Let's Watch This: An Episode of "The Secret Show"

NOTE: Please do not take any of the little nitpicks in this review (or any of my other reviews, for that matter) seriously. I write these reviews in the hopes of making people laugh. Those nitpicks are really just dumb little observations that I'm attempting to make jokes out of, not complaints that add to whether or not I like something.

Ah, the golden age of Nicktoons Network! Back when it had original shows in addition to classic Nickelodeon stuff and wasn't just another place for SpongeBob and Loud House reruns. I've already looked at their acquired programming of Corneil & Bernie and Kappa Mikey, but it's been too long since I've dived into the strange shows that aired on Nicktoons, but wasn't actually made by Nickelodeon, in the 2000s. And one cartoon that I, personally, think of when I think of Nicktoons Network is The Secret Show.

The Secret Show is the creation of Tony Collingwood, originally premiering on CBBC in the United Kingdom on September 16th, 2006 before winding up on Nicktoons Network in the US the following year. If there's one thing the United Kingdom is known for (aside from the obvious stuff like tea, crumpets, and the Beatles), it's spies - both in real life and on the silver screen. So what British child WOULDN'T want to watch a comedic cartoon about spies? Heck, what AMERICAN child wouldn't want to watch a comedic cartoon about spies?

The show focused on the secret organization U.Z.Z. (that stands for "Umbo Zim Zam"). Their two top agents, Anita Knight (voiced by Kate Harbour) and Victor Volt (voiced by Alan D. Marriott), are sent by their commanding agent, whose codename is "Changed Daily" (Keith Wickham), to defeat various villains bent on world domination. Their main enemy? T.H.E.M. (which stands for "The Horrible Evil Menace"), run by the diabolical Doctor Doctor (also Kate Harbour) and her team of agents known as the Expendables. Fifty-two episodes, and two seasons, were produced.

I feel like I might've watched The Secret Show once or twice, but I'm not sure if I've ever watched a full episode. However, the show seems pretty well-liked by those who remember it online, and Keith Dawkins, Nicktoons' vice president at the time, dubbed the show hilarious and claimed that he laughed out loud when he read the first script. That should count for something. While the show was never released on DVD here in the United States, it is avaliable to watch - you'll have to pay for it, however - on Amazon Prime Video, and somebody was nice enough to upload all the episodes to the Internet Archive. In other words, it's once again time for me to tackle a show that's been on my "to-review" list for a while!

We're going to watch the twenty-first episode of the show, "Mr. Atom". This is The Secret Show.

...or is it? When I clicked on the episode I wanted to review, I didn't get any spies or espionage. Instead, I get this lady and her pet rabbits welcoming me to "The Fluffy Bunny Show"!

Happy very early Easter, everybody!

The lady (Kate Harbour) starts singing and playing her mandolin, then all of a sudden this strange contraption on wheels sends her flying and carries off the rabbits. Then a guy in a nice suit and sunglasses (Special Agent Ray, voiced by Martin Hyder) runs in and says that this timeslot is needed urgently for The Secret Show! How strange.

This is how every episode of the show starts. I'm pretty sure there was another cartoon that did something like this before it, but the joke still works - this show is so secret it doesn't even have a timeslot.

"What do I say here again? 'LIVE FROM NEW YORK, IT'S SATURDAY NIGHT!'?
No, that's not it..."

After the opening sequence, the episode itself starts off with Anita already in trouble. She's tangling with a supervillain known as... pause for dramatic effect... The Chef! He probably has some evil scheme involving awful-tasting food.

Though his cooking couldn't possibly be any more disgusting than his chest hair.
Eugh...

Fortunately, Victor shows up to save her, but The Chef isn't going down without a fight... or without using his eggbeater hand on Victor. Oh, wait, never mind - all Victor has to do is beg for him not to scramble his brains and The Chef politely surrenders. If only ALL cartoon villains were so easy to defeat...

Victor and Anita rendevouz back at U.Z.Z. Headquarters with Changed Daily... or, as he's called in this episode, Pinky Woodle... and brilliant scientist Professor Professor (Rob Rackstraw). According to Changed Daily/Pinky, it was not Victor who defeated The Chef but rather Mr. Atom - not to be confused with Atom Ant.

I think this guy is supposed to be based on John Cleese. Or maybe an Easter Island head
disguised as John Cleese. Either or.

Who is Mr. Atom? He is the smallest secret agent in the world. Even smaller than Inch High, Private Eye. He's so small, he makes Thumbelina look like Ginormica from Monsters vs. Aliens. Victor, of course, does not believe that Mr. Atom - currently standing on Professor Professor's finger - actually exists. Hasn't he ever read Horton Hears a Who? It's entirely possible for there to be people that small. In fact, a very tiny person, so small that no one can see them without a microscope, might actually make a great secret agent. They could sneak into bad guys' lairs and foil them undetected.

This does, however, raise a question - how come seemingly everyone EXCEPT Victor can see Mr. Atom without the use of a microscope? Do they all just have much better eyesight than he does?

"Pull my finger, Victor!"

Mr. Atom demonstrates how he defeated The Chef by climbing inside of Victor's nose. Good thing Victor doesn't have a head cold and his nose isn't all clogged up, that would probably make it more difficult to travel inside. Upon entering Victor's brain, he humiliates Victor by making him act like a chicken. Why exactly does everyone think the funniest thing one can do to a person is make them act like a chicken? I mean, aside from "because chickens are funny, LOL".

When Mr. Atom climbs out of Victor's head, Victor accidentally steps on him. Don't worry, he survives - he's a cartoon character, after all. And he does not think very highly of Victor and vows revenge. You see, like most very short people, Mr. Atom has a very short temper. Not only is he mad at Victor, he's also mad at Professor Professor for calling him a "nasty little man", and at Anita simply because she called him short. But that's not an insult, it's a statement of fact. It's like if Shrek were insulted because somebody called him green.

Methinks Mr. Atom has a Napoleon Complex.

Mr. Atom enters Pinky's head and has him say that they shall rue the day they ignited the wrath of the smallest secret agent in the world. Then he announces into the intercom that the base is now at "alert level code CUSTARD" and that Victor, Anita, and Professor Professor are to be eliminated. Uh oh...

Yep, he definitely has a Napoleon Complex.

The three of them make a run for it. "We have to get Mr. Atom out of Pinky Woodle!" Professor Professor exclaims. But HOW? Well, they could always shake pepper in Pinky's face and get him to sneeze him out. But Professor Professor has another idea.

Well, I wouldn't have jumped straight to zapping Pinky's head with a ray gun, but whatever
floats your boat...

The strange invention Professor Professor zaps Pinky with is actually an enlarging ray, and it turns Pinky into a giant. "Fly! Fly up his nose!" he urges Victor and Anita. "Fly up Pinky Woodle's nose and get Mr. Atom!" Of course! It's a foolproof plan! Sort of.

Quite a few people were baffled when John Cleese was cast to play King Kong, but
he actually pulled the role off quite well.

Victor and Anita manage to fly into Pinky's nose, but the agents fly in after them. Eventually, they wind up in the brain, and Professor Professor explains what's going on to the agents who aren't flying around in Pinky's head. Pinky, meanwhile, is stumbling around the city like Godzilla with a mustache, and he's heading straight for the ocean. Mr. Atom blames Victor for what's going on, because it's totally his fault that Mr. Atom took control of somebody's brain and attempted to have them eliminated. Bafflingly, Anita takes his side.

"Look, I can't help it if this guy goes around the size of a pea's smaller brother's... little... small... thing! I couldn't see him!" Victor points out. While they're bickering, Professor Professor zaps Pinky with the enlarging machine again, this time SHRINKING him so small that he winds up in Professor Professor's eye. And you thought having an EYELASH in your eye was annoying, didn't you?

"I feel like I'm running in circles!"

Anita forces Victor to apologize to Mr. Atom. Nobody forces Mr. Atom to apologize to them for what was basically ATTEMPTED MURDER, but he acknowledges that he has difficulty controlling his temper. It's an inferiority thing.

At the moment, Pinky has left Professor Professor's eye and is wandering down the celebral cortex. Note the bunny hiding among the brain matter - there are bunnies hiding all over the place in this episode. I guess nobody told them that "The Fluffy Bunny Show" had been pre-empted.

Hey, now he really IS pink-y! That's sort of amusing.

If he enters the celebral cortex, Professor Professor's head will explode. Y'know, like Donald Trump's probably would if somebody told him that he's basically done nothing to fix whatever problems our country has. But Mr. Atom has a plan - he, Victor, and Anita attatch suction cups to parts of Pinky's brain, which gets it working again and he manages to stop himself from biting down on that stringy bit connecting both sides of the brain. The day is saved.

Pinky makes it out of Professor Professor's brain, everyone else in turn makes it out of his head, and they're all returned to their normal sizes off-camera. The moral of today's story is to be nice to small people, they have feelings too and will violently retaliate against you if you do something to tick them off.

What's the Verdict?

Well, I personally found myself liking The Secret Show. It's a very funny show, with...

...hey, who are you guys? How did you get in here? What do you mean the show is so secret that I'm forbidden from doing a review of it? It's MY blog, I... what are you doing?! Put me down! I have to finish the review! LET GO OF ME!

What's the Verdict?

Secret Mountain Fort Awesome is not worth your time. The characters are disgusting, the art style is repulsive, and the jokes aren't funny at all. As I've said before, surrealism is not a substitute for good writing, and if a show is going out of its way to gross you out, it's likely doing something wrong. I do not recommend watching Secret Mountain Fort Awesome at all. There are far better Cartoon Network shows from this era worth your time.

What do you mean this wasn't the show I was originally reviewing? What's that? Something called "The Secret Show"? About spies and a guy the size of a gnat? Nope, never heard of it. And I'm not just saying that because I have a bunch of U.Z.Z. members holding me at plasma blaster-point. In fact, I don't even know what the U.Z.Z. is. What does that stand for, "United Zucchini Zesters"?