#well no. but fuck jim/oluwande i guess

[kimwxler]

I really wish I could get over all this considering I actually never thought OFMD was amazing television, but currently obsessing over how messy the Jim and Oluwande arcs have been for no reason.

Just... why on earth did they give them a lovely friends-to-lovers arc in Season 1 along with Jim's revenge arc, have them torn apart by circumstance in the finale, and then in Season 2? Oh yeah they're just not together anymore. Yeah, they both have separate brand new love interests we have to get quickly invested in with very little screentime. No, no mention of Jim's family or Oluwande's possible leadership journey either.

And the thing is, I'm easy. I love Archie and Zheng and like both Archie/Jim and Oluwande/Zheng, especially Archie/Jim because there's slightly more time for us to see them interact and get attached. I just don't understand why Jim/Oluwande were broken up and there was never even an in-universe reason given. I could've accepted, for example, that Jim was struggling having thought that Oluwande was dead for months and being deeply traumatized by everything that happened on the break-up boat. Maybe it felt easier for them to be with someone who was also on Blackbeard's crew, or just someone "harder" than Oluwande. But the show didn't even bother. Instead, they broke up because I guess Jim likes Archie now, and I suppose it's too much for us to believe that Jim and Oluwande might be okay having an open relationship, or that Jim might be able to love two people at once.

I genuinely spent 3/4ths of the season delusionally convincing myself that they were in an open relationship and it was just entirely implied and off-screen (also weird and bad writing) but no. They're just exes now and they don't even have any feelings about being exes.

#jim jimenez #oluwande boodhari #our flag means death #ofmd s2 spoilers #like were black pete and lucius broken up even though they had less to do in s1 #AND we had an in-universe reason of lucius being very traumatized and bitter and them briefly clashing over it? #well no. but fuck jim/oluwande i guess #it's not like they were even course correcting a storyline that didn't work or wasn't received well. come on. #very cool and great

[bougiebutchbitch]

happy izzy headcanons, off the cuff:

ed's adhd ass remembers the most random shit about him that he said one time, like that his favorite color is green, he doesn't like sweets, and he used to feed a stray cat when he was a kid (despite not remembering ostensibly more important things / things that were repeated or told to him directly. RIP iykyk etc)

he called the cat Miss Lady and sometimes to get out of "playing" with "fellow" "children" and other such tedium, he would claim she was his boss and he had to go to work for her in her estate (he's like ≤8yo or something when he pulls this)

still has not gotten much better at lying than that tbh

his parents loved each other and him and his big sister very much. they were as happy as they could be in their level of poverty, and iz's youngest years were filled with unconditional love

he and his sister both got their first jobs at the same little shop, but izzy was immediately and comically fired for being crass and rude to customers lmao (also for wearing pants)

he was part of the navy for an astounding one (1) year before being discharged - equally comically - for being the singular most insubordinate little shit ever seen. regular punishments had absolutely no effect on his behavior, and though they threatened to do worse by that point they could not catch him.

his criminal record is just as long as ed's, but the bulk of his charges are morality based. he fucks so severely it is a crime. (not that hard to do really, at the time, but he's proud of it lol.)

Jewish

was taught to read english and hebrew as a kid (Jewish communities at the time had higher literacy on average than other groups & taught girls as well as boys to read, iirc)

can buy and sell in many languages, but can't really converse. is in the process of learning spanish from jim and french from frenchie (with much more unsavory instruction provided by roach, for surprise use on frenchie lmao)

not necessarily about izzy i guess lmao, but i have a scene that runs in my head of izzy telling jim something private in spanish and jim interrupting (but not fast enough) to yell that oluwande is fluent, to which olu nervously says "no, i forgot. those words. don't use 'em much, so. you know. whoosh. gone. didn't understand any of it."

he and anne fake dated way back, to make ed and mary jealous

he and jack tried this also, after it worked for anne but not for izzy, but in the process they accidentally dated for real (jack... might have had ulterior motives lmao)

takes ye olde hrt, in the form of an herbal tea recipe that he got from a midwife who clocked him at 50 paces. they are still friends.

bottom sub leaning, but still a vers switch!!!

explores his gender further, with encouragement and some minor guidance from wee john. he has a little bit of a crisis at first, wondering if he only felt like a man because he didn't make a very pretty woman, but he talks it all through in fits and starts - primarily in out of context ambushes - with john and jim, learns more about drag, etc, and eventually gets comfortable with being a man who pretends to be a woman sometimes and just happens to be very good at it due to certain biological advantages lol

later functionally becomes ed's drag mom, the way john was for him - featuring many more instances of dressing him up like he did for the party in season one

realizes after being folded into the found family that he LOVES cuddling, and physical intimacy of all kinds. like basically discovers acts of service is actually not his only love language. nothing makes him feel more content than being physically in sync with someone.

at some point pete decides he wants to stop being all talk and actually live up to all the shit he's bragged about, but he doesn't want everyone else to know and/or there to be any witnesses to him being bad at stuff at first. so he solicits secret lessons from izzy, and izzy gives them and keeps the secret without condition.

he's basically the gordon ramsay of piracy. if you're learning and you're working at it, he's patient and attentive. if you act like you don't have anything to learn or make claims you can't back up, he calls you a fucking donkey.

grows his hair out. adores having it played with.

takes his job as "unicorn" very seriously. all of his duties are pretty much assigned to him via his own perception of what the fuck being the ship's unicorn even means, but if he says something is or isn't his job everyone goes with it without question. he sometimes abuses this fact, but only with ed lmao.

has each member of the crew add their own x to his tattoo and ends up with a little constellation of slightly differently shaped stars across his cheek/temple

SHRIEKS IN JOY

oh these are PERFECT. Excuse me while i squeal over each and every one.

I KNOW THAT PAIN, ED, BABYBOY, DARLING, PRINCESS WITH A DISORDER. He is theeeee most ADHD gremlin. He will randomly describe in perfect detail a day from 10 years ago that Izzy only has the vaguest recollection of, down to the precise inflection in whatever Izzy said to make that moment stick in his mind - but he still doesn't know Izzy's birthday sldkfhgklsdfhg

oh no. OH NO. Tha'ts horrifically cute. And I love that Izzy is a gritty old pirate who can kill without a moment's hesitation - but he cannot tell a good fib to save his life lmao. It's the 'tism

:cris and holds happy baby Izzy close:

I'm WHEEZING at tiny angry scowly Izzy getting fired from a shop for being a bastard refusing to wear a dress, saying fuck this, running away to join the Navy where the wearing of dresses is not requisite, and almost immediately getting fired for STILL BEING A BASTARD. :chinhands: it's so him

I am just. Imagining. Lucius getting hold of Izzy's criminal record in S1 before they really get to know each other. And just being supremely confused that Izzy has actually walked the walk lmao

JEWISH IZZY JEWISH IZZY JEWISH IZZY :clutches that headcanon very close to my chest:

ohhhhhh gosh I LOVE the crew teaching each other casual little things.... language tutors Jim and Frenchie and co., my favourite. I wonder if Izzy teaches them a tiny bit of Hebrew, too? Or if he keeps that very close to his chest. (I love the headcanon that he and Ed are both Jewish, and it's part of what drew them together~)

SCREAMS at Izzy accidentally Revealing Things to Olu because he doesn't realise he speaks that much Spanish.... And at Jim warning him! I also imagine that like, AS SOON as Jim gives that warning, they get the fuck in front of Oluwande with a knife, juuuust in case Izzy goes for him - but Izzy just glares at Oluwande, jerks a nod, and mutters 'first time I've given a man amnesia without having to hit him in the head'. Oluwande awkward-laughs and flees, but though Izzy's a tiny bit wary of him for a few weeks, he doesn't stab him?? So, y'know, success?

also, as ever, I am OBSESSED with Jim and Izzy being casual quiet trans buddies and helping each other out now and then. :gently pushes my headcanon of Izzy helping Jim acquire Ye Olde Top Surgery towards the fandom on a silver plate:

FAKE DATING FAKE DATING AHHHHHHHHHHH

CJIZZY AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHh (I love Jack being like. 'Yeah I'll fake date you to make Ed jealous, Izzy :D Yeah, absolutely no strings attached. Yeah we're not gonna actually fuck or anything. Of course.' then pulling EVERY string available to get in Izzy's pants dsfklghkdsfgkdlsgf

YESSS TO BOTTOM SUB LEANING VERS SWITCH IZZYYYYYY he has the range, darling! I love the idea that he was Ed's service top for ages, and is legit good with a strap~ >:3c Almost as much as I love subby top Izzy who always comes too soon and goes jellylegged so his partner has to sigh and take over and fuck him into the mattress while telling him what a disappointment he is (which, ofc, only makes him wetter). ......Yes, I blame carryme for this one entirely.

TRANSMASC DRAG QUEEN IZZY TRANSMASC DRAG QUEEN IZZY - I vibe with this on a spiritual level. Also: I can imagine Izzy was REALLY rigidly 'I am a man so I have to be masculine' as a result of internalised transphobia/fear of discovery, so this whole process of realising he can do whatever the fuck he wants, actually, involves a lot of unworking of societal assumptions and confronting past traumas and fears, and Wee John only meant to share something transgressive and fun with Izzy but now Drag Hour is therapy hour too. And honestly, it's good for him and Izzy and Jim, and Izzy's expression goes this amazing mix of offended and delighted and terrified and excited whenever he realises that yes, he is allowed to present himself however he likes and he will 'still be a man'. Although I do think he might draw the line at dresses, and keep to more andro drag? Like, he tries on a pretty dress ONCE and it's a bit Too Much when he sees himself in the mirror - but that's completely okay too, and Wee John and Frenchie are more than happy to help with tailoring outfits that he actually likes!

i AM SCREAMING AT IZZY BEING ED'S DRAG MUM YES YES YES YES YES

ohhhhh.... Izzy being just an absolute cuddle magnet.... be still my heart. I like to imagine that he was too awkward to approach anyone at first, but was SUPREMELY touch starved, so he'd sneak into the cuddle pile on deck at night and then try to wake up in the morning before everyone else. But of COURSE, everyone realises and knows and thinks it's very cute and one day when he tries to make his usual escape (moving slow to try and draw out the warmth and the contact, as well as so as not to wake anyone up) Lucius sleepily grabs his wrist and grumbles, "Izzy, staaaaaay". And, well. How can Izzy say no to that?

PETE IZZY FRIENDSHIP AHHH???? I would read that fic in a heartbeat.

Vis-a-vis the Gordon Ramsey comparison: he has ABSOLUTELY called poor Stede an 'idiot sandwich'

LONG HAIR IZZYYYYYYYYY AHHHHHHHH

Izzy wearing each of the crew's little 'x' kissy marks besides Ed's.... oh, be still my heart. This one got to me. That cheek and his neck and chest are just a map of tiny stars and - OHHHHHHHHHHH you know they're all getting gently smooched

#Izzy Hands #ofmd izzy #our flag means death #ofmd edward teach #ofmd ed teach #YES EXCELLENT #ofmd jim #I AM HOLLERING

[ladyluscinia]

Who are all of these people who are drowning in pro-Izzy content to the exclusion of all other characters and have they been in a fandom that actually has a ridiculous overrepresentation of some shitty guy? I see posts like this:

And the problem sounds a lot more like they are objecting to any Izzy content. Because I certainly can't find this overwhelming dominance. So fine. Let's see how popular Izzy is...

There are 12072 OFMD works on AO3 as I type this.

"Israel Hands" is character tagged in 5393 of them. That's 44.7%. Lower than I would expect, seeing as that includes every fic where he's the choice of villain as well as simply present or a focus. 122 of those are tagged "Major Character Death" (out of 225 in the whole fandom), and I suspect that's undertagged by people who don't think Izzy's fate is that important.

Comparably we have Lucius at 3560 (29.5%), Jim at 2226 (18.4%), and Oluwande at 1935 (16%). Lower than Izzy, yeah, but how many of those Lucius fics have him tagged just to get violently killed off or verbally wrecked and sent away for everyone else's happy ending? How many times does the crew show up untagged individually? I'm guessing the numbers of positive fics are probably a lot more equal... But let's see if we can look at this another way.

How about ships?

Izzy's ship fics are probably more likely to be pro-Izzy / significant content, yeah? So I'll break those down.

The most popular ship in the "Israel Hands" character tag is - to no one's surprise - BlackBonnet at 3183 (so 59% of "Israel Hands" character tagged fics, and 26.4% of all OFMD fics are tagged BlackBonnet + "Israel Hands"). I'd guess that number includes a lot of the "villain Izzy getting defeated" stories. Ships that actually have Izzy in them go:

Edward/Izzy at 1287 under "Israel Hands", 1374 (11.4%) total

Stede/Edward/Izzy at 762 under "Israel Hands", 812 (6.7%, probably with a good amount of BlackHands overlap) total

Stede/Izzy at 482 under "Israel Hands", 509 (4.2%, with overlap again) total

Izzy/Lucius at 477 under "Israel Hands", 514 (4.3%) total.

Lucius/Pete btw? 746 under "Israel Hands", 1188 (9.8%) total. Oluwande/Jim has 579 under "Israel Hands" and 1023 (8.5%) total. They both outrank every non-Edward/Izzy ship inside Izzy's tag, and are not far behind Edward/Izzy in total.

Another consideration I can attest to as a BlackHands reader... a lot of those Edward/Izzy fics are labeled "one sided" in various ways (which gets tag wrangled as the ship). 107 are just plain tagged "Unrequited Love". 94 have "One-Sided Blackbeard | Edward Teach/Israel Hands". Or they are toxic / abusive with a different ship endgame - BlackBonnet (tagged on 656 of them, with 389 as SteddyHands) or Izzy/Lucius (tagged on 70) or a negligible ship like Izzy/Frenchie or Izzy/Sam Bellamy.

These numbers are just NOT an overwhelming surge of fan attention. Izzy is not a third protagonist, no, but he's the most developed antagonist with easily 3rd or 4th most screentime / characterization. Having maybe 1/5 or less of the fandom content that you could call "focused" on him is not much or unusual or proof of bias 🙄 (the tag "Israel Hands-centric" is on 341 fics, or 2.8% of OFMD fics, "POV Israel Hands" on 176 so 1.5%, "Soft Israel Hands" on 107 or 0.9%... These are not big numbers).

Do people want to know where all that attention they think is owed to Jim or Lucius or Frenchie or Ivan and Fang is going?

8705 works tagged as BlackBonnet. That's 72.1% of all OFMD fics. Running the "otp: true" search for BlackBonnet ONLY fics pulls up 5764 results, so still 47.7%! Almost half of this fandom's content is ship fic that only covers the OTP without even tagged background ships.

"Blackbeard | Edward Teach" is character tagged in 9698 OFMD fics at 80.3% and "Stede Bonnet" is next in 8889 at 73.6%.

In the 1188 Lucius/Pete fics, BlackBonnet is tagged in 936 of them. That's 78.8% of all Lucius/Pete.

In the 1023 Oluwande/Jim fics, BlackBonnet is tagged in 788 of them. That's 77% of all Oluwande/Jim.

Those BlackBonnet numbers are insane. Fucking Destiel - the biggest ship on AO3, in a show insanely hostile to side characters - is tagged in 107526 fics of 268568 in the Supernatural fandom. That's 40%. You read that right. Less than half. Maybe some more recent tumblr darlings?

Catra / Adora from She-Ra hit 10248 out of 16141, so 63.5%. And they are canon.

Newer, but I've seen Dream / Hob Gadling surging and it's at roughly 500 (the tags need wrangling) out of 1743 in the Sandman (TV 2022), hitting 28.7%

Never watched The Owl House, but Amity Blight / Luz Noceda is the top ship at 7650 of 16277, so 47%. Pretty sure that one is canon too.

Stranger Things has 51424 works, with top ships Steve/Eddie at 10266 (20%) and Billy/Steve at 9046 (17.6%). Again, I don't watch, but I'm pretty sure these are a lot more accurate examples of minor character takeover ships, and Billy especially is the shitty white guy breakout with barely any screentime. Who has been dead for multiple seasons. And it's still beating Edward/Izzy's percentage significantly.

I'm sorry that your fave isn't getting the content you want. It sucks. But this supposed unfair focus on Izzy just does not exist at any level that would actually be impacting other character content.

Anyone complaining about it is not making a complaint about fandom bias grounded in reality.

And anyone who is proposing "solutions" for this lack of content (a questionable proposition already) better have the bulk of their list as "More BlackBonnet writers need to try branching out" or they are just making up reasons to complain about minor content focused on a character or ship they don't like.

#our flag means death #ofmd meta #i could put a cut in this but idk where so you can all just admire my math #tldr izzy is probably a bit *lower* in popularity than i would expect because blackbonnet dominates too much #he's certainly not even remotely threatening the amount of pure uwu content that he keeps being accused of threatening 🙄 #if authors aren't writing enough lucius or jim content for you it's because they are on their 5th blackbonnet reunion fic #the anti handwringing about how many fans love the evil problematic guy is not rooted in reality. and filtering tags is easy as fuck #fandom culture #shipping #statistics are good and fun #izzy hands ofmd #ladyluscinia #my meta #ao3

[adzeisval]

Goodbye Note

Lucius notices that there is something wrong with Izzy. Also on AO3.

There was something wrong with Izzy. Well there was a lot wrong with Izzy but this was something new. Lucius vaguely noticed Izzy coming back on board from their trip to Jamaica looking bruised and fucked up but he didn’t think much of it. It wasn’t unusual for one or more of them to come back hurt or still drunk. In the week that followed though there were several incidents that indicated that something more was going on. 

Two days out from Jamaica they had a party for Oluwande’s birthday and Lucius had to help Jim get Olu back to their room. Izzy wasn’t at the party, which was odd but sometimes Izzy didn’t seem to be in the mood for parties. They tried to be quiet passing Izzy’s room no one wanted to wake Izzy up. On his way back up to the deck Lucius heard something from Izzy’s room. He paused and thought he heard Izzy crying. Or maybe he was just drunk and imagining it. 

Four days out from Jamaica Izzy caught Lucius and Pete in the storeroom and just sighed and went away. No snarky remarks, no teasing, nothing. 

Lucius spent the next day watching Izzy and he just seemed so off. Usually Izzy made his rounds around the ship to make sure duties were being done. He issued commands and orders and seemed to always be moving around. Now he was just standing and looking out at the water for a long time between half-heartedly doing his duties. 

That night was the crew meeting; they’d started the meeting after the Captain’s got back together to form a union of sorts so they had a say about what went on. Stede was a fan of the idea and Ed just shrugged and let them have the meetings. 

“So I’ve noticed…” 

“That something’s wrong with Izzy?” Jim finished.

“He hasn’t been as much of a bastard lately,” Roach said. 

“I…think I heard him crying the other night,” Lucius said. 

“I guess we need to try to get him to talk,” Roach said. 

“I might try,” Lucius said, “I guess that’s the only thing to do.” 

Lucius thought about how best to approach Izzy but Izzy seemed to spend the day avoiding them all. Lucius went to bed frustrated and uncertain. A few hours later Lucius woke to someone shaking him. He jumped a little when he saw it was Jim. Jim scoffed at him. 

“Get up,” they said. Lucius tried to think of a reason Jim would be waking him up in the middle of the night. It was dark but he didn’t think Jim was holding a weapon. Lucius got up and followed Jim below deck, which was probably a stupid idea. 

Jim walked right past their room and up to Izzy’s door which was open just a little bit. 

“We’re coming in old man,” Jim announced. God what was it about them that made them able to get away with that? The knives? Probably the knives. Lucius followed Jim into Izzy’s room. Olu was there sitting on a chair across from Izzy’s bed. Izzy didn’t look up from where he sat on his bed. Izzy took an unsteady breath and let out a little choked noise. 

Fuck, he’d been crying. 

“What’s going on?” Lucius asked. 

“Nightmare. We think,” Olu said, “He woke us up screaming and crying.”

“It didn’t even look like he recognized us at first,” Jim added. 

“Izzy? Can I sit down by you?” Lucius asked.

Izzy nodded.

“Do you want to tell us what’s going on Izzy? We’ve noticed you’ve been…not yourself. We’re worried about you.” 

That got Izzy to look up at them.

“It doesn’t have to be all three of us,” Lucius added, “Could be more or less. Please Izzy.” 

For a while Izzy was quiet then he spoke, “Alright.” 

*****

Izzy had been going to Rachael’s Tea House for almost twenty years. He’d found the place while trying to avoid another fucking barfight. He just wanted a place to sit by himself and spend some coin on food and drink.

A year and a half ago Izzy had gone to Rachael’s to find his old friend sick. He’d talked to her for a long time and wished her well. When he retired six months later Rachael was gone. 

It was almost exactly a year later when Izzy found himself at Rachael’s again. They’d kept the name the same and he knew Rachaels daughter and husband were running the place. He felt a little nervous going in, but really how much could it have changed in a year?

Izzy walked through the doors and at first nothing seemed that different. He saw several regulars there, people he’d seen almost every time. He approached the counter where Anne, Rachael’s daughter was washing dishes. 

“Afternoon,” he said. 

Anne looked at him and gasped, “You…” 

Izzy frowned a little and continued to stand at the counter even as Anne rushed to the back. He managed to glance back at the other people in the tea house who were all staring. What the fuck? Why on earth would Anne run off? Izzy had never so much as raised his voice in the tea house, he’d always paid with good coin and often extra when he had it, and he’d never fought on the premises. Rachael had known what he was, they probably all knew he was a pirate but…

“You need to leave.” 

Izzy looked at the man before him, Anne’s husband, still in a state of shock. 

“Leave and don’t ever come back you bastard,” he said. 

“What the fuck did I ever do to you?” Izzy growled.

“You tormented Rachael for years. Terrified her. You’re the reason she died so young!” 

“Piss off you nasty pirate,” someone called out from behind him. 

“We’re done putting up with your filth here,” someone else said. 

“Fine,” Izzy growled and walked out. His head was reeling and he didn’t understand what had just happened. He was so lost in thought that he didn’t notice he’d been followed until someone pulled him into an alley and punched him in the gut. 

Izzy went to his knees. 

“Serves you right you little fuck, mom and dad might want to just get rid of you but you deserve worse. Grandma was terrified of you.” 

Izzy looked up at two young men who looked familiar. Ahh, Rachael’s grandsons. He looked at the men, both were over six feet tall and huge. In his younger days Izzy thought he might be able to take them but he wasn’t sure now. 

“Fuck off,” Izzy said and tried to stand. He dodged one punch but not the second which landed heavily on his jaw and sent him against the wall. Another hit to the head sent him sprawling on the ground. One of the men took the opportunity to pin Izzy to the ground on his stomach.  Izzy thrashed and tried to get up but the other one pushed him down, a hand to the back of Izzy’s neck the other pressing his back so hard he could barely breathe.

“We don’t need pirate fucks like ou around here. Only one way to get rid of you for certain.” 

Izzy started to panic. The men could easily kill him and he didn’t think anyone was going to come to save him. No one knew where he was.

Every time one of them would kick or punch him Izy tried to get free, tried to find some sort of leverage as blow after blow came. He was starting to feel dizzy and sick and he wondered if he was about to pass out or die.

 The man pressing his upper body down started  laughing, so much so that he let off the pressure,  just a little. Izzy made one last ditch effort to knock the men off and…it worked. Izzy scrambled up and bolted, not daring to look behind him. He ignored all the pain and bit his tongue to try to stay awake even though he was seeing spots and felt like he would fall over any minute. 

He only felt safe again once he got to the Revenge.

***

Lucius stared at Izzy, mouth open in shock. Fuck. He heard a sound and saw Jim twirling their knife. 

“I’m so sorry Izzy,” Lucius said.

“We’ll go kill those fuckers for you, I’m gonna fucking enjoy it,” Jim said. 

“No. No killing.” 

“Why the fuck not?” Jim said. 

“They’re Rachael’s family. If we were to kill them that makes me exactly what they think. I don’t want to destroy what she built. She…might have been a friend. That bothers me more. I keep thinking back to all the times I talked to her. I never thought she was scared of me. I don’t know if she was. I’m bad with people sometimes. I don’t mean to be. Fuck, I don’t know.” Izzy started to cry again. 

“We’re here for you Izzy,” Olu said. 

“I…fuck I hope I didn’t torment her. I can’t…did I really…what the fuck is wrong with me? That I couldn’t see it?”

“They could have been lying. Putting the blame on you because they’re grieving. Which is still beyond fucked,” Lucius said. 

“If I was there I would have slit their fucking throats for daring to touch you,” Jim said. 

“Are you alright? Physically I mean?” Lucius asked. 

Izzy shrugged, “Bruised and sore. I’ve survived worse.” 

“What can we do for you Izzy?” Lucius asked. 

Izzy frowned then let out a little sob, “I don’t know.”

“If you think of something let us know,” Lucius said. 

“Just don’t tell Edward or Stede please. And I’m sorry Jim and Olu, nightmares should go away soon.” 

“Just remember we’re here,” Lucius said. He wished that he could do something more but if Izzy didn’t know what he needed or wanted Lucius didn’t. He supposed he would just be kind to Izzy and check in. 

In time Izzy got back to normal, or closer to it anyway. There were still times when he seemed to get distant and sad and it seemed once a month or so he would wake crying or screaming. 

About a year later they went back to Jamaica. Izzy claimed to be sick and said he was going to stay on the ship. Jim stayed with him. 

When they got back Lucius noticed Stede handing Izzy a piece of paper. Izzy looked at it like it might bite him and quickly went downstairs. 

Later when Izzy came up he looked a little…off.

“Something wrong Izzy?” Lucius asked. 

“I don’t know. Yet. Can you…can you help me with something Spriggs?” 

“Sure, well unless it involves murder then maybe you’d better ask Jim,” Lucius said. 

Izzy snorted, “It’s not that. I need you to read something for me.” 

“Alright,” Lucius said, still confused, but he followed Izzy down below anyway. 

“Stede came by this letter. It’s addressed to me. From Rachael, before she died. I recognize her handwriting. I’m too nervous to read it myself, fuck, that’s stupid.” 

“It’s not stupid, I’ll read it to you,” Lucius said.

“Thank you,” Izzy said. 

“My dear Izzy, I wish I could tell you this in person, but I’m afraid by the time you return I will be gone. I’ve given control of the tea house to my daughter and her husband. They are trying to change things, draw in richer clientele. I fear this means they won’t welcome you there. I’m sorry. I hope you know how much I enjoyed your presence over the years. I hope you are well and wish you the best. Your friend, Rachael.” 

Izzy took the letter from Lucius and read it carefully. Izzy started to cry as he clutched the letter to his chest. 

“I didn’t scare her…they lied…thank you Lucius,” Izzy said. 

“You're welcome. I’m glad it was something good,” Lucius said.

#whumptober2023 #no.24 #goodbye note #ofmd #fic #izzy hands #lucius spriggs #jim jimenez

[johannestevans]

Our Flag Means Death S01 E01: Close Textual Analysis

Examining OFMD E1: Pilot in close detail and liveblogging/analysing the text. 

A still from Our Flag Means Death E1 via IMDb. 

I’ve done these before, but just to set some expectations:

This is going to be a rewatch liveblog going through E1 and closely reading and responding to the text, bit by bit, in chronological order.

It’s going to be pretty casual in tone, I will be swearing and making sex jokes and blah blah blah, this is close reading for fun and isn’t academic in tone, but it’s still close reading and commentary on the text with some analysis here and there. For fun.

I’m gay, gay, homosexual, gay, and I’m not editing out the bits where I get distracted by being horny for the benefit of your entertainment and also my own lack of shame. You’re welcome. 

I have seen the whole series, I will be making constant reference to other stuff later in the text, so there will be spoilers for later in the series. 

I’ve been meaning to do one of these for a while and I’m planning to go through more of the episodes if not at all of them, but I was definitely inspired by some of the YouTube compilations of background details in the first few episodes, such as by YouTube user swashbuckling sweethearts and YouTube user Rindecision.

Roach and Izzy are my favourite characters in the show so in case you haven’t seen it, Samba Schutte did a really cool interview with JUST ADD COLOR the last day so check that out as well. 

This analysis of E1 is a little over 14k.

1717. The Golden Age of Piracy. 

Wealthy landowner Stede Bonnet set out to find adventure and renown on the high seas.

Things did not go as planned…

Rindecision pointed out in one of their YouTube compilations that they use the same font and justification for the introductory panel as they do to introduce Black Sails which I really appreciate — I know Taika Waititi’s favourite romance movie is Master and Commander, and I love stuff like the homages to Black Sails in this show as well because like… queer sailors, man, it all comes together. 

Anyway, I love and adore Frenchie and I adore his lute and I love his silly little lyrics and his accent. It’s like a West Country thing, I’m guessing Bristol? It’s Joel Fry’s own accent, and I’ve been looking up to see but I can’t see him talking about it anywhere, but I love it. 

One of the things I really love about the show consistently is how people mostly have their own accents (the real characters, not the Spanish/British/French cannon fodder), and especially like, seeing the variety in English accents between Oluwande, Frenchie, Izzy, and Lucius, especially. 

I never noticed until rewatching just how much Oluwande and Pete really get on each other’s nerves, and especially how Oluwande, who’s honestly quite an understanding and easygoing guy, is constantly the first one to tell Pete to shut the fuck up when he’s being a prick, and I love that for him.

They’re all playing cards and Pete’s fidgeting and like:

ROACH: It’s your bet.

PETE: I know it’s my bet.

OLUWANDE: Then bet. Why are you always taking long?

PETE: Fuck this! I’m out.

And he slams his cards down, and like… So I know that there’s the crew as family and that there is a vague sense of like, sibling/bickering family member dynamics between the crew later on, but the thing about the first episode is that you can see a lot of characters do not necessarily like each other or learn to get on with each other as they do later on?

Which, to be fair, is because they have nothing to ally against and all they have to do is have a go at each other, even without Pete’s constant temper tantrums.

I love that they appear to be betting seashells with each other as they gamble, especially because Wee John’s doing rope stuff in the background, Oluwande apparently walked away from the table to do his own rope stuff, the Swede is shuffling cannonballs around, and Jim is just… brooding. As they do. 

I love how all the lads go hey! when Pete shuffles up the cards on the table because it’s such an asshole thing to do, but one thing I really love about Samba Schutte’s approach to Roach is how expressive he is with his body — he does so much acting with his hands and arms and he does so many like… plaintive gestures and stuff, and it kills me. 

Oluwande rolling his eyes at Pete gives me so much love and strength. 

So Buttons is calling out over the ship, “On your feet for your captain!” which I think is interesting — I do kind of get the impression that of the people on the Revenge, Buttons is the one with the most formal experience? Or the most formal proclivities anyway. 

Love that Pete is already on his feet, as is the Swede, Roach, Frenchie, Jim, and Lucius reluctantly get up, and Wee John stays sat down because fuck authority — and so does Oluwande, because he’s the real authority.

Frenchie’s so much shyer in the first few episodes than he is later on and like, I really appreciate his meek defence of Stede saying maybe he’s just a sort of slow pirate, but ditto like, how quiet and sweet his voice is when he goes, “Um, bottle it up?” in response to Bonnet’s talk it through prompting — I really wonder about it because like…

So obviously later on we see Frenchie so much more confident and excited before obviously becoming withdrawn and quiet post-marooning in the final episode, and I think it’d be easy to think that with Frenchie’s conman abilities that the shyness is an act, but I don’t think that’s the case? Like, he can be a good conman, but in episode 1 he’s very much learning who he is on the ship and who he can relax and play with, and I like that by default he’s quite shy even though he’s also a very cheerful and optimistic guy. 

Stede goes, “No, Frenchie, that’s the worst thing you could do!” and he goes, “No? Oh, oh, sorry…” and he backs down and he looks so nervous and like… 

I really hope an interviewer goes through all the cast and their personal backstories for the characters at some point because I know Frenchie mentions being in service and I’m so curious about like, how much of his uncertainty and meekness in conversation comes from uncertainty around, you know, white people — or at the least, rich white people like Stede. 

I like how tired Wee John is of the whole situation, especially when he goes, “We talk about it?” and then looks annoyed at Jim and the Swede — he’s not present much in the passive aggression episode later but I will undoubtedly have thoughts to express on like, Irish approaches to English imperialist ideals around “politeness” and whatever, but also like… compliance with forced politeness to get it over with as soon as possible versus resisting out of awkwardness and then drawing it out. 

When Stede screams “places everybody” and just sort of toddles about awkwardly without any idea what he’s doing it’s. Funny. He’s such an awkward mess of a man. Made of spaghetti. 

I have to wonder if Swede is meant to be in the position of master gunner because it’s him that hauls cannonballs around and awkwardly drops one down on the poor auld fellas and it’s like… Why is it him? Like, “why?” is a good question to ask about this entire crew and ship but. Seriously, why? He can’t lift one cannonball.

WEE JOHN, disapprovingly: They’re just a couple of old geezers… 

My subtitles say that the person coaching Stede over the side to awkwardly clamber down with the ladder is Buttons, but it’s not — it’s Oluwande. I love that it’s the Swede and Roach trying unsuccessfully to hold the ladder still at the top and everyone else just watches with disgust. 

I’m crying I didn’t realise that when Stede pulled his hat off his head and bade the fishermen farewell they did the same thing and said, “Take care of the plant!” These poor fucking old guys.

STEDE (about the plant): Really fills the space, doesn’t it?

LUCIUS: … Yeah. (wide-eyed, staring at Stede like, “is he fucking serious?” but of course he’s serious, because it’s Stede.) It’s fine. (little widening of the eyes/eyeroll to himself and half-shrug as he stares down at the journal to save himself from the awkwardness). 

STEDE: Now, where was I?

LUCIUS: Um… being a pirate captain…

I’m just very curious about Lucius’ position and how he found his way onto the Revenge and into Stede’s employ because literally at no point does he look comfortable or certain of where he is and what he’s doing in the first few episodes — we know he’s a pickpocket and that he can read and write, but also pushes reading and writing as quite impressive? And I think Nathan Foad has mentioned somewhere about him doing some work as a molly and like…

He’s just in a tenuous position in general and I can see how it’d be (relatively) safe under a man like Stede who’s an obvious fruit and also an idiot, but like… he’s at sea? Surrounded by violent men who may or may not hate mollies like him? Like I just die over how it seems to be that the people other than Stede that Lucius talks most with, and who he’s most comfortable with, are actually Pete and Oluwande, who obviously hate each other but like… are the other two queer men on the ship. 

Stede’s got Problems (autism and anxiety same hat lmao) but what I find so funny is that Lucius is so fucking unprepared for them — Stede comes down, sweeps his coat aside with a flourish, sits, is sitting for less than a second, walks across the room, opens the curtains, leans against the wall for two seconds, then just starts walking out of the office, and Lucius is watching him like, “wait, wait, where are you — “ and then is awkwardly chasing after him with his book and quill and it’s so funny. This poor fucking man. 

The language Stede’s using with Lucius is really interesting too — when Stede’s talking about how he pays the crew a salary, he’s saying to Lucius, “For example, if your average pirate doesn’t steal, he doesn’t eat. That’s a lot of mental pressure.” And Lucius is genuinely interested, or at the very least, concentrated — he’s making notes as he follows Stede, but he’s also making eye contact with him and matching his expressions. “So… I pay my crew a salary — same wage every week, no matter what.”

What’s curious to me about this set-up is that Lucius is being treated like an outside observer or an interviewer. The journal is not being paid for or organised by an outside party or authority, and it’s not like Lucius is doing this of his own accord — this is a vanity project, Lucius is Stede’s scribe, and Stede is paying him for this, but Stede talks to him as if it’s Lucius asking him questions rather than Stede directing his own journal.

It’s not that he sees Lucius as a peer, because he calls Lucius “boy” and gives him orders and instructions, but what he is doing is thinking constantly of the eventual intention for his journal to be read by others, his own peers, perhaps the boys who used to bully him at school, men he knows in Barbados. Lucius is therefore serving as an extension of them while Stede is talking, and like… It’s no wonder Lucius isn’t fucking used to that, because while he can read and write, I do not get the impression he’s ever served as a clerk, or that he’s educated enough to get a position like that in a real office rather than with someone who’s not Stede.

Lucius is under a lot of stress here because it’s a weird position to be in — a lot of personal assistant jobs are strangely intimate and have a weird sense of boundaries because you’re expected to act as an extension of another person’s will, but Lucius isn’t just a PA, he’s Stede’s fucking diarist, and he just has to write down all of Stede’s thoughts while Stede (to Lucius, possibly seemingly at random) swaps between talking to Lucius politely, like the two of them are having a measured and even conversation (when Lucius is acting as a scribe and an extension of Stede’s own peer group) and like his servant (the rest of the time). 

I’m not saying Lucius can’t have had experience with that, especially because if he has worked in mollyhouses, sex work often has a similar vibe when you’re testing someone out and seeing who they want you to be to them/act like you are to them, but this specific scenario is almost undoubtedly a new one to him, and a weird feeling to juggle.

I would also point out that Stede says, “I pay my crew a salary…” — the use of the personal pronoun here excludes Lucius. Now, is Stede talking to Lucius, bearing in mind he makes eye contact with him that Lucius returns and engages with as if he’s an interviewer, or is he talking entirely to his imaginary readers? Because it sounds like, from Lucius’ perspective, that Lucius doesn’t count as a member of the crew, that he’s separate from the crew. 

Which, yeah, that could track, in that Lucius is a secretary and is separate from the crew proper, much as on many ships now, ship’s sailors and maintenance crew separate from those responsible for domestic tasks and customer service, but also like… Lucius is very much on board with the mutiny and puts himself between Pete and Oluwande, on their side, and obviously considers himself a part thereof. 

Unionise, I guess, is what I’m saying. 

I do find it telling that Stede says the crew “came around” to the idea and then starts telling Lucius all about amenities that the crew do not necessarily seem massively into though, because like… Stede’s whole thing is having great ideas and not discussing their execution or the appeal of them with the crew. 

STATE OF THE ART EN SUITE where Pete’s having a shit and Roach is stuffed into a tiny little tub that his legs and his arms both stick out of having a bath — but we know that Stede has a literal massive full-sized tub elsewhere? Classic Stede.

Swede’s polishing cannonballs because… It’s the Swede — I do find it interesting that Stede feels the need to go around calling everything the rec center or jam room or whatever when like, it’s literally just the interior of the ship, but it is cute that everyone’s playing music together even if it’s because Stede’s doing a TV interview-style supercut three hundred years before TV was invented. 

STEDE: And, of course, a full library! The crew is free to borrow books whenever. So far, you’re the only one to take me up on it. 

LUCIUS: Well, I’m the only crew member who can read. 

STEDE: That’s not… Is that true? Ough. 

Stede’s face in this scene is so interesting because the harpsichord is doing this background smug thing as Stede haughtily walks away, and he genuinely acts as if it’s distasteful and unthinkable that the crew can’t read, but like… It is not sympathetic or compassionate about them.

He acts as if the crew have all actively made a choice not to be able to read, and as if it’s something they should be looked down on for, and it’s interesting seeing Lucius’ face as the camera goes back to him because Lucius is like… annoyed.

Not massively! He’s not going to kick up a fuss. 

But he’s furrowing his brow and curling his lip a bit and he’s looking at Stede so intently, and what I love about the Lucius we see in the early episodes versus later on is the way we constantly see him exhibiting and exercising significant restraint in telling Stede what’s up because like… his position is tenuous. None of the crew know what Stede is really like yet, and they definitely don’t trust him or think of him as a particularly reliable employer. 

I REFUSE TO BE ATTRACTED TO RHYS DARBY BUT READING GLASSES A BIT HOT, ACTUALLY.

I love how the crew are lined up and all just look so disgusted and annoyed with Stede, even before Stede effectively opens up his notes and critique session by praising himself and saying how “inspiring” his own opening speech was. 

PETE: Stealing a plant is hardly swashbuckling.

ROACH: (laughs)

WEE JOHN: A fecking disgrace is what it is.

I love Roach and Wee John, I don’t think I’ve observed their friendship closely enough but they do team up a LOT, and I’m like… good. Let them tell Stede he’s a prick. 

I love what comes after though because it’s about the reframing of power dynamics and stuff where like… Stede is such a hypocrite and is obviously rich and white and clueless about literally everything, and that’s the core driver in his tensions with much of the crew in the initial few episodes, but the places where I find myself having the most genuine affection for Stede are where he opens himself up to criticism. He doesn’t do it every time, he’s got his own sensitivities about it, but I really appreciate it when it’s obviously something that’s uncomfortable by definition, and the thing is like — 

Because everyone on the crew is so used to brute force as a response to insults, every time Stede does it, or praises them unexpectedly, they’re really caught off guard and engage with it. 

STEDE: What was that? Who said that? Wee John, was that you?

Stede has such primary school teacher vibes, and I do actually love that he says “what?” and “who?” before he directly addresses John, and also asks if it was him even though they’re standing 6 feet away from each other and they both know damn well it was him — it’s Stede’s politeness going, where just outright retorting to John would be overly direct and therefore rude, but it’s also quite a non-threatening way of approaching the conflict in a way that establishes surprise and disapproval that someone would say something unkind before directly addressing the unkindness, just like teachers do with kids.

WEE JOHN, raising his shoulders and his head: And what if it were? (starts raising up a weapon)

LUCIUS: (silently looks at Stede with his lips pressed together, willing Stede to make eye contact with him so he can tell him to back down)

STEDE, flustered: Well, I’d… 

LUCIUS: (literally rocking slightly on his feet)

STEDE: I’d simply ask you to, uh, reframe that criticism… as a suggestion.

I have the show on pause here and I’m fascinated by Wee John’s chance, I want to cup Kristian Nairn’s face between my palms and tell him that I adore him unconditionally, it’s like…

Stede says those words and Wee John is just immediately emotionally — and physically — disarmed. He puts his blunt instrument down by his sides, his arms come down, his shoulders come back, he raises his head and leans back the slightest bit on his heels, his jaw is agape, his eyes are slightly wide, his eyebrows are raised. He’s aghast at this. It doesn’t compute.

Wee John, a few minutes ago, wouldn’t get to his feet just because he was told to do so, but he was also the one who looked vaguely irritated with the crew when no one else gave Stede the obvious right answer to his question — and now, Stede is responding to Wee John’s offer of a fight with like…

Tell me what you’d like to do better.

Tell me how to change.

Tell me, your captain, how best to please you.

STEDE: What’s one thing you’d change around here, if you could?

WEE JOHN: Well, we don’t even have a flag, for one. 

EVERYONE: (murmurings of agreement)

STEDE: Oh. 

WEE JOHN: Any pirate worth a damn has a flag. 

So firstly I’m guessing this scene was cut shortly for time — I really wish that in the cut between Stede asking what he’d change and the camera returning to John that we were able to see John’s transition between his shock and surprise at being asked his opinion to him actually gearing himself up to give that opinion, because he goes from very open body language to a much more businesslike, closed-off stance. I know that OFMD is sitcom and they don’t like, have the time to go through all the organic motions of character work unless it’s for the bigger emotional beats, but I’m just hungry for this kind of character acting and every single member of the cast is so good at it, but in this scene obviously like, especially Nairn.

Anyway, all the crew agree, and you can see Stede listening and taking it really seriously, Rhys Darby does the dad approval thing where he presses his lips together and raises his eyebrows and gives one big nod of the head, which I really like, because it’s like…

The crew are so just weirded out by it, but I love what it says about Stede’s management style as you see the crew go on and like each other.

Waht I really dislike about some people’s readings or surface-level takes from the show is this idea that Stede is somehow like, “civilising” the crew, and that’s not it. His way is not more “civilised”, which you can tell by the way that Stede upholds so much racist shit — what Stede is introducing is not present in “polite” society.

What Stede is introducing is not what he grew up with, or what he’s used to, or what rich people do in general.

What Stede is instead instituting is a management policy where management are open to criticism and, as much as he’s capable of in his tone-deaf way, a working environment that genuinely fosters open communication — and especially rewatching this episode now and thinking about how much conflict everyone has with each other and how much they all get on each other’s nerves versus later, like… This approach works and does have a positive effect, even just in them all being more confident speaking with each other and Stede, not just with criticism, but with positive feedback as well.

Fuck me though, Lucius’ background anxiety is incredible, Nathan Foad really did put his whole fucking heart into this role and I’m a little distracted by his chest hair on the still I paused on right now but like… When Stede and Lucius are putting out the silks, Lucius keeps glancing at Stede and the rest of the crew, and fuck, the anxiety that’s coming off him in waves, like…

So Stede’s putting out the silks and even before Pete starts off on his “that’s women’s work” posturing, Roach and Frenchie look baffled and a little bit annoyed with it. The whole crew are a bit like “what the fuck, mate?” 

And Stede isn’t experiencing any tension because he’s austistic and under several warm, comfortable blankets of denial at all times, but Lucius? 

Also like, watch Pete deliver that line by the way. When he says “That’s women’s work,” he’s looking someone up and down, but the way that Lucius rolls his eyes immediately after, it definitely comes off as Pete doing that at Lucius rather than Stede. 

Lucius a gay man who’s obviously gay on a ship full of, presumably, heterosexual pirates, many of whom have violent inclinations, and Lucius is not used to violence in the first instance, but in the second, like — 

Lucius refers to himself as a crew member and sees himself as a crew member, but there’s very much that awareness that he’s often separated from the rest of the crew and in many ways acts as an extension of Stede, and do the crew see him that way or see him as one of them? Especially when Stede talks to Lucius the way he does and Lucius is afforded special treatment? Even if everyone mutinied and didn’t directly go for Lucius, how well would he do in that situation?

The background acting choices are just… so much. 

OKAY PRIMARY SCHOOL TEACHER STEDE AGAIN LIKE…

STEDE: How many of you sew? Be honest…

ROACH: (slowly raising his hand) Sewed my shoulder up once… after I’d been stabbed. (pulls back his shirt)

EVERYONE: (groans)

STEDE: Oh! Did you hear that, guys? Roach sewed his own arm up!

I love Schutte’s delivery of these lines because like, again, none of these men are used to being asked their opinions or to share, let alone with the whole crew as a collective with no ranks, but Roach comes off as so like… uncertain? He genuinely is shy, he’s treading carefully and trying to figure out exactly how to approach this situation.

Everyone’s responding with a bit of horror because it’s a nasty injury, Lucius is stood there next to Stede with his eyes fixed to Roach as if Roach is about to be the new star of his nightmares and Lucius is already dreading it…

And how does Stede respond? With praise. He gestures to Roach and goes “sewed his own arm up!” in a very demonstrative way, then follows it up with, “Sounds to me like sewing can be pretty tough!”

(And Roach gives a serious little nod.)

How do you get your crew on board with an activity? Praise the person that opts into the activity, hold up their behaviour as a model and praiseworthy, and then pinpoint the insecurity others are feeling about the activity, (in this case, loss of masculinity) and demonstrate that it’s not a concern. 

That’s how you model good behaviour and it kills me that Stede does that so fucking well, especially when his desire to communicate this way is borne out of his own childhood where he consistently got the opposite. 

Love that Wee John immediately wraps himself in a nice fabric and that everyone gets to work, but also I love that what Stede models consistently is like… Praise. He does encourage everyone to express themselves, but then goes, “Oh, that’s very good!” and engages with everybody one on one, asks what they’re doing and makes sure he gets it and understands.

Also him going, “Don’t you look holy!” and Wee John going, “Oh, thank you.” I adore him. 

“A lot of the guys are sweethearts, deep down… (Roach tries to steal something from the Swede, the Swede grabs him, the two of them commence to beat the shit out of each other. Oluwande confiscates the scissors from Roach before he can use them as Stede breaks them up.) … they’re just dealing with a fair amount of trauma.”

I find it really interesting that Stede says this and knows this, but he also did that massive bitchy thing about the crew not being able to read — there’s a few layers to that I think in that like…

So the conversation about the crew not being able to read was one on one between him and Lucius and was an actual conversation, whereas what Stede is saying to Lucius as his diarist is a performance that’s intended to make him look as palatable and like… especially kind and charitable as possible?

But also, to go back to the primary school teacher vibe, like, there’s no way not to think of Stede’s school teacher-esque approach, his parochial, condescending attitude, and also the like, thing about piracy which to him is like, an adventure, but amounts to this weird trauma tourism? Oluwande and Jim sit down and discuss this with him a bit later, I think in this episode, but like — 

The way he goes “fair amount of trauma” feels so charged with racial and class implications too with the way the voice over is applied to him splitting up the fight, because if Stede is a primary school teacher, he’s the very rich and comfortable teacher who’s just gone to volunteer at an underfunded school in a “diverse” area, and he’s incapable of being normal about it. 

It’s not that he’s wrong about any of the crew being traumatised, it’s the fact that he scoffs at the crew not being able to read and talks about them being traumatised with the exact same huffy, superior tone — they’re traumatised and can’t read, unlike their betters (him). 

Like! David Jenkins mentioned in an interview about the value of a legitimately diverse writers’ room and I just want to quote this bit:

[Charles Pulliam-Moore]: The show about the slave-owning pirate should probably have some people of color in the writers’ room.

[David Jenkins]: Right, and it’s not checking off a diversity list with a golf pencil but really being honest with yourself and asking, “Do I have the perspectives and terms of race, gender, sexuality to create a shared sociological imagination?” It’s fucked up because you write a show and a lot of the plaudits go to you, the showrunner, and it’s like you’re using all of these brains. You know, you have this horsepower of all of these writers like this. The season is the function of all of these brains coming together and creating one sociological imagination.

And when it comes to stuff like this, specifically where you see all these levels of awareness and implication layered on top of each other, on top of the fact that you’ve got a cast of incredibly talented character actors who are putting in a lot of work and effort internally but then with each other, like… 

It just feels so real, and that’s so evocative — and it makes it so much more real then when you have these moments of cluelessness, especially like, thoughtless cruelty or callousness, from Stede or the other characters, and it’s part of the broader tapestry of the character proper.

And what’s really refreshing about OFMD too is like… The way that it depicts race, the way it depicts class, gender, sexuality, neurodivergence, disability, basically anything you can think of, is that they’re all a constant and continuous part of the characters and the world, they’re intrinsic to them.

No one is being Black or queer or disabled to try to teach the audience about something, or to represent a nebulous category that’s supposedly meant to satisfy all manner of “diverse” people at once, as a monolith, and similarly, when characters are being racist or homophobic or just generally dicks to one another, it’s not to hold the audience’s hand and teach them a valuable lesson, or stroke their ego and say, “it’s okay, champ, I know you would have done the right thing, not like this racist guy!”

Instead you see stuff like this where like, there’s a lot more overt racism and classism from Stede later in this episode, but here the schoolteacher attitude giving a voiceover interview to a presumed privileged audience, all condescending over his “underprivileged” employees, that’s a thing I’ve heard and seen again and again and again in fiction and in actual documentaries and stuff— and is also parodied in Abbott Elementary with Chris Perfetti’s character, Jacob — and it feels real, because it is real, and it’s stupid, and it’s funny and quite horrid.

There’s just so many TV shows where the characters are written in such a way where it’s like… When you look away or turn the screen off, they’ll stop being Like That because no one’s watching — it’s not just that the characters themselves don’t feel organic or real or richly considered, it’s that any bigotries or structural oppressions they face only apply when writers and directors feel that it will make an interesting story beat, rather than those aspects being intrinsic to the character.

The fact that the whole team has put such consideration into what struggles to portray and what ones to leave offscreen, and how they want to present everything, takes away that uncomfortable feeling and just leaves us with much realer, more complex characters. 

STEDE: (to Roach, doing the stern dad finger point) So, first of all, you should have asked… (to Swede), And second of all, what could you do with your large bit of fabric? 

THE SWEDE: Talk about it?

STEDE: No, shared. You could have shared it. 

THE SWEDE: Oh.

They don’t know the right answer. They have no idea what the fuck kind of game Stede is playing, so whenever Stede asks a question they all assume it’s a bizarre trap, and when he asks more questions, they respond with a rote answer from one of his previous questions, because this isn’t how anyone runs a pirate crew, and I do love that. 

I also think it’s so sweet how the Swede holds the whole swathe of fabric to his chest like it’s a teddy bear or something. 

PETE: Well, guess it’s time…

OLUWANDE: For what?

Pete: To kill Captain.

Obsessed with how Oluwande’s response to Pete shoving his knife through the table is literally to put his hands down and roll his eyes and look away like, “Oh my God, this shit, what the fuck — “ He’s so done. He’s so fucking tired of Pete being Pete.

I do love that Pete apologises to Frenchie for ruining his fabric when Frenchie goes, “Come on, mate,” like, Pete is capable of… some manners.

STEDE, looking dramatically over the ship: If I can help this crew grow, as people, then I’ve succeeded as a pirate captain. 

Like…

I’ll be asking this question a lot as the series goes on, but you do wonder like… Why piracy? Or more specifically like, who is Stede doing piracy for? His stupid fucking diary is so important to him and like, everything he does is for this imaginary audience of people who actually think he’s impressive instead of thinking he’s a bellend, and it’s an interesting parallel, I think, to Ed who does exist in the midst of this heavily constructed personal mythos and feels very trapped by it, especially because Stede is posh and is hiring a diarist and is also white, and his control over his own narrative is very different and can presumably be more directly targeted to a broader audience? I’ll probably ruminate on that parallel further as we go on. 

I love that it’s Buttons who immediately goes to Stede and says mutiny’s on the cards, and Lucius is like “aw fuck,” because they’re getting snitched on, but God, the way that Stede laughs before he goes, Oh, really?

Like, yeah, really, my guy. You are not great at this. 

“Stop writing!” is so interesting because like…

Of course he doesn’t want the people reading his totally authentic and cool pirate diary to know he’s getting mutinied against seconds after he was saying how impressive and charitable he is. 

LUCIUS: Sorry, I’m confused. You said to record everything, warts and all, so that’s what I’m doing!

STEDE: (snatching out a page) Well, not this!

I like the idea of this scene contrating with what we later see on the French vessel and the specific things that Stede considers to be lying or deception or fuckery, versus the things he just considers to be polite or proper — there’s so much deception inherent to his position in society as a matter of course, and what’s fun about seeing him alongside Lucius, and then the rest of the crew, are the things that he considers to be the norm that he ends up having to express outloud and put explicitly into words…

And as soon as he does so, his own hypocrisy or sheer lack of consideration is put into such stark relief.

Lucius is so offended, too, when Stede tells him to go for a walk, being summarily dismissed like that, and why shouldn’t he be offended? 

He obviously knew that Stede didn’t want him to write it down, and it’s fun to see that bit of resistance and rebellion there, especially because he immediately sweeps off and snitches to everyone else that they’re found out. 

Wee John sounds so tired and annoyed when he says that Pete’s never sailed with Black Pete, and especially the way Oluwande keeps rolling his eyes and Roach laughs, I have to wonder just how constantly Pete brings up his fake Blackbeard stories. 

FRENCHIE: Can you pass the black thread, pretty please? (rubs his hands together, grinning) Cheers, me dears.

I love and adore him. Desperately I do. Everything this man does is so unspeakably endearing to me. 

ROACH: What is that, a cat? The flag’s supposed to be scary.

FRENCHIE: Yeah, cats are terrifying. Everyone knows that.

I love Frenchie’s little sailmaker’s palm that he’s using to sew with — I don’t think everyone’s wearing them, but it’s a nice little detail that some of the crew are using them for flag and sail repair to help them push their needles through, even if their sewing on the flag and stuff looks clumsy. 

Oluwande’s face through Frenchie’s delivery here is such a journey, the way he furrows his brow and raises his head like, eh? 

FRENCHIE: ’Cause they’re witches. And they’ve got knives in their feet.

He just says it with so much certainty and I’m just like… I am constantly thinking about the fact that Frenchie is a really adept conman and social manipulator who’s so full of gentleness and affection for others, is generally full of energy and likes to have a laugh, and also, he believes in the most specific and bizarre aspects of folklore or conspiracy. What a man.

WEE JOHN, on the subject of mutiny: If we can light him on fire, I’m in.

As if Stede Bonnet wasn’t already flaming, John. 

It’s noteworthy to me that Lucius immediately goes to the crew and advises them that Buttons told Stede about the mutiny, and goes, “I’m still in, by the way,” immediately. Lucius is the one that spends the most time with Stede and gets most irritated by him, but also displays the most anxiety with a lot of the crew, especially in moments of potential violence? And I’m just so fascinated by that juxtaposition and what he thinks of like… What he’d be on the ship without Stede there, you know?

He’s got a bad back and isn’t adept at most of the ship’s labour, so. 

When Stede and Buttons come out of that weird front passage at the prow of the ship, I do wonder if that’s one of Stede’s various secret passages or what, because Buttons does look curiously about before he peeks over to see if the crew are paying attention.

Anyway, no one is steering the ship at this point, which is a constant in this show, but it is a funny aspect of the muppet ‘verse. 

STEDE: I can’t believe it! Why?

BUTTONS: I wouldn’t take it personal. It’s just that they don’t like you, or the way that you do things.

STEDE: Hmm. I’m supportive, caring. Responsive to their needs…

Thinking about Mary’s POV, and how Stede in her perspective does nothing of value, takes up space in the house, expects Mary to attend to his every whim, do various domestic work for him, takes up the entire bed and doesn’t notice that Mary’s uncomfortable, et cetera.

There’s something to be said about feigned helplessness and weaponised incompetence that some people use within their relationships to avoid their fair share of labour, especially when it’s people who realise early on that they don’t have to contribute for whatever reason (for example, in regards to gendered labour), and then coast on that — but what I find interesting in cisgender men like Stede is that like…

It’s not enough that he never actually listens when people communicate with him, because it’s part of his identity and his own opinion of himself that of course he listens. The fact that he only listens when people say the things he’s coached or pressured them to say is irrelevant to him, because ultimately, all of his kindness, his approach to his duties, and now his management style, is about his own ego and how he appears to his imaginary audience. 

He is all for communication, so long as that communication ends with the result he imagined in the beginning, and because of this he can never compromise or even listen to outside perspectives, because Stede is writing a social script for himself and he expects everyone to say the lines he imagined for them even before they start speaking. 

BUTTONS: See, that may be what’s contributing to the poor overall impression. 

STEDE: What is the overall impression? 

BUTTONS: That you’re weak… soft-bellied, yellow.

STEDE: I see.

BUTTONS: Craven, ill-equipped to lead men. 

STEDE: Understood! … Thank you. 

I really want to keep track of how much Buttons begins to list things when someone starts speaking to him because it’s such a funny and specific tendency — I know it’s a standard improv technique, but Ewen Bremner just does it so well as Buttons and it goes in so well with his like, gruff, slightly overly-procedural characterisation.

Buttons here is being so blunt and so honest with Stede in large part because he feels it’s his duty as first mate, and what really stands out to me is that Stede is asking for him to be honest about what people’s impressons are, but like...

Stede has such an unrealistic idea of himself, yes, but also so much of his identity is based in self-deception and denial? And I never know with Stede how much he’s being honest when he’s trying to act confident, what his self-esteem is like at any one moment.

He’s so certain he’s a loving father, even though he abandoned the family to fuck about at sea; he’s so certain he’s a great husband even though he makes Mary’s life a living Hell with his constant self-obsession; he’s so sure he can just do whatever he likes, and the world will open up to him.

He’s got protagonist syndrome out the wazoo, but simultaneously he despises himself and takes every criticism to heart — it’s not quite on a level with Ed’s own Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria when we see him later, but it’s all about those layers of identity. 

STEDE: What I’m hearing is they could do with more structure. Perhaps, a firmer hand?

BUTTONS: Or an iron fist. Give ’em something to really stick their teeth into, make them earn their keep. Know what I’m saying?

STEDE: I get it. Toughen up. 

Rhys Darby really can stick his lower lip out so far, which I am noticing in this particular profile shot more than I have ever realised before. He really puffs himself up here, and I have to wonder if he’s thinking about his father and what he was taught by him, if he’s thinking about bullies at school, who exactly he’s thinking of and considering emulating. 

The way everyone laughs and hisses at the idea of Pete being captain of the vessel while Pete is completely certain of his ability is interesting — Stede and Pete really are paralleled so much in this episode, I think, in terms of being out of touch as the cis white guys that cannot read the room and have unrealistically high opinions of themselves. 

Everyone loves Jim, and… me too. 

PETE: No offence, I know you’re… mates. 

Love that Pete puts emphasis on the word mates when he’s talking about Jim to Oluwande. Love that implication. 

It’s great too that Jim is just sharpening their dagger on a strop this whole time and isn’t even trying to sew. What a champ. 

Buttons doesn’t appear to need to use the spyglass to look at the approaching vessel, which is interesting — eagle-eyed? Gull-eyed? Whatever.

Oluwande’s skills at de-escalating conflict are so fascinating to me — obviously he has a vested interest in keeping Bonnet in command so that the ship can remain sufficiently stable as a hiding place for himself and Jim, but he’s so subtle about it, firstly in shrugging off Pete’s criticism of Jim and Roach’s suggestion that Jim be the captain by saying that Jim isn’t interested in politics (while Jim keeps their head bowed and doesn’t engage meaningfully in the conversation at all, letting Oluwande take on all of it, which is fascinating to me); secondly, by shrugging and saying that he has no beef with Bonnet and immediately pointing out the story-telling as, “That’s one nice thing about him.”

It’s such a curious thing to lead with, the niceness of Stede Bonnet, because, yes, of course he’s nice, and yet it’s his niceness that the rest of the crew have such a problem with. 

The way they all bully Lucius to do the voice when Lucius knows he can’t do the voice is so funny, but if you look at everyone nagging him to do it, Oluwande isn’t actually joining in — he’s successfully redirected attention on him and Jim as members or not of the mutiny elsewhere, and everyone is just distracted by Lucius Spriggs’ shitty voice acting to keep at them. 

STEDE, with his hands on his hips, the fruitiest he’s been so far: Well here’s the deal, buckos!

He’s such an idiot. I want to keep him in a jar. 

Roach interrupts Stede here after asking if it’s really a big ship this time, and goes, “I’m not asking you, I’m asking him,” and gestures to Buttons, and it’s so funny because it’s like… They just can’t and don’t rely on Stede because they know he’s disconnected from reality, and it cracks me up.

Wee John’s pyromania rears its head again, and then…

The Swede is sharpening blades in a way that seems neither efficient nor safe; Jim is throwing knives; Black Pete is cleaning his guns while looking directly into their barrels; Frenchie is singing about how they’re all about to die. 

Stede’s trauma around blood and violence is so funny to me because of course you’re frightened of blood, you absolute fop, I can’t wait to see you drenched in it in S2, my darling disgusting man.

He really does reach out to Buttons in quite a vulnerable way though, and Buttons is a bit esoteric in his answer, but he doesn’t comment on Stede’s anxiety — I do find it funny that with his iron teeth he comments, “Getting too old for hand-to-hand violence.”

Like, are you? As in, are you getting too old to go hand to hand, but teeth to throat, that’s just fine? Fascinating. Tell me more. 

I think it’s tumeric that Wee John’s smearing on his face, or some sort of yellow powder, anyway? Which… I don’t even know what that’s about.

Anyway, trauma flashback for Stede, woo hoo!

The blood spatter on Rhys Darby’s wee son is so well-shot, and I actually really love the way they show his wince away from his da with the camera at young!Stede’s level, with his father cut off at the neck — it emphasises his smallness and his vulnerability as a child and how intimidating he finds his father, but it also really puts across the impersonal nature of their relationship and the lack of intimacy in it.

He can be close to his father’s butchery, and is being forced to be so, but not to the man himself. 

OFMD is obviously so concerned with varieties of masculinity and the toxicity inherent in so many of them, but his father really does pivot from saying, “This is what a man’s work looks like,” to then lecturing young!Stede broadly about class, but in such a way that’s quite disconnected from reality, or at least, his own reality or place in it?

BONNET SNR: One day, all this will be yours. Not ’cause you deserve it or ’cause you’ve earned it, Lord knows you haven’t done that. Because you lucked into it. What do you suppose that makes you?

STEDE: Fortunate?

BONNET SNR: (laughs) Fortunate?

STEDE: (smiling, but begins to fade)

BONNET SNR: Oh, no. (while smiling) A weak-hearted, soft-handed, lily-livered little rich boy. That’s all you’ll ever be, Stede Bonnet!

Like, my guy, that’s your son. You made him this way, but also like — You’re rich? Also? The way Bonnet Snr leans physically down into his space is obviously designed to make him feel as small and talked down to as possible, but it’s like…

If Stede is indeed weak-hearted, soft-hearted, and lily-livered, there is something to be said for the nurture as well as the nature here — why are you only showing him animal butchery at like, ten years old? Why are you surprised that you, a rich man, have raised a rich son? What is not clicking here?

Anyway, love Stede’s insecurity and dramatic muttering to himself while wrapped in his dressing gown. 

“I find the feel of silk very invigorating.”

Literally, what is Stede talking about at any time?

The fact that Oluwande comes down to check in at Buttons’ behest with Jim as his shadow and immediately puts that aside to ask if Stede’s okay when he’s visibly not okay is so precious to me, but he does immediately offer to go, and like — 

It’s such a weird position that Oluwande and Jim are put in because like, is anyone ever prepared for their manager’s weird mental health issues when they start being unloaded on them? 

STEDE: I was just gonna say, uh, it’s actually been a minute since I’ve, uh, done the old hand-to-hand. 

Oluwande looks around with such curiosity and interest as he crosses the threshold into Stede’s cabin — it’s such a huge and luxurious space, and it’s so evident that apart from Lucius, most of the crew do not regularly (if at all) see the inside of it despite Stede’s assurances that they can dip into the library at any time.

Oluwande and Jim’s dynamic in the beginning is so brilliant to me, because Jim does come into the space with Wande and instead of keeping their head bowed as they have with the rest of the crew, they do actually make eye contact and engage more with Stede — I suppose that of the people on board, Stede is the least likely to potentially see through their disguise and recognise them, particularly as he presumably hired them. 

Jim lets Oluwande take care of most things, but here Oluwande immediately defers to Jim on matters of combat, but like… Fuck me. They already know that Stede’s a soft touch, but the way that Stede is like, “uhhh, refresher?” as if he’s ever fought in his life, and like — 

OLUWANDE: Listen, Captain, you know, if I may…

STEDE: You may! Come on. (pats the couch either side of him) Have a seat. Please.

Obsessed with the look that Oluwande share with this exchange, Oluwande and Jim’s both, complete uncertainty and bafflement at this situation because it’s just so fucking awkward and they are so uncomfortable. 

OLUWANDE: Look, Captain… You know, pirating is not for everyone. 

JIM: (hunkered forward, brim of the hat pulled down, looking bodily away from both of them, shaking their head)

STEDE: Oh, no, yeah. 

OLUWANDE: It’s a really dangerous lifestyle. 

JIM: (nodding their head)

STEDE: (looking to Jim, then Oluwande) Yeah, some of us thrive on danger, don’t we? 

OLUWANDE: (having regrets for a moment as he stares into the middle distance) Yeah…. Yeah, but look. Me and Jim, we don’t do this because we like it. We do it because… we don’t have any other choice. 

STEDE: Oh, I hear that.

OLUWANDE: (visible disbelief)

STEDE: I mean, here we are just the whole band of us. Killing and… having to kill. I mean that’s… having to, having to kill…

He’s just here having this whole mental breakdown over a job he spent a great deal of money on throwing himself into with no experience or awareness of what it was like or what it entailed, and here Oluwande is really showing him a kindness by trying to gently point out to him the way he’s blinkered by his privileged upbringing?

He’s pointing out, as nicely as he can (and as nicely as he very much is forced to by the disparity between his and Stede’s positions) that what Stede is doing is like, you know, trauma tourism that he’s not even emotionally prepared for. 

And Stede is completely and utterly oblivious, buried simultaneously in his own manufactured narrative and his childhood trauma. 

And… fuck.

STEDE: I’m not a pirate. I’m an idiot. Oh, God. Oh, no… 

And fuck, but those deep breaths he takes, the way he almost sobs, and the way Oluwande looks at him and puts his hand on his chest, staring at this man with genuine concern because like — 

Yes, Stede is an idiot, and yes, he’s an arse, but also this is quite an unwell man in front of him and Oluwande feels some sympathy for him, but there is no fucking time for that when the cannon shot comes across.

Stede’s surprise and affront at how big the ship is cracks me up, especially because she’s so heavily crewed, but — 

BUTTONS: Have you been crying?

STEDE, in too deep: What? No… No. 

Anyway, so… The English vessel is interesting. I love that there’s a fella with a tiny spyglass, and then the talking guy with a medium spyglass, and then Rory Kinnear as Nigel Badminton, with a big spyglass.

Something about his penis, I don’t know. 

I really like that Badminton says “eye” and some other fella puts a folded handkerchief over his eye instead of just closing it himself, that’s so unnecessary, ditto his horrible rich sherry voice as he’s talking. 

ENGLISH CUNT, coming up in the tender: I say, does one of you happen to be Stede Bonnet?

STEDE: (looks helplessly at Jim and Oluwande)

JIM: (gestures for him to get up)

OLUWANDE: What are you waiting for? Get up!

Stede cowering on the floor in his dressing gown is me when my washing machine beeps and lets me know it’s time to unload it. 

Stede being met with a bully from school is so wild, especially becaue the crew are all advising him not to do this in hushed voices, and Stede ignores them because like… I don’t know, he’s admittedly in a pretty poor mental state, but also even outside of that his decision-making capacities are never good.

Anyway, there’s literally no reason at this point for Stede to pretend all the Black and brown crew members are his slaves and/or servants, and that the white ones are his buds. He like, does not have to do that at all. That is a choice he makes because he wants to impress a guy that bullied him at school and it’s like…

Bro. 

I do like that while everyone’s scrambling to dress themselves from Stede’s back-up closet, Wee John is playing the fucking harpsichord, he’s white but he’s also Irish, and decides he has no place in this absolute fucking debaucle. 

Shirtless background Roach for the second time this episode. More shirtless Roach in S2. Please. Thanks. 

The way that Badminton says, “Tell me about your colourful crew.” while he’s looking Roach up and down in that skeevy way he has, and then the camera shows Frenchie’s concern and the way he’s measuring the situation so carefully says such a lot about Frenchie’s like, laser focus on tension in pretty much any situation — Stede’s obviously blinkered, but it’s like… Frenchie knows how this works, and we know from his admission on the French ship that he has experience here, but this must be such a fucking stressful situation for him, Roach, and the others, when like — 

They’re already thinking of mutinying because Stede is straight-up just too soft, but what Stede’s done here is put them in a physically dangerous position, inviting fucking English soldiers aboard and then having the crew pose as servants when they literally could have hidden below decks and been safer for it, made themselves scarce; he could have just said they were free men and members of his crew, or that they were passengers or friends of friends — anything other than this, putting them in full view of the Brits, degrading them, but most crucially putting them physically in harm’s way. 

Pete’s got his gun trained on them under the table, but it’s interesting seeing the way that the Brits look to the white pirates and feel that something’s off, the pirates just smile awkwardly in response. 

ENGLISH CUNT: [The tea] has clearly been made by savages…

OLUWANDE: (closes his eyes, disgusted, rolling his eyes)

FRENCHIE: (looks hurt and extremely vulnerable on the other side of the table)

Thinking about the way Frenchie asks, so gently, “What did they do to you, man?” to Ed in the French episode.

Like, Frenchie, what did they do to you? Every time Frenchie does anything I want to wrap him in a blanket and dote on him forever, but here especially like… There’s so much pain here, and you don’t know how recently he was in service, if this is a recent escape, or if it’s dredging up past memories — and it’s such an important parallel, that cut of Frenchie’s face journey for only a moment before it goes to Stede, where for Stede we actually get a flashback and an internal story. 

Frenchie’s eyes are flitting here and there, his lips are pressed together, his eyes have a shine to them like he wants to fucking cry, and the thing about every expression between the Black characters here is that like… They can make whatever faces at all, and the white characters (Stede and the white pirates included) won’t even fucking notice. 

I just… Like, the thing is, this part of the story is still broadly Stede’s POV, and the focus is on his current mental breakdown, but because Joel Fry is just such a good and emotive actor like, you have these bare seconds of shot between Oluwande and Frenchie forced into this position and the depth of fucking feeling here is unspeakable. 

I really do hope in S2 we get flashbacks for the rest of the crew and their backstories more as well as more of Ed’s, but, yeah, fuck.

BADMINTON: We were rowdy school chums. (chuckles) Always playing pranks on one another.

STEDE: (facial expression that clearly communicates he does not remember it that way)

BADMINTON: Hmm? Do you remember the day with the rowboat? 

STEDE: The rowboat? 

BADMINTON: Oh, come on now. 

STEDE: No, I can’t.

BADMINTON: The rowboat. (laughs) It was hysterical!

STEDE: (looking down as the flashback begins)

There’s something so claustrophobic about the long-table separation and the cut between Stede’s face and Badminton’s — something about the candles lit between them along the table and the close frame really does just narrow down the room to just the two of them, and it really does make Stede feel and appear so fucking trapped in the whole scenario, even though it’s a trap partially of his own making. 

That’s something that comes through again and again with this show, I think, how attempting to match yourself to rules of politeness or etiquette that you don’t actually believe in just ends up causing you damage because you’re allowing yourself to be hemmed in by the established oppressive ruleset, and it would show not only more integrity but less vulnerability to refuse to play by those rules at all. 

I love that we see poor young Stede literally just picking fucking flowers before he’s chased by the others, runs into a tree, and then the way his hands are tied to the rowboat’s oars (which will be relevant later on in the episode, actually) as they all throw fucking rocks at him, he’s got a fucking tricorn hat on, and like…

As Stede comes out of this flashback, with the implication as Badminton chuckles that he’s just related this story out loud, we then cut to the white crew members’ reactions…

The Swede, laughing awkwardly while looking entirely pained by what he’s just heard, stopping laughing at soon as Badminton ceases to make eye contact with him and looking sadly at his tea and into the middle distance. 

And then, too, when Stede tries to sort of stand up for himself and Badminton goes, oh, and the horse, do you remember when we made you French kiss the horse? And the British crew are laughing, but like — 

Lucius looks disgusted and upset, is pressing his lips together, but to a visibly gay man he almost certainly received similar bullying that was sexually charged or forced elements of perversion, exactly like, for example, making a boy get too close to a horse’s mouth.

Like, the dislike of Stede in his youth and the decision for him to be the subject of bullying was very much one based in Stede’s effeminacy, but that itself is based in homophobia.

One thing I like about this scene and that I’m grateful for, but that also lends a real additional layer to it is like — 

So we see Frenchie, Roach, and Oluwande’s expressions of pain, disgust, discomfort, fear, uncertainty in this scene, and what we don’t see is flashbacks for them — and none of the white crew are noticing, because at the moment they’re sympathising with Stede who was bullied as a child, sure…

But I really appreciate and am grateful for the fact that as well as not showing Buttons and Pete’s responses to Stede being bullied — the Swede is obviously bullied a lot on the ship now, and Lucius has likely had his own experiences being bullied, whereas Buttons and Pete perhaps not — it doesn’t show us Frenchie and Oluwande sympathising with Stede. Not because they don’t feel compassion for him, I’m not saying they don’t or that they’re likely unaffected by this, but like…

Especially because they are currently literally undergoing a traumatising and unsafe situation because of Stede, ignored by the rest of the white crew and the British interlopers, I’m glad that the camera doesn’t spend time trying to show us them feeling for Stede and his trauma as a child, showing Frenchie and Oluwande like, distracted from what’s currently happening to them to feel sad for Stede. 

In another show, I think that would have been the case? That the Black characters put aside their own literal current suffering to be sad for the white guy’s previous suffering, even though he’s put them in their current predicament?

And I’m just glad that it’s not here. 

I like the contrast of Stede’s flat tone asking if Badminton would like a tour when at the beginning of the episode he enthusiastically led Lucius on a tour, with Lucius’ gaze representing one of Stede’s peers. It’s such a nice little book-end of contrasts between the intro and the beginning of the end of the episode. 

When Badminton comments on the impracticality of the library and all the books falling out, it’s so interesting because like, yes, Stede’s rooms are hugely impractical — in large part because it’s such a huge space with so much loose furniture, which means there’s so much more space for things to slide and shake to when there’s a storm or rough seas. Badminton remembers most about Stede his impracticality and his lack of common sense, and those go hand in hand, I think, with Stede’s gullibility and the ways in which they could presumably trick or manipulate him on top of just, brute force him into X or Y. 

Badminton’s just so confident in his cruelty here, in his utter domination over Stede and his right to speak to him this way, and Stede, hemmed in by his own sense of politeness and propriety, barely says a word to put him off — not just not directly disagreeing or whatever, but he doesn’t even imply that Badminton’s being rude or impolite and put the onus on Badminton to safeguard his reputation, you know?

Stede’s just not deft in these matters, and it’s fucking sad. 

I like the parallel we see of Mary and the children at one end of the dinner table and Stede at the other, the isolation it communicates for Stede, but then the recreation of that close-framed shot up and down the table, of Mary looking coolly at Stede and then looking back to Alma, and cutting to Stede, again with the candlelight taking up some of the shot. It’s such a cool little motif, and so communicative.

It hasn’t come up so much in this episode so far, but I know that Stede does have some body issues that come up later in this ep and the series, and the way that Mary goes, “And which is your favourite pig?” and says the word with that specific emphasis, like… That idea of Stede being lazy, fat, unpleasant, boorish…

I know that the point of this scene in Stede’s sense of rejection and isolation from Mary in the context of the episode, but when you recontextualise it knowing how frustrated Mary is in her own life with Stede’s laziness and how much of her life he takes up, plus the fact that she can’t directly refuse him or say anything about his lack of contribution?

So much depth here. 

I love the music here and the way that Stede stands up for himself just a little bit — “I mean… It’s true.”

And the way we see Badminton raise his head, abruptly become so much more serious before he starts to laugh harder than ever before, and Stede laughs, and he knows he’s being treated so fucking cruelly, he knows it’s the same as what he’s sufered at school, he narrows his eyes, it’s so goddamn tense — 

And then we cut to the Brits and the pirates. 

And fuck me, I love Foad’s performance in the background as Pete is sipping at his drink and doing his big dick bullshit act, because Lucius looks like he wants the sea to swallow him fucking whole, chin against his breast, so small in his seat; the Swede not making eye contact, also freaking out a bit. 

Frenchie in the background, on the other hand, actually looks a bit hype that the Brits are going to offer real commentary on their flags. 

As they go to the next flag Lucius looks like he’s either about to cry or throw up or possibly both, he’s so fucking freaked out, and I’m pretty sure it’s because he knows that the Swede and Pete are going to bicker and potentially blow their cover — Frenchie goes from enjoying a bit of change to grimacing and looking more concerned, and I’m pretty sure he’s realising the same thing too.

Lucius is doing fucking breathing exercises, Frenchie is awkwardly trying to laugh alongside the Brits, and like — 

God.

Anyway, why the fuck does Stede think his little whale paperweight is the ideal to knock the fella out? Oluwande did say like, a blunt, heavy object, but it’s such a small little thing, I know it does the job, but is it just that he wants it to be easily concealed?

BADMINTON: But you were so fat… and soft, and weak. 

STEDE: I thought I was slender. 

BADMINTON: No, no, no, no. No, I recall you were a plumper. 

I’ve seen a few people’s consideration of this scene and the way that the fatphobia is leveraged against Stede when like we saw Stede, and yeah, he was a pretty slim boy — one of the things about fatness leveraged as an insult is that it’s associated so much with a lack of manliness because of this idea that to be fat is to somehow be lazy or less active, but one note I would also point out is the way that fatness goes hand in hand with this idea of softness and weakness — curves, plumpness, like a woman as opposed to a man, the idea that a man should be square and hard, and a woman round and soft, you know?

Stede’s being lied to here and Badminton’s laughing in a way that’s meant to make Stede really doubt himself and his own view of his body, his childhood, but again it’s a jab at his effiminacy, even before Badminton starts talking about Stede’s tears or his enjoying to pick flowers. 

STEDE: (in a whisper) A little bit.

He was soft, yeah, a little bit soft — he did like to pick flowers, a little bit.

He knows that about himself.

And here he is, on a ship where he’s trying to embrace that that’s nothing to be ashamed of, that there was nothing wrong with him, and fuck, like… He’s just being backed into the corner by this ghost of his own past. 

The Brits laughing over Frenchie’s flag makes me sob, because he breaks in with his, “Actually, everyone knows cats are very evil because they steal children’s breath,” and he knows it’s a huge risk and I don’t know if he forgets himself because he was already insecure about his flag or if he just couldn’t handle it, but fuck, the way he flinches and draws back so fucking much, like.

Ugh.

ENGLISH CUNT: Enough interruptions, slave! Your captain may suffer uppity behaviour, but not me! 

And Frenchie’s expression is so fucking serious, is so somber — 

And it’s Jim that breaks.

It’s been pointed out by quite a few people that it’s notable that Jim is the one that breaks and snaps at the Brits when Jim is a person of colour, but they’re the most light-skinned, but like… I’m still glad they did. The dagger through the hand is so good, and so deserved, and Frenchie points and he laughs, and good! Make that man laugh! He deserves it! He deserves a nice time and to see this cunt get skewered in front of him!

Poor Lucius has since fainted and fallen back into his chair, and then, boom, the fight begins.

I think it’s Oluwande that pours a kettle of hot tea into the one Brit’s lap; Buttons holds a razor to another Brit’s throat; Wee John literally breaks down the door and comes in and it’s so hot Kristian Nairn please slide into my DMs just like that; Pete screams “Fuck it!”, Lucius comes to and screams — 

And we cut back to Badminton and Stede listening to the chaos. 

I really love how this show does flashbacks, they’re so well-cut — in Stede’s stuff but also in Ed’s later on, they feel so real and so accurate to how it feels when you’re really processing a traumatic memory in the moment.

The squish when Badminton lands on his sword cracks me up every time. 

I’m gonna be pausing several times in this next sequence to really appreciate the chaos, so like, firstly, we cut to:

Oluwande has his hand around a Brit’s throat, and is threatening to smash his face in, I think with a teapot

Pete is on the other side of the table, holding his little gun at the same fella’s head, and isn’t it nice that Oluwande and Pete are bonding together? 

Frenchie is standing up on the bench wearing a tricorn hat and brandishing his cat flag

Buttons is quaffing wine in the background

The Swede has wrapped another of the Brits in a net and Wee John is helping him

Lucius is hiding almost under the table

And when Stede calls, “Excuse me, you guys? I need a hand with something…” I’m obsessed with how Pete tells everyone to shush and they all go quiet, and it’s Lucius and Oluwande who extricate themselves from the chaos and go to help him out. 

STEDE: I used the stun move.

LUCIUS, sitting in a chair and looking in the other direction because he’s freaked out by the dead body of Nigel Badminton with a sword through his eye: Yeah, no, he looks pretty stunned.

I don’t think I’ve mentioned this specifically so far, but OFMD episode to episode does these fucking great like, dramatic shots where they really make use of the whole shot and like — 

So here, we see Lucius to the right in the foreground, looking horribly stricken and as pale as the hideous suit he’s wearing; Oluwande is stage-left and staring down at Badminton’s body in the middleground; in the centre-background we see Stede in the exact same vulnerable position as Lucius is, knees together, shoulders hunched, barely able to look directly at the body.

It just creates so much fucking depth and and is such a good use of the space and I love it.

Anyway, Oluwande’s face is killing me in this scene. He’s just like, oh, well. He sure did that. 

Even as Stede goes on blabbering about how it was just an accident and he’s leaning forward, Lucius is doing the exact same thing silently in the foreground, and it’s such a clever parallel between the two of them, I really like it. 

OLUWANDE: Hey, hey, hey, this is happening. Okay? Do you want to live? 

Allow me a moment’s distraction with just how attractive Samson Kayo looks in this scene. He looks so good in purple. 

Okay.

STEDE: That’s a tough question. 

OLUWANDE, grabbing him: I said, “Do you want to live?”

STEDE: I think so! … Probably!

OLUWANDE: Well, pull yourself together then! Yeah, because everyone up there wants you dead.

LUCIUS: It’s true.

Lucius Spriggs. My dear and delicious and potentially dead boy. 

Whose side are you on?

(The most important side: his own.)

But God, I love it when Oluwande girlbosses and manipulates and he’s very much notgoing to let Stede fuck this up for him and Jim when Stede’s ship is the safest place for them — I just love how sensibly he orders Stede through not saying that killing Badminton was an accident and Stede is already just destroyed with guilt and not feeling great about it. 

Oluwande’s forearms…

The way the fucking crew looks at Stede after he drops Badminton’s body cracks me up — Buttons is looking at Stede so fascinatedly, Lucius is serious, Jim is unreadable, Frenchie is enjoying himself and loves this violence and good, give my man everything he desires, the Swede is like :o, Roach is having a grand old time, and Pete looks genuinely impressed. 

I love how John says “Respect!” He’s so good. And how Frenchie gags the English cunt from earlier. 

So with the English cunt they do put back on the boat, right — obviously tying his hands to the oars is a parallel to Stede’s own childhood trauma, but what I really like is the three little coconut Brits they put in the back of the tender — you can see Frenchie’s first cat flag making up the chest of one of them, now stained with blood, so I suppose that’s why it goes from Frenchie’s cat licking blood of its paw to Frenchie’s cat on its four paws. 

Roach looks so cute when he wears his chef’s hat and it pushes his hair out at the sides, there’s so much shape there — Pete is so fucking upset about the fact that Stede’s actually done something fucking cool for once, and it cracks me up. Pete and Stede are both just blagging their way through this and it’s so sad for Pete when Stede wins a point. 

PETE: Making us dress up like a bunch of fancy boys?

Um, Pete? Not everyone got dressed up like fancy boys?

There’s another really good shot here that uses the depth of the lens so well -Pete in the foreground, Roach with his arm around Pete and his hand on the Swede’s back, Wee John in the back with the focus on him. 

I don’t think I ever noticed how much Wee John is an authority in the first episode and how much he drives a lot of stuff forward — he keeps quiet a lot, but it’s not because of a lack of strong opinion or consideration. 

There’s this balance here that Stede has to manage between the “nice” things about him that he wants to prioritise and a certain bloodthirstiness, and especially because this specific moment is borne out of deception, it does make you consider the Blackbeard mythos and the weight it puts on Ed’s shoulders, what must have or could have gone on in its construction, you know?

LUCIUS: He’s a terrible captain. 

OLUWANDE: We’re not exactly the best crew though, are we?

Fuck, I love how close they are together in this scene and like… I said before about how much I appreciate the way that Lucius puts himself close to Pete and, separately, Oluwande (and Jim) here because they’re the other queer guys, but here is such a valuable and important moment like… They’re both so close together, and it really is a moment of shared vulnerability because they’re both carrying Stede’s deception, and it is a strategic choice.

Oluwande’s right that they’re not the best crew or a particularly good crew — they’re small and chaotic and ridiculous and a lot of them don’t know what they’re doing; Oluwande wants to make sure he and Jim have a safe place there, whereas Lucius like — 

I wish I knew exactly what he wanted, or what he envisions for himself, because his broader ambitions are kind of an enigma to me. Much to chew on as the episodes go on. 

OLUWANDE: Besides, as long as he’s around, we’re gonna be paid, fed, and we don’t even have to work too hard. 

LUCIUS: (looks at Oluwande, then back at Stede)

OLUWANDE: He’ll be dead soon. We might as well enjoy it while it lasts. 

LUCIUS DOES A SNEAKY LITTLE GLANCE DOWN AT HIS MOUTH BEFORE OLUWANDE LOOKS BACK AT HIM, I SEE YOU, I SEE YOU. 

There’s so much Lucius/Izzy stuff and the obvious Lucius/Pete and Lucius/Fang, but Lucius wants so badly to participate just a little bit in Oluwande and Jim’s dynamic and I for one think we should let the boy be as slutty as he pleases.

Oluwande is so practical and I really think it’s interesting that like… So he obviously has a lot going on trying to ensure he and Jim are in a secure position, but them two and Lucius are the youngest of the crew by like a decade, and it’s great to me that Oluwande is so keenly practical but not because he particularly likes Stede or whatever, like… He’s looking out for himself and Jim, and now he’s sharing his thought process with Lucius and Lucius is engaging with him, and although Lucius is obviously shaken in this scene, I think it’s probably the most comfortable and open in terms of communication he’s been with anybody throughout the episode so far. 

OLUWANDE: Would you rather be captained by that?

And it cuts to Frenchie taunting the Brits, and it’s like… 

That thing of Stede being “one of the good ones” but it’s not even that he’s like, self-aware? It’s that he’s vaguely trying with no idea what he’s doing, he’s going to die over it, but in the meantime, they can get safety and security?

It’s so important to me that Oluwande and Jim are the like, secondary narrators and MCs aside from Stede and Ed because like, it’s just the contrast you need between Stede’s condescension and self-assurance versus like, the facts of the matter, and the crew with their own agency. None of them is with Stede because they’re grateful for Stede’s charity or civilising influence or some other racist bullshit — they’re there because they need the work, they’re being practical, and putting up with Stede Bonnet is safer than putting up with any fucker else. 

LUCIUS: (grimace, slight grunt)

OLUWANDE: Exactly.

Fucking slow pan onto Stede looking out over the ship, sweaty, shaking, crying a little bit, and like…

Here we see the table set up differently — Stede’s place setting and his chair are much closer, they’re not at the end of the table as before, he’s closer to Alma, and all the family are laughing together. 

They’re wearing the same outfits as they were in the other flashback — was it the same night? Was it a different night? Which of those set-ups were more typical of Bonnet family life? Which had the most impact? Which does Stede remember most often?

Stede’s traumatised and his POV comes with so much bias but also is so unreliable, we don’t know exactly what the truth is or how much it stretches, and that kills me, like… Playing High on a Rocky Ledge here while Stede thinks back to Mary and the kids, what are we thinking here? That he regrets leaving them? That he misses Mary?

Because like, I keep going, “Who is Stede writing this diary for? Who is he trying to impress, and get the attention of?” And here’s a verse from High on a Rocky Ledge:

Then spoke a spirit, “If you would win your Lady Love There’s only one way: fall to your death from high above You will begin to grow in snow beside the one You have waited for to be mated with”

(x)

Is that it?

If he risks his life as a pirate, is that what it takes for him to earn all his riches? To prove himself as a real man? Make him no longer lily-livered and soft-handed and weak-hearted? And therefore be worthy of his family, and his wife, by falling to his death?

And no. 

Because Stede doesn’t say, oh, I want to be worthy of her or them. Stede says to himself, “My family’s here now. At sea.”

And like, my guy, that is not what your crew signed up for. They did not sign up for you to be their da, even if they do enjoy that you read them bedtime stories. They did not sign up to be your substitute for your children that didn’t want to play pirates enough for your liking. 

But it’s such an interesting contrast, this song that’s ultimately about a man throwing himself into death and destruction to be with the woman he loves, and Stede is doing that to get the fuck away from her. 

The expectations of hetero society will do that to a man.

I love the choice of Pinocchio as his storybook — I think it’s interesting that Stede reads to the crew from children’s tales (from the future, at that), but obviously Pinocchio is all about someone achieving a level of reality and authenticity that was considered unachievable for him, and that’s so big for both Stede and Ed, I think, in the course of the show, but also for a lot of the crew, what they want from life, goals considered achievable and unachievable, the varities of the self they display to each other, etc.

I really love that Pete’s in a hammock on one side and Frenchie’s on the other and Frenchie’s wearing a little mask over his eyes. Sensitive man. Needs good darkness to sleep by. 

It’s just so — 

Domestic. 

Wee John crying as Lucius looks at him like “um, okay,” all the crew lying on the floor…

And fuck, but the Jim reveal is so good. Jim’s been so much in the background for the entire episode and always there but never like, looked at so closely, and here we see them shake out their hair, remove their nose, lean back, relax without all the fake beard and hat and ephemera. They just look so fucking tired. 

Oluwande’s great knocking on the door — I really like how easily he swaps between telling them to have dinner in English then telling them to eat in Spanish when he knocks on the door, and like, Oluwande just drops food and goes and lets them eat before he zips and I have… feelings about it. 

Roach and the Swede lying close together when they were trying to kill each other earlier is so sweet; I love how Lucius huddles under his blankets and smiles to himself as Stede does the puppet voice better than he could, and obviously we see the first introduction of Karl, who’s standing on Buttons’ head as Button lies back in his own hammock below the British hostages. 

STEDE: Lights out!

WEE JOHN: Can we have just one more?

STEDE: I know you love it, but you’ve got a big day tomorrow, okay? Night night!

Oh, he’s dad. 

And just like he abandoned his real children, he abandons his new fake adult children on his next mental breakdown. 💖 There’s lots of dads who walk out in their families but there’s not many who can do it consecutively like Stede Bonnet can.

Anyway, I love the slow pan up all the crew’s flags because he just can’t pick one, exactly the same energy as the proud dad who just has to put everyone’s drawings on the fridge, and Frenchie’s new cat flag at the top!

Episode directed by Taika Waititi because of course it was. 

I’m really hype to do more close focused readings of the rest of the episodes because like, fuck, there’s so much depth to this show, it’s so fucking well-crafted and I just lose my fucking mind over it. I wish all television was like, even a fraction of how good this show is. 

Thanks for reading! Tune in next time, I guess? 

#our flag means death #episode analysis

[commander-minkowski]

wild s2 speculation based almost entirely on outfits from the trailers

first 1-2 episodes: stede is in his white shirt from the end of s1. I'm guessing the first episode is stede reuniting with his crew (and seeing ed for the first time, briefly?), and the second is him teaming up with izzy. (I really wonder on what kind of terms ed and izzy part -- we essentially don't see ed and izzy interact in these trailers at all, and when izzy and stede team up, ed is nowhere to be seen. also sidenote I'm so excited to see who izzy is without blackbeard. whole new kind of guy I bet). stede and izzy taking a ship+ stede stealing the fancy red coat could also happen here.

episode 3: this is where I'm anticipating the blue-grey robes, mostly because we see a lot of shots with them (one in the teaser, seven in the trailer). I'm really intrigued by this plotline, because on one hand, it seems like there's a tense/dangerous situation they need to escape from ("the entire escape relies on this") but also some casual moments (buttons doing tai chi??) that make me think this is either a staged training situation, like an escape room, or a situation that slowly turns bad. we also see the two crews fully reunite in this one (jim and oluwande bump shoulders, ed and stede smack their foreheads together).

other episodes that I can't find an order for:

vampire episode!!! split second shot of oluwande+jim+a new character (from blackbeard's crew?) wearing garlic wreaths and making crosses. jim and oluwande are also seen in the same outfits flinching away from an explosion, where izzy and lucius (at least I think it's him. I'm 90% sure) are also seen. the only thing I have to go on is it has to be after the blue robes episode, since we see pete has repurposed his robe into a top. also I think they're gonna drag out the lucius reveal at least a little bit, so I'm guessing this is ep 4/5/6

the ... kink party? drag show? torture session?? no idea what's going on there but it looks fun as hell. roach sets off a firework. stede gets burned with a hot poker(?) and tied to the mast

spanish jackie returns, gives ed a pep talk, and takes the swede as one of her husbands(!). again, this has to be a bit later in the season.

stede's dark blue-grey shirt + GOLD HOOP EARRING. it looks so good on him!!! I'm guessing this outfit will show up in multiple episodes. we see him wearing it in a fight scene with some soldiers on a beach and while he's tied to the mast.

finally, misc stuff that's not clothing related:

ed and the bunny <3 I get it man I fucking love bunnies

I'm so glad there are more women in this season

this is not clothing related but when ed says "no more drugs, no more booze, no more stede" ... "stede" is CLEARLY cut in from a different scene. I'm convinced the first part of that line comes from a later, more well-adjusted ed. which leaves me tortured w curiosity as to what the line actually is

jim is so blisteringly agonizingly hot this season. I have to shove my entire fist into my mouth every time I get jumpscared with a jim gif. sorry it has to be said

#my ramblings #our flag means death

[dragonmuse]

@racheltheclumsy was asking if Alma would ever find out about Faith and it occured to me that Eddy doesn't know about Faith in the main timeline. So this is that conversation.

Eddy hadn’t gone by the office before. She saw Izzy once a week reliably to ride (and more and more frequently just to shoot the shit) and he turned up at the Revenge more often these days with less calculation. It all still felt a little fragile. The two of them were still too used to life taking things away, not prepared for them to be returned. 

So Izzy's office had stayed his territory. Until today. Eddy had promised Jim lunch a few days ago and had to cancel, so today was making it up to them. The place they’d wanted to try was closer to the office than to the Revenge. 

And it was definitely the right address. Jim had texted them the office number on the way over.  

So who the fuck was Callahan? 

Eddy knocked and only a few seconds later the door opened.  Read was on the other side, already bundled into her coat. 

“Hi! Jim just went to the bathroom, be right back. Come on in.” 

“You going out too?” Eddy stepped inside. 

“Yeah, meeting Izzy to do some light stalking,” she grinned. “Should be fun.” 

The office was just one boxy room with three glass and chrome desks. Wood floors that someone had put a geometric blue-gray rug over. Filing cabinets lined the back of the wall and there was a fuck off big tree shoved in one corner, the only nod to greenery. Read’s desk was obvious with a few bobbleheads lined up along one edge. Jim’s more subtly marked with a single photo frame that when investigated proved to have a picture that was mostly their hat shielding their and Oluwande’s faces as they probably kissed. 

Izzy’s desk was blank. It looked very different from the office he’d kept all those years which had been stuffed full of papers and boxes, jammed up and half-barricaded in. 

Read was still standing in the middle of the room, watching Eddy stalk around with an amused tilt to her lips. 

“What are you even looking for?” She wondered.  

“Who the hell is Callahan?” Eddy asked. 

“Oh, that,” Read shrugged. “Dunno.” 

“...you never asked?” 

“Nope.” 

Jim came back in then, “Hey. Ready?” 

“Why not?” Eddy demanded of Read. 

“Cause if he wanted me to know he’d tell me.” 

Eddy stared at her, Read looked back with a vague checked out expression. She could play dumb well.  

“Ready,” Eddy decided and switched focus to Jim. 

They did not ask Jim who Callahan was. An unspoken rule of their friendship was discussing Izzy beyond generalities was out. She assumed that it went both ways, couldn’t imagine Jim and Izzy having a gossip session about her.  

So they had to lie in wait for the man himself. Eddy considered a few different approaches, but in the end, they just asked straight out. Their ride was over and they’d gone into the diner for coffee (decaf because the mighty had fallen low and they both liked to sleep at night these days) and a danish for Eddy. 

“Hey, saw your office the other day,” she said casually. 

“I heard. Read thinks you’re nosy.”  He was as relaxed as he ever got. Shoulders rounded, mug in both hands to leech the warmth off. Instead of leather, he was in a dark denim jacket with some kind of wool lining. It looked comfortable. And a little too big for him.  And familiar. Oh, that was cute. 

“You stealing Luc’s shit now?” She asked because she was nosy, thanks very much. 

“No,” Izzy said easily. “It’s on lend while the zipper on my leather one gets fixed.” 

“Uh huh, those things get off track sometimes.”

“Sometimes,” Izzy agreed, eyes sliding away. 

“Especially if someone tugs on it a little too hard,” Eddy guessed and knew she’d scored a hit by the way his eyes didn’t come back to her face. “Well, looks good on you. Anyway, your office.” 

“What about it?” He took a sip of his coffee. 

“I figured it’d be Hands Investigation.” 

“Yeah, cause that sounds good,” Izzy scoffed. “No one looks at a name like that and thinks P.I. right off the bat.” 

“Guess it could be misleading, but uh....who the fuck is Callahan?” 

Izzy set down the mug and he was back to eye contact, staring her down. “I never told you.” 

“Told me what?” Eddy’s eyebrows shot up. Okay, they’d been expecting something, but not that deadly serious look. 

“I thought I might’ve. Maybe I did when we were both drunk or something,” he reached inside his jacket...no, inside his shirt and tugged a little. The familiar black cord with the little ring emerged. 

Of course, Eddy had seen the ring a hundred times. Had even idly asked about it once or twice, but they’d been interrupted or he’d deflected, changed the subject and it hadn’t interested her enough to chase the details. One of the little mysteries of the universe that probably had a boring solution. If pressed, back then she would’ve guessed it was his mother’s or something, but since the trip to the Hands family wedding fiasco, she knew that was unlikely.  

“Not that I remember,” she said lightly. “So?” 

“So...” He leaned back in the booth, the vinyl creaking. “There was a girl. My girl. Once.” 

“A girl?” Eddy frowned. “When? You’ve had that thing as long as I’ve known you.” 

“I was a kid. Fifteen. So was she. We were together until I was eighteen. She died.” 

That was a lot of abridgement. 

“I don’t think I could commit to a sandwich at fifteen and you stayed with a girl for three years?”  

“Two and a half. But yeah,” Izzy put a hand to the ring, pressing it to his chest, then dropping it back under the collar of his shirt. “Faith. Her name was Faith Callahan.”

“And she died...what? A year before we met?” 

“Six months.” 

“You know, I always figured you were just furious at life. Didn’t figure you grieving too,” they admitted. “But yeah, that makes a sort of sense. Way you fought and all.”

“She would’ve hated it,” Izzy shook his head. “Maybe that’s why I did it. Never liked me running face first into fists.” 

“You loved her,” Eddy determined.

“Yeah. Crazy about her, actually.” 

“You and a girl. At that age?” 

“Don’t sound so shocked,” Izzy rolled his eyes. “Went right into loving another one after, didn’t I?” 

“Yeah, but neither of us fucking knew that back then.” 

“Didn’t mean it wasn’t true,” and he said it so casually that Eddy could almost punch him. This man in a denim coat and her ex-right hand’s eyes, who had spent so long refusing to look at her and now saw her again, maybe more clearly than anyone else she knew. It was dizzying, maddening. 

And really fucking nice, actually. To be known like that.

“Fine, you’re a real hetero dude,” she settled on with an eye roll. “Very straight, very impressive.” 

“Nah,” he laughed quietly. “I’m way too into dick for that shit.” 

Her turn to bark a laugh. “So what? You named your whole business after a girl who’s been dead for what...thirty years? That’s some sentimental stuff.” 

He went quiet for a minute and Eddy wondered if she’d stepped on a landmine with that, except that there was no sign of anger or tension. He didn’t snap back or start eyeing up the butter knife, just seemed to look into middle space. 

“I think,” he said after a long silence, “that without her, I wouldn’t be here. Right now.  Don’t believe in much, never did, but I believe in that.” 

“Yeah,” Eddy thought about that eye mural, blown wide and tempting. Not really looking like something a dive bar would have at all. “I know what you mean.” 

They didn’t talk much after that, but it wasn’t a bad silence. They’d had a lot of years of talking between them. It was all right to just sit in a busy diner, drink a cup of coffee and be with each other. Changed and the same, all at once.

#leda house and the kraken verse #ficlet #izzy hands #eddy teach bonnet #poison me a little

[something-about-sunflowers]

The thing is, though... Izzy is meant to irredeemable and unlikable. He was written with zero sympathy for him in text, he was written as an asshole who is malicious, disloyal, and cruel. He is ABUSIVE. He is emotionally manipulative, he gaslights, he makes verbal threats and physical assaults. He deliberately and strategically isolates Ed from his crew. He deliberately disobeys a direct order (an act of mutiny) against Ed when he doesn't stand down and duels Stede. He turns around and betrays Ed when he doesn't get what he wants. VIco is an abuse apologist Izzy stan just like you. And they, just like the rest of the cast, know that you disgusting cultists only care about Izzy. You don't give a shit about Ed, or Stede, or anyone else. You literally just flick your clits to Izzy being unpleasant and abusive. He has no redeeming qualities that weren't stolen from other characters or completely made up by fandom. He's not a good person. He's not a nice guy. His motives are selfish and cruel. He's lazy and he's racist. So you can like him. Because you're a piece of shit abuse apologist. And you and all the other Izzy cultists can hold your breath until you turn blue about how he's not the character he is. But he is. Izzy is not secretly the third protagonist. He's not going to turn around and save the day. He doesn't have a decent, self-sacrificing, genuinely good bone in his body. If there is a Jim/Izzy kiss, then you are hoping for the dissolution of Jim/Oluwande (I guess an ample-bodied, dark-skinned black man isn't good enough for you? But then again, all Izzy stans are ultimately shallow and stupid), and you are disgusting. You would rather Jim be with a man who is racist and cruel than a man who adores them. And you know what, you stupid cunt? Even if it does happen, it WOULDN'T automatically mean good things for Izzy. If Jim kisses him to distract him while other people escape, he's still a piece of shit abuser. But he'll be that regardless. Because he abusive. And he is the villain. There is no redeeming him. The show has made that perfectly fucking clear. He betrayed Ed. He threatened to kill Ed if Ed didn't do what he wanted. He is the thing Ed will have to overcome to truly be happy.

And you're disgusting.

Ok, first of all: Big fan! I've heard so much about you Anon! Second: this made me laugh so fucking hard. I needed a good laugh so thanks Anon! ❤

(Read-more for the sake of my followers dashes, I'm writing essays again lmfao.)

So like. You must hate Mary then too, yeah? Since she's meant to be Izzy's parallel? What do you think of David Jenkins telling us that 'Izzy is the one to watch on a re-watch'? Do you think he's worried we missed him being 'irredeemable'? See, cause I took that as 'see that there's nuance to his character and he's got pretty reasonable motivations if you pay attention' but now, well, I'm just not sure, Anon 😰.

Tell me, where is he malicious outside of, like, regular piracy business? When someone else instigates? Yeah, sounds about right, so cruel of him to not worship at a rich man's feet when said rich man acts like he's the scum of the earth before knowing a single thing about him. How malicious of him to not be buddy-buddy with people his boss has taken prisoner, who are actively antagonizing him. How disloyal of him to *checks notes* uh. Hm. Well. There's just- there's nothing here? Oh! Oh do you mean the thing he did to get to Stede? The thing that Calico Jack (hi, I also love him, does that make me extra problématique?) and Spanish Jackie helped him do? The thing he did because he believed it was in Ed's best interest, since he was acting wildly out of character and incredibly irrationally considering their dangerous profession/lifestyle? That must be on a different list, I don't have that listed under 'disloyal', strange.

Izzy can't even manipulate his own emotions lmfao. Gaslighting? Anon, you must be misremembering, gosh you're so silly. Can't keep anything straight in that head of yours can you? He lies sometimes, I'll give you that, at least by omission, but that's not gaslighting. I'm sure you'll not like this but Ed's actions with regards to Izzy are closer to gaslighting than anything Izzy does to Ed. Or the crew, which I'm assuming you're including in this since you mention 'physical assault' and Izzy's never laid a hand on Ed?

The same crew that he, as far as he was aware (because Ed was *gasp* manipulating him by withholding information), was to treat as prisoners who, upon completing their task of 'repair the ship so we can take it from you, since we're pirates' would be given 'the uzsh' treatment of execution? The crew that he doesn't lay a hand on at all afterwards? Ooh, or do you mean when he grabbed Fang's beard? When Fang was openly questioning his captain's orders? Something that, if unchecked, can lead to a mutiny?

Funny thing about 'he disobeys a direct order' is that, well, Ed doesn't give him a direct order? 'We're not doing this' does not equal 'stand down'. He also doesn't try to stop it. Like, at all. He doesn't even tell Stede to stand down. He may not have wanted it to happen but he didn't do anything to actually prevent it when he's literally the only person on the ship with the power to prevent it. 'Izzy I no longer want him dead', all he needed to say since Izzy was operating on 'Izzy I want him dead but I can't do it myself because I'm conflicted about killing and especially killing things I'm attached to'. If Izzy had ignored that, then we could talk about 'disobeying direct orders'.

Also, he's first mate, its his job to push back on questionable orders from the captain. That's not mutiny that's how you prevent a mutiny.

'When he doesn't get what he wants', being. . . What? What he thought Ed wanted because he didn't communicate otherwise? What he thought was in Ed's best interest, because he's acting irrationally and out of character (which is confirmed by Fang and Ivan, by the way)? He's wrong* about what Ed's best interests are but that doesn't change the fact that he was trying to help rather than harm.

*Arguably. Ed indulging Stede was dangerous. Even without the threat of the navy on their backs (Stede's fault), there was no coasting on Blackbeard's reputation on the Revenge. They'd have to deal with every threat instead of just the one's who'd go after Blackbeard anyway.

So, wait, is Vico one of us or nah? Cause, like, I'll gladly join a cult if Vico is there. What do you think about David Jenkins though? Since his favorite character seems to be Izzy as well? Anyway I'll grant that Stede isn't my favorite character but that hardly means I don't give a shit about him. As for Ed. I love him so much, Anon. I love him so much that I don't infantilize him for the sake of demonizing another character so that I can use that to justify sending anon hate to people with differing opinions to me. I love Ed because he's unpleasant and- *ahem* well.

Some nice misogyny there, by the way. Gonna go out on a limb and say a bit transphobic as well, since I know you're presuming we're all women, some of us are men, some of us are neither or both. Has some notes of sexual harassment too. No, I'm not kidding. You're fantasizing about a group of people, sexually, and sending them messages about it. That's like, textbook sexual harassment. Not cool Anon.

Anon. They're pirates. None of them are good people. None of them are nice guys. All of their motivations are selfish and cruel.

Ed 'loves a good maim'. He's Blackbeard. He's not Robin Hood. He doesn't have secret (or explicit) good motivations for piracy and torture and murder. Stede is a deadbeat dad who chose piracy. Which includes stealing from people, even the poor (do we forget the plant so easily?), despite him. Y'know. Being rich? And like, selfish and cruel are Stede and Ed's middle names, Anon. Turtle vs crab? Setting a ship on fire with everyone still inside? Doesn't matter if the fire was the one who killed them if you're the one who set the fire, Anon. Swede losing teeth/fingernails? But I wanna go on a treasure hunt! And let's not even bring up Mary and the kids.

'Lazy and racist', where? I am legitimately asking, Anon, where? Is it where he makes the crew do their actual jobs? That's his job. Oh, how about where, instead of getting captured by the native people for being a colonizer, he does business with them? (You know, the people who explicitly call out Stede and Pete for being racist?) How about working under and with BIPOC? You think Blackbeard would keep him around if he was being racist? You think Jackie would have given him the time of day if he was racist? You don't think Fang and Ivan would have had some comment about it during the mutiny/planning scene?

I'll do you a solid, you don't have to point to any particular scene that doesn't exist. The writers themselves have said that they're not trying to tackle racism in the show the way that having Izzy be anything but 'white person who is, by virtue of being white, some level of racist' would be. If you don't want to call literally every other sympathetic white character on the show racist, you shouldn't be saying it of Izzy either. Izzy isn't the one who owns a fucking plantation.

Anon, I'm so glad you're giving me permission to keep liking Izzy! Thank you so much! I'm so grateful the fandom has you here to delegate what people are allowed to like and do! What would we do without you?

Nobody thinks Izzy is 'secretly the third protagonist'. Not anymore than people think that of Jim or Oluwande or Frenchie, since they all have side-plots going on as well. As for whether or not he's going to turn around and save the day? We'll see. Obviously he's not going to do everything because he's not the protagonist(s), but he has the potential to try and help just as much as everybody else on either crew. You're certainly entitled to your opinion/interpretation of his character but I can just as well say 'I think you're wrong', especially when you come into my house and throw a fit about it.

Did you forget that Jim and Lucius kissed as well? Are you forgetting 'we don't own each other'? Hell, Anon, I specifically said 'I don't ship Jim and Izzy', but well. Something something 'people on this website piss on the poor' etc. (Anon, you can just say 'fat', its not a bad word. I'm fat, Oluwande is fat, I fucking love that he's fat. I'm also not the best suited to speak on BIPOC representation but I'm also super happy that they're not shying away from including dark-skinned actors like Samson and Leslie. But that doesn't fit into your narrative so 🤷‍♂️.) You can call me all the sweet things you like but it doesn't change the fact that the show has, pretty explicitly, said 'yay polyamory' and Jim (and Oluwande) has two hands. Leave alone the fact that Jim can kiss Lucius and just be friends with him, same as they could with Izzy.

Gosh, Anon, you're really hurting my feelings here. You really think I'm a stupid cunt? That hurts. Genuinely, I'm gutted. I don't think I'll ever recover.

Given that you're literally talking hypotheticals, as we all are, since we don't know what is going to happen in season 2, I'm not going to argue if it would 'mean good things for Izzy' if Jim kissed him. Though I will say, if Jim needed him distracted for people to escape (I'm assuming you mean escaping him, rather than Ed who is the proper threat to anyone in need of escaping right now) they could find easier ways to do it than kissing him?

And the sky is green. And cats are witches. And women have crystals in their bodies. I can say stuff too, Anon. I think you fundamentally misunderstand what redemption means, if we're being entirely honest here. Redemption has less to do with your previous actions and more to do with what you choose to do going forward. Clearly we disagree on his capacity for doing better going forward, and that's fine, its alright to be wrong Anon I won't judge you for that, but him having done bad in the past* has no bearing on his redemption if he chooses to do good in the future.

*'Bad' here being used both generously and ungenerously. Generously towards your definition of bad and ungenerously in the face of his rationale. He had perfectly valid reasons for doing the things he did, regardless of whether or not he should have done them.

I love you too Anon! I hope you have a good day at school tomorrow- er. On Monday, sorry, adult schedules don't always follow the 'weekends off' rules that kid's schedules do, I forget sometimes. Bye bye!

#the dork is being a dork #the dork answers #izzy hands #i'll be honest anon i was starting to feel left out that you hadn't sent me anything like you do to other izzy fans #but now i see you were just saving up all that stupid juuuuust for me #i legit needed a good rant tho #so like genuinely thank you for giving me the opportunity #and i did spend like 10 minutes laughing at this for the record #especially at 'vico is an abuse apologist too' lmfao #WILD

[alfalfairy]

20 questions for fic writers

Thanks to @thetragicallynerdy for tagging me!

1. How many works do you have on AO3? Twelve, ten for Our Flag Means Death and two for Dimension 20 (Fantasy High)

2. What’s your total AO3 word count? 206,896 words

3. What fandoms do you write for? Our Flag Means Death and Dimension 20's Fantasy High

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos? All of them are OFMD fics!

to be more than this devil inside of me with 127 kudos

bitter like whiskey, sweet like wine with 58 kudos

so much hurt is forgotten with the horizon as backdrop with 51 kudos

fled like sweet dreams, leaving thee to mourn with 50 kudos

drink of the feeling of quiet again with 48 kudos

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? Most of the time yes! Although there are some comments sitting in my comments that are from a while ago that I haven't gotten to - honestly, they were too nice and I got kinda overwhelmed.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? Hmm, I tend to prefer happier endings 😅 Honestly? None of the fics I have planned have angsty endings - angst aplenty within, but not at the end. Thinking about it though, probably fled like sweet dreams, leaving thee to mourn - happy ending was implied, but not explicit.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? Hmm, probably has to be drink of the feeling of quiet again, which feels very... summative, in its happiness? Like, it took a lot to get there, so it feels better somehow.

8. Do you get hate on fics? So far, no, and nothing has ever reached me here either 👍🏻

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? Nope, that is not my niche.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written? I have never written a crossover - although when I get into interests, I do think about what kind of DnD races and classes the characters would be. Like, Oluwande as a cleric, and Jim as a rogue.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? Not as far as I'm aware 🤨

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? Nope!

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? Nope!

14. What’s your all time favorite ship? All time? Well, Jim/Oluwande got me back into fandom, and I'm honestly hard-pressed to think of another ship that I'm that invested in - for most other things, I am pretty casual.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? Probably to be more than the devil inside of me. Which is incidentally my most popular fic. I have ideas for how it would end, but I guess I don't want to get super plot heavy with it? If I do end, I worry it won't be satisfying to the readers, but then is it worse to just leave it unfinished?

16. What are your writing strengths? Hmm, I enjoy describing the physical reactions that emotions have on the body, and I realized today that I have a tendency to focus on the ribcage lol.

17. What are your writing weaknesses? I worry about capturing dialogue correctly, and readers thinking they would not fucking say that 😅

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic? I have relied on Google Translate for this, and I've been meaning to go back and update my OFMD fics to use hover/display text for the dialogue in Spanish.

19. First fandom you wrote for? Glee actually, on ff.net. I will die before I say what it was lol.

20. Favorite fic you’ve written? I suppose I'm most proud of drink of the feeling of quiet again, as that took a lot of time and structuring. For Fantasy High, I'm really enjoying writing and planning i have a little shadow that goes in and out with me, and I have lot of other what if ideas that are Riz Gukgak-focused that I'd like to pursue when this one is done.

Thanks for the tag friend! Tagging @hairasuntouchedaspartoftheamazon, @floopdewhoop, @yourlocal-charlatan, and anyone other writing followers interested! No worries if you're not :)

#tag game

[thetragicallynerdy]

1 + jim/oluwande for the ficlet starter lines thing :0?

Oh hell yeah!! This got a little bit long, but it's still within a thousand words, so I guess that counts as a ficlet?? This takes place in an unidentified modern au - it's low-key inspired by @dragonmuse 's birthday party for Jim in Hungry Like A Wolf , because the idea of Jim not having a birthday party since they were a kid until Oluwande throws them one is just so fucking good. (Also everyone should go read their Leda House and the Kraken 'verse it's absolutely stunning)

Thanks again Dwarnian!! This was v fun to write.

#1 - "You know that's not what I meant."

“You know that’s not what I meant!” Jim hissed. “Would you stop? We’re not doing this!”

Oluwande grinned back at them, like he hadn’t just dropped that he was going to throw them a fucking birthday party when they were in the middle of the goddamn grocery store, of all places. At least he’d dragged them here when it was deserted.

“Oh? Then what did you mean?” He kept tossing half-price bags of chips into the shopping cart he was pushing. “Because I could’ve sworn you said, and I quote, ‘Yes, I’d definitely like the biggest birthday bash ever, please Oluwande’.”

“I was being sarcastic!”

Jim grabbed a bag of chips and tried to put it back on the shelf, only for Oluwande to tsk and shove two more in the cart. They fought the urge to bare their teeth at him or to grab the knife hidden under their coat, the one that definitely wasn't legal to carry in this state. Not that they really wanted to threaten Oluwande out of throwing them a birthday party. But the urge was still there, and they still ignored it, which was what counted. Right?

“I don’t even like birthday parties!” they said, waving their hands in the air. “They’re stupid!”

“You liked the one you planned for me just fine. Don’t think I didn’t see the list on your phone of all the ways you want to throw me an even better party next year.”

“That’s – that’s different!” They tried to bat his hands away from a case of pop. “Maltida sea Olu, would you stop? You are not allowed to throw me some big stupid fucking birthday party -”

Oluwande grabbed a different case of pop and tossed it in the cart, then kept walking. “It won’t be stupid at all –“

“It will be – fuck, can you just” – Jim grabbed the front end of the shopping cart and planted themself in front of it, throwing their weight against it until Oluwande stopped – “stop for one damn second –"

Something in the look on their face must have given him pause, because suddenly the air of humour faded, his face shifting into something serious.

“Okay,” he said, leaning his elbows on the handle of the cart. “I’m stopping.” His voice went soft. “Mate, are you really upset about this?”

They chewed on their lip.  

“Because if you really don’t want a party, we won’t have one,” he continued, nothing but sincerity in his voice. “I just… thought it might be nice. Since you said you haven’t had a proper birthday party in like - a really long time.”

“Not since I was a kid,” Jim muttered. They looked down at their hands, white knuckled on the metal edge of the cart. “I’m not – I’m not a birthday person. I don’t need a party just because I made it through another fucking year.”

“I know you don’t need a party. But it’s okay if you want one.” They wrinkled their nose at him, but Oluwande just smiled. “And it’s not just to celebrate still being alive. I mean yeah, that’s good, but it’s to celebrate you, y’know?”

Jim groaned. “Dios, that sounds terrible.”

Oluwande laughed. “Yeah, well, some of us love you. Like, a lot of us love you, actually. And we’d like to get the chance to show you every once in a while.”

Fuck. When he put it that way, it felt like…

It felt like having a family again. And they knew he was theirs, the only family they had. But maybe the rest of their friends could be, too.

“You still don’t have to,” he said, voice going soft again. “Or we can just do something small instead of a party with everyone. You and me, or just a couple people. It’s totally up to you. I won’t be upset either way.”

Jim ducked their head, staring once more at their hands, then at the contents of the cart. It still felt like too much. Too much attention, too much effort for them.

… but they couldn’t deny that they kind of wanted it, too.

“… you really want to throw me a party?”

Oluwande smiled, eyes crinkling at the edges. “Yeah, mate. I really do.”

Jim sighed. They let go of the cart and stepped around to where Oluwande stood at the back, then slipped their hand into his.  

“… fine. We can do a big party.”

The smile on Oluwande’s face shifted into the biggest grin. “Hell yeah we can!”

Jim held up their finger. “On one condition.”

“Name it.”

“Lucius isn’t allowed to choose the music. If I have to listen to one of his stupid fucking Brittney Spears playlists at my own fucking birthday party, we’re gonna have a problem.”

Oluwande laughed and squeezed their hand. “It’s a deal.” When he started forward, tugging them along, they followed. “You can make your own playlist for the party, how’s that?”

Jim pursed their lips. “… make one for me? You know more music than I do.”

They didn’t say that he knew all their favourites. They didn’t need to.

The look Oluwande gave them was unbearably soft, making all their insides flip. “Of course, mate. Anything for you.”

#jim jimenez #oluwande boodhari #our flag means death #ofmd #jim x oluwande #teal oranges #tragicallynerdy writes #ficlet starter lines #ask #dwarnian

[epersonae]

five fic friday

everything broken (M, 52K, series marked "not complete" but both fics are complete) - a reunion, and then retirement? I like the writing style a lot, and the discussion of what the future looks like is really interesting, as is them working on their communication (or not)

What Keeps Us Stargazing (M, 10K) - modern AU, Ed and Stede reunite, accidentally, seven years after Stede fucked up. They work things out.

The Sweater Curse (T, 1656) by @blackbeardskneebrace - modern AU, Ed wants Stede to knit him a sweater. That's it, that's the fic, it's adorable. (Also the fic listed in the author's notes is a lot of fun and will probably appear here eventually.)

The Best Revenge is Kissing Well (T, 4327) - modern AU (yeah I guess that's a bit of a theme this week), Stede needs a date for a terrible NYE party, well, actually, he's been telling everyone that Ed is his boyfriend.

Antipode (E, 18K) by @veeagainsttheday - near-future sci-fi/modern AU, Jim and Oluwande have invented a kind of teleportation. Stede is sad and wants to go to the farthest possible location from where he is on his terrible vacation. Turns out it's Aotearoa, where he finds a man standing on the edge of a cliff. (this might be my favorite thing that I read all week tbh)

#five fic friday #ofmd #ofmd fic #our flag means fanfic #argh two of these authors I'm following but can't remember their tumblr usernames

[august-anon]

jim/oluwande - 🤐

Hi i wrote this in 3 bursts and i have not reread it or edited it, drabble prompts means no second-guessing so this is what you get lol.

[prompt list]

🤐 - Silent Laughter!!

[ao3 link]

Word Count: 701 words

Earn Their Laughter

----

Jim's face was split in a wide, open-mouthed grin. Their shoulders shook against Oluwande's chest and their stomach bounced with their laughter. They pressed down against his fingers on their ribs and squirmed in his hold, their own arms pulled in close to their chest.

But the only sound in the room was their quiet gasps of breath in between bouts of silent laughter, one of their hands coming up to muffle even that.

"Come on, Jim," Oluwande goaded, leaning down to speak directly into their ear. "I know you wanna laugh for me."

Jim shook their head, and though Olu was pretty certain that was an answer to his tease, it was hard to tell with the way they immediately tried to tilt to the side to escape his breath and beard. He chuckled a little.

"You do," Olu said, leaning back down to nuzzle against their ear and neck. They jolted in his hold. "I bet I can get you to laugh out loud for me."

They tilted their head back enough so he could see them bare their teeth at him, and he couldn't help but laugh again. Oluwande tugged Jim closer, crossing his arms over their body to keep them snug against his chest. One hand started sneaking down their side in search of their hip, and the other pressed further upwards to scritch relentlessly against their upper ribs. This time when Jim's head shot back against his shoulder, it was from ticklish shock, their nose scrunched from their bright grin.

Oluwande knew this game well, and he knew how stubborn Jim could be. As goofy as they could be sometimes, Jim was still closed off and defensive at heart. They didn't show vulnerability often, and one type of vulnerability they held close to their chest was laughter. More often than not, Jim would silence their genuine laugh, and while Oluwande would never begrudge them for that, there were times when he was just craving to hear it.

And for times when Jim didn't mind it being drawn out of them, Olu had his own tricks up his sleeves. All he needed to do was trick them into saying something, get them to argue back against one of his teases, hell, even if they just growled. Any sound he could get out of them would put a crack in the wall, and with a big enough crack, there were bound to be leaks.

"You know I'm not going to stop until I hear it, Jim." He laughed against their neck, and their head jerked down against his to try and push him out. "The longer you keep it from me, the longer this is gonna go. Unless you want me to keep going, that is. Unless you like this."

A growl. A strained one, but it was there, pitching up at the end and cut off before it finished. The first few times, that would've been enough, but Jim had learned his tricks now. And while he knew they liked this -- liked the game, liked being dragged into vulnerability with him headfirst so they had an excuse -- they were also the most stubborn person Oluwande had ever met. If they learned how to fight against something, they would. Even if it was just out of spite.

But he knew how to crack them.

"Shit, Jim. You're so damn cute."

Jim's face contorted, and Olu relished in watching the conflicted series of emotions flit across their face. Flushing cheeks and wide eyes, but eyebrows drawing down into a glare. Pleased with the compliment, but refusing to accept it nonetheless. And then--

"Shut the fuck up--" Jim spat, laughter slowly growing in their voice until every word was infused with it. Their sentence ended in a quiet squeal as he leaned down again to nibble at the length of their neck.

"Told you I'd get it out of you," Oluwande muttered against their neck.

"Fuck off!" Jim said, not bothering to try and silence their giggles again. Even if they'd managed, he'd just get it out of them again.

Because he intended to hear that laughter for a good, long time. He deserved his reward for winning, after all.

#tickle fic #my writing #ofmd tickles #ofmd tickling #lee!jim jimenez #ler!oluwande #ticklish!jim jimenez #ofmd #jim jimenez #oluwande boodhari #tealoranges

[glamaphonic]

So speaking of the Revenge crew, any thoughts or guesses about backstories we might see explored in the future? Alternatively: one wish for each of them in the next season.

I did a post once specifically about Lucius' potential backstory here, and I stand by it! I don't have well-formed thoughts about any else's and I want to hear about pretty much the entire crew's backstories T B H. And very particularly I NEEEED flashbacks to how they each all first encountered Stede and joined the crew.

A few specific wishes:

Jim - Credit fully to my gf: I need a Dread Pirate Roberts style "I'll most likely kill you in the morning" sort of Jim making attempts on Ed's life and Ed vaguely like apprenticing them in return, especially since Ed clearly kept Jim due to their fighting skills, but we don't ever really see Jim have much in the way of like sailing/piracy-specific skills. Because they're an assassin who is being a pirate by necessity!

Oluwande - I really want them to keep exploring his leadership capabilities! The crew electing him and him not wanting it, but ultimately accepting it was sooooo good. And I want to keep following that arc of him starting out pretty apathetic, honestly, to the whole piracy thing (it's just a necessity! he assumes they're all just going to die very soon and is like SHRUG) and discovering competencies in that sphere that grow organically out of his personality.

FRENCHIE - Okay, I will fucking die on the hill that Ed kept Frenchie entirely because he just genuinely LIKES Frenchie after 105 and he very much still wants connection. I want them to bond! I want Frenchie to be deeply confused and somewhat alarmed about it but to take it in stride like he does everything else. I want to learn more about Frenchie through this! And I want him to become Ed's first non-Stede actual for real friend. Particularly since, imo, Frenchie jumped to the front of the likely line for that after Ed torpedoed his nascent bond with Lucius. Speaking of...

Lucius - I want the RECKONING re: Ed trying to kill him!! Because Lucius genuinely reaches out to Ed emotionally multiple times through season one and holds him accountable for his emotional shit and it's a delight and it's part of why Ed targeted him (the other part being that Lucius was THE one who convinced Ed that Stede returned his feelings which Ed ofc now believes to be untrue) and like I don't think it'll necessarily be a huge melodrama. Because this is a comedy and see also how Lucius took Jim's attempts to kill him in stride. But it will and should be a thing! I also want Lucius to be like, NO I SWEAR OFF BEING YOUR GAY RELATIONSHIP COUNSELOR NO THANKS (but he doesn't really).

#ofmd #our flag means death #our flag means found fambly #oluwande boodhari #i'd love to be stabbed by jim #frenchie is lowkey fave #our beloved lucius #ask!

[montygreen]

ofmd tag meme

i was tagged by the lovely @blackbeardz thank you so much, vici!!

no pressure tags: @izzyxhands, @ripkarl, @rainbowbonnet, @transtlanticism and anyone else who wants to do this!

your name:  leila

how many sugars: in my tea? zero

characters you relate to most: i’ve honestly never thought about it?? maybe oluwande or frenchie

otp? — stede and ed (but jim and oluwande are VERY close second)

notp? — any ships involving calico jack are a big, big no for me

if you were a pirate captain, what would you call your ship? — i do not have even a single clue?? my brain is failing me on clever and creative ideas today

what position would you have on a pirate ship (bosun, captain, powder monkey, master gunner, surgeon etc.) — given i’m a physiology major, i guess that defaults me to surgeon, doesn’t it?

favourite ofmd fics or arts? — god this fandom is so full of just... the most insanely talented people, but some of my favourite ofmd fics are hiring a mouse management officer (aka the fic where the crew of the revenge get a cat), weather the storm (a REALLY fucking good time loop fic), and perfect pretenders (it’s fake dating? how else can i sell this one to you, i mean COME ON)

biggest wish for season 2? — obviously for stede and ed to eventually talk things through, oh and i think established jim and oluwande would be ADORABLE

favourite quote: stealing vici’s choice of quote here because also my favourite, it’s so fucking funny (especially to me a person in science) “science tells us all the useful organs are on the right part of the body, so i cleverly took the sword on the left” / “is that right? i mean, the--the liver.” / “the liver? we don’t even know what that thing does.”

favourite minor character: frenchie, if he counts as minor, but if he doesn’t, probably spanish jackie

favourite episode: the best revenge is dressing well

has ofmd caused you to re-evaluate your gender: nope

favourite cast/creator quote or interview: that david jenkin’s quote about stede and ed knowing of each other and then meeting and just having chemistry where he goes on to discuss queerbaiting and feeling scene in a story... yeah... yeah that one

do cats have knives in their feet? — oh, absolutely, but i adore them with my entire heart

song that makes you think of stede bonnet: i don’t have a serious answer for this, but i saw an edit someone made of stede to “i have friends” from cxg and it was SO FUNNY, it lives in my head rent free, so that

song that makes you think of ed teach: doomsday by lizzy mcalpine

song that makes you think of izzy hands: .....i’m just a girl in love from crazy ex girlfriend

#tag games

[izzy-b-hands]

Pirate Party Part Two

Party pirates, partying in a piratey way on a pirate ship! Sugar! So much sugar it's not historically accurate! But why take that joy from these fictional children?

TW for emetophobia, underage smoking even tho I don't think they had those laws back then, but they do for this fic I guess lol

---

"Can I learn?" the little girl, maybe seven years old, with her blonde hair falling in her eyes, looked up to Jim.

"How to throw knives?"

The girl nodded. "It's really cool how you do that."

"Thanks," Jim smiled. "Well...okay, you can't tell your parents though. No throwing knives in front of them."

They knelt down and handed the girl a knife, only for Oluwande to snag it instead.

"Jim!"

"She wants to learn!"

"She's a child!"

"I know!"

"This is a fucking knife!"

"I know that too!"

The girl let out a whimper, and they both broke into apologies.

"I'm sorry," Oluwande said. "Jim just keeps their knives really sharp, and I didn't want you to get hurt."

The girl nodded thoughtfully. "Could I learn with less sharp ones?"

"Actually, then if you get cut it's gonna hurt way worse," Jim said.

Oluwande gave them a look.

"It's true!"

"Can I learn how to fish?" The girl asked.

They both let out relieved sighs.

"Absolutely," Oluwande said. "Wait until you see all the weird fish there are..."

From the corner, Izzy listened until they were too far away to hear. This, to him, was maximum, peak, bullshit. There were so many children, and they were everywhere all at once, and sticky! They hadn't even been fed yet, and they were somehow already sticky. It was ridiculous!

Luckily there were a few older kids who had gotten his hints to keep the kids away from him, and they all redirected any of the younger ones if they so much as looked at him.

Except for one.

"Parties are stupid," the boy slouched by him against the wooden wall, and rolled his eyes. "Fucking kid shit."

Izzy bit back a smile. The boy was maybe sixteen, give or take a year or two. "Yeah, I hear ya. I'm not up for all this shit either."

"Like, who even has birthday parties anymore, that's so immature," the boy scoffed, and Izzy faked a cough to stop himself from bursting out laughing. "Like, be original, do something cool."

He was dying, the kid reminded him so much of himself and Ed at that age. It was horrible and funny, but also wild that the kid was clearly trying to impress him.

"What would you have done?" Izzy asked. "Pirate ship isn't cool enough?"

"Okay, so, the locale is actually cool," the kid replied. "But the activities are like...dancing to kid songs? And cake? And whatever that one guy with the seagull is doing?"

Izzy peered out and could just see Mr. Buttons doing what looked like a magic routine with a seagull for some of the kids.

"You don't wanna keep seagull guy?" Izzy joked.

The kid laughed. "Well. I guess he could stay."

Izzy nodded. "Mom made you come to watch a sibling?"

"How'd you know?"

"Just a guess," Izzy said. "You'd rather be doing stuff you think is fun."

"Yeah," the kid said. "Trenton, by the way."

"Izzy."

"Like, me and my friends, we like music and hanging out, and smoking stuff," Trenton said.

"Stuff?" Izzy asked.

"We can't get full smokes from anybody, so we all just cut off bits of our parent's and then glue them back together."

He nearly lost it then. It physically hurt not to laugh. Trenton was so earnest, so painfully wanting someone to think he was cool. The feeling took Izzy back into his own memories.

"Nice," he managed to choke out. "Say, why don't I go grab us each a cigar or a pipe or something?"

Trenton's eyes were dinner plates. "For real?"

Izzy shrugged. "I'm not your parent, and this is a party, right? Hell, I first smoked at thirteen, how old are you?"

"Almost fifteen," Trenton replied.

"You need to catch up then!" Izzy crowed. "I'll be right back with some, hang on."

As he went around the corner to the nearest stash of cigars, he ran into Lucius.

"You are not."

"He's at the age where he wants to be rebellious," Izzy sighed. "I had people help me do stupid shit as a kid, and looking back those were the adults I admired most!"

"I'm sorry your childhood was like that, because that sounds excessive and ultimately damaging," Lucius said sharply. "But you can't give him a cigar."

"He'll throw up and not want the rest anyway," Izzy protested. "That's what I did with my first cigar."

"Ew," Lucius grimaced.

"Yeah, me and Ed, one stolen cigar. Ran miles away from town to smoke it," Izzy continued fondly. "Taking a puff, then puking. Giving it to Ed for his turn, and he'd do the same, then give it back to me and-"

"Yeah, that's good, I get it," Lucius interrupted. "I just-"

"Look, I'm not trying to be creepy or a bad influence or whatever," Izzy cut him off. "Honestly, I know how it seems. He just seems miserable, and miserable kids act up. But maybe if he's happy, even if sick, he'll just fuck off and lay around for the rest of the party."

Lucius nodded. "I hate that that's a good point. I pulled a littler one off a rope and he bit me when I said he couldn't be up there."

"What is it with you and getting bit?"

"I don't know," Lucius muttered. "Anyway...fine. One cigar, but after that he goes to sit in his assigned chair and wait for lunch!"

"Thanks Mom," Izzy rolled his eyes and retrieved the cigar, ignoring the pain when Lucius slammed his hand with the metal lid of the stash box.

Back at the wall Trenton looked like he might pass out already just at the sight of the cigar.

"You said you've smoked before, right?" Izzy asked, knowing full well that had been a lie.

"Yeah, but maybe remind me?"

He smiled as he ran through instructions, and watched the kid light up.

"Take it easy, not so much at once," Izzy warned, finally plucking the cigar from his hand.

But Trenton was preoccupied coughing his lungs out, then hurling over the side of the ship to the delight of the nearby seagulls.

"What did you do?" Ed asked, exasperated. The baby on his hip whined at the cigar smoke in her eyes.

"Sorry," Izzy stubbed the cigar out quickly, waving away the smoke. "Sorry for that kiddo, you weren't meant to get any of that."

"Izzy," Ed said. "Seriously, is he okay?"

"First cigar puff, and he took a big one," Izzy laughed.

Ed's face relaxed. "Oh fuck, is that all? Poor thing, but we all do it."

"Part of growing up," Izzy agreed.

"Yeah, but you're too little for that yet," Ed said to the baby, booping her nose. "Not till you're a silly teenager, making bad decisions and having fun."

A knife suddenly went whizzing past them both, nearly nailing Izzy's head. The baby started to cry, and Ed handed her to Izzy as he rushed off shouting for Jim and Oluwande.

Izzy stared at the baby, who stared back at him, both in the way one might examine a particularly disgusting bug.

"So...what the fuck, huh?" Izzy asked her.

She looked around, babbled something lightly, then hiccuped. For a moment, she seemed content, and he thought maybe he didn't mind the little ones as much as he thought.

Then she gulped, hiccuped, and vomited all over his neck and chest, and he had to resist the urge to drop her and run to puke off the side of the ship himself.

#text post #ofmd fic #marc writes #in other news all the pirates are trying and failing to be good authority figures here lmaooo #they're winging it so hard but that bird don't fly

[dragonmuse]

You talked about stede and eddys love languages but id love to know what all our couples are

The antihistamine is wearing off for the night so please enjoy this ramble:

Pete is a words of affirmation giver. He’ll give Lucius compliments, pep talks and pet names all day long. But I think he likes to receive touch the most. Lucius is the exact opposite. He gives out a lot of physical touch, but needs a lot of affirmation from Pete specifically. They feed really well on each other and results in a very physically affectionate and verbally affirmed relationship that they do not tone down in public because fuck you, that’s why.  Someone is always in someone’s lap and if someone else doesn’t introduce you, you will think both their names are ‘babe’ or ‘sweetie’. 

Now Izzy is 100% acts of service, literally does not understand any other kind of way of expressing or receiving love. Lucius leans into giving acts of service with Izzy and also finds that he’d rather receive quality time from him. Mostly because it’s harder for Izzy to give and therefore feels more precious. Making his goblin king boyfriend sit down and explain his bleak art house photography to him is Lucius' idea of a loving time.  If they’re out in the world, you will clock them as a couple even though they’re not touching. Mostly because Izzy is constantly checking in, circling him and generally being a weird pirhana person while Lucius unconciously reaches for him constantly.

Jim gives equal measures quality time and gifts. They express their love for Oluwande by giving him their full attention and providing him with things that Jim decides he needs. Jim has big cat energy.  Oluwande speaks fluent words of affirmation which Jim is starving for all the time, so well-matched there. He’s also really fond of quality time. They are the couple that most people don’t guess are together until you see them in a Cosco and Jim is nabbing all the best samples and bringing them back to Oluwande after a successful hunt.  They will also make to the register faster than any other couple and are the furthest under budget. They will not hold hands, but they will absolutely communicate entirely through eye contact until you’re sure they’re psychic. 

John and Frenchie.... Well. That would be a spoiler wouldn’t it?  ;)

#leda house and the kraken verse #ask answered #Jim Jimenez #Oluwande Boodhari #Pete Black #Lucius Black #Izzy Hands