#we gull way back

[ofmd-ann]

Stede: I bet there's some insane foliage! 😃🌿

Ed: Uhh 👀 (What the fuck...I want to hold his hand 🥺)

[xray-vex]

POV: you offer Captain some coconuts for the coconut war but he doesn't find any of this to be a blast actually

[lydiajoypalmer]

20 - We Gull Way Back

little papercut guys, who am I to resist the toe touch.

[blatterpussbunnyfromhell]

Take me back to 2022 pleaaaaase

[wrensgeekyvibes]

They Were Co-Captains

In my OFMD Season 1 rewatch, "We Gull Way Back," and the finale really did something to my brain. The scene when Blackbeard goes off with Calico Jack, and he tells Stede that he would soon realize who he was. That made me really sad. All this time, Ed was afraid that he was unlovable, and he was afraid that Stede would see all the traits in him that made him unlovable.

But that was never the case; Stede would always like/love him. You can just see the admiration he had for him. It's lovely. They're lovely.

[cononeillbreastingboobily]

Happy birthday to the fact that upon being captured by the English Edward Teach not only didn't put up a fight, he willingly got pushed on the deck right next to Stede and full on WINKED at him

[sarucane]

Fragile Stories, Strong Stories in "We Gull Way Back": OFMD Meta Analysis

By episode 8 of S1, the stories on the Revenge have nearly fallen apart again and again. The crew plotted mutiny in the first episode; Ed planned to kill Stede in ep 4, changed his mind in ep 6--but still stood by while Izzy tried to go through with the plan--and was considering leaving in ep 7; Stede's actual skills as a pirate captain haven't exactly improved; Jim left in ep 7, leaving the Revenge without its most skilled fighter. And all this begs the question: how strong are the stories that bind these characters, anyway?

Calico Jack sets out to test exactly this. Jack uses stories as a weapons. He manipulates people's emotions,

he sidles in and tricks people into wanting to tell a certain story with him

and uses stories to separate people from each other.

And Jack's good at it. He's charming and fun. He fits into the pirate world in a way that Stede never will. Everyone wants to play his games with them, and no one wants to tell him "no."

Since Stede is the pillar at the center of the Revenge's story, it makes sense that just about everything Jack does is designed to undermine him. He immediately senses Stede's weak spot--he's not 'masculine' enough for the pirate world--and attacks it, calling Stede "the big gal." He repeatedly gets Stede's name wrong on purpose, he pretends fragility when called out on his bullshit, he wraps people up in games and booze so they don't notice just how toxic he is until it's too late.

And he does all this indirectly, by building a story around Stede and manipulating others to fill in the gaps.

Jack has actual conversations with Stede only twice. Both of those conversations have the same goal: drive a wedge between Stede and Ed by showing just how fragile the story Ed's told Stede--and by extension, the story Ed and Stede are telling together--really is.

When Jack tells the story of Ed setting the ship on fire, even he doesn't realize what he's exposing.

Ed's story to Stede about not having killed a man since is father? It's just a story. It's semantics, a split hair that lets Ed tell himself a certain story about himself. Ed's constantly telling stories about himself or acting out stories told by others about him, and even he doesn't really know which of these stories are true and which are false. He barely understands who he is, let alone what stories he wants to be telling. So, extending that logic, is the story he told Stede about not killing anyone as fragile as the story he and Stede have been telling together?

For Stede, the answer to this is actually no. Stede trusts Ed and Ed's 'strength,' rather more than he should sometimes. And Stede's opinion of Ed doesn't actually change after the story of the burned ship.

Jack's ideal outcome would probably have been for Stede to be the one who broke up with Ed. But although he does hone in on a failure of communication between Stede and Ed (one of MANY...and for that manner, a failure of Ed's self-awareness), he doesn't actually succeed in disrupting their relationship over breakfast.

But the second time Jack has a conversation with Stede, he does succeed. He rattles Stede with his talk of "dalliances," of careless sexual relationships, directly implying that any bond Stede thinks he's developed with Ed is fleeting. And then he says the quiet part out loud: Ed isn't who you think he is.

Stede doesn't really get what's going on here, but he knows he doesn't like it. So, he retreats. He tries to go back to the ship without talking to Ed at all. When he does try to explain why he's leaving, he plays into Ed's narrative that Stede and he don't belong in each other's lives.

Stede does well telling Ed how he feels, but he makes a mistake when he tells Ed he doesn't like who Ed is right now. He's openly doing the same thing Jack's been subtly doing: telling Ed "this is who you are." Stede means it as "this is who you are in this situation," but Ed isn't aware of the fragility of his own identity. Or of how much he's changed since his time with Jack.

So here Ed is again, with the idea that he's "a certain kind of person," and there's nothing to be done about it.

And then, everyone gets tested. A point of fragility is exposed, a vulnerability is attacked and destroyed.

And then everyone has to decide how they'll react. Whether they'll tell Jack's story, or their own.

Most of the crew gets through the test. Buttons holds to his truth, keeping glaring at Jack until he's off the ship. Stede gives Jack the boot, to the protest of absolutely no one. The crew don't even think about taking Jack's bait of mutiny when he asks them to come along.

Not so long ago, Stede wouldn't have been able to be this assertive. He would have bullshitted and made a speech, he would have wavered under Jack's glare. And the crew who first got on the Revenge wouldn't have been upset by the killing of a bird. They've changed. Their stories are strong enough to get them through this test.

But Ed fails.

For Ed, Jack's stories have given him a simple, easy, and narrative to regress into: he's a certain kind of person, who doesn't belong on the Revenge. His and Stede's relationship was always fragile and doomed. After all, it was based on pretense and lies.

And at the same time, another fragile story is being exposed. Back at Jackie's, Jim is facing the fact that the monsters of their childhood weren't exactly 'monsters.' those men were dumbass bastards, and if they keep chasing each murderer down they'll wind up as worn down as Jackie. And Jim doesn't really even want to be telling this story, either.

Back at Blind Man's Cover, Ed is faced with a bit of whiplash. He thinks he's here because this is the 'strong' story, this is who he really is. But he only went with Jack after an emotional appeal!

The next morning, Ed's clearly unhappy with what's happened. Because like Jim, Ed doesn't want to tell this story. And after an episode of yes-anding Jack, of protesting an then complying, he finally finds his limit when Jack suggests killing Lucius to steal his stuff.

Ed doesn't want to drink his breakfast, engage in careless murder, or treat his relationship with Stede as just another 'dalliance.' So it's not all that big of a surprise when Ed turns against Jack. Because the most important thing turns out not to be whether a story is strong or fragile. It's whether the tellers want to keep telling it.

And Ed finds that he wants to keep telling his story with Stede. That makes their story strong--and it makes Ed strong. Strong enough to face the biggest risk of his life, and go back to the ship without a clue what'll happen next.

And Ed's not the only one with an unexpectedly strong story. Button's madness turns out to have been truth. And his hex is stronger than anyone expected.

It's Jack's stories that turned out to be fragile. The ones that were true were shallow, and the ones that seemed 'strong' were lies that fell quickly away.

The episode ends with the crew captured, the English triumphant. But for now, at least, the chain isn't broken. And that means the stories are still being told.

[mxmollusca]

Sit down with me and watch a gay man's heart get shattered and then lovingly glued back together.

All the Stede faces from We Gull Way Back get me out of bed in the morning.

[newnewyorker93]

It's knife turtle!

So I made this stabby fellow as a Chanukah present for my dad 💚

There's a little magnet in the knife so it can be a needle minder too 🪡🧵

🔪🐢

[gofrenchie]

i love that calico jack arrives to the revenge, on a serious mission, drunk as a fucking skunk. the absolute madman.

[ofmd-ann]

Edward Teach (S01E08 - We Gull Way Back)

Whose beached babygirl is this? Someone needs to come collect him

[xray-vex]

underrated ofmd snippet: Stede stomping off back to the ship and declining Roach's offer of coconuts for the coconut war

[ourflagmeansgayrights]

the thing with the "not like one of these store-bought types" is

ok so like. have any of you ever been in a casual group conversation, like with a group of friends or classmates or something. and it's like, one guy talking with multiple girls. or one straight person talking to multiple gay people. or one cis person talking to multiple trans people. or one white person talking to multiple people of color. basically Person With X Privilege talking with a group of people who don't have that privilege.

and someone from the bigger group makes a dig at the Person With X Privilege, but like, in an accurate way? like, a woman making a joke about how the one guy in the group doesn't have to worry about walking home at night by themselves, or a gay person making a joke about how the one straight person was allowed to take their date to prom and nobody else in the group was, etc etc etc? and then the group of people laughs?

if you've ever been in that sort of situation, you know the Person With X Privilege has a choice: either laugh along with them, or get defensive. and the correct choice is to laugh along. by making the joke about X Privilege right in front of the Person With X Privilege, the group is giving the Person a chance to prove that they have a baseline level of awareness about their privilege.

not that laughing along makes Person With X Privilege like, One Of The Good Ones or anything, but it shows the group that they're self-aware enough to recognize that they have X Privilege and they're not going to try and deny it or argue about it. (and we're all familiar with those conversations, right? the "not all men" argument? like, a joke about white privilege gets countered by a white person being like "well, i'm also a woman!" or "i grew up poor!" or "my best friend is Black!" trying to distance themselves from their white privilege instead of just laughing along and agreeing with the simple fact that yes, I have white privilege, it's true)

when calico jack said "That's a real pirate! Not like one of these store-bought types," that's the social interaction he was setting up. people don't become pirates by choice, they do it because they have no other choice—everyone on stede's crew is there because they can't make a living elsewhere. stede is the only one there who was born into wealth and still has all his wealth. that's a privilege nobody else on the ship has.

and instead of laughing with them, shrugging it off, stede got defensive. only instead of arguing that he is a real pirate, he tried to argue that jack isn't. and lucius is right: it is a bitchy question! from the perspective of the crew (who weren't all around for jack and stede's first two interactions, first on the deck and then at breakfast), jack just gave stede an opportunity to laugh along with the group. and rather than be cool about it, stede got defensive and bitchy.

(not that jack was being genuine in any way. there's no way the tears are authentic. it's questionable if he's telling the truth about his crew mutinying three times in the past year. he's not actually giving stede an opportunity to laugh along with the crew, he's setting stede up to be defensive so he can make stede look bad. but that doesn't make what he said about "store-bought pirates" any less true.)

[gay-toast]

"this is who I am, Stede"

"NO IT'S NOT ED IT'S WHO YOU WERE, YOUR TAKING THE EASY WAY OUT" - My Mom watching Edward leave with Calico Jack in We Gull Way Back

[mikimeiko]

Listen to the wind blow, watch the sun rise Running in the shadows, damn your love, damn your lies

[brightcopperkettle]

A Brigade of Imbeciles

Go with me now on a journey to Stede’s recruitment process for the crew of the Revenge:

For our purposes here, everyone is in a town like the Republic of Pirates, but smaller, a bit more chill. It’s an island ~nearby~ where the locals hang out and complain about RoP becoming too touristy. 

Stede is on a dock in front of the Revenge, standing next to a sign in his own flourished handwriting that reads “Hiring: hearty men with the stamina for fun and adventure! Handsome payment. Apply within,” and yelling “I am looking for a man or two!” He’s getting attention, but not the right kind. Frustrated, Stede approaches a guitar player sitting nearby and asks him to come play some music by the gangway to “make the ship seem more festive”. He hands Frenchie a huge stack of cash, and Frenchie, looking shocked and pleased, immediately pockets it and starts playing a jaunty tune. 

Having seen that transaction, a few pirates begin to queue up with mild curiosity. The Swede and Roach are in line, Roach wearing an apron and absentmindedly sharpening a kitchen knife, while Swede is running through some vocal warm-ups (after all, seems like the rich guy likes music!).

Suddenly, a commotion. Jim and Olu, having escaped Spanish Jackie herself back in the Republic of Pirates, are running down the docks, two of Jackie’s husbands in hot pursuit. They are running like hell, barrels are falling over, fish is flying in the air, people are yelping. Jim grabs a nearby dockhand - Black Pete - thrusts him in front of the husbands and keeps running. 

Pete, disoriented spins around, only to have one of the husbands crash straight into him. The other one swerves and keeps going, but the husband who crashed into Pete loses his balance, falls off the dock and is immediately, muppetly swept away by the tide. Pete staggers, crashing into Lucius, who has been observing the proceedings with dismay and disgust. Lucius helps Pete stand up, and they catch each other’s eyes for the briefest of moments. A small gasp escapes each of their lips, but then, Pete takes off running after that asshole that pushed him. Lucius looks indecisively back and forth, to the shore, to Pete, to the shore....then chases after him.

As Jim and Olu, pursued by Jackie’s husband, pursued by Pete, pursued by Lucius, approach the Revenge, we hear Frenchie singing and see Swede and Roach walking up the gangway, both reveling in the money they have just been handed. Stede is in the process of handing another stack of cash to Wee John, when Jim and Olu dash up the gangway, pushing Stede and Frenchie aside and shoving between Roach and Swede. They dash into the ship as Spanish Jackie’s husband screams to stop them. Wee John steps in and blocks the gangway, Jackie’s husband crashes into him, falls backwards, and is immediately knocked out. Wee John steps aside, completely unflustered, and returns to getting paid by a startled looking Stede. 

Black Pete leaps over his body, still in pursuit of Jim for pushing him. Lucius, seeing the sign, draws to a stop and asks “Are you the Captain of this....floating brothel?” 

Stede, appalled at the idea of anything so untoward, invites Lucius to be his scribe to ensure no such confusion happens again to this very serious, very frightening pirate ship. As they are negotiating, we see a seagull fly over head and land on the bow of the ship. “KARL! WHERE ARE YE GOIN?” yells a panicked looking Buttons, who runs up the gangway. 

The crew of the Revenge has arrived. As the camera pans away, we see a pub and in the doorway a small, angry man in black leather carrying four beer steins. He’s clearly been watching this entire kerfuffle. 

“Idiots,” scoffs Izzy Hands, staring at the ship. He turns the corner and carries the beers to a table where Ivan, Fang, and Blackbeard sit, totally unaware of the chaos nearby.