Thank you to Heather for commissioning this episode!
This is the point at which we discovered what happened to Brian, and I'm very excited over the fact that he's going to wind up being a superhuman after all. I wasn't sure what direction we were going with him and it seems like he's going to be okay...in terms of actually continuing to be alive, at least. But he's definitely sort of a freak now.
Thanks so much for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!

Thank you very much to Ashleigh for commissioning this episode!
I'm so relieved that things in Nigeria don't go the way that I was fearing they would, and interestingly we've got Michael showing up at Jean's house for an impromptu therapy session. There's a lot going on at the school in the meantime, which I think might be one of the more disturbing but accurate portrayals of the kind of "discipline" a lot of schools inflict upon their students.
Thanks a ton for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!

Thank you to Max for commissioning this episode!
This episode is wild in that we're getting Wrath basically telling Ed and Al everything and saying, "So glad to get that off my chest, as you were, gentlemen." He's so cavalier about it that even Roy is like "WTF" and when he shares this info with Armstrong we find out that our sweet cinnamon roll protested what he was asked to do in Ishval and was sent home. I knew I liked this guy! Meanwhile, Ed and Al are harboring Mei Chang inside Al's armor, and turns out that she and Lan Fan have some beef. Greed, it turns out, is dealing with Ling just popping up and taking control here and there. Weird.
Thanks so much for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!

Thank you very much to Heather for commissioning this episode!
This episode starts with the final escape of Scorp and Viper from Dr. Spears' facility, which surprisingly is pulled off essentially without incident, and without a discovery of Brian because it turns out he's in a totally different place, namely at Dr. Spears' private home. Meanwhile, Ryan is grieving the damage that she's done to Jenna, and Elgin finds out what happened and absolutely panics and bails. Which is, to say it mildly, delightfully satisfying.
Thanks so much for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!

Thank you again to Joanna for commissioning this episode!
These chapters, we find out that there's quite a huge payoff to Nina being on the ground in Fjerda. She's able to tip them off about a secret attack that would have flattened them if they hadn't been prepared, but even with warning the losses are substantial. Meanwhile, Nina is being contacted with a new mission, one that's subtle and dangerous enough that she's going to be walking the edge of a knife, and Nikolai comes back to his palace just in time to see the Shu Princess get burned alive.
Thanks for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!

Thank you very much to Max for commissioning this episode!
So this is the episode where the boys finally meet Father, but if I hoped that this was going to be a major reveal of what the objective is for this crew of homunculi, I was disappointed. Instead of getting a straight answer out of him regarding what he's doing and why, we've got a convergence of almost all our characters (except for Roy's crew and Wrath) in one room duking it out. Also, Ling submits to the Father's experimentation, and when it's over he's been taken over by Greed.
Thanks so much for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!

Thank you very much to Joanna for commissioning this episode!
I'm so excited to be starting this book so quickly after finishing the previous one, and I'm very much here for the way things begin even though it's super unexpected and super SUPER unsettling. I didn't think we were going to see the Darkling being able to flex his power this quickly, and if he's able to do this sort of thing already, what will he be capable of if he's loose???
Thanks so much for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!

Thank you so much to Ashleigh for commissioning this episode!
This is the episode where everyone is taking trips to new places, either to France as in the case of most of the class, or to Nigeria in Eric's case. I remain extremely concerned about Eric's trip and will breathe a huge sigh of relief when he's safely home. Our friends in France, meanwhile, are getting up to a lot of hijinks, whether it's because they're throwing their own shit out the window or hooking up after being left at a rest stop. Jean and Jakob are struggling to regain their equilibrium after he meets one of her ex lovers, and I really hate this for both of them.
Thanks so much for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!

Thank you to Max for commissioning this episode!
So this episode was a little tough to cover because most of it is re-treading a lot of things we've already seen. While it's understandable that we might need a refresh while watching this in real time, for the way I'm watching it just feels really redundant.
However, there are also the interspersed scenes of Hempstool dreaming that he's at a party with Pinako, and reflecting on how human beings are violent and stupid and make the same mistakes over and over again. We see that there's a glasses-less version of him that seems to believe human beings are meant to be used as fuel for the experiments that they (he?) have been working on. So what's up with that?
Thanks so much for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!

Thank you to Heather for commissioning this episode!
So in this section we get a pretty cool series of scenes that have me really wondering what's in store, between Brian deciding to undergo the procedure and Ryan contacting Jenna the AI. Also, there's something shady going on with Reggie and I'm dying to know what it is, because Chance can tell something is up and he's bound to find out eventually.
Thanks so much for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!