The emperor’s new commedia

On a lark, I had my Tivo record an episode of The Emperor’s New School. The episode I watched was actually pretty interesting. Eartha Kitt and Patrick Warburton play the bad guys, and were quite fun to watch. Eartha Kitt, of course, was the Cat Woman, among other things. Patrick Warburton was The Tick.

If you can stand the commercial for ridiculous crap they try to sell to kids these days … and is there really still a Power Rangers tv show on air? That will not die which can eternal lie … and so on.

The script has some good self-referential jokes and anachronisms. There’s a recurring element where the character Kuzco freezes the action and comments on events, which is an interesting ex machina technique to get through exposition and keep the action moving.

The action has various stock characters with improbable changes and events, and there’s a core structure that the character Kuzco must learn lessons that help him become emperor which drives the stories forward.

Hey, they even have a bit of action during the credits so the whole “now we return to the show!” isn’t a lie where they just run credits.

Anyhow, it’s not as great as something like Tiny Toons, but it was good enough that I say check it out.