The Extreme / The Attack / The Exposed / The Experiment (Animorphs #25-28)[July 1, 2024]

[Yanique, Thread Master]

If GR makes this disappear again I will hunt them down!

[Yanique, Thread Master]

comment #2

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Electric Boogaloo

[Nirkatze]

IT LIVES! Huzzah!

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Supplemental Imagery Template

Book 25 - The Extreme:





I think this was made by someone with PC software from the book cover, but it's better than nothing...

Book 26 - The Attack:



Totally normal inner cover art...



Book 27 - The Exposed:



Book 28 - The Experiment:



EDIT: I found the youtube channel for David Mattingly, the animator that made all the morph animations (full color) that were turned into the freeze-frame flipbooks... as some sort of promotion for his artbook, 12 years ago he posted a bunch of animorph morph compilations on yotube... they're about 30 seconds with an ad at the end, and include alot of the morphs from the back half of the series, that I can't find gifs for... here are the links:

Jake: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uNDL...
Rachel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECPeu...
Cassie: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFn7h...
Marco: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BlEX7...
Ax: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTcvR...
Tobias: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6caj...

For some reason Tobias doesn't have a video from David Mattingly... altho some other characters do bird morphs already... someone else made the Tobias video I linked, and it's a bit lacking, but it's better than nothing...

[Nirkatze]

or here...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Yep

[Nirkatze]

Took me three threads to realize something was going on. ^^;

[Nirkatze]

Read #25 The Extreme today--(view spoiler)[Nice to see Eric again, for half a minute... but the highlight for me was the random encounter with Derek. Somewhat stereotypical Inupiat, but still a fun sequence--I love how matter-of-fact he was about everything. And when he started talking about Nanook, well, it made me smile... Nanook is the Inupiaq word for polar bear, so I knew exactly what he was talking about before it was revealed... Also a great morph to have! (hide spoiler)]

[Nirkatze]

Reading #26 The Attack and (view spoiler)[it feels like another one-off episode... but most of the Ellmist or random alien encounters feel like a sideways step out of the main Earth plot. It was nice to see recurring-character Eric again.

Favorite part:
Rachel: "It's about time!"
Marco: "Hey, where's my kiss?"
And it's cute how that ends up being the "time bomb" in the Howler's racial memory... It was interesting how they turned out to be a) all juveniles and b) a manufactured peoples... (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

#25: With this one, we've seen all but one of the aliens from this Animorphs Alien poster:



https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/ani...

Checked the wiki, and #26 is the Howler book, so it's really close to being 100% revealed...

Alot of the alien images I posted in the past were just cropped images from this poster... Helmacrons, Leerans, etc...

Venber are the top one, and Howlers are the dark magma looking one with Wolverine claws, I guess...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Nirkatze wrote: "Read #25 The Extreme today--[spoilers removed]"

I liked most of this one, except the ending... felt a bit unfinished/dangling... (view spoiler)[for all these one-off aliens, they left a few living Venber hybrids alive in the arctic, to fuel the yeti myth... but I don't 100% get why the Yeerks abandon the Venber & the Yeerk Kiddie Pool idea in this one, just because of a little setback... (altho I also don't really understand how useful it would be to have backyard Yeerk pools, anyway... wouldn't it be too exposed, when the human is free to scream and cry while the Yeerk leaves the host and refuels?... at least in the underground lair, nobody can hear them, no neighbors, etc...)

Backyard Yeerk pools seem more like a thing for after they conquer Earth... (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Reading #26, The Attack

Jake seems to get all the Crayak books, and maybe the Ellimist ones?... I forget already...

(view spoiler)[This is the first time Jake & Cassie kiss, right?... altho they've been slowly approaching a relationship over their last couple books...

GROSS, Cooties... maybe that's why I quit ;)

I'm honestly not 100% sure when I stopped reading the series... my memories stop around now, but I dunno if I actually stopped reading at this point, or it's just my most vivid memory...

(view spoiler)[My most vivid memory is my biological grandfather's funeral, and meeting my biological dad for the first/only time, when I was old enough to remember him... my parents separated when I was 3... that and telling a kind old lady about the plot of Animorphs 1-30 seems to have linked them in my mind, and that's probably why I quit or forget past book 30... that would have been March/April 1999, when I was 12... sounds about right... (hide spoiler)]

Anyway, this Yeerk/Yoort thing is wild, and I totally forgot that, and it's a shame this is probably a one-off thing that'll never be mentioned again, afterwards...

The audiobook really captures the annoyingness of the Iskoort voice/etc... glad these books are only 3hrs at 1x speed, lol... (hide spoiler)]

[Nirkatze]

re: Chapter 25--definitely felt like the plot questions would fall over if poked too hard...

re: Chapter 26--(view spoiler)[LOL "ew Cooties!" That was the first time they kissed, hence the lines that were my favorite part... (hide spoiler)]

[Nirkatze]

Read #27 The Exposed yesterday and it kind of went in one ear and out the other... I do remember (view spoiler)[that I like how Rachel's "gung-ho" stereotype is deepening into something traumatic... There was a point when she sided with the voice of caution and everyone was like "this isn't you, you're not supposed to be on this side" and she was like "why not?" I hope I didn't imagine that, lol... I listened to this at like 2am.

The new creatures--didn't catch the name, Emu? something like that--are assholes... Why they thought Rachel would join them, I don't know... (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Rachel's character arc in the series (view spoiler)[is basically sociopath... she gets sucked into the darker side of war, where winning by any means necessary becomes paramount...

Applegate's willingness to explore the darkness of war in a kids series is interesting... really realistic, almost traumatically so... good to not sugarcoat tho, and be a campaign ad for military service, I guess...

Checking the wiki, this book introduced Drode, the assistant to Crayak that's been heard a few times in the past, I think, like in the previous book with the Iskoort... Crayak is the enemy of the Ellimist (but he's also this big hard to move space entity that needs a more mobile subordinate like Drode to complete tasks sometimes)... (hide spoiler)]

[Nirkatze]

Drode! Not "Emu" LOL thanks! Definitely agree on Applegate's overall portrayal--it's refreshing not only seeing the weight of the material treated maturely and realistically, but it's also like... not talking down to the kid readers? I would have loved that as a kid, and it makes the series still appeal as an adult...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

It's great seeing a good kids series that doesn't make the adults all idiots to facilitate kid plots... like that scene awhile back where Cassie heard her parents embarrassment/punishment tactics... the villains are largely kinda Bond / Inspector Gadget villains, but if the villains were too smart these kids would have all died in book 2...

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Started #28 and loving Ax/Tobias watching Soap Operas and commercials, LOL...

And now Ax is doing dramatic pauses, in conversation:

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

More #28: (view spoiler)[Ax thinks chimpanzees are like humans, but cuter, lol... (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

I've been up for hours, and forgot to go checkout Hoopla books like I planned, on the last day of the month...

Rushed over, checked out 1 book... 2nd book said we'd hit the collective checkout limit for the day/month... I literally got the last book...

[Nirkatze]

LOL That's awesome.... Also really like your analysis of the adults in these books, @Iain...

Read #28 The Experiment the other day, and am very glad of your notes... should have commented at the time, because five books and two days later, I've already forgotten most of everything... (view spoiler)[But Ax's favorite parts of TV being the commercials was and subsequent shenanigans was pretty funny... (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Ax moving away and/or becoming self-aware of his eating in human form problem, can only be a good thing... I found it funny as a kid, I think, but just find it annoying now... and it's been the opening gag in 2 of Ax's 3 books so far (doesn't help Ax and Tobias get less books to grow/evolve in)... this is also the first / one of the few Ax books that doesn't involve him reconnecting with the Andalite leadership and almost betraying the Animorphs...

[Nirkatze]

Finished #29 The Sickness. Interesting aspects, but it makes me worry about the solution for this book as a solution for the whole... (view spoiler)[giving Yeerks the power to morph would solve the problem of them being trapped in their bodies... but would also essentially eradicate them as a race... And they'd swap every three days in a pool for every two hours returning to base--or going nothlit.

But I was really glad to see a return to that Yeerk Cassie... not befriended, exactly, but who made a deal with Cassie and kept it. It was nice to get her story wrapped up so positively.

The brain surgery was kind of crazy though! (hide spoiler)]

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Nirkatze wrote: "Finished #29 The Sickness..."

(view spoiler)[nothlits are the solution to alot of things... once you remove the Andalite stigma...

Taxxon hunger, Yeerk parasitism, etc...

Sometimes there are no perfect/great solutions, just the best option...

I'm sure alot of the less warmonger Yeerks would go for it, and the Taxxon resistance from Andalite Chronicles... (hide spoiler)]

[Nirkatze]

Yeah... it's just sad that there's no (view spoiler)[evolutionary or scientific answer that will let them stay their own people... (hide spoiler)]

What's the next .5 book we're reading? I just noticed that Visser has audio on Hoopla, didn't it just come out?

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

All the x.5 books should have audio now... the last couple came out early this year... they recorded the Megamorphs and Chronicles books after the 54 Animorphs books...

Next x.5 is 29.5 Elfangor's Secret -- Megamorphs #3

Visser is 33.5 or 35.5

Megamorphs 4 is 39.5

Ellimist Chronicles is somewhere in the 40s...

[Choko]

Finished The Extreme #25. This was really fun! Loved Eric, as always and I totally agree with Nirkadze, Derek, the Inuit, was the highlight of the show!!! He made me so happy!

I also agree with Iain, that the Yeerks giving up on the northern project over a little disruption seems plausible...

[Nirkatze]

Oh and oops, I realize I should have commented on #29 in the next thread... time to change the month on my calendar...

[Choko]

Finished The Attack #26

This one was intense! So we got to meet, I am guessing, the biggest Bad of the series? Crayak. The Howlers were a very interesting concept. (view spoiler)[ So, I am not sure if the way they defeated them was realistic, but I will take it... Honestly, lately all the wins have been questionable...

The Yeerks/Yoort connection is wild and this is a solution to their problem I can totally get behind. I don't understand why we have to wait 300 years before they come by it ...

The kiss! Finally! :)))) (hide spoiler)]

[Choko]

Finished The Exposed #27 ... So now that we have met Crayak, he is going to be bugging with our guys all the time, I am guessing.. Drode was an asshole, and I am really hoping that down the road, as things progress and get more and more serious, Rachel isn't tempted for real to join their side. By Iain's comments, I am guessing it might become a real problem... That would suck. She already has a very difficult time psychologically, and a lot of it is her own doing with the image of herself she keeps projecting, but as Nirkadze said, the kids around her are kind of pigeon holding her into this one role and not allowing her to change her mind...

The introduction scene with the girls trying to camouflage Eric as a kitchen android, was very funny to me:)

[Choko]

#28 ... The dramatic pauses!!!! Hahaha!

[Timelord Iain, Tech Support]

Choko wrote: "Finished The Attack #26

This one was intense! So we got to meet, I am guessing, the biggest Bad of the series? Crayak. The Howlers were a very interesting concept. So, I am not sure if the way ..."

Crayak has been around since Jake's second book, I think... the one where they end up in the Amazon jungle, some of them die, and then it's a time bubble that gets reset and only Jake remembers it?

Crayak is the half organic / half mechanical entity he sees in the darkness/void... from what little I know/remember, Crayak is enormous and largely restricted in his movements, so has underlings like Drode & the Howlers to do his dirty work...

Unlike Ellimist, whose highly mobile, and more like a space Splinter (the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle rat sensei)...

(view spoiler)[

Splinter



Ellimist



Crayak



Drode (only could find fanart, which includes a much different interpretation of Ellimist & Crayak, too)

(hide spoiler)]

[Choko]

Those are awesome, thank you!!!

Ax: I am young and sometimes restless, so why can't I go without a shirt - paraphrasing:))))

[Choko]

Just finished The Experiment #28 ... I guess we were going for a light story this time. Ax is almost always fun to read. His discoveries of human behavior are funny and I enjoy them. I would have thought he would have more empathy for the cows, being grazers and all .. I love cows! I try to avoid eating beef, but that doesn't stop me from eating chicken and pork... I should probably think about my own feelings on the subject... eventually...

[Nirkatze]

LOL I love your highlights, Choko... had me laughing... almost as much as that awesome fanart @Iain...

[Tonari no Emily]

Read #25 The Extreme and #26 The Attack yesterday and today. I want to catch up to yall in October, guess it depends on how my momentum is. My exhaustion has mildly improved, so I suppose we'll see! But it helps I've been very selective with adding to my BR list and have cut lots out too.. These are just so short it would be easy to catch up if I gave it a go.

I really enjoyed The Extreme! I dunno I think Marco might be my favorite POV. He's better in his head than from another perspective lol

I haven't super been enjoying the Ellimist ones.. They just don't feel as connected. But (view spoiler)[ The Kiss! Awww/Ewww! lol Also the narrator for the Crayak did a good creepy voice imo (hide spoiler)]