New episode 'ono the tickbird'

[Nilla]

Well Simba is Swahili for Lion so I'm not bashing it x)

[Panpardus]

Well Simba is Swahili for Lion so I'm not bashing it x)

True!

[Squeely]

Definitely a bit unbalanced to get so much Ono at the end of the season, as opposed to having had one of these two Ono eps airing much earlier, but it's certainly not a bad thing. If anyone here is a fan of MLP, you often get 2-3 episodes in a row featuring the same character on that show, too. If I had to guess why, I'd say it's because the creative team pitches and works on multiple episodes at once. So then, sure, you have some that need to air before others, but most have a lax continuity and can be aired as they complete them. They just happen to complete a string of eps featuring the same character at around the same time.

[Panpardus]

So, new Lion Guard episode is out. I don't know if this is worth starting a whole discussion over, but I'll give my thoughts anyway.

Spoiler: show

General pros:

• I like that the banter between the guard members is getting more natural. It's nice to see them maturing as a group, showing off both their camaraderie and also the fact that these are still a bunch of pre-teens/teenagers who are prone to snipping at each other. (Ono's got some attitude; he's always been the most passive aggressive of the bunch - Fuli's much more 'in your face' - but he definitely shows it here.)
• Makuu being his usual antagonistic self. Outside of Makucha, Makuu is definitely my favorite antagonist this series has so far offered, and his depiction has been pretty consistent throughout his various appearances, which I like. (Also, side note: the bellowing display that Makuu does with the water ripples is actually something only observed in American alligators, and that is used as a mating display for females, cool as it as to see here.)
• The big action scene towards the end was exciting enough, and did feel like a proper fight scene (with the obligatory comedic rhino ex machina). If this is actually the last episode we get before Season 2 officially starts, then ending it here with an actual fight against the series' most capable recurring antagonist seems plenty fitting. (I had one of those It's going down! reactions when I saw Kion and Makuu circling each other, though I don't know why Kion seemed to have suddenly forgotten that he could just use the roar against the crocs. Maybe he wanted to test his mettle? Either way, I appreciate the fact that he was still losing, though we don't see him again until the whole fight is over.)

General cons:

• Unfortunately, this far into the series, this is the weakest musical number(s) since "The Search for Utamu". This is what happens when you're required to have a song for every episode and you don't have music consultants to provide input and keep things interesting. A lot of these episodes really don't need the songs, and in fact the songs sometimes end up detracting from the overall quality of the episode in question, and if there was ever an episode so far that hasn't needed a song, this was the one. Granted, a lot of my disappointment is my own fault; the commercial for this episode had some Afrobeat or light kwaito playing in the background that I didn't recognize as stock music, so I thought they'd finally pulled in some outside references and I'd gotten my hopes too high. Instead we ended up with a little ditty by two people/characters who... Let's just say they're not the most musically inclined, one much less so than the other.
• Not necessarily a con, but more of a nitpick; even though the importance of the tickbird (aka oxpecker)/rhino relationship is stressed here, this is the first time we've actually seen this relationship in action, even though all the previous times we've seen rhinos in this series, none of them have had the birds around them. Also, I don't know why Ono is complaining since he's a cattle egret, a bird known for displaying much the same behavior around large grazing animals. Also also, not to be a stickler, but the actual tickbird/large mammal relationship is much more one-sided; oxpeckers have been observed opening wounds on their hosts in addition to the bug-eating behavior (in fact, in some regions certain species, including rhinos, actually try to get rid of the birds when they land on them), and studies have shown that their presence has little statistical effect on the population of ticks and other invertebrate parasites on the given animal. (Given this, Ono's actually the better choice.) If any of this actually factored into the story, that would've made it much more believable and would've provided a better conflict between Kifaru and Mwenzi (roughly "traveling companion" in Swahili), and could've actually taught a lesson. As it stands, I don't know what the heck they were actually arguing about that caused Mwenzi to leave, but it reeks of arbitrary plot convenience.

Overall it was a decent episode with some good and bad stuff, but still entertaining enough to make me not dislike it.

[Kallo]

Definitely a bit unbalanced to get so much Ono at the end of the season, as opposed to having had one of these two Ono eps airing much earlier, but it's certainly not a bad thing. If anyone here is a fan of MLP, you often get 2-3 episodes in a row featuring the same character on that show, too. If I had to guess why, I'd say it's because the creative team pitches and works on multiple episodes at once. So then, sure, you have some that need to air before others, but most have a lax continuity and can be aired as they complete them. They just happen to complete a string of eps featuring the same character at around the same time.

I wouldn't say we've had that much Ono towards the end of this season. I mean, yeah, we've had two episodes focused mainly on him within the last 3, with one episode inbetween them. I'd say it just feels like we're getting a lot of him cause we haven't gotten that many episodes focused solely (or even mainly) on one character, in general. In fact, Ono might have the most episodes in total dedicated to him, with three (last one before "Ono's Idol" was "Eye of the Beholder", which was all the way back to episode 5). I mean, Fuli had two straight back-to-back episodes early in the season, to the point some counted it as a two-parter, and then another one just 10 episodes later, but nobody said that period in the show felt particularly Fuli heavy. And also Bunga was much more present and had far more screentime in the early season than in the latter half. So yeah, I'd say we're just feeling like Ono is getting a whole lot of attention suddenly, just because the majority of the episodes so far have been focused on the Guard as a whole rather than just mainly on one character. MLP's certainly been far more guilty of this than TLG so far. There was like three episodes in a row focused on Rarity, back during Season 5. And Season 1 of MLP had Twilight as an important character in every episode. And while Kion is included in all the episodes of TLG so far, like all the members of the Guard, there are quite a few episodes where he's not that important to the story.

Unfortunately, this far into the series, this is the weakest musical number(s) since "The Search for Utamu". This is what happens when you're required to have a song for every episode and you don't have music consultants to provide input and keep things interesting.

Agreed with what you wrote about the songs. Been saying since the beginning we don't need so many songs. And I'd also agree this is musically the worst song the show has done yet. However, I'd argue that this song was there more for comedic purposes. I think it was supposed to be a "catchy kind of bad" and a sort of "friendship jingle" to show how close Kifaru and Mwenzi are. I got the feeling that I was supposed to think "Wow, only super close friends could come up with a dumb little rhyme like this". And the song was sang in three occasions which altogether took about 30 seconds out of the whole episode. So I'd say it's not all things considered the worst song the show has done so far (if you can even count it as one). Imo, the worst kind of songs are the ones that aren't musically much better than this one, but are still full-on songs that last 2-3 minutes and take themselves seriously. In my opinion, that's the worst and far more unbearable than a silly short jingle that's comically bad.

[Elton John]

I remember reading in an interview about how the reason why the episodes aren't two 11 minute long stories independant of each other is because of the musical numbers. They're there to perk up the attention of the younger viewers.

I'll put up with some bland singing if it means a stronger, more cohesive story in each episode.

I despise what DC did to the teen titans and the justice league, making the episodes 11 minutes long each. TTG is now a comedy and justice league is mainly action when previous shows had them tell a story in each episode.

[Nilla]

As it stands, I don't know what the heck they were actually arguing about that caused Mwenzi to leave, but it reeks of arbitrary plot convenience.

I think they were trying to teach the lesson that you should appreciate your friends, and when people do things for you. You shouldn't take others for granted. And that you should talk out your problems instead of being passive aggressive. It makes sense for a moral that is easily applicable to human children, as long as you aren't familiar with how the real animal kingdom works.

[Kallo]

I remember reading in an interview about how the reason why the episodes aren't two 11 minute long stories independant of each other is because of the musical numbers. They're there to perk up the attention of the younger viewers.

I'll put up with some bland singing if it means a stronger, more cohesive story in each episode.

I despise what DC did to the teen titans and the justice league, making the episodes 11 minutes long each. TTG is now a comedy and justice league is mainly action when previous shows had them tell a story in each episode.

I think TLG is definitely the type of show that works better with each episode just being a 20+ minute, self-contained story. And I generally prefer that. There are some shows that work really well with the "two short stories in one episode" approach, though, such as Star vs. the Forces of Evil. The shorter episodes work really well with the type of silly stories they have on that show.

[Panpardus]

I remember reading in an interview about how the reason why the episodes aren't two 11 minute long stories independant of each other is because of the musical numbers. They're there to perk up the attention of the younger viewers.

I'll put up with some bland singing if it means a stronger, more cohesive story in each episode.

I despise what DC did to the teen titans and the justice league, making the episodes 11 minutes long each. TTG is now a comedy and justice league is mainly action when previous shows had them tell a story in each episode.

If it really just took songs to keep each episode a full 22-minute story, then I understand the music requirement enough to live with it. However, the show's placement of songs has deviated from the midway mark several times at this point; after the first few episodes, you started seeing a lot of songs showing up either within the first 5-6 minutes or closer to the end of the story, so I don't know how airtight their reasoning/philosophy behind that is if the show producers are willing to forgo the formula as often as they have. Even then, maybe it's just me not remembering correctly or I was just a weird little kid, but many of the shows I watched when I was in the target demographic for The Lion Guard were hour-long nature documentaries on Animal Planet or Discovery Channel. I don't recall ever actually getting bored of a show that I actually wanted to sit down and watch, and whenever I'd watch something with a song midway through I always thought that was a mark of it being a "baby show", and I'd actually be a little embarrassed to watch it. Again, maybe I'm not representative of the typical young child, but I feel like producers of these shows make a lot of unnecessary (and sometimes inaccurate) assumptions with regards to the attention spans and the content young children can handle. I keep thinking about the studies regarding the increase in hyperactivity of children's shows and can't help but wonder if those content and marketing decisions are being made in response to something from the general audience, or if they're just based on producer-sided concerns.

Agreed with what you wrote about the songs. Been saying since the beginning we don't need so many songs. And I'd also agree this is musically the worst song the show has done yet. However, I'd argue that this song was there more for comedic purposes. I think it was supposed to be a "catchy kind of bad" and a sort of "friendship jingle" to show how close Kifaru and Mwenzi are. I got the feeling that I was supposed to think "Wow, only super close friends could come up with a dumb little rhyme like this". And the song was sang in three occasions which altogether took about 30 seconds out of the whole episode. So I'd say it's not all things considered the worst song the show has done so far (if you can even count it as one). Imo, the worst kind of songs are the ones that aren't musically much better than this one, but are still full-on songs that last 2-3 minutes and take themselves seriously. In my opinion, that's the worst and far more unbearable than a silly short jingle that's comically bad.

True. I get what they were probably trying to do with the little jingle, I just hold the opinion that it was generally a waste of the little time it existed anyway and didn't add much to the story anyway. It just felt like it existed simply to meet a quota, is all I'm saying. There have definitely been worse songs, I'll agree.

As it stands, I don't know what the heck they were actually arguing about that caused Mwenzi to leave, but it reeks of arbitrary plot convenience.

I think they were trying to teach the lesson that you should appreciate your friends, and when people do things for you. You shouldn't take others for granted. And that you should talk out your problems instead of being passive aggressive. It makes sense for a moral that is easily applicable to human children, as long as you aren't familiar with how the real animal kingdom works.

I get the moral they were trying to go with, but it still felt a little underdone from a story perspective, and I feel like it could've been written better while also leaning further into real biology. Plus, they never actually resolve their differences, at least not onscreen; sure, they come to each other's aid in the end because they're still friends, but we see no apology between the two, they never discuss or even mention the problem they had with each other, they're just back together more out of convenience and necessity than anything else. For all we know, they could split up again after the next argument because they never addressed the problems they had in the first place.

[Nilla]

That's true that they never really addressed the original problem, good point.