Toad Tax
As fun as the episodic cartoons have been, it wouldn’t be uncalled for if one would think this show would be more interesting if it focused on something bigger going on. In that instance, it’s fortunate that the middle of this season features two cartoons that do good justice for this show’s world, and subsequent character arcs.
With character arcs, the center of this cartoon is on one of the things Anne is after the most, respect from the town she’s currently living in. Being a human oddity to this world of frogs is still giving her a less-than-pleasing reputation, and having been here for a long time, it’s really starting to get to her. As she laments over how she can possibly earn their respect, big information on how things are done in this world soon reveals itself. Wartwood is visited by another group of amphibians, toads, who live in a place called Toad Tower, and dominate over other towns in the valley with force. How they overpower the frogs is very apparent in several visual cues. They’re taller, are mostly threatening by design, and have a duller color palette compared to the more vibrant frogs. However, while the frogs aren’t accepting of Anne, the toads see her and instantly believe she could be of use to them, so they invite her to join their entourage. Anne sees this as a good opportunity to finally get some respect, and after all the legit scorn and disrespectful gestures she’s been shown to deal with, the direction is easy to get.
Even so, the clearly shady business of the toads raise obvious concerns, and for that, the Plantars have a very good point in saying this is not how Anne should earn respect. What follows though offers great moments for those involved. The toads are here on the account that the frogs in Wartwood haven’t been paying their taxes, so they storm the citizens’ homes and raid them of their valuable possessions. However, while most of the toads take everything and clearly enjoy it despite saying they don’t, Anne doesn’t completely go along with them. She can see that they’re going too far with taking everything, and takes these impressions to heart by allowing the citizens to keep at least one thing that was to be taken from them. It’s honestly a great first step to stick to her own morals when you consider that being too weak to stand up to bad advice got her transported here in the first place.
However, her biggest rebellion is saved for the end when they go after Hop Pop, claiming he didn’t pay his taxes. Anne knows this isn’t true though via a hilarious scene of her enduring the boredom of watching him do just that, as well as how much she’s gotten to know him in general. So when the toads start attacking the Plantars' farm, Anne steps in ready to defend, sword and tennis racket in hand. As a bigger measure, the Wartwood populace comes to see her take on the toads and claim that even if the frogs treated her badly, it would be wrong for her to do the same to them. She's better than that, and she's going to stick to her true moral self. She actually fights off the toads well, though she does later get injured in battle, but that allows the crowd to stand up for her, genuinely caring for her safety. If that’s not enough, the story is also a big shining moment for Sprig who really taps into responsibility by following Anne for safety. In addition, he also discovers why the toads haven’t gotten tax money on his own, exposing a big scandal from Mayor Toadstool in the process. Even if the toads are still at odds with Wartwood, all seems settled, especially with Anne finally being respected, which she only keeps from here on.
By giving the world interesting development, widening the scope
significantly, and bringing solid turning points for characters, this cartoon
is one special entry for the series.
A+
Prison
Break
In this cartoon, something big is revealed about this show’s overall setup. The focus may be on Anne and the frogs she’s staying with, but there are times when it’s willing to shift to the other girls who were transported to this world. This is especially nice to know since at the start, we learned that at least one of them, Sasha, was definitely transported and imprisoned by toads, but nothing was done with that. However, this is the cartoon to look into this legitimately huge development. In the process, there are lots of benefits to covering this topic through showing how Sasha herself functions as a character, and more about the environment she’s imprisoned in.
As was discussed in “Toad Tax,” the toads rule over the frogs from their ominous facility of Toad Tower. Despite that, the toads themselves, at least the ones shown, are actually relatively innocent workers with light-hearted passions. The only toad in the tower that lives up to the threatening standards is the captain of them all, Grime, who relentlessly calls them out for shortcomings and acting soft. As for Sasha, despite being imprisoned, a lot is said about how she interacts with others, in turn showing a contrast to how she gets others on her side compared to the captain. She’s aggressive and bitter about being a prisoner, but always puts on a friendly disposition with the guards, and even inspires several to quit and pursue other opportunities. Her friendly act is very convincing and has strong ties to how toxic her friendship with Anne is considering she was one of two people who convinced her to do thievery. Nevertheless, it’s hard to come up with an ulterior motive when she says that all she wants is to find her friends and go home, which is a natural thing to want in this scenario.
Then the story goes on to put her talents of manipulation to better use when it’s revealed that even the toads can’t avoid attacks from natural predators to amphibians. Giant herons come and attack the tower, causing significant damage to allow Sasha to escape. While she could do that, she shows some heart in the matter too by using fight skills picked up from cheerleading to save Grime from the herons. After Grime sees potential in her moves though Sasha goes back into manipulative mode, saying she’ll help stop the herons if she can be released afterwards. She also passes on her talents of manipulation by telling Grime to give his soldiers compliments so they’ll be inspired to do a better job and get him what he wants. In other words, she’s spreading her toxic mentality and makes it seem like her earlier friendly ways were disingenuous. That said, it’s still funny to watch this aggressive captain try to be nice despite apparent scorn for his crew.
Sasha’s practices work
though as the soldiers are actually successful in beating the herons, and they
appear to be stronger than ever. After
that, while she can just leave now, she sees potential in Grime’s offer to be
second in command as he’s legitimately impressed with her, and she’s attracted
by the promise of power. In the end, she
happily accepts the offer, but also seems to show care for eventually finding
Anne and Marcy, and getting them all home.
Basically, the thing to take from all this is that Sasha’s a very
complex character. This along with
insight on the toads and general atmosphere building allow this cartoon to
stand as a strong break from the norm.
A+
The Ranking
1. Toad Tax
2. Anne vs
Wild
3. The Domino
Effect
4. Prison
Break
5. Contagi-Anne
6. Best Fronds
7. Family
Shrub
8. Lily Pad
Thai
9. Dating
Season
10. Anne or
Beast?
11. Stakeout
12. Taking
Charge
13. Flood,
Sweat, and Tears
14. Anne Theft
Auto
15. Hop Luck
16. Plantar’s
Last Stand
17. Girl Time
18. Breakout
Star
19. Cane Crazy
20. Sprig vs
Hop Pop
The next Amphibia review is back to light-hearted slice of life stories where Sprig has to take care of the town grubhog, and Hop Pop takes up dancing to impress an old love.
Next time on MC Toon Reviews is an episode of The Owl House big on "Sense and Insensitivity."
If you would like to check out other Amphibia reviews on this blog, click here for the guide made especially for them.
No comments:
Post a Comment