On Sept. 19, GLITCH released the pilot episode of their new 2D animated show, working with Dana Terrace, creator of the Disney animated series “The Owl House,” and within the first week of the pilot’s release it quickly gained over 11 million views.
“Knights of Guinevere,” as described by GLITCH, is a psychological thriller set in an amusement park in the sky. On the planet below, we meet Frankie and Andi, two childhood friends who dream of living better lives as amusement park bot engineers.
Guinevere, the theme park princess, is a system of bots that share a memory core to remember guest interactions in the park.
When Frankie fishes out an old generation Guinevere bot in the shadows below, it quickly becomes the opportunity they needed to get the park’s attention. But the park has secrets, and it isn’t long before Frankie and Andi begin working on repairing and protecting the lost bot the crown forces.
The plot alone isn’t all that’s attracting viewers; media blogs such as earlygame’s are questioning if “Knights of Guinevere” is a callout to Disney and their industry. The reasoning behind this speculation has to do with the drama that “The Owl House” was subject to. Even though the show was very popular, Disney wanted to cancel the show because they feared it didn’t match the company’s brand, eventually leading to the show’s abrupt end.
It’s not just “The Owl House.” Over the past few years, we’ve seen shows with LGBTQ+ representation get cancelled again and again.
For instance, in the past three years, Disney has cancelled a total of four shows that showed LGBTQ+ representation. Even though all of these shows had their own reasons for being cancelled, fans are suspicious that Disney just can’t commit to a show giving good and accurate queer representation.
After the cancellation of “The Owl House,” GLITCH reached out to Terrace and pitched a show without Disney’s restrictions, which became the “Knights of Guinevere.”
GLITCH is all too familiar with restrictions; over the past few years, they’ve been trying to fight streaming platforms such as Netflix’s censorship guidelines. Most known for their two animated series, “The Amazing Digital Circus” and “Murder Drones,” GLITCH has been uploading all of its content onto YouTube, growing the indie animation community.
Outside of the show’s rumored calling-out of Disney, the show is beautifully animated, considering that the show’s 2D animation style is outside of GLITCH’s typical animation style, which is 3D rendering.
The pilot episode itself does a great job at highlighting important plot points while still leaving the viewer with mysteries to solve and follow. GLITCH is used to developing psychological horrors, “The Amazing Digital Circus” being one of their most mysterious shows of all. Fan theories heavily plague GLITCH’s viewership.
If you’re not a fan of psychological horror or shows that are intended to give viewers the creeps, I would avoid this one. However, if that genre is right up your alley, this may be the show for you.
Especially for viewers looking for animation styles similar to “The Owl House” and the DreamWorks relaunch of “She-Ra: Princess of Power.”
Don’t worry, though. The “Knights of Guinevere” follows its own plot, and if the series gets the production greenlight, it will be its own stand-alone series for all to enjoy.
With the pilot episode’s success, I can’t say I will be surprised when the show gets the official greenlight to continue with the first season. Overall, I rate “Knights of Guinevere” a 9/10. If you’re looking for a sci-fi-themed thriller, I recommend checking out the pilot episode, which can be found on YouTube.