Lmk s5 suffers detrimentally from the lack of specials and the switch in animation studios certainly doesn't help. Going from a hand drawn show to very clearly lower quality puppet animation, and with the season's entire plot being incredibly rushed. It almost feels like the first few episodes were already in production when suddenly they're hit w the info that they won't be getting specials this season and they have to cram the entire story. Listen, I just think this could've been solved by not making Li Jing an antagonist. I love Nezha content as much as the next person and seeing Li Jing made me very happy but also GODDD does it take up a lot from a season that struggles with it's pacing far more than all the previous ones. Even if that means s5 won't have a clear overarching villian until the final few episodes, that should be fine, s1-2 were almost fully episodic, s3 was the first properly serialised season and even then there were episodic elements to s3-4. Idk, I just feel like balancing out Li Jing and the celestial realm's hunt for the gang with collecting the stones simultainously works for its detriment. But again, I mostly think that's because of the lack of special episodes that the other seasons had. If they'd gotten specials they could've put all the stuff at the end with the pillar and that goodamn snake in those and yk,, let the main plot breathe.
Just a thought that popped into my head, very rambly and incoherent sorry about that, I just find it disappointing that what is likely lmk's final season was such a drop in quality both in writing and animation.
