Bravest Warriors is the second cartoon from Pendleton Ward, creator of Adventure Time. The show is about four 16 year-olds—Chris, Beth, Danny, and Wallow—who journey across the universe saving alien worlds with the power of their emotions. Did we mention this is from the creator of Adventure Time?As with Adventure Time, it started out as a short on Nickelodeon's Random! Cartoons, but never got picked up. It is now a web series being distributed on the YouTube channel Cartoon Hangover, with a new episode every Thursday. There is also a comic book series from Boom! Studios, written by Joey Comeau. The show itself is written and directed by Breehn Burns (of Dr. Tran fame), and is executive-produced by Frederator Studios and Will McRobb and Chris Viscardi.It should be warned that the animation and the comic book, while having roughly the same styles, have a different approach to humor. The comic is more family friendly while the animation tends to get a little vulgar in places.The production blog is here, and you can view the original short here. And the wiki for it is right here.
Bravest Warriors contains examples of the following tropes:
All There in the Manual: A lot of the information about the show is only found in production art so far.
Anguished Declaration of Love: In the pilot Chris gives one to Beth in order to defeat a monster that feeds on pent-up emotions. Subverted in that she doesn't hear it over her laughter.
Apocalypse Maiden: Early production art reveals Beth is a threat to all life and isn't aware of it.
Art Evolution: A lot of it between the short and the series, as usual.
Chris kept his old body type but his hair style changed.
Danny kept his old bodytype and his hair style changed as well as his skin becoming darker.
Wallow became musclebound and gained a few inches on the rest of the group.
Artistic License - Astronomy: Phobos and Deimos are presented as much larger than they actually are in the Martian sky; Deimos in particular would be hard to pick out without knowing what you were looking for, while Phobos would be much smaller than the Earth's moon.
Along with the above, nobody on Mars seems to have the anticipated height gains from growing up in 1/3 Earth gravity.
Though in a Dream Sequence, Danny punts several children much farther than would be possible in Earth gravity.
Assimilation Plot/End of the World as We Know It: Wankershim becoming large enough to encompass the entire universe is treated as both of these tropes by the Emotion Lord, but in practice nothing really changes, besides...
Wallow: Does anyone else feel kinda...tender? Danny: I guess he's everywhere now. Wallow:(scratches head) ...Rad!
Development Gag: Chris's father wielded the lightning sword Chris had in the pilot.
Divide by Zero: In "Butter Lettuce" Wallow's attempt to make the Beth hologram 9000% sexier instead turns her into a flatulent blob.
Early-Bird Cameo: Plum was featured in the comic as the fifth member far before she appeared in the cartoon. Also in issue three of the comic, the New Miami Hackers were mentioned by name before they appeared in the eight episode.
Energy Weapon: The Warriors summon weapons by rubbing heat-sensitive stickers on their suits. Danny has the Dog Sword, Beth has the Cat Lashes, Wallow has the Falcon Axe, and Chris has...Bee With Excellent Leadership Skills.
In the original short, their weapons weren't animal-themed. Beth still had a whip and Wallow still had an axe, but Danny had some shadow blades and Chris had a lightning sword.
Wallow: You fools are meant to be together. Like, all in a soft rock, soul mates, and puberty kinda way. Everybody knows it.
Failed a Spot Check: Beth brushing her teeth in the Holojohn in "Butter Lettuce"... too sleepy to notice the guys are in there with a "30% sexier" hologram of herself.
In "Emotion Lord," Beth says that Chris was standing too close to the Emotion Lord for her to get an accurate reading. The reality is that the Emotion Lord is Chris.
In "Gas-Powered Stick" when Plum kisses Chris, Chris is able to use his x-ray vision to see that Plum has two brains inside her skull.
Four-Fingered Hands: Pretty much everyone who has human-like hands, with the bizarre exception of Wallow, who has a full compliment.
Funny Background Event: In comic issue #1, the Bravest Warriors bake two disturbing sentient cupcakes conditioned to fight each other to the death. Orange cupcake hammers green to pulp, but that's not the end of them. As the Warriors search for a sufficiently frightening movie, an undead, levitating green flash-burns orange with a death ray just as orange uses its bionic arms to retrieve a binder labeled "codes" from the Warriors' safe.
Which later ends up being actually relevant since the orange cupcake was piloted by the Warriors, and the green was being controlled by Sadness.
Future Me Scares Me: It takes a while for Chris to accept that the Emotion Lord is his future self.
Gentle Giant: Wallow likes bringing home aliens as pets and is trained as a Nursing Assistant.
Go Mad from the Revelation: A relatively benign variant: Beth's horse has been catatonic since it realized the true nature of the universe when she was seven. On the plus side, the horse seems to be effectively immortal, since it doesn't seem to have aged and, according to Beth, it doesn't poop anymore.
Held Gaze: Chris and Beth does this in "The Bunless".
Heroes Prefer Swords: In the pilot, Chris has a lightning sword. In the series, Danny gets a Dog Sword.
Heroic BSOD: In issue 6 of the comic, Danny begins to have regrets over destroying the planet of sexism from the first issue and laments not being able to save them.
Home Base: They live in a giant invisible robot. On Mars.
Just Friends: Beth (supposedly) feels this way about Chris.
Love Confession: Chris uses this to defeat the Tickle Monster, but Beth doesn't hear it.
Love Triangle: Danny is crushing on Plum, Plum has a crush on Chris, and Chris is in love with Beth.
Men Don't Cry: Averted with Chris, who's not afraid to shed a couple of tears while kicking ass.
Missing Backblast: Averted in "Lavarinth", when Wallow turns the Falcon Axe into the Falcon Rocket Launcher. He aims it around a corner, and we can clearly see the smoke flying out of the back end.
Musicalis Interruptus: In "Gas Powered Stick", Chris temporarily gains X-ray vision and sees Beth shaving her armpits and decides to sing about it until Plum comes out of the room
Mythology Gag: The first issue of the comic opens with the Bravest Warriors destroying a planet to eliminate sexism like they did in the pilot episode.
Also in the pilot, the nigh emotionless aliens call Chris the "Lord Of Emotions". An Emotion Lord shows up in the second episode of the actual show. It turns out they're right about him becoming an Emotion Lord, give or take a couple hundred years.
Noodle Incident: That time on Venus between Wallow and Gayle.
Exactly how does Chris become God to one set of people and Satan to another?
This troper believes it was simply two different reactions to Chris "magically" appearing in their world. One group viewed him as a divine being, the other group as a creature of black magic.
Noodle People: Goes without saying, since it's a Pen Ward cartoon.
Oblivious to Love: Chris is totally in love with Beth, but she doesn't notice. Danny and Wallow, however, do.
Oh, No... Not Again!: In "Dan Before Time", When Future Danny travels back to the moment Danny is about to use his time machine and destroys it to prevent him from creating a Temporal Paradox or a Time Crash.
Wallow: This happens every time you invent a time machine.
Once an Episode: Like the snail from Adventure Time, there's a mysterious man wearing a space helmet called "The Passenger" hidden in each episode watching the Bravest Warriors. He even manage to appear inside their home without them noticing him.
Out of Focus: Pixel has made no other appearance outside the first episode.
Parental Abandonment: The Bravest Warriors' parents, who were a team called the Courageous Battlers, were trapped in another dimension called the See-Through Zone and have remained there for two years, hence why a bunch of teenagers are living by themselves. The first season finale hints that there may be a way for them to save their parents.
Screw This, I'm Outta Here: At the end of "Time Slime", the Warriors see that they've been killed twice trying to stop the malfunctioning time vortex, and decide to give up and go home.
Also, the rocket bus driver in "Memory Donk" bails out because he can't remember how to fly (unfortunately, he tries this in the vacuum of space). Later, Jelly Kid bails out over Neo-Mars City when Danny asks it to help fight the Memory Donk.
The opening of that episode references the repeated off world colony ad from Blade Runner.
The Smurfette Principle: Beth, since Plum is not a regular cast member. Beth even lampshades it when they lose their memories at one point, saying her role on the team is just being the girl.
Though this is subverted in the comic series since Plum makes more regular appearances.
Stealth Hi/Bye: The Emotion Lord. He frequently pops up and leaves without expectation.
Subverted Kids Show: While the original short is for kids, the internet series is confirmed to be a bit raunchier (think Adventure Time with no censors). Not surprising considering it's on a channel called Cartoon Hangover.
(from Butter Lettuce) Wallow: See that? This'll take hella fortnights. And you'll get prolapsed anus from sittin' there all day. AND I WON'T LET THAT HAPPEN! GO, FALCON AXE!!
Other examples include casual swearing, Aversion of Never Say "Die", and even in the first episode, Wallow having a sentient male AI in his left glove that is clingy and jealous.
Temporal Paradox: This is mentioned more than once as a danger that can be caused by time travel, though the Emotion Lord maintains that creating a Temporal Pair-a-socks is far worse.
Tickle Torture: The monster in the original short does this.
Soft tacos in general for the Warriors seem to come up fairly often.
Took a Level in Kindness: The original pilot has Wallow and Danny be almost interchangable Jerkasses to Chris, but in the show proper they're much more mellow and well rounded.
Unusually Uninteresting Sight: The Warriors seems to be pretty blase about Catbug constantly zapping in and out of their dimension.
Vocal Dissonance: One hideous, slime-oozing, fang-mouthed alien newscaster has a very pleasant-sounding female voice.
Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Happens in "Butter Lettuce", when Wallow makes the Beth hologram 9000% sexier which is so hideous it makes Danny vomit.
In "Dan Before Time", when Danny was a kid, a bully hacker stole his dad's garage door opener remote and hacked it to make Danny vomit anytime he presses the button on the remote.
This happens again in "Catbug". Danny vomits a lot.
Wham Episode: "Lavarinth". The Emotion Lord is revealed to be an older version of Chris from 184 years in the future.
, and you can view the original short here
2 reviews