Does Clivesdale actually suck?

 Look, I get it, it's hilarious to imagine Clivesdale as a normal quaint little town that has no idea about the one-sided animosity between them and their neighbors. In fact, that is what I chose to believe, until I realized something strange. This is that, despite appearing overdramatic, the citizens of Hatchetfield don’t often exaggerate. When characters say something, even if at first it appears to be a hyperbole, it is usually even more true than we could ever imagine.

If you have no idea what I'm talking about, let's first dive into what Clivesdale and Hatchetfield even is. The Hatchetfield universe is a fictional town invented by Nick and Matt Lang for their musicals performed by Team Starkid. We've talked about Starkid before on this blog, it's possibly one of the longest sub-phases I've ever been in. This town is located on an island in Michigan, connected via the Nantucket bridge to another nearby town, Clivesdale. Hatchetfield is extremely prone to disasters of the supernatural kind, from meteors that turn everyone into musical zombies, to five eldritch forces that use the townsfolk as their playthings. There are 3 stage musicals "The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals", "Black Friday", and "Nerdy Prudes Must Die" that are set in this town, and two online series' performed on Zoom named Nightmare Time 1 & 2. 

In the very first musical, nearly everyone in Hatchetfield makes frequent references to their hate for Clivesdale. The characters go as far as being happy that they might die, for at least they aren't dying in Clivesdale. That being said, at the end of the show, Clivesdale hosts a vigil for the lost citizens of Hatchetfield, suggesting this rivalry is more one sided than the Lang brothers let on. I'm here to suggest that, Clivesdale is not only as bad as our main characters warned us about, it may actually be worse. Thanks to mystifying Hatchetfield theories for posting about this and getting my creative juices flowing. 

Okay, first off, to begin this theory I want to establish that the people in Hatchetfield don't often exaggerate, so here are some examples of them using what appears to be hyperbole that turns out to be even truer than one may think. In the nightmare time episode 'Jane’s A Car', most people were surprised Jane turned out to be so manipulative. However, when you look back, that character trait was very clearly foreshadowed. In TGWDLM, Emma talks about how Jane planned out her entire life and stuck with it, showing that she's someone who craves control. Emma is, in her own words, a complete screw up so it's not too far to assume that she would see anyone with their life together as overly controlling. However, as we see later, Jane is extremely controlling and would do anything to keep her vision of the perfect life, suggesting that not only was Emma correct, she underestimated her sisters desire for perfection. 

Moving on to Grace Chasity. In her introduction in TGWDLM, Alice refers to her as a 'nerdy prude'. Most of the audience assume Alice is just being rude, or is simply responding harshly due to her anger against her dad, and we assume that Grace is probably a nice girl. However, after we see her in Nightmare time and perhaps more damning in Nerdy Prudes Must Die, it becomes evident that not only is she the nerdy prude that Alice made her out to be, but she is far far worse, literally killing people to spread her message of abstinence.

Now, perhaps the most on the nose example, Max being described as a 'Literal Monster'. This is the most obvious, because when we hear comparisons between him and a monster, we initially assume that he is just a bad guy, and a threat in school. However, as seen later in the musical, Max comes back to life after being killed, taking the form of a zombie, or in other words, a literal monster.

These past examples have shown us that when Hatchetfield characters are described by other people before their official introduction, those descriptions tend to be accurate. Why wouldn't this apply to the entire town of Clivesdale? The Lang’s aren't being remotely subtle about it, and I'm inclined to believe what everyone says about Clivesdale. It's unclear what this entire town could've done to make them deserving of all this hatred, but it must've been something truly terrible.