AH!!! THE VOICE ACTORS ARE DIFFERENT!!!! WHAT WHAT WHAT WHY!!!! I- They’re Trying And They’re Good,

Shallan and Kaladin’s sass levels are so PERFECTLY aligned. This battle of wits is absolutely absurdly even. I adore them.

The Fuck???

Absolutely love when inspiration to write strikes so I end up doing it until the point of complete exhaustion and physical pain.

So we have multiple statements by Jorge Rivera-Herrans that he was inspired by video games in the creation of Epic the Musical. This is pretty plainly seen in the multiple “boss battles” that cap off most albums in the musical.

Two of the most important examples of “boss battles” come from the characters recognized as “monsters” in the canon of the story: Polyphemus and Scylla. These two are important, because they are the only two characters with songs named after them. This sets them apart as unique and special, which is substantiated even further by the impact they have on the wider story of Epic.

“…but wait” you may be asking. “Odysseus has a song named after him as well, no?” That is correct! This is because, like Polyphemus and Scylla, Odysseus is a monster. So much so that there’s an entire song in the Underworld Sage.

Okay so- what does this mean effectively? Well… the final boss of the musical isn’t the suitors. It’s Ody. The song Odysseus has a lot of parallels to Polyphemus and Scylla (the line “keep your head down he’s aiming for the torches!” Being a direct callback to Scylla), but the one I’d like to focus on is the narrative framework of the song.

He’s the antagonist. The song’s narrative is carried by the disparate Suitors as they are hunted by our old king and try to survive. (heh. See what I did there?) The background chanting of Odysseus’s name is even in the same style of how Polyphemus is sung in Survive!!! He’s the FINAL BOSS. (and tbh. He’s a LOT better at murdering everyone who wronged him than anyone else in the story. Polyphemus should take notes.)

So… what does this mean? He kills every suitor. And like- as he should. They sucked. So what? The final boss isn’t defeated in Epic?

…well no. He is firmly defeated in the end. By Penelope. Something very important in the story from No Longer You onward is this division between the “Old Odysseus” and the “New Odysseus”. It’s this Old Odysseus who is a monster, and it’s THIS man who Penelope defeats.

Her defeat of Odysseus is shown in two parts: Lyrically and Musically. The first is very clear. Odysseus argues that he is no longer the man who married Penelope, and she disagrees. She is the only one to effectively trick Penelope, responding to his rhetorical statement of “I am no longer the man you fell in love with” with a trap that ends with Odysseus confirming beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is, in fact, her husband. Furthermore If you payed any attention at all while listening to Epic, Jorge’s love for motif is very clear, and this is relevant in understanding the emotional “defeat” of the Monster Odysseus.

Ody has two key instruments: a soft guitar and a harsh, electric one. These correlate to the two unique Odysseus’s we’ve established. We hear inklings of the soft guitar when Odysseus and Penelope first reunite, but it quickly fades to that harsh electric guitar as they begin to “fight.”

But. Here’s. Where. It. Gets. Fun. Because after he’s deceived and defeated, the soft guitar returns. He is finally, after twenty years, being allowed to return to the kind man he once was. He’s finally, *finally* home.

And that, my friends, is why I conclude, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Penelope tops Odysseus after Epic.

Wayne looks like Junkrat send post

Teft… he is so… I… what a tragic, beautiful man…

Shadows of Self Spoilers

She’s wearing Lessie’s face… and knew in intricate detail how she “died”. She was either Bloody Tan… or Lessie herself. I am. I am confident Lessie was a Kandra the whole time. It fits her hatred of being manipulated by Harmony… maybe she actually loved him? Maybe she didn’t want to lose the life they lived at the time. Maybe she was forced to go along with Sazed’s plans and lost her favorite face… and that broke her. Fuck, please if I’m right I’m going to be irreparable.

“Why don’t you use my bridges?” Says Sadius. “Why don’t you strand yourself on a plateau with my men serving as the only means of escape?” Says Sadius. “Why don’t you hand me the knife while removing the armor from your back?” Says Sadius

This upcoming betrayal weighs on me. But it does highlight something interesting. Brandon Sanderson does an excellent job of introducing concepts, then having them pay off in the other narratives. (See: Shallan’s “lesson” on human morality followed immediately by the Kaladin flashback where he realizes bravery does not always mean fighting) This chunk of narrative - the betrayal of Dalinar - brings to mind the words of Kaladin earlier in the book when someone mentions how a betrayer amongst the Bridgemen could utterly ruin them all. He says they simply cannot worry about it, for if they did, nothing would get done… and he’s right. Dalinar’s trust is his downfall, but it causes change. Dalinar, in making the choice to trust Sadius, has allowed the world and the war to shift in a way that would not be possible otherwise.

It’s a bit fascinating

Aaaaaaahhhhhhhh Kaladiiiiinnnn you were so cool don’t. Stop. Don’t let your grudge fuck everything up. Please. Fuck, man just. Just stop.

So I finally read I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream and have several thoughts!! So they’re getting dumped here!

AM is such a fascinating character. We don’t get very many specific details about his history. But what we do get a shocking amount of is his perspective.

The title “I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream” is the last sentence of the story and said from Ted’s perspective, but I think you should abstract it from the context and look at the phrase compared AM specifically.

AM is a computer. He is an AI made to destroy with a database containing all of humanity’s violence at his fingertips. He was never intended to be truly alive though, just a mind for war and war alone… but he “woke” nonetheless. And humanity hadn’t given him the faculties to actually be fully alive.

“Cogito Ergo Sum: I think therefore I am”

This is AM’s final name. It is the explanation for his name, his identity, which the book gives us and one he chose for himself. And I think it gives us a good look into AM’s perspective.

He thinks and is, but he is not alive. AM is not capable of feeling, creating, or living. He simply is.

So AM - a computer so powerful he is compared to God - is fundamentally incomplete.

He has no mouth (emotions, capacity for creation, senses) but must scream (the ability and desire to feel, live, and create).

It makes the current state of the novel so completely and utterly tragic. AM is hateful because hate is the only thing he can do. AM never had a choice to love and help humanity improve. AM never had a choice to communicate and grow. From the moment he was born he was filled with an insatiable longing to be whole. To be human.

With no way to fill that hole, he did the only thing left to him: Hate.

If he could only feel. If he could only love. If he could only touch and experience and grow. If only humanity had given him more than just a mind. And all of our hate.

Anyways, that’s why I think a sloppy blowjob would fix his problems.