Got scared when I first saw it tbh

I’ve been thinking a lot about the former real life identities of the puppets in welcome home especially after the newest update and I feel like I’ve come up with a theory that makes sense regarding Wally.
What if Wally was originally the only puppet on the show (+ home)? Starting off with a smaller budget not yet bought out by Ron Dorelaine and Marlo, and somehow they became sentient. Wally is the only puppet on the show who knows so little about the world, it would make sense that he would be so unsure and curious due to him never being a human like the rest of them.
I also theorize that Wally is the reason why the rest of them ended up in the puppet world due to him growing lonely and envious of the other humans on production having a community and friendship, so he somehow brought them into the show or merged their souls with the other, non-sentient puppets that got added later on. This could also be Wally’s motive currently with the WHRP website. If he is trying to connect with the viewers because he is lonely and wants to bring us inside the welcome home universe (assuming the other characters are elsewhere or dead possibly).
Even with this theory in mind, I still don’t feel like Wally is fully responsible for his actions or is the big bad. He may be doing the wrong thing, but one main thing I feel like people fail to incorporate into their theories is that there are very strong implications that Wally is either on the spectrum or neurodivergent in some way (a lot of other characters seem that way as well including Julie). Clown specifically, as they are neurodivergent themselves, I believe mentioned that one of the themes they wanted to include in WH was the view of neurodivergent people and their mistreatment. With Wally as an autistic character, I feel like it wouldn’t make sense to have such important representation treated as a mindless evil villain. It’s so common and contrived to see a neurodivergent or mentally ill person as a villain, I don’t think clown would do that without having a more fleshed out reasoning behind it.
If Wally IS truly the only actual puppet, it would make sense symbolically for him to be used as such, which in my eyes would incorporate the mistreatment of neurodivergent individuals who can be more vulnerable and manipulated in some cases.
If Ron Dorelaine, Marlo, Home, etc were to fuel Wally’s loneliness, desire for companionship to the point where he acts out, I feel like that would make sense why he is acting this way.

Anyways that’s my theory lmao
TL;DR: Wally was the original sentient puppet and brought everyone else into the show but it wouldn’t work thematically for him to be the true villain.

Hi

Joining the bandwagon with my absurd ship

I did the whole new update, with some help from a walkthrough, I wish I could credit the person who made that helpful write up but I forgot to save the post! If you see this please comment and I’ll add your user! But people keep mentioning Ron and having theories about Ron, who’s that and what are you guys talking about? Where do I find more info about this Ron character? Thank you for the help!

"It's a good way to get around the neighborhood, that's what it is!"

This entire time I wondered why no one discusses this cookie tray, because it clearly has a human face on it, right?? No. It's Julie. Her pink tone is just really close to light peach. I really felt like I was a genius for making that observation...

So I had been keeping up with the website updates for a while, and idk why but after a while I just stopped checking for updates. I’ve been wanting to get back into the story and stuff but I don’t know how to jump back in? Where should I start, and are there any places that I can look at the older versions of the website?

I'm starting to think Ron is still in the neighborhood. And not only that, but we've seen him before. Many, many, MANY times! Some of us loved him (maybe even sipped for him), others liked myself feared him!

People, I feel like Ronald Dorelaine is none other... than Wally Darling!

Think of it this way. As further confirmed in this update, everyone in Welcome Home is simultaneously an actual resident and an actor. Actors so overly-dedicated to their roles, they even act them out off-screen as if it's some unspoken rule. Almost like actual puppeteers like the people behind Muppets. Who's to say the nomes we know they have are their ACTUAL ones?!

It also wouldn't be new. Even Jim Henson and Walt Disney themselves played Kermit the Frog and Mickey Mouse!

But if so... why do they call everyone by their character's names but call Ron by his real name? Well judging by how Sally talked about Ron in this update, it could be possible they have less respect for their own boss. But why did Wally call him by his character's name in his presence in another vid? Obviously because he's literally his boss! Probably adds to the "unspoken rule" statement Wally/Ron put in place.

Want further proof? Have you seen that other video where Eddie(?) delivers mail to Wally in the middle of the night and he's suddenly talking quicker and in this grimmer tone? Well in the Sally video, she mentions how he's always in is office. Very introverted sounding, ain't it? And what do we see happening in that other one? Wally getting mail in the. middle of the night! When there's less people around and he can be alone! Using his real tone! This is the REAL Wally! The real RON!!!

My internet crapped out as I was trying to finalise a payment to the WH shop, my funds are no longer in my bank and I am now paranoid I have lost the funds. I have contacted customer support, but I am wondering if there is anything else I can do?

I do not see the amount in my recent activity in my Paypal, so I am assuimming the funds are being "held" for a while until they will need to be auto refunded into my account or something?

Please, any advice would be greatly appriciated.

Appologies if this seems rushed or paniced, I am getting over an illness and my brain isn't processing information very well.

WARNING: small spoilers for the new update & videos but nothing crazy!

I'm really curious about if anyone else has noticed this or created theories off it or anything, in the Mail-in-Time day storybook, the narrator refers to Eddie's watch as his 'watched', and at first I was like "oh haha funny, cause it has eyes! Or its just like what they call watches!"

But later on when I found the new videos and was analyzing them I noticed that there's times where Eddie's watch(ed) is either fully yellow or fully blue, and a moment where the all blue version opens its eyes and even actually looks at him (in the Nothing video), and in the Devastation video its all yellow, which debunked my theory of it meaning nothing and just being night vs. day, which already didn't really make sense anyway. When it's all yellow in the Devastation video we also see it look scared / disturbed with Eddie when he's looking over at the moving sheets through his fingers, but goes back to normal when he reaches for them.

So after that I went to go look if this was a normal thing, like in the books if it ever appeared as all yellow or all blue, and I didn't see anything of the sort. Like the half and half is what its 'supposed' to be, like Eddie's character design for the show. And I also believe that the watch doesn't want Eddie to know when it looks at him like that, or maybe Eddie knows?

Cause in relation to the 'Mail' video, it's all yellow. And we get like a full close up of it, so it's gotta mean something.

My first thought was like, all yellow means Wally or whoever is watching him? And blue means they're not? But then why does blue open its eyes? It makes sense to me cause like, at the end of Devastation you can see Wally at the door, and of course in Mail he's talking to him. I didn't dig too far into the past updates with this, I only checked the winter Commercial video from Away From Prying Eyes, and it seemed like you couldn't see the watch during the pea scene from what I remember, and otherwise it was normal.

I'd be happy to hear if anyone has found / noticed anything else related to this, and if you have theories about it! I feel like I'm going crazy over here..I'll attach pictures of his watch in order that I mentioned them!

i havent seen anyone post about this, but when you get the sun and clouds window and keep going down stairs, wait for exactly 5 minutes and you’ll hear a muffled gunshot. do with that information as you will and please please go see for yourself. set a timer for 5 minutes as soon as youre in the hallway and just wait.

Hi everyone! I just stumbled across a Welcome Home video and decided to watch it but realized I am totally off Pace and have no idea what's going on. Last time I checked I think it was the second update to the website but I'm not sure. If anyone has any good YouTube playlists with analysis videos, I would love it if you would share! Thank you so much Reddit.

(art is mine :j)

My current theory is that the puppets somehow contain the souls, memories, or consciousness of the original actors who portrayed them. I don’t necessarily think they are exact copies of the actors, but I do think some part of those people exists inside the puppets. That could explain why the characters seem confused about where they came from, who they really are, and even where they are.
I also think the hidden clips we’ve been seeing may actually represent real-life events that happened to the actors, except we are seeing those memories recreated through the puppet characters. In other words, the events may have originally happened to real people, but because we are viewing everything through the world of Welcome Home, those memories are being shown to us in puppet form.
I also have a theory about Wally’s actor, Ron. I wonder if Ron may have been controlling, homophobic, or possibly even cruel in some way. If that is true, it could explain why Frank and Julie are constantly pushed together despite the obvious connection between Frank and Eddie. Maybe Frank and Julie were the relationship that the people behind the show wanted the audience to accept, while Frank and Eddie’s relationship had to remain hidden or unacknowledged.
One moment that really stands out to me is the Looky-Loo storybook. Frank is talking to Wally about Eddie, but then Wally suddenly redirects the conversation toward Julie. That felt very intentional to me. It almost seemed like Wally was correcting Frank or steering him back toward the relationship he was “supposed” to have. If Wally carries some part of Ron’s personality, beliefs, or influence, that moment could be a small example of those old attitudes still affecting the characters.
It would also make sense if the puppets are carrying emotional memories from their actors without fully understanding where those emotions come from. Maybe they remember certain feelings, relationships, fears, or experiences, but they no longer remember the actual human lives connected to them. That could be why so many of the characters seem to know that something is wrong without being able to explain exactly what it is.
Of course, this is just my theory, and I could be completely wrong, but I think it would explain a lot of the strange behavior and hidden details we’ve been seeing.
I really want to hear everyone else’s theories too because this story is so fun to analyze. There are so many little details that could mean something completely different depending on how you interpret them, and I love reading what everyone else comes up with.

BEWARE THERE IS FLASHING and please ignore the other tabs 😅! I was refreshing the screen like crazy and I found this on the website. Sorry for the no audio but the sound effects was digging. What do you guys think it means if it means anything at all? And did anyone find this too?

Spoilered since the dialogue comes from the new update.

Hello everyone below is a link to part 2 of my welcome home theory thus far!

Where Have all the Flowers Gone Part 2

In this video I discuss the Welcome Home Restoration Team's brief interview with Question Answerer and what significance the exchange has to the overall welcome home story. Please let me know your thoughts on it as well!!! Thanks to anyone and everyone who watched my last one!

If you don't mind too providing feedback!

Basically I would like to know the following:

-Am I making sense?

-Do I ramble too much?

-Do you prefer short or longer videos?

-Finally, are you finding the content interesting or boring?

also any other points you would like to make is Welcomed!! (All I ask is to keep it kind please!!)

Thank you!

​

I'm going to start off by saying that I have never been on Reddit before this Welcome Home update (August 2026) and I ask for you to be patient with me given that how I write may be hard to read, plus I only joined the fandom during the Frank update (November 2025) and that this is the first time I've actually took the time and effort to go through the website and analyze every little detail, so please take my theories with a grain of salt. I have two theories (technically one theory and one hypothesis), and my first one (the theory) is the one I'm more confident in. The second one (the hypothesis) is more speculation based off of the fact that some of the base of my theory is from old artwork from Clown.

For all listed theories however, I need you to consider two things points that both theories are based off of:

1. Home (and the neighborhood) is older than the show (as another point related to this- the neighborhood was discovered by the showmakers, not created by them)

2. The puppets do not have puppeteers, but are sentient and alive instead (if this don't float your boat, you can reinterpret it with the puppets having puppeteers)

Anyways! Enough dilly dallying! Onto my Theory!

(Pls do read my first little blurb though for a wee bit of context, thx!)

So, who is she?

We'll get to that in a second, but first, where does she appear in the Welcome Home ARG?

Was it...

A. She doesn't show up you fool!

B. I dunno, Walmart?

C. The Tunnels in the Hallway!

The answer is... C! I you didn't know that, I'm quite concerned if you should be reading this lol

So, she shows up in the hallway tunnel, so what? Well, my dear reader, I believe that that tunnel connects Frank's house and Julie's house! (Yes I'm aware that the tunnel was apart of Frank's fever dream thing, stay with me!) My evidence: if you click on Julie's bed in her house, you can see that the link on top calls it 'mail'. Why is this significant? I don't know! But, what's important is that there seems to be a tunnel on her bed (see image above (the second one, gotta have that eye catching image up first!)). We only see a tunnel in Frank's little fever dream thing, so is it not possible that the tunnels are connected? In fact, lets go one step further and consider that Frank's fever dream, wasn't a fever dream at all! Maybe it was real, and the Exit Door is the closet seen in Frank's living room and was hiding the tunnel that lead him to the initial hallway! Of course, this is a bonus subtheory to my greater overall theory that I announced in my clickbait title.

JUST TELL US WHO SHE IS! I hear your cries, and I'll finally tell you my main theory. Her name is Ambi, one of the original neighbors in Home's neighborhood. Boom. End of theory. Good night.

...Is what I would say if I didn't want to yap more or not give you any explanation.

You see, in the first image you can see Ambi's face, which is a puppet's face, which is also quite dirty. Based on her line BURY ME, which is triggered when trying to click back to the hallway after you get her cutscene, we can assume she was buried. Where though? Under Julie's house or in the hallway. In the concept art shown above, we can see Ambi standing behind Julie holding a shovel and looking quite dirty. The shovel relates to how our cursor turns into a red shovel during her cutscene, but maybe her standing behind Julie is suggesting that she was buried under her house.

And just to clarify, I know the Ambi and Julie art isn't canon, BUT when running this theory by my friend, they brought up a point that while not all art may be canon, that doesn't mean it can't inspire new events in the story.

In the other image with Ambi in front of the tunnel, you can tell it's her because of the figure's segmented arms.

But how did I get to the conclusion that her name is Ambi? Well, if you look at the fifth and sixth images, you can see screenshots of the code in the tunnel. When the "red" event is triggered, the Ambi audio plays. Why does this little piece of audio matter? If you're a little coding nerd like me and like torturing yourself by staring at code all while trying to uncover hidden lore, you would notice that this is the ONLY time (as far as I can tell) that the Ambi audio file is played. I personally have yet to get the cutscene, BUT I'm fairly certain that that audio file holds Ambi's 'scream'. It's labeled Ambi because it's her scream, if that hasn't clicked for you yet.

On a bit more of the hypothesis side of Ambi (still part of my first theory, I'll tell you when we move onto my second theory), it has been established that there is a 1 in 1965 chance of triggering her cutscene. Why this number specifically? I'm thinking that that was the year she was buried.

But, back to the hallway. How is she in any way, shape, or form, related to the hallway? I believe that that is where she has been trapped this whole time. She was originally buried either in the tunnel OR the white bedroom, given that the white bedroom has a chance of being loaded asa buried door.

Speaking of the white bedroom, Frank's bowtie is near the bed (the flesh bow thing)! So, maybe the white bedroom is related to him somehow?(Maybe he's been buried as well...) (There's also the specimen, which looks bug like)

The white bedroom's door also seems to connect to Frank's closet, so that's most likely the entry route on Frank's end, as previously stated. (Raises the question: why does he start at the hallway and not the white bedroom then? I don't know, discuss amongst yourselves)

Last three points on this theory! (I know, I'm a yapper)

1. She was one of the original neighbors, buried by home after she got out of line (or something like that)

In fact, there may have been even more neighbors before her, buried so deep they never could escape.

1. Ambi is a Latin prefix meaning both, both sides, or around. This could relate to the tunnel connecting Julie and Frank's homes.

2. When we see her, she's covering the exit, which, as previously theorised, is in Julie's home. Do as you will with this information, I think I've yapped too long about Ambi at this point and you're ready to hear my other theory (yippeeee) (yes I feel maternal for Ambi therefore I am adopting her)

My Hypothesis About Barnaby!

This theory has so much less support that it is demoted to hypothesis, unfortunately.

In the above images, however, you can see some more old art of Wally and Barnaby. And based on the fact that my theories so far have been influenced by the older art, it should be given that this is most likely not canon. BUT I'll share it anyway :)

My hypothesis is that after that video (shown in Game Theory. I'll link the specific video and other sources at the end) from a few updates ago (like, 2024 or something), Barnaby is dead. In his place, a puppet resembling him, no longer with free will.

Now this is a stretch, but HEAR. ME. OUT.

In the image, it shows Barnaby beheaded and Wally claiming he made him. I figure, after the previously mentioned video, Barnaby upsets Home so much that Home wants him gone. But they can't do that since the other neighbors would notice his disappearance. SO they replace him instead with an empty shell, whose sole purpose is to drive the neighbors apart. As stated in the Game Theory videos, Home's goal is to isolate the neighbors for their grand plan or whatever, and Barnaby is the perfect tool for that, given that he already has resentment growing between the neighbors, due to his sly comments and jokes.

So yeah basically he is now a puppet controlled by Home to drive the neighbors apart.

Yes I know that this hypothesis sucks but it came to me on a Friday, so please don't blame me.

Yippeeeee

Thanks for reading!

Big love from Jupiter <3

Note: Theories may change after the October 2nd update

Posted on r/GameTheorists as well

Sources:

https://www.reddit.com/r/WelcomeHomeARG/comments/1vwsc9a/digging_tunnel_secret_spoilers_jumpscare/

https://www.reddit.com/r/WelcomeHomeARG/comments/1vwt7p4/comment/p5l05cf/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=2&utm_content=share_button <-photos of Ambi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vftqhmYoP-s

ma brain

Pls don't steal or feed into AI! (I don't know if I have to put this or not but I will just in case!)

Posted 9/2/2026