#lmao thank you child

[recareels]

gmorning Clari!!! 💘 I’m not sure you’ve done it before, but I’d loooove to know what type of yanderes you’d classify your genshin faves as 😘

ANDYYYY i am so sorry i am responding a few days late to this and that’s because i accidentally wrote you a whole novel for an answer :) your ask sparked so many thoughts and i just BLAAAH spewed them all over the page (*ﾉωﾉ) ugh ahahaha ANYWAY oh gosh okay i have so much to say, let’s get into it!!! also apologies for how MASSIVE ajax’s is waaaah

characters: wriothesley, ajax [childe], kamisato ayato, thoma warnings: 18+ minors do not interact, yandere behaviour (gaslighting, obsessiveness, toxic relationships, delusional thinking, manipulation, over-protectiveness, etc) words: 2.1k

₊˚⊹ 𝐰𝐫𝐢𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐬𝐥𝐞𝐲

WRIOTHESLEY is the controlling, authoritarian type that feels like a really strict father, all under the guise of ‘protecting you’ and ‘keeping you safe’. he veers into delusional territory a little here because he genuinely believes what he’s telling you (and himself) and genuinely believes himself to be doing the right thing. he isn’t possessive, he just wants to make sure you’re going out with safe people. he isn’t obsessive, he just wants to know where you are at all times in case an emergency strikes and he has to come find you. he isn’t overbearing, he just cares and is proactive—don’t you want him to care? can’t you see he’s only this ‘protective’ because he loves you? 

he has thoroughly convinced himself that this behaviour has nothing to do with jealousy or a desire to keep you locked up, to keep you 100% certainly safe and his forever, and nothing to do with wanting to exert complete control over you, orchestrating your every decision—and he’s pretty good at continuously deluding himself into believing it. he’s so good, in fact, and his logic is so sound, that it has YOU wondering if you’re ‘just being crazy’, if you’re overthinking things or reading too much into them. wriothesley has had a lot taken away from him, after all, and he knows exactly how the mind of criminals tick—can you really blame him for being a bit paranoid? maybe you’re the one who’s overreacting and being unreasonable. maybe you’re even feeling a little guilty for being so ungrateful—shouldn’t you appreciate having someone who loves and cares for you this much to go to such extents? shouldn’t you want to relinquish all power to someone you love equally as much? shouldn’t you trust him to make only the best, most sound and appropriate decisions for you? you probably should. 

₊˚⊹ 𝐚𝐣𝐚𝐱

AJAX is kind of like, the typical yandere, and he encompasses several ‘types’, evolving throughout the course of your relationship and shapeshifting into different variants depending on the situation itself. and while the other three men seem normal until you’re in too deep with them, refraining from showing symptoms of yandere-ness until after you’ve been with them for an extended period of time and mean a lot to them, ajax is weird from the very beginning. 

almost immediately you can sense that there’s something slightly off about him, but you can’t put your finger on what it is. it’s so subtle that it doesn’t strike you as particularly dangerous, leading you to merely write it off as one of his quirks and nothing more. 

he’s overbearing right from the start, of course; not necessarily enough to be concerning just yet, but enough for it to be abnormal—unusual—and noticeable (which reminds me of your lil ajax piece!!!). from the instant he sees you, he is irreversibly obsessed with you. you permeate his every waking thought, and eventually begin to leak into his dreams, too, and suddenly he can barely breathe without knowing where you are and what you’re doing, his concentration consumed by you. 

he begins stalking you—‘overseeing’, he had called it—making detailed notes of your favourite locations and your most frequented friends. he’s constantly got an eye on you one way or another, even if he has to employ other people to do it for him, discreetly reporting their findings every few hours. he tells them you’re in danger—which, you are, technically—and that you must be observed at all times from afar, silently and stealthily. 

ajax is patient and he can play the waiting game, carefully devising and then revising his strategy based on your moves. he loves playing predator and prey, gets a thrill from how the hunt unfolds—much like a battle, it’s a story, a rich tapestry you and he are constantly and concurrently creating, together. and that he thinks is so beautiful.

in textbook yandere fashion, once he’s gathered a sufficient amount of intel, he begins ‘showing up’ randomly at your usual spots, ‘bumping into you’ fortuitously. charming and sweet, the only thing that’s initially unsettling is just how well the two of you get along. ajax is sure not to mimic you too much—he doesn’t want to be a mirror, after all, and being too similar is far from a good thing (especially when it matches so well it simply can’t be coincidental).

well—that, and the sharp glint in his eye that flares with something dangerous every time you giggle or gush, every time you fall further for him. and once he has you enchanted, ensnared, you’re trapped for life, tangled up in him so tightly that he might as well have fused to your flesh. 

ajax likes to tell you it isn’t about power and control, but he knows that it is. he’s smart, and he’s self aware, and he doesn’t really care if this is ‘wrong’—he sees it as necessary and he genuinely believes he knows better than you do. he has to take care of you, or else who will? you’re clearly not capable of satisfactorily doing it on your own, so he must (god, how would you manage without him?). even if you oppose him or fight back against him, he’s purely convinced you’re bull-headed and stubborn, snorting at your wanting to be independent when he truly knows you’re too stupid take care of yourself ‘properly’ all on your own.

violence is a mainstay of your relationship, but not towards you; never towards you—merely towards everyone around you. his jealousy knows no bounds, but you will rarely see it outright. instead, ajax prefers to hone his emotions, to fashion them into a weapon or use them as fuel to thoroughly tear apart anyone who looks your way in a manner he doesn’t like. it’s his job as your lover and keeper, isn’t it? 

₊˚⊹ 𝐤𝐚𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐚𝐭𝐨 𝐚𝐲𝐚𝐭𝐨

AYATO knows what he is, and he doesn’t care. why should he, when he’s sure what he’s doing is ultimately correct and he’s used to having everything that he wants, and everything going his way, even if he has to force/manipulate it to? he’s so skilled at that in particular—manipulating situations and events to procure favourable outcomes for himself. in ayato’s mind, you should be grateful that he affords you so many freedoms—he could lock you away in the basement or a padded room, chain you to a bed with no entertainment or stimulation save for the books he has so conscientiously selected for you, and no other human contact aside from himself. but he trusts you, and he doesn’t want to go to those measures (though rest assured, he has promised you he will not hesitate to reach such heights if he deems it absolutely necessary, no matter how much he doesn’t want to; you staying his comes before his personal preferences and pleasures). as such, he allows you to roam the estate grounds under the watchful eye of his closest confidants and most capable guards (usually thoma, unless he is otherwise occupied and busy); he allows you access to letter writing materials (though they must go through two rounds of supervision and revisions before they are approved; once by thoma, and once by ayato himself); he allows you to go out in public as long as you are with him, etc. 

despite these apparent freedoms he affords you, he still picks your outfits out for you each day, and he devises a comprehensive meal plan for you each week, and creates schedules and rules he expects you to follow, thoroughly and meticulously to the letter. it is these subtle forms of ownership that he enjoys the most. he doesn’t feel the need to shout from the mountaintops, loudly and aggressively, that you are his, because the fact is so obvious, so evident, the second anyone merely glances at you. you walk like him, you talk like him, you sit, stand, and bow like him, just like he trained you to. 

ayato is also the type of yandere to punish you. he is molding your pretty little mind into exactly what he wants it to be, and that means that undesirable behaviours must be immediately and severely corrected through appropriate punishments—you must learn, or be taught what is right and what is wrong in ayato terms + definitions, so you will refrain from repeating such behaviour in the future. he is truly crafting you into the most perfect, precious, obedient little doll—and having a blast while doing so. it’s his little pet passion project, in a way; something he looks forward to working on when he has a moment of spare time. 

ayato was sly and clever with the way he initially enticed you, entrapped you, but underneath his cool, precisely chiseled exterior, ayato is selfish, manipulative, and extremely controlling. all decisions are ultimately made by and go through him. he will skillfully and carefully cut you off from all lifelines and communication, rendering you wholly dependent on him, and then will meticulously chip away at your mind until he sculpts it into exactly what he desires—someone who is as obsessed with him as he is with them. he slowly, stealthily, and steadily induces a severe, irreversible case of stockholm syndrome. the damage he does to your mind is permanent—and that’s exactly his goal. you now live for him. your days are marked by his appearances, his comings and goings, and the only thing you have to look forward to is seeing + spending time with him. you live to please him, live to be with him, and become absorbed by him, so you are merely an extension of him and no longer an individual yourself. everything revolves around ayato—he is your entire universe. 

₊˚⊹ 𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐦𝐚

THOMA is the most dangerous type of yandere, because thoma is genuine. thoma’s feelings are 100% authentic—and he earnestly intends to bring you no harm whatsoever—they’re just way too intense. he loves you so much that it veers into insanity, and the passion he feels towards you (and towards keeping you safe + claiming you as his) is so fierce that it physically hurts him to experience, chest blistering with scorching adoration and razored affection, something so dense and so all-consuming that thoma wants to claw through his own flesh and pry his ribcage apart spoke by spoke just so he can experience a shred of relief. 

thoma is, for the most part, an honest guy—starkly, brashly honest, so honest it shatters his words and gnaws at his voice, leaving it rough and raw, splintered to shards; but you can always trust he says exactly what he means. he severely lacks self awareness, not even realizing that his behaviour is inappropriate and extreme (he just cares about you SO much! it blinds his rationale and erodes his logic, incapacitating his ability to understand that he’s so suffocating it borders on terrifying). 

but what makes thoma so incredibly perilous is his sincerity. he truly just wants to keep you safe, eyes brimming with tears and voice hitching on barely contained emotion as he thoroughly explains to you his logic for stashing tracking devices in your bags or his reasoning for shattering the kneecaps of the man who made you uncomfortable at work, sentiment thick in his throat, words straining with the weight of his honesty, with the desperation for you to understand, to see it his way. he swears to the high heavens that he’d never hurt a single hair on your pretty, precious little head, and promises that he doesn’t want to scare you, but firmly asserts that he will do whatever it takes to keep you safe. 

and he means it. thoma is, in the most essential sense, your guard dog. he’s so sweet towards you, even submissive at times, always subservient to your every wish and whim, your every demand and desire, but he’ll fucking rip anyone within a meter of you to pieces with his teeth and bare hands alone if he feels as though you are being threatened in any way—and his standards and definition of ‘threatened’ are extreme and absurd, of course, causing him to react in a way that is severely disproportionate to the situation.

it borders on too much all the time—he is too obsessive, too protective, too clingy, but he’s also so sweet, so gentle, so incredibly bonafide that you can’t help but not be upset with him. he only does what he does because you’re his entire world, right? what’s so harmful about that? 

[betterthanbatman1]

Can anyone tell me where this is from?? pls pls

[milolunde]

Weeeeeeeell, Timmy is kind of 10? There was that whole thing about his wish to stay a kid forever and then it was revealed that he kept everyone in town the same age for like 30 years so he's only kind of 10?

I dunno tho I've only seen videos talking about this

Yes BUT ☝️

The only reason he made that wish is because he is 10.

He likely wasn’t able to mature in that time, permanently 10 and just knowing he made the wish out of fear of losing Cosmo and Wanda (and Poof? I don’t remember when in the series this happens) the only positive adult present in his life forever, not even allowed to remember them. His life before Cosmo and Wanda was living in a neglectful home with an abusive babysitter which went unnoticed because the ones who should have been there to notice, his school teachers, were also abusive— and the only people who would’ve been able to realize the abusive staff, his parents, were neglecting him, it’s a cycle.

Even if, being aware of the wish, Timmy knew it had been 50 years of being 10, 50 years of experiencing life, his body and brain were still stuck at 10 years old, physically incapable of realizing the detriment of “I’ve trapped everyone in a time loop” beyond his personal detriment of “my godparents, my only family, are going to leave me and this is the only way to keep them.”

Timmy Turner was JUST 10 YEARS OLD!!!

[indecisive-dizzy]

Hmmmmmm,,,, I wanna kiss Howdy Pillar,,,,,,

Just mwah mwah his forehead a little,,,,,,

*Insert Daisey with a thought bubble thinking about this lol*

Daisey can go right ahead lol I'm after his brother <3

I will not apologize for old memes. I love them and I laughed

[trashcanwithsprinkles]

I love the new chaoter, but I’m having a hard time visualizing Xingqius injury. If it’s not too much trouble, can I ask for a bit more detail for that scene? Also, was it healing or uh. A full resurrection art because Qiqi can fully revive teammates at c6. Very curious about how bad it was by the time the two were in position to help him.

putting it under a cut just in case the description ends up being a bit too graphic for some (understandable) (but also it turned out a bit too long so that too)

this will all come up in the next chapter i'm pretty sure? but probably not in a lot of detail, so i see no problem in just telling you here. can't really think of it as spoilers so

(i feel like i should also preface this with the fact that i'm not a doctor, so take the accuracy and feasibility of all this as artistic liberties hahah;;)

xingqiu got slashed downwards, which means the blade entered through the lower part of his shoulderblade and crossed a good chunk of his back until it swiped off near the end of his ribcage, like this:

(the line isn't 100% accurate in placement bc i made it w the mouse but you get the idea)

the blade cut five of his ribs, a chunk of his shoulderblade, and like three discs of his spine. since it cut through the ribs, it also managed to get to his right lung, and cut open a good gash on it. as you can imagine it tore nerves and tendons and muscles along the way. now, there's also the fact that the blade used was a spiritual weapon, which means it was imbued with energy and very literal very tangible killing intent, which means it also sent a sort of… shock, through xingqiu's spiritual channels (which while not strictly undeveloped, are like still on the process of being trained if that makes any sense. he can't use any spells yet but he will soon). think of it like being electrocuted while he was at it.

so basically by the time zhongli got to him, not only was his body in shock from the pain and the fall face-first to the ground (which only made his fractured and broken ribs and spine and open lung worse), but he was also in a different kind of shock from the energetic assault from the blade to his functionally undeveloped spiritual channels. with the blood from the wound getting into his cut lung (and the pain and the shock) making it hard for him to breathe, xingqiu had been more or less on his last breaths there. if the blade hand't been a spiritual weapon he wouln't have been on death's door so quickly, but alas.

when zhongli and qiqi got there they essentially had two options: use a normal healing spell to keep him from dying and leave the rest of the tedious healing to baizhu and co. (co. here being mostly time ngl) and risk xingqiu sustaining lasting consequences AND traumatizing a bunch of them by the severity of the injury, OR- have qiqi use a direct resurrection rite, since while not quite dead just yet, xingqiu had been more or less slipping away when they got there. like normal medicine wouldn't have been able to save him basically, since his spiritual channels were attacked and those were a good part of the problem. using the resurrection rite would've not only guaranteed his surivival regardless of further treatment (normal or spiritual), but it would've also saved him from most if not all consequences and spared everyone a good chunk of the trauma (if not all of it)

zhongli didn't know for sure whether this world's baizhu used spiritual healing or just normal medicine, so he couldn't risk the first option on that front either (because while yes normal medicine would've still somewhat worked there, it would've left xingqiu with lasting consequences no matter what, and even worse consequences at that), not to mention all the other drawbacks of it too. so basically either they used a normal spell and put xingqiu's normalcy on the line, or used a resurrection rite and pretended zhongli did it to make sure everything would turn out fine

for the record, baizhu does use spiritual healing. idk if it's ever gonna come up, but he's a student of chansheng here, who is a master in one of the chenyu clans (and a human. he does also have a pet snake. unrelated lmao). since lingmeng guhua is technically a chenyu clan, that's why he gets called to these events, bc they all sort of know eachother.

anyway- i hope that made sense? hopefully that answered your question hahah;;

[whiskey-tango-matcha]

not to brag, but my therapist told me today that i did incredible during our emdr session, which means i get an A for the day in therapy, something that is both normal to want and possible to achieve 🙂‍↕️😌

[madebyteenagefury]

What do you think about Trina in Falsettos??

what do i think about trina in falsettos??? i wwould do anything for her. but also i think if i ever talked to her i might break down sobbing.

ive mentioned it in ramblings before but trina marvin and jason are like a carbon copy of my family. besides the whole, my fathers a homo part and the whole trina marrying marvins psychiatrist part. their dynamics and everything are pretty much the same as my own parents. i was jasons age when they divorced. only difference is (besides the two mentioned) marvin and trina coexist more civilly than we do.

idk why i felt the need to mention that, i think its important like, background to my feelings about her(and the family in general). Shes amazing first and foremost, everyone always talks about marvin and the work he has to do to improve himself, but trina and what she mustve gone through to forgive him? after everything, its incredible. she cares a lot about her family and marvin is apart of it. and she accepts whizzer too i think, ("he shared my life") by the end of it and thats even more amazing to me. i think she deserves a break. i think she deserves the world. i worry (/lh more like just think) about what happens after whizzers death, how marvin cant be there emotoinally for jason and trina and mendel have to take that responsibility. i see my mother in her, a woman who wanted to be free of her ex and live her life but is still chained to him ("ill fight the gods, ill fight my ex") but augh shes so spunky and joyful despite everything!!! year of the child is probably one of if not my absolute favorite song from the soundtrack because its marvin and trina (+mendel charlotte and cordelia) fawning over jason and just being glad and excited that hes growing up and being his parents. the performance especially, because even though theyre techincally fighting at the beginning of the song, they still hug and laugh throughout it. they banter, and its beautiful. i think shes such a strong and resiliant woman, putting up with what she did, coming out the other side only to immediately find more pain. i wouldve liked more insight to her and mendel and jasons relationship. mostly her and jason. but i think there are lots of implications and inferences to be made, and its nice that some things are still up for interpretation.

I have yet to relisten/or even watch in trousers, but i have listened once all the way through, and re-read the lyrics through. trina in trousers,,, god i love her. like. ugh in trousers makes me so sick, marvin and trina and whizzer. mostly marvin and trina. trinas not dumb she knows. especially with love is blind, all the examples she gave and in im breaking down "i used to cry, hed make a scene" she totally knew! and still she even begged him to stay. she tried she really wanted it to work. but ofc it couldnt and im so glad she got to live a life away from him, and find some happiness. that she knows what love is. (oh also, the like. suspected suicide attempt??? bbyg dont worry ill kms for you-. everything about her makes me so so ill because she reminds me so much of my mom.) she tries so hard, with an uncooperative ex and an uncooperative (ish) child, and godbless. i just adore her and want the best things for her. shes such an incredible woman.

anyway thanks for asking! :]

[banesberry-anomoly]

Son of Dionysus

[futuremercifulnerd]

Just learned what Visual Snow syndrome is (its static vision btw) and thats its not normal and is in fact NOT how everyone sees things

[cuteniaarts]

2 hour rough drawing of Ehuang, my precious Green Opal child who I don’t draw nearly enough <3

[nevsclowntown]

for the doodle prompts: hashirama making flower crowns for his brothers? ♥️ only if you fancy ofc :)

they managed to hunt tobirama down for his crown!

[ceilidho]

So you lured me in with bear shifter!Price, then threw Ghoap x reader at me, and I'm in love.

Plz I just want to live in your brain

im multifaceted. and next month, if i can manage it, you'll get new ghoap (no reader).

im kind of anti-nanowrimo because it's too much pressure for me, so only 2 short fics this month (i'll finish the bear shifter fic before the end of november for sure) and then i'll tackle a longer project in december and spend more time with it, like hopefully get it around 20-30k.

[good-beans]

HAI!! haii so so . Listen i was having milgram thoughts as one does and decided to bother you talk to you . Also because i want to lowkey hear your thoughts about this

So i was thinking maybe milgram has a cleaning system thing done by the prisoners?? Like cleaning duties and stuff and obviously i had some silly thoughts like fuuta getting paired with someone taller and not being able to reach a spot that's just bugging him, and they just tower over him and clean it. Also mahiru being extremely good at cleaning because she's always wanted to be the perfect shoujo heroine. And Kazui being good at it to try to make up to his wife for not being able to love her. Muu being a rich girl™ probably wouldn't be all that good at it and I'm not entirely sure about Haruka or Yuno. Shidou probably did help around the house when his family was still around, and being a doctor, probably wants the place to be sanitary, so he'd be good at it too. Anyways, then I thought about Amane.

Like obviously she values cleanliness or purity, but her house isn't exactly the best maintained right? Would that result in her being relatively lax about the cleaning? Or maybe since her guardian was someone who "strayed from the path" (i didn't really know how to put it) she wouldn't want to follow in their example? Making her want to keep the prisoner more clean? I didn't have enough time in school to think about it (sad) but even rn i cant really come to a proper conclusion. Keeping things sanitary was definitely not what she was raised with and if the cult was fine with her running around with her bruises unbandaged and living in her definitely not properly maintained house. But also not wanting to follow something that her guardian did would also definitely be something I'd expect from her…

AHH thank you sm for telling me!! >:3 It’s literally never a bother, I always want to talk Milgram adfsdfsdf I love this 👀 I expand a bit with my thoughts below but all of that is so perfect YES

Omg I love all those -- Mahiru, Shidou, and Kazui definitely seem like the very best cleaners! Mahiru genuinely enjoys it but also holds herself to high societal standards. Kazui probably doesn’t actively enjoy it, but he’d like the clean household and being a good spouse. Shidou seems like he’s just a very meticulously clean person in general -- he also wants to be a good husband but he’d be exactly the same even if he never married lol. 

I think Haruka and Muu would be pretty bad at it, just because they’re not used to the responsibilities. (Muu gives me very genuinely spoken “you missed a spot” vibes lmao. She’s trying to be helpful, but depending on who she says it to, it goes pretty poorly…) 

Fuuta, Yuno, Mikoto, and Kotoko strike me as the type to be varying levels of messy on their own but when they’re forced to clean they do a good job. Fuuta’s bad with leaving gross food/trash/laundry around. Yuno is sanitary, but her possessions get painfully cluttered. Mikoto and Kotoko fall in the middle of this spectrum. Kotoko seems like she’d honestly just forget about taking care of her living space, while the others make the conscious choice to let it go for a while. 

I’m dying over Fuuta not being tall enough to reach a certain spot ASFSDF that’s exactly what would happen 😂 Also I know none of his clothes are his prisoner color, but I’m picturing that classic laundry mishap where he ends up dying his uniform pink by washing it alongside something red… 

And Amane. Hm. I’m intrigued by her case, because I would have said without a doubt that she would be super clean and organized due to her teachings -- but then that mv shot (combined with the injury treatment you mentioned) clearly shows her mother doesn’t live that way. It’s definitely an option that she’s a hypocrite in many areas: punishing Amane for things when she herself has done worse, demanding Amane be perfectly clean when her house is a mess, etc. It could also be that she never asked for that, but the rest of the cult drilled the importance of purity into Amane -- and this contributes to the ways in which Amane notices her mother’s straying). 

Whether cleanliness was expected of her at that time or not, though, I think you’re right: she’d be disgusted with her mother’s lack of it, and this would fuel her to keep everything in Milgram in perfect order. Es may have been the one to originally set up the cleaning/chore rotation in t1, but once she starts speaking for the cult in t2, Amane is the one really enforcing everything. At first, this probably annoys the others (they don’t want to be bossed around by a scary 12yo). But the way she talks about perfection and punishments would likely cue them in on her past, making them act a bit gentler about the whole situation. Some of them try to get her to relax and not fear undue punishments if things aren’t clean, but she’d likely take it as an insult to her code rather than an offer of reassurance :( Still, I think given her physical/mental strain, some of the others would successfully convince her to let them help, and take a few of the tougher/grosser cleaning jobs off her hands.

[drowsystarlight]

Quick and messy sketch but here is my Runner Five :333

Sheet belongs to @crownleys!!

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

[pericky; a look into ricky's head during their meeting.]

---

"I'm glad you came, I wasn't sure you would." The wine pours, the sound of it drowning out the missing word in that sentence: back.

Of course, is the response, and the part of Ricky that's spent twenty years tearing itself apart to understand why vibrates with relief. It doesn't matter anymore. Of course, of course, he thinks giddily along with the words. He never needed to wonder why Pericles wasn't coming back in the first place; he was always going to.

I'm happy you invited me, and of course he thinks again. A lifetime of pretending he wasn't always going to either falls away. However harsh and lonely the world has been, all's right with it again; and the shy voice of the boy inside him that he's tried so hard to kill says, so quietly, I missed you.

[octoagentmiles]

Try list any Octo-Agents and think of an Episode you Think give them a Shining Moment

W O O F this took a while– I was thinking long and hard about this because there are SO MANY good moments and episodes 😅, and so many agents– it was difficult, but I’m happy with my answers 👀

Ranger Marsh’s Shine Episode is definitely The Monitor Lizards. I LOVE this episode, it’s one of my favourites in the whole series so far—not just because of the events in it, but as a concept. I LOVE the callback to the Great Swamp Search!! I watched the 2nd season blind, and seeing all these familiar faces was SUCH a fun surprise. It’s good for Ranger Marsh as a character, because it actually shows him doing his job as a Ranger, not as an Octo-Agent. It also reinforces the fact that he truly cares for and is friends with these creatures, even if they are invasive, and that he's willing to travel to check in on them. This is another episode that also proves (to me) that the writers know they’re dealing with an older audience for the show, and are more likely to delve into solid lore and continuity. This episode makes me really hopeful for more of that.

Natquik’s Shine Episode, WITHOUT QUESTION, is The Red Fox. Honestly I feel like I don’t need to explain why, but I will because I like talking ✨: Natquik is my favourite Octo-Agent, but overall we haven’t actually gotten that many episodes dedicated to him yet. The Red Fox gives us a close and personal look into what Natquik is like by himself (I love episodes where characters are alone 👀), how he deals with problems (by ignoring them until they get worse—which is interesting... *stares at Barnacles*...), and even hints toward his family, by showing us his family portraits, and leaving us wondering, “Where are they?” – There are so many moments I love in this episode, from when he first discovers the kits, decides to help them stay warm, rushes to protect Barnacles, to his bittersweet goodbye at the end. It’s all so perfect.

Tracker absolutely shines in The Missing Lake. Honestly, he shines a LOT in Above and Beyond, considering he never got his own episode in the main series, and was only in Operation Deep Freeze for two scenes. AnB has been really good to Tracker, and I’m so grateful they decided to make him an Agent. The Missing Lake sticks out to me the most, because for the most part he is by himself (and I’ve already mentioned my love for that <3), and unlike all his other episodes, we get to really see him be responsible and use his Polar Scout skills in action. He’s often portrayed as a follower, who just goes along with whatever he's told to do, but he takes charge twice in this episode: when he offers to help Rowan, and when he stays behind to save Buck. Love that for him.

Calico Jack. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh, Calico Jack....... I could talk forever about this funky old cat man. He doesn’t just shine, he GLOWS in every episode he’s in—but alas, for the sake of this post I will be focusing on The Harlequin Duck. I love the showing of his gentle parental instincts in this episode, and his singing; since we know he canonically has a theme song, that I headcanon he wrote himself. I think far too much, and often, about how he legit panicked when he realized the egg was missing. How his first instinct was to hide that fact from Captain Barnacles. He was terrified, having a full blown panic attack on screen. He apologizes to the mother duck with such genuine solace, and promises to get it back “On [his] honour as a pirate!” ...Which is extremely significant to me, considering Kwazii was the first character to EVER say the phrase: “On me honour as an Octonaut!” in The Flying Fish after Inkling’s book was lost – and of course as a final touch, I adore seeing him work with Pete to get the egg back. The way he tosses the egg in the air, fully trusting that Pete will catch it... they’re so in sync, just as pirate and parrot are meant to be ;)

Paani... I feel like there’s so much more to him than what we’ve seen so far, it almost feels unfair to assign him a “Shine Episode”. So, instead of highlighting a single episode, I’ll quickly talk about three that stick out (PS: you might sense a theme 🤣):

The Barnacle Geese - Uncle Paani. I like the “I’ll be my own uncle” joke, and the Edgar Allen Poe reference. I think Paani’s determination to help the chick (who doesn’t seem to want help) is nice to watch, and helps to prove his worthiness as an Agent—which is always fun considering his hesitance when Barnacles tried to recruit him in S1E1. In a way, this episode also makes Paani seem more like Barnacles. See my old post analyzing the show’s intro. (*Stares at the episode title* 👁️👁️)

The Arabian Camels - Take a shot of cocoa every time I mention my love for episodes where characters are forced to be by themselves. This one is especially interesting to me though, because we know that Paani was alone, for a very long time, before he met the Octonauts. He has no trouble working and getting by alone, and we get to see him exhibiting that, while being out of his element (a dry desert) at the same time; and that’s really cool.

The Lonely Frog - ...Y’know how they constantly make the Octonauts/Agents meet creatures with similar issues to them? Yeah. *Stares at the episode title.* *Stares at the end scene where he says “Kinda like when I met you guys!” before obnoxiously jumping into the lake, in response to Shellington+Peso saying “They never even knew each other existed before! [...] and now it’s like they’ve known each other all their lives!”* *STARES MORE AT THE EPISODE TITLE,,* *wonders how long Paani was actually alone before becoming an Agent...*

Pinto, where art thou? He wasn’t in S2 at all, which was a bit disappointing since we just saw him get an Octowatch in S1. I would’ve expected him to be pressing that button every chance he got, giving us a “Penguin who cried Octoalert” episode. But anyway,, The Curious Penguin is the PERFECT episode for Pinto. It shows his personality really well, and I love how his distractions and the things he learns and discovers help him to save the day in the end. I think Pinto (just like Kwazii) is a good portrayal of ADHD, and how he just needs to be in the right environment to succeed. Each time Pinto messes up or loses focus, isn’t because he was left alone and couldn’t be trusted—it’s because he was left alone and understimulated. So when he’s thrown into a sudden high-stakes situation, all of his focus hones in on the moment, and he’s able to save Dashi and Paani by himself.

AND, because you didn’t say it had to be an Above and Beyond moment, I want to throw some love at The Oarfish episode from the main series. In this episode, Pinto no longer views Peso as “less” than an Octonaut, and is so excited to watch him do his job—it’s really cute!! His impulsivity is once again a positive thing—granted, it seems to annoy Peso a little, but when you think about it he kinda saved the day by being impulsive. He sounded the Octoalert without permission, which let the captain know to come back before their radio signal cut out, and by being unafraid of the “monster” and swimming outside, he was able to discover what the problem was so that Peso could help. He did good.

Pearl.... I love Pearl a lot, but I can’t think of one specific episode that comes to mind for her. I love The Pupfish because it introduces Peri to AnB, and I love how he teaches her how to tie a knot, so she can save the algae (and Glen). I like The Bison episode because it’s interesting watching her not doing something with algae for once, and The Pink Glacier because her and Kwazii’s dynamic was something I didn’t know I needed, but now I want more of (/p).

Ryla. Possibly controversial opinion: I liked Ryla in The Caves of Sac Actun, more than I like her now in Above and Beyond. I know she’s only gotten 3 episodes so far, but she’s really missing something. Sac Actun gave us lore on her right off the bat: she’s old friends with Dashi, she’s a skilled cave explorer, she’s spunky, she’s purple. AnB hasn’t given us much yet. So far her only shtick is caves, and that’s getting a bit repetitive. Consider every moment she has in Sac Actun as her “Shining Moment”, because honestly that whole movie is a 10/10.

Koshi,,,, she hasn't gotten that much yet, but I'm gonna say The Longfin Eels is her Shine Episode. I like the way she narrates the whole episode, because it's very in-character. Plus we know she’s literally writing about this adventure in her diary as she's telling it, as if it were a mystery book. She reminds me of narrators from 1920s film noirs, and that’s cool. Also! Honorary mention of the scene when she gets her Octowatch: I loved that for her <3

Min is below the cut, because my answer for her includes some very heavy SEASON 5 SPOILERS, including SCREENSHOTS:

All of Min's appearances so far are dear to my heart. However, my favourite has to be her own introductory episode: The Giant Chinese Salamander.

The Rainforest Rescue is another amazing episode for Min—she’s a wonderful character on her own, of course—but I think we can all agree that she and Inkling are very adorable together (no matter how you interpret their relationship).

When Above and Beyond aired on Netflix, there was a lot of confusion around Min, from the younger audience and other fans who hadn’t seen S5. The Giant Chinese Salamander introduces Min with a 20-minute special; showing her in high-stakes action with Kwazii, bonding with the Octonauts, being an all-around Cool Person™, and a flashback of how she met Inkling when they were younger.

She saved his life. He was thrown far inland by a rough storm, and was trapped until she found him. I honestly headcanon that Min partially (if not outright) inspired Inkling to form the Octonauts, and this moment could have literally sealed the fate of EVERYTHING we know.

But! Until S5 comes out, that's all I've got to say~ 👋💝