Boss, I Shrunk the Mantis

"Boss, I Shrunk the Mantis" is the first half of the fifth episode of the American animated television series Manticoon Mayhem. It first aired on November 7, 1998 alongside "Beware the Dust Mite" on USA Network as part of Gingo on USA.

Summary
Snappy Mantis and his raccoon gang gets shrunk to the size of ants by Shrinky Woman, so they have to stop the villain before she and her army of ants can shrink everybody except themselves and dominate the entire city, if not the entire world.

Plot
The episode starts with a dog smelling the flowers in his backyard when suddenly, he gets hit by a ray and shrinks down to ant size, as the ants kidnap him and lock him in a glass container, as the ants come back to the villain, who is none other than Shrinky Woman. Meanwhile, Snappy Mantis is studying the other members of his race using a scope, and wonders how it must be like for them to live small, unlike him and the raccoon gang. Just then, they receive a call from his boss of the villain's scheme, shrinking other citizens in sight, and they immediately head over there. Suddenly, however, they hit by a ray and get shrunk down to ant size on their way there, and they are then apprehended by the ant army (who is now bigger), and get kidnapped by them.

When Snappy and the raccoons recover, they discover that they are in a glass container, along with the other kidnapped and shrunken citizens (including other villains). As the ants watch them try to escape with joy, Shrinky Woman arrives and tells them about her plan to dominate the city with her ant army, then leaves to shrink more citizens, as they try to escape their tiny prison, while the ants grow bigger. Later, Snappy and the raccoons, after some planning, decide to work together to escape their prison and stop Shrinky Woman from shrinking the entire city, if not the entire world. After taking care of the ant guards, they head outside as they get on a butterfly and fly over to where Shrinky Woman is.

By the time they get there, the ants are already about a foot tall, and are shrinking things in sight under the control of Shrinky Woman, not noticing the butterfly landing on the ground as the mantis and raccoons get off safely. Shrinky, angry that they have escaped from their tiny prison, tries to get the ants to squish them, but they swiftly dodge that as they try to adjust the shrinking machine that she is holding in her hands so that they can return to normal size. However, she notices them and tries to swat them, only for them to dodge that, too, causing her to hit the machine, making the ants grow to double their height at 2 feet.

The ants realize that they have been controlled, so they decide to take control over her, as the queen ant, their leader, takes the shrinking machine from her and places it on her head, then shrinks her down to ant size and places her in her own tiny prison. They then take Snappy and the raccoons and place them in their own tiny prison, where they then tell their captives that now that they are free to do whatever, they are going to shrink everything they can down to ant size and make everyone their slaves, as they become the "dominant species" of the planet, if not the universe. The ants start to shrink everything in sight, leaving Snappy and the raccoons to figure out a way to stop the ants from achieving world domination.

As the ants prepare to shrink the the Tower of Pisa, Snappy Mantis crunches really loudly on food, with dirt by his side, grabbing the ant queen's attention. Angered by this, she prepares to shrink him even further down, but Snappy manages to throw dirt at her just before the shrinking machine is activated, unknowingly adjusting it to "Regular size". This causes Snappy to grow to normal size, as he proceeds to head towards the shrinking machine on the head of the ant queen, narrowly dodging the blasts along the way. Eventually, he reaches the shrinking machine and takes it from her, but as he got to a spot where he can easily aim at the ants, and adjusted the switch to shrink the ants down to their regular size, the ant queen takes the machine, and they fight over it, but she accidentally shrinks herself and her entire ant army to regular ant size, and the tiny prison is retrieved by Snappy.

The ants later apologize to Snappy for threatening to take over the world, but Snappy decides to just let them go back to their home, but not before they give Shrinky Woman a taste of her own medicine as she gets carried away to her prison where she would potentially work in there forever. Soon, everything is back to normal in the world, and another villain is stopped, as Snappy is now studying the ants marching along on a leaf, declaring it as another successful mission, and decides to go eat out at a restaurant where they serve big foods. Meanwhile, Shrinky is spending the rest of her life working with the ants as a slave under the ant queen, who demands her to serve her punishment or be eaten by the ants, and Shrinky continues working harder.

Production
Coming soon!

US

 * Manticoon Mayhem: The Complete First Season (DVD)
 * Manticoon Mayhem: The Complete Series (DVD)

Reception
Coming soon!