Adventure Time Reviews: Season 2 (The Chamber of Frozen Blades/Her Parents)

The episode begins with Finn spying on the Ice King, having received a tip from Flambo (a strange flame creature) that Ice King was going to try to kidnap a princess that day, while Jake reads a manual on how to be a ninja (Finn and Jake both have a fascination with ninjas). Suddenly Finn sees Ice King leaving his castle with a bag and his penguin, Gunter. Finn thinks Ice King looks pleased with himself, and comes to the conclusion that he must have stolen a princess, so they sneak into Ice King’s castle to find and rescue her, whoever she may be.

Most of the rest of the episode alternates between scenes of Finn and Jake looking around Ice King’s castle for a princess that isn’t there and scenes with Ice King and Gunter at a hospital. While in Ice King’s castle, Finn and Jake discover that Ice King has a hidden chamber filled with ninja weapons made from ice and start playing with them. At the hospital, Ice King and Gunter meet Doctor Princess, who Ice King takes interest in immediately.

Later, Ice King returns to his castle, where Finn and Jake jump out at him to rescue whatever princess he’s just kidnapped. However, Ice King only seems to have Gunter and his bag with him, as well as an egg that Gunter laid at the hospital. Realizing that they were in the wrong, not Ice King, Finn and Jake decide that they should make it up to Ice King. They offer to take his bag for him, but when they do so they discover that Doctor Princess (who isn’t even an actual princess, it’s just her surname) is in the bag. Finn and Jake start to fight Ice King, and while they’re fighting Gunter’s egg hatches. Out of the egg comes… a pink cat? Why? And then Finn and Jake both kick Ice King in the face and that’s literally how the episode ends.

So for the last two weeks or so I’ve been obsessively watching every Mortal Kombat X video I can find and all of the ice ninja stuff we see in this episode puts me in mind of Sub-Zero. There’s probably no point in me bringing this up, but it was such a pervasive thought that I felt like I couldn’t not bring it up. Well, anything that reminds me of Mortal Kombat is probably doing something right.

Here’s something I wonder about, though: Ice King mentioned in a previous episode that he gets his ice powers from his crown, but Finn and Jake were able to able to use ice powers after reading Ice King’s manual on ice ninjas. Continuity error?

Ice King is hilarious in this episode. Even more so than usual. Just everything that comes out of his mouth is gold. The scenes in the hospital are priceless. Finn and Jake’s scenes are okay, but Ice King’s scenes in the hospital are really what make this episode worth watching.

I wasn’t very fond of the end of the episode. It ends so suddenly and without any real resolution, I didn’t even realize that was the end at first. I thought that maybe something had gone wrong with the video but… nope. That’s how it ends. I guess in a way that suddenness and randomness of it is funny, but I felt so dissatisfied with the ending when I initially saw it because I didn’t even think it was the ending, so it’s hard for me to really like it because I still associate it with that feeling of unsatisfactory confusion. Does that make sense?

It’s still a good episode overall. It’s funny, the action is pretty fun, and I like how Finn and Jake discover something they have in common with Ice King, even if it is something really small. It’s also interesting that this episode shows more of Finn’s strange moral code, as he sees himself as the bad guy for confronting Ice King and going through his possessions when Ice King seemingly hasn’t done anything wrong (though it turns out that he has, of course). I still find it strange that Finn would ever think of himself as the bad guy when Ice King is involved, but I guess it’s also kind of noble.

Rating: 7.5/10

Lady Rainicorn is nervous about introducing Jake to her parents. To spare her from worrying, Jake invites her parents to come over earlier, so that they can get to know each other and become friends before Lady gets there. Finn asks why Lady is so worried, and Jake says that it’s probably because of the Rainicorn-Dog wars. Apparently, there were terrible wars between Dogs and Rainicorns for territory in the Crystal Dimension. Seriously? I wish we could know more about these wars. Anyway, Finn says that Lady’s parents will probably be prejudiced against Dogs because of the wars and prevent Jake from seeing Lady again upon meeting him, something that Jake hadn’t thought of.

Finn and Jake decide it would be best to disguise Jake as a Rainicorn. Finn covers him in condiments while Jakes takes the form of a Rainicorn, and paints the Tree Fort’s interior in rainbow colors. Lady’s parents, Ethel and Bob, arrive, both wearing translators so they can speak English. I notice that Ethel is much longer than Bob, who’s actually really short. I didn’t know that Rainicorns had different lengths. Actually, before this episode I hadn’t even given much thought to other Rainicorns at all, but I would have guessed that they’d all be roughly the same length, kind of interesting that they’re not. Are females longer than males, or does it just go by chance? Anyway, Ethel and Bob are both partially blind and accept that Jake is a Rainicorn without question. They also think that Finn is his Human servant, which leads them to believe that Jake is extremely wealthy since Humans are so rare. I’m kind of confused about why Jake and Finn decided to go along with this idea, why can’t they just explain that Finn is Jake’s friend, not his servant? Lady is friends with Princess Bubblegum, so it’s not like Rainicorns having friends that are a different species is unheard of. I mean, Lady’s parents do know she’s friends with Bubblegum, right?

Well, anyway, Finn is forced to pretend he’s Jake’s servant, which would be humiliating enough, but he’s also forced to help Jake play Rainicorn games with Ethel and Bob, all of which cause him serious injury. One of them doesn’t even make sense, Finn needs to carry Jake so Jake can pretend he’s flying, but Jake could just make himself wings and fly on his own. Later, he has Finn make lunch for them, but a misunderstanding causes Ethel and Bob to think that Finn himself is what’s being served for lunch. When they try to eat him, Jake finally tells them to leave Finn alone, and also reveals that he’s a Dog, not a Rainicorn. To Jake’s surprise, Ethel and Bob both seem very pleased. Lady arrives and explains to Jake that her parents love Dogs because a Dog saved her father during the war. The episode ends with everyone having a lunch of soy people.

Is it me, or has every Jake episode so far had more or less the same plot? All of them involve Finn being put in danger and Jake not helping him until the last second either because of some personal hurdle of his own or because of laziness. Or sometimes the hurdle is his laziness.

So, the Crystal Dimension is home to Rainicorns? That’s what I understood, anyway. Did Dogs ever manage to get territory there? Who won the war? Did anyone win? Is it still going on? I really want to know more about these wars.

I liked that we get a few more hints about Ooo’s apocalyptic past, with Ethel and Bob mentioning that they Humans were extinct. I really like Finn’s reaction to hearing this, it’s actually very subtle (a word I never thought I’d use when talking about Adventure Time). It’s just a brief expression of disappointment and discomfort from Finn. So far it’s been made pretty obvious that Finn is the only Human in Ooo, but I wonder if he knows that, and how he feels about it if he does know.

Ethel and Bob are jerks though, aren’t they? They may not be prejudiced against Dogs like I was expecting them to be, but they seem to have a prejudice against Humans. They’re horrible to Finn for no discernible reason. Is it because he was a servant? That’s no better. If you want to know what someone’s like, take a look at how they treat their inferiors, not their equals. See? Harry Potter quotes can be applied to real life! Or children’s cartoons. Same thing. Bottom line is, Ethel and Bob are awfully cruel people (though admittedly kind of funny characters).

And that ending… it’s both funny and creepy. I’m starting to think Humans went extinct because they just got eaten. Everyone seems to think they’re delicious. They’re not actually eating Humans at the end, just soy Humans, but they say it tastes just like actual Human meat. How would they know that? I love the uncomfortable look on Finn’s face as they all talk about how delicious Humans taste, and I also love how when he tries a bite of it he smiles as though enjoying it. Funny, yet slightly disturbing.

So, pretty decent episode overall. It’s funny enough and I like getting to learn a bit more about Ooo’s past. We only seem to get little bits and pieces of it, I wonder if we’ll ever get any bigger explanations. I’m not sure what I’d prefer. It’s fun piecing it all together and speculating about it, but at the same time I kind of just want to know already.

Rating: 7/10