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so i’ve touched on this briefly in a few of my izzy hands metas, but i want to talk for a moment about how stede (and the show in general, actually, along with a couple of things that speak volumes about izzy) appears from izzy’s point of view, without the benefit of the audience’s perceptions and ability to see stede when izzy can’t
His first impression of Stede is that Stede took two English hostages, and his second is that Stede ran his ship aground. So right off the bat we have “potentially dangerous” and “stupid” rolled into one.
When we first meet him, Izzy speaks to buttons on the beach. Buttons is, in that moment, completely vulnerable. He has no weapon, no company, all he has is a little whittling knife and the carrot he’s whittling. Izzy asks where the rest of the crew are, and leaves him alone rather than taking the opportunity to either take him hostage or kill him.
We don’t see a lot of Izzy after that until Stede sees him in the jungle, but between these two points Izzy visits the native village (that took Stede and Pete hostage for being lightskins who would be a threat to them), strikes a deal with the natives and buys the hostages.
There’s a couple of things to gather from this: the first is that Izzy was not taken hostage by the natives. He’s a white man who looks like a pirate and has two flunkies of color, but the natives leave him alone. This, to me, says that Izzy has either been here before or his reputation precedes him even here: he might be a pirate and a bit of a shithead, but he’s not a threat to the natives. He isn’t going to kill them without a good reason (self-defense for example), nor is he going to colonize them. Instead, he comes in, makes a fair deal and buys the English hostages from the natives and then leaves with them. This says volumes to me. If he was going to be put on trial like Stede, his trial would have overlapped Stede’s or happened around when Stede was getting psychotherapy from the natives, so it didn’t happen. He was treated with at least a small amount of trust.
He then meets Stede out in the wood and Stede steals his fairly purchased hostages from him. This makes me laugh every time I think about it. Stede is like, “Omg! Izzy STOLE OUR HOSTAGES! We must get them back immediately from that scoundrel!” But, no, Izzy bought them fair and square from the natives who stole them 😂 this makes me unironically laugh far too hard actually.
Stede pretends they’re surrounded, pretends the jungle is haunted (Stede, honey, why that?) and then bests Izzy with what looks like a letter opener.
At this point, Izzy must (fairly) be thinking: what the fuck is going on here? Because he was bested by the stupid pirate, which he supposes is probably how he got the hostages to begin with? (Which; yes).
So he goes back to Edward, who he expects to be like, “Holy shit, Izzy, someone dishonored you in fair combat? Let’s go wreck them RIGHT NOW!” and who is, instead, like, “Holy shit, Izzy, someone dishonored you in fair combat? Let’s go let them wreck me RIGHT NOW!” which… I, too, would be a little disgruntled and confused by that one.
Instead of wanting to destroy this dude that humiliated his first mate and (likely) best friend, Edward wants to meet this dude, invite him on board and…what? Be friendly with him? That must seem utterly insane to Izzy. If my best friend did that to me, I’d be thinking she’d gone crazy too.
By the time they find Stede, he’s about to get murdered by the Spanish and, instead of just… letting that happen… Edward sends his crew (Izzy included) to kill the Spanish first and save Stede and co. They lose crewmembers in the process. So now, not only has Stede not defended Izzy’s honor against the cheating pirate, but he’s also sent a few of their crew to their deaths for… what? To save the worst pirate Izzy has ever seen?
It’s no surprise that by this point Izzy is already losing his shit, and that his entire head explodes when Edward and Stede swap clothes and Edward is introducing Stede as Blackbeard and acting like he has a new best friend. From Izzy’s limited perspective, Edward is losing his mind and making increasingly erratic and irrational choices.
So when Edward spins it as, “I’m bored and I want to go be rich, so I’m thinking we’ll kill Stede and say he’s me and I’m him and then you can have this ship and we’ll be good, yeah?” finally there’s a logical reason for what Edward has been doing. It makes sense now. A few crewmembers aren’t too high a price to pay for a plan like this: lull Stede into a false sense of security where swapping clothes or doing whatever Edward says isn’t out of the realm of possibility, that way when they decide to enact the plan, it’ll be easy.
…except Edward doesn’t go through with the plan. He is, as Izzy puts it in his voiceover (and he got! a voiceover!! Stede, Jim and Izzy are the only ones who have gotten a voiceover, and Jim’s is more a journal entry than an actual Voiceover (Izzy and Stede just get to talk over the show, Jim is writing and the voiceover is translating it)), being seduced by Stede Bonnet.
Which makes sense.
From Izzy’s point of view, Edward had a plan and something he wanted (one of the few things Edward had actually told him about, unlike the thousand other things they don’t communicate over), and then Stede had been seducing him and manipulating him, as well as giving him a taste of the thing he wants (being rich and free) while still holding it over his head and slightly out of reach. As long as Edward is dallying with Stede, he gets fine things, and pretty clothes, and bows in his beard, and he gets to go to fancy parties and whatever else he wants, but all of those things at contingent on Stede’s affections. If Stede gets sick of Edward, or Stede decides he’s had enough, or Edward decides he’s had enough, all those fancy things go away. It isn’t a permanent solution like the “assume Stede Bonnet’s identity” plan is.
And I wonder if Izzy has seen this kind of seduction of Edward before. Not specifically the way it goes with Stede (the feelings are real, it isn’t just sex and a fun distraction), but I wonder if Jack shows up and gets Edward into bed and distracts him and Izzy has to deal with it because if he doesn’t their raids get erratic and they lose more people. Edward is, canonically, neurodivergent and mentally unstable, and although this doesn’t mean he can’t make his own choices or that Izzy should get to run roughshod over everything he wants, it does mean that sometimes he probably makes some poor choices and when those poor choices trickle down and effect the crew and their wellbeing, it is Izzy’s job as first mate to try and fix it.
If Stede decided one day to throw his crew at some horrible situation just on a whim because he felt like it or because his mental health was acting up that day, it would be expected for Buttons or Lucius or Jim or Oluwande or someone to speak up and try and do something about it, for the sake of everyone else. Mental instability is not a get out of jail free card for getting those around you into trouble.
So when Edward seems seduced by Stede, Izzy starts putting pressure on the situation. He, with Ivan and Fang’s backing, relates Edward’s current situation back to a situation from before, making a point that this isn’t just Izzy having a jealous tizzy fit, this is both Edward’s plan and how Edward tends to think in general: pets make you soft, soft is bad and will get you and those around you killed, so deal with the problem before it deals with you.
When Edward can’t handle the pressure and can’t deal with the problem himself, Izzy steps in. Edward does not stop him from stepping in, which regardless of everything else, probably reinforces to Izzy that Edward knows he’s doing the right thing, he just couldn’t do it himself.
And sure, okay, Izzy throws a little fit when he loses, but so would you if your bff’s rich ass, annoying new boo had beaten you once again through virtue only of having a god damn cherry wood mast and now you have to row off in a dinghy to god knows where to figure out how to fix all this and leave the crew behind.
Izzy says again and again throughout the whole show that Stede Bonnet did something to his boss’s mind, and honestly? I can see it. From Izzy’s limited perspective, I can see it. Edward masks, as I’ve said before, and the second he joins Stede’s crew he becomes Stede and the crew. It genuinely seems like Stede brainwashes and changes him, especially when you lack the context of everything that happens in scenes Izzy isn’t in.
And so, Izzy comes up with a plan to deal with the situation. It’s a two-pronged plan:
Part 1 is Calico Jack, who is, without question, the grossest pick for Izzy to send after Edward. If he knows that Edward masks, in his own way, and knows what Edward turns into around Jack? It makes perfect sense to pick specifically Jack to send after Edward to make Edward someone Stede can’t stand to be around to the point Edward has to leave the ship. It even works. Stede really dislikes Ed-masking-as-Jack, and rightly so considering that isn’t the real Ed (Stede gets a lot of glances at the Real Ed, probably moreso than most, probably not quite as much as Izzy, who has the benefit of a lot of time with him, and moments such as the bathtub scene and when Ed actually admits he’s bored and wants to give it all up probably count as unmasked moments, or as close as Ed can get right now) and this version of Ed is… unpleasant to be around.
But from Izzy’s point of view it’s less “Ed becomes unpleasant around Jack,” and more “Yeah, try on this really low class version of Ed, you fucking fancy ass high class snobby little rich boy,” because to Izzy - whose accent is aggressively, unabashedly working-class - it makes perfect god damn sense that Stede would be turned off and horrified by the kind of person Ed becomes with Jack.
Part 2 is the English. This one is simpler: trap Stede and his boat, send the English out there, acquire ship as payment, Stede dies.
It’s a very good plan. It’s a plan that actually goes off with only a minor hitch (Jack got bitchy at Ed about “when Izzy told me–” and Ed’s penny dropped, so he came back). Stede is literally lined up for execution. No one else gets hurt. Edward is remanded to Izzy’s custody. The Revenge is handed over to Izzy. No one but Stede gets hurt.
Truly, I don’t think we talk enough about how mercenary yet merciful this plan of Izzy’s actually is? No one but Stede gets hurt (emotional damage does not count here because that requires Izzy to conceptualize that Ed loves Stede and that the crew do too, he doesn’t think that way right now, so it doesn’t factor), the crew (despite being pirates themselves) are safe, Edward is safe, the English leave them alone (and they actually do! Only Edward and Stede sign up for the Act of Grace, but the English keep their part of the bargain and leave Izzy and the crew in peace), and surely Izzy plans (until the Act of Grace) to hand the Revenge over to Edward, or at least give him a lift back to his own ship. He just wants Edward safe.
The last Izzy sees of Stede is him crying over the idea of being shot and killed, and signing away Edward’s freedom for his own life. Edward actually doesn’t call for an Act of Grace on his own behalf, he’s already fine just remanded to Izzy’s custody, it’s Stede who, out of nowhere, goes, “Well, if I’m signing ten years of my life over to the English, Edward is too!”
Which, ahem, not great, Stede. I see where you’re coming from, but not great at all.
Finally, the last real impression Izzy gets of Stede after this is Ed coming back a broken wreck because Stede got bored of him and cut him loose after all of this.
Izzy’s impression of Stede in season 1 boils down to: incompetent (ran ship aground), lucky (mast), stupid (half the decisions he makes including getting captured by natives), selfish (dragging Edward into his shit), irresponsible (nearly gets his crew killed multiple times) and finally someone who just… leaves Edward when the going got tough.
From Izzy’s point of view right now, Stede is awful, and a bad person for Edward to be around, and I can honestly see that point of view.
This turned a little rambly and disjointed, idk if it’s as good as my usual metas, I was just having Thoughts™ and now y'all have to deal with those thoughts, my apologies lmao.
I’ve had it corrected to me that Ed does actually volunteer himself for the Act of Grace here, which is correct (I rewatched that episode last night) but I’d like to argue two points about that corrected info:
The first is that Ed says Act of Grace and gets the entire crew to parrot it along with Stede, who the Act of Grace was for. It’s one of the English officers who volunteers Blackbeard as also having the Act of Grace, and the implication of Ed having the crew also say Act of Grace to get the English to give it to Stede is that Edward was not volunteering himself for it, though he doesn’t argue when the English say something about it or when Chauncy asks him directly if he’d rather go to war for the king. I don’t think him taking the Act of Grace was his original plan, it just kinda unraveled that way.
The second is that in Izzy’s view, it’s still Stede’s fault and because of Stede. Stede can’t get the Act of Grace without Ed getting it, thusly Ed is bound to it because of Stede.
It doesn’t change how Izzy would see it, I think.