winter xoxo

Beach episodes require swimming, yeah? Except the Boiling Sea will literally kill you if you even try to approach it. But there's someone who can approach, someone who tried to do so this episode.

King Clawthorne.

The episode would be about King learning how to swim with everyone else giving him encouragement while having B and C plots in the background. Because none of them know how to swim either because, again, boiling sea. Luz tries by miming swimming on sand that King finds useless to him and Amity, who is also there, finds adorable.

But fear not, for there is someone else who can swim the boiling sea, who can approach the water without fear of burning. Hunter, whose dealing with being a grimwalker over more than a few episodes as he and Steve try to find themselves.

Except here's the thing folks: Hunter *also* does not know how to swim. So it'd be two idiots who don't know how to swim trying desperately not to drown because they're the only ones who can even approach the water.

during the opening we see willow see that gus is in a very similar situation to her, and offers him some company as well as teaches him her dads' breathing exercise that helps her calm down.

next, we see gus show a lot of concern for hunter even if he's still wary of him at first, and later in the episode he teaches hunter the very same breathing exercise and also finds a way to sympathize with hunter and tells him, "not everybody's great, but not everyone's bad either".

and later, when gus is spiraling down his own bad thoughts, it's hunter's turn to reach out to him and comfort him. this time hunter tries to help gus with the breathing exercise he learned from gus...even though he didn't replicate it completely, his earnest attempt was enough to finally help snap gus out of his whirlwind of thoughts.

and, when hunter was trying to help calm gus down, he echoes back the same words that gus told him earlier during his breakdown. "i promise. i wouldn't mess with you."

another central theme of this episode is trust, and it's nice to see how it develops between gus and hunter, and also willow, even though she spent most of this episode separated from the other two. remember, in any sport a storm willow extends that trust to hunter, and gus was really wary of him. hunter almost broke that trust, but managed to restrengthen it by standing up for willow and the rest of the flying derby team.

during the start of this episode, gus still had some distrust towards hunter, but gus is very perceptive and soon realizes he can trust hunter. and the trust that develops between these two are what ultimately helps break them out of the predicaments they found themselves in. not to mention, willow was able to stand up for hunter because of something she shared with gus, which gus then shared with hunter.

Hunter's Worst Memories Montage is about what we'd expect, given what we've seen of his past and character thus far. Except for one which was pointed out to me on discord tonight.