Final Space Review: All The Moments Lost

"Be aware that havoc is about to become our new normal."

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(NOTE: Due to how late this review is coming in—consult this post for why—I'll be trying to keep discussion short and succinct. Sorry!)

With every passing episode, Season 3 opens up more and more questions. Last episode, Final Space seemed to make the bold announcement that we've hit the point of no return, the point where serious shit starts to happen and hearts begin to break, and "All the Moments Lost" continues its trend with another tantalizing dose of drama and some of the season's most challenging developments yet. 

There are two major components of "All the Moments Lost," but the most immediately striking is Quinn, whom much of the episode is devoted to. She's an interesting character; as I've talked about in the past, for how much Final Space is built around her, she's exercised so little agency due to the stakes of its narrative. Season 1 was all about building trust before cruelly snatching her away, while Season 2 stranded her, forcing her to incubate in Final Space. This season is the first time that we can really see the character coming into her own and getting a truly strong focus, and "All the Moments Lost" is her boldest episode yet, placing the dark undercurrent surrounding her character to the forefront.

Final Space Review: One of Us

"You don't know what danger is until you've read my customer satisfaction survey."

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It would seem as if, after the past four episodes of patient warm-up, Season 3 is finally ready to let slip the dogs of war. While we've spent much of the past season getting a pulse on the foundational changes to the status quo—the most prominent strands being Quinn and Gary's relationship and the re-entry of the Lord Commander—"One of Us" is an episode centered around the climactic intersection of those two camps, ending with the team squad finally, fully intact once again... sans one. We'll get to that.

There was a lot of things I was worried about with this episode; with how much it has on its plate, it risked being another entry into Final Space that has too much on its list and has to selectively omit certain characters, and those fears only grew more rampant when the episode picked up a fluffy C-plot involving Tribore and Quatro. But against all odds, "One of Us" is most certainly the most balanced episode of Season 3 yet, giving every character a moment of their own that defines their utility in the grand scheme of the show.

IMPORTANT BLOG UPDATE

Hey, Internet!

In case you haven't noticed, my coverage over the past few months has been... a bit iffy. My Amphibia reviews have halted entirely, other shows that I was really looking forward to covering—City of Ghosts, Close Enough Season 2, and Elliott from Earth—have failed to come into fruition, and even reviews of the one show that I'm still on top of episodically, Final Space, have not been coming out as on-time as I would like to hope.

I'm incredibly frustrated that I can't attend to everything that I would like to, but I've been having an incredibly arduous semester of college since January which has made it incredibly difficult to allocate as much time as I would like to writing reviews. I alternate between being consumed by work, or alternatively being too exhausted to devote myself to something this intensive in what free time I get. I only really have one day that I'm able to dedicate to writing my reviews, and I try to put everything into that day, but on long weeks they can end up getting squandered pretty easily. 

I am sorry to everyone who enjoyed my coverage of Amphibia and Close Enough that I have been unable to dedicate time to maintaining those bodies of work; I'm as disappointed as you are. I do hope to do some sort of further write-ups concerning Amphibia, perhaps for the Season 2 finale if nothing else so that I can reflect on the past season. I won't lie, though, in also saying that I have been somewhat ambivalent to the direction of the show as it's continued, which has made writing about it frustrating at points. As for the other shows I listed that I wanted to pick up coverage of, I do hope to write something about Elliott from Earth and City of Ghosts at some point in the future. I just can't right now.

I have spent the last four and a half years pouring my life into this blog, but now that my life has become too much to bear for at least this present point in time, I need to loosen away from it and tend to the other things around me. This website has always been a passion project for me, but if I can't put the passion into it right now, why should I keep plugging away at it? I feel a lot of stress and anxiety, and I need to tend to my mental health. Thank you for your understanding.

Final Space Review: The Ventrexian

"Don't you quit on me."

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The progression of a season of Final Space is always interesting. Final Space is a show that is methodically organized and structured, keeping its fingers on every fragment of its narrative and deploying them at all the right times to masterful effect... but that also means it's prone to a slow, if steady start. A rollercoaster needs to have an ascent before the crazy can occur, and true to form, "The Ventrexian" is another entry into the season that keeps pushing things up and harnessing that power, though that also means its potential is intrinsically contained—it exists to get Final Space to that point where it can really cut loose and devastate. All three of its plots, likewise, brace for that crescendo, if feeling a bit restricted.

The most obviously-significant proponent of "The Ventrexian" is, as its title points towards, the back-story it unearths within Avocato. Final Space has constantly alluded to his relationship to the Lord Commander, though hesitantly to avoid giving too much information away. That enables this episode to feel particularly exciting, with LC forcing Avocato to recite their personal history before his son and the rest of the imprisoned team squad. While I'm reluctant to say most of what Avocato outlines is much of a bombshell (at least up until the ending), it's easy to appreciate the show indulging in world-building, effectively a chance to flex the sturdiness of its conception.

Final Space Review: The Hidden Light

"A little love coin just deposited into my happiness savings."

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Right off the bat with our second episode of our fledgling season, it's interesting to compare "The Hidden Light" to the episode that preceded it. "...And Into the Fire" was a flashy spectacle that sought to bring the horror tones of Season 3 to the forefront, but "The Hidden Light" aims to give the overarching narrative a bit more direction. The end result is an episode that doesn't match the former's energy, but it's a crucial stepping stone nonetheless, an enjoyable journey with all the right twists that sets Final Space on the right track for future devastation. 

What I was most interested in, going into the episode, was how "The Hidden Light" would handle its large, fragmented cast. As I mentioned last week, I feel that while Final Space has smart intentionality to how it divides its characters up and uses them across every season, it can be hard-pressed to give them engaging work episodically. While this episode distills what I think this season's priorities are going to be, and while there's still a large portion of the show's cast that feels untapped, it definitely feels a lot smoother than the premiere on that front. 

Final Space Review: ...And Into the Fire

"My danger glands are rock-hard, baby."

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Final Space has returned! After its long, between-season hiatus, and persevering through a world very different from where we were in 2019, it's back, and its reception has been... rather mixed, to say the least. I get it. Expectations are high, Final Space is a show with very eager fans, and being given this long for anticipation to build encourages a certain unhealthiness. So before I really delve into the episode, I want to dissect that a little bit.

I don't want to spend a significant portion of this review discussing toxic fanbase mentalities, nor do I want to posit this as a sort of defense. I enjoyed "...And Into the Fire" independent of the polarizing response that it's gotten, even though I have some criticisms to make. But I do think there are some things that are important to address within that. There's a back and forth about the sort of entitled opinions a lot of people have been expressing about the show and while I, obviously, have no fears of being honest about the quality I perceive in a piece of content, there's been a seriously unpleasant vibe of lacking faith in what Final Space's game plan is. A lot of "critics" online have clung to Olan's word that the episode deliberately aims to not set anything too drastic up as some sort of admittance that he created an episode of intentionally weaker quality, and that Final Space decided to make bad episodes before getting to good ones.

That's not the case at all, of course. A strong show has ebbs and flows in energy, finds a rhythm between the quiet and the intense, and most of all, it necessitates the patience and enthusiasm of its audience to unravel its story. And this is the first episode, for goodness sake! If Final Space wants to start a bit slowly and immerse us in a more lightweight way, why shouldn't we let it? Truth be told, not only do I think that the idea that "...And Into the Fire" accomplishes little is an understatement, but I think that it accomplishes the most that any other season premiere from the span of the show has been able to accomplish. 

Amphibia Review: Ivy on the Run / After the Rain

"We all have our off-days, I suppose."

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This week's episodes were "Ivy on the Run" and "After the Rain." My editor told me to add more to this part but I feel like that would be stalling, and if you've gone out of your way to read what I write, you don't deserve that! You deserve the best. So I hope your general circumstances are comfortable and good. If they aren't, I hope this review makes them better. I don't know how it could, but I'm not you. Anyway: episodes!

If there's anything that always works in Amphibia's favor, it's shifting the focus out of our core cast of characters and giving peripheral figures more of a chance to shine. Ivy Sundew, especially, has proven herself to be particularly endearing, a rare instance of a romantic foil done right. A lot of that comes down to the fact that she's always felt fleshed out beyond just being half of Sprigivy; she matches her counterpart with a fistful of spunk but the same adventurous, sunny spirit. It's because of the sheer joy of her character that "Ivy on the Run" works, giving its rudimentary plot a fun paint job.