#And I never thought I'd be ever comparing Ej and Matteo

[countessofravenclaw]

The real villain of HSMTMTS is Cash Caswell and he has only been in one episode. Cash Caswell is basically like HSMTMTS version of Jack Bolton from the original films putting pressure on their sons to be the best and wanting their sons to be just like them by going to their alma mater. Then their sons telling them that they want to do their own thing by not going to their alma mater. EJ is a lot more similar to Troy than most people think even though Ricky is similar to Troy in some ways.

Cash definitely is the villain at this point. During S2 I thought he would be a person who would understand EJ after he didn't want to go to Duke since that's how they make it seem, he even endorsed Mazzara, but now he is sending his only son and child to school afar away so he doesn't "tarnish" his legacy. Ej is pretty much being punished for making his own decisions. Shouldn't this be called abuse, and if not then at least toxic parenting? Can you blame EJ for being stressed and desperate.

You compared this to Troy my dear anon, but I know a better comparison that I am more familiar with: Matteo Balsano.

His dad is forcing him to go to a school so he can follow the family legacy when he doesn't want to do that and travel far away from his friends and the girl he is in love with. Gina being Luna Valente at this point. When Matteo refused to go to the school to follow his own passions, he was disowned by his dad and same might happen to EJ.

The solution that EJ tried to do and Matteo should have done is to tell their respective girl about the situation so they could help. But neither of them did it/have done yet to avoid hurting Gina/Luna, but just end up hurting them in the process.

At least EJ is on the right path with wanting to tell her. Val in this situation represents Gastón who was the voice of reason for Matteo. But if Val planted the letter for Gina to find (doubtful, but a slight possibility), then Val is also Ambar.

We also have no idea where their respective mothers stand in all of this. We got a direct mention of Ej's mom in ep. 3 so I take she is alive and around, but is she agreeing with Cash? We don't know where Matteo's mom is but I personally think she is dead.

And Tim thought this would be an original storyline... DCLA/D+LA have done this twice already.

So lets all welcome Cash Cashwell to the club of toxic Disney parent with German Castillo, Pricilla Ferro, Sharon Benson, Alexander Balsano and Marco's dad from Enstrelazadons.

At least Ej has more brain cells than Matteo does. Ej won't probably fake another girlfriend or climb fences.