#BUT I SAW ONE SPOILER THAT WAS A BIT MORE SPOOKY THAN IM USED TO AND I SPENT AN HOUR SHAKING ON MY BED AT 2AM

[ween-kitchens]

something a little funny about me is that I need to Keep reminding myself that I am a wimp. you’d assume that I would remember this fact, but apparently playing dredge made me cocky, and I forgot that I can and will have panic attacks over horror games

[riveracheron]

eh. might as well post this now. a few of these are wish fulfillment rather than actual theorizing but explanations under the cut

i have an alchemy hyperfixation and all the alchemy stuff in tmagp makes me very excited so a lot of my theories are related to that

spoilers for the pilot btw

main character gets an eye injury - the image will not leave my head. in the magnus institute ruins statement there was this whole thing about redcanary having some kind of encounter with or experience with eye trauma and that feels like something thats just. gonna come up again

another mechanisms va - self explanatory, we need to complete the set. would love to hear kofi or rachel.

gwen has trauma related to something that happened with elias - this is going on the theory that she’s not elias’ counterpart, but a relative of some kind. something spooky happens to him and that pushes gwen to research the paranormal.

character referencing nicholas flamel - all the main characters have names that reference alchemists, and nicholas flamel is probably the most famous alchemist of all time. i doubt he’ll be given the smirke treatment because that kinda already happened with the transphobic wizard books, but someone could be sharing his name.

mag 114 statement is relevant - thats the. hill top road statement that deals with other realities, and anya (the statement giver) could be from the protocol verse. we could totally hear about the aftermath of her departure

alice/sam/gwen = three primes - the three main alchemical symbols on the OIAR crest, and a good sort of symbolic trio sorter. the three peimes are salt, sulphur and mercury, and are the basis for alchemy. the down to earth, reliable salt, the firey, unpredictable sulfur, and the adaptable, easygoing mercury. i think these could apply i just want to have it called out in universe

lena is a good person - i don’t think they’d pull the evil boss thing twice. i just think lena’s weird mannerisms are from her autistic swag

celia is related to or is agnes - (related to as in. her story involves agnes, not that shes like. a sister.) this comes from a theory by @/pinklotjeart, i think. basically: through the way her death was described (spark returned to the lightless flame) and some timeline discrepancies and general avatarness making it weird, agnes might not be Dead dead. and celia’s counterpart, lynne - well, she saw a fire ghost. also, both her and agnes are the only non one-off characters who have shakespeare names afaik. agnes MONTAGUE, celia from as you like it…

annabelle cane is related somehow - self explanatory, she was at hilltop road when everything went down. might have been pulled in.

a famous alchemist is robert smirke’d - self explaining, give me more canon historical figures jonny

another kitty cat - i want more kitty in podcast is that a crime

augustus is not jonah - we hear jonah’s voice as ben meredith in 193, so im skeptical that tim fearon’s character is jonah for that reason.

oiar group has a messy moment that devolves into actual physical violence - mmm angst i think they deserve to smack eachother around a bit

bonzo cult - yeah.

oiar found family - we got the group of coworkers that hate each other angst last time gimme the “hurting one to get to the others” and self sacrifice angst this time

colin dies early - mmmm i cant say much about this bc its based on one throwaway line at the MCM panel where jonny doesn’t mention colin in the main character group. so . death flags.

oiar is containing the entities scp style - this was a super early theory of mine, either this or theyre using them for power or energy in some way. even more heavy handed capitalism metaphors yay

someone gets ushanka’d - its computer horror: the podcast. that’s all

cookbook statement - a few clues in the ARG had to do with cookbooks, and alex and jonny have already said they’re getting weird with the statement formats (they mentioned an insurance report!) so. cookbook doesn’t seem too far-fetched

tiktoker/influencer character - archives was 2010s and they had a podcaster and youtuber, which were like. the big things. whats the hip trend now??? instagram and tiktok baybee

protocol editors va a small role a la mag 100 or the wtgfs cult - those characters were voiced by other rq team members (ie helen as laverne and martyn as robin) and the team has since expanded!! some editors dis stuff for cry havoc, so im guessing nico, annie, april and others will get a small role!

a villain’s goal is creating the philosopher’s stone or other alchemical thing - tmagp is heavily inspired by alchemy, and the philosopher’s stone was the main goal of alchemy!! it would grant you eternal knowledge snd the ability to turn lead into gold- which seems like a good. evil dude’s ambition

the desolation gets more focus - the institute burned down, the oiar crest has a lot of sulfur symbols (the fire element), alchemy as a whole having to do with fire, celia and her connection- it paints a very. lightless flame picture

trip to germany - a lot of the arg was set in and around berlin, and there was that exchange between sam and colin about german in the pilot! i could see a germany trip happening in the same way jon took a trip to china and america.

[qfantasydragon]

So its the end of the semester and I have been writing Too Many Essays of academic bs and am probably over-analyzing this but its been bouncing around in my head all day so now y’all get to look at it so I can think of other things

Last night I was watching critical role’s narrative telephone and got to Widogast’s Web of Words and after about five minutes of laughing as the other cast members retold the story I had a lightbulb moment spawned, as I said, by too many goddamn essays

“Hey wait a minute. This seems suspiciously Caleb-as-a-volstrucker related.” And the more that thought bounced around my head, the more connections I found, so hear me out:

First off right at the beginning the story, he says “most think of it as a fairy tale to frighten children, but the wise know better.” We know from previous in-game discussion that the voltstrucker are mostly regarded as a spooky story or urban legend within the empire. Exactly the kind of thing you would use to entertain kids. But the smart and the higher up would know that the voltstrucker exist.

So my theory: the three children are Caleb, Astrid, and whats-his-face, Eadwulf, and boy does it mushroom out from there.

The parents told the children to “say their prayers, serve their king, and always walk in the light of the sun” (Liam). We don’t know a ton about Caleb’s parents, but we do know that they were very patriotic. There’s also a lot of talk about the Dawnfather, Pelor, in the first bit, who is neutral good according to the critical role wiki (thanks guys) and one of whose commandments is “deliver the light of the Dawnfather...with kindness, compassion, and mercy” (the wiki). He is also the god of agriculture and a popular focus of worship of the common folk (the wiki). So this is Caleb and classmates before Ikithon, living small town, commoner lives, still full of empathy/kindness/etc.

Then comes the leaving their prayers and going into the dark woods bit, which to me sounds like leaving home, and the way of doing things there, to go to Rexxentrum. Stepping away from the Dawnfather, away from the empathy/kindness thing and the common folk way of life. But at the moment it is still possible for them to return home, unharmed, unchanged. The line describing the woods, “so vast and full of mystery...the desire for knowledge beckoned them. They no longer walked in the light of the sun” sounds like Caleb wanting to learn more about magic and diving headfirst into Soltryce Academy, starting to lose sight of what morality his parents taught him.

Now the children are linking hands as they go through the woods, i.e., Caleb, Astrid, and Eadwulf becoming friends at the Academy. The counting-their-steps-as-they-go thing..well. I couldn’t find any information, but I personally would be very curious how many years the average student spends at the Academy and at what year Ikithon started training them.

Now the children meet the hag, who is described as being the land and is hungry. The being the land bit would mean the hag is representative of the empire, and the fact that she is hungry could represent the Empire’s hunger for power. She says she must eat in order for the land to thrive, i.e., the Empire must gain power in order for it to thrive. This can be done through straightforward battle (eating one of the children whole), but that would eventually cause unrest throughout the empire (our parents would surely despair). That leaves espionage, which is the route the hag symbolically takes.

(Campaign 2 spoilers and interesting side note: who have the might nein recently met who strikes harsh, terrible deals in exchange for double-edged results? a hag. who does Caleb choose to represent what’s going on with the volstruckers? a hag)

The children are frozen in fear (?) (i don’t speak german and the word used sounds like angst and it makes sense so im rolling with it), or the children are restrained as the hag steps forward with her “stone knife.” Hello Caleb being pressured by someone more powerful than him, strapped to a table, and crystals shoved in his arms, how you doing today?

Now the children start losing bits of themselves-- the first his brain, and his thoughts “were no longer his own.” This is Ikithon breaking one of them, im going to say Eadwulf for drama reasons, so that they where were nothing more than a tool, a weapon to be used as Ikithon saw fit.

The second child, and Liam uses female pronouns here and it makes sense so this is Astrid, loses one of her eyes and she “never saw true again.” This is fun because (campaign 2 spoilers) at this point Caleb has already spoken to Astrid and found her viewpoint completely in line with Ikithon’s, with ambitions to take his place one day. Loosing an eye messes with depth perception, or perspective, so Astrid’s perspective is wrong, but her thoughts are still her own as she still has plans outside of what Ikithon wants from her.

The last child looses his heart and “he never knew love again.” Liam uses those exact words and that is important. Its not ‘he could never love again’ which is what would make sense with the loss of a heart, its “he never knew love again”. It is Caleb’s own self-loathing talking. The lost heart is Caleb’s deceased family and all the trauma that came with that loss. Caleb, of the three of them, sees Ikithon clearly and his thoughts are still his own, but he no longer believes himself worthy of love and is a terrified to form relationships, to love, because of how badly that burned him (haha puns) last time.

Another interesting note: This scene occurred in a forest. The Vergesson Sanatorium, where Caleb and crew trained and where Caleb was imprisoned/held was in a forest. (Coincidence? I think not)

The hag says now the land will flourish and the wheat will grow. In other words, thanks to the sacrifice of the children, the empire will flourish and the common folk, the wheat, (see: connections to Pelor, god of the common folk, agriculture, light and goodness) will grow. She releases the children on the condition that they send her their children, and their children’s children and on down the line. Or, more children join the volstruckers, more children are warped and twisted and maimed so that the land, the kingdom, the empire will continue to grow. So that the common folk and the people of the light can continue, unaware that it lies on a foundation of blood and bone.

Throughout the story there is a recurring emphasis that these are children. That they are young and foolish, and yes they messed up but they did not deserve to meet the monster they did. They did not deserve what happened to them. Again, that is Caleb, at his core angry about what was done to him and his friends, and willing to do whatever it takes to set it right.

....

Like I said! Too many goddamn essays. I don’t know if other people have already made this connection or whether Liam O’Brien has confirmed it but I wanted to yell about it for a bit.

If it was intentional, that’s a lot of symbolism in two-ish minutes, and its amazing and incredible.

If it was unintentional, that was an amazing grim-brothers-esque fairytale and I loved it.

If any of y’all have actual social media and know the answer let me know please.

[teegesmagee]

S2E05 of Camp Camp: all my reactions to this great episode!!

Okay so as soon as I saw Miles’ tweet about this episode being about Jasper, I had to make a post of my reactions to watching it for the first time! It was a fantastic episode and I had goosebumps the entire time cause I love these characters so much!!  SO GOOD!!! 

SPOILERS + SCREENSHOTS AHEAD!!! 

Season 2 Episode 5: Jasper Dies At The End

-JASPER EPISODE HELLO iM READY FOR DEATH AND CRYING AND DAVID BEING IN LOVE

-Family road trip hell yeah

-Lmao David’s face when space kid says glue is seeping into his butt 

-I love that Max has already been exposed to David’s Camp Cambell story times aww it’s so cute

-Nikki being 100% down for story time with David is MEE

-A Supernatural reference!! David: “The day I fell in love...with Camp Cambell!”

-FLASHBACK TIME YAYYYY!!!!

-Max trying to stop the flashback like death is upon him lmao

-SING ALONG KIDS!!! *takes deep breath* We've got: Archery, Hiking, Search & Rescue, Biking, Horseback, Training that will save you from a heart attack, Scuba diving, Miming, Keeping up with rhyming, Football, Limbo, Science, Stunting, Pre-Calc, Spaceships, Treasure hunting, Bomb defusal, No refusal, Fantasy, Circus trapeze, and Fights, and Ghosts, and Paints, and Snakes, and Knives, and Chess, and Dance, and Weights– IT’S CAMP CAMP!

-”fair” and “honest” game of charades

-Me: automatically guessing Jasper was going to be the star camper. Jasper: BREAKING THE FOURTH WALL SAYING WE ALL SAW IT COMING

-Quartermaster has not aged a day damn what’s his skin routine 

-ooooo Hiking time!! Can’t wait to see Jasper die...

-OH HOLY SHIT. Young Davey’s voice is SO CUTe fuCK. Miles how??

-”He’s such a trouble maker!” OH SHIT EVERYBODY WE GOT A CANON HEADCANON!!!!! Let’s be honest, we all knew David was a little shit camper just like Max!

-Let Davey say as many Dangs as he wants!!!

-”Don’t be such a square!” *Loud shocked gasps*

- “Woah Davey, what’s your major malfunction?”

-CaMpInG SPiRiT

-Gregg <33 omg my man why do legal fees keep coming out of your paycheck lmaoo

-DAVEY CROSSING HIS ARMS AND ROLLING HIS EYES JUST LIKE MAX!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

-”OFF THE HEEZY”

-Davey being a little sarcastic shit SIGN ME UP

-“Generic Hiking Magazine named richest outdoors man of 1994” what a title

-Yo I’m offended, the star wars prequels are just fine ok ya’ll need to chill

-”I’ve never used technology on any of my adventures! (except for all of them)” Oh, so this is how Jasper dies

-”Is a gun technology?” OMFGG THAT REFERENCE

-Davey verbally saying “SIIIIGH.” and rolling his eyes is officially the sassiest thing of 2017

-Hiking montage!! *Davey gets progressively more and more angry*

- “That’s because we’ve walked by it ten times!” “Really? Hmm, it only felt like five.” I’m so done with this show omf (and btw I went back and only counted 4 times lol)

-DAVEY’S IMMEDIATE CONCERN FOR JASPER’S SAFETY!!! YAASS

-Jasper’s pronouns are confirmed he/his/him!!!

----ok hold on a sec. did Jasper really say “This is not how Jasper’s story ends!” or is present time David the one saying that while he retells this story??----

-Me: holy shit Davey, I’m so sorry, your boyfriend is dead and it’s all your fault

-Jasper: Psych! Just kidding bitches, I’m alive.

-fuckin Cameron Campbell is savage af, he was about to kill Davey right then and there! (but wait isn’t a knife considered Technology???)

-ROTTEN TO THE CORE

-Davey’s speech deserves an award

-I can’t tell if Davey predicted the future, present David is injecting into his own flashback story, or if it’s just ANOTHER fourth wall break--

-*record scratch* OH SHIT NEVER MIND!! MAX MY BOY CALLING DAVID OUT

-Nikki on the edge of her seat is me right now like bitch same I am ready for this

-exCUSE ME. David’s “Wellll” is TOO CUTE. 

-We’ve been searching for hours.

-”Take the shape of my container.” SAme

-Cameron Campbell is a millionaire but he still enjoys being the leader for the camp aww that’s kinda sweet

-Oh no, Jasper looks so small and sad :((

-So, Jasper repeating exactly what Davey said means that they’re a thing right

-JFC I was drinking water when Jasper said “Home Skillets” and choked a bit but then when the whole fuckin bear jumped out of the bushes I SPIT ALL OVER MYSELF DAMMIT GET ME A TOWEL BUSHES OF LOVE

-”lay off man!” Jasper that is not how you talk to bears

-That shoe is going to save the day just you wait lol it looks v important

-”You weren’t planning on having kids were you?” Adoptive-Dad!David confirmed

-DAMN Davey!!! Throwing rocks to destroy technology like a beast! S A V A G E

-”Gasp!”  sTOP SaYING IT oUT LOUD DAVEy UR toO CUTE

-Adopted by bears?? That’s gay 

-Yes Davey my innocent boy. Jasper was indeed their latest hunt

-awww the scooby doo eyes in the cave! Bringing back the childhood vibes

-so dark eh? Seems like they need a certain shoe

-[slight screenwriter rant] okay that mini flashback to the shoes earlier in the episode was totally unnecessary for the audience to see lol 

-What did I fucking say, the shoe saved them all

-I need me some light up kicks

-What the fuck happened in Detroit

-Why am I not surprised the two stuffed bears from the first season are 1) killed by Cameron Campbell himself and 2) are in his “summer home” on Spooky Island

-DAVEY. IS. BRAVE.

-Davey earning a badge too!!! I’m legit crying for him I’m so proud of my baby bean LOOK AT HIS SMILE

-”And we saved Jasper!”  YOU SURE DID SWEETIE!!!! 

-Davey’s second speech also deserves an award

-And from that day on, little Davey had that special sparkle in his eyes

-WHAT. HOW DARE YOU TAKE JASPER’S BADGE AWAY. i WILL FIGHT U

-nooo Jasper don’t be sad ;_;

-I can’t wait for Jasper to be the sour camper that is jelly of his bf Davy 

-oh wow David is legit tearing up at his own story wow I love him even more than before how is that even possible wow////

-David: Ah. I love that story!  Me: I love you

-Aww sleeping Neil

-Welp, I guess Space Kid is dead from glue poisoning 

-Out of gas? Does that mean they get to take a hike in the forest with no technology to guide them back to camp? ;) ;) ;)

-Wait, so Jasper didn’t die yet? Does that mean we get ANOTHER JASPER EPISODE