Recap / Pinky And The Brain S 1 E 4

Episode: Season 1, Episode 4
Title: Pinky & the Fog / Where No Mouse Has Gone Before / Cheese Roll Call
Directed by: Al Ziegler (Where No Mouse Has Gone Before) Audu Paden (Pinky & the Fog, Cheese Roll Call)
Written by: Gordon Bressack, Charles M. Howell IV (Pinky & the Fog, Where No Mouse Has Gone Before), Paul Rugg (Cheese Roll Call)
Air Date: September 24, 1995
Previous: Tokyo Grows / That Smarts / Brainstem
Next: Brainania
Guest Starring: Tress MacNeille

"Pinky & the Fog"/"Where No Mouse Has Gone Before"/"Cheese Roll Call" is the fourth episode of the first season of Pinky and the Brain.

As the title implies it is a combination of three shorter cartoons.

• "Pinky and the Fog" is a period piece set in 1932. A radio drama called "The Mist" stars a protagonist with the power to fog men's minds. The Brain, inspired, develops the power to fog men's minds and make them into his slaves by modulating his voice. He and Pinky sneak their way onto the set of "The Mist" in order for the Brain to beam his mind-controlling voice over the radio and make all the show's listeners his slaves.
• "Where No Mouse Has Gone Before" finds Pinky and the Brain as lab mice at NASA. The Brain gets access to the golden plate that accompanied the Voyager probe. He scratches out the drawings of man and woman and puts a drawing of himself in their place, to make any aliens who find the probe think that he is the ruler of the world. This has unintended consequences.
• "Cheese Roll Call", shorter than the other two cartoons, is a simple song in which Pinky introduces the cheeses of the world.

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"Pinky & the Fog" provides examples of...

• Affectionate Parody: "Pinky & the Fog" is a satire of The Shadow, and of old-time radio drama in general.
• The Coconut Effect: The sound effects guy makes the sounds of horses galloping with coconuts, much to the misfortune of Pinky and the Brain, as he's slamming down the coconut shells right on their heads.
• Mind-Control Eyes: The Brain's mind-control victims get the typical very wide eyes with tiny pupils.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: The actor playing the villain is a caricature of Mel Blanc, while the actor playing the Mist is a caricature of Orson Welles, and the show’s sound effects man is a caricature of Treg Brown, who filled the same role on the classic Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts. The narrator is a caricature of the real-life narrator of The Shadow, Frank Readick Jr.
• Shout-Out: Pinky references the Rockettes and the Ballets Russes.
• Squashed Flat: Pinky and the Brain are squashed flat when the sound effects guy making effects for the radio show drops bricks on them.
• WPUN: The radio station that our heroes infiltrate is called WRLD.

"Where No Mouse Has Gone Before" provides examples of...

• Artificial Gravity: The episode starts with the Brain and Pinky floating around in a NASA zero-gravity machine.
• Bowdlerise: The item set to be launched into space is of the Pioneer plaque, only with the human figures wearing underwear instead of being naked.
• Centrifugal Farce: Pinky and the Brain really get worked over when they're put in a centrifuge.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: The reporter talking about the aliens’ arrival is a caricature of Dan Rather. The caricatures of real people in the crowd include Bill Clinton, Saddam Hussein, Princess Diana, The Queen Mother, Li Peng (the then-current Premier of China), Fidel Castro, George Bush and reporter Sam Donaldson.
• One-Letter Pun: At one point, Pinky and the Brain are posing as scientists to get into a NASA space center so Brain can install a plaque of himself on a rocket. After Pinky makes an idiotic remark, Brain tells him, "From now on, Pinky, whatever anyone asks you, just say 'Ja' or 'Nein.'" Later, with the countdown at three, Brain has installed the plaque and is about to run under the rocket to rejoin Pinky.
  Brain: Did you hear the countdown, Pinky?
  Pinky: Ja!
  Brain: What number are they down to?
  Pinky: Nein!
  Brain: Nine?
  Pinky: Ja!
  Brain: Excellent! Plenty of time.
  [Brain runs under the rocket. It ignites, leaving the Brain with an Ash Face.]
• Opening Shout-Out: "Where No Mouse Has Gone Before" ends just like it begins, with the "What are we going to do tonight, Brain?" question and the zoom out to Acme Labs—except that it's an alien Acme Labs on a different planet.
• Shout-Out: When getting carried away with visions of world domination, the Brain imagines himself as a Brawn Hilda singing "Brain is the leader, Brain is the leader" to the tune of Ride of the Valkyries.
  • The segment’s title is based on the phrase made famous by Star Trek.
  • The opening shot mimicks the beginning space sequence from 2001: A Space Odyssey.
  • Pinky refers to Disney World, Orlando.
  • The edited famous paintings include Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, Thomas Gainsborough’s The Blue Boy and Waterloo from C.M. Coolidge’s "Dogs Playing Poker" series.
  • The other song parodied is Little Richard’s 1955 hit Tutti Frutti.
  • Pinky mentions that he once saw a group of Japanese tourists melt at the final scene of Giselle.
  • The Brain bases his pseodonym on Wernher von Braun, the Nazi rocket scientist who was brought to the US after WWII to help the Americans in the space race. Pinky mentions the Colonel Klink Institute.
  • The aliens are from the planet Frunobulax, named for the dog in the 1974 Frank Zappa song Cheepnis.
• Spinning Paper: Classic spinning newspaper headlines narrate the arrival of the aliens to Earth after receiving the plaque with the Brain's picture.

"Cheese Roll Call" provides examples of...

• British Teeth: The British Wensleydale cheese has a noticeably gap-toothed smile.
• Educational Song: Or a parody thereof, as it's a very silly song in which Pinky sings about the cheeses of the world, set to the tune of Semper Fidelis, the official march of the US Marine Corps.
• High-Class Glass: The British Wensleydale cheese affects one of these to show that he is fancy.