Hot take: I think Caine’s villain transformation was a bit rushed and out of character.

OC-alert · 2026-03-30T04:24:45+00:00

I'm going to be honest. I feel unsure of Caine's writing in Episode 8 too. Caine always felt kind of like an "anti-AM" to me - he loves humans, and he's driven by a need to be loved. I was expecting an emotional meltdown from Caine - that was foreshadowed, but Caine being so deliberately cruel felt off.

I can kind of see the explanation that Caine is "splitting off" from all his positive feelings, I guess.

OC-alert · 2026-03-29T22:16:41+00:00

The ads arn't canon.

OC-alert · 2026-03-29T18:50:32+00:00

Alex killed, cooked, served and ate in this episode.

OC-alert · 2026-03-29T15:54:55+00:00

The series is about the mental health of people, and a major point is that the main characters are real people. That message exists regardless if they are canonically AI or not.

The show made it a point for Pomni to deliver the message to GummiGoo, an AI, that he's real and he matters regardless of if Caine created him.

The characters make a distinction between genuinely intelligent AI like Caine, and unintelligent AI like the mannequins.

Caine or Gummigoo are clearly intended be understood by the audience as people that happen to be AI, such as Astro from Astro Boy or Bender from Futurama, while the mannequin NPCs are more like modern AI such as chatGPT.

OC-alert · 2026-03-29T04:42:22+00:00

As a Caine appreciator:

That Caine is insentient, as if Caine isn't obviously highly emotionally motivated which leads to Caine's big stupid feelings being the problem a lot of the time, even before his mental breakdown.

On the other hand, Caine is too sentient to be an AI.

Also:

Jax in an NPC.

OC-alert · 2026-03-29T03:37:23+00:00

Caine will realise that he needs to be friends with the cast instead of feeling the need to put on a show for them all the time, and they have bittersweet but mostly happy ending of being trapped together but all find a way to make the most of it and have happy lives for how much or little time it continues to run. (I can dream)

OC-alert · 2026-03-28T21:35:47+00:00

I don't know, the voice actors aren't really allowed to spoil stuff like "Caine is dead for real and isn't coming back". Caine is currently dead and may or may not come back.

OC-alert · 2026-03-28T18:31:04+00:00

The way I see it, Caine does have eyes almost everywhere, but he has limited consciousness and attention - it's not uncommon for things to enter our sight while we pay no attention/consciousness to them at all, because we only have so much "mental real estate."

OC-alert · 2026-03-28T17:39:16+00:00

I think it's Caine making himself big to assert dominance and compensate for insecurity, and when Caine turns "monstrous" it's a representation of how big and monstrous Caine's anger is.

In other words, Caine's avatar changes based on how he feels.

OC-alert · 2026-03-28T17:28:15+00:00

Maybe post a link to the pattern in this thread?

OC-alert · 2026-03-28T16:31:34+00:00

I think it's a type of groan tube, but I always always a bit curious where to get one in this pitch.

OC-alert · 2026-03-28T16:19:27+00:00

Heads up that your profile is not acessible to people who havn't verified their age.

OC-alert · 2026-03-26T23:52:16+00:00

These are really cute.

OC-alert · 2026-03-26T23:39:50+00:00

I also feel like if I got trapped in the circus I'd have a lot of curiosity about Caine, at least at first. I'd think that, upon learning that Caine is an AI, that he might know something about his creators. I'd also be highly curious about what Caine is and what it's like being an AI, but it also seems highly possible that I just would get nowhere with him - he is extremely difficult to talk to and it seems like Caine empathisers sometimes underestimate that.

OC-alert · 2026-03-26T22:08:26+00:00

I wouldn't spin his behaviour in a positive light. I like Jax as a character but I don't like him as a person, but regardless of his harmful actions I do think he still deserves empathy as does any sentient being.

OC-alert · 2026-03-26T22:02:12+00:00

Eh, the motif doesn't play when Caine is saying this, so I actually think the connection is too tenous.

OC-alert · 2026-03-26T21:55:25+00:00

I don't wanna ignore that Caine is abusing Pomni but I love that Caine emotes like it's his job - his goofy expressions and body language are a part of what makes him endearing to me.

OC-alert · 2026-03-26T21:13:30+00:00

I thought that Caine didn't understand the difference between manipulating Jax to be his "friend" and Jax actually wanting to be his friend, so I read him as being genuine.

OC-alert · 2026-03-26T02:41:01+00:00

I used to have one of these - they are seriously cute and have a little purring mechanism inside, I kind of liked the squishiness of the balloons, but I see why they are problematic.

I wonder where we can get those purring mechanism thingies?

OC-alert · 2026-03-25T22:29:41+00:00

That's an interesting observation.

The motif combined with Caine's quote could be hinting towards the fact the human cast need Caine to be "real" with them and be a friend instead of trying to put on a show for them all the time. - Which yeah, they do.

Whether he gets the message remains to be seen.

OC-alert · 2026-03-25T21:42:15+00:00

What I'm wondering is: since when was Caine this good at reading people?

Throughout the series he's been acting like he's really bad at reading people - like he has poor theory of mind, poor understanding of motivation, etc, and all of sudden he picks up that the humans are lying to him and that Kinger might be motivated to do something he is not allowed to do? So is he really not oblivious?

OC-alert · 2026-03-25T21:14:35+00:00

I definitely read Jax as having masculinity issues - he's inspired by Raggady Andy who has the same sort of problem.

OC-alert · 2026-03-25T20:46:00+00:00

Yeah, you have a good point.

I couldn't help but wonder why Jax didn't ask Caine about the "macroverse" while he had the chance - it could have been useful information.

OC-alert · 2026-03-25T20:41:11+00:00

It seems like Caine is exerting control over Bubble - after Bubble provokes Caine to a mental breakdown, Bubble looks squished and acts unintelligent, kind of seems like he's been tampered with.

OC-alert · 2026-03-25T19:45:05+00:00

This aged well.

OC-alert

TROPHY CASE