I very much enjoy your writing style! May I hear your thoughts on 3Below now that you've finished it?
Thank you! That means a lot! I’m a bit uncomfortable about my own style, so I’m glad it resonates with other people.
Man, I was going to make a post about 3Below after I finished watching it, but I was working that weekend, and then everything went to pot, and then it was Christmas… anyway. You can definitely hear my thoughts, but be warned, I have many!
I suppose I should start by admitting that I was judging it primarily on its merit as a follow-up to Trollhunters. I stand by my earlier conclusion that the three shows are different parts of the same story. And I’m happy to say I think 3Below did an excellent job both of following up Trollhunters and of standing well on its own. I wouldn’t recommend that someone watch it without also watching Trollhunters, but it was definitely its own thing that I enjoyed separately from Trollhunters, though, on the topic of Trollhunters, I really enjoyed seeing another side of Arcadia that isn’t directly involved in Trollhunting affairs. You can see details from Trollhunters (and also possibly Wizards) in the background, and I just love that. Not only does it serve to tie the three series together, it makes for fun easter eggs!
So 3Below had more jokes in it than Trollhunters, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. As an alien show it’s interacting with more pop culture than Trollhunters was and jokes are a good way to efficiently communicate which pop culture stereotypes we’re going with. And the jokes didn’t intrude on the emotional moments! Look, if you didn’t feel when Aja accepted the title of Queen-in-Waiting even though she didn’t want it because the in-Waiting bit meant her parents were still alive then you are clearly a robot.
Before I began to suspect that all the Tales of Arcadia shows were tied together into a single narrative, I actually didn’t intend to watch 3Below. Aliens generally aren’t my thing. But I’m glad I did! The characters were very well-written and easy to relate to, although I must admit they relied on gimmicks a bit. For example, Vex and his disproportionate violence response or Krel’s tech/math wizardry. It was well done, though. The characters relied on the stereotypes but weren’t just the stereotypes.
I had been going to make a post on racism in Trollhunters before it came out but I’m glad I waited on that one because obviously 3Below digs into that a bit more and I’ve got more to work with. It’s also less fantasy racism and more real life racism. It was really well handled. A lot of stories that include real life racism tend to either skim over it or focus on it to the exclusion of all else, both of which make the stories exceptionally unpleasant to consume. 3Below did not do that, instead taking time to deal with the issue in a reasonably plot-relevant way while everyone remained in character. (I especially appreciated that.)
This is the end of my specific thoughts, I suppose. I’m gonna cosplay Aja sometime. Overall, I really liked it. I’ll definitely be incorporating stuff from it into future posts about themes in ToA! And I can’t wait for Season 2.
tangentwithtanner
areudirty
2087
