(insert standard disclaimer here stating how you have no business reading this if you are offended by bad things said about Gatch, and how the author is not affiliated with Tatsunoko or Sandy Frank or Turner or Saban, and how she is a soon-to-be 27-year-old complaining about a 26-year old show for kids, so she definitely should not be taken seriously.)

The episode begins with some F-1 type racing cars speeding through what appears to be public road winding through a forest of pine trees, and the wheels are screeching, and they all do a curve, and the wheels are screeching, and they cross a bridge, and the wheels screech some more, LIKE WE GET THE POINT ALREADY, and if that weren't enough, I hear the voice of the Narrator from H*ll, and I begin to have an anaphylactic reaction to his voice as it tells me that this is the nation of Ruuman (blatant name plug of Le Mans), the most beautiful country in the world, and as he does his voiceover, we see cable cars climb up a mountain on which pine trees grow, and the NfH tells us that the Kingdom of Ruuman is also known for its gambling and that Large Sums of Money change hands every night, as we see roulette tables and slot machines and people in formal wear, and people counting chips, like we get the point already about it being a Kingdom of Gambling. Then we get a shot of patched laundry hanging to dry, and some old people sitting while leaning their backs against the walls of buildings, looking stoned or something, and for a second I think that the corpse of the disobedient officer that got zapped by Galactor in the Jellyfish lens episode had come back to life as a zombie or something, no, it's the Village Elder in the Red Sand Episode, no, sorry, it's someone else altogether. And we see a little kid going through a garbage can, and he tosses something to a dog who's going through the same garbage can with him, and then the racing cars in the opening scene drive RIGHT OVER THE KID AND THE DOG AND THE GARBAGE CAN and the kid, who is, incredibly enough, still alive, looks up, while NfH tells us that the people are heavily taxed and basically live a hand-to-mouth existence, and all I can think of is 1) don't drink and drive 2) the kid is about a million times cuter than Jinpei (not that that would take much) or, for that matter, any character under the age of 10 that has appeared on this show so far (not that that would take much either) 3) the dog is about a million times cuter than the infamous puppy that Joe saves (not that that would take much either).

Then the NfH throws the $64,000 question at us, which is "where does all the money go?" and we see boxes on conveyer belts, no, wait, they're not boxes, they're attach* cases, and these mechanical graspers open the briefcases, and the open briefcases move down the conveyer belt, where different graspers take the stacks of bills out of the briefcases, and the stacked bills move down the conveyer belt, like since when do you use a conveyer belt to handle money?

Cut to dark room, where a man wearing black gloves, a yellow vest, lavender shirt, and bell bottom jeans is taking pictures of topographical maps, with a tripod and a bulb shutter, and then he closes the book of maps and puts it back in a file cabinet, and what I want to know is 1) when did he have time to set up a tripod 2) when did he have time to set up a bulb shutter 3) why does a red light flash every time he takes a picture, why not just use extra sensitive film, 4) hasn't this guy ever heard of black clothing, ski masks, or even panty hose worn over the head, or, much more importantly, surveillance cameras?

And there's a Green person standing watch, and he hears footsteps, and he yells to stop, and he opens fire, and whoever it is rounds a corner, and Green Person loses him, and he says something that there's no way that he can leave the secret base easily, and you notice that there's a black glove on the floor...can you say "stupid"? And the Green Person presses this button on the wall, and we cue the trumpets so that we know that Something Bad is going to happen.

Berg "Purple Doberman On Speed (copyright Lori MacDonald-sama)" Katze is walking with a little old man with a long white mustache but no beard, and the little old man is wearing an outfit that looks a lot like the one worn by the title character in the movie The Last Emperor in the very beginning of the movie, and this really strange peaked hat with a brim, and a long necklace that looks like he strung pieces of macaroni on a string, or maybe marshmallows, and I start to remember that villain in the first part of Dragon Ball that wanted to collect the set of seven so that he could rule the world, only I think he wore a skullcap, and PDOS gets on the intercom with the Green Person in the previous scene, and Green Person tells him that something fishy is going on, and PDOS says that there's no way that anyone can get into the secret base unnoticed, but to look into it just in case, and then we get this Establishing Conversation that informs us that the Last Emperor is the King of Ruuman, and that he is in cahoots with Galactor, as in he provides the money and they provide the protection, and PDOS wants more donations, and wonders where the Prince is, and then the prince appears, only it is the guy in the yellow vest and lavender shirt we just saw, and he has the remaining black glove hanging out of his back hip pocket, like, can you say "stupid"? And the Prince is all apologetic that he left them, and PDOS says something that makes no sense to me about how young people act quickly, and speaking of which since the Prince is going to enter this year's auto race, how well does he expect to do, and as I wonder what the first sentence that came out of PDOS's mouth has anything to do with the second sentence that came out of PDOS's mouth, and the Prince kind of gets this psychotic grin on his face, and says that he thinks something cool will happen in this year's race, like did this guy take his Haldol this morning, and PDOS says that he'll be looking forward to it, while looking equally psychotic, like did this guy take his Haldol this morning, and the King excuses himself and the Prince, and they leave. A Green Person hands the black glove to PDOS telling him that it was found dropped in front of the reference room, and BK says we're going to have to try and find out what the owner of the glove is up to.

Next scene is Crescent Coral base, and the NfH tells us that Gatchaman and Co. were called in by Dr. Nambu, and Dr. N says Team, emergency orders, and he cues the trumpets, and he goes on to say that they've received top secret information that Prince Luuka of the Kingdom of Ruuman has a microfilm (writer obsession with microfilm yet again) showing locations of Galactor Secret Bases and Headquarters, and this is the first time you hear the prince's name, and for a second you wonder if they got that name off of Star Wars, until you remember that this is episode 18, which would mean that it aired in early 1973, and Star Wars was released in 1976.

Ken wants to know if this is true, and Dr. N, instead of punting Wonder Boy (because we wonder about him all the time)'s backside to the next century for questioning him like that, says yes, it's true, the info came from a Very Reliable Source, and Jinpei is like wow, and Joe says way cool, here's our chance to finish Galactor, while he claps his hand on Ken's shoulder, and he and Wonder Boy look at each other, and I am thinking FANFIC FUEL!

And. Dr. N says that there's going to be this big race in the Kingdom of Rumaan, and that the five of them are to take part in an open race sponsored by His Highness, which really, really makes a lot of sense, I mean, wouldn't it be so much easier to hold some kind of Royal Ball, and then pass the microfilm to Jun while she's dancing with His Highness or something like that, but no, you have to have a Big Race, and now I am having awful visions of the Wacky Races, and Dick Dastardly and his little pet Mutly (I probably have the names wrong, buy hey, it's been nearly 20 years since I watched that show, and they call that dog "Kenken" in Japan, which may be more appropriate than I would care to comment here). And Jinpei is all excited about getting to be in the race, and Dr. N says that's right. His Highness will also be in the race, and that he knows only that the Science Ninja Team is made up of 5 members, so all five of you must go to him at the same time and get the microfilm from him, and you wonder how easy that's going to be in an auto race, and I still like my Royal Ball idea better.

Ken is like whatever, and Dr. N says that this is Joe's specialty, and Joe is all leave it to me, and Dr. N is like whatever, and the Team is like whatever, and we get a shot of the GP surfacing from Crescent Coral, and then we get a shot of the same islands that they always fly over when they are flying A Great Distance, and don't get me started on how I don't think the GP is exactly a good means of transportation for a covert operation, nor on how I don't understand why it has to be the Science Ninja Team that has to do this job, I mean, couldn't some other agent/ spy/ resident diplomat do this job of collecting a small object just as easily, nor on how I still like my idea with the Royal Ball better.

In the next scene, PDOS is looking at a monitor screen of surveillance videotape, as His Highness takes pictures, and PDOS is all oh waste products, we'll be in deep guano if those pictures fall into the wrong hands, we have to do something fast, and since I've already mentioned that the distinctive clothing and uncovered face are such good ideas when you want to do things in secret, I'm not going to mention them again, and instead I will mention that PDOS is wearing lip gloss, and that it never ceases to amaze me that he can look very nice in a profile shot, and yet look incredibly ugly when facing forward.

Giant Blue Chicken tells PDOS that if the secrets fall into the wrong hands, they be in deep guano, especially PDOS, and if the Science Ninja Team shows up on the doorstep of headquarters, he is going to kill PDOS, and PDOS freaks, and GBC is like you know the rules, and PDOS is like yes, I know the rules.

Next! The day of the Big Race! There's a big brass band, wearing long blue cylindrical hats! No, Ayako, the band's uniforms are not supposed to make you wonder whether this so-called Kingdom of Rumaan has Asian influences (the King's "Last Emperor" outfit) or European influences (name of country, band uniforms)! Nor are you supposed to wonder how the band can play music when they don't move their fingers or arms as they play their trumpets and trombones! Don't mind that the people in the cheering crowd aren't moving either as they cheer! And most of all, don't mind that race commentator, who sounds like he's here to torment you when the Narrator from Hell is unavailable!

Then we see this racer in a blue helmet with a red arrow on it, and a blue racing suit and yellow turtleneck, who is practicing this speech to himself about how his father has sold his sold to Galactor, and how he's going to fight to make this nation great again, so I guess this is the Prince in his racing attire, and the race commentator tells us that it's a race consisting of 100 laps around a 3.5 km course, and that any kind of vehicle can participate, and I get visions of Wacky Races again. And Ken, (who is not wearing a helmet, which may be a good thing because if he were wearing a white helmet while sitting in a racing car, we would be wondering if we were in the right decade watching the right Tatsunoko TV series, what with the appearance issue and the voice actor issue and all) who is sitting in a car we have never seen before, flashes his bracelet at the Prince, and Joe in the G2 flashes his bracelet, and Jun on her yellow motorcycle flashes her bracelet, and Jinpei in a buggy we have never seen before flashes his bracelet, and Ryu in a car we have never seen before flashes his bracelet, and 1) what is the point of secrecy if they are going to go showing off their bracelets like that, 2) what is the point of secrecy if they are going to go around in Galactor territory in their numbered jerseys, 3) why is Jun not wearing a motorcycle helmet 4) how can Jun wear pumps while riding a motorcycle 5) would someone please align the wheels on Ken's car, because they look like they are going to fly off at any given moment?

(No, on second thought, let them fly off while he is turning a very, very sharp curve...)

The race commentator talks about how all the contestants are here for fortune and glory, and that they're ready to start, and the Prince holds up the roll of microfilm, and he tosses it in Ken's direction, only a racer in a green suit and a dark purple car comes in between his car and Ken's, and grabs the microfilm, and the Prince is like oh waste products, and Ken is like oh waste products, and the race has begun, and Ken is all follow that shark-shaped car, because it has to be Galactor, and that they have to get the microfilm back, and I still like my Royal Ball idea better, and Jun, who is still without a freaking motorcycle helmet, yells roger. Then Ryu's car starts to blow smoke, and he starts cussing at his car, and Ken is like what is up, and Ryu says nothing is up, but my car is down, so they should go on without him, and that he's going to follow in the GP, and you begin to wonder if Dr. N gave the poor kid a faulty machine on purpose so that there would be someone to pilot the GP.

And the cars are careening down the streets, and we see palm trees, and I wish this country would hurry up and decide if it wants to be Switzerland or Monte Carlo, and Ken tells Joe to follow the Galactor car, and Jun and Jinpei to follow the Prince, and they are all like whatever, and we see that they're on tortuous mountain road, and Joe has his car right next to the Galactor car, and that the Galactor car is trying to force Joe off the road, and Joe decides that he wants to play, and he presses the gas to the floor, and you notice that he is wearing navy blue loafers with white socks, and in Japan, people wear white socks with their business suits, which I think looks really, really, really, really, really DORKY, and the origin of the whole problem is probably the junior high school uniforms in strict schools where they make the boys wear black school uniforms with black loafers and WHITE SOCKS, and the most awful thing I have ever seen was this guitar and mandolin ensemble from an all-male high school, and they played quite well, but I couldn't help focusing on how when they crossed their legs to play their mandolins, the white socks between their black pants and black shoes would show, and I could see the white socks even though I was sitting near the back of the concert hall, and I another thing really wish is for the nurses in my workplace to stop wearing white nylons, I mean, you have to have legs as thin as, I don't know, Jun, in order to not look like you have fat legs if you wear white nylons, and to top it off, a lot of the women don't shave, so you see these black leg hairs poking out of the white nylons, which is really, really, really, really unattractive.

And the Green Suit Driver presses a button on his steering wheel, and for a sec I think that he want to honk his horn, only when he presses the button, his little front wing thing (I'm sure the thing has a name, the wing like thing in a front of an F-1 racing car, that, I think, keeps the car from flying into the air) starts to grow sideways, and we break for a commercial, I think.

And the cars are...excuse me...flying? Yes, the Galactor cars are all flying off a curve, no, really, they are flying in the air, and Joe says that he doesn't like the way they play, and so he jumps off the curve too, mangling the rail, and then he lands on the road below, where the Galactor cars have landed, and tailgates one of them, and one of the cars explodes, and let me just mention that the prefecture where I live right now has one of the highest traffic fatality rates in the nation, but what scares me is that Japan is considered one of the safer countries in Asia in terms of driving, and I've also been on the road in places like Houston and Baltimore (though fortunately someone else was behind the wheel), so I am using this opportunity to tell my friends on the other side of the pond that if you invite me to come visit you, it means that you are coming to pick me up at the airport, because I refuse to drive in your country! (You don't even drive on the correct side of the road! ^.~) and we see that the microfilm is just kind of lying there in the middle of the road, and the Prince gets out of his car to get it, and he picks it up, but he is surrounded by lots of Green Legs, and Ken shouts look out, and Joe dives on top of the prince, which I am not even going to comment on, and Ken does a flying diving kick into the faces of the Green People, and Joe tells the Prince to run, so the Prince gets into his car, and drives away, and 1) Joe should have taken the microfilm from Prince Luuka right then and there 2) I still like my Royal Ball idea better.

Overhead view. We see a highway, and we see a piece of highway being switched to another piece of highway, and the Prince's car runs right over the switched piece of highway, and all of a sudden he notices that he is driving into a bright light, and we hear PDOS cackling, and he must be cackling AWFULLY loud, because I couldn't hear the squeal of brakes over all that cackling, and surely the Prince must have slammed on the brakes, because a second ago he was trying to get away from the Evil Terrorist Organization, and now he is at a stop? And PDOS is like "welcome!" and Jun and Ken look at each other, and PDOS wants the films back, and Prince Luuka does the denial thing, and PDOS throws the black glove the idiot dropped in front of the room where he was trying to play Secret Agent, and Prince Luuka freaks, and PDOS is all you'd better give it to me, and a Green Person enters the room with the Last Emperor, and PDOS says you have a delinquent son, and the Last Emperor says that the prince should do what the PDOS says, and Prince Luuka basically does the speech that he was practicing in the beginning of the episode, how his father has sold his soul to Galactor, and the country doesn't belong to him, and that it belongs to the people, and you begin to wonder if this prince is some sort of long lost cousin to Ken or something, or at least were in the same Public Speaking class in high school, but PDOS, thank goodness, cuts him off, and the Green Person points his rifle at the Last Emperor, and the Last Emperor freaks, and PDOS does the "I'm gonna count to ten" thing, and the Prince takes out the roll of microfilm from under his helmet, and Ken flashes his bracelet, like, is the knowledge of the bracelets a public thing? And when PDOS gets to nine, the Prince says "Father, please forgive me," and tosses the film to Ken, and the Green Person fires at the Last Emperor, who falls face down on the floor, and that hat he was wearing falls off, and you realize that he never took off the hat because he was BALD, and I cannot understand why people are so sensitive about being bald, but maybe that is because I have too much, rather than too little, hair on my head, but what I really cannot understand is why some men will resort to outrageous, obvious tactics to hide the fact that they are indeed growing bald, I mean, there is this surgeon in my hospital, very skilled, well liked by his co-workers and his patients, but he hides the bald spot on the top of his head by combing his side hairs across it, and to keep that "headband" in place, he glues it down with about a liter of extra-strength hair spray, and the excess hair spray forms little translucent beads in his jet black hair, and the first time I saw him, I simply could not take my eyes off those disgusting little beads of hair spray, but perhaps the most awful bald spot concealer in the universe is Sasaki Isao, and every time he appears in a quiz show or as a host as a travel magazine show, I wish that Ken Washio would appear and BIRDRANG THAT UNFORGIVABLY OBVIOUS TOUPEE off his head, I mean, the toupee is orange, and the rest of his hair is black, and you'd think that someone as high-profile as himself would either 1) give it up and go for the Bruce Willis look 2) get himself a hairpiece that matches the rest of his hair.

And the prince is crying over his father, and Ken and Joe and Jun and Jinpei all just kind of stand around, and after like forever, PDOS yells give back the film, and the Green Person points his rifle at Ken, who tosses the film to Joe, and the Green Person points the rifle at Joe, who raises his hands, and drops the film in Jun's hand, and Jun tosses it to Jinpei, who fumbles with it, and then turns red in the face, and claws at his throat saying, aaugh, it's cold, grr, aaugh, and PDOS says, what an idiot, he swallowed (no pun intended) it, get him, and Jinpei kind of wobbles over to Prince Luuka, who is still silently crying over the Last Emperor's body, and he falls on top of the Prince's leg, all the time saying oh I feel awful, I feel awful, and he is doing this strange shaking thing on top of the Prince's leg, and you begin to wonder just where exactly the Prince's heel is in terms of Jinpei's anatomy, and you begin to wonder if Jinpei really feels as awful as he says.

Green People surround Ken and Jun and Joe, with their rifles pointed at him, and PDOS says that they're going to operate on Jinpei so that they can take the microfilm out of his stomach, and Jinpei freaks.

So Jun and Ken and Joe are all in a cell with a really high ceiling, and Jun is hammering on the wall screeching Jinpei, you idiot, I can't believe you swallowed (no pun intended) it, it hurts to have your tummy cut open, in that very annoying voice of hers, and Prince Luuka is sitting in a corner, and Ken is sitting in the middle of the cell with his arms crossed, and Joe is the only one doing something remotely productive, by looking for a potential opening in the wall of the cell, and I begin to think that Jun needs to get out more, because, somehow, I have a feeling that given the situation, PDOS is probably going to do a little bit more than an exploratory laparotomy, but what do I know, I don't get out much either.

And Luuka takes off his boot, and the film rolls out, and he says that Jinpei pretended to swallow (no pun intended) it, and tossed it into my boot, and yes, he did say toss, and no, he did not mention where his heel had been in terms of Jinpei's anatomy, and Ken says, oh, he only pretended to swallow it, and Jun says he even had us fooled, and I am thinking LIKE THAT WOULD TAKE MUCH, and Joe says they have to go save him right away, and Ken says it's up to Jun, and Jun is all leave it to me, and she removes the heel from one of her pumps, and inside, there's plastique explosive, and she sets it on the door, and lights the fuse, and they all take cover and the door explodes, and we get the standard shot of Ken going to Birdstyle, and what I want to know is, why didn't they do this the moment they were placed in the cell, I mean, what is the sudden urgency to save Jinpei that becomes obvious only after they find out that he didn't swallow (no pun intended) the microfilm?

And we see Jinpei spread eagled on an operating table, and he's yelling, you're not going to get the film, even if you cut me open, and you have to admit, he's definitely right on that count, and PDOS tells him to shut up, and slaps him back and forth several times, and although Jinpei might deserve this kind of treatment on another day and another episode, in this particular scene in this particular episode, he's only telling the truth. There is a man in what pretends to be surgical attire, who looks strangely like the masked man I was cheering for in the Icecander episode, when he was going to saw the little girl, who looked like she had food in her cheeks, and had, believe it or not, a voice even more high pitched and more irritating than Jun's (no, I didn't believe such a thing possible myself until I saw that episode), only the man in that episode turned out to be PDOS in disguise. Anyway, the surgeon says that it would be much faster if they just killed him, and it would keep him from giving away the secrets he has learned, which is a very good point, and Jinpei freaks, but PDOS says that he wants to see just what was on the film he swallowed (no pun intended), and that he can do as he likes with the brat, and that all he wants is the film, and as much as I am reminded of a youngest sibling who always gets his own way by Jinpei, and as much as I think that the kid doesn't deserve to die when there are about 80 more episodes to go in Gatch 1 alone, what PDOS just said makes ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE, I mean, what does film exposure have to do with gastric mucosa viability? But the surgeon is like whatever, it's showtime, and a tray of scalpels is wheeled in, and Jinpei is freaking some more, and the surgeon doesn't shave prep Jinpei's belly or even paint the surgical field with Betadine, but then again, I suppose proper sterile technique isn't exactly on the top of the surgeon's list of priorities right now.

And someone kicks in the wall, and anyone who cannot guess who it is must watch the Puppy Episode 100 times, or until they claw their eyeballs out in despair, whichever comes first.

PDOS wants to know how they got here, and Wonder Boy answers that wherever there is Galactor, there is the White Shadow that slips in unseen, and our name is...and Joe cuts in, (but only after the film does this weird jump back, so I suppose they had to recycle animation at the last minute, because the dialogue didn't fit or something, which reminds us that this is classic animation where the animation is done before the voices, as opposed to the voices being done before the animation, which, I understand, is the way it is done most of the time these days) "The Science Ninja Team!" so by now I am absolutely positive that Prince Luuka and Wonder Boy were in the same public speaking class in high school or something, and for those of you are fortunate enough to not know what public speaking class is, it was a class that I was required to take during my last year on the other side of the pond, in 9th grade (or grade 9 if you happen to be one of my Canadian friends), and it consisted of writing speeches, like every other week you had to write a speech about 5 to 7 minutes long on some topic or other, so basically you were writing a paper about six pages long on topics like bilingual education and censorship of music and organ donation every other week, and not only that, you had to memorize the freaking paper, and not only that, you had to show that you had memorized it IN FRONT OF THE WHOLE CLASS, and while you did your speech there was a certain way that you had to gesture with your hands, and a certain way that you had to walk while you were doing your speech, and so you had to practice your speech in front of the mirror in order to do even reasonably well in that class, and annoying little overachiever that I was, I was unbelievably disappointed when I received a final grade of B in that class, I mean, it was the only class that I got a B in that semester, but anyway, I had gone through that kind of intensity when it came to public speaking, and like about four years later in my all-girls high school on this side of the pond, my third year language arts teacher decided that we would all take turns making 5-minute speeches in front of the class before the day's lesson began, so when my turn came, I did a speech on...you guessed it...my speech class, and I did the walk, and I did the hand gestures, and most of all, I memorized my speech, which I thought was the obvious thing to du, but no one else in the class did, because they didn't know that that was an option, and overachiever types as they all were, they didn't think to do something that the teacher hadn't told them to do, and so as my five minutes in the front of the class progressed, more and more of them, including my teacher, kind of looked at me as if I'd grown a third eye, and anyway, the point I am trying to make is that if you want to do a speech well, you have to practice it and have it inside your head, and so I suppose Ken does what I used to do, and read his speech out loud ten times, and then practice his speech with gestures in front of the mirror ten times before he does them for PDOS.

So Ken, ever the dramatic one, shouts Ninja Power Cross Fighter, and Joe and Ken hold hands, and Jun holds their hands and twirls them around and around and around like a great big baton, and then she does the baton toss, and Ken and Joe take down Green People in flying kicks (Yes, it did happen, Sarah-sama! ^.~) Then Joe confronts Katze telling him to show his face so that they'll know his true identity, but I am thinking that looking at an unmasked face of someone I have never seen before in my entire life would not be very likely to give me insight on the person's identity, but that's just me. Meanwhile, Jun goes to untie Jinpei, and Jinpei is all oneechan and Jun is all Jinpei, and Joe is beating Katze up, and trying to take off his mask, and I almost have a heart attack because the beads of perspiration actually fall off of Joe's face, and Katze is like stop that and then they roll around on the floor, only instead of rolling around sideways the way most people do when they are in a fight, they do an Indian Roll, which is what they called this trick we did in P.E. in 8th grade (or, again, grade 8 for my Canadian friends) where you grab your partner's ankles and do a forward roll over them, and then they do a forward roll over you, and on and on and on until you reach the end of the mat, which is kind of fun, only I was no taller than I am today when I was 8th grade, in fact, I was exactly as tall as I am today in 8th grade, and pretty much everyone in my P.E. class was taller than me, so when I did the Indian Roll with anyone, I would end up having to dive over them in a forward roll, which is kind of hard to do when the said person is holding down your ankles. So Joe and Katze stop rolling, and Joe is trying to peel off Katze's mask again, I mean, why not just punch his lights out and drag him back to base and unmask him there, but that's just me, what do I know, and a Green Person tries to attack Joe with a scalpel, and I'm not sure how exactly he managed this, but Joe kicks the scalpel out of the Green Person's hand, but then Katze gets a hold of the scalpel, and he jabs it into Joe's hand, and Joe lets go, and Katze escapes as Joe winces and swears, and I am thinking that must not have been a standard scalpel blade, because although scalpel blades are sharp, they're not very tough, and since Birdstyle is supposed to have a protective function, the scalpel blade should not have penetrated the surface, because when I was in school, we had to use scalpels in gross anatomy, and you can make all the comments you like about how they don't call it gross anatomy for nothing, but I will say that some of us would get scalpel blades lodged in bone or something, and have the blade break on us, and we'd be frantically trying to get the fragment of scalpel blade out from where we'd wedged it, because we had awful visions of what would happen after they cremated the person, and the family would have to do the "pass the ashes from one person to another with chopsticks" thing (which is, by the way, the reason you must never, never, never pass food from one pair of chopsticks to another when in Japan), and come across this fragment of a scalpel blade and wonder what these crazed doctors had done to their loved one, but at the same time we didn't particularly relish the idea of trying to dig out a fragment of sharp metal and getting a cut, I mean, they'd been soaked in industrial alcohol for who knows how long, but still you didn't really have any idea where they'd been.

Ken gives an evacuation order, and the next scene is the G2 and the G4 and the G3 (with Ken riding in back of Jun) and Prince Luuka's car and a bunch of those Galactor racecars with wings leaving the base in a hurry, and the highway is being switched again, and the cars all jump over the gap just as it is being switched. Ryu, who I am glad the writers decided to remember, sees them and says something to the extent of not expecting them to come out of there, and yells over the bracelet to Ken that he's right above them. Ken says they're after us, let's assemble, and Ryu says roger, and we get the assembly sequence which has been recycled for like the 18th time, with Jinpei sliding down his chute, and an oversimplified image of Joe pulling a lever and leaning back and pulling himself up through a tunnel, and then Jun's motorcycle jumps, and Ken sees that one of the cars has its missiles aimed at Prince Luuka's car, and again, ever dramatic, he shouts Bird Flight and jumps off from behind Jun, and sails into the air, and Jun assembles with the GP, and the GP fires missiles, at the Galactor cars, and Ken grabs Luuka from his car seat, and still carrying the Prince, he glides to the road below, just before a missile from Galactor hits the Prince's car and detonates, and you notice that Luuka is only wearing one boot, and then Luuka notices that he is wearing only one boot, which means that the microfilm is gone, and Ken freaks, and Luuka points to his burning car and says over there, and Ken pulls out a burning boot, and he tries to put out the flames, only the microfilm is charred, and Ken is disappointed, and Ryu is disappointed, and Jinpei regrets not having swallowed (no pun intended) it, and Jun points out that there's no use crying over spilt milk, and that maybe Dr. N can do something with any salvageable film, and Ken says good idea, and I almost have a stroke because not only does Jun actually says something intelligent, but Ken agrees that it is intelligent. But am I the only one wondering if Prince Luuka set up the tripod and the bulb shutter to take pictures, and was turning pages, wouldn't he have remembered something or other about what he was photographing? I mean, wouldn't debriefing the Prince help as much as trying to salvage carbonized microfilm?

Then we hear cackling, and it's PDOS's escape saucer thingie, and he says some parting words about how he is going to send them all to a non-geographic location next time, and we see explosions above where the base would have been, and .Ken is outraged that PDOS can kill his own people like that, and NfH tells us, as if we hadn't figured it out already, that the film was burnt, and he also tells us, as if we hadn't heard Jun already, that Dr. N may be able to do something with it, and the Team is facing a sunset, and for the billionth time, would someone please put me out of my misery and make the Narrator from H*ll SHUT UP???

---

O.K., my brief period of niceness...

If you overlook the fact that my idea to have a Royal Ball was probably a better idea strategically speaking, this episode was actually pretty interesting. First, it addresses the issue of financing Evil Terrorist Activities. Even for Evil Terrorist Organizations, money does not grow on trees (and I am not going to get started on how the Japanese government seems to think that they can salvage banks without cutting banker salaries), and the fact that the series actually shows one way the Very Hungry Caterpillar and the mechanical ants and Ibukuron are paid for is of note.

Second, it reminds us that the Team are actually Ninjas. Though this fact is easily forgotten as the Team makes flamboyant attacks on large machines, ninjas are supposed to be spies and agents, who do their work while trying their best to remain unnoticed. Again, if you overlook that the strategy wasn't very good from an intelligence standpoint, it is interesting that you actually have the Team trying to retrieve information without being noticed by the enemy (they don't do a very good job of being unnoticed, but still...)

Third, I believe that this is the first episode where it is addressed that Joe is a racer. We have seen his exceptional driving skills a few times, but I don't remember off hand seeing Joe participate in a race until now.

Fourth...first, last, and only appearance of Cross Fighter. (Hey, I said interesting, I didn't say anything about it making sense.)

Fifth...I think I just wrote the longest PD ever.

(^-^)/))