Editorial: My thoughts on Voltron: Legendary Defender Season 1

Voltron Legendary Defender was initially released on Netflix in July last year. But its roots go back to an anime called Go-Lion, created the animated devision of the company that produces sentai shows, footage from which is used in Power Rangers. The original Voltron series was a dubbed version of Go-Lion, with new bits of animated footage to tone down a few elements and make the odd change, here and there. Legendary Defender is ultimately a reboot of that series, but instead of using footage from a Japanese anime, they're using one of the great animation studios, Studio Mir, the studio that did the vast bulk of Korra. Combine them with an animation powerhouse like Dreamworks and... here's what we get.

The show's premise is simple. Emperor Zarkon has taken over vast regions of space and it's up to Princess Alura, her cohort Curan and 5 pilots, paladins, from Earth to form the greatest weapon in the universe to stop him, Voltron.

The show quickly introduces our 5 main heroes and establishes a small supporting cast that we'll never see again. But the important members. Pidge, the resident tech expert, Keith, the hothead, Lance, the jealous/flirty one, Hunk, the one who's gets sick and likes food and Shiro, the experienced leader who was kidnapped by Zarkon's Galra empire and experimented on, and has PTSD something fierce.

Right off the bat, I'm going to highlight an issue with the PTSD. He really only gets flashes so he can remember things for the plot, PTSD is deeper than that and honestly aside from maybe one scene, it's not mentioned beyond that.

They find the first of the mechanical lions that form Voltron and that's the last we see of earth. They awaken Princess Alura and Coran, who've been cryogenicly preserved for 10,000 years, during which time Zarkon is somehow still alive and has conquered much of the universe. She sends them out to find the other lions, somehow and I really mean somehow knowing which of them would suit them best despite having just met them. The Red Lion is apparently the most difficult to tame but we sadly see very little of that.

With the Lions together and after some practice they form Voltron. But this show does not like having a consistent status quo for very long and things are shaken up a few episodes later. Pidge is considering leaving on her own mission, Hunk misses home, and Lance takes the brunt of a bomb blast. Here's an example of something, characters are always likeable, Lance selflessly took the brunt of the blast to protect Coran, he has a good heart, he just wears it on his sleeve.

With the Galra taking control of the castle and the main power crystal destroyed it's up to Lance and Coran to find a new crystal for a being called the Balmera. The Galra have been mining crystals here, failing to restore the life energy to the creature it's hurting. Seeing how the population of the Balmera are being treated makes Hunk realise he wishes to help and stay. Pidge has to stand alone with Lance and Shiro out of the picture and Keith and Princess Alura locked out, she ultimately decides not to quit the team and reveals something else.

Pyg pretended to be a boy to enter the space academy garrison thing. Her family were part of the mission Shiro was on and they were prisoners of the Galra as well. They take this lightly with Coran laughing off the ludicrousness of it all. Some news sites have made her an icon for transgender and honestly... no, I don't think it works well. She's not transgender, she pretended to be male to serve a purpose... Transgender people really do need a transgender icon.

To be honest, I saw it coming, her voice actor was clearly female, even if she was supposed to sound like a young boy (who sometimes are voiced by female voice actors.) Lance recovers and is soon back to his normal self. They have success with the Balmera but as the finale approaches it's time for the status quo to be shaken up again.

Inside the ship is an artificial intelligence containing the memories of Alura's father, King Alfor, who died 10,000 years ago.  Unfortunately in an episode it's corrupted. It's a great episode, with some nice sci-fi horror to it and the only episode that really gives any onlooking to Shiro's PTSD that does not result in plot progression. Weirdly the episode does not feature Voltron and the lions barely feature, it's entirely about character interactions. To save the day, Alura says goodbye to her father for good.

But the shake up doesn't stop there. They investigate a hidden base for intel and in the process, Alura is captured. Not wanting to lose her, team Voltron mount an assault on the Galra fleet, and Emperor Zarkon himself. The revelations are non stop in this episode, Zarkon was one of the original paladins to the Black Lion and manages to still have some control over it, splitting Voltron apart. Shiro is wounded by the sorceress Haggar, Keith and the Red Lion are thrashed by Zarkon. It's not all going his way though as a traitor within Zarkon's ranks allows them to escape, but not before Haggar disrupts their wormhole and spreads them throughout the cosmos. That is a hell of an ending.

The show is heavily serialised and whilst I've tried to avoid spoiling everything, there is a lot of plot I can't avoid spoiling. The show has flaws, Lance and Keith have yet to have real character arcs, a few plot convenient weapons started showing up and we really don't see any real sense of the bond between Paladin and Lion. But I can't help but feel as if this show has only started and hopefully there's a lot more to go.

What I liked it it never seemed to get too easy for them. During the Red Lion fight with Zarkon, Keith formed a new weapon which blasted hard, but didn't do a goddamn thing to Zarkon. Zarkon is a great villain, carrying menace and power but also forethought and planning. Haggar is an excellent second hand with power and gall to back it up, some of the generals are memorable as well.

Of course the animation is spectacular, with a gorgeous blend of CGI and hand-drawn animation. There is a use of still frames that annoys me a little and the transformation sequence is, in my opinion, elongated and should change settings depending on the environment, but all things considered, these are minor niggles. Studio Mir have gone from steampunk fantasy to sci-fi epic with ease.

The voice acting is stellar, Andrea Romano is an old hand at voice directing, she knows exactly what she's doing. And I'm a sucker for any role played by Josh Keaton. The rest of the cast is great too. Kimberly Brooks, who voiced Oracle in the first 2 Arkham games is back voicing Princess Alura, Cree Summer who did Elmyra in Tiny Toon Adventures and Penny in the Inspector Gadget series voices Haggarth, Steven Yuen from the Walking Dead voices Keith, Jeremy Shada from Adventure Time voices Lance, Bex Taylor-Klaus aka the criminally underused Sin from Arrow voices Pidge, and many other talents, including Robin Atkin Downes, Neil Kaplan, Rhys Darby, Tyler Labine, Jake Eberle.

This show had a great, but not entirely flawless first season, leaving you wanting more, and more we got. Next week I'll be giving my views on season 2