Flight Troubles/Commentary

Ello, I'm Brandon 10! I'm the writer and artist for the series, Brandon 10.

Today, I will be doing a little review/commentary for the episode, Flight Troubles.

The episode starts with Brandon fighting the Creator with Beastie. I dunno, something about this scene is just good. Like this is what Brandon 10 (Original Series) should be. An original villain against an original alien, Coco is there, they hit the lab and talk to Computer... It's like wow. This is great stuff. And then the Mutater attacks afterwards, uh- so good. This is good stuff. I'm saying it like eating some good pasta. Like you've been eating pasta for the past two weeks, it tastes the same kinda. Dry on day, regular stuff the next then you come across this with good cooking and good taste. What I'm trying to say is the opening to this episode is some good pasta. I'm hungry now.

Anyways, Brandon is trying to get right back out there even though he's pretty exhausted but Coco does the best friend thing and uh- well, I was gonna say talk to him about slowing down before he hurts himself out there but, nope, he just hands him a pair of tickets and sends him to the airport without him knowing. These guys are ten/eleven years old too. I guess when you write a four season long series about two kids with the power to go where ever and transform into aliens, you forget about limitations. And in the next episode, Brandon reads the paper and ponders on buying a sailboat. ...Yeah, that's an old one.

I guess the age thing is addressed in the episode with the bag check lady asking if he's too young but I think that was just for the joke. That moment when you address a potentially serious issue with a joke.

Okay, I'm really starting to like this episode. The awesome pasta taste at the beginning was just the start. Of course, with time, the taste will die down as you continue eating through the meal and it becomes the new normal for the time being. But then when you're getting close to the middle or around the middle of the meal, you think to yourself "Man, this is some good pasta. Like I'm really enjoying this meal." This episode is good pasta and here's why. Well, for starters, it's so crisp and I'm not talking about food metaphors, I mean compared to older works, it looks a lot more refined, less spelling errors, more organization and it's just written better than the older ones. Like so much better. Now we come to reason why this episode is so good, so far. Coco arrives at the park where the Mutator is attacking except the Mutator isn't just attacking, he's announcing his soon-to-be take over to the public. Coco interjects and is attacked by a wave of Mutant Squirrels. Squirrels, of all things! This is great. I'm having a blast right now. Squirrels are great, villainous monologuing on a grander scale. It's a good meal, it's a good pasta.

Back over to Brandon, loving the flips too between fighting the Mutator and dealing with airport troubles (you can already see where the name of the episode comes from). It goes through the whole metal detecter gag because he's wearing a watch and can't take it off. It's a good gag, I mean I wrote it so I may be a little bias but it's not like I invented it. Cartoon Network even did some airport promos because summer vacation, I think, and the Ben 10 one was like this exact same scene except Brandon turned into Rath and scared the guard into letting him pass. I may have been inspired by that. If not, good on me.

Back in the park, Four Arms is seen fighting off the Mutant Squirrels which might actually be pretty amusing to see. Just squirrels taking on Four Arms and winning at that. Although, these are Mutant Squirrels so they might be larger and definitely deadly. I guess I thought it would be like those small dinosaurs from Jurassic Park III but now I'm imaging him fighting actual raptors in squirrel suits. They're called Compsognathus, by the way, the small dinos. We call 'em Compys for short.

Now we're on the plane, it's like a journey haha. Everything is fine until we see a figure watching the plane from a distance. Because something needs to happen, it wouldn't be that interesting if it was "Would you like the chips or the peanuts" and then swap over to Mutant Squrriels taking over the city. Note to self, think about doing something involving squirrels taking over a city.

Back in the park again, the Squirrels take the defeated Coco and shove him in a tree like an acorn. He's a kid and I'm sure they fit in the tree holes. I guess showing Coco off to the public is a sign of power as the Mutator asks for their surrender and the citizens agree sadly. This brings up a point which might be the one complaint I have to make to the waiter which ruins the mood of the pasta. It's still good but could this one thing ruin the meal? Find out on next week on Brandon 10 C(ommentary). But seriously, if Coco transformed into Four Arms and was defeated, transforming back into Coco, then put up for display... in a tree, then wouldn't the people realize that Four Arms was Coco? He even interrupted the Mutater when he was addressing the public and transformed right then and there. Maybe I wasn't thinking about that, it feels like a nitpick but I dunno, that kinda of stuff could change the course of an entire franchise. Imagine if everyone found out Brandon could transform into aliens and he had to travel the world to appease his fans and deal with the backlash of the media in the same instant. If only there was a series out there like that. But enough wishful thinking, back to the commentary we go.

Coco claims that the tree is not a severe punishment because y'know it's just a tree. But if splinters weren't something to worry about, or maybe a rogue woodpecker, the tree is actually a Mutant Machine in disguise. It transforms too. Mutant Machine, roll out. I think that's cool, this guy is crazy enough to make his Mutant Machine look like a tree because his army is made up of squirrels. Would be great if there were Acorn explosives like Green Goblin's pumpkin bombs.

Meanwhile in the Plane of Air, Brandon continues his normal flight plans in peace when suddenly a flight attendant arrives in front of him. And yeah the snack scenario kinda ended up happening anyways but one quick look outside shows a figure on the wing of the plane. Cue the scene from the Twight Zone Movie.

Now the plane is under attack and stuff is getting sucked out. Brandon then quickly reacts and transforms into Slime Shot despite wanting Ro-Warasaur. Again, probably a good thing too because I'm not even sure if a plane could support Ro-Warasaur's weight and you also have to take size into consideration. He would probably make more a disaster than what was actually happening. Slime Shot uses himself to close the gap but the alien bird thing, I don't think I ever really explained who or what it was in the episode, starts poking holes in him. So he defeats him and they use broken seats and stuff to cover the hole. Safe for now but uh oh, the pilot is injured. Time to let a kid in the cockpit. This is what I meant earlier about limitations. Sometimes you just forget you're writing about a kid. But I guess, it could add the situation. You've got a bunch of freaked out adults worrying about their well being in an unstable plane with some type of alien attacking them. Brandon goes through this sort of thing all the time. Well, the alien part anyways so I guess it would make sense that he's not as freaked out as everyone else. Oh and the plane is about to crash so there's that.

Back in the park, Coco is resisting the effects of the Mutant Machine. I don't know how but he is. Maybe it's will power, maybe he has a lot of will power and that can stop biological attacks. Or logically, he could be lowered in the Mutating part of the machine and just attempt stop himself from getting any lower. I was going to make a metaphor about stopping yourself from being taken somewhere but- eh, let's just say it's poor timing especially when commenting about it on a episode like this. This scene is kinda short, I guess it just serves as "Here's Coco, we didn't forget about him, he's still being in the Mutant Machine, trying not to get Mutated... by the Mutater."

Brandon's efforts to steer the plane upwards isn't very effective and I would think so considering he's never flown a plane before and is a ten year old. The closest thing to piloting for him would probably be a simulator. Actually, there was the space episode but I'm not sure if he was the pilot... just checked and I'm still not sure. Back to the episode, the Omnitrix finally recharges and Brandon transforms into Four Arms to lift the steering wheel with enhanced strength which actually works and the plane veers upwards. And now for the cool little tie-in, the plane actually flies over the park and destroys the Mutater's Machine in the process. It also takes Coco with it so that's cool and convient. I guess the machine was giving the Mutater his power that made everyone terrorified of him because now the police are here and they're sending him to prison. This might actually be the last time we see the Mutater. I guess he wasn't released for good behavior then.

Brandon transforms back into himself and looses control of the plane again. Coco finds a way inside and Brandon gets the idea to have Coco become Upgrade, since his Omnitrix was charged at the time being. The Upgraded Plane then flies all around, dropping off the passengers. So yeah, good idea with Upgrade. Then the scene cuts to later on where Brandon and Coco are seen on a beach. It's supposed to make you think they're both on vacation but it turns out they just crashed the plane on a deserted island and they're waiting to get Upgrade again to take them home. Or maybe they'll swim. I'm assuming their home is pretty far away from a deserted island, doesn't matter how fast you can swim, a long swim is still a long swim.

So that's the episode. What did I think? Like I said earlier, it's good pasta. It was lingering for a bit near the end but, overall, it's a good episode. At least, in my books. It's a good episode for the Original Series, anyways.

Thanks for checking out this commentary and I'll see you guys later.

It's time for an Ultimate Hero! 21:38, April 19, 2017 (UTC)