Marill DOESN'T Re-Read World Domination
Here's the stats so far.
Exclaimed Count: 153
Muttered Count: 691
Motto Count: 15
Sexist Crap Count: 32
Jessie's Sin Points: 25
Morgan the Sue Count: 7
Seven Dies Count: 5
James Kill Count: 1
Hello and welcome to the worst episode of all time's review. If you're here, and not a mindless spambot, then you'll have sort of read along with me through awful writer's cameos, Team Rocket mottos, Jessie being a bitch, Craig being a creep, James' redemption as not being the worst non-writer character of the season anymore (hurray!), and so many copied Voyager scenes it's pretty much pointless to read them. Hopefully you'll have laughed at some or even just one of my jokes at my expense, agreed/disagreed when I've gone on a tangent or more likely skipped over big looking paragraphs, or found some of my insider info interesting. I dunno, you're still here and in World Domination's review no less, so at the very least you're here for my all caps shouting or rants, maybe some insider scoop.
Who am I to disappoint? Marill, that's who.
I really didn't want to take this episode on. I still don't. I hate this episode and everything it stands for. I've said elsewhere that I wrote WD first, at least it was the first episode of FV completed, because it was as important as Timeline. I dunno what I was drinking when I said that. Yes, it was important since Lilly would make her debut in it. But Damien's original alter ego from the draft copy, and his "Season One" version, wasn't meant to be a big thing. He'd be in two episodes, die in the second, influence a few people for Season Two and then be as forgotten as the Vidiians.
The truth is WD could've been a good episode. I remember being quite proud of the paper draft. I wish I could find it. It's probably not as good as I remember, but I know it'll be an improvement over what I wrote instead for release. FV was a whole different beast when I got there, the writer's were a thing, fourth wall "FANFIC DIMENSIONS" was for some reason the explanation for the Morgan/Kiara dimension split off stuff *gag* and the series was trying too hard to be funny. I guess with the online/official version I tried to go back to Aggressions Part 1/early Timeline draft's style, maybe I didn't like the draft anymore. Who knows, I don't remember.
What I do remember is thinking it'd be oh so clever to tweak it so Voyager goes into the "real world" instead, have it based around my home town/villages, change the story so it includes the writers. And you know what, maybe it would've worked (but still been awful of course) if I took advantage of the "Damien/Boss death causes his hatred of Voyager to begin with" paradox of the original. The writers could've only wrote FV and fourth wall cameo'd in it because they meet the Voyager crew, deal with Damien here. Have this "real world" be before FV's creation.
I suppose it's 15 years too late to think of that now, let's be fair.
Basically World Domination is confusing, it brought in characters/real people who had no involvement in FV or knowledge of it, made the Lilly/Emma debut a convoluted mess (though that ties in with confusing), and was pretty damn offensive in a few ways... maybe more, since I'm basing that off my memory. I haven't read the thing in so many years.
I've reviewed every episode so far even if I've despised them; Aggressions Part 2, Hunters (which wasn't as awful as I recalled), Timeless, Muse. World Domination is definitely (at least) on the same level as Aggressions' second half and yet I refuse to read through it all.
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So what am I going to do? First, an explanation. Second, I'll choose quotes at random to share with you, fully expecting them to be dire and comment as if it's a full review... with no context as I haven't read it in full in many years. Third and finally I'll share the entireity of the stupidest part of the entire episode, season and series. Saying that kinda answers the first part of this so called review's question:
What did World Domination do wrong that the rest of the season didn't?
I guess World Domination being my first completed episode is a big factor.
The thing is the series changed so much between the draft being done and when the episode was due for release. The writers were a re-occurence. The style of the series was different, going from sometimes jokey but more sci-fi/fantasy to extreme parody still taking itself too seriously. The villain was completely different. Pokémon everywhere!
One of my biggest issues with it is it represents the whole FANFIC DIMENSIONS far better/"worserer" than the episode that started it in the first place.
Before Aggressions, or rather Part 2, the basic story was Morgan/Kiara's existence had sent Voyager down a different path to the original. A new dimension, where this one change eventually effects everything. With the introduction of the writers, the new Damien, Seventh Voyager etc... Mirror Universes pulled "fifth dimension is really where all fiction takes place" out of its ass, ignoring the main villains of the episode being from the Seventh and mentions of a Sixth.
At least Mirror still takes place in the "fifth" dimension. World Domination drags Voyager into the so called real world, where they discover their Boss nemesis is really Damien (and I'm sure are surprised, which is odd) and he is from the same place the writers are. That he can do what they can.
Which brings me to the more specific things that bug me:
The Setting: The draft didn't take place in the "real world". They did dimension jump, but they did it to the dimension the Ligers come from. They're trapped on Earth in the 20th/21st century, there's hints to the Ligers (I don't remember them really showing themselves) who are more advanced humans, hidden away so their technology isn't stolen. Which brings me to...
Lilly (and Emma)'s introduction: This was how they were meant to meet Lilly. She joins them, and I'll admit I don't remember if it was on purpose or not. Why wouldn't they meet her in her own dimension? It makes sense right? Right! What sense does it make that she's in the real world? Even past me realised that and tried to bulls$$$ my way through it, but couldn't. I could've started again. No, some convoluted rubbish about her being Firera's namesake, her identity stolen or something... It's so bad and confusing, I actually don't remember the details of it. IT'S AWFUL AND WASN'T MEANT TO HAPPEN, that's enough.
The writers: Obviously they weren't in the original episode. Since they were involved in this stupid Seventh/Damien story, they had to be here. The stupid whim/inspiration to change World Domination's entire setting to the real world, I remember it feeling like a stroke of genius. I dunno why and I don't know how it was supposed to improve anything.
Damien's death and vengeance comes full circle: The final scene of draft World Domination was basically "Damien", or rather his unnamed original alter ego, finding out about his death in the future. He reacts silently, who informs him doesn't know if they've been heard or if he cares. Once they're gone, he begins to draw up his plans for revenge, starting the cycle that leads to his death in the first place. This was so, so good (true the details are fuzzy to me as to how he finds this out at the moment but still!), I was tempted to have an episode like this in Season Five. In the end Three's A Paradox and Five had little scenes, intentionally subtle but I don't know if they come off that way, that kinda do this but with a twist, the twist being it links to the actual reason for the Fifth title and the paradox now.
This obviously means Reboot World Domination cannot do the same as the draft, which is a shame.
It is very sad and annoying that Damien had such terrible roots. I love what I've done with him after he had his new name/character makeover in Season Two. And I especially love that even with the final episode, you still don't know his full back story, you only get glimpses and foreshadowing, what his deal is, and no one in the cast knows what to do with him, his story doesn't end. All the other MC's got some closure, but Damien? Nah. If you're the type that thinks he's failed as a character, or I failed to develop him, I disagree. Not everyone in life gets their lives in order, some people don't ever grow into better people, a lot do not get closure for personal issues, bad people don't always get the karma they deserve and similarly, not all bad people are given a second chance to redeem.
But I'm getting way off track here.
When it comes down to it, World Domination tried to change bits of its plot without realising the ramifications it would have on the rest of the plot. And when it failed, it failed hard.
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Seriously, do I have to read it myself to see how bad it is? Season One has been hilariously awful so far, how can it be worse?
For Part 2 of this so called review I'm going to open the file up in Firefox, randomly scroll up & down, highlight a line(s), all with my eyes closed/narrowed btw, then paste it here. I'll only see what lines they are when I paste them. I'll do this a few times. I'll bet now without even looking, pinky swear, that every bit I pick will be god awful. Ready? YOU ARE NOT PREPARED!
"Oh, H! You're so much cuter in person!" Nicola cooed. She pushed Raichu out of the way and she stood in front of James. He looked terrified. "H, I'm your biggest fan!" she yelled.
"Er.. Nicola, you have to come with us. Them two are not who you think they are. You're in danger, you have to come with us," Raichu said.
Okay, I have no idea what's going on there. What a great start.
James' actor's nickname is H.
Nicola I assume from the spelling and at the time crush is one of the people I mentioned who had no idea FV existed, but was thrown into its narrative anyway.
Oh look, James is mentioned as terrified of yet another girl crushing on him.
Them two, pfft haha
Raichu trying to convince her to come because the "two" will put her in danger might mean the James here is Seventh James. Okay. I'd bet all that I have that the two means him and Jessie.
I was curious, if I was a cat I'd be dead. This is what follows
"Then who are they then?" Nicola asked. Jessie and James looked worried.
"The robots are coming!" they both yelled.
ROBOTS? WHO'S "THEM TWO" THEN IF IT ISN'T JAMES/JESSIE
I'M STILL CONFUSED. DEFINITELY MOVING ON TO THE NEXT RANDOM QUOTE HERE. NEXT!
"You should know who he is. He is the one who owns the Seventh Dimension. He's a bit ticked off with Fifth Voyager and he wants to destroy you from the source," Vulpix said.
Spoiler alert, she's talking about the Boss.
I nearly only copied half the line here. Ok critique time
WHY IS HE TICKED OFF WITH FIFTH VOYAGER?
HASN'T HE ALWAYS TRIED TO SORT IT OUT FROM THE SOURCE, YES I KNOW HE'S ALWAYS IN HIS DAMIEN PERSONA WHILE PESTERING THE WRITERS, BUT STILL... CLEVER FORESHADOWING AIN'T HARD. IT'S EASIER THAN BLATANTLY WRONG, LOOKS LIKE A PLOT HOLE COMMENTS LIKE THIS
HAVE VOYAGER EVER MET THE BOSS PERSONA BEFORE? I don't remember, honestly.
Next...
"So, you fell into my trap. I must say that your site and fanfiction series was ambitious but it's now no more," Damien said. The away team saw smoke coming from upstairs.
"You b******! That was my computer!" Marill screamed. She tried to run to Damien but the robots blocked her way.
THERE'S THOSE ROBOTS AGAIN
HOW DOES MARILL KNOW THE COMPUTER WAS THE ONE ON FIRE. IT ONLY SAYS THE SMOKE'S COMING FROM UPSTAIRS, IS THAT'S ALL THAT'S THERE? It's a big upstairs, the fire might not have gotten to the computer yet. Just saying!
A secret area:
"Excellent, everything is going according to plan," the Boss said in his computer generated voice. On the screen was this website. He closed the window. He switched the computer off.
Voyager:
The Bridge was in shambles. Kathryn stood up and she walked over to Tom's station. He managed to climb back onto his chair.
Literally trying not to laugh here. Oh my god.
I know I have this joke I did twice where there was this typo: there was a horrible site. Someone instead of seeing what I meant, you know correcting it, I instead wrote that someone walks in and sees one of my old websites on the screen and screams horribly.
Yet years before I was seriously having a villain look at the website, trying to be mysterious and evil, like "oooh he's watching us, spooky!". Good god.
I obviously have no context here, other than what I know of the episode already so I might get this critique wrong. If he's attacked Voyager enough to leave them in shambles, in the current episode still being written FYI but still, why is he checking the website?
I have a feeling this is linked to the previous scene where he was using Marill's computer and set it on fire, the dastardly fiend *gasp* That'd explain the hard drive curse.
If I'm right then why is he simply staring at the website, why does he close it down and turn the computer off? Surely it should show him in the episode's file, typing away or laughing at what he's done. Why shut the computer down, why not continue the torture?
"Ha! Looks like Voyager has outsmarted you again," Firera said.
"Don't speak so soon. Damien to the Rabbien Fleet, fire back, show no mercy," Damien said.
"Sixes... er yes sir."
This is an interesting quote, only for the edits. Sixes/Rabbiens are the new official name for these guys, what with the original being stolen. Their replacements, which will have these new names, in the reboot have had quite a bit of work done to them and I'm a little eager to implement it into Reboot Season Two. Too bad that's probably years away.
I can only say this. Damien has his own preferred name for them, while they've called themselves the Sixes. Everyone else uses the latter.
One more for the road:
"Raichu, I saw it crash," Marill muttered.
"How, you can't see from South Stanley."
"We're in Shield Row," Marill replied. The signal cut her off.
I may as well have posted a map on the site with arrows pointing at these places, labelled "I live here", "I went to school here," and it would've been far less subtle.
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As promised, for the final third of the review I've searched for this scene. You need to see this, then anyone still in doubt as to why this review is incomplete will understand. This extract from World Domination is very likely the worst scene in Fifth Voyager history, even topping the two imfamous scenes in Timeless. Yes, it's that bad. Why? See for yourself.
"Safe from what?" one of the girls asked. They all heard footsteps. They all turned around and they saw a girl with long ginger hair.
"Are you the writers of Fifth Voyager?" she asked.
"We three are," Firera replied.
"Who are you?" one girl asked.
"She looks like Willow from Buffy," Togepi said. The girl fell over in Pokémon style.
"You will not believe how many people have said that. Anyway, I'm Lilly Ligren," the girl said.
"No you're not. That's my name," Firera said angrily.
"Firera? You're alive?" Lilly asked.
"Yeah, of course I am," Firera muttered.
"Your parents are really worried about you. They thought that you had been murdered," Lilly said.
"One month after Firera had disappeared her parents 'adopted' me, they're kinda messed up right now," Lilly replied.
"How come you've got the same name as Firera?" Raichu asked.
"My first name is the same, I just use Ligren cos.. you know. Personally, I like Johnstone better," Lilly said.
"Er.. I hate to interrupt but why did you want to know who the writers were?" the tall girl asked.
"Lets just say that I know about everything that's been happening. The Sixes have been my species enemies for years," Lilly said.
"Your species?" everyone said in unison.
"Yeah, I'm half Liger. Me and a few others were put into stasis and were placed in other dimensions for safety, but that isn't important now. I'm here to help," Lilly said.
I don't know why I went with the half Liger garbage. In Kidz Trek she wasn't. With the way I developed them in Fifth Voyager, the Ligers could only be Humans who have separated themselves from the rest of the world and then moved to another planet. Kidz Trek was from a much younger version of the mind that brought you FANFIC DIMENSIONS, so the Ligers back then were supposed to be a different species (think intelligent animals, yep. I was 10ish though). In fact "Liger" was Lilly's family name. Spoiler alert, because she's royalty they name the species after them. So yeah "half Human" makes even less sense now, doesn't it harhar.
Even with that trivia the whole concept of the Ligers brings the half human thing into question. They avoided contact with Humans, so why would there be half Humans. I'm getting Xenoblade Telephia royalty vibes here 0_0 OMG THE LIGERS ARE DOOOOOOOOOOOMED! *cough* Continuing on...
"Ooooh, Voyager," a voice said. Another girl ran over to the ship and she started hugging the hull.
"Who is she?" Marill asked.
"Oh, that's my friend, Emma Goldsbrough. She's obsessed with Voyager," Lilly replied.
"But I'm Emma Goldsbrough," Togepi moaned.
"This is getting too confusing," Firera moaned as she held her head.
"Yeah, I'm getting a headache too," Marill muttered.
YOU DON'T SAY. EVEN THE WRITERS DO NOT KNOW WHAT'S HAPPENING HERE. MAKES SENSE, AS I CLEARLY WAS WINGING IT HERE... oh sorry
"Why is there two Emma's?" Raichu asked.
"I don't know, alternate realities maybe," Lilly replied.
You know what, forget all the garbage I wrote above this huge quote chunk. I think this scene alone proves my point. PEACE OUT Y'ALL
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Well let's see how everything tallies up.
Negatives:
1 to 5152) Every single word
Positives:
HAHAHAHAHAHA
Please Note: Since the episode is not getting a full review, some stats below cannot be counted. If I spot something later I'll change it from N/A to the number.
Marill's Rating: 0/10 I'd give it a minus if I could
Exclaimed Count: 0 (153)
Muttered Count: 35 (726)
Motto Count: 0 (15)
Sexist Crap Count: N/A
Jessie's Sin Points: N/A
Morgan the Sue Count: N/A
Seven Dies Count: N/A
James Kill Count: N/A