Win, Lose and Kaboom

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Win, Lose, and Kaboom is a Nickelodeon TV movie based on the popular TV series The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius. It parodies reality TV in general, especially Survivor and The Apprentice, and for game shows like Wheel of Fortune. The movie was first aired in July 2004 as part of the Nicktoon Summer Film Festival. This movie was originally named You Bet Your Life Form.

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[edit] Plot synopsis

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Jimmy and friends find a strangely marked rock from outer space. While decoding the message on it, Hugh wants to bond with him, but Jimmy's to busy. After decoding the message -- a riddle, with implications of intergalactic prestige for any planet that answers it -- he and his friends (Libby, Cindy, Carl, Sheen, Goddard and Bolbi) sneak onto the military installation holding the rock to inscribe the answer. (The riddle was "In the dark, they appear without being fetched; in the light, they are lost without being stolen." The answer was the stars.) After being "beamed up" to their destination, they find themselves in an alien television studio, representing Earth in Intergalactic Showdown, a popular alien reality show hosted by a shifty host by the name of Meldar (voiced by Tim Allen), who can teleport anything in an instant. If they win the show, they get a new car. If they lose the show, they get their home planet (in this case Earth) destroyed. Three other teams are represented in this particular episode: the Brains, an evolved species with only brains and eyes for bodies; the Needleheads, high pitched, seemingly awkward, neurotic beings that indeed somewhat resemble nerve cells; and the Gorlocks, a warmongering, martial race (and the only humanoid team aside from the Humans).

Jimmy, overestimating his intellect and its usefulness in the games, causes the Human team to lose the first two events: "Florgus Ball", a strange hybrid of polo, jai-alai and (perhaps) Quidditch, with large mechanoid mantis-like beings named Florguses as transportation, and a test of speed and cunning, in which the team must retrieve a glowing mushroom from the mouth of a cave guarded by a deceptively cute, but powerful beast.

After the Survivor-inspired scene in which the team is forced to vote one of their members off the team (the vote is a 3-way tie between Jimmy, Cindy and Bolbi before Bolbi's misunderstood vote against himself casts him off), April (real name "Shee-AHHH!-toh"), the small but spry female Gorlock (voiced by Alyssa Milano), colludes with Jimmy, convincing him to work together to overthrow Meldar and the show itself.

In the next event, a Fear Factor-style eating contest, Jimmy (despite having calculated the exact strength necessary to spin the wheel and choose any generally human-palatable food) reluctantly allows Carl (who, given his appetite, could literally eat anything) to spin for the team. After a Needlehead fails to stomach a banana cream pie, Carl tries, and is enraptured with, an odd alien dish known as a "Plutonian Gut Chunk". After this event, Cindy sees Jimmy agreeing to ally with April and the Gorlocks, an alliance sealed with what Jimmy and Cindy interpret as a kiss, but is in fact a seal of trust to April's people. Both Cindy and April's teammate disapprove of this and stop the discussion.

In the meantime, the parents of Retroville have found themselves receiving the galactic cable network that supplies Intergalactic Showdown, and while Hugh Neutron has trouble staying away from the 8,999,999,999 (nine billion minus one) other channels his television set now carries (especially a soap opera called "Andromeda 90210"), the other parents convince him to keep watching the game show while they fix one of Jimmy's wormholes to travel to the set and save their children.

Eventually, Jimmy truly learns how to swallow his pride and work as a team to defeat the Brains in an obstacle course (including a false shortcut that leads to a mass hallucination on the part of the children that causes the parents to become zombies). The final event is based on "Who Wants to be a Millionaire." A human (Jimmy) and a Gorlock (April's dad) face off in a trivia showdown. They each have one lifeline, someone from their home planet who can answer the question. The Gorlock is the first to get his question, but he answers it wrongly, so it's Jimmy's turn. Meanwhile, the parents get the wormhole working, but just as they get ready to go through, Hugh comes out with a plate of nachos. He trips on a power cord, the nachos go sailing through the wormhole, Hugh dives in after them, and just as he goes through the wormhole shuts down. He ends up on the set of the show, right before Meldar gives Jimmy his question. When Jimmy tries to explain everything, Hugh says he knows everything because of space cable. Because of this, Jimmy realizes that Hugh probably knows more about alien culture than any of them, and has Hugh be his lifeline. The question was about "Andromeda 90210", Hugh's galactic specialty, but Hugh claims the question isn't answerable because it's worded incorrectly, so he gives the correct question and the answer, both of which are correct. They receive a special ceremony and their car. On the way home, Jimmy realizes that they need to save the other races' planets from being destroyed, so they go back and the children, Hugh, and the other three races combine their forces to fight Meldar and his robotic minions, take the gadgets that endowed him with the power to coerce his contestants into playing, and end the show forever, ensuring the safety of all planets involved from the wrath of Meldar.

[edit] Trivia/Goofs

  • This is probably the first Nicktoon movie to be more than the usual hour long.
  • "Andromeda 90210" is a parody of the teen drama soapie Beverly Hills 90210 which ran from 1990 to 2000.
  • The needleheads are an obvious parody of the Coneheads.
  • At the end, Jimmy is responding to April's rock, and is abruptly stopped in the middle by Cindy, and the rock is sent back without Jimmy finishing his message, but if you look closely, you can faintly see Cindy still walking away.
  • When Jimmy is finishing his message, the camera zooms out, keeping Jimmy (and Retroville) in the center. However, when the earth is seen from space, the isthmus of Panama is in the center. If this is to be believed, Retroville is somewhere in Panama!
  • The creature from the cave bears shocking similarities to Twonkies, characters that would not appear until the next episode to air. Such a coincidence is odd. It could be because the creators loved the design and decided to use it in an episode (which would turn out to be a television movie and the next episode, as well as next television movie)
  • When Jimmy and the gang go to the military installation, background music is played. The music played is a parody to the Mission Impossible theme, which has a different theme in it.
  • There are several audience members in the game show. A list:
    • The germs from Journey to the Center of Carl
    • The giant lima bean from I Dream Of Jimmy
    • Bonzilla from The Retroville 9
    • The Space Bandits from A Beautiful Mine, Men at Work, and The Incredible Shrinking Town
    • The Junkman and his dog, Roxxie, from The Junkman Cometh
    • Gortox the Irritable, seen in The Junkman Cometh
    • Yolkians from Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius and The Egg-pire Strikes Back
  • List of teams
    • Team Earth (a.k.a. the Jellybags): Jimmy Neutron, Cindy Vortex, Carl Wheezer, Sheen Estevez, Libby Folfax, Bolbi Stravonowski, Goddard, Hugh Neutron (life-line)
    • Team Gorlock: Shee-AHHH! Poink (a.k.a. April), April's Father, April's Mother
    • Team Brain: Three brains
    • Team Neadlehead: Four Needleheads
  • List of challenges
    • Florgus Ball (Earth vs. Gorlock): Gorlocks win 586-0.
    • Greased Martian Toss (Needlehead vs. Brain): (Unseen) Needleheads win.
    • Mountain Menace (Earth vs. Needlehead): Needleheads win.
    • Can You Eat This?: (Earth vs. Needlehead): Carl against a needlehead. Needlehead: Banana Cream Pie. Carl: Plutonian Gut Chunks. Earth wins.
    • Race (Earth vs. Brain): Brains use illusion to distract Earthlings. Earth still wins.
    • Jeapordy (Earth vs. Gorlock): Gorlock (April's father) rings the gong. Trivia is on alien animal behavior. Gorlocks fail trivia. Earth contestant: Jimmy. Trivia is on "Andromeda 90210" (Hugh's favorite galactic soapie). Lifeline: Hugh. Hugh succeeds. Earthlings win tournament.
  • In the race with brains, they use a crystal to get across lava and through the door. The crystals look like the ones Buzz Lightyear shot his laser at in the beginning of Toy Story 2. Also, the track looks like the area Buzz was in when he shot at the crystal.
    • Tim Allen, who voices Meldar, also voices Buzz Lightyear.
  • Intergalactic Showdown is a parody of the TV Show Xiaolin Showdown.
  • "Low-Gravity Snuggling from Venus" has the same theme as the Jimmy/Cindy love theme from Love Potion 976/J.
  • After eating the alien gut chunks, Carl quotes the book/movie/musical Oliver Twist/Oliver! while holding his plate out to Meldar, asking, "Please sir, may I have some more?"
  • In the Retrieve a Mushroom from the Cave challenge, when the beast comes out of its cave, but out comes a cute little thing, when Jimmy tells Goddard to get it, it attacks him. This part is from a scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail with the killer white rabbit.
  • When Meldar says "he will control all you see and hear", it is a reference to the control voice.
  • The race Gorlocks is similar to the klingons.
  • This episode is similar to the one of the Duck Dodgers (TV series) episodes: Win, Lose of a Duck.

[edit] Quotes

  • Meldar: (Screams in pain) This really hurts (Screams in pain) This is quite painful (Screams in pain)
  • Living lima bean audience member: (after Sheen appears on a TV in the studio) I never heard of Ultra Lord or Clam Crabs!
    Other audience member: But if it's on Network TV it must be true!

[edit] External links

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