#my regret and its interconnectedness with my name isn't mine? oh? ohohohohohohohohohohohooo ?

[inannasdream]

my name isn't mine is a song that, ostensibly, was made for boris and the dark survival from the perspective of boris, but it is my firm belief that this song is actually from the perspective of henry and in this essay i wi

so this reading of mnim stems from the lyrics working from both a literal and figurative perspective. literally -- very obvs it's boris. but figuratively? soooo many of the sentiments expressed in mnim fit a frustrated, depressed cycle henry to a perfect tee. (unintentionally, since we only learned the cycle henry is a different entity from the real world henry in batdr, but hey, art takes on a life of its own once it's unleashed onto the world ;) )

now, let's look at the things that are SOOOO immaculately fitting when read from the perspective of cycle henry (giddily kicking my feet).

i said come one, come all, enjoy the show

call me matpat because i am So excited to dissect this frame by frame obvious callback to blood and ink is obvious! but from henry's perspective, he's mockingly repeating joey's exaggerated mannerisms.

now you've got the heart, but do ya got the soul?

idk, henry, do YOU? but yea, introduction to the ink realm a la "welcome to my fucked up life," you don't even need a soul to end up here!

you gonna let me down? will you fit right in?

or will you drown in the pitch black ink of your sin?

a continuation of henry mocking joey — when you read this in (a caricature of) joey's voice, it actually lines up really well with him! henry brings up the three possible paths here of either letting joey down (leaving), "fitting right in" presumably with the rest of joey's victims (staying with the studio and its employees), or "drowning in the pitch black ink" of his "sin" (suffering in the cycle). note as well how henry equates his leaving joey and the studio to a sin, which was always a word associated with joey rather than henry.

they got ways to keep you quiet

they got ways to keep you tame

this would be him being forced to follow joey's script no matter what. "ways" is a suitably vague word to describe the "up from above" kind of power joey has that keeps henry from being able to break the script in any kind of way. the word tame is also a very demeaning word to use for a human, but it's definitely one i can see joey using -- or, at the very least, one that henry would use to imitate joey's attitude towards his employees. sammy may have been the one to call everyone sheep, but joey was definitely the one who meant it 🤪

now, what the hell did you expect from me?

i'm bound to break if you keep me bending

god u tell him u funky old man. harkens back to the days where joey was casually expecting henry to completely give up his personal life for the studio, and more importantly for joey. dumb bitch that's the quickest path to burnout, so it's no wonder, both in general and particularly to henry himself, that he left back to his family. joey's "all take and no give" attitude was unsustainable from the start.

i'm tired of playing pawn in sick little games

you dream the impossible

a shepherd herding your mindless cattle

calling himself a pawn because he's comparing himself to an insignificant piece, which joey always treated him as until he finally left. pawn in sick little games... identity-less prop for joey's vent cartoon torture story. dreaming the impossible is quite literally joey's motto in life lol. and again the comparison of joey: human owner, his victims: mindless animals that need to be tamed.,,, ough

don't you act so surprised

once you've seen what they've done to us this time

this line refers to after joey's change of heart. i don't think it applies to anywhere else in henry's life (and def not with other people, ie an "us"), so it feels like a point in time where henry is exasperated by the meager bits of help that joey is able to offer him in the cycle after, you know, trapping him there for years.

i said come one, come all, i'll tell the tale

of a stoic lone wolf bound to bail

bail actually works REALLY well here, since it specifically is about abandonment — to an activity, relationship, obligation, but in this specific case, a job. hm, i wonder who is constantly facing the consequences of, in a certain someone's eyes, bailing? it also works presently in tandem with henry's attitude towards being trapped in the cycle, as someone who'd be all too happy to break the script and abandon his role as a tragic hero. his time in the cycle spent as someone who basically everybody wants dead (and is tired of everyone's shit in turn) also paints a pretty good picture of a "stoic lone wolf."

they had ways to keep me quiet

convinced me that i'm insane

pronoun shift here! (i know i'm also surprised to see not Every Single Line here is about joey) "they" seems to generally refer to the ink entities that antagonize henry during his journeys through the studio. the past tense here is so interesting though...

the dancing devil betrayed me

a friend that erased his name

henry was the original creator of bendy, the dancing devil, who went on to become the ink demon (not bendy, the ink demon, hence erasing his name) stalking him in the halls of the cycle's studio.

you never had the heart or soul to let it go

the jealousy, it takes control of everything you do

he repeats the "heart/soul" motif from earlier in the song, drawing specific attention to it in regards to joey. "YOU have a heart and soul, how come you've still been so cruel to everyone around you despite that?" and of course, all that because he can't let go of his cartoon empire, of henry.

and even if you sign the line, pretend it's fine

my name, it isn't mine, i'm an object in your mind

i'm just your property, right?

MY FAVORITE LINES EVER. UGH. it's no wonder my friend group and i love nwtb's music so much. these lines work on so many levels for cycle henry it is unbelievable, like his name isn't his? YEAH because it REALLY ISN'T. IT'S REAL WORLD HENRY'S. while working for joey, he was figuratively stripped too of the personhood encapsulated in a name, merely serving the role of lead animator in joey's fantasy. and now, no amount of scraps of help joey gives him is going to give him back his name (identity. personhood). he feels like he is and always has been an object to joey, from being used for his labor without any consideration whatsoever for his own feelings and personal life, to being used as the protagonist in joey's horrifying rpf fic who serves no other purpose than to suffer for joey's own peace of mind. his characters are property of joey drew studios, and even the damn ink machine, which constitutes cycle henry's existence, belongs to joey. there's just such a level of personal anger in the way these lines are sung (thank u nate for my life), expressed with an exasperation of "yeah, better fucking believe it, but to be honest, i can't either." i'm normal, btw. just gotta mention that somewhere, so we're clear...

maybe i'm not bright

but i'm not what i seem

and maybe it's not right for me (for me)

this is where the song breaks down and starts fading out; on henry looking inward, his anger and frustration towards joey quieting down to a monologue of melancholy for the hand he's been dealt in his life. i think the "it" mentioned in the last lyric here could refer to "the best, first" (elaborated on more in the next passage). so my interpretation of it is, "maybe i wasn't meant to be the genius animation head you wanted me to be."

(edit: furthermore, in the illusion of living, joey makes it a point to emphasize how henry has a lot more to him than he would seem to on the outside. srsly he calls him "forgettable" CONSTANTLY, it's kind of amazing he has the gall to say that abt the man he lets live in his mind 24/7 rent free...)

designed for second best

i feel i'm at my worst

your expectations are my curse

henry is acutely aware of how he plays second best both for joey, who took credit for everything henry ever contributed to the studio and who, even after everything, still gets to live in the real world and keep his possession of the ink machine, and for the real world henry, who is living the life that is just out of reach for cycle henry. of course joey's expectations are his curse — his entire existence was born from joey's unreachable expectations for the real world henry.

maybe i'm not alright

when were u ever.

so yeah. um. im the normalest girl ever. extremely normal about b:tc coming this year. have i m. mentioned im normal.