#autistic stede bonnet
Aargh there’s more embarrassment humour in the gay pirate show than I was expecting.
Oh phew Blackbeard’s turned up and it’s eased off some.
Oh God Blackbeard’s wide-eyed dazzled enchantment at Stede’s wardrobe is not only what I was fucking here for, it changes the tone of the whole show.
UntilBlackbeard/Ed claps eyes on Stede, there’s nowhere really for the humour to go other than “stupid pompous little fantasist bumbles his way through situations he’s not remotely equipped to handle, always under the agonising threat of further humiliation” and my nervous system is just … too delicate for even small doses of that. But Blackbeard, as it were, hijacks the show’s POV as soon as he comes on board, and Blackbeard immediatelydoesn’t see him like that. Blackbeard - at first glance, with no “slow, grudging, learning to respect each other” transitional process, sees a strange, colourful, courageous eccentric in a world that doesn’t have enough of them: “You’re a lunatic and I like it.” And as Blackbeard does not perceive that lack of dignity that has hitherto been central to the show’s comedic premise, it evaporates; immediately the embarrassment humour no longer even makes sense. We’re in a different genre now. Thank God.
Episodes 1-3 for me were the awkwardness of being neurodiverse and trying to fit in somewhere new that you only have a vague familiarity with surrounded by people who - for the most part - are fairly neurotypical and know the behaviour and rules of their particular world.
Stede’s trying but he has no practical experience or genuine real-world knowledge of this society. The fact he’s not in the least embarrassed or flustered about it made it a bit less mortifying for me, because… why would he be embarrassed? In his mind, he’s doing things by the book, only he’s using the wrong social cues, behaving according to the rules of a different society, but the only ones he’s familiar with and doesn’t realise they don’t work until… they don’t.
Then along comes another neurodiverse person who is excited by someone who isn’t boring and stuck in the same routine and that’s why they spark so well, and this guy - who likes shiny and pretty and unusual things as much as him - starts teaching him the language of this world he’s in.
I hope people know that when Stede told Mary he objected to the word whim, he was just objecting to the word whim. I think a lot of people who are used to implicit communication, which very much includes Mary, hear that comment and think he’s making some passive aggressive dismissal of everything Mary just said, but I promise you he is literally objecting to the word whim. He spent the whole time away feeling guilty for the way he left, and he is hurt by the insinuation that he didn’t care.
I’m not saying it’s a good response in this situation (you gotta do the apology sandwich, Stede! First you apologize for your actions — be specific! — and then you can offer any necessary context/explanations, which then needs to be followed by acknowledgement of the harm caused and another sincere apology for your actions). I’m just saying don’t take it for more than what it is. With Stede, if he didn’t *literally* say it, then he didn’t say it.
I saw a meta where the person justifies an interpretation of Stede’s actions by saying that he is the one who knows about passive aggression and how to use it and I’m like, yeah, barely. We see him attempt to use passive aggression two times in the show, and both times he kind of sucks at it to be honest.
But wait, I hear you saying, he is super good at passive aggression; he burned that whole ship down with his passive aggression skills. Oh, my dear, dear friend, just because Stede says he was using passive aggression, that doesn’t mean he’s right. Stede is using passive aggression in that scene like neurodivergent person who believes they have learned a social rule, but is utilizing it in a way that makes it clear that they don’t really understand it. Because, you know, that’s what he is.
Stede defines passive aggression to Ed earlier that episode as “cutting remarks disguised as politeness.” Which yes, but also no. Passive aggression is about engaging in aggressive behavior but in way that avoids direct confrontation. That can include either going stuff behind someone’s back (which we’ll ignore for now since that’s not the kind we’re dealing with here) or doing it to their face while maintaining some kind of plausible deniability that that’s what you’re doing.
So obviously Stede’s conversational tone and his suggestion that they play a game is his attempt at masking what he’s doing in politeness. And it could work. Look at how he starts in with Gabriel & Antoinette, asking how they met, only for them to give different answers. And if he continued to follow that thread with seemingly innocuous questions while inevitably leading to the revelation that the two of them were siblings, that would have been masterful passive aggression. But he doesn’t do that; he immediately follows that question by just outright stating they’re siblings. And with the previous two partygoers he doesn’t even try to hide it, he’s just out here like, let me reveal your dark secret by phrasing it in the form of a question. That’s not being passive aggressive, that’s just walking into a room and dropping a lot of truth bombs with the obvious express purpose of getting everyone pissed off at each other.
The other occasion Stede deliberately tries to use passive aggression is with Calico Jack, who absolutely rubs passive aggressive circles around him. The particular exchange I want to call out starts with Jack calling Blackbeard a real pirate, unlike one of these “store-bought types,” the latter part said while looking directly at Stede. This is good passive aggression. Jack has just insulted Stede by saying he’s not a real pirate, but in such a way that if called out on it he can claim he wasn’t talking about Stede or that he was just making a joke about Stede’s fancy stuff but didn’t really mean it.
Stede, despite his lack of skill at using passive aggression, is still pretty good at picking up on it when it’s directed at him (years of experience, poor baby). So he attempts to volley back by asking Jack where his ship and crew are, because you’d think a real pirate would have one of those. This is much better than the French party. If the crowd had been on Stede’s side he probably could have gotten away with it as just friendly ribbing, so I would call it actual passive aggression. But he still isn’t being terribly subtle about it and is running right up against the line into regular aggression. Which Jack takes full advantage of by starting to “cry,” turning everyone against Stede and his “bitchy” question.
Ironically, I think the closest he comes to good passive aggression (as in well done, not morally good) is after Mary’s show when he throws out there that he forgives her for sleeping with Doug. I say ironically, because I don’t think Stede was really trying to be passive aggressive there. I mean, probably a little, but I think in his (still drunk) mind, he was just putting out there that they’ve both been having a hard time of it and both messed up since he got back, and he’s sorry for what he did and forgives her for what she’s done. I mean, it’s definitely a terrible apology for a number of reasons, I just don’t think he was really trying to be aggressive there.
