I was meta-ing with @pirate-nonsense and she told me I should make a post on it so here we go:
Let’s talk about Silver, insecurity, and the reason he used Dufresne’s head as a trampoline. This season we’ve seen him insult himself a number of times, and it’s depressing as hell. A lot of it has seemed to revolve around his leg. Such as calling himself a “one-legged creature.” But it’s not just that. When he was in the boat with Flint, he said without the crew all he was is an “invalid.” I think that goes back to season 2, in that scene where he claimed the gold to be gone, and thus his time with Flint’s crew was finished. Flint needed Silver in that moment. He couldn’t afford to have him leave. So Flint made a point in saying how without the crew; Silver was nothing. That where else would Silver go where he mattered?
Here’s the thing, I think Flint did bring up some insecurities that were probably buried within Silver. While Silver came across confidant, even arrogant, we all know that means jack shit. Silver believed what Flint said, he even said to Flint in season 3 that he was the reason that Silver started to give a shit about the crew.
Then he lost his leg. After that speech from Flint, learning that a crew member would murder another based off of a LOOK that Silver gave him, Silver had his leg cut off. This experience was, obviously, traumatic, and it added more insecurity to him. He wouldn’t use the crutches. He wouldn’t be seen as weak around the men. This, obviously, showed his new insecurity. Because in season 2 he allowed himself to get the living hell beat out of him in an attempt to work his way back into the crew. He wasn’t overly prideful. But he now feels he needs them. He can’t afford to have the crew thing anything less of them, because he needs them. Without them he thinks he’s nothing, because where else would he go? He now has one leg, and I think in a way when he lost his leg, Silver felt like he lost all other options.
Then the scene with that dick known as Dufresne. Now, let’s recall the first two seasons. Silver gets insulted. A lot. Someone should make a gifset of that. I don’t have the talent for it. But he was insulted quite a bit, and while I doubt he LIKED it, it didn’t seem to horribly bother him. He could roll with the punches because, honestly? I don’t think he believed any of it to be true. He was confidant in his abilities (though based off of the season 2 thing not confidant in where they’d take him without the crew) and he knew he was intelligent. That scene with Dufresne, though? He called Silver an invalid. Mirrored Silver’s own words. Called him half of a man. I think the reason Silver lost it in that scene, and used that dick known as Dufresne as a bouncy house, wasn’t because Dufresne was being mean, and it wasn’t calculated at ALL. Think about it, to leave a witness able to identify him after he left would only serve to PROVE that Flint was in fact back. That he himself had survived. Silver’s smart enough to know this. Without any witness to identify him, others were left to question whether or not Silver had really been there at all.
But Silver’s actions weren’t based off of logic, and Dufresne’s words did have an effect on him, because I think Silver thought they were true. Dufresne was quoting exactly what Silver was thinking in his own mind, and that’s why Silver lost it in that moment. He lost it so badly he didn’t even feel the physical pain he caused himself until after he’d calmed down.
Perhaps when Silver killed Dufresne, he also killed some of his own insecurity, and that must have felt pretty damn good.
