============================================================================
Episode: 14
Cold Opener
+ A spoof of the beginning of "Beany and Cecil," the early '60s animated
series from director Bob Clampett. (JK, JJW)
"Dexter's Date"
+ NCB = NBC, with an episode of Seinfeld being viewed. (JK)
- Note that the famous NBC peacock is replaced by a turkey with
multicolored tail feathers. (JJW)
+ Lobe's line: "Don't touch that dial. For the next 60 minutes I'm
in control." This is a reference to a similar line from the '60s
sci-fi TV series "The Outer Limits." (?)
- Barbra Streisand arrives at the Washington Gardens just before the
Douglas family. (JJW)
+ "Guarding Tess" was a little-seen 1995 film starring Shirley MacLaine
and Nicholas Cage.
+ Freakazoid's celebrity transformations include: Oprah Winfrey, David
Letterman, Michael Jackson, Barney, The Skipper (Alan Hale, Jr.) from
"Gilligan's Island," Judge Lance Ito, and Louis Armstrong. (JK)
+ The Lobe's song and dance mocks "Hello, Dolly," which explains why they
used Louis Armstrong for when Freakazoid sings with the Lobe. One of
Satchmo's best-known performances was of Hello, Dolly. (JK, RO)
+ The staging of the Lobe's number is copied almost exactly from the 1969
film of "Hello, Dolly!" (with Barbara Streisand). (JJW)
+ Or, more specifically, from a videotape of that film. Note that the
waiters are always slightly off-center with respect to The Lobe, and
that during the duet with Freaka-Louis Armstrong, they appear to be
interacting, but the shot always seems to include one or the other,
but not both. The reason is that these shots were copied from the
panned-and-scanned video of "Hello, Dolly!" Pan-and-scan, is the
process by which a portion of a widescreen picture is cropped and
formatted to fill the TV screen when transferred to video; as opposed
to "letterboxed", where the entire image is shown on the screen,
leaving black areas at the top and bottom of the screen. And no, this
does *not* mean that a letterboxed "director's cut" of "Bonjour,
Lobey!" is in the works... (SC)
+ The scroll at the bottom of the screen is in reference to the Jerry
Lewis Telethon, since that is the place most people see a musical
number like that. The names and numbers are people making donations
and their pledge amounts. (BB)
- "Yakko Warner, $1" is not only funny but shows he's cheap. (RB)
- Also note the $100 contribution from Vic Burma, the fictional director
of "The Cloud."
====================================================================================
Episode: 15
"The Freakazoid"
+ The title is a play on "The Godfather," as is the opening logo. (JK,
JJW)
+ The first scene is a direct take-off on the opening scene of "The
Godfather," in which much is made of the tradition that no Sicilian can
refuse any request on his daughter's wedding day. Mr. Fizzizzi = The
undertaker who wants revenge on the boys who raped his daughter; The
Huntsman = Johnny Fontaine, the Sinatra-like singer who begs the
Godfather to help him get part in a movie. (JJW)
- Nit: Why didn't the Huntsman know that superheroes DON'T have to grant
any request on their birthday?
- DYN: Among the names on the list of people Freakazoid has to see:
Butterworth, Bennett, Stallone, Bugsy, Grieco, De Niro, Pacino,
Sinatra, Barken. (JJW)
+ The people lined up to see Freakazoid, from left to right: Joan Rivers,
Rush Limbaugh, Bill Clinton, Princess Di, the Pope, John Wayne (wearing
the eyepatch he sported in his Oscar-winning role in "True Grit"),
Kramer from "Seinfeld," the Mask (hiding his face to avoid copyright
problems), Judge Ito, and one of the waiters from "Dexter's Date."
(JK, JJW)
- DYN: The Lobe's present to Freakazoid is wrapped with Animaniacs
wrapping paper. (JK)
+ The singer in the party scene is a caricature of Johnny Mathis. His
song "When You Cannot Show Your Face" is a parody of Mathis' song "Town
Without Pity." (?)
+ "So it shall be written, so it shall be done" comes from Cecil B.
DeMille's film "The Ten Commandments." (SC)
+ The song "You're a Meany, Nasty Lobe" parodies the song "You're a Mean
One, Mr. Grinch" from Chuck Jones' TV adaption of Dr. Seuss's "How the
Grinch Stole Christmas." The singer did a good job of imitating Thurl
Ravenscroft's performance. (?)
- DYN: After Lobe steals the Mona Lisa, the museum-goers stare admiringly
at the wall.
+ As in "Yabba Dabba Boo," Amblin's headquarters is Acme Looniversity.
+ Freakazoid getting covered with newspapers as the tide of public
opinion turns against him may be inspired by a similar scene in Terry
Gilliam's movie "Brazil." (SC)
- And the scene in "Brazil" was itself inspired by a scene in John Ford's
"The Informer," starring Victor McGlaglen. (TW)
+ The diner whose window Freakazoid looks through is a parody of Edward
Hopper's famous painting "Nighthawks." (many)
+ The final chase appears to be a general parody of movie chase scenes
set in San Francisco, which explains why the streets of Washington
suddenly develop so many peaks and valleys. There are allusions to car
chases from the movies "Bullitt" and "What's Up, Doc?," especially in
the part where they go down the hills, in which the camera angles are
almost IDENTICAL to some of the shots in "What's Up, Doc?" (JJW, RH)
==================================================================================
Episode: 16
"Mission: Freakazoid"--
+ This episode spoofs the TV show "Mission: Impossible" (which was
recently reincarnated as an incomprehensible Tom Cruise movie). The
lighted fuse in the bogus title sequence and the line "your mission,
should you choose to accept it" are taken directly from the original
show.
- DYN: Henry Kissinger is briefly glimpsed in the fake title sequence.
+ The face and voice of the Security Minister are reminiscent of the late
Soviet leader Leonid "The Eyebrows" Brezhnev. His line "Only America
could produce an imbecile of your caliber" is an obvious spoof of
generic Soviet/WarPac propaganda. (SS)
- The mime is from "Animaniacs."
- The joke about torturing a mime and saying "make him talk" is an old
one; most recently, it was used in the (awful) movie "Spy Hard."
+ "Braveheart" and "Rob Roy" are two 1995 movies set in Scotland. Roddy
clearly has very patriotic tastes in cinema. (JJW)
+ Professor Jones is a parody of Doctor Zachary Smith from the '60s TV
show "Lost in Space." The man who does the voice is Jonathan Harris,
who portrayed Dr. Smith. (KMW, EOC)
- "Lost in Space" was basically a sci-fi "Swiss Family Robinson," about
a typical nuclear family stranded on a distant planet with only a robot
and an evil scientist, Dr. Smith, to keep them company. This of course
explains the running query as to whether Professor Jones was on a show
with a robot.
+ Professor Jones' cry of "Oh, Fibber McGee!" refers to Jim Jordan's
character on the famous radio comedy "Fibber McGee and Molly," which
ran on NBC in the '30s and '40s. (EOC)
=====================================================================================
Episode: 17
"A Matter of Love"
+ Mary Beth = Mary Kay, a cosmetics company best known for inspiring a
"Bloom County" continuity about their use of test animals. (JK)
- DYN: In addition to the constant cries of "Huggbees," there are
several signs and billboards displaying this slogan.
+ Gulliver is Gallagher, a favorite target of the Brain. At the height of
his populatiry (late 70's) he'd be on variety shows (The Muppet Show
comes to mind), and one of the parts of his act was smashing fruit,
usually watermelons, with a sledgehammer. The audience would come with
plastic sheeting or rain gear in order to shield themselves. (BC)
- See Animaniacs' "Taming of the Screwy" for another Gallagher reference.
(SC)
+ The Storch Club is a double reference: To Larry Storch, and to
the Stork Club, which was a famous New York City nightspot of the 30s,
40s, and 50s, where a lot of Cafe Society hung out. It was one of
Walter Winchell's big hangouts. (JK, EOC)
+ The chimpanzee spy show Cosgrove and Mary Beth talk about is "Lancelot
Link," a show that had monkeys playing humans. (JK)
+ Clapping and saying "Huggbees" to make Freakazoid better comes from
J.M. Barrie's play "Peter Pan," where the audience is instructed to
clap to revive Tinkerbell. (JK)
+ In the finale, the singer is imitating Jimmy Durante. (EOC)
- I can't ID the song; however, I have heard Durante sing with exactly
that kind of arrangement. (SC)
=================================================================================
Episode: 18
"Joe's Very Own Story"
+ The "nasty monkey" fighting the planes is, of course, King Kong, except
that he's atop the Chrysler Building rather than the Empire State.
(JJW)
+ There was a movie called "Q" in the early eighties which had a big
winged snake living on top of the Chrysler Building. (IW)
"Virtual Freak"
+ "Virtual Tussle" is a parody of "Dactyl Nightmare," the first virtual
reality game. (JK)
+ There were SO many great "Dactyl Nightmare" in-jokes, from the layout
of the world to the arcing shots, to the people unable to hit each
other, to the physical layout of the game in the mall...it goes on and
on. It made otherwise somewhat draggy segments of the show completely
hilarious. (BL)
+ Lobe's comment about his hat refers to the ZZ Top song "Sharp Dressed
Man." (JK)
- Speaking of his hat...rather like my infamous hat...and the guy who
operated the VR game looked kinda like me (or rather how I looked in
August '95 during the visit to WBA). (RO)
- Personally, I thought it was a combination of Keeper and Brendan (it's
the messed-up hair, see...) (BC)
- The music accompanying Portho and Mel's battle is the opening theme of
Antonin Dvorak's Cello Concerto. (JJW)
+ "Am I Blue," by Grant Clarke and Harry Akst, was introduced in the 1929
movie "On With the Show." (EOC, RO)
- DYN: Playing at the mall's movie theatre are "Aerobic Vixens" and "Sister
Sister, the Movie." (BT)
+ "Sister Sister" is a loathsome WB sitcom about twin sisters. (BT)
+ The shot of Freakazoid in the foreground running from the rapidly
approaching dinosaur is a parody of the scene in Alfred Hitchcock's
"North by Northwest" where Cary Grant is pursued by a crop-dusting
plane. The music for this sequence is a good takeoff on Bernard
Herrmann's score for that movie. (JJW)
+ "There's no place like home" comes from "The Wizard of Oz." (JK)
+ As does "I do believe in spooks, I do, I do." (SK)
+ "Babeheart" is based on two 1995 movies, "Braveheart" and "Babe," that
were the major Oscar contenders for best picture of the year. (JK)
=============================================================================
Episode: 19
"Hero Boy"
+ Guitierrez hiding his cyber-ized face and playing the organ refers to
the 1971 horror film "The Abominable Dr. Phibes," which starred Vincent
Price as a hideously disfigured musician who murders a bunch of
surgeons in various gruesome ways. In the movie, Price wears a cloak
similar to the one Guitierrez sports here. (TW)
- The character of Phibes was, of course, inspired by "The Phantom of the
Opera." (JJW)
+ "Hero Boy" is a spoof of "Astroboy," a 1960s anime show that was
popular in the U.S. (JK)
- But despite the comments about bad Japanese animation, the segment was
more a parody of poorly dubbed Japanese monster movies. If Astro was
the target they missed pretty badly. (BM)
+ The catchphrase "I must succeed" is from a 1971 movie entitled "Red Sun"
starring Charles Bronson, Ursula Andress and Toshirô Mifune. Mifune's
character, Kuroda, really doesn't say much in the film, but twice during the
film, he says to Bronson resolutely, "I must succeed." (Craig Crumpton)
+ Gasigo = Texaco, the gas station chain that used to be known for its
commercials featuring singing service men. The best example of this was
"The Texaco Star Theatre," when Milton Berle was the host in the late
40s and early 50s. The first two lines of the jingle ran: "We're the
merry men from Texaco/We work from Maine to Mexico." (JK, EOC)
+ Bobby Knight is a college basketball coach with a reputation for being
hard-driving. (JJW)
+ "What am I, Moe Howard?" Freakazoid's method of blocking an eye gouge
is taken from the Three Stooges. (JK)
+ The "wicked witch" whose weakness is water is, of course, the Wicked
Witch of the West from "The Wizard of Oz," played by Margaret Hamilton.
("I'm MELT-ing!") (EOC)
+ The shot of the Freakaclone being chased by police cars alludes to the
nationally televised car chase between O.J. Simpson and the LAPD a few
days after the murder of his ex-wife and her supposed lover. (JK)
+ "America's Most Hated" is a takeoff on "America's Most Wanted," the Fox
show where viewers help track down criminals. The host is a caricature
of AMW host John Walsh. AMW uses many computer enhancements of crooks
to show what they might look like slightly aged or with (or without)
facial hair. Hence the computer composite of Freakazoid disguised as a
pony. (JK, EOC)
+ "Get your darn ape hands off me!" refers to Charlton Heston's famous
line in the movie "Planet of the Apes": "Get your paws off me, you god
damn dirty apes!" (JJW)
+ The end tag is animated in the style of Terry Gilliam from "Monty
Python's Flying Circus." The three figures are probably Jean MacCurdy,
the head of WB and Hanna-Barbera animation, and Terry Semel and Bob
Daly, the co-chairmen of the WB studio itself. (EOC)
====================================================================================
Episode: 20
"Busy Filler"
+ "Earthworm Jim" was a fine, funny superhero comedy that followed
"Freakazoid!" on the Kids' WB schedule and met the same ignominious
fate. The show's announcer was Jeff Bennett, using his Lord Bravery
voice. (JJW)
"Freak-a-Panel"
+ The "sci-fi convention" is based on the annual San Diego Comics
Convention, which the "Freakazoid!" producers attended in summer 1996
as part of the Kids' WB panel. The lack of audience interest in the
show is, one suspects, more factual than fictional. (JJW)
+ Also on the panel: Tom Minton, producer of "The Sylvester and Tweety
Mysteries," and Paul Dini, producer of "Superman" and "Batman."
Having Minton communicate through printed signs tweaks his in-house
reputation for being rather quiet and soft-spoken. (EOC, JJW)
- This particular caricature, of Minton, which has been seen before in
episodes of "Sylvester and Tweety," is so stylized that it barely
looks like him at all. Also, Paul Dini is portrayed with a beard,
which he doesn't have now, and fat, which he isn't anymore (legend
has it that he decided to lose weight after seeing a caricature of
himself on Tiny Toons). (RO)
+ The caricature of Minton makes him look like Tweety. (EOC)
- DYN: The spot next to Dini, which is marked as being for "Pinky and
the Brain," is empty. This may refer to the fact that P&tB producer
Peter Hastings, who was originally slated to represent the show on
the panel, left WBA a few weeks before the convention started.
+ Re the scene with the mental patient: Apparently this bit was
inspired by hearing about a mental institution where "Freakazoid!"
was a favorite show of the inmates. So F! really *is* very popular
in state institutions. (EOC)
"Tomb of Invisibo"
+ The opening scene is more a parody of a genre than any specific movie.
The frightened natives, the digging in the sand, the reading of the
mysterious and omnious inscription are all stock elements of this type
of "curse" story. (EOC)
+ Professor Beasthead is voiced by John Rhys-Davies, a fixture in these
"archeological" adventures ever since his role as Indiana Jones'
sidekick in "Raiders of the Lost Ark." (JJW)
+ Invisibo's voice is a good imitation of Vincent Price. (BM)
+ Re the "Stockard Channing Show": Stockard Channing had not one, but
two shows on CBS during the 1978-1979 and 1979-1980 seasons. Niether
last more than a few months. Both shows had her playing a recent
divorcee named Susan, starting a new job in LA, with a friend and
co-worker played by Sidney Goldsmith. I can't comment as to any moral
content -- you'll have to ask Mike C. (EOC)
+ "You've got some nice e-mail!" parodies the "You've got mail!"
greeting on America Online. (JJW)
+ The cute girl singers are probably based on the Andrews sisters; in
voices and design they strongly resemble the Andrews-ish singers in
the Animaniacs short "Hot, Bothered and Bedevilled." (JJW, EOC)
============================================================================
Episode: 21
"Island of Dr. Mystico"
+ A spoof of "The Island of Dr. Moreau," an H.G. Wells story about a
scientist who tries to create a new species by combining wild animals
with humans. (JK)
- The story has been filmed several times, most famously in 1932 as
"Island of Lost Souls" with Charles Laughton.
+ Marlon Brando in the sky is a reference to the 1996 remake of the
story, a box-office bomb, which starred Brando as the scientist. (JK)
+ Note also that he looks like the Godfather. (BC)
+ The scene in the cockpit contains numerous references to Edward D.
Wood's notorious movie "Plan 9 From Outer Space." The line "That was
quite a jolt!" is taken directly from the film, and the cockpit itself
looks a lot like the one in the movie's airplane scenes, complete with
curtains at the back (to disguise the fact that Wood couldn't afford
a set for the whole plane). The boom mike in the shot is a Wood
trademark, as is the cheesy dialogue ("You flyboys keep your mind on
those fancy gadgets!") and the forced stage laughter. (SK, LM)
+ Cave Guy's line "unhand me, you hairy ape!" is probably another "Planet
of the Apes" ref, though it could also refer to Eugene O'Neill's play
"The Hairy Ape." (JJW)
+ There really is a Greg. The credits list "Gregory L. Shepherd" as one
of the production assistants. Whether the character here looks like
him--and whether he's really so all-fired efficient--is known only
within the hallowed halls of WBA. (JJW)
+ The song "Carefully on Tiptoe Stealing" comes from Act 2 of Gilbert and
Sullivan's "H.M.S. Pinafore," with the lyrics almost unchanged. (JJW)
============================================================================
Episode: 22
"Statuesque"
+ Yes, Venice Beach, California really IS like that. In fact, an
acquaintance of mine who once lived near Venice Beach informs me that
many of the weirdos glimpsed in this episode are based on actual
mainstays of the area, especially the "Hate Man," who, in real life
as here, is a bearded guy who sings of his hatred of everything and
expects to get paid for it. (JJW)
+ Did anybody else see a familial relationship between Vorn the
Unspeakable and the Great Cthulhu? Vorn's little job description things
do have a certian Lovecraftian spoof sort of feel to them, don't they?
(AR)
+ Aldo Ray was a movie actor in the '50s. His best role was in "The
Marrying Kind" (with Judy Holliday). (JJW)
+ "Waterworld," of course, was the obscenely expensive Kevin Costner
vehicle of 1995. (JJW)
+ "Have you tried sprinkling her with fairy dust?" Another "Peter Pan"
reference, though fairy dust is supposed to give people the ability to
fly, not bring statues back to life. (JJW)
+ The monsters Freakazoid and his friends visit are: Dracula, the Wolf
Man (looking more or less as he did in "House of Freakazoid"), and
the Loch Ness Monster. (JJW)
============================================================================
Episode: 23
"Two Against Freak"
+ "Real Life Police" is a takeoff on "Cops," the long-running Fox show
about...real-life police. The song "Nasty Men" is a parody of "Bad
Boys," the theme song of "Cops." (JK)
+ The opening sequence parodies the shaky hand-held camerawork of Fox's
popular celebration of police brutality. (JJW)
+ Roddy may not have liked feeling like "Obi-Wan cruddy Kenobi," but he
certainly emulates another "Star Wars" character here: his attempt to
instruct Freakazoid in the art of telekinesis recalls the scene in "The
Empire Strikes Back" where Yoda teaches Luke how to move things with
his mind, such as it is. (JJW)
- A sad coincidence (or was it?): The premiere of this episode,
containing the line "Networks are fickle! They can drop you like a man
with big oak fingers!", proved to be the last airing of "Freakazoid!"
on the WB. (many)
+ Here's a bio from the All-Music Guide database of Cobra Queen's musical
favorites, Ray Conniff and his singers:
"Conniff came up through the big-band ranks of the late 30s,
eventually landing staff work on network TV by the early 50s.
Arranging slick pop studio hits for singers Johnnie Ray, Don
Cherry, Johnny Mathis, and others, he became most successful with
a long series of chorus-laden easy-listening albums for the
non-rock & roll market."
Sometimes billed as the Ray Conniff Singers, and sometimes as Ray
Conniff and The Singers. He put out a boatload of albums in the 60s
and 70s, and seems to have had a small revival in the early 90s. (BM)
+ The line "What do they call poo gas in Scotland?" refers to "Pulp
Fiction," with its famous and endlessly rehashed conversation about
French names for various kinds of fast food. (JJW)
============================================================================
Episode: 24
"Normadeus"
+ The title card spoofs the poster for Milos Forman's movie "Amadeus,"
based on Peter Shaffer's play about Mozart and his rival Antonio
Salieri. (many)
+ The first scene is a detail-for-detail parody of the opening scene
of the movie:
* Both scenes start with a snowy night, with screams emanating from a
building.
* Two goons, complete with 3-candle candleabra, go upstairs to check
on their boss. They try to entice him out (in the movie, with a
creamy dessert; in this case, anchovy pizza).
* In the movie, Salieri (the composer jealous of Mozart) attempts
suicide. Here, we see the Lobe trying unsuccessfully to imitate Norm
Abram. Lobe, like Salieri, is a mediocrity who is jealous of a
genius. Hence the title.
* Salieri is taken to an 18th-century insane asylum to recover; Lobe
is taken to the "Conundrum Home for Villains."
* When the Lobe finally cracks, we hear the opening chords from the
overture to Mozart's "Don Giovanni"; while he is being dragged to
the asylum, the music is Mozart's Symphony no. 25 in G minor. The
selection of music is the same as in the movie. (BT for this whole
section)
+ The show the Lobe is watching is "The New Yankee Workshop," on which
Norm Abram crafts exact copies of all sorts of old-fashioned furniture
step by step, and begins each program by reminding the viewer about tool
safety. His weekly warning is repeated near the end of this episode:
"and remember, there is no more important safety rule than to always
wear these: Safety glasses." (AM)
+ Norm is the Master Carpenter on This Old House (read: the guy who does
the work while the host stands there talking). Bob Vila, mentioned on
the Freakablackboard, hosted the show until recently. (AM)
- The working title of this episode was "This Old Freakalair."
- The psychiatrist at the asylum looks and sounds quite a bit like Weed
Memlo, who directed several Yakko, Wakko and Dot cartoons in the '30s
and later went on to direct hygiene films for the navy. (TH)
+ The chap who gets his wood signed after Joe Leahy identifies himself
as Hank, and carries a *huge* wooden object. This fellow looks like
the guy who has been featured in a series of Home Depot print ads.
(EOC)
- DYN: The spooky house shown at the beginning of Act 2 is identical to
Dracula's castle in "Statuesque," which in turn looks very much like
the castle in the "Animaniacs" cartoon "Draculee, Draculaa."
+ The mystery story is a sendup of Agatha Christie novels, which
generally revolve around "a bunch of Brits sitting around in a
drawing room." The French detective, named "Soiro," is obviously
meant to be Hercule Poirot, Christie's most famous character. (EOC,
AM)
+ Soiro is quite close to the version of Poirot played by Peter Ustinov
in the movies "Death On the Nile" and "Evil Under the Sun." (EOC)
+ The stick figures are from a series of TV commercials for OfficeMax;
you can tell by the gap in the circle of the head. (AM)
+ Some of the things written on the blackboard as theories for Norm's
disappearence are typical right-wing milita type conspiracy ravings
(One Wood [read: World] Government, Black Helicopters, Federal
Reserve, etc.) (EOC)
+ The music being played during the story of the pixie people is
Grieg's "In the Hall of the Mountain King." The Mountain King is
a troll, and so the tune has become a standard cartoon theme for
"little people" of any kind (it's also heard in "Lawn Gnomes").
(EOC, JJW)
+ The sound effects cards come from the '60s TV version of "Batman."
(JK)
+ The song at the end is the old standard "We'll Meet Again," most
(in)famous for being used at the end of "Dr. Strangelove: Or How I
Learned To Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb." (AM)
- Mr. Chubbykins is a *white* cat in this episode, for the first time
since his brief appearance in "Dance of Doom." (KC)
- I wonder: was that a mistake, or was it done deliberately as a way
of bringing the show full circle by making the same coloring error in
the first and last episodes? See, I can make up conspiracy
theories too!
==========================================================================
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Episodes # 9-13
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