WMG / Epithet Erased

Mera does care about Indus in her own special way.

Otherwise, she would have settled on taking his epithet. For further evidence:

• The fact that she’s making Indus, of all people, do things that require a fair degree of mental acuity, like laundry, taxes, and cooking. She may actually be training him to be self-sufficient!
• She doesn’t use her epithet on Indus when she breaks her toe. Her Life Drain ability can allow her to recover stamina by taking it from others, and Indus has plenty to spare (and probably willing to give it). The fact that she doesn’t do this means that she must care for his well-being.
• She also doesn’t use her epithet when reprimanding Indus. Because of his mistake, the Banzai Blasters are roaming free, the police are coming, and they won’t get another shot at the amulet if they don’t find it quickly. And yet, even with all that, she chooses to kick Indus for -0 damage instead of one-shotting Indus with her epithet.
• Lastly, instead of breaking the bones of everyone besides her and coming to steal Molly’s epithet, she gives Indus the important task of bringing Molly over to her. She trusts Indus with this, even knowing what happened last time.

The original creator of the Arsene Amulet is still alive.

• Ramsey puts the Amulet's age at "60...65, give or take", but there's no word on when it was created vs when it gained its power. According to Brendan Blaber, who created the series, the Amulet was imbued with its original owner's Copycat epithet—if No Ontological Inertia is in play, it's likely the Amulet will lose its power when the original Inscribed dies and Copycat "passes back" into the word pool.

The Amulet can't actually take someone's Epithet away from them

• Only make a copy of it for the wielder to use. The Amulet is imbued with the Copycat epithet, and Sylvie didn't even try to use his Drowsy powers after Mera came after him. If he had tried, he might have found that both he and Mera could use it.

Molly got a Proficiency boost from getting rid of Dr. Beefton.

After the fight with Mera, Giovanni mentions getting a massive Proficiency boost from defeating her, resulting in the “Fog of Lost Souls” being created. During the fight with Mera, she mentions not being able to hear anything, despite the fact that there is no visible “bubble” in the area and only Mera is affected. Before the fight with Mera, Molly gets rid of Dr. Beefton by turning the fire alarm on and making him disappear. Considering all that, it’s quite possible that Molly gained Proficiency from the Dr. Beefton fight the same way Giovanni got Proficiency from beating Mera. Considering that...

Molly will be more effective in a fight when she next gets into one.

The possible Proficiency boost Molly received means that her stats excluding stamina are close to, if not equal to, Sylvie’s. This means that she could:

• Dumb down larger summons than before.
• Block out more than just sound.
• Have a greater radius of effect.
• Dumb down more damage, making attacks completely ineffective.
• Actually render someone mute (a.k.a. dumb).
  • Confirmed in Prison of Plastic: Molly develops a new ability called 'Bear Paw', which allows her to create a bear paw with dumb energy around her hand and take out larger summons, as well as dumb things down in a bigger radius. It's a great help as the party takes down the S'more dragon Graham summoned by Lorelai.

Car Crash resents Giovanni for his nickname

• And that's why he was so disrespectful towards him while out-of-uniform in Redwood Run—since Giovanni seems to be the one giving out nicknames, and Car Crash obviously hates his (""You crash ONE car FOUR times...!"), he might just resent his boss because of it.

Ben is the youngest of Giovanni's boys

• Besides Molly, of course.

If Giovanni leaves the Banzai Blasters...

• ...not all of his boys will follow him, and he'll have to deal with the results of that. We have no idea who joined the Blasters first, if they had a Captain before Giovanni was promoted, or what drove them to the organization in the first place. If Giovanni leaves to be evil on his own, we have no proof the boys' loyalty to him will be stronger than, say, their desire to be promoted to Captain themselves.
  • Jossed, in the audio book Prison of Plastic they all happily joined his new group despite it being clear he had no plans.

Sylvester’s “last name” isn’t a last name at all-it’s his middle name

The name Ashling is actually a given name. It’s entirely possible he’d rather not disclose his real last name for whatever reason. His parents might not have known that it was a feminine name, or they did it as a family in joke.

• Kinda implausible, since he gave Molly his card, which likely includes his full name. Even if you get a private practice, you still have to give some legitimate form of identity.
  • It does include his full name, but Molly didn't tell the group his last name because on the card it says 'Do not tell people my last name if you know what's good for you!' or something like that. He trusts Molly but not Givonnai with his full name because he's afraid of what Givonnai might do with that information. Knowing someone's full legal name can allow you to find out a lot about them, after all.
    • You are aware that he knew about Molly being one of Giovanni’s underlings, right? Even if she seems less evil(or annoying) than her boss, she could still look Sylvie up later and give the information to Giovanni.
    • Ah, well maybe it'd be best to just remove this headcanon entirely and form a better one. Sylvie does seem like he COULD be the person to refer to himself last name first...

The leader of Bliss Ocean is Mera's father.

Maybe dedicating himself to getting rid of epithets lead him in that direction? Who knows. Kind of a random thought, but it's the kind of thing that kind of happens in stories.

• implied to be jossed, as with Yoomtah implied to be his chauffeur currently and in the past, and predominately hiring mundies into STEM core, it is heavily implied to be Naven.

Indus will have a nemesis with an epithet that is "Forklift".

and he will have no honor

Sylvie can't dream due to his ephitet

Due to how 'Drowsy' works, he is left unable to dream unless he wills himself to do so. However, instances of his 'Dream Big' ability may have manifested accidentally. But, he cannot have regular, mundane dreams like everyone else.

Trixie and Phenocia both have crushes on Molly

No real reason; just thought this would be an interesting and cute dynamic.

Ramsey’s parents exploited his ephitet

When Ramsey inevitably started showing signs of his powers, his parents pushed him into having his Epiphany (what it’s called when you discover your core word). Or even before that, showing him words for valuable things hoping that one of them would be his ephitet. After they discovered it was the word “goldbricker”, Ramsey was told to use his powers to hone them. Once a collection of golden items was obtained, they were sold off and Ramsey’s family grew richer and richer. Later on, Ramsey himself was taught to exploit his ephitet just as his mom and dad had.

• In Anime Campaign his father did exactly that, his mother was never mentioned though.

Giovanni will undergo a Heel–Face Turn.

Well, yeah. Gio's barely evil to begin with. Plus, when Jello gave the main cast DnD-style Character Alignment, Giovanni was listed as "good" alongside Molly, Percy, and Sylvie. The only other criminals labeled as "good" are Ramsey, who pulls a Heel–Face Turn, and Indus, who's only a bad guy out of loyalty to Mera.

• If the show follows the plot of Anime Campaign, then Confirmed.

Bliss Ocean just wants a lot of epithets for themselves

Once Bliss Ocean gathers multiple epithets, the leader will take them all. Plus, tracking down every person with an epithet is an impossible task, and if they wanted to destroy the epithets, they could've made a device to destroy epithets, instead of copying them.

• Kinda muddled by the fact that, in the original Anime Campaign, the purpose of the Gemini Amulet, which did the same thing as the Arsene Amulet, was not to take all the epithets, but to allow Naven and Millie to pass the Flashback and Augment epithets to successors so they can continue to wipe people’s minds of the memory of epithets long after the two have died.
  • It's being used to take epithets now canonically.
    • Molly did use it to give Sylvie back his epithet, so it could still be used to pass the epithets that could be used to make people forget about epithets.

Giovanni's epithet isn't actually soup

Why would every 13th attack Giovanni lands be more powerful? Giovanni could be hiding their epithet so Bliss Ocean doesn't target them. Now, what Giovanni's epithet would be is a mystery.

• His epithet is soup, that makes no sense. Nobody knows that Bliss Ocean is planning to steal all epithets, and all his powers are clearly soup-based. Also the stat sheets don’t contain false information.

Those two kids who raised their hands when Mera asked them if they had an epithet will show up later

It feels like a subtle Chekhov's Gun to me. They will be important later on since the series focuses on people with epithets.

Zora is actually from the time of cowboys.

She talks about how "these days" battles are epithet based and not skill based, which doesn't really work unless she was around before epithets were wide-spread. She definitely has the power to keep herself young and spry for centuries. And, of course, she's dressed like a cowgirl, because that's how she dressed for the last 200 or so years.

• How does Zora have an Epithet then?
• …why would being from the time of cowboys prevent her from having an Epithet?

• Potentially jossed, unless Banzai Blasters existed in the old west. Though it's also unplausible that she could have survived alone in the forest for over 100 years...

Giovanni's epithet can let him manipulate seawater and marine creatures

If you use a very loose definition, the ocean technically counts as a soup since it contains meat (fish), vegetables (seaweed), and seasoning (salt). So power over all soup would include power over everything in the ocean.

• His pink hair is also a hint towards Ocean Country heritage, which would help

Ramsey is Australian.

In the description of the countries in Epithet Erased, one of them is Australia. As said by the wiki: "This strange land lies on the far side of the ocean. Little is known about its strange inhabitants and their strange ways. Some say that these “Australian” people have whiskers and rodent-like appearances, but few have seen an Australian and lived to tell the tale…" And lets pay attention to the description of the Australians, sound familiar?

• Then why does he have a New York accent?
  • How does having a specific accent change where he's from? New York also doesn't have an established equivalent in Epithet Erased.

Rick Shades is from Ocean Country

Ocean Country is heavily isolated, has wizards, and has people with odd/bright hair colors. Rick doesn’t understand much of modern society, he washed up on the beach (coming from the ocean), his hair is purple and bright red, and he is referred to as a ‘wizard’ multiple times.

• Confirmed

Ben's Banzai Blaster name will be "Blade"

Blade was going to be the name of one of Giovanni's boys, but had to be cut to make room for Ben. Assuming he ever reaches a level of respect in which he can earn a name, it'd be a fun Development Gag to have it be the name that he replaced.

Zora’s powers don’t work at night

She’s clearly got an extremely powerful ability, and yet she’s considered the second least (physically) powerful member of Bliss Ocean. It’s highly unlikely an epithet-hating organization could be entirely made up of people like Zora, so it stands to reason that she has some kind of large drawback to her powers. Her villain song also repeatedly emphasizes that she has to finish her job before sundown. Maybe this is because her powers don’t work when the Sun isn’t out—after all, a sundial cannot tell time without the Sun.

• Jossed, as she uses her Epithet to leave the area after the fight ends in Episode 7, then possibly later again on the fake amulet to turn it to a clump of dirt. Though it may be possible that her powers just aren't as strong after the sun sets.

Giovanni has wizardry in his genes

His ‘13th strike critical hit’ ability has nothing to do with his epithet. This power has to come from somewhere, right? His pink hair hints that he has Ocean Country dna, and they are mentioned to have wizards among them. This ability of his could come from some form of latent wizardry.

• Trixie’s power to see ghosts could also be this, instead of an epithet like she thinks.

The reason Howie is considered a Mundie despite his strength and speed...

...is because Mundies =/= ordinary humans in Real Life. Sure, they don't have Epithets, but they're still potentially more powerful than your average Earth human given enough hard work.

It's not actually Mera's Epithet that causes damage to her.

This theory is taken from a Discord server thread, posted by the user named ♡•Calibitch•☆.

• There's a very rare but medically possible condition called Osteogenesis imperfecta, or brittle bones disease, that affects about every 1 in 10-20k people. It's possible Mera's epithet shakes her body, but we've seen her use it in small doses (i.e. the window cracking in the flashback) and it not affecting her. But when DOES she get broken bones? Harsh. Physical. Contact. When Sylvie hits her, when she slams her fist into the ground—we've never seen her get injured JUST by using her Epithet. It's always when she hits against something, hence the possibility that she has undiagnosed osteogenesis.

Possible epithets that could appear in the future.

• Hypnosis
• A Fire Epithet
• A Crow Epithet
• An Epithet that can control plants
• Zombie
• Glamour
• Fiesta
• Anime

Giovanni's thing with 13 hits equaling a critical hit is soup-related.

It's a Soup-er attack, after all.

Naven has an epithet.

• Admittedly there are a few signs that this is possible. It’s hard to say what it could be, but it’s most likely mental, seeing as he knew things he should not have had a way of knowing, especially about Giovanni, such as how Gio was the catalyst for Molly improving and becoming more assertive, and being stunned, yet not surprised when Gio takes Molly for a nap. Not to mention he has taken almost everything that happens in stride including: a kidnapping, three little girls dragging a dead body, the introduction of Vincent Murder, being taken hostage, and being threatened by Lorelei. In fact he even dared her to do so, which for most people would be calling a bluff, but if he has a mental epithet, he probably knew she wouldn’t kill him, and knew just what to say to turn it against her. The only time Naven was caught completely off guard was after his cage being dropped into another room out of the blue, and being immediately caught up to speed only a second later after a brief look at Gio and the Neo trio.
• also of note is how it is mentioned a few times throughout the book that his eyes are always squinting shut. As we have seen with Mera, Zora, and possibly Lorelei, when an epithet gets powerful enough it can physically change a person’s appearance, usually around the eyes.
• The eyes are a window to the soul after all

The reason Molly always says "It's Dumb" like that...

She knows no matter how she answers the question "What's your epithet," she knows the Who's on First? routine is coming and she's sick of it.

There's only one Banzai Baron

Okay, when it comes to the Banzai Blasters, the highest rank to have made a physical appearance so far is Vice Principals (Arnold and Bugsy), and any Banzai Blasters of higher ranks (Associate Justice, Valedictorian, Senpai and Baron) haven't been shown yet, and it's never stated how many of them exist, but I imagine that when it comes to Banzai Baron, the highest rank (And the only rank in the Blasters' confusing system that actually makes sense), there's only one, most likely the original founder of the Banzai Blasters (Or a successor if the previous one passed away). Evidence to there only being one Banzai Baron is that Giovanni and Bugsy both mention giving the Arsene Amulet to "The Boss". Not a boss, The Boss, who would certainly be the Banzai Baron. Who else would they be referring to?

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