MR. CANDLE CARES

- Oskar often plays the typical pieces of who’s just started learning how to play an instrument (and yet in Mewberty he was playing “good”). This and his introduction suggest that he’s a total newbie at music. Or just really bad.



- I guess that even if he weren’t on Tom’s payroll, Mr. Candle would still be an awful counselor, if he thinks that Oskar can be a professional musician.





- With the exception of a quick reference in Royal Pain Star has never talked/ mentioned / showed interest in Oskar after Mewberty, and this time as well she’s more interested in the counseling than her supposed crush (she watches them going away, but I guess it’s a generic “Oh wow I’m so excited now it’s my turn to get my future told!”).

Also, despite not being anymore in the cast shot in the intro, Alfonzo and Ferguson are still alive.







- “Star mistakes the career counseling for actual future reading” is one of the few things in this episode I got right from the promos, and even then I heard it first on 4chan. Marco doesn’t correct her… he should know better after Fortune Cookies and School Spirit, but maybe he just didn’t want to burst her bubble.





- Mewni still appreciates phrenology





- I guess that rasing warnicorn : Mewni = rasing horses : Earth, so the typical “dream job” for a princessy kid. Just more dangerous. Maybe a joke, maybe Star really did put some thinking into her future, disregarding (denying?) the “queen” part.







- The episode focuses more on Marco, giving us less insight on Star’s feelings that I would’ve expected. I truly hope that we’re going to hear about this subject again.Star never directly talked about having to be queen, just how pressuring and stressful her mother is in Sleep Spells. That was about her mother more than about her future.





- Star being this indifferent about the question casts the shadow of doubt on the idea of her journal guarding secret, romantic feelings about Marco (never really believed it anyway, it’s almost surely something about Marco, but I don’t think it’s strictly romantic), but keep in mind that she’s sad and focused on the “future set in stone” thing. Or the writers just didn’t think about it while making this scene.

Still nice seeing her being so natural about it, and not “W-what! No he’s- he’s just my friend” SVTFOE has its own brand of teasing, with no need for the frustrating “Will they won’t they”. Yet.





- Marco always brags about “lame” things.





- So Marco isn’t just nerdy, he’s trying to pave the road to his future? And Red Belt is, in part, about Marco’s fear for his future, for what he’s going to become. I wonder if this is just good ol’ Marco, being so unsure about himself, or if there is more to it.





- Let’s forget, for a moment, about all the “Ahaha Marco want to be queen and he covered his chest after the shower ahah princess Marco canon”:

• “I’d love to be queen” : What about being king ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

• “People would just love you ‘cause they have to” : we’re always back on this subject. Marco has little self esteem, he’s socially awkward and has few friends. He’s just “the safe, good kid”, failing in trying to change how others’ see him.

• “You never have to bathe alone” :

1. That sounds like something an old man, worried to slip and die alone in the shower, would say

2. So that explaines why Star was in the bathroom with a showering Marco in the premiere

3. All those exchange students, caring so much about his friends an trying not to lose them as seen in School Spirit with him trying to save Ferguson from being kidnapped… looks like Marco doesn’t like being alone. Maybe he’s been alone for most of his life, before finding Al, Ferg and Star.

This may apply to Star too.







- Tom’s plan was, probably, to discover if Marco and Star are dating (so even outsiders think that it’s strange for them not being a thing…), and to allude to “having to find a king”, so him (remember that Tom is a prince). A lousy plan, even more since he wanted mr. Candle to explicitly mention his name. Even a depressed Star would have immediatly suspected something.





- [HIGH PITCHED SQUEALING] THEY AKNOWLEDGED US!

“Platonic”. It’s true, it’s just platonic, so far. But it’s always more and more obvious that Starco, as in their relationship, is the foundation of the whole show. Also, it’s nice to see the fandom influencing a bit the show, but keep in mind that production for season 2 started as early as March 2015, before the show’s premiere, so they likely already had this plot in mind, they probably just adlibbed “Starco” as soon as it became such a widespread shipname.







- TAKE NOTES GUYS, THIS SENTENCE IS GOING TO BE SAID AGAIN SERIOUSLY IN A COUPLE OF SEASONS.





- Ok, I was deeead wrong about everything I said. I underestimated Marco’s sassiness -and will to expose Tom, or whoever messes with Star. Note that, before adding “on the lips”, Marco thinks for a moment what to add, as in “Mmmh I should probably lay it on thick to make Tom explode.”

I think that this explains why Marco Diaz, dork, isn’t embarassed by saying something like this, he’s focused on the objective, on the “mission”.





- Mr. Candle probably is an actual school worker, or at least he’s not a bad guy, since he looked worried about Marco getting his boss too angry.





- They got away with this. Daron you mad(wo)man.





- Star Butterfly, first royal of Mewni without a cleft/double chin in a hundred generations





- I was wondering if that spear-lance was the wand, but nevermind it. THAT DUCK IS WEARING A CROWN.





- Show’s running gag runs in the family. And Star is uncharacteristically… self aware.







- If you are thinking “Is this a reference to GoT” the answer is yes. Yes it is.





- Not the first time we are shown how little Star knows about her own parents (not knowing about the King’s wild side, not expecting her mother to be caring in the season finale). Worrying about the duties and obligations of being a queen isn’t obviously all that there is to Moon’s character, as shown in My New Wand and Storm the Castle. But that’s still her life.







- Star is not the sharpest tool in the shed, but she likely has problems in talking with her mother, resorting to a weird way to “measure” happiness -and the Queen, in fact, doesn’t get her.





- Aw, he’s more worried about Star than of being tortured by a demons. Cute. And stupid. When Star tells him about what Candle told her Marco looks distracted, talking about how great being a queen would be. But he was still listening, he didn’t completely ignore Star’s sadness. And he’s not saying “You reminded her that her only future is being queen”, he phrases it as “You made her think alll she’s good for is being queen”.





- Let’s crank the brightness up and laugh at Tom’s tastes in clothes.







- I was kind of expecting him to ask “You’ve got to leave Star alone!”, not “tell her the truth”. I guess that he learned his lesson from Blood Moon Ball and doesn’t want to cut Star out of things, letting her to evaluate things.





- Can’t you let the poor guy brag a little without immediatly punishing him or proving him wrong?





- Demonic powers aside, Tom has what looks like a trophy from a pingpong contest.





- In other news Star apparently doesn’t usually use makeup. And if she needed a sticker to cover her heart instead of simply changing it I guess that she wasn’t really feeling rebellious, this was a clumsy attempt to distance herself from what’s expected from a queen.





- All in all Tom is pretty chill. When he’s not literally on fire. We haven’t seen Brian in this episode, but it looks like he’s making progress.







- Mayhaps this whole scene be a clever and subtle metaphor for different ways to see Star’s personality?





- Even Tom agrees with it, after thinking for a moment, so he probably really liked Star, but Marco is the first to stop playing a game with his life on the line to fondly comment on how much he appreciates Star’s unique way of behaving.





- C’mon Tom, become a likeable support character! Enrich the varied cast of this show!

And Marco PhD is not half bad even without the “costume”







- Almost the same shot.





- Twitchy eye rarely is a good sign.

And look how easily Marco defused the situation. Star really wasn’t that sure about her “rebellion”, it was probably more out of stress and anxiety more than anything else.





- Aww. He doesn’t lie to Star about her not having to be a quuen, but he knows how to say it to make her feel better.







- Oh look. The Sea Captain, the picture that told Marco about the “Moon of lovers”, comfirmed by Daron as the source of the voice, captain of the Starco ship, is looking at the dorks during this tender moment, the first hug of the season, in an episode making explicit references to their relationship.





- Even the lift demon ships he’s obviously referring to Marco being closer to Star than Tom despite all the plans of his boss. Yeah. That’s it.





- Even Tom deserves something, I guess.







- “Brittney is going through an existential crisis” throwaway joke. Dark humor. That’s what this show does best.





RED BELT





I’ve already read and thought of eleven different interpretations for the dream, so I’m not going to try. But I want to point out some things:

- Green light, as the green belt, but also as the “evil” light from the wand’s fragment. Marco is even getting out from a crater, like those left by Ludo’s castle exploding







- Star is holding Marco’s green belt. And she’s acting like a beast. Maybe a reference to those times Marco has been a little taken back by her friend’s alien nature (Mewberty and Storm the Castle)?





- Mewberty’s hearts. As I said, one of the times she was a little scared by Star.







- There is a “worried about my future / about never getting the red belt, thus never proving myself that I’m making progress in life” theme, probably, hence Mr. Candle.

And then there is a callback to Toffee. After the worrying parallelism already seen in Storm the Caslte. The tie even goes from black to red.





- (Alfonzo and Ferguson share the same balloon) don’t know what to make out from this scene, but the music from the Blood Moon dance, slowed down, plays in the background.





- Just a “person trying to wake someone up appears in their dream”, or “Star is the only one who is never going to leave Marco” or “Star is the one holding Marco back and they are going to be stuck there alone” ?





- In the context of the episode the dream obviously means “I’m not making progress with karate and with Jackie and, possibly, with my other friends”, simple as that, and it’s not the first time Marco has it. There isw likely more to it, with all the symbolism it had.





- Just like in Banagic Incident this Star is dumber than usual, maybe even a little OOC, but at least she (partially) learned the “Don’t count on magic too much” lesson from Marco Grows a Beard





- Ok I can see where Marco’s lack of faith in himself and concerns about the future come from.





- I don’t know if they are more worried about Star’s well being (as in knowing that she’d get all depressed from not finding a hammer) or the house’s one.

Either way you are a liar, Raphael Diaz.







- Marco Diaz, self aware cartoon character.





- I know that it’s hard to believe, but according to Mewnipendence Day this guy was married (at the corn base dinner he can be heards saying “So my ex wife says-”)





- Self deprecating and positive in the same sentence. Not bad.

Marco is clearly academically talented, so I guess that most of his insecurities really did come from not making progress with karate and Jackie.

And as determined and focused as Marco usually is he’s definitely not like the sensei.





- Marco is often too scared to even try doing things, Star always throws herself into everything, but doesnt handle failure well. At all.





- I think that by now it’s intentional showing the puppies mimick Star’s emotions.







- Well, duh.





- Seven puppies. Not eight. Someone needs to ask Daron if the one sucked by the black hole in the first episode is officially dead.





- Maybe she didn’t exactly learn the lesson about responsibilities and magic’s use, but at least she’s considerate enough to clean up her mess. She’s making progress.