Review: Amphibia “The Shut-In!”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

On the eve of a spooky night of staying indoors, the Plantars gather around the fireplace to tell real but scary stories, with Anne’s being about a monster that gets its power from social media, Hop Pop being about him taxing Death around town, and Sprig’s being about a creepy neighbor stealing frog skin. Polly tries to come up with her own, but ends up going outside and turning into a monster.

OUR TAKE
And so we get our last Amphibia episode for the rest of the year, as well as just being over halfway through the whole show! Yes, as it turns out, Amphibia is only planned to have three seasons, and with this eleventh episode of the second season, we’re officially in the second half. As the last check-in we’ll be getting with these characters for a few months, it’s not a terrible place to leave us off, though of course I’ll miss the show all the same. It’s a horror anthology episode not unlike The Simpsons’ usual Treehouse of Horror specials, or more closely resembling Gravity Falls’ “Little Gift Ship of Horrors” episode, which came out in…2014?! Jesus, where does the time go. Though for a title like “The Shut-In!”, whether deliberate or on accident, it certainly evokes how a lot of families are likely going to have to spend their Halloween this year due to the pandemic. But leave to a show like this to at least add some fun to that and make the most of it while we’re stuck like this right now.

But yeah, in terms of these types of episodes, the segments are all equal parts creepy and fun! Anne’s story was certainly more original, though it’s probably going to be super dated in about a year. Hop Pop’s feels more sinister, even if it has to cop out at the end with the hair. And Sprig’s with Ivy is both cute and genuinely horrific, as well as further showing this show’s interesting knowledge of real life frogs (even though actual glass frogs don’t look like that thank god). If I had to pick one among them, I’d probably go with Sprig’s for how it balances creepy and fun, though there really isn’t a bad one in the lot. And Polly’s efforts to get involved were cute and luckily avoided this turning into a clip show like it could have been in less creative hands. And I have to give a shout out to the special intro and outro, complete with spooky remix of the theme music!