Okay, there <i>must</i> be a former PPCer on the MCU writing staff. The TVA has a Makes-Things! - PPC Posting Board

Subject: Okay, there must be a former PPCer on the MCU writing staff. The TVA has a Makes-Things!
Author: Neshomeh
Posted on: 2023-09-22 15:13:54 UTC

"Meet OB, Ke Huy Quan's quirky repair guy in Loki season 2"

Season 2 (premiering Oct. 6 on Disney+) finds Loki and Mobius trekking into the deepest bowels of the TVA, seeking help from Quan's quirky repair guy. OB works in the repairs and advancement department, and his office is stuffed in the basement, a sprawling mishmash of gadgets and gizmos.

"His job is basically every piece of tech, every computer, every thing that is running at the TVA," executive producer Kevin Wright tells EW. "He either designed it, or he fixes it and keeps it running."

SEE??

As far as I can tell, this character doesn't exist in the comics. The name is speculated to be a reference to a Mr. Ouroboros, but that's a very minor character who has nothing to do with tech; any similarity would literally be in name only. OB seems for all intents and purposes to be original to the MCU.

And very obviously an expy of Makes-Things slipped in by a former Boarder, if you ask me. Friend, please come forward any time you like! We'd love to pat you on the back in person. {= D

... I'm joking, but wow it's uncanny what with how similar the TVA already was to the PPC. {X D

Cheers to Lily Winterwood for sharing this news with me. I had to bring it here.

~Neshomeh

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Okay, there must be a former PPCer on the MCU writing staff. The TVA has a Makes-Things! by Neshomeh on 2023-09-22 15:13:54 UTC

We've watched episode 1 now (spoiler-free comments). by Huinesoron on 2023-10-09 12:43:24 UTC Reply

So O.B. is very much a Makes-Things. I'm not sure when he's a Makes-Things from - he's not TOS levels of skittish, but most later Makes-Things stories have him a bit grumpy; O.B. is more on the highly-strung enthusiastic end of things.

As is typical with Disney+ shows, I think every shot of O.B. in the trailers was from the first episode. That's fine; hopefully there's more to come! There's also lots of him that isn't in the trailers, so that's cool.

Writing-wise, O.B. works well as a counter to the returning cast's tendency to act as if you just watched the season 1 finale. ^_^ Kaitlyn described the episode as trying to maintain the energy of something two years ago, which is pretty accurate. It's not that they don't recap what they need to - it's that the immediacy the characters feel isn't matched by the gap we've had.

As far as potential fan videos go, O.B. has some very useful short lines, like "Yes" and "No", as well as a straight up "That won't work" which could cover a multitude of HQ's evils.

hS

Us, too! (Wild speculation, but no spoilers.) by Neshomeh on 2023-10-12 02:12:11 UTC Reply

Phobos likes to wait until all the episodes are out, but I insisted. ^_^

The energy of the episode didn't bother me. I was ready to dive in. {= D I think the recapping bits were pretty smooth, too.

I'm enjoying O.B. a lot. His dialogue and the way he volleys with the other characters is fun, and I feel like there's more to him than we're getting right now. Some of that is the hype; some of that is his name; some of that is how funny it would be if Phobos is right that he's secretly the founder of the TVA (or otherwise behind it, above and beyond making the tech) and it was just co-opted by He Who Remains at some point.

Apparently there's also a fan theory that some percentage of TVA employees are Loki variants, including Mobius? I dunno about that myself. I'm only hearing it second-hand, so I don't know what support there is for it. It just doesn't ring true to me. Have you heard anything about this?

~Neshomeh

Episode 2 watched (still no spoilers). by Huinesoron on 2023-10-16 10:38:12 UTC Reply

From a Makes-Things perspective, episode 2 was a good one - there's at least two scenes showing just O.B., one surrounded by tech, one at a console. There's even a scene of him being handed a CAD or RA, and plenty of useful dialogue lines too.

The biggest issue is the TVA's "Cave Johnson's Aperture Science" '70s look. The brown shades are very easy on the eye, but it would make matching O.B. to clips from any other movie a nightmare. We definitely couldn't do a full "PPC short", and even a trailer would look obviously mashed-up.

As for "everyone's a Loki" - I'm rewatching Season 1 and nobody in the TVA likes Lokis. Recruiting them would be a major misstep - and, in fact, recruiting just a single Loki was.

hS

I spotted a Loki Season 2 trailer somewhere. by Huinesoron on 2023-09-25 12:56:46 UTC Reply

There were multiple clips of I-can't-believe-it's-not-Makes-Things, including several voice lines, so I reckon he's going to be a moderately significant character. This bodes well!

For the PPC, I mean, not for Loki. That guy's doomed.

hS

Makes-Things in the trailers. by Huinesoron on 2023-09-26 14:47:54 UTC Reply

I had a few minutes so I went looking.

He appears in this trailer, having a long scene covering the first 36 seconds, and then a brief appearance 1:20-1:24.

This one mostly just has an excerpt of the long scene, but also flashes a closeup at 0:56.

This one is the one I saw first, and it's short but Makes-Things heavy: he shows up 0:10-0:17, and then for a split-second around 0:20.

Finally, this one has a flash at 0:23, then repeats the group shot from the previous trailer a bit later.

I can totally picture him complaining that everyone keeps thinking he's dead for no reason. ^_^

hS

I'm sorry I have nothing to add, but I'm just excited. ^_^ (nm) by Neshomeh on 2023-09-29 04:17:53 UTC Reply

So the question is... by Huinesoron on 2023-09-22 17:23:17 UTC Reply

... will he be on screen long enough that we can use clips of him to take a trailer for a PPC movie?

The PPCCUU would be the obvious place to start from my perspective, but obviously we would need clips to be other characters too. It's tricky, because you don't just need the right face - you need them to have stared in something that gave them the right clothes, in the right kind of setting, and on screen by themselves or with other PPC characters. Ideally they'd even say a line or two we could clip in wildly out of context.

Huh, we did fan casting a few... er... a lot of years back, didn't we? But I don't think it's helpful when we can't put them in the costumes and makeup we need.

hS

hS

Ooh, can we do it again? Fan casting, I mean (nm) by Kі nо Shirayuki on 2023-09-23 02:14:00 UTC Reply

Go for it! by Huinesoron on 2023-09-23 08:23:16 UTC Reply

I am very bad at it; you can see me not contributing at all last time round. :D

hS

I'm only asking because… by Kі nо Shirayuki on 2023-09-23 09:58:21 UTC Edited Reply

I sometimes imagine what agents' dialogues would be like if translated into Japanese, and when I do so for Agent Dafydd, I imagine he would be dubbed by Midorikawa Hikaru, utilizing a deep voice. (He is also roughly the equivalent to Kevin Bacon in Japanese voice acting due to how prolific he is.) I'm not actually that well-versed in live-action actors in any country.

Yeeeah, I can see (um, hear?) that. by Huinesoron on 2023-09-25 12:55:34 UTC Reply

At the least he doesn't sound not Dafydd, which is about the most I can do; like I said, I'm not much of a one for fan-casting.

(Of course, Dafydd technically has a Welsh accent, but I think speaking Japanese in singsong Welsh mode might break something in the concept of linguistics. I would be fascinated to be proven wrong though!)

hS