This is MJ, I'm an author, I'm an artist, I'm an analyzer. You can find all my work at MJMunoz.com.
Welcome to Red Panda Adventures number six, or rather Red Panda Report number six,
Fame Monster, where I will be analyzing and discussing Red Panda Adventures number six.
And to start it off, I'll let you know that the episode is titled Death Danced at Midnight,
and that it originally aired or was released on December 24th, 2005, which is a while ago.
It was written and directed by Greg Taylor. This is episode six, of course, of season one,
which has 12 episodes, and the synopsis for the episode goes like this. Will Holland was sentenced
to die for his crimes. That should have been the end of the story. But one year later, the jurors
that condemned him are sharing his fate one by one. With the aid of a new ally, the Red Panda
and the Flying Squirrel must learn how Death Danced at Midnight. And yeah, this was a pretty
good episode. Pretty, oh no, I was just saying it's pretty straightforward, but there's a twist. It's
one major twist, and interestingly enough, oh, I didn't mention that yet, but I'll mention it
when I get to the point, when I get to that part rather. There wasn't anything I really disliked
in this episode, so I shall skip over trying to force myself to dislike something and just talk
about the things I liked. One of which was Kit coping with failure. So if you've listened to
the episode, which you should by now, and if you haven't, shame on you and go listen to it.
Kit really messes things up, sort of. She very much trusts the asset, the lead, the new ally
mentioned in the copy for this episode, and she almost allows him to keep the murder spree going.
It's interesting that she feels so guilty over that, and it's interesting that she
fails so badly. What I really like about it is that at one point in the episode, she
comforts this same ally who is upset with his own failure, which is orchestrated and manufactured,
of course, though they do not know that yet, the terrific Two-Smooth Toronto, but they learn it
later, and she comforts him and tries to help him know that it's okay, everybody makes these
mistakes, and that he has to buck up and keep moving and do the best he can for the most people.
By the end of the episode, Red Panda uses that on her, slash against her, and I think that's a
great thing, because what she said to the true culprit is true, and they're wise words, and
hearing them quoted back at her was one, good. Two, a good moment for the characters, for Red
Panda and Flying Squirrel, and three, they got to make a really fun joke about how quotable she is,
and Taylor, as Red Panda, does this great thing where he kind of affects her accent, and that was
a lot of fun. But yeah, what she said about not being smart enough, strong enough, lucky enough,
whatever, or fast enough, I think was one of them too, was good, because, you know, life isn't
perfect, and of course this is a fictional life, but still it has the very similitude of Red Panda
and it has the very similitude, which makes it all that much more rich and enjoyable, I think.
I like that there is kind of this cat and mouse aspect to the episode where they are trying to
catch this serial killer who is striking again, and they're finding that they're always kind of
one step behind him, and their efforts are frustrated, and that's interesting because,
like I said, nobody's perfect, and despite the fact that this show goes on for 120 episodes,
spoilers, and, you know, Red Panda and Flying Squirrel live through all of them, spoilers again,
it, there wouldn't be very good stakes and very good drama if they always won every fight
unequivocally. So having their foe out match them, outwit them in some way, is really good,
and it raises, like I said, the stakes, and makes things a lot more interesting, so I appreciate
that Taylor was able to do that in this, and the way he did it was, I think, quite clever,
and one of the ways that he does that is that the killer who was executed about a year ago,
his juror, or his jury, rather, is being killed, and the papers claim that it's a ghost, that it's
the ghost of, what is his name, Will, Will Holland. The ghost of Will Holland is coming back. Turns
out he has a twin brother who assumes an identical twin, and he at one point gets framed up for doing
the murders as vengeance for his brother who he had falsely testified for, he falsified evidence,
and other things, and it was pretty interesting that that was a route that we were going to go,
and honestly, I listened to it twice, not in a row, but I listened to it twice in succession,
and even the second time I listened to it, I thought, I'm actually convinced that the twin
could be the killer, and what a great gag that is, what a great idea that is for it to turn out that
this guy who's come back from the grave to effect his revenge on the jurors who got him executed for
his serial murder spree, is able to do that because it's not really him, it's not really the ghost,
it's his brother, and at this point in the world of Red Panda, we don't know whether or not there
are ghosts and goblins and demons and things like that, and there's a healthy skepticism from Red
Panda himself about this ghost of Holland, and it gets played with in an interesting way here,
and it turns out that it's not a ghost, but there's a plausible explanation for all of it,
and having the twin as an option for that, even though he turned out to be Red Herring,
is very satisfying. Okay, now, I'm going to spoil it for you a little bit, but it turns out that the
contact that they have is a newspaperman, and he is actually the villain of the episode, and he's
making this all happen for himself so that he can reclaim his glory and keep his byline, I guess,
above the fold. He wants to be a headliner daily, like he was back during the Holland murder trial,
or serial murder trial, I should say, and he becomes warped by that, and that's pretty interesting
that that would happen to him. I forgot a key thing earlier, but it's okay.
Anyway, so he becomes warped and twisted by his desire to keep his name in the headlines,
and it plays a pretty interesting part in the story. It's his motivation, basically, but
there's a statement, and I wonder if you've ever heard this, that the media, the news media, is
factual but not truthful, and that they have been called the enemy of the people, at least in the
United States of America. And there was one day, at least we think, when journalists were hardworking
people trying to get the truth out for, you know, Joe Citizen, so that he and she could make the
right decisions and be fully informed. But then again, as we've seen even in the body of this
episode, Red Panda tries to weaponize the press, and we have the culprit, who's the reporter,
weaponizing the press as well, and using it to keep his murder spree, and he's trying to get
it to keep his murder spree going, and that's pretty interesting stuff. I'm going to move on
from there, and basically I've kind of already talked about Holland's ghost. It's an interesting
concept that gets brought up, but it's debunked. It's not actually a ghost or specter or spook.
It's just a man who has lost touch with reality, a man who, through his own twisted logic, has
decided to commit serial murder for the fame, basically. And this desire for fame, this desire
to have that thrill of being so popular and so acclaimed, has warped him until it's turned him
into a monster, the very type of monster that he got famous documenting in the first place, which is
an interesting story. I don't have much else to say about him. He had no powers. He had, I don't
know how he gained entry into any of these people's homes in order to murder them. I don't know any of
those things, and it's all glossed over, which I find clever and interesting on the writing aspect
of it, but also it's interesting how in the moment, the way it's written, it didn't really matter,
and it definitely gets a buy or a pass, and I like that. I want to emulate that kind of writing.
It's good, I think. There are a few lore points that I will go through quickly, and then I'm going
to go ahead and wrap up the episode. Like I said, I did enjoy the episode overall, so there's
nothing to complain about or, you know, attack it over. So the first thing, well actually the last
thing that I have on my list is that Red Panda is apparently not a good driver, and that's pretty
funny. He's so good at all these other things, but not driving. Driving is not his strong suit, and
that's funny, and I can relate. So the Masked Phantom apparently was a mystery man operating
sometime before Red Panda started his career, I would assume in Toronto, partly because he's
mentioned by this fellow from the Sentinel, and that he was mentioned, it basically sounded like
he was in the area, and Red Panda could have known him because of him being in Toronto, and this
reporter being from Toronto knew of this Masked Phantom. So that's cool. I like to, well anyway,
that's just neat to think about that there were other mystery men before Red Panda, which makes
sense he wouldn't be the first one, and it's kind of cool to get any clue about those who came before
him. And who knows, maybe the Masked Phantom will show up in an episode of Red Panda when things are
dire. Maybe he'll come back and give some assistance to help protect the city that he once fought for.
Next thing is Jack Peters reports for the Sentinel, or he does that first of all, which is the paper
that this fellow that they're working with is also a newspaperman at, and he was kidnapped as part of
a plan to use him to get to the Red Panda, which is pretty cool. Which is pretty cool. Not good for
him, but good for the story and the drama telling, right? Apparently there's another reporter, Bailey,
who works for the Sentinel, and he's a contact for them there and helps them. They give him scoops on
stories and he plants information and things like that for him. And that's the last little bit of
lore here that Red Panda uses his newspaper contacts to plant useful information in the papers from
time to time. And again, that's interesting in the context of everything that was going on in this
episode and with the story and this reporter who turned heel, who turned into a villain and a
murderer. So anyway, that was all. Check out all my other work on the website. You can find the links
to everything in the show notes, and I would appreciate you checking that out. I have my own
superhero universe in mind, which is part of the reason I'm going through Red Panda like this,
and doing these reports so that I can learn the craft, because I think Taylor did a masterful job.
And I'd like to emulate him and exceed his performance, his achievement with this show,
or you know, in what he did telling the story of the Red Panda. And anyway, I don't know that I will
do that, but that's my aspiration, and I'm working on it. I'm studying the material in order to do
that. So look forward to my superhero writing, which you can find on the website on MJMunoz.com.
And I'm going to go ahead and call it a night for now. So thank you very much for listening.
And until next time, be well. This is MJ signing out.