| listing and airdates | BMEG | season by season |
"CHILL ZONE"
Written By: Eve Forward
Produced By: Tom Tataranowicz
Directed By: Tom Tataranowicz
Executive Producer: Rick Ungar
INTRODUCTORY SUMMARY NOTE
All right! It's the obligatory Christmas episode! Guaranteed to leave you with a bad case of the warm fuzzies! See the Biker Mice in Santa suits! See Limburger stealing Chicago's snow! See…see…see…aw damn. I can't make up another sentence with a bunch of s's in it. Let's get on with the summary.
EPISODE SYNOPSIS
It's Christmas time in Chicago, and the Windy City is decked out in its traditional holiday finery. Snow covers the streets and swirls on the wind. Strings of lights are strung up across everything that will hold them. Fully-decorated Christmas trees fill the streets, and storefront are filled with cheerful garlands and holly. The city is gorgeous at this time of year, and no heart is left untouched by it. Even Lawrence Limburger, it would seem, is feeling the holiday spirit. He hears a group of people singing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" outside his skyscraper, and watches them through a nearby window.
"Ah. Carolers. Perhaps they would care to quaff a warm drink in this wintry weather," the Plutarkian speculates cheerfully.
He uses a remote control to open his window, then walks over to a small table, on which are sitting a mug and a pot of hot chocolate (or possibly coffee). Limburger fills the mug, and carries the kettle over to the window-- where he dumps the steaming-hot beverage all over the carolers. Their songs are replaced by screams and shouts.
"Yes," Limburger concludes, closing the window. "Truly, it is the season for sharing."
Forget what I said about him being touched by the notion of good will toward his fellow man.
"Speaking of which, I must prepare to deliver my latest present to Plutark."
Limburger sits down at his desk and turns on his small VidCom, summoning up Karbunkle. The mad scientist is wearing a Santa hat when his image appears on the screen.
"Greetings, your chilly cheesiness!" the doctor calls out cheerfully.
"Plutark needs ice, Karbunkle," the Plutarkian says firmly, all business. "Lots of it. NOW! Are the Snow-Suckers ready yet?"
Karbunkle looks over his shoulder at something we can't quite see. He holds up a remote control and replies, "Awaiting your command, your ice creaminess."
"Excellent! Then let us proceed with my plan to pilfer this planet's precious precipitants!"
"You mean, steal the snow, your exquisite execrableness?" Karbunkle asks.
"Exactly," Limburger chuckles sinisterly. "By the time I am finished, Chicago will have had the bleakest, blackest Christmas in memory!"
Don't tell that to the Biker Mice, however. They're having a good time gearing up for the holiday. Outside the city proper, they and Charley are entertaining the children of a nearby orphanage. While Modo has a snowball battle with the kids (letting them pelt him like crazy with icy missiles), Vinnie and Throttle are playing Santa, complete with red coats, hats, and beards (over their helmets, of course).
"Oh, no, man! You don’t really want toys that look some waterlogged reptiles, do you?" Throttle asks the little girl sitting on his lap (making a subtle gibe at the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles at the same time).
Vinnie grins and tears his costume off, flexing.
"Yeah! Fuzzy and buff is where it's at!" he crows.
"Oh, you guys are cute," Charley laughs. "You pretend to be macho and tough, but underneath, you're pushovers for the little orphan kids."
Throttle and Vinnie cringe.
"Who, us?" the white-furred mouse asks.
"No, I'm pretty sure we're macho and tough," Throttle corrects.
"They just got all the cool snow toys, that's all," Modo explains.
"You're right about the 'cute' part, though, sweetheart," Vinnie adds.
Suddenly, a little boy flies down the hill on a saucer sled and collides with Vinnie, knocking him into a snowbank. The others laugh heartily as the mouse picks himself up and pitches a snowball at his assailant. Instantly, he's pelted by a dozen slushy missiles, which only makes the children and his bros laugh harder.
"You guys don't fool me a bit," Charley chuckles.
Nearby, Limburger and Karbunkle watch as the scientist's latest invention, the Snow-Suckers, begin--what else?--sucking up snow. Each of the machines is a boxy, humanoid robot, with a gold dome as its "head" and a long hose attached to its body, through which it vacuums up the snow.
"Ha! The Snow-Suckers are performing perfectly!" Limburger coos, watching as a block of solid snow emerges from the back of a Snow-Sucker and disappears. "Gathering and packing the Earth's frozen fluid and storing it in space, ready for shipment back to Plutark! Oooh, the High Chairman will be so pleased!"
He turns to Karbunkle.
"Augment the acceleration, would you, my dear doctor?"
"What do you mean, your high rankness?" Karbunkle asks.
"Simple. FASTER!" the Plutarkian bellows.
"Your wish is my command, Monsieur fromage!"
Karbunkle frantically makes adjustments via remote control to the robots, which immediately pick up speed and begin marching forward.
The Biker Mice remain pleasantly unaware of Limburger's encroachment upon their fun. Throttle is packing a sizeable snowball in his hands, his bros nowhere to be seen.
"Yo, Throttle?" Vinnie calls out in a sing-songy voice.
"Yeah, Vinnie--"
Throttle turns his head just in time to get hit square in the face by a snowball.
"I just wanted to warn you to duck!" Vinnie shouts from a neighboring hill, where he stands with Charley. He chuckles and adds offhandedly, "I guess I should've told him sooner!"
"Oh, Vincent?" Throttle calls out, also in a sing-songy voice, to get his bro's attention.
Vinnie turns to see Throttle pitch a huge snowball at him. The white-furred mouse ducks just in time.
Modo, who has been building a giant snow-Limburger (a good one, to boot), isn't so lucky. Throttle's icy missile hits him square in the back and slams the mouse into his snow sculpture, wrecking it. Irritated, the gray-furred mouse scoops up a positively gigantic snowball, which he hurls at either Vinnie or Throttle. I don't think he really cares which of them it hits.
Vinnie ducks the slushy spheroid easily, laughing, "Vinnie the blur! You can't hit--"
A snowball hits him in the face.
"--me?"
Throttle, Modo, and Charley all jump on Vinnie, laughing and wrestling him to the ground. Abruptly, they begin to roll downhill, picking up snow as they go, until only the mice's tails are visible in the giant snowball that's formed. Eventually, they collide with a stone wall, smashing the ball apart. Everyone tumbles out, laughing.
"Oh man! This snow stuff is dangerous!" Modo chuckles, shaking it out of his fur.
"Yeah! Great, ain't it?" Vinnie snickers.
Suddenly, Modo spots something approaching in the distance--Limburger's Snow-Suckers. Dozens of them advance on the mice.
"What the heck are those things?" Modo asks as the mice rise to their feet.
"I don't know, but if you ask me, they look like mouse-munchers!" Throttle shouts.
As the Snow-Suckers approach, the Biker Mice quickly mount their rides.
"Get those kids to safety, Charley!" Modo shouts as the mechanic begins herding them away from the oncoming robots.
"Yeah! We'll handle these dopey dozers!" Vinnie adds.
"Hey, what say we try out that ATV mode Charley added to my bike?" Throttle asks, pressing a button on his right handlebar. Instantly, his bike's relatively slender tires expand to the size of those on four-wheelers, allowing Throttle to slog through the deep snow with no trouble whatsoever. He zips off to lead the attack. Modo and Vinnie, meanwhile, come up with their own unique methods of riding through this winter wonderland.
"Dig this, bros!" Modo shouts, using his bike's cannons to blast a trench in the snow. "It's deep!" He rides forward, constantly blasting a space ahead of his bike where it won't get bogged down in the thick snow.
Vinnie tries to just ride straight across the snow, but quickly finds himself sinking deeper and deeper into it.
"Whoops! Time to get on top of the situation!"
He leaps his bike into a nearby saucer sled, and immediately goes flying across the snow.
"Let's rock--and slide!"
But riding in this manner proves a little more difficult than Vinnie imagined. He finds himself briefly out of control, spinning doughnuts across the field.
Not that this bothers him in the least.
"I can't get no-huh huh huh-extra traction!" he sings, looping one last time before finally catching up with his bros.
The three mice ride directly into one snowdrift, and tunnel under the snow toward the Snow-Suckers. They take a zigzagging path, disturbing the flat landscape the robots had been walking across and creating a trench. The Snow-Suckers fall into it and promptly explode (why, I don’t know).
Seconds later, the Biker Mice blast out of the drift (creating their logo as they do) and shoot out into open air.
This is where things start to go wrong. While his bros go flying overhead, Modo lands smack dab right on top of a frozen pond. He hears the ice cracking beneath him, and is only able to utter a single, "Momma" before it breaks and he falls in. The gray-furred mouse rises from the chilly depths a second later, encased in a block of ice.
Vinnie lands better than his older bro, but when he tries to open fire on the Snow-Suckers, the force of the blast from his cannons sends him spiraling out of control once again.
"This battle plan needs a little work!" he shouts, spinning off across the snow.
Throttle, meanwhile, shoots through one drift and into another. He pops out and jumps his bike over a hill-right into a group of Snow-Suckers. The impact destroys them, but the resulting explosion sends Throttle and his bike flying. He crashes into yet another snowdrift, leaving a Throttle-on-his-bike-shaped hole in its pristine surface.
"Not quite the finish I had in mind," he grumbles.
The mouse quickly gets out and rides along a hillside until he's ahead of the Snow-Suckers, at which point he comes to a complete stop.
"I don't know where those machines came from," he says, "but it's time to chill 'em out!"
At least eight laser cannons (in addition to the ones we usually see) pop out of Throttle's bike. They fire at the Snow-Suckers, who are totally annihilated within seconds. The force is so powerful that it actually causes Throttle and his bike to jump back a few feet with each successive blast.
Karbunkle and Limburger watch the destruction from a small hand-held viewing device.
"Something is destroying the Snow-Suckers!" Karbunkle shrieks.
"These days, 'something' always seems to be those bothersome Biker Mice!" Limburger grouses. He turns to Karbunkle and orders him to recall the Snow-Suckers before they're all destroyed (it is a major design flaw that they can't defend themselves).
The reunited Biker Mice (Modo still partially covered in ice) prepare to fight another battalion of the Snow-Suckers, who continue to advance on them. However, before any more of them are totaled by our heroes, they receive the order to leave. The robots make a 180 and begin the march back to their masters.
"They're turnin' tail!" Vinnie howls triumphantly.
"Dang!" Modo grouses, teeth chattering. "Ah could've used the exercise to warm me back up!" He flexes his arms, and the remaining ice shatters and falls off him.
"If those machines came from Limburger, you can bet things will get plenty hot before long," Throttle replies coolly.
Given the incredibly brief amount of time it took for the Biker Mice to destroy Limburger's Snow-Suckers, it seems right that Karbunkle should be upgrading them for combat when we next see him and his boss, back at Limburger Tower.
"Full weaponry, good doctor," Limburger says firmly. "Those Biker Mice must learn just how dangerous it is to damage the property of Lawrence Limburger."
"Oh, they will, your fetidness," Karbunkle replies, looking up from the robot he's working on. "And by the way, I have something to show you which you might find very intriguing."
The two of them walk over to a video monitor, which the scientist turns on. After a moment of static, we see a short film of the Biker Mice (all three of them in Santa suits this time) and Charley once again playing with the orphans, chasing each other in a game of tag.
"This was recorded by the Snow-Sucker monitoring system," Karbunkle explains. "You will notice the mice's fondness for the orphan children, yes?"
Limburger watches with interest.
"Indeed, doctor. It seems the rodent renegades have a sentimental soft spot, eh? And a soft spot is a weakness which I might do well to exploit…"
The Plutarkian laughs fiendishly for a moment, before noticing a soft golden glow coming in through a nearby window. It startles him.
"What's that?" he asks, pointing to the source of the rays.
"The sun, your mellow richness," Karbunkle answers, a little puzzled by his employer's curious question.
"I know it's the sun, you simpering simpleton!" Limburger shouts. "But what is it doing there?"
"Uh….shining?"
"It's melting the snow, you stupid sycophant! Melted snow is useless to me! I need ice!"
"Ahhhh, then worry not, my esteemed excellence," the scientist declares. "I have just the villain to assist us. Observe."
Karbunkle presses a button on his ubiquitous remote control, activating the Transporter. It glows brightly for a moment, before the doors part to reveal a most…unusual looking villain. For one thing, unlike just about every other imported bad guy in the series, this one is female (although given her appearance, I'd say that's open for debate). She's extremely short, almost a midget, with a plump apple-shaped body, large hands, a bosom that almost covers her waistline, and tiny little feet. Her head sits atop broad shoulders. The woman's ears are pointed, like an elf's. She pulls her hair back away from her face with a spiked hairband, and wears dark, triangular glasses.
"Greetings, Dr. Karbunkle," she says with a German accent, goose-stepping out of the Transporter booth and offering our resident mad scientist a bow. "I always said it vould be a cold day before we met again!"
She titters (and before somebody thinks that's something perverted, it means that she laughed in a high pitch).
"Dr. Karbunkle, who is this diminutive dimwit?" Limburger asks, slightly baffled.
"This is the Weathermeister, your portly pot-cheesiness," Karbunkle explains, patting the woman on the head. "She'll have Chicago in a deep freeze and ready for delivery in no time!"
"Don't crease my credulence, Karbunkle," Limburger warns. "How could this crone do that?"
The Weathermeister snaps her fingers, causing a small roll-down blind to appear in mid-air. She pulls it down, revealing it to be a map of Limburger Tower-specifically, Limburger's office (it should be for Karbunkle's laboratory, but hey, I'm not gonna argue).
"Vell, today's forecast shows heavy rainstorms over Limburger central," she declares, slapping a small storm-cloud sticker onto the chart, "so you'd better pack your umbrellas!"
Simultaneously, a small white cloud materializes over Limburger's head. It promptly begins raining on him.
"What?" he asks, looking up. "What's going on?"
Suddenly, the cloud sends down a small lightning bolt, toasting the Big Cheese.
"Never mind," he sighs, face and clothes blackened. "You're hired."
Karbunkle and the Weathermeister share a grin. Far be it from me to speculate, but I wonder if something isn't going on between these two…
Oh God! Someone help me get that picture out of my head!
Soon, Chicago is once again blanketed by snowstorms and high winds. Conditions look positively bleak. Curiously, though, while the sun is nowhere to be seen in the rest of Chicago, a bright golden glow covers the roof of Limburger Tower. There, we find Limburger, Karbunkle, and the Weathermeister, catching rays in the only place in the entire city where the sun is shining.
"And remember," Karbunkle reminds the villainess, "lots of ice."
The Weathermeister giggles, slapping more of her stickers onto her chart, which now displays a map of Chicago.
"Of course! Record lows, heavy snows, und freeeezing blizzards today in the Windy City--except, of course, here on Limburger Tower, vhere it's sun, sun sun!"
"Wonderful work, Weathermeister!" Limburger declares from his lounge chair. "Ooh, perhaps we should turn over a new leaf, go straight, and make our fortunes in the tourist trade."
After a moment of silence, the three of them shout, "NOT!" and laugh merrily.
Limburger rises to his feet and walks over to where the sunshine ends and the winter weather begins. There is no gradual lowering of temperature as he approaches this boundary--on one side, it's hot and toasty, and on the other, it's freezing. No gradient.
"Hmmm. I wonder how the Biker Mice's little wayward waifs are weathering this wintry weather," he says thoughtfully, putting a hand through the barrier to feel the cold air outside.
"I would wager not well, your camembertness," Karbunkle speculates.
"I certainly hope not. They're my bait--my bait for Biker Mice!"
Limburger laughs fiendishly (does he ever laugh any other way?).
Meanwhile, at the Last Chance Garage, the Biker Mice and Charley are making their own Christmas preparations--and preparations for the fight they know is coming with Limburger. While Modo decorates the tree (including a missile tree topper, which promptly causes the pine to droop over drastically), Charley and Throttle are attaching skis to the mice's bikes to allow them to traverse over the snow without difficulty.
And it looks like they're going to need them. Outside, the snow is still blowing, and it's piling up fast. Vinnie wipes a window and peers outside.
"I've heard of dreaming of a white Christmas, but this is more like a…nightmare!" he mutters.
"You're not kidding!" Charley gripes, tightening a bolt. "Remember those orphans? It looks like they're getting some pretty cold treatment by the weather."
The mechanic motions toward the television, where reporter Tara Diddle (serving as an anchor for once, instead of working in the field) is reporting on the situation.
"With no food, heat, or running water, and the snow blocking relief efforts, things look bleak for the children of this orphanage," she explains. "All any of us can do now is pray for a miracle."
"That's us!" Modo shouts from beside the tree.
"Aooow! Miracles Incorporated!" Vinnie cries.
"Neither hail--" Throttle begins.
"--nor snow--" Modo adds.
"--nor Plutarkian stink-fish--" Vinnie quips.
"--shall stay these Biker Mice from saving those kids!" Throttle concludes, jumping on his bikes. His bros quickly do the same, pulling on their helmets as they do.
"Let's rock--"
"--AND RIDE!"
The mice begin racing toward the garage door. Unfortunately, the door is closed--not that this would bother the Biker Mice, who make a habit of through doors without opening them first. Charley, who doesn't want to replace her garage doors again, quickly pulls a switch on the wall. Instantly, it rises, just in time for the mice to pass under it.
The mechanic watches the hirsute heroes disappear into the swirling snow and murmurs, "Just gotta teach them the etiquette of leaving a room…"
The Biker Mice race through the slushy streets.
"Dashin' through the snow…" Throttle sings.
"…on a three-hundred horsepower sleigh…" Modo chants.
"…over the fields we go…." Vinnie croons.
"…whippin' tail all the way!" they all conclude, laughing.
Their mice's joyful spirit might be hampered if they knew they were being watched. From Limburger Tower, the Big Cheese spies on the threesome through a pair of binoculars.
"Ahhh. Those rampaging rodents have revealed themselves at last," the fish coos, for once delighted to see his adversaries. He turns to his hired help and asks, "Ready to mash some mice, Miss Meister?"
"Yes, of course!" she replies, bowing. "One set of huge hailstones, coming right up!"
She summons her chart once again, and slaps on a sticker reading HAILSTONES.
"I love this!"
Our heroes, meanwhile, are plowing through the giant snowdrifts building up on the outskirts of the city. Each one they burst through makes the road a little clearer for the large trucks following them. And no, they aren't Limburger's men--they're relief agencies, bringing food and other supplies for the orphans and others trapped by the blizzards.
"On Throttle, on Modo, on Biker Mice all!" Vinnie shouts.
"Hey, we're doin' it, bros!" Throttle exclaims. "The relief trucks are getting through!"
"Yeah, a merry Christmas to all, and to all a--" Modo begins. He stops suddenly when he sees a gigantic hailstone headed right for him.
"--good night?"
The gray-furred mouse dodges the icy missile easily, but the Biker Mice soon find themselves assaulted by a storm of them.
"Ee-yi!" Vinnie howls. "These sure ain't Christmas ornaments!"
The mice frantically twist and turn their bikes, trying to avoid the giant slush-balls, but no matter how many they dodge, more and more keep coming.
"Man, we'd better start blitzin' (Blitzen), bros!" Throttle shouts, gazing ahead at the orphanage. It too is being pummeled by the gigantic hailstones. The children's screams are audible from outside.
"Those kids are in trouble!" Modo yells.
"Yeah! We've gotta do something!"
"Or we're all going to get our stockings stuffed!" Vinnie quips.
Even after the commercial break, our heroes are still in trouble.
"This weather ain't natural!" Modo shouts, having just leapt over one giant snowball.
"Yeah, it must be some sort of trap!" Vinnie agrees.
"Well, in that case," Throttle says, pulling the pistol from his belt, "let's make it a trap shoot."
He presses an area on the side of his helmet. It brings up a computerized targeting system, which immediately locks on to one of the larger hailstones.
"Follow me," the leader of the mice announces, firing.
Soon, all three of the mice are taking out the worst of the hail before it even gets near them.
"Yeah!" Vinnie shouts. "Hot stuff in the chill zone!"
"Yipee-ti-yi-yo!" Modo howls, firing a round.
Unfortunately, the orphanage doesn't have any built-in lasers (so few of them do outside an urban setting), rendering it extremely vulnerable to the perilous precipitation. More and more holes appear in its roof and sides.
"We gotta rescue those kids!" Throttle shouts.
Inside the orphanage, meanwhile, all the children are gathered together for safety next to the Christmas tree (curiously, there are no adults present). All of them are very clearly frightened, and things don't get any better when one of the hailstones breaks in through one of the large windows and smashes their tree into pine needles.
The Biker Mice burst in through the door, still on their bikes. They pull to a stop in front of the kids, and blast the incoming ice-balls with their lasers.
"It may not be Christmas yet--" Vinnie chirps.
"--but we're making our 'presents' known!" Modo laughs.
"Hey! It's the biker guys!" a little girl shouts. This revelation elicits a very positive response from the rest of the children, who cheer loudly for their heroes.
But the Biker Mice know that they can't stop every single hailstone, so, they quickly put the kids on their bikes and ride out of there--just as a series of gigantic snowball slams into the orphanage, hitting the spots where they were just a minute earlier. As the mice take their charges to safety, their home is completely and utterly destroyed.
They find refuge under a small cliff, and watch as the last of the hailstones strikes the remains of the building. After a few seconds, Vinnie says thankfully, "Looks like the storm's over."
"For now," Throttle mutters dramatically.
"You little tykes okay?" Modo asks the kids. His love of children is evident in his tone and his gentle expression.
The children nod.
"Yeah, we're okay," the little girl from earlier says sadly (she's sitting on the cowling of Modo's bike), "but our house is all smashed down." She wipes a tear away from her face and adds, "And it's almost Christmas!"
"Aw, dang," Modo murmurs, stroking her hair. A tear rolls down his cheek. "It's just like that old movie…"
"Hey, easy, Big Fella," Throttle soothes. He turns to the now-homeless orphans and says in a cheerful, don't-let-them-know-how-bad-things-are tone, "Hey, kids, we'll fix it! Somehow…"
He turns to his bros.
"You know, I've got a feeling that 'storm' was no accident."
"I'd say you're right," Vinnie replies, pointing ahead of them. "Look!"
The three mice look out over the horizon, turning on their helmets' zoom features as they do. They see Limburger Tower, and the curious golden halo surrounding it (I imagine there's some kind of temperature read-out in the mixed-up computer layout, but I can't figure out where).
"The Big Cheese is makin' sure his toes stay toasty!"
"Yeah!" Modo says thoughtfully. "He must've found a way to control the weather!"
"Oh, man, I knew this whole set-up had been a trap!" Throttle exclaims.
"Someone fat, smelly, and ugly is gonna pay for this!" Vinnie growls.
"You said a mouthful, Vincent. Let's rock--"
"--AND RIDE!"
The orphans watch as their furry saviors ride off.
"Do you think they can do it?" a boy asks.
"Sure!" the little girl from earlier replies. "Did you see those cool bikes?"
"Yeah, cool."
"Yeah."
Then they jump into a reprise of "Kyle's Mom's a Dirty--"….oh, wait. That's right. This isn't "South Park." Sorry, everytime I see children in parkas...
Limburger is none too pleased to spot the Biker Mice en route to his tower. What really ticks him off, though, is the fact that they're still alive.
"Blast! Those bothersome Biker Mice have beaten the bombardment!" he howls.
"Yes, your fragrant fulsomeness!" Karbunkle agrees, peering through his own set of binoculars. "And not only that, but they seem to have discovered your dabbling in the disaster!"
Limburger coughs, then says quietly, "It, uh, might not be wise to be here when they arrive…"
He turns to the Weathermeister.
"How's Lake Michigan?"
She pulls down her chart and replies, "Almost a solid block of ice, Herr Cheesemeister."
Suddenly, the Biker Mice open fire on Limburger Tower.
"You stepped WAY over the line this time, Limburger!" Modo shouts.
"Yeah! Nobody endangers little kids when the mamajammers from Mars are around!" Vinnie shouts.
Limburger and the Weathermeister dodge a stray missile. The Plutarkian turns to the villainess and asks, "Shall we depart?"
Vinnie launches another missile at the Plutarkian. Limburger manages to avoid getting hit, but falling debris causes his hair to catch fire (technically, it's not his real hair, just part of the mask, but when your head is on fire, paltry little details like that cease to matter). Limburger falls to the ground and pats his flaming noggin down until it's merely smoking.
"Hastily?"
"You will permit me, Herr Limburger?"
The Weathermeister snaps her fingers. Instantly, a large purple airship appears atop the tower.
"Step aboard my Veatherplane," she giggles, motioning toward it.
The three villains very quickly get in, and hang on as the odd-looking airplane begins to take off. Back on the ground, Throttle sees this, and whistles to get his bros' attention.
"Whoah, whoah, hold your fire, bros!" he shouts. "Our stink-bird is flying the coop!"
"Well, he's gotta come down somewhere," Vinnie says slyly.
"And ah got a phased-plasma present for him when he does," Modo growls, holding up his arm cannon.
Throttle grins.
"So let's dash-away, dash-away, dash-away all!" The echo usually used for "Let's rock-and RIDE!" accents Throttle's words as the snow the mice's tires are kicking up strikes the camera.
At Lake Michigan, Limburger is thrilled to sea the entire expanse of the body of water frozen solid.
"Oooh, excellent!" he cries happily as the Weatherplane soars over the lake. "All this ice should excellently fill my first shipment to Plutark! Karbunkle!"
"Yes, your over-ripeness?" the scientist asks. He cradles a large, tube-shaped piece of machinery in his arms.
"Send in the Snow-Suckers!"
"At once, your cumbersome curdliness!" Karbunkle replies, walking over to the side of the cockpit. He holds up the device and points it toward Lake Michigan. A golden burst lights up the scene, and instantly, dozens of new and improved Snow-Suckers (which look just like the old and unimproved Snow-Suckers) are teleported to the scene. Immediately, the robots march onto the surface of the lake. They form groups of four and stand with their backs to each other (a good defensive position), and begin sucking up the ice, which is instantly Transported to the Space Holding Bin.
"This is excellent!" Limburger declares. "Now I can freeze all of Earth's water, and steal every last icicle for Plutark!"
"You have water to burn!" Karbunkle laughs.
"And then," the fish continues, "with all Earth's water in my control, the leaders of the Earth will beg me to take their natural resources in exchange for….a sip of water." The Plutarkian chuckles. "It's cruel…it's clever…it's…AHHH!"
Limburger screams because of who he sees shooting onto the scene, namely…
"--the Biker Mice!"
"Looks like a cool party!" Vinnie jokes.
"And we came to break the ice!" Modo shouts.
"Let's heat 'em up!" Throttle agrees. The mice quickly open fire on the Weatherplane, shaking it and causing Limburger no end to frustration.
"Must they always make such a violent entrance?" he snaps.
Karbunkle laughs.
"Don't worry, your reeking reverence. My new, improved Snow-Suckers can take care of themselves!"
He presses a button on the device in his hands.
On the ground, all the Snow-Suckers abruptly stop what they were doing (namely, sucking snow) and march together. They begin climbing one on top of the other, making rows, and forming a gigantic robot. The end result dwarfs the mice.
"What the heck--?" Modo asks, watching this unusual construction project.
"Looks like--showtime!" Throttle declares.
Still, the mice aren't impressed.
"You know what they say," Throttle begins. "The bigger they are-"
"-the harder they fall!" Vinnie concludes.
"Fall? Ah thought--ah thought this was winter!" Modo says with a grin.
Throttle and Vinnie scowl at Modo's lame joke. The gray-furred mouse just shrugs.
Inside the Weatherplane, Karbunkle turns on the giant mecha as one single being instead of a group of individual robots. It glows brightly, flexing its arms and legs, before advancing toward the mice.
"Stay cool, bros!" Throttle warns.
The robot lifts one mammoth foot and begins to put it down on top of our heroes.
"'Cause a mighty big problem is about to come down!"
As expected, the mice easily move out of the way and split up.
"Hey, what say we give frosty here a hotfoot?" Throttle asks.
Our heroes open fire on the robot's foot, but do it no harm. The mecha then stomps hard on the surface of the lake, sending forth a giant freezing tidal wave, straight at the Biker Mice.
"This may be a crack-up--" Modo shouts.
"--but it sure ain't funny!" Throttle agrees.
The Biker Mice quickly turn and race away from the wave, with Vinnie shouting nervously, "Hey, my Saturday night fans--stay tuned till July!"
The wave strikes a wall of ice. The Biker Mice leap over it, but aren't out of the woods yet--the water shatters the wall, and continues chasing the mice.
Vinnie spots a tall hill straight ahead of him. He clicks on his bike's jets, rides straight up it, and goes flying into the air, "Aoooooow!"-ing all the way.
Throttle and Modo, meanwhile, go around the obstacle, and watch as the wall of water collides with it. Eventually, the freezing tide loses its strength and recedes to a low ebb. The two mice pull up, and prepare to attack the giant Snow-Sucker once again.
Suddenly, the robot appears before them. Before the mice can come up with a strategy, the monster fires a blast of icy snow and water at Throttle. Instantly, he's encased in a block of ice (as Modo was earlier). The force of it sends Throttle spinning off across the lake, and toward a cliff.
"Hang on, bro!" Modo shouts, racing after him.
"Believe me, I'm doing my best, man!" Throttle cries back.
Just as Throttle goes over the cliff, he manages to break free of the ice. Modo grabs his hand, and Throttle manages to grab his bike, whipping his tail around it before it could plunge into the river below (I don't even wanna think about the strain that's putting on his back). Modo throws Throttle up and back onto solid ground, and the two of them regroup to attack the robot once more.
"Superb!" Limburger comments, watching the battle from above. "Quite the best Christmas spectacle I've ever enjoyed! Now hurry up and finish them, Karbunkle! I have ice to harvest!"
"I'm trying, your rinded reekingness!" the scientist replies, frantically typing commands into the control device. The giant Snow-Sucker fires its lasers at Throttle and Modo, who answer in turn.
Unobserved in all this is Vinnie, still hurtling through the air. He flips his bike around at the apex of his jump, and uses his motorcycle's jets to blast himself forward, toward the Snow-Sucker.
"Here goes nothin'!"
He fires a grappling line at the robot's arm. It catches and loops around several times. Vinnie swings in a few circles around the gigantic metal limb, then leaps off his bike onto the robot's neck. It isn't a perfect landing--Vinnie is badly off-balance and, after much flailing of his arms, he falls forward.
"That's our Vinnie!" Modo says with a grin.
Throttle nods as they watch the robot trying to knock Vinnie out of its head.
"Crazy kid, but lots of style."
Inside the giant Snow-Sucker's head, Vinnie discovers a complicated array of levers, buttons, switches, and displays. He can't make heads nor tails of it.
"Complex city!" the white-furred mouse declares. "This requires concentration and skill!"
After 2.5 seconds of thought, Vinnie grins crazily and laughs, "Oh well!"
He rips a lever off one control panel and uses it to smash another, then goes to town, destroying everything he comes in contact with (there's a flying ironing board in this scene, if you look for it), high on adrenaline and destruction.
Classic Vinnie.
With its brains effectively being smashed to pieces, the robot begins to malfunction badly, its arms and legs swinging around as if it were in the middle of a seizure. Vinnie, his job done, quickly makes his way out of the mecha's head--and finds himself flailing in mid-air! He lands on his bike, resting on the robot's shoulder, and races off it (putting on his helmet as he does). The white-furred mouse jumps into the air and prepares to come down right on the Weatherplane.
"Make room for one more!" he shouts.
Vinnie lands on one of the Weatherplane's wings. The force of his landing causes it to flip crazily in circles, rotating first vertically and then horizontally. Centrifugal force keeps the mouse from falling off, and indeed, makes for an enjoyable ride.
"This is great!" he laughs. But if their frantic screams are any indication, Limburger, Karbunkle, and the Weathermeister would disagree.
As the Weatherplane continues to spin out of control, the defective robot begins shooting streams of ice and snow everywhere as it lunges wildly across the surface of Lake Michigan. But the fact that it's gone haywire doesn't make it any less dangerous. Modo has a difficult time avoiding the robot's fire, no matter how hard he tries.
"Say, bro!" Modo shouts as he's hit in the face by a blast. "Ah'm about to get my tail toasted here!"
Throttle, who has been watching from the safety of a cliff, races down to the lake.
"Well, then, let's get cooking, man!" he exclaims. "Double-heater number 5! Now!"
The two mice meet near the edge of the lake and begin making circles around the robot, their lasers turned on full blast. The berserk machine tries to fire on them, but is so messed up that it can't. Soon, the mice have melted enough of the ice so that the piece of it the robot is standing on is floating in the water. It promptly slips out from under the mecha's feet, causing it to fall flat on its back (suprisingly, it does not fall into the hole). The robot reaches up one flailing arm and grabs the still-spinning Weatherplane, causing the vehicle to come to an abrupt stop.
"Sorry I can't stay," Vinnie chuckles as he jumps his bike off the wing of the ship and rides down the robot's arm to the surface of the lake. "Have a nice winter, and a great fall!"
"Guess you were right," Modo says with a sly grin. "Must be fall."
"I'll have you broiled for this, you mouse!" an enraged Limburger shouts (you can tell how upset he is by the way he was unable to come up with any adjectives to go with 'mouse').
Behind the Plutarkian, the flustered Weathermeister tries to come up with a strategy, but all her equipment is in such disarray that she can't take it.
"Ahhhh!" she howls. "Vind! Snow! Sun! Ahhhh!"
Karbunkle walks out on the wing of the plane and begins kicking and punching the Snow-Sucker's hand, shouting, "Let me go, you metal mutoid moron!"
One of Karbunkle's kicks, however, goes a little deeper than the doctor intended, and does more harm to the robot's already messed-up system. It rises shakily to its feet, still clutching the Weatherplane in its hand. The shift in position causes all three of the vehicle's occupants to slide out onto the wing (with Limburger clinging to the very edge). The Weathermeister's chart is stolen away by the breeze.
"My map! Oh, my map! Now I'll never get on CNN!" she wails.
Limburger, still hanging on to the edge of the wing (he can't pull his own mammoth bulk up), says quietly, "Karbunkle, I believe a precipitous departure would be prudent at this particular point."
"Beg pardon, oh dairy cultured one?" Karbunkle pants.
"Get us out of here!"
Just then, the robot begins to reach up around with its other arm, grabbing the other side of the plane.
"I'll activate the Transporter!"
Karbunkle shrieks.
"NOOOOO!" Limburger howls, knowing what will happen. His words come too late, as he, Karbunkle, the Weathermeister, the Weatherplane, and the giant Snow-Sucker are all suddenly teleported away, leaving the stunned Biker Mice to wonder just what happened.
"Huh?" Modo asks. "Where'd he go?"
"Shoot!" Vinnie curses. "Just when it was starting to be fun!"
"You know, bros, something tells me Limburger's problems are getting bigger by the second," Throttle says with a wry grin.
Back in the city, Limburger Tower suddenly begins to glow green, the same color as the halo surrounding our villains when they teleported away. The building begins to stretch at about the middle. Suddenly, the giant Snow-Sucker's arms burst out of both sides of the building. It stands and tries to take a few steps, and even manages to balance itself-right before it blows up. The tower is totally annihilated--except for the top few stories, which go shooting basically whole into the air. It lands on top of the ruins of the destroyed orphanage, in front of the stunned eyes of Charley and the children.
Later that night, the Biker Mice, Charley, and the orphans all stand around a gigantic Christmas tree, splendidly decorated and surrounded with gifts (no doubt from concerned citizens who heard about the kids being shut in). The mice are all dressed in Santa suits once again.
"Gee, how'd you ever get us this great new house, Santa…Throttle?" a little girl asks.
Throttle thinks for a moment, then replies, "Well, Toby, let's just say it was a contribution from a big man in the business world."
Modo quickly says, "Anyway, little buddies, 'twas the night before Christmas…"
"…and all through the house…" Throttle continues.
"…not a creature was stirring…" Vinnie adds.
The three Santa's link arms and jubilantly shout, "EXCEPT FOR THE MICE!"
Atop the orphanage, hanging from an antenna dish on the Weatherplane (speared on top of the new building's antenna), are Limburger, Karbunkle, and the Weathermeister, none of whom are having the happiest of holidays. A single snowflake lands on top of Limburger's nose.
"Bah. Humbug."
He blows it off, and the little snowflake drifts to the front of the screen, where it covers everything and takes us to the credits.
(duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh!)
MY FEELINGS ON THE EPISODE
"Chill Zone" is another great episode. It follows the classic theme of all American Christmas specials, as paraphrased from John Stewart's stand-up act: "I'm sorry, Timmy, but it looks like we won't be having a Christmas this year…WAIT! We can have Christmas! This is the best Christmas ever!" but isn't as corny as most are. It's to the series' credit that the Biker Mice didn't have to rescue Santa Claus or some similar schtik. Sure, we've got the obligatory cutesy stuff-orphan kids, etc.--but hey, it's made for Christmas. That's the time of the year when we want cutesy!
Something I would have liked to have seen tackled in this episode, however, is just how the guys feel during this time of year. After all, Christmas is a time for family, home, etc., and even if the holiday doesn't exist on Mars (or takes on a different form), our heroes are bound to have picked up on this. Considering that whatever family they may have left after the Plutarkian War is over thirty-five million miles away, this could be a pretty damn depressing time of year. Maybe that was Charley's motive for bringing the guys to the orphanage-to cheer them up a little. I suppose that it would have been a little weird to bring up, though. Imagine one of the mice having the following conversation with a little kid: "So, you're an orphan, too? Really? How'd your parents die? Mine were slaughtered right before my eyes by conquering aliens in a warzone!"
Probably the funniest part of this episode is Vinnie inside the giant Snow-Sucker's head. Like I said, it's classical Vinnie: don't waste time thinking about the problem--just break something. His grin when he decides on his plan of action (such as it is) is priceless.
The animation is great in this episode, but what really stands out in terms of visuals to me is the snow. Not the stuff lying on the ground--the snow falling from the sky. In nearly every scene in this episode, snow is coming down, and you can see it in almost every shot. This kind of attention to detail is fabulous.
I know, I didn't have much to say on this one, did I? Still, it's a great episode, very entertaining. Once again, it's a first-season episode, and is available on video. It's on the tape of the same name, "Chill Zone", along with "Road Ravens", another great episode. E-bay is a great place to pick up the first-season tapes, usually at a bargain price. Simply enter "biker mice" in the search field, and a listing of available Biker Mice products will be given. Amazon.com is another good place to go looking. Searching through Yahoo and AltaVista might also turn up video sources online. You won't regret your search. Good luck!
Main
| basic information | episodes | in-depth | fun | MAIN |