Business Time

"Business Time" is the eighth episode in season one of Adventure Time. This and the episode "Evicted!" were shown before the show's official premiere.

Synopsis
Jake thaws out strange zombie-like businessmen from an iceberg, who teach him of the ways of efficiency while forcing him and Finn into a sedentary lifestyle.

Plot
Finn and Jake are melting icebergs in Iceberg Lake to find items to build their Gauntlet Dock, but they find an iceberg with four men frozen in it. When their iceberg is melted, they turn out to be Businessmen from the 21st century that they hire to do small chores for them, like finishing their Gauntlet Dock. Seeing how successful the dock was once trying it out, Finn decides to keep them around.

As Finn and Jake return to the tree house, the Businessmen begin to improve on Finn and Jake's heroing skills through various minor additions, including cleaning Finn's sword and setting up a "hero monitor" to keep an eye on any evil in and around Ooo, allowing for the duo to take a breather to play video games and eat ice cream instead of always being on the alert. The first such evil disturbance discovered by the monitor is Hot Dog Princess crying for help when Battle Cubes attack her. At first, Finn feels the benefits of relaxation and becomes more excited to be going on the rescue mission. But while fighting the Battle Cubes, Finn and Jake get tired due to battling them for too long and leave it to the Businessmen. As the Businessmen battle the cubes, Finn realizes that they are helpful after all and accepts them. The quartet end up getting promoted for "taking one for the team" while Hot Dog Princess kisses her rescuers for saving her.

The Businessmen soon begin to do all the work for Finn and Jake as they eat ice cream and play games on BMO. Unfortunately, by becoming so sedentary, Finn and Jake begin to lose their edge: they become more tired while growing fatter from sitting around their tree house, to a point where they can make "gut images" of others such as Ice King and Princess Bubblegum. Not even Lumpy Space Princess's cries for help on the Hero Monitor are enough to force them back into action.

Eventually, the Businessmen turn into villains (who are narrowly thinking they are doing the right thing) and start vacuuming Fuzzy Friends into their giant Finn-bot's "Care Sac" to protect them. Finn fires them, and they fly into an uncontrollable rage, sucking in everything including Finn. Jake, using his fat to his advantage, gets stuck in the vacuum tube and keeps growing until the vacuum robot explodes. As Finn falls, he rehires the businessmen and tells them to refreeze themselves and float back into the lake. Jake instantly shrinks back into his normal size, reducing his fat. Finn tries to suck in his gut like Jake, but is still fat. It ends with a stark closeup on Finn's unhappy face with 'THE END' on it.

Major characters

 * Finn
 * Jake
 * Businessmen

Minor characters

 * Flambo
 * Hot Dog Princess
 * Battle Cubes
 * Lumpy Space Princess
 * Swamp Giant
 * Fuzzy Friends
 * BMO
 * Snail

Trivia

 * This episode was shown as a sneak peek on Cartoon Network on March 11, 2010.
 * The cover of Fantastic Story Magazine was the inspiration for the title card.
 * In the episode "Ocean of Fear", it is revealed that Finn is afraid of the ocean, even though he jumps in what looks like the ocean in this episode. When asked about this, Pendleton Ward stated that the body of water in this episode was just a lake.
 * The businessmen write "Fin and Jake Adventure Inc." on their briefcases, misspelling Finn's name.
 * Finn and Jake play an Abraham Lincoln game on BMO, a possible reference to the Animated Short.
 * When Finn notices the businessmen collecting the Fuzzy Friends, he suddenly appears wearing his backpack, even though he was not wearing it earlier in the scene.
 * As they are waving goodbye to the businessmen, one of the Fuzzy Friends says "Pancakes!"
 * Due to the lack of knowledge about real businessmen in Ooo, it seems possible that the businessmen were frozen either before, during, or as a result of the Mushroom War.
 * In this episode, Finn and Jake eat about 48 tubs of ice cream.
 * This is BMO's debut episode.
 * One of the businessmen pronounces fired as "fie-red".
 * One of the businessmen, particularly the leader, has a red tie instead of a blue one.
 * The Giant Robot the Businessmen use resembles Finn.
 * A Battle Cube is sleeping with Hotdog Princess.
 * Although they are not much taller than Finn, in the title card they are giants.