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matt_zimmerAlso reviews for the latest episodes of Star Wars: The Bad Batch, Muppet Babies, and American Dad!.
Masters Of The Universe: Revelation "The Power Of Grayskull"
I was bored by most of that until the last five minutes. We'll get to that.
My first surprise is that this was actually WRITTEN by Kevin Smith. Because say what you will about his movies, he's a clever writer. Here the Cringer and Orko jokes are just as bland and dull as they are on the old show. I was disappointed. This show has better animation, but it was still as boring as the Filmation stuff.
Except for the last scene. It addressed something that bugged the crap out of me about the Filmation show. The people who knew Adam was He-Man were a ridiculously small group. What annoyed me, in the 80's mindset it was, is that it never expanded for any reason. Nobody ever trusted Teela, or no new guest character ever learned or kept the secret, it was in a total holding pattern between five people. I don't know about you all, but that bored the hell out of me. The best part of superheroes is bending who knows what identity and why. But never letting anyone else in on it, the old He-Man cartoon had zero stakes and pathos. You cannot hit a bigger Total Reset Button at the end of every episode than to have the only five people who know the secret still be the only five people who know the secret.
I like that Teela is angry. It's been too damn long, and as the new Man At Arms, this is definitely something that should have been handed down to her (by Duncan). The fact that it comes as a total surprise is just wrong on every level.
For the record, I think King Randor is an idiot. I understand why he's mad at Duncan. But the truth is he JUST told Adam he wasn't actually proud of him. He ain't winning Father of the Year, Duncan or no Duncan. He has nobody to blame for that strained relationship but himself.
When this was a standard He-Man episode I was bored. When it blew up the secret identity I was interested. And I'm starting to get why the subtitle of the show is "Revelation". ***1/2.
Masters Of The Universe: Revelation "The Poisoned Chalice"
The first half was boring, but once they get to Castle Grayskull my interest was piqued again.
I love the idea of Evil-Lynn forming an alliance with the Sorceress. I think this is a bad idea, simply because of Lynn's name. But the Sorceress says their interests align for now, and I believe she believes that. But I still think it's a mistake just based on the name.
My favorite thing in the episode was giving Cringer of all people the role of the wise sage. Stuff like this is the reason this show won't be getting or needing a second season. They are stretching the premise beyond He-Man and exploring the characters and situations in way we've never seen before. That is not an open-ended journey. Whether this winds up an actual sequel or a spiritual sequel doesn't really matter. The set-up and storyline scream "Coda" to me. Whether it's considered canon or not with the Filmation stuff, I believe this series intends to give a definitive ending to Eternia and the He-Man Universe. Which is something that vaguely excites me.
Good episode. ***1/2.
Masters Of The Universe: Revelation "The Most Dangerous Man In Eternia"
Evil-Lynn being super shady at the end.
I like that Lynn always considered Man-At-Arms more dangerous than He-Man. Despite how TV-G the old show was, I kind of understand her point by his fighting style here. He-Man fights for ideals befitting a teenager and young man. Duncan fights to the death like the old battled-hardened warrior he is. That's impossible to get across in an 80's cartoon, but if this show says that dynamic was always in place, I can kind of see it.
I love that Beast Man is in the alliance simply because he still has the hots for Evil-Lynn. Make no mistake: I think it's really cool he is already living in peace in that village with Duncan, Orko, and Roboto.
I haven't made up my mind about this version of Orko. I'm afraid of getting attached because I'm 100% certain he's gonna die before this is all over. His demeanor screams to me that he is an eventual self-sacrifice to save all the heroes. He's too sad and broken to be anything else.
Solid. ***.
Masters Of The Universe: Revelation "Land Of The Dead"
That was something.
They were laying it on a little thick in Teela and Scareglow's mind confrontation but everything else landed like gangbusters.
Orko's sacrifice was precisely as magnificent as it should have been. When he says "I am not afraid," I got literal chills, because it is so far outside of everything we previously knew about that character. I like the characterization that Orko had in the episode. He was always the goofball on the old show, but over the years he's internalized his goof-ups as some huge failure on his end. Which makes him finally getting it right as he died all the more rewarding.
Evil-Lynn likes him in spite of herself. I don't blame her.
I cannot credit the Filmation cartoon for this, but ultimately his learning his real name is Oracle is a bit of genius. It totally fits in hindsight, even though the toys makers at Mattel only named him that because it sounded spacey and alien. What a rewarding thing to learn for people who have been familiar with this franchise for 30 or 40 years. I cannot rave enough about that twist.
Scareglow as a villain is pretty cool. And I like that it's Orko that is his downfall.
Seeing Roboto's see-through body again reminds me why him in a cloak is wholly inadequate.
Adam at the end is another thing to prove that I ultimately have no idea where this is headed. It's going for a big ending, and I can guess pieces of it (like Orko's sacrifice). But ultimately this show is so big and unexpected because it seems like literally anything can happen at this point. Which is a very good thing. *****.
Masters Of The Universe: Revelation "The Forge At The Forest Of Forever"
Yes, anything can happen. Not willing to believe Adam is dead yet. But he COULD be. All bets are off.
The notion of the afterlife being set up here being impossible for mortals to achieve, and Adam only getting there for "services rendered" strikes me as entirely unfair, and as if this Universe is badly designed. It's not as bad as The Good Place in unfairness in its set-up. But at least The Good Place fixed itself by the end. This specific mess does not seem likely to either be corrected or even further explored. It's just an unpleasant fact we can't do anything about.
It's interesting Adam chose to be Adam in Heaven instead of He-Man. That's because Adam is the real him.
Roboto loving the idea that he felt fear before he died was a total Data move. Data loved whenever he somehow experienced unpleasant emotions too. He also died as well.
Skeletor talking about his face being someone nobody else would have is scary and on the nose. I think Smith is deliberately drawing a parallel with the incel movement here. I'm starting to see where the backlash for this show is gonna start.
My only complaint is that we should have gotten the whole season at once. This hiatus is gonna be a pain to wait through. ****1/2.
Star Wars: The Bad Batch "Infested"
Cid really has Omega wrapped around her little finger. She still wants to help her, even after Tech insightfully points out that she just threatened them.
The Pyke have creepy designs and their cold-blooded ruthlessness would be less scary if there was anger or malice attached. No, killing and maiming their enemies is simply how they do business, and is another day at the office.
Durand says it could have been worse. I disagree. Cutting off his horn was a power move designed to humiliate him. He will have that staring back at him in the face every time he looks in the mirror from now on. As far as punishments go, it's exceedingly cruel. I'm not saying killing him would have been nicer, but if this is the idea of the Pykes using a light touch, those guys are total monsters.
Pretty good week. ****.
Muppet Babies "Gonzo-rella / Summer's Car Trouble"
Gonzo-rella:
Nobody tell Fox News about this. We'd never hear the end of it.
So, Gonzo is not transgender, but the producers gave him the arc for any preschoolers who feel a little unsure of themselves there. All mild stuff, all groundbreaking by Disney standards, and all guaranteed to upset certain people if we tell them about it. Shh. Let's keep the nice thing to ourselves.
It's not entirely nice though. It's so stupid that none of the babies recognize Gonzo in the dress. It's a standard cartoon trope, but I'm not going to pretend for one second it's actually acceptable.
Quick! Somebody distract Tucker Carlson and we'll sneak this episode around the back! ****.
Summer's Car Trouble:
I like that Summer's annoying PI character came back to bite her but I don't think the episode fully explored the ramifications for why Summer refuses to admit the car was hers. At the end, she says she was embarrassed, which is simply not the entire truth, and one of the reasons the show being designed for preschoolers hurt this episode. I don't think the toddlers in the audience quite got what was going on. But it's clear none of the other babies have beef with the toy, so Summer has no reason to be embarrassed about it. But Summer refuses to fess up because her lie has spun out of control, and wasted everybody's time, and Summer is desperately trying to get her friends to just drop it. And if they had (like sane people) there would be no moral for Summer to learn and she would have "gotten away" with it. But you can't demonstrate the cause and effect of snowballing lie, and how somebody has to keep up with it to keep it going to toddlers. You're just gonna have to have Summer say she was embarrassed of the car, which was actually only about a tenth of what was really going on. Toddler's can't really do the nuance of recognizing complicated lies or understanding the actual reasons they tend to get worse and worse as they are compounded. In the end, the episode wasn't able to actually discuss with the kids at home the desperation Summer was actually feeling here. Smart kids will get it, but I would have liked Summer to have been able to talk about the pressure she was feeling to keep up the lie. But again, in a preschool show, that doesn't seem like a likely theme to explore.
The episode was all right, but there was more to it than at first glance, and it wasn't allowed to say so. ***1/2,
Episode Overall: ****.
American Dad! "Flush After Reading"
I love the Pride And Prejudice world. The dialogue was so funny and I loved the animation style. The animation styles for all the different books was pretty neat in general.
As far as stories on this show go, that felt reasonably solid. Good mystery, interesting solution, and unlikely but happy resolution. Nobody will ever confuse Francine's pooping mystery for Pride And Prejudice. But as far as recent American Dad plots go, it's tighter than most. Although Rogu is definitely now appearing too much.
I'll give that a positive grade. ***1/2.
Masters Of The Universe: Revelation "The Power Of Grayskull"
I was bored by most of that until the last five minutes. We'll get to that.
My first surprise is that this was actually WRITTEN by Kevin Smith. Because say what you will about his movies, he's a clever writer. Here the Cringer and Orko jokes are just as bland and dull as they are on the old show. I was disappointed. This show has better animation, but it was still as boring as the Filmation stuff.
Except for the last scene. It addressed something that bugged the crap out of me about the Filmation show. The people who knew Adam was He-Man were a ridiculously small group. What annoyed me, in the 80's mindset it was, is that it never expanded for any reason. Nobody ever trusted Teela, or no new guest character ever learned or kept the secret, it was in a total holding pattern between five people. I don't know about you all, but that bored the hell out of me. The best part of superheroes is bending who knows what identity and why. But never letting anyone else in on it, the old He-Man cartoon had zero stakes and pathos. You cannot hit a bigger Total Reset Button at the end of every episode than to have the only five people who know the secret still be the only five people who know the secret.
I like that Teela is angry. It's been too damn long, and as the new Man At Arms, this is definitely something that should have been handed down to her (by Duncan). The fact that it comes as a total surprise is just wrong on every level.
For the record, I think King Randor is an idiot. I understand why he's mad at Duncan. But the truth is he JUST told Adam he wasn't actually proud of him. He ain't winning Father of the Year, Duncan or no Duncan. He has nobody to blame for that strained relationship but himself.
When this was a standard He-Man episode I was bored. When it blew up the secret identity I was interested. And I'm starting to get why the subtitle of the show is "Revelation". ***1/2.
Masters Of The Universe: Revelation "The Poisoned Chalice"
The first half was boring, but once they get to Castle Grayskull my interest was piqued again.
I love the idea of Evil-Lynn forming an alliance with the Sorceress. I think this is a bad idea, simply because of Lynn's name. But the Sorceress says their interests align for now, and I believe she believes that. But I still think it's a mistake just based on the name.
My favorite thing in the episode was giving Cringer of all people the role of the wise sage. Stuff like this is the reason this show won't be getting or needing a second season. They are stretching the premise beyond He-Man and exploring the characters and situations in way we've never seen before. That is not an open-ended journey. Whether this winds up an actual sequel or a spiritual sequel doesn't really matter. The set-up and storyline scream "Coda" to me. Whether it's considered canon or not with the Filmation stuff, I believe this series intends to give a definitive ending to Eternia and the He-Man Universe. Which is something that vaguely excites me.
Good episode. ***1/2.
Masters Of The Universe: Revelation "The Most Dangerous Man In Eternia"
Evil-Lynn being super shady at the end.
I like that Lynn always considered Man-At-Arms more dangerous than He-Man. Despite how TV-G the old show was, I kind of understand her point by his fighting style here. He-Man fights for ideals befitting a teenager and young man. Duncan fights to the death like the old battled-hardened warrior he is. That's impossible to get across in an 80's cartoon, but if this show says that dynamic was always in place, I can kind of see it.
I love that Beast Man is in the alliance simply because he still has the hots for Evil-Lynn. Make no mistake: I think it's really cool he is already living in peace in that village with Duncan, Orko, and Roboto.
I haven't made up my mind about this version of Orko. I'm afraid of getting attached because I'm 100% certain he's gonna die before this is all over. His demeanor screams to me that he is an eventual self-sacrifice to save all the heroes. He's too sad and broken to be anything else.
Solid. ***.
Masters Of The Universe: Revelation "Land Of The Dead"
That was something.
They were laying it on a little thick in Teela and Scareglow's mind confrontation but everything else landed like gangbusters.
Orko's sacrifice was precisely as magnificent as it should have been. When he says "I am not afraid," I got literal chills, because it is so far outside of everything we previously knew about that character. I like the characterization that Orko had in the episode. He was always the goofball on the old show, but over the years he's internalized his goof-ups as some huge failure on his end. Which makes him finally getting it right as he died all the more rewarding.
Evil-Lynn likes him in spite of herself. I don't blame her.
I cannot credit the Filmation cartoon for this, but ultimately his learning his real name is Oracle is a bit of genius. It totally fits in hindsight, even though the toys makers at Mattel only named him that because it sounded spacey and alien. What a rewarding thing to learn for people who have been familiar with this franchise for 30 or 40 years. I cannot rave enough about that twist.
Scareglow as a villain is pretty cool. And I like that it's Orko that is his downfall.
Seeing Roboto's see-through body again reminds me why him in a cloak is wholly inadequate.
Adam at the end is another thing to prove that I ultimately have no idea where this is headed. It's going for a big ending, and I can guess pieces of it (like Orko's sacrifice). But ultimately this show is so big and unexpected because it seems like literally anything can happen at this point. Which is a very good thing. *****.
Masters Of The Universe: Revelation "The Forge At The Forest Of Forever"
Yes, anything can happen. Not willing to believe Adam is dead yet. But he COULD be. All bets are off.
The notion of the afterlife being set up here being impossible for mortals to achieve, and Adam only getting there for "services rendered" strikes me as entirely unfair, and as if this Universe is badly designed. It's not as bad as The Good Place in unfairness in its set-up. But at least The Good Place fixed itself by the end. This specific mess does not seem likely to either be corrected or even further explored. It's just an unpleasant fact we can't do anything about.
It's interesting Adam chose to be Adam in Heaven instead of He-Man. That's because Adam is the real him.
Roboto loving the idea that he felt fear before he died was a total Data move. Data loved whenever he somehow experienced unpleasant emotions too. He also died as well.
Skeletor talking about his face being someone nobody else would have is scary and on the nose. I think Smith is deliberately drawing a parallel with the incel movement here. I'm starting to see where the backlash for this show is gonna start.
My only complaint is that we should have gotten the whole season at once. This hiatus is gonna be a pain to wait through. ****1/2.
Star Wars: The Bad Batch "Infested"
Cid really has Omega wrapped around her little finger. She still wants to help her, even after Tech insightfully points out that she just threatened them.
The Pyke have creepy designs and their cold-blooded ruthlessness would be less scary if there was anger or malice attached. No, killing and maiming their enemies is simply how they do business, and is another day at the office.
Durand says it could have been worse. I disagree. Cutting off his horn was a power move designed to humiliate him. He will have that staring back at him in the face every time he looks in the mirror from now on. As far as punishments go, it's exceedingly cruel. I'm not saying killing him would have been nicer, but if this is the idea of the Pykes using a light touch, those guys are total monsters.
Pretty good week. ****.
Muppet Babies "Gonzo-rella / Summer's Car Trouble"
Gonzo-rella:
Nobody tell Fox News about this. We'd never hear the end of it.
So, Gonzo is not transgender, but the producers gave him the arc for any preschoolers who feel a little unsure of themselves there. All mild stuff, all groundbreaking by Disney standards, and all guaranteed to upset certain people if we tell them about it. Shh. Let's keep the nice thing to ourselves.
It's not entirely nice though. It's so stupid that none of the babies recognize Gonzo in the dress. It's a standard cartoon trope, but I'm not going to pretend for one second it's actually acceptable.
Quick! Somebody distract Tucker Carlson and we'll sneak this episode around the back! ****.
Summer's Car Trouble:
I like that Summer's annoying PI character came back to bite her but I don't think the episode fully explored the ramifications for why Summer refuses to admit the car was hers. At the end, she says she was embarrassed, which is simply not the entire truth, and one of the reasons the show being designed for preschoolers hurt this episode. I don't think the toddlers in the audience quite got what was going on. But it's clear none of the other babies have beef with the toy, so Summer has no reason to be embarrassed about it. But Summer refuses to fess up because her lie has spun out of control, and wasted everybody's time, and Summer is desperately trying to get her friends to just drop it. And if they had (like sane people) there would be no moral for Summer to learn and she would have "gotten away" with it. But you can't demonstrate the cause and effect of snowballing lie, and how somebody has to keep up with it to keep it going to toddlers. You're just gonna have to have Summer say she was embarrassed of the car, which was actually only about a tenth of what was really going on. Toddler's can't really do the nuance of recognizing complicated lies or understanding the actual reasons they tend to get worse and worse as they are compounded. In the end, the episode wasn't able to actually discuss with the kids at home the desperation Summer was actually feeling here. Smart kids will get it, but I would have liked Summer to have been able to talk about the pressure she was feeling to keep up the lie. But again, in a preschool show, that doesn't seem like a likely theme to explore.
The episode was all right, but there was more to it than at first glance, and it wasn't allowed to say so. ***1/2,
Episode Overall: ****.
American Dad! "Flush After Reading"
I love the Pride And Prejudice world. The dialogue was so funny and I loved the animation style. The animation styles for all the different books was pretty neat in general.
As far as stories on this show go, that felt reasonably solid. Good mystery, interesting solution, and unlikely but happy resolution. Nobody will ever confuse Francine's pooping mystery for Pride And Prejudice. But as far as recent American Dad plots go, it's tighter than most. Although Rogu is definitely now appearing too much.
I'll give that a positive grade. ***1/2.
