Why Sal and Larry step-brother writing decision should never happen
hi, i have to rewrite everything from the ground up because some stupid notification popped up and made me lose all my progress. anyways, let's begin (again).
salarry is definitely the most debated and controversial ship ever in the fandom. nowadays, a lot of people ship salvis because i believe it's more 'acceptable' ship besides salash. now, if you ship salvis then it's okay and i have nothing against you shipping them in general but it's not my cup of tea and i believe they just wouldn't work at all in romantic relationship.
however, salarry was definitely the most popular ship within the fandom throughout 2016-2019 (?) but a lot of people ship them further in later years until salvis took over.
this is something i thought about before is that i found it very funny that people can ignore travis having conflicted feelings towards sal after sal tried to be friends with him even though it never worked out. this is directly coming from the creator's mouth in one of his streams. yet, whenever people tried to ignore the whole 'step-brother' decision between sal and larry. now, it's 'you can't do that' ordeal even though there is someone out there who ships ash and todd despite todd is canonically gay and has a boyfriend. i believe this is because it's out there in the open so that's why.
many reasons why i don't think this should ever happen is the creator encouraging the ship and is fine with it. of course, there are people out there who disagree with his take (which is fair), however the shippers kept on shipping them as normal because both sal and larry didn't became step-brothers in their 20s and just happened to become one when both of their parents got married. i'm a new fan of this game back in 2022, while i may not be there from the beginning. i could at least say something about this topic. what really gets me is that i saw many people from tiktok under the comments, saying that they "never" ship them despite the fact that they have shipped them but just don't want to admit it.
mind you, sal and larry were the only first developed characters in chapter 1 (strange neighbors) and chapter 2 didn't came out till 2017 only a year later after the first chapter which was released in 2016. it's funny to see people not getting why lot of fans from the beginning ship them even though it's quite obvious why a lot of them ship them because of their chemistry and their fun personalities.
an argument that people would have is that both sal and larry see each other as family within the game. while i do understand why because in larry's suicide note, larry called sal his 'brother' and sal saying he's 'glad' he's part of the 'family' in episode 3 (the bologna incident) when looking through larry's locker. makes sense, right? well, not really because sal also directly ash his 'family' despite the fact he has a crush on her. sal keeps referring to larry as 'friend' a lot in his dialogue in episode 4. sal saying 'the four of them' (todd and ash) were like family to him during the court in episode 4 (the trial).
this is where i believe things gets super messy when it comes to this writing decision because if the creator does want us to ship sal and larry then he shouldn't made them step-brothers at all. it's simple as that. one of the biggest examples that i believe this should never happen at all is larry telling sal “he doesn't care what other people think of them” and “three of us”even so much as far asking him “what do you think?” in episode 4 when sal had one of his ‘glitch’ moments whenever you picked up the tapes. sal would response to larry with a “uh sure”and larry saying “huh, i didn't think you'd be into that idea.”
keep in mind, this is the same episode where we found out they were step-brothers and the wording sounds like he’s asking for a threeway, which is a lot of people thought of when this dialogue first appeared. of course, the creator said he kept this vague on purpose so people can fill into what larry was saying to sal. if you have people literally thinking he was talking about a threeway to his supposed step-brother then that means it should never ever happen at all. this is something i’ve noticed a pattern where a character says something then the creator will say something else. for example, the scene where sal tells travis in the bathroom he’s not gay or none of his friends are gay expect for todd, yet the creator says that sal’s sexuality is up to interpretation.
i believe the reason why sal and larry became step-brothers is because it seemed like it was planned in advance so much as far back in episode 3 where if you go to the basement and go to lisa’s door, you’ll see a bunch of flowers outside of her room. when clicking upon them, you’ll see a written note from herny, telling her he hopes she gets better soon. however, i believe a lot of people missed this part because this game will automatically think that you got those items or supposed to know what was going to happen like jim’s notes, sal and larry mentioning about megan’s father at the part where her dad was hanged, and possibly so much more.
another big factor i believe this should never happen is when sal and larry go to the bathroom and janis (todd’s mom) will comment ‘did those boys go into the bathroom together?’ and both larry and sal didn’t say anything about it. we could make the argument that they were just a little uncomfortable by what she said, follow by larry’s “…” appeared on screen but we don’t know that for sure.
for some reason, janis should at least know they were step-brothers because according to the creator, he says lisa and her are best friends so it made me think was ‘she just never invited to the wedding at all?’ and well, you can make another argument saying that she was high so it would probably make sense for her to kinda say something like that but still, an odd joke to make.
another reason why this should never happen is both sal and larry were watching a movie together in episode 5 (memories and dreams) and sal asked larry if anyone could love him the way those people in the movie do. larry responded with “what? don’t be stupid! you’re sally face, anyone would love you! you’re perfect!” someone did say that it feels more romantic which i do agree because i’ve never heard step siblings say that to each other ever unless you have very respectful relationship with them but still.
another point i want to make is that the fact they don’t feel like brothers at all even after their parents got married and i feel like the only reason why the ‘brother’ line was added in larry’s note because steve wanted to, despite the fact it doesn’t make any sense because if you want players or fans to interpreted the relationship however they want, maybe don’t make them siblings in the first place. you could literally remove this entire section part of the game because it’s not needed and nothing will change the course of the story.
how i describe it is like playing with barbie dolls and he’s sharing the characters with us so maybe it’s like he see his characters this way but you could see them that way even though people won’t likely see that way because the writing sometimes feels like it doesn’t want to do with sal and larry’s relationship, which is also said by someone else on tiktok and i definitely agree with that take.
i definitely remember someone on pintrest talking about how they recently joined the fandom and has already shipped sal and larry but soon discovered that they were step-brothers and now is conflicted of shipping them. mind you, they JUST join the fandom and has ALREADY shipped them. again, it goes to show you that the whole step-brother writing decision should never ever happen.
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