Main cast: Jude Law (Jod Na Nawood), Robert Timothy Smith (Neel), Ravi Cabot-Conyers (Wim), Ryan Kiera Armstrong (Fern), Kyriana Kratter (KB), Nick Frost (SM-33), Tunde Adebimpe (Wendle), Kerry Condon (Fara), and Kelly Macdonald (Pokkit)
Director: Jake Schreier
Remember all that brouhaha about civil war in the previous episode? Well, it’s okay not to remember, because You Have a Lot to Learn About Pirates moves way past that like the whole thing had been a minor intestinal wind episode.
This time around, they leave for No Attin—is anyone even fooled that the planet was indeed the kids’ home planet?—oh wait, no, the robot SM-33 recalls that he served the famed pirate Tak Rennod. Jod is giddy with excitement, not least because SM-33 likely knows where Tak Rennod’s treasures are, while the kids have the intellectual curiosity of a bowl of pea soup.
Seriously, the kids have been a big disappointment so far, as the child actors are more grating than anything else, and their characters are just kind of there at the moment to move the plot. Not one really stands out… well, except for the elephant thing for making PDF files stand up and pay attention, for what that is worth.
Anyway, Jod manages to manipulate events so that he gets to go to Tak Rennod’s base and then tries to take over the ship, but the kids fool him by… literally falling out of a latch. What happens next? To be continued, of course.
This entire episode could have been done in 15 minutes, but no, let’s stretch everything out with fillers, walking, more walking, talking, and more talking. I’m beating a dead horse, I know, but my goodness, this show was originally conceived as a movie, am I right?
Jude Law is carrying the entire show on his comely shoulders, so much so that I can only worry for his chiropractor bills later. He gives his Long John Silver character some much-needed wicked charm and grown-up sex factor, but still, he can only do so much.
There are some cute moments here to entertain kids below the age of 10, but for the most part, this is a short episode that still manages to outlive its welcome. While I don’t think this show is bad so far, I’d really love to revisit it once someone splices all the episodes together into a movie and cut out all the extraneous bits.
