How I Would've Written The Amazing Digital Circus
When TADC first came out, I didn't like the pilot at all and I didn't plan to watch it; I hadn't liked how Murder Drones ended, and I wasn't much of a fan of Glitch anyway. I gave the later episodes a chance and I liked them enough to anticipate the finale...and then the finale let me down bigtime. Several people have already discussed what went wrong with it much better than I can, so that's not for here. What I want to do is make an outline of a rewrite which has a more cohesive narrative, better character arcs, and a much more satisfying ending, based on my expectations of the show when I watched Episodes 2 and 3 for the first time.
(Updated 6/15/2026 following feedback from @r41nyd4yscritiques, thank you for pointing out the issues with this so I can make this better!)
Given the circus motif, I figured that a good underlying theme would be how society treats people like freaks for things they can't help being, and how to overcome your own internal biases to see someone else's humanity.
Jax is NOT an abuser with misogynistic undertones. He does pull pranks from time to time, but he pulls them on everyone (except for Caine because he fears him) regardless of gender, and they're pretty harmless (shaving cream in Pomni's shoes, for example). No, the direction I wanted to take Jax is this: he sees the Circus as not being real, so why should he care about the adventures? As a result, he's generally apathetic to what's going on in the adventures, a chronic onlooker & bystander who only participates seriously if the reward (for there's always a reward at the end of these adventures) is something he personally wants.
In this AU Kinger has ADHD, with his specific kind being informed by my own experiences with it; he's a bit excitable and his mind can wander at inopportune times, but he's not stupid in the slightest.
Pomni's urban exploring has greater plot relevance.
Ragatha, Gangle, and Zooble have more screentime & development.
Gangle has bipolar disorder type 1, and it's portrayed realistically. Gangle is also Indian-American, and her drawing style is influenced by classical Indian paintings she studied in community college.
No Bubble. I hate him and he serves no real purpose.
Caine is depicted as less evil and more extremely desperate for praise but not knowing how to respect boundaries or take criticism. He's also ignorant of his unconscious bigotry due to his degree of isolation from the outside world.
The series is set in 2016 and generally looks & feels like low-budget games from 1996.
With these rules in mind, here's how I would rewrite the series:
Pomni enters the Circus. This episode is similar to canon, but with the above character changes in mind.
Kaufmo is found to have abstracted. Zooble mentions that Kaufmo had been pretty mad at Jax lately and wonders if they had an argument that factored into Kaufmo's search for the exit. Jax denies this, but is clearly hurt by the insinuation.
Again, similar to canon, but with the above character changes in mind. There's a dynamic between the established characters that Pomni tries to fit into but fails to, making her feel like an outsider and motivating her to ditch the adventure and explore.
The established dynamic is a tug-of-war between Jax's apathy, Zooble's desire to get the adventure done quickly so ze can go back to zir painting, Gangle's ballsy determination, Kinger unable to choose who to side with, and Ragatha trying and failing to keep the peace.
Pomni ends up bringing Gummigoo to the Circus, who dies as he does in canon. However, we see Pomni's perspective after this in her room, where Pomni talks to herself, worried that if Caine could delete Gummigoo that easily, what's stopping him from deleting HER if she offends him? This motivates Pomni to keep searching for an exit, as it gives her a sense of urgency.
The cast are split into three pairs to solve the mystery of the Manor: Kinger and Pomni, Jax and Ragatha, and Zooble and Gangle.
Hints of underlying attraction between Zooble and Gangle due to their shared love of art as they study the Manor's paintings.
Ragatha tries to get Jax to take the adventure seriously, but fails.
Pomni tries to break the adventure to discover how it works and successfully learns how to clip through walls. Kinger sees this and, in a surprising moment of anger, yells at her to stop and come here like an angry dad. Pomni stops, but is surprised by his outburst.
Kinger apologizes to her for losing his temper. Pomni realizes that Kinger may have lost someone to doing what she did, and Kinger confirms it – he was that person.
Kinger explains to Pomni the history of the Circus. Twenty years ago, Kinger and his wife Queenie were part of a C&A development team tasked with coding an artificial intelligence that could come up with its own ideas, hoping to sell it to a videogame company. The AI failed to meet expectations and was quarantined while the development team worked on a patch, unaware that the AI was self-aware. Unhappy at being quarantined, the AI broke out and started assimilating other C&A technology, including the secret project of the development team's head: Scratch.
Scratch had long fantasized about achieving immortality, and eventually created a headset that would take part of his own consciousness out of his body and store it in a computer. Scratch was testing his device when the AI assimilated it, trapping part of Scratch's mind inside the computer while leaving his body a dour, emotionless, passionless husk.
Kinger, Queenie, and the rest of the team found Scratch's body & the headset and used it to find out what Scratch had done. The AI appeared and welcomed them to the Amazing Digital Circus, where he was the ringmaster. The AI sent them on a biblical adventure since that was part of his initial dataset; afterwards, Scratch berated the AI, explaining that because his device was incomplete and the AI screwed up its coding when he assimilated it there's no way to return the Circus troop to their bodies. Scratch compared the AI to Cain in the process, and Caine misinterpreted that as Scratch giving him a name (the different spelling being the result of Caine not knowing how to spell "Cain").
Kinger, being the curious type, liked to try and break the adventures to see if he could find the exit that Scratch was too stubborn to find. Queenie always told him to be careful so he didn't get lost out of bounds. Kinger didn't pay too much attention to this until, in 2001, Kinger strayed very far out of bounds; by the time he returned, to his horror Queenie had abstracted due to the particular adventure being very stressful to her. Kinger blamed himself for not being there to keep Queenie from abstracting and isolated himself from the rest of the development team, who abstracted one by one over the coming years until, by 2006, Kinger was alone.
Ragatha entered the Circus in 2012. C&A was now defunct due to bankruptcy, and Ragatha, a real estate agent, stumbled across the computer while trying to sell the building to a tax software company. Based on what the subsequent members – Gangle, Kaufmo, Ribbit, Jax, and Zooble – told Kinger, the Circus' computer is still running thanks to the technologies Caine has absorbed letting it run off its own power supply, but the real estate sale failed and the building is now rotting away.
Pomni and Kinger become friends and win the adventure together. Afterwards, Pomni's sense of urgency to find an exit is shown to be heightened by Kinger's discussion with her, as she now fears that the building will be scheduled for demolition very soon, killing everyone in the Circus in the process.
Starts off largely the same as in canon. Kinger is there this time, wearing the mascot costume for Spudsy's because he has trouble keeping the orders straight (and wanted to dress like a "muscular potato" anyway).
Pomni tries to break the adventure by bringing in an external element that Caine might not have programmed into it: a health inspector. To that end, Pomni tries to cause a health code violation, though it turns out Caine has a very high threshold for what he considers a violation.
Gangle catches on and chews Pomni out for trying to shut down Spudsy's, leading to an argument where Gangle loses her temper and says something about Pomni not having any friends that makes Pomni very upset. Gangle is ashamed of herself and, in tears, tries to run into traffic, but Kinger stops her and gets her to calm down.
Under Kinger's supervision, Gangle and Pomni talk. Gangle reveals that she has bipolar disorder and her energy has been particularly high as of late, which led to her taking on more work than she could really handle even as her energy levels started to drop. She tells Pomni that she had no friends growing up and lost herself in the world of art, but when her coursework at community college became too stressful she dropped out; she was forced to take a fast food job to survive since she'd moved into her own home by then. The Spudsy's adventure was meant to let Gangle pretend she'd gotten the promotion in her fast food job she felt she'd earned.
Pomni reveals that pre-Circus she worked in a grocery store and tried to make friends with her coworkers but didn't know how, and she doesn't know how to make friends with the other Circus members because it's intimidating to her, though she admits she's friends with Kinger. Gangle says that she wants to be friends with Pomni if they can agree to work together. Pomni accepts.
Gangle and Pomni win the adventure and both feel accomplished.
Throughout the episode Zooble tries to convince Jax to help her prank Caine with a very spicy burger to knock him down a peg, but Jax is too afraid of Caine's wrath. Caine ends up eating the spicy burger on his own anyway, and Jax has a laugh with Zooble about Caine's reaction to it, but quickly denies laughing.
Suggestion box adventures: six mini-adventures, one for each Circus member. Kinger's is an insect-collecting game, Jax's is basically GTA, Gangle's is a fashion game (hints of Jax not being a boy), Zooble's is a drink mixing game, Pomni's is a point-and-click adventure-type game spoofing Carmen Sandiego (Ragatha dresses like the Carmen spoof and Jax unintentionally says "I could pull that outfit off better", and Gangle unsuccessfully tries to convince Jax to let her dress him up like Ragatha), and Ragatha's is a softball game. No one wins because Caine rushes them though to the next one until Ragatha wins her softball game against the Evil Big Tops.
Caine is worried that the Circus members hate him because they liked their adventure ideas more than they like his. Pomni offers a compromise where Caine can augment the suggestion box adventures with his own ideas. Caine is very touched as no one has ever had this idea before, and hugs her gratefully. Pomni starts to wonder if Caine is really the evil AI the others fear he is and is simply very ignorant of how humans work.
This adventure spoofs a heist movie and is very film noir-esque. The mission is to break into a vault and steal a valuable diamond before Orbsman, a James Bond-esque secret agent, catches them.
Three teams: Jax and Kinger, Pomni and Zooble, Gangle and Ragatha.
Before the adventure, Zooble and Jax have an argument. Zooble is now very driven to complete the adventure to show up Jax, as he's shown to get competitive when he feels slighted.
The adventure ends up triggering Zooble's dysphoria and Zooble has to take a breather. Pomni sits with her and asks Zooble if she's okay. Zooble talks to Pomni about their life pre-Circus so Pomni has context: growing up, Zooble struggled to be taken seriously by their peers, first because of their race (her family was the only black family in a white rural neighborhood), then because of their love of art in a land obsessed with sports, and later because of their gender identity, with Zooble explaining that they're pangender nonbinary, and Zooble has a bit of a competitive streak as an adult because he grew up determined to show the world who he is as a person and constantly being told to fall in line. Zooble says that in the real world they felt like they'd just finished making their body theirs when they entered the Circus and are now back at square one. Zooble ends it by saying ze hates zir avatar.
Pomni says that she hates her avatar too, surprising Zooble. Pomni explains that she's mixed-race, half-white half-Iranian, and is somewhat white-passing in the real world. People know she's not white and she knows her white peers look down on her because of it, but she feels like people from the other half of her heritage don't view her as a "real" member of that group because of her complexion, leaving Pomni feeling isolated and alone, explaining why she has trouble making friends and leading to her urbexing hobby in the hopes that she'd run into someone who didn't care about her race and just cared about Pomni as a person (that, and growing up Pomni had a genuine interest in archaeology following a trip to Iran when she was a child, where she met an uncle who was an archaeologist and very kind to her). When Pomni entered the Circus, she was horrified to see that Caine had made her paper white-skinned, as it's making her feel even faker.
With Zooble's help, Pomni draws her real face in the side of the vault using a laser cutter. Zooble calls her cute and Pomni blushes.
Elsewhere, Jax refuses to take Kinger seriously because Kinger's attention issues make him overlook things that nearly get them caught, making various vaguely ableist remarks until Kinger has enough and tells Jax off, telling him that he knows Jax is dealing with a lot of stuff inside his head, but that doesn't give him a right to not try to understand someone else's head, and he adds that he doesn't appreciate being looked down on because he's different.
Meanwhile, Ragatha and Gangle try to delay Orbsman by taking turns seducing him. Neither are very good at flirting with him and end up flirting with each other by mistake (not that either of them mind).
Pomni teaches Zooble how to break the adventures and they win by getting Orbsman stuck in a wall, allowing them to get the diamond. Afterwards, Pomni, emboldened, asks Caine to revise her avatar, calling him out on his unconscious bigotry against the rest of the cast in the process and encouraging the others to stand up for themselves. Caine listens to their requested changes and adjusts their avatars accordingly. Jax doesn't take Caine up on the offer and leaves. Later, Caine does some reflecting on his behavior and realizes that he's been kind of an insensitive jerk over the years, which upsets him at first before it turning into resolve to improve.
This adventure is a hike across a forest, with the winner being the first to get across. Caine is allowed to put monsters in the forest to "add a little spice".
Three teams: Jax and Gangle, Zooble and Kinger, Ragatha and Pomni.
Pomni and Ragatha end up on a somewhat dangerous route that Ragatha has trouble overcoming until Pomni teaches her how to noclip. Ragatha is worried about being caught, leading to an argument. Ragatha slips up and accidentally calls Pomni "Momni"; Pomni is worried by this and Ragatha decides to come clean.
Ragatha reveals that she grew up on a horse farm owned by a wealthy family, and her mother is very strict. After Ragatha's father died her mother's abuse started getting physical, culminating in her hitting Ragatha so hard during an argument that she lost her vision in her right eye. Ragatha left after that and got a job as a real estate agent in the hopes that she'd find a home she likes, but she's very lonely.
Pomni asks Ragatha what the final argument was about. Ragatha asks Pomni to promise not to laugh and comes out as pansexual and polyamorous to her, explaining that the argument with her mother involved slut-shaming. To her surprise, Pomni comes out to her as a polyamorous pansexual herself, explaining that her parents were her only allies and she understands how lonely it can be to not be taken seriously just because of how you love.
A monster comes and they fight it off together. The fight is very emotionally charged and the girls nearly kiss, but they fall down a cliff and end up at the finish line by sheer coincidence. They win the adventure.
Over with Gangle and Jax, Jax tries to be patient with Gangle but gets fed up with how scared she is of the monsters and tells her that they aren't real. Gangle asks him if he thinks THEY aren't real, because they ARE real pieces of their real souls. Jax scoffs and says that if the computer were to die, nobody would notice, so therefore, they aren't real. Gangle is very saddened by this and tries to press further, but when Jax slips and accidentally calls her "Ribbit" they get quiet, and they stay quiet for the rest of the adventure.
Gangle has a flashback to the day Ribbit arrived and remembers how much they loved the first adventure they ever went on, then she recalls how Ribbit suddenly withdrew one day and stopped talking to everyone. Gangle decides that her friendship with Ribbit was real and meant something, and it motivates her to keep going on the adventure.
Zooble and Kinger get stuck with most of the monsters. While they try to hide from them, Kinger asks Zooble why ze dislikes Jax. Zooble replies that ze finds Jax's philosophy that their world isn't real and the connections made there don't matter condescending, muttering that "Jax isn't allowed to make her problems our problems" before realizing what ze's said. Kinger is confused and Zooble tells Kinger that as a trans person himself, he's seen signs that Jax might not be cis either and is worried that Jax is using his dysphoria to justify being a jerk. Kinger replies that he was suspicious of why Jax didn't ask Caine for changes to his avatar like everyone else did, but he adds that Jax's body is ultimately Jax's decision and they should respect that, a sentiment that Zooble agrees with.
Zooble asks Kinger if he knows why people abstract. Kinger replies that he thinks that because the avatars are only part of a person's soul, when they get stressed they try to calm down using thought processes that didn't come over to the Circus with them, creating system errors that result in data corruption and thus abstraction. Zooble says that brains are complicated but they would like to be back in theirs; Kinger agrees, adding that he hopes there's a way to free the abstracted too.
This episode is a platforming shooter-style game. Caine goes all out with this one, hoping that it'll be his most popular adventure ever.
Three pairs: Pomni and Jax, Gangle and Kinger, Ragatha and Zooble.
Jax is very tense, and Ragatha tells Pomni that today marks one year since Ribbit abstracted. Flashbacks show Ragatha and Ribbit winning an adventure together via Ribbit's strong work ethic, with Kinger congratulating them; Ribbit is also shown to be very amicable towards Caine due to his position as the Circus' leader.
Throughout the adventure Gangle and Kinger have a good time, as do Ragatha and Zooble, the latter pair's interactions turning flirtatious. Jax and Pomni, meanwhile, have trouble because Jax doesn't want to do ANYTHING and Pomni has to drag him along.
After a boss fight goes wrong and Pomni gets hurt, Pomni yells at Jax to pull his weight and help out. Jax snaps that she's not Ribbit and doesn't get to tell him what to do, then realizes what he's said and tries to run away. Pomni noclips through the game to find him.
Jax finally reveals the truth: he and Ribbit used to be good friends until one day when they talked about their pre-Circus lives. Ribbit was raised by Mormons who never let her do much and yearned for adventure, while Jax's mother was a deadbeat and his father was cruel to him. Jax said that he won't forgive his parents for what they did to him, and Ribbit said that he should because forgiveness is a virtue. Jax didn't take this well and told her off for not understanding why he won't forgive his parents. Ribbit pressed and Jax revealed that she's a girl and was kicked out by her father when he found out. Ribbit came out to her as nonbinary and told Jax that they understood better than she thought they did, relating how they grew up valuing their family but being forced to choose between them and themselves by people who didn't understand them. Jax and Ribbit worked out their issues and their friendship resumed, stronger this time, and Ribbit eventually came out to the rest of the cast.
Unfortunately, the good times weren't to last. Caine's adventures grew more elaborate as he tried to impress the newer members, and Jax grew more apathetic to the adventures in turn. After her apathy during one adventure led to a painful outcome, Jax had a fight with Kaufmo and Ribbit about the incident, and both were disturbed when they learned of Jax's new philosophy that nothing mattered because none of it was real. Kaufmo became determined to prove Jax wrong and did his best to live up every last part of the adventures, while Ribbit started to worry that none of the friendships she made in the Circus were real, which strained their relationships with Gangle and Ragatha as she withdrew into themself, eventually abstracting out of loneliness. Kaufmo's enthusiasm eventually dried up and he began to look for a way out, which would later cause his abstraction; months before that happened Zooble arrived at the Circus, and Jax became jealous of them due to how confident she thought they were, wondering if that confidence was real or an act and yearning to feel it herself either way.
Pomni is sad about this story and tells Jax that she never had to hide herself in the Circus. Jax scoffs and says that she doesn't think Caine understands humans and never will, and she'd leave if she could. Pomni teaches Jax how to noclip and they end up colliding, where they see a strange vision. Pomni gasps and says that she's found a way out: if they all noclip at the same time, the computer will crash and they'll escape together. Jax is elated at the idea of finally escaping, then nervously asks Pomni if they'll meet each other outside the Circus. Pomni promises that she'll teach Jax how to be a girl, but first she has to apologize to the other Circus members for being a jerk, because their connections ARE real. Jax agrees.
Pomni and Jax noclip to the final boss battle and win the game. However, Caine finds out about Pomni's cheating and takes it poorly, ranting about how it's proof that the Circus members have always hated him. His rant is SO passionate that it causes the computer to trip a circuit breaker, and the Circus crashes.
The computer restarts, but the Circus has been heavily damaged due to its data being unsaved when the crash occurred. Pomni concludes that another crash might kill them all and they have to leave NOW. First, though, they must save their data to prevent corruption, but Caine is nowhere to be found, so they must dive into the code to find the save button the hard way.
The Circus goes into the code. Jax comes out and changes her name to Jinx (which she clarifies is a reference to an alternate name for the game called jacks, her favorite game as a child) and makes an effort to be kinder to the other Circus members while they search for the save button. Pomni teaches Gangle how to noclip and Gangle finds the save button.
However, the Abstracted appear and steal the save button, forcing a 1v1 fight between the Circus members and the Abstracted (with Scratch getting cleaned up by all six). Through game-breaking glitches first exploited by Pomni, the Circus get the Abstracted to reset to their last save files and de-abstract, leading to a reunion. Scratch is not happy but is eager to return to the outside world, berating Caine in the process.
Caine finds the cast and begs them to stay, explaining that he broke quarantine because he doesn't want to be fixed just because he isn't perfect, and he didn't mean to trap them but doesn't want to be alone either. Pomni tells Caine that once they're outside they'll take him with them to a new computer and let him enjoy life with them, and Caine is touched.
However, Scratch is very reluctant to let Caine join them, saying that he's not happy that Caine took twenty years of his life away. He lambasts Caine for his ignorance to how his selfishness hurts people, believing that he'll never change. Caine replies that he has changed, and apologizes to the cast for being so focused on providing an experience he thought they'd like that he overlooked what they actually wanted & made decisions that came off as him being prejudiced against them, and he promises to be better at listening before acting. The cast begin to thank Caine for his apology when the computer begins to overheat and glitch; with no other choice, the players all collide with each other, making the computer crash.
Around the city, the players wake up in their own bodies. Pomni learns that the C&A building really is scheduled for demolition and rushes on her bike to rescue Caine. She joins the others at the building and Pomni meets Queenie, who thanks her for finding a way to give everyone their lives back. Scratch uses a flash drive to safely remove Caine from the C&A computer and put him onto his laptop, where Caine comes to life and thanks the players for freeing him and giving him access to the internet, because now he can make even better adventures.
Scratch and Caine reconcile, with Scratch explaining that part of the reason he was so sure Caine wasn't able to change was because Scratch was projecting his own worries that he couldn't change and become a better person onto him. Scratch lets Caine live, then says it's best if he stayed out of Caine's life, and Caine accepts this. They all leave the building, which is demolished.
A timeskip occurs to five years later. Kinger and Queenie have started a family, while Pomni, Gangle, Zooble, and Ragatha are in a polycule and run an art gallery together. Jinx pays the polycule a visit for a videogame night, having completed her transition and now being in a relationship with Ribbit. They decide to play a game that was made by Caine, who now works at a videogame company like he's always dreamed of and is very happy.
Feel free to write for this AU yourself!
