u/Hamiltonfan25

Obviously, the content of the play is pretty opposite of the comedy that the Loud House is known for, but I still would have loved to see Luan rehearsing some of the more dramatic scenes.

The character of Juliet is kind of the opposite of the goofball that Luan is. To the point where I could see her family being legit shocked to see her in that role. Yes, Luan and Benny having a natural chemistry definitely helps the whole “lovestruck youths” element of the play, but I could still maybe see Mrs Bernardo being nervous about putting Luan at the forefront of such a serious play.

Even if they didn’t want to actually show Luan and Benny pretending to die, maybe they could have animated some of the more sensitive siblings (and Lynn Sr.) actually looking like they were crying in the end.

It’s a little odd that the episode kind of plays into the whole “love story” angle while totally ignoring the whole tragedy angle. I get that some of the younger kids might be too little to understand the depth of the show, but it is still a tragic story.

I only bring it up because it was a real turning point episode for our girl, Luan. It cemented her love of drama club and allowed writers to stop making her just a punchline. It’s also a rare time we see her family actually enjoying something she does…even though it’s the opposite of what they’d expect from her.

Hear me out, DJ is probably my biggest fall from grace character of the whole franchise upon rewatch. I remember ADORING her as a kid because I was the oldest sister in my family, so I found myself relating to her a great deal.

I still like her more than Michelle and Stephanie is still my favorite, and I also contend that she had a really hard childhood (and adulthood) but upon rewatch…I feel like the adults treat her as more of a saint than she really was.

Let me restate that she arguably was a saint when given everything that she’s been put up against (I can’t say I’d be any better) but everyone treats her like she’s just this gold standard kid and kind of acts like her behavior in an episode like “Those Better not be the Days” is her acting wildly out of character, but like, especially in early seasons…she was kind of always a little rebellious in the sense that she tested the waters with her caretakers (especially Jesse and Joey) and yeah, she was a little brasher in this episode…but not by much.

And really all Stephanie was doing was following DJ’s lead. She really wasn’t acting rude in the same way DJ was…just following her lead. It’s kind of weird that the episode wants to act like all 3 girls are acting like brats and monsters when it was mainly DJ being rude. I’d argue Michelle MAYBE should have had to do a FEW of the adult jobs (or tried to) but I can let it slide because she’s just a toddler.

The episode title would be “Funny Fashions” and in it, Leni is given this great opportunity to put on a fashion show for the directors of a fashion university that she really wants to attend.

She gets the idea to have her whole family be her models for the show, that way she can show how diverse her fashion talents are…since her family members are all different ages and personality types.

The mentor character who is helping her get ready and is a representative of the university absolutely loves every member of the Loud family and the outfits Leni has designed for them…except for Luan.

“She’s too…funny looking for fashion,” they’d say.

“Well duh! She’s my funny little sister! She loves being funny! It’s who she is!”

“And that’s all well and good, but fashion is about selling an image to people…some people want to be fashionable parents, or a trendy older teen, or a rockstar, or an athlete…heck, there are even people who want to be goths or dress their babies fashionably or want to look smart…but no other 15 year old girl wants to look like Luan.”

Luan overhears the conversation and feels bad, but brushes it off and tells Leni it’s okay. She just wants her to have a good show. She likes who she is…even if no one else does.

Leni can’t bare seeing Luan being treated so unfairly and neither can the rest of the family, so on the day of the show, they all dress like Luan (or they incorporate part of her style into their own outfits) and the crowd loves it and Leni still gets in to the fashion school but maybe she turns it down because she wants to carve her own path and she doesn’t want to support anywhere that would be so close minded towards a member of her family.

Posted on A03 since fanfiction.net has been having trouble with bugs and such.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/90278866

Lola and Lana are auditioning for a tv show or something that is casting twins and Luan is working a job where she’s dressed as a tv mascot or something else kind of embarrassing. There’s another set of twins their age there and when they see Luan acting goofy they start making fun of her.

Lana thinks they should step in and say something but Lola says Luan’s tough and can easily take the riffing…even though Lana can tell these other kids are taking it too far.

At some point, Luan tries to say hello or good luck or something supportive and one of the other kids asks Lola and Lana if they know “this dork”. Lana is again about to say something, but Lola stops her and says they have no idea who she is. Lola gives Luan a stack of cash to “leave them alone” (giving Luan an apologetic glance because she knows she’s being mean…even for her).

At on point, Lola loses one of her earrings (maybe they are the same earrings Lincoln got her in “Seasons Cheatings”) and Luan steps up and fashions an impromptu fishing pole out of some dental floss and a paperclip in order to get them back.

“Here you go, random kiddo!” She says with a wink. This makes Lola feel terrible for how she’s acted. In the end, the kind of jerky twins end up getting the tv role, but when Lola and Lana come home and find Luan passed out on the couch sweaty and exhausted from her shift, Lola drapes a blanket over her and comments that there’s at least one “actual star” in the family.

I feel really sorry for these guys. For all the over saturation of both Bud and Ladonna, I don’t even remember the names of their oldest brother and sister.

I understand that with them likely being in at least high school, we aren’t going to see much of them in a show where the main characters are elementary schoolers, but we could have maybe gotten a little bit more of them.

What makes me feel really bad for them is how it looks like no one from Elwood City came by to say goodbye to just them. How hard would it have been to animate some high school kids or something? You kind of maybe get vibes that due to the frequency of the Compton family moving, that the oldest kids just more or less…gave up on trying to make friends to save everyone heartache when they inevitably leave.

Maybe I’m over analyzing, but I still feel for these 2 and hope they find some stability in their college years.

Anyone who has explored my Reddit for even a little bit knows that I have a rage relationship with the Arthur episode “DW’s Baby” I hate it more than literally every other episode combined, but I did recently discover a positive spin to it (which I never thought I’d find).

I think that “Go to Your Room, DW!” Accomplishes everything that the other episode tried to do but did so a million times better.

First off, yes, DW is being punished throughout the episode, which I know is a win for people who don’t like her. I’m one of her biggest defenders, but that doesn’t mean I think she never deserves punishment…only that the punishment has to be handled in a way that actively helps her becoming a better person.

She’s given a very developmentally appropriate punishment by being sent to her room for 10 minutes, and while both Jane and David stand by the punishment, they still talk respectfully and calmly to DW.

Yes, some of her imagine sequences were wild, but it really helped having Nadine work off of her for the episode. I love the concept of Nadine being the more calm and logical side of DW but still it’s essentially DW talking to herself. It tells you that no matter how dramatic she’s being or what she’s saying, that deep down inside, there is a logical girl just kind of caught up in her own feelings.

Heck, the book version of the episode literally borrows plot points from DW’s baby (DW wanting to sell Kate, runaway, etc.)

The only part that kind of floors me is that Jane couldn’t even keep Kate out of the bedroom for the entire 10-minutes timeout. That to me is just evidence that DW is going to be hit with the parentification stick even harder than Arthur.

I would maybe understand if Jane wanted to reintroduce Kate into the bedroom while she stayed and supervised, but she just leaves the baby with DW and closes the door, knowing that the whole reason DW’s on punishment is because she threatened harm to Kate.

It’s made a little better by her coming in and praising DW for being kind towards Kate again. That is positive parenting at its finest and something I think was failed miserably in DW’s baby. Yes, correcting bad behavior is important, but so is praising desired behavior.

It also does the one thing DW’s baby never does and lets DW hear that she’s just as loved as Kate. That one sentence was never uttered during Kate’s introduction episode and it failed DW miserably.

I want to make it SUPER clear that Amber went about everything in the absolute wrong way and she very intentionally was really hard to sympathize with. She’s already a princess, super wealthy, beautiful, etc. and she’s not a “traditional” victim. She’s not being outwardly abused or neglected, and let me make this really clear again…she’s taking everything out on Sofia, who is designed to be the most innocent and pure soul imaginable…again, seemingly very black and white storytelling (especially from the POV of Sofia and to the POV of the target demographic).

However…looking back on it as an adult…I’m sorry, but I find Amber extremely sympathetic. It makes sense she’d feel salty that while Sofia’s Welcome Ball is taking place where she’s fully old enough to understand it, and Amber and James special ball took place when they were newborn babies. It makes sense that Amber would be frustrated watching her dad give a priceless heirloom (a POWERFUL one at that) to this girl who is essentially a stranger.

Meanwhile, even her own brother gets to a point where he’s outwardly saying EVERYONE (including HIM) likes Sofia BETTER than her…and he never apologizes for it. Amber has ever reason to feel frustrated, and if anything, her heel turn was almost unbelievable. She literally goes from loathing Sofia to being her biggest ally in the span of less than 10 seconds.

It really says something too that Sofia was the one to offer Amber the olive branch of having her join in dancing with their father at the end…Roland really did make it seem like he was replacing Amber and it’s kind of heartbreaking.

Even Miranda (outside of a sweet scene near the start) makes no attempt to try to bond with Amber because she’s also helping Sofia adjust.

I get that this is because it isn’t Amber’s story…it’s Sofia’s, but still, Amber had her reasons for being how she was.

If anything, Sofia herself shows a couple of times that she’s not too much better about handling sharing family and life changes than Amber was…I’m looking at you “Mom’s the Word”

This is a weird post to make in August, but seeing a post about Arthur’s Perfect Christmas (and specifically the Talking Tabby Tantrum) made me think of posting this.

Arthur is one of the few PBS kids shows that I think is squarely aimed at school aged kids and families. Preschoolers and kids DW’s age definitely have representation…but I don’t think the show is marketed towards them. Even DW herself acts way more like a 7-8 year old than the toddler she’s supposed to be.

Arthur’s Perfect Christmas is a great example of this…it’s kind of wild how determined the special is to spoil the existence of Santa Claus. It’s debunked multiple times throughout the special and while it’s not at all spelled out bluntly…it doesn’t exactly shy away from him not existing.

I could almost see the special upsetting really young kids in that way…I feel like it would be a weird one for them to watch and then instantly start watching another movie that’s more pro-Santa like “Polar Express”.

I’m curious to hear you guys thoughts on it…would you show it to a kid who still believes in Santa? Would you show it to a kid that you are preparing to give “the talk” to? Do you think I’m just overthinking again?

Okay, this is a little bit dark, but I could definitely see it being canon. Even though the Loud family was significantly less Loud back then…I still feel like Rita and Lynn Sr would still have moments of carelessness (every parent does).

Added note: this theory is inspired by Rugrats (I don’t love the Loud parents all the time, but I acknowledge they are typically better than even the best Rugrats parents). In that show, it’s revealed that Dill (Tommy’s little brother) was dropped on his head by Phil and Lil when he was a baby…keeping in mind that Dill is only about a year younger than the rest of the kids.

I could see Lori wanting to help her mom take care of her new baby sister, and accidentally dropping Leni on her head. Rita and Lynn Sr instantly tried tending to her and Leni was soon her happy self, but little Lori felt extremely guilty about it (even though both her parents reassured her it was just an accident).

It’s why Lori is (usually) especially protective over Leni…she never fully got over the guilt that she feels for maybe inadvertently causing Leni any lasting head damage.

It also would maybe explain why Lori was so forgiving over what Leni almost did to her college career. Seriously, if that was ANY other sibling, Lori would have twisted them into a pretzel.

By the way, I love Leni, but she is still absolute trash for that. Easily the most outright awful thing any sibling has done to any other sibling in this show (and yes, I am even counting Luan’s April Fools Day pranks…because even in the third one, where she ruins her family’s reputation, she was still the one who agreed to go to every person she embarrassed her sibling in front of to get their reputations back…and even then, the only reason she had body doubles to pull that off is because her family went behind her back first to spare themselves).

I have a theory that both Lori and Leni and Luna and Luan all went through a phase when they were little where they would genuinely pretend they were twins because they were so close in age (and looked similar to each other).

They definitely coordinated super cute Halloween costumes and dressed alike as often as possible. Part of the reason Rita and Lynn Sr don’t remember the other kids struggling with the preschool adjustment is because all the other kids had big siblings that went to school first…and they were so excited to start going too.

Most preschools cater to kids between 2-5, so I could even see some of them going to preschool together…it was a nightmare for preschool teachers having Luna and Luan together. Not because either was particularly destructive but because they were both very…Loud (and messy…I feel like Luna and Luan both enjoyed mud and being dirty…like less gross versions of Lana).

This episode is being talked about a lot lately thanks to the release of The Odyssey and what a wonderful retelling of the story that it was, but the episode actually starts with Arthur being SUPER unlikable for literally no reason at all.

I think lots of people remember Arthur as this perpetual victim of a terrorist little sister, and as someone who has made it her life mission to defend said terrorist little sister…I have to point out that Arthur has just as many moments of being ruthlessly antagonistic towards her for seemingly no reason at all.

Like, DW wasn’t being mean or bratty to him at all during the first part of the episode, but he got super aggressive over how she can’t tell a good story because she can’t write it down…what’s worse is that when she’s talking to grandma about it later…she clearly took what he said to heart. Admitting that he’s right that she can’t write and therefore can’t tell a good story.

It’s extra annoying because this is a little kid with an incredibly impressive resume for a toddler. She won a NATIONAL jingle writing contest by being able to make up a song out of nowhere. She was also able to remember almost every detail from grandma Thora’s retelling of the story.

I don’t necessarily blame Arthur for not having a lot of patience for DW all the time, but honestly, he’s impatient with her a lot more times than he’s patient with her. I just think it’s noteworthy how mean he comes across in this particular episode…usually there will at least be a catalyst for him having an attitude, but not in this case.

I have a similar problem with how he acted during “Prove It!” and again, this is less about truly blaming him and more about pointing out how DW kind of has her reasons for thinking he can be a mean big brother…because he can be.

Lynn Sr. and Rita have gotten stuck spending a ton of time playing horsey and other games on the floor with their kids because when the kids inevitably have an experience where they walk in on their parents “private time” together, their parents reassure them they are just “playing” so the kids will demand they play more like that with them.

Some of the kids genuinely believe that they are “playing” together, but other kids know that they are really doing something dirty, but decide to use that information as blackmail to force their parents to play with them more.

I think she has funny jokes in this cartoon, and I'm quite a fan of her hilarious behavior when jokes or pranks are light.

It’s funny how despite only being 30 seconds long (and being the only musical style Luna won’t even entertain) her funny song shows an amazing level of depth.

It’s also quite dark with the symbolism of Luan using humor to make light of things in life that scare her or make her depressed.

I loathe the April fools day episodes to no end because it’s so apparent that they will always be part of her legacy as a character.

Like, it doesn’t matter how many great episodes she stars in, how much good she does, how much she’s grown…in the long term it seems like all she’s gonna be remembered for is her pranks and Mr. Coconuts.

It’s literally been SEVEN seasons since her last heartless prankster episode, but people still just see her as a 1-dimensional psycho.

Don’t get me wrong, she’s not the only character whose legacy is going to be tarnished in the eyes of the fandom (cough, cough, LJ!) but I feel like Luan is always going to have it the worst.

I watched the seasons 8 and 9 Loud House retrospective today, and while I didn’t agree with every point that was made…it did help me realize something I’d never considered before.

Beanie kind of instigated the whole conflict between Lori and Luan in “Trouble Brewing”.

This episode has the very unusual distinction of being the worst episode that I kind of enjoy. It’s flawed and annoying almost the entire time, but I can’t help but have a soft spot for seeing Lori and Luan bonding in the beginning and end…even though the middle was a mess.

I am personally in the camp that thinks Luan did absolutely nothing wrong and that Lori was incredibly immature, but I have to admit that after watching the retrospective and speaking to the creator of the video (very nice guy, by the way) I do contend that Luan wasn’t great about getting Lori properly trained.

HOWEVER…

The person that is truly to blame for that is Beanie. For one thing, she waits till the last minute to tell Luan she’s in charge (despite the fact that she’s the youngest member of the team and we haven’t seen any indication of how strong Luan’s skills in the role are). Granted, Luan does show throughout the episode that she does know exactly what she’s doing, so I don’t blame Beanie for putting Luan in charge, but…

It’s 100 percent unreasonable to not only be putting this girl in a managerial position for the first time AND expect her to train a new hire. That is just setting both girls up to fail, ESPECIALLY with them being siblings.

Luan didn’t do the best job of training Lori, but she had a million other new responsibilities thrown at her at the literal last minute. I think she did the best job possible considering what she had to work with.

I mean, it’s implied that Luan sweet talked Beanie into giving Lori a chance, so maybe Luan made it seem like Lori wouldn’t need a lot of training. It also makes sense that Luan’s subconscious would probably think “Lori’s got this…she’s always good about thinking on her feet, she won’t need me to hold her hand,” but neither of them should have been put in that position.

Lori still handled it in the worst way possible and was forgiven way too quickly, imo.

This is a really fantastic Luan episode for people who think she’s literally all jokes. Yes, the play she wrote was about a comedian, but she clearly took the project EXTREMELY seriously.

I find it interesting how she and Lucy are both shown using typewriters, despite the fact that this show takes place in modern times. I get that part of it is due to the visual of being able to instantly show a stack of papers, but it’s just kind of interesting that these modern kids are extremely comfortable using typewriters.

It kind of makes me think that they got the typewriter from Rita as a way of bonding with the fellow writers in the family, but funnily enough, Rita is usually shown writing using her laptop. It’s funny that the kids are the ones using the old tech while the parent is using the newer tech.

This is completely beside the point, but kudos to Loud House for not being afraid to show that parents rely on technology and devices today just as much (if not more) than the kids.