Thursday, September 17, 2020

Jonny Quest: The Complete Original Series [Blu-ray]

Jonny Quest is one of my favorite cartoons but I've never seen all the episodes. Here I'll just be looking at the original series. I'm going to be sharing thoughts as I go. 



So we start off with a terrified guy on the run from... dragons? Two of them- on a leash being held by a one- eyed sumo looking dude. Like some of the other episodes of this series, I'm only a minute in to this one and already rolling my eyes a bit at some of the cultural insensitivities. This kind of stuff would never fly today. Anyway, the guy being hunted escapes and who picks him up but- Dr. Quest? Turns out Dr. Quest was coming to see a Dr. Ashida- the same man our escapee blames for the presence of the dragons. Quest and crew are received by Dr. Ashida on his island, and naturally Dr. Quest asks Ashida about the native and his fear of the dragons. Ashida helpfully explains that he has experimented on Tobura lizards and through genetic manipulation has caused them to grow to great size.

Ashida is a creepy fellow. Bandit clearly doesn't like him, although to be honest I wouldn't mind Bandit becoming lizard food if it would shut him up a bit. Anyway Ashida goes to introduce the Quest crew to Sumi, the aforementioned sumo guy- original name, huh?- and then shows them his fighting pit where he pits the great lizards against each other. At this point I'm wondering- why on earth was Dr. Quest even coming to see this lunatic? Not only that- they're actually guests of his? Anyway Ashida challenges Race to a judo contest, which Race wins, and I'm assuming Ashida is not going to take kindly to that. 

Dr. Quest, meanwhile, decides that whatever reason he had for meeting Ashida is no longer valid, and they try to leave in the middle of the night. Nothing doing, though, as they are chased into the trees by Ashida's dragons and captured. Ashida offers them their freedom if Race can beat Sumi in a bout, and Race accepts, against Dr. Quest's wishes. The judo bout is silly but Race prevails, and Ashida, honorable guy that he is, reneges on his offer of freedom. They're thrown in a dungeon but easily escape-the door is unlocked- and Dr. Quest surmises correctly that it's a trap. They're meant to be dragon food! Race senses that Ashida is pissed at him and offers to be the bait while Quest and the kids escape. Sure enough, they go for Race and he leads the dragons on a merry chase. 

Eventually Race gives 'em the slip and escapes back to the schooner, along with the doctor and the kids, and as they wonder what will become of Ashida, we find out that Sumi has had enough of Ashida's abuse. Ashida is pissed that Sumi failed and is about to punish him, but the joke's on him as a fed- up Sumi feeds Ashida to the dragons! I guess that's sorted. We never find out exactly why Quest was meeting with Ashida, but it doesn't really matter. The whole point was just to have some dragon action and the episode succeeds pretty well at that, I suppose. One of the better installments maybe, in spite of the cultural ridiculousness.    

I give this one 3 of 5 stars.
  

Related image 

5 comments:

  1. I should probably get back to reading graphic novels. They were just right for my wandering attention span and there's a huge selection on hoopla.

    Karen @ For What It's Worth

    ReplyDelete
  2. A little dragon action is always a good thing! ;D

    ReplyDelete
  3. "although to be honest I wouldn't mind Bandit becoming lizard food if it would shut him up a bit." Bahaha! I can't stop laughing at this. :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. It sounds like this serie may be a little 'dated'??
    Still, enjoying your thoughts on these.
    Lynn :D

    ReplyDelete
  5. I remember those weird dragon things, this was one of my fave episodes! Although, I was only seeing it in reruns then, but it was still 'new' to me. I miss the old Cartoon Network.

    ReplyDelete