snealeth

[snealeth]

strange exploration team

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Heads up!

Here's the Lindsay+DJ friendship post I was talking about.

It's from TDWT, since I can't remember off the top of my head if they've had any other significant interactions, and I'm currently jumping around and rewatching episodes from this season.

Anyway:

One thing I really, really adored was the very casual touches, pats and hugs they shared. Lindsay and DJ are very sweet characters, and I honestly wish the writers could understand that not every moment has to be loud and ridiculous! It's like they slowly forgot to balance the comedy, drama AND the chill vibes.

Lindsay being so happy DJ read her mind about inviting Tyler and being chill about it that she gives him a cheek kiss. 🥰🥰

Please, normalize platonic kisses! Normalize smooching people who make you happy!

They also tried their best in cheering the other up, even if it was them two vs the world. I'm glad they gave them some slack in this episode! Lindsay even succeeded in gently easing some guilt in DJ over the curse!

(Something Leshawna tried to force, and Alejandro did with his hidden agenda.)

Nothing to say here except they're so CUTE, and there's a cameo from Chris McLean himself.

Now it's Lindsay's turn to carry him! I've always been a fan of the jumping into someone's arms trope, and all the variations of it.

(Also Chris is there again.)

Run, girl, run!!! 😆

🤣 I also LOVED how Lindsay was subtly trying to get DJ to get that she wanted him to help more. Too bad things took a downturn here. :/

She was really trying to pinpoint what DJ was upset over!!! Their little pep talks were the best, and she wanted to squeeze in one more before their final voting.. thingy, together.

Anyway. That's about it for these cinnamon rolls' appreciation post.

I hope FreshTV remembers that there's more to drama than relationships and over-the-top characters.

#iconic #i support dynamic analysis posts like these #lovely

[snealeth]

3 hour sampher analysis pls

ask and ye shall receive

note: this is like a lotta bullshit if im bein honset, also Sammy smiles at Topher a lot

firstly, notice how the twins are reacting to topher rn - Amy is standing straight with a look of confusion like how dare this guy talk to me or wtf is he on about i was in bed. Meanwhile, Sammy is leaning forward, eyebrows up with a huge smile on her face, she is clearly interested in what Topher has to say, perhaps even eager to be the topic of his thanks. Unfortunately, Topher is praising Amy rather than her, causing her to scowl. So, instead of playing along and keeping quiet, she instead interjects with “I got the berries, not Amy,” a noticeable spark in confidence and defiance which is soon shot down by Amy - compare this to later in the episode where she instantly accepts blame for getting her sister dirty, whereas here she doesn’t apologise to Amy, instead glancing at the ground as though she was thinking over something, perhaps even considering speaking up again.

Next, let us analyse this scene as tho we’re yr11 english teachers. Here, Sammy is once again smiling at Topher as he’s doing his thing, Amy is visibly pissed and glaring at him.

In a following scene, Topher is dicking around again but this time Amy rolls her eyes before bringing her attention to Sammy. Notice the subtle change in expression, Amy lowers an eyebrows as she looks at her while Sammy quickly stops looking at Topher. Perhaps Amy is putting the pieces together - and obviously nothing would be better to do than embarrass her sister in front of her (speculatively speaking) crush, right?

Enter the next scene, Amy pairs up with Sammy who thinks it’s a turning point in their relationship. However, Amy instead takes this moment to bring her down in front of everyone, skewing it as her doing a favour to her team since Sammy is ‘horrible at everything’, now, Amy usually insults Sammy this harshly when they’re on their own such as during the grease pig and water balloon challenges - this makes it easier for her to play the victim in ‘Twinning isn’t Everything’, however, she chooses to bully her in front of her whole team, notice how she glances to the right before insulting her, could this be Amy taking a chance to belittle Sammy’s (again, speculative) feelings for Topher? 🤔

In ‘Twinning isn’t Everything,’ Sammy obviously starts her rant against Amy, which backfires, and this is another point for analysis as Topher interjects frequently, clearly enjoying the drama (honestly same king) and seemingly encourages Sammy to flip her shit bc its good tv probably. Something else to note here, Jasmine interjects afterwards doing the opposite and trying to get Sammy to cool down. But who does she listen to here? Topher, of course. Despite Jasmine’s disapproval, Sammy defends herself, gets to her feet and proclaims Amy a monster, in a very (total) dramatic fashion. She then gets frustrated and leaves, with Topher narrating still.

Now, you may be wondering how this scene is significant, well, remember back to the scene with the berries in ‘I Love You Grease Pig’? In that scene, Sammy stands up for herself after Topher fails to acknowledge that it was her who got the berries, here, Sammy goes a step further to not only claim that she got the berries but to also call Amy a monster - after Topher encourages and directly acknowledges her, perhaps she realises Topher’s love for drama after observing his reactions to the grease pig challenge so she amps it up in front of him. Perhaps she gets his confidence via osmosis. Perhaps I just need to go outside. also sammy glances at topher before the water balloon challenge and i feel like i should mention that.

okay i shall be skipping the events of the lie detector chicken episode because i really dont like that episode so i dont wanna rewatch it plus topher calls sammy a weirdo and that doesnt fit with this propaganda post, furthermore, in ‘A Blast from the Past’, Sammy displays discomfort at him cheering for her (as Amy), but my storage died while i was rewatching so i have like nothing else to put lol

i also think this moment is cute

theres also this which i posted about a couple days ago

And finally, there is this iconic moment in Sampher history where it sounds like Amy is saying “Topher thinks you’re fat,” this could also further cement the idea that Amy is aware of Sammy’s (possible) crush on Topher.

I’ve rambled long enough, please feel free to send me any other out of context screenshots that i missed and thanks for reading

#iconic #i don't ship sampher but like #any amount of three hour ship analysis #i support #congratz

[snealeth]

...Are Leshawna and Courtney friends in Island? Like, seriously, that seems to be the implication. Of course there's Haute Camp-ture, where Courtney's opinion of Leshawna is, "I can't say anything bad about her! And I excel at saying bad things about people." Which already says a lot. But the very episode before has a scene where Leshawna tells Duncan that she knows about Bunny. And how does she know about Bunny? Courtney, apparently. Even though Courtney said that she wouldn't tell anybody about Duncan's actions, Leshawna specifically points to Courtney as to the person who told her. Were they offscreen friends that the show didn't have time to showcase? And how did their friendship deteriorate so much as to be how it is in Action? I really genuinely want to know.

#total drama #total drama island #td courtney #td leshawna #fresh did not want to let two girlbosses bond #so they offscreened them #and then retconned it #:pensive:

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YO I just had a realization about Revenge Of The Island's writing.

Mike and Zoey are two characters I enjoy, but I think their plots in Revenge are flawed, like, structurally. Like, there is an inherent contradiction with their characterizations that makes it really difficult to correct without utterly breaking both of them. Last time that I'll say that this is explicitly towards Revenge Of The Island. All-Stars is flawed in them too but people have already talked about them a ton, and they don't need my help. I'll also warn to take my discussion of Mike with a grain of salt; I do not have Dissociative Identity Disorder, and this essay kind of needs to talk about the subject to get to my point. So just remember that.

So, first off. Who is Zoey? Like, textually, not whatever the story actually thinks she is like. Well, she's kind and optimistic, obviously. She's heavily concerned with what people think of her, overly apologetic a lot of the time, and has a heavy desire for approval. But most centrally towards this essay? She's judgemental.

She's. Very judgemental. - "The guys back home are gorgeous. But they're all hockey thugs and juvie rejects with a collective IQ of ten." - "Mike is so sweet! The way he's always encouraging Cameron is totally cool! The way he's always going into character is... totally weird." - "Mike is so sweet! You know, I don't really get his old man comedy routine, but... I bet it's really funny if you're from, like, France or something." - "I don't like to speak badly about anybody, but Dawn totally creeps me out. Reading auras, talking to animals..." It's a trait that is often completely ignored when talking about her, but it's something that happens so often that it's kind of hard to deny is a trait of hers. And while it doesn't change the fact that she is indeed kindhearted (note that all of these happen during confessionals, when nobody's watching), judging others is something that is pretty solidly ingrained in her psyche. There is just one problem with this.

Zoey's judgemental attitude completely flies in the face with Mike's arc. Mike's arc is, in essence, him overcoming his fear of being ostracized for his DID. His fear is that people will judge him for something he can't control. And while I think there's several problems with the execution of it, most of those problems are unrelated to this. ...Except for the problem where the plot ends with Zoey saying, "Are you kidding? I love oddballs! And you're officially the coolest one ever!" Ignoring the fact that the comment is kind of insensitive (A friend summed it up really well and I'll use their words, but it's basically; Mike - "I'm scared that someone will treat me like some weird outsider." | Zoey - "What if I do that but in a positive way?"), this is in direct contrast to Zoey's behavior up to this point. Zoey has been judgemental to people, and especially Mike, for the entire season up to this point. It's a well-meaning scene out of context, but in context it completely contradicts everything set up before. And obviously, ending it like this is good. I am definitely not asking for Zoey to decide that Mike is weird for having DID, that would be far worse of an outcome. But the contradiction is still a problem. It makes Zoey's characterization inconsistent, weakens the ending of the plot considerably, and overall it's just not well written. Well okay, you might be saying. Just remove her judgement traits, or give her an arc about being less judgemental. Problem solved, right? No, not really. Because, here's where we get to the other half of the problem. We've been mostly talking about Mike's plot, because Zoey has thus far been a side character to Mike's plot instead of having her own. But don't worry, she does get her own after Mike's eliminated and his plot is finished! She gets another one.

A plot where her judgemental traits are required to make her transformation make sense and isn't coming out of nowhere. I think you're starting to see the problem, right? Zoey's plot between episodes 10 and 12 is primarily centered around the game getting to her. She starts becoming more outwardly aggressive, more intentionally trying to win the game, and starts pushing her only remaining ally (Cameron) away, until she becomes Commando Zoey. This brings up the worst traits of her, most notably her judgemental behavior. She's roughly as judgemental as she was previously, her main change is that she's much less afraid to talk about it to others. She's lost her ability to keep in wraps her emotions, and with somebody like Zoey that isn't a good thing. And she needs to redeem herself and snap out of it, which is what the next episode does. And this Zoey is basically her defining scenes in Revenge Of The Island. This is where she gets most of her characterization; The scene where she turns into Commando Zoey is infamous for a reason, after all. Removing Commando Zoey removes one of Zoey's best group of episodes, and a ton of her best characterization. But keeping Commando Zoey means keeping Zoey's judgemental attitude, and that means Mike's arc is hampered considerably. Mike can't learn not to fear judgement when he'd be entirely in the right for fearing it towards Zoey in particular. Which means the writers were basically in a really tight spot where any solution will be incomplete unless they completely rewrote both of their stories. And the writers solution to this is to completely forget Zoey's judgemental attitude at the exact point where that attitude would contradict with Mike's arc. And that is a writing problem, but it is one that I can't help but feel like it was the most damage-mitigating decision they could have picked. The only way to have made it better was it rewrite it completely, so that their plots did not intersect at the worst possible point. Which, they should have done. But it's perfectly believable that at the point they realized the contradiction was the point where it was far too late for that kind of change. On the other hand, the fact that they kind of acted like Zoey's judgement does not exist kind of lead most of the fandom to act like it doesn't exist either. Which is disappointing, since it's one of Zoey's more interesting traits, right up there with her social anxiety, which exists in like two scenes and that's it.

Mike and Zoey are two characters that I find... solid. Like, B-, B tiers. They're not the worst, and both have interesting traits. But I think Mike is just a better character then Zoey, because Zoey just didn't have the framework to be as interesting as she could have potentially been, and that's in large part due to how they duct-taped the structural problem of their arcs that I've spent this entire essay discussing. Zoey was not able to focus on the seeming contradiction with her judgement vs. her kindness, or how her judgemental attitude doesn't inherently make her a bad person, or anything. Because they needed to make it so that that character trait of hers is deep underground where nobody will consciously notice it. Because if they noticed it, noticed those traits, they would realize the quick-fix solution that the writers gave the plot. It's just kind of sad.

#total drama #total drama revenge of the island #tdroti #td mike #td zoey

[snealeth]

On the other side, Lindsay and Jo is also an odd Lindsay relationship, leaning into more of an enemy territory. In Lindsay's cameo in Runaway Model, she laughs at her makeup, though Jo tries to save her, and Jo steals her mirror. They act like they'll further this in the all stars intro, where they fight, with Jo winning.. but then in the one all stars episode Lindsay is in.. they don't talk at all. I think it could actually be a really cool dynamic.

I think Lindsay & Jo would be a great duo, because Jo is in a lot of ways like Heather. While they are different in some key ways, the things they have in common are that they're both bullies that get ahead by taking dumb or desperate people under their wings and then ditching them when the time is right. Lindsay forgave Heather in All-Stars, but she still wouldn't be likely to fall for her tricks again. Which would make it all the more interesting if somebody with that same exact strategy tried to interact with Lindsay. Because Lindsay is great at athletics, and Jo would very likely take notice of her as a potential lackey. Which could make for a cool storyline to see how Lindsay would react if somebody tried to repeat history and rope her into an alliance. Would Jo's plan succeed? Would Lindsay see through the trap and remember what happened with Heather? There's a lot of things you could do with that, and now I'm kind of interested to see how that'd go.

#total drama revenge of the island #tdroti #td lindsay #td jo

[snealeth]

Hm, it's a weird question to ask, but what is your opinion on the relationship of Lindsay and Bridgette? You would expect the girls to be friends, and sometimes they are.. but you have interactions like in Bridgette's elimination, and in Not Quite Famous that give me this like.. frenemy vibe for them, which is really weird.

I don't really interpret Bridgette & Lindsay's dynamic as frenemy-ish. Not only does Lindsay have more interactions with her that's in a positive light then a negative one (She greets Bridgette in a friendly way and Bridgette teaches Lindsay yoga in The Brunch of Disgustingness, Lindsay compliment's Gidgette's relationship in Alien Resurr-eggtion, and the two are pretty nice together in Walk Like An Egyptian - Part 1), the Yukon episode kind of has another side to her. Yeah, Lindsay voted for Bridgette for losing the challenge, but she voted for Leshawna too, and her and Lindsay had an even stronger connection in World Tour. But additionally? When Chris points out that Bridgette polekissed, Leshawna and DJ glare at her. Lindsay just kind of looks worried. And she keeps that expression while the remaining members watch Bridgette fall with a broken parachute. Lindsay yelled at Bridgette in Not Quite Famous, that's undeniable. But that's one moment, and the reason why made sense (she was overly protective of Tyler). I think Bridgette & Lindsay could have a cool dynamic, but I really wouldn't call it frenemy-ish. I just think they'd be nice friends, period.

#td lindsay #td bridgette #total drama world tour #this is what? #the third time i've talked about a bridgette dynamic? #she isn't even a character i like all that much #but her dynamics with other characters is just #really interesting

[snealeth]

Alright, follow up question. When, do you lemon your lemons, and waffle your waffles?

exactly Yes AM and No PM every single day. If I forget then I time travel to the start of the day again.

[snealeth]

Do you lemon your waffles, or do you waffle your lemons?

I lemon my lemons and I waffle my waffles.

[snealeth]

For as much as Total Drama All-Stars is hated, and I'll admit a lot of it is for good reason, there's something I don't see anybody talk about. Like, ever. Mostly because it doesn't really fix any of the problems most people have, but I still believe it should be appreciated, because I think All-Stars has a certain something to it that I believe it does better then the entire rest of the series. And that something?

Shot composition. Because, seriously, the animation of All-Stars is really impressive, but in a way where I don't believe it's the animation itself that got an upgrade. It seems roughly the same as it was in previous seasons, even possibly a little rougher then usual. No, I credit the collective storyboarders, because the best part about All-Stars' visuals is that every single scene is composed in a really solid way that often make for interesting shots and help pretty heavily in showing whatever is needed to show the story.

My favorite example of the sheer amount of effort that goes to the shot-by-shot editing of All-Stars is Lightning's boney island scene in Evil Dread. The scene begins with a bolt of lightning in the sky, and then pans down to Lightning glaring downwards. Then cut to Lightning on a rock in the lake with a stick in his hand.

This shot specifically is pretty solid. It's very wide with a lot of empty space, and that, along with the previous tight shot of Lightning, allows the audience to focus on what's important- Lightning himself. Additionally, while Lightning's pose isn't immediately clear as to what he's doing, it is a very strong pose visually and it's obvious that whatever he's doing he's about to use a lot of force with that stick. It's almost reminiscent of some sort of canine, which fits well with Lightning's character, to the point that you'd be able to tell who Lightning is just by the pose. And the problem of it not being super clear is rectified by the fact that the shot doesn't hold for very long, and the next shot- a fish swimming into the foreground- adds in the necessary context and makes it obvious that Lightning is fishing. In a way, what I gather to be, an unorthodox way- hitting fish with a stick and hope they land on the beach. That fits Lightning's incompetency, his ego that he'll end up doing it, and, later on, his athleticism, as he proves that he can actually do it. Quick cut to the fish jumping out of the water, Lightning hitting the fish, and another cut to a dragged out shot of the fish being thrown into the air and falling to the beach. The shot is dragged out to really sell the impact of the stick, and that sells how strong Lightning actually is. Lightning brags about it, but he is caught off guard by the goose. And we are also caught off guard by the goose, because instead of cutting to another shot, the bird flies right into the current shot.

It's a neat technique to surprise the audience, since they would not expect the shot to be interrupted by the bird. But since it is, it's a neat way of allowing the audience to feel more invested in the story. And I don't think many scenes before this season really focused this much on the whole visual part of the medium. It looked pretty, and some shots were nice, but there wasn't as much thought and attention put into every shot like this. And there's a lot more examples I can bring up. The slow dragging out of the first scene with Camcody in Saving Private Leechball as the audience stews in the uncomfortableness of Sierra just looking at Cameron. The angle of Gwen walking away from the bridge showing how long of a walk it is in Moon Madness. This shot from You Regatta Be Kidding Me.

I just think there's a lot of really good scenes visually in All-Stars, and the fact that nobody talks about it, because Total Drama has not really been known for it's amazing animation, is kind of sad. There should be more discussion about it, because there's a lot of potential in analyzing all of these scenes and how they work in their attempt to emotionally affect the viewer.

#total drama all stars #tdas #anyway evil dread is the best tdas episode #i will not be accepting criticism of that take at this time #/j

[snealeth]

i just got my first ever anon hate. i am moving up in the world!

[snealeth]

The first half of Aftermath I is, like, the best Aftermath sequence in the season specifically because Izzy is absolutely hysterical. She's slowly becoming my favorite gen one character, because she's just. Really funny. Also Izzy's interactions with Geoff and Bridgette are interesting, because the two seem to have slightly differing opinions on Izzy. Geoff mostly reacts to Izzy with utter confusion. He doesn't get Izzy's counter question ("I don't know Geoff, how did it feel?") at first, and tries to tell Izzy how it felt even after Bridgette explained it, and was caught totally off guard by the reveal of Chef's attempt at an alliance. Additionally, he's often just left speechless at her antics and stutters a bit before moving on from the insanity. And his expression at Izzy's double-jointedness. That was gold. Bridgette, meanwhile, seems genuinely kind of annoyed at E-Scope, glaring at her in two separate instances- Izzy lying about her top and her passive aggressive comment of "Yeah, well, you would know!" Despite that, she tries to show more outright sympathy for Izzy then Geoff, like sounding sympathetic when Izzy suddenly starts crying. Only for it to be thrown back in her face when Izzy hits her with a non sequitur. Both reactions make sense for their characters. Geoff in Island and at this point in Action was written mostly as an idiot, so he just has a hard time following along with Izzy's insanity. Meanwhile, while Bridgette normally makes an attempt to be kind, that doesn't mean she never loses her temper. She's just more likely to try to forget that anger and be the better person. Also this interview as far as I'm aware, is the last time Gidgette isn't fighting with each other until the two talk it out in the third Aftermath. Which makes the sequence better by proxy.

#total drama action #td izzy #td bridgette #td geoff #i kind of wish bridgette geoff AND izzy were the aftermath hosts #it would be hilarious #and would mean no gidgette drama #hopefully

[snealeth]

I had a realization about Dakota last night and I could not stop thinking about it and now you all get to hear about it too. Suffer. Also add in some Dakota analysis because of course I ended up doing that.

If I had to pitch Dakota's character, it'd be "vapid spoiled rich girl that learns to be a decent human being by being forced to work under the most physically and mentally demanding jobs possible."

She starts out the season being totally apathetic to everybody around her. Dakota pushes Anne Maria off to the side, fakes her emotions in a confessional, and does not care about doing either challenge. She only cares about things that directly relate to herself and her possible future fame. She reacts strongly to her phone getting taken away, the paparazzi repeatedly being stopped by Chris, and getting eliminated, because she only cares about herself.

That's not exactly true, though. Dakota's problem is that she's just really single-minded. What Dakota truly desires, as we learn from Dawn, is love and attention. She wants fame because she wants millions of people to notice her, to finally care about her, because she believes nobody besides her father has ever done that. She acts apathetic to the people around her because that's not what truly matters to her. She's all in this for one thing- future adoration. And she ignores everybody around her to have that one thing. And the fact that it's single-mindedness is important, because there are moments where Dakota's secret goodheartedness shines through, even before episode four. And, obviously, that's with Sam. Even before she bonds with him over their shared addiction with electronics, there's this scene;

Everybody, including Dakota, laughs when Chris says that somebody farted on the only date they ever had. However, when Sam reveals it was him, Dakota immediately stops laughing and seems to feel guilty that she laughed at Sam, compared to say, Scott, who is still smiling even after it was Sam. This, the electronic scene, and Dakota's reaction to Sam in Ice Ice Baby, give a far different version of Dakota compared to Dakota otherwise, and it was important for the writers to show these scenes because it makes her character growth more logical. Because her single-mindedness about fame is what gets her back on the show, and forces her to do something that she seems to have never done before- Work. And, because it's Chris, she is put under very harsh conditions, doing things like filling toilets with spring water, being in the ocean with piranhas, and cleaning up all the nuclear waste with what's very likely to be no protective equipment whatsoever. Combined with the clear misery she's in, Dakota also believes that she's working for no reason. Her goal of being famous is put on hold while she's Chris's intern, and this, above all else, lets her grow as a person. Without her drive for being famous being active, she's able to keep her desire for fame from getting healthy emotional connections. A.K.A., Sam. Episode four and six show that she genuinely cares about him, as she feels bad for Sam after she accidentally gets him in a booby trap, and she shows genuine excitement over somebody going to her for advice. She roots for him in the challenge, and she gives him her number when Sam is booted out of the game. Which circles us back around to that realization I stated, and the pitch earlier. And I'll reword it a little; "vapid spoiled rich girl that learns to be a decent human being by being forced to work under the most physically and mentally demanding jobs possible under somebody who is even more vapid, spoiled, and rich." Dakota specifically gained somebody who cares about her because she was forced to work for somebody. Specifically, Chris, who I believe is what Dakota could have grown up to be if she did not have that character growth. Chris is somebody who got the fame Dakota always desired, he's popular. But that did nothing to change his apathy, and even outright cruelty, towards others. On the contrary, it made those traits worse. Because having fans is not a substitute for having somebody care about you. And, honestly? There's something almost poetic about this. Dakota's development came from working for Chris. Working for the person she very much could have been, if not for working for him. It's very neat.

#total drama #total drama revenge of the island #tdroti #td dakota #i purposely ignored dakotazoid because she should not have been written #and she doesn't really matter for the point i was trying to make anyway

[snealeth]

Update: I finished rewatching All-Stars a few weeks ago and I forgot about this post until it suddenly got 20+ likes. My current opinion is that All-Stars is that the season suddenly turns five times as worse once the merge came along. Like, literally, every episode in the merge is really bad, while there are a lot of episodes in the pre-merge that are pretty decent actually. I feel like, and don't quote me on this, there were suddenly huge behind the scene changes when the merge episodes were being written, because the difference between characterizations between the two halves are so distinct that it's kind of bewildering to me. Like, seriously, Evil Dread and Suckers Punched are actually pretty darn good. Heroes vs. Villains, Saving Private Leechball, and Moon Madness have flaws but they're still pretty decent. The other two episodes are less then quality but that's still five/seven episodes that I can call better then neutral. And a lot of why is because that they have really good individual scenes. Lightning's entire character is hysterical, Duncan protecting Gwen, the cave scene with Courtney, Sam, Jo, and Zoey, Cameron & Mal in Moon Madness? All of these scenes listed are absolutely gold and if I watched them in a better season they'd have fit right in. After the merge, this gradually stops happening. You Regatta Be Kidding Me has the best iteration of Scott in the season, and Zeek And Ye Shall Find have a few nice scenes, but starting in the obstacle course episode the best scenes are just okay. I think my opinion on All-Stars overall, if people ask me, is that it turns from a mixed scene to a downright bad one. The pre-merge had bad elements, but it also had really enjoyable elements, all of which completely vanished by the time it hit the merge. So yeah, I was kind of right on the hypotheses? But it ended up being more complicated then that.

I'm rewatching All-Stars, having finished the first episode of it a few hours ago. And, as I remember, it's pretty bad. But, after watching the first episode, I have a hypothesis about the writing and I'll need to rewatch the rest of the season in order to see if that's correct. That aforementioned hypothesis is that All-Stars is best when it comes to individual scenes and that it mostly stumbles when it comes to connecting those scenes with each other and with previous continuity. Jo's interactions with Duncan & Lightning, Scott being genuinely terrified of sharks, Courtney & Lindsay's interactions, Zoey saving Mike and Gwen from the sharks. (Also, is that foreshadowing??? Like, genuine question, is that foreshadowing for Gwen & Zoey's eventual friendship in the merge because I really think it is). All of these are actually pretty well-written scenes, and there are more scenes like this that show that All-Stars can be good sometimes. Now, this is not to say that All-Stars is good overall, because the fact that it has horrible continuity is a really big knock against it. Scott, Gwen, Alejandro, and Duncan all show this. And that doesn't mean it is always good when it comes to individual scenes. Things like Mal, Sierra, Zoey, and Duncan show this too. What I'm saying is that All-Stars has good traits to it, and I want to, with the continuation of watching All-Stars, try to figure out what those good traits are. Because every season has its good traits. World Tour is extremely focused on what it wants to do, and it does what it wants to do very well. Action has very good character development. Pahkitew Island is absolutely hilarious. I want to figure out what All-Stars' good trait is, what it does well. And that's what I will attempt to do.

[snealeth]

i am rapidly approaching you at 1299 kilometres an hour.

i am rapidly flying away from you at 1299 kilometres an hour.

[snealeth]

I love this idea. Sadie and Katie have so much potential to be an awesome character duo, and instead, they make the two clones of each other and give Sadie five whole episodes of nothingness before they boot her as soon as she was relevant again. Gwen vs. Sadie (I assume you're replacing Owen with Sadie because of your wording of "won") would have been an awesome finale.

Sadie should have won Total Drama Island. No, I will not take criticism on this. 

[snealeth]

I'm rewatching All-Stars, having finished the first episode of it a few hours ago. And, as I remember, it's pretty bad. But, after watching the first episode, I have a hypothesis about the writing and I'll need to rewatch the rest of the season in order to see if that's correct. That aforementioned hypothesis is that All-Stars is best when it comes to individual scenes and that it mostly stumbles when it comes to connecting those scenes with each other and with previous continuity. Jo's interactions with Duncan & Lightning, Scott being genuinely terrified of sharks, Courtney & Lindsay's interactions, Zoey saving Mike and Gwen from the sharks. (Also, is that foreshadowing??? Like, genuine question, is that foreshadowing for Gwen & Zoey's eventual friendship in the merge because I really think it is). All of these are actually pretty well-written scenes, and there are more scenes like this that show that All-Stars can be good sometimes. Now, this is not to say that All-Stars is good overall, because the fact that it has horrible continuity is a really big knock against it. Scott, Gwen, Alejandro, and Duncan all show this. And that doesn't mean it is always good when it comes to individual scenes. Things like Mal, Sierra, Zoey, and Duncan show this too. What I'm saying is that All-Stars has good traits to it, and I want to, with the continuation of watching All-Stars, try to figure out what those good traits are. Because every season has its good traits. World Tour is extremely focused on what it wants to do, and it does what it wants to do very well. Action has very good character development. Pahkitew Island is absolutely hilarious. I want to figure out what All-Stars' good trait is, what it does well. And that's what I will attempt to do.

#total drama #total drama all stars