Lego Nexo Knights TV Series Discussion

[CM4Sci]

Alright, typing this up as it airs...

Spoilers and plot explanation beware!

So basically, Jestro is the laughingstock at the Knight's Graduation "Battleation" , and because of that, the Book of Monsters talks to him and convinces him to become bad (he literally says bad at least 20 times, "BE BAD!" "BADDEST BADDIE!") so as he fights Clay in the library, Merlok steps in, sacrifices himself to save Clay and explodes the library. The books collected in the sets are spread out across the kingdom as a result of the explosion. Oh, and the Book of Monsters eats the other books to gain power.

The comedy is a little so-so. The Book of Monsters and Jestro "partnership" is probably the only bit of comedy. There's a lot of "Wow you really suck at jokes" jokes. I hate the two "announcer" people. Surprise, surprise, Axl doesn't sound like a "FOOD MAKE ME HUNGRY" ogre, but the hungry jokes are a little excessive. The Bookkeeper is another "dumb, goofy" character, and Jestro turns to the exact same page with the same 3 monsters in the Book of Monsters. Oh, and worst. king. ever. After Jestro attacks the kingdom-- oh, wait, nobody, not even the knights go "Hey, wait, Jestro?!" Then they find Merlok, even though nobody really seemed to notice he was gone except the King and the Knights, and the end.

Why can't they just be knights who graduate and fight Jestro?

I also like how they have a full on look at a shield that you can scan while watching and add it to your Merlok 2.0 App.

Other than that I liked the episodes and can't wait for the show.

[Robert8]

Thanks for the info!

Sounds interesting

[DuckBricks]

Has anyone found it uploaded on any websites yet? The usual suspects don't have Nexo Knights yet...

EDIT: Took a few extra hours, but they're up.

Edited December 14, 2015 by legozebra

[BrickJagger]

Okay, my thoughts:

The first episode was a little bit of a snoozer at the start. The announcers are horrible and the tournament idea seems dumb. However, The Book of Monsters makes a good impression right from the start, and Jestro turning against his own friend is a good way to depict his transformation. Merlok does not put up a good fight at all, and decides to kill himself when he probably didn't have to. Whatever. Jestro somehow survives a fall from several hundred feet, but was I really surprised?

Clay is a pretty good main character and he's easy to root for. I like him.

Lance starts out snobby but will obviously have some sort of "Change of Heart" by the end of the season.

Macy seems pretty cool and not your stereotypical token female hero.

Axl needs to stop with the food jokes.

Not too much from Aaron in these two episodes, but you can tell that he's already hitting on Macy.

Second episode is better, by a lot. The Book and Jestro have some hit or miss funny dialog, with the highlight being when Jestro conjures up the Book Keeper. After eating one of the evil books, TBOM tells Jestro to summon some monsters to attack the kingdom. Sparkz and his buddy appear here, although there is no sign of Infernox, our other Lava Golem. The monsters go and attack some stupid-looking robo-knights, who are kind of funny in their own way. After Merlok comes back from the dead as a hologram, he saves the day and the knights power up to kill all of the monsters.

At this point the story should end, as the knights have ample opportunity to take out a fleeing Jestro and Book Keeper, but instead opt to pose heroically.

Overall, despite my criticism I really like where this show is going. I can't wait to see the human-sized monsters when they show up, and judging by a short teaser before to show, Whiparella has a British accent .

After watching this I can say that this had a better first two episodes than Chima and Ninjago, regardless of the nostalgia blinding the Ninjago stans.

[Mandate]

After watching this I can say that this had a better first two episodes than Chima and Ninjago, regardless of the nostalgia blinding the Ninjago stans.

It's not blinding me. The pilots and first few episodes of NINJAGO were mediocre at best.

Watching Nexo Knights right now. I'll type my thoughts as I watch. Warning: these thoughts have virtually no context given and are potentially capable of destroying your brain cells. Read at your own risk.

Pretty boring so far. Macy's backtory is kind of interesting, but her father seems boring.

Backstory is contradictory already, or Clay's an idiot. Being an expert in combat carries no importance if there's been no fighting for over a century.

Flying robo-horse joust is cool, physics are not.

"Knights! Defend the people of the realm!" against the hideous glowing freaks just standing around looking menacing, harming no one until they were forced to defend themselves against the bigoted Nexo Knights?

"We have to coordinate our attacks!" Character promptly refuses to coordinate attacks with another Knight.

Wow. Merlock's a jerk. Like no one could have seen this being fake at all.

Clay's voice sounds familiar. Is he the one Vincent Tong is playing? Or is that Jestro?

Why does this kingdom need a jester if there's a wizard fully willing to play pranks on everyone?

So, is the moral behind Jestro's transformation going to be that if you have self-esteem issues, you're an evil villain that everyone hates, or is it "this is a guy that had self-esteem issues and turned evil, don't have self-esteem issues"?

Incompetent king is hilarious.

Jestro feels a bit underdeveloped, but it's enough to get the point across.

You can really tell they learned nothing from Chima about animation when you see Jestro's arm stretch across the screen further than a Xenomorph's mini-mouth.

Why is Clay telling Jestro to stop doing what he's doing? For all he knows, Jestro is just staring at a book or conjuring up fairy floss.

Merlock's library has surprisingly had a lot of thought put into it.

Wise old man with a beard and a staff versus evil Mark Oliver who can create unnatural creatures out of nothing. Hmm, where have I seen this before?

Seeing Merlock's burned hat on the ground makes me wonder why he didn't just use Avada Kedavra.

Even Vakama's self-blame over Lhikan wasn't this unnecessary.

You know, with how often Jestro's arm looks like it's stretching out to kill someone I really want to see someone photoshop a scene from Alien to match it.

Eh, it wasn't too bad. Haven't seen the second episode yet, but they've got plenty of areas to improve in with this one already.

[BrickJagger]

"Why does this kingdom need a jester if there's a wizard fully willing to play pranks on everyone?"

'Twas the point. That was one of the reasons why Jestro felt worthless.

"So, is the moral behind Jestro's transformation going to be that if you have self-esteem issues, you're an evil villain that everyone hates, or is it "this is a guy that had self-esteem issues and turned evil, don't have self-esteem issues"?"

I don't think there was a moral there. Jestro isn't even the main bad guy anyway, so he's not going to be as well-rounded.

"Why is Clay telling Jestro to stop doing what he's doing? For all he knows, Jestro is just staring at a book or conjuring up fairy floss."

Well, when you walk into a library and see the court jester, who shouldn't be there in the first place, waving a staff over a book that's talking to him, I think you would have ample reason to be suspicious.

Oh, and sorry for coming in a little too harsh with my comment on Ninjago.

[Mandate]

"Why does this kingdom need a jester if there's a wizard fully willing to play pranks on everyone?"

'Twas the point. That was one of the reasons why Jestro felt worthless.

Yeah, but Merlock is at least 5,000 centuries old at this point. Why has Jestro chosen this path when he's clearly already outmatched?

"Why is Clay telling Jestro to stop doing what he's doing? For all he knows, Jestro is just staring at a book or conjuring up fairy floss."

Well, when you walk into a library and see the court jester, who shouldn't be there in the first place, waving a staff over a book that's talking to him, I think you would have ample reason to be suspicious.

Maybe it was a magic cell phone and he was ordering a pizza?

Oh, and sorry for coming in a little too harsh with my comment on Ninjago.

You didn't seem harsh at all to me.

[DraikNova]

Am I the only person who finds the Nexo Knights website to lag to hell and back? All those glowing patterns and stuff make short work of my computer.

[DuckBricks]

Just watched the intro. Well, it certainly started off with a blast! I thoroughly enjoyed both episodes (well, the second more than the first) and I agree that it was a lot better than both the Ninjago and Chima season openers (but not quite as good as Ninjago is today).

Just some random observations...

-The Book of Monsters has a great voice actor, whoever it is. If it's Vincent Tong, kudos to him for sounding completely different from Kai. I generally enjoyed hearing the Book of Monsters talk and I'm really looking forward to hearing him throughout the next episodes. He can be really funny at times, and also evilly manipulative of Jestro at others.

- I like how they're playing Jestro as a pawn, but he thinks he's the one in control of the situation. Pretty interesting dynamic, but I hope it's not a retread of the disappointing Chima Cragger/Crooler story arc. Then again, this seems to be a lot better as Jestro is acting of his own free will and just being talked into being a "big bad baddie," as the BoM would say.

- The queen is a highly skilled ninja fighter and I 100% support this decision. Also, the king is hilariously bad at... well... being a king. Makes me wish that we got a Queen's Mech set instead and the King gets captured, but that's for the set discussion.

- As much as I like Aaron and (kind of) like Axl, I feel like the team could have been just Lance, Clay, and Macy and it would have worked. The other 2 seem a bit superfluous in these two episodes and there's not much to them despite that fact that "Axl eats a lot!" and "Aaron is an adrenaline junkie!" On the contrary, I really like the Lance and Clay rivalry and how Macy's character is being handled.

- As much as the show wants me to love Clay, I think my favorite character is actually Macy. She seems to be the most grounded in reality and can hold her own as a fighter.

- I love how they made Jestro be friends with Clay. It's really interesting how his morality gets a bit in the way when asked to send monsters after Clay, and it's sickeningly evil (read: I like this) for the BoM to keep coercing him to push away his morality.

- The only big bone I have to pick with these episodes are the Nexo Powers. Up until Merlok 2.0 sent the knights the powers, I felt like I was watching a TV series, not a toy commercial. Suddenly, the villains became one hit kills, which really irks me. There was so much buildup about the dark and evil unbeatable monsters, and even the knights were absolutely useless against them, and then come the Toy Ad AND Plot Device Powers Nexo Powers to save the day... eh

Anyway, overall looking forward to the next episodes! Does anyone know if this will continue next week with the next episodes? Or will it be put on hold until next year?

Edited December 14, 2015 by legozebra

[Mandate]

Just saw episode 2. This series has potential, to say the most. I enjoyed Merlock 2.0 being a complete goofball and that the only people that were actually dependable were the kids (even if that was a big cliche), but aside from that... the BoM seems like it's evil solely for the sake of being evil. Yes, he's an evil magic tome, what more should be expected? But the problem comes with a lack of motives. Why does the BoM want to attack everything? Why does he need books to gain more power? Do they give him additional spells as if they were a power-up in a video game? (not that that's a bad thing)

I'm unconvinced. The characters are flat for the most part; their personalities cliche and boring. For instance, Axl could be described as Hungry Hungry Hulk and no one would know the difference. Their motivations are unclear: why is Clay so devoted to preserving the "Knight's Code"? Why does Lance want to be a knight? Why is ever single robot that runs around some kind of comic gag? I understand that this isn't Harry Potter where you're actually meant to ask questions like this, but as a result of that I can't take this show seriously. It doesn't have the same qualities of NINJAGO or BIONICLE where the source material is mature enough to place boundaries on the humor, it's clearly intended for the same audience as Chima. It reeks of Chima's earliest faults (no surprise since it's the same company), so hopefully in the future it will get better as Chima did. Or so I've been told, I never watched Chima's final season

[Lyichir]

Just saw episode 2. This series has potential, to say the most. I enjoyed Merlock 2.0 being a complete goofball and that the only people that were actually dependable were the kids (even if that was a big cliche), but aside from that... the BoM seems like it's evil solely for the sake of being evil. Yes, he's an evil magic tome, what more should be expected? But the problem comes with a lack of motives. Why does the BoM want to attack everything? Why does he need books to gain more power? Do they give him additional spells as if they were a power-up in a video game? (not that that's a bad thing)

I'm unconvinced. The characters are flat for the most part; their personalities cliche and boring. For instance, Axl could be described as Hungry Hungry Hulk and no one would know the difference. Their motivations are unclear: why is Clay so devoted to preserving the "Knight's Code"? Why does Lance want to be a knight? Why is ever single robot that runs around some kind of comic gag? I understand that this isn't Harry Potter where you're actually meant to ask questions like this, but as a result of that I can't take this show seriously. It doesn't have the same qualities of NINJAGO or BIONICLE where the source material is mature enough to place boundaries on the humor, it's clearly intended for the same audience as Chima. It reeks of Chima's earliest faults (no surprise since it's the same company), so hopefully in the future it will get better as Chima did. Or so I've been told, I never watched Chima's final season

You are essentially accusing the series of ignoring questions it just hasn't gotten around to yet. No one should expect all of the series' questions to be answered within the first two episodes, and to be honest it seemed pretty clear to me that there were plenty of questions the writers was quite purposefully being coy about. Merlok obviously isn't telling the knights everything, not about the Book of Monsters, the other wizards, or even himself. The Book of Monsters is also obviously using Jestro and probably has no intention of being forthright about its ultimate motives. The other characters' motivations and backstories will probably be developed more as the series goes on as well, especially once they each start to get "focus episodes" instead of just a pilot that has to establish them as an ensemble cast. A good pilot episode shouldn't try to spell everything out to you—it should leave you wanting more, and I think these episodes did a great job of it.

Edited December 14, 2015 by Lyichir

[DraikNova]

Really liking it so far. Kind of surprised at how few pages the Book of Monsters has. It's less than 400, at any rate, but I wonder how many of the pages are dedicated to more general-purpose, free-form monster summoning spells. It's also kind of nice how for once it's the one being double-crossed who turns the "we'll [insert goal]" into a "I'll [insert goal]" statement. I'd be really happy if, when the Book of Monsters finally tries to get rid of Jestro, Jestro turns out to have gotten too evil for the book to pull stuff like that on him. And judging by it's vocabulary, the Book of Monster can probably do a great Lee Wilkof impression . And I really appreciate how the grunts are capable of more than just grunting. I really hope the other special monsters, like Lavaria and Beast Master, actually act as characters rather than slightly harder to defeat mooks.

Edited December 14, 2015 by DraikNova

[Mandate]

You are essentially accusing the series of ignoring questions it just hasn't gotten around to yet.

You realize you just said that I'm right?

No one should expect all of the series' questions to be answered within the first two episodes, and to be honest it seemed pretty clear to me that there were plenty of questions the writers was quite purposefully being coy about. Merlok obviously isn't telling the knights everything, not about the Book of Monsters, the other wizards, or even himself. The Book of Monsters is also obviously using Jestro and probably has no intention of being forthright about its ultimate motives. The other characters' motivations and backstories will probably be developed more as the series goes on as well, especially once they each start to get "focus episodes" instead of just a pilot that has to establish them as an ensemble cast. A good pilot episode shouldn't try to spell everything out to you—it should leave you wanting more, and I think these episodes did a great job of it.

Here's the problem: the writers are being coy about everything. We knew more about NINJAGO's characters and world at this point than we do here. While NINJAGO was upfront and forthright with why its central characters (Garmadon, Wu and Kai) were involved in the story, here we know nothing. Out of Nexo Knights' central characters (Jestro, Book of Monsters and Clay. Macy should be here as well since she had more of a presence than Clay, but she's not the face of marketing), we only know the motives of Jestro. The Book of Monsters is set up to betray Jestro (though personally I want to see a double-betrayal and have Jestro come out on top stronger and more psychotic than ever), but it's never made clear what the BoM wants to do in the first place. Does it want to take over Knighton? If so, why? It's not for revenge against Merlock, as far as the BoM knows Merlock is dead. But there's no actual threat when the villain is the epitome of a Saturday morning cartoon doing evil things just because it can. Garmadon fit into the same cookie-cutter at the time, but at least we knew what he wanted. As for Clay, he's determined to uphold the "Knight's Code" at all costs. Again, why? This could have been solved with a five-minute flashback instead of a lame tournament at the beginning. Clay is completely unrelatable, and barring Macy so are the rest of the knights, who just seem to... exist in this primordial soup of a story. This is Chima again, except instead of character traits placed over an entire army's worth of clones they're condensed into a single group of characters. I'm not asking to be explained everything in the story, because that's never a good idea. Star Wars, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, NINJAGO, heck, even Chima all knew this. It's just that unlike said franchises, Nexo Knights doesn't realize it hasn't explained a thing. It's walking around unbeknownst to itself that its pants are down, and by the time it finds out it'll forget to do its fly up too. These are NK's pilot episodes, the very definition of a focus episode. This is where you establish your world, establish your characters, establish your tone and establish (to an extent) what's going to happen. NK hasn't done a very good job at any of these.

There's potential here, no question about it. I'm hesitant to call it a disappointment because it's not, they'd have to be trying pretty hard to do that after that awful minisode they released. But simultaneously, there are a number of flaws they need to make up for later on, and if the jump in quality between episode 1 and 2 is anything to go by then I'll stick around. My biggest concern is that the finer details are going to be lost in the running time, which after Chima's first season is a real problem they're going to face.

[The_Fiery_Rooster]

Where can I find the episodes online? I can't find them.

[DuckBricks]

Where can I find the episodes online? I can't find them.

Found with a very quick google search

[The_Fiery_Rooster]

Found with a very quick google search

Thank you!

[Chilly_Productions]

Thank you!

Is it legal to watch TV shows online?.

[PenPlays]

Is it legal to watch TV shows online?.

No technically... but that's stopped very few people.

I watched it (legally), and I have to say that I'm very impressed with the subject matter already present in the show (death, darkness as a dooming force). The voice acting is fantastic for just being the first couple episodes.

I didn't like how the book of monsters simply can't use the word "evil" unless it's the name of a book. It's all just "be the baddiest baddy that's bad that could ever the baddiest type of bad baddy. Bad bad bad bad bad bad..."

Axl being food driven with caveman talk bothers me a bit. Although if the shorts were anything to go by, there are a few moments where he is inconsistent on that.

I have high hope for Nexo Knights, and I hope that it does better than poor Chima fared.

[Lyichir]

You realize you just said that I'm right?

Here's the problem: the writers are being coy about everything. We knew more about NINJAGO's characters and world at this point than we do here. While NINJAGO was upfront and forthright with why its central characters (Garmadon, Wu and Kai) were involved in the story, here we know nothing. Out of Nexo Knights' central characters (Jestro, Book of Monsters and Clay. Macy should be here as well since she had more of a presence than Clay, but she's not the face of marketing), we only know the motives of Jestro. The Book of Monsters is set up to betray Jestro (though personally I want to see a double-betrayal and have Jestro come out on top stronger and more psychotic than ever), but it's never made clear what the BoM wants to do in the first place. Does it want to take over Knighton? If so, why? It's not for revenge against Merlock, as far as the BoM knows Merlock is dead. But there's no actual threat when the villain is the epitome of a Saturday morning cartoon doing evil things just because it can. Garmadon fit into the same cookie-cutter at the time, but at least we knew what he wanted. As for Clay, he's determined to uphold the "Knight's Code" at all costs. Again, why? This could have been solved with a five-minute flashback instead of a lame tournament at the beginning. Clay is completely unrelatable, and barring Macy so are the rest of the knights, who just seem to... exist in this primordial soup of a story. This is Chima again, except instead of character traits placed over an entire army's worth of clones they're condensed into a single group of characters. I'm not asking to be explained everything in the story, because that's never a good idea. Star Wars, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, NINJAGO, heck, even Chima all knew this. It's just that unlike said franchises, Nexo Knights doesn't realize it hasn't explained a thing. It's walking around unbeknownst to itself that its pants are down, and by the time it finds out it'll forget to do its fly up too. These are NK's pilot episodes, the very definition of a focus episode. This is where you establish your world, establish your characters, establish your tone and establish (to an extent) what's going to happen. NK hasn't done a very good job at any of these.

There's potential here, no question about it. I'm hesitant to call it a disappointment because it's not, they'd have to be trying pretty hard to do that after that awful minisode they released. But simultaneously, there are a number of flaws they need to make up for later on, and if the jump in quality between episode 1 and 2 is anything to go by then I'll stick around. My biggest concern is that the finer details are going to be lost in the running time, which after Chima's first season is a real problem they're going to face.

There is a significant difference between the Ninjago pilot (which began as an independent TV special that told a whole year's worth of story) and this premiere (which is just the first two episodes of what will be an ongoing story). Frankly, I feel like this premiere was a LOT better than the Chima premiere, which rushed to establish the conflict without actually spending enough time on worldbuilding or making the characters compelling. Heck, I'd probably consider it better than the first two episodes of the Ninjago series proper. This premiere may not have told us everything about the characters, but by establishing wonderfully flawed heroes and villains I feel it did a good job making the audience care about them.

[gamejutzu]

It was so-so.

I can say with full confidence, that these first 2 episodes definitely are more cheesier than Ninjago's and even Chima's.

Clay seems cool (is he also voiced by Tong?). Aaron and Axl are filler. Macy has a clear motivation, and is half-cliche, but also half a new character.

Jestro is played by Kai's actor and the BoM is played by Garmadon's. Jestro could have had a better "aren't you sick of ___" moment, with camera spins and a new determination, but still being kinda fragile.

The fight scene with Clay and the monster had good animation. But the team fight had terrible animation, I can say it was worse than Chima's.

I know they can improve the above issues. But the one think I actually hate, not irritated by, is the scan. It's a huge toy commercial.

All in all, it was okay, I guess I need to see at least half the season or so to judge.

After watching this I can say that this had a better first two episodes than Chima and Ninjago, regardless of the nostalgia blinding the Ninjago fans.

Ninjago's first 2 episodes are much more interesting, glasses off and all. I mean, come on. It was a bit cliche, but so much more happened (in a good way).

At least the animation there was better. Gotta agree on that.

I could say that the first 2 here are better than Chima though. They improved from there, but still, in Chima they tried to mask the cliche somehow. But here, it's in the open.

I don't hate this show or anything, i'm just saying I don't get how this was better than Ninjago's first two. Please don't kill me or anything

Edited December 16, 2015 by gamejutzu

[TheBrickPal]

http://brickset.com/article/18203 Edited December 16, 2015 by Puffle Pal26

[The_Fiery_Rooster]

http://brickset.com/article/18203

I agree that Axl so far is the weakest (personality wise) of the knights. His bio made me so hopeful, and then almost none of it is expressed in the first two episodes. I really hope he lives up to what I expected later on.

[gamejutzu]

http://brickset.com/article/18203

You got it wrong.

Visuals are superb.

But animation is not really that good at all. Especially combat-wise. In this area, Ninjago is better.

Edited December 16, 2015 by gamejutzu

[TheBrickPal]

You got it wrong.

Visuals are superb.

But animation is not really that good at all. Especially combat-wise. In this area, Ninjago is better.

Sorry, I get confused when it comes to that. Will fix!

However, I will not lie that, in my opinion, I thought both visuals and animations were superb.

Edited December 16, 2015 by Puffle Pal26

[Mandate]

There is a significant difference between the Ninjago pilot (which began as an independent TV special that told a whole year's worth of story) and this premiere (which is just the first two episodes of what will be an ongoing story). Frankly, I feel like this premiere was a LOT better than the Chima premiere, which rushed to establish the conflict without actually spending enough time on worldbuilding or making the characters compelling. Heck, I'd probably consider it better than the first two episodes of the Ninjago series proper. This premiere may not have told us everything about the characters, but by establishing wonderfully flawed heroes and villains I feel it did a good job making the audience care about them.

Except that Nexo Knights doesn't really focus on anything in its pilot episode. If I asked you what was outside the walls of Knightonia (I had to go to the website to find out the name of the city, if that helps) based on what you saw in the pilots alone, how much would you be able to tell me? If I asked you what sorts of unique locations Knightonia has, how many could you list? If someone asked you why the Book of Monsters wanted evil books so badly, would you be able to answer them? And if you can answer why the Book of Monsters wants them, can you answer what for?

Nothing has had any particular amount of time and care put into it. Each knight, except Macy, is a facade. Clay cares about upholding the Knight's Code and being the "best knight" but beyond that he doesn't have any defining traits. Lance wants the title of knight, but doesn't want to do the work, and there's not really anything else to describe about him. Axl is concerned with eating food and smashing things, but he's not exactly a gentle giant. As for Aaron, I can't quite remember if he did anything other than fly around on a shield and shout "woohoo!" every now and again. As for the villains, there's a goldmine of potential here that I can't help but feel was wasted in some ways already. Jestro's relationship with Clay opens the door to some unique dialogue later on, but I can't help but feel we didn't see enough of Jestro and Clay together beforehand for there to be a real connection. The Book of Monsters is, as I've said before, sort of floating around being evil for the sake of being evil but again, there's potential here in the dates of monsters disappearing, his time on Merlock's shelf and Merlock's connection to this. However, he still has no defining trait other than "EVIL BAD GUY CHARACTER" and his motives for being such are unclear. With time that can be corrected, but the BoM and Jestro is basically Crooler and Cragger all over again at this point.

Most of the secondary characters are very neat though. Merlock being a complete goofball (yet willing to sacrifice himself) makes for a very interesting character, and while I wish we could have seen more of them the kids were pretty good too. The Queen, being a better ninja than anything to come out of NINJAGO, has an interesting dynamic of sticking with the hopelessly incompetent King out of love for him. It's in these characters that Nexo Knights shines by taking your typical boring snorefest and turning it on its head, and it attempts to do the same with the knights but fails to do so because they're the main protagonists: every knight (except Macy) is just an archetype with very little, if anything, added to make them original.

World building... there's some interesting stuff. Well, one interesting thing as far as I can remember, which I mentioned earlier being that monsters hadn't been seen for over a century, and the Book of Monster's claim of staying on the shelf for (over?) a century. But aside from Knightonia, of which we know very little of, we saw nothing of Knighton but some trees. External material doesn't count, but having seen the map myself I can't help but question if spending 3/4 of one episode trying to turn the power on and arguing over what to do (which ultimately led to nothing happening) could have been better spent introducing the knights' backstories. Maybe Axl came from the desert region where there was little food, hence his constant need to eat everything. Perhaps Aaron came from some boring farm village, giving him a thirst for action and adrenaline. This would have created a connection between characters and locations that could be explored in the future, and simultaneously shown us how vast and distinct certain regions are. But they didn't, and we know next to nothing about the world after 40 minutes of time. We don't need to explore every nook and cranny just yet, but when it comes to giving us a taste of what's to come and showing what we can expect Nexo Knights just falls flat on its face.

I did enjoy the premiere of Nexo Knights but it has a lot of stuff to make up for in the future. I understand that the, what, 18 episodes they're releasing make it difficult to introduce too much in the pilot episodes but they really need to take a look at the ways NINJAGO has done this right, rather than wrong (Ninjago City = Knightonia, Ninjago = Knighton, etc).