#parf-fan theory

[parf-fan]

Annual fan-theory rehashing:

The shire of Mount Hope is caught in a time-loop, the same day repeating over and over.

Not always, mind you. This event only seems to be triggered by the presence of royalty in the little NightVale-esque village.  And even then, not all those present will be caught in it.  There is no real rhyme or reason to who will or won’t, but one can live in Mount Hope one’s entire life and never be caught in a loop.

Those trapped in the loop do not notice right away.  Oh, the ones who’ve done this a dozen times, of course they can tell immediately.  But most will not.  How could they?  All they will perceive at first is a vague sense of déjà vu.  As the loop progresses, things will start to seem actively familiar.  Folk meeting for the first time will already know one another.  They guess what is about to happen, and they are always right. They mentally recite the words of others as the words are first spoken.

Some may spend time privately questioning their own sanity.  Others will take counsel with those they trust as soon as they sense something strange.  The loop is openly acknowledged at different rates by different individuals, in part based on the speed at which it is recognized.  Some – particularly those whose minds most resemble those of the Fae – recognize it at once.  The very second time they live this day, they know they’ve lived it before with only slight differences.  Those with more typical minds take over a month’s worth of days to discern what is happening.  But sooner or later, all do.  And as they recognize it, they speak of it, mostly only to those they are closest to.  After a time – a little under two months’ worth of looped days, to be precise – all those within the loop have acknowledged and spoken of it with at least a few others.

Yet time loops are fickle things, and more often than not, the actions of the loop are determined by the attitudes of those within it.  So it is with the loop of Mount Hope.  Once everyone has spoken of and acknowledged the loop, it changes.

Against all rationality, something new – someone new, often – enters the loop.  An element of the supernatural previously absent.  It throws everything, everyone off.  The day begins as it has for months, but then it changes.  Nobody is prepared for this.  Some may think that perhaps they had dreamed the loop, that none of these events had truly yet transpired.  Others merely stare in disbelief, mentally mouthing phrases in the spirit of what the hap is fuckening.

And so they must begin again, recognizing the repeated events.  As before, the Fae-like minds catch on at once.  But the process for all is more speedy this time, for they’ve already recognized a loop once before.  And as they start pinning down this altered loop, they begin to accept. After all, bizarre though the past weeks of their lives have been, they cannot deny that they have enjoyed themselves immensely.  They are living a festival day, after all!  And through that time, they have all bonded with each other deeply.  One by one, they all come to the conclusion that, well, if they are to be stuck in the same day for the rest of eternity, they couldn’t have chosen better company with whom to be stuck.

But acceptance is just what the loop has been waiting for, precisely what was needed to free its prisoners, to end it.  The inhabitants of the loop are somehow aware when it is the last day.  How?  Who knows. Mount Hope is a strange place, and some things within it do not brook questioning.

And so the visitors and denizens of Mount Hope make their way through one final day.  In many ways, it will be a relief to end this, of course; yet there is not one among them wholly pleased.  For all have come to love one another immensely, and the routine of the day – moderately terrifying at times though it may be – has grown strangely soothing.

They live through their day one last time, and they stand on a stage and sing one last farewell.  A very few eyes may be dry, but these are in the minority.

And then it is over. New-reigning Catherine and Henry depart the village, promising to return someday. The Bavarian representatives stay some days yet, and then they, too, must turn their faces away. The Court of France scarce remains longer before setting off for their own realm. Her Majesty, newly crowned, and her cousin, newly redeemed, take their leave of a village newly at peace. Crisis averted, the newlyweds begin their life together, as the remaining civics folk scramble to rectify whatever other ills had been wrought by the architect of the crisis. Two queens, each both fallen and redeemed in differing ways, bid farewell to that setting of upheaval and most of the supporters who had helped enact such tumult. A pair of twins begins the arduous and worthwhile process of dissecting and processing their ill-upbringings to better themselves, as the other leaders begin the process of applying their newfound bounty to better the village.

Yet there is not one who e’er departs that shire who does not vow to return – for a day, a week, a month, another loop.  For such is the power of that strange place, that all who pass through its gates leave a part of themselves there, and all who leave that part of themselves do so because in that place, if only for a little while, they have found their home.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I formulated this headcanon just before Oktoberfest 2017 and have interpreted the Faire through its lens ever since. It serves several functions: most notably making a place in-universe for the repeated day, but most importantly explaining the character-development over the course of the season; as well as why the audience only sees a fraction of the people who must surely reside in this township, not to mention why those people are different even when only a few years have passed in-universe – we only bear witness to the folk caught in the loop.

[parf-fan]

Star Shanties at PARF 2024

Geeky folk at its finest (as is to be expected of music written by Arthur Rowan), the Star Shanties project is not simply music about Star Wars: these are songs that could exist within the world of Star Wars. Each of the songs has lore, not all of which is relayed within the show. Full lore/flavor-text can be found in the video descriptions on the Twin Suns Entertainment YouTube channel, along with lyrics and the earlier versions of the songs.

Many a Parsec Running Down from Kessel Hondo Ohnaka (only flavor-text; no lyrics in description) Old Man Thrawn (only lyrics; no flavor-text in description) Hydian Way

Sing a Song of Obi Wan Bound for Nar Shaddaa The Trooper's Lament Hondo Ohnaka (again) (still no lyrics in description) Ghosts of Alderaan

This last one is the same songs from Saturday's 3:30pm set, plus one from Saturday's 1pm set. I therefore shall not bother linking them again. Still worth watching, if only because they added some PARF-specific verses to Hondo Ohnaka.

Not appearing in any of these performances but you should still go watch them if you haven't: Song of the Midnight Blade Admiral Raddus Let Shine Your Orbs Of Life Day

Time presses, and I have done naught to this footage and audio besides the fades at either end (and the patching of the third set). Please be aware that I cheer VERY loudly and somewhat shrilly throughout the first set; and there is hecking surrounding noise in the second set, as well as sunlight shenanigans (which I'd probably have left in anyway, for artistic reasons).

[parf-fan]

Annual fan-theory rehashing:

The shire of Mount Hope is caught in a time-loop, the same day repeating over and over.

Not always, mind you. This event only seems to be triggered by the presence of royalty in the little NightVale-esque village.  And even then, not all those present will be caught in it.  There is no real rhyme or reason to who will or won’t, but one can live in Mount Hope one’s entire life and never be caught in a loop.

Those trapped in the loop do not notice right away.  Oh, the ones who’ve done this a dozen times, of course they can tell immediately.  But most will not.  How could they?  All they will perceive at first is a vague sense of déjà vu.  As the loop progresses, things will start to seem actively familiar.  Folk meeting for the first time will already know one another.  They guess what is about to happen, and they are always right. They mentally recite the words of others as the words are first spoken.

Some may spend time privately questioning their own sanity.  Others will take counsel with those they trust as soon as they sense something strange.  The loop is openly acknowledged at different rates by different individuals, in part based on the speed at which it is recognized.  Some – particularly those whose minds most resemble those of the Fae – recognize it at once.  The very second time they live this day, they know they’ve lived it before with only slight differences.  Those with more typical minds take over a month’s worth of days to discern what is happening.  But sooner or later, all do.  And as they recognize it, they speak of it, mostly only to those they are closest to.  After a time – a little under two months’ worth of looped days, to be precise – all those within the loop have acknowledged and spoken of it with at least a few others.

Yet time loops are fickle things, and more often than not, the actions of the loop are determined by the attitudes of those within it.  So it is with the loop of Mount Hope.  Once everyone has spoken of and acknowledged the loop, it changes.

Against all rationality, something new – someone new, often – enters the loop.  An element of the supernatural previously absent.  It throws everything, everyone off.  The day begins as it has for months, but then it changes.  Nobody is prepared for this.  Some may think that perhaps they had dreamed the loop, that none of these events had truly yet transpired.  Others merely stare in disbelief, mentally mouthing phrases in the spirit of what the hap is fuckening.

And so they must begin again, recognizing the repeated events.  As before, the Fae-like minds catch on at once.  But the process for all is more speedy this time, for they’ve already recognized a loop once before.  And as they start pinning down this altered loop, they begin to accept. After all, bizarre though the past weeks of their lives have been, they cannot deny that they have enjoyed themselves immensely.  They are living a festival day, after all!  And through that time, they have all bonded with each other deeply.  One by one, they all come to the conclusion that, well, if they are to be stuck in the same day for the rest of eternity, they couldn’t have chosen better company with whom to be stuck.

But acceptance is just what the loop has been waiting for, precisely what was needed to free its prisoners, to end it.  The inhabitants of the loop are somehow aware when it is the last day.  How?  Who knows. Mount Hope is a strange place, and some things within it do not brook questioning.

And so the visitors and denizens of Mount Hope make their way through one final day.  In many ways, it will be a relief to end this, of course; yet there is not one among them wholly pleased.  For all have come to love one another immensely, and the routine of the day – moderately terrifying at times though it may be – has grown strangely soothing.

They live through their day one last time, and they stand on a stage and sing one last farewell.  A very few eyes may be dry, but these are in the minority.

And then it is over. New-reigning Catherine and Henry depart the village, promising to return someday. The Bavarian representatives stay some days yet, and then they, too, must turn their faces away. The Court of France scarce remains longer before setting off for their own realm. Her Majesty, newly crowned, and her cousin, newly redeemed, take their leave of a village newly at peace. Crisis averted, the newlyweds begin their life together, as the remaining civics folk scramble to rectify whatever other ills had been wrought by the architect of the crisis. Two queens, each both fallen and redeemed in differing ways, bid farewell to that setting of upheaval and most of the supporters who had helped enact such tumult.

Yet there is not one who e’er departs that shire who does not vow to return – for a day, a week, a month, another loop.  For such is the power of that strange place, that all who pass through its gates leave a part of themselves there, and all who leave that part of themselves do so because in that place, if only for a little while, they have found their home.

[parf-fan]

Reginald has been gone from Mount Hope shire for quite a long time, at least a decade in-universe.  The Lady Mayor will only ever say that he is away, has been away for a long time.  I theorize that Reginald died some time ago, probably as a result of illness, and those who were close to him mourned in private.  The Lady Mayor has not let his death be publicly known, for fear of other politicians pressuring her to remarry or cede her authority to her son.  She is all too aware that a woman is taken less seriously when not attached to a man, whether or not the man was particularly competent.

[parf-fan]

It began as only one ship, one captain, one crew. They drank, they sang, they joked; they sailed, they boarded, they plundered. Their success was unparalleled, and their crew grew until they had hands to spare.

It came to pass that they captured a vessel as fine as their own, inflicting minimal damage upon it. It seemed a waste to simply scuttle the ship after making off with its treasure, and so they resolved to keep it, and build a fleet. The first mate became captain of the new vessel, and half the crew went along. But all of them were extremely attached to the name of their first vessel, so much so that they determined they should rename this new ship to match the old.

The two pyrate crews, separate and yet one, went about their regular business. More joking, singing, drinking, sailing, boarding, plundering. In time, they once more built up their crews to excess, and once more captured a ship so grand they felt compelled to add it to their ranks.

Yet three pyrate vessels under one command attracts attention, the sort of attention no criminal wants to attract. When news of the fledgling armada reached the lawfolk on the shore, navy ships were sent out with the express purpose of stopping its growth in its tracks.

The battle that ensued is not for me to recount. Know only that it was bloody, and lengthy, with casualties numerous. The pyrates prevailed, but at the cost of one of their ships, and damage to both others. The two remaining captains – the original captain and original mate – took council together, and decided that they had no wish to attract such naval strength again. Thus they declared that they should split their would-be armada up, sailing as one force no more. Yet they would retain an alliance, for friendship’s sake as much as strategy. And both ships would remain named as they were.

The two vessels took their leave of one another, and it is not said that any parted wholly willingly. Yet within all lingered hope that they might meet once more someday.

The minds of the original captain and original mate worked similarly – no doubt explaining their efficiency in mutual endeavors. As both ships followed their own respective path, both encountered success once again, repeatedly. Both eventually captured fine vessels in prime condition, and both split their crews to man the new ship as well as the old. In both cases, the new ships were christened the same as the old. And both new ships left the old ships, sailing as crews separate yet linked.

And so it came to be that a fleet of loosely-allied pyrate ships all bearing the same name roved the seas both far and near, adding to their ranks when e’er they might. None but those aboard knew that every vessel carried the same name, and so it seemed to others that the damage wrought by all was caused by only one. ’Twas thus all sailing nations of the world came to fear the name of a pyrate ship infamous beyond all that came before: the Bloody Shame!

((Did I come up with this headcanon purely so that when there is inevitably a new captain of the Bloody Shame [THE BLOODY SHAME!] next season, it won’t mean that Captain Mendoza and Penny Dreadful were killed? Yes. Yes I did.))

[parf-fan]

Yah this is gonna be badly written but I literally do not have time to write it well.

I'm gonna talk about Sir Walter.  Maybe no one was wondering how in the year 1560+, Sir Walter could still be alive and young as he was in 1518-1520.  But mayhap some of you were. And for those hypotheticals among you who maybe were, I present several options.

The first is that which I deem most canon compliant, and I do to bring receipts.  In autumn of 1518, Sir Walter got engaged to a faerie monarch.  This moment can be seen in Renaissance Road Trip's video here, from about 0:40-1:50, with further reference made at 4:06-4:33.

Though this moment was never repeated at future Finales, a relationship between the two was implied in Rumple's famous Sank Zee speech, as can be seen in PARF Performers's video here, at 27:31 – 28:11.  

A relationship was further alluded to in the Halloween II Finale of 2018, as can be seen in PARF Performers's video here, at 45:27 – 45:46.

Sadly, the most overwhelming moments to support the canonicy of Walterstiltskin were never recorded that I know of, for it was through interaction with Alex as Sir Walter.  At any time in the 2018 season, one could (and my friends and I often did) interact with Sir Walter at length regarding his marriage to Rumpelstiltskin.  It was through such interaction that I learned that Sir Walter canonically split his time between the fae Realm of the Black Forest and the mortal Realm of Mount Hope.

Now, I don't know how familiar you all are with faerie folklore, and it's true that – as with all folklore – there is variation throughout the lore, but it's generally pretty consistent that humans in the fae Realm don't age, particularly when acting as spouse or consort to a faerie.  So it's probable that, at least so long as he is in the fae Realm, Sir Walter does not age. Whether or not he continues aging when in the mortal Realm is up to individual interpretation.  My headcanon so far has been that he does continue to age when in the mortal Realm, and began phasing himself out of the mortal Realm around the time that his peers begin aging and dying off, eventually settling permanently full time in the fae Realm.  This season may change that headcanon, or at least introduce other options, we shall see.  Regardless, there's plenty of canon-sound fae-based explanation for Sir Walter to still be alive and young in the year 1560+.

"But PARF-fan!", I hear you cry.  "Sir Walter canonically died of a heart-attack!  They said as much in the in memorum section of 1558's DisasterCon!" (as can be seen in PARF Performers's video here at 34:05 – 37:19).  And you're correct!  Howe'er, I call your attention to the weekend of DisasterCon: Time-Travelers' Weekend.  Chronology is relative on that weekend.  While I do not deny the fact that Sir Walter eventually dies, that information could have come to them from anywhen, particularly the future.  The distant future.  Given on Time-Travelers' Weekend, this knowledge nullifies nothing.

There are yet some other options, which I run through now.  First, for all we currently know, this could be a descendant of the original Sir Walter, much as I'm theorizing that this season's Diggory Applebottom is a descendant of 2017's Diggory Applebottom.  There is precedent here in the characters of Olivia Charnwood and Yeoman Adam Cringer, both of whom were described in their 2019 character descriptions as the respective grandchildren of the 2018 characters of the same names.

Second, I would be remiss to not call attention to this most excellent theory put forth in the Facebook comments of my character name post by Katie Markey, all hail: “I hear that stress creates minor amounts of electricity. This makes perfect sense, you see, because Sir Walter Rodrick Kensington was an adult in 1518, and has not aged since. It is my theory that the man has promptly had 500 heart attacks only to be brought back with the sheer electric shock of his own stress, and is therefore immortal. I am not taking criticism at this time.”

The lack of ~realism~ of that theory brings me to my final point.  There doesn't have to be an explanation!  Hell, the Lady Mayor hath been here from Elizabethan to Catherinian-Henrecian to Elizabethan again, through several universes and versions of events.  So too have Rip Skeleton and, until recently, Lanky Hemptwister.  We don't need a why in order for it to be believable, any more than we need an explanation as to why a scullerymaid or a painter is a skilled fighter, or why nobody (except Hans) cares a whit that there are actual pyrates running around.  I make it my business to determine the whys of some of these things (not all of them), because I fckn love consistency and continuity, and enjoy fitting all things into a cohesive universe.  But my interpretation of the Faire is not universal, nor would I have it be so.