#if I were a competent blogger I'd go rewatch the episodes for the 50th time to be sure but I got deadlines to meet SIGH

[adelrambles]

Idk if you’ve ever fully answered this on your blog but: DO YOU THINK Bishop fully redeemed himself in the future? By becoming president and uniting all races? Or is he still 🗑️

Oh man no, I don't think Bishop's Good Guy act is all that genuine. I think there's some change, but at his base, beneath all the subterfuge, he's still the same guy. I may have gone over this on the blog before, but like ey what am I gonna just get handed this opportunity to ramble ad nauseum and not take it? NEVER

There are a few pieces of evidence we can read into regarding the faux-ness of Bishop's new persona. First and foremost, for me, is the two instances where he presents the turtles with his "origin story," so to speak. In each instance, he keeps the details vague, and is very hesitant to admit to any direct wrong-doing on his part. The first story is so vague on the details that it feels like he's trying to brush past the turtles' concerns as quickly as possible. The SECOND, though. Bishop consistently dances around going into any detail about what he did or why it was wrong. And he goes on to push all of the blame onto Stockman! I mean honestly, he says Stockman "took things too far." Like dude!! We already know nothing is "too far" for you! It's very suspect to me that the subsequent lab collapse could have been ALL Stockman's fault. Bishop also elevates his own accomplishments and takes full credit for the success of the PGA. Idk but there's something really insidious to me about how he presents the information to make himself look as good as possible-- and the way he's able to convince at least a few of his former enemies that he's trustworthy.

There are other little inconsistencies in his behavior, like him writing off the turtles' warnings about Sh'Okanabo. The Bishop I know is a paranoid freak, he would never in a million years brush off a lead on a possible threat without checking it at all. And if we assume that, then that suggests Bishop said as much to give the turtles the impression it wasn't something worth looking into, meaning he was probably trying to direct their attention away for some reason. All of this tells me (if we just. ignore the possibility of it being a writing flaw agdhgshd) that Bishop is still a very cold and calculating personality, fully willing to throw others to the wolves for his own purposes, but he is WAY better at manipulting, now.

I've said before that I find it likely Bishop's weakest point is his social skills; we see that his superior officers (i.e. the president) dislike him-- which, frankly, is a detriment to his cause as it put his funding in jeopardy at least once that we know of-- and everyone he meets tends to come away some level of discomfitted. So what FF presents us with is a Bishop who needed to improve these skills for the sake of his ultimate goal. If the safety of earth requires friendly relations with aliens, then he needed to become an ambassador, and if he needed to become an ambassador, then he needed to be less overtly unpleasant. Thus, he changed tack. As a result, we have someone who appears trustworthy and is very good at lying and directing your attention, but is just as utilitarian as ever under the mask. That's just his job, after all.

Other details include:

- His intro. We see Bishop personally taking time out to go through monitors all over the city. He apparently has a very thorough surveillance system that he reviews himself. Again, paranoid freak.

- When addressing the turtles, we sometimes see him slip back into snarkier comments. This usually happens when he's frustrated (snapping at them for not attacking the Mouser fast enough for his tastes,) or when he's not being obeyed (making a snide comment about Cody having nightmares when they refuse to exclude him from a mission briefing.)

- As my friend Trauma pointed out to me recently, when storming the moonbase Bishop's men had their guns defaulted to lethal force, he had to give the order to switch to non-lethal. He was fully ready to wipe that place out.

- His willingness to include the turtles and later Cody on missions strikes me as, yknow, very utilitarian in its own right. Cuz those are teenagers, yeah. It could be argued that Bishop can't tell how old the turtles are but he definitely knows Cody is young, and knows well enough that he shouldn't be in a combat situation. But in the finale he praises Cody's decision to defy him and fight anyway. So what changed? In essence, Cody was effective. Bishop is fine with child soldiers as long as they do a good job (and can't be publicly traced back to him.)

Also like did you see that car chase? He ran civilians off the road and did not give a FUCK. That's the same guy.