User blog:Moonshadow191/Amphibia Reviews: Edition 1

Hi everyone! Today I'll be reviewing the first two segments of the series: Anne or Beast? and Best Fronds.

''' Review 1: Anne or Beast? ''' Overall review: 7 out of 10

I love this episode for a lot of reasons. It has pretty much everything - funny, relatable characters, a good message, and the beginnings of a great plot. We get to see Sprig, a kid who's just trying to be appreciated and depended on by his elders. This is an issue for a lot of people, which is part of why I love this show - a lot of the problems and relationships are very similar to real life. There's the funny characters who provide comic relief, mainly Polly, who makes the episode fun and breaks up the serious mood with her hilarious personality. We get to see our girl Anne for the first time, and we get a sense of what the show is going to be like. And on top of that, a sweet message about being kind to others despite what they appear to be on the outside. The other aspect of this episode is the overall plot. The music box is shown when Anne tries to work it, which set off a whole lot of questions for me when I first started the series - why are the gems different colors than before? Why isn't it working now? Things we now know, of course, but still a great teaser of what's to come. The other main thing is Anne's blue eyes. It's a little difficult to see with this particular image, but it's definitely there - this episode, when Anne was holding back the mantis, was the first time her eyes turned blue, the first time we get a hint at what might be to come. This is for-sure proof that Anne is connected to the music box, and leaves us wondering whether she has powers from the gem, or if her eyes turn blue when she does something strong, or both, or even something else entirely. (We now know much more about her and the gem, obviously, but I still find it interesting.) I think when she does something strong and kind that matches the attributes of her gem, her eyes glow and she gets an extra power boost.

Review 2: Best Fronds

Overall review: 7 out of 10 This episode is also pretty great. I love how we start out with how it all began - the thrift shop. I was fascinated to see Anne guiltily steal the music box, and also Sasha and Marcy, who looked as if they were encouraging her to do it. This made me wonder for the first time if Anne was in a toxic friendship, if her friends were going to make her steal from thrift stores. After that, I liked the funny greetings from the Plantars after Anne's first night, particularly Polly threatening Anne with the rolling pin.

I was interested at the fact that Anne coerced Sprig into stealing the key when he was content to stay at home after Hop Pop had put his foot down, and that he went with it without thinking anything was weird. Also, Anne casually shushing him when he tried to make a joke to her while stealing the key.

At the lake, when Sprig is trying to dissuade Anne from swimming after seeing the 'Don't Swim' sign, that was the most eye-opening point in the episode for me. Anne was talking about the standards of friendship, about giving your friend your shoes and pencil case and stealing music boxes to make them happy. Because if they weren't happy, they wouldn't want to be your friend anymore. This pretty much confirmed my theory that Anne's friends on earth were toxic and bullied her into being their friend, if that was what she expected all friendships to be like. And poor Sprig, not knowing that this wasn't normal, since he had no experience with friendship, went with it. But Anne learned her lesson after Sprig almost died, they lied to Hop Pop and got out of trouble, Anne realized that she's okay, and that's all good. And then we see Sasha for the first time! I had so many feelings the first time I watched this - will they find each other, what about Marcy, who's that keeping her captive? All of which we now know, but in the moment, it was like a punch to the stomach. Overall, this episode was really good.