User blog comment:Mattalamode/A Second Opinion: The Banana / The Sidekick/@comment-30307603-20170609025431/@comment-31194372-20170609173018

BUT WHAT IF RACHEL IS JACKIE? THERE IS EVIDENCE - ALBEIT EVIDENCE THAT I'M TOO LAZY TO FIND - AND IT IS NOT TO BE TAKEN IN VAIN FROM THE LIKES OF YOU.

Darwin's duty as moral compass is simultaneously the reason he exists and the reason he's not any more interesting of a character - it's an irritating stalemate. And yes, episodes like "The Roots" and "The Matchmaker" show an altered angle of him, but we hardly even see him in them at all, and his altercations exist solely to make the other characters more interesting or give them more to do. It's a selfless job. (Funnily enough, even in episodes like "The Triangle" where Darwin actively attempts to dissociate, he's still pushed aside regardless.)

I like "The Banana" a lot, but I just like "The Sidekick" more, probably because I forgot how solid of an episode it was (and I was thus a bit more impressed by it on second watching). "The Banana" is strong because it's entirely standard and works within the understanding that it was going to be a subdued episode. "The Sidekick," on the other hand, went all out in what it was trying to get across - Darwin constantly being lessened on purpose - and I liked that the show was almost addressing its issues in a meaningful way as opposed to spinning it into a self-deprecating joke.

I have to disagree with you in terms of Darwin being more aggressive: I think it was more that he disagreed more vocally with Gumball, and it was further compounded by the fact that his correctness was more readily acknowledged. (Compare how Darwin is correct in "The Bet" and goes on to help fix the situation alongside Gumball with "The Hug," where Darwin objects but Gumball refuses to acknowledge it and even screws with him at the end of the episode about it.) Even if Darwin is always agreeable in objecting to Gumball's whims, the show often ignores him for comedic effect, so nowadays, he only ever provides a false sense of actually balancing out the situation.

Season 2 is one of my favorite seasons (Season 3's the best, and Season 5 is shockingly close to taking second place) just because of how much the show didn't care about satisfying its audience. It just did whatever it wanted to do, an attitude that so few shows utilize but that almost always pays off when done correctly. At the same time, it never came across as try-hard, either, and it was comfortable with what it was as opposed to taking extreme precautions to make it something it wasn't.

As for the whole "series ending early" thing: all will be explained next week. And I do think, or at least hope, that the series will be completed, just not on-schedule. I'm optimistic.