If david stayed...

[filmstu2005]

Exactly. I don't think David would have been as cruel as he was had he been involved from the very beginning.

[RYTX]

Oh wait wait, I wanna argue that.
No

David showed he was messed up from the start.
This is a kid, who when he sees a bald eagle in his house, his first response is to get a gun and shot at it.
He has danger toys and pets, professes to never being more than the new kid at school, and handles his business to make sure he isn't screwed over.
And those are character traits from BEFORE he was attacked by space slugs.
On top of that he was perfectly fine with killing anything not human, even a morph?
That's not a habit that develops overnight
Elfangor's role affected them all, yeah, but david doesn't seem like the type of guy who would care a lot about some else's sacrifice.
David was a punk from top to bottom and would have been bound to cause problems no matter when he joined

[Duff]

had david joined from the very beginning, it would have been alot easier for him to turn away from them when they were less capable and less prepared, and they def wouldnt have had what it took to do what they did if it had been so early in the war

The second he got the power he would be like woot lets be crime lords screw the human race we need this for ourselves, and the animorphs would have let him, they were gonna let marco walk away from it werent they, back then they didnt know how dangerous it was

I guess, they chose what they thought was the kindest punishment for David.

thats the beautiful thing about animorphs, they didnt choose the kindest choice, or the smartest choice, it was the cruelest and least humane, but they did it because they were just little kids who didnt have the stones to kill him, and thats real

[CounterInstinct]

I disagree, for one, if he joined from the very beginning, sure, he would reluctant, like Marco, but still, his family still is complete, he still has a human home, and the rest. I think the reason he got semi-insane and semi-psychopath, was that he lost his family in a single moment. Sure, David is tough, but cmon, the guy doesn't have friends. He only has his family to love.

[morfowt]

well he also loves tv but tv can't love him back.

[CounterInstinct]

^ LOL 

Ax also loves TV, not to mention cinnamon buns, but too bad they can't love him back. The Cinnamon might be actually be afraid of Ax.... 

[morfowt]

no. the cinnamon bun exists to be devoured. it wouldn't be afraid of being devoured because it only exists to do that.

[zaprowsdower]

Cinnabons would be freaking out all the time, looking over their proverbial shoulders for Andalites disguised as humans...

[CounterInstinct]

yeah, but being eaten by a human is different by being eaten by a human-morphed Andalite. I mean, these guys can eat c cinnabon in a single gulp! No chewing or savoring necessary.  plus they can eat an entire tray full of cinnabon.... which makes the balance of cinnabons mussed up.

[zaprowsdower]

Poor cinnabons-once Ax finds them, they're doomed...

[sherrilina]

I think David would've turned on them eventually either way. I always felt that his betrayal came too early in the series. His challenges against Jake's authority in the group should've been played out a bit more, and he should've felt like part of the family (like how Ax became) before he turned on them. It would've made a much bigger impact when his betrayal finally did come.

In fact, I probably would've held off on his betrayal as late as #49, when the Animorphs find out that the Yeerks know that they are human. Especially in the scene where Jake finds out his parents and Tom are controllers. It would've been a complete shocker if it turned out that all of a sudden David was an aid to the Yeerks in that plan (maybe he becomes a Yeerk-free double agent for Visser Three or something a few books back?)

It could've worked with the plot on David's misguided blaming of Jake and the Animorphs for the loss of his parents and his life for the Escafil Device, and getting even with Jake for that by taking his family away too (and attempting to take the families away from the rest of the Animorphs at the same time). Heck, I always felt that David had more of a potential of being Jake's arch nemesis than Rachel's.

Anyways, there are a lot of possibilities of where it would've ended up if David had stuck around a bit longer, either as a ally or an enemy. To me though, the way things turned out with him being exposed and his parents and his life being taken away in an instant, his character really only had two major options of where he would end up: Either he would've manned up and been more determined to take out the Yeerks, or he would've ended up like the whiny brat that he did and stab the Animorphs in the back, desperately trying to strike a deal to get his parents and his life back.

Oh please no, even three books of him was bad enough....

Yeah, I'm not a big fan of David or his arc....

David showed he was messed up from the start.
This is a kid, who when he sees a bald eagle in his house, his first response is to get a gun and shot at it.
He has danger toys and pets, professes to never being more than the new kid at school, and handles his business to make sure he isn't screwed over.
And those are character traits from BEFORE he was attacked by space slugs.
On top of that he was perfectly fine with killing anything not human, even a morph?
That's not a habit that develops overnight
Elfangor's role affected them all, yeah, but david doesn't seem like the type of guy who would care a lot about some else's sacrifice.
David was a punk from top to bottom and would have been bound to cause problems no matter when he joined

Exactly--you can only blame so much on circumstances.  David seems to have been rotten to the core, regardless of the Yeerks....

[Animorphsjake]

If david stayed... I would've stopped reading the series.  After the animorphs saved him, giving him a chance to save his parents, he gets so selfish, all because " Your not my boss, Jake!" he acted like such a girl. I was pretty thankfull he was turned into a rat.....man I hated when he camed back.  :evilgrin27:

[wotw2112]

I disagree, for one, if he joined from the very beginning, sure, he would reluctant, like Marco, but still, his family still is complete, he still has a human home, and the rest. I think the reason he got semi-insane and semi-psychopath, was that he lost his family in a single moment. Sure, David is tough, but cmon, the guy doesn't have friends. He only has his family to love.

Still, he was a loose cannon who did pretty much whatever he wanted.  How much more dangerous would he have made every single mission for them?  The series might have been a lot shorter with David in from day one. 

[wotw2112]

Still I would have liked to see him stick around and be better developed.  Based on how the rest of the series tries to blur the lines between good and evil it would've been more consistent to try to get the reader to commiserate with David rather than just making him the typical outcast, hopeless, bad guy who everyone hates.

[Chad32]

I expected David to turn traitor, but they could have probably held off on it for a while longer.

I mentioned somewhere before that he had the potential to be a loose cannonball type villain that fought the Animorphs and the Yeerks. Maybe even have him be the one Crayak tempts instead of Rachel. He had the potential to be an interesting villain.

He's just one of those things that had potential, but was never used. KA brought him back just to have him mess with Rachel, instead of making him Crayak's servant of destruction against the Animorphs or whatever.

I know there would be some fans that would look cross-eyed at him for coming in late. That's why he didn't stay in the group, and why she had Estrid leave too.