Preboot

2021 Golden Stake Nomination
	This article was nominated in the 2021 Golden Stake Awards. It was nominated for the following category: Best Two-Parter However, it didn't win for this category

Production code:

1042-243

Airdate:

November 19, 2016^[1]

Credits

Episodes
Previous "Daddy-Daughter Card Wars"	Next "Reboot"

"Preboot" is the twelfth episode in the eighth season of Adventure Time. It's the two hundred and thirty-seventh episode overall.^[2]

Synopsis

During an excavation of human artifacts, Finn, Jake and Susan are greeted by a mysterious new stranger who may hold the key to the past.^[3]

Plot

In Beautopia, Finn, Jake, and Susan Strong break down a door during high tide that reveals an arcade. Jake doesn't seem to like the place, but Finn says that they are investigating early human culture and that they'll probably find cursed artifacts. Jake starts to get a little bit excited, as it has been a while since he has received a hex.

Whilst walking through the arcade, Jake gleefuly states that someone could get cursed and that he hopes it's him. Susan comes across an old merry-go-round buried in sand and and pulls it out, which Finn believes to be the bones of a prehistoric horse that was covered in feathers and used its poles to sting people who tried to steal its honey. Jake doesn't seem to believe Finn and complains about the lack of hexes, but is unable to finish his sentence as he trips over a dinosaur plush buried in sand. Jake sits up and thinking that it is a demon, rips it out of the ground, only to discover that it's just a harmless plush. After referring to it as a "little cutie", the ground begins to shake, leading to Jake to think that the dinosaur plush is cursed. Finn thinks there is an "Ooo-quake" and with that, he and Susan take Jake with them and run outside.

As they exit, a massive animal-like robot digging its way to the surface right next to Beautopia. Finn, Jake, and Susan stand outside to see what appears to be the eye of the machine open to reveal a walkway that extends down to where they are. The fog clears and Tiffany introduces himself standing on the walkway with a bionic arm. Finn appears happy to see him alive, as he had previously thought him to be devoured by the Worm Queen. Tiffany tells the gang to come with him and that he'll explain almost everything. Finn, Jake, and Susan shrug to each other and follow Tiffany inside.

The door opens for them and a robotic voice welcomes them. The walkway continues and winds around a corner as flowers and various shapes float and grow around them. Whilst walking, Susan starts acting suspiciously, and as they approach a door ahead of them, she makes a strange computer sound which opens the door, leading Finn to asking her when she learned to speak Robot. She then walks to a large flower object and makes the same computer sound as before, causing the flower to open, revealing a strange person in a jellyfish like suit. The stranger is shown monitoring the characters, then turns around shocked when she realizes they can see her. She reveals her name: Dr. Gross and states she is both Tiffany's boss and the one who gave him the mechanical arm. The two decide to take Finn, Jake, and Susan a tour of the ship.

She takes them to a large room full of large and small hybrid animals, all of which have implants on their heads. Dr Gross begins to sing a song about evolution as the trio look around her menagerie. She shows a shark mouse hybrid that can breathe air and eat cheese, a giant chicken with wasp wings, a gigantic dragon eel hybrid that is kept in a huge tank, and many more hybrids. Dr. Gross saves her favorite hybrid for last: a bear that can tell time, which has a grandfather clock for a left arm and a clock on it's tummy. After the song, Finn asks if there are any ordinary animals, to which Dr Gross declines and jokingly states that if there were any, they'd probably die from envy. A skorp-munk tapping on glass catches Jake's attention and begins dancing in a surreptitious manner to warn Jake. As Jake starts to feel that it is trying to communicate to him, Dr. Gross hastily recommends that they move on to look at other things.

Dr. Gross leads the group to her "Examination Room," which Jake mistakenly hears as "Imagination Room". Dr. Gross then brings up seats and lollipops for her guests on account of their good behavior. Susan is reluctant to accept her lollipop; however, Finn and Jake eat theirs without hesitation. Dr. Gross then takes off her suit, revealing that she is human, albeit cybernetically enhanced. Dr. Gross goes on to explain that modifications are not only beneficial, but logical. Her intentions for bringing them become clear as she explains they are being hired, and their interrupted loyalty will earn them upgrades. After Jake tries but fails to use his stretchy powers, Finn and Jake learn that they have been paralyzed from the lollipops, and Susan shares that she cannot move either. Dr. Gross calls up her assistants to help her begin prepping the group. Dr. Gross reveals her agenda to make all humans cybernetically enhanced, implying that more humans still exist. When Dr. Gross begins prepping Susan, she notices Susan already has an implant, but the implant is one from someone else. Suddenly, as she begins to make a revelation about Susan's origins, Susan furiously kicks her to the wall, revealing that instead of eating her paralysing lollipop, she secretly hid it under her large chin. She quickly neutralises the Doctor's assistants and busts out of the Examination Room, carrying Finn and Jake with her.

Dr. Gross signals her hybrid animals, causing them to transform into a cybernetically enhanced version of themselves and leave their cages. The animals are then ordered to fetch up the escaping trio. The scene cuts to Susan who somehow subconsciously knows the quickest path to exit the ship, much to Finn's awe. The hybrid animals catch up to Susan and try to take her down, but are easily dealt with. Unfortunately, Tiffany appears from out of nowhere and fires a net at them, finally subduing them.

Dr. Gross congratulates Tiffany and angrily states that if she can't modify the trio, then she will "use them for spare parts", transforming her arm into a multitude of deadly buzzsaws. Tiffany cries out that Jake (and to a lesser extent Finn) are "blood brothers" and to not harm them, but the Doctor ignores him and continues to move the buzzsaws ever closer to the ensnared trio, causing Tiffany to have a thought crisis. Just as the saws are about to reach the trio, her arm is knocked out of harm's way by Tiffany. Enraged, Susan busts out of the net and fires a net, taking down Dr. Gross. Due to the damage to the ship from Dr. Gross's saw, the ship begins to self-destruct. Still holding onto Finn and Jake, Susan leaps out of the ship in time before it submerges and explodes.

Now outside, Finn and Jake look at the freed hybrid animals. The episode ends with Finn's worries coming true, due to the "giant electro-eel" escaping and heading to the Candy Kingdom.

Characters

Major characters

Minor characters

Hyooman tribe
Hybrid Animals (debut for all except Clock Bear)
Snail

Mentioned only

Music

"Evolution"

Trivia

A Farmworld Finn hat can be seen inside the grabber claw game.
The paralyzing juice has a similar effect to the paralyzing potion in "Still."
This is the only time in the eight season where Martin Mertens is mentioned, not counting the episode Don't Look, in which he is symbolized.

Episode connections

Tiffany survived the supposed death he endured in "Dentist" which resulted in losing his arm.
Finn mentions that "bionic arms are cool" in this episode. In the next episode, he loses his grass arm, which is replaced by a bionic arm afterwards.
The Clock Bear that appears as one of Gross's projects also appeared in one of Finn's dreams in "Hoots."
Dr. Gross makes mention of an island full of human inhabitants, something that the eighth season's Islands miniseries expands upon.
Jake mentioning it being a while since he's been cursed, may be a reference to him being cursed to smell like vanilla, as mentioned in "The Silent King."

Cultural references

A scientist traveling in a vessel resembling a narwhal could be a reference to Jules Verne.
Doctor Gross's song, "Evolution," sounds similar to Gene Wilder's "Pure Imagination" from the 1971 movie, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
The dino plush discovered in the arcade is one of the monsters from the Sea of Monsters in the Beatles' movie Yellow Submarine.
The structure of the giant drill station look similar to Drimogemon from Digimon.
The scene where the creatures escape looks similar to the scene of the release of the monsters in the film The Cabin in the Woods.
Susan's escape is similar to Samus' near the end of the videogame Metroid Fusion, after the SA-X releases several Metroids inside a laboratory while destroying it. The gun-wielding protagonist Samus, much like Susan, narrowly escapes from the damaged lab, which also had flashing red lights and an automated female voice counting down.
In the Menagerie, there is a genetically enhanced apple which bears a keen resemblance to Happy Appy, a character from a creepypasta of the same name. They are very similar except their colors are reversed. Happy Appy is a red apple with green lips, and the enhanced apple is green with red lips.
Some of the bionic hybrid animals chasing Susan & Co. towards the end of the episode are carrying those shark-on-a-stick pinching things, which is funny because they are just toys and ineffectual as weapons in real combat.
Dr. Gross is based on the character of Dr. Moreau from the H.G. Wells novel, "The Island of Dr. Moreau." A mad scientist who experimented with creating hybrid animals.

Production notes

This episode along with "Reboot" were aired as the finale for the seventh season. They aired on a Saturday at a new time slot (8:00 PM).
This episode along with "Reboot" aired in Turkey on October 25, in South Africa on October 26, and in Italy on November 16, 2016 before its intended U.S. airdate.^{[citation needed]}
With 0.77 million viewers (approximately 770,000 viewers) on its premiere, this episode and "Reboot" are some of the lowest watched episodes of Adventure Time, most likely due to the episode getting no promotion, and a last minute time change.