Adventure Time Reviews: Season 4 (I Remember You/The Lich)

Have I mentioned that I love the title cards for this show?

This episode begins with Ice King singing a cover of one of Marceline’s song to Gunter. He talks about what a great songwriter Marceline is and thinks that she can help him write  song to impress the princesses. He also mentions advice he got from Jay T. Doggzone, the same guy wrote that book full of bad advice in the last episode, which is that “Ladies are drawn to bros with tortured pasts.” Ice King thinks he has a tortured past that he can use to his advantage, but of course he doesn’t remember exactly. Yeah, here’s the thing, though, it’s true that a lot of women are drawn to guys who are angsty and brooding and have tortured backstories… but this applies mainly to fictional characters. I don’t think any woman really wants a guy like that, it’s just the fantasy that’s appealing. I mean, of course Ice King is a fictional character to us but he’s real within the world of the show… you know what I mean. Another thing is, I don’t think the “tortured past” angle works if they’re trying to use their tragic-ness for attention or sympathy, that just comes off as manipulative and skeevy. They have to not be trying. But I guess this doesn’t really matter when Ice King can’t even remember if he has a tortured past or not to begin with. He looks in his scrapbooks to try and figure it out but he doesn’t seem able to understand any of it. He flies to Marceline’s house to get her help, and Finn and Jake see him and think he’s up to no good.

When Ice King gets to Marceline’s house, she tells him to get lost but he just lets himself into her house anyway. He starts trying to set up his instruments while explaining to her why he needs her help and ends up hopelessly tangled in the cords. Marceline seems to find this endearing. Finn and Jake show up expecting to have to beat Ice King up, but when they find him entangled on the floor they assume that Marceline must have beaten him already. Jake tells Ice King that his “constant harassment of the female gender makes [Jake] sick”, which caused my opinion of Jake to rise tremendously. Marceline tells Finn and Jake that they can leave, because she and Ice King are going to work on a song together. Finn and Jake are confused, but they agree to leave her and Ice King alone.

Marceline and Ice King get started on their song, Marceline providing an instrumental and Ice King providing the lyrics and vocals. Let’s take a look at this mess of a song.

“Slime Princess, you’re alright. Flame Princess, you’re okay. Wildberry Princess could be better. All of the princesses are pretty alright, but… Oh, Bubblegum! You look like a lot of fun! I’m right outside, and that is how I know! Hey, princess, did you get my text with a picture of my awesome gun show? I’m also workin’ on my pecs! If you like, I’ll send a picture of that, too! Oh, Bubblegum! [Marceline looks uncomfortable.] I really need someone. [She sadly looks down.] Or anyone! [Saddening] …Pretty much anyone. I’m so alone! [Activating ice magic] Won’t somebody tell me what’s wrong with me?! [Shooting frozen lightning bolts] Anybody! [Tearing up] Anybody! [Marceline turns at the sound of his distress.] [Speaking] Anybody!!! [Practically sobbing] Grod in the sky, please tell me why!”

Well, that went “ugh” to “oh…” quickly. If anybody ever wants to know what Ice King’s character is like, I think I’ll just show them this scene.

Anyway, Marceline seems annoyed with Ice King’s behavior, and she yells at him to “stop acting crazy”. He pushes her away and then immediately become apologetic for having pushed her. Confused and frustrated, Marceline expresses herself the only way she seems to know how: by singing.

“You’re so annoying, you pitiful old man. I’d like to help you, but I don’t know if I can. I thought you were nuts, but you’re really really really nuts. [Beat] Every time I move, eventually, you find me, and start hanging around. Just another lame excuse to see me. Man. It’s getting me down. You know, I’m actually glad… to see you! [Speaking] Maybe I’m the one who’s… [Sighing] nuts. ”

Ice King asks Marceline if she likes him and she says that she does. He misinterprets what she means by “like”, however, and tries to kiss her.

• Marceline: [Disgusted] AAAAAGH!!! Not like that!! You don’t remember anything, do you… SIMON?
• Ice King: What-mon?
• Marceline: Why do you even come see me when you don’t remember me?! You don’t even know who you are!
• Ice King: Yes, I do! I am a lyricist! [Pulling pages out] It’s all here! On the page! The page in song, baby! On this receipt! On this takeout menu! On these newspapers! [Laughs]
• [Marceline stares, devastated. A photo lands in her hands.]
• Marceline: Huh? Look! This clipping! This was you, Simon! Before the War!
• [The picture portrays a human Ice King walking out of a car ready to deliver the Enchiridion to a museum.]
• Ice King: Huh? [He can’t make heads or tails of it.] Heh?
• [Marceline hurries to look for something else. She finds a picture of herself as a child and gasps.]
• Marceline: This! You took this picture! Grr, you’ve scribbled all over it… Huh? [She reads the back of the photo, visibly in great shock.]
• Ice King: Ooh, ooh, are they good lyrics? [Grabbing Omnichord] I’ll get the keyboard!
• Marceline: What? [In desperation] Wait, listen!
• Ice King: [Sets Omnichord up] Yeah, let’s go! What’s it say? Sing out, sister!

The end of this episode would be better seen than read.

So, this is one of those episodes that gets talked about a lot and I guess it’s considered one of the “big ones”, so it was pretty much impossible for me to avoid spoilers for it. It’s unfortunate, because I think this would have had a much bigger impact on me if I hadn’t known this was coming, but it’s still a powerful episode.

I think this episode is especially effective for those of us with loved ones who have Alzheimer’s or something similar, because what happens between Ice King and Marceline here is definitely reminiscent of that. It’s a difficult and scary situation. You feel like you’re losing the person even though they’re still there, you feel angry at them for some of the strange things they do or say but you don’t want to be angry at them because you know it’s not really their fault, and most of all you just feel hopeless, because there’s nothing you can do about it. It sucks. It just sucks for everyone.

This episode captures all of that. Simon was obviously important to Marceline. From the short flashback we get at the end, we learn that they knew each other before Ooo even came into existence. They were alone (or so they thought, at least) in the post-apocalyptic world, and Simon seems to have acted as a caretaker for Marceline. The fact that Hambo, the stuffed animal she called her most prized possession, was given to her by Simon says a lot about what Simon meant to her. Marceline obviously meant a lot to Simon as well. He wrote these words to Marceline because he knew his mind was going and he wanted her to understand that if he hurts her or forgets her, it’s not really him, it’s the crown. The line from the song “I want to save you, but who’s going to save me?” hit me particularly hard, because I think what makes Simon/Ice King’s story really sad for me is the fact that Simon was fully aware of how the crown was tearing his mind apart but could do nothing to stop it. So now, Marceline desperately wants Ice King to remember and feels angry and resentful when he doesn’t, but it’s not really Ice King’s fault. It’s painful to watch Marceline point out all of this evidence of Ice King’s past while all of it goes over his head. He doesn’t get it. He doesn’t understand.

That song at the end that Marceline and Ice King sing together is one of the most powerful scenes so far. The fact that Ice King can’t remember writing these words and doesn’t even fully know what they mean is just heartbreaking. When Marceline has him read the words and sing them himself, there’s a really interesting expression on his face. It’s a mixture of confusion and sadness, like he doesn’t understand he’s singing but he knows that it’s something important, and he just can’t remember why. Then Marceline starts to cry as she’s singing, like she’s given up on getting him to remember because she now knows why he can’t and accepts it, which is just as heartbreaking.

What gets to me about this episode is that it really perfectly captures the hopelessness of this situation and… that’s it. It doesn’t offer a solution to the problem, because there isn’t really one. Ice King is too far gone. He’s not going to remember exactly what connection he and Marceline had. It’s hopeless, and the episode just leaves you with that hopelessness. It’s depressing, which of course means I love it.

Rating: 9/10

This episode begins with Finn waking up from a dream in which the Lich!snail attacks Billy. And the Cosmic Owl is there so you know it means something. Worried about Billy, Finn and Jake decide to pay him a visit to make sure he’s okay. Billy, it turns out, is fine, but he’s concerned about the dream that Finn had. He asks Finn and Jake if they want to join him on a world-saving mission and they happily agree, so Billy explains what they must do: steal all of the gems from the crowns of power across Ooo.

So they spend most of the night doing just that, and are later taking a break I guess (honestly I’m not sure why they decided to take a break since Billy tells them they only have one crystal left to get but okay). Finn finds the Enchiridion in Billy’s bag and asks how he got it. Billy says that he got it from a bear, and goes on to explain how the book has magical properties. He tells Finn to turn the magical sword on the cover and Finn does. The circle on the cover opens and reveals nine slots for the gems to go into and shows a brief holographic diagram of what would happen if all of the slots were filled.

• Finn: What is this this stuff?
• Billy: Hold on!
• [Billy concentrates and then produces a beam of light from the gem on the center of his face, which touches a symbol on the book, opening another secret door]
• [A hologram of Booko appears]
• Booko: [speaking very rapidly] Hello, my name is Booko! What you see here is a map of the multiverse! It shows all the known dimensions and the links between each of them. This is the dimension that contains the universe in which we currently reside.
• Jake: Enhance!
• [The hologram’s view closes up on the location on the planet where the guys are from the outer reaches of the dimension, but the view begins to rapidly repeat closing in on their location multiple times, freaking Jake out]
• Jake: Whoa… Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm…MAKE IT STOP!
• [The projector ceases the close up]
• Booko: [Clears throat; again, spoken very rapidly] Anyways, At the center of the multiverse is a dimension called the Time Room, believed to be the quasi-corporeal dwelling place of the almighty Prismo. The Time Room is the single dimension that exists outside of time. The Time Room produces time waves that are experienced by other dimensions. Some dimensions have permanent links that allow travel to and from. Others become linked temporarily by naturally forming Worm Holes. And others can become linked artificially by magical portals, torn open by items of great power. Once the last gem is inserted into the Enchiridion it will have the power to create a portal to any dimension in the multiverse. An activated portal creates a time dilation in which either end of the portal experiences a temporal synchronization allowing for the safe passage of particles [Deep breath] through a non-local region of space-time.

Yeah, there’s no way I could have recapped that. Billy says he’s going to push the Lich through a portal, hence why they needed to collect all of the gems. They head out to get the last one the need, which is, of course, the one from Princess Bubblegum’s crown.

Bubblegum is still awake when Finn and Jake reach her castle (she’s doing some kind of gruesome experiments on tiny creatures, but they seem pretty happy so I guess it’s okay?). Finn breaks into the room and asks for the gem from her crown. Bubblegum, confused and not exactly happy with Finn breaking in, refuses to give him the gem. Instead of bothering to explain what’s going on, Finn decides the best course of action is to take the gem by force. Bubblegum fights him off and ends up accidentally cutting his cheek with the scissors that are still in her hand. Finn and Bubblegum are both stunned for a moment, but finally Bubblegum says that it was an accident. Angered, Finn takes the gem from her crown and leaves without speaking to her, while Bubblegum pleads with him to come back. Finn and Jake put the gem in the final slot, which causes the book to shake and emit lights and do all kinds of odd stuff before encasing itself in stone (???). Billy is standing at the edge of the forest and tells Finn to hurry and bring the book to him, but Bubblegum (who followed them outside) yells at Finn to stop because it’s not really Billy, it’s the Lich, and I am shocked, shocked I tell you. Actually I’m not shocked because I suspected that Billy had been possessed by the Lich and was working for him and this is basically the same thing. But it’s a cool twist all the same.

Just as Bubblegum says this, a Gumball Guardian appears and shoots a laser beam at Billy. Oh hey, a Gumball Guardian finally did something useful. Would have been nice if it had done so sooner, but still. Shooting Billy reveals half of the Lich’s face underneath Billy’s. Um…

Am I the only one reminded of Two-Face from Batman?

Anyway, the Lich demands that Finn give him the Enchiridion, but Finn instead smashes it on his knee. This creates a wormhole, which apparently pleases the Lich. He starts to walk through it, Bubblegum tells Jake to stop him so Jake grabs hold of the Lich, but ends up being dragged in as well. Finn grabs Jake and tries to stop this from happening, but they both go through the wormhole.

The scene changes, and Finn and Jake are sitting on farm. The artwork looks different and Jake appears to be a normal dog. Finn’s mother calls Finn from the house and Finn runs inside, and I sit here feeling very confused as the episode ends.

This show is really good at making stories that feel epic. And dramatic. And nightmarish. And uncomfortable in a good way.

The most effective thing about this episode is that the whole time, you can’t shake the feeling that all of this feels so wrong. Stealing the gems feels wrong. Billy in general feels wrong. That entire scene between Finn and Bubblegum feels all kinds of wrong. There’s a weird aggressiveness and anger toward each other that’s never there in most of their interactions. They’ve gotten angry at each before, of course, but in the end they always have each other’s best interests at heart and will at least apologize if things get out of hand. There’s never really any hostility between them. Not the case when Finn tries to steal her gem. When Bubblegum cuts him with the scissors, which I do believe was an accident, Finn glares at her so coldly that it’s unsettling. And he hisses at her. It just feels so completely wrong.

When the Lich finally does reveal himself he’s just as awesomely creepy as he was in Mortal Folly/Recoil, and I guess the feeling of wrongness is due to his presence. Like his essence is seeping into everyone and making them act out. It’s funny because it’s not like the Lich is even that interesting as a character, he doesn’t even have a character beyond “evil”, but man is he effective. Everything about him is so unsettling and creepy.

I do feel a bit sorry for Finn at the end, though. Billy was Finn’s hero. Finn idolized him and would have done anything for him. Throughout the whole episode, we see evidence of this. When he agrees to go on this mission with Billy, he looks almost entranced, like there isn’t even a question of whether or not he wants to do this. At one point, Finn takes his hat off so he can look more like Billy, and there’s such a look of joy on his face as he does so. And then he finds out that the Lich killed Billy and is wearing his skin like a costume. That must be so crushing for Finn. I feel crushed when I find out about problematic things a favorite celebrity of mine has said, imagine how it would feel to see the person you idolized possessed by a demon bent on destruction.

This episode is a fantastic season finale, I can’t wait to see where this goes.

Rating: 9/10

 

Adventure Time Reviews: Season 4 (The Hard Easy/Reign of Gunters)

Finn and Jake are in a swamp because of reasons when a creature that I think is a tadpole comes out and asks for their help. The tadpole takes them to his village and explains that they keep being attacked by the “Mega Frog”. Finn and Jake agree to help and are given a bag of lollypops in return. They set off to find the Mega Frog, using the lollypops to mark their trails, but they soon run out and get lost. Jake tries stretching himself over the trees to find the way out of the swamp, but it’s too misty for him to see anything. Suddenly they hear something that Finn thinks is the Mega Frog. They find a large mound and attack it, thinking it’s the Mega Frog, but it turns out to be a giant nest. The actual Mega Frog then appears behind them and chases them into a cave. Jake stretches to the Mega Frog’s size and fights him, but it isn’t long before the Mega Frog has him and starts to… “gently eat him”. It looks sort of like he’s trying to make out with Jake. Finn apparently think so too, and he realizes that the Mega Frog only wants to kiss someone. Finn kisses the Mega Frog and it transforms into a humanoid prince, who thanks Finn for breaking his curse. The prince wonders why the curse didn’t break until now because he had already kissed “just about everything [he] could get [his] lips on”. Finn tells him that to break curses like this, someone else needs to kiss him voluntarily. The prince thanks him again and flies away.

This episode is like BMO Noire in that there isn’t really much to discuss, so time for more lists.

Things I liked

• The scenery. This show is usually so bright and colorful but I like it when they do darker and gloomier artwork. It looks good and it makes for great atmosphere.
• The prince’s transformation scene at the end was pretty funny, though I do think it dragged a bit.
• That bit with Jake making signals at Finn that the latter doesn’t understand at all. It’s a cliche joke but I have to admit it pretty much always makes me laugh, perhaps because I’m really bad at reading signals and lip movements and stuff like that so I can relate to the character’s confusion.
• The way that Finn figures out what the Mega Frog wants is pretty funny.

Things I didn’t like

• Boring.

Yeah, I think that about covers it.

Rating: 4.5/10

The episode begins with Ice King searching his room for his Demonic Wishing Eye. Gunter comes in and tries to get Ice King’s attention, but she only manages to annoy Ice King. Finally, Ice King decides to go to Wizard City and buy a new wishing eye, warning Gunter not to break anything while he’s gone. Instead, Gunter breaks every bottle in sight, then reveals her hiding spot, where her kitten offspring (I forgot Gunter hatched a kitten…) is kept, as well as Ice King’s Demonic Wishing Eye.

We next see Finn waking up to find the Tree Fort full of green copies of Gunter. He and Jake try to make the Gunters go away but they wind up being attacked by them, until the real Gunter comes in wearing the Demonic Wishing Eye and breaks two bottles. Finn demands to know where Ice King is, thinking that he’s the one behind this, but Gunter just leaves, the fake Gunters following. Finn and Jake go outside with them and discover that the entirety of Ooo has been conquered by the Gunters, except the Candy Kingdom which they are currently headed for. Finn and Jake rush to the Candy Kingdom’s aid.

While this is going on, Ice King is in Wizard City trying to find out where to buy a Demonic Wishing Eye. After a failed attempt to hit on Huntress Wizard (whose design I absolutely love, holy crap), Ice King walks into a store where he hears some other wizards discussing some secret, resulting in Ice King being attacked.

Back to Finn and Jake. Finn calls Princess Bubblegum, who tells Finn that her Banana Guards and Gumball Guardians are ready to defend the Candy Kingdom. Jake tells her this won’t work so she asks if they have another plan. Finn says that he does have a plan, but then refuses to tell her what its, to her annoyance. Then he hangs up on her, prompting Jake to ask Finn what he’s doing exactly.

• Jake: You’re not gonna tell her the plan?
• Finn: No, I gotta be mysterious.
• Jake: What? I thought you weren’t into Bubblegum anymore.
• Finn: I’m not. But this is how I act now with all the ladies, you see? I keep ’em in a state of confusion. That way, I’ve always got options in case Flame Princess doesn’t work out.
• Jake: OH MY GOSH! Where is this coming from?!
• Finn: It’s called “future farming.” I read it in that book you have by Jay T. Doggzone.
• Jake: Jay T. Dogg—awww, dude! Don’t read that book! It’s gonna mess up your brain. I keep that book around for laughs. It’s all really bad advice.
• Finn: Oh, okay. I’ll stop it, then.
• Jake: No, well… you can still be mysterious—that’s fine.
• Finn: What? Now I’m confused.
• Jake: [Arriving at the Candy Kingdom] Never mind—I didn’t say nothin’.

I love this exchange for a couple of reasons. One, I like how the awful advice Finn got is from the same source that Ice King got his awful “swing at every ball” advice from. Two, I like it when Jake acts like a big brother to Finn the way he does here. Three, I like that Jake keeps a book full of bad advice about women just for laughs. I guarantee you any book that says it can tell you how to attract potential romantic/sexual partners (no matter their gender or yours) is going to be full of terrible advice and you should definitely laugh at it.

Anyway, they arrive at the Candy Kingdom where Bubblegum (I like the way she’s designed in this episode) is preparing for battle as the Gunters approach. She commands her army to attack them and defend the Candy Kingdom, but the Gunters have no problem getting past them, even the Gumball Guardians. I swear these things are useless. Have we ever seen them actually do their job well? It’s too bad because they have such a prestigious-sounding title and they look as bad ass as giant gumball machines can look, which is surprisingly pretty bad ass, but they don’t exactly live up to their title or appearance. Well, while the Gumball Guardians are getting their asses kicked, Finn carries out his plan, which was to collect all of the bottles in the Candy Kingdom and distracts the Gunter with them. This works for about a minute, until all of the bottles are broken and the Gunters become aggressive again. Bubblegum then says that she has another plan, which is to rebuild the bottles piece by piece forever so the Gunters never run out of bottles to break and therefore won’t attack. That’s a shitty plan, Bubblegum. Suddenly, an injured Ice King shows up and sees Gunter wearing the Demonic Wishing Eye. He takes it back from her and scolds her for having stolen it, the Gunter copies disappear as soon as the Wishing Eye is removed. Well. Problem solved. I wonder why no one thought to remove it before.

This episode is basically eleven minutes of silliness, but it also brings back some stuff from past episodes, which I’d forgotten about until now.

For one thing, there’s Ice King’s Demonic Wishing Eye. We haven’t seen that since When Wedding Bells Thaw, which was in, what, Season 2? Maybe Season 1? That’s a cool throwback. There’s also Gunter’s behavior in this episode that reminds of something Hunson Abadeer said in It Came From the Nightosphere (I hope I got that episode title right). He said that Gunter was the most evil thing he’d ever seen, and since then there have been a few jokes about Gunter secretly being evil and dangerous or maybe a secret weapon of Ice King’s. Plus, Gunter’s always been weird. She hatched a magic kitten, after all. I think the idea that Ice King is the only who preventing Gunter from conquering Ooo, maybe without him even realizing this, is pretty funny.

What exactly is Ice King’s relationship with his penguins anyway? He calls all of them Gunter no matter their gender, usually he seems to think of them all as boys but he refers to the one in this episode as a girl. He treats them like subjects and servants but also like pets… but also like his children? It’s all very strange.

Rating: 7/10

Adventure Time Reviews: Season 4 (Who Would Win/Ignition Point)

Finn and Jake are hanging out when they stumble upon what looks like a wrestling match. The Marauders (remember them?) are fighting a giant who either has a body shaped like a barn or wears a barn over his body. Either way, he’s called “the Farm”. He’s a legendary fighter and the Marauders are trying in vain to beat him. Finn and Jake want to try fighting the Farm, but they decide to train first.

Finn takes training very seriously, but Jake quickly gets bored and starts playing video games behind Finn’s back. Finn breaks Jake’s game in a fit of rage, which causes Jake to get just as angry and threaten Finn. The two start to fight. Really fight. Like, they’re not holding anything back and they’re not afraid to fight dirty. That’s actually what 90% of the fight is, cheap and underhanded moves. Throwing mud in each other’s eyes, pulling down pants, biting each other. They fight until they’re both exhausted and bruised and can barely walk, then each decides that they can fight the Farm without the other’s help.

When they get back the Farm, they’re knocked out easily, and both enter a linked dream. In it, they meet the Dream Warrior, who says seemingly random things to them and then sends them back to reality. When they wake up, they realize that the Dream Warrior was telling them to use their cheap moves on the Farm. They do so and manage to take him down, so Finn and Jake are hailed as the victors.

I think this is the first episode where we really see Finn and Jake fight. They’ve had little disagreements and arguments before, but never an all-out fight, and certainly never a physical one (correct me if I’m wrong, for some reason my memory for this show is terrible).

I’ve never really been in a physical fight before. I mean, I have hit people out of anger before, but, you know, that was when I was a kid and didn’t have the control that I do now, and they never hit me back so it was never a fight. I would hit someone in self-defense, but hopefully I’ll never have to do so. Still, I have had some intense verbal fights with people, and I’ve noticed that the closer you are with someone, the bigger your fights are going to be when you do fight. No two people can get along all the time, especially when they’re always together like Finn and Jake are. Eventually, something is going to snap, and because you know the person so well you know exactly what to do or say to really hurt them. So… yeah, fights with people you’re close to can get ugly. I like that this episode showcases that. Finn and Jake’s fight is violent and brutal and ugly, and it’s precisely because they’re so close that it is this way.

Unfortunately the episode doesn’t start to get interesting until Finn and Jake start fighting, and that’s about halfway through, so that lowers its score. But it is a pretty decent episode that’s actually fairly realistic… for Adventure Time, I mean. I guess the fact that it seems to condone fighting dirty means this episode has questionable morality, though.

Rating: 6.5/10

The episode begins with Finn and Jake spending time with Flame Princess at her new home. She mentions that she misses her scented candles that she left at the Fire Palace, but she doesn’t want to go get them because she’s still mad at her father for locking her up and she doesn’t want to risk facing him. Finn and Jake offer to go for her and Flame Princess agrees to this plan, but warns them not to let her father see them because she doesn’t want him thinking she needs anything from him. They discover Flambo lurking nearby for reasons unknown and get him to cast Flame Shield over them so they can enter the Fire Kingdom safely.

Once in the Fire Kingdom, they enter Flame Princess’ bedroom through a window and find her scented candles. They put the candles in Finn’s bag and are about to leave when they hear voices beyond the door. They listen and look under the crack of the door. One of the speaker’s has a voice that hisses and the other has an untied shoe. The speakers are plotting to kill the Flame King with ice. Finn and Jake decide that they must stop the speakers from carrying out their plan.

They start to wander around the castle looking for the conspirators while also trying to avoid getting caught themselves, eventually finding themselves disguised among an acting troupe. The troupe is about to perform in front of the Flame King, so Finn and Jake come up with a plan. They decide to pretend to be the conspirators they overheard and then watch for guilty reactions from the audience to find out who the conspirators actually are. Unfortunately the plan backfires, as the Flame King suspects Finn and Jake of trying to murder him and tries to have them executed. The executioners turn out to be the real conspirators, so Finn warns the Flame King. The King removes the executioner’s masks.

• Flame King: [Surprised] Furnius and Torcho!
• Furnius: Hello Uuuncle!
• Audience: [Shocked and surprised] Wait, what!?
• Flame King: [Orders] Arrest the executioners!
• Flame Guards: [Arrests the executioners]
• Flame King: Hmmmm, [Points right finger at Furnius and Torcho] I thought I had you two extinguished.
• Furnius: You cannot quench the flamessss of revenge!
• Torcho: You snucked on our father to become king!
• Flame King: Oh, yeah! Hehe. [Orders] Take them to the punishment room!

Well, Finn now knows that Flame King killed his brother to take the throne, and that everyone in the Fire Kingdom is evil. Flame King himself confirms this. Finn asks if Flame Princess is evil as well or maybe “chaotic neutral” (tee hee, references), but Flame King says that Flame Princess is evil. Finn asks if she could become good by hanging out with someone good, to which Flame King replies that “there’d be penalties to her experience, if she acted out of alignment. But, yes, someone could change her.” As Finn and Jake leave the Fire Palace, Flame King looks concerned about the idea of someone changing his daughter to good. The episode ends with Flame Princess sleeping peacefully with her candles lit beside her, when suddenly Flame King’s face appears in the candles’ fire and whispers “evil” multiple times into Flame Princess’ ear. He disappears when she wakes up, looking scared.

This was a fun episode. I enjoyed finding out more about the Fire Kingdom. Turns out it’s very Shakespearean. I mean, come on, the Fire King took the throne by killing his brother, his nephews were going to avenge their father and kill the current king by putting ice in his ears… they even perform in a play in the episode. Obviously shout-outs to Hamlet.

The alignment references at the end were fun too. I think even people who have never played D&D know about the alignments and at least have a basic understanding of what they all are. I think it’s pretty fun to apply the alignments to characters from different fandoms, just like I think it’s fun to sort characters from different fandoms into Hogwarts houses (Finn is a Gryffindor, in case anyone was wondering), so I got a kick out of the reference.

I kind of like how the Fire Kingdom is evil yet it’s also… boring. Well, not exactly boring, more like normal. I think it’s funny that everyone in the Fire Kingdom is evil but they’re also quite mundane. Sure, they might be attempted murderers but they might also be bakers who obsessively measure their cakes. I don’t know why but I always find it funny when villainous characters are shown to be really mundane in some ways, I guess because we tend to think of villains as practically otherworldly so it’s funny to be reminded that they’re actually just, you know, normal people whose lives can actually be kind of boring. I also find it interesting that “evil” is sort of part of the Fire Kingdom’s culture. No one bats an eye at the fact that their king usurped the throne, and they don’t even get that worked up about attempted murders. Those are just the kind of things that happen in the Fire Kingdom. And clearly, Flame King doesn’t want his daughter to be too far removed from evil. At the end of the episode, he’s disturbed at the idea of someone changing his daughter to good, and he seems to want to stop this from possibly happening. At this point, it’s clear that Flame Princess isn’t so much evil as she is unstable. She’s volatile and destructive when emotional, but for the most part she’s quite calm and there’s a weird innocence about her. I think she would be easy to manipulate, so I wonder what will happen between her and her father from here on out.

Overall, this episode is good, but not really anything special. I like the Fire Kingdom so I enjoyed getting to see more of it, and there are some good jokes here and there but aside from that it’s pretty basic.

Rating: 7/10

Adventure Time Reviews: Season 4 (Lady & Peebles/You Made Me)

I really like how in all of these pictures, Finn and Jake are always scribbled out. That’s a good detail.

This episode begins with Princess Bubblegum and Lady Rainicorn making plans to find Finn and Jake, who have been missing for three weeks after an encounter with Ice King. Lady is worried about Jake, but Bubblegum assures her that they should have no problem finding the boys. Bubblegum has a way of tracking Finn and Jake since she apparently had a GPS implanted in Finn’s ear. The boys are trapped in an uncharted black ice cave, but Bubblegum has calculated every possible danger and has come prepared with weapons. As she says, they’ve got science on their side, and Ice King usually isn’t a major threat anyway. Once inside the cave, Bubblegum is unable to get a signal on her GPS but is able to use her heart signature machine. It shows three heart signatures and she assumes that they belong to Finn, Jake and Ice King.

This black ice cave… really doesn’t look like an ice cave. It looks biological. It’s fleshy and there are various body parts all over. There’s a chamber where they get attacked by hands (that take away Bubblegum’s weapons) and another where they’re almost crushed by a giant tongue. In one chamber, they hear Ice King yelling at someone through an air vent. Ice King is saying something about how whoever he’s talking to is “only in love with her because [Ice King’s] in love with her” and basically telling them not to compete with him. Obviously he’s talking about Bubblegum, and I’m sure she appreciates being talked about as though she’s a prize and has no personal agency. Bubblegum and Lady proceed and find a chamber filled with eyes. The eyes shoot laser beams and one of them hits Lady, making her unable to fly. Lady tells Bubblegum to leave her in the chamber so she won’t be a burden, but Bubblegum refuses to leave her friend when she’s injured and carries her instead.

They walk through a dark passageway for a while when Bubblegum suddenly finds an eviscerated Ice King lying on the floor. No really, he’s lying on the floor with his chest open and what looks like veins pouring out of him and strewn on the floor. Bubblegum is understandably shocked, and then Ricardio, still mostly in darkness, reveals himself to be the culprit. In case anyone needs their memory refreshed, Ricardio is Ice King’s heart. After an experiment gone wrong, Ricardio left Ice King’s body and made plans to cut Bubblegum’s heart out and marry it, but then was forced back into Ice King’s body at the end of the episode. This was all the way back in Season 1, and God does that feel like a long time ago, but if anything Ricardio has only gotten creepier. Anyway, Bubblegum demands to know what Ricardio has done with Finn and Jake, and he throws their unconscious bodies at her feet. Ricardio starts to explain that he thought he only wanted Bubblegum’s heart, but now he realizes that he really wants the “full package”. That’s when he steps forward and reveals his new body, causing Bubblegum to scream in terror and I don’t blame her. He explains that he made his new body from Ice King’s living tissue, breaking and reassembling his bones and sinews (Ice King takes this opportunity to try and get Bubblegum to hug him – yep, he’s still a creep too). Ricardio starts showing off his powerful new limbs by tying Lady into a knot and Bubblegum yells at him to stop, but he ignores her and throws Lady against a wall. When Bubblegum tries to check on Lady, Ricardio steps in front of her and starts backing her up against the wall, saying that they can finally be united and basically ignoring the fact that Bubblegum is clearly reacting negatively to all of this.

Writing that whole scene with Ricardio out somehow makes it all seem even more horrifying, which is saying something because the scene is already really horrifying. It’s not just the creepy scenery or the fact that Ice King is eviscerated on the floor or Ricardio having made a body out of pieces of Ice King. It’s the fact that Ricardio is essentially a PG-rated rapist. They’re not even trying to be subtle about that being what he is. He’s completely ignoring Bubblegum’s feelings and that literally none of her reactions to Ricardio have been positive or enthusiastic. He crowds her against the wall and tries to make it so that she can’t escape. She’s obviously scared and uncomfortable and he doesn’t care, because he sees her as a prize that’s he’s entitled to and not a person. It’s a situation that women find themselves in very commonly and it’s awful. But then, we get what is possibly the best scene of the show:

So often, girls are told that we’re supposed to take any kind of attention men give us as a compliment, we’re supposed to be nice and smile for them and go easy on them. It starts at a really young age. Do you know how many time I got told when I was a kid that if a boy picked on me at school it just meant that he liked me? Do you realize how fucked up it is to tell little girls that boys being mean to them should be taken as a sign of affection? We’re essentially told that our feelings don’t matter and that men are entitled to us, and the number of men who will react aggressively to being told “no” is way too high. (And before anyone says it, I know that not all men think like this, but we can’t ignore how common is it.) So what does Bubblegum do when she’s cornered by a creep who isn’t going to take no for an answer? Does she let him off easy and try to talk her way out of it? No, because Ricardio doesn’t deserve that and it probably wouldn’t work anyway. The least Ricardio deserves is a punch to the face, and that’s exactly what he gets. Bubblegum doesn’t play nice, she isn’t apologetic, she fights her way out of the situation any way that she can. She can’t overpower Ricardio physically, so instead she fights with her wits. She recognizes his weakest point and attacks him there. She literally tears him limb from limb, all while insulting his intellect. “You don’t leave your heart exposed!” is a great line, as it can be taken literally in this context but also metaphorically.  Then, when Ricardio tries to give a bullshit excuse about wanting to impress her, Bubblegum is having none of that. She tells him that he didn’t and then sends him away. Bubblegum is facing women’s worst nightmare, being completely alone with a sexually aggressive man. All of her friends are incapacitated, she’s by herself. And she kicks ass and saves herself and her friends. Bubblegum is amazing.

The next scene takes place a few days after this, Bubblegum had apparently dragged Lady, Finn, Jake, and Ice King to the Candy Kingdom and has been personally taking care of all them. I just… Bubblegum is too amazing. When Finn wakes up he immediately freaks out and tries to warn Bubblegum about Ricardio’s return. I like how Finn says that Ricardio is “peacocking hardcore”, basically referring to how Ricardio  uses underhanded tricks to get Bubblegum much like a “pickup artist” (aka gross misogynist) would. Bubblegum calms Finn down and assures him that she has defeated Ricardio. She goes on to explain how she brought everyone back to the castle for treatment and made Ice King a new heart out of Ricardio’s sinews, toffee and maracas. Bubblegum then goes to check on Lady. She apologizes to Lady for putting her in danger, saying that she saw the five small dots next to Lady’s on the heart monitor and didn’t know what it meant. Lady tells her it’s okay and it was her fault for hiding it, then reveals to Jake (in English, so the audience can understand her) that she’s pregnant. Ricardio tied Lady into a knot and threw her against a wall while she was pregnant. Jesus Christ.

Man, this episode. This episode.

I was enjoying this episode from the start, because I was happy to see Bubblegum and Lady being the heroes while Finn and Jake were the ones who needed saving for once, but this episode gets really dark really fast. This is easily the most horrifying episode yet, and if someone told me that they found it too scary or too triggering to watch again I would completely understand. It’s a really hard episode to watch because it hits so close to home, but I think it may actually be my new favorite episode.

I already talked about the whole scene between Bubblegum and Ricardio in detail, but that’s not even the whole of it. From the moment Lady and Bubblegum enter the cave, the episode is filled with imagery and symbols of unwanted male attention. The hands groping at them and taking their weapons away, the tongue trying to lick them, the eyes staring at them. When Ricardio shows up, he asks Bubblegum if she found his dungeon “stimulating”, as if she was supposed to enjoy the groping hands and staring eyes. Ricardio has convinced himself that his unwanted advances are wanted, just like most chauvinists do.

It’s so hard for me to decide how I feel about Ricardio. He’s the most realistic villain on the show despite being a disembodied heart, but it’s like the Dolores Umbridge effect. He represents something so common, he’s so real and so like people I’ve met that it makes it hard to watch him. He’s the only villain so far that I found legitimately scary. Ice King isn’t really considered a villain anymore and he’s usually more pathetic than threatening anyway. The Lich is creepy but too far removed from reality for me to be truly frightened of him. Magic Man is threatening because of how unpredictable he is but again he’s too far removed from reality to be really frightening. Ricardio, though, is really not that far from real life as far as his actions, motives, and attitude go. I’ve met people like Ricardio, and it’s terrifying. Ricardio is a great villain because of how realistic he feels, but because of that he’s not exactly enjoyable, if that makes sense. (Although, I do get a kick out of the fact that he’s voiced by George Takei, particularly hearing him say “Oh my!”)

As I said, I would completely understand if someone told me this episode was too much for them, but personally I really appreciated it. I appreciate the fact that this wasn’t played as a joke. It wasn’t just a silly metaphor for a horrible situation, it was basically the real situation and it was taken seriously and shown to be every bit as horrible as it is. And I’m glad that Bubblegum was the one to save herself from this situation rather than having someone else swoop in. Heroes don’t always show up in situations like this, so we need to do whatever we can to get ourselves out of there. I found this episode really cathartic, and I think this is a great episode for kids to watch because while they may not understand exactly what the scene represents, there is a lesson that they can take away from it. Kids can see Ricardio’s behavior and know that it’s wrong, and they can see Bubblegum fighting back and know that if they find themselves in a situation like this, they can fight back too. And they should not feel guilty about doing so. People like Ricardio don’t deserve mercy, so they should do whatever they can to get away and get to safety. I think this is such an important lesson for kids, particularly for girls but for boys as well.

Also, I couldn’t really find a place to mention this but I really want to bring it up so I’m awkwardly putting it at the end of the review, but I love the fact that Ricardio calls Ice King “Simon”. His heart still remembers who he is, even if his mind doesn’t! I mean, this kind of raises some questions about why Ricardio is so awful if he supposedly remembers, but I think we can put that down to Ricardio being extremely tainted by magic. I wonder how having a new heart is going to effect Ice King now.

 Rating: 12/10

Finn and Jake are at the Candy Kingdom hanging out with Bubblegum, who’s showing them one of her new inventions. They leave when Jake starts to complain about being tired, but on their way out they get distracted by two Banana Guards supervising the castle’s security cameras. The Banana Guards tell Finn and Jake about something weird that they’ve been seeing on the monitor for the past two weeks and make them promise to keep it a secret. They show them how the cameras have spotted Lemongrab lurking around the castle, sneaking into rooms and watching people sleep. Okay then. That’s… unpleasant. Finn and Jake tell Bubblegum because she really should have known about this sooner and she decides to go talk to Lemongrab. She asks him why he’s “stalking [her] peeps” and he starts to to whine and shriek the way only Lemongrab does about how he’s all alone at Castle Lemongrab, and because Bubblegum has excess Candy citizens she should donate some to him. Ah, Lemongrab… I haven’t missed you at all. Bubblegum argues that he doesn’t get along with others and that she doesn’t understand him. Lemongrab responds by running away from the castle in distress while tearing off his clothes (because what else do you do when you’re upset?) and shouting “No one… No one understands! I am alone… and you made me like this. You made me! You made me! You’re… my… Glob! You’re my Glob!” Bubblegum watches him leave and sighs sadly. Lemongrab actually has a point. Okay, fine, Lemongrab. You get one Sympathy Point from me. You need 99 more to qualify for Level One Coddling.

The next day, Bubblegum gathers the Candy People together to decide on three citizens to send to Lemongrab. No one wants to go for completely understandable reasons, until three young Candy People who call themselves the Pup Gang offer to go in exchange for money and amnesty for past crimes. Bubblegum agrees and the Pup Gang go to Lemongrab Castle.

There’s really no way to explain what Lemongrab is like. It’s something everyone needs to experience themselves.

Because of the Pup Gang’s, um, “insubordination”, Lemongrab takes them to his reconditioning chamber, where he electrocutes them as punishment. Whoa, kind of makes you miss the days of “one million years dungeon”, doesn’t it? Anyway, Lemongrab then begins stalking Bubblegum’s citizens again, so she confronts him. Again. She asks what happened to his new citizens and Lemongrab says that they didn’t understand his “lemon stylez” and he prefers stalking Bubblegum’s peeps. She tells Lemongrab that maybe he didn’t understand his citizens, and decides to teach him more about them. She tells him that Candy People need a lot of coddling.

Honestly my reaction to children.  Lemongrab goes on, “Who says your way’s right, anyway? I look in the lemon heart you gave me and see my lemon way to act! And that must be right!” Oh, honey. No. As Lemongrab runs back to his castle, Finn and Jake are ready to “crush his mess accordingly”, but Bubblegum still wants to help him because he’s her responsibility. They go to his castle and try to find the Pup Gang and Lemongrab. Bubblegum tells Finn and Jake to go on ahead while she carries out her plan. Finn and Jake find the Pup Gang unconscious in the reconditioning chamber and try to save them, but Lemongrab catches them and locks them inside of it as well, threatening them with electrocution. Bubblegum comes in and tells Lemongrab to stop, saying that she can help him. Lemongrab screams at her that she was the one who made him this way and so can’t possibly help, and that she’s “poison” and needs reconditioning. Yikes. Suddenly a second Lemongrab walks into the room. Bubblegum says she made him for Lemongrab so that he wouldn’t be lonely. The two Lemongrabs are exactly alike and quickly become friends, so Bubblegum, Finn, Jake and the Pup Gang are allowed to leave.

Lemongrab. In my review of the first episode Lemongrab was in, Too Young, I mentioned that I dislike Lemongrab. I’m not sure if that’s still true. I’m honestly not sure how I feel about him at all. He’s so… bizarre. I mean, nearly everyone on this show is weird in one way or another, but among all of these weirdos Melongrab (that was actually a typo but I’m keeping it) is the one who stands out as the weird one. I think I both love and hate Lemongrab. Or I hate him so much that it’s somehow come back around to me liking him. I don’t even know.

This episode both made me realize how truly dangerous Lemongrab is and made me feel a bit more sympathetic to him. Saying that Lemongrab doesn’t get along with others is an understatement. He has no clue how to interact with other people. That seems to be a common thing on this show, Marceline and Ice King are inept when it comes to social interaction too (although Marceline does seem to be improving somewhat since becoming friends with Finn and Jake) and it seems like most character’s problem arise from just not knowing how to handle a certain aspect of socialization. Lemongrab is the absolute extreme of this. He wants everyone to act the way he sees fit and if they don’t he thinks the problem is them, not himself. He’s a narcissist, basically. He only cares about himself and what makes sense to him, and he lashes out in strange ways when things aren’t exactly the way he wants them to be. The fact that he has a reconditioning chamber, which is essentially a torture device to force people into behaving the ways he thinks is “correct”, proves this. Not to mention he got really aggressive with Bubblegum near the end, cornering her and screaming abuse at her and almost hitting her with the sound sword. The only reason he didn’t hit her with the sound sword was that Finn escaped the reconditioning chamber and jumped in front of her just in time. (As a side note, I really like that they added that bit with Finn protecting her. After Burning Low, I was a little worried that Finn and Bubblegum’s friendship might not be as strong, I’m glad this episode pair shows that these two would still risk their lives for each other.)

In Too Young, I had thought that Bubblegum and Lemongrab were sort of similar to Frankenstein and his monster. I mean, there are some differences. For one thing, Bubblegum created Lemongrab for a good purpose (ruling the Candy Kingdom in case something happened to her) and not for the sake of narcissism. Her aversion to Lemongrab once he was created is a little better than just “ew he’s ugly”, the experiment had gone wrong and Lemongrab’s personality made him awful to be around and definitely unfit to be a ruler. Plus, Lemongrab isn’t as sympathetic as Frankenstein’s monster and Bubblegum is much more likable than Frankenstein. But still, it’s not exactly Lemongrab’s fault that he is the way he is, it was an experiment gone wrong that made him this way. When he yells at Bubblegum about how no one understands him and she was the one who made him like this… he’s kind of right. It may not have been her intention, but she did condemn Lemongrab to a lonely existence.

On the other hand, Bubblegum did try to take responsibility for Lemongrab and improve his attitude and social skills, it just didn’t work. Trying Bubblegum’s more nurturing approach to ruling seemed like it was physically painful for Lemongrab. It makes me wonder if Lemongrab is unable to change or if he simply isn’t willing. I have a feeling that at least some of his misery is self-inflicted, that he’s so deep in it that he doesn’t even want to be brought out of it anymore, he just wants to make everyone else around him as miserable as he is.

I can’t believe I’m actually looking forward to the next time we see Lemongrab. I’m actually interested in finding out more about him and about his relationship with Bubblegum as creator and creation.

Rating: 8/10

Adventure Time Reviews: Seson 4 (BMO Noire/King Worm)

This episodes begins with Finn missing one of his socks and arguing with Jake about whether or not the latter did something with it. BMO hears the argument and decides to solve the case of Finn’s missing sock to stop him and Jake from fighting. From this point on, the episode is black and white and it basically just follows BMO while ze (I’m never totally sure which pronouns to use for BMO, let’s go with these for now) imagines zirself into a film noir type scenario. It involves zir playing a detective and interacting with household objects, cats, a chicken, and Neptr. Not sure where the cats and the chicken came from. I won’t recount everything that BMO imagines, but long story short the sock was in Finn’s pillow the entire time.

Okay, so, this episode doesn’t really have any, like, character development or even much of a story or anything that would be interesting to talk about, so instead I’m just going to make a list of the things I liked about it and the things I didn’t like about it.

Things I liked

• Parodying film noir
• BMO is cute
• Neptr! I really like Neptr. I feel so sorry for him, he’s always getting the short end of the stick but he doesn’t even seem to notice. He’s so upbeat and loving and innocent regardless.
• I like the idea of BMO using the sock incident to just let zir imagination go wild and have some fun. It reminds me of the kind of thing I would do when I was kid.

Things I didn’t like

• It was kinda boring

I guess whether or not you like this episode probably comes down to whether or not you think BMO can carry an episode, and while I like BMO I don’t think ze can, for the same reason that LSP can’t. But still, this is a pretty cute episode, so I don’t dislike it.

Rating: 6/10

Finn wakes up to find himself in Princess Bubblegum’s castle, sitting on a throne next to her. Bubblegum is calling Finn her husband and king. Aside from the obvious weirdness of the situation to begin with, there are a couple of other things that appear odd. The ears of Finn’s hat are longer than usual and the Banana Guards watching over Bubblegum and Finn seem to be upside down. On Bubblegum’s shoulder is a green worm that Finn thinks he recognizes. Bubblegum whispers to Peppermint Butler that Finn doesn’t know he’s dreaming. Finn is confused as the scene suddenly changes. He’s now sitting across from Flame Princess in a forest, as she tells him to eat the soup in front of him. He eats some of it and the scene changes again to the Tree Fort, and Flame Princess transforms into Peppermint Butler, who is holding the green worm. Peppermint Butler explains to Finn that he’s trapped in a dream, and to get out he needs to find the King Worm and break it. When Finn points out that Peppermint Butler is holding the worm, the worm suddenly turns into a spoon.

Finn notices Jake and Lady Rainicorn in another room through a window, though that room appears to be upside down. Jake looks normal, but Lady has two mouths and is speaking English in a deep voice. One of her mouths spits out tape that Jake is using to wrap a gift. Lady tells Jake to play his viola, but the instrument and the bow are weirdly bent. When Jake tries to play it, a music note comes out, and the note turns into the worm, which then crawls away into a hole in the wall. Finn runs into the room and starts to talk with Jake. The two discover that they’re in a linked dream together, so they team up to find the King Worm. Jake explains to Finn that because this is a dream, that means Finn is capable of doing anything he wants, but if he lets his subconscious fears get in the way, it will fall apart. Finn and Jake shrink down so that they can crawl through the hole that the worm disappeared into.

After encounters with Ice King (who refers to them as Fionna and Cake, ha!), some monsters, and raining Lumpy Space Princess (hallelujah?), Finn and Jake finally find the King Worm and break it, causing the dream to fade away. They wake up in their Tree Fort again and ask each other if they’re okay. The ears of Finn’s hat are still longer than usual, and the more he examines his surroundings the more he notices that things are not quite normal, despite Jake repeating that everything is fine. Jake had pinched Finn upon “waking up”, but Finn never pinched Jake back. When he tries to do so, Jake backs away from him. When he does catch and pinch Jake, it causes Jake to melt, so Finn knows that he must still be dreaming. The King Worm appears and tells Finn that he’ll never be allowed to escape the dream, the King Worm is going to keep him there and consume all of his life energy. Finn voices his fear of being stuck in the dream and the ceiling starts to crack, which causes Finn to remember what Jake had told him about his fears causing the dream to fall apart. So Finn starts to think about all of his deepest fears and insecurities, which include the ocean, the Lich, Bubblegum telling him he’s too young, and other such things. Eventually the worm shrivels up and the dream shatters, setting Finn free.

Have I ever mentioned that I’m really fascinated by dreams? When I was a kid, I had a bunch of books on dream symbolism and I would try to analyze my dreams all the time, and if somebody shared one of their dreams with me you bet I was ready to analyze it, usually to their annoyance. I don’t do that anymore, but I’m still really fascinated by them and could talk about them for hours.

What I like about King Worm is that I think it’s the most realistic depiction of a dream that I’ve seen in a cartoon. A story about being trapped in a dream isn’t exactly something new, especially in animation, but I rarely find the dreamscapes in these stories to be accurate to my own dreams. I know that sounds like a weird thing to say because everyone’s dreams are different so it would be difficult to create something that everyone feels is an accurate depiction, but I don’t think dreams really vary that much from person to person, or at least not in a way that makes it impossible for their to be a universally relatable interpretation. Does that make sense? Just bear with me for a minute. While certain elements of dreams may differ depending on the person, a lot of them are also really similar. Actually, some dreams are even common, like how nearly everyone has had nightmares about falling or going to school and forgetting something important. The dreams might not go the exact same way, but it’s basically the same dream, because we all have similar experiences and fears and insecurities that seep into our subconscious. But anyway, back to what I was saying. Even with dreams that aren’t necessarily common, I think a lot them follow a similar pattern.

The thing that usually makes these dream-centered stories inaccurate, in my opinion, is that they put too much focus on being weird. Dreams are often weird, we can all agree on that, but I think we can also all agree that they’re not weird in the “WHOA WACKY RANDOM STUFF THROWN IN YOUR FACE CONSTANTLY” way. They do follow a kind of logic and order, they’re just very surreal. Sometimes they’re actually really close to reality, but with just a few small details that are wrong or out of place, and what’s interesting is that those details are often consistent from dream to dream. Have you ever noticed that everyone seems to have some strange common element in their dreams? For example, in my dreams, I can never dial a phone properly. Every time I try to make a phone call in a dream, I mess up the number and have to try over and over again and I never get it right. I’ve had people tell me that in their dreams they can never turn on a light, or they can never read, or mirrors are always distorted. Little things like that.

I like that King Worm shows us the surreal world of the dream in smaller ways, not just by showing us constant craziness. There are tiny details like the ears of Finn’s hat being longer, and then we have other, bigger details like rooms being upside down but otherwise normal, Ice King calling Finn and Jake by the wrong names, Jake’s viola being bent in a weird way, Lady’s appearance and voice being altered, or Finn’s reflection not looking right in the mirror. The only really wacky things that happen are Lady having a mouth that spits tape, raining LSP and Gunter turning into a monster, but those aren’t given much focus. That makes it seem much more like a dream that someone might actually have, and it’s actually more unsettling because it’s so close to reality and yet so unlike it. I also like the point about how fears and insecurities effect what happens in the dream, because that’s also very accurate. It doesn’t take much to turn a normal (well, you know, “normal”) dream into a complete nightmare.

Speaking of turning dreams into nightmares, note that the dream only gets really weird and trippy once Finn starts purposefully filling it with his fears. This makes a lot more sense than if the dream had been this way from the beginning, because it seems as though King Worm’s goal is to keep Finn ignorant as long as possible, he’s not supposed to know it’s a dream. Once Finn realizes that he’s dreaming, it all starts to fall apart. Finn can make whatever he wants happen in the dream, but he doesn’t seem to have any control over it once it does, so that’s when things get bizarre and trippy and start to come apart, like a lucid dream gone horribly wrong. Which is exactly what it is, of course. Another thing is, those really wacky things I mentioned before, like the raining LSP and the Gunter monster, those things happen more the closer that Finn and Jake get to King Worm, and even in the second dream things got weirder once he appeared, so it seems as though King Worm’s presence is what really distorts the dreamscape, otherwise it seems normal enough unless you pay close attention.

All of this to say that the dreamscape in this episode was surprisingly realistic. It’s nice to see a story about a dream that actually feels like it’s a dream, and not just abstract craziness for the sake of it or poor attempts at foreshadowing and character development. There are a lot of ways that dreams can be badly incorporated into a story (I won’t go into all of them because that would make this review much longer than it already is), and it’s annoying to see. Adventure Time of all things actually seems to have a better understanding of how dreams work than most media.

Rating: 8/10