I’m not sure, tbh! It’s a little less prominent rereading the archive, but it definitely seemed for a long while like they were setting up for Gil to crash the party. The Watsonian explanation is, presumably, that his trackers/spies had managed to get info on where Tarvek had ended up, and the whole point of his cross-continent madboy rampage was to get Tarvek back.

I checked the page with his letter to Seffie, and there’s really nothing about what was in it other than “I’m coming to Paris.” It could easily have been a reply to her letters, since I’d wager she’s probably sending him a lot, but other than that I’m not sure why he’d write her.

I also adore Gil and Tarvek’s current dynamic, but I would’ve loved to see Gil crash the party!

Pretty sure the reason is the Dyne. All of its energy – energy that was enough to warp the land and creatures around it, energy expanded and multiplied by Egregious Heterodyne’s experiments on the spring – went into the Castle, and as we learnt during the siege, the Castle’s reach extends through the entire town as well. So once the Castle was back online, it was able to unleash all the stuff it had stored, which was. A lot.

I know there’s been speculation lately that there might be other Dynelike sources, connected to either the mirrors of the semi-immortal god-queens (or both) – but time will have to tell!

I think he legitimately thinks it’s different? As far as he’s concerned he’s utterly entitled to the crown of the Storm King and everything associated with it – including Agatha and half of the goddamn continent – and so anything he does to get those things is justified, since they should be his already. 

The Other has no such right, and she’s threatening him and what he believes is his. On the same page as the panels above, he talks about how he thinks the Queen of the Dawn is part of the Other’s plot because “she was trying to attach herself to me” – which. That’s fucking rich coming from Mr. “I altered your body chemistry so you’ll die if you don’t touch me.”

for fuck’s sake tweedle

i mean, whether or not it was Actually A Thing before it turned into time prisons and etc, can you imagine the 200 years of passive-aggressive academic journal shipping wars? 

Yeah, it’s... it’s very much ‘what’s the worst thing for you?’

Agatha’s fought tooth and nail for her agency and her town. From the moment she found out she was a Spark, let alone a Heterodyne, she’s had people trying to control her freedom, her body, her mind -- and also from the beginning, she’s had no patience for any of it, even coming from people she likes.

And then she goes to Mechanicsburg -- for allies, for a stronghold, for a position of strength -- and what she finds there is what she’s been missing, in the town that’s been missing her. It’s her terrifying town full of monsters and minions and deathtrap AIs. Hers.

Then she’s kidnapped, isolated, and has her literal physical autonomy taken away, only to discover on her escape that the town she fought so hard to save is trapped and even she doesn’t know how to undo it. And for a while she doesn't even know that Mechanicsburg is safe, if frozen -- all she knows is that Tarvek’s supposedly dead, that something is deeply wrong with Gil, and that something huge and horrible has happened to her town and almost everyone else she cares about.

Tarvek comes into his own so much during the siege: running the Empire, racing through a flaming airship to rescue the best hope against wasps, leading Jägers into battle - and at the same time his relationship with Agatha gets both more lighthearted (”There’s more to being an evil despot than getting cake whenever you want it”) and more open/vulnerable (”We could have kept him safe.”) He's found a way other than his family's; more than just "bide your time and stay alive."

And then his family crashes back in, and takes Agatha again, and he gets a knife to the chest. We find out later that he recognized the poison. He knew what it was going to do to him.

And almost as soon as he wakes up, he’s dragged back in by his family - only this time, it’s without whatever power he had before.

And... then there's Gil.

Gil, who’s been trying to prove himself to an immovable force of a father since well before we met him; Gil whose natural inclinations are airplanes and heroics and punching all his problems in the face, made and making himself responsible for everything. Gil who’s prone to self-destructive bouts of depression. Gil who can’t handle being alone.

Gil, going to take control of the Empire -- something he’s dreaded -- because so much is at risk if he doesn’t. Gil, cornered, restrained, betrayed, made to agree to being mind controlled.

Gil, spending two and a half years alone except for Bang, everyone he cares about trapped in his father’s time bubble. Gil, the Empire collapsing around his ears as everyone attacks. Gil, his every action monitored so Klaus can take over at any time if he disapproves. Gil, not allowed to be in a room with Agatha or even to listen to her reassure him remotely.

All super personalized hellscapes! All no good very bad times! Please let them rest 

Ah, you’re right - I’m looking at the beginning of “Tarvek Embarks” again - I’d remembered her “I’ve always been destined for a political marriage,” but not her “The power of love!” She also does say she’s “never made a secret” of going after Gil, which implies that it was going on for a while and that Tarvek would’ve known about it (ie, not just the timeskip).

The “I’ve been intercepting Gil’s letters since I was a child” line is…very weird, because yeah, Gil’s only been “out” as the heir since (if I remember correctly)  a few months before the story started. 

I think it’s most likely that Seffie was already stalking/obsessing over Gil when he was a no-name Spark running around Paris. Maybe she’d found out about Tarvek’s belief that the Baron was hiding a big secret about him - maybe even the Teufel story. Maybe she’d just put it together that he had to be important somehow, and then when he turned out to be Klaus’s heir that only intensified her fixation, since now she had a reason to move in on him politically.

The other option could be that she’s younger, chronologically, than the others, and she’s stretching the definition of “child” – if she’s 18ish now, she would’ve been 15ish when his identity was revealed.

Either way, I am increasingly creeped out! Because her brother is the literal worst, it’s been a little easier for me to give her leniency in comparison. I’d completely forgotten the teacup-smashing scene, which is, tbh, kind of terrifying!. Her sheer persistence is uncomfortable on its own, but totally losing her shit over Gil talking about Agatha in his letters (that she stole!) is - yikes.