Carmen Sandiego is not only entertaining, but it also has great animation and action sequences and an adorable animation/art style. Prepare for an ungodly amount of puns. I hope there will be a second season. If there will be, there is advice at the bottom of this review.
It starts off great in the first two episodes. Here, Carmen tells about her life and upbringing from her point of view as her old friend keeps her at gunpoint. We learn about her, her motivations and her fears, and also about the people around her. These two episodes are not only entertaining, but also surprisingly touching.
In the following episodes we see her attempts at thwarting the operations of V.I.L.E. together with her friends "Player", Zack, and Ivy. These range from retrieving stolen museum pieces to preventing a rocket from being launched. Although these later episodes are a bit repetitive, they're entertaining nonetheless.
The art style is very good looking and sharp. I don't know a lot of art terms in English (as it isn't my native language), but the art style is worth mentioning nonetheless.
However, this show isn't perfect, and there were things that bothered me about it. Most of the episodes felt kind of repetitive, and didn't have the high stakes or depth that the first two episodes had. The quality of some episodes was just not good in some of the episodes. (For example in episode 6, how on earth could Carmen deduce that V.I.L.E wanted to destroy an Aboriginal reservation with a rocket?)
And as much as I like the artstyle of this series, it bothers me a little that Carmen doesn't seem to be drawn the same way. In this series, everyone has pronounced facial features (noses, freckles, lines, etc.). In comparison, Carmen's face (with almost no nose and no freckles or lines) looks almost featureless.
If there's going to be a second season, here are my recommendations. Let Carmen be vulnerable once in a while. Let there be actual high stakes. Let the relationship between those Interpol agents develop past constant bickering. (Romantic or platonic, I don't care.) Let us get to know more about the lives and backstories of Player, Jack and Ivy.
