Fishtank Live [Season 2]

Well I'm five days behind but better late than never. It's time once again for me to blogpost about Fishtank Live. Which due to the success of season 1, is at least planning on releasing a new season every 6 months.
If anything, this is more so an outlet for me to rant and do power rankings of the contestants like I did for season1. But if one person out of maybe the ten or so who reads this decides to start watching, then hey done deal and worth it anyway. Imma TRY to do a post after each elimination with a brief summary and personal ranking update like I did for season1. We'll see. If you need a quick overview of what Fishtank Live is all about, check out the intro post in my season1 thread among the below links.

Suggested Related Links:
My Season1 Coverage: https://cwcki.club/index.php?threads/fishtank-live.2428/
Main Steam Viewing Site (It's free nerds, just have to sign up): https://www.fishtank.live/
Best Source for Nearly 24/7 Updates: https://twitter.com/fishtankhouse
Best Source for Daily Summaries: https://twitter.com/vilerat_
My Twitter which for the next month is probably gonna be 50% Fishtank shit in the replies: https://twitter.com/MrGlaive

What New With Season 2?:
Prize money increased likely due to the wild success of season1. They also outright bought the new house that season2 is hosted in. Word is that they got Nick Rochefort to handle a lot of the interior design choices to get the tank to it's current 70s decor. Much comfier and less sterile looking, solid improvement even though house is clearly dated. The general premises, rules, and audience interactions are all the same. The site does have some new features but the UI seems like a downgrade. Sorta ugly. The new features are mostly gimmicky and aren't worth a notable mention. However the endorsement feature is neat, as it lets each user pick a single contestant at a time that they want to suggest is their favorite. Always fun to see how the general audience stacks them up without having to wait for a manual poll to be posted up.

How The Hell Do I Enjoy Something Like Fishtank?:
Throwing this out because similar to trying to gear people towards certain shows, book series, game series, streams, ect. ect., your gonna have a bad time without some background prep. Since the show streams literally 24/7 with a camera in every room, if your first impression is sitting an hour straight watching one of the bedroom cameras with only 2 or 3 contestants just shooting the shit at 11am you're not going to catch anything worthwhile 99% of the time. Waste of time. I love Fishtank as a series but I honestly only watch live 4-5 times a week in short spurts. Once you get familiarized enough with the contestants, you can essentially "watch" it via other's highlight snippits. Then simply tune in whenever you've got some downtime. Twitter seems to be most reliable dumping ground of updates, and you can likewise get word of upcoming challenges or events in advance to know when you might want to actually tune in live. Challenges and entrances of new guests are usually the two best moments to catch live. Among that, simply seeing the other fan's reactions and takes makes following Fishtank a lot more digestible without a huge time commitment after getting familiarized enough and picking out some favorite fish.

Since I'm 5 days behind I'll make a post right after this with my initial rankings.
Stay frosty Fishtankers

 

Well, didn't keep my word on posting initial power rankings immediately. Christmas and all that jazz.
We've already lost a significant number of fish by now after only a single week of showtime. So I'll break off the ones that are gone already into a separate section since there's no point in having them ranked. But they likewise still deserve to be sussed out.

This one is going to be LONG as fug given it's the initial sniff test of each fish. My (hopeful) further posts should have rankings with slight adjustment blurbs and not textwall bios.

Glaive's Current Fishtank Cast Review + Rankings

1. Jimmy - Jimmy, or as I've so fondly taken to calling him, Jimbo, easily tops out my current rankings. As much as I enjoyed season 1 of Fishtank and still had my favorites to win, there was never anyone that I felt I could say I backed as an obvious standout contestant. It wavered a lot between Jon, Josie, and Vance. Each likable off of a given angle which shifted day to day in spite of serious flaws. But here with season 2 it's a clear choice. He's too relatable for me to not pick with just how he speaks. Yes, he trauma dumps about his issues far too much. Yes, he can't read certain situations well enough and then just autist rambles over everyone as cover. But the very specific references he keys in on tells me he's our lad and he's got no breaks with generating highly memorable moments. Jimmy and Jimmy alone called out the fact the Fishtank season 2 cast were all in the know already as dedicated MDE fans. As Tai would have put it, "he broke the Fishtank" and far earlier than planned which made production scramble to pull an audible. He's by far the most aware of the inner workings of the show but is genuinely schizo enough that he doesn't even need to put on an act about it as cover. He can sheepishly play that angle to his advantage and it's the biggest edge he's got whether he knows it or not. His downfall would be letting his inner schizo demons win, which might pan out as being the number 1 most likely to shoot up their class in anyone's High School yearbook. For now he's drinking straight from the fishtank both literally and figuratively.
2. Shinji - Now this is a steep dropoff for me down to the #2 contestant. That's not to try and dimmish what Shinji does bring to the tank, he's playing an incredibly smart game with winning in mind. Shinji isn't rocking the boat harshly with any one contestant and has maintained a fairly neutral stance through and through with most peeps. That being said he also isn't a complete empty void of no content. There's a big difference between playing it safe and playing it safe to the point where you are just sleeping through the majority of Fishtank and not speaking to anyone. We've seen that before....not naming names. Instead, Shinji has at least shown enthusiasm in most challenges and gets a lot of positive shock value from his tales about his weird ass Japanese JAV porn title work. He's gotta watch that angle though. Audience seems to be giving him some grace but he has clearly been oversharing about some unsavory bits that might backfire with enough internet sleuthing. Despite also being a vaguely autistic mess like the rest of the cast, he still seems to have more interpersonal awareness than most which has already proven worth. Convinced he's locked in the weeaboo vote by simply being Japanese. He'll get to top 3.
3. TJ - Our wild jungle man of this season, who early on appeared like a Josie clone with his constant fidgeting and rocking back and forth. Times ten. This boi can't sit still. Unless you get him drunk as shit which magically calms the autism and has happened in a few instances. Granted he spent half of an entire night passed out cold enough to where an air horn couldn't wake him up. But seems like TJ can get settled enough to be vaguely sociable with just a little push in the right direction or be given a decent prompt within a challenge. He can be a content sinkhole at times so his longterm success is likely dependent on how often and creative the production staff get with challenges going forward. Great attitude alone gets him higher up in my ranking as he seems fairly undisturbed by what would otherwise be jarring moments for those who dropped out already. His overall favorability is low still, so doubt he will go too far without a serious character development plotline shift. Strangely hardened contestant in ways people wouldn't have guessed.
4. Tayleigh - It feels weird putting Tayleigh forth. As I suppose I haven't specified if my power ranking list is off of sheer "liking" the contents versus whether or not I think they will genuinely win. Huge difference. During season 1 the rankings I did were almost solely based on just personal likeability but probably fudged the listings a bit based on some trends. That being said, no, I don't REALLY like Tayleigh. But everyone below her I've got at least some gripe with that puts them into the bottom rung. She's not been enough of a shit stirrer, and the few times she has been have been the only moments that have really garnered her a fanbase. Content blackhole void even worse than TJ at times on top of lack of any showstopping challenge performances are really the dealbreaker here for me. Personality wise she's not as bad as what others might say, it's more so just the lack of action that does me in here. Starting fights might actually do her well if they are pointed enough at right time/person, just doubtful after a week if she's really capable of that.
5. Trish - Mkay now we are getting into the actively disliked category of fish. While yes, it's true Trish has been an excellent sport and has gone through with some embarrassing plans pitched out by production staff without even a blink that overall gained her some likeability, she's still a one-trick pony. Being the one vaguely attractive female contestant (in certain lights) willing to do slightly raunchy shit only goes so far. Will it take her into the final half? Yes absolutely. Will she have a serious character development breakthrough that wins the hearts of fishtank fans and go the full distance? Absolutely not. She IS one of if not the best masker in terms of already having outside knowledge. Everyone is vastly underestimating how much she knows about Fishtank and MDE as a whole. Jimmy still beats her out, but she's way more versed than she'd ever let on. I personally found various socials of hers before anyone else, and yes, she's well clued in and tracks lolcows and whatnot. She'll go far but I ain't backing her ever.
6. Brian - Trash tier time. I already disliked Brian knowing he was the one single last minute substitute to fill in for the other 10th contestant that got cut. To be honest I thought Brian would be gone by now given that alone. Figured he'd have Christmas plans already situated and this was just a means of having him be the final tenth contestant able to finally start the show with. But yet, he's still here. Brian gives me normie vibes in such an off-putting way I'm not really sure how to express it properly. This isn't to say folks from normal walks of life that would otherwise be pinned as "normies" can't be solid fishtank cast members. It's just that Brian has this grandeur of being "a normal MDE/Fishtank fan" who is somehow better because of uh....soup kitchens???? Scripted love triangle shit??? He needs to go, now.

Glaive's Eliminated Fishtank Cast Review

• Summer - As horribly on-the-nose as it was, I still give Summer the trophy for making the best season 1 reference yet. After revealing that yes, every single person in the room had already watched at least some of Fishtank season 1, Summer lets out the tried and true blurb to take all blurbs of "Hehe, so where's the ice cream in this joint?!??" followed by Sam giving an awkwardly long pause. That alone made me a Summer fan. I'm sold she knew how to draw the line between making timely cringe versus hamfisted cringe when it came to gags relying on that type of guff. Despite that she was obviously far too mentally unstable to endure the tank let alone put up with the days she did stay there. Tactical puke can only be endearing so many times in a row. If she doesn't attack production for putting her in a defensive situation any further, I'll think she'll still come out of this experience in a positive light to most. Good run lass.
• Meghan - I would have likely rated Meghan more so neutrally if I hadn't tuned into her stream with Cole. No matter what she still bitched out and tapped as soon as our based boi Jimbo used his radio announcer voice to assert dominance and toss a chair VAGUELY in her general direction. Weak showing. Her best chance would have been somehow leaning into grabbing the "ironic" vote from the fanbase. Which would have in no way won her the entire tank, but she might have made it mid-season off of some fan inspired grifts. But yeah she's a dusty cunt for pandering to Cole after his departure as the one crumb of attention she realized she could scrape up as one of the only other eliminated fish.
• JC - This is the quickest entry as her stay was so unremarkable and brief that there's not much of anything to be said. Fake Cole sidekick? Yeah sure she played that bit okay. Other than that she wasn't even around long enough to partake in any challenges besides literally counting rice grains in usual Fishtank demeaning fashion. BUT she's been keen on casting thoughts post-exit-fishtank which have been an invaluable source of tidbits. Other eliminated fish seem to find a way to incorporate or otherwise organize calls involving JC. So yeah I guess she's useful bullet fodder.
• Cole - Easily the most difficult tank member to write about without rustling a large sect of the fishtank fanbase. I should start by saying production staff made a grave mistake hammering him as hard as they did. They pressed Cole in ways that were overly simplistic and poorly thought out. So now Cole looks like a martyr for "getting kicked". THAT'S the edge Cole's got currently with being so popular despite being adamant about already wanting to leave on his own accord. Cole very explicitly voiced he was done with the abuse and staff leaned into it wanting him gone anyway. Became very opportunistic then to just explain him away. His entire "detective" schtick was amusing and was worthily of keeping him around for at least another week or two minimum. Big staff L. Cole in no way should have been anywhere near final three though, one-trick pony regardless.

 

I broke the Fishtank thread, message limit increased solely from this post.