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The End of Las Nevadas; A Beautifully Made Stream with Nothing to Say

(All names are in reference to the characters unless stated otherwise.)

While glossy, well-shot, and technically impressive, the Las Nevadas Finale leaves a lot to be desired in ways I haven't seen anyone mention—sporting flaws in its foundations that stretch farther than just its story development.

In no particular order, I'll be breaking down each part one-by-one to hopefully shed some light on things I've felt alone so far in noticing.

Pacing

This stream was undoubtedly beautiful; making great use of snappy transitions, a fantastic set of shots, and several well-edited montage sequences. cc!Quackity's lore has always been lovingly and painstakingly crafted. However, while it is stellar in the visual and editing department, it still stands to grow with regards to its pacing. Previous episodes have suffered from slow pacing in some areas, but this episode seems its polar opposite.

Each scene and line races past, only to be bogged down with extremely elongated establishing shots that could've been trimmed in half. Every plot moment doesn't give itself time to breathe and exist as it cuts to something else that speeds by just as nauseatingly. The ending especially reflects this as, once Quackity has lost another life and the country is damaged, there's a few speedy lines of closing exposition and... that's it.

That's how it all wraps up. It doesn't let the audience take in what happened or question if it's something repairable or even wonder how Q would react to the fallout. We're just told the result, flat and plainly, and then it's closing credits.

On the flip side, the scene where Ranboo and MD talk takes up an absurd Ten Minutes of the runtime (time which could've been used to develop other plot beats, which I'll mention later) where they don't mention much of anything important. It drives the story momentum to a grinding halt.

Scenes which did take their time to breathe were Calamity Duo's intro scene, the moment where Punz and Purpled negotiate, and Charlie's speech to Q in the hotel, followed by Q's death.

Music

Even with these moments of pacing brevity, there's still the prevailing issue on top which is this stream's use of music. Previous Las Nevadas episodes have executed their music cues well when they were necessary (all of cc!Quackity's montages excel at this), and it was because they understood the necessary balance between when to add music and when to leave the scene silent.

Music, when used effectively, can aid the tone of a scene. However, when used clumsily, it can fight against the tone set by the dialogue and actions of the characters. Oftentimes, silence can be more effective than any music ever could be because it leaves the dialogue and story to speak for itself and allows the audience to exist in the moment with the characters.

Throughout the entire stream, there was not a single moment of silence. Every moment was accompanied by music and about half were in active odds with its tone.

The most prevalent of these were the pieces accompanying Quackity's visit to Charlie's grave, Quackity's death, and Charlie's speech, all of which would've greatly benefited from silence, as the music ends up distracting from the moment, drawing more attention to itself than it should.

Story

While other Las Nevadas episodes have followed the standard Three Act structure, this one... does not. A conflict is introduced on Quackity's end and is never followed up on. There is no second-act low point; the period where the protagonist should be at their most hopeless.

And because there is no main-staying conflict (even harking over from previous episodes), the climax of the stream feels especially weak. Although it does call back to previous hanging plot threads, like Charlie's disappearance, Dream's quest for revenge, and Quackity's plans to open the casino, it still leaves the stream feeling meandering and pointless.

It says an awful lot that I've seen more discussion over a single speech and two lines of dialogue ("How to BE human. How to THINK like humans.") than any other aspect of its story.

By breaking its content down step by step, the sheer bare-bones development becomes apparent—The episode opens with a flashback, which delivers information the audience already knows. Then we're introduced to the grave scene, which hints at an off-screen moment between Charlie and Quackity that is never called back to (something which centers around the key to the city, an item which has no significance other than to be inserted into the episode for merch purposes.)

Again, it re-establishes information the audience already knows—Quackity cares a lot for Charlie. Then we introduce the main conflict; Quackity opens the country and no one visits. Thus, he makes a plan to genetically engineer citizens.

However we never see them used practically to solve this problem, so the conflict initially sparking this development turns the solution pointless. Then we get a scene of Punz convincing Purpled to aid Dream to torture Quackity by using Charlie to get to him. This sets the stakes.

(It also implies that Dream's offer to Foolish didn't go through? I suppose this is yet again another moment relegated to off-screen development, which would've only benefited the audience to actually see, unless this plot development is later touched on in Volume Two. I won't hold my breath.)

Then we get an... unrelated scene of Ranboo and MD that doesn't develop the plot—something which was most definitely added last minute (probably at cc!Ranboo's request.) Suddenly, we jump to post-Charlie's shift in character, where Dream appears with Punz and Purpled with absolutely no buildup.

During this scene, Quackity calls on Foolish for help and all the genetically engineered citizens are released and instantly solve the conflict at hand, quashing the tension flat. Then Charlie has his speech, throwing both Purpled and Quackity from the hotel. All of this, concluding on Las Nevadas' destruction (which turns out to not matter because... we were told so through exposition), and Quackity decides to forgive all of his enemies.

If picked apart, it becomes obvious just how thinly stretched the plot is and how many vital scenes of buildup are simply missing entirely. We never get a scene of Charlie coming back to himself and having his intentions twisted by Dream—even if the reveal implies Charlie was aware of everyone's motivations to use him from the get-go. We never see a moment of Dream and Purpled's trek to Las Nevadas, signalling to the audience of their arrival and amplifying tension.

We never get time to settle on Quackity and Charlie's reunion, which was rushed through (another unfortunate thing, since it's been highly anticipated for almost a full year now.) We never see how the genetically engineered citizens actually solve Q's population problem.

All of this is Necessary buildup to bring cohesion to the narrative, and would've even alleviated a lot of the pacing issues. It is especially egregious how script-driven and transplanted the slime army was to the story because it was introduced solely to dig Quackity out of a narrative hole. The conflict of Las Nevadas' population seems contrived specifically to put a roadblock in the way of Dream succeeding in his plans, because the audience is more than aware of how perfectly capable he is of this.

Therefore the conflict and Quackity's decision to create genetically cloned citizens feel as if they were puppeteered cartoonishly to be an easy solution to a later narrative conflict. All of which, unfortunately, decimated the tension of the scene because there was no time for Quackity to realistically feel in danger.

Dream

It goes without saying that Dream used to be one of the most intimidating and formidable villains in the story's history. Just the simple act of him logging on used to fill thousands of audience member's hearts with fear. However, with the unending bout of lore hiatuses and the dragging on of the Prison Arc, followed by another period of nothing, it has left a damper on the formidability of him as an antagonist.

This was dug even deeper with his rather lackluster attempt at revenge on Quackity, which goes wrong in a very... flat way. Since we're never shown what Charlie was told to do, believe, or say, the audience is left in utter confusion as to what Dream planned to use Charlie for to begin with. Even if he was only meant to emotionally toy with Q, Dream doesn't say a thing to Charlie, who stands behind Quackity and does nothing for a good few minutes.

Then when the slime army comes to attack, Dream just... gets instantly overwhelmed? And instead of going after Quackity again once the hoard is dead, he just resigns to blowing up Las Nevadas a teeny tiny bit.

Certainly not a Doomsday attempt, which is what the audience has come to expect at this point—overkill. That is Dream's specialty. However, he doesn't.

Once the destruction is over, Dream doesn't pursue Quackity further, despite going to LNVs with the sole intent of capturing him, dragging him off, and torturing him to death; along with destroying everything and everyone he loves. In the end, this is yet again the script pupeteering the actions of the characters.

The writers need Dream to not succeed, or else they can't carry this conflict over into Volume Two. And if that's not what they're planning to do then the question of why this happened will only multiply.

Charlie and Quackity

The dramatic shift and decay of this pair's respective characters and relationship is this stream's second greatest detriment, just shy of its empty story content. Quackity's decision to create a genetically engineered body of citizens because he misses Charlie and wants people who are "just like him" is startlingly out of character, shatters the perception of Dap Duo's friendship foundation, and presides on a logically flawed premise.

Quackity is a character who is naturally protective of those who are weak, innocent, or who remind him of himself. He goes out of his way to self-sacrifice for them, and this is especially true with Tommy and Charlie. Quackity knows that true friends are rare for him and are something special and meant to be cherished, even if he closes himself off, pushes them away, and pretends not to care.

It is possible to buy Quackity missing Charlie enough to create copies of him, however this has no real buildup. There's no turn to the more extreme and dramatic to overcome his loss. And worst of all, it is specifically the loss that is de-emphasized in favor of a short-term solution to a problem wholly manufactured by the script to later solve the central conflict.

It comes out of nowhere and is gone just as fast. On top of it, its implications are troubling as Quackity has shown an urge to control things, but never to this degree and not this heartlessly. This change for the worse can work, certainly.

A gradual change for the worse or the better is what character development is all about. However, this change is instant, jarring, and again, has no buildup. The cruelty of this action is also never addressed and Quackity's inclination to it is never foreshadowed (most likely because it was never meant to be dwelt on, as it's only added to the story to thwart Dream's plans.)

There's also the deeper implications of Quackity genetically cloning beings that are meant to be "like Charlie." It implies that Quackity has always seen Charlie as someone mindlessly obedient and disposable—someone who is more like a pet, than an actual friend, when we were consistently shown otherwise.

Quackity started off initially planning to use Charlie's naivety to his advantage to get him to spy for him. However, as time went on, he formed a genuine connection to him, and thus dropped this initial plan. Instead, because he came to trust him and care for him as a friend, he chose him as the inheritor of all his work. In a backwards way, he tries to teach Charlie everything he knows.

Not manipulate him, not lie to him—tell him exactly how Quackity himself sees the world and how he wishes Charlie to see it too; because he wants Charlie to be safe and because he wants Charlie to keep his nation safe. He comes to see Charlie as someone human, and when Charlie is hurt, Quackity dives in after to save him at the potential expense of his own life. When Charlie dies, it destroys Quackity.

How could it not? That was his first true friend he'd made in a long, long time. However, with this new development, it shatters what was previously established, showing that Quackity only ever saw Charlie as someone who could be made again, who was nothing but a follower (despite teaching him to be a future leader); someone who he never saw as human.

There's also the majorly overlooked issue of him searching for the perfect follower in "someone just like Charlie." Sure, Charlie was naive and went along with many orders, but he consistently questioned Quackity. He consistently took apart the logic of his arguments, his lessons, his ideals.

He laid them down, piece by piece, in a way that left Quackity to question himself. Charlie was never a perfect follower, and Quackity knew that. He made mistakes, he disobeyed, he never once stopped asking "Why?"

If Quackity knew him well enough by then to be destroyed by his death and disappearance, then why did he expect that making another version of Charlie would create someone perfectly obedient and mindless? Why did he see Charlie in this way when both him and the audience knew otherwise?

Then we have the issue of Charlie's dramatic shift in characterization. Because we were never shown what went on between Charlie and Dream, we have no reference for how or why this shifted Charlie's demeanor. We have no reference for his epiphany or how he "woke up."

Even if it's imperative for Charlie's realization about Q to remain a secret for a plot twist, it begs the question of why Charlie ever greeted Q at the restaurant or decided to stay with him when he knew that Quackity was "a bad person" from the get-go (something which he knew Quackity was aware of already feeling. In Charlie's only POV stream, he asks Q if he thinks of himself as a good person and Quackity replies "I don't know." It's not something Quackity needs to be told, because he knows and he struggles with those thoughts already.)

As pointed out before, Charlie has always been capable of questioning Quackity's rules and reasoning, so why not tell Quackity about how terrible he thought he was all those months ago? Why not be upfront with him, as he was about everything else? If Charlie never actually liked Quackity or anything that was happening, why would he proclaim to trust him upon first instinct?

Why would he live in denial of Quackity's mortality, as if hoping he'd stick around forever? It also seems especially out of character for him to go out of his way to physically hurt Quackity—someone who once risked his life to save his; someone who only ever wanted to protect him and trust him and give him everything he'd ever worked to earn (regardless of the means.)

There's simply not enough buildup to warrant that sort of payoff because we never got to see that change occur in Charlie.

The (hollow) Theme of Revenge

In the previous Las Nevadas episode, we were shown Quackity's gradual change for the better under Charlie's influence. Despite being his leader and mentor, it was Quackity who had the most to learn from Charlie, who questioned Q's morals and lessons in a way that Quackity had to confront. Quackity, like Tommy and Wilbur and Tubbo and many others, was taught "lessons" stemming from violence.

They were physically hurt by people who were stronger than them, who did this as a way to force them to grow. However, the things learned from this practice were traumatic and unhealthy and actively stumped their growth on their journey to being better, kinder people. It was only because Charlie opposed Quackity in a non-violent, non-confrontational manner that Quackity was more susceptible to learning and growing and doing so without closing himself off and being afraid.

He effectively learns that revenge is never worth the price in one of the most powerful scenes in Quackity's entire arc; where the two friends talk as they stand on the Needle's balcony and overlook the country. The question is asked if revenge is ever worth it and Quackity finally, after so long, answers truthfully—"No. It's not."

To finally hammer this home, Quackity loses Charlie because Purpled decides to seek revenge for a previous misdeed. He sought revenge and he succeeded. It finally rings clear, that because Quackity had acted in the same way Purpled had in the past, he is forced to see himself from another perspective—from the eyes of someone who reaps what they've sown.

He can ask himself, again, was this worth it? Quackity again says no, and doesn't seek out Purpled to repay the favor because he finally sees what Charlie had tried to tell him. This is a perfect demonstration of this theme, and I'd argue, it is the only well-executed moment regarding revenge in the entire Dream SMP storyline.

Unfortunately, this is all horribly undermined by the later development of Charlie returning and violently killing Quackity (someone who'd never wronged him further than his dishonesty and opportunism, both of which he regrets.) Quackity's selfless act of diving into danger to save Charlie is purposely ignored; repaid by a callous, out-of-character act of revenge, which serves nothing. That's not even getting into the issue of Charlie's act of revenge belonging solely to Purpled, because despite Purpled's actions being tied to Quackity, they are not Quackity's fault.

If this logic were applied appropriately in every aspect of the story, then Quackity would not be considered at fault for the Butcher Army—it would be Techno, because he "started it." Shifting the blame of the cycle of vengeance onto the person who caused the initial injustice also completely undercuts the actions and responsibilities of every person involved in sustaining a conflict. It also de-emphasizes the strength and kindness it takes for someone to forgive and be the one to end the cycle.

While Quackity's death is poetic and well-shot, it says nothing. Charlie follows the lessons he himself had questioned to be flawed, despite having free will. And if this was because of Dream's influence, we will never know because it was never shown.

To add insult to injury, this act of violence is what forces Quackity to change for the better, and give everyone who wronged him a letter of reconciliation. This destroys every other moment the Dream SMP has laid out thus far regarding its collective theme of violence; that it will never teach anyone anything good, useful, or healthy. It will only cause trauma and hurt and leave people to unlearn the good and moral code they carry with them.

Instead, the message here is that violence was actually Quackity's wake-up-call, instead of the perfectly fitting scene between Q and Charlie of the two simply... talking, as friends. Violence being Quackity's "teacher" is much less powerful and it's intensely at odds with the rest of everything established in his arc.

For the sake of spectacle and shock, we've received a message of revenge so hollow and meaningless that it manages to say Nothing At All.

Minor Issues

These have no bearing on my opinion of the stream, but I haven't seen anyone point these out yet.

During the Calamity Duo flashback, the ending of it is a smash-cut to the destruction of Las Nevadas. The destruction shown in the clip doesn't match what actually happens nearly an hour later, with the former taking place at night and containing more fire than explosion. Quackity was also never physically present at the destruction, so it's a mystery as to why that little tonal shock was included to begin with as it spoils the ending of the episode (even if it may have been obvious going in.)

Purpled's motivations for kidnapping Charlie were because he... wanted to kill him. Okay. Why not just kill him when you first found him? Why not kill him at any point on the way back to your hideout? Why did you have to kill him in a very specific location where Quackity would never see it? Wouldn't it hurt Quackity worse if you killed him around Las Nevadas where Q could find him quickly? Even if Purpled was afraid of Q being notified via chat message, he didn't have to bring Charlie all the way back to the main area to do that.

During the montage where Quackity gives letters of reconciliation to everyone, he leaves one where Wilbur had sailed away. This implies that Tommy told Quackity that Wilbur was gone. Again, yet another scene that happened off-screen that would've only benefited the audience to actually see.

Conclusion

While beautiful and well-made—as cc!Quackity's streams always are—the issues with story, pacing, music, and characterization leave this stream a disappointing sendoff for the end of Quackity's character in Volume One.

It is painful to see it end like this, as Quackity is my favorite character, second only to Tommy. That isn't to say there isn't something to like in this episode, but it is a far cry from the height of its predecessors.

I hope to see better from him in the future, if there ever is better to come.

#for later #this is very long ngl

findingjoynweirdstuff

I think the reason I love Sands of Time so much is because a lot of Minecraft minigames tend to test certain aspects of Minecraft gameplay like PvP, building, or parkour, but you don’t as often see a game that tests a players skill at doing something that, really, is such a big part of the vanilla Minecraft experience: caving.

Everything about Sands of Time seems far removed from Minecraft as a game at first, and it kind of took a while for the game to grow on me for that reason, but when you actually look at what it’s all about, it’s completely parallel to the experience of cave-exploring.

You go down into one tunnel thinking you have a good sense of direction to get back out afterwards, but then you start going down branches and split offs and the torches you placed to lead you back can sometimes end up confusing you instead.

Or maybe you place down a line of cobblestone at the mouth of a cave to mark it as having been explored already, just like you do with the carpets.

You fight mobs, you mine ores for riches, but you have to bring those all back safely too – and half the adventure of caving is having to find your way back home afterwards.

Idk, maybe this is all completely obvious and it just took me way too many MCCs to notice, but as someone who isn’t as into playing PvP or parkour minigames I just really, really like the concept of SOT

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