Episode 7 - Fuli's New Family

[s-tlk]

So time for episode No. 7:


The rest of the Lion Guard is sad about Fuli's lonely hunts, so they decided to take Fuli in each of the members' families hunting sessions, when she seems to be alone. What they didn't realize is that Fuli prefers to hunt on her own. When every attempt to include her ends in a catastrophe, Fuli runs away. After the song "My own way", she hears Bunga in the outlands and Fuli saved him from another attempt to get himself killed. In the end they they realized that they need to respect Fuli's wish to be on her own sometimes.


I actually enjoyed this episode very much. Good thing that not always Kion is the center of attention and we learn more about the other members. Plus it had a very cute ending:
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Hopefully there will be more of this kind in the future. Of course you shouldn't try to incorporate anything we saw into SP, especially everything related to Kiara. Fuli also seems to be much older than the others as she's acting more mature and is as big as Kion.

[Aurelian]

Fuli kinda reminds me of myself. A loner by nature, but still like to hang with friends on MY time. Not much for being touched unless I innitiate.

I am also pretty damned fast in short bursts.

[Kasei]

Actually probably one of the better episodes, in my opinion. I could've done with a little less of the Bunga side story though, personally. But whatever. Kids probably think he's funny or something. It was nice to get to have a Fuli episode...so excited for the Beshte one! x3 He's quickly becoming one of my favorite personalities on the show. So good natured, I love 'im.

Okay, and I gotta admit--I definitely legitimately Lol'd at the chipper "That's not mud!" comment from Ono. xD Wasn't expecting that.

Also, I feel like once Kiara and Fuli get older that they will be awesome hunting buddies/friends. They both seemed really into getting the job done....even though Kiara is a terrible hunter apparently according to SP, but whatever. xD I'm just treating the lion guard like an AU realtiy spin off or something.

Biggest takeaway from the ep: Bunga is an idiot. And super annoying. Also, when did Timon and Pumbaa start being such terrible parents? They managed to raise Simba didn't they? Why didn't they correct his misunderstanding when he was STANDING RIGHT IN FRONT OF THEM?? And clearly trying to hang out in a gator's mouth?

[KanuTGL]

I second everything Kasei said :p

I haven't been very fond of Fuli to begin with and wasn't sure what I was going to think about this story, but she's really grown on me with this episode. It's really very nice to see a character who likes her alone time shown in a positive light :3 Female character I can identify with - yay! Her song was pretty cool too. Beshte is still my darling, but Fuli is climbing the ranks on my list of favourites now, haha!

Also, The Lion Guard's idea of "being brave" is "to be stupid" apparently... Fearlessness/foolhardiness is not the same as bravery and I'm growing more and more frustrated with Bunga with every scene he's in :go-on:

If anyone was being brave in this episode it was Fuli, who rushed in to save Bunga even though he was being chased by hyenas in a volcano...

[Lyonize]

You guys have pretty much conveyed all my thoughts.

As for Bunga, I think he needs to understand danger before I can take his "bravery" seriously. Bravery is an understanding of what could happen but doing it anyway while Bunga is just like "lol YOLO. What's the worst that could happen?"

[Leorgathar]

As for Bunga, I think he needs to understand danger before I can take his "bravery" seriously. Bravery is an understanding of what could happen but doing it anyway while Bunga is just like "lol YOLO. What's the worst that could happen?"

YES! this. I think Bunga would really benefit from an episode where he learns this lesson, just like Simba did in TLK with the Elephant Graveyard incident: Be brave only when you have to be. Being brave doesn't mean you go looking for trouble.
Place him in a similar situation, one where he really messes up and the rest of the Guard gets angry at him, then he learns the lesson and later on he proves his bravery in the right way. That episode has to happen, otherwise he's just in the Guard because he's friends with Kion, and that's kinda low.

But overall I enjoyed this episode, it's one of my favourites now. I too am glad Fuli's alone time was respected in the end, it was a good lesson and one I can certainly relate to. Fuli is starting to shine as a amazing female character, I can't wait to see more of her ^^

Most of my thoughts have already been covered, I'll just add that we now have confirmation that there's an active volcano in the Outlands (in the movies we only saw geysers). I have my doubts about that being possible, but hey! this totally explains this lava level (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijiiHQfwXTs) from the TLK SNES game! That's pretty much the only problem I had with it and now it's been solved, lava rivers and all! I can finally rest in peace :lol:

[Kasei]

That episode has to happen, otherwise he's just in the Guard because he's friends with Kion, and that's kinda low.


So you just made me think back to the movie and how the minute Simba saw that Kion had chosen Bunga to be in the guard he was like, "Seriously Kion?! I want you to actually DO this, not play with your friends!" Everyone painted Simba in this racist sort of light when he did that, but now that I know more about Bunga (not that I liked him a ton in the movie, but...) I can TOTALLY see why that was Simba's gut reaction. I'm sure Simba is familiar with Bunga's idiocy at this point and did not relish the idea of him being in the guard. I mean, if I gave my son a big responsibility to choose what is essentially a special task police force and he came back with that clown in tow as his first choice...well, I'd be pretty upset too and feel like he wasn't taking it seriously.

[Lyonize]

I was thinking the same thing! I saw bunga in this episode and I was like "No wonder Simba was so prejudiced!"

We can only hope Bunga gets better as the show goes on. Y'know. Character development and all that. :scartsk:

[s-tlk]

In every series there is a someone like Bunga for the simple reason that this guy gets everything explained. Otherwise there is no way the audience gain what is common knowledge between the rest of the characters. And don't forget that this series is for little kids, so I seriously doubt it get any better.

[Lyonize]

Yeah, that's why they do it. Still, I think kids are smarter than these writers/studios think they are. I don't have any kind of data or studies to back that up, but if kids can't understand Rafiki saying "Ayy don't worry about it. Honey badgers are immune to snake venom", I'll have lost a little faith in humanity. I still think at least half the kids would get it and the other half would have just learned a new word.

[KanuTGL]

I don't think the writers underestimate the viewers, if you look at a lot of the other themes in TLG that are fairly "advanced" for the target audience. I think Bunga is meant to be partly an audience insert that gets everything explained, like s-tlk said, but he could also be made to be really dumb to let the viewers feel smart. A lot of people I know like to watch extremely stupid reality TV for the sole reason of feeling smarter than the people in the shows :kionhmph:

[Sharifu]

Okay, and I gotta admit--I definitely legitimately Lol'd at the chipper "That's not mud!" comment from Ono. xD Wasn't expecting that.

Bwhaha, I definitely laughed at that too. :p


I haven't been very fond of Fuli to begin with and wasn't sure what I was going to think about this story, but she's really grown on me with this episode.

I felt that same way about Fuli in the beginning. I just felt like she was always negative and complaining about mostly everything. And even though she was complaining some in this episode, I felt it was for more justified reasons. Well one good reason was she was hungry and everyone kept stopping her from finishing her hunt.

But I also felt we saw more of her personality in this episode and got to understand her and know her better. And I have to agree with s-tlk, I thought the ending was adorable. I definitely "aww'd". Hehe.

[cleargreenwater]

Well, I'm over commenting on every back episode now :p, but this one deserves a mention. Really really really important lesson for "kids" (both the overly friendly and the loner ones) that you need to give people space and leave them alone sometimes, and that that's okay, too. Everyone's pretty much said everything already, but this one's close to my heart just like it is to everyone else who discussed it here.

I didn't like Fuli at first, but I'm a convert.