Wirt Application for entranceway

[singloversing]

Name: Koji
DW username: losers_day
E-Mail: timefortags [AT] gmail [dot] com
IM: goodhotcocoa
Plurk: goodhotcocoa

Other Characters: James Potter [pottershotter], The Once-ler [thneedifestdestiny] and Tohru Honda [breakthecurse]

Character Name: Wirt
Series: Over the Garden Wall
Timeline: Between episodes five and six
Canon Resource Link: Wirt on the Over the Garden Wall Wiki ; Over the Garden Wall on Wikipedia. There's also a section from the comic book, which unfortunately I haven't found a good summary for anywhere, but I've marked that section off clearly in the app.
Character History:
Wirt is about fifteen years old, dressed like a garden gnome, wandering through the Unknown.

Allow me to back up though – throughout the series, we're given some clues as to what his life was like before the series began. Wirt was an only child for a long time. He had a mother and a father for a while, but sometime before Wirt turned nine his father left the picture. It is never made clear exactly how this happened, but there are some strong implications that it may have been a nasty divorce.

Wirt's mom eventually remarried another man, and then when Wirt was nine she and her new husband had a new baby – a little boy they named Gregory. Wirt calls Greg his little brother (never half-brother) but he does not like his stepfather very much and will sometimes refer to him as just “Greg's Dad”. There doesn't seem to be any indication that Greg's Dad is a bad person. The only problem seems to be that Greg's Dad is more extroverted than Wirt is, and Wirt tends to feel like he's messing with his life by doing things like repeatedly suggesting he join marching band.

Fast-forward to Halloween six years later and Wirt is sitting alone in his room, agonizing over a mixtape he's made for a girl named Sara. He paces around, throws it at the wall in frustration, but then decides to be brave and go for it. Since it's Halloween, he puts together a costume before going out (which seems to be a last-minute decision, since he didn't have a costume to begin with). He cuts the trim off a Santa hat and throws an old blue wartime nurse's cape over his shoulders and heads off to go declare his love for Sara.

Declaring his love for Sara proves to be difficult though, because Wirt has some relatively severe social anxiety. Sara is the mascot for the football team and when he gets there he can't even go in the gate – he just stands there and watches her, tape in hand. Greg wanders by soon, after helping Old Lady Daniels in her garden, and figures out pretty quick what's happening – and much to Wirt's horror, he takes the tape and heads off to give it to Sara. He's stopped on the way by some girls Wirt knows, and he rushes in to stop him before Greg can ruin his life, but he can't seem to get the words out. They ask what he's supposed to be dressed as and he just kind of stammers and can't really explain, and then they tell him to hurry and give the tape to Sara because Jason Funderberker is planning to ask her out, and Wirt just sort of short-circuits at that point and leaves. He can't compete with Jason Funderberker.

Greg follows him and they walk a little ways while Wirt wallows in misery and Greg begs to go catch frogs. They quickly realize the girls still have Wirt's tape though, and when they run back to the football field they tell him they put it in Sara's jacket. Getting the tape out of her jacket means going to a party he wasn't actually invited to though, and clearly his life is over and Sara and Jason are going to listen to his clarinet and poetry and they're going to laugh and laugh and laugh. Greg has no such issues and just rushes into the party, and when Wirt follows in a panic, it turns out that everyone was actually pretty happy to see him show up. He finds Sara and she invites him to a graveyard a few of their friends are heading to, but Jason Funderberker is there and Wirt declines the offer. However, since he was unsuccessful at retrieving his tape for Sara, he and Greg follow them to the graveyard. Even then though, he can't bring himself to approach his friends, and instead he hides behind a gravestone. At first he tells Greg to hide too, but then he sees Jason Funderberker holding Sara's hand and in a fit of jealousy he sends Greg out to act as a distraction. Unfortunately, this backfires and his friends find out he's there, and Wirt is absolutely mortified.

This doesn't last very long though, as a police officer breaks up the gathering and they all scatter in different directions. The officer follows Wirt and Greg, and in a panic they climb up a tree and jump over the cemetery wall, ignoring the officer's insistence that it's dangerous. Greg finds a frog and Wirt yells at his brother for ruining everything, despite the fact that ultimately Wirt created most of his own problems. He doesn't have much time for that though, as they're on train tracks and a train is coming. The two jump out of the way in time, but they go rolling high-speed down a hill and crash into water.

Then, Wirt and Greg are walking in the woods, with no recollection of how they got there. Wirt starts to panic immediately about it, realising they're lost and they need to figure out how to get home. Nearby, they hear the Woodsman chopping down a gross oily tree, and they rush over to investigate. Greg and Wirt argue about whether to go ask him for help until it dissolves into a shh battle, but when the Woodsman leaves Wirt wonders if maybe they really should have asked him for help.

That's when a talking bird (Beatrice) offers her assistance and Wirt smacks himself in the face in disbelief. While he tries to explain to Greg that birds brains aren't big enough for cognizant thought, he offends her and calls her an it, and the commotion draws the Woodsman's attention to them. He demands they explain why they're out there and Wirt is the one who tries to answer and he just says they're trying to get home (with all their arms and limbs attached). The Woodsman says the woods are no place for children, and that there is a beast afoot. He calls it the Unknown, and says they're more lost than they realize and this does not help Wirt's nerves in any way at all.

The Woodsman brings them to an abandoned home he's been staying in that's attached to an old grist mill, and they learn that he grinds the trees into oil for his lantern. He describes it as his burden, and it creeps Wirt out a lot so he starts plotting with Greg to escape, but decides his plan of knocking the Woodsman out and running for it is a dumb one. The Woodsman asks what they're whispering about and Greg tells him, even as Wirt tries to shh him again. They're told to leave if they wish, but the Woodsman warns them that the Beast is in the woods, singing and searching for lost souls to steal. He says he'll guide them through the woods if they're still there when he returns from his work, and leaves them alone in the house.

Wirt is very conflicted about whether to trust this weird Woodsman or not and debates it to himself while not really paying attention to what Greg is doing. He tries to ask for Greg's opinion, but Greg just gives him a rock fact and Wirt tells him to go play with his frog while he lays on the Woodsman's couch and wallows in his indecision, thinking about how he's a boat upon a winding river, twisting towards an endless black sea, drifting further away where he wants to be - who he wants to be. The mental poetry continues until he gets bored and finds a wooden ball on a stick to play with, but then he hears noises outside. Greg is probably in trouble but he hesistates and noticeably does not want to go out there. The Woodsman returns and asks where Greg is but Wirt has no idea at all. Just then Greg turns up with a demonic dog creature on his trail. He also knocks out the Woodsman and things go from bad to terrifying very quickly.

To make a long action sequence much shorter, it turns out Greg accidentally led it there with a candy trail and Wirt blames him for their predicament. They figure out a way to defeat the dog, but in the process they destroy the grist mill and the Woodsman kicks them out. He also tells off Wirt for blaming the entire thing on Greg, and says that as the older child Wirt is the one who is responsible for their mistakes. He nervously apologizes, but is at a loss because he can't actually fix anything they've done.

After that, they head north as the Woodsman suggested, and they run into Beatrice again. Greg saves her from a bush and she says she owes him a favor after that. She offers to bring them to Adelaide of the pasture, the good woman of the woods, saying that she can get them home. Wirt is immediately distrustful and wants absolutely nothing to do with talking birds or magic, so he leads them to Pottsfield instead. She follows them along to Pottsfield, a little colonial town. The town seems to be abandoned at first, and the only resident Wirt immediately finds while he's looking for a phone is a turkey.

Soon though, they hear singing from a barn and find people in vegetable costumes dancing around a pole. They're told that they should don their own pumpkin costumes as well and join in, but it's clear immediately that they aren't like anyone else there. Wirt thinks they seem nice enough, even if they're kind of weird so he ignores Beatrice's complaining about how creepy the whole thing is. He speaks to one pumpkin lass who says he looks like he's too early, like he's not ready to join them yet, and mentions people don't just pass through Pottsfield. He mentions wanting to leave and the party stops and turns on him, but Enoch steps in before anything happens – Enoch being a large pumpkin-headed being with a straw body. Wirt tries to explain what happened, but Enoch isn't pleased that they barged in and trampled their crops and interrupted their party so he sentences them to a few hours of manual labor.

Wirt is okay with this punishment and trusts that the pumpkin people will let them go when it's all done, so he and Greg tend to the crops and fields in shackles. It's not so bad, except for that time turkeys took his hat. The last task is digging holes and Beatrice asks what they'll do after that. The day had actually gone so okay that Wirt debates just staying in Pottsfield after that, but admits he doesn't know what they'll do at all. Beatrice points out that maybe they're going to bury Wirt and Greg in the holes they're digging, and Wirt doesn't believe it...until Greg digs up a skeleton, at which point he begs and pleads for Beatrice to help them and pick their locks. The pumpkins come to check on the progress and Wirt stalls for time while Beatrice undoes their shackles. Wirt sees Greg run off with Beatrice and is astonished they just left him there (though it turns out Beatrice had already picked his lock and he just didn't notice). This allows Wirt to learn the secret of Pottsfield though – the skeletons come to life and don pumpkins to join the party. Enoch asks if Wirt's sure he doesn't want to stay, but Wirt absolutely wants to leave the creepy skeleton town. Enoch laughs darkly and just tells him he'll join them someday.

[The following section is from the comic book, because it fits very neatly into the canon overall.]

After that they decide that maybe following Beatrice is a better idea, so they start trying to find Adelaide of the pasture. They start wandering around in her general direction and Wirt is content to let Beatrice take the lead and to let his thoughts drift away back home to Sara and how much he messed things up, but also it occurs to him that it's just easier to follow someone else around. He admits in his mind that there's a comfort in being lost and that not having to be the leader took the burden off of his shoulders. He spends a lot of time no paying attention to what's going on around him.

They come across four soldiers sailing across the plains in a bicorne hat. Really. While Wirt isn't paying attention Greg and Beatrice agree to join their crew so they can sail to Adelaide's house. Wirt protests that it's not safe since boats can't just sail around on grass, but then they threaten to leave without him so he hurries along up a rope ladder on the side of the ship. He's anxious about how weird this all is, but Beatrice tells him to just do everything she says without question and after a thoughtful pause he agrees. Wirt spends most of his time on the boat staring off into the plains as they sail, and he's praised for “taking initiative” and “watching for enemy reinforcements” even though he's really not doing much watching at all. He's just lost in thought, watching the plains roll by them and realizing they do seem like ocean waves. Everything almost made sense for a minute. The soldiers keep promoting Wirt in the ranks even though he's not really doing anything and they tell Greg he should be more like his brother, who follows orders like a good soldier.

Beatrice keeps trying to get Wirt's attention but his thoughts have drifted back to Sara and she doesn't manage it until she threatens to blow up the bicorne boat. Wirt threatens to report her to the General, since blowing up the ship will blow up everyone on it, and she offers to commandeer it instead, but Wirt doesn't like that either, insisting he's not a hijacker. She again tells him to follow her every command or she'll ditch them, and when he points out that she's honor bound to help them she mentions it's not the first time she's been dishonorable. He's forced to either stick with his morals or compromise his ideals so Beatrice doesn't abandon them. Given those two options, he reluctantly agrees to help her and he relieves the soldiers so he can steer the boat overnight.

He and Beatrice talk for a while as he steers the boat, and he asks her if girls like poetry. She insists that no one likes poetry, and when Wirt points out that some people do she clarifies that no one like people who like poetry. She accuses him of being just like his brother for asking questions, even though he's just trying to make conversation, and it actually offends him. He takes a lot of pride in not being like Greg, who's always getting into trouble. Wirt prefers to avoid conflict and wants to stay out of people's lives as much as he can. Beatrice points out how said this is, that he basically wants to float through life like a ghost, and Wirt is forced to admit it doesn't sound great when she puts it like that. But she claims it makes him perfect for steering the boat all night alone and goes to sleep, and Wirt can't protest for fear of her ditching them. She tells him to keep going east, the direction of the moon, and he's so focused on following her orders that it doesn't occur to him that the moon changes positions overnight. He spends the night reciting poetry in his head and disagrees with Beatrice – how can no one like poetry? What is the world if not poetry?

In the morning, a ship (shaped like a wash bin) approaches them and in order to avoid it Wirt would have to go off course. He tries to wake everyone up for advice on what to do, but no one stirs. He decides to just keep going straight and follow Beatrice's orders, even if it seems stupid, because it's always worked before and it's easier to follow her commands than to make his own decisions about what's going on. Predictably, they crash into the other boat, which is being driven by Greg, who escaped at some point. He and the soldiers have a very silly battle and Greg loses. They commend him for his fight but also banish him, and they banish Wirt as well for rising too high in the ranks. They sail away without them, and Wirt, Greg, and Beatrice realize that Wirt managed to steer them right back to where they started, so they make no progress at all.

[End of comic things!]

From there, they continue their search for Adelaide. Greg tries to get them to sing but neither Wirt or Beatrice are thrilled by that. Wirt keeps trying to tie his shoe, but Beatrice won't let him stop, and then she tells Greg that he should be more like his brother – a pathetic pushover who relies on others to make his decisions for him. This of course, as the comic revealed, is exactly what he is but he doesn't appreciate being called out on it and insists he's not a pushover. While he's busy being annoyed by that, Greg wanders off somewhere and they have to go and find him. They stumble on a school, and the teacher tells them to sit down because they're late for class. Beatrice tries to get them to leave but it's too late. Wirt has begun a passive aggressive pushover war and spends the entire episode doing everything anyone asks him to do (except Beatrice) just to make her angry and to prove a point. She points out Greg could be in trouble somewhere, but he's just running around outside so Wirt has zero reason to stop what he's doing. He even willingly sits in the dunce box after the teacher sends him there. Beatrice is getting more annoyed by the minute, and Wirt is very pleased by that. He stubbornly keeps it up all day, and when they all lay down to sleep with the animal students for the night, Beatrice admits he's not a pushover – he's a stubborn jerk! And when asked when he's going to give it up his answer is “maybe never”. There's some drama with the school being closed and a gorilla but that has more to do with Greg than Wirt – except for the part where Wirt accidentally tackles a guy in a gorilla suit because he trips on his untied shoes.

After that, they head off on the journey to Adelaide again and Beatrice makes them stop at a creepy tavern for directions. Wirt doesn't want to go in and at first suggests that Greg and Beatrice go ask for directions, but then he realizes he doesn't want to be outside alone either. He finally agrees to go, but he's too anxious about asking the tavern people for directions, so he asks Beatrice to do it. Unfortunately, Beatrice gets kicked out immediately because the Tavern Keeper doesn't want bluebirds in her tavern, and says they're bad luck. So Beatrice has to wait outside while Wirt gets the directions.

This proves to be a struggle. The people in the tavern won't help him at all until they know who he is, and “Wirt” is not sufficient. They're looking for a title, like the Baker or the Tailor or the Tavern Keeper, and Wirt...has no idea. He says he doesn't really like labels and that he's just...himself. The people of the tavern wonder if he's “simple” and he insists he's not. He keeps trying to ask and they wind up under the mistaken impression that he's the Young Lover, and that Adelaide is the girl he's pining for. This is only about fifty percent correct at best but they still throw him up onto the stage and toss him around gleefully. They make him sing a song and it is both terrible and has very little to do with being a young lover, since it's all about needing directions, and that's when the Butcher figures it out – they're the Pilgrims.

Wirt...kind of likes this title, once he realizes it's not about guys with buckles on their hats. He's a traveler on a sacred journey – the master of his own destiny, and the hero of his own story. The Tavern folk ask him to tell them stories about the challenges they've overcome and Greg is the first to chime in with amazing things Wirt has done in the last few days and it's met with cheers so Wirt tentatively tells them about meeting the Woodsman, and how he told him about the Beast. He was expecting them to not know this story, but they all gasp. They know very well of the Beast, and he gets more information from them in song than he has at all so far. They tell him that the Beast lures lost souls in the Unknown, and that when they lose their will the Beast turns them into a tree of oil and burns that oil in his lantern. This confuses Wirt because the Woodsman was the one with the dark lantern and the oil trees, and that he had told them where to go, but the Tavern Keeper points out that listening to him got them more lost than ever. That reminds Wirt about asking for directions, and something about being the Pilgrim made him more comfortable asking for them directly. But, the people of the tavern are not helpful and just tell him to follow his heart.

Before he can insist further, he hears Beatrice scream, and the people of the tavern all encourage him to go save her and to get themselves home, and cheer him on as he leaves. He's very nervous, since he's never truly had to be a leader or save anyone before, but their support gives him the courage to try something reckless, and he steals a horse (which he's never ridden before) and rides off into the Unknown to go save Beatrice, and grabs both Greg and a lantern on the way. Soon, they come across an Edelwood tree and the Woodsman, and Beatrice is knocked out beside him. Wirt accuses the Woodsman of being the Beast, and of trying to turn Beatrice into an Edelwood tree, but before he can explain Wirt blows out his lantern and scares the horse – which, in turn, startles the Woodsman and makes him easier to grab so that Greg can get Beatrice. They knock over the Woodsman's latern in the process and accidentally set the Edelwood tree on fire as they climb back on their horse and leave. Beatrice comes to and Greg tells her about how amazing Wirt just was but she's not impressed because they were supposed to get directions. Wirt did get the directions though – from Fred, who turned out to be a talking horse.

After that they go to the mansion of Quincy Endicott and Wirt and Greg pose as his long-lost nephews. When Wirt asks Beatrice why they're bothering with this, she explains that it's so they can steal from him. Wirt is not a fan of this idea, but Beatrice and Fred both think it's a good plan and Fred is actually excited by the idea. However, Wirt only agrees when he learns they just need two pennies – which is the price to get on a ferry that will take them to Adelaide's house. They can probably find that in couch cushions, so while Greg, Fred, and Endicott go on a ghost hunting adventure, Wirt and Beatrice go looking for loose change. Beatrice manages to break half the room because birds aren't very good at searching for things, but even Wirt knocks over a vase. They think they hear Endicott coming back, so they hide in an armoire, but they get locked inside of it. Wirt looks for change while they're in there, and Beatrice suggests checking the seams, since she used to sew coins into her clothes when she was human.

This surprises Wirt – he had no idea she was actually a human this whole time. He pesters her about why she's a bluebird, but she's very reluctant to answer and tries to get him to tell his dark secrets instead, but he claims his secrets are too secret. While this conversation is going on they find a secret passage and escape the armoire. Finally she tells him that she threw a rock at a bluebird and it cursed her and her family, and now they're all bluebirds. It's why she's going to Adelaide's herself, to have Adelaide use her magic scissors to snip their wings away, or at least that was the plan. Compared to that, Wirt's secrets aren't really that bad – he tells Beatrice that he has a crush on a girl, and he thinks about her a lot, and that he plays clarinet and whispers poetry to himself at night. Beatrice says they're not weird (except the poetry); they're just character traits.

She asks him what else he likes to do and he just says he doesn't know, but then he notices something weird about where they are. The passage led them to a part of the house that doesn't match the rest. He can tell it's French Roccoco style and not Georgian like the rest of the mansion. Beatrice is weirded out that he knows that off of the top of his head and it makes him feel kind of awkward. But he figures out the mystery of the house! It turns out that Endicott's mansion is so big that it actually connected to the mansion of his business competitor, Margueritte Grey, and that she's the beautiful ghost Endicott thought he was seeing. Endicott rewards Greg for helping him face his fears with two pennies, and they wind up not having to steal from Endicott at all. Unfortunately, Greg throws the pennies away in a fountain and says dramatically that Endicott was wrong about him – he's got no sense at all.

This is the point I'll be taking Wirt from – the span of time between when they lose the pennies and when they decide to just sneak onto the ferry.

Abilities/Special Powers: Wirt has no supernatural powers to speak of and is an ordinary human. He can play clarinet though, and apparently bassoon if he sets his mind to it. He also writes poetry and has an interest in interior design among other things, though he's very shy about his interests since he's pretty sure they're not normal for a fifteen year old boy.

Third-Person Sample:
“So, how far away is the ferry anyway?” Wirt asks. “I...I kind of feel like we've been going around in circles for a while.”

Ah, but aren't they always going around in circles? Round and around like a carousel, heading nowhere but forever orbiting around in the Unknown. Would the ride ever end? Or would motion-sickness overtak- no, that's dumb. This is a dumb poem and Wirt scraps the whole metaphor, and it's only then that he realizes that no one had answered him and that's he's alone. When did that happen? How long has he been talking to himself? Why does he keep doing that?

“Uh. ...Greg? Beatrice?”

No answer, except for a familiar tingling of unease.

“...Guys? Hello? Greg? ...Anybody?”

Nothing.

There seems to be a clearing up ahead though, so Wirt moves forward and finds himself on the edge of the forest and...and some other mansion? It's not Endicott's, though the thought did cross his mind that maybe he got turned around and walked back all the way they had come. The architecture isn't right for his house though. It looks more like it's got a Beaux-Arts thing going on, but it's kind of hard to tell from so far away.

Without thinking much of it, he heads for the mansion. Maybe someone there has seen Greg or Beatrice, or maybe he can point him to the ferry and he'll find them there. Still, there's a knot in his stomach. He really doesn't want to go alone, but it's not like he's got any other choices at the moment.

First-Person Sample:
[When the camera turns on, it's centered on a teenage boy in a blue cape and a giant red hat in one of the halls of the mansion, and he seems very, very uncomfortable with the idea of recording himself.]

Uh, I think that's... [He tilts it a little.] ...Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's on. I think.

[He sets it on a table and steps back a little bit. He wishes he could see it it was centered correctly but it's kind of hard to do by himself. He thinks about making a test video or something, but he's kind of in a hurry.]

U-Um. ...Hi. [He puts his hand up like he's going to wave it, but he hesistates and puts it back down. Do people even do that in home movies?] I-I don't...I don't know if anyone can see me, or hear me or whatever but, uh. My name's Wirt, and I...think I got lost somewhere? I'm looking for my little brother Greg and his frog, and Beatrice – who is, uh. She's a talking. Bluebird.

[This feels so stupid.]

A-Anyway I was looking for them and if anyone's seen them around that would be super great. Or! O-Or maybe they're already where we were trying to go so...if anyone knows how to get to the ferry from here, that...that would be really great.

[Was there anything else? ...No, that was probably it, but ending the message feels kind of weird and uncomfortable.]

Uh. ...Thanks in advance, I guess. [And then he reaches over and shuts it off.]