#kristina's delivery of 'are you alright' is SO FUCKING GOOD
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the way the world falls away when they look at each other
#avatrice#warrior nun#avatriceedit#warriornunedit#ava silva#sister beatrice#alba baptista#kristina tonteri-young#this is such an underrated moment#kristina's delivery of 'are you alright' is SO FUCKING GOOD#it's so tender and soft#then ava's reassuring 'i'm fine' and just fjslkafjsalkf#the way they look at each other#not okay#i am#not#forever here#myedits
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Young Royals Season 2 play-by-play analysis
The last episode, the climax to the conflict, the conclusion to this arc, the start of the revolution… it’s so dramatic, so tense and so satisfying.
(Ugh, why does it take me so long to find the gifs I want... Why can't I always find the absolute perfect gifs when I want them and I know they exist...)
Brace yourselves, because this analysis is LOOOONG. I can’t stop the thoughts, sorry. Too many moments, too many unspoken things that speak volumes…
EPISODE 6
The boys have been together for hours now, in their little bubble. As far as we know, there have been no food or bathroom breaks…? Just the two of them, making the most of every second together, just loving each other one last time… Then morning comes and the bubble bursts. Simon has to do the right thing, he knows that there’s a big chance that nothing will come off it, but he has to try. Even if it means that August won’t be next in line to the throne, which at least would be a giant blow for August, but an equally big one for Wille… but Simon has to try, he can’t just not do anything, he has to get some form of justice… and whatever happens after that they will deal with it together, hopefully.
So after hours of loving and being loved, Wille looks resigned again, watching as Simon gets dressed. He asks if he’s going there now, to the police station. Does it have to be now? Can’t we have more time together. Simon is heading to the police later, but he has to break up with Marcus first, once and for all. He hesitates before kneeling down next to the bed. If he doesn’t go now, he might lose his nerve. That forehead kiss, it’s so sweet, like he’s saying that everything will be alright, somehow. Like he wants to reassure Wille that it’s not the end, that there’s still love. Just kill me…
August is having a mental breakdown. He knows he can’t get out of this one without help. He knows that maybe the Royal Court can help him sweep the whole matter under the rug… But what if they don’t? He’s not entirely in there yet, he’s not exactly in their good graces yet.
“August, we are counting on you to not give us any problems whatsoever.” You’re on thin ice, August. They forgave you one scandal, they won’t forgive another. “You represent the entire Royal Court now.” Already? It’s like they’re already counting on Wille to give up, and August to need to step up. Way to keep putting the pressure on kids, by the way. Although August is of age, he’s still a fucking kid. But he will be tried as an adult…
“It’s silly, I will take care of it myself,” August says. Then he turns to the person who also already has a vendetta against Wille and Simon…
Listen, my work has let me see people’s different styles of public-speaking. Everyone has a different style, and there are some people that are more natural at it than others, some people seem to have been born for it… and some people just don’t. (And even the people who seem to be natural at it require training, they’re not just born knowing how to do it, it’s just easier for them to get it). I don’t have public-speaking abilities, although I could develop them, but I’m an introvert, and so is Wille. It takes more work than that. It’s not just knowing what to say, because anyone can read words from a page; it’s the delivery, it’s the power behind the words, and it’s the ability to look into a crowd and not lose your nerve… And the fact that they’re forcing him to give a speech at such a young age, during an event of such magnitude, without even giving him some sort of training first, is fucking unfair and mental. They just expect him to be a natural at it. Like becoming the Crown Prince suddenly means that he should be able to. Nah, it doesn’t work like that. It’s not an app or a plugin that you suddenly get, it takes work, especially if you’re not a natural… Fuck the Royal Court and Kristina.
Simon ghosting Marcus, but then showing up. And Marcus being all sour, because he knows, he knows everything. “You haven’t replied in days”. Guess what, Marcus? It’s not really your business. You’re not his boyfriend, no matter how much you wanted to believe it.
“Not compared to a prince, at least.” Fuck you, Marcus, you snob, you don’t know Wille. Wille being a prince is not a plus, it has never been a plus, in fact it’s been the biggest obstacle between them… You’re making Simon sound like an elitist, and that shows how little you know about Simon.
“You only brought me to make him jealous.” Well, you got that part right, but also, he brought you to distract himself, he was trying to move on. He wanted to like you, somewhat... (guess he dodged a bullet there...)
“I told you that I wasn’t ready for a relationship but you haven’t been listening to me.” Yes, and that negates the “perfect” thing. Stop being nice and telling him that he’s perfect, Simon. He’s not. He’s a manipulative snob.
“So it’s my fault that you treated me like crap.” OH WHO’S PLAYING VICTIM NOW…
You, sir, you are the problem. Not even the main one, no. Just a problem in Simon's life. Stop being so annoying.
“You see yourself as some kind of victim among all those brats.” FUCK YOU MARCUS. He IS a victim, he’s an outsider among all the privilege kids, he’s at a disadvantage and constantly reminded of it. He IS a victim of the system, the system rigged in favor of privileged kids, rigged in favor of the Crown, the system that protects powerful people and keeps the cycle of silence and oppression going. And he IS a victim of sexual harassment perpetuated by one of the brats. You have no fucking idea, Marcus. DO NOT believe a word he said, Simon.
And Simon tried to make it right, he tried to apologize, and Marcus just made him feel terrible and accused him of things that weren't even true. Simon doesn’t deserve that.
I still think it's ironic that Rosh and Ayub were like "Ugh, Wille's so toxic, you should totally hook up with Marcus, have a rebound," and Marcus turned out to be the toxic one... I'm not saying that Wille or Simon are perfect, and I know that what Simon did to Marcus was not nice, to ghost him, to use him like that, even if he had made it clear to Marcus that they were not a thing. But Marcus was full of red flags; he is a snob who thinks himself better than the "rich brats" at Hillerska, and doesn't fail to point it out; he calls out Simon for his relationship with Wille by saying that the thing that Simon liked about him was that he was a prince, which is actually the opposite; he absolutely LIED about not watching the sex video, because of course he did and that's probably what sparked his interest and made him approach Simon now, after knowing about him for much longer (everyone in Bjärstad knows each other, and their mums are literally friends, wtf); he used what he knew from his mother about the Eriksson family to manipulate Simon into not breaking things off with him; and he's slightly older so technically there's a slight power dynamic there. And as a final blow he accuses Simon of pretending to be a victim and loving the drama... You know nothing, you jerk...
(It reminded me so much of when August and Felice dated, and August was jealous at Felice's closeness to Wille, then going on and kissing Sara... and of course there's that little "funny" thing he said about her when we first meet him and find out what kind of person he is, and what he thinks of women... Of course August is much worse, the worst in fact, but Marcus was unexpectedly a wolf disguised as a lamb...)
The palatset is decorated with blue and yellow streamers and balloons and Swedish flags and other party decor. There will be a party after the Jubilee.
August with his back turned to the door, like a classic villain…
I think there’s an expression or a proverb or something for wanting something so bad that you would do terrible things to obtain it. There was a Huffington Post opinion article that someone shared on here recently on how the people who want to have power are precisely the people who should have it, whilst the people who are most suited to be in power are the ones who don’t want it at all. Real, good leaders are collaborative, they like to help others shine, they are selfless, they sacrifice. Power-hungry people are easily corrupted by power or by the desire to obtain it… August is so power-hungry he will do anything for it, and yet he’s not aware of what he would have to sacrifice for it and when the time comes he’s just not going to; Sara wants so bad to be part of the elite that she’s willing to screw over her own brother, lie to her friends, join forces with the worst person. Meanwhile, Wilhelm cares so little about being Crown Prince, and Simon has never cared about Wille’s title. In fact, the Crown has been for them both more of a hindrance than a promise… In fact, the only time that Wille uses his title is to weaponize it against August, but it turns him into a pretty bad person; he uses his power to get revenge on August, but it shows an ugly side of him. However, it doesn’t last long, because he’s not a narcissist like August. Once he’s back to being himself, to the person who doesn’t want the title, then he once again becomes perfectly suited for it. Beyond the royal title, beyond the inherited nature of it, Wille’s a good leader, he’s just young and misguided at times. That’s why therapy is so helpful to him, to understand his emotions, to find that balance.
August says he knows that what he did was unforgivable, “But Erik would not have let Simon go to the police.” HOW DARE YOU BRING ERIK INTO THIS. You do not speak for the dead, August.
“So now it’s my responsibility too to protect the Royal Family.” You’re just as bad as the Queen, August. You fit right in.
As it has been pointed out, Alexander doesn’t really work as the scapegoat: the video was recorded when Alexander had already been caught with the drugs; and it makes no sense to pretend that he’d still be in possession of August’s phone when the video was leaked either, a few days later, and already having been expelled. Especially since only a few minutes after the video was leaked, August had his phone with him and even answered a phone call from Minou from the Royal Court. Even if Alexander had had August’s phone, and had been able to record without unblocking the phone (August has an iPhone with a home button, so usually a fingerprint is required), it still would raise the question of when and how the phone was “hacked” to obtain the video, how long the video remained in the phone, etc. And August doesn’t seem to know that the Royal Court is in possession of the most damning evidence of all, the library computer from which he logged in and posted the video… As far as August knows the Queen and the Royal Court found out that it was August because Wille told them, because Felice figured it out and told him. So his whole plan is playing with fire and full of holes anyway. Either he and Alexander are too stupid to realize this, or they’re just counting of Wille getting scared. Which is why they’re warning him about what they’ll do if Simon reports.
And the weirdest thing to me is… Alexander is getting back at Will by willingly taking the blame for CHILD PORNOGRAPHY???? Something that he didn’t actually do???? He’s willing to be known as the guy who filmed the Crown Prince and Simon in an intimate moment and created a video that went infamously viral???? Like that could not have an impact on his future??? For fuck’s sake, he’s dumber than I thought…
But Wille is right, this whole stupid-ass plot won’t stop Simon from going to the police. But the drugs definitely will… There’s no escaping that…
“It’s time to stop this, everything calmed down once you denied the rumors… no one cares about the video.” “I CARE!”
Wille looks ready to commit murder. I would have loved him to use his headbutting skills to give August a nice purple bruise that would look really nice at the Jubilee.
I feel bad for Rousseau. That new owner is a dick.
“I want to be completely honest with you. No more secrets between us” says Felice, and Sara has been the most dishonest of the two this whole time…
“I’m in love with August.” Not “I’ve been sleeping with August” or “I have been seeing August in secret”. LOVE. Whoa.
This whole time Sara really thought that Felice would hate her for being in love with August just because he was her ex, when in reality it’s because Felice knows that August is a terrible person who can’t be trusted and Sara shouldn’t be in love someone like that… not knowing that Sara has been pretty bad herself and should not be trusted.
August being all “What’s this? The police? What is this police of which you speak?” Like he doesn’t know that Simon can knock him down and sit on him again and mash his face into the ground…
“I’m prepared to do whatever it takes to protect the royal family. Maybe you should do the same.” Very well, thinks Wille, picking up the gun to kill August and protect the royal family from the threat that is August.
Simon stepping back, in case Wille does shoot August or something, but not trying to talk him down. “He’s about to confess.” Wille says it, letting him know that he’s serious, this will turn into an “accident” if August doesn’t confess.
It’s been pointed out before that that moment, when Wille is ready to shoot August for what he did to him, to them, when he flinches as Wille shoots into the air, is the first time that Simon sees how much the video leak affected Wille, but also how much he couldn't do anything about it. Even if he denied the whole thing on an interview, people still knew that was him on the video, he was still outed, his privacy was still violated, and his own family still betrayed him, and it changed him forever. And this is all that built up anger coming out. So if Simon still thought that Wille only did badly for a while and then he was fine, now he sees that Wille is deeply traumatized.
When August glances at Sara, Felice already knows… Sara just revealed to her that she’s in love with August, so if she knew that Simon was going to the police, she might have told August. And then Sara confirms it.
The look on Simon’s face when Sara looks guilty. He’s in absolute disbelief. They all are.
“I was in love with him.” This is the first time August is hearing this…
“I thought the damage was done since the video was already out there.” More proof that Sara didn’t really understand what Simon was going through, that it wasn’t just about the video, it was the wedge that was driven between him and Wille, it was the fact that August got away with it, that the Royal Court protected him.
And for all of Sara’s excuses, the fact remains that she chose August over her own brother, even before she was actually in love with August. Which means she chose the privilege that August offered over being loyal to her own brother…
“He wanted to come clean. And I believed him.” Like she really kept it a secret for that reason… No, Sara, you weren’t hoping that August would come clean, you just wanted to live in Manor house and be elite and potentially even become the future Queen…
“It wasn’t enough that you destroyed my family, you had to destroy another one.”
At this point August really believes that Wille might shoot him and starts to beg him not to. It’s like he almost believes that Wille has nothing to lose.
“You don’t even want to be prince.” And August is right. As he watches Simon walk away, Wille drops the gun to go after him, because Simon is much more important than the fucking crown, something that August doesn’t seem to understand, something he will never understand. Wille walks away toward Simon, because he won’t let August destroy that too. (If Wille has ever thought of a long-term future with Simon, of being each other’s family, that’s the family that he wants to protect now.)
“You’re despicable.” Felice realizing what Sara is capable of. Was their friendship real? Was it just convenient to Sara? To have access to Rousseau, to be with the most popular girl in Hillerska? If she betrayed her own brother, what’s keeping Sara from betraying anyone else?
Personally spitting on August is a nice touch. Wille is basically saying “I won’t get my hands dirty because of you, but this is how I feel about you, this is what you’re worth, scum.”
“You were going to confess, August.” Sara doesn’t understand the value of secrecy in this society. Also August confessing was never really a major thing for her until Simon found out and wanted to go to the police. Before that, she was fine with how things were, even when she saw how miserable her brother was…
“You know about the struggle to get what you want… we’re the same, you and I.” August comparing Sara being working class and wanting to fit in in an elite school to him wanting to keep his status and become next in line to the throne… yes, they are the same, but at different levels. I’m not excusing what Sara did, but August is definitely worse. “It’s what I love about you.” What? You love that she became ruthless and deceitful and treacherous? Because that’s what you are…
“I had no other choice.” To be precise, he had no other choice that would keep him out of potentially going to jail.
Simon is keeping all of his emotions inside. Wille hugging him brings them too close to the surface and he’s at risk of them spilling all over… the way his voice trembles as he says “please…”, like he’s about to cry, but he doesn’t want to cry here, not where someone can see him, he just wants to go home, he wants to get away from it all, even Wille. You can’t fix this, he’s basically saying. Everything is destroyed in ways that he didn’t even know, because his own sister, his own family, betrayed him too. It’s not even about just August, it’s also now Sara, and it’s everything that has happened to him since the moment he met Wille. He hasn’t had a moment of peace…
And Wille watches him go, knowing too that he can’t fix it either. And he’s still trapped…
Kristina doesn’t even know what Wille’s crying about, she just comforts him, sort of… and he smiles sort of (because despite what she has done to him, she’s still his mother, he still wants to trust her, be comforted by her). But she doesn’t ask him what’s wrong.
Simon’s face and eyes are raw from crying. He called his friends, who know the whole story, to vent… And Ayub and Rosh immediately jump to the conclusion that Sara must have been brainwashed by August to have done this, otherwise she would be incapable… is clear that they don’t know her either.
Linda, again, what’s up with you? Your son looks like he’s been crying himself raw, and his friends look morose. How do you not get that something more is going on…? Simon doesn’t want her to know, anyway, because it would break her heart. He’s the protector, he wants to protect his family. I agree with a lot of people who say that the events of that day show Simon that Wille really had no choice, that he was after all just acting like everything was fine but he was most definitely not fine. After seeing how he pointed a gun at August, nearly losing it, it's clear to Simon that Wille's never intended to protect August, but had not choice but to put up with him; that of course he was traumatized by the leaked video, but he was forced to deny it. And after finding out that even his own sister had betrayed him, Simon realizes that he has no choice either, that someone else will always have the upper hand. So now he will have to change his strategy if he wants to protect those he cares about, including Wille. “If everyone is going to protect their families, then I’ll do the same.” Simon is a lot like his mother, he sacrifices a lot for his family. Linda looks like she understands. She is proud of Simon and she will support whatever he decides.
(gif by @almostliving84, because I don't know how to search for it in the gifs search bar when I already know where the gif is...)
As I mentioned before, Kristina also went to Hillerska, she knows about the palatset, she knows about the secrecy culture. Her choice to send Wille to Hillerska was never really about making him into a proper prince, it was about keeping him out of the public eye so he could do whatever he wanted without it becoming a scandal. A plan which majorly backfired when the secrecy cycle was broken… by August of all people…
“Your mother is not as innocent as she’d like to appear.” Yes, we know. “Stop it, don’t put ideas into his head.” Don’t worry, Kristina, your son will never ever be like you.
Wilhelm looking in pain as he is forced to participate in this charade. “How are you, gubben?” Now she asks. Boy has been moping since before you got there, and you didn’t even care, until now when it’s too obvious to ignore.
“It just creates new and bigger problems.” The way that the video, that everything has been handled, is nothing new; everything that doesn’t fit into the mold is swept under the rug, every wrinkle is ironed out, and then everyone goes on pretending like nothing happened.
“It’s important to talk about your emotions, but you can talk to us about anything.” “But it’s not enough.” Indeed it’s not. Krissy, you wanted him to talk to a psychologist, but that’s not the solution to the problem. Wille has finally understood why he feels the way he feels, and he’s learned to communicate. But it’s not enough, what’s the point of talking if nothing happens? If nothing changes? He’s expected to learn to handle his emotions, but the root of the problem, of the thing causing his distress, his anxiety, remains untouched. The monarchy, the cycle of secrecy, the traditions… everything stays the same…
The crowd of girls gathered outside the room. Either word spreads really freaking fast, or Sara took a very long time to go back to her room… Or did Felice leave the door open and then start telling Stella and Fredrika about it so loudly that everyone heard? Judging from the fact that just now the housemistress arrives, maybe it hasn’t been that long…
Sara very subtly threatens Stella with outing her. She unfortunately doesn’t realize how much like August she is. Making threats when she doesn’t have the upper hand, when she’s being called out.
“Sara has proven that she’s not a friend. She’s not loyal.” Obviously Felice can’t talk about the real reason why Sara’s betrayal is so big, not in front of Stella, Fredrika or the housemistress, but she makes it very clear to Sara.
“I don’t know what happened, I’ve never been in love before.” But again, Sara wasn’t in love with August when she decided to keep this huge secret from Simon. She might have had been catching feelings, because they kissed and she was curious, but still she made that choice to get an advantage. “I could always tell right from wrong, but with him it all seemed right.” Bullshit, she always knew it was wrong. Otherwise she wouldn’t have threatened to tell Wille last season; otherwise she wouldn’t have implied to Simon that a person can’t help what they feel, when Simon felt rotten about “cheating” on Marcus. She knew it was wrong. “You’re so totally full of shit,” Felice calls her out. It’s been months of secrecy at this point.
August texting “Please, I feel like shit.” You should. The drugs he claimed he would stop taking soon beckon him. Another lie. Then he looks in the mirror as he practices the speech and says “to make you proud.” Irony.
Wilhelm is lying in bed, bathed in red light, and I first missed the symbolism of him playing with Erik’s lighter… playing with fire… Cities on fire, won’t you burn it all… before he looks at Erik’s cigarette case… He’s thinking of Erik, he still feels the weight of his title and the commitment of living up to his brother’s memory and legacy, but also maybe he’s wondering what Erik would tell him to do in this situation…
(Could not find these gifs in the search bar either, so I found it in @levok s page, thank you for it. Seriously, if anyone can teach this loser -me- to search for gifs when you already know where it is, so that it shows up with the credit and all, please teach me so I can fix this, and all the previous posts. Thank you.)
Never not loving the scene of Ayub and Simon talking as they’re both falling asleep, that’s a really supportive friend, we all deserve an Ayub. “But he wants to keep it a secret, and you don’t.” Not quite; Wille doesn’t want their relationship to be a secret, he he just knows that it was an option proposed by his mother, and he was desperate enough to consider it. Simon tells Ayub about the possibility of him and Wille being a secret relationship until they’re eighteen. As far as we know, he hadn’t thought about that again, since Wille mentioned it in the locker room, because he had pretty much discarded that option as insulting. Because it made him feel like a dirty little secret… But now… now it seems like an option again, maybe the only option… to be with Wille, even if it has to be secret. He’s also bathed in red light as he ponders it…
“Only you can decide,” says Ayub. The light turns from blue (the color of calm, security and inner reflection) to purple (the color of royalty, but also as the combination of blue and red, it contains the stability of blue and the energy of red, and it also symbolizes spirituality, creativity and wisdom, and perhaps more importantly, it’s the color of resistance of the queer community) to red (the color of love and passion), signaling that Simon might have already made his choice.
The stage is set; the Swedish flag, the pomp and circumstance… On the bus, Simon looks pretty serene. Like he already knows, he’s already made up his mind. He just hopes he doesn’t regret it. Meanwhile, Wille practices the speech, resigned to following the charade, fitting into the perfect image of a crown prince.
Felice emerges from a room (a random room under the stairs? I had decided in my head that she either went to Stella and Fredrika’s room, or even more likely to Madison’s, and slept on the floor, but the way that she leaves the door open…), to find Sara gone, the expensive riding pants the girls gifted her left behind, a major symbol of how she realized that she’s never going to fit in with the girls at Manor house. (By the way, how long did Sara take to go from Manor house to the entrance, if Felice found her gone already, but by the time the jubilee is already happening and people are arriving she hasn’t even left the premises…? How fucking far is Manor house from the main gate??)
August arriving like nothing’s happened. He thinks he’s in. He still has to stand on the back of pictures, but he’s still living it. Kristina looking at Wille like she’s gauging how committed he is to the charade, to pretending that there’s no bad blood with August.
Vincent and Nils tease August, like there’s no bad blood anymore either. Do they know he’s next in line, did he tell them?
Wille glances at August, sees how different they’re acting in that lineup. Whilst Wille feels so awkward and stifled, August looks like he fits right in. If it weren’t because he detests him, he’d give it all up to August, who actually likes performing like this.
August is so ecstatic about how well he’s doing that he momentarily forgot about Sara. Until he sees her. Things are not perfect, indeed.
August buying Rousseau for Sara thinking that’s what she wanted. No, she wanted you to be a better person. You can’t throw money at everything. And also yes, of course she wanted Rousseau, but how do you expect her to take care of it???? She has no money. Then as she leaves, he calls weakly after her, but then he walks the other way. Clearly he has his priorities in the right order, and she’s not as important to him as everything else.
Simon signals to Wille that he wants to talk. Wille probably thought that everything had gone to shit again, that Simon would never speak to him again… again… They go into the coat room, the place where they had their first kiss, where everything started… Wille is so tense, he’s so afraid of what Simon is going to say. He listens, apprehensive, until he realizes where Simon is going… “It’s not worth destroying our families over that. And it’s not worth destroying what we have.” Simon and Wille somehow, deep down, might already think of each other as family, as each other’s future. My heart…
“I want to be with you. Even if it has to be a secret.” The tension melts. “But no more secrets between us.” The little smile of joy, the little relieved exhale, the excited little nod… and meanwhile Simon is smiling so big that his eyes crinkle. Then Wille takes his hand, because he’s allowed again… Then they look at each other and they hug, and Wille is home again. He’s happy again. They both are. They still have each other.
And then Simon says ‘I love you’, and Wilhelm has been hoping to hear those words for so long, the confirmation that Simon feels the same way, and he realizes that it does not deserve to be a secret. He doesn’t want it to be a secret. That they both deserve more. That he wants to love Simon openly. If anything else happens that jeopardizes them being together, he can’t allow it. He hasn’t decided what he’s going to do yet, or when, but he needs to make sure that they (the Court) can’t go back on their promise of letting him be with Simon. He’a willing to fight tooth and nail for that. He can’t let anything get between them again.
Jan-Olof interrupts them (asshole), and Simon immediately backs away, drops his arms, but Wille is not so fazed, he’s almost defiant. He wants to touch and caress Simon so bad, but he can’t be as effusive as he wishes, because someone is watching, and that’s how it would be all the time. But he gives in for the moment, walking away casually. And Simon is being so brave about it, knowing that they’re good, that they’re finally on the same page, even if they’re not entirely happy with the page.
Sara hears the choir begin to sing. She is missing out on the event that she was sort of preparing for, imagining having to greet the Queen, learning what to say. She is once again an outsider looking in (or rather listening in). The event has lost its meaning.
Meanwhile Wille watches as Simon performs with the crowd, looking dejected, just another member of the group. Knowing what Simon can do as a soloist, knowing how much he loves hearing Simon sing, knowing that that was supposed to be a song written by Simon, a song he was proud of, a song that (he later found out) was about him, it really highlights how unfair and outdated the system is, to deny one student, one talented choir singer, to stand out.
Sara might change schools next season, now that I think about it. What if she’s too ashamed to return? Continuing to attend Hillerska would mean enduring gossip about her, hateful looks from Felice and Simon, judgement from Wille and the rest of the people who know what she did (Stella, Fredrika, the rest of the girls at Manor House, etc.) and having to encounter August.
In a misguided attempt to make things right with her brother, she calls the police to report August. She should not have made that call, not only because we know it might make things worse now, but also because it was not her place to make the report, it was Simon’s.
Wilhelm braving his anxiety and feeling ill and making a last second decision to do the speech, because he saw Simon’s worried face when smug August starts walking toward the podium. Giving up this moment to August means giving everything to August, and it means they win. They, the Crown, the Royal Court, the system, they win. And Wille can’t let that happen, he needs to regain control of the narrative again, for himself and for Simon. This is it, this is his chance, anxiety be damned.
The confused look on everyone’s faces. What the hell was that about? August’s face as he is forced to sit his ass back down. The “torture”, the humiliation at the hands of Wille continues. Karma, bitch.
And Krissy looking so proud, thinking that her plan worked. But no mi ciela, it wasn’t August that ultimately lit the fire under Wille, it was Simon. His decision to step up is not driven by hate, but by love.
I don’t think that Wille knew what he was going to say when he stood up to do the speech, he just knew that he couldn’t let August take over, because then it wasn’t only him and Simon getting stuck with August, it was everyone else. Taking away August’s chance to give the jubilee speech, for example, is not about having revenge on August anymore, it’s about fulfilling his leadership role, and realizing that if he doesn’t, then there won’t be a leader, but a power-hungry narcissist “in charge”.
Wille chooses to lead by example, stopping the cycle of silence and secrecy by telling the truth, being honest, and if he had let August, August would basically lead by example too but by continuing that cycle of secrecy and silence.
Also Wille standing up to do the speech instead of August was at first about putting Simon’s feelings first, before his own feelings of unease and anxiety. Simon who has just been hit in the face with such revelations, like Sara’s betrayal, and how far August was willing to go to screw him over and Wille, his threat to use his father’s drugs against him… and it’s so clear on his face how much he’s putting up with August for his and Wille’s sake, now having to be a part of the people who have to pretend that they don’t know that August committed sexual harassment against them, that August exposed them to the world and ruined their lives, Simon has to hide his feelings, his distress at knowing that, despite all those things, at any moment August just gets everything he’s ever wanted, he’s Wille’s backup, he’s one step closer to his beloved Crown… And Wille’s not having it. Not for himself anymore, but for Simon. He will sacrifice his own freedom for Simon, and for the greater good.
The girl with the phone thinking “whoa, he’s going off-script. Better stream this.” Simon looking nervous, knowing what’s coming. Boris looking so proud and amused. And Krissy on the verge of a fit, silently begging “stop”...
When Wille says “it was me in the video, the video of me and Simon,” the camera cuts to several faces, including of course the Queen and Simon, and a moment earlier to Boris looking all proud. But it wasn’t until the Netflix reel announcing Season 3, when they did the 12 Days of Christmas song, in the part where it goes “Four pretty words”, the four faces being shown are Simon, Kristina, Boris… and Stella… Stella looking shocked. I hadn’t realized that the first face they cut to after Wille mentions Simon is Stella’s. They focused, albeit briefly, on her reaction to Wille coming out… of course Stella’s sexuality is going to be a big thing next season, but I love how they focused on her, making it obvious that we’ll learn more about her.
I thought it was a nice little detail that the two students whom we see filming Wille, when Wille says that it was a private moment, they both look up from the screen of their cameras and instead look directly at Wille.
The cameras flashing at Simon, at his distressed face. Foreboding. And yet he smiles.
Wilhelm knows that what’s coming now is going to be difficult, but at least he’ll have Simon by his side. He glances skyward, as if to check with Erik, wondering if he’s proud of his little brother. Yes, Wille, I think Erik would be really proud.
He then looks defiantly at us, like he knows we’re here, watching, and his lips curl into the faintest of smiles, a rebellious, daring smirk. He has regained control.
My royals babies have truly been through the wringer, and I know that yet more challenges will arise for them in the third season. But they will be together, they will face them together, and although they have been changed forever, in good ways and bad ways, they have made each other stronger
#young royals#wilmon#young royals analysis#young royals thoughts#wilmon endgame#young royals season 2#young royals s2
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