At least the rock girl knows something besides “shoot sharp object that puffs.”
Impressions:
Is about a minute and a half of excessive animation enough to carry an entire episode? Probably not, especially when it’s pretty close to the exact same sequence that every single one of these fights has been. You have all the possibilities granted to you by ‘magic’ and yet somehow, every single goddamn fight ends up being throwing projectiles that conveniently explode into large puffs of smoke. Occasionally, it even calls it out, like when he was trapped, had a boulder dropped on him, was fine, everybody went “But how!?” and then simply moved on. That was a good question, guys, and the protagonist just being invulnerable to all attacks undermines the whole underdog thing. Well, that and a truly grotesque amount of exposition and announcing the minutia of magic, even when it doesn’t make a single iota of sense. They particularly made a huge deal about ice dude being able to summon clones and it being impossible to tell them apart except for a couple little tricks… except that there were multiple points where the clones all went away and then got resummoned, and at no point whatsoever was there any reason to think that the dude had moved or was even trying to swap places with any of them.
And of course, the walrus in the room of nobody ever picking up the golden snitch and both choosing to instead throw tantrums at each other, which does Will no favors either. It’s so simple to address too. Just make it some magic thingy that requires some amount of uninterrupted time to deal with, but they keep doing these shots of Will reflected in or staring at it, and then proceeds to ignore it so he can facetank some more projectiles, conveniently hidden by the smoke they all create so he can jump out of it. Also trying to ignore the entire stadium full of people cheering on a lunatic literally slobbering at the mouth attempting as he rants like a mad lunatic and they all cheer his genius. That’s also doing a good job wiping out what scant credibility this school or setting in its entirety may have left.
But sure, the opening played for 90 seconds of well animated running around and whacking projectiles. Unfortunately, the exact same as every single other one of these fights against the classist/racist dudes that comprise 100% of this show’s antagonists. This time it was dudes, a change from the first time when it was circles, or the second time when it was also circles, or the third time when it was a dude and a bird. How many more of them to go for this season? Perhaps next time it can be squares. Or vines.
