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Waste Management

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Waste Management
KRBaY E087 Crowemon laser attack wide shot screenshot.png
Crowemon and his crow army harass Dyna Blade as the others watch at a distance.
Details
First aired Japan June 21, 2003
NA June 4, 2005
Episode # 87
Episode # (US) 87
Copy Ability (Abilities) featured Wing
Monster(s) featured Crowemon
Character(s) featured Kirby, Tiff, King Dedede, Crowemon
Episode order
A Chow Challenge Shell-Shocked
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This article is about the episode with Crowemon, and should not be confused with Junk Jam or A Trashy Tale.

Waste Management is the 87th episode of the Kirby: Right Back at Ya! series. In this episode, King Dedede attempts to take care of his garbage by having a murder of dislocated crows led by their talking leader scavenge it, but the crows become too greedy and cause problems for Dream Land. Feeling betrayed by the King, the crow leader finds the remnants of the insta-monster mixture from The Empty Nest Mess and drinks it to turn into a monster, and then proceeds to cast a hypnotizing spell on all the other birds of Dream Land to attack. The only birds who are not affected are Dyna Blade and Dyna Chick, who are thereafter threatened by the crow army. To stop them, Kirby gains the Wing Copy Ability and rescues Dyna Chick from the monster crow's clutches, allowing Dyna Blade to take care of the rest. Tiff then promises the leader crow - now returned to normal - to help restore their forest home so they can live in peace.

This episode marks the only appearance of the Wing Copy Ability in the anime series.

Characters[edit]

The following characters appear in this episode:

Cast of "Waste Management"  
Character Selected quote
Primary characters
"Poyooyoo!"
"I knew these crows were gonna be a problem, I just knew it!"
"Thanks for flyin' in, boys! Pick what'cha want and chow down!"
"We've made it! Our troubles are over! The ruler of this land has promised to feed our flock if we stay here!"
Secondary characters
(no dialogue)
"They're disturbing creatures!"
"On second thought, let's not have lunch here!"
"By orders of King Dedede this garden is being converted into a garbage dump!"
"I can't remember, Tokkori! I cooked it a month ago!"
"I'm a cop, not a scarecrow!"
"You always have to keep on your guard when you're around crows! They can be very devious!"
"They're trashing the town!"
(no dialogue)
(no dialogue)
"Go hug a tree-frog, sister! That's not the way we're getting rid of this rubbish!"
(no dialogue)
"It's time to take a stone-cold approach!"
"They got mine, too!"
"I was drawing this tree here, but a bird just landed on it!"
"Creepy."
"That's very eco-logistical!"
"Yes, but with all their cawing, now we'll have to deal with the noise pollution problem!"
"Your Majesty, this is an outrage!"
"I'll have to pop the battery out of my hearing aid."
"Now it is controlling all of the other birds! They must be stopped!"
"Our trash will be gone in no time!"
"What? Did you see one of them crows attackin' us in your crystal ball?"
"I say, it's a rancid mountain of rubbish!"
"That's weird."
(no dialogue)
"Well, ya got me stumped. I couldn't tell ya what this mystery meat is if ya paid me!"
"Yeah, he's tellin' the rest of the crows what to do!"
(no dialogue)
(no dialogue)

Locations[edit]

Plot synopsis[edit]

The crow army approaches Castle Dedede to take care of the garbage.

The episode begins at night out in the Dream Land countryside. King Dedede and his troops are hauling some cargo using the Royal Racecar and trying to keep quiet. Once they approach the riverbank, they proceed to dump the contents of their wagon into the river, which turns out to be their trash. They think at first to have gotten away with this dumping, but they are immediately caught by Tiff and the people of Cappy Town who had camped there specifically to catch Dedede and his troops red-handed for polluting their water supply. King Dedede is forced to backpedal and orders his Waddle Dees to pull all of the garbage out of the river. Meanwhile, a strange bird watches from the distance and starts to caw, which catches Kirby's attention. The next day, at Castle Dedede, Tiff and her family are disturbed by a rancid smell, and discover that the Waddle Dees are piling up the trash from earlier in the castle garden on Dedede's orders. King Dedede and Escargoon then reveal that they are going to use a murder of crows to take care of the trash, and they proceed to pick it apart. Watching the crows divvy out the food scraps, Tiff and Tuff notice one of them in particular who seems to be ordering the others around. Kirby momentarily loses his inhibitions and tries to join in, but Tiff pulls him away and flees the odor of the garbage.

As the people in Cappy Town notice the sheer number of crows around the castle, the birds become agitated and demand more food, harassing the Waddle Dees in the process. The crow leader demands more food from King Dedede, and he directs the crows to Cappy Town, where they proceed to raid it mercilessly and cause a panic. The Cappies soon retaliate by tossing rocks at the crows, forcing them to flee. They attempt return the Castle Dedede, but King Dedede wards them off using cannon fire. A short time later, the crow leader rallies his flock out in the countryside, and swears they will exact vengeance for their treatment by the Dream Landers. He then proceeds to start divvying up the food they collected, and finds among it a container full of vials of strange fluid with King Dedede's emblem on them. The crow leader drinks these vials, which starts to have a strange effect on him. Later on, Samo and Mabel are boating in a lake when a random bird attacks them. They recount this incident to Doctor Yabui, but he makes light of the situation. Meanwhile, at Kirby's House, Coo and Tokkori are discussing how dangerous crows can be, when they are suddenly overcome by a strange spell and fly off. The rest of Dream Land's birds follow suit and form into a giant flock on the sky.

All the birds of Dream Land are possessed by Crowemon.

Tiff and the other kids soon notice the birds acting strangely while they are out drawing. They try to back away slowly but accidentally leave Kirby behind. When they call out for him, the birds make their move and attack, forcing the kids to flee. King Dedede and Escargoon report the sudden attack from all the birds on Channel DDD while they themselves are being harassed. The Cappies proceed to brace themselves inside their own homes, but to little avail, and the birds cause havoc across the kingdom. Tiff, Tuff, and Kirby soon spot the leader crow, now grown to a much larger size, and Meta Knight shows up with the serum that the crow drank, explaining it to be the cause. Tiff and Tuff recall the events of The Empty Nest Mess, and realize that the serum in question is the same insta-monster mixture from that episode. Tiff concludes that if they are to stop these birds, they should request the help of Dyna Blade, and head to her nest. Once they get there, however, they fail to find any trace of Dyna Blade or her chick. Dyna Blade then returns with food for her chick, and Tiff tells the giant bird about the situation with the crows. Returning to her nest, however, Dyna Blade finds that her chick has been kidnapped by the crows, and rushes off after them. Dyna Blade soon finds the crow leader with Dyna Chick in his talons, who warns Dyna Blade not to interfere with their plans or else he will kill the chick.

Crowmon is defeated by Dyna Blade.

As Tiff, Tuff, and Kirby monitor the situation, King Dedede and Escargoon show up and try to draw pity toward themselves, and request that the kids find some way to stop the crows. Forced to hesitate for the sake of her chick, Dyna Blade is knocked back when the giant crow zaps her with laser eyes. Tiff orders Kirby to inhale one of the crow's feathers, and he does so, gaining the Wing Copy Ability. Wing Kirby then flies in and uses his Feather Gun attack to knock the crows down. From here, Kirby uses a Condor Head attack on the leader crow, and then rescues Dyna Chick from falling. Once Kirby and the chick are in a defensible location, Dyna Blade swoops in and knocks the remaining crows away. The leader crow tries one more time to attack Dyna Blade, but she knocks him away using her wings, causing him to crash into the mountain and knock away King Dedede and Escargoon in the process. From here, the crow leader returns to his normal size, and his spell is broken. Tiff promises to help restore the crows' forest to ensure something like this does not happen again, and the episode ends as Kirby celebrates with the Dyna Chick and some baby crows.

Differences between versions[edit]

  • In the Japanese version, there is an extra small scene where some Cappy kids are attacked by the crows after they leave Tuggle's grocery store with some snacks.

Dialogue differences[edit]

  • In the Japanese version, King Dedede cannot be heard when he whispers to Crowemon, but the implication is still the same.
  • In the Japanese version, when Samo and Mabel are being patched up by Doctor Yabui, Yabui initially confuses their report as hornets attacking rather than sparrows. This is due to the fact that the words for "sparrow" and "hornet" are similar in Japanese.
  • In the Japanese version, Wing Kirby shouts "Feather Gun!" and "Condor Head!" when he attacks.

Trivia[edit]

  • Near the beginning of the episode, Iro can be spotted in the crowd of Cappies gathered to admonish King Dedede for his dumping, but for some reason, he is portrayed as being roughly the same size as the adult Cappies. He later appears his proper size, so this seems to be a mistake on part of the animation team.
  • This episode takes many cues from the earlier episode Sheepwrecked, particularly when Crowemon gives his speech to his crow army in the same spot and manner that Amon did for the sheep in the aforementioned episode.
  • The episode takes many cues from Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds, set in a town beset by violent bird attacks. In addition to the overarching premise, the episode references very specific scenes from the Hitchcock film, including sparrows swarming the inside of a house by entering through a chimney, birds attacking a service station attendant resulting in spilled gasoline causing an explosion, and a large murder of crows watching and then chasing the children of the town. (The real-world inspiration for the birds of The Birds behaved the way they did due to toxic algae rather than insta-monster mixture.)
  • For unknown reasons, Kirby's House is painted blue in this episode.

Gallery[edit]

Names in other languages[edit]

Language Name Meaning
Japanese 襲撃! カラスの勝手軍団
Shūgeki! Karasu no Katte Gundan
Attack! An Unruly Army of Crows
Brazilian Portuguese Operação Limpeza Operation Cleaning