#the biggest: why the hell is mephone here

[smile-files]

i continue to find ii3 baffling. why did they make it (this isn't to hate on the season, i'm genuinely curious)

[ii-meeple-confessions]

Anyways the theme of Mephone attaching himself most to other robots on the show is so interesting to me???

Obviously in season 1 there's 4S, and he's not that eager to be friends with him (to be fair, 4S DID try to kill him... multiple times. Succeeded once! In another timeline), but he goes along with him anyways at the end and they do form some type of weird competitive 'enemies who are friends' bond on the show when 4S is serving as cohost. Obviously 4S also gives up his life for Mephone, which is a really huge thing for his character. But overall, they were both still kind of distant from each other, and that distance would only grow as 4S is literally trapped inside of Mephones software. He'll get a chance to shine later though, of course.

Then theres probably the biggest example of this; Mepad! His loyal new assistant in Season 2! There's so much to say about Mepad that it's really hard to condense all my thoughts into a summary, but Mephone treats him incredibly well, and clearly cares for him. He compliments him, makes sure he receives credit for his work (albeit at the cost of crediting toilet), and is overall a lot more friendly towards Mepad. Of course, Mepad helps with this by being the best assistant one could hope for, but as the season wears on its clear theres gaps in their (admittedly very complex) relationship.

I'll only cover Mephones side of things right now though, since this is a Mephone focused ramble. He's incredibly attached to Mepad. It's not hard to notice, he prescribes emotions to Mepad even after he tells him he cant feel them, and he constantly looks for validation from Mepad-- "How do you feel about that Mepad?" (When talking about how exciting the eliminations are), and he even excuses it when he lies to him-- Not bringing it up because he, presumably, doesn't want to cause conflict. Which is interesting, he's usually very big on staking the flames of conflict in the game. But his approach to Mepad is different!

And obviously I've been avoiding the biggest thing here; the flashback scenes in the "Objects in Mirror", showing him talking to Mepad. We know the background behind this; Mephone stole Mepad from Meeple on his way out, saving him from ever having to experience that. But Mephone, when he woke up, presumably did not have this background. He likely just saw Mepad sitting there and felt some sort of inclination towards him-- To come back to him. I mean, he even (in the flashback scenes) is shown talking to him and sitting next to him for comfort. (Actually, that flashback in particular makes me so curious. Why was he so anxious?) And he's shown similarly leaning on Mepad at other times in the show. For support.

Mephone cares a hell lot about Mepad. But historically he's absolutely TERRIBLE with expressing it, so it's not surprising when it all begins to shatter and break. Mepad quits the show, which is one thing that evidently destroys Mephone, but they quickly recover from it-- Working together... Despite that. Mepad gives him a second chance. But the situation is already too deeply entrenched in flames. Mephone fucks up his second chance. And honestly IMO it's kind of hard to blame him for how it ALL goes down, but there are things he could've done differently-- Like, you know, being honest to Mepad BEFORE Toilet outed him for hiding something. Mepad is right to be upset, but I do think the situation is kind of out of Mephone's control at that point, and them working together... probably would've been more of a benefit to everyone.

Speaking of working together though, Mepad isn't done with Mephone. At least, not for the sake of the contestants. Mepad and the ghost squad Do come to Save Mephones LIFE when he needs it most. Mepad, despite EVERYTHING isn't leaving Mephone for dead. He literally saves his life-- And yes, even if it IS for the contestants, and not for Mephone, his sacrifice still ends up saving Mephone from certain death. His last words, saying he didn't do that for him are ALSO kind of 'for' Mephone. He's expressed time and time again he doesn't want anyone else to die for him, Mepad admitting his sacrifice was not for him but the contestants alleviates that guilt. Which is genuinely a very touching thing for Mepad to do in his final moments. Sharing his love for the contestants, and sparing Mephone more pain then his death will already cause him.

OKAY. SO. Now that the 5 Mepad paragraphs are done, we can finally transcend the timeline a bit and move backwards to Season 3! And, for the first time in a season, theres no other Meeplers here. Mephone is alone, the only robot on the island and the only robot of his kind. Untillllll Bot comes around! Mephone's reaction to Bot being a robot is genuinely so chill by the way, no clue why, maybe he knew before hand?? But he's very quick to understand and excuse them from the challenge. "Don't worry-- I'll take care of it." I've seen someone speculate before that his quick and pretty caring reaction is due to him having seen injured robots before (such as 3GS) and thus equating the situations. Except here he can do something rather then just running away.

And from there, his friendship with Bot grows. And I think this shows that it doesn't matter if their his co-host or a contestant, if you throw another robot at this guy he's most likely to bond to that other robot rather than someone else who isn't a robot. And I've seen some people equate this to "He doesn't bond with his creations because they're not real" but not only is that not true-- He DOES bond with the other contestants, and he DOES think they're real prior to the reveal-- But also... Think about the only other object he knew-- Prior to the show. Cobs. Even without the memory OF him, he might be subconsciously acting on the basis that objects have hurt him before while his fellow robots have not. And subconscious biases like that are hard to get rid of.

All of this is to say that Mephone's got a bad case of tending to bond most with other robots and I think that's a really fun and often overlooked aspect of his character. I think the one contestant he bonded with most who ISN'T a robot is probably floory though, considering he's his co-host in Season 3 and all. Anyways, I hope these paragraphs of me talking about this weird ass robot phone were entertaining and/or interesting!!! Have a great day. -2G Anon

OEUUEJEJJEJJRORODJWJM

2G anon coming in again with the asks so good I have genuinely nothing to add onto them. Please just read this it is SO GOOD AUUGHGH I LOVE YOUR ANALYSIS OF MEPHONE AND MEPADS RELATIONSHIP. THE MEEPLINGS… URGH