When joking about how ridiculous it is that Fabian is popular I don’t think people realize how insanely cool the bad kids are in universe. As viewers we see their cool moments but we also see them being dorks and lame idiots. Think about their in universe reputations and how you would react to hearing about them if you lived in the same world as them.
There is a group of six people who saved the world 3 different times before they even entered their junior year of high school.
One of them never showed up to any of their classes until their third year and still passed. She is a rockstar and arch devil of rebellion who owns a recording studio in hell where she plays the bass.
One dude threw the greatest party the entire high school has ever seen, is captain of the sports team, and killed the school’s evil principal without facing any punishment.
One performed a motorcycle kick-flip that was doing a jump off of a mansion’s roof into a pool of flaming tartar sauce. Said kick-flip student has created a god, killed that god, brought herself back from the dead, and resurrected a completely different god.
One of the girls is the chosen oracle of all elves and punched her dad so hard he instantly died. Also if you dig deep enough into the political history books it turns out she caused there to be a feud (bordering on full war) between her home nation and the nation she currently lives in.
The quietest kid of the bunch is a super genius who invented a solar lasso that captured and contained an eldritch horror into his van, took 4 years of high school all at once and passed all of them, is currently acing his arcane mechanics and physical Ed studies, and is the second hand man on the school sports team. He also is the drummer for the arch devil’s band and launched a fully working satellite into space before he even started studying arcane mechanics.
Finally the “dork” of their group is an arcane consultant of heaven, became a P.I. after freshman year, is currently in every extra-curricular school club, and is beloved by seemingly all of his underclassmen. Also after he found out that the dragon his party was fighting ate his dad he fucking ATE IT to avenge him.
Obviously we know the truth behind all of these things and the actual way these six dorks act, but think how insanely sick they all sound in universe.
The amount of times in FH:JY that NPCs have gotten angry over very minor things in otherwise chill interactions - like with Gertie and Skrank - is too many times to be a coincidence.
Maybe the Rat Grinders are actively channeling the Rage God/Demon's powers to stress Aguefort's population out and anger people in order to turn them against the Bad Kids with these rituals they're doing, like the one we saw at Frosty Faire.
And while Kitty-litter Copenhagen is pretty irritating, I can't see the Rat Grinders as being the primary antagonists for this season, they strike me more so the manipulated pawns of a demon feeding them lies.
Kristen: "Oh, I see. 'Cause I thought that teacher found you so you don't have to take any classes."
Adaine: "Right."
KIPPERLILLY/BRENNAN'S EXPRESSION!!! 😭😭✋✋
THE AWKWARD SILENCE HERE! 😭✋
Gorgug & Fig: *eating chips with Kristen's salsa hat*
Brennan: "You see that"
Kristen: *eats chips from her salsa hat*
Brennan: "she..."
Kristen: *rubs the salsa chip all over her face* 😭✋
(Brennan's laugh! 😭✋ & Ally's laugh! 😭✋)
Brennan: "She looks at you and says,"
Kipperlilly: "It's nice to be able to focus. How are things going with your goddess?"
Kristen: *scoffs* "It's been a lot better. Did you hear? She passed."
The awesome caption team: (all laughing)
(LOU HIDING HIS FACE! + THE CONCERN ON ZAC'S FACE! 😭✋ I CAN'T! 😭✋)
Ally: "I actually meant that seriously."
Brennan: "Yeah."
Ally: "Yeah."
Kristen to Riz: "Is this going well?"
Riz: *shakes his head* "We're gonna head out."
Kristen: "We are gonna head out. I can't move too fast."
Riz: "Good contest."
Ally: "I'm trying to run, but I'm-"
Brennan: "As you walk away, it's like five seconds later, and you see that Kipperlilly now let's you get a little bit away so she can say,"
Kipperlilly: "Your goddess passed?" *echoing* "How can you cast spells?"
Brennan: "And the whole campus hears it."
Riz: "Passed the test."
Kristen: "Passed the test...to give me extra spells."
Ally: "And then I try to Spider-Man web." *laughs*
Murph: "Can I prestidigitation?"
The awesome caption team: (all laughing)
Emily: "I also prestidigitation."
Lou: "I'm gonna cast Pyrotechnics. And I'm just gonna shoot off a 💩 ton of fireworks."
Brennan: "I'm gonna say right now that all of you do whatever you need to do. I'm gonna say the difficulty of covering that is a 40. And you may add all of your checks together."
Murph: "You in a salsa hat."
Siobhan: "I'm gonna cast Nondetection on Kristen so nobody can tell that it's not coming from her."
Lou: "Pyrotechnics, just" *waves his hand in the air*
Emily: "I'm casting-"
Murph: "Prestidigitation."
Ally: "But do we have any Bardics going around that we can try to..."
Emily: "You don't want mine."
Ally: "Okay."
Emily: "I'm gonna cast Fear because it creates an image and I'm just gonna create an image of a huge nefarious spiderweb."
Ally: *spiderweb-shooter noise*
Brennan: "So what everyone sees is Kristen shoots spiderweb that also produces a elephant-sized spider that begins to run amuck on the campus as Kristen ejects from a Jump spell straight over the school into another field."
The awesome caption team: (all laughing)
Lou: "Through fireworks."
Brennan: "Through fireworks."
Lou: "Through fireworks."
Brennan: "Everyone starts screaming."
Ally: "Passed the test to gimme extra spells!"
The Bad Kids chanting: "Kristen! Kristen! Kristen! Kristen!"
Adaine: "Wow, I'm voting for her for sure."
Riz: "You've seen the shrimp jump, and now have you seen the salsa jump?"
Brennan: *laughing*
Adaine: "I'm so wet, it's burning my face."
Brennan: "Food trucks peel out from the ****ing giant spider."
Gorgug: "Get outta here, losers."
The awesome caption team: (all laughing)
Brennan: "And with that, what better not to engage in our very first downtime."
Gorgug: "Phew!" *wipes forehead*
Riz: *laughs*
Fabian: "We gotta get it together." *laughs*
Kristen: "Yeah, I'm so sorry."
Riz: "Kipperlilly knows that your other god died but didn't know that this one just died."
Kristen: "*** **** it!"
Fig: "Well, I actually liked that you played it honest, though. 'Cause she's telling us lies and you just told the truth."
Kristen: "That's true, but-"
Fig: "Well, until you didn't."
Kristen: "Until I lied big time. But you guys really covered it up. Okay?"
Fabian: "Passed the test."
Gorgug: "Hey, do we need to lock it in?"
Fabian: "Yeah, we lock it in."
Kristen: *takes off her hat* "You guys, I'm really sorry."
Riz: "Let's all never talk to Kipperlilly ever again."
Fabian: "Throw this hat away."
Ally: "Can I do an insight check on when I confronted her about the teacher finding her and her not finding the teacher?"
Brennan: "Yeah. Yeah."
Ally: "Did she give me any- Like, did I ice through one little barrier?"
Brennan: "Give me an insight check."
Ally: "Okay."
Ally gets a 14 on the insight check.
Brennan: "Once again, she didn't say anything in response to it, which feels like a confirmation of it to you, but you didn't see it rattle her. You didn't see anything... Like, in other words, on a 14 you can't get any insight into it. But fundamentally, I think maybe Kristen would feel on some level that if you were to say, 'Hey, that was a ******** technicality,' she'd almost be more proud. Do you know what I mean? Like, literally if someone were like, 'Hey, the spirit of that rule is you're supposed to find the Rogue teacher, not have the Rogue teacher find you. She would be like, 'A success against the spirit of the rule is actually more enticing to me.'"
Ally: "She thinks she gamed it and that's actually more impressive."
Brennan: "Yes, precisely."
Ally: "Okay, got it. *** ******."
Siobhan: "I wonder if the Rogue teacher found her to say, 'Hey, grinding is not the way to do this and you actually have to study and you're in trouble.'"
Ally: "Or she like put herself in danger and that's why that person died. The Rogue teacher had to step in and-"
Ok, guys. A lot of people have their fan casts for a Rat Grinders spinoff series, but hear me out.
What if season whatever of Dimension 20 was with the intrepid heroes, but Brennan didn’t tell them what their characters were. They get into the dome, The background is the normal Fantasy High background. The DM screen is the normal Fantasy High DM screen. They all sit as if they would for their Fantasy High characters. Brennan does the introduction, everybody’s smiling everybody’s happy, then he starts with the first scene.
But Nobody has a character sheet nobody knows who they are. “Strange, how do you play if you don’t know who you are playing?” A sentiment throughout the six heroes. The scene moves on, and he does it through one of the players perspectives, and it becomes clearer and clearer, slowly, that that person is playing their Fancy High characters antithesis from the Rat Grinders. Brennan hands them a character sheet.
The scenes go on, each hero getting their own. The character sheets are handed out. Horror: screams are heard throughout the dome, yells and shouts for Brendan to do unspeakable things. All the players are befuddled. All the players are filled with wishes for revenge.
The Intrepid Heroes, beloved of the characters they play called The Bad Kids, now play what they hate the most.
Yes, yes, Emily often confounds Brennan which is always fun, but I also love when she, or any of the others suggest something really cool and Brennan is just like 😃😃😃 He really makes it feel like a collaborative story they are all telling together, rather than like, it's him *against* the PCs trying to "beat" them.