I have a variety of reasons for headcanoning William Wisp as a trans man, but I wanna ramble a little about one of the big ones that I got thinking about a lot today
Which is that quite simply, I think Will’s relationship with his superpowers could be read as a kind of allegory for a trans person struggling to come out of the closet (perhaps projecting as enby who is still in the closet for the most part)
Will has this big secret, a big part of himself that initially only his close friends, parents and guardian know of. Even then, he’s scared to fully let it out and show it off in front of them. He’s not fully accepted it
As time goes by, things only get harder, the prospect of accepting it further away. More people outside of his trusted circle find out (Summer, Doug, etc). Then there’s Mallard Conway, this creepy guy who immediately clocks what William is, and follows it up with coercive and manipulative behaviour that feeds into William’s negative perception of himself and makes him hate what he is more
In season 2, when he learns he’s slowly decaying, William begins to feel like his body is betraying him. Something is so deeply wrong with it, it’s changing in ways that he doesn’t want it to, he hates it… and he blames his powers. He falls into complete denial, doing everything he can to push it away, to just be ‘normal’. Until eventually, the wisps leave. Back into the closet
But unlike he hoped, things don’t get better. They get much much worse, his mental health tanking.
Greyscale. He spirals. He hurts people, people he cares about. Becomes the worst version of himself.
And yet even after that horrific low, he continues to repress his truth… and it ends in his death. There is no good end for him as long as he refuses to live as his true self and embrace his identity as the Wisperer
And when he finally does so in the Spirit World, no longer running from who he is, he gets a second chance. He comes back with a new body, one that doesn’t decay and hurt, that finally fits. He gets to live as the real William Wisp, the Wisperer, superhero and defender of Prime
Wiwi my trans icon you mean the world to me
