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[lake-vandal]

Because this blog turned up again in my notifications, I’m taking a moment for some nostalgic self-reflection.

Back then I started the rewatching Sanders Sides because I was so frustrated with the series, the fandom and with Thomas and his behavior but I still loved the characters and wanted to give him the benefit of doubt. I made this blog to write down my thoughts and to organize them because I was sort of hanging in a limbo. It helped, it made me realize that no amount of pleasant nostalgic feeling is worth hanging on to content that developed into something that gives you bad feelings. Especially if the “message” it contains turned into a direction that goes against your own values.

Seeing what happens out of the corner of my eye through some mutuals still engaged in the fandom is weird. With every new event that unfolds I’m asking myself; What did you all expect? What did you think all that has been brewing for almost two years would culminate into? Why is everyone so surprised? Why so disappointed? This is the expected development of a long-apparent behavior. This is what the majority supported, encouraged even. Still encourages.

Unconditionally and uncritical support may sound nice and wholesome but it’s not doing anyone involved any favors.

[lake-vandal]

How do you feel about the upload schedule for sanders sides? It’s been 10 months since the last proper episode. Also, I read a post on another blog about how they feel him hiring his friends leads to a slower production process due to messing around. Thoughts on that? Also also, do you think that since YT is his job, he should upload more? these are things I am thinking of tonight.

Not to worry anon, these are things I think about a lot because I have nothing better to do with my life. 

Seeing as I joined the fandom shortly after Can Lying Be Good? came out, the longest my first wait for a new episode wasn’t that long actually. The video came out in February but I didn’t see it until early March. The next episode Logic vs Passion, came out in April. So it didn’t bother me much. And right after that we got Crofters: The Musical so I was on the hype train and fully invested. 

Then we didn’t get another episode until October which left me a bit antsy, but I was still excited anyway and didn’t mind the wait. Embarrassing Phases then came out that December. So we got two videos within a fairly short time span. 

SVS Part 1 came out that next year in March, again, bit of a wait, but it’s becoming standard now that we get a couple of new episodes every few months. No biggie. We get Dealing With Intrusive Thoughts in June, Asides in November... This newest one just came out now in May... 

Yeah, if we hadn’t been given that Asides, we would have had almost a year-long wait for this next episode. And we did have a year-long wait for the follow up to a video that honestly, kinda made me think “Why do we still care about this? I’m not really invested in the “Wedding or callback” dilemma anymore” which, when you’re trying to tell a story using this medium, the last thing you want is your audience to lose interest in something that’s meant to be this big of an event within the series. 

And what do all these videos have in common? Each one uses some kind of gimmick. CLBG and SVS had them filming in different locations, Logic vs Passion, LNTAO, and POF involved them using different mediums to tell the story (animations and puppets) Crofters and DWIT both had music in them, and Embarrassing Phases had the costumes. 

Before that, the videos were all fairly simple. Maybe a few gimmicks here and there, but none of them went to the same level as these other ones. 

Basically, what’s happening here is that with each new episode, the team is trying to bring something new to the table each time, and their solution is to use a different gimmick. Which, in theory, is fine. But I honestly believe these are doing more harm than good. For one thing, not everyone is a fan of these gimmicks and while sometimes they can be used to benefit the story, other times they just take over and the writing suffers for it. 

The main reason (as far as we know) that this newest episode in particular took so long was because of the video game animations they wanted to use, but after watching the video besides a few instances, they really weren’t necessary to have. 

And I plan to make a whole other post on this topic so I’ll leave it there for now. In regards to Thomas hiring more of his friends to work on episodes? Again, it’s good in theory, but I for one have noticed a certain change in the episodes since they brought on more writers, which officially started with Embarrassing Phases where Thomas said in the live stream following it that it was the first episode he really didn’t work on and it shows (but more on that in another post) I do think the other writers are talented people, but maybe all of them shouldn’t be working on Sanders Sides. 

Each one is gonna have their own preferences for each character and ideas that may clash, and if these were simply coworkers, it wouldn’t be as much of a problem shutting down ideas that go too far. But when they’re literally all your friends, you have that connection to them and you don’t want them hurt, which can make saying “No” to certain things much harder. I’m not sure exactly how the writing team gets along so I can only speculate based on what I’ve learned from live streams. 

As for their inclusion making the production for videos longer, I can also understand that seeing as you’re more inclined to goof off with people you’re close and comfortable with, especially when you’re not in a professional setting. Which, in Thomas’ case, he’s usually at home with his friends around. This automatically makes things more casual and one would feel more relaxed and not worry too much about being serious. Which, when you’re trying to get things done, can be a problem.

I’m gonna briefly use my own workplace as an example: I work in fast food, and all of my coworkers get along really well. We like to joke around and have fun, especially when we’re slow. But as soon as things start picking up it’s like a switch is flipped and we go from “Fun mode” to “work mode” just like that. Sure, we might continue to quip and joke with each other. But we never let it take precedence over the work that needs to be done. Some of our coworkers, don’t understand this. And when the rest of us are trying to work, they’re still goofing off. And in fast food, if just one person isn’t doing their job, it can bring everything crashing down. We have customers waiting in line for almost ten minutes, they get angry, they get mad at us, even if it’s just because of one person not doing their job. But we don’t have time to argue. We accept their complaints and do our best to fix the issue and get things moving again. 

Obviously, what Thomas does is very different from working in fast food, but Youtube is still his job. Logan puts it best in LNTAO, “Thomas made a commitment to regularly sharing content. He must be held accountable.” 

Now in fast food, we are most definitely held accountable by the customers if their food isn’t delivered in a timely manner or isn’t made to their liking, and we as the providers of said product, have to heed their words and make the product to their liking in order to ensure their satisfied. If they’re not satisfied, they won’t want to pay. Simple as that. 

Thomas, on the other hand, is never held accountable by his fanbase. Now I’m not saying it’s a bad thing for him to have such a supportive fandom, heck I wish the customers I had to deal with on a regular basis were as understanding. But honestly, the way the majority of this fandom blindly follows Thomas and holds him on this golden pedestal is... 

Kinda creepy... 

He is surrounded by constant praise, hardly any criticism, and I believe that’s why we hardly get content from him. 

Quick note, I understand that part of why this video in particular was delayed due to the pandemic and I respect their decision to not put themselves or anyone else at unnecessary risk for the sake of a Youtube video. However, plenty of Youtubers are still making and posting regular content on their channels despite this. To me, the main issue with Thomas’ content as of late is that he tries to put too much into what should be simple things. I understand wanting to give your audience the very best, but honestly, in my opinion, his newer content isn’t as good as the older stuff. It all had just such a simple, wholesome charm to it, that’s now been replaced with a fancier production and flashy editing. Not only that, they tend to start way too many projects at once, which result in never getting done.

You guys remember when they said they’d be bringing back Story Time Madlibs? That was last year, and the most recent thing we’ve heard about it is that they want to add more to it by including animations made by different people! Which will only increase the amount of time it will take to make what should have been a simple video that shouldn’t have taken more than a couple of weeks to film, edit, then post. 

I’m not saying they shouldn’t try new things, but they’ve been trying to do so much that we end up getting nothing, and the fandom just seems okay with this. 

At the end of the day though, this is just one opinion from a random faceless, nameless person sitting behind a computer screen. I doubt anyone on Thomas’ team will see it. I doubt a majority of the fandom would agree with any of it. But with more people starting to voice their opinions, it’s only a matter of time before it becomes too much of a thing to ignore. And if it becomes apparent that there’s a group in the fandom that is being ignored, that’s definitely going to cause problems.

Because in short if someone is out there, producing content for people, and they have complaints about it, then if those complaints are legitimate and can be fixed, then I believe it is the responsibility of that person to consider what they are saying and do their best to heed their words. If no one is ever criticized, then how will they ever improve? Criticism is not a bad thing. And once people get that out of their heads I think things will go much smoother for this fandom. But honestly, that’s just wishful thinking at this point.Sorry this answer got so long, I really should have just made a whole other post about this. XD

[lake-vandal]

Kudos to everyone who sent me hate on my main because I once said that Patton's moral understanding is at nursery school level.

[lake-vandal]

Exactly like I feared. The whole set up was just way too much for my taste. 

Makes me sad because this video could have been at the top of my favorites if the presentation hadn't been so ... unsuitable.

[lake-vandal]

After Thomas last tweet about “probably jinxed it” I just realized what has bugged me about his tweets for a long time. He seldom posts an information without including phrases that evoke emotions of sympathy and compassion for him for things that MAY possible happen in the future. Consciously or unconsciously it feels like he uses an uncomfortable amount of emotional manipulative language.

[lake-vandal]

The majority in this fandom really has the toxic habit of vilifying everyone they disagree with.

Stop exaggerating everything into some moral dilemma.

Not every disagreement is an epic battle between good and bad.

[lake-vandal]

If they simply backpedal in the next video and say it was wrong to go to the wedding I’m going to scream. They put a black and white moral on a complex situation, called going to the wedding “the right thing” and being a “good person” (implying that everyone who would choose different is a selfish and bad person) and I want them to at least acknowledge what a fucked up thing that was and not just make a video one year later with some washed up “wedding was boring, feel bad, buhuu” content.

Omg this ask is so salty and so trueeeee

[lake-vandal]

Losing My Motivation

Rewatching Sanders Sides

- Logan's affinity for learning is really showing through

- procrastinating Thomas is very relatable here

- Logan taking it too literal, that was the first one, I think?

- his outfit change was so unexpected but I love the mischievous look he has right before

- Virgil’s pop up is iconic

- I actually really like him in this video, he’s snarky, he’s anxiety but he’s laid back because he’s currently not doing anything job related

- (subtitles are really horrible sometimes)

- daddy joke, very unexpected, hilarious, laughed so much

- (the subtitles are giving me a headache)

- Logan is so offended that his deduction was not right

- I know people see it as cute and supporting but Patton really feels patronizing in this Scene

- the descriptions of Thomas when Logan deduces him are great

- Virgil acknowledging that they need Roman is pretty grown up of him

- I love Roman in this scene, I honestly miss this Roman

- news-y hipster theater geek-mark from rent!

- “I trusted you” Logan may be Logic but he’s still part of Thomas and just as much of a dramatic dork than him

- 4th wall break

- Virgil ducking to the side as if he expects Logan to explode anytime

- why is it never addressed that Patton forgot that he gave his dollar to Roman?

- name reveal, I remember how the whole fandom exploded, that was a riot

- I honestly think that name reveal was fitting for Logan, I actually really love it, no angsty background fanon or whatever. I don’t even think he cared that much about it, it’s just been made into something bigger and more dramatic because of the reaction to the fact that they have names.

Good tips for keeping up a creating process and battling procrastination. I like the interactions between everyone, it feels real, natural. This video shows more facets about the characters, but in a subtle way. Also, some people write subtitles as if they’re stuck in the fanfic style from 2011. Complete with self insert dialogue and commentary. It’s awful.

[lake-vandal]

from „Losing My Motivation“

Logan: There must be something else… Virgil: Other than me? … … Something other than me? SomeONE other than me? Others than me? The Others? … …

[lake-vandal]

Alone on VALENTINE'S DAY

Rewatching Sanders Sides

- Pattons „lets practice on each other” was THE scene for every shipper

- I absolutely love how Valerie plays not actually being Valerie but some imagined image of her

- telling your anxiety if it doesn’t play nice it should just sit back; iconic

- I laugh every time at Virgil’s “That’s … not exactly how I work.”

- I love that Logan’s suggestion is actually a good one at first, being upfront and honest, and then instantly messes it up by basically asking for sex

- Patton thinking with his stomach again. (c’mon, bagels?)

- Roman gives the impression of being one of that kind of people who memorize quotes and verses without knowing more about the actual subject

 - VALERINTINE’S DAY!!! I’ve watched this vid for how many times and this is the first time I’ve noticed it.

- All of their faces while Patton reads his letter

- big compliment to Valerie, I don’t think I could’ve ever kept a serious expression in this scene

- “not talk about me”, this is such a small sequence but I love it because Roman is not only creativity, he’s also the ego. That detail is always so neglected.

- first appearance of the sword; I’m always wondering if they’ll include some sort of background story on why Roman carries around a deadly weapon or if they just leave it as part of the aesthetic

- how DOES he know Spanish?

- “weddings are nothing but outdated, expensive pageantry’s” man, I have so many opinions on virgils behavior in svs

- babying patton

- absolutely fantastic point on finding romance

- coming from anxiety, because he didn’t hold back his opinion

- kudos to Thomas for including more than just the romantic type of love

- “self-love” I really wish they’d reflect more on Romans whole aspect

This video shows that you can’t listen to one aspect of yourself. Every part has a good point, you need to take these pieces and put them into perspective. And a healthy amount of anxiety can help you with that. Apart from that, I just love the whole dynamic in this video. They way they all just have a goddamn normal discussion together. And let’s face it, this video has so many fanservices for shippers.

[lake-vandal]

@icanlife

answered to your post “Ok, first, bloopers should be mostly shown AFTER the original content...”

                       First of all, I don't think you realize how extremely well edited that bloopers video was. I mean, did you watch it? Second, I don't know where you got the idea that bloopers should be directly after the main content. With most movies, the movie comes out and then the bloopers come out with the out-of-theate release. That wasn't 5 minutes of bloops without any effort put into it.                    

Blooper are, in my experience, something that comes at the end of the actual movie. Even when they’re a bonus in the DVD (of the actual movie) they’re certainly not some new announced content released right before the new episode. That’s not something I’ve ever seen and in my opinion it was a really bad decision. Especially in the current situation.  What has the editing of the video to do with anything? It doesn’t address anything in my post nor has it anything to do with your answer. If you just included it to provoke some guilt, bad move, try again.  And like in the first comment you didn’t address what the post actually was about, the end scenes. Maybe, just maybe, address what my posts are about if you have to say anything and spare me your knee jerk reactions.

[lake-vandal]

@icanlife 

answered to your post “And another thing. I like visual effects and tricks as much as the...”

                       What the hell, man? I have no idea what you're talking about. These guys work hard to create content they can personally be proud of, and we can be proud of too. I hope the rest of the fandom isn't asking for quantity over quality, because I sure as hell am not.                    

First, it’s not about quantity. It‘s about a regular post schedule, something with a bit of organization instead of chucking out stuff whenever and about whatever with little to no information. If he’s only able to make one sides video a year so be it but he should make a clear statement and not going “haha, seems you’re all starved for content”.  You’re all treating Thomas as if he’s a three-year-old with his hobby channel. He’s not. He wants to do this as his job. This is his work. The one he wants to get his money from. Asking for a little bit of a professional behavior really shouldn’t be such a controversial topic.   Second, and what the post really was about if you’d bother to use some reading comprehension. Special effects are not synonymous with quality. And in my opinion, the quality of the videos suffered a lot since they started to focus on the technique.  Doing something different once in a while is great to keep the interest going. Doing something special in almost every episode is too much. It doesn’t make it special anymore. It takes away the focus from the actual content and especially in episodes where said focus should be on the story and the emotions it’s just unnecessary showing of.  So yes, I’m salty because I don’t care that every video has some fucking special doodad that takes them over half a year to manage and that costs a lot of atmosphere.

[lake-vandal]

Am I the only one who finds the amount of burps they put in the bloopers really not funny? 

[lake-vandal]

What are your opinions?

Okay. Ive got a few…

First of all, I just didn’t really think this blooper video was super funny. I’ve rewatched the other blooper reels so many times and they still make me laugh out loud. This one was just? Meh? It didn’t have that cute fun spark that all the others had. One of the things that made the bloopers funny for me was when Thomas continued his acting through the bloopers. He would joke as the sides and stay relatively in character. I was really excited to see a lot of off-the-cuff Remus bloopers, but it just felt like Thomas… This video was just haha swearing and messing around with Joan. Maybe that’s someone’s favorite kind of humor, but not mine.

Second, why exactly did they sponsor a bloopers video? Like… did that feel weird to anyone else, or just me? I don’t want to go on about conspiracies, but it seems to me like they had a deadline for the sponsorship and missed the mark with the new sanders sides episode so they had to put it on this one. Idk, just a though, but it did seem kinda out of place.

Third, lets talk about the ending sequence. It’s a trailer for the next sanders sides episode. One that doesnt give us a release date and frankly doesnt give us any idea what the next episode is going to be like. The majority of the trailer is just old footage from SvsS… there is hardly even any new audio. People are freaking out about it… but… really? I’m just left wanting a little bit more.. Like if they were going to put that in there, they couldnt have just given us a bit more? Cause guys, frankly we got nothing.

Last, and idk how people are going to feel about this, but video games? Really…? This episode is supposed to be super intense and deal with some heavy stuff between Roman and Patton and they chose the theme of video games? I’m not trying to discredit any of the artists who worked on the art or anything like that, but it just seems like an odd theme for such a serious topic… I guess we’ll see what they do with it.

[lake-vandal]

And another thing. I like visual effects and tricks as much as the next person but maybe just put out content regularly and do those as something special and not in every second fucking episode. And maybe not in every important, high emotional episode? It was exciting the first time but now It’s just getting on my nerves. I want to see some normal videos. I want to see the sides. I want to see problems actual tackled in a comprehensible way.

I want to see some sanders sides videos and not a portfolio of possible special effects.

[lake-vandal]

Ok, first, bloopers should be mostly shown AFTER the original content and not, like, 8 months after it and before the new episode. Second, that ending? That should have gone onto the ACTUAL FIRST PART of the two part video. I feel like I’ve gotten kicked. Seriously. 8 months later, bullshit moral lesson and then they hang this onto a FUCKING BLOOPER VIDEO. 

I don’t know who makes those organization decisions but they really need to think over their strategy again. 

[lake-vandal]

This! Even if the next episode would be absolutely perfect it couldn't erase the bad taste in my mouth.

There's just so much wrong with the whole setup in the moment. It makes me actually fear the content, and the messages, of the next episodes.

Anon with the content problem here. Everyone always says “it’s a two part” but that just makes it even sourer for me. There was no indication within the video that it is. The fandom only knows it because they said so later, once. You missed that info? It’s a standalone. And even with that information. SvS was 10 months ago. 1/2

This. Is so true? Like I feel stupid for not realizing that they never mention in the episode that it’s a two-parter.

Leaving the episode on such a terrible moral lesson (put other before yourself no matter what, it’s the right thing to do) is a really irresponsible thing for the team to do… it makes me worried for people that actually took that message to heart :/