Happy Birthday, Thomas Brodie-Sangster!
One night in December of 2015, I was sitting on my couch, scrolling through tumblr, not paying attention to the TV. My parents were watching The Maze Runner, a movie they had seen most of but I had never seen. I happened to look up right when Newt had a close-up, and I recognized him as the little boy Simon from Nanny McPhee. Then he opened his mouth and spoke - “He saved your life today” - and that was the push that sent me spiraling into Maze Runner hell.
I’d always liked Thomas. Granted, I didn’t know him outside of Nanny McPhee, but Simon had always been my favorite because he was so damn cute. Naturally, Thomas’s adorableness is what got me hooked on The Maze Runner, and that opened the floodgates that drowned me in a new fandom.
I don’t remember how I started watching the TMR cast interviews online, but at some point I did, and somehow I fell in love with this tall, lanky Brit and his dry sense of humor and his gorgeous hair and just everything about him. He’s such a humble human being - he doesn’t let fame get to his head and he’s not self-absorbed like a lot of other celebrities. He’s kind to his fans and polite in interviews; he gives such in-depth answers to even the most simple questions. And he has such a nice voice. I could listen to him talk for days and never get tired of it.
The friendship - no, the family - he has formed with the Maze Runner cast is the most pure thing I have ever seen. Even though the movies are over, they remain friends and still love and support each other so much. Kaya once said in a panel that you can tell when actors are just pretending to be friends for the camera, and that the friendship they forged is not like that. It is true and genuine and you can see it not only in interviews, but in the behind-the-scenes and gag reels too (good lord, the gag reels...honestly how did they get anything done on TDC they were just goofing off half the time). Thomas is a quiet person, he doesn’t talk much, but when he’s around them he so clearly relaxes and opens up and just seems comfortable. Especially with Dylan, who he arguably has the closest friendship with. They have had such a positive influence on him and I truly hope they all stay in touch and get to work together again in some form.
Thomas is such an amazing actor and in my own personal opinion, he’s better than most A-list actors who have a filmography twice as long as his. He throws everything he has into his characters and immerses himself in the story they are a part of. Wes Ball stated in the audio commentary of TMR that they took out one of Newt’s lines because with Thomas’s silent acting, it just plain was not necessary. Thomas took a scene in Scorch Trials and rewrote it with Dylan - even if it didn’t make the final cut, he still did that. And just yesterday we learned that he improvised one of Newt’s most iconic and memorable lines in The Death Cure. Thomas is honestly a gift to the acting industry and it is utter blasphemy that no one has cast him as a villain yet. Give him what he deserves, for fuck’s sake!
Okay WOW that got really long but tl;dr I love Thomas Brodie-Sangster so much and I hope he has a great 28th birthday!