#juggling apples over here trying to remember the vague plot threads of the assistant noah au

[kijosakka]

After leaving Bridgette, stuck to a frozen pole... How Alejandro would react to Assistant Noah saying that he knows what Alejandro is doing, but Noah honestly doesn't care?... What if Noah only cares about how Alejandro unfairly treats Owen?

ASSISTANT NOAH: "None of the people on this show are exactly innocent angels either, so if the guys are dumb enough to fall for your charming tricks and the girls let themselves be swooned by you despite having boyfriends, then they deserve to lose." 🙄

i do think this instance would have add some in the way of later plot, what with london and the eel comment -- as established up until around germany, assistant noah has a neutral-positive view of alejandro:

(though ngl just considering his general mannerisms i am leaning more towards neutral -- character arcs and whatnot, neutral > negative > positive, so his ribbing comes off as uninterested as he is, more like general commentary on what's happening)

anyway its post-egypt and not much further and i don't think alejandro would expect, at this point, to react any different -- assuming that he would assume noah was coming up to rib him about the challenge again.

on noahs end, there is no real distaste for alejandro (....yet), emphasized by his seemingly unimpressed that no one catches onto alejandros scheming -- implying that noah sees it as something obvious.

^ tinged by bias by virtue of being on the crew and seeing behind-the-scenes clips and footage or not, to be so blatant about 'if they don't know, they deserve it' does mean that noah believes it to be something people should be catching onto (also worth mentioning that through him specifically telling owen, he offers more leeway for him in the face of this; favoritism.)

anyway, recap (for myself, mostly): alejandro's perception of noah up until this point is basically 'guy on the crew who ribbed me once' and didn't gloat about any of his strategies to avoid having a paper trail of his manipulation.

ergo -- this alters alejandro's pespective of noah drastically. because, again, noah is part of the crew and therefore not a threat to his game (and in fact could only really be an asset through this to alejandro), so for him to also be so outwardly comfortable with alejandro's manipulation signifies him as a kind of confidant role; someone alejandro can gloat to in small moments as long as he's careful about who's listening, because noah doesn't care.

as for how that changes london -- well, previously, noah would only take up that kind of confidant role post-london, once the cards were out on the table and alejandro goes with his flirting deflection thing. now though i do think it adds if he takes up the role earlier:

because, well. conflict. in alejandro's eyes, noah is taking on, again, that confidant role that he himself grows quite comfortable in, seeking reprieves from the competition that don't damage his game like how heather does suddenly insulting him behind his back and becoming very outwardly vitriolic and distasteful.

however in noahs eyes, alejandro is two-timing -- he'd probably assume that alejandro is aware (probably assuming he's watched previous seasons) that him and owen are friends, and thus assume he's trying to have his cake and eat it too, through being friendly with noah but being so vocal about his dislike of owen. they're a Package Deal, doesn't he know that?

anyway my point here is that it opens up a lot of opportunity for alejandro to be hurt/confused and retaliate in whatever ways, and for noah to assume he's just doubling-down and thus have it sour his opinion more. misunderstand is what i'm saying here.

.........or comedy of errors. both. both are good.