The perfect Spiral Summer Break is the subject of the July 2023 Extra Credit objective. Where will I go? What will I do? Who is going with me? I thought long and hard about this one. My first thought was to take The Professor and fly to various destinations around the Spiral in his B.O.X.. However, he is usually too busy fighting off the Maestro to really take a vacation.
I next thought about taking Captain Reynolds and his crew using one of my Pirate’s ships. But on further thought, I’m not sure I’d want to take a vacation with that squabbling crew. I thought about asking Captain Pork, Beans, and Sparck but they’ve crash landed on Ariel Shore in Empyrea and seem to be intent on repairing their ship and not going on vacation. I thought about asking Bonnie Anne or El Torro if they’d like to go but they’re busy with Cunning Charles Xavier (my main pirate). In the end I think I’d enjoy taking a vacation with Istar the Dreamy Genie. And yes all of these possibilities (except Bonnie Anne) are from My Top 10 favorite pop cultures references.
Why Istar? In addition to the fact that she is a very beautiful female, she is a Genie. She’d be able to “poof” anything we would need for our trip. That takes care of everything except the adventure and what better place for adventure, tropical sands and sunny beaches than Skull Island. If it’s a vacation, we’ll want to go somewhere untouched by the wart against the Armada or spiral shattering vendettas that crop up every other month in the more magical parts of the Spiral.
How would we get there? There is no Spiral Door to Skull Island. I was tempted to use my Flying Saucer, but flying the Skyways in a UFO is too cliche`. We’ll take my Arcane Express. With no threats to the Spiral to fight off near Skull Isalnd and pirates dealing with the war against the Armada, Istar and I would have nothing better to do than to lounge on a beach drinking Yum and eating coconuts. Maybe we’d conjure up a boat and go on a hunt for buried pirate treasure. Now THAT sounds like a fun vacation.
The Pop Culture connections
Istar is a loving pastiche of the titular Jeanie from the 1965-1970 television show, “I Dream of Jeanie”. I Dream of Jeannie is an American fantasy sitcom television series, created by Sidney Sheldon that starred Barbara Eden as a sultry, 2,000-year-old genie and Larry Hagman, as an astronaut with whom she falls in love and eventually marries. Produced by Screen Gems, the show originally aired for 139 episodes over five seasons, from September 18, 1965, to May 26, 1970, on NBC.
I have no definitive proof, but when I first saw the Arcane Express, I was reminded of the Little Engine that could. The Little Engine That Could is an American folktale (existing in the form of several illustrated children’s books and films) that became widely known in the United States after publication in 1930 by Platt & Munk written by Watty Piper. My Grandmother used to read me the Little Golden Book version of this story on a daily basis.
In the tale, a long train must be pulled over a high mountain after its locomotive breaks down. Larger locomotives, treated anthropomorphically, are asked to pull the train; for various reasons they refuse. The request is sent to a small engine, who agrees to try. Despite the steep climb and heavy load, the engine slowly succeeds in pulling the train over the mountain while repeating the motto: “I-think-I-can”.
The story of the little engine has been told and retold many times. The underlying theme is the same—a stranded train is unable to find an engine willing to take it on over difficult terrain to its destination. Only the little engine is willing to try and, while repeating the mantra “I think I can, I think I can”, overcomes a seemingly impossible task.
*note the similarities in color and design to the Arcane Express*
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Dream_of_Jeannie
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Little_Engine_That_Could
Text for this article is excerpted from the linked wiki pages.
Previous Extra Credit articles can be found here
All Wizard101 and Pirate101 images are copyright of KingsIsle Entertainment.
Barbara Eden as Jeanie is copyright Sydney Sheldon Productions and Screen Gems
The Little Engine That Could cover is copyright Little Golden Books
All images are published under Fair Use.
Vulcan Stev's Database 