You've read about in my Oddities section, and maybe you've even seen it somewhere before, but here it is: A complete synopsis of the Puss 'n Boots episode of Captain N: The Game Master! Enjoy!
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The story begins when Kevin (Captain N), his dog, and the Princess decide to go on a picnic with Link and Zelda in Hyrule. I can hardly blame them. I mean, if you really could get zapped through your TV and go live in video game worlds, then who wouldn't go on a picnic with Link and Zelda?
Things go well, until a swarm of gigantic pink fly/wasp things called "Boons" (at least that's what Link calls them) spots their picnic and decides to steal all the food. At one point, they take the whole picnic basket, and even try to carry off the dog! But as Kevin so mildly says, "We're not going to let a few bugs spoil our picnic, now are we, Link?" You see, in Hyrule, getting attacked by insects that are big enough to carry off a dog is a normal thing, so nobody should dare think that this could possibly cause any problems.
Incidentally, I think this episode must hold the record for number of bad puns. This is where we hear bad pun #1: Kevin shoots a Boon that's carried off a chocolate cake. The Boon disappears and drops the cake. Kevin conveniently catches and says, "Heh! PIECE of CAKE!!"
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While our heroes are valiantly zapping and slashing away at these big bugs (all the while yelling lame insults), a couple of strange characters suddenly appear in the bushes. They are a well-dressed pig and jackal named Count Gruemon and Dr. GariGari, respectively. These two were the final bosses of the Puss n Boots game - a couple of bastards that rapidly slide back and forth across the screen, firing bullets so fast that they often kill you as soon as you enter the room, before you even have a chance to do much. In the cartoon, these two have used a flying Time Machine to come to Hyrule to trace a strange power source that they discovered.
Completely unaware of this intrusion, our heroes continue to fight the Boons. But by now, all hell has broken loose and even the Princess and Zelda have gotten in on the act. Zelda uses a bow and arrow to shoot at the flies, and the Princess takes a hint from Super Mario Bros. 2 and throws vegetables at them (compelete with the SMB2 sound effect!) Eventually, one of the Boons steals Link's sword right out of his hand (something I can't imagine happening if it weren't in the script), and what follows is the first truly crazy scene in this episode: Link grabs a tree branch, swings himself around it several times, goes flying through the air, and gives the Boon a Bayou Billy-style jump kick, which destroys it and makes it drop the sword. Why he never does anything cool like that in the games, I don't know. But we all learned from Ocarina of Time that a Swordless Link can do some pretty whacked-out things.
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Not to be outdone, Kevin witnesses Link's moment of acrobatic prowess, and decides he's going to do something even crazier. He wants to prove he can defeat a Boon without his weapon, too, so he takes off his belt, which contains his magical "Power Pad" and "Zapper Gun", and runs after the Boon that's carrying the picnic basket. Why he had to take the belt off to do this, I'll never understand. Couldn't he have just put his Zapper in the holster, and said, "Watch, I'll do this without using it?" But, no, that isn't how things are destined to work out. So, even without his Power Pad, Kevin makes an impossibly high leap in the air and tries to kick the Boon, but instead plants his foot directly into the picnic basket. What ensues is a Wile E. Coyote-caliber scene of Kevin flailing his arms wildly in the air a few moments, and then only falling once he looks down. This is probably the single most hilarious moment involving Kevin in the whole Captain N series, considering that the show at least tried to take that character seriously most of the time.
If that isn't crazy enough for you, when Kevin lands on the ground, somehow the picnic basket is dislodged from his foot and ends up on his head! The dog walks over and lifts the basket up with his nose, and proceeds to lick something that looks like mayonaisse off his face. As if trying to save face Kevin says, "Eh...I guess I'm a little rusty." Depends on what you were trying to do, Kev. If that was supposed to be a Wile E. Coyote impression, you get a 9.5 from me.
While this little comedic routine has been going on, Count Gruemon, who is still hiding in the bushes, takes the oppurtunity to nab Kevin's belt, which he had thrown on the ground, earlier. Apparently, this is the "power source" that he and Dr. GariGari had traced to Hyrule, and he wants to use it to help power his Time Machine. Kevin notices the pig taking off with his belt, but only too late. Count Gruemon hops into the Time Machine and it takes off. It's actually pretty cool-looking and its wings make an unusual noise when it flies. I think it may have been based on these airplanes that are in the Puss n Boots game. Kind of looks like it.
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As the machine takes off, it kicks up quite a wind, and for a brief moment, Zelda appears to have lost her pants. No, I'm not kidding. Look at the photo above on the right and judge for yourself.
Anyway, the machine flies off into the woods, dives into a huge hole, and vanishes. Our heroes run over to investigate and discover that a huge warp zone exists inside the hole. Kevin, Link, and Duke they're going in, and so begins one long acid trip of an adventure.
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The warp takes them to a town that resembles something out of the Wild West. Kevin enters a saloon and walks up to a huge guy sitting at a table and asks, "I know this sounds weird, but...have you seen any animals dressed in clothes?" I have to wonder what would inspire Kevin to word his question in that exact manner. I think I probably would've been a little more specific, like ask if anyone saw a bug-eyed flying machine with strange-sounding wings, or a dude who looked like an overbloated pig in a suit. "Animals dressed in clothes" isn't even all that weird a thing in the real world. I have pictures of my dog dressed in clothes. So, I would think it would be even less weirder in video game worlds where flies are as big as bobcats, eggplants talk, and people can leap 50 feet in the air.
Anyway, the large man stands up and turns around and it's revealed that he's actually a bull. (It's not as though you couldn't see the horns before he turned around!) He grabs Kevin by his shirt and mutters, "Are you calling me weird, human?" But before Kevin gets a chance to try to talk his way out of this one, a cat sitting at the same table convinces the bull to put Kevin down. And this cat is none other than....
PERO THE CAT!!
Yes, Pero! The hero of the Puss n Boots NES game! Pero is probably the coolest character to ever appear in Captain N. When I first saw this episode years ago, I never heard of the Puss n Boots game, so I didn't know who Pero was. But I didn't care. All I cared about was that Pero was a smooth-talking cat who automatically gets a new set of clothes whenever he warps into a new world. And he also had the same voice actor as Goku on Dragon Ball Z. What more could you possibly want?
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While Pero negotiates with the bull for a map that he needs, a pitchfork lands in the middle of the table, followed by a gritty voice saying, "Give up, Pero. Your 9 lives are numbered!" (I'll refrain from doing a joke about how redundant that is.) The scene cuts over to the door of the saloon, and we see two cats, a small skinny one, and taller, fat one. From this point out, these two are going to officially provide the comic relief (probably because King Hippo and the Eggplant Wizard weren't in this episode.)
Pero takes a boomerang and throws it at the cats, but it misses. (Yes, Pero has a boomerang weapon in the Puss n Boots game.) The fat dopey cat taunts Pero for missing, and then lassos him with a rope. Pero begs Kevin for help, and makes bad pun #2, "You've gotta help me! I'm at my ROPE'S END!!"
Kevin decides to help Pero, but forgets that he no longer has his Zapper. The skinny cat tells Kevin, "Let's see you slap leather", and in another moment of Looney Tunes-hilarity, Kevin makes his hand in the shape of a gun for a brief moment, before he realizes he's acting like a moron. The skinny cat pulls out a slingshot and Kevin goes screaming in horror across the room. He trips over several things along the way, and ultimately, a table lands on top of him. He then mutters, "Somehow, things just aren't the same without my Zapper and Power Pad..." Brilliant revelation!! I guess this is what happens when you choose someone for a hero whose only requirement was that he was "really good at videogames".
But Link saves the day by swinging from a rope off a chandelier for an impossibly long time. He grabs Kevin and Pero and crashes through a window, landing in a hay wagon that just happens to be parked outside the window. The wagon's horse is startled and takes off. The two villain cats are unable to catch up, and the skinny one gets pissed off, throws his hat down, and starts stomping up and down on it. Characters in cartoons tend to do stuff like that all the time. Can you imagine if people in real life stomped up and down on their hats when they got mad? When he's done throwing his temper tantrum, the skinny cat says, "I hope the boss doesn't get upset that we let that durn cat get away!" I don't know about you, but I think that anybody who can use the word "durn" in a sentence can't be all bad. At this point, the two cats look up to see the Time Machine flying overheard, so I guess we now know who their "boss" is.
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Meanwhile, our heroes are still traveling across the countryside in the wagon. It turns out that Kevin and Pero have a common enemy in Count Gruemon. Gruemon hates Pero because he once saved a "poor, defenseless mouse" from his hench-cats. So, Gruemon sent Pero spinning through time, and now he's trying to find his way back home. The map that he had gotten from the bull earlier happens to be a map showing all the Time Warps in Pero's world. Kevin agrees to help Pero find his way home so long as Pero helps get the Power Pad and Zapper back. Kevin stresses that he needs to get it back ASAP, because if Gruemon uses up all its power, he could lose it forever. (Umm...can't it be recharged??)
Just as the deal is made, a bomb falls from the sky and lands near the wagon. The Time Machine has appeared overhead, with the two hench-cats hanging from it by ropes. The dopey fat cat remarks that it wasn't their fault Pero got away since he had help from the humans. Count Gruemon recognizes them as the people he stole the Power Pad from and orders Dr. GariGari to drop more bombs on them.
"All this because of a mouse?!", yells Link. And Pero's reply is bad pun #3, "That, and the fact that I love BACON BURGERS!!"
So the horse and wagon take off, trying desperately to outrun the bombs. Pero instructs Kevin to steer into a nearby forest, where the first Time Warp happens to be located. They immediately find the Time Warp upon entering the forest, and everyone leaps into it. It's kind of funny how they leap. They all just seem to go flying through the air like those people in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
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The Time Warps plops our heroes right down in the middle of a pirate ship, commandeered by a crew of weasels and a snake named (bad pun #4) Captain Long John Slither! Just thought I'd mentiond Slither has this cool little pirate's hook on the end of his tail. Anyway, Slither demands to know who these people are and threatens to make them "walk the plank". Pero holds up the map and explains that they are "poor lost souls in search of treasure on Skull Island". Slither buys this story and commands his crew to set sail for Skull Island.
All the while Dr. GariGari has been using a "Time Scanner" to track our heroes, so he and Count Gruemon warp the Time Machine to the Pirate Ship's location. Gruemon sends his hench-cats down to the pirate, but not before making bad pun #5, "If you mess up this time, you're FISH FOOD!!" (Okay, that one wasn't quite as bad as some of the others.) The two hench-cats land in conveniently-placed barrels. One of them takes a bar of soap and throws it on the floor in front of Captain Slither, and he slides across the desk uncontrollably on it. Slither lands face-first in a cannon and is helped out by his crew members. He then demands to know who caused him to slip. (Why would he automatically assume it was someone else's fault that he slipped across the deck??) The two hench-cats, donning weasel masks, accuse Kevin and crew of causing the trouble, and Slither readily believes them. He threatens to make them walk the plank (again) and to keep their map.
But Pero has other plans. He grabs a rope and swings over to Slither, nabbing the map along the way. And, at this point, I should point out that a really rockin' guitar version of the Puss n Boots "Game Over" Theme starts playing in the background. Pero climbs up the rigging to the mast, as Slither and two weasels follow. But Pero cuts part of the mast off, and the villains fall overboard.
ON TO PART 2!
BACK TO MAIN
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