#and as we see in the crime reason analysis. marcus was trying his best

[hoperays-song]

Analysis of Johnny's Character Design Pt.1

CW: Discussion of malnutrition, poverty, and childhood hunger

So, one of the first things that you notice about Johnny in terms of character design is how small he is. This is incredibly noticeable in Sing 1 when you compare him to his family, with him barely reaching his dad's shoulder when standing flat on the ground.

However, while that could be dismissed as Marcus being older, we do see Johnny around gorillas who are implied to be close to his age in Sing 2. And he is still noticeable shorter than them.

Now, most people's first thought would be that Johnny might be a different subspecies of gorilla. After all, those all have different height and weight ranges. But, we actually can't use this line of logic here as Johnny has been called a Mountain Gorilla. Which is the second largest gorilla subspecies in the world. And the least endangered gorilla subspecies are smaller than Mountain gorillas. Meaning that yeah, he should be much bigger than he actually is.

So why isn't he? Well, as I discussed in my analysis of the gang and why they likely turned to crime, Johnny and his dad would likely be below the poverty line, even with money from their crimes. Meaning that they would not have money laying around to cover their expenses in the slightest. And one of those expenses would be food.

There isn't a ton of research in malnourishment of gorillas that I found readily available online (which I think is probably a good thing since that means its not that common in nature so yay), so I will just be using the common indicators from humans and other great ape species.

Some of these indicators however, are blatantly obvious on Johnny once you know what to look for.

Hair Thickness and Shine

The first thing that is an indicator that Johnny is malnourished is his hair (yes, Gorillas have hair, not fur). Hair is actually used a fair bit by people in healthcare as a way to se what the potential health problems a patient is facing. Common things that can be diagnosed with hair as a symptom are things like anemia and thyroid issues. However, as your hair is very dependant on your health (think about those multivitamins that help your hair as well as other parts of your body), it is a way to see malnutrition.

When you are malnourished, your hair becomes brittle/course, thin, and dull. It loses pigmentation as well. It also tends to fall out, with hair loss being a huge indicator. And while we never see Johnny actively losing hair in the movie, we see the rest of the indicators.

See the similarities in the texture and shine quality of the hair? The child's face is censored for their privacy of course, but that photo comes from an article talking about malnutrition and childhood hunger in Nicaragua and is a before photo from their program.

But let's look at Johnny's hair real quick. It's very brittle/coarse looking but not thick. The coarseness might make it seem that way, but look at his hand. The hair is patchy, as if it is very thin and has been falling out. The dullness of his hair is pretty obvious, though, it does appear shiny due to the spotlight. Again if you look on his hand, it has no natural shine to it. The lack of pigmentation is going to look the most different between species obviously, but it's import to point out that Johnny's hair is way more brown here than we see it in Sing 2, aka, a loss of pigmentation. His hair is pretty bluntly saying he's malnourished.

However, these effects can be fixed! Typically, in a lot of cases that is, these effects of malnutrition on hair will disappear (or start to) after six months of nutritional stability. Which makes sense when we see Johnny in Sing 2! I put the time of the movies to be about a year apart, and this makes sense with the changes in Johnny's hair. It's thicker, no longer course, and has a shine to it. The amount of brown has evened out more naturally into his hair, looking more like natural highlights in comparison to a loss of pigmentation as it did earlier. These changes are especially obvious when you look at Johnny's hands. The hair there looks full and isn't patchy, and is the place where we can easily see the natural shine. Johnny has been eating regularly for at least six months. His hair has healed.

Posture

Now, this one is not used at all from what I can see online (or from when I bugged my medical friends) as an actual diagnosis aid. And I will admit the original study on this was conducted a very long time ago. However, several medical institutions do still seem to list diet as a thing that can effect your posture, so I'm going to run with it (I do not have a medical degree, I just know wayyy too many doctors).

The thing that effects your posture in terms of nutrition is your vitamin intake. Several vitamins, namely vitamin D and calcium, are essential for bone health. And your spine, surprise surprise, is made of bones. If you do not consume enough of these vitamins, your bones become weak and supporting body weight is difficult, leading to you likely having worse posture than normal.

And in Sing 1, which character has arguably the worst posture I have seen in my entire life? Johnny.

And again, this is a thing that changes drastically between the two movies. And is absolutely something I want to contribute to the clear change in the amount of food this kid is eating.

Sorry, this was the clearest photo I could easily find. But! Look at that difference! There is still a slight curve, which is in most people's posture, but it has greatly improved. His bones, muscles, and ligaments are getting the amount of nutrition they need to actually work properly and support his body.

Size/developmental Milestones

Now this is the most obvious one and the thing that kicked off this research deep dive. Johnny is obviously smaller than his father and uncles in Sing 1, who are the same subspecies as him. However, I will agree, that is not a fair comparison. Marcus, Stan, and Barry are mature adults and have finished growing. Johnny is still a juvenile-young adult in the gorilla lifespan (I place him as 17 in Sing 1).

However, that does mean Johnny should be closing the gap with them, or starting to, in terms of height and weight. But he clearly isn't. In fact, we see that he hasn't grown by Sing 2 either, when gorillas around his age are very clearly bigger than him.

Malnourishment stunts the growth of children significantly. In fact, that is typically one of the first signs doctors look for (think of how your height and weight are checked at every doctor visit). This effects millions of children worldwide every day and it is very very important to remedy this as quickly as possible.

Why? Because as a whole, stunted growth is largely irreversible. While the child can recover weight pretty easily, height isn't the same. Even if they do eventually get nutritional stability, it's unlikely that they will actually grow to the height they could have been before. And I feel like that is a prime example of what has happened to Johnny.

While in the year between the two movies Johnny has clearly had nutritional stability and has largely recovered in terms of health, he hasn't grown much, if at all. And Johnny is 17-18 years old (by my estimate, he could be as old as 19 in Sing 2 but that is the eldest I'm able to believe), he should still be growing. However, again, when we compare him to other gorillas his age, he is significantly behind in growth. And will likely remain that way his entire life.

So...

In summary, I believe that, despite the drastic measures taken by Marcus, Stan, and Barry to support him, Johnny did grown up malnourished, resulting in his growth being stunted. This malnourishment was replaced with nutritional stability in the year between the two movies, likely while he was in foster care and the debt of the garage was payed off by Nana or another capable party. Despite this dietary change between movies and Johnny's newfound health, his growth had been stunted for long enough that the damage was irreversible, leading to Johnny being so noticeably small compared to other gorillas who are around his age.

------Mentioned Analysis------ Gang's reasons for crime analysis:

[sometimesrosy]

6.05 The Gospel of Josephine rewatch

Oh well first off, I didn’t realize how QUICKLY Bellamy figured out Clarke was Josephine. I thought it took FOREVER the first time I saw it.

But it was really like this. Clarke said Madi could go to school, “chill out” made a lewd reference to Cillian, was not freaked out when they found out about the primes/hosts, wanted to stay in sanctum anyway, looked confused when he spoke trig. Then he knew. “How are we on opposite sides of this?” “You know I judge myself every day.” That’s when he tells her that he sees the people he murdered in his dreams not in the mirror. Which means he already knew.

That wasn’t even 3/4 through the episode. It felt like forever when I watched it. And Abby was so focused on Kane, and also hadn’t slept in two days, she didn’t put together anything when Clarke was right handed instead of left. I’ll say it’s the exhaustion that made her miss that.

I don’t think this analysis is going to be in order, because I stopped in the middle of the show to rebut that anon who told me to give up on bellarke (really i don’t understand those people. why does she care if i ship bellarke?)

Anyway, Octavia and Diyoza were great. Throw in Gabriel and they were super. But it’s really interesting how Diyoza understands her so well because she was her, and how she wants to help her now, even if half her help is sarcasm. It’s still wisdom. 

It reminded me of that ask I got a bit ago saying Octavia had no redemption arc or development, she was just suddenly fine which is 100% false. The scene where she’s after Gabriel and gets trapped in the orbeez pit and forced to face Diyoza with the snark/wisdom is part of her development. She tells Diyoza to kill her but then when the temporal flare passes (Temporal means TIME, something about that anomaly is time related,) she goes into the orbeez to stay alive. Diyoza says “you wanted to live” when she realized she took cover. So this right there is one step on her development. From “I should have died in the gorge” to taking cover so the anomaly didn’t killl her. 

OH. The scene with Jackson and Abby where she says the reason why she’s so focused on bringing Marcus back is because he’s good and they are not, because they stood by Blodreina and didn’t try to stop her. Jackson says he was just doing his job, and she said ‘said every war criminal ever.’ I think that was an important concept, even if she then went on to commit more crimes against humanity.

This season has a lot of our characters saying things that are hypocritical or untrue or that they are not able to follow through on. OH. I think that’s because this season is about facing OUR OWN crimes and sins and guilt. LOOKING in the mirror. So we have Clarke LITERALLY facing herself in her mindspace/w Josephine. We have Bellamy saying one thing to Echo and being unable to follow through and turning to Clarke instead. We have Abby saying they’re war criminals and wanting to save Kane because he’s not but then commiting more crimes to save him. We have Raven blaming Clarke for making impossible decisions and then being forced to make them herself. We have Murphy not wanting to die and sacrificing Clarke and vengeance for immortality, after blaming her for her sins. Hmm. INteresting.

Speaking of Murphy. I found his scene with Josephine very good. When he realizes it’s her and he’s just freaking horrified. He is not okay with Clarke’s death, but as the survivor, he concedes to Josephine’s will to get immortality too. HE’s trying to make the best of it. But he was shaken and horrified and sad and grief stricken. I am going to keep an eye on his behavior to see how he goes. I never thought he turned against Clarke, but was only trying to help everyone else and himself. 

@linzzmorgan100 @wolfheartgirl  @braindeadkat @kattitudereads @beholdmysparkle @elspethelfgordie @theatre-steph @franklyineedcoffee  @iishallbelieve

[foggedgrief]

so noemi and nicky were in part one but this is part two and y’all are going to get the loves of my life, poppy finnegan ( click here to find some quick facts about my boy ) and sebastian lazzaro ( click here to find some quick facts about my girl ) ! wanted connections can be found here.

be warned ! before you click that handy dandy little read more, the following triggers will be discussed : death ( multiple deaths due to the fog, not explicit : poppy ), divorce ( not traumatic, amenable divorce : laz ) !

writing  letters  to  your  mother  even  though  she’ll  never  read  them,  praying  for  forgiveness  when  you  press  flowers  between  pages  when  you  play  god  with  life  and  death,  staring  at  the  fog  from  your  perch  on  your  window  sill  wondering  what  it  might  be  like  to  stay  for  a  while,  the  ever  dawning  realization  that  you  are  less  than  you  could  be  but  more  than  you  were,  the  desire  to  wear  masks  more  interesting  than  your  own  (  what  would  your  mother  say  that  you  wish  to  be  someone  other  than  your  own  self  ?  )

penelope jean finnegan is the eldest child of the finnegan family and is like a de facto rory gilmore with just how often she’s seen around town and i mean that in the best kind of way. 

it’s mostly thanks to her mama, the late dottie finnegan. if you only knew one person in town, it was probably dottie. she owned the mad batter, has made almost every confectionary sold at the school’s bake sake, has made every birthday cake for most people in town since she was fourteen, and just radiated the best kind of mom energy that you would look for in another person. 

poppy was relatively popular in high school and was an active member of the thespian troupe. she won a superior and second place in the state level thespian competition in costume design and she’s been designing and sewing her own clothes since then. she also worked at the bakery from the time she was sixteen until she went off to college and was prom queen her senior year. 

also in high school, poppy and her parents converted one of the rooms in the house into an artistically inviting space and sometimes poppy treated it more like her bedroom than her actual bedroom when she was in school. while dottie expressed most of her art through paints, sketches, and cakes, poppy has always had a desire to design her own clothes and make them. she does take commissions around prom season for a little extra pocket money and opens her etsy store as early as january and runs through june for prom and graduation. 

she met her now boyfriend ( ex ? maybe ! ) in college and dual majored in two business degrees, one in entrepreneurship and one in marketing. she did so with the explicit of interest in going back to her family business and expanding it into a franchise across the state and eventually into a generational empire of baked goods and love. 

for legal reasons that’s mostly a joke but with her degrees and moving back to town, though, she did begin cultivating their social media presence and started nationally shipping orders about two years ago. the company has a large following, especially on tiktok, where poppy maintains her own account, the mad batter’s, and the finnefam account for the finnegan family. they are those people. 

poppy was always especially close to her mother and the loss of dottie has been horrifically detrimental to her stability and the additional loss of one of her best friends, max, only sent a downward turn into a spiral. all she wants is for the world to straighten out again but she doesn’t really even know what that means. 

when poppy came home from college, her arm was linked with marcus’ and they moved into the one bedroom mother in law apartment behind the family’s home. it’s cute as fuck and dottie helped her design it but it’s suffocatingly familiar with all of these losses that she’s found herself staying in her childhood bedroom instead of with marcus. ser maxibald, their corgi, is staying with marcus. 

when she took the job at the tower, it was under the excuse of wanting to make sure that august stayed safe. and maybe one day she’ll believe her own lie but if she had to choose between sitting up in a tower amongst the fog that took her mother and going to work at the bakery like her mother did every day for as long as she could remember... well the forest starts to look good after a while.

literally will fight anyone, including the fog, for the safety of her siblings and father. is 10/10 taking her anger, frustration, and sadness out on her father and boyfriend and honestly that’s not healthy and she knows it but we all do strange things in the fog of grief. 

the  desperate  feeling  that  sits  on  your  chest  when  you  feel  the  need  to  drown  out  the  silence,  the  walk  of  shame  when  you  have  to  collect  your  bowls  and  dishes  from  your  room  and  bring  them  to  the  kitchen,  happier  days  filled  with  love  and  laughter  polluted  by  sixty  hour  work  weeks  and  fifty  too  many  missed  recitals,  appointments,  holidays,  vibrant  dreams  of  better  days  and  waking  up  alone,  still  reaching  to  fidget  with  a  ring  that  isn’t  there  anymore.

sebastian isaac lazzaro, known as bash by his family, laz by everyone else in the world, grew up in pine haven and had that all american kind of boy small towns love to publish articles about when they get into a major state school on a scholarship for their athletic prowess and talk about that one time they rescued a cat from a tree. 

his sport was soccer and he got a full ride to umaine for it. he pursued a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice and law. he went to law school and spent a few years at a practice in massachusetts before deciding to apply to the fbi. your man passed through training with flying colors and was assigned to his first choice, the behavioral analysis unit. 

laz married the sister of one of his closest friends in high school, rory finnegan. they didn’t start dating until they were at university of maine together and he was absolutely head over heels for her. she showed up a year later and it felt like a better time than any to ask her out properly without the prying eyes of the town trying to figure out what their relationship was and if it was more than friendly. 

they were married for about twelve years and dated for another five on top of that. they were married about a year after she graduated from college and divorced a little over a year ago. though their divorce didn’t end back of a lack of love, laz didn’t know how to appropriately prioritize his family over his work and watched the best people in his life slip through his fingers. 

they did have a daughter, sophia. she’s twelve now. she was named after laz’s mother and she’s the light of his life. when his wife first served him with papers, he agreed that she should take primary custody of sophia because of the unpredictable nature of his schedule and a desire to devote himself to a schedule he wouldn’t fuck up. he bought them a house in pine haven so his wife could be close to her brother and sophia be close to her cousins. the town isn’t the safest because of the fog but he knew that crime wasn’t going to be an issue. 

he’s incredibly consistent with his support payments and adheres almost rigidly to the custody agreement. now that he’s back in town because of the disappearances, though, things a little awkward. they haven’t had to see each other for this long before and laz is conflicted on how to approach something very obvious to him and his team: his love for his wife and the fact that every time he leaves pine haven, he leaves his heart behind too. 

but on to lighter notes: murder. laz hunts down serial killers for a living and helps construct the profiles that bring them to justice. it was in his office that he got the notification of death for his former sister in law, dorothy finnegan. laz had to leave the room when he saw her face among the missing and returned a few minutes later to tell the team to get together and they were flying out the same day. he didn’t really tell anyone he was coming back to town and has been here for two weeks. the last time he was in town was for whatever the most recent major holiday was because he spends his holidays with the finnegans, usually. 

over all good man. gives good hugs but not as good as nicky. 7.5 / 10.