The V3 Read-A-thon Redux

[Yonagoda]

I want to try this out! can you give me a kid please?

[Ruggahissy]

Jilly: Sloan Henriksen
Yona: Corbin Arlen
Rugga: Evan Angler

Brad write up tomorrow when I'm less tired.

[Jilly]

At age 4, he lost his mother in a terrorist attack on her workplace, Applied Technology Corporation. The only memories he has about the attack are that it happened when he was 4, he lost his mother in it, and a sketch of the perpetrator, who was of vaguely Eastern European descent.

?

He was taken on his first hunting trip at age 10. It was readily apparent that he had no problem killing animals; whether he'll have a problem killing humans remains to be seen, but it's likely that he won't. He started drum lessons at age 11. Again, it's highly doubtful that this will have a whole ton of bearing on the situation.

???

His friends (who, aside from Jimmy Trejo, don't appear to have boarded the plane) have called him a smartass. They're right. Sloan's the kind of person who would die flipping you the bird if he thought it would piss you off. Sloan's the kind of person who will make smartass remarks at people who would murder him brutally in a heartbeat.

His closest friend, who did not board the plane, said this about him: "Sloan's a good guy, but he's fucking disgusting. When most people say they want to kill a motherfucker, they mean they want to shoot them in the head. When Sloan says he wants to kill a motherfucker, he means he wants to slice all their limbs off, mutilate their face, cut their intestines out and leave them there to rot. Fortunately he doesn't get like this very often, hence the good guy comment."

????????????????????????????

Ok so with that profile jank out of the way, I’m gonna be honest. I kinda like Sloan...... at first. Heavy asterisk by that.

Is he good? No. Is he quality? No But is he worthwhile? No. But he is fun, in a kinda wack and early SOTF sillyness way.

That being said.

Sloan is a great lesson about reading the room, both from an in-character and out-of-character experience. His last thread, At a Loss, is even one of the historic reasons why death threads are (usually) private, or at least it’s why wandering into and disrupting very serious scenes is considered a HUGE faux pas.

Imagine you have a heartfelt but tragic scene set up, with a reunion cut very short by a gunman hiding in the (murder)bushes. Imagine you have it set up to where the shot character will die in the arms of another, and the gunman who also got fatally shot tries to crawl his way over to apologize for his massive mistake (not like that would change the situation but like, ya know, besides the point).

Then imagine some jabroni wanders in when the bodies haven’t even gotten cold, asking you to let him and his companion who may or may not exist by, in an open area where someone could, say, easily just go around them. Imagine the jabroni does everything in his power to more or less escalate the situation, a situation he himself knowingly wandered into. Imagine said jabroni dies, and his last two posts have out-of-characters notes about how, why yes, he just referenced Gurren Lagann and Unreal Tournament, how could you tell?

All I can say is OOF. Sloan’s wiki page says he got rolled so I have no clue how soon that happened in coorelation with him wandering into Jake Henkie and Jeff Thorne’s death thread, but like. Wow. I really am speechless at the audacity for someone to completely derail a scene like this. Like, I know it’s kind of a meme about how people used to just wander in to throw a grenade and leave, especially in V3 days, but I think this kind of situation is somehow worse. And it’s not a great look on Sloan as a character’s part either, like I was kinda into him and vibing along in his first thread but this last one made my opinion on him do a complete nosedive and soured the whole thing.

So, do I recommend Sloan? HARD NO. He has no real value other than as a case study on how important, important, important it is to read the mood of the room before going wandering into any threads, even if they’re technically open. Please don’t be a Sloan.

….Give me another kid, please.

[Ruggahissy]

Jilly: Raven Lawrence

[Yonagoda]

Oh boy, here we go!

[+] I love him so much and oh wow hes surprisingly good what a pure sweet boi you deserved so much better and-

Oh boy, here we go!

Hobbies: Film Making, concerts, making friends, school radio

That. I like that. It's normal, it's not a long paragraph explaining the causes of their interests, it's just a short list of four hobbies.

Appearance: Corbin's appearance has some... tonal issues. it's nowhere near the precise, almost clinical way we do appearances today, but it at least gives me an decent idea of what he looks like. There's a lot of, like "he's X, but not that much though, but he still isn't Y" which made it feel a little unsure. Examples include

"He isn't attractive in the way that jocks might be with their bulging muscles and lean features, but he isn't ugly,"

and

"his t-shirts are usually dark in color, but that's just because he likes the t-shirt, not necessarily a love for black"

Overall, it isn't the best, but it's also V3 and doesn't sound alarm bells in my head.

Biography: Corbin’s bio consists of like a dozen 3-sentence paragraphs. We know literally almost nothing about his childhood up until high school other than

Corbin grew up with a fairly normal life. His family is middle class, and his parents were both happily married. Corbin spent his childhood playing with friends and making home movies, albeit very bad ones.

Almost all of the rest of the biography was details about how films. What made him like them, filming contests, etc. The last two “paragraphs”, consisting of a 3 sentences dedicated to concerts and one sentence dedicated to him being in the school radio, were almost a breath of fresh air. I feel like it was almost like you took a full biography, and then ripped out only the important pieces of information about his hobbies, and then that’s where Corbin’s bio came from. What little we have isn’t bad, per se, I just want more. He seems like a really swell guy with a really nice, normal personality.

Advantages:

He is very creative, and is some-what well known throughout his school. He knows lots of technical equipment and he is very flexible when it comes to problems. He also has a lot of knowledge of not only computer animated special effects but home made special effects like smoke and explosions and gunshot wounds

I mean… It was good at first, but why would knowledge about special effects matter? I can sorta get, like, the technical equipment when it comes to weapons and maybe getting rid of the collars, but that part was a little unnecessary. It all fits into his personality though, and I guess he can… fake gunshot wounds? If he needs them?

Disadvantages:

Not very physically strong, he knows how to shoot a camera not a gun, is very trusting

Whoa Whoa Whoa ok. That’s the tonal issues flaring up again. “Knows how to shoot a camera not a gun” I mean like knowing how to shoot a camera might actually belong to the Advantages section, because of like, good aim and stuff. You wouldn't expect a normal high schooler to know how to shoot a gun, tbh. The other two are pretty good, though.

Kills: None. Killed by: Nathaniel… oh, Blood boy. That guy. I checked and he’s his last victim, not sure how it’ll go. At least some of my initial fears of him being fodder was gone because he seems to have made it decently far-7 threads. Ok, darn, that’ll take a while

He has one pregame on the beach consisting of the last post in a 5-post thread, where he meets two other students while to shoot footage for a film. It had potential, but then no one responded. Oof.

Island time! So the first thing that Corbin does on the Island, in a oneshot, is that he prays. Apparently, he wasn’t “loyal to” god before, but his instincts told him to go to the church and pray for his survival and for him to go back home with his friends. He’s genuinely distressed, and responded in a somewhat realistic way, turning to religion. I maybe would liked to have some elaboration on religion in his profile, but oh well.

Second thread: He became a little, like, paranoid and started jumping at sounds and he wants someone to talk to. He’s quite self-aware of his own paranoia and the fact that he’s, like, toting a gun around pointing forward, and I sorta like that. He’s got a clear, reasonable internal narration that sorta shows that he’s panicking. He meets Khrysta, who sees him toting an assault rifle and asks him if he’s “playing” and he replies that he’ll never play, all the while still holding the gun “just in case”. It’s a nice tough, the way that he’s not a total uwu innocent pacifist baby, he’s not too naive and he asks Khrysta right back if she’s planning to play and hoping that she’ll answer with no. The two decided to partner up. Krysta tells him that there are people around who are playing, and he tells Khrysta that he is willing to kill to protect the two of them. So he’s sorta toughening up. It’s a little jarring, but fits his current paranoia and his friendly, seemingly protective nature.

Flagg enters the thread and calls out for people, and the two were, like, surprisingly not unfriendly? Like instead of teaming up like the two did before they just got out of there. That’s kinda weird.

Third thread: the two walk straight into a thread where Bobby’s trying to shoot someone, and immediately walk out of the thread and avoid the conflict. Thank god for common sense.

Fourth thread: Corbin walks into another conflict, where Dan’s threatening Khrysta, and then takes off when he sees Corbs with his good ol’ assault rifle. He gains a new ally in the form of Mary, a pregnant girl (oh no!) who Khrysta saved from Dan apparently, and he’s glad that he managed to save someone. It’s nice, they’re happy, and then Paul Smith walks in. Khrysta starts talking to him while Corbin stands by, hand on the trigger, ready to shoot if things go wrong. I feel like he sorta designates himself as the protector of the group. He’s def going in a heroic route. Adwin Green then enters the scene, and sotf help says that she’s inactive and has been rolled to die here. She sees Corbin’s gun, assumes he’s going to attack him, and then immediately tries to kill him. Paul shoots her in the back, the group welcomes Paul as a new member, a guy named Matthew pops in and then pops out, next thread! This is actually pretty good. He’s, like, understandably shaken by the event.

The gang moves to the sea cliffs where they find Rebecca’s body. They are grossed out and Corbin shows a slight vengeful streak, but they decide to rest for now. The conversation, though, turns to escape as they discuss the collars. Paul leaves the group in the middle of the convo, getting immediately replaced by new guy Niel Sinclair right as Corbin’s about to mess with Rebeca’s collar. Soon, things go to shit as multiple people arrive in the thread and Khrysta was killed by Jodene. In understandable rage, Corbin loses his shit and fires at Jodene, who escapes the thread right after. He makes a speech about smashing cameras and breaking the collars as a group named SADD, picking up on the previous interrupted conversation. That’s nice.

What’s not nice is the fact that the group did start to randomly smash cameras, although Mary got separated. I was a little confused why their collars didn’t pop when they destroyed them, until later. They get into a chapel, find it occupied, get away, Dominica Shapiro joins the group, and they meet new friends until announcements.

Now, apparently, instead of announcing the no camera breaking rule, Danya decided to surprise them by detonating a collar for every camera destroyed, starting with their new friends! Yay! Honestly, that’s kinda weird, as someone in the the break-a-camera-your-collar-goes-boom era, but oh well

The area that they’re in got danger-zoned, they try to leave and- oh no! Blood boy!

The remains of the group fight and kill BB in a pretty good fight, although Corbin gets stabbed. With a poisoned ida. Rip, bro, you’ve been a nice read.

Corbin’s death is a semi-songpost, except It’s Neil singing American Pie to him as per request. Now, I’ve never heard the song, and it's a little weird, but it is like… a songpost out of narration where the song’s actually being played, so I can forgive that. He has a little memory of the good ol’ days, and it’s sad, it’s all sad, and I’m sad. He’s a good read, a sympathetic character, and overall a good person. His writing exceeded the expectations that I had when I started his profile. Shit, I wanna draw him now. I wanna draw everyone in his little group. I love them

10/10 got sad, would recommend. Although a little weird at bits, he’s a hidden gem of V3.

[Ruggahissy]

I have finally finished.

BRAD
RABD
DARB

Hello. I’m here to talk to you all about Brad. Let’s begin. 

[+] profile

I’ll get to the meat here at the jump since the profile does. Brad used to be a nerd but now he he’s tough because he went to jail for murder. Now let us back up and talk about the fucking circus that leads us to this point. 
Brad seems to have been nice, slightly bullied, easy going. His parents tell him to take some mail to a neighbor and he walks in, doesn’t see anyone, picks up a towel on the ground, drops it, puts the mail on a table and leaves. Sadly the old woman had just been strangled with the very same dish towel and when the cops come around they arrest him for murder because he was seen leaving the house and “his finger prints” were on the towel. Feels like a towel is a hard thing to get prints off.

A jury finds him guilty of murder because she was a beloved member of the community and Brad goes to jail. He spends three days in jail and joins EVERY SINGLE GANG IN JAIL, but then the real murderer comes forward and he’s released. And no, I wasn’t exaggerating for comic effect regarding joining every gang. 

  he became a small part of every single prison gang

 

I’ll do my best to break down this maddening web. Did you know that I’ve sat in to report on two actual murder trials in my life? Ask me about them sometime because they were wild. 

First, he goes from arrested to leaving jail in three months. The original draft of this was long and had a lot of screaming but essentially, in the state of California which is where this is, this process would have taken four months minimum. This is a very minor problem in the grand scheme of things though. 

Second, he’s not a flight risk so he should have been given bail and been walking around and going to school and such during the majority of those three months. Brad seems to have vanished into the court system after the arrest and it’s a plot point in pregame that no one knows what happened to him until he reappeared. 

Third, the trial itself is farce. Brad would not have been arrested on such flimsy bullshit let alone tried for it. The whole thing is based on the most circumstantial evidence on earth (he was seen leaving and his “finger prints” were on a dish towel). The real murderer was the woman’s son who wanted inheritance money which is the very first person you would look at and not some rando kid who has nothing to gain. Brad’s parents can even back up his story of being sent to give her mail. Most importantly, Brad never went upstairs where the body is, so none of his DNA or prints or anything would be in the room of the actual murder or on the body. If this woman was such a prominent figure that this bloodthirsty jury would convict anyone regardless of how obviously innocent they are, that’s a petition for change of venue. The profile says the DA “completely trashed Brad’s testimony,” and I’m not even sure what that means. Why did Brad’s lawyers let him testify if he sucks at it? You don’t have to do that. Also your lawyer is supposed to coach you for cross examination. If they ask something out of line or mistreat the witness your lawyer is supposed to object. You can’t just do whatever you want in court. Is his lawyer Lionel Hutz from The Simpsons? 

Yes, I know Ciel was 16 when he wrote this. But you know what? I was on my high school’s mock trial team when I was 15. I had to read a whole case docket on a murder trial and I had to argue a pretrial motion to dismiss evidence in front of an actual California judge and I was one year younger than Ciel when he wrote this SO I DON’T WANNA HEAR IT. YOU CAN GOOGLE.

So then he makes friends with his jail buddies, joins every gang, he makes friends with two inmates who teach him to fight and his personality completely changes. Three days. Now he’s rude and he swears and gets mad sometimes. 

Brad has been in jail, so he knows all about fighting dirty when the opportunity presents itself. He is also very good at making alliances and convincing people, a technique he picked up during not only his exploits in school, and intensively developed during his time in jail.

FFFfffffffff
Ok so I went into this like “You know what? Maybe this is like Heather Penderghast from V1 where her profile was crazy bullshit but it pretty much was never mentioned in game so I could totally ignore it like it never happened and she was great. Maybe it will be like that. 

[+] Pregame

It’s not like that. 
So first he ponders a bit about his jail time, which is not encouraging. and then he goes to the school gym and meets with possibly one of my least favorite kids I have ever encountered in a pregame, Troy. Troy is horrible. I hope everyone is ready for some rape jokes (from both Troy and Brad) and some uncomfortable racial stereotyping.

Troy actually gained quite a bit of respect for Brad Kavanagh because of that jail time, even though it turned out Brad was innocent. Troy honestly believed that spending time in "tha joint" was a surefire way of earning gangsta "cred," and thankfully, it appeared that Brad took it like a man (whether he took it up like a man was beyond him) and didn't become a prison Aryan National. 
….. For a gangsta, gay sex was something that happened in prison to people who just couldn't take the heat.

Didn’t you hear, Troy? He was a part of every gang. The Latin Kings and the Aryans. The Crips and the Bloods. MS13 and the skinheads. 

Now, as Brad listen to Troy, he noticed how he was both very similar and very different to the 'gangstas'. Troy had the loud, black voice that many of the black gangsta's were known for, but.... Brad wasn't too sure. Maybe it was because HE KNEW what Troy was like before he turned gangsta.
Troy was the kind of person who no one would ever expect to turn 'street'. Yet it happened. Brad was as surprised as anyone else could have been. Troy was a full-fledged black gangster now.

 

STOP SAYING GANGSTA 
While in the gym they see Kara walking away from her boyfriend ummm….. Gabe? This is important because before he went to jail Brad and Kara fucked but then he disappeared to jail and no one knew what happened, so Kara thought he ghosted her and got really upset. When he shows back up she’s still mad about it, but has moved on to Gabe. 
This is all relevant for the next thread which is the bowling thread. This thread is long and a mess and I believe about 12 different characters go in and out, some never interacting with others. The important bit for us is that Troy and Brad go to the bowling alley and see Kara and her boyfriend Gabe, who are there with Kara’s cousin…..uh oh…um….Cindy? and Steve who is the boyfriend of Serenity Halos. Whatsherface and Steve go on a drive. Kara walks outside to have beef with some girl. While Kara is outside, Brad decides this is a good time to tell Gabe that he fucked his girlfriend in the most weasel-y, cowardly way possible. Why would he do this, you may ask? Why would he do this, Troy, his gangsta urban friend, asks? Good question, reader and Troy. We’ll find out in a second. 

As blunt and serious as he could manage. "Kara's slept with other men, Gabe.”

 

We need to break this down too. Slept with other MEN? You only know she slept with you, one man, singular. Kara walks back inside and rightly thinks Brad is making it sound like she fucked the football team. Also, there’s no time qualifier on that, making it sound like she is having sex with other men PLURAL right now when she is in a relationship. The truth is she had sex with Brad one time before she dated Gabe. Why even tell him this? 

"You want to know where I've got that info, huh? Can't just trust my word for it? I'm practically being the bravest guy in here to come and tell Gabe this”

 

So now he’s so brave he’s not willing to tell Gabe it was him and this is all horseshit. He’s also super brave by waiting until Kara went outside to do this. Nice! I hate it! When pressed he admits that she is not sleeping with multiple guys and says she fucked him, so maybe her standards are low enough to fuck anyone. Doin’ great, buddy! 

He still has feelings for Kara and thinks things should be out in the open but that makes no sense if you think for more than 5 seconds because as soon as you tell her boyfriend that, he's gonna probably not believe you and she will be ultra pissed so what have you accomplished? You’ll find out, gentle reader. 

"Whatever I'm telling Gabe is the truth, since you have to be the deceitful one and, from the looks of things lye to him completely. THIRDLY, you should have seen this day coming for awhile. He was going to find out sooner or later! I was all peachy about keeping this shit from him, but you certainly did a good job of changing my mind!”

 

He’s trying to ruin her relationship because he didn’t like that she was cold to him and ignoring him. This is him punishing her for that. Gabe thinks about how he can use this mess to get guilt sex out of Kara while thinking about how he is the real victim in all this, so I hope a meteor crashes into this bowling alley and kills everyone. Josh comes up and calls Kara a whore, Gabe punches him in the fucking face and Kara throws a bowling ball at Brad’s head, spraining her wrist. Sadly, the bowling ball hits him in the chest, but Brad is angry so he grabs Kara and throws her on the ground.

As he pushes her to the ground he says: 

"You know that bedtime story I just told Gabe? The one staring me and you? Yeah. EVERYONE'S GOING TO KNOW. Everyone. And not only will that give me some street cred and let Gabe back on the market to girls who will actually give a damn about him instead of his title... the best part about it is that everyone's going to know what a deceptful little bitch that you are. Heh... I hope you're happy. I'm going to make you regret EVER hitting me with that bowling ball.”

. 

So he’s going to tell everyone that they had sex to slut shame her while increasing his own social standing. Our hero? The owner of the establishment has called the police who show up to arrest everyone except Josh and mercifully the thread ends. 

We take a side detour to another thread where Brad is entering an illegal teen fight club in the basement of a knock-off Hooters with the hope of eventually winning $200. He loses. Nothing much of note happens. 

Back in the main timeline, Brad has been released by the cops. Bowling was after school sometime in the evening, it’s probably pretty late at night now that he’s been released. I guess you better turn in for the night, huh Brad? 

Kara is brought home from the police station and her crazy parents nail her window shut. Brad decides to LOOK UP HER ADDRESS IN THE PHONE BOOK AND GO TO HER HOUSE RIGHT NOW TO TALK TO HER LIKE A STALKING DICKHEAD. 

“I know there has to be some good inside of her. I know that she must like me, if only a little. That’s all I want, I guess….jesus christ. I’m so stubborn.” 

SHE DOESN’T WANT TO TALK TO YOU. GO AWAY. 
The thread ends with him knocking on her door so I will head canon that she saw him outside and called the police who hauled him back to the station. I am gonna state my hot take and say “but she HAS to like me!” is a bad reason for going to see someone who is really mad at you. Especially given that he tried to fuck up her relationship

At the end of pregame, I despise Brad. I find him to be, at present, more unpleasant than some of the more cartoony unpleasant people because his mentality is familiar. He’s a nice guy. Kara should like him back because he likes her and he’s nice. I’m gonna go to her house after we’ve all been bailed out of jail to talk to her even though the last time I saw her I shoved her to the ground and told her I was gonna tell everyone we fucked. Why doesn’t she like me?

He is selfish and vindictive and cowardly and his backstory of being in jail seems like it’s only there to make him at once tough but sympathetic and he is neither. I resent the narrative trying to cheat and he has yet to display any redeeming qualities. 

[+] Island

Ok. The island.

The first thing I am struck by is that I went back to the profile to find the first island thread and am blown off my chair to see fucking chess in the hobbies and interests. WHEN? WHEN DID YOU PLAY CHESS? IN PRISON? Just kidding, its to mark him as a smelly nerd pre-prison.   

I’m getting side tracked.  We start in Archangel which is a very cool thread name and Brad has no starting tag. This is the very first thing he says: 



“…a hockey mask?" "..." "..A hockey mask?”  Brad Kavanagh (B14) repeated that single, solumn name in his mind

  

Is “hockey mask” a name? Who knows? Write me in and tell me.  We come upon a girl named Terrie, who I liked, and a boy named Gabriel who uh….tells Brad he’s killed a man and outs Terrie’s hiding spot. Brad smirks and says he is not afraid of this giant murderer and also thinks that he doesn’t care a ton if he dies so ???? Not gonna dwell here on non Brad people but Terrie is quite good. I’ve been informed Gabriel is just Garry Dodd from V2 wearing Groucho Marx Halloween glasses.  

Another kid walks up and asks to team up. Gabriel removes the bloody heart of his victim and uh….brandishes it….sure.  Brad reassures Terrie that he means no harm and tries to calm her and is appropriately confused and disturbed that Gabriel killed and de-hearted someone Brad knew casually. Gabriel slashes at them and Brad shields Terrie, taking a slash to the chest. It's a little funny that Brad notices he has a limp and kicks Gabriel right in his injured knee, bringing him down. Having successfully stopped the threat, Adam Dodd suddenly shows up and grabs him and Terrie, flinging them backwards into the bushes to fight this foe, who has already been stopped.  

Brad sees Adam ready to take on Gabriel’s sword with his light stick thing and just kind of wishes him luck and bails. It says he goes to follow Terrie, but there’s not a lot of info here on why he is doing what he is doing. Feels kind of shitty to abandon Adam to someone with a weapon, but perhaps he’s more concerned about Terrie? I don’t know. Maybe we will find out.  

How the Stars Have Fallen 

Brad was different from many people though. The fear, the apprehension was he felt the moment he woke up on this island... was the same fear and apprehension he felt when he was incarcerated.

  Brad has mentioned being in jail a few times thus far in the game. My big problem with the mentions is that they seem to be attempting to be short hand to communicate to the reader that Brad is TOUGH and seasoned. But he doesn’t act that way and we’ve never seen him be like that so it feels unearned. What I am being told and what I am reading do not match up. Stop trying to convince me he is tough, he’s not.  

Simon shows up to ask to band together and reveals that Adam threw Gabriel off a cliff. Both Simon and Terrie feel guilty about leaving Adam behind, but Brad isn’t concerned. Terrie bandages up Brad and tells the others she has a gun. Brad rallies the troops  

" I think that I, out of everyone else, can find it the easiest to believe that we have the chances to rise up. I also believe that just about anyone, no matter who it is, can become a monster who would kill all of his or her friends just to survive... But we can band together. Just because there are freaks like Gabriel who take joy in this type of shit doesn't mean that everyone else is as willing. There have to be some rational kids who really believe that there is a way to win without so much bloodshed. There has to be a way we can overcome this shit. There has to be. Nothing is ever perfect. There are always some holes in the greatest of quilts, whether they be small ones or very noticeable ones."

 

He also has a line about how this is the first group of kids that could do everything right and get out. Why? It’s not like they kidnapped an engineering school or an army boot camp or a bunch of gang criminals.  This section sits very weirdly with me. I feel like Ciel knew he’d be part of the escape and this is trying to set up for that, but it also feels very out of nowhere. Brad’s never been a big leader and he just woke up a few minutes ago. 

Simon comforts Terrie about her Adam guilt (which again, Brad doesn’t notice I guess?) and both the other kids agree to Brad’s plan. Great, we’re on a roll.  He gives more speech about how they need a lot of kids to join them, not just the easy marks, but the kids who think they have to play. Also he keeps laughing during this second speech and it’s very weird.  Suddenly two boys named Christian and Will, who I am deciding are handcuffed together chained heat-style because they are both written by Shiola, come out of the bushes and tell the group they have been hunting Gabriel because he killed their friend and they invite themselves to their escape group.  Simon is suspicious and Terrie is happy they want to join but additionally suspect because these two people were trying to hunt down and kill another student on like, day one? This is a good point. Good point, Terrie. She tells them they can join, but if they want to hunt Gabriel they can do it on their own, adding that it’s a pointless endeavor that won’t bring their friend back. Can we make Terrie in charge? Brad is a lot more wishy-washy, saying he doesn’t love the idea of them seeking a revenge murder and then points them in the direction they last saw Gabriel.  : /  Not a very firm stance from Brad. He tells them they’ll be at the chapel and the group moves out.  

LOST  

Brad gets them lost in the forest. Also he thinks about how he’s not really a natural leader, which I agree with. But then thinks about how his team sucks, which doesn’t seem true and kind of unpleasant. Terrie patched you up, dude. Terrie and Simon are too tired and ask to stop for the night. They talk a bit and Brad asks if they have allies they can count on. I learn that Terrie is friends with Elizabeth Priestly and the awesome Khrysta. Brad offers Steve and TROY. Troy : I  Enough of that talking bullshit. Will and Christian show up, saying they know the way to the chapel. Then Blood Boy appears and shoots at Brad’s stomach three times in a semi-god mody way, but Brad is instead hit once in the arm. Terrie yells into the dark that they are not violent, but Blood Boy is not dissuaded and shoots at her, grazing her twice.  Brad takes Terrie’s gun and shoots at him, asking forgiveness from God and crossing himself which is…uh….weird. He’s never been religious prior. He shoots twice but hits either Will or Christian, I don’t remember. It is here that he lays out that he is not really a tough dude. He never wanted to hurt anyone and he feels terrible that his shots hit someone. Better. Improvement.  A post of very good character work from Terrie happens and Ianto wanders in looking for Serenity and is happy to see Terrie. Brad starts to crumble, questioning if the morning announcements are accurate (Terrie says she believes they are as Danya has been truthful in the past and she says she doesn’t think he has a reason to lie) and berating himself as a failure. He begins to cry. The stress and the sight of shot Christian (I think) as well as his injuries compile and he faints.

Simon runs off and Terrie is left to deal with three injured people: Brad, Christian and Serenity, as well as herself, and thinks unkindly about Simon running off. Well, Dr. Terrie starts disinfecting and bandaging as quickly as she can.  Some unrelated bullshit happens next with Kristin which I won’t go in to because Brad is out cold but Viktor accidentally kills her and is kind of retconned into being a bad guy. I wrote a Kristin writeup for the OG V3 RAT so go look at that.  Brad has a dream that he’s back in prison talking to his prison buddy about how he had a crazzzzyyy dream about SOTF. WAS PRISON THE GOOD TIMES? IS THAT WHAT YOU ARE WISHING YOU WERE BACK TO? Johnny tells him he’s an idiot and that this is a dream. Dream Johnny says that this is a hallucination because he can’t cope with his terrible real situation, which is how dreams go, amirite? What was accomplished by this dream detour? Nothing much except that he feels bad about shooting that guy on accident. Usually when we have a dream sequence the sequence is supposed to give us additional information about the character but we don’t really learn anything here since Brad just recaps what happened to dream prison friend. It doesn’t have atmosphere either which is the other function of a dream: to provide the mood. 

Brad wakes up to Viktor saying he thought Kristin meant them harm and that’s why he shot her, begging them not to hurt him. Brad tells the kid that she probably didn’t mean them harm and lightly chastises him before ordering everyone to move out.  Will agrees to let Viktor join them only to elbow him in the face so he can take his weapon in a bit of weapon cannibalism since both are Oliver kids.  

18 and Life  

We open up on Brad thinking about how funny it is they are on an island with a jailhouse and they are currently in the jailhouse. Because he went to jail, if you forgot. Dude, I’m begging you. Stop talking about jail. Just go one thread without mentioning it.  He thinks about how his time in the joint has made him strong and he can do this. Proof of which is he’s gone two days without killing someone. But then he loses sight of his friends and says out loud that he’s scared. Again, I can gel with this. He is not a hardened badass. He’s a scared teddy bear pretending to be a badass. Bless, Terrie is still with him and has been so busy patching up others she has ignored her own wounds. She suggests they make sure the jailhouse is clear before setting up for the night. Good idea, Terrie!  Writing props to Ciel for describing Brad being hit with “A dumbbell of guilt falling from the sky” when he remembers he dragged Terrie with him, because I like that description. Announcements play and he learns his HOMIE Troy was killed by not Gary and his um…girl….he screamed at…was killed by Blood Boy. Brad collapses in a sobbing fit while Serenity and her friend also walk up. Terrie gives a speech to shore their hopes, saying they need to keep going because that is what their friends would want before heading in first with her gun to check out the jail.   Terrie is their leader, right?  

"For the past forty-two hours he had riding on the hopes of finding Troy, Kara, and a bunch of other people...”  

It’s funny because the last time Brad ever saw Kara in canon she was trying to throw a bowling ball at his head and then he pushed her to the ground and screamed horrible things at her. Brad suddenly remembers she hates him a post later. Also he’s moping and looks up to realize Terrie has gone into the jail while he’s been moping to no one, which is great.  Everyone goes in and Brad starts breaking down over the day’s events. He thinks about the time HIS SISTER TRIED TO HANG HERSELF? This is the first time we have ever ever heard about the sister (name Victoria : /) outside of a single mention in the profile. You made me listen to your jail adventures every thread for 7 threads but you couldn’t spare a paragraph about the time your sister tried to hang herself? 

"Brad had tried to encourage her to look at the bright side, telling her about all the things that were good about life (although most of these were lies that one would hear during an after-school special about drugs and teen suicide)”  

.......okay (?) 

“Sure she had friends, but they weren’t as close to her as her brother was. With no one like Brad to lean against during the hard times, what would be the point in living?” 

Urge to kill rising. I don’t know how to explain my exasperation with this. It’s very strange that he told his sister that life was worth living even though apparently he said those were lies. It’s also weird that he says that without him life is not worth living. Let’s be charitable and say that as a teen boy he is not so articulate and is just concerned that without his support his sister may try to kill herself again and that’s his big motivation for living.  However, the fact that we are just now hearing about this four threads into the game proper and it was never brought up in pregame feels like it was thrown in kind of haphazardly. She’s mentioned once in the profile to say she exists and once in pregame because Brad wants to help with her college tuition by being in the illegal fight club. It reads like an attempt to make him more sympathetic but it comes so out of nowhere. She’s not mentioned again until the epilogue when we learn she stabbed a classmate which is a whole ‘nother ball of WTF that I guess we’ll deal with at the end.  

Brad decides to pick up Serenity, saying he feels like an action star, but then falters when he realizes how heavy a human person is. It’s another nice touch of him pretending to be tough but actually being a dork without much forethought, but it also reads weirdly silly when everyone else is so serious.  

SADIST  

They enter the mess hall with Brad carrying Serenity and Terrie right behind. She proposes barricading the windows and doors before resting. Sadly Brad didn’t hear that because he was staring at her and thinking about how cute she is. Oops. Terrie is weirded out that he’s just staring at her. But then Quincy walks up and asks for shelter. A student named Bobby comes up and shoots at Quincy. I have no idea if this was justified or not. Terrie tells Brad to grab Serenity and book it into the kitchen. Brad says it’s a dead end and Terrie points out that it is ridiculous that a kitchen would only have one entrance and exit for fire safety reasons, but here we are.  Serenity is coming to and Terrie and Brad discuss which of them should go out to face the attacker. Terrie reasons it should be her since she has the gun but Brad volunteers….but also says they should keep the gun. I don’t think that’s smart and neither does Terrie, but we’re not in charge. Ilanto (yaaaaaay) from the last thread comes in late and shoots at Bobby to give the other kids cover. Brad tackles Bobby and they FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT.

Brad does a fakeout that I hate where the post pretends he’s been shot in the head, complete with red text death tag. Yeah, you really fooled me, I thought was dead : / . He also says here that he was in jail for “months” when the profile clearly says “three days” and I’m furious. WHICH ONE IS IT? He then tells us that that’s how it WOULD HAVE GONE if he hadn’t changed during his time on the island (it’s been five days)  

However, the thing that Bobby didn't realize was that Brad was a much tougher fucker than the Brad Kavanagh from Highland Beach. These two Brads were completely different from each other. This Brad, it seemed, didn't like the fact that there was a gun currently pointed out at the center of his head and showed his dissatisfaction with a loud snarl.  "Go to hell!"

  

This reads as lame to me because to me he seems pretty much like pregame Brad. Basically, I don’t believe you, Brad. You’re trying to tell me to believe things again.  Meanwhile…. OH FUCK DRAMA. Serenity is badly hurt and asks Terrie to mercy kill her. Serenity is in pain and says that she is slowing them down by forcing them to lug her around. Terrie secretly agrees with this assessment, but still won’t kill her. Terrie seriously considers the pros and cons here and I like that a lot.  Brad and Bobby fight some more.  BACK TO THE GIRLS WHO I AM LEGIT INTERESTED IN. Serenity tries to convince Terrie she is ready and ok with dying while also blaming herself for Kara and Kristen’s death, reasoning if she wasn’t injured dead weight she could have helped.  Bobby just kind of leaves and I’m fine with it. Steve comes in who I believe is Serenity’s boyfriend. They start to talk and then a weirdo named Heath and Ilanto show up. Brad is mildly annoyed by the weirdo and then LAYS into Ilanto for showing up late. Dude, I don’t think he stopped at the 7-11 or something.  Serenity is thrilled to see Steve and Ilanto and with a more capable writer this could be very dramatic but Mitsuko doesn’t have the chops and her pleas for death come off as flat and like she’s telling them she really needs them to order lunch. Steve shoots her and the death isn’t great. Brad hears the gunshot and is annoyed. He says “Oy vey” for like the fourth time (why? He’s not Jewish? He crossed himself earlier) and tells Heath “The things I do for love.” WHY ARE YOU NOT MORE WORRIED, MAN? Even the rattail weirdo is more worried. That kid’s freaking out.  Suddenly some girl named Margaret rolls up saying that Brad is one of the only people at school she cares about. What?! Who are you? I’ve read * all * Brad and I’ve never heard of you!  Brad flips out once he realizes Serenity is dead. He acknowledges that this was a mercy kill done because Serenity was in pain and requested the person she loved most to do it but is still furious. His anger at Steve suggests that he was like, possessive of Serenity, which is strange because they never really talked. He also thinks that Steve isn’t emoting properly about the death and sobbing openly. It’s all sort of selfish, like Serenity was his responsibility and he wouldn’t consider that maybe some people react with shock. Then he berates himself for awhile. Terrie and Ilanto walk past him to escape the danger zone they are now in and he cries and begs them not to leave him alone.  

He picked up his bag and with a sniffle he ran after them, Ianto's gun in tow. "No, wait guys, WAIT! Don't leave me here!"

 

Hey, didn’t he just say two pages ago during the Bobby fight that he was a totally different Brad now who had been hardened by his island experience? Also where did his new best friend I’ve never heard of go? Is V3 trying to gaslight me?  


SMASHING PUMPKINS SONG TITLE THREAD NAME 

Brad has lost sight of his companions and finds a couch in a structure at the airfield. Bad writing: “Brad couldn’t remember a time where he wasn’t this tired.” That means he is always tired even before the island.  Good writing: The narrative at this point treats him a bit like the doofus he is and when he announces he’s found a couch it says that he does that “as if he had actually accomplished something.” I just wish this was consistent.  His new best friend who has always been there, Margaret, knocks on the door, causing him to roll off the couch and break his nose. Again, more consistent with the Brad I think is the true Brad. He asks who the fuck is at the door and only vaguely recognizes her. BUT MARGRET TOLD ME YOU WERE ONE OF THE ONLY PEOPLE SHE CARES ABOUT. I THOUGHT YOU WERE BEST FRIENDS. Don’t do this to me, V3.  Margaret explains that they are not friends but that she cares deeply about him, from afar, like a weirdo, because he’s been the victim of an unjust criminal system. But you know, never talked to him before.  In comes Heath from the last thread who has not great writing but is still fairly likable, and Petra. Petra’s writing is lovely and she is written like a real human, so obviously I won’t get to keep her.  Brad tells Margaret that Serenity and he barely knew each other and were not friends. Well, that makes the weird way you reacted to Steve super off putting. He also thinks about how he avoided smelly dirty weirdo Margaret at school and how he wants to slam the door on her face now. All hilarious, but makes him kind of an ass.  Terrie, Petra, Ilanto and Heath go into the hangar. I hate Margaret. I have many reasons. This is not a Margaret write up.  

Hey, it’s me again. I took a year long break from this but now I’m locked in my house due to global pandemic, so of course I turn to Brad to life my spirits. Let’s continue.

SHIAWASE DESU

Google says this means “I’m happy” in Japanese, you filthy weebs.

The very first thing that hits my stupid face is an OOC note that Ciel is taking over Terrie. Terrie, who I love. Who was getting them through this.

She’s scared and incompetent now.

“One thing was for certain: Terrie could never fire her Beretta. She could try to shoot Leo. For all the life in her she could try, but it would never work out. Her hand began to shake violently, her index finger rubbing against the trigger.
“

She has also killed Leo and Boxer is trying to get her when BRAD shows up. Yaaaaay. Anyway, they just leave. Next scene.

#1 New Paths

Brad wistfully wishes Kara were with him despite the last time they saw each other resulting in both of their apprehension by police. Ianto is back with them and they see Sean for a second before he runs off. Brad runs after him, concerned. I suspect this is plot set up for the escape.

#5
This is a single post consisting of seven sentences where Terrie asks Brad if there’s any hope for them. He says he doesn’t know.

Weird given she gave an entire pro-hope pep talk several threads back. What was the point of this? Your guess is as good as mine.

#6

Terrie and Brad stumble upon the escape group. Ianta got there on his own. How’d they get there? Question for the ages.

“Terrie seemed to be in much higher spirits. “

“Terrie meanwhile seemed in high spirits (which contradicted her earlier attitude). “

Same post. I get it, high spirits. The thread is a cluster and most of the kids aren’t interacting with Brad so skipping most of them. Brad and Terrie get their collars off and Ianto is happy to see them.

Adam Dodd monologues for five years. Brad has a big hero speech about how Dodd is being a condescending asshole and that they need to work together as equals to get out of here. Hi, I don’t think we’ve met before. Is this still Brad?

Darnell makes salient points about Dodd’s monologue being bullshit despite my suspicions this is just Kyle wanting to shoot Adam. TIME GOES WONKY. Terrorists show up and surround the armory. Terrie tells Brad they have to go out fighting and Brad says they should just stay put. What’s going on with their personalities? I thought you told me she could never fire her gun on purpose when you took over? Terrie runs out to face the terrorists and Brad runs after her after pretending that her idea was his even though he just said they should stay before she ran off.

“Okay, decision time. Should Brad stay here with the rest or should he go after Terrie?

His chest went tight at the thought of Terrie... and he knew what was going to do.

"Guys... I think we should run, get organized and kill them all... This is the worst place to stay!"
“

Live and Let Die
Terrie and Brad make it to the beach and she hugs him. He regrets ever being interested in Kara. I roll my eyes. I have a lot of Terrie stuff to say since Brad and Terrie now share posts but I guess it’s not the Terrie writeup. I’ll just say she says a lot of stuff that gels with what is in her profile but not with what I’ve observed of her on the island. So I guess Ciel took a quick read over the profile before writing this. Brad compares how Terrie feels the island stronger to how he feels jail made him stronger. DON’T MENTION JAIL, I’D FORGOTTEN. He and Terrie flirt I guess and she kisses him which is weird because she mostly seemed kind of exasperated by him in the past and I never picked up on vibes. Things go to hell by the boats and suddenly Brad can’t shoot at people. I don’t know what to say about him anymore.

[+] EPILOGUEAAHHHHH

Brad walks in drunk as fuck and Maxie takes the bottle. He complains that it “cost him a lot of cash” though Google tells me you can buy a whole bottle for $20. Anyway, he’s an alcoholic now. And a for real tough guy. Like, really this time.

"I can fucking chill when it's winter," Brad retorted, then he added. "It's the middle of May."

You’re in Australia which means that yes, it’s nearly winter if it’s currently May???? Brad calls his mom from a bar pretending to be with the electric company, but then says he’s taking a census. Apparently this doesn’t seem suspect? She does freakout when he asks about the number of people in the home and then volunteers that his sister STABBED HER CLASSMATE AND THEN KILLED HERSELF. Why? There are no answers. He then steals a car and fucking totals it. Before he bites it, he thinks that perhaps he is a selfish asshole as Maxie had said. Yes, you are. But I don’t know if we’re meant to agree.

We then get an extended flashback to his time in prison before the game. Are you fucking kidding me? Why can’t you let this dumb prison subplot go? It makes me enjoy the character less every time it shows up.

Brad wakes up and apparently that high speed collision only gave him a broken rib and twisted ankle. Praise Jesus. A woman and her wife found him and even though he’s been unconscious for several days, they did not take him to a hospital! It becomes increasingly clear that we’ve entered into a full recreation of Misery as this older woman won’t take him to town and shames him for his potty mouth. The lady’s daughter comes up to pester Brad and I thought it was really cute until I learned she was supposed to be 15. She sounds 11. I'm highly disturbed.

Also they grow vegetables in their toilet I guess

“Lotti shrugged again, "Umm, you didn't know we lived on a farm? Well not a farm, we mostly grow vegetables in the outhouse.”

Time passes and Brad is still on the Misery farm doing manual labor. How long has he been a farm slave? Weeks? Months? Years? He can’t tell and neither can I. He catches their girl watching Survival of the Fittest one night. He says who he is and this little girl knows all about his relationship to the class president. What the fuck is happening?

“Brad found a painful throb in his heart. A… cold-blooded killer? Was that what they thought…?

"Besides," Lotti added. "You're way too, um, cold to be him. Brad was always so emotional and thoughtful, like put other people before himself – " She stopped. "No offense."
“

"But you can't be Brad! He was the handsomest greatest most heroic big dick ever!"

The kid then becomes a mouth piece for the writer, as far as I can tell, saying that Brad can’t think of the escape as a success and instead is negative and focuses on his failures to push people away. You know, like all children do. She then has him watch all his SOTF footage to see that he was a good, kind, brave person after all. And he watches and he agrees! Wow! What a swell guy! Not a tramautizing thing at all! Also Lottie says these lesbians who have trapped Brad on their farm aren't her parents and no one asks followup questions.

Eventually he goes back to STAR and tells them he's moving to the farm forever even though they say that's super dangerous for both those people and the STAR folks

Grossi: Ok but you realize that we could use your help here and also by leaving you are putting all of us at risk --
Brad: That sounds like a you problem

Wow. Truly he’s the most selfless.

Brad ends, having refused to help STAR and also putting everyone at risk including the Misery farm lesbians.

THE END.

FINAL THOUGHTS: This character seems to have been missed as one of the trademark crazy ones back in the day, but it is only because his insanity is subtle. The narrative is constantly pushing this idea that Brad is all kinds of things. He’s a wronged victim, he’s actually a badass from his jail time (joining every single gang), he’s in love with Serentiy despite talking to her twice. I’ll say I started to forget how much I was frustrated going into the escape threads because he becomes so flat that there is nothing objectionable. But it comes back so strongly in the epilogue. The epilogue goes as far as to have other characters tell him that, no, he is good and kind. But all the evidence I’ve seen shows him to be a selfish jerk. I like the parts of the game where he acts like a crybaby and a doofus, because that feels truer to who he is. But he’s so god damn invested in this awful nonsense prison storyline that it makes the character concept almost unsalvageable because he insists on going back to it over and over. His last act is one of extreme selfishness and it’s somehow not played that way? This is a case of the writer trying to push a narrative of a kid where his actions don’t match up and that makes me mad. He’s not as bad as some of the way bonkers characters, but I think that almost makes him worse? He’s not even fun. I hope he never leaves his poop vegetable slave farm.

[Brackie]

if you're a james/nope/trash kid in v3-4 that usually means that you'll be in a thread and not posted with for several months before wandering into your death, so let's see if hayden continues the pattern:

profile
hayden's profile paints him as a trash loser who plays too much online gaming and who still gets his hair cut at his mom's hairdresser, to which i say most of us can relate at points. it's a good profile for v3, no complaints here. he also has no character conclusion because it was during that transition point of v3 where profiles were just t-shirt gunned into v3 like many a shirt sailing towards maude flanders so who has time for those

pregame
this also means he was made during the game and as such has no pregame! moving on!

v3
hayden is introduced in media res, as one was wont to do in v3, where he reveals he's been hiding for days and is looking for a gun to defend himself. he hears the gunshot happening in the active thread he's in and hides, but this just means he goes several months without a post and his next post is him having fallen asleep at some point, after which he wakes up and runs off.

he then ends up in a thread with james brown, trish mccarroll and danni champney gee i wonder who's going to be the side character here. anyway, he's gone crazy, tried to eat bark, stripped mostly naked and caught a fever, so naturally he attacks trish before being body blocked by danni and is then subsequently shot and killed by trish.

in conclusion
hayden was a james/nope/trash kid in v3-4 that was in a thread, not posted with for several months, before wandering into his death. if you're reading james/trish/danni you'll encounter him so no real point in reading him on his own.

another child please!

[Ruggahissy]

Brackie: Francis Temple

[Brackie]

first post: eheheh i'm gonna hide, unlike that idiot Jeff who is being killed by the Poison Angles
second post killing him via dangerzone/staff: oh no I have fallen down the well and can't get out, fuck
---
uhhhh yeah. I guess his first post had a bit of a biting voice and the death is notable, but....well, c'mon, lets not kid ourselves here. short v3 profile + no pregame + only two posts is fairly easy Read-A-Thon math to solve.

one more?

[Ruggahissy]

Brackie: Jake Henkie
DN: Mattew Wittany

[Ohm]

Alright, there isn't much on Michael's handler as his profile been deleted and Michael was the only character he had according to the wiki. Gunblazer 42 their name was. We will remember thee.

So Michael's profile is both good and bad, sort of. His appearance is filled out and I can picture this guy in my head pretty well. And there isn't any weird messing with the format.

Now the gist of it, his biography. There's barely any history here, as it mostly covers Michael's personality. So you get a good sense of that, but not much about his parents or family for that matter, school, grades, future plans etc. And since there isn't any pregame to him either, all character is given on island.

His advantages/disadvantages is all about the fact he's albino, no seriously.

"Advantages: Being an albino, he is legally blind and nearsighted. As such, he usually sees things others would miss since he has to get up close to see them. He also likes to make the use of the environment to create mental landmarks to prevent getting lost, or to remember where important things were located. And being nearsighted, his other senses make up for the lack in vision. Not to the point of being superhuman, but they're somewhat better then normal people's. He likes thinking rationally and tries to plan out his moves, as well.
Disadvantages: Being an albino, he is legally blind and nearsighted. As such, he can't see that far off, and will usually miss things others can see. He can make contrast very well though, so he knows that something's there. But if there's text, he won't be able to read it unless it's very large. And, of course, there is also the issue of the sun and the fact that he turns beet red if exposed for more than 10 minutes. So he likes, or has to, to stay in indoor or very shaded areas."

Got a lot of mileage out of that, he did. It's pretty bad honestly, like he couldn't think of something not involving him being an albino for his advantages/disadvantages to use. Bits of it even looks like it got copypasted actually.

Right, getting sidetracked. Michael has 4 threads. His first is a oneshot and the rest are normal threads. Luckily none of them have gone to the obnoxious length Dennis's thread was so this won't take long.

Michael starts out on the fifth day, having decided to stay in the jungle due to the sunlight. I'm so glad we don't do the characters show up during the course the game anymore, so people don't have to fish out excuses like this. It's very hackneyed writing.

It's mostly about him being stuck in the jungle, bemoaning his weapon (a wrench) and the fact he's alone. After a while he decides to make his way to the airfield after doing head and tails with a wrench for his decision making.

Shows up on the last post on the second page, making me have to read Sloan where there is no punishment severe enough for. Honestly, nothing happens for him in this thread. He plays heads and tails again with his wrench, searches a hangar for a bit before leaving. It's obvious he was hoping to interact with Anna and Sloan, but both bail pretty quickly in some short posts. Then he leaves as well.

Oh, four pages. Oh dear. I have no problem reading a lot of stuff, but since this is V3 I'm curious how much of it is just people going in and out instead of making a new thread.

Ok so this wasn't noted on his wiki, but Michael's been adopted at this point by Pigeon Army. Looking them up on the wiki in V3 they had other than Michael, Dorian Sanders, Leo Curtis and Kathy Holden. I've read all three of them, they all seem pretty good. Their also known for their V4 work with Maf Tuigamala, Dustin Royal, Max Neill and Rachel Gettys. So from the body of their work I'm looking forward to this.

He meets up with Evan Angler, Dawn Beckworth and Abel Williams at the swinging bridge. Things look to start cordially enough until almost immediatly after Evan's post greeting him and warning him not to spook Dawn suddenly with his appearance since she's deaf, Melina Frost comes out of nowhere and shoots at Michael. Poison Angels ( I think their name was?) rolling into the thread --- Interlude: Laz getting yelled at for not reading the thread he wants to join --- And then everything kind of goes crazy for a second with guns being pointed at people and people leaving and post order along with activity has gone to full shit judging by the ooc notes. (one of the aspects we've lost with the migration being the time of posting so I can only judge by those unless I want to trek back to the forbidden land)

Both Evan and Dawn leave during this, more ooc notes on where characters are at occur and finally Michael leave the thread with Abel.

Michael's final thread starts with Eddie Sullivan so I've got high hopes now. Abel and Michael enter after Eddie falls asleep thinking of the people he'd met and start befriending one another proper. For some reason sweet home alabama is playing in Michael's head, apparantly because Abel's country as fuck? The two start dancing and singing it, but not before tragedy strikes with one misplaced footstep from Michael sends Abel crashing head first into a few rocks, killing him.

Michael's reaction is to run around in panic until he runs into a tree and knocks himself out.

Eddie wakes up, finds Michael and tries to check up on him. More people join, in this case Jimmy Trejo and Lyn Burbank. An entire conversation ensues between the three where Michael pretends to still be unconcious. Mid convo Lyn finds Guy Rapide's body along with Mary's dead baby fetus. And Mary's body made to look like a...homunculus according to the thread here?

And now you know why staff won't allow pregnant girls anymore.

All three leave pretty quickly after that. Michael gets up and reveals he's lost his memory of the previous events. He doesn't know he killed Abel.

Enter Bobby Jacks.

Michael immediatly accuses him of killing Abel, seemingly apes Princess Bride and attacks. In return, Bobby shoots, but misses and hits a...landmine?! Blowing that up which doesn't kill Michael, no, instead it unleashes another trap --- A swinging log that smashes Michael's neck to pieces, killing him.

So, after all that can I recommend Michael? Unfortunatly, I wouldn't. While there's nothing wrong with him writing wise, Gunblazer 42's writing with the character was fine, just unfortunate timing on their part and Pigeon did better elsewhere in V3 and would do better work circa V4. There's also very little happening in his story. His first two threads have nothing happening in them and while stuff starts happening to him in his last two. OOC reasons for the third keeps it from being good and the last gets a bit too contrived for my tastes.