[00:00:00] Principal: Now listen, your paranoid behavior and your one track mind concerning these children are getting on my nerves.

[00:00:13] Jeremy: Return to the past now.

[00:00:26] Ian: Hello everybody and welcome to the Inter Millennium Media Project podcast. My name's Ian Porter. 

[00:00:33] Matthew: I'm Matthew Porter. 

[00:00:34] Ian: He's my dad. I'm his son, and I've taken over once again, it's the millennial strikes back. The millennial strikes back, and I am here to return to a piece of my own past. This is, oh goodness.

Oh, you've had shows on the show, uh, that you've, uh, shown me now already, dad. Where when you saw it is vague. It's fuzzy. It's kind of been just like, I remember the action of seeing it, but not how I got there. 

[00:01:04] Matthew: It was all just kind of always part of the environment, right? 

[00:01:08] Ian: Yes, absolutely. And so there's some like glitch in my memory where I jump cut as a middle school, Ian in the middle of class to home watching the weirdest new segment on Cartoon Network called Miguzi, which I could do a whole little side thing on as well.

I might for the patrons. But I was watching it because there was this new show and it caught me and I didn't understand what I was watching. I just knew it was the coolest thing and it had a, it had style. In two different ways. And that was Code Lyoko the French Anime

Code Lyoko and its strange cyberpunk action. Repeatable isekai weirdness. 

[00:02:11] Matthew: That is as good a concise description of this as I think I could imagine. 

[00:02:16] Ian: And it's fascinating because Code Lyoko I can definitely feel its influence on a lot of other things but the biggest thing code CCA did was teach me to never assume, I can predict how a story is built or will go, 

[00:02:35] Matthew: oh, that's interesting.

[00:02:37] Ian: Because on the surface, this looks like a kid's action show, and it is for the entirety of itself a kid's action show. It is also a strange character piece, an in-depth look at the evolution of, the animation industry at the time. And I kind of think it's like Kids First Twin Peaks. 

[00:03:03] Matthew: I, yeah, I can see that last one.

Certainly. It's, it's in there 

[00:03:07] Ian: or XFiles, somewhere in between there a little, a little bit of one or the other. 

[00:03:12] Matthew: Yep. 

[00:03:13] Ian: And I knew with some of the weirdness with uh, ELO and some of these things, it felt like the right tonal time mm-hmm. To bring you through this. And so I grabbed a couple episodes from Seasons one and two, which are the seasons I remember the most, just age wise.

And hopefully give you a picture of just the weirdness of this show.

[00:03:36] Matthew: And I remember having seen this show and having watched a few episodes with it, but unlike some shows that we'll probably talk about on future takeovers, I didn't sit and watch it with you from the beginning. I, I saw enough individual episodes to have a sense they seemed well done, but formulaic and they had built in a way to, to bring us back to the status quo so you could keep telling stories in the same formula over and over.

So it was interesting to see a selection of episodes that you picked out to show me some progression there. 

[00:04:11] Ian: Yeah. It's a formulaic show, but the formula is allowed to change season to season is the best way I can describe it. 

[00:04:19] Matthew: Yeah. Uh, we watched some of season one and some of season two, and.

Of course there is some continuity, but very different style, very different focus. And I like that. I, I like the idea it each season, based on what I've seen so far, it seems like each season is a sequel to the previous season as opposed to a mere continuation of the previous season. 

[00:04:39] Ian: Exactly. And it feels weird to start out with an explanation of what the narrative of this show is.

'cause the first episode doesn't even do that. 

[00:04:47] Matthew: It, it fearlessly does absolutely nothing to explain itself and 

[00:04:54] Ian: Absolutely 

[00:04:55] Matthew: that is weirdly captivating. It's like somebody warned them not to do an "as you know, Bob," so they killed Bob in cold blood and then looked around the room saying, anybody else want an explanation?

[00:05:09] Ian: Exactly. 

[00:05:10] Matthew: We got nothing. 

[00:05:13] Ian: Which makes the initial impact of that first episode and kind of. Watching the episodes to figure out what's going on. Yes, that compelling aspect. It is a mystery, not for the characters, but for you the audience. 

[00:05:29] Matthew: And it's not just who are these characters and what are their motivations?

It's what on earth is going on here? Who are these people, but what are they doing? What do they know? How do they know what they do? What is this other place they can go to? And there are about three different other places they can go to. It is, yeah, it is wild. And there's absolutely, you are forced to try to catch up and not given really any material with which to do so, but the stories pull you in.

[00:06:01] Ian: So I'm just gonna kind of explain the way episode one explains it, which is we start out at Kadic Academy, this. Boarding school of everywhere from elementary up through I think high school or at least late middle school. It's fuzzy, but then it's also European.

Interestingly enough, when I first saw this show, they tried to pretend it was in America until a later episode, gave satellite footage of France and required the scene, forever, to be an, an important part of the story. And they kind of went, oh, we can't keep pretending. This is somewhere in the Midwest. 

[00:06:43] Matthew: The jig is up.

[00:06:43] Ian: Okay, we'll just admit it. 

[00:06:47] Matthew: Can we pretend it's Paris, Texas for a while? No. Okay. It was worth a shot. 

[00:06:50] Ian: I think between that and the large bowls of, , cafe au lait with croissants Yes. That the kids were served at breakfast in a couple episodes are just like, no, you can't lie. This is in France.

So French boarding school and we get this standardly drawn animated style of kids bullying, other kids being, you know, it's, you know, school drama sort of scenario. 

[00:07:18] Matthew: You say standardly drawn, but art style's a but yeah. I'm gonna wanna come back to that. 

[00:07:22] Ian: Art style's a little off. One thing that Code Lyoko is known for is the fact that the character design has really large heads and really big forehead, 

[00:07:31] Matthew: enormous foreheads.

Everybody looks like the Steal Your face logo from the Grateful Dead. Yeah.

[00:07:39] Ian: It doesn't matter what age, who the character design is. The, the, the eye to hairline distance is huge. I'll acknowledge, and the animation is present, but this is a show that leans heavily on its panning, setting shots on its framed backgrounds that it can move its characters around on. It saves its money where it can.

[00:08:04] Matthew: And I appreciate that 

[00:08:04] Ian: in terms of its animation. 

Absolutely. 

[00:08:06] Matthew: I totally respect that. 

They, and they do a good job. It's never obtrusive. It's never, oh, this should be done differently. It's just part of their style and it works.

[00:08:13] Ian: And we get introduced to three of our main characters. Odd Della Robia, Ulrich Stern, and Yumi Ishimaya as they deal with the school bully, the daughter of the principal Sissy, who's kind of just a generic jerk, but she's a generic jerk, complete with two backup minions

who are fleshed out characters in their own rights. So, and it's, you know, it's kind of fun and standard. Sissy steals a teddy bear and there's a bit of a, oh, someone trashed her room, but we found the teddy bear. We gotta prove that she's the thief. And meanwhile, another of our main character, Jeremy, is spending a lot of his time on his computer in the dorm talking with a pink haired CGI girl named Aelita.

[00:09:05] Matthew: And Aelita is kind of elf like with pointy ears in the whole bit. 

[00:09:09] Ian: Yes, very much. 

And so there's this weird, like already there's some sci-fi cyberpunk elements going on here, and we're very confused until XANA attacks

the greatest weird villain, I'll just say this now. XANA is always written like an acronym. We never get an answer as to what it's an acronym of no in the entire series, XANA. the logo of the show is actually the eye of the villain, XANA the little icon. It pops up when it takes things over and immediately the entire story shifts into a horror story as XANA turns the lost teddy bear into a giant monster.

Hence the name. Teddy Gozilla, which is the episode title, and so it's a, it's a giant monster movie. Meanwhile, there's this cool bop, as Jeremy and Odd run to the Factory, take a giant animated elevator down to the Secret lab and virtualize odd into the world of Lyoko, where he becomes a purple cat boy and attacks and fights giant monsters in there to help a Aelita defeat XANA, 

[00:10:42] Matthew: because that is where Aelita lives in this virtual world of Lyoko.

[00:10:47] Ian: Yes. Which makes this kind of a power Rangers or shonen, there's a magical battle story. But the magical battle is video gamey and takes place inside a computer in an old abandoned warehouse. 

[00:11:06] Matthew: And all of the scenes in Lyoko are CGI. So there's this clear differentiation between the real world, which is cell animation and Lyoko, which is early aughts, CGI.

And I love that use of the different styles to distinguish the worlds. 

[00:11:24] Ian: It's really great. And when you look at it, the character designs in the CGI don't look as oddly proportioned. The head sizes are a little bit better.

[00:11:36] Matthew: I guess so. 

[00:11:37] Ian: I think so. 

[00:11:37] Matthew: Yeah. You're right. 

[00:11:38] Ian: So there's an element of the fact that these two very disparate animation styles are attempting to create a cohesive whole.

But the fact that they're so different is part of the, interesting thing, the creatures. On Lyoko controlled by XANA are weird mechanical, fleshy creatures that have lasers and all these effects, and it's very action oriented, and yet there's this real and present danger as we cut back and forth from the action fight in the CGI, back to the entirety of the school getting stomped on and trying to save people's lives over on the cell animated side.

And it goes back and forth to create a sense of time and present danger. 

[00:12:30] Matthew: Yeah. It, it heightens that urgency of the fights that are happening within Lyoko because it's not just we need to win this fight that's in front of us. It's, there are consequences to this fight happening back in the real world we came from and all the people we know there.

Mm-hmm. Because there's this complicated thing that has to happen that Aelita has to do to stop these XANA attacks, and they have to run, they're fighting to run interference for her. 

[00:13:00] Ian: Yeah. She has to get to like special towers and deactivate them using the Code Lyoko Hey, uh, in order to shut down whatever it is XANA is doing, because apparently XANA is in that computer as well.

The source of their ability to stop XANA is also where XANA is from. So there's a bit of a, you've released to the Genie and now you must contain it 

[00:13:28] Matthew: And it's directly connected to Aelita because this is her only existence is within Lyoko. 

[00:13:34] Ian: Yeah, , she is just , the computer girl inside this machine who has a bit of a back and forth, flirting with Jeremy when our other lead 

[00:13:44] Matthew: absolutely, 

[00:13:44] Ian: Who is such the quintessential guy in the chair, that he has a spinning, rotating, multi-monitor floating chair attached to the supercomputer.

So you'll get this, our main characters, uh, Odd is our kind of back backflipping, acrobatic, long range fighter. Ulrich is this sword wielding Samurai character. And Yumi is this fan wielding deflection and barrier protector. 

[00:14:13] Matthew: Yeah. It's worth noting. They have very distinct avatars versions of themselves that they turn into.

When they're in Lyoko. Yeah. It's not just a digitized computer animated version of the kids we see back at the academy. It's like you say, they're very particular fighting styles. Odd even has a tail and paws either. Yeah. Real or part of his costume in Lyoko 

[00:14:35] Ian: and that's the thing, it is very much a standard kids' magical transformation show, but the magical transformation is walking into a giant teleporter and this cool synthesizer themed section of digitizing them and then they drop into the world in their character.

[00:14:57] Matthew: You talked about some of the stylistic influences on this in terms of, of Twin Peaks and the X-Files. This is very much a post The Matrix show. This is the matrix for middle school. Yes. 

[00:15:09] Ian: That is absolutely right. It is, matrix for Middle School is such a good description of this show. I'm actually thinking of it like the battles with the robots attacking the humans in like the later matrix films cutting back and forth between that and Neo doing his big fights in the Matrix. That's what this show is every, every week. 

[00:15:30] Matthew: And the formula is that every week there is an attack by XANA on the real world.

As he comes in through power and computer systems, they have to go into Lyoko to fight the monsters in Lyoko that are attempting to prevent Aelita from getting to the tower, entering the code and shutting down XANA's attack. And then, , they'll have to do that, again. 

[00:15:52] Ian: And each episode, XANA tries a different method.

So. I, I had us do episode one, which is such a fun, like, hi, welcome to the deep end. Figure it out. 

[00:16:04] Matthew: And there's something very specific that happens at the end of each one of these battles as they succeed, because you would think that, well, the people in the real world have just been attacked by a giant cybernetic teddy bear that's gonna affect things in the real world, right?

[00:16:21] Ian: Mm-hmm. But apparently deactivating a tower unlocks something else that the computer can do. Return to the past. Now as we see a giant ball of white light expand from the supercomputer, engulf the factory, engulf the school, engulf the world. We assume, and we reset to an earlier part in the episode, usually that establishing social scene.

[00:16:51] Matthew: It's like the point at which the XANA attack is about to happen. So mm-hmm. They erase everything that happened except that our, our main characters remember. But everything else is back to status quo 

[00:17:05] Ian: every single episode. 

[00:17:06] Matthew: And I cannot emphasize enough that absolutely zero is explained. None of this is explained.

You pick up whatever you can from context. This show abs to me, this show is very dreamlike. And by that I don't mean kind of surreal and strange and, and lots of non sequiturs and things. I'm talking about a very, very specific kind of dream that I had when I was a kid. 

[00:17:38] Ian: Oh yeah. 

[00:17:39] Matthew: I would have very specific, usually recurring dreams in which there were all these complicated rules and.

Boundaries and, and goals in these adventures I'd be having in these dreams. And so I just knew them somehow, just like the kids in this story somehow knew them. I mean, there's, there's the, the two statues that are hidden somewhere in my neighborhood. One of them is blue and one of them is yellow. And me and the cute girl who sits two rows away from me in, in second grade, I was about eight years old.

We have to find these statues because if we have the statues, then the monsters can't harm us and we can fly, but the monsters want the statue as well. And if we only have one statue, we can either be invisible or we can run really fast depending on which statue we've got, of course. And then the monster, of course, like I said, the monster wants to find these statues and eat them because then the mon, if the monster eats the statues, he can fly forever.

But there's really two monsters. There's the big monster who's scary and slow and wants to eat the statues, but there's also the small monster who works for the big monster. And he's not very strong or scary, but he's sneaky and he wants to trick us into giving up some of these statues. But he doesn't really like the big monster he works for.

So if he gets a statue from us, he will not give it to the big monster. He will hide it. So then I, and the cute girl who sits two a rows away from me in second grade have to go and find it again. Um, and I had that dream like four nights in a row, and it was awesome. It was the, like, I, I couldn't wait to go to bed because maybe I'll have that cool dream again and maybe we'll find the statues this time.

That is what this show sounded like. 

[00:19:26] Ian: If anybody in our audience is an animator, please grab that segment right now. That would be amazing. 

[00:19:35] Matthew: I just, I, I kept thinking about that, watching this show. 

[00:19:39] Ian: Oh, absolutely. That's what this show is because you're every single, imagine what that, that does something to your mind, just in general.

So here I am in middle school myself. I've just watched this weird show and it doesn't leave my head for the same sort of reasons. It's like, wait a minute, they can go to the past. So why were they worried about the giant teddy bear stepping on people? If someone dies, do they not come back when the time goes back?

Oh no. Um, and wait a minute, like they are, he had to reload his ammo. So he had, so there's like a counter and there was health points. And when you die in Lyoko, you're thrown back out, almost looks like forcefully from the digitizer. Oh my goodness, what's going on? What happens if Aelita gets killed? Oh my goodness.

Like, what can XANA do? He apparently made the teddy bear giant. So like, you know, doesn't matter how big something is, he can make it dangerous. Oh my goodness. 

[00:20:33] Matthew: I love that. Because you're invested not only in figuring out these rules. But in inventing them, because there are some things they just never tell you and you're trying to make them consistent and make them sensible yourself, which is a great way to get, like you say, a middle schooler invested in what's happening here.

[00:20:49] Ian: And 

it's such an interesting effect because it builds over time. The more episodes you watch, you kind of pick up on things in context. One of the things I picked up on in context is that this is not a show , with morals always. Specifically. Our main characters are kind of not the best anyway.

And their answer to dealing with the bullies is sometimes counter bullying in an unfortunate way. 

[00:21:15] Matthew: Yeah. Yeah. It's not, not a great mm-hmm. Um, a model for behavior in that way. 

[00:21:20] Ian: No. But each time something new came in and was treated like it was just always there. It. It threw you for a loop. The moment Jeremy says, return to the past, in that first episode, it's like, wait, do what?

Wait, what? Now? You can do what? Why did you launch a nuke? It had that kind of effect, and I'm moving on then to episode five, which feels very the same. It starts out extremely similar, and I'll say a lot of that first season is extremely formulaic in that sense. Yeah. It's just the same, oh, sissy's being a bully usually to the same two kids.

Our heroes step in them dealing with that gets interrupted by whatever XANA's attack is, and that means that they deal with the XANA attack and then revert time and fix the bullying a different way. I will say episode five's XANA attack is notable and it's one I remembered. Because it goes from, I made a teddy bear giant to, I'm going to collide two trains, some of which are carrying extremely dangerous and explosive chemicals.

And so it's like, okay, we've gone from a horror parody to straight up XANA is being a terrorist. 

[00:22:49] Matthew: Yes.

[00:22:50] Ian: Which is wild. And it puts, it puts an immediate extra weight on how much our main characters are doing to prevent XANA. There's a lot of shows for kids where it's like, I'm going to save the world and Code Lyoko is one of the only ones I can think of where I'm going to save the world from.

Some of the times. This very realistic and honest to goodness danger. It's like this is an actual terrifyingly. Possible thing. It just happens to have been enacted by a creepy, ghostly computer virus creature. 

[00:23:31] Matthew: Yeah. This is not a Sentai team fighting an octopus monster in the middle of an empty field.

This is no, there is about to be devastation in a town a few miles away from where I live. And then it's going to spread to the whole world. And I'm a middle schooler who has to do something about this. 

[00:23:48] Ian: Yeah. And the way I can do something about that is running in and playing a video game that seems to deal me physical pain.

[00:23:57] Matthew: There is, there is a little bit of an Evangelion vibe here. Yeah. With how much is riding on these kids, how much is depending on them. 

[00:24:07] Ian: And, and in that way as the series goes on with the next episode, after the psychological pressure on these kids is huge. 

[00:24:15] Matthew: Yeah. 

[00:24:16] Ian: This is not, this is not a gentle story to them because we get episode 20, like Big Bug is the one with the, the trains.

And I just remember that as the moment I was watching and went, oh goodness, like that's real. 

[00:24:33] Matthew: And I saw the title. I expected a giant insect attack mirroring the giant Teddy Bear attack. No, it's a computer bug, uh, that is infecting, yeah. Uh, systems all over the world. 

[00:24:44] Ian: And there is something to be said for the fact that this is a show that came out.

The first episodes were released in September of 2003. So just the, the political landscape, the news landscape at that time? Yeah. After things like nine 11 and like some of these hit harder. this was a show dealing with things of the news in some ways. Yeah. Concepts that were on the periphery of kids' minds.

[00:25:11] Matthew: Yeah. They were part of the environment in which these kids were growing up and kids like you growing up. 

[00:25:16] Ian: So, those early episodes are very similar and so there's not much to say, but the types of attacks that XANA does are wide and varied. Mm-hmm. I think some episodes we didn't see are like him creating a rat plague.

[00:25:28] Matthew: Um, no, I don't remember that one. Um, 

[00:25:31] Ian: yeah, there's a, there's a full on like zombie plague episode. There is a. A gas attack where he like tries to create a cloud of poisonous gas that will float through the entirety of the buildings and 

[00:25:46] Matthew: Wow. This, this is really heavy. 

[00:25:48] Ian: Yeah. Really heavy stuff. And it's solved with, back flips and superpowers inside the CGI realm, which is really cool, but really weird.

Yes. 

[00:26:01] Matthew: It's interesting as a show for middle schoolers, it takes these large scary things happening in the world and it gives the characters a very concrete and understandable way to face them and overcome them. Not a realistic way, but it gives a certain satisfaction of, oh, I understand how to jump around and shoot laser arrows, as opposed to mm-hmm.

There's literally nothing I can do as a kid to deal with the. The, the geopolitical military landscape in the world in which I happen to be growing up. 

[00:26:37] Ian: Yeah. Um, oh, and I'll kind of, I'll kind of go off it. You mentioned the laser arrows and such. The environment of Lyoko is very, very easy to understand if you're kid who's played video games, it's this giant world with four sectors.

So they get to do a desert world and an ice world and a jungle world. And I forget what the fourth one is. I don't think it's used anywhere near as much. I think it might be like the, I think it's like the stone, like the volcanic world. Oh, okay. But it's these distinct thematic worlds and you're fighting off creatures that are like blocks giant cubes with laser eyes on them, on little crab legs or giant big actual enemy crabs.

At some points, 

[00:27:29] Matthew: very, very creepy looking. There was a certain David Cronenberg for kids vibe with those monsters. The way they skidder around on the tiny crap legs creeped me out. I loved it. 

[00:27:38] Ian: My little Geiger, my little Geiger. 

Ah, 

yeah. Very, very creepy and weird in that sense, in the right way. I, I think , the tiniest drones are these little roach creatures that yes, aren't down low, but they're upright with four little legs, somewhere between a, an insect and a walking sentry turret.

[00:28:04] Matthew: And Jeremy is monitoring all of these battles from back at his computer workstation. And he's got like this card interface. Like all the people in Lyoko are showing up as cards on his screen. He can monitor their life points. I have to admit that, you know, thanks to you, I'm building magic, the gathering decks for the last three weeks, and there was a certain magic, the gathering vibe to this for me, with the different kinds of lands and the card interface on Jeremy's screen, 

[00:28:32] Ian: the way that Code Lyoko depicts not just inside the digital world, but the physicality in the real world of the computer technology is so cool.

The giant pillars , and the floating holographic map of Lyoko. I still know that there are projects out there that are trying to make computer interfaces that look like the Lyoko main frame, that Jeremy uses with his Slidable card interface for all the things and. Shortcut, key commands that all end with a very dramatic enter.

[00:29:09] Matthew: Yeah. I'm gonna build a keyboard with an extra, extra clicky return key. 

[00:29:13] Ian: Exactly. It's like, no, no, I need to put three cherry switches right underneath that one then we, I'm gonna go to episode 24, which is the next of the ones I showed you.

Yeah. Ghost Channel, which is the episode that really starts showing that XANA is not attacking mindlessly. He is trying to eliminate and attack our heroes, specifically because this is the weird one where he throws them into a fake version of their own world and starts attacking them inside Lyoko in that way.

And it's. It's a very, like, I almost want to call it, it's a wonderful life ish scenario where we're seeing this strange parallel of them each trying to live out the same day, but in alternate versions of it. 

[00:30:10] Matthew: And it's that very intense, scary scenario of, I, I think I've left this other place and gone back home, but I'm not really back home.

I'm still stuck in this weird virtual world. And how would I know, I think I 

[00:30:22] Ian: woke up from, yeah, I think I woke up from the dream. Yeah, it's, it's, it's kids' inception in that sense. Mm-hmm. But it, it gets really creepy because this is the one where XANA has like a body and a voice for the first time as his fake version of Jeremy.

And that's where some of the, the psychological damage this does really comes through as this twist, as this version of your best friend here twists into a horrible monster and starts yelling that it'll kill you, it'll kill you all. 

[00:30:56] Matthew: And it, it's interesting to see how Jeremy bears so much of this burden of this entire thing, because everybody else has to go in and do their fighting and maybe figure out a mystery.

But Jeremy has to maintain and advance all of their technical ability to do this and mm-hmm. Has to be the one to notice and alert everyone to any XANA attack. And, he's the linchpin of everything. And then he's, replaced, by . An evil version of himself. And it seems to me that Jeremy is, um, shows most of that ongoing trauma from this.

[00:31:34] Ian: Yeah, I would say that Odd, Ulrich and Yumi are the main characters of the school storylines. But Jeremy is the main character of the overarching Lyoko story. He's this weird mix of the mentor figure. 'cause he's the one figuring it all out and giving them their abilities.

He's the, the goofy sidekick because he's the one that can't fight and has to kind of be off to the sidelines and he's their equivalent to the Red Ranger 'cause he's the one leading them into battle and he's doing all of that at once. 

[00:32:11] Matthew: And interestingly that, episode 24, you talked about Ghost Channel.

It starts out in the middle of a fight. 

[00:32:18] Ian: Yeah. 

[00:32:18] Matthew: And Odd, essentially insulting Jeremy for not being a fighter. 

[00:32:23] Ian: Mm-hmm. 

[00:32:24] Matthew: When meanwhile, none of this, you know, they, they all would've succumbeded to XANA ages ago if Jeremy were not as good as he is at what he does. 

[00:32:32] Ian: That one ends with, Jeremy digitizing himself. We never see him in the, the digital Lyoko mode. He drops himself into the still cell-shaded fake real world and helps his friends escape that way. But just as XANA has been attacking and attacking, Jeremy has been working on the other main project, which is materialization for Aelita.

They're gonna get her out of the machine. Their friend who's trapped inside. This will finally be on Earth. And the end of Season one is all about that, the two part of Code Earth and False Start, that has us dealing with more of, the school faculty too. Namely the gym teacher, Jim. 

[00:33:21] Matthew: Yeah. The conveniently named, phys ed teacher. 

[00:33:24] Ian: Who is kind of the biggest comic relief character in the series, but he is consistently one with a lot of heart. 

[00:33:33] Matthew: He's the one who notices that these kids are up to something. They're always. Having excuses to get out of class and having to run off. And they disappear when they run into the park where there's the secret entrance to their secret factory. So he's like actually alert enough to know something weird is going on, and yet he's kind of overbearing and bumbling and a stereotypical, comic, nemesis for the kids. But you're right, he has a heart. 

[00:33:59] Ian: He has a heart. And the nice thing about the return to the past setup is that there are multiple episodes where Jim finds out where he catches them. And the, the two part here is kind of the start of that trend.

And every time it's like, okay, Jim found us this time. Catch him up again. And the moment he understands, oh dang, okay, keep saving the world kids. I'll be here watching guard if you need. He is part of a team the moment he knows it's there, but it's probably safer to not have him as a member.

So , they never let him. Apparently you have to be on Lyoko to not be affected by the return to the past, I think. Oh, but they don't explain anything. But 

[00:34:41] Matthew: Jeremy is not affected and he doesn't go to Lyoko. So like Yeah, yeah. For some reason, nobody else is, is exempt from the return to the past.

And like you say, they, they never even, they don't explain, pretend to explain it. Never even promise to explain it. Never even suggest that an explanation is possible. 

[00:35:01] Ian: Yeah. But they, they keep on, you know, resetting Jim but bringing him back in because he keeps proving himself to them. And he doesn't remember doing so.

'cause he doesn't remember it thanks to the return trips. But code Earth and False Start, the two-parter really shows that when Jim loses his job and they help him, live in the factory and he watches guard as they attempt the dangerous thing of de virtualizing, of materializing Aelita.

And it works. They bring Aelita to the real world and we see the crew go through all the process of trying to figure out how to get her to, , live at the school or maybe room with Yumi at her parents' house, and they go through all of this, but they've made an open door and they can't turn off the supercomputer because it causes Aelita to instantly faint.

She's connected still and. now XANA is attempting to put the monsters of Lyoko into the real world. And it's fascinating to see these creatures we've been seeing in all these episodes in CGI animated in the cell style again, reinforcing that connected worlds element and making it really terrifying when they don't have their powers and the things that fire lasers at them are now running through the halls of the school.

[00:36:26] Matthew: Yeah. Suddenly they're just middle school kids in the halls of their middle school and they have to fight these things. They're not, video game heroes. And it's interesting that when Aelita is materialized, she does not look like an elf with pointed ears and things the way she does in uh, Lyoko. She looks like a no, a girl.

I think maybe she's still got pink hair, but that's just the cartoon style. Um, yeah. So it's as if. Everybody who goes from our world to, Lyoko gets a video game version of themselves. She's a video game person who gets a real world version of herself when she comes to the real world. 

[00:37:04] Ian: Absolutely.

Or is she Yeah. 

[00:37:10] Matthew: Or is she indeed 

[00:37:13] Ian: because they, they have a lot of fun and season one ends having dealt with its core thing. The running through line was, let's bring Aelita to the real world, and by the end of season one, they do it. A kid's show that despite literally having a return to the past reset button has forward narrative progression on its overarching plot line.

[00:37:39] Matthew: That is impressive in that you're right. They have built in a way that they could tell the same story in the same formula as many times as they want, and yet they choose higher stakes and a way to move forward.

[00:37:51] Ian: And they set up the threat of the next season with, Aelita is still connected to the computer so she can live in the real world, but XANA will keep attacking now. And that's the plot for season two. Now it's a how do we disconnect her, 

[00:38:07] Matthew: right? Because she can visit our world, but she can't stay here because that's too dangerous for the us, for her, and for them because apparently XANA puts some kind of virus in her Lyoko version code that keeps them connected. 

[00:38:21] Ian: And now Jeremy worked on materializing her, and now he needs to work on an antivirus. And so we go into season two. 

[00:38:30] Matthew: No pressure, Jeremy. 

[00:38:32] Ian: No pressure. Jeremy. You, you did fine dealing with all the stresses of that before. Right? Well keep going. Uh, now you can kind of see if you and the pink haired girl you were crushing on could date, but you might not have time for that.

You're kind of still doing everything you used to do. 

Season two starts out with, Aelita at school with the rest of the team trying to get used to life as a human on earth. Very fish out of water story. But she starts having visions like she kind of used to on Lyoko of an old house and. This is where some more mystery comes in.

Again, and this is part that I really remembered. 

[00:39:22] Matthew: The very first scene, the very first shots in the first episode of season two, we have a completely different art style once again. Yes. And it's this little gnome running through a dark forest trying to escape big, vicious wolves. And I saw this and I'm thinking, come on, I just spent a season trying to figure out without success what you were doing before.

And now there's a new world with a new kind of character and it turns out it's a dream sequence. But they got me there for a few minutes. 

[00:39:53] Ian: Oh, absolutely. This is, there's, there's so much animator flexing in this, even with their budget not being massive, even with some reused things, everything else.

When they want to do something with a visual style, they do it. And that's really something to applaud because now they've got this third thing for these weird hazy visions. Aelita's having that lead them to this old house in the nearby woods called the Hermitage. And they start finding out about who owned the place, some man named Franz Hopper who might have something to do with Lyoko because his house had a second entrance over to the supercomputer.

, they do upgrade some of the CGI in this season. A lot of things do get upgraded over time, just visually. And we get to see that Jeremy is working on things like he builds vehicles for the group so that they can move around and do more tricks and stunts. I kept expecting like Tony Hawk pro skater sound effects sometimes in these scenes.

But XANA like attacks them using the house and I think tries to like overheat the, boiler and almost kills two of our characters Ulrich and Yumi in, an overheated room that's causing them to faint. It's very like that we almo, we almost see two characters die in a much more graphic way than I expected.

[00:41:25] Matthew: Yes, that's some, there are some episodes in which that return to the past happens at literally the last second. 

[00:41:32] Ian: Yeah.

But the pattern of, XANA attacking and them going still is there, but they're finding out new things now, including about, Fran Hopper and the fifth section of Lyoko, which I remember so deeply because of the, the weird coolness of it. the core of Lyoko called Carthage

and the creepiest monster that lives within 

[00:42:00] Matthew: Oh, yes, yes. The, the, the floating mind flayer squid type thing. 

[00:42:06] Ian: Absolutely. Uh, that's another thing. There's something a little bit, honestly, there's something, a lot, a bit, Code Lyoko and Stranger Things. 

[00:42:16] Matthew: Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:42:17] Ian: Group of kids, meet a girl who has amazing powers and deal with a monster from the same place the powers are from, which is causing havoc in the town, and they work together to defeat it, including going to the giant secret lab on a regular basis.

Yeah, there's some parallels. 

[00:42:37] Matthew: Yep. 

[00:42:37] Ian: , but the, apparently, whatever these flashbacks that Aelita is having are important enough that XANA creates the thing called, oh, what is that thing called? It is the zoa. 

[00:42:52] Matthew: Yeah. I didn't quite make that out. That sounds about right. 

[00:42:54] Ian: I, yeah. It's this disturbing, floating jellyfish creature that grabs onto her and starts sucking her memories away.

That thing gave me nightmares. 

[00:43:08] Matthew: I'd believe it. 

[00:43:08] Ian: What in the world?

But they're figuring this out. And I, a lot of season two is more linear than season one. There's actual progression episode to episode 

[00:43:21] Matthew: and it was very much that figuring out mystery structure. 

[00:43:25] Ian: Yes. And it's reinforced by the coolest ending ever, where as the credit scroll by this hard rock anthem starts up and the ending credits animation to this kid's show is like the opening and reviewing of contents of a classified files document with like cir red pens circled people in a group photo and timed and, you know, dates written on the back of old Polaroids kind of stuff.

It's like, what is this X-Files for kids going on here? And season two explains that over time kind of revealing more. And still not explaining anything.

And we, we stopped at season two, but I'll tell you, they didn't give a origins of Code Lyoko until part of season three. So it takes two seasons before they decide to show you how the kids know about any of this. 

[00:44:25] Matthew: I kind of respect that. We didn't even get 

[00:44:26] Ian: to that in this one. 

[00:44:27] Matthew: There's no spoonfeeding to us or the characters.

There's nothing 

[00:44:33] Ian: but the, that action almost spycraft element that builds up over time is part of why I like this show. Liked it's a continual layering. Everything from season one is there, but we've layered more on top and they add on continuously. Mm-hmm. Which is pretty cool.

And I just remember, especially some of these early episodes so vividly because they are so distinct and weird and that combination is something you don't see a lot of other places. 

[00:45:09] Matthew: The stories had this interesting internal episode progression and all this also this overall progression without seeming overly planned you got the sense that the people knowing this show knew more than they were letting on, but it never felt like nothing ever felt inevitable.

[00:45:25] Ian: And it didn't hold back. Its stories were formulaic in some ways in generic kid show, but they were also darker and heavier than most of the other things on either. Adjacent time slot. They were, it's, it's got an element of that fridge horror where the more you learn about it, the more you realize just how, dangerous and terrifying this scenario and concept is.

[00:45:54] Matthew: And, and that interesting aspect of threading that, repeatability and originality needle, it also, applied to , the little middle school teen drama that we get in the real world as usually as you're saying, bookends to the, the episode, they're, they're formulaic, but they're never repeated.

They're never just giving you the same exact kids conflict over and over. 

[00:46:18] Ian: Mm-hmm. Oh, um, uh, one moment. In interviews, it had been, it, it looks like it was directly inspired by Yes. The Matrix Neon Genesis, Evangelion, Tron, and Serial Experiments Lain 

[00:46:36] Matthew: Oh, Lain. And that was pretty recent when this came out. Uh, yeah. Yeah. I, I see the, the, all those in, yeah. Including Lain, no question. 

[00:46:45] Ian: Mm-hmm. So that's the kind of combining and we've, and stylistic elements we've got going on here.

And I haven't, we haven't talked too much about the characters because they're kind of generic. 

[00:46:58] Matthew: Yeah. 

[00:46:59] Ian: Jeremy is always the nerdy one. Odd is the silly one. Ulrich's the brooding one. 

[00:47:04] Matthew: Yeah. The brooding Stalwart hero. 

[00:47:07] Ian: Yeah. 

[00:47:08] Matthew: Yumi is the character. I think Yumi is a little bit older than the others, like in the next grade up.

[00:47:13] Ian: She's one great up. 

[00:47:13] Matthew: Yeah. And she is the, she is just as competent as Ulrich, but a little less, a little less broody, a little more, enjoying life. 

[00:47:24] Ian: And I admit, one of the things I love about Aelita is the fact that she starts in season one as the, the kind of wispy elf like character from the digital world who's wondering about what, what you're doing there in, in your human lands.

And as she comes into the real world and, learns more things and figures it out, she has a little bit of that still, but she kind of becomes the, the snarker of the group. She's got a sense of humor on her. There's episodes later on in season two where she finds a love of being a dj and so.

It's this weird, like odd is got this Spider-Man-y flipping hey kind of attitude. But the spider Manny quips are coming from Aelita as she dodges something outta the way. It's like, you know, a giant, giant, uh, rolling tank sphere. Creature comes at her and she joss it his way and says, you know, ah, just keep rolling.

Kind of. She, she gets silly and starts enjoying it and becomes a competent fighter. She was my favorite character of the show. I'm like, I relate to Jeremy. He's the character that, you know, oh, look, glasses wearing nerdy middle school. Ian is like, I want to be the guy in the computer chair. But Aelita was just fun.

[00:48:52] Matthew: And you, you think about the, the, the implications of what they do show you, which I always like to overthink. Mm-hmm. Aelita spent a whole lot of her time isolated, alone. Living in Lyoko because she was still there, whether or not any, any anybody else was there, whether or not Jeremy was connected so that he could talk to her.

She was there alone for days on end. And even if she got a call from Jeremy once or twice a day, that's still, uh, an isolated existence that's going to affect your personality. And it's interesting to see that shift very understandably happen as she is in the company of more people more frequently. 

[00:49:34] Ian: I, I admit, I didn't watch as a kid much past season two.

I mean, middle school is two years. Mm-hmm. That's two seasons. And I grew out of it to some extent, despite how much it, it appealed to me. But I did see some of season three and I've seen bits of season four. And they go into some of that. Uh, I didn't go into that here in case we wanted to ever watch more or discuss more, but they discuss like what the isolation is.

They discuss some of that, that disconnect, and they, they keep layering on some of the dark aspects and what, what vanishing like that does to a person. Yeah. R really, really comes into play and becomes really, really scary. 

[00:50:24] Matthew: Yeah. I, I have a feeling we're gonna come back to this show. 

[00:50:27] Ian: I, I have a feeling we will, so I was, part of why I wanted to cut us off at season two is because , it keeps changing each season.

Mm-hmm. But we might be headed towards our final thoughts there? 

[00:50:36] Matthew: I wanna talk a little bit more about some of those production aspects. We talked about some of the ways that they squeezed more, uh, animation out of their budget with a good use of static backgrounds and things like that.

We described the, the character designs as the weirdly large foreheads, but apart from that, I kind of like the art style because unlike so much American or Japanese animation, it, it's very kind of sketchy and gestural. Yeah. It has a real hand drawn, I don't know what, probably a lot of, uh, computers, even in the, the cell animation segments, but it had a certain hand drawn feel, which I really liked.

[00:51:16] Ian: Kind of 

grunge in that sense. 

[00:51:18] Matthew: Yeah, yeah. 

[00:51:20] Ian: It's cyberpunk, grunge in terms of its design elements. And that, that dirty, rusty element for a lot of its environments, it's old factories and such, adds to the fact that the characters have these rougher lines. There's texture to the fabric of their clothes.

They show, Odd's iPod and it's got little nicks and dings. It's got that beaten up used kind of feel to it. 

[00:51:43] Matthew: And talking about the factory and getting to the lab and the computer workstation for Lyoko and the, virtualizer, there's , a long sequence of how they get there.

They go through a secret passage that starts in the park down a tunnel. They get to a place where they keep scooters and skateboards stored, and they. Go through this. And it's in the sewers. It's in the sewers. And they go to this factory through this secret tunnel and the sewers where they then have to climb down a rope and get to this elevator that you described.

It's wonderfully detailed and unlikely. And of course it's a nice long animation sequence that they could reuse once an episode at least, which is great for their budget. But I would never remove that. I love that sequence. I think it's so cool. I can only imagine how cool it seemed to a middle schooler, but I love that sequence.

[00:52:36] Ian: So many other shows of this nature would have the reused animation be the transformation sequence, right? Like the powering up in a dragon ball or, the transformation in Sailor Moon Code Lyoko instead gives us like. A fighter pilots scramble to your cockpits style scene of them getting ready and then drops them into the action in their character form later.

Mm-hmm. Because they've got a similar reused scene for the virtualization of our characters when they go in and then they de virtualize. They, they, they've got their reused animatic there, but they are, they're of that high energy running around getting where you need to go. Element, not the becoming what you need to be element.

[00:53:27] Matthew: There is, I do have to say that I did get the sense sometimes that whoever was behind the animation direction and such of this was kind of a creep. Yeah. Because 

[00:53:40] Jeremy: yeah, that's, that's definitely there 

[00:53:41] Matthew: in the character designs. You know, they will have as many. Students with, with bare midriffs as they can have.

And not just that for the, for character design and costume design, but the, the choices of, of camera angles and some of the animation seem to be intended to emphasize that and absolutely unnecessary, , bathing and changing scenes in some of these episodes. Yeah. It's like, you know, oh, I don't know. Maybe it's, maybe it's that it's French.

Maybe it's a cultural thing. Maybe I'm just a cranky old man. But yeah, I did have a few times that I'm saying, Hey, you really, this is, come on. And I almost got the sense that somebody told them that because it was worst in the first episode, I almost get the impression that somebody, uh, some executive let that stand and then pointed out, you know, we're trying to sell this around the world, including in America.

Tone it down guys. Maybe they did. I don't know. 

[00:54:36] Ian: Um, I'm not sure if you noticed between seasons one and two, it was. Uh, the production company got purchased. Yes. It went from anti films to moon scoop. Um, and I think that's part of it and there's definitely, that is one of those elements where the original version attempting to pretend it's in America faltered because of some of that cultural change, I think.

Also, definitely there was some camera shifts and some design shifts that that first season has this element of that goes away by the start of season two. 

[00:55:12] Matthew: Yeah. And uh, and it's funny that in the American translation, at least, there's a shot early on in the first season where there's a, our background characters in an establishing shot talking about these fashions with all the exposed navels and things.

Yes. I have a feeling. Yes. That is, that was a translator's comment. 

[00:55:33] Ian: I think it might have been there. There's definitely some elements there. And the fact that this is a translated show, it can throw you, it's a dubbed show, but the lip flaps don't always match. 

[00:55:44] Matthew: Mm-hmm. 

[00:55:45] Ian: Plenty of moments where, someone says something, but their sentence continues on into the next shot as sentence lengths change And editing is used to hide that, but it was always developed knowing that it would be aired in America as well.

Because I believe that yeah, the French, the French production studio already had it planned for Cartoon Network early on. So from what I'm seeing here, because it was, it aired the next year on Cartoon Network. And that probably means they were already dubbing it early enough, especially with how fast the dubbing industry was at that time.

So they, they built that in knowing it, but it didn't always work. And they got better over time. Yeah. 

[00:56:32] Matthew: one other thing I wanna mention though is the music and the sound design 

[00:56:37] Ian: music is so cool. 

[00:56:38] Matthew: Music is terrific. I love the opening, music. Mrs. Darling wife and I have a little disagreement about this in that I think the music itself, musically it is really, really cool.

Mm-hmm. I do think that the lyrics are like as bland as they could possibly be. Very generic hero adventure story, uh, lyrics. 

[00:57:02] Ian: You are of the same idea that the production company apparently had. 'cause by season four, an instrumental version is used instead of the lyric version. 

[00:57:12] Matthew: I mean, it's, it's, it's not, it's, it's, it's fun.

But, you know, it's, it's so, it's so generic and yet the, the music, it's so generic musically. It is so good. 

[00:57:24] Ian: It is also possibly the most, uh, like aughts thing of it that kind of like inspiring techno pop kind of styling. Yeah. 

[00:57:34] Matthew: And the music, , you talked about the second season episode ending that is, is terrific. It's this creepy techno mystery kind of, uh, rock and 

[00:57:45] Ian: super crunchy guitar. 

[00:57:47] Matthew: And the music, the background music they use during the episode. Some of it is repetitive on very short loops like fight music. But it works. It's well done. It's simple synth orchestration, and it keeps the tension going.

It's, it's not distracting in either a good or a bad way. I like all the music in it. 

[00:58:10] Ian: I do too. And they've gotten musical themes throughout it. There is that little da da, which becomes like the leitmotif of Lyoko, and so you'll wind up with like something's happening on Lyoko and that'll pop up in the music leitmotif just to keep that connection.

And I mean, nothing will beat in terms of getting a bunch of kids to realize the, the episode started and the commercials ending. Nothing will beat that initial horn blasts at the start of every episode where it's just like the tuba players just like sounding the alarm on the first few notes of the, of the opening theme to pull everyone in.

[00:58:53] Matthew: And the sound design with the, the, the sound effects and the monster sounds of the skittering and the, the, all the technology that Jeremy has to deal with. It's all really well done. It's, it's not overdone. Mm-hmm. But it pulls you in. It makes everything seem real. It makes everything seem cool. I think whoever was dealing with both the music and the sound did a great job.

[00:59:15] Ian: I'm, I made the joke earlier in this episode, but I'm, I am honestly wondering how many people my age are a fan of clack keyboards like I am because of Jeremy's wildly clack. Yes. You know, I'm doing something on Lyoko keyboard , there's such a, a visceral nature and it's pure sound design there, because they don't always animate his hands on it, but they're, they can just put that sound in the background and him saying, I'm, I'm seeing three monsters coming at you, and that clack sound just adds it.

[00:59:48] Matthew: Yep. 

[00:59:50] Ian: So heading to our final questions then? 

[00:59:54] Matthew: I think so. I think so. 

[00:59:57] Ian: Okay. But before we get there, we've gotta thank everyone who's listening. Thank you. We, we love to hear from you. 

We can be found at IMMProject.com where you can find all of our back episodes. You can find our, contact page if you've got something you remember as well. And you can find our shop if you like, t-shirts and mugs and such. It's a great place there. We'd love a review on whatever podcast app you're using to listen to us.

And share with your friends. , that's the best way to help us grow. We also have our Patreon where you can help support us or even join our movie club if you want to know what it's like being me with a new thing to watch and something you might never have seen before. It's a great way and we're happy to, , have you join in on the experience . 

[01:00:47] Matthew: And also on our Patreon, you can get bonus audio content if you join us starting at just $3 a month. Before the end of this episode, we might mention something that I think is gonna show up as bonus audio content.

[01:00:59] Ian: And where can they find you online, dad? 

[01:01:01] Matthew: You can find me just about anywhere as byMatthewPorter. So you can go to bymatthewporter.com. I'm also by Matthew Porter on YouTube, on Blue Sky and Mastodon. And, and on that YouTube channel I review movies and movie theater experiences and occasionally travel destinations.

And Ian, where can people find you? 

[01:01:20] Ian: I can be found as itemcrafting, be that itemcrafting.com. My website currently getting a bit of a revamp or as itemcraftinglive on Twitch. Come join me every Thursday evening for some games and some crafting. And I actually, for any of our Code Lyoko people here, I'm actually planning on, uh, modeling myself up printing and painting a replica of the Block Monsters from Code Lyoko to commemorate this episode.

I, let's hear that. So I'll be probably doing that live on stream over the course of a few months. happy to have you come join, see what I'm doing. And. chat with me there. 

[01:01:58] Matthew: Those streams are a lot of fun. And uh, it was, it was fun to finally see you beat that giant armored boar in, uh, a dark souls.

[01:02:07] Ian: It didn't beat that thing. It ran into a fire all on its own. You very cleverly, 

[01:02:12] Matthew: you very cleverly let it through that fire by setting yourself on fire. 

[01:02:17] Ian: Yeah, that works.

So, final thoughts on Code Lyoko at least final thought thoughts for the first two seasons. What were your, what do you think, 

[01:02:29] Matthew: dad?

Well, if we're talking a, a screen or no screen, a view or no view, um, I would say view. I'd say it's, it's worth a look. Yeah, it's an interesting, it's an interesting time capsule of TV science, fiction of its time and yet it isn't. It is by no means generic. Early aughts, uh, sci-fi, it, um, it, it has a lot of innovation to offer, even though you can trace all of its influences back.

So I'd say give it a look and, uh, if, if an episode or two is enough, fine. If it grabs you, there's plenty more to watch. 

[01:03:04] Ian: I agree. I admit watching it again, my goodness, the school scenes are not as great, but I enjoy all of the other parts so much. I'm saying screen, but there's an element of like, you gotta sit through the kids show portion to get to the fun show, but it, you know, that's coming.

It's a, it's a fine piece and it's, it is an excellent bit of storytelling, even if it was aimed towards that younger audience. 

[01:03:32] Matthew: Yeah, that's a fair point. You kinda have to know what you're getting into. And if, if you're, if you have zero interest in anything that's not specifically made for adults, then it's not your thing.

That's fine. 

[01:03:42] Ian: Mm-hmm. Ah, and then we get into revive, reboot, or rest in peace. 

[01:03:51] Matthew: Yes. And isn't that interesting? I mean, in our terms, revive means, uh, a sequel or a prequel or something else in the same continuity, another generation or something. Mm-hmm. Or, or reboot is a, a new, a new take on the same idea starting from scratch.

The continuity that came before is not part of the show anymore, 

[01:04:14] Ian: And we only watched part of the first two seasons, but there were four seasons in total of the original series, so it had more story than this, and then it got a revival. In 2012 it got a revival. 

[01:04:30] Matthew: Are you talking about Code Lyoko evolution?

[01:04:33] Ian: Yes. The revival that replaced the cell animated real world with live action actors and kept the CGI for Lyoko world.

The one that had to like apparently retcon a bunch of the original series to prove its own existence Oh. And was so critically panned. I don't believe it ever got a proper English dub. It's only available I, oh, I will say the entirety of the original Code Lyoko is available on the official Code Lyoko YouTube channel for free.

Cool. So that's pretty awesome. Evolutions there too, but it never got a dump. It's just subtitled. And that's a bit of the, oh, drop that. Kind of and walk away slowly attitude. It got at by the end. 

[01:05:26] Matthew: I, I had no idea that this existed, even though I knew of Code Lyoko I had no idea that evolution existed until earlier today, as a matter of fact.

Um, 

[01:05:34] Ian: oh goodness. 

[01:05:35] Matthew: I, I think, I think we might have to take a look at that. 

[01:05:40] Ian: Oh, no. I think I kind of was worried that would be the case. 

[01:05:43] Matthew: I think we might have to, for the sake of our audience and for the sake of those who support us on Patreon, we might need , , to take a look at a few episodes of this and, drop a bonus discussion.

[01:05:54] Ian: Oh, goodness. See, that's the thing. This came out two years after I graduated high school. The amount of time between the original series, and this gave me enough time to go through the entirety. Oh, this is the most awesome thing. Oh, that's a kid's show. I'm too old for that.

Okay. That was actually pretty cool cycle. And then this drops, and I looked at screenshots. I looked at screenshots at my while sitting between classes in community college, staring at this thing going, why are you, why are you burning my childhood? 

[01:06:36] Matthew: I'm just imagining you listening. What, what 

[01:06:38] Ian: have I done to 

[01:06:38] Matthew: you?

It just breaks in like to Kool-Aid man to destroy your world. 

[01:06:43] Ian: Absolutely. Uh, the one, that's the thing, the one thing that , code LoLyoko evolution did for me is it got me to binge the original series in between classes during college, again, which is an out of bounds timeframe, but still, I've watched the series twice thanks to that, but.

I never watched Evolution, I wouldn't touch it. So, so I'm terrified, but I'm, I'm willing to do this. 

[01:07:10] Matthew: Now in our terms is as to the extent, you know, is evolution a, a revival? Is it a continuation of the existing continuity or is it a reboot? Is it starting again, telling the stories again, not necessarily the same stories, but does it start fresh?

[01:07:28] Ian: It is a revival. It is a straight up the next school year of the, of the, the story from where the ending was. 

[01:07:38] Matthew: Oh, wow. 

[01:07:39] Ian: And undoes a little bit of the finale episodes in order to keep it going. 

[01:07:44] Matthew: Okay. 

[01:07:45] Ian: So it retcon some of the animated series and kind of branches off from like partway through season four, I think, to become its own air quotes, season five. So that's what that lands as, 

[01:08:01] Matthew: so it did get I revival. 

[01:08:03] Ian: It did get a revival. Um, okay. This is funny, a q and a with one of the lead writers of the series. I'm seeing this as a link via Wikipedia, but yeah, in a q and a, one of the lead writers called it Non Cannon to the original show. It's just like that.

No, that's not

that, that, that doesn't count. It says the creators of the show. okay, so that's a good question. Revive, Reboot or Rest In Peace. Revive would be doing kind of another evolution would be going from where the series ended and keep going, but that could be from whenever. That could be a set now. 

[01:08:46] Matthew: Yeah. 

[01:08:46] Ian: The, the Lyoko warriors are old enough to now be potentially teachers. Yeah. 

[01:08:52] Matthew: It could be another generation.

It could be that they have to mentor the next group of kids who have to save the world from XANA. 

[01:08:59] Ian: And a reboot would be starting again, uh, a reboot That once again doesn't explain anything, would be amazing. 

[01:09:08] Matthew: Oh, yes. All or even a, even in a revival. Yes. It's in the same continuity. Yeah. All kinds of inexplicable things that have happened to totally change what's, what's going on and what the rules are.

And we're not gonna tell you what those changes, arely. We're just gonna let you know that Ulrich and Yumi are now teachers. And ODD is the new, uh, phys ed teacher. And, uh, uh, I know XANA is now inhabiting a popcorn machine, and we're not gonna explain any of that.

[01:09:38] Ian: Nothing. 

Oh, you want explanation? No theory craft kids that, oh my goodness.

Honestly, a reboot or a revival either way would do so well in the modern era where this is now a, a version of Code Lyco in the YouTube era. Mm. Can you imagine the theory videos, the half hour follow ups to every episode as people try to figure out what's going on? That would be, uh, that'd be 

[01:10:07] Matthew: amazing.

Yeah. Built in marketing there. 

[01:10:09] Ian: Built in marketing. Honestly, though, I'm really tempted to say that this should get a reboot, and yet I'm scared that it would get all of its cool varied elements sanded down that. Trying to put it through the modern, industry machine would remove something of that heart that made this such a weird, fun art piece of a show.

[01:10:42] Matthew: Yeah. I am, I'm inclined to say rest in peace for that kind of reason. Mm-hmm. I, think we talked about all of the influences that it had. We talked about the kinds of things that have happened since that are similar. It is part of a long continuity of this overall kind of show. It's a fascinatingly weird example from its time, but I think that, you know, today's middle schoolers and tomorrow's middle schoolers should have their own inexplicably weird TV show, not necessarily a reboot of one from, uh, 20 years ago.

[01:11:15] Ian: Yeah. It, and, and I will also say there's something about the fact that Code LoLyoko sticks in the mind. Yeah. There are other productions later. Where people will put the eye of XANA, that little logo in the background, it's one of those tiny pieces, you know, that becomes a calling card to an entire fan base that's still out there.

You can put an eye of XANA, you can have someone just say that their return to the past now, and it'll catch certain people off guard and ca and you'll watch them awaken like a sleeper agent in the best way. I don't want to blur that I want a spiritual successor, to Code Lyoko. I want kids to have their new, weird, unexplained thing.

Honestly, the, the way that I loved and my mind got grabbed by Code Lyoko is the way I hear younger generations talk about having their mind, uh. Grabbed onto by things like Gravity falls. 

[01:12:15] Matthew: Yeah. Yeah. 

[01:12:16] Ian: Where it's like, here's taking concepts that are above you and stranger than a lot of the other shows are talking about and filtering it to something you can get into and not hiding the weirdness.

That's the same sort of stuff. So I am, I'm hopeful that there's, there's more Code Lyokos out there, but not more Code Lyoko in that sense. 

[01:12:44] Matthew: Yeah, I would agree with that. 

[01:12:46] Ian: This has been fun and I'm glad I got to show this to you because it's one of those old memories. It's one of those things that's fun to go back to, and I, I had a feeling you'd find it weird and interesting to look at. 

[01:12:58] Matthew: It was, and it was an interesting, to have a reason to, to real focus on it.

As opposed to having it in the background. And I kind of watch an episode or two with you, like I did back then. Mm-hmm. But to kind of take it on its own terms as opposed to, oh, this is the thing that Ian likes. It's okay. Let's, let's examine this for its own sake.

And that was interesting. I,

[01:13:17] Ian: but that'll be it for this episode. Thank you all for joining. And, when we come back in two weeks, we'll be back to our standard programming. Dad will have something new to show me, or not just me. Possibly. 

[01:13:31] Matthew: In the meantime, find something old to watch. 

[01:13:36] Ian: I'm also really tempted to, make a bit about, the MIguzi bumpers. Just because that's not really a content to put into a whole thing, but that was the weird little animations in between.

So, , my episodes of Code Lyoko were interspersed with those and I'd love to talk about that. So