Edited and Written by: Ryan
Super Wings is a South Korean animated tv show created in 2013 by Gil Hoon Jung and produced by FunnyFlux Entertainment.
In this blog, I will explain why I personally believe this show lost its charm. Please note that this is my own opinions and do not take these reviews seriously.
Warning! Spoilers Ahead!
Overview
Ever since discovering this show during the COVID lockdowns, Super Wings became my go-to comfort show during these uncertain times. However, as I grew older and rewatch the show multiple, I soon realized that Super Wings has its flaws, and the more I kept rewatching and revisiting them, I disappointed at the direction this show is currently heading.
For context, Super Wings is a show about a group of planes called the Super Wings who can transform into robots. The main character is Jett, a red delivery plane who delivers packages to children around the world. In the series, they get to learn about different cultures, languages, and countries while also solving problems along the way.
The format are usually different between seasons, originally, it is mostly Jett who travels alone to deliver packages and whenever a problem arises, he would call the Super Wings for assistance. From season 4, Jett would be accompanied by a fellow Super Wing for his deliveries and instead of calling for backup, they would call for something called Super Charge, which is basically a power-up. In season 5, Jett would be accompanied by Jett Pet, a boxy, cuter version of himself. Season 6 would be the last time the show follows the original delivery format before switching to the season 4 format.
Problem 1: Repetitive Format & Poor Story Quality
The show primarily focuses, or if not, mainly focuses on Jett delivering packages to children around the world. I honestly find this quite repetitive as it is present in nearly every single episode and seasons. While there are some episodes that doesn’t feature a delivery, it still annoys me on how they kept using this concept since day one instead of changing scenes. In season 5, they introduced Golden Boy, the show’s first ever permanent antagonist and a foil to Jett. At first, I thought that this was a great idea as it introduces new problems and challenges unlike the previous seasons where there are no actual opposing forces to confront the characters.
However, as I lean further into this new format, I became disillusioned at how they treated this new hero vs villain concept, but I will explain this in the next section.
From season 8 onwards, I genuinely believed that the show fell flat. They replaced a majority of the original cast with new ones. They also change their headquarter format. Initially, they started off with an airport, then switch to a flying airship from season 4 onwards, and finally, in season 8, they set up their new base in outer space, which defies all logic for me. While technically explainable in-universe to manage logistic and efficiency, I really believe this new format ruined the originality of the show.
They also made several spin-offs of this series, with one notable spin-off series being the Dino Wings. I frankly despise how they incorporate this spin-off into active seasons as filler episodes instead of treating and making it as a different show. Much like how Rubble & Crew is its own show instead of being fused into the main PAW Patrol show. One element in particular in this spin-off that makes no sense is how Jett can travel back in time to assist with the Dino Wings. The Dinos are based in the prehistoric era during the times of the dinosaurs and it just doesn’t make any logical sense to me of how they can contact the future from the past.
I also noticed that as the show progressed, they seem to detach more and more from their original touch of actually learning and discovering new language and culture to solving problems more often.
I do believe that they should use the delivery format less often and focus more on the characters and their chemistry instead of just focusing on deliveries.
Problem 2: Consistent Character Write-Offs, Sidelining, & Poor Character Development
Oh boy, here is something I can rant about all day. What I notice in this show is the repeated character write-offs they did since season 2 and lack of character development. This really disturbs me because for me, what really matters in keeping a good story is to write consistent characters that are meaningful to a plot and to introduce them with a specific reason.
This show bothers me so much due to the fact they have a habit of writing off characters every single season since season 2 for no inexplicable reasons at all. Worst of all, most of these characters were only introduced for a single season only to never be seen again. They also gave these characters barely enough screen time and chemistry with others.
Some of these characters also made zero sense for me at all when they were first introduced. Characters like Sara or Shine. While I do understand it is a children’s show, it just does not fits me that some characters appear without a meaningful explanation to be there in the first place.
Another factor is how random these character’s abilities and skillsets can be, ranging from the ability to travel through time to a character with literal god-like abilities.
On the villain side, I can’t fathom the fact that whenever the antagonist gets a new assistant, they wrote them off the next season and replace them with another, repeating the cycle. It really annoys me how the writers sideline these henchmen every single season since season 6 instead of grouping them and make them work together to fight off the Super Wings.
Season 8 really blew me off with probably the biggest character change ever. Out of the 6 main characters, 4 of them were replaced in this season. In season 10, they wrote off the replacements with the very characters they are intended to replace, which really gets on my nerves.
I also hate how this show’s poster child is the main character as well as the supporting main characters while the other less frequently use supporting characters were treated as dispensable.
Problem 3: Following The Toyetic Model
The Toyetic model is system where movies, tv swhows, or characters are easily translated to marketable merchandise.
For Super Wings, this show basically dependant on this concept and is a huge contribution to the show losing its touch in my opinions. Because they care more about selling merchandises, they practically follow the demands of the manufacturer over the storyline, leading to mass sidelining of characters and themes that don’t make any sense just to sell merchandise.
Honorable Mention: Poor Dubbing, Dialogues, & Scripts
On the technical aspect, the audio and dubbing quality is so bad, especially in the later seasons where the voice actors in the english dub sounds like they do not have any energy to do the voicing and sounds like they even lack the passion and love to voice over them.
The dialogues are cringe worthy sometimes, contrasting the characters on-screen actions, which doesn’t even fits well in addition to the terrible voice acting.
Summary:
To sum up, I truly believe that Super Wings lost its charm lately. However, I still have some hope in this series but nothing can undo my disappointment for the show unless they actually change their storyline and stop writing off characters and introducing meaningless ones.