Richard's Animorphs Forum
Animorphs Section => Animorphs Forum Classic => Topic started by: Stephquiem on October 22, 2009, 09:46:16 PM
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So, I was sitting in my Gender and Family Communications class this morning, and we were talking about Power. Because I've been spending too much time around here, I started thinking about Jake as the leader of the Animorphs. For his personality, I think it fits.
I've seen a discussion here (maybe here) about who would be the second choice for leader if Jake wasn't around, or was unable to lead for some reason. But I was wondering--since every one in the group fills a specific role (or two. Marco works as the comedian and strategist, for example), would it be possible for one of them to fill a different role?
Obviously, only Ax can be the "Alien." But still, theoretically speaking, the way KAA developed their personalities, could any of them fit the "moral compass," "warrior," "strategist" etc. roles? If, say, Marco got hit on the head and was in a coma for months, could someone take his place for that period?
I have no idea if any of that made any sense. XD
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I'm not quite sure what you're talking about but the title of this post made me lol
I mean, I guess this was played with a little bit in the series, like when Rachel had to take over when Jake left, when poor Cassie has to make a *tough strategy decision*, etc. I think they all tend toward certain roles, but they're certainly all capable of anything, which made them so occasionally terrifying.
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lol yeah I was wondering what I'd find when I opened the thread..
I dont think any of characters could take over another character entirely, but there are parts of the series that say "Marco/Rachel wasn't around so I had to do/say it" (joking or being reckless). Ugh I suck at explaining things.
I can't see anyone fitting Jake's shoes. I think they'd more work as a team than have an actual leader. Well, a leader for a long period of time anyway.
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I'm not quite sure what you're talking about but the title of this post made me lol
i laughed as well, actually. maybe a d-lounge thread copy? :D
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I'm not quite sure what you're talking about but the title of this post made me lol
i laughed as well, actually. maybe a d-lounge thread copy? :D
I dare you :P
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:P I couldn't come up with any good ideas for a title when I made it, okay? XD
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It was a good title Steph... For what it's worth, I understood immediately what it was about... (though there was some snickering in the back of my mind as I opened the thread...) :rofl2:
I think that "positions" may be being applied in too broad a way here...
If you have positions like: leader, comedian, strategist, moral compass, etc., I'm fairly certain that almost any of the Animorphs could have filled almost any of the positions... For instance, Ax was hilarious a lot, even if he wasn't trying to be... Jake had a great moral compass, as did Tobias... Marco and Tobias could have easily filled a "leader" role... Ax (having studdied war) would have done just fine as a strategist... and on and on...
The issue comes when you add their personalities... None of the Animorphs could have filled any position of the others quite like they could... Tobias and Marco would have had completely different leadership styles and tendencies from each other, and definitely from Jake... Ax might have come up with different strategies... The Animorphs might not have been so shackled by 'zero tolerance' moral policies... etc...
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my mind was totally thinking d lounge material.
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Don't worry Steph, I knew what you were talking about from first glance. I didn't even think of the other application until it was mentioned here. *scoff* Pervs. ::) ;D
Personally I don't think Tobias would be that good of a leader, he's too unsure of himself when it comes to his friends. And also it's not just "can they give orders?" type of thing. It's the weight of possibly sending your friends to their deaths and making those decisions quickly and effectively. Making every decision for the team and taking the brunt of responsibility if things go sour.
Personally I think the times that KA had the other members play serrogate leader was her way of showing us how vital Jake was to the team. Showing that yes, they can make decisions, but they can't handle the weight that comes with it.
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Don't worry Steph, I knew what you were talking about from first glance. I didn't even think of the other application until it was mentioned here. *scoff* Pervs. ::) ;D
I don't even understand what this second meaning is. What else could "animorph positions" mean?
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"Positions?" ^-^
think naughty, Morf, you can do it.
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Good point there Parker...
When it comes to Tobias though, I think a tick differently. In MM2, he makes the tough, swift call to basically doom an entire race (the nuke thing), as well as handling most of the dealings with Taylor. He screws up, yes, but he shows that he can indeed make the hard decisions. Both he and Marco (I think) could have won the war as leaders, but it wouldn't have been nearly as efficient as Jake's war. Marco would have gotten there, gotten there ruthlessly, and resulted in a complete loss of self in the process. Ruthlessness would have managed it.
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I don't remember much of MM2. The last time I read it was a decade ago. No joke.
He was able to sacrifice himself in the Taylor torture situation, but could he send in one of his friends, let alone send in Rachel to be tortured. They all would give their own lives if it meant that the rest lived, but not all of them could order their friends into dangerous situations the way Jake did.
Yes Tobias can give precise directions from above, and lead others, but he normally leads people out of danger. I think he would question himself too much if he had to direct others into danger. Jake questioned himself, but he did it afterwards, and he stood by his decisions.
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Marco is a great strategist and sees the big picture, yes. However I think if he were in charge, I think either they would've lost a member earlier on, or they probably would've exposed the Yeerks and forced the Yeerks to initiate a full scale evasion.
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LOL ANIMORPH POSITIONS!!!!!!!!!!
i have nothing else to say.
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Animorphs positions?
Marco: I'm Republican
Cassie: I'm Democratic
Tobias: I'm with PETA
I haven't thought much about how people would do in the other positions. Cassie is definitely not a strategist. She's afraid to be the leader. Tobias may be able to think of a strategy after getting a view of the area, and Ax probably has some basic training in strategy. But Cassie just can't, and Rachel is a bit too short sighted.
Ax may be the only person on the team that could fill Rachel's position, through sheer hatred of Yeerks. Maybe Marco too, but he's not as emotional.
Nobody could really fill Ax's position. They just physically can't do things like fight in their normal forms, or keep accurate track of time.
Jake might be able to fill Cassie's position, and maybe Tobias too.
Tobias' position has been filled by others from time to time, as an eye in the sky. Ax could probably do it best, since he's already their eye on the ground. Though being a bird all the time still makes tobias the best at what he does.
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"Positions?" ^-^
think naughty, Morf, you can do it.
*thinks* *comes us blank*
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XD haha took me a long time to figure that out.. i was all what are they talking about. what is so funny about it. I mean i got the original concept first.
well anyway moving on
no one can take Aximili's place. i mean get them all to eat cinnamon bunzzz .. he will beat them all even if they are all against him XD. Tobias tried to be Alien once he did a great job at it but it was not as good as the real thing.
I think the same goes with the rest. Others may take their place but they will never be as good.
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Yeah, KA created a perfect team. :thumbsup:
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LOL ANIMORPH POSITIONS!!!!!!!!!!
i have nothing else to say.
This basically.
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Wow, this thread turned into half perversion, and half discussion.
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yeah it has . XD
but well it happens. well anyway back on topic.
I think one of the Animorphs may be better qualified to replace someone than others but depending on situations... but i think it was already mentioned before. Like Marco being able to make strategic decisions more than the others yet not being able to take the burden as well as Jake can. ( not that it didn't affect him)
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Wow, this thread turned into half perversion, and half discussion.
looks more like 90%, 10% to me...
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Wow, this thread turned into half perversion, and half discussion.
looks more like 90%, 10% to me...
I'd agree with this. :crazy:
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Okay, how about this
60% on topic, 40% off topic
Better? ::)
I do wonder how Melissa would do as an Animorph. They showed that she replaced Rachel, but how effective would she be compared to Rachel?
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I don't think it would have been better. They needed someone like Rachel, and her raw power and emotion. The team with Mellissa were about a month from losing, or something like that, though there were likely many factors besides not having rachel.
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Oh yeah, definitely. Not having Tobias for one. He attributed sooo much to the team. I wonder how many missions would've ended in failure without having Tobias in the sky.
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Are you not familiar with the concept of "five man band" as seen on TV tropes?
also for politics, demographically speaking all are likely to be democrats except for Tobias, though Ax would be a conservative human is actually a liberal Andalite.
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Yeah, I'm not a frequenter of TV tropes. Sorry.
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Speaking of bands, what instruments would the Animorphs play if they started a band? Is there a thread for that???
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They actually do list instruments in the Five Man Band page of TV tropes.
Leader: Lead singer
Lancer: Lead guitar
Smart Guy: Keyboard/Bass guitar
Big Guy: Drummer
Chick: Vocal effects/Tambourine
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no one can take Aximili's place. i mean get them all to eat cinnamon bunzzz .. he will beat them all even if they are all against him XD. Tobias tried to be Alien once he did a great job at it but it was not as good as the real thing.
I think the same goes with the rest. Others may take their place but they will never be as good.
Yup, no one can take Ax's place. But he could do a lot of others. In the book were the Animorphs have to stop WWIII he knocks out Jake and comes close to droping a nuke on the Animorpgs town. Like Marco he can see the stiraght line from point A to piont B. He didn't let anything get in the way. Only until after the mission did he question himself. Ax probly could lead the group if he had to. He can look in three differnent directions. Ax on the scale of Animorphs is in front of Jake, Tobais, Cassie, and Marco but behind Rachel on a battle feild. So Yeah, if he had to he could take on the stategist, leader, warroir and the eye. By the way; When was Tobais the Alein?
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Tobias the Alien as in, Elfangor, the Andalite's son...
It's really weak, but it's still (theoretically) there...
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Yeah, but Tobias was conceived by a human morph, so I don't know how well that translates. :donno:
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Tobias is a human. He was born human, he was raised human, he died...well, hawk, but there is nothing about him that's alien. Elfangor was a glorified sperm donor who even the mother didn't know had anything to do with it.
It's messed up, but it really is meaningless.
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...who even the mother didn't know had anything to do with it.
Loren knew about it at the time of conception, but the Ellimist messed with her mind afterwards.
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right
which in a way is terrifying. The Ellimist alluded to the fact that Loren was supposed to think someone else was the father (which let's be real makes her kind of a ****) but the way it was explained in #48 (or #49...I sort of lose track at that point) is that she didn't know anybody, Tobias never had a "father," there was no man that Loren thought spawned Tobias.
LOREN GOT SHMI SKYWALKER'D! Or Virgin Mary'd if you care to look at it like that, but **** even she had a choice.
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Yeah, it was pretty messed up. Why did she even need to forget anyway?
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Loren might have been badass enough to go steal a Bug Fighter and hunt Elfangor down. Conversely, she might have been badass enough to quietly accept that there were powers at play that she could neither understand nor combat, and raised Tobias on her own.
BUT IF THAT WERE THE CASE HE MAY HAVE HAD A NORMAL, WELL-ADJUSTED UPBRINGING and by God we couldn't have that, could we?
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He wouldn't be everyone's favorite chewtoy otherwise.
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exactly
the universe aka the authors just could not leave that poor family alone
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Yep, the Fangor family is doomed so that mankind may live. :'(
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Hurray Mankind! :D
Awww... Fangor family... :'(
In any case, Tobias was adjusted enough to know right and wrong, and not flip out on the rest of the crew... And had a strong enough will to deal with Yeerks and torture and crap... The only reason he was such a loser/dork/bully magnet in the beginning was that he just didn't care enough about his life to try to improve it...
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I feel that his difficult life was designed to prepare him for the torture and trials of his AniLife.
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I suppose that's one way to look at it...
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more over would they have been able to make up for Ax's technical know how, sure they were okay for the first 4-8 (as Ax didn't really help/exposit information until the end of book 8 )
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There were a few missions that would've never happened, that's for sure.
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my mind was totally thinking d lounge material.
lols..yup
first thought: say wht? and then *mind flickers thorugh a whole bunch of random animals* and then you find yourself thinking which animal would..uh...nevermi nd XD
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One time, I think in the book where Ax and Tobias morph cows, Ax looks at a large lock on the door and instead of spending a bit on hacking it he just, well, hacks it into pieces.
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If Jake HAD to be replaced, I think Tobias would be best suited for the position as leader. Here's why:
Cassie: Simply wouldn't accept the title to begin with. She is openly uncomfortable with decisions over the safety of her comrades.
Rachel: Would probably accept the title, however I do not think she would have the full support of the group. Though an excellent soldier, she lacks the leadership qualities and strategic planning. She's more straight forward.
Marco: His decision making process is cold and calculated, where Jake always considered the human variable. He'd be very objective, but sometimes subjective decisions are necessary.
Ax: Would make an excellent Andalite leader, but have difficulty in this case simply because his level and manner of thinking significantly differs from his peers.
Tobias: Proven track record in several cases of being a successful leader. Though he can be as emotional as Cassie, he's shown he can be as objective as Marco. I think this shows he knows how to balance the scale when necessary. He's also shown he can make decisions quickly as well as under pressure.
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I wonder if the above statement would have worked if Tobias was the leader to begin with.....
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I wonder if the above statement would have worked if Tobias was the leader to begin with.....
Or to take that a little further, what if Jake was never a part of the Animorphs period? We know that Cassie, Marco, Tobias and Ax were intentionally brought together through the Ellimist's planning and that Rachel was a lucky accident added on but it is never explicitly said either way whether he was part of the team by chance or not.
Without Rachel and Jake would the team have been capable of functioning in an effective, long term way against the Yeerks?
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It was never really said, but I believe many fans assume Jake was purposefully included for his leadership abilities. Without him, I think Cassie, Marco, and Rachel may have bickered a lot more. Cassie and marco definitely have differing ideas. Rachel has her own ideas, and even though she likes Cassie better than Marco, her ideas are different from both of them. Obviously Ax doesn't care for Rachel, and likely wouldn't follow her. He may have followed Marco, but he doesn't always understand Marco.
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It all depends on the timing of discovering alliances, like Jake making a faction with the Taxxons, would that have happened if he'd not been involved?
Jake and Rachel also had the two most powerful morphs, so they were important as far as combat goes...w/o them, the Animorphs would have been infiltration mostly, like Tom Clancy wrote the books or somethin
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So are you telling me that a tiger, bear, or elephant is more dangerous than an Andalite (whith their tail-blades and all)? (Which Ax is, and Tobias has a morph of.)
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the first 2 would probably lose, but Elephant vs. Andalite straight up? Unless he gets to the eyes, he'll probably lose. He'll have to run in circles or somethin, but head up....no more cinnabunzuh
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Yeah, Ax's natural form was very valuable in combat, but not completely superior to the Earth animal morphs; it's the fact that he has years of experience and training as a Andalite warrior that makes him potentially more effective in that form than if he morphed; as well as the fact that once they've infiltrated a place as a bug of sorts he can go straight to it while the other Anis (except Tobias) have to find secure locations to go human then battle morphs. Actually, back on the topic of this thread, that is another valuable position that Ax and sometimes Tobias plays on the team: keeping enemies busy/distracted so that the others don't need quite as secure/secluded a place to get changed from infiltration morphs to battle morphs.
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If Jake wasn't there I think Rachel would end up filling the leadership role. In my opinion she'd be the best of the remaining anis as a leader. She was decisive enough and could lead people. She didn't have the ability to plan well (at least compared to other anis), and got emotional at times though. Marco Is the opposite side of the same coin, I don't think he could lead the others, even though he could plan very well. He could remain unemotional during a fight, but probably wouldn't have the decisiveness in a fight that rachel would have (the ability to make snap decisions and not second guess himself).
I don't think tobias could lead them. He can make the tough decisions and accept the responsibility, but like marco I don't think he could actually lead them.
I don't think Cassie could handle the responsibility of it. As in I don't think she would be willing to make decisions that could get everyone killed, even if they did everything right. Which would cause hesitation, that would get everyone killed. I also think her reluctance to kill when it's necessary might cause problems (I think she'd do it, but there would be hesitation). I also don't think she would allow them to take high risk missions most of the time, although I'm not sure on this, since whe went into the yeerk pool solo to grab a (potentially) heavily guarded prisoner out, but then she wasn't risking everyone else's lives, and the decision to go was already made.
I don't really know about Ax. He did have military training, but without knowing how much they taught leadership in their basic training courses it's hard to say how much difference it would make as far as being a leader. And I can't think of enough example's as far as leadership qualities go to really make a good judgement on him. My gut readction is that he would not be a good leader, but I have nothing to really support this.
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Ax would be lost too b/c of human functions....like certain events you have to attack certain ways on Earth.
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ok, I reread 37 since I couldn't remember anything at all about it, and wow, rachel screwed up. I'm trying not to be too critical, since everyone sucks their first time, but wow. I mean, I was left scratching my head going "what the heck?". She did make all the mistakes I thought she would, and then a hundred more. She was always impulsive and even reckless, but almost never downright arrogant. And I never thought she'd violate the warrior ethos, and it astounded me that she broke the single most important rule a leader has to follow (even though it's surprisingly common for people to break): The commander's responsible.
As for comedy, they're all hilarious, when they don't try to be. Except for Rachel, but only when she's responding to Marco, so if he goes, I don't think there'd be a good comedian in the team.
for survalience (yes I know it's misspelled, and yes I am so lazy I'm not looking it up), any of them could do it for a mission, ax could do it for the long term searching for pool entrances, and IDing controllers, but without any cultural context I don't think he'd be anywhere near as effective as tobias
For a moral compass, jake maybe, but it's hard to say how much he was influenced by cassie. Tobais might be also able to take that role.
For knowledge of animals, they might be able to google it (yes google existed that long ago) but it woulnd't have been as good as having cassie around
For planning, jake's not too bad, but noone's as good as marco, it'd definitely suffer
For hacking, DIY projects, and knowledge of aliens ax is simply irreplacible
I'm not really sure any of them could be taken out and the team still be able to function effectively without new team member to replace that person
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For knowledge of animals, they might be able to google it (yes google existed that long ago) but it woulnd't have been as good as having cassie around
I don't know about this one really even being important beyond acquiring their initial battle morphs/travel birds (and even that they could have done pretty much the same way, but running around the Gardens where they shouldn't have been recklessly and getting away with it, Cassie really didn't get them effective clearance there). Basically, they never used morphs of the types of animals that she cared for in the clinic; her knowledge was never really important in ways that were not either common knowledge, easy too look up things that she wouldn't have known without looking up, or all stuff they figured out as soon as they got into morph anyways.
It's really a shame, because it was a very good plot-setup right from the beginning of the series that is very relevant to the entire premise, and the characters even occasionally take the time to remind us in their opening narrations: "Cassie's parents have a clinic where she takes care of sick animals, she knows about animals and the clinic is a convenient place to acquire morphs and Cassie's mom works at the Gardens, where we can get more specialized ones." But this very well placed plot-setup was never really utilized well.
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Yeah, Ax's natural form was very valuable in combat, but not completely superior to the Earth animal morphs; it's the fact that he has years of experience and training as a Andalite warrior that makes him potentially more effective in that form than if he morphed
ax had no experience as a warrior, he may have gone through training but he'd never seen combat before teaming up with the animorphs.
I don't think Tobias would work as the leader, hes too emotionally fragile. At one point or another all of them lead a mission, rachel in 37 marco in 30 tobias in mm2. Jake was special because he could not only lead and make the tough decisions but he could live with them the next day. Most of the others were capable of leading for one day but to make horrible life threatening decisions, live with them for months, and then have the strength to make the same kind of decisions again took something special.
The thing with Rachel and maybe Jake being happy mistakes by the Ellimist is interesting. I always thought that they were the connection to the rest of the team. Marco, Tobias and Cassie were all chosen but without Jake and Rachel those three have no connection at all and no reason to be walking through a construction site late at night
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ax had no experience as a warrior, he may have gone through training but he'd never seen combat before teaming up with the animorphs.
yeah, I think one of the books mentioned that he had never been in a fight
I don't think Tobias would work as the leader, hes too emotionally fragile.
What makes you say that?
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ok, I reread 37 since I couldn't remember anything at all about it, and wow, rachel screwed up. I'm trying not to be too critical, since everyone sucks their first time, but wow. I mean, I was left scratching my head going "what the heck?". She did make all the mistakes I thought she would, and then a hundred more. She was always impulsive and even reckless, but almost never downright arrogant. And I never thought she'd violate the warrior ethos, and it astounded me that she broke the single most important rule a leader has to follow (even though it's surprisingly common for people to break): The commander's responsible.
Yeah, Rachel was definitely at her worst there. I'm surprised nobody got killed.
For a moral compass, jake maybe, but it's hard to say how much he was influenced by cassie. Tobais might be also able to take that role.
Jake couldn't do it, which he proved by flushing 17,000 Yeerks just to provide "a diversion". Tobias might, but I think he was tainted by being a predator; when everything is "eat or be eaten", I don't think you keep many morals.
For hacking, DIY projects, and knowledge of aliens ax is simply irreplacible
Not to mention keeping V3 in the dark about the rest of the Animorphs being human. Eventually, he'd have gotten suspicious about all the Earth animals but no Andalites, particularly when he talked to the Animorphs.
I'm not really sure any of them could be taken out and the team still be able to function effectively without new team member to replace that person
I completely agree. They were like a puzzle - each one had unique strengths and weaknesses which the others offset. You can't complete a puzzle unless all the pieces are there, and the same holds for the Animorphs.
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I don't think Tobias would work as the leader, hes too emotionally fragile.
What makes you say that?
He constantly shows his inability to deal with stress and pressure. When he first becomes a hawk he has a mini meltdown, not that anyone can blame him. He handles the Taylor thing well in 33 but right after that hes scarred for awhile, especially when they have to face her again in 43. MM4 shows hes the perfect confused, stressed candidate for the sharing.
I'm not saying hes not strong enough, he just cant handle stress and difficult decisions as well as Jake can.
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I just realized how long this was, I apologize in advance
ok, I gotta admit I haven't actually finished the series, the first time I read through it I only got halfway through book 40 (long story) I've been reading the ebooks over the last couple months and just read 41 a few days ago, I definitely could have done without that one, other than the sheer weirdness of it, after the first 15 pages or so I felt like reaching in and strangling Jake, but I digress. My point being I can't really comment on what happened after that, so I'll have to concede whatever happened in 43 and mm4 for now, if anything happened there that invalidates what I'm about to say, just tell me that rather than going into detail, I'll trust you and eventually read through them.
As far as an ability to handle stress, that's a complicated issue. It actually has very little do with personality, none really. Well not in susceptibility to stress issues, although it does in how quickly you recover from them.
As to what does affect susceptibility to it I'll focus on the ones relevant to Tobias
Israeli studies found that the strongest factor which distinguished between soldiers who were decorated for heroic acts and those who became battle shock casualties was having had many recent changes on the home front.
I think permanently becoming a hawk qualifies, as does finding out what's her name was really v3
The second strongest factor found in the Israeli studies was unit cohesion: the soldiers who became stress casualties were often committed to battle alongside strangers, while those who became heroes were alongside unit members they knew well, trusted, and depended on.
Since Tobias was the only member who had no prior connection to the members of the team whereas the other were friends or related he was the only one who had this risk factor
Of course it's a moot point if they continue to influence him, but as time goes by he should accept that he's become a hawk, mostly removing this risk factor, and would learn to trust the team members as they fought together more, so these two only really influenced him for his breakdowns in 3 and 23. Although I can't really recall any serious problems he had other than those, at least prior to book 42
I'm noticing a definite foreshadowing that Tobias is about to have a breakdown, although I can't figure out why Jake never takes notice of these things and try to fix them before they become problems
Anyone may become a battle fatigue casualty if too many high-risk factors occur
At several points every other member of the team had similar breakdowns. Jake in 8, 11, 31 and 41, Marco in 15, 30, and 35, Cassie in 9, 16, 17, 19, mm3, and 41, Ax in 8, 18, 26, and mm3, Rachel in (maybe, I can't quite remember) 22, 33, 37, and 41.
So I'm not really sure that he couldn't handle the stress, at least not worse than any of the others
I think Tobias wouldn't be able to lead because he wouldn't have the confidence or command presence to do it. Given some time and maybe a little guidance he would be able to, but I think the same holds true for most of the others as well. In the long term, I think Tobias would probably be a good second choice
@kotetsu
I agree that she never really got them any good morphs except maybe the birds, I can't remember how they got them, but she did know which animals to get and how they'd react, like knowing to use the squid to get to the ship and whales to get the squids
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@kotetsu
I agree that she never really got them any good morphs except maybe the birds, I can't remember how they got them, but she did know which animals to get and how they'd react, like knowing to use the squid to get to the ship and whales to get the squids
Yeah, the predator morphs that they used for travel mostly came from Cassie's farm. My point was mainly that it was sad that a plot point they they often stressed during the introduction sequences was "Cassie's house has lots of injured animals kept there, it's a very convinient place to acquire a wide variety of local animals that would be much more difficult to track down in the wild," But this plot point is really never used beyond the first couple books, so it just becomes an ongoing Chekhov's gun; they keep setting it up to be used in future books but it is never really realized.
As far as Cassie goes, I'm not saying she didn't make herself useful by offering some insight (more often in the earlier books) into the morphs they were getting into, but very rarely in ways that were not common knowledge or something that they would have quickly discovered on their own (I really can't come up with any good examples of her making herself 'irreplaceable' in the role of animal knowledge). As far as the squid morph goes, that wasn't even a result of her role as 'animal knowledge expert,' she came up with it because of a book so it was nothing more than a lucky crap shot that any of the characters could have provided (Marco is the one who usually proves to be well versed and read in books/shows/and movies before his time, as evidenced in references in his jokes); or if they had gotten over their "oh it's hopless" moping and Googled/researched "Deep sea creatures" before giving up then the squid would have come up, meaning that that flash of random insight wasn't actually necessary.
I guess what I'm ultimately saying isn't that Cassie was useless in this respect because the role of 'animal knowledge provider' is useless, but that in a book where the premise includes 'children who morph into any animal they can touch' then the role of 'animal knowledge provider' really could have been developed a lot more than it was.
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Reading back over it, it looks like I'm suggesting that a person experiencing an extreme stress reaction is excused from their actions, which I'm not trying to. People are always responsible for their choices. It might explain them, but I still hold a person responsible for their choices even if I don't blame them for the choices (if that makes sense).
The main point I was trying to make is that tobias didn't really seem that much more susceptible to stress than the others and in fact seemed to handle it better than anyone else, except possibly Jake (maybe maybe not)
BTW major kudos to KA for how cassie was behaving in 17 and whats-his-name (the guy who got stuck as a taxxon) in TAC. Very nicely done.
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Reading back over it, it looks like I'm suggesting that a person experiencing an extreme stress reaction is excused from their actions, which I'm not trying to. People are always responsible for their choices. It might explain them, but I still hold a person responsible for their choices even if I don't blame them for the choices (if that makes sense).
Honestly, that doesn't make sense to me, and usually I understand what people mean by their 'if that makes any sense' statements. I understand how at first you are saying that people are always responsible for their choices even if a stress reaction explains the choice. I'm not trying to start another huge debate on philosophical meanings and distinctions, but could you explain how you can hold a person responsible for a choice but not blame them, since to 'not blame' someone basically means to not hold them responsible by definition; I just want to understand the distinction in your meaning.
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Rachel would take Marco's place as the comedian, Marco or Ax would be good for leader positions.
I think most of them were capable of filling more than one role, if they had to. If not all of them.
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lol animorph positions... i do remember jake going doggy style (homer) once and listened to the sharing meeting on the beach
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Yeah I don't quite get it either.
I guess it's like someone who steals food so they don't starve, they're still responsible for stealing, but I don't really blame them.
I suppose it's like saying it can't be excused but I don't really hold it against them, they still have to own the consequences, even though i don't think less of them for it.
And I actually think most the blame prolly falls on jake in most of those cases