View source for The Secret of the Moai

{{DisplayTitle/italics}}
{{Episode infobox
|series = The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest
|seasonnum = [[The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest season one|One]]
|episodenum = 21
|titlecard = The Secret of the Moai title card.png
|mainimage = The Secret of the Moai (TRAOJQ).jpg
|airdate = September 24, 1996
|writtenby = [[John Pelinski]]
|previousepisode = ''[[In the Darkness of the Moon]]''
|nextepisode = ''[[Expedition to Khumbu]]''
}}
'''''The Secret of the Moai''''' is the twenty-first episode of the [[The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest season one|first season]] of ''[[The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest]]''.

==Premise==
The storyline involves Jonny Quest and his team exploring a certain Polynesian island, where they encounter remnants of an ancient, advanced civilization and decipher hieroglyphs, realizing they are musical notes. This discovery is crucial in their mission to find "The Star of Polynesia," a powerful crystal. Meanwhile, Surd is using an alien craft to experiment with human de-evolution. He uses his new weapons on Dr. Quest and Race, who de-evolve into apelike beings.

==Synopsis==
===Teaser===
On prehistoric Easter Island, several humanoid apes emerge from a cave and hear a loud rumbling. An object descends from the sky, prompting two of them to run back to the cave; the third sees a strange, alien creature emerge from a perfect orb spaceship. Later, the alien straps the ape down to an operation table and hits a strange device with many discs mounted on the ceiling of the craft. It emits radiation, warping the ape to what appears to be a predecessor or bearded form of homo sapiens. Just then, the island's volcano erupts, and the lava flow engulfs the orb and hardens over it, trapping the two for eternity.
===Act I===
[[Benton Quest (The Real Adventures)|Dr. Benton Quest]] and the team are in Easter Island to investigate a strange lava flow. After taking pictures of the Moai, [[Jonny Quest (The Real Adventures)|Jonny]] helps his dad set up a vibroseis cannon, which collects sonar data and relays it to [[Hadji Singh|Hadji]]'s computer. He finds what appears to be a small, circular cave with bones inside it. As [[Race Bannon (The Real Adventures)|Race Bannon]] and his daughter [[Jessie Bannon|Jessie]] fly in on the PBY Catalina, Dr. Quest radios and asks Race to pick up a couple drill bits in Easter Island's only habited town. Jessie makes a smooth landing, and soon the operation is underway. Hadji has been analyzing the cave, and finds that it is a perfect sphere—four times Pi times the radius cubed, with perfection tracked to the two millionth digit of Pi. Dr. Quest agrees that only zero gravity could afford construction of such a sphere, and as the drill is raised out, Jonny volunteers to search. Inside he finds the skeletons of the alien and the ape; the alien is holding a rongorongo made from metal. They exhume the bones topside, where Dr. Quest is perplexed by both their structures. Jonny and Jessie suggest scanning the bones into Questworld and reconstructing them from there. They are amazed at the huge space for the brain within the alien's skull, as well as its large nasal cavity and lack of ears; the alien seems to have triple-helix DNA.

Dr. Quest suggests the nasal cavity may be a sound chamber, and Jonny's fooling with the bones proves it as contact strikes a distinct musical note. The team believe that the ape is the missing link in human evolution; that the alien presumably was responsible for making the jump. To test the alien's apparent evolution for harmonic applications, Dr. Quest rigs a keyboard to the rest of his equipment and a speaker, and plays the note made by the bones. The bones resonate, as do the huge moai statues across the island. Once the vibrations stop, Jessie finds that the normally yellow grass on the island has been altered around the statues, and Dr. Quest finds that the DNA is unique. He concludes that the alien possessed a sound-based DNA altering technology, a similar conclusion to [[Jeremiah Surd]]'s, who has been watching the entire ordeal. He postulates that the technology might work on humans, and that he could possibly be restored. He orders [[Lorenzo]] and [[Julia]] to take him there to steal the technology. Meanwhile, Dr. Quest has become aware of the serious moral ramifications of technology capable of altering humans in real time and decides to hide the research until the mechanics of the technology can be truly understood. That night, several of Surd's henchmen parachute in and approach the camp with guns ready.

===Act II===
As a henchman prepares to kill Jonny, he's reprimanded by his officer and told to wait. The next day, Hadji finds that Surd is hacking Questworld and stealing the DNA technology files; Jonny and Jessie volunteer to go hot in cyberspace to defeat him, but Race and Dr. Quest go in their stead. They find a digital recreation of Easter Island, and Surd tells them that he's about to reverse their genetics to that of primates as an experiment of the powers. Race deploys a laser gun, but Surd evades him with each shot, and eventually Dr. Quest and Race turn into primates in Questworld. As the team outside try to help, they are held prisoner by Surd's team, one of which whom prepares to pull Benton and Race out of Questworld, transferring their ape psyches to their bodies forever. Hadji protests but the guard shoots out the Quests' computers, pulling Race and Benton out of Questworld. Enraged in a primal state, they overpower and knock out all of Surd's troops before turning on Jonny and Jessie, who plead with them to recognize them as their progeny. Race and Benton are confused, and retreat to the grass in a docile state. Jessie produces a laptop with a portable Questworld unit, but Hadji notes that they have no way of using the technology with trashed computers. Jonny disagrees, arguing that if the alien's bones and the statues were musical, the rongorongo must consist of musical notes, not words. Hadji feeds the notes into the computer, and the tones emanate from the Moai. Surd lands in a Chinook, and Jonny tells him to turn around. They watch helplessly as another alien ship descends from the sky, beaming Surd, his helicopter, and his guards out of existence and reversing his damage. Jonny rushes to Benton's side, but neither can remember anything about the incident, and the computer files for the past three days are erased. Surd and his crew are in the Nazca plains of Peru without any memory either. Dr. Quest packs up base as Jonny doubts they'll ever learn anything about the moai.

==Characters==
'''Main characters:'''
* [[Jonny Quest (The Real Adventures)|Jonny Quest]]
* [[Hadji Singh]]
* [[Benton Quest (The Real Adventures)|Dr. Benton Quest]]
* [[Race Bannon (The Real Adventures)|Race Bannon]]
* [[Jessie Bannon]]

'''Supporting characters:'''
* None

'''Villains:'''
* [[Jeremiah Surd|Dr. Jeremiah Surd]]
* [[Julia]]
* [[Lorenzo]]
* Hired thugs {{Only}}

'''Other characters:'''
* Primate test subject {{Only}}{{NL}}{{Flashback}}
* Moai alien {{Only}}{{NL}}{{Flashback}}

==Locations==
* [[Pacific Ocean]]
** [[Easter Island]]
* [[Maine]] {{Mentioned}}
** [[Quest Compound]] {{Mentioned}}
* [[Peru]]
* [[Questworld]]

==Objects==
* [[QuestWorld V.R. Visor|VR headsets]]

==Vehicles==
* ''[[Catalina]]''

==Cast==
{| class="wikitable"
! [[J.D. Roth]]
| [[Jonny Quest (The Real Adventures)|Jonny Quest]]
|-
! [[Michael Benyaer]]
| [[Hadji Singh]]<br />Thug 1
|-
! [[George Segal]]
| [[Benton Quest (The Real Adventures)|Dr. Benton Quest]]
|-
! [[Robert Patrick]]
| [[Race Bannon (The Real Adventures)|Race Bannon]]
|-
! [[Jesse Douglas]]
| [[Jessie Bannon]]
|-
! [[Frank Welker]]
| [[Jeremiah Surd|Dr. Jeremiah Surd]]<br />Primate
|-
! [[Megan Cavanagh]]
| [[Julia]]
|-
! [[Chick Vennera]]
| [[Lorenzo]]<br />Thug 2
|}

==Notes/trivia==
* [[Michael Ryan]] is credited for additional story material.
* [[Bandit (The Real Adventures)|Bandit]] is absent.
* There is no Quest Byte.

===Goofs===
* None known.

==Home media==
* {{Home media list | TRA | s1 v2 }}
* {{Home media list | streaming }}

==Quotes==

== Navigation ==
{{Navbox TRA episodes|1}}

==External links==
* [https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00GBJUQ6C Buy] from Amazon.com
* [https://itunes.apple.com/us/tv-season/real-adventures-jonny-quest/id665438963 Buy] from iTunes (US)
* [https://itunes.apple.com/gb/tv-season/real-adventures-jonny-quest/id665438963 Buy] from iTunes (UK)
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Cdq7_e0CTw Watch the official upload] on WarnerBrosTelevision's YouTube channel (US residents only)

{{DEFAULTSORT:Secret of the Moai, The}}
[[Category:The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest season one episodes]]