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Since one of Disney’s biggest animated shows of recent day is back with a new season, I find it fitting to start reviewing the second season of its companion series. They both feature a young teenage female protagonist transported to an unpredictable fantasy world and set themselves up for bigger things with every new season. Instead of owls and witches, we’re in for a brand new season in a world of talking frogs and other amphibians with:
Amphibia (Season 2)
Basic Premise
The key to a great animated production is a unique creative vision able to unfold seamlessly in an artistic sequence. As a company well-known to have make a big name of itself primarily through animation, the best place one can find such great creative visions is Disney. It’s true that the people in charge of the company have made it seem more like a soulless media corporation looking to make a buck, but I tend to look beyond that. While most of their attention is towards their more profitable ventures like live action and purchases of other properties, they know to leave their own animation firms alone. This way, all their animation for film and television can be their very best and stay true to whatever the artists, the true heroes of the Disney company, imagine. Any artist with a story they want to tell and/or world they want to bring alive is free to go all out and immerse the audience in what they have to offer. Very little executive meddling holds back their intentions, and their impactful contributions to the medium are apparent every step of the way. Even when their audience isn’t the biggest and there aren't many seasons to it, getting good reception is exactly what’s guaranteed to have it endure in the long run. Ultimately, for all the company’s controversies and even difficult management of certain forms of media, I think artists should be proud to get to contribute to Disney animation. This time, in the company’s television animation division, we look into a new season of Matt Braly’s Amphibia.
It’s a show with a simple sounding premise of a teen girl
with toxic friends transported to a world of talking amphibians through a magic
music box. However, through watching the
show and its distinguishable cast at play, there’s always a feeling that
there’s so much more to it than one would think. Braly has described his show as a metaphor
for change, and when you consider how frogs grow from tadpoles to their own
amphibious creatures, that’s a clever analogy.
It also applies well to the series when you consider the feel of each
season. The first season was very
episodic, mainly covering the most important characters and their daily
adventures and occasional interactions with certain side characters. In addition to legitimately strong comedy and
pleasing aesthetic, one recurring element was always the heart between the main
characters and their community.
That emphasis would typically pay off when the show would venture into
heavier world building stories also offering major emotional
undertones. That was when the characters
and their heart could truly be felt, and the development they experienced could
truly shine through. The events of the
story essentially growing alongside the cast certainly helped too, showcasing
quality animation storytelling, especially animation coming from Disney. Going into the second season, the show is
going to change even more, broadening its heart, potential, and overall
greatness. We’ll be witnessing bigger
story threads, more insight to this creative world, great new additions to the
cast, and even more surprises. What may
have seemed like just a fun animated frog show to some is going to get bigger
than ever, unfolding in a ride unlike any other.
The animated TV shows of Disney have been great additions to
its legacy in recent years, and Amphibia is
no exception, even if the executives in charge can’t see it. As to exactly how great this second season
is, let’s take a leap through a box to a world with a swamp where frogs talk and find out.
Also, when looking at the rankings of all the cartoons of the series, to tell each one apart, Season 1 titles will be colored blue, and Season 2 titles will be colored green.
Now on with the reviews:
Handy Anne
The most ideal season premieres set up everything that’s to come while telling its own good story. Fortunately, that’s what we get in this Season 2 premiere. As Anne and Sprig reflect on the coming of a new season, which can have two different meanings if you think about it, many topics are set up naturally. Even if some only come up in a brief mention, they’re all that’s needed to let the audience know what to mainly look forward to. One brief mention is how Anne is handling the memories of her tense encounter with one of her human friends, Sasha, at the end of Season 1. It’s brought up for a short time, but it says a lot of how Anne is practically traumatized of having to fight such a close companion.
Elements that are actually big for this cartoon show up after that when Hop Pop arrives with a new family wagon, bringing to light a theme of traveling and world building. This wagon is to take Anne and the Plantars to Newtopia, home to all-knowing newts who may know how to get Anne home. This in turn sets up seeing more of this world beyond Wartwood, not to mention Anne possibly finding her other human friend, Marcy. While that’s another brief mention, the plot covers a theme to define the series.
Upon hearing of the trip, Anne feels bad that the Plantars are leaving their home behind susceptible to danger. Because of the influences of her friends, Anne has been very reckless, impulsive, and often inclined to not think of how her actions affect others. This is where she proves to have developed significantly, being considerate of how much is at stake for the adoptive frog family she’s grown to love. She makes it her goal to fortify the Plantar farm to keep it safe while they’re gone. There is still some impulsiveness on Anne’s part by not showing enough faith in the frog intended to watch the house or reading instructions on the fortifications she gets. Despite this, the heart of her actions is completely undeniable.
Still, there are expected backfires to Anne’s approach to everything, though they do exercise great creativity. Her protection means turn the Plantars' crops into sentient vegetables the Plantars have to fight off, all with very imaginative designs.
What’s more, even when it seems like they’re beaten, their threat only escalates, turning into what looks like a giant vegetable robot. When it destroys the house Anne worked hard to protect, something else is set up to explore. This destruction unleashes some sort of power in Anne marked by glowing blue eyes that leads her to beat the vegetable creature with an intense action maneuver. This was only slightly hinted prior, but now some meaning to it starts to emerge.
After that, family love wins
out as Anne and the Plantars understand the meaning behind what happened as the
trip officially begins. As they set off though, there is a reminder of a dark truth of Hop Pop burying the music box that sent Anne and her friends to this world in the
first place. I will also say that it
feels like the house is repaired too easily, weakening the impact of what
happened, and maybe there could have been more of a sendoff from the Wartwood
citizens. Perhaps it would have taken
away too much focus from the important elements, but it still could have been
nice touches. Thankfully, what’s meant
to be focused on is explored to its best extent and sets up the entire second
season well, as all premieres should do. In
addition to telling a good story with likable family bonds at the heart, it’s a
pleasing watch to kick things off.
A
Fort in the Road
With every new season of a show, the best thing to hope for is a growth in maturity of the overall storytelling. Despite this, some plot archetypes from the previous season are bound to be persist early on. This doesn’t make the featured cartoons bad, but it does make them look weak in comparison to others. This applies to this cartoon where even when out on the road, Hop Pop and the Plantar youths don’t see eye-to-eye.
The kids are excited that the current trip to Newtopia means they’ll be seeing what’s beyond their home valley, and long to get in on the adventure. As he often does, Hop Pop lays down a lot of strict rules to follow while they’re traveling; he even has an entire book of rules. The thing is a lot of Hop Pop’s rules are completely ridiculous that don’t guarantee danger. It’s highly likely that they’ll be just fine doing things like striking heroic poses, making a few pit stops, and going faster than a junebug can fly. Adding to the frustration is that there isn’t legit justification. Hop Pop literally wrote them all himself, and acts as if his views are the only ones to follow. Now, later on this season, there is a solid and endearing reason for being so desperate to protect the family, so it doesn’t make his portrayal here as bad as it could have been. However, it does not and should not justify his clearly extreme measures.
As would often be the case with kids when parents control them too much, Sprig, the most vocal about making the most of the trip, is pushed to rebel. When passing through an interesting location of old ruins, he and Anne leave the wagon and explore it behind Hop Pop’s back. In other words, it’s another instance of the kids having a problem with Hop Pop’s stickler for rules, so they go and disobey him to larger than acceptable extents.
Fortunately, there are some good touches to make the trope’s execution more credible. Instead of this act being kept secret from Hop Pop, he’s quick to blow the cover and follows Anne and Sprig into one of the ruins’ structures. Through his comedic ongoing rants on the kids’ disobedience, some pretty interesting things are revealed about this world. It may appear to be rustic and rural, but the interior of the structure is much more modern and technological, a departure from expectations. Combined with Sprig’s intense curiosity, tendency to touch everything, and his frustrations with Hop Pop, the technology brings on quite an obstacle with Hop Pop in the thick of it. Sprig’s fiddling around reveals that the structure is a factory, and it’s turned on to restart production on whatever it was made to create. Hop Pop is safe in the procedure at first, but it gets dangerous fast with him and Anne close to being crushed. It only takes haphazardly cramming that rule book into the factory computer to turn it off and get everyone to safety.
Now, in accordance with this setup, one side would be fully right with the other driven to apologize. In a nice move, both sides admit they were at fault with the kids appreciating the rules and Hop Pop realizing he was too strict. A compromise is reached to continue the trip but also make the most of it by stopping at any place that seems interesting. There’s also something specific to be gained here with the cartoon ending with a robot emerging from rubble and proceeding to follow the Plantars. This gives some good insight to the factory’s purpose, and it gets a good payoff later on.
You still have to sit through a tired setup
and it’s clear the best of Season 2 is yet to come, but it’s executed to a pleasing
extent.
B+
Series Ranking
1.
Reunion
2.
Toad Tax
3.
Anne vs Wild
4.
The Domino Effect
5.
Prison Break
6.
Anne of the Year
7.
Contagi-Anne
8.
Best Fronds
9.
Family Shrub
10.
Hop-Popular
11.
Wally and Anne
12.
Children of the Spore
13.
A Night at the Inn
14.
Handy Anne
15.
Lily Pad Thai
16.
Dating Season
17.
Anne or Beast?
18.
Combat Camp
19.
Cursed!
20.
Snow Day
21.
Civil Wart
22.
Stakeout
23.
Croak and Punishment
24.
Taking Charge
25.
Flood, Sweat, and Tears
26.
Bizarre Bazaar
27.
Trip to the Archives
28.
Anne Theft Auto
29.
Hop Luck
30.
Hop Pop and Lock
31.
Plantar’s Last Stand
32.
Fort in the Road
33.
The Big Bugball Game
34.
Fiddle Me This
35.
Family Fishing Trip
36.
Girl Time
37.
Breakout Star
38.
Grubhog Day
39.
Cane Crazy
40.
Sprig vs Hop Pop
41.
Cracking Mrs. Croaker
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