Zay-tah! Can you say it? All together, now. ZAY-TAH!

Rather sad, in that TZP and SS seem to represent the dumbing-down of WBA’s action shows, just as PE&tB and H! heralded the dumbing-down of their comedy shows. Still, TZP wasn’t nearly as bad as I’d feared. It’s fairly enjoyable, and less corny than SS, anyway.

My biggest objection is probably the main titles. *gag* They actually expect to grab people with THAT? I guess they’re trying to create something of a departure from B:TAS / S:TAS / TNBSA / BB by throwing some dialogue in there. I don’t know what effect they were going for, but it comes off as shouting to the audience, Hey! This show is just like everything else in kids’ television! Watch it if you like, but it doesn’t really matter it probably won’t be here next season anyway.

Other than that, the designs did not thrill me. They weren’t awful, but it seems like the designers (one of the names I saw in the credits was the much-disliked Bob Doucette, of H! / D! fame) took the stylized Bruce Timm look from TNBSA / BB, and stylized it even further. The result is really flat, pointy characters, which are not pleasant to look at. The backgrounds are pretty dull, too nowhere near as cool as any of the shows Timm worked on. Ah, well.

The writing was a bit better. Alan Burnett’s second attempt at a series independent of Dini & Timm this season is arguably more effective than his first (I say arguably, because the writing is undoubtedly better here, but it doesn’t have that fun element that SS has). The biggest surprise for me was Ro you know, I actually liked her! I’d figured she’s probably be tolerable at best, but I actually liked her! Sort of reminiscent of Gosalyn Mallard she’s been alone all her life, she’s something of a smartass, but she’s a sweet, well-meaning kid. She’s got spirit. ;)

The plot still has many echoes of IG. Agent Bennett seems a pretty one-dimensional character nowhere near as fun as the psychologically complex villains on B:TAS. But we’ll see what happens with him. Agent West was rather banal, but he had his moments.

The plot idea of trying to find Z’s creators was a nice touch. Gives them something to do besides run away from the Feds. And the chemistry between Zeta and Ro was quite charming. Z’s naiveté and Ro’s getting involved with him despite her better sense telling her not to were pretty well-done. They managed to get me interested enough in the characters to tune in next week, anyhoo.

Nothing to stop the presses over, but we’ll see what happens. I’ll give it a tentative thumbs-up.


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