We fell a little behind with our Adventure Time reviews here at PDI, so get ready for an Adventure Time onslaught! Today and tomorrow will get us caught up on back episodes, and then every day this week we’ll have reviews of the Adventure Time Corn-Ooo-Copia marathon of new episodes that aired Thanksgiving Week! Tell your friends!
In the opening moments of the first new Adventure Time in about a month, “Everything’s Jake,” I thought the ghost fly was coming back. But that was no fly. That was Magic Man! And you know what that means. He’s gonna mess with somebody’s head and maybe, just maybe, a lesson will be learned, for good or ill. This time, it’s Jake being messed with, as Magic Man injects our hero with a mysterious substance, chants a mysterious phrase — “The waffle doll will fall / Lest you eat the yellow dough” — and flies away happily as Jake grows tired, falls asleep hungry and then HIS FACE SLIDES DOWN INSIDE HIS BODY!!
Almost the entire episode is spent in Jake’s inner world, a world made up of his own flesh, shifting and changing as he explores it. But he’s not alone in there. Futurama‘s Billy West makes a guest-voice-appearance, as Jake’s (Futurama‘s John DiMaggio) best friend Goose (who speaks with Fry’s voice), the Mayor (Zapp Branigan’s voice), and Professor Eric Addamkimson (Professor Farnsworth’s voice).
Really, I’d have loved this episode for just bringing West in for an under-the-radar Futurama reunion, but this one, written and storyboarded by Seo Jung Kim and Somvilay Xayaphone, had even more going for it. The metaphoric level seems to be pretty clear on the surface, with a lesson about self-absorption and isolation, but then it moves into more multifaceted areas as Jake is forced to choose between feeding his hunger and surviving or starving in order to save Jake World.
Ultimately that’s a Catch 22, since if Jake starves the body dies and any Jake People who survive the massive belly quakes would wither away with him anyway. So the choice ends up being between sacrificing himself for his creation or abandoning his creation with the hope that he might be able to return someday.
He almost finds a way to have it both ways, as Professor Addamkimson makes an arduous and dangerous journey to the Sky Hole, in order to retrieve bagels for Jake. Unfortunately, as with most adventurers who cross over to another realm, his mind is not prepared for what he finds: an ingenious combination of Cthulhu and the Flying Spaghetti Monster in the form of Finn with a sloppy mouthful of noodles.
Seriously, that may be my favorite moment from any episode so far.
I don’t know if it’s just me, but after Jake’s rather cavalier murders in “Ghost Fly,” I can’t help but wonder if Magic Man’s lesson has something to do with teaching Jake the value of life. Slipping into the scene as a fly could lend credence to that interpretation and in the end, as Jake — now back in the real world — eats beans from the can while crying, he accidentally calls Finn Goose. He misses his best friend, and lost a part of himself at the same time.
Looking ahead to the next episode, I think this theme is intentional as we start to see Jake growing as a person. Um, I mean, as a dog. Er, um, as a glob?