The Trial of the Monarch

"The Trial of the Monarch"

"The Trial of the Monarch" is the twelfth episode in the first season of The Venture Bros.

Plot

The episode opens with a scene of a deep, dark cave, with Hank dressed in Indiana Jones garb and Dean bearing a more than passing resemblance to Magnum, P.I.. They are exploring a lost tomb and find a chest full of priceless... arts and crafts supplies. They also find a tablet covered in Sanskrit which Dean begins trying to decipher. As he reads his awkward translation aloud, a giant statue of an hoplite soldier begins to stir; it draws its enormous stone sword and lumbers towards the boys. Responding to their cries for help, Brock appears, dressed in a fashion similar to that of Michael Knight, rips the statue's arm off and proceeds to punch it in the crotch with its own limb. Suddenly, out of a cloud of smoke emerges The Monarch, clad in a much more intimidating costume. He fires laser beams from his eyes that freeze Brock into a block of ice... but the boys turn the tables on him by becoming an ultra-powerful Transformer, Mecha-Shiva! At this point, the scene dissolves into a courtroom, where The Monarch is noisily objecting to Hank and Dean's ridiculously overblown and obviously false testimony. As the boys continue to chant "Mecha-Shiva" and The Monarch continues to rail against them, the judge demands order in the court.

Outside the courtroom, two guards are approached by a figure in a trench coat and fedora-style hat. He asks whether the trial within is that of The Monarch; when the guards affirm that it is, he grabs their arms and kills them with strange pulses of energy. The stranger speaks into a radio that he needs "cleaners" and enters the court, where he sits in the back row next to a woman whose face is covered by a black veil.

Hank is on the stand, being questioned by The Monarch. As he engages in childish reparteé with the witness, the exasperated judge calls for an hour's recess and summons both attorneys to his chambers. He scolds The Monarch, who is serving as his own lawyer, that his actions may very well cost him the case (in which The Monarch stands accused of murdering a police officer, who has not been seen since confronting the villain); unsurprisingly, the warnings are ignored. A large, wide-eyed man in a white business suit enters the room, his head lolling backwards as he nears the others. His shirt opens to reveal what appears to be a small, conjoined twin emerging from his stomach. This man, a prosecutor known simply as Tiny Attorney, says in a southern accent that he has had plenty of experience putting supervillians behind bars and The Monarch will prove no trouble.

In the hallway outside the courtroom, the Ventures open their brown-bag lunches. As Hank and Dean gripe about their sandwiches, Dr. Venture complains to Brock that he would have called the police on The Monarch long ago if he knew he could have. Brock responds that the police do not interfere with Guild business and implies that the group of villains bear a grudge against The Monarch for some reason. As if to prove his point, the scene changes to what appears to be a sinister secret base of operations. A costumed figure speaks into a microphone, informing someone that everything is ready.

When the court resumes, The Monarch begins testifying on his own behalf. He begins with the furor caused by the publication of Flight of The Monarch, a book filled with "lies and pictures of also-lies." Livid over the slanderous book, The Monarch informs his henchmen that he knows one of them is responsible, and that he will kill them all if the guilty party does not step forward in the next twenty minutes (as recurring henchmen Numbers 21 and 24 exchange worried grimaces). He flees sobbing to his bedroom, where Dr. Girlfriend attempts to console him. The door opens and a henchman flops forward with a note reading "I DID IT" pinned to the back of his skull with a dart.

Responding to Tiny Attorney's objection, the judge prompts The Monarch to get to the point of his testimony. He continues, describing how the book's descriptions (and pictures) of Dr. Girlfriend's past led to a huge fight between them. In a rage, The Monarch called her a whore and threw her out of the Cocoon base. Downplaying his emotional reaction, he says that afterwards, she probably lost her mind with grief. In the back of the courtroom, Dr. Girlfriend rips off her veil and shouts that The Monarch is lying.

Taking the stand, Dr. Girlfriend begins offering her side of the story. After The Monarch threw her out, she walked in the rain to the house of Phantom Limb, her former partner and boyfriend. Oozing oily sympathy, The Limb takes her in and listens to her ranting about The Monarch's actions. He has no dry clothes to offer her except her old costume -- an extremely revealing, mostly sheer slip. She questions some "hard chunks" stuck to the outfit, but the Limb smoothly explains that they are his tears. The Monarch interrupts again in furious disbelief, sputtering that the Limb had obviously masturbated over the costume. Dr. Venture objects to the judge, stating that his children are present; the judge orders The Monarch's comments stricken and sympathetically suggests that the boys leave the courtroom. Venture, unwilling to miss the juicy details, asks Brock to keep them busy for a while. As the three leave the courtroom, the trench coat-wearing figure urgently whispers into a communicator that they have "lost full containment." In the hallway outside, Hank and Dean eagerly begin investigating the mystery of the chewing gum left on the water fountain, to Brock's utter indifference.

Tiny Attorney asks Dr. Girlfriend to continue her testimony. The flashback resumes with her wearing her Queen Etheria costume, as she and Phantom Limb converse for a while until he begins to grope her. Just then, the doorbell rings; it is The Monarch, accusing her of running back to "that floating, smooth-talking jackass." He continues to insult her until she slams the door in his face; the scene returns to the courtroom, where Dr. Girlfriend says that apart from some flashing lights and shouting later, she does not remember anything.

Dean enthusiastically explains to Hank how a hair affixed to a doorframe with saliva can serve as a discreet indicator of whether the door has been opened. He painstakingly places a hair on a door, which is suddenly opened as Dr. Orpheus dramatically expounds on the Taco Bell lunch that wreaked havoc upon his bowels. The necromancer drifts into the courtroom, theatrically announcing his entrance.

After being sworn in (using the Necronomicon rather than an ordinary bible), Orpheus explains his mystic credentials to Tiny Attorney and the jury. Meanwhile, Brock notices a sudden surge of Guild operatives, called Strangers; obviously something big is about to happen. He feels no need to warn Dr. Venture, however, since the Guild has no quarrel with him or his family and therefore will not harm them.

Despite the defendant's objections, the judge allows Orpheus to read The Monarch's mind to determine the truth of what happened on the night in question. A flashback reveals The Monarch drunkenly urinating in the Limb's yard. A policeman arrives and questions The Monarch, who responds incoherently. A tranquilizer dart knocks out the rambling villain and a Stranger approaches the police officer. He gives the cop a briefcase full of cash and informs him that a new life is waiting, including a supermodel wife. The police officer happily departs as a group of Strangers carry away the barely-conscious Monarch.

Ending his mind-meld, Orpheus draws breath to relate his newfound knowledge to the court when the stranger is the back of the court room barks an order into his radio. In the restroom, Brock forces the boys onto the floor as Guild operatives pour into the courtroom and freeze everyone (except the stranger and Dr. Girlfriend). The stranger removes his disguise revealing himself to be Phantom Limb and smugly orders a "level three memory wipe" on the spectators as a team of Strangers abducts Tiny Attorney, the target of the entire operation. One Stranger asks for instructions regarding Orpheus, since necromancers are highly resistant to memory wipes; Phantom Limb replies that they are highly susceptible to hypnotic suggestion. Leaning close to the frozen Orpheus' ear, Phantom Limb whispers that The Monarch is a very bad man who wishes harm to the Ventures and is guilty of all charges. In return, the Guild will repay Orpheus with the archenemy he has so sorely wanted.

Dr. Girlfriend seems uneasy about setting up the Monarch, but Phantom Limb assures her that someone must be the patsy. Still distraught, she tells the immobilized Monarch that the Venture brothers, and not she, is responsible for all of this. As the group leaves the courtroom, one of the Strangers thanks Brock for not interfering and that they have twenty seconds until the freeze effects wear off. The boys and Brock take a seat next to Dr. Venture just as everyone awakens as if nothing had happened. As the Limb had predicted, Orpheus cries his fervent belief that The Monarch is guilty.

The final scene after the credits shows The Monarch wearing an orange prison jumpsuit over his black bodysuit. He is in the visitor's area, separated by a sheet of glass from Dr. Girlfriend, with whom he is speaking via a telephone. The Monarch affirms that he forgives Girlfriend and that they will start over with each other when he is released in a few decades. A reverse angle shot shows that his visitor is actually henchman Number 24, who uneasily asks if he can leave now.

Trivia

• The costume the Monarch wears during Hank and Dean's made-up witness statement is based on the one he wore in the pilot episode.
• The regular title sequence is replaced with a quick shot of the title next to a skull to fit the show's time constraints without cutting any of the scenes.
• The end credits are also different; instead of backdrops of scenes from the episode, the credits appear over a spiral design, presumably representing Dr. Orpheus' mystical powers.
• The book that Dr. Orpheus uses in the courtroom is the necronomicon from the Evil Dead series in look and name. The necronomicon originated in the writings of author H.P. Lovecraft.
• When the Monarch raves on how the writer of the scandalous biography will be punished, Numbers 21 and 24 look especially distraught, implying that one or both were responsible. The author is probably 21, as he says that he never thought the Monarch would find out, to which 24 points out that he put the Monarch's picture on the cover.
• During their fight over the book, The Monarch sarcastically asks Dr. Girlfriend if Frank Frazetta designed her outfit. Frazetta is a noted fantasy and science fiction artist whose subjects are often scantily-clad. He further states with disgust that in one of the pictures, he can see her "dirty pillows." This unusual term for breasts is a reference to a term the overprotective mother uses in Stephen King's novel Carrie and the film based on it.
• The biography The Flight of the Monarch makes numerous references to the early-80's New York City punk scene. In it, the Monarch is pictured with Lydia Lunch and Stiv Bators at the Danceteria, and Dr. Girlfriend is pictured skinny-dipping with Jim Foetus (a.k.a. Jim Thirlwell, the show's musical composer).
• The jury is made up of the show's cast and crew.
• Phantom Limb's call for a "cleaner" to get rid of the dead bodies is reminiscent of the movie La Femme Nikita.
• The character Tiny Attorney is a parody of Kuato, a character in the movie Total Recall who was also a deformed twin growing out of a man's torso. Tiny Attorney's overall demeanor, complete with white suit, is that of the "southern gentleman attorney" stereotype, such as Ben Matlock.
• The voice of the "Sovereign" that the Strangers talk to in the Command Center is heavily reminiscent of the Emperor from Star Wars. His distorted appearance in the video screen seems to be a parody of the face in the Queen's/Witch's magic mirror featured in Walt Disney's "Snow White"(1937).
• In the shot showing the Guild of Calamitous Intent's command center, Doc Hammer and Jackson Publick are shown on separate monitors talking into what appears to be radios.
• The Strangers' names, garb and operations are inspired by the antagonists of the 1998 science fiction thriller Dark City. Both groups are known as Strangers, dress in fur-lined trench coats, alter people's memories after putting them in a state of stasis. Furthermore, The Monarch is in a situation similar to that of the protagonist of Dark City, John Murdock: both are blamed for a murder they did not commit.
• One of the animation directors (Kimson Albert) gets to have a "nickname" inserted into his credits. The nickname is an unusual line or word from the preceding episode. For "Trial of the Monarch" the credit reads Kimson "Mecha-Shiva" Albert.