User Reviews

This episode is based upon the dinosaur-themed Doom Zone play-set "Mighty Max Blows up Dino Lab", and I think they made a fun little story out of it, the concept is good and it's got a great villain. The sadly deceased Kenneth Mars did an amazing job as the demented Zygote, the evolution-obsessed professor who tampers with experiments in evolution to create monsters and more importantly in this story, dinosaurs, all of which are pretty scary and well animated. He did a perfect mad scientist voice, and I mainly enjoy this episode for a voice performance which gives his character as distinct an identity as much as the character's design. And I find that particularly impressive because he only ever did two episodes, both of which are great and memorable in my humble. The evolution angle makes him unique among the gallery of fun megalomaniac bad guys that featured throughout the show's run. He's already kind of scary enough when he's still just a man, but he really becomes something creepy and interesting at the end of the story when he decides that he has to know the secrets of what his own evolutionary future holds, and becomes a telepathic creature with withered arms and legs and a huge brain that levitates to move around. The only problem is that he evolves himself too fast for his mind to handle, and he temporarily behaves like a babbling infant that accidentally demolishes the lab as well as activating the nearby volcano! And later on in the epilogue when he emerges from the ocean in complete control of his newfound mental abilities and promises to return to exact revenge in the near future is a great sinister closing scene. I always liked it when the final scene of an episode was of a villain. The prologue with the two fat old tourists who pick the wrong spot to stop and take some photos is really hilarious but it's such a total cheat, it gives the strong impression that they are devoured by the plesiosaur or whatever it is, when they're just captured to be later turned into hideous apes! They never do get changed back to normal by the end of the story, oh dear.. I love how they actually devised a way to include Max's cute little pet iguana Thor significantly in the story as a huge prehistoric version of himself. It makes me laugh when Max lures him through the cave with the giant fly! It's also fun and freaky to see a pterodactyl version of Virgil flying around for a while! Love this episode and this series, warts and all. Or, scales..bye!