Crisis of Infinite Episodes - Invasion of the Gleeks

Wow, this episode had it all: sinister simians, an evil Gleek, superhero weaknesses exposed, a turtle mounted ice turret, and like a cherry on top of the sundae, a giant robot monkey. Sure the episode never really went into why the Exxorian monkeys were evil, but maybe they were just misguided.

Crisis of Infinite Episodes - The Make-Up Monster

 So, the premise to this was actually sort of intriguing. A movie makeup guy discovered a way to turn people into creatures using hormone treated costumes. Yeah, the science may be a bit off, but the potential is there. Not sure why that made him evil though. He chose to be a swamp monster, pterodactyl and King Kong, 3 great choices! It was nice for Flash to appear, but he didn't really do much. I sort of expected him to run fast at some point. This still wasn't amazing, but it was kind of fun seeing a few classic monsters battle the Super Friends.

Crisis of Infinite Episodes - Plastic Man Meets Plastic Ape

 A giant plastic ape? Sold! The plastic ape element was also fun as it allowed a stretch off between the simian and Plas. In fact this episode seemed to have more stretching than usual with Plastic Man assuming shapes from a bed to a jack hammer to a torpedo to a phone booth. Even Hula got in on the act after accidental exposure to plastic gas. One thing I didn't like was that the ape was really just regular size. Being giant was a result of his plasticity. Why didn't Plas just make himself giant? In the end, this was another fun but frivolous romp.

-----
Episode Count: 0370
Series Count: (33 of 35)

Crisis of Infinite Episodes - The Chimp Who Made It Big

Original Airdate: October 1, 1996

When a space capsule was zapped with cosmic rays, the chimp pilot Toto got really big and began to shoot kryptonite lasers from his eyes. As far as I know this was pretty much adapted from the 1959 Superman #127 issue introducing the character Toto who would later be renamed Titano and would return to torment an animated Superman years later.

Crisis of Infinite Episodes - Goofy Groceries

In 1941, Warner Brothers under the Merrie Melodies label released Goofy Groceries. I am not going to really review this cartoon because I am pretty sure its like "really ground breaking" and stuff and I am no expert on anything non-superhero of the era. Lets just say its basically the 1940's version of Toy Story in a grocery store, which does sound pretty cutting edge if I put it that way.

Anyways, after a few minutes of dancing soup cans and a monocle wearing potato taking a dip in the sink, a gorilla animal cracker freaked out. Turtle soup tanks and gingerbread paratroopers proved no match and finally "Superguy" leapt off of a box of soap chips. The doofus got scared and turned into a baby. And thus, we were given the first animated superhero parody. Interestingly, as far as I can tell, Goofy Groceries debuted in March of 1941 and Superman AKA The Mad Scientist on September, so this parody actually predated the animated Superman. How 'bout that?

Crisis of Infinite Episodes - Terror on the Midway

Original Airdate: August 28, 1942

Over the years, Superman has had quite a few run ins with monkeys (or apes as the case may be) This was his first! In fact he took on a whole circus worth of animals after an enraged gorilla got loose.

Best Part: Watching Superman put a panther in a full nelson was pretty awesome.

Worst Part: With a name like Gigantic, the gorilla wasn’t really that big. Actually he was at first, but when Superman fought him he seemed to have shrunk. I am not too concerned, over the years I know for a fact Superman will face larger simian species.

-----
Episode Count: 0009
Series Count: (9 of 17)
Giant Monkey Count: 0001