Elena of Avalor S2 E5

## Plot

Well, what do you know, Migs's kids and Dulce show up again after being introduced last episode! The kids seem more articulate and talkative, and Migs wants to be a cool dad and impress them. There's a jaquin festival going on in Avalor, and Elena and Naomi are busy making sure that everything is perfect. Especially Naomi, since Elena made her the festival planner. Meanwhile, Shuriki is making a shapeshifting potion. Carla will drink it and be transformed into a total stranger. After that, she'll go to the palace and pretend to be Armando's long lost relative. Then she'll find a way into the treasury and steal Lucia's tiara, which is confirmed to have a magical jewel. I knew it! She drinks it, but there's one flaw: Her reflection looks the same. Victor tells her to stay away from mirrors, and she'll fool everyone. She poses as Rita, Armando's prima, or cousin. She gets him to give her a tour of the palace. Migs, Luna, and Skylar are doing a practice festival flyover for Isabel, Estrella, Zoom, and Mingo. However, the kids aren't impressed. Migs wants to add more tricks to the routine to impress them, and Isabel says that she has an invention that can help. Carla wants to see the royal treasury, but Armando tells her that it will only be opened tomorrow, so Naomi, the festival planner, can grab the golden jaquin statue. She has to convince Elena that she would make a better planner than Naomi. She convinces them to move everything from the port to the stadium to hold a big crowd. Isabel gives the jaquins sky painters. All they have to do is turn a gear to release a trail of colorful smoke. After Luna and Skylar make fun of Migs, he quits and decides not to do the flyover. Carla dresses the same as Naomi, and rips the banner she had worked so hard on so she can replace it with one she made. Elena and Naomi talk, and Naomi thinks that "Rita" is trying to make her look bad and ruined her banner on purpose. Elena thinks that she just looks up to Naomi. Carla also adds vinegar to the anoki berries, which makes them go sour, and hides the jaquin masks for the little kids. Also, Elena wears another beautiful dress. Naomi quickly fixes all of Carla's setbacks, telling "Rita" that they can have jaquin face painting, and jaquin shaped cookies. Carla lies and says that there's a big bush of anoki berries at the glen by the waterfall, and claims that Elena will think that she saved the festival and will be grateful to her instead of Naomi. A glen is a type of valley. Naomi gets jealous and goes instead, not knowing that it was all a lie by Carla to manipulate her, and to pass off her ideas to Elena as "Rita's" own. Luna, Skylar, and Isabel go to Mooncliff Mountain to convince Migs to do the flyover. He doesn't want to let his kids down. Isabel also has a new dress. She says that Migs will only let his kids down if he doesn't show up. He changes his mind, and Luna and Skylar agree to practice his routine and listen to him this time. Naomi shows up, disheveled and furious. She accuses "Rita" of stealing everything from her, including the masks, and storms out to prove it. Elena and Carla go after her. Elena thinks that Naomi is under too much pressure from all the festival planning. Naomi gets angry, quits, and leaves. "Rita" volunteers to be the planner in her place. Back at her house, Naomi gets a package addressed to her. It's the jaquin masks. This makes her think that "Rita" is innocent and didn't take the masks. Technically, she didn't, she just hid them, but still! She has the same voice as Carla! Why don't any of you notice her reflection?! Carla reminds Elena about the jaquin statue. However, she sends Rico the royal guard with her to escort her and gives him the key. Naomi meets up with Elena at the stadium and talks to her. She admits that she felt like Rita was taking her place as festival planner, and as Elena's best friend, and she was jealous. Elena assures her that no one could ever take her place, and the two hug and make up. Naomi heads to the palace to apologize to Rita personally. Rico disarms the traps in the treasury. Carla sends him away by saying that the statue looks too heavy for one guard, so he should go get another one. Before she can steal the tiara, Naomi comes in and apologizes to her. Rico comes back with another guard. They leave with the statue, and Carla is forced to leave without the tiara. The flyover is about to start. King Verago and Chief Zephyr are there, as well as a jaquin named Cruz, who Luna says will be the next jaquin chief. Dulce, Estrella, Zoom, and Mingo are also there. Everyone loves the flyover performance. Carla tells Victor what happened. He tells her that she has to come up with another plan to steal the tiara soon, since the potion won't last forever.

## Review

Admittedly, both the A and B plots felt very cliché, but I guess the writers did put their own spin on them. For starters, Carla really *was* trying to take Naomi's place as festival planner, and she *did* rip the banner and hide the masks. Migs isn't your stereotypical, bumbling, incompetent dad, nor was he an absentee or neglectful one who only focused on work, and he didn't try to be "the fun parent" in order to make his kids like him. In fact, he just became a father in the previous episode. Plus, I will take any mediocre plot if it means I can see those adorable baby jaquins again. They're so cute! If I had one major problem with this episode, it would be that Carla was never discovered. It was especially obvious in the end. You'd think that in a place full of reflective surfaces like the treasury, she'd be spotted easily, but nope! Seriously, why set up an Achilles' Heel if it's never going to be used? I guess that's a nice way to subvert audience expectations, but still! While I do like the more serialized nature of the show, they have to take arcs like this slow, or the pacing may feel too fast or too slow. Or, as was the case in this episode, completely unnecessary. Carla didn't accomplish her goal, but no one found her out, so no actual progress was made in the story arc. This is the third episode of the season that we've seen Carla, Victor, and Shuriki in, and it's just the fifth episode of the season overall! You have to take your time on myth arcs, and only reveal a little at a time, with filler episodes in between. But the filler episodes themselves have to at least be entertaining, to keep people coming back on a weekly, biweekly, or monthly basis, like *DuckTales (2017)* or Tangled: The Series. I guess they wanted the long hiatus to not start with a filler episode, but still, it just really bugs me.