#anne listens to tma again

[buttercups-song]

MAG 1 Anglerfish (contains spoilers for the whole series so beware)

I completely forgot how short this episode was and how... idk weirdly baby Jon's voice was? Not child-like, but like... unformed? Obviously it was probably one of the first things Jonny recorded as Jon and he didn't have the hang of it yet but it's so weird to hear after 200 episodes. On a meta level, Jon is probably trying to sound professional and older, which makes him sound like he's faking his own accent.

I love the double/triple meaning of the title: the "anglerfish" luring it's victims in the statement, the first episode of the series luring the audience, Jon's first real statement sealing his fate as the archivist.

Ah, Jon pretending not to believe in the paranormal my beloved (also already bitching about Gertrude keeping the archives as disorganised as possible - if only he knew)

I deeply enjoy that Jonny started the series already going for the throat and shitting on academia ("Combine that with the fact that most of the Institute prefers the ivory tower of pure academia to the complicated work of dealing with statements or recent experiences and you have the recipe for an impeccably organised library and an absolute mess of an archive")

screaming crying vomiting shaking

Jon hating on Martin in the first episode is both extremely funny and absolutely heartbreaking. In the end Martin contributed so much, his existence is literally why Jon wasn't alone on his odyssey through the fearscapes, why his descent into monsterhood didn't mean losing his humanity, he was The Reason. He also created the delay (on purpose, on purpose) that sealed his and Jon's (and the world's fate).

Jon obviously means future normal researchers just doing their jobs, he has no idea what the tapes are, what the archive is, he has no clue what he's doing. But even though he doesn't know it he's also apologising to the people who will find the tapes in whatever universe they were sent to. To the next archivist who will try to understand, who will perhaps be sceptical, who might attempt to save their own world using the files.

god i hate it here

time is a circle

the story is over the moment it begins

you sure did stare at the Stranger my dude

also we should talk about this guy (alongside the coffin dude, the lady in the tube and the guy who was late for dinner) more. He used his braincell and survived because he didn't go into the creepy alleyway to give a creepy person a cigarette. Be like Nathan Watts! Don't get skinned by the Stranger!

[buttercups-song]

So, I've decided to start magnus from the beginning. I never listened to the trailers so I've decided to start there and boy (gn) oh boy!

I’m about to start biting! Jfc Jonny! I don’t even know if it was intentional or not, we know that Jonny stared with a rough idea about the entities but I don’t know if he ever said if he had known from the beginning about what the tapes really are... “to take sth for a spin” is a common enough phrase but like!! Spin! Like a spider spins its web!

I can't take it! It's all there! In the trailer! Who is the statement giver? (all we get is that his name is Jacob) Obviously he's talking about the eye ("you can stare all you want", "your beholding will come to nothing") and the rituals (specifically the watcher's crown?). "It'll get you too" is he an avatar, a victim, both?

"Your beholding will come to nothing" so we can read this as "your beholding, your inquiries about what's going on will do absolutely nothing to save you. You can try to understand what's going on and it'll only make it worse" or "your Beholding (the Eye) will come to nothing. It's only one of the entities beyond your comprehension. In the end it's going to lose, it cannot be brought to this universe alone, in the end even the fears will disappear"

Oh how Jon will wish in the end that he had stopped listening and run, but he can't, can he? The thing is, he's already doomed. It's like in this quote:

Jon is already doomed, he's already marked and "given" to the institute by the web, he's already the archivist (not yet the Archivist perhaps but still), he can't quit the job, he's reading a statement, feeding the eye, he cannot run, cannot not be the archivist. He doesn't even have a name in the trailer, he's the archivist, nothing more nothing less. In the transcripts he's always the archivist never Jon. From the moment we hear his voice recorded on the tapes his fate is sealed. The tapes are in our universe now, the story has not yet begun and at the same time it's over already. There is nothing we can do but keep listening even if it makes us complicit in spreading the fears.