#the curse of watching the most normie show on tv 😓

[cavehags]

i know we're all hyped about roy and jamie training sessions but i do hope the show addresses roy's tendency to angry outbursts not just around jamie but directed at him. i really thought we were past this shit but the trying to lunge at him because he assumes jamie told the team about his break up and that bullshit move of flicking food from his fork and making him clean it were just clear evidence roy's got some work to do on himself

(2/2) it feels especially shitty 'cause they had made progress and he comforted jamie after the fight with his father you would think he'd know not to do that shit and it's not like jamie doesn't react in ways that would tell roy that he maybe should watch his fucking steps because jamie doesn't laugh roy's anger when it's directed at him, he flinches, he looks scared. i'm just really hoping the writers address this pattern soon

this may sound harsh, but: this is a comedy show. in comedy, heightened reactions are quite normal. the intent is for the viewer to find the heightened reality humorous, rather than to consider the character reprehensible for it. that is just how it works.

for instance, to use a fandom darling on a show tumblr loved dearly, consider rosa diaz on brooklyn nine nine, a woman who threatened colleagues with death regularly (a credible threat from a police officer, no less) and famously told a room of her coworkers that if any harm came to her dog, she would murder everyone in the office and then kill herself. conversations have evolved surrounding that show as the copaganda discourse kicked into high gear a few years ago, but i do not remember anyone ever saying that rosa's threat was real and she needed to learn anger management -- nor do i remember anyone laying on especially thick sympathy because jake peralta had a hard childhood and was really scared of her.

in comedy, we are asked to accept that characters act and react in ways that might be problematic (original definition) in life. you have to get that in order to enjoy it as an art form. a character lunging at someone else and needing to be held back by a comically large team of people is such a disney-channel-ass overdone joke that i am shocked that anyone could be treating it seriously. (if we ARE taking it so seriously, should we go a step further and question the physical mechanics behind why roy, a two-years-retired coach played by a 42 year old man with - i'm sorry to say - limited muscular definition, would require quite so many active professional athletes to restrain him? no, because we get that this isn't meant to be hyperrealistic. in other words, it is a joke. so is flinging food on the wall.)

but furthermore, i also want to quibble with your claims about who roy is as a person and what jamie thinks of him. jamie most certainly is not scared of roy - in 3x02, he laughs when roy is yelling at the team and he says flat-out that he thinks roy's anger is funny. jamie, again, is a professional athlete at his physical peak. he is not afraid of getting flicked on the nuts by a man he called granddad. i think there's a real danger of woobifying jamie as a poor widdle victim of abuse who cannot operate with dignity in the masculine sphere of professional football and i urge you not to succumb to that mentality. jamie was a dressing room bully, he can give as good as he gets, and he plainly enjoys getting a rise out of roy for whatever reason (i like to posit that it's a very particular reason but ymmv). he spent all of season one winding roy up and calling him names. funny way to express that you're terrified of someone if you ask me.

lastly, as far as where the show is heading? it's quite clear to me that we ARE going to get to a place where roy and jamie understand each other better and communicate with less tension than they had between them at the start. the show has spelled out in explicit, unmissable dialogue that roy sees jamie as a younger version of himself. the show has also shown us that roy doesn't like himself very much and isn't convinced he deserves love. so i do think his hostility toward jamie can be understood through that lens -- and the show spoon-fed us that information about roy in the hopes that we would understand his behaviour in context. the natural conclusion of roy's arc is for him to learn to accept love and kindness in his own life, and acknowledge that he deserves it. and jamie, as an extension of his self-image, should reap the rewards of that lesson too. if you continue watching this workplace sitcom, i do hope you keep that in mind!