#I tend to just experience hypomania so I am aware I do not feel the full extent of how destructive those feelings can be

[scarawayfromfallingapart]

but The (After)life of the Party is one of THOSE songs to me that’s like… to be cliche… a kick drum beating in my chest (again) like idk. This is one of those songs where I think they succeeded in writing it better than I’ve ever felt it but here I go trying to analyze it anyway… I realize I am taking your shtick @petewentzisblack1312 … but this song NEEDS to be analyzed and I am going to try and make you like it :) I have been lurking in ur asks as an anon for a couple weeks and I HAVe to say this off anon… I’m sorry to bother u. My greatest hits include my autotune does not equal bad/talentless rant and my Wilson (Expensive Mistakes) mini-analysis 🤪 but also I learn SO MUCH from ur blog I love it. Anyway!!! Analysis of this song:

Tw : mania, depression, anxiety, substance use

To me this song is about coming down from a manic episode, maybe not even necessarily transitioning right into depression but like. Just coming down from it and kinda seeing the world as it is again, and feeling that kind of mellowed out, where your body allows itself to feel tired again. The title makes it more obvious - he’s no longer the life of the party - it’s over, everyone’s gone home, but he’s still there trying in vain to carry it on.

“I’m a stitch away from making it and a scar away from falling apart” is my FAVORITE line (hence my URL lol)… but the fact that this song opens with that and the narrator is oscillating between feeling 100% and feeling like they’re going to breakdown like THAT is what these transitions feel like to me (ok also I generally feel like this on a daily basis). But this line also gives you a hint of how well it is going… like he’s a stitch away from getting there - the cut hasn’t completely healed so he’s not getting there any time soon : but a scar away from falling apart - like a scar has already healed so it’s old hurt that is threatening to tear him apart —> “my old aches become new again”.

Then we get “blood cells pixelate” which I personally find hilarious since this song has been likened to the sims 3 soundtrack 💀 (I played the sims but I refused to have the music on so I have no idea cannot confirm or deny). Butttt this is obviously like a nod to everything being on film like even everything down to the blood coursing through his veins is made into an image, poster boys for your scene am I right? Also has to do with the scar/stitch - his breakdown is there for everyone to see, immortalized on magazine covers and interviews and E!News segments. But like only the blood cells, like no one gives a damn if he heals from this, thats not newsworthy. Eyes dilate (drugs and/or sex but maybe drugs Bc of the next line - full moon pills got him out on the street at night) butttt mania often comes with insomnia as we well know so. Maybe the pills are metaphorical idk

THEN the narrator becomes an observer - it’s no longer introspective, he’s watching someone else work the room, he’s cutting all ties to them loose, just sitting back and relaxing and watching and I always had this vision of Pete and/or patrick watching some girl flit around the room while he sat there with a lazy smile and drank a beer and leaned back in his chair. BUT on thinking on this more… I think- bear with me - maybe… just maybe… he’s watching himself outside of himself like some kind of dissociative thing (I personally experience that but it’s due to anxiety but it is common among just the general population so who knows) and it’s like you’re feeling that irritable high from the manic phase still and you’re trying to push through and just be part of this party right (or just part of life in general right, like the party is metaphorical IMO) and you separate form yourself in order to get through - your mind and body are not one. You have to watch yourself from the inside out, rely on muscle memory to get you through the party or your job or the tour or whatever it was in his case.

also tying back to I’m a stitch away - right like some part of you is cut in half and I’m a scar away - again, you were cut somewhere, something was severed, mind and body maybe… big brain hours (but also I’m probably reaching for that one)

Anyway then we have the “put love on hold” bc fuck if he’s ready for a relationship - he’s watching this girl desperate for stardom, maybe it’s the girl he’s watching work the room (if it’s not a dissociative thing, or maybe it’s both tbh). Her nose runs ruby red (cocaine is probably the cause I’m thinking, she’s doing lines at this party to be working the room). Death’s in a double bed (orgasms… nice one Pete) but really it’s a classic tale of a girl desperate for roles that she’s willing to sleep around to get there, she’s singing songs that could only catch the ear of other desperate people like her… but… Pete is writing THIS song and Patrick is singing it and they are just as desperate, right, like he’s helplessly watching someone enjoy a party and he’s verging on miserable (or he’s watching himself try to enjoy the party while he’s actually miserable) and they’re trying to catch our ears… we are the desperate… —> “I’m here to collect your hearts/it’s the only reason that I sing”

Then the bridge is where he starts to actually breakdown, the vocals get more intense and strained and chaotic, the sims 3 soundtrack music swells, and he repeats the beginning, reiterating that but adding on “kiss away young thrills and kills on the mouths of all of my friends” - to me he wants to take away all their joy and pain (kills could also = orgasm if u want to be nasty lol and tie it into the death in a double bed) and he wants to feel it for himself because right now he feels NOTHING like he’s right in the goddamn middle of feeling great and feeling like shit and again, to me that exemplifies the transition between mania and depression and we are back to square 1 (to me also thrills = mania and kills= depression but that’s just probably dumb lol).

Also he’s kissing it all away - it’s gentle, it’s loving, like brushing someone’s tears away, he’s not trying to be forceful about it, but he feels like HE should be experiencing all the highs and lows not his friends… or he doesn’t want his friends to suffer… both probably and the chorus is unhinged this time, patrick gives it his all, loses it, signifying hey wait, the narrator DID lose it… but then the song ends with the music coming off that swell, slowing down, relaxing, the narrator resignedly signing off “I’m a stitch away”… giving us maybe an etch of hope, that maybe his stitches healed after all and he did make it through (with hearts and wrists intact I am so corny sorry)

ANYWAY tldr I love this song and it means so much to me and like when I was 15 and found it the first time I was always like “why does this one hurt me so bad, like I don’t get it” but like. Now that I know what bipolar disorder is and that I suffer from it I understand lol. I don’t know if this is how Pete intended this idk I feel like I got some lines right but to ME this is what it feels like. Also it is v fun to play on the violin :)

[gardenerian]

Okay, obviously I know this is all going to be subjective, but in your opinion, what were Ian's various states during s8? I tend to believe he was taking his meds and he wasn't lying when people asked him, they just weren't working anymore. At some point he stopped because he does the classic Ian evasion technique when Fiona asks about them in the beginning of s9. But when do you think they started to lose efficacy and he started showing symptoms?

whew okay. i got carried away and went all in on this - it’s longer than my 4x11 post so don’t feel obligated to read it all. let me start by saying that i have…. many gripes with how ian’s disorder is portrayed in s8/s9, but i won’t get into that here. i can only do so much in this post 😅 i’ll be examining this as if i did not have those gripes. (edit: having reread this, i could not fully commit to that…)

second - i am always down to talk about this aspect of the show but i don’t want to say that i am absolutely right! others may have different ideas/experiences/interpretations - shit, maybe i’m totally wrong and yall can correct me. let’s talk. 

with that said:

you’re right that he begins the season taking his meds and i went through the season (it was a journey) to take a closer look at when that might have changed. i think we can divide s8 into four stages for ian: stable, hypomanic and rising, manic, then delusional manic.

it’s crucial that one of our first looks at ian this season is him taking his meds, and that he’s doing it in front of his family. it’s quick and casual, a non-question for him at this point. ian’s pretty good at the start of the season (strictly in bipolar terms, lol). he’s preoccupied with trevor and monica, but he’s lucid. we see his typical petty, goofy, somewhat-naive self. the way we see him working in 8x02 - gentle, clear. and he’s introspective, aware of himself. he questions himself about monica and his feelings of grief. he knows the chub bar was… not the way to handle his emotions (not gonna go off on the other aspects of that but… yeah.) his agitation with carl in 8x02 is a manifestation of grief rather than mania - and we will see a contrast with his agitation later in the season. he’s present and capable in dealing with the meth situation - 8x03 is about the grief. 

8x04 sees ian fiddling with his meds in the kitchen - i can only assume he’s taken them. the cap is off when we first see the bottle, then he screws it back on. he’s also doing some introspection in this episode. those red shoes are the only thing i cannot explain, he’s clearly lost it with those and iM KIDDING. 

if i had to pinpoint where his meds start going off kilter, it’s 8x05/8x06. all the earlier upheaval is catching up. he’s…  intense in the second half of 8x05. ian is naturally kind of intense, but it’s clearly being amped up a little, especially once we get into the church feud. i think he’s moving swiftly into hypomania - his reaction and hesitance with the donor’s wife kinda tell me that he’s still in a pretty rational frame of mind. but. intense. a somewhat inflated sense of self. it’s starting. that rage with fiona at the end of 8x05… fiona is uh incorrect here at first but ian takes it to a v high level. he doesn’t do much in 8x06 - but that scene with fiona in the ambulance is very telling. he goes 0-100 real quick. you see his jaw twitch when she’s talking. the agitation is coursing under his skin. again, this kinda reaction comes naturally for ian but it’s like. idk, super ian?

i don’t know how to explain the ice water stuff in 8x07. idk what the fuck that’s about. but ian clearly thinks he’s in the right. and that trend continues throughout this ridiculous episode. the egging/spray painting/occupy stuff - i watched this one twice to try to decide if he’s hypomanic or manic, and it’s a tough call? he’s elevated in a noticeable way but i don’t know if i would call him impaired, which is kinda the qualifying factor for mania. either way, he’s up. obsessive thinking is a symptom of hypo/mania - and this is different from ian’s one-track mind re: trevor from earlier in the season. people who know him are starting to notice (i have a bone to pick with fiona but that’s for another time). this is not a rational way to react to anything. and his hair looks like trash. 

i think you’re right that ian is taking his meds when he’s asked (twice) - he’s offended when he’s questioned, bc he doesn’t see how things have shifted. and, to him at least, if he doesn’t notice the shift, why would anyone assume he’s unmedicated? that confrontation in the lot is enough to know that he’s on a very rapid upswing and it’s kinda hard to watch. i am once again reiterating that we have to allow agency for mentally ill people and the way he treats fiona here is unpleasant to witness. a real sign of this meteoric rise is the conversation with fi at the end of this episode. he’s latching on to what will become gay jesus (kill me) and the lucidity is slipping a bit. 

he’s moving into more severe mania in 8x08/8x09/8x10 where he finds a new hyper-fixation. the way he comes charging into the house asking for a bible and dives right into it. he probably stops taking his meds somewhere in here, too distracted by what’s going on, or too invested in the sense of purpose the mania is giving him. it’s not delusional or psychotic mania, but it’s impeding his ability to function in his day to day life, which is a key and crucial aspect for an episode to be considered mania. he’s got an incredibly inflated sense of himself here. he’s rambling, tripping over his thoughts. he’s unable to concentrate on anything else (except sex, although i would not call him hyper-sexual). the fact that lip can look at that charlie kelly style map of his and not notice that something is wrong is BONKERS. 

but... he’s not fully on board with the gay jesus thing yet. the delusion hasn’t quite taken hold. he’s manic and getting higher but he’s a little skeptical of all the attention, flattering though it may be. he knows it’s getting to be too much. he doesn’t yet have the god complex that often comes with full-blown delusional mania. holy shit but then he gets up at the end of 8x10 and delivers that rambling, cringey speech - i don’t know if it’s the high from this moment that triggers it, but it’s all over after this. like you see it in his eyes. and it’s upsetting. it’s like watching kanye west talk about anything - how are the people in the audience not horrified?

8x11/8x12, whew. your life is no longer your own, that dude says. uh, yeah. reality is over. we all know what happens next….. and the people that enabled him… what the fuck. lip, trevor, and fiona all asking each other if he’s off his meds………………………………….. um. no shit. and he doubles down on the whole thing. i feel good. and alive. that is the saddest shit ever to me. so we know he’s Straight Up Manic now. and it continues into s9 which…. i won’t go there today. and that’s s8 ian.

fin. 

(side note: watching these episodes made me homicidal but the 8x01 scene with all the gallagher brothers in the hot tub together was nice. the bar is low.)