Hi guys! I haven't made a project talking about BFDI episodes for a WHILE, the last time I did was TPOT 12 I think. With twelve new episodes of TPOT having released since then and with TPOT 25 officially releasing on youtube in a few days, I feel like now is a pretty good time to talk about something that I've been thinking about for a while now. TPOT is perhaps the single most interesting season of BFDI to talk to, for better or for worse. I personally think that TPOT is an excellent season and I love the direction it is going in, but this is definitely not the unanimous sentiment. For every person I see saying that a recent episode release was one of the best the OSC has ever seen, I see another who is either underwhelmed or just doesn't like it at all. That has been the case nowadays more than ever with the Defeat One trilogy, and I think the actual reason why the OSC has been so split on modern TPOT comes down to the core point I'm gonna be making in this project. Ever since 2025, TPOT has been in it's experimental phase. And this has not just had an effect on BFDI, but on the OSC as a whole. Now, what do I mean by that? TPOT as a show can be split into four distinct 'eras'. Episodes 1-2 are part of the 'Satomi era'. This is back when TPOT was promised to be 'the pinnacle of what the object show community had to offer' in Cary's own words, and the quality on the episodes arguably delivered. They aren't for everyone sure, but whether you like them or not it's impossible to say that they didn't have any ambition. Characters and plotlines were intensely thought out and stakes for otherwise simplistic challenges felt higher than they ever did before; it truly felt like the series had become something larger than it had ever been before. The issue was that with this evident quality, two episodes were released in two years. So while these episodes were and still are beloved by many people, it wasn't sustainable for long term. The cast had 41 characters left after TPOT 2 ended and if the creators didn't want to finish TPOT in their seventies than something had to change. Next we have the 'early-mid season era' of TPOT, every episode releasing in 2023 (episodes 3-9). Many people have taken to calling this era the 'dark age of TPOT', but I personally wouldn't go there since I feel like that's insensitive. That's because while the episodes released in this time aren't very good, it makes sense why they were like this. Right before the release of episode 3, Cary released a video called "Let's keep BFDI casual", a video where he addresses how the goal of BFDI was never to be some groundbreaking paradox shifting series, it was meant to just be fun and lighthearted stuff that the creative team could mess around with. And while I definitely think his overall message with this video is extremely insightful and uplifting to new creators, it does kind of undermine TPOT's entire conception and existance as a season. As I mentioned earlier, TPOT came with the promise of being 'the pinnacle of what the object show community had to offer', but now they were saying that it wasn't ever supposed to be like that. But while I am not exactly thrilled about the way it was done, I nonetheless understand and can empathize with the goals of a creator changing with time. It is their show after all, so if they didn't want TPOT to be this big magnum opus than it didn't have to be. So what followed was seven in my opinion mediocre episodes that were about on par with post-split, nothing special or ambitious but still lighthearted fun that wasn't harmful by any means. Next is the 2024 episodes (10-14), and I've dubbed this the 'transitional era'. While early-mid season could be categorized this way too, I feel like it applies to this set of episodes even better. This set of episodes are distinct from the ones that came before it because each of them started doing something huge that would set up the next era. TPOT 10 was the first episode of the season that went full force on character insight and development, as well as wrapping up multiple arcs in satisfying ways. TPOT 11 was the very first non-competition episode in the series and started an entire sub-genre of episodes. TPOT 12 was the episode that really started the One storyline that the current episodes are centered around. TPOT 13 was the single largest scale and most ambitious episode the series had ever seen, and is to this day the best episode in my opinion. And TPOT 14 fully embraced the chaos of the remaining cast and just went wild with it. While I don't love all five of these episodes, I can still say they stood out for doing something that no previous ones had. But more importantly, these episodes did a great job at building up to the fourth and currently final major 'era' of TPOT. (CONTINUED IN N&C) | | V
Music: Moth Steet - KaLegend (Start here if you want to skip the recap of how TPOT 1-14 impacted the series and just want to hear my main argument) | | V Everything 2025 and onwards (episodes 15-24) falls under the experiemental era. Every episode from then until now has taken the ideas that were being built from the transitional period and have gone full force in trying new things. TPOT 16 specifically was the biggest turning point of the season, it marked the point where episodes more than ever would be more character focused. Nowadays characters have been getting a lot more time in the oven to develop, and now they feel more complex than they ever have. Like her or not, Pencil has far and away been more fleshed out than she ever has in any other season. Grassy has been more fleshed out than in any other season. Pen, Donut, Golf Ball, Marker, all of these characters have been getting so much more to do than ever before. When I say experimental, I don't just mean the character building either; the core formatting of episodes have been more experimental too. The episodes themselves have gotten longer, to the point where a sub 30 minute episode has become uncommon. Non-competition episodes have explored backstories and large side stories that the main competition didn't. The visuals have increased substantially almost every episode. Episodes have had AMC theater releases!!! But specifically, no better episodes exist to define the 'experimental era' than TPOT 23 and 24. The Defeat One trilogy has been somewhat contentious because of how it has handled its many different storylines. But regardless of how good they are, they have once again been doing things that no episode has ever done. The Algebralians have become involved with the main cast canonically. There are full songs with lyrics in episodes now. There has been major exploration of the BFDI universe as a whole. For the first time EVERYONE is here and involved with what is happening. While one could definitely say that this era is a mess for casual viewers, it has undeniably been pushing the very boundaries of what was previously thought to be possible in BFDI. Ironically, it is very flagrantly going against the ideas of what Cary presented in "Let's keep BFDI casual". So, what is my point in all of this? While it is up to personal opinion, the objective fact is that TPOT as a season, specifically in this experimental era, has been doing something new. Something that isn't just 'another object show'. And because of this experimentalism, it has been rubbing off on the OSC. New shows with completely new ideas and concepts have never been more prevalent than they are now! Stuff like DIBS!, TRIPWIRE, Object Invasion, Animatic Battle, ITFT, A is For, Objectified, Purgatory, and tons of other shows are all thriving right now in creativity. BFDI is undeniably the most influential show in the OSC, and the amount it has been doing in the past couple of years to make its presence known has caused a flurry of new creators to go wild with their own creative concepts and ideas. The OSC as a whole has been able to make a merchandise website, be featured in news articles, have theater releases. There has been an insane amount of growth for an otherwise niche community in recent memory, and I don't think any of it would've been possible if this 'experimental era' in both TPOT and the OSC didn't happen. So what I'm saying is that even if you don't like the direction TPOT or BFDI as a whole has been going in, it has been doing so many new ideas and has brought so many new ideas to the OSC. The take that "object shows aren't worth watching anymore" is insane to me, because in my opinion there has never been a better time to considering how many new shows and concepts are coming to life. Anyways yeah that's about all I have to say on this. Feel free to talk about how you feel about the experimental era of both TPOT and the OSC in the comments if you want to! Byeeee
