honestly I'm the opposite, I'm surprised that it's been only one year lol! I thought it was like 3 or 2 years at best and 3 was obviously a stretch lol, probably because I paid close attention to the pre-release controversies lol.
That's because it was yesterday.... I introduced this to a friend who managed to avoid learning about High Guardian spice through some miracle and he bust a gut laughing about how bad it was... he said it was Mystery Science Theater 3000 levels of bad
“Her mother is dead, but not really and gave her a magic sword and she wants to be a superhero” applies to Steven universe so strongly and I can’t help but feel like that’s not a coincidence
I suppose to the authors the answer was so obvious they didn't even think about explaining. A guardian is probably "that job that every DnD character is seemingly doing, which is some kind of mercenary/soldier/ranger/adventurer/whatever"... XD
I have no bloody clue what they are but maybe they're just.. magical defenders against evil? I don't even know man. Seriously, it was such a major plot point of the show and they *NEVER FUCKING TOLD US WHAT IT WAS!* Like... at all. Literally any of explanations given by anyone are better and more cohesive than whatever the show gave us.
If rumors are true, then that budget is about twice what Attack on Titan costs to make. Think about that. The problem isn't budget size. It's the team's mismanagement of the budget. Heck, Foodfight cost $65 million to make because of all the massive redos (and Kassanoff's disturbingly vague direction).
And teaching kids how to fight for dominance and use bad words to act edgy, fulfilling that joke from the Gravity Falls episode The Stanchurian Candidate. High Guardian Spice's greatest achievement was because Crunchyroll shoehorned in mature content to fit in with their adult-oriented anime, but it is still very tame compared to Attack on Titan. Maybe Alex Hirsch wishes he put Gravity Falls on Crunchyroll instead of Disney Channel, because Crunchyroll would not make him censor anything. October 26, 2022, 8:14pm
paraphrasing what Mr Wilson once said: "Sometimes, there's more to say about a cartoon that tried to do something and failed miserably than just a good cartoon."
@@cantmakeacreativename2072 But what was the effort? I saw no effort to make a good story, make something entertaining, make something artistic, or even just to make something marketable. All I saw was a series that tried to force a social agenda. But, I didn't even see any effort put into that. There was no effort put in to make any reasonable argument to justify their beliefs. Instead, we get things like the explaining transgender which comes out of nowhere, gives a copy paste explanation out of the dictionary, and then is gone just as fast with no impact whatsoever to the plot. It doesn't help that the overall vision for the series is just plain weak, so what little effort was put in is negated further by a lack of purpose. Like a lot of modern media, it feels like the reason it exists isn't because of any effort from the series itself, but rather from the people in charge who green-light it to show off how diverse and Woke they are, rather then because the thought it was a good show.
@@zandershadowbane my comment was a bit of a joke, but sure. The thing is, it’s animated and there’s assumingely several episodes and a whole season (I haven’t even took a glance at the show so I wouldn’t know how many episodes it has). Animation is HARD. Even crappy animation like what I’ve seen in this show. So the fact that people actually considered working on this, it shows there was at least the most MINIMAL amount of effort to make this show actually exist and public lmao.
The reason why they let Parsley hurt a student and not Snap Dragon is because Parsley made it look like an accident. You gotta be able to cover your tracks in High Guardian Accademy.
Me and my homie watched some show yesterday and that's what he told me of his experience with season 2 of the show we watched, and i just told him "It's not nearly as bad as High Guardian Spice". Sooo the show is officially a meme.
"Does HGA just leave powerful demon summoning rituals just lying around?" Dude, it's an established death trap that poisons its students on the first day of class; this is the most consistent thing in the show. Of course they do.
Dretch (the demon MILF) being there implies the school does deal with demonkind, so yeah, I'd expect them to have demon rituals lying around. That's actually a tiny rewrite I had proposed at one point: that Thyme got the idea to summon the demon in Ep 10 by meeting Dretch and thinking maybe making a deal with one wouldn't be such a bad idea... then her own attempt goes horribly wrong due to her underestimation of demons and she starts taking her Guardian training more seriously.
@@insulttothehumanrace3807 if by demon milf you mean Ms. Deviantart, then I'm afraid to inform you that she is not actually a demon in the actual show's lore, she's a dragon lady. Yes. They were that good at character design that thay made a dragon lady that looks like the most generic demon lady ever. I can't wait until it will be revealed that centaur teacher was a goblin this whole time
@@АлексейЮрловский Ohhhhhh. That would explain why she is in one of the photos of young-girl Caraway. Doesn't explain why she's named after a class of demon from D&D, though. But that is hilarious. Addendum: Nor does it explain her affinity for darkness-based magic, or her character introduction being her appearing out of a dark portal with glowing purple eyes like some kind of demon. You can probably see where I got the wrong idea about her character. Still hilarious.
@@insulttothehumanrace3807 They probably just mixed up the pictures of a thiefling and a dragon kin when they were stealing ideas, it is an easy mistake if you know zero about D&D. Still, considering the spells Sage finds in episode 2 (I think), they have spells making you immortal lying around where any student can find it so demon summoning spells are probably all around the place. Actually, some tweaks and this school could actually be a fun D&D module where the teachers switch between neglect and trying to kill the students. Tomb of horror is nothing compared to going to this insane school, but you would have to ramp up the difficulty a bit. I mean, giving the students poisoned tea in potions class is stupid. Only an complete idiot would fall for that. So if you make the teachers neglectful, murderous *and smart* and register your poor PCs at the school I could see that be fun.
@@barneyerror4561 I honestly wish we got to see those guys with no censorship, I think some insane things would have happened. With the Benefit of Hindsight, I feel we were all far too harsh on 4kids.
They didn't so much "forget" how to do what those producers made, the other studios had the common sense to avoid the obvious poison. The producers would be a "Survivalist" show that had two episodes showing some lanky, pale dude picking random mushrooms and eating them going "I can't believe that Mycologists forget about all this natural food you can survive off of!" While other studios are screaming at their screens.
Ironically anyone saying anyone real or fake are a faker as well. You constantly denying people and declaring what you don't like based on your own assessment
@ArrowSlinger I think it's a reference to a line of dialog in the show where Rosemary asked if sleep was a food. Just another example of the not so good writing that the show has
@@pablocasas5906 As follow up context, a common joke in anime is when the dumb character asks if an unknown person, item or concept is "tasty". People were not only peeved at the mere stupidity of the line "Is sleep a food?", but also the writers utterly failing to utilize a basic, but popular trope properly.
@@sxatcychan1988 oh yeah, for example, in Dragon Ball there were plenty of occasions in which Goku and other characters asked if the titular Dragon Balls were some kind of food. There's also a good joke that gets lost in translation, when Chi-Chi proposed to Goku, he mistook the word "kon'yaku" (engagement) with "konjac" (a plant that's used in various asian dishes). Still, those are better jokes than the ones from HGS
I ultimately feel bad for the people who had high hopes for the show. And I know the exist, they were on the subreddit. Because they actually cared and went against the stream to hope it was good. Just for it to suck. And seriously, to the maybe two people saying how the show is amazing and better than anything else in media, I think you need a doctor's appointment.
Sorry to say it to you, if they still believe the show is better than most thing out there (even the Twilight movie), then they are already too far gone...
I've never seen people say its good, I've seen some people simply like it, they know it's bad but they somehow find enjoyment in it and I won't fault them for that
I remember the time when it first came out, it was treated as if art had died that day. It became clear that this was basically the part where animation had become gentrified by corporations and exclusionary ideologies, and that people like me thought that animation (at least in the West) had died in a fiery wreck. It was no different in my art school here in France. The news about HGS became a wildfire that my fellow artists started questioning what Western animation had truly become. I even recall my animation instructor blurted in a barrage of French profanities after me and my friend showed the poor writing, shoddy animation work and horrendous characterization of High Guardian Spice after our class. My instructor then explained how Raye Rodriguez and his band of writers were spineless and egotistical people who never cared to make animation for the sake of telling a good story, rather to spread ideas that we don't even believe in. At the end, he encouraged me and my friend to *make something better than High Guardian Spice, because he believes that there are more better stories out there that needed to be told.* For me as a person and an artist, I may be already infamous for commenting a lot on HGS commentary videos made by Guardian HQ and LobsterHero about my analysis of the show, going as far as comparing the technicalities of HGS to Wakfu, a better animated show made in my native country, that had stellar worldbuilding, good characterization and a better written antagonist with clear intentions, but that's just how I view this show from my perspective. It is a show that is so ridden with errors that it can no longer be saved by rewrites, and that we can even write stories better than what Raye Rodriguez wasted for nearly 10 years developing this show.
Dude, no joke, I've been doing the same thing of comparing it to Wakfu. I'm literally obsessed with that show! I consider it 10/10 and I love the worldbuilding. It's so rare to see it mentioned.
I would say that while Wakfu is the objectively better product, something like the original Code Lyoko would be a better comparison. Because despite being old, and looking reasonably budgeted when it came to it's 2D animation, it still blows HGS out of the water. Wakfu has production and animation quality that I feel exceeds or at least matches a lot of anime, even a lot of the big names like GitS or TTGL. Much less this this tripe, which has quality a few steps above the original Speed Racer; and is still a far cry from the admittedly low bar for American shows. Can't believe I'm looking back at _Generator Rex_ as the peak of American cartoons, much as I liked the show when it came out. And I'm glad to hear your teacher has a spine. A lot here, as he has said, don't! Which is why we have this problem in the first place.
@@ShadowWolfRising Sad thing is, I didn't grow up early enough to actually watch stuff like that. Albeit, now that I say it out loud, I should go back a bit further and say _Teen Titians_ or _Justice League Unlimited._ Generator Rex was a perfectly good show, but the industry was already on the decline by that point.
"Mature product looking and feeling like the one made for children" can be super good if done right. Like, "Made in Abyss" just nailed the perfect balance between adventurous and silly vibe and full-on body horror. I think HGS just tried to do something like that but failed miserably
@@QueenAleenaFan I've actually heard exactly opposite info that they intended it to be for 14-16 yo audience but then publisher interfered and made them add more "childish" stuff
I think my favorite part of this show that _isn't_ its use as a teaching tool for how NOT to execute and publish your passion project, is some of the character designs. The main 4, Amaryllis, Snapdragon, and Olive especially all have distinct hair and outfits that fit them, with good color pallette choices. I have legitimately considered drawing them despite never having actually watched HGS. Granted, I personally enjoy cartoonish designs. _(Also, as a Splatoon fan, I think calling Amaryllis' hair a sting ray should be taken as a compliment.)_
lol yeah, the character designs were decent despite the show, i drew sage after I watched the show last year and strangely enough one of my best drawings lmao.
Olive is ripped from Tokyo mew mew though, including the dress, she just had a palette switch so while her design is good, it is someone else who actually did it.
Can we even call Rosemary the main character? She has no story to tell. The only significant detail about her is that she misses her mom - but this doesn’t affect what little plot we get. Rose makes no attempt to track her mother down. The only thing she ever does strive for us to become a guardian, whatever that means. It’s the same goal her three cohorts have, but the three of them all have stories of their own on the side - terrible stories, yes, but at least they ARE stories. Rosemary is just a tagalong in her own show.
Rosemary is very badly characterized but I will give her one (or really half of a) brownie point. I do actually like her character design as it matches her; being round and bubbly, but it also doesn't hinder her fighting very badly. It also has layers, and I especially love how it defines her silhouette (which isn't just her hair apparently). The colors were also really nice and she fit the world's fashion, unlike Anise. Everybody else's designs were okay, but the Triad and Snapdragon were pretty decent. Sage just has generic dress and witch hat, there was no effort put into it at all. :( Rosemary might just be a pink blob, but she's a very aesthetically pleasing pink blob and I actually like her design a lot. (Not the mermaid though). Sorry if I rambled btw, but I do need to give credit for Rosemary's designs.
But then where do they go from there, do the good guys chase the villains, to the villains go on the attack like they did. They should start by thinking of an actual motivation for the villains
This is a whole-ass 30 minutes video review and it feels like it didn't even scratched a surface, holy shit. I love the HGS actually. It's like a good lesson in "What things you shouldn't do". It is unironically inspiring
@@wubbers662 nah it's a good thing, atleast people who will use this as a case study will make better content than what this is. So atleast it gave a good standard on what not to do.
there's a special place in my heart for this garbage series because it's the first show me and my best friend watched together over video call, and by proxy the first time I've spoken to them verbally after three years of texting We're still watching garbage and playing games together to this day. I can't believe it's a year old already to be honest happy birthday, high guardian spice. if the show were a person I'd push them down a flight of stairs
Rest in peace, it was like a hollow cupcake, with a hot sauce flavored sprinkle, only one sprinkle. I'm sure the creator and team really wanted the show to be good but without the talent/experience, money, and the time needed to make something good: they were doomed.
Speaking of the animation, it reminds me of RWBY season 1 when they didn't have the budget for background characters so they just made them all silhouettes. except that was in 2013 and they were basically an indie studio back then so they had an excuse.
Good character design is based on silhouette, exaggeration, and readability; the best character designs are ones that can be recognised just by silhouette alone, exaggerated features like big noses or noodle bodies, and how well the design communicates who the character is. Link from Twilight Princess and Link from Wind Waker are good examples - Twilight Princess Link has very sharp features, like the shape of his eyes and his pointed nose and chin, while his eyebrows sit low over his eyes in an almost permanent frown, and his iteration of the hero's tunic has chainmail underneath it; this all communicates just how dangerous he can be and how familiar he is with violence (most of the moves he learns from the shade are just brutal, like the helmsplitter or the finisher on a prone enemy). Wind Waker Link, on the other hand, has a big round head on a little body and is very cute, while still keeping the Link frown; still dangerous, but also a baby bean who goes home to grandmother for soup. Both are easily recognisable from their silhouettes. So I wouldn't say High Guardian Spice has especially bad character design, at least not from what I've seen, but it doesn't do anything well either. Even then, though, the teachers are too baby-faced for me to see them as adults and all the students just look like thirteen year olds to three year olds, but that might just be me since I don't know or care how old they're supposed to be.
Those are not good examples of silhouettes at all, not just the fact both games have completely different character designs and art style period but also stuff like facial expressions aren't noticeable in silhouettes with no face... You're comparing different art styles, not silhouettes. Like Master Chief to Mario. You need to compare Mario to Luigi. Twilight Princess Link to Midna. Wind Waker Link to Tetra. Yet good character design can use extremely similar silhouettes as well. Marth to Lucina for example from Fire Emblem give Lucina tries to be Marth in short. Good character design is them fitting the role needed in universe and visually matching it. Even matching a silhouette or even not standing out.
@@Buglin_Burger7878 I literally looked up what makes good character designs to make sure I had my wording right, and distinctive silhouettes were one of the first points. One of their examples was Mickey Mouse. And yes, expressions aren't visible in silhouettes - well done; but a silhouette is only one part of a good character design and expression is another, as is key exaggerated features like the shape of the nose, colour schemes, etc. I'd argue art style is completely irrelevant to character design, up to a point anyway. A good character design can be distinct and recognisable in any art style - which is why I brought up two different Links, because despite the differing styles they both look recognisably the same because to one extent or another they are the same character. Mario and Luigi and Peach will always be recognisable because of their design - the Mario from the first game is still the same Mario from Odyssey despite a change in art style, Mario from Sunshine or 64 still looks like the same Mario from the new film, because of the key exaggerated features that make him - bulbous nose, moustache, hat, and overalls. Art style, on the other hand, takes up a largely separate area like, as you said, how well the characters visually fit into the world, but also aesthetics and tone. BOTW has a distinctly different style to Wind Waker despite both being partly cel shaded because BOTW is much more grounded and less whimsical, but again it's the character design that makes them both Links because of the key features they share, while the differences in their design also makes them distinct from one another in order to fit their respective roles and the needs of the story.
In terms of good character design, I think the TF2 mercenaries are a good example. Their silhouettes are pretty recognizable, and they're distinct from each other which makes them memorable.
From the very first few sentences alone I can already state with confidence that this analysis is hot garbage. My bad, but good characters designs are ABSOLUTELY not defined by silhouette and exaggeration. If anything, being caricatural and/or exaggerated are generally considered to be bad things. It’s EXTREMELY rare for a show to get those things right (with One Piece being one of the few good examples). You’re watching too much Nickelodeon. Good character design is defined by two very simple things: Beauty and recognisability. It needs to be immediately recognisable, or so to say, even remotely unique. And it also needs to be pleasant to look at. It’s worthy to say that beauty isn’t really related to “being a beautiful person” at all. Beauty is related to being pleasant. If a character is awfully ugly but you can recognise the design as something detailed and well thought that represents the character’s personality well, then this will be pleasant to look at and therefor a good design (Quasimodo being a damn near perfect example). And then… That’s really just it. Nothing more to add.
If I remember, in Episode 6, Parsley wanted to bring Parnell to first place in the dumb obstacle course because she thought he merited it more, but Hakone didn’t really care and wouldn’t change their ranking. (Another point on negligent asshole teachers.) The only exception is if she caused grievous bodily harm to another contestant; then she’d get the boot. So, there’s still some motivation behind why she crushed Aster’s foot, but it’s still extremely stupid. Not to mention that it highlights how bad the teachers are not only for ignoring to their students, but letting them get away with harming others because “haha she listened to my advice and actually did it. Props to her” which… no. She wouldn’t have done it if you had listened to her.
Everything about the obstacle course is convoluted, really. He was tallying individual points prior to teaming everyone up and leading them to the course? There's no set order on the obstacles? Parsley and Parnell didn't even go through the maze, as far as we saw? There's a big gaudy trophy for what's some mid-term assignment? Parsley can only lose points if she brutally harms another student? All these elements only seem to exist to make certain things happen (like Parsley smashing Aster's foot). Hell, the only thing I appreciate about this episode is how the partners are paired, if only because it humbles Sage's clingy attempt to drag Rosemary next to herself.
I actually adore this show, explicitly because it is so bad. While we did technically get a far more awful show just a few months later in the form of Santa, Inc., that one actually had at least a few bits of redemption, such as beautiful stop-motion. But HGS? It's almost an actual art. Literally none of this show was done correctly and exactly none of it is even memorable save for the simple fact it is _just so perfectly bad._ The Perfect Poster-Child of what not to do, and I can appreciate that.
I agree, I'm simply infatuated with it. It's incredible, and I'm so hyped for the potential season 2. Plus we'll get another abridged series, which is marvelous.
Well I'm probably not gonna ever meet you in the entire life and you're probably on the other side of the world but still, happy birthday and I wish you a happy life.
it still feels like yesterday when i went through the HGS fandom page and saw that Olive was voiced by sailor moon and hinata hyuga along with Olive's species being listed as 'catgirl'
Happy High Guardian Spice-versary yalls!🥳🥳 Thanks to this show my life changed forever. Now for the video games that I want to make in the future I know that I can't not try when making stories, characters, worlds, and writing
I actually like slime boy and his voice acting a lot. He deserves a better show, honestly, he has such a jarring and unique performance. If that performance was given for a konosuba character I think it would work. I think the show had a lot of good ideas and fumbled most of them but the show is definitely better because slime boy is in it.
I have watched an unhealthy amount of High Guardian Spice review videos and it took THIS VIDEO for me to actually find out about what the plot is supposed to be. I had never heard the words "Rot" or "Triumvirate" until now, and I think that's everything you need to know about how this show handles its "plot".
Anime America's Review of High Guardian Spice was amazing, It was like Spectrum Pulse's Review of AJR's The Click Review Level of Rage and Frustration, we got her IDGAF song because of that review.
Since this is the one year anniversary, I thought I may share my ideas about how the sort of main plot, that is the rot, could relate to the girls. My idea is to go with what the show hints at, the rot is caused by new magic. Further, the girls start getting close to the truth about the rot and they do so because between the four of them, they just happens to have the abilities needed for doing so. My idea with Sage is that instead of angsting about new magic, she wants to do everything she does with new magic using old magic as well. She performs the assignments she's given by the school using new magic and then tries to do the same tasks with old magic. She does so because she thinks she needs to understand and stay aware of the cost of casting spells and that using new magic does still have a cost, an unknown one (which of course turns out to be true). She does not want to take the magic for granted. Doing this gives her an understanding people who only uses new magic would not have. There can also be scenarios like she deals with rot infested area by using new magic and another infested area with old magic and in the area she relied on new magic, the rot started to affect other plants and animals while the area where she stuck to old magic fared much better in the future. Thyme has some knowledge about the rot due to her background. I'm also thinking that she should be adept at using magic that specifically affects plants and to a lesser extent other living things. We do see her use magic to move some branches at one point and that would give her a way to interact with rot affected plants and creatures. For Parsley, I was thinking that in order to make the whole learning blacksmithing thing in high guardian academy make any sense, what she is learning is to make magic weapons, armor and tools. That seems more plausible than the students learning blacksmithing. Since the Terra-spheres are basically magic items that I've decided drain magic from other living things to let the users cast spells at no cost to themselves, and then the living being drained by magic may end up afflicted by the rot, having one person adept at magic items and another at living being allows the two of them to gain some insight about the rot. Left is Rosemary. Before handling Rosemary herself, what I'm thinking about magic period is that apart from being used up when you cast spells, you also use your own magic when you use a magic item, like Rose's sword. Further, magic can work similar to the concept of ki, as life energy that makes you stronger, faster and so on. Now, my idea is that Rosemary and her mother seemingly have double the reserve of other humans and double the ability to use it to enhance their strength, speed and whatever. However, this later turns out not to be entiely the case. Most living being can, as a survival measure, only use up half of their magic before they feel drained and unable to use more magic. Rosemary and her mother however can drain almost all of their magic, thus creating the illusion that they have twice the reserve of others. When they do so, they end up empty of magic, just like say a tree may if someone completely drains it with a Terra-sphere. This gives Rosemary a way to contribute towards finding out what the rot is about and an explanation to how she and her mom can keep up with mages. With that I've also decided all other guardian students are either full magic users or hybrid fighters/magic users, no other guardian is a pure fighter. I'm thinking that being more than 50% drained from magic makes you susceptible to the rot. Further, the more intelligent a creature is, the better it can resist the rot, but the more severe it is if the rot does take hold. A plant has no mind and no mobility and is thus easiest afflicted, but it also just sits there and cannot attack anybody. An animal with low intelligence becomes monstrous, goes berserk and mindlessly attacks other creatures. A more intelligent creature is less vulnerable to be afflicted, but if it does get afflicted, it turns just as hostile towards other creatures as an animal with low intelligence would, but attacks with more cunning and gain better control over it's own transformation and thus becomes very dangerous. Humans like Rosemary and her mother would as such have a great resistance against the rot, but they are not immune. By using their special advantages, they will gradually become afflicted over the years. This will be used as the reason Rose's mom left her family and also may or may not have turned evil, she noticed something was wrong with her and both needed to figure out what is happening to her and she needed to get away from her family for the sake of their safety. Anyway, this I think ties the girls more into the plot, gives Rosemary a reason to be the main character and a way for the girls to run into a conspiracy that puts their lives in a great mortal danger.
Finally, someone who has thought of something better than this show as well. Well to be fair, if they didn't say the story was original then I might have forgive their story a bit. The problem is that they say it was original and never done before... But there are a couple of Anime (even old ones) which has similar premise and story. The problem is HGS copied that... and made it 1000x worse
as much as you hope they did, they did NOT pay for the stock image of the lamp post. when you buy images from stockphoto or other similar hosting sites, you are given a download of the image with the watermark removed in your purchase history. so they really did rip it straight from google.
It's funny because "there's nothing to get attached to" really describes this show. It shakes you off like a dog tries to shake off its ticks. I wanted to watch the show for studies, by latching on to Sage because I wanted to attach to the level-headed nerd. One video later, I learned Sage was a manipulative sociopath so I settled for the abridged series, so at least I kinda got what I wanted.
I think the biggest issue with High Guardian Spice is that they spent too much time focusing on diversity and less time on story. There is all sorts of representation in HGS, but it amounts to nothing because the characters lack attributes that make them interesting. For example, Thyme has an amazing look and she has a noble goal. But Thyme's broodiness is so over the top that it makes her annoying. The writers didn't know where to focus their efforts and figured simple characters that are diverse would be sufficient. Oh well. Here's to a year of High Guardian Spice.
That's because the show was written by people that believe ethnicity and sexuality are not only character traits, but *the only* character traits that matter. You're supposed to love them because they aren't white and straight, you see. Do you want to be a bigot?
I swear Raye and crew had this on paper when they hired writers: Four lesbian protagonists, a transgender teacher, new magic vs old magic and lesbian aunts. Then told them to make it 12 episodes
Checks out in the way of the characters being identified by their design/backstory but never the personality, the magic not being explained beyond just the allegory, etc.
How to give the bad guys an obvious goal. “We have a way to cure the rot. First we let it grow out of control and cause problems for the world, then we offer our cure to the world and become rich and regarded as heroes.” Ta-da, I did it.
29:28: I agree. Am really enjoying some of the interesting elements you've introduced in the Abridged, particularly Demon Rosemary (and her ripping up and devouring Aster), and also the spiked cookies from the first episode.
It's like broccoli and ice cream for me. There are a lot of ideas that could have been good on their own. They just really don't go well together. Obvious example being new magic both representing same sex attraction and the dangers of industrialization.
There was good concepts but like the comments above this one the concept of messages like old magic vs new magic and it’s cost wasnt establish clear enough. The suspense was added way too late in the show in my opinion so the investment of a characters stakes in risk taking may be more or less meh assuming you stayed invested long enough to see this in episode 8. It hurt worse because the dropped the ball to even air it on time, their hesitance cost them and it shows but you also feel like even then they didn’t do nearly enough to make this special with that extra time. The same year outside anime by 2020 ; TWO other magic girl inspired shows by western media hit the market by competitors: Owl House from Disney and Magical Girl Friendship Squad that aired on Syfy in the United States. We are now in 2022 in which sailor moon is still a tour de force with how The recent movie came out and it still makes money as it’s highly merchandisable and we have been spoiled with various magic girl shows either having a new adaptation like Tokyo mew mew new or we get continuations to shows like Magical Madoka etc. It had steep competition and it’s old magic vs new magic concept is interesting but they didn’t nourish this concept of plot. Excuse the long tangent; I just hope I was able to provide an example of how it suffered in more than 1 area.
I've never actually watched High Guardian spice. Fortunately I don't need to since you give me all the info I could need on why I really don't want to watch
I've never seen the show but I would've thought it was a TH-cam series. The animation has the amateur feeling where they're only capable of animating one thing at a time y'know? I'm not an animator so its hard to explain what I mean.
Hannah Barbara had a budget of the change found in three couches and whatever they could get in the classifieds section of a community College newspaper for each of their shows; yet they still made classics. Budget is no excuse.
@@barneyerror4561 I know, right? It shows that good writing and your heart in the right place will always produce a better product than self indulgence and I think a mole person in charge.
Me viewing the art in HGS: "You know, this doesn't look so bad" When the characters enter the picture: "Oooooooooooooh....." The Wizard101 soundtrack in the background. Well, that was a quick half hour.
Amazing how they hyped it up like it's going to be groundbreaking and incredible when the only groundbreaking and incredible thing about is how bad it is. Sidenote, I admire the dedication and spite to make an entire channel with the purpose to analyze how bad a show really is and I am all for it.
I think when the dude said, "2D animation...studios had forgotten" he was referring to how over dependant America has gotten on CGI and 3D animation. Although they didn't really do 2D animation justice with their crudey dog shjt art style.
I think the point is that the show was airing on Crunchyroll, which is filled to the brim with good 2D animated shows. It'd have some merit if we're talking about Nickelodeon or whatever, but 2D seems to make up the vast majority of anime.
If they wanted the hammer scene to work, during the obstacle course have the grip strap come off of the hammer earlier. She almost drops the hammer in the pit but catches it last minute. Then have it actually slip out her hand later to hit his foot. Foreshadowing and payoff. I haven't even seen the show, just watched reviews, so maybe I'm missing something but why didn't they do that? Oh right, they're bad writers.
A review. Didn't realize you didn't make one yet. Yeah this show wouldn't nearly have gotten much hate if produced on Disney or Nickelodeon. Seriously Crunchyroll ticked off people who understandably didn't want their money going to non anime projects. Like I said before, if the side characters were main characters, this show would've been more entertaining and less bland. I just wish the plot was fleshed out more or certain elements were given more focus. Lots of shows take a while grabbing an audience but this doesn't pass the three episode rule.
I think it's just them though. Onyx Equinox got its share of hate when it first came out of course due to it not being anime but since then, look how popular it is now. Wonder how the creators of high guardian spice feel about that.😶
0:30 _”High Guardian Spice was a Crunchyroll original that did not meet expectations, if there were expectations at all.”_ I actually did have expectations for HGS: I expected a half-rate anime knockoff that promoted “diversity” over story, with Mary Sue protags, shipping fuel for Twitter, and nonstop virtue signaling. And the show met them all. The only thing I didn’t expect was for so many people to still be talking about HGS after a year - not that I’m complaining, because ripping on this show will _never_ get old for me! Thank you for helping to pull some real entertainment value out of this animated travesty.
Also I noticed a few of the students don't have costumes on at all, you know, seeing as it's supposedly against the law not to wear one, and considering how the school is so barbaric against its students, I have no choice but to believe that the whole kingdom is like that and that breaking that law probably has the death penalty.
I think that was supposed to be an attempt at a joke with Thyme's friends pressuring her to wear a costume because it's "illegal", but you can clearly see students not wearing costumes?
@@TuesdaysArt yep, in the school while Sage and Rosemary were waiting for Parsley and Thyme to come out wearing their costumes and before Cal comes out.
@@DespairDoctor Part of me wants to say that's intentional (to show the girls are exaggerating), but it's not even that good of a joke and the worldbuilding is such a mess that people took it literally. Idk if I should give them that much credit though
What Kingdom is this suppose to be anyway? Does the school answer to them? Is the town the school is in an independent city state or something? Is this related to which country or are apart of the same nation as which country? Is there a king or royal family or anything? Are guardians technically government employees to them and can they fight for enemy nations? A million questions and zero answers to this.
The show feels like creator's first homebrew/DnD campaign and thought it was SO COOL AND FUN and would make a good show. Feels like their was a plathura of web comics and pilots with the same premise at the time, 'my first DnD the show"
I haven't seen this show, but the absolute horror I felt when you played the Death Note theme while discussing it at 11:15 is probably more intense than any emotion that the show manages to pull off.
When it comes to the writing of the series, something tells me that there probably was a lot of headcanon and world building the crew made and talked about to the point they knew by second nature, but they forgot to put it into the series. It's like when you try to teach someone something you're really good at, but you forget to teach them minor details because it just comes naturally to you. To them, the story must make perfect sense because they know all the details. But forgot to tell us what to tell us what those details were.
- You forgot a few more experienced VAs: Salli Saffioti (The Triad), Stephanie Sheh (Olive), Cindy Robinson (Zinnia), and Karen Strassman (Elodie). These, along with Goodson and Clarke, could NOT have come cheap (even if two of them are only present for one episode each). And even if his voice-acting career wasn't as long as theirs, SungWon Cho might have cost a fair bit himself. (Audu Paden is also a pretty experienced VA, but he weirdly has the most inconsistent voice quality between character roles here. Some like the Triumvirate are clear and audible, while others like Moss Phlox and Smoke Face sound very off.) - My two cents on the backgrounds: maybe they were TOO detailed for the budget, especially if they're gonna have so many size inconsistencies at times. More simplified BGs probably would've been easier on the crew, and wouldn't clash as much with the characters' designs. - Y'know, despite any of their flaws, I see more protagonist energy in Sage, Parsley, Thyme, Amaryllis, AND Snapdragon each than I ever did in Rosemary. Her only true emotional investment is "My mom is missing," and she repeats this so frequently that it gets stale. As for the other five: -> *Sage:* More dynamic character, gets all the super powerful techniques easily -> *Parsley:* A magnetic personality that attracts many others, more mature -> *Thyme:* Focused the most on combating the main threat -> *Amaryllis:* Entertaining attitude, shows a lot of positive development -> *Snapdragon:* More believable attitude, and this is suddenly a trans story anyhow so why not - ...I'll give it THIS much against Foodfight: this one has a way smoother frame rate.
Technically speaking this is better made than Foodfight. But Foodfight is so insane and memeworthy that is cycles back into being at least somewhat entertaining.
Still can't get over the fact that this show came out a year ago. It feels like yesterday when I saw people laughing at the PNG bread XD
honestly I'm the opposite, I'm surprised that it's been only one year lol! I thought it was like 3 or 2 years at best and 3 was obviously a stretch lol, probably because I paid close attention to the pre-release controversies lol.
That’s actually how I was introduced to the show XD
@@dooplon5083 yeah same
Hyper-realistic bread.
That's because it was yesterday.... I introduced this to a friend who managed to avoid learning about High Guardian spice through some miracle and he bust a gut laughing about how bad it was... he said it was Mystery Science Theater 3000 levels of bad
“Her mother is dead, but not really and gave her a magic sword and she wants to be a superhero” applies to Steven universe so strongly and I can’t help but feel like that’s not a coincidence
It's almost become a trope for a parental figure not being in the picture but leaving behind a weapon (usually a sword)
At least Disney had multiple reasons why one parent is present if not both!
I just hear C Puff in my head going " her mom is dead.. and she's SAAAD about it." 😂
to say nothing of the strong colour association between them all
Nobody tell Lily Orchard or else she’ll make another 5 hour video
A whole year and we still have no idea what a guardian is supposed to be
It guards stuff
Is a Guardian a type of food?
I suppose to the authors the answer was so obvious they didn't even think about explaining. A guardian is probably "that job that every DnD character is seemingly doing, which is some kind of mercenary/soldier/ranger/adventurer/whatever"... XD
Guardians are the friends we made along the way
I have no bloody clue what they are but maybe they're just.. magical defenders against evil? I don't even know man. Seriously, it was such a major plot point of the show and they *NEVER FUCKING TOLD US WHAT IT WAS!* Like... at all. Literally any of explanations given by anyone are better and more cohesive than whatever the show gave us.
One year later, and the greatest achievement for a show that was bad "due to budget" was a host of videos taking the piss out of it.
If rumors are true, then that budget is about twice what Attack on Titan costs to make. Think about that.
The problem isn't budget size. It's the team's mismanagement of the budget. Heck, Foodfight cost $65 million to make because of all the massive redos (and Kassanoff's disturbingly vague direction).
And MarzGurl trying to defend it for some reason
I think I’m surprised why anyone gives 2 nickels about a bad show
And teaching kids how to fight for dominance and use bad words to act edgy, fulfilling that joke from the Gravity Falls episode The Stanchurian Candidate. High Guardian Spice's greatest achievement was because Crunchyroll shoehorned in mature content to fit in with their adult-oriented anime, but it is still very tame compared to Attack on Titan. Maybe Alex Hirsch wishes he put Gravity Falls on Crunchyroll instead of Disney Channel, because Crunchyroll would not make him censor anything. October 26, 2022, 8:14pm
@@jtlovescodelyoko Not surprising she would
paraphrasing what Mr Wilson once said:
"Sometimes, there's more to say about a cartoon that tried to do something and failed miserably than just a good cartoon."
I'm not 100% sure this show 'tried' to do something though. "Trying to do something" implies effort, which I don't really see.
@@zandershadowbane I mean. The show actually existed. There’s gotta be some effort to pull that off lmao.
Which is a good answer to all the people that question why others are still talking about it.
@@cantmakeacreativename2072 But what was the effort? I saw no effort to make a good story, make something entertaining, make something artistic, or even just to make something marketable. All I saw was a series that tried to force a social agenda. But, I didn't even see any effort put into that. There was no effort put in to make any reasonable argument to justify their beliefs. Instead, we get things like the explaining transgender which comes out of nowhere, gives a copy paste explanation out of the dictionary, and then is gone just as fast with no impact whatsoever to the plot.
It doesn't help that the overall vision for the series is just plain weak, so what little effort was put in is negated further by a lack of purpose.
Like a lot of modern media, it feels like the reason it exists isn't because of any effort from the series itself, but rather from the people in charge who green-light it to show off how diverse and Woke they are, rather then because the thought it was a good show.
@@zandershadowbane my comment was a bit of a joke, but sure.
The thing is, it’s animated and there’s assumingely several episodes and a whole season (I haven’t even took a glance at the show so I wouldn’t know how many episodes it has). Animation is HARD. Even crappy animation like what I’ve seen in this show. So the fact that people actually considered working on this, it shows there was at least the most MINIMAL amount of effort to make this show actually exist and public lmao.
The reason why they let Parsley hurt a student and not Snap Dragon is because Parsley made it look like an accident.
You gotta be able to cover your tracks in High Guardian Accademy.
Maybe Hakone is more apathetic compared to Caraway. Hakone would probably encourage Snapdragon, Caraway seems like he'd send Parsley to the Triad
@@TuesdaysArt Caraway is the guy who said "Nice use of violence!" 😂
@@lou9635 I mean, fair point lol
I would question the cognitive ability of anyone who didn't see the sarcasm in her excuse. So of course the f'in teacher falls for it.
so a guardian is an insurance fraudster?
This show is the personification of
“Our expectations were low BUT HOLY SHIT”
Me and my homie watched some show yesterday and that's what he told me of his experience with season 2 of the show we watched, and i just told him "It's not nearly as bad as High Guardian Spice". Sooo the show is officially a meme.
"Does HGA just leave powerful demon summoning rituals just lying around?" Dude, it's an established death trap that poisons its students on the first day of class; this is the most consistent thing in the show. Of course they do.
Dretch (the demon MILF) being there implies the school does deal with demonkind, so yeah, I'd expect them to have demon rituals lying around.
That's actually a tiny rewrite I had proposed at one point: that Thyme got the idea to summon the demon in Ep 10 by meeting Dretch and thinking maybe making a deal with one wouldn't be such a bad idea... then her own attempt goes horribly wrong due to her underestimation of demons and she starts taking her Guardian training more seriously.
@@insulttothehumanrace3807 if by demon milf you mean Ms. Deviantart, then I'm afraid to inform you that she is not actually a demon in the actual show's lore, she's a dragon lady. Yes. They were that good at character design that thay made a dragon lady that looks like the most generic demon lady ever. I can't wait until it will be revealed that centaur teacher was a goblin this whole time
@@АлексейЮрловский Ohhhhhh. That would explain why she is in one of the photos of young-girl Caraway. Doesn't explain why she's named after a class of demon from D&D, though.
But that is hilarious.
Addendum: Nor does it explain her affinity for darkness-based magic, or her character introduction being her appearing out of a dark portal with glowing purple eyes like some kind of demon. You can probably see where I got the wrong idea about her character. Still hilarious.
@@insulttothehumanrace3807 They probably just mixed up the pictures of a thiefling and a dragon kin when they were stealing ideas, it is an easy mistake if you know zero about D&D.
Still, considering the spells Sage finds in episode 2 (I think), they have spells making you immortal lying around where any student can find it so demon summoning spells are probably all around the place.
Actually, some tweaks and this school could actually be a fun D&D module where the teachers switch between neglect and trying to kill the students. Tomb of horror is nothing compared to going to this insane school, but you would have to ramp up the difficulty a bit. I mean, giving the students poisoned tea in potions class is stupid. Only an complete idiot would fall for that. So if you make the teachers neglectful, murderous *and smart* and register your poor PCs at the school I could see that be fun.
I like when the grandma says "we should just throw them in lava like we used to" instead of the death cave test.
Reminder that a four kids dub of Pokemon explained a Pokemon Master better than this show explained the concept of being a guardian
4kids, were easily the best when it came to dubbing Japanese anime shows.
@@barneyerror4561 the censorship and weird americanization sure was wacky, but at least it was consistently high quality
@@barneyerror4561 I honestly wish we got to see those guys with no censorship, I think some insane things would have happened.
With the Benefit of Hindsight, I feel we were all far too harsh on 4kids.
@@ShadowWolfRising As LittleKuriboh said in his YuGiOh abridged series, they were the first and they gave us many hours of entertainment and memories.
@@ShadowWolfRising Also just to celebrate this anniversary…th-cam.com/video/yDnwbhbEAQQ/w-d-xo.html
"The animation value is um, it's uh, it's animated?"
Carriage from episode one: *Am I a joke to you?*
The animation in HGS makes the nft animation looks like handrawn cel animation in comparison
The absolute arrogance of the producers to say "it gives us a chance to do what other studios have forgotten to do" only for them up produce... This.
other studios forgot how to be poop
They didn't so much "forget" how to do what those producers made, the other studios had the common sense to avoid the obvious poison.
The producers would be a "Survivalist" show that had two episodes showing some lanky, pale dude picking random mushrooms and eating them going "I can't believe that Mycologists forget about all this natural food you can survive off of!" While other studios are screaming at their screens.
Wdym? They’re statement was completely right.
Because most other studios have forgotten how to make total and complete garbage.
@@ProtocolAbyss lol
Twice the pride, double the fall.
Dave a McDonald's chicken nugget is more organic than any relationship this show has
Not everyone can afford pricy food
check your privelege
Ironically anyone saying anyone real or fake are a faker as well. You constantly denying people and declaring what you don't like based on your own assessment
@@danjoredd There's 15 fans??? Wow, I was expecting a single digit count.
@@danjoredd I'm afraid to ask. So, I won't.
I can't believe it's been a year since the incident that led to Rosemary asking if everything was a food in your comment section
@ArrowSlinger I think it's a reference to a line of dialog in the show where Rosemary asked if sleep was a food. Just another example of the not so good writing that the show has
@@pablocasas5906 As follow up context, a common joke in anime is when the dumb character asks if an unknown person, item or concept is "tasty". People were not only peeved at the mere stupidity of the line "Is sleep a food?", but also the writers utterly failing to utilize a basic, but popular trope properly.
@@sxatcychan1988 oh yeah, for example, in Dragon Ball there were plenty of occasions in which Goku and other characters asked if the titular Dragon Balls were some kind of food. There's also a good joke that gets lost in translation, when Chi-Chi proposed to Goku, he mistook the word "kon'yaku" (engagement) with "konjac" (a plant that's used in various asian dishes). Still, those are better jokes than the ones from HGS
@@pablocasas5906 or in Danganronpa 2 during the first trial when Akane asks “What’s an ‘aspersion’? Is it yummy?”
Where?
I ultimately feel bad for the people who had high hopes for the show. And I know the exist, they were on the subreddit. Because they actually cared and went against the stream to hope it was good. Just for it to suck. And seriously, to the maybe two people saying how the show is amazing and better than anything else in media, I think you need a doctor's appointment.
Sorry to say it to you, if they still believe the show is better than most thing out there (even the Twilight movie), then they are already too far gone...
I've never seen people say its good, I've seen some people simply like it, they know it's bad but they somehow find enjoyment in it and I won't fault them for that
You are base my friend
Maybe said people are still worried about being labeled as sexist if they deliver any criticism against HGS?
@@Zavitor but that doesn't mean they have to praise it or even acknowledge it's obscure existence
I remember the time when it first came out, it was treated as if art had died that day. It became clear that this was basically the part where animation had become gentrified by corporations and exclusionary ideologies, and that people like me thought that animation (at least in the West) had died in a fiery wreck.
It was no different in my art school here in France. The news about HGS became a wildfire that my fellow artists started questioning what Western animation had truly become. I even recall my animation instructor blurted in a barrage of French profanities after me and my friend showed the poor writing, shoddy animation work and horrendous characterization of High Guardian Spice after our class. My instructor then explained how Raye Rodriguez and his band of writers were spineless and egotistical people who never cared to make animation for the sake of telling a good story, rather to spread ideas that we don't even believe in. At the end, he encouraged me and my friend to *make something better than High Guardian Spice, because he believes that there are more better stories out there that needed to be told.*
For me as a person and an artist, I may be already infamous for commenting a lot on HGS commentary videos made by Guardian HQ and LobsterHero about my analysis of the show, going as far as comparing the technicalities of HGS to Wakfu, a better animated show made in my native country, that had stellar worldbuilding, good characterization and a better written antagonist with clear intentions, but that's just how I view this show from my perspective. It is a show that is so ridden with errors that it can no longer be saved by rewrites, and that we can even write stories better than what Raye Rodriguez wasted for nearly 10 years developing this show.
Dude, no joke, I've been doing the same thing of comparing it to Wakfu. I'm literally obsessed with that show! I consider it 10/10 and I love the worldbuilding.
It's so rare to see it mentioned.
I would say that while Wakfu is the objectively better product, something like the original Code Lyoko would be a better comparison.
Because despite being old, and looking reasonably budgeted when it came to it's 2D animation, it still blows HGS out of the water. Wakfu has production and animation quality that I feel exceeds or at least matches a lot of anime, even a lot of the big names like GitS or TTGL. Much less this this tripe, which has quality a few steps above the original Speed Racer; and is still a far cry from the admittedly low bar for American shows. Can't believe I'm looking back at _Generator Rex_ as the peak of American cartoons, much as I liked the show when it came out.
And I'm glad to hear your teacher has a spine. A lot here, as he has said, don't! Which is why we have this problem in the first place.
based art class
@@galvanizeddreamer2051 Generator Rex is the peak?
Not Megas XLR?
@@ShadowWolfRising Sad thing is, I didn't grow up early enough to actually watch stuff like that.
Albeit, now that I say it out loud, I should go back a bit further and say _Teen Titians_ or _Justice League Unlimited._ Generator Rex was a perfectly good show, but the industry was already on the decline by that point.
"Mature product looking and feeling like the one made for children" can be super good if done right. Like, "Made in Abyss" just nailed the perfect balance between adventurous and silly vibe and full-on body horror. I think HGS just tried to do something like that but failed miserably
There is a theory that High Guardian spice was just made to be childish and they added a lot of the adult stuff later for some reason.
@@QueenAleenaFan I've actually heard exactly opposite info that they intended it to be for 14-16 yo audience but then publisher interfered and made them add more "childish" stuff
Is this the one where shit comes out of a little girl ears
Made in Abyss has so much body horror, aaaaAAAA
@@QueenAleenaFan Raye admitted HGS was supposed to be like a CN show but Crunchyroll wanted it be more mature
"Amaryllis's hair looks like a stingray." I think that was the point. At least I hope so.
In the words of a youtuber or something similar who redesigned the characters ‘her hair looks like yellow diamond’s hair aka a helmet’
she's got the personality of one, i'll give you that
@@libraeevee9467 It's looks like a mix of a Valkyrie and an Archer's hairstyle from Clash of Clans, that's how wacky it is.
I thought it looked like an axe head.
I think my favorite part of this show that _isn't_ its use as a teaching tool for how NOT to execute and publish your passion project, is some of the character designs. The main 4, Amaryllis, Snapdragon, and Olive especially all have distinct hair and outfits that fit them, with good color pallette choices. I have legitimately considered drawing them despite never having actually watched HGS.
Granted, I personally enjoy cartoonish designs.
_(Also, as a Splatoon fan, I think calling Amaryllis' hair a sting ray should be taken as a compliment.)_
I've also considered drawing them, Thyme especially, but I just hate their personalities to much to put a lot of effort into a nice drawing.
@Viewer that actually sounds like a good idea. If the “manga” is successful, then they can move on to making the animated adaptation.
lol yeah, the character designs were decent despite the show, i drew sage after I watched the show last year and strangely enough one of my best drawings lmao.
Olive is ripped from Tokyo mew mew though, including the dress, she just had a palette switch so while her design is good, it is someone else who actually did it.
I think that's one of the biggest diaspointments, this show had so much potential 🙁
The whole world shifted into the dark timeline after high guardian spice
Can we even call Rosemary the main character? She has no story to tell. The only significant detail about her is that she misses her mom - but this doesn’t affect what little plot we get. Rose makes no attempt to track her mother down. The only thing she ever does strive for us to become a guardian, whatever that means. It’s the same goal her three cohorts have, but the three of them all have stories of their own on the side - terrible stories, yes, but at least they ARE stories. Rosemary is just a tagalong in her own show.
Rosemary is very badly characterized but I will give her one (or really half of a) brownie point. I do actually like her character design as it matches her; being round and bubbly, but it also doesn't hinder her fighting very badly. It also has layers, and I especially love how it defines her silhouette (which isn't just her hair apparently). The colors were also really nice and she fit the world's fashion, unlike Anise. Everybody else's designs were okay, but the Triad and Snapdragon were pretty decent. Sage just has generic dress and witch hat, there was no effort put into it at all. :(
Rosemary might just be a pink blob, but she's a very aesthetically pleasing pink blob and I actually like her design a lot. (Not the mermaid though). Sorry if I rambled btw, but I do need to give credit for Rosemary's designs.
You always choose the most nostalgic music for the background lol, I love it
Wizard 101 really is a vibe
I didn't know what you meant then I heard the tf2 music
I just heard Death Note.
thyme should've been the main character and the plot should've focused on the rot and the bad guys by at least episode two
Either that or make the show have all stand alone episodes. Which probably would've made the show more tolerable
More focus should've been on Parsley and Thyme. C Puff made a good case for why Parsley should've been the main character.
But then where do they go from there, do the good guys chase the villains, to the villains go on the attack like they did. They should start by thinking of an actual motivation for the villains
This is a whole-ass 30 minutes video review and it feels like it didn't even scratched a surface, holy shit.
I love the HGS actually. It's like a good lesson in "What things you shouldn't do". It is unironically inspiring
Ironically, yeah. The best thing HGS did was show everything *NOT* to do.
Yes, but that doesn't make it good, it makes it terrible
@@wubbers662 nah it's a good thing, atleast people who will use this as a case study will make better content than what this is.
So atleast it gave a good standard on what not to do.
@@ashurad_fox5991 I mean it doesn't make the show itself good, only useful on what not to do, but in general it's just bad
@@wubbers662 true, nobody can argue with that because the show's just bad in everything it does
there's a special place in my heart for this garbage series because it's the first show me and my best friend watched together over video call, and by proxy the first time I've spoken to them verbally after three years of texting
We're still watching garbage and playing games together to this day. I can't believe it's a year old already to be honest
happy birthday, high guardian spice. if the show were a person I'd push them down a flight of stairs
It's been a whole year and STILL nothing about a season 2, good.
Production finished in 2019, the show is pretty much dead.
Rest in peace, it was like a hollow cupcake, with a hot sauce flavored sprinkle, only one sprinkle. I'm sure the creator and team really wanted the show to be good but without the talent/experience, money, and the time needed to make something good: they were doomed.
*Good*
Speaking of the animation, it reminds me of RWBY season 1 when they didn't have the budget for background characters so they just made them all silhouettes. except that was in 2013 and they were basically an indie studio back then so they had an excuse.
And it still made up for it with the absolutely sick color trailers
@@ARStudios2000 And just made better.
Good character design is based on silhouette, exaggeration, and readability; the best character designs are ones that can be recognised just by silhouette alone, exaggerated features like big noses or noodle bodies, and how well the design communicates who the character is. Link from Twilight Princess and Link from Wind Waker are good examples - Twilight Princess Link has very sharp features, like the shape of his eyes and his pointed nose and chin, while his eyebrows sit low over his eyes in an almost permanent frown, and his iteration of the hero's tunic has chainmail underneath it; this all communicates just how dangerous he can be and how familiar he is with violence (most of the moves he learns from the shade are just brutal, like the helmsplitter or the finisher on a prone enemy). Wind Waker Link, on the other hand, has a big round head on a little body and is very cute, while still keeping the Link frown; still dangerous, but also a baby bean who goes home to grandmother for soup. Both are easily recognisable from their silhouettes.
So I wouldn't say High Guardian Spice has especially bad character design, at least not from what I've seen, but it doesn't do anything well either. Even then, though, the teachers are too baby-faced for me to see them as adults and all the students just look like thirteen year olds to three year olds, but that might just be me since I don't know or care how old they're supposed to be.
Those are not good examples of silhouettes at all, not just the fact both games have completely different character designs and art style period but also stuff like facial expressions aren't noticeable in silhouettes with no face...
You're comparing different art styles, not silhouettes. Like Master Chief to Mario.
You need to compare Mario to Luigi.
Twilight Princess Link to Midna.
Wind Waker Link to Tetra.
Yet good character design can use extremely similar silhouettes as well.
Marth to Lucina for example from Fire Emblem give Lucina tries to be Marth in short.
Good character design is them fitting the role needed in universe and visually matching it.
Even matching a silhouette or even not standing out.
@@Buglin_Burger7878 I literally looked up what makes good character designs to make sure I had my wording right, and distinctive silhouettes were one of the first points. One of their examples was Mickey Mouse. And yes, expressions aren't visible in silhouettes - well done; but a silhouette is only one part of a good character design and expression is another, as is key exaggerated features like the shape of the nose, colour schemes, etc.
I'd argue art style is completely irrelevant to character design, up to a point anyway. A good character design can be distinct and recognisable in any art style - which is why I brought up two different Links, because despite the differing styles they both look recognisably the same because to one extent or another they are the same character. Mario and Luigi and Peach will always be recognisable because of their design - the Mario from the first game is still the same Mario from Odyssey despite a change in art style, Mario from Sunshine or 64 still looks like the same Mario from the new film, because of the key exaggerated features that make him - bulbous nose, moustache, hat, and overalls.
Art style, on the other hand, takes up a largely separate area like, as you said, how well the characters visually fit into the world, but also aesthetics and tone. BOTW has a distinctly different style to Wind Waker despite both being partly cel shaded because BOTW is much more grounded and less whimsical, but again it's the character design that makes them both Links because of the key features they share, while the differences in their design also makes them distinct from one another in order to fit their respective roles and the needs of the story.
In terms of good character design, I think the TF2 mercenaries are a good example. Their silhouettes are pretty recognizable, and they're distinct from each other which makes them memorable.
@@RiddleMajor When I opened this thread, I KNEW someone would mention TF2 as an example.
From the very first few sentences alone I can already state with confidence that this analysis is hot garbage.
My bad, but good characters designs are ABSOLUTELY not defined by silhouette and exaggeration. If anything, being caricatural and/or exaggerated are generally considered to be bad things. It’s EXTREMELY rare for a show to get those things right (with One Piece being one of the few good examples).
You’re watching too much Nickelodeon.
Good character design is defined by two very simple things:
Beauty and recognisability.
It needs to be immediately recognisable, or so to say, even remotely unique.
And it also needs to be pleasant to look at.
It’s worthy to say that beauty isn’t really related to “being a beautiful person” at all. Beauty is related to being pleasant.
If a character is awfully ugly but you can recognise the design as something detailed and well thought that represents the character’s personality well, then this will be pleasant to look at and therefor a good design (Quasimodo being a damn near perfect example).
And then…
That’s really just it.
Nothing more to add.
Reviewing it now is like beating the guy who's beating the dead horse.
KEEP IT UP. DO NOT LET THIS TRAGEDY BE FORGOTTEN.
Im all for that, that guy is an asshole, he probably killed that horse.
If I remember, in Episode 6, Parsley wanted to bring Parnell to first place in the dumb obstacle course because she thought he merited it more, but Hakone didn’t really care and wouldn’t change their ranking. (Another point on negligent asshole teachers.) The only exception is if she caused grievous bodily harm to another contestant; then she’d get the boot.
So, there’s still some motivation behind why she crushed Aster’s foot, but it’s still extremely stupid. Not to mention that it highlights how bad the teachers are not only for ignoring to their students, but letting them get away with harming others because “haha she listened to my advice and actually did it. Props to her” which… no. She wouldn’t have done it if you had listened to her.
Everything about the obstacle course is convoluted, really.
He was tallying individual points prior to teaming everyone up and leading them to the course? There's no set order on the obstacles? Parsley and Parnell didn't even go through the maze, as far as we saw? There's a big gaudy trophy for what's some mid-term assignment? Parsley can only lose points if she brutally harms another student?
All these elements only seem to exist to make certain things happen (like Parsley smashing Aster's foot). Hell, the only thing I appreciate about this episode is how the partners are paired, if only because it humbles Sage's clingy attempt to drag Rosemary next to herself.
@@MrAuthor3DS Oh, definitely agree with these points.
I actually adore this show, explicitly because it is so bad. While we did technically get a far more awful show just a few months later in the form of Santa, Inc., that one actually had at least a few bits of redemption, such as beautiful stop-motion.
But HGS? It's almost an actual art. Literally none of this show was done correctly and exactly none of it is even memorable save for the simple fact it is _just so perfectly bad._
The Perfect Poster-Child of what not to do, and I can appreciate that.
I agree, I'm simply infatuated with it. It's incredible, and I'm so hyped for the potential season 2. Plus we'll get another abridged series, which is marvelous.
The worst sin of this show is, it's so horrible that we won't ever see new scenes of Amaryllis again.
24:16 "It felt about as organic as a McDonald's chicken nugget" Nice Line!
I cannot hear the theme song without wishing it was the Mentos song.
Same thing for the end credits song. I will only listen to Reeses Puffs
One year ago, a certain someone asked if sleep was a food
Can't believe it's been 1 year already
Congrats.
For all that's worth.
Hope for another year more.
It still such, don't get us wrong and wait till they "Attempt" to do Season 2.
I sure hope they do, I'm deeply invested in the abridged series, so if there's a season 2 hopefully they'll make an abridged season 2.
If they do a S2, please hire a production company that knows what the fuck they're doing!
I'm not sure If this show coming out on my birthday is a curse or a blessing. Most likely a curse.
Happy birthday.
At least you get a Guardian HQ video released today. Happy birthday, by the way.
Happy birthday user Tim thornton
Happy birthday !🎂🎉🎊🎁🎈
Well I'm probably not gonna ever meet you in the entire life and you're probably on the other side of the world but still, happy birthday and I wish you a happy life.
Just finished watching C-Puff's videos on this show, thanks for the recommendation I enjoyed them
Anime America's review a Highly Recommend
HAPPY ANNIVERSARY... for the death of our sanity and mental health.
it still feels like yesterday when i went through the HGS fandom page and saw that Olive was voiced by sailor moon and hinata hyuga along with Olive's species being listed as 'catgirl'
Happy High Guardian Spice-versary yalls!🥳🥳
Thanks to this show my life changed forever. Now for the video games that I want to make in the future I know that I can't not try when making stories, characters, worlds, and writing
I actually like slime boy and his voice acting a lot. He deserves a better show, honestly, he has such a jarring and unique performance. If that performance was given for a konosuba character I think it would work. I think the show had a lot of good ideas and fumbled most of them but the show is definitely better because slime boy is in it.
His voice acting would be right at home in Smiling Friends
There was a review for the show I saw that said "the reason why Rosemary brings up her mom so much is cuz she doesn't have a real personality"
There are a thousand lessons in defeat but only one in victory.
Unfortunately, the only "lesson" the team that made this show will learn is that everyone else is wrong and bigoted.
Today is this show's Anniversary? Ha! That is Hilarious how something can go to memory this Hard.
All Snapdragon needed to do was poorly play off the punching as an accident and he would have gotten off scot-free.
The best thing to come from this show is the small community built around its rotting corpse, including your abridged series.
Guardian HQ: I misspelled Ray's name that one time.
Me: I do it intentionally. Because autocorrect is an idiot.
Considering that this was loosely based on D&D the characters should have much better designs.
14:57 This face right here gave me an aneurysm. Thanks, Crunchyroll!
FOOD REVIEW
sleep 10/10
Yummy :3
I'm still dying to know what Pig-tail Orange hair girl's name is. She's truly an engima considering how often she shows up yet never does anything.
I have watched an unhealthy amount of High Guardian Spice review videos and it took THIS VIDEO for me to actually find out about what the plot is supposed to be. I had never heard the words "Rot" or "Triumvirate" until now, and I think that's everything you need to know about how this show handles its "plot".
One year later, and Guardian HQ is STILL torturing himself with this show. Congrats...but please take some much needed R&R after this!
Anime America's Review of High Guardian Spice was amazing, It was like Spectrum Pulse's Review of AJR's The Click Review Level of Rage and Frustration, we got her IDGAF song because of that review.
Hey JT long time no see how's it going man
@@kingj9664 Doing Well
@@jtlovescodelyoko That's cool to hear man I haven't seen you since the whole war of superstar Artemis prime days
Since this is the one year anniversary, I thought I may share my ideas about how the sort of main plot, that is the rot, could relate to the girls.
My idea is to go with what the show hints at, the rot is caused by new magic. Further, the girls start getting close to the truth about the rot and they do so because between the four of them, they just happens to have the abilities needed for doing so.
My idea with Sage is that instead of angsting about new magic, she wants to do everything she does with new magic using old magic as well. She performs the assignments she's given by the school using new magic and then tries to do the same tasks with old magic. She does so because she thinks she needs to understand and stay aware of the cost of casting spells and that using new magic does still have a cost, an unknown one (which of course turns out to be true). She does not want to take the magic for granted. Doing this gives her an understanding people who only uses new magic would not have. There can also be scenarios like she deals with rot infested area by using new magic and another infested area with old magic and in the area she relied on new magic, the rot started to affect other plants and animals while the area where she stuck to old magic fared much better in the future.
Thyme has some knowledge about the rot due to her background. I'm also thinking that she should be adept at using magic that specifically affects plants and to a lesser extent other living things. We do see her use magic to move some branches at one point and that would give her a way to interact with rot affected plants and creatures. For Parsley, I was thinking that in order to make the whole learning blacksmithing thing in high guardian academy make any sense, what she is learning is to make magic weapons, armor and tools. That seems more plausible than the students learning blacksmithing. Since the Terra-spheres are basically magic items that I've decided drain magic from other living things to let the users cast spells at no cost to themselves, and then the living being drained by magic may end up afflicted by the rot, having one person adept at magic items and another at living being allows the two of them to gain some insight about the rot.
Left is Rosemary. Before handling Rosemary herself, what I'm thinking about magic period is that apart from being used up when you cast spells, you also use your own magic when you use a magic item, like Rose's sword. Further, magic can work similar to the concept of ki, as life energy that makes you stronger, faster and so on. Now, my idea is that Rosemary and her mother seemingly have double the reserve of other humans and double the ability to use it to enhance their strength, speed and whatever. However, this later turns out not to be entiely the case. Most living being can, as a survival measure, only use up half of their magic before they feel drained and unable to use more magic. Rosemary and her mother however can drain almost all of their magic, thus creating the illusion that they have twice the reserve of others. When they do so, they end up empty of magic, just like say a tree may if someone completely drains it with a Terra-sphere. This gives Rosemary a way to contribute towards finding out what the rot is about and an explanation to how she and her mom can keep up with mages. With that I've also decided all other guardian students are either full magic users or hybrid fighters/magic users, no other guardian is a pure fighter.
I'm thinking that being more than 50% drained from magic makes you susceptible to the rot. Further, the more intelligent a creature is, the better it can resist the rot, but the more severe it is if the rot does take hold. A plant has no mind and no mobility and is thus easiest afflicted, but it also just sits there and cannot attack anybody. An animal with low intelligence becomes monstrous, goes berserk and mindlessly attacks other creatures. A more intelligent creature is less vulnerable to be afflicted, but if it does get afflicted, it turns just as hostile towards other creatures as an animal with low intelligence would, but attacks with more cunning and gain better control over it's own transformation and thus becomes very dangerous.
Humans like Rosemary and her mother would as such have a great resistance against the rot, but they are not immune. By using their special advantages, they will gradually become afflicted over the years. This will be used as the reason Rose's mom left her family and also may or may not have turned evil, she noticed something was wrong with her and both needed to figure out what is happening to her and she needed to get away from her family for the sake of their safety.
Anyway, this I think ties the girls more into the plot, gives Rosemary a reason to be the main character and a way for the girls to run into a conspiracy that puts their lives in a great mortal danger.
This. Thank you. This is what the plot should have been.😊
if you find an animator can you please re animate high guardian spice this shit is good
Finally! A conspiracy plot with far better potential than Bayformers could ever achieve!
Finally, someone who has thought of something better than this show as well.
Well to be fair, if they didn't say the story was original then I might have forgive their story a bit. The problem is that they say it was original and never done before... But there are a couple of Anime (even old ones) which has similar premise and story. The problem is HGS copied that... and made it 1000x worse
If, at any time, HGS gets a reboot, this should be included!
Happy(not really) high guardian spice anniversary!
as much as you hope they did, they did NOT pay for the stock image of the lamp post. when you buy images from stockphoto or other similar hosting sites, you are given a download of the image with the watermark removed in your purchase history. so they really did rip it straight from google.
HA! Knew it.
"Is dave a food?" 😏
Ayo wtf-
10:55 that was perfect sync
Oh god, I thought this was a short video when I clicked on it, but here I am I guess 😅
Surprise!
Finally a review. Took long enough dave.
Man ONLY a year? I honestly feels like it's been forever but that may be due to the delays in release at the start
It's funny because "there's nothing to get attached to" really describes this show. It shakes you off like a dog tries to shake off its ticks.
I wanted to watch the show for studies, by latching on to Sage because I wanted to attach to the level-headed nerd. One video later, I learned Sage was a manipulative sociopath so I settled for the abridged series, so at least I kinda got what I wanted.
the background characters sometimes look more interesting to look at than the main characters lol
I think the biggest issue with High Guardian Spice is that they spent too much time focusing on diversity and less time on story. There is all sorts of representation in HGS, but it amounts to nothing because the characters lack attributes that make them interesting.
For example, Thyme has an amazing look and she has a noble goal. But Thyme's broodiness is so over the top that it makes her annoying.
The writers didn't know where to focus their efforts and figured simple characters that are diverse would be sufficient.
Oh well. Here's to a year of High Guardian Spice.
That's because the show was written by people that believe ethnicity and sexuality are not only character traits, but *the only* character traits that matter. You're supposed to love them because they aren't white and straight, you see. Do you want to be a bigot?
in RWBY, they didnt make blake that broody.
The funny thing is, Twitter, a website which is know for it's toxicity, actually loves this show and wants more. Talk about irony, am I right?
Not surpising
Yeah, this show was basically made for Twitter-dwellers.
I think it shows how incredibly young and ignorant they are
I've never seen anyone on twitter who actually likes hgs, ironically.
It's twitter
They love things that ppl hates but hate it if ppl loves
I swear Raye and crew had this on paper when they hired writers: Four lesbian protagonists, a transgender teacher, new magic vs old magic and lesbian aunts. Then told them to make it 12 episodes
Checks out in the way of the characters being identified by their design/backstory but never the personality, the magic not being explained beyond just the allegory, etc.
Its been a year since these vids were made by you, yet im still entertained to watch them when im bored
Show is only good to be trashed on
I still can't properly comprehend the difference between old and new magic after the whole mixing thing
How to give the bad guys an obvious goal.
“We have a way to cure the rot. First we let it grow out of control and cause problems for the world, then we offer our cure to the world and become rich and regarded as heroes.” Ta-da, I did it.
29:28: I agree. Am really enjoying some of the interesting elements you've introduced in the Abridged, particularly Demon Rosemary (and her ripping up and devouring Aster), and also the spiked cookies from the first episode.
Didn't even know it released on my birthday until this video and now I want to forget it
I still feel weirdly connected to this show - I can strongly feel what the writers TRIED to do and it's very appealing to me for some reason.
It's like broccoli and ice cream for me. There are a lot of ideas that could have been good on their own. They just really don't go well together. Obvious example being new magic both representing same sex attraction and the dangers of industrialization.
@@wind64a39 They didn’t really think that one through did they 🤦🏻♂️🤣
There was good concepts but like the comments above this one the concept of messages like old magic vs new magic and it’s cost wasnt establish clear enough.
The suspense was added way too late in the show in my opinion so the investment of a characters stakes in risk taking may be more or less meh assuming you stayed invested long enough to see this in episode 8.
It hurt worse because the dropped the ball to even air it on time, their hesitance cost them and it shows but you also feel like even then they didn’t do nearly enough to make this special with that extra time.
The same year outside anime by 2020 ; TWO other magic girl inspired shows by western media hit the market by competitors: Owl House from Disney and Magical Girl Friendship Squad that aired on Syfy in the United States.
We are now in 2022 in which sailor moon is still a tour de force with how The recent movie came out and it still makes money as it’s highly merchandisable and we have been spoiled with various magic girl shows either having a new adaptation like Tokyo mew mew new or we get continuations to shows like Magical Madoka etc.
It had steep competition and it’s old magic vs new magic concept is interesting but they didn’t nourish this concept of plot.
Excuse the long tangent; I just hope I was able to provide an example of how it suffered in more than 1 area.
@wind64a Or industrialisation and the dangers of same-sex attraction.
Just to crap on one of the writers' sacred cows. :P
@@KopperNeoman I'd rather not preach about the "dangers" of my own sexuality.
Okay you just taught me that ProZD voices a character in High Guardian Spice. Now I'm going to go watch it. I have to hear that.
I've never actually watched High Guardian spice. Fortunately I don't need to since you give me all the info I could need on why I really don't want to watch
I've never seen the show but I would've thought it was a TH-cam series. The animation has the amateur feeling where they're only capable of animating one thing at a time y'know? I'm not an animator so its hard to explain what I mean.
Nah, I understand what you mean. And you are right in that assumption!
I like how you were basically the demon teacher saying all that shit and sighed in defeat as you talked about the writing
Hannah Barbara had a budget of the change found in three couches and whatever they could get in the classifieds section of a community College newspaper for each of their shows; yet they still made classics. Budget is no excuse.
I still enjoy their cartoons to this day as we speak. They carry a level of warmth most shows can’t carry.
@@barneyerror4561 I know, right? It shows that good writing and your heart in the right place will always produce a better product than self indulgence and I think a mole person in charge.
I feel old already
Me viewing the art in HGS: "You know, this doesn't look so bad"
When the characters enter the picture: "Oooooooooooooh....."
The Wizard101 soundtrack in the background.
Well, that was a quick half hour.
Amazing how they hyped it up like it's going to be groundbreaking and incredible when the only groundbreaking and incredible thing about is how bad it is.
Sidenote, I admire the dedication and spite to make an entire channel with the purpose to analyze how bad a show really is and I am all for it.
That first trailer was a behind the scenes thing. Either way it's pretty sad how they said all of that and this the result
Surreal to hear Wizard 101 music in the background.
I think when the dude said, "2D animation...studios had forgotten" he was referring to how over dependant America has gotten on CGI and 3D animation. Although they didn't really do 2D animation justice with their crudey dog shjt art style.
I think the point is that the show was airing on Crunchyroll, which is filled to the brim with good 2D animated shows. It'd have some merit if we're talking about Nickelodeon or whatever, but 2D seems to make up the vast majority of anime.
If they wanted the hammer scene to work, during the obstacle course have the grip strap come off of the hammer earlier. She almost drops the hammer in the pit but catches it last minute. Then have it actually slip out her hand later to hit his foot. Foreshadowing and payoff. I haven't even seen the show, just watched reviews, so maybe I'm missing something but why didn't they do that? Oh right, they're bad writers.
It's one of the cardinal sins of writing: stuffed full of "and thens" that have no connection or relation to anything else.
Wow, "slightly aggressive tree stump" is certainly one way to describe a character
It's only been a year? It felt like at least five.
A review. Didn't realize you didn't make one yet. Yeah this show wouldn't nearly have gotten much hate if produced on Disney or Nickelodeon. Seriously Crunchyroll ticked off people who understandably didn't want their money going to non anime projects.
Like I said before, if the side characters were main characters, this show would've been more entertaining and less bland. I just wish the plot was fleshed out more or certain elements were given more focus. Lots of shows take a while grabbing an audience but this doesn't pass the three episode rule.
Like i said, It looks like a HBO MAX Original
I think it's just them though. Onyx Equinox got its share of hate when it first came out of course due to it not being anime but since then, look how popular it is now. Wonder how the creators of high guardian spice feel about that.😶
0:30 _”High Guardian Spice was a Crunchyroll original that did not meet expectations, if there were expectations at all.”_
I actually did have expectations for HGS: I expected a half-rate anime knockoff that promoted “diversity” over story, with Mary Sue protags, shipping fuel for Twitter, and nonstop virtue signaling. And the show met them all. The only thing I didn’t expect was for so many people to still be talking about HGS after a year - not that I’m complaining, because ripping on this show will _never_ get old for me! Thank you for helping to pull some real entertainment value out of this animated travesty.
"It felt about as organic as a McDonald's chicken nugget." Lmao
I watched a show that's animation budget was like a 10 dollar bill and a flat beer, but damn, the story was made by a goddess of writing for real
Also I noticed a few of the students don't have costumes on at all, you know, seeing as it's supposedly against the law not to wear one, and considering how the school is so barbaric against its students, I have no choice but to believe that the whole kingdom is like that and that breaking that law probably has the death penalty.
I think that was supposed to be an attempt at a joke with Thyme's friends pressuring her to wear a costume because it's "illegal", but you can clearly see students not wearing costumes?
@@TuesdaysArt yep, in the school while Sage and Rosemary were waiting for Parsley and Thyme to come out wearing their costumes and before Cal comes out.
@@DespairDoctor Part of me wants to say that's intentional (to show the girls are exaggerating), but it's not even that good of a joke and the worldbuilding is such a mess that people took it literally. Idk if I should give them that much credit though
@@TuesdaysArt yeah I sure wouldn't.
What Kingdom is this suppose to be anyway? Does the school answer to them? Is the town the school is in an independent city state or something? Is this related to which country or are apart of the same nation as which country? Is there a king or royal family or anything? Are guardians technically government employees to them and can they fight for enemy nations? A million questions and zero answers to this.
The show feels like creator's first homebrew/DnD campaign and thought it was SO COOL AND FUN and would make a good show. Feels like their was a plathura of web comics and pilots with the same premise at the time, 'my first DnD the show"
I haven't seen this show, but the absolute horror I felt when you played the Death Note theme while discussing it at 11:15 is probably more intense than any emotion that the show manages to pull off.
OKAY THANK YOU FOR YOUR ADVICE AT THE END YOU JUST FLIPPED MY PERSPECTIVE. I'll go watch it
When it comes to the writing of the series, something tells me that there probably was a lot of headcanon and world building the crew made and talked about to the point they knew by second nature, but they forgot to put it into the series. It's like when you try to teach someone something you're really good at, but you forget to teach them minor details because it just comes naturally to you. To them, the story must make perfect sense because they know all the details.
But forgot to tell us what to tell us what those details were.
Me trying to explain drawing😅
I just don't know how to do it properly, but I'm self taught so I still kinda suck.
i like the old lady in the triad, and the triad girl with flowers in her hair looks like a hippie
- You forgot a few more experienced VAs: Salli Saffioti (The Triad), Stephanie Sheh (Olive), Cindy Robinson (Zinnia), and Karen Strassman (Elodie). These, along with Goodson and Clarke, could NOT have come cheap (even if two of them are only present for one episode each). And even if his voice-acting career wasn't as long as theirs, SungWon Cho might have cost a fair bit himself.
(Audu Paden is also a pretty experienced VA, but he weirdly has the most inconsistent voice quality between character roles here. Some like the Triumvirate are clear and audible, while others like Moss Phlox and Smoke Face sound very off.)
- My two cents on the backgrounds: maybe they were TOO detailed for the budget, especially if they're gonna have so many size inconsistencies at times. More simplified BGs probably would've been easier on the crew, and wouldn't clash as much with the characters' designs.
- Y'know, despite any of their flaws, I see more protagonist energy in Sage, Parsley, Thyme, Amaryllis, AND Snapdragon each than I ever did in Rosemary. Her only true emotional investment is "My mom is missing," and she repeats this so frequently that it gets stale. As for the other five:
-> *Sage:* More dynamic character, gets all the super powerful techniques easily
-> *Parsley:* A magnetic personality that attracts many others, more mature
-> *Thyme:* Focused the most on combating the main threat
-> *Amaryllis:* Entertaining attitude, shows a lot of positive development
-> *Snapdragon:* More believable attitude, and this is suddenly a trans story anyhow so why not
- ...I'll give it THIS much against Foodfight: this one has a way smoother frame rate.
Technically speaking this is better made than Foodfight.
But Foodfight is so insane and memeworthy that is cycles back into being at least somewhat entertaining.
Omg- it feels like it was yesterday.