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Western Animation - Discuss American, Canadian, and European cartoons here (or just bitch about wokeshit, I guess)
I have watched the 11 episodes currently avaiable of Dragon Striker, the new magic soccer frenchanime from disney. This is season 1 but it's probably a case of a split season. I'll try to give a quick summary review.
It's about a boy with no magic who is a fan of magic soccer, who finds out he actually has the strongest and most dangerous dragon magic, the same from his dead mother, so he is taken to the magic soccer school (???) to learn and play magic soccer.
The school has 4 teams (dragons, bards, roses, shadows) but the team he was going to enter tried to murder him and he loses the trials, so they just find a new field by coincidence and make their own team, the knights.
Key is the protag. He's got that ben 10 brattiness that makes him unsufferable early on, with a mix of shounen hot blood who is ready to protect friends and thrash talk anyone. He has some anger issues over not controlling his powers and blowing shit up, but he befriends the 9 tailed fox i mean the dragon inside him.
Ssyele (what a name) is white blonde goal keeper. She is a newbie but very good and becomes the captain as the level headed person on the group, altho she kinda stumbles into plot revelant stuff by luck too often. Despite being a random chef daughter, she has time stopping powers.
Odward is black boy with shades. He used to play on the Bards team but quit cause his boyfriend was bullying his brother. He is kinda meant to be jerk with a heart of gold, and usually cynical but smug. He can make fairly overpowered illisions that everyone falls for.
Milo is odward's brother. He is the gentle giant, shy clumsy and cowardly guy who feels bad cause his tama (super power) sucks as it's just jelly bean. But i feel like his power upgrades TOO FAST and by episode 11 he straight up has jelly machinegun, jelly traps, jelly shields, etc.
Ameline is the nerd girl. She barely talks and whenever she does it's like a gremlin. She is only in the team to fill the fifth slot and is barely explored. She can suck other people's powers and hold it in her mouth, but somehow this combos with milo to make power disabling bullets.
Good things first
+The animation is very good
There are some frenchanime like wakfu and this is one of those. The first episode is avaiable on youtube
The show is just very colorful and pretty. Usually these soccer anime have everyone with the same uniform but here the cast has different clothes. The teams are only 5v5 and field is small so the casts are not that large.
I like the main characters, their friendship is bit rushd and feel like they pep talk each other too often but their dynamics are earned and fun. They are all likable without feeling forced, even key and odward who start annoying mellow out later.
I also like that this is a WE NEED TO GET SHIT DONE show. Every episode has one or more high stakes conflict where they can't afford to fuck around and the main cast is very proactive. There is zero "filler" in this cartoon.
The matches are pretty cool, the powers are used creatively and there is combo moves, altho this might be just me but i find the sheer escalation in powers too fast. Like, some matches are less soccer and more like a bunch of wizards spamming spells at each other while doing flips with a ball. There is also a LOT of "i kick the ball very high, then i jump up there and kick at the goal".
Things i dislike
-There isn't really a "story" or goal and yet it feels super rushed.
This might sound silly but i do not know why anyone in this show even plays magic soccer. Even a very simple "I want to be the king of magic soccer, believe it!" would be fine but there is literally nothing, everyone is just kinda there. There isn't even a shared "love of the game" between players.
The story is also bizarrely fast for 11 episodes. In one episodes key will lose control of his power and control, then the next episode he loses it again and controls it furhter, in what feels like should've been a season long arc.
They say "combos" haven't been seen in 300 years yet key's team pulls it off by accident or master it offscreen with no issue. At some point dialogue is awkward as if characters are speedrunning their arcs and some important stuff simply happens offscreen.
I STILL don't know if this country or world even has a name at all. It also takes like 7 episodes to show an external evil force who i assume are the actual villains here but it's insane that you would release your first "season" without one.
-The world building and rules are non existent. I can't even say it sucks and they failed, i don't think they even tried.
What the heck is a dragon striker? It's a striker with dragon powers? They treat it like a special rare role but only the knights have someone with dragon power, yet his powers are nowhere close to Key's. Key has a dragon inside him that was in his mother first so are the powers his magic or the dragon's?
Like, the school makes no sense. We never see key actually attend a single class. The only staff are the 4 coaches who i think are teachers too but how? Is there no headmaster? What to they even teach here? No one bother training Key until he blows up a chunk of the school by accident and suddendly "he is dangerous we got to expel him".
There was only 2 yellow cards and it's when someone KOs the opponent intentionally so i assumed we only judge by the damage taken and a red card would be death. It can't be sportsmanship or intent because these niggas are tackling each other onto brick walls and not holding back. There is no failsafe or any kind and the refs don't give a fuck.
There is seemingly no limit to how someone uses their magic or even rules to watch they bring. One girlie brings a magic tiara that lets her summon the ghosts of the best soccer players to replace her team mates. We got 12 year olds playing school soccer and suddendly someone summons the ghost of Pelé to play and this is LEGAL?
The heroes have metal uniforms so the guys with magnetic powers can literally flick them at each other with ease and they're super violent with it too so like, is there no rule about this?? Are they not allowed to play without the metal uniform???
What are even are these ages anyway?? Key is 12 so i assume but some kids look like 16+. Milo mentions a swimming team but where do they swim? They can't use magic outside of soccer match so i assume it's a soccer school but if you're not one of the 30 players then what the fuck do you do??? What defines your magic? It seems to be hereditary in some cases but not others.
How can the heroes simply make up a fifth team?? They say allyou need is 5 players, a field and uniforms but not a coach? They found it in some random abandoned floating island except it wasn't abandoned cause another team used it but this goes against the elevator being old and dirty?
-Everyone in this show is AN ASSHOLE who straight up LOVES MURDER.
Every rival is a smug arrogant showboat and outside of the roses, everyone loves cheating and murder.
Episode 1 the Dragons evil rival straight up says "i want everyone to aim at the enemy goalie face. She still standing? Fuck it, i'm going to dragon fury this bitch, i dont care if i get suspended". The mc tells the ref and he says "whatever he can do anything he wants".
Later one the same rival beats the shit out of Key to the point he bleeds (in a disney cartoon whoa) and leaves him to fall off the flying island. I'm sorry? Isn't that like, actual attempter murder?
The shadows use a cheating magic relic to summon ghosts of old players that is never explictly called cheating (but it's pretty much cheating) are ready to attack the heroes on sight.
The twins from the Bards also LOVE cheating and murder. They tried it early on and again in episode 11, when their coach straight up tells the team to kill the MC.
"You must KILL Ronaldo! RIGHT NOW!"
Oh yeah the coaches...
-The coaches are the only adults and they are insane
The coaches are the only authorities yet they're all addicted to winning and will abuse these kids and call them failures and threaten them into steal / cheat / murder without any regulation. You would think the reason they're like this is the coaches but nope, i'm pretty sure these kids are demons and love it.
(WHY ARE YOU TRAUMADUMPING ON THIS CHILD YOU BARELY KNOW)
At one point the roses coach says "My star player got his power stolen, we need to expel the knights" and others are like "eeeeh there is no proof lets wait it out idk", except these niggas would be doing the same if it was them but since it's their literal competitor they are fine with it. So the roses coach goes and uses her power to attack the suspected student in broad daylight, seemingly ready to kill her until the other coaches appeared and proved her innocent.
Then she walks away and she faced no repercussions for it.
Imagine if in harry potter, Snape simply started swinging at harry at the cafeteria cause he thinks he stole something. It's like, all the authorities in this school are actively corrupt and awful and i can't take them seriously.
-This show has gay boys kissing in a way so obvious that i don't know why they bothered pseudo censoring it
(odward breaks with his boyfriend episode 2 but we find out he is SO EVIL that it's weird odward even liked him)
Apparently one of the animators (?) is also a yaoi enthusiast
(what is this age gap? 16 and 12? creeeeepy)
This isn't necessary awful as the show never preaches wokeness or anything like that, so i hope this only raises some eyebrows and not some flags (why did disney allow this?)
So tl;dr: It's #hype and #aura magic soccer anime with kino animation and a decently likable main cast but an incredibly underveloped world, very vague rules, asshole rivals and a few useless abusive adults.
I do not know why the creators made the show this fast unless they were afraid of disney canceling it or something. I hope they learn to stop and breathe for next season (or other half of season?).
https://youtube.com/watch?v=mtC4sjABZNw
Anyways, disneys newest movie trailer is out and it sucks ass as expected. Disney really is just super incompetent when it comes to making original stuff. Their last 2 decent and successful outputs are moana (which at least had maui folklore to borrow from) and encanto, with both being hard carried by lin manual miranda music. This is definitely gonna be another raya or wish.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=mtC4sjABZNw
Anyways, disneys newest movie trailer is out and it sucks ass as expected. Disney really is just super incompetent when it comes to making original stuff. Their last 2 decent and successful outputs are moana (which at least had maui folklore to borrow from) and encanto, with both being hard carried by lin manual miranda music. This is definitely gonna be another raya or wish.
The story of a bug-eyed ethnically ambiguous girl who feels like she just doesn't fit in, where do they keep coming up with these incredibly original ideas for animated films?
That dragon football anime... I swear, didn't we have like 2-3 cartoons about football with super-powers already? One was galactic-themed, another was fantasy anime, then there's Captain Tsubasa IIRC. This Dragon Striker seems to be late AND possibly, fatally woke, but of course, dammit.
Got this trailer for some kind of animated show. They didn't even attempt to be subtle, it's straight-up about a transwoman with magic. I'm more aware of this guy being trans than of anything else that's going on in Olympia.
Imagine if in harry potter, Snape simply started swinging at harry at the cafeteria cause he thinks he stole something. It's like, all the authorities in this school are actively corrupt and awful and i can't take them seriously.
With the recent controversy over the new designs for Shrek 5.
Opinions are very mixed, constantly getting into fights with each other, and after a quick examination of the new designs, I can see why they got upset.
For you see, one of the biggest changes in Shrek 5's animation style is that they made models more... cartoony. The eyes are far more expressive. You episcally see this with Shrek, episcally how they decided to give him more bushy eyebrows.
It reminds me of Donkey Kong's new design in his recent game, when they, too, made his eyes more expressive. Once you notice it, it becomes painfully distracting.
They went so far as to change his vest. Instead of being tied together, it's now separated.
They even changed Donkey's hair, making it a bit more spread out.
The most drastic change would be the Gingerbreadman, looking far more elastic despite being a cookie.
Even if you wanted to make the argument that they look like this because they're older now, that really isn't a good excuse.
And this goes into another problem with Shrek 5. It's sacrificing its original aesthetic to be more "modern," and as a result, it already feels dated.
The thing is, the reason Shrek's animation leans toward a more realistic style is that it was meant as a mockery of Disney animations. Instead of being whimsical, it was grimy, and this worked because Shrek was always meant for an older audience. It was dry comedy. Most of its best moments come from character banter with each other. You can see this with one Shrek classic joke: orcs are like onions.
And before you ask, yes, Puss succeeded when they changed his style, but here's the thing: one, it was a spin-off, and two, among the characters in Shrek, Puss was the most pleasing to look at. He was an exception to the grimy art style because it played into the joke that he was a cat and would use that to manipulate people. They even made a joke where he would enlarge his eyes to get what he wanted, much like a cat does. Lastly, the changes to Puss' new designs were minimal, so they weren't as distracting as everyone else's in Shrek 5.
This gets at a problem I constantly encounter in the animation community. They fundamentally don't understand the importance of aesthetics in animation, and worse, they're terrible with pattern recognition.
It's made even worse when people constantly get into petty arguments online, even though they want to see the classic designs.
Classic fujoshit shenanigans. They have been doing it for ages in Japan, sneaking faggot and crossdressing shit into media for kids and teens. The western side is just getting to their levels degeneracy.
Edit: Just learned that this was inspired by Inazuma Level, and yeah, this thing had no chance from the beginning. That aninu was supposed to be for little boys but female pedos made it all about sodomy and the troon-like designs for little boys didn't help either. The other shonen manga inspiration, Captain Tsubasa, was one of the first media properties to get a crazy BL doujinishi following in Japan as well, if I am not wrong. There is no mistake about it, the animators know about this and enjoy drawn CP of little boys. This whole cartoon was made as a fetish for female pedophiles who get off to sodomy. Thanks Disney!
I may not suprise people here with this take, but I wish fujoshit would be blacklisted and never allowed to work for kid shows. Or any show at all. The moment fujoshit's smut faggot account gets discovered, she must be fired and never allowed near kid stuff.
The story of a bug-eyed ethnically ambiguous girl who feels like she just doesn't fit in, where do they keep coming up with these incredibly original ideas for animated films?
From the latinx / AZN immigrants who grew up as far away from their native cultures as any other kid in their suburban neighborhood, and who've developed serious identity issues because of that. My guess, anyway.
Asian, apparantely: two of the three (!!!) directors are Thai and Filipino, respectively. They always seem to be the craziest about this stuff, for some reason. So that might be more true than I thought.
With that in mind, if I had to guess, the movie is really a self-insert allegory about a Hyphenated-American suffering from an identity crisis (notice how everyone at the school wears those preppy uniforms) and rediscovering their roots in the most obnoxious, Marxist, and performative way imaginable. In this case, the protag gets isekai'd and finds out she's super duper special and part of a long line of witches who rule this land—which the mother or grandmother decided to abandon to live in a nice suburban neighborhood. And she takes over as leader and lives happily ever after. Well, until the cartel comes asking for tribute.
Never gonna watch it, so someone please tell me if I'm close.
Anyway, damn thing looks so generic. You'd think it was entirely made with AI but the however-hundred-million they spent on this movie surely wasn't thrown in one big bonfire. They really need to retire the fantasy thing by now and come up with something else. Liminal spaces are pretty big now, maybe they can do something with that.
And before you ask, yes, Puss succeeded when they changed his style, but here's the thing: one, it was a spin-off, and two, among the characters in Shrek, Puss was the most pleasing to look at. He was an exception to the grimy art style because it played into the joke that he was a cat and would use that to manipulate people. They even made a joke where he would enlarge his eyes to get what he wanted, much like a cat does. Lastly, the changes to Puss' new designs were minimal, so they weren't as distracting as everyone else's in Shrek 5.
And TLW was more actiony and visual which benefits from a more attractive art style. Shrek 5 does not seem to be trying to go the way of TLW so the art style change is pointless and distracting.
I really want to know why decisions like this are made, because it seems unlikely that if they kept the art style that anyone would complain. Is it really just out of touch suits? I refuse to accept that "it just isn't possible" to recreate the art style like I've seen claimed.
Got this trailer for some kind of animated show. They didn't even attempt to be subtle, it's straight-up about a transwoman with magic. I'm more aware of this guy being trans than of anything else that's going on in Olympia. https://youtube.com/watch?v=bLsdPsiLmzo
Got this trailer for some kind of animated show. They didn't even attempt to be subtle, it's straight-up about a transwoman with magic. I'm more aware of this guy being trans than of anything else that's going on in Olympia. https://youtube.com/watch?v=bLsdPsiLmzo
I didn't realize you could glaze your main character so much in one trailer.
"You don't realize how important you are. You don't realize how special you are. You don't realize how brave you are. You don't realize how powerful you are. YOU DON'T KNOW!"
Here's what bothers me with indie animation. Where the hell did all the stickman fights animators go?
Why wasn't the guy who made this: https://youtube.com/watch?v=MoDGzRa1LW0given his own series that's just 12 minute episodes of mindless but well choreographed martial arts fights?
Doesn't even have to be martial arts, who do I have to fund to get more tacticool action powerfantasy in the vein of Astartes? I know it'll never be on that quality but I at least want beefy FACELESS(important) supersoldiers carving swathes through disposable cultists and demons again.
I'm here 3 months late to let everyone know I'm a dumbass and Terkoiz had returned this year and made an animation in 2026 called Time Fight and it's really good.
"You don't realize how important you are. You don't realize how special you are. You don't realize how brave you are. You don't realize how powerful you are. YOU DON'T KNOW!"
