How should #54 have ended? (Unmarked spoilers!)

[YeerkSalad]

I disagree with leaving Cassie as a butterfly, I don't really feel like that would give her character justice. Doesn't it make more since if Jake dies than Marco or Rachel. He's the leader, and it could be a leader's sacrifice.

1. #19's ending was a Deus Ex Machina. Naturally occurred morphing? I hardly think so! Inside a cocoon, caterpillars essentially melt into goo (retaining some memories) and reshape into a butterfly-y thing. The process is very different. Cassie's non-butterflyness at the end was clearly caused by Applegate having a soft spot for Cassie. It was a loophole that was far too forgiving.
2. I don't like Heroic Sacrifices. They seem kind of cliché. They're so common in today's works that it makes the writer seem lazy.

If Marco died, I suppose that Jake would have to be the one to do the whole flushy thing. That'd actually be good, emotion-wise. Jake would have to run away from one of the worst things he ever did, only to do something arguably worse.

[Dylan]

I agree that 19 ends with a bad Deus Ex Machina. But leaving someone to die as a butterfly as a pretty horrible way to end a character's arc.

[YeerkSalad]

Let's agree to disagree there. I think that it would have quite an impact on the viewers/Aftran. It'd be a great way for her to take her bow.

[Tim Bruening]

Let's agree to disagree there. I think that it would have quite an impact on the viewers/Aftran. It'd be a great way for her to take her bow.

Why not have Cassie stay a butterfly, and then recruit Aftran an an Animorph once the morphing cube is found?  (Keep Aftran in a water trough between missions, and have her crawl into Erek's head to feed every 3 days).

[YeerkSalad]

I don't think she could feed inside of Erek. He probably has no ear orifices. Wouldn't it be difficult to carry a slug around without accidentally crushing it? Aftran would get killed in no time.

[Chad32]

I don't see much unethical against using handicapped people. They needed to recruit people that Yeerks would overlook, and they wouldn't be able to control adults as well as people more their age. Getting them all killed was just because KA decided they should all get killed.

I'm not saying I'm against them recruting the Auxiliary Animorphs, it was a necessary tactical decision. But do you seriously think that after the war it wouldn't have got them in trouble? Maybe it wouldn't have gone as far as an actual trial (crap happens in war and they had just saved the world and all) but it's still something I think deserved mentioning. 

Well, someone is bound to have a problem with anything you do. I don't think the Anis were conscripting these people.

[Tim Bruening]

I don't think she could feed inside of Erek. He probably has no ear orifices. Wouldn't it be difficult to carry a slug around without accidentally crushing it? Aftran would get killed in no time.

Excerpt from the thread "Marco killing Karen", Reply #55 on: December 28, 2011, 08:56:14 PM about Erek's ability to keep a Yeerk alive in his head.
Quote

<How did you convince the Yeerks that you are one of them?> Ax asked him.
      Erek turned off his hologram and became a machine once again. And then the front of his head
    split open. Inside his steel and ivory head was a chamber, just a few inches in diameter.  And inside that chamber was a gray slug,
    helpless, unable to escape. Tiny wires, no thicker than hairs, wrapped around it.
      <Yeerk!> Ax hissed.
      "Yes," Erek said. "The Yeerks believe I am human. I accepted infestation. But of course the Yeerk cannot make a Controller of me. I made a
    place for him instead. He sees nothing. Knows nothing. I tapped his memory, not the other way around. And now I can pass among the Yeerks like one of them."
      I had two reactions. One, I was sick at the thought of that Yeerk, trapped inside a steel cage. As much as I hated Yeerks, it seemed harsh just the
    same. But another reaction was much stronger. We had an ally! A powerful ally. An android who could pass as a Controller, who could enter Yeerk society. And an android with many powers of his own.
      "How do you keep the Yeerk alive without Kandrona rays?" Cassie asked.
      See, every three days a Yeerk has to return to the Yeerk pool to absorb Kandrona rays. Without that, they die.
      "I am able to use my own internal power to generate Kandrona rays to keep this Yeerk alive," Erek explained. "When I go to the Yeerk
    pool I am able to trick the Yeerks into believing that my Yeerk is swimming in the pool. I generate a hologram of a Yeerk leaving my ear
    and dropping into the pool. Later, I create a hologram of it returning. The Yeerks never notice that they don't encounter this Yeerk actually
    in the pool. Yeerks communicate very little in their natural states.

[YeerkSalad]

Which book is this from?

[Chad32]

Book 10, when the Chee are introduced. This is never mentioned again, though. You'd think the Chee's ability to produce Kandrona radiation would come up later, especially after the YPM is introduced. and I'm still a bit irked that the chee don't seem to have any connection to them. You'd think they'd be the one to start such a thing.

[Tim Bruening]

Book 10, when the Chee are introduced. This is never mentioned again, though. You'd think the Chee's ability to produce Kandrona radiation would come up later, especially after the YPM is introduced. and I'm still a bit irked that the chee don't seem to have any connection to them. You'd think they'd be the one to start such a thing.

I nominate the failure of anyone to mention the Chee ability to produce Kandrona radiation and thus keep Yeerks alive to be one of the most amazing omissions in the series!

Book 29: When Cassie was thrashing around trying to figure out how to keep Aftran alive away from the Pool, it would have been utterly natural for Erek (who was right there in the Barn while Cassie was agonizing) to offer to feed her Kandrona rays in his head, yet he somehow forgets to make such an offer!  It would also have been utterly natural for Cassie to wonder if Erek could feed Aftran Kandrona rays in his head.  Someone should surely have said "Wait a minute, don't the Chee have the ability to produce Kandrona radiation and thus keep Yeerks alive?".

[YeerkSalad]

I still think it'd be hard to have Aftran as an Animorph. I guess they could have her just hanging out in Erek.

If the Yeerks found the Pemalite crystal and reprogrammed the Chee, they could shove Yeerks in the Chees' heads! They'd have easy, nearly-invincible transport!
If that happened, they could have won the war in like... a week.

[Chad32]

It's like KA mentioned it, but changed her mind about it, and hoped we'd forget about it if it was never mentioned again. Like Alloran saying there are Yeerks on the Andalite Homeworld. Nothing done about that either, except for a fight where V3 morphs a Kafit bird.

[Tim Bruening]

It's like KA mentioned it, but changed her mind about it, and hoped we'd forget about it if it was never mentioned again. Like Alloran saying there are Yeerks on the Andalite Homeworld. Nothing done about that either, except for a fight where V3 morphs a Kafit bird.

I theorize that in the weeks after the great Andalite victory on Leera, the Leerans used the telepathic abilities to root out all Andalite traitors.

[YeerkSalad]

Applegate really should've written these important things down.

LIST OF IMPORTANT THINGS I REALLY NEED TO CARRY ON IN A STORY ARC THING

[Chad32]

I don't know if it ever got out that the andalite captain was a traitor, and Andalites don't really want mind readers hanging around them anyway. Too many important secrets.