#bc there was so little detail given that no one can actually confirm or deny physical hcs | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

mazegays · 1 year

Text

@its-tea-time-darling i am trying to answer your ask but tumblr is being dumb about it so i copy-pasted it here instead and am hoping it works yes hello i am on my computer now and so i feel like i can actually write this out better bc it is. an essay (and no doubt going to get longer when i start writing it v me just thinking about it) i'm sure others may have said similar before, but until very recently i've been avoiding most teresa content lol In this fandom (less so in more recent years than in the past), Teresa is the betrayer and the dead girl. First, she gains Thomas's trust. Then she makes out like she wants him dead--very convincingly. Then she reveal that that was because WICKED made her. And, finally, she dies for Thomas. That leaves Thomas (and us) with a very complicated set of feelings and thoughts surrounding Teresa. Let's try and unpack some of mine.

(if you haven't read fever code and the kill order, you might want to skip or skim this part)

In Kill Order, we first meet baby!teresa--a traumatized little girl, hardly out of toddlerhood, who is found by Mark, Alec, Trina, and Lena in a deserted village. She's got marks showing she was injected with the virus (which is not from the solar flares as WICKED posits, but instead a human bioweapon), but she's fine, marking her as immune. She was witness to the attacks on her settlement and everyone turning into Cranks and subsequently dying. Due to her immunity, Mark turns her over the the Post-Flare Coalition, aka WICKED, at the end of the book, saving her life. She has witnessed more death and had others infected with the virus assume that she's a demon because she's immune. In the second epilogue (and the prologue, where Thomas is swiped and sent into the maze) we see an older Teresa, who is sympathetic to the infected and believes they deserve a chance to be saved because of what Mark, Alec, Trina, and Lena did for her. Throughout Fever Code, we see Teresa through Thomas's eyes. We know from the two years later epilogue of Kill Order that he's five at the time he's brought into WICKED, making Teresa seven and two years older than him; he wouldn't remember the immediate-post infection world the way she does (this particular detail is also something I stew over quite a bit, but that's for another post). They have plenty of differences, and argue over methods even when they're young, but it's not nearly as high-stakes as it is later, and after a while, they're pretty much each other's only friends. At the end of Fever Code, before Thomas is sent into the maze, Teresa admits that she still believes in the possibility of a cure. This is a few years after they have to kill the original Creators. (As this is not her POV, I can guess that she might not know--or might be denying the fact--that it's WICKED who released the Flare in the first place. Thomas doesn't know at all, having been taught along with everyone else that the disease was named after the solar event it was named for--the Solar Flares.) In the epilogue--a memo from Paige to the Council--Teresa and Aris are named as the final candidates. Given the use of the same term in Death Cure (by Janson, to refer to Thomas), plans changed. It also thanks them for their loyalty. Teresa's memo is the more interesting one, here. It confirms that Teresa and Aris kept their memories, and were going to coordinate with WICKED throughout the trials. She truly believes in what WICKED is doing, and that hasn't wavered in her ten years, likely closer to eleven, there. As we know, she write the infamous 'WICKED is good' on her arm, in order to 'plant the seed' in the Gladers' minds.

(if you were skipping, you can stop now!)

In Maze Runner, she tells Thomas she triggered the end, and pretends to know as little as they do--she leads the decoding of the maps, even, when it's entirely possible she already knew the code. She programmed the maze's day and night cycle and the griever hole, after all. We don't know what she sent to WICKED, or when. (Not that there's a lot they didn't already know, with the beetle blades.) She's a key factor in their escape, despite pretty much everyone other than Thomas doubting her and her intentions at first. In Scorch Trials, she must know about the switch before it happens. Thomas can communicate with Aris telepathically, so she and Aris are probably coordinating not only the switch (Group B can't have left for the Scorch before Group A for this to work, despite canonically getting out of their maze earlier.) but also meeting up with the Gladers to kidnap Thomas. She's also the screaming girl in the first half of the book, during their first day in the Scorch. She waits until they're taking a break to stop screaming and leave the building--Thomas hasn't gotten anything from or to her mentally, so Aris must have told her. When Thomas gets close to her, he notes three specific details: She's clean, not dusty and dirty from a day in the desert, she's crying, and her behavior reminds him of Gally right before he killed Chuck. She warns him to get away from her. Obviously when he is kidnapped by Group B, her behavior has switched. She's now angry with Thomas outwardly, for reasons she's not explaining to him, while whispering to him entirely different things. She lets it slip that they were told to kill him by WICKED. Harriet tells Thomas that Teresa has 'hated' him the entire time, that she's acting like killing him is her idea. Trying to convince WICKED, maybe? That she'll do whatever they tell her to, even when it hurts her? After the chamber, she's changed again, and Thomas no longer knows what to feel about her (and neither did I, as the reader, for my first through read-throughs.) It's confirmed at this point that she's been talking to Aris the whole time, including in the maze. Thomas already knew this was a set-up, but this is the first time we see how much of a set-up it is. Free will is almost non-existent for these kids. Of course, when they meet up again, Minho and the Gladers consider Teresa and Aris traitors and don't trust them. Given how much we--and Thomas--now know that they have manipulated behind the scenes (as ordered by WICKED) that is completely fair and expected, especially when they don't know the whole story as Thomas does--but even Thomas giving them details later doesn’t matter. We all know how Death Cure goes--her biggest role in this book is dying for Thomas. She is in Denver, for a time, but Thomas is more with Minho, Newt, Gally, or Brenda, so we don't see a lot of her. With her chip removed, it's now impossible for WICKED to control her--assuming that WICKED removed the chips as they said they would, and assuming that Teresa doesn't still have hers. She's shown to believe in WICKED's mission until the end of the her life. Now, with that summary that was longer than I expected it to be out of the way, let's talk more directly about Teresa's relationship with WICKED. All Teresa knows outside of WICKED is terror and fear. She likely starved for a time, she was attacked and hurt, and undoubtedly would have died on her own or been killed by Cranks. Growing up within WICKED facilities literally saved her life, and she knows that from a young age. Unlike Thomas, she's not angry or upset about being given a new name. She's happy to accept it, because she wants to forget everything that happened outside of WICKED's walls. She wants to forget, and she wants to prove that providing for her was worth it. So she does what they tell her: Kills the Creators, lies to Thomas about his entrance to the Maze (he thinks they're both going in memories intact) and communicates with Aris and WICKED throughout TMR and TST to coordinate meetings. She acts in a such a way that Thomas goes from liking her to hating her to being so conflicted about her that he feels nothing when she kisses him again. Meanwhile, Teresa is doing this to save him, or so WICKED says. They know she likes him, watched them grow up together, and they'll use it against her, against them both. She, like Thomas, is nothing but a pawn in WICKED's game. Every time she thinks she's gaining ground, they reveal another card to put her back in her place. Her firm belief in wanting a cure for the Flare combined with a childhood of being taught only what WICKED wanted her to know, seeking their approval at many turns, leaves her very open to manipulation. This results in Teresa being someone Thomas and the others aren't sure they can trust, because of her past, and Teresa herself just being a teenage girl trying to ensure that the boy she loves, the boy she grew up with, grew up loving, survives at all costs to her. She's the betrayer, sure. But would she do betray Thomas if she thought she had no other choice? I don't think she would. Teresa, even as a secondary protagonist, is far more complex than just being 'the betrayer' and 'the dead girl'. She's a terrified little girl who doesn't want anyone to go through the suffering she saw as a child, and has been given an option to try and end that suffering by working toward a cure. She's a well-fed, well-protected child who knows of the horrors of the world outside but never goes back out to it; the same child is taught whatever WICKED wants her to know. She's a teenage girl who has killed, who may be falling in love with boy-next-door (literally), who still desperately wants to fix the world. Her avenue for saving Thomas and fixing the world isn't a branching path: They're both lined with flashing WICKED signs. If she listens to them, Thomas will be safe. If she works with them, they can find a cure. She can have both. So she writes 'WICKED is good'. She's spreading the seed, trying to convince the Gladers. Maybe that message wasn't for them, though. Not entirely. No. Maybe she was really trying to convince herself.

#teresa #tea #ask box stuff #tmr analysis #teresa character study #teresa analysis #tmr #tst #tdc #kill order #tko #fever code #tfc #mine #long post

12 notes · View notes

docholligay · 4 years

Text

On Doc Watching Princess Principal

Hello my little cabbages of love, and welcome to ANOTHER comment liveblog winner! This was won/selected by @ariadnearca!

I know nothing about this show WHATSOEVER except it comes up for nomination during eight days of content. I can only assume it’s about some spoiled little royal girl having to take over a school or something, or princesses at school, and what I’m saying is given my general hatred of the monarchy* this ought to be very interesting, but! There might be a Michiru-level snob.

ANYWAY, let’s keep it that way! Please don’t confirm, deny, hint, suggest, correct, inform, tell, remind, or answer ANYTHING about the show. This includes anything that might be a cultural benchmark, detail, or issue. This includes well-intentioned trigger warnings I don’t need. This includes interviews with the creators or cast. Please don’t ask me leading questions. If you’re wondering why this warning is so detailed, I regret to inform you if I don’t get intensely specific, people want to tell me.

OTHER NOTES:

I am allowed to hate or love any character I wish, and that includes your fave! I encourage you to have your own mind! But it’s okay if I don’t like someone, and PLEASE remember that y’all have the ENTIRE SHOW to draw on, and have what I am presented with. This was a huge problem in Utena, please spare me the essay about how Princess Sophie’s murder of her chambermaid is actually a reaction to internalized homophobia.

Want to gossip behind my back? the Discord is right here! I hear they are a fun group (I don’t look bc spoilers)

The tag to follow or block is #Doc Watches Princess Principal

HERE WE GO!

*Americans who love monarchies: What gives? Destroying the monarchical system** was one of the handful of fantastic fucking ideas our Founders had, along with not requiring citizens to quarter soldiers and that the Government cannot endorse a religion. I find y’all very very weird. I can at least hope that modern-day Vanderbilts are terrible with money and can lose the fortune (like, say, the Vanderbilts) but in a monarchy THEY ALWAYS GET TO HAVE IT.

**”Doc despite the American ideal of anti-aristocracy and dissolution of the idea of peerage, one might argue fairly that a system of tax breaks and nepotism has created an American aristocracy that is becoming more and more difficult to break.” Hi did you read my paper in Modern American History because this was basically it. You will see few people as devoted to the blissful joy of the estate tax and other ball-busting measures as me. Nuke the Caymans from orbit, as well as the other countries that act as tax shelters worldwide.***

***Doc you are already on your shit today. I HAD A BREAKFAST SANDWICH.

17 notes · View notes