Venture Bros. Episode 3 “Arrears in Science”

Nightrider here! I think it’s safe to say that this “trilogy” regarding PROBLEM, The Blue Morpho, The Monarch and the Venture building has come to a close. But there are new questions that arise after seeing this episode.

Beware: There be spoilers ahead!

From the previous episode, it concluded that the “real” Blue Morpho showed up at the Ventech building leaving The Monarch free from the wrath of Wide Wale.

Four months before the present, a robot termed “Vendata” wakes up in an abandoned facility and heads to the Monarch’s house and enter the Blue Morpho’s lair and dons an extra suit. During this segment, Vendata has flashbacks of his wife, times with Jonas Venture and crew and the Blue Morpho.

Vendata walks towards Jonas’ remains and connects to him via a plug-in. Jonas speaks to Vendata about his time “living” in Gargantua 1, from the destruction of Gargantua 1 with Bud Manstrong to the discovery of PROBLEM by Jonas Venture Jr. and subsequent relocation to VenTech Tower. It revealed that Vendata is Venturion; Blue Morpho died with his wife in a plane crash and reconstructed as a cyborg similar to RoboCop. Venturion was dismantled after an error made Venturion strangle Rusty in his youth as Venturion’s son (the future Monarch) cries because Rusty stole a toy car from him.

While Hank catches up with current events, The Monarch plots to kill Venturion to look good with the Guild. The rest of the Guild shows up, and Dr. Zin reveals that during the seventies he found Venturion in the Venture dumpster outside the old compound while in a drunken stupor with some friends; Vendata is born but not put into play as Dr. Zin was arrested for possession of coke.

During the plug-in, Vendata reveals that Jonas recorded an orgy with Blue Morpho and two actresses (Jill St. John and Stella Stevens) and blackmailed Blue Morpho into doing Jonas’ dirty work. But Blue Morpho wanted to remain faithful to his wife because they wanted children; Jonas offers his “science” to help with that. So what I got from this is that Jonas slept with Blue Morpho’s wife and thus The Monarch is Rusty’s brother!

Meanwhile, Red Death reveals to Brock and the Guild about what happened at the “Movie Night Massacre” back in the eighties when he teamed up with Vendata and other villains to hijack Gargantua 1. It’s revealed that Vendata was about to reveal Jonas’ orgy tape for revenge and then open the airlock so that everyone inside gets sucked into space; Jonas scoffs it off, claiming that Vendata is indeed Blue Morpho and that as a hero and friend Vendata would never kill the innocent. Vendata is then shown as responsible for the massacre that killed Jonas in the process, leaving Red Death’s audience shocked. Then the SPINX Wars began as a result due to the former Sovereign of the Guild shifting into the leader of SPHINX and claiming responsibility so that Red Death’s actions were kept secret.

Back at VenTech, Dr. Orpheus’ prediction came true as Action Man has a heart attack (stroke) and taken to the hospital via a giant cockroach. Billy speaks to Jonas via watch communicator and refuses to kill Vendata because of the Hippocratic oath. The Monarch shows up ready to kill Vendata but now sees that Vendata is his “father.” Then Jonas, Vendata, Rusty and The Monarch get rocketed outside the building and fall on the Rusty Venture balloon float because local cops were setting up for the Macy’s Day Parade; the Guild witnesses the Monarch “saving the day” for “finishing” the Blue Morpho. As the Venture Clan watch the parade the following morning, OSI requests that Rusty hand over Jonas’ head for experiments. Then the Rusty Venture balloon falls towards VenTech.

Many revelations from this trilogy have now brought out new questions to ask: does Monarch know that Rusty is his brother? Is Blue Morpho truly dead now? What will happen to the Monarch now that he is probably going to get the Guild’s rewards for “killing” Blue Morpho? The new questions can go on and on. Another thing to point out is that Jonas is not a saint that everyone knows him for. Jonas is only looking out for himself and would do anything in the name of his own legacy, even going so far as to blackmailing his best friend and screwing his wife so that he can do it all over again while winning the adoration of his fans. Blue Morpho was a definite good guy who had the pay the price for his infidelity and subsequent transformation into something that Jonas could control and disappear.

This seventh season started out with a bang that I enjoyed. I hope to see more revelations and screwballs in the coming weeks.