animorphslj | Z-Spaces: An Animorphs Psychochronography #8 (Reply)

#8 - It feels weird to just sit around and relax (Megamorphs #1 The Andalite's Gift)

It's May 1997. The death of the Notorious B.I.G. brings his single "Hypnotize" to number one. It falls three weeks later to another death blow to the popular rap scene, "MMMBop" by Hanson. I actually have a begrudging respect for the self-made Hanson, but they could not be any further from Biggie Smalls if they tried. The Spice Girls announce the production of their movie Spiceworld... at the Cannes Film Festival of all places. The May box office starts with some film nobody remembers called Breakdown before giving way to the excellent pop-sci-fi stylings of The Fifth Element. That's #1 for two weeks until Speilberg's The Lost World: Jurassic Park debuts. Austin Power also debuts, causing large swaths of unfunny people to say "Oh, behave!" because there is no God.

In real news, Tony Blair wins the UK general election by a landslide, bringing the Labour Party back in power. IBM's Deep Blue beats Garry Kasparov in a game of chess, the first time a computer has beaten a World champion. The Russian-Chechen Peace Treaty is signed, and the United States acknowledges the existence of the Secret War in Laos. Kelly Flinn, the first female bomber pilot, accepts a general discharge after getting caught doing it with a married soccer coach.

The summer months encroach. Kids are let out of school, the beaches and theme parks open, reruns play on television, forcing people outside to go to concerts and the big loud movies that play at the time. Through centuries of cultural evolution, we've established a clockwork system that ceases to be three-or-so months out of the middle of the year, the Metropolis-style mechanical motions of public education and the work sector giving way to a kind of structed anarchy, or at least the illusion of such (the British idea of mandatory holidays is kind of a joke, really). And with the summer, Animorphs throws its structure aside for its first big event book.

Whereas the previous seven books have been filled with paranoia and suspense, thoughts and themes, spying and retreating and pain, Megamorphs #1 is about the Animorphs fighting a Big Ol' Monster. The book is defined by its action beats, several chase things building up to a finale where the Animorphs kill the Big Ol' Monster with a whale. In terms of set pieces, Animorphs had never been this extravagant. A house gets torn to shreds. A crazy woman traps Rachel in a burning shack. Low flying Bug Fighters, police officers and an amnesiac Rachel in elephant morph explode through a suburb while Jake in tiger morph gets chased through the woods. Marco and Ax get trapped on the Blade Ship.

This is the Animorphs equivalent of big summer blockbusters like Independance Day, which we talked about before. Despite my tearing apart of that film, I do not hate simple action movies, just dumb ones, and Megamorphs #1 fits very soundly on the "simple" side of things. But it is more than just a summer book in that it's big and loud, it is actually the most summer-esque in its setting, despite taking place while school is still going on. Summer is a time for letting one's hair down, to relax and ignore, at least in part, the opressive systems around you. Rachel goes to gymnastics camp. Marco and Ax crash a pool party. Cassie goes to the mall. These are all summer-type events, points for the Animorphs to take a deep breath and stop thinking about the Yeerks for just a second.

But, of course, the Yeerks have none of that, and assault these summer events in the loudest and most destructive ways. This could almost be described as an summer implosion, big summer events, in this case the blockbuster movie aspects of the story, destroying other summer events until it curls in on itself into a ball of cloudy chaos. The Big Ol' Monster itself is a dark cloud, like a rain cloud come to bloat out the sun for all the beach-goers and mountain climbers and naps-on-the-porch-takers. The message is clear: the Animorphs themselves can't afford summer. They cannot afford to relax and take it easy, they can't take their eye off the ball for one second, or Rachel might lose her memories and they'll get chased around by Visser Three's pet.

That's still a simpler idea than the ones explored in past books, but for my money, its enough to qualify the book as a worthwhile summer blockbuster.