Review: Star vs the Forces of Evil “Goblin Dogs / By the Book”

 

We do this review BY THE BOOK!


Story A: “Goblin Dogs”

The episode begins in an unspecified dimension, where Star, Marco, and Pony Head are searching for a otherworldly rare food truck that sells “goblin dogs”. Having already searched a dozen other dimensions for the truck, Marco wants to give up and go back to Earth. Star spots the goblin dog truck over the horizon, but there are hundreds of people from other dimensions waiting in line ahead of them. Fortunately, Pony Head’s friend Kelly saved them a spot in line.

While Star and Pony Head catch up on recent events (such as the complete repurposing of St. Olga’s Reform School for Wayward Princesses into a party school), Marco tries to talk to Kelly, but she remains silent the entire time. Marco questions why anyone would wait in such a long line for a hot dog, but several others in the line claim that goblin dogs are the best-tasting hot dogs in the universe; even Pony Head claims to have had one before. During the wait, little goblins entertain the crowd by playing music and giving out T-shirts.

After hours of waiting, Marco approaches one of the goblins named Roy to complain, and Roy offers to sneak him and his friends into the much shorter V.I.P. line. As part of this arrangement, they are forced to boy a lot of goblin dog merchandise using Marco’s money

When they finally reach the front of the line, Roy directs them to another line to wait in. To Star and her friends’ horror, the waiting line for goblin dogs is just a never-ending chain of waiting lines. Marco demands to speak to Roy’s manager (who is just Roy wearing a different hat) and discovers that some people have waited in line for years just to try a goblin dog.

After also discovering that Pony Head lied about trying a goblin dog before, Marco is fed up and starts to leave. Pony Head stops him, and Star argues that even though Pony Head lied, Roy is even guiltier for misleading everyone waiting in line. Because of this, the other people in the line start to riot and angrily rush the truck. After fending off the rioters with a T-shirt cannon, Roy drives off, and Star and her friends give chase.

Star stops him by turning the truck’s tires into marshmallows, and Pony Head demands some goblin dogs. Roy confesses that goblin dogs are not real and that he’s just a con artist. He offers to refund Marco’s money, but Marco lets him keep it to serve as a constant reminder of his displeased customers.

Because of Marco’s generosity, Roy tells him that he passed the goblin dog trial, and Kelly finally speaks up. Roy explains that goblin dogs are real, but they are not simply given to anyone—the goblin dogs choose their master, and they have now chosen Star and her friends. Through an impressive display of magic, Roy serves goblin dogs to Star and the others. They taste like ordinary hot dogs at first, but Star and her friends soon experience colorful, hallucinatory vision.

Though they agree that goblin dogs were indeed worth the wait, they decide to finally go home. As Marco gives his farewell to Kelly, he meets her boyfriend Tad – a short, bushy creature who lives in Kelly’s hair stating that he’s a vegan and the episode ends.

Overview:

Despite the (I thought) abrupt beginning, Goblin Dogs was a fun little episode chronicling the all-day adventures of being in line for a legendary food everyone’s extremely racing to get at a hardcore level, with some good laughs in hand and a brilliant twist ending. It’s also nice to see Jerry Trainor getting more work, and he’s actually a riot as Roy here.

SCORE

6/10

Story B: “By the Book”

The episode opens on Mewni, where Ludo still struggles to control his magic wand. As he tries to get it to work properly, Ludo realizes that the wand can speak with him telepathically. The wand tells Ludo to seek out Star Butterfly; though Ludo believes she no longer has a magic wand of her own, he can still extract valuable knowledge from her.

Meanwhile, at the Diaz Household on Earth, The Blue Imp, Glossaryck (voice by Jeffery Tambor) trains Star in the use of her new magic wand with the help of her Magic Instruction Book, but Star is incredibly bored by all the lessons.

Because of her lack of enthusiasm and effort, the spells she performs are not as effective as they should be.

When Star declares that she’s done with training for the day, she accidentally implies that she and Glossaryck are not friends and that they don’t have any fun when they’re together.

Deeply upset by Star’s words, Glossaryck retreats into a donut box. Star tries to apologize to Glossaryck, but he refuses to come out.

In an attempt to draw Glossaryck out of hiding, Marco and Star take him to the movies. (A really weird one too.) Also the fans on Tumblr think this overly random & dramatic scene of the movie they’re watching could be possible foreshadowing of Star & Marco’s relationship. (Guys This is “Star vs the Forces of Evil” not “Rabid Shipper Porn.”

However, Glossaryck refuses to even speak to Star, only giving her messages through Marco. Star tries to conjure up some snacks with magic, but her spells continue to backfire on her.

That night, Star and Marco try to get Glossaryck out of the donut box by faking a monster attack, but he doesn’t fall for it. In their final attempt to get Glossaryck out of the box, Star and Marco drop the box in a smelly dumpster. Unfortunately, the dumpster is picked up by a garbage truck, and Glossaryck’s box falls into the trash compactor.

Before Star and Marco can rescue Glossaryck, Ludo and his giant eagle and spider companions appear out of a dimensional portal. Star and Ludo are each equally surprised that the other wields a magic wand. Ludo attacks Star with his wild and unpredictable magic, and Star fights back with less-than-effective spells because she hasn’t been taking her training seriously.

As Star and Ludo duel, Marco fends off the giant eagle and spider. Star tries to save Glossaryck from the trash compactor, but Ludo constantly intervenes, and the donut box is eventually crushed.

Star and Marco are horrified by Glossaryck’s apparent demise, and Ludo prepares to capture Star. Star tries to fight back, but her spells still don’t work correctly. Before Ludo can destroy Star, the donut box pops out of the trash compactor and lands in front of him, causing him to trip. Glossaryck then emerges from the donut box completely unharmed. He calls the Magic Instruction Book to him and tells Star to perform an Incantation Dance on one of its pages. Without hesitation, Star performs the dance and summons a stampede of warnicorns to defeat Ludo and his companions and send them back to Mewni.

Star finally realizes the benefit of taking her wand training seriously. She apologizes to Glossaryck for hurting his feelings, but Glossaryck reveals that the entire ordeal was all part of his plan, including locking himself in the donut box, falling into the trash compactor, and tripping Ludo.

Meanwhile, back on Mewni, though Ludo has been defeated, he is pleased to learn of the existence of Star’s instruction book and the Episode Ends.

Overview:

So you mean to tell me that NO ONE (Marco, Ludo, and even Star her self) realized that each wand had half a star? That maybe the need to take the wand from Ludo?? -No, just gonna banish him back from where he came not questioned anything. WHAT THE HELL!!??.

Because of this major plot-hole I thought it could’ve been executed better, it’s still a pretty good episode. It’s nice to see Glossaryck’s brilliance in action, I really like the ending when Star and Ludo met again at last (and Ludo even learned Marco’s name finally, though if any certain theories are correct, that AND the fact that Ludo is actually becoming more legitimately evil as the season progresses (might be more from Toffee’s Dark influence on the wand), and it’s a neat way to move the season’s plot along. Also, the part at the movie theater was really funny yet possibly foreboding. Honestly, though, not really much to say about the rest of it. Never thought much of it at first, but quickly, I grew to really like this one.

So yeah, that’s the long and short of tonight’s adventures.

SCORE

5/10