the.walking.meme

Turns out Benthomaar and Vania been living out a full six season romantic soap opera in the background ever since the merge that's still ongoing, and whenever we happen to bump into one of them there's some wild new development the plot refuses to go into actual detail about. You make it a forbidden romance somehow, but they've fallen in love in secret and betrayed each other and got caught up in arranged marriages. There was an assassination attempt in there somewhere and tampered love notes and blackmail and a long lost twin brother all mixed in for good measure. Every time any character tries to get clarification on what's going on you just end up more confused.

So like, you get a scene with the ninja just chatting it up with Bentho at some diplomatic function, they see Vania enter the room and Lloyd is just like "Oh hey! Vania's here too! You know Vania?"

our ninja being dumbasses they are would totally miss it and meanwhile vania and bentho would totally fall in love like 3 times and break up and make up like 3 more XD

got tagged by @elegantdeerbaran some time ago but i thought i was too basic for it, got tagged again yesterday by @darthdisasterous and now i feel i've got no choice lol

Ummm lemme see

@i-do-anything-but-write

@loftwingofcrimson

@butterfly-teacup

also thankee for the tag <3

these are so basic but!! here ya go, good luck :D

(i don't have much mutuals here bc i don't come here as often but i can tag who i can hah)

The highlighted ones are the Main Hobbies they do)

Kai- Guitar, singing, Drawing, Fighting (learning different styles\techniques), Metal work/Blacksmithing, Collecting random trinkets, napping

(When be was a little kid he was Obsessed with bugs/insects/etc)

Nya- Surfing, Dancing, Swimming (sometimes competitively?), Engineering, Boxing, Watching really bad movies and complaining about them after (Sharknado is a classic) Or watching reality Tv and throwing the remote at the tv when something stupid happens

Jay- Dancing, video games, tinkering/making tech stuff, Sometimes goes surfing with Nya, Watching hour long video essays about random topics and yapping about them

Cole- Art (painting/drawing), Video games, Hiking, Rock climbing, Rock collecting, Listening to music, Guitar, Thrifting (Ok all of them thrift but Cole does it for the love of the game), Watching reality shows like “Love is blind” literally just to judge people for their horrible taste

Lloyd- Volunteering at animal shelters, Reading (mostly comics), Mediation, Colouring, walking, Staring at walls? Watching weird Romcoms, Playing Tomagatchi life

Zane- Cooking/Baking, Bird watching, Reading, Crocheting and/or Knitting, Researching, Listening to true crime documentaries/podcasts, watching Nature documentaries

Pixal- Gardening, Painting, Engineering, Researching, Bill nye the science guy (idk why T-T), Being an absolute baddie

*Not that any of them have time to actually do any of their hobbies lol*

If anyone DOES happen to die, they aren't really fazed and just discuss how long they think til they come back. Bets on Lloyd are usually shorter than everyone else's given he met god and woke up with same-day delivery.

This concerns the children.

Wyldfyre: YOU GUYS ZANE DIED

Sora: OH NO WHAT ARE WE GONNA DO

Frak: That's okay, I'll call the rest of the ninja

(the rest of the team comes)

Lloyd: I bet 2 months

Nya: What? 2 whole months? No no no, at least like 1

Cole: I'm telling you guys, 3 weeks should be okay

Jay: What are you talking about, Cole? More like 2 weeks

Kai: I bet you guys... 1 WEEK

Everyone: WHAAAAAT??

Pix (already on her way to rebuild him): If i hurry, he could be back tomorrow in the morning

Arin: CAN YOU GUYS STOP ACTING LIKE NOTHING HAPENNED??

Kai: You guys are gonna get used to that, don't worry

1. Snake Among Us- Jay

10/10. Sums up the season perfectly

2. I could use a spare arm- Lloyd

10/10. He just wants to be like his father 🥺 also movie foreshadowing???

3. They didn’t win, we lost- Lloyd

11/10. Lloyd is 14 and thinks this is super deep.

4. What’s earth anyway?- some kryptarium inmate in s6

422/10. Ninjagoan conspiracy theorists are on a whole other level.

Sometimes people forget that Kai had to run an entire forge and raise his sister in the years leading up to season 1. So, just a reminder, Kai had to run an entire forge AND raise his sister in the years leading up to season 1.

Our favorite hothead is, in fact, perfectly capable of making responsible choices and taking charge when he needs to, he just doesn't like doing it- which is a HUGE contrast to his character in the early seasons, and there are a lot of reasons for why this is such an important part of his development over the show, but a few of the big ones are

A.) Kai is a fighter, a brawler- his preferred method of doing anything is jumping in and figuring it out along the way. Stepping back and assessing a situation is not how he likes to do things, and never has been. But that's how he was forced to do things before the start of the series, because it was just him and Nya. Somebody had to teach her critical thinking skills, and it sure as hell wasn't their parents.

B.) Being in a team dynamic wasn't exactly something any of them were used to- Kai especially. He had to learn that it was a good thing he wasn't in charge, wasn't the best or the strongest or the smartest, because he didn't have to be- and when he learned that, he became infinitely more comfortable and confident is his own abilities

Reason B also happens to be why losing his powers effected him so hard in season 11- his skill set and role had changed once again, and as the show has established, Kai's not really a huge fan of losing control of situations, but his own personal development has been based around his growing ability to adapt and overcome without taking too many risks in the meantime. All of this circles back to my original point- It's not really his strong suit, making choices and having the foresight to see how they'll affect his situation- but what he does have is the ability to carry through and complete the task ahead of him, so long as he knows what it is.

Also:

SEASON 5 WHEN THEY TAKE TURNS LEADING IT'S LITERALLY THIS EXACT SCENARIO-

Kai with all due respect was extremely stupid, I get he's probably just really fucking stressed about Lloyd and wants to rescue him, but that stress completely destroyed his ability to make sensible decisions and we saw this with how he almost like- lashes out and gets mad at the others when they suddenly decided to follow Zane because he knows the way to styxx.

We're shown that Kai cannot work well if he's constantly under pressure and especially if he's leading while under pressure, because when you're leading you have to think long term and especially in their situation, because Lloyd is on the line here and they don't know how long it'll take them until they get him back.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, Zane "Ninjago" Julien.

initially, he starts out really good, leading the Ninja to styxx and helping with the job needed to get money for Ronin, but eventually something goes wrong and it just happens to be his voice box malfunctioning, granted you could attribute Zane's failure as a leader to ironically enough, Kai. (because he raised Ronin's price and also hit Zane with the crane, which AGAIN, PROVES THAT KAI SUCKS AT LEADING LMAO).

And the 2nd example is probably SoG with the whole snake jaguar thing and how he essentially threw Cole under the bus, heck in the next episode "Snake Jaguar" you could literally see Zane sorta struggling with the whole riding with the SoG thing and maintaining the hidden persona, so much is going on all at once and he's yet again like Kai in Season 5, under pressure, a different kind this time but pressure nonetheless.

And that ends up him at the bottom of the canyon.

And that's why they just work together so well.

Kai is Zane's sense of direction in a difficult and chaotic and constantly changing situation/environment, he helps guide Zane throw the chaos because that's just how he grew up, he knows how to think on the fly and how to work well with what you have on your hands.

On the contrary:

Zane is Kai's compass of normality and calm in an ever changing and dangerous world, Zane is the only one capable of helping Kai ground himself in reality, because even for Kai, the constantly changing environment takes its toll on his overthinking brain, but Zane's there to help just slow down and relax, to sort of De-stress his brain and help him calm down.

And these attribute about then are only amplified by 10 when you consider what type of people they are.

Selfless, caring people who only want to see their friends and family happy and safe, because that's the mentality they grew up, a mentality of "Protect those close to you at ALL costs.", a mentality quite literally engraved into them from a young age.

And I feel like once they realised that about each other, they suddenly started working together a lot better, because now, they for a FACT know that there's someone else besides them that cares this much about the others.

Finding comfort in relatability is probably one of their strongest suits, and it's one of the reasons they just work so well together, because aside covering each other's weaknesses, they also amplify each other's strengths.

Kai knows who to go and talk to if he ever gets overwhelmed by his constantly changing and dangerous life.

And Zane knows who to go and talk to if he ever feels lost and stressed by his constantly changing and dangerous life.

They lift each other up in times of need, for fucks sake they're brothers at this point, not by blood, but bond.

like the analisis is great and i absolutely love it

(btw i just thought this was gonna be a small reblog but hell no, i get too excited and overly analitycal when it comes to my 2 favorite legos, so long post alert again or sth)

Kai and Zane are my favorite duo and i've always seen them as best friends (kinda like bruise but kinda different) and i kinda felt like while the bruise friendship was happening onscreen (almost all the time), the opposite friendship was more offscreen and was more implied than shown or told to have been happening

they don't have those big moments like Cole and Jay (like them making up during the fight at the tournament of the elements or Cole trying to save Jay from Nadakhan) but it was more of those small things that just make you go - wow those two are closer than it seems

(also this kinda fits the idea of a more secret bond that the author of the previous post mentioned in the tags)

(btw i loooooove this idea)

the thing that made me think about it first was the 1st episode of the tournament of the elements, when Lloyd is talking to the rest of the ninja how the team needs them back and all that stuff

Jay talks about how he's mad at Cole

Cole talks about how he's mad at Jay

and Kai talks about how he misses Zane and how the team isn't the same without him and how he'd rather die instead of him and all that and he's the only ninja we see visiting Zane's statue in the show (except for the funeral ofc)

also Zane's funeral

Kai is the one doing the speech at his funeral (not other ninja, not Pix and not even sensei Wu or sensei Garmadon; like dude was picked to speak at his funeral when litteraly 2 of the possible options were his masters) and the speech was very personal (even tho ninja were all very close with each other, he didn't say that he powered all of them, he spoke from his personal experience "as he powered me")

another thing that i noticed was when in possesion, Zane started talking backwards and no one could understand him (even Jay who knows his way around when it comes to technology) but when Zane said some gibberish when they were in Ronin's shop, Kai was just like: he said it's another one of Morro's friends (maybe i'm overanalysing this one but you guys XD it wouldn't be possible in all the merged realms for a person that knows as little about tech as Kai "i hate technologyyyyyy" Smith to understand a nindroid that damaged his voice box and started talking backwards if he didn't know the said nindroid well enough on some deep level or sth to guess correctly what he's saying)

another thing could be the scene from master of the mountain, i mean it's like one of the most famous moments with those characters together if i'm not wrong (i mean i know some of their lines by heart, it's hilarious) but the reason they got lost together in the dungeons in the first place was bc during the breakout from the mines, they were running away together (i may be overanalysing as well but i wouldn't have it any other way XDD), maybe it was just some instincts or sth but still, they have that kind of trust in each other and they can feel safer together (when they saw Cole running in the same direction, they wanted him to go with them too but the rocks blocked the way, but it's not that relevant to my point now haha)

another thing about Kai and Zane that made me think about it was how in those "baby teams" that they were in during that year between hands of time and the oni trilogy, they were teamed up with each other

when ninja split up to fight some bad guys if needed and find sensei Wu who got lost in the time stream, it made perfect sense for Cole and Jay to go together (bc besties and they've been through so much together that they're probably only people in all the realms that could handle each other for a year), it made perfect sense for Nya to go by herself (you know she's used to working alone and she likes solitude and is very independent) and it made perfect sense for Lloyd to go alone too (a future master, with Wu gone he probably was also figuring out stuff for himself) and just like those teams made perfect sense, the Kai and Zane team also made perfect sense (maybe in a bit less obvious way, but it's a way of showing the relationship that they have, and just how comfortable they are with each other and how natural this whole "who likes ice cream? i do! how was that for a last line, Kai? can we leave now?" thing was, i actually love the idea of Zane wanting to learn some lines to throw at villains and wanting Kai to teach him that while our Kai is still stuck at the old "NOT SO FAST" since basically the beggining of the show XDDD), and obviously since Wu was gone at the time, no one set those teams up, but the ninja themselves (so that means that they chose to go together, yay)

i've noticed another thing with the opposite friendship that i've found interesting, when Zane was the Ice Emperor and Lloyd was trying to remind him of his past he was just like: but Kai? you gotta remember Kai! and just proceeded to tell him the story about him being a pink ninja for a day (i just think that's really funny but also kinda cute that in a situation where Zane needs to remember stuff to no longer be an evil tyrant, Lloyd just tells him about Kai, i think that either he knew that these 2 were close or pulling that laundry prank on Zane was his favorite memory from his childhood, i kinda think it was both ngl)

another throwback to the Never Realm, when Zane plugged that mech into his head to charge it he said something along the lines of: "like Kai used to say: here goes nothing!" (idk the quote but you get what i'm saying hah), like bro is about to risk his life or memories bc he has no other way and he's thinking about his best friend who actually does risky stuff for fun XD (ofc he risks to protect, just like Zane, but not only ofc XD he kinda likes that risky feeling and all that, but i also feel like that ability to take a risk without much analysis is something that Kai may have taught him a bit)

also another thing that stuck with me was in march of the oni, after Cole fell into this oni cloud thing and when Kai is like "we have to turn back" and is under strong emotions (can't actually tell what it is, excuse my alexithymia XD but i get it in this weird non-verbalised way hah) and Zane is the one that's trying to calm him down

oh and i almost forgot about Zane waking up after the merge, i mean Wu could've just called Nya there bc she's good with tech stuff and she could reactivate Zane by herself, but for some reason he also called Kai (Kai knows nothing about technology but was there, maybe to support his best friend on his first mission since the merge or he wanted him especially to be one of the people that he first sees after being reactivated)

alright maybe some of that was overanalysing but idc XD

i sometimes believe that if you like duos that interact a whole lot, you have a lot just handed to you, but if you like duos that don't have a big thing in the plot, you just turn into detective Zane and overanalise stuff about your favorite legos XD

Vania: omg, I get so many butterflies when I'm around him, he's so cute, I've got the biggest crush, do you think he likes me back???