#the difference being that in this case while crozier does order jopson to tell him

[notkingyet2]

Crozier ordering Jopson to tell him about his mother and Jopson smiling through the pain is like the grim dramatic version of Robin Hood: Men in Tights

[mootmuse]

Legitimately this is exactly how this scene went. And instead of doing the stuff I should be I ended up rambling about that. Here goes:

I managed a rewatch recently and as genuinely funny as it is to talk about, this scene was kind of chilling. Like the way Crozier just Turned as soon as someone who would/could stand up to him walked in. (Or someone who - like Jopson - he associates with feeling good and having his addiction fed.) Like the way he was in one moment like 'oh of course you're right it's dangerous to send the men outside' when Blanky stood up to him, and in the very next moment once Blanky wasn't around to see, coldly ordering Little outside again. And the contrast with how he treated someone (Jopson) who was never in a position to have to tell him 'I don't have any whiskey for you'. Genuinely excellent illustration of how far he'd spiralled to and how bad it'd got.

Like the show doesn't spend any extra time hammering anything into your head, but the way Crozier was at that point lying to the people around him based on whether he could push them around, and how that was all centered around the goal of getting more to drink was very much there.

I also think Little and Crozier's earlier dynamic here is interesting in terms of how people under that kind of stress interact with different personalities. There's more than just this at play but, even without it coming up in terms of words or actions, in the way Little and Jopson both speak and carry themselves it's obvious that one is a much stronger personality than the other, and someone in the mindset Crozier was in then is going to respond to that instinctively.

Also, while I do think rank and class were at play there - if Jopson was the type of person to tell Crozier anything he didn't want to hear just then I think he might have been on thinner ice than Blanky was, because Crozier's so used to him being a servant and perfectly obedient in everything. But Blanky did very much get away with pushing back a little bit, and Blanky is lower in rank and class than Crozier is too. According to Wikipedia historical-Little (and so probably his fictional counterpart) is a first lieutenant, which I assume (knowing nothing about any kind of military) makes him the man on the spot when the Captain wants to give a direct order, so that's probably a big part of why he becomes the target of Crozier's addiction-feeding at that point, but the show I think makes a good case that personality is a part of it as well.

The only thing that gets me is when people act like this is Crozier and Little's ENTIRE dynamic. Like with a lot of Crozier's early show behavior that often gets taken for his entire default personality this side of him came out in specific circumstances for specific reasons, and changing those circumstances changes Crozier's behavior and dynamic with the other characters, like Little. Crozier's not soulbonded besties with Little the way he is with Jopson, but when it comes down to it all these guys are just Adventure Coworkers who signed up to bunk together for a few years. His relationship with Jopson is weirder than his relationship with Little, which reads to me as a very normal one; when it comes down to it Crozier is ultimately just Little's boss (although interestingly the script does note I think at the promoting Jopson scene that at that point Little sees Crozier as an admirable person, so- a boss that Little maybe looks up to).

I'm not getting at anything, I just think it's all pretty interesting, the way the show handled this part of things, and I needed something fun to do.

edward i need you to walk a mile in the freezing cold to bring me more liquor. yes it is so cold you could literally die. chop chop. JOPSONNN YAY how are you my sweetiepie sparkle jumprope queen. i will never let anything happen to you. my perfect baby boy. EDWARD where the FUCK is my whiskey