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Oh come on, this is Izzy's life story then? Loving someone and never being able to give his love to them? Does the poor guy ever get anything from the people he loves?
Also, never letting go of the ring - and never letting go of his love for Ed until the end...
Maybe he carried the ring as a reminder to himself to never let himself be vulnerable again - love and piracy don't mix?
(and the whole getting rid of Stede thing was mainly about protecting Ed from - what Izzy thought he knew from experience - inevitable heartbreak and ruin)
Con O'Neill: "THE RING ISN'T FROM ANYONE - IT WAS ABOUT TO BE GIVEN TO SOMEONE" 💍👀
From this podcast (starts cca 52 min in) ❤❤❤
#ofmd#izzy hands#please give us Izzy's backstory 😭#that guy sure holds onto his loves#and he might even have been relieved that Ed didn't openly reciprocate#what's unspoken can't hurt you
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Spotted in Hastings, Sussex 🏴☠️
THEM.THAT.DIES.ARE.THE.LUCKY.ONES
(I'm imagining Ed and Izzy coming up with more and more dramatic slogans and finally settling on that one)
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How can you not be fascinated by EdIzzy/Blackbeard...
Both of them hiding their love behind this fearsome myth they created
Izzy hiding his past so well, he doesn't even notice he's in love with Ed in the present
Ed hiding his soft, vulnerable side so well he loses all sense of who he is and what he wants
And when Stede comes along and shatters that protective but suffocating shell - both Ed and Izzy die from the shock of it
(and come back to life, and to love - and I am now almost convinced again that both of them were supposed to have their happy ending)
#ofmd#izzy hands#edward teach#stede bonnet#Con is putting pre-finale thoughts in my head again#bless him ❤#it's all about blackhands for me#and letting go of each other#Izzy deserved (deserves?) better!
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I haven't even watched the video yet, but...
Tattoo with a name and cut marks?
Emerald ring related to a love Izzy didn't allow himself to express or experience fully?
BACKSTORY IN S3????
All I ever wanted was more backstory dammit!
Did Izzy give up this love for Ed/Blackbeard? Why the cut marks? Did he think he had to cut this person completely out of his life? Did Izzy see no possible world in which he could have what Ed and Stede have?
God, this makes everything 100 times worse. "Done something to my bosses' brain" alright - he knew exactly how that felt, didn't he.
Who was this past love? Was it Ed's former first mate? The one Izzy presumably had to kill, just to be extra dramatic (probably not, but with this show you never know)?
Was Ed somehow involved in this? Did the no pets policy already apply? I know I love the drama (why else would I be an EdIzzy girl), but wouldn't it be ironic if Ed was the reason Izzy thought he wasn't supposed to fall in love - and then Stede comes along...
And I thought I'd lost interest in this show... just a tiny little crumb of Izzy backstory and I'm pulled right back in 😄.
(brb watching the video)
#ofmd#izzy hands#edward teach#con o'neill#Izzy lives btw#picking up the ring from his grave right now
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Ooohhh, interesting! Captain Kidd's name also pops up in the last episode, when Izzy corrects Ricky about Kidd "hanging people by the thumbs" (That's not what he did, you twɑt).
It seems like Izzy knows Kidd, so Ed probably knows him as well from back in the day. I'm totally on board with your theory!
We'll see in S3 (crossing all available fingers).
Rewatching OFMD (again) I love that in Stede's little blue Book of Pirates the engraving for Captain Kidd...
... is actually the General History of the Pyrates engraving of himself, Stede Bonnet.
Blackbeard is of course the actual Blackbeard from the same book.
So Stede has a book with an engraving of Blackbeard and himself side by side 🙂.
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Rewatching OFMD (again) I love that in Stede's little blue Book of Pirates the engraving for Captain Kidd...
... is actually the General History of the Pyrates engraving of himself, Stede Bonnet.
Blackbeard is of course the actual Blackbeard from the same book.
So Stede has a book with an engraving of Blackbeard and himself side by side 🙂.
#ofmd#edward teach#stede bonnet#renew as a crew#I've just noticed this after my 5th rewatch 😅#always something new to find I suppose!
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So Izzy's grave really is the last we'll see of this show, huh?
All those loose threads I expected (or hoped) they'd pick up in S3... this is fucking depressing.
(also, I'm still waiting for Ed's and Izzy's backstories, goddammit!)
#ofmd#izzy hands#my beloved - goodbye#I'm not surprised really#but it still hurts#the ending of S2 felt like they fast forwarded through their planned S3 arc#but still...#even without Izzy there was so much more story to tell 😭
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Look what I found at my parent's house over Christmas! Proof I was always into pirates 🏴☠️.
This little book is from approximately 1990, with real photos and everything! I was about 12 back then and my sister 7.
My sister's bed is the pirate ship here, with an all-female crew. Teresa in the blue dress is captain, and Peggy in the green skirt is 1st mate.
"The following photos are from the play PIRATES!"
"Anne on the way to Teresa's pirate ship. Let the adventure begin!"
As far as I remember, Anne was from a workhouse and really poor. This was her last chance.
"Everyday life on the pirate ship."
Look at the detail! Tara's the scribe, there's cooking, cleaning, treasure, provisions and a large comfy bed in the background. I've always loved the pan because it looks so used and realistic. Teresa's blue dress was specifically bought because it looks so piratey. The rest of the crew is dressed according to their status/back story.
"Hostile pirates under the command of Captain Jim enter Teresa's ship! Peggy comes down from the crows nest and knocks Tom to the ground with her feet. Tara falls to the floor screaming."
I think we didn't really like Tara. And Peggy is a perfect 1st mate, strangling the attacker with her skirt.
"Jim threatens Teresa with a club but Anne rescues her with the pan. And Jeany counters Ken's attack with a casual Judo grip."
Finally, it's Anne's moment to shine! And Jeany was always effortlessly cool.
"Teresa's crew has won. Slowly, the girls are starting to make friends with the hostages."
"Here we see a romance under the moonlight. Ken and Jeany ❤!"
Yeah, of course there has to be romance in the end 😅. You might have noticed that male crew members have no shirts. It's the pirate way.
"Teresa and Jim have also fallen in love. But the next excitement is already waiting! Thanks to a treasure map, men and women have to search for the treasure together... and they finally find it in the form of gold and jewels!!! THE END"
What's going on in that last picture? Where are the men? We'll never know. Love the little spotlight on the map though!
I really hope this was interesting for someone, to me it feels like a historic document - almost 35 years old!
My sister and I were so thrilled to find this again... and I remembered how long it took us to get everything just right for the photos - our pirates kept falling over. And then the 1 week wait for developing...
Also, I'm tagging this OFMD - there are some parallels, I swear!
#ofmd#barbie#1990s#pirates on the high beds#this was one of the best plays we did#the story went on for weeks!
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AU: Captain Israel Hands. The holy trinity 🤭
+ redesigns Frenchie and Jim (I don't think this is the final version)
Sorry for the long absence, I’ll try to please you with some more art in the near future
#ofmd#jim jimenez#ofmd frenchie#izzy hands#this is so so brilliant#look at them they're glowing#they look invincible#😍😍😍
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Awww, Fang picking Izzy up and helping him down the stairs ❤
From Samba's new video
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This is it. These two pictures, side by side.
That's what I'm here for. That's what drew me in.
From the start, I felt for Izzy - it's so obvious Ed is his whole life.
For decades, that's how it probably went - Izzy focusing on Ed 100%, yearning, being there for Ed in his way and trying to be content with the scraps he got.
And then this rich boy comes along and suddely Ed is the one with the longing gaze - for someone else.
In S2 I almost let myself believe that maybe, maybe...
...we could complete this triangle?
I still think it would have been neat - not the tragic yearning look, but mutual fondness - the 3 of them ❤
#ofmd#izzy hands#edward teach#stede bonnet#I'm not even saying steddyhands#(or am I)#it's just that someone should look at Izzy fondly for more than a few days#he's had years and years of being looked away from :(
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Prince Ricky and Izzy Hands - WTF actually happened there and why?
Yesterday I was rewatching the finale with my first-time-OFMD friend, and she was absolutely baffled by Ricky shooting Izzy with his own gun.
In her words: "Nobody took it off him, that's not realistic! That's impossible, totally impossible, I can't buy that, you don't just forget a gun on a prisoner?!?!?!?"
And on my first watch I thought the same thing (as we all did), and then forgot about it a bit, but now I want to speculate. Because WHY did that happen?
The easiest explanation is, of course: Ricky needed a gun and it doesn't really matter where it came from. The writers didn't think it was important and neither should we.
But I'd like to expect a bit more from this show - I remember that I was taken out of my immersion quite a bit by this obvious "mistake". Ricky is a hostage who was just about to kill every single pirate we know - and nobody notices he's armed? And he's led through the enemy lines by Izzy with only a small knife to his back?
If Ricky still has his gun, that means that they took his sword but noone thought of searching him properly (and to really rub it in, Ricky is shown cleaning his gun in an earlier scene). The gun also seems very accessible later, so it probably wasn't even hidden well.
So why didn't the writers have Ricky take Izzy's (or Black Pete's) gun? I know Izzy almost never carries a gun (which is interesting in itself), but they were all in Navy uniforms anyway. Why not take the weapons too? Or have Ricky stab Izzy with a hidden knife (in a way that the other characters won't notice, like with the gunshot, presumably)?
Or was the whole thing actually deliberate? In a "it doesn't really matter if you take it at face value, but if you look closer there might be another explanation" kinda way?
(that was a really long introduction to what I'm actually here for, I'm sorry)
Who actually searched Ricky and took his sword? Was it the same person who stayed next to Ricky during the cool dressing up montage? Who led Ricky through the woods?
(Hint: it's the guy who's always in the background when these 2 are kissing)
Of course we have no proof that Izzy searched Ricky, but I think it is very probable.
Izzy had just been talking to Ricky. He'd been sitting next to Ricky when he was knocked out.
Izzy had just deeply insulted and provoked Ricky and made himself the spokesperson of piracy - "It's about letting go of ego for something larger." - "Kill me. Kill us all. Our spirit will last throughout your entire fuckin' empire." - thereby almost goading Ricky into killing him.
And then Stede presents his nebulous plan we never actually hear, and Izzy (why Izzy?) is put in the most dangerous position, right at the frontlines leading the hostage. Did he volunteer for that?
And are we really expected to believe that Izzy wouldn't double-check that Ricky was unarmed?
I really don't like where this is leading, by the way. Because the explanation that makes most sense from a Watsonian perspective is that Izzy either didn't mind or actively wanted to be killed/wounded.
The show went out of its way to portray Izzy as older, wiser and more resigned in the last 2 episodes - he looked like he'd aged 10 years in a few days, he moved around slower and seemed to be in more pain (and groaning when sitting down, etc.). Also, he seemed to have made peace with everything and everyone, and he seemed... tired.
(I know he's just been shot here, but he just looks exhausted)
I think there might be a possibility that Izzy let Ricky keep his gun because he did want to go. Stede's "It's only suicide if we die!" sounds almost to fitting in this context. Izzy might have thought that the one conversation Ed needed, the one where Izzy could set Ed free, could only happen on his deathbed (as I said elswhere, Iz and Ed are closest in life-and-death situations).
Or (and this is what I choose to believe until S3 comes around), Izzy took Ricky's pistol while he was unconcious, took the bullet out and faked his death to set Ed and himself free. He very pointedly doesn't want Ed to see his wound, after all (Ed: "It's not even that bad!"). If it's only about the deathbed absolution, and removing himself (and the spectre of Blackbeard) from the situation, Izzy doesn't actually have to die, does he?
This also fits with the song played over the end sequence, panning to Izzy's grave:
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who that will be namin'
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'
Yeah. A bit too conspiracy-theory-like maybe. But it was the first assumption my friend made - 5 seconds after the scene: "The gun can't have been there by accident, that's just stupid. Oh no. Did Izzy arrange that? Did he really want to die for Ed?" and I thought - you know what? That was my first thought as well. I just immediately dismissed it for being too dramatic.
So, either Izzy is the most reckless, stupid and negligent pirate ever (which he obviously isn't, quite the opposite) - or he trusted the person who (badly) searched Ricky (oooh, new conspiracy theory - it was Ed! Sorry.) - or there was something else at play.
OR
...maybe it was just lazy writing after all.
#ofmd#izzy hands#ofmd meta#you must admit it is a weird scene#it's such a glaring oversight#WHY WHY and WHERE did the pistol come from#I love over-analysing :)#Izzy lives btw I've circled back to denial - feels great!
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My first-time-viewing friend and me finally got around to watching the last two episodes.
Here are her predictions for the finale after seeing episode 7 (from somewhat reasonable to... less so):
"While Ed is somewhere else fishing, Izzy and Stede team up to recreate Blackbeard. Stede tries first, but isn't convincing (mainly because he misses Ed too much). Then Izzy tries - and succeeds (to everyone's surprise, especially his own).
In the middle of the fight, Ed comes back. Seeing Izzy as Blackbeard helps Ed make peace with his past - he realizes that Blackbeard's like a 4th person among them and separate from Ed. This helps Ed to move on."
"Ed's and Izzy's marriage was broken - they both needed Stede as a marriage councellor. Ed didn't realize how deeply Izzy loved him, and was afraid of being loved in general. Izzy thought he wasn't allowed to be soft and vulnerable, so others weren't allowed either.
But over the course of 2 seasons, Stede opened their eyes - and now they're ready. His purpose fulfilled, Stede can leave and be a pirate while Ed and Izzy resume their marriage, apply everything they've learned and live happily ever after."
"Ed is fishing and sees the English attack the Republic of Pirates and all the ships. He just calmly carries on fishing while everyone dies. He's a fisherman now. The end."
(her thoughts about the real finale are much sadder)
#ofmd#izzy hands#edward teach#stede bonnet#first time viewer#I love the marriage councellor one - I've never heard that one before 😂#it would have been a real twist though!
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It's so weird to me that seemingly a lot of people have blocked me - recently, I was blocked while writing a reply to my earlier comment, I had it all typed out and couldn't send it anymore. That was a bit frustrating to be honest.
To my knowledge, I have never posted anything hateful or negative about any character on OFMD (for the reason that I genuinely love them all). Even my post-finale posts were more confused and hurt than angry.
My blog is very obviously Izzy centric and Izzy positive though (but still based on canon I hope), and that is apparently enough for a lot of people to block me? I mean ok, maybe it's for the better, but I'd never block anyone for liking a character I don't like, or interpreting them differently.
Blocking an account who incessantly and actively hates my fave? Absolutely. But I don't think I've ever hated a character so much that I'd want to block out any positive discussion about them. I just don't get it.
(It's probably about Ed, isn't it.)
#ofmd#izzy hands#I don't even know how to tag this#better keep it in the Izzy tag though#maybe I'm naive but this really surprised me#my takes are so tame I'd have thought#and I really try to stick to canon and be fair and balanced#I guess it did hurt a bit
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So, that new interview with Con...
Again the emphasis on his loneliness!
"So, it wasn't an easy job. It was quite a lonely job. It was quite a difficult job because it was going down that path that I knew inevitably we were going to go down."
And the way he has to search for words, and his expression before "it was going down that path..." this is breaking my heart 😥
This part is just incredibly beautiful - especially because Con says it with so much love and emotion:
"We always associate love with romance. That isn't the case here. The love that Blackbeard and Izzy have for each other is deep, man. It's deep, and it's rooted in years of working together, loving each other, saving each other's lives, being constant. This is probably the only constant they both had in their lives, is Blackbeard is Izzy, Izzy is Blackbeard, and then they have this buffoon come in and steal Blackbeard's heart."
Also THIS:
"And then once, I think once Blackbeard hands him the gun, everything changes. And Blackbeard says, kill yourself. Everything changes."
"Blackbeard says, kill yourself"??? I mean yes, but also - CON!!!! The way he just lays it out here, like obviously? Chilling.
But the more I think about that relationship, the more I go down all these different avenues of what it could have been, and what it could never have been, and what it is and what it wasn't.
I haven't even finished the interview yet, but when I heard this I was so touched by how much this man loves Izzy, and how much he loves Ed. He's still thinking about their relationship, and it is obvious how much it means to him. "Go down all these different avenues of what it could have been" oh my God 😭!!!
What have we done to deserve this man? I can feel his sadness about everything that happened to Izzy, he's still in his head, isn't he? His insistence on "all he wanted to do is fix Blackbeard" - and he did try - until his last second. How seriously he takes his relationship with Ed.
If they don't bring Izzy back - what a fucking waste.
(I've used the wonderful transcription here, I hope that's ok!)
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On Ed and Izzy's relationship
I see the "Izzy was the cunning mastermind manipulator in their relationship while Ed was his helpless innocent victim" take is doing the rounds again...
I honestly just feel sorry for anyone who can't comprehend and appreciate their relationship with its full complexity and nuance. Because it was simply magnificent. S01E04 alone is a masterpiece in character study that encapsulated their mutually toxic dynamic at its peak, and switching the character whose perspective you're watching it from completely switches what it looks like and who seems to be in the wrong. That episode was pure, beautiful, fucked up tragedy. They're both talking past each other. They both refuse to listen. Ed is crying out for help, but Izzy shuts him down. Ed wants to enjoy all those new fun original things on the ship that make him appreciate life again, but Izzy keeps nagging him. Clearly he's just an annoying, mean, insensitive buzzkill, right?
Except the whole time Izzy's terrified they are going to die because they're about to be attacked by the Spanish - something Ed brought upon them with his decision - and Ed seems completely disinterested in doing anything about it. Of course he's not going to indulge Edward playing with a toy ship or have a heart-to-heart in those circumstances. He doesn't insult or mock Ed for being suicidal, he simply points out that they're literally going to die if he doesn't come up with a plan right now. Meanwhile Ed's deliberately withholding crucial information from his own first mate and the rest of the crew, either (less charitable interpretation) for his own entertainment or to flex his skills or (slightly more charitable interpretation) to make a point to Stede.
The rest of it was so masterfully balanced out too. Right up until the point where Izzy betrayed them to the Navy, he didn't actually do anything wrong. Yes, he was still wrong - but so was Ed. Izzy was the "lawful evil". He was the one playing by the rules, while Ed was trying to cheat his way out of having to make a decision. Trying to run away from his problems instead of confronting them head-on (or just crashing into the opposite extreme and trying to violence his way out of his feelings) was literally the major theme of Ed's character. So was his inability to form meaningful relationships without bolting or lashing out the moment he encounters an obstacle. Completely removing this from the equation while putting all the blame on Izzy simply destroys Ed's agency and character depth.
We were literally given a glimpse of his childhood abuse to see where his trauma originated. It wasn't Izzy. Nor was it Izzy who appeared as the embodiment of Ed's self-hatred in the gravy basket. Izzy didn't somehow singlehandedly isolate Ed from forming meaningful relationships with people. He never had this much power over Ed. Their relationship was mutually toxic and codependent, but neither of them was each other's slave, they still had their own mind. We saw Ed constantly ignoring Izzy's advice and his judgment. We literally only saw it work when Izzy had the backup of other crew members and got overruled, and when he struck out at Ed when he was at his weakest and most vulnerable. And Ed wasted no time reestablishing the power dynamic in his favour, where it stayed until they managed to symbolically-and-almost-literally kill each in S02E02. That's what it took. That's how powerful their fucked up toxic relationship was.
That's exactly what I don't get about Ed fans who are Izzy haters (or misunderstanders). They claim to love Ed... and then they strip him of all the darkness and complexity and anything even remotely "unpalatable" that makes him such a richly realised character, and turn him into a cardboard cutout who's so indefensible as a character that the only way they can prevent people from criticising him is by pulling out the racism card. Which is so ironic and absurd because OFMD is amazing at diversity and writing characters equally well no matter what their gender, sexuality or skin colour is. It's also literally a show about one of history's most famous pirates. If someone doesn't want to see PoC characters portrayed behaving violently (even when that violence is shown to be caused by trauma and general pirate lifestyle and not indicative of their moral worth as a person), then OFMD probably isn't for them.
#YES to all of this#why would you choose the less interesting story#when you could have this layered fascinating relationship#the writing of the EdIzzy dynamic is so brilliant#and again and again the show goes out of its way to flip expectations - especially concerning Izzy#and then people go and reduce it to this boring bad guy/good guy shit#“I'll break your neck Hornigold” Ed doesn't need Izzy as an excuse for violence#he's Blackbeard who loves a good maiming as well as Ed who appreciates a fine fabric#also Izzy “I deserved it” Hands evilly puppeteering a helpless Ed is just... I mean come on#ofmd#izzy hands
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I think the tragedy of Izzy is that he is the only character in the show who is severely punished for every transgression - and even the transgressions of others.
Ed gets a cannonball to the head, yes, but he is trying to get himself killed at that point. His atonement after he comes back is a few hours of banishment and a cat bell. The crew who openly plot to mutiny (and kill Stede) in S1 get art therapy.
Compare that to the mental and physical torture Izzy undergoes in S2 - and the lasting reminders of the violence done to him. There are lash marks on his back. His first severed toe doesn't magically heal, and his shot leg has to be amputated. Even his suicide attempt leaves a visible scar, while Ed comes away from a cannonball to the head without any lasting damage. In the end, Izzy (probably) dies from a combination of blood loss and an abdominal gunshot.
No other character in this show has any lasting effects from being - in some cases mortally - wounded like Izzy (apart from Lucius, but his finger is played more or less as comedy, and it's definitely not narrative punishment).
But Izzy doesn't only have to carry the consequences of his own actions. In the end, Izzy dies of a combination of the worst traits of the people he loves/aligns himself with.
Ed's projected self-hatred and perceived unloveableness costs Izzy half a leg. Yes, Izzy hurt him deeply and goaded Ed into becoming Blackbeard again. But Ed's extreme reaction and violence towards the person closest to him is all about Ed's issues.
Stede's careless recklessness (Things have a way of working out. At least for me.) and his casual disregard for the safety of others besides himself and Ed put Izzy in the path of a bullet. And yes, it wasn't Stede's fault. But it was Stede's "suicide mission" - planned without a thought for risk minimization and a blind trust in luck (or other people jumping in to save the day).
If I wanted to be really dramatic, I'd say Izzy died for Ed's and Stede's sins. And in the end, he even takes all of Ed's faults onto himself - thereby absolving him.
Maybe the Jesus Christ Superstar thing wasn't as clear-cut as we thought. We even get the classic pietà pose of a crying Ed holding his dead Izzy in the end.
(Which would make Ed a mother figure to Izzy. I think I'll better stop here.)
#ofmd#izzy hands#ofmd meta#Izzy has his faults#Ed has his faults#Stede has his faults#but Izzy suffers exponentially more than those two#also his suffering leaves scars - and finally leads to his death#I really cannot see how on earth Izzy deserved this#this is a comedy - sure#not for poor Iz though
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