GLITCH is an indie studio because they work independently. That is it.

Yes, they have partnerships with Amazon Prime and Netflix but those companies do not interfere with show production nor do they have any say with what happens in the shows; it is, OBJECTIVELY, an indie studio. Also, no, I don't think this is "selling out" either.

Episode 2 of TaDC was to set out the world of the Circus and its many background characters. It establishes that these NPCs DO think and they think they're real people with real lives. If anything, the episode does what it sets out to do perfectly. Gummigoo discovering that he's nothing more than code and a player model was the pinnacle of the episode because it showed that. TaDC is not an insanely complicated series, and it shouldn't have to be for the sake of being "interesting".

Episode 4 of TaDC, again, set out to explore Gangle as a character; because exploring characters and their lives is the main point of TaDC's narrative. It establishes her as only being confident when she's wearing a mask: literally and figuratively. Her art skills that the show drags on about because she wanted to fulfill a career in animation but never managed to. Again, an episode that anyone with a lick of media literacy would be able to understand because of TaDC's storytelling being fairly straightforward.