse is behind these abductions. Modem suspects this because he believes that Mouse is a web creature based on her fangs. He then tells Bob the story of his sister getting abducted by a web creature as a child. Bob, without trying to seem insensitive, tells him that he'll be claiming to have seen the user next. Modem, however, believes that The User is a lie fabricated by The Guardians to keep people in check, and they control the Games in order to promote the User myth.

This conversation is cut short by Mike the TV doing a brief news report on the abduction of Number 5. Once the report ends, Mike walks away, but unknown to him, his crew have all been abducted by the unseen being. Once he realises this, he flees from the creature, but this is in vein as the creature ends up attacking him, but we see the silhouette of whatever it is fly away without abducting him.

Everyone within the diner can hear the noise the creature is making. Bob, Modem and Nully all leave the diner. Modem and Nully discover Mouse kneeling over the unconscious Mike the TV. They immediately point their guns at her, and Bob soon catches up with them. Mouse assures Bob that it isn't what it looks like, but it doesn't look good for her. She's able to distract Modem and Nully long enough to slice their guns in half, and momentarily allows Bob to lower his guard by asking him to trust her and then kissing him before running off. Bob is able to pin a tracker from Glitch on the bottom of Mouse's boot, and then takes off in pursuit of her, leaving Modem and Nully to watch over Mike. Shortly after Bob leaves, Mike regains consciousness, saying that the creature bit him then left, ranting about how the light saved him.

Bob tracks Mouse to a long abandoned warehouse. He contacts Phong and tells him that he's found where the creature's hiding. He has identified it as a Web Creature, but it isn't Mouse based on the fact that it's shedding it's skin. He also suspects that the creature is abducting Sprites and Binomes for nourishment.

As Mouse also wanders through the warehouse, she contacts Turbo to inform him that she's found the creature's hideout, and she's going to rescue the Mainframers. Turbo tells her to forget the Mainframers, and just worry about getting proof of the creature. She presses on anyway, eventually reaching a large room filled with organic cocoons that have binomes encased inside of them. She eventually comes across one with Dot encased inside, and immediately frees her before freeing the others. This immediately wakes up the creature, who bursts through a wall and manages to grab Dot with it's tentacles.

Just before the creature can consume Dot, Bob arrives along with Modem and Nully, who shine their flashlights on the creature. This incapacitates it, causing it to drop Dot. Mouse then contacts Turbo with proof of the creature. We then cut to a dark room where this mysterious Turbo is sitting with several other figures shrouded in darkness. One of these tells Turbo that they need to act now since this creature is a Class M with portal forming abilities, meaning it is capable of invading the entire net.

One interesting thing to note about this sequence is that, asides from Turbo, the other Guardians are all reused models of other characters since there was little point creating new character models who were barely going to get any screen time. The fact that the Guardian office is shrouded in darkness mostly hides this (although you can see in the screenshot above that the Guardian sitting closest to Turbo is clearly Dot's model with added Guardian gauntlets and a keytool), but it also adds to the mood of the scene.

Bob isn't too happy about what Mouse has just done, since the Guardian protocol for dealing with Web Creatures is to destroy the system. Bob inspects the communicator that Mouse was provided with by the Guardians and discovers that there's a bomb inside of it. The Guardians activate the bomb, and Turbo asks to be alone since him and Bob go back a long way. Once he's alone, he's able to delay the detonation to allow Bob more time to dispose of it.

Bob quickly zips through the city in order to reach a safe distance where the detonation won't destroy Mainframe. When the bomb detonates, the sky goes black and several tears form together to make a giant one. However, Bob is nowhere to be seen, and Phong cannot reach him on the vid window.

The tear's appearance gives the Web Creature the strength requires to resist the bright lights and break free. Phong tries to contact Bob again, and eventually succeeds. It turns out that the explosion affected Bob's ability to communicate temporarily. When Phong informs him that the Web Creature has escaped, he's incredibly distressed by this since the creature could form a portal to the Web. However, there's no time to stop it as the creature flies straight at the tear, causing it to form into a giant sphere which is somewhere between pink and red and has a surreal ever changing pattern. Bob contacts Phong, telling him to prepare for war.

So far this season, we've had definite hints of darkness sprinkled throughout. This was more prevalent in the previous two episodes, but it was still relatively subtle hinting at something dark through the mysterious creature that has made it's way into Mainframe. This episode dives straight into the darkness, something that is going to retain in the show for the most part for the remainder of it's run. This episode, much like the two before it, has stakes that are bigger than a lot of what we've had so far in the show with bigger threats. Two weeks back, we had Nullzilla threatening to destroy all of Mainframe through it's chaotic nature. Last week, we had an amalgamation of Megabyte and Hexadecimal nearly gaining enough power to access the super computer. This week, the threat is the creature that caused all this havoc to begin with.

More importantly, we know exactly what it is; it's a creature from the Web, the mysterious realm that was first mentioned in High Code that by the time of Painted Windows supposedly went out of control and began invading systems. The way that the creature is built up in this episode is done incredibly well. Initially, we don't see it at all, we just see through it's eyes to build up tension of what's going to happen as well as seeing it's silhouette. When we finally see the creature near the end of the episode, it's pretty terrifying. The creature has clearly grown a lot since it's appearance in Nullzilla, and now has an incredibly large jaw. Following the events of last episode, it's been abducting Sprites and Binomes alike and draining their energy for nourishment, which I imagine is how it's managed to grow so much in a short space of time. What's worse is, while our heroes were able to save all the abductees, they didn't stop the creature, it managed to form a portal to the Web, allowing it to invade Mainframe. Something which they will need to put a stop to next time around.

We also get to learn what Mouse's purpose was in Mainframe last episode. Since the Guardians are based in the Super Computer which is where the creature was before it came out of Hexadecimal's looking glass, the Guardians were definitely aware of it's existence. Knowing the threat that it posed to the entire Net, they hired Mouse to track it down for them and prove it's existence before taking action. This puts the Guardian's morality within somewhat of a grey area. Sure, they 'mend and defend' The Net, but what ends will they go to achieve that goal? This episode, it turns out that it's nuking systems for the sake of the rest of the net. It's also interesting to briefly see the head of the Guardians, known as Turbo. He's barely seen, but he definitely makes a lasting impression based on what we do see of him. We know that, while he doesn't necessarily want to destroy Mainframe, he knows that there's no other choice but to do so. He also has some kind of history with Bob, this leads to him allowing Bob the time to get rid of the bomb.

This episode also puts Mouse in an interesting position. Last time, we were made aware that Mouse was up to something at the end of the episode, but we weren't sure what that purpose was. At first, we're lead to believe that she's responsible for the abductions, possibly even taking the form of the creature. While that isn't the case, it provides us with a red herring to make us believe that it is up until we find out that it isn't.

The credited 'writer' for this episode and the next one was Mark Leiren Young, someone who last year became quite a controversial figure within the ReBoot community. I won't go too deeply into it here since it ties into a post that I'm going to be writing at the end of this retrospective, but seeing as it somewhat relates to these two episodes, I'll give a brief run down before going into full details when we reach that point. As well as writing the worst episode of last year's 'sequel' series 'ReBoot: The Guardian Code' (which is saying something, given the overall quality of that show), Mark wrote a series of blog posts about his time writing that episode, then went back to write some posts on this episode and the next one. Said posts consisted of lots of backpatting where he took credit for things such as creating Turbo, coming up with the idea of the Guardians being morally ambiguous and something in the next episode that's going to come up. This is definitely not the case since the 'story by' credit has four other people in the credits alongside MLY, three of those being the show's showrunners. While he may have contributed some minor ideas to these episodes, he had little to nothing to do with the overall story of these episodes, and Gavin Blair disputes his claims heavily.

We also get the 'death' of Bob this episode. When the bomb detonates, we're initially lead to believe that Bob is dead. However, it's quickly revealed that this wasn't the case, relieving the audience as well as the characters who were lead to believe that the show's main character was dead, if only for a moment. This is great since it gives us the impression that no one is necessarily safe in this universe anymore.

Of course, one of the most memorable aspects of the episode is it's X Files references. This is achieved not just through the appearance of binome stand ins for Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, but through the episode's mirroring of a typical 'monster of the week' episode of The X Files. The starting sequence of the episode with Al's Waiter being abducted by the Web Creature is rather reminiscent of cold openings in your typical X Files episode which show one of the episode's guest characters being attacked or killed by that episode's monster before we meet our main characters after the credits. Since we've already had the opening credits, we then cut to our main characters after the title card. The theme of the characters investigating a web creature is also a fairly X Files esque element since that show's premise is about investigating supernatural creatures.

While Gillian Anderson was more than happy to come and play Data Nully, her X Files co-star David Duchovny was not interested and declined the creator's request to appear. Because of this, they got Scott McNeil (who has been voicing Hack since Nullzilla, replacing previous voice actor Phil Hayes) to do a cruel parody of Duchovny's performance in the show. McNeil had never seen The X Files prior to this, and upon watching the show for research, he said that the performance was 'nothing', so he performed the role accordingly. His performance as Fax Modem managed to win him the parts of multiple characters on Mainframe's follow up series, Beast Wars: Transformers.

This is one of the strongest episodes of the season with a great amount of mystery, intrigue and horror as well as some high stakes and a fun parody of what was one of the biggest shows on TV at the time. It also does a great job of setting up the following episode of the show. All we can be certain of is that there's going to be a war, and it's possible that not everyone will make it out alive...

Next week: Bob is forced to team up with Megabyte and Hexadecimal to combat The Web in 'Web World Wars'

Episode 21 - Gigabyte

Last episode started the story arc that is going to close out this season. While it had it's beginning, middle, and end, it also left things open that are going to play out in this episode. For one, the creature that came out of Hex's looking glass is still out there, and at the end of the previous episode, it infected Megabyte in a similar way to how it infected Hexadecimal at the beginning of the episode. This episode isn't quite as good as it's predecessor, but it does a pretty good job of continuing the story set up in Nullzilla.

We begin this episode where we left off last week with Kits Sector in ruins after the heroes battle with Nullzilla. A yellow vehicle picks up the robot from the previous episode, taking him away from the sector and knocking over three buildings in the process. A builder binome contacts Dot to tell her that despite a few setbacks, they’re on track to repair the sector.

Meanwhile, Bob is overseeing Hexadecimal. He tells Phong that she’s weak due to the Nulls draining her energy, but she’ll recover. The conversation then turns to whatever attacked her, and Phong tells Bob that he hasn’t been able to pick up on its signal. Based on the fact that it went after Hex, Bob theorises that maybe whatever got her preys on viruses. Phong predicts that since it went after Hexadecimal, it’s next target would be...

Hexadecimal seemingly finishes Phong's sentence with one word, 'Megabyte'. Bob agrees with her, but it turns out she was alerting Bob to the fact that the infected Megabyte is with them right now. He pushes Bob aside and attempts to merge with Hexadecimal. Bob uses Glitch to fire an energy beam at Megabyte, knocking him away into a nearby wall. He then sends Glitch to start up his car. However, Megabyte gets up very quickly, and begins making his way over to Bob and Hexadecimal. Hex is able to momentarily slow him down with what’s left of her powers. Just before he reaches the two, Megabyte is picked up by a giant claw being piloted by Dot, giving Bob and Hex time to get to Bob's car and escape. Megabyte begins infecting the claw part of Dot's vehicle, but she detaches the claw before he can infect the whole vehicle.

Bob interrogates Hexadecimal about how she was merging with Megabyte, and she reveals that Megabyte is her brother. This perplexes Bob, since the two are always trying to destroy each other, but Hex reveals that it’s just sibling rivalry. If the two were to merge, Hex tells Bob the end result would be 'the next generation'. Dot then contacts Bob to tell him that she was unable to contain Megabyte, but this communication is cut short by Megabyte jumping on the hood of Bob's car, knocking off the windshield before grabbing Hex and jumping off. Once the two reach ground level, they merge into one virus.

The new virus is a hulking beast with a giant claw on one arm, taking elements of both Megabyte's and Hexadecimal's respective colour palettes. Bob contacts a Phong to inform him of what just happened, and tells him that he’s going down to communicate with the virus since he feels that it might be a Benin virus. Bob asks him to identify himself, and he tells Bob that he has become Gigabyte, 'destroyer of systems'. He attacks Bob, and Bob retaliates with an attack from Glitch. This doesn’t work since Gigabyte is a Class 5 virus, meaning he absorbs energy. Gigabyte then slashes Bob's back, damaging his armour. Bob has no choice but to flee, so he grabs a zip board and flies away.

Bob then checks back in with Phong. He tells him that Gigabyte is at least as strong as Megabyte but hasn’t used any of Hexadecimal's powers yet. Phong speculates that this is due to the transformation making him weak, as he would have already opened a portal to the net if he had access to Hexadecimal's power. He tells Bob that they need to stop him before this can happen. Bob tells Phong to power down the city and that he’s going to call in for help before signing off.

Bob then sends out a net wide alert to call for assistance, but as soon as he’s finished, Dot flies in shooting at Gigabyte. However, her attacks have no effect other than giving him more strength. Gigabyte attacks her vehicle, causing it to crash. Bob helps Dot out, and the two flee on zip boards.

Their escape soon gets cut short as the power down of the city affects their zip boards as well. They end up at the end of an alley with Gigabyte blocking their escape. Feeling as if they are doomed, Bob tries to tell Dot something but is cut off by her saying 'I know'. Gigabyte demands that Bob hands over Glitch, but Bob sends Glitch away. Gigabyte then decides to settle with using Bob and Dot for energy, but just as he’s about to swipe at Bob, a sword wielded by an unseen force severs Gigabyte's arm, sending it to the floor. This is when we see that Mouse has returned.

While Gigabyte reattaches his arm, Bob, Dot, and Mouse manage to escape to Mouse's ship (simply called 'Ship'). Bob is confused as to how Mouse arrived so quickly since he’d only sent out the distress signal a nano ago. Mouse says that she was already on her way, which displeases Dot since she almost deleted Enzo last time she was in Mainframe. Once they reach the Principle Office, Phong is reluctant to lower the shields as he doesn’t want Mouse to enter. Bob tries to argue his case for her since she just saved them from Gigabyte, but Mouse hacks through the defences anyway, allowing them to enter the Principle Office.

Inside, they come up with a plan to stop Gigabyte. The plan is for Mouse and Dot to catch a tear from the energy sea to overload Gigabyte with power while Bob keeps Gigabyte away from the Principle Office. Bob lures Gigabyte to Floating Point Park with the help of Hack and Slash, and Phong detaches that sector to keep him further away.

Meanwhile, Dot keeps the ship steady while Mouse uses a PlayStation controller to catch a tear. Just as she’s able to secure it, an overload of power knocks Mouse off her platform, sending her falling down to the energy sea. Luckily Dot is able to catch her before she hits the water. Mouse is impressed with Dots flying, and the two make their way towards the Principle Office.

Back on Floating Point, Gigabyte drains Hack's energy, and a distraught Slash punches Gigabyte so hard that he goes flying back to Mainframe. With Hack's energy, Gigabyte now has the ability to fly. He begins to absorb the energy from     the Principle Office shield, but Phong takes the shield down before he can absorb it all. Eventually, Dot and Mouse are able to make their way back to the Principle Office and they drop the tear on Gigabyte. Bob uses this to split Gigabyte, and he splits into three separate portals - Megabyte, Hexadecimal, and a mysterious black portal. While this seems like a victory, Bob suspects that there’s something rotten in the heart of Mainframe as we zoom into a gauntlet on Mouse's wrist revealing a blinking red light.

This is probably the weakest episode of the four episodes that make up the four part finale to this season. It's not that this episode is bad, it's just not as strong as the other three episodes. However, there is plenty to like about this episode. It's great that this episode starts right after the previous one, and much like Nullzilla, this episode has it's beginning, middle and end with a few threads left open to be followed up on in the next episode.

Mouse makes her long awaited return in this episode after her one episode stint last season. As I said in my entry on 'The Great Brain Robbery', Mouse was the most interesting part of that episode. She was a character who operated within a more morally grey area compared to everyone else we'd seen at that point, and this is something that remains in this episode. While she's helping our heroes, she invites herself into the Principle Office with her hacking skills in spite of Phong's refusal to allow her entry. She also has another purpose in Mainframe, something that we're not 100% sure of, but if the end of the episode is anything to go by, it can't be good.

Much like in other episodes, Bob finds himself needing to use means other than Glitch to resolve the episode's conflict. Glitch has no affect on Gigabyte asides from providing him with more energy, meaning he needs to use his wits in order to best this new threat. It's also great to see him working with Hack and Slash again much like he did in Bad Bob.

Much like in Infected, the powered down Mainframe makes for a visually stunning colour palette that fits in with the tone of the episode. The darker looking sky has a sinister looking tinge to it that creates some fantastic imagery throughout the episode.

Dot's arc this episode is pretty interesting. It revolves around her learning to work with and trust Mouse, someone she isn't too fond of after she nearly deleted her younger brother. After being incredibly vocal about how she distrusts Mouse, she finds herself forced to work alongside her. By the episode's end, the two characters find a newfound respect for each other

The concept of a fusion of Megabyte and Hexadecimal is an interesting one, as is the reveal of the family link between the two. Gigabyte's design is very cool as well, combining elements of Megabyte's design with subtle hints of Hexadecimals and a mixture of their respective colour palettes. However, Gigabyte doesn't quite live up to his promise as he just comes across as a rampaging brute and isn't as interesting as Megabyte and Hexadecimal are individually.

In spite of that, this is a great continuation to the story that started in the previous episode. However, while Gigabyte has been dealt with, it's clear that this isn't the end of this story. For one, whatever attacked Megabyte and Hexadecimal is still out there, we still have no idea what it is or what it's purpose is, and Mouse may or may not have some connection to the creature...

Next week: CGI Agents Fax Modem and Data Nully assist Bob in tracking down the creature in 'Trust No One'

Episode 20 - Nullzilla

As I said in the end of my post on the previous episode, the last three episodes have been about shuffling characters around to put them in a certain place. Enzo now has a friend in the form of AndrAIa, who as a fish out of water now acts as the audience surrogate for characters to explain things they already know to, and Mike the TV is keeping Hexadecimal in check after her near death experience at the end of Painted Windows. With all this in place, this episode begins the four part story arc that is going to close out the season and put things in place for next season.

We open the episode with a null travelling through Lost Angles before we pan across to Hexadecimal's lair, where it turns out that she’s been able to use her looking glass to access the Super Computer, which turns out to be the place we see at the start of the show's intro, succeeding where Megabyte has failed several times throughout the course of the show so far. After gloating about this to Mike the TV and Scuzzy, she gets bored and asks Mike to show her something. He initially shows her a B Movie called 'The Bride of Frankennome'. Hex demands something else since she’s already seen the film, so Mike changes the channel to an Opera Singer Binome singing the final high note. This shatter's both Scuzzy's dome and Hex's looking glass, the latter of which unleashed some tentacles that grab Hexadecimal.

At Silicon Tor, Hack and Slash are contacted by Megabyte, calling them to ask if they’ve completed the first two phases of their operation, and to proceed with phase 3, asking them to remember what happens to those who fail him before signing off. It turns out that Phase 3 is simply to read a story to Nibbles, Megabyte's pet null, and put him to sleep.

Meanwhile, at the Principle Office, Bob, Dot, and Phong are conducting experiments on nulls while Enzo and AndrAIa observe. AndrAIa questions why they’re trying to help nulls as they’re horrible. Enzo explains that nulls used to be sprites, and this is what happens when they lose games. Phong then explains that the city is full of nulls due to having lost several games before Bob arrived in Mainframe. Bob then informs AndrAIa that they're conducting experiments to restore nulls to Sprites, something that Dot points out has been unsuccessful so far on account of the fact that nulls avoid games, leading them to devise other methods to restore them.

Back at Hexadecimal's lair, an organic looking spore emerges from out of the tentacles within the Super Computer, heading towards Hex and latching onto her. This causes her to change colour from red to black, and also alerts the entirety of a Mainframe's null population, including Nibbles. Slash misinterprets this as Nibbles paying attention to the story, but then Nibbles crawls out of his cage. Hack and Slash watch him before panicking and heading off after him. The nulls at the Principle Office also react, but only AndrAIa and Frisket are able to pick up on this due to the noise of the nulls which the others are unable to hear. Enzo spots that the nulls are trying to escape their containment areas, and points this out to the others. Bob checks Glitch and picks up a bizarre energy reading, and Phong determines that this signal is coming from coming from Lost Angles. Bob initially believes that Megabyte to be behind this until Enzo corrects him by saying this has something to do with Hexadecimal.

The infected Hexadecimal makes her way towards Mike and Scuzzy, but before she can reach them, all the nulls end up swarming on top of her. Outside, Hack and Slash arrive in Lost Angles, applying their null stealth mode in order to hide from Hexadecimal. This is when Mike reaches them, panically yelling at the pair to run. Once he stops, Hack asks Mike if he’s seen a null, and Mike informs them that it’s their lucky day, since there's millions of nulls, referring to the null beast as 'Nullzilla'.

Back at the Principle Office, Bob decides to go and investigate the signal, with Phong suggesting they release the nulls and follow them to the source. Dot and Enzo tag along, and AndrAIa also wishes to join, but since she’s not familiar with the ways of Mainframe, Phong instructs her to stay with him. Bob, Dot, Enzo and Frisket follow the nulls to the bridge that connects Mainframe to Lost Angles where they spot Hack and Slash carrying Mike the TV flying across. As they land, Bob instructs Enzo to keep Frisket back and for Dot to ‘Stay Frosty'.

Hack and Slash tell Bob that they need his help as they lost a Nibbles, but Mike the TV then diverts their attention to Nullzilla walking across the bridge. Bob enquires what it is, and Mike tells them about the nulls swarming Hexadecimal, which Dot finds strange since Hexadecimal controls the nulls. Mike explains that she did until the creature came out of her looking glass and got her. This is when Enzo suggests going to see Phong.

Phong explains that the nulls are trying to isolate Hexadecimal from the rest of Mainframe. Bob points out this will eventually drain all of her energy, which Enzo believes to be a good thing as once she’s drained if energy, Nullzilla will also be gone. Phong, however, doesn’t think this is the case due to Hex's trans finite power limits, with Dot adding that Hex's attempts to break free are devastating the city. Bob says they need to stop this monster for Mainframe's sake. Since physical force won’t harm nulls, Dot suggests trying to contain the beast. It turns out that Phong has prepared something for just the occasion, leading them over to a wall and giving the command 'F.A.B'.

This causes the wall to open up to reveal Phong's Office, a room with a clear 1960's aesthetic. Bob, Dot, Frisket and Mike are all wearing bizarre insect themed outfits. Bob removes the mouthpiece from his outfit, declaring 'You can’t talk in these things, and I feel ridiculous!'. Phong apologises, but says the outfits are a necessity in order for them to control their vehicles. Enzo shows up in a green grasshopper themed outfit performing intricate martial arts moves. Once the team is gathered, Phong commands them to get to their stations.

Various parts of the wall switch round, transporting them to a giant slide that eventually reaches a large hanger bay. One by one, Bob, Dot, Enzo, Frisket (who barks), and Mike the TV say the names of their crafts, prompting them to appear. The vehicles then leave the hanger bay and Phong explains to Bob over a TV monitor that these vehicles form a giant robot that will help defeat Nullzilla. The 5 vehicles try to fly together to form the robot, but this doesn’t go so well since the robots don’t fit together. Phong tells them that they need to give the command, and doing so transforms the 5 vehicles into a large robot.

Meanwhile, Nullzilla is causing havoc in the city, eventually reaching Bob's apartment. This is when the robot catches up to it, and the fight begins. Bob's apartment ends up getting destroyed by Nullzilla landing on it (which inconveniences Bob as he’s only just redecorated). However, they are able to contain the monster and ask Phong what to do next. When he asks them to use something called a Disrupt-O-Matic, Dot points out that they don’t have one. This is when Phong realises that it’s back at the Principle Office, so he sends AndrAIa to pilot it over to them.

The Disrupt-O-Matic eventually reaches the robot, and ends up getting used as a giant whisk that scatters the nulls all over Mainframe as the binomes flee in terror (including one who appears to be smoking a joint that appears for a split second). The heroes go down to check up on Hexadecimal, and Bob reveals that while she’s drained of energy, whatever got her is now gone. This leads Dot to question where it went to.

At Silicon Tor, Nibbles finds his way back. Megabyte picks him up, saying 'There  you are, father!' As he enquires as to where Hack and Slash are, the creature that got Hexadecimal crashes through the wall and infects Megabyte in a similar manner.

While the show has been great up until this point, I feel this episode in particular is the start of when the show reached it's peak in terms of quality. As the first part of a multi part story arc, this episode does a good job of telling it's own individual story while also setting things up for the rest of the story. For one, it's interesting to see that Hexadecimal is able to access the Super Computer through her looking glass. It ties into my conclusion based upon her antics in both Medusa Bug and Painted Windows that Hexadecimal is more powerful than Megabyte, and if she wanted to, she could easily take over Mainframe and, as we learn this week, the Super Computer. However, she isn't accessing the Super Computer because she wants to take it over, she's just doing it because she can and possibly also to prove that she can succeed where Megabyte has failed so many times.

Speaking of Megabyte, he doesn't appear much in this episode until the ending, but we do find out something interesting; Nibbles, his pet null, is apparently his father. How he became a null, we have no idea at this point, and it's not something that will get revealed until we get to Season 4. In spite of that, it's a very interesting bit of foreshadowing that raises a lot of questions and speculation as to how Megabyte's apparent 'father' became a null.

We also get the sense that things are getting darker through the presence of the mysterious creature that was in the Super Computer. What is it? Where did it come from? What was it doing in the Super Computer? What is it doing to viruses? It's certainly a lot more organic looking in comparison to a lot of what we've seen before, and it also has a lovecraftian vibe to it. This mystery of not knowing quite what it is at this point adds to the menace that it presents to the show's cast.

While the show is clearly edging closer towards darker territory that it's flirted with before, this episode makes sure to keep the humour in order to keep the show grounded and edge towards the darkness slowly rather than diving head first in. The humour still remains in the show after this point, but in this episode it's rather prominent, both through Hack and Slash's antics and the witty exchanges between characters (my favourite being Bob questioning how Phong was prepared for a Null Monster rampaging throughout Mainframe), but we also get some more pop culture references.

The main references this time are to Tokusatsu properties such as Godzilla and Super Sentai. Godzilla is of course referenced through Nullzilla (including a nice visual nod where binomes are running in front of a screen projecting a rough looking film of Nullzilla rampaging throughout the city), and while Super Sentai isn't directly referenced, the show is referencing it's western counterpart, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, which spliced the fight scenes from Super Sentai with new footage shot in America. The year before ReBoot made it's debut, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers premiered in 1993 and started a massive phenomenon in spite of the show's quality being somewhat questionable (even if the cheesiness is part of what makes the show fun to watch). ReBoot's creators of course saw this as a great thing to parody, and ironically, last year's 'sequel' series ReBoot: The Guardian Code ended up taking the tropes parodied in this episode and playing them completely straight (more on that misstep in a later post).

While those are the main references, there's also a more subtle reference which I imagine most fans outside of the UK, Japan, or Australia might not pick up on. Phong's office (including the phrase 'F.A.B' that opens the wall to reveal it), the method in which the characters transport to their vehicles, Phong telling AndrAIa 'now all we can do is sit and wait' once they've begun the transportation process, and even the TV monitor in Bob's vehicle that he uses to contact Phong are all homages to the 1960's British Sci Fi puppet series 'Thunderbirds'. The show was a massive success in Britain in the 60's, and it's success was repeated in Japan and Australia, and it also managed to have two successful revivals through repeat screenings in the early 90's and the 2000's, both of which prompted new waves of toys that flew off shelves to the extent that the children's program 'Blue Peter' had to show children how they could make their own version of the popular Tracy Island playset with household junk. Of course, seeing as the show's creators grew up in Britain around the time the show was airing, they were obviously fans and wanted to pay homage to it. As someone who was raised on Thunderbirds in the 90's through VHS tapes and TV repeats, seeing this reference when I eventually saw this episode at 13 was like a collision of two of my most beloved childhood programs. Heck, even some of the music in this sequence is relatively similar to the iconic Thunderbirds theme.

This is a very strong start to the story arc that is going to continue throughout the series. The story is relatively stand alone with a beginning, a middle, and an end, but it also puts things in place that are going to play a role in the next episode. Namely, the creature that infected Hexadecimal has now infected Megabyte, and who knows what damage an infected Megabyte will inflict...

Next week: A familiar face from last season makes her return and we witness the power that's possessed by the deadly 'Gigabyte'

Episode 19 - AndrAIa

On the surface, this episode appears to pretty much be your standard, by the numbers ReBoot episode of 'issue, game cube, resolve issue'. However, this episode has a lot more to offer with the addition of a new character as well as fleshing out the show's backstory a little.

We start with a poorly acted recreation of the end of 'The Quick and The Fed' performed by binomes on the set of a TV show. This turns out to be a program called 'True Stories of Mainframe' that a very bored and depressed Enzo is watching at Dot's Diner on Mike the TV (who is clearly taking a break from his duties of taking care of Hexadecimal). Dot enters the diner and asks Enzo why he doesn’t play outside instead of watching Mike the TV all day, to which he responds that he has no friends and Bob's currently in a game. He continues to rant about how Dot doesn’t let him go into games anymore after the events of Bad Bob, and that he bets Bob is having a great time in the game.

Meanwhile, in the game we see, that isn’t the case. Bob is frustrated that one of his fellow pilots has set the planet to detonate, and they only have ten seconds to escape before detonation. Luckily, they manage to escape in time, ending the game. Bob enters the Diner with the binome pilots from the game, Captain Quirk and Jean Luc. He rants at them for their reckless actions in the game, and Dot gives him the suggestion of hosting a lecture on games. The conversation then switches back to Enzo, and Bob mentions that Enzo hasn’t got any friends since most the sprites were deleted when Mainframe's Twin City was destroyed. This upsets Dot a little, since the mention of the Twin City reminds her of her father, so Bob tries to console her by saying it wasn’t her father's fault, and the experiment just got out of control. Bob and Dot go over to Enzo in an attempt to cheer him up. This doesn’t go too well, as Enzo blames his father for him not having any friends, claiming that he’d have some friends if his dad hadn’t deleted most the sprites before storming out of the diner.

At the Principle Office, Bob is giving his lecture on games. This scene is a parody of the scene in Raiders of the Lost Arc where Indiana Jones is giving a lecture at his university, complete with a binome in the audience having 'love you' written on their eyelids. As well as catching any new viewers up to speed on how games work, it also serves the purpose of explaining the role of game sprites and their varying types. There’s aggressive types that attack the User, defensive types that block the User in their tracks, chaotic types that attack anything that comes their way, passive types that provide information about the game, and a new type; Artificial Intelligence sprites who have the ability to learn from the User and become better opponents. Following the lecture, Dot and Phong speak to Bob about Enzo's problem. This conversation ends up getting cut short by the announcement of an incoming game, which it turns out is headed for the Diner, where Enzo currently is.

All the patrons rush out of the diner asides from Enzo in spite of Cecil's insistence that he leaves. Bob and Dot head over to the Diner, hoping to find Enzo within the game before he gets into any danger. The Game cube lands and we see that this is an aquatic themed game. Enzo is swimming in the water and ReBoots into a sailor with an eyepatch. He’s also provided with a submarine to pilot. Meanwhile, Bob and Dot ReBoot into merpeople. We hear Bob thinking that Dot looks amazing, but Dot hears this as well since their characters in the game are telepathic. Bob uses Glitch to find details about the game, and they learn the objective is to beat the User to the lost treasure of Atlantis. After learning of their abilities within the game, they head off to find the User.

We then cut to the User, who in this game takes the form of a shark shaped submarine. Peering out from behind a rock is a young mermaid who appears to be around Enzo's age. She takes a starfish out of her hair and uses it as a sort of boomerang to attack the User. This proves somewhat effective as it pierces the hull, but the User then turns round and begins firing out her, knocking her out cold. Just before she can be hit with torpedos, she gets scooped up by Enzo's submarine, which then hides in a small hole within a rock.

Bob and Dot catch up to the User, and Dot takes him out with a pirana mine. This is a short lived victory since it doesn’t end the game. Instead, the User respawns. Bob finds out from Glitch that this is due to the User having multiple lives, 15 to be exact. Cutting back to Enzo, we see him watching over the mermaid he just rescued, hoping that she’s okay. She springs to life soon after, extruding claws from her nails and prepares to attack Enzo. However, she becomes more peaceful and friendly after Enzo remarks how cool the nails are. She tells him that they paralyse, and Enzo tells her that all he got when he ReBooted was an eyepatch. She asks him who he is, and he tells her that he’s a Guardian. She responds by telling him her name, AndrAIa, but before she can tell Enzo what she is, he tells her that he’s never seen her around Mainframe and that she has a nice name. AndrAIa takes herself off to the cockpit of the submarine, telling Enzo that she can hear something and that he should turn around.

Meanwhile, Bob and Dot are slowly taking out the User's multiple lives, but they have quite a few left to take out, and they’re currently on the game's final level. Dot points out that she’s running low on power, meaning that their only chance is to beat the User to the treasure. Bob uses his powers within the game to slice the user's engine, slowing him down. We then see Enzo and AndrAIa having a laugh as he tells her about Bob ReBooting as a damsel in The Quick and The Fed (although, we of course know it was actually him and not Bob who did so), telling AndrAIa that this is the best time he’s ever had. She tells Enzo that she likes him, and he responds by promising to introduce her to Bob and Dot at the Diner once the game ends. Their fun is then cut short once the User appears right ahead of them. The two attack the User with the submarine's weapons, depleting it of another one of its lives.

Bob and Dot end up in a portion of the ocean coloured red, which turns out to be shark infested waters. While they struggle at first, Bob eventually sliced one shark inside, causing the remaining sharks to flee in terror. This then clears the path for the User to reach the treasure. Bob and Dot race after him, however the User's sub sports rocket engines as it reaches Atlantis. He’s stopped from reaching the treasure by Enzo's sub crashing right into his, sending both subs crashing down to the ground. Bob spots Enzo in the window of the sub, also recognising that AndrAIa's a game sprite. This panics Dot, but Bob says there’s no time to help Enzo since they need to finish the game. They head towards the treasure only to be grabbed by giant tentacles just as the User begins heading towards the treasure.

Enzo panics about potentially being nullified, a concept that AndrAIa is unfamiliar with. This is when Enzo realises that she’s a game sprite. This upsets him, as he knows that they can’t be friends due to her leaving with the game. AndrAIa uses her claws to paralyse Enzo, then fires him in a torpedo towards the treasure. As it reaches the treasure, we see a sombre AndrAIa look on as she says 'Goodbye, my friend'. Enzo's torpedo reaches the treasure before the User, in turn ending the game.

Once the game leaves, Bob and Dot rush over to Enzo to check if he’s okay. Enzo tells them that AndrAIa was his friend, and that she helped them win the game. This is when Bob spots something on Enzo's icon. Once he taps it, it grows until AndrAIa materialises in Mainframe. She tells Enzo that she downloaded a backup of herself onto his icon, which let her leave the game since it thought she was Enzo. She seems equally as surprised that she can do this. Bob is confused about this as well, but this fades as he asks Enzo what AndrAIa meant when she referred to him as a Guardian.

This episode probably has the biggest change to the status quo so far by introducing a new character to the show's main cast. Sure, we've previously had characters such as Captain Capacitor, Mouse, and Lens who have been prominent parts of the episodes they've appeared in, but they vanish by the episode's end. With AndrAIa, the episode gives you the impression that she's going to be leaving the show for good at the end of the episode, leaving with the game. However, we soon find our expectations subverted when it turns out that AndrAIa has downloaded a backup of herself onto Enzo's icon, allowing her to enter Mainframe.

Speaking of AndrAIa, she's an interesting character with plenty of room to grow going onwards from this point. While we have met game sprites in previous episodes, they have all been voiceless obstacles with no personality. Here, we get an intelligent game sprite who has a personality. Somewhat like Enzo, she's an idealistic and wide eyed youth with an energetic personality. We also get to see some of her abilities she gets through the game, such as her paralysing nails and her ability to hear things from great distances, abilities that she's sure to make use of later on. Of course, since she's now out of the game, she's out of her element, meaning that her arc going forward is going to be her learning the ways of life outside of the games. From this point, AndrAIa serves two purposes; a friend for Enzo and a means for characters to explain things they would otherwise already know, the latter of which is going to be pretty fundamental going forward.

Another interesting point is that the AndrAIa who left the game isn't the original AndrAIa, she's merely a backup that was downloaded onto Enzo's icon. This means that the original AndrAIa is left by herself in the game, hence why she sadly says goodbye to him just before the game ends. It's an interesting point, but it doesn't end up coming up again in the series, although I don't think this is an idea that really needs exploring too much.

While this episode is largely Enzo centric, it doesn't mean that Bob and Dot don't have anything to do. Both characters are given plenty of action in the game, mainly taking on the User, but they also get to briefly tackle some hungry sharks. They are both met with the challenge of ensuring the User doesn't win, which isn't as easy as usual since the user has multiple lives, meaning that they have to deplete all of these before he can reach the end of the game.

We learn a bit more about the show's backstory in this episode which is a very interesting bombshell. Back in my post on The Tearing, I commented on how there was an in universe reason for why Mainframe is mainly populated by binomes with very few humanoid sprite characters to be seen, and this is it - most of the sprites were killed as the result of an experiment that destroyed Mainframe's twin city, and worst of all, Dot and Enzo's dad is responsible for this. This is a pretty dark backstory that's been added into the show, but it also continues this show's shift towards a larger sense of continuity.

I've kind of joked in my previous entries in this season about some of the things that have been subtly mentioned/occurred in those episodes, but so far this season, there's been some incredibly subtle continuity and foreshadowing within these episodes. I'll get more into this when we get to the end of this season since it's quite cleverly structured, but so far, we've had references to some kind of family tie between Megabyte and Hexadecimal and a place called The Web (which has apparently gone out of control and started invading systems). We also had Enzo building his air kart in High Code which he has built by the time we get to Bad Bob.

In particular, these past three episodes have been about shuffling things around and putting things in place. At the end of Bad Bob, Enzo is forbidden from following Bob into games, which leads into Enzo's depression at the start of the episode since he's now left with nothing to do due to a lack of friends his own age, which is of course the driving force behind this episode which ends with the introduction of a new character. We've also got Hexadecimal being placed into the care of Mike the TV.

What is the purpose of this shuffling around of characters? Well, from this point onwards, the subtle continuity we've had previously is going to be brought to the forefront with most episodes being part of an intricate story arc. Of course, today this is pretty much commonplace, but back in the 90's, this form of storytelling in TV shows was pretty rare to find, especially within kid's shows. It was a pretty bold move for the showrunners to attempt this, but as we'll discover in the coming weeks, it definitely pays off big time for the most part. Now everyone is in place, the story can truly begin...

Next time: Hexadecimal gets turned into a Kaiju monster made of nulls in 'Nullzilla'