With last night's premiere of Voltron Force, the world was introduced to three new cadets who are going to be trained to eventually become pilots. Unfortunately, the three are a psychopath, a speed freak, and a nerd.
Daniel, the main character who's bizarrely into going fast, is plucked by the Voltron team out of the Galactic Alliance Flight Academy, along with his new friend, the super-intelligent Vince, to train to eventually become pilots of the lions.
Although the lions were outlawed after an accident by the evil Sky Marshall Wade and the Galactic Alliance, the growth of a new evil in the universe — the return of King Lotor — has forced the pilots to become outlaws and free the Lions. Neither Daniel nor Vince seem to bat an eye at leaving behind their lives to become part of Voltron (the issue of parents is completely ignored –- got to love cartoon logic).
When they arrive on Arus, they meet the other recruit: the nephew of Princess Allura, Larmina. Happy to meet the other recruits, she greets them warmly with a sarcastic "Oh yay, classmates." The psychopath has arrived. And for some reason, her surly greeting immediately makes Daniel have a crush on her.
The three of them are probably the worst part of the show. Despite some clever moments from Keith and the fun idea of having Voltron get in a fight with both Lotor and the Galactic Alliance, the new characters really get in the way. Daniel uses the word "snark" as an insult multiple times, at one point actually says "I can tell something cool is going on here," and subtly talks about how going fast is the best way to get things done. And he explicitly calls himself impulsive, just in case you missed that bit of characterization. He has no time to learn in classrooms, he needs to fly!
Larmina is bizarrely into hand-to-hand combat and when her Aunt Allura is kidnapped, she is excited to have a fight, but does not seem concerned about her Aunt at all. Even Keith thinks it's weird enough to comment on. Finally, Vince is such a nerdy wimp that when asked to fly a lion, he mumbles and waits for Daniel to get there, despite showing great aptitude in the simulator.
It is not necessarily a surprise that a children's show lacks perfect logic, but these three are unbearable. The charm of the old characters seems to be there and seeing them all out shout "Let's go Voltron Force" is certainly cool, so there is hope for the show. The CG lion-bot moments were not lost on me — nice job all around in every action scene. Plus there's a space mouse, space sunglasses, and really strange aliens who wear rings on all of their fingers (check it out). So there's always that.