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sarucane · 7 months

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OFMD Spiral Narratives 43: Stede's Fantasies Creating Reality

Intro: What I love most about how season 2 builds on season 1 of OFMD is the spiral narrative structure. Ground is repeatedly and explicitly re-trod from season 1 to season 2, but in season 2 everything goes deeper than season 1. Meanings are shuffled, emotions are stronger and truer, and transformation is showcased above everything. The first season plucks certain notes, then the second season plucks the same ones--but louder, and then it weaves them together to create a symphony.

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At the beginning of each season of OFMD, Stede is living in a fantasy. In the first season, it's a fantasy of being "the greatest pirate who ever lived." In the second season, it's a fantasy of romance (and a bit of uber-pirate fun). In each season, the fantasy is tempered over time by reality. Stede adapts, changes his expectations, and figures out how to keep moving forward. But a funny thing happens: over time, his fantasy ideas of reality reshape reality around him. It's not the perfect reality he once imagined and projected on the world. By the end of each season, it's a fantasy that has outgrown him, spread from him to others and enriched their lives, and the result is imperfect, hard-earned, and absolutely beautiful.

In season 1, Stede is blissfully unaware of how out of touch with reality his fantasy is. By all signs, he genuinely seems to believe his first "raid" goes well, and that he came off as a "real" pirate while stealing a plant.

And he thinks he's doing a great job as a pirate captain, even though he's totally unaware of what's going on in his crew. They don't remember his crazy shit about "talking it through," and they don't care.

They don't really get what the hell he's trying to do with his "amenities," (Pete demands to know what game he's even playing), and Stede's attempts to overlay his class-shaped fantasies onto reality lead to a "ballroom" and a library full of books the crew can't read. He doesn't think he's living in a fantasy world, but he is.

Stede's fantasy world of Season 2 is spiraled in to become more intense: he's literally in a fantasy when the season opens.

The fantasy starts with the season 1 fantasy: he's a super-pirate, complete with sword skills to match Izzy's, one-liners, vengeance for betrayals, and an earring. Then the older fantasy merges with the more recent fantasy, as references to Ed appear--followed by the man himself.

But this isn't the real Ed: this is a fantasy super-pirate version of Ed (hence the return of his beard, even though Stede last saw him completely clean-shaven). And this is a fantasy version of Ed who isn't mad at all over what Stede did last season. Love conquers all and sunset bearded* beach sex awaits. Fantasy (adolescent) romance.

And then the reality of Stede's situation attempts to suffocate him to death: Ed marrooned his crew and went off to chase madness in Stede's ship (largely as a consequence of what Stede did to him, although Izzy gets a hunk of blame for that one too), so now Stede and the gang are living in squalor.

Just like, in Season 1, Stede was lost in a fantasy that Lucius was inscribing (a literal example of Stede imposing his fantasy on reality, the idea being the this book of shit will be what future generations think of him) so it would eclipse any reality--right up until Buttons intervened with bad news.

In season 1, Stede is able to avoid reality tossing him overboard by imposing a second layer of fantasy over reality, claiming he killed Nigel so the crew will respect him.

In season 2, Stede is also using writing to avoid reality, also presenting a narrative of what's happening around him that only bears the most basic resemblance to reality (like the book Lucius wrote).

But this time, his relationship to the fantasy is more complex: it's his way of trying to cope with how quickly his life spiraled out of control; to cope with the distance between him and Ed right now; to banish the insecurity-birthed fears of his past.

But despite the fact that Stede is still struggling with the mismatch between fantasy and reality, he also demonstrates real growth in the second season.

In season 1, Stede really believed that his fantasy would come to life in front of him, as soon as he arranged it so the conditions would be right.

But in season 2, Stede knows he's creating a fantasy. He knows the fantasy that things are going well is pure copium. And that fantasy is an evolution of his "perfect pirate" fantasy from season 1, the fantasy that meant Stede's dream started with dueling and defeating Izzy, not with reaching Ed. But in season 2, Stede is able to recognize and set aside that fantasy before it takes over his life and gets him killed, like it almost did in season 1.

But the second part of Stede's season 2 fantasy is Ed, and his desperate belief that their romance will survive what's happened since they last met. Stede could have written these letters and then set them aside, to give to Ed when they meet again. Instead, even after acknowledging that the odds of Ed finding the letters are slim, even after acknowledging reality, Stede chooses a fantasy. Chooses to hope, and defies reality to hang onto that hope.

Stede's different relationships with his fantasies foreshadow his resolution this season: his fantasies about being a super-pirate captain will fade, but his romantic dream of Ed will not. And by the end of the year, of course, he'll set aside one in favor of the other.

But in the meantime, as the seasons unfold, Stede's fantasies run up into reality and lose--but not before they get him where he needs to be.

In the first season, Stede hangs onto his fantasy and hangs onto his fantasy and ends up on a Spanish warship, where he's stabbed and almost dies.

But even though riding his fantasy here was insane and misguided, it's changed his life forever--for the better. Because Stede's fantasy of being the Gentleman Pirate had a measurable effect on reality.

If Stede hadn't held onto his fantasies well past knowing "I'm not a pirate, I'm an idiot," if he hadn't imposed one layer of fantasy after another on reality, he never even would have met Ed. The odds were slim, as Stede said, of him and Ed finding each other in the first place--but Stede grabbed reality with both hands, closed his eyes, and hummed, and here they are.

And something similar happens in season 2.

If anyone had asked Ed at this point whether he wanted to see Stede--that Stede wanted to apologize--the answer would probably have been a deafeningly loud "NO." Stede's been wandering around telling anyone who will listen how crazy he is about Ed and how they're "on a break" but it'll all be fine, and if anything the obstacle will be that Ed's doing so well without him that Stede'll disrupt his life. All of this is ridiculously out of sync with reality. But it all got Stede where he needed to be. Stede believed so hard, and so long, that he was in the right place at the right time to make something fantastical really happen.

The structure gets a bit tricky here, because Stede's reckoning with his fantasy in season 1 comes before it works out for him (with Ed's arrival), but comes after it works out for him in Season 2.

In season 2, first off, just as Stede's pirate fantasy led straight to him being stabbed, his romantic fantasy leads right to him being headbutted.

Reality asserts itself, and Stede has to deal. Both times, he starts dealing with some denial.

And both times, his attempt to deny is punched in the face by reality.

In season 1, Stede's development balancing fantasy and reality is fairly straightforward--Stede believes his fantasy long enough to attract Ed, who then helps Stede not get killed by his fantasy. In season 2, Stede sits and talks to Ed and does the relationship work that lets them move forward, embracing real communication instead of romantic fantasies. He works with Izzy and learns how to bring his piracy closer to reality, to respect other people's fantasies (the cursed suit)

But here's the thing: even as Stede adjusts, sets out to become a better pirate (by taking notes, but still, he is trying) and to become a better partner, the seeds of his fantasies have been sown.

The fantasies Stede tried to impose on reality return, and they serve to reshape reality--to save him, and to give hope in darkness to the man he loves.

In season 1, Stede's fantasies of being a bloodthirsty killer and having murdered Chauncy almost get him executed--but they also get him saved. And in season 2, Stede's fantasies and resulting brief reign as a "super-pirate" may be gone, but he's still gained enough skills in pursuit of that fantasy to survive for this:

It's hardly equivalent to defeating Izzy Hands in a duel, but Stede's fantasy followed by his work has gotten him where he wants to be.

And then, in both seasons, Stede's Episode 1 fantasy appears in his Episode 8 reality. His dream of being a different kind of pirate captain is animated by his crew. His fantasy of creating a place where traumatize pirates can grow as people has come true, because other people came to want it as much as he does.

And in Season 2, going deeper as usual, the same music as in Stede's dream plays as Ed and Stede reunite. And when this fantasy becomes reality, it's more complicated than it was in Stede's dreams. But it's shared, and so it goes deeper--and it's all the more true for being earned by two imperfect men who defied the world and their own fears for each other.

And of course Stede knows. After all, his knowing made all of this happen.

#ofmd s2 spoilers #ofmd #ofmd s2 #our flag means death #ofmd spoilers #ofmd meta #ed teach #stede bonnet #blackbonnet #i have seen every episode probably 18 times by now #i sat down to write this thinking "huh season 1 starts with stede imagining he's a pirate and season 2 with him dreaming he's a pirate #suppose there's something there prob #2 hours or writing later i'm going “WHAT EVEN IS THIS SHOW”

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