As someone who grew up in a bilingual household where we spoke English but also signed, the part of Mabel and Theo's relationship that fascinates me the most is the communication, or lack thereof.
I'm mostly hearing (...sort of...) but grew up around a lot of d/Deaf people, CODAs, interpreters, etc. so while I can't give any input on the experience of profound deafness, I can at least tell apart different styles of signing. It's a little hard to tell sometimes how much of this is characterization vs. the skill level of the actors, but it is interesting.
Teddy Dimas does not sign fluidly. It's immediately obvious. It's not that he's terrible or that he can't be understood... it's just that there are a lot of tells that he does not sign as a primary language. The terseness of the signs, the deliberateness. You can tell that there's a second of thought before each sign, a jerky sort of compactness to them, that's common with people who learn to sign later in life. (Or who don't get a ton of practice with it.)
Signing, when you do it right, requires the use of your whole body. That can be hard for hearing people, who are generally used to more restrained movements. Teddy Dimas has never quite lost that restraint. He still can't go all in, not with his signing or his parenting.
I always thought this was really interesting, because it means that Teddy most likely learned to sign for his son (tragically uncommon with hearing parents of Deaf children) but that he still can't quite translate his thoughts properly into sign language. He can't quite get his emotions through to his son. There's a barrier there between them, and it seems to be largely one that Teddy's erected -- until Theo starts snapping back.
What I'm getting at is that Teddy has always forcibly drawn his son into his world instead of immersing himself in Theo's, and it shows. And it has really harmed their relationship, in more ways than one.
Zoe... we don't see a ton of her signing, but there does seem to be something somewhat performative about it. It's more fluid, like perhaps she's done it her whole life, but there's also something sort of... idk, false about it? And I wonder if that's just Zoe. It felt like she was always covering up her true feelings of loneliness and emptiness with a flamboyant personality, and the little flourishes to her signing seem to convey that as well. Her signing feels almost theatrical to me.
Theo and Mabel, though... I've always loved that episode where they go to Coney Island together. I get the criticism that Theo said at the beginning that he couldn't understand much of what she said when he was reading lips -- and then she proceeded to just talk at him for the rest of the episode anyway. But to me, at least, that always seemed like it was kind of the point. They couldn't understand each other, not fully, and that was something soothing to them.
There's something healing, I think, about shouting into the void. Letting out all of your most personal, complicated feelings without fear of repercussion or judgement. Talking into the wind because you know it won't talk back. You need to feel that echo but also know that it won't be heard.
I think there was some of that there in their initial relationship. Both of them desperately needed to talk, to get everything off their chests, but both of them also have trouble opening up to others due to trauma. So I think speaking to someone who couldn't understand them was, in some ways, ideal. They could make a human connection while keeping it fairly impersonal. They could unload without fear of judgement -- or worse, understanding.
Oddly, I think their mutual need to communicate without being understood was the one thing they understood best about each other. They could sense each other's loneliness and wariness and inability to trust that they could tell someone something important without it being used against them -- because their love and their trust have always been used against them.
So maybe in a way, their inability to talk to each other was actually what helped them communicate on a deeper level...?
Still, though. Still. I was so pleased to see that Mabel is learning more sign language so she can talk to Theo. She's got a long way to go, but no one learns to sign overnight. She's making progress, and you can tell that Theo appreciates it. There are still times where he gets too excited and signs too fast and she doesn't catch all of it, and there are times when she gets so wrapped up in her own soliloquies that she forgets that you have to face Deaf people while talking to them, but there's a familiarity to it now. When he signs too fast, she smiles and teases him. When she talks too quickly or forgets to sign or turns away from him, he just smiles and sighs and shakes his head. Then waits for her to come back.
Theo finds it irritating, obviously, but also understands that it's just... Mabel. She spends so much time in her own head that she has trouble communicating even with people who speak her language, as evidenced with Tobert. And maybe Theo does understand her in ways that others can't. Maybe it's the very fact that he accepts that he can't always understand her that makes her feel comfortable with him.
I also have to wonder, y'know... Has anyone ever learned to sign for him before, other than his father, who clearly saw it as a burden? Has anyone ever seen him as worth the effort of learning, not out of an obligation to speak to him but a desire to? No wonder he's being patient with her. I wonder if anyone has ever put in as much effort for him as she already has. It makes me so sad to think about, because what she's doing now is so... bare minimum. Theo has been so desperately alone, and so much of that is because his father isolated him. It's because no one else ever reached out. :(
idk, it just makes me happy that these two people who originally bonded over their inability to communicate are now comfortable enough with each other to try actually talking. There's something so shy and so joyful about it. I love that for them, especially Theo.
I don't want him to be alone anymore!! I want him to have someone he can talk to, whom he trusts enough to talk to, who thinks he's worth learning to talk to back!
Their odd brand of bilingual communication (or lack thereof) is just fascinating to me. ;;
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Sometimes I wish westerners could read ruzzian. Or at least use google translate when writing articles about ruzzians and their opinions.
"Russia believes they have a right to invade a foreign country because russian speakers are being bombed."
But what ruzzian news says is...
"Ukrainians and Ukraine never existed. This is our historical territory. We need to flatten "ukraine" and take back what is ours! They are all dogs and bugs anyways!"
And that is news channels with millions or ruzzians watching and supporting. They will legit say the most rancid dehumanizing shit possible about Ukrainians and western media still tries to "portray the situation evenly". They still say "innocent russians in russia dont know! They have no idea whats happening! They dont support the war!". I'm sorry they have no idea? All their news outlets are covering the war and talking about how Ukraine is their land. ruzzians still have access to other media. They CHOOSE to support and believe that Ukrainians are subhuman and deserve to die because they dared not to be ruzzian and dared not to speak ruzzian.
Why aren't westerners covering what pootin says? What he actually says about Ukraine and Ukrainians? Most articles never bring up the batshit crazy things he says out loud about Ukrainians. If we compile the shit pootin says about Ukraine and Ukrainians then you will not be able to tell the difference between him and hitler or mussolini. Or even the north American churches when they spoke of natives. If anything with how much he says out loud he would probably come off even worse.
My friends dad even said that "she [me] doesnt know everything about whats going on in Ukraine and Russia." His claim was this was actually all about resources. Guess how many languages he understands? One. English. Me? The holy trinity. Ukrainian, Russian, and English.
They are completely ignorant of how much moscovites hate us and for how long they have been appropriating our history and culture. They have no idea how many excuses under the sun moscovites will use to push away and hide the real reason for all of this.
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