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fly-pow-bye · 7 years

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Powerpuff Girls 2016 - “Power of Four” (Parts 3-5)

Written by: Jake Goldman, Haley Mancini

Written & Storyboarded by: Kyle Neswald, Benjamin P. Carow, Julia Vickerman, Cheyenne Curtis, Alicia Chan, Grace Craft (sic), Jaydeep Hasrajani, Leticia Abreu Silva

Directed by: Nick Jennings, Bob Boyle

Sorry for the wait, everyone!

Part 3 - Blisster Sister

Written & Storyboarded by: Julia Vickerman, Cheyenne Curtis

Despite having superpowers, she doesn't even know if she can be a Powerpuff Girl, but the Powerpuff Girls insist that it's "in her blood". Their first priority is not seeing if she could stop a crime, but some "new superhero threads". Because that's what the reboot Puffs are all about, putting on new costumes for the toyline to show how fashionable they are!

She first comes out in a business suit, much to the joy of Blossom, but the other two don't really care for it. She tries on a cutesy costume and a slasher villain costume, appealing to Bubbles and Buttercup respectively, but they still say no. She also picks up a costume that's clearly meant to be a Wonder Woman reference, but the Powerpuff Girls immediately shoot it down because, in Buttercup's words:

Buttercup: Where's the rest of it?

Blossom: PASS!

Not that I would want Bliss in Wonder Woman's costume, but it's really telling that the first joke the writers think about with Wonder Woman is how skimpy her clothing is. It just feels wrong, especially after that amazing movie that inspired girls far more than this show did. Not to mention that whole scene in Equal Fights. She tries on a few other costumes, some of them parodies of other superheroes, one of them a pear because random, and most of them unseen because they ran out of ideas.

They eventually decide on a costume that looked just like what she wore before. "Always a classic", says Blossom, unintentionally telling people that they really were afraid to stray too far from the original when it comes to the looks. Blossom does add one thing to the costume: her old headband she lost when she was a kid, which still fits her because, as said previously, she didn't age from the waist up.

This gets interrupted by the Gnat, a reboot villain I particularly liked in his first episode, mostly because of how mediocre at best everything else in that episode was. We even get to hear his origin story, and the Powerpuff Girls lost the ability to fast forward through origin stories in this part. The Powerpuff Girls can't skip the Gnat's origin story, but Reboot Jojo is fair game! At least we get an explanation on why he doesn’t look like an ordinary gnat: he was bit by a radioactive middle-aged man, gaining his strength! Not even Marvel is safe.

The guy is basically the Amoeba Boys, except instead of being an incompetent villain, he's more of a troll. He even kind of looks like one, which makes me wonder if he was meant to be a trollface reference at one point. Blossom tells Bliss this is the perfect opportunity to show off her crime-fighting skills, as the Gnat is easy.

Unfortunately, thanks to conflicting advice from each Powerpuff Girl and her getting stuck on the one-liner, all she does is another emotional explosion, wrecking the clothing store, but not the Gnat. The Gnat gloats until Blossom punches him through a wall. A rare scene of a non-Bliss Powerpuff Girl beating a villain easily in this episode.

Bubbles suggests that this is all due to "stage fright", and recommends relaxing on some swan boats to treat her anxiety. Blossom and Buttercup give their own ideas, a tax book, because that's relatable, and heavy metal, because Buttercup's the rascally little green princess, and they start arguing again. This almost leads to another explosion, but the Gnat shows up just in time for Round 2. This is just the same scene as before, except this time, it's the Gnat's trolling that causes her powers to go haywire.

Buttercup does her own idea to relax Bliss: a demolition derby! Buttercup's reasoning is that she can blow stuff up, and nobody would care. The problem is that Bliss cares and doesn't want to blow stuff up, so Blossom gives her a simple task: divvy up the chili dogs. Unfortunately, they get into another argument over who gets the one with the most chili.

Buttercup: Don't give Bubbles that one! She gets gassy!

Yup, they really are trying to make "Bubbles is the farty one" a thing. Thankfully, there's no Bubbles fart joke this time. This argument causes her to make the chili dogs explode. They're not really that consistent with it. You may notice a pattern, and you'll be right in guessing that the Gnat shows up here, too. This time, in a giant robot suit! The three try to fight the Gnat, while Bliss goes away to get chili dogs and mope about how she'll never be a superhero.

As she's moping, a flaming tire almost goes towards the chili dog stand, and it suddenly stops in its tracks. This gives her an epiphany: all she had to do to control her powers is to not think about it too hard. She's just that powerful; all she needed to do is not try.

Meanwhile, the Powerpuff Girls are, surprise, aren't doing too well against the Gnat's giant robot. He even traps them in a sticky fly trap, a reference to his origin story. This episode has a habit of reminding me of classic episodes involving new superheroes, whether it be Powerprof's 3D movie gag, or Stray Bullet's sticky fly trap!

Before he can use his giant fly swatter to swat the bug eyed freaks, Bliss shows up and saves her sisters by making the Gnat hit himself. So far, she has saved the ultra-super-powerful superheroes twice, once by just the majesty of her appearance, and the other just after she found out how to control her powers.

It's a a very by-the-numbers part, and just wasn't interesting to me. After a part that was shockingly decent, and a part with silly and terrible retcons, we get an episode that’s repetitive and predictable.

Well, okay, maybe not every scene is predictable. The part ends with Mee, as the closed captions spell his name, looking ominously at the camera. He then farts, because even in the special, we have to have needless fart jokes. It’s funny low little this elephant even comes up in the first three parts. Almost like they’re building him up to be the...elephant in the room? Eh? Eh?

Part 4 - Breaking Bliss

Written & Storyboarded by: Jaydeep Hasrajani, Leticia Abreu Silva

We suddenly cut to the result of a Monster Punch Girls Down on the Powerpuff Girls by Tyranosaurus Tex, a cowboy dinosaur. This feels very abrupt if you don't know this was the 4th part; they really needed a fade-out or something. Thankfully for those poor little ultra-super-powerful heroes, Bliss comes in to save the day with her telekinesis and her 60's Batman hit flashes. Glad to say her telekinesis isn't used as an excuse to have her not punch.

This randomness all turns out to be simulation from the simulation room from Bubblevicious, which is proof that they must have watched some of the original. Hey, maybe the Powerpuff Girls were intentionally struggling to test Bliss's abilities. Yeah, that's gotta be it! While her not-overpowered powers not-overpowered every simulation, the Professor still can't trust her to fight crime, and disallows her from participating when the girls get the emergency signal on their phones. Finally, some sort of explanation: it's actually an emergency signal.

While the Powerpuff Girls go out to fight the crime, Bliss stays in the Powerpuff Girls' room. Even Buttercup questions how it became hers. She plays Cattleship with her pet friend Mee. Four parts in, and we finally get to see Mee in a major scene. He starts off by just say "mee mee mee mee mee mee", but Bliss tells him to talk normally. Well, at least it's good to know she can't speak animal. However, much like almost every other animal in the show, Mee can actually talk.

Not just that, he can transform, too, as seen here as he mocks the Professor for not allowing her to fight crime. So, not only does this special newcomer to the series not just have a pet elephant, but have a magical transforming talking pet elephant. I would talk about this more, but there's actually a reason for this. Surprisingly, it will be satisfying.

The Powerpuff Girls come back after successfully beating up someone named Chipmunk Commando. I assumed this was going to be another offscreen random villain like the "plate smashing ninjas" I forgot to mention in Part 1, but we'll see him later. Bliss is still sad that she couldn't join in and make the Powerpuff Girls completely useless, but Buttercup tells Bliss that the Professor usually gets over things like this at dinner time.

He doesn't. In fact, he doesn't even want her to go to school, telling her to learn from a Fischer Price See N Say parody. Such a great father, he only does this so Bliss can have a reason to hate him. This also avoids the question on whether or not she would go to that unnamed school the Powerpuff Girls go to. It is a school without grades, apparently!

As the Powerpuff Girls try to comfort her when she cries in her room about how much she hates that her Dad doesn't trust her, the emergency signal goes off again. Because there's no way the Professor would allow it, they decide to let Bliss sneak out with them, just so they show that she could fight crime. I do like how she makes an extra hole in the house, as if they're saying she's the fourth wheel of the tricycle.

As mentioned before, it's Chipmunk Commando, and we get to see him in action. The name suggests a certain Austrian Death Machine, but he seems to have some sort of Australian gimmick, as if they mixed up the two countries. He references shrimp-on-the-barbies, he calls someone a kookabura, and Bubbles even uses a kangaroo aura to try to attack him. Chipmunks aren't even native to Australia, or even Austria for that matter. Random!

Notice I said "try". Despite being able to defeat him before without Bliss, when Bliss is around, the Powerpuff Girls get destroyed by the chipmunk with his ability to make everything else slow-motion. It's almost like they're forcing a situation where Bliss would have to help them again. Yeah, we can't have any scene where the Powerpuff Girls can defeat anything more than a gnat without a robot suit. That would be too insulting for our marvelous little girl!

Of course, he suddenly forgets that ability when Bliss starts throwing garbage at him with her telekinesis like she's Darth Vader. Defeated easily by the not-overpowered new sister, he tries to tap out, but she continues the carnage. She even throws a barrage of energy balls out of her hands. I'd talk about all these "special powers" she has that the other girls don't have, but she is made of a different chemical. This could be the Chemical W version of the eye lasers. The Powerpuff Girls don't use eye lasers in this episode either, so it's anyone's guess.

While that's unclear, she makes it pretty clear why she's going overkill with this chipmunk.

Bliss: This is everything the Professor wanted, but that's not enough! I'll (blast) show (blast) you (blast) what (blast) I (blast) can't (blast) DO! (readies big fireball)

She has so many of those certain issues, she didn't even call him Dad this time! As she gets ready to vaporize him with a huge fireball, the Powerpuff Girls try to stop her. They fly right into the energy ball, and the Powerpuff Girls get hurt.

The Professor rushes to the scene, just magically knowing the Powerpuff Girls were there, and assumes correctly that it was Bliss's fault. Unfortunately

Professor: You'll never control your powers!

Bliss: Never?

Professor: No, no, not like that...

That loving father figure finally decides to backtrack from his statements, possibly realizing he's doing more harm than good, but it's too late. Not helping is that Mee, who happened to be brought with them, decides now is the time to not be shy and begins to talk to Bliss in front of them. The Powerpuff Girls are shocked that an animal can talk.

Buttercup: Wow! Just like the dog from the baked bean commercials!

Huh, I guess their Bush's Baked Beans endorsement didn't go through. Mee even turns into a butterfly, sort of like what a certain villain turned into in the original's All Chalked Up. It's here that I had a inkling of what this elephant's twist is. Even with that one scene of him looking menacingly in the camera, I didn't really know what was going on.

Among a few other lies, Mee tells her that she really wants to be the only Powerpuff Girl, which is the only time that is even brought up. With the main trio's on-screen record of getting destroyed by trains, gnats, and squirrels, Bliss may as well be the only ultra-super-powerful superheroine here. It gets slightly better for the main three. Slightly.

Mee then turns into a snake, and now it's really obvious what this is going to be. I'm actually really shocked; I didn't think they would outright reference the most well known "deal with the you-know-who" ever. Oh yeah, notice every time I said Mee's name, I said that's what the closed captions say? It turns out, they have been misspelling the transforming stretchy elephant’s name the whole time, because the actual spelling is Mih.

As in Him backwards, as he turns into his usual form. To be fair, you couldn't make a name like Licosi out of a three letter name. By the way, Him sure likes to play the long game, does he? Him has been doing this "act like the elephant friend" thing for at least 10 years. He probably had to do this while he was juggling around being the guitar shop guy and Harvey from school.

Him offers her the chance to get what she wants, all she has to do is take his hand. Bliss finally gets a flaw in her character besides "she's so powerful, but she causes issues": she immediately trusts Him. She decides to shake one of his claws, and they both get covered with red spirals, her headband gets broken in a symbolic way, and they explode into a Him/Bliss fusion.

HimBliss: Now the real fun begins! Hahahahahahaha!

That's a really great way to end the part. Instead of ending it there, they have the Professor telling her, "well, someone's grounded". This takes away a little bit of the weight. Not only is it not necessary, he never follows through with that. She really must be the Professor's favorite.

There was quite a bit of inconsistency for me to give this a Happy, but that last reveal was actually decent. Once that commercial break hit, I had to know what came next. We finally get to see Him terrorize the city rather than be the evil item peddler, though the way he does it is a little odd, to say the least.

Part 5 - Blisstersweet Symphony

Written & Storyboarded by: Kyle Neswald, Benjamin P. Carow

Breaking news from the somehow overly happy news crew: Him and Bliss have fused, and is now causing chaos. This is the only part that really does any kind of recap of the previous episodes events, which is a good idea.

It seems like every character tries to defeat this fusion to no avail. Bubbles tries to talk to Bliss, which leads to a decent scene where Bliss tries to burst through the fusion's chest, Blossom tries to just punch the fusion, Buttercup tries to use a tree, and even the Professor tries to use a ray meant to seperate fusions. None of this works, with the Professor getting turned into a See N Say as some sort of karmic retribution. Reboot Jojo shows up too, but he gets hit while doing an overly long monologue. Wow, that's really close to something Mojo Jojo would do!

And yeah, Him's whole idea of chaos consists of turning people into silly objects. It seems like more of a Discord thing, but it's still far better than the "strange item peddler" he was in previous episodes. It helps that he's doing this while Townsville is on fire, adding to how hopeless everything is. It does make me wonder: couldn't Him do this on his own? I guess he just needed some power from someone who totally isn't super-overpowered.

One Bliss power Him does use for sure is her telekinesis, which, persumably combined with Him’s near infinite power, is used to rev up Saturn and turning its rings into a giant buzzsaw heading towards the Earth. Okay, that's a neat idea.

Their options limited, the girls decide to a plan they haven't done before. Something that was completely out of the question. Something dangerous. They really build this up as this forbidden thing to be only used as a last resort. It must be the Dyna...

...oh, it's just another combined aura called the Mewtilator. Maybe it's for the best it wasn't the Dynamo, because it doesn't even last long. BlissHim smacks down the chipmunk riding a this thing shoots out, and grabs and immobilizes the aura with her hair. The only actions her massive hair did in this entire special was give the devil a place to rest, be used as a weapon, and to make her unrecognizable in silhouette.

Reboot Jojo shows up again, thankfully only getting into a Spongebob mushroom cloud rather than being transformed, with a spiked ball. Initially failing because he's just not as athletic, Bubbles has the idea to use the Mewtilator's tail to throw it at BlissHim's face. In other words, Bubbles saves Bliss with her butt.

No really, all they had to do to free Bliss is to throw a spiked ball at the fusion. Who would have guessed demonic possession had such an easy cure? Unfortunately, this happiness doesn't last, as it turns out Him is still alive. That's only the ordinary bad news.

Him: What you've done is made more powerful than you can ever imagine!

Thanks to absorbing Bliss's power, that is something implied he could do later in the episode, he turned into a huge demon similar to his transformation in Speed Demon. He uses his newfound powers to turn the Mayor's office into a giant crying pickle baby! I guess he couldn't really top the Saturn thing.

Speaking of which, Saturn got close enough that it sawed through the Moon. The tides disappear, the Earth gets rained upon by the Moon's pieces, the seasons start changing rapidly, and the Earth comes to a demise much ahead of schedule. Way to go, Bliss!

Do the titles fit?

Nah, I'm just kidding, it's just a random scene that never comes up again, only to show how little time the girls have left to save the day. Even the Powerpuff Girls must have realized how useless they are at the almighty fourth sister, as they try to get Bliss to save the day herself. However, Bliss doesn't trust herself anymore, as she's just too unstable. Not like that other 4th Puff they forgot about. Again, she never gets mentioned.

The girls, knowing that she's kind of right, decide to do another plan. It's very anime, even one of the onlookers turn anime faced at it.

Combining their auras with Bliss's power, they turn into the Mighty Powerpuff Sisterhood. I'm surprised to say: I have no problems with this fight scene. Him gets some shots in, the Sisterhood gets some shots in, they have a sword fight out of nowhere, it actually feels like an actual two-sided fight rather than the Monster Punch Girls Down that usually happens. It's the best fight scene in the entire reboot so far, though that's not much of an accomplishment.

Eventually, Him gets the upper hand by grabbing them, and threatens to absorb their power and possibly turn into a another fusion. We don't get to see this, as the Powerpuff Girls and Bliss join hands once again and free themselves with the power of sisterly love.

A giant laser beam from the heart works, too. It even makes the ending hearts, referencing something they have not done in a long time. This disintegrates Him, and, consistent with the last time he got disintegrated, he takes it by laughing. and, of course, prove that fusion is just a way to make weak Puffs stronger. I'm sorry, I had to put that line somewhere.

This majesty is so good, that Saturn just stops in its tracks. We can assume the moon just magically reassembled itself, as it never seems to come up.

Oh, of course Bliss has to be written out, as the writers can barely make plots for three Powerpuff Girls, never mind four it is her solemn duty to bring Saturn back to where it belongs. Forget lifting buildings full of people, this girl can move an entire planet nine times bigger than the Earth. A gas giant, but still.

Even Reboot Jojo is sad, with him even repeating the "I'm allergic to sad things" joke from the last episode. Most importantly, she hugs her Dad goodbye, who now accepts her as the fourth Powerpuff Girl...just when she has to leave.

This is the most entertaining part of the five. The best Him appearance yet, and a fight scene that isn't one-sided!

Do the titles fit?

Power of Four - We do get to see the Power of Four at the end, though most of it is just "The Power of One because we decided to make the other three weak for most of the special."

Find Your Bliss - They don't really find Bliss, it's more like Bliss finding them.

Bliss Reminiscence - Most of the episode is a flashback.

Blisster Sister - The episode is all about Bliss's sisters trying to give her an identity.

Breaking Bliss - Bliss is at her lowest point here. Also, they were on something when they thought up the "23 chemicals" gag.

Blisstersweet Symphony - It's supposed to be a bittersweet ending, as Bliss has to disappear.

As a whole, how does it stack up?

Bliss is definitely overpowered and definitely feels like a "DeviantART OC", but they don't do a horrible job of balancing it with her inexperience. What I really didn't like is that the original three Reboot Puffs had very little chance to shine, as if them doing anything cool would take away from how special Bliss is.

It had a great beginning and ending, and a not so great middle. It all kind of balanced itself out into an "eh, I guess I can't say she's Chloe from The Fairly Oddparents." In fact, I actually wouldn't mind seeing Bliss again, as I didn't exactly hate her.

Next, we go from beating up the devil to...something. I honestly wouldn't blame Cartoon Network for wanting an at least two week break between this and the next one.

← Power of Four (Parts 1-2) ☆ I’ll Be Bake & Bliss Unaware (shorts) →

#fpb ppg 2016 #ppg 2016 #fpb reviews #powerpuff girls #cartoon network

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