tek's rating: ½

Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, on Disney Channel
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Caution: spoilers.

Season One
This is based on comic books I've never read, and probably had never heard of until this show was announced. It's about a 13-year-old genius named Lunella Lafayette (Diamond White), who lives with her parents, Adria and James Jr., and grandparents, Miriam (aka Mimi, voiced by Alfre Woodard) and James Sr. (aka Pops), in New York City's Lower East Side (LES), where they own a roller rink. One day, Lunella finds the schematics for a generator, left behind by a scientist called Moon Girl, who had disappeared years ago. She builds the generator, which turns out to create portals. When one opens, a red T-rex comes through, and quickly bonds with Lunella. She names him Devil Dinosaur (Fred Tatasciore); he communicates in grunts, but they understand each other, somehow. She also befriends a classmate and media influencer named Casey Calderon. And she makes a bunch of gadgets for herself to fight crime, along with Devil, taking on the name Moon Girl for herself. Casey begins managing Moon Girl's social media, and is the only one who knows her secret identity. In one episode, Moon Girl meets a cosmic trickster called the Beyonder (Laurence Fishburne), who causes all sorts of trouble, and could put an end to humanity if he chose to. Moon Girl convinces him not to, but he shows up occasionally after that, always causing some sort of mischief. (Before his introduction as a proper character, he was a narrator for the show.) Whenever Moon Girl thwarts a villain, she calls in S.H.I.E.L.D. to arrest them. Her contact with the organization is Agent Maria Hill (Cobie Smulders). In the two-part season finale, Lunella learns the identity of the original Moon Girl (which I had guessed at least a couple episodes earlier). They work together to fight an enemy named Maris Morlak. They manage to foil his plans, but Moon Girl ends up stuck in another dimension.

The show has lots of cool music, cool animation, some fun humor, and good characters and relationships, and an amazing roster of guest star voices.

Season Two
Moon Girl encounters the Beyonder on a desolate planet ruled by Molecule Man, who has a grudge against the Beyonder. MG and the Beyonder have to work together to get home, but Moon Girl nearly dies, which leaves her traumatized for some time afterward. But while she struggles with PTSD, she eventually gets back to her old heroic self. At one point, she meets a boy named Marvin, who turns out to be a Kree in disguise. They're enemies at first, but Marvin eventually becomes a superhero, calling himself Kid Kree. Then there was an episode that never aired, so I haven't seen it, but would really like to. (It involves LGBTQ themes, and Disney often sucks about that, which is why it didn't air.) Then in another episode, Lunella and the Beyonder have a falling out. Devil makes friends with a group of animals who are former sidekicks of superheroes. Lunella eventually tells her family that she is Moon Girl, which her mom doesn't take well. She's terrified that Lunella could get hurt, so forbids her from being Moon Girl anymore. Adria eventually relents, but it's still some time before she's (somewhat) comfortable acknowleding her daughter's double life. They do eventually bond over Lunella's first period. Pops eventually learns something about Mimi that causes tension between them for awhile, but I won't spoil what it was. Moon Girl and the Beyond eventually make up, and awhile after that, he introduces himself to her family. And Agent Hill offers Moon Girl a chance to join SHIELD on a mission, but MG struggles with deciding whether to accept, because it would leave the LES unprotected in her absence. But throughout the series, she had inspired several villains to reform their ways, and they end up becoming superheroes. So Moon Girl decides to accept the mission, though we don't get to learn what it is. She also finally meets SHIELD's director, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson).

And... I've left out tons of details, of course. But those are most of the big things that happen. The season finale works pretty well as a series finale, but I still really wish there would be a third season (in which hopefully we would get to see MG on her mission with SHIELD). Oh well. The show was a ton of fun while it lasted.


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