TITLE: Prisoners of Love
LOGO: "Captivating Chaos!"
EPISODE #: 8
SEASON: 1
AIRDATE: May 15, 2004
DIRECTOR: Butch Hartman, Wincat Alcala, Juli Hashiguchi
STORY: Steve Marmel
WRITERS: Marty Isenberg
STORYBOARD: Erik Wiese, Wincat Alcala
ART DIRECTIONS: Bob Boyle
MUSIC: Guy Moon
APPEARANCE: Alicia and bunches of hillbillies, Alicia's ex-husband (1st appearance), Main Trio, Jack and Maddie, Jazz
GHOST APPEARANCE: Walker and Ghost Cops (1st appearance), Skulker, Lunch Lady, Dora the Dragon Ghost Girl, Box Ghost, Technus, Desiree
FENTON GADGET APPEARANCE: Spector Speeder (1st appearance), Camera/head phone combo
LESSON: Hillbillies can have pearly white teeth, too
Danny enters the basement lab similar to the opening scene from "Parental Bonding", only this time papa ain't fishing and Danny is reading; a usually rare occurrence for the boy. He asks a question we’ll never know because Jack is quick to assume his son is talking about his latest invention, the Specter Speeder. Shoving his kid inside, he mentions the various doo-dads of the vehicle, including a super sized cup holder—oh, you Americans and your Big Gulps. Maddie cautiously approaches and in her sweetest, most-guaranteed-to-still-want-sex voice, asks her dear ol’ husband if he remembers what today is. Like every modern American husband, he gives off a blank look. Taking a cue from Lunch Lady Ghost, calm Maddie turns into raged Goddess of Fury when he forgets their wedding anniversary...for the 18th year in a row. She slams her fist onto the side of the Specter Speeder, causing it to activate (somehow) and fly into the Ghost Zone, Danny still inside. Jack is too busy looking dumfounded as Maddie bitches for them to notice any of this. I hear social service really isn’t that bad.
Entering the Ghost Zone for the first time (sorta, he was kinda in it during "Splitting Images"), Danny screams for about a good five seconds (no, I’m serious, he fucking screams for five seconds) showcasing David Kaufman’s impressive set of lungs (also being serious, Danny yells a lot in the series). Bypassing all the eerie dark green, Danny enters more green stuff, only surreal and swirly with many random whatever floating around. He doesn't get the time to sight-see because 1. He’s peed his pants in fear and 2. There’s a giant Walker blocking his path and glaring the humanly fluid out of him. I’ll vouch for him; if that were me in his position, I’d be scared shitless. Walker warns him that he’s trespassing, but is kind to let him off with just that. Danny finally gets some sense into his head and backs the Specter Speeder in reverse. By the time he arrives, Maddie has finished her aggressive speech and storms off. Jack laments this to his son, unaware that his second child is probably in need of a good heart doctor and a therapist. Really, social services, the phone is right there.
Anyone else thinks Danny’s eyes look a little too green and bubbly in that title card? Finally grasping the severity of the situation, Jack desperately clings onto Maddie's bag as she boards a taxi to go over to her sister's house. She mentions a divorce, and then leaves him in the dust. Danny and Jazz overhears this and the former panics over that dreaded word, "divorce". The ever so intelligence Jazz isn’t close to fear; in standard insufferable intelligence know-it-all mode, she tells Danny Jack will merely forget to apologize as she expects of him. But noooo, Jack decides enough is enough. He unpredictability hitches a cab to do exactly that and give Maddie the best damn anniversary ever, leaving his kids alone for God only knows when. SOCIAL. SERVICE. While Danny worries some more, Jazz goes into shock because (in her own words), she claims she is wrong about her family’s offering.
Coffee in hand (and presumably not the first cup), Jazz looks through all her personal records that denotes otherwise over her father’s behavior (questionable at that), trying to make heads or tails over what she could have possibly gotten wrong. Obviously she’s never heard the concept of free will. Finding a way to stroke her ego proves distracting when her brother is vacuuming a room away. Danny is undergoing his own personal crisis; cleaning up the entire house so that both his parents would have a clean place to come home to. Keyword, "both". Jazz berates Danny before admitting defeat and retreating to the library instead. Being the good Samaritan that he is, Danny resumes cleaning—next stop, the Fenton basement and damn, does he have work to do. The whole place looked as if a hurricane struck through, something exploded, and then some hobos came and peed on the corners. Experimenting, Danny uses his ghost rays and manages to push every object back in their rightful place. Yes, because the objects would most certainly not explode on contact—the chemical barrels don’t even flinch from a violent encounter. This isn’t writing convenience, this is a massive, massive plothole!
Danny gets carried away and shoots an unrelated present into the open Fenton Portal. Note to Jack: close the fucking thing. You’re going to let the air out and strange animals in. Taking the tag that fell off of it, Danny reads, "Let this gift repair the bridge to our love, Happy Anniversary, Jack." Now realizing what that gift was for and where it's in, Danny's enters a whole new ballgame. Frankly, I’m more surprised Jack is pretty good with romantic metaphors. When did he buy that present? Considering the time between when Maddie yelled at him and when she left, did he somehow squeeze in a gift? Did he buy it prior to the argument, but merely forgot about it? The latter doesn’t even work since the note is meant clearly as an apology. Explain, TV show, EXPLAIN!
Jack boards a plane to Spittoon, Arkansas (and the bad hillbilly stereotypes only get worse) and is subsequently pushed out with a parachute because they have no airport landing pad. What the hell do they do then? Crash and hope they’ll survive? "Thank y'all for flying Air Grits!" This is the highlight of their redneck jokes. Meanwhile, in another part of Spittoon, Maddie is getting a lecture from her sister Alicia who proudly states she’s been single for ten years. Now she enjoys her single life chopping woods and looking deciding butch Lesbian. Like yet another sitcom character archetype, Alicia plays the role of blunt in-laws who hate their sibling’s spouse. She is quick to tell Maddie she can do so much better then Jack. I think Alicia and Vlad would hit it off very well. Like everything in fictional TV land, the person they were talking about coincidentally shows up, snagged in a tree by his own parachute. Unleashing some Fenton...mini rod...pen thing, Maddie attacks him, thinking he’s a ghost until a big, orange guy pops out from the white sheet like a piñata. Uh-Oh! Looks like the grown-ups are in for some messy conflict now! Will hilarity ensue? Find out after this commercial break, proudly sponsored by NBC, the network of crappy comedies! *canned laughter*
"They NEVER fight." Danny tells his friends the next day at school. This is before Steve Marmel and crew decided to retcon it with the stupid Christmas fight they have every year. Tucker and Sam tries to reassure him, but the former isn’t helping, "It’s not your mom actually said the word, "divorce". That proves too much for him and Danny. Determined to keep his parents’ marriage intact, he vows to get that gift back from the Ghost Zone, for good or ill. Very good kid.
Scene switch has Alicia berating Jack to apologize to Maddie since he's been doing nothing but sip lemonade for the past hour. He gets up to do so, but ends up needing to use the bathroom. With none inside her house or an outhouse nearby, Jack runs off to find one and thus starts a completely unneeded running toilet gag, because Hartman can’t go one step without adding one. Whoop-de-doo. Maddie’s still upset, but she defends Jack anyways, "You know, in his own way, he really is trying." Alicia still doesn't give a rat's ass about him and further jamming the knife in, points out she's had ten years of bliss because of her divorce. Oooh, now we know why she said that word. Poor Danny doesn’t know it, so he’s got himself in a jam. Will he be able to get out of that baaaad situation? We’ll tell you after this commercial break, sponsored by FOX; just give the fans Firefly back already.
Sporting a nicely made webcam/communicator combo, Danny prepares himself to enter the Ghost Zone. Tucker is suppose to monitor his activates, but he’d rather play Space Invaders in one of the few instance where 8-bit sounds actually ARE appropriate to the game he’s playing. Danny dives in and we’re treated to the same surreal, eerie backgrounds we briefly saw earlier. That was the preview, this is the main event. Orgasmic of all things weird, Sam is mighty impressed, but not Danny. He takes a guess and opens one of the many floating doors, only to spot a human child watching a static-inducing television. Danny asks if he saw a present floating about and the boy responds with a 180 head twist. He then reverts into a monster and tells him to get the shit out of his room to which Danny undoubtedly obeys. This scene would have been slightly more effective if the boy/monster’s voice didn’t sound so ridiculously narmy. Clinging to the door he just closed, Danny lists his failures until said door lures him down to a cemetery for no apparent reason. Why would ghouls need cemetery I don’t know, but they’re not empty. Skeletons pop out and get all molesty on him. Danny flies away in time though.
Sam continues to reassure him while ADD-Tucker impressively eyes the Specter Speeder; shocked Danny refuses to take it. Yeah, well, his first experience with it wasn’t particularly a good one. Sam answers that he can cover more ground on his own while (Why? It still involves going into the Ghost Zone), but fuck if Tucker cares. He settles for pushing buttons at his own risk. What did your daddy tell you about touching other people’s stuff?! He must have Irish Luck as he managed to find a "Real World" tracker that can scan for Earth objects in the Ghost Zone. Just how prejudice is Jack that he calls Earth the "Real world" and the GZ...um..."Fake World?" For that matter, the Specter Speeder apparently has the awesome ability to detect human items inside the Ghost Zone from inside the Fenton Lab. This vehicle must be the mechanic equivalent of a bloodhound.
Using it, they guide Danny to the direction of the present. The boy enters a magenta room filled with everyday objects of the human world floating. He also gets a bonus Box Ghost who quickly states this is where all ghosts end up in when Danny unleashes them from his thermos. This plot point is never used again and remains irrelevant to the entire show. To their credit, no other episodes contradict it either, so there. Box Ghost then gets threatening to a less-than-amused Danny and for good reason and I quote, "Beware, for I am merely one of your foes who reside in this realm, in fact, you might say...we're a packaged deal!" I think I wanna go back to the deranged hillbillies now. Their meeting is cut short when police sirens are heard. Green ectoplasmic rays or something or another shoots both the Box Ghost and Danny, giving them Ecto-handcuffs. Walker (nor in normal size) walks towards Danny and takes possession of his web cam communicator—an item not allow in the Ghost Zone according to his law. He drags him and Box Ghost to jail. Wait, what did Box Ghost do? Danny complains this is the worst day ever, but gets a nasty surprise when the prison he’s sent to host all his ol’ buddies he beat the shit out of in previous episodes (except Sidney, so...he's right: worst day ever. The episode does not attempt to explain why Technus is in his robotic disguise instead of his true form as Doc Brown nor do they bother to explain why the fuck they are ALL. IN. JAIL. Explain, TV show, EXPLAIN!
Back in the lab, Tucker and Sam have lost contact with Danny, so they have no choice but to dive in—fueled even further when Jazz yells from above, asking if they want to help her look through all the major and minor details of her records. Not as OCD as her, the two bolt. Jazz heads downstairs, only to find no one there. She crazily whines she was wrong again when she assumed otherwise.
Chained to a chair, Danny (dressed in typical black and white prisoner clothing) is in the warden’s office, awaiting his verdict. Walker mentions the laws he broke, including possessing that present. He then introduces himself to Danny, "Name's Walker, son. Know it, fear it, obey it. I am judge, executioner, jury, executioner, jailer, and if necessary, executioner." He loves that part of the job, by the way. If ghosts are killed, where do they go? And annoying of all annoying, they call Earthling stuff "Real World" objects, too. Argghhh. Look, I know ghosts aren’t "real" or "solid" in a sense like we are, but if they’re "real" enough to exist, then why the fuck would they use an inappropriately named term? It makes no sense! Why can’t you just call it "Earth object" or the "Object of the living!?" Danny tries to convince Walker to let him be, saying he’ll take the object back, no harm, no foul. Bah.
Meanwhile, Jack is still in search of the magical toilet. He reaches a general store where three other hillbillies are spitting. When Jack asks for a little assistant, one guy suggests Alicia’s rhubarb until another guy tells him that’s a one way ticket to a broken nose. That doesn’t stop him and sensing Alicia may be filling his wife’s head with divorces, he marches on over and does his dirty business. There’s an extra scene after of one hillbilly with bad teeth and another telling him to get it fixed. He then shows off his squeaky clean teeth. Yeah, nope, doesn’t remedy the other offensive jokes.
With a thousand year to go, Danny is sent off to the cafeteria for lunch where his foes angrily eye him with vengeance, much like high school. Skulker, Technus, Box Ghost, and Desiree all walk over to deliver the smack down on him, regardless of watching guards. Danny runs off to the main cafeteria line where Lunch Lady serves the food until she decides to get in on the action. A crowd surrounds Danny as ghost after ghosts pushes him until he pulls the smart card out.
Danny: I'm not the enemy here! Yeah, I sent you all back to the Ghost Zone, but I didn't lock you up here, did I? Box Ghost: It is true! He did not package us in this box of iron! (Oh, my God, box puns up the ass). I am the B--*SMACKED by Skulker (hilarious)*Skulker: *intrigued* Go on.
Danny: If we work together, we can all bust out of here and you can always kick my butt later.
Skulker: The enemy of my enemy is my friend...for now.
A total win-win situation at hand, Danny’s enemies listens to his marvelous plan. Again, the guards do not seem to care that they’re talking behind their back. How underpaid are these jerkasses? In another part of the GZ, Sam complains over Tucker's faith in technology, as the two are lost. Because all men don’t ask for directions, Sam seeks the nearest floating ghost and asks for help. For some reason, Tucker does not warn Sam that she’s the fucking dragon ghost girl when he had a very clear look at her before. He still doesn’t warn her when she goes ghost for some reason and gives chase. Was she stressed because Sam interrupted her moping? Explain, TV SHOW, FUCKIN’ EXPLAIN!
The plan goes underway as Skulker routinely beats up Danny ("My prey ceases to amuse me") until the guards decide to take only Danny away. If they weren’t lazy before, then they’re just incompetent. Danny starts his plan and promptly beats them down. Skulker commands the other ghouls and they all get into a prison riot. That’s the plan? Why didn’t Danny just shout "PRISON RIOT!" instead of holding the element of surprise to the audience? That isn’t a brilliant plan—that isn’t even a plan! It’s just one team ganging up against another. The prisoners get the upper hand (mostly thanks to Lunch Lady’s giant chicken leg) and make their escape. Walker would have done better and implemented electric shock collars to all his prisoners if they can easily escape with their powers alone. As they bolt, Danny heads the other way, he needs some talky-time with the warden. Skulker is also kind to lend his good-byes, till next time. Who says he can’t be a [homicidal] gentleman? Despite his moral conscience, Danny seems to have absolutely no problem releasing dangerous, evil ghosts into the wild, or for that matter, escaping and breaking the law, GZ or not.
Sam and Tucker are still on the run from Dora, but manage to find Danny via the "Real World" detector (Ugh). They enter the prison's iron gates in haste, speeding right through it like...well, a ghost would. Dora can’t and ends up crashing into it. Somehow, humans and humanly objects have the ability to phase into the Ghost Zone. Um, why?
Walker demands to know what the shit is going on from his office, but his answer comes when Danny bursts in and harasses him for the gift. The ghost cop catches him by the leg though and drops him to the floor, placing his boot over his chest and getting high and mighty, "Now let me acquaint you with a few rules; Rule 1: You cross me, you pay the consequences, Rule 2: Just because you're a ghost doesn't mean I can't crush you within an inch of you Afterlife, Rule 3—" ZOMG SPECTERSPEEDER! Tucker and Sam to the rescue! They inform him humans are essentially ghosts in the GZ which still doesn’t make a lick of sense. If the GZ is meant to be an opposite where humans can phase through, why is it that the ghosts can not only phase through Earth, but still use their abilities? We’re to assume phasing is as much a ghostly ability as shooting ecto rays, yet they can do one on Earth and not the other in the GZ? This isn’t convenient! This is a cheap plothole to end the episode. It’s not creative if no one gives a clear explanation for it! EXPLAIN, TV SHOW, EXPLAIN! Danny goes human, grabs the present, and leaves.
It’s nighttime at Spittoon when Jack comes, dressed in the latest hillbilly chic in an attempt to impress his wife. His redneck buddies cheer from afar, but he barely gets a sentence in when he foregoes the crappy makeover and starts speaking from his heart. Much to Alicia's dismay, Maddie is charmed, so Jack wraps it up by offering the present he had had...which he forgot...which Maddie somehow already knew off. How? How? EXPLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIINNN!
Lucky for him, Jazz and Danny parachutes with the gift in hand. Giddy with relief, he takes it and hands it over to Maddie. Danny tries to confirm all this silly confusion. It turns out Maddie came here to host Alicia’s tenth anniversary of her divorce which looks like she took the same time as Jack and Maddie’s anniversary (what kind of spiteful in-law is she). The party proceeds to have themselves a hoedown (Drew Carey not included) and all is right in the world. Maddie opens her gift, only for the Box Ghost to pop out (that was a quick escape) and like any other good couple, they give chase. Jazz manages to find peace with herself; she may be wrong, but things are back to normalcy, so she can presumably be right again the next time; "I'll take being right and embarrassed over being wrong every time." She offers Danny rhubarb pie out of hammer space, but a local hillbilly warns them not to eat it. The episode ends in potty humor. Wonderful.
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Article written revised in: Apr. 22, 2010
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