Thundercats: Between Brothers

[sakon76]

Okay, some seriously clunky writing going on here. I was calling out lines before they happened. Also snarking with Princess Bride lines, but sometimes that's all too easy. ("So you put down your club and I put down my nunchuks and we try to kill each other like civilized people" etc.)

What gets me, though, is, (1) "The Sword of Omens can't be beaten!" Um, anyone else remember the episode The Duelist and the Drifter? Because Lion-O clearly doesn't.

And, (2), the big one. Somehow Cheetara choosing Tygra over Lion-O equates to Tygra betraying Lion-O. Because, obviously, it's all about them and she has no freedom to choose. I was willing to ignore their pissing contest over her before now, but the writers finally managed to hit my feminist button.

Panthro choosing to sacrifice his arms was interesting, though. That I liked. I'm hoping he'll get replacement cyborg arms or something eventually. Maybe drag Bengali in to make them? I liked his snapping to Snarf about not needing a nursemaid, particularly given that in the original series Snarf was a nursemaid. :) Still, someone else is going to have to drive and maintain the Thundertank now....

Please let the next story arc be written better?

Comments

[hoshikage.livejournal.com]

Please, yes. I spent most of the episode snarling at the screen. The biggest issues being, in order:

1) I see that Cheetara's feelings are of absolutely no importance to anybody and it's all about winning her as a prize. Objectification is fun, kids! Besides, it's not like any girls are going to be watching this show, right?

2) Tygra's memory of said incident is so great that he didn't remember running for help? Are you kidding me? And this fact never once came up before? Like, I dunno, "Hey Lion-O, it's okay now, I brought Dad!"

3) Cheetara's feelings? *checks* Nope, still not important.

4) This drives me bonkers in general - there was a series of books by Janny Wurts that I actually had to stop reading because it was about two princely brothers who were cursed to hate each other and start a war. This would have been fine and all except that they'd been TOLD this (several times), they KNEW this, and yet it never once occurred to either of them that oh gee, maybe there's this curse at work and that's why we're fighting! If Lion-O had half a brain, he should have realized the concept of "self-fulfilling prophecy" a whole lot sooner. Of course, the show in general really relies far too heavily on the characters being stupid in order to advance the plot...

5) Cheetara's wishes? Oh, maybe they're - no wait, still not important after all. (Also, the whole previous connection to Tygra thing was nowhere near developed enough to have that make any sense.)

GAH. Basically Panthro was the only good thing. I also vote for cyborg arms.

The really, truly irritating part is that I'm absolutely certain that the writers can do better than this. The first episodes, they have betrayed me! >:(

[amidoh.livejournal.com]

The most likeable, most identifyable character in this is Mumm-ra and he's been off making daisy chains since about episode 3.

I'm starting not to blame him for wanting to wipe the cats off the face of the earth.

[ghilledhu.livejournal.com]

Did anyone else notice that the warning went from "Your brother WILL betray you" to "you will FEEL betrayed"? This series has had a lot of really nice moments and some good ideas, but overall it lacks much subtlety in its storytelling.

Don't even get me started on the whole Cheetara mess. For a moment there with Tygra I thought the show had finally pulled its head out of its ass, but no. I can only hope both boys get so obnoxious about it that she tells them both off and runs away with Snarf or something.

[jeff-morris.livejournal.com]

I confess I was half hoping Cheetara would choose Panthro, so they could walk arm in stump toward the sunset. :)

Yeah, this was not the best episode by a long shot.