Having feelings about the fact that the two times we see Ed lose his temper and get seriously violent and aggressive with anyone, it’s when he’s been repeatedly verbally provoked about subjects that are very painful for him. I would also argue for the case of his father, but that was more premeditated than reactive.
The first time is with the French captain, when Stede is giving Ed a dining lesson and critiques the lack of utensils. The Captain angrily snaps “I did not imagine we would be hosting your kind”, a blatantly racist Othering of Ed. (And don’t even start me on the fact that the flashback shows his mother diminishes herself compared to her white employers by saying “we not that kind of people”)
For a moment, Ed goes very still, calmly and quietly asking “my kind? what’s that supposed to mean?” and the French captain sneers “it means a rich donkey is still a donkey”. Historically, donkey was frequently used as an offensive slur towards Polynesian people by white British people and given what we later learn about Ed’s family and how he was taught to view himself by his mother, it’s no surprise that it’s an emotional trigger point.
“A donkey,” he repeats, breathing hard, “a fucking donkey”
The fact that he defensively lashes out, shouting “Do you know where I’m from? You know fucking nothing about me!” highlights just how distressing and offensive the whole interaction is. (Also worth mentioning that David Fane - Fang - is also from NZ and of Samoan descent, so having him and Taika do this scene with this particular insult is incredibly loaded)
The second time we see him lash out it’s in episode 10 and what makes it even worse is the fact that it comes after he’s been receiving the support and acceptance of Stede’s crew. He’s puttering around, humming, tidying up his living area and laughingly saying “can you believe I lived like this?” - he’s still sad about everything that happened with Stede, but there’s a light at the end of the tunnel and he’s starting to pick up the pieces.
Then Izzy forking Hands, the living incarnation of internalised homophobia and toxic masculinity intervenes.
And it’s not when he tells Ed that he should have let the English kill him. It’s not when he describes him as “this thing that you’ve become” (and hooboy, that gender identity stuff is just begging me to write it). It’s not even when he yells in Ed’s face that “this is Blackbeard” while waving a piece of propaganda.
Ed’s clearly hurt and tired and saddened by it, but the thing that pushes him over the edge is when Izzy dares to bring up Stede, mocking him for “pining for his boyfriend”, when Ed’s cracked and broken heart is still raw and fragile. The fact he does it to make him stop talking makes my heart hurt.
And Izzy doesn’t care about that. All he cares about is reawakening the violent, physical, aggressive man that he wants and when he shows his approval, Ed immediately recoils, backing away in distress. The damage is done. Izzy has proved his point by jabbing his fingers straight into an open wound and laughing when Ed reacted to make him shut up.
Ed is not by nature an explosively violent person and the fact it takes people repeatedly slamming on his emotional vulnerable places with a verbal hammer to make him react in an aggressive way speaks measures for him.
Don’t get me wrong, he’s very good at doing a violence as part of the job - he loves a good maim and all that - but violence as an emotional reaction? It takes a lot to get that out of him and often when he’s already feeling off-balance.