Nimona headcanons just cause
Nimona and Ambrosius are both like sentient space heaters
Nimona runs hotter than the average human being because obvi
But Ambrosius is a whole nother ballpark
I just know this man hates summer more than the average person
Poor baby is just a miserable sweaty clammy mess and if anyone tries to touch him during summer he threatens to bite them
Nimona and Ambrosius always refuse to let the ac get higher than 60 degrees and Bal suffers
Bal should be classified as a damn reptile
Poor baby has terrible circulation
It’s bad enough that Ambrosius has dragged him to the doctor multiple times
He clings to Ambrosius and Nimona in the winter because this man is constantly freezing
I just know he’s a damn menace the second it gets a little chilly
This little brat will shove his hands up Ambrosius’ shirt the second he gets home to “warm up”
And he’s got a metal hand so it’s twice as cold
Ambrosius has been woken up from a deep sleep by freezing hands or freezing feet and will whine about how it feels like waking up in an ice bath
One time Ambrosius walked into the living room to find Bal chasing Nimona around while they were screaming “Frosty the snowman is trying to kill me with his icicle hands”
Ambrosius is weirdly good with all kids he’s been described multiple times as a “natural parent”
Does he like kids…. That’s up for debate
Like he doesn’t hate them if their parents raised them right but if that kid is a little bully then fuck no he doesn’t like them
Nimona is also really good with kids
He’s a little cautious around elementary school kids cause you know trauma and has weird beef with all middle schoolers
Bal is fucking terrified of babies
One time someone asked him to hold their baby and then walked off and which sent him into a panic attack
He’ll go on hour-long rants about how fragile are and how he can’t be trusted with something that can suffocate if you don’t lay them down the wrong way
He’s okay with elementary school kids and doesn’t mind middle schoolers but he has massive issues with highschoolers for some reason
A high school once asked him to visit and give a talk to the students and Ambrosius had to take his laptop away before he emailed them back saying “I’d rather chop my other arm off”
Honestly I think even though Nimona craves stability she also needs freedom
So every couple of weeks she’ll go on little solo adventures
She keeps the boys updated constantly about where she is but she never tells them when she’s coming back because she doesn’t even know
Most of the time she’ll come back when she wants a homecooked meal (and when she misses the boys)
The boys are pretty used to this routine so they aren’t surprised anymore when they come home to a note saying she’ll be gone for a bit
They also aren't surprised when he climes through their window at 2 in the morning to wake them up and demand food
Could he make it himself? Absolutely
Does he want to? Fuck no where’s the fun in that
Plus he knows no matter how much the boys complain about messed up sleep schedules and how he “gave them a heart attack” they'd rather be woken up in the middle of the night so they can make sure he’s healthy and fed
When they do come home the boys “force” them into a sleepover in the living room where they eat a stupid amount of junk food and watch old horror movies
And they call out of work so they can catch up and learn everything that can't fit in a text
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ok sure i'll talk about farleigh start. i'll talk about his tragedy of never being enough as it were and then having to deal with fucking oliver. sure. disclaimer: it's about class (and race) and the horrible reality of the rich. the horrible reality of living as farleigh.
another disclaimer: i'm white! and poc definitely pick up on everything i'm talking about here as it is, and better. i was and am specifically interested in farleigh vs. oliver but it's impossible to examine without considering race. definitely let me know if anything abt this sucks!
farleigh and oliver are similar. it's annoying because every intruder that is not himself is annoying, partly because felix's attention swaying from farleigh is dangerous; there is always a threat of being discarded, even if no precedent existed. the potential is terrifying.
but you'd think he's seen this before, every summer (if venetia is telling the truth) or at least often enough to learn to recognize it fast, so he should know this will pass. part of it is i think still the deep anxiety, and i think he hated every boy that was there before, and it is sort of routine.
but definitely a huge factor in farleigh's annoyance is the fact that he's a biracial (black for cattons, that's all they see) man in a white rich household. he's alert and exhausted all the time. of course he's angry at oliver, regardless of whether he's the first to crash at saltburn for the summer or the fifty-first.
but the important thing is this.
farleigh is very jealous of and angry and pissed at oliver because farleigh sees all the similarities between them. outsider, in financial trouble, whatever it is, in need of cattons; and yet oliver is preferred. and farleigh seems to be the only one to really consider it. felix does not pick up on the hint when farleigh brings up the birthday party vs. his mother. felix's clumsy "different or... anything like that" is as much about race as it is about class, of course. the "we've done all that we can" bit is felix absolving himself of guilt because surely they had, surely the mysterious collective cattons that he's not really part of had tried all they could do. to him, farleigh is different from oliver, because farleigh has been helped. felix is rich and white and twofold uncomfortable with farleigh, even if he's nice about it, even if he genuinely enjoys his company; he doesn't look too close at farleigh because he feels too guilty to come too close. and farleigh can't do anything about it. he can't nice himself into it. the fucking tragedy of him is that he's never enough in the world of the ultra-rich white, even if (especially because!) he's born into it.
farleigh is very pissed at oliver because farleigh also sees all the differences between them. you know who can be nice poor white enough to fit in? fucking oliver. felix says "just be yourself, they'll love you" when oliver first moves in. farleigh was also probably told the same thing, and felix also probably believed that farleigh could just be himself, but even if the cattons were magically not racist at all (impossible), it wouldn't make a difference to farleigh. he would still self-censor, keep in check, be in dangerous waters (because racism is not just about the individual, but about the system). we see that he'd won himself leeway by years of trial and error by the way he speaks to the family, but it's still within the boundaries of acceptable, built by the cattons. he's part of them because they allow it, and farleigh is very, very aware.
the annoying thing is oliver can be himself. like, truly, genuinely, he can just be. and farleigh can't help but envy that.
as a side note, oliver is obviously jealous of farleigh in the beginning as well, because regardless of the reality of farleigh's situation, he was born into it, and hence, at least in oliver's mind, has his position solidified. oliver's whole thing is unquenchable thirst and hunger for whatever and everything the cattons have (including themselves!). he wishes to have been a catton from birth. to oliver, at first, there's nothing farleigh can really do to lose it. and until he figures out the cattons completely, he can't help but envy that.
but i think farleigh senses something different about oliver early on. at least on the level of the text, we have "you're almost passing [for] a real, human boy", which is so important because farleigh is the first to point out oliver's weirdness. the next to do so is venetia in the bath scene calling him a freak, but it's too late. farleigh is too early.
and i like to think he clocks oliver too early because he sees the jagged edges that he recognizes in himself. i think that one other thing that farleigh envies is oliver's freedom to let go. freedom to let go is very similar to freedom to be, but not quite the same.
to be is about perception: farleigh knows he cannot fall out of line, but would like to, and oliver does not have to worry about it at all (i mean, he does, because oliver also performs for felix, but farleigh doesn't know that).
to let go is about the self: farleigh is too scared to even want what oliver eventually does, to even consider the possibility. oliver can let himself want. oliver can let himself act. oliver just can do things and want things. i'm not sure farleigh can.
and so in this scene, when oliver's wants and actions have landed him nowhere with farleigh, felix, venetia, the cattons, of course farleigh gloats. he can let himself do that, because if the cattons are slowly discarding him, farleigh can allow himself this one small victory. he's relieved because despite the dangerous similarities, oliver is, thankfully, not really the same as farleigh, right?
but like. this movie is a love letter to all things gothic. oliver is a white man. he prevails. the brief performance that oliver put on did eventually end up more effective than farleigh's lifetime of constraint. my heart fucking breaks for him to be honest.
the issue that remains is the fact of farleigh's survival. i like to think that oliver came to respect him. oliver is smart, but farleigh is clever. he picks up on everything oliver does (to refer back to the karaoke scene, farleigh immediately retaliates in the cleverest way, in the moment), and he's the only one to do so consistently (venetia, again, for example, comes close, but too late; oliver doesn't like that, there's nothing to work with). hence, stay with me for a little longer, the paradox: farleigh survives because he was never enough for the cattons, but he is very worthy of oliver's attention. in his own freaky way, oliver wants him. look at that.
so. farleigh. farleigh might come back. he always comes back. and i think oliver wants to try harder next time.
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