M.A.S.K. S1E27

Panda Power

Four figures stand before a stone head on a wooden platform as pandas crowd the grass.

V.E.N.O.M. takes nearly every panda in China from a preserve and kidnaps Andre, the sculptor Matt has hired to make a giant panda statue for a dedication in Peking. Both are taken to Easter Island, where Mayhem has Andre recarve the island's stone heads into portraits of the gang, with the pandas kept close as insurance against attack. Scott and T-Bob look after a baby panda while M.A.S.K. works out where the animals have gone. Matt's plan, called panda power, brings crates to the island so that the animals swarm the V.E.N.O.M. agents, and the cub can be reunited with its parents.

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Most hostage plots ask what the villains want in exchange. "Panda Power" asks what they want the hostages for, and the answer is a surprise: V.E.N.O.M. has emptied China of nearly all its pandas as insurance for a vanity project, the recarving of Easter Island's stone heads into portraits of the gang, done by a kidnapped sculptor.

The sculptor is Andre, whom Matt has brought over from New York to make a giant stone panda for a dedication in Peking. Scott and T-Bob are at the preserve, where a baby panda wanders in and a night of noise leaves scrape marks and no adult pandas at all. The national wildlife representative, Chin Ho, warns Matt that the news cannot be kept from the public for long. Andre is scooped up at the statue, Matt ends up in a cart of tomatoes that Scott pushes into the scene; the rest of the episode is the long way round to a stone head on a wooden platform, with pandas crowded on the grass in front of it.

What the episode cares about is the baby, and it tells the story through T-Bob. Everything else is a delivery system for that animal: the jokes about bears, the flight on which the cub sleeps like a real baby, the family reunion that Matt arranges as the last stage of his plan. The villains treat pandas as property and a shield, the heroes treat one as a child, and the conflict is settled by which of those views the plot rewards.

The writing is relentlessly punning, and it has the nerve to commit. Pandemonium, bear facts and bear necessities arrive early, and Matt even tosses off a line that the fan wiki traces back to the stump-the-band routine on the Tonight Show. The vanity plot gives the villains their liveliest material: the sculptor finishes Mayhem's portrait, the others queue up and squabble over who is next, and the argument ends on a half-finished 'ladies before' line.

The standout is the incubator. Scott hot-wires T-Bob so that his chest compartment holds the temperature of a mother's hand, T-Bob frets that he will look like a kangaroo, and soon there is a cub in his chest with a baby bottle in its paws. The animation commits to the gag: the open compartment, the panda's contented face, T-Bob's worried eyes above it. The tomato catch is the other piece of slapstick worth remembering, with Matt's good suit splashed red, but the incubator is the scene that is more than a set-up for something else.

The climax belongs to the pandas. M.A.S.K. delivers crates of panda food to the island, a crate bursts open in a spray of bamboo leaves and splinters, and the animals swarm the gang; one agent in green leaps over the crowd with a panda licking his face. Mayhem has just gloated that M.A.S.K. has not fired a single laser, and the next shot shows why they did not need to.

The weakness is the clock the episode builds and abandons. The Peking dedication gives the opening a deadline, with the crowds due in two hours, and as far as the dialogue shows it drops out of sight once the action moves to the island. The animation also leans on reuse, with the jet transformation for Thunderhawk played twice, the only difference being Matt's clothing, according to the fan wiki.

Even so, this is a gentle episode. The villain's motive is pride, the heroes win with animals and crates rather than lasers, and the winner is a baby panda!

The M.A.S.K. wiki notes that the animation of Thunderhawk converting to jet mode is used twice, with the only difference being Matt Trakker's clothing: a suit the first time and his M.A.S.K. uniform the second.
The wiki says that when Matt remarks that a question will stump the band, he is referring to the long-running Tonight Show segment in which audience members challenged the band to play an obscure song.
According to the wiki, Bruce Sato is Thunderhawk's co-pilot on this mission even though the M.A.S.K. Computer names Rhino as his vehicle.
The wiki lists a voice slip: when Bruce says 'And the pandas' just before his mask lowers in Thunderhawk, the voice is Matt Trakker's.
The wiki lists Sharon Noble as the voice of Vanessa Warfield, the M.A.S.K. Computer and the baby panda in this episode.
The wiki points out that Sly Rax wears his sunglasses when he arrives on Easter Island with Vanessa but not when the pandas are unloaded a moment later.
The wiki records that as the agents laugh at T-Bob in the closing scene, Hondo MacLean's hair is colored light brown instead of black.
The wiki lists a Knight Books paperback novelization of this episode, the fifth book in a series of eight, and says the book explains that Manta ran in a 'whisper mode' when it took the pandas, which is why only a rush of wind is heard.
The wiki gives the episode's safety tip as a warning about running with sticks, delivered by Scott to a small boy while he and T-Bob build a tree house.

Matt Trakker

Alex Sector

Bruce Sato

Hondo MacLean

Miles Mayhem

Cliff Dagger

Sly Rax

Vanessa Warfield

Scott Trakker

T-Bob

Matt Trakker smiles in a purple suit under a blue sky.

Scott looks off to the side with T-Bob beside him.

A steel scaffold surrounds a rough stone sculpture with two tiny workers on top.

Scott pets a baby panda that sits next to T-Bob's leg.

T-Bob looks down worriedly with a blue mouth light and gray arms.

Scott lies in bed with his hands behind his head as T-Bob lies under a pink blanket.

Scott turns in bed to look at T-Bob under the pink blanket.

Scott in pajamas peers out from behind a cream curtain at night.

Scott in pajamas rests his hands on a ledge beside T-Bob.

Matt Trakker shines a flashlight on Scott and T-Bob as a bearded man looks on.

Matt Trakker aims a flashlight beam at the bearded man in the dark.

Scott in pajamas bends to pick up a panda cub in front of T-Bob.

Scott cradles a panda cub with T-Bob while Matt and the bearded man stand in a flashlight glow.

A red car with its wing doors raised and headlights glaring sits on dry ground.

Scott watches a panda cub in T-Bob's open chest compartment as a hand ties a bandage.

Scott looks worried beside T-Bob who carries a panda cub in his chest.

Scott looks downcast beside T-Bob who holds a panda cub.

Matt Trakker stands before the lattice-covered stone panda, seen from behind.

A man in a brown jacket climbs into an orange truck.

Matt Trakker in a purple suit shakes hands with a man in a gray cap and tunic.

A man in a gray cap and glasses gestures with an open hand.

Matt Trakker speaks with an open hand held out.

Matt Trakker and the man in the gray cap spread their hands near a dark car.

Dozens of tiny pandas lie in a grassy field around a brown stone pillar.

Cliff Dagger and a stout man in a blue uniform look off to the side.

A purple car carries a large pod on its roof, with sharp wings out, flying through speed lines.

The purple car with a pod on its roof rests on a plain as two men stand nearby.

V.E.N.O.M. agents unload pandas from a purple ramp as a red-haired woman watches.

The stout man in blue points an arm as Vanessa Warfield stands beside the ramp.

The stout man in blue kicks a man in green out of the purple doorway.

Hands pull wires inside a control panel.

Scott feeds T-Bob's chest compartment with a gray box as T-Bob looks on.

Scott kneels beside T-Bob while a panda cub sits on the floor of a furnished room.

A panda cub sits in T-Bob's chest compartment with a smiling face.

A panda cub holds a baby bottle in T-Bob's chest compartment.

A crowded Chinese plaza stretches before a palace gate with a lattice-covered panda on a stand.

A scaffold-covered panda statue of gray stone rises against the sky.

A man pulls a cart of oranges past a market stall as a blue-uniformed man walks beside it.

T-Bob feeds a bottle to a panda cub in his open chest while a girl watches.

The stone panda statue rises beside an elevator tower of scaffolding.

The bearded man clutches his head beside the stone panda while Matt Trakker looks on.

The bearded man grabs his head and shouts as Matt Trakker looks on in alarm.

A figure climbs the scaffold covering the cracked stone panda statue.

Matt Trakker looks stunned with a black band across his shoulder.

Scott dashes forward pushing a cart of tomatoes with T-Bob carrying a panda cub.

Scott and T-Bob race a tomato cart past a man in a cap.

Scott sits splattered in tomatoes as T-Bob and onlookers in gray tunics look on.

Scott looks up at Matt Trakker whose suit is smeared with tomatoes.

Matt Trakker sits at the wheel of a car looking ahead.

Alex Sector reads papers in a room with caged animals and a parrot.

Alex Sector holds the papers up beside his wristwatch.

A man in a shirt and tie talks with six small children in a park.

A man in a green jacket sits at a desk piled with papers, seen from behind.

A desk with stacks of papers and an empty chair, with a man in green stepping aside.

Alex Sector gestures to Matt Trakker in gray armor.

Matt Trakker in armor looks to the side with a slight smile.

Alex Sector and Matt Trakker lean in to look at a console.

Alex Sector and Matt Trakker look off to the side in the vehicle.

Matt Trakker and Alex Sector lean toward a panel in the vehicle.

Alex Sector and Matt Trakker stare at each other in close view.

Matt Trakker sits in a car cab as a dark-haired agent in an orange vest drives.

A monitor shows pandas gathered around a large stone head on a platform.

Vanessa Warfield, a man in sunglasses, Cliff Dagger and the stout man in blue shield their faces.

The V.E.N.O.M. group keeps covering their faces as Cliff Dagger frowns.

The stout man in blue squints and shouts with his mouth open.

A V.E.N.O.M. agent in an orange suit and gas mask raises a hand to his face.

A V.E.N.O.M. agent in an orange helmet and mask stands beside a vehicle.

A blue jet with a tall tail floats in the sky.

Matt Trakker in armor and a dark-haired agent stand next to a red car.

Matt Trakker, Scott, T-Bob and Alex Sector walk across the plain as a truck crashes down.

Matt Trakker, Scott, T-Bob, Alex Sector and two agents talk on the plain.

Scott looks worried beside T-Bob who carries a panda cub in his chest.

A panda cub looks out of T-Bob's chest compartment under his worried eyes.

Matt Trakker in armor leans against a wooden crate.

An orange-suited V.E.N.O.M. agent in a gas mask stands under a streak of yellow light.

A red truck spins through the air above a wooden crate in a ring of yellow arcs.

Scott watches Matt Trakker work at a red car as T-Bob stands beside them.

Two V.E.N.O.M. agents in masks sit in a vehicle, one in orange and one in red and white.

Four V.E.N.O.M. members stand at the foot of a scaffold with pandas around them.

Cliff Dagger listens as the stout man in blue gestures to one side.

Cliff Dagger rubs his cheek next to the stout man in blue.

Cliff Dagger and the stout man in blue look up in surprise.

Vanessa Warfield, Cliff Dagger, the stout man in blue and a man in green stand on the grass.

A wooden crate corner sits in front of a red truck.

A crate bursts apart in a spray of bamboo leaves and splinters.

The stout man in blue frowns as Vanessa Warfield glances over his shoulder.

A giant panda walks past V.E.N.O.M. agents standing at a scaffold tower.

Two masked V.E.N.O.M. agents sit in a vehicle, one in orange and one in a red scarf.

A red armored truck and an orange pickup race across a plain.

The front grille of a red armored truck looms over the plain.

Orange flame bursts out of the red truck grille.

An armored V.E.N.O.M. agent in a black helmet grips a steering wheel.

A close view of rough brown stone shows a crack and speckled pores.

T-Bob stands in front of a panda cub with a hand reaching for his side.

Scott holds a panda cub in his arms with a troubled look.

A purple car faces the rear of a red armored truck.

A purple car tumbles on its side across the sand.

A V.E.N.O.M. agent in a blue suit with a blue backpack lunges forward on his hands.

An orange fireball erupts in the sky with shards flying out.

A metal shard spins through an orange explosion.

Scores of pandas pile together on the plain with splinters flying.

A V.E.N.O.M. man in green wrapped in bamboo grimaces as a panda licks his face.

A V.E.N.O.M. man in green flings out an arm as a panda runs at him.

A white-gloved hand grips a control lever with a red knob.

A V.E.N.O.M. agent in a black helmet raises both arms holding a blue object overhead.

The V.E.N.O.M. man in green and bamboo leaves leaps above a crowd of pandas.

Two V.E.N.O.M. agents in a vehicle drive, one in orange mask, one in red scarf.

Three vehicles cross a field of pandas as figures walk across the grass.

Matt Trakker, Alex Sector, two agents, T-Bob and Scott gather around a panda cub.

A group of M.A.S.K. agents, Scott and T-Bob watch two pandas on the ground.

The M.A.S.K. team laughs as a panda hugs T-Bob and Scott stands by.

A panda hugs T-Bob and chews a bamboo stem.

Miles Mayhem grips two control sticks in a cockpit.

Scott and T-Bob sit on a platform in the fork of a large tree.

A boy in a white shirt runs along a path holding a bamboo stalk.

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