Thursday, April 26, 2018

In The Death Cure was it Friendship or Something More for Thomas and Brenda?


After re-watching The Death Cure yesterday, I realized there were more moments between Thomas and Brenda than I initially noticed the first time I watched the movie. Although Brenda and Thomas never kissed or confessed their love in this movie, I feel like they have a friendship that is headed towards romance. There was a lot of meaning and emotion in a lot of their scenes. It's hard not to see all the looks and not wonder if there was something developing between them.

However, something was holding Thomas back from admitting his feelings for Brenda and that was Teresa. Despite Teresa's betrayal in the second movie The Scorch Trials, Thomas still had feelings for her but I don't think they were as strong as they had once been. In the brief glimpse of Thomas' backstory (shown in the first two movies The Maze Runner and TST), you can see that those two were close when they were working for WCKD and they may have even been in a relationship but due to Thomas' memory loss there is probably no way of really knowing for sure. It's obvious they shared something at one point and despite now being on different sides those feelings still lingered between them.

But somewhere during the months of trying to find his friend Minho who had been captured by WCKD, Thomas had started to grow closer to Brenda. There was a real connection growing between them and they definitely cared about each other. I think after Brenda met Thomas and his friends (in TST), she changed because her main priority had simply been to survive. Besides herself, the only other person she cared about was Jorge but meeting Thomas and his friends caused her to open her heart and learn to care about others again. In TST you find out that she had been separated from her brother and she has no idea whether he was alive or not. She had also said that she had lost a lot of friends and I guess over time, she stopped trying to connect and care about anyone other than herself and Jorge. And add living for who knows how long in the harsh environment of the Scorch trying to survive, something like that is bound to change you.

Which is why I couldn't help noticing that throughout The Death Cure, she was helping out where ever she could. Her and Jorge could have easily left this ragtag group a while ago and went on their way. But they didn't, they believed in the groups cause and wanted to do everything they could to help. A scene that really stuck with me was when Thomas was telling Brenda that he along with Newt, Minho and Gally were trapped in The Last City and that she should leave them behind. However, despite her telling him earlier in the church scene that he doesn't know when to let someone go, she was very adamant that she was not going to leave any of them behind. That scene held so much emotion and meaning in their words (and in Brenda's tears).


The first time I saw the kiss between Thomas and Teresa I was annoyed because it didn't make any sense that they would share a kiss. He may have forgiven her but his feelings had changed. But after watching that scene again, the kiss seemed more like a goodbye because they thought they were going to die instead of it being something more romantic or passionate. I think he felt bad when she died because she still meant something to him but I think his heart had already started to move on.

Even though this film went with a more subtle approach to showing Brenda and Thomas' developing relationship, I do think given time, they would eventually end up together. The scenes where they were in the safe haven showed them sitting together several times and sharing looks. They could have easily found other places to sit among their friends yet they always seem to gravitate towards each other. He did give her a kiss on the cheek during the scene where they hugged but the kiss was so quick it's really a blink or you'll miss it moment. At that time, I don't think he was ready to admit his feelings for Brenda just yet but I think they were heading in that direction.


If you watched the movie, what did you think of Thomas and Brenda's relationship? Was there more to it than friendship?

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