I was pretty iffy on episode 7, as well as parts of ep 8, so I’m pretty paranoid about how TADC is gonna wrap up. The C&A stuff feels extremely rushed with how all of it is crammed into exposition dumps from “Abel”/The Mannequin and Kinger
yeah, it feels like they sort of had a direction but they spent too long focusing on wacky hijinks and sparce character moments.
it reminds me of Amphibia, in a lot of ways. Amphibia also spent way too much time focusing on Anne and the Plantars doing crazy shit together, instead of explaining the calamity stones or the prophecy. and then towards the end, they haphazardly told us what the prophecy was, with no further explanation.
i really need shows to actually map out their plot properly. i'm generally a fan of shows with lesser episodes/seasons — Over The Garden Wall, Infinity Train and Gravity Falls have all handled it really well. it's a lot better than dragging the story on for five more seasons and ruining whatever charm it had.
but if lesser episodes means we get an unfinished, unsatisfactory story, that's also bad. some things can be left to speculation. but the main plot and characters need closure.
OTGW does this really well. Wirt and Greg's story gets a happy and satisfying ending. Wirt goes through character development and learns how to take care of his brother better, also becomes more confident. Beatrice also gets her happy ending and reunites with her family.
but at the same time, a lot of the other aspects are intentionally kept mysterious. is the Unknown a real place? is it purgatory? how did the Beast's soul get trapped in the lantern? was he a human once too?
it's perfect storytelling because there's enough clarity for the audience to be satisfied, and enough ambiguity so that people can speculate and get creative with theories.
