My Thoughts On a Specific BFDIA 23 Scene and Its Narrative Implications
(Mild spoilers for a specific BFDIA 23 scene below the cut!)
I'm seeing a lot of people really praise the scene between Needle and Pencil during the challenge, but I personally feel as if.. people are sort of missing the point of it? I personally think that it's well written if intentional, but I'm seeing people on Twitter and such only take away from this scene: "Wow, Pencil is so kind in BFDIA! What could've possibly happened in IDFB to change her?" That's.. not true? Nothing about Pencil actually screams kind and genuine here.
(Quick disclaimer here that this is not Pencil slander. I think that she's a well written character but that her increasingly becoming more and more terrible of a person is what makes her so interesting.)
Pencil is not looking out for Needle's best interests here. In many previous episodes of BFDIA, Pencil repeatedly dismisses Needle and dehumanizes her, saying that she only has worth to her if she proves herself to Freesmart. She flips between saying that Needle is allowed to have free will and then getting mad when she makes the personal decision to consider other options. This is not even mentioning her previous behavior such as when she yells at Ruby until she cries in BFDIA 5c or when she repeatedly disregards Book's suggestions and concerns in episodes such as BFDIA 8.
So, when Pencil is saying that Needle shouldn't be winning for herself because it's more fun to win with friends, she is being a hypocrite (Especially since she has willingly abandoned Freesmart, such as when she was genuinely considering working with Fries and Coiny for the rest of the season after BFDIA 15 until Coiny wanted to add Pin to their alliance.) and also once again trying to strip away Needle's ability to have free will.
Even when Needle opens up to Pencil and talks about how she's doing all of this because of how she feels inadequate and struggling with feeling as if she is her own person outside of being a friend or an ally to someone, Pencil pretty much changes the subject and says that Needle should win the challenge for her sake. Here, Pencil genuinely thinks that she's being a good person and helping Needle, but much like how Book points out during their argument in TPOT 17, Pencil is still being selfish and dehumanizing Needle.
In fact, I'm willing to argue that this is the first domino in a chain reaction that causes Needle to fully go back to Freesmart in IDFB, as she is seen to be guarding the Science Museum on behalf of them. Again, however, she's clearly having her autonomy taken away here, as she is forced to do one duty and isn't even allowed to spend time with the rest of the group like she would've wanted.
Pencil didn't suddenly "turn evil" after this scene. She's just luring Needle in with kind words to do the exact same thing to her that she's been trying to do for literally the entire season.
