Webtoon Review: Disenchantment Seasons 4-5
Note: This review contains SPOILERS for Seasons 1-3. If you’re sensitive to that, you may want to check out my earlier reviews first.
Quick recap: Rambunctious princess (and for a while queen) Bean and her friends, wimpy half-elf Elfo and tempter demon Luci, have gone through many adventures together in the magical kingdom of Dreamland and the surrounding area. At the end of Season Three, they were separated, each in their own peril.
The first part of season four deals with the trio separately escaping and moving to reunite. Then it’s time to set up for season five. Some previously minor characters, like “Mop Girl” start taking larger roles.
And season five, of course, ramps up the action and brings back nearly everyone as even more secrets are revealed (including things you probably didn’t think were secrets) and the series moves toward a definitive end.
This last distinguishes Disenchanted from its sister animated series. Due to their more episodic natures, The Simpsons has just been going with a status quo long enough for children who grew up watching the show to now be running it, while Futurama has had several “finales” only to lurch back to life. This show is more linear in nature, with an actual overall plot, so has a more natural stopping point.
These seasons are much better than the earlier ones about consistent character development. Bean stops being someone who runs away from her problems and becomes someone who works towards her goals and realizes where her heart lies. Elfo works on being slightly less needy, and Luci ends up in the last place he would have expected at the start of his plotline. Even King Zog does some work on himself.
There’s still plenty of gags, though. My favorite was a moment that will tickle the fancy of anyone who remembers Jack Chick comics.
The ending? Well, this is, after all, a fairy tale. Not everyone, perhaps , deserves as happy an ending as they got, though most of the worst people got endings I am okay with. There’s some bitter with the sweet, happy separately rather than together.
Content note: Lots of violence, both slapstick and lethal. Gruesome if cartoony wounds and corpses. Nudity (including genitals in the final season!), and mostly offscreen extramarital sex. Rough language. Blasphemy. Gross-out humor.
Overall: A mostly satisfactory last two parts to the series. The first season was particularly bumpy, but it does get better as it goes along. Recommended to Matt Groening fans and comedic fantasy fans.
