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Recap / The Aquabats! Super Show! S1 E12 "CobraMan!"

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On the way to the next stop of their tour, the Commander tells Jimmy to pull over when he sees signs for a roadside freakshow with a real live CobraMan, something a kid in fourth grade bet him he'd never see (the Commander having a history of letting people trick him into taking outlandish bets, actually). They meet Carl, the masked magician and keeper of the Cobra Man, who collapses a tent on them and steals the Battletram so he can show CobraMan on the road. The Aquabats use Carl's car to try to catch up, but CobraMan shoots snakes out of his snake-hands at them, freaking the Aquabats out enough that Carl gets away. No Battletram means no rock tour, and no rock tour means no more Aquabats...

The next day the former Aquabats are working as landscapers when they see the Battletram a block away, converted into a mobile roadside attraction. Despite the others wanting to try to get it back, the Commander tells them they need to leave the past in the past... until Ricky bets him they can't get the Battletram back. They get the drop on Carl and his CobraMan, until Carl bets the Commander he can't beat CobraMan in a one-on-one fight. Carl teleports the two of them to the desert for their fight to the finish, which the Commander actually does win by sneaking up on CobraMan and putting him in a sleeper hold. Meanwhile Jimmy defeats Carl by pumping knockout gas into the room.

The Commander lets CobraMan go when CobraMan bets him he won't, and CobraMan promises to break Carl out of jail at the soonest convenience.


Tropes

  • Calling Your Attacks: Carl shouts "MAGIC!" whenever he uses his, well, magic. Later, when he hijacks the Battletram, he shouts "TECHNOLOGY!" whenever he does anything on the Battletram's console.
  • Compressed Vice: Subverted. In this episode, the MCBC suddenly can't turn down a bet, to the point of thoughtlessly injuring himself or letting CobraMan escape. However, later Super Show! episodes run with this character trait.
  • Expy: Between that strangely familiar luchador mask and being played by Matt Chapman, Carl is basically Strong Bad crossed with a birthday party magician.
  • Evil Is Petty: Despite having some formidable abilities between the two of them, Carl and Cobra Man aren't interested in doing anything more grandiose than taking their cheesy tourist attraction from place to place.
  • Hypocritical Humor: Carl gets mad at the Aquabats for taking his car to chase him after he steals the Battletram from them.
  • Knockout Gas: While the team is trapped inside the Battletram by Carl, who forces the team to watch the Commander fight the CobraMan, Jimmy detaches one of his hands and remote controls it so as to access a knockout gas button that, when activated, knocks out Carl and the rest of the team inside (Jimmy, being a robot, isn't affected by the gas), effectively freeing the team from Carl's clutches.
  • Suddenly Voiced: At the end of the episode, CobraMan can suddenly talk, surprising the Aquabats as much as anybody.
  • Throw It In!: In the commentary they say that the part where Crash is taking off his groundskeeper outfit and the strap of his hat gets caught on his nose wasn't planned, but it was just such a perfect happy accident they left it in anyway.
  • We Will Meet Again: Implied when CobraMan, who's still free, promises to break Carl out of jail later. Come Saturday Morning, he did return.

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