Amphibia Weekly Round-up Review (feat. "Croak and Punishment," "Snow Day," "Wally and Anne," and more!)

"Wow, you've gone from Town Beast to Town Protector! Big fan of that narrative."

(Because of Disney's ridiculous "eight-episodes-a-week" scheduling, I'm trying a new way to write about the show. Hopefully it works out.)

Amphibia is clearly aware of how ambitious its narrative will ultimately become, but at the moment, it's embracing a more episodic nature, with hints of its progression occasionally coming to the forefront with some level of influence. It's a sound formula, and one that allows the writing to occupy a very specific and valuable time and place: it allows its characters to establish themselves, and gives time to flesh out the universe of the show. It's just a matter of, at this point, what more the series really needs to elaborate upon, and while this past string of episodes has been consistently fun, it feels like Amphibia tends to coasts along by virtue of its own goodwill and inherent strengths, occasionally (but not always) bringing something new to the table.

Perhaps most noticeable is how many of the past few episodes have used Sprig as a catalyst for conflict, to varied effect. Entries like "Trip to the Archives" and "Family Fishing Trip" feel somewhat on auto-pilot by taking advantage of his ability to behave poorly, and even if they're just another means of him learning some valuable lesson along the way, it's a lesson he's learned enough times that the repetitive nature of his use feels sort of disruptive. There's certainly an interesting kernel to their premises, with "Trip to the Archives" being a field trip to the town archives to ready Anne for her journey and "Family Fishing Trip" showing how Hop Pop's new relationship with Sylvia affects Sprig, but they just take advantage of his ability to be petty, which feels unflattering.

Rather, it's the episodes that allow him to channel energy into more interesting directions that tend to serve Sprig better. "Croak and Punishment" certainly hinges on his lack of hingedness, sure, but there's something more deeply humorous about watching him turn into a wreckless bad cop from a trash cop show. ("This town is a dirty cesspool of vice," he says at one point, watching little kids run around the town fountain.) "Cracking Mrs. Croaker" probably takes advantage of Sprig the best, though, in turning his world upside-down: he lives to be loved by the town, and when Mrs. Croaker refuses to share the sentiment, in sends him into a downward spiral of desperation for her love that manages to lead to her almost getting assassinated.

This batch of episodes, despite placing emphasis on him, also granted a lot of spotlight to the rest of the core cast, with each of them getting their own moments in the spotlight. Polly, most notably, gets to save the day in "A Night at the Inn," proving Hop Pop wrong in his constant belittling of her by saving her family from being cannibalized by horned toads, and even if I found the episode to be somewhat unfulfilling and predictable, it's nice to see her establishing a stronger presence in the series.

Hop Pop, while not at the center of as many episodes this time around (the most Hop Pop-centric episode, "Family Fishing Trip," curtails him in favor of emphasizing Sprig), gets some great supporting roles in all of them, "Bizarre Bazaar" most surprisingly. It's a strange episode that seeks to acknowledge the Calamity Box more by highlighting its dangers, all of which Anne is unaware of, placing Hop Pop in the position of trying to both protect it and, as the episode ends, hide it. The episode itself, too, is a bit more atmospheric, emphasizing its titular Bizarre Bazaar to interesting effect as a means of exhibiting the sort of oddities in Amphibia's culture, something I always appreciate the show exploring.

If there's two episodes that I think really deserve to be brought up, though, it's "Snow Day" and "Wally and Anne," two lower-key episodes that allow Amphibia to do some incredible things.

"Snow Day" is probably one of the simplest episodes that the series has done, but it succeeds by virtue of its straightforwardness: when Anne discovers that the whole town freezes over every year on Hiber-Day, and one villager always goes inconspicuously missing, she steps up to be the town protector. Anne's been through a lot of lessons about responsibility since the season premiered, but "Snow Day's" definitely the series' best take on that idea, due in no small part to the interesting changes in direction that its premise allows for. Even though Anne unthaws Sprig when she gets bored, he's so hilariously loopy that the episode feels a lot like a solo outing for her to prove her worth all on her own, and she does. Even beyond that, "Snow Day" is just Amphibia at its most hilarious (indebted, significantly, to Sprig's brokenness), as well as a nifty chance to show off its animation—her fight against the giant weasel is particularly awesome. This one'll definitely be a Season 1 classic.

There's similar vibes of memorability coming from "Wally and Anne." One-Eyed Wally has always been one of Amphibia's stranger characters, the town yokel who seems to exist exclusively as a source of comic relief, but "Wally and Anne" really frames him in a new, unexpected light. More than anything else, even if he can be unreliable, he's someone who doesn't care what other people think of him, making him an excellent companion to Anne, a character who functions completely opposite of this. Whether in her ostracization in town from the first half of the season, or how easily her friends back home manipulated her, she's always cared immensely about how others feel about her, and when she witnesses a mythical creature in the woods, the mockery she gets from the community, and most importantly the Plantars, drives her off the deep end.

It's the perfect chance to put the two together, and against all odds, they have an amazing amount of chemistry. Even though, before Anne embarks on the journey with him to hunt down the Moss Man, there's a clear divide between the two, they start to grow through their journey, with Wally demonstrating a surprising amount of insight in his life philosophies. He's just someone who feels comfortable being in his own skin, and someone who knows just the right things to say to help Anne feel more at ease, and it's legitimately sweet to see Anne come to appreciate him as more than just a loon. I sure did, too. Maybe, at the end of the day, Anne never got proof of the Moss Man, and nobody else will believe her, but at least she discovered something new about herself, all while being able to make a good friend.

All in all, I'd say it was a pretty darn good week for the show. While some of its episodes just sort of flew by, the ones that stick really stuck, and with only a few episodes left in the season, it'll be interesting to see how this final week goes.

FINAL GRADES:
-"Croak and Punishment": B+.
-"Trip to the Archive": B.
-"Snow Day": A.
-"Cracking Mrs. Croaker": B+.
-"A Night at the Inn": B.
-"Wally and Anne": A.
-"Family Fishing Trip": B.
-"Bizarre Bazaar": B+.

For the last set of Amphibia reviews for "Civil Wart" and "Hop-Popular," CLICK HERE.

For updates every time I post a new review, follow me on Twitter @Matt_a_la_mode.