ASPCA - A Samurai Pizza Cats Abridged

Samurai Pizza Cats is the English dub adaptation of Kyatto Ninden Teyandee, a silly anime about ninja cats working undercover at a pizzaria while trying to prevent the evil prime minister (at least that's one of the titles the dub gives him, but then they also labeled the cats as samurai to differentiate them from the ninja crows working for the villain) from overthrowing the emperor. The English version is even sillier, not taking itself seriously for the most part and breaking the fourth wall constantly. That being said, an abridged version would be redundant, and I don't have the resources to make one (first I would like to see all the Japanese episodes but that's not going to happen either). However, after going back and watching the entire English series for the first time since childhood, here are the top ten jokes I would make if I were to abridge it. (Number 11 would have been references to The Noid.)

10. The title. ASPCA is the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. During the end credits of every Samurai Pizza Cats episode, they felt the need to state that "No animals were harmed during the making of this cartoon."

9. References to Sonic X The Abridged Series. There are plenty, and I can make them because I did voicework for that series. For starters, the villain dubbed "Big Cheese" in the English adaptation is not actually a rat but a fox. The proof lies in episode 12, in which he attempts to imitate Miles "Tails"Prower. Also, the way Cream and Vanilla are written in SXTAS is similar to how Princess Vi and Emperess Frida (who are also rabbits) act on a regular basis.

8. References to Pokemon. When SPC was taken off the air, I had to find a new anime to watch. I found Pokemon, and the main characters reminded me of the main characters in SPC: Speedy and Ash are the short-in-stature leaders, Polly and Misty are the hot-tempered red-heads, and Guido and Brock will go after pretty much any woman they see. When it's time for aliases, you know where I'd turn.

7. Heroes' entrance. This is different every time, so something clever would need to be thought of on the fly. Individual theme music could also be used. For example, Guido is also the name of the main character from the movie Nine, so music from that movie's soundtrack would be appropo for his entrance.

6. Trogdor. In episode one, they fight a dragon that is terrorizing the town. Use of the Trogdor theme would be a given due to the fact that the countryside and peasants are getting burninated.

5. Keyboard Cat. Also in episode one, the dub makes a reference to Francine having taken piano lessons. This is an inner monologue bit that probably did not take place in the original Japanese, but insert reference to Keyboard Cat here just the same.

4. General Patton. There is a character on the Rescue Team called General Catton in the dub, obviously a play on General Patton. But if you're going to carry the name, you might as well act the part. With apologies to Linkara.

3. The Wasserman Factor. In episode 13, our three main heroes get a battle mech of their own as well as enhanced armor. Since this is similar to the Power Rangers' Megazord and Battlizers, we'll need some epic music, and there's only one man for the job. Also, the Ninja Crows are similar to Tengas from MMPR season 3, so that theme would be used too.

2. Emperor Fred. He's a figurehead, and an insane one at that. He doesn't talk much, so who better to supply his one-liners than a certain YouTube user of the same name? Like him or not, I'd say that's a choice that makes sense.

And the number one joke I would make in the abridged is....

Big Cheese: "I'm just a sweet transvestite..."

Yes, the villain crossdresses almost constantly, so much that it's best just to have this be his theme song. Like "E.G.G.M.A.N." is to Eggman from Sonic X, it fits his character perfectly. In fact, it's been suggested that he's in a homosexual relationship with right hand man Jerry Atric (God, the puns in the dub are too numerous to count), so that guy can be played off as Riff Raff. Hell, even Bad Bird and Carla can have "Damn It, Janet" to themselves. Rocky Horror Picture Show references would abound over the entire course of the abridged series, and I would love every minute of it.

If you've never seen this show, you should check it out. It's really silly and certainly very corny as it aired in the early nineties and was framed to compete with Teenage Mutant NinjaTurtles. Unless you can stand watching that sort of thing or are looking at it through nostalgia goggles, proceed with caution and take everything you see and hear with a grain of salt (and if you can find subtitled episodes of the original Japanese, that would be great too). Robert Axelrod was actually one of the writers for the dub, so kudos to him on that.

And now a moment of silence for Justin Carmical a.k.a. JewWario, who once reviewed the KNT video game...