Promise me you'll think about the implications

You might argue that Dream Machine and Hey, Melissa! were not made into official episodes and therefore shouldn't be necessary. And while you definitely don't need to know about these episodes to enjoy Hatchetfield in general, I think anyone who is specifically interested in Paul's character should appreciate the insights these stories provide and try to engage in the themes and patterns they explore. The fact that they were conceptualized at all to the point of having full plot summaries and a drafted script (the second Nightmare Time script ever written in fact) gives us a good grasp of the creators’ ideas surrounding who Paul is. These episodes fit perfectly with his characterization in fully produced installments and reinforce his story so much that I think it would be an oversight not to analyze them just because they're technically unofficial or–in many people's opinion–uncomfortable.

Hey, Melissa! is easier to find and watch since it was read live, so here's a brief summary of Dream Machine (if you’d like to hear it directly from Matt Lang, skip to 38:14 in the Nerdy Prudes Must Livestream! VOD on YouTube): 

The story opens on Ted and Charlotte in bed together.

“Gee, Ted, don’t you think something at the office is weird?” asks Charlotte.

“I don’t know, Charlotte, what’s weird?” Ted responds, offended. “Is there something weird? Are you trying to point out that someone in our office is weird, Charlotte?”

“No, I’m not saying that…”

“Spit it out, Charlotte! Who do you think is weird?”

“I didn’t say he was weird I just think it’s…” She sighs. “I just think it’s weird that at our office, there’s a coworker of ours who’s a four foot tall anthropomorphic squirrel who can talk.”

“Charlotte, why are you still obsessing about this? Peanuts fell into a vat of ooze with mutagenic properties and was transformed into a four foot tall anthropomorphic squirrel who can talk! And he just wants to live a normal life, without people like you fetishizing him.”

Cut to: Peanuts the Hatchetfield Pocket Squirrel. Four feet tall. Talking. Working at CCRP for some reason. But other than that, very normal. He’s in love with a waitress who sings and works at the Birdhouse, named Tina. Tina is kidnapped by people from CCRP, so Peanuts has to go into the basement of CCRP to save her. When he gets down there, Mr. Davidson has Tina tied up, threatening to kill her unless Peanuts does what he says.

Peanuts puts his hands up. “I’ll do whatever you want, what do you need me to do?”

“Don’t listen to him, Peanuts!” Tina says. “He can’t hurt me.”

“What are you talking about, Tina, he’s got a gun on you!”

“Peanuts,” says Mr. Davidson, “I want you to open this box.” He points to a black box.

Tina yells, “Don’t open the box, Peanuts! Don’t open the box! You don’t wanna see what’s inside!”

“I can’t, Tina!” Peanuts replies. “I got no choice, he’s gonna shoot you!” 

He opens the box-

-and suddenly Paul Matthews wakes up with a violent gasp. Everything beforehand had been a dream where Paul thought he was Peanuts. He is hooked up to something that CCRP is experimenting with called the Dream Machine, where you can live your greatest dream. Paul’s greatest dream is to be the hero of Hatchetfield. And the only person everyone in Hatchetfield loves unconditionally is Peanuts, so he became a four foot tall anthropomorphic squirrel.

So. Paul comes out of the machine and the scientists check up on him.

“You’re back, Paul.”

“...What is this? No, I’m not a man. I’m Peanuts!”

“Oh no.”

“We’ve lost another one.”

Turns out, it’s common for people who enter the dream machine to exit believing that the dream was their real life. The scientists send Paul back to his regular life, but he’s two feet taller than he thinks he should be, he feels the lack of his strong front teeth and bushy tail. He hates it. He wants to be a squirrel.

The people in Paul’s life are trying to get him over this. Thinking it will help, Ted dresses as a penguin and brings Paul to The Barnhouse, a club frequented by Hatchetfield’s thriving furry community. He tries introducing Paul to a furry, but Paul exclaims, “This is disgusting! I don’t want to have sex with a squirrel, I AM a squirrel!”

And then it leads to a very, very upsetting end. Whatever that is, it hasn’t been revealed to the public. 

The Lang Brothers said that scrapped Nightmare Time stories are either

Too stupid

Too upsetting, or

Too weird

According to them, Dream Machine is all three. So suffice to say, it does not end well. But we’ll get into that later. (Side note: my favourite detail of this story is the implication that Paul knows about Ted and Charlotte's affair, since that scene took place in his dream.)

A few things to establish before we begin:

1. This functions half like an informative analysis, and half like a creative writing piece where I just needed to get these thoughts out of my head. The latter is what it started as, so it was not really created with the intent to get ideas across to other people. And it’s also barely edited because I wanted to finish this before TGWDLM:Reprised! begins showing. I’m sorry if it’s somewhat hard to follow, and I kind of purposefully wrote it as its own piece with double meanings and references and ways to interpret it. Also, keep this in mind: 

There's a million different angles and interpretations you can view this series with. I've barely laid out a fraction of them, and whatever I say here is not divine scripture straight from the Black Book or something. I am just one person who overthinks about the implications. Speaking of which…

2. Please promise me you'll think about the implications. It's obviously not the viewers’ fault that Hey, Melissa! was delivered as an unpolished script and tends to leave more of an impact based on shock value rather than its actual character exploration; but for that reason I've spent a lot of time thinking about it, trying to piece together what the story is all about, and I think the implications are incredibly interesting. The structure and subtext of an amazing story is there, even if the execution is undercooked.

3. Ever since watching episode 2 of Nightmare Time, I've privately thought of future Ted as the “Time Bastard” instead of the more colloquial “Homeless Man” and that's how I'll refer to him throughout.

4. Based on the livechat from Nerdy Prudes Must Livestream!, it seems like a lot of people misunderstand Paul 23 and Android Emma as nearly separate, wrong, evil versions of the original Paul and Emma. It was kind of surprising to see so many people in the chat become upset when Paul acted violently in Hey, Melissa! and they exclaimed that this wasn't Paul, Paul wouldn't do this, he must be a clone. Everyone… the artificial Paul and Emma in Forever and Always think and behave exactly like the originals. That's why Paul has the exact same relationship dynamics with his coworkers and even continues to work at CCRP despite what they put him through. That's why the real Emma is so distressed that her double has predicted and copied her every move. That's why the two of them end up together in the first place. Paul and Emma will always find each other again, even as an android and a clone. (If you need Word of God to believe me, Matt Lang explicitly confirms this during Nerdy Prudes Must Livestream! 5:38:37)

Thanks to this fascinating scenario, at points where I talk about Paul 23's actions as part of reinforcing the character analysis, I will often refer to him without the additional monikers of “clone” or “23” and rather as if he is Paul himself, because in all practicality, he is. He's the exact same person, just placed in different circumstances.

5. This one is important: I operate under the common consensus that Paul is autistic, and I’ve found that the more you analyze him, the more apparent it becomes. It’s funny but not surprising that he wasn’t written with this intention and that this paradoxically resulted in a well-rounded autistic character who is written with flaws and nuance and so much depth to the way this core part of him is embedded in his personality. If you haven’t thought about him from this angle, I highly suggest watching this video:

I have a few differing opinions and interpretations, but overall it provides a clear, informative breakdown of the autistic reading of The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals and is explained very well.

If you’re interested in a more broad analysis of the first Hatchetfield musical, I highly recommend reading this: https://wits-writing.tumblr.com/post/666594771464339456/the-guy-who-didnt-like-musicals-and-the-roles-we 

It’s my favourite analysis of the story thanks to how comprehensive it is.

And if you’re more of a video essay kinda guy, the videos below are ones which prompted me to think about the implications deeper than I otherwise would’ve. It’s interesting to see so many different readings because even if I don’t subscribe to each idea presented, seeing so many perspectives and ways to interpret these stories has helped open my eyes to the layered, complex writing of the Hatchetfield series.

(That last one was a huge inspiration for me to write this. Video essays unfortunately aren't a medium I'm confident in, but if this was adapted into a more digestible video version, it'd probably be titled something like “Paul Matthews & the Secret to Happiness”)

Now, it’s showtime!

The world being outside of your control

If you’ve seen any Hatchetfield installment, you know what I’m talking about. The protagonists could do everything right with the information they have and still lose it all. In TGWDLM, this is evident in its horrifying conclusion. The characters did their best with the information they had. Emma had a sound theory, Paul fought until the end and sacrificed himself, and still, it wasn’t enough. They are unaware of the medium they occupy and the narrative they are a part of. Of course they were never going to win, the musical is all there is and all there ever was. It was inevitable.

Sometimes life plans are cut short. Sacrifice isn’t rewarded. The decks really are always just this stacked by no fault of your own.

But for a time, we had to try. We could believe in each other. We met in the eye of the storm and it was worth something. At the end of the world, it was worth everything.

The cyclical nature of hurting our children

Kids in Hatchetfield are constantly failed by the adults they should be able to trust, and then go on to cause more harm, or die in an apocalypse, or worse yet, grow up into those same jaded adults. This is much more prominent in Black Friday and Nerdy Prudes Must Die as well as certain Nightmare Time episodes which have children as central characters, but it is still present in TGWDLM via the storylines of Alice, Bill, and Emma. And perhaps to a certain degree, Paul himself.

The Woodwards are on the tamer side of toxic cycles in comparison to the likes of the Chasitys or the Jerries, but they are still emblematic of this pattern. Bill is well-meaning but dismissive of Alice’s opinions and feelings when it comes to dating Deb, which builds up her contempt towards the way he judges her life, and leads to her hiding things from him, ultimately putting her more at risk than if Bill had been genuinely supportive and open to conversation (e.g. secretly hanging out with the Smoke Club, getting off the bus to go see Deb and getting infected). Whether they were her real feelings or manipulation from the Hive, every fear and insecurity Bill has about his relationship with his daughter is thrown back in his face once Alice is assimilated, and his time spent arguing with her turns into time stolen from them both.

Emma’s upbringing positioned her as the moon to Jane’s sun, and while she doesn’t speak ill of her parents, that kind of feeling of inferiority doesn’t come from nowhere. She clearly has the brains and potential to do great things, but Emma wandered the world without planting roots or forming ambitions because her sister was “the good one” who would always overshadow her, so why try at all? Her perceived shortcomings keep her from ever seeing Jane again before the car crash, keep her from returning to Hatchetfield until it’s too late. She’s an adventurer with small town boredom, but only because she’s an adult still stuck on her teenage years, and she’s disoriented from the light after spending too long in someone else’s shadow.

Paul is a bit harder to explain, and you could read the scenes expositing what little we know about his background in a number of ways. It’s implied from the lack of a theatre department that Sycamore has less funding in comparison to Hatchetfield High, and he half-jokes to Emma that he hated himself. Whether that self-awareness was present in high school or he realized it later in life, Paul seems to have internalized that there is only so much he can hope for from his station, which is why he never admits his own unhappiness until he is literally forced to let it out. He’s learned to be satisfied (or complacent—same difference) where he is, and gets upset when this is challenged, whether by charity workers reminding him of his fallibility, or friends who prompt him for more than he is used to. He lashes out. He becomes withdrawn. Paul’s dreams, small as they may or may not have been without outside influences, are dampened by the social environment around him since childhood. And as an adult, he becomes another feature of the environment, another apathetic extra idling about in a town that chews kids up for breakfast and spits them out as faceless corpses planted in the woods.

Put simply: hurt people hurt people. And no one goes through life unscathed.

Powerful forces will twist your wants to suit their own

Throughout TGWDLM, the Hive is constantly prodding and poking at Paul trying to make him admit what he wants. It's not even strictly necessary, as seen in Yellow Jacket, Pokey can take over bodies with no need for this extra step. But the third preview scene for Miss Holloween reveals in a single line that defiance is part of what endears him to certain characters. Pokey is uncompromising, but he's also theatrical, and impulsive, and perhaps he doesn't love the thrill of the chase like Nibbly, but he certainly loves the win. Like all the Lords in Black, he plays with the characters because it's entertaining, and what better stimulation for an all-powerful god than the subjugation of someone who desperately wants to evade your clutches? Characters like Hidgens who want to join the Hive are too easy, they're not satisfying prey. Hannah is powerful. Miss Holloway is defiant. Paul on the other hand is such a perfect worker that he was chosen to be cloned to create an entire subservient labour force for a secret mining colony on the moon. Paul is passive. Paul is docile. Paul is… something else. We’ll come back to that.

With each infection and isolation and death, we become acquainted with the characters’ wants, and how they are manipulated by the Hive. Charlotte wants her husband to love her. He serenades her while he rips her guts out. Bill wants his daughter back. She shoots him with a shotgun to assimilate him into the Hive. Ted wants to be a better person, he claims. But what he really wants is self-preservation and importance. Why, now he's a loyal soldier to a force higher than he could imagine, and he'll hold that thin blue line down to preserve the future the Hive is building! What could be better than that?

The true desires of all these people are twisted until they fit into the world the Hive wants, no matter how antithetical to their true personalities it may be. It doesn't matter that Bill attempts suicide after he is taunted by the alien puppeting his daughter's body. It doesn't matter that MacNamara entered Hatchetfield to fight the extraterrestrial threat. It doesn't matter that Paul doesn't like musicals. The only important thing is falling in line and joining everyone else in the Hive. Your petty human squabbles, your strife, your longing and attempts to be better, to hope for more… none of it matters in the face of apotheosis. Your individuality is just an obstacle in the way of true world peace. Nevermind all that. Never think about it again. If you clear your mind, empty it of troubles, and simply do as the highest authority says? According to that authority, you will be happy.

According to the world as it truly is, you are as good as dead.

Your wants drive your life

TGWDLM is a story that examines the power of desire and disdain, of wanting and not wanting, mainly through Emma and Paul’s contrasting personalities and character motivations. Paul is a temperate fellow who, if his disdain for musicals didn’t exist, honestly already lives the life that the Hive would otherwise want for him. He is rather content in his disposition, not wanting to go out of his way to help nor hinder other people. In another story, he’d be an unassuming background character (in several installments, he is). The Lords in Black feed on your unfulfilled dreams for their own satisfaction and power, so this expression of complacency, as well as his disdain for musicals, is what allows him to survive for so long. Paul is unable to be turned until close to the end when he admits aloud that he wants a romantic relationship with Emma, and once the infection takes root the Hive can coax out his deeper dissatisfaction with life and true desire for happiness.

Emma on the other hand is crabby and headstrong, with a desire to make something of herself. She has lived an adventurous life and now, motivated by Jane’s death, she has strong ambition and a specific vision she can share with precise precision. Emma has that one concrete goal that motivates all her actions. Emma is the final survivor. Her desires to live, to make something of herself, to die anywhere but Hatchetfield, are what allow her to escape the Hive and carry her to the end. And technically, she got what she wanted. Just like everyone else.

Emma and Paul are both stubborn and know precisely what they want and what they don’t want, respectively. Both are fine perspectives to operate from, but the Hive flattens out any variance in its members, or co-opts their beliefs and twists them to suit Pokey’s conformist tune (“Do you wanna save the planet? Well there's just one way you can do it. By singing a song… Singing along!”). Emma is free-spirited and values her autonomy more than almost any other character in Hatchetfield. In Forever and Always, Android Emma points out that Emma wasn’t living her life to the fullest and that’s why she picked up what she wasn't using, while the original Emma Perkins asserts that hey, maybe running away was a shitty way to live, but it’s still my life, and you don’t get to take that decision away from me. Perky’s Buds explicitly lays out that she doesn’t ever want her dreams to be taken or controlled by other people, and even if all hope is lost, she will take back any kind of control she can and go down in a blaze of glory.

The interesting thing about Hatchetfield’s inevitable couple is that in a traditional story, Emma is the main character and Paul is the supporting love interest, or not even that sometimes. In the timeline shown in Nightmare Time 2, Emma gets a whole episode focused on her, while Paul only shows up for two quick cameos in Honey Queen. Emma is the plucky kid who knew she needed to escape this small town life, the adventurous wild child who ends up coming back and settling down. Emma has the passion to drive the primary plot. None of the characters in TGWDLM survive as long as they do if she doesn’t bring them to Hidgens’ manor. Tom doesn’t get to Lakeside Mall for Black Friday if Emma’s unwilling to spend time with Tim. Emma has wants. Emma is defiant. So why is Paul the leading man?

Well for one, Emma is honest with her feelings, and unlike Paul, she isn’t avoiding thinking about her dissatisfaction with her life. She acknowledges her failings and is actively working towards improving her situation, and therefore doesn’t have this blind spot for the Hive to exploit. Like Emma, Paul is stubborn. He doesn’t want to extend himself for Greenpeace Girl, or the Time Bastard, or even his best friend Bill. Taking the theme of disdain beyond TGWDLM, it's implied that Paul not wanting to do any of Melissa's activities because of his dislike of cats is how he manages to avoid being kidnapped by her in the majority of timelines. He is a character who is seemingly defined by his lack of wants, and only really defiant in the face of that which he wants to avoid.  Paul is the protagonist precisely because he is so hard for the Hive to grasp, and his supposed vagueness combined with his specific dislike of musicals angers Pokey, greatly.

Who is this background character, this completely average man to continue to evade and reject the will of god? Paul's disdain for musicals is the one thing that makes him completely incompatible with the Hive’s methods, so he is the forbidden fruit. The sweetest prize. Paul is principled. And this isn't to say that he's a paragon of morality; far from it. He just has very clear dislikes and personal beliefs that he sticks by, and nothing short of psychological torture can take that away from him. 

Humanity is not Black and White

Based on YouTube comments and my own personal experience watching with friends, it seems like people miss the nuance of characters in TGWDLM on a first viewing. The first scene at CCRP is the best example of this. People view Paul as an asshole after he turns down Bill, simplifying the entire interaction and labelling Bill as “good” and Paul as “bad.” Paul in that scene knows his own boundaries and asserts them clearly. He's honest with Bill and isn't going to put himself through his own personal hell to attempt to solve Bill's problems which run much deeper than Alice’s mom having the money to bring her on a trip to Broadway. Bill guilt trips Paul with the line, “I'm trying to reconnect with my teenage kid and you're just gonna leave me hanging?” and maybe this would work on someone other than Paul, but his friend simply says no and offers a bit of more tangible comfort in the form of a caramel frappe. Bill is not some poor victim in this scene, and at the same time, Paul's no angel. He doesn't extend himself for Bill or offer further advice or thoughts beyond a sarcastic “Wow. She'll like that just as much as Hamilton,” and he doesn't even get him the damn caramel frappe. These two are best friends, and still they hurt each other, and still they love each other. 

The best description I’ve ever seen of Paul is “balanced.” Some people swing too far in the opposite direction of asshole and try to prop him up as an upstanding citizen or extremely kind person, but neither of those are true. He’s balanced. For as much as he is making up excuses when he's going to Beanie's to see Emma, we see in Nightmare Time that he really does prefer to give his money to local businesses, heading to The Java Café for his coffee instead of Starbucks. He gets extremely defensive when his morality is challenged, but he doesn’t want to interact with the homeless guy asking for spare change. He keeps up with community events and local news but shuts off the TV the second the story he cares about finishes. He’s devoted to his wife, but also dismisses her confession about her identity until he literally sees her choking her doppelganger in a bar full of corpses.

Paul is one of the most interesting everyman characters I've ever seen because although he is an ordinary person acting as the audience surrogate, the series plays around with the idea of what an “average” person actually is. It is deceptively difficult to write an everyman character, mostly because being a blank slate anyone can project onto means that one rather lacks character, lacks specificity and the drive to push a story forward. But Paul, while lacking in ambition, is his own person and IS someone specific. How many of us can say we have a stable job and health insurance and a pothead soulmate? Who here likes black coffee and dislikes musicals but continues to watch them in hopes of finding one that you like? What kind of building do you live in? Do you know the names of your neighbours? Do you know their full educational history? Their family ties? Paul is average. And average people are not complete blank slates, no matter how much or how little we know about each other. 

The Hatchetfield series is interested in deeply real, human behaviour. It is filled with characters who are complex and sympathetic as much as they are twisted, and it does not shy away from showcasing the less flattering parts of ourselves. This is exemplified in Paul especially, a guy born and bred in Hatchetfield, and who likes it no matter how fucked up. He is generally nice. He uses recent serial murders as an excuse to make a move on his crush. He works a boring job he hates because it gives him insurance. He sucks at talking to kids. He ignores the murders of innocents so he can maintain his relationships. He sacrifices himself to stop the apotheosis. He is full of contradictions and kindness and aggression and messy, sheer humanity.

I’ve never been happy

Wouldn’t that be nice?

Is this the secret?

Singing and dancing through life

It’s kind of been driving me mad that this line is so underappreciated and I haven’t seen anyone else comment on this because it was glaringly obvious to me the first time I heard it: “Singing and dancing through life” is a reference to the Wicked song “Dancing Through Life”, where the characters sing about being empty minded, about never questioning or examining anything, and revelling in the joys of ignorance and repression.

Stop studying strife

And learn to live the unexamined life

Dancing through life, skimming the surface

Gliding where turf is smooth

Life's more painless for the brainless

Why think too hard when it's so soothing?

Dancing through life, no need to tough it

When you can slough it off as I do

Nothin' matters but knowin' nothin' matters

It's just life

So keep dancing through

It's such a brilliant line because it reflects Paul's situation on a meta level that a portion of viewers watching won't even pick up on, which is entirely the point! If you're not familiar with musical theatre or Wicked in particular, how could anyone expect you to recognize what is being referenced and really said here? How could you be blamed for something completely unintuitive that you need to learn about? Is this the secret? Not understanding because no one will explain, but masking all your distress, going with the flow, accepting that you are viewed as stupid and lesser than and emptying your head of thoughts and resistance because “life is more painless for the brainless”? Life is fraughtless when you’re thoughtless. Wouldn’t that be nice?

“I've never been happy” is such a simple yet incredibly layered line. What does happiness mean in this context, in the blend of Paul’s innermost thoughts and the Hive’s coercion? Is it social acceptance? Is it unconditional love? Is this Paul admitting he is unhappy with his life, or is it him mourning the fact that he has never naturally fit in with society and him identifying all the things he hasn't accomplished as markers of unhappiness? The answer, at least in my opinion, lies somewhere in the middle of all these readings.

Paul is rather content with the life he lives, isn't he? He likes his routine of working a (seemingly) standard office job, walking to the same coffee shop and drinking plain black coffee everyday, wearing extremely similar suits everywhere even when he's not at work. He wants money to survive, a partner, maybe kids someday, but for now he's fine going to work, talking with friends, flirting with the barista he has a crush on. Is this a happy life? On some level, yes, but maybe not entirely. I mean, he gets by, surely. But he also doesn't exhibit much interest in… anything? If anything, he has a special disinterest in musicals. Paul is… not quite depressed. But not quite satisfied either. He's fine. He spends his days surfing the web, specifically pretending to do his job while scrolling through Facebook. We know he plays video games and board games, watches movies, and the closest we ever get to him leading that “happy life” is finding purpose through his relationship with Emma. He's completely fine with this. Or at least he would be, if he didn't keep having to justify himself, to act out unnatural social niceties, to deal with coworkers who are passive-aggressive about his boundaries, to listen to overstimulating musicals that everyone seems to like except him.

The reason Emma is his soulmate and he finds fulfillment with her is because she forces no judgement on the way he communicates or moves through the world, he doesn't have to constantly prove himself or mask his feelings, and they love each other as they are. Until she comes into the picture, Paul is certainly well-liked enough and has a handful of friends, but the people around him and especially strangers in passing aren't completely understanding of this; nice as they may be, they don't quite fully accept the quiet life he leads. The world isn't built for people like him. But Paul knows who he is. And if he wasn't constantly faced with these miniscule pressures, interrogations of his sincerity, disapproval of his integrity, then this life–even without a soulmate to “give him purpose”–could be happy.

The unfortunate truth, however, is that the world is outside of your control. Dealing with other people comes with the messy clash of personalities and opinions and circumstances that do not often have simple solutions. Life is made up of compromises. A lot of people won’t understand you, or accept you, and there will always be bargains that need to be made, work to do to move forward. But it’s so exhausting. Is it really worth the trouble?

This is based on my own interpretation because I’ve seen many people believe the contrary: When Paul asks, “Is my integrity worth anything at all?” this is not (primarily) a moment of pause and consideration where he debates joining the Hive. This is an existential question, in the same way you try to measure the objective merit of a sunset. In the same way you hit a low point and wonder if your life is worth anything when you are a speck of dust in this infinite universe. Paul asks aloud if his integrity, his beliefs, his principles, mean anything when faced with such a world where everyone but him seems to have figured it out. And the world answers, “No.” You’ve finally learned the secret to happiness, so why are you so adamant and stubborn in your useless, worthless opinions when you can only join the rest of the world once you let go of your grip on them? Let your damn reasons go. Let your integrity fall. You can never be happy otherwise.

This is the lie that the Hive tells its victims and the lie it believes itself.

Remember this recurring pattern: Powerful forces will twist your wants to suit their own. The Hive proclaims its domination as the only answer to people's problems. Regardless of how varied and different the problems are, the Hive insists on the apotheosis as the final solution (a lyric which is horrifyingly on the nose). Given the rest of the Hatchetfield series, doesn't this sound familiar? Familial, even?

“You think Wiggly can fix this hole, but he can't. It's a trick. That's how it works, he promises to fix all of the holes, but he doesn't. And that's why it works on adults. Because you guys have more holes; you need more things and you need it harder. You gotta worry about your loveless marriage, or the kids that are gonna hate you, or your endless mortgage. I mean, you're, like, 40, you probably think your life is over! I don't. I'm gonna be an actress! Do you get what I'm saying, Mr. Houston? Wiggly is a fucking lie. And I think you know it. But I think you're scared. Because if he's not the answer... then what is?”

Rather than classic eldritch horror which inspires dread due to incomprehensibility, the Lords in Black are a different take on all-powerful beings, and are terrifying almost because they are comprehensible. They are representations of banal horrors in the modern world which are upheld by systems of power that may be difficult to confront, but can be understood. The Lords promise happiness via submission and the shortcuts to supposed success. Through worship, through consumption, through the sacrifice of others, through all the channels that lead back to their own power. But by implicating you in their schadenfreude, by promising vindication and privilege and the satiation of your hunger, you get lost in the spell, in this deep sleep where all the easy choices are justified and right. You lose sight of the cruel reality in front of you. You forget your wants. Your wants become subsumed by something bigger.

The main overarching theme of The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals is the horror of conformity.

And the words will come to you

We swear we will teach you

What it means to love

What it means to OBEY, Paul!

According to the Hive, love means giving up what makes you you, obeying so you can be fully accepted, so you can join the party, so the world becomes unified with one Singular Voice. If what you truly feel is love, then “isn’t that worth a show-stopping fiesta?” Why aren’t you expressing it in a way we can all understand? Stop resisting. Stop disobeying. The very first line Paul sings in Nightmare Time is this for a reason:

No need to contemplate

How deeply that you're afraid

Don't question it. It's futile. Happiness is guaranteed when you succumb to the inevitable and become part of the predestined mold that we must grow accustomed to. Because it fills the holes in our soul. Because it tells us that we are great again.

But there are no answers to be found in this solution. The Hive doesn’t actually fix anything in these characters’ lives, it only makes them compliant with the situation at hand. McNamara never resolves the problems he has with PEIP’s methods and instead becomes a soldier focused solely on ruthless orders. The Time Bastard is still tortured and unhoused, but now plays the part of a joyous chorus member, happy with his life on the streets. Hidgens never fulfills his dream of producing Workin’ Boys… but he joined the Hive willingly, did he not? Wasn't he asking for it? Wasn't he happy?

Hidgens’ heel turn is mainly used for comic relief and is iconic in that regard, but it's also emblematic of an unfortunate kind of reaction to authoritarianism. Something halfway between despondency and rejuvenation. When people have gone on for quite a while hoping for change but seeing none, it can become too tiresome to carry on. Some start to blame themselves for all the world's problems they cannot single-handedly fix, or they blame others and become bitter and jaded. And in this time, the enchantment of leaders promising a picturesque recreation of the past is too comforting to resist. For the same reason that retro pop culture regains traction during a recession, the apotheosis reawakens Hidgens’ love for musical theatre, as its presentation acts as equal parts distraction and dream-come-true. Finally, Henry can relive his college days. He can live without worrying about nuclear holocaust or climate change or any of the anxiety that comes with going outside and interacting with people you might not be in sync with. Because this new uniform regime is the true solution. It will bring world peace. And perhaps other people may find it difficult to sing and dance, but Henry? He was built for this. This won't hurt him like it does the others. It's his second chance.

As Lex Foster so aptly put it: adults have more holes. They need more things and they need it harder. Those simpler glory days of youth before become romanticized, idealized, and become a goal that is near impossible to reach, perhaps because it never existed in the first place. Perhaps what changed after adolescence has less to do with the past being better, but more to do with your awareness expanding and responsibilities growing. But your resentment must go somewhere. And it's harder to direct it at the authoritative, lest it bounce back from the force of their power acting as a shield. It becomes draining, all this accumulated life experience only contributing to a hopeless feeling in the pit of your stomach. And you recognize the apocalypse for what it is, but the euphoric idea of unity and living out your dream is simply worth the price. When the world is rebuilt, it will be heaven. It doesn't even cross your mind that it could be another man's own personal hell.

This mindset blinds Hidgens to the reality of the life he's chosen, the people he has to hurt if he wants this utopia achieved. He lets go of his integrity and readily accepts the puppeteered corpses pretending to be his boyfriends because it's better than the reality, and he doesn't want to acknowledge their deceitful dancing and hungry eyes. At the moment he asks to be made a part of the Hive, Henry Hidgens is completely blindsided by the pain of what he's chosen, what he believed would not harm him if he gave up the fight and instead embraced it with open arms. He chokes out, “Wait-” he cries, “Not my tummy!” because on some level he believed himself exempt from the violence of the force he's aligned himself with, believed that he could pick his poison and benefit from the aftereffects. And at the end of it all, he’s not happy like he thought he would be. He’s just dead. Just like everyone else.

In the audition tapes, Charlotte describes the signs of Sam’s apotheosis like this:

“But he didn’t seem drunk. He seemed… happier than I’d seen him in a long time. And in fact, when I went into the kitchen, he’d made me breakfast! A big pot of coffee and two eggs sunny side up just the way I like ’em! And it was so nice and, well, I hate to say this because well, he’d done it for me, but it was just so… unusual. It frightened me. So I left. Without eating. I didn’t even say goodbye. And… heavens to betsy, I… I don’t know why, but I just got so scared. Just, Sam seemed so happy, and… That song he was singing… how did it go?”

Charlotte is unfortunately the least featured CCRP Tech employee in the Hatchetfield series so it’s difficult to definitively say a lot about her, but it seems that she tends to ask questions and push back when pushed too far. In Dream Machine, she questions why a mutagenic squirrel works at CCRP, while Ted gets upset and tells her to stop obsessing and just accept things as they are. In TGWDLM, Charlotte is the first friend of Paul’s to feel frightened by the apotheosis, and the first to be killed. She notices right away that Sam isn’t behaving like himself. Even if he acts out the perfect marriage she dreams of, she can tell that there is something wrong with the display of affection, and it frightens her. This isn’t genuine. This isn’t happiness. This is death.

Charlotte is not under the impression that the Hive offers anything but her doom. But the thing that lures her and Paul in, even if just momentarily, is the offer of happiness. Love. Belonging. The things which we crave and the things that can be used against us. The variety of reactions to the apotheosis among the main cast mean that we as audience members are likely to see ourselves in at least one of them, but if we think about what is considered an “average” response, it is simply becoming infected like all the extras we see before Paul even starts his work day. And as an extremely average joe, he would have been caught, too, if not for the people around him. Namely, (unsurprisingly) Emma. Paul is spurred to action and survives until he blows up the meteor because of her initiative, her connections, his desire to see her and be with her. Emma is the supervillain of the play because she is the reason Paul doesn’t like musicals.

Maybe you have a few passions, or perhaps you float through life aimless, but it is almost always because of other people that you might discover something new within you. It is because of Emma that Paul is the main character. More than just being smitten, Paul is motivated by Emma. He seeks understanding from her at Beanie’s, he comforts her during their heart-to-heart at Hidgens’ manor, he goes on a suicide mission so that she might survive. It is his want for her that gets him infected. And make no mistake, this motivation is not just exclusive to his love interest. He puts himself in harm’s way to warn Charlotte to get away from Sam. He knows that the chances of survival are slim, but guides Bill to his daughter. Paul is an exploration of the average person. Perhaps we can be unsociable or easily influenced or completely unremarkable, but however briefly, perhaps we can escape the horror of conformity if we become influenced and motivated by the people around us. That is what it means to live. To change others, to be changed.

Even if it wasn’t forever, it was for good.

Where Paul is soft spoken, Ted is crass; where Paul is defiant, Ted is pliable; where Paul is embraced, Ted lays dead. Ted has a secret kindness to him underneath all the (many, many) layers of self-interest, while Paul's self-interest is covered by an air of nicety. He is generally kind, at least on the surface, and only becomes ruthless in dire circumstances.

In contrast to Paul, Ted takes to dehumanization very easily because the core of his character (greatly simplifying it) is self preservation and desperation for affection, which he has trained himself to manifest as sexual desire. It is even a relief sometimes if he no longer has to think about his life and live as himself. He’s a horny creep at the Honey Festival which gets Sheila’s attention, and he immediately agrees to marry her despite knowing nothing about her. He stays in Melissa’s apartment even though she’s mutilated him because he thinks she’ll fuck him later. He chooses to die as Konk because Lucy loved him for doing toddler levels of problem solving. Nothing in Jenny's goodbye letter ever indicated that Andy was a pushy asshole and that was the reason why she chose to marry him; that's simply an assumption Ted made all on his own, and he recreates himself around this misogynistic “nice guys finish last” mindset. Internal and external pressures are frequently focused on in Hatchetfield, and Ted and Paul are some of the best exemplifiers of this. Ted is mainly miserable in an internal, self-inflicted way, as opposed to Paul who seems self-assured but faces external obstacles. 

Melissa on the other hand is Paul’s worst attributes carried out to harmful extremes. This is something she shares in common with Paul’s other major protagonist, the Singular Voice himself, Pokotho. Paul is possessive and stubborn and justifies all his actions clinging to the belief that he is a good person. Or at least not a bad person. He’s only doing what he must. “This is how I achieve a happy life,” Paul 23 says while replacing Paul Matthews. “This is how I get rid of terrible people,” Melissa says while dismembering men in her apartment. “This is how I bring about world peace,” Pokey says while subjecting every civilization he can reach to an existence of mindless slavery. But they don’t think about it that way. No, this isn’t torment, this isn’t death. This is godhood, this is justice, this is what I am owed. This is what I deserve.

On a smaller, less lethal scale, think about Paul's very first interaction with Harmony Jones, aka Greenpeace Girl. When both honesty and deceit fail him, he becomes defensive and hostile, even holding a grudge against her the next day. And this isn’t irrational to him because in his head, she is the rude one. He isn’t wrong for having lied, she’s wrong for coming on so strongly with that whole “save the planet” thing. He’s not a bad guy, he insists to this stranger.

To his friendly coworker, Melissa, he's a bit more honest.

Something I think is as important as it is difficult to figure out is what the point of the Patches story is. Broadly, it’s to foreshadow Paul getting hit by a car at the end, but what does it say about him as a character, that this story parallels his captor’s actions? Well, we now come to Melissa as Paul taking things to extremes. While telling her the story of “his” childhood dog, Paul demonstrates this possessive love and this demand to change something’s identity to better fit his own life and understanding of them. The focus on his retelling of events is on the terrible guilt he feels for getting “Spot” killed, but the entire time he still uses the wrong name and even berates Patches’ original family, passing negative judgement on people who he doesn’t even know.

The story he tells directly lines up with the way Melissa treats him in the present, acting aggressively towards Emma and Bill (Paul’s real family), and possessively holding onto “Puss” as tight as she can. If we follow this line of thought to the very end, we can also infer that Paul’s feelings towards his cat, Whiskers, line up with Melissa’s feelings towards Ted. Paul would not mind at all if that “bad cat” died, as long as “Spot” was safe. We barely have to infer this actually, because this is exactly what happens at the end of Forever and Always when Paul chooses to stay loyal to his wife and stabs Emma Perkins to death. “It was the only choice I could make,” he says. Paul always prioritizes himself and his own over others.

When he wakes up in the hospital, Freddie Biggs explains to Paul that Melissa “put down” thirteen “dogs” without a lick of remorse, claiming that she had to, she didn't have a choice. The only regret she felt was for seemingly getting her cat killed, i.e. she only claimed responsibility for that which directly affected what she cared about. Melissa prioritizes herself and her own over others.

I won’t delve deep right now into the complicated way gender is written as a part of Hey, Melissa! but it is a very important part of the story. All the casual, almost flippant instances of sexual harassment towards women shown in this episode serve to reinforce how commonplace this misogyny is, and imply that it’s likely what pushed Melissa and the rest of Kitty-Cat Club to believing that these slobbering men are dogs who need to be put down. Though their worldview is fundamentally flawed and dehumanizing, it developed from a place of real hurt and social oppression. Like Audition and Carrie and Hard Candy and many more stories before it, Hey, Melissa! aims to showcase the horror of mirrored action, someone who's been harmed doling out both retribution and unearned vitriol. The fear of subtle, normalized slights against a group being paid back in violent action.

Likewise, but again to a lesser degree, Paul's refusal to respect people who aren't immediately affable to him potentially stems from a lifetime of accumulated discomfort (though this is much more open to interpretation). Throughout TGWDLM, people are constantly touching and grabbing and yelling at Paul, and he always flinches away or visibly self-stimulates using his hands to calm himself down. As a teenager, he went to the lesser-funded high school in town, aware that the other school hated them and not-so-jokingly also hating himself. As part of self preservation or perhaps his most violent tendencies requiring a push to the surface, the common disrespect and dismissal of his boundaries has lead to Paul learning to ignore the movements of the people around him, never extending himself or granting them grace in their supposed slights against him. It's a strange place to be in, to feel like other people are communicating in code, liking the musicals that make you squirm, all understanding something you do not. And that's why Paul is a dog person.

…Stay with me here.

Melissa is a cat person. She wants something cute and loving and completely non-threatening to her. She needs to have the upper hand in a situation to feel at ease, because as a woman, she has experienced the world of creepy men and come to resent it, becoming violent and cruel in response. Mangy dogs have to be put down. As an autist, Paul misses social cues, has his boundaries belittled, always feels just a little bit out of place. So Paul wants to be shown explicit affection. Not a show-stopping, uncomfortable fiesta of loud proclamations and performances, but no guesswork either. Something clear. Pure. Unconditional. So Paul is a dog person. 

My ears perked up while rewatching the episode when Paul talks about Whiskers and says she was mean to Spot. And I turned it over and over in my brain wondering if it means something that the girl-cat and boy-dog association applies to Paul’s story. Perhaps it’s completely innocuous, but let’s be honest, I’m reading into every single thing in Hatchetfield. So. Another reason why Melissa and Paul like cats and dogs respectively is because they are centering themselves. It’s a miniscule detail, but fits with the rest of their self-serving characterizations. Their love goes towards the animal associated with their gender, regardless of their actual understanding of these animals.

Both Paul and Melissa’s affinity for these pets seems to be at least partially built on misunderstanding animal behaviour. Paul doesn’t really take the dog’s autonomy into account when it comes to choosing who to love; Melissa gives Paul orders as if cats are obedient. But neither of them really care to consider that. They just know that pets don’t come with the baggage of people. They don’t harass you, they don’t challenge your worldview, they are cute and simple and don’t make love so hard. Cats are not obedient the way Melissa wants Paul to act, but neither of them care, because they will reach the end goal of safe, easy love and companionship, whether through positive or negative reinforcement. The ends justify the means, and if their ending is good, then they never need to examine themselves again.

The difference between them is that Paul has had the time to process what he did, to develop a healthier view of his actions, to look back on the situation with a hint of remorse; or even if he doesn’t feel guilt, he can admit he was in the wrong. It's the worst thing he's ever done. He comes to a more balanced conclusion about himself, though he is still loath to admit it. Melissa…doesn't do this. We don't know the specifics of her life story, but then again, we hardly know anything about Paul's background, too. For the sake of this analysis, it is not particularly relevant how they came to different conclusions about their actions. All that matters is that Melissa is a living mirror to Paul's past, and in it, he doesn't like what he sees. He doesn't like what he's done. He has to look away…or he has to distort the image.

No, Paul, no, it doesn’t make you a monster. But you need to let go of this dichotomy of Monsters and Men.

In the audition tape, Paul has a lot of explicit verbal examples of this:

Mr. Davidson: Who do you think you are? Mike Pence?

Paul: God no! I’m a decent person!

-

Paul: You’re talking to me like a normal human being.

Emma: Yes. Are you… not a normal human being?

Paul: NO.

Emma: …Alright.

Paul: No, I- I- I- I am normal. It’s everybody else that’s the problem.

-

Emma: Look, you seem like a nice guy-

Paul: I am.

In the show proper, he begins to justify himself to Greenpeace Girl by saying, “Look, I’m not a bad guy, okay? I’ve given to charities in the past-” And this view of Paul is even corroborated by his friends. When they escape Hidgens’ manor, Ted tells Paul, “I wish I could be brave. Like you.” Bill indirectly compliments Paul when he urges him to date Melissa and asks, “Is it crazy that I want her to be with a good person?”

It’s something few people want to acknowledge, and something even fewer people try to work on, but we are usually quite self-centred. We unknowingly think of ourselves as “good” and “right” since we can only see things from our limited individual perspectives. People become defensive when this is challenged, and we need to work to do better and expand our horizons. This egoism is one of the reasons I became so fascinated with Paul’s character, because I can’t recall the last time I saw an everyman who, as a narrative tool, is used to explore our tendency for subconsciously high self-regard; and as a character, really is as complicated and disagreeable as the average person you pass by on the street. 

Recall what happens in TGWDLM and Yellow Jacket and consider Pokey as Paul’s worst facets taken to extremes. The Singular Voice is the most uncompromising of the Lords in Black, and insists that what he offers the citizens of Hatchetfield isn’t death, but deification. Godhood. World peace. Goodness. This insistent egoism is something he may or may not recognize as a more tame but still prominent trait in Paul. They are two beings firm in their completely incompatible preferences and dancing around each other to the beat of gunshots and hurried footfalls. Something like recognition of the self through the other and hating what you see. Something like kindred spirits forming a terrible, inescapable bond.

The way Paul tries to sympathize with others is by relating their experiences to his own and sometimes projecting his personal feelings into a similar situation. Because this view of others is filtered through his own perspective, he often assumes/asserts good in others especially when he already has an affinity for them or when they are amicable specifically to him. This is why he describes Greenpeace canvasser Harmony Jones as “this very rude woman” and describes military general John MacNamara as “a good man.” This is why when he learns that his wife murdered everyone in a bar, Paul reasons that “she'd never do anything violent unless she was threatened” because HE only became violent and murderous when he was threatened. He clings to the flimsy rationale of “those bikers looked very scary” while failing to mention the fact that Emma also killed all the witnesses. He insists “she's a good person” and “she's a reasonable person” because this is what he wants to think about himself. And he fails to account for the fact that he killed the original Paul Matthews who did not know about the cloning experiments and did absolutely nothing wrong.

This is why Paul goes back to Melissa even after she's been arrested. He can understand the feeling of wanting to take care of someone, the possessive urge to hold on to what you believe you are entitled to, the terrible guilt of being responsible for the death of a pet. Enough time has passed since his dog's death that he can reluctantly admit that what he did was wrong, but that doesn't mean all those emotions about the experience have been forgotten. So when the same scenario plays out for Melissa, all those thoughts and rationalizations bubble up to the surface again, made worse by the fact that he can't think straight because of his concussion. Hey, Melissa! is the only story where Paul explicitly, verbally concedes his belief that he is a good person. But he appears to have this all or nothing, black and white, monsters versus men outlook. If he wasn't a good man, well… maybe he could be a good cat. Paul may be in the position of the pet, but through this situation he can project his feelings onto Melissa and rectify his past. In this fantasy where his actions always had merit, Paul wishes that if “Spot” never died, that he would happily choose to be part of Paul's family, that all that came before they found each other didn't need to be acknowledged. If Spot survived, he would understand that all Paul wanted was to love and protect him, ignoring the rest; and if given the opportunity, he would choose to stay.

And if all this seems convoluted and complicated and like the thought process does not hold up to scrutiny, you're correct. But it doesn't have to hold up. It just has to make their actions make some sort of logical sense, however flawed it may actually be, so they can continue thinking and behaving as they do without the discomfort that comes with considering you might be in the wrong. Paul knows he should have returned Patches to his family, but speaks poorly about said family anyway. Melissa knows Paul isn't really a cat, demonstrated by her scene with Emma, but the line between her lies and her beliefs is nonexistent. Pokey reveals in a frustrated rage (“Join Us and Die”) that he knows the members of the Hive die, even if just in individual spirit, but he continues to call it ascendance.

Paul and Melissa and Pokey and Emma and Ted and every person both in Hatchetfield and in the real world may do this throughout their lives. They have contradictions in their thought processes but use denial and omission and avoidance to aid their rationalizations, to avoid thinking about the disappointing parts of yourself or to defend yourself from perceived scrutiny. Out of sight, out of mind. Simply wrap up the body and toss it to the streets, to the basement, to the Hive, to the water under the Nantucket Bridge. Wash your hands of it, and don't think too hard about the life you chose.

Paul is stubborn in his opinions, slow to change, and sympathizes with others by relating their experiences to his own similar experiences. In other words: if given time, Paul can slowly work towards a healthier outlook and admit to mistakes, but in an immediate or urgent moment he may side with, or be taken advantage of, or be enabled by people who have caused harm but who he shares similar experiences with; and he will rationalize their actions in the same way he rationalizes his own. Even to his own detriment. Maybe especially to his own detriment.

But it’s okay, okay?

As long as he gets what he wants.

These desires are the most prominent in Dream Machine for obvious reasons: Paul’s greatest dream is on full display thanks to CCRP. What’s interesting about the simulated scenario isn’t that Paul wants to be a squirrel, but that he’s (mostly) still himself. It is mainly perception and circumstance which change in his dream world. The actions of “Peanuts” are no different from Paul’s day to day life; he goes to work at his boring office job and frequents the dining establishment where his crush works. The actions that he takes once “Tina” is kidnapped are not dissimilar to what he’d do in a more volatile timeline, like going to Hatchetfield High with Bill to rescue Alice, or strangling Freddie to save Melissa. His name and appearance might be different, but nothing about him on the inside has changed. Paul does not imagine himself as the Hatchetfield Pocket Squirrel because he wants to behave as an animal does and receive praise for a mindless, cute existence. He wants to act as himself, work at the same boring office job, avoid social events he doesn't like, and go to bars, but he wants to be loved without reluctance as he does this. He imagines a Ted who defends his right to exist as he is instead of calling him useless. He imagines dangerous scenarios that allow his heroism to shine through, that cause others to acknowledge that he is someone brave, he is someone worth caring about. He imagines his life as something worthy of admiration. He imagines himself, but loved. Adored.

When the illusion is shattered, Paul still believes he is a four foot tall anthropomorphic squirrel, and he cannot accept that he is not Peanuts, beloved by all. This is not unique to him and his psyche, since the CCRP experimenters grimace at another person broken by the machine. Paul is maladjusted, anxious and awkward in a body that he can’t remember is his, and we never learn how he fixes this, or if it’s resolved at all. 

Hey, Melissa! repeats the pattern of Paul Matthews’ story and shows the direction Dream Machine was headed towards. Paul is again subjected to the horrors of simply living in Hatchetfield, and is forced to become the pet of a sadistic murderer. He is humiliated and dehumanized and held captive in a visceral nightmare. But he also becomes a hero in this reality. Freddie Biggs says it straight to his face. He “causes” Ted’s death, but really, Ted is always his own worst enemy. He successfully saves Bill in this timeline, and he gets a group of serial killers arrested. He is free.

Until it’s revealed he never was. 

Once again, Paul is broken by his hellish experience, and at least in this timeline, he crawls back to the safety of that which harmed and imprisoned him in the first place. It’s nearly impossible to say how much of this was really of his own volition, both because the story is purposefully vague, and also because the script is not refined. In these two unmade Nightmare Time ideas, Paul’s story is both clear as day yet never fully realized. Dream Machine’s ending is unknown, but at this point it’s very safe to assume it does not end well. Or maybe it does, depending on your perspective.

Here is the arc of Paul Matthews’ narrative: He leads his boring, ordinary life. Sometimes he’s already met the love of his life, sometimes she’s absent for no reason at all. He is unobtrusive and mild-mannered and docile and perfect to project any idea of a person onto because he does not have enough interest nor awareness of this objectification to protest. His tempered personality grabs the attention of someone more something than he is. More powerful, more passionate, more daring, more dangerous. And when who he actually is as a unique, flawed person is incongruent with the life they imagine for him, he suffers the way the story demands. He is repeatedly denied and/or successfully stripped of his humanity and finds himself stuck in the life forced upon him. And, unfortunately for him, he’s happy. He is beatified. In a roundabout way, he gets to play the role of a hero; he gets the uncomplicated love he’s always craved; he’s happy to have this moment in the spotlight before quelling his misery and retiring back into the arms of maniacal captors and their grand schemes.

But both of these stories are still inconclusive, incomplete, and Paul is too brain damaged to clearly resolve the true question at the heart of his desire: Would he sacrifice his humanity and sense of self if it meant he could be loved?

Well, The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals provides a pretty solid answer: No. Paul fights the apotheosis and rejects godhood in “Let It Out,” he maintains his integrity and asserts his opinions against the medium he inhabits, screams and shouts, “I don’t like musicals!” as he enacts his suicide mission. Paul becomes a hero in this reality, not in a simulation or a dream, but leading a life of his own, and staying true to himself until the end. 

And in the end, it doesn’t matter.

Because the story is bigger than his desires. God has deemed him the leading man, and he must become a part of the hivemind, the star of the show. His defiance is tantalizing, his incompatibility with the medium is a challenge, a flaw to be overcome. He is not allowed to win because the world insists that there is a truer version of himself trapped inside of him, a Singular Voice that can and will come out, a version of him that can love and be loved, if only he allows himself to be taught. If only he obeys.

The horror of all of these stories is the way that Paul is forced into becoming something other than himself, that he is whittled and warped into accepting a facsimile of a “happy life” which destroys who he is but offers a twisted love which he can’t refuse. And not because he doesn’t want to refuse it, but because even if he reaches temporary freedom, he is trapped by forces outside of his control. Whether through scientific negligence or psychological conditioning or Eldritch magic, Paul is caught in a complex web spun from his desires and woven into the fabric of his being. Like nearly every character in Hatchetfield, Paul is a victim of the narrative. He is not particularly special or unique in this position. He is simply unfortunate, and heroic, and loved to the point of obsession. He got everything he ever wanted, and he was doomed right from the start.

There are a lot of discussions of love and happiness outside of Paul’s stories.

When Charlotte and Ted are left alone with an infected Sam, they have this exchange:

Charlotte: I wanted to make things work with Sam. I love him. I know I shouldn’t, but I do.

Ted: No, Charlotte, no! This guy is a scumbag, alright? You could upgrade… to a sleazeball. ...But you refuse to be happy.

Love itself isn’t enough to fix Charlotte’s marriage or improve Ted’s behaviour or end any of the addictions and lies and mundane small-town problems any of them have. Love keeps Charlotte tied to her husband. Love makes her refuse happiness. And even if she did choose to cut off Sam and date Ted, would that be enough to save her? Would he truly commit to change and build a happy life with her, or would they fall into their old habits of demeaning misogyny and deceitful affairs?

That’s all yet to be seen, if it ever even happens.

In Black Friday, Wiley coaxes Linda to reveal what she wants.

Linda: I want what everybody wants… to be loved. Is that a crime?

Wiley: Oh Linda, that’s the type of bullshit you feed your therapist and your life coach. Come on now! We all know that love is highly overrated. It’s a two-way street. You gotta give a little up yourself. But why should you give when you can get? No no no Linda, you wanna be… adored. Worshipped.

Linda and Wiley view love as compromise, and find it debasing and unpleasant to participate in. It's much better to be adored. Worshipped. Never conceding to those worker bees meant to serve you. Or you yourself could serve a higher power and find ways to make it suit your own agenda. But this doesn’t stop Linda from craving her father’s love and approval in Honey Queen, and she spends weeks practicing and sabotaging and murdering her way into his heart. And she nearly loses the competition because she loves her son; she can’t bring herself to sacrifice River just so she can get an ounce of love from Roman. She gets the adoration and worship she wants from her husband, but when the pageant is over, she calls to affirm she loves him more than she says. She finds that there is some value to it after all. Love ties her family together, despite how harsh and difficult it is. And worship from cultists deep in the Witchwood simply leaves her to the jaws of an ancient monster that adores her blessed sacrifice.

Similar to Paul, Tom Houston’s stories explore love and happiness, but from the perspective of a grieving widow. 

I don't say it enough

I'm scared you blame me for mom

I'm scared you blame me for your luck

But there's no end

There's no end to how much I love…

Love alone didn’t make the Houstons a happy family. Tom goes to buy a Wiggly doll instead of simply being present, spending the holidays with his son. And at the end of the day, Tim dies, hurt and alone in the backseat of Emma’s car. But we know that they can get there, to the point of healing and moving forward from Jane’s death.

In Jane’s A Car, Tom is seen taking action, no longer bottling up his feelings and instead admitting his triggers and letting the people he loves help him. He is still hesitant to let Becky sleep over, and hesitant to let go of the car his wife died in, but it’s understandable. When Lex finds out Mr. Houston’s had his car serviced for the past year and a half, Ethan comments, “He’d be happier in a Mazda.” To which she responds, “Maybe he doesn’t want to be happy. Maybe he doesn’t want to forget her.” Love motivates him to hold on to the things that were precious to Jane. Love haunts him and makes him spiral in this story which paints a painful picture of survivor’s guilt and regression. But holding on to your love is not wrong. Becky and Tom are high school sweethearts, for crying out loud. They’ve kept each other in their hearts even after they were married to other people. But that original rift was on their own terms.

We're entering a muddy area of speculation and extrapolation here, but it’s worth mentioning that I don't think that the ending of Hey, Melissa! is sustainable. Potential logical flaws of the story aside, it makes sense in the moment for the two to reunite at the end, but Paul has done several things differently here compared to other timelines. He has a certain degree of control over the situation. He brought Melissa to his apartment. He only has a regular concussion that can possibly heal within the month. He is not being subjugated by ancient horrors or a shadowy tech conglomerate, just an ex-coworker who doesn’t even have her taser anymore. There is no magic or sci-fi side effect here, the only thing tying them together is love. And love is fickle. It is a give-and-take that these two are not compatible nor willing enough to navigate together. When their wants clash again, which I don’t doubt they will, Paul has an out. It could take weeks or months, but I like to think that he won't stay with her for the rest of his life, and unlike CCRP and Pokey, she doesn't have the absolute power to force him to. 

Even if she strokes his head “with the purest love,” it is not enough to build a happy life.  Recalling “his” dog’s death, Paul admits that, “If I'd held on to him tighter, or hell… If I'd let him go back to his real family, that dog may have had a long, happy life.” His disregard and smothering of the creature is what ruined what he had, is what got Patches hit by a car and killed him. Pure love is not a cure-all remedy. Love is not permission to possess someone else. Love...

Why does it hurt to love you?

Why am I in pain?

Why does it hurt to know you?

You’ll let me down again

If I turned my insides out would you even know that I was there?

Why does it hurt to love you?

Why does it hurt to love…?

In Watcher World, Bill and Alice have this exchange:

Bill: Jesus Christ, Alice. Would you grow up?

Alice: I’m trying! I’m trying to grow up, but you won’t let me! I should be at that party! Not at this shitty Disneyland knock-off! You made me come here. You made me ride that stupid ride! Why are you always ruining my life!?!

Bill: You know, Alice... I love you to the moon and back. But you make it very hard for me to like you.

Alice: Oh, so now you don’t like me? Well that’s fine. ’Cause... I hate you.

The love between the Woodwards is complicated and messy, and leads both of them to do and say things they regret.

What gets them their happy ending and lets them escape Watcher World isn’t purely love. What saves them is Bill’s strength, the difficult choice to put Alice’s needs above his own want to control her, and he continues to uphold that even after they leave. He doesn’t pry into her social media on the drive back home, and Alice returns his grace with her own, following him on Instagram before tossing her phone in the backseat. 

Love hurts. Love is not easily categorized or expressed. Love is wicked. Love is cruel. Love is irrational. Love is pure. What matters, and what actually counts towards building a happy life, is what you choose to do with your love.

Up until now, I’ve only brought up lyrics in regards to the themes woven into the musical numbers, but there’s a lot more you could analyze in the series, like the repetition of motifs throughout the musicals such as “What Do You Want, Paul?” playing throughout key scenes in Forever and Always and Hey, Melissa!, but I’m not musically inclined. I just want to talk about the relevance of two seemingly unrelated songs: If you listen carefully to the instrumental portions of “Forever and Always,” you’ll notice a striking similarity between its lilting piano notes and the chorus of “Feast or Famine” from Black Friday, specifically these lines:

You never should settle for the lifetime that is handed to you

There's always a line to be cut and someone to barrel through

“Feast or famine” is a phrase that refers to extremes: extreme abundance or extreme scarcity. Paul 23 and Android Emma both had terrible inhumane fates from the moment of their creation, but they don't settle for the lifetime that is handed to them, both individually and with each other. The lyrics of their wedding song say that “one day less than forever won't be enough.” They decide to cut down the people which they were modelled after and barrel through them to take the happy lives that they want. 

Paul and Emma are selfish, and in a way, that dooms them. In a way, it makes them happy. They are the greatest romance in the universe. They lie dead at the bottom of the Nantucket River. They are married until the end of time. Their corpses dance together in a tortuous loop of eternal bliss. They are so human at their cores, even when they are artificially engineered. They are the extreme of self-centred desire and loyalty and love, and they will find each other in every timeline. Forever and always.

In the penultimate number of Nerdy Prudes Must Die, Steph and Pete use these lines to describe how they are the “Best of You” to each other:

It’s like you threw me

It’s like you fooled me

It’s like you test me

But not to best me

When Emma tells Paul how her life is being stolen and his wife is an imposter, he doesn’t believe her and says, “Look, I don't know if this is some kind of test...” And later on, from the imposter Emma, there is a test. One that he wasn’t aware of, but he passes nonetheless. Because Paul chooses to stay loyal to his wife not because of any threat of violence, but because of the vow they made. The promise which bloomed from the love they’ve naturally developed.

What you'll notice in even the most hopeful of Hatchetfield stories is that love alone is not enough to preserve a relationship. Love doesn't stop Emma Matthews’ past from coming back to throw a wrench in her life; love doesn't fix all of the communication problems between Paul and Emma; love doesn't save their marriage. It certainly motivates Paul to make the choices he does, but that's just the thing: it is a motivator, not an active step. The choices he makes motivated by love are the things that count toward rebuilding trust with his wife. The love itself is not proof of functionality, of understanding, of happiness. It is merely an influence, one factor of many that is quite prevalent in our lives but not the end all be all. And something about that is special in its own way. That we as people are complicated and messy and need to fight for proof of love in actions that require deliberation. Love could be an involuntary emotion, but the actions that follow can be your choice. 

Paul: I know things aren’t perfect. We’ve hurt each other. We’re murderers. But…do you still love me?

Emma: I do.

Paul: Then I will do anything to stay by your side.

Forever and Always shows that Paul and Emma bring out the best in each other. 

Emma needed someone to ground her, an absolute geek with a boring office job that he only does because it gets them insurance, who makes her feel like saving money instead of splurging it. Paul needed someone outspoken and unafraid to live her life the way she wants to. Paul wants to want, and he wants to prove himself a good man worthy of being next to her. He says this during their wedding vows:

“I was born here in Hatchetfield. I never really wanted anything. Until I met you, Emma Perkins. You gave me a purpose.”

Purpose.

The metafiction nature of TGWDLM follows Paul wherever he goes.

His character’s “purpose” is to be Emma's love interest.

His purpose is to be a background character.

His purpose is to be an audience surrogate protagonist.

His purpose is to be an exploration of humanity.

And because of these purposes within the narrative, he doesn’t really have a purpose in his life as a person; no one concrete goal, no big ambitions. Because most people don’t. Your life doesn’t need to have a “purpose” to be worth living. Sometimes you are born in a town and never want to leave. Sometimes the most noteworthy thing about you is utterly mundane. Sometimes you want what everyone wants, but at the end of the day, you are still completely your own person. And you need to work for your happiness.

MacNamara says it more succinctly than I could. During his tenure with the military, no doubt being exposed to all sorts of harsh conditions and harrowing missions, he's learned to value people above blind loyalty to the supposed greatness of his country. There is a reason he exposits all this to the main character. It's delivered comically, but in reality it is the blunt statement of Paul's central theme.

The universal truth of love and strength of the human heart. This doesn't mean infallible romance or unwavering bravery. It is fragile and flawed and fluctuating yet firm. It is at the core of every single one of Paul's stories, whether for better or worse. He is human. And with every installment in the series, every timeline, every loop of the musical, that is a higher power than any eldritch force can hope to comprehend.

Paul is an everyman who embodies the spirit of Hatchetfield better than the Honey Queen ever has. Because Hatchetfield is a place where humanity is tested. Hatchetfield is a place that is fucked up beyond belief and scary in its indifference and comforting in its familiarity. A place where the most normal person alive is capable of great kindness and terrible violence and transcendent love. A place that, despite everything, will always be home.

“Paul is an average guy. With small dreams. And no ambition. He likes movies, and pizza, and average guy things. He does not like…musicals. To Paul, Rent is something to be paid on the first of the month. Les Mis is a book he's never read. Hamilton is the man on the ten dollar bill, and America's sixth president. Paul's wrong about that last bit.”

Paul is average, but he still has his own personality, likes and dislikes, quirks that are unique to him. There are specifics to him, his hometown, his upbringing, his job, his personality. If I were to list some traits that Paul has, demographics he fits into, things he likes, and compare them to a list about myself? There would be very little overlap. There is no such thing as a true blank slate of a person. I like his costume design a lot because it's a rather plain and unassuming black suit, but then you get closer, pay it a bit more attention, and you learn that it's brown. Just a little different from the mold of “normal” but still close. Yet still unique. And yet he is not special. And yet he is the protagonist.

The messages of Paul Matthews’ life are simple, but ubiquitous, and true. 

We are all fucked up. We are not heaven-sent angels with upstanding morals or actions or rationalizations that always make sense. Sometimes you face your own personal hell head-on when push comes to shove. Sometimes you tell lies to avoid helping the less fortunate. You could be a hero if placed in the right circumstances, you could be homicidal if placed in the wrong ones. And you want to be loved. You want to be loved and treasured above all else, unconditionally.

But the promise of unconditional love is a lie. 

It is a soothing balm and a dream where you never have to face the difficulties of being a person, where you never have to explore different parts of yourself, or think for yourself, or change or grow or do anything but submit to a higher power. Worse yet, people may market their love as unconditional, but come with the major caveat of hating your true self, of suppressing it to better suit their version of your story.

It is never unconditional no matter how much we love each other because we are not of one mind, and if we were, it wouldn't be love for another, but for an egoistic collective. It wouldn't be love for you. If the price for such a fickle thing as love is your humanity, it is not a price worth paying. Whatever love you manage to hold on to, it has to be built on trust, on choice, on understanding and mutual respect, on vows made with the knowledge that they can be broken. But you have to believe that they won't be. 

Find your real family. Surround yourself with people who love you as you are, not an idea of you that they have in their heads, not an idyllic, objectified version of you that they want to force you to be. Maybe it's uncomfortable and difficult to live knowing your actions can beget harm; that sometimes you need to let things go; that you might need to learn more about yourself and face your greatest fears and change accordingly; that your personality might clash with the people around you; that life is a series of negotiations where we all need to try to understand each other; that some people might never understand you or even try; that you are always at risk of being hurt and hurting others in turn.

But if in order to receive love, your personality must be so warped that you become the very thing you've hated, would it be worth the love you're being given?

This love could be pure and true, but love without latitude is not love worth submitting to, worth obeying, worth keeping unchanged forever. It does not value your integrity. It does not value you.

To bring back the Wicked reference from Paul’s crucial bridge, consider these lines in “Dancing Through Life”:

Stop studying strife

And learn to live the unexamined life

Did you know this is a reference to a famous adage by Socrates?

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”

Allegedly, the philosopher said this at his criminal trial for offending the gods, and he asserted that death was better than a life without individuality and freedom of expression. Sound familiar?

Ultimately, that's the answer to Paul's question. This is the secret. Life is not worth living if you simply throw out your worries by conforming to the role that other people expect you to play. Happiness and integrity are not mutually exclusive, despite what powerful people want you to believe. Because outside pressures will always exist and interfere with your life, it may be difficult to flourish exactly as you are. But you don't need one goal that motivates all your actions; you don't need a purpose; you don't need to justify your existence to people who wouldn't care less if you dropped dead on the spot right now. You might not change the world, but you can decide what kind of person you are going to be, what kind of life you are going to live. It's hard work. And it will never be perfect. But it is yours.

And if you find the people who choose to love you for you?