#lizzie ldshadowlady analysis

[allay-uxini]

^ Amazing tags from my lovely mutual @/reblog-house, completely agree

Okay but people actually view Lizzie as the braincell of the Bamboozlers? I thought it was common knowledge that all three of them can be equally as stupid as each other?

However I do think that the reason for why Lizzie is characterised as that isn��t just misogyny (though that still plays a part) but also because Jimmy and especially Scar aren’t seen as very competent in the fandom with people overplaying how supposedly ‘bad’ they are at the games so they use Lizzie as a point of contrast. I think the more outspoken, rash and loud a character is the more likely the character is viewed as dumb (Scar, Bdubs, Jimmy etc.) even if they do a lot of smart and incredible things. Lizzie’s personality isn’t something that I consider “loud” or very overt unlike say Joel who is known for getting angry quickly, being full of himself etc. Lizzie on a surface level is very snarky and occasionally deadpan so people just characterise her as the ‘compotent’ one of the bamboozlers even though there is SO much more to her like how she gets paranoid quickly and gets very jumpy, she sometimes like being silly, sometimes she doesn’t pick up on other people’s jokes, she enjoys playing the villain, all of that just gets thrown away from her character because it’s simpler to view her as just ‘the rational one’. All these bamboozlers are competent, they just can sometimes make mistakes in their judgement and not be very situationally aware, just like the rest of us.

Also I find it weird that the fandom likes to say Lizzie “saved Jimmy from the canary curse” when it’s really just a situation of wrong place, wrong time. Lizzie was at her lowest in secret life because even though in last life she lost her home and dealt with Cleo’s betrayal, in secret life she was completely alone and didn’t have anyone she truly could call her friend with the slumber party being the final nail in the coffin as it showed that in her server, most people forgot about her. Because of this loneliness she makes some irrational decisions like the invisible skeleton horse that got her killed by Jimmy and she clung onto the only person who was there for her sleep over, her husband Joel so she agrees to help him with his task and because she never realised Joel failed early, she went after Scott and got herself killed.

Lizzie didn’t get first out because she was trying to save Jimmy but because she became just as reckless as Jimmy because Jimmy was in a safer position this season with a steady ally and his ally being the only other red so he didn’t have to worry about traps.

Lizzie being reckless and dying first doesn’t make her incompetent but it means she’s flawed. The fandom should acknowledge Lizzie’s more interesting flaws in the life series because only then can you truly understand her character.

My thoughts on the women being the brain cell thing is that men are "supposed" to be like. Hyperactive and goofy so when they do it it's normal. Even when they're not acting that way, they're purposely interpreted that way (I see this a lot with Grian). This creates a contrast between them and women, making women seem reasonable even if they're not being reasonable (Pearl is often very reckless in the life series, but people like to see her as motherly for some reason). Therefore, they're labeled as the brain cell.

I am at school and have only skimmed your posts so I'm sorry if I've literally just repeated what you or someone else has already said lol

Nods nods. It is a weird double standard but it's even weirder that the women are simultaneously largely presented as more competent and smart by the fandom, for feats that I'd argue are not exclusive to them, ignoring their flaws and failures, while also letting those failures define them, but almost exclusively to further the sisterly or motherly notion. Biggest victim of course being Lizzie "taking on the canary curse". Like isn't is so weird that people paint ONE early death of hers as having literally anything to with Jimmy, to the point that most characterization I've seen of her is the "curse", how she fell into the void, how Jimmy was saved thanks to her. I am THE Jimmy guy man and yet it drives me nuts because it's such a disservice to the both of them. How her death isn't about her but treated as honorable to the benefit of a guy, as if she was an unwilling or willing sacrifice for Jimmy. Makes me feel icky. Her character in SL has so much to say about her. Same with WL but most I see is "haha thats the braincell of the loser trio!"

Sorry it takes literally so little to make me go on tangents about Lizzie's characterization lol but yeah. The women are most definitely just treated inherently different from the male players by a large chunk of the fandom which just deepens the misogyny

[allay-uxini]

The wild life finale has made me insane over Traffic!Lizzie and I’m now working on a super long life series Lizzie analysis!!!! Here’s a screenshot of my unhinged outline for the thing

Full analysis coming soon! (Maybe)

[nerdyenby]

Jimmy broke the curse fair and square, but he’s still the canary. Lizzie died in the End, alone. Not to another player, not to the effects of the game itself, she just fell. A tragedy in its own right, it took minutes for the others to even notice she was gone. The game barely acknowledged her passing, as it was so beyond its reach. She died first, yes, but the canary’s call means nothing to those beyond the coal mine.

[autumnwhistles]

Lyric Breakdown in my Last Life (mainly Martyn-centric) song, "Corners of the World"

'Abridged' version here, and longer analysis (ft. a lot of Martyn character analysis... and also the full lyrics I'm actually talking about) under the cut.

"I'll lie, double cross to best them all" is yet again a reference to a line from Martyn's Last Life teaser poem ("Surpass them all/Take friends for foes"), which was from the perspective of the Watchers (and was previously referenced by them in the first song, Middle of Nowhere). Martyn using this phrasing hints that the Watchers already hold some influence over him, hence the outline of the lyrics flashing purple in the video!

"Walls, corners, edges" is taken from Martyn's speech after Ren's beheading (as is the title of this song, for the same reason):

"You took me in when I was a lowly traveler, going across the land, searching the four corners of this world. I learned there was nothing in this world for me – nothing but walls, corners, edges. And you know what, you showed me life. As much as I’ve taken it from you, you gave it back to me in buckets’ fulls."

The point here is that, after the events of 3rd Life, Martyn's reverted back to that previous worldview. That life he was shown clearly meant something to him, but ultimately, its price was far too high. So now, he's deliberately separating himself from a mindset that would allow him to care too much about others and feel that same pain: the world is walls and edges; the people in it are figures to use for his own benefit, not to care about; the world does not hold those buckets' fulls of life. As we see with his reactions to the Southlands' fall, he doesn't really end up being successful in this (and it's a major topic of exploration throughout the musical) – but it doesn't mean he doesn't want or try to be.

Of course, the wordplay this verse ("You'll be cornered in the corners, and on edge in many more/And walls you'll build and walls you'll raise(/raze), and walls will fall in war") is to establish Martyn's strengths in that area. Getting the voice right is an important part of musical characterisation too!

"Keep it a void you're fighting for" is either dramatic irony or foreshadowing depending on how much you know of his lore. Martyn's only referring to not fighting for anyone else's sake here, but between the seasons the players do spend their time falling through the void (while unconscious) – regardless of whether they win or lose. By fighting to win, you are just fighting for that same void... which of course, Martyn doesn't know (because surely winning means something). If he knew nothing changes after you win, the incentive to win would be much weaker, and I'd argue we do see that in c!Martyn post-Limited Life. But despite his cynicism and distrust, he's still naïve to this particular cruelty of the world... :) i mean lore-wise if you win a fragment of your soul does get protected but 1) no bearing on last life and so on this musical whatsoever, and 2) how is c!martyn supposed to know that even after his win

"Careful with the name you pick/Don't want it to get flamed" is (as the editing hopefully makes clear) a pun – 'you don't want your name to be made fun of', and 'your tree fort is flammable'. This is again meant to establish Martyn's quick wit as well as progressing the song/storyline, and as well as showing us him messing with people, which he very much likes to do! (I am also aware Cleo was the one who informed Lizzie, but I had to streamline various things for the sake of the medium – this is both a Martyn character establishment song and an intro to the world and various figures in it, so it's easier if Martyn is the one who introduces that to those figures (and for us to get more information about Martyn based on how he interacts with them). And Lizzie's reaction to that information was something I wanted to keep in)

Of course Skizz and Etho were in the Red Army too, Martyn's just being cheeky/faking indignation here (if there'd been space, I'd have given Skizz a line of protest, but from a musical standpoint I preferred the instant transition into Scar's section). But guys.... BEST/Dogwarts parallels... guys.....

"(...)I'll lead, not play a pawn"/"(...)little pawn" (sung simultaneously, the first by Martyn and the second by the Watchers) is a callback to the first song, Middle of Nowhere, in which there's a section of randomised lives being given out. The first line there is "Four for the traitor, four for the pawn", and this confirms/establishes 'the pawn' as referring to Martyn (referencing what he's treated as by the Watchers). Note that here Martyn's desire 'to lead' refers to being in control of his actions and not deferring to anyone, not specifically to leading an alliance. Of course, Martyn's part is full of dramatic irony on his behalf :)

Those are the 'flashier' lines and word choices I especially wanted to highlight. Now, for the version with way more character analysis!

As mentioned, Corners of the World is Martyn's – our main character's – introductory song. Regardless of whether it counts as an 'I Want' song or not (it's a bit nebulous, because yes, he does express things he wants – to win, to be in contol of his own actions and not at others' whims. But for me, the more important part of the song is what he doesn't want to do, what things he's distancing himself from that he's presumably done before, and the questions and implications that arise from that. And the core of that is explored slightly later on), it's going to be our first impression of him as a character. The traits and worldview established here will be viewed as important, and will form the basis of his arc throughout the musical.

Because of that, the two verses focus on establishing that inital worldview (as well as establishing what he's aiming for):

MARTYN (Verse 1) Right, here I go again — new world, another start. New chance to see who’ll reach the end, and who will fall apart Well, won’t be me – this time I’ll be the very last to fall No care for cost, I’ll lie, double cross to best them all

So we know he wants to survive and win the game (especially after not doing so last time), we know he's willing to play dirty to achieve that and definitely should not be trusted. We know he's under no impression that this is anything other than a death game (or death match, to quote his Limited Life self) – he doesn't hide from the knowledge that people will fall apart, that only one person will be left standing. Importantly, this means he's playing the game exactly as intended, with no intentions of defying it or even deviating slightly* from what the first song has expressed to be the goal (to 'best'/'surpass' everyone else). Even as he expresses the wish to play for himself, he's already committed himself to following others' unseen rules.

Walls, corners, edges, I’ve been this way before. You’ll be cornered in the corners, and on edge in many more; And walls you’ll build and walls you’ll raise(/raze) and walls will fall in war, Kinship destroyed, so keep it a void you’re fighting for.

And here we get an exploration of Martyn's mindset in more detail. I've touched on this already, but a major point of exploration throughout the musical is Martyn's relashionship to emotional attachment – he's coming right off the bat of Ren's death in 3rd Life, which "broke" him and made him play more selfishly since (both statements taken from the LimLife lore stream), and he is someone who tends keep his distance and who'll prioritise himself over allies whenever things get dicey. But the "life" that closeness gave him back in 3rd Life was still clearly important to that version of him, and he does inadvertently (and unwillingly) start chasing that again this season – ending up growing close to the Southlanders (bar Grian) despite his efforts, enough to hallucinate them and be manipulated by the Voice's(/Watchers') false promise to bring them back to life if he follows its commads (in a moment where he expresses resistance to following its commands, and where the Voice is clearly distressing him). LL Episode 8 intro my beloved...

Still, that's to come. At the start of Last Life, he's firmly in a reactionary mindset to the events of 3rd Life, separating himself from that life and that version of him. 3rd Life was a failure on his part (in addition to the emotional damage, but he's trying to separate himself from that side of things and to focus purely on the win), and he's absolutely not wasting this new chance at victory.

So corner to corner, I’ll keep wandering on, Border to border, through woods, through caves, through spawn, Sure, laugh with some, don’t keep it glum, so long as lines are drawn Forego the rest, and don’t invest, just keep on wandering- WATCHERS Wandering, wandering MARTYN -on.

It's Watcher manipulation time, encouraging unhealthy mindsets that help them further their own aims! The more untied he is, the easier he'll be for them to play (less loyalties to others –> the more likely he is to rely on the Voice, and the less resistance there is to doing certain things that might involve those connections). Yes, emotional connections would mean more emotional pain (and so more negative emotions for them to feed on) in the future, but Martyn's very resistant to that idea right now, so it wouldn't do much to push it. They do encourage emotional connections later, though (heavily pushing him towards Ren for example, and note that that's only once it would mean Martyn betraying his own alliance (which would mean more emotional pain for someone, regardless of its impacts on Martyn himself. Or it would've been if that was revealed)).

There's another important part here, though. After all the 'allies won't help you' etc in the first two verses, I wanted to make clear that Martyn's not against being around people, far from it – he's almost constantly around people, just not generally around the same ones for an extended period of time – it's just the emotional investment he's trying to avoid. He is a very social player, he does enjoy joking and/or messing around with others and does it constantly, that's also an important aspect to him (he's a very "you talk a lot but never say anything" type of person**). So "sure, laugh with some, don't keep it glum" is a very important line!

LIZZIE Welcome, oh welcome to my tree fort, yet unnamed. MARTYN Be careful with that name you pick — don’t want it to get… flamed. LIZZIE …Ah. They won’t demean A fellow green? …Your lives? MARTYN That’s mine to know Is that a tower over there? See you, I’ve got to go!

And immediately, here's an example of Martyn actually messing with someone (as a new player, Lizzie is fun to tease)! His "don't want it to get flamed" triples as that, as a wordplay demonstration, and as another recognition that they are living in a world where people will inevitably turn on each other. If something's flammable, it will be burned.

Lizzie's characterisation here is meant to show her as someone who wants to do her best and is establishing herself, but is unsure/nervous about how the game will unfold due to having had no past experience (, the '...your lives?' comment is prompted by the momentary urge to want to know how close Martyn is to turning Red and potentially burning down her tree fort) There is the element of naïvité coming from not having lived through a previous series, too – not thinking about how badly having a flammable base may end, 'they won't demean a fellow green' again here, etc.

Because this verse is a dialogue, I focused a lot more on trying to keep the character's voices true to themselves as well. With Lizzie, the "Welcome, oh [welcome]" is moreso there to suit the 'fairy queen' persona she was going for, but the "tree fort... yet unnamed" would be something she'd say for humour's sake, in her particular style which I cannot for the life of me describe; her 'ah' would be quite deadpan in that way too (again, not sure which words to use to describe it). With Martyn we have the aforementioned wordplay, but also his method of slipping out of situations that go in directions he wants to avoid... which is to pretend to get distracted by something else, promptly change the subject to that thing, and run off (a clear example of this is in Wild Life when Scott is questioning him about his powers, and he conveniently gets 'distracted' by a zombified Skizz dying in the distance instead (~17:30 in his vid). Maybe not the smoothest of getaways... but a habit nonetheless).

TEAM BEST BEST will be the best, and we’ll show em what we got With our matching shields, and our towering snow fort MARTYN Hold on a sec, where’s your respect? BDUBS Respect? MARTYN Yeah, that’s my bit! Same shields? Snow? A world ago? With Ren and- fine, have it

Again, this verse is largely leaning into character voices and interactions. BEST do initally set out to be the heroes of the server (eg by recovering the enchanting table and returning it to the server), and do have some very loud/enthiusiastic figures within their ranks (Bdubs and Skizz), so the tone of their lyrics is meant to reflect this (though the instrumentation, which we'll talk about in a different post, does a lot of this work as well). Of course you also have Etho who's the complete opposite of course (and Tango somewhere in the middle), but it's the louder voices that are going to be heard in the interactions so it's their side of things I'm portraying. And, as mentioned before, we also have Martyn completely going into mock-offense mode.

SCAR/BEST/LIZZIE/MARTYN No matter if you're in your sixes or twos/Let's find some ore to- I'll sell you an offer you/-mine cannot refuse/It'll be the fairy fort! Crystals for fleeing,/I'm fine just to chat Crystals for flame,/Not falling for that! Survival's the ALL Name of the game!

Pretty self-explanatory here, with Martyn not buying into Scar's deals and other alliances going about their lives. BEST heading down to mine is set-up for the next song (aptly named "Down In The Mines"), in which Bdubs reveals he was cursed with the Boogeyman curse while down there, narrating his experiences in the form of a ghost story.

SCAR/BEST/LIZZIE/MARTYN Corner to corner, I'll just keep on wandering, wandering on/Yes, join the fairy fort, I'd love to have you here!/BEST will be the best, with our diamonds and our gold We can build a secret passageway so we'll always be near!/Put us to the test, and you'll see that we won't fold/A crystal or spell, oh, Joel, you'd help me sell?/Through woods, through caves- -But still for my sake I probably should find a team: it would do me some-/We'll aid each other when we need, together we will succeed, oh-/Put us to the test and you'll see that we'll do-/Goody! Magical Mountain we'll be! ALL (including Cleo, BigB and Joel, who are now onstage with their respective alliances) Good – It's this I've understood!*

Here we see the different players' attitudes to playing the game, and what they've "understood" about how to play it, as well as more alliances forming. Nothing much to say about Scar and Martyn here (aside from Martyn expressing the fact that he does want to be part of an alliance for numbers' sake, which we'll build more on in Song 4 (A(ha)lliances) when the Southlands are formed; and also continuing the thread that he sees others as figures he can use to benefit himself. Maybe there were things to say about Martyn here!), but a lot of Team BEST's part is foreshadowing ("put us to the text and you'll see that we won't fold"... they will fold. They will) in addition to contuining the 'server heroes' thread from earlier. Meanwhile, Lizzie's part continues to show her as a player who hasn't experienced the way the server devolves into bloodshed, still having a pretty idealistic view about the co-operation between herself, BigB and Cleo without thinking about the ways they'll inevitably have to turn on each other if they get later in the game.

The part about the tunnel connecting the Fairy Fort to Cleo and BigB's base is taken directly from the first session (originally proposed as an escape tunnel, in the same conversation that Cleo pointed out that the fort was flammable).

UPPER WATCHERS/LOWER WATCHERS Oh, wander, wander on/Wonder, wonder On/When they'll all start to turn tails Wonder, wonder/Wander, wander When trust will yield to betrayals/On

I've mentioned it before, but the Watchers feed on negative emotions, which is why they run the Life series. This is one of the few times we see emotions from them, as they're very excited to see what chaos and carnage this new game they've formed will bring (which I took care to portray in my voice)!

WATCHERS/MARTYN Till the rest are gone.../Right, here I go again – I'll fight with my axe drawn* Oh, wander, little pawn/But, unlike then... I'll lead, not play a pawn.

I've talked about this in the 'abridged' version, so I won't repeat that. The other thing here is the axe being an obligatory Dogwarts reference (or, more accurately, an obligatory rhyme (with 'pawn') which gave way to a Dogwarts reference I took).

[End]

(You can hear the instrumental continue for a while – ideally, Martyn would talk for a bit with Scott, Pearl and Jimmy, but though I can act through singing I can't act through speech and I'm not subjecting viewers to that xD)

If you've read this, thank you so much! You can definitely chart me going more and more unhinged as this progressed...

--

*eg by also wanting to find friendships, to be helpful while you can, etc, in addition to winning. There's no secondary aim there, aside from protecting himself from emotional harm.

**(to quote Martha from Doctor Who)

[mikorae]

canary curse analysis

alright. i keep seeing people call Lizzie the new canary. i would like to kindly disagree with all of ye :D

Lizzie is not the new canary.

lets take a look.

an enderman pushed Lizzie into the void, in the End. her cries were unheard. her fall was unseen. the only player there was Scott(hes irrelevant rn though sorry cyan guy) Joel was the only one in the overworld, who hadnt witnessed the death, to notice. her husband was the only one to notice. he spread the word. but still, no one had actually been there. (im really disregarding Scott im so sorry but hes just not a part of this)

lets look at our canary. he died in the overworld, with witnesses, to the hands of a wither and warden. (technically just the warden but shh) Jimmy's death was seen, his call was heard. the canary sang again. they heard his song. they heard the warning. they watched as the canary didnt make it out of the coal mine.

oh and Mumbo died too- he died just to make Grian sad.(#theWatchersagainsmh) thats about all i can say about that lol.

Lizzie is not the canary. Jimmy still is. his call was heard.

Lizzie's just silly and fell :3 (the Watchers forgot she existed so they couldnt prevent it)

hope you liked my analysis!!

[elizasidepiece]

trying to draw lizzie and Joel based off a screenshot from when Joel streamed the other day. I think Joel is coming along nicely but lizzie's face is giving me trouble..hmmmmm...

[becca4leafclover]

What if Joel is the same Joel from S1, via reincarnation. He's the only one to directly reincarnate that way though- all the others are more or less coincidences

Why?

When S1! Joel and Lizzie were married and found out Lizzie is a god, they did some research in figuring out how to move forward. Immortality is definitely something that could get in the way of a relationship, after all.

And what they found, was a spell to make a mortal INTO an immortal after death.

They decided to do it, so when Joel inevitably died as a mortal, they could then be together forever.

But well...

No one expected Lizzie to die first.

Joel forgot about the immortality spell by the time he died, many many years after the Rapture.

And when he awoke later, surrounded by gods he did not know, being told he had to play a part, all he could think of were the two gods he knew before that held no place in this pantheon and seemed to have been scrubbed from the history books.

Maybe Joel was the only god to survive of this pantheon is because he was never a part of that pantheon to begin with.

While he begins anew, his heart is always aching for people long gone. He will never get his wife, or any other Emperor back as they should be.

(Maybe that's why he listens more attent to Sausage's enthusiastic ramblings of his culture, because he knew the one once called Saint Pearl as an ally.)

(Maybe that's why he feuds with the Sheriff, for claiming the name his best friend once wore and using it for the worst. You are a toy with the way you play with morals like a game. )

(Maybe that's why he teases Lizzie, Mayor of Animalia. Silly cat, why are you so small? You should be big and tall and not afraid of water. I get my best traits from you.)

(Maybe we never should have tried to change fate.)

[crastledivorce]

Lizzie’s lore is so sad.

She's someone who set a lot of her early life around an obligation: protect her little brother, and now she can't even remember him, and because of that she's just entirely alone, empty even, for a long time. 

And then there's the themes of control: her fear about the way her body is changing because of something beyond her control, the way her life is being pushed around and controlled by destiny and the prophecy which she also cannot control. 

Honestly she's a lot like Scott in a way: I know a lot of people have joked about them being similar because they both were trying to scam each other but ever beyond the superficial they are very similar. What with the themes of destiny and loneliness and all (and of course both of them finding out that they have a long lost sibling). Scott as Aeor’s champion, fated to fight Xornoth, Lizzie being the blue axolotl, destined to rule the oceans.

(and that’s something we still don’t know: where did the prophecies come from? where do Lizzie’s powers come from? what with the mention of the ocean gods in the myth, I quite like the idea that the prophecies and Lizzie’s power come from them. power has to come from somewhere. if Lizzie really is the ocean’s champion that would just further the parallels with Scott)

I wonder if that’s why Lizzie and Scott don’t get along, because they see themselves in each other. 

[belovedgamers]

Jimmy 🤝 Lizzie

Malicious compliance

They really are seablings

[ladiesinshiningarmor]

Dropping in my own two cents here - I wonder whether a portion of her naivety was cultivated, made a deliberate shield in the early game - after all, the cute little fairy fort doesn't look like a threat, doesn't sound like a threat. It's nice and flammable, and you could destroy it any time you like ... right after you've finished up with the other, scarier factions.

okay actually I would LOVE to read a deep-dive on Lizzie in all this. Everyone still obsessed with Renchanting (myself included) is guilty of focusing more on Ren, but Lizzie is a FASCINATING character and player herself, and I would adore some analysis on her series so far.

oh hell yeah! i think part of the reason lizzie's character doesn't get much focus is the length of her episodes - not a bad thing, i appreciate having someone who makes shorter episodes tbh. but it does make it a little harder to get a read on her character when a lot of the time we have to rely on others' povs for her. i'll do my best though! :D

as one of the three new players, you can't talk about lizzie without talking about her comparative naïveté to the 3rd lifers. i think i'd have to touch on this for all three new members, because it really shapes how they interact with the others. session one, for example, sees lizzie be very very explicitly warned about the flammability of her base. she realises she's made a mistake, but commits to it regardless (despite how terrified she may be of cleo). this session is pretty terrifying for her; i'd say she has it the worst of the three newcomers, being first terrorised by scar and grian and then having to deal with cleo's threats on top of that.

but she adapts quickly. of course, the fairy fort is eventually burned to the ground by cleo. lizzie builds a new mushroom home in the grounds of the shadow tower, and it's still made of flammable materials. she says she clearly hasn't learned anything, but this time it doesn't feel like she's being naive to me. i mean, she could quite easily just tear it down and rebuild a little stone hut if she was truly that worried about it burning down again. to be honest, it feels more like lizzie is showing her defiant side. she'll build something beautiful, knowing full well that it could go up in flames within minutes, because she's not going to let cleo fully extinguish her spirit. genuinely putting effort into making something actually nice is rare to see on this server, and it's even more rare for that thing to survive - the monopoly mountain tower, the scottage, joel's cottage, etc. even the crastle was blown up a couple times. so... i don't know. lizzie refusing to give in and insisting on a cute little mushroom hut just stuck with me this session, for some reason.

i think what draws people to her is her down-to-earth nature. the shadow fairies revolved around her (even the name), despite her never insisting on being in charge or anything of the sort. lizzie, cleo and bigb all just happened to make friends, but lizzie had become the de facto leader of the alliance even before ren devoted himself to her. after ren becomes her knight, she still never refers to herself as the shadow queen or anything of the sort. actually, she directly tells martyn, "the shadow queen is more of a nickname anyway, i do not actually consider myself royalty in these lands". she later assumes the alias "the shadow fairy" too, rather than using this existing nickname. i think this nature of hers is also what made her such a convincing boogeyman; scott and pearl somehow didn't realise it was a trap, they trusted lizzie enough to follow her down.

another point of evidence about how smart and adaptable she is would definitely be her involvement with tango's bet in sessio 2. she sees joel's success (or lack thereof) in getting a boogeyman kill, and has the forethought to go and place a bet on him turning red. joel's deaths are publicly viewable, everyone can see he's having a terrible time and she's not the only one who knows he's the boogeyman, but she's the only one to think to go and place a bet on him. her handling of her winnings is fantastic too: many people think that having more lives equates to having more power. and it does, to some extent - rather, having a sensible amount of lives gives you power. but having five or above just makes you a target. lizzie recognises this and trades three of hers away - with the added bonus of earning herself three allies, one of whom is now a ride or die knight, and the enchanting table. the next session she gets rid of it in exchange for some much more valuable gear.

lizzie keeps to herself. she doesn't go looking for power or allies, but they seem to gravitate towards her regardless. she's loyal and empathetic - which only makes things harder for her in situations like the cleo and bigb one, where she's torn between her two closest allies on the server. ultimately though her empathy for bigb as a fellow victim of the curse wins out - she knows how it affects a person, and she won't throw him away, even if it means losing cleo. she stands by her decisions, not only keeping him in the alliance but warning him to hide from cleo, even opening her home to him, knowing that cleo has deemed her as equally traitorous.

(i just also feel the need to point out how amazing it is that she just casually set up an enderporter and got it to work first try, given that last season the enderporter was best associated with "my redstone didn't work". and then she had the forethought to trap it when she realised cleo might try and use it against her. queen.)

[cupcraft]

george for the ask game!

:D HELLOOO!

[dsmpblr ask game]

george: when did you first start watching the smp and what made you get into it?

Okay this will be long im sorry. so i was on tumblr here currently in the supernatural fandom as it was ending. And occasionally on trending or for some of the ppl i followed at the time i'd see like stuff about the dream smp. I also occasionally saw stuff about it on twitter. I had never watched wilbur, tommy, or really most of these people. I was mostly only familiar with Skeppy, Techno, and the older mcyts like the Captain, Dantdm, LDshadowlady, Scott, and Joel, and a few others. I actually didnt even know who dream was if you'd believe it. So all i remember is on twitter i see tommy got exiled and i was like omg poor kid why would this dream guy exile him from a silly minecraft server wtf (toxic inniter from day 1....lmao) and then i realized it was roleplay and the last minecraft rp i had watched was some of scott/cpk's/lizzy's series like kingdom craft so i was intrigued and decided to follow tommy on twitch and i was immediately in the exile arc. I went back and saw clips and stuff of prior arcs but i relied heavily on who i was following until i eventually read long analysis posts and watched old vods in Spring 2021. So if you read some of my old posts (when i got the courage to post) some of my opinions changed until i got to know cwilbur from my own vod watching/actually following wilburians on tumblr. My first liveblog was the mansion tftsmp episode :)!

Sorry this was long!

[guster-animations]

mbti theory with last life smp: inferior functions and stuff

i've found an interesting link between the mbti types of last life characters and what brings about their demise. in a person's function stack of four functions, the least used function is the inferior function. it's usually a dormant function, but it can be used in interesting ways.

in last life, people die several deaths each, but there's only one true demise for each of them. whether it's them dying for the final time or losing their last life, or something earlier that didn't involve their own death, each member has one true demise. and these are often connected to the inferior functions of their mbti types.

disclaimer 1: if you dont know anything about mbti you will be very confused. try to at least skim this page before reading.

disclaimer 2: don't take my word as gospel, i'm just a kid with a special interest. any typings or analysis may be completely off.

disclaimer 3: this was written after the release of session 7 and before the release of session 8. this may contain spoilers, and it might be really outdated by the time you're reading this.

disclaimer 4: i didn't use the listings for the players because the listings are shit. but please go over to this page and add your own thoughts!

let's get to it!

we have to start this essay somewhere, and where else would we start it than with jimmy solidarity (isfp)? as the first permadeath on the server, jimmy's a pretty innocent and unassuming guy. however, his final death reveals a lot about him. he tried to lightly punch grian, but then it escalated into a bigger thirst for blood, grian overreacted, and then before he knew it, he was dead. this shows the worst use of te that i've ever seen. he tried to shoot as straight as possible and keep doing what he shouldn't have done, and it backfired and resulted in his death.

the next specimen's actually not a red name or a spectator. zombiecleo (entp) went red back in episode 4 and has since gotten a life back, but it's before even then that i want to look at. her true demise was when bigb killed her and put her on 2 lives. after cleo respawns, she is comforted by etho, who encourages her revenge and agrees that betrayal has to hurt.

cleo then goes to steal all of her alliance's resources, abandoning her group because she doesn't trust them anymore after bigb's betrayal. she's using si here. she's using advice from etho. she's then moving her trust, even after the other members of the shadow alliance desperately plead with her, and she's stubbornly sticking with her new alliance (scott and pearl) for every episode since then.

this brings us to lizzie ldshadowlady (esfj). she has the same true demise as cleo... in a way. after cleo is killed by bigb, she searches everywhere for cleo. when she finally finds her, cleo's trying to take the alliance's villager. lizzie tells her, 'i knew i never could trust you," placing the blame on her ti. she's blaming herself for cleo's leaving by saying that her own reasoning is at fault.

lizzie's permadeath can also be analyzed for this but i'm tired and i need to work on my novel

the last player i'll talk about is impulse sv (infj). his permadeath was indirectly caused by grian spawning the wither, which impulse helped to create. impulse was riding high on the event, but then a team of green names invaded the area. he was watching them kill the wither, hoping one of them would die, when he was two-shot. he was using his se, trying to view the battle and stay in the moment, when he was caught off guard and killed.

that's it lol

[nerdyenby]

One of my favorite things about the life series — aside from the everything — is how fluid the narrative is and how it’s primarily shaped by the fanbase. Because of this, you can maintain multiple contradicting theories with minimal concern about starting an argument or being proven wrong, it’s great

For example, I have two separate interpretations of Jimmy not being first out of Secret Life. I love them both to death and I don’t have to choose (at least for now)

1. the curse isn’t broken (lizzie)

This theory (introduced in this post) is essentially that Lizzie’s final death doesn’t break Jimmy’s curse. The canary’s curse is to be a warning of impending doom, to die to signal danger to miners within caves. Jimmy was still the first to die in the Overworld, the first funeral, the first lightning strike. Lizzie died in the End, a tragic accident that went unnoticed for seconds if not minutes. She died in the void like no player before. The End has not been in play in any prior season, and the Watchers are known to have a special relationship with it. Is it possible she escaped their notice? That her death was beyond their reach? Beyond the bounds of the game? Jimmy has always been the first to die, a warning to others that death is coming, but what meaning does the canary’s call — or lack of it — have to those beyond the coal mine?

2. the curse is broken (skizz)

I noted (in this post) when episode four first came out that Skizz said something unexpected, something with unusual confidence behind it. He called Jimmy a winner, commended his fighting spirit, and told him things would be different this time. He truly believed in Jimmy, and, possibly more importantly, got Jimmy to believe in himself. Fans have consistently interpreted Skizz’s character as angelic — as kind, honest, pure, good, steadfast, sacrificial, and selfless. Between his pattern with threes (being in every season except the third, having three deaths in the first episode of Limited Life, etc.) and the pattern known as “Skizz’s Blessing,” (where the winner of each season was there when he died) it’s easy to see why. His words historically have weight in the games, take “TIES makes top three” for example. Whether he predicts or dictates events as we know them, we don’t know, but it doesn’t seem to matter. When Skizz speaks there is truth we don’t see anywhere else. He is an omen of victory, all the sweeter in Jimmy’s case considering Skizz was the one to end his series — end anyone’s series — for the very first time.

(Note that I gotta go back and fact check the other patterns/curses I reference, these may be edited accordingly)

[nerdyenby]

The mechanics of Secret Life lend themselves to a sort of point system, here’s what I’ve come up with:

The current system has no negative points and is open to suggestions

Task completion = 2 points

Hard task completion = 5 points

Red task completion = 3 points

Killing another player = 5 points

Out-surviving another player = 1 point

Top ten bonus = 2 points

Placement bonus: 3rd = 2 points, 2nd = 3 points, 1st = 5 points

Placements as of session 6 are below the cut (keep in mind that this will change drastically as the game continues and more players are eliminated)

Martyn and Scar: 26 points (4 task completions, 5 red task completions, 3 survival points)/(4 task completions, 1 hard task completion, 2 kills, and 3 survival points)

Mumbo: 19 points (3 task completions, 3 red task completions, and 2 survival points)

Jimmy and Scott: 18 points (3 task completions, 2 red task completions, 1 kill, and 1 survival point)/(5 task completions, 1 hard task completion, and 3 survival points)

Bdubs and Etho: 16 points (4 task completions, 1 hard task completion, 3 survival points)

Cleo: 15 points (6 task completions and 3 survival points)

Grian: 14 points (3 task completions, 1 hard task completion, and 3 survival points)

Bigb and Pearl: 13 points (5 task completions and 3 survival points)

Gem: 12 points (2 task completions, 1 hard task completion, and 3 survival points)

Joel and Tango: 11 points (4 task completions and 3 survival points)

Lizzie: 10 points (2 task completions and 2 red task completions)

Impulse and Skizz: 9 points (3 task completions and 3 survival points)

[crastledivorce]

Lizzie’s character at her core is someone who protects others. 

She spent the first part of her taking care of Jimmy’s egg and waiting for him to hatch for literally hundreds of years. When she learns that killing the dragon will bring destruction to the realm she’s the only one of the codvengers who tries to save it. She helps her allies whenever they ask. She’s definitely not someone who’s generous with anyone but she will try her hardest to fight on the behalf of those she cares about. 

But when have they done the same for her? When has she needed help and reached out? So far whenever she’s had a real problem like the mutations she tries to hide it and solve it on her own. She seems unwilling (perhaps even guilty) to admit that she needs help, even when she wouldn’t hesitate to help a friend in her position. 

I really hope she’ll need that help soon. Some kind of big problem that even she knows she can’t solve alone. Or maybe she tries to solve it alone and her allies come help her anyways. She’s a strong person but even she isn’t invincible. She can’t stand alone forever.