2023’s Greatest TV Character Isn’t the One You’re Thinking Of – Armessa Movie News

There are a lot of characters in TV shows. There are even a lot of very good characters in TV shows. But sometimes, a character rises above the rest and enhances your enjoyment of the entire show just by being there. The kind of character you’d keep watching the show for even if the rest of the show isn’t as good. This was my recent experience with Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix. Specifically, that character was Bullfrog (Balak), who is unequivocally the best TV character of 2023, and you cannot convince me otherwise.

What is ‘Captain Laserhawk’ About?

To understand what makes Bullfrog so great, you’ll need some context. Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix is a reimagining of video game publisher Ubisoft’s wide catalog of video game franchises, set in a dystopian cyberpunk version of 1992. It takes its name from a 2013 expansion to 2012’s Far Cry 3 but incorporates characters and ideas from many different Ubisoft games, from Assassin’s Creed and WATCH_DOGS to Rayman and Rabbids. The general arc of the story follows the titular Dolph Laserhawk (Nathaniel Curtis) after he’s betrayed by his boyfriend and partner Alex Taylor (Boris Hiestand) during a heist. Laserhawk is captured by the villainous Eden (a technocracy that has taken the place of the United States of America) and locked away in a black site prison called Supermaxx. There, the Warden (Caroline Ford) of Supermaxx uses him and other prisoners with special talents as a secret task force called the Ghosts. These missions ultimately cause Laserhawk and Alex’s paths to cross again, as Alex seeks to destroy Eden through a violent and destructive revolution.

All that paints a straightforward picture of a show that is anything but. While Laserhawk is always at the center of the story, the show’s supporting cast is a wild assortment of Ubisoft’s most iconic characters. The Warden turns out to be a character from the Splinter Cell games, while the operators from Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege are reimagined as a Power Rangers-style team of enforcers for Eden. More jarringly, the titular hero of the platformer series Rayman (David Menkin) is the Voice of Eden, spewing propaganda for the villainous Board of Directors. Other characters are pulled from games like The Crew and Beyond Good & Evil, resulting in a pastiche of styles and tones that is completely unexpected for anyone with a passing familiarity with these games.

Most bizarrely, however, is that it all works. The show’s pacing is uneven, and its plot is inconsistent, but the crossover unfolding before your eyes is simply too captivating to look away. You shouldn’t be able to put everything together like this and feel like it belongs together, but it does. Captain Laserhawk uses the cyberpunk trappings of the original Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon to fit everything nicely together in a massive homage to Ubisoft’s publication history. And the best example of this is Bullfrog the Assassin.

Who Is Bullfrog in ‘Captain Laserhawk’?

Bullfrog is an anthropomorphic frog and French Assassin who is a member of the Ghosts alongside Dolph Laserhawk. That’s ‘Assassin’ with a capital A, as Bullfrog is the last living member of the Assassin Brotherhood from the Assassin’s Creed games. He wears a costume inspired by those of the game series’ protagonists, especially the iconic costume of fan-favorite character Ezio. He regularly references his adherence to the Creed, the code of honor and ethics all Assassins are supposed to follow. He repeatedly performs the iconic Leap of Faith maneuver that has become synonymous with the Assassin’s Creed franchise. Seemingly unrelated to being an Assassin, he can also blow (he calls it blowing, but it’s more like belching) bubbles, in which he can see images of the past and occasionally the future. He plays a major supporting role throughout the show, using his talents at the behest of the Warden but also to undermine Eden.

But unlike other key characters, like Alex, the Warden, or Marcus Holloway (Mark Ebulue), Bullfrog isn’t directly lifted from a Ubisoft game. He’s an Assassin, but he’s also a Hybrid, a creature with both human and animal traits like Rayman, who is a bird-like hybrid (sort of — it’s complicated). He’s an explicit crossover character in a way most of the others aren’t. He bridges the gap between the more apparently ‘serious’ characters from games like WATCH_DOGS or Splinter Cell with the lighter games like Rayman, both in terms of the plot and tone. The fact that he’s a Hybrid connects him to characters like Rayman or Pey’j (Glenn Wrage) as they deal with Eden’s systemic oppression. But his role as an Assassin gives him more agency than most of the show’s other Hybrid characters, and directly ties him to the main plot after the final episode quietly reveals that Eden is the current iteration of the Templar Order, the primary antagonists of the Assassin’s Creed franchise. But it’s not this crucial narrative space that he occupies that makes him the best.

Bullfrog Is the Best Television Character of 2023. Period.

In many ways, Bullfrog is the moral center of Captain Laserhawk. While he doesn’t have a character arc like Dolph or Rayman do, he’s essential to the stories of everyone else he interacts with. When Pey’j is struggling with his desire to enact violent revenge, Bullfrog reaches out to stop him before he can do something he regrets. And at Dolph’s lowest moments, it’s the memory of Bullfrog’s unflinching devotion to his friends and ideals that convinces him to get back in the fight. And a single interaction with Bullfrog is enough to drastically change the arc of Rayman’s character in the final two episodes. He’s an incredibly empathetic and generous individual, which becomes more and more obvious the longer the show goes on. When faced with the threat of imminent death, Bullfrog’s thoughts go to the friends who didn’t make it as far as he did. His only regret is that he didn’t do more to help them while he could. He’s more emotionally mature than just about anyone else on the show and is a source of wisdom and comfort for those around him.

But he manages to do all that while also being both hilarious and adorable. Despite being fully capable of standing on his own two legs, he often sits like a frog. He’s notably smaller than the rest of the characters, barely coming up to their waists. He really wants to be able to assassinate the bad guys he encounters and gets very disappointed if he’s not allowed to. He tries to find the best in any situation, such as trying to break the tension after a rough mission by turning on the radio or relishing the small joys of juice boxes while he’s incarcerated. All this is enhanced by some truly delightful animation that rapidly and smoothly shifts between more serious moments and the funny ones. But the humor of his character never undercuts the serious moments.

And finally, Bullfrog is a total badass. He’s a frighteningly competent Assassin, capable of great feats of stealth and combat. His one solo action sequence, about halfway through the show, demonstrates exactly what he’s capable of. After ineffectually bouncing off one of his much taller and more visually imposing opponents several times, he takes a moment to explain the power of his bubbles to them. Then he asks, “Would you like to know which one of you will die first?” which is objectively one of the coolest things you can say in that situation. He then kills all three opponents in under 20 seconds despite their own supernatural and technological abilities. Throughout the rest of the show, he’s shown to be calm and collected in a crisis and is the only Ghost to not crack under pressure in their first mission. In a show full of incredibly capable and powerful fighters, Bullfrog ranks up there with the best of them, and he doesn’t even have a laser cannon.

The fact that Bullfrog manages to perfectly balance between being funny, cool, and genuine without any dissonance is impressive. He evokes the best bits of other iconic characters like Yoda, Paddington, or the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. He should just be a silly little joke character, but instead, he’s the heart of the whole show. Captain Laserhawk is far from the best thing to be released in 2023 — it’s messy and sometimes contradictory, it goes a little too fast, and it doesn’t treat all its characters with the same amount of respect. It takes a lot for a single character to elevate the show they’re in, but Bullfrog can do that and more. He deserves his own show, or better yet, his own Assassin’s Creed game. He’s just that great.

Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix is now streaming on Netflix in the U.S.

Watch Now