Sometimes I Just Smile And Think About Andrew Being Helplessly Charmed By Neil's Messiness. His Tendency

sometimes i just smile and think about andrew being helplessly charmed by neil's messiness. his tendency to run his mouth at the worst times to the worst people. picking fights and booking it immediately. telling people exactly what he thinks of them. turning andrew's own words against him. his witty wordplay and easy back-and-forth with andrew, when andrew is usually so slow to converse with anyone. just. andrew being in love with neil.

so we have the trojans and jean is paris. kevin is helen of sparta and neil is achilles and andrew is cassandra???

i think some people need to understand that saying a character is an objectively terrible person is not robbing a character of nuance.

actually neil hating baseball is the realest thing about him

something i think about all the time is genuinely how smart and perceptive of a person neil is. like obv it's a running in joke within the fandom that he's oblivious asf sometimes, esp about emotional and relational things but i feel like it's a pretty large part of his character just how much he sees people, especially the people he's close to. it's also what makes him so good with words, and how he always seems to know what to say, because he's so good at taking stock of situations and people. why did the riko roast (all 29390431 of them) land so perfectly and hit riko's sore spot so well? because neil could see right through riko. even though they didn't even know each other, neil knows about riko's inferiority complex, his family issues (esp regarding his father) and he goes right for the throat. obviously his conversations with andrew are also another focal point because the reason why andrew genuinely seems to enjoy conversing with neil isn't just because he has a crush on him (tho that's definitely a part of it) it's the fact that neil understands andrew as a person, and knows where to push and where to give ground in the conversation. he asks all the right questions and almost always comes to the correct conclusions with the information andrew gives him. he understands and sees andrew so profoundly and that's why so many of his words hit andrew harder than they would if it came from someone else. when he says "i want to see you lose control" it's him telling andrew that he knows andrew isn't the out-of-control psycho everyone paints him as. it's him telling andrew that he knows andrew keeps his emotions to himself, but he isn't afraid of them. when neil tells andrew "if it means losing you, then no" he's communicating to andrew that even tho andrew promised to protect neil, neil isn't willing for andrew to come to harm in his stead and in order to protect him. he cares more about andrew than he does about keeping himself safe, and that's probably the first time anyone's ever expressed that towards him (aaron probably feels the same way, only he's never vocalised it so clearly). and i think if you really want proof of just how smart neil is with his words and his understanding of the situations he's in, just go read the negotiation scene with ichirou. he's almost entirely honest during that scene and says everything he feels in the ice-cold manner of a wesninski, which is what he's trying to convince ichirou he is. while we don't know exactly what convinced ichirou, neil's persuasion definitely plays a part in it. he knows what ichirou wants, and he knows the right angle to push where he can just make it out alive and fine. even just the scene after baltimore when he thanks wymack for taking a chance on him, he just has a way with words, like he isn't a very emotional person, but he conveys all his feelings so well in the way he speaks and what he says. and despite everyone saying he's a pathological liar, i genuinely think he's one of the most honest characters in the series.