Dexter's Laboratory: Ego Trip

Dexter's Laboratory: Ego Trip is a 1999 animated television film produced by Hanna-Barbera Cartoons and originally aired on December 10, 1999, on Cartoon Network. It is based on the Cartoon Network's animated television series Dexter's Laboratory. The special follows Dexter, the series' protagonist, as he travels forward through time and meets futuristic versions of himself and his rival Mandark.

While made for television, the film is the directorial debut of series creator Genndy Tartakovsky and was originally intended to conclude the series. Ego Trip was the first Cartoon Network television movie produced, and is the final Dexter's Laboratory installment to be animated using traditional cel animation. This is one of the final times Christine Cavanaugh reprises her role as Dexter; Candi Milo would replace her beginning in the third season.

Plot
After chasing his rival Mandark out of his lab when he tries to steal his latest invention, the Neurotomic Protocore, an energy source that also draws on and distributes the brainpower of its user, Dexter asks his sister Dee Dee to leave the lab, where she unintentionally enters a time machine stored near the entrance. Suddenly, Dexter is confronted with a group of red robots that have appeared from this time machine. They declare that they are here to "destroy the one who saved the future" and appear to make ready to attack Dexter. Dexter easily destroys them with the use of various tools and gadgets from his lab, as the robots mysteriously don't attack at all. Believing that he is "The One Who Saved the Future" that the robots spoke of, Dexter decides to travel through time to discover how "cool" he becomes.

However, in the first time period he visits, Dexter finds a tall, skinny, weak version of himself (known only as "Number Twelve") working in an office designing cubicles – and Mandark is his rich, successful – and sadistically abusive – boss. The kid Dexter berates his older self for allowing Mandark to bully him around and manages to convince him to come along to see how cool they become, but unwittingly leaves the Neurotomic Protocore and its related blueprints out in his cubicle, which Mandark steals as the two Dexters move forward in time.

In the second time period, all the technology from the blueprints has been implemented, creating a utopian society of science and knowledge where anything can be materialized through the power of the Core. The two Dexters meet their much older self, a wizened senior citizen Dexter about the same height as the kid Dexter who is responsible for bringing the world into this new age with his brainpower (and Mandark's brain in a vat who cannot do anything other than complain about his situation). Due to his advanced age, however, Old Man Dexter can't remember anything about how he saved the world, so they travel back in time to find out.

In the third and last time period, which takes place between the first and second time periods, they find a dystopic world where everyone is stupid and fire and technology are forbidden, controlled by overlord Mandark thanks to the Neurotomic Protocore. They meet action hero Dexter, who is tall, muscular, bald and sports a beard, fighting Mandark's evil robots. Action Hero Dexter explains that he and Mandark had been employed as corporate research scientists many years ago, where a jealous Mandark, unable to come up with the ideas Dexter could, stole them and passed them off as his own, using them to rise through the ranks and eventually take over the company in a coup – turning Dexter into the weak, cowardly, cubicle-designing Twelve.

Eventually, Mandark got a hold of the Neurotomic Protocore (due to Twelve's mistake in leaving it out in his cubicle) and attempted to harness its power, but set the core's positive flow to negative due to his incompetence with it, twisting his already evil mind. As the Core's now negative energies slowly swept over the world, they gradually numbed the minds of the population and allowed him to take over the world, hoarding all science and knowledge for himself. Dexter, no longer able to stand being enslaved and determined to stop Mandark, spent years digging underground to escape Mandark's tower, growing into his Action Hero persona in the process. By the time he emerged, the world was in its current state.

The four Dexters, determined to end Mandark's oppressive rule once and for all, go back to their ruined laboratory and use its resources to build a giant robot to invade his fortress. They manage to fight their way in – though the robot is destroyed in the process – and confront Overlord Mandark, now morbidly obese with brain matter, with his only form of locomotion being carried around his lair by a hook-and-winch. Outnumbered, Mandark evens the playing field by summoning his three selves from the other time periods to help him defeat the Dexters. A battle royal ensues, with each Dexter fighting the Mandark of their respective time period. Twelve eventually stands up to his Mandark after finally becoming fed up with his boss' abuse, who he defeats before rallying the other Dexters to reach the Core's controls.

The fight ends in a stalemate, both groups restraining each other from pressing the Core's main button; however, Dee Dee emerges from the time machine welded into the Dexters’ now-destroyed robot. With her sudden presence confusing the Dexters and distracting the Mandarks, no one able to stop her as she – driven by her habit of seeing what buttons do – presses it herself.

With the positive flow of the Neurotomic Protocore restored, the world's intelligence returns to normal and causes Mandark's three time-displaced selves to be sent back to their own time periods, his head to burst open with only his brain intact, and his fortress to collapse. However, the Dexters, realizing in anger that Dee Dee was "the one who saved the future," create a group of five robots from the rubble to get revenge on her for inadvertently taking away their triumph. The kid Dexter commands them to "destroy the one who saved the future" before sending them back to the past, unwittingly setting the whole series of events in motion himself.

The Dexters return to their original time periods. The kid Dexter returns shortly before he originally left, and sees himself fighting the robots he just built with his other selves. Realizing the time loop he has created (or rather that he has come back too far back to before he ever left), Dexter becomes confused when he attempts to wrap his head around it all but ultimately decides to ignore it and goes to eat a sandwich. When Dee Dee – who had already used the time machine to return home after saving the future – shows up, Dexter gathers up his food and walks away, still angry. Unaware of what she did, Dee Dee is left to shrug at the audience in a confused manner, as the movie draws to an end.

Release
Ego Trip first aired on Cartoon Network on December 10, 1999, and re-aired on New Year's Day 2000. The film re-aired as part of Cartoon Network's "Leap Year Time Travel Day" marathon on February 29, 2004. It was eventually seen on Boomerang in the 2010s.

The special was released on VHS & Video CD in Region 1 on November 7, 2000, and VHS in Region 2 on July 23, 2001. The VHS also includes the episodes "The Justice Friends: Krunk's Date" and "Dial M for Monkey: Rasslor". The film is included in the region 4 DVD release Dexter's Laboratory: Collected Experiments.

In a 2022 interview with Polygon, director Genndy Tartakovsky commented on the television film's scarcity, stating, "I don't think people know about it, honestly. Like, as far as the people who run HBO Max and Cartoon Network, I don't think it's been on their radar since we released it." In December 2022, Ego Trip was made available on Amazon Prime Video.

The film is included on the final disc of the Region 1 DVD release for the complete series, which released on June 25, 2024.

Reception
Marc Bernardin of Entertainment Weekly called Ego Trip "drawn-out", saying that Dexter's Laboratory does not do as well in an hour-long format as it does in normal television episodes. Christine Cavanaugh, the voice actor for Dexter, received an Annie Award in 2000 for the category "Outstanding Individual Achievement for Voice Acting by a Female Performer in an Animated Television Production" for her role in the movie.