River Monsters - "Mongolian Mauler"

In this episode, JW goes to Mongolia to catch one of the rarer fishes of the Northern Hemisphere: the taimen. A cousin to salmon and trout, this is an alpha predator of the Mongolian rivers, where calm flows get interrupted by the rapids at any minute. And?

And it was a very good episode. Firstly, because it was centered on the action - on the fishing. The infamous "Asian Slayer" episode, for example, was focused mainly on the local tradition of the native ethnos, with the actual fishing shown in very small amounts, rather inappropriate for a fishing-based show. But to each his or her own, one supposes. In contrast, the "Mongolian Mauler" episode (yeah, it was probably named so for the M-M alliteration) had relatively little ethnic flavor, mostly the usual witch doctor (here shaman) blessing JW for luck, and that was all. (Seriously, JW gets blessed with fishing luck so often that one honestly wonders just what is his faith?)

The animals played a big role too. The various fish that JW caught were very impressive (if a bit on a smaller side of JW's catches), and the Siberian pit viper was even more so: North American audiences may know about the various American rattlesnakes (about the Canadian - less so), but the fact that some live in the Old World is usually a surprise to them. (The pit viper in the ep wasn't a rattlesnake, but the Mongolian counterpart of the water moccasin instead.)

Finally, there was the reference to Mongolian ninja - apparently, unlike their Japanese namesakes, those are illegal gold prospectors (rather like those from America's Old West) rather than assassins for hire, even if they kill people too. If Mr. Kishimoto was making Naruto a Mongolian, rather than a Japanese-based cartoon, then Naruto would be more like a western, it seems. Ah well, Naruto-canon is still cool (and if Madara had a mustache, he'd still find an insane way of conquering the world).

So... an impressive fish character of the ep., other featured wildlife is also interesting, and the ethnic factor was just right. If it wasn't for the pointless (in my opinion) references to Genghis Khan that cropped up in the episode, "Mongolian Mauler" would've been great. As it is, it was still one of the best episodes of this show's S4 so far.

Romance - A:TLA vs. LoK

One of the differences between A: TLA and LoK is, of course, the romance factor, active vs. passive. Here are my thoughts as to how that came to be.

One of the strengths of the A: TLA series was the relative passiveness of the romance. Sure, team Bryke (let us call them that, shall we?) claimed to be Kataang shippers, but there was certainly plenty of Zutara materials to work with too (especially if you were willing to begin with). The Crystal Catacombs incident, for example, or the final showdown of ‘team Zutara’ with Azula. Team Bryke had really sent some conflicting messages on this one, didn’t they?

Someone else apparently thought so too, when then came “The Promise” comic series, where Maiko and Kataang could not have become more obvious, especially by the old A: TLA standards. Not sure why team Bryke could not have used this approach in the original series, but they did not, and frankly, I am glad. “The Promise” was simply insane, especially Zuko asking Ozai for advice. Seriously. WTF? Ozai. He was the man who had scarred and exiled you in the first place, Zuko, remember? Do you really expect him to provide anything helpful or sane to you, Zuko? “Son, you have an Avatar problem? Take great-grandfather Sozin’s favorite kanabo (a samurai version of a club) and hit the Avatar until he reincarnates into someone more useful.” That is the advice you wanted to hear, Zuko? Again, WTF?

But such issues aside it is the blatant and obvious coupling of “The Promise” that we are interested in. LoK appears to have followed “The Promise’s” cue and is very obvious in its’ ‘ships, especially team Makorra. Someone has even suggested that it is team Bryke’s official parody of Zutara, but I seriously doubt that. For all of their posturing team Bryke probably wasn’t in any rush to alienate its’ fans with A: TLA, and besides, if they want to be pissed at someone, try Mr. Shamalyan’s movie – now that was shoddy work; so shoddy, that there aren’t even any rumors of a sequel!

Back to LoK. I doubt that team Bryke actually want to piss off their fans...not to mention that some of them may be obtuse enough not to recognize the parody unless it is told to their faces directly, so – no go. What is left?

That overly obvious approach that already appeared in “The Promise”. I do not know why team Bryke shifted from covert to overt approach to the romance, but shift they did... to the detriment of LoK. It is just is not as good as A: TLA was, period. But... it is just the first season...maybe the next ones will be better...

River Monsters - Invisible Executioner

As far as I am concerned, the success of each individual episode of RM depends on several factors, but the most important, or basic, or central one is the fish. In this episode, the "Invisible Episode", the fish that JW is after is yet another catfish - the vundu catfish, one of the biggest catfishes in southern Africa. JW loves catching catfishes, and overall RM is a good show, but this episode was not. What went wrong?

The catfish. I am not against JW catching catfishes - after all, with him it's not just the fish, but it's also the fishing technique and the promise, and here the promise failed. Unlike the "Asian Slayer" episode, where he failed to catch the mahseer (even though he had caught it once, when he was fishing for the goonch in "Killer Catfish"), here JW did catch the Vundu, but it was far smaller than what the audience may've expected it to look like.

Is that important? Tricky to say. Unlike the "Asian Slayer" episode JW did not go overboard with the local culture, and of course the native wildlife - Nile crocodile, hippopotamus, tigerfish, etc. - were present as well: both factors that make "Invisible Executioner" different from the other episode. But because the final catfish - the Vundu catfish - was far less impressive than how JW made it sound, this episode isn't as good as it might've been. The Vundu simply doesn't look like any executioner - just like a regular catfish that may be able to swallow a child - but it also may not; in fact it looks like it does not. Any arguments? I would be happy to argue!

River Monsters - Asian Slayer

This episode of RM was, well, controversial - at the very least. On one hand, it had plenty of excitement - foreign customs, river monsters, and even a surprise twist in the end, when the fish actually got away, but it felt rather unsatisfying, though not because it was too "empty", but because it was too "rich".

More precisely, there are episodes, set in Europe, or even Russia, where the wildlife and the ethnic flavor play minimal role in the episode. Here, however, the bulk of the episode was taken over by the ethnic - Hindu - flavor and the fishing itself played a decisively second-hand role. I don't like that, sorry, and so I disapprove.

On the other hand, once he came to Thailand and its specialized lake, where he caught the arapaima, the red-tailed catfish, the Mekong giant catfish and so on, the fishing itself became over-the-top - just like the ethnic issues were in the first half of the episode. And JW's theatrics did not help it any either: i.e. - the mahseer is an obsession of his? Dude, if that is the case, go and see a therapist, take a break, don't shoot this episode! You're not a commercial angler that gets paid by the hour, are you? Because if you are, all of those spiritual issues you're talking about are lies...

In any case, "Asian Slayer" is one of my least favorite episodes of RM up to date - over the top and almost hypocritical. If anyone has a different opinion, please, let him or her share it with me.

River Monsters - Pack of Teeth

Honestly, I confess: this is my favorite episode of RM S4 up to date, for several reasons.

First of all, this is an episode set in Africa. I like Africa; make no mistake, I like nature in general, but Africa so far is the best for some reason I cannot put my finger on. Maybe it's because JW in his show depicts it so colorfully: the animals, the native people and their culture, and, of course, the fish. The witch doctor's performance in this episode was amazing and certainly interesting - I have enjoyed watching it a lot.

I also felt great regret to the victims of the Nile crocodile's attack: the second-biggest crocodile in the modern world, the armored king of Africa's swamps and rivers isn't very impressed by the latest alpha species on land and feeds on humans as if they were any other sort of prey - a far call from the highly urbanized city life of Canada and States...

Of course, the Nile crocodile was just one of the species featured in this RW episode - from the small tilapia to the elegant egret to the massive hippopotamus were shown very vividly and vivaciously - very much alive. This is a clear contrast to Russian landscape that appears to be devoid of any life other than people - and people are dying out as well...

The fish themselves number two, not counting the incidental tilapia: the catfish and the African tigerfish. The catfish... is the catfish: there are more RM episodes that do feature a catfish of some species than vice versa. You just go to accept it.

The tigerfish, however, were something else: powerful and wicked-looking they're worthy cousins to the goliath tigerfish that appeared in the previous seasons. Unlike the goliath, this species hunts in packs, apparently, and it is just as deadly as the South American piranhas, only more so, since even this species of tigerfish is larger than the piranhas are.

In any case, I certainly enjoyed viewing this episode, and I hope that the following episodes of RM will be just as good as this one.