Youngblood returns, but as he can only be seen by kids, Danny appears to be fighting air, convincing Jazz that he's losing it.
7.0
"Good"
"The Fenton Menace" finds Youngblood free of his pirate ship (and now in cowboy garb) and on Danny's tail. But since he can only be seen by children, no one else in the family can see him, and Danny appears to be losing his mind. Jazz, wanting him to calm down, has the family go on a ghost-free camping trip. But Youngblood, counting on everyone else failing to see him, trails the Fentons. And as Danny appears more crazy and Jazz becomes more overprotective, the little brat is free to wreack havoc.
I rather liked this one! I quite enjoyed watching it.
This is how I feel a "filler" episode that's caught between big events or is unrelated to the ongoing plots of the show should work - light and fun, but with a solid story and good character development. "13" is the best example of that so far, I feel. DD, PR, and especially IC seemed very lacking to me, because it didn't seem like they had any of that - they were just there to take up the empty spaces. TFM, though, I very much enjoyed.
Interesting how this is set right before TUE chronologically, and both TFM and TUE feature Jazz and Danny's sibling bond getting stronger. Nice job on that one. Jazz was lovely in the episode. Her narration was very nice (and brought a nice feel of nostalgia from WyW's using that device with Tucker), and her determination to help Danny was very sweet and IC. Locking him up in the RV was a bit harsh, and none of her help was really beneficial until she figured out what was going on with Danny, but she had his best interests at heart. She is the best older sibling I have ever seen on TV, and Butch and all his staff should win some kind of an award for creating such a lovely character for a role that most other shows turn into a cliched, jerky, one-dimensional shell.
And seeing her younger side amidst all her maternal instincts was a nice touch. An Einstein bear, eh? That is so Jazz.
Danny's reactions to all the chaos Youngblood was causing was handled very believeably. He was really stressed out and getting freaked out. It was nice to see him back in-character after the mess that was IC, and his taking Youngblood's threat seriously after first regarding him as a pest in PR was very nice.
That was the one thing this episode had that I haven't felt in a regular, 30-minute ep of DP since MB - the threat. Youngblood was actually worth the effort. He was making Danny seem crazy, wearing him out, and he almost knocked the parents off over the waterfall. It really felt like someone could get hurt, and it made Danny's struggle to convince everyone what was happening and his attempts to stop Youngblood all the more meaningful.
So Youngblood's a quick-change villain in his roles, eh? I've always been more partial to swashbucklers than westerns, but I found Youngblood more tolerable as a cowboy than as a pirate. And his parrot was still great.
I loved the parents in this ep and all the new Fenton inventions. There was a lot of humour with the parents and all the family gear. This ep had a lot of humour, actually, and most of it (more on that later) was in good taste. The verbal puns were great. "Thank you for shopping at Fenton-Mart" and especially the "I spy with my little eye something that starts with a W!" had me in hysterics. The pacing, timing, and continuity of the verbal humour was wonderful in this episode.
Sam and Tuck didn't show up much, but they were IC and it was very nice to see them stand by Danny's theory. It was also nice to see them not acting in unison so much like in IC (or even TUE to a certain extent - not that I'm complaining about TUE, of course). Their behaviour and reactions to certain things were very distinct and true to their characters.
Nice animation in this one. The shots under the sea by the pirate ship were absolutely gorgeous. And it was nice to see some new environments on the show. All the action scenes were well-staged, well-shot, and well-drawn. Kudos.
I would give this episode 8/10 for being a fun, light, and well-done filler, but there was one thing that held it back IMO - the gross-out humour. I don't like it in any situation or any type of story, but in DP it just seems a thousand times worse to me. And this ep had as much gross humour as it did the verbal repartee. The difference in how well the respective types of humour work on DP was never more clear than in this ep IMO. Tucker's machine in particular really irked me. It was just too much IMO, and every time I see gross humour on DP I feel like it's out of place.
And why couldn't Sam or Tuck see Youngblood when Danny could? They're his age and they don't act like adults (and Tuck's sometimes more immature than Danny)
But all in all, I really enjoyed this ep as I have no filler episode since 13. A 7/10 and a thank-you to Butch and the DP cast and crew for a job well done.