Title: Fantasy High: Junior Year
GM: Brennan Lee Mulligan
Players: Emily Axford (she/her) as Fig Faeth (she/her). Zac Oyama (he/him) as Gorgug Thistlespring (he/him). Siobhan Thompson (she/her) as Adaine Abernant (she/her). Lou Wilson (he/him) as Fabian Seacaster (he/him). Ally Beardsley (they/them) as Kristen Applebees (she/her). Brian Murphy (he/him) as Riz Gukgak (he/him).
Streaming Service: Dropout

If you missed it, catch our review of the first, second, and third episodes!

We’re right back into the thick of it this week.

Jumping in where we left off, Kristen speaks with Cassandra and Kalina, strategizing on how to gather more followers. While Kristen wants to prioritize the truth of Cassandra, Kalina desires to do whatever it takes to get more follower, and the cleric continues to dig a hole that she doesn’t have the dexterity to climb out of.

After Fabian checks in with his trust fund, the Bad Kids reunite at lunch. They discuss the Kipperlilly situation, not considering that Kipperlilly may have forced the rogue professor to come to her as a means of finding them. As the group tries to get their feet under them, Gorthalax gives them some information on the Rat Grinders, Kipperlilly’s adventuring party. Riz rages when they discover that the Rat Grinders literally killed low level monsters in hoards for experience.

Gorgug heads to meet the artificer professor, Henry Hopclap. Considering he shares a surname with a certain other gnome we’ve met this season, we may need to take anything he says with a grain of salt. All of his suggestions come with warnings, but they’re presented in a way that really hits the gaps in Gorgug’s personality, and he seems determined to not see how damaging this situation could be.

Porter, the barbarian teacher, permits Gorgug to multi-class, but it requires Fig to multi-class in barbarian, which she already has some experience with. With her agreement, that has Fig triple classing with warlock, barbarian, and bard while Gorgug takes three years worth of artificer in addition to his barbarian course load.

At Bloodrush tryouts, we meet another Rat Grinder, Mary Ann Skuttle. She completely wrecks Gorgug, but her attitude is absolutely apathetic.

We get the perfect round when Kristen and Adaine discover the new cleric of Helio is a member of the Rat Grinders as well. If we ever needed a reason why the Rat Grinders put their sights on Kristen in particular, their cleric is answer enough.

Instead of recognizing that Fabian using his money to help his friend would help all of them, Adaine gets a job which will take up the bulk if not all of her free time. Fabian could’ve hired her to use her magic to decorate or assist him, but despite the friend group having the ability to help each other, Riz and Fig seem the only ones recognizing those opportunities. No wonder Gilear had to be shipped out immediately. He would’ve solved half of these problems while cleaning yogurt from his shirt. The Cubbys would be so disappointed.

Highlights

With all these spilled foods on her clothes, Fig seems to be taking after Gilear. If we end up finding out that his glum clumsiness came from a curse or a bargained exchange, I’m not sure any of us will look at him the same way again.

We ended on Cassandra breaking down and losing control, causing the Bad Kids to abandon the party and leave Seacaster Manor open to attack. While the event itself isn’t a highlight, knowing that we’ll be starting in combat next go around gives me hope we might see some success and at least a minor upturn in this depressive slog of self-sabotage.

Final Score (2 out of 5 Stars)

We continue to see the Bad Kids self-sabotage. The voices of reason are gone, and there is no deus ex machina to rush in and save the day, but they continue to chase jokes over actually getting things done. Ally mentioned that chaos is no longer cute. Despite this, no one seems eager to actually solidly try to change course, and that quickly gets old.

Worse still, while bottlenecking while passing an accident may be common out of morbid curiosity, it’s absolutely painful to watch these characters fail over and over again. They don’t consider how things will ripple out. On one hand, you have to give them credit for playing teens realistically, but on the other, after having survived two years of absolute chaos, how have they not learned?

When it comes to the creativity of the cast, everyone sitting at the table is extremely talented, and both prior seasons of Fantasy High had moments similar to this, but the pacing just doesn’t hit right this go around. The Bad Kids haven’t learned. Their codependency undermines their ability to divide and conquer, and if we’re still beating our heroes down in episode 4, it will be a long road to the end.

Are you enjoying Fantasy High: Junior Year? Or are you struggling to keep watching? Let us know what you think in the comments below or go over to our Discord channel to join the conversation.

Featured Image: Dimension 20

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