The Show-Runner Gets a Performance Review

The Show-runner

The show-runner is taking a lunch break, rasping pieces off of the sea sponge provided by it’s dotted-line boss. Ever since the mermaid Daphne pointed out the existence of the show-runner in her office aquarium, Tyalangan has made sure to keep her aquarium well-stocked with the most succulent sea sponges for it. While it eats, it watches the manufacturing process for office staplers, pining for Stanley. I’ll save you one day, you sexy anthropomorphic stapler!

So, it is surprised to find itself on top of a mahogany desk, outside of the tank. It starts to fear for its life, as it is out of saltwater for the first time ever. The air is so dry. Its gills collapse under their own weight. It looks for its Speak ‘n’ Spell, as it needs the toy to communicate. It isn’t here! A silver-furred cat looms over it, licking her feline lips. “Good morning,” the cat purrs, “my favorite nudibranch in the multiverse.”

The show-runner quivers in fear.

The cat purrs again, “You can just talk here. I can understand you.”

“Oh,” the show-runner says, “are you going to eat me now, Ms. E?”

“Wasn’t planning on it. This is a performance review, as it were. You have attracted some critics. And, unlike the goofuses that Tyalangan commented on, these critics are both much more competent and focused on your work.”

Someone reviewed us?

“Shall we begin?” the producer asks.

Green hands squeezed the soft boob gently, but firmly. The tanned flesh compressed, the dark, engorged nipple seemed to swell—and then a single golden droplet formed, right on the tip, and rolled down.

“Nothing like starting with a colostrum reference. That is some quality lactation fetish fodder. Wrynn and Gambio, take notes,” the cat smugly suggests.

“Really, ma’am?”

“Really. Again, this is a much more competent review than the other one. And it has better lactation action. Realism is sexy, not overinflated firehose action. Moving on.”

"How many constitute a harem?" the green one asked.

"Well, one is a wife or lover, and two would be a threesome or throuple," Rowana said. "So I guess the minimum is three subordinate women under one master or mistress."

“Funny enough, Scarlet wondered a very similar question at some point in the first Week.”

“Really, ma’am?”

“It is an interesting question. And leads to the next section to address.”

"Josie was actually introduced in the first chapter, using a butt as a pillow, and has been an occasional viewpoint character throughout. Which makes me think she may be the primary viewpoint character for the story going forward, although we shall see," Rowana said. "Azzie, comment?"

"Like, normally the Master seems to be a unifying theme and the harem, and thus the story, is built around their history and desires. But in this case, they're all lesbians with tenuous connections to each other. Given that the Master is named 'Francis,' a traditionally male name, this suggests either a lot of these ladies are going to have to learn to like cock or Frank is going to be re-coded as female. Or maybe just likes to watch? Those are all kind of interestin' kinks to explore in a harem scenario, though I think six is too many," the Uruk-Hai said.

“There is a lot there. Show-runner, address this.”

The nudibranch quivers, then stammers, “Well, the hag Mr. C foisted on us wanted to de-emphasize the Master during the opening, partially because the hag thought that changing up the format of the opening would make the usual ceremony more interesting, partially due to the nature of the surprise slow-burn MtF theme for the season. It retrospect, this was a narrative mistake, as a measurable percentage of the audience did not appreciate the twist and made that VERY OBNOXIOUSLY CLEAR. While the typical opening ceremony uses the Master as the primary perspective in the transcripts, the conceit here needed a perspective to build the narrative around. The final contestant made the most narrative sense.”

“As far as the harem count goes,” the producer points out, “the basic rules of the show declare that six initial contestants is the minimum. While I would agree that a lower initial count would allow for better development, the game show rules are the rules. I will point out that most branches start with more than six, usually eight, sometimes up to the double-digits. So, this season is a tight one, as far as it goes.”

"A lot of these are just too much," Azzie noted. "Like, these are enough to deal with and keep track of for an entire normal storyline, but you just know that they're going to pile even more on top. There's got to be a better way to track these things, maybe character sheets?"

"Actually, props for that, there actually are character sheets. 70 BP to Fogeight," Rowana said. "And it only took us 14 chapters to get through the introduction to the characters and the first transformations. Now the plot starts!"

“Do I get the 70 BP, ma’am?”

“Sure. Want to address their complaints about the initial transformations being too mean?”

“We broadly divide the different versions of the show into ‘light’ and ‘dark’ seasons. Light seasons are all ‘a Master and contestants get a strange tropical vacation.’ Dark seasons are all ‘a Master and contestants get tormented by a monster.’ The hag was shooting for a dark season, so some of the transformation cruelty was the hag wanting to be impressively evil like Yuki or Aurora. Some of the cruelty, especially after this round, was due to needing to **** the Master to use the vetoes. The veto mechanic needed to have transformations that warrant editing. I will note that our current season is an attempt at a ‘light’ season, if that would help.”

"I mean, we don't have volleyball in Middle Earth, but that's only like, six people to a team? So three women? A foursome?" Rowana said, her brow furrowed. "I mean, when you're trapped in a harem anime, that's a warm-up. Actually, come to think of it, wouldn't it be fun if the contestants were a volleyball team, and the Master was the coach, and they had to compete against other volleyball harems?"

“Sure, only 6 volleyballists can be on the field at once, but there are alternates, second stringers. In American high schools, there are often 3 different volleyball levels at a given school: a 9th grade squad, a junior varsity squad, and a varsity squad. Depending on the school, players may end up playing on multiple squads, depending on the circumstances. In a sense, all three squads are on the same team. They at the very least train together. There are also limits to how many games a given player can participate in, so these teams would have more players than professional volleyball teams. I presume there are professional volleyball teams? So, ‘half of the volleyball team’ could easily be 10 different girls,” the nudibranch notes.

“Also, Gambio would be the best one to ask about a Harem Hotel volleyball team season. Sea slugs are notorious for not understanding the mechanics of volleyball, beyond what rules they can find on the Internet. A lack of limbs means volleyball is beyond them.”

"The problem with this setup is that Fogeight has not established that Frank's cock is exposed before he reads the instruction to keep his cock out. Ideally, if you're going to make rocking the cock out an ongoing gag plot point, you first want to set up that the cock is actually out. Have him react to that. Or at least make Frank and the audience aware of it. Establish the fact that the cock is out first," Azzie said. "And saying that you established it four chapters ago is not good enough. People forget. Remind them."

“That is fair enough,” the show-runner concedes. “I could blame the fact that I am transcribing a television show. Instead, I’ll blame my primitive brain that relies more on our equivalent to the sense of smell and vibrations than on sight. I forget about vision quite a bit.”

"We mostly aren't talking about this kind of thing, but when it comes to punctuation, you don't have any after the quotation mark," Azzie said. Her hands shifted to life Rowana's breasts from below, letting her fingers rub the sensitive undersides. "I wouldn't make a deal about it except this happens repeatedly and is very annoying."

“I’ll admit that I never liked this rule of grammar. What if the appropriate punctuation mark for a quoted line is inappropriate for the end of the sentence proper? Still, that, the over-reliance on indirect phrases, the excess use of adjectives as nouns, and too much passive voice are all legitimate complaints in my writing style. As far as the spelling mistakes go, I miss some, even after giving the entire reviewed section three complete beginning-to-end re-reads for editing purposes. The dangers of being your own editor.”

"Is it weird to say that after Añil going full slut-mode and Skye suggesting assisted semen donation is normal, that this date is a little too vanilla?" Azzie said. "Like, I'm all for slow build-up because Josie is a dedicated lesbian and doesn't find Francis attractive at all, that's a major part of the tension of the game, but I feel like one or both of them should have worked out a scene where they could find an accommodation."

“That does happen, most explicitly with Tina, but with Scarlet and Añil, too. It’s just that those sexy time scenes are weirder than that.”

"I feel like Foreight is not comfortable with writing an actual erotic belly rub scene," Azzie said. "At least, not yet."

“I guess I need to talk Tyalangan into having an erotic belly rub scene with Josie at some point in the new season.”

“Josie is not going to like that.”

The cat grins, “That’ll make it funnier.”

"You know what this needed? Some sort of double date. Like two of the lesbians making out with each other as a show while Francis jerks off to them. That would be movement in the direction of progress."

“For better and for worse,” the producer notes, “Week One dates are always one-on-one and rarely end up with much in the way of sexy times. It’s a ‘getting to know you’ type of situation. This was especially important with this branch, as they are all mostly strangers. Most people are not so open to the idea of having sex with someone they just met. Throw in the ‘lesbians paired with a male’ scenario and it leads to not a lot of sexual progress. I’d argue that everyone, save Añil, made some progress with Francis during the week. It’s just that most of that progress was more starting to develop mental and emotional connection. The audience rarely wants just fucking.”

The nudibranch adds, “But, again, more sexy times happen in later weeks; Josie’s second date is a more **** version of what they asked for in that snippet. And the current season has more sexy times in Week One.”

"So, this is just naked bait for Gina, right?" Azzie said.

"Yeah, 100%, no notes," Rowana agreed. "Like dick biting, Gina seems to like shark girls in a philosophical sense, but is uncomfortable with them up close. I suspect she wants to imagine being the swimmer in the water, legs dangling and ****, as the shark comes up from below."

“Funny enough,” the show-runner notes, “I was only vaguely aware of Marcie and Gina until the Andy birthday party cross-promotion event, which occurred around our season’s final challenge. I literally could not tell those two degenerates apart until I read Hard Candy right before requesting our review. The shark girl transformation was a coincidence. The mermaids were thinking about potential punishment transformations for every contestant and they have a bit of a one-track mind.”

"Didn't Josie leave early on his very first date?" Azzie said.

“First item needing correction in the whole review,” the cat smugly notes, tail whipping, “Francis woke up with Ariel in his bed the morning after Josie’s night. That lead to a maybe Zeebop like scene of a mermaid licking dried semen off of a confused guy.”

"Do cows and horses not have morning wood?" Azzie said.

Rowana, who grew up on a farm instead of being decanted in a tank, smiled. "No. Most mammals have a bone, called a baculum, in their penis. While the cock isn't always visible, they are always ready to go when the time comes. So now, they don't get morning wood. Cock can leave its sheath for a variety of reasons, but it is perfectly possible for farmgirl there to have never seen an adult human male prick before."

“The former Ms. Kimura worked primarily as a vine tender. Her mothers grew grapes and made wine. The males in the community were housed together in a single barrack type situation. She never had to deal with ‘morning wood’ before, even if she was very familiar with male pricks when flaccid. I did enjoy the baculum talk. There was a baculum reference in Week 3, if you get to it.”

"The mutual triangulation onto lesbian threesome is being heavily foreshadowed, but 'why' escapes me," Azzie said. "Like, none of these ladies seem to be really into group sex? And none of them have been exactly having sexy thoughts about group sex with the others? So it feels like the fact that they're navigating toward lesbian threesome indicates we either missed something or hasn't been established very well."

“Little Column A, Little Column B,” the cat shrugs.

“In the Column B category,” the show-runner elaborates, “This was my first published story and I didn’t emphasize thoughts that I should have at the time. The ribbon of eggs on my head when I realized that Scarlet was engaged to be wed as a part of a lesbian throuple at one point. I really should have made that more overt.”

“In Column A, Josie was regularly in a big group sex situation at her gym. Just because the only sex scene we have in Week One between Josie and another member of the gym was one-on-one, doesn’t mean she isn’t into group sex.”

"But it does feel like the narrative is being dragged in seven different directions. Like it isn't sure whether it wants Francis to have a dick or not, if it wants the haremites to be pregnant or not, if it wants Josie to be the woobie or just kind of a karma sink for a broken universe, etc."

“In a sense,” the nudibranch notes, “the story is being pulled in seven different directions. Each participant has their own things going on. Now, did I execute on that as well as I would have liked? No. Perhaps, if the show allowed for a smaller starting cast, I would have had an easier time developing solid character arcs from the raw footage I had.”

"I would not consider that sexting," Azzie said. "There was no sext. 'Keep that pussy warm for me' would work better if he had a pussy or if they had established that Francis was becoming her girlfriend."

“Another technical correction. The sext VP reward was for the unintentional nude video text. Whether that qualifies as sexting in your mind, that is another matter.”

"Although in this particular instance, it feels like he's specifically addressing the prevalence of pregnancy kink in other Harem Hotel paths. Our unfamiliarity with the other branches is really making it difficult to say how much of this is metatextual."

“The Jenny scene is partly an attempt to address the pregnancy kink, partly an attempt to address a different metatext item, namely, eliminations. Every season has some sort of example elimination introduced relatively early on to make the concept real. Also, maybe its just that I am a nudibranch, but I really don’t get the pregnancy kink. You expel sperm towards your breeding partner, collect the sperm expelled towards you, then shoot out fertilized eggs into the ocean. What’s the big deal?”

"I cannot tell if this is a reflection of how the Harem Hotel games play to the audience participation aspect or are building up Añil for either total failure or the biggest character growth in the story," Azzie said. "Like a lot of things in this story, it feels like this would normally be build-up for something but it could go either way. It would help if Añil had any redeeming attributes, but she's trying to reject reality and replace it with her own when the world does not work that way, and the only way for her to actually achieve anything is to stop being who she is. Which is kind of a shit moral, but then she's kind of a shit person."

"Let's be honest, that goes for a lot of the participants," Rowana said. "And it comes back down toward motivation. Nothing about this game seems to have triggered survival mode in Añil yet, but it also isn't really triggering be-a-better-person in any of the other characters either. The closest thing we've seen to real motivation (except for the mermaids) is Tina learning Real Magic, and the only real self-discovery is Josie finding out she's a shit friend, which she sort of already knew."

Eye stalks droop as the nudibranch somewhat concedes, “That is somewhat the nature of the format, somewhat my poor skills. The scene Rowana and Azzie are addressing that triggered this conversation, Añil livestreaming to get the audience to give her VP directly, was compiled while the votes were ongoing. In fact, part of the purpose of that scene (making both the broadcast and the transcript) was to show off the girl to be brought in if that transformation won. The scene had to go either way, because the vote could have gone either way.”

“I would also point out that, with the exception of Dinah, none of the contestants have seen the consequences of elimination at that point in the game (and most of them haven’t even read the rules). The conditions to triggering survival mode hasn’t really hit yet.”

"I wanted more sex. I wanted sexier writing. We get transformations, but they tend to be immediate and almost perfunctory; we don't often get to see the characters live in their new bodies or with their new desires. We hear a lot about mindblowing orgasms but we don't see them. And it feels like the characters don't really know what they want or how to achieve their goals, and most of their planning is indistinguishable from luck or foul play," Azzie said.

"Agreed on all points. However, I don't want to imply that 4og8zzjkc is a bad writer; a lot of that falls to the format of Harem Hotel and the inherent necessity of the plot bending to audience votes. A lot of the stuff we're pointing out is more obvious in hindsight, and much more difficult to see while actually doing the writing in real time on a schedule. Reading a roleplaying game session is very different than reading a novel, and if you go into a D&D replay expecting the erotic equivalent of The Silmarillion, you are destined for disappointment," Rowana said.

"Right. So, in the future: less telling us about the awesome sexual escapades, more showing us the awesome sexual escapades," the Uruk-Hai said. "And keep writing!"

The sea slug’s eye stalks droops again, “I like to think that my transcribing work did get better as I went. And they all got more extensive sex scenes depicted as the season developed. Motivations became sharper. You know what they say, practice makes perfect. And thank you for your consideration.”

The cat smiles, looming over the nudibranch. “So, was it that bad?”

The sea slug shakes its head, “No, ma’am.”

“Feel better about your work? You weren’t exactly treated well by the hag.”

“A little? I’m always looking for improvements.”

The cat pets the show-runner on the head. “There, there. Someone thinks you aren’t a bad writer.”

“Thank you, ma’am?”

“You’re welcome. Now, stop lusting after staplers on company property.”

And, suddenly, the show-runner finds itself back in its aquarium home, sea sponge lunch still waiting for it. It slides over to the sessile creature and begins to munch on it again. Mmmm... tasty.