Disenchantment Part 2 Review

After a wait of just over a year Disenchantment is back for a second part and shows that the series has matured – along with its characters.

Dreamland has fallen: King Zøg (John DiMaggio) has been betrayed by his resurrected wife, Dagmar (Sharon Horgan), and the citizens have been turned to stone. Dagmar has taken her daughter, Princess Tiabeanie, AKA Bean (Abbi Jacobson) to her homeland. Bean soon finds out that she has been tricked by her mother and sets out save Dreamland.

The first part of Disenchantment received a mixed reception from critics but I enjoyed it immensely. I put that down to my love for classic – era Simpsons and Futurama. Disenchantment was created by Matt Groening and Josh Weinstein and the writing staff included David X. Cohen and Bill Oakley, veterans from The Simpsons and Futurama. So the style of humour in Disenchantment appealed to me which was comical observations, hilarious lines, visual and animation gags and a combination of all of these.

The core of Disenchantment was the friendship between Bean, Elfo (Nat Faxon), and Luci (Eric Andre). As stated in my review of part one, they were basically Leela, Fry, and Bender from Futurama. Bean was the tough, unladylike princess, Elfo was the dimwitted fish-out-of-water, and Luci was the scene-stealing amoral character. Both groups were misfits who were drawn together. But they are different between the futuristic sci-fi trio and the group in the fantasy world.

The Disenchantment friends have changed over the course of the two parts. Bean changed most of all. In the first part Bean was a drunken rebel without a cause but after her mother’s betrayal, she matures. She doesn’t drink as much in this season and when she does its more to get merry than blind stinking drunk. Her relationship with her father has improved massively since the first part since she knew what motivated him – Bean doesn’t actively try to piss him off. The ending of the eighth and ninth episodes showed how much progress Bean and Zøg have made.

Luci was still the snarky creature who enjoyed trolling people and making them give in to their impulses – like helping Zøg get gout or having a party without telling Elfo. But deep down he cares for friends. There were signs of this in the first part, and in the first three episodes when he’s willing to make a big sacrifice to save Bean and Elfo.

One of the big criticisms of the first part was Elfo longing for Bean which was a repeat of the Fry/Leela relationship. The second part wisely puts this storyline on the backburner, showing the pair as friends instead of having Elfo trying to get into Bean’s pants. He got to show off his badass credentials in the episode “Our Bodies, Our Elves” where he got to fight off a load of ogres.

Supporting characters also evolve during the season. In the first part Prince Merkimer (Matt Berry) was basically British Zapp Brannigan which was funny, but the showrunners felt he had to evolve. In this part he realise he was boorish and needed to be less selfish – even though he still wanted validation of some sort. Prince Derek (Tress MacNeille) was a wonderful mix of innocence and screw-up thanks to being locked in a tower for five months. Other characters remain the same. Odval (Maurice LaMarche) was still a dubious figure whose motivates were questionable.

Since the heydays of The Simpsons and Futurama, the adult animation genre has changed. Due to the Netflix model of releasing the whole series in one day – many shows have an overarching storyline and events that connect with each other. Disenchantment had to keep up. The first three episodes and the final two were extended episodes and there were story threads that were deliberately left dangling. In the series Bean worries if she has inherited the madness that blighted her material family – Bean finding clues Dagmar left in the castle, items being left in the castle, and the elves know that something was hidden under Dreamland. And the series has still left other mysteries unsolved like Elfo’s parentage.

The show has found a sweet spot of allowing their episodes to work as both standalone adventures and be a part of the wider story. The fourth episode, “The Lonely Heart is a Hunter” was the best example of this. The central plot was about Bean findings symbols around the castle and has dreams involving her mother. The subplots involving  Zøg finding a lover and Luci making Elfo jealous were standalone stories. Other episodes that seemed like a standalone episode end up getting referenced in later episodes.

Even “Stairway to Hell” and the final two episodes work as standalone episodes. As the title suggests in “Stairway to Hell” sees Bean and Luci go down to hell and save Elfo. The plot was similar to the rescue missions in the Futurama episodes “Hell is Other Robots” and “A Clone of My Own” and visually it referenced The Simpsons Halloween segment “The Devil and Homer Simpson.”

The season finale had two wildly different episodes. “The Electric Princess” sees Bean go off to Steamland, a more progressive steampunk land, whilst in the follow-up “Tiabeanie Falls” the show turns Disenchantment into Game of Thrones as palace intrigue takes over.

Fans of the first part of Disenchantment and Matt Goering’s previous work will continue to enjoy the show and it is developing more of its own identity.