I cannot stop thinking about the poem that comes up if you enter "Stanley" repeatedly and then click on "how he defeated me" a bunch (written out fully with analysis under the cut). I've never been a big Bill fan, but you can bet your ass I'm obsessed with Stan Pines, and I can't believe I never fully thought through the parallels between them.
"Stanley Pines, the common clown,
Always dragged his family down.
One mistake, disowned, denied.
Only thing to do was hide.
One way out: the open road.
Reinvent, retry, reload.
A girdle, eyepatch, father's fez,
'I'm a new man!' so he says.
Couldn't outrun life's regrets,
Just kept placing bigger bets.
Changed his haircut, switched hotels-
Truth is just whatever sells.
When you've lost track of your lies,
When the poison starts to rise,
When the walls are closing in,
When it's clear you cannot win,
When your actions make it worse,
When they see you as a curse,
Give the wheel one last spin,
Take your chips and go all in,
And Lucky Stan- the roll's on black,
He got his life and family back.
His big break, it finally came,
Redemption from a life of shame.
You really think you won the day.
You packed your bags and sailed away.
You think you left the past behind.
But trust me
I'm still on your mind"
Combine this with some of the other things Bill says in the pages leading up to the poem, (calling him "Bootleg Sixer," ranting about how Stan is useless and only defeated Bill by following Ford's plan, etc), and it makes me wonder if Bill ever really believed in his own schemes.
Bill clearly values and respects Ford while deriding Stan, and yet many of the things he criticizes about Stan are also true about himself ("always dragged his family down," "one mistake," "reinvent, retry, reload," "just kept placing bigger bets," hell, "truth is just whatever sells" feels like a direct parallel to "reality is an illusion). In my mind, this implies that on some level he believes that people like him and Stan are destined for misery, but he convinced himself that he'd be satisfied with power and chaos, something that Stan gave up for his family.
Stan is someone who functions like Bill on a surface level while being fundamentally different in ways Bill can't even comprehend. To Bill, it's unfair that Stan "got his life and family back" while he is still alone in the universe, because he can't get his head around the fact that Stan is just a better person who worked to make up for his failures and earn his redemption in a way Bill never did. It wasn't just "his big break," Stan didn't win a bet or something. He spent thirty years committing himself to being the protector of his family and rescuing his brother from the exile he caused, and all that love and effort paid off in the end. He genuinely gave a fuck while remaining goofy and brash. Stan didn't need to become like Ford in order to be worthy, and so he works as an example of how people like them can thrive. It's proof that Bill's chaos isn't inherently inferior, it's Bill himself who couldn't hack it. He can respect Ford as an ally or an adversary, that logic might be able to triumph over chaos; but Bill cannot stand that Stanley was able to beat him at his own game.
272 notes
·
View notes
We have lumax and jancy
And yet the only time milkvan are together is a clip from season 1
And they show multiple scenes of El being an independent girlboss (no Mike in sight)
Lots of confirmation byler have screentime together though
Mike and Will walking side by side
Will leaning over Mike
The party are back together
Also Noah saying he thinks this is going to be the best season yet and Finn saying he's excited to have scenes with the original four. Byler is coming home!!!
156 notes
·
View notes