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Seeing Isn't Believing
Synopsis | Review by Juan F. Lara | Additional Comments by Jozef Szekeres
Overview
- Proteus has escaped New Olympus and come to New York, followed by Taurus.
- Proteus takes on various shapes to pit Elisa and Goliath against each other.
- Proteus is captured by our heroes. He and Taurus return to New Olympus.
Synopsis
[Missing]
Review
by Juan F. Lara
A very corny episode, but one that was interesting to watch.
I thought the story was only O.K. Elisa's confrontation of Goliath in Act 1 came off as less melodramatic that "The Goliath Chronicles" has usually been. That scene had good dialogue, with Elisa willing to consider the possiblity of Goliath being framed when he suggested this. Also, this episode had the precedent of "The Cage", wherein Goliath was dishonest to Elisa. So Elisa's concerns about and frustrations with Goliath had credibility. But I didn't get much interested in the story beyond Act 1. Proteus and the good guys just chased each other around for two acts, and the resolution made me wince.
I didn't like Taurus at all. I only hoped for Michael Dorn's sake that he really, really enjoys playing Lt. Comm. Worf. :-) So I rolled my eyes when Taurus lamented that Proteus escaped "...on MY watch". Proteus the character I also didn't care for. (though he did come up with clever riddles for the good guys to solve) But I did enjoy Roddy MacDowell's enthusiastic voice work.
But let's now discuss the animation...:-)
I was surprised to see WD-Australia finally animating a "Gargoyles" episode after all this time. Diz-Oz is the best animation studio available to Disney TV. Anyone who's watched the other shows Disney TV has made has seen how Diz-Oz has excelled in facial expressions, detailed body language, and squash and stretch. They've particularly done well with "funny animals".
Here, though their work didn't quite fit the series. Dis-Oz characters would have very fluid movement but not the solid appearance that WD-Japan characters would have. So characters seemed more rubbery than usual and moved with a lot of exaggeration. The thieves looked like they were made of jello when ran across the rooftop, and their expressions of terror looked laughably cartoony. Also, Diz-Oz usually doesn't get the models correct in its first efforts. (i.e. "The Return of Jafar") So Angela looked unusally cute to me and Matt and Goliath sometimes looked distorted... And Elisa had Jasmine's eyes, Pocahontas's physique, and Jessica Rabbit's walk. You had to see THAT to believe it. :-)
Nevertheless, this episode did feature Diz-Oz's strength at detail in movement. Their work on Goliath ripping the helicoptor apart impressed me, with the tail coming apart very spectacularly. ( You could recognize Diz-Oz just from the way they drew the smoke. ) And at times small details in the characters' movements made them very appealing to watch. Elisa's hair often moved even when she was motionless on the whole. So I'd prefer Diz-Oz's work over the stale work that HanHo and Akom have been turning in all year. I figured that Diz-Oz could produce gorgeous "Gargoyle" episodes once they've practiced the character models. (Of course, they have only one more episode to practice on, and apparently one more for good...:-( )
Miscellaneous
I wonder what Sevarius was in jail for. Kidnapping a lochness monster? :-)
Lucky for Angela that the stone wall shattered before she did. Similarly, that pilot was sure built to last. :-)
Goliath: Proteus!
Proteus: In the flesh...for now.
Hudson: Unless you two want to stay like that for the next 12 hours, we
better go.
[Heck, maybe they did. ] :-)
Proteus: I acquired these elastic chords from a most curious place called "a sporting goods shop."
"Seeing Isn't Believing" had a mediocre story. But I still found it worth watching for the animation and for MacDowell's performance. This "New Olympians" follow-up could've been a lot worse.
Additional Comments
by Jozef Szekeres
"Elisa had Jasmine's eyes, Pocahontas's physique, and Jessica Rabbit's walk. You had to see THAT to believe it."
That was my fault...and pleasure. I was animating for Disney at the time, I can't remember if I was on staff full-time at the time of just freelancing (I often moved from one state to another so I could be flexible for work opportunities).
I animated quite a bit of Elisa footage for this episode. There were some really fun close ups that I did. I remember a walk to camera that I did of Elisa that was sexy as...Plus a transformation scene which I really liked.
I think that the Oz Studio only had the one episode to do, and we got it because there was a rewrite on one of our Direct-to-Video features. It may have been a rewrite of Aladdin King of Thieves where I know I was full time and animated the Jasmine character. We may have gotten another filler episode to do later, but I think I was onto other projects at the time.
I really didn't know much about the series when we did the episode. I don't think it was screening in Australia at the time, and we had only a few episodes as reference. I basically animated Elisa as I wanted to see her, and have fun with it. It was treated like a throw away project, a fill-in, and time filler, so the lead up time that we would usually get to "know" a character was not there, so we pretty much did them as we wanted to do them. I mostly animated the female leads during my time with Disney, and so, I was the guy that animated love scenes and scenes where the female leads needed to be feminine and/or sexy. So, I just went to town on Elisa.
Best,
Jozef Szekeres
Animator of Elisa
Seeing Isn't Believing
Season Three - The Goliath Chronicles