Mayors' Retreat

Mayors' Retreat is an episode of Cactoid Jim, King of the Martian Frontier, a part of the Sparks Nevada, Marshal on Mars universe.

Audio[]

Episode audio at Nerdist

Cast[]

WorkJuice Players[]

Derp - Craig Cackowski
A41397X442 - Hal Lublin

Guest Stars[]

Theme Song[]

Detailed Description[]

Cactoid Jim has organized a Mayor's retreat for several mayors in the solar system to better their mayoring through the open exchange of ideas. He speaks with mayor Derp of Mars ' smaller moon, Deimos and A41397X442, the mayor of robots and a diplomacy robot, then thanks them both for their help.

A41397X442 alerts Jim and Derp that a rocket ship is incoming. A very old ship appears in the sky out of nowhere. It opens, and Jim's old friends from the 25th century, Mitch Snow and Ray Bogle appear.

Jim tells A41397X442 and Derp how he used to live in the 25th century, but he flew his ship through a time disturbance and ended up in the 30th century. Mitch and Ray call Jim "Jimmy" and reveal his name is actually James Lyons. Snow and Lyons were his best friends. Ray Bogle in particular is taken with A41397X442.

Snow and Bogle soon reveal that all of Earth took the loss of Jim pretty hard when he flew through the time disturbance, and all of humanity banded together to figure out how to find and retrieve Jim. A general armistice was called and after five years and ten inventions, Snow and Bogle were sent to the thirty first century to bring Jim back.

Jim, however, insists he is not going back to the 25th century, which very much upsets Bogle and Snow. He claims that he is home now, and if he went back, and humanity would stop striving to be better since their goal was reached with Jim returned. Jim claims he did as much good as he could back then, and he has too much good to do in the thirty-first century.

Snow asks what will happen with Cynthia, the woman Jim was married to. They also had a child, Owen. Jim blesses a relationship between Cynthia and Mitch Snow, saying he's already done as much good as he could for all of them, as now Snow will have someone when he didn't before.

A41397X442 announces another time disturbance. Harry Deacon from the Twenty First century, Jim's first Astronaut partner, also comes through a small fissure in the hole in time Bogle and Snow made. The Twenty-Sixth century time hole that scientists in Snow and Bogle's time is an open sore, which allowed Deacon to appear in the thirty first century at the same time as Snow and Bogle.

Jim reveals that he is actually an Astronaut from the twenty-first century. There was a hiccup in Jim's cryo-sleep, and he slept for five hundred years before becoming a twenty-fifth century astronaut. Deacon wants Jim to go back with him to the 21st Century, where Jim has a wife named Elizabeth and a son named Jimmy Jr. Jim declines, instead asks Harry to have Todd Cooper take care of Elizabeth and Jimmy Jr. in his absence, and his fissure fades.

Jim encourages Bogle to go back to his time and find himself. Derp and A41397X442 realize that Ray Bogle was the inventor of sentient robots. A41397X442 tells Bogle this just before Bogle and Snow go back to the twenty-sixth century. Snow did not forgive Jim for not returning to the twenty-sixth century with him, calling him a snake in the grass.

Afterwards, A41397X442, Derp and Jim all head back to the retreat together.

End theme[]

A hero for all time was what he aimed to be

With valor he is filled to the brim

The champion and mayor of the Martian frontier

Sky's the limit for Cactoid Jim

Oh that sure-shooting, ice-breaking, star-ascending Cactoid Jim!

Cactoid Jim Descriptors[]

That needlepointing Cactoid Jim
The origin of Cactoid Jim
That inspiration Cactoid Jim
Oh that sure-shooting, ice-breaking, star-ascending Cactoid Jim!

Notes[]

This is where we first learn that the Jim Lyons from War of Two Worlds is also Cactoid Jim. It appears that Lyons, who was once a baseball player, turned astronaut sometime after he was credited with finding the Martian weakness to nuts that would eventually win the War of Two Worlds.
It's likely that the Todd Cooper that Jim asks Harry to have take care of his 21st century wife and child is named for the real-world Todd Cooper that works at Largo doing various tasks including controlling the curtain.

Continuity[]

This is the 83rd episode of The Thrilling Adventure Hour.
The previous episode is #82 One Night at O'Tooles, which is also the previous episode in Sparks Nevada universe canon.
The next episode is Down in Moonshine Holler - Nativity Ploy.
The next episode in Sparks Nevada canon is #86 Mercy Killing.

Production[]

This episode was recorded at Largo on March 3, 2012 and released on August 13, 2012.

Writers: Ben Acker and Ben Blacker
Director: Aaron Ginsburg
Music: Andy Paley & the Andy Paley Orchestra
Cactoid Jim Theme: Andy Paley
Theme performed by: Willy Watson, Sara Watkins, Sean Watkins