M.A.S.K. S1E40

Eyes of the Skull

Miles Mayhem holds a pale skull up to his face behind bars.

At a San Francisco auction, a crystal skull vanishes through a trapdoor beneath its glowing pedestal. Mayhem has stolen it and learns that whoever looks through its eyes can see through solid objects up to about fifteen feet, enough to read a bank vault's combination. He uses it to see through M.A.S.K. masks and learn who Matt Trakker is, kidnaps Scott, and demands the Trakker fortune and every M.A.S.K. secret, including the agents' identities and the location of Boulder Hill. A rival bidder, Professor Crowley, explains that the skull cannot survive its own image, and that destroying it erases what it has shown. Matt meets Mayhem on the Golden Gate Bridge with T-Bob in tow.

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T-Bob lifts an arm, and by the time the auctioneer has finished counting he has apparently bid ninety thousand dollars on a crystal skull. It is a good opening gag with a short fuse: the skull glows, the room is dazzled, and when the light drops the skull is gone through a trapdoor in the stage, with a tiny laser left behind in the pedestal to explain the glow. Nobody has stolen a vase. Somebody has stolen the thing that, as the M.A.S.K. computer reports a little later, lets you look through solid objects.

The episode is about the one secret the series cannot let V.E.N.O.M. keep. A show whose hero is a secret cannot let his enemy learn his name and hold on to it, so the story in which Mayhem finds out who Matt Trakker is has to end with Mayhem forgetting. The neat thing is that the writer builds the forgetting into the prop. Destroy the skull, the professor says, and whatever anyone has seen through it is erased from their minds. The constraint that would have limited the plot becomes its solution, and the skull's single weakness is that it can see through everything except itself.

The first half makes the skull frightening and funny at once. Mayhem takes it to a bank on a Sunday, when nobody is around, and tests it on the door; he can see through it, he says, and through anything up to about fifteen feet. A string of numbers is called out for the vault, and Cliff Dagger walks out with the money bags. Mayhem's boast that the interesting part of the robbery is the method is the best villain line in the episode, a man delighted with his own cleverness.

T-Bob carries the rest. He asks to see Alcatraz at the auction and keeps asking, until Scott threatens to leave him on it; when the finale arrives he finally gets his view, and has no interest, because he has been made the Joker in the team's deck and is about to be ferried onto the Golden Gate Bridge with the cargo Mayhem demanded. The gag is planted early and paid off at the moment when the payoff is worth least, which is the joke. The skull itself is drawn as a pale, glassy object that Mayhem holds up to his face like a monocle, and the bridge sequences are drawn in a dusky purple palette, with tall towers that make a believable stage for a handover.

The standout is the handover. Matt arrives with a cart of masks and data files, T-Bob among them, and Mayhem insists on checking that nothing is fake, while the rest of the team waits for word that Scott is safe. Then, going by the dialogue and a frame of a disc raised on top of T-Bob's head, the skull is made to look at itself, and a gadget that has seen through masks and vault doors is undone by its own reflection.

The weakness is how the rules arrive. Professor Crowley turns up in a single scene, having bid against Matt at the auction, and recites everything the plot needs: the skull cannot survive its own image, and destroying it erases knowledge from anyone who has looked through it. It is delivered in one calm speech, by a man we have barely met, and the solution is in place before Matt has had to work for it. Gloria and Dusty, meanwhile, never put their masks on, so the team's usual spectacle is thin on the ground.

Eyes of the Skull is a neat gadget episode, with a gag that keeps its shape, a villain who is plainly having a wonderful time, and a solution built into the object!

The M.A.S.K. wiki's continuity notes say Gloria Baker and Dusty Hayes never get to wear their masks during the mission, and that Aura and Backlash are seen only briefly during the M.A.S.K. Computer call-up.
The M.A.S.K. wiki lists a continuity slip in which Rax passes the same buildings twice during the Piranha and T-Bob chase, including one with a My House billboard.
The M.A.S.K. wiki notes that Matt calls Boulder Hill Boulder Mountain in this episode.
The M.A.S.K. wiki lists a continuity slip at Boulder Hill, where Dusty holds Spectrum and Lifter even though Matt and Bruce wore them in San Francisco.
According to the M.A.S.K. wiki, Mayhem is still carrying the skull after it explodes, as he climbs into Switchblade.
The M.A.S.K. wiki describes the safety tip as T-Bob spotting a prowler at night and Scott wanting to call the police, with T-Bob finding the person is only fixing a flat tire; Scott's point is that it is still wise to call.
Wikipedia's article on crystal skulls says Smithsonian anthropologist Jane Walsh examined the Mitchell-Hedges skull in 2007 and 2008 and found tool marks from a high-speed metal rotary tool coated with an abrasive, concluding it was probably carved in the 1930s; the episode's Computer, by contrast, calls such skulls possible artifacts of the ancient Maya.
Wikipedia's article on crystal skulls also reports a 2008 British Museum study that found the skulls were shaped with a rotary disc tool made from some suitable metal and worked with a harsh abrasive such as corundum or diamond, quite likely at workshops in Idar-Oberstein, Germany, in the 19th century.

Matt Trakker

Bruce Sato

Gloria Baker

Dusty Hayes

Miles Mayhem

Cliff Dagger

Sly Rax

Scott Trakker

T-Bob

T-Bob looks on with yellow eyes as a dark-haired man rests his chin on his hand.

Scott Trakker sits in a plush chair beside T-Bob, looking ahead.

Scott Trakker holds a finger to his lips beside T-Bob.

Rows of formally dressed spectators sit in an auction hall.

A dark-haired man in a blue suit sits with arms crossed beside a woman in an orange dress.

A bald auctioneer points into the audience where T-Bob sits among the seated guests.

An older gray-haired man strokes his beard beside a worried brown-haired man and Matt Trakker.

Scott Trakker reaches out toward T-Bob as a man sits behind them.

Scott Trakker leans toward T-Bob and holds his arm.

A large crystal chandelier hangs from a ceiling.

A gray-haired bearded man gasps with wide eyes beside a worried man.

A woman in a white hat shields her face from a blue beam of light.

A gray-haired bearded man shakes his head and shields his eyes.

The gray-haired bearded man clutches his head, eyes squeezed shut.

A bald auctioneer in a bow tie spreads his hands while Matt Trakker looks down at him.

T-Bob stands on a podium as the auctioneer, Matt Trakker, Scott Trakker and a dark-haired man look on.

The auctioneer, T-Bob, Scott Trakker, Matt Trakker and a dark-haired man stand before the blue curtains.

Scott Trakker looks down into a round hole in the floor as the men stand beside him.

T-Bob walks along a rocky wall toward a small paintbrush hanging in the air.

Matt Trakker holds a small object as the group stands around a hole on stage.

Scott Trakker gestures with one open hand and a pointing finger.

T-Bob looks up, one arm raised in a shrug as a man's hand extends nearby.

A gray-haired professor in a brown suit stands in a hall with a framed painting.

A bald auctioneer and Matt Trakker stand near Scott Trakker and T-Bob in a hall.

Seen from above, a group stands around a hole while a gray-haired man floats above.

Matt Trakker speaks as he drives a car down a street.

Scott Trakker looks worried beside T-Bob in the back seat.

Miles Mayhem scowls beside a building window.

A bank with a street sign stands on a corner with a dark vehicle at its edge.

A tilted view of a brick building with windows and an orange glow.

Miles Mayhem holds a skull while a black SUV waits by a brick wall.

Miles Mayhem holds a pale skull beside a mustached man in a green jacket.

A keypad with numbers and two round clocks is mounted on a wall.

A grid of shelves holds rows of stacked white boxes.

A hand presses a button on a number keypad.

Wooden shelves hold stacked white bundles.

Cliff Dagger grins with a bag over his shoulder as Miles Mayhem looks on.

A black SUV and motorcycle sit by a brick wall and a yellow building.

Scott Trakker walks toward T-Bob as two men sit in a car beyond.

Scott Trakker walks past T-Bob in front of an apartment building.

Cars drive along a city street between tall buildings.

Cliff Dagger holds out both hands in a doorway with money bags behind him.

A dark-haired man in a green jacket holds a pale glass skull to his face.

Miles Mayhem hurries into a room while a man holds a skull at the right edge.

Miles Mayhem hurries toward large glass doors in a lobby.

Two agents in gray and orange kneel beside a green bench, seen from above.

Two agents in gray and orange kneel beside a bench behind a window pane.

Miles Mayhem holds a pale skull up to his face.

A masked rider on a dark motorcycle waits beside a building entrance.

A masked agent in an orange helmet and another in a red helmet look ahead.

A black and white pattern of angled stripes fills the screen.

A monitor shows green outlines of a man and two faces above a red outline of a vehicle.

A brick and wood building with tall windows rises above a ground floor arch.

Scott Trakker and T-Bob stand on a sidewalk with two men in suits and two women nearby.

Scott Trakker looks worried beside T-Bob in front of a window.

A masked rider on a motorcycle and a truck drive down a city street.

A man in an orange visor helmet and blue uniform grips two control sticks.

T-Bob stands on a sidewalk beside a planter in front of glass doors.

T-Bob raises both arms with a surprised face.

A city street empties toward distant buildings with a small car and bike far away.

T-Bob's arm and a dark motorcycle appear in front of a tall building.

A flower garden terrace curves in front of a city skyline.

A small motorcycle climbs a garden path through a flower bed.

A masked rider on a dark motorcycle rides past a building with a sidecar holding Scott Trakker.

A yellow and pink starburst explodes across the screen.

A red car drives along a street past a tall hotel building.

A pair of hands types on a laptop showing a skull.

A telephone keypad with a speaker sits on a desk.

Matt Trakker speaks seriously as a dark-haired man stands with his back to him.

Miles Mayhem speaks into a phone.

Matt Trakker leans over a desk phone while a dark-haired man watches.

T-Bob rolls in front of an orange taxi on a city street.

T-Bob stands with Matt Trakker and a dark-haired man in an office.

Matt Trakker speaks from a video screen above a round table.

Gloria Baker and Dusty Hayes watch the screen in a control room.

A dark-haired man in a blue suit stands by a desk as T-Bob sits on the checkered floor.

Two agents work at a round table in a yellow room beneath a mechanical arm.

A red sports car with a lightning bolt stands on a sunlit street beside a brownstone.

Matt Trakker stands with a dark-haired man and faces a gray-haired man at a window.

A gray-haired bearded man with glasses stares ahead in alarm.

The gray-haired bearded man frowns in profile beside a curtain.

The gray-haired bearded man speaks in front of a window.

A large glass window above an arched entrance reflects a blue sky.

Dusty Hayes leans over a console in a gray vehicle.

Matt Trakker speaks while touching his chin.

Matt Trakker looks off to the side with a half smile.

A hand pats the top of T-Bob's dome as he clasps his own arms.

Golden Gate style bridge towers stand over purple water at dusk.

A bridge tower rises over a roadway lined with lamps at dusk.

T-Bob clasps his hands and looks sideways.

Rocky shoreline cliffs lead to a bridge in the dusk with a white car at the edge.

Matt Trakker stands on the bridge with a hand on a cart while T-Bob looks on.

A dark SUV drives toward the viewer on the bridge at dusk.

The dark SUV continues forward in front of the bridge tower.

A figure in a dark blue visor helmet with a gold bat badge sits in a cockpit.

Matt Trakker holds a cart handle as T-Bob rises into view.

Matt Trakker speaks, with T-Bob's dome in the lower left.

Scott Trakker jumps up from behind T-Bob, who holds a skull on a cable.

Scott Trakker runs forward beside T-Bob on the bridge.

Scott Trakker stands on a bridge deck beside T-Bob, who sits on the ground.

T-Bob sits on the bridge deck with a worried look.

A man in a red vest sits in a vehicle as spray splashes at the left.

T-Bob's face and dome fill the frame as a lid closes over him.

Matt Trakker holds the pale skull beside a bridge post with a worried look.

Matt Trakker smiles faintly beside a bridge post.

A figure in a blue uniform and visor helmet stands beside a masked man on a bridge.

Three masked figures in blue, purple and green clothing stand side by side on the bridge.

T-Bob's dome has a lid popped open as he steps aside.

Matt Trakker looks down beside a bridge post.

A frayed rope or handle stretches across a steel bridge truss.

T-Bob stands with a disc raised on top of his head.

Matt Trakker reaches up and looks anxiously upward against a starry sky.

Matt Trakker bursts through a pink splash in a blue sky.

Matt Trakker and agents walk toward a barred cage where T-Bob stands.

Scott Trakker puts his hands on his hips behind bars with Matt Trakker and the agents.

Scott Trakker sleeps in a bed with a white pillow and pink blanket.

Scott Trakker answers a bedside phone while T-Bob waits by the curtain.

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