#literally any ship people don’t agree with is sibling coded apparently

[oscarwiide]

“they’re sibling-coded-” bashes you over the head with a fucking rock

[callonpeevesie]

Things that bother me about Percabeth

Warning: this is going to be long and I'm not even sure if this will make sense. Also don't read this if you aren't open to criticizms of Percabeth.

Percabeth is a good ship, or at least has potential as one, but it has many legit flaws (this and this go into the flaws. By the way, go check out @takaraphoenix's Riordan crit) and I have some personal grievances. I'll write this out to understand my stance better because I need to get this off my chest.

I believe most people wouldn't agree with me on all this, but this post is entirely self-indulgent and I'm doing this for catharsis, so don't come at me. This isn't an objective analysis, just me trying to clear my thoughts. But feel free to share your opinions if you want.

Evolution in PJO

This is a pretty general point. I love the evolution of their dynamic in pjo. Their bickering, them opening up to each other and becoming so important to each other, the slow and steady buildup, it's great. Heck, I love slow burn. They have some good moments in pjo: Annabeth opening up to Percy on the zoo express, the scene with the sirens, Percy doing everything he did to save Annabeth in ttc, their conversation after Annabeth took the knife for Percy in tlo. (The underwater kiss is not one of my favourite moments, I'll come to that later.)

The romantic evolution, though, I'm not sure. I enjoyed it in ttc, there were small subtle hints like Aphrodite's scarf, or Aphrodite looking like Annabeth to Percy. But it became kind of tiring in botl onwards. Annabeth was extremely possessive and awful to Rachel. And in tlo things became a bit over-the-top.

I think Rick tried to establish them as the Most Important Person to each other. I don't like that. This is more apparent in HoO. I'll come to hoo later, but there is one instance of this in tlo: Percy seeing Annabeth in the Styx. Like one of the posts I've linked above says, it's shippy nonsense. It comes from the idea that one's romantic partner must be the most important. It doesn't make sense. I think Percy should have seen his mother in the Styx. It would make sense for Sally to be Percy's anchor, considering how much she means to him.

In short, their enemies-to-friends evolution was great, their friends-to-lovers evolution started out fine but became too much for me, and their friends-to-Most-Important-Person-to-each-other evolution was unnecessary and forced.

Luke

Luke and Annabeth's romantic subplot didn't need to exist. This isn't exactly Percabeth, but I'll say it here anyway. First of all, there's a seven year age gap, so Luke returning Annabeth's feelings is creepy. And it seems pretty unnecessary to me. It's also a bit of a mess. In tlt Annabeth blushes when Luke is around, and Luke says 'She's like my little sister.' In tlo Luke asks Annabeth if she loved him, and she says 'You were like a brother to me.' This part feels like Rick trying to add last-moment tension to Percabeth by making Luke a potential 'rival' to Percy. In the Staff of Hermes Percy says Annabeth had a crush on Luke, and as she got older, Luke had a crush on her too. Just ... Why?

They and Thalia were each other's first friends. Annabeth looked up to Luke and Luke was fond of Annabeth. That is enough reason for Annabeth to be hurt and for Luke to care about Annabeth. That is enough to set up their post-betrayal dynamic. The romance thing was completely unnecessary.

Rachel

I absolutely hate the way Annabeth treated Rachel. If there is one thing I despise about romantic subplots, it's justifying bitchiness with romantic jealousy. I guess it's okay to feel a little jealous or even possessive, and I can kind of see where Annabeth was coming from, but treating someone like shit because of that, especially in the middle of dangerous quests, is not okay. It's petty and immature. (It could be argued that Annabeth was mad because Rachel got to lead her quest, but let's be honest, she wouldn't have been that mad if it were anyone else. She specifically treated Rachel like that out of jealousy.) It was never called out and Annabeth never seemed to regret it. This bothers me so much. Fanfiction is a good coping mechanism, I suppose, but I'm here to complain about canon, not cope with it.

Speaking of Rachel, Perachel could have been a good ship. A demigod looking for a normal life and a mortal with clear sight. This elaborates on that pretty well. At the end of tlo it really felt like Rick had to get Rachel out of the way to make way for Percabeth.

Annabeth seems to be too demanding

Annabeth's attitude towards Percy bothers me sometimes. She's a good character and has a strong dynamic with Percy, but she's a bit tiring with regards to Percy (in a romantic sense; she's fine as his friend). I mean look at this quote from tlo:

I can't pretend I hadn't thought about Rachel. She was so much easier to be around than ... Well, than some other girls I knew. I didn't have to work hard, or watch what I said, or wrack my brain trying to figure out what she was thinking.

Percy feeling that way about Annabeth - his best friend of four years - just doesn't sit well with me. Percy straight up admits he's more comfortable with Rachel than with Annabeth.

There's more: Annabeth punching Percy when he asked who he should dance with in ttc, the way she treated Rachel, the way she behaved towards Percy regarding Rachel in botl, judo flipping him in moa. It's pretty tiring in general. Now that I think of it, this wasn't a thing before the romance showed up. Their dynamic was better in the earlier books in general.

Also personally I'm not a fan of Annabeth constantly calling Percy Seaweed Brain. This and this nicely sum up how I feel about that. Annabeth making fun of Percy's intelligence even after getting to know him makes no sense, especially as he was insecure about his intelligence. (And yes, I know she thought he was intelligent, as she said in the Demigod Files, but that doesn't cancel out the million times she called him stupid to his face.)

They became too couple coded

I've seen people say that Percabeth is better as friends than as lovers, and honestly I agree, and I've done some thinking to figure out why. I think it's because of the way they were written after they became a couple. They could have been fine as a couple, if they were written differently.

They started out not being able to stand each other, then gradually, they went through a lot together, got to know each other, learned to work together, and became a team. That was a great evolution, like I said before.

And like I also said before, everything I dislike about Percabeth showed up with the romance. Annabeth became catty and possessive. They became a couple. And it was as if the friendship wasn't there anymore, just the romance. They became like a cliche unreasonable girlfriend and clueless boyfriend. This is especially obvious in the beginning of Percy Jackson and the Staff of Hermes. Where's the friendship? Where's the comfortable bantering? Where's the known-each-other-for-years soundness? Hoo Percabeth just doesn't live up to pjo Percabeth at all.

(Also this is a personal bias of mine, but I'm partially romance repulsed. I can't stand cheesy romantic coded stuff. I only like lovers if they're also friends. So I guess I'm kind of pissed about Percabeth becoming so couple coded after becoming a couple.)

Their HoO dynamic

This is a related point. Like I said, hoo Percabeth doesn't live up to pjo Percabeth. All they care about is each other. They literally don't think about anyone else at all. Percy loses his memory and he remembers Annabeth. Why? Does Hera ship Percabeth? If he remembered anyone, it should have been his mom, like in the Styx. The only reason Percy remembered Annabeth, i.e Annabeth was made out to be more important to Percy than everyone else (including Grover and Tyson and Sally 'best person in the world' Jackson) is that she was his romantic partner. Again, it's shippy nonsense.

And there's this reveal that Annabeth had a crush on Percy all along. Are you kidding me? It completely retcons the enemies-to-friends development. Are you telling me that the Percabeth evolution in pjo where they learned not to hate each other was a lie? That Annabeth gradually opening up to Percy and coming to appreciate him was her acting out of a crush? I'm not believing that, no way.

I'm probably not making any sense, but my point is that Percabeth in hoo in cheesy and can't go one day without each other and people love it but I don't. It kind of messes up their previous dynamic, which is a shame because I liked pre-hoo Percabeth.

Rick seems to go overboard sometimes

I'm about to get a little controversial here. Many of the Percabeth posts in those tumblr screenshots going around social media are about the campers shipping Percabeth, or Arachne making Percabeth fanart, things like that. My theory is that part of the reason Percabeth is so popular is that the characters ship it. And Rick kind of goes overboard with that - not just with the in-universe shipping, with the ship itself.

Prime examples of going overboard are Percy seeing Annabeth in the Styx and remembering Annabeth when Hera took his memory, which imply that Annabeth was objectively the Most Important Person to Percy. I've already ranted about these above so moving on to the part about the in-universe shipping. Like I said, I'm not a fan of the underwater kiss. It's because of the situation involved. The campers just won a war and lost their friends and siblings, Clarisse just lost Silena, you'd think they'd have other things to care about than Percy and Annabeth kissing, at least for one day. And why did Arachne make fanart of that? How did she even know? There was also the matter of moving to New Rome - them wanting to move halfway across country to live together, away from New York, doesn't really make sense to me. This post elaborates on that and suggests better alternatives.

Of course, the author has complete control over the narrative, and the author wants you to believe they are making sense. And when the characters believe that too, it becomes harder for readers not to. When all the campers ship Percabeth, it's enough to convince half the readers to ship it too. (And of course, the pjo fandom has an unhealthy thing with canon ships.)

It's pretty much kept up by the fans

While we're at it, let's talk about the out-of-universe shipping. The fandom has always shipped Percabeth, partly just because they are the male lead and female lead of a series. Percabeth was set up to happen, so when Rick introduced Rachel, who actually made Percy feel good about himself and let him be himself around her, and whom Percy was interested in, he had to get her out of the way. I'm not sure I can explain it, but the Percabeth ending in the first series feels very fan service-y to me.

Platonic Percabeth vs romantic Percabeth

I think everything I've said above just explains why Percabeth worked better as friends. The had a great friendship arc and became two friends who know each other inside out, butt heads a lot but love and respect each other deeply. And then when the romance happened, Annabeth began to show these romanticized but actually toxic girlfriend stereotypes - being jealous and possessive, expecting Percy to read her mind and getting pissed when he can't, etc.

The fandom thinks those traits are okay, because they are normalised in society. People think that's how couples should work (it's not). And so the reasons I don't like Percabeth are the same reasons many people do. The date in the beginning of Staff of Hermes makes me cringe, because they were friends first and friends don't work like that. But no doubt there are many people who find it cute because society loves to romanticise the unreasonable girlfriend and clueless boyfriend trope. There are plenty of people who romanticise Annabeth judo flipping Percy or treating Rachel like shit, because things like that are normalised but I personally can't stomach them at all.

Anyway, those toxic traits come with the Percabeth romance as a package deal and there's no getting rid of them. That's why Percy and Annabeth worked better as friends, and why I feel things would be better if they just stayed friends. There was none of that tiring crap pre-romance. I can't stress this enough, I really loved their friendship in tlt or som. But when their dynamic evolved to romance, it messed up their friendship. There was a specific moment in botl when Percabeth began to feel off for me.

'She will calm down,' Chiron promised. 'She's jealous, my boy.'

'That's stupid. She's not... it's not like...'

Chiron chuckled. 'It hardly matters. Annabeth is very territorial about her friends, in case you haven't noticed. ...'

I don't know why this moment specifically, but this kind of marked a change for me. This is where Percabeth became seriously romantic, and I didn't like the related developments. This was the beginning of Annabeth's jealousy.

So what would I prefer?

I'll be honest, I shipped Percabeth for a while, probably because I love some friends-to-lovers. So I was going to make a list of things I'd change about Percabeth. I wanted to make some self-indulgent UAs (universe alterations) to fix the things I don't like. But then I started writing this thing and read up on other posts and stuff and I realised the list of things that bother me is huge and I could never make Percabeth work for me without messing everything up. So I just gave up shipping it entirely.

What I would prefer is an AU where Percabeth stays platonic forever (@elf-loving-dragon has been encouraging that idea as well). They were great as friends and I want that back. It would be so refreshing to have the male lead and female lead not end up together. Annabeth could end up alone, and still get her something permanent with her friends and camp. It would be so beautiful if something completely romance-free was specifically stated as permanent, because friendships in media deserve as much love as romance.

As for Percy, he could end up either alone or with Rachel. I don't ship him with anyone else rn. While I have made it obvious that I like Perachel, I still don't know if I actually ship it, and the idea of Percy ending up alone is not too bad either. (Update: I stan platonic Percabeth and qpp Perachel now.)

I promise I'm done now. Whew. If you've made it to the end of this long repetitive introspection, congratulations. If you agree, feel free to tell me, and if you want to argue, go ahead, I wouldn't mind listening to others' opinions. If you read this and hate me because of this just keep that to yourself. I have no patience for people who attack those who don't agree with their ship. K thanks, bye.

[flipthescreen]

just so I don’t forget here’s the 3rth part of Galactis’ story/my sith warrior headcanon

with no more tasks from Malgus’ orders, Galactis went to Baras this time to get a general idea of what he should be doing in the war, to which Baras began monologuing about how this war was the key for him to rise to the dark council, which prompted Galactis to go to the cantina for a while, and had a bit of a fling and returned to Baras’ office the next day to which Baras told Galactis’ he had taken another apprentice and needed help rescuing him and Killing baras’ master in order for Baras to rise to the dark council. Galactis was less than amused at the idea of not being on the front lines of the war, but was keen at the opportunity to murder a dark council member, in fact the only thought that put him off was who’s attention it could grab, but it would be more likely the blame would be placed on Baras for the murder, so Galactis obliged and rescued Baras’ new apprentice, Draahg, and then the 2, accompanied by Jaesa, took down Baras’ master, which caused Baras to rise to the dark council as he predicted, and then instructed his apprentices to travel to quesh to take out an “important” military operation for the republic there. On the way to Quesh Jaesa and Pierce expressed some scepticism of Baras’ motives, Jaesa in particular as both her and Galacts had formed a sibling esc bond by this point, Galactis himself had been somewhat interested in Baras’ motives but for the sake of self preservation he didn’t say anything to anyone about his curiosity and brushed off his crews concerns in order to focus on his part in the war. Arriving on Quesh Galactis located the operation he and Draahg were sent to destroy, however the whole thing had been a rouse, Galactis suggested heading back to the main imperial base on quesh to figure out what was going on, it was at this point Draahg said he had been giving the instructions to make sure Galactis didn’t leave the mine they were in alive, from Baras, setting off explosives he had set off around the mine in an attempt to crush Galactis, and he nearly succeeded if Galactis wasn’t quick enough to realise he had been betrayed and bolted out of there, before a rock hit him on his head, knocking him unconscious, which may have had some affects on his mental well-being for a while until his injuries could be fixed. Eventually he woke up and moved slowly to the nearest imperial base on the planet to receive medical treatment and contact his crew, to which he was met by 2 pureblooded sith without proper names, calling themselves servant one and servant two, who tried to explain to Galactis that Baras now being on the dark council gave him too much power, as he tried to make a claim to being the voice of the emperor, and in response the emperor had allegedly instructed his hand to anoint a new emperors wrath after the last one apparently went traitor, siding with an unnamed jedi, to deal with Baras. Galactis, still very muched dazed didn’t think about questioning why the emperor couldn’t take out Baras himself, accepted to role of wrath and headed back to his ship to receive instructions from the hand and explain himself to his crew, who were all very surprised about what Galactis had to say, and even more surprised when servants 1 and 2 appeared on the ships holoterminal. Once the shock died down the crew were instructed to head to the prision planet of belsavis to murder baras’ sister, and with the unexpected aid of a jedi knight, she died very quickly. Next the hand instructed Galactis and his crew to travel to the newly discovered world of voss to kill the actual voice of the emperor, unfortunately for him, going on a murder spree while on voss could turn the entire planet against the empire, which even Galactis could process was a bad thing and Galactis killed the actual voice of the emperor, and some kind of voss prophet on his way out, he was still fathoming on what Baras would look like under his mask considering how deformed his sisters face was so he doesn’t quite remember what happened on voss. On his way back too his ship, he got ambushed by Draahg, to which he promtly shoved off the hangar bridge, into a fiery hellscape they caused whilst duelling.  Galactis’ next assignment was to command one of pierce’s former commanding officers to move to correlia to help one of Baras’ dark council rivals known as darth Vowrawn. Galactis had been giving free reign to solve the problem, had actually figured it would be more practical too keep people alive this time, when he and Pierce went to give the orders to move, they were met by someone truly loyal to Baras, to which they murdered (and by they I mean Galactis gave Pierce the order to shoot him, Galactis allows his friends to murder people who insult them because despite being a stupidly powerful sith lord with possible sociopathy he’s not a total asshole). Once informing the hand that he himself decided to take initiative to put a hole in Baras’ plans he’d move to correlia to wipe out any of his loyalist forces, the hand interrupted him by stating that there were assassins sent by Baras to kill Vowrawn arriving on correlia and instead of a murder spree, he at least kill them first. Halfway there Quinn informed Galactis of a new regulation of getting access codes from an orbital station to get to correlia to which doing so, quinn shot Galactis in the back, literally and metaphorically, to which Galactis, in typical fashion, tried to murder Quinn, but before he actualy struck his ships captain with his lightsaber, he paused, he remembered what he had learnt about Quinn, knowing Baras had been holding Quinn on a leash long before they met, to a a point where he felt a sense of empathy towards Quinn, so he made an offer to Quinn, he forget he literally got shot in the leg and needed to be seen by a medical droid before the wound became infected alongside not telling the rest of the crew this didn’t happen, in exchange Quinn had to severe all ties to Baras he possibly could, to which Quinn agreed. As they landed on Correlia, Baras contacted Galactis’ holoterminal, trying to convince him that he wasn’t working for the emperors hand, to which Vette asked Baras if his fat was just the size of his ego, to which Galactis shut the holoterminal off before bursting into laughter alongside Jaesa and Pierce, Broonmark and Quinn don’t know how to laugh. After the Laughter died down, Galactis murdered the assasins, and helped rescue vowrawn from another assassin that nearly succeeded in his attempt, even going as far to offer his services to Vowrawn for his efforts on the planet, to which he was informed about a darkside being called the entity. After a blurry murder spree they found the “entity” according to Vowrawn the reason Baras was becoming so powerful so quickly was thanks to him having imprisoned the entity to help him with his plans, and right after this explanation, 2 of the guards that had accompanied the 2 were murdered, but Draahg, who was partly made of metal this time, Galactis then responded with stating his metallic implants on his face looked better, then beheaded Draahg while Vowrawn freed the entity. After this Vowrawn said if Galactis wanted his revenge, then they should head to korriban to murder baras in front of the dark council while he’s at his weakest. Upon arriving on korriban, Galactis was met by Lord Rathari, who kept his pledge to Galactis, offering his Moral support against the fight against Baras (it should be mentioned his entire crew had followed for Moral support, Galactis had instructed them not to attack or interupt the battle unless he ordered them too) Upon entering the chambers, Galactis challenged Baras’ attempt to make an official claim to being the emperor’s voice by making his official claim of being the Emperor’s wrath and that if Baras had been touched by the emperor as he claimed to be, then surely he would fall in combat without Baras breaking a sweat, to which Baras’ stomach wide ego accepted, even taking off his mask revealing his old and bald head, and as you can imagine, promptly had his ass kicked by his former apprentice, knowing his lies had been shown to the dark council he swore somehow, he’d strike at Galactis beyond death, and began monologuing about how his power was greater than death, to which a lightsaber strike through the heart interrupted, Galactis wasn’t in the mood to deal with another on of Baras’ ramblings. With this, the Dark council recognised Galactis’ claim, and was dubbed as “Darth Wrath”. Galactis would have asked for a different name, but remembered he had a one night stand with a Darth called “Darth Allures” and decided he’d stick with Darth wrath THE FUCKING END FOR THE NEXT WEEK UNTIL I GET BORED AND WRITE THE INTERLUDE UP TOO FORGED ALLIANCES BECAUSE IN MY HEADCANON THE IMP AGENT AND BOUNTY HUNTER DID THE HUTT CARTEL EXPANSION **ALONE**

[ultraclops]

I Can't Think Of A Creative Title [Mao Mao Spoilers]

SUGAR BERRY FEVER

BULL MONSTER? YEEHAW GIDDY-UP

Oh the Hero's Code IS a real book! Made by Mao's family no less! Cool

I'm gonna say it now. The pirate aunt's kinda cute.

I don't know much about cobbler but I'm pretty sure you don't put it in a trough

*screaming interspaced by cobbler eating*

Why exactly is eating cobbler against the Hero's Code? Did the first person in the Mao clan really hate cobbler or something?

"If I could have that cobbler, I would do things to it that would make my ancestors cry in shame." JESUS CHRIST HOW'D THEY GET AWAY WITH THAT

"Buuut I can't!" Am I the only one who thinks he sounded like Thomas Sanders when he said that

"Has anyone told you that you have issues?"

(Mao ominously hovers into the kitchen with glowing eyes while creepy wails play in the background) Nothing to see here.

The thing Mao's eyes do when he goes 'Oooooo' like if you agree

Apparently Badgerclops' biggest fear is 'crushing self-doubt'. Oooooo.

Tbh I had the same reaction as Mao when the cobbler started talking

I don't like where this is going...

UNCLE JIM-JIM?!

OH NO IT'S THE SCRIBBLY EYES

Okay but if Mao passed out in the kitchen how'd he get in the living room? Badgerclops couldn't have moved him because then he would've known he ate the cobbler

And that's, what, the second table Badgerclops has destroyed?

Cool, HQ has security cam - oh nevermind.

If Badgerclops and Adorabat saw the cobbler on Mao's mouth why didn't they assume he ate it? It wouldn't be there otherwise

"Ah know ah wooould :)" Sassy Adora

"And you're going by yourself. That's okay, I'm emotional anyways."

NYAAAMN NYAAAMN NYAAAMN

So the Sugar Berry Fever is literal? Like, an actual condition caused by eating cobbler? Is that why it's against the Hero's Code? And why didn't Badgerclops and Adorabat get it?

DOUBLE JOINTED BABEY!!

BEARCLOPS HAS RETURNED for like 2 minutes.

I know we makes jokes about Mao going feral but he ABSOLUTELY went feral in this episode. CBS incarnate.

Ok that's really sad. Why would you make a child destroy the thing they love and force their siblings to watch?! At least one of the sisters looks a little hurt over it.

Aaand the Bull Monster's back of course. And it has the fever too? Suspicious.

I don't wanna say where my mind went here but you probably know what I mean

ADORABAT BARKING I'M

B!TCH WENT SUPER SAIYAN - I mean GOLDEN TRUTH

If only fighting your demons was as easy as shoving a cobbler down their throat.

Are we gonna see Golden Truth Mao in the future? I like the he

Mao probably crashed the moment they got home ngl

CAPTURED CLOPS

Those stealth boots look like weird cleats.

"Stealth boots aren't toys." "Then why are mine colored like toys?" "I found them at the toy store." Isn't that a contradiction-

He used to be a villain what did you expect

HE DIDN'T SAAAVE

If BC's chores are fixing the Aerocycle and grocery shopping, what do Mao and Adora do?

"I need to be away from you right now before I LOSE IT on you." Is that a callback to The Truth Stinks or Legend of Torbaclaun? Both?

Yay another BC song, with some casual boulder-chucking

Aww the Sky Pirates are swimming together. Fambly.

BADGERCLOPS GETTING ATTACKED BY A TITMOUSE IN THE BACKGROUND ASDFGHJK

Yes, follow the cute but suspicious puppet that totally isn't trying to murder you

What's with the glowy eyes and creepy autotune?

So running away and cry-singing into a lake is normal for Badgerclops? Damn why isn't HE in therapy

MOM-MOM

You heard it here folks, BC is canonically depressed

That was quick

HOUSE MUSIC ELECTRONICA! And can we get uhh Orangusnake in the 90s?

Dang they still don't have any food? What happened to Mama Ratarang's meatballs?

ORANGUSNAKE WHAT THE HECK

I know it's supposed to be kinda sad but the imaginary food is really shiny.

So he'll fix the Sky Pirate's ship but not the Aerocycle? Priorities, priorities...

Mao and Adora Have Become Ninjas

HOSS WATERBOARDING THE PUPPET I

*Jaws theme*

"I love house music!" Trust me, I know.

DON'T HURT YOUR CO-HERO AND KID BC LET'S TALK ABOUT THIS

They're gonna take the Pure Heart? Weren't they trying to destroy it a couple episodes ago? Oh god what if Badgerclops DID get the Ruby Pure Heart's powers... that'd be scary

I can see the Badgersnake fics now

Mao fixed the Aerocycle - oh nevermind.

VIVA LA REVOLUTION

"How'd you get over here so fast??" "Badgerclops, I walked over here. Casually." Reminds me of a girl I used to know.

Hmm. Should've known the Sky Pirates not eating anything would've had side-effects

So the Sky Pirates could've just. Bought groceries. But chose not to.

"Aren't you forgetting something BIG?!" "*sighs* Thank you for having me" I mean at least he's polite??

How'd he manage to plug the ship into Benny and Penny's house though? And how'd it WORK?!

"Those guys are a little too relaxed" -cuts to the Sky Pirates panicking-

FLYAWAY

Aww, family training exercises - OH NO ADORABAT

Nevermind she's okay she just chipped a tooth.

'Physics...recital?' Do 5-year-olds even study physics? Is Adorabat a child prodigy?

Adorabat can face giant monsters but can't stand the dentist? Is she secretly Goku?

Aww, Mao still has one of his old plushies and he kisses it

I like that book it looks like there's a gemstone on it

Meditating Melvin, because you can't have enough alliterative names.

STAHP IT >:(

(Insert ASCENDED meme here)

Adora: *masters a technique that should take years* ight i'mma head out

WHY WOULD YOU DROP HER FROM THAT HIGH? BAD PARENTING BC

OH GOD THEY'RE GONNA KILL HER. good thing her soul isn't in her body huh

Oh look it's the Meditating Melvin guy. And he gives me strong Wander over Yonder vibes.

Being in the Astral Plane causes you to lose your memories?? Dang Adora better get out fast

Time for a song that TOTALLY isn't a desperate cry for help!

Bugs, smoke bombs, and popping balloons with pikes. These are the things used to summon Adorabat.

Wait, how come Adorabat doesn't feel any of the pain she sustained when Mao and BC were trying to return her soul to her body?

Yaaay Adorabat got over her fear and is ready to go to the dentist - OH MY GOD THAT IS UNCALLED FOR

THAT ENDING I

Wait a minute. If Mao said the technique took years to master, but Adorabat and Badgerclops both achieved it in under a day...does that mean they're more spiritually inclined than him or there's something preventing him from ascending?

BAOST IN SHOW

If I'm honest, I misread the title as 'Boast in Show', which made more sense at the time.

Why is Snugglemagne playing discus by himself though? Where's Quinton?

OH $H!T IT'S BAO BAO

Snugglemagne: it's free dog (and royal pet show)

"You're my new best friend!" Ooh boy.

"If he leaves me a third time, who knows what could happen? I might explode, LITERALLY" Mood

Literally everyone in PHV knows Badgerclops, how does changing his ear shape and putting on a leash count as a disguise. The guards could tell who Penny and Benny were why not him

Adorabat has a pet fly asdgdgffkh

Hey Chet's back

I don't want to imagine all the weird fanart and fanfics that'll come from this scene. Actually from this episode in general.

Whoever wins keeps Bao AND BC?! WHAT THE F-

Aww bento - OH NO ADORA ATE THE FLY

THAT 'DON'T STOP ME NOW' PARODY

IT'S THE SUIT FROM THE CONCEPT ART!

"I'm not actually a pet." "I know." Then why didn't you say anything??

Yay, Mao and Bao are reunited - nevermind Bao just wanted BC's snacks.

HE ACTUALLY EXPLODED and took it shockingly well I'm surprised

Well Mao, you did it. You pissed off Snugglemagne again.

Those combo attacks are freaking GENIUS

I'm tempted to make a "Long live the king" joke when Bao Bao bites Snugglemagne's arm

"I TOLD YOU HE'S TRAITOROUS"

At last, Mao truly forgives Bao and is willing to let him go

"Until next time." Is Bao Bao gonna come back??

Snugglemagne tortures people by forcing them to listen to his harpsichord? Does that even count as torture? And is Mao gonna get them out?