History WebAnimation / RedVsBlueTheProjectFreelancerSaga

The ninth and tenth seasons of ''Machinima/RedVsBlue''. This series cuts between three (later two) concurrent storylines -- a {{Prequel}} to the whole series based around Project Freelancer animated entirely in CGI (as presided over by Creator/MontyOum), and the present day, which in turn consists of both the continuing adventures of the Blood Gulch Crew and Agent Washington (as filmed in ''VideoGame/Halo3'') and Church's experiences inside the Epsilon Unit (as filmed using ''VideoGame/HaloReach''). This story arc contains 60 episodes in total, including two miniseries, "[=MIA=]" and "Where There's a Will, There's a Wall".

* AsideGlance: When Donut [[CallBack mentions]] [[Machinima/RedVsBlueTheRecollection that he was shot]], Wash turns his head to the camera and whistles innocently.

** When [[StuffBlowingUp stuff starts blowing up]] in Episode 4, the Director yells "[[Machinima/RedVsBlueTheBloodGulchChronicles SON OF A BITCH!]]"

** In Episode 14 Wash points out that they're going to meet Carolina in the Recovery Room - [[Machinima/RedVsBlueTheRecollection "Recovery One"]], to be exact.

** [[spoiler:Donut sticks the heads of three Tex Drones with plasma grenades, calling out "Nine points, you dirty whores!" as he did in Episode 19 of ''[[Machinima/RedVsBlueTheBloodGulchChronicles The Blood Gulch Chronicles]]'' (three points in that case, for one person).]]

* LetsGetDangerous: [[spoiler:In Episode 20, Doc's speech about how the [[Machinima/RedVsBlueTheRecollection adventures after Blood Gulch]] ended up giving almost all of the Blood Gulch Crew (and Washington) what they wanted in some way results in the majority of those present agreeing to leave and help Epsilon and Carolina, since Epsilon is still Church, and therefore still their friend. Washington takes some more convincing, but Sarge's subsequent speech is enough to have him join the others in "the worst idea... ever".]]

* WhereItAllBegan: Episode 19 reveals that [[spoiler:Maine assimilated his first additional AIs (Eta and Iota) at Sidewinder/Avalanche near a cliff, with Sigma proclaiming the group in Maine "the Meta" for the first time. Retroactively, this makes Maine's DisneyVillainDeath in [[Machinima/RedVsBlueTheRecollection the finale of Revelation]] an example, as it is both the place where the Meta was "born" and killed]].

* YouDoNOTWantToKnow:

* KnifeFight: Though Carolina uses a [[SimpleStaff Humbler]] [[StaticStunGun stun]] [[http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Humbler_stun_device device]], her battles with the female Insurrectionist member in Episode 9 and with [[spoiler:Conncecticut]] in Episode 10 give off this impression.

** The Director is the absolute last person you'd expect to feel sympathy for ... until he calls out in panic for Allison. Unfortunately, he's back to his {{Jerkass}} self within seconds. [[spoiler:Taken UpToEleven when he acknowledges Carolina as his greatest creation, reconciles with her after becoming a nervous wreck and then is implied to commit suicide. At the time he's a far cry from the strutting super-scientist villain, instead looking devastated and more like the pathetic and insane old man mired in grief that he really is.]]

** [[spoiler:Tex still ''really'' hates Grif. In Episode 21, the first GroinAttack by three Texes with the help of two to wishbone him is subverted by [[BigDamnHeroes Carolina]]'s DivingSave, but followed up by a DoubleSubverted version when one of those holding him still kicks him there anyway. Tucker notes that he should have seen that coming. Then, off screen, the same happens by [[UpToEleven twenty of them at the same time]].]]

* AnAxeToGrind: The Pillman's WeaponOfChoice in the prequel sections, specifically throwing axes. Tex seems pretty adept in their use as well.

** From that scene is two more- Simmons spouts off Grif's "I'd just like to let everyone know that I suck," speech, and there's a brief cut to what the Blues have taken, which includes Donut's motorcycle, the Warthog, the food Donut and Doc made for them previously that season, and multiple [[WeaponOfChoice rocket launchers and shotguns]].

** Carolina seems to have made a twin set of Plasma Rifles her [[WeaponOfChoice weapons of choice]] in this season.

The collection of seasons 9 and 10 of ''Machinima/RedVsBlue''. This series cuts between two concurrent storylines - a {{Prequel}} to the whole series based around Project Freelancer created entirely in CGI, and the continuing adventures of the Blood Gulch crew and Agent Washington, as well as Church's experiences inside the Epsilon Unit.

* DoomedByCanon: Used substantially in the Prequel portion of the series, where a vast majority of the Freelancers have already died in earlier seasons.

** North is KilledOffscreen by The Meta.

** The {{Artificial Intelligence}}s that begin to get introduced at the end of Season 9, most notably [[TheSpock Delta]], [[BadassAdorable Theta]], and Sigma, who get a lot of screentime. All of the [=AIs=] except for Epsilon are KilledOffForReal at the hands of the activation of the [[{{EMP}} "emp"]] at Command.

* EvilVersusEvil: [[spoiler: It was known by this point that the Director was the GreaterScopeVillain of the series, and the seasons themselves make the Project as a whole out as a VillainProtagonist, with the Freelancers ObliviouslyEvil while fighting the actual heroes, the Insurrectionists. Season 12 reveals the connection between the Space Pirates, Insurrectionists, and Charon Industries, all of which are working for the...[[EvilerThanThou Greatest]] [[AlwaysABiggerFish Scope]] [[EvilAllAlong Villain]], Chairman Malcolm Hargrove.]]

* AdultFear: Considering Theta's personality and North's nurturing making him something like a parent, knowing that North dies while his 'child' is pretty much kidnapped is bound to strike a chord with adults, especially in the sense that you failed to save your child.

* SmartDumbAndInBetween: The Freelancers are supposed to be the best of the best, but the worst three Freelancers are ostracised by the rest, and are nicknamed "the Triplets". Agent Ohio is the leader; she's smart and sensible, but lacks confidence. Agent Iowa is the extremely unintelligent and prone to accidentally destroying vehicles. Agent Idaho is in-between. He lacks Ohio's drive to better himself, but is more perceptive and aware than Iowa. They're eventually drummed out of the Freelancers on a fake assignment that sets them up to be cannon fodder.

** Episode 22, [[spoiler:The Director appointing Captain Flowers/Agent Florida as a bodyguard for the Alpha stationed in Blood Gulch has to find a way to explain the mysterious disappearance of Agent Florida, a explaining why in Season 3 Tucker laments the then-unknown fate of Florida.]]

'''Washington:''' [[WhatAnIdiot That's because it]] ''[[WhatAnIdiot is]]'' [[WhatAnIdiot dumb!]]

* TookALevelInJerkass: The Freelancer flashbacks show that almost all of the Freelancers (most notably South, C.T., Wash, and even to a certain extent Maine) used to be idealistic and actually fairly heroic. By the time of the series proper, almost all of them has become disillusioned, cynical, self-serving, and/or utterly ruthless. In fact Wyoming seems to be the only Freelancer who was a {{Jerkass}} to start with, and didn't change at all between the flashbacks and ''Blood Gulch''. York seems to be the only one who didn't lose his sense of moral decency after the team broke up, though all we know about North's eventual fate so far is that South abandoned him to the Meta.

* WhoWouldWantToWatchUs: In Episode 9.
-->'''Tucker:''' Romance happens in movies. In real life, it's called stalking.
-->'''Caboose:''' Well, maybe all of this is happening ''inside of a movie!''
-->'''Tucker:''' Oh please. Who the fuck would watch ''that'' movie? All we do is sit around and talk.

* ArtShift: Burnie Burns has said that, due to the difficulty in matching the game art style with the mocap CGI, they've embraced the difference to tell two simultaneous storylines side-by-side, with the Freelancer stuff in CGI entirely and the "future stuff" in ''VideoGame/HaloReach'' machinima. [[spoiler:Then the shift goes back to ''VideoGame/{{Halo 3}}'' for the last scene of the season, outside of the memory unit and in the present day.]]

** Kinda all over the map with Epsilon-Church. Building on his ending speech in ''Revelation'', he now sees himself as the Alpha in the Memory Unit, having been reincarnated from Epsilon. But now that he's dealing with the less capable Season 1 versions of his teammates, he regains some of his temper from the era of ''The Blood Gulch Chronicles''. He also becomes more reflective and introspective, with Tucker even helping him realize how toxic and self-serving his relationship with Tex is.
** Epsilon-Tex also gets some. More specifically, she opens up to Church more and emphasizes that she's getting sick and tired of being brought BackFromTheDead to just serve as a glorified CosmicPlaything since she's [[FailureIsTheOnlyOption doomed to always fail at the last possible second]]. By consequence, Church starts to take her opinion more into account, with him [[spoiler: granting her wish of [[DeathSeeker "wanting to rest"]] in the season finale by [[MercyKill erasing her from his memory]]]].

** Lopez is mistaken to be Simmons and decides to go along with it for the sake of getting people to listen to him. One of the things he claims [[HughMann that supposedly proves he's human]] is getting math problems wrong for no reason, a reference to when Simmons pretended he was good at math by giving a wrong answer to a multiplication problem during ''The Blood Gulch Chronicles''.

* GenreBlindness: A ''major'' example happens in Episode 15. When someone hands you a rapidly beeping, glowing object and then dashes away, you probably shouldn't stand there staring at it.

* AGlitchInTheMatrix: Church's reality is not as idyllic as it seems.

* NostalgiaAintLikeItUsedToBe: Church's body, Caboose, and Tucker are back to their Season 1 versions; in other words, pretty lame. Also, the camaraderie between the Reds and Blues didn't exist in Season 1, as Church realizes upon walking up to the simulation versions.

** Episode 3 has Church realize that the Reds weren't his buddies in Season 1, what his simulation is based on, when he walks up to them.

** And Church has a much bigger one ''twice'' in the finale [[spoiler:first, when he realizes, right after he forgets Tex, that the quakes aren't because of the Memory Unit dying, but because Caboose was opening it back up, and second when he sees the very much alive Carolina. If the music for the latter is any indication, her being alive might not be entirely good.]]
* OminousLatinChanting: At the end of Episode 16. There's a very light chanting, which is a CallForward to another incident where Maine was about to commit [[BilingualBonus bloody murder]]

* TakeThat: During the "[=MIA=]" miniseries, Sarge is forwarded by Vic to Doc in order to get help looking for Grif (who has gone missing). Sarge hesitantly asks Doc if [[ActualPacifist "you're still one of those lame paci-whatevers."]] Doc's response?
-->'''Doc:''' [[invoked]] ([[DeadpanSnarker dryly]]) Pacifists. Yeah, Sarge, I still am. You don't just turn it off when it's convenient. It's not like being a [[AcceptableTargets vegan]].

* ThereAreNoGirlsOnTheInternet: Tucker assumes this when Caboose mentions he once had an internet girlfriend, but it turned out it was just his e-mail.

** The batteries [[spoiler:that Simmons uses to electrocute Lopez with]] are branded "Puma Batteries."

* BloodierAndGorier: Episode two alone probably has more blood and gore in it than the rest of the series combined. Still not ''incredibly'' gory, but relatively speaking... Justified as Freelancers are already using the Mk 6 armor which is, at least until Halo 4, the deadliest PowerArmor in the military's arsenal. The people they're fighting don't, indicated for example by their lack of the usual voice distortion effects, making them MadeOfPlasticine by comparison.

** [[spoiler:After Episode 18's TheReasonYouSuckSpeech, Epsilon-Church almost immediately has a MyGodWhatHaveIDone moment as the Reds and Blues [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere silently walk out on him one by one]]. After Tucker leaves, this is his reaction.]]

[[spoiler:'''Epsilon-Church:''' ''You're'' my problem! You've ''always'' been my problem! Each and every one of you is just a ''problem'' that I have to ''deal'' with on a [[PunctuatedForEmphasis Daily. Basis!]]]]

'''Wash:''' [[InsaneTrollLogic Yeah, but he's green.]]\\
'''York:''' How does that even make sense?\\
'''North:''' Hey Wash, quit staring; you're making it nervous.\\
'''Wash:''' Yeah, it's just... they're so small.\\
'''York:''' Small, yeah. But you wouldn't ''believe'' what it can do.\\
'''North:''' Besides, you better get used to it, you're going to have one of your own soon enough.\\
'''South:''' Ugh, give me a break.\\

* GrievousHarmWithABody: [[spoiler:During his UnstoppableRage in Episode 21, Caboose, at one point, bashes several Tex drones with the body of one of them.]]

** [[spoiler:Epsilon-Church's TheReasonYouSuckSpeech in Episode 18. After they told their piece and said, rightfully, that killing the Director has nothing to do with them, he screams at all of the assembled Reds and Blues (directing mostly at those from Blood Gulch), blaming them for most his problems and saying that, when it came down to it, all they amounted to problems for him. This KickTheDog was so blatant every single one of [[TrueCompanions them]], even Caboose, [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere walked out on him]] temporarily.]]

** The Director's regulations ultimately ended up turning many Freelancers against each other. He actively encouraged competition between the agents with the Leaderboard and who would eventually get an A.I. He also would regularly chew out any agents for going against his orders or failing a mission, which just built resent for those agents against those who did better than them.
** Carolina is shown to be one to the Reds and Blues in the Present storyline during Season 10. She rounds them all up to force them to help her save Epsilon, then drags them all around with her on her revenge quest to find and kill the Director, constantly insulting them and threatening their lives when they annoy her. She also talks down to her fellow Freelancer Washington, treating him only marginally better than the rest of the Reds and Blues. Epsilon eventually becomes this too. Once he and Carolina start to bond, he ends up siding with her more often than the rest of his friends, talking down to them the same as her and not telling them anything. This eventually reaches a head in Episode 18, when [[spoiler:Carolina and Epsilon make a plan to kill the Director that basically turns the Reds, Tucker, and Caboose into CannonFodder as a [[WeNeedADistraction distraction]]. By this point, the Reds and Blues are all sick of Carolina and Epsilon mistreating them, and all refuse to help them with their personal vendetta anymore. This results in Carolina and Epsilon both having a meltdown over everyone basically refusing to get themselves killed for them, with Carolina trying to hold them at gunpoint until Wash makes her backdown, and Epsilon going on a rant about how everyone owes him this after all the shit they put him through over the years]].

* NotSoDifferent: This season builds up the similarities between Church and the [[EvilTwin Director.]] For that matter, Church and his pre-fragmented self. Episode 13 reveals that even as the original Alpha, Church was always a {{Jerkass}}.
-->'''Church:''' [[SelfDeprecation I'm based on another program called Alpha, who was... kind of a dick. And he was based on this guy called the Director, who was... also kind of a dick.]]
-->'''Tucker:''' [[DeadpanSnarker Good to see you're keeping up tradition.]]

** It's subtle, but the last scene of Episode 19 [[spoiler:mirrors the end of the Meta vs. Tex battle of Season 8. Both Tex and Carolina are initially facedown, then turn over and try to get away as Maine comes up, then he grabs them by the neck and does something painful to their head, then tosses them aside. Just another reminder of [[NotSoDifferent how similar those two really are...]]]]

---> '''Epsilon-Church''': [[spoiler: Because... [[NotSoDifferent I know what it's like to spend your life chasing ghosts.]]]]

** Highlighting just how similar to the Omega-infused Tex it is that Carolina [[NotSoDifferent has become]].

* InsaneTrollLogic: Sarge's plan to save the world, appropriately entitled "Sarge's plan to kick the planet's ass." Ah, Sarge, [[CrazyAwesome we missed that about you.]]

** [[invoked]] Agent North and Agent South in Episode 2. [[MemeticMutation SWITCH!]]
** Agents Maine and Carolina of all people pull this off in Episode 17.

* FreeFallFight: Episode 15 brings us the scene (appropriately, [[LampshadeHanging with "Falling Towards the Sky" in the background]]), where Tex, Wash, Carolina, and York battle the flying mooks and ''Hornets'' to get the Package into 479er's Pelican. Wash shoots one of the Hornet pilots out while standing on the falling package.

* MidfightWeaponExchange: In episode 2, South calls out to North for a shotgun while they're both mid-battle. He tosses her one, and she uses it to blast one of the soldiers she's fighting.

* AerialCanyonChase: In episode 4, Four-Seven-Niner flies the Pelican through a canyon to try and lose their pursuers.