#a tadc theory!

[pekenku]

My TADC Theory: Jax & Ragatha are siblings

The main details I would like to enter into evidence:

"But what do badges even mean in this case?" My theory is it represents family. Specifically, it represents a wealthy family that puts enough stock in their name to make a crest/coat of arms/emblem/mon(紋)*.

I don't think I'd have paid the emblems much attention if I hadn't noticed Jax wasn't wearing that anime delinquent getup(the one Zooble is wearing) and instead was decked out in prep school attire like Ragatha.

There's more to imply Jax & Ragatha knew each other prior to their digital imprisonment (like Ragatha reflecting on her life and mother, with Jax's reaction after she downplays her stormy homelife as 'just kind of a farmgirl!', but I wanted to focus on the family crest thing.

Anyway, this was my first theory post about anything! I hope you liked it! And also drink water!

[cheatsykoopa98]

yeah, gummigoo 100% remembers pomni and wasn't allowed to say it, just look at his face

[findthekeystopthekraang]

this HAS to mean something. it's just a coincidence that right after Ragatha talks about her mom being abusive, the VERY NEXT shot is Jax looking away ????

[teashteinn]

Here is footage of Caine attacking a programmer. Let's sympathize with the victim😔

It’s good that the programmer has a loved one who will always support him❤

[pouletpourri]

what-if concept where kaufmo didn't got abstracted and he and pomni got to co-exist

[kys02]

Hey yall!

To my surprise, I haven’t seen many people talk about this scene.

Moment when Jax suddenly becomes a vegan during the adventure.

Which is strange, considering that - ever since the pilot we’ve known from Kane that:

“One of the few things I don't have control over are your minds.”

After digging into it a bit (since Kane is an AI, and I’m definitely not an expert in that field), I think I’ve found a way to explain it.

So, Zooble says:

Does this mean that participants (not just Zooble, but anyone) can alter each other’s mental states?

Yes, BUT - only within the adventure structure.

Here’s how it works

An “adventure” is a controlled simulation that includes:

• Structure,

• Narrative frame,

• Reset resolution,

• And the ability to install temporary “perception rules”.

When a character (like Zooble) says:

“Let’s make Jax a vegan for the rest of the day.”

they’re basically assigning a variable:

Jax.isVegan = true (while adventure_active)

That variable doesn’t just change behavior

It overwrites part of Jax’s mental structure. So deeply, in fact, that he doesn’t even realize it’s happening.

(Which explains why he freaks out a bit when he notices it.)

When the adventure ends, all temporary mental modifications are rolled back.

Honestly… this creeps me out a little. If this logic holds, you could (probably) write in any mental override for a character - as a joke, or not.

What do ya think?

[gobbogoo]

So after TADC's 5th episode, a lot of little details about the circumstances of the Circus have been revealed:

1. C&A has moved or been fully shut down for long enough that the building housing the Circus has been considered abandoned. For that to happen, you'd need a good 10 years of neglect, I'd say.

2. Pomni and Zooble both got trapped while exploring the abandoned C&A building. (Zooble is the second-newest, according to Gooseworx)

3. It's modern day out there, with Youtube and whatnot. Remembering that the Digital Circus is a late-90s era PC game, that means Kinger has probably been trapped in the Circus for around 25 years. For perspective, he's been in there for longer than Gangle, Jax, and Zooble have been ALIVE. No WONDER he's crazy!

4. This is further emphasized by the fact that nobody else knew about Kinger's wife. For that to happen, you'd need two degrees of separation from when she abstracted: both the people that knew her AND the people that knew OF her are gone. How many abstracted people have been entirely forgotten? How many people has Kinger seen lose themselves?

5. Caine's general looniness may not JUST be the result of him running non-stop for so long. The physical hardware hosting the Circus is likely starting to degrade after so much time. Eventually it WILL give out entirely, assuming it isn't being maintained. The fact that it's still receiving electricity despite the building supposedly being "abandoned" DOES imply someone is trying to maintain the circus, though!

6. If C&A is abandoned then nobody is maintaining the characters' physical bodies. The fact that nobody's died implies their consciousnesses are fully severed from their bodies. This also means that they probably CAN'T escape from the Circus, because they have no bodies to return to.

7. HOWEVER the fact that Pomni didn't mention seeing any decaying bodies when finding the headset implies they're either being moved, or there are many different headset that all lead to the Circus. Either way, it feels like someone on the outside is working to maintain the Circus's existence for some reason...

[bug-juices]

Ok. Let’s talk about the breaking bad joke.

This joke has so many in universe implications and I haven’t seen literally anyone talking about it. Like yea there’s definitely the chance that it was just a throwaway gag but like. There’s so much to talk about.

1) Zooble acknowledges the joke and tells him to “be creative” if he’s going to make up a fake backstory

This implies that breaking bad was already a pop culture staple when Zooble (and probably Jax and gangle) got trapped in the digital circus. The show premiered on January 20th, 2008 but didn’t really gain mainstream popularity until 2011 when it was added to Netflix, and subsequently joined the cultural sphere of generally understood pop culture references. This in turn means that Jax, Gangle and Zooble were probably trapped in the circus sometime post 2011.

2) Ragatha doesn’t understand the reference

This means that Ragatha (and by extension Kinger) have been in the circus since BEFORE 2011! Probably before 2008 if I’m being realistic! This means that Ragatha and Kinger have been here for at the very least 14 years. That’s a long time to be trapped in an unending digital hell.

Anyways this is just my observation (and possible over analyzation) of the BB joke. I just think being able to put these characters on a timeline is crazy.

[raggedyjax]

RIBBIT DESIGN WE GOT THE OFFICIAL RIBBIT DESIGN THIS IS NOT A DRILLLLL

[nanavuu]

i am not well

[almadash]

What if…?

[actuallyjustabiscuit]

OK OK OK SO

The second I saw this scene I instantly remembered this moment from episode 1

Back then I thought the brightening of the lights was meant to make the moment more intense and to emphasize how scary Kaufmo looks. He even looks like he was trying to overcome his madness for a sec.

But, no!

It’s his reaction to the lights. The hallway was too bright for him!

I bet Caine is fully aware of this fact with the abstracted humans, and that’s why he keeps them all in the cellar where it’s dark.

When Kaufmo was loose in the Tent, he just attacked anything in his path, his many eyes darting all over the place. Contrast this with (who I’m assuming is) Queenie in the soft darkness of Kinger’s pillow fort, all of her eyes trained on him and much more focused.

The Circus is overstimulation for the abstracted. That’s what makes them so aggressive.

[teashteinn]

Whaaat, first a chess piece was called an expert in the digital world, and then it turns out that he studied computer science for 7 years? What could this mean?🤯💀🤨

[nillarose02]

Theory!

ok people have probably mentioned this already but in the newest tadc episode when Jax is running down the hallway, the image of his *probably* abstracted friend isn't the only door that he runs past!

He first runs past Kaufmo's definitely abstracted door, and then a second door which is the non-abstracted mannequin we presumably saw at the beginning and end of the episode.

We can only guess right now, but the confirmation that this is an official resident of the circus means that either...

a. there's another person who's now stuck in the circus OR

b. maybe Caine really is losing track of who is or isn't an npc

With all this episode's foreshadowing with Jax and the possibility of Caine being more powerful than he either knows or let's on, there's definitely signs of that there's something going wrong with the circus and the people inside. I'm really excited to see the rest of the season goes, and I hope we get more answers in ep. 6!

[birodactyloftheblog]

Ok so immediately here's some things i noticed while pausing through the episode

First of all: gangle's drawings. Incredible as always

Then there's also kinger's character sheet. Nothing super interesting, but it is pretty funny

Here's the bit i was looking for when i started looking through the episode: jax's hallway bit in the intermission.

We must consider the implications of the frog. 🤔

(Also the abstractions surrounding him?? Boy are you traumatized or what. What happened bro)

Finally, as i was looking at that, I also noticed this right beforehand:

A mannequin guy without an X over its picture. Possibly/probably the same one that appeared at the end of the episode, and also appeared in the background of previous episodes.

Edit: turns out it also appeared at the beginning of the episode and i completely missed it. My bad-

PART 2 / PART 3 / BONUS 1 / BONUS 2 / PART 4 / PART 5

[anamateurhumanbeing]

Is C&A abandoned? This was Pomni's reply when asked how she ended up in the circus.

Remember this line in the pilot?

It sounds like the gap between Pomni joining and whoever last joined was quite a while. That doesn't sound likely if the circus was actively being monitored.

"Some weird headset"

Pomni didn't know what she was getting into when she put on the headset. No one else has ever described something like that. Maybe Pomni was going through an abandoned C&A building and put the headset on for shits and giggles, not expecting it to work, because nothing was working.

This does somewhat contradict my previous theory that Caine was actively being monitored, though it is possible that Caine doesn't know everyone who was working on him is gone anymore. A computer running not knowing it's creators don't care about it anymore.

I guess the one little oddity the theory doesn't explain is Pomni arriving in the circus the same day Kaufmo abstracted. That does seem like a mighty big coincidence to happen if someone didn't actively send Pomni in as a replacement because they knew Kaufmo was gone. Not impossible, but definitely unlikely. IDK, I'm not definitively saying that this is what happened, just throwing out what came into my mind when I first heard that line.