Episode Description:
"Space-age officers Drake and Woots encounter a time travelling scientist on a questionable quest to change history" - AIO
Episode Review:
“Drake and the Time that Time forgot” teaches listeners the invaluable and practical lesson of how wrong it is to travel back in time to remove horrible dictators. This has, of course, been a rampant problem in our culture in recent years, and I’m glad that Odyssey has finally, once and for all, tackled this sensitive and hotly debated issue. It’s a lesson that I’ll be sure to remember next time I make use of my own time machine or –forgive me – the next time I purchase one. I look forward to Adventures in Odyssey tackling other important issues such as, “It is wrong to drink from the Fountain of Youth every day?” or “Is it wrong to create too many clones of oneself?”
In all seriousness, “Drake and the Time that Time forgot”, the follow up to 2014’s “Drake the Cosmic Copper”, does have something important to say about trying to fix the past – and it’s a lesson that can be lost within all the silliness. But it’s there. Without delving into specific examples, we are, currently, a culture that is striving for restitution for societies’ many past sins. We look at our own pasts, or neighbors’, our ancestors’, with a rather unforgiving eye. We continuously seek to rectify those sins through either guilt, blame, shame, restitution, or, in some cases, even re-shaping or re-writing history. And while we should acknowledge and learn from the past, we should also do so carefully and humbly, holding firmly onto the truth: Christ redeems. Nothing we can do can change the event’s past. Time only moves forward: “Good and bad things happen all the time. God is able to use those things to shape us and everything around us […] Dwelling on the past makes us short-sighted.” It’s a good lesson.
The first half of the episode, “Drake and the Time that Time Forgot” is fun and intriguing. I have a personal affection for time travel stories, and it’s a genre that Adventures in Odyssey hasn’t really approached outside of the faux time travel stories of The Imagination Station. As with its predecessor, “Drake the Cosmic Copper”, the listener is once again presented with an exciting world with unique characters – Drake and Woots, dishing enjoyable dialogue throughout – and the story delivers on its themes in creative ways. It was also great to hear Cristina Pucelli as Raelyn Game – instead of playing Emily Jones – as well as Carol Mansell, appearing as Penny’s mom.
However, by the time the 2nd half rolled around, my mind began to wander. Although I had just listened to “Drake the Cosmic Copper”, I still found myself getting lost figuring out all the characters, rules of the world, fast-talking dialogue, and shifting pieces of the plot. The ending grows into a bit of a convoluted mess, with certain revelations as pointless as crinkle-cut fries. For instance, why was it so important to reveal that they hadn’t time travelled, and that their experience had been a holographic projection? It’s a fictional sci-fi setting in a Kid’s Radio production -- just have them time travel for real! But the episode’s need to try and explain how Raelyn, Drake, and Woots hadn’t really time travelled confused me and bogged the story down.
The listener must continuously be able to track the story from beginning to end - and I couldn’t. With so many ludicrous plot points being bombarded at me in the latter half, the episode ended up having the overall hectic pace better suited for a show on the Cartoon Network. Though, perhaps I’m just old. Although “Drake and the Time that Time Forgot” features a world – and characters –that I wouldn’t mind revisiting, these types of episodes must learn to balance its creativity with the parameters of the show’s format: audio drama. Listeners are impaired because we cannot see the action; therefore, it must always strive, first and foremost, for clarity – especially when depicting an unfamiliar setting. Once the listener is on board, entertain us! And as long as the listener can stay afloat the whole way through, feel free to use everything – humor, dialogue, plot twists, music, sound effects – to rock the boat.
"Space-age officers Drake and Woots encounter a time travelling scientist on a questionable quest to change history" - AIO
Episode Review:
“Drake and the Time that Time forgot” teaches listeners the invaluable and practical lesson of how wrong it is to travel back in time to remove horrible dictators. This has, of course, been a rampant problem in our culture in recent years, and I’m glad that Odyssey has finally, once and for all, tackled this sensitive and hotly debated issue. It’s a lesson that I’ll be sure to remember next time I make use of my own time machine or –forgive me – the next time I purchase one. I look forward to Adventures in Odyssey tackling other important issues such as, “It is wrong to drink from the Fountain of Youth every day?” or “Is it wrong to create too many clones of oneself?”
In all seriousness, “Drake and the Time that Time forgot”, the follow up to 2014’s “Drake the Cosmic Copper”, does have something important to say about trying to fix the past – and it’s a lesson that can be lost within all the silliness. But it’s there. Without delving into specific examples, we are, currently, a culture that is striving for restitution for societies’ many past sins. We look at our own pasts, or neighbors’, our ancestors’, with a rather unforgiving eye. We continuously seek to rectify those sins through either guilt, blame, shame, restitution, or, in some cases, even re-shaping or re-writing history. And while we should acknowledge and learn from the past, we should also do so carefully and humbly, holding firmly onto the truth: Christ redeems. Nothing we can do can change the event’s past. Time only moves forward: “Good and bad things happen all the time. God is able to use those things to shape us and everything around us […] Dwelling on the past makes us short-sighted.” It’s a good lesson.
The first half of the episode, “Drake and the Time that Time Forgot” is fun and intriguing. I have a personal affection for time travel stories, and it’s a genre that Adventures in Odyssey hasn’t really approached outside of the faux time travel stories of The Imagination Station. As with its predecessor, “Drake the Cosmic Copper”, the listener is once again presented with an exciting world with unique characters – Drake and Woots, dishing enjoyable dialogue throughout – and the story delivers on its themes in creative ways. It was also great to hear Cristina Pucelli as Raelyn Game – instead of playing Emily Jones – as well as Carol Mansell, appearing as Penny’s mom.
However, by the time the 2nd half rolled around, my mind began to wander. Although I had just listened to “Drake the Cosmic Copper”, I still found myself getting lost figuring out all the characters, rules of the world, fast-talking dialogue, and shifting pieces of the plot. The ending grows into a bit of a convoluted mess, with certain revelations as pointless as crinkle-cut fries. For instance, why was it so important to reveal that they hadn’t time travelled, and that their experience had been a holographic projection? It’s a fictional sci-fi setting in a Kid’s Radio production -- just have them time travel for real! But the episode’s need to try and explain how Raelyn, Drake, and Woots hadn’t really time travelled confused me and bogged the story down.
The listener must continuously be able to track the story from beginning to end - and I couldn’t. With so many ludicrous plot points being bombarded at me in the latter half, the episode ended up having the overall hectic pace better suited for a show on the Cartoon Network. Though, perhaps I’m just old. Although “Drake and the Time that Time Forgot” features a world – and characters –that I wouldn’t mind revisiting, these types of episodes must learn to balance its creativity with the parameters of the show’s format: audio drama. Listeners are impaired because we cannot see the action; therefore, it must always strive, first and foremost, for clarity – especially when depicting an unfamiliar setting. Once the listener is on board, entertain us! And as long as the listener can stay afloat the whole way through, feel free to use everything – humor, dialogue, plot twists, music, sound effects – to rock the boat.
Writer: Bob Hoose
Directed by: Phil Lollar
Sound Engineer: Nathan Jones
Music: John Campbell
Theme: Time
Original Air-date: 04.01.18
Review Published: 05.08.18