This week on Boomb Tube, Ultimate Spider-Man shows that his kung-fu is better than yours and the Teen Titans GO! on a Girl’s and Boy’s Night out.
On Ultimate Spider-Man, Iron Fist is taken away by some monks and Peter decides to go and find him. He does some detective work and says the following line out loud and with no sense of irony: “RAND INDUSTRIES…. THAT’S FUNNY… DANNY LAST’S NAME IS ALSO RAND… THERE MUST BE A CONNECTION.” Anyway, Spidey decides to follow Iron Fist and hops on to the limousine K’un-L’un sent. It’s a little odd they’d send one considering the city’s repeatedly stated distaste for the worldly. Assumedly that distaste does not confront with K’un-L’un’s need to be baller as all hell. Arriving at K’un-L’un via car, Spidey learns that Danny had to be called back to K’un-L’un, which is so annoying to type so we’re replacing K’un-L’un with Karate City, so he could be crowned its king. Iron Fist reveals that long ago he was a wayward teenager so he ran away from home and showed up at Karate City where they decided to crown him king because his surfer accent was just so boss. Karate City works in mysterious, limousine-related, ways.
It turns out that a surfer accent isn’t all that’s needed to win the crown. Iron Fist must fight Scorpion, the classic Spider-Man villain who has been adapted here as a color swap of the Mortal Kombat character of the same name. In spite of everything I’ve said about “Ultimate Spider-Man”, I have said that they are pretty ballsy when it comes to adapting villains who aren’t made of bees. Unfortunately, Scorpion blinds Iron Fist before the tournament because he’s a real big fan of the “Civil War” era of Daredevil. Iron Fist chooses Spider-Man to replace him as his champion, because pulling out Fat Cobra out of left field would have made this show too awesome to exist. Spider-Man and Scorpion duke it out by doing generic kung-fu stuff until Scorpion wins by screaming “GET OVER HERE!” and ripping out Spider-Man’s spine. Probably. I fell alseep during that part. Anyway, the crown for Karate City is actually awarded to Iron Fist because his influence made Spider-Man such a chill dude to be around and maybe, just maybe, having Karate City exert its influence a little could make the world a better place. Truer words have never been spoken, and these ones are spoken by George Takei: a man who isn’t just a great fit as mayor of Karate City, but a man who has proven he will never turn down a role so long as he can be in a cartoon. Truly awe-inspiring stuff.
Final Verdict: 7.4 – Honestly? A pretty fun episode!
Over on Teen Titans Go!, the boys feel like they have earned the right to go relax on a boy’s night out despite the fact that they’ve done superheroic stuff like maybe once since the series started. Starfire wants to join but Robin, Beast Boy, and Cyborg put on their fedoras and say no. It’s during this sequence that Beast Boy uses the word “swag” which is the first recorded use of the word by a superhero so congratulations on breaking that record, Teen Ttians Go! Later, they literally put on their fedoras when they see a hat shop and what follows is a psychedelic, almost indescribable sequence, called the “Hat Party.” It’s beautiful. After that, they have a “Crazy Fries Party.” Also beautiful.
Meanwhile, Starfire drags Raven along to have a night of crazy fun in spite of the boys. They accomplish this by breaeking Jinx out of prison and going on a wild bumper car race across Go City; during which, it’s revealed that Batman and Commissioner Gordon are sitting in a car on a boy’s night out of their own and won’t be bothered with stopping the dangerous drivers. Truly beautiful. Eventually the girls get arrested after a seven-star Grand Theft Auto chase, but Starfire just blasts them out of prison and they do it all over again. They stop by the boys to make fun of them for not having as crazy night as they and the boys don’t care because they’re just so awesome too. Honestly, this episode was magnificent in its levels of just not caring and was an incredibly fun watch.
Final Verdict: 8.2 – Utterly insane, but a beautiful insane.
