#bc he isn't gonna ruin his life over hiram lodge (or grundy. or the army. or whatever else) | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

wallbeatjournal · 2 years ago

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ngl this s5e7 scene reworked my brain chemistry and fully convinced me for a time that eric jackson was a #fightclubcore manifestation of archie's repressed anger and trauma and i still think about it a lot. istg it's a good reading. istg it has legs. istg it works GREAT in the character arc/subtext no question but it also works NEARLY in the literal text to the point that it's magical to me, plus/minus a couple of interactions with real people that can't fully be worked around

i mean s5 had the nerve to move on from this and have eric continue to visibly struggle and suffer under the weight of his rage and grief while (outwardly) functional/coping archie only begins addressing his own ptsd by first witnessing one of eric's ptsd breakdowns and fighting to get ERIC some ptsd support

and then they reveal that archie DOES have trauma manifestation hallucinations haunting him

and then after archie experienced catharsis eric just..."moves away" offscreen alongside all the other war ghosts

it's near-perfect i'm saying. eric could just be archie i'm saying

#i'm telling u it has legs #even during the key party ep jackson gets paired off with minerva who also kind of reads like a manifestation of cheryl's...psychology #dropping the literal reading the subtextual reading is themes on themes. archie can't engage with his trauma. he has work #s5 archie really thinks admitting he's wounded would fuck up his life. he's not at that stage of healing yet #s6 brought him closer - he gets to a point of realizing that being (heavy. dense.) emotionally invulnerable is pure COPE #a power but also a weakness because it relies on perfect control and avoidance (of palladium. of triggers)#and realizing the walls (around himself. around the city of riverdale) were there didn't bring them down. brute forcing it doesn't work #community helps though. which is of course where we left off #(so ideally s7 will take him further along that journey pls pls)#but anyway ~i digress~ this is about s5 jackson being archie. carrying his traumas in loud obvious ways that archie himself can't #bc he isn't gonna ruin his life over hiram lodge (or grundy. or the army. or whatever else)#riverdale #archie andrews #eric jackson #oc

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