Feeling Blue
is an AU Amphibia story by commanderanne where, after an incident involving Dr. Frakes' portal, Anne's calamity powered form becomes separated from her body and develops her own identity. Its plot sticks somewhat close to canonical events, with certain points becoming increasingly more divergent as a result of slight alterations in other events earlier on.
More information not stated in the fic itself and extra Feeling Blue content like author commentary, promo art, fun facts, writing snippets and the like can be found in the Feeling Blue AU tag on commanderanne’s Tumblr here.
This fanfic provides examples of:
- Abusive Parents: Sasha and Marcy's parents are implied as this here, with both being emotionally distant from their daughters.
- Adaptation Expansion: Sasha, Grime, and the Wartwood resistance are shown in "Froggy Little Christmas", showing what they were up to at the time and how they ended up going underground in the Plantar family tunnels as well as having Darcy encounter Sasha earlier than canon.
- Adaptational Angst Upgrade: Compared to canon, Anne shows a much more traumatized reaction to her dad's lightsaber stab joke in chapter 5 (due to reminding her of what happened with Marcy).
- Adaptational Gender Identity: In canon, there's little to suggest that Anne, Sasha, and Marcy are anything other than cisgender girls. All identify as trans or nonbinary here:
- Anne is explicitly stated to be male to female transgender.
- Marcy is now identified as nonbinary.
- Sasha is also identified as genderfluid by chapter 8.
- Adaptational Sexuality:
- While in canon no indication is given on Anne and Marcy's sexualities, here both are identified as lesbians.
- While Ivy has only shown romantic interest in Sprig in canon with no indication on liking girls, chapter 8 reveals Ivy to be bisexual.
- Adapted Out: In Chapter 8, the adventure inside Mother Olm's ear doesn't happen due to Hop Pop bringing up writing the prophecy down and Mother Olm finding the writing on the ceiling.
- Ascended Extra: Sasha, Grime, the Wartwood Resistance, and Darcy are given larger roles earlier in the storyline than in canon, and get more focus in chapters based on episodes where they weren’t present before, notably Chapter 2 and 3’s equivalent of "Froggy Little Christmas" along with Chapter 4, which is solely centric on Wartwood, along with Darcy.
- Bland-Name Product: In Chapter 3, “WcDonald's” is mentioned as a sort of knock-off counterpart to McDonald's, though there is no need to change the name since there aren’t any legal repercussions. Rather, it’s done as a comedic bit.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: The narrator addresses themself in Chapter 3.
Word of God confirms the narrator is someone other than the author, however, and that this fact is "definitely not important in the ending." - Call-Back: In Chapter 4, many items Anne owned throughout the show are mentioned when Sasha goes down to her old room to try to salvage various items after the town was attacked. Many of these items were also shown in Turning Point.
- Darker and Edgier: This story is shown to go darker with canon, especially with Sasha's injuries that Darcy caused, most notably when it stabbed her left eye.
- Death by Adaptation: Lysil and Angwin face this during this fic's events of "Olm Town Road" in chapter 8.
- Disabled in the Adaptation: Here, Sasha ends up losing her left eye to Darcy in Chapter 4.
- Foreshadowing: There are many, many instances of foreshadowing, some having already come true, and some being far more vague or niche than others. An example of this is when Sasha’s left eye gets hit with a branch in Chapter 3, which is supposed to be obvious foreshadowing, as it’s already implied Sasha will lose an eye given the story’s tags, which is then followed by Sasha almost getting murked by a scythe-handed frobot, though it’s mentioned via Word of God in the Chapter 3 Director’s Cut that the “Foreshadowing here… hasn’t actually come true.” It's also stated in the Director's Cut for Chapter 4 that far more niche, vague usage of foreshadowing comes in when Chapter 4 uses the song “Everybody Wants To Rule The World” as a running motif throughout the chapter, especially when Darcy sings a few lines from the song, though it hasn’t been shown what it foreshadows yet. The author also brings up The Hunger Games and Turning Red when mentioning planned foreshadowing/scenes.
- I Call It "Vera": Chapter 4 reveals Sasha names her swords Slashley and Stabitha.
- Important Haircut: In contrast to canon season 3B, Sasha decides to cut her hair down to shoulder length in Chapter 2.
- Laser-Guided Amnesia: Sasha ends up forgetting important details regarding her battle with Darcy in Chapter 4 due to passing out from her injuries.
- Like a Daughter to Me: Vaguely implied to be the case with Bee and Oum's relationship with Sasha and Marcy, with the two girls spending their Christmases with the Boonchuys rather than their own families.
- Parental Substitute: With the implication of Sasha's parents being emotionally distant, Grime serves as this to Sasha which is even noted in Chapter 2.
- Ruder and Cruder: This story has many, many uses of profane language, including replacing dialogue in certain scenes with swears that were otherwise censored in the original version, such as Polly calling Andrias a bitch instead of a dog. Other things include the implication that Grime taught Sasha slurs aimed at frogs in the past and an entire segment in Chapter 3 that’s chock-full of crude humour, most notably an onslaught of the usage of “balls”, among other things.
- Running Gag: The question of Christmas' meaning is a running gag in Chapters 2 and 3, and Word of God states that a running gag is planned involving someone from the rest of the cast occasionally forgetting Blue's presence, which starts in Chapter 3.
- Ship Tease: Dr. Jan and Terri get this during the moments showing the group chat of the Earth allies. It's also confirmed by Word of God that Sasha has a crush on Anne and Marcy, which is vaguely implied in Chapter 4.
- Shout-Out:
- Vaguely implied to be in the same universe as Gravity Falls and The Owl House, just like its canon source. The Show Within a Show Ducktective from the former is often mentioned, with Anne, Blue, and the Plantars being fans of it.
- In chapter 10, Laurel quotes the Junior Woodchuck Guidebook when mentioning "Build things right the first time and they won’t need modification"
- Show Within a Show: Suspicion Island and Primthistle Manor, which are shown in the source material, along with the aforementioned Ducktective are all referenced. A gag with Crystal-Ball Scheduling is involved in Chapter 3 with the Season 7 finale of Suspicion Island mirroring the events of "True Colors".
- Significant Wardrobe Shift: Very similar to canon, Sasha gets a new set of armour in Chapter 4, however it's not directly mentioned in the fic yet. Word of God confirmed the design change and showed it in a piece of promo artwork posted before Chapter 4 was posted along with a sketch posted to their blog◊ in response to a question regarding Sasha's design.
- Split Personality: This trope is the closest to how Darcy is depicted in Feeling Blue—which is a direct reference relating to symptoms and the structure of Dissociative Identity Disorder, which the author has herself. Mentioned in the Chapter 3 and 4 Director's cuts and bluntly stated Word of God style in a Tumblr post, with an entire in-depth general analysis with evidence on how the allegory works having been posted a short while back.
- The Song Before the Storm: Somewhat. Everybody Wants To Rule The World by Tears for Fears is played on Sasha's phone before the attack on the town, but the lyrics are still continued throughout the chapter, along with Darcy singing a few lines from it while it approached Sasha.
- Tragic Keepsake: Sasha ends up wearing Marcy's cape and hairclip along with Anne's Battle of the Bands scarf and dragonfly hairpin. She also manages to salvage Marcy's hoodie before the Fwagon is destroyed by the Frobot attack.
- What If?: What if Dr. Frakes' portal in "If You Give A Frog A Cookie" led Anne's powers to activate and form a separate person?
