History Headscratchers / Animorphs

** It's indicated that there is in fact a "rule" that says you don't take another Yeerk's host. Especially not your superior's, though in theory you could take that body and kill your boss KlingonPromotion style. Visser Three probably also had his own pool (there are perks to being in charge) to avoid this. As to stopping Alloran from escaping, I figure it like this: Step 1: get guards with UndyingLoyalty to you, not to the Yeerk Empire but ''you''. Step 2: Walk up to your pool, and have the guards restrain your legs, tail and put a sheath on the tail blade. Step 3: Leave your host and go into the pool. Step 4: The moment the guards see the Yeerk leave, they shoot the host body with Dracon Beams set to stun. Alloran is too restrained to move at all, and there is no morph he can change into fast enough to avoid being shot. Step 5: Guards wait until cycle in pool is over (restunning host as necessary), and then move the body over so you can get back in. Step 6: Once the Yeerk is back in, remove all restraints.

* In ''The Stranger'' the weird future the Ellmist shows to the Animorphs has Visser Three saying "The Ellimist has brought you six humans...you five humans and one Andalite...here to show you a future." With the Rachel from the past/present saying to her future self and Visser Three "Something has changed! It's Ax, isn't it? You said 'six humans' before. That's what you expected to find. That's what Rachel told you would happen. But the future has changed, hasn't it? Something is different." So...was there a differ net timeline where Ax didn't demorph to scare the Controller woman who bumped into Rachel? Or was there a timeline where Ax was never rescued but there was a sixth hero with them?

** It is not possible that the Yeerk did not know how to morph. He had already morphed several times by that point. He got morphing right on his first try, too. Presumably Visser Three got it right on his first try as well while other Controllers may have taken longer not because he's some sort of prodigy but because Jake and Alloran already knew how to morph and so therefore Temrash and Visser Three did, too. Temrash gave up any real hope of being rescued before the Fugue started so I doubt a lack of strength was a part of it (and indeed, Jake notes that even while the Yeerk is dying he still can't control himself so it's not like the Yeerk's control was slipping). It's possible it never occured to Temrash to trap himself, it's possible that it was the result of the Yeerk tendency Jake noted to quit when it's hopeless, and it's also possible that he'd rather die than spend the rest of his (presumably short) life as a ''nothlit.'' Becoming a ''nothlit'' would have destroyed the Animorphs by destroying their leader but Temrash either didn't have the smarts or the will to pull that off.

When Cassie morphs a caterpillar in [[[[Recap/AnimorphsTheDeparture Book #19]] and stays in that morph for longer than two hours, she becomes a nothlit. Fair enough, that's what always happens when you stay in a given morph for that long. But then she metamorphoses into a butterfly, and suddenly she's able to morph back into a human again. Apparently metamorphosis can reset the morphing clock. The thing is, when any animal goes through metamorphosis, it does not become another species; it remains the same genetically at every stage of its life. So, for example, would a tadpole nothlit be able to morph again once they became a frog? And then there's the matter of animals with more gradual, but still noticeable, growth changes. For example, if you were a chick nothlit, would your morphing clock reset upon becoming an adult chicken, or would you be stuck as a chicken for the rest of your life? In other words, where's the line?

** It's also an unnecessary argument. By the end of the series Humanity and the Animorphs were engaged in a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_War Total War]]. A Total War is SeriousBusiness wherein victory is the ''only'' objective with all directives being secondary, including the ObstructiveCodeOfConduct. To borrow from Website/TheOtherWiki total war is a war ''limitless'' in its scope in which a belligerent engages in the mobilization of ''all'' their available resources in order to crush their rival's capacity for resistance. In a total war, there is less differentiation between combatants and civilians than in other conflicts, and sometimes no such differentiation at all, as nearly every Alien resource, civilians and soldiers alike, can be considered to be part of the belligerent effort. In facing a war of cultural extermination Total War isn't just recommended, it's '''mandatory'''. This doesn't mean being [[StupidEvil unnecessarily cruel]], but it does mean that if presented with a path to victory, you take it without regard to what that path might entail. Facing a complete invasion by alien [[BrainSlug brain slugs]] I don't see why Jake should have any qualms about killing 17,000 of the enemy occupation force to save his planet and his species. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMk5sMHj58I You fight to win the war]]. If WarIsHell then best it be dispensed with quickly.

** Regarding him faking an identity, he didn't do it in today's world, he did do it back in the 80s when it was far easier. It's implied that he helped Steve Jobs and Bill Gates develop computer technology, which was happening in the 70s and 80s. The latest he would've been on Earth as a human would've been the mid 80s, as he was pulled back to his andalite timeline just as Tobias was conceived, and he was about 13 in 1996 when the series started.

* So basically, the Animorphs play on the fact that the Andalites think that they’re incompetent and liable to fall apart at the slightest set-back and stage a break-up so that they can spy on the Andalites and send Ax to them without arousing suspicion. Presumably, Ax is in on the plan but if he’s aware at the time of the break-up (and not informed afterwards) then he thinks some very strange things like ‘I had never heard Marco speak so harshly to Cassie. But more shocking still was that Jake did not step in to silence him’ when if he knew then he wouldn't find it strange or shocking that they were playing their parts to fool the Andalites. I know that the reason for Ax's narration is to lend credence to the unlikely event that the Animorphs really are over but in-universe it doesn’t make sense.

* Also as an OOC reason as a writer, the amount of places the battles could take place were severely limited if Rachel kept using only the elephant morph. It had to be big open areas every single time or she would have been useless. KAA and/or the ghostwriters might have been running out of ideas or wanted to use more locations an elephant wouldn't be able to literally fit in. Using an animal that was around the same size as the ones the rest of the team were all morphing allowed for the writers to use more varied locations.

** Chalk that up to just one of the weird requirements of acquiring DNA. Why does it have to be in your default form? Why can't you acquire DNA from someone in a morph? etc.

* Why, exactly, were the Yeerks so quick to show up after the Animorphs arrived? It can't be that they discovered the Animorphs were up to something with James and the others because the Auxiliary Animorphs were left alone and Cassie had no problems appealing to them for help. Did the room just happen to have a campera and Controller was on duty monitoring it all night despite the first center not having a camera at all?

** Tobias' usefulness (besides being the eye in the sky) was particularly evident in the first book. He was the most willing to believe Elfangor, he helped Jake believe that it all actually happened and he helped everyone realise that they needed to fight the war, if only to respect Elfangors dying wish that Earth be defended. In short, his connection to Elfangor made it easier for the Animorphs to decide to fight. Marco might have been chosen because his connection to Visser One would have made him want to free her from Yeerk control, removing a high ranking Yeerk. Considering what happened after the Animorphs freed Eva (Visser Three's promotion, the declaration of all-out war, the Animorphs actually getting help with defeating Yeerks from other humans, WINNING THE WAR), that was a smart move.

** It was an assassination mission to kill his brother. He sent her because he knew she would do it, because she was that screwed up by the war. No one else was quite that screwed up yet, Marco could understand the horrible necessity, but was needed to work with Ax to get control of the Pool Ship. It was also a suicide mission. You send as few people as possible on those.

** Morphing doesn't seem to affect things like skin and gut flora otherwise there would be unpleasant side effects caused by sterilising your entire body every time you morphed, nor does it effect the Yeerk inside a Controller; given those two pieces of information, it seems likely that a fetus would be unaffected

** Setting aside the quality of California public schools and whether or not they should have been in private schools, yes their education suffered. But what does it really matter? Tobias lives as a hawk, what does he need an education for? The surviving Animorphs are beloved world heroes, so a lack of education probably isn't going to hurt them too much. Marco understands enough about money to become wealthy (chalk that up to knowledge in a particular field), uses his natural charisma to be the "face" of the Animorphs, and acts as the "stunt animal" on a tv show about a hero who turns into animals. Jake, Cassie, and Marco all wrote books, so they knew enough about writing for that be possible, but their popularity surely helped and Cassie's apparently wasn't very interesting. Cassie meanwhile had life long training in animal care, allowing her to pursue that. Jake spent years in depression, but was eventually hired to do something he COULD do: train soldiers how to morph effectively. Ax presumably also rode the "hero train", and last we saw was a ship Captain, so he knew enough for that. Their education was lacking, but it didn't hurt them.

** If they are captured in human form than most of them would be able to just morph Andalite and than try to find a way out of there. As for training I think tactically Ax could probably teach them the "ins and outs" of how to control such a body. Or the others would at least get Ax to try and teach them. The Yeerks believe they are Andalites in human morph or at least suspect it from what I've heard, (I think it said in The Invasion that they thought the kids who escaped were Andalites in disguise because they didn't think they had any reason to be near the fighter) so even if all that is true it is something that I think Jake would at least discuss with Ax. I know they would than have to alter their apperence and hide but at least then any Animorphs not captured would probably not be seen in "human morph" and have slightly less to fear.

** In the first book, Jake ''thought'' Cassie, Rachel, and Tobias went on acquiring morphs. From what we later learn, actually it was just Rachel getting the elephant, which means they tied with Jake and Marco (one new morph per party). As to why in that case, first they had to loose the guards chasing them (the reason they split up), then find a useful morph (antelope? No. Giraffe? No.), one they would be willing to become (Hyena? I hate hyenas.), and enter the pen of (Lion? It might eat me). So that could explain why they only appear to have gotten an elephant morph, but the only excuse for Cassie not getting the elephant too is "she was guarding the door" or something. In the first book, her morph really is just a horse. Which if nothing else, allowed her to rescue one woman from the Pool.

** As to why no one noticed it ''before'' they blew up Elfangor's ship, here's an explanation. When the Yeerks land, the Hork-Bajir and Taxxons mostly just stand to attention and/or act as guards. They simply may not have seen it and might not have even known what it was if they did (it just looks like blue box after all). Visser Three seemed to be focusing on gloating that he's finally defeated his most hated enemy, so he probably didn't see it either. Elfangor standing up one last could have hidden it behind it, and then ship was blown up and the cube went flying.

** And it occured to Jake that Visser One might decide to try something like that which is why before he demorphs he has Ax knock Alloran out. Once he's unconscious, Visser One's options were leaving voluntarily or they threatened to cut him out. The Yeerks aboard the Pool Ship declared their intention to continue fighting if they weren't given amnesty and access to the morphing cube. If they didn't surrender, they either would have lost to the Andalites and been killed or they would have beaten the Andalites (unlikely with the Blade Ship gone and Erek disabling weapons) and still not have had access to morphing. They were getting a pretty good deal, all things considering, and this was really the first opportunity they had to surrender that wouldn't have resulted in the best-case scenario being them forced back to their planet and never being allowed to leave again with nothing better than Gedds to infest.

** I'd say his sole motivation was fear for his hide. It wasn't about remaning free, let alone gaining any gains - it was about survival. He saw the power the Yeerks possessed and he didn't believe the Andalites would win (he even said something to that sound to Alloran). As a paragon of DirtyCoward he reasoned: "Sooner or later they'll find Earth anyway, and then it'll all about orbital bombardment and other unhealthy activities. Forget that, I'd better hurry up and stake my lap-dog position now!"

** As somebody that's read all of the books countless times, I have seen no real in universe explaination for Elfangor failing to take this rather obvious way out. There's no indication in anything we see about him, either in the main books or the Andalite Chronicles that he was suicidal or didn't want to fight, or was panicking at the time and didn't think of it, or was too weak to do it (the Animorphs have been on the verge of death or really really exausted countless times and still been able to morph) Tobias' broken wing was the sole exception in the entire series to complete morph healing that they never give any explaination to either, and there was MORE than enough time for Elfangor and the Animorphs to escape from the construction site before the Yeerks managed to show up. The out of universe reason? Ol' Applegate probably just didn't think of it, or she just didn't want to use the character for some reason.