#cr2x46

[mostlyanything19]

So I’m on episode 46 and Yasha is having storm visions of the past and--

Ashley is there so little during the early Mighty Nein episodes that Yasha is seldom more than a very, very quiet person who fights with them and does little else in terms of interactions, but... man I love Yasha! Every time Ashley is there, even if it’s just for a little bit, she brings such a quality to the character. I can’t get enough of her, she’s so good.

And Ashley’s absences...it was a similar thing with Pike, in that they do inform the character. They can’t not. And Yasha is deliberately built with those absences kept in mind, you can tell. She’s so quiet, anyone can pilot her without necessarily having to roleplay her, which makes it possible for her to at least on paper be around without Ashley being there. Travis or Matt strew in a sentence for her here and there and it doesn’t seem out of character that she doesn’t have more to say - not like whenever Laura is missing and Jester is either weird bc she’s way too quiet or weird bc other people can’t properly play her.

But it also does something with Yasha, and in this episode it shows and it’s just that little bit more heartbreaking. When she comes late to breakfast and grumbles about not having been woken up, and then after a while just says it: You guys were gone six days. I had no idea where you were, I looked for you everywhere in that room and you were just gone, all of you, all at once. And Nott starts in about if she held funerals for them, and it actually after a moment gets Yasha so heated that she blurts something else out: I didn’t know if you were dead or if you had just all fucked off together because you didn’t want me being part of the group anymore. And she hits the same sore spot a second time right after: “I’m glad you’re all okay. For whatever the fuck it’s worth to you.”

So here is Yasha who left the group after the Iron Shepherds, after Molly, and she was initially with the group kind of only because Molly was there, and she joined back up with them in Nicodranas more by circumstance than much else, and has since stuck with them but hasn’t been able, for reasons out of her control (i.e. the fact that Ashley wasn’t there to play her) to bond with everyone as much as they have been doing amongst each other. And ... she felt disregarded and left behind when they all vanished on her. It would hurt her, if they’d leave her, and knowing that it was all an accident only softens the blow in part; following that, she’s still not completely convinced whether they care that she cares. Yasha doesn’t feel secure in her place in this friend group, and that this insecurity is triggered is partly so sad because it’s entirely out of their control. It’s the same as back when Pike would stay behind in Vasselheim or Whitestone and she’d always be so sad, wishing that she could come along, but there’s no out for it, there’s no in-game way to say “hey, just come along then!” - she can’t, she actually really can’t, just like Yasha can’t be anything else right now than somebody who rarely speaks or is spoken to and doesn’t participate in some adventures. But it still affects her.

In conclusion: I love Yasha and I really think she should get a hug or something.

(In other episode notes: Honorable mention to Caduceus, who tells Yasha he can always tell it in his left knee when it’s about to rain or the weather gets cold, and I finally have an answer to why I had taken it for a fact before starting C2 that Caddy has a bit of a limp. Must’ve picked that up from the fandom somewhere, since old injuries are prone to that sort of thing.)

((Honorable mention also to my sister who was half-asleep listening to the Mighty Nein buying food at the mead place and chose that moment to randomly have a brain-glitch and inform me suddenly and decisively that Caduceus was about to brawl in the street, a thing that has no basis in canonical events and never actually happens.))

(And last but not least, shoutout to Marisha’s little face journey at 1:34:30 when Matt narrates the Zuala part and she realizes that Beau might just be not the only lesbian at the table. I wish I had gifs of this it’s great)

[runwithmagic]

the true critical role experience