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diiaf · 6 months ago

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Paranatural Theory: It's All Connected

Paranatural fans, how are we feeling?

I’m a bit late to the Peekaboo party, but in light of the latest reveal, I’m taking the opportunity to put my harebrained theory of everything out into the world. The evidence is tenuous, but if I was right about Peekaboo, then maybe there’s something to it–and the confirmation that Peekaboo is (somehow) connected to the wight is just more evidence.

Here’s my theory:

Peekaboo, Sandman, and the Shadow Spirit are all parts of Mayview’s Great Wight that broke apart after Spender [edit: and Davy, see the bottom of the post] shattered it. That Wight... is Boss Leader.

Let me explain.

Part 1: The Connections

this is 7 parts long so I put in a read more, click at your own risk

(I made this image before the latest chapter reveal but I don’t feel like editing it)

Tendrils: As seen in the merch store sticker, Peekaboo seems to have the same tentacle-y powers that Boss Leader does. Spender’s shadow also uses tendrils, albeit the shadows of tendrils. Is this just a hallmark of Wight powers, as suggested by King Catnine, or is there something more? I’ll elaborate on this later.

Black Tears: Peekaboo seems to have the same darkness inside that that shadow spirit does. It’s been pointed out that Peekaboo could fit neatly inside the hole in Spender’s Shadow’s face—maybe Spender’s blast separated the part from the whole. Spender drips this same black ooze from his eyes, as seen after he wakes from the dream where he met Dr. Burger and Sandman. That’s important for later.

Same Pose: Peekaboo and the Shadow are peeking out from behind their medium in the exact same pose. Coincidence? …yeah, maybe. But why does the Shadow have its left eye here? Why is it in the shape of a mask? A crescent moon? A human mask? What moon-shaped creature would want to appear human? I’ll get to that later.

Wrrrrr: Again, I made this image before it was confirmed that Davy somehow had Peekaboo’s powers, but that was obvious, what with their space warping using the same sound effect. However, Dimitri uses Peekaboo to warp himself, whereas Davy warps the space around him (unless maybe he warped his chin? He looks pretty different from his first appearance). So maybe Peekaboo isn’t all that’s in the locker.

Why do Davy and Dimitri have access to different applications of the same power? Peekaboo's spirit trance Halloween decorations resemble the PTA members, which it could see if it were somehow Davy's spirit too. What’s odd to me is that the Burgers' key didn’t seem like it would fit into the locker—did it open up the dream door? Is that door “real?” Real in the spirit world? Maybe that’s why the locker’s padlock has an eye on it: because the real keyhole is kept in Boss Leader’s dream, behind the door that the Witch eventually summons. Lots of unanswered questions here.

Sand: The locker is either buried in sand, or rising up from it. Sandman seems to rise up from the sandpit in the dream in much the same way. Knowing that Peekaboo is the locker spirit is more evidence that there’s a connection between Peekaboo and Sandman.

Moon Motif (there’s no yellow text highlight): Spender’s shadow is shaped like a crescent moon. Sandman’s whole design is crescent moons. This ties into some other things that I’ll explain later.

🏳️‍⚧️: Sandman is Boss Leader. Sandman didn't choose its name. Boss Leader is the name and form she prefers. Do I really have to spell this one out? I'll address this more in part 2.

To recap: Peekaboo, Sandman, and the Shadow all share some important aspects, namely reality-warping powers and design motifs. Peekaboo seems to be the spirit in Davy's locker, a.k.a. the Great Wight, that was also sealed behind the door in the Consortium's dream.

Part 2: Large Subterranean Insect

How many people remember this thing?

It swoops in for ONE PAGE, saves Max from falling off the ghost train, and departs. Paranatural’e biggest unsolved mystery… until now.

Suitsie Zipper: The Large Subterranean Insect appears on chapter, 4 page 105 to save Max. Boss leader shows up for the first time 8 pages later in Max’s dream. The zipper on the insect’s body resembles the zippers on the consortium’s suitsies. Could the insect merely be a consortium agent? Maybe, but it’s a spirit, not a medium, and all the agents are mediums.

Crescents: Look at Sandman’s head. It’s the same shape as the LSI’s spiky legs. Now look at Spender’s spirit’s tendrils! Have we been confusing insect legs for squid tentacles this whole time?

Granted, when the spirit breaks loose and attacks Max and Isabel on page 138 the tendrils are more octopus-like, but Boss Leader’s dream-tendrils are squiddy as well. The spirit is spiky, the powers are squishy? I know this is a stretch.

Injury: Why does the LSI have that red mark? The Paranatural wiki claims that it's an eye. Maybe. If you ask me, it looks like a scar. A scar shaped like the sparkles that Spender makes when he uses Lucifer’s light powers. When Spender blasted the Lake Spirit (stripping away a shadowy disguise?) maybe it left a scar…

Reddit user DeadMountainDaughter made the connection between BL and the LSI (and compiled a lot of other information that inspired this theory) in a post on the Paranatural subreddit 5 months ago, so credit to her for that.

We know for sure that Boss Leader isn't human. The tragic backstory that she tells Spender and Mina about being forced into eternal slumber is (probably) complete bunk. As King Catnine discovers, "Boss Leader" is the conjured-up puppet of the Wight known as Sandman. Sandman, however, is not the name it chose. Its preferred form, and name, is that of Boss Leader. Can a spirit have gender dysphoria? The answer seems to be yes. Moreover, Sandman's Wight Wail is "PLEASE DON'T BE SCARED." She wants people to like her! She wants to be human! But she can't have that anymore. Not since...

Part 3: The Incident

Using the evidence we’ve been given so far, here’s my interpretation of the hidden background of Paranatural:

Boss Leader is a Wight with the power to mold reality. Out of a fascination/jealousy/love for humanity, she shapes, protects, and sustains Mayview. To protect humans from dangerous spirits, and to fight powerful spirits like Lucifer and King Catnine, she maintains the Activity Consortium.

Thirteen years before present-day Paranatural, something happens: the "unexplained paranatural event 13 years ago" that everyone keeps referring to. This is the event that earned Spender his reputation as the "strongest spectral," where he "defeated" the strongest spirit with a single burst of light. What else do we know about this event? That it was the day that Lucifer came to claim the Mayview Wight's power.

Lucifer was one of "the others" that coveted the Wight. We know Lucifer can cross through the barrier as pure light—Spender uses their spirit fusion to do just that when facing King Catnine. What if he entered Mayview to face the Wight, and was defeated, hopelessly outmatched. His wisp possesses the nearby Richard Spender. The Wight, donning her shadowy human disguise, reaches for Lucifer, who is now possessing Spender.

Spender and Lucifer, or maybe Lucifer possessing Spender, shoots a blast of light. With that blast, something breaks. The part of Boss Leader that can shape reality and the part of her that can shape dreams are split. The part left in reality, broken by Spender’s blast, possesses Spender as the shadow. The fragment that was blasted free (Peekaboo) possesses Dimitri, who is one year old at the time. Dimitri "first became a spectral as an infant" (ch7 pg144), and Peekaboo seems stuck in a childlike mental state. Peekaboo is a ghost, so it makes itself look like a child's idea of a ghost.

Without the Peekaboo part, the Shadow can’t mold the physical world, only shadows. Cut away from the Shadow, Peekaboo loses its identity, reinventing itself according to Dimitri's childhood imagination. Without the ability to shape the physical world, Boss Leader can only manifest her human “self” in dreams. Her insectoid spirit hides below ground, hiding her true form, unable to show herself to humans without frightening them. She can no longer control the part of herself that shapes the real world, and can no longer wear her disguise: the shadowy mask that now possesses Spender.

The part of Boss Leader that can shapeshift in the real world is still there, but it's out of her control. If woken, it would rampage. She "locked it in nightmares," nursed it as a grudge, but she's missing some piece of the puzzle. Little does she know that part of that missing piece has been in Rick Spender all along...

Also: Peekaboo's floor is literally made of puzzle pieces! I know that's in reference to the foam floor tiles that you put down in a kid's room, but it has to mean something. Coincidence? ...yeah, maybe. But I think Peekaboo is the missing piece from the Shadow's mask.

Part 4: King Catnine

This friggin’ guy.

One person in Mayview knows where the Great Wight is—in fact, he’s known all along. Why did Isaac nearly electrocute Dimitri? Why did Catnine amplify Isaac’s shot towards the Hijack-controlled Spender? Because he recognized the power that they possessed, or rather, that was possessing them: the power of a wight. I'm sure he'll have his moment someday.

Part 5: The Locker

When the locker was first shown, the Paranatural fandom exploded trying to decipher the meaning behind its stickers. Was the ghost Peekaboo? Was the Vampire Davy? Was the "zzz" Sandman? Why was the werewolf there? What about the star- was Starchman involved?

The answer is yes, to everything.

I posit that some of the stickers represent the “paranatural” elements of Mayview. Vampires, werewolves, an “unusually high population of ghosts and spirits” (Valerie Day, ch5 pg144), while the burger and sticky note are more pertinent to the locker spirit’s current situation. The wight shapes reality, and these things are its reality—Mayview’s reality. As I’ve already stated, I think the eye on the padlock represents how the real padlock is hidden away in a dream, literally "locked in nightmares." Boss Leader sure has a lot of eye motifs.

(I don’t actually know about the star. Maybe that reflects how Starchman stars are a real, valued currency in the school? Zack’s master plan continues to elude me)

There's another version of this theory. Davy claims that he once "shared the same prison" as the spirit in the locker. Davy, as far as we know, is the oldest vampire in Mayview, and he wasn't yet a vampire when the Consortium defeated the Great Sphinx. What if Mayview's werewolves and vampires, and even their spirits, all come from the sleeping wight's dream-world? The same place that the Doctors Burger were sent, and where Dave Jones may have been sent on his final mission for the Consortium. The Doctors are still there. Davy, however, cut his way out. I'll get to that in a minute. First, look at this passage from the latest chapter:

Where have we seen a boat before?

Where Doctor Burger is, in the Wight’s dream! The lake is where everything went down thirteen years ago, and it's where the fragment of the sleeping Wight still slumbers. But what does this have to do with Boss Leader, if she's also that big insect?

This paragraph from Chapter 8, page 61 is my smoking gun:

Insects flushed from hiding? Dredged up from the depths to be dissected on sands? Wow, that sounds familiar.

Davy Jones once worked for the Consortium, under Boss Leader. For whatever reason (maybe he tried to usurp her? maybe she just sent him on a mission gone wrong), she "let him go" from the consortium, cut off his hand (now Lefty) and sealed him away in the sleeping Wight's dream. Davy, with Cryptide's help (the grudge he held), cut his way out—and maybe cut off some of the wight's space-warping abilities to keep for himself. That last bit is pure speculation; I still don't know exactly how Davy and Dimitri both have access to Peekaboo, and that's my best guess.

Part 6: LOOK AT ME

I know what you're thinking: "Sandman can't be the Wight! Their wails are different!" I hear you, and I propose an answer.

Firstly, who said that a Wight can only have one wail? On the chapter cover, the wail is preceded by a monologue that culminates in the spiral of pure emotion. Secondly, assuming that Sandman and the Sleeping Wight are two parts of the same spirit, if the Sleeping Wight was the mask that Boss Leader showed to the world, no wonder its basic desire would be to be perceived. Put them back together, and all the Great Wight wants is for people to see it without being scared.

(it's all very biblical angel "BE NOT AFRAID," isn't it?)

Peekaboo, in its childlike state, is left with the basic desire to be looked at, played with, and given attention. Spender's shadow, meanwhile, just flails, lashing out to grab people.

Moreover: IS THAT NOT SANDMAN'S EYE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE CHAPTER COVER?? BOSS LEADER IS THE WIGHT I SWEAR

Part 7: Maybe I'm Wrong

Maybe Sandman isn't the Great Wight after all. Peekaboo and the Shadow are certainly related, and I'm convinced that Boss Leader is an insect, but maybe all wights can use those monstrous tendrils. In that case, I have two alternate theories:

One: Maybe Boss Leader was just using the Wight, puppeting it, controlling it through its dreams to shape Mayview while it slept. Davy says that he lent his hand to "your dream," i.e. Boss Leader's dream. That could mean the Consortium, it could mean Mayview as the literal dream of the Wight, but it could also mean Boss Leader's dream for Mayview, enacted through the sleeping Wight. Maybe Lucifer woke the Wight, and then Spender blasted it to pieces, putting it back to sleep but severing Boss Leader's control. Either way, it would still make sense for the Mayview Wight to desire the approving attention of others. Now that BL can't control it, it shapes itself, like Davy claims, according to the dreams of Mayview's people. Or maybe that desire to be looked at just jealousy, simmered for years of watching Davy dote on Cryptide.

Two: Maybe Boss Leader was never controlling it! Maybe "Clayview" was a pre-thirteen-years-ago concept, and the Incident that shattered the Wight was what changed the town into Mayview as the town's collective unconscious made it lush and green. Who knows what would happen if the Wight were to wake up, and what would happen to Mayview.

CONCLUSION

I did not intend to make this post so long. It's a testament to Zack's storytelling ability that there are so many possibilities to distill from this webcomic. I might be way off the mark, but I'm just happy to share my speculations. I'm sure I've missed a lot.

Whoever read this whole essay, I hope you're as excited for the next Paranatural update as I am!

this is how boss leader can still win

EDIT:

I got the timeline all mixed up! Davy was a vampire before the Incident—Davy cutting himself free of the dream had to occur before Spender "defeated" the Wight. That means I need to revise some things.

New Theory: Davy severed Boss Leader from the Lake Spirit, Spender then broke that spirit in two, creating Peekaboo and the Shadow.

Davy, with Cryptide's powers, "cut the age of great wights to a close." That must have included Boss Leader! When Davy cut himself out of Boss Leader's dream, he split the Wight's reality-warping powers in two—splitting Mayview's reality in two, between the dream and the real world. Boss Leader could control dreams from out in the waking world and the Lake Spirit could control the waking world from within a dream. That was why Spender could defeat the Lake Spirit: it was only half the Wight it had been before. It's still connected to Boss Leader, like how the Sphinxes are connected to each other. Davy kept a piece of the wight for himself, somehow, and draws power through the locker.

I maintain that the Shadow is somehow Boss Leader's human mask, or human form. That means her insect spirit is... I don't know. There's a bedbug joke to be made somewhere. The Lake Spirit has empty eyes, Peekaboo has empty eyes, Spender has empty eyes... Sandman and Boss Leader are all about eyes. Is Sandman the spirit's eyes? Sandman looks like a half moon, a completed Shadow would look like a full moon, I'm just spitballing here

Everything else about this theory holds, I think.

Thanks to this post by @blacktycoon that made me realize my anachronism. They also put a lot of these pieces together back in May, way before I did lol.

#paranatural #pnat #pnat spoilers #paranatural spoilers #boss leader #this is the most original fandom content you'll ever see from me

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