Remember that one time where Chapman was on a Zoom call with Visser Three and V3 canonically turned out to be the guy going “SHOW US THE CAT” and then every time afterwards whenever he encountered a cat of any size he would drop everything to have a short monlogue about how much he likes cats?
Andalites don’t have taste but they probably enjoy textures. Like the crunch of things under their hooves or how things squish. Maybe even the feeling of things going up their legs.
Ax drinks a slurpee too fast and gets ankle freeze
Remember that one time where Chapman was on a Zoom call with Visser Three and V3 canonically turned out to be the guy going “SHOW US THE CAT” and then every time afterwards whenever he encountered a cat of any size he would drop everything to have a short monlogue about how much he likes cats?
Yeah
He’s also the guy who would make a bed on his desk for his cat if he had one.
@copperbadge ,I don’t know if you were into Animorphs, but…
The funny thing about the like, casual cultural impact of Animorphs, is that to people who did not read Animorphs, understandably the defining spec fic element of Animorphs is that kids turn into animals, whereas to people who did read Animorphs (and remember them at all) the defining spec fic element of Animorphs is the body stealing imperialist aliens who live inside your brain and take over your life and generate endless psychological horror, which means that on a regular basis I encounter a sci fi work that involves body stealing psychological horror and say “oh just like Animorphs” and someone says “what? those books where they turn into animals? How?”
The Next Passage by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs Alternamorphs #2)
Here is the nicest thing I can say about this second Animorphs choose-your-own-adventure title: it is better than the first one. (It’s not a sequel, though: the “you” before was another kid who was wandering through the abandoned construction site of Animorphs #1 The Invasion at the same time as the regular group and also given morphing powers by Elfangor. The “you” here is a David analogue, experiencing the attack on his house from book #20 The Discovery.) Whereas the previous volume had only six actual decision points, each of which led to either immediate death or the tale’s intended continuation, this followup has nine, including a genuine fork with each branch continuing through additional nodes to a separate possible conclusion. As an activity, the structure / gameplay is thus notably more complex.
The plot is busier, too. The First Journey covered parts of Animorphs #1 and #11 The Forgotten, jumping over the events in-between, but The Next Passage handles #20, #26 The Attack, and Megamorphs #2 In the Time of Dinosaurs, under the premise that the Ellimist appears once you’ve joined the team to send you off on one of those last two paths. That’s not great writing — especially since the options are presented as simply “button A” and “button B” on an unlabeled remote control — but at least it feels like more thought went into the idea than anything in the lazy cash-grab of Alternamorphs #1. Maybe that’s why the first ghostwriter remains unknown, while this one has been openly identified as Emily Costello, who would return a few months later for #42 The Journey in the main series.
As for the weaknesses…. It’s really not a very well-developed story, nor does it seem all that fun or compelling to play. The angst, wartime trauma, and nuanced coming-of-age themes of the franchise are in short supply, and the heroes regularly act out-of-character, as when they trap you as a fly nothlit in one ending, doomed to die within two weeks because you didn’t agree to stay out of their way during future fights. Good luck trying to determine where this alternate universe diverges from the real canon, too — the Animorphs mention having fought the Howlers on Iskoort already, but they give no indication that the morphing cube’s discovery or their prehistoric excursion has likewise happened, even though those adventures came earlier in the proper continuity. There’s no internal consistency or apparent point to the Ellimist’s challenge either, which altogether adds up for a frustrating and weightless read.
I would imagine the intended appeal of a project like this is to immerse the readers in a beloved media property, letting us literally see ourselves joining the action alongside the familiar characters. But even with a less simple narrative shape in place, that attempt can’t possibly succeed in a work that’s so hollow and patronizing about what we supposedly like in these books. A publisher’s impression of Animorphs may sound wacky, with its garish covers of teens turning into animals, but the novels are generally deadly earnest in a way these spinoffs have never managed. I just can’t suspend my disbelief far enough.
[Content warning for body horror, gun violence, and gore.]
I will forever respect Animorphs for tricking kids who are just really into animals to read a book series by going “Hey you, you daydream about what it’s like to be a dolphin or a bird or a wolf? Have I got a book for you!” and then slowly radicalizing them with 50+ books of “There are no winners in war. Whatever ‘victory’ you perceive comes at the cost of sacrificing your own morals and killing the part of you that is human. In the end you will resort to murder, torture and war crimes and the knowledge of what you have done will haunt you for as long as you live.”
I also respect the author for putting them all online for free
To clarify, the author herself didn’t upload the books, but she has expressed total approval of the people who did and thanked them for keeping the series circulating and the fanbase alive, especially since most of the books (of which there are 62) have been out of print for going on two decades now.
I will forever respect Animorphs for tricking kids who are just really into animals to read a book series by going “Hey you, you daydream about what it’s like to be a dolphin or a bird or a wolf? Have I got a book for you!” and then slowly radicalizing them with 50+ books of “There are no winners in war. Whatever ‘victory’ you perceive comes at the cost of sacrificing your own morals and killing the part of you that is human. In the end you will resort to murder, torture and war crimes and the knowledge of what you have done will haunt you for as long as you live.”
I also respect the author for putting them all online for free
Animorphs is a series in which the main children at one point have to permanently trap another child in the body of a rat and abandon him to die so he won’t expose their identities to genocidal space fascists and that’s really only the tenth or fifteenth most fucked up thing that happens.
But how does V3 expect them to reattach a hand so simply? Do the Yeerks have like… superglue for that sort of thing?
1) Visser Three has heard of a humans reattaching limbs with medicine, and severely underestimates how intensive and risky this is. Possibly he assumes it’s done by the amputee themselves with a first-aid kit.
-or-
2) Yeerks can simply smush different parts together, even if the parts come from different yeerks, and he assumes this is true of all creatures.
-or-
3) Visser Three doesn’t understand the difference between humans and machines, and assumes that removing a limb (or a head) is comparable to unplugging a computer monitor. Which honestly explains so much about him.
#petition to pay @church-of-crayak 2x whatever chris grine is making to have them make comics of the entire series instead#because this is 1000% cooler than any anigraphix so far (thejakeformerlyknownasprince)
If you acquired every animal you have ever touched on purpose in your entire life, what would be the coolest thing you could morph into?
Mine would probably be a nurse shark or a boa constrictor. The snake was from when a reptile specialist brought it to my middle school and let us pet it. The shark would be from a Pet The Shark exhibit at an aquarium.
Not gonna lie though, my favorite one (not the coolest, but definitely the most sentimental value) would be the tiny stingray I was friends with when I was 6.
i once touched a monkey at a zoo because it held its hand out (not a smart idea but i was like, 11 lol), also a black bear, and an elephant. i’d just be rachel i guess
uhhhhh ive not drawn anything in a while (its exam season here in the uk) so sorry about that! was feeling things about cassie’s arc throughout the series again (my poor little meow meow). very much inspired by @fluffermckitty ’s design for cassie because i think its really cute haha.
of course, immediately after he wants the cat dead because it could be an andalite bandit but sometimes when you’re a fandom you’ve gotta take things and run with ‘em (i think he also complimented jake’s tiger, but i forget which book it was in. an early one for sure)
