The first season of the TV adaptation of Disney's Tangled ended just last week. and after a somewhat slow start, it finished in a pretty impressive way.
Tangled: the Series is 2D, and really, after seeing how the characters and world look here, it's kind of hard to go back to the movie. The art style is very charming and the animation is really well done. All the voice actors from the movie return, and they still play their characters perfectly. The new characters are handled pretty well themselves, including the third lead, lady-in-waiting who wishes to be a soldier Cassandra, and Tumblr's favorite, awkward alchemist Varian.
The starting special, "Before Ever After" (which should be seen before what's labeled the first episode), takes place between the movie and the wedding short and features Rapunzel coming across strange spikes where the flower that gave her her powers used to grow. After touching them, she regains her long hair and the spikes start appearing around the kingdom.
After the first episode, "What the Hair?!", this storyline with the spikes mostly goes into the background, resulting in many slice of life episodes where Rapunzel and Eugene (AKA Flynn) adjust to living in the kingdom. Though many of these are fun, the animation remains fantastic, there are several hilarious moments, and they're a bit more continuity heavy than one would expect, it seemed like they were playing things very safe with the franchise.
However, things change in the hour-long 16th episode "Queen for a Day". While Rapunzel is left in charge for a day, the season storyline returns with a vengeance, and things go crazy as some very unexpected things are revealed about the setting, going well beyond what's established in the movie. Torn between things to focus on, she's forced to turn away a friend who needed her help right away. From this point on, you should watch every episode. There's a ghost witch, giant robots pop up, and yadda yadda yadda, this awesome song appears in the season finale.
Spoiler heavy, but I think it's good as a, "wait, how does that happen?!" interest-piquing spoiler.
The series is overall charming, with great art, character interactions, and many hilarious moments, but I wouldn't blame you for wanting to skip around. If you do, then the stories I recommend checking out are:
Before Ever After - The beginning, introduces Cassandra and the rest of the supporting cast.
1. What the Hair?! - Introduces Varian and explores the season storyline.
4. Challenge of the Brave - Rapunzel and Cassandra enter a fighting tournament. Yes, really.
6. The Return of Strongbow - Eugene reunites with one of his old thieving buddies, and after going on one last job with him, is forced to confront the fact that he used to rob from the Royal Family. One frustration of the series is that it's surprisingly light on Eugene and Rapunzel scenes, but this episode has some great interactions between them.
8. Great Expotations - During an inventor's fair, we check back in on the season storyline.
9. Under Raps - Cassandra has a boyfriend, and Rapunzel takes them and Eugene on a double date. Things go places.
11. Pascal's Story - Pascal (the chameleon) runs away after he feels unappreciated. Has a flashback to how he and Rapunzel met, and it's a pretty emotional episode.
12. Big Brothers of Corona - Another pretty interesting look at Eugene, as he comes across a pair of young thief sisters and tries to get them on the right track.
13. The Wrath of Ruthless Ruth - Rapunzel, the barbarians, and the captain of the guard are all stuck in the bar. It's haunted by its old owner and they must find a way to appease her. Contains a pretty great song.
14. Max's Enemy - Maximus (the horse) is shown up by a new horse on the guard, and becomes jealous.
And then there's episode 16, "Queen for a Day", where shit gets real. From that point on, you should watch every episode.
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