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Animorphs #6
The Capture
It was really bad when Jake found out his older brother was one of them. It was even worse when Tobias stayed in his morph too long. But nothing compares to the horror the Animorphs are about to face. Nothing.
160 pages, Paperback
First published February 1, 1997
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1377 people want to read
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K.A. Applegate
251 books478 followersalso published under the name Katherine Applegate
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April 28, 2015
Are you ready for this?
Guys, are you ready for this?
It doesn’t matter what you answered. You are not ready for this. None of the preceding five books could prepare us for The Capture.
See, the Yeerks have built a shiny new hospital that they have staffed with Controllers. That way, they can infect the people who go there for treatment—including powerful people, like the state governor, who might one day be the President of the United States. Yikes! So the Animorphs come up with a plan to infiltrate the hospital and put a stop to that, and—wait for it—it goes horribly wrong.
In fact, from now on, just assume that whenever I say “the Animorphs come up with a plan…” the “it goes horribly wrong” is implied. Because it always does.
These books are far too short. Fellow Animorphist (Is that a thing? I’m making it a thing. It’s so fetch.) Julie opined on my review of #1: The Invasion that Applegate’s sparse prose is a positive, earning her the moniker “the Hemingway of YA,” and I can see her point. These books were originally coming out fast and furious, only a few months apart. That doesn’t exactly leave much time for details. Still, I dislike it for entirely selfish reasons. Back in the day, I used to be able to stretch these out for at least the whole day. Now they last maybe an hour, if I’m careful. And I’m only six books in, but I still feel like I’m going through them too fast. Yet I can’t wait to tackle the next one! Graaargh!
Anyway, The Capture kicks off what we might tentatively call the second arc of the Animorphs series. The first five books form the introductory arc, in which we meet each of the Animorphs in first person, and we see them become personally invested in the fight against the Yeerks. With book 6, we start to learn more about the larger galaxy-wide war between the Yeerks and those who oppose them (mostly the Andalites)—Applegate even goes so far as to tantalize us with a vision at the very end of a mysterious being:
Oh, snap! The Eye of Sauron! Er, I mean, Crayak! I had forgotten that Applegate foreshadows Crayak as early as this book, and if I had any doubts she had a master plan and knew what she was doing, this lays them to rest. But of course, where Crayak lurks, the Ellimist must be just around the corner….
Jake has this vision after the Yeerk inhabiting him, poor unlucky Temrash, dies from Kandrona withdrawal. The idea that Jake of all people should become a Controller is a powerful and creepy one. I can’t really critique Applegate’s writing this time around: she does a fantastic job conveying the utter helplessness of Yeerk possession. Couple that with the fact that Temrash, until recently, was the Yeerk in control of Jake’s brother, Tom, and you’ve got yourself a recipe for heart-wrenching drama.
Layered atop this drama, however, is just enough comedy to keep us going. That’s the Animorphs way. It doesn’t take long for Controller!Jake to betray himself, and the Animorphs react swiftly. They put in place a pretty solid plan to isolate Controller!Jake until the Yeerk dies. And, to their credit, it actually works.
I want to emphasize this. At the top of the review I mock the Animorphs for their plans going sideways (and to be fair, no plan, not even ones formulated by military geniuses, survives contact with the enemy). I think the way that they handle Jake’s capture is perhaps the first time in this series where they develop and successfully execute a plan in a way that leads to total victory for them. Most of their other triumphs so far have been accidental more than intentional. But this? This is all them.
While Jake confronts the existential horror of being trapped in his own body with a Yeerk for company, Applegate keeps things light with Temrash’s mounting frustration as the Animorphs thwart escape attempt after escape attempt. Temrash is eager to exploit Jake’s morphing powers, but the other Animorphs always seem one step ahead, going so far as to lay traps that Temrash then falls into. Eventually he betrays a level of frustration that rivals Visser Three’s obsession with those sneaky Andalite warriors, and I start to wonder whether all of the powerful Yeerks are actually just deranged psychotics with child-like levels of maturity.
Applegate wisely does not go near the can of worms that is a Yeerk in the body of someone who can morph. Too many questions. When a Controller morphs, the Yeerk is still in control, so presumably it is still wrapped around the brain of its host body, whatever form that might be. But what if the animal is smaller than a Yeerk, like a flea? I guess the Yeerk body shrinks commensurately? Or is the Yeerk body itself transformed during the morphing process—in which case, can a Yeerk leave its host when it is morphed? If a Yeerk in a morph gets trapped in morph, does it still need Kandrona rays, or has it become merged with the morphed animal?
So many questions. Animorphists, please commence a flame war in the comment thread!
The only thing I wish we had seen more of is Ax impersonating Prince Jake so no one gets suspicious. Thankfully, Applegate includes a few tidbits about what this must have been like (Ax does like his food). Still, I would love to read more about this. Can we have a short story called “A Day in the Life of Prince Jake,” in which Ax recounts everything he did as Jake? Does that fanfic exist? (I don’t want to go searching for it, because I really don’t want to come across Animorph porn….)
Finally, a shout-out to Rachel and Cassie’s exchange at the start of Chapter 6:
Oh, those were the days. I remember having to know how to program a VCR. Do you remember? Pepperidge Farm remembers.
Next review I get to revel in Rachel’s raw sense of self again! It’s also meet-and-greet time with the Animorphs’ personal Trickster/nearly-omnipotent godlike being, the Ellimist. But don’t worry, the Animorphs have a plan….
My reviews of Animorphs:
← #5: The Predator | #7: The Stranger →
Guys, are you ready for this?
It doesn’t matter what you answered. You are not ready for this. None of the preceding five books could prepare us for The Capture.
See, the Yeerks have built a shiny new hospital that they have staffed with Controllers. That way, they can infect the people who go there for treatment—including powerful people, like the state governor, who might one day be the President of the United States. Yikes! So the Animorphs come up with a plan to infiltrate the hospital and put a stop to that, and—wait for it—it goes horribly wrong.
In fact, from now on, just assume that whenever I say “the Animorphs come up with a plan…” the “it goes horribly wrong” is implied. Because it always does.
These books are far too short. Fellow Animorphist (Is that a thing? I’m making it a thing. It’s so fetch.) Julie opined on my review of #1: The Invasion that Applegate’s sparse prose is a positive, earning her the moniker “the Hemingway of YA,” and I can see her point. These books were originally coming out fast and furious, only a few months apart. That doesn’t exactly leave much time for details. Still, I dislike it for entirely selfish reasons. Back in the day, I used to be able to stretch these out for at least the whole day. Now they last maybe an hour, if I’m careful. And I’m only six books in, but I still feel like I’m going through them too fast. Yet I can’t wait to tackle the next one! Graaargh!
Anyway, The Capture kicks off what we might tentatively call the second arc of the Animorphs series. The first five books form the introductory arc, in which we meet each of the Animorphs in first person, and we see them become personally invested in the fight against the Yeerks. With book 6, we start to learn more about the larger galaxy-wide war between the Yeerks and those who oppose them (mostly the Andalites)—Applegate even goes so far as to tantalize us with a vision at the very end of a mysterious being:
And then I saw it.
A creature. Or a machine. Some combination of both. It had no arms. It sat still, as if unable to move, on a throne that was miles high.
Its head was a single eye. The eye turned slowly … left … right …
I trembled. I prayed it would not look my way.
And then it saw me.
The eye, the bloodred eye, looked straight at me.
It saw me.
It SAW me!
Oh, snap! The Eye of Sauron! Er, I mean, Crayak! I had forgotten that Applegate foreshadows Crayak as early as this book, and if I had any doubts she had a master plan and knew what she was doing, this lays them to rest. But of course, where Crayak lurks, the Ellimist must be just around the corner….
Jake has this vision after the Yeerk inhabiting him, poor unlucky Temrash, dies from Kandrona withdrawal. The idea that Jake of all people should become a Controller is a powerful and creepy one. I can’t really critique Applegate’s writing this time around: she does a fantastic job conveying the utter helplessness of Yeerk possession. Couple that with the fact that Temrash, until recently, was the Yeerk in control of Jake’s brother, Tom, and you’ve got yourself a recipe for heart-wrenching drama.
Layered atop this drama, however, is just enough comedy to keep us going. That’s the Animorphs way. It doesn’t take long for Controller!Jake to betray himself, and the Animorphs react swiftly. They put in place a pretty solid plan to isolate Controller!Jake until the Yeerk dies. And, to their credit, it actually works.
I want to emphasize this. At the top of the review I mock the Animorphs for their plans going sideways (and to be fair, no plan, not even ones formulated by military geniuses, survives contact with the enemy). I think the way that they handle Jake’s capture is perhaps the first time in this series where they develop and successfully execute a plan in a way that leads to total victory for them. Most of their other triumphs so far have been accidental more than intentional. But this? This is all them.
While Jake confronts the existential horror of being trapped in his own body with a Yeerk for company, Applegate keeps things light with Temrash’s mounting frustration as the Animorphs thwart escape attempt after escape attempt. Temrash is eager to exploit Jake’s morphing powers, but the other Animorphs always seem one step ahead, going so far as to lay traps that Temrash then falls into. Eventually he betrays a level of frustration that rivals Visser Three’s obsession with those sneaky Andalite warriors, and I start to wonder whether all of the powerful Yeerks are actually just deranged psychotics with child-like levels of maturity.
Applegate wisely does not go near the can of worms that is a Yeerk in the body of someone who can morph. Too many questions. When a Controller morphs, the Yeerk is still in control, so presumably it is still wrapped around the brain of its host body, whatever form that might be. But what if the animal is smaller than a Yeerk, like a flea? I guess the Yeerk body shrinks commensurately? Or is the Yeerk body itself transformed during the morphing process—in which case, can a Yeerk leave its host when it is morphed? If a Yeerk in a morph gets trapped in morph, does it still need Kandrona rays, or has it become merged with the morphed animal?
So many questions. Animorphists, please commence a flame war in the comment thread!
The only thing I wish we had seen more of is Ax impersonating Prince Jake so no one gets suspicious. Thankfully, Applegate includes a few tidbits about what this must have been like (Ax does like his food). Still, I would love to read more about this. Can we have a short story called “A Day in the Life of Prince Jake,” in which Ax recounts everything he did as Jake? Does that fanfic exist? (I don’t want to go searching for it, because I really don’t want to come across Animorph porn….)
Finally, a shout-out to Rachel and Cassie’s exchange at the start of Chapter 6:
“How long do you think this will take?” Rachel asked. She checked her watch. “I set the VCR for two of my favorite shows, but I forgot to tape the movie of the week.”
“I’m taping it in case you miss it,” Cassie said.
Oh, those were the days. I remember having to know how to program a VCR. Do you remember? Pepperidge Farm remembers.
Next review I get to revel in Rachel’s raw sense of self again! It’s also meet-and-greet time with the Animorphs’ personal Trickster/nearly-omnipotent godlike being, the Ellimist. But don’t worry, the Animorphs have a plan….
My reviews of Animorphs:
← #5: The Predator | #7: The Stranger →
July 12, 2016
The introductions to these characters are over, so now it's time to get real, I guess. With POV books from all the characters excepting Ax* in the bag, these kids are now all in on the fight against the Yeerks, even if they're not really sure what that means at this point. Sure, they've had some harrowing experiences (this whole thing was started with an alien brutally murdering another in front of them, after all), but they're kids, and so they don't yet know what it *really* means to fight a war, especially one where they are so greatly outnumbered.
*Ax only gets a POV book every other cycle for the first half of the series, apparently because Scholastic thought kids would be less interested to read from an alien's perspective . . . do they even know kids at all?? His first book will be #8, coming up for me in August.
Because the others have unilaterally decided Jake is their leader, he often gets stories that involve coming to terms with the harsh realities of their situation. He's the one that has to make tough decisions, and the burden of weighing the good of his team and their families against the actions they might take against the Yeerks is on him. He's also the one that has to live with the consequences of those actions. In The Capture, that burden is placed on him regarding his brother Tom, who is a Controller, and whose Yeerk has apparently risen high in the ranks. He and Visser Three have a plan cooked up to take over a hospital and use it to install Yeerks into the heads of strategic people, starting with the Governor. Jake knows they can't let this plan come to fruition, but he also knows that if he and the other Animorphs succeed in disrupting the Yeerks' plans, as the Yeerk in charge, Tom will suffer, perhaps even die, for failing.
Jake gets around this awful choice (with help from Cassie) by staging an initial recon mission, but when it becomes clear that the Yeerks are perilously close to having a Yeerk in such a powerful position, he has no choice but to act. The mission of course has some hiccups.
This book had a really cool premise, and does delve into some meaty ethical dilemmas, but it doesn't take any of them far enough, and in fact, cops out a little, giving Jake the easy way out. In the end, Jake doesn't really reach a conclusion about whether to embrace the predatory nature that seems to be taking him slowly (as represented by the tiger dreams he keeps having, where he stalks and kills visions of his brother, and himself). It's more like, this will be an ongoing problem for you, and eventually you WILL have to make a decision, but not today. It was less satisfying an installment than I'd been remembering as a result.
A lot of seeds for further conflict are planted here, though. We get a tiny bit of a hint at Andalite and Yeerk history, and the first mention of the Gedds, the first race the Yeerks enslaved, and some dark words about the murky relationship between Andalites and Yeerks from the dying one in Jake's head, who is determined to make Jake doubt the Andalites before he goes. We also get a very brief mention of a mysterious red eye which will be coming back later, and the kids add not one but two new disgusting bug morphs to their retinue. And Jake comes away with a newfound sympathy for humans and other beings who are Controllers, for the helplessness and hopelessness they must feel every day.
I would like to add that I don't think it's a coincidence I haven't had a cockroach in my home in over six years, and then I read this book where people are just turning into cockroaches all willy-nilly, and one shows up the next morning dead on my bedroom floor. Something is going on and I want it stopped right now, cockroaches!
Next time, we meet The Ellimist. Gotta love that guy.
[3.5 stars rounded up]
*Ax only gets a POV book every other cycle for the first half of the series, apparently because Scholastic thought kids would be less interested to read from an alien's perspective . . . do they even know kids at all?? His first book will be #8, coming up for me in August.
Because the others have unilaterally decided Jake is their leader, he often gets stories that involve coming to terms with the harsh realities of their situation. He's the one that has to make tough decisions, and the burden of weighing the good of his team and their families against the actions they might take against the Yeerks is on him. He's also the one that has to live with the consequences of those actions. In The Capture, that burden is placed on him regarding his brother Tom, who is a Controller, and whose Yeerk has apparently risen high in the ranks. He and Visser Three have a plan cooked up to take over a hospital and use it to install Yeerks into the heads of strategic people, starting with the Governor. Jake knows they can't let this plan come to fruition, but he also knows that if he and the other Animorphs succeed in disrupting the Yeerks' plans, as the Yeerk in charge, Tom will suffer, perhaps even die, for failing.
Jake gets around this awful choice (with help from Cassie) by staging an initial recon mission, but when it becomes clear that the Yeerks are perilously close to having a Yeerk in such a powerful position, he has no choice but to act. The mission of course has some hiccups.
This book had a really cool premise, and does delve into some meaty ethical dilemmas, but it doesn't take any of them far enough, and in fact, cops out a little, giving Jake the easy way out. In the end, Jake doesn't really reach a conclusion about whether to embrace the predatory nature that seems to be taking him slowly (as represented by the tiger dreams he keeps having, where he stalks and kills visions of his brother, and himself). It's more like, this will be an ongoing problem for you, and eventually you WILL have to make a decision, but not today. It was less satisfying an installment than I'd been remembering as a result.
A lot of seeds for further conflict are planted here, though. We get a tiny bit of a hint at Andalite and Yeerk history, and the first mention of the Gedds, the first race the Yeerks enslaved, and some dark words about the murky relationship between Andalites and Yeerks from the dying one in Jake's head, who is determined to make Jake doubt the Andalites before he goes. We also get a very brief mention of a mysterious red eye which will be coming back later, and the kids add not one but two new disgusting bug morphs to their retinue. And Jake comes away with a newfound sympathy for humans and other beings who are Controllers, for the helplessness and hopelessness they must feel every day.
I would like to add that I don't think it's a coincidence I haven't had a cockroach in my home in over six years, and then I read this book where people are just turning into cockroaches all willy-nilly, and one shows up the next morning dead on my bedroom floor. Something is going on and I want it stopped right now, cockroaches!
Next time, we meet The Ellimist. Gotta love that guy.
[3.5 stars rounded up]
May 20, 2025
(Read in March 2015, February 2020, and May 2025.)
FIRST REVIEW / MAR 10, 2015
Another one that I remember so, so vividly -- I can't believe how great these early books are, and the places they go so early on -- because the premise is just so chilling and great. Congrats, kids: your main character and the very leader of your resistance has been infested with a Yeerk!
The last part of this book is so focused on interiority, for obvious reasons, as Jake becomes a prisoner in his own head. And it also bowls me over with Jake feelings, Tom feelings, and freakin' Yeerk feelings, as you learn a little bit more about their native environment.
Also, morphing flies. The kids joking around and going "Heeeeelppp meeeeeee!" cracks me up every time, because that is exactly what I would do too.
---------------------------------
SECOND REVIEW / FEB 4, 2020
Ugh, this time -- even my third-ish time reading this book -- it finally made me cry for the first time, specifically to do with Tom and the glimpse you get into his head.
It's still astounding to me how quickly the stakes ratchet up in every single book, and how strong these early books are out of the gate. The Animorphs get so close to disaster -- their leader is infested!! -- and yet they're all so sharp and canny that they manage to avert it, manage to contain and control the situation with clever decisions. Their relationships, how well they already know each other, and how justifiably paranoid they are, all combine in the best way to be weaponised against the Yeerk.
Each of these early books had been hammering in the stakes of the war itself, too, and while Jake already had his personal reason to fight, The Capture presents you with even more reasons to care. It's a first-hand experience of how awful being a Controller is: the agency and autonomy it robs from you, the broken wreck it leaves the hosts. It also lays some foreshadowing and details that'll come up again later: Jake's dream; the hint at the history between the Andalites and the Yeerks; the eye that Jake sees at the end.
Even outside the actual capture, this is a really exciting thrill of a book, with several semi-successful missions done. They barely get out alive, as usual, but you really do see the kids getting better and better at tactics, espionage, and then outright attacks on Yeerk facilities.
Favourite quotes moved to Google Docs.
---------------------------------
THIRD REVIEW / MAY 16, 2025
The thing that haunted me this time was Jake staring at Tom across the kitchen table, wondering if he would have it in him to kill his own brother. The way Jake's rage and hatred of the Yeerk led to his own mask almost slipping and giving it away, because he couldn't help but keep pushing.
God, these poor kids.
FIRST REVIEW / MAR 10, 2015
Another one that I remember so, so vividly -- I can't believe how great these early books are, and the places they go so early on -- because the premise is just so chilling and great. Congrats, kids: your main character and the very leader of your resistance has been infested with a Yeerk!
The last part of this book is so focused on interiority, for obvious reasons, as Jake becomes a prisoner in his own head. And it also bowls me over with Jake feelings, Tom feelings, and freakin' Yeerk feelings, as you learn a little bit more about their native environment.
Also, morphing flies. The kids joking around and going "Heeeeelppp meeeeeee!" cracks me up every time, because that is exactly what I would do too.
---------------------------------
SECOND REVIEW / FEB 4, 2020
Ugh, this time -- even my third-ish time reading this book -- it finally made me cry for the first time, specifically to do with Tom and the glimpse you get into his head.
It's still astounding to me how quickly the stakes ratchet up in every single book, and how strong these early books are out of the gate. The Animorphs get so close to disaster -- their leader is infested!! -- and yet they're all so sharp and canny that they manage to avert it, manage to contain and control the situation with clever decisions. Their relationships, how well they already know each other, and how justifiably paranoid they are, all combine in the best way to be weaponised against the Yeerk.
Each of these early books had been hammering in the stakes of the war itself, too, and while Jake already had his personal reason to fight, The Capture presents you with even more reasons to care. It's a first-hand experience of how awful being a Controller is: the agency and autonomy it robs from you, the broken wreck it leaves the hosts. It also lays some foreshadowing and details that'll come up again later: Jake's dream; the hint at the history between the Andalites and the Yeerks; the eye that Jake sees at the end.
Even outside the actual capture, this is a really exciting thrill of a book, with several semi-successful missions done. They barely get out alive, as usual, but you really do see the kids getting better and better at tactics, espionage, and then outright attacks on Yeerk facilities.
Favourite quotes moved to Google Docs.
---------------------------------
THIRD REVIEW / MAY 16, 2025
The thing that haunted me this time was Jake staring at Tom across the kitchen table, wondering if he would have it in him to kill his own brother. The way Jake's rage and hatred of the Yeerk led to his own mask almost slipping and giving it away, because he couldn't help but keep pushing.
God, these poor kids.
August 1, 2020
Rating 4.5
~~Spoilers for previous books~~
So many creepy crawly morphs in this one, yuck 😂
We're back to Jake as the narrator so we get a little more insight into the whole Tom situation again, which was interesting since this means that we get a look into the inner workings of the Yeerk society.
This is a kids' series so I can't really criticize it too much for simplifying the conflict to an easy good vs evil story, I'm really only commenting on this because I just finished watching a series with a really grey-and-grey morality storyline so I really felt the contrast when reading this book.
Onto the next one!
~~Spoilers for previous books~~
So many creepy crawly morphs in this one, yuck 😂
We're back to Jake as the narrator so we get a little more insight into the whole Tom situation again, which was interesting since this means that we get a look into the inner workings of the Yeerk society.
This is a kids' series so I can't really criticize it too much for simplifying the conflict to an easy good vs evil story, I'm really only commenting on this because I just finished watching a series with a really grey-and-grey morality storyline so I really felt the contrast when reading this book.
Onto the next one!
January 30, 2019
Did I already say these were super dark? The team commits their first war crime by executing hundreds of the enemy in an unarmed and defenseless state. Furthermore, they feel little to no remorse afterward as team leader Jake has been captured and turned.
The last third of the book was very well done as the alien parasite slowly starves to death and Jake gains insight into the life of the creature that has taken over his body.
The last third of the book was very well done as the alien parasite slowly starves to death and Jake gains insight into the life of the creature that has taken over his body.
January 22, 2022
Come check out my 4 hour 35 minute deep dive into reading every single Animorphs book for the first time on YouTube. I recap and review all of the books from the main series: https://youtu.be/H8kUM2q3CIU
February 14, 2016
The major story stuff doesn't start until halfway through the book, but man, this book gets a bit dark. It looks at what it's like to be enslaved by a yeerk and it totally raises the stakes of the series. All the characters are just so on point and I love this series!
September 28, 2020
I am a grown woman reading Animorphs for the first time and I was completely unable to put this one down. I started it over breakfast and was done by noon. Holy f. If I had read this as a twelve-year-old, I think I would have passed out.
February 8, 2024
Herein lies one of the first recorded instances of girl math
Rachel: “The blouse was originally $33 and you’re getting it for $17.50.”
Jake: “I was only going to spend $15”
Rachel: “Don’t you know anything? You saved $15.50. You came out ahead by over 15 bucks!”
Tell him what’s what Rachel
Rachel: “The blouse was originally $33 and you’re getting it for $17.50.”
Jake: “I was only going to spend $15”
Rachel: “Don’t you know anything? You saved $15.50. You came out ahead by over 15 bucks!”
Tell him what’s what Rachel
July 21, 2022
Now we know all the Animorphs, it’s time to kick the series into second gear. Jake, the leader of the Animorphs, gets infected by a Yeerk. The Animorphs get to see first-hand the horrors they are facing in this war and they finally get to really know their enemy.
September 9, 2022
this one was brutal. ka applegate really just had middle schoolers getting traumatized in various ways 😱
March 11, 2020
Thrilling and terrifying. Tobias is more and more comfortable in his hawk body. Ax is more and more comfortable with human slang, unless he has to use an actual mouth. And our boy Jake... well, this one's quite the journey for him. I remember the absolute terror that gripped me the first time I read this -- there was NO WAY they were going to handle a Yeerk! And then, they did it. They used all the knowledge Elfangor had imparted with the morphing cube to anticipate what this Yeerk might do with Jake's morphs. Seeing that character growth again made me so emotional, almost more than when we heard Tom's real emotions. And then the wolf-morph phone call. I can't even.
January 13, 2025
WHAT A WILD RIDE
August 2, 2024
When I revisited the ‘Animorphs’ series in early 2020, the first I’d read it since getting only midway through the series in my childhood, I fell in love and devoured the books, quickly reading and rating them on Goodreads—most without a review of any sort! the horror!—without any knowledge of their place within the larger story and certainly without any group reference to draw from. What I mean by that is that I did not know which ones “the fans” liked best, though I could make some educated guesses. When I read THE CAPTURE, the sixth book in the series, I’d given all but one of the first five books four stars. My rating for THE CAPTURE was the lowest yet: two stars.
My sense, now that I’m more aware of the larger ‘Animorphs’ “community”, is that this is generally looked favorably upon as one of the better books. Incidentally, the one book in the first five I gave a lower rating is book #3 (THE ENCOUNTER), the first book narrated by Tobias, and one which most consider top-tier Animorphs; I gave it three stars. The first one I gave one star is book #12 (THE REACTION), which I think is mostly thought of by others with fondness as well. Which is to say that I’m already out of lockstep with the majority of ‘Animorphs’ fans, but nevertheless, I wondered whether there was something in THE CAPTURE I was missing. Having recently listened to the audiobook of installment #10 (THE ANDROID) and been impressed anew by the book, I was eager to keep the ‘Animorphs’ audiobooks going and specifically selected this book to find out if the audio format might help the story open up for me.
The reason I selected this book of all of them is that I remembered the overall plot as being pretty cool and possibly darker than I gave it credit for: the Animorphs leader, Jake, is infested by a Yeerk. That seems like a big deal! It felt like there was a good likelihood that I failed to sufficiently appreciate the book on my first read as an adult because when I think about the story I think, wow, that’s pretty heavy for one of the first books in the series. I think about the fact that the book ends with Jake literally watching the Yeerk die of starvation and I think, yeah, this book has to be better than I gave it credit for.
Well, you can see the rating: still two stars. I struggled with the rating a little because I don’t feel negatively toward the book, per se, but being honest with myself the weaknesses of it win out of whatever strengths it has. You can call it 2.5 stars, that’s probably more accurate, but in Goodreads terms where I’m forced to err up or down, it’s two. I hadn’t thought of it until just now, but what THE CAPTURE reminds me mostly strongly of is ROCKY IV (spoilers for ROCKY IV follow, if that’s something that bothers you). When I first watched it, I absolutely loathed it. On a rewatch later, I saw it in a different light—it still sucked, don’t get me wrong, but I saw what it was going for. I posted about it on Facebook:
Or perhaps the simpler way of saying things is that THE CAPTURE has a nugget of a good idea which just isn’t executed as well as it ought to have been. I wish they’d saved the “Jake gets Yeerked” story for later in the series. In fact, in my mind I was drawing up plans for a whole alternate end to the series where Jake gets Yeerked, becomes Visser One, Tom joins the Animorphs in Jake’s place, and Rachel has to move into the leadership role for real. I feel like it could offer so much more dramatic stakes and pathos if they had leaned into this storyline more than they do. As it is, despite how seemingly momentous the storyline is, in practice it feels too lightweight.
In this book, Jake and Co. discover that the Yeerks have essentially taken over a hospital—a great way to Yeerk unsuspecting patients, of course, but specifically a way to Yeerk the state’s governor who has a good chance of becoming President. The Animorphs therefore decide to break into the hospital to detail the contours of the Yeerks’ evil plan, though it seems obvious from the start that Jake’s assertion that this is merely a “spy” mission is a fig leaf for what’s really about to go down. The Animorphs use a fly morph and roach morph to get into the hospital, but there’s relatively little tension in this. Even as the team, as roaches, is spotted by Visser Three (in human morph for the first time!) and a bunch of human-Controllers, their escape is more slapstick than it is exciting. They then find a room housing a portable Yeerk pool and decide to boil the Yeerks inside, though as their plan is nearly coming to fruition an action sequence erupts during which time Jake accidentally gets his head pushed into the sludgy soup and finds himself infested with Temrash 114, coincidentally the same Yeerk that had until now been in his brother Tom’s head.
I want to stop for a minute to point out that the “boiling the enemy to death” plan is extremely callous. I recognize that at this point in the series they’ve not yet individuated the Yeerks in the way they do later, such that right now they are just a faceless, evil other… but still. You’d think Cassie, at least, would have some reservations about the plan. You’d think there’d be some kind of discussion, even if they came down on the side of committing this atrocity after all. The lack of any wrestling with the moral implications of their action is part of what makes this a lesser ‘Animorphs’ book because when the group has to agonize over whether their actions are just is when the series is at its best. That THE CAPTURE elides this is a mark against it.
So Jake gets Yeerked. He hears a voice inside his head which he slowly recognizes is a Yeerk, and he then discovers that he cannot so much as blink or breathe at will any longer. The rest of the Animorphs figure out what happened with relative ease. I don’t know how to feel about that—whether it was right to upend those expectations or if it is a missed opportunity. They then decide to hold Jake in an abandoned cabin in the woods for three days so that the Yeerk inside him will die from Kandrona starvation, with Ax morphing Jake in the interim to avoid suspicion. There’s a bit of a tête-à-tête between Jake and Temrash here, but it’s mostly just the two antagonizing each other without a lot of substance. The focus seems to be entirely on whether or not Temrash will succeed in exposing the Animorphs, whereas this would have been a good opportunity to complicate things. Make Temrash reveal the “humanity” of the Yeerks so that Jake almost begins to feel sorry for his captor; or make him question the Animorphs’ brutality so that Jake questions his goodness. OR, here’s an idea: this is a great opportunity to explore how what the Animorphs do to the animals they morph—overcoming their will—is similar to what the Yeerks do to their hosts. To my recollection, ‘Animorphs’ never seriously dives into that. Whatever the case, give Jake something to have an existential crisis about! Instead, it’s just sort of a repeating exchange of “You’ll never win!” “Yes we will!” “No you won’t!” “Oh yes we will!”
Second, it takes a surprisingly long time for Temrash to utilize Jake’s morphing ability. When he does, he’s pestered by the other Animorphs to prevent him from getting away. I guess we’re supposed to think it’s cool how in control the Animorphs are here, but it’s not an especially memorable sequence. The morphing power is used, yes, but the result isn’t especially rewarding. There is no real moment where Jake has to watch in horror as he involuntarily attacks his friends. Instead, the other Animorphs perpetually have the upper hand over Temrash.
Lastly, there is the matter of Temrash’s death. There is a sequence where, in his final moments, Temrash broadcasts to Jake memories of his Yeerk youth and of his time with Tom. Once more, though, these scenes lack any immediacy. Yes, Tom is described as struggling against the controllers forcing him into the Yeerk pool, but this adds so little to our understanding of Tom. We literally had an opportunity to look into his mind and yet the book has nothing to offer except “He was mad / sad / scared”. I would think that the Yeerk’s death would be excruciating for Jake, that he would feel the same sensations as Temrash, that he would believe that he himself had just been starved and died, only to blink back awake at the last minute—wouldn’t that be stunning? Instead, there’s that final set of images from Temrash and then the Yeerk just kind of withers and slips out of Jake’s head. Even this scene, the moment where the Animorphs literally starve their enemy to death feels so bloodless.
There’s an amazing set of ideas at play in THE CAPTURE, but it just all comes together so haphazardly.
P.S. I haven’t yet discussed the performance of MacLeod Andrews who narrated the audiobook. He does a decent job overall; his voice is easier to take as Jake’s than was Ramón de Ocampo as Marco in THE ANDROID. That said, he and de Ocampo both voice Ax with a Mr. Spock-like tone, which bothers me because that is not true to the character. They also both pronounce the word “Yeerk” so that it sounds like “Y-ear-k” instead of rhyming with “jerk”—a dumb way to pronounce the word in that it is different from how I’ve always pronounced it. Hmph. I will say that when Andrews says it he does not enunciate it as much and so it’s not quite as bothersome as it was in THE ANDROID, but it’s still bothersome. Lastly, his voices for Rachel and Cassie are awful. I’m coming to think that men are just incapable of voicing female characters without having them sound like absurd parodies. It’s terrible. On the other hand, one thing that Andrews does well is the voice of Temrash: he gives it the character a voice somewhat reminiscent of Krang from ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ and I think it’s an excellent portrayal of this character. I still think audiobooks add something to the story that you don’t necessarily get from reading it off the page, but they are definitely not wholly good. I think I’m going to take a little break from ‘Animorphs’ audiobooks now but I am sure I’ll be returning for another before long.
My sense, now that I’m more aware of the larger ‘Animorphs’ “community”, is that this is generally looked favorably upon as one of the better books. Incidentally, the one book in the first five I gave a lower rating is book #3 (THE ENCOUNTER), the first book narrated by Tobias, and one which most consider top-tier Animorphs; I gave it three stars. The first one I gave one star is book #12 (THE REACTION), which I think is mostly thought of by others with fondness as well. Which is to say that I’m already out of lockstep with the majority of ‘Animorphs’ fans, but nevertheless, I wondered whether there was something in THE CAPTURE I was missing. Having recently listened to the audiobook of installment #10 (THE ANDROID) and been impressed anew by the book, I was eager to keep the ‘Animorphs’ audiobooks going and specifically selected this book to find out if the audio format might help the story open up for me.
The reason I selected this book of all of them is that I remembered the overall plot as being pretty cool and possibly darker than I gave it credit for: the Animorphs leader, Jake, is infested by a Yeerk. That seems like a big deal! It felt like there was a good likelihood that I failed to sufficiently appreciate the book on my first read as an adult because when I think about the story I think, wow, that’s pretty heavy for one of the first books in the series. I think about the fact that the book ends with Jake literally watching the Yeerk die of starvation and I think, yeah, this book has to be better than I gave it credit for.
Well, you can see the rating: still two stars. I struggled with the rating a little because I don’t feel negatively toward the book, per se, but being honest with myself the weaknesses of it win out of whatever strengths it has. You can call it 2.5 stars, that’s probably more accurate, but in Goodreads terms where I’m forced to err up or down, it’s two. I hadn’t thought of it until just now, but what THE CAPTURE reminds me mostly strongly of is ROCKY IV (spoilers for ROCKY IV follow, if that’s something that bothers you). When I first watched it, I absolutely loathed it. On a rewatch later, I saw it in a different light—it still sucked, don’t get me wrong, but I saw what it was going for. I posted about it on Facebook:
Now I can see that there is a good movie trapped inside the garbage. The version we got places far too much emphasis on fighting the Cold War through Rocky Balboa, but that’s not where the heart of the movie lies. Creed tells Rocky at the start that he fights *because he has to*. He goes into the fight with Drago not because of some stupid love for ‘Murica, but because he needed to go down in the ring. Likewise, Drago at the end says “I fight for me” – that’s the moment that reveals his humanity. It should help Rocky realize that Drago is a man and not a machine, as Duke says. Both he and Creed fight because of an addiction, a compulsion. Not because of brainless patriotism. It’s appropriate that Rocky mistake Drago’s drive for villainy, but he should come to realize there was never any villainy at all. The version of the movie that exists doesn’t seem to recognize that it has this arc.
Or perhaps the simpler way of saying things is that THE CAPTURE has a nugget of a good idea which just isn’t executed as well as it ought to have been. I wish they’d saved the “Jake gets Yeerked” story for later in the series. In fact, in my mind I was drawing up plans for a whole alternate end to the series where Jake gets Yeerked, becomes Visser One, Tom joins the Animorphs in Jake’s place, and Rachel has to move into the leadership role for real. I feel like it could offer so much more dramatic stakes and pathos if they had leaned into this storyline more than they do. As it is, despite how seemingly momentous the storyline is, in practice it feels too lightweight.
In this book, Jake and Co. discover that the Yeerks have essentially taken over a hospital—a great way to Yeerk unsuspecting patients, of course, but specifically a way to Yeerk the state’s governor who has a good chance of becoming President. The Animorphs therefore decide to break into the hospital to detail the contours of the Yeerks’ evil plan, though it seems obvious from the start that Jake’s assertion that this is merely a “spy” mission is a fig leaf for what’s really about to go down. The Animorphs use a fly morph and roach morph to get into the hospital, but there’s relatively little tension in this. Even as the team, as roaches, is spotted by Visser Three (in human morph for the first time!) and a bunch of human-Controllers, their escape is more slapstick than it is exciting. They then find a room housing a portable Yeerk pool and decide to boil the Yeerks inside, though as their plan is nearly coming to fruition an action sequence erupts during which time Jake accidentally gets his head pushed into the sludgy soup and finds himself infested with Temrash 114, coincidentally the same Yeerk that had until now been in his brother Tom’s head.
I want to stop for a minute to point out that the “boiling the enemy to death” plan is extremely callous. I recognize that at this point in the series they’ve not yet individuated the Yeerks in the way they do later, such that right now they are just a faceless, evil other… but still. You’d think Cassie, at least, would have some reservations about the plan. You’d think there’d be some kind of discussion, even if they came down on the side of committing this atrocity after all. The lack of any wrestling with the moral implications of their action is part of what makes this a lesser ‘Animorphs’ book because when the group has to agonize over whether their actions are just is when the series is at its best. That THE CAPTURE elides this is a mark against it.
So Jake gets Yeerked. He hears a voice inside his head which he slowly recognizes is a Yeerk, and he then discovers that he cannot so much as blink or breathe at will any longer. The rest of the Animorphs figure out what happened with relative ease. I don’t know how to feel about that—whether it was right to upend those expectations or if it is a missed opportunity. They then decide to hold Jake in an abandoned cabin in the woods for three days so that the Yeerk inside him will die from Kandrona starvation, with Ax morphing Jake in the interim to avoid suspicion. There’s a bit of a tête-à-tête between Jake and Temrash here, but it’s mostly just the two antagonizing each other without a lot of substance. The focus seems to be entirely on whether or not Temrash will succeed in exposing the Animorphs, whereas this would have been a good opportunity to complicate things. Make Temrash reveal the “humanity” of the Yeerks so that Jake almost begins to feel sorry for his captor; or make him question the Animorphs’ brutality so that Jake questions his goodness. OR, here’s an idea: this is a great opportunity to explore how what the Animorphs do to the animals they morph—overcoming their will—is similar to what the Yeerks do to their hosts. To my recollection, ‘Animorphs’ never seriously dives into that. Whatever the case, give Jake something to have an existential crisis about! Instead, it’s just sort of a repeating exchange of “You’ll never win!” “Yes we will!” “No you won’t!” “Oh yes we will!”
Second, it takes a surprisingly long time for Temrash to utilize Jake’s morphing ability. When he does, he’s pestered by the other Animorphs to prevent him from getting away. I guess we’re supposed to think it’s cool how in control the Animorphs are here, but it’s not an especially memorable sequence. The morphing power is used, yes, but the result isn’t especially rewarding. There is no real moment where Jake has to watch in horror as he involuntarily attacks his friends. Instead, the other Animorphs perpetually have the upper hand over Temrash.
Lastly, there is the matter of Temrash’s death. There is a sequence where, in his final moments, Temrash broadcasts to Jake memories of his Yeerk youth and of his time with Tom. Once more, though, these scenes lack any immediacy. Yes, Tom is described as struggling against the controllers forcing him into the Yeerk pool, but this adds so little to our understanding of Tom. We literally had an opportunity to look into his mind and yet the book has nothing to offer except “He was mad / sad / scared”. I would think that the Yeerk’s death would be excruciating for Jake, that he would feel the same sensations as Temrash, that he would believe that he himself had just been starved and died, only to blink back awake at the last minute—wouldn’t that be stunning? Instead, there’s that final set of images from Temrash and then the Yeerk just kind of withers and slips out of Jake’s head. Even this scene, the moment where the Animorphs literally starve their enemy to death feels so bloodless.
There’s an amazing set of ideas at play in THE CAPTURE, but it just all comes together so haphazardly.
P.S. I haven’t yet discussed the performance of MacLeod Andrews who narrated the audiobook. He does a decent job overall; his voice is easier to take as Jake’s than was Ramón de Ocampo as Marco in THE ANDROID. That said, he and de Ocampo both voice Ax with a Mr. Spock-like tone, which bothers me because that is not true to the character. They also both pronounce the word “Yeerk” so that it sounds like “Y-ear-k” instead of rhyming with “jerk”—a dumb way to pronounce the word in that it is different from how I’ve always pronounced it. Hmph. I will say that when Andrews says it he does not enunciate it as much and so it’s not quite as bothersome as it was in THE ANDROID, but it’s still bothersome. Lastly, his voices for Rachel and Cassie are awful. I’m coming to think that men are just incapable of voicing female characters without having them sound like absurd parodies. It’s terrible. On the other hand, one thing that Andrews does well is the voice of Temrash: he gives it the character a voice somewhat reminiscent of Krang from ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ and I think it’s an excellent portrayal of this character. I still think audiobooks add something to the story that you don’t necessarily get from reading it off the page, but they are definitely not wholly good. I think I’m going to take a little break from ‘Animorphs’ audiobooks now but I am sure I’ll be returning for another before long.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 1, 2024
This one was actually really good? The first round of books set up everything, and this is the first in the second round. I was actually shocked how good this one was.
Jake gets a Yeerk in his head. We get to see what it's like for someone that is taken over. The rest of the Animorphs actually put together a solid plan to get the Yeerk out by basically putting Jake in the middle of the woods and beating the crap out of him every time he tries to morph. If he morphs into something small they figure he won't get far in two hours and will have to morph back to human.
I'm still annoyed by the hand wavey morph cooldown. Why can't he turn into a small bug, get as far as he can in two hours, morph to human and then morph back to bug again?
Either way, the Animorphs finally put together a solid plan. The Yeerk gives up and dies and all is well. Great book.
Jake gets a Yeerk in his head. We get to see what it's like for someone that is taken over. The rest of the Animorphs actually put together a solid plan to get the Yeerk out by basically putting Jake in the middle of the woods and beating the crap out of him every time he tries to morph. If he morphs into something small they figure he won't get far in two hours and will have to morph back to human.
I'm still annoyed by the hand wavey morph cooldown. Why can't he turn into a small bug, get as far as he can in two hours, morph to human and then morph back to bug again?
Either way, the Animorphs finally put together a solid plan. The Yeerk gives up and dies and all is well. Great book.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 11, 2021
We begin cycle 2 as we head back to Jake. The thing with Jake is that he simply serves as the leader and of the group, he has less personality outside of his role. He worked for book 1 as our audience surrogate but I feared he'd have trouble holding up books once we get past that. But while he hasn't quite hit his development yet, I felt like he held up okay due to the Tom stuff. See, at the start we found out his brother Tom is a Controller which was the first bit that showed just how big this whole thing was.
This gets further into that. But here's the thing with this book: The back blurb makes it seem like the entire premise is that Jake gets a Yeerk inside him, dun dun dun. That really interested me...but spoilers, that doesn't happen until like almost 100 pages in. Yes, really.
There's 50 pages to go from there so that's sort of enough but not quite given this is supposed to be the premise. Before, we get mostly the usual stuff. Granted, we have the hook of them finding out the Yeerks plan to invest the state's Governor, which is big. But otherwise it is generally the standard stuff, although at least we get the Visser 3 showdown earlier on than usual.
As usual, the strengths of the series still make it work but it does have some filler moments, and drags its feet before getting to the most interesting stuff. There's good inner drama here with the Tom stuff and some exciting morphing moments and all that. It's in the weird inbetween between the more generic plots of the earliest ones and the more specifc stuff we've been getting lately.
The promised premise being such an interesting one makes this hurt a bit more. Once we get there, it works. We get more on the Yeerks that is pretty neat and I involved how mustache twirl-y this one got, although he had a few slight idiot moments. He's also got Tom ties that add a lot. Oh and there's a payoff to a throwaway line from earlier that was pretty cool.'
'
The ending is a solid, sobering moment too. I know there's only so much you can do but you could have introduced it earlier and made a better balance. You get barely enough but it stills a tad rushed as a result of coming in late.
That makes this a fairly solid but conflicting one. It worked as a Jake book, or at least better than I expected and it's got plenty going for it. But it also has some filler and doesn't quite balance the more generic fomrula stuff and the book specific concepts as well as a couple others did, mostly by delaying the actual premise.
Still, most of it does work well enough and there's nothing to sloppy/stupid at least. Still plenty of solid little things here, just wish it was constructed a bit better.
Next time, we get back to Rachael as we'll meet yet another character too. See ya then.
(Also, this copy decided having one Goosebumps ad wasn't enough, it needed a separate one for Give Yourself lol)
This gets further into that. But here's the thing with this book: The back blurb makes it seem like the entire premise is that Jake gets a Yeerk inside him, dun dun dun. That really interested me...but spoilers, that doesn't happen until like almost 100 pages in. Yes, really.
There's 50 pages to go from there so that's sort of enough but not quite given this is supposed to be the premise. Before, we get mostly the usual stuff. Granted, we have the hook of them finding out the Yeerks plan to invest the state's Governor, which is big. But otherwise it is generally the standard stuff, although at least we get the Visser 3 showdown earlier on than usual.
As usual, the strengths of the series still make it work but it does have some filler moments, and drags its feet before getting to the most interesting stuff. There's good inner drama here with the Tom stuff and some exciting morphing moments and all that. It's in the weird inbetween between the more generic plots of the earliest ones and the more specifc stuff we've been getting lately.
The promised premise being such an interesting one makes this hurt a bit more. Once we get there, it works. We get more on the Yeerks that is pretty neat and I involved how mustache twirl-y this one got, although he had a few slight idiot moments. He's also got Tom ties that add a lot. Oh and there's a payoff to a throwaway line from earlier that was pretty cool.'
'
The ending is a solid, sobering moment too. I know there's only so much you can do but you could have introduced it earlier and made a better balance. You get barely enough but it stills a tad rushed as a result of coming in late.
That makes this a fairly solid but conflicting one. It worked as a Jake book, or at least better than I expected and it's got plenty going for it. But it also has some filler and doesn't quite balance the more generic fomrula stuff and the book specific concepts as well as a couple others did, mostly by delaying the actual premise.
Still, most of it does work well enough and there's nothing to sloppy/stupid at least. Still plenty of solid little things here, just wish it was constructed a bit better.
Next time, we get back to Rachael as we'll meet yet another character too. See ya then.
(Also, this copy decided having one Goosebumps ad wasn't enough, it needed a separate one for Give Yourself lol)
August 16, 2020
This is the book from the series that I most remember reading when I was a kid, and for good reason. It is the culmination of a promise, the firing of Chekhov's gun. If the threat of the series is the loss of autonomy as a result of Yeerk infestation, then one of the kids simply has to undergo the infestation in order for young readers to grasp the personal dimension of the stakes in the protagonists' battles against their enemies. Of course, the broader concern of the series is the conquest of Earth, but that's not what our heroes are personally risking when we read about their efforts to resist the evil empire in this juvenile space opera. No, rather what the heroes individually face when they go up against the Yeerks is something that kids understand too well -- not being in full control of yourself, not getting to render your own decisions, an incomplete agency in which you still suffer from decisions you never got the chance to decide in the first place.
And while the book does square its depiction of this struggle with an appropriate tone for its young target audience, the implied horror is still very present and discernible. After all, it has stuck around in my mind all these years, maybe more than two decades since I first read the books.
What else is subtly portrayed in this installment of the series is the ongoing theme of brutalization. Our heroes are slowly and quietly being affected by all that they've seen and all that they've done. Violence is becoming second nature and none of them are even aware of their shifting perspectives. When Yeerk!Jake says that he despairs over the destruction of any animal and Human!Jake thinks this must ring true to his friends because it is how he really feels, the reader has already seen Jake jump at the opportunity to burn and boil Yeerks alive. When Tobias tells Yeerk!Jake that he is glad to crush Yeerk!Jake's head or pluck out Yeerk!Jake's head, readers already have been told repeatedly that Tobias's essential nature is gentle and dreamy. By this point, the heroes have been shot at, poisoned, variously dismembered, and nearly drowned. They are becoming more and more comfortable with what violence they confront, and more and more comfortable with resorting to violence themselves in their resistance activities. They are no longer merely disrupters or saboteurs, trying to take out a supply ship here or perform a rescue mission there. They're increasingly buying into their role as Earth's armed resistance, and it's surprising to see that theme assert itself so early in the series, and so subtly in books that are meant for children.
And while the book does square its depiction of this struggle with an appropriate tone for its young target audience, the implied horror is still very present and discernible. After all, it has stuck around in my mind all these years, maybe more than two decades since I first read the books.
What else is subtly portrayed in this installment of the series is the ongoing theme of brutalization. Our heroes are slowly and quietly being affected by all that they've seen and all that they've done. Violence is becoming second nature and none of them are even aware of their shifting perspectives. When Yeerk!Jake says that he despairs over the destruction of any animal and Human!Jake thinks this must ring true to his friends because it is how he really feels, the reader has already seen Jake jump at the opportunity to burn and boil Yeerks alive. When Tobias tells Yeerk!Jake that he is glad to crush Yeerk!Jake's head or pluck out Yeerk!Jake's head, readers already have been told repeatedly that Tobias's essential nature is gentle and dreamy. By this point, the heroes have been shot at, poisoned, variously dismembered, and nearly drowned. They are becoming more and more comfortable with what violence they confront, and more and more comfortable with resorting to violence themselves in their resistance activities. They are no longer merely disrupters or saboteurs, trying to take out a supply ship here or perform a rescue mission there. They're increasingly buying into their role as Earth's armed resistance, and it's surprising to see that theme assert itself so early in the series, and so subtly in books that are meant for children.
March 29, 2021
There are more than fifty books in this series and the first six have each completely devastated me. How am I going to read these. I think I got into the thirties when I first read them in middle school. I don’t know if I’m strong enough for that anymore. What the fuck.
February 25, 2015
Things take an insane turn in this volume. Definitely recommended for fans of the series up to this point.
January 25, 2019
We had a LOT of developments in this book. A good amount of world building that established so much in just 50-ish pages. One of the best ones I’ve read so far!!
February 5, 2023
I forgot how good this one was!
April 26, 2017
(Originally reviewed at thelibraryladies.com.)
Narrator: Jake
Plot: I only have vague memories of some of the plots of these books. This one I did remember was about Jake being infested by a Yeerk, but, as always it seems, there was tons more going on in this book that I had completely forgotten! In my memory, Jake was taken over about a quarter of the book in and the rest was his struggles, but nope! That only happens about halfway through the story (and considering how short these things are, you do the math on how much page time that means this plot line actually gets!)
The story starts out with a Jake doing something the Animorphs NEVER seem to do! Practicing a morph! This time it’s a cockroach morph that leads to a short, madcap adventure through Jake’s kitchen that ends with him stuck in a roach motel. It’s a pretty humorous start to the story and Applegate even plays a bit with the narrative, having the scene cut and then finish as a story that Jake is telling his fellow Animorphs later. The crux of their larger mission revolves around some quick deductions (and a mini mission as roaches into a Yeerk meeting) that lead them to believe that the Yeerks have installed a mini Yeerk pool in a local hospital which they are using to infest patients who come in for procedures. While this is worrying enough, the fact that the state governor is scheduled for a minor surgery in the upcoming week is the real kick in the pants they need to investigate. And low and behold, there is a Yeerk pool and in the confusion of battle Jake ends up face first in said pool, only to emerge as a Controller. Luckily, the Yeerk in his head doesn’t have the best self-control and lets out a few major slips early on in his possession of Jake, alerting the others that something is up.
The rest of the book is basically an outwit/outlast scenario set in an abandoned cabin in the woods with the Animorphs trying to coral Yeerk!Jake for the three days it will take to starve the Yeerk in his brain. We get some really interesting looks into the Yeerk’s mind and this portion really serves to flesh out the Yeerks as a species and explain some of the questions about how they are able to mimic the person they are controlling. It’s also a very drawn out Yeerk torture scene, as Applegate doesn’t pull any punches about the reality of what is happening, the Yeerk slowly dying of starvation. In the end, of course, Jake is freed of the Yeerk and the game board is essentially re-set, if only now with a clearer understanding of the Yeerks altogether.
Our Fearless Leader: There are a lot of interesting things going on in this book for Jake. First, he is having nightmares of being a tiger and hunting his brother and then even himself. It’s a bit heavy handed, but I applaud Applegate for trying to bring in the psychological struggle of it all so early on in the series. Through these dreams, we can see the ongoing mental exhaustion that comes from living a life so full of violence and moral dilemmas. And for Jake, the chosen leader of the group, it makes sense that this burden would weight more heavily. Second, a large part of the book is understandably spent simply in Jake’s head and it is interesting hearing his thoughts on his fellow Animorphs as he basically roots for them against himself. Through his eyes, we see just how adept this team has come at managing unexpected and difficult situations as a united group with very few missteps.
After Jake is taken over, we learn a lot more about the Yeerks as a civilization. Particularly, just how entitled they are! We hear about a species called the Gedds, which were the first race of beings to be taken over by the Yeekrs, and through Jake’s Yeerk’s thoughts on the matter, we learn that since the Gedds were simple minded beings, the Yeerks essentially decided they were just made to be infested. And then this mindset just expanded out to the larger universe.
As I said earlier, it was also really interesting (and horrifying!) reading about the process of being controlled. Jake discusses feeling like his brain is being read like an open book. And being amazed and horrified by how completely the Yeerk slips into character, able to mimic not just the words that Jake would say but the way he would say them. It’s all super creepy and really highlights the hell that all the Controlled beings are living in constantly.
Towards the end, when the Yeerk in Jake’s head is dying, things get rather gruesome. But in it all, we get a brief vision of a great red eye. I can’t remember all of the details, but I do know that this is foreshadowing for another big bad who shows up later on. I had completely forgotten that these little bread crumbs were being sprinkled so early.
Xena, Warriar Princess: Rachel’s big moment is getting to be bait in some weird attempt to lure Yeerk!Jake into trying to escape into the woods. There are several problems with this plan, as I detail later in the “bad plans” portion. But another problem with it has to do with the Yeerk’s intimate knowledge of all of the Animorphs based on Jake’s own knowledge. I feel like Jake would know that, of all of them, Rachel would be the last one to sleep on the job and most likely to take the whole thing as a personal insult and just stare angrily at Yeerk!Jake for the entire time. So the fact that the Yeerk (and even Jake) is tricked by this, seems strange and out of character.
A Hawk’s Life:Tobias really doesn’t do much in this book. He helps guard Yeerk!Jake, but can’t participate in most of the action of the hospital mission. Very sad for me, as a major Tobias fan.
Peace, Love, and Animals: The Yeerk immediately narrows in on Cassie as the weak point of the group, misidentifying her caring nature for naivety and carelessness. It’s an easy mistake to make, and I know that as a reader, even I am likely to fall into the trap of underestimating Cassie. But here she proves that her sympathy is a strength. Her greater knowledge of Jake (and people in general) allows her to focus in on the differences early on, and she’s just as fierce as her teammates when it comes to patrolling the woods and containing Yeerk!Jake.
The Comic Relief: Marco proves yet again that he is probably the smartest one of the group. I’ve probably said it before, and I’ll say it again, the decision to make Marco the most canny of the characters was a really good choice that saves him from just being, as this section title implies, the comic relief character with all the one liners. Here, Marco gets the governor’s schedule all on his own by coming up with the direct, yet effective, plan of posing as a member of the press on the phone and simply requesting it. If left to themselves, the rest of the Animorphs would have probably come up with some stupidly complicated mission that involved infiltrating the governor’s mansion with no prior scouting using three morphs they’d never tried before. He also identifies the deeper tell that Yeerk!Jake gives away: the fact that if Jake weren’t controlled, he’d be trying to help them with this plan to hideout in the woods as a necessary precaution, rather than arguing against it.
E.T./Ax Phone Home: Ax plays some pretty important roles in this book, both on and off page. First, if he hadn’t been there in his Andalite form, it’s not a given that the Animorphs would have caught on to Jake’s situation. Apparently the Yeerks just can’t contain their hatred! I mean, it wasn’t even a minor slip. The Yeerk outright called Ax “Andalite filth.” There’s really no coming back from that. Jake being “stressed” is a ridiculous attempt at an out, and one that the Animorphs weren’t buying for a minute. But I feel like we were all greatly denied the three days that Ax had to impersonate Jake at home. The few references we got to it were Jake’s parents’ confusion about his suddenly increased appetite and weird vocabulary issues during this time (and their barely disguised relief that he was back to normal when he returns). But given the last time we saw Ax as a morphed human he was busily eating cigarette butts in a mall, one has to think we missed out on real comedy gold never getting these scenes.
Best (?) Body Horror Moment: I mean, the cockroaches are pretty bad. They’re made a bit better by the comedic introduction the morph gets in the beginning of the book with Jake’s roach motel escapade, but there’s no avoiding the simple fact that they all end up morphing roaches. And then they morph flies. It’s just a book full of bugs. And, like all the bug morphs that have come before and I’m sure will come later, there’s the rather gruesome descriptions of their skeleton and organs all essentially turning to goo…
Couples Watch!: Not a lot of couple action in this one, really. Yes, Cassie is one of the early ones to become suspicious of Jake, a testament to her knowledge of him. And the Yeerk does make a few comments about Jake caring for her, but other than that, this book is largely focused on other relationships in Jake’s life, primarily that between him and his brother Tom.
If Only Visser Three had Mustache to Twirl: Visser Three shows up in a human morph for the first time in this book. And it speaks to his truly evil nature that somehow all of the Animorphs sense that something is wrong about this particular human right from the get go. Visser Three is so evil that it leaks through his morph! Also, after the cockroach infestation is discovered at the super secret Controller meeting, there’s a pretty funny visual image of a bunch of human Controllers all frantically stomping around the room trying to crush bugs. This is what the mighty Yeerk empire has been reduced to…
Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: All of the Tom drama. Through the Yeerk’s inner monologues to Jake, we get a real look into Tom’s deteriorating mindset through this prolonged time as a Controller (the Yeerk just happens to be the one who had controlled Tom). We saw him rebelling in the first book, but since then, things have gone down hill and Tom has pretty much given up. At the end of the story, Jake disguises his voice and calls Tom and tells him not to give up, knowing that his brother will hear him even through the Controller’s ears. It’s all very sad, especially knowing how long the journey ahead still is.
What a Terrible Plan, Guys!: Most of their plans are pretty good in this book, actually, especially given their success rate at both their original mission and the fallout that comes from it with Yeark!Jake. It doesn’t take them long to figure out how to deal with what has to have been a completely unexpected situation, and they pull off the whole thing fairly smoothly. The one part I really didn’t understand was why they felt the need to set up the Yeerk to try to escape in the first place. Rachel pretends to fall asleep, and Yeerk!Jake sneaks out, and then they capture him again. But why?? There’s no real benefit to be gained from this. First, just try to discourage him to begin with by highlighting all the fail safes you’ve put in place. And then, worst case scenario, if he still tries it, you can capture him anyways. But there’s no benefit to risking anything going wrong with a fake out attempt. What if the Yeerk had tried to kill fake-sleeping-Rachel? She was pretty exposed as her human self just “sleeping” there. (The reader in me knows that this was just for dramatic effect, but that really just proves how bad of a plan it would have been in actual life).
Favorite Quote:
This is what I’ve been saying!!
“I can’t believe we are actually going to practice a morph,” Marco said. “We never practice. We just do it, and when it’s a huge disaster we try and deal with it then.”
Scorecard: Yeerks 1, Animorphs 3
Not only do the Yeerks miss out on the best opportunity to completely wipe out the Animorphs that they’ve had yet (if the Yeerk in Jake’s head had had a bit more self-control and successfully pulled the wool over the others’ eyes long enough to sneak back to base and report on them all, the Animorphs would have been completely done for), but the Animorphs were also successful in their mission to sabotage the hospital Yeerk pool plan. They prevented the governor from being taken over and they boiled a bunch of Yeerks in the process. So a pretty solid win!
Narrator: Jake
Plot: I only have vague memories of some of the plots of these books. This one I did remember was about Jake being infested by a Yeerk, but, as always it seems, there was tons more going on in this book that I had completely forgotten! In my memory, Jake was taken over about a quarter of the book in and the rest was his struggles, but nope! That only happens about halfway through the story (and considering how short these things are, you do the math on how much page time that means this plot line actually gets!)
The story starts out with a Jake doing something the Animorphs NEVER seem to do! Practicing a morph! This time it’s a cockroach morph that leads to a short, madcap adventure through Jake’s kitchen that ends with him stuck in a roach motel. It’s a pretty humorous start to the story and Applegate even plays a bit with the narrative, having the scene cut and then finish as a story that Jake is telling his fellow Animorphs later. The crux of their larger mission revolves around some quick deductions (and a mini mission as roaches into a Yeerk meeting) that lead them to believe that the Yeerks have installed a mini Yeerk pool in a local hospital which they are using to infest patients who come in for procedures. While this is worrying enough, the fact that the state governor is scheduled for a minor surgery in the upcoming week is the real kick in the pants they need to investigate. And low and behold, there is a Yeerk pool and in the confusion of battle Jake ends up face first in said pool, only to emerge as a Controller. Luckily, the Yeerk in his head doesn’t have the best self-control and lets out a few major slips early on in his possession of Jake, alerting the others that something is up.
The rest of the book is basically an outwit/outlast scenario set in an abandoned cabin in the woods with the Animorphs trying to coral Yeerk!Jake for the three days it will take to starve the Yeerk in his brain. We get some really interesting looks into the Yeerk’s mind and this portion really serves to flesh out the Yeerks as a species and explain some of the questions about how they are able to mimic the person they are controlling. It’s also a very drawn out Yeerk torture scene, as Applegate doesn’t pull any punches about the reality of what is happening, the Yeerk slowly dying of starvation. In the end, of course, Jake is freed of the Yeerk and the game board is essentially re-set, if only now with a clearer understanding of the Yeerks altogether.
Our Fearless Leader: There are a lot of interesting things going on in this book for Jake. First, he is having nightmares of being a tiger and hunting his brother and then even himself. It’s a bit heavy handed, but I applaud Applegate for trying to bring in the psychological struggle of it all so early on in the series. Through these dreams, we can see the ongoing mental exhaustion that comes from living a life so full of violence and moral dilemmas. And for Jake, the chosen leader of the group, it makes sense that this burden would weight more heavily. Second, a large part of the book is understandably spent simply in Jake’s head and it is interesting hearing his thoughts on his fellow Animorphs as he basically roots for them against himself. Through his eyes, we see just how adept this team has come at managing unexpected and difficult situations as a united group with very few missteps.
After Jake is taken over, we learn a lot more about the Yeerks as a civilization. Particularly, just how entitled they are! We hear about a species called the Gedds, which were the first race of beings to be taken over by the Yeekrs, and through Jake’s Yeerk’s thoughts on the matter, we learn that since the Gedds were simple minded beings, the Yeerks essentially decided they were just made to be infested. And then this mindset just expanded out to the larger universe.
As I said earlier, it was also really interesting (and horrifying!) reading about the process of being controlled. Jake discusses feeling like his brain is being read like an open book. And being amazed and horrified by how completely the Yeerk slips into character, able to mimic not just the words that Jake would say but the way he would say them. It’s all super creepy and really highlights the hell that all the Controlled beings are living in constantly.
Towards the end, when the Yeerk in Jake’s head is dying, things get rather gruesome. But in it all, we get a brief vision of a great red eye. I can’t remember all of the details, but I do know that this is foreshadowing for another big bad who shows up later on. I had completely forgotten that these little bread crumbs were being sprinkled so early.
Xena, Warriar Princess: Rachel’s big moment is getting to be bait in some weird attempt to lure Yeerk!Jake into trying to escape into the woods. There are several problems with this plan, as I detail later in the “bad plans” portion. But another problem with it has to do with the Yeerk’s intimate knowledge of all of the Animorphs based on Jake’s own knowledge. I feel like Jake would know that, of all of them, Rachel would be the last one to sleep on the job and most likely to take the whole thing as a personal insult and just stare angrily at Yeerk!Jake for the entire time. So the fact that the Yeerk (and even Jake) is tricked by this, seems strange and out of character.
A Hawk’s Life:Tobias really doesn’t do much in this book. He helps guard Yeerk!Jake, but can’t participate in most of the action of the hospital mission. Very sad for me, as a major Tobias fan.
Peace, Love, and Animals: The Yeerk immediately narrows in on Cassie as the weak point of the group, misidentifying her caring nature for naivety and carelessness. It’s an easy mistake to make, and I know that as a reader, even I am likely to fall into the trap of underestimating Cassie. But here she proves that her sympathy is a strength. Her greater knowledge of Jake (and people in general) allows her to focus in on the differences early on, and she’s just as fierce as her teammates when it comes to patrolling the woods and containing Yeerk!Jake.
The Comic Relief: Marco proves yet again that he is probably the smartest one of the group. I’ve probably said it before, and I’ll say it again, the decision to make Marco the most canny of the characters was a really good choice that saves him from just being, as this section title implies, the comic relief character with all the one liners. Here, Marco gets the governor’s schedule all on his own by coming up with the direct, yet effective, plan of posing as a member of the press on the phone and simply requesting it. If left to themselves, the rest of the Animorphs would have probably come up with some stupidly complicated mission that involved infiltrating the governor’s mansion with no prior scouting using three morphs they’d never tried before. He also identifies the deeper tell that Yeerk!Jake gives away: the fact that if Jake weren’t controlled, he’d be trying to help them with this plan to hideout in the woods as a necessary precaution, rather than arguing against it.
E.T./Ax Phone Home: Ax plays some pretty important roles in this book, both on and off page. First, if he hadn’t been there in his Andalite form, it’s not a given that the Animorphs would have caught on to Jake’s situation. Apparently the Yeerks just can’t contain their hatred! I mean, it wasn’t even a minor slip. The Yeerk outright called Ax “Andalite filth.” There’s really no coming back from that. Jake being “stressed” is a ridiculous attempt at an out, and one that the Animorphs weren’t buying for a minute. But I feel like we were all greatly denied the three days that Ax had to impersonate Jake at home. The few references we got to it were Jake’s parents’ confusion about his suddenly increased appetite and weird vocabulary issues during this time (and their barely disguised relief that he was back to normal when he returns). But given the last time we saw Ax as a morphed human he was busily eating cigarette butts in a mall, one has to think we missed out on real comedy gold never getting these scenes.
Best (?) Body Horror Moment: I mean, the cockroaches are pretty bad. They’re made a bit better by the comedic introduction the morph gets in the beginning of the book with Jake’s roach motel escapade, but there’s no avoiding the simple fact that they all end up morphing roaches. And then they morph flies. It’s just a book full of bugs. And, like all the bug morphs that have come before and I’m sure will come later, there’s the rather gruesome descriptions of their skeleton and organs all essentially turning to goo…
Couples Watch!: Not a lot of couple action in this one, really. Yes, Cassie is one of the early ones to become suspicious of Jake, a testament to her knowledge of him. And the Yeerk does make a few comments about Jake caring for her, but other than that, this book is largely focused on other relationships in Jake’s life, primarily that between him and his brother Tom.
If Only Visser Three had Mustache to Twirl: Visser Three shows up in a human morph for the first time in this book. And it speaks to his truly evil nature that somehow all of the Animorphs sense that something is wrong about this particular human right from the get go. Visser Three is so evil that it leaks through his morph! Also, after the cockroach infestation is discovered at the super secret Controller meeting, there’s a pretty funny visual image of a bunch of human Controllers all frantically stomping around the room trying to crush bugs. This is what the mighty Yeerk empire has been reduced to…
Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: All of the Tom drama. Through the Yeerk’s inner monologues to Jake, we get a real look into Tom’s deteriorating mindset through this prolonged time as a Controller (the Yeerk just happens to be the one who had controlled Tom). We saw him rebelling in the first book, but since then, things have gone down hill and Tom has pretty much given up. At the end of the story, Jake disguises his voice and calls Tom and tells him not to give up, knowing that his brother will hear him even through the Controller’s ears. It’s all very sad, especially knowing how long the journey ahead still is.
What a Terrible Plan, Guys!: Most of their plans are pretty good in this book, actually, especially given their success rate at both their original mission and the fallout that comes from it with Yeark!Jake. It doesn’t take them long to figure out how to deal with what has to have been a completely unexpected situation, and they pull off the whole thing fairly smoothly. The one part I really didn’t understand was why they felt the need to set up the Yeerk to try to escape in the first place. Rachel pretends to fall asleep, and Yeerk!Jake sneaks out, and then they capture him again. But why?? There’s no real benefit to be gained from this. First, just try to discourage him to begin with by highlighting all the fail safes you’ve put in place. And then, worst case scenario, if he still tries it, you can capture him anyways. But there’s no benefit to risking anything going wrong with a fake out attempt. What if the Yeerk had tried to kill fake-sleeping-Rachel? She was pretty exposed as her human self just “sleeping” there. (The reader in me knows that this was just for dramatic effect, but that really just proves how bad of a plan it would have been in actual life).
Favorite Quote:
This is what I’ve been saying!!
“I can’t believe we are actually going to practice a morph,” Marco said. “We never practice. We just do it, and when it’s a huge disaster we try and deal with it then.”
Scorecard: Yeerks 1, Animorphs 3
Not only do the Yeerks miss out on the best opportunity to completely wipe out the Animorphs that they’ve had yet (if the Yeerk in Jake’s head had had a bit more self-control and successfully pulled the wool over the others’ eyes long enough to sneak back to base and report on them all, the Animorphs would have been completely done for), but the Animorphs were also successful in their mission to sabotage the hospital Yeerk pool plan. They prevented the governor from being taken over and they boiled a bunch of Yeerks in the process. So a pretty solid win!
April 12, 2020
Holy shit - this one caught me completely off-guard. For some reason I remember thinking of this one being one of the first "filler" books... maybe it's because I never liked the cover lol.
I think this one might be my favorite so far.
The Yeerks have set up a hospital that they plan to use to manufacture involuntary hosts, among them being the Governor. They have a plan to stop them - but of course, it goes wrong. It goes really wrong. Jake gets body-snatched.
Woof. I don't know how I forgot this whole story-arc. Jake's helplessness as the Yeerk seemlessly takes him over. The Animorphs facing the reality that one of their own may be the enemy now. We get a glimpse at Yeerk history - how they began on their home world infesting the Gedd. A hint that there is a darker history between the Andalites and Yeerks... it might not be as righteous of a cause as they implied.
And and AND!!! Our first glimpse of Crayak. Oooooh.
The final chapter was incredibly moving. I'd forgotten how good this series was early on. Also: MacLeod Andrews is a freaking gift to voice acting. I'm done complaining about his Tobias voice. Every single voice he does is distinct, fits the characters age range, and the Yeerk in particular was chilling. Loving these audiobooks!
If I had any complaints, it's that I wish the final third of the book were more like two thirds of the book lol. More time exploring Jake's relationship with the Yeerk would have been welcome. As it is, it astounds me how much Applegate packs into these tiny books. Her sparse wordsmanship may be a turnoff at first, but I think it ultimately served her well in churning out 150-200 page books like this every month.
I think this one might be my favorite so far.
The Yeerks have set up a hospital that they plan to use to manufacture involuntary hosts, among them being the Governor. They have a plan to stop them - but of course, it goes wrong. It goes really wrong. Jake gets body-snatched.
Woof. I don't know how I forgot this whole story-arc. Jake's helplessness as the Yeerk seemlessly takes him over. The Animorphs facing the reality that one of their own may be the enemy now. We get a glimpse at Yeerk history - how they began on their home world infesting the Gedd. A hint that there is a darker history between the Andalites and Yeerks... it might not be as righteous of a cause as they implied.
And and AND!!! Our first glimpse of Crayak. Oooooh.
The final chapter was incredibly moving. I'd forgotten how good this series was early on. Also: MacLeod Andrews is a freaking gift to voice acting. I'm done complaining about his Tobias voice. Every single voice he does is distinct, fits the characters age range, and the Yeerk in particular was chilling. Loving these audiobooks!
If I had any complaints, it's that I wish the final third of the book were more like two thirds of the book lol. More time exploring Jake's relationship with the Yeerk would have been welcome. As it is, it astounds me how much Applegate packs into these tiny books. Her sparse wordsmanship may be a turnoff at first, but I think it ultimately served her well in churning out 150-200 page books like this every month.
October 27, 2025
5 little boy alien clones out of 5
Think this is my fave animorphs book i say this about every single one I read LOL
it’s so interesting getting a glimpse into an actual controller and what it feels like being a slave to a yeerk but it was also incredibly tense, like I think this was definitely the most thrilling book yet. It’s devastating to read about esp when Jake talks about watching life thru a tv screen and it rlly puts this entire series into perspective, like this is genuinely terrifying. The entire time Jake was a controller I was literally at the edge of my seat but I’m so glad the squad saved him.
Pmo when we get a glimpse into Tom’s feelings about being a controller and why he even joined the sharing in the first place, and his monologue when the yeerk tries to recruit Jake, it’s just so heart breaking and then also when we learn about how Tom had a thriving future ahead of him and the yeerk just took it away from him made me want to punch smth. “He spent his time wishing he could die.” like genuinely I am affected by this viscerally
I surprising really loved the Jake POV, he’s SO cute with Cassie and their blossoming relationship and the way Cassie cares for him in such a mature way warms my heart these characters deserve so much happiness UGH and the scene where they lament turning into flies at the mall is so cute
Scene where Rachel takes Cassie and Jake shopping literally made my week they are so funny. Scene where they’re watching Cassie morph into a fly and everyone is freaking out is comedic gold. Scene where Ax SLICES OFF A CONTROLLERS ARM WITH HIS TAIL LIKE OHMYGOSH I thought this was a kids book.
Glad to see Tobias getting more comfortable with being a bird but still so tragic. And Marco ofc being the funniest character in the history of literature, so many funny one liners.
What would my life b w/out the animorphs
Think this is my fave animorphs book i say this about every single one I read LOL
it’s so interesting getting a glimpse into an actual controller and what it feels like being a slave to a yeerk but it was also incredibly tense, like I think this was definitely the most thrilling book yet. It’s devastating to read about esp when Jake talks about watching life thru a tv screen and it rlly puts this entire series into perspective, like this is genuinely terrifying. The entire time Jake was a controller I was literally at the edge of my seat but I’m so glad the squad saved him.
Pmo when we get a glimpse into Tom’s feelings about being a controller and why he even joined the sharing in the first place, and his monologue when the yeerk tries to recruit Jake, it’s just so heart breaking and then also when we learn about how Tom had a thriving future ahead of him and the yeerk just took it away from him made me want to punch smth. “He spent his time wishing he could die.” like genuinely I am affected by this viscerally
I surprising really loved the Jake POV, he’s SO cute with Cassie and their blossoming relationship and the way Cassie cares for him in such a mature way warms my heart these characters deserve so much happiness UGH and the scene where they lament turning into flies at the mall is so cute
Scene where Rachel takes Cassie and Jake shopping literally made my week they are so funny. Scene where they’re watching Cassie morph into a fly and everyone is freaking out is comedic gold. Scene where Ax SLICES OFF A CONTROLLERS ARM WITH HIS TAIL LIKE OHMYGOSH I thought this was a kids book.
Glad to see Tobias getting more comfortable with being a bird but still so tragic. And Marco ofc being the funniest character in the history of literature, so many funny one liners.
What would my life b w/out the animorphs
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 16, 2023
Okayyy, it's taking up speed!
What I really liked about this part, is first, the humor. All the others were kinda funny too, but in a more immature way. This one was actually hilarious in parts. (Especially the fly part). But also the more philosophic part is coming through, which I was hoping for. More existential questions get pondered. It gets hinted, that the Andalites are not the all-good people they seem. We get more insight in the Yeerks thinking. His and Jakes thought-conversations are really entertaining, witty and thoughtful. I feel, like some leaps are still missing (they're concerned with human Controllers and don't want to kill them, because underneath is still a person. They're not as concerned with Hork-Bajir, even though they're supposed to be friendly). But overall I'm hooked and getting invested.
What I really liked about this part, is first, the humor. All the others were kinda funny too, but in a more immature way. This one was actually hilarious in parts. (Especially the fly part). But also the more philosophic part is coming through, which I was hoping for. More existential questions get pondered. It gets hinted, that the Andalites are not the all-good people they seem. We get more insight in the Yeerks thinking. His and Jakes thought-conversations are really entertaining, witty and thoughtful. I feel, like some leaps are still missing (they're concerned with human Controllers and don't want to kill them, because underneath is still a person. They're not as concerned with Hork-Bajir, even though they're supposed to be friendly). But overall I'm hooked and getting invested.
Read
July 27, 2020THERE IS SO MUCH PAIN in this book omg. these preteens (if they're 13 right now i will be surprised. they have to be only 12 years old right now.) I forgot how serious these books are, especially in the beginning (it only gets more dire though, THAT i remember). also @elighhh's comment in book club is perfect: "these boys do a lot of no homo in their monologuing" because every time Jake or Marco describe each other it's to the effect of "the girls say he's cute but I wouldn't know" even though they describe each other with strong chins and nice eyes, omg. ALL THAT ASIDE THOUGH these kids are going through a lot to try and stave off an alien invasion force by themselves and an alien teenager. I LOVE THESE BOOKS omg. 10 year old me also loved them. this were real intense storylines for a kid omg.
March 19, 2022
The unthinkable happens in an extremely tense plot line that gives Jake a deeper understanding of the history of the Yeerks. He also gets a more in-depth look at what’s been going on with his brother, Tom, since Tom’s enslavement.
We see so much of Jake’s strength and commitment to the Animorphs in this seemingly never ending war with the Yeerks.
We also see a potential opportunity to save Tom if the Animorphs wanted to, but it would open the door to new conflicts with maintaining his safety afterward.
I’m very stressed and emotionally attached to everyone. I also don’t love that the boys are written so much better than the girls. They have significantly more depth and complexity and it’s something I’m hoping changes over time.
CW: war, slavery, death, grief, violence, imprisonment, brief fatphobia
We see so much of Jake’s strength and commitment to the Animorphs in this seemingly never ending war with the Yeerks.
We also see a potential opportunity to save Tom if the Animorphs wanted to, but it would open the door to new conflicts with maintaining his safety afterward.
I’m very stressed and emotionally attached to everyone. I also don’t love that the boys are written so much better than the girls. They have significantly more depth and complexity and it’s something I’m hoping changes over time.
CW: war, slavery, death, grief, violence, imprisonment, brief fatphobia
January 7, 2023
+5 stars for the resistance is futile reference, -1 star for cockroach morphs :/
December 17, 2023
One of the best in the series so far— this entry really slithers about with the horror of the Yeerks control and delivers vivid internal monologues, unlike any other Animorphs book.
July 17, 2024
One of the coolest scenes out of anything I've read. It involves some amazing game-theoretic reasoning, paired with animals of all sorts. Very cool
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