Recap / The Nostalgia Critic S 2 E 14

Release: March 31, 2009

Movie: The Pagemaster (1994)

This review contains examples of:

• Actually Pretty Funny: Critic acknowledges that Adventure using a book-based pun to flirt with Fantasy "deserves a point".
• Bait-and-Switch: The episode opens with the Critic talking about Michael Jackson's Moonwalker, but instead of clips from that movie, he is greeted with clips from The Pagemaster, which he doesn't remember watching. (This episode was uploaded around April Fools' Day, and an actual Moonwalker review was released the following week.)
• Bolt of Divine Retribution: The Critic plays up the scene of Richard navigating through various kinds of disasters on the way to the hardware store as God trying to smite Macaulay Culkin before he could star in the 1993 Nutcracker movie.
  God: Getting Even with Dad? I'm getting even with you! Good Son? Goodbye! (laughs) I got a million of them. I am God, you know.
• Fridge Logicinvoked: The Critic is confused by the ending, as it seemed to imply that Richard became a bookworm. The Critic points out that Richard was already a bookworm beforehand, as he must have read the statistics from somewhere. (And indeed he did; in the opening, Richard's father says that he was reading a medical journal).
• Hurricane of Puns: When the books make lots of book puns, the Critic starts making his own:
  "Hey! If we arrest anybody, we should probably book 'em! I wonder if Ellen Page^note This was before Page came out as transmasculine in 2020 and started going by Elliot is in this movie. Did anybody watch any films with Rex Reed?"
  ...
  "Hey, if the film's not trying, why should I?"
• Running Gag: "Zuul, motherfucker!", when Richard opens The Hound of the Baskervilles.
• So Okay, It's Averageinvoked: His actual issue with the movie, by his own admission there's nothing really that hateable about the movie he just feels that it's boring.
• Shout-Out:
  • The scene depicting Richard's Toon Transformation is called "an evil version of Reading Rainbow".
  • The scene where Richard is manhandled by the librarian has Critic bringing up a "Sonic Sez" clip.
  • Critic calls Dr. Jekyll (voiced by Leonard Nimoy) "Doctor Spock".
  • His yelling for the dragon of the Fantasy segment to do something is accompanied by an appropriate clip from Spaceballs.
• Subverted Catchphrase: "I'm the Nostalgia Critic, I remember it... usually, so you don't have to."
• Take That!:
  • Critic compares Richard's fear-monger statistics to Al Gore.
  • Early on there's a jab at Ted Turner since he helped produce it, with the Critic feeling that this and Captain Planet are proof that he should stop trying so hard to educate children.