After watching this week’s second-to-last episode of 12 oz. Mouse, many questions are still left in my mind, but the most prominent is this: Why on earth is this show being cancelled?
Never has a show this roughly illustrated had a story so compelling. This specially extended episode is packed from beginning to end with character pinnacles and story conclusions. Sure, all of this great stuff comes with a bit of a letdown, but it’s not too bad.
There is only disappointment to speak of, and it comes early on. After traveling through the ventilation shaft from the clock shop and winding up in Shark’s video monitoring room, Fitz, Skillet, and Green-Sweatered Woman burst out and shoot everything in sight. Shark just sits there for a moment, at which point I’m thinking, “Oh right! Because he’s bullet proof!” Then, shockingly, Fitz blows his head off. Although I suppose Shark’s sudden vulnerability could be attributed to Rich Businessman releasing a bullet-proof shield he had placed on him, that still doesn’t explain the most annoying factor of this scene: Shark, the show’s biggest smart-ass, dies without saying anything.
If the death had been a quick one, this would probably have gone unnoticed. But the scenes involving Shark drag on for so long that it becomes very awkward to not hear him speak. It’s a shame to see one of the show’s oldest characters go down on such low note, but fortunately the rest of the episode is good enough to forgive this imperfection.
Soon after Shark’s death, the Eye touchingly decides to take the half-digested New Guy to the river on foot while the others fly off in a giant metal Shark ship. What follows is a funny and tense battle with the tie-bots.
Soon to join them in the air, Rich Businessman travels off to his bank, where he argues with the Shadowy Figure in a very well executed villain-speech scene. This works both as a parody of these cliche scenes in action films, and as a genuinely intriguing part of the story. RBM reveals with typical arrogance that he’s been using Shark as a pawn, and that the underground aspirind farms are finally ready to be harvested.
Now aware of this, the hovervacs begin ripping open the pavement and collecting hundreds of pills which lay under the streets. Even as they do so, the corn-droid tries to slaughter them, flying throughout clusters of them and easily blowing them to bits.
Underground, Liquor strangely discovers that Roostre’s body has been vacated to free Muff, who turns out to be a glowing blue orb, hoping to help Fitz escape through “the upfalls”, which I imagine is near the river.
Bringing it all to an unexpected and semi-devastating conclusion is an airborne battle between RBM and Skillet. Surprisingly, the villainous pink square wins, incinerating our beloved rodent and sending the rest of the crew careening into the asphalt below.
The aftermath of this moment is sobering, even for Peanut, soaking the scene in an uncomfortable gravity. And by that, I mean it evoked thoughts of, “Why do I feel bad that an Adult Swim character died?!” It’s very weird, and pretty impressive at the same time.
On top of that, we get a bit of icing on the cake. By the time the episode’s credits would normally be rolling, we get a finale that brings Amalockh back into the city to destroy RBM’s ship and send the liquefied Shadowy Figure flying.
I can honestly say that I left this episode stunned. It’s definitely not an episode filled with jokes, but the show doesn’t even need them anymore. Why? Because they’ve got something else: An immersive story that transcends both its artwork and the genre-box associated with the network it airs on.