#the arrival

[violettttttttttttttt]

I finished playing The Arrival and I can't stop thinking about her😔

[aduckwithears]

The way Crowley automatically starts toward the bookshop, then has to do an about face for the coffee shop.

Little things to love about Good Omens S2 (17/?) - Masterpost

[nunl33]

🤤

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

So I read the first 30 or so animorphs many times over. I also read #54 and the Ellimist Chronicles a lot. But the ones in the late 30s through the 50s, I probably only read once or twice. What are the highlight books in that span? The ones that you get excited about in the re-read?

TBH, #36 - #52 really is where the series dips in quality. Continuity gets shaky, Jordan and Rachel especially have out-of-character notes, and some of the plots are After School Special Handled Badly. But. Many excellent books to be had in there. My favorites:

#38: The Arrival One of the less popular books overall, but my favorite Ax story. I love how the andalite Suicide Squad coming to Earth becomes this visceral demonstration of how much better the Animorphs have gotten than even elite andalite fighters, because the Animorphs are just so damn experienced. It also forces Ax to confront his growing discomfort with andalite imperialism while also driving home just how lonely he is as the only member of his species on this entire planet. He wants to go home, but even if home's waiting for him, he's no longer the person who fit in there.

#45: The Revelation Of course I'm a sucker for any book that lets Eva be awesome, but I also really like the pacing and tonal shifts in this one. It goes from light (Marco at dinner with Peter and Nora) to horrifying (Peter almost infested) to bittersweet (Nora infested, Rachel being a true bro) to bleak and disturbing (Visser One's near-death) to almost giddy with tension and humor (stealing the Bug fighter) to horrifying again (Eva not being the sweet person Marco remembers). It feels like the best of Marco's narration, silly and dark all at once.

#49: The Diversion Mostly I like this one for the deep irony in Tobias's and Jake's arcs. Tobias starts out darkly humorous about how he's their least source of worry since he doesn't have any family, while they're all micro-focused on Jake because they plan to evacuate Tom. Tobias ends trying not to pity the now family-less Jake (because he knows how much it sucks to be pitied) as he and his mom and her dog sit on a park bench playing fetch together. It all reverses, in the span of a few hours. And Jake's mistake is what got them there.

#51: The Absolute Another one of my all-time favorite books, because the Marco-Ax-Tobias dynamic is unparalleled. It's a breath of fresh air before the awful bleakness of the endgame, a chance to let the three Animorphs who are actually having an okay time of it have one last wacky adventure set against the backdrop of their friends falling apart around them.

[emeraldmew]

I love that the "make it look like the Animorphs broke up" plan involves Rachel actually attacking a McDonalds. Girl found out that it's fun to be a grizzly in a public location last book and she's not giving it up.

[imperfectskeleton]

The biggest question that #38 (The Arrival) raises is not "Is Estrid Alloran's daughter?" but "did Arbat ever truly intend to personally kill Visser Three?"

Sure it seems like a distraction to hide the real mission from ever going down in history — a failed assassination attempt with the most expendable soldiers available. But killing Visser Three would be big. It would be worth a lot (even though the Yeerk empire is not remotely playing to his strengths having him in charge of Earth, he's still a very powerful leader, after all).

I know there are a lot of reasons to say killing Visser Three is a ruse to stall their way to the Yeerk pool but I think Arbat meant to do it until he heard his name in his brother's voice. Because even when the playful teasing is a gut punch, a knife in the back, it's the sound of a childhood. It's playfully sparring while their parents are busy, training after school, roughhousing as young adults who've never seen war or eliminated a species for the good of the universe.

The voice of a brother you haven't seen for 15 years or more, calling back memories of your childhood except this time the fight is real (it doesn't matter if it's real. What's real is your brother, worse than dead by all accounts, and he didn't really try to hurt you, just disarmed you. It wasn't a real fight, it was Alloran. You've looked after his family disgraced twice over, but how can you be disgraced when this is YOUR BROTHER)

I think this is the only time Esplin has interacted with Alloran's family. I think he's genuinely delighted to twist the knife, for both Alloran and his brother. Watch me break him, too, butcher of the Hork-Bajir. You watched every soldier in your unit massacred, took the fall for a planet that could not be saved and your brother? He was never that. Soft. Scientific. So female in his interests. Oh, how easily one of my lieutenants could break him. Or, if I'm feeling kind, I can torture him, and morph, and you can live with the knowledge of having eaten him. Isn't this fun, War-Prince Alloran?

Andalites care about honour and revenge killings. Alloran would be near impossible to free, and at this point in the series Jake is giving up on Tom, an easy target. Killing him would be the kind thing to do, the duty of his next of kin. I really think Arbat meant it until he heard his brother's voice.

[goodgrammaritan]

"I don't take orders," Prince Jake snapped. "I give them. And now, this meeting is over."

And later:

"Now we stop playing games. You're not the Andalite fleet. And I'm not going to snap a salute and say 'yes, sir!' We deal as equals. Which, to be honest, is generous of us under the circumstances."

"The Arrival" by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #38)

😳😍😳 Jake's never been hotter