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The birds don't have much time to miss Gale after her departure before a great ruckus erupts in the forest beneath the Big Tree. What in the name of Golden Island is going on down there?!
This episode should be a fun one, in theory. It shows us how Gale's betrayal affects Stella; it shows the pigs' work ethics, given that they've felled a significant portion of the forest AND built half a castle seemingly overnight; it sets up the enviromentalist themes that the Angry Birds Stella sub-series as a whole wants to achieve; introduces us to Handsome Pig; shows off the flock's fighting prowesses in a fight scene; and it reinforces Gale's betrayal.
Unfortunately, this episode is a little underwhelming to me. I'd even say you could skip the most of the episode and it wouldn't affect your viewing experience. For starters, in the afformentioned fight scene, we don't actually see the birds use their abilities, instead they just punch and kick using their head feathers. Even then, the birds literally NEVER get physical with the pigs ever again! And the enviromentalism? Also never gets brought up again! This makes 2 out of 6 points in the first paragraph ultimately pointless.
At least we still got 4 points, right? Well, "the pigs are hardworking" and "Gale is evil" are both things we already learned from watching the previous episode, and will continue to learn by simply watching the rest of the show. I feel like you don't need to dedicate nearly a whole episode to simply these two points.
So what does this mean? This means that the only real important part of this episode are the beginning and end scenes at the Big Tree. Everything else in between is completely irrelevant, and gives no further insight about the characters(save for Handsome Pig's glorious character establishing moment).
But now it's for some positivity, because these few important bits are indeed important! They effectively establish that Gale's betrayal affects Stella the most: The others have already started to joke at Gale's expense, whilst Stella's still reminiscing what she had lost. But in the end, she realizes that she still has 4 other friends to appreciate.
Handsome Pig's introduction is also pretty unforgettable. It's nothing revolutionary, but it gives you a solid idea of his character in a quick, concise manner.
That's about all I can say about this episode. It sets up conflict between Stella and Gale, and introduces a secondary antagonist, but unfortunately does not do much for most of its runtime.
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