This is MJ, I'm an author, I'm an artist, I'm an analyzer.
You can find all my work at MJMunoz.com.
Join me as I analyze the thrilling Red Panda adventure's number 8 Curse of Beaton Hall,
featuring a hotel, a hasty honeymoon, and a haunted hotel.
That's two hotels there.
I did not mean to do that, but I'm not going to fix it now.
Too bad.
I'll have to be more careful next time.
Perhaps it was too early in the morning.
Curse of Beaton Hall, originally aired April 15, 2006.
It was written and directed by Greg Taylor, and here is the copy from DakotaRingTheatre.com.
Beaton Hall, an idyllic resort not far from the city, an oasis from the cares of the world,
or a spider's web of danger and death.
When the guests of Beaton Hall begin to meet with a series of unfortunate accidents, the
press decides the old family manor must be cursed.
The city's greatest champion suspects murder rather than misfortune.
Can the Red Panda and the Flying Squirrel defeat this deadly game, or will they become
the final victims of the Curse of Beaton Hall?
So I'm going to launch right into my analysis of this.
And first of all, actually I'm going to belay that and I'm going to stop myself and say,
I liked this episode.
It was good.
It was fun.
A lot of good moments in it.
Lots of cute moments between Kit and Red Panda.
And there was, like, I don't mind it, and it didn't bother me except for in the wider
context of things.
There's a he-too moment, I would say, where Kit basically tries to coerce Red Panda into
kissing her in front of all the guests, or well, yeah, kissing her in public in order
to sell their schtick as a married couple on their honeymoon at this hotel.
And I just thought it was kind of funny because if he had tried to say, oh, you know, this
cover idea would work better if you kissed me, Kit, that could be uncomfortable.
And I don't think Taylor would write something like that.
And it's just ironic that Kit can write it, and it's fine all day long.
But it struck me as odd, and I thought, isn't that sexual harassment technically that she's
trying to do on her boss?
And he just deescalates the situation, defuses the situation by doing one of his, no, no,
I don't see that, that's not what's going on here, things.
And you know, it works in the context, and it is funny, but it's also, I don't know,
it's just kind of pointing at a little odd.
And yeah, that's it.
Okay, so moving on to the real good stuff.
That couple in the beginning of the episode after the intro, that Charlie and Susan who
they were killed and Red Panda read about it in the paper while Kit was driving around,
and that's what sparked them going to Beaton Hall, their scene was really good.
I think, gosh, I think that's, I don't remember the guy's name.
I like his voice all right.
I think he's asked to do like a more hammed up, you know, fancy men voice.
Oh, darling, surely this must be wrong.
He was Peter.
He was the guy who played Peter in the, oh man, the rabbit season episode.
So like there's nothing wrong with his performances.
The style of them is, you know, he's been asked to do these like over dramatic, you
know, socialite guy, you know, never worked on his day in his life type of person, which
again, I think he does a commendable job.
I believe the lady who does the voice of his wife though is Judy Florio, who ends up doing
the voice for Harry Kelly for a long time, which is an important character coming up
maybe next season.
Maybe he's a season three guy because it's still season one anyway.
And he's a kid.
So that's why she does his voice.
And anyway, I think she does a fabulous job.
Got a great range as a, you know, a woman and then also as the kid later on.
And she's played like a tough or something too in one of these episodes.
So anyway, I like her performance a lot, but like especially her terror and his, cause
he was trying to put her at ease.
So her terror really sold it.
And then eventually when he freaks out and then they were like, you know, choking to
death, both of them did really well.
And it honestly did make it creepy, especially with all the, the laugh track and the, you
know, the, I don't think they had the chandelier crash, but you know, they couldn't get through
the walls or anything like that of the maze.
That was really creepy and effective and I thought that was excellent, excellent work.
I thought it was funny that, you know, after they had discussed this case and red pandas
suggested they go in to the country as a married couple to disguise their identities further
and allow them to operate there without drawing attention to him, this big socialite being
there that she almost crashed the car and like he didn't either didn't pick up on it,
which is odd cause he's, you know, this great detective in the red Panda or he chose to
ignore it, which I think is actually the case as you'll see later on.
There's a lot of, I'm going to choose to ignore this for the sake of, you know, keeping
these normal and good or whatever.
But you know, she almost crashes into a lamp post and then she says, like that's funny.
First of all, and the, the like sound design on that was good.
There was a screeching and a honking and whatever.
And then she says, oh, he just jumped out right in front of me, which obviously a lamp
post did not do.
And she's like too flummoxed by the whole situation to even make up a good excuse for
why she almost crashed.
And that was a lot of fun.
And then I liked them going into Beaton Hall as John and Jane Morris.
That was a lot of fun.
I actually, the first time I listened to this, I thought, I wonder if he's going to turn
out to actually be John Morris or John something or something Morris.
And there's like a little clue there for who the red Panda's real identity is, if we ever
find out one day, which I'm sure we won't.
And that was kind of fun.
Although I did think it was kind of weak that they're John and Jane.
I mean, we a little more creative than that, right?
It seems a little too obvious, but sometimes, you know, couples have those names that just
go together like that.
And that's kind of funny.
And then the whole thing with the, the attack by the mystery killer and the crashing chandelier,
that's a very classic, you know, trapped in a manner or even like Phantom of the Opera
type thing.
And it was cool.
I liked it.
It was like just, it was very classic mystery.
And I thought it was a lot of fun.
Done very well.
I did think it was odd that they used Clarissa, the Netherlands, Voice of the Flying Squirrel
and Kit Baxter for the laugh because while she has a great creepy laugh, it sounds too
much like her.
And I almost wish they had like lampshaded that a little bit in having her make a comment
and about it, but I don't think it happened.
Maybe there was like a very soft lampshading, but it didn't quite work for me.
But I thought it was interesting that they did that, especially because, you know, she's
not the only one who can do a crazy wicked laugh like that.
Or they could have modulated or they could have done something to make it a little more
seamless the fact that that's, you know, just her laughing.
It sounded like the flying squirrel laughing a little bit.
So that was, that detracted a tiny bit, but still not to a major extent.
And then they didn't really use any gadgets.
There wasn't really any lore going on in this episode.
The villain, I kind of don't want to spoil it.
I'm not sure why, is the beaten bastard.
And you know, that is a clue, but it's also not telling you who it is.
And if you haven't listened to it yet, it's a reason to go back.
And to go ahead and listen to it.
And which you can find links to DakotaRingTheatre.com in the show notes here on mjmunoz.com.
And anyway, it was a cool, it was a cool way for it to go.
It was a cool villain idea.
And I liked the plot that he had and what he was trying to attain and how he was trying
to do it as well.
Because they go into a little bit of that and it's neat to have this mystery set up
and then have our heroes unravel it.
And it made it a lot of fun.
So anyway, that's all I have to say about this one.
Let me know, excuse me, let me know what you thought about the episode or any of the stuff
that I said.
You can make a comment over on mjmunoz.com or any of the places where this is published.
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and enjoy it as much as you and I are.
Anyway, until next time, folks, this is MJ signing out.
I hope you enjoyed that.
Go to mjmunoz.com to leave any questions, comments, or other feedback you might have.
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