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popculturebuffet · 1 month ago

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Big City Greens The Movie: Spacecation Review! (Gwendolyn Zapp Retrospective Part 2 of 2): The most Stellar Animated Film of the Year

Hello all you happy people! Last month I took a look at every episode of big city greens starring Gwendolyn Zapp, an unstable tech billionare seemingly immune to consequences with a lot of power and no moral compass. Obviously.. a LOT changed in that month and i'm just. i'm fine. I'm fine look how fine I am

I'M FINE... but if you need a breather, check out the review

So naturally the main reason to do this... was to get to the movie, somethign Kev's wanted me to cover since it came out and something I was glad to. I love this movie, and a second watch only strengthened my love of it. Spacecation will probably be my faviorite animated film of the year, and while it's a light year to compete in, it still more than earns it.

Spacecation was announced simply as big city greens the movie in 2022, directed by series director Anna O'Brien. The Houghtons naturally wrote the film and were admirably cautious: they knew two key things: The first was that the story had to be big enough to justify the film existing. If they could tell the story in the show proper, why do it. They had the greenlight for a film but wisely realized a film adaptation HAS to have a good reason to exist. The second was not to over escalate as their keenly aware as a show goes on it has to keep esclating to keep attention and going too far could break the world they painstakingly set up.

Thankfully they had an ace up their sleeve that made going as far as they needed easy: Gwendolyn Zapp. As I pointed out last time, Gwendolyn gives the series a free pass to do weird shit: she keeps things grounded enough as her inventions: robots, space monster crops, tweaking someone's personality via a big ole gun in cyber space.. all things scientists probably HAVE attempted or are actively working on, simply upped to pure super science for funsies. Hell her having a space program was there from day one: she tried to launch the Kludge into space for her mars project and squashed happens entirely thanks to her mars colony. Thanks to her previous episodes she knew the greens and unlike chip the history wasn't as dense and complicated; She's a weird dangerous billionare the greens deliver to frequently because she pays good and who has limitless resources. That's all you need to set up and as someone who went into the film not having seen her other apperances the film does a perfect job sliding in you. She gave them everything they needed for the film and was deranged enough that having her go full big bad was easy.

So with the setup easy, the film got underway, though they doubled the crew size to do it, a smart move as i've seen shows suffer due to the film adaptation. Looking at you regular show. So doubling the crew so they could facilitate both while keeping quality up was the right call. I also applaud disney for making this possible. It's a very low bar to say "you need more people to do two projects" but given how they've been this year, it's a miracle they cleared it. As far as I can tell production was smooth as butter, with the film coming out on time earlier this year, with the plot being kept under wraps for most of it's runtime.

As for where the series fits in the timeline of the series the houghtons have left it vauge for now, since they likely had no idea when the film would be finished or even once it was when it'd come out, and kept it purposfully detatched not just for that, but to welcome new viewers. My best guess is sometime in early season 3, one of two possible options they gave and the one that fits the most with the series: Nancy, the kids mom comes to babysit but makes no mention of whose watching her place, and the greens farm from their front yard. Mid season 3 the greens buy their farm back and spend the rest of the season, along with Remy and eventually Alice, in smalton, their old home. Eventually it's clear the Greens miss big city, so they move back with alice, while Nancy stays behind to run the farm, having found peace there. So Spacecation fits better with Nancy still in big city and the greens still using the family farm. The fact Gwendolyn Zapp's absent after delivernator early in season 3 also makes this easy and while she's one of many reacting to the greens going away, she's also very weird and probably woudln't think nothing of the time she left them in space to die and with buisness booming and way more crops to sell than before, not to mentoin the extra money from the cafe, there would be no reason to keep selling to her after she tried to leave them to die in space. SO TLDR: it fits better in season 3 just before they buy the farm back .

With that I can finally dive into the film itself under the cut!

The Views are Cinematic

So before we dive into the meat of the film let's talk about the potatoes. Spacecation looks gorgeous and you can tell while Disney didn't pour all it's money into this like it should've it still gave the crew a healthy budget and it shows: the film uses wider angels and sweeping shots , stuff that would be expensive to pull off in the series proper and is saved for the bigger moments, but here they can do pretty often, with a shocking amount of action scenes. The settings look gorgeous from the spacious sci fi halls of big tech, to the relaistic yet gorgeous spacecraft, all the way to a desolate farming astroid with a gorgeous farm tucked in, with the void of space looking as vast, terrifying and wonderous as it should. The film makes fantastic use of color doing a trick I love where a character is lit all in one color for contrast. The story is bigger and the film makes you feel it just like the Simpsons or Bobs Burgers movies on what had to be a fraction of those films generous budgets. It's one thing to make a movie but Spacecation understands out to make something cinematic and it's a shame it dosen't seem Disney ever considered this for theaters. I thought i might of over the months since it came out built up this film looking this good in my head but no.. it really looks that sharp, looking like a regular episode in for smaller scenes but really punching it up when needed. It dosen't have the shading of a theatrical relase but damn if it isn't staged perfectly with some really dynamic visuals.

All this visual razzle dazzle would mean nothing though if there weren't meat on the bones... thankfully this film is juicy as heck and boy do i regret this metaphor let's just move on to the films center.

Those Things I Said

Spacecation, as fresh as it feels, is as good as it is by relying on some familiar formulas. The first is one other film adaptations like Kim Possible: So the Drama, The Proud Family Movie, The Simpsons Movie and The Bobs Burgers Movie have done: Take the series core conflict, one they've done a billion times, and take it to it's logical conclusion. See what happens when you bend it so far it breaks and what the characters do. For Kim it's having the villian plot of the week not only be bigger but largely succeed, pushing kim to her breaking point. For the simpsons movie it was taking Homer's habbit of screwing up and having to fix it, and inflating it with him fucking up so bad the whole town wants to kill him and the rest of his family, and fixing it involves stopping the us goverment from bombing springfield from existance. Bobs Burgers takes the restraunts normal precarious position and has it in genuine threat of closing, with usual saving grace Mr Fishoder accused of murder with the kids usual shenanigans now being "solve a friggin murder". It's a simple trick and while not every show does it, and good for that I like some diversity, It works really well for escalating a sitcom like this, rooting the big flashy set pieces in the heart of the show.

That leads to our second and the piece they choose to go with, cricket and bill arguing over something. This was VERY common in the first two seasons. Out of 116 segments, 22 involve this, a good 20 percent of the show at that point. It's easy to see fans getting tired of neither green really learning the lesson to not be a reckless meanace or a wild child. And tha'ts JUST the circket bill stuff there's more episodes of cricket's stubborness causing issues.

However to their credit, the crew eased up on it after this: Season 3 only has three of these and the last one to date is bill omniously warning cricket about having a usual instead of a serious conflict. Rather than go to this well forevermore, hello simpsons and your marriage crisis episodes please stop it love jake, they made a concious decision to end them.. and to have the movie serve as the final pin. Cricket won't stop being reckless and bill won't sotp being overprotective, but it was wise to just have the two grow past fighting every five episodes and do new stuff. Maybe bill bores his family, feels hurt they don't like the same things and becomes the crow.

Given the simpsons has done 76 Homer and Marge marriage Crisis Episodes (Thank you The Real Jims for counting all those in his video on the subject), it's nice to see a show decide to just end a theme like this in style.

The final major toss up between these two begins simply enough before setting controls for outer space: it's time for a GREEN FAMILY VACATION, and i'll get to the songs later but that one is a fucking bop and has been in my head for a good chunk of the review process. The Greens have saved up enough to take a break and go on a vacation, with Nancy watching the pets and also getting a gloriously gay b-plot with gloria i'll get to later.

For once Cricket is thinking ahead, and actually made a pamphlet, a nice little handrawn thing of suggestions and freeze framing it.. what suggestions they are. Going ot mexico, breakfast land, volcanos.. it's great. None of it is plausible, but you can tell he put his heart into the thing.

That pamphlet is the secret suace that makes the terrible thigns he does as the film goes on work: Cricket actually did come up with ideas, was excited and wanted to go on a fun exciting adventure with the family. He likes adventure and Bill damn well knows that.

And instead of that Bill.. offers the same trip as last year. And look Bill has some good intetions: he knew everyone enjoyed it, wanted to keep everyone safe which is hard to do on a vacation, he meant some well.. but ther'es some selfishness here that does a lot of the heavy lifting towards making this a both sides issue when one of the sides is "tricking your family into space". Bill later calls Cricket out for being selfish.. but Bill has the same stubborness and selfishness. As his ex wife will later point out int he movie, part of the reason they butt head sso much.. is that Cricket and Bill are a lot more alike than they seem. THeir diffrent enough in their wants for this to be an issue, but their both stubborna nd tend to make decisions based on what THEY want without considering what someone else wants.

And bill.. didn't think about cricket or alice. Bill accuses Cricket of steamrolling people and he's not wrong.. but Bill often does the same. Bill knew Cricket would be outvoted and filed off his concerns and wants as "stupid ideas". He likely barely read the pamphlet instead of maybe sitting down with his son and finding a middle ground between a ten year old's fantasy and "repeating a trip we already took without telling him ahead of time. " Given how Cricket is , Bill SHOULD have seen the backlash and some Zany scheme coming. This isn't like the goofy movie where max tricks a very naive goofy (if for understandable reasons Goofy goes with once they actually talk). Bill knows his son does this kind of thing.

Now while i'm being hard on bill make no mistake: Cricket screws up. Cricket is a brat and while he's right ot be angry, he too fucks up royally. Now wanting a vacation in space when Gwendolyn asks the greens to go into space, that's fair. He sees a giant hotel she started, a fun adventure with his family, and he's ten so he dosen't see the ten dozen red flags or learn from the fact Gwendolyn's stuff tends to be dangerous. He assumes this will just be some fun space adventure and not what space travel is:

So his wanting it.. is understandable.. but the actions he takes to get what he wants are horrible, even by "he's a children standards". While I do thinka LOT of fans were too hard on cricket/didn't give bill enough flak for his own part as bill is a grown man, Cricket still hits a new low here. He lies to Gwendolyn, agreeing to do the mission if they can stay at her fancy space hotel after, and then lies to his family to get them on the rocket. The only reason they don't turn around is Gwendolyn Zapp is a heartless monster who blackmails them into it and also dosen't realize contracts signed by ten year olds wont' hold up in court no matter how much money you have.

Yet you still don't hate him entirely as while he fucks up royally.. his goals aren't entirley selfish. Yes he wants a good vacation for himself. Yes he hated bill's idea and resented him for shooting down his ideas, the latter being entirely resonable given Bill didn't bother discussing it with anyone or thinking that "just because these ideas are insane dosen't mean my son isn't taking them dead seriously". But he WANTS his family go have a good vacation: Tilly looses her Journal and Gramma looses her leg in the entry process, so while his getting them replacements could just be him trying to butter them up.. it comes off more as he realized he screwed up a little and space isn't AS fun as he thought and rather than give up, he wants to MAKE it fun. He finds genine replacements in a recorder and a robot leg that both love and it's clear he cares. He does want his dad to enjoy it.. but it's not for the "win" of proving his dad wrong.. he just geninely wants his dad to have a fun trip in space. It's what makes cricket works: sometims he's just a selfish little goblin.. and other times he's a well meaning and destructive little goblin. This shenanigan is a mix of the two: he did want a cool vacation for himself, didnt' think it through and put everyone in danger, but he dosen't just run off to do space stuff with everyone mad at him. He wants them to enjoy it too. The bulk of the first half is Cricket trying to help bill have fun. We see in "Chill Bill" Bill rarely loosens up with Cricket not having seen how bill gets on lakes (Chill as fuck for the record). It's the films heart: these two DO care about each other they just aren't good about actually carring what the other wants to the letter. Both are so used to ignoring the other and doing what they want it's easy to forget they love each other.

In Cricket's way though is Colleen Voyd, played amazingly by Renee Elyse Goldsberry of Hamilton Fame. Voyd is hopelessly devoted to Gwendolyn, a stickler for the rules and a bit of a pain in the ass. A lot of it is understandable: Space is dangerous, she wants the greens to live, and she wants the mission to succeed for her god empreror genius mommy. But Cricket hates her for not wanting any fun, and understandably: not for not wanting fun on a deadly mission but for treating a child like an astronaut who knew what he was getting into. Maam this is a children, he's not going to get your trying to keep him safe.

Granted how he works around her.. is fucked. It's probably the worst thing Cricket's ever done. Instead of trying to talk with her, reason with her, or figure something out, not options that might've worked but he could certainly try, he decides to instead lock her in the cryo chambers of the ship. It's better than Gramma's plan of we kill her.. and while it's a joke that she said "we kill her" i've seen alice in enough episodes to know she probably did entirely think "let's do a murder" as her first solution and backed off because her grandson dosen't have the taste for it yet. They trick her in there with Tilly noticing and being talked into it.

Cricket TRIES to get bill to accept it with a jaunty musical number, but it clashes with who bill is: Tilly goes with the flow, Alice and Cricket are naturally reckless but bill while a kind man, a good farmer and a solid father... is a naturally awkward easily startled man. Space was going to be his own personal hell. I can relate. I love sci fi but I know the actual experince of going into space, while life changing would also be deeply terrifying at the point it's at. It's a point the movie makes and something that helpfully grounds it: whiel the tech is a touch ahead of what we have, the risks of space travel and the time and energy it takes are all there.

Still Bill does slowly warm up, and a close call with a trashteroid field helps close the gap. I do love the trashteroid field as it's set up as a one off joke: Gwendolyn off handily mentions their just shooting garbage into space futurama style if in smalle rquantities... leading to a giant field of trash our heroes have to navigate with. IT gets the old standard of "navegating astroeids" in there but spruces it up with the fresh visuals of all this rubbish. The Trashteroid sequence is awesome and a joy to watch and the 3d animation in this film is top notch. Cricket has bill drive.. and he does so with style, saving thie rlives.. if damaging the ship.

Bill is actually warming up, and it's nice to see. Bob Joules does a great job as bill but it's really nice to see him just.. relax. Be happy. But it also creates a ticking time bomb as you KNOW any second Cricket's lies will come unraveled and it's only a matter of when. I"m usually not a fan of liar revealed plots but it can work and this one feels more like the goofy movie: I.e. you get why the characters doing the bad thing so you don't hate them completely, and the lie is much simplier: Max was doing the trip as usual, and Cricket simply says Coleen got sick. The lie isnt' for perosnal glory or anything but for simple human reasons. Dosen't make the lie okay, but it dosen't make you resent the character for getting deeper and deeper down the lie hole.

The other ticking time bomb is the farm bots, Gwendolyn's original farmers who are also funny robots..and thanks to a coding error have gone rogue. Naturally Gwendolyn didn't remotely warn them of this and sends the greens into danger without any prepreation. We do get one last nice bit of vacation as the greens see the space hotel, their reward for the mission Cricket got for them, and them farming which is neat. I love the zero gravity farm, it's rotating collumns, and just how happy bil is... before the robots try to plant them.

One super runaway later, our heroes find the ship is broken and everything else breaks down as their ships engine is clogged. So Tilly breaks out Colleen and Bill finds out what Cricket done did and of course dosen't take it well, not being suprised as of course his son did the reckless selfish thing while Cricket clearly feels ashamed, but is too prideful to actually apologize.

Not helping is Colleen chooses the mission over their lives, more on that later, so our heroes have to do a few awesome action set pieces and strap a rocket to the kludge. Cricket ends up driving for a bit and ... does actually find a way to reach the dome they do, a ramp jump he has carefully thought out for a change. But then they both screw up: Bill jerks the controls away and he and Cricket fight over them. Both Greens can't give an inch when it matters: Cricket is pissed his dad won't trust him the one time he needs it and refuses to accept WHY that is given he just spent several hours lying to the man, while BIll can't accept cricket isn't ALWAYS wrong and they can't really play it safe right now as there IS no safe surrounded by killer robots.

The truth is.. they BOTH fuck up and cause them to crash into the dome and while they can shut down the power, it's caused the asteroid to go off course.. it's heading for earth and specifically big city. They have to cut the right wire or else humanities doomed and Cricket once again screws up and cuts the communciation.

It's what makes this next scene work, the scene the whole film hinges on: The fight between Cricket and Bill that's been bubbling all movie, all series. And it begins with Cricket asking one simple question "Why did you pull the wheel away from me?" Like any family argument.. it begins with something you really shoudln't be asking... yet feels like a fair question. Bill tries to table it and it's fair to: Their trying to save the world, this isn't the time for it.. but the problem is WHOSE saying that: Bill has shut down cricket again and again, constantly telling him his ideas are bad and he should feel bad. So instead of taking it as "We really can't fight right now" Cricket understandably explodes at the worst possible time, pissed his dad helped cause this.

Bill rather than be the adult in the room, decides to fight back, pointing out Cricket's why their here in the first place the two sniping back and forth: Bill points out Cricket's ideas are dangerous, Cricket fires back if he weren't so "boring" he'd like them. Alice tries to stop bill and I love her "That's enough" It's not her usual anger.. but the anger of a mother knowing her child is going too far with his own kid and needs to back up.. but not able to stop him.

Both reach the point where they say things they can't take back: Bill says "All your ideas are bad! I'm sorry I don't like bad ideas!" and Cricket.. takes this as confrimation of what he's all belivied, something that makes everything, his actions, his lies, his mistakes... understandable. Not good or something he shouldn't make up for or have to apologize for, but understandable. It's the key to making what Cricket did work: that he isn't just doing this for himself, or his family.. but to prove something to himself: That his dad likes him. That he can have ONE idea his dad actually likes. As his response to all this is "I get it now.. when you say you dont' like my dieas.. what your really saying is you don't like me. Well that's fine because I don't like YOU"

Chris Houghton's delivery is painful and perfect: the quiet pain at first, the bitterness, the doubling down.. it's all so harsh yet understandable: Bill constantly says Cricket is wrong.. how else is the kid supposed to take it? He didn't mean harm by it.. but you can see why Cricket ended up in such an extreme. You can only be told your wrong so many times before you internalize it. Believe me, i've been there.

So everything explodes.. literally to add to the emotoinal blow up and Cricket is left adrift. We then get the best song of the movie, those things I said. It's the only one i'm commenting on ahead of getting to the songs later as it's a centerpiece of the film showing how much both green men regret what they've done. IT's also why I don't get the dogpiling on Cricket: He fucked up bad, the film dosen't let him off for that, and dosen't try to make bill AS culpable, simply.. culpable. Which he is. The boy spends a whole song singing about how badly he screwed up, how he regrets telling his dad he dosen't like him, and how he got everyone he loves seemingly killed. Cricket is left utterly broken, realizing that no the risk wasn't worth it this time and that as much as his dad hurt him hurting him back dosen't fix it. It's a painfully real thing about this kind of argument getting out what you feel... dosen't always exactly fix things and sometimes those wounds don't heal. Same with Bill who realizes by being so hard on cricket always, it pushed him this far.

Thankfully there IS an adult in the room.. or rather Gramma's leg who can help. Nancy. So quickly covering this subplot: Nancy naturally saw something was up seeing on the news that her family went into space, but couldn't get a straight answer out of Gwendolyn and gets escorted off the premises. Thankfully Nancy has a not so straight ally in Gloria. Gloria and Nancy's subplot this film can best be described as

As while they INTEND for Gloria to see Nancy as a second mom, having said as much before it instead comes off as Gloria crushing heavily on a cool older woman but having not realized she's bi yet. While Gloria being awkward as fuck is buisness as usual for the series the way she is ... not straight. It's just not. I say this as a bi diasaster myself who would act the same way around keith david despite, like Gloria, knowing nothing could happen. The man is happily married and a few decades older than me. I get it. But there's no harm in looking long as your repspectful.

This subplot also works because it pairs up two characters who haven't gotten a subplot togehter; Nancy and Gloria have shared a scene or two, but haven't actually interacted before this and McLoven-Covey and Akana have great chemistry, Nancy trying to focus on the job and Gloria being at her most awkward, which says a lot. They sneak in, get captured, hear a villian monologue and Gloria ultimately proves herself getting them free to help save the day and serve as mission control.

Admittedly the subplot is loosely tied to the main plot but it IS essential on two fronts: the first is showing off Zapp's callousness and giving her someone to monologue to, complete with villain song. It helps explains why she's doing this and also lets us see her decide to fuck off to mars instead of save the world. While we get that info later in the main plot too, it works better with us KNOWING she did this. The second is getting in contact with Cricket. It makes more sense having Nancy, who Cricket hasn't hurt and is you know, his parent, give him the peptalk over his family.

IN this case Cricket is ready to give up, figuring he'll just do something worse. And while he's not wrong to feel bad about what he did, Nancy even gives an oof when talking to him, Nancy recognizes her family needs her boy to do his best. That yes he screws up a lot, and he and his father are both stubborn.. but they both want whats best for the family. And right now what's best is saving the world, in this case using the tractor beam from the space hotel that was set up earlier but I didn't mention.

Thankfully the rest of the family finds Cricket, Cricket finds bill but I like that while they both clearly feel bad and all's forgiven.. both aren't quite back yet. While Cricket rushes out to fix the tractor beam himself when it proves not strong enough to redirect the farming asteroid, getting some of his reckless but creative mojo back.... he can't lift it and gives up. It's.. heartining seeing Cricket this down on himself. You understand why, he fucked up real good, but it's still not pledsant. Ther'es no joy in the win. And Bill sees that and admits he too isn't perfect: he plays it too safe, the vacation was indeed toos afe and while Cricket scares him sometimes... he admits the boys heart is in the right place: most of his shenanigans are about getting the most out of something for those he loves.

They often backfire horribly and not ALL of them are selfless (not that he says that), but it's that heart that drive sthe chaos. The boy mostly means well and makes life.. intresting and he can do this. Hell bill knows it. It's a seen that's heartwarming as hell and adorabl, affring both greens may of fucked up.. but they love each other still always willa nd wha'ts said in the heat of things isn't always true. B Oth sides screwed up.. but both can make it better.

Cricket flips the switches btu gets caught in a stream of trash the beams pulling in. So BILL shows his own development; Cricket realized he screwed up and felt genine remorse, now bill in addition to that, also jumps out and helps his son, the two saving the day.

The duo end the film on good terms blasting off into the sunset, or the equilvent to have a space vacation with Bill learning his lesson and asking Cricket if he has any ideas. So we end on an adorable montage of them having some space fun while waiting for a rescue craft. It's a pitch perfect end to a near perfect end to the series longest standing plot. It's a lesson in empathy: that sometimes your both wrong even if one person is more wrong, and that if we listen to each others heart, we'll find we're never too far apart, and maybe love is the reason why for the first time ever their seeing theings eye to eye.

The Fall of the House of Zapp

So i'd like to start this section with one of the great philosophers of our time..

I used to wanna get the chance to show the world I'm smart (ha) Isn't that dumb? I should've focused mostly on the heart 'Cause I seen smarter people trample life like it's an art So bein' smart ain't what it used to be, that's fuckin' dark EL-P, (As Part of Run the Jewels), A Few Words for the Firing Squad

This.. really sums up Gwendolyn Zapp and the people she's meant to be a parody of: Stupid Rich Kids who get more money and power than they know what to do with, get frozen at 20, surrounded with people either unable to call them out or unable to see their deranged, and who do what THEY think is best for the future and not what people might actually need. It's something that's only become clearer since my last post, as I watched a few episodes of the amazing podcast behidn the bastards on tech billionares: Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and human dumpster fire Elon Musk among others. It's not the podcasts only focus you can also hear how Napoleon Bonaparte III got drunkenly caught while doing an insurrection then shot a man in the face for reasons known only to him, Scott Addams wanted to name Dogbert Dildog, and how fashion monster Peter Nygaard responded to his neightbors understandable requests by super imposing said neighbors face over shots of the twin towers falling.

But it put into persepctive that the bulk of tech billionares are spoiled manchildren (and in one case womanchildren), who grew up with extra advantages and daddy's money, either the dad was a good parent or not, and never bothered to learn empathy or the consequences of their actions before becoming rich. Learning all this helps deep Gwendolyn Zapp as a character: She's primarily a wacky joke machines... but like all these billionares her money is built on a mixture of entitlement, never being told no, and being stuck with sychophants and true beliviers who will gladly care out her bidding no matter how questionable or awful it is, only stepping in if their going to get sued. Zapp SEEMED like she was a wacky exageration and while she was.. it's only by the tinest margin.

So really like any real life tech billionare, it isn't that far a drop from "kooky eccentric" to "Mad Scientest who will make the world pay". Gwendolyn almost ended the world ONCE already on the show and tried to rewrite childrend's brains. Having her be the antagonist was a perfect fit and serves as a perfect capper to her character.

This appearnce really boils down everything about her perfectly to the point that, as I mentioned, I had not seen any of her eps.. and still got the character's whole deal easily. She's an egotist entirely out of touch with reality, if she was ever in touch with it who wants big bountiful advances for humanity, but in a showy way that gets her all the credit. From day one she pointed out how she could solve so many issues but instead makes robo pants.

In this case she's farming in space, which isn't a terrible idea: At it's best it provides more sustainable food for people who need it, at worst it's a backup plan on the high chance humanity fucks up the planet too bad to be livable. But her reasons aren't alturisim or making the future better.. she just wants to prove her kindergarten teacher wrong.

Yeah she's that petty. As we find out in her decent villian song mid film.. that's the whole reason why Zapp is doing this. The whole reason why farm veggies in space. And the saddest part is.. her teacher wasn't even mean to her. She just chuckled about how cute the idea a six year old presented her was. It's the kind of horrifying thing that can indeed happen in real life when you piss off a billonare with tons of money and thin skin. I mean Elon Musk brought Twitter because he had beef with his daughterand wants to buy Hasbro because the head of creatvie for DND dosen't give a shit what he thinks, while Steve Jobs called the mother of his daughter a whore and denied being his daughter Lisa's father for decades to the point of having the people working on the Apple Lisa come up with an acronym so he could deny naming it after her. I wish I made either of these things up.

Billionaires are petty husks of human beings. What I thought was an exaggerated wacky kidnapping plot.. is something terrifyingly possible. I"m not saying these guys HAVE kidnapped their old teachers to gloat to them, but the fact they COULD'VE and easily buried it is alarming.

So in just a few short months Zapp's plotline has gone from "wacky but fun" to "deeply disturbing.. and still a little fun". I mean Cheri Oteri is a delight in this role and while this could easily be the end, I wouldn't mind seeing her again in season 5. It's a clear throughline in the tech industry that the tech persons ego matters more than money, common sense or lives, and this plot illuminates that hauntingly well. Gwendolyn Zapp is trying to prove a point to someone who was never really against her and dammed if it costs lives.

And it's a horrifying mantra she's indocirnated into her employees, as we see with her biggest Loyalist and one of the films leads Coleen Voyd, played to perfection by Renee Elise Goldsberry. If Zapp is a reflection of how dangerous and unstable tech mobles are taken to comical degrees, Voyd shows how scary unblinking loyalty to these kinds of techbros can be, that just because someone CAN change the world dosen't mean their doing it for the right reason.

Coleen Voyd has fully bought the hype: She sees Zapp as a visonary who can do no wrong, the mission as paramount and follows her Zappstronaut rules to the letter even when their kinda draconian when implied to literal children. She WORSHIPS Gwendolyn, and can't fathom her or the rules ever being wrong, following them to a fault. While Cricket defintely shouldn't of thrown her in cryo, that was horrible.. Voyd wasn't a good leader, not getting that her crew, while volunteering for this mission far as she knew, is still civllians with no formal training. Just belting a cool song at them isn't going to make them listen to you and while Cricket shouldn't of mutinied, someone was gonna at some point when your only command is "OBEY THE WORDS GOD EMPRESS ZAPP HAS DECREED PEONS".

Voyd shows the dangers of letting someone do whatever they want because it's "for the greater good"

A lot of tech bro worship, especailly in cases like Elon in the House, the horrifying Cory in the House sequel 50 percent of the country apparently asked for, comes from "Well they donate or they do this or that". I turned a blind eye to bill gates for a long time not relaizing he was bullying people who actually knew what they were doing to do the dangerous shit he wanted to do. IT's why Narcissism and Charity can't coexist. You can't genuinely build a better world if you think your the only one who can. Other people have good ideas. You are not the only person in the world whose opinon matters and if your the kind of person who clearly thinks your thinks that, your going to do some TERRIBLE shit and people will do terrible shit in your name. It's this cult bullshit that got us the president elect we have. I wanted to stay out of politics for this one but it's impossible to given how close to home this hits: the idea that you can put all your faith and good intentions.. in a person who geninely dosen't care if you live or die and whose idea of a good future is built on a mountain of corpses.

Am I getting just a tad dark about a children's cartoon character? Eh maybe, but I like how this is told:Through comedy. It's a lesson kids NEED to know: that just because someone's smart or charasmtic does not make them a good person. The comedy makes it almost easy to forget that Gwendolyn Zapp when given the choice between her vanity project and 5 human lives.. chooses the vanity project. It's what most egomanical billionares would do given the choice. It's what constantly fluffing someone's ego up and buying into their madness gets you: stranded in space. Colleen willingly sends the vegtables and not the greens and herself home because that's the mission. And the Green's don't even know the reason WHY Zapp discarded them. It's a pitch perfect metaphor for tha tdisconnect: the innocent people who get thrown away don't CHOOSE this, they don't sign on for some glorious purpose.. they just want to get buy. As much as cricket fucked up he did NOT sign on to fight for his life and Zapp hid all this from them till it was too late.

Thankfully both parties get a compupance in a way they deserve. For Colleen Voyd.. it's redemption. She did fuck up royally, put her faith in the wrong person and like cricket and bill at first doubles down, refuses to accept she was wrong or betrayed everyone present. After all as far as she knows she put her faith in the right person. Gwendolyn will save them and the earth and smite their enemies.

Instead.. she gets let down. Gwendolyn decides "fuck earth" when the asteroid threat is apparently and peaces out ot mars in a giant face ship leaving everyone to die. If there was any doubt she was a bad person remotely left... this removes it. She may of seemed personable but Gwendolyn Zapp.. was a monster, a selfish narcisit who flees.

Colleen .. dosen't take it well, taking a few minutes in real time and about an hour to despair. It's only when the greens try to break into the controls to the tractor beam she spouts off her rules.. then breaks them. It's a good lesson: Just because someone you trusted with your heart and soul betrays you dosen't mean you should give up, and just because your hero lets you down dosne't mean you can't be a hero yourself. Collenn shapes up and finds a better path for herself: She wasn't a terrible person, just bound too rigidly to rules set out by someone anyone else could see was terrible because they didn't worship her. And her exit from the movie is the heroes exit she deserves: She heads off to fix things, Tilly gives her Cookie, the weird blob she's been carrying around all film who disney isn't merchandising to hell and back because they dumb, and the two get to work cleaning up the trash and making a better future the hard way... the right way.

As for Gwendolyn... everything comes crashing down carmically. She has to watch her space hotel get burnt up (The greens saved everybody so don't worry), then returns oblivous as usual.. to an angry populus that threw the free space produce she gave them at her It may only be thanks to the power of fictoin, but Gwendolyn Zapp finally lost the one thing she needed to.. not the millions of dollars, sadly even in fiction you can't take those away, but the public's respect and willingness to tolerate her crap. There won't be another Colleen Voyd, thank god and Gwendolyn Zapp will slowly collapse into the dustbin of history... or probably show up for an epilogue in season 5. Save the date!

The Movie The Musical One of the first things about this movie that was announced that it'll be a MUSICAL ... which was a shock as Big City greens has done a musical episode and maybe two or three numbers over four seasons. Still it was a fun idea and works well. IT reminds me of the goofy movie where it is technically a musical, but there's some gaps between the numbers. In fact Rules Rap was added entirley because there was about half an hour between Green Family Vacation and Space is Fun.

Green Family Vacation gets us off to a great start, a fun number where everyone gets a solo with Cricket's really hammering in why he ends up doing the shit he does. It has great coregraphy complete with some lala land style dancing on top of cars and a great cameo from officer keyes. It's jaunty, gets stuck in your head, it's everything an opening number should be and more.

Rules Rap... should really be called Zappstronaut Rules as Colleen says it enough times with an excellent belt. It's really well done though. Renee has bars for days and shows it off, going rapid fire as hell. It's the chorus I feel lets these ones down as while operatic, it feels out of tone with the rapid pace of the rest of hte rap and how dauntless the rules feel, stacked on one after another on top of our heroes. Still a banger. It really gets colleens cultish warship of gwendoln and sticklership, as well as how dangerous things are, all out nice and fast and making it a musical number was a genius move.

Space is Fun is okay. Visually it's fantastic, really showing off the ship and space itself and Bill's terror beautifully. But content wise i'ts just ... cricket going on about how fun space is. It's not really substantive.

Gwendolyn's Lament: Is decent. Cheri Oteri belts it out, I just wish they'd leand on her vocals more instead of having her talk thorugh a chunk of it, as she CAN belt it. Still having Gwendlon do a full on jazz number to gorgeous color contrast visuals was never not going to be fun.

Stuff I Said is a masterpiece, getting into Cricket and Billl's regret beautifully with Chris Houghton being a suprisingly effective singer. Bob Joules.. .isn't the best but has enough emotoin. And that's the song's strength: the emotion of it, takin ga slow second to let the weight of the shitty things they've done wash over Cricket and Bill. It sells both's changes as both realize they ding dang blorped up and need to fix it. It's a masterful song.

Green Family Vacation Reprise is great as the first one and a fun note to end on. Not much more to say, I aboslutely love them driving on saturn and the solar color washed credits.

Overall the music is decent. Only Green Family Vacation and Stuff I Said Really stick out to me. None of it's horrible or detracts from the movie, but it's still notably weaker than the well crafted story, deftly timed comedy, wonderful character beats or gorgeous visuals. I'ts not terrible, but it's not really memorable. Most musicals have me rushing to spotify to add my faviorites. This one.. I honestly didn't realize was even on spotify till recently. It's not terrible but in a film this good, it's noticably average.

Odds and Ends:

I didn't really talk about Tilly and Gramma in the main portions as their off to the side in their own weird fitting adventures: Tilly gets an alien, Alice gets a super leg and plots murder. Their good solid subplots but both are the side dishes to bill and cricket's main course. They contribute more than enough great jokes and to the plot, with Cookie, Tilly's alien, having the abillity to break glass they come in contact with and gramma's new leg allowing her to kick ass because she can't chew bubblegum with those dentures. Both characters are fantastic, there simply isn't anything to dig into with their arcs is all.

Supporting cast wise the film keeps it delebriately light: the only characters outside of Gwendolyn to show up are officer keys, who cameos in the opening number and has two great gags later first remarking what a good day this is seconds before news of the asteroid hits.. and then being proven right later when the apocalypse being cancelled leads to free hot dogs.

Otherwise the only returnees are chris and terry, the gay couple next door who annoy Gloria for a second with the whole foam gag, and Remy's parents.

I bring up Remy's parents for two reasons: to tackle Remy's small roll in the plot and to point out something weird. For some reason Remy's guard, manny and closest friend outside of Cricket Vasquez... is not in the film. The remmingtons are, with Remy going to the space hotel and proving critical to the climax.. but weirdly his bodyguard.. dosen't come along on vacation. And you'd say "Well it's vacaton of course he dosen't" but we're talking three very rich people in a very dangerous environment and a man who needs to see his therapist when Remy goes to a birthday party alone. IT's very weird he's absent.

Now his absence COULD be explained by his voice actor: Vasquez is voiced by everyone's faviorite character actor Danny Trejo. He's done a ton of voice acting on top of that.. which makes his absence questionable for two reasons: 1) while Danny is PROBABLY getting paid a decent wage, and I only say probably because Disney has been confirmed to be the worst and if they overwork pixar and do homophobic shit they probably aren't above underpaying a voice acting and regular acting legend, it's defintely not enough to break the budget and even if they coudln't 2) the remingtons are silent. Also the fact they paid andy daily for three lines tells me they can pay another guest actor for the same. It's a weird absence.

Remy himself is barely in the movie but I appricate finding space for him so the whole main cast gets featured. And Zeno Robinson does make good use of the time, mostly setting up the tractor beam

And getting to conga everyone to saftey in a hilaroius sequence towards the end. He's just kinda there, but it feels right having him there you know. It's the same reason it feels very wrong not having Vasquez around when the rest of Remy's family is there.

Almost forgot the cowboy resembling Sam Elliot. This is just a fun gag having him narrate the greens.. only to turn out to be doing it in story too as some weirdo they have to shoo away. It's a good nod to the big lebowski, a great weird little gag and a fun way to introduce the cast to new viewers.

Spaceclusion

If it wasn't clear already I love this movie. It's tightly animated, nicely takes a stock conflict for the show and blows it the fuck up, it's gorgeous to look at and it's so very funny. It's the movie this show deserved and proof the show has deserved to last this long. While I wish more shows got treated this well by disney, fuck them and their homophobia, I am glad at least one got to shoot for the stars and didn't miss. This movie is fantastic and well worth watching. If you love the show, you'll adore this, if you haven't seen it, it's a great introduction. This film deserves more eyes on it especially in a year full of so much misery from disney it's nice to see them release something this good with no abuse behind it. Thanks for reading and i'm pullin for you, we're all in this together

#big city greens #big city greens spacecation #cricket green #bill green #tilly green #alice green #colleen voyd #gwendolyn zapp #gloria sato #Nancy Green #disney channel #animation #film

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