Twenty One Pilots (also known just as top) is a duo made up of Tyler Joseph and Josh Dun. It started out as a 3 person band in 2009 composed of Tyler, Nick Thomas, and Chris Salih. In 2011 Tyler met Josh and he became the drummer, while Nick and Chris had to leave the band to focus on their personal lives.
The band gets their name from a play titled “All My Sons” which is about a man during WW2 who commits suicide after causing the death of 21 pilots by sending them faulty parts. Tyler’s entire career with his music comes from his personal struggles with depression, which led him to release a solo album in 2007 (which isn’t available on streaming anymore, only reuploads on YouTube) called “No Phun Intended”.
The continent of Trench, the city of Dema, Vialism, and Clancy – The Rundown
Trench is a continent that’s lush and vibrant, while in the southernmost part lies a circular cement city surrounded by walls called Dema. It’s run by 9 Bishops, whose names are Nico, Keons, Nills, Sacarver, Lisden, Listo, Reisdro, Ventomo, and Andre, who each run a district. Citizens aren’t allowed outside of their district or beyond the walls. The Bishops promote this religion called Vialism.
Vialism is a corrupt religion that fuels a divine power, it teaches that self-destruction is the only way to paradise, and those who fall victim to it are called the Glorious Gone. The Gone give the Bishops vessels to use. The Bishops have this ability called “seizing” where they can move their consciousness into a dead body, or vessel, for a short period of time before they decay.
Our main character, Clancy, (Played by Tyler Joseph) is an exception to that rule. He can be seized while alive, which is shown in multiple music videos across the Blurryface era. Clancy is an important asset to the bishops and he uses that to his advantage. He uses it as a way to escape. He convinced Nico to take him outside of the walls where he created a fiery diversion and escaped.
Trench Era (Jumpsuit, Levitate)
He wanders through Trench, growing weaker by the day, but then he sees the Banditos, a group of rebels who denounce Vialism and the Bishops. However, Clancy is caught by Nico in an act called smearing.
Smearing is the practice by the bishops to lure people back to the city by putting them in a submissive state. Clancy has this happen to him, but he notices yellow flowers while following Nico, which pulls him out of it. The Banditos then throw yellow flower petals onto him, further breaking him out of that trance and allowing him to run. He was still caught by Nico in the end.
Clancy is freed by the Banditos again and is brought back to Trench. He becomes close with the leader of the Banditos, only canonically known as The Torchbearer (Played by Josh Dun). It’s theorized that he was at the Bandito camp for 2-3 years before being captured again and being brought back to Dema by Nico, and this is where it really gets interesting.
Scaled and Icy Era (The livestream, Saturday, and The Outside)
Clancy became known in Dema, and the bishops didn’t like this, so they made him perform and entertain the people, aka, the entire album of Scaled and Icy. He was imprisoned in a cell, only able to come out when he had to write or perform. It’s theorized that he spent 2-6 years as propaganda for the bishops, but we don’t know how long he was there canonically as it’s up for individual interpretation due to the limit of music videos.
During the 2021 Scaled and Icy livestream we got a better understanding as to what he was doing. He was a “guest” on a talk show called “Good Day Dema” run by two bishops, Lisden and Sacarver, who seized the bodies of two vialists named Sally and Dan, and Sally makes fun at the fact that Josh isn’t there, this is heavily important later, as he was in Dema with Clancy.
(He also wrote letters about his experiences in Dema, which will be linked at the end of this essay.)
Clancy then had to play a gig in a submarine (the Saturday music video) where he was freed by Keons who seized a dragon (The same dragon on the album cover) and Keons was then killed by the other eight for betraying Nico.
Clancy washes up on an island called Voldsoy, where he sees Torch, and they start to wander, before finding this creature called a Ned (Neuro Expansion Device). The Neds lead Clancy and Torch to this cave, where laying on the outside were new clothes and supplies for the both of them. Clancy and Torch split up in the cave, and Clancy is given the same seizing abilities as the bishops via a Ned who gave him its horns.
Clancy then seizes the body of Keons, starting a fire in the towers, and he and Torch then make their way back to the main continent of Trench.
Clancy Era (Overcompensate, Navigating, Paladin Strait)
In the events of the Overcompensate music video we see Clancy teaching citizens of Dema what Vialism actually is by using his newfound abilities.
He and Torch then follow three Banditos through Trench after they crossed the Paladin, and Clancy learns that Torch wasn’t with him at all throughout his entire time stuck in Dema. It was a projection.
Torch has this ability called “Guiding” where he can project himself to guide people back to Trench. This projection is physical and can interact with the world around it. Its state is dependent on Josh’s. (Some people call the projection Torch while they call the actual Torchbearer Josh) Clancy is then given his mask by Josh.
They then make their way back to camp, and prepare to take on Dema. Clancy is given his outfit, his stole, and rope to keep the antlers on him at all times. He’s the only one in red.
During the events of Paladin the bishops summon an army of Glorious Gone to try to stop the Banditos from getting into the city. However, Clancy knew a way in through passages underneath the city. He then starts climbing one of the nine towers, and after barely looking at each other this entire time, Torch looks back and watches as Clancy climbs. (Bro is not Orpheus idk why he looked back)
Once Clancy makes it to the top of the tower, he uses his abilities to knock 7 of the bishops out, but Nico isn’t in there, until he catches Clancy off guard and he’s now trapped again.
What happens next?
I know you’re probably thinking, “it can’t end just like that!” and to that I say, it’s not finished. The lore is currently in its ending phase, but the guys do this thing where every show they have a fan exhibit. It costs more, but it shows off things from all their eras from the past 16 years. At these exhibits we get these things called FPE letters. Letters from either citizens of Dema or other Banditos.
Each letter is given in partials, and as more shows happen the more snippets we get. These letters aren’t just for the people who bought FPE tickets though; every show the Discord Clique posts the letters when they’re shown, and a database of all the letters is updated.
The letters can contain morse code at the bottom, which spell out words once all the letters have been discovered. For the US leg it says “We must destroy them so we don’t become them. And if we become them we must do better.”
The US leg ended with a letter from Torchbearer that was ripped, canonically it never got to Clancy, however the Torchbearer letter that came out when the Europe leg started, was in full condition, implying that Clancy got that one.
Both letters from Torch are questioning Clancy’s motives, out of a place of concern more than hatred. While other letters referencing Clancy from the Europe leg paint him in a very negative light.
Update 5/22:
As of 5/14 we got the last letter at the end of the Europe leg, which was from Clancy to Torchbearer, showing that he has become somewhat of a tyrant and how he will be Dema’s example of absolute power. We also got an announcement on 5/21 for a new album titled Breach, which is what the morse code in the FPE letters ended up spelling out, which will conclude the Dema storyline.
Special thanks to the Discord Clique and the friends who’ve helped me understand more about the storyline! I’ve been theorizing and learning about this stuff for about 2 months now. It’s something that I’ve never seen in other media and has sparked my own creativity in multiple ways. None of it is owned by me, the music and the storyline are all owned by Tyler Joseph and Josh Dun of Twenty-One Pilots.
Sources
https://www.dmaorg.site/ – Letters + Maps from Trench starting from 2018 with the last update being from early 2024.
https://archive.demacouncil.top/ – FPE letters from both the Europe leg and the US leg.
https://www.twentyonepilots.wiki/ – The wiki run by the official TOP discord!
https://www.twentyonepilots.com/ – The official twenty one pilots website.
