He Looked At Weaver, Where She Sat At The Far End Of The Bench. Her Old Teammate Had Insisted On Coming

I was about to make a post about the general stress of living in the world of the Power Fantasy caused indoor smoking to have a longer life, but it turns out bans on indoor smoking only really started after the turn of the millennium. They’re younger than me

This is fun, but I have a single addendum: instead of controlling a small number of bugs but getting detailed sensory data, Lisa should have no control over any bugs but get the sense data from all of them within a range similar, if only a bit smaller, to Taylor’s

I'm chewing enthusiastically on the possibilities of an AU featuring Taylor, Lisa, and Brian as cluster triggers. Setting aside the incredible AU gymnastics required to make something resembling their canon triggers occur in close proximity and rapid succession to each other, the possibilities of their versions of each other's powers have me frothing at the lips.

I think their versions of each other's powers should still be shaped towards their own traumas, so:

Taylor's version of Brian's power focuses more on the power copying than the darkness. I think when she makes contact with a parahuman, she picks up an extremely weak version of their power for a short time. Like, touching Sundancer would let her make a match flame. But when her bugs touch a parahuman, they also gain a weak version of the power, and she can use a large swarm of very weak powers to very great effect. I think her version of Lisa's power would give her insight specifically on power mechanics and interactions; she can extrapolate power function from seeing it in use or its consequences.

Brian's version of Taylor's power would, I think, be a very direct, more limited form. I think he can, with concentration, manifest bugs out of darkness that he can control to the same degree that Taylor controls her swarm. What he does not get, however, is her multitasking ability, and if he's not maintaining active concentration on a group of his shadow bugs, they dissolve. So manifesting and using more than a small number for a simple task is pretty incapacitating for him. His version of Lisa's power is all about his own presentation; he can intuit how people perceive him and what he would need to do to change their perception of him into something different.

Lisa's version of Taylor's power would be all about information gathering - she can manifest a very small number of bugs under her control, and her control doesn't have much finesse, but she can process their sensory input extremely well. Her version of Brian's power would let her tag people with clinging shadows via projectile - as long as the shadow lingers, she can sense exactly where they are relative to her in great detail.

And that's not even touching on what their cluster power balancing would be! Something fun and psychological that really plays up the opportunity for cluster bleed through and kiss-kill dynamics.

It'd also be a ton of fun to explore how that bleed through affects them all psychologically, especially if they come together at a point in time where Lisa and Brian are as new to and insecure in their powers as Taylor. I think there's room for delightfully frightening shades of codependence only previously visible to shrimp.

And, of course, I think that would all almost inevitably lead to what would be simultaneously the most emotionally horny and emotionally repressed threesome known to man. None of them would be able to look each other in the eyes for weeks - except for Lisa, who Won the threesome, something that is not only possible but extremely Normal and Healthy, thank you very much.

Actually maybe Wildbow’s tendency to issue poorly thought out proclamations about his stories to win arguments with his fans is a good thing, as it forcibly introduces otherwise naive readers to the idea of the death of the author

the funniest part of the endgame sequence of Worm is when the narrative completely forgets about the END OF THE WORLD for a hot second to describe in great detail how sexy and effeminate Marquis is. how even though she isn't usually interested in feminine men or older men Amy's dad is gnc af and just so incredibly fuckable. Taylor there's people that are dying

Glow-Worm P.3

I'm a fan of this one. I enjoyed the anti-cape discussion, and I find the discussion of the amnesty both interesting and realistic. A blanket amnesty would be controversial, as it would allow criminals to escape justice for their actions and for criminal organisations to regather their strength in the light. But it is also necessary because the heroes need all the manpower they can get and the criminal justice system barely exists. Similarly, its pragmatic to provide villains with accommodations as a bribe to not engage in criminal activities, but it is also manifestly unfair. I like how Swansong promotes the pragmatic view while also establishing her personality and her need to be respected and feared.

Her and Victoria also have good chemistry

Valkyrie awkwardly not acknowledging her past is also fun and hopefully thematically relevant

I am also required to point out the oddness of "Chief Armstrong"; his title and him giving a statement on the applicability of the amnesty to two specific capes implies that he is in a position of authority within the Wardens, which doesn't work because the Wardens, as stated in both Worm and Ward, are without civilian oversight. Plus 1 to both inconsistency counters.

Internal Inconsistency Counter: 6 (+1)

Inconsistency with Worm Counter: 1 (+1)

I'm 93% sure I made a post about this before, but Taylor using other people's powers better than they do is such a fun part of her character, especially since she seems to constantly be thinking "damn if only I got that actually useful power." Like, Lisa thinks Taylor would do better than her with her insight power, Taylor coordinates Cuff and Theo to make a lightning rod during Behemoth fight when neither of them had thought of that, Clockblocker with the string, ordering around like 10 people including fucking Eidolon to hold Behemoth still for Phir Se, she's always scheming and using people as chess pieces in such a way that they're not even mad because it's a learning experience. I think a large part of it is a want to be anyone but herself, which leads to her looking at other powers and considering their uses more than most people do because she just finds every reason to be jealous and justify her passive belief that she's inferior and weak. Also she's just so used to high stress fucked up situations that she performs well under pressure. She kinda acknowledges that in the chapter where she's like "what the hell why is Amy so stupid she should be using microbes to form defenses" because she realizes Amy has no experience in fighting, so she's never had a need to think about this. But Taylor is always fighting, even when she's finally safe she doesn't let herself relax, so she's used to this.

And as for wanting to escape her body and be someone else who's cooler and has a better power and isn't lame and worthless, if I recall correctly she comments more than once on how powerful Genesis is and how she would love her power, which honestly fits so well. She wants to have other people's powers because she doesn't like herself, and Genesis's power lets her create and customize new bodies that aren't her and can do whatever she wants. It's the perfect way for her escape being herself.

And then Khepri is thematically significant as always. She finally can use other people's powers, and damn she's good with them! She magnifies Sundancer's sun with Vista, she combines Ballistic and Foil, she uses every combination and interaction possible for an advantage. She can use other people's powers like she always wanted, and she stops being herself, just like she always wanted.

Truly the tragedy of Taylor is that she was just, the best at violence and discovered this at a time in her life when she had nothing else. Is it any surprise that she ended up as a creature of nought but violence when people only cared about her in relation to her capacity for violence?

list of times taylor hebert used other peoples powers better than them:

when she told genesis to create a body that looked like crawler with the s9 riding on his back

when she used clockblockers power to bisect echidna. this literally fundamentally changed the way clock used his own power

when she made doormaker open and close portals overlapping each other so that the portals were effectively moving (granted this was only possible with the help of taylors multitasking power)

help me add more things to the list

I'm not actually sure he made her those eggs, I think maybe he had a cult member do it, but this sure was fun to draw.

It is an actual crime that Ward isn't set in New York City. The portrait of the city painted in Worm's epilogue is genuinely an incredibly compelling setting. A city with depth. An ungovernable labyrinthine city spread over dozens of worlds, accessible only through portals created by humanity's saviour, with its central hub being the partially rebuilt ruins of the last sizeable outpost on Bet protected from the pollutants created by the destruction of Bet only by a thin forcefield. A city created by the final battle, and yet scared by it.

New York, in the process of being rebuilt.  Dust and ominous clouds were being held at bay by a thin forcefield, and the city stood in the center of a brilliant sunlight.  Where glass had broken and where oils had risen to the tops of city streets, things almost glittered.  A shining city.

Does Ward ever explain why they went from rebuilding New York on Earth-Bet to living in 'The City' on Earth Gimmel? Or does it just do that and leave us to wonder as to the answers?

My god, did Wildbow even re-read the epilogues before he wrote Ward? Like, I knew he didn't re-read Worm as a whole, because his characterizations of Amy in Ward are like, frozen in Arc 14 for most of the text but did he not even make the effort to at least re-read the last couple of chapters?

What the fuckberries? How is this the first I'm hearing, in all the complaints I've seen about Ward, and 'The City', that they were GODDAMN REBUILDING NEW YORK CITY after Golden Morning?

So there’s a question that Worm asks, and answers, again and again. And the question is, “If a person does something sufficiently bad, if they are a bad enough person, does it become okay to do bad things to them?” And again and again, the answer to that question is no.

Glory Girl flattening the Nazi is a pointed example of this; she breaks an irredeemable scumbag’s back, and no tears or shed, but the narrative is really pointed about the fact that she shouldn’t have, that the power disparity made it totally unnecessary, and she clearly knows that too. And later, when the karma wheel comes back around, what happens to Glory Girl is patently in excess of anything bad she ever did as a dumb, angry teen.

Regent enslaves people! But he exclusively (on-screen) enslaves gangsters, serial killers, and bullies who use their power to hurt those weaker than them. This appears to be an actual line in the sand he drew for himself; he’s outsourcing his morality to common ideas of cathartic vengeance. But when he systematically disassembles Sophia’s life for what she did to Taylor, it’s framed as horrifying.

Armsmaster throws Kaiser, a wealthy Neo-Nazi gang leader, to the wolves, and Kaiser gets torn in half. He had it coming and it’s still treated as a massive ethical breach that Armsmaster did this. 

Moord Nag suffers a breakdown during the tail end of Gold Morning, and it’s treated as an example of how Taylor’s gone too far- forget the fact she built an empire on literal human sacrifice, nothing justifies what’s being done to her.

I think, or I have this theory, that about 40 percent of worm discourse is rooted in the fact that people have very, very different intuitions about the correct answer to the above question.

Because I’ve seen people criticize the writing and ethics of Worm on the basis that the dumpster Nazi deserved it, and that the framing is overly sympathetic to Nazis for having that be how Glory Girl abuses her power. From the opposite direction, I’ve seen people- fuck that, it’s been ten years, we’ve all seen people saying that Vicky, in turn, had the wretchening coming because she’s a junior cop. I see people cheerleading Regent because they do, in fact, think Sophia had it coming; I see people criticizing the race and gender politics of the book because they think the author thinks Sophia had it coming. Armsmaster feeding Kaiser to Leviathan? I’ve seen people criticize how that’s treated as an ethical breach alongside all the other stuff he did during the Endbringer attack, that it’s overly sympathetic to Nazis. 

And, you know, I don’t think it’s necessarily wrong, per se, to hold many of these opinions. Vengeful Bloodlust is kind of foundational to my personality so I do very much get it. But so often this gets painted as “bad writing” or “plot holes!” 

 No! No it isn’t! You just disagree! You’ve got a different ethical framework than the one presented by the book and you disagree with the conclusions it draws!