#like idk idk i think qwilbur is a very interesting character but also incredibly mischaracterized by people who Only watch wilbur pov

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something that really gets me about qwilbur is that he really does live in this fantasy world where nothing is really That Bad. like up until yesterday after his fight with phil where he went off on his own and had to claw through a Bit of the horrors by himself to really understand how bad things are, I don't think he ever really understood it. and it's not entirely his fault, he's been gone so long and it's hard to believe some of the things that have happened if you weren't there for them. it's hard to realize how awful things were if you weren't there. I'm remembering the brief period he was back when he found tallulah and phil tried to tell him then, tried to explain how dangerous the island really is and explain what awful things have been happening but wilbur kind of brushed things off. he didn't understand the depth of fear that phil had, couldn't understand why he was being so doom and gloom about things. because phil had been there living through it all and wilbur hadn't. and then he left again and things got worse again and the island moved on and the people moved on but wilbur didn't. he comes back and he expects the same place he left but it has undergone an unfathomable change, one that no one can even begin to explain to him in words alone. it's the kind of things that you really don't understand unless you work through it on your own. so of course he got upset at the maze and of course phil yelled back - they're both people who are hurting but who are at two different points of that hurt. there simply wasn't time to get wilbur from point a to point b by the time the group wanted to move. and there was simply no way for wilbur to reconcile his point a with where everyone else was and how everyone else was acting at point b. he Had to go off on his own for that, to work through it on his own. and he says that when he sees phil again! their whole apology is built on that, on recognizing that they weren't seeing each other evenly in that moment. for the island, they've had the time to pack their grief and their worry and their anger away enough for them to keep moving, to keep living, to focus on what they need to in order to find some answers. they HAD to, they've had not other choice, time keeps moving even though their kids are gone. but wilbur hasn't had that time. and it's not just him realizing that tallulah is gone, it's him realizing that he's been wrong about the island for so long now. it's him waking up months later and realizing this is something that's been going on for longer than he's even spent time on the island. this isn't something easy, this isn't something he can fix. it's equal parts anger and fear and helplessness. if he didnt even KNOW that this stuff was going on, how can he hope to fix it? if the eggs have really been gone this long and they're no closer to finding them, then surely the residents just aren't trying hard enough. thats what he has to believe, because the alternative is that this whole island of people - a whole community of people who are prepared, who have supplies, who have knowledge - if they can't find them, then what the hell can he do? how is he supposed to save his daughter when all of them haven't been able to?