#spoilers for wtit

[sorry-not-feeling-it-right-now]

SO TRUE!!!!

Also one more thing that I wanted to add is that it also ties into his role as Creativity’s other half

While Roman’s creativity is tied more onto escapism and more fantastical, Remus’s creativity is more true and brutal, like addressing difficult topics through the power of fiction

Kinda like different types of creative media irl, which further emphasis that the twins are two sides of the same coin

okay, so... the new episode came out and i was sucked back into tss against my will. sorry to everyone who followed me for dsmp stuff 😅. buuuuuuuut- that means it’s time for another character analysis!

So I want to talk about Remus.

There’s been a lot of theorizing about Logan’s character development and the orange side (which i am super excited for!!) but i haven’t seen that many posts discussing Remus’s role in this last episode, which I think was a LOT more important than we all realized.

Here’s the thing: Remus is smarter than he looks. We haven’t gotten to see much of this before now- I mean, sure, he had like an entire 45 minutes devoted solely to him, but that was just the introduction. There’s clearly a lot more to Remus than he lets on, and we got a bit of that in WTIT. Now this episode was great for a lot of reasons, but especially because it started to answer a question i’ve had since DWIT-- what is Remus’s purpose? He’s intrusive thoughts, yes. But that isn’t why he exists. Every side has a certain job to fulfill, all of which help thomas in some way. For example, Virgil’s title is anxiety, but his purpose is to keep Thomas safe.

So what is Remus really trying to accomplish? If we just look at DWIT, it seems like all he’s trying to do is hurt thomas. But that can’t be right- it seems the only common factor between the sides is that they all want to help thomas as much as possible (though they have very different ideas of what ‘help‘ is). So how does Remus help thomas? Lets look at what he does.

Probably the most beneficial thing Remus has done is get Logan to snap at him. Why? Because Logan ‘I do not have emotions and everything will be fine if i simply ignore them’ Sanders needed that. And Remus knew this. He also— because it’s his job--knew exactly what buttons to push to get get to Logan’s breaking point. He knows that Logan is feeling ignored- which already makes him a lot more perceptive than any of the others seem to be.

Here’s the thing: A problem can’t be solved until it’s addressed.

So what’s Remus’s purpose? What has he done?

Remus is honesty. That’s not his title, no, but that’s his purpose. To get Thomas to be honest with himself. Remus takes all the nasty, slimy, twisted parts of everyone that they’ve all preferred to just shove under the rug and he brings them to the light. He pokes and prods and needles until they have no choice but to address their problems, and, consequently... fix them.

And here’s the thing! WTIT isn’t the first time Remus has done this. Remember when he first appeared? Remember all those little comments toward Virgil, pushing his buttons and dropping subtle hints that left everyone else confused?

Remus was the tipping point, the last straw that led to Virgil finally telling thomas about his past. And Remus knew this. Sure, it was awful, and there was definitely a better way get Virgil out of his shell—but it eventually led to what we saw in the first asides. Thomas let Virgil know that they were still friends, and it was okay. They were okay, despite a rocky history.

I‘m sure Virgil himself would’ve preferred never to tell thomas— but they couldn’t have truly moved on and worked through other problems if he hadn’t.

I‘m almost certain the same thing is going to happen with Logan being ignored, and whoever the orange side turns out to be.

Remus is working for Thomas’s benefit, even if it’s hard to see.

[halloween4life]

The Orange Side is going to represent Impulsiveness and the rest of y'all are wrong: a thread

For obvious reasons the title of this post is a joke. But anyway, hi hello. I wanted to talk about my theory of what I think the Orange Side is gonna be! Now this post is going to be looong so for the sake of everyone it's going to be put under the cut.

Disclaimers that I want to get out of the way now: I have just recently re-entered the fandom and I haven't been into Sanders Sides in years. I'm not a Patreon supporter nor do I have Twitter so I lack any information that may have been revealed there. Also I am still in the process of rewatching the series. So as of now, I don't really have a complete understanding of the series. I apologize if I get anything wrong, and if any of this puts you off, totally valid.

Oh also, general spoilers for like, anything Sanders Sides related but specifically Working Through Intrusive Thoughts (if you still somehow have not watched it). Honestly I recommend watching it before reading this as a refresher, because most of this theory is based around/supported by that video. It's like, really the only foundation for this theory as I don't really delve much into the other episodes.

First things first, I am going to lay down some rules on what the Orange Side could represent:

1) The concept needs to in some way be the "opposite" of logic. Realistically this doesn't have to be the case in the series, but based on how the other Dark Sides function, it makes the most sense for now.

2) The concept needs to be generally considered negative for them to be considered a Dark Side.

3) Whatever they represent needs to REALISTICALLY make sense as an aspect of C! Thomas' identity. I think a lot of people forget that the Sides are that, Sides of a whole person. So I tried my best to make that work.

Now, with that out of the way,,,I'm going to "debunk" some theories first. Yes sorry there is a lot of set up to this theory, but I feel like it's important. Also, reminder, if you believe in either of the theories I am going to debunk, that is TOTALLY 100% VALID! I'm just going to discuss why I don't think they work, so this is all just my opinion!

Theory 1: The Orange Side represents Rage

I'm pretty sure this is the most popular theory right now, and I know a lot of people also disagree with it. I think this one mostly came about because our only real evidence of the Orange Side is through Logan's anger fueled outbursts in WTIT and Learning New Things About Ourselves. While I definitely understand this line of thinking, I don't think it's right.

First and foremost, it breaks the third rule set up earlier. Again, all these characters are facets of Thomas' personality. And from what we've seen of him, it just doesn't make sense with his personality. Now, again, this could obviously be different in the series, we could learn that this is actually his rage and he's just been repressing it, but I doubt that'll be the case. (Also I feel like this could break the first rule but I don't know how to explain why).

Secondly, and I just think that rage in and of itself is just, way too specific of a concept to be represented by a side. This kinda works in tandem with the first point, since again, it just doesn't seem that large of an aspect of Thomas that it would be represented by its own side. As well, all the other sides represent either much larger concepts or multiple at a time. For instance, Logan, Patton, and Roman represent logic, morality, and (good) creativity respectively. While Virgil and Janus do represent anxiety and deceit, those titles are rather reductive, as they also represent vigilance and self-preservation respectively. (Really I think we need to talk more about the fact that Janus is canonically Thomas' self-preservation but is really only viewed as "deceit"). Remus is a fun case as although he is viewed as "intrusive thoughts", he as a whole represents the bad side of creativity. TLDR: Rage is too specific a concept to be its own side.

Theory 2: The Orange Side Represents Emotion

Okay I'm going to be honest, I've only seen one person on here with this theory (and for the life of me I can't remember their name). But I just want to say that if you are reading this, this isn't me calling you out or anything (honestly I really agreed with your theory until I came up with this one). If I remember correctly, this theory is more built on the Orange Side being an opposite to logic, and how emotions tend to cloud logic, similar to the reasoning for rage.

I think this theory most obviously breaks rule 2. Now emotions as a whole do have the capacity to be bad, I think the concept of just emotion is not generally considered bad. Definitely not enough for it to be considered along with the Dark Sides. It's simply too big of a concept to be either "good" or "bad".

On that subject, I think this theory has a similar issue to the rage theory, but in the opposite direction. While rage was too specific, emotions are waaay too broad to just be one singular side. Especially given that all of the current sides have some sway over Thomas' emotions. And it's also possible that this side would be considered too close to Patton. While yes, it is not explicitly stated that he is in charge of Thomas' emotions, he definitely has the most sway over them. Ultimately, I think this theory is just too vague to work.

Okay, now with that all out of the way, let's get into my actual theory. So,

Why do I think the Orange Side will represent Impulsiveness?

I'm going to start this off by comparing my claims to the rules I made up. Because tbh, that's how I came to the conclusion in the first place before I started finding evidence to support it (but isn't that how all good hypotheses work?)

1) Does impulsiveness act as a counter to logic?

According to Merriam-Webster's dictionary, Impulsive is defined as "prone to sudden illogical changes of mind, ideas, or actions". Now I was gonna go on a big explanation of how they are opposites but it literally says illogical in the definition. So uh, yayy 🎉🎉🎉

2) Is impulsiveness seen as a negative thing?

Now, truthfully there is no way for me to prove that impulsiveness is either "good" or "bad". That being said, I feel like a lot of people generally view impulsiveness as a bad thing. While in small amounts it can be seen as good and fun, the more frequently you engage in impulsive behaviors, the more destructive it can become. Often leading to bad decision making, i.e. avoiding work, making big financial decisions without much thought, and generally just doing what you want over what may be important.

3) Does this fit within Thomas' personality?

Yes. It has been shown time and time again that Thomas has an issue with his impulsive behaviors. Oftentimes manifesting in him avoiding chores and general self-care in favor of doing something easy or entertaining. The most clear example of this being the video "Growing Up." While yes, most of these decisions are made due to Patton, it's not entirely uncommon for the sides to be affected or swayed by the others. (Also if I'm being honest, I don't think it entirely fair to analyze the earlier episodes with the same critical lens as the later ones, it's definitely not fair to Thomas (the real Thomas) to criticize the early episodes for not perfectly aligning with later lore).

Now, finally, we can get into some evidence to support all these claims I'm making. First things first, as of right now Logan and the Orange Side are one in the same. We haven't been given any proof that they are at least physically different beings (unless you want to count the orange eyes in the Sanders Sides anime intro parody). So all of our evidence is just Logan acting really out of character. So, where does Logan act impulsively?

Our first major incident of this (I'm pretty sure) is in the episode "Learning New Things About Ourselves", specifically the scene where Roman essentially pisses him off so much that he throw's a crumpled up note card at him. Most important is his reaction afterwards, being shocked at himself.

He was basically pushed so far that he reacted without thinking (impulsively some may say? ok I'll stop, I'm sorry). Which, obviously, is EXTREMELY out of character for him. He is logic, he is supposed to think first before he acts, go through possible scenarios and decide the most favorable outcome. Yet, here he loses all control.

Our next example is less of Logan acting impulsive and more so how I believe his actions are affecting Thomas. In the episode "Working Through Intrusive Thoughts", Thomas basically spends the whole time being tormented by Remus because he can't keep his mind off of the risky text he sent Nico (I'm aroace but I'm gonna assume valid? So real?). While Logan is simultaneously trying to keep Thomas on schedule, accommodate his struggles, and accommodate Remus' actions as part of Thomas' identity. Basically, it's a lot, and when he's finally at his limit, well

Yeahhhh, a certain something makes itself known. And while Logan doesn't act particularly irrationally or impulsively in this moment (literally all he does is yell at Remus), it is what Thomas does after this outbreak that I find interesting. As immediately afterward he gets a call from Nico, inviting him out. And given the choice between what he has planned to do and needs to get done for the day, vs spending the day with Nico?

He decides suddenly to just drop everything he is doing for Nico. A rather impulsive decision if you ask me. And while yes, technically none of what Thomas was doing needed to get done that day (it was mostly chores), it was part of a plan and he promised himself to stick to it. Logan doesn't react well to any of this, both his own outburst and Thomas deciding to just leave him behind like it's nothing. And I don't think it's gonna spell anything good in the future for Logan and the rest of the gang.

So, where does that leave us now?

Well, moving a bit on to what I think is going to happen next. Obviously things are going to get worse before they get better. Logan will fall more and more into impulsive behaviors, which will only become more destructive for Thomas. As well, I think (hope, pray) that there will be some sort of team up between Logan and Remus. They're the only sides who I think could "properly" get along (I know that Janus and Remus have some sort of friendship, but it can only work so well as Janus being self-preservation can only really run counter to Remus' intrusive thoughts). Most likely they will feed into each other in a horrible cycle of "I can make him worse." I don't think that would be either of their genuine intentions, as I don't like labeling the Dark Sides and "bad", but I definitely don't think they would be good for each other. I do also think this will come about because Remus either knows or understands something about Logan that the others don't, not even Janus. As well I do hope that Logan and the Orange Side are one in the same somehow, and not just Logan being influenced.

Anyway, sorry for the insanely long post and sorry if it started to devolve towards the end. I am quite literally writing this on no hours of sleep, so give me a bit of grace. Also, another sorry if I have gotten anything wrong or if I have missed something. It has been very long since I've engaged with Sanders Sides, but I'm trying my best. Anyway, thank you for coming to my ted-talk, I hope Logan gets to commit murder in the next episode.

[radioactive-dazey]

*Swipes my entire desk clear, knocks over the bulletin board covered in photographs and red string, aggressively shakes my fists at the sky*

JANUS REPRESENTS IGNORANCE

TURNING A BLIND EYE (being willfully ignorant) IS AN ACT OF LYING TO YOURSELF

ALL OF MY "IGNORANCE = ORANGE SIDE" THEORIES JUST NEED TO APPLY TO JANUS AT THIS POINT

The entire fucking WTIT episode Thomas is distracted and upset and intrusive thoughts are invading his brain and he can't do anything

Then Logan the cool teacher man is like "I shall help you" and does so, RIGHT ??

*Shakes you aggressively* RIGHT?!

At the end of the episode Thomas dips after Logan was helping him and hes like "its not *that* bad ill get to it another day"

And Logan stands there like "?? Tf?"

Then Janus takes a bite out of that fucking apple at the end card. How does it relate? Uhh- I dunno I'll get back to you on that

Edit: HERES THE THEORY (not the original but one of them) I MADE WAY BACK

ITS SO OBVIOUS LOOKING BACK NOW

[randomgreenchair]

a collection of my favourite quotes from the new asides episode bc aaaAAAAA-

tw: swearing, knife mention (only within quotes from the video)

spoilers for 'working through intrusive thoughts'

"owowowowowowow, it's got SOAP on it! i'm allergic to soap, you bitch! I don't care about the knife, but the soap!"

remus, using his dunce hat as a megaphone: "aLL bY MySeLf~"

*ominously* "yes... you..... am...."

logan's little: 'hey..! wait..!' because he's not okay and neither are any of us

roman: another job well done by yours truly!

virgil: ... but you didnt do anything

PLEASE THE SIDE-EYES AND SARCASM. PATTON IS ON THIN. ICE.

JANUS COMING IN AT THE VERY END AAAAAAAAAA

and that concludes my collection bECAUSE GODDAMMIT NOT LOGAN PLEASE

[noblest-roman-of-them-all]

Totally honest, I think Janus has the Anti-Spoiler spray because Remus is helping him with his overarching scheme of getting Orange out and accepted, but where Janus knows Thomas isn't ready for somethings Remus is going to kick down the door and make Thomas pay attention.

I think we see that in Remus’s premier episode. Thomas lies to Logan about feeling fine, Virgil spouts off all the ways Thomas feels like trashy and wraps it up with

To which Logan looks rightfully smug because he's getting the honest answer out of Virgil thay Thomas doesn't want to admit to and let's Logan point out that

Then again we see in WTIT

Remus drawing attention to an issue this time directly with Logan.

Remus is totally in on Janus's scheming. I think he's just a little impatient about it all.

I don't think Remus is given enough credit for being clever.

[creativia10]

Others in "Working Through Intrusive Thoughts

The following contains SPOILERS for "Working Through Intrusive Thoughts"

Summary: Janus once again finds himself popping in to just watch the drama unfold. However, things take an interesting turn. He may find he has more to think about than he would have expected for that day.

Notes: Let me know if there is another way to Spoiler tag this that I missed. (Title may change). I felt the urge to write something like this pretty quickly after watching the new episode. Spoilers ahead, so please be aware. I am not sure how I feel about this. This feels different from the other one. Let me know if I've missed any warnings.

Pairing: Janus and Remus, hints of Intruloceit

Word count: 945

Warnings: Sexual innuendos, references to the content warnings from WTIT,

Janus sighed as he popped into Thomas’ living room, not announcing his presence, as he was just here for the drama again. He glanced around the room for Remus, but didn’t actively look for him, as giving him away would be ‘participating’. He would shuffle around though, not necessarily ‘hiding’ but not in their view of attention either. He snorted at Remus’ attempts at getting Logan when Logan finally saw Remus. He also took the wine bottle from Logan, pouring some for himself, then sat himself down at the table.

Logan sighed.

“Do you have to encourage him?” Janus smirked and shrugged.

“I’m just here. I’m not doing anything to egg him on.”

Logan sighed again and brought his attention back to Thomas. Virgil, despite them not talking directly, was panicking through Thomas multiple times which made Janus sigh. He almost felt bad for him.

So Janus basically just watched where he could. Logan was impressive as always. Remus’ extra-ness was entertaining as usual, although he wouldn’t have been surprised if he was going overboard to impress Janus. This didn’t always work though.

Then he did that weird little roleplay scene for Logan, which confused the man as much as everything else did. Probably didn’t even pick up that Remus was flirting. Which was fine, that was just how Remus was. There wasn’t really a reason for Janus to be jealous. He understood anyways, the nerd was desirable. He was distracted from his not-jealousy with the next thing that Remus set up.

As impressed as Janus was by all that Remus could do, the situation with Nico was clearly a sore spot. Janus wasn’t going to chastise Remus or anything of course. Besides, Logan had it covered. Oh, to wish good things for either side of this rivalry today. Another reason he was just watching, it didn’t really involve him anyways. He might even be able to calm Remus down afterwards.

Strangely enough, at one point the other two were in a different room from Thomas. The more exciting area seemed to be with Remus and Logan, although Janus was still somewhat aware of Thomas.

So he continued lurking as Logan, surprisingly tried to negotiate with Remus. If Remus didn’t have that sensitive pride that creativities seemed to have, he might have even been believed. Turned out today would be more exciting that Janus originally thought though.

Remus was pushing Logan’s buttons, of course, because that was one of Remus’ stronger qualities. Logan was starting to actually show his building frustration, which was surprising. Might even be good for Logan in the end, although Janus didn’t exactly revel in the logical side’s upset.

“Stop IGNORING ME!”

and whoa. Logan’s eyes glowed fire orange. That was not typical of him at all.

Remus went all for it. Janus was thinking more about it though. Then Thomas left to meet up with Nico, of course. Although Janus saw Logan’s face after Thomas already left.

He couldn’t help but sigh, understanding what that felt like. Sometimes he didn’t always like the ways he would do what was best for Thomas. It wasn’t like he would have been good at comfort anyways though.

Janus lounged in the tree looking over all of them as Thomas talked with Nico. Janus picked up on the tensions just bubbling under the surface, and how unstable their ‘fine-ness’ was, perpetuating the thought that it was okay, because that was what Thomas wanted. He knew though. This wouldn’t last. The theatre in him couldn’t resist the dramatics, and bit into the apple almost as a reminder to himself of what would come next.

“Well hey there Double Dee”

Janus oofed as Remus practically appeared over him and fell onto him. He grabbed hold of the tree, probably forgetting he was imaginary again.

“Hello Remus,” Janus was still looking down at the others, still thinking. He paid particular attention to Logan.

“So what’d ya think of today, huh? Teach is hot, but man can he be annoying.”

“Mhm.”

Remus leaned into him more and did his typical shimmy.

“I’m riled up again,” He breathed into Janus’ ear.

“Wanna get out of here so I can let it out?”

“I’m, not really in the mood right now, Remus.”

Remus blinked and leaned back. He seemed to take in Janus’ body language for the first time.

“Hey, er, are you ok?”

“…I’m not sure. I’m, thinking about what happened with him today.”

“Oh, Logan? Yeah, the fire eyes thing was kinda hot not gonna lie. I wonder what else I can pull at to see that again, because woo man would I want to.”

Janus pursed his lips as that ugly green feeling came back.

“Surely you realize what this could mean though.” Janus said.

Remus shrugged. “I mean, we have you. “ Remus nudged into Janus’ shoulder. “We’ll be alright.”

Janus rolled his eyes with a small smile and leaned back into the shoulder.

“Flatterer.”

“So, you really don’t want to-“

“No, Remus. Unfortunately I find my priority lies in Thomas’ mind sphere.”

Remus pouted a little.

“I’ll still see you later tonight,” Janus said softly.

Remus nodded. “You gonna try and talk to the nerd or something?”

Janus shrugged. “I am not sure what good that will do in the long run. It is certainly interesting though to be the only knowing something is coming. That is inevitable.”

Janus turned over surprised at Remus’ quiet, when Remus leaned over to kiss him. Janus returned the kiss of course, but then pulled back to give him a questioning look. Remus simply smiled and then sunk out. Janus rolled his eyes, and went back to watching them.

[ironwoman359]

well shit

[hootnhoney]

Ok but can we please talk about how funny Remus was tho

[turning-the-frigging-frogs-gay]

Anyone remember that theory about the orange side and eyes??

So this is an ages old theory but for anyone new I’ll give u a refresher

So in the background of moving on (just before Janus was introduced for the first time which introduced the “dark sides”) there’s 3 strange pictures. One has Thomas covering his mouth, the next his ears, and the final one his eyes. Seems a bit strange, no? The room is supposed to be full of Thomas’ memories but this just seems kinda random

And then from there the series went on to introduce the “dark sides”. We see the effect Janus has on Logan in the next episode, forcing him to cover his mouth

Then a few episodes later remus has all the sides covering their ears.

That’s when this theory first came about and everyone predicted that orange would have to do with eyes . And then in this ep with orange, well….

Seems like a reference to “see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil”

So yeah, maybe that weird photo did mean something…

[sleepy-starling]

Currently blasting Elton John’s “The Bitch is Back” on loop

[briandthemoon]

[TSSPOILERS FOR WTIT]

@thatsthat24 THIS EPISODE SLAPPED SO HARD I THINK I CAN SEE THE 100TH DIMENSION, WHAT!!?!?!

[Do Not Repost This Art]

[deostyx]

RECORD SCRATCH!?

[sandysandsides]

[itsame-tehded]

So…. sad………

[reddstardust]

⚠️Spoilers for "Working THROUGH intrusive thoughts"⚠️

You know I had to draw this scene 😔👊

♡reblogs are very appreciated♡

🚫DON'T REPOST MY ART WITHOUT PERMISSION/CREDIT🚫

[justanotherpurplebutterfly]

Just a thought...

"You're not listening."

"There might be something in the oatmeal and if I choked there would be nothing I could do because"

"I'm all alone."

.

Anyone notice those changing pictures in the background? Remember where we also saw changing pictures? Patton's room.

The green lighting was quite an obvious sign that Thomas was getting lost in Remus' schemes, but remember how different the lighting was in Virgil's room compared to all other non-room videos?

Also, sides can't change things irl but Remus built his contraptions to direct Thomas' attention just fine.

The mess also fits in his aesthetic, although I fully believe it Thomas' real mess.

Could Thomas be in Remus' room? Or maybe, teetering on te edge of it and Logan is trying to pull him back every time. That last one would also explain why Logan isn't really affected by Remus' room like he was in Virgil's.

I don't think he willingly or consciously went there bc, like, why would you ever want to? But I think his lack of control over the situations he's in, with covid and social distancing, with his friends moving on, moving away, with Nico... I think he is dragged there, sometimes, and it gives Remus more control over him.