#teo yapping

Absolutely YESSSSSS

One of my favorite arcs, honestly — I won't say I know it in minute detail, but I really like it. That chilling, creepy vibe with their devotion to the Egg, and I love how Bad was developed in it (the archetype of 'relatively kind' characters who are hungry for power — yeah, those are my favorites).

Once upon a time, I had an abandoned project where the central arc would revolve around the Egg cult — and now the Eggpire has one of the leading roles in Voice's, like I said — essentially the strongest faction on the server.

Actually, just like with the Revival Book, I think I'd like to learn more canonical facts about the Egg itself — what it is, where it came from, where it all would have led, like...

Why is it afraid of green? Why specifically the Church of Prime? Did it fear the Church of YouTube?

Why is the Egg a 'she'? Is there really a connection to the Dreamons? Does it feed on people, or are they needed for something else? And so on.

Hmm,

I've followed Phil's character in some ways, so I'll draw my conclusions based on my observations and judgments from his reactions on streams.

If we're talking about c!Phil — the simplest and softest explanation of his character would be "he absolutely doesn't give a fuck about kids," despite his parental figure status. First of all, his behavior shows he's not the best father/friend even to those he cares about — his only canonical child, Wilbur (the situation with Tubbo and his box is debatable), didn't really concern Phil that much.

He loved him, I'll agree — because he hung out with his ghost and kept Wilbur's photo in his house — but his detached parenting is a character trait that can't be denied. He ignored Wilbur's letters, as far as I remember.

Same story with Techno, and a better example too. No matter how close they were, Phil was around, but his moments of indifference and neglect still show through. For example, what are the odds that your friend tells you: "oh, I'm going to my death, here's my will," and you read it once and put it on a shelf? Or don't even read it at all?

"I thought you said three months" — Phil laughed, accepted the fact that something could've happened to Techno way too easily, and didn't seem too worried about his best and oldest friend.

Also, I'll remind you that there was a moment where cc!Phil talked about a plot twist where c!Phil betrays c!Techno — which suggests that c!Phil shouldn't be seen as a merciful old man ready to take everyone in, even if that's a simple and popular stereotype. Technically, we're dealing with a calculating, somewhat cynical person, careless and cold toward others. If he does worry about anyone, it's those close to him — first I'd put Wilbur, second Techno.

Kristin probably holds a special pedestal, but she appeared very little in the lore, even though she saved him from the explosion.

From this, I think Phil would be fairly indifferent to Tommy. If he were someone with a compassionate soul for children, he would've been concerned that in New L'Manberg, where he lived for quite a while, the entire weight of the government fell on a kid — the only adult in that government was Quackity, give or take. Plus, he couldn't have not heard about the exile, since there was a trial and it was a fairly public matter.

Techno visited Tommy, Phil didn't (I doubt Philza would be scared of Dream, lol) — another point.

So based on this character, c!Phil wouldn't have reacted to the exile at all. "Local squabbles, let them sort out their own problems. " (Yes, I think the moment where he defended Tommy after the jailbreak was extremely forced, and I think Phil was more afraid that he'd have to defend his house since he's retired, rather than actually caring about Tommy).

Hi! :)

Yeah, I've kind of disappeared a bit — I lose track of time, too deep in the process of drawing the animatic. I want to finish it as soon as possible, not get stuck like I usually do.

Hmm, that's actually a very interesting question. c!Dream, for me, started existing, like, from the very beginning of the server — he appeared with a "pop" sound, and nothing existed before that. XD

I think in his case, I stick to pretty basic headcanons — about his long friendship with George and Sapnap, and fitting manhunts into his backstory.

But I think it's worth mentioning a pretty interesting backstory related to Voice!Dream: in this headcanon, he was raised in an XD cult, which instills in him those traits of narcissism and cruelty that we see; Puffy is his mother — but she couldn't handle the weight of responsibility, so the child randomly ended up under Bad's care, and thus Dream is technically his son, with Sapnap and George as his stepbrothers.

Under Bad's care, Dream picked up a lot of knowledge — he finally learned to read, or to cook edible food out of random junk. And the absence of a proper parental figure, combined with being raised too late, played its part in him becoming a 'troubled teen'.

Well, for different AUs I try to create different designs and behavior models, but here I'm specifically talking about the canon.

Just to be clear — for me as a writer, design + behavior are inseparable, and Dream will probably come out a bit more thought-out because he's my favorite character, plus I had the chance to roleplay him in a group called 'Talk with Me' for a couple of years, plus cosplay... His image has more details, ha-ha)

In my interpretation, c!Dream has a humanoid appearance — given his grandiloquence, probably an elf (and adding his pedantic nature and love of showing off his read books and his 300 IQ — a high elf). His Prime era — I think that's around Doomsday. During that time, his mental health was at its most 'stable,' as stable as possible for Dream. He mostly wears all-black clothing, something with a high collar, mittens, closed pants with lots of extra pockets, and fairly thin boots. A long cloak, since he's used to not showing his armor off, so as not to reveal his preparedness to a potential opponent, and oh, he absolutely loves sneaking up on people / moves almost on his tiptoes — he's a very quiet bastard, despite his height.

His weapon of choice I've always imagined as a battle axe — Dream is reckless in battle, and the counterbalance to his agility - a heavy, massive weapon creates an interesting combination that the opponent doesn't expect.

As for the mask, he never takes it off — it's not particularly scary, more just strange-looking, which creates an uncanny valley effect, even though there's nothing actually unsettling about it. (It probably has enchantments on it and he can see just fine through it, though I like the idea that you could actually see his eyes through it). By the way, Dream loves staring at people, intently following them with his gaze, almost eye-to-eye, and he finds their discomfort amusing. And there's a funny quirk — he unconsciously tilts his head to the right when something interests him.

And Dream from the post-prison era is more changed psychologically — he doesn't have that proud posture anymore, he often slouches; this is truly a crazy homeless man with a full-blown God complex and a terrible fear of failure. He can't tolerate any criticism, he hates when his mistakes are pointed out even indirectly — very aggressively toxic, and he can't stand being around anyone; he always has to be right, the last word must be his. And unlike his earlier self, he has a hard time handling sarcasm directed at himself.

He still wears his cloak and never takes off his armor, but sometimes he might forget his mask; he believes his body is just a vessel and inside he is literally a Deity, constantly drawing biblical parallels about himself. Food sucks, sleep is a whim — so no stops until he knows everything and ascends. And of course, no one can kill him or get rid of him — too many have tried — so he's invincible.

As for Tommy — he seems human to me, or a bird, like a sparrow. Honestly, he's very much like a sparrow, with his audacity and general vibe. You can see him in armor sometimes, but it's rarely very good because Tommy is reckless and fights terribly, so he usually loses netherite easily. He often wears iron or stolen diamonds, usually uses a sword, and his fighting style is sloppy, more recklessly in Sapnap's direction — like 'hit and get hit in the face, then think.' I like to add band-aids to him sometimes, for no particular reason — it looks funny, and maybe the idea of a green bandana looks cool, but I don't feel a strong connection between Tommy and Tubbo, so that's optional. Otherwise, he's a teenager in sneakers, and I think I like pairing his t-shirt with wide brown shorts (bro doesn't even think about wearing pants — skinned knees +vibe /j)

His hairstyle is slightly similar to Wil's style, with some differences — after all, he found himself a role model of sorts.

What are your thoughts on exile and c!Dream’s purpose for it / actions during it after that? I know you said it changed your view a lot so I’m curious what changed!

Thank you so much for the question!

There's going to be a lot of text and a bit of backstory XD

So, I got introduced to Dream during the prison arc and assumed that my new favorite would again be Villain™ who did a bunch of bad stuff. However, when I watched a brief lore summary, I was left completely confused as to why Dream was the only one who deserved prison. Well, to figure it out I started watching Tommy's streams, and I understood less and less why he was the 'hero' of the server and what exactly Dream had done wrong. I thought maybe I'd end up turning against Dream after the Exile arc, but… I couldn't sympathize with Tommy while watching those videos — though that's a different story.

1. In one of the several videos related to the Exile arc (I can't say exactly if it was before or after Technoblade's visit to Logstedshire), Dream clearly says something along the lines of "yeah, Techno lives in that direction, about (...) blocks from here", pointing to the side. It's a small phrase, barely noticeable, but it immediately caught my attention. Yes, I initially interpreted exile as the fandom's "most unjust treatment of a poor innocent child", but — if you're a villain who wants to torment a child in solitude and isolation, why would you point out where someone close to Tommy lives?

He could have misspoken — which would make him quite human (and not much of a 'master manipulator,' since that's important info. Dream didn't reveal anything about the Book or his connection to Punz even under torture, so why would he blab to Tommy?), or he said it intentionally, assuming Tommy would latch onto it.

(At that time, the prison was being built + around the same time, Dream very publicly fell out with Punz so the server wouldn't know about their collaboration. However, it would be very strange if Tommy could just run away from him for no reason — that would undermine his authority. But "escape and take shelter with Techno" sounds entirely plausible.)

2. Regarding Doomsday — I don't think exile played a huge role in that. c!Tommy doesn't change or grow as a character (I should note that I don't think that's a bad thing — such characters should exist), and his betrayal of Techno was only a matter of time. Techno had been planning to destroy L'Manberg for a long time and was essentially taking any allies he could find for that purpose. He thought Tommy had learned his lessons — he just didn't account for the fact that this guy's frontal lobe development simply doesn't happen /j

3. My thoughts on exile.

Well, since we never saw and will never see the story from our favorite blob's perspective, I can only make assumptions — and there are several.

- Dream was trying to scare Tommy. This is the most likely, considering how much trouble Tommy caused and how many times he got in Dream's way and interfered with his plans. Given that at this time Dream was trying to bring peace to the server through his very unique methods, he was probably trying to get Tommy to just stop being a nuisance (A quick reminder — he did the same thing after escaping prison: scare him and leave him alone). But it didn't work.

- Dream was taking out his anger. Also quite possible. Again, I'm not trying to whitewash the character — but considering the amount of pain and destruction Tommy caused Dream (and essentially, it all started because Dream asked Tommy for an apology for attacking Alyssa), his nerves probably gave out. A harsh lesson he tried to teach from the height of his own understanding of 'right and wrong.' And harsh by our world's standards — considering their attitude toward non-canon deaths, it was essentially a punishment akin to 'standing in the corner on peas.'

'If a child breaks other people's houses and steals things precious to you, do the same to them — break something in front of them.'

(By the way, we don't even know how old Dream is, so this could be two teenagers butting heads — and kids are ve-ery cruel creatures.)

- Dream was trying to rehabilitate Tommy. Also plausible. Given that in an environment where Tommy was enabled by his friends, who weren't really capable of standing up to his temperament, he could do whatever he wanted — it's quite possible that Dream was trying to isolate him from the world in order to retrain his habits. Again, being a fairly firm and quite ruthless person, he chose to do it away from people who would pity Tommy and undo all progress.

I lean toward a mix of these reasons.

In any case, I tried to watch the Exile arc through Tommy's eyes to understand where the 'horrible abuse' was supposed to happen and why I should feel sorry for him. Unfortunately, even watching most of the server from Tommy's perspective didn't give me answers — moreover, the dramatization and the lack of truly horrifying actions from Dream only strengthened my sympathy for the latter.

Still, I think Dream's behavior and the comment about Techno's house were part of a larger preparation for his Plan and that final battle — and who better than Tommy to spread the word across the server about the 'big scary villain'? The key is to let him 'escape' naturally.

My main question: why did he politely leave the cardholder for us on the trash bin? (Hahaha)

<333