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INCHWORM

@inchwormpodcast

a chapter by chapter spoiler-free podcast covering Worm by Wildbow

Jenny and Ted discuss Insinuation 2.9.

Episode Notes:

  • A narratively advisable detente
  • Maybe Rachel is only 67% likely to betray you
  • Is violence good sometimes?
  • Taylor’s power also involves training
  • What’s behind Brian’s smile?
  • Regent and Lisa explain his power
  • Bug’s relationship to pills
  • Danny could be an asset to Taylor
  • The insinuation is going both ways, Taylor!!!
  • A second gun has entered the chat
  • This arc, Taylor is a lying liar who lies
  • The reasons people lie about powers
  • It’s been… checks notes… 17 hours since chapter 3??? And she’s won two fights???
  • Taking a step back, these first two arcs are totally copacetic
  • Briefly, some factors that might go into whether Wildbow wants to revisit Worm
  • Predictions that include a boss-hero conspiracy!!
  • Next interlude: Grace Lands?
  • The name game

Your latest episode of Inchworm ended with several minutes of uninterrupted silence

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Thanks for letting us know! There should have been a fixed file uploaded this morning. If you're still seeing the 50 minute episode let me know what platform you use and I'll try to fix it

Jenny and Ted discuss Insinuation2.8.

Episode Notes:

  • Wildbow calls our bluff on a scary cliffhanger
  • Taylor has hidden depths of protagging
  • Is Rachel just Mean Rachel from Animorphs, with a totally different sense of style?
  • Rachel's sibling rivalry feelings are justified
  • We're so satisfied at seeing Taylor take her finger off the off-switch of her power
  • Taylor seems to be better at tactics than strategy
  • Positive echoes of Brandon Sanderson and Naomi Novik
  • Taylor finally gets her boy fight
  • Brian: manipulative schemer or kind of okay?
  • The Undersiders' dysfunction has excellent pacing
  • Can't catch bug girl off guard with some measly darkness!
  • To Taylor, Rachel is always Bitch
  • These are Very Good Dogs (and Rachel is a very good dog trainer)
  • We predict: a missing body part and a heist

Jenny and Ted discuss Insinuation 2.7.

Episode Notes:

  • The loft feels like (narrative) home
  • Brian’s conscientiousness
  • Is Lisa’s power finding “known unknowns”?
  • Being undercover when dealing with Lisa
  • Quick poll: would you recognize a TiVo?
  • Supervillainy as a teen job
  • The undersides are pretty non-hierarchical?
  • Puppet theory
  • Taylor gets the friend group she is so desperate to have
  • Seeing the good in the bad part of town
  • Conflicting needs for community and purpose
  • Password Corner
  • Predictions

Jenny and Ted discuss Insinuation 2.6.

Episode Notes:

  • Taylor rushes in
  • Bug scouts
  • She’s got mail
  • Jenny accuses all Lisas and Brians of being old
  • What Lisa sees in Taylor
  • Smart Alec
  • Tall Brian
  • The Undersiders’ ethos is disarming but their boss is intriguing
  • Other teams and capes
  • Is Taylor funny?
  • This is an easy choice for Taylor
  • Dick Corner 2 (ft. Consequences)
  • Friends-casting the Undersiders
  • Predictions and names

Jenny and Ted discuss Insinuation2.5.

Episode Notes:

  • Smashing a button that says “JENNY WAS RIGHT”
  • A Tale of Two Taylors
  • Theories about red jacket lady and Arcadia High
  • We love Tattletale’s tattle-tude
  • Who’s the leader of the teen villain crew?
  • Extensive predictions about how the “insinuation” will play out
  • How Taylor’s intellect supports her emotional needs
  • Names

fire emoji: Claw

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I never finished Claw. Didn't even read a majority of Claw. Or a plurality of Claw. But I will say that Wildbow is one of very few authors from whom the basic setting conceit of Claw- a genre-world in the vein of Worm where instead of superheroes, every early-oughts war-on-terror-influenced Jack-Bauerlike airport novel primetime technothriller is happening at once, one-after-the-other, forever- sounds even remotely tolerable. In a vacuum that kind of thing sounds like an insufferable right-wing jackoff session, and a huge portion of what made Claw's implementation of that idea so great is the frog-boil reveal that that's what's going on- the dawning realization over the first arc and change that these characters are living at the margins of a society as cartoonishly dysfunctional and tumultuous as that whole fictional space implies. It was great.

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Jenny and Ted discuss Insinuation 2.4.

Episode Notes:

  • Power ranking the trio of bullies
  • Why is Emma the worst, and is it because she has a power?
  • The wily narrative and how it made us grieve Taylor's mom
  • Rethinking Danny’s anger
  • The G in Mr. G stands for Gutless
  • Taylor's analytical mind
  • The gender dynamics of battle
  • The cape in “escape”
  • Predictions

Let's talk about Seek's arc titles! The technology or computer angle has been apparent, but the last three arc titles are all settings you'd see on a sound mixer.

CONTROL in the sense of the control room output for monitoring the recording, SEND in the sense of the aux send output for creating a separate mix for the performer by e.g. silencing their own input or for creating an effects loop, and now MUTE in fairly straightforward sense of muting a particular or group of tracks/channels/inputs.

(I don't have a specific association with HACKing and a sound mixer)

The obvious thematic connection this sparks for me is the sound mixer's role in connecting the physical and digital, similar to how onboards function for everyone in Seek

Inspired from a couple others doing worm fashion hcs I’ll do the boys and Rachel later (maybe)

if u want to know anything about particulars lemme know :]

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