#jd Connor

[larsisfrommars]

Wild Wild Reviews

The Night Of The Deadly Bed

Overall Score

Story: 4/5

Dame: 4.5/5

Villain: 4/5

Gadgets: 5/5

Disguises: 4/5

Bonus Points: Gay Subtext: 2.5/5

The Yikes Dated Factor: 0/-5

Score: 25/25

Tier: S (100%)

Previous Review • Next Review

FULL REVIEW UNDER THE CUT

The Story

This episode is up there as far as quality, it almost feels as though THIS should’ve been the pilot as opposed to TNOT Inferno. It’s finally got all of its limbs (meaning Artemus has his proper characterization which is what was missing in the pilot) and doesn’t have the same racist trappings as the previous installation. All the major elements pay off, the mystery isn’t sloppy, the villain and lady of the week are well written. The biggest drawback is that stupid unnecessarily complex death trap that gave the episode its name. Why does the hotel even have that?!Why didn’t Jim get sedated enough for that to even be an issue?! It’s so dumb that it borders on Batman series levels of comically avoidable. It’s just not quite a 5, gotta reserve that for the best of the best.

The Dame

Our lady of the week is Barbara Luna! Whom I know as Marlena from the Star Trek TOS episode Mirror Mirror!

Say it with my y’all, I. Love. Gatita!! She’s so awesome and one of the best female characters this show has ever had. Which is WILD cuz we’re like 2 episodes in and there’s a 102 more. She’s intelligent and brave, she’s got her own personality and motivations. She is working for the baddie to protect her people who’ve been enslaved by him. She even fights back in her own way by giving his girlfriend food when he’s trying to starve her, not to mention attacking one of the guards! The relationship she develops with Jim feels genuine and relatively well developed. The only reason she’s not getting a perfect 5 is because she gets treated and written as “exotic” in the first half of the episode but that’s not a fault of her as a character.

The Villain

Our villain of the week is played by JD Connor!

What a great and hateable villain, he is cruel to women and minorities, he’s got an overdeveloped sense of class, and he’s got delusions of grandeur. Also he’s idea of a train killing train to take over the US with is extremely unhinged and silly which is exactly what we need in our Wild Wild West villains. He’s not perfect though. He lacks a certain uniqueness that would have him stand out amongst other egotistical traitors and invading powers that frequently pop up in this show.

The Gadgets

They knocked it out of the park again with the gadgets this episode. Particularly the explosive coal which was such a fun Chekov’s Gun this episode, with satisfying high stakes pay off. We also see our good friend knock out gas featured, and the first but not the last instance of Artie accidentally getting KOed by his own invention lol. The ring was also a neat gimmick and I’m kinda disappointed we don’t really get to see it again.

The Disguise

Artemus’s disguise in this episode was fun, well thought out, and useful. He successfully infiltrated the labor camp where Jim and Gatita’s village were being held. He used it (and a drunken rendition of one of my fav Spanish folk songs “Malagueña Salerosa”) to rescue Jim, and he also exploited it as means to start a revolt while Jim planted the bombs! The only reason it’s not a 5 out of 5 is because he didn’t really do a specific character, he was just trying to blend in which isn’t as insane or enjoyable as his more fleshed out personas.

The Gay Subtext

(Don’t ship it? Skip it!)

A joke could be made about Artemus giving Jim a specially made ring and to “wear it in good health”. There’s also a moment where Gatita feels like she could be making a joke about Jim being bi when she talks about “looking for a girl, now you’re looking for a man” which I think is hilarious even if it wasn’t intentional. Then of course we have our regularly scheduled story beats of Artemus looking like the world just fell out from under him when he thinks Jim is dead, and looking bitter (or dare say jealous) and exasperated when Jim makes out with the woman of the week at the end of the episode.

The Yikes Dated Factor

When I put yikes dated at 0 that does NOT mean there was nothing problematic in the episode. However there was very little that was straight up cringeworthy that made me embarrassed on behalf of white people or made me wanna turn the episode off. There were microaggressions and casual nationalism for sure, but no shoe polish or wildly inappropriate caricatures. For the time this show was made it was very respectful and for that I will give this episode props!

[niallhoranhasthat1thing]

canucks: Staring down the 24.25 season.

[nonbinarychair]

While I guys wait 4 the boyf riends and richjer art here's this thing o drew a few weeks ago of Jeremy heere eating a tie pod

[sharksliveontrains]

[connormoving]

i used to like sb ppl when they were inactive for like several months but i dont anymore bc i feel rly guilty whenever i do it.... like what if they do actually come back and they realize i sbed them and they think i hate them . and they dont want to refollow me bc theyre worried itll be awkward. you know

[spirirsstuff]

i have a bad idea

but hear me out

connor as heather chandler

evan as veronica

the scene where heather dies and her last words are "CORN NUTS" and grips veronica's thigh and she awkwardly just. takes it off

[makeme-blue]

I would like to introduce you to a concept

musical hell

when a character IN A MUSICAL dies, they go to musical hell. Only happens if they die in the actual musical unless it’s for comedic relief

[biancasaidstfu]

you're exactly right about why people follow A which is why this whole "PR" thing makes no sense because the moment they "breakup" she will lose that following entirely, she's doing nothing to keep us interesting in her - the only things exciting are her Luke "hints" that all of us look out for.

Even JD, even though I loathe to say it - he has his own work and his own famous friends. I was actually pretty excited to see connor swindells and Jonah in his photos. And I think some of Nics fans have genuinely become his as well. (though he'll likely lose a lot of followers too - but def not as much as A)

I think that’s why there’s an attempt to garner her own following not tied to Luke but the problem is people love to go spread hate on her work and that’s a bad look that could be preventing her from obtaining new projects.

If people actually used their brains for once and STOPPED with the hateful comments on her work maybe we can get through this a little easier. Like please, I need people to grow up and stop being triggered by her. It’s MAD WEIRD.

[mountaindewgay]

Dream Roles?

Reblog if you want to share your dream roles :)

my dream roles:

Connor Murphy (DEH)

Noel Gruber (RTC)

Squip (BMC)

Damien (mean girls)

JD (Heathers)

[ithemyso]

A list of my BATIM + BATDR headcanons that ignore all canon, in no particular order (which will be added onto later):

GENT sent in people to work on the ink machine, but that team also included a doctor, some chefs, a few artsy folks, and plenty others of varying skillsets that ended up staying at JDS permanently.

Before it was called Joey Drew Studios, the studio was named Sillyvision (it didn't change until well after Bendy cartoons took off in popularity).

The real life studio was originally around 3 times the size of the area we see in chapter 1, but it expanded rapidly after it became successful.

There were a LOT of people working in Heavenly Toys. They probably even had an assembly line in the later years.

While Bendy cartoons were what made JDS famous to begin with, they had a few other series as well, and plenty of standalone shorts too. It was the latter which the initial Bendy show started out as, and from there it grew into JDS' bread and butter.

Bendy and Boris had voice actors, both of whom were supposedly fairly good friends with Susie Campbell and Sammy Lawrence due to the nature of their work. Nothing else is known (or remembered) about them.

Henry's favorite cartoon that he made was Boris.

Norman Polk and Thomas Connor were both black. Allison Pendle was Asian-American.

Sammy was the first to be infected by the ink, but wasn't the first to die by it.

Audrey Drew looks almost exactly like her father, but her hair is thicker and curlier than his, she's taller, and her face has a slightly different shape.

Joey Drew keeps a copy of the real life Ink Machine in a closet in his apartment. It's just the top part we see in Chapter 1 of BATIM, but a bit smaller. Nonetheless, it contains a path to the Cycle, which he can manage from his own home.

And finally: the entirity of the games would have been avoided had Linda caught wind of what was going on (she would've straight up killed Joey, and not a soul would've breathed a word about it to the cops)

[skemford]

Wanted to collect some thoughts i have about the ink demon as a character and what made him the way he is

So here we go, another personal character analysis

1. Backstory/Background

As we all know, the ink demon is an attempt to create real life toon Bendy with using the ink machine

He's the only one known instance of cartoon character being recreated without someone dying (for example, Buddy Boris) or without them being based on real people (Tom and Allison)

GENT and Joey saw him as a failed experiment and they've tried to find reasons for "why" it didn't worked the way it was intended.

It's really important for story's development and becomes one of main forces that move it:

Joey believes that you need human souls to create a perfect cartoon character (explored through batim)

GENT tries to figure out if there's something wrong with the ink machine and decides to start experiments on humans later (batdr/fade to black)

1.1 Isolation

The ink demon was closed off and isolated from everyone while they've tried to find the ways to "fix" him

Joey said that he started this project to create "alive attractions" and BendyLand in batim's cycle has a spot where Bendy (presumably) could've been placed if he was perfect:

which, obviously, didn't happen

It's worth to note that this place can be found at the haunted house which is a part of "Dark Land", location that was later confirmed to be toon Bendy's personalized attraction.

We don't know for how long the ink demon was closed at JDS but it was long enough for some employees like Norman to notice that something is off:

"...Every night, just as I'm pickin' up my coat, there's a deep groan rising up from the floor. One of these days, I'm gonna get my light and see what's causin' all the fuss below me" (Norman Polk, Boris and the dark survival tape)

After JDS went down, he was transported to New Jersey and was closed off again.

Similar thing repeats one more time in 1953 when Joey has started to work on "Joey Drew Studios show" at Kismet Productions.

We have no idea when exactly Joey has decided to 'permanently' put him in the cycle,we can only speculate that it happened somewhere in 1950s.

2. Thomas Connor/GENT

Thomas is GENT representative at JDS and he was directly involved in the ink machine's creation:

"One weird note, the first figure ever created was a failed attempt in the likeness of the character called Bendy" (Thomas Connor, batim ch 5)

In batim ch 5 Joey claims that he saw the ink demon at Tom's office which confirms that he was completely harmless at the beginning:

"...Whatever that grinning thing was I saw wandering around your office,you better keep it locked up tight!" (Joey Drew, chapter 5 tape)

He doesn't say anything about him being violent or damaging their property.

It looks like the way he acts is a consequence of abuse and isolation from GENT and Joey; it's not the reason he was isolated in the first place.

3. Joey Drew

Joey saw toon Bendy as his child that he loved and cherished but the ink demon is seen as "a weird abomination" and "a grinning thing" by him:

("... I'm paying for living attractions,not weird abominations!...")

Outside of wanting to make profit without spending more money than he intended to,Joey is also known to be obsessed with toon Bendy and his design; he sees the little devil as the most perfect work of art the world has ever saw:

"Picture me standing side by side with my greatest creation, Bendy." (TIOL, page 11)

He also notes in TIOL that toon Bendy's creation process was supposed to perfect and he nitpicks every minor detail as important

Joey calls himself a perfectionist on multiple occasions which further explains his disgust toward the ink demon, someone who came out "imperfection".

"...They were swell, I’m sure you’ve seen them and enjoyed them yourself, but they weren’t what I, ever the perfectionist, wanted them to be. Something was off." (TIOL, page 159)

"It wasn’t Bendy. But it was a cartoon character. It triggered something inside me. That deep-down place that held the solution to Bendy’s appearance had finally stirred" (TIOL,page 153)

Shawn Flynn mentions that Joey reacts deeply negatively to bendy dolls having crooked smiles:

"...So what if i went and painted some of these bendy dolls with a crooked smile? That's sure no reason for Mr. Drew to be flyin' off the handle at me..." (Shawn Flynn, batim ch 3 tape)

In Joey's eyes, Bendy was supposed to be 1 in 1 recreation for him to be perfect and lovable; the idea of him coming out off-model was something deeply unacceptable.

He separates bendy from the ink demon and calls the ink demon monster or beast:

“I think you woke the beast.” (FtB, page 247)

We know the ink demon's perspective on Joey only through his minor interaction with Memory Joey in Batdr's ending. After he decided to speak about his love toward Audrey with ignoring second person in the room, the ink demon calls him a "poor excuse of Joey Drew" and crushes to death.

He was never loved after being recreated by the ink machine and this scene can be easily interpreted as jealousy.

Even with Audrey and the ink demon temporarily sharing one body, she was still separated and put above him.

4. Henry Stein

Henry is Bendy's second creator (or "real" one, depends on how you interpret this) but he wasn't present in the ink demon's life when he was 'born' from the ink machine.

Does the ink demon know that Cycle! Henry is not the real deal? Likely he does, it was stated a couple of times that he can differentiate humans from ink creatures (and he senses ink creatures through the ink)

Latest source of this information is FtB, where he easily knew where Archie Carter, person who was experimented on, was located.

“He’s connected to me. I can’t hide and I’m leading him right for you both..." (page 215, FTB)

We don't know the ink demon's perspective on Henry (sadly,they don't have interactions in BATDR) but it can be said that he likely has complicated feelings about him.

The tombstone picnic cartoon (1929) features toon Bendy looking at someone and smiling after seeing them:

TimetheHobo (previous cartoon animator) has confirmed that this shadow was intended to be Henry:

It explains why this is the only one cartoon with a lost ending; after Henry has left the studio, Joey didn't wanted him to be associated with Bendy in any way. But especially when Bendy was happy to see Henry in cartoon's context.

Possibly the ink demon remembers Henry from cartoons? It may be the case but it's based on thin speculations; i won't claim that it's confirmed to be canon. Only time will tell.

5. The keepers/Wilson Arch

After Wilson has decided to enter the cycle and "tame" it, the ink demon becomes one of things he wants to deal with first and foremost.

The keepers, being Wilson's servants of sort, were tasked with capturing him. We don't get context on how exactly they've succeeded but we do have a couple of tapes from them:

" ...Be advised that sedation will not last long. Termination must commence immediately upon reception. Wilson will expect a detailed report of the creature's demise." (Keeper Log 13, Batdr)

Some time passes and they figure out that it's impossible to destroy him, so plans start to change. They decide to include tortures and surgical invasions to try to make him weaker:

"Keepers have administered quarter hourly sessions of physical tortures and surgical invasions to wear down his powers. All of these efforts have been ultimately unsuccessful. A new method of control must be devised" (Keeper Log 26, Batdr)

Which, obviously, fails to work. On their 44th experiments they were able to press him into toon bendy form, which has worked as a 'jail' of sorts:

"...He is smaller in size and harmless in this more timid state. His powers are also greatly reduced." (Keepers Log 44, batdr)

They also state that it was painful for him and under this pressure he has started to express emotions,like crying:

"...Using lengths of steel wire to cut into the side of his body, he now registers emotional responses. There were tears of ink documented. Screams of pain..." (Keepers Log 44, batdr)

Through the game the lost ones did wanted to believe that the ink demon has "died" but they knew that it's not true:

" He said that the ink demon is dead but i saw him. I really did"

Putting the ink demon into a smaller form and placing signal towers around is not equal to destroying him

It doesn't seems like this effect was permanent anyway; Betty says that the ink demon was at the North Wing some time ago, which seems to happen way before Audrey has entered the cycle

Wilson's plan didn't worked from the beginning, he simply delayed the issue that he had.

6. Audrey Drew

The ink demon knows who Audrey is (even before she or the player does), he says himself that ink speaks to him and has revealed everything that it knows about her:

"...The ink speaks to me. It whispers your secrets..."

"... This realm.. is mine. You were born from it... you belong to it."

They have strong narrative parallels through the whole game:

The ink demon was abandoned and forgotten. He's a cartoon mascot who's supposed to be profitable and if he isn't, he doesn't serve his purpose.

Audrey in contradictory was loved. She's human passing and wasn't put under the pressure that the ink demon has experienced.

6.1 The ink demon projects his feelings onto Audrey

The ink demon does understand that their situation is a bit similar, at the end of BATDR he projects on Audrey on purpose. She's the only one person who can (at least try to) understand the way he feels.

Based on that, they do have a lot of things in common:

One creator;

Audrey's relation to Joey is obvious, he created a daughter for himself and refers to her this way.

With the Ink demon it's Joey's presence after his creation, comments and intentions which makes them 'related'. The ink demon=Bendy and Joey saw toon Bendy as his child/"firstborn".

Failed daughters/Audreys were replaced until the perfect one, in similar way with the ink demon being replaced because he's imperfect;

Even if girls demises is not Joey's fault (we genuinely lack context), it's still interesting that it has happened.

It does makes Audrey's existence "a terrible lie" (as the ink demon says) because she doesn't know that it has happened

Their situation may make them feel lonely among others;

One of them is a tall demon among dead employees/more cartoonish characters and another is an artificial human among regular humans. Again, the ink demon's attempts to project on her make a lot of sense.

Other residents of the cycle were manipulated by higher-ups (or created to only exists in the cycle) but before that,they had normal life (or fake memories about it)

With these two, it never was "normal" for either of them, even if their experiences are highly different.

6.2 He's trying to be honest

I've brought it up in my post with Joey analysis but I'll mention it here too:

The ink demon doesn't lie

Him being an antagonist doesn't mean that he has to lie or that you can't trust him. Antagonists aren't always plain evil characters,they can be complex! In contradictory to Joey who's a huge liar,his creation isn't one.

Nothing he says is misleading, neither he intends it to be. He either tells truth directly or projects onto people.

At the moment Audrey is the only one character he has a couple of completely honest moments with:

"He's lying, Audrey..." (about Wilson)

"They promised us peace,but they bring us only more pain" (about Wilson and the Keepers)

He drops the act of sounding threating here and says it as calm as he can. He stops it only after she says "be quiet".

He was shut down when he wanted to do a genuinely good thing in a long time; after that,he won't say anything similar anymore.

7. DR Beast Bendy

The ink demon doesn't need someone's soul (whatever this concept means in canon) to transform, which is backed up by Batim; him wanting to become one with Audrey is not related to this.

The ink demon wants to feel perfect and loved, using Audrey for this (who had almost everything he didn't) is the closest thing to perfection he can do.

He became one with "Joey's greatest creation" only to feel perfect. He wants to "give her purpose" only because he feels like he doesn't has one.

It goes from a really sentimental place which has made this scene look cheesy or weird to some people; but we're talking about 'unlovable' character who was completely abandoned by people

I also doubt that he couldn't fight for control in his own body, resetting the cycle is something that he has accepted at the end of the day (even without wanting it to happen)

8. DR Toon Bendy

Personally I interpret him as one person, there's nothing in canon right now that says that it's Jekyll & Hyde situation.

He's still the ink demon but smaller and weaker,as thekeepers say in their logs. This form is designated as "toon bendy" but it was never said that they were able to create another personality.

After signal towers forced the ink demon into the 'toon' form,he simply walks away from Audrey. He knows that she wouldn't want to see him after that.

If they indeed were different personalities, toon Bendy would have no reason to do so; we know from Buddy Boris that two personalities in one body have different values and don't blame themselves for something another one did.

I don't think that his behaviour was "manipulative" or "pretendious",it feels as it misses the point of his character.

He acts the way people would expect toon Bendy to act, the way Joey expected him to be. He has the looks for it and he can get positive attention he never had before.

People loved Bendy in cartoons. Audrey was happy to see Bendy and wanted to spend time with him/protect him.

I see this as him playing the role that he could never fullfil before. As I've mentioned earlier, even when looking as himself he still has small moments of honesty/vulnerability.

9. The cycle

(based on personal speculations from BATDR)

"...Here, you'll find the meaning in your pain.

This voice line is one of my favourites, i also can see it as him projecting. Possibly he has tried to find the meaning for himself or for why everything has went the way it is.

The cycle is the only one thing that belongs to him, he takes control over it and has no one who'd command him (especially after Joey's death)

He's the most important entity in it and everyone are either scared or worship him.

I can see the cycle as something that also gives him sense of stability/"privileges" which would explain why he was against resetting it even after Wilson's influence.

Outside of this,he had no idea what Audrey would do to him after she'll leave the cycle; she doesn't communicate anything and he was left in the dark.

10. "The end"

"...You see, there's only one thing Bendy has never known: He was there for his beginning, but he's never seen... The End." (Joey Drew, batim ch 5)

I always liked that "the end" reel is his only one weakness. It makes perfect sense because Bendy's a cartoon character and JDS has closed without release of any "goodbye" episode.

But it also makes a lot of sense for ink demon's origins. He saw his beginning but he never got a happy ending.

Every loop ends with the ink demon looking at Henry's face and reaching to him before the reset; it continues in BATDR in similar way.

I've mentioned "The tombstone picnic" (1929) cartoon earlier and it feels like batim's ending was written by Joey this way on purpose.

One huge difference is that in cartoon Bendy was happy to see Henry but in the loop it's written off as a negative thing.

Henry is the one who brought "the end" to Bendy

Studio has started it's slow downfall right after Henry has left. He was way more important than Joey wanted to admit.

Joey has blamed Henry for almost everything,he likely blamed him for this too,so it makes sense why the cycle ends this way; it reflects what has happened in reality

TL;DR:

The ink demon didn't came out the way that was expected but he's still (obviously) is Bendy. After Joey has figured out that it's impossible to 'fix' him, he closes him in the cycle and puts into the role of the main antagonist.

The ink demon embraced this role and doesn't see himself more than a mistake and a monster (which he projects onto Audrey in DR)

~~~~~~~~

I'm always open to discussion if you've noticed that i missed or misinterpret something!

Thank you if you've read it to the end! I really appreciate that you've decided to spare some time for me

Also TY @cr33ping-cr34tv3r for inspiring me to finish it! :)

[linskywords]

For me personally, I think McDrai doesn’t have as many fics because the only “intuitive” storyline is friends to lovers, obviously there are many amazing writers who have managed to tell other types of stories through them, or do friends to lovers as a background to something else, but I think not having a clear conflict to work from besides the typical friends to lovers is one of the reasons they aren’t written about as much.

Like, even if you take other common friends to lovers in hockey rpf. Sid/Geno you have the language and culture barrier, PK/Jonny you have them fighting at the beginning, TK/Patty you have the migraines and them just being chaotic, Auston/Mitch and Will/Mack you have the coming of age story.

Leon and Connor don’t really have that

Ooh, I think there's something here. I'm not sure what I need to be interested in a pairing is conflict, exactly -- but there needs to be something other than just two guys who play together and are good at the game. Sometimes that something else is at least in part just really compelling friendship. That's what we're seeing with Will/Mack right now -- Mack's backstory with his dad is interesting stuff, but I don't think it would be enough without their clear friend-crush, which also pulls in the narratives around their college buddies and the potential jealousies there. Similar thing with Mitch/Auston, where we got some great friendship stuff their first year, on top of them, like Will and Mack, being a pair of exciting rookies for skill reasons. TK/Patty is similar, where people were already interested in Nolan because of the drama around his draft and his penchant for injuries, and then he of the quiet demeanor and blushy cheeks became super close friends with the yappy bouncy one who wouldn't shut up or sit still. Nolan's story obviously got way more dramatic later on, but they were already a big pairing before that, because of their friendship dynamic. And then you have pairings like JD/TZ, where there wasn't really much at all going on besides them both being good at hockey and cute and clearly crazy about each other. Or Jack/Nico, which I'm pretty sure wouldn't be nearly as big as it is without the pictures of Nico hugging Jack from behind and both of them grinning like adorable fools.

...Okay, I could clearly go on for ages about why various pairings are compelling, but the point is, I agree with you that Connor and Leon didn't have enough of a hook at the start. Connor was narratively appealing -- hence so many fics being written about him and Dylan and him and Jack Eichel -- but Leon wasn't really on the radar, and he and Connor didn't have that instant-love friendship we've seen in other pairings. It took until the past few years for that connection between them to become clear. But once you have that obvious devotion, you don't need all that much more to be a compelling pairing. The hockey setting provides the conflict -- it's an incredibly homophobic environment, where two players dating each other would be fundamentally subversive and dangerous to their careers. This is especially true for high-profile players, which is why we get so many pairings that are two very talented teammates who started playing around the same time and who became friends with each other. Sprinkle in even one or two more ingredients, and you're good to go.

That said, it's become clear to me that my penchant for friends to lovers over enemies/rivals to lovers is not everyone's. MattDrai took off because of the rivals to lovers energy, and even fics that are more friends to lovers do often have a contentious vibe, like Patrick/Jonny. But I'd argue that there's so much to be done with friends to lovers in an HRPF setting, you don't actually need a different dynamic. Look at Sid/Geno -- they are basically pure devotion. They both have other interesting things about them, and the language barrier does create an obstacle, but I think what's made them so compelling over the years (and still one of the top ships!!) is their obvious and consistent affection and loyalty. Connor and Leon's problem early on wasn't that they were only friends and that was boring. It was that they weren't friends ENOUGH.

[peonyblossom]

Characters/Ships I'll Write For

for reference :)

Pixelberry

All of Us

Alex x m!MC (Dexter Del Rossi)

Tess x f!MC (Jo Moreno)

Alpha

m!Channing Lowe x m!MC (Kalani Mochizuki)

America's Most Eligible

Carson Stewart x f!MC (Juliet James)

Blades of Light and Shadow

Nia Ellarious x f!human!MC (Iris of Riverbend)

Valax x f!human!MC (Iris of Riverbend)

Mal Volari x Tyril Starfury

Mal Volari x Tyril Starfury x m!elf!MC (Hades Nightbloom)

Bloodbound

Adrian Raines x Gaius Augustine

Dirty Little Secrets

m!Carpenter (Emmett King) x m!MC (Brooklyn Peters)

High School Story

Wes Porter x Ezra Mitchell

Payton Saunders x f!MC (Lola Williams)

Michael Harrison x nb!MC (Jamie Baxter)

Mia Warren x Katherine

Ajay Bhandari x m!MC (Matty Wright)

Hollywood U

Thomas Hunt x f/nb!MC (Jackie Winters)

Hot Couture

Marco Di Vincenzo x f!MC (Analise Moore)

Immortal Desires

m!Cas x m!Gabe x nb!MC (Reese O'Malley)

Lewyn Junius x m!OC (Jude Junius)

It Lives Anthology

Noah Marshall x m!MC (Harry Spear)

Ava Cunningham x f!MC (Raven Adams)

Noah Marshall x Connor Green

Connor Green x m!MC (Jesse Harrison)

Stacy Green x f!MC (Ivy Lovelace)

Noah Marshall x m!MC (Devon Yasuda)

Noah Marshall x f!MC (Bella Potter)

m!MC (Isaak Vance)

Imogen Wescott x f!MC (Fiona Vance)

Tom Sato x m!MC (River Vance)

Danni Asturias x f!MC (Merliah Vance)

f!MC (Bailey Vance)

Tom Sato x f!MC (Pearl Vance)

Abel Flint x nb!MC (Ollie Bridgers)

Lincoln Aquino x nb!MC (Keagan Burke)

Amalia de León x nb!MC (Lottie Hamilton)

Jocelyn Wu x f!MC (Eleanor Wilkins) (slowburn)

Matthias McQuoid x m!OC (Ezra Wilkins)

Jocelyn Wu x nb!MC (Benni Locke) (fwb)

nb!MC (Erin Klein)

Laws of Attraction

Gabe Ricci x Aislinn Tanaka x nb!MC (Sav Zarza)

Murder at Homecoming

Donovan Navarro x nb!MC (Jupiter Stone)

Open Heart

Ethan Ramsey x m!MC (Sydney Valentine)

Ethan Ramsey x Tobias Carrick

Aurora Emery x Sienna Trinh

Queen B

Zoey Wade x f!MC (Quinn Hughes)

Ian Kingsley x f!MC (Quinn Hughes)

Untameable Anthology

m!Kit Jackson x m!MC (Jules Rojas)

Mandy Martinez x Ryder Wilson x m!MC (Barrett Kemp)

Gravity Falls

Stan Pines x Reader

Stan Pines x nb!OC (JD Willows)

Ford Pines x Fiddleford McGucket

Grey's Anatomy/Station 19

Mark Sloan x Jackson Avery x Lexi Grey

Mark Sloan x Jackson Avery

Meredith Grey x Derek Shepherd

Meredith Grey x Andy Herrera

Victoria Hughes x Lucas Ripley

Izzie Stevens x Denny Duquette

Ben Warren x Miranda Bailey

Cristina Yang x Teddy Altman

Maya Bishop x Carina DeLuca

[tricoufamily]

character/story influences tag

Rules: Write up a blurb or make a visual collage of the people or characters (from books, TV shows, movies, etc.) that inspired your OC, either visually, personality wise, or just a general vibe.

i misremembered this tag completely it was all about characters the whole time and i hallucinated the story part? so i guess everyone who did the character version like 2 years ago has to do the story version now sry

tagging @literalite idk who else hasn't done it do it!!!!!! it's fun!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(media/characters in order) this is the fall: succession, maurice, romeo and juliet, saturn devouring his son, that random dark academia bridge i saw that one time on tv that birthed the entire idea amen blood sports: the batman, the sopranos, macbeth, joker, jesus of suburbia music video, preacher's daughter hugo: fiona from shameless, yuuri from yuri on ice, belle, michael corleone, haruhi from ouran, sophie from howl's moving castle, wirt, elizabeth from pride and prejudice, mycroft holmes, saturn's son beckett: macbeth, arkham riddler, jack dawson, john marston rdr2, gotham riddler, billy loomis, jack skellington, stu scream, dano riddler, timothee chalamet's guy in lady bird, pretty odd era ryan ross, lead singer of midland specifically in the burn out video (it's where the mustache was birthed), kurt cobain, river phoenix connor: dutch rdr2, tony soprano, lady macbeth, arkham penguin, jd heathers, arkham origins joker, lestat, gotham penguin, robbie gravity falls, robert pattinson in the lighthouse, jade from victorious, amy lee, revenge era gerard way

[devil-works-hard]

I've always loved the use of memos and audio logs for exposition and lore. But for me, BATDR's audio logs and memos just didn't hit as hard as BATIM's did. Why?

One reason is that we get lots of new characters, but not enough of the old. Combining audio recordings and memos, we get 18 new characters and only 6 old characters (8 if you count Susie and Allison). But who are these new people, what do they do, and why should we care about them? We get:

Sally Newt, Grant's secretary

Dale Little, or as I like to call him, Wally 2

Angus Newman, a lazy toymaker

Kay Lee, an auditor who helped Grant and Joey hide some assets

Grace Conway, or as I like to call her, Norman 2

Archie Carter, the Gent test subject

Bill Danton, animator

Chef Buck, the cannibal chef

Jane Todd, creator of Carley

Telly Wester, who doesn't really seem to actually work at JDS

Phil Clark, who only seems to exist to hint at the door code

Hudson Doyle, a tour guide, I think?

Muncie Dunn, the crane operator?

Eugene Lloyd

Hank Scott

Lance Derby

Steve McGregor

Kitty Thompson

Notice how I left some of their descriptions blank. That's because it's not entirely clear how some of them are connected to JDS. Artist, toymaker, maintenance- who knows? That's one problem with the new characters: we don't really know who they are.

Hell, a lot of them don't even seem to work at JDS. One of them even runs the farmer's market stand. A couple of them seem to work for Gent (you can tell because their notes are marked by a gear), but still, we don't learn much about Gent through them anyway.

Now, let's look at the returning characters, not counting Susie and Allison:

Grant Cohen (yay!)

Sammy Lawrence

Wally Franks

Jack Fain

Shawn Flynn

Thomas Connor

With Jack and Shawn, their logs are just of them leaving. Given the fact that BATDR takes place after the closure of JDS and Archgate's purchase of the Bendy IP, their logs make sense. Wally's note is for game purposes. But it's awfully disappointing to me.

Which leads me into my second point: they don't actually say much of anything.

Adding new characters could make the studio feel more populous and lived-in, like an actual studio, but the new exposition fails to meaningfully build on the info we get in the first game. Telly's note boils down to "Oh no, they're sad it's closing down!" Lance doesn't trust the Gent workers (this didn't need to be introduced, we already don't trust Gent), Grace is a repeat of Norman (I would have rather just had another Norman log), and Angus is just lazy. Steve ends up becoming Big Steve, which is pretty neat, and a lot of these memos introduce various mechanics, but they don't really build on what BATIM established. Once again, I think this is because they're focusing on the end of JDS's run, but they don't tell us… anything. Nothing interesting, nothing new.

Grant's log and Sally's note just reiterate that the studio was in dire straits and that something happened to him. Again, we already know this. Tell us something new.

This is part of the issue I have with a lot of the anonymous notes left around the studio too. A lot of them fall under what I call "vague spooky shit," which is exactly that it sounds like-- vague, spooky shit that doesn't say anything, and only serves to be spooky or creepy. The whole "ghost" theme applies here a lot. Whenever the theme of ghosts shows up, it's usually pretty literal, and doesn't really do anything interesting with the motif other than being spooky.

Also: Why the hell are Nathan's audio logs in the cycle? Did Wilson add them? The timeline confuses me.