#but i know it's not worth it so i slog on a pathetic wet cat

[artificervaldi]

The thing about being pro recovery w a disorder you can't actually recover from is like. I can get better but holy shit my backslides are bad. But also if you put me near someone that is anti recovery I'll start convulsing and be worse.

[huggywuggysuppy]

Gem and Pearl chatted lightly about the WL finale on Pearl's Dec 4th stream (here) and now we know what they meant.

Among references to Pearl's wet catness, at 1:55:30:

Gem: We're both a little bit pathetic in wild life, it's fine.

Pearl: I don't know if you can call yourself pathetic, Gem. I really don't-

Gem: I think-I think I was pathetic yesterday [in the finale.]

Pearl: You reckon?

Gem: I mean I've got like the biggest target on my back ever so it's like doomed, but I think it was a little bit pathetic

Pearl: mmmmm I don't want to spoil anything otherwise I would have a full blown conversation about why you think that. But also I can't. [because spoilers]

So why'd they say all that? Spoiler analysis ahead!

Gem lost her final life to the wildcard all alone at her base, which isn't the most interesting death. Many of the CC's have mentioned that a boring final death sucks -- even in the same stream Pearl mentions she hesitates to fight reds cause she doesn't want to inflict a bad finale on them. Also, in the ep Gem muses that she regrets holding herself back so much from murder -- the "sweat" accusations are really getting to all the CC's I fear. Gem isn't pathetic, and had a lot of entertaining moments in her ep, but the death was unsatisfying.

Pearl hesitated to even post her finale in part because she thought it was boring / unfulfilling. The wet cat bit is funny (and she's sort of owning it?) but even its origin is messy. Due to Aussie ping (as she demonstrated earlier in the stream), it was straight up improbable to get a mace kill, no matter how much she tried. She was fighting lag the rest of the episode too due to the wildcard overload. That was on top of episodes worth of failed traps, storylines, and murder attempts, that were largely foiled by not having enough time to do them properly. Placed final 5 as always, but she suffered the whole way there and mostly just survived without getting any kills herself.

Most importantly: neither of them got to enjoy/execute their divorce arc plans. It's an ongoing problem with WL but especially noticeable in the finale. Neither of them wanted to rush things, but the series forced their hands! Joel kept interrupting with (valid) murder attempts, and Pearl actively tried saving Gem when she was getting attacked by the rest of the server. Everyone loves and longs for another Murder Camel team up, CC's included, but it just wasn't viable. They agreed to hold off on their foreshadowed 1v1 until Gem was red, where she then died right before the wildcards deactivated (when there was room for lore/rp.) Overall, they were punished for pacing things out.

And why wouldn't they feel bad after that? Gem died unceremoniously, Pearl slogged through the ep with very little payoff, and neither got to fulfill their season long arcs. And that's what everyone's here for at the end of the day: telling a good story! Life series is special for its specific brand of focusing on RP, which is why the "a gimmick an episode" format hurt so bad. The CC's aren't pathetic, the wildcards are the problem.

(I hope the CC's feel better after the positive reception they HAVE gotten from the ep, as we still enjoyed the season and storyline they did squeeze in. Joel's ep in particular was still fire inc the final fight, although I dream of the au where Gem makes it to the end with him.)

(Pearl's stream line about "wanting a full convo" says good things about the CC's examining what went wrong and why so many people walked away unsatisfied. It's also sweet that the girlies don't want each other to think they're "pathetic /srs" instead of "pathetic /wet cat." I trust Grian + co. will figure things out for (hopefully) next time.)