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7/19 c5 Guestjust.guest
Okay. I'm sorry that I've taken so long to respond. I’ve been occupied with other matters, but even then, I just figured you were already doing a very good job. I figured you really didn’t need ME to tell you how to write good stories. And, no, you don’t have to forgive me, either.

With that said, the following stood out to me:

"He did it to me and did it to Ms. Keane. He tried to make himself out to be some good guy who was only there to learn."

Ms. Keane. *shakes head* There was so much wrong with that episode, I can’t imagine how anyone involved in its making thought it was supposed to get a chuckle out of the audience. The teacher’s obliviousness to everything happening around her, the lawsuits she AND the school would’ve had to face from the injuries the other students suffered…

Some of the same people who worked on the original PPG show also worked on the fourth generation of MLP and brought over some of the same flaws, including portraying schoolteachers who can’t seem to discipline students the right way and are apparently immune to any disasters that befall the setting. So what’s the problem? Well, let me put it this way:

Say what you will about MLP Tales; it is in fact so generic an entry in the MLP animated canon, you could replace the ponies with anything else and nothing would be missed. But if there’s one thing it got right where FiM failed, it’s the inclusion of reasonable authority figures…including TEACHERS. I don’t know what kind of misery the producers of PPG and FiM suffered while growing up, but I for one have NEVER been interested in the misery of their personal lives. Or maybe it’s just a carryover from the general anti-authoritarian, “kid empowerment” fad that dominated the 1990s. Whatever the case, I do not for one minute care about their sob stories and never will. “Wahhh, when you coming home, Dad?” “Wahhh, I was bullied in school! Kids like them are the devil!” “Boo hoo, my teachers sucked and that girl/boy rejected me!”

WHO CARES?!

That’s the problem with “creator-driven” material: It’s just an excuse for creators to throw a big tantrum and dump their misery on the rest of us. A little realism may go a long way, but when I have to sit through installment after installment essentially of losers griping about life giving them a raw deal in this or that…well, that just ruins the show for me.



Pardon the rambling. Back with Ms. Keane: I don’t know if you plan on including it for this or another story you’ve posted, or even a future project, but I would certainly like to see any or all of the girls become disillusioned with how their teacher’s been running things. Why people thought this woman made a good girlfriend for the professor, I still have yet to understand…

…Wait, I just got something. Jack mentioned the aftereffects of his handling the Gangreen Gang after that episode, dumpster ‘n all. What about when he got hit by that ball? Also, did he ever do anything about Ms. Keane’s sloppy handling of her students?

“It was written in the Bill of Rights itself, the eighth amendment…How could those people have figured things out in the 1700s while Blossom didn’t realize her folly…in what was supposed to be the 21st century?”

That is such a good point, it HURTS.

Also, if you enjoyed Blossom After the Disgrace by Dougster, I recommend the following if you haven’t checked it out already:

Reader Beware by ThatGirl (PPG)
7/18 c4 2Alice Kettle
If there was one problem that I had with “A Very Special Blossom” it was the fact that Bubbles and Buttercup didn’t seem to have any sort of compassion or understanding for Blossom at the end of the episode, even after finding out about the sympathetic motivations as to why their sister stole the clubs. Yeah, they had every right to be disappointed, but Blossom still had sympathetic motives for stealing the clubs that were she admitted to. Professor Utonium was kind of uncharacteristically shallow and selfish in his obsession with those clubs by brushing off Bubbles and Buttercup’s reasonable questions to Blossom about where she got them from with “who cares,” but he realized he was partially responsible for Blossom being tempted to steal the clubs for him and admitted to it at the end, so I let it go there.

I do like how this chapter sort of fixes the ending of “A Very Special Blossom” by having the Professor calling out Bubbles and Buttercup for hypocritically looking down on Blossom for stealing the clubs as a gift for him when they aren’t perfect themselves, and has Blossom realizing that she and Bubbles went way too far in punishing Buttercup for her crimes.
7/18 c4 7KawaiiCutie12
Okay three things:

1) I love how u tied in another episode with this fanfic. Not only did u do it perfectly, it definitely gives emphasis on Blossom's guilt.

2) I never liked Blossom (as a kid and even now) and ur story's making my dislike grow XD

And 3) I get that it's UR account but. I'm glad u finally said something to her. It's pretty fucking annoying everytime I go to comment I see a big ass useless paragraph saying the same shit over and over.
7/16 c1 13howardrhonda828
AliceKettle: I had to remove quite a profane comment complaining about your feelings towards the original episode Moral Decay being re-iterated again and again to the chagrin of this Guest reviewer. While I definitely do not agree with the insult lobbed at you (which I will not be repeating for decency's sake), I do have to agree that you're beginning to turn into a bit of a broken record and with all due respect, it's not really helpful to have feedback that veers more towards spam.

I am not trying to stifle your freedom of expression at all but it would be more helpful if you focused your opinions more on the story than on what is clearly your most hated episode of "The Powerpuff Girls."
7/15 c3 Peachy
So Wednesday is taking Buttercup home with him? Is that what he did with the Gangreen Gang? That’s gonna be awkward for Buttercup if they’re there.
7/14 c3 2Alice Kettle
Like I said before, since I love the Utonium’s otherwise normally happy and heartwarming family dynamic on the show, in spite of their flaws, “Moral Decay” is the one episode from the series that I apply the concept of fanon discontinuity to, and pretend never happened, especially since Buttercup’s relationships with her family go back to normal back after that, and the events of that episode are never mentioned again, anyway.

But even still, it felt very bafflingly and disturbingly out of character for Professor Utonium to not even express partial remorse over Buttercup’s crimes and eventual downfall for failing to notice and put a stop to what was happening before it was too late, and she got hurt. You could infer that Blossom and Bubbles told him that they sold Buttercup out to get her teeth knocked out at the end because they’re not punished, but it’s also not entirely certain if they did within the context either. I’d imagine he would have been a lot more shocked if he did know about Blossom’s and Bubbles’ involvement in her downfall. Blossom also does shoot her an evil look, and Bubbles shares in it. It could suggest that they were feeling self-satisfied because there was no way that she would be able to tell the Professor about what they did when most of her teeth were gone, and she had to get her teeth drilled. Either way, none of the implications at the end of that episode were good or at all iin character.
I’d have let it go if they’d gone for the same ending, except without involving Blossom and Bubbles in the set up of Buttercup’s downfall, and had Professor Utonium still saying he hoped she learned her lesson from all this, but that he was sorry that it ended up having to be in a way that wound up with her getting hurt, at least in part, because he failed to notice what was going on sooner and put a stop to it. However, the way in which they DID end it on the show felt like very needlessly and uncharacteristically cruel, hateful, and twisted nightmare fuel without a punchline that tainted the Utonium family’s otherwise relatively sweet reputation. The writers seemed to think her family’s uncharacteristically exceedingly cold and cruel reactions in regards to finding out about Buttercup’s crimes were justified because her motivations were so needlessly and uncharacteristically cruel and unsympathetic. Plus, she didn’t really seem to feel any remorse herself. But here’s the thing, even if her motivations weren’t sympathetic, and even if she wasn’t in any sort of life-threatening, long-lasting, or permanently debilitating REAL danger in that beat down because of cartoon logic, status quo, and her superpowers, she’s still a little girl, who’s emotionally/morally still a child just like her sisters. Yeah, they have the intellect of the average adult, but their senses of empathy and right versus wrong are still at a child’s level, so their motives weren’t always going to be pure, sympathetic, and levelheaded.

As for Blossom never complimenting Buttercup in the classic series, that’s not actually true. She praised Buttercup for being a “genius” when she came up with the idea to use their superpowers to stop Mojo and his evil army of mutant chimps in the 2002 movie. Before they started teasing her about her blankie in “Cover Up,” Blossom and Bubbles were cheering on Buttercup for being able to take on a monster all by herself. Bubbles was really impressed by how much of a badass she was in “Bubblevicious” when Buttercup handled all of those monsters in simulation training.

Professor Utonium didn’t really have the same heartwarming moments between him and Buttercup in her centric episodes that he had with her sisters in theirs, but he did give her individual positive attention in certain episodes here and there, too, such as keeping her past Father’s Day present in “A Very Special Blossom,” pinching her cheeks affectionately and calling her a bunch of adorably embarrassing pet names in “PowerProf.” because he was so impressed with how she was able to take down all those bad guys by herself in front of him, she went to him for advice in “Pee Pee Gees,” and in “Knock It Off” he seemed to get suspicious when the knock off Buttercup on TV said “girl power” because he knew that wasn’t something his little tomboy normally said otherwise. In “Boogie Frights”
and “Lying Around The House,” he actually did go easy on Buttercup when he caught her teasing her sisters, and he went easy on her when she was blatantly lying to him about breaking one of his trophies and haphazardly putting it back together with chewing gum and string.

But yeah, Buttercup did tend to get less positive and supportive attention than both her sisters. I know it was sort of her thing to play the role of the “black sheep” in her centrics, and while I could see how some of them could be irritating in their treatment of her, I’d generally been willing to forgive it because it wasn’t outrageously hateful, offensive, or unjust. However, “Moral Decay” set off so many red flags of character assassination for the entire Utonium family, and that ending seemed to imply that her sisters selling her out to get her teeth knocked out by every villain in the city and her dad’s seeming indifference to her downfall for her crimes, which he failed to notice and put a stop to before it was too late, gave off vibes of hatred from her family. That is just NOT in character at all.
I don’t care if cartoon logic, her superpowers, and status quo on classic PPG means that Buttercup wasn’t in any REAL physical danger in that beat down of her teeth from the villains, realistically and if this show actually had an overarching storyline with continuity between episodes, emotionally and psychologically it still would be very traumatizing for Buttercup’s to have deal with her own siblings selling her out to get beat up, and her dad seeming indifferent to her suffering.

This would be a great way to fix the story on the show though, and I can’t wait to see what happens next. I’m glad Blossom, Bubbles, and Professor Utonium realized they screwed up with Buttercup. I just hope they can make it up to her, and actually get her back.
7/14 c3 SakiaN
Ooh interested to see Buttercup and Wednesday’s new home and how they’ll develop as well as Professor and the girls next move. Really like the story so far
7/14 c3 7KawaiiCutie12
It's about damn time they came to their senses! Honestly, now that I'm thinking back on it, I don't think Blossom has ever complimented Buttercup...

Great chaps tho! I wonder if Wednesday will put up a fight
7/2 c1 SakiaN
Really enjoyed the first chapter, def made me think a lot in BC’s footsteps. I’m excited to read the next chapter
6/22 c1 2Alice Kettle
While I do appreciate and understand what you’re trying to do here, “Moral Decay” is one of those episodes from the series that I just like to pretend never happened at all since the writers completely ruined my image of Buttercup’s relationships with her family at the end of that episode for absolutely no other reason to create a completely out of character and senselessly mean-spirited cheaply shocking ending. I just replace it with the comic version called “Holy Molar” in my mind because that’s way more in-character, and way more true to the family oriented theme of the show for the girls as sisters and Professor Utonium as their dad.
I think the best way you could sort of redeem the ending of “Moral Decay” is by assuming the best possible case scenario, which would be that Blossom and Bubbles might have deliberately left out the fact that THEY were the ones who arranged for Buttercup to get her comeuppance from the villains after finding out about her crimes when they told the Professor why she got beaten up because they wanted to avoid getting in trouble. Doesn’t mean he still wasn’t partially responsible for Buttercup’s crimes and eventual downfall in the context via neglect in “Moral Decay,” but within a fantasy superhero cartoon, I would consider that forgivable, if he realized he was wrong, and took steps to change it. He didn’t really seem to feel any guilt for Buttercup’s crimes and eventual downfall at the end of “Moral Decay.” Yes, he had every right to be disappointed in Buttercup, and to punish her for what she did. However, it baffled me as to why he wouldn’t think to himself “Well, gee, you know, if I had just taken the time to check up on Buttercup sooner, or caught on to the signs that she had a money addiction before it was too late, then she might never have gotten hurt.”

Also, Buttercup was unable to say anything because she had gotten most of her teeth knocked out as result, and all three girls are young children, who have all occasionally shown a rather sadistic and twisted sense of justice before in the series in episodes, such as “Gettin’ Twiggy With It,” “Slave The Day,” amd “Dream Scheme,” so it wouldn’t surprise me if Buttercup thought her punishment was justified too. It’s not just because, realistically speaking, her self-esteem would take a of a hit after this, but because she and her sisters have practiced the “eye for an eye and a tooth for tooth” retributive type justice against criminals as punishment for their crimes before, gone into sadistic and needlessly cruel territory on a few occasions, and even gotten framed as “right” for it. The girls do grow out of it in S4-S6, actually, but one of my problems upon rewatch of the classic series is that the writers didn’t consistently frame it as wrong with negative consequences when the girls went overboard in punishing criminals.

I will say that, if nothing else, I don’t think Buttercup was actually in any danger of getting maimed or murdered in that beat down from all the villains as comeuppance for her crimes because Blossom and Bubbles were watching it happen from the sidelines. I think the whole point was just for the villains to knock out Buttercup’s teeth to teach her a lesson of an “eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” It still was uncomfortable and very ooc to see them sell out their sister and take that much pleasure in her suffering.

Professor Utonium usually knew better, though, at least in regards to his kids, which is why his seemingly cold reaction to Buttercup at the end of “Moral Decay” baffled me.

I’m going to take a lucky guess, though, and assume you’re going to fix this. The Professor does genuinely seem to be realizing that he was at least partly guilty for what happened. Blossom and Bubbles seemed pretty self-righteous about Buttercup’s downfall after selling her out to get beat up, and seeing her suffer at the dentist. However, it does seem like they are starting to feel guilty here and beginning to realize they went too far.
In real life, I wouldn’t want or expect for this sort of thing to be resolved with her family, but in this fallout for “Moral Decay” you’re writing, I hope it does.
On the whole, in the classic series, I didn’t really get this sense that Buttercup was this horribly abused, mistreated, and neglected child by her family and friends. Occasionally misunderstood in her centrics, sure, but the ONLY time it ever seemed to fall into very uncharacteristically uncomfortable levels of mistreatment that implied abuse and/or neglect, even if that wasn’t the writers intentions, was in “Moral Decay.” That episode NEVER gets mentioned or referenced in the series EVER again afterwards, though, and so things go right back to being relatively happy and normal between Buttercup and her family in the very next episode.

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