The second season of the Hollow justifies the cartoon’s existence

 Last year, I watched the first season of the Netflix cartoon The Hollow. I just finished the second season. And it is ridiculously better than the first season.

Spoilers

Spoilers

Spoilers 

Spoilers 

Spoilers

The whole schtick of the first season is that the characters are actually in a video game. And that’s honestly pretty much it. It had nice animation and was a pleasant distraction but it was pure fluff. In fact, since the characters start the game with no memories, there wasn’t even much character development. Everyone but Kai is static.

The twist is the second season, which is actually really easy to see coming, is that the characters in this season are actually digital clones of the characters from the first season, accidentally created by a glitch. But a big part of what makes the story work is not that they aren’t ‘real’ but how they deal with it.

At the start of the first season, the characters start off with no memories. This time, they have all their memories and we actually get to know who the characters are. More than that, we learn that some of them have known each other for years and that includes people on the other team. The opposing team from the first season were cardboard thin at best but actually get developed into meaningful supporting roles this time.

Major spoiler: I knew that this season would be more interesting when a major supporting character dies for real at the end of the fourth episode. It isn’t just game over or only the glitches. Things were now serious.

In other words, we are given characters who can develop and who we can care about and there are actual stakes involved.

While the resolution for ‘are we real?’ dilemma  was simplistic, it did remind me of Gilbert K. Chesterton’s Manalive. You don’t ponder the meaning of the universe if someone is shooting at you. Simple but it works.

Afterwards, I told my wife that she might enjoy the second season but she could skip the first one. The first season was fluff I had on for background noise while cooked or such. I actually was interested in this season.

I understand that the series has officially been canceled. Which I think is reasonable. Even with the improved second season, the Hollow is still simply good, not a classic. So, I am just happy the second season exists at all.

The Hollow as a weird world building exercise

I recently stumbled across a description of the cartoon the Hollow and ended up watching a bit of it, including the end since the description spoiled it for me :D It was an okay cartoon, good for background noise but not captivating in and of itself. But it did get me thinking.

Spoilers...

Spoilers...

Spoilers...

Okay, the characters are in a video game and they might even still be stuck in it at the end. In actuality, going in already knowing that made the show more enjoyable for me since that justified all the wacky world building. Each area in the game was very much it’s own genre and, taken on a whole, wouldn’t have made any sense except as a video game. Spooky Woods next to Decaying Creepy Amusement Park next to Wild West Ghost Town next to Invaded Space Stations. It’s either really bad or really brilliant world building. 

And it also made me think of older games where the world building was kind of shaky. The original Zork has magical rainbow wands, exorcisms, steam punk dams and the Cyclops explicitly from the Odyssey. While later games tried make it all make more sense, it was a goofy, kitchen sink setting where the only point was to grab all the loot you could.

However, what it _really_ reminded me of was the failed RPG experiment Sandman: Map Of Halaal. (http://www.gnomepondering.com/2016/05/sandman-map-of-halaal-weird-art-project.html?m=1) Man, that was a weird game on almost every level but the setting was the weirdest part. Casablanca mixed with early Disney movies mixed with Arabian Nights mixed with Einstein in a rocket ship topped off with psychodramas.

Okay, when I actually look back at Sandman: Map Of Halaal, it is much, much more deranged than the more mundane kitchen sink of The Hollow. It is literally like someone dumped random pop culture into a blender.

The Hollow, truth to tell, doesn’t have that interesting a plot and the character development is minimal. But the retro, kitchen sink setting did take me back to a different era of gaming.