When working on a piece of media, there are a few major considerations that need to be made in the development process.
1.) What is the plot? Who are the characters? What are their motivations? How far are they willing to go to get what they want?
2.) Who is the intended audience? Sex, age, interests, themes, etc are all considered here.
3.) What is the message trying to convey? What is the audience supposed to take from this when all is said and done?
These are the big three questions to consider while making your media. I'm going to use examples pulling from TADC to stay on topic.
What is the plot?
TADC, when introduced, gives us the rough plot of the story. Pomni is dropped into a new world, and she is confused. She doesn't know her real name, and she wants out of the circus. These are the first few established ideas we get from the pilot episode. The big key points made in the series are:
What is my name? Who am I? How do I get out of here?
That establishes the plot of the series. This is a fine way to start a story because it builds intrigue. Who is Pomni? Why is she so level-headed compared to everyone else? What's up with that door? We are given questions to be followed through each episode.
So we have covered:
What is the plot? - Characters are stuck in a quirky place and want to get out.
Who are the characters? - Pomni (Main) Caine (Antagonist) + everyone else
What are their motivations? - Pomni wants to know who she is. She wants to understand the Digital Circus, but also wants to escape from it.
How far are they willing to go to get what they want? - Pomni is willing to genuinely anger Caine, the only knowledgeable character (at the time), and piss him off. He could torture them, possibly delete them, but is willing to take the risk (Climax potential).
Who is the intended audience?
Next, we have to identify who the intended audience is, which is where it gets muddy, even from a conceptual point of view. Goose wanted an adult audience, but ended up with a child audience instead.
TADC uses censoring, bright colors, child-friendly designs (Jojo's Circus, anyone?), loud & random humor, overly expressive animation, and is featured in a "Circus", which are typically family-friendly. This is where issues pop up. Goose did not think this part through in the concept stage.
You can have a show of TADC caliber while still maintaining either a young adult or adult audience. Poppee the Performer is like TADC in concept, but it uses muddy colors and an unsettling stage that would make kids uncomfortable. It's kind of ugly to look at, the characters move oddly and don't really speak. It isn't "flashy" or "cute", it just is.
Another example is Happy Tree Friends. It uses cute, bright colored characters that would also attract children, but quickly delves into gore, which would turn off young audiences. It has a juxtaposition of soft, cute, cuddly creatures who are repeatedly maimed, disfigured, tortured, and killed. It sets its tone very easily.
Now, let's use another example of successful media that also turns kids away, despite looking kid-friendly. Candle Cove. CC is designed to be a children's show that adults can not see. The characters have cutesy names (Pirate Percy, Horace Horrible), but then shift to "Skin Taker". It's sudden and unforgiving. Bright colors are muted, designs are uncanny but not really terrifying (Kind of like Courage). It can use children's media, but still curate an adult audience.
This was not very well thought out from the concept on Goose's part. This is where the series for TADC already begins to fail. It has no true target audience. Kids flock to it because of cute characters, loud noises, and funny teeth man. Adults flock to it for clussy, loreslop, and Jax maid porn.
It doesn't establish itself as adult media from the get-go. I have no idea who this is supposed to appeal to.
Women often prefer romance/shippable/LGB/T+ characters in modern media. Jax x Pomni, Pomni x Ragatha yurislop, Zooble identity crisis, etc, and TADC falls strongly into that category. "Who am I?? Where am I?? Why am I here?? Who was I??"
Men often prefer characters they can relate to or characters who do cool shit. I can't see much of a male appeal for this series, but considering the creator is a mentally ill man, it's hard to say.
What's the theme for TADC? Mystery, horror, comedy? It's not a very strong combination of traits. They don't really bleed well into one another, which is likely part of the reason the show doesn't always flow together. One minute we have a giant face jump scare (horror), then Jax in a maid outfit (Comedy), then Kinger lore dump (Mystery), Abstraction (Horror/Mystery), Caine doing fuckshit (Comedy), therapy talk (???), so on, so forth. It's jarring and random, not to mention the therapy sessions that always come out of nowhere. Plus the sudden "serious" moments (Jax shooting Ragatha multiple times because he's mad, Kinger darkness talks with Pomni, GummyGoo "dying", etc)
It's trying to do a lot of shit at once. Nothing blends into itself naturally. You have to force these to work together. One example I can think of even is the Gangle episode. It felt jarring from the rest of the series for me. Sticks out like a thumb because it feels very different from the rest of the series.
What is the message?
Now, what was the END message of the series when all is said and done? What do we want the audience to take away, and how do we want to show it?
There are many ways this show could've ended. I'm not going to beat a dead horse here.
What is the message trying to convey? - Some people can't be/aren't worth saving? Be happy with what you have and not what you could have had? Learn to find peace within yourself and your situation?
TADC did a shit job at its conclusion. Abstractions never served any real purpose; by the end, their existence means nothing. One of the few "stakes" we had in the series was that you could abstract if your mental health deteriorates. You can become a monster. But what's the real purpose of it? Why should we care about all these literally who abstractions, anyway? Jax shows us at one point that abstraction is peaceful, so what's the problem? Also, if Caine is able to just "undo" an abstraction, where was there ever a stake in it?
The only thing stopping Caine from undoing the abstractions is just miscommunication. He doesn't realize humans don't just naturally abstract. If he is told this, he can bring everyone back. Instead of exploring this, it's just left unanswered. Kinger is okay with his wife living in a fishtank. Jax and Ribbit could've been reunited, Scratch brought back, etc, but they won't for the sake of...a forced bittersweet ending? Why?
You can create a story with a weird, non-logical ending. The horror movie "Tusk" ends with the human walrus man just living in a zoo for some reason. Does it make sense? Not really. Is it stupid? Kinda, yeah. But Tusk is also just a stupid movie. It doesn't really take its concept as seriously as TADC tries to.
What is the audience supposed to take from this when all is said and done? - This ties back into the main message, but it's not the same thing. This part is often overlooked in modern writing. This is the part that you actively feel once you finish a series. How did it impact you? Have you ever see a piece of media that just made you go "holy shit"? Or maybe a piece of media that made you angry (in a good way)? Have you ever experienced a piece of media that changed your outlook, maybe the way you look at a certain concept, or appreciate something you never really cared about before? This is what you take away from a series. A feeling, an idea, an anger, or a happiness that makes you THINK. It CHALLENGES you.
One example is the original Saw movie, also a horror/mystery. You follow the story, the characters, everything, and then there is that big twist! ...It was all a recording. There is no way to save those people because they're already dead. The one man's son? In a safe place? Pissed me the fuck off. But it makes you think. It can make you look at problems differently. Make you look for something you never would have looked for before. Ever since I watched Saw, it has changed that part of me.
All storytellers should strive to have their audience take something from their story long-term. You don't have this much anymore because everything is so surface-level. They tell instead of show. "Don't be Racist", "Don't be hateful", "Help those around you who need help". Elementary grade messages. No one is going to care when all is said and done.
Other Considerations:
There's so much other bullshit that happens in this series. One detail I'm going to bring attention to is the worldbuilding. TADC has shitty worldbuilding full of logical fallacies.
Worldbuilding is critical for original works. You can go into detail, or, as Space King said, "Keep it simple, Stupid".
Not everything that happens needs to be explained. This is part of what makes fiction so good, especially horror fiction.
One of my favorite examples to pull from is the original Alien franchise. It was terrifying when it first came out because you didn't know what to expect. What were the Aliens? Where did they come from? What do they want? How do we protect ourselves from them?
It played on one of the easiest parts of the brain to take advantage of--the fear of the unknown. If someone is scared of the dark, they aren't scared because it's dark; they're scared of what might be lurking in the dark. Your brain can make you see things that aren't there. Your brain can lie to you about what you are experiencing as a way to make up for not understanding. It's why cosmic horror works so well.
But TADC doesn't understand this. It both tells us too much, but also not enough at the same time.
1.) We know that nothing in TADC is real. NPCs, locations, missions, etc. It's all just a game made by Caine, who is a creative AI.
2.) Abstractions only truly come from "player" characters. Abstractions occur when people lose their minds. What makes them lose their minds? Real problems. Ribbit, Jax, and Kaufmo all abstracted due to issues within their little friend group. Torture won't make you abstract because it's the pain of the digital flesh, not the manifested mind. That's why Ragatha and her mommy issues, or Gangle with her self-identity issues during Caine's rampage, don't make them abstract. These are digital traits that were scanned into them. It's a part of who they are, it distresses them, but doesn't trigger abstraction. What does? Other active players are messing with their minds.
TADC has scanned characters who have a "default" setting, kind of like the NPC characters. They have a natural state they can exist in that is only truly bothered by other player characters. It's like in real life, you can drone away at your 9-5, and if you don't have to interact with people, you could probably happily work in peace. It's your natural state you're working in. But now throw in coworkers, drama, family issues, pets dying, issues caused by people above you, etc, now you can't work in your flow state anymore. Other people often drive people to suicide. It's not always the case, but one of the biggest reasons.
We know too much about abstractions. At first, they're freaky and interesting because we don't know about them. It's like Xenomorphs; they look dangerous, and we don't understand them. It's what makes us stay away. We want to protect ourselves and our loved ones from harm. It's a natural instinct. In TADC, it's shown that abstracting just turns you into a mindless, confused creature that stumbles along. But we are also shown that it's a peaceful state for the one who actually lost their mind.
Not sure if controversial, but I don't feel like we ever needed to know this. The characters in the story do not know this. At the end, with Queenie swimming around in a tank, she could be in pain for all they know. She could faintly recognize her husband and feel drawn to him. Sitting Kinger outside her enclosure could fill her with sorrow she no longer knows how to express. THEY don't know this. But because WE were shown this, it seems to give the implication that characters in-story do, which I believe to be an overlooked detail.
3.) There are so many fucking characters. Let's break down each character by their type and contributions to the story.
READY PLAYER ONE:
Pomni - Main character, the individual we experience the circus through. She knows as much as we do. She's level-headed, skittish, confused, but also the typical voice of reason. We see the circus through her, so her role makes sense.
Jax - Later established as the main character. Cynical, self-loathing, angry, scared, and impulsive. He's scared of the truth. He's been in the circus for a long time, lost his friends due to personal issues. Caused friends to feel abstract due to pulling away. (This may be due to his initial scan as well. As I stated before, characters spawn in as their default selves. They may not be able to grow from those scanned traits for the same reason NPCs may not be able to grow long-term once reset. Jax was always destined to fail and drag other characters down with him)
Ragatha - Overly positive, tries too hard to be accommodating, and is afraid to share her true feelings. She has issues with her mother that she was scanned with. She's a temporary friend to Pomni, the main purpose is to loredump.
Kinger - One of the original programmers. doesn't know a lot...until he does? Longest living Circus member to date. How no one else realized he becomes intelligent in the dark is beyond me. Plot hole. Not even his wife noticed to tell anyone before abstracting? Alright.
Gangle - What the fuck was the point of Gangle long term? Bullied by Jax, possibly due to his initial scan characteristics. She...well, she was a love interest for Zooble, I guess? She didn't really contribute much that I can think of. I thought that one moment where she forgives Jax would have some payoff, but it just...didn't. If Gangle was removed, the story could still play out as normal.
Zooble - Bitch character. Unlikable and only complains and looks for the negatives. Doesn't want to go on missions, pisses off Caine, saves Pomni from abstracting with Jax, and...helps make Gangle not sad? Could also be removed from the series without changing anything.
honestly, the story would've been stronger if we only had Pomni, Ragatha, Caine, and Kinger. They have genuine roles to fill, but Gangle/Zooble don't. Jax could piss off Caine way easier and more naturally.
Kaufmo - Exists to abstract, introduces the audience to the possibility of abstraction and its dangers.
Scratch - One of the original programmers. Knowing this doesn't really do us any good long-term because Scratch never comes back to do anything with real purpose. Lore dump character.
Ribbit - Jax's implied girlfriend. Exists to show that Jax has undesirable traits scanned that make him dangerous to be around. He brings everyone around him down. He can't grow or develop as a character. He's doomed to be stagnant and to inadvertently kill the ones he loves.
Queenie - Kinger's wife. That's about it. He misses her when he remembers her.
Non Player characters (of relevance):
Caine - Main AI, creates the missions and world, serves as the lead antagonist. Struggles to learn, grow, and listen to others. He also has a default state that he can't outgrow until the blue AI is removed from him.
Bubble - The blue AI (?) spites Caine, adds humor to the duo, but doesn't play any real role by the end. He's implied to have a purpose when Ragebaiting Caine, but just disappears when Caine goes Postal. Could also be removed from the story with no real consequences, or simply existed in a dormant/lobotomized state until being unearthed as the blue AI.
Gloink Queen - do you even remember this character? It was the large slug. It has smaller characters who are abstracted by Kaufmo going berserk. Decent use of a character for a one-off episode, but it offers no true payoff after the pilot. Exists to show why abstracted players are dangerous.
GummyGoo & Co - Introduces us to the idea that NPC characters are not the same as Player characters. Pomni has to learn a hard lesson that the world is not real. Her friends are not real and can disappear at any time. She can not bring back what was lost. Best use of an NPC character.
Princess Lollilau: You remember her? Exactly.
Abel: Another intelligent NPC character. Used to set up a "secret" mission, showing that the efforts made by the main cast don't amount to anything. Playing along doesn't get them anywhere in the long term. The only way they can bring change is to break the core of the game itself through Caine. Also, a good use of an NPC character. He forces the cast to realize the stakes at play. He indirectly causes them to play a hand.
There were a bunch of other characters that didn't add a whole lot. Angel (big scary face), Fudge Monster, Ghostly (Spookys Jumpscare Mansion ripoff), disappearing guy, Big Evil Tops (Main cast but evil), Ming (Mannequin gun guy), Sun, then Joshua Moon. A lot of these characters played no important role in the series. If it were episodic, it would be fine, but the show is intended to be a progressive story. There are others, too. I just don't have enough in me to tell you about the cardboard cutout character that is named for some fucking reason.
This brings me back to Over the Garden Wall. It has a tight cast of tight characters. Each character plays a role that either helps the main cast understand the world itself, come to conclusions, change their way of thinking to solve problems, or introduces them to other characters. TADC has bloat. Many characters could have been cut by the finale.
Fuckass Lore Segment:
Sigh.
The characters are brain scans, small brain scans because the technology is old. The last memory they have before entering is the computer in the abandoned building.
Small files were all that could be used in TADC. What made some memories more important than others is not specified. We know that deep core characteristics of the Player character are included, but not all. I'm only focusing on the main characters for this part.
Pomni - In real life, Pomni likes exploring and taking pictures.
Jax - Jax may have killed his mother, hit someone with his car, been homeless, and didn't seem to have anyone to be his friend for a while.
Small scans imply that only the most important and relevant parts of someone's person can be transferred in the file. Perhaps things that were fresh on that person's mind before they were scanned? For Jax, he was afraid and lonely. He may have killed someone he loved for a lesser trait he possessed (not being manly enough). He didn't have a lot going on in his life and may be a wanted criminal.
When scanned, these are the only surviving traits from him because it's all he remembers.
- Jax may have killed his mother for not being manly enough.
- Jax is put in a maid outfit and freaks the fuck out.
- Jax accidentally causes Ribbit/Kaufmo, his only two friends, to abstract because he's used to being alone (homeless & motherless behavior). He can't risk being seen as soft and effeminate because that idea is what made him possibly kill his mother. One of his last memories is running away and escaping the police, so these could be his "prioritized" traits in his scan.
- Jax can't tell people about his problems because it pushes them away. We see him often almost tell the other characters why he is the way he is, but then decides against it. Telling people causes them to abstract or die.
- Jax can't make and keep friends because his default scan won't let him. He can not grow or develop as a character. Only the worst parts of him were brought into the circus, so that's what everyone around him is stuck with.
- Jax loses sense of his reality. IF they leave the circus, he only has bad things to return to, leading to him pressing the button that would make them stay. Leaving means coming to terms with what he has done and his crimes. He's stuck in a prison of his own making. He has no way out, no matter where he goes, because he is doomed from the start.
Kind of makes it more fucked up that they kept milking him being in a maid dress when it probably reminds him of his PTSD of when he possibly killed his mother. Tranny hates women and thinks killing them is funny, more at seven. Imagine being at the lowest state in your life, pushing your elderly parent on Halloween, possibly killing them, then in the afterlife, you're forced to wear the costume you killed your parent in because it's "UwU omg so cute lmaooo so silly twink boy in cute fetish gear xD".
I'd go postal, too ig.
Now we need to talk about The Door. The door was never real, the room was never real. It was foreshadowing to the fact that they could all have admin controls if they realized it. The Door was never a true way out of the circus, but because it's what they wanted, they could conjure it up. They all had this power, but never knew it because it was being withheld from their memory. At the end, they can work together to make the circus in their vision.
The computer in an abandoned building left by C&A. This is where it doesn't make sense to me. I'm guessing it's implied C&A went out of business (empty offices, lonesome computer program, real-life Scratch and Kinger nowhere to be seen), but why would they leave the computer program running? Unless it was some kind of SCP thing, leaving it running for eternity doesn't make sense.
Wreck-It Ralph needed the machines to be on to keep from "dying" or "resetting", but was also in a booming arcade and could travel between machines. The main cast connects to the internet and sees their real selves, meaning someone is paying for the internet in that abandoned building...why?
Then another point I wanted to bring up was the fact that the main cast sees their real selves and are just...okay with it? This makes no sense for any reason or excuse you could possibly conjure up.
If I saw a clone of myself living freely in an open world, free to live my life, have kids, a family, a future, pursue my dreams, and have ups and downs while I'm living in a digital cage, I'd become depressed. Any person would. That's something that would make anyone bitter and angry in their circumstances. Stripped of your life, name, title, accomplishments, put in a world with people you don't really like, never knowing who or what may come next, all while there is a more successful version of yourself out there, past the screen, having children, celebrating their birthdays, and watching them go to school and college...
That's the shit that would make you abstract. It would mess with your mind. No amount of happy-go-lucky determination for better days would make you see your significant other (who isn't really yours) in another person's arms, feeling love and affection as they build a life together, then just be like "it is what it is".
But the Digital Cast is bittersweet and happy about it? They didn't even know their real names. It's illogical to react like that in any capacity. Why would they suddenly be okay with that after trying to escape the circus for an unspecified amount of time? Will they continue to check up on themselves over time? What about when the day comes that they pass away? Would Kinger just watch recordings of his grandchildren on TikTok while Queenie continues swimming around?
It's a crappy ending. Earlier in this comment, I mentioned Tusk, yes? The ending feels like a worse version of Tusk.
It would've made more sense for the characters to at least change their bodies now that they have the ability to. We see multiple times throughout the show that they hate their bodies. Now that they have admin controls, they can make themselves look more authentic. They see pictures of their real selves and don't even try to make even small changes? Pomni can't drop the hat and have her own camera? Gangle can't give herself a more desirable body to make drawing easier? Or make her emotions easier to express beyond a porcelain plate? Zooble doesn't make any physical changes either? Her whole thing was "I hate my body and my life lol shit sucks ig" and that just isn't resolved? Was it forgotten by the end?
Creators of a series need to keep a list of all their side plots in a notebook, I swear to god. If you want the story to be more than about its main plot, don't introduce other plots if you don't intend to give them some sort of payoff.
If X occurs, then Y must happen after. Cause brings effect. Actions bring consequences. If I steal from a cookie jar, then it turns out those cookies were for my older sibling's school baking project, that would result in a repercussion or a solution needing to be made. I did X, so Y must happen.
Zooble hates her body, so what is she going to do about it?
Gangle wants to become more confident and express emotion easier, what will she do about it?
Pomni wants to know who she really is, and what she is going to do about it?
The characters want to know what their real names are. What does learning those names do for them? Bring them closure? Do they go by their real names from then on? What does showing them their real names do for them by the end of the series? WHAT HAPPENS FROM THEM LEARNING THEIR NAMES?
Caine doesn't listen, so he goes apeshit. Then he "dies", comes back later, and is sorry, but nothing comes of it. X happened, but Y didn't do anything.
You could make an argument of "oh well, nothing is real in TADC, so it doesn't matter," and for that, I humbly say that you're a fucking retard. Plot convenience shouldn't excuse bad writing. Everything happens for a reason. If things happen for no reason, then it's just filler. Filler is optional and doesn't progress a story. You can have filler, but it should still at least give us SOMETHING. Show how characters interact with one another that you don't often see, for example.
Filler could be the Digital Cast talking to Bubble one-on-one. It gives us something new that we haven't seen and might reveal new data. Or, it could just be for a funny interaction to play into the show's comical side.
Now, if Bubble were to go up to Kinger, ask him if he misses Scratch, then is never brought up again, that's just distasteful and useless in the long term. You give the impression that this reaction will give us some kind of payoff, then proceed to forget it happened in the first place.
