#MAG125 | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

tmisaccidentreportbook · 2 years

Text

MAG024, Strange Music

Case #0051701, Leanne Denikin Release date: June 22, 2016 First listen: 20th October, can’t remember where I was and I’ve been trying to cleanse the palette a little with some of The Adventure Zone: Graduation. That makes for an interesting combo.

The possessed killer doll has been done a lot. Child's Play, Annabelle, and a new release M3GAN to name a few. And, it may be that I am not as in tune with media tropes as I’d thought, but it honestly hadn’t occurred to me that this was a possessed killer doll situation until sitting down to make notes on this one. I’m going to chalk it up to Jonny’s writing giving this a new lick of grease paint.

- ‘Let me be clear: I’m not scared of clowns.’ Well I am. Or well, I thought I was. But not long after this, I’d go on a Scare Night with a group of my friends from work; masked, boostered and outside. But it was a series of horror mazes we’d work our way through, you know the sort, and they were themed. One of them was definitely circus themed. I wasn’t scared or spooked in that one, or indeed any of them if memory serves. Mainly in the circus one I was just distracted by the sheer noise and strobing lights. But I think there was also a little bit of ‘I might be a bit nervous but I have several dear friends who are actively terrified and are huddling around me like I’m the mama goose in this situation. Time to link arms, hold hands and turn on the flamingo shaped fairy lights I’m wearing in my infinity scarf. Off you go girls!’ I had a great night but I wasn’t spooked. Possibly because of the noise, probably by the fact that I had finished consuming Season 1 by that point at least.

- I agree with ‘baffling’ nature of clowns and to a degree dolls to. Leanne makes a good point about statues.

- Leanne takes quiet a stand on insisting that the events she’s reporting actually happened. I wonder if she’s run up against indifference or hostility before in connection to this. She later states that there has been police investigation, more than likely she’s not been believed or she may not have dared to tell them. She’s got little to no relationship with her parents and she no longer has her partner, she’s more than likely desperate to be believed but someone, anyone. And given how the Institute operates a… supply chain shall we say for The Lonely, she would have been ripe for the taking, given that, her grief and loss and how her story ends. I wonder, did she emigrate, or was she just lost.

- I had never heard of Bootle, needed to look it up. Appears to be a seaside town, just north of Liverpool.

- Music wasn’t something I’d quite considered as a tool for horror before this podcast. Yes, I knew of sirens singing to lure the unwary in and how the film soundtrack can change to let you know shits about to go down, but short of ritualistic chanting, I can’t think of any times where I’ve seen music actively drawing out the threat and being so linked to it. We’ve seen music play a part before with The Piper, MAG007, and we’ll see it with Grifter’s Bone, MAG042, and I think in MAG125, Civilian Casualties, bagpipes cry. The Slaughter and The Stranger seem to be the two Entities that employ music the most, Nikola Orsinov referring to the efforts of The Stranger preparing for ‘the dance’. It’s interesting how these Entities both draw on music as a tool, because at first thought they don’t seem that aligned, but they have many themes in common. The confusion of battle, not knowing friend from foe, common man becoming the enemy other, the idea of officers dancing at balls the night before battle through the 1800s, circuses and shows being run like military operations, the military flair of a ringmaster’s regalia. The two seem very tangled up together and it seems fitting that The Slaughter put pay to The Stranger’s ritual attempt in 1787, MAG116.

- ‘I don’t have a great relationship with my parents, and have always had some problems making friends.’ Leanne seems perfectly ready for The Lonely to take her by the end of her statement. Her hesitancy in calling Joshua her ‘partner’ is telling. Although the nature of the end of the relationships were very different, the only statement of The Lonely we’ve had so fair has been MAG013, from a woman mourning the sudden loss of her fiance.

- ‘It was a hot, muggy day, and I remember wondering whether the stinging in my eyes was from the tears or the sweat.’ I’ve attended funerals in the summer, I’ve worked funerals in the summer. It’s never easy.

- ‘…I’d always felt it was mine in some ways.’ I can understand this sentiment, and I think that makes the break in and burglary all the more brutal. It’s the violation of the safe space and sanctuary. Although I’ve been living away from the family home for a good long while and I’ve never really been one for roots, there will always be a part of me that belongs to a home, garden and field in the Vale of Belvoir.

- So Grandpa Nick was Nikolai. We’ve establishing the Russian connection.

- ‘…had to cut the lock off.’ I’m gonna say, it there’s a padlock on an attic door that you’ve never seen opened or used and you can’t find a key for it anywhere on the property, that’s a red flag.

- ‘The only things there were an old steamer trunk, a small stool and a bright red calliope organ.’ I’m gonna say, it there’s a padlock on an attic door that you’ve never seen opened or used and you can’t find a key for it anywhere on the property, and then you get it open and there’s only a few, rather singular items in there, that’s a bloody big red flag.

- Oh now I’m imaging a statement covering an episode of a ‘storage hunters’ type show and the premise is terrifying and hilarious in equal measure to me.

- ‘The Calliaphone’. Right, I looked this up because it didn’t quite sound right and it might be a case of brand name becoming the common term. From the wiki ‘the air-driven calliope is sometimes called a calliaphone, the name given to it by Norman Baker, but the "Calliaphone" name is registered by the Miner Company for instruments produced under the Tangley name’.

- The carving of ‘Be still, for there is strange music’ on the lid is interesting and the statement doesn’t specify if machined on, done by hand professionally or roughly scratched on. Was it done buy an artisan proud of their work and sending it off with a blessing or was it added as a warning?

- Also, the instruction of ‘be still’ is one that makes me nervous. Usually the wish would be for merriment and movement when music plays, which is why being made to sit tight during concerts always made me antsy, so why do you need to be still for them music? Is it so something doesn’t see you? Will you be caught in the dance and unable to stop? Will you become still, whether you will it or not?

- The jaws are gone. Dolls that have been silenced… Why that manner of death though?

- 23 dolls. Grandpa was up to some shit.

- ‘…oldest doll still has jaw.’ So, I’ve learnt that there are recognised different types of clowns. Great, that live in my head. But I think this lil guy could possibly to be a white faced clown, a Pierrot, the loyal, hardworking, dependable servant character of the Commedia dell'Arte. Well, he’s hard working, gotten 23 meals already.

- ‘Or maybe selling. They were definitely antiques, so they might have been worth something.’ I already mentioned working auctions in MAG005 and yeah, while the dolls themselves may have been eerie, they weren’t as eerie as the folks most interested in them.

- In the style of Grizzop drik acht Amsterdam around the 41minute mark of RQG 92 – Bringing Down The House SASHA!

- ‘Tried and succeeded. They were actually quite helpful.’ All of the archival assistances are wonderful, they are the best beans, but Sasha is probably the most effectively by conventional and, y’know, well tested and legal methods. I reckon by illegal methods, she’d be down right dangerous. But Harold Silvana isn’t a name we’ve heard yet, but we will in MAG035, which is a type of statement I’ve taken to referring to in my head as ‘fear goulash’. Like, freaking shit is happening, but they’re all in on it, MAG020 was a bit like that, everyone had a bit of flavour in there.

- There is a whole section on the calliope wiki about how it can be pronounced. There a great little rhyme featured there;

Proud folk stare after me, Call me Calliope; Tooting joy, tooting hope, I am the calliope.

I mean, it’s wrong, but it’s cute.

- I am with Jon hard on this one. The instrument is named after the Greek muse eloquence and epic poetry. Mother of Orpheus. Hesiod and Ovid called her ‘Chief of All Muses’. Put some respect on her name.

- I love that when the recording resumes, there’s some emphasis on ‘ka lie oh pee’. Just a little bit of pepper to make the point.

- ‘By rights, when I sat in front of it and pressed the first key down, nothing should have happened.’ Oh and that ‘should’ is key there isn’t it. If the laws of the world are being fucked with, get out. If reason and physics peace out, you do too.

- ‘…came a loud, howling tone.’ I’m reminded again of the Carnyx as I mentioned them in MAG007, a howling instrument for the battlefield rather than the music hall.

- I can’t find any indication of what piece of music ‘Faster Faster’ might have been but it is a very evocative name for The Stranger’s purposes. Moving and dancing faster and faster until the world around you is unrecognisable. It could also be that Leanne is chasing her grief, as when she first played it, it was to her Grandpa’s memory.

- Josh’s reaction to the music is something that could be expected, especially after his reaction to the contents of the trunk, but it can not be as easily explained. While Leanne is caught up in the playing of the music, we get no indication of what Josh is seeing, if she or their surroundings are changing in anyway or if his reaction is solely to the music and its’ effects on him. As he doesn’t give any justification or explanation when the music stops, we can’t be sure.

- Was there a chance that the clown doll glimpsed him, in the short moment the trunk was open?

- ‘…in those last weeks he became moody, short-tempered, constantly on edge.’ The change in Josh’s behaviour can certainly be attributed to The Stranger’s influence, but I’m interested to know exactly how. Is it simply the constant presence of the music or is it something more? Is this new behaviour that’s being propagated within him, or are his masking behaviours being stripped away to reveal what he was really like?

- But Leanne is fully alone now; somewhat estranged from her parents, grandfather dead, partner out of the picture.

- ‘So, for the third time, I got out that ladder and climbed into the loft.’ We get the magical rule of three and we see the cloth poppet of Josh. With the Clown, the ringleader, reaching for him.

- I’m glad there is no use of the phrase ‘voodoo doll’ in the piece. Although the use of a doll effigy to hurt Josh is clearly implied, with the likeness and the 22 other jawless dolls, the words are not said and I appreciate it as the practise is so often misattributed with terrible connotations.

- I’d like to know more of why Josh was chosen. Was it simply a case of the calliope and its’ retinue needed to feed? Was Leanne off limits as she was the one who provided the music? Was it because Josh had hurt her and the calliope and the attendant now considered her under their protection?

- The break in, another instance of the violation of the safety of the home, especially considering that Leanne had such a connection to the place. But Breekon and Hope, and yes it’s got to be those two; two people, ‘looked legitimate’ as a moving service, in the employ of The Stranger, Breekon and Hope not being stopped because they ‘looked legitimate’. The shit you can accomplish with a hard hat, a high vis jacket and a clip board, I tell you.

- Leanne immediately knew that the calliope and what happened to Josh was connected. I mean, the signs are all there, but although she may not know how it works, she understood the connection enough to swear up and down that she didn’t play the calliope a third time.

- Before Josh and Leanne broke up, he said that ‘he still heard that calliope music’. And once again my mind circled back around to MAG007, and Wilfred Owen and other doomed soldiers cocking their heads to catch the music of The Piper.

- So Josh was found dead, jaw gone, no foreign DNA found on him, and his windpipe crushed by ‘some sort of rope, apparently woven out of thick wool’. Well, the white clown had ‘no woollen hair left’. None left. What if it was kept to hand though, within the trunk?

- ‘Tim said it reminded him of some articles he’d read on travelling circuses.’ We’ve still to meet Tim in the flesh, but this is the first indication we get of Tim’s history with The Stranger and with the Circus of Gregor Osinov.

- ‘Gregor Osinov and Nikolai Denikin.’ Yup, Grandpa was up in some shit. We don’t get confirmation that Nikolai is the calliope player, but given his talent at the piano, it’s not a massive leap of logic. If that is the case though, who are the other 22 dolls.

- The picture was taken 1948, so in the wake of WWII. A time when The Slaughter and The Stranger probably stalked the world rank and file.

- We get our first mention of The Circus of the Other and the legacy of Gregor Osinov.

- So the calliope was unaccounted for between 2004 and 2007. What was Nikola Osinov doing with it in that time, and why did it make its’ way to the Magnus Institute?

#MAGO24 #The Stranger #the magnus archives

2 notes · View notes

soveryanon · 6 years

Text

Reviewing time for MAG125 /o/

- I’m still going to nickname that power ~Insight~ until further notice because of MAG123 (“I have no theories on it, no… no sudden insights.”), though Basira’s “spooky brain” is A Very Tempting Phrase to cover it. Interestingly, there were similarities in the ways it has manifested so far:

(MAG124) ARCHIVIST: Still no sign of Peter Lukas of course, or Mar– [STATIC] Wait– Wait.

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: Peter Lukas is just… sitting up there, doing whatever the hell it is he [STATIC-] and Elias have planned, and Melanie still has that bullet pumping violence into her, waiting to turn this place into another Lanncraig. [/STATIC] I just wish there w– … w… … Wait, I, I, I didn’t… Did I read that somewhere, or…? R–right, yes [CLEARS THROAT]. The bullet, er, didn’t show up on… electronic or… mechanical scans, but it’s still lodged in her leg, just above the tibia. … And it’s been getting slowly infected ever sin– I have to find Basira.

1°) After Jon read a statement. (It had also been the case in MAG099 when he had dropped Gerard’s name amongst the list of Gertrude’s acquaintances when he’d been given absolutely no reason to do so.) 2°) Both times, regarding the assistants – who are Jon’s primarily concern as of now (at least explicitly). (3°) Right after Jon mentioned Peter Lukas, but that one is most likely to be a coincidence. Probably.)

-> … is this the equivalent of Beholding throwing him a treat and going “thank you for the meal”.

- If his screams are any indication: Jon got hurt. Again. Beating his own record from season 2, in which it had taken 7 episodes for him to Get A New Injury (the reopening of his worms-induced wounds in MAG041 notwithstanding). I wonder how long it will take for us to know where he got hurt and what happened exactly? It had taken from MAG047 to MAG053 to learn that Michael had cut him deeply enough to require five stitches – and even know, we don’t know where he got stabbed exactly. (I’m love it, I love that we know that Jon gets hurt but that it’s rare to know which part of his body was damaged every time around; we’re not even sure what hurt him here? Could have been the scissors, could have been the scalpel, could have been a surprise! hidden knife. So many sharps things laying around.) (*Tim’s voice from MAG082* “When you[’ve been hurt] and there are more than three different ways you might [have gotten sta]–”.)

On the one hand, insert jokes here about how Jonathan “Disaster” Sims is collecting the set.

…………….. on the other hand, he is. Indeed. Slowly completing the set of getting physical injuries from other entities, things that might be considered a form of marking?, and/or getting live-statements from other avatars, and it has never been highlighted as a problem by Elias – all the contrary, it’s technically a good thing according to what he said about Jon’s job description (MAG092: “It is your job to chronicle these things, to experience them, whether first-hand or through the eyes of others.”):

* The Web: encountered “A Guest For Mr Spider” as a child (recounted in MAG081: “The first of the dark powers to touch me, perhaps, but it did not claim me.”). * Beholding: claimed him hard (when becoming the Archivist? when he signed on as Head Archivist? when he began working for the Institute? when he watched the other boy get taken as a child?). * The Corruption: worms digging into him during the Jane Prentiss invasion (MAG039), Jon still has the scars on various parts of his body. * The Spiral: slashed/stabbed by “Michael”, probably on his arm/hand since he was trying to stop it? The injury required five stitches (MAG047). “Michael” gave its statement in MAG101. * The Desolation: one hand burned by Jude Perry following a Handshake Event (MAG089). Received her live-statement. * The Vast: thrown into it by Mike Crew, sayonara to your already tar-filled lungs motherfucker (MAG091). Received his live-statement. * The Hunt: Alice “Daisy” Tonner did something to his neck, half-strangling him or cutting it with his own knife, we don’t know, but it wasn’t pretty since Elias commented on it the following episode (MAG091). Received her live-statement in MAG061, and Trevor&Julia’s in MAG109. * The Stranger: terrorised by the Not!Them (MAG079), punched or strangled a bit by Nikola (MAG097), held captive by Nikola for a month (MAG101), the whole Unknowing mess (MAG118-MAG119). (And Nikola left her mark on his skin uwu) * The End: approached it following the bombing of the Unknowing, and received a live-statement from Oliver Banks (MAG121: “You’re… balanced on an edge where The End can’t touch you – but you can’t escape him”) + dead-but-not-dead-dead!Gerry’s in MAG111. * The Slaughter: given his screams, probably hurt by Melanie (MAG125).

Now, for the missing ones:

- The Buried: no direct injury on that front, but a few weird occurrences around that one – Jon received that live-statement from Karolina Górka in MAG071, who might have been claimed after her experience (“Aside from that, all that’s left to do is sweep up after Ms. Górka. She left the place rather dusty.”); the “DIG” ad that crept into Jon’s nightmares (MAG120) was not from a statement he had read, but from one read by Martin (MAG088), and Elias’s narration had the same static as Martin’s when he described it (what happened with that one?!); the statement-giver, Enrique MacMillan, had felt something in what is now Jon’s office and tried to dig it up in November 2003 (“cold, empty and calling. There’s something here, you see. Something to be dug up, rooted out, buried within. A hollow space that all eyes point towards. And I intend to reach it, if my fingers don’t give out first. I know where to dig.”) – the tunnels? Daisy had mentioned they felt “empty”… - The Flesh: attacked the Institute when Jon was in a coma (as mentioned in MAG123). Curiously, we haven’t met/heard any avatar of that one yet, not… in the flesh (badadadumdum), so it might be coming? - The Dark: has people lurking around (MAG125: “In the last week, I’ve seen two different people wearing symbols for the People’s Church of the Divine Host”) and, in the same way, we haven’t met/heard any avatar of that one yet (though Basira has). - The Lonely: has Peter as interim director of the Institute, and Jon has already highlighted that he’s feeling isolated on multiple occasions:

(MAG123) ARCHIVIST: I wish I could talk it through with Martin. … Or Tim. Or Sasha. But we never really did that, did we…? … Everything’s changed.

(MAG124) ARCHIVIST: It’s been a week and… Melanie’s attitude towards me hasn’t softened. And Basira, though she is very willing to talk, still doesn’t seem to trust me enough […]. Still no sign of Peter Lukas of course, or Mar–

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: I find myself basically alone.

So… it might be at least affecting him already, although it’s not a physical injury (yet).

Once again: is Jon supposed to catch them all as a part of The Watcher’s Crown ritual…? ;;

- There were a few hours of panic for Patreons when the episode came out in early release, because Martin was listed in the voicecast for the episode. So, WHERE WAS HE. WAS HE THERE DURING THE SHOUTING AT THE END OF THE EPISODE?? HAD HE COME BACK JUST BECAUSE JON SCREAMED AND HAD BEEN HURT AGAIN?? HAD HE BEEN TRYING TO STOP THE OTHER TWO WHEN THEY BEGAN OPERATING ON MELANIE?? IS HIS VOICE SOMEWHERE IN THE CHAOS??

In the end, nop, genuine mistake, he wasn’t meant to be in the episode.

Schrödinger’s Martin.

- I stand with this statement-giver on the idea that Sheep Are Weird And Evil. You’re valid, statement-giver.

- I really like the way Slaughter statements are tackled, because there is an overall quietness in them: the violence erupts, or has left its victims behind and is only reconstructed through them, but it’s mostly… stillness and silence. The Slaughter has its own logic and, from an exterior point of view, you never understand why things are happening; they just happen, breaking all the links and coherences that had been reigning until then. It might actually one of the fears that gets me the most, now that I think about it, because of the suddenness of its outbursts, the fact that you don’t see the violence coming? (This plot in particular made me think of the last arc of Naoki Urasawa’s Monster, too!)

- … this statement felt especially gruesome, and one of the things that freaked me out even more, at first, was that Jon… was apparently unfazed by it?

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: Statement ends. Hm. An Englishman returning from Scotland with a fear of bagpipes and sheep. I’m sure we can all relate! In many ways, The Slaughter fascinates me.

Immediately throwing a joke and then going on philosophising about the Slaughter’s implications, without giving a thought to the villagers…? Really, Jon, really…? Nnnnnot the time, maybe? On first hearing, I was very unsettled/worried (comparatively to MAG123 and MAG124, it sounded… very harsh); after stepping back, I realised that it’s… actually a Typical Jon Thing, though. He wasn’t only doing that in season 1 (when it’s official that he was faking it to conceal the fact that he was actually afraid), and he wasn’t discovering the story for the first time (like us listeners), so that could be why he felt too detached to me there. Still. Not great, Jon ;;

(I’ll keep being a bit paranoid about Jon having lost something since he woke up, until we learn about what it’s supposed to mean for him…)

- Also, I’m *squints* about this bit:

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: Regardless, I’ve hit another research dead end with this. It’s… frustrating, to be honest. I finally feel myself, I feel… focused, and ready – and I find myself basically alone.

“READY” FOR WHAT, JON???

Sidenote, but I wonder whether Jon is absolutely sincere and genuine here, or trying to… wave a hand at Elias or whoever can be listening in, basically trying to bait them into acting by showing that he’s impatient/waiting for them to do something? I’m glad that, at least, Jon has no illusion that Peter’s behaviour might be going all according to Elias’s plan, slumping them in the same bag:

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: But honestly, it’s the internal threats I’m worried about. Peter Lukas is just… sitting up there, doing whatever the hell it is he and Elias have planned […].

(I love that although they’re (almost) entirely absent, Jon delivers a Quota of mentions about Martin and Elias(+Peter).) Peter could actually be something outside of Elias’s control/plans/interests but… I’m glad that Jon is assuming that they’re on the same side, and that it means Bad News, for now. (/ meanwhile, other side of my brain: “oh my gods, it sounds like Elias&Peter are a power couple when you say it like that, Jon.”)

- This is the third statement picked up by Jon since he woke up (since he didn’t have any say on MAG122’s), and the second one that delved a bit into an aspect of “control”, together with MAG123’s.

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: There seems to be, in all cases, a question at its heart about… control. Is it a mindless dance, dragging participants along by the beat of a drum or… is there a kernel of will in there, a lucidity and deliberateness to the random fury and violence? I suppose that’s the question with so much of “violence”, “war”: how much are you really in command of yourself or of others? I’m not sure what scares me more: the idea that deep down, everyone is in complete control of their actions, that everything is, on some level, intentional; or that ultimately, we don’t have any control of ourselves at all, and the rest is just… rationalisation.

It sounded a bit too Relatable to his own situation and concerns, uh? Since the end of season 3 had a few moments of Jon’s worry about becoming a monster and how to deal with it – Georgie’s advice in MAG093, Tim’s “These things aren’t human. It’s… instinct. You can’t not!” (MAG114), Jon’s decision to trust the assistants in MAG117, etc. Jon’s lines, here, specifically reminded me of Tessa Winters’s pondering about the human consciousness, what control you exert on it?

(MAG065) TESSA: […] Assuming I’m not losing my mind, of course. ARCHIVIST: Yes, I hear that a lot too. TESSA: Well, that’s what’s terrifying, isn’t it? Your mind is all you are. There’s no backup, no reset, if it goes… I’m not just talking about madness as it appears, but what it is from inside… The way people talk about it, it’s like you have to think you’re saying that our mind is everything we perceive, everything we are. Well that means… you can never know when your grasp might be slipping. I’m not convinced that’s it, though. Or maybe deep down, somewhere inside, you understand what’s happening to you and… No, I am… I don’t know which scares me more.

That’s still a relevant thematic, now more than ever, since Jon apparently ~became The Archivist for real~ and we still don’t know what that means, and what he truly knows about it (officially, he’s missing some of his memory, but to what extent?). Jon’s “and the rest is just… rationalisation” also put me to mind of how the Web tends to operate according to Trevor:

(MAG056, Trevor Herbert) The weirdest sensation began to flow through me; I wanted to leave. It wasn’t like with a vampire, where I would feel like I’d been spoken to. This was just a sudden awareness of my own desire. I’d been sober for three years at that point, but I felt like I desperately wanted to get high, and I knew that the best place to get some was out in the night. Looking back, I think it might have been my own mind rationalising the way I felt my will being tugged out of the room, but it was still very powerful. If I hadn’t had a lifetime’s experience of identifying and fighting off the effect of the vampire’s gaze, I probably would have done it, too.

Aaaand of course, what Elias had said to Melanie about her own intentions (which is a bit more relevant here in a Slaughter context):

(MAG106) ELIAS: Whatever I’m planning needs to be stopped! Even if it costs a few lives. Including your own. MELANIE: Well, that’s not even– ELIAS: A rationalisation, of course. A lie, about your own selfishness, that you would rather be dead than trapped without the self-determination you prize so highly.

I was assuming that Slaughter and Web would probably be on opposite sides on the spectrum of Colours-That-Hate-Me, since respectively unleashed chaos and absolute control, but I’m not so sure anymore?

- There was a tiny allusion to “What The Ghost?” in Jon’s pondering, though! Patreons got one episode of it (so far? I hope that they are more to come, the first one was… plainly amazing) and this bit sounded like a reference to its content:

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: […] In many ways, The Slaughter fascinates me. There seems to be, in all cases, a question at its heart about… control. Is it a mindless dance, dragging participants along by the beat of a drum or…

We already knew that Jon listens to WTG but still… nice!! … and also sad because that’s a way to think about Georgie without even naming her. *cRIES*

- Jon, please.

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: Another Leitner, obviously. Not one I can readily identify, though it sounds like it would now be… inert, anyway. Given the blank pages, I do wonder whether its destruction was a last-ditch effort to stop its effects, or the exact thing that released its power in such an… extreme way.

Technically Not A Leitner since the statement was from 1993 (implying that it never made its way into the library before it was destroyed in 1994), how dare you slander Leitner by associating his name to this book :ww

- Okay, so Melanie and Basira are now living in the Institute, that was made explicit.

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: You’ve been staying here too. BASIRA: Got a camp bed at the other end, near the tunnels. I like to keep an eye on them. Besides, I wanted to give her some space, y’know. But yeah. Living outside the Institute, ’s just not safe anymore. ARCHIVIST: What about Martin…? BASIRA: I think he’s still got a place? He’s not down here anyway.

1°) Not exactly sure where exactly they’re sleeping? It definitely sounded like they were in the tunnels, but Basira very clearly said that she’s sleeping “near the tunnels” (not inside of them)? Unless they’re in one of the rooms and Basira is staying close to its entrance to keep a broader look on the corridors? 2°) (Melanie and Basira… are… roommates… (OH MY GODS THEY ARE ROOMMATES.)) 3°) ;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; Where is Martin sleeping, that is a good question. Does he really still have his flat or did he… leave everything behind when he began working with someone-that-we’re-assuming-must-be-Peter? Or is he living in the Archives, too, though in ~another space~? DO HE AND JON SOMETIMES ACCIDENTALLY SHARE A BED IN THAT-ROOM-IN-THE-ARCHIVES, WITHOUT EVEN REALISING IT? (… Or does he sleep at Peter’s place.)

- Except for season 1 (in which he was a stuck-up ass) and season 2 (in which he was a paranoid ass), Jon has never mentioned Martin so much, has never been so concerned about Martin… and it’s understandable that he would, if Martin is acting in a worrisome way!! But. But. Still. He immediately wondered about Martin’s own accommodations and, after their encounter in MAG124:

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: I am now sure Martin is actually avoiding me.

aOUCH… I’m glad that Jon is preoccupied about Martin, thinking about Martin and not taking him for granted anymore (kind of)… but AT WHAT COST………………

- uUUUuuuh… Meanwhile, Jon kind of implied that he is still going outside?

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: Basira was right about the Institute being watched, though. In the last week, I’ve seen two different people wearing symbols for the People’s Church of the Divine Host, and it’s rare I go anywhere without cobwebs anymore. … I, er, find myself keeping my guard up around mannequins as well, though I’ll admit that one is more likely to be my own projection.

I would have assumed that Jon would have been the most likely to migrate long-term in the Archives, there is something funny in the idea that he… isn’t, somehow. (Also, Jon: what. are. you. doing. with all this free time.)

I’m not sure if cobwebs are a new thing around Jon, or if it’s only that he is able to pay attention to their gravitating around him nowadays: spiders had been… very prevalent in the Institute before. Or is it just growing even worse? (;; Sad for Jon, regarding the mannequins mention… Jude Perry is a prime example of avatar being still around and holding grudges after Gertrude messed with them, so… Jon being cautious of potential Stranger agents is not unwarranted. Maybe some survived, and maybe some would want to go after him…)

I’m laughing at the fact that is sounds like you can NEVER GET RID OF THE PEOPLE’S CHURCH OF THE DIVINE HOST. From “a small cult that grew around the defrocked Pentecostal minister Maxwell Rayner in London during the late eighties and early nineties. […] Mr Rayner himself disappeared from public view sometime in 1994 and the group fragmented shortly afterwards.” (MAG009) to them being around in March 2015 (MAG025), to Maxwell Rayner being stopped by the police in February 2017 (MAG073). It’s almost a running gag at this point, that they’re still there and lurking in whichever circumstances efurefdvhjnref. (Julia!! Julia, come back!! They’re still around, surely you would like to take care of them? Please? Pretty please?)

- ONE GOOD THING ABOUT WHAT THEY DID TO MELANIE if it was indeed in the tunnels (it sure sounded like it): assuming that they’re right and that Elias can’t see shit inside of them… then Elias didn’t see it, didn’t watch as Jon was able to ~see~ the bullet inside of Melanie. I’m taking all the Positivity I can, okay. :[

- But also: Jon escapes your Eyes for 35min, and he comes back bloody and with a new stab wound. Typical Jon. (Do you think that Peter and Elias had a bet going on about how much time Jon would need before getting a new injury once he would be back? Or about the nature of the next injury? Who betted what? We know that Peter was implied to go with the gruesome option when betting with Salesa (MAG066); but on the other hand, Elias is supposed to know Jon a bit more. Who would have gone the most realistically pessimistic about Jon?)

- I’m worried that Jon is using his powers so much since he woke up, because it feels like there should be a compensation or a catch – it’s… very beneficial to Jon right now, and I can’t really believe that it could be solely positive and something he’s using without being used by it. Jon is more than ready to use it to his own advantage, quite obviously; the contrast with how he had been startled and thrown-off when Elias had highlighted the phenomenon in MAG102 is just… telling:

(MAG102) ARCHIVIST: […] Is there anyone else who might know what it is, or– or where? Aside from Leitner, or Gerard. ELIAS: … Sorry? Gerard Keay? ARCHIVIST: Uh… yes…? ELIAS: How did you… Who, who told you he was working with Gertrude? ARCHIVIST: No-one, I–I–I just, I… I read it in one of the statements. ELIAS: I don’t think you did. ARCHIVIST: I… but… aaah… ELIAS: You just… knew it! ARCHIVIST: What, no, I, I… Th– that’s not a– ELIAS: No, no, no. No, Jon, this is good. It’s a promising development! ARCHIVIST: [GETTING FLUSTERED] No, No I… It’s just, it’s just… just d–deduction or– ELIAS: Is this the first time it’s happened? ARCHIVIST: Look, I don’t– Look… Haaa… Gerard’s not really a lead. He… he’s dead, isn’t he?

^His stuttering was terrible back then. In MAG125, he was startled, a bit shaken at first, but quickly got back on his feet, accepted what had happened, and ran with the new information in order to do something for Melanie. More used to it? More comfortable with it? Ready to use everything he can in order to fight? There was something overall… more firm, more goal-orientated within Jon afterwards, and it also made me think of… Gertrude.

(MAG101) “MICHAEL”: Gertrude Robinson did not waver. She did not… hesitate. She gave no indication that she saw anything more or less than was expected. Hers was not a mind that left room for doubt. She stared into us carefully, her eyes scanning for something that was my heart. Looking for my door. And she found it.

(MAG125) BASIRA: The guy said you’d need to hit the right nerve for it to work. Do you know much ab– ARCHIVIST: [STATIC-] Here. [/STATIC] BASIRA: You sure? ARCHIVIST: [SHARPLY] Yes. […] … God. Look at that. [STATIC] BASIRA: I don’t… It’s a leg. ARCHIVIST: No. Inside… BASIRA: I don’t know what you’re seeing, Jon. ARCHIVIST: It’s… Christ, it’s all rotten… BASIRA: Can you see the bullet? ARCHIVIST: Yes… […] BASIRA: You better be right about this. ARCHIVIST: I am.

Jon was sure when it came to what was happening and… that part was a novelty. It wasn’t the fake-it-until-it-becomes-real from season 1, nor the blatant bullshitting from season 2; he was certain of his information. (And!! Using it for good!! Gertrude had one priority, stopping the rituals, and… so far, it seems that Jon’s is more about protecting the assistants. … which means there will probably come a point where he’ll have to choose between the two, and it will hurt, uh.)

- But at the same time, it was still… Jon. Jon being awkward, Jon asking the wrong kind of questions to the person in front of him,

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: … yes, right. Sorry. You, er… you managed to get some anaesthetic? BASIRA: Here. The guy said it was a nerve block. Should numb pretty much the whole leg. ARCHIVIST: Right. Right. … Was it hard to come by? BASIRA: No, I just popped down Superdrug. Yes it was hard to come by. ARCHIVIST: You–you couldn’t get any general anaesthetic, knock her out fully? BASIRA: Oh, sure! Did your spooky brain tell you the right dosage to not kill her? ARCHIVIST: … N–no. N–no, it didn’t. BASIRA: Then it’s got to be the local. Here, get on with it. ARCHIVIST: What, me? BASIRA: Yeah, she comes around, she’s gonna kill us or someone, and… You know. Not it. […] Okay, go for it. ARCHIVIST: [SHAKY VOICE] R–right. BASIRA: And pray the injection doesn’t wake her. ARCHIVIST: Yes, thank you Basira. […] BASIRA: You ready? ARCHIVIST: [DRY HOLLOW LAUGHTER] No…? [SHAKY VOICE] You’re sure you don’t have… restraints, or…

1°) I’m love Basira. I’m love how casually dry and savage she can be, how she’s just throwing Jon into the lion’s den without any hesitation nor remorse. What a legend. 2°) That [“You ready?” “No…? *laughs hollowly and does it anyway*”] refdhbjrefdhj Jon, you absolute millennial icon.

The mix of Jon being certain and awkward and obviously thinking about how it could easily end badly for him was so… satisfying and fun and hilarious to me. Still an awkward dork, I’m glad!! =D

- BUT I’M STILL WORRIED ABOUT THE WHOLE “JON USING POWERS” DEAL… if Elias had portrayed it as a good thing and as Jon sinking deeper into Beholding territory, then it’s *gulps*:

(MAG0116) ELIAS: I have been doing my best to prepare you, Jon, to See. You should hopefully have it a bit easier than the others. ARCHIVIST: Another of my… powers? ELIAS: More… an aspect of your becoming. DAISY: You don’t say. ARCHIVIST: Er… right. ELIAS: Regardless, it should, I hope, give you an edge. Otherwise I would never suggest you go yourself.

It wasn’t only a punctual ~insight~, it was a series of them (helping Jon to know where to inject the product and block the nerve) and x-ray vision allowing him to see the Spooky State of Melanie’s leg, when it was officially fine in our realm (the scans hadn’t revealed anything). I’m glad that Jon is using his powers for Good, but I don’t believe that it can last and remains as positive as it is, even though there would be something very beautiful and satisfying in the idea that no, the Fears do not actually corrupt you – it’s just that most avatars were already rotten humans to begin with? ;; (There is something fishy, to start with, with the fact that Jon is missing memories…)

(… okay, and there would also be something utterly satisfying if Elias was proven totally wrong. And bittersweet, if Tim was also proven wrong about the idea that you can’t fight these things or things happening to you.)

- The way I understood Jon’s “The bullet, er, didn’t show up on… electronic or… mechanical scans, but it’s still lodged in her leg, just above the tibia. … And it’s been getting slowly infected ever sin–” is that: Jon had listened to MAG117’s tape(s), potentially even before the Unknowing, and knew about Melanie’s recollection of how she got shot – I think that part wasn’t coming from the Insight? But the new knowledge that was planted within him, or emerged from him, was something irrefutable: that the bullet was still there and the root of the problem (“Melanie still has that bullet pumping violence into her, waiting to turn this place into another Lanncraig.”) It could/should have been a hypothesis from him, it sounds like a logical explanation; but the way it was presented, it wasn’t some wild guess or pondering. It was a certainty.

Insert here obligatory sobbing about how compulsion and this power provide Jon, who is prone to paranoia fits, who is prone to be wary of people, with absolute truth… yeah, the powers cater a bit too much to him, as a way of keeping his own personal human relationships-oriented fears at bay, uh.

- On the relationship side: gOSH, Melanie… probably won’t be fine, and would have every right to not be ;; But Melanie specifically… won’t react positively with something deliberately done to her while she had not consented (MAG102, Elias: “Even more than the others she has a visceral hatred of being trapped. Regardless of how much freedom I afford her.”), even if it could ultimately save her from The Slaughter. She probably won’t forgive.

She was already in an antagonistic spiral regarding Jon, (MAG102: “We’ll try it your way. But whatever your way actually is, you’d better figure it out fast. Because it is your fault that I’m here. Fix it, or get out of the way!” / MAG124: “Wipe that look off your face. Like you’re not the reason all of this is happening. Like you’re any better than– […] He’s still alive. You are still alive. So THIS PLACE is still–!”), and even though part of it was probably Slaughter-induced (MAG117: “Elias thinks he’s got this ingenious way to hurt people, but it’s just the same old bullshit in a creepy new package. … asshole… God! I just want to rip his…! [BREATHES] When did I… start to lose the parts of me that weren’t just anger…? … Hum.”), Jon highlighted in his conclusions about MAG125’s statement that perhaps The Slaughter is not making people lose their mind so much as making them follow something they already had inside of them.

At the same time, we already got Tim resenting and antagonising Jon at every turn, so I don’t know if Melanie will ultimately follow the same path? Technically, it’s… probably Basira who should deserve her ire about the non-consensual surgery on her asleep body, since:

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: And it’s been getting slowly infected ever sin– I have to find Basira. [STANDS UP] [CLICK.] […] You’re sure we shouldn’t just… tell her…? BASIRA: … I really don’t know how she’d take it. Not well. If we want to get it out of her, this is it. ARCHIVIST: [SIGHS] Okay.

JON WANTED TO TALK TO MELANIE ABOUT IT!!! Holy shit, Jon!! Such progress ;__; First for going to talk to Basira about it right away, and then for offering to talk to Melanie, and for ultimately trusting Basira’s judgement about it!!

Basira’s cold pragmatism is not… exactly surprising, to be honest: she’s always been prone to assessing the situation and making drastic decisions right away when it comes to saving lives or to doing what she deems right (Daisy in MAG092, the expedition to stop Rayner, the fact that she took the tapes from the police to give them to Jon when they tried to cover up the reason her colleague died…). In this particular case, there was no right thing to do? Melanie would have probably exploded and ruined any chance for them to remove the bullet if they had even tried to mention its existence to her, true? But they took the decision for her and it was definitely wrong on many levels, and Melanie will have many reasons to feel shaken, violated and betrayed by what they did ;; She already had it bad in season 2 (the fact that her old team fell apart, her first injury, her downfall) and season 3 (the second injury, the lack of options, the fact that she actually got trapped in the Institute, Elias torturing her with the memories of her father’s death), I hope she won’t get too messed up by this new thing?? ;; But the concept of non-consensual surgery applied to her, with her personality, with everything that has already happened to her… is especially horrifying ;; (And she has no support network either… Maybe Georgie still applies, though, but the situation is likely to get complicated in that area since Georgie is also tied to Jon.)

… at the same time, there could be something comforting for Melanie in getting a hold back on her own anger, instead of the foreign surge of violence that was injected into her? I really don’t see how the situation could get better for her and ;; I’m sad sad sad.

… on the other hand, Basira will probably open up a bit more to Jon after this, since… he kinda proved himself to her, here? Proved that, even though he has powers, even though he’s ready to use them, even though he has sunk deeper in, he’s also there to help the assistants, even if it means getting hurt or ruining his relationships with them – as long as it helps them to survive. So. We’ll see.

;;

(I have trouble picturing that nobody will visit Elias in prison at some point, so, hey. Basira is the one who has contacts in the police. She might be a bit more willing to share them with Jon.)

- I can Never Believe how this show manages to always make moments… creepy, and tense, and horrifying, and convey that well a sense of dread while, at the same time, making them so hilarious. The dialogues are always lovely; but Basira and Jon were just… amazing, here.

(- Patreons already got the title for MAG126 with the new schedule planning, and it feels so weird to speculate with the title alone! Not spoiling it, then, but I’m worried about its second meaning (outside of the statement itself). Could be many very wrong things, and the worst I’m coming to on my own, as of now, is “what if it’s about Peter and Martin”.)

#(as aza pointed out: the most horrifying thing with jon's new pet-power is that #if you want jon to be in a situation in which he could drop new valuable information... then you have to make him #talk and ramble. a. lot.)#the magnus archives #mag125 #tma season 4 #tma liveblog #tma spoilers

18 notes · View notes