the fact that i literally can't picture silver killing flint and then standing there or cradling or sitting next to or just walking away from his Body is so weird & powerful, like obviously you can't know for certain that he did or didn't kill flint but that's irrelevant here. this is like the scene in season 3 where flint tells silver his history with the hamiltons except! we aren't allowed to see that moment of intimacy, we don't know what it looked or sounded or felt like we only see the aftermath. same with the missing silvermadi sex scene, we only really see the aftermath. silver never lets us see these moments of intimacy unlike flint who is always bared to us except for these scenes with silver, when he becomes known by someone else other than us and then unknown again when silver hides him from everyone
to quote my friend mattie on twitter: happy "we had it in our hands" wednesday
transcript below:
Silver: My god!
Flint: You fucking lied to me!
Silver: Of course I lied! I let you try it your way, I did trust you. But I am through wagering with her life now. If what it takes to secure her release is to turn over the cache, I'm very glad I brought it with us!
Flint: We had it. We had it in our hands. This war was breathing air, it was alive. Now Julius is back in that camp, pointing to a hole in the ground, telling anyone who'll listen, "This is what it looks like when you trust a pirate!" Yesterday he had nothing! He was shouting at the rain! Now you've given him all he needs to kill this war dead.
Silver: My god. The number of times I have followed you blindly. Backed you with the men blindly, put men in the fucking ground! Good men! Friends! Because you said, "I know the way." "Don't ask me how, just do as I say." I may not have understood it, I may not have supported it but I did it! And god damn it, right now you’re going to return the favor!
(thunder rumbles)
Silver: We will find a way to put it all back together with whatever we have left at our disposal. But do not ask me to choose between a war and a wife. I do not think you’re going to like the answer...
Whatever must be done to secure Madi's release... I'm going to do it. I do not expect your understanding, but I demand your support. As my partner. As my friend. Do I have it? Do I have it?
no but you see!! eleanor and flint share their backstories with rogers and silver respectively like “this is the worst crime that was done against me, you are the only person on earth i’ve told about it” and then those two just go and do That Crime to them. like with rogers and eleanor it is obviously the raid, and with silverflint it’s the taking of flint’s entire life from him and have it told differently, falsely, the removal of his ability to be the narrator of his own story.
"i think when [silver] goes in and he pulls that gun [on flint] [...] the closest thing i could relate it to was kind of... putting down the family dog. [...] if it's on a farm, it gets blooded, it bites a sheep or whatever and it's... it's something else now. and you love it, but it's turned into this thing, and you have to go 'sorry, i love you, but i have to stop this for your own good.'"
silver has the men, and flint is on his own out there and disadvantaged. that said, flint’s been on his own and disadvantaged countless times since i’ve known him… and here we are.
the way that silver said "I will stand here with you an hour, a day, a year" to flint and "I will wait a day, a month, a year, forever" to madi....I'm sick to my stomach. who is doing unhinged devotion like this man
bro is so bowled over with grief he clings to the false identity of a man his partners didnt even love. like they didnt care abt Long John Silver bc they knew him already before his name became that And Yet THAT legacy is what he fucking claws into til hes bloody bc he thinks thats what they wanted. your fucking stupid dude im killing you
I’m new to Black Sails so I’m sure this has been said, but it’s wrecking me. S4 spoilers.
I feel like the moment toward the end when Flint straight up panics about Silver possibly getting shot and then kills his own man and sabotages his own plan to save Silver was a full-stop, hold up, pause it right there, what the fuck moment that Silver would have absolutely been stunned by it if he weren’t too far gone in his own fucked up mental headspace and scheming plans.
One of the most insidious things Flint does is kill his closest friend and confidant (as close as he’ll allow someone to be to him as his Flint persona, anyway) because Gates was going to interfere with his plans. The plans came first. The plans always come first. Flint repeatedly has a one-track mind and the will of the Gods to see his plans through (ie creating the storm). Something like friendship can’t stand in the way. Nothing can.
Except—
In this moment near the finale, Flint makes the complete opposite decision. He chooses his friend over his plans. He chooses Silver over what he thinks is the way to succeed, over what’s necessary for the war. He chooses Silver over his plans. In a split second, entirely instinctual and emotional reaction, he chooses Silver.
And Silver was there when Flint killed Gates. He knows what Flint is capable of in moments like this one. He should’ve stopped everything right then and there and realized and been forced to accept how much Flint cared about him, but he didn’t. He couldn’t.
Flint could tell Silver his story and about Thomas, but Silver didn’t tell his own story. He couldn’t.
That is so fucking heartbreaking. This is the real reason he inevitably becomes the villain, not because of Billy’s propaganda or all of the posturing. It’s his mind, his outlook: Survival only. Survival first.
Silver has already shut Flint out when he first realized Flint might choose the war over Madi, even though so many times afterward and so sincerely does Flint promise that she’s a priority and that they’ll save her. Flint has pulled off the impossible before. Silver has believed him and only him capable of pulling off impossible things before. But Silver has already made up his mind and refuses to see or accept a reality where Flint actually cares for him, and by extension, Madi.
Silver is completely lost to his own insecurity? inability to connect and trust and love? once there are actually people in his life who love him that he has forced a story onto those around him that leaves himself out of an actual life with them.
me seeing john get pinned down on the table by a bunch of men and the axe coming- "oh you're fine, there are two seasons left, i know you're not going to die."
me remembering him as a Character from Popular Book like a split second later- "THE LEG"