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.
Whenever Lightiplier and Angeliceye get startled their feathers puff up to make them look bigger. Becoming massive scared floofs.
It’s an automatic response to slowly raise their wings whenever they feel threatened. And they take great amusement in saying nothing as they slowly fan out their wings, watching the uncertainty in other egos faces heighten the more their wings open and fill up the space around them.
I’ve arrived with more angst because I like being in pain and I want people to suffer with me
Okay, so yet again, I think that there’s a moment of the Crofters- The Musical, we’re not talking much about.
Remember that Angsty Cut Out Roman that got all of us screaming? Well, I went frame by frame through what happened later and let me tell you- I came up with a very interesting theory but let’s starts from the beginning.
I think at this point we all agree that there’s a serious angst going on in Roman’s character. He’s clearly dealing with something, and I don’t mean only the fact that he didn’t get his own jam but that’s not important here. What is important though is the way Roman says it.
At first it reminded me a little bit of The Office but then I remembered that Ro has already done The Office cut and it looked completely different. So I did some digging and searching inside my head because I just knew that the view of a character talking to himself, being turned around from the rest of the actors reminds me of something. *beep beep beeep*
Bingo! The classical theatre.
Now we all know that Roman is a huge geek. Theatre, musical? That’s his jam. We do know that he’s the one who stands on the stage with Thomas whenever he performs. Roman is always performing with Thomas.
So what if, this time, Roman was the actor of his own play? What if it was a tragedy of a one man?
Look it makes sense, in both tragedy and comedy, the characters tend to do their monologues often on the side of the scene, refering to themselves so that the audience could learn their true feelings are. I think that’s exactly what Roman does it here.
Another point? Even if other actors are on the stage, the very often don’t “hear” or “get” what is the Monologuing Character says on the side. They know that he/she/they talks about something but they can’t “hear” that. And let’s see what Thomas does when Roman is in the middle of his monologue
He looks like he had no idea what was going on. As if he was bringing Roman back in the actual stage.
(let’s skip the fake smile Roman sends here, I don’t feel like crying rn)
Okay, so it looks like Thomas did notice that Roman has been talking to himself on the side, right? Yeah, but you see… his words in no way suggest that he has heard what Roman said. All that he says is:
He only refers to the issue he has been aware of before the cut out Roman did. We all know Thomas (as a character)- I don’t think he would let that just slip. The Angsty Cut Out clearly screams that Roman isn’t alright and I doubt that Thomas would ignore it so plainly. And he didn’t refer to that at all. As if he didn;t hear that quite right.
And now, let’s go back to that title. Crofters- The Musical. It doesn’t say “song” (like in A new year of lying to myself…in a song!!), it’s not just plain Crofters (like in 12 Days of Christmas). The title is Crofters- The Musical. And every musical needs a tragic character with angst monologues and feelings. In this case? In this case it’s Roman. And I think he knows about that.
Some Thoughts about the “Big Picture”: A Metaphor for Life
Logan: Logan seems to want very much to understand the painting in Thomas’ living room. In fact, he’s asked about it seven times. It seems to frustrate him that it is something he may never fully understand. Consider this as Logan’s approach to life: desperate to understand, even though some things may be beyond him.
Roman: Does not acknowledge the painting at all. Consider how Logan accuses Roman of ignoring reality by fantasizing and dreaming up alternative worlds.
Patton: Appreciates the painting without questions. He seems quite happy just to be looking at it. It’s his transition into talking about making others happy. Patton sees the world in the same way: as a piece of beautiful art that can be appreciated without understanding all of it.
Virgil: Virgil is drawn to the painting by Patton (emotion/morality) and says that he finds the “big picture” calming. Coping with anxiety often means asking “what’s the worst that could happen in the big picture?” or “will this be important to me in five years?” Virgil can be helped by looking at the big picture of life and not focusing so much on the little things.
Thank you for coming to my TED talk where TED stands for Thomas Excellence Daily.
“Anyway, as I was saying, I’m not a huge jelly guy.”
We know Roman’s not been feeling great about himself lately, and heck, this video literally confirmed that his self-esteem is at a low point at the moment. When you’re not feeling great about yourself, it can be really easy to let your mind spiral and dwell on all the times that confirm in your mind that you aren’t a good person/deserve to feel this way about yourself.
And what happens when he (you know it was him conjuring the flashback, cause it’s imagination, that’s his department) tries to conjure up a crofters memory? He instead gets a reminder of the person he used to be, someone he’s not proud of, insulting his best friend and treating him like a villain, and on top of everything else it’s not even the right jelly sentiment.
I could be making angst when there’s none here, but I think in this case it’s not too hidden: Roman feels really guilty about the way he used to treat Virgil. He’s feeling bad in this video specifically because of his decline in popularity, but think about it: he’s probably been dwelling for days on everything he’s ever done that would make the fans ‘dislike’ him. And he must know we all love Virgil, and that some people aren’t fond of the way he used to treat him.
How much you wanna bet that he beats himself up for that a lot? How much you wanna bet that he beats himself up for any mistake from his past, like what he said to Patton in the Growing Up video or how he acted in Can Lying Be Good, or the lyrical failure from 12 Days of Christmas? He’s very insecure, poor thing, and it’s really straining him right now for some reason. I still anticipate a full Roman arc soon, this was just a taste…a taste of the pain to come. But at least we know now that we aren’t pulling our Roman angst out of nowhere.
“Roman you duntz! You made a joke and now they’ll think that everything’s fine!”
Everything is not fine, and what’s more, he doesn’t even want to hide it anymore. He’s tired of feeling this way and he doesn’t care if they know: he’s not okay right now. Of course, Ro is also easily distracted, and the possibility of him having his own flavor was enough to temporarily shift his mood and the whole mood of the video back into super happy fun town, but don’t think for a second that those feelings have disappeared.
Think Things 