Beetle Mania

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**Beetle Mania** is the fourth episode of *3Below*.

## Official Synopsis

Royal super-fan Stuart offers to help eradicate an alien beetle infestation before it exposes the sibling's true identities.

## Plot

Stuart wakes up, tied up in the Mothership's kitchen. Dadblank starts to interrogate him. Momblank then joins him. Varvatos steps in and sends them both away, taking over the interrogation himself. He demands to know why he was spying on the royals, threatening him with disembowelment. Stuart then tells them he's a huge fan of theirs. He crash landed on Earth himself. He's from Durio, which is why he stinks. He tells them they're going to love Earth. An annoyed Varvatos cuts him off and is about to deliver agony on Stuart when suddenly, the fridge starts moving on its own. It's Skeltegs, who feed on electronics to multiply. Krel points the finger at Aja, whom is obsessed with Skelteg fighting on Akiridion-5. She defends that the pests must have stowed away on the ship. Their camouflage starts failing, both inside and out. Stuart knows a way to help them, but they have to untie him.

Zadra wakes up and remembers being in battle. She's shackled to the bed. General Morando comes in and says he spared her life. He wants her as a loyal subject to make the others fall in line. If she doesn't, he will kill her. He further demoralizes her by promising that his bounty hunters will soon find and kill House Tarron.

Stuart opens his electronics store. He's been on 30 years, so he's done a lot. Stuart looks around for his solution. Krel pulls a boom box off the shelf and enjoys that it plays music. Stuart says Krel can have it. Stuart then presents them with a vacuum cleaner, which he says will clear up the infestation. Varvatos then tells the kids they need to get to school. Unbeknownst to Krel, a Skelteg has come with him on the boom box.

Krel carries the boom box around school. Aja learns that Mary uploaded the video of her taking down Steve and it went viral. The whole school is obsessed with her now. Mary pulls Aja along with her and Darci, but Aja isn't interested in ruling the school with them.

Krel puts the boom box and the skelteg in his locker. Steve then asks him if his sister is seeing anyone. Krel misunderstands and says her vision is excellent. The skelteg flies out of his locker and into the microwave in the teachers' lounge. Uhl starts the microwave and a few seconds later, the skelteg bursts out of the now-broken microwave, where it has bred.

Izita sees that Zadra is awake and tells her they need to go now. She says she's with the Resistance. She leads Zadra around as she explains during Morando's uprising, Aja saved her child's life and she's forever indebted to House Tarron. She believes the heirs can fight off the bounty hunters and make their way back. Izita tries to send Zadra to a rebel base, but she says she can't leave. Izita gives Zadra a ring, which she takes with her.

Krel finishes his test in math class and then sees a skelteg on the projector just as Mary notices a bite taken out of her calculator. He knocks over the projector and stomps on the skelteg. He then tries to cover by ranting about overuse of electronics. He collects all the phones in the room just as the kids notice the skeltegs. He runs out of the room and meets Aja, who is also noticed the skeltegs. Aja and Krel realize they need to stop this quickly before they colonize the whole school. Uhl comes over the intercom and announces that classes are cancelled right before a skeleton eats his microphone. The power then starts to go out, so Aja calls Varvatos.

The phone rings, but a skelteg eats it. Stuart and Varvatos are working on eliminating the skeltegs. Varvatos is angry because he doesn't feel Stuart is doing enough as the skeltegs continue to fly around and breed. Stuart fails to reassure him with Earth phrases as Varvatos threatens to destroy him if he doesn't make good on his vow.

Aja and Krel prepare to face the skeltegs at the school. Steve appears and says he's going to help. He trades weapons with Aja so he can have his scepter and then goes on the attack Aja tells Krel she thinks Steve likes her more than other humans.

Mary is filming the skeltegs. The others come into the room and start to attack. When Mary's phone rings, they discover that the music makes the skeltegs freeze in place. They leave her playing the music on her phone and race to Krel's locker, where he pulls out the boom box, which has frayed wires. Aja is angry because he brought them to school. Krel sits down to fix the boom box.

Stuart and Varvatos are still fighting the skeltegs at home. Mother warns them that her functions are shutting down. Stuart asks to have all power re-routed to him so he can defeat them once and for all.

Mary uses her phone to kill the skeltegs. Suddenly, her phone dies and so Steve takes over, but Mary says nothing's happening.

Krel has fixed the boom box. He plays music and it works immediately.

Steve is still playing music, but the skeltegs leave the room.

They fly toward the boom box, which kills them when Krel switches it to techno music. They realize they need to take the boom box home to rid themselves of the infestation there.

Stuart connects the power, but it doesn't work. Just then, Krel and Aja arrive at home and use the boom box to kill the skeltegs. Varvatos forgives Stuart for his lack of help and accepts him as an ally.

Zadra stands behind General Morando as he speaks to the people. As he pontificates that House Tarron left Akiridion-5 vulnerable and that he will make them the rightful galactic power, a dissenter attempts to attack him only to be dragged away.

Izita watches on the screen as Zadra flashes the ring, affirming her allegiance to the Resistance.

Full power to the house has been restored and they're able to camouflage again. Aja and Krel apologize for blaming each other. Aja wonders if they can build their own daxial array. Krel first doesn't believe they can, but Aja says they already did the impossible once today. Aja asks Mother to open the windows because it smells like Stuart, but doing so releases a skelteg out into the world. It flies to where it's grabbed by Zeron Alpha, who knows Aja and Krel are nearby because of it.

## Cast

* Tatiana Maslany as Aja Tarron
* Diego Luna as Krel Tarron
* Nick Offerman as Varvatos Vex
* Glenn Close as Mothership
* Nick Frost as Stuart
* Alon Abutbul as General Morando
* Hayley Atwell as Zadra
* Darin De Paul as Zeron Alpha
* Jennifer Hale as Izita
* Cheryl Hines as Momblank
* Tom Kenny as Dadblank
* Laraine Newman as Miss Janeth
* Yara Shahidi as Darci Scott
* Fred Tatasciore as Señor Uhl
* Lauren Tom as Mary Wang
* Frank Welker as Luug
* Thomas F. Wilson as Coach Lawrence
* Bebe Wood as Shannon Longhannon
* Steven Yeun as Steve Palchuk

## Trivia

* Judging from when Darci says, "Last week, the teachers' coffee got spiked and now *this*?", it's safe to assume that this takes place a week after the *Trollhunters* episode "Bad Coffee."
	+ **Chronology Error:** The opening scene most likely takes place the day after the previous episode (along with "Arcadia's Most Wanted"), which means that episode took place a week after "Bad Coffee", then the episodes are chronologically mixed up.
		- **Plausible Theory:** Of course, if one wanted to keep the chronology intact with a guess, then maybe Stuart (through unknown means) was rendered unconscious for a good whole week while Varvatos and the royal children discuss what they should do to him (Aja and Krel maybe skipped a few school days, one of them being the day "Bad Coffee" took place, which is why they never appeared), until they decide to interrogate Stuart one week later after he finally regains consciousness.
		- Judging from the brief phone call between Mary and Claire, Claire most likely stayed at home from her illness in this episode, and it is safe to assume this takes place before the *Trollhunters* episode "So I'm Dating a Sorceress". If the Plausible Theory above is true, this and the hug between Darci and Claire in the *Trollhunters* episode "So I'm Dating a Sorceress" implies that Claire has skipped one week (or more) of school for her sickness.
* **Title:** The title of the episode is a reference to the intense fan frenzy directed towards the English rock band the Beatles in the 1960s known as "Beatlemania".
* Stuart Electronics was first referenced by Jim in the *Trollhunters* episode "Becoming: Part 2" while he and Toby flee from Bular.
* Steve regains his Spring Fling scepter which was taken from him in the *Trollhunters* episode "Skullcrusher", though it is never seen again after this episode.
* Steve tried to impress Aja for the first time in this episode. It is also possible that Aja started developing feelings for Steve in this episode, as she smiled at Steve with a satisfied look.

## Gallery

***Arcadia Oaks-pedia*** has a collection of images and media related to *Beetle Mania* which can be found at
***Beetle Mania/Gallery***.