#😭 HI POPSIE

[chiimcharred]

Siffrin and Bonnie should take up knitting I think. This would be great enrichment for them both.

i mean

[manchestereyes]

I had kinda dipped out of the phandom during the was era (sorry) so I would to hear how that era led to them being so connected in this one

oh that is so valid, friend! 🧡 i kinda did too since it was announced right when i got my first full time job and suddenly i didn't have time to engage with phandom stuff anymore 😭 but things are a lot chiller now, so let's dive in! (under the cut because this is gonna be loooong--dnp please do not read if you happen to stumble across this!)

i think to get a full perspective on this journey, we really need to look at the full history of dan and phil. how they forged such a deep connection in 2009 and did whatever they could to be together. how they were blowing up more and more in the early 2010s and seeing more opportunities come from this youtube business. and how one youtube glitch could've ruined those opportunities forever.

i'm sure we all know by now how big of a deal the vday video was but if you don't... it was a huge deal. suddenly this very private piece of their lives was out in the open, long before either of them were ready to publicly address it. and it changed everything. yes, their love story was basically documented already, but they never expected those posts would be seen by millions of people one day, potentially even by people who could give them jobs. so they shut down. they insisted they were separate people and made completely different videos while also showing us the family sized box of shreddies they'd bought for the two of them.

and this is where wad comes in. yes i know i'm jumping really far into the future here, but hear me out--in a way, i believe wad is directly connected to everything that went down in 2012. see, phil's told us that he's always been happy doing amazingphil and dan and phil things. but dan's different.

SPECULATION TIME -- IF YOU ARE DAN AND PHIL, PLEASE CLICK AWAY NOW. THIS IS YOUR FINAL WARNING.

dan grew up desperate for validation from parents who never had time for him and from peers who constantly bullied him. he's always had a voice in the back of his head telling him he's not good enough, and even when phil tells him his videos are great, he still wants them to appeal to all the people who dismissed him growing up. he wants to be his full self, yet he's also terrified of acknowledging that he could be the very thing he was tormented for. meanwhile, phil (as far as i can tell) had that validation growing up. his parents were older and had more money and therefore, more energy to devote to phil and martyn. phil's always been super close with his whole family, whereas dan (from what we know) has only ever been close with his nana and popsie, and now with his mum too. phil had a whole group of friends growing up, whereas dan flitted from group to group, never quite fitting in, and even had no friends for a while. this is why he developed the cynical, sarcastic persona he's worn for so long. it was his battle armor. every time he'd shown his real self growing up, he'd been rejected. but once he saw how lovely we all are, that battle armor was quickly becoming restricting. but he'd spent so long wearing it that now dan didn't know who he was now.

so we got the hiatus, while dan worked out who he was and how he wanted to present himself and threw himself into different projects that did and didn't see the light (rip dinok our strongest soldier 💔)--one of those projects being wad. suddenly dan, theatre kid extraordinaire, who'd spent two tours working with his favorite person onstage, was now facing the prospect of carrying an entire stage show on his own. on one hand, that was terrifying as fuck, but on the other, it was a culmination of all the work dan had done on himself. and he did it. he spent months physically apart from phil only to find that we loved him for who he is. and that was deeply healing for him.

however, being apart for several months was SO hard on him and phil. phil said he was having a lot of trouble with his migraines around that time and i have to wonder if that could have partly been from the stress of not having dan around for long periods of time. and we know dan had plenty of crises on the road that he frantically texted phil about--enough to have him credited as "remote crisis manager" in the wad recording. and that's the thing, isn't it? i think dan especially needed that time apart to realize that he and phil are truly magical together. and with all the pressure he puts on himself for solo content, he knew it would take a herculean effort to put anything out on his main channel. but phil's been working with a really cool editor for his main channel. and the gaming channel has never had that content threshold.

so they finally both dropped the masks (for the most part) and dove into this new version of dan and phil that emphasizes their connection. because it's okay for them to be this close now. they've already worked with some hugely powerful people (and been accepted by their families) and now all they need is us. and we've not only accepted them for it, we've celebrated it--all the way to the finals of the rpf tourney. and i think that acceptance means more to dnp than we will ever know.

tl;dr: dan and phil had to be apart for a while to see just how much they needed each other. and now that they've experienced that, they know they can never let each other go--and that their connection is just as special to us as it is to them, so there's no harm in showing it off every chance they get.

[etcnnante]

@earthssprout asked ! : " I ... I GOT M - MISTER A POPSY - CULL! " With a beaming smile & a set of eyes just as bright, Ari offered the tri - colored treat out to the stranger. " 'c - cuz mister looks like the puh ... the poh— the popsy - cull! vvv ... very, very much! " // ( for Mista 😭 let the fun with Mr. Rocket Pop begin ! 🌷 )

WAS SHE talking to him ? darkened hues glanced around , wondering if she was referring to someone else. but - not one else appeared to resemble the ice cream within the young girl's hand. eyes looked at his own outfit , realizing she was indeed talking to the brightly colored male ! ' oh ... really , for me ? thank you ! ' MISTA EXCITEDLY took the offer , immediately biting into it as he basked in the hot italian summer. the cool , fresh ice cream cooling hot body temperature. a soft content 'hm' leaves his lips as he takes another bite , watching how sex pistols started to nibble softly at the base of the sugary treat. ' mhm , you know what you remind me of ? you remind me of the spongebob popsicles ! the ones with the gumball eyes , you know ? those are my favorite ! '

[yikesola]

just saw a gifset that made me so happy it short-circuited my brain! i’m so 🥰🥰 about the time in “Dan Reacts to His Childhood Videos” that dan was six and full of six year old energy and was repeating “joggity jog” while bouncing on a bed next to popsie holding baby adrian, and popsie just straight up grabbed danny’s ankle and pulled his leg out from under him 😭😭💞

asldkfjsf popsie is an icon 

i’m 🥰🥰 thinking about 1:04-1:10 and 1:53-2:00 of pinof2 when dan is busy trying to show off and phil’s little brother energy is through the fuckin roof

what moment makes you 🥰🥰? tell me, pass it round!