The Podcast Against Giygas: An Earthbound Story

Just when it all seemed hopeless, the fellowship irreparably broken, Teddy gone off to who knows where in his shame, Ninten abandoning Ana and Lloyd in his rage, and he treading through the woods alone in his severe asthma to boot… things are slowly starting to look up for the Chosen Four. With a little help from a certain popular musician unattached to samsara, Teddy snatched Ninten from the sudden jaws of death, and now they're taking it easy, skipping rocks in a gentle pond in the woods. Now, what once was broken must be mended anew. Teddy needs to come clean to Ninten about a few eh... inaccuracies, in the previous telling of his deeds. Lloyd needs to knock some sense into these mopey dopes and get them back to George Moley's old log cabin pronto. And somehow, by some miracle, Ninten and Ana both need to find some way to say, "I'm sorry I betrayed your trust," and "I'm sorry I broke your heart."Will Ninten be able to withstand Teddy's iron grip and keep his promise to him? Will Lloyd steer clear of any leeches or parasitic protozoans in that pond? And will Ninten, a notorious wallflower, find it in him to kick off his shoes and dance through the whole eponymous debut LP by the Runaway Five, from the first track "All That I Needed Was You" on side one all the way to the last song on side two... "Fallin' in Love?" Find out on this week's episode of... The Podcast Against Giygas! No crying until the ending. “I’ll talk about my adventure, and you can tell me about all your mistakes!”

Magicant is safe from that nasty dragon, the castle is rebuilt anew, and now, with their bellies full of only modestly-too-much ice cream this time, the Chosen Four continue on their journey. And where does their journey take them next, none other than the quiet suburban town of Onett, Eagleland! See the gently-sloping valleys, the Neo-classical marble public buildings, the bustling downtown thoroughfare, the luxurious waterfront timeshare properties rife for the taking, the... Sharks hanging out at the arcade?! Uh oh...That's right folks, the nastiest gang in Onett town. from all the way back in season one, have been here even since 197X! And when they spot poor Teddy, the rival gang leader of the Black Bloods of Merrysville, casually walking around their home turf, the Sharks immediately smell blood and declare war! The Chosen Four will have their hands full fighting against this menace, but fight they must, if they have any hope of finally approaching the last stop on their long quest, just a few miles away and looming over Onett in the horizon... the Holey Moley Mountain! Will Teddy emerge victorious from the knock-down drag-out gang fight with the "Great White" leader of the Sharks, by a... erm, well, by a head? Will Ninten like the penguin after all? And for Pete's sake, will ANY ONE be able to tell me just WHAT in the heck these guys are TALKING ABOUT?! Find out on this week's episode of... The Podcast Against Giygas! No crying until the ending. “I’ll talk about my adventure, and you can tell me about all your mistakes!”

The Chosen Four escaped from Ellay Town and made it safely back to Magicant, lucky to be alive and not telepathically enslaved by the evil Giygas! Out of the frying pan they may be, little do they know they’re jumping headlong into fire… dragon fire, that is! Remember “Ninten’s dragon” from way back in episode 6? Looks like it somehow, mysteriously got free of its rather wide and quite-easy-to-remove leash, and now it’s wreaking havoc all over Queen Mary’s magical candy queendom!As Ninten battles the creature alone, a reflection of everything “selfish, craven, and cruel” in his own heart, Ana no less wrestles with her feelings for the monster that is Ninten and his rotten attitude, but with a bit of help from the gracious Queen, now a little more lucid thanks to the melodies they found before (well, just a little bit anyway), maybe they can both emerge victorious!Will Ana be able to pick one stuffed animal (just one, please!) from Queen Mary’s magnificent menagerie? Will they finally be spared the tortures of five big sundae desserts in a row (of course they will, thanks to the Queen’s new failsafe mnemonic device, guaranteed to work… probably)? Will this episode make season two pass the Bechdel test with flying colors (uh… yeah, I guess not this time, sorry folks…)? Find out on this week’s episode of… The Podcast Against Giygas! No crying until the ending.“I’ll talk about my adventure, and you can tell me about all your mistakes!”

Ellay, Ellay, it's a heck of a town! Ninten and his friends finally find themselves in the sunny coastal metropolis where pink sunsets, palm trees swaying in the wind, and glamorous movie stars reign supreme. For their first stop, they throw poor Lloyd a bone and visit "The World of Earthbound Science and Technology Exhibition," a.k.a. the Olympics for nerds, held on a nearby island only reachable by speeding rocket ship! Here, they meet a... somewhat familiar face, who gasses up the eager Lloyd with scientific feats of derring-do and generous helpings of the most delicious treat mathematically possible to mankind. After that, it's finally time for the Chosen Four to head to Rosemary Manor, home of the once-famous but now reclusive starlet of the silver screen, Janet Rosemary herself! What secrets does she hold within her powerful mind, about psionic power, about the melody, and about their ultimate foe? And what awful price will the children have to pay for those secrets?Will Lloyd leave the big expo with more than an armful of neat brochures and stuff? Will Teddy be able to bend solid iron bars with his bare hands? And will Ninten and his companions stand brave and tall when none other than Giygas, the Destroyer of Worlds, finally shows his hand?! Find out on this week's episode of... The Podcast Against Giygas! No crying until the ending.“I’ll talk about my adventure, and you can tell me about all your mistakes!”

The Chosen Four finally found that dangnabbit cactus, and now they’re “leavin’ on a jet plane!” With Lloyd dreaming sweet dreams of lots and lots of legos, which of course means Lloyd finally shutting his trap for once, it’s just smooth sailing all the way to Ellay Town on the west coast.It’s gonna be a shorter, laid back episode this time, folks. Yup, just an ordinary old plane ride, and a welcome change at that, considering all the wild and wacky hardships Ninten and his friends have encountered thus far. And to think, Lloyd was SO worried the plane was going to malfunction in midair!Will Ninten and his companions finally kick back and maybe catch some must-needed z’s? Will they open up to each other a little, having not that much to do? Will the food on board be kind of gross? The answer to all these questions is an emphatic YES, on this week’s episode of… The Podcast Against Giygas! No crying until the ending.“I’ll talk about my adventure, and you can tell me about all your mistakes!”

Ninten awakens from a wonderful dream to find a big day ahead of him... which includes plenty more walking through a miserable desert, more deadly alien-controlled robots, a kooky old-timer with a tank and a method of keeping trespassers off his property that's banned by international law, and worst of all, the grand entrance of their most formidable foe yet, the terrible gargantuan Duncan bots!And guess, dear reader, what it does NOT include? Any sign of that stinkin' singing cactus ANYWHERE!Will Ninten and his companions find their needle in a cactus stack after all? Will Teddy get all those thorns out of his mouth? Will Lloyd find the courage to board a... what?! That's a World War TWO plane?! Oh, nonononono. No way, ho-zay! Just think about the metal fatigue, and that radial piston engine, and pulleys and cables attached to the control board, if just any one of those breaks down...Erm, well, anyway... find out on this week's episode of... The Podcast Against Giygas! No crying until the ending.“I’ll talk about my adventure, and you can tell me about all your mistakes!”

While looking through George Moley's diary, Ninten catches a glimpse of their sworn enemy's ultimate plan: a horrific mind-control machine called the Slave Engine, which seems to involve that famous scream-queen of the silver screen herself, Janet Rosemary. Maybe she has psionic power somehow, like Ninten and Ana do? Heck, the journal even has her full address way out in Ellay Town. Their next destination is abundantly clear...That's right, it's the hot, dusty, dry Yucca Desert, to find a cactus, somewhere, that will hopefully sing the next bar of Queen Mary's mysterious melody, hopefully sometime before they run out of water. Whose brilliant plan was this? I'll give you a hint, her name starts with a "P" and ends with an "ollyana is the most aggravating weirdo and freak I ever met in my whole entire life." Stuck in the desert until further notice, Ninten will have a lot of time to get to know his companions, and they will each have a lot of time to get on every last one of his nerves.Will they get in trouble for Teddy defacing private property? Will Lloyd ever get a decent war cry down? Will Ninten ever stop being such a great big "proof of burden" all the time? Find out on this week's episode of... The Podcast Against Giygas! No crying until the ending.  “I’ll talk about my adventure, and you can tell me about all your mistakes!”

The Chosen Four heroes of Magicant have their mandate from Queen Mary: go and find five more bars of that strange melody! Too bad the Paradise Line’s train tracks to the next town are mysteriously blockaded by a random avalanche! And if that’s not bad enough, Lloyd also has a sudden bout of low self-esteem and decides, maybe he’s not all that useful to the mission, and maybe it’s for the best if he goes back to Podunk? Teddy, however, disagrees. Lloyd isn’t a weak fighter at all, he just needs to pack some heavier firepower, like maybe some sweet laser guns which are ripe for the taking at the recently shut-down Duncan factory! Before Ninten or Ana can say nay, Teddy grabs poor Lloyd by the wrist and together they go a-trespassin to the old abandoned factory… which maybe isn’t so abandoned after all!Will Ninten muster up a force field as good as Ana’s? Will Lloyd’s snazzy new shooters be enough against scores of mass-produced robots as well as sinister Starmen and cackling tentacled Mooks? Will his penchant for Missile Command be enough for him to, well, command a missile? Find out on this week’s episode of… The Podcast Against Giygas! No crying until the ending.  “I’ll talk about my adventure, and you can tell me about all your mistakes!”

Ninten pulled through in the bridge and emerged victorious from the… ugh, sing off. With Teddy now an official member of their motley crew, the complete Chosen Four  finally make way to the strange land ruled by the strange woman’s voice in their heads.A magical dreamland full of candy and ice cream, where cats swim on the ground and fish swim in caves, where kittens and puppies live in the village and frogs guard the castle. It can’t be real, can it? It has to all be just a weird hallucination or something. But then, why does Queen Mary, who is so muddle-headed she could forget what’s right in front of her, nonetheless seem to know so much about Ninten’s strange quest, and his strange powers, and even the frightening foe they are destined to face?Will Ninten guess the answer to a riddle that doesn’t even have a question? Will he be able to forget the forgotten man? And will he have the guts, literally, to face his biggest challenge yet: unlimited dessert served by a host with chronic short-term memory loss?Find out on this week’s episode of… The Podcast Against Giygas! No crying until the ending. “I’ll talk about my adventure, and you can tell me about all your mistakes!”

Ninten, Ana, and Lloyd head to Merrysville next, home of the world-famous Duncan Inc. flagship factory… which has recently shut down. Now the town is a shell of its former glory, run-down and overrun by local gangs. Well, just one gang, actually, but the biggest, baddest, meanest gang of them all… the Black Bloods! And when Lloyd accidentally runs afoul of one of their numbers, the Chosen three-out-of-four find themselves face to face with B.B. gang’s formidable leader…Ladies and gentlemen... are you REDDY... for some TEEEEEEDDY?!!!He's big as a whale, strong as an ox, mean as a weasel, and he has a lovely baritone voice. Now, Ninten has no choice but to square off with the ferocious Teddy in a good-old-fashioned no-holds-barred rumble. And wouldn't you know it, there's Arlene's Live House just across the street, as good a venue as any. Will Ninten stand up to his friends against these nasty no-good B.B. bullies? Will he pull through in the bridge? And will they once and for all please stop picking on him already just because he has a subscription to the Economist (seriously, he only reads it for the articles! Sheesh...)? Find out on this week's episode of... The Podcast Against Giygas! No crying until the ending.“I’ll talk about my adventure, and you can tell me about all your mistakes!”