#Marcy wu analysis

[hughjidiot]

So, some people in the Amphibia fandom claim that Marcy being in a coma and possessed for most of season three was necessary to "show her the consequences of her actions."

Here's my rebuttal to that line of thought: wouldn't it have made more sense to have Marcy be involved in the plot so she can actually, you know, see the consequences of her actions?

Marcy didn't get to actually see the destruction Andrias reaped upon Amphibia because she helped him get the fully charged Calamity Box. Nor did she actually face Anne and Sasha being upset with her beyond what happened in True Colors; all she did was get yelled at by a holographic illusion of the two of them, and then was instantly forgiven by the real Anne and Sasha upon being rescued.

Compare and contrast Sasha, who actually had to fight alongside the frogs she spent almost two whole seasons disliking. Then when Anne returned to Amphibia things weren't instantly okay between them; Anne still had lingering feelings of doubt after Sasha's betrayals and general behavior before Amphibia, and the two of them had to work through their issues for the sake of reparing their friendship.

This is why I respectfully disagree with people who say Marcy needed to spend season three offscreen as part of her character arc. Because Sasha didn't, so why couldn't Marcy?

[cherllyio]

OWL HOUSE AND AMPHIBIA FANS I GOT SOMETHING FOR YOU(LMK Season 5 spoilers)

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We got a main characther who sacfriced themselves and then met god

AND they got someone close to them (mentor, brother or friend) who got possesed by the big bad.

[wren-writes-things]

You know sometimes I consider whether or not coffee in Amphibia is not as strong as human coffee or if Marcy is just immune.

Because you see she consumed most of 8 cups of coffee in what appears to be one sitting and went back for more. Assuming the same average amount of caffeine that is almost double the maximum amount recommended by the FDA. But she shows literally no effects.

Meanwhile Sprig and Hop Pop display immediate extreme effects when consuming caffeine such as getting a huge boost in energy or literally gaining super speed. And both consumed considerably less than Marcy did. (Though Sprig did consume it at a considerably faster rate)

And you see I can’t find any information on the effects of caffeine on frogs in comparison to humans because apparently that is not something that people actively write (or at least not without me having to pay ridiculous sums of money to access it). So to quote Anne, “What science do you even do?”

I did find that caffeine overdoses are lethal in some species of frogs. So perhaps caffeine is a more controlled or limited substance, but that wouldn’t make sense given that Sprig was given 5 of them with no problem. And if it was a controlled substance I don’t think they would allow that. But I don’t know because I do not know enough about controlled substances to reach any conclusions about that.

Anyway my conclusion given my complete lack of evidence in any direction whatsoever is that Marcy is just immune because honestly Marcy being a semi magical being with an immunity to caffeine and the ability to spontaneously (and completely unintentionally) set things on fire amuses me. Either that or the Calamity gem’s power was just actively offsetting how much caffeine she drank.

[agalychnisspranneusroseus]

Just how much power did Marcy have over her friends pre-Amphibia? When they throw the kpop puppy party at school, the principal assumes "those two" pushed Anne into it, and Anne kind of admits it. When Anne is about to sacrifice herself, she says "all my life I've followed you two". During her one and only S1 appearance, she's seen maliciously nodding alongside Sasha when Anne steals the box, and with Marcy asking to meet up on Anne's birthday, while Sasha is the one to carry out the order, the implication is that they're almost like... working together. I know she was supposed to be "meaner" when they were working on S1, and I think they changed her personality because Haley Tju made her too adorable(? and maybe also because Matt thought the whole show would fall apart if people didn't like Marcy (considering what a huge impact she has on everything that happens, I'd say he was right). But Anne's line in THT and the flashback in All In implies she wasn't nearly as much as a doormat as it may seem sometimes, at least not as much as Anne.

Or maybe she was? Because you also see her in this place of submission when it comes to Sasha (and also Anne?), especially in BOTB, when she's happy to switch from Anne's song to Sasha's without even hearing the first, only stopping to consider Anne's approval. That scene struck me as her always happy to go along with her friends' wishes and never having much of an opinion of her own. That's why she was so desperate for them to get along during The Dinner, and why she never took a side when Anne told her she and Sasha had a fight. She closest thing to defying Sasha that we ever see her do is when she's working alongside like 10 other people to protect Newtopia from the Toad Army, and she says they had to "defeat Sasha and Grime" specifically, which I think makes sense considering they're attacking the city she's supposed to protect (she's IS a high-ranking member of its military forces AND a close advisor to its king), and not wanting to "defeat Sasha" would rock the boat with everyone else involved, Anne included. Yet we never really see her angry at Sasha for what she's doing, she just wants her and Anne to "work things out". I think it's clear that Marcy struggles with empathy, because if she put herself in Anne's shoes, she wouldn't expect her to "just work things out" with Sasha. In fact, she would have taken Anne's side agessssss ago, but she's way too focused on herself (her goal is for everyone to be happy forever and get along, while Anne and Sasha may want something else). Marcy being self-centered isn't a hot take, and I don't think she's any more self-centered than Anne was during most of S1. In fact, I'd argue Anne was even worse lol. The difference is that Anne made a million relatively small mistakes while Marcy made like two or three very big, very bad mistakes (bringing them to Amphibia, striking a deal with Andrias behind their backs, and not taking a side in Anne and Sasha's fight, which is something I never see people bring up as one of Marcy's most flawed moments).

So... going back to the question I made in the beginning... did Marcy just go along with Sasha's plans so enthusiastically when compared to Anne, who had more doubts and had to be pressured into them, that it made it look like she and Sasha were more in cahoots than they actually were? I think this is very likely. I also think it's likely that she and Sasha genuinely shared a liking for rule breaking back in LA, and her own self-centered-ness prevented her from realizing Anne wasn't comfortable with it. Maybe she never even considered if she liked to go along with Sasha's plans, like, Marcy strikes me as someone who doesn't look inwards much. I think we can rule out both Sasha and Marcy being equally controlling and possesive of Anne, because her relationship with Sasha was very much not one of equals, with Anne as a third wheel. Was she more of a third wheel? We know Anne and Sasha don't share most of her interests and will often ignore her and her needs, and we know she feels like losing them is becoming dangerously easy. We also know Sasha has no qualms taking Anne on some kind of birthday date without Marcy which I'm 75% convinced it's because she had a huge crush on Anne but I digress which, from a doylian perspective, is explained by the fact that they seemingly didn't want to show Marcy too early, but from a watsonian perspective, it just comes across as Sasha not priorizing Anne spending her birthday with both her best friends. Like, you can do with or without Marcy. She doesn't seem to remember Marcy until she texted her, actually.

But then you have lines from Anne about how "if you friend wants to you steal something, you do it, because if you don't, they may not want to be your friend anymore", which, oh boy, if she at least perceived Marcy as pressuring her into stealing the box (rather than it being 100% Sasha's idea) that would shed a whole new light on her relationship with Marcy, because it would seem like she, too, feels like their friendship could fall apart if she didn't go along with the other two's plans. And I do think Marcy at least somewhat participated in pushing Anne into it. It wouldn't be the first time she made Anne do something bad - she told her to lie to Valeriana about stealing the box, something Anne later appeared to be ashamed of, and she insisted of going along with the puppy party when Anne was having doubts. I imagine Sasha (who also pressured Anne into doing very much not so "lawful good" things, in more extreme ways than Marcy) might have come up with the idea of stealing it, and Marcy just supported it. Marcy taking Sasha's side. Possibly over and over again. We know Sasha didn't exactly manipulate her because she didn't have to: Marcy just always did everything she said. Anne was the one who needed a bit more convincing.

Marcy's relationship with Anne and Sasha is fascinating. She's definitely the most morally gray of the trio, and possibly the most complex one too, in the sense that she's full of realistic contradictions - an adorkable manipulator, an amoral softie, a self-centered sweetheart who loves her friends more than life itself, a possesive kidnapper with a heart of gold, a very selfish and self-sacrificial person... and it's never just a mask or anything, she's not just pretending to be nice, she really is that way, she really is all of that together. I think that's why people struggle to read her a lot of the times, because so much about her characterization seems conflicting with itself... but I think that's the key to making characters deep and realistic. In real life, we're all walking contradictions and we don't really make sense. Marcy's character doesn't seem clumsily put together to me, like they frankeinsteined all the different character traits she needed to make the plot work without any cohesion between them. I think she's a complex tapestry that sometimes requires a closer inspection to decypher it, and I think the glue holding everything together is her lack of intrapersonal intelligence, her inability to look inwards and notice her own contradictions.

We know she felt unloved by her friends yet desperately clung to them with everything she had, going to extreme measures to ensure they all stayed together, even when it hurt them. We know she's capable of manipulation, scheming and lying to the people that love her most in order to guarantee that goal. We know she's possesive with them, but she also loves them enough to let them go in the rare cases when she realizes she's hurting them (as seen in A Day in the Aquarium). From her journal, we also know she feels very ashamed of these possesive impulses. We know she'll neglect to form her own opinions and ideas to agree always with her friends' wishes, which means she feels completely lost when they want different things. But this also shows that she would never think of an idea of hers as being explicitly opposed to what her friends want. She wouldn't consciously do something that they wouldn't like. Which is insane, because, who would want to be separated from their family and thrown into a different world without any sort of notice? Which leads us to understand that Marcy has zero emotional intelligence and has never looked inwards in her LIFE, AND that her empathy skills are in negative digits because it would have taken her a nanosecond of thought to realize Anne and Sasha probably wouldn't like to be kidnapped. And since we know she never wants to do something they dislike, she must have just... not thought about it at all. No thoughts head empty. It really was just BLANK up there when she made that decision. I think Marcy is a very "true neutral" character who struggles with empathy and humility, who loves her friends but doesn't have the emotional intelligence to really understand them, and who is happy and enthusiastic to be Sasha 2 Electric Boogaloo because... that's what she knows. That's how her friend group works and her goal was never to have a deeper and more genuine connection to them, but to keep it close to her.

So... my conclussion is that, pre-amphibia, Marcy was Sasha's very enthusiastic (but emotionally neglected) right hand man, with Anne as their oblivious victim. It really IS complex because you have to then add Anne always looking out for her, losing sleep over her, yet also ignoring her needs, and Sasha not even bothering to hide how much she doesn't care about Marcy's feelings (which reflects on Marcy not consciously caring about her own feelings). There's also Marcy always assuming the best from them too, despite repeated evidence of their disinterest, and her fear of displeasing them looming over her constantly. Ik I said Anne was Sasha and Marcy's victim, but I meant that like... symbolically, because Anne is not innocent here either. She wasn't a great friend to Marcy before Amphibia. Here's why I always say Anne couldn't develop a deeper, more genuine and open connection with Marcy because of Sasha's oppressive presence and her own lack of emotional maturity. And Marcy couldn't develop a deeper, more genuine and open connection with Anne because of her own lack of empathy and reluctance to face any kind of conflict. So Marcy is Sasha's enthusiastic but emotionall neglected right hand man, who also feels subordinate to Anne despite Anne feeling subordinate to her. That's why they both feel like third wheels at different times. There's an illusion of Marcy with more agency and power than she actually has. In reality, only Sasha is on top, and the other two are two very flawed individuals, one slowly cracking under the weight and the other, less sensitive to the same pressure, trying to uphold the status quo.

[heart-wit-strength]

It feels like with olivia, the writes set her up as a motherly figure to marcy, only to remember “oh wait marcy isn’t supposed to make friends, better add corporal punishment”

Referring to this post I'm assuming

Well for the corporal punishment, I wouldn't be surprised if those are probably just super normalised things in a place like Newtopia. Given how Newtopian social structure works and how duty and sophistication is the major key that the upper class of amphibia defines itself with? They're all about enforcement, enforcing strict law, sticking to their pride. We've seen examples of how extreme this is. They're willing to execute a toad captain without trial for failing to heed an order. There's an episode about the Newtopia University which I don't remember well but I think it talked about how scholars are treated like prisoners in camps.

Does this influence Olivia? She grew a part of this norm, I think it's implied why she acts the way she does. Olivia's literal worst fear was own mother confronting her on failing to fulfill her vow to protect nature, up and utmost priority. This reflects on her relationship with Marcy, she's trying to be good, she's caring, but she still has it in her; she encourages Marcy to be humble to her duty and expectations be her utmost. Moreover she expects her to meet up to what represents newts as a race. So is the possible consequences when she violates those heavy standards of what the crown expects.

That's almost one trait she shares with Andrias, that duty and family expectations heavily influence her actions.

[random-dragon-exe]

Ok so can we talk about poor Cricket?

The poor guy was mortified when he found out Chip was alive and was coming for him.

And that's putting it lightly. He flat out gets paranoid that if he doesn't do his best to hide, Chip will kill him and his family.

Now to be honest, I thought a paranoid role like this was going to go to Bill.

I thought that Bill's hinted anxiety would come to the surface and that he'll be paranoid because he wants to protect his family.

But no, instead they gave it to Cricket. (Which BTW, I'm not complaining, I like the angle they're going for, because angst)

I mean of course Cricket would be terrified of Chip coming back, the last time he saw him, Chip was literally about to do him and his family in with a helicopter. Twice.

It even gets to the point that he begins seeing things that aren't there.

I also find it interesting because at first, we're led to believe that Cricket wasn't that affected by Chip since in Chipped Off we see him literally dance in relief knowing he's dead on TV. But no, they brought it to attention that deep down he's terrified of Chip because at the end of the day, he's still a kid.

Like I never thought I'd say this, but I think Cricket needs to join the traumatized children's corner with Hunter, Luz, Marcy, Dipper, and Mabel. Then got to therapy with Sasha.

[sars-wulf]

Okay so I’ve seen some people going around saying Sasha Waybright is a jock…

No?

No she is not 😭

Despite being the avatar of the quality of strength, Anne is the jock compared to Sasha.

They literally go to a mini preparatory school (well it’s a catholic school, but close enough! I think one can assume it IS a preparatory school actually since normally public schools aren’t necessarily named after a saint. Orrrr it used to be a parochial (religious) school, and kept the name after transitioning to a public school… we don’t know the history but for my purposes I’m assuming SJMS is a parochial school.)

Prep is defined as someone who is wealthy, upper-middle class, and can be found anywhere. But this is an American subculture and this is an America centric post…(Rahhh!!! /silly)

They can be shallow, ignorant or rude to people not from their socioeconomic background, and display this behavior to anyone not in their in-group. They are also usually white as well.

Guess which human does this in the show?

They often exhibit traits of insecurity, which Sasha does show, as she is insecure in her friendship with Anne and Marcy, and is jealous of Sprig when he presents himself as Anne’s best friend. She also gets angry and possessive upon learning Marcy and Anne are working together.

Preps are often on the cheerleading team or football team depending on gender, and guess what! Sasha is a cheerleader.

Sasha is prep also because she presents herself as not really connecting much with her friends beyond controlling them (preps don’t really interact with other groups beyond their in group). So you could also say Sasha is prep because she didn’t try to interact with anyone outside of her trusted group until amphibia too.

Also Sasha would totally wear those fucking prep outfits. You know the ones.

It’s not just a style of dress, imo, it’s your actions too. When we see Sasha assert her superiority over Maggie, we notice that she has a habit of doing so. To Anne, to Marcy, and to others she doesn’t know. “End. Of. Discussion.”

Preps assert their financial superiority over others, and chances are, Sasha’s parents DO have fuck you money. How else does she get away with stuff so often that she’s built up a rebellious habit?

Now about Anne… she’s the jock. Plays sports, has one brain cell most of the time (in an endearing way, not a demeaning way. She’s actually pretty intelligent, so give her some credit! (Girl chose a HARD SCIENCE WTF)), she didn’t really have much interest in intellectual pursuits in the show and zoned out when Marcy said anything more complex.

However, despite people assuming athletics and academics to be mutually exclusive, they don’t have to be… Anne is just an air head! A herbo, if you will.

Anne is the type to go “want smoothies after, dude?”

Sasha goes “Ew, you want me to do that?!” (Which happened in mother olm so….)

Marcy, the nerd (I’m not explaining this, it’s self explanatory), will info dump about her newest creatures and caverns campaign.

Anyways, that’s my two cents!

Sasha Waybright is NOT the jock, she is the prep of the trio, and I will die on this hill /silly.

[nextstop-fixationstation]

OK analysis time! Matt said that Marcy's affection towards Sasha was more surface level than Anne's, which was described as "complicated." People might assume that this means that Marcy's affection for Sasha wasn't deep, or that their relationship wasn't.

If we're being honest here they weren't presented as having depth to their relationship so much as having acts and services. They're on the level with each other and can interpret each other's needs for a plan but they are lacking somehow when it comes to each other's emotional needs. This is something Darcy touches upon when they say they might not have ever been friends at all, and might be a core conflict between Sasha and Marcy. It's also a good example of why Anne is the actual Heart of their friendship. She connects and makes their dynamic deeper. While Marcy is desperate to keep people together and hates being alone, she admits she lacks a core understanding of emotional intelligence and this is something she admires in Anne. Marcy treats herself as a tool and mostly makes friends by doing things for them and complimenting them. She's kind of the perfect POV character for a journal that gives lore specifically because she's very attentive to things like strengths and weaknesses and team synergy, but isn't necessarily attuned to emotional intelligence. She kind of blocks herself off from feeling certain things too keenly or doubting herself, and masks it using this peppy overachiever persona.

Maybe if Marcy were more emotionally self aware, she would have been even more openly hurt by how dismissive Sasha is of her interests (even though Sasha clearly does like nerdy things), or she would have noticed that her friends don't really care for RP (etc). But in the series what we see is a Marcy so afraid of being left alone that she'll hide every emotion and every hurt aside from what she thinks will make people stay - she delivers compliments, improves infrastructure, says all the right things to earn trust. She's a great twist antagonist! Admitting that her friends don't or can't reciprocate her interests or desires is important to her arc, because it serves as a lesson to her that friendship is more than just doing things together or doing things for each other. Marcy and the others aren't just tools in schemes and plans.

We hear from Anna that Sasha has difficulty knowing when to bring other people to the table, so for someone like Marcy who thinks that she needs to earn everything through acts/upgrades, it makes sense that their relationship remained very surface level. Neither of them pushes the other to see things differently, while Anne does. Anne can acknowledge where people hurt and hurt her, and can acknowledge that this doesn't mean they aren't friends or significant to each other. Anne notes the complexity! It's why she's so compelling.

So, Marcy acknowledging how hurt she is that her friends don't want to do what she wants is significant because she also says, "I believe in you." Love goes beyond the stuff we do for each other. There's a bit of faith, too. What she did isn't right either. Being hurt isn't an excuse.

Darcy isn't just "evil Marcy," the Core is also every temptation for Marcy. Escapism, distraction, perfect friends who go on quests with her whenever she wants. There's a darkness to this kind of insecure attachment that Darcy reveals. Fear of inadequacy and irrelevance. Fear of loss. Fear of change. Fear of what is deeper than skin deep. Maybe my friends will forget me if I move. Maybe I'm just their nerd, just like Sasha's just cool. So their relationship isn't surface level to us, because this nuance is communicated to us through the subtleties of the show's execution. It's a really well acted, well boarded, well written show with fantastic music! It's really amazing!

Sasharcy IS very complicated! But it's complicated because they never dig deeper with each other until it's too late. It's also why it's significant that Sasha is the one to ask, "Can we save this friendship?"

Why is friendship with Marcy so easy? Is it because they got along and there's mutuality here, or is it because they didn't let themselves get any deeper than what was easy? It's so easy for them to just be the controller and the executor.

Forgiveness is hard. Forgiveness takes time. It takes a lot of thought, discussion, and work. Friendship in the long term, deep enough to mean something and hurt when it's gone, is similar. It's not just sentimentality and acts of appeasement.

aaaaand that's what i think matt meant when he was like "marcy's affection for sasha was kind of surface level"! I will admit I was like noooo Matt noooo don't say it was surface level whyyyy but like i had time to think abt it so i'm fine now lol lmk ur thoughts💙

smth i didn't add to my original tweet thread is that i DO find it interesting that marcy appears to specifically empathize with the experience of lonely people who grow up a certain way or doing things a certain way to protect themselves from loneliness. she seems to have an intuitive understanding of people fitting into groups via niches, but is drawn to people who already seem like outcasts as opposed to being able to identify it when someone is surrounded by people they seem to easily connect with. Marcy has this fundamentally insecure and lonely viewpoint that makes her very interesting to read and analyze, and I suspect it also contributes to her popularity. I mean, clearly *I* love her

[owlphibiaisthebest15]

Hi guys! I want to talk about a minor problem I have with Amphibia and how they could've been done better. I will not be talking about any of the big problems that people have already complained about, like Sasha and Marcy's lack of screentime, their character arcs, parents, nobody talking about Marcy after "True Colors", yada yada yada, because we don't need another post like that, and I want to keep this overdue rant as short as possible. This is based on my personal opinions along with a few others, but feel free to disagree with me if you want. But with further, let us begin...

Anne almost always gets way too easily forgiven for f*cking up.

Okay! This one may be a hot take because I have never seen another person complain about this. But this has been eating me away for MONTHS, and if no one else is going to say it, then I will. While this occasionally extends to some other characters depending on the episode. The one I want to talk about most is Anne. Now, at the start of the series, Anne was pretty much a jerk with a heart of gold. She was selfish, bratty, lazy, and irresponsible, but she did learn from the mistakes that she made and became a true hero by the end of the series. While some of these flaws and mistakes are not worth talking about, there are still others that are actually worse than what the show's narrative portrays them to be.

They may not be as bad as leading a toad army to invade the capital city, burying the only thing that could get Anne home, or sending your friends to another world on purpose. Anne has still made some pretty questionable decisions, even to the point where they often cross the line.

Here's a list of some of the worst things Anne Boonchuy has ever done from Season 1 and 2:

Breaking Hop Pop's favorite cane that also happens to be a keepsake of his father and grandfather all while making fun of him.

Manipulating Sprig into taking Bessie the family Snail on a Joyride without reading. Which is like someone taking a car out for a spin without a driver's permit.

Forcing Sprig to marry Maddie despite his obvious discomfort for Pizza Dough and later forces him to date Ivy while he's still engaged to Maddie.

Faking being sick to get out of farm duty, which led the Plantars getting sick themselves and even thought they were all going to die from red leg.

Slacking off while she was supposed to be protecting the frozen townsfolk, while aware of what happens to one of them while they're frozen. Which, of course, led to Polly almost getting eaten by a giant weasel.

Causes massive property damage with Polly while on the streets of Newtopia, and later breaks into Newtopia University in hopes of finding a rad college party. The second one was Polly's idea, but Anne had no problem going along with it.

A team effort along with her frog family. Sending a giant chicken to attack Wartwood. Which BTW can create tornadoes, breathe fire, and even turned their loved ones into stone, all because they forgot to buy everyone gifts. Sure, Anne was against the idea, but she still went along with it.

What do characters usually respond with when Anne admits her mess ups?! "It's okay! You're good! What you did was serious, but it doesn't matter that we almost died, as long as you learned your lesson."

Though Anne still at least got a lot better, as the worst things she's done in Season 3 were covering up some major plot points from her parents, robbing a museum to get a clue on how to find a way back to Amphibia, and tricking Blair the Balloonist into flying a hot air balloon. Though, the first one is still a little f*cked up, but she did have selfless reasons for doing these, and she came clean for 2/3 of these.

But still, 90% of this show is just a lighthearted slice of life cartoon, but when it shifts to its dark story driven and plot twisting side, this is where the narrative (and by some extent Anne herself) gets pretty hypocritical. It's pretty much when Anne messes up and lies to other characters. It's a simple error in judgment. But when other main characters such as Sasha, Marcy, and even Hop Pop do the same to her, first they gotta face hell for it, and then they get their redemption arc.

Yes! They did do some serious sh*t, and Anne had a right to be mad at them. But it seems that other characters are just not allowed to even stay mad at Anne when she does pretty similar sh*t. I mean, yes, she does try to make up for it, and yes, she admits what she's done most of the time, and eventually, she does become a better person from them. But so have Hop Pop, Sasha, and Marcy. But again, they didn't get the protagonists treatment. They got hurt and thrown around like ragdolls because of one or two big mistakes, and even that wasn't enough.

While Anne sometimes faces some consequences for her actions, like breaking Hop Pop's heirloom cane with HP giving her dish duty for a month (Cmon man! You should've given her way more than that!), gets banned from an arcade because she threatened to eat newt kids for cutting in line (which is not important), and most importantly, gets stranded in Amphibia after being peer pressured by her friends to shoplift it, all on her 13th birthday. Which I guess was enough for karma itself to feel so bad for her that she will hardly ever worry about facing any lasting consequences for her misdeeds ever again. While karma beats the cr*p out of others who would dare lie and betray our precious protagonists, even when they have sympathetic reasons for doing so.

Speaking of, this leads to me to clarify something that some fans have misinterpreted since the beginning of the series. The flashback scene in the second episode, "Best Fronds," was intended to show where Anne's distorted views on friendship and some of her toxic traits come from. Not to justify every single bad decision Anne has ever made, like what some fans think.

While I'm not gonna say that Anne was just as bad as Sasha before Amphibia, as it does show that Anne had her own personal flaws that she had to get through without depending on her friends. Who were more enabling her flaws than causing them.

However, while the show does try to show that Anne wasn't exactly much better in their friend dynamic than they were. For the reasons I mentioned earlier, it instead paints Anne as the least toxic one or not being toxic at all. With them only making a handful of moments that show that even after their betrayals, Anne still isn't much better than them. But the usual wacky slice of life narrative in her character development episodes downplays the severity of her actions, with Anne only just getting an emotional lesson after nearly getting everyone killed, and some of the said lessons being brought up in a few episodes to test her character or as examples to show others how much she has grown.

Now, I'm going to do some comparisons between Amphibia and The Owl House. While there are several things that Amphibia did better than TOH and about an equal amount of things TOH did better than Amphibia. One of those things that The Owl House did better than Amphibia was the writers treating each and every character fairly. The characters make mistakes and learn from them without the narrative downplaying the seriousness of their mistakes, and it isn't always "Okay! You're forgiven! What you did was serious, but it doesn't matter that we almost died. You learned your lesson, and that's what matters." While it doesn't give other characters the short end of the forgiveness stick for doing similar sh*t. With that, it also makes the character arcs a little bit better, in my opinion.

However, I'm not saying that Anne's character development was bad or that Matt Braly is treating Anne like how some see Alex Hirsch did with Mabel. The show did alright with changing a bratty teenager with flawed views of friendship into a true and selfless hero. All of what I described seems to what TV Tropes would call "Protagonist Centered Morality," and if I'm being honest, but because of that reason, I don't find Anne to be the most appealing character to me. I'm sorry! I know that a lot of you love her, and she's the second most popular character in the show; with the first being Marcy (my favorite), but I don't even dislike her either. I just feel that the narrative could've done better in treating the characters more fairly, like how TOH did with their characters. I really want to like Anne more than I do now, but for what I described, it makes it kinda hard for me to.

That's it for my opinions on this. This was longer than I thought, so if you read it this far or read it at all. You either think that I have a point and should do more of this or my analysis stinks, and I should never speak my dumb mind again. I'll probably see how this goes either way. If anybody else here still cares about this show.

[karioke13]

Ok this scene in Amphibia True Colors lives in my mind rent free for a couple of reasons…

Spoilers for Amphibia below 👇

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First off, I love Anne’s reaction here. Not only is it extremely relatable, but it’s also incredibly tragic to watch Anne go through this. I swear Brenda Song did an incredible job voicing Anne. I especially love the raw delivery of the line when she says to Sasha “You’re a horrible person! And I am done being friends with you!” You can really feel the anger and the betrayal in her voice when she says this. You can even hear a little crack in her voice during that line, showing how heartbroken she is after realizing that she got tricked by someone she once called one of her best friend. She even sounds defeated in the end when she tells Marcy that they can’t fix their friendship anymore, almost like she’s give up on even trying to fix their once strong connection that they had together.

Now let’s talk about Sasha here in this scene specifically! Now Sasha, for me at least, has always been interesting yet difficult character to watch, as I myself have met people like her so I have first hand knowledge with people like Sasha. Like for one, after completely ruining the plan that Marcy and Anne set up to back home, Sasha completely turns it south and ruins the plan for them, which ends up costing Amphibia and its ruler. And yet while Marcy and Anne are still in shock of what just occurred, Sasha acts like everything that happened was simply no big deal (ha see what I did there?). She even casually mentions how they could either go back home or help decorate the place. Now you must be wondering “how could Sasha act so casual after betraying Anne and Marcy like that?” And there’s only one answer for her whole reasoning behind it: revenge. In previous episodes throughout season two, once Sasha figures out that Anne and Marcy are going on adventures without her, she’s starting to feel left out. And as we know, Sasha didn’t have the best childhood, due to her parents divorce early on in her life, and their attitude towards her is most likely the reason why Sasha turned out the way she did. All she wanted was to be cared about and payed attention to. This is what makes Sasha such a complicated yet fascinating character to watch, especially during this scene. We see something snap in her finally after Anne says that she’s done being friends with her. Like it hits her. She’s now realizing the consequences of her actions which caused her to lose one of the last people that believed and cared for her, finally hitting her that besides Grime, she has no one left.

Then there’s the importance of the music. I love the instrumental track that plays with the scene because it symbolizes the argument itself that Sasha and Anne have. For instance in the beginning, the music sounds a bit silly, like jokey music, but then it turns into more quiet music which represents Sasha’s belief that everything that just happened is not as bad as it seems, trying to hush up the fact that she just took over Amphibia and betrayed her friends with little to no remorse. But then something changes. And that something is Anne. Beforehand, Anne never really stuck up for herself against Sasha. She always was a doormat towards Sasha and even let her boss her around which would cause Anne to get in trouble. However, once Anne lands in Amphibia, she realizes her worth as a person and we see her grow into this confident, strong person who believes and herself and others. This new confidence she obtains allows her to decide that enough is enough with Sasha’s bullying towards her. And we see it loud and clear in this scene. As Anne’s emotions begin to grow, so does the music. It starts to get just a hint louder until the music stops when Sasha abruptly tries to cut Anne off and it almost feels like she’s cutting the music off too so that SHE can try to control the narrative. However, it’s Anne’s turn to take control and as she finally does so, the music once again grows louder and louder as Anne finally stands up against Sasha, knowing that she can no longer stand with a traitor, she once considered her ally.

Now those are just some of my thoughts and rambles I had because this is one of my favorite scenes of all time in Amphibia. I swear Matt Braly and his crew are such geniuses! Scenes like this truly make Amphibia one of the best cartoons ever made! 🙌🏼💯🔥

[knave-of-clubs]

The Brainworms are eating me alive so I need to talk about the Calamity Gems and their associated Traits

(Below will be a lot of probably incoherent words, spoilers for Amphibia (mostly S2), and The Brainworms. You've been warned.)

Okay okay okay, disclaimer: I'm relatively new to the Amphibia fandom, so if you read this and go, "Bro, literally everyone already knows that" then cut me some slack. That being said, I've been sitting on some of these concepts since I watched the Temple episodes a month or so ago and I'm very excited to share my madman ramblings with the class–

As y'all already know, the Temples go Wit, then Heart, then Strength, yeah yeah old news, right? Okay, here's the new parts:

Marcy, our Wit, was tested for the Trait of Wit, yes, but also the secondary Trait of Humility. Humility, as in the ability to put put aside your pride and "lower your standards", so to speak. Humility, the ability to look past your pride and connect to others. Sounding familiar?

Anne, our Heart, was tested for her Heart, but also for her sense of Responsibility. Her ability to look her mistakes in the face and say, "Yeah, those are mine." Her ability to take accountability for her actions, and to be accountable for the well-being of others. Y'all can maybe start to see where this is going?

Sasha, our Strength, was tested for her Trait of Strength, and her Trait of Persistence. Bear with me, we're stretching a little bit here. Persistence is the ability to, well, Persist. To keep going, whether there are people who believe in you or not (although it certainly helped that, in Sasha's case, people did have her back). Persistence isn't exactly near-synonymous with Wit like the other two pairs, but the two are inherently linked— that's why the First Temple had to test the Marcy's willingness to give up for the sake of others, because it's in her nature as the 'Star' of Wit to Persist No Matter What (more on that another time 'cause it's a Fun topic)

So, if y'all haven't guessed by now, I'm sure that last one made it obvious: what I'm suggesting is that each Temple tested its Star for a secondary Trait linked to the next Temple in the cycle. Put simpler— Marcy was tested for Heart in the Wit Temple, Anne was tested for Strength in the Heart Temple, and Sasha was tested for Wit in the Strength Temple. It's a circle!! (Triangle, really, but whatever)

Part of why I came to this conclusion was also because of the arcs of the Calamity Trio throughout all of that Temple business, as well as before/after it. This was the section of the story where Anne was learning to stand up for herself and bite back when people try to intimidate her into doing things she doesn't want, continuing from the S1 finale with Sasha. This was the section of the story where Marcy was being forced to acknowledge that she tends to treat people like NPCs and slowly learning how to actually form genuine connections with others in Amphibia. Sasha's a little bit harder to pin down given that she only got two episodes before showing up at the Third Temple, but we know for a fact that Sasha "Queen of Manipulation" Waybright already had Wit to an extent— I think that what we see instead in "Toadcatcher" and "Barrel's Warhammer" is her acquiring Persistence by pushing herself harder and harder in training after losing Anne and giving up greater prices for the sake of her goals (which causes her to lose Percy and Braddock). This pattern of acquisition also, interestingly enough, seems to carry through to the S3 arcs as well, and by the finale all three girls seem to each have their own full set of Traits— but I'm not gonna ramble about that, I can do that in another post.

I think I've done a decent job of explaining myself here? But I'm gonna drop some assorted thoughts to see if I can make this more cohesive, because I analyse specific word choices way too much:

Heart is a value based on connecting to people, on seeing them and being there for them and loving them come Hell or high water. It's only natural that, when looking for a true Star to represent it, you need to make sure that they have the Strength to take Responsibility for their mistakes, and that they can handle the Responsibility of protecting the people they care about.

Strength is based on brute force, on fighting tooth and nail and being a steady 'rock' someone can depend on. So, if you want to rely on someone, you need to know that they have Persistence, that they're never going to give up when they commit to something, and that they're Clever enough to find a way to succeed in their goals.

Wit is based on mind over matter, on finding creative ways past obstacles, on solving every puzzle and never giving up on their drive to know more. But if you let someone drive themself to borderline-obsession with their passion for knowledge, you need to know that they have Humility. Why Humility, you ask? Humility is considered the opposite of Pride, the quality of being grounded and humble. Humility serves an anchor for when you're too lost in the maze of puzzles, of learning about everything, of knowing more and more until the world around you starts to blur together into meaningless faces. In Amphibia (the show), Humility is mainly seen in the connections that people make with each other, the friends and family someone is willing to drop everything to protect— it's the Heart that makes them truly Human (or Amphibian)

So, I'm gonna cut myself off here before I continue on trying to endlessly justify my thoughts to an imaginary audience in increasingly irrational ways–

But! If anyone reading this— my dear non-imaginary audience that I am very grateful for— has any questions at all, even if it's just, "Bro what the hell are you on?" I'd love to hear it! Because I'd be happy to further explain anything if needed. I know there are a lot of times where I don't make much sense when rambling 😅

[youroomwasquare]

Marcy Wu, and Why Her Unfinished Character Arc Worked.

I'm gonna ramble a bit about our favorite newtopian ranger, marcy wu!!

so. I, like many others in the fandom, was a bit disappointed with how the show handled marcy's growth and character arc. it felt rushed.. incomplete, and overall messy. I felt that marcy's growth wasn't given the same attention and care that anne & sasha's growth was. coupled with the overall tragedy of marcy's character and role in the story, I was feeling extremely discontented with marcy's character.. until I realized that the show writers may have unintentionally made that the point of marcy's arc.

because LISTEN. out of all of them, marcy was the one who came away with the least positive things from amphibia. she didn't connect with her amphibian charges (she even admits it herself in the finale, and says that she wished she got to know them better), she was more focused on the technical and worldly aspects of amphibia, and while she did come into her own, she wasn't able to address and tackle her underlying core issues in the way that anne and sasha were. --

the two main themes of amphibia are learning to embrace change and letting go. and all the story arcs of the calamity trio showcase this in different ways (that's a discussion for another time, however). of these two themes, marcy's arc leans more towards the letting go aspect. but here's the thing. that was her main problem. marcy's greatest fear is being alone, and her greatest flaw is her inability to let go. marcy couldn't FATHOM a world without anne and sasha. they were her biggest support system, and by moving, marcy was essentially stranded. she had a hard time connecting with people, and she didn't have the social skills that anne and sasha did. so to her, moving was the absolute WORST thing that could have happened. she was unable to live in a world without anne and sasha, and so she didn't. she chose to take matters into her own hands, and as long as she was able to get anne and sasha on board, everything would be fine, right? wrong. we obviously saw how catastrophic that was, both for marcy and everyone around her. it was beat into marcy's head repeatedly how reckless and stupid and downright fatal her mistake could have been, how fatal it was. marcy's biggest lesson in amphibia was that there are some things you will have to let go of. no matter how desperately you latch onto them, there will always be claw marks left behind.

--

my point however, is that this was marcy's only major flaw. marcy was a flawed character, deeply flawed in some ways, but from what I observed, she was never flawed in the way anne and sasha were. outside of her major flaw.. marcy was a pretty well rounded person. and of course, there is growth to be left desired, but most of marcy's (visible) flaws were communication, and the ability to make yourself be truly seen in a friendship.. and they aren't really even flaws. more just things she needs to work on.

unlike anne, she didn't have self-esteem issues. she was pretty confident in her abilities and her interests, as shown by the first temple. surrounded by the right people (which at the time, were unfortunately not anne and sasha), she would've flourished. and in amphibia, she did. because for once, she was allowed to be the person she truly wanted to be. and unlike sasha, she didn't have horrendous control issues. anne and sasha's flaws are what I like to call character flaws, flaws that are innate and come from you; ie, they aren't as a result of other people's actions. anne and sasha were allowed to address and properly correct their character flaws because amphibia (and the places they landed in) was the perfect environment for them to see their flaws and to see the consequences that came with them. sasha learned that trying to control everyone and everything around you will only drive them away, and end up destroying both them and you in the process. her strength came from lifting people up, allowing them to rise WITH her instead of pushing them down like she used to. anne learned that self love is important, and in order to become the best version of yourself, you need to surround yourself with love, and in turn, it will come back to you. anne's heart comes from the people around her. their love allowed her to give love tenfold-- both to herself and the people around her. their major flaws only got resolved because of amphibia.

but marcy? her main flaw, which is letting go? that could not be resolved in amphibia, no. because amphibia only amplified this flaw. because choosing to go to amphibia, making the conscious decision to run away, is the entire reason why this flaw is most prominent. marcy flourished in amphibia, yes, but she was never able to address her major flaw. because of a multitude of different reasons, of course, but also because to marcy, amphibia was another out. another way to run from her problems instead of facing them head on and dealing with the fallout. anne dealt with the fallout. she stood up to sasha, for ONCE in her life, and watched her plummet down a cliff in return. (this is a weak point, but for the sake of parallels, I can't take it out.) sasha dealt with the fallout. she betrayed anne, once, twice, and was forced to go back to wartwood, anne's town, with the knowledge that she and anne are no longer friends, no longer anything. marcy's way of dealing with the fallout.. was not the core. to many, the core may be a physical personification of all of marcy's flaws coming back to bite her in the behind, but I disagree. the core was a cruel, merciless, and downright horrible way for marcy to learn her lesson, yes, but the core was not the fallout. the fallout, that showed marcy the consequences of her major flaw, was in true colors. was in the throne room. was in watching anne and sasha's faces twist into horror and disgust, respectively. the fallout was in living with the fact that everything she did was for nothing, and that she still had to live in a world without anne and sasha, that in her mind, they now hated her. that was when marcy hit rock bottom. and when you hit rock bottom, you have nowhere to go but up, right?

--

marcy did atone. in the core, in the face of everything she could have ever wanted being handed to her on a silver platter, she said no. she swatted aldrich’s hand, and said that for once in my life, I'm not going to run away. I'm going to face this head on. and why did she do that, pray tell? because of anne and sasha. because everything that marcy wu did depended on anne and sasha. because in her mind, even if they hated her, she'd rather face their potential wrath instead of accepting a reality without them. the real them. it's natural, of course. her major flaw was not of just letting go. it was letting go of anne and sasha.

--

and so, the reason why marcy wu's major flaw could never be resolved in amphibia, is because amphibia is a personification of marcy wu's major flaw. sure, she had good moments, and things about it she will always cherish and remember (and less good things that she’ll always remember), but marcy wu could not start getting better, could not start healing, until after she left amphibia. going through that portal meant many things, for all of them, but for marcy, I think it represented her final act of truly letting go. of letting go of her escapism, and her tendency to run away. of letting go of the old version of her, who came to amphibia with the intent of being with anne and sasha forever. going through that portal also symbolizes the end of that version of their friendship, the version that marcy kept chasing after. and I think that’s one of the many reasons why the only way to close off marcy’s journey, at least from our point, is by having her move. the move, and how marcy dealt with it, was what started this entire, crazy journey. and by choosing to have marcy move at the end of the series, even after everything that happened, is a brilliant move from the show’s writers. because it shows that marcy truly did learn from her time in amphibia. she HAS accepted and is taking the steps to overcome her major flaw, and I think more than anything, that is proof of the growth that marcy is capable of. marcy acknowledges that anne and sasha changed, yes, but through her actions and words, she also acknowledges that she changed as well. going through the portal, going back to earth, facing everything is a symbol of marcy's growth. because the marcy we were introduced to would have never done that.

--

going to amphibia changed all three of them. and even though we only get to see anne and sasha’s growth, marcy’s growth is SO poignant as well. I think it was for the best to leave marcy’s arc unfinished, because it shows that she still has a lot to learn and a LOT of healing to undergo. marcy’s final arc in the show has drawn to a close. but her character has not. and the amount of opportunities, possibilities, lessons, friendships, love, and more, are limitless. I also think it's poignant that we're left with a sort of open ended interpretation as to what happened to marcy after she moved. as for her friendship with the girls, I have many thoughts on that, but that’s also a discussion for another time. I think I’ll close it off by saying that moving was good for marcy in a different way as well: it allowed the calamity trio to truly come into their own. their reconciliation with marcy in all in was proof that they want to give their friendship another try, and that they are better off in each other’s lives. but showing that they drifted apart, came back together, and redefined their friendship on their own terms is beautiful. I think even without amphibia, they eventually would have to come apart. not forever of course, but long enough to carve out their own paths and figure out what they want to do with their lives. I know the fandom loves the idea of them being codependent messes together (it’s also a guilty pleasure for me lol) but I LOVE the fact that in canon, they allowed their childhood friendship to morph into something new, something better. in the wise words of anne boonchuy, change can be difficult, but it’s how we grow. but of the things you let go, you’d be surprised what makes its way back to you.

not to get all sappy, but out of all of them, I think I’m the proudest of marcy. and I relate to her a lot! so writing this was extra personal :,)

[aquaaquila]

As for Marcy's name translating to god of war, for some reason my brain always sorta associated it hinting how war started in amphibia, one that did (unintentionally) forge through Marcy's hands via Andrias

Ok, rant time since it's like my first ask which isn't about reblog games or some support scam:

All Calamity Girls represent each race they were sent to in their entirety. All the wars, invasions, and conflicts started with newts. Down from Valeriana and her order creating the Calamity Box that would be later used to conquer the other worlds which would be directly under the command of the Newt dynasty Andrias belonged to (all 3 races contributed though, much like all 3 girls came together to waste their lives together, and sure Sasha was the ultimate control freak, but it was Marcy who "always had a plan" according to Sash and both Sasha and Marcy bonded over pragmatic understanding that Anne is too "nice" (granted it's usually Sasha perceived as mean, Marcy as nice and Anne as in-between, it's more so about Anne being moral to Sasha's immoral and Marcy's amoral), and how she should go along with their schemes like them throwing dance parties + Marcy also always inviting Sash and Anne to do stuff with her even if they weren't interested). And of course the aftermath of Leif's betrayal in which Andrias started Amphibia's racism and used newts specifically to uphold such a system by making them in charge and most privileged, and then leading another invasion on Earth which was basically a war to end all wars.

Because as I said, Marcy represents the newts, she also kickstarts all the conflicts in the show. She got all 3 of them stuck in Amphibia, which finally made Anne confront Sasha, all of their misadventures, and finally enabled Andrias to lead the invasion to Earth by supporting him. And we shall also not forget about Darcy, who while not the same person as Marcy, is still part of her character. Darcy's color scheme also matches the planet Mars which is where the part of "God of War" in Marcy's name comes from, whereas Marcy's normal color scheme represents the Planet Earth, ironic considering she was the least eager to come back to Earth. Darcy of course was the ultimate Mastermind behind the invasion and the tradition of starting wars. Darcy was one of the final bosses of Amphibia to defeat, the one representing the ultimate consequences of how far the toxicity of all 3 girls could've gone.

So yeah, personality-wise Marcy may not seem like she would suit her name, heck people probably would think she should be more like Athena. However without doubt the name of Marcy Regina Wu fits her actual role in the story, even if it wasn't exactly her willing choice. Though it's not like she doesn't have it in her, I mean she is a gamer who always slays-

Just in case you haven't noticed I just love how the entire trio was crafted, they're such perfect characters ong-

[agalychnisspranneusroseus]

What drives me insane about marcanne is that Anne could only fall in love with Marcy when she's matured and grown and developed a stronger sense of self and emotional intelligence and empathy and the capacity to truly see her. Early S1 Anne would never appreciate S2 Marcy the way S2 Anne does. She wouldn't see the change for what it was. She wouldn't understand the transformation.

All while Marcy fell in love with Anne ages ago, while she was still deep in her silent denial, her comformity, her eternal tolerance, her unfairly unwavering patience, accepting any crumbs of love Anne gave her. She snapped in a moment of desperation and made the mistake of bringing her friends to a new dangerous world without their knowledge. She saw them drift away. She saw Anne hug her goodbye and willingly leave - willingly separate from her, because unlike Marcy, she was so confident in their friendship that she didn't think leaving would be a threat. And because she overestimated Marcy's growth. Because she thought Marcy saw the way Anne had changed in the same way Anne understood Marcy's growth. But this was an incomplete, eldritch metamorphosis - a half-melted butterfly that came out of its chrysalis too soon. She could have been something beautiful but she got scared midway through and that fucking blue lizar played the role of the devil on her shoulder and told her she didn't need to change. She didn't even need to accept Anne had changed. She could indulge in her most possesive, dishonest and selfish desires shamelessly. By S2, Anne understand Marcy in a level in which Marcy does not understand Anne, and even then, Anne still only gets half the picture until True Colors, and by then it's too late. The girl she fell in love with has been a farce this whole time, and in her desperate attempt to save her, she's killed right before her eyes.

[heart-wit-strength]

Thinking of potential connection between Marcy describing the Core's weakness as "Fear" in THT vs in O&Y the Core projects her, Olivia and Yunan's worst fears against them, two of which (minus Yunan's fear of grubhogs) both Marcy and Olivia's fears were being either disowned and "not good enough" for their friends or mother after failing a purpose.

like a part of the Core obsesses excessively over fear and insecurity in general, and it's almost like it understands it too well, almost like insecurity is what really drives it

[mothidocandart]

I don't even go here anymore but I'm writing a shitty essay about the effect of polyamory on the media its in and how it's portrayed and I was talking about Marcy from Amphibia, and it got me thinking...

Does Marcy think she's inherently betraying Anne and Sasha by having feelings for them?

I was thinking about the prom poster from Olivia and Yunan, and the fact that it doesn't offer a chance to say no really mirrors how she brought them to Amphibia and then tried to explore other worlds with Andrias and bring them along, and how they were made because she didn't give them a choice or ask them first. Most notably, because she never thought they would say no.

However, the fact that the SJMS logo also morphs into a heart when Sasha and Anne combine into one and reject her is also another evidence of this love = betrayal idea. She loves the both of them, and because she loves the both of them, she does things that inherently betray them, but doesn't quite realize why they feel betrayed. At this point, unless I'm remembering wrong, Marcy doesn't have a strong grasp on why Anne and Sasha feel the way they do, and strongly associates her want for them to be together with them being angry with her. She doesn't realize that they're not mad about the fact that she cares about them and wants them to be together, they're mad about the fact that she took away their autonomy.

By loving them, by doing things that show that she loves them, she is betraying them. And therefore, her feelings for them are bad.

EDIT: OH. NOT TO MENTION. Maybe she feels that the only way that Anne and Sasha could possibly be with her in the way that she wants is IF she took away their autonomy. She feels like they'd never want her otherwise. Screaming and cryin