okay one thing i gotta say (now that I’m doing the rewatch too), I think Bellamy’s super udnerestimated in that first episode alone.
people all saw him as the bad guy, who was trying to save his skin, which true, he is that but I just love how smart he goes on about things.
he listens carefully to Clarke when she explains the wristbands will tell the Ark if the ground is survivable, so they could follow.
THEN-
he first goes to Murphy and Mbege (the two John’s) with the idea of them taking the wristbands off, selling them and might you-very well-the idea of why they should be free and do this. Then with confidence, he says when they ask him what they get in return, that he’ll need help managing things, so he actually believes he can pull that thing off but of course there’s also the real, non bad-ass Bellamy part of him that truly does hate the Ark system and the way it had punished him and his family (unfairly so), so she has true hatred for people like Wells and Clarke and wants to teach them a lesson (apart from him trying to save himself and protect his sister)
then, he figures wells would definitely be an obstacle. they have the whole convo by the fire when the rain starts and he talks to him about the 100 being *his people*, something he doesn’t believe truly back then but which happens to turn into a reality by the end of s1 and is the core of who he is in s2 (which is another reason why i dont get some people saying he was boring as a hero in s2; probably because they were drawn by that dark side they saw at first that imo isn’t dark at all);
and then, what is really interesting is when he treatens Wells and takes hi away from camp; he pulls out his gun then, suggesting, very much so that he could shoot him (like we already know he did the chancellor) but despite his treats and his big boy bravado behavior, he actually ends up just forcing the John’s and some of his other newly found frends to push him down and take the wristband off forcefully;
which should’ve been our cue number 1 that yes, he’s not a killer; if he really was that mean, he would’ve shot wells and taken full control by installing fear in the 100, but instead he’s smart and also, as much as we can’t see it at first very Bellamy even if we don’t know him well in just that one episode;
i know people would say that he didn’t shoot wells cause he didn’t want to add to his troubles if the rest of the Ark ever came down-true, very possible but from what we know later on, he shot Jaha in the stomach even when he could’ve aimed for the head or the heart (aka Raven’s you’re a lousy shot when two episodes down the line we find out that in fact, he isn’t at all when he saves Clarke from Anya on the bridge) but he didn’t want to; just like he didn’t want to truly hurt Wells;
he was just trying to protect his sister and make sure she would be alright while somehow maintaining a position in which he could keep living during the current circumstances;
anyway, I just wanted to say I loved the dialgue between first Bellamy-Murphy/Mbege and then Bellamy-Wells cause it showed how smart he was;
