#school spirits analysis

The ghosts are physically frozen in time to the day of their death, but I think that they are still capable of “mentally aging” on some level (aside from physical brain development.) I don’t believe that they are stuck in the same state of mind and maturity as the time of their death (shown with how Wally and Rhondas personalities have gone though big changes since they were alive) Experiences and time shape a person just as much (if not, more) as a body does.

[One way this is proven, Is through the rapid maturation, and developmental arrests seen in kids and adults with complex PTSD. Maddie is actually an in-show example of this, but that’s too big to talk about in this post.]

But, with that being said, I think that our ghosts have mentally aged very little within the decades they’ve been in the school. I would argue that their maturation is significantly more limited by how they are stuck in the school, and in the support group, than they are limited by their ageless bodies.

For example: Rhonda has been around longer, and has experienced more things than Dave Nears has. But! Dave has experienced life as an adult, while Rhonda has not. Rhonda’s mind has changed and grown throughout the 60 years she’s spent in the afterlife, but not as much as how Dave was able to grow and mature through his role as a father, and as an adult in society. His experiences carry much more weight and growth in that shorter time span, due to the nature of them. The ghosts at the school, have been encouraged to think of themselves as students, and to reject maturation by Mr. Martin. That, plus the physical limits of the ghosts having a full relationship with the world around them, is what really stunts them from maturing. It doesn’t stop them, but it limits the direction that their growth can take.

Wally is a big example of this. He has matured a huge amount through his relationship with Charley. But it is a form of maturation that is encouraged by the environment that the ghosts are stuck in.

Ever since Maddie arrived, the ghosts have shown much more personal and relational growth due to the circumstances pushing them out of the “students in a support group” role they’ve been confined to. They have been maturing faster than they ever previously were, because of these new outside influences.

It’s not as simple as “they are all teenagers” or “they are teen bodies but 75/35/49” It’s such a deeply complex and interesting concept that I think the show expresses well.

Going into deeper more headcanon-y territory, I'm thinking about how the age of their death could affect their maturation. Charley is a great example of “having a teenager brain.” He and Yuri are both younger ghosts, so they both hit their living maturing limit before the others, and at the same time. And that is shown in their characterization. Charlie definitely acts the most like a teenager out of the group, and Yuri matches a similar energy in a different way with his teen-like coping mechanisms.

Yuris death was even directly related to how not ready he was to think of himself as an adult.

Ghosts like Rhonda, Wally, and Quinn died at the age where they were preparing for adulthood. In their final year of school, where they were beginning to explore the ideas of where their adult life would take them, at varying levels of readiness. Rhonda was excited and eager to explore herself and the world. Wally was happy where he was, and probably wasn’t looking forward to his graduation. I imagine Quinn was somewhere between the two.

It’s another interesting layer to think about. They are stuck in the image of their place in the world. “Almost an adult, and free.” “Not ready to leave, but I have to.” “I’m still a kid, I can’t handle my sudden approaching adulthood.”

Overall, these characters are at really interesting mental places that I, as an autistic bitch with cptsd, find so fascinating. They are all more mature and “older” than someone living as the age they died as, but they are also not at all as “old” as the years they’ve existed since birth.

Bonus:

"Does that mean you could go back to your life?" "I don't know." "Well... would you?"

In a recent interview, Rhonda’s actor Sarah Yarkin, mentions having a conversation with the shows creators back in season 1 about Rhonda’s Queerness. She was created as a queer character from the beginning, but it isn’t made explicit to the audience until the 3rd season.

But just because she doesn’t come out, or have a romantic relationship, doesn’t mean that her queerness has not been relevant this whole time. Thats not how being queer and writing a queer character works.

Most notably, her gender non conformity has been a large part of her backstory (and likely her death, which will have to be its own post, because oh boy…) Her beatnik style, and choice to wear pants during a time when that was extremely frowned upon (which we now know likely started alongside her gay awaking) are very queer coded but, that’s not the only queer thing that has driven her earlier character arcs.

When re-watching season 1 with my family, I noticed quite a few details about Rhonda’s character arc that before season 3, I felt a queer energy from, but brushed off as queer coding and nothing more. More specifically, I noticed some things pointing towards Rhonda having a crush on Maddie in season 1 and 2.

Rhondas season 1 arc goes like this:

She is reluctant to participating in group activities—>befriends Maddie—>decides that she will try to cross over—>betrays the group—>Helps the group.

Her arc is driven by Maddie’s appearance making her start to realize that her core belief “nothing ever changes” might be wrong. But within that arc, she backslides twice. The two instances where her character arc takes a turn, have one specific thing in common: The inciting incident is witnessing Maddie be loved by her two love interests. (In season 1, Simon was a love interest in a way that did not end up continuing into the next seasons, but it’s relevant here.)

The first scene is with Simon, where he ends up giving Maddie his sweater as a way to hug her. She watches this interaction from behind glass, and walks away with tears in her eyes.

Immediately after this, we see her sit beside Mr. Martin during movie night, and express that she’s ready to take group seriously because she can’t be stuck in this school any longer. This begins her arc of working alongside Mr Martin and even agreeing to “keep an eye on Maddie” for him.

At this point, she hasn’t reached a point of betrayal yet. She keeps Mr. Martin unaware of what Maddie is up to, until the homecoming dance.

It isn’t until season 2 when we get her explanation on why she betrayed the group. Over a flashback to the homecoming dance, Rhonda tells Maddie “The night of the homecoming dance, I saw you and Wally. …I felt so alone, lonelier than I’ve felt in lots of very lonely years.” And explains that that loneliness is what led her to seek out Mr. Martin again and eventually (after seeing her acceptance letter) tell him that Maddie has been talking to Simon.

These two examples of sudden change of behavior seem to be showing Rhonda experiencing “Truama reenactment” which is something that occurs in people with Complex PTSD.

The loneliness that seeing Maddie with these two boys triggers within Rhonda, triggers her mental state to the loneliness that she felt while she was alive with her neglectful parents. In a season 1 scene with Maddie where she opens up to her about her death, she admits that her parent’s neglect is what led her to seek a more personal relationship with Mr. Manfredo. (He seemed to be providing the emotional needs that her parents weren’t) upon being mentally brought back to this state of isolation, Rhonda reenacts seeking out a more personal relationship with an authority figure in Mr Martin.

This could of course, easily exist without Rhonda feeling any sort of romantic attraction to Maddie. But, she makes a distinction that this loneliness was different than usual—implying that it’s new, and she hasn’t felt this way for decades. It wasn’t Wally or Simon that made her feel this new pain, it was Maddie.

Going back to the conversation with Maddie where she admits all this, she says something interesting: “I’m not like you. You’ve been here a few weeks, and you’ve let everybody in. I can’t do that.”

What’s interesting here, is that Rhonda doesn’t realize it, but she has done *exactly* that. Within a few days of meeting Maddie, Rhonda opens up to her about her death and even tells her about the parental neglect that made her childhood so lonely. This goes against Rhonda’s own beliefs about her personality. For some reason, she found herself wanting to be vulnerable to Maddie.

There are also more moments within the season pointing to Rhonda desiring more closeness to Maddie, and feeling insecure about where she stands with Maddie, despite there being no bad blood between them. First of all, she adorably sits with and watches over Maddie as she sleeps in the teachers lounge. There’s also a moment where she offers to look for Maddie, only to be interrupted by Charley saying “I’ll do it, she likes me more.” Which is met with a hurt expression, and a much more sour mood for the rest of the episode.

There’s probably more I have to say about Rhonda’s queerness in season 1-2 but I have yet to finish my season 1-2 rewatch, and I could probably be here all day if I went over everything I noticed.

By season 2, I believe Rhonda’s romantic feelings for Maddie have subsided. I also don’t think Rhonda realized she had feelings for Maddie in the first place. If she did, it wasn’t until those feelings were almost all gone.

I’m not claiming that Maddie was ever a love interest for Rhonda. In fact, I LOVE that she isn’t. As a lesbian with complex PTSD I see so much of me, and friends of mine’s experiences in this interpretation. I would even argue that most lesbians have experienced having feelings for someone, but not realizing it until those feelings cause you to act in a way that you aren’t proud of. This analysis is not about shipping. It is about (part of) the spectrum of Rhonda’s queerness.

Okay I know this ask is literally not that deep but I'm actually about to go on a whole thing about maturity in this show cause my brain is buzzing. So in answer to your ask:

I kinda get where you're coming from on this but I think in all fairness. She had a lot on her mind at the dance too, so I can understand it.

Now for my insane persons tangent: