User blog:AustinDR/Final Thoughts on "Back in Black" & General Concerns

With the week of new LH episodes over, I'd like to reflect back on the episodes this week. "Suite and Sour," it was okay; I didn't hate it, but I felt that it was average at best. "Baby Steps" I thought was an adorable episode, especially in how Clyde saves Lana. "Brawl "The Episode That Must Never Be Named" was a total disaster. I knew it would suck, you knew it would suck, Little Tim across the street knew it would suck. Moving on. Lastly, there was "Back in Black" which made me slowly regain my respect for the Loud sisters (although slightly), and I also liked Lucy's interactions with Rocky. However, as much as I loved the episode for being an improvement over "Garbage House", there were a few issues that I had with the episode. When I read the summary of the episode, I concluded that the boy that Lucy had a crush on would like her back, and sure enough, I was proven right. Now, I still loved the episode, particularly Lucy's new self (though who says "YOLO" anymore? I nearly cringed when I heard that slip out of Lucy's mouth). However, I found the outcome of the ending predictable. That's the main gripe that I have with the series as a whole at the moment.

Now, I love the series to death, but there are some glaring problems in the series so far. The episodes tend to be formulaic. Stop me if you've heard this before: one of the siblings is made to change something about themselves only to either realize that they were special in their own way. Yeah, they have done that type of moral in about three or four episodes. There was "Toads and Tiaras," "Undie Pressure," recently "Back in Black," etc. Now, it's not a bad moral in and of itself, but it seems that they don't need to repeatedly state the obvious message numerous times. They also use the whole "sibling pretends to be another sibling" formula more than once. "Cover Girls," "The Loudest Yard," and "Toads and Tiaras" all follow this basic premise. Or how about whenever the siblings compete with each other, it usually ends up affecting Lily in some way? One instance is in "Come Sail Away" in which the Loud kids believed that they accidentally sold Lily's blanket when it was really just being dried.

And like I have said before: some of the episodes are cliched. Seriously, who didn't see the McBrides getting a kitten coming? "Back in Black" suffers because of its predictable plot and its cliche of "boy likes girl because he thinks she's cool." Again, a really cute couple, but I would've been surprised if Rocky ended up not liking Lucy pre-makeover and post-makeover. I'm not saying that the Loud House needs Breaking Bad level plots or story arcs. I mean shows like Steven Universe and South Park already have those, so we don't really need another one, but I fear that if they continue to enforce formulated episodes, without mixing them up, the show will become stale.

I guess I'm in the minority for saying this, but that's fine.