“Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego?”
January 7, 2019 4:50 AM   Subscribe

Carmen Sandiego [YouTube][Netflix][OfficialTrailer] “The series, which is based on the character’s ’80s and ’90s edutainment games and TV series, looks to explore the origins of the international thief. The show will also feature some of her post-school heists, as she travels the world as a thief that only steals from other thieves. The trailer also gives us a brief introduction to both series lead Carmen, who is voiced by Annihilation's Gina Rodriguez, as well as her partner-in-crime, Player, who will provide the voice in her ear on missions — and act as a nod to the original games. He’s voiced by Finn Wolfhard from Stranger Things.” [via: Polygon]
posted by Fizz (49 comments total) 18 users marked this as a favorite
 
Netflix has been hit or miss with a lot of its films and tv series, but I'm loving the recent run of animated series we've been getting on Netflix: Voltron: Legendary Defender, Hilda, Castlevania, The Dragon Prince, Big Mouth. This looks like it's going to be a lot of fun.
posted by Fizz at 5:03 AM on January 7, 2019 [4 favorites]


Needs more, "Do it, Rockapella!".
posted by TwoStride at 5:07 AM on January 7, 2019 [40 favorites]


I hope she goes to North Dakota in this series.
posted by Servo5678 at 5:09 AM on January 7, 2019 [4 favorites]


How did I forget She-Ra and the Princesses of Power. While we're waiting on this to be released, GO WATCH THAT. You won't reget it.
posted by Fizz at 5:17 AM on January 7, 2019 [14 favorites]


This looks fun, TBH.
posted by tobascodagama at 5:22 AM on January 7, 2019


This looks fun, TBH.
Totally.
This gives me lots of warm memories of watching the show, playing the computer game ("You've come too close, gumshoe!"), and watching a filming of an episode when I was in middle school. Cool to see something explore her origin - and kind of interesting to reflect on the fact that in the game and the show, she was never really demonized: there was a playful relationship between her and the game/shoe's narrative. Go figure - it was about learning and playing, after all, and not about establishing this hard good-vs-bad narrative.
posted by entropone at 5:27 AM on January 7, 2019 [6 favorites]


Go figure - it was about learning and playing, after all, and not about establishing this hard good-vs-bad narrative.

Indeed, from what I recall of my childhood watching the tv series, it felt like we just misunderstood her, the thief with a good heart kind of trope, very Robin Hood-esque.
posted by Fizz at 5:32 AM on January 7, 2019 [2 favorites]


Looks fun but I dunno about the necessity of the 'thief with a heart of gold' aspect of the reboot. I never watched the tv series but loved the 1996 game (while thinking "wtf is a gumshoe") and despite V.I.L.E being a thing, I always got the impression that Sandiego was cheerfully amoral rather than an evil villain, as such.

Stealing increasingly absurd things like the Grand Canyon/all the salsa in Mexico/the entire island of Bali felt like the kind of thing one does for the challenge rather than from malice, you know? Hence the playful lightheartedness entropone identifies. Hopefully they don't lose that by making her closer to a conventional good hearted hero. Buuuut then I am not really the target market so good for all the kids who get this in their lives.
posted by ocular shenanigans at 6:11 AM on January 7, 2019 [28 favorites]


I love this and I'm giggling to be headed to Indonesia just like Carmen San Diego. Bali has nothing to fear from me, though!
posted by ChuraChura at 6:15 AM on January 7, 2019 [3 favorites]


It's pretty, but a story that rests on the phrase "Crime School" and manages to be so poe faced doesn't really seem consistent with the good-natured goofiness of the various Carmen Sandiego properties. Or, you know, it's own premise. Like, if you were doing a reboot of Legends of the Hidden Temple, I'm not sure I'd want to see a bunch of over-serious, moralistic dialogue while characters discus their shifts at a Haunted, Montezuma themed restaurant.

I might just be grumpy, tho. It's early. I also agree with Twostride: I don't see any organic way to blend a capella singing into this world, and that saddens me.
Ocular shenanigans has it, too. I'm really bewildered by the gloomy, melodramatic re-imaginings of things like Archie, Power Rangers, Transformers and Sabrina, which this seems to be a kitty version of. But kids seem to like it. Hyper-realism + high concept + ultra seriousness is just a weird, unpleasant mix. You can't quite call them 'gritty reboots,' because there's not an interest in realism so much as pathos, drama, and high stakes. The thing I love about late 80s/90s culture is its willingness to laugh at itself, even and especially when dealing with morbid topics. Because I'm old; get of my lawn IP! Yup, I'm grumpy.

posted by es_de_bah at 6:32 AM on January 7, 2019


I want to note that the Carmen Sandiego game show never made it out of North America, while the games and the 90s cartoon series both travelled worldwide. So when people say "where's the acapella" I'm like "why the fuck do you think acapella is the key part of the property".*

I've thought a lot about how you'd reboot Carmen Sandiego. They really hit gold with the idea of the mysterious grandmaster thief, able to pull off impossible heists, with a network of disposable henchmen so that Carmen stayed mysterious and almost playful. It's a dynamic you don't really see with any similar characters: either they're entirely in the background, or they get foregrounded almost immediately and there's no playful cat-and-mouse because they're too vicious or not enough fun. The only comparison I can think of is Omar, from The Wire, except the cops never really even tried to take down Omar.

This take, where Carmen is a master thief who liberates artifacts, owes something to the Chinese cultural artifact thieves that have been reported on recently. It makes a lot of sense for a TV series to focus on Carmen as a villain protagonist, although as others have said it's a little too earnest and po-faced in the trailers. At the very least, if you're structuring your show around a weekly heist you've gotta commit to doing the heist tropes - the break-in, the banter, the bit where it looks like it's all gone pear-shaped but it turns out it was all part of the plan.

But the computer games have lain dormant for a while, as well. They are ultimately about using an almanac as an aid to research, an obsolete mechanic in this age of search engines... but perhaps there's meat on the idea that Carmen and her henchmen hide through misinformation - so the goal is instead to sniff out when search engines are giving you a bum steer, and to assess how reliable information is. (How you make the game itself ungoogleable is a trickier question.)

* I visited Canada as a child, and it was surreal to find out they'd based a game show on a computer game, and not, like "hey kids like computer games" but they'd actually tried to make a proper thing. It was one of the most surreal experiences of my life until Pokemon Go came out.
posted by Merus at 6:48 AM on January 7, 2019 [7 favorites]


Lynne Thigpen wasn't part of the games either, but I'm still sad the Chief won't be part of this.
posted by Space Coyote at 6:52 AM on January 7, 2019 [17 favorites]


The Chief in Carmen Sandiego has been such a non-entity that while I think acapella would only clash with the rest of it, I'd be happy for the Chief from the game show to be the model for the Chief of ACME going forward. I mean it's either that or the Egon Spengler muppet from the cartoon.
posted by Merus at 6:57 AM on January 7, 2019 [1 favorite]


I'm not really familiar with CS aside from the basic premise, but I've already seen a few fauxraged hot-takes to the effect of "She's not a villain any more? Argh my childhood!" Because no villain has ever done a heel-face turn in the history of ever. (Or even just stepped in the "beyond good and evil" booth.) I'll check this out both because of G-Rod and Finn "His name will never stop sounding fake, but in a cool way" Wolfhard.

Also, es_de_bah: "Because I'm old" ha ha ha oh you. It's not about age.
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:45 AM on January 7, 2019 [4 favorites]


Stoked for the inevitable reboot portraying Mavis Beacon as a Hidden-Figures-type anti-corporate hacker, set in the early 90s.
posted by belarius at 7:46 AM on January 7, 2019 [31 favorites]


I'm getting a really great Samurai Jack vibe from the animation style. Surprised to say that I'm looking forward to this!
posted by AstroCatCommander at 7:49 AM on January 7, 2019


Time for the psycho-sexual soap opera reboot of Oregon Trails, replete with homoerotic scandal.
posted by es_de_bah at 7:50 AM on January 7, 2019 [5 favorites]


There better be at least one episode set entirely in North Dakota.
posted by ckape at 7:59 AM on January 7, 2019


It has certainly been one of the most effective phrases to kill off an earbug tune that's driving you crazy.

Where in the world is....

(yes hate me now ;-)
posted by sammyo at 8:08 AM on January 7, 2019


I would prefer to never see an origin story for an already established character ever again.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:26 AM on January 7, 2019 [11 favorites]


My entry in the inexplicably grimdark videogame franchise reboot: Leaving Leisure Suit Larry.
posted by Halloween Jack at 8:30 AM on January 7, 2019 [8 favorites]


I'm surprised nobody has snapped up Infocom's properties and made a Zork series.
posted by kokaku at 8:34 AM on January 7, 2019 [8 favorites]


I hope by "thief who only robs other thieves" they mean to show her robbing industrialists, government officials, and exploitative capitalists. If it's just her robbing poor people doing thefts, I'm out.

"They are ultimately about using an almanac as an aid to research, an obsolete mechanic in this age of search engines... "

On the other hand, I can't remember the last videogame I played without opening up it's wiki at some point or another. Some games I just leave the wiki tab or tabs open for the duration of my playing it and that's not all that different than having an almanac on hand.
posted by GoblinHoney at 8:38 AM on January 7, 2019 [2 favorites]


If it's just her robbing poor people doing thefts, I'm out.

I mean, Jean Valjean didn't exactly have an original Van Gogh for Carmen to swipe back from him, so presumably that's not where they're going with this, no.
posted by tobascodagama at 8:53 AM on January 7, 2019 [5 favorites]


yeah, it seems half original and fun, and half "here's another explanation of another random game design choice from 30 years ago, that didn't need an explanation"

Here's hoping they put most of the groaners in the trailer, and focus on making a fun spy series, like a 'Mission Impossible: Panama Papers'

You could take this FBI report and make a whole series:

But the playing field has changed. We have seen a shift from regional families with a clear structure, to flat, fluid networks with global reach. These international enterprises are more anonymous and more sophisticated. Rather than running discrete operations, on their own turf, they are running multi-national, multi-billion dollar schemes from start to finish.

We are investigating groups in Asia, Eastern Europe, West Africa, and the Middle East. And we are seeing cross-pollination between groups that historically have not worked together. Criminals who may never meet, but who share one thing in common: greed.

They may be former members of nation-state governments, security services, or the military. These individuals know who and what to target, and how best to do it. They are capitalists and entrepreneurs. But they are also master criminals who move easily between the licit and illicit worlds. And in some cases, these organizations are as forward-leaning as Fortune 500 companies.

posted by eustatic at 9:03 AM on January 7, 2019 [3 favorites]


Lynne Thigpen wasn't part of the games either, but I'm still sad the Chief won't be part of this.

She was in the version I played, which appears to have been some 1996 redo of the older game? There were FMV sequences at the start and end of every mission where The Chief would give you the situation. I don't think I was the only child who didn't realise that there was a US tv series or that she was a character from it, added to the game which spawned the franchise. As good an adaptation of the hardass police chief for children's entertainment as is conceivable
posted by ocular shenanigans at 9:16 AM on January 7, 2019 [2 favorites]


Make 'em do a 1994 map of Africa!

Oh wait, it's not that kind of show?
posted by East14thTaco at 9:42 AM on January 7, 2019 [1 favorite]


'No one ever asks how is Carmen San Diego?'
posted by Rumple at 10:07 AM on January 7, 2019 [24 favorites]


'No one ever asks how is Carmen San Diego?'

That's the gritty reboot we need, IMO.

Open in media res: Crash cut to a woman in red shirt and cement-grey and scarlet camouflage pants, carrying a large, art-portfolio case and sprinting full out.

[Ominous Announcer Voice] Everybody asks...

Cut to: Wider pan. The woman in scarlet is sprinting down an alleyway towards a black sprinter van, yards ahead of four lumbering security guards.

[OAV]: Who Is Carmen Sandiego?

Close up on her face, looking back as she jumps into the van, fingerless red leather gloves slamming the door as it peels away. Security guards lumber to a halt, some breathing heavy, some yelling into walkie talkies. Sirens in the distance.

[OAV]: But the real question is:

Cut to a young, red-haired child walking into an art gallery. Cut to her looking up at a huge framed painting, like a Caravaggio, something like Judith Beheading Holofernes.

[OAV]: Why?

[Inception Honk]
posted by mhoye at 11:13 AM on January 7, 2019 [9 favorites]


All I want is Carmen Sandiego to steal the cross of Coronado and then, when confronted, shout "it doesn't belong in a museum!", give it to the indigenous people on whose land it was found, and then come home to me her girlfriend. Is that so unreasonable? I also wouldn't mind if she picked up dinner on the way.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 11:50 AM on January 7, 2019 [30 favorites]


I also wouldn't mind if she picked up dinner on the way.

...and now we know why she stole the World Famous Peking Duck.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 12:23 PM on January 7, 2019 [2 favorites]


Soooooo maybe this has been asked already, but do we actually get learn trivia about the places she visits? Or is this Tomb Raider
posted by Brocktoon at 1:09 PM on January 7, 2019 [1 favorite]


I hope she goes to North Dakota in this series.

Okay so this came out while I was 10. Lived in North Dakota. And played a bunch of apple II games. Including, most certainly, Carmen Sandiego. At least on SOME platform.

Do I have no memory of this because I have a terrible time remembering things from childhood?

Because I played it and it just made sense that there would be state specific ones and I didn't know it was unique?

I think I need to ask my mom.
posted by flaterik at 1:10 PM on January 7, 2019


Carmen San Diego seems to be a grey hat in this version.
posted by ZeusHumms at 1:22 PM on January 7, 2019


Oh man do I love Kevin Dart's coloring and art aesthetic. So stoked he's working on this and not the Peabody and Sherman show (which was fine but forgettable). I really like the idea of a kid who is Carmen's Oracle and also the player-insert, as if Finn Wolfhard is playing the game on an old Macintosh SE.
posted by sleeping bear at 1:29 PM on January 7, 2019


Can we get a reboot of Leverage with Carmen Sandiego as the mastermind?
posted by demiurge at 1:41 PM on January 7, 2019 [5 favorites]


[INT. on a room that's mostly bare concrete. A simple cot is in one corner, toilet and sink in another. A window with both bars and metal mesh gives an exterior view. A young woman in a red jumpsuit sits in the window sill, looking outside. Two men with guns, badges, and manila folders sit at a folding table.]

OLDER MAN: Look, Ms. Sandiego--I still can't believe that that's your real name--you know that we have you dead to rights. We've got beautiful video of you at the scene. Absolutely beautiful. If it weren't a three-quarters shot, you could use it for your passport. Not that you'll be going anywhere anytime soon.

CARMEN: Yes, I've seen it.

YOUNGER MAN: Then I guess we don't need to beat around the bush. We've got DNA evidence that links you to the scene. You don't have an alibi. The best you can do right now is a plea agreement, and you will absolutely need to lead us to the Leonardo if you don't want to spend the rest of your life behind bars.

OLDER MAN: I mean, why won't you give 'em up? They left you high and dry, lady. You don't have the painting, you don't have diddly. What could you possibly owe them? You're no crook, you don't even have a shoplifting arrest on your record. You even return your library books on time.

CARMEN: Why don't you show me that picture again.

[OLDER MAN and YOUNGER MAN look at each other, shrug. YOUNGER MAN turns on a portable projector, which shows an image of CARMEN dressed in a red coat and hat, looking over her shoulder and grinning as she gets into a van. CARMEN slowly walks over to the projected picture, then turns around. OLDER MAN and YOUNGER MAN look at each other, mouths hanging open. The woman in the picture is clearly older than the woman in the cell, maybe by as much as two decades.]

CARMEN: No, I've never committed a crime--not yet.

[A hole seems to appear in mid-air, and a figure in a hooded sweatshirt steps through. OLDER MAN and YOUNGER MAN draw their guns.]

OLDER MAN: Y-you stop right there, buddy!

HOODED FIGURE: It's all the same to me, pally.

[OLDER MAN opens fire, but the bullets seem to bounce off an invisible wall in front of HOODED FIGURE. HOODED FIGURE takes CARMEN by the arm.]

HOODED FIGURE: Hey, boss.

CARMEN: I've never seen you--what? What the hell are--

[HOODED FIGURE glances briefly at the men, then back at CARMEN. The hood falls away to reveal a scaly, reptilian-humanoid face.]

HOODED FIGURE: Don't worry boss. This will all make sense, just give it... time.

[HOODED FIGURE and CARMEN vanish from the cell.]

WHEN IN TIME IS CARMEN SANDIEGO?

posted by Halloween Jack at 1:55 PM on January 7, 2019 [6 favorites]


It's been done.
posted by Chrysostom at 2:18 PM on January 7, 2019 [2 favorites]


Where in Time remains my favorite Carmen Sandiego game. I still have that little encyclopedia.
posted by Ruki at 2:19 PM on January 7, 2019 [5 favorites]


How did I forget She-Ra and the Princesses of Power. While we're waiting on this to be released, GO WATCH THAT. You won't reget it.

Yes. Also, something something Theater 3000.
posted by JHarris at 2:26 PM on January 7, 2019 [3 favorites]


It's been done.

Uh... sure! Sure, I knew that! I was just scripting out the, uh, gritty reboot. Yeah, that's the ticket.
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:31 PM on January 7, 2019 [2 favorites]


(How you make the game itself ungoogleable is a trickier question.)

Why would you do that? The whole point of the original games was to teach you to do the contemporary equivalent of Googling something- if you just knew something that was fine, but the point was to develop kids' research skills by giving them a reference book and a reason to read several entries. You weren't performing complex analysis- you were learning that when somebody says "She said she wanted to talk Vincent van Gogh's ear off", the part you should pay attention to is Vincent van Gogh. Flick through the reference book to the article on van Gogh and oh hey, one of the possible destinations is France 1850-1900. Fire up the Chronoskimmer and head out!

The skill being taught wasn't really the use of reference books. It was learning how to identify the relevant from the irrelevant and research it. Reference books were just the most convenient and accessible way of doing that during the period the game came out. Nowadays, you'd Google the clues.
posted by Pope Guilty at 4:20 PM on January 7, 2019 [9 favorites]


I don't love the animation on this. It looks off, somehow. Felt the same way about the DuckTales reboot. I also don't need a psychological explanation for Carmen Sandiego. I just loved that she was a badass woman running an international crime syndicate and jetsetting all over the world.

I had a version of the game (Where in Time?) where at the end of every case, you'd get a cup of coffee from the coffee vending machine, and depending how well you'd done, you'd get real coffee, or drips and drabs, or the cup would fall on its side and the game would mock you. I have a coffee vending machine at work like that and EVERY TIME I'm like "Oh man I hope this works!"
posted by basalganglia at 5:35 PM on January 7, 2019 [8 favorites]


I still have my dog-eared copy of Dante's Inferno from compulsively playing Where in Hell is Carmen Sandiego?
posted by ckape at 7:16 PM on January 7, 2019 [4 favorites]


Why would you do that? Nowadays, you'd Google the clues.

There is a game called The Secret World. It's an MMO, and one of its big things (other than being a game where you play as a member of a secret society in a world where all the conspiracies are true, and colliding with one another) is that it had quests where you'd have to do real-world research and Google the clues.

The top two pages of results for most of these clues, now, are walkthroughs for the quest.

Without an effort to make it ungoogleable, the game loop will basically involve typing stuff into Google and then clicking on a couple of buttons to get your next search term, which is just going to be tedious. The "looking things up" part of the game can't be the challenge like it was in the 80s, because that process is not a challenge in 2019.
posted by Merus at 7:30 PM on January 7, 2019 [2 favorites]


I thought they already did a reboot?
posted by sexyrobot at 7:38 PM on January 7, 2019


Yes, Google mysteries obsolete, including the titular question Where in the world is Carmen (Street) San (D)iego?
posted by pwnguin at 12:50 PM on January 8, 2019


You can still do The Secret World's research objectives without the walkthroughs. You just have to not click on the clearly-labeled spoilers and actually do it properly. It's your choice, just like it's your choice to download cheat engine or not.
posted by Pope Guilty at 4:15 PM on January 8, 2019 [1 favorite]


Merus: * I visited Canada as a child, and it was surreal to find out they'd based a game show on a computer game, and not, like "hey kids like computer games" but they'd actually tried to make a proper thing. It was one of the most surreal experiences of my life until Pokemon Go came out.

Obligatory xkcd:

"Late-Night PBS"
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 7:49 AM on January 12, 2019


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