>>105717902On its face, VLD has a cute art style with a fun cast of characters that seem like they'd have good chemistry, in a fairly familiar and interesting setting thanks to being a legacy show. Not a lot of good sci-fi super robot stuff to choose from lately, and it's taking inspiration from some beloved shows: Robotech, Gurren Lagann, the original Voltron if you were into that.
So on a shallow surface level, there's a lot to draw people in. Add to that people pining over the AtLA series and you have a nice big fanbase before the show even starts. The rest of the show is a study in how to wipe your ass with all that good will.
Over time, people stuck to it less for the show itself and more for what they wish it was. This makes for a very splintered and clannish fanbase divided into camps, mostly over shipping and general waifushit, which of course pisses /co/ off to no fucking end because /co/ these days is full of people who are more concerned with what other people do offsite rather than the show itself. Not to say that the fanbase wasn't a garbage fire, but it was because the show could do NOTHING to unite them over shared interest and just presented them with the basic building blocks of what could have been charming and constantly squandered it.
I hate to be the person that says writing is bad because it didn't go where I wanted it to go, but I'm hard pressed to find many people that are truly satisfied with the whole package or even have any one particular thing that outweighs their disappointment on other fronts.
