ThomasNATION Reviews - Ace's Brave Jump

July 09, 2020

I’ve made it no secret that I like the character that is Ace. While he makes for a terrible villain, he’s still a charming character with a fun personality, a fantastic vocal performance from Peter Andre, and to be fair, one of the best songs of Big World! Big Adventures! He was arguably the best character in the movie, so you can imagine that when it was announced that he would get his own episode, I was pretty jazzed. But is Ace’s own solo adventure as free and easy as he lets on? Let’s begin.
Ace's Brave Jump | Thomas the Tank Engine Wikia | Fandom
While in Australia, Thomas runs into Ace who’s preparing to pull off a major stunt for a show. But there’s just one problem: Ace is afraid of wild animals, so Thomas has to help him overcome his fear.
What I have to admire is how the episode cleverly gives depth to Ace, putting his fear of animals in full focus. This was only briefly touched upon in Big World! Big Adventures!, but it was only for a second and was played mostly for laughs. And I’ll be honest, his fear of animals is kind of justified: he comes from Australia, a land of poisonous spiders, snakes, scorpions, and a whole other set of agressive creatures, so you can see where he’s coming at. I’ll also admit that I do kinda love how he freaks out at a tiny frog on his roof, that was really funny.
However, there is one major problem I have with it to the point where it almost ruins the episode: Thomas’ interactions with Ace. As you recall, Thomas ended his journey with Ace on pretty bad terms after Ace forced him to abandon Nia. Here, it’s almost as if all of that never happened, Thomas is just all buddy-buddy with him. That moment is never even adressed, which is a shame because I feel like the episode should’ve been about Ace trying to redeem himself while Thomas is still mad at him. But nope, Thomas just decides it’s just water under the bridge for no reason, and I just gotta ask “why?” so at the end of the day, it was a major missed opportunity.
But other than that, the episode is a mixed bag. It supplies some decent humor and some good development on Ace, but at the same time it manages to get wrong what should've been so easy to get right. I’d only really recommend this to fans of Ace, but other than that, it’s not really worth it so it earns a 2.5/5. Even as someone who really liked Ace, this episode was a major letdown.

Final Score: 2.5/5

About the Author: JF the LOLZOR

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