I'm writing agere headcanons for The Deep rn and it's made me remember how absolute flanderized his character has become.
Like in season 1 yeah, he was dumb — his lack of intelligence has been a very big part of his character from the beginning — but he wasn't a moron. He was able to communicate important info clearly, like telling Stillwell about the scorch marks on the plane Homelander shot down, and he was smart enough to know that he would be able to manipulate Starlight into thinking he was actually important and respected in The Seven because she looked up to him and was new to the tower. He wasn't just a bumbling fool like they've been portraying him recently, where he can't even pronounce the word "exemplary" and spent three extra years in college. Although I do like the emotional growth to his character with Ambrosius in season 4, it doesn't outweigh how poorly — in my opinion — he's been handled.
It's sad to see, like I get the whole point of his character is to have a chance and redemption and not take it, but it sucks because you can see in season 1 that he wants more for himself than what Vought is giving him. I feel like a lot of characters in general had so much potential in season 1 that just didn't get developed later in the series. Like for example, it lowkey makes me sad that they made his memoir be ghostwritten in season 3 because it's very clear in season 1 that he wanted to write his memoir for himself. Like it was already something he was really thinking about doing for himself before being on sabbatical and it was something he wanted to do because he knew he was more than “just the fish guy”
this is wayyy to long and literally nobody cares this much but me lol. I just really like this stupid guppy and wish he was written a little better for season 4 and for the small promotional material he was in for Gen V.
