PLOT A: "Frozen: Dreamworks Style"
After the Hofferson family name was ruined
when the Frightmare killed “Fearless Finn Hofferson” 10 years ago, Astrid has
sworn revenge on the Frightmare, and with its arrival coming soon she’s finally
going to get that chance.
This is probably the first
“Astrid-centric” episode we’ve gotten since the mighty Heather Report duo last
season and while I enjoyed Heather Report a lot more than this episode, it had
some good points.
First off, it was interesting to see
an actual flashback in show since I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that the
show wasn’t really for flashbacks. But it seems they tactfully skimped around
having to pay for making a younger model for Astrid by using one of the little
girl models already used in the show and re-coloring her hair. I’m pretty sure
it was the same little girl that was in episode 202 wanting Fishlegs’
autograph.
But still, this episode just might
have a lot more depth in backstory than anticipated. If there really is some
kind of embarrassment of dishonor of the Hofferson name after Finn was killed
by the frightmare, that might explain Astrid’s continual drive in the movie and
so forth to be the best at everything. Because she doesn’t want to be an
embarrassment or add more dishonor to her family name….?
It’s an interesting thought to chew
on.
Still, irrational and impulsive Astrid
is always entertaining to watch as she usually thinks things through before
jumping into stuff, she had a tunnel vision goal of defeating this dragon, so
it was an odd turn of events to see Hiccup be the non-impulsive voice of
reason.
And the end was good as well, though I
think it would’ve benefited with maybe Astrid saying something about her uncle
and not Hiccup. I know he was doing her a solid, but it was “Astrid’s” episode,
after all.
But, onto the Frightmare. It’s a very pretty dragon. Very nice light
effects and design, if I do say so myself. And the twist—if you wanna call it a
twist—that it paralyzes it’s prey before striking it is….interesting to say the
least. Though a bit gruesome when you think of poor Finn being frozen while it
watches a dragon hurling towards him before it brutally murders him….
Lucky for Astrid, Hiccup was there to
get her out of the way.
And the other “twist” that the Frightmare
comes to Berk every year because it’s following a glowing river algae ignited
by the aurora felt very national geographic, but it worked…and was a perfect
thing for Fishlegs to solve.
I did enjoy how they only used the
characters that were necessary to this plot, and I’m continually liking Astrid,
Hiccup, and Fishlegs as the main problem solving trio of the show.
The ending battle was…it was good. I
wouldn’t say it blew my mind but it wasn’t bad. Just your standard good fight.
I do grow tired of the dragon commands, though. Still, I get their purpose, but
I think Toothless knows to roll over during a fight without Hiccup telling him
to.
So, this plot was mostly just a bag of
“good but not great” things here.
PLOT B: "Mission Impossible….for
Snotlout"
Ruffnut and Tuffnut have a “exclusive bunker”
made for taking refuge during the Frightmare’s arrival and Snotlout wants in,
but he first has to complete a list of outrageous errands for the twins.
This plot is basically the definition
of a comedic sideplot. This episode had a more serious tone to it with its main
plot, so I suppose they wanted something lighter to balance it out, and thus we
get this plot with the twins and Snotlout.
It was cute and funny, I can say that,
so there was nothing wrong with the plot itself. Just how much screen time it
got. It got way for much for
something that was a sideplot, and it ended up using time that could’ve
been
used to flush out the A plot better.
Now the A plot was in no way rushed,
so to speak, but there was more than one time in this episode where when this
comedic sideplot came up I was tapping my fingers waiting for it to get back to
the main point of the episode.
Comedic sideplots are perfectly fine
as long as they stay on the side, and
this plot started pushing too much in terms of how much screen time it got when
it didn’t advance the plot whatsoever.
So…while it was good and funny and
all, it needed a little less time because, again, it wasn’t the point of the
episode.
FINAL THOUGHTS:
So, this episode had a lot of hype
behind it and I already anticipated it wouldn’t live up to it…mainly because
the hype was all Hiccstrid.
I wasn’t expecting any romance in this
episode so I wasn’t disappointed or
shocked like I know some of the fans were.
That aside, I do think this episode
had a bit of an issue with balance between the A and B plot, but managed to
still have that issue and not let the episode seemed rushed. So, I praise it on
that.
It was a nice look back into Astrid’s
past and motivations, and offered a lovely new dragon.
No comments:
Post a Comment