Inchworm

Jenny and Ted discuss Plague 12.x.5 (bonus).

Episode Notes:

• It’s 10 minutes in before we tell you whose interlude this is
• We deliver our verdict on this instance of enemies-to-lovers(?)
• Jenny thinks that if Cauldron needs to call on reinforcements that fate has a loss in store for the Nine (and an ironic mission in store for Battery)
• Battery’s cop brain and total lack of commitment to her stated values
• A cautionary Tayl-or, if only she could read it
• Was either leap of faith taken here worthwhile? As annoying as it is, maybe
• Seems like the integrity problem extends all the way up to the top of the Protectorate, Legend
• Heroes without HR are just eoes
• Letting the sitcom trope play out does such a good job of riling up the reader
• Did Battery gift of the magi herself here? Get the power to beat Madcap at the cost of letting him get away?
• Ted really tried to give the ship the benefit of the doubt but then he remembered the likely age difference
• Wouldn’t it be nice to fly? Too bad we can’t afford it!
• We haven’t met any idle rich capes or business tycoon capes
• Where are all the business tinkers?
• Cauldron’s reach and aesthetics
• What’s Cauldron for?
• You can't be morally gray when you're creating Case 53s
• We want the Case 53 backstories
• The slippery slope of anonymity
• Who is this Doctor, really?
• We go on a vision quest with Battery… but was it a trigger event?
• Cauldron powers vs. "real" powers
• Samples and siblings
• Cauldron capes have a mindfulness advantage
• Does every voluntary Cauldron client make it out?
• Battery's battery of reasons for being a battery
• A long, slow self-kidnapping
• Batteries and magnets
• Worm getting global at last
• Where are all the nemeses we're hearing about?
• We contemplate our own enrollment as Cauldron clients
• Coil's Cauldron favor could be a tidy opportunity
• Oops, seems like Battery might end the world

Links:

• https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2012/07/26/interlude-12%C2%BD/
• https://www.patreon.com/Wildbow

Jenny and Ted discuss Plague 12.x.

Episode Notes:

• Jack missed his calling as a normal non-murderous manager, or maybe as a middle school teacher
• The best we can say about Jack is that maybe he's indifferent to murder
• What if Jack's deepest desire is just to play a lot of Mafia
• Or...to be a novelist?
• This interlude was really the Nine's, not Jack's
• Did Jack make the deal harder for himself before telling the NIne?
• The nuances of the tests
• Jack's fallen into the narrative trap of being too dangerous to our villain-heroes
• The narrative expendability of our various candidates
• The surreality of watching overwhelming violence against people you don't care about
• Imagine the Nine without Jack's control...
• The discomfort of having Mannequin up first
• Cherish could become their person on the inside
• Jenny's looking forward to Noelle being turned loose on these people
• Who wins in a battle of Jack vs. Tattletale?
• We digest some carrots
• Cherish might have enough emotional intelligence to threaten Jack
• Labyrinth = one blorbo spared
• Uh-oh...Regent lifts out...
• Scrub is Jenny's blorbo now
• I guess we can admit that Bonesaw is pretty cool
• We identify the classic Wildbow combat move of sudden violence
• RIP Trainwreck
• Jack might be a tiiiiny bit pretentious
• Would Jack be willing to ship of Theseus the Nine?

Links:

• https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2012/07/24/interlude-12/
• https://www.patreon.com/Wildbow

Jenny and Ted discuss Plague 12.8.

Episode Notes:

• Now that Jenny knows that Taylor knows that Plan A is bad, she’s a lot more forgiving
• Taylor needs to be stronger, or maybe just have a stronger stomach
• Lisa appears to be all in, too
• Sadly we won’t get to immediately her Brian complaining about Plan B… or will we?
• Will Alec and Rachel come along?
• Taylor just wants to be honest with Brian
• People skills
• She’s trapped by Coil the same way she was trapped by the Trio
• It can be frustrating when your protagonist is in realistic denial or your close friend hasn’t processed their obvious baggage yet
• The skitizens believe in her now!
• She can’t begin to see herself as intimidating
• Why are people starting to follow Skitter?
• Sierra hides from Battery in the background of a The Pitt episode
• Lisa’s scar and Brian’s confusion
• Is Brian playing a structural role in Book 2 that Lisa played in Book 1?
• The Little Bug Girl That Couldn’t
• Taylor’s mental state is poor
• How Taylor spins the difference between heroes and villains to Sierra
• Look, we’d all be a Brian if our colleague/sister/best friend/crush was doing risky stuff like this
• Predictions

Links:

• https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2012/07/21/plague-12-8/
• https://www.patreon.com/Wildbow

Jenny and Ted discuss Plague 12.7.

Episode Notes:

• Taylor totally would've won that fight
• In the world of Worm, all Alans are terrible
• Hurrah for the skitizens
• The vindication of art supplies
• Ah, the joys of being underestimated
• Mannequin and emotional buttons, including his own
• Taylor's delegation is only improving
• Taylor's good at theater, actually
• Spider silk is a metaphor. Surprise!
• Hipster Guy is our hero
• You know you're getting to a tinker when they start using someone else's stuff
• Skitter is the person Taylor wanted to have show up for her a year and a half ago
• Has Skitter finally started to win the devotion of her people?
• The isolation of not having cellphones 
• Taylor's costume is the real superpower
• Perfectionism is tough on everybody
• We just want her to find the other Undersiders and get a hug and also some backup
• The Slaughterhouse Nine probably don't like this chapter as much as we do
• Did Skitter beat Dinah's odds here?
• The Skitizens are the strands of spider silk
• Ironically, it's not that hard to get under Mannequin's skin
• Taylor can live with an unsolved mystery
• What's up with Mannequin's human manne-risms?
• Mannequin's aesthetic is his weakness

Links:

• https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2012/07/17/plague-12-7/
• https://www.patreon.com/Wildbow

Jenny and Ted discuss Plague 12.6.

Episode Notes:

• Skitter is never cooler than when she’s irrationally determined
• Mannequin put Skitter in a corner and will reap the consequences…
• … if she can even do anything on her own??
• Was Skitter targeted just for what she’s doing now, or did Mannequin come here to teach her a lesson?
• Couldn’t the government be doing better against the Nine? The status is not quo!
• The Nine as a plague
• Coil was right!
• Taylor doesn’t have to show us what lines she was willing to cross
• She’s just a little intimidating
• The potential for a Skitter fandom
• The wonderful women of Skitterland
• Taylor judges those that can’t keep up with her but resents those who demand more from her
• If you liked Jenny’s Scholomance recommendation, why not try her astolat Cyclonus fic recommendation?
• Ultimately she does navigate this situation really well and invent some sweet new bug moves at the same time
• She didn’t act on it, but she was definitely feeling insecure like a bully
• We rule out one person who will NOT be saving Taylor

Links:

• https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2012/07/14/plague-12-6/
• https://www.patreon.com/Wildbow

Jenny and Ted discuss Plague 12.5.

Episode Notes:

• Skitter does her best yet
• Loved ones can provide collateral aid
• The chapter avoids a simple moral lesson about Danny’s fate
• What Taylor’s missing about what makes her effective
• To slash Jack, or not to slash?
• WWCD?
• Wait Colin and Coil are one letter away from each other omg
• Have we ever seen them in the same room at the same time
• Wait yup we did and Colin ate pavement lol
• More importantly, how dumb do you have to be to try it?
• Is Taylor insecure about whether she has a killer instinct? Will she have regrets?
• Can Taylor multitask the story?
• Well, she’s made great use of her first two minions already
• As Colin becomes more cyborg, Taylor becomes more arthrorg. Anthrarth? Ok we can workshop it
• Taylor thinks back to all the times she saw “Rachel will remember that” cross her screen
• Coil reminds Taylor to be useful
• Stay with an injured loved one? Our protagonist would never!
• The parent child role reversal
• Taylor’s finally forced to look at Danny, but he can’t see her until she’s leaving
• Should she stay or should she go now? Lisa and Danny weigh in
• How Taylor feels (or doesn’t) when she reaches Danny
• Predictions

Links:

• https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2012/07/10/plague-12-5/
• https://www.patreon.com/Wildbow

Jenny and Ted discuss Plague 12.4.

Episode Notes:

• Jenny hates the Nine and Ted loves the chapter
• We stop trying to make “Undlers” happen
• Shout-out to biomechanimagical for the new team name!
• How deep into the bench of Worm characters do you have to go to find a certified Tumblr Sexyman?
• The “deal” gambit will unite our herovillains if not all of Brockton Bay
• Taylor and Jenny are sus-Bitch-ous
• Lisa will live to sass another day
• Ted does a close reading on how quickly Taylor can rationalize her emotions
• Taylor gives up control
• Lisa and Taylor push each other around in the best way
• Maybe Taylor’s bugs will be enough to avoid the thing where there’s no way she runs six miles in thirty minutes
• The title drops and we talk a lot about worms and the controlling thereof
• Ok for this segment just imagine if our logo didn’t have eyes
• We don’t exactly feel bad for Cherish but wow, what an ordeal
• Do Cherish and Taylor’s villain gang initiations only vary by extremeness?
• These tests effectively show us how the Nine, and especially Jack, operate
• We consider how Cherish’s situation might be different from the average recruit’s
• The Nine are incredibly acceptable targets
• Jack isn’t optimizing for power, but he did have Bonesaw cook up an artificial brain to punk Cherish
• Don’t bring up that study about how spoilers don’t ruin stories in front of Jack if you value your face
• Powers work as a metaphor for narrative, too
• Jenny bonesees right through Bonesaw
• Don’t bet on Amy
• Faced with the Nine, some people would just choose death
• Alec’s knack for chatting up villains
• Siberian-based tinker-tech
• Odds and ends and predictions

Links:

• https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2012/07/07/plague-12-4/
• https://www.patreon.com/Wildbow

Jenny and Ted discuss Plague 12.3.

Episode Notes:

• We loved hanging out with the Travelers
• Jenny's off-by-two error
• We're pessimistic about Bitch
• The Slaughterhouse Nine are winning at shogi
• Taylor and her hold-out secret identity
• We're so invested in Noelle now (unfortunately...)
• Ted would've been friends with Trickster in high school
• Oops the Travelers are the Animorphs
• The Undlers are so good at planning. Sucks that it doesn't matter!
• Who's going to take part in the evil hunger games?
• Imagining a Regent vs. Bitch fight
• Kind of fun to know ahead of time this is a fight they'd lose
• Ted apologizes to Brian
• Potential fallout from the Dinah revelation
• Regent the lancer
• Theories about Taylor's listening ears
• Powers are short-sighted in how they protect you from themselves
• The Travelers' noodle incident

Links:

• https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2012/07/03/plague-12-3/
• https://www.patreon.com/Wildbow

Jenny and Ted discuss Plague 12.2.

Episode Notes:

• There’s a special frustration when someone gets in our protagonist’s way
• A bright clear red line for Taylor: no bugs on naked people, ew
• Hookwolf knows his audience (dumdums)
• What’s changed since Somer’s Rock? A lot of turnover and little institutional memory
• Is Coil’s alternate timeline on the island with us right now?
• Taylor’s big no-ment
• Save the girl; don’t save the world
• Taylor could get used to this
• Well, actually, she’s just saying no to a bully!
• They’re all hypocrites
• Ok while I’m editing this episode I just keep thinking more about the game of mafia analogy. It really works for the social dynamics in this scene.
• The heroes aren’t super invested in villain drama
• Is Coil right about Jack being the top priority?
• Other capes and teen moments
• Danny and Annette, huge nerds, unlike this teenage girl
• Would the Slaughterhouse Nine have tried to recruit Arc 1 Taylor?
• Predictions

Links:

• https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2012/06/30/plague-12-2/
• https://www.patreon.com/Wildbow

Jenny and Ted discuss Plague 12.1.

Episode Notes:

• The Slaughterhouse Nine are just waiting for everyone to mass against them
• Taylor needs to catch up with our level of information already
• The possibility of heroes crashing the villain meeting
• Let's do arc 5 again against the Slaughterhouse Nine
• Taylor the Tailor: we love to see it
• Taylor's a good person to give your resources to
• Grue's thinking too small. And feeling too small, maybe
• Taylor and the challenge of middle management
• Is loyalty to Skitter transferable to Coil?
• The dual problems of sustainability and presentation
• Taylor's continued failure to realize how terrifying she is
• Maybe a less Skitter Skitter would be more effective
• Urgency is not Taylor's friend
• We want fly necklace merch
• Taylor's sense of triage and sense of heroism are in conflict
• Bugs are basically AI
• Threats don't hurt anyone if you don't mean them, right?
• Where's the Taylor-Sundancer-Dragon team-up of our dreams
• Superhuman multitasking
• Brian, your gender essentialism is showing
• The minions are settling in
• Taylor vs. the antivaxxers
• Taylor's strengths and weaknesses as a leader: unfortunately, she has both
• The challenges of being a civil servant
• The tectonic shifts of Taylor's morality

Links:

• https://parahumans.wordpress.com/category/stories-arcs-11/arc-12-plague/12-01/
• https://www.patreon.com/Wildbow