canyouheatmeuponafrozennight

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Infinity Pool

Emptiness, emasculation, emergence, emotion

Em

What a hard movie to predict the direction of. First minute mark, is this a Midsommar? A few more minutes, is this a Perfume? A while more and is this a The Menu? Ultimately, it is mostly Infinity Pool, and trying to call it something else doesn't communicate what it does (and what it doesn't)

The most glaring theme is the emasculation of James. Married to a woman who married him not due to his qualities or merits, but simply due to her relationship with her dad. Thanks to such a connection, he can afford to be a broke, failed author, but that "ease" only leaves him with time to acknowledge his mediocrity, his nothingness. He doesn't hunger, so he can't strive for more (seeing as how he hasn't started writing at all in 6 years.) With this setup, the direction the story ought to take (as in, the template of this sort of story) is a meeting with a younger beautiful woman crazy for him inflates him with life once more and now he can achieve something. Is it still a manic pixie dream girl when they're this old? Either way, the railway is setting him to become a "man" again, now that he got a younger woman gunning for him.

But it isn't the case. She had shown signs early on ("Was having no eyebrows a sign?" "yes but it doesn't hold up in court") that she was the boss of the pack, but James doesn't spare a thought for anyone else, so he can't notice (does he not have enough internal peace to afford it, or is he too self-absorbed aside) that he isn't recovering his manhood through Gabi; She tames him, deaging him little by little, from man, to teen, to child, to a baby. Gabi wants to "fix" him, but she most likely means it as "neuter", not "repair."

James can't fight back against Em, against Gabi, even a child has power over him. Upon being ripped apart, there is nothing within him. The other zombies can do whatever they want in the island, then return to their private lives with dozens of affairs and activities to handle, but James has nowhere to return to, nothing to do wherever he is. His journey was a journey of nothingness. The young woman he met on a journey didn't make him better, nor did it make him realize the woman he has is the right one. Joining the cool kid club and doing drugs, sex, crimes doesn't open his eyes to anything. He experiences no growth, only gets to notice how little he is.

Infinity Pool couldn't be someone's first movie, as it can only deliver what it wants when the viewer is familiar how these stories generally go. Without this context, it's a movie about humiliating a man until he sees himself as a speck of dust. There's no difference between him and the other Jameses, they're ashes in a pot, he's dust in a human container.

Extrinsically, it might be a son expressing his feelings living under the shadow of his father, but that side of the story was kept so reined in, I can only imagine he was stopping himself from making it too personal whenever it veered in that direction. (One could argue the reason James can't find an answer to his plight is because Brandon doesn't have an answer yet. No answer felt true as an ending, so he had to leave it open-ended. Maybe one day he'll figure it out, but we'll probably never know.)

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Enuma Elish

Like Ajax, rather than a review, I only have assorted thoughts. It might be a little hard to get feelings for a cosmogony, but there is much to think about it (as shown by how my edition had the tablets in 100 pages and 300 pages of discussion on them)

Raised by RPGs, including the tabletop kind, Tiamat to me was FHD woman for most of my life. Finding out now that she is a water goddess is about as much as a shock as finding out Bahamut is not Megaflare Dragon, but an enormous fish.

There is an ambivalence in how she is treated in the book that my edition denounced as just sexism, and it is possible that it was just the values of the time truly, but seeing through modern lenses, I can swing it both ways. In a nutshell, the male gods are trying to convince another bigger man to be the one to kill Tiamat, as she is just a woman, and a woman can't beat a man, of course. They say so after surrendering before her, knowing they can't defeat her. This is a masculine behavior, toxic masculinity if you will; A man will downplay, underestimate, belittle a woman, but as a front to not admit the inferiority they feel to her, when she's greater than them. I don't necessarily think a character exhibiting a flaw is endorsement by the author, even if it's the good guys, so I can see this scene as social commentary. They're cowardly cowering before Tiamat, seeking someone else to fight her, but still thinking she's "just a woman." It is unsightly behavior, and unbefitting for a god, a fool would take it at face value, but I do think maybe the author was being critical of the behavior.

Tiamat is very interesting as a character, as a primeval goddess, I'll probably think about her for much longer, and most likely will let her influence my future writing too. Marduk is a bit interesting, but there's little to create or imagine around him. Being a storm god who slayed a dragon/serpent who then turned into rivers, I can see a little of Susanoo in him, though, which is an interesting cultural inheritance, but the overall aspects of the stories are so different I wouldn't boldly claim Susanoo descends from him.

-x-

Why do you think myths so often feature patricide? Cronus kills Uranus, and is then killed by Zeus. Kagutsuchi kills Izanami on birth. YHVH is too ultimate to be killed, but instead gets betrayed by Lucifer then by Adam. Egyptian myth also isn't exactly the same, but close enough via Horus and Set (I think this episode is very close to Ea and Apsu, despite everything). In Enuma Elish, Ea kills Apsu, then Marduk kills Tiamat. I think the root of it is in how the child is meant to surpass the parent. The authors of all these theogonies, either intentionally or subconsciously, all portrayed that in their work. (Paradise Lost diverges in that rather than the new surpassing the old, it is how the child must leave the nest, but still is a story about the relationships of father and child.)

-x-

What is the world they are in before the world is created? I see it as being Tiamat's womb. She is in the world, and she is the world, they're all inside the waters of her womb. The "net meant to capture the insides of Tiamat" to me means "the net that captures the Tiamat that is inside."

The initial world was just water, no sound, no movement. With the creation of the gods, sound appeared, and the old ones hated it. Ea kills Apsu, and creates a blank space within Tiamat, where it used to be Apsu (if you see the two being united as a Yin Yang, the masculine side of the water became void or air now). In this void, Ea could create Marduk, the ultimate god without any influence from Tiamat or Apsu (I'd liken this to the birth of a human free from the Original Sin; setting aside whether that human would be a godslayer, they'd surely exhibit 10 times the aura of the average man too).

Now that there is space/air, the winds can be created, and the wind creates waves in this world of water. The stillness is broken, both sound and movement exist and those who enjoyed the lull that was existing can't take it anymore. To me this is the most significant part of the story, the biggest message, in a way: Those who want to preserve the status quo will try to annihilate those who bring change, and this myth validates those who break the stillness. It says that the correct path is the path that kills the dogmas. This patricide, more than any other, denounces the old ways (the ways of our parents) and pushes the children to be the creators of their own ideal world.

However, it doesn't blindly order the children to knock down the sandcastle and invent something new: The new world is created from the remains of our parents. Apsu and Tiamat are both used to create the world, Kingu is sacrificed to create humankind. Doing away with the old isn't scorched earth, it's evolution, it's development. "Rebel, but not without a cause."

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Metamorphoses

When writing, killing is easy, death being a stake is simple, but it's easy for it to not feel real. The hero will live so the story continues, so this death looming over them can't be real. Through Metamorphoses, one can see plenty on what other ways to end someone other than death there can be. Mutating can be punishment, as well as salvation, before death, or after death. One's misery turns them into a tree, one's hubris turns them into a beast. A sinner who desires death becomes a creature that can't kill itself, a hero who deserved more can become eternal in the stars, in the words of people, in a flower or a fruit. (I already had an interpretation of Kafka's Metamorphosis as Gregor being a corpse the family couldn't accept, but through these lenses now, I can also see him as being a corpse turned cockroach too.)

Many of the stories will probably take a second reading to fully leave an impression, but many of them are pretty solid on the first time, and I think the hit rate is pretty high, most of them are meaningful or memorable in one way or two. Ovid's transitions are a work of art, and the way emotions are expressed are also fantastic, a notch above many of the Greek-Roman writers of the time I've read. The mastery of the epithet still belongs to Homer to me, but Ovid's verses I probably like more than Homer's and Vergil's. Also quite surprising to see women so respected by the author. The world is still as cruel as ever, they're still mostly used, violated and abused by men constantly, weak and opressed, but not submissive, they rise and rage, struggle and die, proudly or sorrowfully. This narrative peaks, to me, with Arachne's tapestry, showing the countless violences perpetrated by the gods on women. The myths are built on rapes, and she won't let that be forgotten, she won't turn a blind eye to the violence. (Honestly could see Ovid being a woman)

Some of the stories are competing with other authors, with varying results, but reading both still feels the most pleasant way to make the most of it. Ovid's Aeneid ends much further, and delivers what I think Vergil should have on his version, actually establishing Rome, instead of closing it on the defeat of Proxy-Achilles by Aeneias. Ovid's Argonauts didn't do Medea the justice she deserved, so I'd definitely insist one to read Apollonius' Argonautika and Medea too. The fight for Achilles' weapons was very masterfully done, but rather than the quick conclusion it sees in Metamorphoses, following it with the Ajax play makes it much more savory (and still consistent)

My journey through Greco-Roman classics enters a hiatus here, and I'm glad this was the book that did it. Works perfectly as the starting point for the journey through these classics, as well as a perfect climax to reading through all of them.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Ajax

Not a review as much as just assorted thoughts

Hector and Achilles: Dead Aeneas: Going through hell Ajax: Betrayed, humiliated, deceived and hated, dead

Being the strongest and second strongest didn't really serve them anything, huh? Much like Medea, be a hero roman, greek or a "barbarian," no glory awaits for them at the end of the quest, just more suffering. (Aeneas won ultimately, but how much did he have to lose first to arrive there, is what I'm thinking of. The war ended, he lost his city, and that was just the start of another struggle. During the early Aeneid, he even wished he had fallen in Troy, so one can only see that the hell afterwards was worse than the one of whence.)

It's Ajax's tragedy, but Odysseus manages to come as the hero still, though Teucros also bravely fought against the Atreides for Ajax's honor. In the greater picture, it could even be said that this is the answer to the argument between Achilles and Odysseus: Odysseus lived to return to his own home (and didn't get killed by his wife either), so while it might not make the greater hero, wit is better than might when it comes to survival.

I'm a fan of thinking of similarities in cultures, and what was particularly curious in this story is how it could very well be an episode that happened in Japan. (you may want to skip the part he tries to kill his allies in their sleep and skip to killing himself upon being dishonored; I'd say that makes it more stereotipically Japanese, but it's very possible in a realistic Japan for such betrayal to occur if you consider he went insane.)

Lastly, you could see this tragedy as mirroring Achilles' rage in the Iliad, which leads us to the conclusion that the Atreides simply are inept leaders. Two times they lost their best warrior (without Achilles, Ajax was the new best, did they realize that?) because they're simply unable to give these warriors proper respect. (But then again, they won the war because of the Trojan Horse, thought up by Odysseus, and maybe if they got on his bad side by not giving him Achilles' weapons, he wouldn't share that plan with them. I don't see him as being that type of character, but who's to know. They won the war, so who am I to call them bad at their jobs.)

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

The Aeneid

Impossible to speak of without bringing up Homer

How to defeat Illiad and the Odyssey? Do both in a single book. Is what perhaps Virgil had in mind, or maybe he was only trying to give the Romans what the Greek had with less pages. Starting with the Odyssey and concluding with the Illiad, it certainly feels a much more linear read than going from the Illiad to the Odyssey, as the Homer reading order goes (but if you think about it, the real Illiad occurs, then followed by Aeneid's Odyssey and Aeneid's Illiad, so one might argue it goes back to itself after a small break.)

I wouldn't classify as "doing it better," but I do think it was a more intense portrayal of the Odyssey: The starting premise is a rewrite of Poseidon's vendetta on Odysseus, making it instead someone more relentless, Hera, and the deity protecting Aeneas is instead a goddess with a much weaker standing and less wisdom than Athena, Aphrodite. Thus, Aeneas goes through the odyssey facing much more hardship in concept, but his way of words is much less dramatic than Odysseus, so going by their accounts, the man of suffering's journey sounds much more hellish.

The Illiad part of Aeneid, though, I do think has some better writing than the real Illiad. By which I mean the battle scenes are much clearer in a way, but much more simpler, as there is less divine meddling. Nisus and Euryalus' raid being my favorite part of the book, as it felt the most personal and character-driven.

Which is exactly what I felt made Virgil not surpass Homer in this book: The journey and the battles are there, but the heart isn't nearly as present. Going back home to your son and wife and finding a new home, recreating your empire sound alike, and both can be quite heartful journeys, but Virgil's execution wasn't very human-centered. Its focus was on the legend it ought to create, rather than the human element, the epic element was central. I'm certain there is a crowd that prefers such core, but what I love in stories is the heart of humans, so it wasn't for me, simply put.

Odysseus' challenge is not only crossing the seas when Poseidon is out to kill him, but to also resist the temptation of settling down elsewhere; he must reject the hand given to him (by calypso, by circe) and venture the darkness, believe that his home still stands and his loved ones still wait for him. Aeneas faces no such temptation, his travels are about finding a place and seeing if this time Hera will manage to take it from him or not. (In a way, Aeneas is more of a realistic human, fate plays with him and he merely tries his best to survive the hands dealt to him, in a game the house is desperate to win.)

The war against Turnus feels like vindication for Aeneas, as, in the Illiad, he loses to Diomedes and Achilles. While much less divine, his standing also mirrors Achilles': Agamemnon took his spoils, so he stubbornly locked himself away from the war, while Turnus started the war at the news that Lavinia would be given to Aeneas. Personally, I saw Diomedes as being Aeneas nemesis, but Achilles is the nemesis of the Trojans', so I can't deny that it is natural that, in the epic about giving the Trojans' closure, it is a mirror of Achilles that must be defeated to finish it. (Perhaps the bigger picture is that Aeneas had to avenge Pallas(Hector) to be a Nepenthes to Evander(Priamus) and that can only be achieved by defeating Turnus(Achilles) in battle. It was all done by proxy.)

Continuing about the differences in humanity in the story, the cast is also quite lacking, and even Aeneas himself doesn't show much of a personality, much of his heart. We are told he is pius, we are told he laments, meanwhile, Odysseus spends hours crying and giving long speeches about his sorrows. The Illiad has many warriors, quite a few of them which are only named to die, as does the Aeneid, but the Aeneid is lacking in Atreides, in Paris, in Hector, in Patroclus, in Odysseus, in Achilles, in Priamus, in Ajax, in Diomedes, in Nestor. There are ranks in nobility, in prowess, in divinity, in wits, in beauty that compete with each other, that clash with each other. Hector hates Paris guts, but doesn't deny he is beautiful, Achilles and Odysseus are antagonistic to each other over their approaches to true might; Agamemnon isn't more powerful than Achilles, but has a higher rank than him, they are king and soldier. They all have a past, a present, a future and the story can hold it all within its pages in the Illiad, while the Aeneid mostly just wants to talk about Aeneas, and can't develop or deepen him beyond a certain degree. I'd even say Aeneas has more personality in the Illiad than in the Aeneid, as I love his line "Meriones, you are a good dancer, but if I had hit you my spear would soon have made an end of you." and can still quote it, while I can't say much about the words he speaks in the Aeneid.

That said, I think Virgil's verses are beautiful, his poetry does surpass Homer's (Homer's epithets still are the greatest thing in literature though), there were many verses I chose to save because I want them in my memory. "Euryalus, do the gods set this fire in our hearts, or does each man's fatal desire become godlike to him?" made me quake, honestly. What the characters lack in depth, the verses have in soul. Were I unable to recommend the book for its story, I'd still recommend it for its writing (I digress, but I was also reading Genji Monogatari on the side, and its poetry is of a beauty that can't be measured; yet it didnt make Aeneid's poetry pale, which means plenty to me.)

Lastly, I find the goddesses in this book to be portrayed very well. Aphrodite's standing on the Olympus is very weak, portrayed time and again across multiple authors, and Hera and Athena especially seem to love humiliating her. (Marriage in Hera, Wisdom in Athena, Sex and Love in Aphrodite, there's room to talk about how they'd be at odds from a domain perspective.) So this battle between Aphrodite and Hera is somewhat of an underdog story, a lone weaker mother against a cruel and vicious God-Mother. In the Odyssey, Athena has to act while Poseidon isn't around to get her victory, but Aphrodite faces Hera head-on, aware of their standings, aware Zeus ought to favor his wife over her, but still, she is determined to protect her son and grandsons, cost what it may. Perhaps the biggest Aphrodite victory in mythology.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

The Argonautika (Apollonius Rhodius) and Medea (Euripides)

An essay about heroes

When it was renamed as Jason and the Argonauts, was it because they didn't consider Jason an Argonaut or because they needed to plant it into the audience's head that Jason is the protagonist?

I think I don't often say if I liked it or not, but I want to say I loved the book in this one. People who think Homer isn't direct enough probably can enjoy this epic writing much more, and I wouldn't be surprised if that's just according to Apollonius' plan.

Jason

Is he a hero? Is he a new kind of hero? Is he the best of the argonauts? Is he Odysseus while Hercules is Achilles? The many discussions around this character and what he represents were very interesting to read, and to think about. In many ways, I think Jason mirrors Hercules (not one but two kings force him to perform an impossible task. it's no twelve labors, but he wasn't a demigod either) and Medea as well (he didn't do it for glory; he just wanted the right to return home), whilst being just a common guy. These days you can occasionally find characters that are the weakest of a group legendary heroes but accidentally got the leader position. Who'd imagine this trope goes this back? Jason walked so One Punch Man King could rev his engine. I don't think he was either particularly a strong, exemplary leader, but that's exactly why it worked out for him, he didn't try to carry it out all by himself, he believed in the crew more than anything, he worried for the crew more than anything else. Much like Greek mythology itself was big because of the humanization of the gods, I believe Argonautika greatly humanized the epic hero, almost as if trying to answer "how weak can the hero be?"

Or maybe it didn't, if you believe that the true hero of the story is...

Medea

She only arrives halfway through, but she is the true hero, undoubtedly. But while she looks like an invincible witch concerning what she can do, she is just as much as a frail human as Jason is painted to be on his part of the story. She can make him survive the bulls, she can defeat the dragon(/serpent), she can defeat Talos, but she can't do anything about the rage of her father but run away, she depends on a helping hand to survive after betraying her people. (Sad to think how the gods favoring Jason would mess with her fate so much, yet no one divine would come to help her ever. I'm not expecting the gods to hold responsibility for anything they do, but jesus)

I find it hard to believe Jason ever even loved her, just used her and then was stuck with her due to the promise he made until he got a new wife in the play. That's another part of the cruelty of the gods, if you ask me. Cupid only hit Medea, not both of them. Divine providence only needed her to save him, it didn't care about what would come to her afterwards. To the gods, it'd probably have been fine if Jason promised her nothing and just left her to sink on her own. (If you give him a hero mentality, maybe he made that "sacrifice" because itd ensure their safe return, or even that it was just the correct thing to do after she threw everything away from him. Even if he felt no love for her, the "correct" thing to do is to take responsibility for her now. Whether he didn't care about the correct thing anymore later, or felt he had paid her back enough and could now live his life, it's going too far since we're supposing inside a supposition. Conversely, we should ask ourselves how long we'd be able to give up on love due to our debt to someone else? Would you survive a loveless marriage because you owe them something? It was mutually abusive, mutually toxic, and the gods are to blame, not either of them.)

And here is the core of my essay and what is most important to me, Medea is Odysseus. Or rather, a mirror of Odysseus? Odysseus' bad end? She is the hero of the Argonautika, the task was only completed and they only returned thanks to her. This is her glory, this is her pride. Yet she wasn't awarded with anything, she lost it all and was then sent to a place that isn't home, to loveless marriage surrounded by strangers. She only has her husband, which she was made to love, but he feels nothing but a debt to her.

Her killing the princess and the king is the same as Odysseus killing the suitors. This hero comes home to find out there are strangers in their nest. She's as justified in her killing as Odysseus is, but their surroundings are too different for this "crime" to go unpunished. Odysseus had his family, his wife kept loving him, his son was an adult and a warrior, his father waited for him, his employees were loyal and longing. Medea has little kids which won't protect her nor fend for themselves; her husband didn't stop loving her, as he never did. Her father, if he is even alive, won't help her now any more than he'd then (or could the prodigal daughter turn home and be accepted now? time can mend a wound, but also only make it rot). Odysseus came home to be surrounded by enemies. Did Medea even have a home to return to? Her true home wouldn't take her back, the only person she had in her Greek "home" had turned on her. The entire world stomped on her, but she still knew she deserved more, that she was the hero that saved Argos, and wouldn't let go of that.

If I was asked the central message of Medea, I'd probably say that it's reminding us that we should know our worth. She was cursed to be in love with Jason and couldn't get away from it, but we don't need to live like that, we don't need to be eternally attached to someone who doesn't love us when we've done so much for them.

Before reading, all I knew about Medea is that she wanted to go home, and I thought she had been just kidnapped, but her tragedy was so much more than that, and it started so much earlier than the play: her and Jason's demise had been set the moment cupid's arrow pierced her.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Iliad and Odyssey

Mirror images of Crime and Punishment

When the Iliad ended, I honestly got confused, because that's not how I expected it'd end. To me it was obvious it'd end with Paris shooting Achilles and what ensued. However, it concludes with Hector's corpse being returned to King Priam. That's when I started thinking, and how did the story start? And what was the midway climax? Achilles' anger at the Achaens, then achilles heading to the battlefield finally.

This wasn't a tale of war, nor of a hero, but a tale of one man's feelings. Anger and sadness, stubbornness, his injured pride and honor. His heart was closed to the Achaens, his allies. When disaster strikes and Patroclus is lost, this new pain in his heart sets him into motion, he becomes the slayer of Troyans, furiously searching for Hector. Not satisfied with annihilating Hector, he continues to humiliate the corpse, in hopes that this would calm Patroclus' soul down in Hades.

Priam walks into his enemy's HQ and begs for the body to be returned. And the murderous lamenting demigod listens to his resquest, remembering his own father, relating to the feeling of loss the poor old man exhibits. His heart was closed to Achaeans, but he could find in the enemy, the father of the killer of his beloved, someone whose heart he could connect to, someone that validates his sorrow.

Achilles' great journey was entirely about his feelings, across a few weeks in the battlefield. Anger, regret, grief, then forgiving. I didn't notice it at all while reading, lost in the rage of war, invested in the killing, thinking this was a tale of killing the enemy, killing those who take from you.

Punishing Hector's dead body for day after day didn't help Achilles move on, but forgiving him, allowing his father to respect this body which he dragged around, giving the troyans time to grief this enemy of his, he found himself finding a shard of peace. In a time of war, he finds inner peace by allowing himself to forget the anger.

And we find the opposite direction in the Odyssey. Odysseus finds men who live in an age of peace and are rotten to the core, and in his heart there's no forgival. Was what the suitors did worse than what Hector did? Perhaps not, but were they as great as Hector for there them to be deserving of respect, of forgival? Perhaps that is the abyss separating one man from a group of men. 108 of them together didn't have as much worth in their character, in their feats, as this singular hero. Which isn't to say Great Men Have The Right To Eliminate Parasites To Make The World Better, but explains Odysseus not stepping back and being satisfied with eliminating Antinous, but needing to eradicate them all, accepting of the price he'd pay for it.

Secondary to that, there is a second unforgiving rage which guides the story, which is Poseidon's. Odysseus sinned against Polyphemus, and thus Poseidon brings him ruin whenever he is at sea, punishing him endlessly, and even those who help him achieve his goal. Nothing can calm Poseidon's rage, just as nothing could stop Odysseus'. The suitors came into his home and to it brought harm, as did he to the cyclops, setting him as the man of pain, inflicter and inflicted. And as the seer forecast, when he is old, the ocean will fall on him and take his life, showing how Poseidon's rage won't end until this life he takes with his own hands.

Achille's great enemy was Hector, while Odysseus was never matched by the suitors, making his true great enemy Poseidon, and the many horrors he faced on the way, the many temptations he was offered in place of venturing into the unknown, not only meaning unknown waters, but an unknown homeland, and unknown home, an unknown son, a wife that might not have waited for him all this time. Time and again he could have stayed in a paradise with a goddess or queen by his side, yet he once more chose to try to return home. The book doesn't show him thinking about, hesitating on which path to take, because to him, those weren't options at all, but where us, weaker and less noble people in his place, would we so easily and promptly reject Calypso, Circe and Nausicaa, to return to someone who we don't know is waiting for us? Odysseus determination and love wasn't told in words, but shown constantly through and through, much like The Iliad didn't spell out how Achilles' inner turmoil was much more relevant than the war taking place outside.

The heart and soul of both stories lies on what isn't said, perhaps that's what made Homer the main root of western literature, these two stories really were masterful works.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Reviewing Kamen Rider Gotchard Pre-Finale

Or "How does one make a story with this little depth?"

I thought of rewriting the characters since I don't think Houtaro is the protagonist this story needed, but instead I'll just leave it as is and just go about how it could work for me. Starting from the edges and moving towards the center.

Minato's story and himself don't need to be that important, though I do think he is Houtaro's Virgilius. His past could remain the same, but the ends could be tied together, and the friend he let die ages ago was Houtaro's father, explaining why the old man is gone with no explanation (he died and the memories were erased to keep alchemy secrets, so Houtaro and the mom think he's just off traveling somewhere. In a way, this storyline would draw from Den-O's Zeronos subplot, a beloved family member that's been forgotten, but different enough to not feel like a rerun). He feels responsible for Houtaro, and at the same time wants to make up for his past mistake, making him paradoxically desire to bring him into the world of alchemy and distance him from the dark parts of it. While Houtaro and crew are hunting Chemy and having fun, he's cheering for them, but fighting and investigating Gryon's forces. When Houtaro insists too much on joining the true battle he closes his heart and goes Dread on him, as he knows too much now and wants to walk the same path his father did, which he can't allow.

Sabimaru could have had a great story with the beats given in the show, he is the chemy lover, the original gotta catch 'em all of the academy, but he couldn't communicate with them like H does, nor can he fuse with the Chemy and turn into a Kamen Rider and that developed in an inferiority complex, which would be exploited by the sisters to turn him into Dread. While he wants to reject the power, he is finally on par with H and can even defeat him a few times, so he must come to terms with his own negative side to properly overcome that he enjoyed being Dread for a while. He then gets better at using Chemy to at least support H (it could be like the Zukkyunpire trick they used once, except meaningful and across the show; his role would be like Kasumi no Joe, a friend and a fighter that doesnt need to be a Kamen Rider)

Renge doesn't need to exist I'm sorry if you like her but she just exists, they didn't give her a role in the show and i won't be the one to make one up (though if you put a gun to my head I'd say that, going from her line about wanting to become an alchemist to become rich, she could be a bit of a gryon sympathizer since he's a gold lover and she betrays the team halfway through because she's tempted by the golds radiance. In this show alchemy is bullshit magic, but at the center of it should be indeed the desire to turn things into gold, so she and gryon in a way would be alchemist boomers keeping things the good old way instead of being magicians 2.0)

Kurogane has many interesting storylines to approach, I'll start by listing everything that goes on with him. Has the dark flames that belong to the main villain, had his parents killed by the villain, 1st class alchemist but tertiary rider, nonhuman gf, adopted son of the crazy scientist and a realist that contrasts the MC's idealist. He's almost got too much going on, now that I think about it. If we wrote with the dark flames in mind from the beginning, he should have burst in flames from his first fight with H, in a fit of rage over him not being the Kamen Rider, and his pride being hurt as he lost to a non-alchemist. As they're forced to work together, instead of controlling the flames and fearing them, he learns how to hone them, culminating with the purification of them into white flames. His parents were killed by Gryon when they attacked him after finding out he put the dark flames in him, as an experiment to find out if a human vessel could handle the power of the Abyss. As he fears the flames, he was always distant from people, even more so upon finding out they were the power of the Abyss, he didn't feel human anymore due to the power running in his veins, which is why he bonds that way with Lachesis, who shares with him a bond with the Abyss and mirrors him, being a doll who wants to become human, while he is a human that can feel the villains strings tugging at his limbs from time to time. Both can keep the other in check, and remind each other who they are when the darkness tries to take over. Him giving a chance to idealism (I think this would also tie with the alchemy theme in a way; turning ones ideals into something else) also would make sense, not framing it as idealism > realism simply, but it's about embracing the hope for the future instead of drowning in the despair of the present. a doll can become human, there's no reason to accept things are as they are and forever will be as they are.

Rinne is the daughter of a traitor, so she plays by the rules much more than anyone else, because she fears walking outside of the lines because of the stigma she carries. A situation relatable to many demographics, to say the least, and now that I think about it, she could probably have a story with Hijiri too, being the sister of a criminal, she knows the stigma too, and they could bond over that claustrophobic feeling of living, and the paranoia that comes with it. But I digress. She has no friends, normal kids don't like how straightlaced she is, Spanner comes around, but she knows(thinks) he's spying on her to make sure she doesn't try anything weird like her father. H is a dumbass, knows nothing about the rules and got his powers from her father, so he has no ill will towards him. With all those pieces together, it was easy for him to become a friend to her, a pillar in her crumbling world. Would be fun if even at home she felt watched, resulting in her visiting, staying over and eventually working at ichinose's because it gave back to her the warmth of a home. With these budding feelings of a possible love, romantic or not, towards this boy and his family that accepted her after the entire world suspected her, the episode with H's childhood friend would make more sense, and would serve a purpose in that she needs to face her feelings and realize she's grown dependant of the ichinose's, she felt caged before, now she's putting others in a cage together with her because this one is happier and warmer for her. To me, this would be her pivotal arc, and after this she'd start trying to make other friends to break out of her shell. By having more choices, she can finally get to the conclusion that it's not that she needs the ichinose family, she wants to be with them. I don't think she needs the Atropos storyline exactly, but it does work as a good mirror. She can tell Atropos comes pester her because she wants a friend, and thatd serve for her to see her own desire to make friends, and upon setting out to make more friends, she could finally accept Atropos approaching her, instead of shoving her away like she always did.

Houtaro... a tough character to walk with, he is almost as blank as a slate as Renge is. He says MC things, he does the kamen rider/pokemon hero speeches, but there's no Houtaro in there. It's "what a hero would say" not "what this individual character" would say. When in trouble, make him say gotcha and call it a day. I left him for last (for the main cast) because I wanted to find him through the others. In this world, then, he probably heard about Chemys as child from his dad, and even now he thinks his father is chasing a legendary chemy, or traveling while riding in one. He even learned a bit of basic alchemy, despite not knowing what it is at first, but he never used it in public because he promised it. His father planned to bring him into the world of alchemy, but died before he could do that (Minato knew of this plan, which is why he becomes H's guide). While most alchemists only used Chemys as tools or saw them as pests, H's Dad was the original "chemys are our friends" ideologist, and he passed that onto Houtaro while he was a kid, and he continued to believe that. When Abyss attacks and Rinne's dad gives him the driver, he can use his basic knowledge and his love to fuse with a Chemy and become Kamen Rider, an art that had been lost for millennia (because alchemists forgot how to love chemy, so they became unable to combine). H's shallow heroic speeches can stay in, but it's because he's actually modulating his father. He started the act at home when dad was gone, to cheer his mom up, but eventually forgot his real face while lost in the act. He knows what his dad would say, what his dad would do, but at times he wishes he could know what he wants to do, what he should say. He learns to find his own words through the alchemy academy crowd of course, Rinne becomes a friend, Minato a guide, sabimaru a teacher, Spanner a rival, and through these chemical reactions, he finds out who he is again. And his foil in Clotho is formed as she is the most emotionless of the dolls, she's just performing the role that was assigned to her, she has no ideals or goals of her own. Seeing the ruthless doll and fighting with her many times, he couldn't help but see himself in her, he can't criticize her way of being, and what other says about her bounces off and hits him too, as others might not know, but he knows that he's also just acting the part he thinks he should play. The goal of his arc is actually to find words of his own to say to Clotho, to reach out to her and release her from the protocol that binds her. His intent was to feel he could also be free if she became free, but ultimately he reverts the order, becoming free (by which I mean, finding his own words) in order to free her.

Villains would be Gryon and the three sisters. Gryon is extremely conservative in what is true alchemy, if you're not turning things into gold, you're not doing it right. In this version, only some chemys are the Midas type and have a gold touch, while others can convent matter too, but in simpler ways, changing texture taste and so on, while others convert matter into non-gold elements, and gryon thinks any non Midas Type are trash chemys and should be erased. At first he was a good chemy hunter and the alchemists loved him, but his views grew more extreme with time, and instead of erasing the pest type chemys, he started going for everything, and was eventually shunned, which pushed him off the deepest ends. He created his automatons that would capture chemys and eliminate the non-Midas ones, as well as any alchemists who stood in their way. He was doing the world a favor, and the world dared to exile him, so now he'll turn this whole worthless world into gold, the only way he could find to make it worth anything again. (This set of beliefs would make Houtaro being a hopper user more antagonistic to him, not only he is fusing with a worthless chemy, it's a biblical plague even). The three sisters are foils to the three riders and bond with them through their battles, Lachesis deserting to be with Spanner, Atropos making friends with Rinne in their own awkward way and Clotho finding her own heart through Houtaro's original words (listed in the order the events take place in my imaginary timeline).

Got a little excited and wrote much more than I intended to, but that's all I have.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Read: Wuthering Heights

Heathcliff is an Orpheus and a Romeo. Unable to turn back and let her ghost go, unable to die with her, he rages and rages and unleashes a blind vengeance. Towards Lintons, towards Earnshaws, he drives his anger towards names that did nothing to him, because of what these names once did to him.

A lone creature in this world, deprived of the one treasure he once held, by his own fault as well as the world's fault, his journey ends with him turning to the ghost and choosing his own end.

I see him as having found his peace in Hareton. Or rather, he saw his possibility, a world where the brute, uneducated loner hated by his guardian could still be worth of Catherine's love. She was a Linton, she was a Heathcliff, and was heading back to Earnshaw. His world must have crumbled like a sand castle, his vengeance, his rage, all the flames within him were erased by the rain of their love. And seeing that in front of him, as well as the eyes of Catherine in their faces, he could no longer ignore the ghost which followed him for two decades. And thus, he decided to go towards where she waits, and find peace, happiness, rest, once more. He doesn't deserve punishment for his crime, as his own life had been such punishment until the day of his death.

In the end, makes sense that only Catherine could bring change and closure to Wuthering Heights. In her forgiving Hareton and growing close to him, he could save himself, and him being saved in turn saved/doomed Heathcliff. The original Catherine learned with the Lintons that her and Heath weren't the same, and couldn't be loyal to her love to him, while Little Catherine could forget her sorrows and animosity to open her heart to Hareton. She saved her heart, and by saving it, she saved Hareton's and Heathcliff's too.

I love Nelly too, but I'll store my feelings for her in my chest.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Watched: Argento Soma

Words are what connect people, which isn't to say as long as you talk things will work out, but that the words of the talker must be heard by the listener.

"If you told me" "Why didn't you tell me?"

We can use these words to blind ourselves and act as if it was someone's choice to not talk to us, when we are the ones who didn't create a relationship, a space, a trust, where they could feel comfortable telling us. Words unspoken aren't the others fault, but more likely ours. We teach others to fear us, we react to their words, we show them what they're worth or how they affect us, and that in turn shifts their words. The listener is a seemingly passive role, but it can hurt the speaker just as much as a speaker can hurt a listener.

I've lived a hypocritical life and know I've said expected and requested things of others that I myself couldn't offer, and felt offended that it wasn't provided to me. It's hard to notice such things as you do them, much less admit it, but I've come a long way from those days, I want to think.

Of course, I'm still far from perfect, but I want to become better at listening, or perhaps I should say I want to be a kinder listener, someone others can trust to talk to, to say the truth and share their hearts when they're in need. Or, being more honest, there's one person whose trust I don't want to betray, and to continue being a worthy confidant.

I could see much of my younger self in Ryu, at times it was tough to watch, so his whole struggle was very relatable. While I saw myself in him he saw himself in Frank and we both didn't like what we saw.

A very good anime from start to finish, I'm glad I didn't watch it years ago, I feel I wouldn't understand it this well, I wouldn't feel it this deeply, had I watched it sooner.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Read: Markheim

Came as an extra in my Jekyll and Hyde and I entered it without expecting anything, but it was a really great short story.

Once stained by sin it is easy to go ever ever deeper into it, since it won't come off, might as well bask in it. Is that human nature? I wouldn't know to say if it is or not, maybe it's just gravity. Maybe it's like what Itadori said, you kill once, and killing becomes an option at all times. Doing it once is enough for you to consider it as many times as it takes, our brains get used to it, it's acceptance, not nature, I'd say. In that loop of bad behaviors, we also enable ourselves, we say it couldn't be helped, it is not by my hand I fell to this point, we live in a society, blah blah blah, the list goes on. In some 30 pages, this tale gives a simple message: You can be whatever you are, for whatever reason, but you don't need to bask in it once you're dirty. You can hate the negativity you've surrounded yourself with, and fight against it, even if it'll be harder that way.

This story simultaneously evokes Dorian Gray and Crime and Punishment, an amazing feat. I personally found it better than the main story of Jekyll and Hyde even, uncanny. Might have to read more Stevenson because his writing in this story really enthralled me, the talk with "the devil" was really interesting, in prose and content.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Read: Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Shame I couldn't experience reading this not knowing they're the same person, I didn't expect the whole book to be a mystery on what went on between Jekyll and Hyde (I thought itd be about coming to terms with the monster inside or something). So this is a case of spoilers really ruin the work, huh

Anyway, there are still things I managed to think about on the last chapter, which is most of the pulp of the story once the mystery element is removed.

"Man must be better and more evil" - Having an oversoul of your evil side walking around to keep your good side, well, good does sound somewhat philosophical, but perhaps it's more akin to ventilating stress than making way for the overman. I like how it's not a clear split, Hyde is evil and Jekyll is good, Jekyll is mixed, just a natural, but having this scapegoat in Hyde and fortress in Jekyll keeps him balanced. This way of life is in no way alien to us in reality and modernity, as it's still how some of us live. A good person IRL gets online and spews vile thoughts, attacks and humiliates others for no reason other than their amusement, to vent, to have fun, because the internet isn't reality, because the people they might hurt aren't real. If you saw what someone you like does under anonimity, you might feel the same disgust people feel when looking at Hyde, which is probably not something Stevenson was imagining would happen at the time, which is a bit funny to me. People turn into Hyde much more frequently and don't get punished for it by turning forever into Hyde (in some cases, they do, I suppose), the wonders of science and technology.

Addiction - Jekyll "could have stopped at any time, just one more day as Hyde," and eventually never returned. As a metaphor for how addiction takes over one's lives, it's also very effective. Be it gambling, porn, alcohol or whatever, it's difficult for most to stay clean. Jekyll's suicide then becomes that much more melancholic, as he chose death over the shame of letting his peers see him at rockbottom, better be dead than have everyone know and treat me like an addict.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Read: L'étranger

Three deaths. A loved one, a stranger and oneself. If all lives are equal, all three deaths matter the same, if death is inevitable and we must accept it, there's nothing to be sad about any of those deaths. Through a long chain of this equals that, the whole universe comes out seeming meaningless. Maybe it is. Why care when the universe doesn't care? Naturally, all things which are very easy to say conceptually. I had prepared for it, so I thought I'd be fine when my cat died, when my father was sent to the ER, but I cried in both instances and felt my soul shrinking (and saying it in reverse, you could argue my cat's life and father's life are equally precious to me. to someone out there that could make me a stranger by itself, crying for a cat as much as for a father probably makes no sense to most. people in my family itself said "sure sure ill give you two cats so you forget that one" when it happened. theyd never say that about a father for sure, in the great scheme, that life only mattered to me, and I don't need anyone else to feel the same or understand my feeling. if anything, id be happy enough if they just didn't deny it.)

Meursault tried to block the sun when his mother died. A stranger even to himself, he could not process his own feelings. He overhears his neighbor crying over his lost dog, and thinks of his mother, but can't tell why. He smiles when looking at his reflection, yet it remains somber.

The multitude had no place in his world and, likewise, the multitude also rejected him. Though even if given more time, he'd probably only continue averting his eyes from the sun, instead of one day understanding at least himself. Only his death could make him understand himself, his anger, his violence and, at the same time, come to terms with his mother's death. And perhaps more importantly, understand the last of her life. He couldn't love Marie (or at least understand if he did so or not properly), but managed to see why his mother got a boyfriend at the end of her life.

"Nobody had the right to cry for her" to me reads like a loving statement. She lived, and lived again in her golden years. What joy did he see that, what peace he must have seen in the way she lived. He sees not the loss he suffered, but what she achieved, what she had before leaving, and thus wishes none to look at her with tears, with sadness. "Maman lived and died happily, don't stain that with tears!" is what his heart screams to me. If at first he didn't understand his own sadness, at the end he understands there is nothing to be sad about. Run or walk, the sun will get you.

"We're all privileged, but one day we'll be condemned." Great equalizer is the death In his outburst he finally takes the wheel of his life. The trial took place with him apart from it, he had no place in deciding his own fate in the world of men. But in front of (a man of) God, he finally expressed his anger, his violence, his beliefs. He seeks not redemption or forgival or such earthly, humane values, because he's seen through the intrinsic value of reality. Nothing matters, everything matters, it's all the same (Letters, from Natasha Pierre and the Great Comet). Zarathustra also advocates one to find their own truth, which is what Meursault seized for himself and found peace in it (He is no pale criminal, however, as his act did not terrify him, but I digress), therefore placing Meursault closer to overman than man.

We will live, make choices on how to live, and one day we shall die. Be it our best life or our worst life, it'll end one day. If that brings you hope or despair or indifference, it doesn't matter to me, it won't affect me. To you, it only matters how you feel, and to me, it only matters how I feel about it. We're strangers to one another, we can open our hearts, but never share our qualia. Someone might choose to not open their umbrella and instead dance when it rains. That's what it means to have free will.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Also Sprach Zarathustra x Crime and Punishment

hard to not think of raskol's theory and the overman

or at least so I thought at first, but as ASZ went on, I didn't think there was much to do, but it crosses over sometimes.

Of The Pale Criminal, for one, feels very much like a straight look into Raskol. He killed to prove his theory, blood for the sake of blood. But Zarathustra doesn't admonish the criminal, he admires his insanity for allowing him to go beyond, and wishes more people had it. (But considering how he advocates one is only as great as the enemy, and thus you owe them some respect, it conflicts with Raskol's argument that killing a leech isn't a crime. To dehumanize the enemy is to make you, their killer, smaller too, I'd say. A true Napoleon needs great enemies, there's no admiration in history for a hero that didn't topple great foes.)

In Of The Priests, he talks about how having spilled blood doesn't prove the truth of your beliefs. While his message is against Christian values, does this not also apply to a theory that would claim a hero has the right to eliminate those in the way of their greatness? While it doesn't deny that right per se, I believe it denies that it makes such a man extraordinary. Killing, winning and proving yourself right doesn't prove one has surpassed man, it doesn't set one above man. At the same time, the insanity to go beyond the limits of good and evil, to seize that power, doesn't sound like a denial of Rodion's theory. Rodion probably would feel validated by Zarathustra, but Zarathustra wouldn't affirm Rodion.

Of the Sublime Men speaks of great men that don't know joy. Putting it in Gash Bell terms, Zarathustra wishes for great men to be hippos, not lions. All animals run away from the lion, but a hippo gets birds and fish to clean their teeth. A force to be reckoned with must know kindness, must have levity, must know how to dance. This is probably how Sonya sees Rodya, these words are the salvation she offers him. If Zarathustra saw Rodion at the end of the book, he'd probably acknowledge his growth, if nothing else.

Zarathustra's overman isn't a Napoleon (he doesn't want us to become heroes, but gods), and Raskol's theory is flawed to begin with, so naturally they're not walking the same path ideologically, but I still love how much ASZ and C&P mutually give each other depth through through the ideals displayed in both works.

P.S: God is dead, we killed him. God died because he loved man too much. In these lines, having read Paradise Lost, I can read it as the death of a conceptual being through self-denial. For God to be a perfect being, he can't make mistakes. However, his beloved child, Man, was a mistake. To keep existing, God would have to kill man, but his love was too deep to do that. Therefore God allowed himself to die for man to live. (know how in monogatari theres that black orb that kills oddities that stopped acting their role? think theres one of these that can devour god?)

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Watched: Lonely Castle in the Mirror

There's so much I'd like to say, but more than speak it to the void I'd like to talk about it with someone, so I won't say much here.

The more I thought about it, more I realized how heartfelt and intelligent the movie was, through what it displayed, through what it said.

Glass children need the support of adults and of fellow children to recover. Sometimes these types of movies can try to be just too hopeful and everything is solved magically, or too out of touch and bullies/abusers just reform when the plot needs it (or the children forgive their enemies and then the problem vanishes without any weight to it), so seeing how this movie portrays the fear felt by children and how the world may not be kind, but there will be someone on your side and one's battle is about staying on the side that loves you, instead of surrendering to the one that will devour you alive was very refreshing, very good.

Personally, my favorite part was the teacher who didn't care about Kokoro's situation, enraging her mother with his dismissiveness. It's a hopeful realism, your teacher may not care, but your mother will protect you, it's a message of hope for children. And in a more broad interpretation, it says that not every adult will be ignorant to your plight.

There are good adults and bad adults, good children and bad children; when despairing one might grow distrustful and see all around them as the enemy, but this movie is almost screaming how this world has enemies and allies, and you should rely, trust and believe in those who will look out for you, because no one is an island, there are things you can't overcome by yourself, try as you might.

Believe in others and pass it forward, grow to become an adult an endangered child can rely on.

Lastly

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Read: Crime and Punishment

One Sin and Hundreds of Good Deeds, Napoleon, Obtaining Paradise. There are many angles to approach this story from, many ideas to discuss about it, I don't feel like I'm literate enough to speak of them all. Anyway, let's talk about sins and sinners.

Rodion, the murderer. Poor and depressed, unemployed and lost, but above all, a smart dumbass. Living in a small cubicle, sleeping and doing nothing all day, Rodion wanted to prove to himself he was worth something. A hero is a murderer that history justified, he took his own theory and turned it around, inverting the cause and effect and murdering someone to prove he wasn't a nobody, that he could achieve greatness.

Amidst the whole cast, and the many people who tried to understand him, I feel the only person who really saw completely through him was Porfiri. Not only he knew how fragile Rodya's heart was, he could tell how dettached to life he was, and pleaded with him to not give up on living. He knew Rodion was a criminal, he had nothing to gain from it, and just out of his own morals, his own wish for this young man to live, he went out of his way to give him a better chance to recover.

To surpass limits and take hold of power, this is what drove Rodion to murdering. I think all the key characters of C&P have done that, but Porfiri's "limit break" was the one without a shred of "sin" in it. The greatest enemy before Rodion, the one that broke down his crime, was one such extraordinary person, and a virtuous foil of Rodion.

On the other end of the spectrum, we have Arkadi, the pedo-rapist. From his very introduction, I thought he was a mirror to Rodion. Both somewhat insane broken men, uncaring about others thoughts and opinions, self-centered and arrogant, but while Rodion was so from a low social position, Arkadi was rich. At first, that's all I thought he was, just a rich Rodion. Nothing prepared me for him to be that much of a mirror image, the same figure with inverted values, pretty much. While Rodion couldn't even put into words his love for Sonya until the end, Arkadi had multiple wives and lovers. Rodion couldn't tell why Sonya would follow him anywhere he went, while Arkadi was this sure Dunya also loved him. Rodion saw the pawnbroker as less than human and thus could kill her, Arkadi saw a child as tempting, and proceeded to defile her. Last and most important, Rodion couldn't kill himself and chose to accept punishment for his crime, while Arkadi decided he should kill himself.

Arkadi's limit break was entirely sinful, he went above and beyond in his lust, in his debauchery, and felt no regret over it (as Rodion over his own murder). He wasn't just Rodion if he had money, he was Rodion if he never accepted punishment, if he hid and ran from all the pain that comes with the crime. He helped many with his (wife's) money, but hundreds of good deeds can't erase even one sin, so he could no longer live with himself, also knowing he couldn't change his nature. He himself told Rodion only a bullet to the temple could stop him, and he committed to it.

Lastly, we have the purest sinner, Sonya, the harlot. At first I couldn't tell why Rodion liked her and respected her so much just from hearing Marmieladov talk about her, but in hindsight, it's clear that he felt in her his ideal, she was a limit breaker. She became a prostitute for her family, she drenched herself in sin to protect her stepfamily. She didn't murder another to achieve greatness, she allowed herself to be murdered, if it meant their happiness. Upon killing another and falling apart, Rodion needed to know how she, who took all the pain unto herself, didn't, and to him, an atheist, it must have felt conflicting to see that it was her faith that kept her together. I feel that, at the same time he wanted to see her faith break (and her too), he wanted to find the will to believe and keep himself together too, resulting in the Ressurection of Lazarus Reading scene, that was akin to his "battles" with Porfiri, in that moment he was trying to find out which of them was justice, does justice lie with the one that believes or the one that doesn't?

Sonya doesn't mirror Rodya, she is what lies beyond his flawed theory of greatness. He, who believes himself to be great, could not befriend anyone in prison or find himself having any will to live. She, who suffered even more than him, who holds herself humbly, is loved by all. When he killed the pawnbroker, he already knew his theory was shattering, and Porfiri continued to smash it, to force him to see reality, but that wasn't enough to save him. Porfiri could only break his world, Sonya can be there to show him what a great person can be once his antiquated mindset is gone.

Without her, he'd easily return to who he was before the murder, a depressed man in a coffin-like room, in a world of darkness. What probably made him aware of her importance, of what she represented in his world, was her illness making her not visit for a while. In prison, without her, he was just who he was before murdering the pawnbroker. And that simple change, that single realization, could change who he was and his view towards the future.

It isn't the courage to kill that allows him to surpass his limits, it's the courage to love. Love himself, even if he is mediocre, to then allow himself to consider himself worthy of the love given to him by others, and ultimately be able to love them back properly.

[canyouheatmeuponafrozennight]

Read: Paradise Lost

Satan, Adam, God, Paradise and Family

Satan

Making Satan too sympathetic got Milton in trouble at the time, which at first indeed might seem like a wild stance to take, especially at the time. Too human for Christians, too pitiful for a satanist. People need their icons to be perfect, even if for that they must be dehumanized or have their darkness hidden (Even Christ is treated that way, as some don't allow him to have feared death or have loved a prostitute and so on). I've seen commentary that says everything Satan speaks is a lie, the sympathy one might feel for him stems from his gaslighting, but I don't think that's what Milton was writing with him.

The reason he is the protagonist for half the book, the reason he is drawn sympathetically, is because Satan is Adam. If we're being technical, Satan, Adam and Christ are all brothers (I'd even argue Man's knowledge of good and evil, the possibility of swinging either way itself works within that metaphor. The neutral path that is man, the evil that is Satan and the good that is Christ, these are the three paths created by God through his direct children) but the biggest parallels are drawn between Satan and Adam, that's why it matters that we meet and know him. (Sin is born from Satan, and from their incestuous union comes Death. Eve is born from Adam, and from their incestuous union comes humankind, for one.)

Second, both are expelled from paradise, both are rejected by their father. Satan, unable to accept his younger brother as superior (was Hokuto no Ken Paradise Lost-inspired?) rebels against his father and falls to a hell of his making. Still, ruling over hell sounds greater than serving God in Heaven, therefore he accepts that punishment pretending it doesn't even hurt. However, still bitter and looking to frustrate God in return nevertheless, he departs to ruin God's new plan. In other words, he must corrupt his youngest brother to piss God off.

One passage that feels very much like a convoluted family drama, is how God feels conflicted on Man's punishment because erasing man would allow Satan to mock him for throwing away his favorite children the moment they cross him once. A father pressured by the judgemental eyes of the eldest son, the only child old and wise enough to be able to call out his wrongdoings.

Satan is bitter and childish, but paradoxically, also the only adult in the story that can talk back to God, that can challenge providence. As the corruptor of Man, our greatest-uncle did leave this gift for us, the power of evil to confront those who might be mightier than ourselves for our own sake. Satan is self-tempted, he chose for himself to go against God, which I do have to say is more admirable behavior than Adam and Eve's being tempted by another (but also the reason why Satan's punishment was more severe; they could be excused as someone else was to blame at least). Jeanne D'arc ending up as she did might not be a surprise, as the strength to stand up by yourself is indeed a satanic trait.

Satan is very much a prototype of Adam, human-like and sinful, angry and rebellious, he can't see his punishment as his fault, he can't see his failures as his failures. Powerful enough to fight against God, but not pure enough to recognize what he's done, what he has broken; he can't see that he lost Paradise.

Adam

Our greatest-father, Satan with a bit less bite. Personally, a character that always existed within me, perhaps one of the first literature character I've met, but to me never a person, just a symbol. Adam and Eve started mankind, that line is all they were to me, until this book.

I feel the need to start with the line that moved me most, that connected me the most to Adam: When I saw [Eve], all that was beautiful until now, no longer was. The rest of his descriptions of Eve, of being with Eve all rung true within my heart to. I know how it was because he was just like me; a man in love with a woman (Hadestown)

It's easy to say "these two lived in Eden but then lost it all," but what lies before, between and after that, isn't something the Bible makes you think about, but Paradise Lost does. The solitude of a man alone in Paradise for God knows how long, meeting with his soulmate and getting to experience life by her side in a place you two know nothing but peace and joy and good. Thinking about experiencing that, and losing that, makes a short line about the original progenitor which has no meaning gain much more weight, gain significance.

When a now sinful Eve approaches him and tempts him into also consuming the fruit, he thinks about how he can't live without her, and would rather betray God than her. Once he obtains evil he lashes out and says it's her fault this happened, but what I see drawn here is the shape of true love. Before he knew evil, he'd rather die than be without her, once he did, he felt like arguing and playing the blame game. When we love someone to the point of doing anything for them, to be with them, that's Adam within us, the purest, God-betraying love that rests within us is also his gift.

Scared and regretful, Adam, unlike Satan, can tell he lost Paradise, that things won't be good anymore, not only for him and Eve, but to their children. They'll know death, they'll know illness, they'll know pain. Is it worth bringing a child into this world, knowing this is what awaits them? Milton a father himself, in an age much less kind than ours, probably could write that feeling with much more personal investment than one might infer from the text. To answer that question, Raphael comes to Adam and shows him the future, sins, war and plague, but also salvation, redemption and forgival.

When a tragedy occurs, it's not the end of the world. You can make good out of evil. Satan's betrayal created man. Man's betrayal brought Jesus and many other heroes. Mankind was born in sin, but doesn't need to live in sin. That is the positive, existentialist meaning of this journey, when Paradise is Lost (the end of the book), the real story (history) begins.

God, Paradise and Family

Seeing God as a father and Paradise as the nest, the story of Genesis is much more familiar than holy. The father/mother provides all they can to give their children happiness while they're immature, but one day they'll grow and develop, until they no longer can sleep on that same nest. The kids one day will leave and become Gods of their own Paradises, maybe create and provide for their Adams until these are ready to also leave and become gods too. When the fruit makes Adam and Eve become like gods, this is what it means, that these children now will fend for themselves, instead of live under their parent's wings.

Adam's sorrow, however, is probably a feeling that can't be done justice. I'll speak of not being in talking terms with your father, and we'll know our feelings, the feelings of our peers who went through that, the portrayal of characters that went through that. Adam, however, was the first person to experience that "loss," that "grief," even. He prayed because he knew his father would listen, but God would never talk to him again. For 900 years, Adam lived regretting and trying to reconnect, trying to obtain forgival. He was at his happiest when God visited, everyday, always at the same time; what is this if not a child who waits for his dad to get home again? His sin innocent, his punishment eternal and heartwrenching, a torture of the soul probably heavier than the shadow of death and the guilt of sin.

My mother often talks about wanting to see her late mother again, wanting to talk about things which happened, happy and sad. Is that sadness one that can be sublimated in 900 years, or one that only grows with time? Do you think it'd be silly to pray for Adam today, and ask God to forgive him? As a timeless being, perhaps something done today can still change the past. Maybe something can still be done about God and Adam. At least I want to believe that, because otherwise the melancholy is just too overwhelming.