annavere

[annavere]

Tessa facing down Grayson across a case of swords. The symbolism kills me. Look at that grace. Her determination. Her strength.

[annavere]

"I'd destroy the world to protect you" but it's a parent/child relationship

[annavere]

[annavere]

Tossing my hat in the Teen Wolf meta ring, because I've been thinking about this all day. I've read various theories about why Peter Hale offered Stiles the bite and then accepted a refusal, when he didn't offer a choice to either Scott or Lydia. Most of these seem to involve Peter respecting Stiles more than the others, or being aware that Stiles would be a very unpleasant adversary as an unwilling bite-ee.

My theory: He offers Stiles the bite, because Stiles might actually accept it. He doesn't make the same offer to Scott or Lydia, because neither of them would say yes. Peter is a very patient man (usually). His modus operandi is sitting around, collecting information, avoiding conflicts, then swooping in at the perfect moment (usually late in the season) to mop up. He's a manipulator by preference, but if he can't manipulate, he'll use force. He needs Scott, and Lydia, and there's no point asking if they want the bite, since they're not going to give the answer he wants to hear.

Obviously, given the short window of opportunity, he can't just walk up to Scott in the forest at night and say "Hey kid, wanna become a werewolf? You can have claws and fangs, it'll be great. No asthma! Think it over. You've got ten minutes." That's not gonna work, so why bother? If Sheriff had found Scott, leaving Stiles alone in the woods, Peter wouldn't have asked him for permission, either. Lest we forget, Melissa McCall was also on his bite-happy list, and the premise applies to her as well: Nothing would have induced that sensible woman to say yes.

Meanwhile, he definitely stalked Lydia, and was in the room with her at both Macy's and the winter formal, where the conversations he had opportunity to overhear would tell him Lydia had her life on track exactly as she wanted it. She was not going to jump at the chance to become a supernatural creature of any sort (especially not to bail his sorry ass out in event of his demise). It wouldn't help with her school popularity or her winning of the Fields Medal, therefore… "Pass."

Stiles, however, is tempted (at least according to Peter). "Do you know what I heard just then? Your heart beating slightly faster over the words 'I don't want.' You may believe that you're telling me the truth, but you are lying to yourself." Hence Peter can shrug and walk away, because Stiles wants it, and that means Stiles can eventually be put in a position where he'll say yes.

We see the exact same behavior play out again a season later, with Lydia. The man who didn't care about violating her physical and mental autonomy is suddenly willing to play nice, asking permission to kiss her and backing off when she refuses. Why? Because while she would never have agreed to have her latent banshee powers triggered, she is attracted to him. She places boundaries and he accepts them, because it's only a matter of time before she capitulates. Sure enough, he creates a scenario that works for her in the very next episode. When she finds out who young!Peter is, she rejects any further make out sessions, and (although he remains the handsy stuff of nightmares) he does not force that particular issue. Given the "only have eyes for you" vibe every time they are ever in a room together afterward, he is presumably content to wait her out.

This, after all, is the man who says of teenagers: "One minute, it's 'I hate you, don't talk to me.' The next, it's frantic groping in any dark corner they could manage to find." This statement is the closest he ever comes to commenting on his own actions after spending a month in Lydia's mind. Teenagers, according to his self-serving universe, refuse things they secretly want, things Peter knows they want because he can hear their heartbeats. And if Stiles and Lydia say no, but mean yes, he's already won. He'll collect later.

So, tl;dr: Peter Hale, provided nothing urgently requires him to override the issue, does care about consent and is willing to abide by it - but only if the answer is eventually going to be yes.

[annavere]

After seeing @thisdiscontentedwinter  ‘Talia’s a bad leader’ theory something stuck out to me that I remembered from rewatching Season 3 yesterday. After Peter tells Stiles and Cora about Derek’s past in the episode Visionary Stiles asks Peter if Derek remembers it was Ennis who it Paige. Peter replies, “if he does he keeps it to himself.”  

Which strikes me as an odd response for two reasons.

1.) Why wouldn’t Derek remember? That’s a pretty traumatic event. Derek’s life up until that point had been one series of traumatic events after another, but he would remember the person who killed his first love, it’s not like Ennis is easily misremembered either, he is a giant alpha now who was a giant alpha back then. There can’t be that many giant alphas running around.

2.) Peter states outright that it was Derek’s idea to call Ennis, but we clearly see Peter suggesting it. However, during the flashbacks Peter runs away from Ennis and hides behind a corner, clearly frightened. If Peter was the one to call Ennis to the school why would he hide from him? 

Derek hears Paige crying out, runs down the hallway, and when Ennis sees him Ennis gets defensive and prepares to fight Derek. Derek lunges at him and though he’s subdued Ennis walks away without saying anything. If Derek called Ennis, why would Ennis be so hostile towards him and why would Derek be angry that he bit Paige?

It doesn’t make sense for either of them to be the one who called Ennis. If it was Peter he shouldn’t have run, if it was Derek he shouldn’t have been angry. Maybe he was angry that Ennis hurt Paige but that would make sense, he was trying to bite her. It makes much more sense if Talia was the one to arrange it.

After Derek kills Paige we see Talia show up at the Nemeton. She tells him, “Derek. You did something, something terrible. I know.” Derek tells her his eyes are different and she responds; “different but still beautiful. Just like the rest of you.”

How did she find out? The Peter we know isn’t about to go running to his sister when something doesn’t go his way, and its doubtful Ennis would have told her. A lot of this episode doesn’t make sense, but it does if Talia was the one who manipulated the situation. She also doesn’t appear that upset that her child essentially got someone killed.

We are told throughout that we are dealing with unreliable narrators (Gerard and Peter.) Cora responds to this by saying, “so we heard Peter’s perspective,” and Stiles says he doesn’t think they’re getting the full story. I think the perspective we’re actually seeing is Talia’s alteration.  

When dealing with two conflicting stories the best way to approach it is by looking at what stays the same and in both Gerard and Peter’s versions Talia is there, quietly pulling strings in the background. It was even her Emissary who arranged the meeting between Deucalion and Gerard in the first place.

The fighting between Ennis and Gerard was sparked because Ennis’s beta killed a hunter, the hunters killed the beta, and so Ennis wanted vengeance. It’s possible that Talia thought a new packmate might assuage some of Ennis’s aggression and maybe he would have been placated with a new packmate to replace the one he lost.

It’s also possible that Talia knew what Derek was thinking and that he wanted Paige to be a werewolf so they could be together. If Ennis bites Paige then Derek gets his girl, the fighting with the hunters might stop, and the packs and the hunters can go back to their uneasy stalemates. Turning Paige might have seemed like the solution to the coming war.

We also know Talia manipulates memories, she took Peter’s memory of Malia from him and Peter not only remembers this happening but he knows she possesses the ability to do so with her claws. Maybe the only reason she’s viewed as such a great leader is that she takes away the evidence she wasn’t? Maybe she also took away Derek’s memory of Ennis and that’s why the two never seem to fully recognize each other. Even during their fight, when the two are up close and personal, they act like two regular combatants, not like they have a history. It’s possible Talia has a history of getting rid of things she doesn’t like, because why would she take just the memory of Malia and leave Peter with the memory of herself taking it? Maybe she didn’t, but Peter remembered her doing it to Derek or someone else and knew she must have done the same to him when he realized there were gaps in his memory, and maybe that’s why Peter says “<i>if</i> he remembers.”

[annavere]

Not to go on an ENTIRELY different segue here BUT ALSO Heather!!

Peter's possessiveness of Derek has one more layer to it, I think, Talia!!

We know through legend and others around them that Derek is both physically and spiritually like her.

Ducalian and Kali comment on his physical attributes (Literally his FACE) about how he looks a lot like Talia, and also Satomi talks about how he reminded her of Talia!!

Like _chews glass_

Let's not even get started with the level of guilt Derek must have around comments like this though. His mother, the fantastic leader murdered BECAUSE of him, but Peter!!

Kid bro Peter who would have sulked all his life about being a Beta, (and probably killed one of the Alpha pack to get the Spark and then carved up the Hale territory), but like with others he wouldn't have wanted Talia dead, because SHE was also his.

okay so i was about to go to bed and address all my asks later but this one.....

listen do you know how the fact we never got anything substantial about talia and peter's relationship keeps me awake at night? do you?

there's implications and allusions but what i wouldn't give for peter to have actually spoken about talia. i actually talked about the impressions i have about the talia and peter relationship in my laura meta but as always i have more.

peter was in the house when the fire happened. peter survived but was trapped in his own mind for six years where he descended into madness.

peter was in the house. all that was left of talia were her claws. peter had to listen to her die.

talia was his sister. talia was his alpha. losing a pack member is like losing a limb.

he loved her. he respected her. he resented her.

she let him mentor her son. she took the memories of his daughter.

he thought she was too soft and made them into sheep instead of wolves but he never challenged her for power that we know of.

he killed her eldest daughter. he won't kill her son.

derek looks like talia. he acts like talia. peter cannot kill him.

he helped get her claws back because he wanted the memories she took but the claws were all that was left of her. there was no body to bury. hunters kept her claws as a perverted trophy denying the hales what was left of their alpha. denying peter what was left of his sister.

i think talia knew full well peter was lurking during the summit. he ran to her when he found derek and paige to tell her what happened.

she was his sister.

talia probably understood peter better and deeper than anyone else ever had or will. he hated it, resented it and misses it.

[annavere]

B A N S H E E / L Y D I A M A R T I N 🌑

[annavere]

[annavere]

Also, she deserves her snaps for enduring all of it without plot armour. And doing it in heels lol.

[annavere]

Derek was previously living (?) in a ratty subway station. All he cares about is maintaining his car. Derek is probably used to sleeping on the floor, indifferent to his own welfare. I am sure he did not do the furniture shopping. He stuck Peter with the task, and suddenly Peter's calling him up saying he's still too weak to move the couch by himself, get down here.

This is why the loft is so sparsely furnished. Peter was not allowed to finish building a bachelor pad.

He did make sure his nephew had an actual bed to sleep on, though.

peter + derek's crushed velvet sofa

[annavere]

[annavere]

[annavere]

Watching Teen Wolf, have reached 3B, episode 'Galvanize' and the little detail I am now fixated on is the red yarn Lydia casually wraps around her fingers while hanging out with Stiles. She's fretting, she has self-doubt (Lydia runs on facts and figures, not intuition, and banshee powers are not natural to the way her mind works) and really she's just giving her hands something to do.

Except this is the same episode, the same precise timeframe, where Peter just so happens to be experiencing finger agony of a particular, mystical, communing-with-the-dead variety (through Talia's fingernails getting shoved under his own so he can stick them in Derek's neck). And while that's going on, Lydia is twisting red yarn around her fingers for no reason whatsoever...

[annavere]

i've never really thought of how gothic teen wolf is, i think because i get caught up in the camp, but derek living in the burnt remains of his family manor is so fucking hardcore gothic. he's a goddamn ghost. a ghoul. a spectre. haunting his charred estate while the memories of his family haunt him.

[annavere]

Heather, we gotta talk about Peter and Lydia's dynamic, and then how he 'grew'???? Into his relationship with Malia. I mean like kind of insane of him to use Lydia as a soul capsule???? Then just letting her run around??? Then trying to manipulate her into thinking about everything???

i had to sit with this one a little bit to collect my thoughts about lydia and peter.

i'm sure what attracts people is that there's this element of perspheone and hades, of lydia's decent into the world of the supernatural because of peter, that he drove her into some form of madness with the two of them.

peter got lucky with lydia.

her being a banshee along side the connection between an alpha and someone they bit pulled his ass out of the afterlife.

him being his high-school self? was it a manipulation? did peter even have control of it? was it lydia's banshee powers? was it them both seeking a connection in a form lydia would be more comfortable with? less likely to be suspicious of?

in 6a lenore is able to create a manifestation of her deceased son. banshee powers are ill-defined in canon because it seems they are limitless and entirely unique to the banshee forged by their trauma and circumstance.

it's no coincidence to me that lydia under the tutelage of meredith is finally able to control and purposefully use her powers to save malia. lydia's loss of allison is a well spring of trauma, of pain and grief for her. she would do anything to not have someone else she cares about die knowing she could've done something to prevent it.

and also lydia is someone who spent a lot of time not using her voice, hiding behind a mask of the popular queen bee persona and when she does find her voice it becomes her greatest weapon. lydia's being true to herself and using her voice saves mason, stiles, malia and deaton. the wool is fully removed from her eyes. her powers let her perceive beyond the veil to the deepest truth of them all -- death.

the thing about peter is he's clever, cunning and manipulative but this man is also a hale so he's also in turn somewhat reckless and dramatic at all times. peter knows no chill and he will recognize no chill. you commit to your goddamn bit.

during peter's time as an alpha he only bites two people. scott and lydia. scott was bitten because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time but lydia was bitten deliberately.

s2 makes it clear that peter knew she wasn't going to turn but instead her banshee abilities were going to go from being passive to active. it was also a chance to intimate and strong arm stiles with lydia's life on the line.

as with many things with peter there's multiple reasons but i think he knew very quickly what she was when he encountered her in the tell.

going back to season 1 there were hints of lydia's banshee nature but none were as big as the tell. lydia arriving at the video store coincided closely with the death of the clerk. peter was even still lurking on the premises.

her powers were always there just latent.

alpha peter dicks around with terrorizing jackson and than bursts out only to startle lydia who screams. this moment is captured on the cctv footage which the the sheriff shows deaton stills from. this is also a moment when i think deaton begins to realize what's up.

i think lydia's scream brought peter out of his alpha form. a few episodes later is night school where peter brings all his people of interest to one place to have a really intense game of hide and seek, casual murder and attempts at intimidation. it wasn't just scott he was scoping out is what i'm saying. it's lydia's molotovs that eventually kill him. she's connected to both his death and resurrection.

i think peter knew he was on limited time anyway towards the end either derek was going to kill him or the argents so he took precautions to resurrect himself and lydia just fell into his lap like a portent.

he has continued interest in her like the creep he is though. i don't buy for a second he felt cowed at all when she came to the loft at the end of season 3a when she was trying to get information on where the nemeton is.

i don't really think peter necessarily feels guilt for what he thinks are necessary actions and the most necessary thing of all is the continued survival of peter hale. he's a complicated man. like i think he feels regret at having killed laura but it was a necessary sacrifice to obtain the alpha spark. acting contrite with lydia keeps her from killing him basically.

but again peter is complicated and when he views someone as his in any way he will try to protect them even if it's against his instinct of self preservation.

we see this behavior with malia and derek and cora. even stiles.

but lydia and scott? they are his. he bit them. they're both his greatest successes and his greatest failures as an alpha. he will guard that jealously and revel in it. he will be a pain in their ass. he is their demon to wrestle.

[annavere]

Hey Prince Escalus! I have seen your work and posts for quite a while actually and I admire your credibility and honesty with debates, questions and answers in the Teen Wolf universe. Especially with the characters, their strengths and flaws, the plot and storyline, the motives behind every character, how the villains are portrayed and even pointing out the very mind boggling tropes and disputes that occur from the Fandom and is placed in the characters of Teen Wolf.

I was rewatching season 2 the other night and there were a few things that did caught my eye and confused yet intrigued me at the same time. It's when Lydia does give the key to Jackson the first time in 2x05 (Venomous), but Jackson still transformed into the Kanima after the Hale pack invade Scott's house to murder Lydia. But what caught my eyes more was when Lydia touched Jackson's arm in 2x09 (Party Guessed) it looked as if Jackson partially snapped out of the trance he was in as the Kanima briefly from her touch and presence, until she left after he warned her that she shouldn't want him to come to her party. Then again in 2x12 (Master Plan), Lydia's presence and her giving Jackson his key reverted him back from his Kanima form to regaining his human features. I was brainstorming, could it have been Lydia's emerging banshee abilities that had that affect on Jackson? Or was it because Jackson was under two different Kanima Masters, where the first time it didn't work because it was Matt and he had a strong grasp on him whereas with Gerard, after being defeated, the link between him and the Kanima was weak that it allowed Lydia to bring Jackson back? I was thinking alot about this since it was rather intriguing. What would your thoughts be on this?

I think all these things contribute, but I think that the primary answer lies in the details of the scenes themselves. While Lydia presents the key to Jackson in both scenes, the conditions of those presentations are entirely different.

In Venomous (2x05), Stiles, Allison, and Jackson have spirited Lydia away to Scott's house to protect her from Isaac and Erica, who were planning to kill her on Derek's orders. They haven't told Lydia why (which they will all later realize was a mistake) and she's confused and defensive as a result. While Jackson may want to protect Lydia, he's still convinced that someone broke into his house and edited the tape he made of himself turning into a werewolf, and he thinks it might be her. So in this scene, the key isn't evidence of their connection, it is evidence of people deceiving him.

Jackson: Where's my key, Lydia? It was you, wasn't it? You edited the tape. Lydia: What tape? Jackson: The night of the full moon. The recording. You came into my house - into my room - and you saw what was happening to me, so you took the tape from the camera and you edited out the most important part. I don't know why. Maybe because you wanted to take that from me, my moment, like you take everything. Or maybe you just thought you were protecting me. But it was you, wasn't it? Lydia: I don't know what you're talking about - But if you need it so badly - Fine. Lydia: I hate you. I hate you so much. Jackson: No. No, you don't.

She doesn't reach Jackson when she presents him with the key this time because the emotions behind it are all wrong. He's convinced she is denying him the identity he desires. But then, right before he transforms into the kanima, he realizes that she does have real feelings for him, which he doesn't understand. Jackson didn't become the kanima because he wanted to be a reptilian murder-slave; he wanted to be a werewolf to be special, which means he would be valuable to someone. (The irony of course is that he was already special and valuable; he just doesn't believe he is. Impostor Syndrome FTW!) The key doesn't stop him from becoming the kanima because it doesn't reinforce his own identity; in fact, in this instance, it confuses him even more.

Now, we move to Party Guessed (2x09) where Lydia goes to Jackson to personally invite him to her party, because she does care for him. Jackson is being influenced by the kanima identity (and Matt), but when she touches him -- now that he knows she cares for non-supernatural Jackson -- it shocks him momentarily free from the kanima transformation. (The irony here is that she is offering a way back to himself even as she slips farther under Peter's control.) His look of loss when the touch breaks off is real, and it helps set up the terms and power in the final scene you mention.

The situation in Master Plan (2x12), when Lydia presents the key again, is completely different than in Venomous. This time, Jackson isn't pursing her to get the key and solve the mystery of why he didn't transform; this time it is Lydia who is seeking him out because getting the key back is what Jackson wants. It shocks him, just like the touch in Party Guessed did, because she is here for him. For Jackson. Not for the kanima. She calls his name, peeling back the kanima's identity, and he remembers how he gave her the key in the first place.

Jackson: Do you - do you still - Lydia: I do. I do still love you. I do, I do still love you. I do. I do. I do still love you, I do.

Peter wasn't just spouting romantic nonsense when he talked about the power of human love. Love, real love in all its forms from romantic to familiar to platonic, is an expression of absolute care for another person. In this case, Lydia loves Jackson -- Jackson's original identity -- because of their relationship and not through some supernaturally enforced master-slave relationship, such as the ones which existed between Matt and Jackson and exists between Gerard and Jackson. Those two villains didn't love Jackson, they were using him. Lydia isn't getting anything out of this act; on the contrary, she could straight up die since Gerard ordered the kanima to kill them all. This is made real to him by the presentation of the key, because Lydia understands he "need[s] it so badly" that she came to this dangerous place for him.

While I do believe that there is power in Lydia's voice, Peter was right again when he said it's just a tool. In this case, the power of the voice "drowns out" everything for Jackson but the "real connection" forged between Lydia and Jackson, which, as Peter put it in Battlefield (2x11), is "disappearing beneath a reptilian skin and [she] needs to bring him back."

And so she did.

[annavere]

Sometimes things smashing around in my head make me rethink my position on interpreting a point of canon. In this case Season One Peter.

How aware Peter is when he kills Laura is always a part of deciding how forgivable I find his actions. And I flip flop on the subject. But something I read made me rethink it in a new light.

Because the next night Peter attacked and bit Scott.

Which wouldn’t tell us much, except we see Peter offer the bite to Stiles not much later. And as creepy as he is about it, consent does seem to matter to him.

So what’s changed? Well, not much, other than he’s healed. Yes. I’m aware there are other things. Clearly Derek has talked about Stiles during his talks to a presumed comatose Peter. But I’m not really sure that would be enough to change Peter’s actions.

It’s not a concrete thing, but it did make me rethink the beginning of Season one, and one of the many unanswered questions it leaves me with.