Please delete this is if being rude! I’m not sure how to word things properly and don’t want to sound like an ass! And really sorry if I come off as one!
To me personally I’m not really satisfied with phils Ender king arc. Don’t get me wrong! It seems really interesting! But…I’m not sure. My brain can’t latch onto it as easily
From what I’ve heard his acting is amazing! And it’s really interesting! But it doesn’t feel surprising, you know?
It feels like you knew what was going to happen, like oh yeah, Philza Minecraft gets possessed, neat. That it doesn’t have the plot twisting “oh fuck what now??” That most shows or books or other media would have
And it might be a problem server wide, to be honest.. it feels like knowing what’s going to happen takes away a lot of the emotions you feel when it happens. Because you were expecting it.
Fits current deadline arc I think negates this pretty well, you know there’s a deadline, there’s a threat of some kind. But you don’t know /what/ exactly is going to happen. It’s not fully spelled out yet
Or, I think another good way of negating this is tubbos death arc, where it was a spontaneous, spur of the moment type deal. So your like “oohhh holy hell, what??” That kind of shocked silence like end of an episode in the middle of the season with a cliff hanger type thing. (However, creation specifically saying that he was going to come back fucked up did sort of change things instead of letting it be seen subtly, which I would have preferred. But also a lot of people might not get that so it’s a ehh 50/50 kinda thing)
I think someone else who didn’t do this well was BadBoyHalo. I love his lore, I cried over it I will admit. But I knew what was going to happen, he was going to die, he was going to come back wrong, it took the whump out of it. Sort of. (Though he did an amazing job with the egg streams,,,sobs)
On another thing, I think my perception of the lore is different then yours because of what media I regularly enjoy. I usually watch tv shows, movies, or read books. I enjoy lore seeming like a tv show or movie, meaning I enjoy more subtle things that one might pick up from watching a tv show. (Background stuff, character movements and behavior)
And forgive me if I’m wrong, but you play and enjoy ttrpg right? I think those who play them enjoy more obvious roleplay lore, like where you can see everything like a board game, you can see the DM roleplaying character specific lore (unless you seperate..forgive me again I don’t do dnd type stuff lolzz) so stuff that’s more in your face, and sort of expected is your jam. You know?
It’s just an interesting psychology(?) thing I noticed in this fandom. I might be talking out of my ass but. Yeah.
I also think media comprehension might be a big part also. But I’d get into that at a different time. And culture, it’s a whole smodge podge of cool stuff that I fuckin LOVE it’s like. Grr grr grr grr grr and likekdkfkgkrkrkg this is why I’m planning on getting a doctorate in psychology and this stuff BECAUSE ITS SO COOL GRRR
Sorry for turning into a small mammal
(Idk if it’s important but I am a Tubbo main, so that might change things also, I didn’t want to add it because I know you have a. History. With us and I didn’t want to like change how you saw this but yeah. Uhm. Yeah. Anywayyy)
Idk how to end this
Uh
Ball. Singular. One single ball. Yes. That’s it
(about the end anon lmao dont worry about it. i am aware not every tubbling is terrible, there's just a LOUD part that grips onto toxic internet culture way more than others and i cant stand it)
onto the other topic…. eh, let's agree to disagree
see, phil and bad's lores (to me) are entertaining because you see it coming.as a phil viewer i can tell you he's been laying down the road, and leading us to conclusions for about half a year now! if we hadnt taken the hints and gotten to some conclusions, it would have been terrible on us. that is one way of doing narrative: constant foreshadowing of things to come. it reads very much as a greek or classic english tragedy: they tell you from the beginning "this is a sad story, the people you are about to meet will suffer and most of them will die", and you go into the story with the sword of damocles hanging on top of you, never knowing when it's going to drop. and im pretty sure if you ask bbh viewers, the answer would be similar!
both characters have been having their lore that just happened building since before purgatory, and both have been keeping and giving consistent subtle hints at what was going to happen/could happen since then. bad had his breakdown and loss of his purpose when the eggs were gone, the entire loss of his color and brightness and reverting to his more primal demon state, the allowing the vultures to hurt him was the start of this entire plot and that was back in october, if i remember correctly. you can trace a direct line from where his arc is today, passing the radiation damage, the cognitive issues he had, passing to the way he acted in purgatory to his breakdown in the server alone with curucucho hallucinations to his colourless state aaaall the way back to the eggs going missing. he’s been laying down a very clear road, and his watchers (and those of us keeping up with it not as closely as ghosties) were able to see that road, see where it was going and still had the hope “maybe it will end well, maybe it will be different”, but it wasn’t.
basically the same can be said about philza’s lore. as someone who has followed it close, there’s such a consistent character he’s been playing, and a narrative that he’s been building since the eggs were taken… the birdhouse, the hallucinations, the doubting what’s real and what’s not, isolating himself after it in an attempt of hiding, getting help from a protector, having that safety ripped away… hell, these past weeks we didn’t even notice his ramping greediness, because he played his character so well that we were all going “haha, bird man go brr” that it wasn’t until it became obvious and we looked back at the past weeks that we all began panicking at how obvious everything was. it was once again a road that had been laid masterfully, and we could see where it was going and we were being taken there
both phil and bad are those type of story tellers, the ones were you can see where you’re going clearly, and the ride to that conclusion (not even, because there’s more to go!) is what is exhilarating and enjoyable. because there’s a huge satisfaction in seeing the story bit being completed, the satisfaction of a narrative conclusion you knew was coming and wanted to see fulfilled…. along with the inherent tragedy of being a greek chorus trying to warn the protagonist of a tragedy they themselves are writing, but being unable to change the conclusion of i
this tension is also a super intense contrast to phil and bbh's general demeanour as silly guys, both are people who have dealt with horror, loss and tragedy, but manage to live through it by their nature and they both still manage to be sturdy sources of comfort and happiness for those around them. AND at the same time their self-isolating nature, and their tendency to take responsibility for everything around them and to put all the weight on their shoulders and never share their burdens with anyone is their ultimate undoing. and those are some of the best kind of characters, for me at least
on another hand, fit's narrative is very much similar to what both phil and bad have been doing (subtle build up, big lore-focused moments to amp up the narrative, self-isolation and not communicating to the others what's going on, leading to a very clear -to me at least- conclusion that is not on his control), so it's kinda wild to me that you're praising it while you're so critical of both phil's and bad's
while i enjoy the overarching narrative of tubbo's current lore, i am not a fan of a few of the choices he has done narratively…. not in the story perse, but how it bounces off of others (players and npcs alike), but that is just me. and also, it genuinely feels like watching an M. Night Shamalan movie, where he's trying to do as many plot twists as possible to try and keep the audience engaged through shock value and "who knows what might happen next! i dont, and you dont either!!", instead of laying down solid building blocks that keep people coming back for more the next stream because of you knowing something is going to go down, in a specific timeframe and with assumed consequences. tubbo is amazing at character RPing, he's great at emotional story beats and to bouncing dialog back and forth with people, but -TO ME- the way narrative appears out of nowhere, with no narrative build up to it is just not engaging. again, this is just how i see it, and why i personally just dont find myself watching his streams as invested as say, phil's, fit, bad's or bagi's
i will also say, kinda weird that you assumed i dont watch or enjoy other medias that you mentioned, cause like. i was a literature major, i love books, i love movies and shows, i am a gamer and have been consistently playing genshin mainly for the lore and story since 2020, i love anime and longform mangas, and im very much a theorist in an almost manic way when it comes to the media i consume (i am also an autistic with pattern recognition, and tend to predict foreshadowed plot twist/story bits in advance with a 9/10 accuracy)
and also, yeah your understanding of ttrpgs and how they work is kinda wild, because ttrpg narrative is NOT obvious lmao, you dont get how ttrpgs and that much is obvious ebcause literally nothing is on the board (hell, 80% of the time there is No Board To See), and 95% of shit that goes on is improv, with the other 5% being the DM clumsily herding cats (the players) back towards the main narrative. i've seen players walk over rather obvious story bits and miss them entirely, i've seen DMs have to re-write entire campaigns because the actions of the player were so out of what they expected that they shifted the narrative on its head (hell, i have been this dm). i fucking adore improv narrative and improvised storytelling, and, im sorry if this is not how you meant it, the way that you wrote about it feels incredibly condescending :/
i will also say, you said "from what i hear his acting is amazing" so, you havent watched… so how can you say that his lore isnt subtle? that there's no improvisation or off the moment scenes? there's a lot of his lore that after it's done he'll tell us "i had no idea that was coming, the admins threw that shit at me out of nowhere". bad has also talked about improvising parts of his lore in the past even if the big thing on itself is all planned, but i dont know that much about it, maybe ghosties can corroborate?
all in all, i genuinely have no idea what you were trying to get at with this ask. it feels like you're kinda trying to imply that because i enjoy phil's lore and you enjoy tubbo's, you have a better media comprehension than me? which is. kinda wild. like i said earlier, idk if that was your intention or not but your tone ("stuff that’s more in your face, and sort of expected is your jam. You know?") reads as extremely condescending or that you believe im stupid/dont have media comprehension based on the fact that i…. enjoy stories that have build-up that leads to a clear cut payoff?
idk man, this is for sure one hell of an ask to wake up to
Okay I know we make jokes about Hermes twerking it up on the raft while Ody is literally trying to survive. But can I point out that Hermes stayed with Ody up until Charybdis. All he had to do was deliver the bag and a warning, and then his job was done. He chose to stay with his great-grandson. He chose to keep him company. And that's just adorable.
friends
Something I gotta give props to Red Team/ Team Bolas is that even though they are doomed, they all are on the same page
After the first day, Etoiles mentioned and some people here said that it was kinda rough in the beginning for blue and green team, especially when picking their leaders.
Blue has Tubbo, Pierre, and Bad which are three people who would want to be leaders/know how to do things. And Tubbo and Bad having beef in the past probably didnt help.
Green team has Forever, Bagi, Etoiles, and Quackity who are again are people who want to be leaders/know how to do things. But also add Max and Antoine who can be silly, but also know how to do things, it probably got messy (keep in mind that i only heard from other ppl)
Then we have Red team, who knows they are fucked. They have Philza, Baghera, Cellbit, and Foolish who are great leaders, but they know that this is survival/PvP. If I remember right that they were kinda like “uh so Philza or Cellbit?” and was the first team to pick their name and leader.
Then after that, they all communicated and just let each other do their thing which I think really helped. Foolish mentioned this after with Tina that they didnt try to tell each other what to do or become actual leaders. They just were like “hey imma make some bread.” “Okay im in the ocean looking for ships” etc etc
Also Slime being a strategist and jumping into other peoples calls was so smart and playing to his element. And as soon as they realized that Carre was a god at PvP, they cheered him on and Cellbit helped communicate with Carre more clearly. Philza using his Minecraft knowledge and scouting for world generated boats and stuff to get more loot and telling everyone.
They all let each other do what they want and played to their strengths. It probably helped that it was a small team and in terms of lore, the characters had things conflicting with each other, but they still respected each other highly.
And when it came down to them fucking giving up, they were 100% on board and even wanted to change their skins and just roleplay it out. They stated over and over again, they didnt want to break up the team at all. They know they were fucked, but didn’t want anything to change.
I need to watch the other Povs to see the other teams, but goddamn. Team Bolas my beloveds. I hope they fucking lose it and get worse <3
Alright-y time for my thoughts on DAY 1 of the TWO-WEEK LONG PURGATORY EVENT
First off, while I did kinda assume things would become chaotic pretty quickly, I did NOT think it would be this quickly and I REALLY didn't think that PHIL'S team of all people would lose it first. Like it kinda makes sense with Jaiden, Foolish, and Slime there, but damn, everyone there just kinda went crazy like immediately huh??
I'm not at all surprised that BBH was the first one to start killing, and I'm not surprised that Tubbo got in on it too. (Nor that he wasn't that great at it most of the time lol)
And I gotta say it kinda SUCKED watching Etoiles and Fit, Phil's two closest allies thus far, just immediately kill him upon finding him. Like damn guys that was COLD.
And while I did like the overall event today, I do kinda hope it isn't like this the WHOLE time. I don't just wanna see them all immediately going for blood, I wanna see the problem-solvers solve the problems. Start trying to figure out who the Cursed Team is, what the deal with this place is, and what they can do to make sure that as many eggs as possible survive this. (I'm going to make a post about that pretty much right after this btw)
Overall I am REALLY excited to see where this event goes. I'm hoping it doesn't permanently tear apart all the teams and friendships we've seen built for about six months now. (I don't actually see that definitely happening, but let's be real, someone might go for that angst)
hat
In my head, when Phil joined the call today to check on his team, he had been watching them all and speaking through crows that perch on people's shoulders like giving advice for the enchantments for Cellbit, or directing people on what to do like Charlie and Jaiden, or was circling overhead like with Foolish and his duel with Etoiles.
Just checking in on his team, making sure they're alright, keeping them calm and encouraging them, saying he's proud and to let them know they're doing really well and to keep doing the thing and not to stress out
A crow always nearby, watching over his flock
it's still insane to me that phil logged on at midnight for him after a charity event, and spent a solid hour pulling up the streams of his team members and actually coaching them in mining strategies, and how echanting works, and checking foolish's pvp against etoile and giving him pointers, and the best ways of gathering resources and like.... fuck man, he's just so GOOD
and then after that, whenthey already had that mentality of at least getting all the resources, Carre logs in -who they were all sure wouldnt come back- and his mere rpesence motivates them SO MUCH that they managed to grind out a win by 3% in the last 30 seconds
LIKE. that's CRAZY.
bro I'm gonna explode
q!philza is always shocked when people build their houses next to him, move into his basement, trust his judgement and advice, trust him with their lives
MY BROTHER IN CHRIST
the new member's first memories of this server are gonna be how you gave them waypoints, then money so they could use them, then explained the bounty system, then swooped in like a guardian angel when one of the players was downed all by herself
AND EVERY NEW MEMBER IS TREATED SIMILAR BY YOU
ANYTIME ANYONE ON THE SERVER NEEDS HELP, YOU SWOOP IN, AVOCADO TOAST IN HAND
I just wanna shake q!philza by the shoulders and yell in his self-depreciating face "YOU ARE A GOOD PERSON AND YOU ARE LOVED!"
you STUPID egg.
The thing is, Phil is actually doing alright.
He knows he's trapped, knows most likely no one will come looking for him for a few days at least. He knows he was tricked with the stupidest setup that he should've seen from a mile away (did see and didn't care about the consequences, is never above throwing himself on a sword if it's to save his kids). He knows he has limited food aside from golden apples, that this tiny home was built specifically to taunt him in every way, that he won't be able to tell how much time has passed or if his kids are okay or if anyone is even looking for him.
He knows. And that's exactly why he's doing alright.
Because the thing about torture is that it's scientifically proven not to work. That once you know someone's goal is to break you, it becomes that much easier to resist breaking. He knows what the federation wants- they want him to break down, crying and begging to see his kids again, just so that they can make an offer he won't refuse, so they can use him.
Phil is not only smarter than that, but bigger than that.
He's spent eons with no one but his crows for company. Eons spent idling, no goal in mind except what he gives himself, finding new ways to keep himself occupied. This? This is nothing. Phil is strong. Phil is resilient. Phil is the Angel of Death.
Phil is laying curled up on his side in front of the door.
Moving would take energy. Energy he needs to conserve and use for planning, for keeping sane, for not breaking. He can do all of that from the ground, in the spot the walls are thinnest and he has the greatest chance of hearing any changes from the other side.
(He can't hear anything. Hasn't for the past however long. It's probably been less than an hour, right? He can't have been laying here for hours.)
Phil is listening. He's on his side, breathing evenly, not moving a muscle, because he's listening.
(Just the birds and his own breaths. They still come a little wet, a little hoarse.)
He knows what he's listening for. Fit's smooth baritone, Toby's post-pubescent rasp, Missa's soft worry, even Forever's booming shouts. He can picture them clearly in his mind- picture isn't the right word, but the point is he can practically hear them, sharp and real, right there on the other side of this wall.
They aren't. He knows that. But they will be.
(No one was before, those eons alone. He didn't listen then. He could fly then. Could create. Could explore. Had only himself to worry about besides.)
Phil has his eyes closed. He doesn't sleep, doesn't dream. He's listening.
He's listening.
He-
"Phil? Phil, are you in there? Phil!"
He can hear them!
Of course. Of course, all he had to do was wait, he can open his mouth and shout to them now, he...
Phil is...
Phil is not opening his mouth.
Why? Why isn't he shouting? Why isn't he moving?
"Phil...?"
He's here. He's right here. Please, come on, he's right here!
"Did you find something?"
"No... I don't think so, sorry."
HE'S RIGHT HERE! PHIL IS HERE, PLEASE, LISTEN! HE'S HERE!
"Let's move on."
Phil is jolting awake.
His heart is beating. His lungs are heaving. His eyes are open. His mouth too.
Ah. Better stop screaming.
Better breathe slower too.
He is. Phil is breathing slower. He is. He is.
(Phil is sobbing.)
Phil is doing alright.
(Phil is being stupid. Has been nothing but stupid for the past two weeks- the first when he left, the second when he didn't find his children faster.)
He's alright.
(He's useless.)
He's alright.
(He's weak.)
He's alright.
(He's breaking.)