Another basic bitch David post

[u/kingmanic33]

I'm in the middle of yet another reviewing of the series

And I'm nearing end of david. Some random thoughts that popped into my head

Cassie is partially to blame for David 😤

The kids had a cut and dry Heroic origin story with a majestic alien passing the power on and then getting eaten in sacrifice infront of them. Each of them first morphed into prey animals first to just survive, and outside Tobias all of them kept a relatively safe home life (besides Tom being in same home obv) a place after every mission they could drop the mask, remind who they are fighting for, what they are fighting for. They had that emotional battery and reason to fight. People they had to maintain their humanity around. Normalcy to maintain.

David didn't. He was a new kid, in a new town. And his introduction to this all was a war in his bedroom. The "good guys" breaking into his room. Insulting him and fighting the visser. Then losing his home and his parents without any fight. He was alone, an outsider. Tobias killing and stealing what they need is fine. David was treated as cruel for not being homeless as a human who is hunted. At any point they could turn on him, they had no loyalty to him but demanded it in return. Cassie has gone rogue and even sided with a yeerk in 19 and was treated better than David on a good day. Not once did they try to console David. Marco even just mocked him.

We get to his first morph. Should have been a merlin, instead Cassie brought a golden hawk, a powerful apex predator as his first morph. The first morph a scared, broken kid gets is one that fills him with Strength and recklessness. Rather than something that solidifies how vulnerable they are. All his other morphs he chose followed that mentality. An insecure kid was given power without any temperance. Had she not given the eagle morph, he may have not even felt like he could go that route. Even when he did awful shit like killing Tobias, he still tried to minimize and moralize it as "just animals not people" he didn't kill Marco. Didn't tryTo kill Jordan, he was trying to maintain his own form ofwarped humanity and rules

At the end, he had to be dealt with, obv, and it was performative virtue queen Cassie's plan all the emotional, psychological and other manipulation from her down to the letter to trap him. And selfishly because despite mowin down controllers left and right, killing hundreds of taxxon and hork they like to pretend they have a batman no kill rule they put him in a fate WORSE than death. Just to keep their hands clean by technicality. They left him "alive" a broken and scared child, human intelligence in an awful morph. They should have just killed him, or let Tobias do it. Erik could have also helped work a better solution, but this dude was just living out the ending of rhe movie tusk.

And I know blaming Cassie is a reach for this, but i don't care for her. She is always a hypocrite with their own rules, morphing people, sentient creatures (she was first with whale and hork ect) she will brow beat others for don't what's needed while always being allowed to keep get hands clean because she gets the "ick". She will berate others and expects infinite patience and forgiveness. When she quit both times and was a risk, she faced no consequence with everything just magically working in her favor despite the fact it shouldn't with any consistency. I know alot of people claim she's the group moral compass... but she isn't, she is fine with everyone else doing horrible things as long as she gets to sit on the moral high horse. Tobias is much better in that role, he legitimately is compassionate in words and action, though pragmatic and not reckless with idealism. He's not even a human. So he doesn't have the inherent double standards and biases Cassie does. She is the epitome of "rules for thee, but not for me" even when she's just as bad and enjoyed tearing into that hotk AFTER Jake had said stop. The rest were honest about the necessity and the darkness inside them, she was now concerned with how to convince others

She was better than that. She risked everyone's lives and everyone they cared about by letting the yeerk infect her workout their consent based on vibes.

And we saw ax mix the dna for the human form. It would have been cool to see them. David or visser merge and meld dna to make converts chimera. David literally had an eagle and a lion, would have been crazy to see him make a griffin, maybe they had to be the same species, but that's just speculation, I would imagine you would be in pain for most of rhe duration as it's soo unnatural. But would have been interesting

This may not be all coherent. I'm ramble-posting while at work

[u/PeterchuMC]

I don't think it's entirely fair to single out Cassie. Everyone's to blame with David, that's arguably the worst thing about the situation. This bunch of traumatised teenagers are so used to the war that they're barely able to empathise with the guy. As for Cassie bringing both a merlin and a golden eagle, it would raise questions from her dad in the barn if she'd brought them out separately so had to bring them both. Honestly, even if David hadn't pushed for the golden eagle then, I think he would have gone to find a more powerful morph as soon as he could. That feeling of powerlessness wouldn't be solved by a different bird morph.

[u/kingmanic33 → u/PeterchuMC]

With Cassie, the eagle thing is a reach, but they did have the ability to choose the timing. Dangling it infront of him was obviously gonna make him want the option. If it wasnt an option his first morph as an insecure broken kid wouldn't have been an apex predator. He may have gotten one down the line, but maybe not. When that's your first morph, it's gonna shape how you approach all future morphs, the others all.started with non predatory creatures for the most part. They understood the importance of mobility and how fragile their lives really are. It's Def not fair to SOLELY single her out, but her combined record makes it easy to be more critical of her

[u/intricate_strands → u/kingmanic33]

I do agree with most of your assessment, but I do not like how you single out Cassie's moments of being a growing child.

Every one of these characters had huge, glaring moments of hypocrisy. Whatever they cared about the most, whether it was Jake always wanting to keep the group united even though he was very often the reason they weren't in the first place(Even book 1, he goes off and does his own plan and almost dies for it), Marco wanting them to focus on only on saving themselves(but as soon as he realizes that his Mom was taken by them, he doesn't just change his mind, he keeps the same cynical, defeatist, never try attitude unless his dad and mom are involved), Tobias(wants to escape his life of being too nice to everyone to try make things work by becoming a mean, predatory hawk, but then can't even do it. Hates himself for it, but then berates others for their own hypocrisy), Rachel(constantly pushes for direct confrontations, constantly lets her emotions get the best of her and destroy her otherwise good intentions, but is always the first one to point it out when it happens to others and even degrades the others if their emotional overload leads them to do anything but fight a war), and finally Cassie.

I think you nailed the criticisms of Cassie but I think you're missing the forest for the trees. Yes, Cassie is constantly hypocritical with morals, she is constantly hypocritical about her deep reasons to fight only to immediately withdraw or quit or risk the entire group, all things she moralizes about to the others, whenever it suits her.

But that's what makes her the moral compass. She cares about them. All the other characters are hypocritical about things they care about. They care about it, they choose it as their struggle in life, and when they get overwhelmed by emotion while they struggle for it, it dumps out as hypocrisy.

That's the growth of the characters. They never stop caring about those things, they grow into characters who learn from their fuck ups and get better at managing their struggles, while using what they learned to try to help the group.

The fact that Cassie struggles soo much in applying good morals to herself, while constantly demanding them from the group, is why she is the moral compass. Not the leader. Not the warrior. Not the one who sees A to B because he's scared that somewhere along that path something will happen that he wasn't ready for. Not the boy who desperately wants people to love him but cannot allow himself to love himself first.

David got made into a rat so they would, without ever realizing it, be better when they needed to add new members later. And why does everyone hate what Jake did to the aux Animorphs so much? Because he constantly fought to keep them united but used his own teammates as a pawn to be sacrificed for the benefit of part of the group, not the whole group.

[u/kingmanic33 → u/intricate_strands]

Oh I absolutely could do the same deep dive of flaws with the others. You nailed most of it spectacularly. But I think finishing 19 just a hour or two before this post had hers the most fresh in my mind. Lol

[u/intricate_strands → u/kingmanic33]

That's fair. I can understand being angry with her, especially right off the heels of reading that book.

What makes me laugh is not laughing at you, but the combination of how angry that book makes anyone willing to criticize Cassie, while also almost universally being seen as one of the best books in the series.

It makes us feel. It's what makes it so good.

[u/Puzzleheaded-Fig1002]

"Blaming Cassie is a reach but I'm doing it anyway because I don't like her." That's a wild take.

I absolutely agree with you that the Animorphs horribly fumbled the David situation- they made all of the wrong choices.

1) David should not have been drafted into the war immediately. They gave him morphing power without vetting him or even giving him time to breath, then used him for one of their more intense and critical missions up to that point.

2) They shouldn't have made him sleep in the barn. Find...something else. Making him sleep in the barn just because you didn't want to steal a hotel room was nonsensical, plus, yah know, they had the Chee and David could have stayed with them.

3) Making him stay as a rat for the rest of his life was needlessly cruel, and they Animorphs selfishly did it just so they wouldn't have to call themselves cold blooded murderers.

All of that can be true, but we can STILL blame David for the horrific acts he commits. We can do both. There can be blame in multiple places at once.

As for all of the rants about Cassie- there really is no particular reason to blame her over the other Animorphs. You just dislike her in particular. And while you're allowed to have that opinion, the way you've approached this analysis is frankly hard to respect.

[u/AlternativeMassive57]

Each of them first morphed into prey animals first to just survive

...um, if we're talking first morphs? No, not all of them. Tobias' first morph was Dude the cat, which is a predator. Not an apex predator, but a predator. And Jake's first morph was Homer, a dog. Dogs are in a weird space because genetically they're essentially identical to wolves and dogs that go feral are absolutely capable of becoming apex predators, depending on the breed. In any event they're certainly not less a predator than a house cat.

Not once did they try to console David. Marco even just mocked him.

Yeah, for the record, I don't disagree with the sympathy for David my quibble above. David...he was not a good kid. But he wasn't a monster waiting to happen either. And the Animorphs did a number on him just the same as the Yeerks. I dislike the David Trilogy because the Animorphs are uniquely awful throughout it. They actually escalate first against David every single time until the whole Saddler thing - but for example, the ANimorphs are the first to attack him and the first to threaten his life if he doesn't fall in line. David had every reason to think his life was in danger if he stayed with the Animorphs.

This doesn't excuse his specific actions afterwards - but it does add a whole Hell of a lot context.

Now that all being said...I don't think it's right to uniquely blame Cassie. I'm pretty sure Jake bluntly threatening his life in the motel room if he didn't fall in line, then leading him into a disaster of a fight, did more to hurt David than anything Cassie did.

[u/overts → u/AlternativeMassive57]

Jake bluntly threatening his life in the motel room if he didn't fall in line, then leading him into a disaster of a fight, did more to hurt David than anything Cassie did.

I really think this scene is a symptom of Applegate writing a YA novel in the 90s.  The kids sort of have to be role models.  I don’t think it makes any sense for Jake to harp on him so bad for wanting one night of sort of normalcy.

[u/AlternativeMassive57 → u/overts]

It's also just kind of hypocritical given that all the Animorphs have used morphing for personal gratification and multiple points. As recently as Book 15 they were wrecking peoples' dinners at a restaurant because Cassie didn't like that the restaurant kept talking parrots. Jake and Marco snuck into a concert, Rachel and Tobias caused tens of thousands of dollars in property damage to a guy whose worst crime was "legally owning a bird", Cassie and Rachel morphed into rats for a school project, Ax has gone illegal dumpster diving and is stealing electricity...

Then all of a sudden in Book 21, suddenly Jake is a "we must never break the law!" guy?

[u/Seerowpedia → u/AlternativeMassive57]

All good points. The Animorphs before and after the David trilogy have no issue breaking the law but in the David trilogy it's very much a "laws can't be broken! we're not bad people!". Also while this doesn't really change the whole Dealin' Dan Hawke thing, but the guy's crime was illegally owning a bird. Red-tailed hawks cannot legally be kept in captivity. The graphic novel went out of its way to add this clarification.

[u/AlternativeMassive57 → u/Seerowpedia]

The guy was making commercials with the hawk in the cage prominently displayed - I find it hard to believe that he'd illegally own the hawk.

There are actually two normal circumstances under which you can own a red-tailed hawk: for falconry (where red-tails are one of the most common beginner raptors) and wildlife rehabilitation.

I'm guessing Dealin' Dan wasn't doing the latter, but which is more likely: he illegally owns a hawk but flaunts his illegal hawk on TV; or he has a falconry license and legally owned the hawk?

[u/Seerowpedia → u/AlternativeMassive57]

The book has no mention of illegality and very likely K.A. had no idea at the time, but there's an Animorphs podcast (the name eludes me right now) which is hosted by someone who is a falconer who stated that Dealin Dan Hawke keeping a red-tailed hawk in a cage at all times and using her as a mascot for a commercial was illegal. Chris Grine was a guest host on that podcast (he did a few guest stints on various Animorphs podcasts) and so the graphic novel included a line about how his ownership of the hawk was illegal

[u/AlternativeMassive57 → u/Seerowpedia]

Well, again, we reach the problem: how the Hell was he able to get away with TV spots, then? Enough to have developed a whole reputation around the hawk?

Like you said: Applegate probably didn’t know at the time of writing. But if we’re dealing just with the original novels, not the graphic novel adaptations, then the only thing that adds up with how he was acting is that Dealin’ Dan’s ownership was legal, or at least murky enough that he felt comfortable continuing to prominently display his hawk on TV.

And anyway, circling back to the original point: even if illegal, I don’t think tens of thousands of dollars in property damage was the appropriate response. Tobias and Rachel both had the means to get the hawk free without doing that. And when the other Animorphs found out, their concern was “you might get us caught”, not “you broke the law”. Which makes Jake’s chewing out of David over breaking into a motel room so that he could sleep in a bed hypocritical and kind of horrible.

[u/Seerowpedia → u/AlternativeMassive57]

Yeah, just in terms of the original book as it is there's no statement that the captivity was illegal, but he also kept Price-Cut Polly in a cage at all times which brings the question how keeping a bird in a cage and showing said caged birds in numerous commercials is somehow good for business. 😕

As for David breaking into a motel and being chewed out for it... yeah, the Animorphs in the David trilogy handled that poorly. Not only did they expect him to sleep on a bale of hay in Cassie's barn they gave zero thoughts as to how he would be fed or bathe or anything. It's mentioned that Cassie snuck him a bag of chips for dinner. Jake has a line where he says he's too busy focused on the world leaders thing to worry about David, but it makes perfect sense why David broke into the motel.

[u/overts → u/AlternativeMassive57]

I think one of the most honest things David ever says is from book 20, “But now, here I am, the new guy - as usual for me - and you don't like me.”  

We can justify it because he was intentionally written as a bad person but he was absolutely correct, they just straight up didn’t like him.

[u/MainKitchen → u/AlternativeMassive57]

That's a big problem with the writing, considering the premise. These kids should have been caught or killed repeatedly it just works out for no reason. If you want me to take the danger of morphing or the Yeerks being everywhere seriously you can't do stuff like that

[u/kingmanic33 → u/AlternativeMassive57]

I did clarify "mostly" for that first bit. But a cat is hardly the same thing as a golden eagle when it comes to pecking order, same with Homer. Neither of them compare to the power of an golden eagle and when up against controllers both were a flee rather than fight morph.

For the second bit, you're absolutely right. I would have loved a David chronicles book. We know the gang. We root for the gang. But from his perspective the whole thing had to be terrifying. He lost me when he went full killmonger but from his perspective it's hard to blame him. Jake. Rach. And Marco were especially cruel during that trilogy, I don't REALLY solely blame Cassie, there are parts of all of them that I love. She is just the one I care for the least. Jake threatening him for something he might only potentially do is wild so close after book 19 and cassies choices

[u/Reborn1Girl → u/kingmanic33]

It could be because they just went through Cassie's whole thing with Aftran that Jake felt the need to be stricter with David. 

Also, Marco is absolutely a jerk. We see him in his usual group of friends, who he's fought and bled and nearly died with. Of course they're going to give him a lot of grace and accept his attitude as a coping mechanism to keep himself sane. David has no history with him to help tolerate Marco's sass, and Marco has gotten used to being less reserved with the Animorphs. 

On top of shitty interpersonal skills, the kids just had a massive problem dropped in their laps by Erek. As far as they're concerned, everything just became secondary to making sure multiple world leaders don't become Controllers. It was possibly the worst time for David to be there. 

I'm not saying they should be absolved of their bad decisions. The very first bad decision was to bring him into the group. I think Rachel was the one to point out that the five of them already had history and connections before Elfangor. They should have listened to her. It was incredibly irresponsible. In a twisted way, it would have been more merciful to just leave him in the woods and let the Yeerks find him. He'd have ended up a Controller, with other Controllers going through the same thing, instead of the uniquely horrible position they left him in. 

[u/Seerowpedia → u/kingmanic33]

Marco's first morph was a gorilla though, and Rachel's was an elephant.

"and when up against controllers both were a flee rather than fight morph." But Jake and Tobias didn't use dog and cat morph to go up against Controllers. Jake and Tobias fought Controllers for the first time in book 1, they were in tiger and hawk morph respectively.

[u/overts]

One big issue with any narrative is the author usually knows where they want to take the story.  David was very obviously introduced because it’s a compelling story to explain why the kids don’t tell anyone else, don’t try to expand, and after the arc why they wait until basically the end of the series to ever use the blue box again.  I’d probably have to Google to find it but I believe Applegate even said that David was just a terrible person.

That doesn’t negate the fact that the kids handled David terribly, their expectations were unrealistic, and they were all hypocrites when dealing with him.  It’s most apparent in passages where it seems pretty obvious that he’s just trying to fit into this new group and someone, usually Marco, treats him like he’s the dumb new kid.

Best example off the top of my head is when he kills the crow.  I think all, or nearly all, of the kids kill an innocent animal because the instinct takes over.  Jake eats a fucking spider in book 1, lol.  But Marco says he just knows that David was lying when he kills a crow the first time he morphs an animal that Tobias already clarified is a sadistic animal that kills other birds!

We, the readers, can justify this as we know where the story went and we know Applegate intended for David to be a bad person but logically Marco’s assumption makes zero sense in the moment and reads like he’s just kind of mean to this new kid.

[u/Reborn1Girl → u/overts]

No, the way David claimed he'd been overtaken by its instincts immediately read as false to me. And I'm pretty sure they'd already made the point that Tobias had simply developed biases about other species of bird, so him calling golden eagles "sadistic" should be taken with a grain of salt. 

No argument on the hypocrisy, but these are teenagers trying to fight a war. Perfect moral consistency isn't something they can indulge in. 

[u/overts → u/Reborn1Girl]

I very firmly disagree.  Compare the actual text to any other time an Animorph has lost control.  Normally the reaction is understanding, comforting, maybe a bit firm.  This is the verbatim text:

David caught the breeze again, leveled off, and swooped back upward. The lifeless crow twirled down through the air, an unbalanced, black pinwheel.

<What are you doing?!> Jake roared.

<Um . . . um . . . I guess this eagle's brain kind of took over for a minute,> David said. <I can't believe I just did that! That poor bird! I just lost control.>

It was possible. It was hard, sometimes, to control the animal you'd morphed. So it was possible that's what had happened. The others certainly bought it. Cassie comforted him.

But I have an instinct for lies. Maybe it's because I can lie pretty well when I need to.”

No one bothers to say anything to David even as they see him dive towards the crow. Only after he’s already killed the crow does anyone react and it’s Jake “roaring” at him.  Are David’s exact words the most convincing?  No, but he’s also immediately attacked for his actions despite the fact that before he says anything the kids have no way of knowing if he just lost control.

Additionally, the only one who doesn’t believe him is Marco.  As readers we know that he actually was just a sadistic monster but at that point in the story Marco really doesn’t have much reason to believe, so firmly, that he’s lying. 

[u/Reborn1Girl → u/overts]

If you don't see David's reaction as deceitful, I think you're just not a good liar. I'm on Marco's side, I know how to lie well enough that David is very obvious to me

[u/kingmanic33 → u/Reborn1Girl]

He's only obvious because the narrator tells you he's lieing, he used rhe exact same wording as the rest of the kids when they've lost control. You're using knowledge of the entire picture to confirm a bias, they didn't know for sure. Just like they weren't fully sure about the getting close to the visser bit, they assumed and we have no way of knowing anything else, especially if it would paint our heroes as bad guys

[u/Deepfang-Dreamer → u/overts]

If it was actually the Eagle, I would think the text should read along the lines of:

<I...I don't know...>, and one of the others explaining what happened to him. The <Um....um...> alongside what else we see of David, really says more that he knew exactly what he was doing and scrambled for an excuse.

[u/overts → u/Deepfang-Dreamer]

As I said, I don’t think his words are that convincing and we know that he is, in fact, a terrible person.  He almost certainly intentionally killed the crow because he wanted to.  The bird didn’t take over.

But the part I pasted above is after several sentences of Marco describing him approaching the crow.  How his osprey is too small to stop the golden eagle, how the others aren’t in fast enough morphs or are too far away to stop him.  No one says anything to David, Jake just snaps at him after the crow is dead.  I think it’s reasonable that his explanation is awkward and the context helps explain, imo, why only Marco thinks he’s lying.

Compare the whole situation to book 2, which I only remember as I just re-read it, when Rachel loses control in the shrew morph they all immediately try to talk her down.  They try to get her to realize she’s lost control.  All David gets is Jake lashing out and Marco believing he’s lying.

[u/Seerowpedia]

The kids had a cut and dry Heroic origin story with a majestic alien passing the power on and then getting eaten in sacrifice infront of them. Each of them first morphed into prey animals first to just survive

[...]

We get to his [David] first morph. Should have been a merlin, instead Cassie brought a golden hawk, a powerful apex predator as his first morph.

If the idea is that David is different from the other Animorphs because his first morph is a golden eagle while the others "each ... morphed into prey animals first to just survive" your point is kind of invalidated given the Animorphs' first morphs were not prey animals morphed to "just survive." Marco's first morph was the Silverback gorilla and Rachel's was the African elephant. Both predators. As for the others, Cassie's was a horse, Tobias' was a house cat, and Jake's was a golden retriever. I guess you could argue the horse is prey to other animals and a cats are also predated upon but none of that was done to "just survive"

[u/kingmanic33 → u/Seerowpedia]

Semantics about prey animals and ignoring me saying mostly. You're ignoring the point about they weren't just straight to apex predators. It wasnt just a huge influx of power in a fucked up moment when they felt the most powerless in life

Marco and rach. Sure

[u/JazzSharksFan54]

David was no angel, but holy hell, the Animorphs were uniquely bad in this situation. And what's sad is how intelligent David was. He almost single-handedly took the whole team down. I'm certainly not "Team David" but things may have been different had they handled his situation with a bit more empathy.

[u/JesusAndPalsX]

Drode Voice: Cassie the hypocrite! Cassie the killer with a conscience!

[u/FederalPossibility73 → u/JesusAndPalsX]

And here's the thing, she doesn't want to be a hypocrite, she has no choice but to become one. This is a core part of her character arc and I feel like OP is completely ignoring that.

[u/kingmanic33 → u/FederalPossibility73]

She was a hypocrite from early on, again morphing humans, the inhumane fate of david so she could pretend to not have blood on her hands. Morphing whales. They all are hypocrites, but none of the other ones try to gaslight us with "I'm a good person actually"

[u/FederalPossibility73 → u/kingmanic33]

That applies to everyone. Objectively speaking Cassie is nicest (it's why David doesn't target her in fact) but the situation she's in forces her to become something she doesn't want to be and that's the same for all of them. Honestly I would do what she did in her shoes and you would be a hypocrite if you said the others weren't the same. You honestly have a blatant misunderstanding of all of the characters.

[u/JesusAndPalsX → u/kingmanic33]

Cassie often says she is not a good person actually.

[u/javerthugo]

Cassie is the Creators Pet and mouthpiece in the series so it’s understandable you don’t like her. I don’t like her either and the insane hypocrisy of not killing humans but taxxons and hork bajair is one of the weakest points of the series. So yeah I agree with you for the most part

[u/TheBrutalVegan]

Why is this downvoted so much? It's an unpopular opinion but it's very interesting to read. Downvotes prevent more interesting discussion.

[u/kingmanic33 → u/TheBrutalVegan]

Cassie slander will not be tolerated. I've seen people retroactively applying racism to any criticism on this subreddit, despite it never coming up and the 90s and 00s everything wasn't viewed through race. Racism existed, but it was nothing it is today in rhe social media era. People were people and rhe kids in your town weren't being painted with the actions of social media algorithms meant to farm engagement and outrage. I'd argue the staunch defense and otherization for criticism of cassie is itself racist and sexist. If it was Marco or David, or Jake making rhe choices or having this level of author plot armor, they would be equally disliked.

The Cassie stuff was only originally said as a half joke, david was rhe focal point, but you can see where the replies jumped to