The Legend of Prince Valiant Season 1 Episodes 1-26 COMPLETED (just season 2 left to go which is 39 episodes) - Initially I was a tad underwhelmed by this when I watched the first four episodes, mainly as I found the bickering between Valiant, Arn and Rowanne, combined with the the show's apparent penchant for having her be kidnapped and tied up or carried off, to give off an unpleasant whiff of potential sexism and "this is and should be a man's world" vibes. (TBF I wasn't paying the closest attention so take that with a pinch of salt) BUT! Regardless of my earlier misgivings when I watched Episode 5 I was very impressed and quickly became hooked. The series definitely moves past all that "damsel perpetually in distress" stuff and also refreshingly portrays men crying and expressing platonic physical affection in a way that still feels unusually forward thinking for a kids' cartoon even in 2022 (sad though that state of affairs is I must give the show credit for it). The writing is excellent with plenty of adventure, a compelling plot and characters and its heart firmly in the right place, moral messages are good and the series makes a real effort to actually
show rather than just
tell all the time. It's also more raw and realistic than most animated children's and family fare in some key ways - not much blood but there are deaths and injuries and some episodes deal with issues like child abuse and the like, plus words like "murder" and "kill" are used when needed rather than "destroy" etc. I mean considering it's set during the time of Arthurian legend and features wars you'd kind of expect that much really but I still feel it's worth mentioning. The animation is consistently solid enough to support the drama, there's plenty of lovely background art, and the musical score is good enough that I may seek it out in OST format after finishing the series
People here may have noticed that I no longer post in the viewing journal thread unless I actually complete a series or at least an entire season of it, but I will note that I have watched the first four episodes or so of Season 2 and am thus far pretty impressed with that too, feeling that it maintains the overall quality of Season 1 - I mention this because when I have watched all of Season 2 I will be able to say whether I think this series' relative lack of popularity contrasted with say, Batman: TAS or Gargoyles is justified or not. I'm certainly excited to see how it all pans out
