Bright Side of the Moon

Infobox VG
title = Sam & Max: Bright Side of the Moon


caption = The GameTap title card for "Bright Side of the Moon"
developer = Telltale Games
publisher = Telltale Games
GameTap
distributor =
designer = Brendan Q. Ferguson
David Grossman
Heather Logas
Chuck Jordan
Steve Purcell
engine =
version =
released = Vgrelease|USA|April 26 2007 (GameTap)
May 10 2007 (Online)
genre = Adventure
modes = Single player
ratings = ESRB: Teen
platforms = Microsoft Windows
media = Download
requirements = 800 MHz processor, 256 MB of RAM, 3D card with 32MB of RAM.
input = Keyboard, mouse

"Bright Side of the Moon" is the season finale to Sam & Max Season One.

Plot

What started out as a local mind-control scheme has grown to global proportions, and Sam & Max are off to the moon to save the entire planet from a lifetime of hypnotic enslavement. But when chaos collides with tranquility, have the Freelance Police finally met their match?

Chasing the Mastermind

Sam quickly realizes that the pseudonym "Roy G. Biv" is Hugh Bliss' cover name, and quickly determines that he must be concocting some mind warping plan on the Moon.

The duo arrive on the Moon to find, besides the tacky tourist spots, that the door to Hugh's lair is protected by Agent Superball, requiring proof of Sam and Max's "prismatology" level. After some trickery, they are able to enter the realm and meet the head of Abraham Lincoln, "Mr. Featherly", and the C.O.P.S. (all from previous episodes), now all members of Hugh's prismatology cult. Each of them have a special talisman that will allow Sam and Max into Hugh's inner sanctum but either can't or won't readily give it up without the help of the two.

Max in Pieces

Eventually, all the talismans are recovered, and Sam and Max enter the inner sanctum just in time to watch Hugh insert himself into a giant crystal aimed at Earth, sending waves of bliss to the entire population. Hugh notes that only one force in the universe can stop him, that force being Max. To prevent Max from stopping him, Hugh uses his magic on Max to "Separate his Bliss", causing his violent hand, his gluttonous stomach, and his slothful tail to separate and take on their own Max-like forms, leaving Max a faithful slave to Hugh.

The Final Battle

Sam figures out how to defeat each of the Max clones, and is able to rejoin his buddy with his key body parts. Returning to Hugh's machine, Sam attempts to shoot Hugh only to learn that Hugh is nothing but a large colony of space-faring bacteria aiming to enslave the Earth in order to use the slaves as food to feed the colony, and that there's no way for Max to stop him. Tauntingly, Hugh swaps places with Max in the large crystal, (making the world think they are Max) while he places Sam in a series of magical death traps. Sam gains hold of the Magician's Talisman, allowing him to also switch places with Hugh in each of the traps, though Hugh readily escapes each, seeing that bacteria cannot be killed in the ways the death traps intended. Sam finally sees the opening: by booby trapping the lunar lander trap as to have its engine blast into a pool of water, the Cleansing Bath of Annihilation, he is able to boil the bacteria of Hugh, and thus disinfecting the world of him once and for all.

Epilogue

While all seems to end well, because of Max being trapped in Hugh's machine, every member of the world's populace now acts like Max. Sam gladly gives Max his favorite boxing glove in order to take care of the problem back on Earth, as seen over the final credits of the series.

Trivia

*If the player attempts to put Jimmy Two-Teeth into the microwave or the freezer, Sam comments that he believes there was once a computer game that allowed you to do that, but he is not willing to try it himself. This is a reference to "Maniac Mansion" and its sequel, "Day of the Tentacle". Both adventure game series originally were created by LucasArts.
*Sam makes a second LucasArts adventure game reference when he claims he can only hold his breath for 9 minutes. This means that he is slightly less proficient than Guybrush Threepwood from "Monkey Island", who can do so for 10 minutes.
*Sam's exclamation of "To the moon, Alice!" is a reference to "The Honeymooners".
*Max asks Harry Moleman if the spoon talisman can bend wrenches, another throwback to "Hit the Road".
*This final episode brought back every character in the entire season (some only in the ending credits), with the exception of Brady Culture from episode 1 (although his afro can still be found in the closet). It is mentioned that he stole the hypno-glasses from the moon.
*The song that plays over the ending credits is a parody of the theme from "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World'
*The title of the episode is a parody of Pink Floyd's album, Dark Side of the Moon.
*The Spoon-Bending Talisman is possibly a reference to the spoon-bending child from The Matrix
*The See Through Lead Talisman is possibly a reference to Superman, as the only thing that Superman can not see through with his x-ray vision is lead.

External links

* [http://www.telltalegames.com/samandmax/brightside Telltale's "Sam & Max" website]
*moby game|id=/sam-max-episode-6-bright-side-of-the-moon