Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-3496661-20131113034013/@comment-5336615-20140104075240

I disagree on pretty much everything. I guess I'm a minority, but for me, Season 11 was a major disappointment. Let me explain that, using the same format as above.

Story:

Here's my biggest criticism of Season 11 - the story is incredibly slow and most of the plot elements end up being rather pointless. I would argue that what you view as the main conflicts of the early season were actually just subplots. Fixing the comm tower, for example - only minor attention is paid to it - most of the dialogue in the episodes are completely unrelated to the struggle, despite their need for survival. In fact, that thread seems mainly to have served as character development for Wash and Tucker.

Similarly, the "Problem of Freckles" was also a character development subplot, this time about the relationship of Wash and Caboose. Because we already knew what the main plot was - because at the end of the episode, the primary question on the audience's minds wasn't, "How will Caboose and Wash resolve this domestic issue," it was "WHO THE HELL IS LOCUS AND WHAT IS HE UP TO."

Look, the story of Locus is clearly the main plotline - the overarching story that's driving this story. The comm tower problem is resolved almost as an afterthought, and Freckles was never depicted as the major crisis that could destroy the Reds and Blues. No, from his first appearance, it was clear that Locus the primary antagonist, represents the primary conflict, and that any rising tension, climax, and resolution would have to involve facing him.

So what does it mean that it takes almost the entire season for Locus to truly be established? The audience is aware of him from early on - we're aware that he's a primary story element. But he's a story element that's never addressed because the Reds and Blues don't even know he exists. They don't know Locus exists - they don't know the primary conflict exists - they don't even know that the main storyline exists.

That's what I mean by slow-moving. Look, good pacing doesn't mean "nonstop action." There are plenty of examples of action-packed movies out there that feel like they just drag on. You don't need action, but pacing requires that something is happening to drive this story from its beginning toward its conclusion. And it's taken an entire season for the protagonists to even become aware of the problem, the players, and the stakes of the main plot. That's poor pacing.

You can't focus on subplots and character development to the exclusion of the main storyline. You weave those around the main plot - you strengthen the main plot by interlacing subplots and character dynamics into it. You can't just set the core story aside, shown only in short cliffhangers at the end of each episode, to just focus on Wash learning how to become a leader.

If I could also throw in another criticism here - the dialogue. You compliment the writing and the scripting - I thought it was mediocre at best. The jokes felt stale and the dialogue kinda fakey. Like they were trying hard to be something. Actually, it felt like it was trying to return to the old Blood Gulch Chronicles. But when BGC was being written, the characters were fresh and the jokes could be original - with the thinking of, "What would be a funny thing to say right now?"

While Season 11 felt like, "What would [Character] have said back in Blood Gulch if this happened?" It felt like it was trying to return to a point that it had long since passed and recapture the magic that existed in the novelty, not in the formula.

Characters

Here, we do have some agreement - character development was done quite well. In fact, better than most of the other seasons. I agree with almost all your points here.

Again, though, I wish it had been better weaved into the core story to form a strong, interlacing narrative. Wash and Caboose repairing their relationship while also dealing with a new mysterious threat is quite possible. Separating these out made the story seem disjointed.

A general desire, rather than a criticism, though - I wish more character development was done with the Reds. Story and relationships always seem to disproportionately focus on the Blues. The Reds get as much screentime but have less involvement in the ongoing story.

Also, some of the characters seemed to have changed somewhat in Season 11. Wash, for instance, seems less confident and much less of a leader. While certainly Wash in the Freelancer Saga-era  was a dumb, inept, happy-go-lucky flake, I had been under the impression (based on Recovery One and the Reconstruction Trilogy) that Wash had all the happy-go-lucky beaten out of him and replaced with badass and hardass (in equal measure).

Other characters too seem to have lost various character developments gained over the past few seasons - for example, Sarge seems more like the gungo-ho kill-all-Blues Sarge of pre-Reconstruction. Where's the guy who faced and overcame the existential crisis of knowing he's nothing but a sim-trooper and was once an emotional leader for Reds AND Blues combined?

But overall, liked the character arcs as they developed. The best part of Season 11.

Presentation:

Ok, so a big disagreement: for me, the Halo 4 engine was really distracting. I kept noticing it. The animations were jerky, there were noticeable "jumps" by character models, and overall, the movements seemed unnatural for what they supposedly represented. It just felt poorly matched for machinima. (Also, am I crazy, or are the arms at a weird angle?) Maybe it's because I haven't played enough Halo 4 to get used to the engine.

But then again, I didn't play much Halo 3, either and on THAT engine, the machinima looked goddamned amazing.

Music was great. No qualms there.

Conclusion:

Now ... about "flashy." I agree, flashy for flashy's sake is dumb, and I do feel that Season 10 suffered from a focus on "spectacle." At times, the melodrama and the over-the-top action seemed to distract from and not serve the story.

That said, "flashy" isn't necessarily bad. Because an attempt at making a strong coherent story, with beautiful visuals, and excellent execution will also be "flashy" - as a natural side effect to its awesomeness. You don't go for the spectacle - the spectacle occurs because your creation is just that good.

See, the underlying problem, I feel, with Season 11 that I think it's  unambitious .

You said it - it's "simple, straight, and to the point" - and while there's beauty in that, there's nothing wrong with aiming for greatness. To create something that is cohesive, powerful, and beautiful. Certainly, RvB has aimed for those high goals in the past, and has achieved them. This ... feels like maybe we've drawn back a little too far from the cutting edge.

Because "simple" can easily become "trite", "straight" can easily become "boring", and "to the point" can easily become "pointless."

I didn't know that there was a new writer on board - it makes sense, explains a lot of my criticisms. Perhaps he was just trying to lay down a foundation to build his own stories, test the waters with some new ideas. But I really hope Season 12 tries to build into something more. To be honest, that "Federal vs Republic" setup doesn't really appeal to me.

Because if this becomes the standard story of a scrappy band of goodhearted noble underdogs against the big, ridiculously evil empire, well ... then it really is just Star Wars. Except, even Star Wars had its "I am your father" moments - aimed for something better.

So it'll be Star Wars, but without the complexity.