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The Sparrow
Scouts
In an endearing move to develop Hilda’s transition from
wilderness life to city life, we get this episode that grants her human friends
who frequently join her for adventures.
In the process, there’s also development to the environment of Trolberg
as well as previously explored concepts.
As the title suggests, one of those concepts has been of a scout troop
called the Sparrow Scouts. They got
plenty of focus during the parade in the last episode, and two scouts, Frida
and David, had a fair share of moments here and there. Now, as Hilda becomes a Sparrow Scout to
follow in the footsteps of her mother who was also part of the team, her
friendship with Frida and David is pretty much solidified.
The main focus of the episode is on the three
of them forming a team for one specific badge.
Groups of scouts are assigned to clear an area of a park of waste and
plant a garden there. It’s a simple
setup, but it’s made interesting by charming chemistry between the three
characters. Frida puts a lot of value in
the badges she’s earned and has an almost aggressive need to be the best of the
best. David is easily distracted and
nervous and is in need of someone to tell him what to do. Although it’s apparent that one of the two is
truly productive with badge challenges, Hilda’s knowledge of the wilderness is
a worthy factor towards success. It also
makes for cute clashes of worldviews when Hilda’s plan ideas inspired by her
wilderness life put Frida and David at a loss for words.
Also aiding in making their simple badge
quest stand out is the world-building involved, showing that in this world, a wall
cannot stop supernatural things from happening.
After a long day of gardening, the kids come back the next day to find
their hard work vandalized. The cause
for this is a very agitated anthropomorphic onion-like creature called a
vittra. Through a rude yet hilarious
rant, he explains that through their planting, the kids dug up all his friends
and brethren who were hibernating below the surface. Apparently, the tops of their heads look an
awful lot like weeds most people would pull, so I can call this a creative
explanation for an occurrence. There’s
clearly no way they could have known they were pulling up creatures, so it does
get frustrating that the vittra constantly insists they did it on purpose. His ire also sparks less pleasing parts of
Frida’s character flaws when she shows so much concern for her mere badges that
she gets herself trapped in the vittra’s lair.
This leads to a creative and nicely staged explore through the lair as
Hilda goes after Frida. There’s plenty
of surprises through every hole, and a few off-the-wall elements like the
vittras having tiny cows for pets. After
some trial and error through finding Frida, a deal is made that if they
retrieve the dug up vitra, Frida will get her badges back. The resulting climax at the mulchers is fun
to see with plenty of suspense as Hilda rushes to free the vittra, and her new
friendships grow as they save her from a nasty fall. I have to question how they knew they saved
all the vittra since some could have been mulched earlier that day, but that’s
just me. There’s also some good heart at
the end when Frida writes a diary entry discussing that even if she failed to
get a badge, she’s grateful for getting a new friend.
That said, I wonder if any other Sparrow
Scouts were willing to put off weeding.
Are there even other vittra around?
Major head scratchers like that as well as the somewhat basic story and
characterizations make this less great than the other episodes. Still, it’s a charming episode to fully
introduce Hilda to her first true human friends.
A-
The Ranking
- The Bird Parade
- The Midnight Giant
- The Hidden People
- The Sparrow Scouts
In this episode, while waiting for Hilda, David finds a strange rock and takes it home with him. The next review is on the results of that move.
Next time on MC Toon Reviews is "The Status Seekers" from DuckTales.
If you would like to check out other Hilda reviews on this blog, click here for the guide made especially for them.
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