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The year 2021 has brought us many new surprises in the world of TPOT and BFB. Now we know several things: here are the things I found out, in chronological order. If you haven't watched the new TPOT, spoilers abound.

  1. Two new characters have joined TPOT 1, not one.
  2. New TPOT episodes are released every few months, not in one month. BFB is produced more frequently.
  3. Because of that, I think BFB will end before TPOT will, the opposite of what I'd thought before.

But just because we have these things on our minds doesn't mean we have to stop asking questions. In this revised version of the old article, I have written down some new projections for old inquiries, in hopes that they're more accurate than the originals were.

Question 1: How many TPOT episodes will there be?[]

Fact: From BFDI to the two next episodes of TPOT and BFB, the average net change during the course of a non-pilot, non-finale episode is . The standard deviation of those values is .

Fact: Many object shows (the ones that make it to their finales, that is) end with a final three or a final two.

As I'd mentioned on the earlier post, a format of one contestant being eliminated per episode without any chance of rejoining or recommended character debuts is out of the picture. Not just because it's boring, but because the data show something different. Here is the net change in the number of contestants per (non-pilot, non finale) episode.[1][2]

Episodes that count as a continuation of the previous one(s), namely BFDIA 5B through 5E and BFB 14, are counted as half an episode. Although they are treated as independent episodes, nothing happens to their net changes.

  • –1: 49 instances (83.8% of NPNFEs)
  • ±0: 6½ instances (11.1%)
  • +1: 3 instances (5.1%)

With this information and the true average net change in account, the mean number of episodes that I'm expecting TPOT to have is anything from 50 to 52 episodes, with an average of 51.02.[3][4]

The true standard deviation of the data, since we are expecting (an average of) 51.02 episodes (hereby simplified to 51), would be calculated by dividing the original standard deviation by the square root of 51 in this equation: .[5] From this we get .

This is what happens at the fiftieth percentile, or zero standard deviations.

What if TPOT didn't follow the expected number of episodes?[]

What if the creators changed the mean net change for whatever reason? What if double eliminations become a thing, or if three recommended characters join the show in one episode?

Note on standard deviations
When... the mean net change is... which means... i.e...
the standard deviation is lower, farther from zero, more contestants eliminated per episode, the series is shorter.
the standard deviation is higher, closer to zero, more rejoinings or debuts in the series, the series is longer.

The table below shows the average number of episodes that there might be of TPOT.

Average number of TPOT (and BFB) episodes made after 2021
Number of standard deviations away from the average Mean net change per episode Number of TPOT episodes made until the final two or three Number of TPOT episodes overall
–3 –1.006 39 to 41 40 to 42
–2 –0.933 42 to 44 43 to 45
–1 –0.859 46 to 48 47 to 49
0 (average) –0.786 50 to 52 51 to 53
+1 –0.713 55 to 57 56 to 58
+2 –0.640 61 to 63 62 to 64
+3 –0.567 69 to 71 70 to 72

This paints an optimistic picture for a lot of people, I guess (including the animators). TPOT will end up with fewer episodes than what I had predicted in last year's post. But does that mean the series is going to be shorter?

Question 2: On what date will TPOT end?[]

Honestly, I don't know. I'm aware of the dangers of making predictions about the end of a series before it's it's happened, and TPOT is still on its first episode, with only a couple hints from several speculators to inform us about the future of the series. It should be obvious to many of the viewers, but TPOT episodes will be released quite sparingly compared to those of BFB. Some people on the Internet said that there are more contestants and more character development, and also because it's just so much greater in quality than BFB.

Don't get me wrong, I'm enjoying the tail end of the storylines we're getting right now with X, Four, Teardrop, Gelatin and the other one, but I think The Power of Two!! carries an insanely cool novelty factor with it that BFB never really had (except for during the first few weeks in November 2017).[6]

But when will they be released?

As soon as the next episode comes out, I'll have an update.

Some say soon[]

Update from a few hours later: I can't wait! I went to the Other Wiki page for TPOT 2 and analysed every comment that contained a prediction of when its writer thought the episode will come out. The good news is that everyone there believes it will be released this year. But there still isn't much agreement over the date (some even a few days ago said it would be released in February!) and I'm sure people had to stop themselves from arguing amongst each other. At least it was in good spirits. After all, it is the BFDI wiki.

I took each comment and converted its information into two dates, one for an early boundary and the other for a late one. For example:

  • "released in March or April": 1 March and 30 April
  • "in early June": 1 June and 9 June
  • "on May 15th": 15 May and 15 May (just duplicated)
  • "in April but before July": 1 April and 30 June

The creators tell me so[]

It was at this point I was confronted again with the video Jacknjellify had made almost a year ago: "The Secret Behind BFB's Split". I knew it existed but I didn't watch it because, once again, slump. But in the video Cary said it would take "four to five months" before a new episode was released to the video-hungry public.

Since I trust the Huang brothers' words over those of the people on the BFDI Wiki (no offence), I set "four to five months" after TPOT 1 was released as the ideal range, i.e. 10 May and 10 June. But I didn't discount the opinion of the object-show commoners like you and me. Fifty percent of the estimates came from the Wiki people, and fifty percent came from Jacknjellify's announcement.

Since I haven't been asked yet[]

The average release date people have predicted for the second episode of The Power of Two!!, in other words, my most likely prediction of when it will come out, is sometime around 21 May 2021.[7]

If we extrapolate that to all the other episodes of TPOT up to the supposed finale (plus up to three deviations of possible episodes):

Predictions for release dates of selected TPOT episodes, revised estimates
Episode Release date Context
2 21 May 2021 The next episode in production order, probably being worked on today.

Also when TPOT overtakes IDFB in number of episodes.

3 29 September 2021
6 June 2022[8] TPOT overtakes BFDIA in number of episodes.
10 April 2024
20 November 2027
25 December 2029 TPOT overtakes BFDI in number of episodes.
31 June 2031 TPOT overtakes BFB in number of episodes.
41 May 2035 Three standard deviations below the average total number of episodes.
46 March 2037 Two standard deviations below the average…
48 November 2037 One standard deviation below the average…
52 April 2039 The average total number of episodes (the most likely prediction).
57 February 2041 One standard deviation above the average…
63 April 2043 Two standard deviations above the average…
71 February 2046 Three standard deviations above the average…

Think about it: TPOT might not be finished until the 2040s.

The probability of this happening is exceedingly low, however, and not only because of how far it would be on a normal curve. According to the empirical rule of statistics, the chances of the finale being released after 2046 is 0.27%. I think we'll be fine, as will the future 24-year-olds conceived while TPOT was playing somewhere in the world.

But here's the real reason I don't think it will take until the end of the next decade for TPOT to end.

Letters from Satomi[]

No, I didn't receive an epistle from a member of the Jacknjellify crew. As many people on the Net know, the voice of Ice Cube, Gaty and Black Hole has a strong online presence, along with a Twitter account with billions of followers.[9] A user from the Other Wiki pointed out that the break between episodes might not be as long as we expected, citing Satomi Hinatsu's recent TPOT-related tweet.[10]

Normally I'd take some alternative futures into account, such as those that include a certain number of delays,[11] but since these are unknown for the time being, I'm going to stick with circa 2039 but more likely before that as when the final episode of TPOT is expected to air. Just to be safe.

Question 3: What does this imply for RLTPOT?[]

Ah, yes, the thing that exists in my mind now, but didn't when I was writing the older speculations post. Remember the two most important things regarding the chronology in this human universe.

  1. The episodes were released 48 years before they were on YouTube. RLBFB began in 1969, not in 2017.
  2. Every ten years since the first episode of RLBFDI, all characters are de-aged by five years. The last time this happened was on 1 January 1972 (2020). This basically means that the contestants age half the speed of non-contestants in this universe.[12]

This, of course, works wonders for the future of the human-universe version of TPOT, which ends not in 2039, but almost five decades prior… on 27 April 1991.[13] This means a couple things.

By then, two re-aging processes will have taken place since the start of RLBFDI: one in 1972 and the other in 1982. The contestants' simulated dates of births will thus be moved forward by ten years, and they'd have been due to move up by another five years if the show hadn't ended. Here are the RLTPOT contestants' ages at the time of the finale—I won't use their human names in place of their more well-known object names, but they'll appear if you hover over them.[14][15]

  • 30 years old: Remote (though her actress would have been 37), Robot Flower (though the person on whom she was based would be 59), Rocky
  • 31: Ice Cube
  • 32: Grassy
  • 33: Bottle, Cake, Lightning, Naily, Nickel
  • 34: Marker, Puffball
  • 35: Bell, Bomby, Pin
  • 36: Basketball, Book, Coiny, Eggy, Fanny, Foldy, Gaty, Needle, Saw
  • 37: Barf Bag, Pie, Pillow, TV
  • 38: Black Hole, Clock, Donut, Fries, Pen
  • 39: Eraser
  • 41: Tree
  • 44: Yellow Face
  • 50: Tennis Ball
  • 51: Golf Ball
  • 699: Snowball

On Winner and Price Tag, the new contestants, I don't have any detailed information yet. But Winner would be around 44 years old (cf. Loser), while Price Tag would be in their early thirties (cf. Naily).

Yeah, I'm going to have to retcon something to make them all seem younger. 699 is too, too, too old![16] Or I could keep them that way; after all, there are a lot of older actors out there who have more vitality than any of their juniors.

But what a comforting thought it is that The Power of Two!! will be with us through all these years.

Notes[]

  1. Henceforth abbreviated as NPNFE.
  2. A value of –1 doesn't necessarily mean that one contestant was eliminated. It could be that two contestants were eliminated, but there was a debut, among other possible combinations.
  3. The end of TPOT 2 will (most likely) end with 41 contestants. Because of that, I subtracted the average mean from 41 until I reached a number of episodes that's acceptable for a finale, i.e. 2 or 3 (2.5 if a precise number is needed). The equation was used.
  4. Unlike in the other post, I won't be including the last episodes of BFB. They're being released independently of TPOT, which I should have considered obvious, considering that it's a completely separate season.
  5. I remember learning that you have to divide by the square root of the sample size—the number I got made more sense than one standard deviation away from the average being that someone gets eliminated every fifth episode.
  6. That's just a very personalized opinion of mine. It's 2021 and I've been approaching another peak in BFDI-mania, while in the late 2010s (especially 2019), I was in an object-show-related slump.
  7. The standard deviation is 45 days, though I wouldn't take that number to heart for the reasons below.
  8. Again, trying to avoid "overkill" by giving the full date. No one is that specific, not even Jnj themselves.
  9. I think so; neither this wiki nor I have a Twitter.
  10. I can't find it right now, but I recall that they posted a screenshot.
  11. I'm not ignoring the idea that there could be months of delays during the production of TPOT. 2039 is what I gave as the absolute latest date for the finale—it's really likely to be over before that, of course—but at the same time it's pretty reasonable when you factor in the potential delays. BFDIA 6 could have come out in January 2013 rather than August 2016 if episodes were released monthly, and BFB could have concluded in December 2018 if episodes had been released at the same interval as that between 1 and 2. As you know, they didn't, and in the object show community that's only natural. Hiatuses sometimes have to happen, and they happen to just about everyone.
  12. Doesn't excuse him from mutilating, electrocuting or screeching at the human contestants, but thank you, Four or similar cosmic force!
  13. Yes, by sheer coincidence, RLTPOT ends on the same day as the finale of 21 Jump Street.
  14. If there's no underline, it means their names are the same in both universes.
  15. A lot of them don't go by their young-people nicknames any more. A bit sad, innit.
  16. I've got a feeling that the DeviantArt people will treat them like they're still teenagers in high school by then.
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