#canonizzyhours

but it's especially funny with ofmd where one of the big themes of the story is that worrying about what you deserve is a trap. the only character we see talking about what people "deserve" is stede's dad telling him he should feel bad about inheriting wealth he didn't earn.

so stede goes off and builds a community that's willing to embrace a guy who's done nothing to deserve it. that's the whole point of izzy's arc. he didn't deserve better. he actually deserved way worse. he deserved for stede to leave him in the red flags brig for killing the man stede loved and lying to stede's face about it. but stede isn't his dad, and he doesn't think people should be shamed for accepting grace they don't deserve. and stede's crew, who learned from him, don't think you should have to earn your place in a community. the unicorn figurehead didn't have a FUNCTION on the ship but they loved it anyway and they're willing to offer love to izzy without him doing anything to earn it.

anyway i'm proposing a new ao3 tag that's more in keeping with the themes of the show: Izzy Hands Deserved Worse Actually (But It's Beautiful That He Didn't Get What He Deserved)

Stede views him as a rival for Ed's love and is competitive about it

Ed likes him and enjoys being around him

Ed finds him attractive and has had sex with him before

he and Ed grew up together on Hornigold's ship

he's unambiguously explicitly queer even though he's also homophobic

he's toxic and mean and a bully and does a lot of stuff that hurts Ed and Stede really badly... but he does actually like Ed and MIGHT even care about him as a person, deep down, in a way he's too repressed to admit or express in a healthy way

That character is Calico Jack. But Jack would smell bad so fandom ignores him and projects all these traits on Izzy, who canonically has none of them, because they're horny for Con O'Neill and not Will Arnett. That's obviously all it is.

Izzy is introduced as stressed and overworked while his boss is indifferent and only gives orders. Izzy told a plan of what will happen and that there will be a promotion for him, but the plan is changed and Izzy loses his job so he seeks revenge in order to get the promotion.

I don't know a millennial or older GenZ who couldn't relate to Izzy as an employee.

That would totally make sense. I understand why people assume that's what happened because honestly it would make way more sense than what actually happened. But it is not true. The canyon was exactly as deranged and toxic as they are now long before season 2 dropped. The only difference is that they used to aim the toxicity only at other fans who were insufficiently deferential to their interpretation of Izzy, and now they also aim it at the creators of the show and the show itself.

Here's just one example and it's something everyone can agree objectively happened. In January 2023, long before season 2, an OFMD charity fanzine was published. There was a purchase price, with the proceeds going 100% to Rainbow Youth, a nonprofit org providing support for queer youth in Aotearoa. The zine contained some meta essays. One essay was about Izzy - specifically, about why he's a really compelling character who the author liked a lot.

The essay notably tried really hard to avoid taking any particular stance on ANYTHING remotely controversial about how to interpret Izzy as a character; for instance, it didn't take any stance on whether or not he's queer OR on whether or not he's homophobic OR on whether or not he was destined for redemption. It did, however, describe him as an antagonist in season 1, and as a character many fans "love to hate."

This essay was considered so deeply offensive by the proto-canyon that they not only complained en masse about it, they WANTED REFUNDS. I don't mean they said "shit man this sucks I want a refund" in a jokey way, I mean significant numbers of people LITERALLY IN FULL SERIOUSNESS DEMANDED THEIR MONEY BACK. From a CHARITY ZINE. Money that was going TO CHARITY. The makers of the zine actually had to put out an official response to this because it was a serious thing.

The zine was called The Art of Fxckery. You can look this up.

That's what the canyon was already fully like by January 2023. That's why those of us who've been here the whole time always knew it would end this way: even if David Jenkins made an active decision to pander to the canyon, there was no possible way the show could kowtow to the canyon's demands thoroughly enough to be spared. Even describing season one Izzy as an antagonist was enough.

is something i would say if i were one of the people who spend all their time on tumblr trying to prove that other fans of the show secretly hate stede bonnet. izzy IS portrayed as being a highly skilled swordsman on a technical level though and it REALLY DOES take away from stede's achievement to pretend otherwise. defeating izzy in a sword duel is something nobody but stede bonnet could have done and if you deny that in your eagerness to avoid giving izzy any credit even on this one thing, then you miss what the show is saying about how incredible stede is.