Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt - Episode 8

I'm sure I don't need to tell you that zombies are the in thing these days (actually, never mind these days, they have been for quite some time), so I suppose it's inevitable that Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt would look to get its teeth around the genre at some point.

So it goes that the first half of episode eight brings us a typical zombie apocalypse scenario... well, typical until it comes to using the inventory of a sex toy shop as anti-zombie weaponry that is.  While Panty and Stocking try to get a handle on the situation in their "one day only" role as police officers, we learn that the source of the zombie outbreak is none other than Scanty and Kneesocks, as everything goes to Hell in a hand-basket as you might expect when you mix the brain dead together with... well, some zombies.

From here, the second half of the episode brings us a trial by television, as Panty and Stocking find themselves accused of the murder of an innocent Ghost; the loyal husband to a wonderful wife who also happens to be a Ghost, and a pair of character who look more than a little familiar to anyone who has ever watched Ren and Stimpy before... Throw in a monkey defence lawyer and Tom Cruise on the prosecution and you have your plot, as Scanty and Kneesocks again become involved while we build up to the inevitable Phoenix Wright "objection!" joke that becomes basically the highlight of the episode before our pair of titular characters get their moment of pole dancing and ass kicking.

After the wonders of episode five, the action-packed awesomeness of episode six and the loving Transformers parody of episode seven, this felt like a real let-down; a far weaker episode that slipped back into the cliches of earlier instalments with a first half that relied mostly on swearing and "ooh look, zombie movie reference" moments, while the second half arguably had some social commentary going on behind its tepid concept that did at least spawn a couple of funny moments, even if you could see one of them coming a mile off.  I suppose it's inevitable that Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt is going to suffer from variable quality given its structure, and after three good episodes on the bounce I'm willing to let this one go - let's just hope it returns to its dizzy heights (whatever they might involve) sooner rather than later.