by Emily Maesar, Associate TV Editor

Fantasy High: Junior Year
Episode 3 “Not All Who Wanda Are Lost”
With Brennan Lee Mulligan, Emily Axford, Zac Oyama, Siobhan Thompson, Lou Wilson, Ally Beardsley, and Brian Murphy
Streaming now on Dropout.tv

“If you’re a cleric and you let your god die, then that’s a failure.” - Brennan Lee Mulligan

After episode three of Junior Year, it’s very clear that two of the biggest things that will likely come up during this season of Fantasy High are first, the Frostyfaire Folk Festival, which Sklonda Gukgak is investigating for a client and which Gorgug’s parents are hosting at the Thistlespring tree this year. Second, and the one that is the most prominent to the Bad Kids now, is whatever nonsense is going on with Kipperlilly Copperkettle. But more on her later!

Riz (Brian Murphy), with his new mission of making sure everybody’s grades are good enough to go to college and stay together, has made in depth folders for everybody in the adventuring party. Well, except for Adaine (Siobhan Thompson), who’s in a similarly solid position as he is because they’re both huge nerds. With a 30 skill check, Murph gets lots of information about where everybody sits academically. Fig (Emily Axford) is doing great… except for attendance, which is causing her to be in jeopardy. She’s in tune with that teenage rebellion of not wanting to go to her classes. Kristen (Ally Beardsley) is just overall doing bad, with unfiled paperwork and the whole letting her god die last season… it’s not looking too great.

However, Fabian (Lou Wilson) and Gorgug (Zac Oyama) seem to be doing well. Their grades are good and they’re on the bloodrush team, so their extracurriculars are solid. They’re both working toward multiclassing, though, so they need to take the MCAT (Multiclass Achievement Test), and it first starts with being allowed to take actual classes outside their original major, by their main professor. It should also be noted that Fig is also multiclassing, but it’s undocumented at the school. Truly amazing.

As the Bad Kids kick off their mornings, the Mordred Manor crew is off to a fun start. Kristen and Fig don’t want to go to their first day, but Adaine casts the Friends spell on them. Fig willingly fails the check because she loves her friends and actually does want to be with them and do what they want, and Kristen’s DC (which is the Difficulty Class—aka what somebody needs to roll in order to succeed) is remarkably low. Set by Ally, themselves, it’s only a 10 (so right in the middle). Likely because Kristen ultimately knows she should go to school, which I think is a really lovely touch from Ally.

Gorgug makes a metal homunculus that’s a dragon-like creature with patchy feathers and which he accidentally names Cloaca. But! It means that Cloaca joins the merry band of small sidekicks that our intrepid heroes now have. This includes Boggy the Froggy from Adaine and Wretchrot/Baby from Fig.

Now, Fig is having a lot of accidents and mishaps. In the last episode, at Mordred Manor, she got her boot stuck in a bucket of cement and at school she nearly walked into a giant pit but was saved because somebody whacked her in the face with some gym equipment. An interesting turn of events that seem random as Brennan keeps asking for mysterious rolls from her. It seems likely that it’s a result of her recent soul selling from the first episode. It has yet to be resolved, so I’m very curious where that will lead her.

As the party rolls up to school the Bad Kids are finally in that awkward stage of high school (aka junior year) where you’re on the older half of the student body. They get to be the older kids, but it also means that their exploits are much more known… including the idea that the Bad Kids might be a group getting preferential treatment. Fig is dating the headmaster’s daughter (Ayda) after all. But this year Arthur Aguefort is away on a time travel trip with Ayda, so there’s an interim principal named Grix.

Grix is the first of many new characters in this episode.We also get to meet two of the members of the adventuring party the Rat Grinders: Kipperlilly Copperkettle, a halfling rogue who is running for student body president, and Ruben Hopclap, a gnome bard who wrote the song of the summer while Fig was away fighting the Night Yorb.

As part of the plan to get Kristen into a place where she can graduate, Riz makes the suggestion that she should run for student body president. Obviously, there’s a balancing act that all candidates must achieve between campaigning and classes… except for Kipperlilly. Apparently. She “found” the rogue professor, and, per the rules of the school, she passes her entire year without having to waste any time in class.

While Fabian finds great success in the dancing bard class, which is what he’d be multiclassing into, the barbarian professor is refusing to let Gorgug multiclass into Artificer. Also, somebody once said that Fabian was really doing a Troy Bolton from High School Musical and with this season actually taking place back at school during… yeah. So true. He’s doing a dance bard multiclass, while also being the captain of the bloodrush team. We’re so back, baby.

Meanwhile, Fig is being an absolute menace. She uses Disguise Self to turn herself into an emo girlie (instead of being a metal girlie) to befriend Ruben. She names herself Wanda Childa because Emily Axford is one of the funniest people to ever play a TTRPG. Fig does get kicked out of class, though, since she (as Wanda) isn’t supposed to be there. I, for one, cannot wait to see how this plays out in the near future.

Riz tries to get the copy of the folder that Kipperlilly turned in about finding the rogue teacher, but with two 15s rolling with advantage for sleight of hand, it’s just not enough as Jawbone’s voice rings out over his attempt with a simple, “I wouldn’t.” Riz stops, leaving the envelope where it was while Kristen officially signs up to run for president with him as her campaign manager.

As the bell rings and classes are about to get into swing, Kristen’s younger brother Bucky is getting dropped off by their parents—all of whom Kristen hasn’t seen in a very long time. Mac and Donna are being just as terrible to Bucky as they were to Kristen, and she simply cannot take it. So, she approaches them, all the courage of having escaped hell. Cassandra, Kristen’s new god, pops in to see what’s going on. Kristen rebuffs her, which causes the weirdness with Cassandra to continue, something that will surely come back swiftly considering the ending of episode three. But Ally rolls a nat 20 to lie to Kristen’s parents and get the upper hand, which means it works like a charm. The tables get turned on them and Kristen, no matter how she’s actually doing, is living the life without them.

Finally, Adaine also being broke is really going to make being a wizard a huge issue. Because she needs lots of material components for her spells in class and there’s not any kind of supplemental source from the school. Her separating herself from her family (and killing her father in Sophomore Year) and the entire adventuring party having to give away all the money they got from defeating the BBEG from season one because it was the only way to break one of the curses, means Adaine finds herself in a precarious situation. It’s one that Riz also finds himself in, and it’s one that is very familiar to many American teens.

The episode finishes up with Kristen going into one of the cleric prayer rooms to look for Cassandra. She finds Cassandra crying and scared she’ll be left to live forever in the astral plane like YES!, Kristen’s previous god who she let die. In her fear and anger, Cassandra summons a familiar black cat. Kalina is back, baby! The investment of the entire table makes the reveal so much tastier—which is going to catapult us into a truly amazing season.