Okay, Coming Back To This Post Initiated From @jellybeanium124 Now That I've Had Some Time To Wake Up

Okay, coming back to this post initiated from @jellybeanium124 now that I've had some time to wake up and rewatch the scene in question of Stede walking in on the crew devouring the seagull raw.

Like I said in my original "something something" response, there is some folklore that seagulls possess the souls of deceased sailors, and the screeches they make are the sailor's mournful wails. Therefore, it was considered bad luck to harm seagulls in any way, because it would be doing injury to the soul of a sailor.

Related, there is of course The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, where the mariner kills the albatross, bringing about great calamity to the crew. The mariner is then forced by the crew to wear the albatross around his neck as a sign of his guilt while they go through hell on the high seas.

I do believe the world of OFMD follows these superstitions. We see it with Karl and Olivia being able to speak with Buttons, and we see what happens to Calico Jack when he kills Karl. Yes, that was with some hexly influence from Buttons, but point stands: killing birds is Bad.

Something I keep stirring in my "is this intentional or is this DJenks handwaving to move the story along" pot is that the crew apparently didn't check if Ed was breathing. They dealt the blow, then laid his body out and did their best to forget about him.

Until Stede shows up.

I believe this scene is meant to show that the crew is literally chewing on their guilt. They just killed the greatest sailor they knew. He was their friend. This isn't what they wanted to happen, but they felt they had no choice.

And perhaps that's why they didn't check to see if he was breathing. Because they didn't want to look too closely. They didn't want to confront the horror of what happened that night. They just made sure they were out of danger, then closed the door and attempted to move on without dwelling on it. As Frenchie would say, they took the terrible things they saw, put them in a box in their minds, lock the box, and don't open it again.

But then Stede arrives, and they know they're going to have to open the box.

They don't say anything. They just keep chewing on their guilt, as if saying "yeah, we did what we had to do. Who are you to judge?"

But eventually it's all going to come out.

you know stede would play along with ed's innkeeper roleplay

OH MY GOD HE WOULD!!!!!! YOU JUST KNOW HE WOULD

he'd ding the bell without being asked to. he'd announce that he's got a reservation under some fake name, and then he'd ask ed to walk him to his room for him. i guarantee that fruitcake would even ask to see the ring of keys.

all ed wants in this stupid life is for someone to match his energy and be silly with. and then here comes drama-club-kid stede bonnet and blows it out of the fucking water. i hate them (lying)

Google Docs

OFMD S2 Episodes: Photo Guide (Spoilers)

OFMD S2 Episodes: Photo Guide (Spoilers) Updated October 3rd 21:42 UTC-4 Photos are approximately in order of the S2 speculated plot based

I have completed work on my OFMD S2 Photo Guide ahead of Season 2 dropping and I’m very fucking proud of it.

Photos from promos and the BTS vid are placed in loose order of the speculated plot & grouped by episode. This guide used info from 20+ advance reviews and officially released content to piece together the suspected events of S2.

If you don’t want an episode-by-episode breakdown of the possible A-plot of S2, please do not look at this guide!!

do you love it when parties get crowded? do you feel like you need to crotchet your mouth shut? do you love it when you wake up to silence? do you think apathy is boring and that sadness is so last year? congrats u should listen to apathy is boring by bears in trees!!!!

fun fact about me is that when i was a kid id write capital E’s with as many of those little horizontal lines as possible and id call them ladder E’s and adults fucking hated them

Can I also say how touching it is that Stede said he believed Ed would he happier without him, who, even in his fantasies, could only picture Ed wanting him as a picture of masculinity with a beard and no hesitation to kill. Stede still, deep down, doesn't understand why Ed would ever want him as he is.

But who did Ed see coming down to rescue him? It wasn't a manly recreation of Stede with a beard, masculine style and a killing spirit, it was a merman. Someone bright, colourful, by all accounts a rather feminine perception of Stede.

That was who rescued Ed. It wasn't who Stede thought he needed to be, it was someone soft, and bright, and graceful, and expressive. Someone feminine, someone queer.

I just think that's beautiful.