Re: My thoughts on The Weekenders

This week, take your pick: Tino minus his usual emotion, and Tino at
Carver's. Thoughts follow shortly.

















- Pizza gags: Pizza Byte has Carv taking a pot shot at modern
technology (or rather, jammed printers) and Pizza Spy uses a different
take on the undercover theme.
- FOTW isn't left out either: We see her in the second story serving
the "original" South American potato: Something dandy from the Andes.
- Is that Percy I see in the lines for the potato, as well as the
arcade at Funville?
- If they're doing anything to pad time, it's those freezes before the
midway break: In the second story, the picture freezes (after Tino's
comments about "having trouble living in Carver's world") for about 1
1/2 seconds before the fade. (The other break point BTW: Tino
denouncing all emotions... after a brief fit of anger.)
First story thoughts:
- Tino whips out a remote and shows us something new (well, to this
show anyhow): his class. At school. In this case, watching Romeo and
Juliet.
- Next thing you know, we see all sorts of students teasing him for
crying during R&J (resulting in him denouncing his emotions).
Including:
* The guy who was trying to take one of his "Tickets" to see
Chumbukkit (speaking of which, the band gets a mention AGAIN later on,
as does Dreadnought), and
* Those two girls who called Carv "Pickletoes".
- The "someday you'll thank me" parental speech... finally, someone
points out how cliched it is.
- Dot Cardigan pops up again (OK, all we see is her back), and I
notice that her shirt has dots on it... maybe that's how she got her
name?
- Kind of a shrewd way to get Tino to learn about the value of
emotions from Tino's mom...
- Favorite line: Quite a selection of choice lines, for example: (Carv
sees a pizza jammed in a
"printer") "Curse you, modern technology!" (Tino looking at Sunday
night dinner) "Leftover *leftover* cactus curry..."
- The writers take another pot shot at Carv's bad handwriting. As if
they haven't had enough of his footwear obsessions...
- According to this ep, Tino won a chess trophy... at a previous
school picnic perhaps? (See "Dead Ringer", the one with the
horseshoes, to see what I mean.)
- Meanwhile, remember when Tish abandoned a video game just to spite
the gang for "Tishing"? It's back with a new version that's better,
louder... and more prone to breakdown, as we see when Tish and Carv
are about to take their turn. "Whatever."
Second story thoughts:
- Sigh, another one of those water ripple flashbacks... and the
Katsufrakis parents pop up in this one.
- The entire Descarte family also pops up. Did you know they're all
voiced either by Phil LaMarr (Carv, dad) or Cree Summer (Penny, Todd,
mom)?
- Speaking of Penny, she gets all of one line (and as previously
mentioned, her focus ep won't even be shown here): "Who forgot to put
the cap back on the toothpaste?".
- Favorite line: (Washing dishes) "Are you having trouble living in
the real world?" "No, I'm just having trouble living in Carver's
world." Or maybe the lines about Carv's clenched teeth upon waking up
on Sunday morning.
- And as if we hadn't already had enough "whatever's" in the first
story, Tino says it at some point in the 2nd story (not quite sure of
where tho).
- Preceding a nightmare sequence with Tino's face pasted over that of
Carv's in the Descarte family portrait: Usually, when the Sunday
caption pops up, it fades straight into the caption... this time, it
faded to a blank light blue screen before the word Sunday faded up in
dark blue (IIRC).
- So we're left with Carver delivering Tino's usual closing schtick,
complete with his line. Not that there's anything wrong with it of
course... but the fact that I don't remember the moral clearly
(something about being a model son?) might suggest that the morality
is starting to get a bit weak.
- Either that, or it's the fact that I went to bed at 11:00pm the
night before. (Tino to Carv) "You wake up at 6:30am on Saturday
mornings?" Well, I do that to watch this show... (meanwhile, by the
end of the scene, the clock reads 6:35).
Sticking around for a couple more minutes:
- Has it suddenly become the trendy thing to do to put a prologue
scene before the opening titles? KP, All Grown Up!, Ozzy & Drix and
Heavy Gear (among others) are doing this.
- And speaking of KP, look who popped up today: Senor Senor, the
villain whose son is so not down with his villainy ways... and did you
know he's voiced by the late great Ricardo Montalban? In the states,
he's most known for ads selling cars with Corinthian leather, and was
most recently seen in the Spy Kids flicks (let's hope the producers
stick to their promise of not making more of them).
- Later that day, guess who popped up on KND: Lizzie (who first
appeared in "Lizzie", and don't ask me to recite the "full form" of
the title), wanting to take Number 1 (or Nigel) out on a date (except
that he's sleeping, so Number 5 has Number 4 dress as him instead :-D
... good thing they both have the same accent). And here I thought she
was going to be a one-shot character...
- Remember that comment made during the discussion for "Talent Show"
where one of you (Chika, right?) said that the gang never wins
anything? And how I pointed out that they won a "Radio Drama" contest?
Well, I realized that in "The (not so) Perfect Weekend", Tish won a
dulcimer contest as well. That incident came to me when I thought of
examples of how in toons, when a character has a performance that gets
a standing ovation, we (usually) only see the standing ovation itself
(so as to save the animators some work): besides Tish's dulcimer win,
ISTR that in an ep of "Mona the Vampire" (I think you should know this
series, since I believe it's British), a ballet dancer gets injured
and needs to be replaced for a duo show... and the replacement says
something about knowing how to improvise a routine... and cue a fade
to the two dancers getting a standing ovation. My memory's a bit fuzzy
on this...
- And speaking of saving some work: how about semi-significant
characters who don't speak? (Hey) Arnold's rival in an eating contest,
the students in detention with Dexter, the grown up Maggie Simpson,
and (in a somewhat bizarre case) some person being interviewed on the
radio in an ep of Thornberrys. Saves *vocal casting* some work. ;-)
More thoughts to come when (or if) I come up with them. Later days.