I used to love the original Dora the Explorer series when I was younger, but now I hate it and find that it doesn't hold up anymore. I decided to watch the reboot because I heard that it was an improvement from the original in some ways. I recently watched 6 full episodes, so I gave it a fair chance. It's not as bad as the original, but it's not that much of an improvement. It lacks some of the original's problems, and others remain. If you're a fan of the original Dora, it's unlikely that you'll like the reboot. If you like the reboot or the source material, I can handle your opinion.
Pros:
1. The source material's theme song has been replaced with a new theme song, which I don't find anywhere near as annoying.
2. Dora and Boots surprisingly don't scream a majority of their lines at the top of their lungs anymore, unlike their original portrayals. Instead, they're calmer and more patient with the viewers like Steve, Joe, and Josh from Blue's Clues.
3. Backpack and Map's theme songs, the Travel Song, and We Did It are shortened, and they're not in every episode, so they're not as annoying or repetitive as their original versions. They're also less likely to get stuck in your head when you don't want them to.
4. The pacing is faster than the source material: the reboot's episodes are only 11 minutes, while the source material's episodes are 22 minutes (except for the specials). This means Dora and Boots can now walk a mile in only a minute or two, and they no longer have to overcome obstacles in order to do simple tasks like picking blueberries or buying ice cream.
Cons:
1. Dora and company are still the same annoying, oblivious, flat, and one-dimensional characters, except for the Grumpy Old Troll.
2. The characters still treat the audience like idiots by asking dumb questions that are impossible for even a 4-year-old to answer incorrectly, like "Is this a triangle?" and "Can you see that blue house?". That's right, Dora still asks the audience where her destinations are all the time, even when they're right in front of her or next to her and hard to miss.
3. The series has a generic, Cocomelon-like animation style.
4. Dora and Boots still do their "Swiper, no swiping!" routine, and it still scares Swiper away every time. This could make little kids think they can stop a thief from stealing their belongings and scare them away just by shouting "Swiper, no swiping!" or something similar.
5. Swiper's motivation to steal Dora's belongings is still never explained. To make matters worse, he still never learns not to take things that don't belong to him no matter what. One might think he'd learn from his mistakes after being called out for them thousands of times and that he'd get headaches from hearing Dora and Boots shout at him all the time, but apparently not.
6. Boots is now fluent in both Spanish and English, making the Spanish lessons pointless. He originally only spoke English, and Dora would always teach him Spanish, which allowed the audience to learn Spanish too, as bad as the original series is.
7. The Grumpy Old Troll is now a good guy, and he has less personality than in the original series (from what I've seen). His original portrayal wasn't too good either, but at least he had more personality back then.
8. Map is now female for some unspecified reason. If it's for the sake of gender equality, that seems unnecessary since the source material already had a balanced representation of both male and female characters.
