Isaac Lahey (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
freezerburned) wrote2013-04-11 01:51 am
freezerburned) wrote2013-04-11 01:51 am
Character Analysis: Isaac Lahey
Note: this was written before 3b! I still have to update it for the second half of the season.
Overview
→ 'Enjoy the show.'
What happens when those who are bullied most are given an opportunity to fight back?
This seems to be the main question in mind when the three wolves of Derek's pack are introduced in the beginning of Season Two. While Erica and Boyd both have problems at school, most of Isaac's trouble originates in his home life- his mother and brother are both dead, and his father is physically and emotionally abusive.
Isaac's situation is a complex one, and something that still is not fully explored in the show. There are reasons for this, of course- his situation is rather dark, and it's something that the showrunner doesn't quite feel comfortable with delving into in a show about teenage werewolves.
Still, as I'm not trying to appeal to a demographic, I'll go a little further into detail here and attempt to expand on what glimpses we've been shown in canon.
Teenager
→ 'I don't know. I'm not very good at this yet.'
I think that it's important to note here that most of the main cast of Teen Wolf are teenagers, and Isaac is no different. He exemplifies many traits that one would imagine when they think of a typical teenager, and in doing so, he brings a certain ineptitude and inexperience to the plot as a whole.
Firstly, Isaac is impulsive. This goes hand in hand with his violence, but he's rash, quick to anger, and when he's operating by himself, he doesn't think things through very well- this is likely because he's never really learned a positive way of dealing with anger, considering how both Derek and his father resorted to violence at such times. He's capable of taking a step back and looking at the situation, especially when being influenced by other characters, but most of the problem solving skills he's displayed have been 'hit it until it stops being an issue'. This repeatedly gets him into trouble, especially with his tendency to pick fights with enemies who are stronger than him.
Along with this problem of not being able to think things through comes a certain... well, ineptitude. Isaac is not the smartest character in the show- that's not to say he's stupid, but he's definitely a fighter, not a thinker. Isaac is not the one coming up with the game plans (and when he does, it's usually along the lines of 'are you sure we can't just kill them?'), and hell, he shows up in school for a grand total of two days in the entire third season. He was pressured into getting good grades by his father, but the one violent scene between them was due to him earning a D in Chemistry. He tries, but more often than not, he is much more moved by emotion, rather than logic, and tends to make his decisions based on how he's feeling rather than taking the facts into consideration.
Additionally, as the third season progresses, Isaac is shown with an actual sense of humor. Instead of the wry, cocksure little bastard he was in season 2, as he opens up a little, his sense of humor comes out. Isaac is intentionally flippant in morbid times, using dry wit and sarcasm to diffuse the situation. There's an almost inappropriate sense of apathy that rises up when serious things are mentioned, and above all, he just seems exasperated with things, rather than taking things at a deadly face value like Scott or Derek.
Relationships
→ 'You being happy really isn't a priority of mine.'
Isaac is also not shown to have an on-screen relationship, and given the nature of his home life, I think it's safe to assume that he's never had a long term significant other. This doesn't mean that he's adverse to the idea- a running joke in the Teen Wolf fandom is that Isaac has scenes that could be considered a prelude to romance with plenty of characters on the show. He comments on the physical attractiveness of a teacher, asked Lydia to go out with him at one point, and openly stares at a myriad of other characters. To put it bluntly, Isaac is a bit of a typical hormonal teenager, and while it's difficult for him to put stock into closeness and trust, that doesn't necessarily mean he doesn't want to.
Still, desire and reality are two separate things. I personally feel like he has to face his own demons before he can really open himself up to someone. Sure he wants a relationship, and he'd probably be keen to jump into one, but I don't think he'd be emotionally capable to keep something like that running until he gets some serious therapy or self realization or something. This sentiment isn't shared by Jeff Davis, though, so we'll see how his love life progresses as the show goes on.
As it stands now, he obviously wants the physicality of a relationship. Isaac has been presumably starved for affection at least since his mother died, and in some way, he seems to want it again. Still, he seems almost always hesitant to make the first move, instead staying where it's safe, watching people when they don't see how he looks at them, initiating nonviolent contact rather rarely.
(It's interesting to note here, that of his scenes with Allison thusfar, she pinned him, she put her hand on his with the blacklight and the motorcycle, whereas Isaac was the one who stepped in to break her handcuffs and wrap an arm around her when she was panicking. I'm not denying that he's developing feelings for her, however, simply saying that Allison is the one who tends to bridge the gap between them more often than not and that Isaac doesn't generally touch her unless the situation calls for it).
Anyway (and this is purely headcanon), but I think that from what we know of his personality so far, Isaac longs for control- in life as well as in a relationship. If he did jump into something with somebody he doesn't implicitly trust, he would try to take that control, regardless of if he could handle it or not, regardless of the other person's feelings. However, it would be far more healthy to him if he was able to be with someone he does trust so that he could relinquish a little of that, let himself be vulnerable again to someone who has the ability to hurt him. All pure speculation, of course, but I do play him with that in mind.
Lifestyle
→ 'It's a good floor. It's, uh... flat. And hard. Flat and hard.'
Again, we're sort of limited on making big guesses toward Isaac's lifestyle by the time constraints and irrelevance it apparently has toward the story. What we do know is actually sort of interesting.
-Isaac's father was the swim team coach for a time.
-His family own a graveyard,
-His brother was KIA
-His mother is dead
-He lived across the street from 'my parents bought me a porsche' Jackson
In the second season, we can presume that Isaac became homeless after his father was murdered- first as a fugitive, and then when his name was cleared, a runaway. The pack seemed to reside in an abandoned subway, but it's not known if Isaac actually stayed there, or... what. Since there really aren't many other options to consider (the Hale house having been since discovered by the Argents, and being Peter's resting place, not exactly likely- and the Lahey house was probably turned over as a crime scene, not that Isaac could inherit it anyway, being 16), we might as well presume that Derek and Isaac stayed in the subway. Whether Boyd and Erica joined them at the time was anyone's guess.
In the third season, Derek scrapes together the cash to buy an apartment... condo thing. Isaac stays there with him for a time, until Derek throws him out onto the streets. From here, he seems to just go from family to family, staying with the McCalls and growing closer to the Argents. Isaac is basically couch cruising at this point.
What I find interesting about his progression is that, due to the way he takes to being a fugitive/runaway/homeless kid, you'd want to assume that he's not used to money in the first place. However, I think it's actually the opposite: given that they live across the street from Jackson's mansion, the fact that their house is actually quite nice, the plot of land/graveyard his father owns, the death benefits from his brother's KIA, and maybe? his mother's life insurance, he was most likely pretty well off.
God knows he wears enough expensive cardigans, I mean, really.
Anyway, despite all of that, he's basically homeless as of right now. Nobody seems to care? Nobody is really intervening, school-wise, and while, if this were a real-world setting, he'd be slapped into foster care and given a healthy dose of therapy, that's not exactly what's going on here.
He takes well to having nothing, at any rate, and seems to live mostly out of a duffel bag, and it seems like he tries to make the best of things anyway, using humor to dismiss any concerns about his well being.
Violence
→ 'How do you two losers even survive?'
In choosing members of his pack, Derek selected people who basically had no other option but to accept his 'offer'- and Isaac was no different. However, the thing about giving massive amounts of power to the powerless is that it doesn't always result in cartoon heroes who use their abilities for the greater good. No, Erica and Isaac were bitter. They were resentful, angry, after years of abuse and frustration with no outlet and no one to turn to.
So they become the new bullies, prone to violence, lashing out against people simply because they can, because they have the power to do so now. This sudden shift in personality turns once-sympathetic characters into minor antagonists for the majority of the second season, and this trait of problem solving through violence is still evident in Isaac's character, almost two full seasons after his introduction.
Because Isaac has always known violence, he reacts with violence, even in situations where it's not strictly necessary. Like many abusive environments, his life at home revolved around a very skewed power balance between him and his father and it gave him a very negative impression of the world. It seems as if he feels like part of being strong is being violent, like if you don't step on people, they'll just turn around and step on you.
This is likely a big reason why he stayed loyal to Derek for as long as he did: Isaac is comfortable in a setting with a skewed power dynamic. If a guardian breaks your arm, constantly puts you in danger, and externally appears to completely disregard your personal safety... then most people would probably leave. Isaac doesn't, most likely because he doesn't realize that it's not normal (or if he does, he's adjusted enough to it that it's not a dealbreaker). Hell, even after Derek violently kicks him out on the streets in the third season, Isaac comes back a few episodes later to try and protect him.
This is also one of the huge reasons that Scott is such a powerful force in Isaac's life. Scott is stronger than him, this has been established, and for a time they were even enemies. However, Scott was most likely the first person to ever give a damn about Isaac as a person, rather than just a disobedient son or a tool. Isaac doesn't know what to do with someone who actually cares about him, and he seems almost unnerved by it early on in their relationship. However, Scott works with him, continues to support him and it seems as if the majority of Isaac's positive character development is due to someone actually being kind to him.
Abuse
→ 'He didn't used to'
Isaac's past has a constant motif of helplessness in it. He's unable to escape his situation, and at times even physically restrained and locked inside of a freezer chest in the basement. This form of abuse has many long-term consequences that we see throughout the series, even after his father dies and can no longer hurt him.
The most obvious result of this is an intense claustrophobia, to the point where forcing him in a small space will cause him to lose control and shift into his werewolf form. Isaac is locked in a closet in season three and proceeded to have a complete panic attack, in which he attacks one of the main characters and has to be forcibly calmed down by Scott. He mentions his dislike of small spaces once or twice and his worst fear is being locked back in that freezer.
However, there are more subtle results of his childhood as well. I touched on the violence/kindness dichotomy earlier, but Isaac is basically more comfortable with outright violence than he is with kindness. Anger is familiar, and kindness cannot be trusted- which is another reason why Isaac continues to stay with Derek and is apprehensive and at times even wary of Scott early on in their friendship.
In the scene we see between Isaac and his father, Mr. Lahey practically toys with his son's emotions, smiling at him and trying to brush of a bad grade like it's not a big deal, luring Isaac into a false sense of security before attacking him. From this, it's easy to jump to the conclusion that not only is Isaac not used to empathy, but he also doesn't trust it, as it was used as a mask for violence in his home life.
This leads me to a very important facet of Isaac's personality: trust. His trust is something that's not easily won- as a matter of fact, it's likely that the only person he does genuinely trust is Scott. He seems to have trouble building many secure relationships, and most of his scenes with characters-who-aren't-Scott are either volatile or... almost awkward, in a way.
This can be illustrated through his nervous tics- tightening his hands, clenching his jaw, pacing- or through his own attempt to diffuse a situation with (often macabre) humor and sarcasm. Frankly, he doesn't let people get close to him and isn't shown confiding into anyone except Scott and, recently, Allison.
Father
→ 'It's something my father taught me. Take a step back, look at the whole picture.'
It should be noted here that Isaac seemingly can't bring himself to hate his father or paint him as the bastard that everyone else sees him as. When asked how he can master his aggression during his second full moon as a werewolf, Isaac responds that his father is his anchor- the one thing he holds onto to remind himself that he's still human.
Isaac's relationship with his father is only hinted at, but the few offhanded comments he makes about Mr. Lahey imply a very complicated and multifaceted relationship. Isaac gives advice to Allison that his father had given him, and he shows some remorse at his death. Still, he comments that he wouldn't be surprised if his father was a killer and isn't shown openly mourning him, and it's clearly a very conflicting relationship. When he's reminded of how his father locked him in the freezer, all he can say is that he wasn't always this way.
With this, not only have we seen a more subtle, manipulative form of abuse- his father telling him that the beating is his own fault- but we are also given an idea that at one point, Isaac may have had a happier family, and the memories of those times are what prevented him from running away, attacking his father after being bitten, and outright loathing him after his death.
It's likely that Isaac is prone to turning blame inward, even if it isn't overtly shown throughout the series. The scene of Derek kicking him out is an intentional parallel to the scene of him running away from his father's violence earlier in the series- except when his father said 'this is your fault', Isaac turns to Derek and says 'did I do something wrong?' It's true that survivors of abuse tend to internalize attacks against them as bringing it upon themselves, and from the verbal abuse we hear during the nightmare episode, this may not be far off from how Isaac reacts.
Still, if he does, he's good at hiding it- save for the nervous tics I mentioned earlier. Isaac presents himself as overconfident and generally pretty secure, and his moments of self-doubt are only in scenes where he's extremely vulnerable and as such, are few and far between. Frankly, he's had to create a strong external persona so that he could keep himself from falling back into being a victim again. And since he doesn't know how to be kind and strong, this mask often shifts to being condescending, arrogant, and cruel- just like his father.
Loss
→ 'Well, I guess that makes me lucky, because I don't have anyone.'
What I found particularly interesting about Isaac's character is how flippant he is, regarding death- even the death of major characters in his life. This can partially be handwaved away as him mourning offscreen, but I think it's different than that.
Isaac's life has been steeped in death. For starters, his family owns a cemetery, and he apparently used to dig graves before meeting Derek. On a more personal level his mother is dead, his brother is dead, his father dies the night after Isaac takes the Bite. Throughout the series, he almost kills a hunter, witnesses the almost-death of Gerard and Jackson, he does witness the death of Boyd, and he's too late to save Erica. He has lost both his blood family and the members of his pack that he was closest to, his first real friends.
Interestingly enough, however, Isaac is never shown actually mourning. Hell, when he thought that Derek was dead, Isaac was the one to comfort Boyd and tell him not to let Derek's death get to him. Boyd got a short scene in which he mentioned Erica's death with remorse- Isaac got no such scene, even after Boyd's death. When Boyd died in front of him, Isaac just watched, blankly, and didn't bring it up for some time afterward.
From all of this, I think it's fair to say that Isaac is used to death. Maybe he doesn't want to die, but everyone is constantly dying around him, and he forces himself not to be affected by it. The nonchalance he has when mentioning his parents' death is almost morbid, but frankly, Isaac does not seem to care. Death happens, it happens to him a lot, but it's a fact of life, and he's somehow strangely detached from it.
Honestly, I think this cycles a lot back into his psychosis, the air of 'don't talk about it, don't acknowledge it, just keep moving on'. Isaac is a survivor, and in order to survive, you have to put everything behind you and just disregard it. This can potentially be seen as disrespectful, and on some levels, it is. I don't think his nonchalance about Erica and Boyd's death was because he didn't care about them- he did. Rather, it's more of the fact that he just point-blank accepts it for what it is, even when he probably shouldn't.
Transition
→ 'Why did you do this to us, Derek?'
I mentioned that Scott has been an integral part of Isaac's character development, and I think that no scene shows this better than in the second season, when Isaac turns to Scott when he's not sure if he should run away with his packmates or stay and help the protagonists fight. He gives the reasoning that Scott always wants to do the right thing, and that Isaac trusts him. Before this scene, Isaac and Scott's only interaction had been fighting one another and one scene where Scott tells him to be careful because he doesn't want him to get hurt.
It seems like a throwaway line, something a typical hero would say, but that moment was massive for Isaac, whose physical safety has been ignored his entire life. From here on, we can see Isaac begin to defer to Scott- the moral compass of the series- rather than Derek. He follows in Scott's footsteps and stays to fight, even though he doesn't believe that he personally has anything worth staying for. What's more, he actively plans ways to help Scott, and even though he uses more violence than necessary, he's still starting to use his aggression for reasons that are somewhat more morally right.
As the third season progresses, Isaac's reliance on Scott turns into more than just a budding friendship- it becomes a relationship that starkly contrasts Isaac's relationship with Derek, who is supposed to be his alpha. His friendship with Scott brings out qualities in him that he previously hadn't shown: Isaac has a fierce loyalty and a strong desire to do what's right, even if he needs help figuring out what the right thing to do is in the first place.
This loyalty gives way to him being somewhat self sacrificing. In the second episode, he risks his life to find out information on where his runaway packmates are, and he does so with a silent encouragement from Scott. Later on, he goes with Scott as a backup to meet with Deucalion, the Big Bad of the season- in the finale, he puts himself into a collapsing cellar, a location that turns his claustrophobia into a very real possibility of being buried alive to save his friends and Scott's mother. All of these scenes have a real danger to them, and in putting his life on the line for others of his own volition, rather than Derek's orders as he had in Season 2, Isaac is starting so show how he's changing as a character: from the violent, cocksure bully in early S2 into an ally and packmate in S3.
All of this seems like it's obvious, but his transition from Derek to Scott is a slow one, encompassing an entire season. In the end, Peter remarks that his loyalties are shifting from one alpha to another, that he has fully left Derek's pack and joined with Scott. And while Isaac is definitely more motivated by loyalty than morality, however, Scott's kindness inspires that loyalty in a way that Derek's anger could not manage to accomplish.
Wow~!
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