The Pajama War

Air Date: January 8, 2015 | Written and Storyboarded by Somvilay Xayaphone & Seo Kim | Reviewed by Blip

It’s been quite a while (more than a year and a half, actually) since I wrote up one of these. And I’m very rapidly realizing that I don’t have as much time to write this as I was hoping. So please, bear with me, I’m going to be a little rusty.

Anyway, from a plot perspective there really isn’t all that much that goes on in this episode. While taking part in a Candy Kingdom slumber party in the castle, Finn and Princess Bubblegum lose at musical chairs and are ushered by the Candy People into a closet to think ‘heavenly thoughts’. Revealing a hidden passage in the back of the closet, PB requests that they ditch the party and hang out for a little while. Not hearing anything on the other side of the door, the Candy People begin to grow worried and spiral straight into civil war and anarchy (while Jake watches and laughs). After a few small, fun adventures, Finn and PB become aware of what is going on from some texts from Jake. PB returns to the party, the Candy People immediately fall back into line, and PB reads them a bedtime story (about the history of menswear).

I’ve always been quite fond of this episode. Part of that is contrasting nature of the episode’s structure, the chill tone of PB and Finn’s storyline compared with the increasing hysteria of the Candy People, which helps to heighten the hilarity. But perhaps a bigger part of it is the way the episode both rebuilds Finn and PB’s friendship and shows a different side of PB from what we’ve been seeing lately. In the beginning of the show, Finn was kind of consumed by his crush on the candy princess. With the introduction of Flame Princess, this element fell into the background, only to briefly resurface in ‘Too Old’ after the big Finn/Flame Princess breakup. For so long Finn has dealt with his romantic feelings and struggles, particularly as they relate to PB, that it is very nice to see the two of them able to hang out in (what I at least interpret as) a platonic manner like this.

Additionally, a running plotline of the last couple seasons has been PB’s increasing descent into authoritarianism. Although her methods are frequently questionable, to say the least, they’re not entirely unjustified. The Candy People usually don’t come across as the sharpest crayons in the box and are quick to fall into anarchy or get themselves into danger, so she feels an intense responsibility to keep them safe. Still, she has a tendency to go too far in the name of protection, as we’ve seen many times before. So to see her not only continue her progress from the end of The Cooler by acknowledging that her subjects need their space and the freedom to make their own choices, but to act on that as well (if only for a little while) feels like a pretty significant bit of progress in her character arc. Even if the Candy People don’t really rise to the challenge at this juncture.

Stray Thoughts:

• Mr. Pig, you probably need to work on your jealous streak there. Although Finn also needs to think more about how he says things.
• Mr. Cupcake never does fail to take an opportunity to flex his muscles, huh?
• I love how the Candy People become convinced that Manfried should be the leader because he is the only one that everyone can see at all times.
• Finn and PB passing through a green field with a white picket fence on their VR walk, exactly as Crunchy had described, was a fun sight gag.
• I’m sure the history of modern menswear is very interesting.
• Given what happened here and in the very first episode of the show, Slumber Party Panic, it probably isn’t the best idea to continue to have slumber parties for the Candy People.
• Timmy is perfect. I’m sad we never see him again.
• The title card is likely inspired by Eugene Delacroix’s famous painting Liberty Leading the People.

Evergreen

Boarded by: Tom Herpich and Steve Wolfhard | Originally Aired: January 5, 2015 | Reviewed by: Lyssie

Well, here we are – the other half of the mystery of the Ice King. We’ve already learned about the man – Simon the human, and the tragedy of how he lost himself; and now we get to learn about the crown that captured him and why it affects him like it does. 

At some point in the past there were four guardian spirits of sorts for the four elements of the world: ice, fire, candy, and slime. 

… sure!

Evergreen, the guardian of ice, has called the others to join him in stopping a dangerous comet that will soon hit the planet, killing everything including them. To do this he’s crafted some kind of super-powered high-tech crown that will be tied to his personality and can stop the comet. The others basically warn him against upsetting the natural order – a comet hits the planet every thousand years, and their elements will survive even if they don’t. In response he freezes them and sets out for the magical jewels he needs in order to complete the crown.

He takes with him his put-upon servant and supposed student, Gunther, a cute little lizard guy with a cute little demon-dog pet, Nina. The two are a clear parallel to Finn and Jake, from Nina looking basically like a form Jake could take, to the title card having them in the same pose as the title shot in the opening credits, to the way that alternate Finns have already had dogs similar to Finn. But Gunther isn’t a hero – he isn’t strong, he doesn’t know how to fight, he doesn’t leap into action; he doesn’t even stand up to Evergreen in any way, just keeps doing what he’s told and hoping to actually learn some magic from him one day. Hell, he even fills in Evergreen’s silences by responding to the refusal he can expect to get from him! And the one time he does try to be brave, and save Evergreen from his screwup, he’s unable to use the magic that Evergreen never actually taught him, and doesn’t even think to try and use any of the magic bottles he has. All he can think to do it emulate Evergreen, or freeze. 

This feels like the effect of nurture at play. Someone like Finn might have turned out completely different if, instead of being raised by a cool older brother who loves and encourages him, it was some guy who stole him as a baby and keeps him as an abused servant. It’s interesting to parallel this with the last episode, where Finn talks about wanting Martin to be more of a daddy; here, Evergreen is probably even less of a daddy than Martin, but where Martin abandons Finn, Evergreen keeps Gunther trapped. 

Well, it all comes home to roost for Evergreen in the end. The monster he stole the jewels from shows up to interrupt the ritual and bring his fortress crashing down, he’s trapped in place and has to rely on Gunther to use the crown by focusing on his deepest wish. And then Gunther gets trapped himself, because his deepest wish is to become his abuser, so he can only act out an endless barrage of putting himself down. The comet crashes, and Ice King wakes up from his recurring dream. 

In the same way that Betty revealed that IK’s obsession with princesses was a twisting of Simon’s love for Betty, here we get to see how other stuff in his life came about. Gunther, of course, got a spiritual successor in IK’s favorite penguin, but who he also treats quite poorly much like Evergreen did his own Gunther. IK’s fixation on Finn and Jake doesn’t come just from being lonely and wanting friends, it’s also him recognizing OG!Gunther and Nina in them. 

But most importantly, we finally understand where the Ice King personality came from and what makes it tick. The selfishness, the arrogance, the narrow-mindedness, the hypocrisy… it’s all there in Evergreen, imprinted onto whoever puts on the crown due to Evergreen tying it to his own personality. If anything he seems quite a bit worse than IK – more cruel, less fun. I wonder if Simon passively or actively counteracted some of the crown’s effect – he couldn’t stop it completely, but he could at least make his version of the Ice King less horrible. 

I’ll be honest, as someone who latched on to IK’s dementia metaphor, and has tracked the ways it paralleled real-life dementia in her reviews – I’m a bit disappointed by this development. Don’t get me wrong, this is a pretty great episode, it’s a cool direction to take the story and worldbuilding, it’s thematically fitting. It’s just, from that particular viewpoint, there was something much more striking when it wasn’t tied to any particular person or decision, it was just an artifact that enslaved anyone who wore it to a particular archetype. Felt much more like a magical disease to mirror the real one. 

But at any rate this was still a fascinating expansion of IK’s origins and the broader history of this world! 

Stray Observations: 

I wonder about the symbolism of ‘evergreen’ as the name of a character who found a way to keep himself going on eternally. 

I liked how Nina looks similar to Jake and gets called a demon by Gunther. I wonder if that was just an easter egg, or if it’s because she’s actually a demon. 

Does this mean that what happened between the 21st century and the present day of the show wasn’t a nuke? It was a comet? 

Alternatively, it was a nuke, and it hit even before this episode, and that’s why slime and candy are already among the elements of the world. 

Alternatively alternatively, a comet hits every 1000 years, and in addition there was a nuke. 

Wish magic being “the real deal” reminds me of Bartolomeo Giuseppe, with the search for new kinds of magic (IK even being one of the searchers!), and that what Giuseppe did at the end might have been wish magic.