[Omniverse Audio Brand]

 

[90s phone ring and pick up]

 

CAT

Hey, this is Cat!

 

JESS

And Jess

 

CAT

You know, “Mother,” She Wrote is free to listen to, but it’s not free to make.

 

JESS

So please consider supporting our work on Patreon.

 

CAT

You’ll get early, ad-free episodes of this show and all the storytelling podcasts we create. 

 

JESS

Head to Patreon.com/OmniverseMedia to chip in and join our community of world-saving wunderkind.

 

CAT

Oh and - heads up: this episode contains discussions of depression, mental illness, and death.

 

JESS

Please use your best judgment when listening… and take care of yourself. 

 

CAT & JESS

Love youuuu.

​

[phone disconnect sound]

 

[peaceful, but pensive music plays]

 

NINTEN:

Dear Mom, 

 

I’m in Merrysville now - spending the night in a hotel. It feels…weird, knowing that home is only one town away, but I’ve been so much farther than that. Magicant IS real, Mom. I know because now I can go back there any time I want in the blink of an eye. …It’s getting back out that’s the trouble.

 

[haunting tones play]

 

NINTEN

Queen Mary’s castle was… incredible. Inside, the floors were the deepest green I’ve ever seen, like a polished emerald. It’s kept up by these big kinda rag doll people called The Chamberlains. One of them asked me to be gentle when I talk to the Queen. She’s been having a rough time. They said-

 

CHAMBERLAIN

Oh, Queen Mary often has nightmares. Sometimes she talks in her sleep and sounds like she’s scolding a naughty child. The dreams always end the same. AH- it’s bad she cries out “I’m scared! I’m scared!”. And then she starts to sing… But she can’t remember the tune. Our poor queen! She’ll like to see the face of such a nice boy. 

 

NINTEN

As soon as I saw Queen Mary sitting in her throne, in her big fancy pink dress, with her crown and her jewels, I knew I needed to kneel. It just felt like the thing to do. Her eyes were glistening, like she might cry? 

 

[strings start to play - regal but slow and strange]

 

NINTEN

She made a hand motion for me to come forward, and… she knew my name before I opened my mouth.

 

QUEEN MARY

Welcome Ninten. Here in Magicant, everyone is your friend. You can have as much as you like, of whatever you want. 

 

NINTEN

Thank you, Queen Mary. I- I would love to hear you sing. Everyone says you have the most beautiful singing voice. 

 

QUEEN MARY

Oh, that’s so kind of them. I would love to sing you my song, Ninten but… I don’t know why, I just can’t remember it. 

 

[the strings stop]

 

NINTEN

Oh- Does it… Just a sec-

 

[Ninten rummages through his backpack]

 

NINTEN

Does it sound like this?

 

[Ninten starts to play a song made from the three melodies he’s heard so far]

 

NINTEN

I took out the ocarina and I played the song I’d pieced together from Grandma Maria’s doll, and Songbird Laura, and the singing monkey…

 

QUEEN MARY

Oh! Oh my sweet boy- that’s it! Keep playing! Please!

 

[the playing stops, the haunted tones return]

 

NINTEN

I- I’m sorry Queen Mary, that’s all I know. 

 

She stepped from her throne and threw her arms around me, kissing me on the cheek and forehead- 

 

QUEEN MARY

I could feel it, I could almost feel it. It’s so close. Maybe you could learn the song. It is only eight melodies long.

 

NINTEN

Sure- sure thing, Queen Mary.

 

I asked her how to get home so I could find more melodies, but she looked really distant, haunted - and said she couldn’t remember.

 

My heart sank. I thought for sure she’d know. I looked everywhere, I talked to everyone. 

 

[strange steel drum music starts to play]

 

Eventually, out in the waving plains of clouds, I found a house all by itself. When the people inside saw me coming, they ran out to greet me. At first I thought maybe they were more nightmare creatures attacking me, but then I recognized them! 

 

[excited masculine shouting]

 

It was the Flying Men, Mom! The Flying Men! It was really them! Just like you told me about in your bedtime stories! Five bird brothers with bodies like a human’s but covered in soft yellow feathers, with red-beaked bird faces. They were so strong, they lifted me over their heads!

 

I couldn’t believe it. It was like meeting old friends. They said they’d been waiting for me to come. That it was their destiny to help me and fight beside me. It was decided that one of the brothers would travel with me and help me look for a way home. 

 

[the upbeat music ends, low ambience starts and the sound of wind through grasses] 

 

NINTEN

We found a grove filled with… wells, like for getting water from the ground. They weren’t dry but the whole place was desolate, abandoned. But then, on the wind, I heard something…

 

[the wind rises and with it, the sound of traffic as though through a distant tunnel]

 

NINTEN

It was town noise! Cars and construction - It was Earth! The Flying Man and I followed the sound until we found a well that didn’t have water in it - just a ladder going down. 

 

[the town noise fades to a wet ambience]

 

NINTEN

Inside, it was cold and dark. Some tunnels led to nowhere. I had to draw in Great Grandpa’s journal to figure out where we’d been and how to get back out. There were things down there - eyes in the darkness… judging me… If the Flying Man wasn’t there giving me courage and helping me fight… I-I don’t know what I’d have done. 

 

We heard rushing water all around us, like behind this stone there was an ocean that could crush us. It felt like we were at the bottom of the world. 

 

[a low, wet rumble starts, in a slow rhythm]

 

We followed a weird, rumbling rhythm. I thought maybe it was a train from Earth or something - But - when we turned a corner my flashlight’s beam fell across a sleeping dragon. 

 

[the rumble becomes an ominous, growling snore]

 

NINTEN

It was enormous and curled up at a dead end like a giant cat, snoring. I was so shocked that I tripped over a rock-

 

[rocky, stumbling]

 

NINTEN

-Which made a bunch of noise.

 

[the snore gets louder, almost a growl, but doesn’t rouse]

NINTEN

Fortunately it didn’t wake up. We went the other way, hoping maybe we could just leave the dragon alone, and that was fine - but I stumbled again.

 

[a watery impact]

 

NINTEN

This time into a hole. I fell into water and darkness. Something brushed up against me - something sharp. 

 

[watery noises]

 

NINTEN

And then I heard it - a gasping noise. 

 

[a growly, breathy noise]

 

NINTEN

I spun around just in time to see a giant fish!

 

[a splash]

 

NINTEN

It lunged at me, sharp-toothed mouth gaping, ready to eat me! The Flying Man dove-

 

[feathery noises]

 

FLYING MAN

Ha-HA!

 

NINTEN

-And pushed me out of the way, and… 

 

[Electric bass music starts, then a biting noise and a pained grunt]

 

NINTEN

He died. The fish bit right into him. The last thing he said was:

 

FLYING MAN

Keep- fighting, kid! I believe in you! 

 

[rock music starts]

 

NINTEN

I charged at the fish with everything I had. 

 

[watery battle noises]

 

NINTEN

It thrashed and I hit back, reaching out with my PSI abilities to catch it off guard and-

 

[a big impact, guitars wail]

 

NINTEN

It stopped moving. 

 

[electric bass fades, Ninten breathes heavy]

 

NINTEN

My flashlight glinted across something sticking out of its lip - a big fish hook made of black stone. One of Queen Mary’s Chamberlins had mentioned something called “The Onyx Hook”. They said that with it I could return. I didn't know what they meant at first, but holding it in my hands - now, in our world - I can feel Magicant, like a light glowing at the bottom of an ocean in my mind. 

 

[strange tones swirl]

 

NINTEN

I just put the hook in the water and… -But it only takes me back! I still have to get out the hard way. 

 

[the tones fade]

 

NINTEN

The Flying Man gave his life so I could find the way out. I climbed out of the hole I’d fallen into, towards those city noises…

 

[wet, ominous ambience]

 

NINTEN

And there, in the dim light, I saw a figure in a doorway. His back was turned to me. 

 

Hello? …Hello?

 

…He didn’t say anything. It was like he froze. Like, he thought if he didn’t move I couldn’t see him.

 

[a low breath]

 

NINTEN

Excuse me, sir? …Are you okay?

 

FORGOTTEN MAN

I- I’m a forgotten man. I’m not really here. You didn’t have to notice me… Please- ignore me.

 

NINTEN

Well, that’s not right I mean… Do you live down here? It’s dangerous.

 

FORGOTTEN MAN

You talk… kindly… Ur… I’ve been alone since the moment I was born. 

 

NINTEN

…You don’t have to be. 

 

FORGOTTEN MAN 

[muttering] What? Sometimes even breathing becomes too much… Why do you insist on talking to me?

 

NINTEN

I’m here, so…

 

FORGOTTEN MAN

…Are you a forgotten man too?

 

NINTEN

…No…

 

FORGOTTEN MAN

That’s right. That is right, right? Nnn… Please… ignore me like everyone else. Please.

 

NINTEN

Okay…

 

FORGOTTEN MAN

[sighs in relief] Good… Good.

 

[a strange noise, like fabric shuffling in reverse, and a high-pitched noise wells up]

 

FORGOTTEN MAN

Thank you.

 

[the disturbing noise builds, the Forgotten Man sighs, a high frequency becomes the dominant sound]

 

NINTEN

And then he was gone. Like he was never there. The crushing weight of all the loneliness of this place bore down as I walked through the doorway and-

 

[the high frequency stops abruptly, giving way to late afternoon nature sounds]

 

NINTEN

I was in a cave in the hills just outside Merrysville. It was twilight and dark by the time I made it to town. 

 

[pretty, but sad music plays]

 

NINTEN

I wish I was home mom. I wish you were here to tell me, “sweet dreams” but then… Tonight… I don’t think I wanna dream at all. 

 

[the nature sounds fade and the music plays under the hosts dialogue]JESS

Welcome to “MOTHER,” She Wrote - a travelog diary through the strangest, most thought-provoking, most heart-rending video games ever made: MOTHER as it’s called in Japan, and EarthBound - as it’s called everywhere else. This is the story of the first game in that series: EarthBound Beginnings.

 

I’m Jessica Mudd - here to remind you that it's best to let Teddy Bears fly and sleeping dragons lie. And with me as always is-

 

CAT 

Cat Blackard, just a nowhere girl, sitting in a nowhere world, making all my nowhere plans for nobody.

 

JESS

Well, I'll never forget you even if you're lost in the deepest hole on another world. 

 

[the music fades out]

 

CAT 

Aw.

 

[a telegraph beeping starts and the Mother’s Day Times fanfare begins]

 

JESS

Before we voyage further into the subconscious, let’s check out the latest community news in The Mother’s Day Times!

 

[the fanfare swells and ends]

 

CAT

Welcome to the Mother’s Day Times! This is a segment you’ll hear in every episode of the show going forward where we keep you abreast of the latest happenings from all across Eagleland: goings on in the EarthBound fan community and letters, reviews, or haikus from YOUs - the citizens of the people’s republic of “MOTHER,” She Wrote. 

 

JESS

You should definitely write us a letter! You can share with us your story of how the Mother games impacted your life, strange sights you’ve seen in the real world… and we rattle off a lot of facts here in the show - maybe we missed something, maybe we got something wrong? Let us know!

 

CAT

Send us a letter at dearmothershewrote@gmail.com or you can chat with us on our Discord and on social networks all of which are linked to on our website at mothershewrote.earth, but if you’d like to specifically write in for this segment, again: dearmothershewrote@gmail.com

 

JESS

First up, let’s share some fascinating findings and new insights into MOTHER!A community researcher called Pineapple Carl discovered an interview with Shogo Toda - who it turns out, wrote the MOTHER Encyclopedia under the pen name Matsuo Heizen! In that interview he also shared a previously unknown working title for MOTHER. When Shigesato Itoi first called him in to work on the game, it was called “ESP-1”. 

 

CAT

ESP-1… does that mean there’d be an ESP-2? Well, that may have been the plan! Researcher, Biozilla, found an interview with Itoi from the time of MOTHER’s release where he said that MOTHER was intended to be a trilogy of games from the outset! 

 

JESS

From that same interview we learned that Pippi ended up in the graveyard because she was chasing woodland critters and got stuck there.

 

CAT

Aw Pippi!

 

JESS

[laughs]

 

CAT

Kody Nokolo, the head of Mother Forever, the website at the epicenter of the modern EarthBound fandom, learned something very significant about Shigesato Itoi’s childhood from a biography - details that influenced the series overall and the town of Podunk aka Mother’s Day.

JESSItoi’s mother left when he was young, so he was raised by his father and grandmother. On Mother’s Day, in school, kids would be given red carnations to give to their moms. But kids without moms? They’d be given white carnations and Itoi felt singled out. He felt embarrassed, and hurt by this. CAT

This tradition involving red carnations is why they’re the symbol for the town of Mother’s Day. There’s flowerbeds of red carnations everywhere.

JESSGoing a bit deeper - Itoi has no memory of ever being hugged in his childhood. 

 

CAT

Which is just like  UGH - that poor kid. That’s terrible.

 

JESS

Hopefully he’s had a lot of hugs since then. …In the 1980s, Itoi saw a Rolling Stone magazine cover featuring John Lennon hugging Yoko Ono - and that conjured a lot of feelings, as he considered the warmth of that hug, his life without a mother, and Lennon’s past as a motherless child as depicted in his song, “Mother”. CAT

The name of this series comes from a far more personal place than we realized. 

Finally, in-so-far as insights into the game, in the time since we recorded this episode it’s come to light that Stephen King and Peter Straub’s 1984 novel The Talisman was a massive influence on MOTHER. I’ve started reading it and I can share that the Magicant section in particular is filled with direct parallels. Queen Mary and the Flying Man have direct character influences from the book. 

 

JESS

You’ll remember last episode we mentioned the shopkeepers in Magicant that are actually from Earth. Well, it turns out that shady characters bringing capitalism to a dreamland - that’s both a little bit Momo and a little bit Talisman. 

 

CAT

We’ll be talking much more about this as we get deeper into EarthBound Beginnings.

 

JESS

The MOTHER series is home to all sorts of amazing fan projects!

 

CAT

You’re listening to one right now.

 

JESS

Mm-hmm. But here’s another outpouring of psychokinetic love that you’ll want to know about: a MOTHER series fanzine called Your Name, Please! It’s over 130 full-color pages of articles, illustrations, and comics. Find it at motherserieszine.bigcartel.com and linked on this episode’s page.

 

CAT

Nintendo Force Magazine is publishing their first book! It’s called “The Impact of Iwata” - a biography of Nintendo’s President Satoru Iwata - a game designer and producer whose life and work shaped gaming as we know it. Including EarthBound! So much so they’ve devoted an entire chapter of the book to it! The book is currently being funded on Kickstarter, where it has already met its goal. 

 

JESS

You can get a first edition copy and help support the project for a couple more weeks as of this episodes’ release and we’ll link to the Kickstarter, again, on this episode’s page. 

 

Last, but definitely not least, we’d like to give a shout out to Biozilla, who we mentioned earlier. He’s been collecting and scanning MOTHER guidebooks from Japan, uncovering new information and a bunch of fantastic artwork. Much of what he’s uncovered is featured on Mother Forever, but he’s shared some yet-unpublished pieces with us. You can see them on “MOTHER,” She Wrote’s tumblr and twitter.

CATWe’re super grateful to Biozilla - he’s been an enormous supporter of this show from the outset and left us an incredible and actually very humbling review on Apple Podcasts where he said some very kind things about “MOTHER,” She Wrote and offered personal perspectives such as this:

JESS“I was already aware of Itoi’s desire to answer the question of, ‘If Steven Spielberg created an RPG, what would it be like?’ but hadn't considered how certain scenes in the game lend themselves to cinematic adaptation. It’s great stuff, and I hope Cat and Jess continue to make such intriguing observations.”

 

CAT

We’ll do our best - Thank you Biozilla!

 

If YOU would like to spread the word about this show, you too can leave us a rating or a review on Apple Podcasts or Podchaser. Those significantly boost our show’s discoverability. 

 

JESS

We really appreciate it! You’ll find links to where you can leave those reviews at mothershewrote.earth, along with links to our tumblr, our twitter, and the Omniverse Discord.

 

CAT

Come hang out with us!

 

JESS

And write in, again, at dearmothershewrote@gmail.com. That’s all for now. This has been The Mother’s Day Times.

 

[Mother’s Day Times outro fanfare]

 

CAT    

Hey, Jess.    

     

JESS    

Yeah?    

     

CAT    

Were you playing the game long enough that your dad called you?    

     

JESS    

Yes, I was. And I was so surprised to see that.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, this is a thing that's also in EarthBound where, you know, normally you're calling from, like, regular rotary dial telephones, payphones, but all of a sudden - you're playing the game, everything pauses, and your phone rings. And…How is this happening? I don't know.    

JESS    

Yeah, It's like you have a cell phone or something, right?    

     

CAT    

Because if you did, you'd be 1) loaded. And 2) you don't have the inventory space for it. It would take up the whole inventory.    

     

JESS    

Attached to a car. Yeah. But at some point your dad calls and he asks you if you've been playing too much and you need to take a little bit of a break.    

     

CAT    

Yeah. He says-

 

[tough, electric bass-heavy music starts]

 

CAT

“This is your dad. Now, son, it’s not my business, but why not rest?” And if you select “Continue” he says, “I see. I know the Earth faces a crisis. Good luck.”   

 

CAT and JESS

[laugh]  

     

JESS    

Now, I will say - after finding the old man and getting my funds out, because of all those tasty looking, magical items back at the shop…

 

[music ends]

 

JESS

-I was walking back to the store and I had fought this one particular creature a couple of times and that was called a “raeb yddet” and what I figured out was that it's “teddy bear” backwards, but it's in the game it’s “raeb yddet”, And when you're fighting these teddy bears. Occasionally it can call for help and it summons a flying teddy. Now, the flying teddy has a move called Final Strike or something like that. And it does an incredible amount of damage to you. And I got one shotted by one of these things after picking up all my money again and lost like 1500 dollars.    

     

CAT    

Gosh, that sucks. That sucks so bad.    

     

JESS    

[laughs]

But how are you supposed to know? You’re just wandering around, you're fighting enemies, and all of a sudden somebody shows up that just one shots you like that?    

     

CAT    

Well, yeah. And what's more, it's a weird quirk of an enemy where it's an enemy that only appears when it's summoned by another enemy.    

     

JESS  

And it didn't happen just one time. I got killed by that thing twice. I fought it the second time, and I tried to use my PSI shield on myself. 

 

CAT

Yeah.

 

JESS

And that didn't do anything against it. Still just got right through. And then I encountered it a third time. That time I just used 4D-Slip. I just got out of there.    

     

CAT    

That's a good call.  

     

JESS  

I just said, I'm not dealing with this.    

     

CAT    

Somehow I took out the raeb yddets beforehand. I managed to not see a single flying one the whole time.

 

JESS

Flying bear?

 

CAT

Yeah. Fun fact they're called “bearu’ in Japanese which is just the Japanese pronunciation of “bear” and there is a bear enemy later in the game, which I assume is the Japanese word for bear. So this whole teddy bear thing is just an invention of the translators.    

     

JESS    

Some of the other enemies that you encounter in this area are woodohs and big woodohs, and they're basically just like trees? And the big woodoh is like a stump..    

     

CAT    

Yeah. Freaky trees with faces and grinning teeth.    

     

JESS  

Yeah. And the big woodoh explodes when you defeat it and does a lot of fire damage.    

     

CAT    

Yeah. A classic of EarthBound games is an enemy that, upon death, issues a significant penalty that hopefully you can survive.    

     

JESS    

Yeah.    

     

CAT    

And the woodohs are really annoying if they get going. They sews seeds, and make more of themselves, and they can do an attack that puts a puzzled status effect on you. And this is one of the times I got completely killed. Every turn: “Ninten is daydreaming.” Ninten is daydreaming.” And they are smashing me and destroying me and a whole gang of trees punched Ninten into to a bloody pulp until he died.    

     

JESS    

Oh no! That never happen to me. I don't think I ever fought more than one two at the same time. I must have taken them out quick enough.    

     

CAT    

I don't recommend it.    

     

JESS  

Yeah, doesn’t sound like it. There was also a cool magic snail that had a very delicious-looking peppermint shell.    

     

CAT    

Heh, you say “cool,” but those enemies are brutal. Their shells - their defense is crazy good. There's not a time that I fought them, that I wasn't using defense down on them. Just to get a couple good hits in.  

     

JESS    

Yeah, just constantly defense down.    

     

CAT    

At this point in the game, Ninten only has PSI powers that are status-related like: put up a shield, lower defense, stuff like that. And you need them. You need them real bad. They're not optional.    

     

JESS    

Where's my area lightning attack? That's what I want.

 

CAT

Maybe later. 

 

JESS

Maybe. One day… One day it will come. There was also some other really interesting-looking enemies. A lot of eyes.    

     

CAT    

What do you think this represents? You know, psychologically - how there's just a bunch of disembodied, as Billy Idol would say, “eyes without a face” just floating around menacingly?   

     

JESS    

This was fascinating for me. After sort of realizing what was going on and seeing all of these enemies that had different characteristics to them - they’re all basically just like a pair of eyeballs looking at you, but they kind of behaved in a certain way that was really interesting. So like, I think the first one that you might encounter is called just Watcher, and it's a pretty basic set of eyes. Then there's Groucho, which is like Groucho Marx, like eyeballs, the glasses, and the nose, and everything. And it can just kind of like laugh at you and run away. And then you still get the experience from it.    

     

CAT    

Well, actually, there's many reasons that Groucho is my favorite enemy of this particular part of the playthrough. The actual text is “Groucho said ‘hello,’ and then just walked away. Don't know why, but Ninten’s XP increased.” Now it doesn't just increase. When you defeat Groucho, you get 3 experience. When Groucho says “hello,” and walks away? You get 50.    

     

JESS    

Oh, wow.    

     

CAT    

The weird thing is, it's only given to one member of the party if there is a party there.    

     

JESS    

So it's best just to not even attack Groucho. Just let it you know… do it’s thing.    

     

CAT    

Well, if you can.  

     

JESS    

Well, while we're on the topic, we can also talk about my favorite, and that is Dad's Eyes. 

 

CAT

[laughs]

 

JESS

When I first saw that, I just started laughing out loud. It was so surreal and funny, especially because you're so used to talking to your dad through a telephone. You never see him. And then also to have this NPC that just shows up, which is just dad's eyes looking at you. But the interesting thing about Dad's Eyes, its special characteristic, is that it has an ability where it flies into a rage and its attack power raises substantially. And I'm wondering what that says about great Grandpa George or Ninten’s dad or some of the other men that might have been in Maria's life.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, that also speaks to a kind of, you know, general, I suppose, trait of fathers in some regard - cross-culturally. 

 

JESS

Sure.

 

CAT

Like, dads fly into a rage… and that sucks. That's one of the many weird human things that get confronted in the MOTHER games.    

     

JESS    

Yeah. And the Mom's Eyes have an attack that repeats over and over again. It hits twice, basically.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, they have, I think, high speed. So, like, they're very likely to strike first, even before you do. And when they do, it's a continuous attack. They hit it twice, which is super annoying.    

     

JESS    

And I sort of get that that is a different type of aggression. It's kind of like that sustained, over time, pressure to adhere to your mother's expectations or something like that.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, like the continuous attack is kind of like just not letting something go. And then just, for good measure, there's Four Eyes, which is two pairs of eyes stacked on top of each other. They've kind of got their own thing going on, but they're not as distinct in terms of attacking as any other ones. And I do, of course, love eventually down in the wells, you often get a set of Watcher, Mom's Eyes and Dad's Eyes all traveling as a family.    

     

JESS

Yeah. That did not escape my notice as well. I can just really imagine, Maria sort of like feeling all these pressures from the people in her life, wanting her to do these different things, and be these different things, and sort of like the way that that is weighing on her mind.        

CAT    

Yeah. Now, there's an interesting question, though: is  it Maria, or are these nightmares - are they someone else's nightmares, or are they your nightmares, or are they a juxtaposition of the two?

 

JESS

Yeah, that's true. I'm making an assumption here that it's Maria, but it really could be any number of characters.    

     

CAT    

Yeah. If you're someone who's inside someone else's dream, there's all kinds of different questions about how it may operate. These eyes are called Swooshes and Japanese. So Watcher is Swoosh. Groucho is Bonus Swoosh. Four Eyes is Whoosh Swoosh. And Mom's Eyes and Dad's Eyes are Swooshette and Papa Swoosh.  

     

JESS    

Aw. Papa Swoosh.    

     

CAT    

Now, in fighting these enemies, you probably could use some help. And fortunately, the game has your back in the form of the Flying Men.    

     

JESS    

That's right. There is a house that is on the north side of Magicant, and if you walk inside of it, there are several beds and several men who appear to have like beaks and wings maybe - walking around and they call themselves the Flying Men. And if you go up and talk to one of them, they volunteer to come with you.    

     

CAT    

Their destiny is to help you, in fact.    

     

JESS  

Yeah. And they say they can't wait for you to come back so that they can help you.    

     

CAT    

Now, fans of either Smash Brothers, where they eventually appeared in a later game in a particular fighting map and fight alongside you, or fans of EarthBound will recognize the Flying Man. In fact, fans of EarthBound may recognize the name Magicant, but that's a story for another time. 

 

Now, when it comes to the Flying Men, the way that they operate is very odd. Like Pippi, they join your party. But unlike Pippi, you don't have any control over them. You can't give them anything. They just do whatever it is they do. And they generally soak up any enemy attacks that come for you, while also dishing out a fair amount of punch themselves. But they can die. And when they die, there's only five of them and they're dead forever. And a gravesite appears outside their house with an epithet.  

     

JESS    

Oh gosh. Oh, that's so dark. I'm glad they didn't go back and get another one. Although I wonder if maybe the Flying Men are a counter to the flying teddies.    

     

CAT    

[laughs] Maybe. I don't know. I mean… trapped in endless battle?    

     

JESS    

Well, they seem to like their job, and there's nothing I can do to dissuade them from it.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, they're really into it. They're really, really, really, really into it. I mean, as I said, it is their destiny, not their density, but their destiny. 

 

JESS

[laughs]

 

CAT

There is, however-

 

JESS

That’s heavy.

 

CAT

-I found out, one way to replenish their HP, which I thought there was no way to do that. But if you go to the magic fountain, you can restore all the lost hit points for the Flying Men. Now, I did sacrifice three Flying Men in my journey. When one of them dies, and you talk to the other one, they say, “I heard that my brother died with honor in combat. With all our love, he was buried in our cemetery. It is with great pride that I take his place by you.” The first headstone says “Ninten's strong and powerful ally, the brave soldier Flying Man, rests here in peace.” The second one says, “to Ninten's horror and dismay, the brave soldier Flying Man rests here in peace.” And the third one says, “Ninten's faithful and loyal servant, the brave soldier Flying Man, rests here in peace.” 

 

I'm going to let the other two stay alive. They need each other. But here's what the Encyclopedia says about the Flying Men - this is pretty big:

 

“When you were still little, your mother used to sit by her bedside and softly tell you the story of the Flying Men. You probably don't remember the sad tale, but it was invented by your Great Grandmother. You should pay them a visit. You should have a talk with them because you just might remember the story. 

 

JESS

Hmm. 

CAT

I think it's time we went to Queen Mary's castle, huh?  Don't you think?    

     

JESS    

Okay, let's do that. 

 

[regal musical transition]

 

JESS

So before you can walk into the castle, there's a big fence that's surrounding it. And there are three guards stationed outside. And you're supposed to solve a riddle before they will let you pass. Now, they don't tell you what the riddle is, but if you use telepathy, then you read their mind and they say, “that's right. The answer to the riddle is ‘two alligators.’” But they haven't figured out what the riddle is yet.    

     

CAT    

That was a real serious runner for my Mother, She Quote.    

     

JESS    

[laughs] It’s a good one.    

     

CAT    

Yeah. So they let you through. And when we get into the castle, we have my favorite piece of music from this section.    

     

JESS    

Me too!  

     

CAT  

Oh? Yeah!  

     

JESS    

Yay! We match! 

 

CAT

[laughs]

 

JESS

Stamp your bingo card. 

 

CAT

Thunk!    

 

JESS

[laughs]

     

CAT    

It's a track that's called “Wisdom of the World”, and it is really sweet, and really beautiful, and good grief - When you hear the album version of this song with Catherine Warwick singing over the top of it, it sounds like it could be the credits music to an eighties fantasy film. I mean, they are going for it. That's when I was like, “this is Neverending Story!” This is way better than the title song to that film, which I like, but “Wisdom of the World” is better.    

     

JESS    

Yeah, I really like the song in the castle, too. That was my choice. There wasn't a whole lot of different music in this section of the game, but that was definitely the one that stood out to me the most.    

     

CAT    

Oh, and hey, speaking of music, we should mention something kind of weird here. Fans of the Flying Man from EarthBound will remember Flying Man's really, really distinct music. And fans of the MOTHER soundtrack for this game, EarthBound Beginnings, will know that there's a track called “Flying Man” on there with that music, but that music doesn't appear in EarthBound Beginnings at all.    

     

So they wrote a song called “Flying Man”, which is super funky and has lyrics, for this game. But I guess they ran out of space or something or couldn't figure out how to do it because it's nowhere to be found in this game. It was written for this game, but doesn't appear until the next game.    

     

JESS    

So as you're walking through the castle, there are a few rooms that have guards in them - presumably. There's the throne room and then there's a whole lot of treasure rooms. The guards have some interesting things to say, including my Mother, She Quote for the segment.    

     

CAT    

Ooh, lay it on me.    

     

JESS    

So one of the guards that you talk to is telling you the story about Queen Mary's nightmares. And he says, “Queen Mary often has nightmares as if scolding a naughty child. She cries out, ‘I'm scared! I'm scared!’ And then she starts to sing just a little bit. Then, she forgets the tune and wakes in a sweat. I wonder what that experience has done this to Queen Mary.” 

 

I thought that was an extremely haunting piece of dialog. It made me really feel for what these characters are going through in a way that I hadn't until this point.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, it's just a fun fantasy world until you read about someone's trauma.    

     

JESS    

Yeah. It also could mean that Queen Mary probably knows a piece of the song? Well, it made me think that initially. Now I think that you probably have to collect all the song pieces and then come back and play it for her. And then that, you know, lets you win the game or something like that.    

     

CAT    

Well, the Queen Mary herself says to you, “welcome Ninten. Here in Magicant, everyone is your friend. You can have as much as you like of whatever you want. What? You want to listen to my song? Sorry. I don't know why, but I just can't sing. I beg you to learn the melody. It's only eight notes long. When you learn them all, return and sing it for me. If only I could hear that song.” So she needs you to jog her memory.    

     

JESS    

Yeah. That seems like a quest that we would be on.    

     

CAT    

Yep, it sure does.    

     

JESS  

And one of the guards sits in the throne room… This was almost my Mother, She Quote, but he says, “all of us know that you don't belong here, but we consider you one of us. Everyone here loves you Ninen.” And I thought that was so sweet. Everyone's like, “we know you don't belong here, but we consider you to be one of us. And everybody here loves you.”  

     

CAT    

And they also say, “promise me that if you need help, you'll come back.”

 

JESS

Mm hmm. 

 

CAT

It's very interesting that Magicant is a place where you can have whatever you want. If you go to one of these people's houses, they serve your favorite food.    

     

JESS    

Yeah. They ask you, “do you know what food we serve here?” And if you say “yes,” they’re like, “that's right, pizza. “For me, anyway.    

     

CAT    

Yeah. It is like entering a child's fantasyland and being confronted with that in such a weird way is really emotionally disarming. The Encyclopedia says about entering the castle:

 

“When you awaken from a dream, even though you know you were there a moment ago, you can't remember what you saw in it. The feel and touch of your dream you can sense with your whole body as plain as day, but trying to picture it, any of it - turns out to be a different matter, for some reason. This feeling of being unable to remember. So heartrending, it hurts, will rain cats and dogs all over your whole frame when you enter this castle. What's that all about?” 

 

And the folks who you've been referring to as guards, it's unclear what they are. They look kind of weird… Well, it describes them as “Chamberlains” and says it's like they're wearing a sack from head to toe. I think they kind of look like rag dolls. Like old time rag dolls.    

     

JESS    

Yeah, I thought it might have been armor, but that makes sense, too. It's kind of hard to tell with 8-bit graphics, but yeah, I can see that.    

     

CAT    

And the floor is green, which evokes a very like Return to Oz kind of thing - and reflective. The Encyclopedia describes it as though it “holds a lake of deeply submerged sorrow.”

 

JESS

Wow. 

 

CAT

And inside this castle is a bunch of stuff! 

 

JESS

Yeah, that you can’t pick up.

 

CAT

They give you so many items, can't possibly carry them, and they also torment you. Eventually, you find a - it's like a weird little maze, and eventually you find a room with six chests in it and you can only pick one. You don't know there are any rules to this at all. But you only pick one and then all the other ones disappear.    

     

JESS    

I got a strength capsule out of one of them. I guess there's other items in the other ones.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, there is. The top three presents are a boomerang, a PSI stone, and a fight capsule. And the bottom three presents are a rope, a ruler, and berry tofu. 

 

JESS

…Berry tofu…

 

CAT

Most strategy guides say, you know, try to get the boomerang. They're all in the same place. So once you know where they are, it's all good. But I think… the boomerang you can buy eventually and pretty soon in the game. So, the fight capsule, which permanently raises your energy stat. I prefer that.    

     

JESS  

That seems better.    

     

CAT    

You can also get a quirky item called the “flashdark” in the castle.    

     

JESS  

Yes! I love the flashdark.    

     

CAT    

It blinds enemies, has multiple uses, and its description is “the opposite of a flashlight”.    

     

JESS  

[laughs] I thought that was so brilliant. I was like, “a flashdark? What's this?” And then I read the description and I was like, “that's crazy. I love that.” You can also pick up a bullhorn, which I presume is the same item that the hippie was trying to use against you.    

     

CAT    

It's true. That's exactly what it is. You can tell someone else that their mother's calling them.    

     

JESS    

But most of the items in there I couldn't pick up, again, because I had no inventory space.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, it just got to keep coming back to Magicant, but you wouldn't…who knows that?

 

JESS

That's true… Or go down into a dungeon, take all that stuff with you, and then have to discard it because you need room for the stuff that you pick up in the dungeon!  

     

CAT    

True. Yeah. 

[ominous synth music plays]

 

CAT

We've seen all the sights of magic, but only one thing remains, and that is to try to get the hell out of here, even though it's really wonderful.    

     

JESS  

Yeah.   

 

[music ends]  

     

JESS    

Something else I didn't figure out until way too late is that you can actually step off of the clouds. I thought it was one of those situations where you're on a path. These are the places you can go. But no, you can step right off the clouds and you can walk pretty much anywhere.    

     

CAT  

The land is pink, and that is disarming. The section under all the wells… the header in the book says “Magicant Underground” in English, but next to all the English headers is text in Japanese. kenisu, who translated it, had a really interesting take on this specific section and they had a Twitter thread sort of exploring this

 

In Japanese, it calls the Magicant Underground “Chika Taiga” or “The Great Underground River”. And they go on to say, “until now I've ignored these secondary names, but since, in this case, something significant would be lost in translation - the fact that there's running water down here - I'm choosing, in my translation, to call this “The Underflow”. And I think that's a really great name for this space, especially based on how it's described in the Encyclopedia.    

     

JESS    

Yeah, I mean, it's a well, right? So that makes sense. There would be water down there.    

     

CAT    

It's a well, but it's also “the utmost depths of the dream.” And you can kind of see the water because when you go inside, the space is made out of giant bricks, like you're a very small person inside of a very big well… and the floor is black. But outside of the map, you can see like the edges of the labyrinth you're walking through and it's like submerged in water or reflected water. You can see that there's some kind of like watery sort of styling and you're in some kind of stony pocket inside of a lot of water.    

     

JESS    

Hmm. That's interesting.    

     

CAT    

It's a bit abstract.    

     

JESS    

But after you go down the well, you are confronted with two passageways. There's one left, one on the right, and you kind of choose which one to go down. And after you go down that passageway, you're confronted with another two passageways and so on, and so forth. So basically, the map of this area sort of forms this big tree of you know, decisions about ways that you could go. And some of the paths lead to nothing. Some of them lead to an item, but one leads to a larger area.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, it's a very weird sort of like trial and error puzzle of a bunch of rooms look exactly the same and eventually you get to where you're going. And when you get to the larger labyrinth at the end of all these forking paths, it's actually, in EarthBound Beginnings, significantly scaled back in floor size. All the same stuff is there, but it's like half the size of what it was in the original MOTHER game.    

     

JESS    

Really? 

 

CAT

Yeah. 

 

JESS

Okay. So they did change some things with the American translation other than just censoring some of the enemies that you fight.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, and I've never heard anybody outright say this, but I think it's safe to assume that there were some changes that were clearly for the sake of localization and meeting the standards and practices of Nintendo of America. But there are other changes that do kind of feel like director's cut changes. Like fewer enemies, having a run feature, and in some cases taking care of places where it was extra easy to get lost. But maybe, you know, I don't know. I don't know if anyone's ever found out for sure who made those choices.    

     

JESS    

Did you encounter the fish down there?    

     

CAT    

Well, since I mentioned leaving without the Onyx Hook, I think you can imagine that I… I just kind of passed that by accidentally when I was down there.    

     

JESS  

 Wait, so… The fish is a part of the Onyx Hook?    

     

CAT    

There are these weird little trapdoor spaces, and that's how you go down, and down, and down all the different forking paths. 

 

JESS

Right.

 

CAT

Well, when you get into the primary labyrinth, there is one more trapdoor space. And when you walk over that, you battle the fish and then you're able to go down in that trapdoor space.    

     

JESS  

Oh, okay. So the fish is kind of like a mini boss to get down to where the Onyx Hook is.  

     

CAT    

Yeah. And it’s kinda weird because-  

     

JESS    

I thought it would be a random encounter.    

     

CAT    

It feels like it would be. It's in the middle of the floor. Me moving around it was just me thinking like, “well, I see there's a present up ahead. I'm going to get that, and then I'll double back.” And never did.    

     

JESS    

I see, okay, well, that makes sense. I thought the fish was pretty fun. It is “The Fish”. There's no other fish. This is The Fish that's down here.    

     

CAT    

It looks like a big, scary piranha of some kind. And it is a tough fish.    

     

JESS    

It was tough. Yeah.    

     

CAT    

Even with me using defense up, which normally had like made enemies, like, only deal one damage to me - it was dealing seven damage in a continuous attack, and the flashdark did not work on it.    

     

JESS    

Yeah I didn't think to use the flashdark. I just kind of like beat it up.    

     

CAT    

In the Japanese version, the fish has a cooler name: “The Master of the Underflow, who dwells further still beneath the Underflow.”    

     

JESS    

Hmm. Okay...    

     

CAT    

Something called Master of the Underflow, that is a fish, makes sense that you might get the Onyx Hook from them. However, it's not called the Onyx Hook either. In Japanese, it's called the Agate Fishhook.    

     

JESS    

Onyx Hook is better.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, Onyx Hook does sound cooler, but I was questioning, “okay, so specifically it's a fishhook and you get it from a fish. So that - I guess that sort of makes sense. Or a fish is guarding it. But why agate? And then why change agate to onyx?” I assume that they must have thought, “well, agate is kind of a weirder stone that maybe American audiences would think it was like ‘a gate’,” like ‘a gate’ and be confused by it. But I thought, “well, what are the traditional properties of agate according to Japanese folks?” So I went to a strange source.    

     

JESS    

Uh huh. Let's see the depths of the rabbit holes you will go down, my dear Catherine.    

     

CAT    

Into the Internet's Underflow, I go. 

 

JESS

[laughs]

 

CAT

So I went to a very strange source, a Netherlands website about Japanese culture.    

     

JESS    

Okay.    

     

CAT    

A website called Japanfans.nl. But I went there specifically because, according to a list that they had, they were touting that they were like speaking about these stones in the context of Japanese culture, which is something that I wouldn't otherwise have access to. I don't know if I’d go to, say, my local witchy store and check out what they've listed as the properties of agate, if that's going to be the same for English-speaking culture. But, according to this Netherlands website: in Japan, agate is regarded as a protective stone. They can prevent bad dreams, stress and energy drain. “According to ancient beliefs agate is a gemstone that balances energies and helps to awaken talents.” Maybe that says nothing. Or maybe it's not a coincidence that it says that it can prevent bad dreams.    

     

JESS    

Or that it awakens talents.  

     

CAT    

Yeah.    

     

JESS    

Like PSI abilities. What is the descriptor for Onyx?    

     

CAT    

I could not find a Japanese descriptor for Onyx, but in terms of like an American descriptor for Onyx, I did look it up. It seemed so inconsequential to like the context of the game that I was like, “they named it Onyx Book because it's a cooler name and they’re right.    

     

JESS    

Rule of cool.    

     

CAT    

I'll play it.    

     

JESS    

You found the Onyx Hook, and stole it from the fish in the Sea of Holes.    

     

CAT    

[laughs] Yeah. And then you meet a Nowhere Man.    

     

JESS    

He's a real nowhere man.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, but we'll get to him in a moment because there's a bunch of other weird stuff in this labyrinth… namely a gall darn dragon!    

     

JESS    

Yeah! A sleeping dragon! I didn't know what to make of that. I tried to wake it up, though.    

     

CAT    

How'd that go for you?    

     

JESS    

It didn't work. It said that I did not have the psionic strength to stir this dragon. So then I thought, Well, maybe I'll try this psi stone. That didn't do anything either. This dragon was not moving for anything or anyone.    

     

CAT    

Well, I guess you're just going to have to get your levels higher, huh?    

     

JESS    

I guess so.    

     

CAT    

And then see what happens.    

     

JESS    

Mm-hmm. Wake the dragon.  

     

CAT    

Yeah. Also, weirdly, in the middle of a path is a present. And when you open it, you get a sword. But you can't use a sword.    

     

JESS    

Nope. It takes a lot of training. Only a few people can learn to use the sword.    

     

CAT    

According to the description, yeah. Wonder where that's going to come into play?    

     

JESS    

Hmm. Maybe when I get my own flying Teddy.    

     

CAT    

[Laughs] Maybe. Maybe... 

 

CAT and JESS

[chuckle]

 

CAT

But, just beyond that present with the sword in it, you find a person with their back turned towards you, standing in a hole in the wall. That hole was made for him.    

     

JESS    

Oh my- No, don't remind me of that. Ugh.    

     

CAT    

This section is very strange. And though it's a forgotten man, this experience is unforgettable. He says, “I'm a forgotten man. I'm not really here. I'm a forgotten man. I'm not really here. You didn't have to notice me. Please ignore me.” And that's it. But if you talk to him again, his dialog changes. 

 

“I'm a man who does not exist. You talk so kindly. I don't know what to do. If I miss people, I cannot live alone anymore.” And if you talk to him again, he says, “my conversation is always a monologue. I've been alone since the moment I was born,” but if you talk to him again, he says, “lucky, unlucky. It makes no difference to me. Sometimes even breathing becomes too much.” …And if you talk to him again? He says, “why do you insist on talking to me? Are you a forgotten? man too?” What did you say, Jess?    

     

JESS    

Yes, I tried both paths.    

     

CAT    

If you say “no,” he says “That's right. That is right, right? Go ahead. Ignore me like everyone else.” And you get another yes or no choice. If you say “no,” his entire dialog sequence repeats. But if you say “yes,” agreeing to ignore him, he says, “that's right. Thank you.” and disappears.    

     

JESS    

If these holes are an analogy representative of depression, the forgotten man is the experience of depression. It is somebody who feels disconnected from society. They're blocking the path that is preventing you from returning to the normal world. It's the person that keeps you inside your own mental state of mind, spiraling down this path like the helter skelters outside. You feel unnoticed, unloved, like everybody is just ignoring you or doesn't see you. Breathing is too much. It feels overwhelming. It doesn't make any difference to you. Lucky, unlucky - it doesn't matter. Nothing matters to you… when you're a forgotten man.    

     

CAT    

Yeah. And when he disappears, that may be his death. In the Encyclopedia, it says “I suppose from now on, however many times you come to this exit, your thoughts will return to the now-deceased forgotten man.” But it does also contradict itself elsewhere it says, “answer yes when he says, ‘ignore me already’ and the man will leave and the exit will appear.” So which is it? Maybe it's both.    

     

JESS    

Well, I mean, “leave” can mean “die”.    

     

CAT    

True. Now, there is a funny and deeply frustrating thing about the forgotten man. It's so awful that they removed it from the game.    

     

JESS    

Okay.    

     

CAT    

You mentioned that there was a person in the woods who sort of mentions the forgotten man right?    

     

JESS    

Mm-hmm.    

     

CAT    

Well, in the original version of this game in Japanese, there's a girl in the forest. That person in the forest gives you a Friendship Ring. It is a ring that does nothing. When they give it to you, they say, “don't you forget me, now! If you have this on you during your exchange with the forgotten man, I hear something will happen.  “  

     

JESS    

Okay.    

     

CAT    

So kenisu, brave traveler that they are, tried this out. So, the forgotten man, when you encounter them, when you give the wrong answer, it loops, right? You have to go through the dialog sequence again to get back there. In the original version, it warps you back to town.    

     

JESS    

[gasps] Which town?    

     

CAT    

Magicant.    

     

JESS    

Okay.    

     

CAT    

So it spits you back out in the middle of town. You’ve got to go back down into the Underflow and then hope you do it right the next time.    

     

JESS    

Right?    

     

CAT    

So kenisu thought, “hey, I bet the Friendship Ring prevents you from getting warped back to town if you give the wrong answer.” So when he asks, “are you a forgotten man too” if you say “yes,” he says, “you liar. Go back to the girl you've got waiting for you.” He doesn't even know that you have somebody, but he's angry that you probably have somebody waiting for you and warps you back to the girl on the town bridge.  

 

JESS

Huh.  

     

CAT    

But, as kenisu found, when you have the Friendship Ring on you, in your inventory, it still warps you. But this time it warps you back to the girl in the forest who gave you the friendship ring in the first place.    

     

JESS    

Wow. Okay… that's not a huge difference, but… It’s something.  

     

CAT    

No, it's worse, in fact.    

     

JESS    

It's worse because it's like…?    

     

CAT    

Because she's farther away. I mean, if you're judging by distance, it's worse.    

     

JESS    

But it's basically like “no, you have somebody. Go back to her. Let me send you back there. Let me remind you how you're not a forgotten man.”    

     

CAT    

Yeah. So that is weird and emotional, but also such a lousy game mechanic, I totally understand why they got rid of it. Especially because, you know, inventory space is precious, and you're going to do this? Come on.    

     

JESS    

Sure. Yeah. I feel sorry for the forgotten man, though.    

     

CAT    

I think you're supposed to.    

     

JESS    

It's like, he cannot die until you agree to ignore him. And he just seems to exist in this perpetual state of pain.    

     

CAT    

It's kind of like… hopefully he doesn't come back. Hopefully that's like, you know, liberation. Instead of that pain going somewhere else.

 

[melodies start to play on piano, fading in]

 

CAT

We can ask, “who's forgotten, man is he?” Is he his own person? Is he someone else's? In he Ninten’s? Probably not. Ninten has an attentive mom. That's probably not Ninten's psyche.    

JESS    

He doesn’t feel forgotten?    

     

CAT    

Yeah, but down there, if we wanted to deeply analyze this…we certainly could. It’s all there.  

     

JESS    

There's no end of options for ways you could interpret this. After the forgotten man disappears, you can exit the Underflow and suddenly are popped out. There's another one of those little pink spire things, and you're inside of a different cave, and you walk outside and you're somewhere else.    

     

CAT    

Yeah, on a cliffside just outside the town of Marrysville, the next town over from Podunk.    

     

JESS    

Yeah. But it was quite a journey to get from point A to point B, And since we have the Onyx Hook, we can go back to Magicant pretty much any time we want. And I'm sure we will.    

     

CAT    

We're going to have to.    

     

JESS    

Because we're going to need some help,those folks seem to need our help, and there's a lot of good to do in this world, and in the dream world.    

     

CAT    

When I initially said, “hey, Jess, get to the other side of the the mysterious cave,” you were like, “What? What's in there?” [giggles]

 

JESS

Mm-hmm.

 

CAT

So I'd say, what's in there is more than you bargained for?

 

JESS

Yeah. It definitely inSPIREd me, though. 

 

CAT

Oh, my gosh. 

 

CAT and JESS

[laugh]

 

JESS

And on that note!  

     

CAT    

I'm Cat.    

     

JESS    

I'm Jess! 

 

CAT and JESS

And that's all she wrote! [laughs]

 

[melodies ends]   

 

[upbeat music plays]

 

CAT

“MOTHER,” She Wrote is made possible thanks to the generous support of our Patreon Producers: Becky Scott Fairley, Bob Hogan, C B, David Devereux, Joe “Tank” Ricciardelli, Josh King, McDibble Deluxe, MjolnirMK86, Patrick Webster, Sean Hutchinson, Sean T. Redd…

 

And our Super-Deluxe Executive Patreon Producers:

BigBadShadowMan, Marcus Larsson, and Jaimeson LaLone

 

JESS

You can join the team at Patreon.com/OmniverseMedia! And if you think “MOTHER,” She Wrote is simply smashing, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Podchaser  - and be sure to subscribe via your favorite podcast player.

 

CAT

This series is recorded and produced in Orlando, Florida and Louisville, Kentucky on lands stolen from their Indigenous people: the Timucua and Seminole, and Shawnee, Cherokee, Osage, Seneca-Iroquois, Miami, Hopewell and Adena.

 

JESS

Acknowledgement of the first peoples of these lands, and the lasting repercussions of colonization is just the beginning of the restorative work that is necessary. Through awareness, we can prompt allyship, action, and ultimately decolonization. 

 

CAT

For links to aid Indigenous efforts and to learn more about the first nations of the land where you live: visit omniverse.media/landback

 

JESS

“MOTHER,” She Wrote is written, produced, and performed by me: Jessica Mudd.

 

CAT

And me: Cat Blackard. Our original score is composed and performed by Jess and this episode features Cynthia Beckert as Queen Mary.

 

JESS

Special thanks to Kenisu for his invaluable work translating the MOTHER Encyclopedia. Find a link to his translation, other media we’ve referenced, and full episode transcripts at mothershewrote.earth

 

CAT

“Mother,” She Wrote is not affiliated with Nintendo, Shigesato Itoi, or any rights holders of the MOTHER and EarthBound intellectual properties. Please play the games' official Nintendo releases.

 

[Omniverse Audio Brand]