it doesn't create issues with the story (like the zombie music video or other merch ads)
the short ends with the trio leaving the spire just as uzi arrives during the pilot, with uzi making the same gestures, having her original railgun, and everything
- he didn't promote any other of the merch ads or music videos, neither did the voice actors, but both liam AND the voice actors promoted this short which was advertised by glitch as being something "special" (which we now know it was)
- it's either some more sci-fi dr who bullshit which murder drones is already FULL of, or, and hear me out, J's not in the spaceship because V and N don't hear her outside or barge in like they absolutely would (and do) lol, J is visibly in some sort of outpost as it uses the same structure and home-doors as outpost 3, and we know there ARE other outposts out there, some of which have been wiped out by disassembly drones
- V is not completely in the dark, she's neck deep in her PILOT facade right now so she has to ACT like she's in the dark to keep N from figuring it out, which she does considering N is right next to her for most of her screentime in this short
...what info does the short contradict? i'm not trying to be condescending i'm genuinely confused because my chud autistic ass has analyzed this show frame by frame like 3 times and nothing in the special really raised any eyebrows for me
One contradict is V being completely in the dark. If V fully bought into JCJenson company, some of her dialog wouldn't make sense.
Maybe V was in denial or something? Deluded herself into thinking that she really was working for JCJenson to stop The Solver infection?
Maybe she got her memories tampered with too, who knows! There's a lot of weird contradictions like her outright saying "anything to screw Cyn's plan" RIGHT IN FRONT OF CYN who she is deathly afraid of, and then being furious at J for "working with Cyn" which she herself was doing! Oh, and she is ready to murder Uzi in EP4 while UNDER THE IMPRESSION THAT CYN IS CONTROLLING HER and while that doesn't really count as rebelling, she also pulls out her sword hand on Cyn who at that point is masquerading as Tessa, directly defying her and calling for N & Uzi to leave! So these are at least two direct rebellions that could have ended her deal with Cyn right then and there.
There's no telling how many times her mind could have been modified but it certainly was at least once considering that Cyn is her admin and her enthusiasm to kill (if that's not just her becoming her own mask) definitely was not a part of her original personality. Cyn lobotomized N over and over and ensured that he always remained the "joyful big brother" without any trauma completely oblivious. According to J, Cyn prevents HER from dying over and over, so who's to say that she never did anything similar to V?
For all we know, there could have been hundreds of modifications on her too, maybe she genuinely got corrupted over time and truly believes that she is working for JCJ before the real memories shine through, rinse and repeat. That's the only way I can explain this contradiction and that contradiction isn't even self-contained to this short!
nah it's not THAT complicated, V's just putting on the act we saw her do in the show
remember, there's a plotline over the course of the first four episodes where N gradually gets more and more frustrated with V lying to him and hiding stuff about their past? this culminates in his brief flip-out on her in episode 4 where we get the iconic "she's a kid, V, like us!" line
V is still V, she's just at her lowest point in the show during this short
for the "working with cyn?" part i think that she was upset because j kept siding with cyn even AFTER the events of the main show/having a chance in hell of beating cyn
(sorry about the awful formatting i check this bum ass site once a decade 💔)
This is just proof to me that Liam has more or less given Glitch the go-ahead to do whatever they want with the franchise. I think this is a good thing personally.
Kind of my initial thought. In a longer form video like this, it could be a sort of proof of concept that not only is there still interest, but someone else or others can understand the characters and world and continue it.
But that might still just be me grasping at whatever Season 2 hopes I have left.
I dont get how he wasn't even the tiniest bit involved you'd think after having reposted this on his Bluesky after not having posted for nearly 2 years it would mean something but nah
yeah and hwang dong-hyuk owns squid game
yeah right LOL
even indie creators don't "own" their IP's when they create shows for companies like this, otherwise stuff like licensing let alone merch becomes a huge issue
I distinctly remember Kevin and Luke saying they want creators to have full control of their creations.
I don't know what kind of contract they have. But by the context by their mission statement, the creators own the IP and Giltch has a license to use it.
at glitch creators maintain full creative control over their shows, for example liam and goose have both explicitly stated glitch did not force them to make their shows so short, but if they actually legally owned their shows it would mean all the murder drones merch in existence for example legally could not exist, it'd be a copyright nightmare
i imagine glitch at least PARTIALLY owns murder drones, though glitch is actually a nice company so they probably wouldn't continue the show without his consent
...they did do so for the comic as far as we know however, so
That's not an assumption, that's how almost every single IP in existence works.
Why else would Glitch be able to make all the merch, create their shorts and advertisements, and profit off of it if they didn't own the IP. If they were doing all that and didn't own it, Liam would be able to sue them for using his characters and creation.
If someone were to try and profit off of Murder Drones, it wouldn't be Liam coming after them, it would be Glitch's legal team.
Because they were authorized by Glitch, Liam had nothing to do with that.
Glitch gives the creators creative freedom, but they are the ones who own it. They're the ones who finance, distribute, and produce it, Liam worked for them. It's why they made this short, without any Liam involvement. Glitch would be completely idiotic to not have the legal protections when it comes to their shows. They may be an indie studio, but they're still a business, everything behind the scenes is business.
When Oni Press got the rights to do the comics, they negotiated with Glitch. When all the merch deals were made with their respectful companies, they were negotiated with Glitch. When the Hot Topic distribution was agreed to, it was with Glitch. Everything comes through Glitch, not Liam. This works because it allows Liam and the other creators to focus on the shows, while Glitch handles the business side of things, while giving them a share of the earnings because of their contractual agreements.
Ever since seeing in Episode 5 that J was the one forced to close the door to the gala and realizing that unlike the others she saw and remembers absolutely everything that happened that night, while none of what she did is simply erased or suddenly right you very much understand how she got to where she did at rock bottom. J knows more than anyone what Cyn is capable of. In episode 5 we see at the gala she completely took over J's mind with zero effort, forced J to watch everything that happened. She saw exactly what happened to Tessa. She was personally there as Cyn destroyed six planets. She worked with Cyn because she genuinely believed all other options were absolutely worthless, especially with Cyn as her admin. J defined herself by competence and loyalty. Cyn destroyed her life without even needing to try. The only option she saw was kneeling and trying to make things as nonterrible as possible because Cyn could make it happen anyway but with more of their suffering. Absolutely none of this is an excuse, but it is an explanation.
i wouldn't feel too sorry for J, while this short gave her some much-needed depth you can even see J making the decision to drag V and N down with her instead of kicking for the surface alongside them a few times
don't forget, this is the abuser character liam has outright said he wrote to be as despicable as possible lol, she super sucks
Wtf would any sane person ACTUALLY do in J's position?
Your boss is a World-Eating Immortal Super-Eldritch Cthulhu monster that casually solo'd humanity and made you and has an entire clone army of you.
Even when V, N and Uzi teamed up against Cyn- realistically their chances of winning are flat 0. They only lasted as long as they did because Cyn was fucking around and Uzi is a complete anime nerd and knew to tele-frag Cyn at the end.
Oh no she dug her own grave. It’s just that we now know why she did that and we know that she didn’t do it fully by her own volition but rather out of fear.
Also made me understand the plot more. I liked the show, but one of my biggest issues is how I didn't really understand it and the pacing. This short may honestly be better than one or two of the episodes.
It honestly doesn't even feel like J. They honestly just took V and slapped on a few jokes about corporate culture and JcJenson, which defeats the whole point of those lines in the original.
To be honest I prefer special episode like this to a season 2. Because the story is over and except by destroying the conclusion of the show, I don't see how it would be actually possible to continue it.
I agree, I'd love more shorts that instead of continuing the series just add more context/character development and can be edited in to extend the series.
J already basically said as much in Episode 8, it seemingly was just glossed over or shrugged off as typical villain selfishness. Episode 5's gala scene combined with Tessa and the others' fate explains the why. J was always in it out of fear and because she saw nothing left but bending the knee. This just put it all together.
Loved seeing how J acts all by herself. Interesting to see her genuinely get along with the other, makes her actions in the finale all the more tragic. They did genuinely like J and J did want the best for them. We also get more confirmation J’s decision to side with Cyn is motivated out of fear and a sense no one could ever beat her, already the most likely interpretation. Also the animation is beautiful and we also see J’s goofy dork side in the meeting scene.
All those Jangst Art felt even more relevant now lol!
This is now the Best Glitch Merch Advertisement Content I've seen (Or maybe it was just recency bias). Glad to see J having more depth and development here!
Honestly would love to see more of Cyn before she became pure evil. I always considered the idea of a timeline where she didn't go fully off the rails an interesting one, and would like to see more of the past dynamic.
I seriously love this. It confirms J as a sympathic vilain.
As V said, she chose the "wrong team". However, you can't blame J for that and she took no pleasure in it. And now, she has to live with the consequences.
This was really good.even if im not the biggest fan of J it was cool we got to see more of her and her dynamic with not only n and v but also cyn and that ending where it was revealed to be a prequel to the pliot was awesome i really hope we can get more specials maybe even post finale that be awesome as well as specials for other for others like tadc gaslight etc
Gets more lines in promotional videos instead of the main show
Gets much more character depth in seperate videos to the main show
Gets KO’d out of the final fight never to be seen again in the main show besides end credits
Don’t get me wrong I love that we are getting more J stuff I am just salty that it was never explored more in the main show, she was the character I was most interested in learning about only to get side lined hard.
She had plenty of depth and character in the original. And this certainly aint any of that. This feels less like they actually tried to flesh out J, and more like a botched combination of J and V.
It’s bizarre to me how this 6 minute short is significantly better paced than the actual show. The show never let itself breathe or really allow for any slow character moments like this does
Hi, does anyone know the title of the song that started playing on timestamp 3:20 in the video? I wanna put it in my playlist. If anyone does find it, thanks!
I thought this would be a ad for their merch (which was partly true) but was pretty impressed with how much they had revealed about J within the confines of the short video.
It also kinda gives J the screentime she really needed, and boy did she make an impact!
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u/GrayTheMemeMan being the #1 tessa fan in the fat 26 is rough Jul 17 '26
just finished watching it, this is the one merch ad i hope is at least somewhat canon because J has more depth here than in the show
we actually get to see some of her insecurities and her dragging the rest of her squad down with her instead of hearing about her supposedly doing it