I TOLD YOU SO

the cycle is so predictable it’s almost impressive at this point. rumors about them being seen with girls → people panic → sudden wave of posts trying to “prove” willmack is still real, still in love → and then the immediate reassurance posts like “thank you grace for showing us he wasn’t on a date” “grace saw how desperate we are so they had to remind us they’re still together”

willmack fandom feels larrie-coded in the worst way this post annoyed me so bad bc the pupil stuff is such a reach the lighting in that vid blows out his eyes the whole time not just when he mentions mack if u watch literally any locker room interview of him his pupils look the same no matter what he’s talking abt ppl are literally cutting the part where he mentions mack what actually bothers me more is how it’s crossed from silly fandom fun into straight-up invasive behavior. stalking his sister’s tiktok digging thru his mom’s facebook reposting old private pics of him as a minor and calling him a twink… weird and uncomfortable rpf is supposed to be abt enjoying a dynamic and playing in that fictional sandbox, not trying to prove they’re secretly together irl. once it turns into evidence boards and personal-life surveillance the fun is gone hopefully the break cools ppl down a bit bc rn it’s less “haha fun ship” and more… pls log off for a minute

this is literally what i was saying before people started twisting my posts like i was trying to kill the fun or that i hate will/mack or whatever they decided to invent. you know a fandom is a little cooked when basic boundaries start sounding controversial.

loveranalyzing random little details? every fandom does that, whatever. i roll my eyes and move on. but digging through family socials, old private photos, childhood stuff etc is where it stops being silly fandom behavior and starts being genuinely invasive. that shouldn’t be normalized. same with people deciding to hate leno or gabe over narratives they fully made up in their own heads.

tf? is anon 15? “let people enjoy things” trying so hard not to sound like a cunt but what do you think happens when people being freaks on main is seen by wm and people in their life? do you think they’re gonna love it? they’re gonna look at everything and be just so happy? that they won’t start gatekeeping more? Genuinely are you slow?

yeah this is exactly what’s been bothering me too. it’s one thing to enjoy a ship but the second people start rewriting real friendships into “threats” or “villains” just because they’re close to will, it stops being fun and starts feeling weirdly larrie core. gabe and leno aren’t side characters in a fic, they’re literally part of his REAL LIFE. i feel like some people forget that you don’t have to erase everyone else around them to enjoy willmack.

it’s honestly so obvious to me that he is a little different, and yeah i agree that people who deny it are either in denial or just got here recently. i don’t even mean there’s tension or anything dramatic it’s more about the way will and mack used to naturally look for each other. that easy, instinctive bench/celly dynamic feels more contained now. and maybe (this is just my read, obviously) nothing actually changed between them personally. we still get those little glimpses when they seem to think they’re not being filmed and they look relaxed and normal and open but in public? yeah, he feels more self-aware. they don’t automatically gravitate toward each other the same way, and when they do, it sometimes feels a bit more restrained like they know they’re being watched.

there’s been this wave of people who don’t watch a single game, don’t know the roster, couldn’t name three players on the San Jose Sharks if their life depended on it, but somehow exist purely as “willmack truthers.” and the way the ship burst the bubble and landed straight into the hands of a new generation of larrie-style fandom is… kind of wild to watch in real time.

everything now gets screenshotted, ripped out of context, reposted here or on twitter (i hate that place) with zero fact-checking, just so someone can go viral or prove they “noticed” something first. it stopped feeling like silly, fun rpf brainrot and started feeling like people are trying to build cases. like it’s less about enjoying the dynamic and more about proving something.

and the thing is if you’ve been in rpf spaces long enough, you know the unspoken rule is that the healthiest version of it is a little bit of gatekeeping, a little bit of self-awareness, and a LOT of keeping it contained. but willmack got so out of hand that even sharks media clearly knows what willmack twitter wants to hear which… yeah, not shocking. part of their job is literally monitoring fan engagement online. of course they know what gets clicks.

also, obviously will came back a bit different after the shoulder injury. if i had to guess, he probably opened tiktok, saw 500 untagged edits of himself and his friend (yeah, friend. not best friend. like yes, will and mack are close, nobody’s denying that. but that video where he hears best friend and looks like he has to physically restrain himself from rolling his eyes says enough lol) set to romantic music and went “okay. maybe let’s cut this off at the root.” honestly? good for him. i wouldn’t blame him.

at this point i half-jokingly feel like the only thing that would calm people down is either; their friendship getting visibly more distant, their on-ice chemistry cooling off or will getting photographed kissing some random blonde girl on a beach

(and even then people would say she’s a fake girlfriend hired to cover the relationship, because that genuinely feels like the current level of conspiracy thinking in this fandom 💀)