Now I was thinking about Patton’s character and thought over something: if Patton is the embodiment of emotions, does he get emotionally strained? throughout the Sanders Sides series, Patton is only ever shown to portray a small amount of different emotion, the major ones being happiness and, as of Season Two, sadness. But the human spectrum of emotions is so much more vast, as detailed in this graph:
Let’s take a look at these moments from MOVING ON Part 2: Dealing With a Breakup
He Feels He Isn’t Listened To. We all know the theories about Logan and Roman feeling like they are ignored by the other sides, but what about Patton? As I was re-watching the Sanders Sides videos for evidence I found that the other sides often times don’t take him seriously and ignore his input. Take a look at the dialogue from Season 1 Episode 13- Growing Up:
Logan: “Morality, you are the issue here.” “You stand there making your puns and are just needlessly silly, all the time.”
Roman: “You are holding Thomas back!” “We need actual contributions from you every now and then.” “Perhaps it’s best you stick to knowing the difference between right and wrong, and leaving the rest to us.”
Virgil: “His heart’s just not in the right place.”
For the entire middle section of this video Patton is being ridiculed for how he feels and how he does his job. Just look at the face he makes when the others don’t seem to need him.
He looks genuinely down trodden. Even when the others later accepted his input later in the video, the others still appear hesitant to follow his advice or listen to him in later episodes, especially in the very next video. If the others won’t even listen to his ideas, then why would they want to know how he feels?
Patton Can’t Control / Doesn’t Understand His Own Feelings. Okay, going through all of the videos I noticed something that Patton CONSTANTLY did: quickly hiding his reactions to different things. It didn’t matter if he showed signs of being sad or angry, if he didn’t look happy for whatever reason he would quickly put on a smile, crack a joke, or act silly.
Alone On VALENTINE’S DAY!
MOVING ON Part ½: exploring Nostalgia
Patton also seems to back track out of things he says or does whenever he realizes he’s being nonsensical.
Patton doesn’t really seem to be very confident in himself or his thoughts. This may be backed up by him constantly being told by the others that he’s overly silly and not being taken seriously.
Have you ever noticed how much Patton clings to Logan? It’s Obvious that he sees Logan as the perfect example as what he should be like, calm, collected, and in control of his emotions. He even called Logan “grounded”. Remember this moment from Making Some Changes!?
Besides the Logicality factor of this moment I always wondered why Patton wanted to talk to Logan more. Like, why Logan? Surely if Patton really wanted to talk about his feelings and problems then he’d turn to Roman since he’s the only other side on the right of the brain. But then I remembered this from the previous episode Growing Up:
I know Patton is eccentric, but doesn’t he seem a little too eager? And note how he reacts when no one wants to talk.
He’s stammering and appearing to be hugging himself, both signs that he’s nervous and put off. Again, no one cares about how he feels. So if he can’t share his feelings, might as well bottle it in. Such as he was told by Logan himself three episodes earlier in My Personality Q&A: “That’s one of those outbursts we internalize.“
Patton Is Split Between What is Morally Right And Wrong. Bringing it back to his roots, Patton was always Morality at his core, but what does this mean? Well the definition of morality is principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong or good and bad behavior. In society there have always been a contradicting belief in two different things. It should be okay for people to share their feelings. You should be doing fine all the time without the need to seek help. I often see these two ideas in life and scoff at the irony, but imagine that this is what Patton has been based on, that would mean that the core of his being is always fighting with each other. So how would he find a solution for this internal war? By giving discreet signals that he’s not okay.
A lot of these moments appear like him being silly in passing, but when you really look at them they seem to be him letting his emotions go, even if just for a short while.
So, now that we’ve established Patton’s insecurities and inner debate, how does this change him? Well this may be the reason why he’s so flamboyant, his emotions are constantly changing, while at the same time he’s trying to keep them contained and filtered for only the ‘nice’ emotions. But what if this constant containment emotionally exhausts him to the point where he needs to be able to let all of his emotions come to light. Fitting In (Hogwarts Houses!) “That old cardigan just weighs me down!”
Greetings! The name is Time Lizzy, or Time as my friends call me. They/Them pronouns. I love to try new things, draw, sing, dance, garden, and I do some witchcraft in my free time. I'm a Hetalia role playing partner if you guys are interested.
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