#this episoooooooode!!

[heyclickadee]

Things about "The Outpost" that are still killing me:

1. That airstrip was huge. And by the time we see Mayday and Crosshair on it they've been walking across it for a while, at the rate they’re going. The TK troopers don't see them at first, but once they do, they gather, see this:

These two men, barely on their feet, clearly in pain, one of them unable to keep holding on to his crutch anymore, staggering towards them inch by inch, looking towards them for help--not a single one of the TK troopers offers any kind of assistance whatsoever. No one calls for a medic, no one rushes forward to carry Mayday. They all just stand there and watch. And when Nolan tells them to go, they do, because they probably don't see the clones that differently than Nolan does.  

Yeah, Lieutenant Nolan is an asshole. He went from, "I'm probably going to dislike this guy," to, "LOATHE," in my book with a single line. He's a pathetic officer-wannabe who genuinely thinks of the clones as machinery he can push around and direct how he likes. He doesn't see the problem with kicking around someone like Mayday--someone who technically outranks him, I think--or the danger inherent in goading someone like Crosshair, because he doesn't see either of them as reasoning, emotion-having people who may just retaliate if pushed far enough. He's a snake and he deserved what he got. But his malice is more than matched by the TK troopers' apathy.

2. The way that there's ice and snow frozen to Crosshair's armor on the landing strip, and the fact that Mayday can't quite make it to the end of the tarmac, nor is Crosshair able to continue carrying him. They're both so cold and tired. They've both hit their physical limit and it would have been enough if anyone had cared to help.

3. Crosshair is--literally--stripped of everything that marks him as an imperial soldier or a soldier at all by the end of the episode, and most of it is stuff he casts aside himself. His CT number (in a way, when he gives Mayday his name), his helmet that he doesn't even look for (there as SO MANY good helmet metas out there, so I'm not going to get into it), his rifle (which he gives to Mayday to use as a crutch and doesn't retrieve when Mayday drops it), his backpack (I'm guessing it got too heavy so he threw it away to keep carrying Mayday), and even his armor, reflection mirror...sticker...things, and sidepiece (all of which are taken from him after he blacks out. I'm not real happy about the fact that the scientists at Mount Tantiss changed his clothes while he was unconscious). Of course, the last few function a little bit differently than they first ones do. The CT number, the helmet, the rifle, and I guess (?) even the backpack (though to a much lesser extent) are all Crosshair intentionally putting his imperial identity aside in order to help someone he sees as a brother and re-humanizing himself in the process. The last couple--the armor, the sidepiece--that's the writers telling us how vulnerable Crosshair is in his current situation.

4. The SNOW and the way it interacted with the CHARACTERS was just *chef's kiss* Credit to Joel Aron and the effects department, you guys knocked it out of the park.

5. Likewise, while I'm really glad The Bad Batch does list the names of the animators at CGCG who worked on each episode in the credits (because guess what--not every animated show does this. Sometimes they just list the name of the studio), I really want to know which animators were responsible for animating Crosshair this time around. Or at least Crosshair's shots, since the way I think it often works is that an animator will be assigned a series of shots and be responsible for animating everyone in those shots, because oh boy, was that a performance. Crosshair's animation has always been standout, I think partly (partly) because he's a character that doesn't actually talk that much, and says stuff he doesn't mean at least half the time, so there has to be a certain level of clarity and nuance in his performance for the character comes across the way the writers intend (and partly because being an ultra-expressive but taciturn bundle of emotions is a big part of Crosshair as a person). But the team working on this episode took something that was already great and kicked it up another level.

6. I want to know if Jennifer Corbett, the board artists, layout artists, the other writers, the directors, and others high-fived each other when they came up with the ice vulture symbolism and the rock-wings shot. I want to know if they knew we'd go crazy over it.

7. Mayday. Literally everything about Mayday. Mayday my beloved. *cries*

8. The look on Crosshair's face when he's about to pass out and sees the TK troopers coming still messes me up, because it's the closest thing we've gotten to a real smile (one that actually reaches his eyes) pretty much since he was teasing Echo in the med bay in "Aftermath." Crosshair's someone who's come across as to me passively suicidal since the moment he turned around after the droid fight in "Return to Kamino" and saw Hunter and the rest pointing their guns at him. Passively--meaning that he's not going to actually do anything, that he doesn't actually want to die, he’ll survive however he can, but that he's not exactly planning for the future, either. He'll just keep doing what he's doing until it (almost definitely) kills him. And. I mean. Crosshair's not stupid. He knows what killing Lieutenant Nolan means for him. I'm not saying that Crosshair didn't expect to wake up afterwards, or that he wanted to not wake up, but I am saying that he did decide that avenging Mayday and defying the Empire in whatever small way he could was worth dying for. And that he was very, very tired.

9. I'm so! Glad! That Crosshair's growth wasn't centered around Omega, Wrecker, Tech, Hunter, or Echo. We already know that he cares about them. Showing us the lengths he'll go to help a relative stranger instead and making that his breaking point does so much more to tell us that he's grown.

10. The thing that sticks with me most, though, is the fact that this episode wasn't just sad. It wasn't just unrelenting tragedy, or even like "The Solitary Clone," where overriding emotion of the whole episode is despair. I mean, yes, this episode is sad. It's tragic. You have Lieutenant Nolan's cruelty, you have the malice of the Empire, you have the apathy of the TK troopers, the dehumanization of the clones, the soul-crushing way in which Mayday and Crosshair find out that the clones were always going to be replaced, that inevitability, the futility (on one level) struggle that ends in Mayday's death. 

But it's not just that. There's warmth, too. There's camraderie and a little bit of humor. Mayday, a survivor starting to see how pointless it all was, and Crosshair, who's so desperate for companionship at this point that he'd pack bond with a rock, snark back and forth at each other a little bit like old friends. Heck, this is the episode where we get the most profound act of compassion we've seen in the show so far. Mayday didn't have to disarm that mine and save Crosshair, but he did, and it matters. No, Mayday didn't make it, but Crosshair carried him through a blizzard for two days and made sure he didn't get left behind or die alone, even if he couldn't save him, and that matters. Yes, Crosshair's a prisoner now, but he chose to avenge Mayday, grab hold of his own humanity again, and told the Empire where to stuff it, and that matters. Kindness and defiance have their own meaning, even if they don't change the outcome. But the fact that this episode is more than just sad is, I think, why it's so harrowing in the first place.

#the bad batch #tbb spoilers #tbbspoilers #the bad batch spoilers #crosshair bad batch #commander mayday #lieutenant asshole #tw suicide ideation #this episoooooooode!! #back to the shambles I go #I’ll write a normal length post about this show when I’m dead #it’s either two sentences or an essay #there is no in-between

[alketaire]

i am. so fucking jazzed. for hive-demigod-heretic eris.

and i am so fucking jazzed for her and ikora and aunt sav to publish their seminal collab "how to blow up a tithing line"

#d2 #destiny #season of the witch spoilers #I AM ALSO EXTREMELY JAZZED FOR POST-TFS EPISOOOOOOOODES #AND I AM UNFATHOMABLY FUCKING EXUBERANT ABOUT PYROGALE GAUNTLEEEEEEEETS

[mewmewchann]

Me: *drawing with episode 34 in the background*

Ashton: Does Jiana Hexum have something to do with this?

Treshi: She held onto and took care of the contraband before it was shipped out.

Me: Huh, cool.

Me: *suddenly remembers why Cyrus has a bounty on his head*

Me:

Me: WAIT A FUCKIN MINUTE-

#critical role #cr campaign 3 #cr spoilers #jiana hexum #cyrus wyvernwind #ashton greymoore #armand treshi #Ok I know that the only important thing Cyrus remembered was the golem BUT CONSIDER #what if the golem was like a sleeper guard for the actual shipment and Cyrus didn't know about it????? #he probably just assumed that they wanted to steal the golem or smth #or maybe like the people he was with knew and just didn't tell him #and because of how important the cargo was when the robbery failed they pinned it on him #I know this is a stretch BUT STILL!!!!!! #HHHHHH THIS EPISOOOOOOOODE #seriously the moment I realised I had to fucking stop drawing when it hit me #it's probably a stretch but still holy SHIT

[deangirldisease]

ELLA EPISODE ELLA EPISODE ELLA EPISOOOOOOOODE

#lucifer tv #im so obsessed with ella i cannot pick a favorite character in this show for the life of me theyre all so so great #love how luciters over dans trauma in like a day tho lol

[agardenintheshire]

damn king your murder tape looks gnc af

#personal #SDKLFSJLJAAAAAAAAAAAA BORN UNDER A BAD SIGN SURE IS AN EPISOOOOOOOODE #shout out to jules for saying this <3 #sammy smonday is going well thank you for askiing #yes we are unwell #supernatural

[hanasaku-shijin]

If I told you Revue Starlight contained a scene of a girl alone in a British museum at night frantically and seriously calling a giraffe on her cell phone you’d probably think I’m a liar or that the series is a fucking joke and yet here we are

#please watch revue starlight #yes you're 2 years late BUT THE MOVIES ARE STILL COMING #skrs stuff #i fucking looooove this episoooOOOOODE

[lil-demi-boy]

DAN OH MY GOD THE ORIGINAL EDDSWORLD CHANNEL JUST POSTED SOMETHING FOR THE FIRST TIME IN 4 YEARS (lydiaselfships)

@lydiaselfships YEAH I JUST SAW IT OMFG

#MATT EPISOOOOOOOODE

[duskbellamy]

Feather Beau-a

#critical role #i love this episoooooooode

[sigil-stone]

is thIS A NONBINARY HALF ELF?

#cr #i owe matt mercer my life! #i'm on episoooooooode #five i think

[thebeastofblackmoor]

noir episoooooooode??

[geekeryisafoot]

Helen episoooooooode!

#the magnus archives spoilers #rip this is the last time I get to post this :'( #the magnus archives #helen spiral #mineminemine #I think this is the most delighted I've ever been while a character I love dies #Helen is a delightful character but also imo Jon made the right decision #and hotdamn she got a cool death

[withinadream27]

I have to get up for a blood draw at 6:45 so I need to be asleep 15 minutes ago but the procedural I'm watching is doing a plane crash episoooooooode

#plane crashes......my morbid fascination catnip #inane text posts

[kristenbouchard]

if y’all really cared about deancas rights someone would POST THE FUCKING EPISOOOOOOOODE

#supernatural #spn #deancas #im about to walk outside naked and just lay in the snow

[ohifonlyx33]

jemma jemma jemma. noble noble jemma. jemmaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa 

anyway can we uuhhhh get a fitzsimmons bottle episoooooooode?

Philinda flashbacks during the fight. owwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww. WHY DO THEY HURT MEEEE???

awwww Tremors/Mack reunion!!!

#aos #aos spoilers #fitzsimmons #aos live!

[narkinafive]

ACES EPISOOOOOOOODE

FORBIDDEN GRIFF HALLORAN BACKSTORY????

[morathor]

Ladies of Darkness 37/?

"Nah I can just hypnotize them, it's fine." "Oh.  O... kay, then.  Great.  For you." "Great, we just have a fucking sixteen year old, who tries her best.  That's how we get into places." "Well maybe you should have, maybe you should have thought about becoming vampires instead of demons." "Aw, fuck." "Yeah maybe you shoulda been--" "There's always next time." "Maybe you shoulda been playing Vampire the Masquerade, idiots."

Okay.  Intermission.  THEN grand finale.  So so so so, it's Ladies of Darkness!  If you don't know what I'm talking about, you haven't been following my blog very long because I babble about this podcast like... every other week.  It's good.  Go check it out.  @ladiesofdarkness

So the battle is over and they just... kinda... go.  Like their accomplice in the organization, the one that let Charlie out, shows up, and is like, "Cool good job bye now" and there's a super awkward elevator ride with Cecil and Nikki.  And Steph brought up the whole, exorcising Vahkiel deal but they're not in the mood.  Having a crisis of faith there.  So Charlie does her best to recruit them, and they get a maybe from Nikki.

And now!  It is time... to... LEVEL UP!  Game mechanics, build decisions; this is what gaming is all about folks.  Sophie chooses to level up Arakiel's item crafting/enchanting powers over their earth powers, because the maxed out earth powers cause too much collateral damage and that just doesn't seem very Arakiel.  Tamara decides not to get a superform she qualifies for, because it does not match Valoel's Aesthetic.  (She got a different one.)  Good calls on both fronts.  Steph pretty much already maxed out everything she was working on with her character, so now she's picking up a second lore, boosting some skills and stats to support it. Very pragmatic.

So now Valoel and Arakiel have visages.  Valoel's is a fuckin creepypasta, Arakiel is metal as fuck.  Steph went into a bit more detail on Vahkiel's visage, which now includes "Long arms/hands that go down to my ankles."  NICE.  Also, I have to say, they put on some background music for this which is, approximately, the Miiverse theme over the percussion track from Sympathy for the Devil?  It's kind of mesmerising.

So back into the game and Mary Margaret invites Charlie to fucking makeout point.  Charlie brings fancy chocolates.  And Richie is coming along too!  It's very, very awkward.  But apparently the intention was to deal with an imminent zombie outbreak.  Hey, you know, that's not a bad date idea MM.  Charlie gets into it pretty good.  Richie is super confused tho.

Valoel and Dor(k)ian go out for pizza and riff on Nina's pizza choices.  And also the whole, she's generally in a bad mood, probably because their current plan means going against Paimon which means going against Haniel who I guess is very much a parental figure in her life?  (Also, Dorian you are not either a real actor.  Come on.)  They talk about what comes after they beat the bad guys, but then like, the TOWN EXPLODES and they gotta go deal with that mess.

Arakiel and Eitan go to hang out with Doris and Lailah, and they have a fun chat about--haha no we're skipping straight to the doom and gloom on this one.  Lailah is scared, she feels like she messed up and everyone's doomed, because she didn't try to stop what was going down, she didn't expose Paimon's plans, she didn't even run away and stop helping, and now it's all about to go to shit.  And Arakiel is like, look we all got used here, we've all been complicit in our own ways, we all wanted to stay alive.  It um.  It's a very intense and emotional scene here?

Also Haniel's dead see you next episoooooooode.

#ladies of darkness #lodcast #lodwod