Recap – Supernatural 7.14 “Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magical Menagerie”
Dean watches and any mortification he’s feeling about sitting there disappears very quickly when a girl walks by playing with a giant plastic slinky. It was if Dean’s wildest dreams came true! He gets all excited, rushes over to the prize desk and weird guy with the rainbow vest is there with his goofy smile. Dean has two words, “Giant slinky.” It’s 1,000 tickets. Hee, those things are such a rip off. You easily spend $40 in tokens, often more. Naturally though, weird guy won’t give Dean the slinky for a mere cost. “We don’t take cash here at Plucky Pennywhistle’s. Only tickets won through hard work and determination.” In other words, the slinky costs them about $2, but they want you to spend all that time in their place chewing through tokens, getting so hungry and thirsty that you’ll buy their overpriced food just to get enough tickets to buy their cheap crap. Yet I did it for years, because watching the excitement on my kids’ faces as they got their prizes was worth it. I swear, it’s the most crooked racquet imaginable, but you don’t see attorney generals going after these places.
So what’s Dean’s option? It’s double ticket Tuesday if he plays skee ball. You want to know how hard it is to win a lot of tickets in skee ball? Even when you do decent you only get like 3 tickets per game. Can you tell I’ve spent a lot of time in these places? Dean gives this guy a misanthropic glare and goes to play skee ball. Sure enough, a kid comes up with some tickets and a major smile. There, that’s why we parents do this.
Back to Sam who at least is being a jerk in a clown free environment. He has the nerve to ask the manager where she was last night. Duh Sam, there, with you after she found the corpse. She also has proven footage from the security camera that she was by the register the entire time. She didn’t hear the shark attack. She admits she’s new to the job, got promoted a few weeks ago. She had to write an essay about what she would do for the kids and got picked. She actually did two semesters in college. Oh, so this is the job college dropouts get. She wonders if she’s in trouble. “I don’t know, you tell me,” Sam answers. She claims she wouldn’t do anything illegal. Sam slams on the table in front on her and towers over her in the most intimidating fashion. “Sure you wouldn’t.” Oh, Sammy, you do know over the top bad cop!
Back to Dean who’s now playing skee ball and I’m just grinning from ear to ear over the boyish joy on his face as sinks the ball in the 30 slot. His game is done and how many tickets does he have…why 3 of course. He’s got a long way to 1,000. The manager leaves the office and Dean ends up throwing a skee ball in a hurry. He doesn’t even see he scores 100! He needs to figure out how to keep doing that. He catches the manager outside lighting up some marijuana. Are they going to hold that against her? Heck no! “High times not our gal,” Dean texts.
Up next on Sam’s list, weird guy, aka Howard. He’s so impressed with Sam’s “Special Agent” business card. He tries to tell Sam how much he appreciates what “you guys” do but Sam is still in dick mode. Careful Sammy, this is going to get you into trouble!
Now a fat kid is has climbed up the skee ball unit and stuffing balls into the 100 slot. Tickets are pouring out. The young kid of the employee comes up and tells this twerp that he’s cheating. I’ll tell you what fun I had with this scene. Every single time you looked at the skee ball unit, the number of tickets displayed as the bonus is different. Here it’s 430. The two boys have a stare down, and now the tickets is at 190. The fat kid ignores him, goes on with what he was doing, so Dean comes over and backs the kid up with an intimidating “You heard the kid, knock it off.” Now the big kid is scared and runs away. Number of tickets is at 280.
“Jackass,” both Dean and the kid say at the same time. Hee! I love Dean with kid scenes. BTW, the number of tickets is now at 330. The woman employee has “Tyler’s” dinner (so that’s his name) and it’s one crappy looking piece of pizza. Now the tickets is flashing at 450 again and Dean sees the tickets there not being claimed. That’ll get him closer! While Tyler protests to his mother, Dean takes the tickets. The ticket board is at 250 as Dean pockets his winnings.
Dean comes over and advises Tyler to cut his mom some slack. “What do you care?” Dean confesses he’s been where the kid is. “Your mom made you camp at a stupid Plucky’s after school?” No, but his Dad hauled him places. Plus his Mom is working hard. She must be exhausted. “And hey, free grub.” Tyler says the pizza tastes like butt. Dean can’t believe that and takes a bite. He tries to like it, but he ends up spitting it out. You know it must be bad if Dean Winchester spits it out! “That is butt.” The kid is smiling now.
Dean notices the kid is drawing his worst fear. “You scared of robots?” “They have laser eyes,” Tyler says, pointing to his eyes EXACTLY like Ronald Resnick when he was talking about the mandroid in “Nightshifter.” CLUE!!! Clue or not, it’s hilarious coming from this kid. Dean sees weirdo Howard walking by calling a kid “friend.” Not him.
Now Sam is interrogating the Lion. Like in full outfit, head and all. I just love all the absurd touches! “Lose the head,” Sam instructs and the guy inside does so. He looks REALLY nervous. Sam wants to know why he did it, the kid has no idea what he’s talking about. “I think you know.” The kid claims he has rights so Sam pushes the chair away, leans in and gives him the mean stare. “I’m the Federal government pal I can do whatever I want!” So, the kid throws the lions head at him and runs! That’s one use for a lion’s head I guess. Of course the kid has trouble opening the door with his big paws, but he does it eventually. Oh yes, absurdity well played!
The kid runs, but Dean is easily ready for pursuit. Sam is behind him, but gets held up because the clown comes over to see what’s going on and blocks Sam’s way. He’s so not a tough cop now! Sam overcomes his fear and chases, and I’m loving this 1970’s cop show chase music they’re using for this scene. You know the musical directors have been dying to use that score for a while. Dean chases, grabs the tail which rips off, and eventually tackles the kid into a pile of tires. Where did those come from? Both guys bounce around in the mess of tires, flopping all over the place. Um, anyone notice the gratuitous shot of Dean’s riding up shirt on his back as he flips upside down? It’s entirely possible that’s Jensen’s stunt double, but I’m happy with just calling it Dean’s. Yummy!
The kid pleads that the Meth lab that fireballed up in Butte (I think that’s what I heard), it wasn’t him. It was his brother and they have the same fingerprints. The kid shows off his lions paws and Dean’s weird face hints an unsettling mental picture. Dean decides to ask a straighter question this guy, who‘s name is Cliff. “You’re not using kids nightmares to smoke people, are you?” Leave it to Dean to keep things real. No, he didn’t think he was doing that. I think he’d probably remember that. Dean helps the kid up and doesn’t care if he “Broke Bad.” BTW, I just recently caught up on 4 seasons of “Breaking Bad.” Just, whoa!
Dean tells this guy that there’s some very serious stuff going on in there. Oh yeah, the stuff in the sub basement. The existence of a sub basement is news to them! He knows about it because he and Saul used to come in after hours and… he laughs. “You ever shroom in a ball pit?” No, but I want to now! Cliff turns to Sam and the cold hard stare tells him no. Laughing done. He wouldn’t do that. Just Saul. Anyway, they heard spooky stuff coming from the boiler room through the vents.
Meanwhile, back inside at Plucky’s the lady employee is ready to leave with Tyler. Uh oh, Tyler’s drawing is missing. Mom yells at him to draw another one, and Dean comes in with Sam and Cliff the Lion just in time to give him the stare. Tyler backs off and cuts his mother a break. She’s appreciative. “That placemat sucked anyway.” Now Dean catches that. Not good.
Dean explains the whole thing to Sam. “While you were out playing ‘Dirty Harry’ (hee!) Tyler’s mom got pissy with him and now his placemat’s missing.” What does this mean? “I think that bitchy mom plus sad kid plus placemat with something nuts written on it equals wacky corpse.” Sam decides to go warn the Mom which leaves the boiler room for Dean. Oh, but first, what did the kid draw? “Robot. The size of a house. Shoots destruco beams out of its eyes.” Sam’s reaction is priceless!!! How can he stop that? “At least I’ll see it coming.” Sorry, I must pause again.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!
Isn’t it really funny that the predicament he does face ends up even worse?
I only got through the second paragraph and had to stop and comment. You put that you feel Hammer of the Gods Is the worst episode ever written. I feel otherwise, that the episode is in fact a great one and great written at that. Therefore I cannot take your opinion on this episode or any other episode seriously, though I plan on reading this whole review. I would like for you to give an explanation why you believe Hammer of the Gods to be the worst written episode ever, as I can think of many other episodes much worse than that one. Thank you.
Finding my old reviews are pretty easy. I’ve been writing them since season three. Go to our episode guide (easy to find on the menu on the top left side). Here’s the link to the one I wrote for Blogcritics and the full length recap for here.
[url]http://blogcritics.org/video/article/tv-review-supernatural-hammer-of-the/[/url]
https://www.thewinchesterfamilybusiness.com/article-list/category9/7874-recap-qhammer-of-the-godsq.html
Ever since that episode aired, I have made it no secret how much I hated it. MANY times. Sorry you’re offended by that, but I can’t change almost two years worth of complete and total disgust for it. If you think that hatred for one episode is going to reflect on what I write about others, I’m not sure that’s being very open minded. After all, I’ve written of ton of these things and haven’t gotten many complaints.
As we say here, we’ll agree to disagree. So what did you think of the actual episode being reviewed here?
Obviously people have different tastes. I too hate Hammer of the Gods but I also hate Yellow Fever. What can you say? I always go into reviews knowing that on some episode the reviewer and I will not agree. I still love your reviews. If we disagree, I look on it as getting another POV so I can see the episode through fresh eyes.
In other words, thanks for all your reviews. I look forward to them.
Oh wait you’re Alice? My apologies! How I failed to realize that is beyond me! Much apologies to you, I am a grateful fan of all you do and I have enjoyed reading things from you and am a fan of the facebook page. I will keep an open mind as I’m now about to read this review along with the one for Hammer of the Gods as I enjoy my first cup of coffee and will give my thoughts when I am done. Sorry again for sounding so hatred toward you.
No problem! I apologize too if my response sounded a little defensive.
I certainly don’t expect people to agree with me (any many times they don’t) but I still have fans to this day come back to me blasting me for reviews I wrote years ago. It’s really funny how some cling onto those grudges. I’m glad to see you aren’t one of those people.
Honestly, when he used the term Juggalo, I nearly keeled over! I’m from MN, my oldest daughter is a Juggalette. I couldn’t believe it! She couldn’t believe it! LOL
Too funny! I must admit, I’ve never heard of the term before now. Great to see it used!
Hey, Alice! This was a wonderful review! Oh, and I agree with you “Hammer of the Gods” was not a great episode. It’s on my “yuk” list, but “Yellow Fever” is on my must watch list. I’m adding this current episode to that list. 😆
Anyway, at first I only really liked this episode, but the more I’ve re-watched it…it’s jumped up to a LOVED one! Definitely a solid “A” in my book! My number one thing that I loved…Dean laughed hard! It was a big hearty laugh. I haven’t seen that since “Free to be You and Me” although Dean did give a big smile at Rufus in “And Then There Were None”. The second thing was Sam’s look when he first entered Plucky’s. That was priceless. That look of raw terror! Jensen and Jared hit this one out of the ballpark! 😀
Now, the creepy guy was just that creepy! I read somewhere that he’s Julie McNiven’s husband. Wow! That’s really cool. He did a good job. His eyes were just…. 😮
I agree with you. There were loads of clues in this episode. I really think that the theory that one of the brothers is having a dream fits. You think it’s Sam and I think it’s Dean. The time references going back to coordinates could be…but I still don’t see where the 4 hour clue fits into the puzzle unless that’s the actual time. Reality seeping in. I’m going have to ponder that one for a while.
Now onto the next one! I don’t know about you, but I’m going to have the tissues, wine, etc. on standby and I’m going to try to stay off Twitter…since I’m on the west coast! (I’m not sure if I’ll be able to…that old curiosity killing the cat and satisfaction bringing him back thing) Oh, well…. 😉
So glad you liked both the episode and the review. These full length recaps are a bit overwhelming! To think I actually wrote these for every episode once.
Yeah, I’m really not sure if it’s Sam or Dean or both if it’s a dream scenario. I just wonder why they keep putting all this crap in. It’s my guess to torture bored fans!
Yes, Friday’s looks intense. We’ll see what comes of it. We just might need a few weeks break after it.
I was waiting for your take and i loved both your take and the episode.
1) About thinking it was an angel i think Sam was referring to gabriel like angel.
2)I liked that they gave both Sam’s and Dean’s pov on the same childhood memory.Whereas Dean thought Sam would have fun at penny’s Sam actually hated it.I really don’t think Sam was scared at that time of clowns,So that is why Dean left him at a place where children of Sam’s age group enjoy to do something he enjoys. I am no psychologist but i think people can develop phobias at any age.So i don’t think Dean was insensitive.
Thanks! Glad you like the review.
I don’t think Dean is ever intentionally insensitive. I’m sure things like childhood fears are something he just doesn’t get though. After all, he saw his mother toasted on a ceiling. Once you’ve had that happen to you, all other horrors pale in comparison. Dean just doesn’t realize that Sam has a different perspective. At least he doesn’t until it’s too late! Plus, what sibling doesn’t rib the other about fears? Sam seemed to have fun both times with the flying thing.
Oh, Alice. You did love this episode. I did too. I really like D&L as writers. I don’t always like their episodes (After School Special, Jump the Shark, Unforgiven, Time for a Wedding), but they know these two characters and I know I’m going to get insight into them when they write an episode.
Mostly I like D&L because they usually introduce deep insight and elements into the two boys and the story that become canon. For instance, Dean’s alcoholism was introduced in Yellow Fever. Sam’s unforeseen anger management was introduced in Sam, Interrupted. Also in that episode, Dean was seen to be truly crazy, which had only been hinted at before. John as a complete douche bag (or, as some may think, purely human) and Dean’s crumbling hero worship of John was introduced in Jump the Shark, and it showed that Sam was exactly like John. Dean discarded the amulet in Dark Side of the Moon, when Dean realized that Sam’s leaving for Stanford was a reflection of how Sam had always felt about his family. After School Special showed more insight into Sam’s character than any other one. I Believe the Children Are Our Future solidified Dean and Cas’s friendship, which we are still seeing played out. I’ll stop here on this point.
D&L episodes usually also set up what is going to happen in the rest of the season. I’m not sure I can tell what that is at this point, but Plucky’s did show that Dean is quite adept at using black magic and he didn’t flinch once about killing a human in doing so; whereas, in Family Remains when he killed the feral boy in self-defense, he did show regret. All I can really tell about this one right now is that the brothers were back to being the brothers we all love, for whatever that means, and that is a complete reversal of how we saw the brothers at the end of The Slice Girls.
I’m still really skeptical about this all being a dream season. If it is, I’m not going to like it one bit and will call BS for a complete wasted season that went nowhere.
I’m not convinced it’s a dream season, but I wonder if parts are an hallucination or dream of some kind. It just seems so strange they would keep throwing all that at us.
I’m so with you on what you said about Dabb and Loflin. I still think “Dark Side of The Moon” is a cannot miss classic. “Unforgiven” thought is one of my favorite episodes of season six, if not one of my personal favorites overall. I LOVED the way it was shot and how Sam kept quietly falling apart with each memory. Too bad all of that went nowhere. Kind of like “I Believe The Children Are Our Future.” Great setup that went nowhere.
Couldn’t agree with you more on Dark Side of the Moon. That one may be my No. 1 of the series (on the drama side of things).
Funny how a episode can be seen differently I dont like Dark side of the Moon at all for my own reasons. And Time for a Wedding was one of the reasons I stopped watching for a while .
And yet this episode from these two I enjoyed so these writers can be hit and miss for me.
That was a great recap, I do enjoy them so. I’ve already posted a few times on how I thought this episode was all kinds of awesome, so I won’t do it again.
Just a small comment on this: “There are phone booths left somewhere?†The show being filmed in Canada, yes we still have phone booths. Our shopping centers still have them too. And thank God, cause I don’t have a cell phone and it’s handy when you need to call someone. But I’ll agree with Dean about the yuck factor. I don’t lean the phone on my ear when I need to use one, and I purell like crazy afterwards.
Ah, that explains it. You Canadians are mucking up the works! 🙂
There are probably plenty of phone booths around in major cities but in the suburban and rural midwest US, they’re completely gone. I’m shocked to find they found one in rural anywhere.
Thanks for commenting!
Hi Alice
I loved this episode for all the reasons you and all the other reviewers and commentors have given. It was light humoured, fun (except for Sam’s beatdown, poor Sammy) and I just loved the brotherly moments.
As for the countdown clock I took those numbers to be the countdown in hours, minutes and seconds. The first one indicated 60:00:00 meaning they went back 60 hours(2 days and 12 hours) from Sam’s first NOW moment. When Dean is looking through the bloodied hole that the Unicorn made it was 36:36:07 meaning it was now 36 hours, 36 minutes and 07 seconds away from Sam’s NOW moment.
Hi Karen!
Oh sure, it was a countdown clock to hours, minutes, and seconds, but I was questioning whether that was supposed to mean something else too. These time references are popping up all over this season and I just wondered if this could be another clue.
I’m really glad you loved the brotherly moments. They seem so few and far between these days. We got to treasure them when they do happen!
Ok, now I understand.
D’oh! 😳
The glitter part was the funniest thing I’ve ever seen in this season so far. They are probably still cleaning glitter from Sam’s clothes and I’m pretty sure Jared kept finding it in weird places lol. it never goes away.
THREE rolling smilies in one recap! I’m going to hazard a guess and say you liked the episode….
Re: the different cars, I never noticed that. Why the hell do they have different cars? Could it be a sign of Sam’s need to be in control (because if he’s not then hello Lucifer) and also of Dean um, reDeaning himself, slowing making his way back to the Impala, which will be the final sign that Dean is really Dean again, not this half a guy we’ve seen for most of the season?
The Impala has to be a metaphor for something. It’s no coincidence that she’s been absent for most of the season and there have been numerous connections between the destruction of the car and the destruction of various stages of Deans life ie rebuilding it after Sam’s collapsed wall and after his father’s death. I guess once we see him sit back into the Impala that will means he’s (properly) back.
Re: the octovamp. The same day this episode was on there was a programme on about Humboldt squids. Now those guys are soil yourself scary. Ten arms, more teeth than our freaking national debt, a bloody BEAK!! Oh, and apparently they’re hitting the west coast of the U.S at an allmerciful rate (thought you guys would like to know that….) Anyway, I’m not surprised that Octovamp was on some kid’s scary list.
Wonder if the slinky will become like the new amulet. Admittedly it’ll be a pain to hang around Dean’s neck but at least it will brighten up the place (once Dean stays away from trashcans!)
Is JP pulling a Dorian Grey on us because I think he’s getting younger looking? Either that or absolute terror knocks years off you.
Up until reading DixieThorns reply I thought ‘Juggalo’ was a made up word, like some sort of strange type of gigolo. (What, I didn’t know it was a real word…)
I love the attention to small detail like the bits of glitter flying out with the clown tooth.
I think I’m buying more into your ‘The whole thing is a dream’ idea for this season. Maybe it’s because I’m on hollerdays (yay!) and I’ve had time to think about it but yeah, there’s definitely something there (either that or they’re overcompensating). I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see Sam or Dean get out of the shower at the end of the season and then see John sitting on the motel room bed, cleaning weapons (now that bit might be wishful thinking but still).
Thanks for this, Alice.
I’ve never been a fan of Dabb and Loflin’s episodes – I hated both Yellow Fever and DSOTM and was just meh about all the others – but this one I absolutely loved. It was a great big glittery, rainbow slinky, brotherly love hour of fun. Plus it had those wonderful clips of ELAC!Sam – one of my all time favourite episodes, not to mention my all time favourite Sam!Hair – at the beginning. 😆 I felt so bad for Sam in this week’s episode (I hate clowns too) but whilst half of me wanted to grab him and take him someplace clown-free and safe the other half of me was laughing too hard at the poor boy’s misfortunes. 😆 There were so many scenes I loved – Dean reassurring Sam over the phone and his ‘Sammy’ (awwww…) when Sam protested ever slightly too much, Sam’s near to overwhelming panic when he first went into Plucky’s, Sam’s bad cop routine, Dean’s ‘oooohhh…I want one…’ face when he first saw the giant slinkys at Plucky’s, the way Dean’s eyes narrowed so dangerously when the bad guy said Sam was the next to be targeted, Sam’s dimples and smiles in the scenes at the beginning when Dean was on the phone to Frank and shortly after when the boys were discussing monster babies. But my favourite scene has to be the last one. Dean’s laugh – oh how I’ve missed happy Dean, Sam’s happiness at seeing Dean happy, Sam giving Dean the slinky and the sparkly awesomeness that was Glitter!Sam. Fabulous stuff. Now roll on next week. I am SO excited to see what’s ahead for Sam.
Thanks for the review. I do love reading all the reviews here. Although I’ve got to say I hope the ‘it’s all a dream’ idea doesn’t actually materialise on the show. I really don’t want to see that scenario at all.
Fun review for a fun episode! Jared sold Sam’s fear and exasperation so well, though having lost many a game of skeeball, I do sympathize with Dean’s plight.
My only complaint for this episode is that is didn’t seem to fit into this part of the season. There was a lack of continuity in tone. However, Glitter!Sam makes up for so much.
I am starting to buy the dream theory. This whole season would make more sense if that was the case, with its odd time jumps and call backs.
As long as “Hammer of the Gods” is being discussed, I thought it had a couple good moments, and was nowhere near the train wreck that was the first 7/8ths of “Seven 7: Time For A Wedding”, but I respect all opinions – unless there is someone out there who has “Bugs” in their ten best episodes list.
Thanks Alice!
First time responder. I have wondered since last season if things were off because we were in Dean’s head, maybe a bad djinn trip. To me cas exploding and Bobby dying in that order were reminiscent of stull battle. Then I rewatched s 6 and realized …. oh the mytharc is purgatory. So not my favorite season but makes more sense. This season is Also off. In addition to everything noted in the speculative articles/comments I would add the conspicuous use of genre iconic. actors. We have seen Buffy /angel, x-files, and vmars/moonlight alumni. If we are in anyone’s. Head it feels like Dean. It feels like his pov mostly and his fears. And he is more the pop culture junkie.
[quote]
I don’t think Dean is ever intentionally insensitive.
Dean just doesn’t realize that Sam has a different perspective. [/quote]
i agree
Seasons 1-5 were the Winchester Gospel presented to the viewer as a cohesive and editted tale of the brothers and their roles leading up to the averted apocalypse, courtesy of chuck. Maybe seasons 6-7 have a different feel because the story is no longer edited per se. We are seeing events more piecemeal. In fact season 6 might be best described as castiel’s story and we and the Winchesters were in the dark as to his role for most of the season. If cas started it he may have to finish it. Season 7 may still be his story even though he has been indisposed. Who knows maybe cas is the “dreamer” somehow both aware and disconnected from events.
The Hammer of the Gods is very poorly researched. Hindu Gods are vegetarians and to show them as cannibals was shocking. Goddess Kali is the destroyer of demons and not a destroyer of the world and she is the most powerful God out there. Ganesh is the God of Plenty and the most kind-hearted, gentle and loving God in Hinduism. In Hinduism animals are worshipped as anyone with even a bit of general knowledge should know. That is the reason why Hindu Gods don’t eat flesh and that is why in India we have preserved wildlife for so long. That is why vegetarianism is so common in India.
I am a Supernatural fan, and the only reason I did not take offense at this episode is because I realised that it was just stupid writing. I mean how would Christians feel if Jesus was depicted as a cannibal? They would laugh I guess!
Just discovered your side two days ago. Finally, I can enjoy other fan-girls opinions on the episodes I am recently watching because I am new to the Winchester Universere and am still catching up.
I looooved your review for “Death’s Door” btw. It left me in tears again.
I felt like commenting on this review because I have a total different opinion on this episode, which makes me wonder why. IMO it was the worst episode ever. Totally unecessary and crappy. Normally I enjoy the more lighter, funnier episodes. They ease my hearth because it’s good to see the boys having some fun once in a while. I hysterically laughed watching “Yellow Fewer”.
But the whole clown thing totally lost me. I start wondering if it is because I cannot relate to those play paradises (what are they called?) one can put their kids into. The whole concept of such places is new to me (do they even excist in Europe???) and maybe that’s the reason I did not get all the jokes and the overall funny-ness of the Winchester brothers in such a place?
On the other hand I was really waiting for some moving-forward the character development and the overall story-line. So far Season 7 confused me with it’s sudden jumps in mood and non-comprehensible character twists.
But well, jsut my two cents. 🙂
Welcome to the site! Your two cents are most valued!
I don’t think this is the funniest episode ever to hit the show, but I did love the beating by clowns. Also compared to a lot of season seven, this ended up being one of the better ones. You are right, the writing was wildly inconsistent most of the season.
Those pizza places here are basically called Chuck E Cheese here in the US. I’ve spent a few times there when my kids were younger, and trust me, they’re the seventh circle of Hell! 🙂
Thanks for commenting and spending time with us!