meta: a timeline of events
Apr. 6th, 2015 07:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bonnefoisTumblr link in case it stretches
So, according to the wiki, we finally have confirmation on when Expiration Date occurs, and it’s before MVM. What does this mean for canon? It means now every panel we took as face value and interpreted in a certain way now is shown in another light concerning Scout and Miss Pauling.
Many assumed that their relationship was more like what we saw in Meet The Director. Scout being flirty, Miss Pauling being somewhat wary, likely due to his history of flirting indiscriminately with any woman around and possible complications of them both working together.
However, in the end of Expiration Date, she offers to take him along with her job. But if she no longer has bodies to clean up, and her work becomes increasingly stressful, and may no longer even have time off at all. It’s also noteworthy that we don’t see her smile during these times, to the point where much of fandom has forgotten that she can smile, that she started out as a character who was, and always has been, both badass and cute.
The answer to how the MVM scenes we saw relate was actually answered in Expiration Date. He tried to tell her his feelings unsuccessfully several times, and each time he tried when she was busy. It was only when the danger was completely past that he could get her attention.
Which isn’t too far off from her preparing everyone for a large scale robot attack.
(Though this one is BLU Scout, so it might have changed her reaction, given that all her interactions prior have been with the RED one).
Or deep in planning a way to take back territory after the war is going poorly.
Which came before, making many of us (myself included) believe that she didn’t have the best view of him. However, given the events of Expiration Date, I theorize that these scenes weren’t so much “I’m not interested in you at all,” given that in Expiration Date her only issue with dating him was her job, and she readily tried to fit him in to go on jobs with her. The issue was “I’m a little busy stopping a robot invasion here, Scout” and the aforementioned point that Miss Pauling becomes very focused when she is doing something important, and Scout has poor timing.
Then, that brings up the scenes in A Cold Day In Hell.
Given his dialogue, it cuts out the idea they dated and broke up after the events of Expiration Date. He wouldn’t say they’d never dated if she dumped him. It would’ve been a line like “We aren’t even dating anymore.”
From these, I’d take a wild guess that they never got to got to go out on a real date outside of the body burying due to the Robot War happening, and even more, Scout could no longer hang around with her on body disposal as she now was too busy with the war. After six months of no contact at all and being stuck on death row in jail, he began to lose hope, got distracted momentarily by the hot Russian woman demanding he sex her up. However, he realizes that he wants Miss Pauling more than other random women, and decides to stick with her. In this case, The Waiting Game likely refers to waiting for her to actually have free time.(Waiting for her to change her mind could again refer to time again, or an off-screen parting where she says she just didn’t have time to date or do anything but fight robots right now)
However, even in that weird point of “I’d date you, but I my job eats up all my free time so we probably aren’t actually dating unless carrying bodies counts as dating” he wants to stay loyal to her. Scout, once the mercenary most likely to hit on any female in a ten meter distance is giving up all other girls, no matter how hot, and no matter how long he has to wait for her next free day.
As for Miss Pauling during all these months between Ring of Fired and Expiration Date, there’s a noteworthy scene which says a lot:
She thought he’d come back. All the other mercenaries she knew she’d have to track down, and possibly pull out of other jobs and/or jails. But, with Scout, there was never a question of whether he’d come back to her. The only question was when.
That means all of these scenes came after this one:
Something which other commentary has glossed over is that she’s the one who asks him out with the can we do this again line and when time is an issue, she’s the one who attempts to fit him into her busy schedule multiple times, even when he turns down her gory tasks.
She knows very well that he’s trying to date her and has shown doesn’t mind him talking to her when she actually has free time, and is actually quite interested in fitting him in between less pressing jobs. The problem is she has less and less free time as time goes on. No longer are they simply body disposal jobs, but far more pressing things like company takeovers and robot assaults.
Their interactions make much more sense when under the lens that they at the very least almost dated, and that Miss Pauling is so busy at the moment that she barely has time to have a second to herself, let alone to think of flirting and days off.
So, according to the wiki, we finally have confirmation on when Expiration Date occurs, and it’s before MVM. What does this mean for canon? It means now every panel we took as face value and interpreted in a certain way now is shown in another light concerning Scout and Miss Pauling.
Many assumed that their relationship was more like what we saw in Meet The Director. Scout being flirty, Miss Pauling being somewhat wary, likely due to his history of flirting indiscriminately with any woman around and possible complications of them both working together.
However, in the end of Expiration Date, she offers to take him along with her job. But if she no longer has bodies to clean up, and her work becomes increasingly stressful, and may no longer even have time off at all. It’s also noteworthy that we don’t see her smile during these times, to the point where much of fandom has forgotten that she can smile, that she started out as a character who was, and always has been, both badass and cute.
The answer to how the MVM scenes we saw relate was actually answered in Expiration Date. He tried to tell her his feelings unsuccessfully several times, and each time he tried when she was busy. It was only when the danger was completely past that he could get her attention.
Which isn’t too far off from her preparing everyone for a large scale robot attack.
(Though this one is BLU Scout, so it might have changed her reaction, given that all her interactions prior have been with the RED one).
Or deep in planning a way to take back territory after the war is going poorly.
Which came before, making many of us (myself included) believe that she didn’t have the best view of him. However, given the events of Expiration Date, I theorize that these scenes weren’t so much “I’m not interested in you at all,” given that in Expiration Date her only issue with dating him was her job, and she readily tried to fit him in to go on jobs with her. The issue was “I’m a little busy stopping a robot invasion here, Scout” and the aforementioned point that Miss Pauling becomes very focused when she is doing something important, and Scout has poor timing.
Then, that brings up the scenes in A Cold Day In Hell.
Given his dialogue, it cuts out the idea they dated and broke up after the events of Expiration Date. He wouldn’t say they’d never dated if she dumped him. It would’ve been a line like “We aren’t even dating anymore.”
From these, I’d take a wild guess that they never got to got to go out on a real date outside of the body burying due to the Robot War happening, and even more, Scout could no longer hang around with her on body disposal as she now was too busy with the war. After six months of no contact at all and being stuck on death row in jail, he began to lose hope, got distracted momentarily by the hot Russian woman demanding he sex her up. However, he realizes that he wants Miss Pauling more than other random women, and decides to stick with her. In this case, The Waiting Game likely refers to waiting for her to actually have free time.(Waiting for her to change her mind could again refer to time again, or an off-screen parting where she says she just didn’t have time to date or do anything but fight robots right now)
However, even in that weird point of “I’d date you, but I my job eats up all my free time so we probably aren’t actually dating unless carrying bodies counts as dating” he wants to stay loyal to her. Scout, once the mercenary most likely to hit on any female in a ten meter distance is giving up all other girls, no matter how hot, and no matter how long he has to wait for her next free day.
As for Miss Pauling during all these months between Ring of Fired and Expiration Date, there’s a noteworthy scene which says a lot:
She thought he’d come back. All the other mercenaries she knew she’d have to track down, and possibly pull out of other jobs and/or jails. But, with Scout, there was never a question of whether he’d come back to her. The only question was when.
That means all of these scenes came after this one:
Something which other commentary has glossed over is that she’s the one who asks him out with the can we do this again line and when time is an issue, she’s the one who attempts to fit him into her busy schedule multiple times, even when he turns down her gory tasks.
She knows very well that he’s trying to date her and has shown doesn’t mind him talking to her when she actually has free time, and is actually quite interested in fitting him in between less pressing jobs. The problem is she has less and less free time as time goes on. No longer are they simply body disposal jobs, but far more pressing things like company takeovers and robot assaults.
Their interactions make much more sense when under the lens that they at the very least almost dated, and that Miss Pauling is so busy at the moment that she barely has time to have a second to herself, let alone to think of flirting and days off.
