Tbh I think Woodes is very similar to Flint - there is NOTHING they wouldn't do to protect a loved one and unfortunately it a) leads them down very dark paths or b) they make mistakes and end up paying the price. I don't doubt Flint loved Thomas and Miranda, I don't doubt Woodes loved Eleanor. Unfortunately it just wasn't enough to save them.
I think they’re similar but I also think that there are lines that even Flint hasn’t crossed that Rogers has. Flint kills people, yes. He pillages and burns and does horrible, awful things in vengeance, but he doesn’t torture them. He doesn’t go for scare tactics to prevent violence to his loved ones - he reacts when someone hurts one of them, but it’s quick, it’s clean, and there’s no element of enjoying it. He hates what he does, he hates himself for doing it, even while he can’t think of another way to handle things that will assuage the bit of him that wants to rip and tear and burn the world to cinders. Rogers, on the other hand - I keep thinking of him saying that out of 72 men, only one survived to tell the tale of what had happened and that the torture and killing of the others was stretched out over weeks. There’s something infinitely more horrifying about that - a message there that I don’t think Flint ever bothered trying to send. With Flint it’s, “you’ve deliberately set out to hurt the people I care about and now you will pay.” With Rogers it’s, “my brother is dead (and it could have been anyone on that crew), and now I will make certain that none of your kind ever come near me or my family ever, ever again out of fear.” IDK, on the one hand, Rogers’ approach is probably more productive in the long run but Flint’s is less horrifying and less brutal. I also think Rogers is missing that element of hating himself for what he does - he does it, he knows it’s awful, and his biggest worry is that if it gets out society will shun him, not that he’s corrupted himself forever, whereas Flint worries about that near constantly,Â
