Forest of No Return

 

Got a short review today. There’s technically not much wrong with this episode, but it doesn’t really add anything either, so... 

Summary: The group finds themselves lost in the mysterious, ever-changing "Forest of No Return". Eugene's navigating skills prove disastrous for everyone until the mysterious Adira appears yet again, with a map that can lead them through it. Eugene becomes envious of Adira, and tries to prove he’s better than her only to make things worse. 

Shouldn’t Lance Be Just as Knowledgeable as Eugene Here?The point of the episode is that Eugene gets a swelled head because he’s back in his element due to all his travels and is now the most experienced person in the group. Except Lance grew up with him, worked with him for years, and no doubt traveled just as much as he has. Lance should be just as competent as Eugene, but the episode reduces him to useless comedic relief.  And this won't be the last time where Lance’s backstory and characterization is sacrificed in the name of ‘comedy’ either. 

This Episode Undermines Cass’s Arc This entire episode is about getting the gang to trust Adria, including Cassandra here. Yet she goes back to being antagonist towards Adria again for no reason come the mid-season finale. It’s inconsistent and makes Cass look like an unreasonable jerk; despite the series desperately trying to make her look sympathetic. 

I don’t mind Cassandra being flawed, but the series doesn’t hold her accountable, just like Frederic, just like Raps ect. Cass is clearly in the wrong in her feud with Adria; so there’s little reason for the audience to feel sorry for Cass when her friends later ignore her for it. 

This Episode is a Waste of a Set Up

So this episode is still filler, even though it just so happens to be better constructed filler than the likes of The Return of Quaid. (TTS sure likes to use the word return a lot in their titles hun?) What sets good filler from bad filler apart is character focus; and here we get development for Eugene. However, this episode shouldn’t have been filler. 

Adria is an important character who is connected to the main arc and connected to several of the mains on a personal level, including Eugene. She doesn’t appear in every episode, so when she does the writers need to make the most of it. This episode should have doubled as both a character development episode and as foreshadowing for Eugene’s past. As is though, it’s very much skippable. 

Conclusion

On its own it’s fine, and Adria is very fun character, but she’s extremely underutilized and the overuse of fillers in the series is detrimental to the overall arcs.