Fans of the Animorphs

all right so we're finally to the major turning point in the series!

Looking back, I do like the idea of this *story arc*. I don't think it was executed perfectly, but my favorite kind of fiction in any medium is the kind where things we did years ago still have consequences today. Serial vs. episodic storytelling. LOST vs. Law and Order.

Animorphs had...some of that. Like maybe 75%. It was sort of frustrating how a lot of little details got lost in the mix, but there were a lot of things that came up again and again. More like cameos than plot arcs, though. I don't know I'm babbling.

Anyway, like I said, the concept of this trilogy was good. You were always kind of wondering if this is how big the team was ever going to get. We were only reminded every single book how insurmountable the war was, so any kid with a basic grasp of arithmetic goes "okay, if one side is less than the other side, add more to make them equal."

So we finally get a new warrior!

But the process by which that happens is the first idiot plot in an otherwise pretty tight-minded series.

All right, let me start at the beginning first of all, I got some bases to cover:

"There are millions of Hork-Bajir that have been made into Controllers. And millions of Taxxons. And at least thousands of humans." 5
This is the kind of continuity shit I'm talking about. There was a point that I just stopped paying attention to the dreaded 1st-chapter recap because YAWN I KNOW ALL OF THIS. But now that I'm reading it again, I'm reading a little closer.

The scale of this war changes book to book. Which isn't really a big deal until you get to *ENDGAME*, but still...I have a lot of problems with the semantics of this war, which I might never actually get written down, but if I do it will be during THBC, which is...soon?

Okay anyway: "I don't know. I found it. It was in that construction site over across from the mall. In a hole in the wall. Inside the cement block. Like it had been put there or something." 8
Does anyone else find this as intriguing as I do? She didn't have to be this detailed about how he found it. But she was. I mean, the implication is obvious and tbth sort of annoying, but...brushed on, and never mentioned again, until Ax the buzzkill says <All I can suggest is that maybe it was a simple incident of random chance.> 11
Nothing is a simple incident of random chance in this series, kiddo, get on board.

OKAY. Other little stuff I'm ignoring, like a cute Rachel/Marco line...OKAY.

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The way David gets made into an Animorph is really, really dumb.

<Kid's window is wide open. I can see the blue box sitting in his desk. In and out. I'd have done it myself, but you said to report back.> 20
This seriously made me scream. Like if you're being really, really honest, the fact that the Animorphs are ever outwitted by a window and a dumb kid is...there really are no words.

"I set it up on a timer so the e-mail with my address won't go out till right before I get home." 39
This whole thing is really convoluted, and honestly I was having trouble figuring it out because I couldn't even remember how e-mail worked in 2000 or whenever this book was published. This was pre-E-bay, pre-certified seller, pre-identity theft countermeasures.

David posts an ad...somewhere...on the internet, selling the Escafil Device. Obviously the Yeerks find the ad (now that I think about it, they find the ad but that chatroom in #16 never got any viruses or shit?). And he sets up an e-mail to be sent right before he gets home. Who the fuck does that? Tell them to send a phone number, meet at a public place. This is not rocket science!

And even then, parents were telling their kids not to be dumbasses on the internet.

Seriously, kids didn't need to morph into no animals to stop this from happening. All they needed was Chris Hansen.

<Ah. Um...if there's a password, why not just turn off the computer?>
I don't think this will work, but still. Marco was out-of-character this book, Tobias getting all of these burns or slam dunks or whatever you want to call it. And I really don't think Marco acting out-of-character can be totally explained by the issue at hand. He's cooler than this. He's more calculating. This thing is really forced.

"Hey, these people left the door unlocked." 49
This is after Tobias, the only one with any sense in this mission, gets conked on the head (and says something hilarious/unintentionally gross like <Miss Scarlett? Was it Miss Scarlet with the plum in the professor?> 29 >:))

"And there, on the screen, the fateful words: Your mail has been sent." 56
If I recall correctly, AOL had an "unsend" button. And David was using AOL.

The only other thing I have to say about this whole trilogy at this point, and I don't want to say it too much because it's really not important until #22, is exactly what role everyone plays in this.

So, story structure. Heroes and villains. More interestingly, protagonists and antagonists. Heroes and villains come muddied up with all of those moral implications, "bad guys" and "good guys," but the protagonist and antagonist of a story are usually defined by the role they play in a narrative. John August had an interesting article (http://johnaugust.com/archives/2005/whats-the-difference-between-hero-main-character-and-protagonist) about "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," where he basically says that according to Classic Dramatic definitons, Charlie is the "antagonist" and Willy Wonka is the "protagonist." Here are some perfectly valid and irrefutable wikipedia definitons to help us out.

A protagonist is the main character (the central or primary personal figure) of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, video game, or musical narrative, around whom the events of the narrative's plot revolve and with whom the audience is intended to share the most empathy.

An antagonist is a character, group of characters, or an institution, who represents the opposition against which the protagonist(s) must contend.

all right, that really didn't help to make my point, but let's just look at what happens from David's perspective.

"dum dee dum, walking home from school, hey, what's that! Looks cool! I'm going to sell it on the interwebz so I can buy a new official Red Ryder carbine-action 200-shot range model air rifle! What's this? Other people want what I found? AND THEY'RE IN AN INTERGALACTIC WAR? I don't want any of this, leave me--holy shit you destroyed my house and took my parents away? I AM A VICTIM!"

Edited Date: 2009-11-16 07:20 am (UTC)

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I may be alone in this, but I think in the whole David trilogy, the Animorphs kind of play the role of the bad guys. AT LEAST the antagonists. You've got to give me that. They involved themselves. They were *spurned*, they plucked David out of his normal life. I think David acting like a sociopath and all of that was just to shoehorn him into the position of "villain." But I think if we're being fair, he's a villain protagonist.

All right I'll talk more about it later I guess. That's all for now.

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I'm going to sell it on the interwebz so I can buy a new official Red Ryder carbine-action 200-shot range model air rifle!

Ahahaahahaha. You are awesome Jen.

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To be fair about the AOL "unsend" thing, it worked only with other AOL user. So if the e-mail was sent to diefiltyhumans@angelfire.com, then Marco could not have unsent it. Not that I know which e-mail provider the Yeerks preferred, but.

<i>"Hey, these people left the door unlocked." 49
This is after Tobias, the only one with any sense in this mission, gets conked on the head (and says something hilarious/unintentionally gross like <Miss Scarlett? Was it Miss Scarlet with the plum in the professor?> 29 >:))</i>
I think your chronology's off here. Tobias got bonked in the head during the first attempt, and they go in the back door during the second. But I'm still with you on Marco not being on the top of his game in this book. Part of me wants to say that it was his total fuckery with this mission that finished what the whole Visser One thing started, turning sweet, trusting 10-year-old Marco into the cynical, razor-sharp Marco we know and love ("Now I have a new superstition: Anytime I'm not worried, I worry" 13).
Also, the Professor Plum thing reminds me that I think this is probably the only time KA flubbed a joke. Usually, she's hilarous. And this started out hilarious, Tobias' totally random comments throughout, until the last page of the chapter when Tobias said "Man, I was having this weird dream. I was trapped in the conservatory with Professor Plum" (34). Reading that, I was like "... I know. I got it. Jokes are not funnier when you explain them." Maybe I'm being too critical.

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sporadicfungian.livejournal.com

Part of me wants to say that it was his total fuckery with this mission that finished what the whole Visser One thing started, turning sweet, trusting 10-year-old Marco into the cynical, razor-sharp Marco we know and love ("Now I have a new superstition: Anytime I'm not worried, I worry" 13).

oooooh i have to go write a paper so i can't say more but, i like this theory. i like it a lot, actually. hmmm.

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YES EXACTLY. If you can find one of those quotes, that would be great. I really know I should just reread every chapter one recap to see how widely they vary, but I am too goddamn lazy :(

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The opening scene where Marco tried to hit on those girls was hilarious and awesome. It's just something Marco would do. He tries to be so smooth haha. He calls that girl buff and actually expects her to be like "WOW THAT'S SO NICE AND ROMANTIC OMG NOBODY REALIZES HOW BUFF I AM, EVERYONE IS SO INSENSITIVE. BUT YOU ARE NOT. CLEARLY I SHOULD MAKE OUT WITH YOU IMMEDIATLEY." Ahhh so funny.

I must also add this quote:

Rachel nodded thoughtfully. "Well, if he thinks Marco's an idiot he can't be all bad." She batted her eyelashes at me to show she was kidding.

I love it when she does that.

THERE. THAT. RACHEL AND MARCO. MARCO AND RACHEL. I LOVE THEM. THIS IS ALL THE PROOF I NEED.

Omg and later in the next chapter they have an arm wrestling contest and Rachel wins by kicking Marco under the table. YES. YES RACHEL AND MARCO JUST TRY TO DENY IT EVERYONE.

More quotes:

Cassie has way too many morals and ethics. She's always wondering whether something is right or wrong. Me, I just wonder "will it work? or not."

ILU MARCO AND YOUR BIG SEXY ANALYTICAL BRAIN.

I did not want my obituary to say "died from injuries substained while battling a fat house cat." That would be embarrassing.

LOL.

As for David, this quote sort of struck me. When David is first talking to Marco:

"Snake?"

"Yeah, he's really cool. He's a cobra. You're not even supposed to be able to own them, but my dad got it for me. He goes overseas a lot. He's a spy. But don't tell anyone."

Like, really David? I hate the kid already. He's bragging and over compensating and trying to seem like a badass with obvious lying... which comes off as kind of assholish and pathetic. Ughhghghg and this is only the beginning of David as a character. I think K.A. does a good job setting it up here. We already get a sense of this kid and have bad feelings about him even before he starts trying to kill off Animorphs and morph dead cousins and what not. But when he first gets made into an Animorph you feel bad for the kid, you pity him. He lost his parents, his home, everything. But we shouldn't have been fooled. It's like pity made the Animorphs make a really bad decision.

A good chunk of this book takes place in David's house. Reading it again kind of made me frustrated. It was like one thing went wrong after another. I mean, first it was supposed to be easy to get the blue morphing cube back from David... then they screwed that up. Next it was supposed to be easy to stop the email from going out to Visser Three... but that got screwed up too. And then next thing you know it, all hell breaks loose, chaos, destruction, Visser Three in morph, Hork Bajir, David losing his parents, the Animorphs barely making it out alive...

GODDAMN.

And then the rest of the book the Animorphs are stuck trying to worry about the leaders of the free world meeting together while David is dealing with the reality of having no home and no parents.

Ughhh. It's a little overwhelming just READING it. Just imagine LIVING it.

Plot-wise I wanted to point out that when Erek tells them about the meeting of Presidents and Prime Ministers he says that they will start arriving to the Marriot hotel in only two days. TWO DAYS! So basically all of book #20 and #21 happen within a week or so. It just made me realize how short of a time frame the Animorphs had to deal with all of this at once. It's amazing these kids aren't totally crazy by the end of this mission. IDK. I just feel bad for the Animorphs suddenly. Like I just want to give them a good night sleep for once. I'll tuck them all in and read them a bedtime story.

Awww.

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haha that was exactly the marco/rachel quote I was going to post

HE WAS TOTALLY IN LOVE WITH HER AND I JUST KNOW HER DEATH AFFECTED HIM JUST AS BAD AS EVERYONE ELSE EVEN THOUGH HE TRIED TO DENY IT

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YESSSSSSSSSSS.

I'm actually writing a fic about that RIGHT NOW where Marco is in total denial after the war and hooks up with this gorgeous blond who seems to resemble somebody we know >_>

AH RACHEL AND MARCO ILU.

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I LOVE MARCO FOR HIS BIG SEXY BRAIN TOO.

TWO DAYS! So basically all of book #20 and #21 happen within a week or so.
This makes me think of reality shows. Particularly Project Runway. You know, you watch the show for an hour once a week and you're like OH MY GOD THAT DRESS IS CRAPPY HOW CAN THEY BE DOING SUCH A BAD JOB. And then you read the interviews and it turns out that every single challenge is back to back without even a few hours rest between them, and it's a miracle they're even coherent. So you think, these 58 books (including MMs but not Chronicles which rarely involved them) took place over three years, about nineteen missions a year, some of them days and days of nonstop terror? That's crazy, for 14 year olds. For anyone, really.

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As I finished reading #20 last night, later they say it's four days until the leaders arrive. Which annoys me since Erek clearly said "day after tomorrow." But whatevs. Still a quick turn-around either way.

And omg. Project Runway. I'm basically obsessed with that show. It's totally a warzone for fashion. I know I would break down trying to sew a dress in two days (never mind that I can't sew) let alone trying to SAVE THE GODDAMN PLANET from parasitic slugs.

Also, since we are talking about fashion and I have no where else to rave about this... Later in the book when they are getting David his Golden Eagle morph, Rachel is carrying around the blue box in a fucking FANNY PACK. AND NO. NO. RACHEL WOULD NOT WEAR A FANNY PACK, EVEN IN THE 90s. Nobody can look remotely fashionable in a fanny pack.

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LOLOL. You're so right. Rachel would never wear a fanny pack ever unless she was a middle-aged dad on family vacation and probably even not then. Maybe it was a proto-messenger bag, and Marco didn't know what it was called. Although I disagree that Rachel would have looked bad in it. Remember, that girl could look great in anything. She'd look hot in neon parachute pants and a sweatband.

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NOW I WANT TO SEE RACHEL IN NEON PARACHUTE PANTS AND A SWEATBAND.

I may have to draw this.

Maybe.

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This is my first re-read! Hi everyone!

Oh, man. I love Marco's extraordinary fail at girls. Personally, I think that his crush on Rachel has totally ruined his ability to flirt. He can say the craziest stuff to Rachel, and she still gives him attention, even if it's mostly negative attention. And then he tries similar methods on other girls, and they're just like "Go away." No flirtatious fighting or anything! Poor guy!

"[Cassie] quit the Animorphs...She came back, of course. But since then I'd felt a little bit shaky around her. Cassie had way too many morals and ethics." 12-13
First of all, I always like it when problems from previous books carry other, especially into books that aren't the narrator's. Sure, we'll get Tobias ruminations on Taylor in every book that ends in "3" forever and ever, but for Marco to mention that his dynamic with Cassie is forever changed, over something that at the time wasn't even about him? I dig it. Also...how true do y'all think this is? Everyone talked in the last discussion about the Rachel/Cassie dynamic changing after BitchComment '98, but do you think that the Marco/Cassie dymanic was always shaky after this? I seem to remember that Marco and Cassie rarely ever voted on the same side (unless it pertained to Jake), but then again, any non-unamimous vote always seemed to come down to Marco and Rachel vs. Cassie and Tobias.

I think that the "one world leader is a controller but we have NO IDEA who" problem is a bit contrived. We never really got a sense that the Yeerk invasion on Earth was much bigger than California. If they had a world leader, wouldn't the Yeerk movement in that country have been at least slightly present? But...whatever.

< I'd have done it myself, but you said to report back. > 20
OH GEEZ. I think that this is one of the greatest mistakes in Animorphs history (the other being Jake deciding to wait a night on collecting their parents). This entire mission is such an epic failure. MARCO, MARCO, MARCO. Tobias is your ninja. I guess Jake was trying not to be a jackass leader on what was supposed to be a simple mission, but if he'd really been thinking, they wouldn't have drawn fries. The team would have been Jake, Tobias, and Rachel. Tobias to ninja his way in and out, Rachel for backup firepower and heavy lifting, and Jake for some tactics. He wouldn't have gone all testosterone-y on Tobias like Marco did, boom, blue cube and no annoying sociopath, done.

"Don't listen to them, Tommy," he said, with a sob in his voice. "Your face is just fine! It's just fine, I tell you! The doctors say someday you may be normal again!" 24
I love it when Jake's randomly hilarious.

"I set it up on timer so that the E-mail with my address won't go out till right before I get home." 39
People have already commented on this but seriously. WUT. First of all, could you do that to e-mail back then? Second, why the hell did he go to all the trouble to send a message three minutes before he got home, when be could have just sent it...the minute he got home?

"I ate Ax." 64
I love it that everyone's ratio of "saving your life in battle" to "accidentally eating/attemping to eat you while in morph" is roughly 1:1. It's like they don't even have to apologize anymore because they've all done it.

"We? A second ago it was I. How many of you are there?" 67
David's dad would not have been able to handle the Ellimist.

< We didn't all know each other back when the Elfangor used the box on us, > Tobias pointed out.
"We didn't know you, Tobias," Rachel said. "But Cassie and I were already best friends. Cassie and Jake were, um...friends. Jake was my cousin. Marco was his best friend. There were connections." 94
I found this exchange interesting, for several reasons. On a superficial level, the awkward crush reference made me smile. Also, I think that this exchange is the turning point for Rachel in the discussion, even though Marco doesn't recognize it. Before this, Rachel is all "I don't like it." After this, she starts to agree with the idea of recruiting David, even though Marco is confident she'll vote with him up until the moment she doesn't. I think that realizing that Tobias was once the outsider they all discounted is what made Rachel change her mind.

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Also: "She likes Tobias more than me, and Cassie a lot more than me." (also 94)
is another interesting dynamic quote. But...unclear. Is it "Rachel likes Tobias more than she likes me, and she likes Cassie a lot more than she likes me" or is it "She likes Tobias more than I do, and she likes Cassie a lot more than I do."? Both are true. I think that the former makes more sense in context, but the latter is something I think Marco is more likely to say (especially since Marco and Cassie are on the outs in this book, although by this point hasn't all of the weirdness between Tobias and Marco been resolved?).

So, when Marco is teaching David about what it means to be an Animorph, there's seriously, like, two pages of Marco describing every horror of the Yeerk pool. What does everyone think of this? Was Marco too harsh, or did he have a point? Was is necessary that Marco be the one to tell David because he was the one among them who had most had his home life affected by the Yeerk invasion, or did that make it too personal--should they have chosen someone else? Or would David have still gone off the hook no matter what had been said?

LOL. The whole thing with Marco catching David trying to use his house phone reminds me of a time before cell phones. Can you imagine how much more of a nightmare this whole thing might have been if David had had a cell phone? And LOL, the Yeerk try to pull it off as an NSA prank. And David wants to believe it. LOLOL.

On page 127, Cassie catches golden eagle!David with her BARE HANDS. Earlier in the book, while the Animorphs are having a conversation she is simultaneously stuffing pills down a swan's throat. I know there's a lot of shit (rightly) piled on Cassie here for her wishy-washy morals, but when it comes to animals, Cassie is such a BAMF.

Speaking of Cassie, p. 144 is one of those times when we see how her perception of people can be used for highly manipulative ends. I think that the reason the Animorphs always do so well is that they have four different strategists, and they each have a different specialty. Ax is around to give them the universal big picture--he just knows a lot of stuff they have no idea about, and he's a technological wizard. Marco is good at group strategy and the whole point A to point B thing he's always talking about. He can say "If we do this and this and this, then we'll win." Jake can take Marco's plan and figure out where he needs to put individuals to make it successful. He knows everyone's strengths and weaknesses. He's not going to put Rachel in mission position that requires stealth. He's not going to put Cassie on one that reqires firepower. He's not going to put Marco too close to his mom. Etc. But all he can do is tell people where to go, and they can choose to listen or not. Mostly they do, but if they don't? Cassie's the strategist on the most intimate level. She's really good at manipulating people into position. Manipulating has a negative connotation, and in this context she's getting David to do something he doesn't want to do by testosterone-ing him against Marco, but she can also raise spirits and sway arguments.

ZOMG CLIFFHANGER. HOW WILL I HOLD ON UNTIL ~~NEXT MONTH~~ NEXT WEEK?!

The ads in the back of the book make me smile and remember a more innocent time. We've got a "COMING THIS FALL" ad for Animorphs TV and an ad for a 1999 calendar. Oh, 1998. An innocent time, before the Bush administration, back when we still had hope that AniTV was going to be good.

Also, I remember that my 13-year-old girl heart was devestated that the recruitment of David meant that the Animorphs were five boys and two girls. I know Cassie and Rachel have epic amounts of girl power between them, but....I was sad.

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OH EM GEE ILU. Your comments are so funny and insightful. David's dad would not have been able to handle the Ellimist. LOLLOL.

And I really liked what you said about the Animorphs having four separate strategists, because it's so true. Even Tobias, on some level, has a fair amount of strategy in him, since he can see things from the air that others can't always see. POOR RACHEL SHE IS LEFT OUT. It's okay. We still use you to bust open doors and be a totally smokin' badass.

Also 1998 was awesome. Sixth grade mother fuckers! I wanted to be Rachel so I tried to channel her in everything I was doing. I remember this skinny boy tried to tackle me and kiss me on the playground and I kicked him in the stomach. I KICKED HIM IN THE STOMACH OMG I'M ALMOST AS BADASS AS RACHEL I'M BASICALLY AN ANIMORPH NOW.

;)

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Yeah. I love Rachel, but she is so clearly not the brains of this operation. That's okay. Big Guys (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheBigGuy) usually aren't, and we love them for it. I think this was especially evident in #32, when the Animorphs beat the Rachels by outthinking them. Sure, part of that was because her intelligence was split between two people, but seriously? I'm glad it was Rachel who was split because can you imagine outthinking Mean Jake? Or holy crap, Mean Marco? Mean Marco would be the most diabolical supervillain ever.

YEAH YOU KICKED HIM IN THE STOMACH YOU ARE RACHEL.

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mattiris.livejournal.com

KA was originally tossing up between Rachel and Marco for the "split in half" story. As much as I like #32 and the Good/Mean Rachel dichotomy, I can't help wishing it had been a Marco book instead, cause good that would have been interesting. I think I remember one of the Rachel's even mentioning that a split Marco would be mindfuckingly intense (not her actual words).

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