There’s something I need this fandom to understand about Martin Kartin Blackwood.
IS he an expert manipulator? Yes. Does he have some serious skills in using people pleasing and framing and psychology to his advantage? ABSOLUTELY. He is gaslight, gatekeep, girlbossing his way through the first 3 seasons and we LOVE him for it.
On the other hand, though, I feel like we don’t acknowledge enough as a fandom how isolating people pleasing can be in itself. I ranted about this in the tags of another Martin post, but basically, the person you create to be palatable to as many people as possible becomes a wall. A barrier between you and the outside world. Yes, everyone likes you, but that comes at the cost of no one knowing you in your entirety because you don’t let them see the parts of you that are harder to swallow.
Martin effectively trapped himself in his own web of lies, suspended 30 feet away from his own life. He’s dissociated from it all from the beginning, which is what made him the candidate Peter chose in the first place. He was always slated for The Lonely as much as he was The Web.
That leads me into my next point, which is that MARTIN PRE-LONELY WAS NOT ENTIRELY DISINGENUOUS. I see so many people implying that Martin straight-up wasn’t anything like he said he was in the beginning. Common fandom reading comprehension L. He really does like people, and he really does want to be nice. It just also happens that you don’t end up people pleasing to those lengths without it having developed as a defense mechanism!
Take the wall I introduced earlier. You surround yourself in this persona and swallow your teeth to protect yourself from other people. Realistically, it probably started with his mother, who is implied in Canon to not have been kind to him. There’s a 3rd partner to Fight or Flight that doesn’t get discussed very often, and it is “Fawn.” This is the people-pleasing response that we see him exhibit. Ultimately, what he fears is rejection, and therefore, he fears being alone. He’s nice and kind and polite and swallows his teeth in order to keep people around.
Post-Lonely Martin is the other extreme. He has no energy to please anyone anymore, and it doesn’t serve him. He is tired and angry and constantly stressed. He doesn’t bother hiding his teeth anymore, and he’s prone to lashing out. Post-Lonely Martin is when he’s surpassed his limit. Post-Lonely Martin is burnout.
As someone who relates to Martin Blackwood very much, I can tell you that the quiet moments where he’s not deeply distressed either way is where we see the real Martin. He still loves and cares in private, and we see that over and over. The love is real. He just doesn’t believe he deserves it in return, so he tries very hard to be someone who does. To “make up” for it.
okay, hold on, time out. that’s not fair. if they’re allowed to shoot energy beams using the power of friendship, i should be able to summon a monster using the power of divorce
idk how to feel abt genuinely drafting a jmart fic after five years of writers block in every fandom ive been in. these boys are doing some kind of cocomelon shit to me
“Average person eats 5 statements a day” factoid actually a statistical error. Statements Jon, who lives in the archives and eats 10,000 statements per hour is an outlier and should not have been included.
“Average person makes 5 cups of tea per day” factoid actually a statistical error. Teabags Mart, who brews 10,000 teacups per hour to deal with the Horrors, is an outlier and should not have been included
Back again to expert cursed book hunting duo, Gerry and Mike, cause I just enjoy having an excuse to get the avatar and avatar-adjacent characters to interact. ✨ Also experimenting with short hair Jon, I realized I’ve never actually drew him like that.
thinking about the distortion on this sunday night. what was once michael died for being too human and what was once helen died for not being human enough…
no ok im not done thinking. he let what he was overcome what he is and she was so far removed from who she was that what she became wasn’t allowed to continue to be
one of my first thoughts upon realizing it was probably just a dream was that posting it like it was real + spreading misinformation would be kinda funny
had a dream last night that i was writing some fic about jon and aromanticism or something and it was a really good idea but UNFORTUNATELY ! i forgor. woke up n it was gone . Sad !