Well,
I don't have a whole lot of time to spend writing today's piece, and I almost
considered not doing one at all...but since I'm near the end of A POP CULTURE ADDICT'S ADVENT CALENDAR, I figure I can't very well
abandon it now.
So,
this is Day #21's entry.
And, I'm going to begin this article by telling you a personal story and
linking it to the main subject of this piece.
Don't
worry...the personal story is quite funny, and nobody got hurt. I may have been very embarrassed, but nobody
got hurt.
Now,
there are a couple of things that you need to know before I go ahead with this
story.
First,
the legal drinking age in Ontario, Canada (where I am from) is nineteen. It has been nineteen for as long as I can
remember, anyway.
And
second...I was a very naive, very STUPID ten-year-old who believed everything
that anybody told me. I have since fine
tuned my internal lie detector inside my brain, but I feel you all should be
aware of this fact just so it makes sense.
So,
this story takes place during Christmas 1991.
I was ten, and my next oldest sibling was my then 19-year-old
sister. I happened to come downstairs
to the family living room where the Christmas tree and presents were located,
and I noticed that she was drinking some sort of beverage inside of a small
glass.
Being
the curious sort that I was back at the age of ten, I asked her what she was
drinking. And to be honest with you, I
probably should have noticed the wheels turning inside of her head, and I
should have been a lot smarter than I was back then, but little did I know at
the time that she was planning a rather horrifying but clever trick on me.
She
informed me that what she was drinking was chocolate milk from Germany. And right off the bat I should have been
skeptical since no dairy product could survive a trip across the Atlantic Ocean
without being properly refrigerated.
But unfortunately, my love for chocolate milk trumped all, and I asked
her if I could have some.
Oh,
she smirked at me and did her best to keep from laughing as she served me a
glass of "German Chocolate Milk", knowing that Mom and Dad were out
Christmas shopping at the time and that was how she could get away with the
prank she was going to play on me.
For
what it was worth, the "chocolate milk" wasn't that bad tasting. It sure didn't taste like any chocolate milk
that I ever had before, but it didn't make me throw up or anything. I quite liked it. In fact, I believe I asked for another glass of it, it tasted so
good.
Well,
it was at that moment that my sister had to confess her little trick before it
had gotten out of hand.
You
see, what I was drinking wasn't chocolate milk from Germany.
What
I was drinking was a cocktail made from Kahlua...which happens to be a very
alcoholic drink.
Yes,
you read it here first. At the age of
10, my sister tried to get me plastered.
Luckily her conscience kicked in before things went too far, but
needless to say, I wasn't very impressed - even if it DID taste great.
Fortunately,
we all laugh about it now. And, frankly,
this was all done in the safety of our own home. Besides, it wasn't as though things went very far anyway.
So,
how does this link to today's blog topic?
Simple. The idea is to be
responsible no matter what.
I
mean, obviously, you shouldn't give cocktails to a ten year old unless it
happens to be a Shirley Temple, or a fruit punch that hasn't been spiked.
In
all seriousness though, there's a good possibility that many of you will be
going out to Christmas and New Years Eve parties over the holidays, and chances
are that you will be enjoying a couple of cold beers, a glass or two of egg
nog, some champagne for a toast, or some really wacky alcoholic beverage that
consists of creme de menthe, Dr. Pepper, and a candy cane for garnish that can
only be served during the holidays.
(Hey,
that last one could happen.)
It's
okay to indulge a little bit during the holiday season. We all do it. What's NOT okay is to indulge and put other people's lives as
risk. Drunk driving is still a factor
in many fatal car accidents, and as far as I am concerned, there's no excuse
why anyone should be behind the wheel while intoxicated. Zero tolerance.
So,
what can you do to ensure that you still have a good time, and are alive to
remember it?
Well,
here's some tips.
1. Space out alcoholic beverages with
water. It dilutes the alcohol and makes
it slower for the alcohol to take effect.
2. Have taxi cab fare on hand for people who
need it. Whether you call the good old
cab company or Uber it, if you've had too much to drink, you'd better call a
cab.
3. Take the bus. Some cities have bus service that run late - some as late as one
o'clock in the morning. Definitely take
advantage of it if you want.
4. Prepare guest rooms. This comes in handy if your guests live a
considerable distance away. Better to
have peace of mind knowing that they're sleeping in your home rather than
having them die while on the way to theirs.
Let's
all work together to make sure that all our holidays are safe and happy ones.
So,
this is it. We're down to the final
stretch of holiday fun. At last check,
this is Day #20 in A POP CULTURE ADDICT'S ADVENT CALENDAR, and all I have to say is
that if you haven't finished your holiday shopping (or even started your
holiday shopping for that matter), you'd best hurry up. There's only a few precious days left.
You
also may want to bring along a compass and Band-Aids...in case you get lost or
injured at the mall. Believe me, if I
didn't work in retail, you can bet your bottom dollar that I would not be
anywhere near a mall the last week before Christmas!
Fear
not though. I am here to help with
another cool gift idea for you to consider.
And as luck would have it, it happens to be tied to today's theme!
I'm
sure everybody has heard of Mr. Sketch markers, right? They're those felt tip markers that are in
bright colours, smell like fruit, and seem to last several years?
(No
kidding. I got a set for a birthday
gift when I was ten, and I was still using them at 16. Definitely a good quality product, believe
me.)
Well,
during the holiday season, Mr. Sketch came out with a special 6-pack of scented
markers that each have a different holiday scent to them. Have a look!
Now,
my only regret is that I can't let you smell these markers yourself. I don't think the Internet provides
"Smell-O-Vision" just yet.
But I can assure you that all six scents definitely remind me of the
holidays.
In
fact, that's what I've decided to make this post all about. Smells that remind you of the holidays.
Of
course, I'll be talking about all six scents that these markers release, but I
think there are other holiday scents that Mr. Sketch may have not thought about
and therefore I'll be adding my own suggestions along with the colour that I
think would work best.
The
first marker in the package is red, and according to the legend, the red marker emits
a candy cane scent. Certainly, this one
is one that I can get behind. In fact,
of the six colours that are in this package, the red is my favourite. Now, candy canes are one of those things
that are quite optional. Some people
love putting them on their trees as decorations, while others just don't
bother. I'll admit that I used to use
candy canes, but by the time Christmas came, we'd have maybe two out of 24
canes still on the tree because we all ate the other 22. Still, there's nothing quite like the scent
of a peppermint candy cane, and while I suppose the scent is the same as a
package of Doublemint gum, the smell and taste of a candy cane absolutely reminds
me that Christmas is coming.
(SAFETY WARNING: Do NOT
eat Mr. Sketch markers.)
The
next colour in the mix is kind of a light yellow colour...almost beige. But there's a good reason for that. Do you maybe notice that the colour of the
marker is almost the same colour as cookie dough? That's because the marker has a sugar cookie scent. And really, what's Christmas without
cookies? Why else do you think I used
cookies as the theme for this year's advent calendar? Cookies that are baking in the oven are admittedly a common smell
during the holidays. I think my mother
bakes enough cookies during the month of December to keep every bakery in town
stocked up...until Christmas 2018. For
what it's worth, I love the scent of this marker...but since yellow is not my
favourite colour, this marker doesn't really get used a lot.
Next
up is a dark green colour, and gee...I can't imagine what Christmas
item you could find that is dark green in colour...except for maybe the
centerpiece of any Christmas celebration.
Yes, the green marker is supposed to represent pine needles...but
instead, I think the good people at Mr. Sketch used too much scented stuff in
the marker because instead of smelling like pine needles, it smells more like
Pine-Sol. But you can't argue the logic
of having pine needles as the quintessential holiday scent. Back in the days when my family used real
Christmas trees, it truly was the sign that Christmas was here...the smell of a
freshly cut pine tree. Now that I use
artificial trees, that Christmas joy seems to be slightly less magical. But I suppose that if I really wanted to
recapture that authenticity, I could either buy pine scented Febreze or hang up
a dozen of those car air fresheners on the tree itself.
The
purple marker is perhaps one of the most confusing of all, because it's scent
represents something that I completely had no idea even existed. But according to the marker legend, it
represents sugar plums. You know, sugar
plums? The things that the kids dream
about in "Twas The Night Before Christmas"? Apparently, they really do exist. They aren't really plums, but they kind of look like purple
jujubes sprinkled in sugar crystals.
I've actually never seen one, let alone eaten one, so I have no idea if
the marker is accurate in their scent.
But, it's a pleasant enough smell.
I imagine the Sugar Plum Fairy in the Nutcracker smelling just as
sweet...well, if she were real, that is.
In
this package, there's also a brown marker, and the only brown things that I can
think of that could also be the colours of Christmas stuff are yule logs and
gingerbread houses. And, well...in this
case, they went with gingerbread. Now,
I have to say, I am not the biggest gingerbread fan in the world. I could maybe bite the head off of a gingerbread
man and that would satisfy my gingerbread craving all year long. But when it comes to the smell of
gingerbread, I absolutely love it.
Gingerbread baking in an oven is like the most perfect Christmas smell
ever. And, even though I may not like
eating gingerbread, I do love decorating gingerbread houses.
I
wish I could say the same about the final marker in the bunch. Whoever decided to make a scent that smelled
like chimney smoke must have been out of their minds at the time, but yet,
that's exactly what the dark gray marker smells like. Chimney smoke. Seriously, I made the mistake of smelling this one first, and it
totally made me gag. But, I suppose
that with Santa Claus sliding his way down at least a billion chimneys every
Christmas Eve, I suppose it's only natural that his velvet red suit gets coated
in soot. I imagine his dry cleaning
bills must be horrendous!
So,
those were the six scents that the people at Mr. Sketch chose. Now I will add six scents and colours of my
own to make this one a twelve pack. I
think I can do it.
1.
Orange = Pumpkin Pie
(More
of a Thanksgiving themed scent, but then again, it is the holiday edition.)
2.
Light Brown = Hot Chocolate
(Whenever I came inside to warm up, hot chocolate was my go-to drink. And besides...how can you screw up the smell
of chocolate?)
3.
Light Orange = Stuffing
(And I don't mean Stove Top either...I mean the stuff you bake from scratch!)
4.
Yellow = Egg Nog
(I may hate the taste of egg nog, but I do love the smell.)
5.
Periwinkle = Winter Scented Candle
(Okay, so I'm cheating with this one...I just wanted an excuse to have a blue
marker.)
6.
Pink = Honey Glazed Ham
(Seriously, imagine having a ham scented marker. It was either that or baked beans, and personally, I think ham
makes a better colour.)
Welcome
to Day #19 of A POP CULTURE ADDICT'S ADVENT CALENDAR! I trust that all of you have been enjoying the month-long feature
so far. I really hope you are. I love doing these holiday themed blogs
every year, and I find that the closer we get to the end, the more excited I am
for the holidays.
And
believe me, this year has been a challenge to get into the holiday spirit.
Now,
as I mentioned before, different people celebrate different holidays during the
month of December. For people who
celebrate Christmas, it is just six short days away. For those who celebrate Kwanzaa, I think it starts the 26th. And for those of you who celebrated
Hanukkah, I hope it was a great eight days, as your celebrations wrapped up on
the fourteenth.
In
fact, regardless of what you celebrate, I hope you celebrate it in style.
You
know, when it comes down to holidays, and I use Christmas as an example since
that's the holiday that I have grown up celebrating my whole life, there are
certainly modern traditions that we follow.
We exchange presents, we listen to Christmas music, and we sit by the
fireplaces looking to see what is in our stockings. But there's also a religious background to the holiday as well,
and for a lot of families, part of the Christmas tradition is going to church
on Christmas Eve night and singing traditional Christmas hymns and talking
about how Baby Jesus was born in the manger all those years ago.
In
many ways, Christmas Eve mass is one of the few activities that one can
participate in that really allow people to have as authentic of a Christmas as
they can, and while it may not be necessary for all families (my family was
never really the churchgoing type), I do respect those who have attended
Christmas Eve mass and have made it a part of their daily tradition. After all, some of those services in
traditional churches can be quite lovely.
But
have you heard of these so-called "megachurches"? I don't think we have too many of those in
Canada, but in the United States and some other foreign countries, they've
built churches that are almost the size of arenas and can hold thousands of
worshippers. To be honest with you, I
don't agree with that. I'm not that
religious of a person, but I think that megachurches kind of defeat the purpose
of why people go to church in the first place, which I think for most is
because they want to have a personal connection to God. It's kind of hard to have that connection
when you are in a situation that feels like you're about to watch the Super
Bowl instead of a sermon from a pastor.
Now,
imagine if your church that you and your family have attended for generations
was bulldozed to the ground and replaced with a megachurch. Would you still attend, or would you feel
very uncomfortable?
Well,
for little Lisa Simpson, she found herself in a similar position on one episode
of "The Simpsons", and it is this episode that happens to be the
subject of the nineteenth entry in this advent calendar.
It's
an episode entitled "She Of Little Faith", and it originally
aired on December 16, 2001.
So,
the episode is set right around the month of December, and it starts off the
way most Simpsons episodes begin. Bart
and Lisa are watching television and Bart happens to see a commercial for a
model rocket that he of course has to have.
After all, Bart is the biggest fan of explosive devices ever. The problem is that he doesn't have any
money to purchase the rocket, so he swipes Homer's credit card to order
it. But, I'm guessing Homer doesn't
mind too much because before you know it, he's helping Bart and Milhouse build
the rocket...which promptly explodes.
Homer
recruits the help of his nerdy friends from college to design a super powered
rocket (which I might add he only does to try and one-up Ned Flanders) that can
carry a hamster passenger. But when the
rocket proves to be too powerful, the hamster bails and Homer is left trying to
figure out how to get the rocket down.
He decides to shoot the rocket with a shotgun which does work...
...but
when the rocket crashes into Reverend Lovejoy's church and burns the whole
thing down, let's just say it's not one of Homer's finest moments.
Nor
is it a good one for Reverend Lovejoy, who lacks the funds necessary to rebuild
it.
Eventually,
Reverend Lovejoy literally sells his soul to the capitalistic devil himself, C.
Montgomery Burns, alongside his partner in crime, the robotic businesswoman
herself, Lindsey Naegle. Together,
Burns and Naegle build a megachurch in the place of the old style church,
complete with advertising slogans and posters that rival those of Times Square,
and a Jumbotron in the middle of the church.
Not
surprisingly, everyone in Springfield gravitates towards the new church look,
tempted by the promise of comfortable seats and advertising galore. Mainly because as the show has established
many times, the people of Springfield are complete morons. I mean, when even uber-religious Ned
Flanders gets suckered in by the new church, you know he's two Chicken
McNuggets short of a 20-pack.
One
person who is NOT impressed is Lisa Simpson, the little girl who seems like the
only one in Springfield with actual intelligence, and she is so disgusted by
the new church that she outright abandons Christianity for good!
Instead,
she decides that she wants to take up Buddhism after seeing Lenny and Carl
practicing it in Springfield's Buddhist Temple. Even Hollywood actor Richard Gere stops by to educate Lisa on the
wonders of Buddhism, and Lisa is very much convinced that Buddhism is the right
religion for her.
But
Marge is not convinced that Lisa is making the right choice. In fact, Marge acts very out of character in
a way by plotting with Reverend Lovejoy to woo Lisa back to Christianity. The not-so-good reverend tells Marge that if
she uses the Christmas holiday to convince Lisa to go back to Christianity, and
Marge agrees. She does everything to
make the house look like a Christmas card and even manages to get Lisa the pony
that she has always wanted.
(Okay,
okay...so the pony is actually Ralph and Milhouse in disguise...another one of
Marge's despicable methods to try and make Lisa do anything that Marge wants.)
Lisa
manages to see through the ruse though and runs away from home to vent to
Richard Gere about just how much her family tricked her.
Now
pay attention...this is where I drive the point home about not just the
episode, but this whole blog post at that.
Richard
explains that the main goal of Buddhism is to find inner peace within
yourself...but it's also important to respect the
diversity of other religions based on love and compassion!
Therefore,
according to that logic, Lisa can celebrate Christmas with her family without
feeling guilty about it. So, Lisa
decides that she can respect her family for being Christian while still
devoting her whole life to being a Buddhist.
And Marge apologizes for being so...what's the word...manipulative with
her. Seriously, Marge, your
manipulation techniques are best served for Homer or Bart.
Though,
Lisa never DID get her pony in the end.
But
still...what a great episode this was.
For starters, getting Richard Gere as a special guest star was a coup
for the showrunners. And Richard agreed
to be in the episode, provided two things happen. First, Lisa had to utter the words "Free Tibet" (which
didn't really happen in this episode, but I believe happened in another show
later that season). And the second was
that Lisa had to stay a Buddhist for as long as the show stayed on the air.
And
just like the Simpsons promised Paul and Linda McCartney that Lisa would remain
vegetarian for the rest of the series, Lisa has stayed a firm Buddhist.
But
even more importantly, this episode proved that anybody can accept any religion
if they love and respect the person enough.
I think some of our future world leaders - particularly most of those
running for leadership of the Republican Party of America can benefit from
having learned this lesson.
It
also showed that materialism can really put a damper on religious faith. Sadly, much like how most of us see
Christmas these days.
But as Lisa Simpson showed all of us, we don't
have to be that way.
I'm
always reminded around this time of year to watch out and not cry. I've also been told not to pout because
Santa Claus is coming to town.
I've
also been told he sees you when you're sleeping and knows when you're awake,
and he knows if you've been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake.
Or,
so they tell me.
Anyway,
in this latest installment of The New Archies Reviewed, Archie and Eugene toy with
the idea of doing something naughty in order to get a nice result. But when their consciences get the better of
them, will they change their minds before Santa drops a lump of coal in their
stockings?
Well,
it's Day #18 in A POP CULTURE ADDICT'S ADVENT CALENDAR, so let's have a look and
see with today's episode.
This
is Episode 11B: Gunk
For Gold!
Now,
normally I would say that it is way too cold outside to be thinking about
playing a soccer game in the middle of December, but here in Ontario, we're
going up to fifty-five degrees Fahrenheit on Christmas Eve. We'll just go with the fact that this takes
place in December.
Anyway,
Archie and the gang (who are dressed in the appropriate blue and gold as
opposed to the red uniforms the football team wore) are trying to play a game
against the Bainbridge Bongoes, and they are absolutely failing miserably. I mean, just look at Coach Kleats'
expression. Mind you, Coach Kleats is
NEVER happy in this series, but in this case he has reason to be. The entire soccer team, known as the
Riverdale Rockets are absolutely horrible.
Wait...Riverdale
Rockets? Another thing they got
wrong! The team name is the
BULLDOGS!!! Sheesh. Oh well, maybe the Rockets were the junior
high school name.
And
apparently, like the United States of America, nobody at Riverdale cares about
soccer. The spectators for the home team
are MS. Grundy and Mr. Weatherbee...and one of them doesn't look like they even
want to be there!
Somehow
though, I understand why they are doing bad.
I mean, if the other team can hire a paparazzi person to blind the very
vain Veronica on the field, then Riverdale deserves to lose based on that fact
alone.
Though,
secretly, I'd love for Riverdale to win one game, just so they can make a
mockery of the uber-annoying team captain of the Bongoes, Biff. His laugh is more annoying than Seth Rogen's
and he is so obnoxious he makes Reggie look like Princess Diana.
Long
story short, the Rockets lose for the third straight game, and everyone is
really bummed about the loss. Some of
them are willing to hang up their soccer cleats once and for all.
I
mean, when you have Biff entering the opposing team's locker room to make fun
of you, you know that can't be a good thing.
You
want to know who is optimistic about the team?
Archie Andrews, that's who. And
to prove it, he tells the team that they can do whatever they put their minds
to, and quotes the great Billy Ocean by saying "when the going gets tough,
the tough get going".
You
know, that's a great song. Let's add it
in here.
Of
course, not even the smooth vocal stylings of Mr. Ocean, nor the optimism of
Archie can convince the rest of the team that they will be the stars of the
school, and they leave poor Archie standing there like a fool.
Well,
it looks like hours later, Archie and Eugene are working together on a science
project. Notice that Archie is eating a
big slice of pizza while Eugene is making some sort of reddish liquid. Unless it's black cherry soda, I don't care
what Eugene's making.
But
a funny thing happens. Did you know
that when you mix that red stuff with a combination of melted mozzarella
cheese, tomato sauce, and pepperoni, you make it turn green and bounce all
around the room? Seriously, Archie,
watch where you eat your dinner!
Archie
tries his best to catch the bouncy green ball, and he thinks he succeeds by
jumping on top of it. But the bouncy
green gunk catapults Archie out the second story window breaking his neck and
killing him instantly.
Just
kidding.
No,
that green gunk has apparently made Archie jump super high...and apparently has
made him believe that he is Marky Mark with the posing that he's doing. And Eugene has a few ideas to test the gunk
out.
First,
he throws a basketball towards Archie, who sinks it in the basket without
breaking a sweat.
Then
he tosses the old pigskin towards Archie, who jumps almost as high as that
skyscraper in the background.
Archie
then declares that the gunk they created is fantastic, and that he and Eugene
should do something with it. Well, we
know that they can't legally SELL it.
Because we all know that Archie and Eugene basically invented
"Flubber", which the Nutty Professor created back in 1961. But since the name Flubber is trademarked,
they just refer to it as super gunk.
Ah,
this is where Gunk for Gold comes in...oh, wait. Oh damn. Damn damn
damn. Please for the love of God tell
me this isn't the magic feet episode.
I'm getting a sinking feeling about this one.
You
know, Reggie suddenly pops up with a soccer ball, and stares at Archie and
Eugene, and I'm relieved to see him.
This buys me some time before I inevitably have to recap the...magic
feet portion of the episode.
See,
Reggie has an idea to use the gunk to make the soccer team better. He tells Archie and Eugene that it is their
duty to test the gunk out, so he gets them to spread the gunk on the bottom of
everyone's soccer shoes. After all, the
captain of the Bongoes is evil. More
evil than Reggie. They have to show him
karmic retribution.
Of
course, the only ones who know about the secret are Archie, Eugene, and
Reggie. And at the next game, the three
of them try to tell everyone else that they should believe in themselves
because they now have "magic feet".
Oh, dear lord, it IS that episode.
Shoot me. Shoot me now.
At
first the rest of the team scoffs at the notion, but when Jughead suddenly
loses control of his feet, it convinces the rest of the team that maybe they
have the goods after all.
I
won't bore you with the recap of the games...just that the team does
significantly better and perform moves that would probably make a referee
wonder if he should reprimand them or cheer them on.
Turns
out that the team is making the comeback of the century, all thanks to the gunk
that gave them magic feet. They do so
well that they end up winning the next three games. See, look at the scoreboard!
Oh,
and there's Betty and Veronica doing a magic feet cheer. I'd crawl into a hole and die at this point
over how cheesy this is, but I have to say...when Betty and Veronica are doing
this cheer, it is kind of cute. A lot
cuter than say, if Jughead and Moose were in their positions.
And
in the seat behind them, Archie and Eugene are looking tired and miserable,
which prompts Betty to ask them why they are upset. After all, the team doesn't suck any more! But I think in Archie's case, he's starting
to realize that winning by taking the easy way out isn't as much fun as he
believed it would be.
But
his conscience isn't strong enough to stop using the gunk. At the next game, Jughead is so cool, calm,
and collected that he actually listens to his Walkman, eats a burger and moonwalks across the
soccer field! He better be listening to
Michael Jackson's "The Way You Make Me Feel".
Ooooh...that's
another awesome song. Let's add it in
as well!
Also,
I'm pretty sure that Jughead wearing a Walkman on the soccer field is against
the rules...but what do I know? I've
never played soccer professionally.
Oh,
and there's also another scene where Big Ethel simultaneously injures eight
players at once while Moose headbutts the soccer ball into the opposing goal,
saying that he felt like Kareem-Abdul Jabbar the whole time.
Because
Kareem-Abdul Jabbar was a well-known soccer basketball player...
And
as the Riverdale Rockets win one game after another, Archie's nerves start to
get the better of him. He talks to MS.
Grundy about it, but doesn't exactly reveal that he and Eugene have been using
the gunk to make their team unstoppable.
Instead, as he plants a rubber glove (seriously, he does), he listens to
MS. Grundy's wise words as she basically tells him that it's better to keep
your integrity in check rather than take the easy way out.
It's
in that moment that Archie and Eugene realize they have to come clean.
I
sure wish that they didn't start by contacting the Riverdale newspaper. For one, Reggie's dad owns it, and judging
by the way he laughs in their ears over the receiver, Reggie's dad is as much
of an unethical jerk as Reggie is himself.
No,
instead, they gather the whole team together at Pop's, and confess
everything. And how they confess is
through visual aid. Archie grabs Jughead's
beanie, dips it in the gunk, and throws it towards the video arcade.
Where
Archie quickly realizes that he owes three people in the arcade a quarter each
for distracting them from their game by a super bouncy hat.
Once
the gang realizes that Archie, Eugene, and Reggie have duped them, they rip off
their heads and use them as soccer balls Archie has the team make a
decision. Do they want to use the gunk
at the final match of the season to make Biff eat his words, or do they not use
the gunk and play a good clean match even though the final score could be so
horrendous that the only way the Riverdale Rockets could ever play soccer again
is if they relocate to Siberia.
Reggie
naturally wants to keep cheating. The
rest of the team...not so much.
The
action shifts over to the last game of the season, and the Riverdale Rockets
are playing the Bainbridge Bongoes.
Look how excited the team looks to get out on the field!
Wow...if
that's excitement, I'd hate to see what depression looks like.
It
doesn't take long to realize that the team opted not to use the gunk after all
because they all felt that cheating was wrong.
After all, no team that uses gunk knocks each other out on the soccer
field like Moose and Reggie have displayed here. And of course, Biff's laughter and attitude are just as obnoxious
as ever.
Long
story short, the crowd of supporters seems to be shocked that once again, their
team sucks.
And
by the end of the first half of the game, the Bongoes lead the Rockets
6-0. I have no idea if that's a good
score or not, but either way, the Rockets have a lot of work to do.
And
as the Rockets feel sorry for themselves, and Veronica verbally declares that
they are no good without gunk, Archie pulls out his soapbox and announces that
it wasn't the gunk that made them the team they are (well, actually, it was),
but instead it was their ability to believe in themselves enough to actually
put forth the honest effort needed to win all those games. It wasn't the gunk that gave them
"magic feet" (actually it was), but their determination.
And
just like that, the team thinks that Archie is Gandhi and they start chanting
"magic feet" as if they were under his hypnosis.
Soon
after, MS. Grundy leads the crowd into doing a "MAGIC FEET! MAGIC FEET!" chorus, and it is
seriously taking everything in me not to throw up right now.
So
in the second half of the game, the team's newfound confidence allows the team
to play at their very best, adding goals to their own total, and...
...and
I'm pretty sure that what Ethel and Jughead are doing is AGAINST THE RULES AND
WOULD GET BOTH OF THEM EJECTED FROM THE GAME!!!
But
whatever...score's 6-6, and there's a minute left in play.
Oh,
look. It's Amani for her required 30
seconds of airtime to score the winning goal for the team!
GOAL!!!
The
crowd goes wild! MS. Grundy and Mr.
Weatherbee are losing their minds. The
Magic Feet tour bus has arrived at the station. And Archie is thrilled that his power to motivate people
continues to work!
We
end the episode with MS. Grundy looking at a photo of the team winning the
championship, which MS. Grundy adds was done fair and square. This makes me wonder if she knew all along
that they were cheating...I guess we'll never know.
Okay,
so the pros of the episode? Well, I
think this one of only two episodes (the other one is "Stealing The Show") that features the whole cast. All of the kids appear in it, as well as the
two main adults. So, that's very
special. The episode also has a couple
of good messages for kids. One is that
you should never cheat your way through life because you won't feel good about
it. And the other is that if you
believe in yourself enough, you can get through anything.
But
if I hear the words Magic Feet one more time...I'm gonna scream.
Next week, we learn about the stock market and how
Jughead finds his life changed forever...but you'll have to wait until the 26th
for that one.