Toonami Absolution

Megatron walks into the alien installation with the Golden Disk and comes out with something that could change everything.

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam cover "Other Visits (Part 2)" and "Bad Spark."

"Other Visits (Part 2)" continues the show’s alien arc as Megatron uses the Alien Disk to gain access to the Metal Hunter (an alien space ship) and charts a course back to Cybertron, triggering a race against time to take the ship out of the sky before Megatron can activate his teleport.

Then "Bad Spark" takes a completely different turn: a damaged stasis pod produces Protoform X, a monstrous Transformer whose spark cannot be destroyed. Both Maximals and Predacons are terrified of him. But despite the horrors, Silverbolt and Blackarachnia find the time to have a little bit of romance, even if Silverbolt is a little too dumb to work out what is going on.

We discuss the episodes as well as Beast Wars Season 2’s odd tone changes (we’ve gone from cowboys to Universal Monsters in about 3 episodes) and discuss the dropped plot points that were originally planned to build on “Bad Sparks” most interesting plot points.

🔔 Subscribe for our ongoing coverage of Beast Wars from the very beginning!

📌 Topics covered this episode:

– Beast Wars Season 2 Episode 7 "Other Visits (Part 2)" recap & review

– Beast Wars Season 2 Episode 8 "Bad Spark" recap & review

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Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

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See more Toonami Absolution stuff (including the video version of the podcast) by checking out our Linktree!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Last week, we sent Cooler into the sun. This week, he's back in robot form. Even worse, there are now hundreds of him. Goku just can’t catch a break...

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam cover Dragon Ball Z: The Return of Cooler (1992), the direct sequel to Cooler's Revenge and the first DBZ film to feature Vegeta.

After being blasted into the sun at the end of Cooler's Revenge, Cooler's remains drifted through space until they merged with a massive mechanical entity called the Big Gete Star scoops him up.

Now he’s launched an attack on New Namek and begun using the Namekian population as biological fuel, forcing the Z-Fighters travel to New Namek so Piccolo, Gohan, Krillin, and the others can give him a good kicking. However, Goku soon finds himself going head-to-head with Meta-Cooler a cybernetic, self-regenerating version of Cooler who won’t stay down. Can Vegeta (who is here for reasons) turn the tide? Or will Namek fall (again).

We discuss the movie and its production and figure out where Return of Cooler sits in the wider DBZ film ranking now that we've seen both halves of the Cooler duology.

🔔 Subscribe for our ongoing watch-through of Toonami and Adult Swim's most iconic anime films and series!

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Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

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See more Toonami Absolution stuff (including the video version of the podcast) by checking out our Linktree!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It all comes down to this. Alas, this fight is not as easy as it first seems, pushing Yusuke to his limit.

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam cover Yu Yu Hakusho Episode 25: "Kuwabara's Fight of Love" the final episode of Yu Yu Hakusho season one, the finale of the Spirit Detective Saga and the conclusion of the Yukina Rescue Arc.

The Toguro Brothers are waiting. Elder Toguro has already transformed himself into a giant sword for his brother to wield, and Younger Toguro is ready to show that, up until this point, he’s been holding back. Yusuke gives the fight all he has, but as is tradition, he quickly finds himself getting tossed around like a sack of potatoes. However, Kuwabara won’t let Yukina suffer any longer, so he launches one of the stupidest attacks in anime history…

🔔 Subscribe for our week-by-week watch-through of Yu Yu Hakusho and every other Toonami classic!

📌 Topics covered this episode:

– Yu Yu Hakusho Episode 25 "Kuwabara's Fight of Love" recap & review

– Spirit Detective Saga retrospective

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Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

****

See more Toonami Absolution stuff (including the video version of the podcast) by checking out our Linktree!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dinobot makes a decision that will haunt the rest of the season. Two fan-favourite Maximals get abducted by aliens. And yes, there are spiders in this one too.

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam cover "Maximal, No More" and "Other Visits (Part 1)."

"Maximal, No More" shows Dinobot at his best as, after being captured, he makes the calculated decision to ask Megatron for permission to rejoin the Predacons. An action that forces him to hand over the Golden Disk.While he eventually does return to the Maximals the Disk remains gone, setting in motion a chain of events that will change the Beast Wars forever.

Then "Other Visits (Part 1)" opens the aliens-are-back arc in dramatic fashion: Tigatron and Airazor get abducted by aliens. Rhinox tries to work out what happened, only to find that Megatron’s study of the Alien Disks have allowed him to put an evil plan into motion. Tarantulas is also on his way, because of course he is.

🔔 Subscribe for our ongoing coverage of Beast Wars from the very beginning!

📌 Topics covered this episode:

– Beast Wars Season 2 Episode 5 "Maximal, No More" recap & review

– Beast Wars Season 2 Episode 6 "Other Visits (Part 1)" recap & review

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Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

****

See more Toonami Absolution stuff (including the video version of the podcast) by checking out our Linktree!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Frieza is dead. Goku is home. Everything is fine. And then Frieza's older, taller, somehow even more evil brother shows up, looking for revenge.

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam cover Dragon Ball Z: Cooler's Revenge (1991), the fifth DBZ film and the one that introduces one of the franchise's most beloved non-canon villains.

The film opens with a flashback that recontextualises everything we know about Goku's escape from Planet Vegeta: turns out Cooler's ship detected the infant's pod leaving the system, but Cooler opted to let it go.

However, when Cooler learns that Frieza has been destroyed by a Saiyan, he summons his (surprisingly French) Armored Squadron and heads to Earth to finish Goku off once and for all. In a surprising break from tradition, Cooler nearly succeeds, leaving Gohan, Krillin, and eventually a Piccolo to hold things together long enough for a Senzu Bean to arrive.

But Cooler has a trick up his sleeve, turns out Frieza isn’t the only one in the family who can transform!

We dig into why Cooler is so cool, how this film sidesteps many of the DBZ films' problems, how it uses Piccolo and Gohan more effectively, how the numerous dubbing firms handled the movie, and where Cooler's Revenge stands in our ongoing DBZ movie ranking.

🔔 Subscribe for our ongoing watch-through of Toonami and Adult Swim's most iconic anime films and series!

****

Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

****

See more Toonami Absolution stuff (including the video version of the podcast) by checking out our Linktree!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tarukane's mansion is guarded by an army of demons led by the mysterious Toguro Brothers, can Kuwabara make good on his promise to rescue Yukina or will he and Yusuke end up as just more chips in Tarukane’s gambling game?

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam cover Yu Yu Hakusho Episodes 23 and 24: "The Toguro Brothers Gang" and "The Deadly Triad."

Episode 23 sees Yusuke, Kuwabara, and Botan fight their way up through waves of demon guards while Tarukane and his Black Black club bet on how far they get.

On paper, episode 24, "The Deadly Triad," sounds like a blast, as it make Yusuke run the gauntlet against three of Tarukane's elite fighters: Miyuki, Inmaki, and the massive Gokumonki. However, in reality it is one of the most painful episodes of Yu Yu Hakusho as the fight with Miyuki reminds us that this show was made in the ‘90s, leading to some painful gender jokes.

We talk about these episodes, both what they’re doing well and how badly this episode has dated. We also discuss how Toonami had to edit these episodes to make them suitable for young viewers, which means fixing the Miyuki fight and trying to find a way to cover up the fact that Sakyo is constantly smoking.

🔔 Subscribe for our week-by-week watch-through of Yu Yu Hakusho and every other Toonami classic!

📌 Topics covered this episode:

– Yu Yu Hakusho Episode 23 "The Toguro Brothers Gang" recap & review

– Yu Yu Hakusho Episode 24 "The Deadly Triad" recap & review

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Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

****

See more Toonami Absolution stuff (including the video version of the podcast) by checking out our Linktree!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We're back in the Beast Wars! Unfortunately, Tarantulas and Blackarachnia are also back. We’re not happy about it either, but that is how life goes sometimes.

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam cover "Coming of the Fuzors (Part 2)" and "Tangled Web.”

"Coming of the Fuzors (Part 2)" picks up with the Maximals badly outnumbered. Rattrap, Cheetor, and Dinobot holding off Megatron's full Predacon force. While they do this, Rhinox decides to go on a psychedelic magical mystery tour in a big to bring back Optimus Primal, but can he do it in time (the answer is year, clearly. Optimus Primial is still in the opening titles after all).

Then "Tangled Web" arrives. Yep, as the name suggests this is almost entirely a Tarantulas and Blackarachnia episode. Megatron assigns the two scheming spider-bots (plus Quickstrike) to build an energon refuelling station, which immediately becomes a vehicle for Tarantulas to plot against Megatron.

Meanwhile Waspinator has another mission, one with a lot less backstabbing (but that’s why we love him).

We discuss how the second season is going, how the Fuzors mixup the group dynamics, and how much Tarantulas is too much Tarantulas. (Spoiler Alert: we may be approaching that limit.)

🔔 Subscribe for our ongoing coverage of Beast Wars from the very beginning!

📌 Topics covered this episode:

– Beast Wars Season 2 Episode 3 "Coming of the Fuzors (Part 2)" recap & review

– Beast Wars Season 2 Episode 4 "Tangled Web" recap & review

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Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

****

See more Toonami Absolution stuff (including the video version of the podcast) by checking out our Linktree!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We were promised cars. We were not prepared for other worlds and ancient aliens.

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam cover the 2003 Cartoon Network film Hot Wheels: World Race. And I’m going to be honest with you, none of us were quite ready for what this movie actually is.

On paper: a racing film where 35 drivers compete for a multi-million dollar prize on the most extreme tracks in the world. Think Cannonball Run if it was trying to sell you toys for the entire runtime.

In practice: Dr. Peter Tezla is sending a load of drivers onto Highway 35, a racetrack in an alternative dimension that was built by aliens (who we never see). His goal, to collect the Wheel of Power, a magical artifact created by the aliens that can produce unlimited energy.

I want to remind you, this is a Hot Wheels movie.

But hey, this is made by Mainframe Productions, the team behind Transformers Beast Wars, so it can’t all be bad right?

Plus, we scan some old interviews to find some fascinating behind-the-scenes stories about this film (turns out, it was originally meant to be even weirder!)

🔔 Subscribe for our ongoing watch-through of Toonami and Adult Swim's greatest shows, films, and things that surprised us more than they had any right to!

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Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

****

See more Toonami Absolution stuff (including the video version of the podcast) by checking out our Linktree!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Saint Beasts arc ends. Then something genuinely new begins and it introduces two of the most important figures in the entire series.

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam cover Yu Yu Hakusho Episodes 21 and 22: "Yusuke's Sacrifice" and "Lamenting Beauty."

Episode 21 brings the Suzaku fight to its conclusion as Yusuke, running on almost nothing, blasts all seven of Suzaku's clones simultaneously with his Spirit Shotgun in one of the most cathartic moments in the entire arc. Also one of the most romantic, as Kuwabara once again shows that he is the ultimate best buddy.

Then Episode 22 pivots to a new mission entirely: a beautiful ice apparition named Yukina is being held captive by a human crime lord named Tarukane. Yusuke, Kuwabara, and Botan are dispatched to rescue her. But turns out this mission has a strange link to Hiei, one that will cause a lot of problem. Plus, the Toguro Brothers, Tarukane’s new bodyguards seem to know way more than they’re letting on about the whole thing.

🔔 Subscribe for our week-by-week watch-through of Yu Yu Hakusho and every other Toonami classic!

📌 Topics covered this episode:

– Yu Yu Hakusho Episode 21 "Yusuke's Sacrifice" recap & review

– Yu Yu Hakusho Episode 22 "Lamenting Beauty" recap & review

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Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

****

See more Toonami Absolution stuff (including the video version of the podcast) by checking out our Linktree!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Optimus Primal is gone. Two fan-favourite Predacons are dead before the opening credits finish. And a handful of Maximals and Predacons just got entirely new bodies. Season 2 of Beast Wars does not ease you back in.

This week on Toonami Absolution, Alyx, Jon, and Sam kick off Beast Wars Season 2 with "Aftermath" and "Coming of the Fuzors (Part 1)."

"Aftermath" deals with the shockwave from the destruction of the Vok's alien moon, which kills Terrorsaur and Scorponok on the spot, and transforms Rattrap, Cheetor, and Megatron into their new Transmetal forms.

Then "Coming of the Fuzors" introduces two stasis pods that malfunction mid-scan, producing a brand new type of Transformer: the Fuzors. Quickstrike, a half-scorpion half-snake menace, and Silverbolt, a half-wolf half-eagle Predacon, who seemingly thinks he is Sir Lancelot.

Meanwhile, Dinobot steals the Golden Disks and takes a moment to deliver a little bit of Shakespeare. Who said Transformers can’t be cultured?

🔔 Subscribe for our ongoing coverage of Beast Wars from the very beginning!

📌 Topics covered this episode:

– Beast Wars Season 2 Episode 1 "Aftermath" recap & review

– Beast Wars Season 2 Episode 2 "Coming of the Fuzors (Part 1)" recap & review

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Toonami Absolution is a weekly podcast where Alyx, Jon, and Sam revisit the Toonami and Adult Swim shows that made them, and you, you.

From the block's early days with shows like Space Ghost: Coast to Coast and Transformers: Beast Wars to the imported anime that made Toonami and Adult Swim appointment television for a generation of kids, such as Cowboy Bebop, Sailor Moon, and Dragon Ball.

****

See more Toonami Absolution stuff (including the video version of the podcast) by checking out our Linktree!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.