Category: Great Animorphs Re-Read

Animorphs #46: “The Deception”

Publishing Info: Scholastic Paperbacks, October 2000

Where Did I Get this Book: own it!

Book Description: The Animorphs and Ax have managed to contact the Andalite home world. But the battle is far from over. Visser Two has arrived on earth, and he’s not happy about the state of things. He decides the best way to take over Earth is to have the humans destroy the people and the land the Yeerk’s don’t need. He decides to start World War III.

Ax and his friends know that Visser Two means business and there will probably only be two ways to keep him from destroying everything they know: Find a way to stop the war. Or, find away to stop him …forever..

Narrator: Ax

Plot: Another “beginning of the end” book where we see the start of the expansion of what, to this point, has been a very small war up on to a much larger, global scale. And poor Ax really embraces his role as being of two people and what that means, and it’s just rough.

The story picks up right off the back of the last with the Animorphs reaching out to the Andalites. In no surprise to anyone, even, notably, Ax himself at this point, the Andalites are huge dicks and immediately question the validity of the information the Animorphs are providing about the Yeerks preparation for the Andalite fleet. They accuse the Animorphs of potentially just trying to make things up to re-direct the Andalite fleet back towards helping Earth. Ax even gets on at one point and they say that while they’ll take what he says “under consideration,” he “might have confused his loyalties” by all of this time on Earth at this point, so they can’t completely trust him. Again, Andalites, showing their true colors as just the worst (all the more so for always strutting around claiming to be the best).

Later, Ax, Marco and Tobias overhear a garble report from the Yeerks on the transmitter. Ax manages to hack the transmitter into the NSA computer system and with its greater power is able to more fully receive the full Yeerk report: Visser Two is on his way to Earth to begin to put Visser Three’s (now Visser One) more grand plans into action. They overhear a set of coordinates and immediately need to make a plan.

They discover that the location is far out over the Pacific Ocean, and with the short amount of time before the plan, whatever it may be, is set to be put in motion, they won’t have time to make it out there using any of their morphs. This sets off the moral debate about whether or not they’ve finally reached the point where they will need to compromise on their general practice of not morphing humans. Cassie protests, but Jake is able to convince her that by this point in the war, they have to make these tough choices.

They make their way to an air force base and there Rachel and Ax knock out two pilots, morph them, and commandeer a fighter jet. The other morph flea and hang on for the ride, their small bodies able to survive the increased pressure from the incredible speeds the jet reaches. They make their way out to a large nuclear carrier ship in the middle of the ocean. But by the time they’ve gotten there, the original pilots have been discovered and everyone is on high alert. Ax manages to execute a controlled crash into the ocean and they all morph seagulls and make their way to the ship.

Jake, it turns out, has an almost encyclopedic knowledge of huge military ships like this, and using this information, they infiltrate the ship with Ax morphing another human sailor and making his way around. The problem is: they don’t know what they’re looking for! Until they spot some new arrivals who include a familiar face: Chapman. Alongside an officer called Admiral Carrington who they quickly discover is Visser Two, Chapman approaches the ship’s captain and says they have a special delivery for him. Ax slips two of the roach!Animorphs into the captain’s pocket and they are able to get in the room with him, but they are too late and the captain is infested. Ax and the others go to battle morphs to try and help, witnessed by several sailors around them. They barge in and Ax upends the portable Yeerk pool. In the madness, human soldiers barge in and the Animorphs have to bail to avoid hurting innocents.

Cassie and Ax end up together and Ax once more morphs his human sailor morph and, with Cassie on board, makes his way through the ship to an information deck that Jake had mentioned. There, they overhear an announcement of an incoming Chinese missile which shortly after hits with a massive explosion. Ax is quick to put together the Yeerk plot: they are planning on setting off WWIII by instigating a war between the Chinese and the U.S. Ax frantically calls out to Jake who orders him to do whatever he has to to reverse the admiral and captain’s orders to retaliate. Ax shoots the admiral/Visser Two in the leg. When the medics arrive to take him to medical bay, Ax follows them and quickly knocks them out when they are in a private room. He acquires the admiral and returns to the control center where he orders the captain to reverse the order for a counter attack.

Chapman and the captain return to the room where Visser Two is lying, but the room is now also full of the rest of the Animorphs in their battle morphs. They demand to know what the rest of the plan is. In the way of any true villain, Visser Two immediately spills the rest of the plan: in a few hours, the US will hear that the ship has been attacked by the Chinese, and a specific sub, manned by Yeerks, will set out with a nuclear weapon to attack China. They try to threaten Visser Two into telling them which sub is the one controlled, but Visser Two is a true believer and zealously wackadoodle with his visions of Yeerk glory and refuses to tell them.

They are interrupted by the arrival of a bunch of Bug Fighters carrying Hork Bajir. Pandemonium breaks out on the ship with the human crew fighting against the Controlled crew and the alien invaders. Several members of the crew begin to recognize that the Earth animals that have suddenly appeared on the ship are fighting on their side and try to team up with the Animorphs. However, they are all badly outnumbered and it is hard to tell which humans are Controlled and which aren’t in the madness. In the madness, Visser Two escapes.

Ax sets off through the battle to track him down. To do so, he decides to follow Chapman and to do that, he gets another human morph, this time asking the individual in question who quickly agrees. He tracks down Chapman and, holding him at gun point, tries to get him to reveal the location of Visser Two. But before he can make much progress, he gets knocked out. He comes to, returns to his Andalite body, and makes his way back through the ship where he discovers the dying Captain. The Yeerk slithers out, but Ax knows it won’t make it far. The Captain says he tried to fight it, and Ax reassures him that he did all he could and stays with him until he dies.

Ax meets up with Tobias who has also acquired another human morph. All around them, the battle is being lost, with more and more of the ship falling under Yeerk control and the real humans being massacred. They meet up with the others and debate what to do, knowing that Visser Two, in his mania, can’t be threatened into revealing the Yeerk-controlled sub.

It’s at this point that Ax realizes the only way forward and privately thought speaks Jake. He tells him that in this situation, they only threat that could work against Visser Two is  a threat against the Yeerk pool itself. And fighter jets on the ship has some pretty strong bombs…Jake is horrified, knowing that they’d have to kill thousands of humans to drop a bomb through the middle of their city to reach the Yeerk pool. Ax realizes that Jake can’t make this decision, but he, Ax, the alien and outsider, can. He knocks Jake out and tells Cassie that he’s been injured.

He spots Visser Two and calls out to Rachel, Tobias and Marco that he needs there help; he needs to steal a plane and Visser Two needs to be one it with him. Tobias and Rachel don’t stop to question him, but Marco is suspicious asking not only where Jake is but what Ax plans on doing once he’s in a plane with Visser Two.

<You Andalites. You people have a tendency to destroy what you want to preserve.

And that plane is carrying a nuke. I saw it being fitted up by some of the visser’s

men.>

Ax acknowledges that he and Marco have not always trusted each other, but that he, Ax, knows that Marco has always been one to put the mission first, to do what needs to be done in the face of horrible choices. Rachel looks to Marco, and Tobias looks away. Marco finally agrees to help, asking whether they ever really had any choices in this war.

With Marco, Tobias and Rachel’s help, Ax manages to get Visser Two on a plane and take off, right as Cassie and Jake run up. In the plane, Ax lays out the situation for Visser Two: either contact the submarine and have it stand down, or he will drop a nuke on the Yeerk Pool. At the very last moment, Visser Two agrees and Ax lets him use the radio to contact the submarine. He releases Visser Two and makes his way home, wondering how he will be received by his friends.

E.T./Ax Phone Home: This is a big book for Ax, with a lot of important notes for his character. One of the smallest ones, but one I still found interesting, was seeing just how far Ax has come in his understanding of human behavior. Throughout this story, instead of the general confusion and bewilderment at “strange humans” like we’ve seen in past books, instead we saw more and more evidence of how thoroughly Ax has come to understand humanity. From little things like know what rhetorical questions are and even using them himself, to larger things like being able to imagine facial expressions alongside comments made by his friends while in morph, thus increasing his knowledge of what is truly being communicated beyond the words themselves.

We also see in the very beginning of the book how much Ax has had to readjust his perceptions of his own people. He’s no longer completely surprised by the Andalites’ poor response to pleas for help from him and his friends. And, when asked by Jake later, he admits to not knowing whether the Andalites will ultimately listen to their warning.

Throughout the story, we hear more and more about how much Ax now sees himself as both Andalite and human. He is horrified by the evils of each race, but also loyal and and values them both as well. The destruction on the ship and loss of human life hurts him just as much as it does the others. But then, in the end, he also realizes the unique role he has come to inhabit on the team. He has adopted humanity as his own, but he is also still an alien, still the only one capable of making a decision such as the one to drop a nuke on the Yeerk Pool. That being the case, however, we see how much this decision tears him apart. Marco accuses him of perhaps doing it for Andalite glory, but as a reader, inside of Ax’s head, we see how terrible this decision weighs on him the entire time. And, given that Marco, Rachel, and Tobias ultimately agree to help him, we have to imagine they sense that his real reasons are still in the right place: trying to avoid WWIII.

Our Fearless Leader: It’s pretty lucky/convenient that Jake has so much knowledge of the layout and organization of a massive battleship like the one they end up on. But on the other hand, as someone who has been leading an underground war for years now, it’s also probably not surprising that he may have spent his down time researching other military avenues.

The moment between Ax and Jake where Ax brings up the suggestion to bomb the Yeerk Pool is exceptionally good. We see that while Jake has come far in his ruthlessness and willingness to bend moral lines to do what needs to be done, he still has a pretty hard and fast line with regards to the loss of human life. Ax, to his credit, is quick to realize this as well and to even conclude that it hadn’t been right of him to even ask or expect Jake to be able to grapple with a decision like this. This is pretty close to the end of the series, and I think from here on out, Jake’s progress down this ruthless path goes faster and faster.

Xena, Warrior Princess: Rachel doesn’t have a whole lot in this one. Of course, she’s in on the action the entire time and is chosen to be the other Animorph to morph another person to operate the fighter jet with Ax in the beginning. Ax mentions that she was elected to this role for her “nerves of steel,” since the incredible speeds of the plane would be pretty intimidating to most. It’s also worth noting that in the end, when confronted with Ax’s plan, she looks to Marco to make the ultimate decision about whether they will help Ax.

A Hawk’s Life: Tobias, too, doesn’t have much other than his involvement in Ax’s plan in the end. Looking at the three who end up involved in this, I think it makes a lot of sense. Of the entire team, Rachel, Tobias and Marco have a pretty solid history of making big, often ruthless decisions. Let it not be forgotten that Tobias and Ax were the ones to ultimately decide the fate of an entire alien species back in Megamorphs #2.

Peace, Love, and Animals: One of the more notable moments for Cassie came with the discussion about morphing humans. She immediately resists the idea, but Jake is able to convince her that it has to be done (though, notably, she doesn’t do it herself). She also says that Jake is the only one she would trust to know if the time has come where this type of moral compromise is truly necessary.

The Comic Relief: As I said, it makes sense that Marco, Tobias, and Rachel end up being the three to ultimately decide to go with Ax’s plan. It’s also great seeing just how quickly Marco figures out what is going on. Ax even notes that he had prepped for Marco to ask where Jake was, but even with that prep, Marco jumps immediately to the correct conclusion about Ax’s use of the plane as well. It’s interesting to see Marco accuse Ax of potentially doing this for Andalite glory. Being in Ax’s head, especially in this book, we’ve seen the transformation he’s underwent with regards to the naivety he used to have about his own people. We see how much he values Earth and sees the Animorphs as his family. But from an outsider’s perspective, especially someone as naturally cynical and suspicious as Marco, it’s interesting to note that a motivation like this could still be assigned to him. But Ax’s direct reasoning, that WWIII can not be allowed to happen, is exactly the sort of Point A to Point B line of thinking that would resonate with someone like Marco.

Best (?) Body Horror Moment: There wasn’t a whole lot as far as body horror goes in this one, other than your usual morph descriptions. I will say that it’s interesting to see just how “all-in” they went on the morphing humans thing once they decided that was the way to go. Ax ends up acquiring something like three human morphs over this entire book, and he’s the one of them that even has a human morph already that couldn’t be traced (though, of course, the fact that he’s a kid would stand out). And then Tobias and Rachel each morph people. Rachel’s makes sense, but I’m not sure that Tobias really had to. It almost seems a bit too easy, morally speaking. Like once they got the go-ahead, any moral qualms were immediately out of the window, making it seem like the only one who truly cared about this particular issue was Cassie herself. The others just start morphing people willy-nilly.
Couples Watch!: Not a whole lot in this one, unsurprisingly given it’s an Ax book. Marco notes at one point, after riling Rachel up, that he doesn’t know how Tobias does it. And, of course, we see Cassie’s trust in Jake’s judgement when he gets her to agree to them using human morphs.

If Only Visser Three had  Mustache to Twirl: Whelp, it has happened: Visser Three has become Visser One. And we get the introduction of yet another Visser, Visser Two. For the most part, he’s played for pretty comical effect. I mean, the title of this topic area pretty much fits him perfectly. He immediately reveals the Yeerks’ entire plan under very little pressure. And he randomly starts saluting and genuflecting throughout his various speeches about the coming glory. For all of this, he’s also set up as a pretty unmovable foe as far as being threatened into giving up any real advantages. Unlike Visser Three who values his own life above anything, it’s made pretty clear that Visser Two would die before giving up the submarine, which ultimately forces Ax’s hand at the end to take things to a much more extreme level.

Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: There are a handful of pretty sad scenes in the last third of the book when we see the poor human sailors fighting against the Hork Bajir. Ax’s own encounter with the dying captain, and his last words essentially trying to apologize for everything, was pretty heart breaking. But there’s also another scene where at one point a sailor solutes gorilla!Marco, having noted that the Earth animals seem to be on their side. And later in the battle, Ax spots Marco kneeling over the body of this same soldier. Scenes like these also prompt Ax further into action, as well as the others, who all see how badly this individual battle is being lost and are, for the first time, losing fellow human fighters alongside them.

What  a Terrible Plan, Guys!: A lot of people see them morph in this book. Like…a lot. Pretty much immediately it seems they all throw caution to the wind and start morphing/demoprhing in front of pretty much anyone. I don’t get this! For one, it’s pretty well established that they don’t know who is Controlled and who is not. And for two, it’s also pretty well assumed that almost everyone will be eventually Controlled once the Yeerks show up and start laying the smack down. So all of those people who saw kids morphing…not only is now really obvious that its humans morphing, but after the close call with Marco in the last book, it’d be really easy to figure out the exact identity of these kids. Obviously, the whole secrecy thing is going to go out the window pretty quickly now, but the Animorphs themselves have no reason to assume this, so their lack of caution is pretty strange.

The other really strange thing is the idea that somehow preventing the Yeerk-staffed sub from launching an counter attack will do much to stop a domino fall that’s already been started. I mean, it would already be communicated back to who knows how many bases that the Chinese attacked this ship. So…isn’t the mission already successful for the Yeerks? Theoretically, the US on its own would launch a counter attack, no need for a Yeerks-only sub at all!

Favorite Quote:

This line from Jake to Cassie when they are discussing the morality of morphing humans is a pretty good summation of the general thought-process/experience of every one of the Animorphs that we witness playing out in each of their books in the entire series:

“But…doesn’t it always come down to each one of us, all alone, asking ourselves: Am I right in doing whatever it takes for the greater good? And, do I trust myself enough to know I won’t become evil in the process? It always comes down to something that personal.”

There are so many good lines from Ax as he reflects on his choices at the end of the book, but he concludes with this simple, but sad, realization.

I would accept the consequences of my actions. I would accept full responsibility. I was the alien.

Scorecard: Yeerks 12, Animorphs 16

I’m going to give this one to the Animorphs, since preventing WWIII is a pretty big win (regardless of whether or not it’s believable that they actually accomplished this.)

Rating: This was a really good book. It reads a lot differently than other Ax books, which, at this point in the series, is pretty great to see. We see how fully he’s come to embrace his role as belonging to both species and how that effects the way he thinks and interacts with each.

The story does drag a bit in the middle when it feels like they just spend a lot of time running around a huge ship with no real idea of what to do. But then it concludes with a massive battle on the ship, with humans teaming up with the Animorphs for the first time really. And then the excellent, huge moral dilemma that Ax finds himself in at the end of the book.

I didn’t remember that this one ended without really resolving how Ax’s return to the group plays out. I’m not sure I like the cliff-hanger like ending here, though. I get that there’s potentially a lot that would need to be gone through with that reunion, but it also feels wrong to not get that scene from Ax’s perspective in particular, after spending so much time in his head for the rest of it. Oh well, still a great book!

Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all!

Animorphs #45.5: “The Ellimist Chronicles”

Publishing Info: Scholastic Paperbacks, October 2000

Where Did I Get this Book: own it!

Book Description: He is called the Ellimist. A being with the ability to alter space and time. A being with a power that will never be fully understood. He is the reason Elfangor came to Earth. He is the reason the Earth now has a fighting chance. And though his actions never seem quite right or wrong, you can be certain they are never, ever what anyone expects.

This is the beginning and the middle of the story. A story that needs to be told in order to understand what might happen to the future. The future of the Animorphs. The future of humanity. The future of Earth.

He is called the Ellimist. And this is his story…

Narrator: Toomin/Ellimist

Plot: I only read this one once as a kid, and now I remember why…

There will be spoilers for the end of the series in this one for sure! You have been warned.

Bam. An Animorph will die. Just right there, in your face in the first few sentences of this book. I can’t remember my reaction as a kid, but it had to have been terrible. Especially since at that point the books were still being released so I didn’t know how many were left, whether it would happen in the last book itself or the very next one or when at all! Now, having a firm grasp on the few precious books we have left with dear Rachel, it’s not much better. And I had completely forgotten that these small bookend scenes were even part of this story, so that was sure a joy to discover when I picked this one up!

The story starts out in the nebulous unknown with a recently killed, unnamed Animorph questioning the Ellimist about the meaning of it all. Not having a succinct answer, the Ellimist lays out his story.

Long ago, he was born a member of the Ket race, an advanced alien life form that lived on crystal formations that the winged Ket kept in the air through shared lift duting. A young Toomin has lead a happy life of community and, importantly, gaming, where he goes by the gamer tag “Ellimist.” He and his friends regularly participate in a complicated game called “Alien Civilizations” which has complicated scenarios in which players try to control the outcome of alien races throughout time. In the midst of all of this, the Ket are preparing to launch their first Z-space ship to explore the greater galaxy. Toomin is lucky enough to be sponsored and drafted as non-essential crew for this ship.

In the months leading up to its launch, Toomin and his friends (he’s especially pleased to hang around more with the attractive female Aguella) visit another crystal colony where he meets another gamer named Menno. Menno describes how their crystal has recently adapted a democratic system of governance, doing away with the traditional form of following the leadership of an older member of the Ket. His mentality of chasing change crosses over to his approach to gamesmanship. Toomin is both fascinated and distrubed by Menno’s attitude.

As Toomin continues to learn about the ship and his impending trip into space, he and Aquella (also drafted to the crew) are brought into the secret that the Ket race had recently discovered a new species and part of their mission will be to reach out this new race. A few days before the launch, however, a mysterious ship shows. With brutal efficiency, it uses a host of weapons to take out Toomin’s home crystal, killing thousands. Toomin and about one hundred others happen to be on the ship at the time and so escape immediate death. Using a crystal shard, Toomin is able to take out the small alien ship, but as the Ket ship makes its final escape, they trap the now disabled alien ship in their force field. Out in Z-space, Toomin and the others discover that the alien is a member of the race that they had been planning to visit. They know they must head back to their planet to see if they can find any other survivors.

But when they get back, all they find are empty skies. They do manage to find one crystal however: Menno’s crystal that is using cloud cover to run away from the chasing alien ships that are leisurely hunting it. Toomin and the others land and meet up with Menno and the leadership of this crystal. They discover that Menno and the others, so proud of their embrace of change, sent out videos of themselves playing games in “Alien Civilization.” But the real disaster is they sent no explanation for what is being shown in the videos, leaving it to look like the Ket are a race of beings that simply play with the fates of others species for the fun of it. Menno and a few others make it onto the ship before the other aliens blow up that crystal as well.

Over the next 60 some years, Toomin and his crew scour the galaxy for a new home world. Menno, who Toomin makes his second in command to appease the Ket from the other crystal, pushes for them to accept their reality and adapt their own biology to become a land-based species. Toomin, Aguella (the two have now bonded into a pair but are waiting to have children until they can find a home), and the others resist this idea, insisting that they are beings of the air. As they continue their search, they discover a blue moon. Toomin heads up a crew of a handful of Ket who pilot a smaller ship into the ocean that makes up much of the moon. Once there, the ship is quickly destroyed.

Toomin “awakes” to find that he is the only member of his crew that is still alive (Menno and the original ship tried to save them after seeing the exploratory ship being attacked). He has been assimilated, essentially, into the living being that essentially makes up the entire moon and calls itself Father. Using plant-like tentacles, Father attaches himself to the bodies of all the beings trapped on his planet, using their knowledge to build himself up. Over the course of a century, Father insists that Toomin play games with him as a form of entertainment. Toomin continuously loses (something that he was also famous for doing back on his home world when he tried to play there, often focusing on trying to find the most moral route through scenarios). But at one point, Father introduces a new game that involves something called music. This new art form opens Toomin’s mind in a completely new way and he begins to win. As he wins more and more, Father retreats in a huff. While he’s away, Toomin reaches out and begins “downloading” the essences of all the trapped,dead beings around him, including his former Ket crew. When Father finally notices, Toomin has grown strong enough to over throw him and he does so, finally killing his captor.

With all the knowledge and power that Father had now in his control, Toomin “downloads” everything into his own mind and builds himself an advanced ship that incorporates his physical Ket body into it as well as creates a massive “brain” of sorts for his greater being to reside. He destroys the dying moon that was Father and takes off into the world. He wanders for a long time before finding his calling as an all-mighty do-gooder, interceding in the affairs of various civilizations throughout the universe to establish peace and order. After centuries of doing this, he returns to the site of his first “intercession” where he prevented two warring planets from continuing their conflict. He discovers that the change he caused to stop the war inspired one side to discover a new method of warfare that allowed them to completely destroy the species on the other planet. And then, without that conflict driving them, the winning species slipped backwards in technological advancement and is living a primitive life. As the Ellimist watches on in dismay, another all powerful being arrives who calls himself Crayak.

Crayak says he has been searching for this inter-galactic do-gooder and is pleased to finally meet the Ellimist. Crayak shares that he has an opposing goal: where the Ellimist wants to bring order and prosperity, Crayak simply wants to exterminate. And so begins another game, with Crayak racing ahead creating manipulative and cruel “games” with the lives of entire species and forcing the Ellimist to always play what turns out to be a losing hand. Slowly, Crayak begins winning and more and more life begins to disappear from the universe. Eventually, the Ellimist despairs and races away to a far corner of the universe.

There he discovers a primitive race of grass-eaters and he creates a body for himself and goes down to live among them. He calls these aliens Andalites and throws himself into his new life there. He marries a female Andalite and has a child, but is devastated when that child dies from a disease that he knows he could have prevented (though he has learned caution about how far he can/should intercede with the lives of species.) He is shocked when his wife comes to him later saying she wants to have another child. Over time, they have 5 children, two of whom live. It is through his wife’s vision of hope that he finally discovers a way to beat Crayak: where Crayak destroys, the Ellimist will create. Some may die, but others will live. He leaves the Andalites and goes about doing this, spreading life amount the stars. One of his favorite creations is a species called the Pemalites who he sets out to spread life as well.

Eventually, Crayak catches up to him, but by this point the Ellimist is even more powerful. As centuries go by, the Ellimist begins to win their battle of extinction and creation, with more of his lifeforms thriving than Crayak can exterminate. On this high of success, the Ellimist finally confronts Crayak himself. The two engage in a massive battle that takes place across the entire universe, crushing planets and civilizations in their wake. The Ellimist slowly gains on Crayak until, in a bout of over-confidence, he is lead into a trap and is sucked into a black hole. There, somehow, while his entire “body” is destroyed, the vast being that is now the Ellimist survives, even managing to gain control of new abilities like managing time itself. He continues his work against Crayak subtly but is eventually discovered. Now past the point of being able to be physically destroyed by each other, Crayak and the Ellimist strike a deal for one last game with a final winner and loser. It will be the last game and it will need to have rules. And so it has been playing out for millennia.

Back with the dying Animorph, the Ellimist ends his story. The Animorph knows that they cannot ask whether they will ultimately win or lose and the Ellimist agrees that even he does not know that. But the Animorph has one last question: did they matter. And the Ellimist says yes, yes they did.

Ellimist/Toomin: Oof, as per the usual for our “chronicles” characters, Toomin leads a rough life. He essentially has a few happy years as a child and then is thrown into a millennia of existential horror. From the loss of his entire home world, to a few short years (relatively speaking) of aimlessly wandering the galaxy looking for a new home, to witnessing the ultimate destruction of the sole survivors of his race, to being trapped in some mind game scenario surrounded by his dead friends for centuries, to getting caught up in another horror scenario with some random force of evil that tracks him down, to ultimately getting sucked into a black hole during his one brief moment of almost-triumph, to finally, another game that he’s been stuck playing for who knows how long. I mean, what part of any of that sounds like a good time?

In this light, we see how important it must have been for him to have that brief life span as an Andalite where he married and had kids. And even that was tragic, with the loss of his kids, while knowing that he could have saved them!

Of course, the running theme of the book is around his being a brilliant loser, so we have to see him do a lot of just that. And the story does do a good job of highlighting the importance of those few relationships he had to building up his identity and giving him enough strength to persist in what can often feel like foolish optimism in the face of impossible odds. It’s also interesting see all of this “losses” in the light that, from our perspective, we’ve only seen the Ellimist come out ahead, winning all of the smaller skirmishes that he’s been involved in with the Animorphs.

Poor, doomed Animorph: In the prologue, there’s really no clues as to who this Animorph could be. I’d say be the way he/she is written to speak, we can pretty easily write off Ax and Cassie, but other than that, the remaining four would all work. But then once you get to the epilogue, it gets narrowed down quite a bit. The Ellimist refers to the fact that this Animorph wasn’t one of the one he’s selected, but a lucky addition. From what we know from the fourth Megamorphs book, that leaves us with either Rachel or Jake. And, I guess, you could probably make a reasonable guess that Jake wouldn’t be the one to be killed off since that would essentially end the series in a lot of ways. So, without being told as much, by the end of the book, I think it would be fairly reasonable to be confident that Rachel is the going to be the one to go. And, obviously, we know that’s the case. I don’t remember making this connection as a kid, but I think I was so busy being in denial about the whole thing that I didn’t spend much time really thinking about it and putting the pieces together.

Best (?) Body Horror Moment: There are quite a few bad body horror moments in this book, really. But the worst has to be Father and the way that he is essentially a living graveyard, with his tentacles twisting in and out of the millions of dead beings trapped on his surface. Toomin’s brief looks into reality (when he’s not pulled in the gaming mind zone with Father) are pretty stark. He’s surrounded by his dead friends, some of whom are torn up by their deaths, and he can see the tentacles going through his own original body as well. Pulling himself out of all this when he finally escapes is pretty gross, too.

Couples Watch!: We see Toomin/Ellimist form two major relation
If Only Visser Three had  Mustache to Twirl: Crayak is obviously the primary villain in this book, but in some ways I feel like we almost got more from Father than from him. At least with Father, by the end, we understood what he was: essentially a moon-sized sponge the built itself off everything that was caught in it. His motivations were also clear. Crayak…is just kind of evil for evil’s sake? And the main problem in creating an entire book that gives a backstory to an all-powerful, godlike character is that it raises a lot of questions about how another can also exist. There were millions upon millions upon millions of odds that had to play out just right to end up with the Ellimist gaining the abilities he had by the end. It’s hard to imagine a similar order of events playing out for the creation of Crayak. And, if so, I’m just as curious about those as I was am about the Ellimist, if not more so. Not only how did he become as powerful as he was, but why does he have the destructive goals that he does? It all just raises more questions than it answers, ultimately, and Crayak really exemplifies the worst part of this.

Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: Like I said, the “chronicles” characters always have a tragic story it seems, and the same goes for this. I mean, it’s pretty hard to choose a crying moment when you have genocide and then the loss of not one but two spouses. I think though that the saddest part has to go to the loss of his first Andalite child. Not only is the loss of a child horribly tragic, but you have to add that on to the fact that the Ellimist knows that he could have easily prevented the disease that killed his child. And he’s having to choose not to do this. And, of course, this tragedy leads to his greatest realization about how to beat Crayak, by putting his weight behind creation in the face of destruction.

What  a Terrible Plan, Guys!: I mean, the worst plan has to be Menno’s. I have to think that Applegate pulled inspiration from Orson Scott Card’s “Ender’s Game” with the whole misunderstanding of aggression between alien species and how that leads to a war.

We had lost our world because the Capasins thought we were aggressors when we were not.

But man, isn’t it fairly obvious that blasting out videos of your species essentially playing god with entire civilizations and worlds without any explanation that it’s just a game is just a terrible idea?? And it’s definitely interesting that more aliens than just the ones that conquered the Kets must have seen these videos, because this is the exact perception that Ax has about the “Ellimists” as a species when they first encounter the Ellimist: that they’re all-powerful gods that play with other species just for the fun of it.

Favorite Quote:

This quote highlights both the arrogance at the heart of what gets the Ellimist in trouble at various points throughout the story, but still, even at the end, the driving force that moves him as he plays out his “game” with Crayak.

Boldness allied with restraint and a minimalist aesthetic, all in the service of moral certainties: that peace was better than war, that freedom was better than slavery, that knowledge was better than ignorance. Oh, yes, the galaxy would be a wonderful place under my guidance.

Scorecard: Yeerks 12, Animorphs 15

No change!

Rating: I really liked re-reading this book. Mostly because it read so differently this time around as it did as a kid. When I read it the first time, I was pretty not into it to be honest. So much so, that I was actually dreading reading it this go around, as all I could remember was being extremely bored. And really, I can see why I didn’t love it as a kid. This is the most “hard sci-fi” book in the entire series. Not only do we have a ton of alien species thrown at us, with very little explanation for them all, but there are a lot of “high concept” theories being tossed around throughout the story. It’s less one of action and what happens, and more the slow moral development of this godlike character’s approach to creation, destruction, and balance. Expand this book out a bit more, and it would fit in perfectly in the adult science fiction section at the bookstore. But as a kid, there was not enough from our main characters and much of the greater questions and theories either went over my head or were simply not interesting to me at that point.

I do still question whether it really adds something to the Animorphs series as a whole. Like I said, it’s only a few steps away from being a good stand-alone science fiction novel on its own. But as part of this series? I’m not convinced. In many ways, I think it introduces more questions than it answers and there’s almost too much “neatness” in the way that other aspects of the series are all tied together with the Ellimist’s journey (his creation of the Pemalites, his time as an Andalite, etc.). Bitter moment: the fact that this book exists makes me even more angry about the introduction of “the One” in the final book and the weirdness of whatever other godlike creature was at work in Jake’s book a few books back during his period spent in an alternate universe where the Yeerks had won. If you’re going to have a bunch of unexplained god-like creatures, don’t bother explaining any of them. Because all this did was highlight how very much the odds are against any being like this existing, given all of the things that had to play out just so for the Ellimist to end up how he does. And now we have not only the Ellimist, but Crayak (unexplained), the One (unexplained), and the nameless one from Jake’s book that has been noted by the authors to not be the One either (also unexplained). It’s just too much, and while I still would never love that number of god-like characters in a series like this, it would be easier to swallow if we were just given them all on equal footing. The explanation of the Ellimist just highlights the problems with the others.

Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all!

Animorphs #45: “The Revelation”

Publishing Info: Scholastic Paperbacks, September 2000

Where Did I Get this Book: own it!

Book Description: Things were already really weird. Fighting aliens. Battling to save Earth. And still trying to be normal. Marco, the other Animorphs, and Ax are almost used to it. Almost. But things are changing. The Yeerk invastion of Earth started out passively. Secretly. But now, everything seems to be stepped up. Even Marco’s father is talking about some top secret project at his job. Something about developing Zero-space…

Marco doesn’t even know whether his father is a Controller. But he does know he’s not going to let the Yeerks win this one. They’ve already got his mother. And Marco will do anything it takes to save his father. Anything…

Narrator: Marco

Plot: I had honestly forgotten that this was one of the first big game changer books in the end game line up of this series. For one, I think the previous Cassie book being so incredibly not relevant to the overarching plot serves as a pretty big distraction. You read that one and are left feeling like “yep, here we are, still in the middle of filler land!” Then you pick up this one and…

It’s just an average evening at home for Marco: making frozen pizza for the family, accepting Nora as part of said family, avoiding any and all views of displays of affection between Nora and his father. Then his father starts up on the dinner conversation and low and behold, his company is just a few short steps away from creating a zero space communicator. Marco recognizes this for the potential disaster it is. He immediately calls Jake and the group meets up at Cassie’s barn.

At the barn, Marco says that he tested his father and doesn’t believe him to be a Controller yet, but that they’ll need to keep him under surveillance. The group agrees, and Jake sends Tobias and Ax out on first watch: it is clear that Jake thinks Marco is too invested. Back home, in the middle of the night, Marco wakes up to a phone call. He picks it up and overhears a man from his Dad’s work saying that a co-worker’s wife has died and that he should come in for some support. Marco is quick to realize that this is a ploy, calls Rachel for back-up, and sets off after his father.

He barely makes it in time, seeing through a window that his father is bound and held by two Hork Bajir who are preparing to dunk him into a mini Yeerk pool. Without thinking, Marco barges in to save his father. Rachel shows up as back up and they make their escape. Rachel retreats to tell the others what has happened and gorilla!Marco and his father speed away in a car. After they get a ways away, Marco’s dad begins questioning everything and Marco reveals who he is and what he can do with morphing. They stop at a run-down diner and Marco tells him everything.

He allows his dad to call home, but when his dad almost reveals to Nora where they are, Marco disconnects the call, angry that his father clearly hasn’t listened to anything he said. Marco does a quick breeze through of his morphs to finally convince his dad that what he’s said is true. He also reveals that his mom is alive and is Visser One. Marco’s dad struggles not only to accept that his son is now giving him orders (like the fact that Marco has decided to stow him away with the Chee for now) and with the fact that his first wife is alive, but he also loves Nora.

Marco takes him to the King’s house where his Dad gets even more of an eye-opener on just how weird Marco’s world is. But he’s also distracted by the amazing technology on display. Erek and the other Chee go out in disguise as Marco and his dad, knowing that if they both are seen as missing that Marco will be under suspicion and through him, all of his friends. Marco takes off back to the barn to meet up with the rest of the Animorphs.

Once there, it is clear that none of them technically approve of what he’s done, but they also know that they wouldn’t have done anything differently had they been in that position. They also realize that the fact that Marco’s dad knows how to build a zero space communicator is a huge win. Marco and Ax return to the Chee and recruit Marco’s dad into helping Ax build it.

The next day, cockroach!Marco watches himself die. Erek and Mr. King, posing as Marco and his dad, are “killed” by a force of Yeerks who storm Marco’s home. Nora, now clearly infested, stands outside and watches. Once it is done, Marco realizes that life as he knew it is over, not stopping to even take anything from his room.

Back with the Chee, Ax and Marco’s dad have made progress on the communicator, enough to have discovered that Visser One has been convicted of treason and is being held in the Yeerk Pool for execution by starvation. Visser Three will be promoted to Visser One and his plans for all out destruction are imminent. They decide to rescue Marco’s mom and eventually set up his mother and father for life in the free Hork Bajir valley.

To get into the Yeerk Pool, the Animorphs need to steal a Bug fighter. The security has been upped once again and no living thing can make it through the entrance tunnel, but the shields of a Bug fighter will do the trick. They lure a ship into the forest claiming to be a forest service worker who “captured a strange, bladed monster” and quickly take over the ship. But the ship is a new version and one that Ax has trouble handling. Luckily, there is an auto pilot system installed that can take over if the pilot seems “erratic.” After a bumpy ride, the team, now all in Hork Bajir morphs, find themselves in the Yeerk Pool entrance tunnel that is accessed through a holographic sunken ship under the ocean.

They make their way to the Yeerk Pool only to discover that Visser One has been tied to a pier in the middle of the pool and is clearly at the last stages of her starvation. They head back to the ship, thinking to use it to grab Visser One. On the way, things go sideways and they are discovered. They rush back to the ship and end up having to blast their way back into the Yeerk Pool. Marco and Rachel jump out to grab Visser One, but the others are forced to retreat in the ship, leaving them exposed.

An elite force of Hork Bajir show up who are clearly more skilled at fighting. They manage to grab Eva and make their way back to the edge of the pool. Rachel is badly injured in the fight and Visser One makes a break for it, escaping out of Eva’s ear. Marco is left trying to save his mother (who is violently struggling to kill Visser One before she makes it to the pool) and helping Rachel. Eva manages to nab Visser One and with the help of Marco, they kill her. Visser Three shows up and morphs a huge, fanged winged alien that comes after them. But the other Animorphs in the Bug fighter are able to badly injure him and rescue Marco, Cassie, and Eva. However, the ship is shot and lands in the pool.

With Eva’s extra knowledge of how the ship operates, they manage to overhear the engine corp enough to get the ship up again, boiling a large portion of the Yeerk pool in the process. They finally manage to escape.

Marco sets up his mother and father at the free Hork Bajir colony. They have a happy reunion though later Marco’s father approaches him about Nora’s fate. Marco plants the suspicion that Nora was always a Controller and had been put in his path to monitor his work. Marco himself sets up camp living with the Chee at the Kings’ household, making trips to the Hork Bajir colony every once in a while.

Later, on the beach, the team finally use the zero space communicator they made to contact the Andalites. Jake is the one to speak and when asked who is on the other line, he says “This is Earth.”

The Comic Relief: This is a huge book for Marco. Everything kind of comes to a head all at once and he ends up being the first one of the group to have his cover blown. The speed at which it all falls apart is also a great example of how precariously balanced their charade has been this entire time. One little event and BAM! Marco’s entire life is up-ended and he has to fake his own death, and his father’s, and let his step mom get infested.

Obviously Marco struggles a lot with the action at the heart of the story. But on the emotional side of things, he is most struck by the realization that his dad truly loves Nora and what that means for his father to go through all of this. It’s a hard hit for Marco who, up to this point, it seems, always believed that while his dad cared for Nora, what he felt for her wasn’t the same as what he felt for Marco’s mother. To realize that one can feel that kind of love more than once and that a parent has moved on to another, it’s a hard hit for Marco.

He also questions whether he could have done more to save her and whether his own shock at his father’s feelings at all impacted his decision to not try to get back to their house to rescue her.

In the end, when he finally has his family reunited at the free Hork Bajir valley, we see that this joy, what he always wished for, has been tinged by the realities of adulthood, time, and what love looks like. His father is happy to be with his mother, but he’s also going to grieve Nora.

Our Fearless Leader: Early in the book, Marco notes that Jake is a fair leader when he asks for Marco’s input on the situation with his father. But at the same time, he catches himself wishing that Jake would just make the call, taking the weight of the decision off of Marco. It’s a nice moment to highlight how much the team members depend on Jake to shoulder this weight. Throughout the rest of the book, Jake pretty effectively highlights his hard-won ability to calmly and effectively roll with all of the punches that are thrown at them.

He’s also the one at the end to speak via the zero space communicator. He initially waves towards Ax to do it, but Ax rightly recognizes that Jake needs to be seen as the leader from the very beginning, so Jake ends up with the great closing line.

Xena, Warrior Princess: Rachel ends up teaming up with Marco several times in this book. She’s the one he calls when he sees his dad taking off in the middle of the night, and she’s also the one to end up on the pier with him at the end. Some of it is necessity (she’s the one available by phone and the one with the power morph at the pool), but at this point it’s also clearly more than coincidence that these two work well together.

We also get a great moment from her that highlights that she’s more than just the tank of the team. When they’re in the barn discussing how useful (or not) the zero space communicator would be (especially considering how often the Andalites have ignored the plight of Earth in the past, so who’s to say contacting them again is even worth it), she’s the one to draw their attention to its abilities to spy on Yeerk communications. Marco is frustrated that he didn’t see this himself. And as a reader, it is surprising, as this is exactly the kind of thing that we expect to see from his character. But it’s a nice reminder that Rachel has brains, too, and Marco isn’t the only one who can evaluate situations effectively.

A Hawk’s Life: Tobias doesn’t have a whole lot in this book. But he does contribute when it comes to Eva/Visser One’s experience with torture. The others all say that she will gain nothing from revealing their secrets, but Tobias is quick to correct them that, when under extreme suffering, one will do almost anything if they think there’s a chance to stop the pain. Another lovely reminder of poor Tobias’s sucky life. This is what he gets to be now: the guy with all the insights into torture experiences!

Peace, Love, and Animals: There are few quick moments from Cassie that are all kind of neat for her character. In the beginning, Marco notices Jake shooting a quick glance to Cassie before assigning Ax and Tobias to watch Marco’s dad. Marco realizes that in that quick look, Cassie was able to convey to Jake that she thought Marco was too close to it and shouldn’t be trusted to guard his own father.

Later, she’s also the one to quickly speak up for saving Marco’s mom. She knows that after everything the team went through for his dad, that Marco can’t ask them to take on a suicide mission back into the pool for his mom. So she does it for him, coming up with a good excuse for why it’s necessary. Marco is incredibly thankful for this.

And then, towards the end, when they end up boiling the Yeerk pool, we see her turn away from the window and the destruction, another reminder that, of them all, she struggles the most with moments like this where the destruction doesn’t come from battles, but from other choices.

E.T./Ax Phone Home: Ax has some definite struggles coming to grips with the fact that humanity might have figured out zero space, and way faster than the Andalites did, relatively speaking to their own technological time lines. He also proves himself capable of giving Marco a run for his money on the bad driving front. Though, to be fair, the Bug fighter seems pretty advanced and Marco should have at least gone through driver’s ed at this point…It did lead to some fairly comical lines from Ax though:

<You should always wear the safety restraints,> Ax scolded, struggling futilely to get four humans and an angry bird off him.

Best (?) Body Horror Moment: Marco definitely knew the right morph to effectively traumatize his father quickly: always, always go ant, if your goal is utter horror. Marco’s poor father, to see that, then followed by the bird, and then have your son threaten lobster morph on you…yikes. But, I have to say, of all the ridiculous cover morphs we’ve seen, it’s pretty dumb that the one that ended up using the ant morph was from the book where this morph literally gets about two sentences. Marco doesn’t even make it fully ant! It’s pretty silly.

Couples Watch!: Man, you really have to feel for Marco’s dad in this one. His wife who died years ago, who he mourned, is now back in his life. His new wife, who he legitimately loved, is now essentially dead in her own way. What’s more, his son has now planted the idea that the woman he loved may have never even been real in the first place. I don’t think relationship drama gets worse than this.

If Only Visser Three had  Mustache to Twirl: Visser Three only makes a brief appearance with yet another of his super sweet alien morphs that lasts a hot second before immediately getting taken down by the Animorphs. You’d think he’d at least learn to stop per-emptively bragging about his morphs’ badass abilities every time he tries out a new one, given his past failure rate. More importantly, the fact that Visser Three will now be Visser One is the crucial news of this story. After “Visser,” the Animorphs have a much clearer idea of what Visser Three’s vision of the Earth invasion looks like, and it’s a lot less of the subtlety and a lot more of this:

Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: Towards the very end of the book, Marco makes the decision to plant the idea that Nora was maybe always a Controller and had been put in his dad’s life to spy on his work. It’s a really dark moment, more so for the fact that’s it’s not clear whether this was the right or wrong call, to either Marco or the reader. Marco’s thought is that this idea will give his dad a sense of peace, that he didn’t simply abandon his wife to a life of infestation or that he cheated in some way on Eva, since Nora was a spy all along. But…is that really a comfort? His feelings for Nora were real, and with this idea, he’s now left with the thought that their whole relationship was a sham. And Eva is going to tell him, too, about the fact that that one “blissful year” that he remembers with her before she died, yeah, she was Controlled then too. So now poor Marco’s dad has two wives, both of whom were creating sham relationships with him for some portion of their time together. I kind of think this lie is just easier for Marco than for his dad. It’s a rough little moment, but I can’t also say he was completely wrong to have thought it might help.

What  a Terrible Plan, Guys!: As you’ll see with my scorecard below, given the Animorphs’ past experiences with the Andalites, being able to contact them doesn’t seem like that great of a thing. They’ve been routinely dismissed by the Andaites and have heard through enough grapevines for it to be pretty believable that the Andalite fleet isn’t anywhere nearby and doesn’t even think of Earth as a priority. So, it’s not that it’s a bad plan to contact them, but all of the past stuff does kind of undercut what could have been a really cool moment at the end of the book.

Favorite Quote: There’s a great moment between Marco and his dad right after Marco has told him the truth, where it really gets hit home how swapped their roles now are:

“Dad, of course you’re my father,” I said, fighting an onslaught of emotion. And it would be so nice to have someone make decisions for me again, I added silently. “I love you. I respect you. But I’ve been fighting this war for a long time. I’ve been on more missions, in more fights, and seen more terrible things than you can imagine. This is my fight. My war. Me and my friends, we know what’s going on. You don’t.”

And with that, the son will now be the one making the decisions and fighting the battles. What’s always been is now just in the open. And for a more humorous addition to Marco’s dad’s life lessons:

“Dad, just a suggestion, but when you’re dealing with the Animorphs, never say it can’t get any weirder. It always does.”

Scorecard: Yeerks 12, Animorphs 15

I’m giving this one to the Yeerks. Not only was this the first time they successfully flushed out one of our main characters into having to fake his own death and go into hiding, but Visser Three somehow at last maneuvered Visser One into death penalty for treason and is about to get a big promotion and his all-out invasion protocol approved. The Animorphs do make contact with the Andalites in the end, but they’ve manged that before to rather disappointing results. So at this point, the Yeerks are making much more progress towards their own agenda while the Animorphs are forced to go into partial hiding and react.

Rating: This book is excellent. It’s truly the beginning of the end and it kind of just hits you out of nowhere. Like I said earlier, the fact that Cassie’s previous book was such a nothing story, really works in the series’ favor at this point, since you never see any of this coming. And then, I imagine for first time readers, as the story is going along, you just kind of keep waiting for the magical reset button that we’ve seen so often in the past to come into play and put everything back in place by the end. There have been some pretty crazy plots and ploys used to do this in the past, so it’s hard to believe as the story keeps going and going that yes, this is really going to end in a completely different place than any of the other books: Marco is in hiding, his dad knows about them, his mother has been saved, Visser Three is going to become Visser One, and the Animorphs reach out to the Andalites. It’s a lot to take in! But it definitely serves as a much-needed jump start to a series that was starting to feel like it was floundering for the last…many books now.

I also can’t leave this without noting the fact that they make a reference to “Independence Day” early in the book and then proceed to essentially rip off the entire third act of that movie with the Bug fighter/auto pilot charade. There’s even a line in this portion that is the Animorphs commenting on just how big the invasion force looks, exactly like Jeff Goldblum’s line about the aliens in that movie. I love that movie and I love these books, so I’m not mad about it. If only Jake’s epic last line had been more of a speech. You know the kind. Made to rousing music? In the misty night? Via a megaphone?

Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all!

Animorphs #44: “The Unexpected”

Publishing Info: Scholastic Paperbacks, August 2000

Where Did I Get this Book: own it!

Book Description: The Animorphs have been split up before. And they’ve had to fight battles without one another. But this time is very different. Not only is Cassie totally alone. She’s managed to find herself in Australia. In the rural Outback. The other Animorphs and Ax don’t even know she’s there.

Cassie doesn’t have any idea where she’s going, or if she can even survive the rugged terrain. But she does know she has to get to a town or village and contact her family and friends. Because she’s just realized that there’s someone else who is also new to the Outback.

Visser Three.

Narrator: Cassie

Plot: Well, we’ve reached what is almost unanimously known as one of the most useless books in the series. Not the most hated. Not the most controversial. Just the most…useless. Again, I had very few memories of this book, but it’s not because I actually blocked anything out this time. Just not very much happens!

Cassie and co. are on a mission at the airport to try and capture a chunk of a broken Bug Fighter that the military has gotten its hands on. Of course, the Yeerks are there too with the same thing in mind. Everything goes south, however, when a gun fight breaks out between the Marines and the incoming Controllers. Jake calls for a retreat, but seagull!Cassie doesn’t want to leave the innocent Marines behind. She tries to get involved (ugh, by pooping on a Controller), but ends up shot and having to partially de-morph to make an escape using a luggage cart. Chased by Yeerks, she ends up hiding beneath a pile of luggage and trying to make herself demorph as she passes out.

An unknown amount of time later, she wakes up fully human, but freezing and still under the luggage. She then realizes that she’s on a plane, and what’s worse, the plane is in flight. While trying to figure out what to do, the plane suddenly stops moving and a green scanner sweeps through. She ends up partially paralyzed and realizes the Yeerks have followed her, knowing that an “Andalite bandit” is stashed somewhere on the plane. She decides to go Rachel’s route and morphs a polar bear. When the Yeerks open the cargo bay door, she attacks. She manages to take out several Hork Bajir and forces them to retreat, blowing up a Bug fighter on the way. However, she knows they’ll be back. She scratches up the inside of the cargo bay, hoping to make it look like she fell out with the Hork Bajir in the fight. When the green light strikes again, she hides and makes her way up to the passenger level.

Unfortunately, the Yeerks have a monitor that tracks movement and they are able to spot something going up. As a human girl, she quickly sits down in an empty seat and pretends to be frozen. This mostly works until the Controllers decide to start tazing the passengers, looking for a flinch. Cassie times her attack of the Hork Bajir doing the tazing in an effort to escape. She manages to get away and dives out one of the emergency exits, morphing osprey on her way down. In a deep canyon, she finds a crevice and hides out as flea. After waiting as long as she can, she emerges and demorphs, only to realize she’s been spotted by a local boy named Yami.

Yami is unphased, saying that his grandfather has taught him about the spirits of the Outback that can change their forms, so a girl who can turn into an osprey must be special. He also informs Cassie where she is: Australia. Yami offers to take her back to his place where she can make a plan from there. On the way, they pass a mob of kangeroos and Cassie sees a mother and joey that have gotten stuck in some fencing. She manages to release it while also acquiring it. Yami sees her ability to calm the wild animal as further proof of her supernatural origins. They head back to Yami’s home where she meets his family and the aforementioned grandfather.

The next day, she wakes up and knows she needs to find a way back home. It turns out that the Bug fighter she took out in the air had crashed nearby and taken out the radio transmitter that Yami and his family use to communicate with the outside world. Without it, she’ll have to a wait a week for the mail delivery people to come by. She forms a plan to morph the kangaroo that night and make her way to the nearest city, which is is about 70 miles away. During the day, Yami and his grandfather gift Cassie a boomerang and show her how to use it. While they are practicing, she sees several small airplanes flying overhead. Yami says they are tourists and they usually fly out in the morning and will fly back over later that night.

As the practice, Yami’s grandfather suddenly collapses. Cassie and Yami bring him back to the house where they discover a badly infected cut on his leg that Yami’s grandfather says came from a strange piece of metal he found out in the wilderness; Cassie recognizes it as part of the downed Bug fighter. The leg worsens throughout the day until finally, near the end of the day, Cassie realizes that they have no choice but to amputate. She morphs Hork Bajir for both the blades and strength to complete the task. Yami looks on with fear, but helps Cassie perform the surgery. Yami’s grandfather quickly starts to look better. But before she can think of a next step, the Blade ship arrives and she hears Visser Three’s voice booming out insisting that the “Andalite” show itself or he will destroy everything in sight.

Cassie morphs the kangaroo and tries to lead the Yeerks away. Hork Bajir and Taxxons give chase. She ends up in a mob of other kangaroos all of which also attack the Yeerks, some dying in the process. She manages to take out a few herself before becoming injured. Yami, his family, and his dog come to the rescue, killing a few Hork Bajir with their boomerangs. However, it won’t be enough. Luckily, the returning tourists are spotted and Cassie hears Visser Three calling for a retreat and speedy clean-up of the area. She manages to demorph just as familiar member of the Chee shows up, saying he caught a ride with the Yeerks and is here to take Cassie home.

Back home, Cassie and the rest meet up at the zoo. Cassie had wanted to go “shopping,” which Rachel was disappointed to learn meant “getting a postcard from the zoo.” The team tease Jake about his frantic search for Cassie while she was missing and he asks to see the postcard she purchased: it is of an osprey an on it she has written two words: “No worries.” It’s a phrase that Yami repeated many times throughout her stay, and she knows that he will recognize it and know the card is from her and that she is safe.

Peace, Love, and Animals: For all of its rather boring plot and lack of contribution to the larger story, I actually liked this book for what it had to offer for Cassie’s character. Again, we have Cassie on her own. (I still really don’t understand why this is a repeated theme for this character. It’s rarely a good thing for ANY of them, but I also think Cassie in particular is less suited for it.) But throughout the story, we see her evaluating her options against what other members of the team would do: Rachel’s penchant for action, Marco’s deliberation, Jake’s caution, etc.

We also get to see some clever thinking on her part when it comes to escaping the Yeerks on the plane. I think there might have been a few better options to be had, but on her own, she did fairly well. She also has to fight one-on-one with several Controllers and, while she does struggle with this (especially the fact that she shoots a Hork Bajir with a Dracon beam that was set on high and instantly killed him), she also doesn’t get too caught up in things.

It’s also always fun seeing her doctoring abilities come out, and she’s given a great platform for that with her amputation of the grandfather’s leg using her Hork Bajir morph. Again, not sure that that was the only option there and that using actual knives like a real doctor wouldn’t have been better. But it was a cool combination of morph mechanics and Cassie’s medical abilities.

Our Fearless Leader: We see Jake abort a mission early in the book, something that doesn’t come around that often. But it does lead to the interesting idea that there are a lot of missions that could have happened between books that just went down as failures and wouldn’t be written about. Like this one, if Cassie hadn’t, you know, ended up in Australia.

Xena, Warrior Princess: There were some good bits of dialogue for Rachel both in the first part of the book when she makes fun of Marco’s driving and in the end, when she bemoans Cassie’s definition of “shopping.” There’s also a really interesting moment about halfway through the book where Cassie is reflecting on her past choices and how, as a whole, they don’t all make sense, but she just had to make up her mind with each individual situation, without knowing what new horrible choice would come from that first one. Ultimately, she notes that she might be more reckless than Rachel, even though Rachel is the one with the reputation for rashness. Rachel’s recklessness presents as bravery to the point of foolishness and a preference for action above all. But Cassie realizes that some of even her more deliberative choices ultimately are more reckless than Rachel’s “go get em” attitude. It’s a really interesting character moment. And it speaks to one of the annoyances I’ve had throughout the series both with regards to the increasingly bad reputation that Rachel has gotten for being reckless and the free pass that Cassie has also been given for making what are ultimately way more dangerous decisions. It’s nice to have the book acknowledge this, as well as Cassie herself.

A Hawk’s Life: Tobias really had nothing in this book. He jumps on the “tease Jake” bandwagon with Rachel in the end about the fact that Jake was behaving “like a zombie” when Cassie was missing. His description of Jake’s behavior was pretty funny, and it’s always nice to see Tobias’s snarky side come out.

The Comic Relief: Gorilla!Marco ends up careening around driving a luggage truck in the opening mission in this book. It’s a nice nod to the fact that somehow Marco always ends up driving (not just when he’s in gorilla morph either!). And apparently he hasn’t improved at all, which is a bit surprising because you’d think they’d all be coming up to driver’s ed about now in the timeline.

E.T./Ax Phone Home: Ax, too, has very little, other than the fairly typical scene of him trying to eat the popcorn carton when they’re all hanging out at the zoo in the end of the book.

Best (?) Body Horror Moment: We’ve seen the Animorphs use partial de-morphs as a way to disguise their identity in the past, and it’s almost always sure to land in this section of my review. There’s no way around the sheer horror factor of what most of these half-morphs look like. But…I also have a deep fear of birds, so the idea of half-human, half-seagull Cassie lurching around on the tarmac…truly, truly horrific.

Couples Watch!: There were a few interesting things in this book. For one, we have the continued evidence that Rachel and Tobias are the more acknowledged, steady couple in the series. In the brief scene at the end of the book, we see them sitting together and teasing Jake and Cassie together, very confident in their own relationship. Jake and Cassie, on the other hand, are still nervous about even sitting next to each other and are still doing awkward things like putting their hands near each other and hoping the other one touches them. Jake even asks Cassie to stick around to “talk” and Rachel and Tobias jump on that saying he just wants to kiss Cassie.

The other notable bit is that while Yami is teaching Cassie to throw the boomerang they have a bit of a “moment,” enough of one even that Cassie feels mild guilt about it when she gets back and the others are teasing Jake about his freak out while she was gone. She worries that she was essentially flirting while he was worrying.

Knowing what we do about the end of the series, both of these things are kind of interesting: the fact that Cassie and Jake are still, after several years at this point, kind of awkward and uncomfortable with their relationship and the fact that Cassie had this small connection with this other boy.

If Only Visser Three had  Mustache to Twirl: The Yeerks really commit to chasing down this one Andalite. I mean, given how often they run into conflicts with the Animorphs and they all end up going their own ways without extremes taken to chase each other down…this all seems a bit much. Especially after Cassie gets off the plane. There’s really zero reason that Visser Three should know to show up at Yami’s house thinking the “Andalite bandit” will be hiding out there. Why would they be? A rogue Andalite could have morphed any animal and be anywhere, most likely heading towards a major city to get back home (like Cassie’s plan is anyways). Really, the last place an Andalite would go would be to hang out with a bunch of humans on a ranch. It’s very strange.

Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: The closest I came was probably the descriptions of the poor kangaroos that got taken out by Hork Bajir and Taxxons. And my extreme concern in that same fight when Yami’s dog got involved, and I couldn’t remember whether the dog survived.

What  a Terrible Plan, Guys!: I actually found the explanation for how Cassie ended up on the plane fairly plausible as far as strange things that happen in these books go. I do think she could have managed to get off it a bit easier, mostly be morphing a bug right next to the airlock so that when the door opened, even if they gassed the plane, she would be out in no time, and the Yeerks would have had no way of knowing.

It’s not so much a terrible plan, but the explanation of the Chee randomly showing up and getting her out of there has to be one of the most blatant examples of lazy writing. They literally show up out of nowhere, with no explanation for how they even knew to follow the Yeerks to Australia, and then there is still no explanation for how they really get back. I mean, Cassie’s still a minor with zero documentation off in Australia. It’s all pretty weird and best not think about, in the end.

Favorite Quote:

This was the main chunk of the bit where Cassie is reflecting on her past choices, and I think it’s pretty good. Just too bad that it got stuck in such a nothing book where I think many readers forget she even reflected on some of these things. Same thing goes for her comparison between herself and Rachel with regards to recklessness.

I’m not trying to be some kind of martyr, or say that I’m always a screwup. I’m not. In my world, making hard choices is part of the deal. Sometimes I’m right, sometimes I’m wrong. Sometimes I just can’t tell, even when the mission is over and we’ve all come out alive, at least. Leave the Animorphs. Come back. Trust Aftran, the Yeerk. Trust her again. Take responsibility for the never-ending, always unfolding consequences of those decisions. Say, no, I can’t be part of this mission, can’t be part of a mass killing of innocent people no matter what the ultimate goal, I won’t. Get involved anyway, commit acts maybe much worse. Why? To save some lives, not others. A choice. There’s always a choice.

There’s also a good line from the grandfather when Cassie is freaking out that she lead the Yeerks right to them, and it’s a good line for not only Cassie to remember, but all of them, at one point or another.

“They’re here because of me.”

“No.”

Yami’s grandfather touched my arm. I looked down, startled. He drew a sharp breath. His face twisted in pain, but his eyes stayed bright and alert.

“They’re here because they’re evil.”

Scorecard: Yeerks 11, Animorphs 15

The Animorphs literally call this one a tie themselves, so I’ll stick with their rating.

Rating: There’s no getting around the fact that this book is incredibly slow. Cassie doesn’t even get to Australia until almost over halfway through the story. And for a book that is marketed completely on her adventures in Australia, that’s pretty disappointing. It’d almost be more realistic for it to be “Cassie’s adventures at an airport and on an airplane.” Beyond that, any book that separates one character away from the others is almost always worse. It’s even more depressing in this one because not only is Cassie not the strongest character on her own, but the brief bits we get of dialogue from the others is great, so the ghost writer clearly had a good handle on the group dynamics (something that is not always a given at this point). And, of course, this book does nothing to advance the ongoing story. Not to mention the hot garbage that is the explanation for how she gets back with some weird “the Chee did it!” handwave-solution.

But! As far as Cassie herself goes, there’s actually a good amount that I really enjoyed. She addresses her own past decisions and how a lot of the times they were contradictory and even more reckless than Rachel’s, and that adds a really nice layer to the character. She has some shining moments of having to choose to fight and accept that, as well as the great scene of her utilizing her badass medical knowledge.

One last thing, however, has to do with Yami and his family. With Cassie sending the postcard in the end, it’s assumed that Yami and his family are safe and well in the end. But…why would they be? Not only is the idea that the Yeerks just left them alive pretty out of place with our knowledge of how Visser Three and the Yeerks operate, but really Yami and his family are a massive liability for Cassie and the others! While they might think she has some strange spirit animal thing going on, a quick infestation of Yami or any of them would quickly bring down the whole house of cards. And, even more so than just kill them, again, why WOULDN’T the Yeerks infest these people? They know that Yami and his family were hiding the “Andalite,” so it seems like a pretty obvious source of information, at the very least. Oh well, chock it up as another “just don’t think too hard about it” moment, I guess.

Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all!

Animorphs #43: “The Test”

Publishing Info: Scholastic Paperbacks, July 2000

Where Did I Get this Book: own it!

Book Description: Tobias, the other Animorphs, and Ax have seen things so bizarre that no sane person would believe their story. No one would believe that aliens have taken over Earth, and are in the process of infesting as many humans as possible. No one could believe the battles and missions and losses these six kids have had to deal with. And it’s not over yet.

Tobias has been captured by the same human-Controller that nearly tortured him to death once before. She claims that she’s now a part of the Yeerk Peace Movement. That she just needs a favor. Tobias isn’t sure what to believe, but he knows that if the Animorphs and Ax don’t find him soon, what he believes won’t matter anymore…

Narrator: Tobias

Plot: Our favorite Yeerk psychopath/torturer is back! Taylor shows up once again and is ready and able to make Tobias’s already generally miserable existence that much worse.

On one of his usual fly-overs above the woods, Tobias stumbles upon a search and rescue attempt for a small boy who’s been lost. Communicating through thought-speak with the father, Tobias successfully leads rescuers to the kid. But he’s quickly taken out by a golden eagle. Luckily, the human rescuers save the “superhero hawk,” and Tobias awakes in a cage in the clinic. He sees on TV that his rescue has become a news story and knows that odd animal behavior like this is sure to attract the Yeerks. And sure enough, soon Hork Bajir barge into the clinic and nab his cage. On their way out, they’re attacked by the Animorphs who are there on a rescue mission. In the madness, Taylor, Tobias’s torturer/nemesis from several books ago, shows up and manages to knock out Tobias with a gas and steal him away. During the madness, however, Tobias manages to acquire Taylor.

He wakes up in a grimy trailer. Taylor proceeds to try to convince him that she is on the outs with the Yeerks, and that she and other Yeerks have decided to form a rebel force against leadership that they see as failing them. They want the “Andalite bandits” to help. She then opens the cage and lets Tobias go free. He immediately heads to Rachel’s house and the two decide to meet with the others.

At Cassie’s barn, after discussing the likelihood that Taylor is cray cray, Jake leaves the decision to Tobias. He decides that they need to hear more. Using a janky computer set-up that Ax has devised, they log in to a webpage that Taylor had given Tobias and leave a message board comment agreeing to meet up. They do so at  Borders bookstore where Tobias comes in his new Taylor morph while the others take up positions around the store. The two Taylors sit down and the real Taylor begins detailing her mission: she wants the “Andalites” to morph Taxxon and tunnel down to the Yeerk pool. Then she will release a natural gas pipeline leak that will explode, killing tons of Yeerks. In exchange for their help, Taylor will get them access to Visser Three. During the meeting, however, the real girl, Taylor, briefly breaks through and tries to warn Tobias off.

At the mall, the group meets up once again to decide whether to go through with Taylor’s plan. While expressing various levels of disgust and ruthlessness, they all decide on the mission, except for Cassie who refuses to participate. She briefly mentions that large number of human hosts will be killed, but focuses mostly on the idea that the Yeerk Peace movement might also be hurt by this action. She compares it to blowing up the mall that they’re all sitting in now. This makes everyone uncomfortable, but the others see the strategic advantage as too high to miss out on.

The next day, Ax and Tobias (in Andalite morph) meet up with Taylor to acquire a Taxxon she has captured. It goes about as well as expected, with Ax having to kill the Taxxon but both still managing to acquire it. They then meet up with the other Animorphs near the natural gas station to begin tunneling. Cassie is there to see where they will be working, but will be leaving, still refusing to participate.

Tobias morphs first and struggles to control the Taxxon morph. After almost killing his friends, he realizes that he will never be able to completely control the Taxxon’s all-consuming hunger, but instead can only direct it towards tunneling, eating the dirt as he goes. As he comes up against the two-hour time limit, he is just able to regain enough control to demorph. Then it is Ax’s turn. Ax, too, manages to gain cautious control of the Taxxon and begins tunneling. However, again, close to the two hour limit, the others realize that he’s lost some degree of control because he is not responding and has not returned to the surface to de-morph. They go after him, only to discover him almost passed out at the end of the tunnel. Turns out that Taxxons, in their crazed hunger, will literally kill themselves through exhausted eating of things that don’t contain nutrients, like dirt. They manage to get him to demorph, however, and Tobias once again takes over tunneling duty.

At last, he breaks into the top of the Yeerk pool. Looking down, he sees the usual chaos of weeping hosts and the horrible pool. But he also notices a large group of humans that look oddly calm, even determined. Before he has a chance to wonder too much about this, Taylor shows up and begins taunting him and trying to convince him in joining her attempt to take over the Yeerk Empire. When he refuses, she jabs him with her paralysis gas again and runs back up the tunnel. He tries to call out to warn the others, but they respond that they’ve already been paralyzed and are helpless to do anything.

Tobias manages to drag himself back up the tunnel. He catches up to her just as she reaches the gas line, but isn’t able to stop her before she blows a hole in it and toxic gas shoots out, knocking out the air and pushing them all back down the tunnel towards the Yeerk pool. The Animorphs all manage to catch on to each other through various holds and bites, and Taxxon!Tobias scrambles to keep hold on the tunnel walls, breaking off many legs in the process. Tobais’s Taxxon body is more able to handle the lack of clean air, and he manages to drag his barely conscious friends back up the tunnel to fresh air. They realize the gas has been turned off and all demorph.

They get to the main gas building and find  Controlled!humans laying on the floor, badly injured. In a back room, they find Cassie crying. She had turned off the gas and was struggling with having to viciously attack the people in the gas building to accomplish it.

The next day, Tobias and Rachel fly to a private beach that they have discovered. Once their, Rachel demorphs and Tobias morphs his human body. Rachel confirms that Jake had told Cassie that she could warn the Yeerk Peace group, and once she had, she discovered that all of the Yeerks in the movement had organized to feed at the pool on the same days. And one of those days was the day of Taylor’s attack. Taylor had been working with Visser Three the entire time and the plan had been to take out both the “Andalite bandits” and the Yeerk Peace movement all in one hit, pinning the disaster on the Yeerk Peace participants to boot. Rachel tries to reassure Tobias that they couldn’t have known, that they operated on the best information they had, and that through their actions they saved the Yeerk Peace group. Tobias wonders if Taylor survived. But, in the end, he and Rachel hold hands and agree that they can’t worry about what is done, but only move forward.

A Hawk’s Life: Per the usual, this Tobias book deep dives into all of the issues. I think this might be a reason why Tobias, Marco, and Jake books are often listed as the most popular by other fans. Each of these three have ongoing challenges that they face throughout the entire series, and it’s a rare book for any of them that doesn’t touch on one of the main themes important to that character. Marco’s, of course, is his mother. Jake’s is his struggles with leadership and his own growing ruthlessness. And Tobias has…a bunch! And, unlike Jake and Marco, every single Tobias book has one of these issues, if not multiple, at its heart.

Not only does he have the challenges of his life as a hawk, and with it, the biggest question of all “who is he?” But he also struggles with what lead to his life as a hawk. And then, after his book before this one, he continues to feel the psychological repercussions of his capture and torture at the hands of Taylor. These last two, cowardice and the PTSD from torture, are a big focus for him in this book.

Throughout the book, Tobias struggles with his ongoing reaction to being tortured by Taylor. He sees his own reaction as one of cowardice and weakness, one that only Taylor knows. Whether she actually thinks of him this way or not, we do see her clearly taking advantage of his insecurities on these points throughout the book. In response, Tobias also insists on being the one to interact with Taylor the most. All of these thoughts come to a head when he comes up to the Yeerk pool and is looking out over it with Taylor whispering her evil words into his ear. At the same time, he sees the spot where he hid out way back in book one and became stuck as a hawk. He questions whether this, too, was a form of cowardice. That he could have done more to avoid this fate, but some part of him was too scared to go back to the challenges of the life he had before.

There’s a lot of great exploration of all of these topics, and less than what one could hope for as far as resolutions go. There are a couple throw-away lines towards the end where Tobias resolves once again not to fret about the past, but we’ve all heard that before. However, even without reaching any grand conclusions, I really enjoyed the deeper look into Tobias’s psyche and the fact that the events from his torture session are still playing large in his mind, even before Taylor shows up.

Our Fearless Leader: Jake’s got some typical “big leader moments,” what with knowing that Tobias ultimately needs to be the one to decide whether to go forward with working with Taylor, to accepting the fact that Cassie disagrees with their plan to the point of refusing to participate, but decides that the group will go on without her. There’s also a pretty dark moment, pretty important in the grand scheme of things, that if Tom is a victim of this attack, that is a risk worth taking for the larger advantage.

For all of that, this book sits very oddly with the last Jake book being the one that handled the topic of terrorism so thoroughly. Throughout his entire last book, Jake struggled with the question of terrorism and its role in warfare. He also was routinely horrified by it and saw it as one of the biggest markers of how wrong things had gone in that alternate reality. But here, in what is clearly the biggest act of terrorism the Animorphs would have ever participated in (hundreds, if not thousands, of innocent humans and Hork Bajir, and others, would die in this attack), he doesn’t seem to have any thoughts on the matter or references to his past struggles. Perhaps if his terrorism book had come earlier in the series, it would be easier to buy that he had hardened himself since then to making decisions like this. But…it was literally two books ago. It reads as really strange.

Xena, Warrior Princess: We see Rachel operating as Tobias’s primary support system throughout the book. She’s the one who constantly turns to him to see how he is dealing with the whole Taylor business, and she’s the one to talk him around in the end.

But we also seem some interesting shifts for herself throughout the book. It’s no surprise that she’s one of the first ones to be on-board for the mission when they are discussing next steps in the mall. Action is always preferred to inaction for Rachel, and she (with Marco and often Jake) is more likely to fall on the ruthless side of things as far as necessary sacrifices in war. But we also see her have a pretty major breakdown about three-fourths of the way through the book, questioning whether they are doing the right thing. It’s a really nice moment that serves as a reminder that a well-drawn portrayal of Rachel’s character can, and should, include more than just her ruthless (often shown as “mindless”) streak.

Peace, Love, and Animals: There’s some pretty good stuff for Cassie’s character in this book. One thing I did find very strange, however, was the focus of her objections when they all met to discuss Taylor’s plans in the mall. From a reader perspective, it seems pretty clear that her focus on the Yeerks Peace movement was a not very subtle way for the author to hint that that was going to come up as a thing later in the book. This group isn’t referenced too often, so it makes some sense to bring them up early on. But…as far as characterization goes, it ends up playing very oddly for Cassie herself. She gets out maybe one line about the innocent humans who will die in this attack before switching the entire rest of her argument to the  Yeerks Peace movement. And as a natural thought process or argument, it reads very oddly and makes Cassie seem to have strange, if even condemnable, priorities towards the “good” Yeerks over innocent human victims. Beyond making it seem like her own values are out of line, this argument is always going to be a harder sell to the rest of the Animorphs, who, while impressed by Cassie’s ability to form a connection with a Yeerk, have no personal attachments of their own. As a character who we know is a keen manipulator, a Cassie free from needing to do authorial work with foreshadowing would have known that pressing the innocent human line would have been a better route to convincing the others.

There’s also the moment in the end where Cassie saves them all by taking matters into her own hands. This is the kind of story that would have been great to read from Cassie’s perspective! She would have had some great insights into the humanity of choices like this with regards to the larger mission, but then would have to challenge her own values with the choice to attack human Controllers to save the Yeerk pool and her friends. Really, the more I write about it, the more I can just envision this as a Cassie book and wish we had it, especially given the general weakness of most of her books.

The Comic Relief: Marco doesn’t have a whole lot in this book. Even the number of jokes he has is pretty tamped down. This kind of makes sense since Marco is definitely one of the characters with a more peripheral relationship with Tobias.

E.T./Ax Phone Home: Ax is the other Animorph to get to experience the joy that is morphing Taxxon. He manages to discover that the Taxxons have a hibernation state that allows him to gain more control over the morph, but then, in the end, he, too, succumbs to the morph and almost dies/passes the time limit when he gets stuck at the end of the tunnel. There’s also an interesting little bit where he cuts off some of Andalite!Tobias’s fur in an effort to make Tobias look less like an identical copy of Ax when they go to meet Taylor. He explains that cutting fur is a form a discipline that serves as a reminder of wrong-doing until the fur grows back out and the offense is forgotten. Just another interesting little tid-bit of Andalite society!

Best (?) Body Horror Moment: Obviously all of the Taxxon stuff. Not only morphing the disgusting Taxxon body, but the entire experience. Looking at it, though, I couldn’t help but start to wonder how Taxxons even exist, biologically speaking. The hunger thing seems to strong that it would override every other natural instinct. As we saw with Ax, Taxxons will literally kill themselves through futile eating of non-nutrient rich things, like dirt. We’ve seen them cannibalize themselves at the slightest injury as well. How are they not extinct??

Couples Watch!: We get a handful of sweet, little moments for Tobias and Rachel throughout the story. For one, the first thing he does when Taylor releases him in the beginning of the book is to fly to Rachel’s. Together, they decide what to do from there. Thoughts of Rachel are also the only thing that breaks through the hunger-haze when he first morphs Taxxons. He gets caught up in the hunger and imaging eating his friends, but when he gets to Rachel, it stops him up short and gives him just enough of a break to regain control. And then, obviously, at the end we have the two of them on their private beach, holding hands and talking themselves through what could have been a huge disaster of a mission.

If Only Visser Three had  Mustache to Twirl: Taylor is the real villain of this book, even if the plan behind it all is laid at Visser Three’s feet. Taylor is a very interesting villain in her own right, as she was given quite a bit of page time and backstory in her first book. Here, we get further glimpses into her madness. However, many of these glimpses ultimately ended up just being frustrating teases. We get the brief break-through from the real Taylor at the bookstore, where she warns Tobias away (why this isn’t given more weight when they’re all considering what to do would also fit under the “Terrible Plan” segment). And Tobias himself wonders several times about the breakdown between Yeerk and girl. Before, Taylor was a willing host, having chosen this reality to restore her beauty. But clearly something has gone wrong since, and she’s fighting against her Yeerk. This is really interesting! And it goes…nowhere. We never get any answers to this and it’s the kind of frustrating add-on that I wish had just been cut out. It doesn’t add anything to the story as it is, but instead just leaves annoying questions in its wake, making it feel like there was much more story to be had here than what we are ultimately given.

Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: As we know, Tobias books are often big on the tears. This one’s discussion of cowardice and Tobias’s fears that he’s a coward at heart is pretty rough. Not only does he feel that he somehow “failed” while be tortured, exposing his “true nature” to his torturer, Taylor, but he also worries that he’s always been a coward. And that this cowardice was part of the reason that he ended up trapped as a hawk; he was too scared to approach life as a boy any longer. Beyond the obvious horrors of his human life (like living with his terrible aunt and uncle and the constant bullying), he even worries that part of him was scared of the joy, too, like being with Rachel. In some of the previous books, we’ve seen him deal with the fact that his hawk form has allowed him to keep careful control on that relationship, both to Rachel’s frustration and to his own shame. The moments when he’s hanging out above the Yeerk Pool looking directly at the spot where he hid so long ago are pretty heart-wrenching.

What  a Terrible Plan, Guys!: There are a good number of awful plans in this book, both on the part of the Animorphs and the Yeerks. For one, as I mentioned in Jake’s section, it’s hard to buy that there weren’t more objections to the general terrible nature of the plan and the high human collateral it would entail.

Beyond that, they are all very willing to go along with a plan given to them by Taylor, someone they have a terrible history with. Not only does Taylor’s host break through at one point and literally warn them away, but they have no evidence that her plan is part of a larger revolt. They never meet any co-conspirators or see any proof that she’s not just operating on her own. What’s more, part of the carrot that is given for their cooperation is some vague promise that she will get them Visser Three. But..how? The whole explanation for her mission is that she’s on the outs. How exactly is she going to get them access to someone like Visser Three? And the Animorphs never even question this!

And then from the Yeerks’ perspective, the entire plan is very high risk, questionable reward. We know that Visser Three is happy enough to off Yeerks that displease him, but loosing the entire Yeerk Pool seems a bit much, even for him. Sure, he’s wiped out the Yeerk Peace movement, but he has to report back to the Council of Thirteen that a guerrilla group managed to blow up the entire Yeerk Pool under his watch…and bizarrely took themselves out with it? Not only does it not make sense, but it doesn’t paint in him a very good picture, and as we already know that his methods have been coming under question, it’s hard to see how this would benefit him. Beyond that, through Taylor’s successful contact with the Animorphs, there were much easier ways to simply lead that group into a trap. The successful capture of the “Andalite bandits” would do a whole heck of a lot more for him than taking out some Yeerk Peace movement members while losing the entire pool. And would have been super easy to pull off, considering how “all in” the Animorphs were with Taylor’s plan. I mean, at one point they were all lying paralyzed on the floor! How easy would it have been for Visser Three to swoop in and simply gather them all up?

Favorite Quote:

This book had a lot of good ruminations on a variety of topics, but I think some of the better parts had to do with fear and evil when Tobias was analyzing what makes up the heart of the Taxxon psyche and evil in general:

Yes, a fear. . . grossly exaggerated … beyond anything humans experience .. . a desperate fear of not having enough .. . a terror of starvation .. . a horror that your essential needs will go unfulfilled .. . a horror demented and contorted by the Taxxon mind until it became a sick, murderous evil.

Evil, even the worst evil, has banal origins every human can understand. Weakness. Fear. Insecurity.

Ax hooks up a janky computer set-up in the woods to contact Taylor initially, and the event ends with this utterly quotable line:

<The computer has, as you say, crashed,> Ax announced coolly.

Scorecard: Yeerks 11, Animorphs 15

No change! Both the Yeerks and the Animorphs had terrible instincts and plans in this book. I could easily justify taking a point away from each of them, but as that makes not overall difference, we’ll just leave things as they are.

Rating:  For all that it falls apart if you really start looking at things closely (like both the Animorphs’ and the Yeerks’ reasoning for all of these events, and the biological impossibility of the Taxxons), I really enjoyed this book. As I’ve repeatedly mentioned, Tobias books are always good for a deeper look into a variety of pretty tough topics. And, unlike Cassie books, usually avoid coming off as preachy or self-righteous. For that matter, as I mentioned in the Cassie section above, this book would have succeeded tackling many of these topics AS a Cassie book. But I particularly enjoyed the analysis of fear and cowardice, and Tobias tying all of these various factors together in his worries that he is a coward: his being caught as a hawk, his handling of being tortured by Taylor the first time, how he has handled the events of this entire book. Just a lot of good stuff!

Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all!

Animorphs #42: “The Journey”

Publishing Info: Scholastic Paperbacks, June 2000

Where Did I Get this Book: own it!

Book Description: The Helmacrons need more power to escape the earth’s atmosphere, so they have returned to demand the morphing cube. When Rachel tries to destroy their ship, the tiny egomaniacs bail — right into Marco’s left nostril. And the other Animorphs have to get them out before the little aliens do some real damage.

Narrator: Rachel & Marco

Plot: We all know the story: a frizzle-haired teacher, a class of students, and a magical school bus that goes anywhere and makes even the most ridiculous things seem fun and cool. Sure, many of their adventures were legitimately cool on their own; who wouldn’t enjoy traveling to all of the planets! But some of them…definitely could have gone another way. And Animorphs is here to prove how!

The story starts off in the normal way: the team returning from yet another battle. But as they demorph in an alley, they are temporarily blinded by the flash of a camera. Some kid has taken a picture of them mid-morph! They chase after him, but he disappears into an apartment complex. The team sets up a state-out and agrees to meet up at Cassie’s barn the next day to discuss next steps.

And from there, it all goes haywire with the sudden reappearance of the Helmacrons. All together in Cassie’s barn, the tiny Helmacron ship reappears and, predictably, is again after the blue box that Cassie has hidden there. Rachel and Marco both lunge to grab the ship before it can get to the box, and in the process, Marco hits his head and falls to the ground. From there, Tobias gets to witness the truly terrible image of a group of Helmacrons marching straight up Marco’s nose.

Now the team is in a real pickle. The Helmacrons have their tiny lasers on them, and there’s a real concern over the amount of damage they could do to Marco if they should start firing inside of his body. So naturally, the only thing to be done is to go in after them! Jake strictly instructs Marco to lay low and not to morph, not knowing how morphing could affect them while inside Marco’s body. They use the Helmacrons’ ship to shrink themselves down to size, and Marco uses a bit of straw to deposit them in his nose.

Insert lovely scenes about snot and walking through snot and burying oneself in snot to avoid a sneeze. Lovely stuff. They eventually come upon the Helmacrons but quickly notice something is wrong: the Animorphs are much, much smaller than even the Helmacrons. They realize that they had been set up and fallen into the trap. Luckily, the Helmacrons are engaged in a bit of a civil war between the genders and aren’t making too much progress with whatever their plan is either. After a few mishaps, the Animorphs and the Helmacrons all end up falling down Marco’s throat and end up in his stomach.

Meanwhile, Marco is getting bored of waiting. He can’t speak to the team, and for some reason Ax is just not updating him on what’s going on. Restless, he decides to go check out the kid’s apartment and try and get a hold of the camera and film. Breaking in doesn’t go as planned and he ends up being bitten by the kid’s pit bull.

In Marco’s stomach, the team struggles to survive being eaten away by the acid, an all too familiar scenario for poor Rachel and Tobias. Cassie morphs a whale at one point and the team huddles on top of her to try and gather their bearings. From there, they witness several Helmacrons die in the acid themselves, but the others manage to slice a whole in Marco’s stomach and make their way out into his blood stream. The team figures that they must be capable of breathing “under water” and determine that the best way to follow would be in shark morph. They morph sharks and all struggle at first with the madness that their close proximity with blood inspires in the sharks’ minds. They follow the Helmacrons out into the arteries. Along the way, Cassie shares “body facts” about what they’re seeing.

Back in Marco’s perspective, things are not going well. He has begun to feel strange, reckless and anxious. He decides to go back to the kid’s apartment once more and try again to get the camera. Once there, he decides that he needs to morph a cockroach. He proceeds to morph.

Inside Marco, the others realize that Marco is morphing and frantically wonder what is going on that would force him to take such a reckless action. They all manage to survive the morph, and immediately thought speak to Marco asking him why he felt the need to risk their lives morphing. Marco responds in a very petulant manner and Rachel begins to wonder what is going on. She knows that it’s not a great situation for Marco, but that he’s never stupid, and morphing with them in his body was stupid.

They finally catch up with the Helmacrons, but they won’t be reasoned with and start firing their guns. Marco goes still. The others are convinced that he has been killed by the internal damage. They manage to get a hold of the laser guns from the Helmacrons and force them to give in. They cut a hole in cockroach!Marco and make their way out. Outside his body, Cassie begins to theorize that it seems strange that Marco would have died as a cockroach, since they are practically unkillable. The team takes turns trying to wake him up before the two hour deadlines expires. At the last minute, he comes to. He morphs a gull, the team climbs on, still holding the Helmacrons hostage, and Marco grabs the camera in his beak on the way out.

Xena, Warrior Princess: Like the Atlantis book was for Jake, and the first Helmacrons book was for Cassie, these books that veer all the way into crazyland tend to be rather dud-like as far as any real character growth goes. But, on the other hand, the last several Rachel books have been more damaging to her character than anything, so maybe I should count this as a lucky miss that there’s practically nothing worth discussing for her here. Sure, there are a couple of moments where we see her dive head first into the action, but even those instances are pretty restrained and not too notable. Towards the end, there are a couple of moments that reflect the deeper understanding of Marco’s character that she has gained from being an Animorph with him. Before, I imagine, he was just her cousin Jake’s annoying friend. Now, she knows him well enough to notice that his defensive and weirdly aggressive responses to why he morphed when Jake had expressly told him not to were out of character for him. She notes that while he can be annoying, he is anything but stupid, and morphing in this instance was stupid. It not only risked the other Animorphs’ lives, but Marco’s own.

Our Fearless Leader: Jake has a few comical moments when he tries to mimic the Helmacrons’ grandiose way of speaking in an attempt to convince them to leave Marco and give up their quest for the blue box. He also shows how comfortable he has become giving members of the team orders, noting in the end that he still needs to talk to Marco about why exactly Marco disobeyed a direct order. This is definitely the type of comment that we’d not expect to hear from early-series Jake who was still struggling to accept his role as a leader, especially when it comes to laying down laws on his best friend.

A Hawk’s Life: Not much from Tobias in this book, which is always a bummer on its own, but is worse in Rachel books where we stand a better chance of getting more from him.

Peace, Love, and Animals: Cassie plays the role of “Ms. Frizzle” in this book and is pretty much giving them a tour of Marco’s insides throughout the story. At one point, she is so caught up in this role that she is essentially evaluating the state of Marco’s immune system instead of paying attention to anything else that is going on. It’s pretty bizarre, frankly. But with a book like this, which is essentially setting out to accomplish exactly the same thing that the Magic School Bus episode was, to teach kids about the body’s inner workings, we would need a character like this along the way, and Cassie makes the most sense. She’s also the one to realize that Marco is likely not dead in the end, noting how difficult it is to truly kill a cockroach.

The Comic Relief: This is a strange book in that it’s another one where we get weird insert of POV chapters from another character’s point of view. Rachel is one of my favorite characters and, not only do I think she gets short-changed in a lot of books, other than Jake, she has potentially the most interesting arc throughout the series to follow. So with that in mind, it’s a bit unfortunate to see one of her books divided between her and another character. But, if I was going to have to pick that character, Marco’s always a good choice. Of course, he’s also weirdly written for most of this as he is suffering from rabies-induced mania for much of it. Even without Rachel noting Marco’s strange behavior, fans of the series, especially this late in the game, are sure to raise an eyebrow at much of the out-of-character decision making we see from Marco here.

E.T./Ax Phone Home: Also not much from Ax. On and off, he serves as a communication point to Marco as one of the few members of group who can use thought-speak. But…yeah, other than that.

Best (?) Body Horror Moment: Really, most of this book. Unlike the cartoon-y take we get from Magic School Bus, this book tears that cutesy band-aid off right away with overly disgusting descriptions of the Animorphs having to bury themselves in snot to avoid getting sneezed out. It’s pretty disgusting and vaults this book up next to the “Andalite toilet” book as far as catering to middle grade body humor goes. I did not enjoy a return to this level of “entertainment.”

Couples Watch!: Ugh, practically nothing! There was literally one line where Tobias privately thought-spoke to Rachel when they were in Marco’s stomach telling her to morph quickly when she was stuck in the stomach acid. Which can also be attributed to the fact that the two of them already had a close encounter with potentially being digested back in Megamorphs #2. So yeah, as far as romance goes, a pretty big let down here. It’s all the more sad to see knowing how close we are getting to the end.

If Only Visser Three had  Mustache to Twirl: No Visser Three in this book! The Animorphs note a few times that they can’t be sure that the Helmacrons aren’t working with the Yeerks, so this is meant to add another level of urgency to their mission, though I’m never quite sure their reasoning makes sense.

Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: Again, I cry at the return of childish body-humor as a form of entertainment. Just…no.

What  a Terrible Plan, Guys!: Kind of the whole thing? I don’t understand what the Helmacrons’ endgame was. How was getting the Animorphs to follow them into Marco really going to accomplish anything? I’m not convinced that all of the Animorphs going in after them was wise, rather than just a few of them. And why oh why the group then chooses to keep Marco completely out of the loop the entire time is beyond strange. Ax should have been updating him the entire time and then when they all morph sharks, they definitely should have been letting him know what was going on. You could make the case that Marco wouldn’t have felt compelled to go after the camera in the first place had he been more in the loop with what the others were up to. Beyond that, I’m pretty skeptical of the whole rabies subplot. How exactly did someone’s pet pitbull end up with rabies? It’s pretty rare for that disease to be found in household pets since most are vaccinated and then rarely would come into contact with the wild animals that would need to give it to them in the first place. And there’s no mention of the fact that, hey, some kid and his family are now LIVING WITH A RABID ANIMAL! And Rachel thinks it’s more important to let Marco question his own sanity for another night than, I don’t know, warn this poor family about this life-threatening situation.

Favorite Quote:

TRUTH:

“You know,” Jake said thoughtfully. “I think this is the most disgusting mission we’ve ever done.”

Scorecard: Yeerks 11, Animorphs 15

No change!

Rating: All in all, a pretty “meh” book. It didn’t enrage me, but I also kind of buzzed through it, not caring at all what was going on. I didn’t enjoy the return of body humor and I was sad to see another book where Rachel doesn’t really have much character progression. For all that we hear about her deteriorating mindset from other characters in their books, it’s a real shame that we don’t see more of it from Rachel herself and how she is coping with these changes. The potential here is gold and it’s so, so wasted. Plus, the whole story was stock full of ridiculous scenarios that don’t make much sense. From the very beginning, it’s clear that this is just a “concept” book that derived from a wacky idea. There’s no good reason for the Helmacrons to be back, or for them to take the actions they do, or for them to give up in the end really and agree to leave. If I think about it too much, I could probably get frustrated with the laziness, but as it is, I’m happy enough just letting this one slide back into cool indifference, lost to memory eventually.

Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all!

Megamorphs #4: “Back to Before”

Publishing Info: Scholastic Paperbacks, May 2000

Where Did I GeAt this Book: own it!

Book Description: Jake’s finally weakened. After a grisly battle, the Drode offers the Animorphs’ leader an escape from the terrifying pressure. He’ll reverse the decision to start the Animorphs. Now, there’s no morphing, no missions, and no knowledge of the Yeerks. That is, until very strange things begin to happen and Jake, Rachel, Tobias, Cassie, Marco and Ax are forced to confront their new reality.

Narrator: Everyone!

Plot: After a particularly horrible battle, Jake is back in his room, dreading the inevitable nightmares that are sure to come: his friends dying, all because of his own decisions. At this weak point, Crayak’s servant the Drode appears and gives Jake an out: say the words and this can all go away, Jake and the other Animorphs can go back to blissful ignorance, back before they met Elfangor in the abandoned construction lot. From there, a weird alternate reality takes over.

After meeting up at the mall one evening, Cassie and Rachel spot Jake, Marco and this guy named Tobias, (they think?) heading out. We witness the same exchange that we got from Jake’s perspective way back in book #1, but this time from Cassie’s POV. They agree to head home together, but instead of going through the construction site, they take the long way around. In the sky, they see a flash of what looks like a meteorite falling. Cassie gets an odd feeling, but they all reach home safely.

Over the next few days, we check in with the rest of the crew. Tobias is living with his uncle and has quickly fallen out of hanging around with Jake and Marco, getting the sense that while nice enough to him, they’re not really looking for new friends. This leaves Tobias at the mercy of even more bullies, that is until he’s invited by another kid to a meeting of The Sharing. He sees Jake and Tom there, but doesn’t talk to them.

Cassie is having weird dreams, voices in her head and images of the ocean. She goes into the barn now and then and is having weird memories of Marco lounging on hay bales (but Marco’s never been there) and a large bird of prey up in the rafters.

Ax is under the sea, waiting for rescue. It’s been weeks, however, and no one has come. We see him captures and acquire the hammerhead shark morph that he had when the Animorphs originally met up with him back in book #4. After a period of time, he finally decides to give up waiting just as a group of Controllers make their way towards the Dome ship. He escapes as a shark, taking out a bunch of Taxxons on his way, and makes his way to the surface.

Jake is receiving increasing pressure from Tom to join The Sharing. He has nothing against it, but is more and more beginning to resent the pressure from Tom to join.

Marco and Rachel go on a school trip together where Marco flirts outrageously with her. He is happy to find that there is more to her than her looks as she wittily matches him and puts him in his place with his ridiculous come-ons. Just as things are getting interesting, Marco spots his “dead” mom and takes off after her, trying to chase her down.

Rachel has felt all her life that something is missing, and when Marco takes off after some woman who can’t possibly be his dead mother, she doesn’t think twice, leaping into action and following after. The two chase Marco’s mom around town, finally backing her into a corner in an alley, only to find that she’s called reinforcements and now it’s they who are trapped. What’s more, the reinforcements don’t shoot regular guns, but some type of strange laser beam. Rachel and Marco manage to make their escape up a fire ladder in the end. They also start quasi-dating off page.

Tobias, now being protected from the bullies by members of The Sharing, finally decides to join as a full member. He meets Jake in the hall at school and mentions this. Jake seems suspicious of the whole thing, mentioning that any group that asks individuals to give up themselves in order to be part of some whole might be a bit weird. Tobias, though, at the mercy of bullies and practically no family, decides to go through with it. At The Sharing, he and a few others go into a room to become full members. To his surprise, Vice Principal Chapman and a strange man named Mr. Visser are there. Chapman gives a pretty speech about how Tobias will now be part of something bigger than he is. Mr. Visser scoffs at the necessity of the speech, but Chapman says it usually helps. Even with the speech, Tobias starts freaking out when they lock him down to a chair. From there, he’s infested with a Yeerk. But not just any Yeerk, a Yeerk who secretly works for Visser One and there to tell Visser Three that the Council of Thirteen wishes Visser Three to proceed with Visser One’s more secretive approach to the invasion on Earth.

Ax has found himself a place to stay: the mental hospital. But after a while there, he realizes that he must do more and the only way to tell if the Yeerks are on Earth is to present them with bait they can’t resist, an Andalite. He makes his way to a TV station and projects a short video of himself.

At home, Jake and Tom both see the video. Tom freaks out and tries to sneak out of the house, but Jake sees that he has a gun with him and, suspicious, stows away in the back of the car. Tom makes his way to the TV studio. There he meets up with Chapman, Mr. Visser, and, strangely, Tobias. A small fight breaks out, and in the chaos, Tom shoots at Jake with a ray gun (though he can’t see who it is to know it’s Jake). Jake briefly sees his own hand start to change into the paw of a tiger. He freaks out and rushes back to meet up with Rachel, Cassie, and Marco in the barn.

There, Cassie confesses to the strange visions she’s been having. Before Jake can describe the alien on the video, Cassie is able to describe him herself, based on these strange “visions.” They all agree that some sort of conspiracy is going on, likely involving The Sharing since they know Tom and Tobias were involved. Cassie watches the discussion and notes that everyone is the way they “should” be: Jake is the leader, making the decision when necessary; Rachel is ready to act, now; Marco is sitting back, cautious and analyzing the situation from afar. But something is still missing.

Back with Tobias, we see the slow spiral of his thoughts as he realizes the truly terrible situation he has gotten himself into. There’s no going back, and this is his life now. He also realizes that the Yeerk in his head is a bit scared, noting that Visser Three is being too accommodating of a Yeerk who just delivered bad news. At a meeting, Visser Three confronts Controlled!Tobias and accuses the Yeerk of working for Visser One. After threatening to starve him to death, the Yeerk confesses and Controlled!Tobias is shot in the head.

The others have decided to track Tom, their only known lead. But we see how difficult their task is without morphing abilities: even following him becomes almost impossible because they can’t drive. Jake and Marco try to sneak through Tom’s things, but don’t see anything. On the TV, however, they see another broadcast from Ax, this time on all of the stations. He explains about the Yeerks, how they Control people and that Earth is under attack. Marco quickly guesses that this is what has happened to Tom and his mother. Tom confronts them with a laser gun and tries to herd them out into a waiting car, likely to be infested now themselves. Rachel shows up with a bat and takes Tom out. From there, chaos breaks out.

A Bug fighter shows up in plain sight and begins chasing them. They manage to make it a few blocks before the fighter blows up some cars. The explosion beats up Rachel and Jake, but it kills Marco. Shell-shocked, they make their way to the mall and meet up with Cassie. Ax is there as well, having holed up in Circuit City to broadcast his message. On his way out, he runs into three teenage humans who are now being chased by a bunch of Yeerks through the mall. One of them knows his name. Cassie convinces Ax that she doesn’t know what’s going on, but something’s not right and they are supposed to be friends and allies. Ax says they need to make their way to the roof to escape.

On the way there, several fights break out and Rachel comes into her own with a blaze of battle prowess. But once on the roof, she is killed by a Hork Bajir. Ax, Jake, and Cassie run towards the Blade ship that has landed on the roof. As they run, Cassie, too, is shot and killed by a laser. Jake and Ax make their way on to the Blade ship, but they run into Visser Three who is about to kill them when Cassie appears again out of nowhere and kills him. A disembodied voice complains that she was dead and that this is getting out of hand.

Ax, Cassie, and Jake fly the ship into space and are just about to take out the Yeerk Pool Ship, likely resulting in their own death as well, when it all stops. A being that calls itself the Drode and an old, grandfatherly-like creatures calling itself the Ellimist show up. The other dead Animorphs also show up. The Drode complains that the Ellimist cheated, that Cassie is an anomaly that messed with the alternate reality. He accuses the Ellimist of “stacking the deck” by selecting Cassie, a time/space anomaly, Marco, the son of Visser One’s host, Tobias, Elfangor’s son, and Ax, Elfangor’s borther, to be part of his team. The Ellimist says that his decisions came into play before the timeline change, so it was a fair deal. It’s not his fault that Cassie’s mere presence will always ruin it, grounding the timeline into the one that is meant to be. Besides, the Drode was the one to call things off in the end, just as Jake, Ax, and Cassie were about to blow up the Yeerk Pool Ship.

Through all of this, the others regain their memories. Jake is horrified that he gave in and that this was the result. The Ellimist says that things will reset to the night Jake made this decision and that none of them would remember but for Cassie who would have vague images here and there. Cassie decides that whatever she remembers she will keep to herself. She doesn’t want Jake to know he ever caved to Crayak or Tobias to know he chose to be a Controller. Rachel comments that she will be more than happy to forget dating Marco.

Time resets. Jake is in his room, dreading his nightmares. The Drode appears and temps him, just as Jake is about to answer, the Drode sighs in annoyance, says never mind, and disappears.

Our Fearless Leader: The brief scene at the beginning of this book is brutally effective, especially given how short it is. We don’t know the details of the mission, but multiple members of the Animorphs almost die. They also have to walk out on a dying human Controller that was taken out in the action. There’s nothing special about this fight, which is what makes it all the more believable that it would be the one to break Jake. It isn’t a matter of the fight itself being worse, but the accumulation.

We get some good stuff from Jake throughout the book, but some of the bigger moments are his discussion with Tobias about The Sharing and his natural fall into leadership, even in this alternate reality. The former gets at Jake’s inherent distrust of organizations that call for the loss of the individual, and it’s a brief discussion, but very interesting for what it says about him. The second is a good example of just how inevitable it was that Jake would be the one to lead this group. He’s a natural leader, able to make tough decisions quickly when they need to be made, regardless of changed circumstances. It’s also definitely for the best that Cassie is the only one who will even partially remember this whole thing. Jake has enough weight to carry and the knowledge that he ever made this choice would surely be the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Xena, Warrior Princess: Rachel, too, falls naturally into her regular role. She pines for action from the very beginning and doesn’t question motives or sanity or anything when Marco takes off after his “mother.” She acts, and she acts quickly. She’s the one that really gets them out of the alley situation, vaulting Marco up to pull down the escape ladder.

There’s also the neat scene where she comes to Jake and Marco’s rescue when they’re being carted off by Tom, and she takes him out with a bat. We get this line from Jake, and it’s the kind of scene that you can picture showing up in a movie:

I stared at my cousin. Rachel was breathing hard. But her outfit, hair, and makeup had remained perfect.

We also see what has to be a contender for one of her most bad-ass moments in the entire series during the fights that take place in the mall. At one point, the group is fighting a bunch of Hork Bajir with the few ray guns they’ve manged to get their hands on. Things aren’t looking good at one point when Rachel manages to use the decapitated head of one Hork Bajir to stab another Hork Bajir in the chest, killing him.

A Hawk’s Life: Omg, Tobias. His entire section is just heart-wrenching. What makes it all the worse is how very believable it is. Through the entire series, it’s easy to wonder what would make a person agree to be a Controller, and it’s hard to imagine any scenario where that would be a choice someone would make. But here, we see not just some random person do it, but a beloved hero we’ve followed through tons of books. Tobias’s life is terrible. His aunt and uncle are the worst kind of indifferent. One set of bullies was put off by Jake, but another group is always waiting to beat up on him next. Even his rescuers, Jake and Marco, don’t really do much to help Tobias. Sure, Jake stood up for him, but Tobias can sense their lack of interest in being friends, and he inevitably drifts away. The Sharing is perfectly positioned to prey on kids like him.

And when he’s Controlled, the situation is just worse. He sees his life before and acknowledges that it was terrible, and that while yes, there was nothing he could do at the moment to change it, all he had to do was endure. But even with these thoughts, it’s not made to seem like Tobias made a stupid, easy-to-avoid decision . His life was hard; even knowing that endurance will provide an escape at some point, the reality of what life is like for kids like this is still really tough. And then he gets shot in the head because the Yeerk inside him is caught out as a spy. Oof.

Peace, Love, and Animals: This is a great book for Cassie. Not only are her chapters fun to read (especially the first one when we experience the scene before the construction night from her POV), but her insights into the team are put to great use. Through her eyes, we see how these individuals have key characteristics that remain true, regardless of how things played out. Her visions of the future are also great, being just subtle enough to create disturbing moments for her (like her recurring vision of a hawk in the barn) and clear enough for readers to get excited about the familiarities. She never just “suddenly remembers” anything in the lazy way of writing that so easily could have happened. Instead, her small insights and visions are always just enough at any given moment to slowly push things. Her memory of Ax’s name is the biggest one. Without that name, there’s a good chance things would have gone very differently, with the team never coming together and all being killed before they could reach the Blade ship and fly it into space, creating enough of a threat to force the Drode to stop things.

And then, of course, there are passive things that Cassie caused, like Jake’s weird hand morphing incident and the much more extreme example of her essentially coming back to life just in time to kill Visser Three. Most importantly, she realizes immediately that any memory of this experience that she retains is one that she must keep to herself; it would be too damaging to the group to know, especially Tobias and Jake.

The Comic Relief: For all that Marco quickly calls out the insanity when they’re all in the barn discussing the possibility of some weird conspiracy with The Sharing, he’s also the one to really defend the idea too, nicely highlighting the strengths of Marco’s character: he can say what everyone is thinking, but do it in a way that also highlights the realities of the situation. He has several moments where he shows his smarts, especially when it comes to spying on Tom. While Rachel wants action (any action!), Marco knows that they have to be cautious. He’s the one who warns Jake to look for booby traps that Tom might have set to warn him if anyone snoops around his room. Because of this, Jake is able to see the hair placed in a door to do just that.

It’s also important that Marco spotted his mom in the beginning of this book. We know from what we saw in the beginning of this series that, while smart, Marco is a very pragmatic character and would likely be unmoved to get involved in this whole situation had he not had a good motivation. And now, like then, that motivation comes in the form of his mother. It’s interesting to think, then, that if the only thing that changed was missing that construction site meeting, then there had to have been some Animorphs-related mission in the normal reality that prevented Marco and Rachel from being at that theater and seeing Marco’s mother then, instead of on the ship in book #5.

E.T./Ax Phone Home: It’s great to get some scenes from Ax’s time in the Dome ship in the ocean before the Animorphs would have rescued him. We even get to see how he goes about acquiring the shark, which is a great little tidbit of a scene to throw to fans of the series.

It’s also interesting to see how (and what) he learns about humanity without the Animorphs to help him out. For one, it takes him a bit to even establish which living being he should be when trying to fit in on Earth. In another nice Easter egg, we see that he considered cows at first because of their physical similarities to Andalites before dismissing them as too stupid. He does settle on humans eventually and it’s also no surprise that he would then wind up in a mental hospital. More nice tidbits with references to his eating habits, having managed to once again eat cigarette butts. But this time he fixates on Oreos instead of Cinnabuns.

His plan with the TV studio is also interesting, especially his final broadcast when he transmits the entire plot to the world. It’s hard to know whether this was really a good plan, as it forces the Yeerks’ hands into all-out warfare that humanity was clearly not ready for. But Ax is operating alone, and it’s easy to see him deciding to do something like this when he’s alone on a planet and playing any type of long-game would be incredibly difficult, both in actuality and emotionally.

Best (?) Body Horror Moment: Tobias being infested, hands down. We’ve seen this before with Jake, but there it was kind of happening in the background and readers, like Jake, weren’t really sure what was happening. Here, we know the entire time where things are leading with Tobias’s plan to become a full member of The Sharing. And then reading about him being literally strapped down to a chair and a Yeerk climbing in his head…yikes, it’s bad.

Couples Watch!: I mean, obviously I’ve read this entire series before, so I knew this book existed way back when I started promoting the secondary Marco/Rachel ship. But c’mon, the very fact that it exists proves that that theory was a good one even from the very beginning. It’s not a hard leap to watch Marco and Rachel’s banter morph into something that could actually work. Marco makes Rachel laugh. Rachel is able to match Marco’s wit. They both leap into action together to chase Marco’s mom and are even able to quickly read each other’s minds as far as next steps with their approach to the chase and their final escape. Obviously, I still love Tobias/Rachel (and Rachel has a great moment in the end where she’s quick to reassure Tobias about his choice to become a Controller, that of course that would never happen), but the book does do a good job of presenting a legitimate alternative.

It’s also worth noting that Cassie pretty much asks Jake out (asks him to come study at least), which is more than what she’s managed to really do in main series. Non-Animorph Jake and Cassie are definitely more brave about their relationship than they end up being in reality.

If Only Visser Three had  Mustache to Twirl: We get an interesting look behind the curtain into the world of Visser Three early in the invasion. Through Controlled!Tobias’s eyes, we see that the maneuvering between Visser One and Three had been going on long before the events of book #5. Given the small change in history, there’s no reason to think Visser Three hadn’t made this request to the Council in the normal time line as well, and that Visser One had tried to trick him out of it using a spy. We also see Visser Three sneer at Chapman’s attempts to convince Tobias that this choice is something good; Visser Three clearly sees it as a waste of time.

But, of course, the true enemy in this book is again Crayak, experienced through his minion, the Drode. The Drode has some pretty amusing lines and ways of speaking, but the scene in the very beginning when he temps Jake, really highlights how truly awful Crayak is:

“Just  one word, Jake,”  the  Drode whispered. “No …  no, two, I think.  One  must  not sacrifice good  manners.  Two words and  it  never was.  Two words and  you  know nothing,  have  no power,  no responsibility.”

“What words?”

“One is Crayak. The other is please.”

Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: Again, like, the entire book? We’ve seen Animorphs die before, but there is something particularly heartbreaking about watching it happen here. In the other versions, the Animorphs have all been fighting a very dangerous war for quite a while. In their own ways, they’ve all grappled with the reality that they or their friends may die at any time. And they each continue to make the choice to get up and fight again, knowing that the risk is worth it in their attempt to save humanity.

Here, they’re just kids (even younger than the Animorphs we’re used to, as around two years has probably gone by at this point). Regular kids, with no powers, no greater knowledge of this war or greater responsibility to handle it, than anyone else. Tobias gets shot in the head for simply having the wrong Yeerk Control him. Marco gets taken out by a Bug fighter the first time any of them truly understand the technology they’re up against. Rachel holds her own in a fight for a bit, but the reality is that no teenage girl can last against Hork Bajir warriors. And the others have to just watch their friends die, in no way prepared for it or accepting that this was a risk when they got up that morning. It’s shell-shocking and traumatic.

What  a Terrible Plan, Guys!: As I said in Ax’s section, there could be some questioning of whether or not Ax’s approach was truly a wise decision. With the Andalites nowhere near, goading the Yeerks into an all-out war is a pretty risky decision. But he’s an alien kid, alone on a strange planet, we’ll cut him some slack. And, as far as it goes, with no powers and very little information, it’s pretty impressive that the remnants of the team manage to maneuver themselves into a situation where they’re essentially about to win, even if they die in the process. So much so, that they force the Drode’s hand in calling the whole thing quits.

Favorite Quote:

An obligatory section of Marco and Rachel flirting/quipping:

“Still, we should go out.  Do a movie.  Eat some burgers.  I could  make you laugh.”

“Actually,  I think the mere memory of that suggestion will  supply me with  plenty of  laughter.”

And, a longer section, but a good one given how the events of this entire book start because of Jake grappling with the challenges of being the leader and what that means:

 “Jake? What do we do?” [Rachel]

“Yeah.  What  do  we  do,  Big  Jake?”  Marco asked, half-mocking.

“What  do  you  mean,  what  do  we  do?”  Jake shot back.  “Why are you asking me?”

Marco shrugged.  “You’re the leader, man.”

“What  are  you  talking  about?  The  leader  of what? And why am I the leader?”

“Because you are,” I [Cassie] said. The words were out of  my  mouth  before  I  could think  about them.  I felt  as if…  as  if  I  was  a  judge  and  had  just passed sentence on Jake.

Marco  jerked  his  thumb  at  me.  “What  the crazy chick said:  Because you are.”

Scorecard: Yeerks 10, Animorphs 15

No change! Obviously none of this comes to pass, so the results don’t have any larger impact on the war. The Ellimist can count it as a win, though.

Rating: Sadness, this is the last Megamorphs book of the series. The Megamorphs books are a really mixed bag of experiences. The first one, I felt, was a big old swing and a miss. The concept was fun, as it’s the first book where we had multiple perspectives, but the action wasn’t really enough to support the style. It had some of the most memorable lines in the series (“Do you just hate trash cans?! Is that what it is?”), but as a whole, it’s not a great introduction into these off-shoot books.

I have a soft spot for Megamorphs #2 and #3. Both are completely hinging on the weird concepts of their stories (dinosaurs! time travel!) and it seems like readers’ appreciation of each will come down to how much fun they can have with those, albeit silly, themes. I was there for the campiness of the dinosaurs and entertained enough by the time travel (and the Tobias/Rachel kiss!) that I could turn my brain off enough to not think too hard about how it would really work.

But after all of this, the best was saved for last. This is the only one of the four that not only fully takes advantage of its split narrations (probably works so well because several members of the team, like Ax and Tobias, are completely disconnected and doing their own things for the majority of the story. And unlike amnesia!Rachel in Megamorphs #1, their actions are actually important to the story), but also has a solid concept that actually has things to say. We get a few great scenes that we missed in the early part of the series (Cassie’s perspective of their first meeting, Ax’s acquiring the shark), and the way the entire thing unfolds is as believable as it is terrifying. While, again, because of the nature of Megamorphs books, that they operate outside of the regular series, everything gets returned to normal and there is no lasting effect on the main plot, this book also seems to have enough new things to show and say that it seems like it should be required reading for the entire series.

Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all! But I’ll give a one sentence conclusion and you can take from that what you will!

Animorphs #40: “The Other”

Publishing Info: Scholastic Paperbacks, April 2000

Where Did I Get this Book: own it!

Book Description: Ax and the Animorphs find new hope when they learn that he is not the only non-infected Andalite on Earth.

Narrator: Marco

Plot: I had some vague memories of this book, of the fact that it was another “more Andalites on Earth” book VERY shortly after we had just gotten done with the last “more Andalites on Earth” book. But since I really liked the last one, I had high hopes for this one. And while it doesn’t paint certain Animorphs coughAxcough in the best light, it’s a pretty good book as far as general characterization for our team and for Marco in particular.

Marco is chilling at home on one of his rare free evenings when he sees a strange video clip being highlighted on the news and immediately recognizes the blurry form as an Adalite. Sure that Ax has been caught on film and that a good percentage of Controllers also saw the clip and will be trying to find him, Marco immediately morphs osprey and flies off to find Ax and Tobias in their meadow. Once there, Ax is able to view the clip and notes that this is an entirely different Andalite, since it is missing the last half of its tail. Tobias is also able to guess at the location of the scene and he, Ax, and Marco quickly take off to check it out. Once there, Marco demorphs. Halfway through, however, a local possum starts morphing as well and they find themselves confronted with a massive, adult Andalite, notable NOT the one in the film. After a brief confrontation where the adult Andalite threatens them, smacks around Tobias, and insists they leave, they split off. But, of course, they decide to follow the new Andalite. After seeing him morph human, they are able to track him to a house in the suburbs. They decide that now is the time to call in the rest of the team.

Back with the group, Ax reports that he has heard of both the Andalites who are stranded on Earth. The large one is named Gafinilan and the injured one is named Mertil. Both have strong reputations, though Ax makes sure to get in a few digs about how Mertil is now essentially useless due to his injury. The group decides that for now it is best for just Ax and Marco to approach, not giving away their true numbers. At the house, osprey!Marco decides to try and get a closer look, but when he flies in towards the house he is zapped by a force field. Gafinilan gets on a speaker system and tells him to surrender and come in or he will shoot them. Marco and Ax demorph and approach.

After some more barbed words, Marco and Ax are invited in. On the way in, Marco notices a slight tremble in Gafinilan’s large body. Inside, he leads them to a hidden room where through mad gardening skills he has re-created an Andalite meadow. He and Ax partake in eating an Andalite herb while Marco surreptitiously acquire a  bee that is buzzing around, figuring he may need the morph later. After establishing a reluctant amount of trust, Marco and Ax agree to bring their Prince to meet with Gafinilan.

The next day, the group meets up at the mall to discuss their plan of action. It’s agreed that while Gainilan appears to be a bit of a loose canon, Jake should go ahead and meet with him. The others head out, but Rachel lingers behind with Marco. She has correctly guessed that Marco has his own plans and isn’t about to let Jake wander in without further investigation. The two team up for a spy job.

At Gafinilan’s house, Rachel sets up to provide back up support and Marco morphs bee to make his way in. He almost gets eaten by another bug on his way in, but eagle!Rachel manages to rescue him. The second trip in goes better and bee!Marco makes his way into the house. He doesn’t find Mertil. Anywhere.

After Jake scolds Marco and Rachel, the team try and figure out what game Gafinilan is playing. Ax suddenly realizes the importance of the herb he ate while visiting. It is a pain killer, and after witnessing Gafinilan’s shaking, Ax is able to guess that he has a horrible Andalite disease called Soola’s Disease. It create horrendous pain and is fatal. They figure out that Gafinilan is likely trying to meet Jake thinking that he is an adult Andalite whom Gafinilan could acquire and thus escape his disease (even though, according to Ax, this is considered a very shameful thing to do).

The next day, Jake goes in to meet with Gafinilan. After becoming frustrated when Jake refuses to “demorph” to his Andalite form, Gafinilan pulls a shredder on him and tries to force him to demorph. The other Animorphs barge in in their battle morphs. Gafinilan realizes that they all are human, except for Ax. Gafinilan finally comes clean with what is going on. He does not want to acquire Jake, agreeing with Ax that this is a shameful way out of his illness. Instead, the Yeerks have captured Mertil and are willing to exchange him for a healthy Andalite (the Yeerks don’t want Mertil since he is morph incapable and don’t want Gafinilan because of his illness). Ax is incredulous that Gafinilan would be willing to exchange one of his own people for a mere vecol, an Andalite who can’t morph. Gafinilan says that he would do anything for his friend, vecol or no.

They begin to form a plan to rescue Mertil. The Yeerks move him daily and he is well-guarded. Ax again protests that a vecol is not worth them risking their lives over. Marco finally snaps and calls Ax out on his horrible attitude. Jake says it doesn’t matter what Ax things and they will move forward with the rescue plan.

Marco, speaking from his own ruthless nature, recognizes the same trait in Gafinilan. That he would do terrible things (like turn them over) all to reach the goal of saving his friend. This leaves the Animorphs in a perilous position, trusting Gafinilan to not give them up in the middle of the mission. They move forward with the plan, however, and locate Mertil in an old train yard.

The Animorphs and Gafinilan go in for the rescue, but what started out as a surprise attack quickly devolves into the team be largely outnumbered by Yeerks. A massive fight breaks out. The team is quickly divided up, all fighting seemingly losing battles. The Yeerks attempt to drive off with Mertil in a Uhaul, but gorilla!Marco and elephant!Rachel manage to catch up with them. Gafinilan shows up too and helps rescue Mertil.

Ax again sinks to his normal low for this book with more disparaging comments about Mertil. Tobias finally snaps and calls Ax out on his inability to look past “normal.” Ax finally seems to cave and reluctantly greets Mertil saying that he will always remember the hero he was (great progress, really great).

After they escape, Gafinilan asks the Animorphs to give the two Andalites their space. Gafinilan is dying and would like to be left alone with Mertil during this time. A few days later, Marco makes his way to visit Mertil in the greenhouse. He lets Mertil know that once Gafinilan passes, he would be wiling to visit Mertil, not wanting him to just be alone. After a long silence, Mertil thanks Marco.

The Comic Relief: After the Marco’s last book which was a massive letdown, it was a relief to open this one and find myself back with the character I know and love. We again have a smart, strategic thinker who is impatient with others’ bullshit and willing to confront his own darkness.

Throughout the book, Marco repeatedly calls Ax out for his really negative attitude towards Mertil and those with disabilities. As the story progresses, these put-down become more and more harsh; but in this case, one is completely on Marco’s side of this situation. At one point towards the end, Marco chews Ax out pretty thoroughly and Rachel notes that this might be a bit hypocritical of Marco, who regularly makes some pretty inappropriate jokes. He rightly notes that there is a big difference, that that is gallows humor and that when it comes to his actions, he’s not like that at all. It’s a nice highlight of a key feature for Marco. Yes, he makes a lot of jokes, some that definitely tow the line. He’s also very cynical and suspicious. But, importantly, he owns these aspects of himself and, even more importantly, when it comes to his actions, he’s one of the most loyal members of the group. We also see, at the end of this book, that he can be very considerate, coming to visit Mertil and offering companionship. Just making sure not to tell the others that he has a heart.

We also get a return to Marco’s self-evaluation as far as his ruthlessness and direct-line method of getting from point A to point  B. He sympathizes with Gafinilan, who was willing to turn over another Andalite to save a friend. To Marco, this type of cold-hearted decision making makes sense. Gafinilan’s priority is his friend, and that rules all. It’s a very unique point of view to Marco, and it’s nice to see it used to differentiate how Marco can see, and understand, Gafinilan’s choice as compared to the others.

Our Fearless Leader: Jake has some really good lines when he first meets Gafinilan. At this point, Jake’s met his fair share of arrogant, adult Andalite leaders and isn’t having any of it. It’s always fun to see him in his element as leader of the group, fully embracing his role and even making sure that others (usually other Andalites) know that he will be the one calling the shots from here on out.

Xena, Warrior Princess: I really liked how much Rachel/Marco team up action there was in this book. Though I’ll save some of my thoughts on that for the “Couples” section since there isn’t any actual romantic couple stuff to cover for this book. But we see Rachel team up with Marco not only for the initial spy mission, but also in the end when they both are the ones to catch up with and rescue Mertil from the UHaul.

A Hawk’s Life: There are a lot of weird hints in this book about Tobias being a bit off. I can’t remember this building up towards anything in other books (at least not in a way that feels like it was intentional here), so I have to imagine it was just to lead up to the last discussion about Ax and his unpleasant attitudes when Tobias finally cracks and comes down on him. He has a nice little speech about “normal” being a word that this group, in particular, probably shouldn’t throw around. He mentions all the weirdness in his own life as good examples. Stuck as a bird. Best friend is an alien. Girlfriend is a human. Etc. But as good as his speech is, he’s also not saying anything that the others haven’t said to some extent before in this book. They all come down on Ax at one point or another. But we have to imagine that when Tobias finally speaks up, it’s more the fact that he’s Ax’s best friend than what he actually says that finally breaks through to Ax.

Peace, Love, and Animals: Cassie doesn’t have a whole lot in this book. She makes one really strange observation towards the middle of the book that makes you question whether she’s actually paying attention to what’s going on, though. After Marco returns from the spy mission and they’re debating whether they can trust Gafinilan, she says that he must be a good guy because of the care he’s taken of Mertil. But…we’ve just established that no one really knows where Mertil even is! Why is she so sure that Gafinilan is taking such good care of him? It’s really strange. Marco even partially notes that this is a ridiculous line of reasoning, so it can’t be excused as just a weird writing mishap. The author actually just wrote Cassie as being this out of it. I mean, we all know Cassie’s not my favorite character, but this would be really dumb, even for her. But she’s also the one to note in the end that Marco’s right, that his actions do prove more than his out-there jokes, as far as being on the right side of the disability argument.

E.T./Ax Phone Home: Man, it’s been a long time since I’ve disliked Ax this much. And really, the other times it at least made more sense, because it was usually early in the series and he wasn’t quite on-board with his role in the team. In other stories, we’ve seen plenty of examples of the nastiness at the heart of the Andalite culture. But this is one of the few times where we’ve seen it really come out in Ax himself. And not just once, but again, and again, AND AGAIN. It never really gets better, and in fact just gets worse and worse. He tries to claim that he never said he was human, but the Animorphs (and readers, I have to think) aren’t going for it. Especially when you have another Andalite in the book who is proving that you can get past this type of backwards thinking, regardless of how instilled it is in Andalite culture. But nope! Ax is all-in, saying again and again that Mertil is completely valueless, not worth saving, and even says as much to Mertil’s face after they rescue him. Even in the end, his small step in the right direction is so tiny that it barely counts. Especially with the insult that is wedged into it as well, that all that is worth honoring/remembering about Mertil is how he was before. At this point, between the attitude towards the disabled and the idea that it is somehow “cowardly” for an Andalite like Gafinilan to try to save himself, I think we just have to admit that the Andalites as a whole are just kind of bad people. They can be on the right side of this war, but being better than a Yeerk is a low bar, and I’m not convinced they’re doing a whole lot to elevate themselves above it.

Rachel said it best as far as Ax goes in this book. Not only Ax actually making progress on his own thinking, but the sheer number of times we have to go over his bad attitude.

<Jeez, can’t we just get over this issue, please?> Rachel said.

Best (?) Body Horror Moment: There wasn’t really much as far as body horror, other than our usual descriptions of gross morphing. Marco rightly is concerned about morphing a bee, theorizing that it is also a hive-mind insect like the ants and might be equally horrible. Luckily, he has a better time of it here than he did then.

Couples Watch!: So, it’s been a long time since I’ve been able to indulge my side-ship of Marco/Rachel. As I’ve noted so many times in the past, these two are really the members of the group who have the most in common as far as their philosophies and attitudes towards the war. We still usually see them on the same side of most arguments and they still have good banter. So, it’s nice to see here that Rachel is the only member of the group to cotton on to Marco’s plan to further investigate Gafinilan’s house before letting Jake go in. They have a nice little buddy adventure scoping it out, and it really proves how in-step they both are with the other.

If Only Visser Three had  Mustache to Twirl: Visser Three is absent from this book. I do wonder at the reasoning behind some of his choices though. I mean, from a strategic standpoint, Gafinilan and Mertil would still be strong assets on their own as Controllers, if only for their knowledge of Andalite strategy and plans. It also seems strange that Visser Three would ask him to only turn over one other Andalite or, really, even attempt this kind of trade at all. It seems more in line for him that he’d try to just set a general trap to capture all of the bandits who he’s assume are connected to these two.

Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: Not much really, other than my general frustration at the number of times we have to hear about Ax’s horrible ideas.

What  a Terrible Plan, Guys!: They have some good plans in this book. Their approach to Jake’s first meet-and-greet with Gafinilan is probably one of the better ones. They are all prepared in various forms of back up (Marco going in with Jake as a bug, the others waiting in the wing in their battle morphs), and Jake never flinches when Gafinilan goes off track and pulls the shredder on him. Clearly, they were expecting this and it shows with the tidy way they clean up the situation.

Favorite Quote:

One of Marco’s more lethal put-downs of Ax:

Ax interrupted,

“Okay, Ax-man,” I said, my voice a little less than steady. “I’ve been cutting you slack on this handicapped thing because you’re part of the team. But when you talk like that, like this guy is some sort of dirty, worthless thing, I have to say you’re just not one of us.”

And a nice, funny bit of dialogue when they’re going in to the train yard to rescue Meril at the end:

<Gee, Jake, have the odds ever been this bad?> I asked brightly.

<Sure,> Jake answered. <But this time we’ve got the element of surprise.>

“Andalite!”

<Oh, crap.>

Scorecard: Yeerks 10, Animorphs 15

No change! Technically this is a win for the Animorphs, but the stage remains largely unchanged by the end of it, since Mertil and Gafinilan pretty much take themselves out of the equation on both sides.

Rating: I really liked this book as a Marco book. I’m not sure about it as anything else. As I said, it was a relief to get back to a book from his narrative standpoint that wasn’t ridiculous. But man, other things about this book drove me up the wall. For one thing, Ax makes himself very, VERY unlikable in this book. And the book just keeps hitting.that.point.home. And in the end, it doesn’t even feel like he’s made progress. Beyond that, it seems to further reinforce the fact that Andalites are probably just a terrible group of beings, given what we’ve seen about their general culture. And lastly, it’s only been one book since the LAST story we’ve had dealing with new Andalites on Earth. The timing makes it feel very strange and its proximity to the last book kind of cuts the legs out of the interest of this one. After going for long in the series without anything from the Andalites, it’s a bit much to have two stories like this so close together. But, again, I liked it as a Marco book, so I came away pleased.

Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all! But I’ll give a one sentence conclusion and you can take from that what you will!

Animorphs #39: “The Hidden”

Publishing Info: Scholastic Paperbacks, March 2000

Where Did I Get this Book: own it!

Book Description: The Yeerks plan to use the Helmacron ship they have repaired to capture the Andalites and track down Elfangor’s blue cube–the cube that gives Cassie, and the other animorphs the ability to morph.

Narrator: Cassie

Plot: I had zero memory of this book when I picked it up again. I think if you had asked me whether there was an Animorphs cover with Cassie morphing a buffalo, I wouldn’t have been entirely sure you were even serious. That’s how fully I’d forgotten this book.

Erek shows up at Cassie’s barn with bad news: the Yeerks have discovered how to use the Helmacrons’ morphing tracker and are even now on their way towards the blue box that emits a low level morphing energy. Cassie quickly nabs the cube and hops a ride to The Gardens with her mother. There, the others in seagull morph show up and they try to decide what to do, since any morphing will draw the attention of the Yeerks. Before they can form a plan, helicopters begin circling the area and Cassie makes a break for it, hiding in a van that is exiting the park. Inside she confronts a cape buffalo. She acquires it to keep it calm, but chaos suddenly erupts when the van is intercepted by the Yeerks, including Chapman and Visser Three. She morphs the buffalo and barges out of the van. The real buffalo attacks the Controllers and head butts Chapman. Cassie is able to escape into the nearby woods, with the real buffalo trailing behind.

Back as a girl in the woods, she witnesses something horrific: the buffalo must have touched the blue box and acquired Chapman when he headbutted him. He wildly morphs and demorphs partially between his true buffalo body and the human Chapman form. By morphing the buffalo again herself, Cassie is able to get the buffalo to mimic her actions and return to its true form as well. The others arrive and are caught up to speed on the horror of the situation. What’s worse, the buffalo has now witnessed Cassie morphing, so if the Yeerks capture or infest it, the Animorphs’ secret will be out.

The helicopters are still circling, so they morph wolves and take off once again, leaving the buffalo behind. They hide in a cave and continue to discuss what to do not only about the tracker, but about the buffalo. They all know that the buffalo can’t be left alive, though Cassie is hesitant to kill it, now that it has human DNA in its system.  As for the tracker, the challenge will be getting to it when it’s up in a helicopter. So they decide to go with the tried and true method of dropping something heavy on the bad guys over water. But before they can move on this plan, they hear the buffalo in distress. Knowing they can’t let the Yeerks capture it, they head off.

They find the buffalo surrounded by Controllers with Visser Three himself yelling at the “Andalite” to reveal himself and tell the Visser where the cube is. The buffalo manages to acquire the Visser and begins morphing him. The group uses this as a distraction to escape (sorry, but I just can’t help but interrupt myself…didn’t they JUST say they were there to rescue the buffalo? And then immediately ditch said buffalo to escape the situation they willingly put themselves in in the first place? Ugh.) As they run off, they see the Andalite!buffalo and Visser Three go at it with their tail blades. The Andalite!buffalo gets in a lucky shot and knocks out Visser Three and then comes running after them.

The group decides that the majority of them will continue on to the ocean, but that Cassie will stay behind with the buffalo to distract the following Yeerks. She manages to get the buffalo to again demorph into its natural state before the Yeerks show up once again. She takes off, buffalo following, and jumps off a minor cliff to escape. They both crash to the bottom and are horribly injured. Cassie demorphs and gets the buffalo to also morph human to heal its own injuries. She then catches up with the group again.

The others wonder at how the buffalo managed to survive the fall and Cassie tells a white lie that the buffalo simply mimicked her morphing, leaving out that she was actively trying to save it. In human form, the buffalo begins mimicking their speaking patterns. Cassie insists that it is learning, but the others push back saying that it is only mimicking and that she is making too much out of this. As they are talking, Cassie brushes an ant off of the cube that she is holding. She finally gets the buffalo to morph back to buffalo and then they have to leave it behind once again when they hear the helicopters approaching.

As the others continue forward, Cassie begins to demorph again to put the plan in action. But before she can get far, she sees something truly nightmare-inducing: an ant morphing into a version of Cassie herself. She realizes that the ant that had crawled on the box and her hand earlier must have acquired morphing abilities and her own DNA. The Cassie!ant goes crazy half way through morph and attacks her with gigantic pincers. The buffalo shows up and attacks the Cassie!ant, but the ant begins demorphing. Cassie rushes over and stomps everything in sight. She then quickly begins morphing the osprey, finally ready to put their plan into action. As she gets ready to leave, the Yeerks show up and kill the buffalo with a Dracon beam.

Osprey!Cassie flies out to sea where the Yeerks are now shooting down at the rest of the Animorphs in dolphin morph. Gaining altitude, Cassie positions herself directly above the helicopter and begins to demorph. But it goes wrong and she loses her wings too quickly and begins to fall too fast. She makes it back to human and is partially through her whale morph when she realizes that she won’t be big enough when she hits the helicopter and will likely be cut to pieces by the blades. What’s worse, the helicopter pilot looks up and spots her, veering out of her line of descent. Luckily for everyone, a rogue seagull gets sucked into the engine and the helicopter blows up, destroying the Helmacron sensor within it. Cassie is badly burnt, but wakes up again in the ocean in her human form and surrounded by her friends. They call it a success and head home.

Peace, Love, and Animals: This is one of the better Cassie books as far as characterization of Cassie herself goes. The book is a hot mess in every other way, but her sympathy and struggle with how to resolve the buffalo situation is a very sympathetic cause. Any animal lover would understand just how difficult this situation would be. Though, that being said, her nonsense about the human DNA part of it is just that: nonsense. And what makes that worse is not only does this line of thought just seem ridiculous and undermines Cassie’s character as a rational, thoughtful being, but it was completely unnecessary. As an animal lover myself, the idea of having to kill an innocent animal, especially one that has bounded with you and trusts you, is just agonizing. We don’t need any silly other justifications to explain Cassie’s hesitancy.

The one question I do have about her handling of this situation is the balance between her repeatedly saying that she understand the buffalo can’t be allowed to live but then her willingness to essentially draw out its torment. We’ve seen some really good examples in the past of Cassie knowing that sometimes the harder choice is the right one, specifically when she was trying to save the Hork Bajir the Yeerks had experimented on back in the Atlantis book and knows that in the end it is best to let him die then to keep trying to fix the unfixable. That was an excellent scene that highlighted that mercy some times comes in strange forms. But here, the poor buffalo is repeatedly being abandoned by the Animorphs, drawn into battles with the Yeerks to protect the Animorphs, lead of a cliff to plummet to a painful end, and then finally killed by the Yeerks. It’s a tough situation, but it would have been another good opportunity to highlight this particular strength of Cassie’s, had she realized that this ongoing torment was not actually better.

Our Fearless Leader: At one point in the story, Cassie is upset with Jake for “not trusting her to do what is right.” But….really? I mean, for better or worse, Cassie has a long history of not necessarily doing the “right” thing objectively, even if she feels it is right for herself and her moral code. From a team leader perspective, I can absolutely understand Jake not trusting Cassie to do the “right” thing. Girl let herself be infested by a Yeerk! She asked Jake to outright murder a  Controller on her behalf! Just a few books ago, she was all set to go on a mission purely based on revenge! She lost the right to feel miffed about casual distrust like this quite a while ago. And really, at this point, after being in Jake’s head, we know that some level of casual distrust goes out to all of the Animorphs at various times, it’s just one of the struggles of being a leader. Jake knows the weaknesses of them all, and thus can’t always trust them to do the right thing in specific scenarios that play to those weaknesses.

Xena, Warrior Princess: Along with Marco, Rachel is quite clear from the very beginning that the buffalo will have to go. She also firmly tells Cassie to stop making more out of the human DNA thing than it deserves, which, thank you!

A Hawk’s Life: Tobias has practically nothing. I mean, you could probably count his lines of dialogue on one hand.

The Comic Relief: As expected, Marco is not very sentimental about the fact that the buffalo can’t be left alive. He and Rachel both team up on this position right away, and there’s really no arguing with their reasoning. The case could maybe be made for getting the buffalo to acquire some similar animal, morph that animal, and then get itself stuck in that form and then have Cassie “adopt” it at her farm. Seems like something that Cassie or even Tobias would think of, but we can say that they were all too frazzled from the constant running to really think of this solution.

E.T./Ax Phone Home: Ax has a running joke with Marco where he’s trying to still understand humor. He even joins in the fun with what he thinks are good jokes only to be met with silence and thus concluding that humor is over-rated. So there’s some good dialogue bits with that, but not much else for him in this book.

Best (?) Body Horror Moment: I mean, the entire concept of this book is pretty horrifying, but I will reserve the honor of this section for the Cassie!ant. It just had to be ants, didn’t it? It’s not like the poor Animorphs haven’t suffered enough trauma at the hands (pincers?) of ants already, but now one has to go and partially morph Cassie and then almost bite her arm off with its ginormous pincers. Then Cassie gets to watch the buffalo start tramping something that looks just like her to death. Though, I will note that apparently human DNA is only morally impactful in mammals, since she had zero concerns about stomping all over that ant once it was small again, human DNA or no human DNA.

Couples Watch!:  Not much really. After Cassie’s fall from the sky, Jake remarks privately to her how glad he is that she is ok and since she’s in human form, she has to respond out loud, cluing in everyone as to what’s going on. Marco teases them some, but she says she doesn’t care since everyone knows how much Jake and Cassie “like” each other. This might just be my age speaking, but it gets more and more uncomfortable as the series progresses to hear about these relationships in terms of “liking” each other, especially when the “love” word  has been thrown around. It just doesn’t ring true to the level of maturing and closeness that has built after fighting a war like this for as long as they have. I get that its done for the age-level of the audience, but I still find it weird. I honestly don’t think teens would have been weirded out if the writers had just gotten over it and said “love” already.

If Only Visser Three had  Mustache to Twirl: So, Visser Three loses a tailblade fight to a buffalo….there’s just no getting around that fact. A mammal, in a completely foreign body, with a very low-level of intelligence, somehow managed to knock him out cold pretty quickly. I’m not sure who this is worse for, Visser Three and his ego, or all of the others (including Ax!) who have failed to take Visser Three down themselves in a fight! It’s not a good look for any of them that’s for sure. Also, I’ll add, this is yet another supremely unbelievable element of the book, so even talking about this in any verging-on-serious manner is pretty pointless. But the fact remains: it’s now canon that a buffalo is a better tailblade fighter than Ax.

Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: Ok, as dumb as the whole buffalo morphing plot was, I have to admit that there was a good amount of tearing up in this book for me. I’m a sucker for animals and I particularly have a hard time with descriptions of animals suffering and not understanding why. So all of the scenes of the Animorphs running off and the poor buffalo trying to follow behind just really got to me. And then it goes and saves them several times and just casually gets blown up, right after Cassie is saying goodbye and doesn’t know what else to do but tell it that it has been good, one of the few words it seems to understand.

<l have to go now,> I said, knowing it couldn’t understand me. <Thank you for saving my life.>

The buffalo’s ears twitched. And then I knew what to say.

<You are good,> I said softly. Its ears came forward and it made a soft, almost friendly sound.

So stupidity aside, they definitely got me invested in this buffalo storyline in the end and there may, MAY, have been some tears.

What  a Terrible Plan, Guys!: Oh man, this entire book, again was full of terrible plans. But two big ones come to mind. 1.) They keep insisting that the buffalo can’t be allowed to be captured by the Yeerks, even going so far as to run back towards danger to “rescue” it at one point. And then they repeatedly abandon it and leave it behind to potentially be captured. And their “rescue” attempt was the worst example of it. They literally run back to it, find themselves surrounded, and then immediately use the buffalo itself as a distraction to bail, leaving it behind once again. What was the point of even going back if this was the plan?? And like I said, that was just the worst example. They leave the buffalo behind at least 4-5 times, any of which could have resulted in its capture by the Yeerks. 2.) The “anvil” plan with whale!Cassie. I mean, this was implausible enough the first time it showed up in Megamorphs #1 and in no way deserved a second showing. Not only am I getting sick and tired of this “wash and repeat” attitude towards past plot devices, but this one in particular was rather hard to swallow the first time and is even dumber here. At least it didn’t work, which is shouldn’t have for all the reason we saw here, mainly that it’s pretty easy for a helicopter pilot to become aware of a whale plummeting towards them and move out of the way. Luckily, a convenient sea gull was just where the author wanted it.

Favorite Quote:

<He should trust me to do the right thing,> I said. <He does, or he would’ve made somebody else carry the cube. That’s why he put me back here. While you do the right thing, I do the necessary thing. Get it?> [said Rachel]

(Inset long rant about the difference between doing the the right vs. necessary thing. It’s a nice distinction that Rachel is drawing here, but I’m pretty sure Jake’s version of it was not trusting Cassie to do the right OR necessary thing.)

Scorecard: Yeerks 10, Animorphs 15

I’m going to give a point to the Yeerks just because they were the only ones with the semblance of a clever plan here with the idea to use the Helmacron ship this way. The Animorphs only survived this out of sheer luck, with the Yeerks taking care of the buffalo and a random seagull sacrificing its life for the cause.

Rating: I liked this book as far as Cassie’s characterization goes. I hated this book for its bizarre ret-conning of the blue box. And I couldn’t care less about this book for the fact that I honestly couldn’t even remember the order of events during the middle third since all it was was running around randomly stopping/splitting up/getting attacked by Yeerks and repeat.

But man, that blue box thing. That’s pretty out of line as far as completely disregarding past precedent for a pretty important artifact. Not only does the box thing itself make zero sense (it’s not like David suddenly had morphing abilities after just touching the box), but the fact that animals would then be able to acquire DNA and morph?? In every book, EVERY BOOK, we hear the Animorphs talk about having to concentrate to both acquire DNA initially and then to morph. There is no way the buffalo, let alone the ant, would be able to do anything like this. It’s so stupid and there’s no getting around the fact that the majority of this book is hanging on this idiotic concept.

Then add in the fact that we have yet another repeated story that involves essentially just re-writing a previous book. The entire Megamorphs #1 book was about some Yeerk controlled thing tracking morphing and then ends with whale!Cassie crashing it into the sea. And here, YET AGAIN, we have the Yeerks tracking morphing and whale!Cassie trying to crash it into the sea. Like I said in the Marco book that did this, at least mix and match. At least TRY to pretend you’re doing something original. Or…maybe don’t, if what you consider original is ret-conning the blue box and pretending that ants/buffalo are capable of the intelligence required to morph.

Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all! But I’ll give a one sentence conclusion and you can take from that what you will!