Out of the
Picture
I always love it when a plot that doesn’t sound all that
interesting turns out to be something great that you weren’t expecting. That’s just what happens with this cartoon,
and the final result isn’t just great, but also one of the most heartwarming
through character bonds and developments. At its core, this cartoon is just another
Lincoln and Clyde misadventure this time featuring the boys trying to get
themselves in yearbook group photos so that they won’t be forgotten. At first glance, it doesn’t really sound that
interesting since it’s hard to think of what noteworthy things can be done
with this setup, not to mention they both have family and friends who will
always remember them. Admittedly, in
execution, this part of the cartoon turns out to be the least interesting and a
little stupid since Lincoln and Clyde’s attempts to put themselves in group
photos are filled with obvious drawbacks that are easy to see coming. When they first sneak into the photos in
disguise, you can easily see that their attempt will fail because they
obviously don’t have the right grasp on the groups they're sneaking into, except
for the morticians club whose failure is beyond their control. Stupidity also abounds when they get jobs on
the yearbook staff and Photoshop themselves in all groups, even ones that don’t
make sense to have members, which could clearly get students and staff to notice
something’s not quite right. The cartoon
may have the boys look very dumb which isn’t the best impression of them to
leave on the audience, but that’s where the true greatness of the cartoon comes
in. There’s also a subplot of Lola
getting extremely angered by the yearbook’s mediator, Coach Pacowski, taking a
bad yearbook photo of her, putting her pageant reputation at great risk. You’d think it would be hard to sympathize
with someone vain, bratty, and overactive like Lola, but through exaggerations
of her anger spurts, she’s honestly pretty hilarious, and worth following as
she tries to switch out her photo. This
leads to entertaining interactions with the sisters who have different ideas of
photographing her, ending with Lily, of all Louds, taking the best one. Also when she finds out that Lincoln and
Clyde are on the yearbook staff, there’s a lot of genuine sweetness from her as
she entrusts them to switch out her bad yearbook photo with the improved
one. Of course, the boys intend to add
in the group photos with them included, but as Lincoln is doing so, he listens
in on Clyde’s mock therapy session for Coach Pacowski. In an interesting move that develops the
coach beyond a standard gym teacher, he reveals that he gets stressed due to
being forced to move away from his hopes, dreams, and reason to live by his
parents. This isn’t only relatable to most people who feel stress, but Lincoln
also finds it relatable to Lola, which brings on one of his most noble deeds of
deciding to forget adding the staged group photos (which really wouldn’t have
worked anyway) and switching Lola’s picture instead. In the end, the boys’ sacrifice for the good
of one of Lincoln’s sisters is greatly rewarding for everyone. Lola gets a good photo in the yearbook and
has one of her nicest moments with her brother and his friend, Lincoln and
Clyde end up as part of the staff photo, which they honestly joined, in the
yearbook, and even Coach Pacowski gets to live out his true passion of Irish step-dancing
for a while. This cartoon would’ve been
dumb and drab if it wasn’t for the funny, heartwarming, and insightful
subplots. As a result, we’re left with
one strong cartoon most wouldn’t see coming. 9.5/10
Room with a
Feud
Most fans of this show, including me, have made it perfectly
clear that the cartoon, “Brawl in the Family” is a major failure of this show. It rewards a protocol that creates major
hardships for everyone that only Lincoln notices, makes Lincoln look like an
idiot when he’s supposed to be a brotherly, man with the plan, and gets really
unpleasant by throwing in needless insults that don’t relate to the main
conflict. I can’t say for sure if the
crew behind this show intended for this to happen, but this cartoon, with a
very similar subject of fights, greatly gets right what “Brawl in the Family”
got wrong. Lincoln’s sisters are constantly
having roommate issues which gets out of hand, leading Lincoln to step in to
help them. He gives them a compatibility test to have them find better
roommates, and unlike in “Brawl in the Family,” the sisters are open to letting
him try to solve their issues, as if they appreciate that he wants to help and
get his talent of problem-solving. As
for the sisters’ fights, they never harshly affect the lifestyle of the house
and the sisters' fighting stays on point, never getting worse through adding
on extraneous, unrelated insults. Plus,
the fights are leveled out by several nice moments that make up the
cartoon. It’s well-known that the
sisters have their own entertaining quirks which is what makes life in the Loud
House fun to watch most of the time, so to see two sisters who normally
wouldn’t be roommates together is great to see.
Lynn and Lana bond over playing dirty, Luna and Lisa enjoy being loud,
Leni seems to find Luan’s jokes funny, Lola and Lucy nicely socialize over a
tea party, and even Lori and Lily, the oldest and youngest Loud together, bond
over their love of using the phone.
Unfortunately, while the new team-ups work well at first, the sisters
still find something to fight about, though the fights greatly continue to stay
on topic. Also, even if Lincoln’s
compatibility test failed, the reveal for the failure makes him look misguided
due to following something from a comic he understandably wouldn’t know would
be a good option for anyone not a fan of the comic in real life, as opposed to the careless idiot he was in “Brawl
in the Family.” Also, the sisters
continue to try and settle the fighting roommate issue with Lisa’s more
scientific measures directing everyone where to go, including Lincoln who ends
up paired with Lily. It turns out that
even though he’s had a good relationship with Lily before, her baby habits
don’t make her an ideal roommate.
However, everyone else gets along splendidly as shown through even more
nice interactions between different sisters.
In fact, the new pairings are so nice to watch, from ones with shared
interests like Luna and Lana, Lori and Lola, and Luan and Lucy to unexpected
good teams like Lynn and Leni, that Lincoln can’t bring himself to protest this
and willingly puts up with his problematic roommate. This is made even better by what happens next.
Like in the previous cartoon, Lincoln’s generous actions are appropriately
rewarded with him being moved back to his own room. The sisters even decide to go back to their
old rooms too, even if they don’t have to, saying that they can all get along
if they change their attitudes. Not only
does this continue to completely trump the last fight-centered cartoon’s idea
of settling conflicts, but it nicely wraps up everyone’s hardships with a great
display of family love this show can’t live without. Everything here amounts to a great little
cartoon with pleasing character interactions, proof that the siblings do care
for each other, and best of all, presenting the sibling fights in a respectable
and considerate manner. 10/10
The Ranking
- 11 Louds a Leapin’
- L is for Love
- Pulp Friction
- Frog Wild
- Party Down
- Room with a Feud
- Lock n Loud
- Fed Up
- Out of the Picture
- Potty Mouth
- The Loudest Mission: Relative Chaos
- Baby Steps
- Shell Shock
- Suite and Sour
- Back in Black
- Patching Things Up
- The Whole Picture
- The Old and the Restless
- Kick the Bucket List
- Intern for the Worse
- Cheater by the Dozen
- Pets Peeved
- Making the Grade
- Vantastic Voyage
- No Such Luck
- Brawl in the Family
Be sure to stay tuned for the review of the next episode where it really shows that Lincoln has great friends as well as a great family as Clyde and the others get him "Back Out There," and Lucy has some fun with an ancient book of spells in "Spell it Out."
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