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"A MOUSE AND HIS MOTORCYCLE"
Written By: Pamela Hickey and Dennys McCoy
Produced By: Tom Tataranowicz
Directed By: Tom Tataranowicz
Executive Producer: Rick Ungar
INTRODUCTORY SUMMARY NOTE
"A Mouse and His Motorcycle" focuses primarily on Modo and his bond with his bike, Lil' Hoss (also occasionally referred to as "Lil' Darlin'.") While not as much fun as the other Modo-focus episode, "Steelfinger", this episode does have its own charm and gives a better sense of Modo's personality.
EPISODE SYNOPSIS
Just outside a government storage depot somewhere near Chicago, on a moonlit night, a man in army fatigues is standing watch. His very presence raises questions. Who is he? Where is he from? Does he have a family? What’s he thinking at this very moment?
.......
We’ll never know, as he doesn’t really have a damn thing to do with the story. He does, however, hear what sounds like motorcycle engines somewhere nearby. The soldier looks around a moment, but sees nothing, so he goes back to his silent patrol.
If our boy could have seen through the shrubbery and trees on the ravine overlooking the depot, however, he might have seen three grappling lines shoot out of nowhere and crunch into a trio of huge boulders. And if he followed those lines, he would have seen the Biker Mice from Mars sitting on their bikes, having a bit of a disagreement (although, one has to believe that, in accordance with his military training, the solider would have just shouted, "Swamp gas!" and gone back to his job).
"Bros," Throttle chides, slightly annoyed, "this is not what I consider being on guard."
"Aw, lighten up, Throttle!" Vinnie chuckles. "We’re still watchin’ the armory."
"Yeah," Modo agrees. "We’re just havin’ us a nice friendly little tractor-pull contest whilst we maintain our vigilance (hey, this show is educational-how many other cartoon shows have you seen that use the word "whilst"?)."
Throttle, however, seems determined to be a wet blanket on this one. Guard duty may be boring, but being the responsible leader-type, he’s well aware that now is not the time for play. His bros, however, will not give up so easily. Vinnie winks at Modo, then turns to Throttle and remarks dismissively, "Course, if you think your bike can’t handle it...."
"Handle it?" Throttle snaps, outraged. "My bike? Righhhhhht. You just worry about that tin can of yours, hotshot." He points to a tree about a hundred yards away and shouts, "First one to the big tree wins!"
Modo and Vinnie slap palms proudly, their snare successful.
The mice kick-start their bikes. As they prepare for their drag, Modo spares a loving glance at his ride and whispers gently, "Come on, Lil’ Hoss. Do it like ah know you can (viewers should note that this is the first occasion on which Modo calls his bike by name)."
Vinnie counts them down, and soon, the mice are pulling for all they're worth, trying to move those mammoth boulders. Slowly, with much tire-squealing and racing of engines, they begin making headway toward the tree, the boulders following slowly behind. They dig gigantic ruts in the ground, testament to their weight and the power of the Martian motorcycles tugging on them.
Suddenly, at the depot, a window is blown out by an explosion. Abruptly, Limburger’s head lackey, Dr. Karbunkle, shoots out amidst flames and broken glass. He zips through the air courtesy of a jetpack, clutching a canister ominously labeled TOP SECRET in his rubber-gloved hands. Despite the lasers streaking through the sky all around him, the mad scientist remains untouched.
"Bye-bye, you bullet-brained boneheads!" he cackles.
Back at the "race," our heroes are still at it. The three mice are neck and neck, until Modo pulls ahead, physically straining to get the lead. He's first to get his boulder past the tree, and in a twinkling, the race is over.
"Yee hah! You did it!" the gray-furred mouse shouts proudly (meaning the praise for his bike).
His bros pull up beside him.
"Eh, the weight of your big behind gives you traction," Throttle retorts, grinning.
"Nope," Modo chuckles, patting his bike’s cowl. "All the credit goes to my sweet darlin’ here."
The sound of wailing sirens and gunfire grabs the mice’s errant attention and puts it smack dab back on the armory. They look up just in time to see Karbunkle disappear over the horizon.
"It's Karbunkle!" Vinnie shouts.
"That depraved deviant?" Modo asks (there! "Depraved deviant"! I told you this show was educational! Look at all the great vocab words!).
"Man, I knew that flatulent felon Limburger would want that gas!" Throttle snaps. One gets the impression that he's very frustrated with himself for letting this happen. He orders his bros to release the boulders, then, with a call of "Let’s Rock...And RIDE!", its a straight shot into Chi-town to try and stop whatever nefarious scheme Limburger’s got in mind.
Zip-pan to Limburger Tower, where our favorite malicious mackerel, Lawrence Limburger, is eagerly awaiting the return of Karbunkle. He's not waiting long (at least, he didn’t seem to be bored) before the mad scientist comes shooting out of the stratosphere and lands on the roof, like a depraved version of Peter Pan.
"Your mission was successful, I trust?" Limburger asks eagerly.
"Gas to the gaseous, your fulsome fragrantness," Karbunkle replies, passing the canister to his plump employer.
Limburger holds the can up proudly.
"Ah, yes, amazing, isn't it?" he asks. "This one little canister contains enough top secret knockout gas to make Chicago sleep for twenty-four hours. All the time I need to gut it."
On a neighboring rooftop, the Biker Mice, who are watching Limburger on a small screen on Throttle's bike, gape in horror.
Limburger pulls on a gas mask and concludes, "So good night, sweet citizens. I do hope you have pleasant dreams. Because by the time you awaken, there will be no more Chicago!"
He chucks the sleep-gas canister over the side of the building.
Limburger guffaws proudly, certain that his scheme will succeed, until he hears the all-too familiar sound of squealing tires. He watches in horror as the Biker Mice tear down the side of the next side-scraper over, racing the canister to the ground. Will they make it in time? Can they make it? I certainly hope so. It’d be a pretty boring episode if everyone was asleep for the next full day. On the other hand, that would make a cool "Elseworlds" story, y’know? What if the Biker Mice didn’t catch the canister, and Chicago was gutted while they were asleep? Hmm... All kinds of things could happ--
Okay, okay! Geez. Back to the story.
Vinnie and Throttle are first to the ground. As the canister comes closer and closer to putting everyone in the city down for a nap, they race through rush-hour traffic, then pull quickly to a stop. Brakes screech, and one assumes that the mice were the recipients of many single-finger gestures that evening. In any case, traffic is effectively stopped, leaving Modo just enough room enough to zip in and catch the sleep-gas canister a second before it strikes the ground.
"Fair catch!" Modo cries, holding up the canister.
"Easy out!" Vinnie cries.
"Game over!" Throttle concludes.
Fair to say they’ve been living in a scoreboard for too long, eh?
Limburger is understandably miffed. He orders his goons to get the canister back from the mice, but naturally, our boys are ready for whatever their Plutarkian playmate can throw at them.
"Time to play hardball," Throttle says coolly just before knocks one goon clean out of his dune buggy with one well-timed punch. The three mice lead their foes through the city streets and into a construction area. Too late, the goons realize that the project is a bridge over a wide river. They are unable to stop in time and fall in, forced to watch soggily as the Biker Mice soar over the river and land on the other side.
"Chalk up another successful saving of the city, bros," Throttle says as the mice ride off into the sunrise (as opposed to the sunset of Westerns), clutching the sleep-gas canister in his hand.
"Ah wonder if we can get a government grant?" Modo says thoughtfully.
Hours later, we find Limburger lamenting his loss in his office. He's sitting at his desk, his head in his hands. A machine gun sits precariously nearby. Heaven help anyone who should come into this room with bad news (this means you, Greasepit).
"So close!" Limburger wails. "I was so close!"
He folds his hands and looks up pleadingly.
"All I want to do is to destroy one single measly paltry little planet! Is that so much to ask?"
Obviously, yes.
Limburger rises to his feet and strolls across the room.
"A city here, a city there…I'm a patient man! It would all add up! But no! Always those blasted Biker Mice bring me down!"
Still sulking, Limburger uses his personal elevator to enter the lower levels of Limburger Tower. He disembarks in Karbunkle’s lab, where the mad scientist is presently pouring a strange blue liquid into the open cranium of his sadomasochistic assistant, Fred the Mutant. When Limburger bellows his name (Karbunkle’s, not Fred’s), the scientist quickly flips the top of Fred’s head down and buckles it shut with a lock before turning to his employer. While they talk (or, at any rate, while Limburger rants), the mutant hiccups as if he's about to throw up.
"I require cheering up," Limburger growls as he strides over to Karbunkle. "Show me something truly....nasty. Something…evil. Something…diabolical. Something that will rid me of those nefarious mice!"
So naturally, at this point, Fred's head explodes. As Karbunkle and Limburger watch (the latter decidedly disgusted), bubbling blue goo shoots out of the mutant's head, covering him from head to toe. Eventually, all that's visible of the little freak are his three eyes, which blink giddily, enraptured by pain.
"Yup," Fred gurgles. "I think you got the formula perfect, doc."
"What are you doing?" Limburger asks, slightly sickened.
"My newest invention, your laughing bovineness," Karbunkle explains. "I call it Toxic Goo!" He cradles a test tube of it in his arms and coos, "All we have to do is spill it anywhere we want, and the land is ruined! Then you just volunteer to clean it up, and you can dig up all you want!"
Limburger grimaces. He puts an arm around his scientist's shoulder and says calmly, "My dear Doctor Karbunkle, allow me to point out the tiny flaw in your reasoning. If the land is ruined, WHY WOULD I WANT IT?!"
The force of Limburger's shouting nearly knocks Karbunkle over, but the scientist is still confident in his invention--particularly because he's already planned for that contingency. He picks up a beaker full of an orange powder (five will get you ten that it's Kool-Aid) and drizzles some over Fred. Within seconds, the blue liquid disappears, and Fred is restored to his normal self.
That feels like an oxymoron…
"Hello Betty!" Fred laughs, clapping his hands. "That was fun! Do it again!"
"Quite brilliant, doctor," Limburger concedes sadly.
"Thank you," Karbunkle replies.
"But useless."
"What?"
Limburger strolls over to Karbunkle's lab table and runs a hand along its edge.
"Those rampaging rodents will simply arrive and ruin everything as they always do," he explains morosely. "Those blasted bikes of theirs are too fast, too powerful, too ingenious. If only I could obtain one and learn its marvelous secrets!"
It is then that Limburger notices that during his little monologue, he knocked over a beaker of the Toxic Goo, spilling it onto one of his large, Mickey Mouse-like gloves. He pulls it off, and is suprised to see that the goo seeped through onto his scaly skin.
A smile slowly creeps across his face.
"That’s the solution!" the felonious flounder says gleefully, tossing his bubbling glove into a wastecan. "We’ll set a trap! A toxic trap!"
The following afternoon finds the Biker Mice relaxing in a secluded Chicago park located alongside a river (or possibly a lake; they never mention the name). Vinnie and Throttle are stretched out on the ground, just watching the clouds go by, while Modo polishes Lil’ Hoss lovingly.
"This is great," Vinnie says with a sigh.
"Even us inter-planetary heroes need a little time off now and then," Throttle agrees.
Modo stops polishing for a moment to admire his work.
"There ya go, Darlin’," he tells the bike with a smile. "Pretty as a one-two punch!"
"Hey, guys!" Charley calls from somewhere off-screen.
Vinnie sits up and gazes at the mechanic, who emerges from the water wearing a skin-tight bathing suit (this is where we get the second gratuitous butt-shot of the series).
"Speaking of knock-outs..." the mouse says with a grin.
Charley squeezes the water from her hair and asks, "You guys comin’ in? The water’s great!"
So naturally, at this point, Fred’s head explodes.
No, actually, a huge waves sweeps up out of the normally placid river and knocks Charley down. The force of it pushes her back to shore, where she and the mice stare up at the source of the wave--a huge barge cutting through the lake/river/whatever’s waters. Bad enough it knocks down our favorite pit princess--it's being piloted by Greasepit!
And yes, female fans of the series should be aware that this intrusion also cancels out any chance of seeing the mice in Speedos in the immediate future. One-two-three: "AWWW!"
"What's that over-lubed lugnut up to?" Modo asks as the mice quickly mount their bikes.
"I don't know, but if Limburger's behind it--" Vinnie snaps.
"--you know it reeks!" Throttle concludes. "Let's ride!"
The mice race off to stop Greasepit (even though they have no idea what he’s up to, which could complicate things considerably). Charley dresses quickly, shouting for the bros to wait up, but trips while pulling on a boot. From the ground, she watches as the mice disappear.
"Oooh! Men!" she grouses, pounding a fist into the dirt. "They’re all rats! Those guys are just more...obvious about it."
Meanwhile, somewhere further down the river, a sinister-looking box sinks slowly into the ground. Karbunkle watches it disappear from a small control panel hidden in the nearby shrubs.
"All is in readiness, Herr Cheesemeister," he says into a small radio. "When the mice show up, they will be riding right into a trap!"
Limburger smiles from a purple helicopter flying just overhead. Fred the Mutant sits in the copilot’s seat (kinda makes you wonder who was behind that Valujet crash a few years back....). Limburger watches as the Biker Mice approach Greasepit's barge.
Below, Vinnie races across a broken bride to the opposite side of the....oh, Hell, I’m just gonna call it a river. That’s what it looks like. Okay, river. He flies across the bride, then takes his position directly across from Throttle, who is on the opposite side of the water. The two mice fire grappling lines into the barge.
"Yo! Yank the tank!" Throttle shouts, shooting forward.
The bikes’ back tires blaze bright orange as the two mice begin pulling as hard as they can on the boat. In an amazing show of power, the tanker stops dead in the water (sending Greasepit right smack into the glass).
"It's workin'! We’re holding it!" Throttle cries.
"Tow the line, sweetheart!" Vinnie grumbles as his bike slides backward slightly.
Greasepit peeks outside the ship’s cabin at his foes.
"So, them mousies wanna play tug of war, huh?" he shouts. "I'll show 'em!"
The goon races to the ship's control panel and increases its speed. It exceeds the power of Throttle and Vinnie's bikes, and abruptly, the two of them find themselves now drug behind the tanker.
"Can't hold it…much…longer!" Throttle groans, digging his heels into the ground.
"This is a real drag!" Vinnie grouses.
This, natch, is Modo’s cue to jump into the fray. He jumps his bike off a hill, parodies a Jimi Hendrix song ("'Scuse me while I burn some sky!"), and lands expertly on the ship’s deck, all within the space of a few seconds (not bad, eh?). Greasepit, not exactly a bastion of elocution himself, mutters, "Hey, it’s that mouse that talks real stoopid-like." He grabs a pistol and runs down to the deck. "I'll give him an enlightenin' education." The goon opens fire on Modo, who quickly jumps off his bike and returns fire. The mouse turns to his bike and says, "Get to safety, Lil' Hoss. Don’t want your paint gettin’ scratched."
Immediately, the bike hides itself behind an oil barrel per its rider's instructions. It then beeps supportively.
Modo and Greasepit continue to exchange fire, with the gray-furred mouse gaining the upper hand as he blasts a drum of oil (possibly grease; I don’t know, but it’s definitely not Toxic Goo, barrels of which fairly litter the ship-sounds suspicious, eh?) right in the goon’s face.
In the mean time, if anybody cares, Throttle and Vinnie are still being drug behind the ship.
Greasepit chases Modo around the ship's cabin, and fires once again. Modo uses his bionic arm to block the shot, which ricochets off it harmlessly.
"Pretty tricky, mousie," Greasepit growls. He levels his pistol at Lil’ Hoss and asks, "But guess where the next one goes? I’m gonna blast your bike!"
That was not, I repeat, not a good idea.
Modo’s single eye blazes bright red.
"YOU LOWDOWN SCUM!" he snarls (complete with reverb).
While what happens exactly is uncertain (I think Modo shoots him, but the animation is kinda ambiguous), the end result is the entire back of the ship being blown to bits, with Greasepit being blown off the tanker. The blast also pops Throttle and Vinnie’s grappling lines free of the ship. All that power they’d been using to hold the ship in place sends them shooting forward at high speed. Both mice quickly lose control and are thrown from their rides.
Owee.
On the ship, Modo kneels beside his ride and asks gently, "You okay, old Hoss?"
The bike beeps urgently. Modo turns and notices the fast-approaching shore. The extremely-fast-approaching shore. The there's-no-time-to-act-extremely-fast-approaching shore.
"Uh oh," Modo whispers.
The ship collides with the beach, breaking the hull wide open. Waves of Toxic Goo spill out onto the shore and all over the formerly gorgeous park (presumably, with a "sloosh"-ing sound).
Throttle and Vinnie, however, are a bit more concerned with the status of their bro than the landscape.
"Big Fella!" Throttle shouts, righting his ride.
"Modo!" Vinnie cries.
The two mice zip quickly over to the side of the ship, out of which Modo stumbles weakly. The mouse is obviously in pain, and barely concious. But why? Well, the impact has obviously done damage of its own, but it's the Toxic Good that has had the most detrimental effect on Modo. His fur is heavily matted with the stuff, and it's obvious that it has sickened him greatly. Modo falls to his knees, then pushes himself up again slowly, trying desperately to get to his bike.
"Modo, get outta that goo!" Throttle shouts, leaping off his own bike and trying to get as close to his bro as possible without actually touching the thick, bubbly blue carpet Modo is presently wading through.
"Hustle, bro! It’s crime slime!" Vinnie adds, panicked.
"But….my bike!" Modo cries.
His strength waning, the gray-furred mouse ignores his bros’ earnest pleas and continues to wobble toward his ride, just a few feet away. He stumbles and falls flat on the ground less than two yards from where Lil’ Hoss lays on its side.
But just before Modo can lay a hand on it, however, a hook appears from the sky and clasps like an eagle’s talons around Lil’ Hoss. To Modo’s horror, his bike is lifted skyward-right into the purple helicopter Limburger happens to be occupying. The weakened mouse moans loudly as it disappears into the whirlybird’s bombay doors.
"Not your bike any longer," The Plutarkian gloats proudly into a microphone. "I believe it is now my bike. And you two are jailed gerbils!"
Too late, Throttle and Vinnie see the walls of the silver box we saw sink into the ground earlier rising around them. It begins to box them in. The two mice scramble quickly to their feet and try to push the last wall down, but are unable to stop it from completely enveloping them.
Inside, one of Vinnie's flares illuminates the darkness. He presses it against one of the walls and tries to melt a hole in it. After a few minutes without so much as the metal blackening, the mouse sighs and pulls back.
"It's no good," Vinnie grumbles, turning the flare off (curiously, there's still abundant light left to see by even once the room's only light source is removed ^^). "It's Plutarkian steel. Man, what a time to be caught without a can-opener!"
"I'm worried about Modo," Throttle interrupts, obviously concerned. "He's not looking too good."
Throttle calls to their gray-furred bro, and is joined by Vinnie.
Modo, looking worse than before, has managed to drag himself out of the goo and into some clean grass. Steam rolls off his fur from the Goo. The mouse is clearly in a haze, not to mention a great deal of pain. Faintly, he can hear his bros shouting for him from the box. The mouse groans and tries to push himself to his feet wearily.
"My bros....my bike....." he moans.
He seems unaware that Limburger’s helicopter is passing right overhead, disappearing toward Chicago, Modo's bike locked up tight in its steel belly. Just as well; he couldn’t really do much about it at this point.
He couldn't really do much about anything at this point.
Which, as it turns out, is extremely disadvantageous for Throttle and Vinnie, as Limburger has just ordered Karbunkle to destroy the two of them. The mad scientist gleefully pulls the single lever before him on his control panel. On a small viewscreen, we can see the outline of the box growing smaller. And that’s what it’s doing in real life, too. The sidewalls are quickly coming together (right now, over me!), moving to smash the mice between them. This is a pretty standard supervillain trap, but hey, sometimes the old methods are the best.
Throttle and Vinnie quickly begin pushing against opposite walls and struggle to stop their progress, but to no avail. The two of them are quickly smashed into one another, despite their best efforts.
"We gotta stop this thing," Throttle groans through gritted teeth, "or we’re gonna be two all-mouse patties--"
"--special sauce--" Vinnie quips.
"--lettuce, cheese--"
"No cheese! No cheese! I hate cheese!"
Modo, dizzy and disoriented, rises weakly to his feet and stumbles on wobbly legs toward the sound of his bros’ desperate cries.
"My.....bros...." he whispers.
"Two more seconds," Karbunkle shrieks giddily as he watches the box shrink, "and it’s fuzzy flapjack time!"
BAM!
One powerful punch from Modo sends Karbunkle flying into a tree. The impact knocks leaves from the tree (and the punch three teeth from Karbunkle’s mouth). The scientist scuttles away quickly as Modo lumbers over to the machine controlling the box and smashes it to bits with his bare hands.
"Nobody....hurts....my.....bros," he whispers, then moans weakly and falls to the ground.
At this point (no, I'm not going to pull that "Fred's head exploded" thing again), Charley arrives on the scene. She sees Modo lying there unconscious, shrieks his name, and sinks to her knees beside him (he looks like a giant in this shot).
"Modo? Modo? Modo, are you alright?" she asks, turning his head slightly in her hands. Modo lets out something not unlike a whimper, then falls silent.
A banging sound comes from inside the box, and suddenly, one side falls away. Throttle and Vinnie pop out quickly. Their jaws drop in horror as they take in the sight of their unconscious bro lying far too still on the ground, barely breathing.
In what is probably the understatement of the year, Charley shouts, "Guys! Modo’s in bad shape!"
Hours later, a still unconscious Modo lies in bed back at the Quigley Field Scoreboard. He moans occasionally, but shows no other signs of life. The gray-furred mouse has been cleaned up, but despite this, he doesn't look that much better. Charley, wearing rubber gloves, wipes his brow while Throttle and Vinnie stand by nervously, waiting for some reassurance that their bro will pull through.
Tossing her stained rag into a nearby trashcan, already fairly over-flowing with them, Charley sighs, "That’s the last of the goo. But he’s still pretty weak."
Suddenly, Modo’s eye snaps open.
"MY BIKE!" he screams, sitting bolt-upright. He's disoriented and clearly not all there. This isn’t unusual--I mean, this is Modo we’re talking about here--but this is worse than usual. Throttle and Vinnie try desperately to hold their bro still, to keep him from hurting himself-and themselves, for that matter. They're barely able to keep him still.
"This is weak?" Vinnie asks.
"He’s delirious! Hold him!" Charley shouts.
But Modo, even in the throes of illness, is still the strongest of the Biker Mice. With one sweep of his arm, he sends Throttle into the bookcase on the other side of the room (the impact knocking books and such off the shelves) and Vinnie flying toward the ceiling.
As luck would have it, it’s Charley who finally gets Modo under control. Ignoring what he just did to his bros, she grabs his face in her hands and forces him to look at her (give the girl credit; she's got guts). Firmly, she half-says, half-shouts, "Modo! Listen to me! It’s gonna be alright. You’re gonna be fine. But you’ve got to rest!"
After a moment, the gray-furred mouse calms down. His bros return to his side as he whispers, "My bike. Limburger’s got my bike."
"We’ll get it back for you, bro," Vinnie says gently.
"Promise?" Modo asks, a slight warble to his voice.
"Biker’s honor," Throttle replies.
Modo clasps both his bros’ wrists in his hands. Throttle pulls out of the grasp, but only so he can clutch Modo's hand himself (this is a touching scene that, for some reason, is missing from the commercial tape version of the episode, and only seems to be in the broadcast version. The weird part is, you can still hear their hands clasping. Your guess is as good as mine why it was removed).
The gray-furred mouse takes one last look at both bros, reassured, then falls back onto his pillow with a groan.
"Poor big lug," Charley says gently, wiping his forehead once again. "What's that reeking fish-face done to you?"
Vinnie, his normal impatient self (and itching to beat the snot out of Limburger for Modo's suffering) turns to Throttle and snaps, "So what’re we waitin’ for? Let’s go dice the big cheese and get Modo’s ride back!"
Throttle shakes his head and replies, "No, Limburger’ll be expecting that. I’m sure he’s got a full squad of wrench-heads on guard. And without Modo....we’ve lost a key player. We gotta bide our time."
From the bed, Modo grumbles, "That stinkin’ cheeseball....better not hurt my bike!"
His bros grin, now certain that Modo is going to be okay.
"Hey, hey, hey, Big Fella," Throttle chuckles. "Your bike can take care of herself!"
Vinnie snickers and adds, "Yeah, one thing for sure; she ain’t bein’ a model prisoner."
Damn straight.
Inside Limburger Tower, Modo's beloved Lil’ Hoss is being anything but cooperative. The bike is doing everything possible to show its displeasure. It charges Karbunkle repeatedly, throwing lab equipment everywhere and coming very close to running the mad scientist and his helpers down on several occasions. When Limburger’s goons try to cast a net over the bike, Lil’ Hoss launches a pair of missiles at them which catch in the net and send them hurtling out the door.
Limburger enters the laboratory and glances at the gigantic holes blasted in the walls and the unconscious goons lying on either side of him.
"Been having difficulties?" he asks casually.
"It’s alive! It's a mad thing, I tell you!" Karbunkle screams. "We can't catch it!"
When it looks as though the bike is about to attack again, the scientist gives a little shriek and hides behind Limburger’s chubby ankles.
"Don't be absurd, my dear doctor--you're simply incompetent!" Limburger chides him. "Letting those wretched rodents escape you--"
Suddenly, the cannons pop out of Lil' Hoss, all pointed right at Limburger and Karbunkle.
"Look out! It's going to attack!" the doctor howls.
"Nonsense!" Limburger replies. "It's merely a machine, reflecting its owner's personality. And that shall be its downfall."
He pulls a small yellow CD from his pocket and slips it into a boom box.
"What I have here is the most odious enemy of all rock and roll enthusiasts--polka music!"
He hits the play button, and immediately, bouncy accordion music pours fourth from its speakers. Lil’ Hoss, like Modo, can’t stand polka, and tries desperately to get away from the irritating sound. But Limburger won't let it get away; he follows the beleaguered bike all around the room, chasing it with the wretched music.
Suddenly, the bike suddenly rears up and blasts the CD player into atoms. But Limburger’s scheme still has the desired effect. The bike is so exhausted that it no longer has the strength to keep going. It tips over, wheels spinning slowly, no longer a threat.
"You see?" the Plutarkian asks proudly. "A little finesse…a little distraction…a little...Lawrence Welk."
Karbunkle smiles and rises to his feet.
"I am deeply awed, your cheesiness," he says, rubbing his hands together (you can here the rubber squeaking). "You are truly moldy to the core."
"It's a gift," Limburger replies, casually tossing a net over the bike. "Something I was hatched with." Limburger's goons quickly take their cue from their boss and begin tying the bike up with chains.
"Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a press conference to attend."
Limburger pauses a second and turns to his doctor.
"Oh, and Karbunkle?"
"Yes, your poly-unsaturatedness?"
"I'll want to start digging immediately. Make sure that there is a sufficient amount of that powder that dissolves the Toxic Goo."
No one notices the way Lil' Hoss's headlight begins blinking and beeping, as if taking in the information for later use.
"You can count on me, your whip-creaminess!" Karbunkle declares proudly.
"Yes," Limburger sighs. "Unfortunately, I have no choice."
Limburger addresses a slew of reporters that afternoon outside his building, unaware that atop a nearby skyscraper, the Biker Mice and Charley are watching him hatefully. Modo is obviously still feeling the effects of the Toxic Goo, but is at least on his feet by this point.
"My fellow citizens," Limburger says from his podium, "as you know, an unexplained toxic spill is even now contaminating one of our fairest waterfront parklands."
"Unexplained, huh?" Throttle asks bitterly.
Vinnie crosses his arms over his chest and mutters, "I’d like to ‘unexplain’ his--"
Charley shushes him and turns her attention back to the podium.
"As you know," the Plutarkian continues, "I have always had... special plans for this city."
"Yeah," Modo grumbles. "To turn it into a giant crater."
"And so, in the interest of the public good, I now volunteer the Limburger Toxic Clean-up Corporation to take care of this tragic spill. Of course, it will require a great deal of expensive digging, but I am prepared to shoulder the cost. It would be a tragedy to put Chicago 'in the hole', as it were."
Cheers rise up from the crowd. They're obviously relieved that they won't have to put their own hard-earned bucks into the effort--and the whole "cleaning up the park" thing is okay, too.
The Biker Mice, however, know the ominous meaning behind Limburger’s faux philanthropy. It’s as clear as the spidery Plutarkian backhoes inching their way toward the park.
"We gotta stop ‘im!" Throttle shouts.
"An’ get my bike back!" Modo cries.
Charley jumps on the back of Vinnie’s bike and says quickly, "I’ve got an idea. But we need that knockout gas. Let’s get back to the Garage, and hurry! Before Chicago’s best park takes a one-way ride to Plutark!"
Later, the mice watch from an alley near Limburger Tower as Greasepit leads his troops toward the park. They can't help but notice that the skyscraper is more heavily guarded than usual.
"Limburger's not taking any chances!" Throttle comments. "I've never seen so many ugly bozos with blasters!"
Modo, still reeling from the Toxic Goo, leans against the side of one building and snaps, "We gotta get my bike! If Karbunkle so much as dings a fender, I’ll--"
"Easy, bro! We'll get it, we'll get it!" Vinnie says quickly. "Charley's got a great plan!"
"It’s a dangerous plan!" Charley snaps, looking up from the modifications she's making to Vinnie's bike.
"That’s why I like it!" Vinnie chirps gleefully.
"Listen up, then," Charley orders him as she draws the mice closer. "I've hooked up the sleep gas canister to this button. Fire it when you get inside."
She points out a new button on Vinnie’s bike connected to the sleep-gas canister, which is mounted near the rear tire.
"Yeah, yeah, get to the good part, sweetheart," the white-furred mouse begs urgently.
"And this," she says, pointing to a new addition to the front of the bike, "is your new super-charger."
"Gettin’ warmer," he coos.
"It’ll give you thirty seconds of super-sonic speed. Got that?"
"Ya-ha-ha!" Vinnie laughs. "Can this girl cook or what?"
Charley angrily snaps, "Listen to me! Thirty seconds. No more. After that--BOOM! The super-charger goes up like a bomb. And if it’s still on the bike, so do you."
With a momentarily serious face, Vinnie mumbles, "Impending catastrophe," then howls happily, "That’s why I LOVE IT!"
"He’s a wild mouse," Modo says, shaking his head.
"How has he lived this long?" Throttle wonders aloud.
"Well, if he takes more than thirty seconds," Charley replies, turning on the super charger's display, "he won’t live much longer."
Inside Karbunkle’s lab, Lil’ Hoss, chained to the floor, bucks madly as the carrot-topped technician inches closer and closer, holding a blowtorch in his hands. But the mad scientist has lost some of his fear of the bike, and approaches it bravely.
"There there, now, just hold still," he assures it. "This won’t hurt a bit. I’m just going to cut you open and look at your brain!"
Not hurt a bit. Riggggght. This guy must’ve been a dentist.
Karbunkle’s just about to begin his vehicle vivisection when an alarm sounds.
"What?" he shouts. "Not again!"
Outside, the multitude of goons on guard barely see Vinnie before he blasts past them, his speed so enhanced by the super-charger that neither Limburger’s flunkies nor the building's automated cannons are unable to draw a bead on him. Lasers strafe the street all around the white-furred wild child, but aren’t fast enough to hit him. Vinnie grins and watches the seconds tick down before him.
"Yeah, baby!" he laughs. "Let's shift into third!"
He presses a button on the super-charger.
The result: a sonic boom knocks the goons off their feet, and destroys the plate-glass windows of Limburger Tower’s ground floor. As precious time ticks away, Vinnie hits the button ejecting the sleep gas, racing all through the Tower to spread it around. Dozens of goons suddenly drop over, as if struck by a sudden fit of narcolepsy. Only Limburger sees the gas in time as it seeps slowly into his office through a vent, and throws on a mask just before he disappears into Karbunkle’s lab.
"Not again!" he snaps as his desk begins sinking into the floor. "Please!"
But time is almost up! By the time Vinnie hits the staircase, less than nine seconds remain on the readout! He shoots up onto the rooftop, pulls to a quick stop, rips the supercharger off, and throws it into the air just in the nick of time.
BOOM!
Charley watches the explosion (suprisingly firework-like) from the ground, and glances at her watch.
"Full second to spare," she says with a grin. "Hardly even exciting."
Oh yeah. I think it's safe to say she’s been hanging around those mice too long.
Now, with Limburger’s goons taken care of, the stage is set for Throttle and Modo to infiltrate the Tower and liberate Lil’ Hoss. They ride in straight through the hole Vinnie made a few moments earlier, past the sleeping goons, and burst into the lab with no difficulty whatsoever.
But their rescue attempt is thwarted. Limburger and Karbunkle are waiting for them, still wearing gas masks, and open fire on the mice. Throttle and Modo leap off Throttle’s bike and dive for cover.
"We’re not exactly in control of this situation, are we?" Throttle says thoughtfully. "Somehow, we gotta find a way to take those creeps out!"
"Not us!" Modo interrupts.
"Whaddaya mean?"
"This ain’t our fight!"
Modo pops up and fires a few blasts from his arm cannon, aimed not at Limburger and Karbunkle, but at the chains holding his beloved bike captive.
"Go get 'em, Lil' Hoss!" he shouts.
The bike charges the two villains eagerly. It knocks both bad guys out the window with an impressive burst of firepower, into the fountain below, most certainly savoring its sweet revenge.
"That's my bike! Can she whip tail or what?" Modo laughs, sitting astride his motorcycle. He pats its crankcase lovingly.
"Yeah, she's the best, but we still gotta do something about Greasepit and that Toxic Goo," Throttle reminds him.
Lil’ Hoss beeps urgently, trying to get both mice’s attention.
"Hey, she’s tryin’ to tell us something!" Modo says quickly.
"Oh, come on…"
"Hey, hey, ah know my bike! Whatcha sayin', darlin'?"
Modo steps off his bike. Throttle watches doubtfully as the bike rolls a few feet away, then shines its headlight on a lab table, illuminating a beaker containing the orange powder which dissolves the goo. Stunned, the leader of the mice picks it up and mutters, under his breath, "Well, I’ll be darned."
Modo smiles from atop his bike.
"Told ya."
The three mice gather outside, ready to put the skids to Limburger’s demolition of the park. But of course, this wouldn’t be an episode of "Biker Mice" if Limburger Tower didn’t collapse, now would it? Hell no! They fire their grappling lines into the Tower (reminiscent of the beginning of this episode) and pull it down behind them. The building falls with a crash--right on top of Limburger and Karbunkle, who were just getting out of the fountain! The Plutarkian holds up his underling as a meek defense against the building's collapse as the edifice collapses over him.
At the park, reporter Tara Diddle is (what else?) reporting on the clean-up effort, just about to get underway. "Tragically," she tells the viewing audience, "this environmentally necessary clean-up will result in the devastation of this beautiful parkland."
Or will it?
The Biker Mice suddenly shoot over the crest of a hill and become airborne. The thrill-seeking threesome dump the Karbunkle's orange powder over the entire park, instantly dissolving the Goo. Not only is the park cleaned up, but the land beneath is untouched! The crowd goes wild--except for the frustrated Greasepit, sitting in one of the spidery backhoes, who pounds a fist into his control panel and howls, "Darn them dang mices!"
Tara Diddle turns back to the camera.
"Ladies and gentlemen, something amazing has just happened," she says happily. "Three mysterious motorcyclists have just caused the toxic spill to…vanish! The park appears to be saved!"
Our heroes watch from a distance.
"So hey, are we good or what?" Throttle asks with a chuckle.
"The best!" Vinnie laughs, as if this should be totally obvious.
Modo pats Lil' Hoss on the crankcase.
"You did good, bike. You did real good," he says with a smile.
With a cry of "Let's rock--AND RIDE!", our heroes ride off into the--well, I guess it’s not sunset yet. How about they ride off into the mid-day sun?
Frustrated, Greasepit starts to step out of the backhoe's cab.
"Blast those hog-ridin' hamsters!" he shouts. "When the Big Cheese finds out about this, they're in for a--FAAAAAAAAAAAAALL!"
As it turns out, the goon is unlucky enough to slip on a small spot of grease left on the floor by his angry thumping of the control panel. He falls right out of his cab and lands smack-dab in a pile of the Goo. Before he can move a muscle, a small cloud of the orange powder falls on him. This time, however, it dissolves not only the goo, but also his overalls (thankfully leaving his boxers intact)! Naturally, as it always does, the media pokes its head in at this hideously embarrassing moment, and a red-cheeked Greasepit is forced to slink away in the harsh glow of the spotlight with his hat between his legs, mortified.
Back at what remains of Limburger Tower, the Big Cheese crawls out of the rubble and dusts himself off, buttoning his coat.
"I am in a bad mood," he grumbles, scanning the debris. "A very bad mood. I need something to cheer me up."
It is then that he notices Karbunkle’s unconscious body lying nearby, facedown in the gravel. His butt, however, is sticking straight up in the air, almost invitingly.
"And I know just what would do it."
Limburger smiles, gets a running head start, and pulls his leg back to punt the doctor square in the ass. The screen fades to black, we hear a thump, and Karbunkle cries out in pain.
I think we both know what happened.
(duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh!)
MY FEELINGS ON THE EPISODE
"A Mouse and His Motorcycle" is entertaining, enlightening, and an all-around good episode. The real star of the episode is Modo's bike, Lil' Hoss, of course. While we see just how close the bond is between Modo and his beloved ride, the really interesting part of the episode is seeing just how intelligent the bike is, and just how great a degree of independence it has. While all three of the Biker Mice's bikes have artificial intelligence, Lil' Hoss definitely has the most personality. Tragically, we don't see more of this bike's independent operation as much as we could in later episodes, although the kinship it feels with Modo and vice-versa is tangible throughout.
This is also a good episode to observe the closeness of the bros to one another. I mentioned the hand-clasping thing earlier, which, as I said, was very touching. Vinnie and Throttle are extremely concerned about Modo when they see he's unconscious, their shock and fear visible on their faces.
The animation is good throughout this episode. I particularly liked the sparkling effect of the falling powder when the mice were sprinkling it all over the park. Some of the comedic effects in this episode, like Fred spinning back to his normal self and Lil' Hoss's cannons sagging from exhaustion were also very cute. Music is typically good, and voice acting is great, particularly on the part of Dorian Harewood, who makes certain that we can hear Modo's pain in his voice.
"A Mouse and His Motorcycle," while not the greatest episode ever, is still very good. Like the rest of the first season episodes, it's available on tape, aptly called "A Mouse and His Motorcycle." The tape also has "Steelfinger," the other major spotlight episode for the gray-furred mouse. If you don't want to buy the tape for "A Mouse and His Motorcycle," then do it for "Steelfinger." 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
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