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wishesinthedark · 2 years ago
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My theory is that Dan Schneider had a weird…interest in? Relationship with? Sean Flynn, aka Chase Matthews in Zoey 101. I'm not going to say obsessed with or in love with or whatever, and I'm certainly not going to speculate about whether sexual abuse occurred; what we do know about Dan is that he, in addition to being a misogynist, is emotionally abusive and vindictive. And I do think that, for whatever reason, that the latter manifested itself very strongly here. I will attempt to write this in the best chronological order I know how, and will likewise clarify what is speculation and what actually happened.
In a January 2004 interview with the Sneeze, Dan is asked about his Better Off Dead costar Diane Franklin and says: She was very much my "type." She was small and cute with dark curly hair and [a] cute face.
I'm not sure when auditions for Zoey 101 had started and if this interview came before or after, but sometime later Dan meets Sean at an audition and is reportedly "fascinated" by his hair. To be clear, I'm not implying this was immediately a sinister interaction, but it is potentially notable context.
May 17 – May 21, 2004: Zoey 101 pilot is filmed.
From June 14 – June 18, 2004 they film the second episode. Dan has posted five photos of Sean from this week on his website and socials, based on the shirt Sean is wearing in the episode. Again, not implying this was outrightly sinister, but it could be seen as somewhat excessive.
Nothing particularly notable happens during Season 1. While one could argue that Sean's screentime increases as the season goes on, this could just be because he ended up being one of the stronger actors in the ensemble and was always intended the male lead. However, it is worth noting that Sean was rumoured to have dated Kristen Herrera (Dana) around this time, and frankly it's kind of obvious when they're on screen seeing as they are often seen standing next to each other. This is especially true in the last couple of episodes. Kristen's speaking time also steadily declined as the season progressed. Correlation is not causation, and Kristen apparently had a tendency to forget her lines so I can see that they would cut them for pure pragmatism, especially as Dan was known for doing an excessive number of takes and running overtime and overbudget.
Going into the second season, Kristen has been replaced by Victoria Justice. The reasoning for this has always been very vague. She apparently said she left due to family reasons, while Jamie Lynn's memoir said she was gone because the "producers wanted a change", whatever that means. The timeline is even more confusing. Based on a 2005 interview, Victoria's audition process happened pretty quickly, and there's also the fact that Kristen was apparently involved in the Season 2 promo shoot that they ultimately photoshopped Victoria into. She also attended the Kids Choice Awards back in 2 April 2005.
Either way, Season 2 begins filming from May 23 - May 27 2005 and Kristen is not there. Season 2 also marks the shift into Zoey 101 being much more Chase 101. To be clear, Dan just seemed totally disinterested in Jamie Lynn as an actor which, as someone who has watched the show, is kind of fair. So the first episode opens on Chase riding his bike, follows him for the next 2-3 minutes, and then finally lands on Zoey because she's his love interest and he needs to fall down some stairs. Also she's the main character or something. Nicole says something dismissive about Dana not being able to annoy her from France (which is in no way Alexa's fault and I'm incredibly sorry she had such an awful experience on the show that Dan enabled if not encouraged), we literally never hear about Dana ever again after that one line, and then the subsequent three episodes are pretty Chase-centric.
(Some quick anecdotal stuff:
In one of the podcasts they did Dan says that Jamie wasn't in "Time Capsule" as much because she was at cheerleading camp, to which Sean interjects that he was in the episode a lot despite having finals that week, which is a lot to unpack but the first bit makes me laugh because Jamie is frankly in Time Capsule just as much as she in other episodes. Dan also apparently heated the water up for Sean and Chris during the rain scene and phrased it as "the nice thing I did for you" which I hate and Sean has a fun Freudian slip where he says "Dan being the nice guy that he was…and is." This isn't evidence of anything but Sean being a bit of a snarky sixteen year old boy which will come up later.)
For context, my theory is that Dan's writing reflects who he's interested. I don't think he's ever been properly interested in someone without talent (Amanda Bynes and Jennette McCurdy being the most obvious examples), and I think he genuinely enjoys writing parts for people that he sees potential in. He does this a lot, like how Gibby in iCarly was supposed to be a one-off character and by the final seasons had been upgraded not just to recurring but to main cast. On Zoey 101, it happened twice: first with Erin Sanders, who had the role of Quinn especially created for her because Dan was impressed by her audition (and specifically fought for her even though there wasn't enough budget), and secondly with the role of Stacey in Season 3, who ends up being in more episodes than Paul Butcher despite him being the brother of the title character.
And the writing reflects this. In Season 2, Dan is credited with writing three episodes (he would have edited all of them but theoretically wrote the most for these two): Back to PCA, Robot Wars and Spring Break Up. Spring Break Up, the first Zoey 101 "movie" is very neatly divided into two plots: Chase angsts and Quinn is quirky (Zoey reacting with a blank stare is, for some reason, not movie plot material). Yes, of course the other cast members do things: by this point Dan has discovered that Sean and Chris play off of each other really well, and Paul screams a lot. But for the same reason that people noticed Alexa's role in the film seems very diminished, it seems worth noting that the entire A-plot is Sean's. It is his emotions and actions that matter; Chris is great but literally all he does is say "tell Zoey you love her". Does Zoey love Chase back? Irrelevant! That would require Jamie Lynn to act and Sean has angsting to do because Dan has decided that he has The Range.
And so, after the iconic scene of Zoey's TekMate falling into the fountain, we move into Season 3. Jamie Lynn against doesn't show up until three minutes in because, again, the boys are way more interesting and Sean in particular has grown up in both looks and in acting ability. The show immediately announces its shift into teen dramedy (even Spring Break Up was still primarily comedic) by having an episode where Sean's character gets a girlfriend because his character is the dramatic and emotional heart of the entire show and the closest Dan has ever come to a cohesive plot in his life. Season 3 also has episodes like "The Great Vince Blake" where Zoey gets relegated to the B-story (possibly a first and only for the series?) while Chase gets the A-story; more dramatic moments for him in "The Radio" and of course, the ending of "Chase's Grandma" which features him crying in the rain, still to this day one of the best and most memorable scenes (for all the right reasons) from any Dan Schneider show. (In a 2020 interview Sean said he knows Dan is particularly proud of that episode.)
Season 3 is also notable for being the longest season at twenty-six episodes compared to every other season's thirteen. Correspondingly, production continues past summer until the December 2006-January 2007. The set had also changed from Pepperdine in Malibu to Santa Clarita, which was three hours away from Nickelodeon studios and was twice as hot, so that half of the casts' memories of the show is dancing to the macarena in 113 degree heat. I bring this up to illustrate that the conditions for this season are arguably tougher than they'd been in previous seasons, especially if you add schooling and any personal troubles (ie normal teenage troubles like family tension, dating etc - Dan isn't responsible for everything), and you're probably not having a fun time. Which is maybe why all of the season 3 photos Erin posted on her website back in the day feature Sean not smiling, or even managing to rival Jamie Lynn in how disinterested he seems in the teen nick podcasts from that period. Perhaps relatedly, the second half of Season 3 shifts its attention away from Sean and more onto Chris and the rest of the cast and is the poorer for it.  I would also argue that Sean's performances worsen, his weight visibly fluctuates and his clothing gets visibly tighter.
At some point, Sean decides to pursue school instead of returning as a regular cast member in Season 4, as otherwise he wouldn't have had enough credits to graduate on time (also he went to a very expensive Jewish school and presumably someone wanted to get their money's worth). While there were probably multiple factors related to that decision, the story has been consistent since 2007, though lesser known and less speculated about than Alexa's departure. I believe it; I am, however, very curious as to when the decision was made. Apparently, the season three finale was written to set up Sean's absence in Season 4, which means it would have been discussed likely around October-November 2006. I can't confirm if the show had already been renewed for Season 4 by then, and it was theoretically also open-ended enough to work if Sean had decided to come back for Season 4. That said, I've also heard that Season 4 was essentially already written by the time he decided to leave (suddenly) and that's why it is Like That (which we will get to). But we will go with danwarp.shows because they do have an impressive amount of detailed knowledge. 
This brings me to my theory that Dan wrote Goodbye Zoey asking Sean to stay (and lowkey assuming he would). That boy gets three different scenes that basically say "look at my dramatic range! Put this scene in a demo reel!" including the big "I was in love with her from the moment I met her" monologue. Sure, dramas often have a big episode before they kill a character off but a) it's a kids show - and a tween show at that, we're not talking Degrassi here and b) it doesn't feel like an episode that is about to transition a main character into a glorified cameo. The episode as a whole is some of Dan's best writing and it feels like he put effort into it - which is saying something, especially compared to later shows. Plus the plot is literally about Zoey moving to a very fancy school in London which Chase doesn't want her to go to because he loves her
Also Sean gets to wear sweatpants for a good chunk of it which, after the tightness of his jeans for the latter half of the season, might have been perceived as a gift.
So Dan, who has a giant ego and a temper the size of Jupiter, has maybe put actual effort into a script and is used to always getting his way. And Sean still says nope, I'm outta here. Do we think Dan responds to this well?
iCarly's first season starts production in January 2007, with the second episode filming in March 2007. It is an episode called iLike Jake starring Austin Butler, and Erin Sanders pays a visit to meet her new costar. Whether Dan had actually held auditions for James or if he just saw the first pretty boy on set and went "you did well with the one line you had in Quarantine, you're hired" I do not know. But Austin Butler gets hired as Sean's replacement, James, who kisses Zoey within two days of knowing her while Chase had to wait 3.5 years for her to even notice him. Some people have argued that this happened because Season 4 was already written so they just swapped out Zoey and Chase with Zoey dating a rando, which is certainly what it feels like, but again, there are conflicting timelines here.
Season 4 of Zoey 101 starts filming in May 2007, and kicks off with one of the only table reads they ever did (unlike the other shows they did not get rehearsals due to filming on location). It is for the episode "Fake Roommate", named after the life size doll (???) Michael and Logan get of Chase to try to avoid getting a new roommate for hot tub purposes. This doll later gets peed on by a dog (???), and then dragged off screen by another dog (where are they coming from when no one is allowed pets on campus???). Literally why do we never talk about this. Why was this one of the only episodes to warrant a table read? Is this wacky comedy or is it Dan fantasising about humiliating a 17 year old child? Is this Dan taking it well? I would like to know. 
Season 4 continues. The vibes are Off, the comedy having completely changed from the teen drama of the previous season to parodies of The Sopranos and the View. Dan is less involved due to working on iCarly, where he can begin his emotional torture of Jennette, and so George Doty runs the writer's room.
Sean comes back to film Trading Places in June 2007. I don't know when his school finished or if he had to complete summer school, but if he didn't then he might have been able to film more episodes. Either way, Dan relegates him to the last 10 minutes of the episode, where he gives a heartbreakingly good performance, and the show actually feels like how it did in the best parts of Season 3. It feels a lot like he is acting in a completely different (and better) show than literally everyone else, but I digress. 
Sean doesn't return again until August 2007, when they're filming the final ever episode Chasing Zoey (and no, Jamie Lynn is not pregnant). For those that haven't watched the show and/or weren't there in 2008, this was a deeply hyped up episode. People wanted to see two things: Chase return to get together with Zoey and the gang's reaction to Quinn and Logan secretly dating. Specifically, they wanted a resolution to the perceived "love triangle" of Zoey/James/Chase - did Chase know about James? Did James know about Chase?
Dan does not care. These questions did not get answers. Instead, Michael learns to drive a stick shift for the first 30 minutes, and Chase comes again in the last ten minutes (meaning he doesn't even get a "special guest star" credit in the first part, ie every time Nickelodeon didn't air it as a movie). He and James do not interact because Austin Butler falls off the movie because he served no purpose and has no personality, Zoey doesn't say I love you to anyone, and no one is there when Quinn and Logan announce they're in love.
One gets the sense that Dan was not particularly interested when he wrote this. If nothing else, the finale is horribly lazy writing that barely delivers on the bare minimum of expectations and seemingly deliberately gives no one anything that they want. Yes, Dan himself cameos and screams in a taxi with Victoria because he's about to make Victorious, but it doesn't really make up for anything else. Despite being on-screen for less than ten minutes, Sean also has to wear a custom-made wig because god forbid a teenage boy get a haircut (just put in a joke about people not recognising him without the hair! It would have presumably been cheaper!)
I assume Dan was mad when Sean left. It is hard for me to not interpret a dog urinating on a stand-in as anything other than Dan quite transparently announcing that. Add Austin Butler to that: his good looks, his blondeness, his abs, the fact that this is emphasised heavily in the show, and him getting with the main character in record time and kissing in front of the fountain (Zoey and Chase had history there, man!) all seem like choices you don't make unless you are filled with some degree of spite. One of the episodes Dan is credited with brings back a character that beat up Chase in the previous season as a love interest for Victoria. Feels like you could have just…given her Austin Butler, but sure.
So I assume there was some kind of argument when Sean confirmed he was leaving. But I also wonder if they had another, potentially worse, fight after Sean filmed Trading Places. First of all, Sean cut his hair after that episode was filmed, which would have been an effective "fuck you" to Dan. His performance in Chasing Zoey also feels "off", despite being only a couple of months after he'd filmed Trading Places (in comparison, there was a six month gap between filming his final episode of Season 3 and Trading Places). Secondly, the last few episodes before the finale feel like filler: in one, coffee gets banned so the boys and girls create cafes in their dorm rooms, and in the second one Michael overcomes *checks notes* his fear of rollercoasters and the episode ends with an unexplained musical performance. Hell, those last two barely even have any Quogan moments in them, which was the closest Season 4 got to a plot or effort. It wouldn't surprise me if Sean had been contracted to appear in more episodes, or even just as a surprise in the last five minutes to lead into the finale, only for Dan to get so angry that he broke contract just to limit Sean's time on-set.
The point is, it feels like something went down.
So Zoey 101 ends. Jamie Lynn gets pregnant and overshadows most of Season 4 so that people only ever ask about the pregnancy and not Sean's absence, and Dan blows up with iCarly's success and popularity. In 2009, he begins working on Victorious.
Despite not even mentioning Zoey 101 for a good few years, it did seem to be the blueprint for Victorious. Going beyond the previous cast member in Victoria, it was another ensemble compared to the duo of Drake & Josh and the trio of iCarly, and it has the same basic structure: four girls (Jade and Cat being the obvious equivalents to Dana and Nicole) and three boys (hot one, black one, and Jewfro one - I assume this is how Dan's reductive and racist brain works). Furthermore, Daniella Monet is cast, who had previously played Chase's girlfriend. Apparently, the team do not recognise her, a point I find dubious and dismissive seeing as she was in three episodes of Zoey 101 with a major part (and they apparently remembered Austin Butler in Quarantine), but ok.
The similarities between Matt Bennett and Sean Flynn are immediately obvious to most people, and jokes about Robbie being Chase's cousin ensue, but not on the show itself. In fact, the closest Zoey 101 ever gets to being mentioned in Victorious is in Blooptorious, wherein Victoria's role as Lola gets referenced, and Rex/Christopher Cane simply responds, "I never watched it [Zoey 101]," which is honestly hilarious to me Dan hates it so much.
In the first season of Victorious especially, Robbie is a loser. In Tori the Zombie, a Dan credited episode, multiple jokes about the tightness of his jeans and his acting ability are made. Girls never pay attention to him because, why would they, when they could have Beck? He is effeminate because he talks about wearing "male makeup" and leather pants. The Slap emphasises that his hair is not a perm, but all natural baby. His last name is also Shapiro, which is relatively close to ‘Sean Rio’.
While Victorious sees a cameo from Josh Peck, it sees none from any Zoey 101 cast members, even though Chris Massey visits Victoria on-set and Erin and Victoria stay friends while Erin films Big Time Rush down the road. Abby Wilde does cameo on iCarly, lisp returned despite being written out in Chasing Zoey, and the character of Quinn Pensky gets a three second easter egg in iWas A Pageant Girl, but that's about it. 
For some reason, Jack Savatore (aka Mark del Figgalo) does end up having a cameo in one of the last ever episodes of Victorious. Sean apparently had always kept in touch with most of the cast, but he was apparently especially close to Jack. Relatedly, Jack and Sean both end up at the Season 3 Victorious wrap up party, and Dan posts a then/now photo of Sean and Victoria. It is July 21, 2012 and Dan has not publicly acknowledged Sean Flynn once since 2007.  He then posts a headshot of Sean on Facebook with a caption about him being "grown up and looking cool" in August 2012. I do not have broader context for that.
Victorious gets cancelled and Dan starts working full-time on Sam & Cat in early 2013. One of the other characters introduced is Dice. There are multiple jokes about how Dice is a hair model and his adult friend Goomer (who has the IQ of a potato) gets very angry if you make fun of his friend's "beautiful, beautiful hair". It's a joke, but the canned audience cheers as Goomer beats up the guy anyway.
Despite "relentlessly" emotionally torturing Jennette and Viacom launching an internal investigation into his abuse, in 2014 Dan gets awarded the first (and last) Lifetime Kids Choice Award. A lot of former cast members return to congratulate him: all of Victorious, Drake & Josh, a spattering of iCarly (not Jennette) and from Zoey 101? We have Chris. Just Chris.
In 2014, Dan starts work on Henry Danger and Gameshakers. While Gameshakers stars veteran Nick actor Kel Mitchell, the demographic is firmly younger than Victorious and Sam & Cat and he has seemingly started in on a new generation both in terms of actors and audience. Still, he regularly uploads "throwback" content for his new website, featuring never seen behind the scenes for previous shows such as All That, Drake & Josh and Zoey 101, which comes as a surprise to me, the only Zoey 101 fan left alive, because I honestly didn't think he would have had any photos of a show he seemingly does not like. He also begins wishing people happy birthday: happy birthday to Victoria Justice, Eric Lange, Erin Sanders, Avan Jogia and Sean Flynn.
In 2015, he seems borderline nostalgic for Zoey 101, a show he barely if ever mentioned (I once asked him in a Q&A what his favourite episode was and he said "I don't remember, I'd have to look them up" a statement I do not believe). He posts a behind-the-scenes video for a Halloween episode and a fun facts video, where he mentions that Sean wore a custom wig in the finale and is the grandson of Errol Flynn, because no one has heard that 2984 times. He doesn't post any photos taken after Season 2 on his website, with the exception of a couple of photos of Abby Wilde because he's weird about her too.
2015 also sees the release of the "What Did Zoey Say" video, which is an abomination for what it did to Chase's character. It is a direct sequel to a Season 2 episode and seemingly ignores the fact that the finale had Zoey and Chase getting together, or that Trading Places had them saying I love you because at this point Dan just sort of pretends Season 4 doesn't exist (I would find all of this more forgivable if he acknowledged not just Season 3 but how good half of it was). To be fair, it was also done in like 12 hours and solely because Dan kept getting harassed on twitter about it. The short is filmed in September, though apparently only because someone else suggested the fans would like it (despite him posting twenty one Zoey 101 related instagram posts up to that point during the year and publishing the fun facts a video a month before). Dan posts a photo of Sean and Chris with the casts of Henry Danger and Gameshakers. It is the closest Sean or Chris ever get to starring in an episode (in comparison, Matt Bennett and Nathan Kress have a brief part in both Sam & Cat and Gameshakers, while other actors like Jerry Trainor popped up in cameos and blooper episodes).
(I also want to note that Teen Nick messed up the airing of this, resulting in "betrayed" fans harassing Dan on twitter even more, so it got to the point where he uploaded it onto his Youtube channel and literally started replying to people being like "I'm good a guy! I didn't lie!" Like a) my guy, you are not a good guy, and b) how are you so touchy about what people say about you on twitter when for the past year every second tweet has accused you of being a pedophile??) 
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The following year, Henry Danger has its first hour long special titled "Hour of Power" (filmed in July 2016 and airing at the end of the same year). It is worth noting that at this point, Dan can barely write for shit, a trend which started with iCarly and only got worse. Any emotion he was able to tap into in his Zoey 101 monologue days is gone, and he is increasingly unable to keep any plot in line or fetish at bay (see the episode of Henry Danger where Henry eats a banana while sitting in an older guys lap because I don't fucking know). He is also stupid on anger and ego, as seen in the Season 2 episode Henry & the Woodpeckers where he announces that he has personally been reprimanded for yelling at children by Nickelodeon executives multiple times, but haha, it's an episode about participation trophies in sport! He is so clever and subtle, guys.
Hour of Power starts with Ray, the middle aged superhero Captain Man, trying to fight a bad guy  named Drex without Henry, his sidekick Kid Danger, knowing about it. Why? Because the bad guy *drum roll* used to be his sidekick. Why is this such a shocking revelation that Henry drops his ice cream to the ground? Mostly so that Henry can be hurt because he thought he was Ray's first sidekick, because that matters for some reason (?), and then they play into the "jealous married couple that isn't actually married or even romantic" trope. Even though Ray is in his mid to late 30s and Henry is a child, but ok.
See, Drex seemed perfect but he actually had a dark side. And one day he and Ray fought and it was so bad that, if Ray wasn't indestructible, he would have been destroyed, whatever the hell that means. And this all happened nine years ago, which would have been 2007 for those counting at home. So Ray needs to fight him alone, because it would be weird if his current sidekick met his former sidekick, but Henry refuses and says, "Let's go meet your former sidekick…that you used to love," which seems oddly out of place even in the episode's context. So they go to Schneider's Bakery, both the name of Dan's own production company and a tribute to his grandfather's real bakery, because Drex "loves this bakery as much as [Ray] does" and they used to go there together twice a week, and then Ray gets stuck in a trap because the actor needed to go be with his pregnant wife in real life and we know Dan loves putting actors in boxes.
The episode then derails into a whole thing about Drex "spanking [Ray's] boyish sidekick" and then Henry gets superpowers and spanks Drex and also all of this is filmed and put on the news because Dan is fucking weird about technology and he has no filter and his mind is polluted.
Anyway.
Listen. I know I am reading too much into this. I have zero proof that this episode set up is based on anyone, let alone a specific person, other than that the Vibes are once again very firmly Off and it feels a little too specific. It could be about anyone, because I don't believe Dan only limited his abuse to cast members, and I admire any crew, extra or offset person that was brave enough to stand up for themselves. That said, it would make sense to me if it was about Sean. It’s likely he was able to stand up for himself in a way other people weren't: he's a double nepotism kid whose father is a TV producer with presumably a bit of power in the industry, and he was not acting for money the way cast members like Jennette were. Even in the very short Season 2 podcasts, Sean does seem to stand up to Dan more than the others. In one, Dan tries to make fun of him and Matthew for "not being man enough to do your own stunts" and Sean immediately responds saying Dan is the one who won't let them (to be clear, Dan is not in the wrong here, though he has been accused of endangering other, female actors by pressuring them to do their own stunts. But don't pretend like you gave people the choice of opting in or out).
It also tracks with Dan's weird relationship with Zoey 101. There are a myriad of reasons for him to not like it: it's not a sitcom and that's what he likes; the show had been mired in controversy because of Jamie Lynn's pregnancy (and he was probably sick of people accusing him of fathering her child by people who don't have eyes), as well as Matthew Underwood's multiple arrests, and the overall cast's general lack of success that we will assume was not due to Dan blacklisting everyone to Antarctica and back. Except for when he does seem to like it or at least be influenced by it. Likewise his reluctance to acknowledge the existence of the bad Season 4 but the very good Season 3 makes sense if he feels it was "tainted" by the apparently very traumatic memory of a 17 year old boy telling him to fuck off, I guess? (Dan if I'm wrong and you're reading this post something nice about Sean Flynn in Season 3 right now)
Dan and Nickelodeon "part ways" in late March 2018 because Dan screamed at a lot of wrong people after Gameshakers got cancelled and most of his supporters in high places left and got replaced. Also, he'd been an arsehole for twenty years and apparently hadn’t been allowed onset with actors for years (!!???!), not to mention the #MeToo era and his rife misogyny and harassment. He goes dead silent on social media and deletes almost all of his tweets, which is in no way suspicious. Eventually after a year, he begins sporadically posting on Instagram with comments turned off, including a return to his classic "happy birthday" messages. Drake Bell gets one (that is STILL up), and then he posts one for Sean.
Less than three weeks later they have the now notorious reunion (excluding Alexa and Kristen). It's dumb - what reboot is he gonna do to help your careers when he literally just got out ousted guys?? The only justification I can think of is that they went because he'd been ousted; he was no longer (as) powerful and the footing is maybe a bit equal now, so maybe they can control it. Sean wears like three layers of clothing again like he did at the 2012 wrap up party despite it being California in July.
Covid happens, putting a dent in the Victorious reunion that moves to Zoom. Dan also begins to properly up the birthday posts: you get a birthday post! You get a birthday post! We have details, we have fun facts, we have photos of other cast members with Dan. A lot of them are very nice, even personalised (while others, like Austin Butler, have a weird "from Team Danwarp" caveat). Sean gets called "one of my best casting choices ever", which seems like a weird thing to say about someone who's most notable post-Nickelodeon role was a minor part his dad got him on Devious Maids. It also seems pretty significant from a guy that cast Amanda Bynes, Kenan & Kel, and Ariana Grande; plus genuine but less recognised talent such as Jennette McCurdy, Liz Gillies etc. See, Dan is very involved in casting - he's talked about auditioning over forty girls for the role of Megan in Drake & Josh. He is genuinely involved in it and actively proud of it when it works out. He's also never really qualified who he considers his "best" casting choices, even though we can guess. But apparently Sean is up there.
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(this was deleted/archived on instagram as of late March 2022, coincidentally the same month Sean got married, with a bunch of other birthday posts including Jennette's.)
I am definitely reading too much into it, but I maintain it's weird.
A final coincidence I find interesting: while Dan was not involved in the final seasons of Henry Danger due to being ousted (though he was allowed at the wrap up party for some reason), it seems worth noting that one of the final episodes has Henry and Ray arguing because Henry won't be able to graduate high school on time "due to [his] commitment to this job [as sidekick]". Ray replies "well you don't seem very committed to me" and Henry quits. Ray then proceeds to refer to him only as "the quitter" for an episode. Again, Dan didn't write this - it ends with Ray apologising and acknowledging that Henry 'was thirteen when [he] took that oath, [he] didn't know what you were getting into' if you wanted proof - but I found the parallel interesting all the same.
Ultimately, I have no idea who Dan did or did not abuse. I think he's a generally abusive person, to the point where probably most cast members have at least one story of being uncomfortable, but that doesn't mean he wasn't charming or kind or loyal when he wanted to be. Abusers are like that. I am inclined to think that he treated the people he hated and the people he liked the most the worst, and that you probably faired the best if he just ignored you.
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