*takes out a glass and a bottle of alcohol only to drink from the bottle instead* 

Oh hey, congrats on surviving 2023. You must've been through a lot just to get to 2024. Unfortunately, not everyone made it to the new year and that everyone would be TBATF.

In case if you didn't know or haven't been in the fandom for quite awhile, back in July 2022, the people behind TBATF announced that the comic would be on hiatus. A full year later, it was announced in December of last year, that the comic has been cancelled which nobody saw coming.

i was really looking forward to seeing what chapter 9 would be like but I guess that's not happening. Ah well, it was fun while it lasted. What made it worse is that the TBATF crew didn't bother on sharing what happens next or share the screenshots to their roleplay which the comic was based off of. Instead of doing that, they let the comic go off with a sad whimper. 

*sighs* 

You know... I wasn't always a hater towards this comic. At some point I used to really like it especially when chapter 1 was released. At the time, I thought it had a really interesting concept and it there were some story elements that were never done.

To this day, I consider the first chapters as being the best chapters out of the entire comic. I wasn't a fan of chapter 3 but it was an alright chapter. If I were to recommend the comic to people who are curious, I would say read the first three chapters and don't bother reading the other five chapters. Instead make up what happens in the story as your own continuation because it all goes downhill after chapter 4. Trust me. 

Whenever I would make a review on each new TBATF chapter, I would put a disclaimer saying that if you like comic than don't let my opinions ruin your enjoyment. I'm not here to tell you to stop liking what you like, but I beg you, please don't ignore the disgusting actions of the people who made the comic. 

Speaking of actions, let's go over all the sins that the TBATF crew committed one last time, shall we.

*clears throat* 

- Being total a-holes towards people who wanted to join them during cosplay conventions? Check

 - Drawing their original female characters to be overly sexual while completely ignoring that their fanbase is filled with minors? Check 

-Drawing Tord in nazi imagery and even as going as far as to making him into one? Check 

- Jax telling a kid to go off themself on their birthday and completely denying it despite there being proof? Check 

- Calling all the people who dislike the comic "dEDDheads" which is really disrespectful towards the real Edd? Check

- Drawing Tord in a tub full of over sexualized women and calling Matt a "nosey f**ker" when he discovered it? Check 

- Blocking a whole bunch of people including a few mods (which was against the rules) for criticizing their comic and their actions which lead them to getting banned from the Eddsworld Amino?

Check 

- Bad stereotyping of characters with the prime example of Vlahd being a typical evil Russian man with little to no personality mixed with bad Russian translations that were seemingly pulled from Google translate? Check

 - Racism with Tord having a wife in their Steampunk AU that was Asian and was portrayed as being abusive along with Edd being disguised as a fortune teller which is really offensive towards Romani people? Check 

- Having a scene in the comic where Edd gets sexually assaulted by a bunch of anime girls while playing it off as a joke? Oh hohohoho, checkity check check 

I'm pretty sure that I've missed a few other things that they did but these are the ones that I can recall at the time of my mind. Feel free to remind me of them in the comments below.

Anyway, the biggest offender has to be the one scene in the comic where Edd gets SA'd. If you're wondering where in the comic, it's in Chapter 3 page 21. Anywho, the TBATF thought that Edd getting SA'd was funny and they would tell people that he was consenting.

As the Lbat Attorney and basically Edd's attorney as well, I would like to say: OBJECTION!!! 

Edd was not consenting and if you can see by his facial expression, he was panicking and he was calling out for help. I would also like to point out that after he was freed, he looked really uncomfortable. TBATF crew you should be ashamed of yourselves for thinking that SA is funny and it doesn't help that you decided to use the main character of the series for this quote-unquote "joke". SA isn't funny and it never will be. 

If you to bring up your issues with the comic you would get blocked. Yeah, you heard that right. The TBATF crew have a habit of blocking people who aren't blindly praising them and their comic 24/7. Do you like the comic but want to give some suggestions or have a problem with the comic? Prepare to die. Hate the comic? Prepare to die. Want to critic the comic? Prepare to die. Want to breathe in their direction while passing them by on the street? Oh ho, you're in the jungle now, baby. You're going down. 

So yeah, TL;DR: the TBATF crew are awful people. Well, not all of them. I haven't heard anything bad about Fishiecomics. They're kinda like Aly and tend to be quiet; however, I could be wrong on that. So, feel free to correct me in the comments.

(Editing Lbat: Hey uh, this is future Lbat and I apologize for the interruption. I originally had this part in my drafts but ended up not putting it in. So, while I looking to see what the TBATF crew have been up to after taking a long hiatus, I discovered that Kenz blocked me on Twitter. I have no idea when she did this and to be honest, I didn't know she had a Twitter account up until now and if I did knew about it, I wouldn't dare interact with any of her tweets.

I'm assuming she saw my name pop up in the main eddsworld tag and proceeded to block me on spot. If that's the case than she only made herself look worse. It's been five years since I made that rant and a lot of things have changed.

However, the one thing that hasn't changed is that the TBATF crew are all awful people, but Kenz is the absolute worst out of the four. This lady is literally 30 years old and she's acting like a soiled two year old when she gets criticized by someone. Anyway, I would like to end this part off by saying this: Kenz, if you're somehow reading this and have made this far, I hope you step on a Lego brick every time you wake up in the morning. Alright, that's enough of me. Back to the show) 

Alright, that's enough of the TBATF crew. It's time to talk about the comic and oh boy, where do I even start. I guess we start off with some small pet peeves that I have with it. 

Small Pet Peeves

Like I said earlier, TBATF had a very interesting concept and had pretty good ideas on paper. It's too bad that some of those ideas were executed poorly. I'm still mad about that whole Cyberus thing from Chapter 7 pt. 2. 

Cyberus was based on one of my favorite creatures in Greek mythology. The design could've been better but I was hoping that its role in the chapter would make up for it. It's too bad that everything surrounding it was muddled in stupidity. Sure there was a lot of build up to it being an opposing threat as it lurked in the shadows while Matt was unaware that he was being hunted down, but instead of having any sense of tension, Cyberus had to go out like a little... *clears throat*.. b word in the most underwhelming way as possible.

I feel like that one Simpsons meme, you know the one where Principle Skinner is looking down on something while saying "pathetic", that's basically me when I whenever look at Cyberus. So pathetic and so disappointing. 

There's some moments in the comic that ended up going nowhere and basically became wasted potential. The biggest had to be the time where Edd was working for Tord at the end of chapter 4. I remember the hype surrounding it and even I was on board with the idea of Green Leader and Red Leader working together. It would've been really cool to see. Just imagine the shock on both Tom and Matt's face when they see Edd standing side by side with Tord. Unfortunately, it didn't happen, but man... I'd rather have Edd working with Tord than whatever we got instead. 

The only likable original characters in the comic were both Vlahd and Richard because they had personality unlike the original female characters. Don't even get me on started on them. I know that female characters don't appear that often in Eddsworld but they weren't made to eye candy. The female oc characters are so god damn one dimensional and apparently they have names which I can't even remember because they don't serve any purpose. The only one that does have some personality is the blonde general lady known as Karen aka Brianna but she's just so unlikeable to the point where I just don't care.

Hey, TBATF crew, I hope you don't mind me stealing Vlahd and Richard. They're my legally characters now and there's nothing you can do about it. Speaking of Vlahd, the power scaling in this comic can be really inconsistent at times. Like Edd is able to break reality in this comic which I can't take seriously. It's so stupid. Vlahd on the other hand is really strong. In chapter 5, he was able to burst through a wall and was able to beat up both Tom and Matt with no problem. Alright, it makes sense since Vlahd has a lot of military combat experience while Tom and Matt don't. Then when Tom turns into a monster, Tom had the upper advantage against Vlahd who was struggling. 

Are you guys following? Good. Now explain to me how Vlahd managed to beat up Tom's monster form in chapter 7 pt. 2. One minute Vlahd was struggling and in the next minute, Vlahd is able to beat the monster out of Tom. Tell me how? Because this doesn't make any sense. Sure, maybe you could say that Tom felt fear when Vlahd looked at him, but he was staring at Vlahd right in the eye in chapter 5. Maybe, it had something to do with Tom's visor getting fried by cola. I don't know and I don't care. My brains hurts trying to figure out the logic behind any of this. 

TL;DR: The power scaling in this comic is inconsistent and so is Vlahd's strength. I'm still mad about the whole Vlahd getting beaten by getting electrocuted and scratched by Tord. The scratch part I understand, but Vlahd literally had Tord in a chokehold and Vlahd was shown to be able to break Tord's robot arm in a panel. 

Back on the topic of personality, it's time for the segment that are you were waiting for

Character Derailment

Oh boy, we're finally at the part of how each character got butchered in terms of personality. Just a bit of a disclaimer, I'm not approach this like an animal. I will be starting off with the characters from least butchered to most butchered. Before we begin, I would like point out the TBATF crew said that watched every single of Eddsworld to get their personalities right. However, as a fanfic writer myself, I would like to say that there isn't a correct way or a wrong way on how you should write the characters. It mostly depends on the episode and how the characters would react.

The only advice I could give to someone is that put Edd, Tom, and Matt in a room or basically anywhere and have them interact with their surroundings. Start off slow and just let the interactions flow. Alright, that's enough of the Eddsworld school lesson, let's talk about how the characters are prorated in this comic

Paul and Patryck - These two are the only ones weren't butchered because they don't appear all that often and it's worth knowing that these only had a few lines together in the actual series. They're the only likeable characters but I wasn't a fan of them getting bullied by Karen- I mean Brianna. However, I'm glad that Paul and Patryck worked together with Matt to make Karen's life miserable so I can't be too mad.

The neighbors - All of them were portrayed rather well in their first appearance in chapter 4 where they mocked Tom's plan. However, that was the last we saw them, not counting the one meanwhile comic. In later chapters, both Mark and Todd are dead and what makes it worse is that we didn't get to know how they were killed. I'm a huge neighbors fan, but I am pissed at this.

At least Eduardo's alive but.... it's just painful to watch him. Eduardo in this comic only knows one emotion and that constant anger. There's not even a scene in this comic where Eduardo is mourning the lost of his friends. He's just angry for the sake of being angry. In the series, Eduardo was shown to have emotions of fear when a missile was targeting at his house, showing sadness when Jon died, showing concern when Edd gets hurt by monster Tom even going as far as to save him, and there some scenes where Eduardo can really chill. The TBATF crew would've known about this if they didn't threw every character positive character traits out the window, but what I know? I'm a dEddhead according to them meaning that I'm not a real Eddsworld fan. 

Tom - Tom started off really good at the start of the comic, he peaked in chapters 3 and 4, and ended up falling off of a cliff after chapter 5. He became a nothing character or what I like to call him, a prop. He would end up vanishing out existence only to be brought back when the TBATF crew remembered that he has a role of being a mind controlled slave following Tord's orders.

I'm not a fan of the whole Tom being mind controlled by Tord trope and I don't plan on going into detail as to why. I'm saving it for a different time. I've seen this trope happen in fan content so many times to the point where I'm just sick of seeing it. Can we please let this trope die? 

Matt - Oh my god, I hate what they did to him and this coming from a person who's comfort character is literally Matt. Matt started off good at the beginning up until chapter 7 pt. 2 (well chapter 6) where he's treated like an absolute joke. Matt on this comic has been portrayed as being stupid and sometimes smart. However, his smartness is far and a few between while his stupidity is his main trait to the point where it's just infuriating to look to at.

Some of the decisions that he makes in later chapters due to plot reasons gives me pain. Like why did he stopped trying to help free Eduardo? Why didn't he just drag Tom somewhere else when he got the perfect chance to go near him while nobody was looking? Why was he sneezing so much when he hiding from Cyberus? I get he's allergic to dogs, but he didn't have to sneeze every time. Like why!? 

Edd - *sighs with a tears in my eyes*.... Look, how they masscared my boy. ....My sweet baby boy. ....My favorite bastard boy that wears a green hoodie. It hurts, it hurts so much. Edd was handled really well from the start of the comic and while he did some moments that were a bit jarring, the way how he reacted toward everything made up it. That is until chapter 3 where he gets SA'd and what made it worse is that Matt was the closest to him and he didn't even notice that Edd was being surrounded by anime girls. Surely nothing could be worse than Edd getting SA'd, right? Right? Edd wouldn't be in the second entry if that was case. 

So, who wants to hear a story of how I get these scars? It's a little something called chapter 5. I don't think I've ever made it clear but I really, really, REALLY despise this chapter and it's because of how Edd was treated. So, basically Edd and Tord make a deal which involves Edd getting cola. However, Tord lies and betrays him which causes Edd to get really angry and storms out while leaving both Tom and Matt behind. I repeat, Edd left Tom and Matt behind after he was betrayed by Tord all because Edd wanted cola.

Do you see what's wrong with this picture? Yes, Edd can be a jerk in the series, but he wouldn't leave his friends behind especially when they are in danger and are almost beaten to death. I get Edd wanted cola, but this wasn't the way to get it. If you think things can't any worse, fast forward to the future where Edd is now Future Edd and he is now very depressed to the point where it's just so painful to watch. Future Edd is a beloved character and he gave us a look into a bleak reality where Edd lost everything and wants to kill his past self. WTFuture gave us so many questions and what does the TBATF crew do with it? Well, they made this version of Future Edd so unbearable. How lovely. 

Now, not everything is bad. I did enjoy the moment where Edd reunites with Ringo until the moment is ruined when the Tord's army finds him and he ends up abandoning her on the streets.

*inhales* Boi!! 

Why would you leave Ringo to die like that!? I get that your life is one the line but what's stopping you from taking your beloved pet cat with you? Oh wait, plot reasons. 

Oh and that's not the end of it. While being chased around by Vlahd (and basically everything else that's out to get him, but mostly Vlahd), he makes puns EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. Edd, are you trying to get yourself killed? Are you that desperate to die? We get it, TBATF crew!! Edd likes to make puns!! You don't have to spell it out for us!!! WE'RE NOT F**KING IDIOTS!!! 

So yeah, long story short: I hate Edd's portrayal in the later chapters. They completely ruined the main character of the series and they made him so god damn unlikable which is why I gave him the name Discount Edd because he's not the Edd that I know. He's an imposter. A faker. 

Tord - I'll be honest here, I was considering to have Edd and Tord as one entry because they're both equally bad. However, after taking the time to think about it, Tord is the worst character in this entire comic which means that I can finally let loose all of anger and nobody will get mad. In fact, I believe that we all come together and agree that Tord got beaten up like a dead animal. 

So where did the killing of Tord's personality happened exactly? It can't be the chapter he was introduced in since it was actually good. Hmm.... oh? Hey, it's chapter 5 again. Wait.... oh no. I know I keep bringing up chapter 5 but this was chapter were all character personalities went to die and oh boy, did Tord's personality died that day.

I'm not going to sugar coat it, they made Tord into a straight up nazi both appearance wise and personality wise. He went from a person who seemed to have evil motives behind the scenes to a cartoon villain with no redeeming qualities. On the topic of motives, he has none. It's never explained why he wants to take over London and the world nor what his ambitions.

I'm sure that there's probably an explanation and if there was one, the comic did a poor job at explaining. Every story has a villain that has goals that rivals the protagonist's goal. A villain usually has a motive as why they think they're doing is good. Some villains like the destruction that their plans bring while some villains are sympathetic which you can relate to.

So, does Tord have any goals that rivals the goals of the main trio? No. Is Tord sympathetic? Nope. Does Tord enjoy the destruction that happens? Well, uhh.... he seems to enjoy it I guess. 

That's one out of three questions answered but what made Tord come up with the idea to the rule the world? What makes Tord tick? Something must've happened. Well dear audience, he was always evil especially back in preschool which is an insult to all preschoolers. No child acts evil at such a young age and if they did, than that would be really concerning.

Oh, but that's not all, the TBATF crew thought it was a good idea give Tord a mental disorder which is APSD (Anti-social Personality Disorder; mostly called Sociopathy for short). I would like to clarify, you are allowed to give a character a mental disorder, but you have to do your research. You can't just slap it onto them without any thought or reason.

Did the TBATF crew do their research before giving Tord a mental disorder? Of course they didn't. I wouldn't be talking about this if they did do their research. To add insult to injury, they gave Tord medication to manage his APSD but they also make him not take it. But wait, it's get much worse. The TBATF crew actually made Tord's mental disorder the reason why he's evil which is really ableist to people that actually suffer from APSD. 

Before I lose my sanity, I would like to congratulate Tord. He is officially the worst character in this entire comic.

Welcome to the jungle, baby. God, I'm so done with this. I need another drink... *takes out another bottle of alcohol and starts chugging it down* 

BONUS ROUND

Oh golly gee, I've been really negative towards both chapter 5 and the later chapters, but mostly toward chapter 5. Seriously though, f**k chapter 5. There are two positive things that I can say about the later chapters. Those being: 

1) Laurel only appeared for a spilt second and was lucky enough to not get her personality absolutely destroyed. Thank god. 

And 2) The uniforms that the Red Army were wearing look pretty nice. I love really dig the red and black uniforms. 

Unfortunately, the colors do not work on Tord. Yeah, we're going to be talking about Tord's uniform because oh dear lord, what the hell is up with this design? It looks so awful and I hate it. 

Why is there so many shades of red red!? I get that he's the Red Leader but this is too much. I know there's lines that tell you where his robot arm and hoodie start and end but that's only if you're looking really closely. When you're not looking closely, the lines just blend together and it just looks messy. Also, what is up with that blade thing that's on the top top of his robot arm? Also, what is up with those gun hoisters that are on his sides in some scenes? Do the TBATF crew think that they look cool? Well, they don't look cool to me. They look stupid. The same can be said about that stupid super villain cape that he's wearing. 

I'm assuming that the TBATF crew were basing the uniform design from the Red Leader concept art from the Super Average project that was canned due to Edd's death and if that was the case, they failed miserably with what they came up with. I've seen hundreds upon hundreds of Red Leader fanart each with a different uniform design. You are allowed to be creative but you have make sure it looks good and don't have Tord look like a nazi.

If I had it my way in designing a uniform for Tord in this comic, I would keep the black and yellow that he has on his sleeves. I would make the coat blue to match the coat that he was wearing in his debut chapter. I would also get ride of the blade and replace it with the bandages that he had back in chapter 2. I would get rid of the cape along with the black scars that are on the right side of his face because he looks like moldy cheese. I would also get rid of the red glowing eye and replace it with an eyepatch since I don't like it. For the finishing touch I would give Tord his spiked helmet. 

See, does sound better than what we got? Of course it does. Anyway, I just wanted to do complain about Tord's uniform for a few minutes. Moving on. 

The End of TBATF-vangelion

It's over. I can't believe it but it's finally over. TBATF is done. Like I said in the beginning, TBATF had a very interesting concept but it was poorly executed.

So, what's next? Well, we do what the Eddsworld fandom is known to do when it comes to fan content. Whenever a piece of fan content goes into the sunset, a new creation rises up from its ashes like a phoenix. I'm hoping that someone out there will create something better than TBATF or perhaps recreate it in their own way.

There is someone that did repurpose the concept of TBATF and that person is no other than SofArtfactory who created the story, Protect: Tord. I have to say after reading the first three chapters, their story is really good and it's better than TBATF. I highly recommend checking it out. The story is on Wattpad just search up the words "protect: tord" and you'll find it. Also, it's their first story so remember to be nice when leaving a critique.

There's also a parody of TBATF that was created by The Amazing Meh on YouTube and that too is also very good. Go check it out. 

You're probably thinking this: "Lbat what's going to happen now that TBATF is over?" 

Well, I plan do on reviewing more Eddsworld and probably review fan content. I'm sad that I won't be reviewing chapter 9 but I'm also happy that the comic is over. Reading each page and panel to a chapter is pretty exhausting but I did it because I saw that nobody was reviewing the chapter. So, I was the one that would take the bullet so nobody had to. Don't thank me, you're welcome.

I would like to say thank you to TBATF for helping me get to where I am right now. Sure, we may gotten off on the wrong foot but thanks for encouraging me to write. 

"Hey Lbat, will you recreate TBATF in the future or maybe give a retrospect of the comic?" 

I do have plan on reviewing the entire comic for its 10 year anniversary. As for recreating TBATF, I thinking about doing it; however, it's going to take a longtime because I'll probably just reboot the entire thing. I'll keep concept though and put my own twist into it.

Anyway, this has been Lbat1901 and it's been a pleasure being your tour guide through the world's dangerous ride known as The Beginning And The Friend. Now, it's time to lay this comic to rest with a bang. 

Hasta la vista, baby...

*presses a red button which fires off three large energy beams that travel up towards the sky and heads towards a planet named "TBATF". The beams hit the planet causes the planet to explode into a colorful display of fireworks that light up the night sky*