Quarantine Control #197: A Disenchanted and Streaming Echo

DC Staff | January 11, 2024 | Animation, Features, Movies, Reviews, Television | No Comments

Here’s a familiar story: We are within one of the biggest COVID-19 waves yet right now. Did you know that? You might have, but there’s a better chance that you didn’t, and you can’t be blamed for it. “COVID is over” became the dominant narrative when people decided they were sick of it, months after vaccines started circulating and vaccine adoption was high enough. The narrative was so overpowering that many ordinarily reasonable people and the media establishment are still refusing to relent on that. It’s fine to go on with your life as it is, but remember to take necessary precautions to protect those around you.

Geoffrey Barnes

I’m hearing a reverberating sound. No, it’s more like…

Marvel’s Echo (2024)
Source: Disney Plus
Episodes: 5

It’s still mind-blowing that Echo exists as a series that Marvel Studios green lit.

I know why it happened. It’s a remnant of the period when the Marvel brand could do no wrong, when they could turn ostensible bronze into gold. The company turned previously-obscure franchises and characters into theatrical successes, including Guardians of the Galaxy and Ant-Man. This thought process led to the Echo series, a continuation story for Maya Lopez/Echo (Alaqua Cox) as introduced through the Hawkeye series. Echo is so obscure of a character in the Marvel-verse that she doesn’t even have her own comic book series, and she’s getting a live-action show? Sure, okay.

Marvel’s run into some unfortunate luck lately, so this series isn’t arriving at the best time. There’s a reason why the ad campaign shifted focus to how it would be the first TV-MA show made for Disney Plus, and to the inclusion of Matt Murdock/Daredevil (Charlie Cox) and Wilson Fisk (Vincent D’Onofrio). (Note: Daredevil appears only in the premiere.) This is, however, a tale about Echo, and her whereabouts before and after Hawkeye. It’s a good one, too, though it could have been better.

The series ventures through how Maya became the person the viewers met in Hawkeye, and how her tale very much takes place nearly in tandem with the prior and now-canonical Marvel Defenders shows. This is heavily tied to her relationship with Wilson Fisk, aka The Kingpin, who helped raise her as an uncle-like figure. Their relationship was shattered at the end of Hawkeye, but Fisk isn’t the kind of guy to let things go.

Echo is also about Maya finding herself. A bunch of the trailers teased the street-level New York City content, but most of the story takes place in Oklahoma. Many Indigenous people and families still reside there, with Maya reconnecting with former friends and family while she seeks to still fight the Kingpin from afar. It’s also tied to Maya becoming who she wants to be now. This is also where the Echo show is at its best, with Native American/Indigenous content being largely untouched by the Marvel Cinematic Universe at large. Between this show and Kahhori’s tale in the second season of What If?, they’re tackling it in full now.

The storytelling is an improvement on other recent Marvel content. The inclusion of Echo’s need for sign language as a character (and actress) who’s deaf and disabled is utilized even better than in Hawkeye, with several more characters (and actors through lessons) capable of interacting with her through sign language. In addition to that and the content about Indigenous land and history, I also appreciated how this series lacks most of the sarcastic quips from other recent Marvel, instead opting for a tone closer to the Defenders shows.

It’s fun, but a few issues hamper it. Echo inherits the same breakneck pacing issues as most other Marvel Disney Plus shows. It’s like Marvel Studios/Disney told the production crew they had to resolve whatever story they had in five to six episodes, regardless of how much they had planned. This results in several subplots and side characters being either underexplored and undercooked. Maya’s relationship with her sister Bonnie is the biggest culprit, which makes it fortunate that her superlative actress, Devery Jacobs, was also recently cast as the voice of Kahhori in the aforementioned What If?. Echo didn’t need to be as long as a Marvel Netflix show, but it could have used twice the number of episodes. The first episode alone could have been expanded into three given how much content it covers. It almost feels like an abridged recap. The ending also feels rushed.

It was always clear that Echo wouldn’t have the same powers as her comic book counterpart, the latter of which could mimic the techniques of those she was fighting. But those she has here are unclear and underutilized. This isn’t as big of a problem as the rushed feel of the show thanks to them being nicely tied to her Indigenous heritage, but it would have been nice to see her use them more fully. Considering Marvel’s position these days, I fear she may never get another chance to properly display them.

Echo is a good show that could have been better with more planning, perhaps if Marvel and Disney provided the production team and director Sydney Freeland a bigger opportunity to create a longer show. But it was already hard enough for them to make one where the focus is a on a deaf and disabled anti-hero. Who knows if there will be another chance for something similarly risky again. It’s good that this was all about Echo and not a poorly-disguised prologue to Daredevil: Born Again, though the ending to this series will lead right into that.

Angela Moseley

Disenchantment, Season 5 (2023)
Source: Netflix
Episodes: 10

The announcement of season 5 of Disenchantment nearly went under my radar. It wasn’t until I saw thumbnails from video essays on YouTube did I realize there was another season available. After getting caught up with Rick and Morty, my next goal was to sit down to watch this strange fantasy series. It became pretty clear that this was the final season. I was taken aback, but glad the show had a proper ending. I also like the trend of a franchise having an actual end instead of dragging on forever until people tire of it, or it gets cancelled without receiving an ending. The season finale of Disenchantment does a fantastic job of wrapping up the plot, giving everyone a decent ending, and saying goodbye to Matt Groening and Josh Weinstein’s venture into fantasy.

After the shockingly dramatic ending to season 4, Queen Dagmar (Sharon Horgan) is fully in control of Dreamland. Her powerful, but useless husband, Satan (Richard Fulcher) aids her in finding the beheaded body of Bean’s (Abbi Jacobson) evil doppelgänger. Hiding the body in the castle, Luci (Eric André), Elfo (Nat Faxon), and Mop Girl (Lauren Tom) endeavor to keep it out of the evil queen’s hands. Meanwhile, King Zog (John DiMaggio) desperately searches for his kidnapped sons in Steamland. As for the real Bean, she’s gone on the run with her mermaid girlfriend, Mora (Meredith Hagner). After lamenting over wanting to get away from all the strife that comes with being a ruler of Dreamland, Bean realizes she has to confront her evil mother and set things right in the kingdom.

The break from season 4 to season 5 was roughly a year and a half. I admit, I had a hard time remembering all the exact nuances from the last season. The gap was so apparent that even the showrunners slipped in a joke about it. Enter a critic perched in his second story window complaining about not remembering the past events from the long gap at a public gathering. He’s promptly shot with a flaming arrow and falls out of the window. Other than being shot, I identified with that character. Once the more significant facts from past seasons returned to me, I was able to fully enjoy the show in the present.

The season finale of Disenchantment served to reunite Bean, Zog, and other family in order to get them moving back to Dreamland. Along the way, it’s clear how the relationship between the king and his daughter has changed. At the start of the series Zog saw Bean as little more than a political pawn to be married off. He was also obsessed with maintaining power and status as a king. Now he’s more focused on his mixed family and finding happiness. He urges Bean to do the same, as she’s more important than the kingdom. In contrast, Bean always shirked her responsibility as a princess. Now that she has friends she cares about and a lover, she feels a strong sense of duty as crowned queen not to let her mother run roughshod over everyone. The character growth has been the strongest aspect of this series.

We finally get a clearer understanding of what the antagonists want. Queen Dagmar wants to be immortal, and doesn’t care who she steps on to achieve that goal. Satan loves her just because. And the others either want power, love, or to simply be treated with respect. The only true mustache twirling villain in the cartoon was owner of the literal Freak Show, and he gets what he deserves by the series’ end.

Speaking of the end, the final showdown between Bean and Dagmar was fantastic. Along the way Bean realizes the key to defeating her mother wasn’t being stronger or being more hateful. It was having someone to love, be it friendly or romantic. The theme of love shows up again, as all the people Bean befriended refuse to let her face Dagmar and her minions alone. Also, at one of the lowest emotional points in the series, a form of Platonic love wins the day from a character who always had a loving side, if you were willing to see it. He makes the ultimate sacrifice so Bean can be happy.

Some critics lament the show not having a sixth season, as the events in the final season were rushed. I disagree with this point. Sure, some elements could have used a longer explanation, but they were wrapped up in a way that made sense. I think another season would have just added fat to this show, as every single important plot point was addressed as the show dropped the episodic format and went fully serialized. We even got a glimpse into what the characters decided to do with their lives after the big battle. I couldn’t have asked for a better sendoff for Disenchantment.

Having seen all five seasons I highly recommend this show if you’re a fan of Matt Groening’s work. The humor is a bit dry, but it works well. The animation is top-notch, and the animators go all out in the final season. At 50 episodes, this show may seem like a heavy-lift, but the episode count isn’t unreasonable. I only hope that this fantasy comedy sees a release on Blu-ray now that it’s over.

Joseph Daniels

This week was up in the air for me. I didn’t know what I was going to write about for tonight’s column. Quarantine Control has mostly been about what we’ve been watching and/or playing, and most of that is due in no small part to the various streaming services that exist to deliver content on demand. But as has become apparent in recent weeks, the so-called “digital future” isn’t a classic era Star Trek style paradise, it’s a Star Wars style wretched hive of scum and villainy. It’s Mad Max. It’s the Planet of the Apes. Ironically, back when Netflix was the only game in town, everything was there and it was actually a good thing for customers. You paid your monthly subscription fee and you could watch whatever you wanted. Almost. Current American television shows airing on networks were always behind a year (here in Canada, anyway, I don’t know what it was like in the United States), so if you wanted to catch up and be current, you had to hope that you could binge an entire 22-24 episode season in barely a day. Maybe you would be given a week if you were lucky.

But that said, everything was there on one service and you didn’t have to pay through the nose. But then people started to claim that this was a bad monopoly and needed to be split apart, but here’s the thing. Netflix was not jacking up the price like people claimed they were going to do. Netflix was delivering good service for cheap and was raking in the cash, so they didn’t need to increase the price. However, other services started popping up. Disney ended their licensing deal with Netflix and created Disney+. Other services popped up, carving up the market further. Some streaming services are exclusive to one single country, like Crave here in Canada, which makes it an even more crowded market.

The reality of our current streaming landscape is that we are now paying more for less and Netflix is now having to constantly raise the price of their service, whereas when Netflix had the monopoly, we were paying a significantly less amount for significantly more content and even Netflix’s price was low. We also don’t know where everything is anymore. The other day, mom was looking for a show she was in the mood to watch and couldn’t find it until I pointed out that she had been looking on Disney+ and she needed to look on Netflix for it. The joke is that you basically have to Google a show these days to find out where it can be found, but that’s not far from the truth. At least if it’s anime, it’s probably going to be found on Crunchyroll or HIDIVE now that Funimation has been shuttered. Maybe Retro Crush if you’re looking for classic anime. Netflix has a few shows, and Disney+ has a small amount as well, but you can usually get your anime fix on one of two services.

If you’re looking for a random movie or TV show, it’s a bit more difficult. Let’s say I get a craving to watch Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist. A quick Google search tells me that here in Canada, I’m out of luck unless I rent it from the Cineplex store. Incidentally, the price for buying it digitally from Cineplex is a lot higher than the current price of a physical copy on Amazon, although I suspect that once it sells out, that’s it, it might not be in print any more. You’re stuck with buying it digitally unless you nose around on eBay for a used copy.

Buying something digitally is not a guarantee you own it, though. Although Sony reversed course on the deletion of Discovery’s content, it’s only a matter of time before someone tries again and actually succeeds in stealing the content back that you paid for. Meanwhile, content is constantly being deleted from streaming services all the time as it moves from one to another. I started watching Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. on Crave until the license expired and Disney+ stopped geoblocking it from Canadians. Some shows don’t get picked up by another service right away, though, and I have to hope that I can find it again once it disappears, if I want to watch it again. I also have to hope it’ll show up on a service I currently pay for, because not everyone can afford to just pay for everything. I don’t subscribe to Paramount+ so I’m pretty much out of luck when it comes to watching CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. Neither the new or old versions of Quantum Leap are currently available for me to stream, so I have to buy them. Doctor Who was on Crave but it’s vanished and is presumably going to be coming to Disney+, but right now the first ten seasons are at least on Amazon Prime and the recent specials are already on Disney+. I’m just not allowed to watch the Thirteenth Doctor’s adventures right now, simply because I’m Canadian.

Actually, with everything Crave’s lost over the past few months, including everything in the Star Trek franchise, it’s quickly getting harder and harder to justify paying for it.

Between this and the article Geoff posted yesterday, I just don’t have it in me to promote streaming this week. If you’ve got Covid and you’re looking for something to do, why don’t you look through your DVDs to see if there’s anything you want to watch? Blurays, too. Maybe it’s a rewatch, maybe you have a stack of DVDs that you still haven’t taken the shrink wrap off of yet. In fact, if you do, that should be what I recommend you watch this week. Take all of your DVDs that still have the plastic on them, put them in a stack. I’ll wait.

Okay, now take that stack and look for the sixth DVD from the top. Watch that. If you have less than six DVDs in the pile, watch the one on the very bottom. If all of your DVDs have been watched at least once, watch one with a rabbit in it. It is the Year of the Rabbit still.

This Week’s Short Film
Abigail (2019; uploaded 2023)

The fatigue with fighting COVID-19 these days is understandable, but it’s unlikely to be taken as seriously this time around thanks to the inevitable drop in cases we’ll see over the next few weeks and months. See you next week.

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