Have You Read The New Wattpad?

[Astyl]

The seventh comic dropped and it reads like a fanfic. When the comic was confirmed to be near finished and ready to be released, it was via an email where Valve gracefully declined the community's offer to write it for them. They obviously knew they already wrote the community's comic and felt it would be pointless to create two issues.

Let me start off by saying what I don't agree with most people about. The "we did it Reddit" ending was the only way. It's the sole way to conclude that isn't a sad ending to any form of media, the Issue you have with it is they pulled the classic "The treasure we found was actually the reader that read all along the way". That's the Reddit part. Have that removed and the table picture part becomes good. Everything else leading up to it is what people really have a problem with.

You would think that having seven years to make it would make sure the last comic isn't rushed, but no, in classic Valve fashion, it's wait 69 morbillion years, rush out bad content, repeat.

Scout just has a sudden epiphany about miss Pauling that was out of place and out of character. I know we're all meant to assume they grew in the time since the last comic but you must at least address that growth. It's extremely weird seeing nearly every quirk or shortcoming being waved away as "well they're old now". Everyone is suddenly brilliant and knows just what to do and deeply introspective. That part would have been much better and funnier and would have allowed to showcase the same amount of growth better if scout admitted his love to her in his usual way only to be met with a simple "no" and then accepting the fact rather than monologuing in a Shakespearean sonnet or whatever the hell he did.

The administrator was all throughout TF2's history made out to be this mysterious character with a higher purpose but now she's just evil because "She just is, ok? Trust me bro." It was so obvious that her entire character backstory and motive was scrapped and replaced to fit within a short comic and her most faithful assistant miss Pauling decides to suddenly pull the plug on her when she sees she talked nasty to an old man. This is despite her saying just moments before that she doesn't care about the administrator's cause. Also I just like how suddenly she doesn't want to kill herself, the administrator.

Miss pauling has a brief existential crisis that is resolved on command when she realizes she will, in fact, not be using the conveniently conjured australium from soldier's cave. Why? Because the blue engy told her so, and that's his only role in this comic, again, despite what he was made out to be prior. Also they were the ones that cut the sea cables.

The writers of this comic obviously loved soldier way too much. Pyro, demo, sniper and medic may as well be mannequins while soldier gets merrasmus killed for some reason and hey guys we're quirky he's now possessing a standard issue brick like his good ol' buddy Tom Jones. Yes, he's an extremely powerful wizard that can resurect himself, but, this way soldier gets to fill another panel with his goofy one-liners about shidding and farding on the toilet.

Saxton simply firing Olivia was also another clear cop-out. I like how the writers can just invent any BS and chalk it up to it being quirky and thus "funny". No, these are not the rules you set. Before it made some kind of sense and served a purpose that wasn't entirely circular.

The Saxton and bae ending was good I think, spy's full face reveal is good and I think they managed to not screw up his face. He looks just as he should. Pyro's gender is likely male, and it's good they didn't do a Dream minecraft face reveal like some people suggested because then you lose all the intrigue that's the only thing propping that character up. I also like soldier repeatedly saying he is going to get Zhana pregnant, that was funny and in character.

Spy not admiting his relationship to scout shows lack of growth on his side, while at the same time, his relationship with the kid he gave the mask to is deeply wholesome and shows how much he truly cares for them. He is a troubled but caring Frenchman and I think that was handled nearly perfectly. I think he should have admited it to scout, but given the writing in this comic I'm glad he didn't.

The writting clearly shows at times they still have the capacity to make funny, thought-out scenes in their panels, but they just forgo that for cheap fan service. Kinda the trend with the entire game for a while now isn't it?

[Eighteen-Counts Trevor]

You misunderstand. The mysterious contributor at the end wasn't you, the reader. It was secret Team Fortress 2 lore character Dracula (real), who helped the mercenaries the whole time in the background.

Side note, genuinely how do you come to any conclusion regarding pyro's gender when pyro literally does nothing for the entire comic? There's no definitive evidence for pyro being anything, especially in comic 7 where Pyro was just a literal background character.

Also the way I see it, Olivia just getting fired is pretty fitting when her entire purpose in the story was "Do nothing, get Saxton fired" in the first place. She was a cop-out answer to "how do we make Saxton lose control of Mann Co" and didn't have any purpose in the story beyond that.

[Astyl]

Originally posted by Two-Timing Trevor:

You misunderstand. The mysterious contributor at the end wasn't you, the reader. It was secret Team Fortress 2 lore character Dracula (real), who helped the mercenaries the whole time in the background.

Side note, genuinely how do you come to any conclusion regarding pyro's gender when pyro literally does nothing for the entire comic? There's no definitive evidence for pyro being anything, especially in comic 7 where Pyro was just a literal background character.

Also the way I see it, Olivia just getting fired is pretty fitting when her entire purpose in the story was "Do nothing, get Saxton fired" in the first place. She was a cop-out answer to "how do we make Saxton lose control of Mann Co" and didn't have any purpose in the story beyond that.

I didn't come to a conclusion, and I certainly didn't imply comic number 7 had anything to do with it. It just makes sense that 9 mercs are men as the other 8 are, the clear flip flopping from Valve calling pyro a he then a she then a he just shows you how little they care for that detail, what's most likely is that he's just a small schizophernic dude.

Two wrongs don't make a right. That makes it even more pointless and an even bigger cop-out.

[Eighteen-Counts Trevor]

Originally posted by Astyl:

Originally posted by Two-Timing Trevor:

You misunderstand. The mysterious contributor at the end wasn't you, the reader. It was secret Team Fortress 2 lore character Dracula (real), who helped the mercenaries the whole time in the background.

Side note, genuinely how do you come to any conclusion regarding pyro's gender when pyro literally does nothing for the entire comic? There's no definitive evidence for pyro being anything, especially in comic 7 where Pyro was just a literal background character.

Also the way I see it, Olivia just getting fired is pretty fitting when her entire purpose in the story was "Do nothing, get Saxton fired" in the first place. She was a cop-out answer to "how do we make Saxton lose control of Mann Co" and didn't have any purpose in the story beyond that.

I didn't come to a conclusion, and I certainly didn't imply comic number 7 had anything to do with it. It just makes sense that 9 mercs are men as the other 8 are, the clear flip flopping from Valve calling pyro a he then a she then a he just shows you how little they care for that detail, what's most likely is that he's just a small schizophernic dude.

Two wrongs don't make a right. That makes it even more pointless and an even bigger cop-out.

Except there were nine classic mercenaries. The fact that one of them was confirmed to be a woman should be strong enough evidence to prove that, if you could use a pattern to determine pyro's gender, that pattern isn't "the other eight are men"

The entire character of Olivia was a cop-out. If you want to complain about something, complaining about the cop-out character getting solved with a cop-out solution really isn't the most productive thing. You could just leave it at "i didn't find Olivia funny" and it would be a more reasonable argument because the comics are filled with cop-outs. Bad situations being solved by cop-outs is basically a running gag in the comics. Anticlimax is basically the theme of the comics.

[Astyl]

Originally posted by Two-Timing Trevor:

Originally posted by Astyl:

I didn't come to a conclusion, and I certainly didn't imply comic number 7 had anything to do with it. It just makes sense that 9 mercs are men as the other 8 are, the clear flip flopping from Valve calling pyro a he then a she then a he just shows you how little they care for that detail, what's most likely is that he's just a small schizophernic dude.

Two wrongs don't make a right. That makes it even more pointless and an even bigger cop-out.

Except there were nine classic mercenaries. The fact that one of them was confirmed to be a woman should be strong enough evidence to prove that, if you could use a pattern to determine pyro's gender, that pattern isn't "the other eight are men"

The entire character of Olivia was a cop-out.

I mean fair enough but classic is really a different team entirely from a different game shoehorned into the TF2 universe.

Yes and now they created a cop-out answer to a cop-out problem, doubling their bad writing. It isn't like matter and anti-matter. Cop-outs were never funny and the more of them there are and the less meaning they have to the story or the characters, the worse. Trying to excuse bad writing by saying that it was the point that it sucks is really something.

[Bob]

They have forgotten about our favourite side kick from this comic series: Astyl. He appeared every time the story did not make sense and stated why it is bad in Astyl-like manner.

[Eighteen-Counts Trevor]

Originally posted by Astyl:

Originally posted by Two-Timing Trevor:

Except there were nine classic mercenaries. The fact that one of them was confirmed to be a woman should be strong enough evidence to prove that, if you could use a pattern to determine pyro's gender, that pattern isn't "the other eight are men"

The entire character of Olivia was a cop-out.

I mean fair enough but classic is really a different team entirely from a different game shoehorned into the TF2 universe. And yes thr pattern is still true because in both cases most of them are men, so the likelihood is still on that side.

Yes and now they created a cop-out answer to a cop-out problem, doubling their bad writing. It isn't like matter and anti-matter.

Except no it isn't. Because the pattern isn't "they're all men so pyro is a man as well." The pattern is "the other eight mercenaries are consistently men but the pyros aren't consistently men," which leaves tf2 pyro still up in the air. We only have three known teams and no confirmed answer so for all we know the pattern could be 9 men, 8 men 1 woman, 8 men 3 monkeys in a suit.

If you think that's doubling I'd hate for you to realize just how many times they've copped-out. You do realize low quality can be a joke in and of itself, right? The difference between a deliberately bad joke and a joke that falls flat is that you, the audience, are being laughed at for expecting something good. That's the point of a cop-out joke like the ending to Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

[Astyl]

Originally posted by Aim Bob:

They have forgotten about our favourite side kick from this comic series: Astyl. He appeared every time the story did not make sense and stated why it is bad in Astyl-like manner.

I felt really betrayed by that.

[Astyl]

Originally posted by Two-Timing Trevor:

Originally posted by Astyl:

I mean fair enough but classic is really a different team entirely from a different game shoehorned into the TF2 universe. And yes thr pattern is still true because in both cases most of them are men, so the likelihood is still on that side.

Yes and now they created a cop-out answer to a cop-out problem, doubling their bad writing. It isn't like matter and anti-matter.

Except no it isn't. Because the pattern isn't "they're all men so pyro is a man as well." The pattern is "the other eight mercenaries are consistently men but the pyros aren't consistently men," which leaves tf2 pyro still up in the air. We only have three known teams and no confirmed answer so for all we know the pattern could be 9 men, 8 men 1 woman, 8 men 3 monkeys in a suit.

If you think that's doubling I'd hate for you to realize just how many times they've copped-out.

Yeah I removed that part when I realized the error.

I didn't say they didn't, cop-outs were bad then, they're bad now.

Also can you stop adding whole sections to your comments, I hate going back and forth responding to unnoted amendments in it.

Ok and what deeply funny comedic stroke of genius was pretending Hale didn't know he could fire her? It loses its charm when literally everything can be excused by "Hale dum dum".

[Eighteen-Counts Trevor]

Originally posted by Astyl:

Originally posted by Two-Timing Trevor:

Except no it isn't. Because the pattern isn't "they're all men so pyro is a man as well." The pattern is "the other eight mercenaries are consistently men but the pyros aren't consistently men," which leaves tf2 pyro still up in the air. We only have three known teams and no confirmed answer so for all we know the pattern could be 9 men, 8 men 1 woman, 8 men 3 monkeys in a suit.

If you think that's doubling I'd hate for you to realize just how many times they've copped-out.

Yeah I removed that part when I realized the error.

I didn't say they didn't, cop-outs were bad then, they're bad now.

Also can you stop adding whole sections to your comments, I hate going back and forth responding to unnoted amendments in it.

Ok and what deeply funny comedic stroke of genius was pretending Hale didn't know he could fire her? It loses its charm when literally everything can be excused by "Hale dum dum".

And all I'm doing is pointing out that the story was filled with cop-outs before they fired Olivia.

No thanks. If I have something to add after I've said my part, I'll use the feature they've given me to do so. You're guilty of the same thing by the way, so you really don't have room to be requesting such a thing.

Not sure what you mean by "pretending," people tend to forget obvious things all the time. Might I ask a similar question? Why didn't He just literally throw Olivia out in the first place so he wouldn't have to splatter his office with kid blood? Or even just kill Gray Mann while he was vulnerable? The answer is that the point of the joke is that Hale forgets obvious things as you've so graciously pointed out. The whole point of many jokes and resolutions is that the writers thought it would be funnier if the characters never thought to take the very obvious solution and just end things there until after things happened. It's all over the comics, it's been a thing for six other issues. It's not suddenly a problem now. Why are you acting like it is?

[Astyl]

Originally posted by Two-Timing Trevor:

Originally posted by Astyl:

Yeah I removed that part when I realized the error.

I didn't say they didn't, cop-outs were bad then, they're bad now.

Also can you stop adding whole sections to your comments, I hate going back and forth responding to unnoted amendments in it.

Ok and what deeply funny comedic stroke of genius was pretending Hale didn't know he could fire her? It loses its charm when literally everything can be excused by "Hale dum dum".

And all I'm doing is pointing out that the story was filled with cop-outs before they fired Olivia.

No thanks. If I have something to add after I've said my part, I'll use the feature they've given me to do so. You're guilty of the same thing by the way, so you really don't have room to be requesting such a thing.

Not sure what you mean by "pretending," people tend to forget obvious things all the time. Might I ask a similar question? Why didn't He just literally throw Olivia out in the first place so he wouldn't have to splatter his office with kid blood? Or even just kill Gray Mann while he was vulnerable? The answer is that the point of the joke is that Hale forgets obvious things as you've so graciously pointed out. The whole point of many jokes and resolutions is that the writers thought it would be funnier if the characters never thought to take the very obvious solution and just end things there until after things happened. It's all over the comics, it's been a thing for six other issues. It's not suddenly a problem now. Why are you acting like it is?

And they upped the absurdity of their cop-outs in this comic, that's all I am saying.

Well then be prepared not to have something answered because I ain't going back to carbon dating to see what you've changed. I realized my error and removed it thinking you didn't yet read the first edition. I then addressed it after that turned out not to be the case. You're just adding stuff. I'm pretty sure the edit function was made for typos and editors notes, but the general rule of parlance is adding an edit label before the addition.

I'm not saying Hale must be smart and do the right thing. Hell, no movie would ever be made if the characters made sensible choices, but even being the butt of every joke in a movie and being dumb has its limits. That entire dethroning served no purpose because it was resolved the same way it was started, without reason with a cheap "joke".

[Eighteen-Counts Trevor]

Originally posted by Astyl:

Originally posted by Two-Timing Trevor:

And all I'm doing is pointing out that the story was filled with cop-outs before they fired Olivia.

No thanks. If I have something to add after I've said my part, I'll use the feature they've given me to do so. You're guilty of the same thing by the way, so you really don't have room to be requesting such a thing.

Not sure what you mean by "pretending," people tend to forget obvious things all the time. Might I ask a similar question? Why didn't He just literally throw Olivia out in the first place so he wouldn't have to splatter his office with kid blood? Or even just kill Gray Mann while he was vulnerable? The answer is that the point of the joke is that Hale forgets obvious things as you've so graciously pointed out. The whole point of many jokes and resolutions is that the writers thought it would be funnier if the characters never thought to take the very obvious solution and just end things there until after things happened. It's all over the comics, it's been a thing for six other issues. It's not suddenly a problem now. Why are you acting like it is?

And they upped the absurdity of their cop-outs in this comic, that's all I am saying.

Well then be prepared not to have something answered because I ain't going back to carbon dating to see what you've changed. I realized my error and removed it thinking you didn't yet read the first edition. I then addressed it after that turned out not to be the case. You're just adding stuff. I'm pretty sure the edit function was made for typos and editors notes, but the general rule of parlance is adding an edit label before the addition.

I'm not saying Hale must be smart and do the right thing. Hell, no movie would ever be made if the characters made sensible choices, but even being the butt of every joke in a movie and being dumb has its limits. That entire dethroning served no purpose because it was resolved the same way it was started, without reason with a cheap "joke".

They didn't though. One of the most absurd things that happened in the comics was the mercenaries almost getting hanged by the mayor and that was resolved because Miss Pauling said mayors don't have the power to hang people. Conveniently forgetting that you can just fire someone is frankly way less absurd than having a mayor that has no idea what a mayor does and being convinced not to hang actual war criminals because he learned what mayors do and they're both absurd. But acting like absurdity is a bad thing is, itself, absurd because the comics have made it clear they're supposed to be absurd. Looking at an absurd comic and scoffing at the absurdity is like going to the meat isle of your local grocery store and being mad they're selling meat.

Cool, I don't care. A lot of what I add isn't important to my main point anyways. It's "Another thing" this and "Another thing" that which I only add to help my main point.

Yeah that's the point. Do you want a cookie for the keen observation of noticing how such a major plot point was started with a throw-away character and ended with the throw-away character getting thrown away?

[Astyl]

Originally posted by Two-Timing Trevor:

Originally posted by Astyl:

And they upped the absurdity of their cop-outs in this comic, that's all I am saying.

Well then be prepared not to have something answered because I ain't going back to carbon dating to see what you've changed. I realized my error and removed it thinking you didn't yet read the first edition. I then addressed it after that turned out not to be the case. You're just adding stuff. I'm pretty sure the edit function was made for typos and editors notes, but the general rule of parlance is adding an edit label before the addition.

I'm not saying Hale must be smart and do the right thing. Hell, no movie would ever be made if the characters made sensible choices, but even being the butt of every joke in a movie and being dumb has its limits. That entire dethroning served no purpose because it was resolved the same way it was started, without reason with a cheap "joke".

They didn't though. One of the most absurd things that happened in the comics was the mercenaries almost getting hanged by the mayor and that was resolved because Miss Pauling said mayors don't have the power to hang people. Conveniently forgetting that you can just fire someone is frankly way less absurd than having a mayor that has no idea what a mayor does and being convinced not to hang actual war criminals because he learned what mayors do and they're both absurd. But acting like absurdity is a bad thing is, itself, absurd because the comics have made it clear they're supposed to be absurd. Looking at an absurd comic and scoffing at the absurdity is like going to the meat isle of your local grocery store and being mad they're selling meat.

Cool, I don't care. A lot of what I add isn't important to my main point anyways. It's "Another thing" this and "Another thing" that which I only add to help my main point.

Yeah that's the point. Do you want a cookie for the keen observation of noticing how such a major plot point was started with a throw-away character and ended with the throw-away character getting thrown away?

In that case I guess I forgot how bad the cop-outs were prior. I concede on the comparison but I still stand by saying it's bad writing.

Let me clarify that I'm not against absurdity. I'm against pointless absurdity. The mayor example was a joke that advances the plot, it is a cop-out but at least it didn't both start and end itself.

Fair enough.

You think you're being snarky while you're only being one-dimensional. One of the major complaints for the horror movie Smile 2 was how the universe was set up and constantly took advantage of the unlimited writing freedom the script writers enjoyed. At any point everything could be undone in any way and all plot elements shifted and rearanged in whatever perspective was useful. This is not an issue I solely developed in my shed, it's bad writing. You're capable of understanding the concept of dad-joke type cop-outs but not capable of understanding that the more you utilize it, the less invested you are and the less it all matters. It diminishes the humour as much as any cheap jumpscare, which is why you have the word cheap put in front of it.

[Eighteen-Counts Trevor]

Originally posted by Astyl:

Originally posted by Two-Timing Trevor:

They didn't though. One of the most absurd things that happened in the comics was the mercenaries almost getting hanged by the mayor and that was resolved because Miss Pauling said mayors don't have the power to hang people. Conveniently forgetting that you can just fire someone is frankly way less absurd than having a mayor that has no idea what a mayor does and being convinced not to hang actual war criminals because he learned what mayors do and they're both absurd. But acting like absurdity is a bad thing is, itself, absurd because the comics have made it clear they're supposed to be absurd. Looking at an absurd comic and scoffing at the absurdity is like going to the meat isle of your local grocery store and being mad they're selling meat.

Cool, I don't care. A lot of what I add isn't important to my main point anyways. It's "Another thing" this and "Another thing" that which I only add to help my main point.

Yeah that's the point. Do you want a cookie for the keen observation of noticing how such a major plot point was started with a throw-away character and ended with the throw-away character getting thrown away?

In that case I guess I forgot how bad the cop-outs were prior. I concede on the comparison but I still stand by saying it's bad writing.

Let me clarify that I'm not against absurdity. I'm against pointless absurdity. The mayor example was a joke that advances the plot, it is a cop-out but at least it didn't both start and end itself.

Fair enough.

You think you're being snarky while you're only being one-dimensional. One of the major complaints for the horror movie Smile 2 was how the universe was set up and constantly took advantage of the unlimited writing freedom the script writers enjoyed. At any point everything could be undone in any way and all plot elements shifted and rearanged in whatever perspective was useful. This is not an issue I solely developed in my shed, it's bad writing. You're capable of understanding the concept of dad-joke type cop-outs but not capable of understanding that the more you utilize it, the less invested you are and the less it all matters. It diminishes the humour as much as any cheap jumpscare, which is why you have the word cheap put in front of it.

And the bad writing in question is played for laughs because it's bad on purpose.

Except the mayor has way less of an impact on the plot because all he really does is try to execute the mercenaries, with the key word here being "try" because in practice he doesn't do anything at all. At least Olivia started the plot by doing absolutely nothing, the mayor did something and still didn't do much to affect the plot. So yeah, he is pointless absurdity.

Smile 2 is supposed to be taken seriously. Team Fortress 2 is not. The simple concept of a cop-out isn't what makes it stale as a joke, it's repetition with no variance. Running gags wouldn't be funny without variance. Likewise all of the cop-outs would be stale if they were all resolved the same way. You can make a very valid point of how the mayor and Olivia subplots were resolved in a very similar manner, a character realized they could not or could do something and they did not do it or did it respectively, which would contribute to the joke getting stale, but what other examples would you bring up that resolve the same way? A running gag doesn't get stale on the second try, that's usually the point where they start having to shake things up anyways. That's a genuine request by the way, please do point out other conflicts in the comic that resolved with "character realized they could or could not do something and did or did not do it". Humor isn't comparable to jumpscares. Jumpscares are a subcategory of horror that are a quick and easy way of instantly activating fear. Humor is not a subcategory of anything, but there is a subcategory of humor that is comparable to jumpscares. I have no idea what it's called but I can definitely describe it by telling you what a jumpscare is but replacing the words with ones more fitting for humor, because quick and easy ways of activating laughter are real jokes that people make. Anyways, the line between good horror/humor and bad horror/humor is the execution. Jumpscares and "loud = funny humor" are bad because they're repetitive, the same as all bad horror and humor. It's not about how often you use it, it's about how you shake it up each time you do use it. And I'd argue it's fine to shake things up by putting a "not" your second time, and I don't mean in a subversive way because that's best saved for when the joke gets stale.

[Dominic]

Spy was not Scouts father from what I know. Just a lot of people took it like that while Spy was just a co worker like the rest of the mercs.

So I kind of thought it was funny.

[Astyl]

Originally posted by Dominic:

Spy was not Scouts father from what I know. Just a lot of people took it like that while Spy was just a co worker like the rest of the mercs.

So I kind of thought it was funny.

Why in the world would he hesitate to say he's a friend for work in this latest comic?