#like sure add all of my favourite tropes but WITH A TWIST :'DDD

[skayafair]

Episode 44

In short, I am unwell 🥴 spoilers below.

First thought while listening: Omfg is this Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles all over again with "the price" of granting a wish resulting into "the wisher has to never stay in the same place and always continue the journey across the worlds"? WHO on the team is a CLAMP fan? I don't want Silas and Cass to be doomed by the narrative :')

But THEN congratulations, TSP team, you made a BIG fan of specifically clones, doubles and shapeshifters reeeeeally uncomfortable with them for the first time ever :D even DW's Flesh episodes failed to freak me out this much - I mean yeah the long neck Japanese horror inspired Jennifer was terrifying but part of me was still very sad for her.

These guys though... my mind is rooting for them because they are trying to do a good thing (by their words, anyway), but I can't trust them? It's just another group of people who are convinced the aim justifies any means, which I believe has already lead them into a bit of a wrong direction at the very least. And I didn't feel much for them before because we don't know enough to compile an image? Ok Finley is extra charming, but that's beside the point. But now I'm terrified of them and the idea of "oh gods, you can't trust anyone now".

This is a very interesting effect. It's not like I've never seen this trope playing out. It still didn't affect me - at most it made me more intrigued, never so unsettled. I was really rooting for the doppelgangers in The Flesh, clones were one of my favourite characters in Tsubasa and Tales of Abyss (and I like the question their nature raised there), I support the Echo's rights but more importantly the Echo's wrongs (despite her/them? being an antagonist) in The Sheridan Tapes, same as Ned's from the same podcast, and a shifter is basically what I'd like to be if I could be anything but a human. Oh, and I LOVE the Stranger in TMA.

But here? Ohhh boy. They are very likable characters on their own, but this demonstration of power was INTENSE. Podcasts have an interesting effect with horror on me: I'm not scared at all or at least not as much as I would of any movie because there are no visuals. But having only an audio as a source also amplifies the emotional effect if the acting is right, I suppose. I think Silas is just a very good choice for a viewpoint character. Any listener who's got to this point has to sympathize with him by now, so the listener feels the impact from his emotions. But there has to be another component, too.

Because the uneasiness is not about WHAT they are or their abilities, but the way they choose to use those. Say, in The Flesh the characters have just found out they are/have doppelgangers, so for one team the drastic measures were a matter of survival while for another it was fear of the unknown, and both teams acted on emotions because they didn't have much time to calm down and process everything properly. Extreme situations make people do things they wouldn't do in their sane mind, so there's no evil there. In ToA the clones were treated basically as expendable slaves or objects and suffered a lot, so while they participated in organized violent action, it was still easy enough to understand and sympathize with them. For Echo from TST it was a question of survival, too, and while I was uneasy at times about what she could do, most of her "crimes" stayed off the screen and we the listeners don't even know much about them. Were there any?.. Anyway, I couldn't bring myself not to have sympathy for her and was VERY pleased with her ending. And so on.

But Nico and the others had a looot of time to prepare for whatever. They don't tell what the danger is, exactly, which doesn't help trusting them at all. They act in cold blood. They attacked the base while getting the info about Alpha - could they just talk to Silas and co?The team could very well listen. Instead a lot of lives were lost, and they went specifically after Silas who wasn't even THAT thrilled with going down the Breaches in the first place and was already having second thoughts about this whole thing. So they seem very "rational" and bold but this, again, doesn't help their case.

So they hurt people who don't actually have to be hurt despite the fact that they have all the time to prepare. They don't care - or it seems so. And, again, they don't tell what exactly the danger of the final world is, so it's hard to judge if their actions are justified.

And the way they lead the demonstration. There wasn't even mocking, I think? Some sarcasm, sure, but it didn't feel like mocking. No one was supposed to laugh. It was a very casual and that's why all the more horrifying show of what they are not only capable of but actually do and will do. J was a low blow, but impersonating Silas to the point of "I become Silas Caldwell"? And Cass as the final and the most painful nail in the coffin? This isn't driving the point home, it's intentionally hurting another person for nothing. And part of why I felt so unsettled is because of how good they are at this. And how they just mercilessly shoved that into Silas' face. Like... The Echo in TST did that too, and it did feel a bit unsettling, but it was very different in every regard.

So doppelgangers/shifters? Great! Merciless other species who plan ahead and really just don't care who they hurt and use their abilities to a full potential? Honestly terrifying.

The remaining team Alpha seems to be in a very unfavorable position between three forces which don't see them as people, only the pawns.

I mean. Maybe Nico and co are going to be not only reluctant allies but actually value the team's lives and sanity. They seem to get along in present timeline, after all. I just don't see the point of psychologically torturing a person who has been complying with every word so far and showed to be nothing but willing to help, not faltering even when being held at the gunpoint. It seems to go overboard for just Nico freaking out because Cass made another deal.

All this is not a critique, by the way. I'm very impressed! It's so interesting!