'Toon Reviews 15: Steven Universe Season 2 Episode 18: Catch and Release

Catch and Release

This is where Peridot officially becomes a profound addition to the cast with new depths to her character and major reveals for what’s to come. 

Bringing on Peridot’s great display of character is the turning point of the Crystal Gems’ attempts to catch her.  When she captures Steven to make him repair the galaxy warp so she can finally escape Earth, she laments about how the planet is going to face destruction with little to no menace, further showing that there’s more to her than a simple antagonist.  As her frets about Earth raise questions, the Crystal Gems save Steven and promptly poof and bubble Peridot away, not bothering to listen to what she has to say. 

Even without Peridot’s meaning for panic, the moment still brings interesting information about her.  When she’s poofed, her limbs don’t poof back to her gemstone with the rest of her body.  They’ve always looked artificial from the beginning yet added to the overall mystery of Peridot, and the Crystal Gems retrieving her foot back in “Friend Ship” gave an impression that her limbs were fake.  I find this reveal fascinating for showing that, in addition to getting easily annoyed and scared, Peridot needing artificial arms and legs, i.e. limb enhancers, shows that there truly is humanity within her villainous exterior. 

What’s even better is that while the Crystal Gems don’t see it, Steven does, so he releases her from her bubble to find the reasons for her being worried about Earth and why she said the Crystal Gems need her.  As he tries to talk to Peridot, we see how much of an outsider she is to this planet, not just that she’s from Homeworld.  For how smart and collected she was in many appearances, she doesn’t have a good understanding of the simplest of things, like how simply slapping others can bring them pain.  Considering how much trouble the Crystal Gems have given her, of course she’d feel like inflicting a lot of it, and it’s a funny to see her act like she’s getting the upper hand by simply slapping Steven. 

It’s through this comedic interaction that Steven gets some information Peridot is withholding, namely what she was really sent to Earth for.  Rather than conquering the planet for Homeworld, she was simply coming to check progress on something called the Cluster.  This was something she only mentioned in passing back in “Jailbreak” leaving one to wonder what she was talking about.  Now it’s known by the main protagonists, and Peridot is terrified of it eventually emerging and destroying the planet she’s stuck on.  However, learning more about the Cluster is difficult as we see in even more hilarious moments of Peridot’s lack of knowledge of Earth as she refuses to tell the Crystal Gems anything, culminating in her locking herself in the bathroom. 

This is easily where her outsider nature is at its most interesting and entertaining with memorable moments of her trying to escape by flushing herself down the toilet, and thinking harmless bathroom objects are weapons. 

As enjoyable as she is and as insightful her reveals are, what makes everything work is the payoff.  After tense confrontations with all the Crystal Gems, Peridot opens up to Steven and lets him in the bathroom after he offers the foot they caught from her as a peace offering.  The cartoon ends when Peridot accepts Steven’s help to stop the Cluster, leading to something to look forward to in other cartoons. 

Even if this cartoon exists to lead into the bigger things, it’s still notable for its promise, and the last scene of Peridot warming up to Steven solidifies the appeal.  Along with the first bits of her greatness as a character and memorable moments from everyone else involved, this is a great start to a new beginning for the series. 9.5/10

The Ranking

1. Sworn to the Sword
2. Keystone Motel
3. Friend Ship
4. Nightmare Hospital
5. Chille Tid
6. Cry for Help
7. Keeping it Together
8. Full Disclosure
9. Catch and Release
10. We Need to Talk
11. Reformed
12. Historical Friction
13. Joy Ride
14. Say Uncle
15. Onion Friend
16. Rising Tides, Crashing Skies
17. Sadie’s Song
18. Love Letters

The next Steven Universe review will cover a more endearing take on Peridot learning about what Earth has to offer, including things as simple as rain.

Next time on MC Toon Reviews, we'll start a new set of reviews. For the first time on this blog, we'll be covering Rocko's Modern Life.

If you want to stay updated for more reviews, become a follower of this blog, click here to like the official Facebook page, and click here to follow me on Twitter.

If you would like to check out other Steven Universe reviews on this blog, click here for the guide made especially for them.

'Toon Reviews 17: Voltron: Legendary Defender Season 2 Episode 13: Blackout + Final Thoughts

Blackout

This is the second part of the Paladins’ battle to end Zarkon’s reign which this season has been building up to, and it delivers on many fronts. 

It starts out with a confident tone that the Paladins can it off considering how they got Zarkon’s base through the teludav in the previous episode.  Working in their favor is Zarkon’s continued obsession of getting his original black lion.  At this point, it’s become so bad, he’s compromising common sense by flying straight into Voltron’s fray and using armor that hasn’t been tested.  Despite Zarkon’s behavior being a huge detractor, the episode knows not to make the battle too easy for our heroes. 

The battle offers Haggar a huge chance to work her magic by powering the base since.  She also creates a black hole that gives Voltron some very nasty blasts and drains the lions of their quintessence or energy.  The first of these blasts leaves a devastating effect when the lions float helplessly and the Paladins are unconscious.  However, as a previous episode established, the lions unleash advanced powers when their Paladins connect with them enough, and it’s a very pleasing sequence when it happens here.  It's not just the Paladins who get up to great moments here.  Usually, the supervisors, Allura and Coran, stay in the castle ship offering moral support behind their particle barrier.  In a battle this big, they let it down and initiate their own attack on Zarkon’s base as assistance.  It’s impressively brave to see them pull off a huge attack even if it gets them struck with a blast from Haggar that costs the castle power. 

Their support doesn’t stop there when Allura makes a bold move to face Haggar head-on with Blade of Marmora members Kolivan and Antok coming for support.  What follows is an intense combat scene with an actual death, a big reveal that Haggar is a being of Allura’s home planet when her mysterious cloak is let down, and Allura unlocking a new power to protect her from Haggar’s attacks, most likely due to being Altean just like her.  As for the Paladins, they continue to put up a good fight once they better connect with their lions. Shiro especially advances when he discovers his lions’ bayard, plugs it in, and unlocks its special powers that come in handy as Zarkon gets closer to controlling the lion.  It’s a great stage of development for Shiro unlocking these powers, and stand out even more when they bring the final attack that obliterates Zarkon’s armor and leaves Zarkon himself hospitalized. 

Like the last season though, there are lasting negative impacts from this last blow when the Paladins find that Shiro has disappeared, and a new Galra ruler, Prince Lotor, is called in while Zarkon is out of commission.  These are heavy aftereffects sure to shake up the dynamic, and give an enticing reason to keep watching this show.  With memorable action set pieces, shining moments for character after character, and moments with lots of promise for the future, this final battle ends Season 2 with style. 10/10

The Ranking

1. Blackout
2. Shiro’s Escape
3. Best Laid Plans
4. Greening the Cube
5. The Blade of Marmora
6. Escape from Beta Traz
7. The Ark of Taujeer
8. Eye of the Storm
9. Stayin’ Alive
10. The Belly of the Weblum
11. Across the Universe
12. The Depths
13. Space Mall

Final Thoughts

After leaving such a strong first impression with its first season, Voltron: Legendary Defender Season 2 greatly capitalizes on that season’s strengths resulting in not just a strong continuation of the story, but a well put together space odyssey that builds up to something great.  In fact, it’s so great it helps the show to move past its previous detracting points.

Through starting off exactly where the first season left off, the show starts to get an idea of where it wants to go.  Each episode offers a major step in the Paladins’ plan to save the galaxy, and when you put them all together, everything falls into a cohesive strategy with a definitive concluding point.  We start with the Paladins regrouping after being separated, then they learn about good Galra members out there, then they try to find out why Zarkon keeps tracking them as they form a new plan, then they form alliances with the rebel Galra groups who help them construct everything, and finally execute the plan which comes with its own consequences.  It’s an instance where nearly every episode matters in the grand scheme building up to a substantial final battle. 

Out of the storytelling is big expansion the show’s universe with many creative planets our heroes end up in like the technology-based tree planet, Olkarion, the decaying planet prompting immediate escape, Taujeer, and the secret base of the Blade of Marmora located between two black holes.  The steps to putting the Galra defeat plan together have many creative adventures to them too that take the Paladins to wild locations with insane and intense jobs to do involving escapades at a mall while getting important lenses, getting eaten by a giant worm, and going through with a jailbreak with a confusing idea of who to rescue.  It can occasionally get bogged down with a lot of time devoted to complicated explanations on how inventions like the teludav or creatures like the weblum worm work, but they usually turn out fine when we also get some light-hearted reiterations of the explanations. 

What really makes the storytelling stand out are strong themes that are prominent throughout several of the episodes.  A big one is about the importance of letting go of any prejudicial attitude as the Paladins find that some members of the Galra are rebelling against Zarkon’s rule.  They start out meeting one individual good Galra creature, Ulaz, builds up with them forming an alliance with an entire anti-Zarkon resistance, and culminates with a Galra traitor helping them at Zarkon’s base.  Some of them even go as far as to give their lives for the Paladins, making for some of the season’s more impactful moments. 

The final battle is an extremely satisfying payoff to all the work going into the plan with a lot of twists and surprises through showing how advanced the Paladins have become through controlling their lions with exciting blows against Zarkon, reveals of certain characters, and especially the aftermath.  Shiro disappearing and the call for Prince Lotor both leave a lot to look forward to in following seasons, and coming off of what may be the show’s most exciting battle leaves them with a lot to live up to.  The storytelling still isn’t perfect though, mostly through spending time on planets that don’t offer anything significant for future episodes like the trash nebula, the mermaid planet, and especially the space mall, mostly the shops not carrying the item of importance.  Even with that, there’s still plenty of plot development that adds to the appeal of the main story which thoroughly delivers in the end.

The characters we follow also impress with how more interesting they’ve become, at least most of them.  Some of them are still lacking in development like Hunk being predominantly nervous and thinking of food while Lance is still mostly a smart-talking fool, though the latter does have at least one genuinely nice moment on finding out what his purpose is.  Practically everyone else gets new developments that tie into the arcs started for them in the previous season.  Pidge, while not looking for her family nearly as much as last season, has one of the most beautiful moments of character development in the season when she expands her horizons beyond technical stuff.  Shiro goes through a lot of development through trying to make it as the Paladins’ leader through advocating his continuously returning memories for bigger causes, striving to establish a stronger control with the black lion so not to be overpowered by Zarkon, and even gives thought to who should take over for him.  You can easily tell how much Shiro has to put up with, so when he disappears in the end, you really feel for him and his teammates. 

As for his chosen successor, Keith is the standout characters for the season with a compelling arc of his own.  He has his own anxieties that only get more complicated when, in the first episode, Shiro requests him to lead the Paladins if something should happen to him.  A lot of time is devoted to Keith studying a blade with a Galra symbol on it, and protecting it from anyone who tries to take it, even the Galra resistance group everyone’s trying to get on their side.  His hesitations on becoming leader start to make sense when it’s revealed that he’s of Galra blood.  The impressive thing about Keith is that even with this reveal, he still acts the way he usually does while also having a much better control of his emotions when adventuring with the others.  He’s even fairly well accepted despite being half Galra by the rest of the team, though he does get a good amount of disgust from Allura.  Speaking of Allura, she has a relatable arc regarding prejudices against Galra, seeming stubbornly hesitant of believing there are good ones out there since they didn’t do anything to stop Zarkon for thousands of years.  It’s understandable behavior towards any victim of an evil race, though her behavior can go out of proportion, especially involving Keith.  This is why it’s emotionally satisfying when Keith going off to sabotage the Galra base opens her to accept him as a Paladin and family member.  As you can tell, a good number of our heroes are given a lot of defining moments and arcs that make them far more fleshed-out and relatable enough to follow. 

Even the villains feel more fleshed out, which is great considering how one-note all Galra members were in Season 1.  In addition to there being good Galra, this season adds some relatable members to much of the Galra like many of them fearing their leader when interrogated, or getting overly excited and confident over successfully carrying out a mission.  Even the leaders are a bit more interesting with Zarkon having a relatable flaw of obsessing over something, in this case his old black lion, to the point of losing focus on the main mission, and Haggar being revealed to be Altean like Allura, leaving something interesting to explore in the future.  The Galra are still not the most interesting villains, but I do give credit for being more multilayered than they first let on.  If anything, the Blade of Marmora is stiffer than they are at this point, though I would take the Blade over a grating neurotic like Slav, but that’s beside the point.  What matters is that while there’s still a ways to go with character development, it’s apparent enough that Season 2 has brought a lot of progress to that.

There’s no doubt that Voltron: Legendary Defender is more interesting as a series than ever with its second season with a well-flowing story, new heights reached by many of the characters, and an overall creative and epic scope.  If you like the first season, you’ll easily latch onto the second one and, like me, be excited to see what the show does next.  Until the look at the next season of this show, Vrepit Sa.

Highly Recommended

That's all there is to Season 2 of Voltron: Legendary Defender. I hope you enjoyed these reviews and stick around for my eventual look at the third season.

In the meantime, there's going to be a review set of a show new to this blog to fill in the third slot.  From the wild mind of Joe Murray, be on the lookout for reviews on the first season of the Nicktoon classic, Rocko's Modern Life. 

Also, don't forget about the reviews of Steven Universe Season 2 and Hey Arnold Season 3 currently in progress.

I'll see you all next time with more great reviews to share. Until then:

Stay Animated Folks!

'Toon Reviews 17: Voltron: Legendary Defender Season 2 Episode 12: Best Laid Plans

Best Laid Plans

The first part of the season's final battle is impressive with a consistent focus on the Zarkon defeat plan.  However, the way the team puts everything together not only gets them closer to their goal, but also leaves several impacts from the characters’ moments. 

Keith in particular stands out among the heroes by offering to infiltrate Zarkon’s base, being of Galra blood himself, to input a code to make it susceptible to viruses, which Pidge will provide.  It’s great to see how far Keith has come, playing to his usual traits of willfully sticking to his risky ideas, but having strong reasons to validate them.  There’s also a heartfelt scene between him and Allura before he leaves.  Allura has had a lot of Galra prejudice throughout the season which wasn’t always comfortable, with some disdain towards Keith becoming more prominent recently.  For her to confirm to Keith that she’s become less judgmental through seeing him and the Paladins as family is great, and shows that her views are not all black and white. 

With the antagonists, they continue to improve as well.  The trend of good members of the Galra is as strong as ever. Much of their moments are spent on interrogating the member they found out allowed the Paladins to escape a while back, a commander named Thace.  Even the empire's emperor is shown to have humanity.  Zarkon has had the black lion, the Voltron lion he used to pilot long ago, on his mind, but now, his desire to get it back has become very obsessive. It’s starting to get in the way of the Galra Empire maintaining control of the galaxy right down to falling for Shiro’s trap of using the lion as bait to get his base to the teludav.  The obsession is a relatable flaw to anyone, so the audience can see a part of themselves in the main villain. 

As for Thace, it’s a bit contrived that Haggar’s druids let him go while Zarkon’s absorbing energy to track the black lion.  The druids could’ve kept him cuffed up during that time and what later happens could’ve been avoided.  Even if we don’t have a logical explanation for them letting Thace go, his moment with Keith is thrilling and impactful.  Thace helps Keith by trying to enact the code needed to shut down the anti-virus system, but the druids changed the code.   With that, Thace turns the control room into a bomb and lets Keith escape while he stays behind to fight the druids before the bomb explodes, sacrificing himself in the process.  It’s not as impactful as Ulaz’s sacrifice since we don’t know as much about Thace, but the lengths this Galra soldier goes through for the greater good are still of high value. 

With all these character actions in place, the episode reaches an exciting climax where the whole team rushes to move their big teludav over Zarkon’s base now infected with Pidge’s virus while the Voltron lions reassemble.  It’s a grand sequence that impresses with how well it works after many episodes of buildup, thus making a perfect moment of satisfaction to make worth out of the trouble and sacrifices made prior.  However, when the episode ends with a statement that this is just the beginning and the Paladins forming Voltron, the excitement remains as you’re left with something to look forward to next time. 

With all this said, all the shining character moments and the built-up climax really delivering make this a truly great penultimate episode for Season 2. 9.5/10

The Ranking

1. Shiro’s Escape
2. Best Laid Plans
3. Greening the Cube
4. The Blade of Marmora
5. Escape from Beta Traz
6. The Ark of Taujeer
7. Eye of the Storm
8. Stayin’ Alive
9. The Belly of the Weblum
10. Across the Universe
11. The Depths
12. Space Mall

Be sure to stay tuned for the review of the last episode of this season which sets the next steps of the plan into motion and leads to big game changing results.

If you want to stay updated for more reviews, become a follower of this blog, click here to like the official Facebook page, and click here to follow me on Twitter.

If you would like to check out other Voltron: Legendary Defender reviews on this blog, click here for the guide made especially for them.

'Toon Reviews 16: Hey Arnold Season 3 Episode 15: Arnold and Lila/Grand Prix

Arnold and Lila

It’s hard to believe how long a time has passed between Lila’s major appearances.  She first appeared as a seemingly perfect, but troubled character given her poor lifestyle.  Starting with this cartoon, her lifestyle, her most interesting trait, is no longer discussed, and she acts perfect and overly kind with no trouble at all.  Not only that, she molds into a role of a potential love interest for literally all her other appearances which not just keeps her from being as interesting as she could’ve been, but more annoying than ever for a severe lack of relatable flaws.  To be fair, the way she fits into such a role is well-executed. 

It happens when Helga, while privately expressing her love for Arnold, is led to do capitalize on her feelings by writing “Arnold loves Helga” on a nearby wall.  However, since other people can clearly see the wall, she erases her name and just happens to replace it with Lila’s before anyone comes by.  Everyone believes Arnold like-likes Lila and push for the apparent romance of the sight despite Arnold only liking Lila as a friend.  From here, Arnold finds himself spending a lot of time with Lila, and she just can’t get enough of him all while Helga is forced to deal with the fact that the boy she loves getting attached to someone else was brought on by herself.  The latter point is especially interesting for Helga dwelling on her own faults instead of blaming someone else which makes it easy to take the conflict seriously. 

As for Arnold, it becomes difficult for him to keep living the misunderstanding, though I don’t get why he’s also teased for being together with Lila, especially by kids who liked the idea of getting together with her earlier.  It would make more sense for them to be jealous of Arnold.  Arnold finally ends the whole thing through honesty by telling Lila that he never wrote the message while admirably being gentle with letting her down, and Lila seems to take it well despite apparent disappointment.  Still, even with him explaining the truth, everyone calls him a “fickle” through saying he loved Lila (which he never did) and now denying it.  The strangest thing is, Arnold actually grows to like-like Lila after all through thinking hard about their time together which appears to be a combination of admiring the appearance of a cute girl and the peer pressure of everyone witnessing him live a lie. 

From here, this starts a reoccurring trend of plots in which Arnold expresses to Lila that he like-likes her and she keeps telling him that she only likes him as a friend since she only like-liked him because she thought he felt the same about her .  It’s not exactly the best route for the series to take for making Arnold look very closed-minded and making it seem like Lila is only good for being a love interest.  At least Arnold’s come a long way with expressing his true feelings to crushes.  Also, we end with a nice moment on a couple worth supporting when Helga appears and actually lets up on bullying Arnold, shows concern for his feelings, and is touched when Arnold talks about the pains of unrequited love.  This brief ending scene lays the foundation of truly healthy couples to get behind, and shows that it could work if Arnold was aware of the true Helga. 

In the end, while it does rob Lila of anything potentially interesting for the rest of the series and Arnold is put down for something he didn’t even say, this cartoon shines for the great way it handles the subject of what makes a healthy romance. 9/10

Grand Prix

So far, this season has prided itself on giving strong development to side characters and interesting story ideas, but there’s still room for cartoons on Arnold and the gang doing basic activities popular with kids, the activity here being about go-cart racing.  As a result, it’s not one of the more interesting cartoons, but it’s no doubt charming and fun thanks to the strengths of the characters. 

The main racing teams are Arnold, Stinky, and Sid with their cart called the Dark Avenger, and Eugene with his cart called the Mauve Storm.  Now, at this point in the series, it’s a given that if Eugene is involved, there’s going to be some major obstacle to work through.  Sure enough, his known status as a jinx and overconfidence of his cart during the first race causes both the Mauve Storm and the Dark Avenger to crash, yet they somehow qualify to be well enough to compete in the grand prix if the teams can get the carts fixed.  It’s at least good that the crews of both carts have a chance to keep on fighting especially since this race features a one-dimensional bully like Wolfgang never allowing them to live it down. 

Also, as basic as the following story is with the crews combining forces to fix the carts by putting whatever isn’t broken from each of them into one new cart, it’s still thoroughly entertaining with a few funny moments throughout the repair process as well as some of the better moments from problematic characters.  The season has not been very kind to Sid and Stinky as characters with their major roles making them come off as annoying and stupid, uninteresting, and at times unlikable.  This cartoon puts aside their negative traits and utilizes them for more entertaining and funny moments through putting the cart together and expressing worry if it stands a chance against the competition.  As for Eugene, there’s a lot more believable behavior from him than in most of his appearances including his previous one.  Unlike in moments from those cartoons, he’s able to see how bad the situation is with his prized go-cart destroyed, and rather than being all happy, he’s firm with saying that he wants to take part in the construction and driving of the cart, and it’s always nice to see normally friendly characters show a bit of a backbone.  It shows that there’s more to them than their basic character traits. 

Everything leads up to the titular grand prix where the broken carts are fully repurposed as the Mauve Avenger which I have no idea why they think it’s a bad name.  The race works as an exciting payoff filled with many great character moments.  Some of them offer different character perspectives on running the race either racing furiously, statistically, or even nonchalantly.  They come off as cathartic when all of Wolfgang’s bullying for the cartoon is met with humility when he wipes out, Eugene desperately trying to drive safely as the Mauve Avenger falls apart, and of all characters, Phoebe races the roughest of all taking first place.  Even one-shot characters of a French racer and an Italian racer have a few humorous moments as they take off to race, let their minds wander, and wipe out, though they may cause discomfort to some through sounding stereotypical.  It all ends well with the truly bad characters losing what they deserve, and the cartoon’s main players being happy with their position even if they lost their cart and didn’t win first place which is as good an ending you can ask for. 

Again, it’s not the most interesting or thought-provoking, but if you’re into racing, you’re in for a lot of fun with this cartoon. 9/10

The Ranking

1. Helga Blabs it All
2. Harold the Butcher
3. Cool Party
4. Grandpa’s Birthday
5. Crabby Author
6. Mr. Hyunh Goes Country
7. Road Trip
8. Helga Vs. Big Patty
9. Hey Harold!
10. Curly Snaps
11. The Aptitude Test
12. Pre-Teen Scream
13. The Pig War
14. Olga Gets Engaged
15. Oskar Gets a Job
16. Arnold and Lila
17. Phoebe Takes the Fall
18. Best Man
19. Career Day
20. Gerald’s Tonsils
21. Grand Prix
22. Rich Kid
23. Dangerous Lumber
24. Casa Paradiso
25. Arnold’s Room
26. Helga and the Nanny
27. Roller Coaster
28. Stinky Goes Hollywood
29. Sid’s Revenge
30. Arnold Betrays Iggy

The next Hey Arnold review will be on its Thanksgiving special, but it will be uploaded on the holiday Arnold's Grandma constantly mistakes for Thanksgiving.

Next time on MC Toon Reviews will be the penultimate episode of Voltron: Legendary Defender Season 2, "Best Laid Plans."

If you want to stay updated for more reviews, become a follower of this blog, click here to like the official Facebook page, and click here to follow me on Twitter.

If you would like to check out other Hey Arnold reviews on this blog, click here for the guide made especially for them.