#or bra*n's comment that “you'll get plenty of tomgreg this season”

[turtlesallthewaytomgreg]

tomgreg dependent on stress not tomshiv

okay so lil headcannon theory: thinking about how the idea that 'tomgreg only works when tom has someone to take his shiv-related aggression out on' doesn't seem to fully capture their relationship. tom being willing to go to prison for greg, greg not leaking whatever was in the logistics folder, tom taking the fall for boar on the floor, etc. etc.

i'm wondering if their relationship materializes, less out of tom's relationship to shiv and more out of tom and greg's relationship to environmental stressors. when everything's 'good,' their interactions are pretty surface level and or minimal, right? i mean, no reason to scheme, black mail, throw water bottles if there aren't any active shooters, corporate scandals, congressional hearings, etc. etc. but when things are bad? they pull together like magnets. they're the only two who really get what its like to be in that state of being the 'first to go' in the event of a huge stressor/threat to waystar as 'non roy' members of the roy family.

it's well documented that heightened levels of emotional arousal under stressful situations--which involves releasing adrenal into the body--increases the romantic attraction between two individuals. this certainly makes sense in the context of tom and greg's homoerotic build-up in s2/s3. the cruises scandal and threat of going to prison hit their stress response systems like a fucking bullet train (no pun intended). greg's getting a haircut even though he didn't need one because it felt 'soothing,' and the clear, physical and verbal manifestations of anxiety pre- and post- appearing before congress. not to mention tom constantly bringing up the prison blogs with his big sad eyes, months of fear and worry and dysregulation and expectation leading up to the culminating moment of emotional release: learning that he wouldn't be going to prison, waltzing into greg's office, flipping his desk over, beating his chest on top of the filing cabinets, pulling greg into a post-adrenal-fueled haze of a forehead kiss, etc.

s3 already established that tom goes to greg at the height of his emotional dysregulation, and s4 continues to confirm it. logan suddenly and unexpectedly dying? an extremely traumatic/emotional stressor, and tom responds by calling greg? solidifying him not only tom's number one confidant but the person he goes to first when his adrenaline's spiked by stress.

in the first couple of episodes, they didn't have a whole lot of reason to be stressed. they're at logan's birthday party, tom's getting a divorce, pretty standard family dysfunction. but what do we have here, episode three and four? now their sole protector is dead and the new guy, mattson has apparently no qualms about a total and immediate corporate restructure. sure, tom and greg aren't on the kill list for now, but what's actually standing in between them and a total loss of control? i don't know about you but the slow build up of uncertainty/stress within the plot across 4.01-4.04 seems like some pretty solid grounds for some late season romantic ~bonding!~ if you ask me :)