Jonny Quest (TV Series) Arctic Splashdown (1964) User Reviews

Seals and killer whales!

[VetteRanger · 8/10 · 13 March 2023]

When a US rocket with an advanced guidance system crashes in the Arctic ice, who better to send to retrieve it than Doctor Benton Quest and his entourage.

Hadji, who didn't appear in the first episode, is suddenly part of the group, and as a kid watching, I didn't question that. They'd finally get around to airing Hadji's backstory and acquaintance with the Quests and Race Bannon in the seventh episode, where they meet Hadji in Calcutta.

Here, everyone is dressed in snow suits, and of course a foreign power on the scene in a sub (two subs episodes in a row in fact) is also on the scene, vying to gain control of the module.

You'll find out that in the early 60s, cartoon writers were not afraid for bad guys to meet violent ends. :-)

Hadji appears with no preamble

[cashbacher · 10/10 · 3 April 2020]

The most memorable aspect of this episode is that it is the first one that features the east Indian boy Hadji. There is no explanation of his presence, he just appears in the opening with his name as a subtitle. Since he is such an integral part of the team and a close companion to Jonny, some mention of how he joined the group would have been helpful. The premise is that a missile has crash-landed in the ice of the Arctic Ocean. It contains critical technical components and there is a submarine of a hostile foreign power that is trying to acquire them. Dr. Benton Quest and his team are sent to the crash site in order to grab the components or at least prevent them from being taken by hostiles. The cool gadget of this episode is an extremely fast snow sled and both Jonny and Hadji know how to drive it. This is once again a demonstration that the boys are an integral part of the team, generally treated as equals by Benton Quest and Race Bannon. While the action is a bit predictable and the opposition forces are stereotyped, this is an exciting episode with an explosive climax followed by some fun.

Jonny goes to the North Pole

[bensonmum2 · 5/10 · 26 November 2008]

A rocket headed for space goes off-course and crashes in the Arctic. The rocket was armed with an auto-destruct mechanism, but it mysteriously failed to activate. Dr. Quest and family are sent in to investigate and retrieve the valuable scientific instruments on board the craft. But Quest and Company aren't alone. There's a foreign power prowling beneath the Arctic ice flow who will stop at nothing to get their hands on the rocket's many secrets.

"Arctic Splashdown" proves that not all episodes of Jonny Quest were created equally. To the best of my memory, this has to be one of the weakest of the bunch. The problem is nothing much happens and there's no air of menace so often present in the show. The episode features one of the lamest baddies the Quest gang would run across. After firing a torpedo at Quest's ship and hitting an ice berg instead (Am I supposed to believe he didn't see that giant floating block of ice?), #1 baddie decides not to fire again, but wait for later. Huh? How stupid is that? "Arctic Splashdown" isn't a total waste as it does feature some pretty cool gadgets like the ice skiffs (I think that's what they're called), that groovy Jonny Quest music, and that overall sense of nostalgia that I always get when watching Jonny Quest. A 5/10 seems about right for this episode.