Going to make my Marisha Ray post now, because I have a bit of time before I need to leave for work, and it’s the shortest/most straightforward post I currently have in mind.
And it’s not anything that hasn’t been said before–although it gets said a lot more often about Liam, and it’s extremely true of him as well. But guys…Marisha is so generous in her Role Play. She’s so consistently devoted to approaching other people’s characters and strengthening her own character’s relationships with them, and probing into their stories, and coaxing out meaningful conversations/interactions that are centered more on them than on her.
Both she and Liam especially seem to keep in mind which characters their characters are close to, and they reinforce those friendships at every opportunity. For Caleb, that mostly means Nott and Beau; for Beau, it’s Caleb, Fjord, and Jester. In fact, Marisha/Beau almost seems to play Ping-Pong with Fjord and Caleb sometimes–if she has a meaningful interaction with one of them, she’ll hop right over to the other for some quality time. In-character, I feel like this says something adorable about Beau being careful to place equal value on her Jock Bro and her Book Bro. (And how much do I love that Beau has really and truly unleashed her inner nerd at last, and will unapologetically pair off with Caleb for any adventure involving libraries or research?? SO, SO MUCH!)
Anyway, amidst all the Big Moments in this episode, two of my favorite Little Moments were Beau dragging Caleb along to talk to the moonie and Beau offering to help Fjord train in martial arts (…and oversharing about her kinks). It’s funny because both of those moments ended up being ‘meaningless’ in any practical sense–nothing productive came of the moonie meeting, and Fjord’s few training sessions with Beau prooobably didn’t contribute toward his shiny new multiclassed status–but they emphasized what both Marisha and Beau do so well: shine a spotlight on other characters, keep relationships strong, and really bring those fictional dynamics to life in all their serious/silly/multifaceted glory. For someone so badly neglected, abused, and ground down throughout her life, Beau is really good at loving people, okay? (And Marisha is jaw-droppingly good at Role Play, and I have no idea how anyone has ever thought otherwise.)
