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whhomecooked · 1 month ago

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Julie Is Disabled:

A Partially Coherent Yap Session & Welcome Home

Theory

MANY SPOILERS- SPOILERS ON SPOILERS- I mention just about every single inch of the Spring Update

[Pretty Much Just A Deep Dive of Julie in the context of the Spring Update]

Content Warnings: Ableism [Social and Internalized], Complex/Unhealthy Family Dynamics[Brief]

This has been sitting in my drafts since I started this sideblog LOL I have 4 pages of a Google Doc + Screenshots to prove my point <3 Settle in, Neighbor

Thesis

Julie has a disability and/or a birth defect, that influences her ability to do her job as a Rainbow Monster, either hindering it or rendering her unable to do her job at all. This also influences her perception of self, and the version of herself that she puts forth to cope with her aforementioned disability.

I've separated my points for your viewing pleasure, Neighbor @:]

For the purposes of this theory I am also of the belief that the Marlo Flower is a Winter Flower, as some theories suggest based on its nature and coloration.

Theory

Her Differences As a Rainbow Monster

Julie is very different from what we know about Rainbow Monsters. Visually, she differs from her siblings greatly. However, from what we know about Rainbow Monsters in general, there's some other criteria she doesn't quite meet.

Horns

In What Makes The Flowers Bloom, The Joyfuls tell us about Rainbow Monster Horns.

Rainbow Monsters have special horns that grow in sunshine and shed when it's cold. Rainbow monster Horns come in all different shapes and colors, but the bigger the better obviously.

Sharp cut to Julie's horns, which aren't just short, they're stunted.

Im aware that there is also concept art featuring Julie with horns of two different sizes. While I'm aware it is not canon, it does imply that there is some aspect of her character that has been fundamentally off-beat[pun intended] from the standard Rainbow Monster since her creation. It just presents differently than it did then.

We can look at Bea's horns in comparison, as she not only has the shortest horns of the three, but we also see the base of her horns.

Julie's horns are also shaped differently due to their size. At least with Franny and Bea, [though we don't see the base of Jonesy's horns im sure its the same case] they flare out in the middle and get smaller at the base, whereas Julie's get even wider at their base.

If she were to have some sort of birth defect/disability/etc, it would make sense that we would see physical aspects of this, as we do in the real world.

Though, yes, they are her actual horns, and not fake horns, as we see.

Color

Also in What Makes The Flowers Bloom, Jonesy [I love that little pothead<3] talks about how Rainbow monsters can come in any color, but all rainbow monsters are one color.

"Rainbow monsters come in all hues toos! From our heads to our roots, from our leaves to our nose! We stick to one color, so that together we're totally kaleidoscopic!"

Julie being multiple colors makes her not only stand out from standard Rainbow Monsters, but would, in theory, make her clash with the rest of her band, and I think she knows that.

I would also note that she's not just multicolored, she's the same colors as her siblings, with orange/yellow horns,, and blue/green legs. Which, to me, clashes further with the idea that Jonesy gives, with each Rainbow Monster being their own color so that every band is some portion of the rainbow. If Julie had been just pink[red], they would have had every color, as the central color palette Clown uses for the neighbors doesn't include purple.

Again, her being multicolored clashes too harshly with information we are told directly by other members of her species, for it to not be applicable. It's clear she stands out, but combined with other things we see, im inclined to think that her coloration is the dogwhistle.

Fur [The Lack Thereof]

Jonesy, Franny, and Bea, are all shown to have fur, most notably in their Devotion album color, where we can see they have fur on their chests and shoulders. Julie is never shown to have fur on her.

I checked the whole damn site. Even the storybooks, because you don't see her chest or shoulders in her normal outfit. So I found outfits where you could. In Sweet Briar, you see her collar and shoulders in one of the outfits she wears.

I also verified with different art styles, where other characters had notable fur.

While we're never directly told that Rainbow Monsters have fur, we're indirectly told that at least, of Rainbow Monsters, the Joyfuls have fur. With it being everyone but Julie, and my previous points, i'm not inclined to think that Julie's siblings are the odd ones out of the Rainbow Monsters.

Speaking With Plants

While in the hidden videos she does talk about not being able to speak to flowers while they're budded, we also have no real confirmation that she can talk to *any* flowers. There are two notable times that I think of when she mentions speaking for the flowers.

Eddie & the Rhododendron

She bullies Eddie into fighting 'the flower' after she accuses him of almost stepping on it. She doesn't need to *talk* to a flower to know it wouldnt enjoy almost being stepped on.

Sally & Her Tulips

This one is the first one that peaked my theoriest ears, but, the way Julie talks for the flowers really feels like she's just pulling stuff out of her Puppet Sleeve. She doesnt compliment Sally outside of the very basic things you can either see about her

Julie compliments how she shines, how pointy she is, how yellow she is, etc. in addition to very base level things anyone would be able to parse out about Sally, such as how Julie attributes the well-cared for nature of the flowers to Sally's passion for theatre.

Neither of these scenarios require her to actually speak for these flowers, just for people to assume she can.

Internalized Ableism, Complex Family Dynamics, & The Marlo Flower

What is Her Job, Like Actually?

So i'm the last person to bring real world logic into a puppet realm where sentient houses are casual things, especially in the case of these three, but what does Julie actually do? Her role in spring seems inconsequential, compared to the other three. If we lay out each of their roles in beginning spring, it'd be split up like this:

Franny

Makes the snow melt and turn into rain/morning dew

Gives the plants water, which they need to grow

Jonesy

Makes the seeds take root/sprout

starting the growth process all together.

Bea

makes the sun shine. Allows the now budding plants to make food and actually grow.

Essentially kickstarts photosynthesis

And Julie... makes the already sprouted, fed, and watered plants.. bloom?

The way i've come to interpret it, the central purpose of the role is to make her feel included. Her presence in the band is largely inconsequential to the grand scheme of things. The flowers have soil, water, and sunlight- they are going to bloom regardless.

To a degree I think she is aware of that, or is at least aware that her role isn't as crucial to spring as her brother and sisters are. That's why

A: She takes it so seriously, and why I think she tweaks out when the Marlo Flower doesn't bloom. The one thing she is supposedly tasked with doing, she cant do now that she really has to.

B: she doesn't want to join the band after leaving the first time.

We're going to look at both of these, most likely in depth.

Julie's Villain Arc, Sponsored By: Flowers and Fake Friends

Brief Reminder: For the purposes of this theory I am also of the belief that the Marlo Flower is a Winter Flower, as some theories suggest based on its nature and coloration.

The Marlo flower doesn't just act as a literal flower that cant bloom, but can perhaps be viewed as a foil of sorts to Julie in this update. This flower not only serves as a medium for which the audience can get a view into Julie's internal thought, but, a secondary perspective into the life of Home, and how Julie sees the world.

Throughout Welcome Home's updates we've seen a strengthening theme of Purpose, specifically the need for it, and loss of a sense of purpose within the community. Julie's sense of purpose is crushed by the existence of the Marlo Flower, but her 'crashout' is intensified, perhaps, by her rocky standings within her own chosen community.

In The Julie Guide To Being Joyful, Julie explicitly lies to Wally about her attitude/relationships with the neighbors, in order to show him what joy is. We know she lies because in the 'regardforgetfulnesssilence' video, Julie speaks to what we can assume to be the truth of her day interacting with her neighbors. In context of the book, we can assume this is to provide Wally with concrete examples of good interactions between the neighbors. In context of the update, this is Julie lying to herself, Wally, or both, in order to keep up the ideation and appearance that she is well loved within her community, when inside she knows she isn't.

A [Not] Brief Comparison of The Book & Hidden Video

Yes, I screenshotted every page, because, yes, i have comments about every page. Going in page order, i'll be comparing and contrasting the lines used in The Julie Guide To Being Joyful, and the lines spoken by Julie in 'regardforgetfulnesssilence', titled as 'Book' and 'Video' respectively from here and forward.

Barnaby

Book: "The last time we played, we both had so much fun even if it did take him a whole clock spin to find me!"

Video: "Home is really nice... through some people can be a little rude... Barnaby is always makin' fun of me, calling me a silly girl.."

Barnaby's neutral language towards Julie is very consistent through the material we've seen between them. Most often this takes the form of Barnaby making fun of Julie for her bad jokes, though he also has no qualms making fun of Julie & Frank in tandem.

Sally

Video: "And Sally's funny, she's a gen-u-ine star! She tells the best stories"

Book: "The Duchess of Dahlia's jubilations have never been so emotionally vivaciously joyous! It's pulchritudinous!"

With Sally I had initially nothing I wanted to cover, as her words seemed fairly standard- theatrical and overdramatic. But, I did some digging and found out that 'Duchess of Dahlia's is a type of Dahlia flower- one of the largest and tallest growing, if I remember correctly. But the interesting thing to note is if you take it in the context of floriography, Dahlias represent Instability. In which case, it would be intentional for Sally to make such a specific reference to a flower Julie would already know the meaning of. Just food for thought.

Poppy

"Poppy is really nice and reeeally big! She's kind of a scaredy bird though"

In Poppy's case I can't immediately tell if Julie knows she's being dismissive of her, because it might not immediately ring alarm bells for Julie that Poppy doesn't want any of the pie that they've just baked.

Eddie

[continued from Poppy's] "Eddie can be that way too"

Eddie, I think, perhaps along with Wally & Frank, is the only person that I believe is genuinely nice to her because they want to be nice to her.

Howdy

Book: "Julie you're hi-larious! I oughtta put two cherries on your malt for all these uproarious laughs your givin' me! This is the bee's knees, This is the berries! Applesauce!"

Video: "Howdy tells me to get better material sometimes, too..."

We can observe the contradictions between how Julie says their interactions go, and how their interactions actually went best with Howdy's. It's not even a slight smudge of the truth, it's an outright lie in order to keep up the idea that everyone likes her.

Frank [technically]

Video: "But I think I like Frank most of all. He's the first one I met when I came to Home... I was just like you, I didn't know anyone when I came here. (she sounds worried) "It's... kind of hard to remember how we met. But, I think it was while I was making my burrow... He fell into my tunnel from above. He had a big fruit basket, too, I think he was coming to say hi to me

Julie's relationship to the Marlo Flower & The Joyfuls

Julie's relationship with the Marlo flower, from my perspective, is a physical representation of her trying and failing to hide the severity of a sort of disability she's representative of, in the same way one can assume Wally has Autism judging by the way he interacts with the world around him.

In begging and eventually trying to force the flower to bloom, she is effectively trying to fight an uphill battle to prove that she's capable, even though her disability limits her too severely to accomplish her goals in a way that satisfies her internal need to be perceived as useful to the rest of home, and capable to the rest of the Joyfuls. She doesn't want people to think less of her because of this disability, so she tries harder in spite of these failures. This eventually leads to what we can assume is Julie ripping up the flower.

It's implied Frank knows that Julie is going off to check on the Marlo Flower, and him accepting her excuse suggests he is at least mildly aware of her predicament and the stakes it carries for her. Less we forget she took him to see it once already. He knows where it is, and he's not stupid to miss a detail like that.

At the same time, I think her internal need to be perceived and socially accepted as useful and capable is ALSO why she doesn't want to join the band again, if not why she left in the first place. She's the one person in her family that is incapable of doing the very thing Rainbow Monsters are supposed to be able to do- the very thing that separates them from other species living in the world of Home, and she, again, doesn't want to be a burden or hinderance, especially to her family.

We can connect this back to the aforementioned themes of ableism within my earlier texts, in addition to the theme of Purpose we're seeing in the wider story [most notably with Eddie in the Homewarming update]. However, Julie's case focuses on her internalized ableism, brought on by a socially perceived need for contribution. What is she to Home if she has no distinctive use or function in the neighborhood? What's to stop her from being kicked out or replaced if she doesn't pull her weight, and being sent back to live with her family?

Which is to say, Julie's sense of purpose, as is being tested within this update, lies in a skill she may not even have the base ability to perform. If she should actually be lying about her Rainbow Monster abilities, it spells trouble for her future when she cant legitimately put this skill to use when she needs it. The Marlo flower exists to amplify and better present this fragile sense of belonging and purpose Julie has created for herself, and in destroying the flower ina. desperate attempt to continue to seem useful and capable, seals herself and Frank into a situation I am sure will come back to bite them in the future.

Small Afternote: If you’re into welcome home theories, my entire blog is dedicated to that, and I’d appreciated if you checked it out :) If you have any questions, want me to elaborate, or have counter theories, I’d love to hear them! My asks are also open for any reason ^^

#welcome home theories #welcome home arg #home-cooked columns #welcome home #welcome home puppet show #welcome home theory #welcome home restoration project #julie joyful #welcome home julie

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