#nya also is a minor focus this season

[nin-jay-go]

mmmmmmm i have only been thinking about ninjago for the past few weeks. you will be here for my brainrot

so ive got this rewrite i'm working on rn, which ive called alterline (portmanteau of alternate timeline) since like 2018. ive picked it back up and i'm officially working on the rewrite, but for it i added a few new seasons. specifically 3 brand new fanseasons.

the other two don't matter right now. all that matters is s17. my mad science season.

fun fact about me i am in love with mad science stuff and i figured hey! why not! i needed to do Something with my s17, so why not work some fucked up science into it :)

the tldr for those who don't wanna hear me ramble or don't wanna see what i will be rambling about (bc heavy tw for mad science themes like body horror, vivisection, and general medical malpractice) is below, but one bit of information before we proceed. nya is still the ocean. let her stay dead for longer than 2 episodes !

s17 is a kai focus! he and the ninja get invited to a lab by a scientist to run some tests (they are still powerless), but she traps them and runs experiments on them. there, they find out that 1) nya is alive now, 2) dr cy is working with aspheera, and 3) the new ninja are clones of the old ninja. kai ends up blowing the lab up and going on a minor destructive arc before calming down. the rest of the season focuses on the new ninja realizing they're clones and helping the old ninja take out mayor trustable.

so now that the summary is over. time to get into the details (or just what i have so far)

hi thanks for uncovering the hell. i'm gonna be rambling for a while.

again, this is a kai-focused season! we haven't had one since my s11 and he deserves to have a focus. as a treat :) (i realize this is just kai suffers the season. i realize that. but it's fiiiiine don't worry)

some prehistory for the season. dr cy calls up aspheera for her magical talents, and they summon nya together. they pull her from the ocean and violently rip her back into her body. of course, she can only be here if her powers are gone, so aspheera drains her water powers. nya has no memory of who she was or what she's doing here. she just knew she was the ocean. and now she's here.

a month later, the ninja are ninja-ing. it's been a year since the events of crystalized, two since nya died. that's the longest any of them stayed dead (sans morro who was dead for 40 years). kai really misses her, but has accepted the fact that she's gone. (she helped out in crystalized, but she wasn't really nya. she was the sea)

he runs into dr cy, who offers him and the ninja an opportunity to get tested. she could figure out the origin of elemental powers and help restore them to the ninja. they deserve their powers back, after saving the world so many times! she's a huge fan!

kai discusses it with the team, who agree that it's worth a shot at least. pixal stays behind since she's mostly unaffected by elemental nonsense, but also to keep an eye on the new ninja. she doesn't trust them. plus, if it ends up being bad, she can break them out.

the first tests kinda go normally, just general doctor checkups. she's just being a little bit weird about the nonhuman members of the team (aka everyone but kai), but a lot of people end up being weird about it. jay's publically part snake, zane's obviously a nindroid, lloyd is lloyd, cole used to be dead, and morro's got their own thing going on.

(oh. some background context. in my rewrite the ninjas' public identities are secret. the only ones with a face and name known to the public are lloyd and morro, to an extent, and jay for those who remember the alternate timeline)

when the ninja thank cy for her time and investigation, she uh. traps them in there JKDFSHKJSFDH because she needs to find out where elemental power comes from. and how she can bring it back for the ninja. to restore them to their full glory.

they're stuck in there for a while. a week, maybe? i haven't decided how long exactly, but a Long Time. pixal does try and rescue them but is taken out by aspheera with water powers, meaning pixal is the first person to find out about nya being alive. she doesn't take it well, so she and aspheera are kinda duking it out out there

meanwhile, the ninja are being put through tests to activate what's called their elements' emergency response, aka a hypercharged form designed for protecting the body and the element. kind of like nya's merged form with the ocean, but temporary. cy is trying to activate the emergency response through putting the guys through Situations that they don't like one bit. one of them included kai in a super frozen room and zane in a super boiling room, morro being pretty much buried, and other stuff like that.

sometimes she tries to stimulate them further by exposing them to their element, like frying jay or lloyd with electrical currents, or piling heavy boulders on cole. maybe that will trigger their emergency responses, but nothing seems to work. she even tries it out with nya to see if she can summon back her water powers, but nya's kind of being a sad sack of amnesia right now.

speaking of nya, she's just kinda. here? around the lab? she's mostly locked in her cell, but she treats aspheera and cy as important people, like parents. she trusts them. she's also kinda having a bad time physically, constantly melting and dripping water. she's not really a solid person right now :(

[tw for vivisection begins here] so eventually, cy tries to take it a step further and pulls out some Forbidden Things. she needs to make kai's fire act up more. he's 100% human still. how would his body react to parts of a fire dragon? so she tries it out, doing a quick lung transplant to see if, maybe, the lungs being close to the heart could kickstart a bit of fire. maybe even some dragon blood? all to see how kai reacts to it.

he reacts badly.

congratz on the dragon parts now, kai! the last human is no longer human, not fully. he refuses to acknowledge that he isn't fully human anymore, denying that he'll probably never breathe the same way humans do again. it's fine. he's fine. [end tw]

through this, however, cy decides to keep a closer eye on his developments. eventually, she lets him in on a secret. she leads him to the back of the lab, a room that no one is allowed to enter. she shows him what's inside.

it's cloning pods. she had already had their dna for who knows how long, and had used it to essentially clone them. make perfect ninja replicas. ones that had all their skills. only five managed to survive the process and come out the other end alive. cy reveals this was something she was hired by mayor trustable to do, and when the clones finished growing, he took them off her hands.

but she's always hated him for that. the original ninja would always be superior. the clones could not come close, ever. that's why she's so adamant about bringing their powers back. she wants them to wipe their clones out and prove they're superior.

kai thinks that's absolutely unhinged and manages to escape, running through the lab. he took a wrong turn and finds a cell, where nya is sitting. his sister is alive. he and nya talk, but it's obvious she doesn't know who he is, or who she even is. kai promises to get her out, but nya doesn't understand. he leaves and gets captured and sent back to his cell.

he goes to visit nya's cell sometimes, now that he knows where she is. he tries reminding her of her memories, to which she listens to best she can. she's a bit... spacey. but it's ok, they're bonding.

that is, until cy catches him visiting her and gets pissed. she threatens to hurt nya if he doesn't back off and go back to his cell, to which he snaps and activates his emergency response. his sister is in danger. he would not let his family be in danger.

he becomes a wildfire and destroys the lab. it gets burned down, its entire foundation gone. and for her cruelty, for what she did to him, his friends, his family, his sister, kai kills dr cy.

still in his emergency response, he can't do much other than rampage, a living wildfire. the others find nya and they all get out of there. pixal, meanwhile, is holding kai back and fighting him off. he's not kai right now, just a mess of fire and rage. it hurts to see him like this.

but nya sees him like that. memories flood back. the element of water rushes back to her (aspheera losing hold on the magic) and she turns back into the sea. she has her memories. she stares kai in the firey face and they calm each other down. their emergency states fade away, leaving two not-quite humans in their wake. kai realizes what he did in his state. nya realizes how long it's been. they're both sobbing messes against each other.

now that cy and the lab are gone, and nya and kai have their elements back, there's two issues to solve. the first is the others' elements, which they don't really want to trigger the emergency response for. the other is the new ninja, their clones.

the og ninja decide to tell the new ninja directly that they know they're clones. turns out the new ninja also did not know they were clones. so that was a fun development where the new ninja realize that Oh God. they're not even actual people. they were just made for one purpose.

the bizarros also get involved. it becomes very confusing to have like three people with the same face in the same room, but the bizarros deserve to know there's clones of their light counterparts. i'm normal about my bizarros.

with their combined effort, they overthrow mayor trustable. and everyone lives happily ever after. more or less.

the new ninja agree to also be city protectors, since they were literally made for that, but that they'll also learn to live their own lives and figure out who they are as people. they aren't the bizarros, who are kinda predisposed to doing bad things.

kai is having a time, meanwhile. he killed someone. he isn't human anymore. he's changed. if there's any more room left in the season, it's left for kai to discover who he is again. maybe he goes on a vacation. they all can go on vacation. they deserve it.

how did the others get their elements back? fuck if i know <3 i haven't gotten that far yet kjdhfgkjdhfg

[allofthebees]

Fic Masterlist!

Here’s a list of all my projects. Completed? Upcoming? Vague ideas in my brain that I wanna delve into? All here!

Mutatis Mutandis AU

This is an AU about Pixal and Echo inheriting the elements of time. A rather big project that I’m working on completely out of order because I’m attractive like that. It all started out as a lil theory I had about Pixal’s ability to use the Forbidden Scroll and I decided to actually do something about it up until I got Ronin brainworms. Also, now that the vengestone buyer has been revealed, I gotta add that this AU has a completely different idea as to who it is because I think my idea is cool and sexy.

Cherries

Oneshot; Romance

Pixane; Pixal character study

Post Season 10/Pre-Season 11

Rated T bc these robots are gonna make out

Late at night in the hangar, Pixal and Zane discuss their humanity.

(I promise this is in fact important to the main story sajkdadkj)

STATUS: OUTLINED 1/1

-

Mutatis Mutandis

Multichapter; Adventure/Drama

Pixal Focus; Pixal&Echo friendship; Pixane conflict, minor background Jaya and Scruff. POSSIBLE background Lava? We’ll see…

Rated T for Violence

Post Season 13/Pre-Island

When the Bounty is ambushed by Captain Soto, Pixal suddenly and unexpectedly unlocks her True Potential, revealing that she is the new Master of Forward Time. This causes a series of events that lead to question Destiny itself, and whether or not the Masters of Time should be allowed to have so much control over it.

STATUS: OUTLINED 1/?

 -

Echo’s Collection of Dads: The Trilogy

A spinoff saga based off Mutatis Mutandis that started out as a dumb offhanded joke I made about Ronin being the one to find Echo to it now becoming my sole duty for it to be a running gag that Echo keeps acquiring dad after dad.

Guess I’m a Dad Now

Multichapter; Found Family/Comedy/Adventure/Angst(?)

Ronin&Echo friendship focus; Extremely minor pre-Scruffshipping

Rated T for Heavy Swearing and Violence

Post Season 12/Mid-Season 13

Caught in a storm, Ronin takes refuge in an abandoned lighthouse.

STATUS: COMPLETE 7/7 (ALTERNATE ENDING IN PROGRESS)

 -

Shuriken

Multichapter; Comedy/Romance

Mixed Focus; Ronin&Echo, Dareth&Echo, Ronin&Skylor, Echo&Skylor, Dareth&Skylor, Dareth&OC friendships; Eventual Scruffshipping

Rated T for Heavy Swearing, Violence, Alcohol Use, and possible light Sexual Themes

Post Season 13/Pre-Island

Sequel to Guess I’m a Dad Now. For Dareth, it started out just paying back what he owed, but the guy just kept coming back. Finding yet another reason for him to be in debt one way or another. He doesn’t know what he did, but he’s starting to suspect this guy doesn’t like him… He couldn’t be more wrong.

STATUS: OUTLINED 8/10

 -

Okino Has Joined the Party!

Multichapter; Comedy/Romance

Okino focus; Okino&Echo friendship; Established Scruffshipping, eventual Dareth/Ronin/Okino

Rated ???

Post Season 13/Island doesn’t FUCKING happen LOL

Sequel to Shuriken. It’s been a year since he entered the real world, but Okino is still struggling to adjust. Learning that your tragic backstory was merely “written in” to “make your character more sympathetic” can really mess with a guy. He takes to visiting a bar.

STATUS: SWIMMING IN MY HEAD

 ---

Non-AU Works

All my other stuff that doesn’t relate to Mutatis Mudantis

We Nearly Drowned

Multichapter; Drama/Angst/Romance

Ronin&Nya friendship focus; Established Jaya, Eventual Scruffshipping

Rated M for Heavy Swearing, Violence, Alcohol Usage, and?????

Post Island/Pre-Season 14

Ronin is in prison for his crimes against the Island Keepers. He gains a regular visitor, and occasional others, but they’re all never the one he truly wants to see.

(I was literally drunk when I wrote this and I wanna do something with it so it’s sticking around lol)

STATUS: ?????? 1/?

 -

BODY

Multichapter; Adventure/Comedy/Horror(?)

Rated T for Heavy Swearing, Violence and Death

Ronin Focus; No Ships

Shadow of Ronin Novelization

Just when it was finally his again, he loses a piece of it, and now owes the rest to some dead con artist. Things are looking up, though, he's found a way to pay what's owed and save his skin. All that stands in his way are a bunch of teenagers. This'll be easy.

STATUS: OUTLINED 1/?

-

The Caretaker

Multichapter; Angst

Dr. Julien Focus

Rated ?

A series of oneshots starting with Dr. Julien’s revival, showing his ever-spiraling health, until his death before season 3.

STATUS: RESEARCHING (I wanna handle this subject as sensitively as possible)

 -

Miss Me?

Multichapter; Fluff/Romance

Glaciershipping

Rated G; Some Violence

It was a completely innocuous quip, but the genuine response to it ended up hitting him harder than he could ever imagine.

STATUS: FULLY OUTLINED AND IN PROGRESS 5/10

 -

Some Kinda Bootleg Batman

Multichapter; Action/Crimefighting/Comedy/Romance

Dareth&Pixal friendship focus; Eventual Scruffshipping and Samuraishipping

Rated M for Heavy Swearing, Violence, Alcohol Usage, and possible Sexual Themes

Post Season 7/Pre-Season 8

With the Ninja all busy searching for their Sensei, Ninjago City is now vulnerable. It’s up to The Brown Ninja, and his trusty sidekick Samurai X to keep the people safe.

STATUS: OUTLINING

 -

Press B to Till the Soil

Oneshot; Fluff/Comedy

Wu&Jay friendship focus

Rated G

Post Season 10/Pre-Season 11

Wu finds Jay up at an ungodly hour playing video games. Wu doesn’t get why he can’t just do this stuff in real life.

STATUS: OUTLINED 1/1

 -

Untitled (For Now)

Oneshot; Romance

Nya/Pixal/Zane

Rated G

It scared her at first. Even now, she gets questions about her love life; recieves "fanmail" criticizing her on her refusal to choose between Jay and Cole. If word about this gets out, she'll become the ninja known to have dated almost everyone in the team, the backlash will be insane.

It's nobody's business, she decides.

STATUS: SWIMMING IN MY HEAD

-

Copper and Tellurium

Oneshot; Comedy/Romance

Samuraishipping, Past Jaya

Rated G

Mid-Season 3, then Post Season 10

Nya is bad at flirting. Like, really bad.

STATUS: COMPLETE 1/1

 -

Kiss of the Arachnid Kind

Oneshot; Romance/Fluff

Samuraishipping

Rated G

Post Season 12/Pre-Season 13

Pixal has a request that she’s a little embarrassed to ask for. Nya thinks her girlfriend is adorable. These girls are SMOOCHING!

STATUS: COMPLETE 1/1

 -

You Can Learn Just About Anything From wikiHow

Oneshot; Comedy

Pre-Scruffshipping

Rated T for Ronin’s potty mouth

Mid-Season 7, Specifically during the episode “Scavengers”

Dareth helps Ronin with his broken leg, and they talk about stuff

(This fic is basically canon to all of my Ronin and Dareth related works)

STATUS: COMPLETE 1/1

-

This Canonically Happened

Oneshot; Romance/Humor

Scruffshipping

Rated G

Ronin tries ye olde distraction maneuver to make Dareth forget he just spent a ridiculous amount of cash to bail him out. It only works a little this time.

STATUS: COMPLETE 1/1

-

"When did I get on top of Dareth?"

Oneshot; Humor

Scruffshipping

Rated T for Swearing, Alcohol and Sexual Innuendo

The ninja throw a party after defeating the Oni. Dareth is feeling a bit overstimulated, and decides to take a break somewhere quiet. Only to find Ronin up to his usual antics.

STATUS: COMPLETE 1/1

[grimbeak]

How Pirate Jay Au Jay deal with the rest of the seasons 

DotD: 

*I haven’t watched this ep in 4+ years so Im just gonna focus on the bruise at the end

*Very happy that his bf is no longer a ghost! Now he can give surprise hugs without faceplanting on the floor! (Kai comments that they’re ‘going to be even worse now’)

*Oh yeah and he’s happy to see Morro bc that happens ig 

S7:

*Spends most of it having literally no idea what’s going on

*Acronix tries to manipulate him ab his mom and Jay’s like ‘bitch stfu’ so it doesn’t rly work out

*He honestly doesn’t care ab the fact that Wu’s dying all that much bc he’s only known him for a few months (and he’s still a bit upset about the whole ‘banishing my mom instead of trying to talk to her’ thing)

*He doesn’t have Ed n Edna to worry ab so he just fucks around a bit before going ‘fuck it’ and grabbing the timeblade before anyone else can get to it

*he didn’t have a vehicle he just ran

*pirate coat flowing in the wind 

*Anyway Kai eventually rants to him ab his parents being supposedly evil and jay’s like ‘oh no,,,, how awful that must be for you,,, can’t relate,,,, at all,,,’ which earns him a smack on the head

*Ray and Maya see this new lightning master and are like ‘um is no one else concerned about this’ 

S8:

*Jay searched for Wu for a year (despite not givin a fuck lmao) purely to spend a year with his boyf. That was the only reason. 

*He is freak tF out by Lloyd’s voice change:

‘WHAT’S WRONG WITH HIM’ 

‘he’s fine it’s just puberty- you literally went through this jay’

‘NORMAL HUMAN FUNCTIONS DON’T WORK PROPERLY IN THE CURSED REALM MY VOICE NEVER CHANGED BITCH’

‘is that why you’re still so short’

‘FUCK OFF I NEED TO EAT MORE APPARENLY’

*Harumi is just unimpressed with him her description of him is smthn like ‘the pirate ninja who has no self control’ 

*He instantly knows she’s the traitor but no one really listens to him

*He laughs at them when they figure out he was right

*Jay gets a very quick rundown of what happened with Garmadon and is no longer laughing 

*uhhh canon events happen ig

S9:

*Yeah pretty much canon events as well except for the fact that Jay is freaKING OUT about the fact that there are DRAGONS

‘jay we can make magical dragons’

‘YEAH BUT THEY’RE MADE OF ENERGY AND OUR OWN EMOTIONS THESE ONES ARE NOT’ 

*He still loses it for a bit but instead of him just giving up completely it’s more like he’s drunk

S10:

*No proposin yet because they’re literal children and also shits goin DOWN

*goin down like cole

*sorry

*They have to physically restrain Jay from jumping down after Cole when he falls

*when kai re-makes the golden weapons jay’s kinda like ‘ohhh so that’s what the nunchucks looked like b4 you guys melted them cool cool’ 

*Cole’s back!! Jay’s happy!! Everyone wins!! 

*no one wins bcuz Lloyd’s dead. When he comes back Jay offers him an invite to the club of ‘we died but not anymore’. Zane and Jay were previously the only members. 

S11:

*uhhh what happens in this season again 

*nothing important so lets move on

S12:

(Pre-season 12, Jay gets an odd feeling, and finds Clutch Powers just about to open the teapot of tyrahn. He smacks him and goes ‘no’ before kicking it into the ocean. Ninjago city is safe once more.) 

*Nothing really changes except for the fact that he actually calls the cult that he made a cult and they only cause anarchy 

*Cole just points to where the crowds are running from and is like ‘jay’s over there’ 

*Also Jay has literally no idea what’s going on in this video game world bcuz like everything is just weird and he hasn’t really had time for games with all the heroing going on 

*Bruise happens n they dance

*Jay is horrible at dancing but they do it anyway

*Canon stuff (except Nya dies in the car with Kai for bruise reasons)

*Cole sacrificing himself at the end fuckin hurts bcuz last time Jay died in Cole’s arms,,, now it’s the opposite (sorta lmao) 

*At the confrontation with Unagami, Jay’s just like “look dude the people who were supposed to protect me threw my mom who was pregnant with me into the cursed realm without even giving me a chance to live, so let’s just both agree that our families suck and move on” and Unagami’s like “Sure that makes sense” 

*They bond over having no idea what anything is at any time

S13: 

*Jay is so proud of his boyfriend getting a season

*Jay please stop breaking the fourth wall I’m trying to write

*Vania tries to flirt with Cole, Jay responds by fuckin making out with him in front of everyone

*y e a h

*the queen tries to marry him and jay’s like ‘uh i have a bf’ and she’s like ‘not anymore’ and nya’s like ‘im his lesbian sister let me fight you for him’ and the queen’s like ‘do you wanna get married instead’ and nya’s like ‘uh no i have a gf too’ and the queen is like ‘well i can’t marry the green one he’s a minor’ and lloyd’s just so confused 

*Cole does his Thing with his new 3 poly uncles 

*Uh stuff happens

*

*

*Bruise

*No one’s really sure who the queen ended up marrying but they’re never going back there just in case

The Island:

*Jay likes his flower crown. He wears on the brim of his pirate hat.

[themadauthorshatter]

I should probably back-track to Ninjago Season 1.

I've been excited for the rewrite of Episode 7😈

For context, in Episode 4, we'd see Zane's "green ninja" dream, which Wu would ask he share. He does fully; he half truths it to the others, exceot Cole, who gets pushy. Like I said in Episode 5's rewrite, he collapsed and heard the falcons shouting his name.

This is also the episode, hopefully, where Zane talks the most. And there's a lot of glaciershipping in this one.

We start in the dead of night, as a pan over the ninja shows they are all sleeping peacefully. All except for Zane, who we see close up tossing and turning as he writhes and groans in a cold sweat, possibly having a seizure and a nightmare.

In this nightmare, Zane sprints through a wooded area as hands and snake tails reach out to grab him. He's tired, sweaty, and really doesn't want to be grabbed because he doesn't want to know what could be waiting to pull him to his doom.

Thankfully, he breaks through the foliage and lands infront of a pair of a certain black clad six year old.

"Lloyd?" He asks as he stands. "Lloyd, thank goodness. Sensei has been worried sick. Quickly, we must-"

"Why, Zane?"

It rattles Zane to his core that a girl's voice comes oit of Lloyd's mouth, but not enough to pull him close as dark figures approach and surround them.

Zane pulls Lloyd close and unsheathes his shurikens to defend the two of them.

It gets worse when Zane can't move because the figures are armed men, not serpentine.

Lloyd asks him, 'Why?' again, and this time Zane backs away because half of Lloyd's face looks sunken in while the other looks fine enough considering how he's crying and coughing up blood, as in his tears are also blood.

He loses his shurikens and, in his panic to gind them in black colored snow, gets a muzzle to the cranium and a boot to the stomach.

"The hell's your problem!?" He gets another kick, this time to the face. "First you ask for a fight, and now you can't even make it a good one!?" Zane groans as the soldier stomps on his ear. "You little coward! You worthless, spineless bastard!"

As he tries blicking all the hits as more soldiers join in, Zane hears numerous people screaming his name, begging the soldiers to stop. He sees the messed version of Lloyd try to reach him, even though he's being held back by a smirking Pythor.

He cries for it all to stop, the screaming, the kicks and punches, and the pain he's in, quiet at first, but soon shouting as loudly as he can.

"STOP IT!" Zane screams as he shoots off his back and readies a kunai under his pillow; all you need to know is that Kai and Jay tried pulling a prank, and it went TERRIBLY wrong, and he feels safer, despite being among friends.

Regardless, Zane pants as he looks around and sees that the others are sleeping soundly, even though there's some movement from Cole's bed, like he just got back into it. (Hmmmmm?)

He calms down and holds a hand against his very sweaty forehead, very much shaken and stirred by his nightmare as he groans and rest his head against his knees. "Damn. Why?"

Hope you noticed that detail of Cole moving because we cut to his perspective as he lies on his side and pretends to be asleep. He's really just keeping his eyes on the wall as he listens for any more distress from Zane, who cautiously leaves his own bed and the bunk rooms entirely.

After a minute, Cole quickly gets up and follows him. He doesn't bother trying to be quiet because Kai and Jay can sleep through anything.

It's night and the moon is out, which gives the perfect lighting for Cole to look for Zane on the deck, where he is not.

He looks up and finds him on the mast, more specifically the part that actually holds the sails.

With Zane, he's sitting and switching between staring at the sky and staring at the kunai knife from his pillow, turning it in his hand and sort of inspecting it, not noticing Cole climb up to meet him.

"You know, you're pretty hard to wake up, especially when you're having those seizures."

Zane bites back a retort as Cole joins his side, egging him on to express himself.

"For the leader of the tean, you are terribly disciplined."

Cole takes the jab, and asks what he dreamed of, seeing as how shaken up Zane is.

Zane shrugs it off and simply half-lies that he's worried about Lloyd, hoping that he's okay. Cole agrees and asks for Zane to try and go back to bed, because it's late.

As Cole goes back to bed, Zane stares back up at the sky, seeing a very vague shape of the falcon fly above.

Cut to the serpentine, who walk to an underground cavern with Lloyd, who's in a cage and really doesn't want to be here.

Like before, Pythor needs the general's staffs to reaveal the silver fang blades on a map.

They set it down on a "table" with the staffs just strewn around it like before, and they all sit and play the waiting game.

Yeah, short jump cut, but the serpentine play a minor role here.

Back with the ninja, Zane is under water because he dropped a training shuriken and just stayed under because he's still stressed about the nightmare.

He stays under for almost an hour and a half before resurfacing.

They ask if he's okay, and Cole covers for him that they might be reaching their full potential.

We get the 'full potential' talk with Wu and the origin of how Garmadon became evil, though the only thing I'm changing in the origin story is that we'd get a flashback of Wu and Garmadon talking, where Garmadon attacks Wu and screams in his face that it's his fault Garmadon's on pain and sick from the snake venom. Their father pulls them apart and Wu runs, terrified as Garmadon shouts that he's weak, a coward, and should be the one who got bit.

Wu leaves and, TV perspective, we get a pan shot of the ninja seeing him off, though we focus on Zane, who's still contemplating the whole "break through your inner limits to reach your full potential" and wonders what's holding him back, considering all he knows about himself. We fade to the ninja enacting their greatest plan yet: using fliers to get info or locations on the fang blades; they already searched a library and archives and found nothing.

Zane's zoning out until Jay shakes him out of it. "Hey! Keep up, man! We need to put up as many of these as possible."

Now it's Kai's turn to ask what's wrong, citing how Zane woke up screaming, was distant all morning and is a lot quieter than usual, even refusing to be carried on Cole's back.

Before he can respond, Zane spots a little girl being picked on by two other kids, a boy and another girl. Good thing her older brother saves her and scares them off.

Rather than a seizure, it gives him a very bad headache, one that makes him fall to the ground and drop the fliers, much to the annoyance of some passersby.

Cole holds him as Kai and Jay pick up, though they aren't focused on their task for long as the spot the falcon.

Nya, who's totally been hear the whole time, takes up putting up the fliers as the ninja go after it, first by foot, with Zane on Cole's back where he belings, before switching to their vehicles, where Zane must ride with Kai as he has another headache, though the death metal grunge trash Kai listens to does absolutely nothing except piss him off.

When they're back on their feet, the sky's getting darker as dusk approaches and Jay falls behind because he may be fast, but he can't run forever.

Kai, Cole, and Zane continue, until Kai falls behind, then followed by Cole, who we stay with as Zane races onward. He calls for Zane to stop as he catches his breath, finds the 'Beware of treehorns' sign, and wonders to himself how Zane can run forever like that.

Speaking of Zane, he sprints after the falcon, demanding where it's taking him.

It continues to fly until it falls, panting as it instead hops onward.

Zane stops running and, getting uncomfortable, goes for and turns on a small flashlight in his pocket.

Turns out that stupid bird led him to a graveyard, which he learns by seeing numerous tombstones in the light.

"I apologize for breathing on all of you."

The falcon chirps, and Zane follows, finding it on top of a tombstone that is next to many other tombstones, all the first names different, but the last names the same. A family. The falcon pecks on the one it's perched on and Zane reads it.

'Zane Silver. Beloved son, and a brave fighter. May he rest in peace.'

The falcon walks away from the grave and leads Zane to a large tree...

Where a cougar-robot hybrid thing leaps out in front of him, growling and hissing at him

Zane fights it, even though it beats him senseless, and prevails.

Good thing, too, because the falcon pecks at the tree, which Zane opens to find the 'lab' from before, except it's bigger and the lights turn on when he steps inside.

The falcon makes a rough landing on a desk, amd Zane follows in half-wonder, asking why it brought him to here and the graveyard.

He gets his answer when he examines the papers and journal on the desk. TV perspective, we don't see what he's reading, but he removes his hood and shows confusion before that melts away into utter fear and despair, shaking his head and muttering, "No," over and over again as he searches them all over again in a crazy jump cut montage that shows his face, controted with pain and even more Danganronpa style despair, his hands practically tearing through the papers and journal pages, and flashes of his dreams and images of people he doesn't remember meeting(yet).

Unable to take the pain, Zane throws the journal, shouts, "NO!" and collapses as he hears the screaming from his nightmare, and even the sound of people just saying things to him.

We don't see the images, but we hear the voices, which stop as Zane, clutching his head as he screams at the very top of his lunges.

CUT TO THE SERPENTINE!!! That piece of paper has done nothing and they're all sitting and being bored. Maybe we can have a gag of a Constricti and a Hypnobri playing poker as Lloyd watches, just for shits and giggles.

Pythor, however, isn't in the mood for that, and growls that something MUST be missing.

Hope you remembered that drawing of either Garmadon or a shaded figure drawing blood on a map, because Skales wonders if blood mixed with the Great Devourer's venom will help, seeing as how Garmadon was bitten by the thing.

He and Pythor turn to Lloyd, who panics as they approach him. The Hypnobri, however, grabs him arm and holds his hand out to the two of them, and Pythor shushes Lloyd as he rubs his head.

We see the serpentine all brace themselves for what's going to happen next, but breathe a sigh of relief when Pythor simply pricks Lloyd's finger and takes a small amount of it and returns to the table.

He drips it on the paper and, through the power of some magic BS I can't explain, it makes a map of ninjago, but no location of the fang blades.

So they're back to watching and waiting, except Lloyd, who's seriously planning on how he can escape.

BACK WITH THE NINJA!

They find the tree lab and see Zane lying on the ground on his side with the falcon trying to get under his hand, so it can get pets.

Cole rushes to his side and shoos the bird away before pulling Zane into a sitting position to see if he's hurt.

He's fine, but his eyes are red and puffy, his hair is messier than Kai's, and his cheeks are heavily tear stained.

Kai and Jay catch up and they ask if he's okay, what happened, how did he end up like this, etc.

He just shoves past all of them and sprints out of the tree lab, journal in hand, which prompts them to follow, the falcon on Cole's shoulder and pretending to fly because it's exhausted from flying for real.

"Can't the guy just WALK for once!?" Kai shouts, "We've already done enough running!"

Fade to them walking through the trees, with Kai lighting the way with his sword, as they reach the cemetery and Zane.

He's kneeling and holding on to his tombstone as he shakily weeps. They're all at a loss of words for seeing him like this.

Cole approaches and puts a hand on his shoulder, asking him what's going on with him.

Zane sighs and takes a breath before standing and moving away from the tombstone, so the others can see it.

Without looking at them, he takes a scalpel that was in the journal, which he tosses to them, and unties his gi so his torso is showing.

GORE TW, even though it's not that explicitly shown in TV perspective, Zane carves lines into his body, a straight line that goes between his pelvic bones, a straight line going up from that line, his stomach, and stopping at his heart, and to diagonal lines that meet at the vertical line, making a Y shape.

The ninja are horrified, especially at the fact he didn't even react.

Zane meets their eyes, sad and very emotionally drained, and pulls his skin back to reveal a bunch of mechanisms and gizmos inside his body, especially the core I talked about in his character touch-up post.

They all scream, and this is what follows:

"Y-You...," Kai stammers. "Zane, you're-"

"You're a ROBOT!?" Jay shouts.

Zane sighs and shakes his head. "No, Jay. I... I am not a robot."

Kai babbles on about nonsense in the background with his hands in his hair as Jay pales and Cole only slowly shakes his head.

"You're... No. You can't be. How!?"

"I do not know," Zane admits as he holds his head in his hands. "I just learned myself, and... I don't know."

Kai calms down and states, "Hey, we just learned this, too, so maybe we can figure it out together. I mean, you have all the time in the world now, so..."

"A-and it probably explains why you didn't get jokes before, right?" Jay offers.

Cole glares at them both, but Zane continues.

"Didn't get jokes before. How could I when I did not even remember?"

Zane turns to the other graves and drops back onto his hands and knees.

"Wait," Kai murmurs. "'Remember?'"

"Yes. I believe I am starting to remember, but I do not yet know everything. Someone killed me and I had been brought back to life. That lab was where I... resided for many years."

"Why'd you leave?" Cole asks as he kneels next to Zane.

Zane only clenches his fist on the ground. "I... don't remember."

"Didn't you just say-"

"Kai, didn't I just say I do not yet know everything?" Zane snaps, effectively shutting him up before continuing. "I remember asking someone to make me forget, but... what was so awful that I had to force myself and my mind into hiding?"

He breaks down again, but this time, Cole puts an arm on his shoulder.

The ninja comfort him and tell him he's still Zane, even with the elephant in the room of him being not exactly alive.

They try motivating him to fighting again, but he tells them he'll catch up, because he needs a serious minute to think about what he just learned; he has been dead for a WHILE now.

The ninja leave him, but are then swarmed by treehorns, though it's a harder fight because it's night out. Yeah, that cougar-ribot thing was meant to keep them away.

Zane hears rhem and races to help, but he too get his ass handed to him as his powers are stunted from learning the truth. He ebds uo getting thrown into the tree lab, where he tumbles down the steps and breaks his fall on the desk before hitting the ground. (As Cinemawins would say: Brutal).

We cut back to the fight, and see the ninja do well enough until they don't. Cole, especially, who frantically shouts for Zane, having not seen him step in earlier.

Good thing I bring up Zane, because he comes to and finds the falcon in front of him. He sits up and asks what it's teying to tell him and why, seeing as how he knows the truth.

Silly Zane. Knowing is not understanding.

The falcon gives him the journal and flips to the very first page, which Zane begrudgingly reads.

We get a voice over from the writer as he talks about how, as a 'taboo' scientist, he's had to choose serving the army over being executed, how the village he's stationed in really maked him want to continue his research, and how he met a boy that's really caught his attention, one with quite a large family, a mother, father, grandfather, uncle, 3 cousins, and 5 siblings, where the boy was the second oldest-having learned from having dinner with them after a mishap in the street.

Zane has another headache and sees flashes of this family, and the man who wrote the journal, who, as a slight gag, sits very uncomfortably between two arguing twins before they ask this secind eldest to take a side.

He reads on and remembers more, seeing more of his family, that he did indeed die, get resurrected, and lived until the doctor-soldier died of old age and left Zane alone.

The mechanisms and circuits meant to keep these memories away give, and Zane weeps at all of this new found knowledge, even the fact that HE HIMSELF asked to forget his family.

That word catches him: Family.

He may have had his adopted family, who are all dead, but then there's his new family. Sensei Wu, Cole, Jay, Nya, Kai, and Lloyd. People he's laughed with, semi-cried with, trained with, fought with, people he genuinely doesn't like, but people he really loves with every ounce and fiber of his being.

The falcon watches Zane collect himself and examine the core and mechanisms in his body, remembering the doctor, his father, tell him it will keep him alive, and that it, ironically, makes him more human because his heart is literally bigger than his brain, amd humans are usually more emotional than logical.

With a rush of vigor, Zane seals up his torso with some skin glue, ties his gi back up, and races back outside.

Thank goodness because Cole is being thrown like a rag doll, Kai's exhausted, and Jay's about to become fast food, which Zane prevents by dive-tackling him and tossing him a few yards away, making some snow for him to land in, which surprises them both.

Zane ignores it for now and saves Kai and Cole, the latter almost hugging him before Zane shouts that they need to focus.

They regroup, amd we get an Avengers spin around them, because it's cool, and they leap back into it, Zane lending a huge hand as he uses his ice powers to help them, given their injuries.

As they continue fighting, Zane can't help but notice he feels extremely light on his feet, like a weight's off his shoulders.

They fight off a majority of the treehorns before the queen struts her way in, and Zane is more than happy to oblige her a challenge.

The ninja tell him they can ALL take her, but, TV perspective with Zane's back to the camera, the white ninja states, more serious than he's ever been in his life, "I lost my family once to a power hungry monster. I refuse to let it happen again."

The snow on the ground circles Zane and he glows brightly as the queen of the nest snaps at him.

He levitates and holds a hand out, shooting ice at her at freezing her into a treehorn-cicle.

The other treehorns back off as Zane floats back to the ground.

His powers cease and Zane sighs as he falls back onto his rear, panting as the ninja join him and tell him how awesome that all was, Cole especially so as he asks how Zane did all that.

Zane admits he doesn't know, but reveals he now remembers EVERYTHING, his life from before he died, that he died trying to keep them and others safe, that he'd been brought back and 'raised' by his father, who erased his memory for him before dying himself, and how Wu RE-FOUND Zane and let him join the team. He remembers playing with his siblings, and annoying his older sibling, remembers helping his father-the doctor- with his research and how they even played chess. He remembers that dying SERIOUSLY hurt and was killed for trying to save an old man who was getting hurt. He remembers having his mind physically altered so he wouldn't remember, and that the seizures were due to his mind literally fighting itself.

For those in back, HE REMEMBERS EVERYTHING.

The ninja are all silent upon hearing this and, knowing he'd been the first to ask, Kai apologizes for everything Zane's been through, especially with the seizures.

Zane shakes his head, admitting with tears in his eyes he's too glad for words he remembers. He now knows that he wants to keep others safe, even the team, and hopes he can still help in stopping Pythor.

He's still in, and the group decide to camp out at the tree lab for the night before heading back, though as they settle in, Zane is about to drift off before he feels his old bed creak and someone hold him close with their arms around his shoulders.

It's Cole, though the falcon hops its way to Zane and falls asleep next to him, glad to have him back.

Back with the serpentine, they've all had it, tired of waiting and having their time wasted before they discover the venom in the staffs and use it ro reveal the fang blades' locations.

The episode ends with Pythor holding the map up in victory and Lloyd staring at the map in fear of what's to come

[sibillascribbles08]

If you could take creative control of ninjago what would you change

Christ...

WELL

Actually no idk where to start with this there’s so much anon there’S SO M U C H I guess I’ll do a run of MINIMAL changes tho (for as long as I can)

I don’t think I have to change much in the first two seasons, thankfully, since the writers actually sat down to think about what they were writing at the time but g o d did it go to hell afterwards

Season 3 - This Zane focused season is going to be ZANE FOCUSED DAMN IT. We’re focusing on his loss over his Father, having salt rubbed in the wound by having his father’s work turned into an evil army, and being faced with the fact he’s obsolete compared to it all. He keeps trying to stack up numbers to win, recalculate things, and it’s why his line at the ending ACTUALLY has impact. The thing that sets him apart from the nindroids, his ability to love, is what allows him to defeat the Overlord.

Jay, Cole and Nya love triangle is DESTROYED. Pixal, Zane and Cole is the new love triangle and later OT3

Season 4 - The explanation for the other EMs being around is far less stupid. Garmadon establishes that oh yeah all of your parents had elemental powers and even talks about a few of them because holy SHIT. Cole mentions his mom because he should have done that a g e s ago. Is this supposed to be a Kai season doesn’t feel like it. Open the season with better explanations of why the ninja split. Emphasis the fact that Kai blames himself for what happened to Zane, and continues to do so throughout the season. Add that to why he’s so desperate to save Skylor from her dad (not willing to lose someone else). We still lose Garmadon, Kai and Lloyd have a talk at the end of the season. Also ZANE IMMEDIATELY GOES TO GET PIXAL A NEW BODY WTHHH????

Season 5 - Idk this season was pretty good over all I think. A bit better lore established into the cloud kingdom, hints that they don’t actually control fate they just think they do. Explain where the FUCK NIMBUS CAME FROM?? Water can still beat up ghosts but idk feel like there should be some other factors involved, some magic. Kai and Zane figure out they can make water a LOT sooner. Also why doesn’t Kai just set the preeminent’s house armor on fire??? Should have. OH I did forget since this season is supposed to be for NYA GETTING HER WATER ELEMENT how about she actually GO WITH THE NINJA AND DO SOME SHIT SOMETIMES??? I don’t mind her training, specially Ronin helping her but like??? Wtf why not have her ENGAGE, idiots.

Season 6 - I’m the weirdo who actually likes season 6 but that doesn’t mean it’s not without its issues. I don’t mind Jay wondering about where he stands with Nya but his behavior throughout the season has to stay consistent. When he agrees with Nya he needs to let it go he needs to LET IT GO. IT LITERALLY SHOULDN’T BE BROUGHT UP AGAIN UNTIL THE LIGHTHOUSE. He also needs to linger more on his birth father (and besides he should have suspected he’s adopted since season 4 cause he knows neither of his parents had lightning powers). Zane doesn’t ignore Pixal’s warning about Nadakhan but if she’s off somewhere else idk how she gets threatened I’m sure Nadakhan could figure it out. OH and time can still reset and stuff idc but like, Jay and Nya need to talk about it and they need to GO BACK FOR ECHO. EVEN IF THEY DON’T FIND HIM THERE.

Day of the Departed - just wish it was longer tbh, but major changes: Why do the ninja not seem to care that cole is FADING OUT OF EXISTENCE and Lou should be a lot more worried about his son.

Season 7 - I mean, it’s mostly a trash fire, but I think it’d be a lot more enjoyable if they actually had good sibling dynamics going on. Acronix following his brother because he always has, but starts questioning their plans as things go. At first their relationship is much better, which is why they best Kai and Nya, but by the end that flips over. Actually have Kai and Nya having an ISSUE. Kai thinks their parents could have been traitors, Nya seemingly doesn’t care because she’s so wrapped up with her samurai x stuff being stolen. They end up fighting and don’t make up until the boiling sea. ALSO GIVE RAY AND MAYA A BETTER FUCKING EXCUSE FOR BEING GONE THEY COULD HAVE FUCKING SHANKED KRUX WHEN HIS BACK WAS TURNED GET OUT OF HERE HE HAD NO LEVERAGE.

Also Machia isn’t dead okay she’s just in the past she WILL COME BACK

Seasons 8 and 9 I’d say are pretty solid honestly? My minor changes: Garmadon isn’t Garmadon he’s a fucking fake get out of here with that shit THE REAL GARMADON WOULD NEVER. We actually learn where Mr. E came from I don’t even care if it’s just Harumi and UV talking about how they found him in a scrap heap and got him fixed just give me something. Stop treating Dareth like SHIT. Ronin and The Commissioner plan a jail break long before they’re let out in season 9. Teen Wu is a lot less... air headed. Like seriously he seems to have more logic when he’s a child it doesn’t add up. I’m not saying he has to remember everything but wth?? Oh, and Mistaké isn’t dead fuck you.

Season 10 - ............................................ delete it and start over. Literally, hate all of it, get it out of here. Four episodes for villains you built up like FUCK in the last two seasons??? All of them fucking as big as people???????? cowardly, weak, uninspired, I don’t want it I’m just going to have to redo this whole gd season. A) Oni leader is a QUEEN now and she can be up to 30 feet tall no I do not give a FUCK B) Fake ass Garmadon is revealed to be a different oni entirely he was an agent for the queen the whole time but never finished his mission C) She can still paralyze a bunch of people but man Lloyd you’re going to need more than a shiny tornado to fight her off. D) In fact you need to summon your other great grandma so the two of them can get over their divorce spat. E) Where’s the mask of vengeance bring that back into play. F) Mistaké shows back up to help. I suppose plot wise it can?? Mostly run the same but I think they’re going to have to run much farther than the city with how fast she spreads her reach. Also she’s weak for Lloyd because he’s the smol great grandson and he has to use that to his advantage to slow her down. Mistaké makes something that can unparalyze people and they get some of their allies back before the finale thank god. Faith isn’t just in a coma the whole GD time.

Season 11 - Fire half? Good. I need a much better reason why the ninja go to the never realm tho because wow did they just make everyone out of character in that last episode. The ninja have no reason to just ignore Wu and shove him out like that. Wu has no reason to NOT NOTICE LLOYD IS BREAKING INTO HIS ROOM WHEN HE WAS KICKING THE NINJAS ASSES IN THE FIRST EPISODE. Ice half?? ... h Yeah no they should have known Zane was the emperor from the start LMAO. Or at least suspected the possibility. The decades of time passing??? Deleted. Maybe give it a year. Idk why it’s just Lloyd snapping Zane out if why aren’t the other ninja involved like p l e a s e. Also kill Vex with an ice spike, thanks.

Season 12 - Over all I liked what this season had going but there... should have been more. And that ending felt so crunched together like damn... Unagami was a p cool villain at least BUT idk, despite all the focus on the plot so much of it didn’t feel tangible enough. Even if we’re going to focus more on the video game world I want to see more of what these NPCs are up to. Should have tossed in a couple of filler episodes. Also can someone just kill the Mechanic too SMH (and they should have tied Wu up in something sturdier how did he not just break out of that WHATEVER)

Suppose I’ll stop there I haven’t season season 13 yet.

Oh, the timeline itself needs some fucking work too. At least establish Wu and Garmadon’s sudden aging. At least establish how old Zane is (I’d believe he was built 40 years ago but I find it hard to believe he was active for all of it). Establish that yeah the FSM really did basically fuck off like idk 14 years ago and idk why the show acts like it was so long ago it couldn’t have been based on the other facts we know have Wu learn that his dad is a bitch ass motherfucker and he needs to ditch.

Honestly there’s more but like................. this is the simple version

[moved-to-moothebloo]

My thoughts and feelings on the new episode. Spoilers of coarse.

- Nya might be the best thing. They still manage to keep her well made personality but still write her into the story well enough that she doesn’t feel forced and almost like she’s been on the main team the whole time.

- Some characters get some good development. Cole and Nya seem to be written better with more character.

- Please please please don’t do what I think you’re gonna do and flanderize Kai. Please. We already have to accept it from Zane, we don’t need it from two characters. And Kai’s too wonderful to be given that treatment. Please?

- SO MUCH WONDERFUL INTERACTIONS AND SHIPPING FUEL. Like almost every ship between the six of them get at least a few moments. And even if you took off the shipping goggles they still all have nice friendly conversations together that show the chemistry they all have as a team.

- The animation, while yes it does have much higher quality than before... I still have a problem with it.

Some things I do like about it, like they make the movement of the characters a little more smooth, especially with action scenes, and they made the lip syncing a lot more better. But most of the time the more cinematic perspective can feel like I’m watching a completely different show.

Call me nostalgia blinded but there was just something oddly wholesome about the style and color of the past animation type. All the color choices for the settings always felt natural by making them a little dull, both so it felt a little closer to reality and so the bright main characters would pop out more. Here almost all the backgrounds are more flashy and more colorful then the characters, so you never know what to focus on. Especially since we’re already trying to get used to the new designs. I know I’m probably just gonna have to get used to it over time which I’m fine with but DAMN is it distracting!

- They do a clever job explaining why everything is different by saying that Wu changed the timeline, but it also has a downside by making us question if everything that happened in the past seasons has still happened. We don’t know yet but if it’s revealed a whole lot of what happened didn’t happen now I’m going to be really pissed.

Also it still kind of opens up to a lot more plot holes, like how are they even still able to remember him if time has changed.

- Most of the writing for the dialogue is still great. At least for Ninjago. We get some good lines from characters, both from sentimental scenes like Harumi and Nya, and comedic scenes like hearing Cole say “my body is a temple.”

- Awesome attention to detail in little animation things and such. It really does make it feel more fun to watch.

- A lot of the pacing and writing is concerning.

Both of those things were wildly inconsistent and weird throughout most of the episode. A lot of scenes were given a lot more time then they probably should have like the beginning scene, and a lot of scenes that felt like they should’ve added more time to like the princess or the guarding scene.

- Also the plot itself in this episode seemed to be very confused.

First we got Lloyd fighting bad guys who we never see again, Nya doing basically nothing, then we see Cole and Jay are still looking for Wu, and then that’s quickly forgotten for a little fight between Kai and Zane and a minor antagonist. None of those story lines connect and it makes everything feel very weird. Yes I get they’re trying to ease us into the new change of the show which I understand, but you could’ve made them connect more like what they did in the beginning of Season 4, because it makes the other half feel really awkward and annoying.

- At least they kept the most sacred Ninjago tradition alive. Luh-Lloyd still has little to no personality.

- I still think this season can be good, this was just not a good first impression.

[woodswolf]

okay i really want to know, 5 things you'd change about ninjago

honestly the bigger question is 5 things i wouldn’t change about ninjago, but i suppose i’ll narrow down the top of my list of things that Need To Change

1. I’d fix the timeline so that it Actually Makes Sense and allows more room for exploration of other elements. Biggest thing is really to make the Serpentine War take place a long ass time ago with none of the ninjas’ parents being involved. By extension, I’d also end up changing the way the elemental powers work or carry from generation to generation (like one of my 50-some fleshed-out explanations of how the powers should work, instead of this arbitrary “and YOU get it from your parents, and YOU get it from your parents, and YOU’RE obviously adopted because your parents don’t have it, and YOU get it from your parents” etc. etc. etc. because honestly just no. No. That’s not good enough for me sorry. :P

2. More emphasis on the everyone’s relationships with other people, rather than just the core cast. I wanna see more of Kai and Nya bonding over remembering their parents. I wanna see more of Jay interacting with his parents. I want to learn who Cole’s mom is and see how that impacts Cole and Lou. I want literally anything to happen with Zane and Julien and Echo, because after S6 we are Incredibly Ripe for a discussion which I really want to see. Basically, I want to learn more about who these characters are, who they care for, and who they care about - unlike in canon Ninjago, where the team pretty much Exists as a singular entity that has no ties to any people in particular. TL;DR: I want a minor characters to exist for more than one episode sometimes.

3. No romance bullshit. Listen, back in S1 and S2, Jaya was cute. Now, though, after everything that happened in all the recent seasons? Sorry, no. It’s quite literally the opposite of a healthy relationship 90% of the time - the one example I can think of where they actually communicated with each other without all the other bullshit is TLR, but considering TLR is probably one of the best Ninjago episodes of all time, that pretty much shows the state they’ve been in. All the two of them ever do is try to kiss each other, even when they’re fighting almost constantly, which really isn’t a good way to figure out what’s wrong in your relationship to try and fix it. Basically, fuck the love triangle.

4. Fuck S3 in general. Sure, you can have a season with some of the same general ideas in its plot - I mean, if you can even find an overarching plot in S3 to imitate, which is a pretty fuckin hard task if I do say so myself - but the sudden genre switch from “mostly fantasy” to “mostly sci-fi” is a really fucking sudden transition, and it really doesn’t work well with the show’s strengths. The sad thing about S3 is that a lot of the concepts introduced in it are wonderful - Cyrus, Pixal, Hiroshi’s Labyrinth, Pythor’s return, the Serpentine underground city, etc. - but the plot is so unfocused and all over the place that it just comes off as complete bullshit. Hell, even the sudden genre switch could’ve felt more natural if the plot took a bit more time and cut out the love triangle bullshit. But it didn’t. So fuck S3.

5. General characterization cleanup. In the last few seasons, everybody’s really been coming off as pretty flat - Kai’s the impulsive one, Cole’s the sorta-serious one, Zane’s the smart one, Lloyd kinda exists, Nya doesn’t have character unless she’s arguing with someone, and Jay is a nightmare and makes me want to die. This one I’m going to split up into subcategories for each of the main characters because this is a huge problem.

Jay: He’s been so screamy and whiny all the time in recent seasons, and sure, he also was a little bit back in the earlier seasons, but the Hagemans have slowly turned him up to eleven over time. S6 was literally so bad at points that I could hardly sit through it. It’s gotten to the point where I can instantly tell that the Hagemans haven’t written the script for something if Jay doesn’t piss me off - and so far I’ve always been right, because I’ve been able to successfully predict it for Day of the Departed and S7, neither of which were/are written by them. It’s worth noting that both of them portray Jay a lot better and have a “normal” amount of focus on him, so it’s possible that S6 was only really especially bad because the camera was on him the entire time.

Cole and Lloyd: Back in the second half of S2 or so (though it only really became obvious in S3), Cole and Lloyd actually swapped a lot of their “personality” traits. Before the swap, Lloyd was more of the “foodie” character and Cole was the “default leader”, but around Child’s Play their traits actually got swapped around. Now, back in the olden days, all of the characters were more 3-dimensional, so it was really hard to tell - but as soon as S3 started it was very obvious that Cole was suddenly “goofy food-lover” and Lloyd was “default leader the team would be incompetent without”. I’d switch them back. #MakeLloydSillyAgain

Zane: Honestly, of all the Ninja, Zane’s the one that most pisses me off right now, even more so than Jay. While Jay’s just annoying and screamy, our current Zane is a completely different character than the one we had back in the early days of Ninjago. Both versions of Zane are smart, but while the old Zane was kind and understanding, the Zane we have now is very egotistical and occasionally quite mean-spirited. The easiest way to show the difference is by taking a look at the scene where new Zane asks for wishes from Nadakhan - new Zane tries to outsmart Nadakhan and gets punished for it. Old Zane probably would’ve wished for his friends to be freed. :/

Nya: I’m too tired to try to come up with reasons for this because honestly Nya’s character has always been treated like shit. One thing I’d definitely change doesn’t have anything to do with her - it’s that I’d have her independence be treated as an asset instead of a liability.

Kai: I don’t have much to say with him - of all the Ninja, his character has stayed the most consistent throughout the show. He’s impulsive and a bit rash at times, but he’s not stupid; and he’ll do anything he can to protect the people he cares about. In recent seasons, the writers have frequently ignored the “but he’s not stupid” part, but other than that he’s pretty much the same as he was at the beginning.

k so that’s 5, good job woods it only took you an hour to write all this shit

[sibillascribbles08]

So this has been stirring around in my head for a few days but the more I think about it the more I want to talk about it. So buckle in for a probably lengthy post about Kai, Season 4, and the relation between the two.

Now I love season 4, it’s one of my personal favorites. For what it is the pacing works really well. You have a number of iconic scenes. The elemental masters are a delight, the villain is hilarious (although very creepy... why the sleeveless uniforms Chen? Huh? You scalie)

So post catching up on ninjago while my brain starved for new content I started doing some reading. Low and behold my surprise when I’m glancing over season 4 while munching on chocolate to find out Kai was the focus character of season 4.

Bitch where ????

Again, I love season 4 for what it was, but like ??

Look if I’m being deadass honest Kai hasn’t gotten any actual character development since season 1.

Yeah, season 1.

Season 4 was meant to be a focus season but for all the struggle we see initially we get none of that later on. We aren’t even given a clear source on it.

Season 7 was also meant to focus on him and Nya but among all the other messes in that season ? Nothing happened

In order for a character to develop they not only need to face a situation that forces them to change but those changes have to actually like, stick.

Kai’s struggle to deal with the concept that his parents might not have been the people he looked up to went null and void after he found them. Him and Nya developing a stronger relationship falls short because they never had anything threatening their relationship in the first place.

But anyway we aren’t here to talk about that.

So, as much as I love season 4, let’s talk about ways it could have been even better.

Lets start where it starts, episode 1, which for all I love about it there was always one thing that irked me.

Why do they all hate each other so much?

Like obviously Lloyd doesn’t, he seems to still be in frequent communication with everyone. And Cole and Jay kind of make sense with the whole thing with Nya from the last season but like, WOW, there is some venom going on here. They look so goddamn angry to see each other at that noodle house. Even Kai, despite the fact he ? seemingly has no reason to be fighting with them so much.

So you open the same, Lloyd testing Borg’s security, the inventor wondering why the other ninja weren’t there.

And you cut to Jay, running his show. To Lloyd arguing with him and trying to convince him to come back. And maybe Jay considers it for a moment but then you have, hear me out

a minor flashback

not much, just something. I feel like with all the grief that came with losing Zane it’s not stretch that these boys blew up at each other, hey maybe even Nya. Do any of them besides Kai still talk to her?? Either way that a huge argument was the start of them going their separate ways. You wouldn’t need to show the argument, just maybe a couple of insults that were thrown Jay’s way.

So he says no, he refuses, Lloyd insists Jay will know where to find him and leaves.

You get the similar deal with Cole and Kai. Both of them remembering different parts of the argument and adamantly refusing to go back. 

And heeeey since Kai is, idk, our focus character, let’s focus a little more on why he’s so fucked up. Because while the show might not show it as much I’m fairly certain it’s because he’s mad at himself.

Kai puts a lot of emphasis on his ability to protect others. Reaching his true potential rested on him realizing his duty wasn’t to protect the world but to protect his friends, and he failed. Zane is dead. Kai couldn’t do anything because in the end he wasn’t strong enough.

This is important later on.

Hell, draw that shit out for when Kai goes to Zane’s statue. Make me cry fuckers.

You cut to short scenes of all of them getting the pamphlet for the tournament, including the information that they have Zane.

So NOW they all go and find Lloyd, at Garmadon’s monastery. Meeting in secret as they try and figure out if it’s real, and who is this Chen person? Not the person in charge of that noodle house surely. (Because, honestly, why would that be their place to meet I know Chen didn’t exist until this season but we’ve never heard of this noodle house WHY IS THAT THEIR GO TO PLACE WE’VE NEVER SEEN THEM HANG OUT THERE whatever) So now they go, they find some minions, ask some questions, but in the end the only way they can figure out is to go themselves.

They get to the ship. Garmadon follows. But instead of an easy time introducing all the elements the ninjas immediately split, going to their own corners. Because, oh yeah, weren’t they fighting? Didn’t they mainly agree to go to the island together to find Zane?

Heck on you for dropping that conflict until it was convenient again mmmm

SO off in his own corner, Kai meets Skylor. And yes he’s crushing but here’s another concept, they get along really well. She’s cryptic but easy to talk to. They crack some jokes, and Kai’s just glad he might have a friend outside of Lloyd in this after all.

Blah blah, fight with Karlof, another moment where he’s trying to buff up his strength.

I say he should bond more with Skylor from the get go for a handful of reasons

1) Kai is fiercely loyal and protective, he won’t stray from his mission but struggles between trusting the friends he’s known for ages but is currently pissed off at vs. someone he barely knows but gets along with.

2) It makes Skylor’s betrayal that much more devastating but also

3) Makes his decision to join Chen that much more convincing.

Like OBVIOUSLY Kai had a plan up his sleeve originally, but it was too obvious, so obvious ur sitting here like “Is Chen really falling for this no... can’t be.......”

So, concept, Chen asks because he knows Kai is close to Skylor. He asks because he promises if Kai helps him he’ll finally lead him to Zane.

And Kai takes it because he thinks it might be the only way to help Zane and Cole, because their teamwork is still frayed and Cole failed to inform the others he was planning that huge breakout.

You build it up so it seems like Kai is violently determined to help Zane, to make up for the fact he failed back then. There’s actually suspense when Chen steals the rest of the elements. Kai’s spoken about his doubts with Skylor, sure, but there’s still so much at stake.

But, SURPRISE.

And hey, remember how Kai’s conflict, at it’s core, is him struggling with the fact he wasn’t strong enough to protect his friend? Now it also makes more sense for him to cling to that staff, for him to go off on a rant about how he should have been the green ninja.

Additionally I hate how? Lost he gets in the narrative later on. Like I know we just lost Garmadon and GOD IT SUCKS but you could have easily had a scene with Lloyd and Kai. You could have easily had a short scene of Kai beating himself up because, once again, he didn’t do enough. He didn’t stop Chen early on. If he had, maybe Garmadon would still be around. Idk, I can’t think of details but you could probably do a lot with both Kai and Lloyd coming to terms with the fact that they both feel weak because they both feel like neither of them did enough. And wouldn’t that be a good lead in to season 5 with Lloyd getting possessed.

Hey, remember how Kai was awful at roller skating? More build up.

Hey, remember that fight with Ash? More build up.

AN D? Fuck bro. As much as I love Lloyd, Kai should have been the one to rally all the elemental masters together after surprising Chen, when they all had to break off the island. I wanted a scene where all these boys get past their in-fighting, not just Cole and Jay, which was great but WHY WAS KAI SO FUCKING MAD AT THEM GOD WHATEVER. My point, Kai, who’s felt so weak for this whole season, rallying everyone and making them believe in their own strength would make me fucking cry.

Anyway I’ll get off my soap box now. Thanks for coming to my TedTalk