The Legend of Vox Machina: Test of Pride (2x09)

Knowing that this batch of episodes contained the Fey Realm stuff, if someone would have told me the Westruun-only episode might be my favorite of the three, I wouldn't have believed them. But... this might be my favorite of the three! The glow-up that Scanlan, Grog, and Pike have all gotten as characters this season, from characters I loved because I already knew them from the stream, to fully realized creations in their own right... it's a beautiful thing to behold.

Cons:

I feel like the way Grog's backstory was framed was the slightest bit confusing, specifically as regarded Pike's knowledge of it. Where we land is that Pike knows how they first took Grog in, but didn't know the full extent of what Grog had been made to do with the herd. What's confusing is that in the flashback, younger Pike thanks Grog for what he did for her grandpa, but when present-day Pike is hearing the story of Grog sparing the old man's life, she says "Grandpa Wilhand?" like she's confused or this is brand new information. The backstory finishes with Pike being like "I never knew..." but yes she did, we just heard Pike thanking Grog for it in the past! I think this is just a small adjustment, where present-day Pike needed to make it clear that while she knew the basics, she never knew how bad things had really been.

I've got to say, I'm not really sure what to make of Ripley's involvement here. Is she going to come into play in some major way in this season? Are we going to get... you know... the culmination of Ripley's story... ahem... in the next three episodes? I kind of don't see how, since we've still gotta do the Kill Box and Umbrasyl. And if Ripley's just here to wave her hand and say "remember me, I'm Ripley and I'm still here", it feels a little odd. I don't know, we'll see. It's not like she's taking up a lot of our time, anyway.

Pros:

Where to start! Despite my slight confusion on how they laid out the flashbacks, I absolutely loved getting this glimpse of Grog's past. Travis is killing it with his performance, imbuing a lot of gravity into Grog's character while never losing sight of the fact that he's a total dumbass (affectionate). This episode has him feeling the shame of his past, and seeing it echoed back at him when the townsfolk are afraid of him because of what his kin have done to Westruun. But we still see his goofy side, when he's acting like a herd member to get him and Pike inside the city to look for Scanlan. And we see how brave he is, to stand up to Kevdak there at the end. This is going to be intense!

One subtle moment I enjoyed is right at the beginning there, when Pike wanted to kill the herd members who murdered the innocent man, but Grog was the one who stopped her. Such a clever and quick way to show us how serious this is, how afraid Grog is and how we should not be underestimating these people as our foes.

The image of Kevdak beating Grog to the point of death is really chilling. Oftentimes the gore on this show is sort of take it or leave it for me, I'm not sure what it's enhancing, but that show of the blood drenching Grog's body and the ground beneath him was haunting and affecting.

Meanwhile, Scanlan sneaks off to do some recon in Westruun, after getting egged on by a particularly flirty Pike, and he meets a group of townsfolk along with a traveling troupe of musicians. Among them is a gnome named Kaylie, who seems to know who Scanlan is and is giving him a really hard time. First off, I have such a blast finding Matt everywhere throughout the show. Dr. Dranzel is so fun, for the brief moments we see him. Second off, Kaylie is PERFECT. I love her hair and her cute little nose and her attitude. I love "one thing I learned in this life, no one comes back to save you." Which. Ouch. And then Scanlan's last words to her as she runs off at the end of the episode are: "take them. We'll catch up. I promise." LIKE. OUCH. I wonder what non-stream-watchers will think of Kaylie. God, this is such a brilliant way of reordering a sequence of events to make an even bigger impact. I am already so obsessed with this.

Pike and Grog do the Wookie Prisoner Trick to find Scanlan, and they all do big hugs when they reunite, which is just the cutest thing! I love how much they were both worried about him. I feel like this show takes the time to show how much these characters all care for each other, how scared they really get when something might be going wrong. It's no small thing, and it captures the energy at the table really well, too.

Gotta shout out the herd members playing boulder, parchment, sheers... that's so fun...

We get to meet Kevdak, and also his son Zanror. I love the distinct look of these two characters, the way you can sense the dynamic between them, and how Grog is going to interface with that dynamic. The herd is in over its head, paying tribute to Umbrasyl, who really is only humoring these people in letting them control Westruun. In the one scene with Umbrasyl, you can sense how everything might turn on a dime at any moment, dependent on the whims of the dragons.

As our episode ends, we have Pike tearfully trying to convince Grog that going after Kevdak is suicide, and they need to stick together. Grog has learned a partial good lesson from his recent trip down memory lane, and that's that he has to stand up for the little folk. It's what sets him apart from the rest of the herd. But he also says "I have to do this on my own," which proves that he doesn't quite have all the pieces of the puzzle to his own self-actualization. They've done a masterful job of teasing out the themes for Grog and packaging them in a way to give themselves a nice build to a really, really cool climactic moment next week. I mean, I assume. Not like I know for sure what's going to happen, or anything.

So yeah! Kaylie is a triumph already, I deeply deeply love her. And Grog's character arc over this season has been a master class in how to adapt from a meandering streaming D&D game to a tightly packed animated series format. Can't wait to see how it all shakes out a week from now!

9.5/10