Survival Of The Fittest

Hah, wow, Ernest's writeup is so much longer than I expected it to be, so it's spoiler'd. have funnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn!

[+] Spoiler

Well, now that I’ve mostly recovered from that experience, I’m glad to be reading this guy. From what I remember of him, Ernest Decarteret has no right being as good as he is.

His profile starts with some “promising” hobbies, which are as follows: Chess Club, Occult, and Scottish reinactment. (sic)

So, like, yeah…

Ernest is a scrawny nerd albino. His hair is a “bird’s nest” (i know what it means but goshdangit I want to imagine him with an actual nest on his head). His eyes are red and stuff and he wears sunglasses because albinism. Apparently, his voice can be anywhere from slow to fast. So, like, that’s literally normal tho.

His bio is also fun. Right off the bat, we’ve got a dead brother. yay! Ernest feels like he’s living in his brother’s shadow and wants to live up to his perception of his brother. Also his brother’s name was Clark. Clark and Ernest. Jeez, their parents really liked old-white-person names.

anyways Ernest is apparently a psychopath even though his handler doesn’t really understand what psychopathy is and so it’s just used as an umbrella term to define “Really fucking crazy”. His parents found out about this when he was caught flaying a squirrel. When he was six. like ok. Literally a future serial killer. dank u danya 4 keeping the streets safe. also his dad taught him how to shoot guns for some reason. *shrug*

Ernest got meds for his “problem”, so that’s good for him. Also he does tarot card stuff now.

“Once, Erenst refused to take his medication for a week, in eighth grade.”


NO ERENST! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

so basically he goes crazy and tries to summon the devil and is then institutionalized for a while. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Take your fucking meds.

mmmmmmmm anyways Ernest is a big fan of military history and battle tactics, having read The Art of War “several” times. Also, he’s a biiiiiiiiig fan of Erwin Rommel, because he was a good tactician apparently. Maybe, like, choose someone who isn’t a nazi that’s a good tactician, i dunno. Also his IQ is 143 (sorry murdergoblin’s got you beat, Ernest.). Also, he has a cat named Rommel.

His cat is literally named after a nazi. I don’t know if I can reiterate this enough. HIS CAT IS NAMED AFTER A NAZI! WHAAAAAAAAAAAT? WHAT IS GOING ON HERE? MY MENTAL DEGRADATION IS STARTING AGAIN I NEED TO GO TO BED!




*8 hours later*





wow hi im back!

Ernest is bad at social skills because he is a smelly nerd. The end.



Now, you might be seeing a few problems with Ernest so far. buuuuuuuuuuuutttt……

He makes them work.





PREGAME:

The first sentence of his first post is “There was a ghost in line”. Ernest is the ghost (also it’s a lunch line). Ernest realizes he neeeeeeds his meds, and so while trying to take them, he spills coffee on himself. well okeydokey. And then Megami points out that Ernest is at the wrong school. Like, okay, but he’s written in a way that makes him seem like a normal person, (BUT HE’S NOT!). He’s got a similar thing to Greg Moyer—another one of his handler’s kids; like, based off of their concepts, they should be completely unbelievable and shitty. BUT THEY’RE NOT! If only the same could be said for the rest of V2’s wild children….



BAM BOARD CHANGE!



The first sentence of Ernest’s second post is “A ghost whispered into the room, carrying a brown beverage full of caffeine.” So, either Ernest’s life is like, groundhog day level repetitive, or that last thread was non-canon. I don’t know which. Anyways, it’s homeroom time! Ernest is in Ms. Saranna’s homeroom. Ernest is the first one to show up, and he starts reading a chess booooooooooook(!?) . Maggie “Powerline” Heartgreeder is here too. OH! OH YES! THE GOSSIP KING! MY LOVE!



“"I hope one of the nerds die today." said Paris Persphone surrounded by a group of 'populars'.”




I can tell you THE GOSSIP KING and Ernest are gonna have a wonderful friendship already. Oh, THEGOSSIPKING literally thinks “He was some emo punk freak show who just happens to share the same homeroom as the Gossip King himself.” about Ernest so you know it’s gonna be gud. uh oh





See, the disparity between the respective quality of Ernest and THEGOSSIPKING is such a good way of demonstrating Ernest's goodness. Both are whack AF V2 concepts, but while Paris gets bogged down with, like, his writing and the way his character is portrayed, Ernest just feels right.

Ernest internally snarks at Paris and then IMAGINES FLAYING HIM ALIVE ERNEST NO STOPIT! But then Ernest realizes flaying people alive is bad. I’ll agree with you on that one, Ernest. Then Ernest whispers something creepy in THEGOSSIPKING’s ear. Ernest stahp. Adrian’s here too! Everyone in the thread hates THE GOSSIP KING blahblahblah end thread.

Ernest goes to geometry class and then has a flashback in blue. It’s nice, and my heart was warmed by it (ouch my heart i need doktor).

Last pregame thread!  Ernest’s walking home from school, has another flashback in blue, and gets accosted by a psychic acting like how drug dealers act in drugs r bad PSAs. Ernest is like “okay” and then the psychic does her stuff and Ernest is like “no you’re full of shit”.

Overall, Ernest’s pregame was a pleasant experience. Like, compared to some (most) of the other V2 pregame kids, he seems outwardly normal and his mental illness is only mentioned when Ernest A. needs his meds, or B. THE GOSSIP KING is being THE GOSSIP KING, and it’s not in a way that is like “Oh yup he’s gonna be a murderer.”




Islanddddddddddddddd!: Ernest’s eyelids blink a few times. Ernest doesn’t blink, His eyelids do. aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand ohh noooooooo! Ernest’s meds got spilled! OHHHHH NOOOOOOOOOO! He has four pills left, which is two days worth of meds. I really like his “Oh god I need to escape before my meds run out and I go craaaaaaaazy” kind of storyline, and it’d be pretty much impossible for someone to pull it off in modern SOTF because realism ugharoooooooo.

nextthread! It’s a Mitch and Cathalie thread at the school! Ernest arrives, and he’s momentarily worried about there being scary murderers in the school, but then he realizes it might be better for him to die before he goes crazy. I really like that. He heards Mitch/Cathalie being sad in a classroom and knocks on the door, asking if anyone’s there. Mitch and Cathalie are one character, so I’ll be calling them Mathalie. The M of Mathalie is like “go away debt collector” and I’m like “mitch how are you in high school with that level of crazy?”. Mitch bothers me, but that's okay because everything bothers me nowadays. Mathalie is like “Go away or we’ll kill you like [insert V1 reference here]” and Ernest’s like “no.” and then Mathalie’s like “okay you can come in”. Ernest hears Mathalie talking about chloroform and is like “wait maybe not” and runs the fuck away. Bye Mathalie!




Oh. Heeeeeeeeeee’re Johnny!  jonathan michaels BOXING CHAMPION OF THE WORLD. Ernest’s in some bushes or whatever and pops out and waves at BOXING CHAMP. ERNEST NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Also BOXING CHAMP is coming straight off of killing Brad Wilson.

I skipped over all of Jonathan’s post except for the dialogue because I want to keep my sanity relatively intact today. Jonathan angsts, which is all he ever does other than kill/be killed by Chad’s other characters. Ernest is like “hi im ernest what’s your name?” and Matthias pops up and he’s watching them from some bushes and Vesa pops up and then leaves in the same post and then Whitney pops up and then Andi pops up and neither Jonathan or Ernest have had any posts calm down V2 there are other threads to join jeez. Jonathan’s like “hey r u whitney acosta” because chad’s SI was like “whitney is blonde nd has big boooooooooobs” before Jonathan 'sploded his head.


kermitscreaming


no.






NO! I CANT LET V2 DO THIS TO ME AGAIN! I HAVE TO STAY STRONG!

Ernest hates Jonathan almost as much as he hates THE GOSSIP KING. Also he recognizes Jonathan as THE BOXING CHAMPION OF THE WORLD, so that’s good. Whitney and Matthias leave because Jonathan. Andi’s still here for some reason even though his group left before he arrived in the thread (he was with Vesa) and he has a flashback/flashsideways that is about Siouxie Sioux or something and I’m grumpy right now >: (((((((((.






Sorry, I got distracted by chat talking about Mariavel’s enormous breasts.

hmmm

I’ll just leave this little excerpt from one of Ernest’s posts here: “Ernest spent 32.23 hours listening to glass shattering.”

That’s how V2 feels.










Anyways Ernest leaves because Jonathan amirite?

His next thread is 6 pages and I DONT WANT TO READ THAT so I’ll just go off memory. Felix Travertil is obviously evil and he/Ernest team up because Felix is a liarface. also this is at the hospital. Ernest’s like “i’m gonna see if they have my meds” and then some people show up and steal the spotlight and one of them is Alex  Ovechkin and Ernest comes up with an escape plan but everyone leaves.

Ernest is in the thread where Adrian falls off of a ladder and dies because it’s raining. i love it. Marimar’s also here, hi Marimar. Ernest shows up and is like “Jesus stop fighting u idiots”  and then Dan Johnson’s like “hey casper i’m big and strong and you’re little and weak so fuk u” and then Adrian falls off a ladder and dies. lol adrian. Ernest’s just like “well this was pointless.” and begins leaving, but Dan’s all like “HEY U PASTY COCKSUCKER I’LL BREAK UR TEETH IN" and tries to...stab(?) Ernest with a syringe. Ernest is like “fuck off” and leaves. Iloveuernest.



Wait…

Oh no...

M-Mitsuko? B-But I thought Ernest was handled by Endless_Helix?





“Mariavel, Carmen, Marimar, Micheal, and Earnest Continued from: all over the place”

Oh

Oh god…

I-Is it a Mariavel massacre?

It is, isn't it?

rip ernest









I’ll just copy+paste the part of this post relevant to Ernest below.

Thou shalt not; how ironic these words may seem at times when one views the “slings and arrows” of another’s misfortune. After all, no infant is born into the world prepared to sin against God. Nor do children wish to disappoint or hurt their parents but some often do through their actions and deeds. More often than not, people by their very nature attempt to experiment with life never fully examining the consequences.

And that’s why Miss Carmen Somerset wasn’t Catholic.

She despised the ideals, and hated the increasingly idiotic tendencies of the religion. It infuriated her, to think that a religion such as that could even be put into existence. Maybe Christ was a good person, she wouldn’t know. How could anyone know that any of those stories were true. Religion was just another way for the public to control you.

Carmen thought all these things as she sat here, in the back lobby of the hotel, speaking with a boy whom she’d learned was named Earnest Decartet. They spoke about religion, and about family. And of many other things. It was nice, she guessed.

“Earnest…. Why is it that everything seems to be mashing together? It… it seems as if everyone is just… we’re not trying to survive…. Just to melt into each other and ignore the entirety of what’s been happening…” she curled her knees into her chest and rested her chin on them. He looked up at her. The albino boy seemed to think for a moment before speaking.

“I suppose everyone doesn’t want to face the truth. Everything’s getting tougher by the second… over seventy people are dead now. It’s down to the wire.” She nodded her head in agreement, remembering that Mariavel Varella, whom she’d bullied profusely in Bathurst, was a top killer on the island. That scared her in a back part of her mind.

“Yeah… I guess.” Suddenly she felt nature’s urge grasping her. “If you’ll excuse me earnest, I need to go to the little girl’s room.”

He nodded simply and Carmen trotted away.

===============================================================

The vile Ursula had finally abandoned her lair. Now, as the princess of Atlantica, she had the chance to rid the kingdom of Ursula’s final cohort. She would save her people, no matter the cost. As crown princess of Atlantica she was destined to do this. To defeat the evil!

Marimar Perez watched as Carmen Somerset, or Ursula to her, strode from the lobby. This was her chance. She’d kill him here, and then finish Ursula in one final attack. She took the Machete from the sheath on her leg and held it close. The boy stood from his seated position and stretched. It was time to strike.

She ran in quickly. He seemed to hear her because he turned to them noise. He saw the Machete and screamed out. He tried to defend himself but couldn’t. She slashed. His right arm held a new gash. She slashed again. He fell to his back as the blade cut through his stomach, causing blood to spill from his mouth.

She looked at the fallen boy with a crazed look in her eyes. She jumped on him, jamming the Machete into his shoulder. He cried out again. From far off you could hear Carmen’s yell of his name. She was returning. Marimar had to complete her mission quickly. She pulled the Machete from him and slammed it into his neck, cleanly severing his head from his body. Marimar stood and grabbed the head by the hair. She head a scream from behind. She turned, bloodied and holding the head. Carmen screamed again. Marimar Smiled. She threw the head to her side.

“It’s time to die.”

THE END!






>: (





So, like, he just becomes a NPC for Carmen and then gets killed in what ends up being a Mariavelassacre thread (though he dies before she shows up thanks marimar). Also Marimar doesn’t see Ernest as a fish for some reason, even though she hallucinates Carmen being Ursula? That’s not even mentioning my biggest gripe with this.



M’kay, so remember how Ernest has two days worth of meds left? Well, all of his posts before this were within two IC days, but…







Ernest dies on day six.

WHAT!?

WHY IS HE ACTING COMPLETELY NORMAL THEN? MITSUKOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!




like, according to like everything about him, he should be going fucking mental, trying to summon demons and fun stuff like that. BUT NO! “Carmen thought all these things as she sat here, in the back lobby of the hotel, speaking with a boy whom she’d learned was named Earnest Decartet. They spoke about religion, and about family. And of many other things. It was nice, she guessed.”

: (

Well, darn.










Conclusion: Ernest is a character who would only be accepted into V1/2. Despite this, while he’s handled by Endless_Helix, he’s not a bad character. He’s somehow believable and entertaining to read. I really dig the “limited amount of crazy meds left, have to escape before they run out and I go mad” concept, too. But then...


Yeah.

I’m really bitter about this.

Another kid, please.



EDIT: Took out much of my angry screaming. I'll try not to get as emotional (and mean) next time (i hope).

Venus Gwendolyn is your average everyday Malibu Barbie.

With the very first line of the profile, you can tell exactly what kind of character this is going to be. Her profile and only pregame thread paint her as a stereotypical “popular girl”, that is, shallow and extremely focused on status. She also seems to be an extremely bad judge of character, immediately falling for the guy who tried to provoke her ex-boyfriend into beating her up. Seriously, here’s how the sequence of events goes:

[ul]
[li]Venus tells her boyfriend, Kurt, (who she knows has “anger management issues”) that she wants to break up with him.[/li]
[li]Kurt grabs Venus roughly and begins to yell at her for being a slut.[/li]
[li]Felix Travertil walks up and, in a bold-faced lie, tells Kurt that Venus was cheating on him and that Felix and Venus were now a couple.[/li]
[li]Venus reacts fearfully, rightfully scared that her ex-boyfriend is going to react with violence, and begs Felix to stop joking around and tell the truth.[/li]
[li]Felix escalates the situation and begins insulting Kurt.[/li]
[li]Kurt freaks out and assaults both Felix and Venus before being dragged away by a security guard.[/li]
[li]Venus slaps Felix, and as Felix walks away, she decides that she’s attracted to his bad boy attitude and begins planning to “get with him” later.[/li]
[/ul]

Now, on to the island.

Venus wakes up with a (surprisingly uncommon for V2) post where she freaks out about the fact that she’s in SOTF. Her main concern is how that the injuries will damage her looks. You got that right. She cares more about losing her beauty than actually dying. She then walks up to the Zed, who had woken up nearby, and then attempts to seduce him (of course >_<) in order to make an ally who will defend her on the island. Zed responds to this exactly as you would expect for V2, excited that he’s finally going to get lucky despite being surrounded by people who want to kill him. After a few posts, Zed finally realizes that this is a bad idea, but it’s already too late, as Venus pushes him down and rapes him while he weakly tries to escape.

The wiki describes what happened as "he eventually succumbed to her beauty and charm", but LaZ's narration makes it rather clear that despite the involuntary physical reactions resulting from his body being stimulated in that way, Zed really doesn't want this to be happening, and is expecting her to kill him at any moment. Seems like a pretty clear cut example of sexual assault to me.

I don’t know about you guys, but it seems to me that, considering the purpose of seduction is to get somebody to put their guard down, escalating it into rape would accomplish the exact opposite. It doesn’t really even make sense, as Venus’ narrative talks about how she finds this guy to be a disgusting nerd and hates the idea of having sex with him, yet she just rapes him anyway because, well, V2. The rape scene continues for a bit and then…

Oh.

She bites his dick off.

The narrative lovingly describes Venus’ sadistic enjoyment of the torture visited upon Zed’ genitalia. For some reason, Venus views it as punishment for being a “nerd”. Clearly established as an exaggerated one-dimensional stereotype at this point, Venus then steals the poor guy’s weapon (an American flag) and runs off as a couple other “nerds” happen upon the scene. While running, she thanks God for giving her great dancing legs, which allows us to check off another point on the V2 stereotype bingo.

In her next thread, Venus wishes that she could meet up with Ali or Carmen, other members of the “sisterhood”.  Instead, she meets up with a guy named Darren, who she immediately attempts to seduce (>_<). Unfortunately for her, this guy isn’t having any of it, and pulls out a katana and immediately attempts to kill her. She then begs for her life in the middle of a songpost. The song? Barbie Girl, by Aqua.

Yeah. If that’s not tonal dissonance, I don’t know what is.

Darren hesitates, overcome by guilt due to the fact that he just tried to murder someone. In another songpost with the same song as before, Venus immediately takes advantage of his hesitation to knock him down and steal his weapon. In yet another songpost (guess which song), she contemplates whether or not to kill him, before deciding that committing murder would compromise her “perfection”. Venus loots Darren’s bag for supplies, than leaves.

So… stabbing a dude with a sword means that you’re not “perfect”, but biting a guy’s dick off is A-OK? Seems a little...never mind, let’s keep going.

Venus then enters an abandoned school, where she reflects on the fact that, as a member of the Sisterhood, that she was in effect part of the school’s aristocracy, and most other students were essentially cockroaches to her. She begins to cry, homesick for a life where she could basically shit on everyone around her with no consequences, before things take an even stranger turn. She begins to hallucinate a strange woman, pale as a ghost and dressed in Victorian-era clothes, berating her for not being “perfect” enough. The “barbie”, as the narrative calls her, ignores the several other students in the school as the ghost woman gives her several lessons on being “perfect”. After Venus passes these tests, the ghost deems Venus to be “officially perfect” and gives her permission to kill as many people as she needs to, because she deserves to live more than they do. Because she’s “perfect”.

Yes, I get that she thinks that she’s better than everyone else, okay?

Venus then makes it to the Botanical Gardens, where she meets up with Matt and Rob, everybody’s favourite buddy comedy duo. She tries to, you guessed it, seduce them, but it doesn’t this work this time either, as Matt and Rob seem to be in possession of one of the most scarce resources on the V2 island, common sense. They rightfully anticipate that Venus is trying to get them to put their guards down so she can kill them, and they exit the scene post-haste.
Venus stands there confused at why anybody would turn down sex with a “perfect” girl like her, when Felix Travertil, from pregame, enters the thread. I think it’s obvious at this point what Venus’ next course of action is. This seduction attempt is almost immediately no sold, followed by Venus going to plan B and kicking Felix in the balls. They fight for a bit, flirting with each other for some reason. At the last moment, just as Felix is about to stab her, he kisses her instead. They make out for a bit before realizing that they are both madly in love with each other. The two lovers then resolve to stay together, and walk off hand in hand into the sunset…

...ending up in separate threads for no explained reason other than "Venus got lost".

She enters a thread with John Davies before immediately leaving, as she obviously doesn’t want to be in the same place as a man who is so far beneath her. She runs off to find Felix, somehow under the impression that both of them will be able to make it home. (We don’t get to see John’s reaction to this, sadly, as he immediately goes inactive.)

Her final thread leads her back to the Botanical Gardens, where she futily searches for Felix. She begins to despair as she realizes that Felix has abandoned her, as she finally realizes that the two of them won’t be able to both win the game. Her thoughts are interrupted by the reappearance of the Ghost Lady in one of the most horrificly structured paragraphs that I have read over the course of this read-a-thon. I’ve had to spoiler it here, due to the length, but take a look at it. Seriously. Did the writer proofread this at all?

[+] Spoiler

The whole situation blew out of proportion, Kurt almost faught with Felix and ended up getting him kicked out. She was angry at Felix for a time, but she easily succumbed to his charming personality. Even though it was embarassing it didn't matter, it was still one of the best days of her life. Since then her heart welled up and it was head over heels from that point on. "Oh Felix, I'm going to miss you so much..." she said calmly, trying to force back her tears. A butterfly lazily flew in dotted circles around the various roses, landing on the one she happened to be feeling. Venus smiled at the creature, it was an electric blue butterfly; the wings blazed like neon. The butterfly flew from the rose and landed on Venus' head. She giggled a little, happy to be of some company for such an elegant insect. "Thanks for keeping me company. I'm tired of being alone.....But I'm not anymore..." she said to herself realizing this. She had Felix and she had the butterfly. "What do you think your doing!?" Venus turned startled to see the grey headmistress from her 'perfect' class back at the school. "I-I'm not doing anything...." she said quielty. The grey lady had a expression of disapproval on her face and slowly came foreward. Her grey dress swept the floor; the whole area around her felt eerie and dark. "Have you forgotten what I have taught you? You completley just threw away more precise teaching and for what? Love?" The grey lady snottily laughed at her own statement. "You'll gain nothing from love. He's not coming back don't you realize that? Your just standing here like a ninny doing nothing! The game has dwindled down.....This is yoru chance to strike!" she said.

Venus then kills the ghost, before turning her katana on herself. She cuts upon her stomach, bleeding out dramatically over the flowers as she thinks of Felix. The girl who thought that she was the most perfect person on the island, the one most deserving of life, kills herself over a guy who has done nothing but harm her since before the game started. Doesn’t really make sense, but that’s V2 for you.

Content-wise, I would say that while she’s not as bad as Sam Sorenson, she’s definitely on the same continuum of horribleness. In some ways, she’s even worse, because at least Chad was technically competent as a writer, with the main shock value being in the subject matter of his writing. Venus is a nonsensical, one-dimensional character who commits horrific acts with very little motivation behind them, just like many others in V2. Unfortunately, when compared to even those, the writing quality is abysmal, sinking in quality as the story goes on. By her final post, Strawberry Prince’s prose is basically unreadable. Would not recommend.

...I don’t really know why I’m still doing this, but I’ll take another character anyway.

Seth Mattlock is a unique figure in SOTF who requires some explanation.

v2 took place at a transitional point in SOTF's history. The site moved to a new board, and many old handlers and staff members left at various points during the version. As a result, the remaining staff was stretched very thin when it came to making and enforcing the rules, up to and including inactivity guidelines. When it comes to these turbulent times, Seth Mattlock might as well be the poster child.

Seth went inactive shortly after his first scene, which was fairly early in the game. He was never inactive-killed and no one ever did anything with his death rights, even though he was rolled multiple times. As a result, Seth was simply a ghost for most of the game until his handler returned, realized that he was still alive somehow, and killed him off in his second scene, which took place near the end of the game. To my knowledge, the board hasn't experienced a situation quite like this before or since, so Seth has his own place in history in that way.

In terms of his actual character, Seth has a very over-the-top backstory involving his dad being a former cop who joined the mob, and now he hangs out with mobsters all the time and deals drugs for them. He also claims that the Bloody Fists are not a criminal gang, which clashes with Mariavel's backstory in which she kills someone while doing work for the gang. All in all, he reads like another one of v2's premade players.

Then Seth reaches the island, and winds up being surprisingly heroic. True, he only has two scenes, so it's hard to say what would have happened had he been active the whole time, but his story details him saving Mariavel from Walter Smith before disappearing into the night, then unexpectedly reemerging at a crucial moment days later to save Bryan and Tori from Felix Travertil. He winds up coming off as a bit of a deus ex machina character because of this, but his scenes are well-written and his fights are pretty good, so I'm willing to forgive that. His death is also quite heartfelt, and I feel like Slayer really wanted to do right by Seth. And honestly, I think he succeeded.

Seth Mattlock may not have been around very much, but he saw more than his fair share of action. And since he's part of one of my favorite v2 scenes as well as one of the most vital parts of Bryan's story, he's definitely worth checking out. My only real gripe is that his paragraphs can get way too long for my taste, but at least the contents of said paragraphs are usually good. If you want an action-oriented character, you probably won't find many more suited to the job than Seth Mattlock.

Another character, if you please.

I was happy for a minute when I saw Matthew but then I remembered the good Matthew was already taken rip me anyway this kid. Matthew Lafferty's profile is short and needs proofreading and is tonally super off but honestly it's not bad. He sounds like an athletic, temperamental, spoiled, fairly normal kid. and he Doesn't get killed via Mitsuko Massacre so maybe he doesn't go inactive???? I just checked his killer and it's Andi Ayala who Polybius just read and apparently Matt was sacrificed to one of his handlers other characters which isn't actually much better than inactivity deaths imo. whatever let's do this

Matt's first thread (no pregame) starts with.. a double post sure okay. we learn that he's had suicidal impulses which doesn't come up in his profile anywhere you'd think that was important. Alice Nichols shows up, they both freak out for a second and then talk to each other and laugh and it's kind of cute. Then they both fuck off to different threads w/ zero resolution. I assume they were in a danger zone or in danger of inactivity or Something idk i'm kind of disappointed there was a possibility of something good here

second thread god fucking dammit this is the thread where the boxing champion of the world shoves a gun down chad's throat again isn't it. anyway I get to skip all of that because Matt only runs through the thread for one post. basically all he does is decide to go to the hotel because there are beds there, which would probably be my state of mind at this point too, so I won't complain. his last thread is 6 goddamn pages but for most of them Matt isn't there so I'm skipping through. anyway he turns up at the end of page 4/6, i thought he was going to the hotel this is the hospital? whatever it's fine. also his handler's other character refers to him as "amazingly handsome" in his thoughts. Matt wanders into the hospital and displays what are at this point really OOC-seeming fits of paranoia and rage to basically provoke Andi Ayala into shooting him. His death is described in 6 really short and mostly mechanical sentences, and then he dies.

final thoughts/tl;dr: nothing much here. Matt's not a bad character and his writing isn't bad either, but he just doesn't really do anything and turns into fodder for one of his handler's other characters. I feel like if he'd actually stuck around w/ Alice Nichols there might have been something to recommend but he doesn't and there isn't. (wait alice dies in her next thread anyway so there probably wasn't much there either)

gimme another please!

I GOT THE EXPLODING GIRL

Caitlin Evans has a really long profile which seems irrelevant since i know she explodes in her first thread but i'm gonna read it anyway. her profile isn't actually bad at all, she's basically a smart hippie kid who's a social outcast due to her low economic status and her lack of interest in Conformity. it's kind of heavy handed but it works fine.

now let's watch her explode

she only has one thread, in which she explodes. clarification: she gets one post, and then her second post is basically just her exploding. the one post is very long and kind of confusing but basically she finds a corpse and pokes it with a stick. she's apparently already desensitized to SotF despite this being her first post. then she- you know what i'm just going to post the whole thing i can't say anything to make this better

[+] caitlin esplode

Caitlin was about to answer her visitors as she went towards them she tripped and fell on her knee.

"Motherfucker..."

Just then, however, with a blinding flash and a thunderous boom, she exploded in chemical burst, splattering gore across the cliffs. Most of the SOTF viewers believed the student was mentally unstable, and had strapped a bomb to her back and was saying goodbye to her life after being confronted with death and the blew herself to smithereens. However, this was entirely false.

You see, a small chemical reaction had begun in her lower intestine, where several chemical compounds ingested with food had combined. While alone, these chemicals are not dangerous. However, when mixed, they formed into a highly volatile chemical gas. Due to a minor disorder of the small intestine, the compound was sent into her stomach, where it further mixed with stomach acid, creating an even more volatile substance.

When he fell on her knee, she inadvertently swallowed some air. It traveled to the stomach, where it set off the gas in a large explosion.

Naturally, the probably of any of this happening is so remote that you need not lose any sleep over it. However it was weird enough to no doubt put some surprised face to the people at the Cliff's.

CAITLIN EVANS-ELIMINATED

yeah. that happened!

final thoughts/tl;dr: this is not long enough to need a tl;dr. anyway the only part of Caitlyn that you need to read is the part i just posted. you're welcome. oh and she has one good line when she finds her weapon and goes “Non-fatal, unless of course I was a member of the LAPD...” which actually works really well for a political hippie chick. basically the character had some potential but nothing happens with it so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

another!!

So Elizabeth Ebert was... unusual.

Her bio describes her as an extremely sheltered girl from a very conservative family who thinks that pretty much anything will corrupt her if she is exposed to it. However, she watches SOTF at her friend's house and it becomes her favorite show. She takes a particular liking to Adam Dodd, and hopes to meet the "actor" who plays him. Nothing too out of the ordinary, I guess.

Then she gets on the island, and realizes that she's in SOTF. However, instead of panicking, she thinks about how awesome it is that she's on her favorite show. She sees some corpses and thinks that they're mannequins. She handles her gun and thinks that it's a prop. Even worse, when Penelope Withers panics and charges her with a mace, she thinks that she's interrupting a scene and decides to improvise by pointing her gun at Penelope. This leads to Penelope getting shot and dying, and it's only then that Beth realizes what is going on.

Basically, what I'm trying to say is that Beth comes off as an utter moron with no common sense to speak of for her first two threads.

Her third thread is spent in full freakout mode as she tries to come to terms with the fact that she killed someone and is actually in a life-or-death situation, then she goes inactive and ends up as a footnote in one of Mariavel's killing sprees, showing up and dying over the course of a single paragraph at the end of the thread.

The best way I can describe Beth is... weird. She has very little content for a character that reached the Final 10, and what she has isn't particularly good in my eyes. You might like her if you enjoy oddball characters, but I wasn't a fan.

Another character, if you please.

As an aside before we start, I really like Narfinkool’s avatar. It looks pretty cool and I think it really fits the tone of the scenes he is in, as well as the edginess that characterizes a lot of V2.


Russ’ first post is written in present tense. It’s a little difficult to read, but the grammar and prose are much easier to read than other character affected by the same problem, so it’s not as bad as it could have been. He soon corrects this problem, thankfully, and begins writing in past tense like everyone else, with only occasional slips back into present.

One thing that I don’t like is that he signals that a character is dreaming not through the narrative, but through OOC tags. It really breaks the immersion, and is kind of unnecessary, since most readers would easily be able to tell when the dream in question begins and ends.

His handler is a pretty inexperienced writer, and it shows, but his work is far from unreadable. I really liked that Russ’ narrative showed him to be a fairly ordinary guy, albeit with some anger issues. The backstory of abuse adds almost nothing to the character, but I would prefer that to seeing him use it as an excuse to turn into a psychopathic slasher villain, as has happened with several other characters in this version.

We then come to an interesting scene while a shotgun-wielding Russ stands between Franco Sebberts and Marvin Hendrick, as both try to convince him to kill the other guy. After brief consideration, Russ accepts, on the basis of Franco’s spurious logic, that Marvin has gone insane and is going to kill them both. This poor judgement, while a little confusing, makes sense coming from Russ, whose profile notes that he’s not exactly the sharpest tool in the shed. The two of them make short work of Marvin, and resolve to form an alliance.

The two of them continue on, with Franco making up the brains of the duo, and Russ making up the brawn. They scavenge for supplies for a bit, and share a quiet moment where they discuss their pasts and how things were for them at school. It was an interesting dynamic, as Russ is clearly a lot more invested in their partnership than Franco, yet Franco can’t help but appreciate Russ’ simple-minded loyalty towards him.

Franco goes to pick up his Best Kill Award for killing Marvin, leaving Russ on the outside of the danger zone. Surprisingly, while Russ does appear briefly in this thread, it isn’t in his list of threads on the wiki. I’m not sure if I should add it in, but probably will after I finish this review.

The duo goes on to the mall, where they have a confrontation with another V2 duo, Matt and Rob. Russ’ inner thoughts, while already somewhat angry, begin to ramp up in aggression as he begins to finally have some doubts as to the wisdom of his continued partnership with Franco. After some internal conflict, his existing trust in Franco wins out, and Russ continues following him, albeit reluctantly. His trust in Franco is somewhat validated as the two of them work together to take out an attacker, watching each other’s backs and using strategy to back the girl into a corner before Franco finishes her off.

However, it is at this point that a different type of doubt sets in. Russ begins to realize that he doesn’t exactly have the stomach for killing, and fears that Franco will find this out and abandon him. He begins to put on a gangster-style facade of brutality in order to hide his self-perceived weakness, while never actually killing anyone himself.

Russ and Franco’s partnership comes to an end as one would expect. While scavenging for supplies, a shelf falls over and traps Russ against the ground just as the area is declared a danger zone. Franco, as expected, prioritises his own well being and leaves Russ to his death. The post, while written entirely by Franco’s handler, does Russ a great deal of justice, in my opinion. Russ lashes out impotently as he realizes that he’s been betrayed by somebody who he thought he could trust, as Franco walks away guilty for his selfish abandonment of somebody who was loyal enough to not to the same to him.

I really enjoyed reading this part of the story. Narfinkool’s writing isn’t amazing, and his dialogue feels fairly unnatural, but his action scenes were pretty good. Russ felt like a solid character and the two handlers involved do a decent job of selling the partnership between Russ and Franco. While definitely not one of SOTF’s best characters, I feel like I can recommend Russ as one of V2’s better cast members, or at least the best one that I’ve read so far.

Another character, please.

Ladies and gentlemen, today I bring you the story of the phantom rape. On one side of the coin we have Kayla Ravoy, who was tragically raped by her boyfriend Felix, and whose rape has stuck with her ever since, infecting her mind with images of him racing around the island bestowing his own brand of violence upon its innocent inhabitants. On the other, Felix himself, who claims that it was all lies. I really, really wish I could overlook the rape stuff since it sort of cancels itself out amongst the characters, but since it informs a ton of Kayla’s early game decisions, it’s really hard to.

[HOST NOTE: KAYLA IS LYING, THIS IS A FALSE RAPE ACCUSATION]

Kayla lies a lot - or, we’re informed that she does - so the rape itself is cast into this crazy amount of doubt, exacerbated by the fact that both Felix and Kayla were handled by the same person. Kayla’s posts are short and peppered with typos and tense failures, but between the haze of grammatical issues a character is formed, albeit one that’s somewhat against the author’s intentions.

Kayla’s entire story pivots on Felix - he is constantly in her thoughts as this big time villain who is definitely murdering mass amounts of people. Her entire story seems a parallel to his, except nothing really happens with hers. Her first interaction on the island is one that goes nowhere with a girl, then she stops by another person, sees a dead body, and immediately turns tail - a one post drive by. It seems like it’s building towards an eventual meet-up for the two, which we seem to be getting in the third thread. Except, surprise! We just follow the fascinating adventures of Felix as he runs around the area collecting the ‘healthiest snacks he can find’ while Kayla, Gail, and Jackie sit and talk. These four characters are handled by two people, and it is… pretty terrible reading.

When Felix finally comes face to face with Kayla, we are truly in for a pinnacle of foreshadowing. We’ve followed Kayla’s headspace wherein she can barely go two posts without mentioning this awful human who raped her before she could break off their relationships, where she insists that he’s probably racing around with a knife on his penis and is using it to stab people to death with, and when they meet up we are treated to an incredibly awkward argument between the two where everyone else just kinda… sits around and watches, I guess.

Felix hits Kayla with her boomerang - to which she claims he just tried to take her arm off (throwing serious water on the rape claims if she exaggerates this much) and then entices Jackie to attack him. While doing so, she plots the best way to attack Felix herself. When Jackie tells her to run, however, she immediately does so.

Kayla is such a bitch.

She goes inactive/adopts off, and then… dies in someone else’s post.

Man, the fact that she was only really utilized to boost someone else’s story bothers me. She does have some interesting parts of her that are up for debate - whether or not she’s lying/perceiving the rape as something different, whether or not she actually gives a crap about her friends, etc. Because of the hand-off to Dan, she basically teleports between threads and none of this stuff is explored.
C+. Rating: Inoffensive.

Next.

Jameson only has one post, but it's actually not too bad.

Basically, what happens is that the terrorists were flying a little too high with the helicopter that they dumped him on the island from, and Jameson breaks a bunch of bones, which are abnormally fragile due to not being fully healed from a recent accident. He then suffocates due to his shattered ribs shredding his lungs and other internal organs. The death post focuses mostly on the physical effects of the damage to Jameson's body and his quick realization that he's going to die. It's done competently, but the read isn't too interesting, overall.

I don't know if I can recommend him, exactly, but his run is short enough that it won't take much time for you to read him if you want to give him a shot. Not much else that I can say, really.

Another character, please.

Now I had to add Cathalie to my google dictionary too. Strangely enough, Meguro worked, but eh, maybe it's just more common. Doesn't take much to be more common a name than Cathalie.

Burns aside, a look at the profile reveals that at least some thought was put into diversifying her interests. It's startling that a good sign to me is that the Looks section of the profile doesn't mention bra size. Her backstory is relatively tame, as far as V2 goes - at least she hasn't killed anyone. While writing a kind of gothy "damaged" girl raises some flags on its own, it's nothing I can't look past for what is really here. The profile itself is decently well written, and if I wasn't desensitized I'd say that it's almost impressive for the V2 time frame. Her abusive friendship with Mitch Gunther is… cute? It's totally weird and a little unsettling, but I think it's a good thing, for now, unless things turn sexual at some point.

Knowing V2, they always do.

Cathalie's time in V2 is comprised of two pre-game threads and two island threads - a mercy that I am very thankful for - and her first thread takes place at school, Bathurst High, the same school of the winning kid Bryan Calvert. For some reason, when I think of V2, this is the school I come back to mentally. The name is just sort of...iconic? Or notorious? Maybe both? Well, at the very least, it's known as the school with the weird kid who wanders around barefoot and talks to himself about burgers during a class assignment on the atomic bomb. While the other students, here Ian Rico and Sofie de Wilde, try to treat him kindly, Cathalie returns from the bathroom and puts her dog on a leash immediately.

Power Couple wrote:"Ahhh Cathalie, the sunshine of my life, the air I breathe everyday. To bask in your presence is to drown blissfully in the rivers of Para-"

"Shut up, Mitch."

"Yes, Cathalie."

Cathalie takes the other's kindness as malice, but caves in once she decides that if she doesn't let Mitch have his first burger, then she'll never hear the end of it. Of course, this dynamic reminds incredibly of Lust and Gluttony from Fullmetal Alchemist, a Japanese manga series that was decently popular around V2 - still kind of is, but it's faded away gradually with time. Good show, but lifting this dynamic of "Cold girl, food obsessed guy" without any of the symbolic connotations or writing skill that came with it is kind of, well, finicky. Especially as Ali Grayson comes in and makes a mess of thing, requiring Mitch to be reeled in even further. He bites her, which would probably make anyone handle their animal a bit more cautiously. Mitch isn't an animal, sure, but the comparison can be drawn here.

Or not! Cathalie just lets this happen, because she's kind of edgy, and doesn't like popular people, I'm guessing. Mitch is a weird kid, but a good intentioned one, and Cathalie warms up to people that he warms up to, thankfully. If Cathalie was just 100% mean all the way then we'd have some stuff wrong here, because that's just one-note and trite and kind of dumb. Thankfully, instead we get something kind of balanced and internally consistent in the wacky wild world of V2. I'm sort of impressed, already.

Their dynamic is amusing. I'm thoroughly amused. The two actually take up Ian Rico on the offer of burgers, which is fitting right now because in pre-game it's important to set up some story progression or hooks early on for the island stuff. Here, it's social rejection, as Mitch's social unacceptable behaviour is unsurprisingly rejected by the carnival goers. Cathalie decides at some point to avoid curfew and be herself for the evening, which I'm guessing was entirely helped along by Mitch pushing her over the edge. They have a fun time at the park, and that's pre-game. It's all remarkably decently written, and there aren't really any complaints here.

Island-time now. It is time to see if this quality, what we've so thankfully been graced with so far, keeps going into the island. I'm going to hazard a wild guess right now and say that it doesn't, but I'm willing to be pleasantly surprised here.

Cathalie has a bit of a mental breakdown at the start of V2, and a violent one at that. Mitch has her best intentions at heart, but she rejects it, instead electing to throw a desk across the room and overturn a table. Ernest wanders into the thread now, while Cathalie tries to bluff having a shotgun to keep him out, a plot that Mitch foils it by announcing that they don't really have a shotgun in a playful way. They try to ambush Ernest as he walks in with the rag of chloroform that Cathalie got, but he decides that they aren't worth it and turns around to leave. They have some cutesy small-talk, until Cathalie falls asleep, Mitch standing guard and staying in this sort of hypnagogic state while waiting for Cathalie to wake up again.

This girl, Venus, wanders into the room, and starts drawing things on the chalkboard, before wandering back out again. The announcement plays, which somehow doesn't wake Cathalie up, but Mitch's constant mantra mumbling does. She throws a flashlight at him to try and shut him up, since he keeps kind of whining about the dark, but she realizes that she should have thrown a little more than a flashlight when she realizes that they're sitting in a danger zone, Mitch having neglected to inform her of the announcement. They manage to make it out of the school building in time, which is pretty confusing to me given how little time you have to get out of a danger zone and the barricade they put up in front of their door, but, whatever. Overall, their first island thread is solid.

Now, it's time for the moment that you've all been waiting for; Cathalie's second and final island thread.

The first thing that stuck out to me was the handler writing this post. Threads one through three were all handled by LadyMakaze, while the final thread, the pivotal death moment, is handled by Nealosi, and instantly something feels off. It's not as if an attempt wasn't made to keep the style of writing for these characters consistent, but more like the attempt was made without paying much attention to detail. For one thing, Mitch's absurdly large vocabulary and strangely intelligible ramblings are reduced to somewhat plain speak, and he loses most of his quirky charm. Cathalie's change is a bit more believable - she's been stuck on the island for an additional five days, now, and she just seems a lot more tired and stressed out. How these two managed to survive for five whole days without drawing too much attention to themselves is a bit out of the realm of possibility for me, but, whatever, it's some OOC stuff that I don't know about anyways.

Cathalie decides that putting Mitch to sleep is a good idea, now, as a mercy kill. Cathalie has accepted her fate, and probably intends to do the same kind of thing to herself, but Mitch still has the resolve - or naivete - to believe that some kind of rescue or escape is possible. This resolve really touches Cathalie, and she finally extends an olive branch to Mitch after all of her abuse. Everything seems like it's going to turn out okay for the two of them.

Everything seems like it's going to turn out okay, until the tree behind them explodes, splinters tearing holes in their faces and throwing them to the ground.

I'm guessing that Franco Sebberts is Nealosi's own kid, and that these two kids are being fed to his own because of inactivity. Regardless, Franco steps out from behind the tree, a sadistic smile on his face, and reveals himself to have caused the explosion via grenade launcher. Cathalie is on the ground, bleeding out from the mouth, and tries to convince Mitch to run. Mitch, however, can't let anyone hurt his Cathalie, so he heroically charges Franco, who isn't playing nearly as fairly. Using a concealed taser, he zaps Mitch, sending him to the ground, while spouting off about how these two aren't the only ones who want to leave, stating that his way is the only way.

This is the part that I was warned about. I won't get too graphic, because thankfully this scene isn't as descriptive as the Mariavel hotel scene, but it goes something like this.

Franco forces Mitch to watch as he molests Cathalie, using the taser as a torture device, occasionally taking a few breaks to beat Mitch as well. Cathalie begs him to stop, and eventually he caves in, shooting her in the head, though not before she can thank him for his mercy. Mitch screams out in anger, but Franco puts a bullet through his skull, too.

And that's that.

I'm really disappointed by the way this happened to end. I don't blame any of the handlers for how it happened - inactivity was, as we've seen, a commonplace issue in V2, yet one that the site hadn't come together to solve yet. At the very least, we get some closure for Cathalie and Mitch's arc, as they have a moment of understanding at the start of the thread. As far as the realism scale goes for V2, Cathalie and Mitch manage to balance the unconventional nature of a lot of early concepts with some decently well written posts. However, such an intricate concept can't survive as well on it's own in the hands of another, and that is blameless - it's clear when reading some of Mitch and Cathalie's interactions in pre-game that a lot of thought went into how these two felt about each other, thought that was likely inaccessible after the original handler's inactivity, except for going back and reading the original posts.

A case study in how inactivity was handled back in V2, and the pitfalls of the original methods of dealing with it, without resorting to linking someone a Mariavel massacre. Plus, some solid writing early on, if the concept is a little unbelievable. Personally, I think Cathalie's the least likeable of the two as a person, but in all honesty, I have a hard enough time dealing with my completely sane little brother, so I guess I can say I understand, a little?

#mitchdidnothingwrong

Another one, please.

Alright, Peter Rosenthal. A kid with five whole on-island threads and two kills who ends up committing suicide. Might actually?? Be interesting??? lets see. his profile bugs me because he's apparently up to 300 pounds which is "a bit overweight" which is Not. this is a nitpick. less of a nitpick: he loses his virginity to a 20-something-year-old dude when he's 14 and i'm supposed to be totally cool w/ that. i am not! i am not cool with that. this experience apparently helps him realize he's gay and i continue to be uncomfortable with statutory rape being framed as a positive experience. anyway he's a big smart gay guy who takes things too personally. got it. i'm gonna just feel slightly uncomfortable for the rest of this writeup

peter has 2 pre-game threads but one is lost to the ages and the other, according to the wiki, peter's handler wanted deleted anyway, so I'm not gonna read it and lets go straight to his game proper. his opening post is fine- he panicks, he finds his weapon, he thinks of his... boyfriend? crush? he has no pregame so i have no idea what his relationship with Andi Ayala is. anyway he thinks of him and is Worried. he's in a thread with Mamien Darter-Cadison whose red text is giving me a headache and Kristey Burrowell who's kind of in a mood. Peter is definitely the most normal person here. he's actually trying to be nice and learn who these other people are and doesn't immediately want to murder them! i'm proud. basically this whole thread Camien Marter-Dadison is contemplating murder w/ the voices in his head, Kristey is considering murdering Him, and Peter is just kind of like , which is the correct reaction. sam sorenson wanders into the thread and peter doesn't even acknowledge it happened which makes me like him more. apparently Kristey is Andi's half-sister and Andi is confirmed to be Peter's boyfriend and they're friends now and the area becomes a danger zone so they leave

next thread. a lot of people are here! i actually like how the relationship between Peter and Kristey is winding up. like they're sticking together because they're looking for the same person, and they're not overly sentimental or overly aggressive toward each other. they're just kinda neutral-to-friendly in a way that works. on the other hand now Peter is considering killing Mamien Carter-Dadison outright instead of just considering killing him if he needs to in the future. which... Might be justified, considering how he's been acting? anyway they don't really interact with anyone here, they just spot Meme Name Boy from afar and he spots them and then they run.

holy shit I only at this point realized Andi Ayala is one of his kills. huh. wait didn't Polybius talk about this. i'm going to completely ignore that so i can pretend this might go well. next thread: i read this one!! it's the one where matt lafferty gets eaten (not literally) (please god no cannibalism v2 is bad enough) by andi ayala which makes this the reunion thread i guess. Peter doesn't actually turn up until 5 pages in where he runs into Vesa Turunen and apparently they had been penpals or something so now they're bros. and then he sees Andi! and it's at this point that Peter's island story goes reeeal downhill real fast. like I mentioned in Matthew's writeup his handler has him act very OOC to give Andi an excuse to kill him, which he does. Kristey (Andi/Kristey/Matthew all have the same handler btw, as do Peter and Vesa, this thread is really hard to follow) sees Andi kill Matt and is immediately terrified and that basically ends the Peter/Kristey alliance. and also Kristey was apparently planning on killing Andi from the start. i missed that little tidbit apparently. also Kristey uses the word "faggot" to describe her brother like 7573 times in this thread and it's off-putting

i need to stop rambling so much here's the short version of The Peter Rosenthal Story from here on out: he loves Andi, is cool w/ killing everyone else, and is openly mocking toward people who die who have teased him in the past. some guy walks in on them when they're about to fuck and they decide that's a good enough reason to kill him. then they fuckmurder-suicide which is a new one

final thoughts/tl;dr:



this could have been good! Peter was actually a pretty decent character at the beginning!! i was kind of looking forward to finding out why/how he kills his boyfriend!!! HE IGNORED SAM SORENSON!! but then he actually finds his boyfriend and it just turns into the Tragic Gay Love Murder Story. you know. that stereotypical tale. anyway basically him and andi merge into one being once they find each other and it's not interesting or compelling. so in the end Peter's still one of the better characters I've read but I still wouldn't recommend him because he disappointed me. he disappointed all of us.

next kid please !

Aaah, fuck Alexander Bee.

Alexander is a history nerd, that's his character. He's pretty simple and flat, and all of his posts are wrought with spelling and grammatical errors. Every sentence has something wrong in it.

Alexander is assigned a claymore mine as his weapon. He immediately decides that he wants to blow up the lighthouse. His only reason for this is that he wants to thin out the competition a bit. Not the greatest survival plan. I think his handler was just really excited that he was given the opportunity to possibly blow up a building, so he decided to make that his goal with Alex.

Alex gets held up by a girl with a gun and runs away. He goes to the lighthouse, but it becomes a danger zone. He decides to blow up the mall instead, but there are people there and he leaves. Then, he goes inactive.

Alex is part of a three person inactive death written by Megami. Megami writes him much better than Strawberry_Prince did. Does that count as an exception to the V2 adoption trend? Anyway, the death is stupid as hell. The terrorists crash a boat off of the coast of the island somehow and the three doomed kids decide to hide in it. The boat apparently has some super duper terrorist secrets, so Danya just sets off Alex's collar. That sets off the mine and everyone is incinerated. At least Alex got to blow some people up in the end, I guess.

Minimal screaming this time!


Oh hey it’s Mitch! I read some of him when I was reading through Ernest (we don’t speak of that anymore), and, well, he was good from a technical standpoint, but he ended up being too much of a cloud-cuckoo-lander to really grab me as a character, and I ended up more engrossed with his more reasonable counterpart, Cathalie. Well, maybe my opinion will change, who knows?

Actually that whole paragraph was mostly a lie because I’ve read him before, but let’s just pretend this is the first time. For funzies.




Profile:

"Hobbies and Interests: No extracurricular activities. Interests and hobbies include reading, taking in stray animals, solving puzzles and playing mind-stretching games, stealing shiny objects, wandering around, taking apart machinery, napping, and being with Cathalie."

If I didn’t know Mitch was a human, I’d assume he was the comic-relief animal sidekick in an animated children’s movie. That’s fine, I guess. I was okay with Ernest having weird hobbies, so I’ll be okay with this.

Mitch gives the impression that he’s sickly and underfed. wow #twinzies! He’s strong though, and his fingers look like claws. The look in his eyes conveys the fact that he’s often somewhere else mentally. He goes barefoot most of the time, which is definitely against school dress code, but fuck it, whatever. Also his shirts are really big and usually expose his shoulders, which is also against dress code, I’d assume. Oh well. It’s not the biggest dress code violation in V2. *coughJohn Davies wearing weird martial arts clothes even though he goes to a school that requires he wears a school uniformcough*

Mitch is covered in burns and scars which are covered by bandages (He’s not a mummy or anything, they’re just on his arms/neck/torso). Mitch pulls on them a lot, so they’re kinda hanging off of him. Aren’t bandages routinely changed? Oh well. I’m sure there’ll be a charming explanation for why he’s covered in burns/scars/burn scars.

Huh. Well, it’s not a charming explanation, but it’s better than no explanation. Well, actually, there’s no explanation for the initial scars other than he had them when he was orphaned at age one, but the rest of the scars are from abusive foster families. Christ on a bike that’s disturbing. New Jersey, fix your fucking foster care system, jesus. He met Cathalie Meguro at the age of five, and they’ve been friends ever since. The rest of his bio is establishing how he kind of acts like uh, well, a comic-relief animal sidekick in an animated children’s movie (Cathalie’s the hero of the movie.).
His profile’s fine. It’s well written from a technical standpoint and it’s not like he’s any less believable than Ernest.

Under the “your thoughts” section of his wiki page, there’s this: ""I want to have Mitch's virtual babies"- Leo"

I’m hoping this is a good sign.

Pregame: More like prelame hahahah I don’t want to read V2 pregame anymore! I’m assuming CBP goes over it in his Cathalie writeup that I’m not gonna read until I’m done with this. If not, sorry.

Game: eh screw it i’m not gonna go over it in detail. Basically Mitch and Cathalie meet up really early on, and their relationship is TBH pretty heartwarming (ouch my heart no again). Mitch says stuff that’s mostly disconnected from reality and Cathalie’s like “no Mitch calm urself”. Ernest bumbles along and I’ve already talked about it. Also Mitch knows a lot about guns apparently, I guess. He could ID the exact kind of gun used in the prologue video, so that’s something. Also Cathalie’s G01 and Mitch is B01. Mitch and Cathalie have a little exchange and heeeeeeeeeerreeeeee’s Venus! Everyone runs away from Venus. End Thread! I know I didn’t really go into detail about this thread, but I quite liked it. It’s pretty good!

Next thread! Franco is a bad person! He sticks a tazer up Cathalie’s girlparts and tazes her! And then he kills both of them! FRAAAAAANCOOOOOOO! I’m bothered.

Well that just seemed kinda cruel to kill him off that way. aw man. :' (



Conclusion: While he’s not that realistic, Mitch is still a nice, good character. I will admit that I did prefer Cathalie over him, but only because I inherently prefer characters that behave in a grounded manner. I was sad to see them go inactive, and I really wish I could have seen where they went had they not been, well, inactive’d. Overall, Mitch is a pretty good read, just maybe skip the death thread. I’ve been pleasantly surprised!

Another one!

Prepare for stream of consciousness, I'm going to write this in real time.

[+] Profile

Is a freshman supposed to be 16? I swear that's the 14-15 age bracket. Moving on.
"Hobbies: Kendo, Kenjutsu, unarmed forms" just in case you were worried he was going to be one of those kids that can't fight, better put three different combat styles as his first three hobbies, to be safe. The rest are normal enough, System of a Down is a band I'm fairly fond of too but the name-drop gives me pause, I hope he's not going to be super edgy.

Appearance is nothing exciting, but what on Earth is this grammar? "He has a great dislike for school uniform wearing custom dress pants to make legging wider to more like a European hakama so stopping at the ankle but do not seem to come in contact with his legs unless running." There should definitely be more commas in here, I get the general idea but parsing it is a bit awkward. But don't worry, it gets a bit more unclear. Our local weeb also wears geta and tabi, and specifically mentions "The sandals are thick rope laced with a rubber sole for hard long travel during harsh weather with socks that seem very queer. He calls them tabi." First I thought he was saying he calls his sandals tabi, even now I find these sentences a bit awkward to parse. But okay, he's a pretty normal looking guy but apparently he doesn't like school uniform but just casually gets away with wearing not!hakama and he hasn't become an ostracised hermit for wearing socks with sandals yet.

I don't have much to say on his biography either, it's pretty normal until he mentions that he had a crisis of faith and... he likes samurai so he became a zen buddhist? But his parents are okay with it, more or less? He believes in Zen Buddhism principles and refuses to lead prayers at dinner but doesn't comment or combat their ideas unless he forced to cause it leads him into rocky and sandbar water. If I'm parsing that one right, they're kind of live and let live about his change in beliefs.

"Slowly he started reading the old stories of swordsmen real and fabled but each story taught him a lesson he felt was worth while. The morals and codes long forgotten and watered down by western culture and misunderstandings, Against his parents wishes but acceptance. He started to dabble into Kendo and wandering into several unarmed martial arts (Kempo, Muay Tai) but felt it lacked real mental aspects he was looking for." What I notice here is he also sort of undoes two of his hobbies, saying that he's not really into kendo or martial arts? He goes on to explain how he's more into kenjutsu and suddenly brings up battojutsu, both of which he trains in "with his only trust worthy and much more experienced friend" who goes unnamed. No allies are listed later on so I guess it never comes up.

His advantages are... uh, heroic determination and zen wisdom? Okay. And knowledge of "human anonymity" which I'm guessing is supposed to be anatomy. So he's a wise warrior man who knows how to kill people, great start. At least he's a good- or at least lawful-aligned killer, I guess.
Disadvantages, he refuses to use guns. Something tells me Batman's morals might not be quite so solid if it's life or death, but whatever. Also he doesn't trust people easily, which strikes me as an advantage on-island, but okay he's a loner.

Long story short, he's weeaboo Batman, except instead of being trained as a ninja by the League of Shadows, he thinks he's a samurai because he practised with his best friend.

[+] Pregame He has one thread

Class. Eat. Study. begins as the Seth and Marvin show, and I really don't feel like reading that. At the very bottom of the page, Jun and his odd grammar appear, and oh boy just to complete the look, this is his avatar. Just in case we weren't sure that John is a samurai.


Uh... anyway his first post in the thread is the last one. Our misunderstood aloof-meister sighs at normal kids being normal, complains about his clothes being uncomfortable, carries all his stuff in his bag all at once instead of using his locker, and texts his anonymous friend back home in New York. Seems about right based on his profile, but ultimately this was a meaningless post but it's nice to see a presumably new member make an effort to engage in pregame rather than just dive into the island and start killing.

[+] Version 2 proper The Island

He begins in To figure things out. which apparently starts on day 2? He wakes up to the announcements, so I can only guess he slept right the way through the first day. John goes through his stuff, wisely decides to leaf through the survival guide provided by "Mr. Donya", then begins marking off areas of interest on the map. Pretty sharp kid, he's doing the sort of stuff I imagine a lot of real people would in his situation; try to act like he's got a handle on it, formulate a plan, even if it all turns out to be empty bravado later it's a good psychological crutch. The writing remains a bit odd and randomly switches to first person perspective for half a sentence, but I'll stop commenting on that for now, assume it's still weird unless I mention that it's not.

Seems we have a badass in the room, he's going to endure this "biggest test" using his "brand new... HAIRBRUSH OF DEATH!". What a dork. I like his spirit. He then goes on to find the corpse of an "African Women" (what are plurals?), and whilst being put of by the view and the smell (again, liking the realism here, he's making an effort at least), he decides to loot all her valuables, namely the contents of her first aid kit, some shears and some flashbangs. Apparently whoever beheaded her left these niche weapons behind, and while he's not a ninja he'll take them for the chance they might be worth bartering with later. Then he thinks about trying to build a wooden sword... guess it could be feasible if those shears are sharp enough? Probably just as good to break them into two knives or straight up use a wooden club but, whatever. Samurais gonna samurai.

Immediately thereafter he walks out into the rain to find some wood to do exactly that, comes back, changes out of his wet clothes into full samurai regalia (complete with Japanese names and translations), writes a profound proverb on the wall whilst enjoying some one-sided banter with the viewing public, then finally breaks the two blades of his shears apart and starts whittling himself a sword. I maintain he could've just used the blades. As he does so he goes on a lengthy diatribe about how modern day America is falling apart due to corruption, comparing it to the Roman Empire, drawing parallels between gladiator combat and SotF as though his predicament is even legal, let alone government sanctioned and popular. Apparently a Mel Brooks movie where two legionaries get stoned is relevant to this monologue. Anyway.

Someone called Kristey turns up complaining internally about getting punched by a "Chink woman", and with an attitude to Asians like that it's hardly a surprise she talked shit and got hit. John completely ignores her and changes back into his now dry clothes. Okay. Apparently she hears the next day's announcements in the mid-afternoon and vanishes. John doesn't hear them but hears her footsteps on the way out. He changes back into what he just changed out of, says some dramatic sounding stuff about letting blood flow like a river, discards his flashbangs and hairbrush, and leaves.

John moves on to the Park in To Awake And Avenge The Dead, Megami, Cyco and Mitsuko are all in this one, but none of their most infamous kids. Was Megami infamous back then? I might be remembering her for something else. But it's not Bryan or Mariavel. Someone called baby_g is here too. John turns up and  it's foggy, so he decides the best approach is to sneak up on the assembled kids (Kevin, Sera, Jana and Zilya). Sera immediately notices a figure in the shadows anyway, and makes a point of having her gun ready without actually aiming it right at him. So out he comes, and tries to make nice, beginning by addressing them as "everything" instead of "everyone", which hardly seems polite to me. Zilya leaves immediately without acknowledging him. The others are skeptical (well, other two, Mitsuko just gets skipped over for a while), and he reacts with a self-important anime monologue, including how he could probably kill Jana with his wooden sword before she could even fire her crossbow, which apparently has enough recoil to shatter her wrist, too.

Kevin, at this point, decides that John is a threat (can't imagine why, after he expounded on how easy for him it'd be to kill people), and brings his fists to the wooden swordfight. Sera lets some of the air out of the potential epic duel by just threatening to shoot John if he does anything. John snarks about how cowardly it is to shoot someone from hiding, then leaves the thread before anyone has a chance to gainsay him, I guess he assumes that by saying that shooting him in the back would be dishonourable, he gains protection from such dishonourable conduct? Whatever. Let's see where he goes next, while I wonder if it's just John that's got an inflated idea of how good he is, or his handler.

The greed of man finds John in the Hospital, though he seems to think it's a shopping mall. He thinks wistfully about his last encounter, excusing the other kids' actions on account of how "life as they know it is dead", which would come off as endearingly profound and forgiving, if it wasn't for how he goes on to be completely blasé about the situation and how he'll probably die "with some honor and a-bit of style", whilst referring to his anonymous friend whom he hopes it watching. The post closes with 'As a man unsheaths his sword he becomes a demon. The question is can he sheath his sword and turn back to a human?' , which I can't tell if it's supposed to be thoughts or dialogue. But it's a total non-sequitur so I don't really care.

Venus walks in, ironically apparently she has an actual steel katana, but then she leaves in the same post so John has no chance to complete his cosplay. Thanks, by the way Strawberry Prince, for reminding me of what Venus did to Zed, I really needed to remember that. After that post, Megami drops in to inform us that she's taking over John on account of his handler's inactivity, and leaves the thread. But not before imitating John's prior style a little, saying a prayer for the dead in response to the next announcement (I have absolutely no idea how much time is meant to have passed) and wondering "Must we die like this?" Yes John, yes we must, kind of the premise of the game.

Now under Mitsuko's management instead of Megami's, John encounters Zilya again at the School Building in A Remarkable End. Apparently there's about 30 kids left at this point, so looks like John did alright for himself despite only appearing in four threads, including this one. Zilya immediately attacks him with her nunchaku, because, what's a girl to do when she's this close to the endgame and she meets a kid in cosplay? The first leg of the fight is short and unceremonious, thankfully without any more epic anime monologuing, and Zilya gets the upper hand, eventually thwacking John in the head and knocking him to the ground. But he gets back up, which she evidently does nothing to stop, and calls her out on her carelessness. The "Tch..." sound effect isn't written but by god it's palpable, if only he wore glasses too you could be sure they'd be gleaming menacingly while he pushes them back up his nose. Anyway they trade a few more blows, eventually Zilya hits John on the head again, and this time capitalises on the opening to start throttling him with her nunchaku chain, only to get elbowed in the ribs and drop her weapon. John presses the attack, backing Zilya up towards the furnace, she tries to defend herself using a flashlight...

Fucking really?
WHAT?

Okay I'd already read that he gets incinerated in a fight, I spoiler'd myself on that one, but that's how it happens? Apparently knocking the flashlight out of her hands into the furnace turns it into a bomb. They get blown to smithereens and half the school building collapses. GG, no re.

Okay so, summary.
John's written without much technical skill, I can't really find a delicate way to say that and I doubt the original handler will ever see this to be offended by it. His first post had to be edited from first to third person, which explains why he managed to miss out parts of it and get the weird mix of "he", "I" and "we" in there. As far as characterisation goes, he's nothing special, though he seems to be written as though he is. He reacts to everything that happens with an extremely blasé indifference, showing not the slightest hint of fear having guns or crossbows pointed at him, far outstripping what you'd reasonably expect from his supposed advantages of wisdom and maturity. It feels as though the handler has bought into his own hype and is writing John as this stoic badass who's obviously going to get through everything he encounters, dropping some profound wisdom-bombs along the way. He's then taken over by Mitsuko who does at least spare him the indignity of a Mariavel slaughterhouse, instead sending John out in a literal blaze of glory after a short duel to the death, which I guess does pay some homage to his intended characterisation.

Honest final thoughts; John's not really worth reading. His death isn't even that great, and feels kind of perfunctory from Mitsuko, though I guess she did have a lot of killing to get done, so I can't entirely hold that against her. Points for trying to be a decent person on-island in a version full of psychotic killers and rapists, but at least as many deducted for being a poorly written shonen protagonist cliché. In a word: meh.

But screw it, give me one more.

Welp. I had to get a Chad character eventually. Here we go with Jonathan Michaels.

Jonathan Michaels has a pregame thread where he plays with a lighter in the hallway as he ditches class due to the pregame murder taking everyone's attention or something? Another same-handler character named Jack strolls in and they have a conversation with no dialogue tags so I can't be bothered to keep track of who's speaking. Anyway.

SO.

It should be noted, if you're not aware, that Jonathan Michaels is the professional FEATHERWEIGHT BOXING CHAMPION OF THE ENTIRE WORLD. Apparently he was just dang good at boxing, because all that's basically given is that he started boxing when he was seven, had a rough first year after going pro (as I imagine most 14-year-olds would) and then turned it around an won the championship on his sixteenth birthday. He immediately celebrated with a three-month long drug binge so his parents made him go to public school. It's said he's a "former" champion in the bio, but there's no mention of him losing or getting stripped of the title and later in the bio it says he still has it. That bugs me a bit. That's also pretty much the entire bio so him being the drug-addled boxing champion of the world is all we're gonna get.

SO ON-ISLAND

It takes all of two sentences before Jonathan is reminiscing about all the blowjobs he's gotten. This is also a songpost set to the Red Hot Chili Peppers, which saddens me. But.... OK Jonathan is thinking about his life and making the connection between getting fucked by a girl because everyone fucks you over in life and now he's on SOTF blah blah blah, and IT'S NOT TERRIBLE. Like, lame, but not bad. That italics flashback isn't bad.... and then it turns bad, into an endless thread of 200-word run-on sentences that are meant to be poetic or whatever. Chad something comes up to Jonathan and screeches about how he needs an ally to find a girl. Jonathan tells him to fuck off, so Chad calls the boxing champion of the world gay. Jonathan gets up and goes into a massive rambling monologue broken by spurts of Chad crying, pleading, revelling in Jonathan's badassness, and pissing his pants, until they stare at each other for five minutes and Jonathan shoves his entire shotgun down Chad's throat and blows his head off. That... was pretty terrible. Oh and then Jonathan cries at the pathos of what fate has brought his way or whatever.

An Linh Tran comes by and tackles him, so Jonathan starts thinking about sex he might have had with her in the past and "9 inches of Jonathan Michaels poking her in the eye". WELP. She also gets the better of him during the fight for a bit, which says some very sad things about the state of boxing these days. She later dodges his punches. You're kind of a shitty boxer, Jonathan. Then they both run to open their bags and his zipper gets stuck so An Lihn hits him in the face with brass knuckles, and he runs away, not bothering to shoot her because reasons.

THE FEATHERWEIGHT BOXING CHAMPION OF THE WORLD, PEOPLE.

In his next thread he muses over how the shitstorm that just went down was a "PR Disaster" (yep) and self-loathes a bit. OK, I like that Jonathan is a self-loathing guy. It helps a bit that he's always musing on how deep down he hates himself, and while I wouldn't say it makes him relatable, it's better than nothing.

But forget anything with potential happening because here comes another same-handler-handled character for a dumb death. Brad Wilson comes by and says in like two sentences "HELLO angry person! Why not have some water I give you? Nothing suspicious here!" so Jonathan starts slurping it down while unloading a bit on how fucked up he is. Fine. BUT NO, Brad had deviously put LSD in the water so as to turn Jonathan into his enslaved minion, or something.

That does not work. Instead Jonathan hallucinates random things and screams "BEGONE FOUL HYDRA" before ripping Brad's clothes and face parts off with his bare hands and also blowing his head off with the shotgun. Then Jonathan is fine again and moves on. So will I.

He has some pleasant memories about "orgies with Czech supermodels" when he was 15 and rambles on about v1 and nothing in particular. About like six people come by but all Jonathan cares about is Whitney Acosta (whom he doesn't even know but she's the most important and Chad had mentioned her). Some people recognize him from whatever homeroom, but no one seems to notice or care that he's a multiple-killer or also THE BOXING CHAMPION OF THE ENTIRE WORLD. Whitney leaves and then a couple other people come and leave and everyone leaves. Glad to see these kind of pointless threads aren't a recent invention at least! Jonathan has another pointless RHCP songpost about all the gazillions of sex he'd had on the beach in Miami or whatever.

He immediately moves into a new thread with fucking Blind Melon songposting AAAAAARHG. He's showing some signs of cracking up by screaming to himself about An Lihn, we'll see if that goes anywhere. Four hundred pound Rupert Stockton watches this, does seem to recognize him as the boxing champ, and insults his penis size. Jonathan starts to reply, but then the announcement comes on. The first announcement.

ALL THIS HAPPENED ON THE FIRST DAY?!

So Jonathan is terrified at being announced as a killer, which completely goes against what I've seen of his character, and runs off. He meets ANOTHER Chad-handled character in Chris Cohen. They fight and apparently have some backstory about Jonathan... I don't even know. Chris and his wife (?!) were at a concert and Jonathan apparently ripped off a girl's clothes and left her there naked? So they start idiotically monologuing at each other during the fight and then it degenerates into them just getting into some philosophical argument that they decide to solve with rock paper scissors. Jonathan loses and cries while honorably giving Chris the shotgun to kill him. Chris runs away instead of shooting. But then Chris turns around and shoots Jonathan in the back from fifty yards away anyway. This gives Jonathan a barrage of shrapnel that the narrative helpfully tells us is badly at risk for infection, so Jonathan then decides he needs an ally.

His final thread is a completely incomprehensible screed that's presented as an interview in the diary of 12-year-old Brandon Cuthbert (guess who handled him). The interview is utterly pointless and then Jonathan walks away and the 12-year-old child proceeds to effortlessly beat him up, then chokes him out with an X-Box controller and dissects him alive.

THE FEATHERWEIGHT BOXING CHAMPION OF THE WORLD, PEOPLE!

So yeah. Jonathan Michaels... I try to be a bit positive. And if you first of all forget the fucking world boxing champion stuff, and cut out all the idiocy about him sleeping with ten girls a week or whatever wannabe-edgy shit his handler loves to stuff in, there's a bit of a glimmer of what could have been. Jonathan has a few moments where he's truly this angry, self-loathing guy who can't help but tell people to fuck off and then lash out at them if they don't, and if THAT had been played up instead of, well, everything else, and if he'd had some actual relations and threads with people who WEREN'T also handled by Chad, maybe we could've had something. But instead you get what was above, and hey, that's V2

ANOTHER!