Will: Why Mike is just my Tammy 📽️
I thot I'd make a little summary again about why Mike is just Will's Tammy and why it's not a bad thing. It is Will's self-awareness and thus acceptance. It has been mistakenly interpreted by most as a rejection of Mike. I can only disagree with that. It's not about a rejection of Mike. He has felt the same way since Season 1, but he also suffers from the trauma and fear. By the way, here you can see the beautiful reflection: The mirror characters Vickie and her boyfriend, and Robin as Will's mind. Only when Robin realized that it was just her own fear could she open up to Vickie. She was only able to break up with her boyfriend because of that. Okay, you just need to swap Vickie and Robin once down there.
The supposed heterosexuality of Mike served as a perfect shield for Will. As long as the dream man was "unreachable," the situation was safe. If Mike had been reachable, Will would have had to confront his deep fear of intimacy and potential loss. Unavailability protects against the risk of being abandoned. Both are stuck in the same fear. One disguises himself with extreme heterosexuality, the other uses this disguise to feed his own fears. The twist: Only when Will gets older, interprets the signals correctly, and understands that his own fear has written the script, does the house of cards collapse. He realizes: It wasn't Mike who was the barrier, but his own psyche. The "safety net" of unreachability: For someone with a loss trauma, genuine closeness is paradoxically threatening. When Will files Mike away as "absolutely straight and unattainable," his psyche creates a controllable comfort zone: No risk: Whoever is unreachable cannot leave you. You can't be disappointed because you never even get together. We know that Lonnie left the family. just because he knew that Will was different (gay). That's why Will is afraid to confide in the others, especially Mike (the boy he loves). Will can feel the intense infatuation without ever having to take the real risk of a genuine relationship. Mike's "heterosexuality" becomes the perfect excuse for his own passivity. Mike's mask (compensation): Mike, on the other hand, suffers under the pressure of societal norms ("wanting to be hetero and normal"). The stronger his inner feelings for Will become, the more panicked he tries to cover them up thru overcompensation. He behaves extremely heterosexual (in the text, he is with El, but in reality, he talks a lot about girls and presents himself as stereotypically masculine). This mask of Mike's is so perfect because it is born out of pure fear of rejection and shame. He has no idea that he is feeding the very barrier that serves as a shield for Will. The moment of realization: The breaking of the projection. As Will gets older and receives the unconscious signal from Mike on the field, the mind kicks in. That's Robin. The realization "I had the answer all along, it was just my damn fear" is the turning point: Will recognizes that he used the external circumstances (Mike's supposed heterosexuality) to avoid feeling his inner block (the fear of loss). Taking responsibility: He no longer blames Mike's sexual orientation for their "not getting together." He realizes that his own fear has made him blind to reality. The collapse of the house of cards: The moment he realizes that Mike is also acting out of fear, the illusion loses its power. The supposed reality turns out to be a construct that both have maintained out of fear. Summary of the psychological core: As long as fear ruled, distance was the safest place. Only when Will is mature enough to read the signals behind the mask (Mike) does the projection collapse. He must now face reality: Mike is reachable – and with that, the risk of getting hurt suddenly becomes real.
