Cartoons!

[Cleinhun]

Season 3 fixed most of the problems I had with the first 2 seasons, while improving on the parts they did well. It's basically the show I hoped season 1 would be. The most important changes, at least as far as my enjoyment of the show is concerned, are

A: They significantly turned town the obnoxious teen drama, so it feels like the characters are actually friends

B: The antagonists have both reasonable motivations and character traits other than "evil"

and C: Characters no longer speak exclusively in exposition.

 

If you liked the idea of the show but felt let down by season 1 and/or 2, I think it's absolutely worth giving 3 a shot, they've really stepped up their game.

[Codicier]

Obviously it's in the ancient past for most of the readers on this thread but I've just watched the 1st season of Avatar and the beginning of s2.

I've heard a lot of praise heaped on it, but I must admit my 1st impressions were mixed to say the least.

I mean I know we are supposed to set the bar low with anything made for TV but honestly some of the early animation just seemed clunky & full of shortcuts. It's not that the series has nothing to speak for it, the character dialog and development of the main trio could be excellent at times and uncle & Zukko are pretty fun but the the things just seemed to be stretched much more than the old 'fight of the week' format.

Then we have the finale, now while it's not quite 'girlfriend in the refrigerator' territory the way the northern water princess' death was treated by the series was pretty damn annoying, seemingly primarily played to make the death of the chief villain by the spirit seem 'justified' and then immediately forgotten by the main trio and in particular by Sokka.

There's this scene in the 1st episode of s2 which really sums it up, the gran old master says he's going to give them all something to remind them all that's happened in the north when it come Sokka the one who's supposedly connection with someone who has just died what happens, nothing but a cheap pun. He doesn't even bat a eye when going through the 'cave of two lovers' a few episodes later.

I mean FFS not only do you have a prime chance to really explore grief etc and it just gets utterly ignored, but it makes the whole sacrifice seem like it was brushed under the carpet.

[tegan]

The first season's a little rough. Later episodes will directly address some of the concerns you're having.

[dium]

I agree with you about Season 1 of ATLA; I think it's a pretty average season of children's television. I tried to rewatch the series back when Korra was announced and found myself skipping a lot of episodes and not really enjoying myself as much as I expected.

 

But the second and third seasons are top-tier, I think.

 

Unrelated:

 

I just finished the first season of Netflix's Bojack Horseman. I liked it a lot! It started kinda slow for me, but it was one of those very satisfying seasons of TV where every episode felt like an unequivocal improvement over the one before it. 

 

Related: this is obvious to anyone who's been paying attention, I guess, but Kristen Schaal is quickly making out a place for herself in the pantheon of ubiquitous voice actors (where Steve Blum reigns as king).

[undermind9]

I just finished the first season of Netflix's Bojack Horseman. I liked it a lot! It started kinda slow for me, but it was one of those very satisfying seasons of TV where every episode felt like an unequivocal improvement over the one before it. 

i watched the first 6 over the weekend and thought it was pretty good.  probably do another few eps this weekend

 

i thought that the opening sequence was/is great

[Ucantalas]

I watched the entire season of Bojack in a couple of days.
 

I liked the first half, but I guess I just wasn't ready for it to get so... I dunno, serious, near the end. It's not a bad show by any means, but I wonder if I would have appreciated it more watching it like a traditional TV show instead of binging on it all at once. I think a bit of a gap between episodes may have made the transition feel a little better to me.

(Also, Vincent Adultman is just the best thing I think I've ever seen in a cartoon.)

[tegan]

EDIT: wrong thread!

[tegan]

 

 

 

I am so on board with this.

[Twig]

Oh shit I haven't watched any of the new episodes! Thanks for reminding me!

[tegan]

An aside about Gravity Falls: I am increasingly infatuated with the fan theory that the journals were written by...

Old Man McGucket. I've been thinking about it and he's old enough, he's clearly experienced with advanced technology and is unphased by strange phenomenon, his first name is Fiddleford -which matches the "PROPERTY OF F" label on the laptop- and his right hand is continuously covered by a bandage that could conceal either a sixth finger or be the result of losing said finger.

[Syd]

An aside about Gravity Falls: I am increasingly infatuated with the fan theory that the journals were written by...

Old Man McGucket. I've been thinking about it and he's old enough, he's clearly experienced with advanced technology and is unphased by strange phenomenon, his first name is Fiddleford -which matches the "PROPERTY OF F" label on the laptop- and his right hand is continuously covered by a bandage that could conceal either a sixth finger or be the result of losing said finger.

Almost certainly huge spoilers on that subject lie beyond this point. It involves a (supposedly, but looks really legit) leaked picture from a future episode.

Last chance to turn back. This gives away who the writer of the journals was.

It looks like that theory is probably correct. A leaked picture from a screening of an upcoming episode shows a younger 6-fingered McGucket writing in a book. It couldn't be directly confirmed from the camera angle, but the attached magnifying glass is a pretty big indicator that it's one of the journals.

 

The leaked image in question:

[Syd]

Anyway, to make a post that's not rife with potentially massive spoilers, the episode of Gravity Falls that aired tonight was amazing and I really want to discuss it with someone but I don't personally know anyone that watches the show, and that brings me physical pain.

 

Sock Opera might just be my favorite episode of the entire series so far.

[tegan]

I watched it! So good. Glad to know that Bill's still around, too.

[Ben X]

indiegogo from a load of ex-disney animators for a (mostly) hand-animated short in order to get investors for a full-length feature. Has already got over 300% of its target, and it looks really nice if not particularly inspired.

[tegan]

Wakfu is finally coming to the English-speaking world via Netflix! Yessssssss.

 

Also, while I'm all for 2D animation coming back, that IndieGogo film looks like the bland uninspired stuff that eventually killed it.

[dium]

Whatever you're linking to is 404ing for me, so could you elaborate on what you're talking about?

 

Also: I wish Netflix wasn't so horrible about foreign language stuff. I basically never want to watch English dubs of anything that was originally in another language, and if it's in Japanese I don't want subtitles. But Netflix always has the English dub as the only option, and when it's subbed the subs are baked-in. Boo.

 

(Hulu is better, and yes, I realize that Crunchyroll exists precisely for the kinds of people who complain about this)

[dium]

indiegogo from a load of ex-disney animators for a (mostly) hand-animated short in order to get investors for a full-length feature. Has already got over 300% of its target, and it looks really nice if not particularly inspired.

 

I was a big theoretical fan of steampunk back when the concept was new to me, which seems like forever ago. Since then I can count the number of steampunk things that I actually like on one hand, with most of the fingers lopped off, and all of these things have been very small and very indie and non-commercial (my avatar is from one of them). It's a genre with more-or-less nothing to show for itself, but with enough concept art floating around that everything already looks played-out and generic. This indiegogo is no different.

 

(I still have the faintest hope of a long form steampunk thing actually working, even though I probably shouldn't. Whatever it would be would probably need to be grounded in a very specific real-world time and place, and tone-down the fantastical elements pretty drastically. Sort of an alternate history with steampunk-flavored magical realism, maybe. I say I want this, but maybe what steampunk really needs is to just die and stay dead for a little while.)

[Codicier]

IIRC Wakfu (which is what tegans link seems to be pointing to when i hover over it) is french

 

It probably is in English since they explicitly ran a kickstarter at the beginning of the year to get it dubbed

 

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1836563008/wakfu-the-animated-series

[tegan]

Yeah, sorry, for some reason the forums have been giving me trouble if I try to put italics inside a sentence with a link in it lately.

 

Wakfu was a French cartoon from a few years back that was leaps and bounds better than it had any right to be. It was surprisingly well-written and animated and had a standalone episode from Masaaki Yuasa.

[Ben X]

Ha, yeah, totally agree with you about that indiegogo, it looks a bit Treasure Planet. I probably wouldn't have linked it if it hadn't hit 300% in a few days, which I found interesting.

[Twig]

They invoked Steampunk which automatically pulls in a lot more money than it probably deserves. I personally ain't got nothin' against (good) steampunk, but man it is mostly just a marketing gimmick these days than it is something people do anything interesting with.

[syntheticgerbil]

Yuasa did the character designs, he didn't write or direct the episode.

[Merus]

I'm secretly miffed whenever I see steampunk heroes. I expect them to be reactionaries concerned about the Indian Menace or the poor.

[dium]

Season 4 of Korra is airing in two weeks. Online on their website only, no less.

 

Nickelodeon is clearly washing their hands of this show and dumping everything they have as quickly as possible. It's a real shame because I want the show to do well and Nick doesn't seem to... It's also a shame because I expect literally none of the people I managed to convince to give Korra another shot will be caught up before new episodes air. It's just not gonna happen.

 

Goddamnit.

[Tanukitsune]

Wait, what? Didn't the last season end a month ago?