Iâve been watching through the Stitch event and thereâs a bit of dialogue Lilia says that unfortunately made me Think, so I wanted to gather my babblings here.
This post contains spoilers for: Book 7, Tsumsted Wonderland 2, Lost in the Book with Stitch, Spectral Soiree/Endless Halloween, and Tamashina Mina
After spending the day fighting off Gantuâs robots, scavenging for food, and exploring the island, the boys rest for a bit in an old cottage they found. Lilia wants to take the opportunity to spruce up the cottage and make it more resort-like while theyâre enjoying this âvacationâ, and Riddle and Jack are both surprised and a bit peeved to hear him say this.
Riddle: Donât you want to find a way off this island as soon as possible, Lilia Senpai? Malleus Senpai, Silver, and Sebek⊠Everyone at Diasomnia must be worried sick about you right now. I should think youâd want to assuage their concerns a tad bit faster!
Lilia: âŠThing is, I trust them.
Riddle: You trust them?
Lilia: Mm-hmm. Knowing them, no doubt they understand Iâm safe and sound and having a good time right now. Malleus and the others know Iâm not the type of guy whoâd get in a pickle over something as trivial as this. And thatâs because they know me very, very well â just like family!
(snipped)
Lilia: Itâs truly wonderful having people in your life who trust you and wish the best for you - and for whom you do the same in return - no matter how far apart you may be.
When you take this dialogue and look at in isolation of this event, then itâs a wonderful thing to hear Lilia say. He trusts his boys and they trust him - because theyâre family, and thatâs what families do. Itâs always great to hear the characters themselves acknowledge their strong bonds with each other, and I thought it was really cute how Stitch got so happy to hear Lilia talking about his Ohana.
But when you take what he said and consider the broader story of Twisted Wonderland (vignettes and events, included), and you consider other things heâs said and done in the past⊠This dialogue just hurts.
Thereâs been small moments here and there that made me think Lilia has kind of an unhealthy(?) or warped(?) view of love. Iâm not sure what the best word for it is, but Iâve noticed that he doesnât like people worrying over him, he doesnât like emotional farewells/sappiness, and he really doesnât like letting others see him when heâs weak. Additionally, he seems to value himself very little â he doesnât think people would be worried about him if he were in danger, or that people would be happy getting pictures of him, or that his departure in Book 7 would hurt those around him so much. Iâll go ahead and put examples for each point so you all can understand better what Iâm trying to say.
He doesnât like people worrying about him
We can see this partly from the quote this whole post is based on, as well as from Book 7.
Based on his conversation with Riddle, Liliaâs way of thinking appears to be:
If someone trusts me -> that means they wouldnât worry about me
As well as:
If someone worries about me -> that means they donât trust me
But we do worry about the people we love and care about, donât we? We worry about our spouses getting home safely from a business trip, and our kids making friends at school, and our friends acing the interview theyâve been practicing for because we love them, donât we? And because we want the best for them. But it doesnât seem like Lilia thinks the same way.
And to add onto this point, itâs very clear the boys do worry about Lilia a lot, contrary to what Lilia claims. Due to Liliaâs departure, Malleus brought a snowstorm to the island in his sadness, Silver considered dropping out of school and leaving with his father, only to end up breaking down and crying in front of their crown prince of all people, and Sebek used his one wish to make Lilia be healthy and have him stay with Silver forever. They were all worried terribly about him in their own ways, but it doesnât seem like Lilia ever noticed (or maybe he did, and just didnât want to bring it up for some reason. Who knows.)
At any rate, he also gets mad (well, more like tsundere lol) at Silver when the boy was on the verge of tears after Lilia took a nasty hit for him. (I know this exchange occurred with General Vanrouge, and he was quite the asshole back then, but heâs still retained that dislike for people worrying over him.)
Lilia: Oh, would you quit it with the sniveling. I drank the potion, didnât I? I just to rest for a little bit, and then Iâll be good as new.
He doesnât like emotional farewells/sappiness
He exhibits his distaste of sappiness in Book 7 and the Welcome to Tsumsted Wonderland 2 event. In the latter, when everyone is saying goodbye to their tsums, he mentions he doesnât like the gloomy atmosphere. He wants goodbyes to be happy (and most likely, free of any emotional weight). The same can be said in Book 7, when he wholeheartedly agrees to the going away party the students wanted to put on for him, as well as when Silver mentions his father had wanted them all to send him off with a smile. Iâm not sure if Lilia just doesnât enjoy people getting serious with their emotions towards him, or if he doesnât like seeing it in general. It gives me Macho Man (tm) vibes, kind of? Like, âdonât let people see you cry and feel sad because then you look weakâ kind of thing but idk.
Lilia:Â Farewells are certainly sorrowful, but I hate leaving things on such a gloomy note. Letâs keep our chins up until the end. Tsum, your ability to surprise others was exceptional, and you made today so much fun. So long!
He really doesnât like letting others see him when heâs weak
Thereâs still a lot of loose ends to be resolved in Book 7, one of them being the full extent of Liliaâs motives for wanting to leave so suddenly. It does seem to be heâs telling the truth that his magic ran out early, since he couldnât muster up enough strength to fight back against Malleus when he was about to Overblot, but we donât know if the real reason for that is just because he âwent a little to wildâ in his youth, like he claimed, or if something else caused his magic to deplete so prematurely. But we did hear him reveal a little bit of his motives when he was talking to Floyd at the party.
Floyd was dismayed he never got a chance to fight Lilia, and he wished he couldâve seen Lilia go all out at least once. When he asks Lilia why heâs dropping out, Lilia says under his breathe that he didnât want âthemâ to see him so weak.
Lilia (whispering to himself): âŠItâs because I didnât want them to see me so feeble.
Regardless of why his magic ran out and why he wants to go the Land of Red Dragons of all places, we know part of the reason for his departure is because he doesnât want Malleus and the others to see how far heâd fallen from his former military glory. (sidebar: I have a feeling he thought heâd be a burden on Silver and co. with him losing his magic, and he was trying to leave so quickly to escape his shame towards his rapid loss of strength and independence (I imagine since heâs a magical being who comes from a country that runs on magic, him losing his powers must feel very isolating and limiting, like heâs lost a lot of the control he used to have over his own life).)
He doesnât think people would be worried about him if he were in danger
In Endless Halloween/Spectral Soiree, Lilia was surprised by how much Silver and the others had been worrying about him and Malleus when they disappeared. Interestingly, even though Lilia is the one that Silver was the most relieved to see (itâs hard to tell with the live 2d models, but it looked like he went up to hug? Lilia and Lilia slapped his hand away), Lilia later says âI didnât think youâd be so worried about us.â (referring to himself and the others involved with the party shenanigans).
(I am aware they changed this line to âI didnât think youâd be so worried about meâ In TWST EN, but Iâm just focusing on the JP version).
I just found it weird that even though Silver was very clearly worried about Lilia the most, Lilia kind of redirected Silverâs concern over from âLiliaâ to âLilia and everyone elseâ. Did it make him uncomfortable to hear Silver was that worried about him? Iâm not sure, but it just stood out to me as being a little strange how he responded, and how surprised he was that his own son would get worried about him suddenly disappearing.
He didnât think people would be happy getting pictures of him
At the end of Liliaâs Tamashina Mina vignette, Yuu stops by Diasomnia to give him some photos heâd taken of Lilia on their trip, and Sebek, Silver, and Malleus are delighted to see them, since itâs not often they get to see photos of Lilia. Lilia is surprised at how happy they are to receive those pictures of himself. But why wouldnât they be happy? They love him and treasure him dearly, of course theyâd be overjoyed to have pictures of him to remember him by. Itâs like he thought they wouldnât care about him that much, which is really bizarre, considering the whole âeven if weâre not related by blood weâre still familyâ thing he told Malleus before.
Lilia: To think, youâd all be so delighted just to see some pictures of me. I never wouldâve imagined youâd all react like this.
He didnât think his departure in Book 7 would hurt those around him so much
This relates back to what I mentioned in the first point, but thereâs one scene that demonstrates this perfectly.
After Silver breaks down in front of Malleus, Malleus teleports both of them to Liliaâs going away party. All eyes should have been on Malleus with how strangely he was acting, but the first thing Lilia honed in on was that Silver had been crying. And not only that, but Lilia looked surprised that Silver had been crying. And why wouldnât he cry? The one person who formed Silverâs entire world and sun and stars was about to leave him and go die all by himself on the other side of the planet. There is no reason Lilia shouldâve been surprised at Silverâs tears, yet he was. And I gather thatâs because he never thought the boy could ever possibly want to choose to stay by his side, to choose him over all the hopes and dreams heâd burdened on the poor child from the moment he could walk, to choose him over his real friends and his real family members.
I hope when Lilia âwakes upâ from his dream, the first he does is ask Silver what heâd been crying about back at the party. And I pray to god they will actually talk things out and Lilia will finally apologize for how much of a complete idiot heâs been acting.
My headacheâs coming back so to wrap this up quickly, my current understanding of Lilia Vanrouge is that he either doesnât realize just how loved and cherished he is by his family members, or that he does realize it and just pretends not to. If itâs the latter, which is what I personally lean towards, I think he does this as a means to protect himself.
Heâs already lost so many of his loved ones, and he very well may be putting up these walls around his heart and pushing away the people who love him just so he doesnât have to get hurt again. We donât know how he became an orphan, but his birth family either gave him up or passed away and left him behind. Even when Queen Maleficia took him in, he was always made the scapegoat for the princessâs schemes, and it sounded like he was brought up more as Levan and Mallenoaâs inferior than their equal. And then war struck their nation. And then his one best friend went missing and the other one probably gave up her life trying to protect the very child who'd go on to shatter the ice surrounding his wounded heart.
Perhaps with Malleus and Silver and Sebek now, he thought his best option would be to exit their lives before they had a chance to do the same to him, because he knew they would do the same to him. Everyone does.
As a final note, I still keep going to back to what he said in Caterâs Halloween vignette. I think this one line sums up his views of love better than I ever could:
âBut the more precious a bond is, the more pain it can inflict.â
This show is getting out of control with its meta. Basically Midge here comes to visit Barbie from her âhometownâ, and is a vintage style doll like the original Barbies and is all old fashioned, black and white, and even comes with a 50s/60s sitcom style laugh track. She canât even bend like current Barbie does!
I looked it up on the wiki, and in real life, Midge was introduced in 1963 as Barbieâs âoriginalâ best friend, and for the first two years, she did not have bendable legs. Also, the doll went out of production for 20 years and didnât come back until 1988 as California Dream Midge, so her appearing at Barbieâs house suddenly after being separated from her for a long time, getting a makeover and immediately grabbing a surfboard is all a SUPER NERDY reference to that. I love that aficionados are Barbie history and its ever changing canon are being catered to here, what a niche.
Also vintage Midge got married and had three kids in a âhappy familyâ doll line and there was a pregnant Midge doll that caused controversy because parents thought she was too young to have children (though I donât see any reference to her being a specific age?)
So I choose to believe in the canon of this show, Midge faked her death and abandoned her family back in Barbieâs hometown to start a new life in California. This dark twist adds drama.
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