#like what do i call graham..gray...crackle...whatever..

do i wanna know? | carmen/gray

i love these two so much oml ;_; cant wait to see what s2 has in store for them!!!!

How do you cope with emotional immaturity when your partner doesn't think cheating is a big deal?

In the crackling flames of the fire pit, you reminisced on what once was. You didn't know how Jeongin seemed so content with himself. Across the way, he slumped back in his own lawn chair. It buckled beneath his weight, hovering a bit above the ground. Yours did the same exact thing. 

Your eyes didn't leave the flames. They curled and flickered, sending bolts of fire reflecting in your pupils. Wisps of gray smoke swirled and blew towards the open night sky. Beneath the cover of darkness, it was just you and Jeongin on the cement top of the roof. Shingles were nowhere in sight, just the vast endlessness of electrical equipment for the apartment building. 

Not many people were allowed access to the roof, but after you asked your landlord for permission, they hesitated, but agreed. Welded panels of steel kept the flames trapped inside a portable fire pit. Logs crackled as fire consumed them. You sat in the silence, wondering where everything went wrong. 

RedCrackle, CarmIvy and Carulia.

So, I decided to divide it in parts because we'll have to analyze Gray's character a little bit to understand Red Crackle more. I think this is going to have five parts or something because when I try to post things too long Tumblr goes all error and stuff. And I got a lot to say about Red Crackle.

Okay, to start, I haven't read the novel but I heard that there has some scenes of the novel that conflicts with canon. And I looked for Duane Capizzi saying that and couldn't find it. Second of all, this person seems to don't understand what is Gray's purpose at all. He's that interesting yet misterious unpredictable morally gray character. He's not truly good or truly evil, he's that one character we never know which side he's going to take. Both A.C.M.E and V.I.L.E.(specifically the personification of each, Chief and Maelstrom) talking about "seeing the world in shades of gray" while Gray in on the screen proves that. He never seems to fully embrace completely one of the sides until the very ending of the show. Even when he sticks to V.I.L.E. the good in him still shows. He's the second most sweetheart operative V.I.L.E. ever had(only loses to El Topo). Third thing is when Carmen and Player are talking about it Carmen says that Gray tried to "blow her out like a birthday candle" and when you blow a birthday candle, you can light it up again. Fourth:at the conversation they have on the train, Carmen says:"V.I.L.E. wants me stealing FOR them instead of FROM them" so why would Gray kill her if that's not what V.I.L.E. wants? V.I.L.E. wants her alive, on their side, and we know how V.I.L.E. manipulates their agents to do what they want. Besides Paper Star, I don't think we seen any other agent disobey V.I.L.E. Anyway, for me it doesn't make sense, and I always understood he wanted to make her unconscious and take her back to V.I.L.E. Perhaps V.I.L.E. said :"Convince her and if she doesn't want to, kill her." but I don't get why they would say that since they could just mind wipe her like they did at the finale but then again a lot of things about V.I.L.E.(and on this show overall) don't make sense but it adds a certain charm to it I guess, lol. But canon or non canon that he tried to kill her or not, even Carmen defended him saying he did that on "direct orders of V.I.L.E. which he doesn't seem to remember exists anymore." So if Carmen herlself forgave him, why can't you? I particularly like to think he would have stopped saying he couldn't do it, like we see him doing afterwards in the Himalayans. I like to believe that's the kind of person he is because homeboy listened to her telling almost the whole entire story of her life, when he didn't have to(my personal theory is that he was trying to avoid the moment the most that he could). And when he says "bye black sheep", the camera focus on Carmen saying:"You weren't listening, I go by Carmen now." with the crackle rod on, in front of her. He could have made it quick, but he hesitated. Intentionally or not, he gave Carmen the time to say that and fight back because he lowered his guard down. So these are some signals that, to me, indicate he wouldn't have finished the job, but you can believe whatever you want. The point is that he didn't knew V.I.L.E. would throw him away in an instance. He clearly looked confused before having his mind wiped.

*spoilers* umm....so yeah, i finished watching carmen sandiego, and i’m left in a state of perpetual sadness and despair. i feel like the ending of the show wrapped up wayyy too fast, and kind of left off on a bit of an unsatisfactory note for some of the characters. although i love the large and diverse cast of carmen sandiego, one of the drawbacks of having all those characters and arcs and storylines makes it harder to cram in a satisfying conclusion for everyone in a twenty-minute episode. so here’s what i would do if there was more time. 

let’s start off with the threads that i think were tied off pretty well: 

julia & chase devineaux: i wasn’t really a shipper of julia and devineaux but i actually really enjoyed their relationship throughout season 4. we see a lot of character growth from devineaux in the way that he interacts with julia and the world. julia pushes devineaux to become a better person, to see things with a broader perspective and from other people’s points of view. and he does really change a lot into an understanding person instead of the overconfident, arrogant detective we first saw him as in season 1. in addition, he also grows to respect julia as a person and partner, and it’s completely adorable how he looks at her while zari tells julia that they’ll follow her lead. also i love how he keeps wearing his lucky cat jacket from san francisco in season 4.  

el topo & le chevre: okay, i was pretty much shipping these two the minute they showed up on the screen together. you can tell how much they care about each other throughout the series. whenever one of them gets hurt, you can really see how they prioritize each other over whatever thing vile is planning. when things are good, they’re so sweet and they have so much fun together. and they take dumb cute selfies. they’re so, so adorable, and this season definitely brings the shipping fodder. and they end the season moving on from vile and running a food truck together. the only thing i’m mad about is that we definitely needed more screen time from them. 

shadowsan: i didn’t like shadowsan in season 1 but over the course of the series he really went through a lot of major character development and i love how he’s now basically a grumpy dad figure to carmen. the season ends with him finally reuniting for good with his brother in japan, and it’s a satisfying conclusion for his arc. i also love how he was the one to help carmen in the finale when she’s struggling with the brainwashing thing. which is way better than the brainwashing being resolved by some bs like true love’s kiss. (also carmen and gray are way too hurt and they’re super not ready for a relationship.)  carmen sandiego is a show that emphasizes the importance of family with this father-daughter duo, and i think that’s something really valuable. also i’m interpreting that shadowsan isn’t permanently moving to japan, but rather just visiting his brother. he’s still definitely going to be there for carmen going forward when she needs him. 

player & carmen’s friendship: i love this show for having a male/female friendship with absolutely no romantic feelings going on. it’s a solid friendship, and depicts a wholesome, supportive relationship. absolutely no qualms here.

and here’s all the stuff that needs expanding/fixing: 

tigress: i actually really love tigress as a character, and i personally think that there should have been more of her in the series. i would have liked to see more depth and motivation to her, since she has a lot of character potential. i don’t really know how i would rewrite tigress’s arc, because it’s virtually nonexistent and there’s not too much to go off of. i don’t think she needs a redemption arc, but i would give her more of a spotlight. (also low key fictional-crushing on her.) i would like to include sort of a tigress-centric episode, which can also generally be more expansion on the inner workings of vile.

cleo & saira: villain couple. villain couple. they need to be a villain couple, enough said. i would rewrite season 4 to have include an emotional downbeat moment in which saira struggles with being able to fit in with society and humans and being completely awkward at it while cleo, in all her regal and ettiquite-esque manners, tries to help. this wouldn’t really help with the main plot, but it would be humanizing and provide character depth. i feel like this could be the b-plot in the tigress episode somehow. 

coach brunt: you don’t betray family. at this point, coach brunt has lost the daughter she raised, who, in her mind, has basically backstabbed her entirely. coach brunt was also betrayed by shadowsan and left for the police to find, and in season 4, malestrom basically abandons her to drown. and it’s highly likely that somewhere in her backstory she’s been betrayed many times, likely by her own blood family, which would provide context for why she’s such a loyal person to vile, who she thinks of as her found family. in rewriting season four, i’m adding one extra episode that’s solely on the backstory of coach brunt. in this episode, we would explore brunt’s upbringing and the first time she is betrayed by someone she considers family. in my opinion, coach brunt was likely pushed to fall by another influence, but she also makes the conscious choice to choose revenge over moving on. potentially, we could also explore brunt’s budding friendship with the mechanic, who we never see again after that one episode, as well as a reflection upon this from her adult self. 

gray & the freaking mind control thing & his moral struggles: *sighs* i can see what the show is going for, but i really just don’t see it in the execution. the way that gray struggles with morality is like it’s an on and off switch. he’s either graham, basic civilian, or crackle, basically evil. in that one episode, he flip flops between being overly heroic, even taking out time from his day to specifically track down a random kid to return his wallet instead of just dropping it off at the police station or leaving it where he found it. and then the flip side is like he’s just robotically relapsing into stealing mode, where he just suddenly has to impluse to steal literally anything. i feel like this flip flop wasn’t really a good portrayal of his struggle and didn’t really demonstrate many active choices made by him. and the way that he’s just like “i’m actually just evil” when he confronts carmen at the lab is just super one-dimensional. i just don’t buy it that he flips to vile so quickly in the span of a few episodes. i feel like there should have been more active reflecting and the decision should have been dragged out longer. 

also it’s revealed in the finale that gray also changed his crackle rod to not go beyond a stun, and i think this was a nice touch, because it demonstrates his aversion to murder, which calls back to the first caper, in which he’s confronted with killing the archeologist at the excavation site. but he doesn’t end up having to make that choice, because carmen stops him. but this time, it’s his own choice to take that step away from vile ideals. i don’t think gray is ever going to be a “hero” of the traditional sense or have a complete redemption arc, because it just doesn’t fit him. to be honest, i don’t know what the future will hold for gray, but i definitely think of he will fall somewhere along the lines of red x (teen titans) or catwoman’s (in certain comic runs) gray morality. (and i think the way gray returns to vile kind of screws this up.) he’s still going to steal stuff sometimes probably, but he’s not going to straight up murder people. he would probably be the type to work for himself alone mostly, but be okay teaming up with the good guys sometimes. definitely no joining evil organizations tho. 

gray & carmen & the “i know you’re in there somewhere fight:” i definitely ship these two, but i think they’ve got a long way to go before they’re really ready to admit their feelings for each other. i’m happy that the “i know you’re in there somewhere fight” didn’t culminate in a kiss scene being the thing that snapped carmen out of the trance. because that is just so cliche and not the message of the show. instead, it’s shadowsan who does. and that makes sense going along with the themes of family. i think the issue with this i dislike how there is no more elaboration after carmen supposedly kills gray. this is her best friend. i would imagine that the reaction would be greater, since he was also her friend and teammate during the months they were both working under vile. and then when carmen’s brainwashing wears off, she agonizes that she killed her best friend. but that’s it. the “i know you’re in there somewhere fight” is the last screen appearance of both of them together. then it’s directly cutting to taking down vile. there should have been a hospital scene where carmen rides with him in the ambulance and talks to him as he’s unconscious, and leaves behind a note for him to read when he’s awake. 

i just really think there should be a “heart to heart” scene somewhere in this finale where they confront their feelings (not romantic stuff, but more about like shared trauma at the hands of vile and their broken apart friendship). this could happen at that sydney cafe. both times carmen and gray go on a “date” she leaves him sitting there alone, bewlildered. i think the finale should include a scene of them leaving the cafe together and then walking away and waving to each other. this shows development in their relationship, and that they are now closer, but it also visually shows that they still have differences as they walk away with a sort of two toned kind of environment angle that shows the different paths they have chosen. (and carmen calls him gray. and he doesn’t correct her.) it’s more of a see you later, than a goodbye though. we’re also getting rid of that part of when gray says he doesn’t want to complicate carmen’s life in the hospital scene. instead, he’s going to ask for a sheet of paper on which he will write an indiscernible letter to carmen. (the same letter will be seen in at the carmen brand outerwear hq a few scenes later for continuity, but unopened at the time, as if carmen’s not yet ready to read it. i feel like both of them need to heal a bit on their own before they’re ready to reconnect. gray knows he has hurt carmen in the past but he also knows it will hurt her if he disappears without a trace, so he’s leaving her with the choice if she wants to see him again instead of making the choice for her.)

ivy & zach & found family: carmen leaves a note behind for ivy and zach and leaves to find her mother. i feel like this did not handle team red’s found family very well. basically, the whole show is setting up this importance of family, especially found family not blood family kind of narrative. vile blood runs in carmen’s veins but she chooses to do good and find her own family. ivy and zach both choose carmen, their found family, over their racing career. i think that they should have stuck together, and when carmen goes to find her mom, they would have been totally onboard dropping her off at the airport and saying a “see you soon” or actually driving her to carlotta valdez’s house in lydia (the car). i just don’t think that splitting them up via a note is really a satisfying conclusion to the whole found family aspect. and in that time skip carmen really should have stopped by to say hi to the zach and ivy and the acme squad instead of maintaining the air of mystery. that would have definitely pushed the family feel, instead of the mysterious loner archetype. 

that time skip thing: yeah, no. this part was completely not needed and unhelpful. instead, we’re going to have carmen hug her mother at the airport, and go to visit all of her friends and found family, especially shadowsan in japan and ivy and zach in presumably boston. and the time skip will be a few onths not two effing years. i think it’s natural for them to grow apart a bit and pursue their own personal goals in life after vile’s gone, but they’ll definitely be staying in touch and reconnecting and seeing each other pretty often. and lastly of all, carmen will meet gray at the cafe in sydney.

basically, this is how i would redo the episodes for season 4. 

episode 1: the beijing bullion caper. (this episode remains as is for the most part, i would like more expansion on lady doksu and shadowsan's past since it seems like their pasts are more tied together than is revealed)

episode 2: the big bad ivy caper. (this episode remains as is for the most part.)

episode 3: the robo caper. (the scenes in which carmen first meets the robot and ivy runs it over with a truck can stay the same. where we start to deviate is with gray’s story with a revised, more complex, and in depth view of his moral struggles. instead of being unaware largely as gray flops between graham/crackle, he’s going to be a lot more aware. he’s still going to rob the house, but instead it’s because he feels hopeless that since he was previously a criminal, that’s all he’s ever going to be. gray doesn’t want to be a civilian, and feels like the only thing that he can do instead is be a part of vile. however, when he sees carmen again, he’s going to realize that if she got out of vile, then that means he has a chance to get out of it too. gray comes to a crossroads of deciding between carmen and vile, good and evil. 

episode 4: this will be the episode that concentrates on tigress, with a cleo/saira b-plot. most of this episode will take place within vile, and give more insights on the workings of the organization. 

episode 5: the himalayan rescue caper. (this episode is going to get a real makeover. with the insertion of episode 4, this creates more actual space between the last time we see gray grappling with his big choices, which makes it feel like more time has passed. so it actually feels like he had more time to think. carmen’s still going to try to rescue gray, and the part with player can stay the same. as gray is manipulated by malestrom, i think this episode should further emphasize how vile manipulates their recruits and amp up the shittiness of how malestrom is acting. i think malestrom should say something along the lines indicating that vile is gray’s only family left, this is what he was born to do, he belongs with them, and make up a bunch of bullshit lies about carmen. malestrom will portray this stuff as the “truth” and then say something like “we told you to the full truth, while carmen was hiding your past from you. didn’t you say you wanted to piece together more of your past?” (which gray did express interest in a previous episode.) since more time has passed, malestrom will play the “if carmen wanted to rescue you, she would have done so already. she abandoned you.” card. of course, it’s not easy to get into a super advanced vile facility, so instead carmen’s going to be having more struggles with getting in, which is the real reason she’s taking a while.) i want to keep the scene where he says that his name is crackle, not gray and not graham. i think this scene is particularly painful because graham/crackle is kind representative of the two sides of good and evil that gray thinks he has to choose between. gray will accuse carmen of abandoning him, both in the present but demonstrating that he’s still hurt by the time when she first left vile, and all those times when she kept secrets from him and disappearing in sydney. carmen asks him to leave with her, but instead of him being like “i’m bad, and i was always a villain,” he’s just going to be hurt and feel manipulated and be so conflicted. i feel like gray would choose vile, but not because it’s where he belongs but because he’s afraid of being brainwashed again if he doesn’t agree and because he just wants to know the truth, which vile happened to tell him first (and carmen had been hiding it from him for a while). why would it make sense for gray to willingly side with vile because he’s “throughly bad?” actions speak louder than words, and it’s clear that he’s definitely not evil enough for vile. 

episode 6: the vile history caper. (we’re just going to keep this episode as is for the most part. but like more el topo and le chevre moments.) 

episode 7: this will be the coach brunt backstory episode, piggybacking off of her hurt feelings about maelstrom’s intended betrayal. 

episode 8: the egyptian decryption caper. (this one is just going to be as is for the most part. the cleaners kidnap carmen, but we’re going insert one more painstaking scene of gray learning of vile’s plan to kidnap carmen. he’s not going to know they are planning to brainwash her. he’s going to feel conflicted and try to protest, but then realizes that now that he’s stuck with vile, if he goes against them he’s probably going to get brainwashed himself. and the brainwashing was really traumatizing, so it’s understandable he’s really afraid of it happening to him again.)

episode 9: the viennese waltz caper. (mostly just keeping this episode as is, but more worrying gray scenes. i feel like he should have had a bigger reaction to seeing carmen so unlike her personality. carmen’s lack of empathy should have pushed himself to question if vile is really a healthy place for anyone if they’re so willing to brainwash his best friend in a greater capacity. i think gray should recognize how bad the situation is but he still won’t act upon it since he’s trapped in the nostalgia of their old squad and since he’s been abandoned by carmen before, he’s too afraid that reversing the brainwashing will result in a repeat of her leaving him again. and he’s still afraid of the brainwashing.) 

episode 10 + 11 + 12. the dark red caper. (yeah, this episode is kind of just way too quickly wrapped up. i’m going to expand this into a three parter so we have more time to focus on everyone. basically, we’re going to expand this for the angst. and because this is the last season and i need more content. i feel like we can follow the general plot trajectory but with more nuance and include the improvements i wrote above about the finale. absolutely pushing the found family trope to its limits, and less vagueness since there’s not going to be another season. oh yeah, and the scene when carmen fights shadowsan, i feel like they could have amped up the emotional stuff and make it as much as about him being her dad figure as the doll because #foundfamily. and also the extra time gives more space for all of that other stuff like endings for all the characters, and more team red found family, and a bit about the non-jailed vile operatives, and the acme team, and also maybe a little infrastructure rebuilding montage, and also that carmen and gray moment.)  

Itstalkcartoons recently had a live stream interview with Carmen Sandiego’s showrunner Duane Capizzi, I’ve seen some thoughts on tumblr so after watching the interview I thought I’d drop down some direct quotes and talk about what happened. You can find the interview on Istalkcartoon’s IG page, it’s about an hour and a half long full of other tidbits about the characters and the show so definitely check it out if you’re interested. The post below will have spoilers from season 1 - season 4 so if you haven’t seen it yet, do not read below. 

Graham held his breath as a knife was pressed to his neck.

"What will it be, Carmen?" the lady holding him- Tigress?- taunted. "The vile? Or Crackle?"

Crackle. They kept calling him that. It was strange, Graham felt like he recognised the name. He couldn't quite remember though… it was like it was dancing just out of sight.

Carmen bit her lip and glanced down at the vile in her hands. It contained a cure to a deadly disease that had been devastating the Philippines.

"It's okay Red, " Graham whispered, as Tigress pressed the knife further into his neck, "don't worry about me, "

Carmen shook her head. "No, I can't- I won't let them hurt you again!"

Again? What was she talking about? Graham had never encountered this V.I.L.E before.

Carmen slowly held out her hand with the cure. "Okay. You win. Release him, "

Tigress laughed in delight as she shoved Graham forward into Carmen's arms, and grabbed the cure.

"Are you alright?" Carmen asked softly.

"Why would you do that? The cure-"

"I'll get it back, " Carmen replied. "And I know you have a lot of questions, but I'll explain later, I promise, "

…

"You knew me, from before, " Graham stated, stairing straight into Carmen's eyes. The cure had been secured and delivered to the appropriate medical scientist, and now he and Carmen were sitting in some random restaurant eating dinner. "From before the car accident I mean- if it even was a car accident, "

Carmen looked down. "I did, "

"Why didn't you just tell me?"

"I wanted to keep you safe, " Carmen sighed. "We were mixed up with some bad people. Doing bad things. I didn't want you to go back to them, to get hurt by them again, "

"You keep saying that; that they hurt me, " Graham said, "is that… I have these scars. I was told that I got them in the car accident, but they're pretty weird,"

"I don't know what they did, " Carmen admitted. "You told me that initiation was tough, and whatever they did must have been bad to make you… you're a good person Gray. I believe that. But something they did really hurt you and as a result you started hurting others, "

Graham felt a little sick. "What did I do?"

"Mostly just steal stuff, " Carmen mumbled.

There was silence for a moment.

"Carmen, please tell me, I didn't kill anyone? Did I?"

Carmen looked away. "As far as I know, you didn't,"

"But could I have?"

Carmen sighed and put her head in her hands. "I stopped you, the first time. But then I didn't see you again for quite a while. Anything could have happened, "

"Did we fight? Did I- did I hurt you?" Graham couldn't help but ask. He had to know.

Carmen shook her head and smiled softly, "I'm way too quick for you, "

in which five teens steal some booze cause why not

I.

“On my signal.” Black Sheep glanced back down the corridor they’d come from, then to parallel exit at the end of the hall. Cleo’s suite of classrooms was deserted this time of night, but recon told her there was always a chance of the Countess checking in for some trinket or a nightcap she just had to have before bed. Not really Lambkins’ jam, but hey— some people sleep with a teddy bear, and some sleep with a 12 carat diamond necklace. Cleo was definitely the latter. 

Black Sheep looked up to the ventilation, then stepped lightly - one hop, launching off the wall at just the right angle, and she was hanging on to the grating and pulling herself up to lodge a foot into the molding of the ceiling. “Jean-Paul?” He was the go-between. Sheena was stationed by Cleo’s personal quarters, Jean-Paul covering the vents, and Black Sheep had infiltration team. 

She could just barely hear a tapping somewhere far down the echoing shafts. Jean-Paul translated the tapping from his station much closer; “Oui, on monte au deuxième.”

She grinned, and silently pushed off and lowered herself back to the ground. “All clear,” she passed along the message, smirking to her team. “In we go.”