Hello there.
Once again I’m doing a video that wormed its way into my head due to a comment from
a viewer.
[speaking russian]
What?
Oh, that's the wrong one.
Here we go.
“I have a question. Why is young Peter Hale so deceptive and seeming like one of the bad guys?
Shouldn’t he have only started to be bad and crazy after the fire not before?”
The simple answer is that Peter was always a bad guy.
That’s “bad” in the old comic book vernacular, not this new, overly-complicated universe
of the current timeline where all villains just want to be loved.
Ahhhhh
Kate Veatch: I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.
Peter is an old fashioned villain, a Shakespearean villain.
He’s mostly Iago, a dash of Richard 3 with a sprinkle of Lady Macbeth thrown in
for flavor.
Despite what the polling shows here and over at the Official Teen Wolf Wiki App, I don’t
actually think it’s that complicated.
Peter Hale always was, is and will be a bad guy.
If you enjoy these little jaunts into Teen Wolf canon and nostalgia, you’re welcome
to join us.
Subscribe and get on the bus every week as we go back to Beacon Hills.
Let’s start by answering that specific viewer question. Why did Peter act like a bad
guy before the fire drove him to be an insane blue bigfoot?
All the answers are in there in the Season 3 episode Visionary but they’re not actually
said out loud until Season 4.
First a warning: In Visionary, only believe the flashback or what you can see for yourself.
Never trust adult Peter’s telling of this story because he's lying.
Back in the before time, we see Peter always lurking and watching.
He spies on Derek and his lady love Paige.
He then spies on Talia in her meeting with the other Alphas.
And if you noticed, he seems very interested when Ennis forcefully defies Talia.
Ennis: Useless debate! I'm done with it!
Deucalion: Ennis don't.
It’s after this display of defiance against Talia and the status quo that Peter sets about
manipulating Derek into turning Paige.
Young Peter: I'd probably be thinking about it all the time.
Young Derek: Thinking about what?
Young Peter: Her finding out. There's really only one way to make sure you'll always be together.
turn her.
Laura told you about the packs being her, right? There are more alphas than I've ever seen in once place.
Your mother would never do it and these packs won't be here much longer. the time to do it is now.
One little bite and she never gets sick again. She stays younger, more beautiful.
Derek, the bite is a gift.
It’s important to realize that this whole thing has very little to do with Paige.
Peter’s goal is to somehow emotionally connect Derek to the only Alpha brash enough to defy Talia
If he can get Paige into Ennis’ pack, then Derek is not only in debt to the angry alpha,
he’ll be constantly influenced by Ennis’ kill-first attitude via his girlfriend Paige.
Peter is grooming Derek, showing that his way, Peter’s way, of immediate action
is superior to Talia’s leadership style which calls for wisdom first
and action only as a last resort.
He is trying to take control of Talia’s son to weaken Talia.
That’s it.
There’s nothing more complicated.
He doesn’t show sympathy or love for Derek any more than Scar does for Simba.
Peter is already a fully formed villain at this point in his life.
Peter’s motivation is more show than tell in Visionary.
But all that is made clear when we get a glimpse inside Peter’s head in the Season 4 episode
Monstrous.
This is our bridge between the Hale house fire and Peter’s killing spree in Season 1.
Peter: I predicted this. I told Talia that this was going to happen.
I said that they were going to come for us. The Argents are going to come for us.
They're going to burn us to the ground. Did she listen?
Of course not. They listened to her, that everything was going to be fine we were all perfectly safe.
She made us weak. And what happens to the weakest in the herd? They get picked off by predators.
We used to be the apex predators.
While Peter will claim that these are the ravings of a man driven mad with pain, he
references conversations he had with his sister prior to the fire about her management of
the family, her influence on the wider supernatural world and their live-and-let-live relationship
with the Argent family.
Talia referenced her philosophy on this back in Visionary when she pointed out to Ennis
that the Argents were, at that point, sticking to their code of only hunting those who hunt them
Talia: It's his (Gerard's) right. We're not the only people to adhere to rituals thousands of years old.
As he expressed in his coma rant, Peter thought Talia’s leadership was too weak to keep
the family safe.
His plan to kill everybody and start over is the only crazy thing in this. The rest,
his critique of his sister, is an honest recitation of how he felt before the fire.
He always thought the only way to keep the family safe was to dominate and destroy the
Argents.
He could not tolerate the ongoing détente and was looking forward to taking over the
family once he was fully healed.
And we saw what went down once he was fully healed.
He claims he was driven mad with pain and we all kind of believed him.
But Peter’s actions after the fire, while not as elegant and artful, match pretty well
with his actions prior to the fire.
He manipulated and used people to meet his ends.
He disposed of his niece to gain the alpha spark and kept Derek running around in circles
despite his desperate pleas for help.
Derek: Just give me anything. Blink. Raise a finger, just anything
Peter only revealed himself once he was caught and he felt it was too late for anyone to
stop his revenge plan.
I could go into his role in Season 2, manipulating Lydia from beyond the grave or recap the whole
Season 4 plan that had him teaming up with Kate Argent to kill Scott but that’s really
all just more of the same pattern of villainy manipulating and moving people like pieces
around a chess board in pursuit of power.
Peter sticks to this pattern throughout and I don’t personally believe that changes
once we get into his perceived redemption arc in Season 6.
If enough people show interest in this video, I’ll follow up next time with why I don’t
think anything Peter does in Season 6 changes his villain status.
Thanks for watching.
Do the YouTube things, like and tell me in the comments if you want the follow up.
I’ll see you next time we go back to Beacon Hills.