#but the friends never really do much that affect the romance directly unless they're like the Obnoxious Matchmaker(tm)

[hua-fei-hua]

perhaps doing an experimental work featuring a pairing i’m not known for focusing on that is also typically relegated to side pairing status was not my best idea ever but at this point i have accepted my fate as the writer of cult classics and flops

[mgsapphire]

Ethics and morality... and how they're not the same...

Weird title, and I don't even know if I'll properly approach this one with all the topics I wish to this discuss in today's The Devil Judge essay, because a lot of things peaked my interest, I was debating on doing a separate post for each subject, but I'll do them all in here:

Starting simple

I know we're only 4 episodes in, but I want to break down the things that I often look for in a new show:

Cinematography

Soundtrack

Character building

Plot devices

Social commentary (sometimes)

Of course, these are things most people would consider basics, but I find that a lot of TV shows don't have enough balance in them. Also, cinematography and soundtrack are pretty up there for me because when a plot gets slow, or something like that, I stay for those two (biggest example: King Eternal Monarch).

The soundtrack in The Devil Judge is amazing and the cinematography can be a character of its own. They really get me hooked and are used as tools to properly tell a story. And I'll get into that further down this post.

The onlooker will never understand the actor

Experience is your best friend not only applies to job hunting, but it's true in the real world too. You can't truly weigh in on something unless you've experienced it yourself, you can give it your judgment and everything, but when bad things happen to someone, you'll never truly understand their pain. Am I bringing up because of the difference of mind in Judge Kang and Judge Kim's opinions? On how the public treated the minister's son? No. I'm talking about a very specific scene, where the cinematography told me to think that way and not the dialogue (it's that easy for my mind to be swayed). In episode 3, when the rich are about to dine right after the foundation's commercial for a better future, we see this aerial shot:

What's interesting about this? The seclusion and the enclosed feeling it conveys as a counterpart to the poverty shots we were just shown. Yet, these are the people making ads for a better future, what do they know?

They live comfortably behind concrete walls with no windows to see what goes on apart from the bubble they live in. This idea is further enforced at the party in episode 4, where they're not even a part of the donations, and watch and mock from afar as spectators. Yet, these people call the shots. They even call it commenting, as if they were watching the pain of others on TV.

The intriguing personality and the duality it encites

Now, this was a costume and wardrobe decision, but it was also very well thought of:

Judge Kim wears white and Judge Kang wears black. One is morally perceived by viewers of the show as morally good and the other is perceived as morally dubious at best. However, besides the costume and wardrobe thought put into this, we also have to think about the delivery of this scene and how it may further affect my detailing of this section. Judge Kang brings down the coats, and hangs over the coat to Judge Kim, he's the one who is making that annotation: You're pure, I'm tainted. This can have one of two interpretations:

Either Judge Kang believes Judge Kim to be pure and innocent due to his status as a rookie in the field

Or he believes Judge Kim to be morally white and himself morally black as he's looking at his brother's face and not at Judge Kim's heart.

Because most of the back story we're unveiling is through Judge Kim's perception, there's also an inherit bias we're having as well, because in Judge Kim narrative, he believes he's doing what's right and believes Judge Kang to be evil. In being served information about Judge Kang through Judge Kim's eyes, our bias is inherently skewed.

Another thing is that, when they put on the coat, they're standing in front of the other, as if the producers of this series are telling us they're two sides of the same coin.

The duality is made in more deceitful ways, which include:

A difference of classes that implies one has suffered while the other has not.

A difference of experience that implies one is more tainted while the other is pure.

A difference of age that implies one is a sly fox while the other one is is bunny about to be eaten.

A difference of temper that makes one erratic and the other logical.

Power dynamics

This one, in this one I could make a whole thesis based on just a couple of scenes in the drama. And you know I have to mention it: director Jung being the puppeteer.

It may not be as unexpected at first, nevertheless it brings forward a lot of things I've wished to touch upon for quite some time now. A woman being a puppeteer of an old man in the portrayed dystopia that The Devil Judge is painting makes much more sense than more common demonstrations of these dynamics where it's either a:

A man of power being controlled by a bigger man of power.

A man of power being controlled by a seemingly man of a lower status.

A woman being controlled by a man of power.

Although, there's nothing wrong with those power dynamics, and if they were to be used, a message could also be conveyed, this one in particular works as a megaphone.

A subversion of power in such a way can be interpreted as a true indication of the weak overcoming the powerful. Why? It is not that woman are naturally weaker than men, but that in society, patriarchy has been a big factor in taking voice away from women in order to give it to men.

In order for Director Jung to achieve her purposes, it's smarter for her to do it under the pretense that an old rich man in power is the one calling the shots.

This is better exemplified by her stance when the old man tries to excuse his behavior, and what her moral compass is. I'm not saying I agree with her unethical conduct, but that her morality is directly impacted by the perception of the public of her as a weak woman:

Just because a dog bites a human does the person get dirty?

This is telling on how she perceives the actions of the old man in gropping the waitress. She didn't do anything wrong, even if you touched her, you are the dirty one.

While she's evil, it's a refreshing and deep evil.

The public's opinion and how there's actually logic in the show's portrayal

The public opinion can make or break a person, even if it's not on a public trial like this. While "cancel culture" barely works in today's society, a person's reputation is forever tainted. The show does tell that, but it also exhibits the scary downside of it, by showing how easily it was to make people accept flaggelation as a fitting punishment.

There are many experiments that have tried to test the effect of societal pressure on an individual's decision and the effect of the authority's enforcement of power in the outcome of these decisions. Furthermore, theories based on analysis of human behavior not necessarily relying on experiments can also help break this down. What do I mean? Here's a small attempt at explaining:

Milgram Experiment on Authority: which measured the individual willingness to carry out actions that go against their conscience due to an authority's approval.

Argument from Authority; The idea that people are more likely to use an authority's opinion on something as an argument for their reason. This is often seen in science, where trusted authorities have done the research and offer it to the public. In here, authority bias also plays a role, as we often believe, at first, that an authority must be right.

Moral disengagement: basically speaking, because this is evil or bad, I'm not part of it and I most probably am not actively participating in it. One may disengage by moral justification, which means that before engaging in something that has been previously perceived as immoral, I'm changing my stance on it based on what I tell myself to be logical arguments. This particular form of moral disengagement is very effective in changing the public opinion. I'll be touching on another form further down this post.

Other factors played a part, but these ones in particular came to mind when public flagelation as a form of corporeal punishment was wildly accepted. First, an authority is the one telling them it's correct, to go ahead. Secondly, another authority (the minister) had previously shown approval to such unusual punishment. Thirdly, they are not the ones to be engaging directly in the act, and even if they were, it would be acceptable because an authority has told them so. They may even believe the punishment to be a necessary evil for the greater good.

In fact, the minister's son was actually correct when pleading his case, they were accepting it because it wouldn't affect them directly.

Regarding the cinematographic descent of the public opinion regarding the situation can better be exemplified by the old man we've seen through the episodes.

Does suffering justify misdeeds?

Today I came along the difference between excuse and reason. You may give a reason for your behavior, but it doesn't excuse it.

Not because I've suffered through shit, means I have to make you suffer too.

I may explain myself, but it's on the other side to excuse me.

Why I hate the unreliable narrator and why I love it so much

This story has been told mostly through the eyes of Judge Kim and what he hears and sees regarding Judge Kang, if anything, the narrative is very close to that of the narrative we've seen in The Great Gatsby. An enigmatic man is being narrated to us from the eye of a man who hasn't known him for a long time.

How is that an unreliable narrator? The narrator has their own set of bias and moral standards which function as lenses through which they see the world.

Another way of putting it would be the way teenage romances are often written in a first person narrative where either of the two teenagers is the narrator, so the author can sell to us something as simple as offering a pack of gum as the most romantic act on earth. We're perceiving interactions through rose tainted glasses.

In this case, we're seeing the interactions through Judge Kim's eyes who doesn't trust Judge Kang from the get go due to his own preset bias.

The narrative becomes even more unreliable as we're not exactly sure if what Judge Kang disclosed himself is a fact.

The reason why I love this narrative is because it leaves a lot of space to make simple plot twists to a narrative and make them seem grand, and can elongate a story without making it obvious.

The reason why I hate it is because sometimes, in tv shows mostly, we as viewers can see the other side of the story and grow increasingly frustrated with the main character's prejudice and misunderstandings (I'm looking at you my beloved Beyond Evil).

Also, because I have to wait for a long time before I actually have a clear picture of it.

[festivecuriosity]

[October 13, 2020]

♡ Mercury retrograde in Scorpio is happening tonight. I can already feel/see it's influence. It also doesn't help matters that my current household is primarily made up of Scorpios or Plutonian individuals (most of my roommates are "essential workers" like EMTs or caretakers). Brad (the most Scorpio of the house) has called for a rare consideration; that there be silence in the living room (communal space) when he comes home. He's never asked for that before. This feels very symbolic of Mercury Retrograde in Scorpio. A moment of silence in our otherwise very talkative household. Besides that, he's coming home right around the time MRX/Scorpio would be officially beginning.

♤ Identifying omens is part of my practice. It's one of my oldest, foundational, cornerstones of how I communicate with the Universe and my guides. When you notice something (really notice it) to the point that it stands out in your mind and you end up thinking on it all day, it is an "omen". A symbolic representation of the message the Universe is sending you. I was given an omen by the Universe yesterday as to the immediate future/Mercury RX in Scorpio. I was outside (smoking) when I saw a hawk soaring in the air, being pursued by two black crows, and navigating around their assaults. The hawk (personally) represents my spiritual vision/focus/accuracy. The two crows, I believe, represented thoughts that attack my focus. I.e. Huginn and Muninn, thought and memory. Although, Huginn and Muninn are technically ravens. Not crows. I still think the message from the Universe is to tame my PTSD/where my mind goes/stay focused on my goals instead of letting my negative thoughts pick at me.

Also kind of reminds me of the qliphothic sphere/inverted sphere of Netzach. Where the "crows" pick at the beauty of Source. Another reminder to keep my inner criticism from attacking my spiritual focus/my ability to see the beauty in my life and self.

Two other people in the household got omens on the same day as me. One person got a vulture eating roadkill on the side of the road, the other got a brown cricket. Since the vulture means rebirth and ressurection through shadow work, I think the household is going through a transitional phase (what affects one person in the house typically touches all of us). I am not certain on the brown cricket, however. Good luck? What struck me the most about it was that my roommate was trying to catch it...and it always knew when to hop away just in the nick of time.

♧ I've been rearranging/unpacking my boxes from Seattle finally. For a long time now, I've just been living out of boxes, and refusing to do much magic. I didn't even set up my altar when I got all my stuff back from [Redacted abuser]. It's taken awhile to even get myself back to directly communicating with my guides...much less the Universe/Source. Anyways, I'm finally going through my boxes, and setting up an official altar area. When I was getting into my old rock and crystal collection (I was into that stuff way back before I realized how harmful the crystal/gemstone trend is for Earth's environment), I found an old piece of Mookaite that I friend gave me. And I shit you not, the thing physically vibrated in my hand when I touched it.

I've been holding it ever since. Have totally and honestly forgotten all the exact properties of the stones I own. It's been such a long time. I was also practicing "crystal/crystal energy psychicism" when I was homeless as a means to survive the streets so...I'm pretty sure my PTSD is blocking a lot of that information out.

I guess it's time to rediscover crystals again? Not buying any new ones. Just utilizing the ones I already have to the best of my ability. I feel like it was wrong that so many of them were taken from the ground to be pretty baubles for people. I might as well make it worth something by using them to help myself/others/incorporate them into my active life so they hold meaning.

Mookaite feels very grounding and soothing already. It feels like a very receptive stone, inviting energy into it much like organic pearls do. I also notice that it has almost a dream/trance-like affect to it's grounding energy. I think maybe I'll take time to meditate with it tomorrow.

◇ Brad pretty much runs the household that I live in. Further details; I live in a BDSM polycule, Brad is one of the doms. One of Brad's relationships was very close to being homeless recently. While normally, being homeless is... [redacted PTSD disassociating moment] being non-binary and homeless during COVID-19 is even worse. So we took them in. Inevitably, we had to make some major adjustments (about space, because technically we're fitting 9 people in a 2 bedroom house). It's been a test of adaptability through chaos for everyone. One of the major areas of contention is that everything inside the house is getting moved, rearranged, or tossed. And some people (mainly [redacted name]) is absolutely 100% terrible at adapting to change, unless someone is literally dying. Also, while I get that none of this can really be helped, I'm also a bit annoyed by the sudden introduction of someone new.

But even if I'm annoyed by it, I wasn't about to say "no" when Brad told us what was going on. I'm not a monster. I was homeless too and Brad helped me get off the streets. This person, while I don't know them well enough to make a judgement, deserves the same chance that I did to get stable in an era where stability is a pipe dream.

I'm actually not the one having the hardest problem. Surprising, it's the spirit of the house that's having the hardest problem. Our house is an old 1950's model built at the corner of a crossroads. Technically the house kinda exists as a liminal space. And there's so much stuffed inside of it that theoretically anything *could exist* in the house. Sometimes weird shit pops up and then disappears. It's very similar to the Seattle house I lived in when I was with [KILL BILL SIRENS] but has less of a metaphorical underworld cave vibe and more of a Howl's Moving Castle vibe. Anyways, the house itself is having a bad time adjusting to all the change/cleaning that the new roommate is doing...because it keeps hiding and moving (specifically) all the stuff that the new roommate has. They're not a stoner. They have a decently good memory. And I know that nobody in the house would do something like that. Plus, they apparently heard disembodied laughter right after discovering something was missing. The genuis locci (house spirit) is fucking with 'em hard.

I've never seen the genius locci do this before. The worst it ever did to me was hide a really expensive Egyptian cotton pillow case once. It eventually spat it back out after cuddling with it, I imagine. Seriously; Egyptian cotton sheets. Get you some.

So after the 100× time today that the new roommate was swearing about their missing things, I suggested that maybe they need to butter up the genius locci with gifts. Kinda romance the house a bit. Give it something so that it builds a relationship with the spirits that live here. They're a (self-professed) baby witch whose background is Jewish. They mostly excel at kitchen witchery (for now) and incorporating the works and wisdom of the Torah into their life. So they weren't too certain on ritualistic offerings to a house spirit. But with some suggestions from me and listening to their own intuition, they were able to put something quick together. It's nice to see people using magic around the house and learning new skills. And to their benefit, I felt the house chill out a bit after the ritual/gift giving was done.

I have been giving the house/my guides a portion of my nightly tea every now and then. It's honestly nothing fancy but I figure small gifts count for something right?

[ngame989]

SVTFOE 4A Prediction/Analysis Master Post

So we just had the first two episodes come out, and overall I enjoyed them. There’s been a lot of mixed reactions to the details, from myself included, so let’s dive in a bit. Apologies for when this becomes a giant wall of text in the back half, I'm not digging through promos for images.

Butterfly Follies

In the first episode, 98% of it is focused on Star feeling like shit because Moon is missing and nothing she does to try and find her works, and other people keep telling her she is screwing it up. Yeah, many of us thought this theme of “Star screwing up” would extend a bit more concretely to stuff with Marco and Tom, and it was present but only a tiny bit as a reminder. Her interaction with Tom was basically just a reminder that the situation from after Booth Buddies hadn’t budged - Star still was barely paying attention to him, Tom was still not really a companion to her at all, it just isn’t working, but they haven’t talked about it yet.

Tomstar has always had the candy coating of a romantic relationship (nicknames, handholding, occasional smooching, gossip and drama, etc) with virtually nothing underneath. We see this over and over - Demoncism has a genuine emotional connection between them in that moment, but once their relationship starts up again, it takes until Is Another Mystery for even a hint of true, genuine support between them, and it still doesn’t extend to either of them considering the other as a life companion at all. Most of it is going through the motions for both of them. When everyone’s lives were on the line, Tom stepped up, but this doesn’t immediately make him Marco 2 - the issues that existed before, the lack of commitment and drive between them (still candy-coated by nicknames and whatnot) is as present as ever, and arguably more so, now that Star has the events of the end of S3 dwelling somewhere in the recesses of her mind. Plus we get a moment of Tom checking in with Marco about Star’s comment, showing once again that Marco is the one Tom actually turns to for genuine support.

Contrast that with Starco in these episodes. Yes, it’s not magically perfect, there’s still lots of stuff to resolve and many people (myself included) have felt that it was a bit “off” (more on that soon). But there’s still a genuine sense of progression, where Marco is comfortable being close with Star again, being emotional support, even if he doesn’t always know how to help.

As predicted, Eclipsa’s style of ruling has mostly been “make disliking monsters entirely illegal because that’s Equality™” and it’s not working out so well for true social change. I expect this to be a major plot point moving forward.

Honestly, I dunno what all to make of the details of Glossy’s lines here. Considering the situation with Toffee was pretty explicitly Glossaryck’s intentional method of teaching Star how to do things her own way, this definitely isn’t literal. Maybe he’s playing 4D chess, and Star questioning whether Glossaryck was misleading her is all part of how he leads her. There’s a... nonzero chance, I suppose, that there is some more direct connection here and trying to fix past mistakes (since time travel is brought up very shortly) but I’d be incredibly shocked and largely appalled if that’s where things actually head.

(Skipping around on photos a bit here to just get the point across)

So let’s talk about this for a moment, shall we? I’ve seen a lot of talk about this photo and how it’s really sketchy that Star apparently knew it was from the future the whole time, given its past importance in Starcrushed. Granted, we don’t know exactly how it’s going to pay off yet, but I’ll take a strong educated guess - it’s basically a gag because the writers thought it would be fun. A relevant gag and kind of an asspull, yes, but still just a gag. Yes, the photo is now factually from the future and will be relevant again in that capacity, but I’m entirely convinced that the point of it wasn’t to intentionally retcon something about Starcrushed or anything like that - a meaningful photo of Star and Marco was used in Season 2 to generically remind her of their “good times” and their relationship as a whole, and that same photo was used here as a promise of happiness to come, and the primary purpose of the photo in each case is how it was written for that case.

I know it’s not a satisfying explanation, but it is entirely consistent with this show to have details occur that are largely arbitrary and inconsistent, and there’s a consistency to that inconsistency. Adult Marco is another example, Janna implying Kelly maybe had feelings for Marco in Stump Day is another, any time Star yeeted a high school student into some pit of horrors is another. All of these are situations where, if you examine them thoroughly as a whole and consider all the possible implications, they get kind of sketchy really fast. Yes, it is frustrating at times, but I think you just have to roll with it - Marco has memories of a 30 year old when the boarders want to make a cool reference before Marco does a bunch of fancy weapon tricks, but it never affects his normal existence unless it’s needed for a joke/reference. Janna says something that implies complicated romance drama incoming when the boarders want girly banter to accompany dudes fighting, but it doesn’t go anywhere beyond that. Star has a body count on Earth but she’s not a wanted criminal, probably. The consistency here is that if the show kind of glosses over some sort of possible implication and plays it off for a gag, then that’s what you should take it as.

Again, I don’t know exactly how this will pay itself off, but I have an incredibly strong suspicion that the answer to “what were the boarders thinking when they did this??? It screws up a core moment in Starcrushed!!!” is that they weren’t thinking about that. COULD they actually do something more in-depth with the time travel aspect? I guess, but “throwing organic core moments of character/relationship growth under the bus for the sake of wacky over-the-top plot” sounds like the opposite of this show. I’ll cover more about how I think this might actually work later.

A lot of people said Star and Marco felt like acquaintances this episode, and not best friends. I understand where they’re coming from - there weren’t all kinds of hugs and affection flying around, their talks were awkward. But this honestly makes a lot of sense for where we’re at now. We’re completely over the hump where they they're hesitant to even think of themselves as best buddies, where they’re struggling with their feelings just to spend time with the other. Marco is back to making all attempts to be her close friend and companion and support, Star is comfortable around him... but, there’s still some lingering “OK we moved forward from here, what now?” We saw in Divide that a simple hug between them brought out strong feelings for both of them. I think a lot of the awkwardness remaining could be attributed to the strong sour mood of the situation overall, but part of it could also be a subconscious “OK, Marco confessing his feelings made things better, and we’re OK being close, but...” lingering, waiting to be addressed. And given pancake and cereal clips, it will be soon.

Escape from the Pie Folk

I have less to say about this episode, it was fairly straightforward, honestly. It was 22 minutes of adventure and fights while trying to find and steal away Moon - lot of really fun and well-executed humor, it definitely was a strong showing for pretty much all the parts of the show besides “focus on the relationship growth of Star and Marco”.

More Marco trying to be constantly supportive, but still maybe having a bit of lingering tension in the how.

And sweet family moments.

Overall, a very isolated situation, honestly. The actions and interactions of the characters were put in a very specific, very focused situation where “finding Moon” overrode anything else, and didn’t allow for much other special elements to shine through. I liked the episodes, but some part of me was disappointed that most developments besides Moon were put on pause for the premiere. Still, resolving this in its entirety straight away sets up for some pretty strong coverage of the rest...

INTERMISSION

Let’s take a moment to talk about compartmentalization and the rules of TV pacing. I love Star vs the Forces of Evil, and I’m sure many of you do, even if its infuriating and painful at times. A lot of times. But I definitely think the show is special and does things differently than many others, to an extent. And that extent is key - I like to think of it as content vs structure. Content-wise, it is rather different from what you might expect (especially with character/relationship development). Characters come first, always, and there isn’t a sense of outside drama pushing characters around like ragdolls, changing their relationships and emotions in ways that they aren’t already naturally primed to at that moment. Romance isn’t handled as a drama-fest love triangle, with Star and Jackie or Tom and Marco directly vying for the affection of their love interest, nor do those love triangles ever damage the development of the main dynamic, Starco. Basically every shift in Star and Marco’s relationship, the ebbs and flows of it, can be entirely explained by just the two of them. Yes, seeing the other be romantic with someone else was a partial catalyst to individual moments of growth, but by and large Star and Marco themselves have been their own biggest obstacles, their own insecurities and missteps guiding the path of Starco 1000x more than Jarco or Tomstar or plot.

However, this doesn’t mean the show is magically free of the confines of episodic story pacing, and that’s where people often find faults in it. Many, including myself, went into the premiere thinking/hoping that it would include some relationship payoff, or skip some steps and just have Tom and Star break it off right away. And while anyone is free to disagree with the general concept of the premiere being entirely focused on Moon and plot setup, it’s completely logical for the show to take its development in concrete, compartmentalized chunks. An episode dedicating itself to a theme, to a concrete piece of plot, is likely going to focus on that. And this can be nuanced - I don’t think it was wrong of people to think that Follies could have had a theme of “Star confronted with her screwups” in a broader way that included multiple aspects of that, but it doubled down on Moon and it’s totally understandable that she didn’t take time during her hunt to figure out her feelings, etc. Still, it included reminders of the current situation, and we’ll see those pay off very soon. It’s not so reasonable to expect the show to bend over backwards to steamroll through Starco development right away, but it’s also unreasonable to expect no chunks of development at all, or for them to stop randomly. 

More specifically, the way the episodic structure handles these chunks is to follow up underlying buildup with inevitable realizations. It’s very, very rare for an episode that confronts a character with a specific question (e.g. “How do I feel about my Earth life” - Marco in Sophomore Slump, or “How do I feel about Marco” - Star in Starcrushed) to actually have the emotional development required to understand it occur within that episode. Star isn’t confronted with her crush on Marco until it’s developed enough to be ready to burst out. Marco isn’t confronted with his priorities in life until he’s experience enough of a bold, adventurous life with Star that his heart has already decided, and in both cases it’s a matter of a climactic wake-up call to what’s already there. On that note, onto predictions.

Moon Remembers

Well, I dunno much specific to say about this. Seems like this will be the episode dedicated to trying to get Moon her memory back - we have scenes from the promos of them riding warnicorns and Eclipsa playing guitar with her, maybe just trying to jog it. Could lead to some type of plot revelation (”I remember something big I saw in the Realm of Magic!” etc) but who knows. Seems likely that it’s entirely plot/Moon-focused, maybe with some more tie-ins to magic lore.

Swim Suit

This is a big one. So from the synopsis, we know that this is when Star and Marco attempt to have their beach day (which we now know is a celebration of things being “back to normal”, with Moon being back) but get interrupted by Eclipsa. I don’t know specifics of it, but in general, I think this is going to be the episode where Star truly settles in to an understanding of how she feels.

Quick tangent about the photo and how I think it’ll be used: in Follies, it was primarily encouragement for finding her mom. It’s still definitely interesting, and intentional, that the particular reminder of future happiness is a time with Marco, but it wasn’t relevant immediately - I think it will be used that way moving forward. Basically like this - “I kept this photo as encouragement to think positively and know I’d find my Mom. We found Mom, so now I can be happy like in the photo. It feels really good being happy with Marco like I am in the photo. Huh, I wonder why it is that my ideal of happiness is having fun with Marco...” Clearly the underlying feelings are already there, this is just bringing them to the forefront, actually giving Star a chance to reflect on how her heart feels after recent weeks/months and big events. As for specifics, I think they won’t actually take the photo here. They’ll try to have a beach day, get interrupted, and throughout the course of Eclipsa shenanigans, the episodic plot will tie in towards thinking about her feelings, with the end result being a “well, we didn’t achieve Beach Happiness™, but it was still nice.” We already know that an Earth beach is in episode 16, so maybe the photo comes full circle then (and at that point, they’re completely together already, and the photo is spontaneous). Or maybe I’m wrong, but who knows, this is a level of specificity I can’t predict with any confidence.

Also note here that, provided animation studio order stays consistent as expected, the cereal/pancake/babysitting Meteora scenes aren’t actually from Swim Suit, so who knows where those end up.

Overall, my general expectations for this episode are to set the stage for Starco developments, to start the ball rolling on payoff from last season and to start characters recognizing those changes and truly moving forward. Of course Tomstar is likely not going away officially until Lake House Fever, so I don’t exactly expect Star and Marco to talk about their feelings in depth here, but it’ll still be an important episode for Starco regardless.

Ransomgram

Alright, let’s just make something clear here. Yes, we already know Star is going to be fawning over adult Marco’s hot bod here, and very likely before breaking up with Tom. I know a lot of people are gonna find that sketchy, and I don’t entirely disagree, but adult Marco (and Star thirsting after hot dudes in general) has always been a gag never treated with any real serious weight. Both Jarco and Tomstar overall, but especially Tomstar, never really ever are treated with any true weight in the story. Like, yes, it’s acknowledged that Marco and Star kissing while she’s dating Tom are bad, but none of the moments of Marco abandoning Jackie to be with Star, or Star ignoring Tom to be with Marco, or Tom being a really unhelpful/unsupportive boyfriend, are ever treated with any real gravity. In the real world, perhaps these would be frowned upon much more even in weaker relationships, but in the show, “Star and Tom are dating” is taken as a given in the background, and none of the actions that characters take are really ever truly treated seriously as hurtful. So yes, on some level it’s weird and questionable that Star will be drooling over Marco (again) while STILL not talking to Tom, but Compartmentalization™ and the general lack of concern for treating the possible implications of situations like this seriously add up to explain it. Feel however you want about it, but this is how I expect it to work, because it’s how it’s worked in the past.

MHC is gonna come back here, and there might be a connection to the monster side of the plot, figuring out where the old guard fits in with the new regime and how politics are moving forward. Also, as far as Starco goes, I think this will be a sort of emotional payoff to Swim Suit. Not that anything tangible will result within the episode, but showing the differences in how Star acts around Marco when she’s actually admitting to herself that she loves him. Just like how Marco Jr., for instance, showed a very clear and different Starco interaction than 3A episodes, as a result of the concrete development moments in Deep Dive. Or how their interactions in Divide were very clearly the result of changes in Booth Buddies. So on and so forth.

All of this, then, leads into...

Lake House Fever

So this is where Tomstar finally rots. We have all-but-confirmation from animation studios, hints in the title, and background/SFX “leaks” that this is where the Tom and Star clips in the promos are from. So how exactly might this work? I can’t even say for sure, but I think it’s going to follow the usual trend of Tomstar episodes and basically be a vehicle for Tom development. Let’s face it, Star basically got nothing out of Tomstar besides a general passive armor against having to contemplate heartbreak/feelings since Tom filled the checkbox of “romance” in her life. She initially at least did truly fulfill the role of “normal teenage girlfriend” by spending time with him, dates, etc, but that started to wane after Lava Lake Beach and kept doing so more and more, and it’s now basically at the point of Tomstar being a couple in name only, with 0 effort between either of them put into actually... being anything. 

Let’s compare to Sophomore Slump for a minute, shall we? So in that episode, we had Marco who had undergone a ton of previous developments in how much he cared about adventure and a greater purpose in life and Star, and his heart had already basically made up its mind (Scent of a Hoodie’s ending and wearing the cape in Rest in Pudding, as clear signs of this). Sophomore Slump was the direct reality check, the final piece of the puzzle slotting into place, at least with regards to specifically “where he’d rather be” (even if the why still needed a bit more). So we could say, in effect, that Marco had fully developed everything underneath to answer the question of what mattered more to him, the old safe kid Marco’s ideal Earth life, or the new Marco’s life, and the breakup was simply everything that was already there clicking into place - he moves to Mewni immediately afterwards.

So how does this fit into Lake House Fever? I think the positioning of the episode is going to revolve around Star’s “growth” from it to work like Marco’s. In the Jarco case, the breakup wasn’t about Starco specifically, but Marco’s overall goals and focuses in life (Star was a part of that too, of course). It’s fairly clear that the Tomstar breakup will be different - the tension in their relationship is FAR more directly related to Starco itself (and also a much greater overall dysfunction within Tomstar compared to Jarco). It’s not a case of “this is a perfectly working relationship but it’ll eventually have issues, so let’s end it before we both become miserable”, it’s “this relationship isn’t working at all right now, for multiple reasons, among which are that Star prioritizes/loves someone else, but also general incompatibilities between them for committed companionship”. 

I think on Star’s end of things, we’re going to enter the episode with her knowing, very close to the surface if not on the surface already, that she has feelings for Marco and they need to talk, but will just have the one last hesitation holding her back. Not a “I genuinely don’t know who I like/whether I want to keep going longterm with Tom”, but a “this overall situation needs resolved and I just don’t know exactly how to handle it”. From the very limited info we have from the title/promo (no synopsis yet), it seems like Star might be helping Tom with something - he kind of looked ill in the promos. Regardless, I still sort of predict a semi-arbitrary episodic plot leads them to meet up in the episode. Give em a reason to interact that isn’t directly related to awkward and complex feelings, and let the handling of those naturally evolve from there. 

So as for Tom, I think the bulk of the change in this episode will be on his end. I think he’s going to sort of have an attitude not too dissimilar to Star - knowing they should talk at some point, but not really knowing how. I think the bulk of the episode’s plot, whatever it may be, will lead up towards Tom getting the wakeup call that it 100% won’t work and that he needs to pull the trigger on it. It would give Tom a really solid moment to follow up on some of his initial moments in Season 3, would give him some critical agency when he honestly hasn’t had much of it for a while (Starco developments just kind of happen around him, although of course his general lack of presence in Star’s life contributes to this as well - Star’s a fairly absentee girlfriend, but Tom’s no angel either). Getting over that initial hump of awkwardness would still accomplish things for both of them, but Tom being the one to first make the leap of faith into starting the uncomfortable conversation would fit best imo.

As for afterwards, much like how I said Jarco was the final puzzle piece for Marco decisively figuring out his priorities, I think this will be the same for Star’s feelings. She’ll be aware, nearly-consciously, that she has feelings for Marco ahead of time, but will just be stuck on inaction, not being confident enough to take a bold step forward on her own. So I think the breakup for Star’s feelings will do what the breakup did for Marco’s sense of accomplishment - the final domino will not only help her realize that she has feelings for Marco, but prime her to actually act on them.

Now if this breakup occurred earlier, I’d say it could have a major impact on Star’s own growth and understanding, and it still could, but I don’t think it’ll be so likely. There are certainly situations where the breakup would serve as a shakeup for her to consider her feelings, which would then take some more time afterwards to solidify, but I can’t help but assume that’s what the purpose of multiple Starco episodes beforehand is. The situation is too much of a powderkeg for Star to have any downtime with either of them that doesn’t start turning the gears in her brain. Anyway, that’s all for this.

Eps 5-7

Yada Yada Berries/Down by the River

The Ponyhead Show!/Surviving the Spiderbites

Out of Business/Kelly’s World

These, I have no clue on specifics, to be honest. There’s an RDK Ludo episode coming up, so that would be part of episode 5 most likely. Second half of that seems like a River episode contender, but who knows. The first half of episode 6 is some type of variety show involving Eclipsa in part - this may be part of the plot of Eclipsa trying to find her place as Queen. Spiderbites is a possible contender for the babysitting Meteora clip, the first half of episode 7 is Quest Buy with the Ocrams, and Kelly’s World is something with Marco and Kelly. We’ll circle back to these, but let’s look at broader strokes first.

Curse of the Blood Moon

I’m entirely confident that by the end of this episode (at the latest) Starco will be 100% canon, ready to move forward into Season 4 as a couple, romantic uncertainties behind them. It’s the only possible next “big” step in their development, one that was set up very directly in Booth Buddies with the idea that things were different now and they could no longer ignore their friendship meaning more than friendship. I’m sure it will be tied in to Starco relationship progress, but as I’ve said many times before, it’s entirely out of the realm of how this show handles development as a whole to actually prioritize plot over characters and obstruct character development with plot. The “Curse”, whatever it may be, could very well be activated by Starco itself, but it’s entirely out of line with everything the show has ever done with characterization to actually claim plot is “forcing” feelings, capisce?

Now how could this be accomplished? Well, given the pacing of the show in general, concrete chunks of development along the way seem most likely. And Star and Marco acknowledging the stronger nature of their relationship and stepping over the edge towards mutual romance, to me, seems like a different piece of the puzzle than something so strong as becoming 100% canon forever. After all, Bonbon for Jarco still had a Naysaya before it, a setup with clear and direct Jarco moments nudging it over the edge of romantic before going the whole way. Similarly, Tomstar had Demoncism before they officially confirmed they were a couple a few episodes later. 

Curse is definitely going to be a big episode, but I don’t see it being very likely that we entire the episode with the entire prospect of Star and Marco talking about their feelings still completely looming over them. Another major reason I have to believe this, which is in some ways related to the above point, is that the show doesn’t overly fetishize romance. It’s all-too-common in media, especially family-friendly/kid media with romance, to warp the whole concept and make the “confession + big kiss + happily ever after” one monolithic moment at the very end, as the pinnacle of romance, often going so far as to delay natural developments and put roadblocks of misunderstanding in the way to keep the pair apart until both could have this moment. SVTFOE, on the other hand, historically hasn’t done this. It has always, thus far, recognized the ebbs and flows and slower progression of natural relationships, with steps in between “I guess we might like each other” to “yup we’re 100% dating”. So I can’t guarantee anything about the specific pacing along the way, but I’d wager that Starco has already crossed the threshold into mutual romance before Curse begins.

I have genuinely no idea what the plot will be here overall. We have a shot from the promo which is a newly animated version of the Blood Moon Waltz... flashback? Recreating the event? Time travel? I hope not the last one, but I have no clue.

So circling back around, we have the cereal, pancake, and babysitting Meteora scenes which (as far as I can tell, assuming animation studio order holds) are unaccounted for. There’s... I suppose a nonzero chance for a huge curveball, with some of them being Lake House Fever? Star wears the new S4 outfit in cereal/pancake as well as then, and they’re all Sugarcube. Another option I’d been considering was for Surviving the Spiderbites to be their attempt to spend time together, either resulting in feelingstalk or being the result of feelingstalk and tiptoeing into romance, with the cereal/pancake scenes being about trying to have a good “date” but getting interrupted... which is now the plot of Swim Suit, so I don’t know. Quest Buy has always, historically, involved heavy Starco importance, so perhaps that episode is a leadin to Curse on that front. Note that either everyone actually thinking Kelly’s World (and their baking scene in Ponyhead Show) is actually implying more love triangles is wrong, or the writers officially gave up and we can all go home.

As a note, I’m of course not really making any bold claims of confidence in the minutiae of these predictions: there’s so many options for curveballs that I can’t say anything for sure! But I think, in a general sense, the path of Starco buildup towards and through Curse is a sure thing, one way or another, because there’s basically nothing else meaningful that could happen!

Hope you enjoyed the read, and stay tuned for any new updates we get on future episodes.