I just finished the third season of Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts and I have many thoughts about it but before I get to that I should mention that I watched the first two seasons back in the middle of 2020, the first one on May and the second one on July and I loved them both. It was around the time that I watched the Dragon Prince for the first time and I was really excited to find more amazing shows like that and yeah Kipo is one of them. Amazing animation (by the same company that animated Korra), unique and insanely good music and songs (and I'm saying that that I'm not the biggest fan of musicals but the show isn't a musical though, it just has some songs that I personaly adore). It also has likeable characters and great character development, fresh and addictive story, a really interesting villain that isn't just a typical bad guy and I mean Scarlemagne of course, diversity in the best way possible (as a part of life as it's supposed to be) and even more. So after two great seasons I was expecting something that good or even better for the third season and I can say that I'm a bit disappointed. First I should also mention that I did the pro gamer move to rewatch the first two seasons before I watched the third one for the first time and that was an amazing idea cause I fell in love with them even more than I was before. If I had to rank them, I would rank the first one with A+ and the second one A++, one plus extra for the great ending and ''Heroes on Fire''.
Now let's go to the actual review of the thind season: First thing that seemed a little off to me is seeing things moving now way faster and a bit forced, the amazing characters that we already know in the first two seasons that back then they didn't have any time to breath cause they were about to die or to save someone in every episode, now they seem a little off, not being in the same mode. Even the voice actors (not that it's their fault) seem over enthusiastic at some points that they souldn't be, in the previous seasons they had a reason to be like that and it worked perfectly, but now that the pace of the show is different it doesn't work as it's should. And that's a big problem with the last season as well as it rushed some things and did some unnecessary things as well.
(Major spoilers are coming now)
One of them was killing Scarlemagne right when he was starting to redeem himself and it seemed to me at least, completely unnecessary. The message that I adored and is one of the strongest attributes that the show has to offer, is the same that is already established in the earlier seasons (that mutes and humans should learn to coexist and be friendly to each other) and this one didn't bring anything new to the table and felt a little bit repetitive and dragged.
I also have a problem with the villain Emilia, she was bad for the sakes of being bad, just because she has a superiority complex and her daddy had big expetations from her, she is now bad enough to even execute her own brother just because he became friends with a mute, a change that happened in just an hour!! And until that point she seemed to be pretty close to her brother, being best friends and work together and she even defended him to her arrogant father. That one choice of him was enough for her to execute him on the spot?? Not even to consider anything else as a solution, not any other option (maybe to leave him there or blackmail him with something to keep his mouth shut or anything else). Azula that was basicly evil in human form when she was ''betrayed'' by Mai and Ty Lee, her friends from childhood and she was pissed like hell, she just put them away in some dungeon-jail, she didn't executed them on the spot, who whould do that? And only for just one opinion, to make a decision like that on the spot to a loved one of hers, even if she's crazy mad at him at the moment, it's seems very unrealistic to me. How Emilia does not execute people in a daily basis then? After all she didn't even held back for a moment to think before murdering her own brother!! Also the vaccine, we didn't found out either what will it do or why it wasn't made at all, not even after five years. It's like after they found out that Kipo is immune to the ''cure'', there's no need for a vaccine, who cares about Yumyun and the others! And it sucked cause he was my favourite and they did so much to protect the mutes and now they don't care to bring them back, not even to explain us why??
Also how's any different for Emilia to end up trapped and be lost forever to her mute self, to be the slave-toy of fungus forever? It seems a pretty even punishment to me, but Kipo was so much against the first one but the other one is ok I guess? Not that she didn't deserved that, but heck at least this piece of psychopath is still alive, but Hugo isn't?! She's alive and who knows she's smart and twisted, maybe she will fool fungus one day and escape like Kipo and her friends did once.
But the third season did some good things too like bringing Kipo's mother back to her human self and reunite her with her family, also it showed us Benson's and Dave's backstory and more of Benson's relationship with Troy, just to mention a few things done properly.
To summarize, in my opinion this was a very mediocre season, at least for this show's standards, not awful by any means but it left me a bit empty with many questions and regrets, that this final seasn could have done better. Also in my opinion the music wasn't that good as it was in the first two seasons, not bad but not exceptionally good either. Write me your thoughts on the comments, am I over reacting? I don't know but that's just my criticism about it, if you loved the last season it's perfectly fine as it was supposed to be loved. It's stll one of my favourite animated shows of all time though, that's why I was so harsh with the third season beacause I was expecting even better stuff and a greater ending for this amazing show.