Mech Cadets

I watched it only because I wanted to watch an animated movie/series and this came up my feed. Season 1, Episode 1 really tries to sell you what this series is about. With its good animation and mediocre storyline, I decided in its favour. Please note, I have not read the comic that it is based on.

What I liked about the season 1:

• Overall story is good, with much to be asked from season 2
• Animation is what you would expect from an average anime nowadays
• I liked the emotional weight that they have tried to bring into the story
• I liked the character portrayal of Olivia, felt consistent

What I did NOT like about the season 1:

• Storyline felt like a little rushed
• Much remains to be known on the robots' background

Verdict: I liked the show overall. I liked how each character is passionate about what they are trying to become. Character development is not best, but I believe it is reasonably good for a kids show. Probably it didn't feel as good as the story felt a little rushed.

I would certainly like to see the season 2.

Beginning is classic and quite ok premise, 3-4 first parts are really interesting. Character development is good and with fine progress.

Then starts problems, typical like screenwriters got lazy and starts copying all the classic. Internal strugle between one good and one bad / openly idiotic team.

There is zero military anywhere only some alien robots are only one to help defend. Military base but totally empty except first intro part.

Additionally when is problem no one report it, no one coming to help, no one care and all is careless.

Typical general who without any control is doing what ever he want, what was actually forbidden by some "mysterious never shown" superiors.

Animation is ok just as is mentioned in many cases very low FPS.

Teenagers running everything so it's obviously targeted to very young audience.

Not fully wasted time, just even monsters as animation had better structure and military feel than this.

Typical lazy hot mess netflix show. Lot of invested money and very low downspiraling quality on the end.

So from 8/10 at begining it moves to bare 4/10...

What a great show. I loved the story. The show is targeted towards kids and there are so many great messages for a younger audience: following your dreams, finding acceptance, working together. But I also found some of the parent-child relationship incredibly heartfelt. And the ending!!! A real tear-jerker. I did not see that coming.

I also loved the animation. It's a bit sanitized and clean but again, I imagine that it's for kids (the blood is blue). But it was a really cool mix of 2D and 3D animation. Not as elegant as something like Spider-Verse but it's great to see that style in a TV series.

I love a great mecha genre story and this doesn't dissappoint.

There isn't enough time to grow attached to the characters. I believe this is more of a fault from Netflix, rather than the writers. Netflix bought too few episodes so the writers had to work around it. Towards the end of the season, our MC says "we're family" to his fellow pilots and while it was a sweet moment, it felt kind of unearned. Why? Because we've barely seen these characters properly interact. In one episode, our MC gets his Robo and one of the pilots is like "he hasn't earned it like the rest of us" and she clearly holds some sort of resentment. By the next episode, they're all chill with each other. This show should be like...twice as long. I enjoyed the cute character interactions but there were too few so their bonds don't feel fully developed. The dynamics between characters who've already known each other is smart and enjoyable but between new ones, that could use work. Aside from that relatively small criticism, I really like the story and animation. The character and monster designs are very aesthetically pleasing and perfectly fit this story. It took an episode before i liked the Robo designs and they steadily grew on me throughout. I think the crew involved has done a good job so i'm excited for the next season. The concepts and execution are done well for the most part so i'd suggest this.

Dialog is very disappointing it feels like the left hand does not know what the right hand is doing, character development is also weak, like carrying the weight of the world on a single person i mean its very underwhelming. You dont get the rush in watching i dotn really get connected to the story & i cant get sympathize to any of the characters either there simply so many loopholes in this one this is a complete failure story wise & character building wise. The director/s & producer could have made more of the its time to really galvanize & ties up the story it is so cliche well i dont know if netflix will order the next season.