#paige: I'm so normal. my life is great and this is what being happy and fufilled is like. also paige: drinks heavily

[misstrashchan]

We talk about "show don't tell" in stories, but in podcasts it's impressive when they can do that through the audio format specifically, and one example of this that always sticks with me is in the Silt Verses S1 EP7, It Carries Few It Drowns Many. We're introduced to Paige Duplass describing her daily routine in a life that is seemingly perfect, that she's incredibly lucky and priveliged to have ended up where she is, considering she never thought she would make it this far, and how harsh and hostile the world of the Silt Verses we've seen can be up to this point, for Paige everything seems normal and accepted, with their safe and sanitized gods that are kept as much removed from people's sight as possible.

She has a successful job that pays well, a nice apartment with a beautiful view, etc. This is all undercut with her following up with "this is how you make things worse" referring to her dad messaging and calling her every day asking for money, seemingly the one black spot in this perfect life Paige has built for herself.

One part of her day we do not ever hear her describe however is her drinking heavily after coming home from work each day. But she does. She's opening a bottle every day after work, we hear the popping of the cork and her pouring a glass for herself. It's something conveyed to us only through the audio. This in tandem with her contemplating that despite this life she's built up for herself, the kind of life that one should be content and happy with, it still feels hollow and devoid of purpose, and she's left wondering if this is what happiness and fulfillment is supposed to be.

It gets worse over the course of the next few days when she learns people are going to be let go and sacrificed as the company she works for rebrands and switches from the Bronze Savant to a new god, Crawling in Ecstasy, which includes her friend Vaghn, and she becomes more and more distressed with each passing day, and trying to reason that none of this can really be happening, that it's too crude, that they'd surely do something more elegant, that the company that she works for that's giving her the means for this comfortable life and nice car and free pastries and wellbeing workshops wouldn't do something like this, and if they do it'd only be to the people who really deserved it, the worst of the worst, and they'd do it out of sight, and if it's out of sight they can ignore it, because it's not really happening. (Paige is also drinking before any of this occurs to when she comes home from work each day though)

It's clear that the drinking is part of Paige trying to numb and distance herself from the realities of what this life and the world she lives in is built upon, because it's accepted and considered "normal", and is also a filling of the void and guilt she feels of having all this comfort in spite of this.

And after watching her friend Vaghn be sacrificed and transfigured into a Saint for the Crawling In Ecstasy and immediately killed, she comes home to her apartment, and we hear her popping open another bottle. A pause. And then the smashing of a bottle, the breaking point to which Paige can no longer numb herself to the cruelties and indifferences of this world and her life, that she can't continue on as she is now, as the world is now, and it's so fucking satisfying.

Again, very small part of storytelling in the series for one character in one episode, but I love it nonetheless.

[sulietsexual]

i know you wrote it literally 4 years ago but as i revisit some of your videos i wanted to see what other meta or analysis you had written about charmed and your scenario of how paige would fit into the sisters's lives if prue had lived and breakdown of each dynamics was awesome but i got to thinking some more about parallels between phoebe and paige

both phoebe and paige grow up without knowing their mother and although both have caretakers, people who love and care for them there's that hole in both their lives, something missing and it's what drives them both to act out and get into all sorts of trouble. phoebe never became an alcoholic like paige did in her teens but she was reckless and in with crowds that were dangerous and hyde school reunion gives us a glimpse of that

in your what if scenario with the paige/phoebe dynamic you emphasized several times that they'd be partners in crime and bond over their rebellious youths but i honestly don't think they would because both of them aren't proud of that part of their lives and it was a dark time for both. phoebe was essentially an outcast, her whole look and demeanor was designed to drive people away and it always screamed defense mechanism to me

i think it's easy to look at both teen!paige and teen!phoebe and think they're just teenagers being rebellious because every teenager has that phase but i always thought for both of them it was rooted in something else. phoebe grows up never getting to have a normal sisterly bond with piper or prue but especially prue because prue is the sister and the mother and the father, she puts it upon herself to play those two missing roles in their lives because while their grandma lives she needs help

so even though we don't get to see little phoebe i'd imagine she wasn't often playing with her sisters like we see prue and piper doing in "that 70's episode" both because of the age gap between the three of them and because even if her kid sisters wanted to play with a baby or a toddler once victor left and penny died the home life probably changed a lot, i imagine the time for games had kinda passed, all their childhoods were affected not just prue's

and i also imagine there must have been a huge level of pressure for phoebe that maybe she put on herself to be worthy 'cause she's the baby the one who needs the most attention and with no one to rely on but penny both prue and piper have to step up to help raise her instead of just getting to be carefree kids, i imagine she felt there were unspoken expectations she could never live up to

and in that i see another parallel with paige. paige feeling she could never live up to the memory of prue and how brave and good she was and phoebe with this mother she didn't get to know, that she doesn't even remember but the knowledge from her sisters and grams that she was an amazing woman, the simultaneous sense of loss and wanting to make her proud, wanting to make everyone proud but not knowing how

i apologize for all these messages, the novels i sent you there i was getting hit in my paige/phoebe feels and wanted to share i guess feel free to tell me if you think i'm off about any of the points i brought up. i love reading or seeing good charmed meta/analysis and yours are always great!

Wow, that's a lot to cover Nonnie! Always happy to hear other's thoughts though.

When I said that Phoebe and Paige would bond over being trouble makers, I didn't mean that either was proud of their pasts, just that they have that in common and could probably find common ground over being "black sheep" and that would bond them. Even out bad periods/experiences can bond us with others!

I disagree that Paige had a hole in her life due to missing her biological mother - she had two wonderful parents whom she obviously loved, and while she did seem to have the normal curiosity about her lineage that a lot of adopted kids do (myself included!) I don't think that the absence of a biological mother affected her all that much, again, since she had such great parents who loved and raised her well.

Also disagree with the notion that both Prue and Piper had to give up their childhoods to raise Phoebe. We know canonically that only Prue had this responsibility - Piper herself says in the Pilot that she and Phoebe got off easy and that the two of them were allowed to have a normal childhood, while Prue had to sacrifice her childhood to help raise them. So I definitely think that Piper and Phoebe were close growing up and I don't think that Phoebe was isolated from her sisters at all.

Thanks for the ask and glad you enjoy my Charmed vids and meta!