#doc rants

They find him with his new crew or new family--be it Calico Jack, Anne Bonny, Mary Read, Sam Bellamy, Spanish Jackie, the OC of your choice, whoever--looking relaxed and content in a way he never has before aside from really not being happy to see Stede and Co. again. And Stede invites him back on board in a way that makes it clear he does not want him back but is also actually ordering him to come back because apparently he was doing a WHOLE LOT of the actual work on the ship and they haven’t figured out how to pick up the slack yet and also Ed’s not doing great without someone to ground him or let him be the good cop and also he just kinda got really used to being the center of Izzy’s world and attention and misses it and really cannot be expected to not get everything he wants without consequence or compromise, so won’t Izzy just suck it up and quietly and graciously accept a life of thankless devotion? Maybe if he’s less annoying about it this time, Ed will give him another thump on the back. Maybe even multiple thumps!

And Izzy, who’s been mostly quiet through the whole spiel, says, “No.”

“What do you mean, ‘no’?”

“I mean, absolutely fucking not, Bonnet. Now get out of my sight.”

“But what am I supposed to tell Ed?”

And Izzy smiles. “Tell him he’s got terrible taste in boyfriends and he can go suck eggs in Hell.”

“Everybody deserves love.”

I’m not going to couch my opinions with cautious words or beat around the bush. I hate the context of this line and that it’s coming from Mary.

Because Alice in Mary’s eyes has not been deserving of compassion. Of help. Of understanding. Of friendship. Of family. I’m not about to argue her reasonings for this and whether or not they are justified or how much. That’s not what this is about. It’s simply that this has been her firm stance for a very long time now. But now, suddenly, it’s different.

Now that she’s “in love,” now that it’s a romantic relationship with a man, now it fucking matters. Now she matters.

And this isn’t a post meant to disregard or disparage romantic love. I live for romance, but it is only one kind of love, and something about “Maybe if you’d seen it earlier in your life” just feels so dismissive of every kind that isn’t some broad, bland, made-for-tv-movie idea of a hetero relationship. I mean, it’s not like Mary could even possibly have any details regarding this relationship. All she can conceivably know is that there is Some Guy. And apparently that’s all it takes.

(Also Mary, even if we are just talking about romantic love, what is your criteria for “earlier” here? The girl was thirteen when she was kidnapped and held captive until adulthood. When the hell was she supposed to have had the opportunity to date? Or is that the point? Is this supposed to imply that Mary can feel sympathy for Alice’s plight now specifically because she was denied a romantic life of all things?)

And it’s just such a disservice to Alice and her story to put such importance on this relationship, to hold it, even for a moment in dialogue, in higher regard than her relationships with her family, with her love for her sister, which have been the driving force of her entire arc. And honestly it fucking hurts to think that they might be setting this up as the catalyst for her redemption or turn and for the others to acknowledge her worth and personhood separate from Used-To-Be-Beth.

This.

Not reconnecting with her twin sister after she has now also experienced traumatic imprisonment and memory loss and a turn at villainy.

Not the enduring love of a father.

Not a leap of faith or understanding from someone who has every reason and right to hate her.

Not even an unexpected camaraderie with someone not as personally wounded by her actions.

And certainly not as a result of an internal journey of self-reflection and self-love and a determination to try to make right or do right by her own choice and hands.

Like... No. No, friend. Jervis gets mega creepy for sure, but it’s more complicated and nuanced than a dude mad that he’s not getting laid. Jervis’ attraction is played fairly non-sexual for one. The episode is about the dangerous affects of loneliness, isolation, low self-esteem, and obsessive projection of emotions you can’t deal with. It’s played sympathetically and “not creepy enough” because that’s the POINT. I know it’s uncomfortable to watch from a late 2010s perspective, but the context and narrative is still there. It doesn’t fit the story beats you want for a simple “incel” type villain-of-the-week because it’s NOT.