Transcript
Speaker: Worm is a web serial by J .C. McCray, also known as Wildbo. You can read Worm in its original format by visiting parahumans .wordpress .com or donate to Wildbo's Patreon at patreon .com slash wildbo. This story isn't intended for young or sensitive readers. Readers who are on the lookout for trigger warnings are advised to give Worm a pass. For a complete list, check the description for all of Worm's trigger warnings.
Speaker: Hello, hello. Welcome back to Dissecting Worm. As always, I am your host, Jacob. And joining me, as always, is Alan. Alan, welcome.
Speaker: And as always, to round out the trio, we have our, our good old boy, Michael. Good old boy. Good old boy, Michael. Making us sound good at all of our pauses and our ums and our ahs and fact checking us when we're wrong. We have arc 10 of worm. Not just arc 10, but I don't know if you know this Jacob.
Speaker: We have arc 10 and I have a cat in my lap. We are busy. We got a lot to get through then. They just keep getting better. We'll need the cat's opinion on the events of the arc. I'm going to give you the play by play right now. She is currently nestling and she's crawling up me towards the microphone and she is loafed on a vertical slope.
Speaker: We're going to take that as approval. This is the kind of content that audio listeners definitely enjoy. All right. Getting into arc 10, as we attempt to adapt this arc for television in our continuation of this worm television show, we are theorizing
Speaker: We've started the season we started season two last episode with arc nine kind of gotten a fun little arc with the wards a little cold open episode really and now we sort of get to dive back into our familiar cast of characters and This is an interesting arc. I think there's a lot we can either remove or move around there's a lot we can do we can play around with some of the
Speaker: these scenes and dynamics. So I think we're going to have some fun stuff to talk about. Uh, as always, let's go ahead and kind of start with our cold open, if you will. And, uh, I had some interesting thoughts, uh, but, uh, I'll defer to you. Did you put any thought into how this particular episode should open? So in my head, I like,
Speaker: I got no idea. Jacob, you kick us off.
Speaker: All right. Well, I had a fun thought. So in the arc, the way it plays out is we get the sort of... Because Arc 9 ends and Shadowstalker is essentially trapped by the Undersiders, right? And then Arc 10 starts, we get our little like three days earlier, they catch us up to where we are. I had this idea of sort of changing this just slightly, which is Arc 9 ending.
Speaker: with not a definitive capture of Shadow Stalker. But that's the implication, right? She's not knocked unconscious or anything right away. We save that. And let me follow my train of thought. We're going to come back to it. Don't worry. I think I know where you're going. And I've had similar thoughts, but not for the beginning necessarily. But I like where you're going.
Speaker: All right, let me finish then, then fill in my blanks here. Hit me with it. So then for the cold open for arc 10 or episode, yeah, arc 10, episode two of season two.
Speaker: Well, it's going to get confusing. We'll just call it Arc 10 because that's what we're talking about here. The cold open here, and again, I'm going to pause again just to say, we keep using the term cold open. It's not really a cold open. We know that. It's just helping us organize our trains of thought. As you can tell, we're all over the place. I'm speaking to everybody who's listening here. It's not actually a cold open. This isn't the office, but you get the idea.
Speaker: Put it in the comments if you're if you're angry I understand Anyway, so arc 10 would open with and I would shorten the scene a bit shadow stalker coming back to the PRT headquarters with the undersiders in tow and The cold open is through when weld Calls out the trap
Speaker: And then at that point, title screen, whatever you want to do, then we can cut back three days prior, build up that first part, do what we want through the full capture. And we see what happened to Shadow Stalker with Regent taking over and all that kind of stuff. And then we can jump back to the trap. And now there's kind of context there. So we're sort of the idea being that for the audience,
Speaker: hiding that reveal of Regent's control over Shadow Stalker until after the trap is sprung, or rather not sprung. Yeah, to go off of that, I think this is a very short recovery chapter to begin with. This is a one episode arc now. And honestly, the one episode arc, and it's probably a shorter episode than most.
Speaker: I think, I like your idea. I would even go off of potentially, you know, if there was a good, really good writer, you know, in charge of this, we'd go back and forth with the timeline. What are you saying? I know. Yeah, but yeah, we'd go back and forth at the timeline and I like your idea of like kind of leaving it a mystery.
Speaker: My first thought was originally that we, you, you essentially have the moment when shadow stalker gets out of the room and you know, everybody freaks out and Taylor's like, Oh my gosh. Like, and then, you know, of course it's Alec and like gotcha dork. Um, but have that be the moment where like they put shadow stalker in the room with Alec. It sounds really bad in there. Um,
Speaker: And then all of a sudden shadow stalkers out and we cut and you know, then you're at the PRT building. Oh, okay. I gotcha. Um, but, but you know, we'd be, we'd be going back and forth kind of all over the place with the, the events where you'd have essentially one timeline would be them catching shadow stalker and turning her.
Speaker: And the other half would be ongoing the invasion of the PRT building. But I like yours better. It's more simple and I think cuts out a lot of the unnecessary explanations that we would have to do in order to get them to the PRT building.
Speaker: Yeah. That's kind of what I was, what I was trying to cut down was getting to the building. Um, I feel like you can probably just get there and the audience would be fine, especially if your scapegoat is, Oh, shadow, shadow, shadow stalker just took him there. You know? Yeah. Um, I mean, I'm even okay with the PRT, you know, guys showing up and then unloading, you know, the, the knocked out team.
Speaker: You knocked out undersiders, but, you know, I already have my gripes with like, why the heck are the PRT listening to, you know, the PRT officers listening to shadow stalker, um, you know, known juvie shadow stalker. Yeah. Uh, so like skipping over that is, you know, easier than explaining it for sure. Uh, I think, I think that's a great move. I think it leaves it more of a mystery. Mm -hmm.
Speaker: Yeah, I think you do that and you also have the the capture and the torture of shadow stalker somewhere in there. Yeah, I think that's a really important part. Yeah, no, I agree. And I think you could put that in the in that like.
Speaker: flashback three days, you could build up, do the little bit of flashback scenes, building up the undersiders, getting them back in touch with each other. This is the first time we've really seen them this season. So give them their moments there.
Speaker: And then you can skip ahead to the confrontation with shadow stalker in the alley, resolve that, you know, bringing her back, reaching, taking control. You can still do all of that and keep all of that there. Um, and then, and then jump forward again, you know, back to the back in terms of things we're getting rid of. Cause I do, I do think that cutting stuff is, you know,
Speaker: important thing to do here. Yeah, there's someone for it for sure. Here's what I'm thinking. I'm thinking like you cut out the explanation. You cut out essentially the second shadow stalker fight. You know, there's no her capturing the undersiders. That's gone. Oh yeah. I'm okay with that. Yep. We'll get back to it, but I think you cut out the bitch subplot here. Right. We will come back to that, but yep, I agree. And
Speaker: Uh, you just rearrange the opening of them dragging and torturing, uh, shadow stalker. But I, I think when shadow stalker gets loose and is under control of Alec, I don't think we reveal that it's Alec still. I think we keep that mystery going of like, okay, shadow stalker caught them, but it's a trap. But they did get shadow stalker.
Speaker: But Shadowstalker got loose and then you're flashing back, oh, they're fighting. And then finally we get to the end point of like Shadowstalker maybe acting a bit weird, like the moment where Regent lets Shadowstalker up a bit. And then we get to the end where let's Shadowstalker go.
Speaker: kind of the reveal of like, Oh, this is what Regent can do. Yeah. I think you could play around with that. And maybe, maybe we even cut into the room at one point in time as like an explanation later on. Cause I think it would be really interesting to show essentially he has to sit there and, you know, link up all their nerves together. So, you know, yeah.
Speaker: forcing every single nerve in the body to judder and move one at a time until he's got a complete puppet suit going, I think would be really interesting to get a few glimpses into that. Yeah. Well, I mean, since we're kind of on that note, just to jump to Alex interlude, because I think it's kind of relevant that we talk about it here.
Speaker: I think you can have a lot of fun with how you do that reveal. A lot of really clever ways to expand on Alex control. I think one way you do it would be really fun.
Speaker: He's whole, I'm letting you go now. And the audience thinks that he does. And we get Shadowstalker running away. He's got the little thing, I can take control, don't come back, yada, yada. Shadowstalker leaves and we follow her. And as we follow her, she's talking to herself.
Speaker: But it's really Alec speaking through her as he does in the book. But it sounds off, but you're not quite sure why, right? He says this whole thing about how I like being invisible. Nobody notices me, yada, yada. And you can play it off as her talking to herself.
Speaker: And then as the scene gets worse and worse, and we can kind of talk about how far we really want to go or that kind of thing, how we want to play around with that, we get to the point at the end where Alec addresses her directly through her own mouth. And then all you need is a subtle cut back to Alec just lying on the couch back in their hideout smiling, something simple like that. And you just sort of sell that, oh, shit.
Speaker: She didn't let her go. You can really punch that. That's great. You can hit that really hard. I mean, I'm thinking you've got musical cues. I know Michael's already working on that. You just get a good musical cue going. Of course, of course. Yeah, exactly. I like that setup a lot.
Speaker: Um, I like that reveal a lot cause I like it being, I do think this should be an, you know, an Alec episode kind of, um, but I think having, having it be almost a retrospectively good Alec episode, you know, one of those episodes where in, when you finish the episode, you go, Oh my God. And you rewatch the episode immediately just to watch Alec.
Speaker: the entire episode. Yeah, exactly. I think that's genius. And this is one of those times we've talked before, and this really isn't that prudent to the type of content we're really doing here. But we've talked before about the type of content
Speaker: medium we'd want the show to be in. And I think we both agree that this show would just be visually beautiful in some really crisp animation. Arcane, Castlevania, we both just recently watched Blue Eye Samurai, which was excellent. Just something like that worm would just excel.
Speaker: I would also say that it's moments like this where I'm like, Oh, but man, would I just love to see live action actors work through this type of writing where you would have, you know, the actress playing shadow stalker and the actor playing Alec, their subtle ability to change that character. Um, where like you said, you do go back and you've rewatch and you're like, Oh, and you're picking up on these cues really can't
Speaker: You can't beat a live action performance there. And that's where I'm like resting like, dang it. What would work better in the long run? I don't know. It's hard, but it'd be really fun to see an actor's portrayal of those characters. Yeah. But that's the story and a decision for another time when we have permission and budget. That'll be, you know, that'll be, it'll be a hard decision when, you know, the studios are just throwing like, Hey, I want you.
Speaker: You've got so many options to pick from. Do you want to do it live action? Do you want to do it with us? Do you want to do it with us over here? We'll do it animated. And you're just like, ah, man, I don't know who to choose. I'd love to know what Wild Bo would want. I'm so curious. I wonder what his ideal format is for any sort of an action. Once again, Wild Bo, you coward. Come on on. Come at me. Any time. You're welcome.
Speaker: I want you to get on this podcast and tell me how wrong I am to my face. Yes. And then we will correct your pronunciations. Yes. As we do. Mark. Oh man. All right. Well, that's good. Yeah, I do. I do like that. I agree. I think, um,
Speaker: we'll pump up reach in a bit in this episode as well. So I think that's great. I think that's a great front to back that interlude the Alec interlude finishing. We've talked about, you know, before with the Dyna subplot, how we're kind of getting rid of that. I think this is an interesting part we need to get to, which is, uh,
Speaker: When, you know, looking forward, when does the reveal, the reveal of coil and Dinah show up? Um, and like, when do her powers kind of get revealed? When does coil get revealed as the boss? Uh, we, you know, we still don't have that nailed down per se. And I think that's something we probably need to do before.
Speaker: Uh, before we get to, um, the end of the slaughterhouse. So season two, by the end of season two, we need to have that figured out. Um, it really is a kind of a background issue now. Uh, but like I said, we need to get that hammered out. Um, especially as you know, I'll eventually catch up and you know, be writing this arc. So I think for now, just as a placeholder, tattletale just kind of
Speaker: talks about the fact that slaughterhouses in town or something like that. And that, uh, she got a call from their boss that Jack slash. We'll end the world or something like that. Yeah. I'm fine with that. It's just sort of a placeholder. I know that's really, really ambiguous for now, but like, yeah, just as a placeholder.
Speaker: because she knows it's coil. She gives the reveal that, hey, Jack Slash is gonna end the world if you see him kill on sight. And then she relays that to the undersiders. Yeah, I mean, I think we're both on the same page of sort of shifting around the coil reveal a bit just to make it a little bit more impactful. Well, yeah, we'll definitely have to sort of rework a few of these scenes.
Speaker: Because even beyond Jack Slash, we've got the divvying up of the territories. And moving on from here, as I've read ahead a little bit, there's more we'd have to work through there. So maybe this is a good time for the reveal or maybe it's the next episode. It's kind of hard to say that we will play around with it a little bit for sure. But yeah, for now, I think this could be the moment where like, hey, they bring in the data.
Speaker: This is our moment to be like, Hey, we got the data here. You know, here it is. Coil finally, you know, they give it to coil directly finally. Yeah. Yeah. And maybe we don't reveal the Dinah angle yet. We just reveal that coil exists and that he has it on good authority that Jack slash is coming into town and they need to kill on site because he's destined to end the world.
Speaker: Which I think is a great ticking time bomb to place in the realm of like, hey, Jack Slash has this prophecy essentially. Don't know when, but we need to just be mindful of that. Yeah.
Speaker: I think it's also worth noting too that the reveal should come probably sooner rather than later just because just to give our characters the intelligence they deserve. At this point in the story, there's really not another option for who's pulling the strings.
Speaker: that, you know, unless you were unless you're going to pull some wild like, oh, it was it was her dad the whole time, or it was Mr. Gladly or something like that. Then like because Kaiser is dead, so it's not him. And, you know, it's not fault lines crew like, you know, nothing else makes sense even for our characters. Like the audience knows at this point that it's a coil, but even for our characters, like they would figure it out pretty soon.
Speaker: once they kind of piece it all together. So I think not delaying the reveal too far would be important just so that - I mean, this could be a moment where they're downloading stuff. Skitter sees that they're downloading, maybe Skitter puts it together and just turns to Lisa at one point and goes, hey, level with me. It's coil, isn't it?
Speaker: And Lisa goes, like, yup, you got it. Like, and the understanding that like, Lisa's always known, obviously. And, you know, Taylor doesn't fault her for knowing because that's number one, that's her job. And number two, that's her power. So like, it's sort of expected, but you know, the friendship of like, Hey, Lisa's not about to bullshit you when you do figure it out.
Speaker: Right. Right. I mean, we could even, you could even, you could even give Lisa a moment here, right? And just sort of have her not betray coil, but just sort of call an audible and, you know, whatever you want to give her catch wind of Jack slash or the, you know, the slaughterhouse nine or something else where she just says, you know, it's time enough, enough in the shadows, because especially thinking here that we want to get to divvying up the territories,
Speaker: So they do need to meet, I guess, at some point, really. So maybe at least - This is a good time. This is a good time. So then she's like, you know what, follow me. We got to pay the boss a visit, something like that. Especially she's like, I saw what was on here. We need to talk to the boss about this. And this is a great time for the boss being like,
Speaker: Yeah, I'm about to divvy up the territory anyway. It makes sense that I would reveal my cards. And it's, you know, man, I'm thinking a little maybe too far in the future here. This is a spoiler podcast at this point. We've got to think long term.
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Speaker: I'm such a sucker for foreshadowing. If my job for scripts was just, here's Jacob, here's the script, foreshadow all the big events for us, then that would be happy. I would make that my job, be amazing. And I love well done foreshadowing. I think all reveals should feel earned in that way.
Speaker: So I think little subtleties like that where we see Coyle's power falter a bit, where he's not prepared for a certain event. And somebody like Lisa as another thinker is that type of power that can foil that, which I don't know if this is actually fully explained or this was just always my understanding, which was part of why Coyle bought her service, hired her, was because he wanted her on his side as opposed to somebody who could accidentally interfere with his plans.
Speaker: just because of the type of power she has. So might be like just a spot for something like that. Just, you know, nothing so obvious, but a little understanding. You know, we've talked about taking away some aspects of, you know, villains just in the adaptation. If there's one that I could do or coil
Speaker: It would be make him less of a pedophile. Yeah. Um, yeah, I do feel, I kind of agree. Um, I don't think he needs to be at all in order for his control over Dinah to feel, you know, creepy on its own. Like,
Speaker: Yeah, I think it's going to be impossible to avoid those undertones and similarities just from people who are watching and are going to read things into things. But we absolutely do not need to fuel that fire in any way, I agree. Yeah, I'm fine with that. He's a villain enough as it is.
Speaker: I think he has that fun villain dynamic we've talked about before, both here and on the Brockton Bay Book Club podcast.
Speaker: We've talked about how Coyle sort of has that, Oh, well, you know, would it, would it be so bad if he took over? I mean, he seems like he's got a good plan for the city. You know, he's got that Lex Luthor, uh, Dr. Doom sort of, you know, Oh, maybe this could be a good ruler. You know, yeah, he's evil, but
Speaker: And, you know, nobody, nobody questions whether or not Lex Luthor is a villain or Dr. Doom's a villain. We all like very clearly evil, but they sort of still fill that fun role of antagonist. So yeah, I would much rather him sit in that category than like, you know, Hannibal Lecter or something. Yeah. I think it's a great example of like, uh, you know, that oftentimes these guys are their undoings where if only they weren't
Speaker: you know, fascist, then then like the, yeah. Yeah. If only you weren't a raging dickhead about it, then like, you probably would have gotten away with it, but that is sort of essential to your personality and what you believe. So like it's, it is going to come bite you in the ass. Like, and in this case, you know, well, coil has that Kaiser has that, like all those things come back to bite you. And that's even, even if what you're doing is.
Speaker: I don't know, good, whatever your justification for it is. Exactly.
Speaker: Especially because we do get the really creepy serial killer villains in this season. We're going to meet them real soon. Like we don't need every villain to fill that role. So we'll get our fair share of creeps very soon. I think establishing Coyle as the, you know, the subtler evil or like, okay,
Speaker: He does do bank robberies, but he is improving the city. Like, how would you handle this very complicated? He does certain bad things and certain good things. How do you fall on your opinion of him? We interrupt our scheduled program to bring you a word from our sponsor, Zencaster, a one -stop shop for all your podcasting needs.
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Speaker: Yeah. So I guess this sort of depends on how much we want to rework the fight scene, which I imagine we'll probably want to rework it a little bit. But in my eyes, assuming we didn't touch it at all, you would put the dragon interlude maybe right after the fight. You get the weird ending with dragon. I can anticipate we're going to change this a bit, but get dragons ending to the fight and then the fight resolves, calm down,
Speaker: scene change transition to her booting up. And then just, you can play out the interlude. I think it'd be really fun. I really liked this interlude this early on in our season two, because we get a glimpse at the birdcage, we get our birdcage bros, we get a glimpse at our master sitting there. So it's sort of like a
Speaker: we're two episodes in now and we're kind of rounding out the, oh, that's where everybody is that we love from season one. So I like that it exists. I do like that it exists. I like that it kind of goes all over the place, but through one person's POV. My notes in this entirely are, I don't know what to do with this chapter. I don't want to reveal dragon this early. I don't want to reveal Amy's parentage this early.
Speaker: You know, I think maybe we reveal what Colin is up to. And if we really want to look at the bird cage, this is where we have dragon kill bakuta. Or not dragon lung. Oh, this ray of lung kill bakuta. We have, cause we had lung get in the fight. All of a sudden lung is alive. And maybe it's like,
Speaker: That's our, our cut is we just, you know, back of his head and going down the shoot, right. You know, let out into the bird cage. Right. Um, it's him and all, you know, all of a sudden, you know, he is at the door of Bakutas area and you know, Bakutas like, whoa, uh, you know,
Speaker: What are you doing down here? And it's like, took a while for me to heal, but essentially I'm back and I need to build a reputation again. Yeah, actually I don't dislike that at all. I think that would work pretty well. I definitely find hiding the panacea reveal. We could totally give like a little subtle
Speaker: very vague, how's your daughter, that kind of thing. You're even vaguer than that if you want. But yeah, definitely find hiding that. I'm okay.
Speaker: revealing dragon as an AI here only because, and I'm down to change this, but just right now in my mind, I can't think of a good time later to reveal it. Um, I've changed my mind. I got the sign out in front of me. Feel free to change it. I'm open. My thought, my, uh, my thought would be all the way when we got to deal with either
Speaker: dealing with Defiant and Dragon when they're a team, you know, way later, or when we deal with the dragon slayers. Right. Yeah, that would make the most sense for sure.
Speaker: coughing up a lung here. A lung? I'm coughing up a lung and you go, I'm coughing up a marquee. Yeah, so that definitely works. I'm fine putting a pin on that. I'm fine moving that around, depending on how we sort of want to structure dragon's character arc as a whole.
Speaker: and what makes sense there. Because I think a lot of her character really begins to shine once you realize that she's AI. A lot of pieces start to fall into place. So I wouldn't want to delay that too much because I think there's a lot of fun.
Speaker: Uh, sort of POV that happens with that, with that mindset, but I'm definitely fine. I'm definitely fine moving it around. If we, if we come up with a good place where that works better. Uh, I think. I want to say there's some point later where it's a defiant chapter. I don't think it's as far cause I'm thinking like all the way at like 20. Um, but I believe in like 16 defiant.
Speaker: finds out that dragon is an AI. Oh, well, yeah. Don't say that's yeah. That's, that's the case. Uh, that would work really well. Very, very well. Cause that's, that's after, after the sweater house nine, that would be, and then, and then honestly, we have a whole like two, well,
Speaker: Yeah, so two arcs of coil. Yeah, so it is. You're right. It's an arc 16 defiance interlude. Yeah. So actually, you know what? I'm fine with that. I think that would probably work really well. So we'll put a pin in that. We'll revisit that for sure. Yeah, that could work really well, saving that for that point now.
Speaker: That's another thing. You got to make it rewatchable. You're watching this. Exactly. Were there ever tells, which is, you know, other thing I'm going to, I'm going to pull out here. Um, I don't like the bio computer lizards for dragon. I've never liked them. I think we just ditched those. I'm fine that there's a reasoning behind them. They always felt like a retcon to me. I'm fine with that. Cut the lizards. Um, I think that, that just makes something that's a little bit too much exposition that we need to talk about later.
Speaker: Instead, it's like, ah, yes, it was a robot that, you know, Dragon was remotely piloting. That's fine. We get that. Yeah. And I think, you know what, I think it even, I think it even works better with, uh, with the fight because the way it's written, Alec goes to like, try to throw off Dragon in the, in the power suit. And he's like, I can't, I feel somebody in there, but I can't. Well, just make it that he can't. And they sort of realized that, oh, she's not actually in there.
Speaker: And nobody's just, I can't, why? Like, why can't you, Alec? Now you can't do stuff all of a sudden. They're like, well, not if it's a fucking remote control, not if it's a drone. Right. And you're going to absolutely, you're selling me on this. Just I'm talking through it. Cause you're going to absolutely send people just down the trail, like, Oh, she doesn't actually go anywhere. She just sends out robots that she controls. She's, you know, she's holed up in a base somewhere. And that's going to be where everything.
Speaker: Cause Colin immediately goes like, Oh yeah, sorry about your agoraphobia. Yeah, exactly. It writes itself. No, that's perfect. I liked it. Okay. I'm sold. We're good. Yeah. And especially on the tail of like, we just had the, the big, uh, Leviathan fight and then he's kind of like reminiscing about like, Oh yeah. Like when Leviathan sunk Newfoundland. Yeah, you're right. And you know, you, you know, you kind of never left your apartment after that. Yeah. Understandable.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I like that. Oh, that works. Yeah. Okay. So I like that. I like, I like how we sort of are structuring dragon there. Um, uh, there's only two other things that I had or go ahead, go ahead. Yeah. So one is when we, wherever we do put the, uh, what I'll just call the kid mapping of shadow stalker, like how it opens in the story, the dragging, you know, kind of going through the abandoned,
Speaker: building and like making sure the room's clear. I think we need to make that more immediate and urgent that like, yeah, this is something we're trying to do quickly. And also, you know, it does give it the feeling of a, of a kidnapping. This isn't just like, Oh, like, Hey. And then we realize like, Oh, they're, they're carefully tiptoeing. No, I think this needs to be borderline dragging by the hair into the room so they can torture her. Like this is about to be brutal.
Speaker: It needs to feel up to that kind of brutal too. Like, you know, horror movie style, it just, you know, we cut its shadow stalkers limp body and the two of them are like dragging her across the floor into this, in this flickering lights, abandoned building, tying her to a chair with electrical wire and then leaving her in the room with Alec to some very suspect noises coming from that room.
Speaker: I said it before, while it isn't actually rape. Uh, I think the vibes with Alec being alone in the room with her should be very rapey because he is about to use her body without her permission. And, uh, you know, it's very analogous, I guess. Oh yeah.
Speaker: Yeah. It should be. It's a very uncomfortable, I was going to say. Yeah. Very, very uncomfortable. It should absolutely elicit that. Yeah. Um, and, and rightly so, when we get to the end of the episode, when you're like, Oh yeah, you know, probably would have maybe like, you know,
Speaker: Yeah. Kind of a terrible. I mean, you get, I was going to say it's, it's a really big character moment for Alec because he, we sort of put him into the spotlight. He gets an episode to shine. It's sort of the episode where everybody's like, Oh man, I didn't really care about that guy in season one, but he's kind of cool. Oh yeah. That's neat. He gets his moment. And then at the end, it's just this charade that he plays.
Speaker: Uh, and we see him for who he is, which is he's, I mean, he's, he's a, he's a pretty twisted guy. And obviously the text goes into more detail that we won't, we don't need to really can't put on, on screen in the same way. But you can, you can show that and it's going to be a really uncomfortable scene for a lot of people. Um, yeah, yeah. And I think, I think it needs to be, needs to be pretty, pretty strong.
Speaker: All right, before I go into my big one, do you have anything else you were gonna change up?
Speaker: Not too much to change. This really isn't something that we would do too much for script purposes because this is more action. You would just be like, the action scene happens here. I'm fine shortening and condensing some of these action scenes a bit. I don't think that's too important. I would like to give a little bit of growth from the first episode. It'd be nice to see Weld
Speaker: have the respect of the wards a bit in the fight where he is issuing commands and they're fighting and they're sort of working together because they kind of do in that fight. And it's a nice little bit of not closure because their stories aren't done. But in terms of like that first arc, right? We talked about or arc nine, right? We talked about how the wards sort of start the episode
Speaker: with not respecting weld at all. And then the episode ends with a few of them kind of respecting him a bit. And it'd be nice to sort of cap that off with seeing them in action now, especially because we saw them in action in previous episodes, they didn't fight that well, the travelers kicked their ass. So now in this episode, maybe they have it a bit more together. So I would want to sort of highlight that a bit in some way. And there's a million different ways you could really kind of write that.
Speaker: And then the last big thing I was going to talk. Oh yeah. Do you want to say within just the word section? Cause we really didn't touch on the fight and I don't think much needs to be touched on it. Yeah. I mentioned it before in the other one, but I think need to hurry it up through the kid, win guns. I don't like how long they spend talking about that. Yeah. Testing them out. I think that needs to be like a 10 second sequence right there where they're just like this one, no, this one. And then just, just blows the door open. Like that one.
Speaker: No, I mean, that's yeah, you could you could easily just make it a bit there, right? Where they're they're holding up guns and and and tattletale is all like, you know, no, no, kind of quickly going through them and then imp just grabs one behind their back and just blows open the door, you know, just make it a little bit like a little joke. No, that's great.
Speaker: And then the only other thing I had that I wanted to talk about that I think we'll mention, but I don't know if you anything else was bitches, character and arc here. Um, which I know we've kind of talked about off off mic. That was going to be my big, my big thing there. Okay. Well, go ahead. Go ahead. Lead us off. Yeah. Before I forget, because we're going to go into that. I want to go back to dragon because I forget this note. If I don't say it now.
Speaker: Uh, we've got to figure out how to frame dragons POV, whether it's like, I don't know, security cameras or something. Right. Right. I also think having a conversation between her and Colin about outing people is important because Colin had information and while he was there, outed Taylor, essentially. Right. Right. And dragon.
Speaker: quickly figures out who Taylor is. Yep. And I think we could show just like a computer screen information. Like it doesn't even have to say anything. Computer screen information, you know, Taylor matching it up to, you know, skitter pulled up right next to her. Like, and then you get the impression that like dragon has figured it out so freaking fast. Yeah. You know, pulling up the emails, all that jazz, you know? Yep. But dragon doesn't out her.
Speaker: Yep. And I think, I think that's like having her and Colin have a conversation about essentially what he did wrong and maybe being a little bit remorseful and dragon kind of taking that to heart. Cause we've seen dragon be sympathetic before with our canary interlude that we throw in. Um, and I think here's another example of like, yeah, dragon knows, but dragon doesn't say,
Speaker: out of respect for people. Um, cause it would be so easy for her to do that, but she doesn't. And she maybe doesn't in this case, because of some human growth, because of interaction with Colin, perhaps, and the fact that she's a good soul. No, I do like that. Yeah. Having them talk about that together would be good. But back to what we were, what you were leading me into. Um, I think that we,
Speaker: need to resolve the bitch drama back at the Leviathan chapters. We're having a big issue with trying to figure out what makes Taylor quit the undersiders right before the Leviathan fight and her relationship with them. I think we need to cut bitch and her bitchiness from
Speaker: Uh, this chapter, I think that she doesn't need to betray Taylor. I think none of that. I think she is on board team Taylor all the way. Um, and I think that starts with the fact that Taylor right before the Leviathan fight reveals that she was going to betray the team. This isn't in an attempt to be like more honest and open, but of course, uh, the team does not take kindly to that.
Speaker: And that leads to this big argument of like, she's like, you don't understand, like, I didn't want to be a villain. I still don't want to be a villain, but I do want to be with you guys. And I do want to do some good in the city. That's why I like am the way I am. And I think the real interesting thing here would be Lisa, of course, already knows, uh, bitch is hurt. And like, especially after her and Taylor have had this
Speaker: you know, this character development together. So she storms off. Alec is like, well, I appreciate you telling me it's kind of fucked up, you know, whatever. Or maybe, maybe he also gets upset. Maybe him and grew are both like, what the fuck? And like, you know, we don't want to fucking look at you. You know, so they leave with bitch as well.
Speaker: Then you have the climactic moment where bitch comes back and saves the day and sacrifices her dogs to attack log to save Taylor. I think that's a big moment because it pays off the relationship that we've had with Taylor this whole time and it overcomes the fact that Taylor was going to be a traitor. That is the resolution of that bitch drama right there. No more bitch and Taylor are on good terms.
Speaker: The relationship only grows from here. Then what we do is we get to the hospital scene where Taylor's, you know, having the big confrontation with arms master and arms master in a pathetic attempt to misdirect, you know, the attention from him being a little bitch throws out that, Hey,
Speaker: Taylor or Skitter was going to betray the undersiders to which all of them just kind of fold their arms and go, we know, you know, once an undersider, always an undersider. Yeah. And, you know, and that's grew saying that and Alec is right there with him and, uh, they still go off. Like there's, you know, that, that is essentially like, Hey, we're cool. You know, right. It's rough, but we knew.
Speaker: We still get to have the like Taylor's undecided. She didn't want to be a villain. She never wanted to be a villain. She still has the conversation with Lisa where it's like, do you still want to do this? And she's like, I haven't made up my mind yet. Or, you know, I've got an idea or something. And then we also still get to have potentially the flashback explanation in this, which I actually think would be good for a cold open.
Speaker: I think would be great for a cold open on this episode where Taylor comes back to the, to the play, to the hideout and grew is like, what the fuck are you doing here? You know, she came back and Lisa bitches like, Hey, Taylor thup. Daps up. Alec is like, yo dork. What's happening? Daps up.
Speaker: You know, at least it's like, all right, well, it's everybody against you grew and grew is like, Oh, oh, so this is just how things work now. Like, I don't get a say. And it's like, well, you do get a say, but it means nothing. So fuck off. Yeah. And, uh, so he's the only one that has the contention with Taylor now. Alex, easy to forgive. He's like, Hey, if you're in, you're in. That's all I need to know.
Speaker: You know, you've already, she's already gutted herself to you. And also like we can still have the whole like, dude, like nobody can be act that stupid and goofy around each other, you know, without it being real. Like she's a terrible liar. Um, I think you have all that. It builds this contention between grew and Taylor, which I think is a great, a great interpersonal relationship that we need to hold on to and, you know, keep going as it will in the story.
Speaker: And, uh, also kind of has that leadership dynamic that we keep leaning towards Taylor and away from grow is really important. At that point, you could have that at the beginning where it's like, Hey, and they're like, cool. Uh, you know, okay, well, Taylor's on board now. What is our next move? And Lisa and Taylor kind of give each other a look and they go, well, we have an idea cut to them captured in the PRT.
Speaker: Okay. Okay. Well, or you, you just, you put that before any scene. I think you could open with them being captured by the PRT. It's a trap then cut to her coming to talk to the team. Hey, I have an idea. And then the idea is immediately them dragging the body down the hall.
Speaker: Yeah, you're right. It works kind of either way. That's great. Well, we have this idea. Hear me out. You know that person I really, really fucking hate and how y 'all tried to convince me before that I didn't need to get revenge. Well, believe it or not, they're a viable target now so we can do a war crime.
Speaker: No, I'm fully on board. We talked briefly about this before the episode. So yeah, I completely agree. I really like that change a lot. I really like the idea of switching up everything pre -Leviathan, making that motivation a little bit different.
Speaker: And I like the idea because you still can get the hospital scene. Because really, Taylor leaves, Leviathan fight happens. She's basically unconscious when bitch saves her. She doesn't really know how the undersiders have taken and processed her betrayal. So you still have that emotional moment in the hospital.
Speaker: And I like the idea of a bitch being the one to tell Arms Master, like, we know, buddy. OK, you're not you haven't you haven't broken us up. And you have bitch say it or do you have Alex say it so that grew is the only one who hasn't essentially. Oh, I see. Right. Oh, I like that actually.
Speaker: Because Bitch saved her, so you know they're cool. And then Alec comes in and is like, bro. I was gonna say, actually, I like it with Alec, you're right. Because you can give him a really sassy, sarcastic line. Like, you know, hey, dumbass.
Speaker: We know, okay. Yeah, perfect. I was gonna say like, hey, wanna be a boo? Exactly. Big fucking nerd. Yeah, so it still works. You still get that beat, that emotional beat there. And then I think that fixes this arc a bit. I think that cleans that up a bit. You just kind of eliminate the whole contention here, which I don't think is necessary.
Speaker: especially with them about to kind of go off in separate directions for a bit with their own territories in a way. I don't think you need to... That's sort of the next chapter of their groups dynamic. So it's important to kind of resolve the previous chapter, if you will.
Speaker: Yeah. I think having one subplot, which is, you know, Gru and Taylor have, yeah, there's still some type of issue. Yeah. Especially since Gru is kind of the leader. Right. Sort of. I think that's a good dynamic to leave off on. Yeah. No, I agree. I agree. All right.
Speaker: Well, I think that our mark, I know it's good timing. I think we've kind of hit everything we wanted to touch on. Yeah, pretty good episode. I think it'll flush out into a decent episode. I wouldn't be surprised if we maybe add some stuff or maybe combine some stuff from other arcs. We'll see, but definitely enough here to fill out probably an episode at the most.
Speaker: Let us know, as always. We love interacting with anybody on this topic. And there's not enough conversation on it, as we have said many, many times. So what do you think? We've kind of put through some pretty big changes and big ideas here. We've moved around a lot of moments, some beats, some character arcs.
Speaker: erased some things. We've added some things. So please let us know, reach out to us, leave a comment. Please let us know on any of our social media platforms, what you think of our changes, how you think this is progressing. And tell us why we're wrong. And we'll tell you why we're right. Because we're right, obviously, every time. Thank you, Alan, as always.
Speaker: Oh, thank you, Jacob. Joining me once again. And thank you, Michael, for making us sound good. No problem. My boy. And until next episode, which will be the first half of Arc 11, the numbered chapters, so one through eight, we'll be breaking that down, taking a look at the first half of that arc. Keep reading warm. Fancy outro? I haven't perfected yet.
Speaker: And hit us with a cool beat, Michael. Thank you so much for listening. Read along with us at parahumans .wordpress .com. We'd love to hear your thoughts. What did you love? What did you hate? Anything you think we missed, et cetera, as long as it's kind. If you'd like to get in touch, you can find us on Twitter, threads, Instagram, TikTok, and Reddit at Brockton Bay, B .C. or click the link in the description.
Speaker: Did we say something that you didn't agree with that you can't just put into words on a message board or a forum or a YouTube comment? Well, now you can call us. We have a voicemail. You can call us at 980 -999 -0438 and let us know with your words what we said wrong.
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