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Loud House Reviews: The Loudest Thanksgiving

It’s almost Thanksgiving! And a vastly diffrent one than in recent memory: Most of us are slimming down family gatherings to just whose in our house, you know because theirs a pandemic going on and it’s not worth risking your life for it. To those either guilting their families into it or doing so because MAGa or some such I only have this to say. 

Speaking of Black Friday i’ts spread over a week and it’s cyber deals mean I got a ton of graphic novels for a dollar a piece and my christmas shopping almost done. So in other words, boo Maga, yay safe and responsible captalisim.  But while the holiday may be diffrent, as well as the pseudo holiday attached that spawned a wonderful musical and many many injuries, one thing stays the same; Holiday Episodes. And despite being the less popular of the three holidays, Thanksgiving still produced tons of great holiday episodes and specials. And with everything being so busy I simply didn’t put too much thought into what to do for Turkey Day.. well okay the day proper i’m going to eat, spend time with family and watch a bunch of mystery science theater 3000, stay the course even in these troubling times, just with only the 4 other people who live in my house. But in terms of episodes I thought i had nothing.. then I started actually thinking on it and what do you know I have three things I want to do for the holiday, though one might wait till next year, and possibly a fourth. But given my workload currently, i’m not one to back away from a challenge, so welcome to a three or four course meal of reviews. First course: The Loud House thanksgiving special, the loudest thanksgiving.  I originally wasn’t going to do this one, mostly because due to my large workload and constant battle with procastination, I keep having to push back the latest episode review, and I have to do that one soon, as there’s a new episode in december and a christmas episode i’ve put off watching for far too long , as I INTENDED to watch eleven louds a leapin for every chirstmas up till now and never got to it before the season was over.  But just like elven louds.. Nick forced my hand.. and by that I mean the SPINOFF got a thanksgiving episode that’s also a sequel in some fashion to this episode. If I wanted to cover that episode this thanksgiving or the next I had to at least watch the original. And frankly, this close to the holiday there was no reason not to review it. So with that out of the way. 

Let’s Get At Er. This is The Loudest Thanksgiving... after the break

The Loudest Thanksgiving takes place during season 3, and still pre-casagrandes spinoff launch despite the christmas special taking place earlier. This is actually easy to explain: The Loud House runs on Comic Strip time... i.e. the characters don’t age unless the writers decide they do. But while the spinoff was in motion at this point, it was still a season off airing wise, and ill advised raitings stunt mini series wise, so in order to keep the Casagrandes fresh in people’s minds presumably, they did a crossover that at this point wasn’t a crossover but now technically is because the show exists but this existed before the show. 

It’s just a show, and I should really just relax. Point is this is a pre-crossover crossover, the two families meet for the first time, the man already said pitter patter, let’s get back at er.  So we open with Flip serving as our magical snowman narrator and regaling us with the tale of steven. Every compastionate can you imagine it... and i’m fucking with you, it’s of course abotu that time the louds and the casagrandes tried having thanksgiving together. 

We then cut to Lori and Bobby being all cute, as usual, and both talking over the phone as each show off their thanksgivings to each other and the enusing family shenanigans. On Lori’s side Lynn is wearing baggy pants so she dosen’t miss the game or the meal by going to the bathroom.. because that’s how pissing yourself works. Look if your going to do something that gross, stupid and broish just woman up and wear an adult diaper. The twins are guarding Lynn sr and the food, poorly, and Lisa has invented a Gravy Squriting robot. I can only see this ending one way. 

Yeah those single function robots really get useless once the exestnetial crisis kicks in. 

On the casagrandes side, Rosa is likewise guarding her kitchen, Frida is painting and Hector plans to sernade eveyrone because Hector is the best and you all should know that. Even with the recent Bobby Abuse he’s still awesome. As for the Mercado, CJ and Ronnie Anne are running the annual canned food drive because CJ is better than the best and should really be used more often.  Both wish they could be there.. and both honestly talk about possibly spending thanksgiving with each other and just one of their family. It’s not a wild proposition: Both are going to college soon, both are in a longterm relationship.. they plan to get married down the line for now. If things hold they will eventually have to figure this out. Of course rather than fate let them figure this out themselves, Hector overhears on Bobby’s end and Lincoln, whose busy A Clock Work Oranging himself so he can stay awake during dinner, overhears on Loris, leading to an emergency family meeting for both sides.  Both families are worried their prospective teenager going to another house of their longterm significant other for one year will mean they get all the holidays. Having never had a relationship last long enough to worry about this, I don’t quite get it as in my experince watching couples juggle this.. they usually just alternate years, spoilers the solution the episode goes with, or trade off christmas and thanksgiving, both fair solutions. Buuut as much as this bothered me at first the more I thought about it the more it actually made sense: People.. aren’t always rational and won’t always do the smart or correct thing, especially when it comes to their children. And with Lori leaving college and the casagrandes being togehter for thanksgiving for the first time in about 5 years, with both ronnie anne and her mom not having had a proper one in some time due to her mom needing to work thanksgiving, presumibly because of the eternal curse of gravy chugging contests, they have valid emotional reasons to go a bit nuts and do some irrational and assholish things. They just don’t want to loose their big sister and big brother, and that’s fair. It may not be at all accurate but it’s fair. 

So thus began the great Guilt Off of 2018. ON the Loud side they START with a fairly soft pitch, the twins simply offer her food early, and she takes it because honestly I would too. Then again, i’d also take free food in just about any situation, so i’m not really a good gage for this. As long as it’s not poision i’ll probably eat it if it’s free. The next two are a little.. less subtle, with the kids talking about Lori’s roll in the annual thanksgiving skit.. which I’m assuming is soley for Lynn Sr. as no one else seems to be going to their thanksgiving. Which granted theirs valid explinations for why their neighbors didn’t go, the mcbrides and mr grouse have their own families and while Mr Grouse rarely gets to see his, he now has neighborly friends after the last holiday special happy to help. But Pop Pop.. makes no sense as his girlfriend, the only plausable reason he wouldn’t be there, was said to not have much family in her debut. So he’s just.. absent from thanksgiving for no reason. Thena gain we later find out this play is movie length, so maybe he was just trying to escape that which in that case, who can blame him. Rita almost reigns things back in with the mother’s trump card: parental guilt. Almost. She then almost crushes lori’s hand but it’s funny enough.  At the Casagrandes, their opening move is largely the same only Rosa wins in terms of execution, cooking up some of bobby’s faviorites to specificially target him. Frida paints him into a painting, again the Casagrandes win his one in terms of effort. They do tie in the last bit, as Maria and Ronnie Anne try the same sort of guilt slining with the same bone crushing.  Eventually both teens get fed up with the next bit; For Lori, Lucy gives her a long overdramatic poem about an empty chair which is easily tied with one bit later for best bit of hte episode.. which granted when I can only think of two or three gags that really made me laugh...

Bobby likewise gets Hector telling the story about a realitvie not going to thanksgiving. Both get angry.. which for Lori, isn’t all that suprising, if entirely warranted. For Bobby though? It’s like pissing off a dolphin. IT’s hard to do and very much not something you want to actually pull of. Both families are forced to admit they eavesdropped, and are incredibly worried about this whole situation, with Lynn Sr selling lincoln up the river for telling them... this man’s capacity for selling out his children is as awe insprising as it is truly pathetic. 

So the two teens go back to their rooms to figure something out and come upon a reasonable solution: just have one of the families host and both come to it. That’s more than fair. But given we still have a full special to pad out, both families are still treating this like a competion: while the louds win the coin toss, both sides are determined to win thanksgiving. IT’s far from the most insane contest i’ve seen this month, x of swords was happening and i’ve seen a russian yank a goblin out of the demonic alligator skin he was using as a puppet. And we don’t know for sure Arrakoa and Krakoa didn’t have a trial over a baby turkey being adorable as one of the challenges. Other challenges included getting drunk, an eating contest, telling someone to murder a kitten and a wedding, all of this is actual stuff that happened in this recent crossover, I have made up nothing. 

So after the break and Flip realizing oh shit the audience is back, the war begins. The Louds are preparing for war, with Lola putting out a picture of herself instead of bobby and laurie because of course.. still not a half bad gag. The Casagrandes arrive and in in a passive agressive move that was already done a year before this special by Brooklyn Nine Nine and better, brought their own food.. though the roast pig is a nice and unique touch. Points for that.  And this.. is where the special gets tedious. Yeah while the IDEA of this episode was really good and I was excited to cover it in practice it’s just similar gags on both sides done for both halves: The first being “let’s guilt them into staying” and the second being “Let’s one up each other” with only two bits really working: Frieda having a painting and the louds annual skit.  And the skit is because it raises a LOT of questions: Why is it 90 minutes, who played the adorable turkey in the years between babies? Was it just whoever was youngest? Who wrote this? Who is this for besides Lynn Sr and Pop Pop? Who all has sat through this thing at some point? Is that why the mcbrides don’t come over for thanksgiving? It’s just.. fantastic is what i’m saying.  

But otherwise this part is just the family trying to one up each other with food, or toasts, or song, before devolving into a big fight. What makes it not work is.. there isn’t a lot of personality there. You have these two big, plentiful, intresting casts, even at this stage with the Casagrandes far less established and fleshed out. And instead of finding interesting ways for them to play off one another meeting for the first time, and to use that to also flesh the characters out more for the inevitable spinoff, it’s just 

For most of the second half. Thankfully it DOES manage to bring things around as after things degenerate into a food fight, the families decide to just ASK the two of them where they want to go.. and find them entirely missing.  It then turns out, in a nice twist, this is where Flip came in. Since his place is the only place open 24/7 and 365, barring fishing season, Bobby and Lori fled here to flee their insane families.. who then follow them there because Carlos and Lisa have them chipped. I was suprised at first Carlos had a tracker on bobby but honestly, i’ts just common sense. The man is like a golden retriver in a man’s body. Here’s an artists interpretation

Both families breifly bicker before Lori and Bobby announce their starting their own family thankgiving with blackjack, and hookers. They really shouldn’t of let Flip in on the brainstorming session. Both families don’t want that, and apologize, admitting they just didn’t want to loose them and both genuinely offering to let the other have them next year. Flip, who despite having a “pay for my colonoscopy jar” with a picture of his ass on it, is somehow the voice of reason and just suggests trading thanksgivings every year, everyone accepts, and we do get a genuinely heartwarming ending of both sides gathering everything for a gas station thanksgiving. Honestly reminds me of king of the hill’s airport episode, but in a very good way and still unique enough circumstances to work.Also Flip, of all people, donates the cans needed to finish the can drive.. granted i’m not sure if they WANT any of that meat, but hey, he meant well and it made me really like the character.  We get a heartwearming duet between hector and luna and sono the whole family and we’re out. 

Final Thoughts: This was disapointing. I’ve listed most of my complaints already, but overall it wasted a good premise of two families coming together, and even the feud parts could’ve been funnier. As it is it’s just.. ehhhhhhhhhh. It has some good parts, and bobby is an angel here on earth as always. But the whole just feels padded. Like this was SUPPOSED to just be 11 minutes, got bumped up, and thus here we are. It’s not the worst Loud House has done, i’ve seen and heard of muccch worse, but for a holiday special it just feels stale and i’ve seen way better thanksgiving specials. And i’ll be getting to that.  If there’s an episode of a cartoon you’d like me to cover, just pop in my ask box or dms and you can comission a review for 5 bucks a piece. Discounts on bulk, 15 for movies. Until then , happy thanksgiving.

[wavemaker9]

keeping up the streak

There has to be a moment or two after all this has eased slightly where something gets asked of toni regarding his time in the war. Probably less a “tell us a story” and more “give us some details on” way, like needing the information for a mission or something, otherwise i figure any war stories are kind of off limits for a /long/ fucking while. But anyway, him starting to answer and he starts off starting to lie again on instinct because he’d trained it to be so natural before so that he wouldn’t hesitate and be caught or something, so either him now having to catch himself and correct or someone else catching him and him immediately like oh yeah fuck you’re right, sorry. Damnit. Bad habits, I guess. 

I don’t think either kyle or austin would end up talking to toni one-on-one about it. Already said toni would try to talk to mel and i think unless gil was like austin-levels of cool with it, he would probably try to talk to him, too. The others would have to make it clear they wanted to talk to him, though. He figures those two are the closest to him and would probably be the most upset specifically about what he did because as his best friends aboard the ship they would likely expect more honesty. Toni gets along with the others, but he’s not close to like Cian or Ivan as he is with gil and especially not as he was with mel, so he figures if they’re mad, it’s not going to be /betrayal/ level mad, just. Hey you fucking lied to us and hurt the captain, what the fuck?? Kyle doesn’t really care what Toni has to say. Again, he’s not mad at Toni for himself, he’s mad at Toni for Mel. Austin doesn’t care because again, doesn’t care about any of this. Doesn’t like that things have been kind of disrupted, but he’s just trying to stay out of it. He’s really hoping Toni /doesn’t/ make a one-on-one talk trip to every crew member because he’d stop toni at the door with a “I really don’t care.” and just close the door at that. 

Toni would be relieved that neither ivan nor cian were completely mad at him. Understands there’s still some hostilities and again, figured there’d be at least some level of “you betrayed mel and since she’s our captain and also our friend, fuck you”, but probably had a short fear of like almost everyone just straight up avoiding him over that or some shit. 

I love Toni starting this convo to try and be like “here’s the expectations I saw while in the job so now that you have it you should be made aware” but being caught quickly in a discussion about the whole thing. He’s less prepared for that, which probably means you get him a bit more honest? Not that he’s lying when he talks to other people but like, he hasn’t prepared himself or planned what the best points to bring up to this person are to make himself better understood. It’s just his thoughts as they come up instead of being planned and sorted, so it’s a bit more. God there’s not really a good word? I wanna say like legit or real or whatever but again, that makes the other things sound fake and they’re not WAIT natural. It’s more natural. There we go. 

I think ivan would find out about toni planning to leave in like a full crew meeting? Toni brings it up to mel first, and when she seems to agree it’s the best option, them planning to tell the crew all together. So like good for ivan. Hears the bad panic news in this room full of people and has to wait til he gets back to his room to properly freak out.

Alternatively. Like i was going to say it later but i think drinking with cian would probably be when he first comes up with the idea. Then when sober thinks it over like actually that might be the only good (“good”) option left. Probably keeps it in his brain for a day before bringing it up to mel and then probably the crew that evening or the next day? But would cian think toni was actually considering that if he heard him suggest it very seriously but while drunk? if so, would he let anyone else know like ivan as a “i don’t know how legit this is but” thing? That’s perhaps another option for ivan finding out ahead of time. 

But yeah, speaking of Cian! Toni of course lets Cian in. anyone wants answers on this, they deserve them, he’s not going to dismiss somebody who wants to talk to him and figure out hey why the fuck? Makes the standard simple case about it, that he liked mel and didn’t want to lose her as a friend and so he kept lying when she asked him that first time and kept lying further when anyone asked him after that because that was the established narrative and he would have to have admitted he lied to mel to not lie to the rest of them, too. He’s sorry and it seems foolish now but it’s what happened. 

I think there’s one silver lining to this and it’s that if he’s been drinking in the evenings since all this shit went down, it’s largely been drinking to get drunk. Good to be drinking to drink again. 

Though like. Like i said ivan gets the most natural toni responses because toni is already in the conversation when the question is presented, he doesn’t have any time at all to prepare what he wants to say, it’s all just as the words come out. But cian actually gets a more honest toni. Again, not that toni’s lying a lot but still, he’s picking his words carefully here, he usually is, far more than he lets on and especially now. He’s trying to resolve this, trying to make things better. Even if he doesn’t have a second or two to prepare what he wants to say, he can still do that very easily on the fly. But when he’s tipsy or drunk, that ability is definitely less strong. That very good word filter definitely slacks off, and it’s not like. Like he’s not suddenly talking shit and saying like “i don’t get why mel’s even mad fuck her” or something like that. Like again, he’s not actively lying through most of this, he does 100% genuinely get and accept and understand everyone’s anger on this, he’s angry at /himself/ for this. but with the word filter gone, he would say things off the top of his head that he wouldn’t. Like the suggestion of him leaving. That’s why i think he’d come up with it with cian first. He’d roll it around in his head for a while before saying anything or even just dismiss it totally if he first came up with the idea while sober. It’s why, once sober, he still waits to bring the idea up to mel. But he’s drunk and the idea comes up and he just suggests it. 

Him starting being more honest about how helpless he feels with this! That normally he’d be the person helping himself here. Usually he’s the one with good advice for someone who made a mistake and made someone mad at them! But he thought this was so small at the time and it became so big and he feels like he has to clean up a room of broken mirrors with a paintbrush instead of a broom. He wants there to be a quick and easy fix to this because he hates seeing mel hurting, hates knowing he hurt her, hates knowing that hurting her is affecting the rest of hte crew on top of that, so even if he knows trust can’t be resolved that easily like, that it can take months and years and more to repair it.... Fucking goddamn does he still want it to be quick and easy, though. It feels like the whole ship is suffering because of him and he doesn’t want to put them all through this drama for how long it would normally take to repair a person’s trust in another. He needs to do something, he knows he does. he /wants/ to do something, anything, to fix this and asap, but what? At this point he feels like just being on the ship at all is making things worse. And him leading off of that thought into wait wait wait i can-! What if i just go? If i ain’t around she don’t gotta worry about me, you all don’t gotta worry about us. That would…. And he kinda trails off as it slowly sinks in of like realizing he’d be leaving his home, which is. Not a happy thought. But he said he’d do anything to fix this so. trying to pick up again then, insisting that might be the best option. Doing that little drunk nod thing of just nodding way longer than is necessary to accept something as true. 

God but him thanking cian and cian like wait hold on that wasn’t my idea? Why are you leaving now?? you realize that’s also not going to fix things right?? Besides you’re important to the crew! But tipsy toni is convinced no no it’ll work, it has to! What else is he gonna be able to do to make things better for the crew and stop being trouble for mel?? And he’s not that important anymore, really. Ivan took over one of his jobs and they could find someone else to fill in cooking when needed. He’s seen Kyle cook once or twice and for not knowing what half of the spices are actually called he’s actually kinda good, not as good as toni of course but he could manage in the following absence easily. why not give him that job? toni’ll just bring it up to her and if she agrees that would help then it’ll work and that’s what’s important! 

For kyle and austin hearing toni leaving. 

Austin again, like. Doesn’t care. Maybe a little happy. Not too much, they probably found some things to actually get along with each other on as time passed, but toni did also still definitely make him believe kyle was dead once, so also like. Kinda good? fucking bye?

A, Kyle doesn’t buy into that “i want to go meet up with my brother” for a fucking second, toni we all know you’re running from your problems, nice try. B, Kyle suddenly like flips? Not like flip flips where he’s suddenly not mad at toni, but he too isn’t okay with people abandoning him for some weird reason or another (he didn’t become cold to loss like austin did whoops), especially one of the fucking parental figures on the team, so like. He’s still mad at toni but he suddenly wants that one-on-one talk right now immediately because you can’t just fucking leave??? We’re a fucking crew and you don’t get to just walk out on that because it got rough cause of your own fuck up????? Like, we need you? Toni immediately cracking an amused grin, reiterating some of the same points of “ivan took over one of my jobs and like half of you couldn’t manage to fix your own meals, you don’t /really/ need me anymore, you’re just comfortable having me around. Which I get! I was comfortable here with you all, too, but… listen to me, Kyle, you may not understand it, but it’s for the best.” Insisting he’s basically poisoning the energy of the ship- he’s thought this over and it’s the best option for everyone. Kyle /immediately/ calling bullshit on that, that it’s the best fix short term /maybe/ but probably not even that and definitely not long term. Like this is the one time kyle’s giving toni good advice on how to resolve a fuck up toni did that made people angry at him, oh how the turn tables. Toni dismissing it though, saying kyle doesn’t understand, which is a mistake because this is like the one time kyle does actually maybe have the right idea here. Kyle very mad when toni won’t take his advice though. Keeps raising his voice as if being louder will make toni listen more before just cursing and kicking the door frame before leaving. Fine, toni wants to fuck everything up even more, whatever, let him, [insert string of curses in chinese here]!

God i realized this is like one of the few AUs where kyle knows another language and that’s weird? There's like DnD AU and he learns russian in hetalr but like. I think that’s it? My boy can barely speak english, don’t make him figure out two languages.

Hey this is /completely/ unrelated but remind me to find a way to fit kylee and/or audrey in as planet contacts?