M.A.S.K. S1E08

The Roteks

A man in blue stands among a swarm of insects from an open case.

On a camping trip, Scott tries out a bird caller he built for a science project, and a swarm of metal-eating insects reduces the family trailer to wreckage. Matt calls the Peaceful Nations Alliance and learns the insects are Roteks, bred in a military lab as a weapon, with one colony missing and due to multiply. M.A.S.K. is assembled to hunt them with plastic containers, only to find the missing colony buried on purpose and V.E.N.O.M. controlling it with a device. Matt and Alex search for the frequency that drives the Roteks mad, and the answer turns out to be Scott's bird caller.

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The most important clue in The Roteks is planted before the plot has started. Scott is out at the campsite trying his science project, a gadget that calls birds, while Matt gets the hot dogs ready and remarks that it is probably scaring the birds away. Then Scott spots something strange, the birds stop mattering, and the episode becomes a bug hunt. Nobody mentions the bird caller again until the last act.

That structure is the thing to watch, so it deserves a plain statement: this is a mystery whose solution is a child's hobby, and the episode is fair about it. The Roteks are metal-eating insects, bred in a military lab so that an army could drop them behind enemy lines and let them go to town. V.E.N.O.M. controls them with a device, and its stated plan is to send any country that opposes it back to the Stone Age, since civilization depends on metal. Everything else in the episode is a way of delaying the moment when somebody asks what Scott was doing when the insects first went on the rampage, and the delay is long enough that the question feels like a discovery when it comes.

The script, which the stub credits to S. S. Wilson, takes its time getting there, and the middle is where the episode earns its pacing problems and some of its charm. The team splits up for a contest whose prize is a brass ring, provided the Rotek does not eat it first. Alex, the zoologist of the group, works out that the insects communicate with ultrasonic frequencies. A buried colony turns up, and somebody has deliberately put it there. The jokes carry the stretch: one agent remarks that something does not look quite cricket, and another translates for the rest.

The voice work leans on T-Bob, who spends the episode being afraid of being munched for lunch, and whose terror is funnier than any of the action around it!

The standout scene is the frequency hunt. Alex needs the one signal that will drive the Roteks crazy, so Spectrum broadcasts every frequency in the book and nothing happens. It must be a combination of frequencies, which could take hours the team does not have. Then Matt remembers that the Roteks first went on a rampage when Scott was testing his bird caller, and has Scott play it into the microphone. The scene is a small piece of detective work, and it works because the audience was shown the clue in the opening minutes.

The real weakness is the scale of the threat. The Roteks are supposed to be the end of every piece of metal on Earth, and the episode does say so, but all we ever see them eat is a trailer, an axle and some vehicle parts in one stretch of countryside. The doom is announced rather than shown.

Among the early episodes this one stands out for having a premise that is more science fiction than the usual heist. It ends on the safety tip, with Matt praising Scott for wearing his safety goggles and Scott replying that he always wears them when he uses tools, and that lands better than most of the tips do, because Scott is the kid who just saved the day with a homemade gadget. The Roteks has the tidiest clue of the early episodes.

The M.A.S.K. wiki lists a Golden Books Super Adventure book, also titled The Roteks, published in 1986 and based on this episode.
The M.A.S.K. wiki lists this episode as the only appearance of the Roteks, and says Duane Kennedy of the Peaceful Nations Alliance describes them as a breed of metal-eating insect created in a secret military lab, due to multiply every 12 hours.
In a May 2008 interview posted on matt-trakker.com, S. S. Wilson recalls writing a story about metal-eating bugs for the series; he does not name the episode.
In that same interview, Wilson says writers had to wait until a given toy was designed and ready for production before its vehicle could be used in a script.
Wilson also recalls in that interview that story editor Terrence McDonnell loved puns and was always pushing writers to add them to an episode.
Wikipedia lists S. S. Wilson as a writer of Short Circuit and Tremors as well as M.A.S.K.
The M.A.S.K. wiki lists a continuity error in the conference room scene: Matt appears in his Rhino uniform in the overhead shot and in his Thunderhawk outfit in the next shot.
The M.A.S.K. wiki lists a second continuity error: when Hondo MacLean climbs onto the back of Buddie Hawks's motorcycle, Buddie's jacket changes from purple to blue.
The M.A.S.K. wiki records the closing safety tip as Matt praising Scott for wearing safety goggles while using tools, unlike T-Bob.

Matt Trakker

Brad Turner

Alex Sector

Bruce Sato

Hondo MacLean

Buddie Hawks

Miles Mayhem

Cliff Dagger

Sly Rax

Scott Trakker

T-Bob

Duane Kennedy

Scott and T-Bob stand in forest bushes as red birds flutter above.

Matt cooks at a camp table beside an orange camper van.

Red birds land on T-Bob at the campsite while Matt and Scott look on.

T-Bob balances on one leg with a red bird perched on his dome.

Scott points his handheld gadget as T-Bob hurries past the table and Matt sits behind it.

Matt guides Scott's hand on the gadget as T-Bob hurries along.

Matt folds his arms as Scott and T-Bob stand at the camp table.

Sparks fly across a damaged control panel.

A black insect crawls across a ruined panel among trees.

Black insects crawl across a white engine block in the forest.

Matt sits at a control console as Scott and T-Bob walk up behind him.

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

Matt and Scott watch a monitor showing a man in glasses with clasped hands.

A screen shows insects flying above two figures in white protective suits.

Matt and Scott watch the monitor as T-Bob's arm creeps in at the corner.

Matt sits at the console as Scott leans over a control and T-Bob rolls beside him.

Scott dashes away from the console as foam piles on the floor.

Matt works at the console with his fist clenched.

A green wireframe of a bearded man is crossed out by white lines beside orange motorcycles.

Alex Sector points a stick at a snake in a cage with others coiled nearby.

Alex Sector climbs a cage ladder as a snake rises below him.

Bruce Sato pieces together a mechanical hand among scattered playing cards.

A wireframe of a man in a cap and two red cars appear on a monitor.

Matt studies the wireframe monitor with his fist clenched.

An elderly man in a hat and bow tie stands with an elderly woman beside a red bicycle.

A small gas station sits against a rocky hillside.

Agents sit in chairs around a round table with a grid in the middle.

Alex Sector holds a wire cube while a man in yellow watches him.

Matt sits in profile at a vehicle console.

A mask rack hangs above the round table where agents sit.

Masked agents sit in chairs as the mask rack arms reach down.

A vehicle's undercarriage passes above a road.

A spare tyre, a magazine and torn paper lie on grass among the agents' feet.

Matt walks toward masked agents and Alex at the trashed campsite.

Matt kneels beside Thunderhawk and lifts a grey boulder.

Brad Turner sits at the controls of a green vehicle in sunglasses.

Alex Sector works at a control console inside a vehicle.

A man in an orange-striped suit steps out from behind Rhino.

Matt grips a handheld device at the wheel of Thunderhawk.

Thunderhawk sits tilted on a slope with its wing doors raised.

Dust billows below the underside of Rhino's cab.

Matt holds a clear box with a black insect inside.

Alex Sector holds a clear box with a black insect beside Rhino.

A truck with a bull bar and light bar climbs a forest road.

Agents stand by Rhino as Condor hovers above the trees.

Alex Sector holds up a black insect as Matt looks on.

A man in an orange-striped suit climbs into Rhino's open cab.

A man in orange stripes balances on twin wheels as another man waits in the clearing.

Masked agents stand beside Thunderhawk with an orange-helmeted agent at right.

An orange-helmeted agent and an agent in a red scarf look off together.

A wooden stick marks a square on the grass.

Alex stands with two masked agents in a clearing.

Alex and masked agents look at a broken wooden crate.

Alex pinches a black insect against a vehicle panel.

Miles Mayhem sits strapped into a cockpit with a scowl.

A man in a brown jacket and goggles stands in a clearing near Thunderhawk.

A motorcycle rider kicks up dust on a grassy track.

A forest clearing stands empty beneath a blue sky.

A masked pilot with an eagle badge on a blue helmet looks ahead.

The masked pilot looks ahead through his yellow visor.

The masked pilot grips the controls in a cockpit.

Brad speeds along in his green vehicle with wind streaks behind him.

A green vehicle tilts as it ploughs through dust.

Brad rides the Condor in motorcycle mode as a pink beam flashes ahead.

Masked agents crouch in the forest beside a man in a brown jacket.

A dark vehicle sits hidden behind forest trees.

Two masked agents walk through the forest beside a red car.

Alex walks through the trees with masked agents.

A masked agent in a red scarf fills the frame as a yellow agent peeks in.

A man in white kneels by huge tyres that insects are eating.

Insects swarm over a dark truck as a figure climbs out of the window.

Switchblade hovers over the forest beside a metal box.

A masked pilot in a blue uniform holds a handheld device.

A green vehicle lies overturned and covered in insects as a yellow-suited agent looks on.

A pilot sits strapped into an orange cockpit with a yellow box.

A masked agent in white and orange looks up at a distant flying craft.

Matt holds a blue helmet beside two masked agents.

Matt smiles as he talks.

Scott stands in a tiled lab near a rock-covered machine.

The front of Rhino fills the frame.

Alex and Matt talk in a vehicle cabin.

A black truck and a blue sidecar motorcycle wait on a canyon road below a hovering helicopter.

Miles Mayhem sits belted in a cockpit with a smirk.

Cliff Dagger drives in a purple beret and eyepatch.

Miles Mayhem scowls strapped into his seat.

Matt and Alex stand face to face beside Rhino.

Matt and Alex stand beside Rhino on a forest road.

Thunderhawk sits ringed by golden spirals with a masked driver inside.

A masked agent in orange stripes stands with hands on hips as others gather by Rhino.

A round pod on four jointed legs lowers its propeller.

An elderly couple stand by a red bicycle beside a roadside sign.

The elderly woman dabs her nose while the old man holds his hat.

A masked pilot's yellow visor and bat-like emblem fill the frame.

Switchblade flies toward the viewer with a masked pilot in the cockpit.

A small helicopter flies through a gap between rock cliffs.

Alex types at a console as agents gather behind him.

A rider in a green jacket and helmet stops a blue sidecar motorcycle at a cliff.

Thunderhawk glides through the air with its doors raised above spray.

Thunderhawk speeds down a road between red rock walls with its doors raised.

T-Bob stands behind a brick wall holding a trowel.

T-Bob builds a brick wall in a greenhouse among plants.

Scott watches T-Bob work behind a brick wall.

Scott talks to T-Bob as he stands behind the brick wall.

A masked agent in white and red crawls into a red-framed vehicle.

The masked agent ducks inside as a helicopter flies in the distance.

Miles Mayhem scowls in the cockpit.

The masked agent reaches out a hand while a helicopter and motorcycle appear in the distance.

Black insects swarm all over a cockpit's controls.

Insects swarm around a rider on a blue sidecar motorcycle.

Miles and Sly Rax run down a road.

A masked agent kneels in a dug pit as five figures watch from the rim.

A masked agent crouches in a pit as blue rings sweep toward insects over the hills.

Matt smiles beside two masked agents.

Rhino drives down a desert road with its cannon out.

T-Bob stands between two machines with a red toolbox at his feet.

Scott in goggles and Matt look over T-Bob next to a red toolbox.

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