#i am currently building a lil pen shelf thingy

[sixstepsaway]

I've decided to worry about the fate of Izzy instead of worrying about the state of the world. I hope he gets his happy ending! On the one hand, it's clear he is meant to be in love with Ed, and the creator described their relationship as another kind of love story. There's clear sympathy for him even if it is not as overt.

On the other hand, he still is an antagonist that gets wrecked constantly and is the butt of every joke he's involved in.

But maybe that's just because it was the first season? They had to introduce and develop Stede, then Ed. Season 2, with Ed and Izzy separated from Stede, seems like the perfect time to explore both of them as characters, and who they were before Stede got involved. The ep10 argument and toe scene were the first scenes where Izzy's view and emotions were spotlighted as something to be taken seriously.

I just want him to be happy with a nice daddy? Is that too much to ask?

-dd anon

I can fully and completely understand your concerns.

I've seen some people say the real Israel Hands is who Captain Hook was based on, which makes me worried about further maiming, and I've seen people talk about how historically it's said Blackbeard shot Izzy? Which also gives me concerns.

That said, Izzy is Izzy not Israel, which is immediately an anachronism, I believe (I checked Wiki and the only mention of 'Izzy' is in regards to OFMD), and he's not sixteen and so on.

On top of that, in regards to Izzy I am regularly reminding myself of several things:

Vico and Con's relationship and how much Vico wants Izzy and Jim to be friends. If Izzy and Jim are friends, that completely shifts the narrative in Izzy's favor.

How much we all love Con and Izzy. They are paying attention. Taika saves fanart to his phone. David Jenkins is always retweeting people talking about the show. Vico reads fanfiction. Con retweets so much fanart and commentary on Izzy. They all know we're into Izzy, and from what I can tell our enjoyment of Izzy is a lot louder than the antis. Plus, when the antis are yelling about homophobia and racism, David Jenkins gets to turn to his diverse writing room full of queer and poc and go, "Eh? Did I fuck this up?" and get "No, no, we did not," in response, which I am positive is the reaction he gets.

The veritable shit ton of characters who were introduced in shows with every intention of only being in a couple of episodes, who came back or got to stay and develop further solely because of the fan appeal. In fact, this is a TV tropes page talking about popularity being power, and although it also includes "the writers liked him way too much", a lot of it does talk about things like this.

(Coulson should have stayed dead, they made him into a totally horrifying war crime committing character in AOS whose actions were always fine because he was The Good Guy, but my opinions about the shitshow that is AOS are not what's being discussed here.)

The one I always focus on though is Spike from Buffy, because of a couple of particular points:

Here's what TV Tropes says about him: "British vampire who served as the villain for early Season 2. Was planned to die, but his popularity saved him." Another point, further on: "Ascended Extra: Like Anya, he was originally conceived to be a one-shot Monster of the Week. However, due to The Anointed One's actor having a growth spurt which made it difficult to pull off a convincing immortal child, he ended up being rewritten into the Season 2 Disc-One Final Boss. Eventually, he became a Breakout Villain too, being so popular that he joined the main cast (first on Buffy then on Angel) and ultimately growing into one of the most iconic characters in Buffyverse." This also means Anya was the same! And this one: "Breakout Villain: Joss originally intended for him to be killed off midway through the second season, but Spike ended up so popular with audiences that he changed his mind."

Joss Whedon did not like Spike. Whedon liked Xander because he was the nice guy character (I still love Xander, but I can totally see the complaints that are made about him, and I can see why Whedon loved him above all others, and I can see why this is utterly fucked up. Fuck Joss Whedon.) but hated Spike and hated that everyone - especially the female, or perceived-female by Whedon - preferred Spike as a love interest over Angel, Riley, and even Xander. It pissed him off. But the audience power was so strong, he still let Spike stick around and kept writing him.

Also, to be fair, the fact he's English ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I can factor that in too. "All bad guys are English," says TV. "NOT THIS ONE," says the fans, cuddling the worst of the worst to their chest (which neither Izzy nor Spike are, but it makes a good joke).

Writers like to please their audiences while staying true to their notion. And David Jenkins also likes pleasing his cast and taking their thoughts into account.

Now, I know there's been a spate recently of writers getting mad when audiences figure out where their plots are going and fucking it all up to make a point (Game of Thrones, Westworld Season 2, multiple others but I don't tend to watch those because they fuck me off) but I don't see David Jenkins being like that.

Game of Thrones and Westworld also saw themselves as, like, high brow TV, the kind that Smart People watch. I don't think David Jenkins sees OFMD like that. Despite the fact most of the OFMD fans are pretty smart people who really enjoy it and are currently analyzing it to death and back.

I don't think David Jenkins seems to feel that he's somehow better than the people who watch the show, and thusly we should not be capable of figuring out his plans, and also our opinions are null. I really don't.

I agree that 1x10 could easily be a shift in how to view Izzy, and I hope you're right!

And, finally:

I just want him to be happy with a nice daddy? Is that too much to ask?

Man, do I hope not.