Episode 25 - Between a Raccoon and a Hard Place

While Season 3 of ReBoot is for the most part a lot darker in tone in comparison to previous seasons, that doesn't mean that the show has lost it's sense of humour. For the most part, there's a decent balance between the darker elements and the more comedic elements. This is necessary since with the story being a bit darker, some humour to lighten the mood manages to prevent episodes from becoming overly dark, depressing and po faced (i.e. Man of Steel). This particular episode of Season 3 is probably the one with the most humour in comparison to the remainder of the season, however, said humour seems to heavily contrast with the darker elements of the story this time around.

We get a new intro for this episode. While it retains Megabyte's narration from the previous episode, it features clips from this season as opposed to the clips recapping Web World Wars that we got in the intro of the previous episode.

Following the intro, we begin the episode in a dark alley, zooming in on a poster of a cross eyed Enzo in his Guardian uniform with the caption 'Guardian Shmardian' scribbled on in graffiti. The camera zooms past the alley into a sector of Mainframe where we see a Gamecube and several binomes running around in terror. The camera eventually reaches the Principle Office where Enzo and Dot are explaining to Phong how they tried to reach the game, but Megabyte's troops blocked them at every turn. After Phong points out that Megabyte has done this to Bob in the past, we hear the system voice announce that the game has ended, and the user has won.

As the Game Cube leaves, Mike the TV starts doing a news report on the incident, pondering to the audience where the Guardian was when the city needed him. However, his report is quickly cut short by Hack and Slash. Back in the Principle Office, Dot orders a med team to go over to the nullified sector. However, Mouse points out that Megabyte's forces are now attacking the nullified sector. Phong regretfully calls off the attack and orders the shields to be raised since Megabyte's forces greatly outnumber their own.

At the nullified sector, we see several binomes searching through the rubble. Megabyte's ABC's swarm the area, and Megabyte appears on a vid window, declaring that this sector is now under his control, and ordering the binomes to surrender their PID's to him. A Captain Picard Binome refuses, saying that they're 'Tired of living in fear! The line must be drawn here!' (a reference to Star Trek: First Contact). Megabyte isn't phased by this, ordering an ABC to delete him. Megabyte tells the remaining binomes that 'resistance is futile', and they all hand him their PID's.

Elsewhere, we see that Cyrus is the one pinning up the 'Guardian Schmardian' posters. A tactic Megabyte is using as propaganda in order to divide and conquer the system. Phong decides that they need to fight fire with fire, and make Enzo a 'living icon' and game champion to lead the city out of the darkness. Dot isn't thrilled with this idea, not wanting her brother to take on the user alone. AndrAIa offers to accompany Enzo, since she's a game sprite, she's used to the games. Dot still isn't happy, but Mouse offers to accompany the duo so Dot can remain at the Principle Office to take on Megabyte. Phong points out that Mouse and AndrAIa's icons aren't formatted to ReBoot, meaning that they would be trapped in a game if they were to enter one. Mouse says that isn't a problem, since all she needs is access to a workstation along with Enzo's icon.

Mouse uses the workstation to copy some code from Enzo's icon to AndrAIa's, reformatting it so she can ReBoot and remain in Mainframe once the game ends. Mouse points out that there's no guarantee that will even work, as well as that Megabyte will try and stop them entering. Enzo isn't worried, since he thinks Dot will think of something. Meanwhile, Dot is talking to Phong about her plan, feeling confident that it will succeed. As Phong goes to leave, Dot says that with Bob gone and the ports to the nets closed, Megabyte can't even think about trying to access the Super Computer. Phong agrees, saying that Bob has effectively 'locked us in the cage with the tiger'.

At Silicon Tor, Herr Doktor is attaching a device to Megabyte's arm when Megabyte's lieutenant contacts him via vid window to inform Megabyte that his troops are prepared for the next game. Megabyte then orders them to not harm Enzo, since he wants him alive... for the moment. As if on queue, a voice announces 'Warning, Incoming Game!'

Some ABC's pick up life forms leaving the Principle Office, which turns out to be Dot and Enzo. The ABC's block them from entering the game, however it turns out this isn't the real Dot and Enzo, but rather two binomes hiding behind life sized cardboard cut outs of the two. The sky is suddenly filled with several Dot's and Enzo's. This is the perfect decoy to allow Mouse, Enzo, and AndrAIa to enter the game. AndrAIa's zip board suddenly starts to slow down and lose power, so Mouse takes a look at it. It turns out this is a rouse, as AndrAIa grabs Mouse's zip board from under her feet, stopping her from entering the game.

Enzo and AndrAIa appear to be in some kind of desert. Enzo asks AndrAIa where Mouse is, and she explains that she stopped her entering the game since their icons are untested, and if she is trapped in the game, she can survive there due to being a game sprite. This conversation is soon cut short by the appearance of a prospector binome, who upon seeing Enzo says the posters he's seen are right, and he's just a kid.

Back in the depths of Silicon Tor, Herr Doktor tells Megabyte that 'all is ready', and then awakens Hexadecimal, who has now been rebuilt with a new outfit, although her mask still remains cracked. While she initially seems displeased about her new look, it turns out she likes it. However, as she goes to leave, Megabyte presses a button on the wrist device Herr Doktor attached to him earlier, and it activates a shock collar round Hexadecimal's neck, knocking her out. He tells Herr Doktor that now he controls Hexadecimals power, he will be able to destroy Mainframe and rebuild it as Megaframe.

Back in the game, Enzo uses Glitch to find out information about the game. However, this proves to be a futile gesture since there's a massive billboard that announces that this game is 'Rocky the Rabid Raccoon'. Enzo and AndrAIa then ReBoot, with AndrAIa becoming a 'biker babe', and Enzo... becomes Elmer Fudd from Looney Tunes, complete with his signature speech impediment. Not long after this, Rocky appears, and attempts to kiss AndrAIa before running off. Enzo attempts to make a shot at him, but his bullet misses. However, this bullet sets off a chain reaction in true Looney Tunes fashion that leads to Rocky being hit by a train and losing the first of his three lives.

Back at the Principle Office, Mouse is explaining what happened to Dot, who isn't happy about Enzo being trapped in a game with a game sprite. Phong chimes in, saying that AndrAIa would never do anything to hurt any of them out of her love for Enzo, and then switches the conversation to how they're going to recover Enzo and AndrAIa once they've won the game. Dot, however, feels that she's 'all out of plans'.

Back in the game, Enzo, AndrAIa, and the Prospector are riding on a motorbike which quickly gets swiped away from them by Rocky. However, the trio still appear to be moving, until they look down and then they tumble straight to the ground. Rocky then sets off a missile before jumping into the entrance to level 2. Enzo tries to urge the prospector to come with them as the rocket will destroy them, but he'd rather take his chances where he is. AndrAIa tries to convince Enzo to leave him, but due to him being a Guardian, Enzo doesn't want to do so. This leads to AndrAIa knocking the prospector out, and the three of them avoid the rocket by jumping off a cliff.

At the bottom of the cliff, there are a couple more binomes, all of whom feel that Enzo is a bit young to be a Guardian. Nearby, Rocky is trying to hit a mole with a giant mallet, but soon gives up and goes into the bonus level. This worries Enzo, since there's an extra life down there, so decides to go and stop him. However, the binomes aren't willing to help. Enzo manages to convince them by saying while he's not Bob, if they don't co operate, they'll all be deleted.

In the bonus level, Enzo manages to grab the extra life token before Rocky is able to get down and grab it. Rocky ends up losing another life in the bonus level after being attacked by a hoard of skeleton binomes. Rocky then finds himself in an area looking like a subway tunnel, and this happens:

After he flees, Rocky finds himself by a vending machine which he repeatedly bashes in order to try and lodge some food free, and then this happens:

Rocky then makes his way outside where he's greeted by an angry mob who chase him into an alleyway where construction works are underway. He ends up getting stuck in tar, and his last remaining life is depleted by a steam roller being driven by Enzo and AndrAIa, ending the game.

Outside the game, the binomes have all been won over by Enzo as their protector. Enzo is initially worried that AndrAIa's icon didn't work. However, it turns out she was behind him, meaning the icon worked. Suddenly, they are greeted by a squadron of Megabyte's ABC's. They order the crowd to surrender or be deleted, but they end up fleeing once Enzo steps forward. Not because of Enzo, but because of some cardboard cut outs of CPU's. Enzo comments how Megabyte is going to be 'vewy vewy angwy', ending the episode.

Overall, I enjoy this episode. It's got some of the funniest moments from the entire series (me and my siblings used to sing the 'Raccoon Hat' song all the time back in the day). However, like I said in the opening paragraph, I feel that the humour and the more dramatic moments don't mesh together as well as they should. The episode opens pretty dark with Megabyte taking over a sector by force after preventing Enzo from entering a game, putting his propaganda campaign to turn Mainframe against Enzo into full effect. Then about halfway through the episode, we transition into a more comedic Looney Tunes romp. Both of these elements are entertaining in their own right, but they can at times feel like completely separate episodes. I do appreciate that it's great to have some humour (especially given how dark things are going to get in a few episodes time), but it can feel a bit jarring going straight from Megabyte putting a shock collar on Hexadecimal in order to control her powers to Enzo turning into Elmer Fudd.

Giving AndrAIa the ability to ReBoot and enter games without the risk of remaining with it is a great way to get AndrAIa more involved with the episodes. Since her introduction last season, she's mainly just served the purpose of being the audience surrogate for the other characters to explain information to that they would otherwise already know, mainly just remaining in the background. Now she's able to accompany Enzo into the games, this means that we get more interactions between the two and providing her more to do. It also adds an interesting idea for future episodes - if it's possible to switch a game sprite icon to a regular one, does that mean it's possible for a regular icon to become a game sprite one?

The game this time primarily appears to be a parody of Looney Tunes, but it also seems to be lampooning the mascot platformers that were popular around the same period such as Crash Bandicoot or Sonic the Hedgehog. Rocky definitely seems cut from the same cloth as those two characters (thankfully not from Bubsy the Bobcat), and is a pretty entertaining user to watch. Enzo being Elmer Fudd for this game kind of echoes the theme of him having to prove himself as a Guardian; Elmer is kind of an ineffectual character, always failing to hunt Bugs Bunny or whoever else he's trying to hunt, so Enzo becoming this "lame" ineffectual character is a slight reflection on how he's being presented in Megabyte's propaganda campaign. This gives him more to prove to the binomes who he's trapped in the game with that he is up for the job of defending the system.

Speaking of Megabyte, this week we learn what his intentions were with repairing Hexadecimal after the events of last episodes; he wants to have control of her power. It's been well established in previous episodes that Hexadecimal is a lot more powerful in comparison to Megabyte, and could easily have control of the system if she wanted to. As someone who craves power himself, Megabyte is of course envious of this, and has used this opportunity to try and obtain and control this power for his own gain. The concept of him using a shock collar to control her is incredibly dark and sinister, as well.

The other note I have about Megabyte in this episode is that he tells his troops that he wishes for Enzo to be alive for the moment. This reinforces the idea that Megabyte is really the one in control at the moment - the only reason Enzo hasn't been killed yet is because he has allowed him to live. His plan is to completely undermine the young sprite's confidence as well as shatter the confidence of those depending on him to defend them.

While this episode does have a few slight plot developments, it doesn't further the story so much. However, Enzo has started to win over the citizens of Mainframe, allowing them to have faith in him to defend their city from the games as well as Megabyte. Megabyte's plans to use his captive sister to take over Mainframe do not sound good, and who knows how the Mainframers will be able to stand against such a threat...

Next week: Our heroes decide to find a way to trap Megabyte in 'Firewall'

Episode 24: To Mend and Defend

After getting the greenlight from YTV for a third season of ReBoot, co creators Gavin Blair and Ian Pearson as well as former head of children's television at ABC Dan DiDio (who was brought on to be story editor for this season) got together at a steak house in Santa Monica. While they were there, they began planning the plot for the third season, writing their ideas down on a paper table cloth. While this initial plan differed slightly from the finished season, the overall planned structure for the season remained the same. Much like how the last four episodes of Season 2 were four separate episodes that formed one story arc, Gavin, Ian, and Dan decided to continue using that format, but on a much larger scale; each set of four episodes would be it's own separate story arc, but all four arcs would come together to make one big arc. 

One marvel of the internet is that, while a lot of things end up getting lost, the majority of things posted on there remain available for prosperity. If you look through the Google group alt.tv.reboot (formerly a Usenet group that has been absorbed), you will be able to look at several conversations between fans from when the internet was in it's infancy. It's pretty fascinating looking through all the posts following the second season. There was a lot of speculation with regards to the future of ReBoot and what would happen in Season 3 that all makes for a fascinating read along with fan's first reactions to seeing these episodes for the first time. Eventually, Season 3 made it's premiere when the first episode debuted on CITV in the UK on the 17th July 1997, a month prior to it's broadcast on YTV in Canada on the 20th August 1997. This first episode alone manages to set the precedent for the rest of the season going forward as well as making it clear that the days of Mainframe being restrained by BSNP are long gone.

The episode begins with a new intro recapping the events of Web World Wars. This time around, Bob's narration is replaced by Megabyte's. This is a great way to establish the tone of this first arc, as with Bob gone, Megabyte is now effectively in control with little standing in his way.

Following the intro, we pick up after the events of Web World Wars with the CPU's being chased and gunned down by Megabyte's ABC's. We pan around Mainframe until we reach the Hardware being manned by Hexadecimal. Megabyte ascends from an elevator, and orders Hexadecimal to fire when ready. She fires a blast at the Principle Office that hits the shields. We then cut to the Principle Office war room, which is shaken by the blast. Phong says that the shields are starting to fail, so Mouse begins attempting to fix the issue. Specky, one of the binomes, informs Dot that the remaining CPU's are requesting landing clearance, adding that there's only 9 CPU's left. Dot is clearly upset about this, but quickly begins planning a way to get them home. She orders Specky to contact the CPU's, and get them to proceed in a single file formation without breaking rank. Specky is confused about this, telling Phong that they'll be sitting ducks. Phong, however, says that it's best to do what Dot asks since he suspects that she has a plan.

They are then interrupted by Megabyte contacting the Principle Office via Vid Window. He tells them that their city is almost a mere memory but they can still save themselves by surrendering the Principle Office to him and taking their place at his feet. Enzo retaliates by assuring Megabyte that they'll never surrender to him. This doesn't phase Megabyte, who remarks that never is a long time, and that he awaits their unconditional surrender before singing off. Mouse then manages to get the shields back to full power, and Dot orders the binomes to patch her through to the CPU's in order to bring them home.

The CPU's go into single file formation, flying in between two rows of buildings. The ABC's then split into two separate ranks, flying each side of the CPU's. This then puts them in range of the Principle Office defence cannons, who begin opening fire on the ABC's, destroying them. The CPU's all make it home, but the shields stop functioning, meaning they are now defenceless from Megabyte's weapon.

Megabyte orders Hex to power down, since now the Principle Office is defenceless, the city is theirs for the taking. Hexadecimal doesn't care about this, since she just wants to destroy the Principle Office, even after Megabyte reminds her that doing so will destroy the entire system, including them. Hex fires anyway, but her shot is blocked by a small temporary shield that Mouse has managed to generate. Dot remarks that Bob would say 'this is not good' if he was here. Mouse reminds Dot that he's not here, and don't have a Guardian. Enzo then reminds them that he is a Guardian, but Dot is against this idea. Mouse feels that they have no choice but to take on Megabyte and Hexadecimal directly, tapping her icon and changing into a Samurai esque outfit. Dot joins her, switching her icon around to change from her usual attire to a more military looking outfit. They leave along with a handful of CPU's, ordering Specky to stay on the shields. Phong consoles a sombre Enzo, telling him that his time will come. Enzo says that Dot's right, he's not a real Guardian like Bob was.

Back on the platform, Hexadecimal begins recharging the cannon for another blast. Megabyte then tries to intervene, not wanting Hex to destroy 'my city'. However, Hex knocks him off the platform with an energy blast. Megabyte falls, but is caught by Hack and Slash before he can reach the ground. The system voice then announces 'Warning, Incoming Game!' Hexadecimal aims her shot, but just as she fires, the game cube descends on the weapon. This ends up causing power to surge through the cannon (and her), and the cannon explodes.

This is observed by Dot and Mouse, who then spot Enzo and AndrAIa heading for the game. They immediately give chase after the two. Dot says Enzo can't help himself because of the Guardian protocol, and Mouse says while that's fine, AndrAIa's a game sprite, meaning that even if they win the game, AndrAIa would stay with the game. Mouse is able to grab AndrAIa before she's able to reach the game, and Dot joins Enzo in the game.

Dot and Enzo find themselves in a misty graveyard. Three CPU's are also in the game, and have already ReBooted into zombies. Enzo uses Glitch to find out information about the game, learning that they are on the final level of a game called 'Malicious Corpses', and that their objective is to prevent the User from gathering all the pages of the 'Manual of Mortality' (which is stored in a cabin up ahead).  The user is currently one level below them, and Enzo tells Dot that it's best not to ReBoot until they can see what they're up against. Outside the Game, Herr Doktor finds Hexadecimal's incredibly wounded form, and orders some Binomes to carry her to the back of the van.

Back in the game, a gravestone near the Mainframers begins to crack and eventually explodes only for Frisket to jump out at them. Enzo is happy to see him, but this joy fades when the User appears. This user is a human with a large chin, armed with a shotgun and a chainsaw for a hand. He also tends to use the word 'groovy' a lot.

Now the User's here, Dot, Enzo, and Frisket ReBoot. Frisket is now a hell hound, Enzo is a Zombie wearing Michael Jackson's Thriller outfit, and Dot is a cross between Morticia Addams and Elvira. The User immediately starts shooting at them, and they take cover behind a tombstone. Enzo orders the CPU's to try and find the User's ammo and hide it. They are reluctant to listen to him, remarking that he's a kid and 'hardly a Guardian'. Suddenly, skeletons start coming out of their graves. These a game sprites, which Enzo thinks will give the User something to shoot at instead of them. Enzo asks again for the CPU's to hide the ammo, but they don't do anything until Dot shouts at them to do so. Dot then asks Enzo what they do next, referring to him as 'Guardian'. 

At Silicon Tor, Megabyte is watching an interview with a binome who is giving her thoughts on Enzo as a Guardian. She doesn't seem confident in him defending the system based on him being a little sprite. This gives Megabyte an idea, and he turns to Cyrus, telling him that he has a job for him. Back in the game, the User is still shooting at the skeletons, and when Enzo tells her the next wave of Game Sprites will be Zombies with flesh on their bones, Dot remarks 'what kind of sick creature gets enjoyment out of playing this sort of game?!', giving a fourth wall breaking glare to the audience. One of the binomes manages to find a box of ammo and hide it, but then he's met by the zombie game sprites, who then all get shot at by The User.

In the lower depths of Silicon Tor, Hexadecimal is tied up to some contraption. Megabyte orders Herr Doktor to lower her down, telling him that he wants her to have 'the best treatment'. Back in the game, the User is faced by a menacing tree who has the last page. He simply cuts the tree down with his chainsaw and grabs the page. Enzo orders the CPU's to stay out of the way while they head for the cabin. Frisket, however, runs straight at the User who shoots Frisket, seemingly killing him. Dot drags Enzo into the cabin, and reminds him that they can only help Frisket by winning the game. Enzo then begins planning, telling Dot they need to barricade the door and hide the book. 

Enzo decides to trap the User down a trap door in the cabin. Since it's chained shut, he decides to use Glitch to cut the chain. However, Glitch just short circuits and stops working. The User then starts using his chainsaw to cut through a hole in the wall. As soon as he enters, Dot smashes a lamp over his head, and Enzo plugs it in, this electrocutes him. During this, he ends up breaking the chain locking the trap door through shooting it. As soon as he gets up, he starts shooting Enzo, who dodges his attacks by dancing like Michael Jackson. Dot manages to disarm him of his gun, leaving him with just his chainsaw. He traps Enzo and Dot behind a piano, and begins slicing it with his chainsaw. This renders it useless as now it's covered in wires. Dot and Enzo manage to evade him and he ends up tripping over Frisket, who has wandered into the cabin. The User lands headfirst onto a sofa, and Dot and Enzo instantly begin tying him up with tape. Dot then opens the trap door, and Enzo scares him in. As he falls in, he's sucked into a whirlwind, and re emerges as a zombie, shouting 'I'm dead before dawn! I'm dead before dawn!', ending the game.

Outside the game, paramedic binomes arrive and take Frisket away. Dot requests particular doctors since she wants him to have the best treatment. Back at the Principle Office, the shields are now operational again, and Enzo is greeted by AndrAIa rushing at him. Phong has a message for Enzo from the hospital, showing that Frisket is back to full strength. Dot tells Enzo that he did a great job in the game, but he needs to be train if he wants to be as good as Bob was, cutting off before she can finish her sentence. Enzo then promises to Dot that he'll find Bob and bring him home. Mouse the interrupts with a surprise for Dot, saying that AndrAIa and her found Cecil in the wreckages of Dot's Diner.

As the starting point to this season, this episode does a great job of establishing the new status quo of the series following the massive cliffhanger we were left with at the end of the last season, setting up seeds for the rest of this first story arc, and setting the overall tone for how the rest of this season is going to go. 

At the end of Web World Wars, Bob was gone, and now only Young Enzo stands in Megabyte's way. This episode starts right after the events of that one, showing how Megabyte is incredibly close to victory with little standing in his way. While he may have finally bested Bob, but he still needed to take over the city. However, the rest of the cast weren't going to go down without a fight, even if their resistance seemed somewhat futile at times. If it wasn't for Hexadecimal and her chaotic agenda, it's possible that Megabyte might have been able to succeed.

With Bob gone, Enzo is effectively forced into the role of the show's protagonist. However, unlike Bob, Enzo isn't prepared. As the binomes say, he's only a young sprite. He lacks the training that Bob had, but still has to shoulder the responsibility of protecting Mainframe. While he's more than enthusiastic to help, even he knows he isn't ready. However, in the Game he begins to get used to being a Guardian, being a little more assertive and thinking on his feet in order to find a way to stop the User. Even then, he's nowhere near ready to take on Megabyte directly. We have another new voice actor for Enzo, this season. This time, we have Christopher Grey. This is probably my favourite voice for Enzo. His voice is noticeably deeper than the other voice actors we've had for Enzo, which I feel is pretty fitting given his Guardian upgrade, also suggesting that Enzo is ageing a little.

It's great to see Dot fully in control of Mainframe's defence forces. In Season 2, we got hints of her position within Mainframe's security forces, but this time, she is effectively their leader, with Phong being there to advise and support rather than command. She's also clearly upset about losing Bob, and her reluctance to let Enzo defend Mainframe and enter games is somewhat linked to this since she doesn't want to lose him, as well.

We also get other hints of plot points going forward, mainly involving Megabyte's schemes. The first of which is the job he's given Cyrus, which relates somewhat to propaganda. What this entails is something that will play out in later episodes along with his plans for Hexadecimal. We know he intends to help her recover, but what are his intentions? 

The game this time around is probably the most intense game we've had so far. This works in the episode's favour, both at showing us what to expect in the season, and reinforcing the idea that no one is safe in this universe anymore. The sinister nature of this game allows for Enzo's development as he needs to figure out how to beat the game without Bob, and also presenting the user as a genuine threat. In previous games in the series, the user has mostly been defeated with relative ease and hasn't been seen as much of a threat. This time, we've got a user who's incredibly deadly and could do serious damage to our heroes, which he of course, manages with Frisket.

The main point to talk about the game, however, is how it's obviously a reference to Sam Raimi's 'Evil Dead' franchise, particularly 'Evil Dead 2'. The User this time around is Ash Williams, the protagonist of the Evil Dead franchise. There's also several nod's to the franchise through the cabin being very similar to the one from the films (complete with the talking deer head, who remarks 'it's only funny until someone loses an eye', a line that will make a lot more sense in a couple of weeks), and the sentient tree (thankfully nothing like the trees from the first Evil Dead). 

As great as this sequence is, it ended up getting ITV/Meridian Broadcasting in trouble when they initially aired it in July 1997. After it aired, 19 parents complained to ITC (now Ofcom), the UK's broadcasting authority about how they felt this episode was unsuitable for children and shouldn't have been broadcast at 4:45 on a Thursday afternoon when children could watch it. ITV actually made a decent case to defend the show, but the main point of contention that the ITC had with the episode was the use of characters from a film which was rated '18' (the UK equivalent to the 'R' rating), and they were advised that this episode was unsuitable for the time that it was broadcast. I'll probably talk more about this in a later post since I plan to cover the UK broadcast of ReBoot in a later post, but I'd feel I was missing something if I didn't at least mention it in this post.

One noticeable change from Season 2 to Season 3 is the animation. In between seasons, Mainframe's software capabilities got better, leading to much more detailed animation and visuals. Characters now had eyelashes and shadows, and looked a little less polygonal. While in some areas, it is a little dated, I feel the animation in this season largely holds up pretty well by today's standards. Mainframe had the capability of rendering the show in HD, and rendered several HD still shots to be used for publicity. Looking at these shots compared to their respective shots from the episodes, it's crazy how much detail they were able to put in. Of course, it would have been impossible for Mainframe to render the whole season in HD since each shot took at least 90 minutes to render, plus no networks were broadcasting in HD at the time so there was no point doing so.

Overall, as the start to the season, this does a great job of hitting the ground running after the last season and giving fans an idea of where the show would be going from this point. Sure, Bob is gone for now, but it means we get to spend more time with the characters who haven't had as much focus at this point. Megabyte might have the upper hand for now, but our heroes aren't going to go down without a fight.

Next week: Megabyte puts his plan to turn Mainframe against it's new Guardian into full effect in 'Between a Raccoon and a Hard Place'

Intermission - ReBoot: The Ride

We're jumping ahead a little for this week's post. Technically, I should be talking about this during Season 3. However, since we're having our intermission weeks here, it seems like this is the best place to discuss the first of the two IMAX Ridefilms based on ReBoot. Plus this doesn't really affect the show's story as such, so it feels ideal to discuss this here.

In October 1997, partway through YTV's broadcast of ReBoot's third season, 'ReBoot: The Ride' opened in Ontario, Canada and later opened in Las Vegas. The ride takes the form of a simulator where the audience is seated in a vehicle in front of a large screen that moves in sync with the video being shown on the screen in order to give the illusion of movement (i.e. Star Tours, Back to the Future: The Ride). Seeing as this ride was open to the general public, the ride doesn't rely on prior knowledge of the source material, meaning that we don't have any major references to the show's preexisting lore.

I can't seem to find any details on how this ride came about, but essentially, Mainframe Entertainment teamed up with IMAX to produce two ridefilms exclusively for their IMAX ride system. Since IMAX screens are much larger in comparison to the average TV screen at the time, Mainframe's animators needed to ensure that the city of Mainframe had as much detail as they could possibly achieve. The animator's goal was for Mainframe to have the same feel as the city in Blade Runner.

Before getting on the ride, guests view a preshow that introduces us to our host, a search engine named 'Maxine'. She gives the audience details on how she functions and traverses throughout the net. Once this commercial ends, the camera zooms out to reveal that it was being watched by Megabyte. He wishes to have control over Maxine's 'limitless power', and Herr Doktor has prepared a tractor beam that will allow him to do so. Megabyte seems convinced he will succeed, and when Herr Doktor brings up Bob, he simply says that he's sure he'll be able to keep him and Dot occupied while he carries out his operation, ordering Herr Doktor to activate the system.

The ride itself starts in The Net, with the URL at the top telling us we are currently at the IMAX website. Maxine welcomes the guests and then suddenly, the URL changes to Mainframe's (as a nice touch, it's the same URL used for Mainframe's website). The ride vehicle gets pulled straight into Mainframe where we're instantly greeted by Megabyte. Luckily, Bob intervenes really quickly, leading to the ride taking the form of a chase across Mainframe, culminating with Megabyte's failure to capture the Search Engine and it's escape back into the Net.

While I never got to experience the ride, luckily it has been uploaded to YouTube, and from the looks of it, it looks like it was a really fun experience. The ride is adrenaline filled and exciting and also has loads of little nods to the fans who are riding, such as a large statue of Gigabyte and Bob in a park, and a brief glimpse of Mouse in an apartment. The main draw, however, is how it places guests inside the world of the show. What also adds to this experience is the appearance of all the voice actors from the show voicing their respective characters and the soundtrack from the show's composer Bob Buckley.

As well as this ride, Mainframe also produced a second ridefilm. Titled 'Journey Into Chaos', this ride places us within the mind of Hexadecimal. Unfortunately, this ride was much rarer in comparison to the first one, and only one short 30 second clip of it has seen the light of day. It certainly looks interesting, and I'd love for it to one day find it's way out of oblivion, but as time passes, it's getting harder to acquire it.

Next week: With Bob gone, our heroes need to somehow fend off Megabyte and Hexadecimal without him in 'To Mend and Defend'

Intermission - ReBoot merchandise (Seasons 1 and 2)

Around the time of the first two seasons of ReBoot were airing, a range of different merchandise and promotional tie ins were made available. The majority of this consisted of the toy line, which was produced by the Canadian company Irwin Toys. This toy line was made up of several waves of 5.5 inch action figures and a few vehicles and playsets. 

The first wave of action figures had 7 figures of the principal characters; Bob, Dot, Enzo, Megabyte, Hexadecimal, Hack and Slash. While Bob, Dot, and Enzo don't exactly have the best likenesses of their TV counterparts and the amount of articulation varied between figures, these are all fun figures with some great play features and accessories. Bob has various Glitch accessories that attach to his forearm, Dot comes with Cecil, Enzo comes with a zip board that is compatible with Bob, Megabyte has detachable legs, a moving jaw and retractable claws on one hand, Hexadecimal comes with interchangeable masks, and Hack and Slash explode when you press down on them. There was also a limited edition figure of Bob in his Jet Ball outfit from Talent Night that was also released in this wave.

All of the figures in this wave came with a pink 'delete disk' that was compatible with the Bob's Car vehicle. This playset seats two figures (every figure other than Megabyte, Hack, and Slash can be seated inside), has an opening bonnet which contains the disk launcher, a boot that opens revealing an interchangeable vid window (which can be changed to feature either Enzo or Megabyte), and it also has a rumble feature similar to the scene in Medusa Bug when it wouldn't start.

There was also a range of non articulated 3 inch figurines. This range included Bob (standing and on zip board), Dot, Enzo (with and without package), Megabyte (with and without a gun), Hexadecimal, Hack, Slash, Phong, and Frisket. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find decent pictures of these online, but I owned all of these when I was younger, and their likenesses weren't the best asides from Hack, Slash, Frisket, and Phong. 

There was also a small range of micro playsets in a similar vein to the Mighty Max playsets released by Mattel/Bluebird in the early to mid 90's. These were in the shape of a character's head, and opened up to reveal the playset and all the figures inside of it. Three of these were produced, Megabyte's Throne Room, Hexadecimal's Lair, and Hack and Slash's Vehicle Bay (the latter being my introduction to the series, as stated in my introductory post at the start of this retrospective). All playsets came with delete disks that could be fired from the detachable disk launchers that came with the playsets. These ones were distinguishable from the ones that came with the action figures since they were green rather than pink. 

Three more waves of figures were released by Irwin for the show's second season. The first of these waves had six figures that all come packaged with a small binome figure. The figures in this wave were Bob (with Old Man Pearson) and Dot (with a repainted 3 inch Phong) in their prison guard uniforms from The Tiff, Enzo in his Season 2 '10' outfit (with Mike the TV), Frisket (with a repackaged Cecil), Medusa Bug Infected Megabyte (with Cyrus), and Web Creature Infected Hexadecimal (with Skuzzy). The likenesses of Bob and Enzo are greatly improved from the previous wave, and it's great to have alternative versions of the characters as well as Frisket who hadn't been released in this scale, even if this wave and the next two are incredibly rare in comparison to the first wave.

The next wave was made up of 7 figures, and these ones all changed colour when cooled. Bob appears to be in his outfit from The Great Brain Robbery, Dot is in her wizard outfit from Wizards, Warriors, and a Word from our Sponsor, and Enzo is in his outfit from Racing the Clock. Megabyte, Hexadecimal, Hack, and Slash all have different coloured splatters on them. Again, it's great to have alternative outfits for the heroes, although the colour change feature is more of a gimmick.

The last wave of figures came with a CD Rom that contained trivia on the show and a tour of Mainframe amongst other things. These were all alternative forms of the characters not seen in figure form at that point. Bob is wearing his Mad Max outfit from Bad Bob, Dot is wearing her dress from Talent Night, Enzo is in his Guardian Cadet uniform given to him by Bob in Web World Wars, Frisket is an interesting one since he's taking the form of a 'Hell Hound' which doesn't appear until next season, Megabyte is in his Web Infected form seen in Nullzilla and Gigabyte, and Hack and Slash have their fists replaced with guns. This is an interesting wave of figures, and it's great to see these new versions of the characters represented in figure form. 

Another vehicle was released alongside these waves, this one being Dot's Exo Skeleton from Infected. While this was a very cool looking toy, it unfortunately wasn't incredibly sturdy, so it was prone to breaking.

As well as this, there was a small expansion to the Micro Playsets range. Two mini vehicles were produced, an ABC vehicle that fired two missiles and Mouse's Submarine from The Great Brain Robbery that had movable claws. There was also a larger playset of Megatruck from Bad Bob that was 5 playsets in one. Unfortunately, the Mouse's submarine playset features the only figure released of Mouse.

The catalogue pages below show that there were some toys produced that never made it to store shelves. These include a range of micro vehicles, two different plush toys of Frisket in different scales, and a five in one toy of Glitch. Prototypes were definitely produced for these toys, but unfortunately they never made it to market. However, the one existing plush Frisket prototype is known to be in the possession of ReBoot Co Creator Ian Pearson. Another interesting note about these pages is that the Dot in the Binome wave of figures appears to come with a Captain Capacitor Binome instead of the repainted 3 inch Phong that the actual figure came packaged with.

There were also toys produced for various promotions with food companies. Kellogg's had a range of exclusive micro playsets and foil stickers. These playsets were smaller than the Irwin ones, and featured one or two plastic figures and double sided cardboard figures to fill out the cast of characters available. The playsets in this promotion were Megabyte's Throne Room, Hexadecimal's Lair, Bob's Apartment, and Dot's Diner.

In the UK, ReBoot's broadcast on CITV was sponsored by Skips crisps, who did a small range of bendable figures that were free with Skip's Tokens. They also had limited edition donut and pizza flavours which had ReBoot characters on the packets. The UK also had a range of 'Megabyte Biscuits'.

Outside of the toys, there was a wide range of other merchandise available. For instance, a range of Choose Your Own Adventure books where you guide the characters on an adventure by navigating from section to section. Most of these were original adventures, but there was also one based on the episode 'Racing the Clock'. HTML versions of these books can be played here: http://purplemagpie.0catch.com/reboot/adventure/?fbclid=IwAR1QCwQ9h7XAryph1GN5xE6hmUZmaL5QxuaVDwdVjG5oNgf0HVza3juL4UE.

Two different board games were released (both confusingly called 'Mainframe Game'). The first is more of a strategy game, whereas the other appears to be a more typical kids board game. There was also an LCD handheld game similar to those produced by Tiger Electronics around the same time.

Trading card company Fleer Ultra produced a series of ReBoot Trading Cards which featured stills from the show and information about the characters, and a series of ReBoot Pogs was also produced (ReBoot Pogs is probably the most 90's thing ever).

There was also a ReBoot duvet set, lampshade, colouring book (and crayons), bubble bath, and toothbrushes produced as well as a Bob dressing up costume complete with a creepy looking mask that barely resembles Bob.

There was a lot more merchandise out there than this, but I just thought I'd point out some of the more interesting examples as well as overview the toy line which was the main focus of this post. Some more examples can be found on Haku's ReBoot Museum, which is where I took some of the pictures used in this post: http://haku.co.uk/ReBootMuseum/index.html

Nowadays, this merchandise is interesting to look back on based on how much was released and the variety of different items as well. The toy line was fun although it would have been nice to have seen figures for Mouse and AndrAIa. However, the action figure line ended up remaining dormant until 2001, around the time of the Fourth Season, but that's a story for another day.

Next week: We take a look at the first Imax Ridefilm, 'ReBoot: The Ride'