#but lucifer resonated more with me so i follow him along with other divines

[bitchy-peachy]

Made an offering to Lord Lucifer today instead of tomorrow as usual. I will give him his favorite tea tomorrow though.

[geeks-universe]

Veritas Vos Liberabit III

The truth will set you free.

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Tag List: @the-british-koala @ilearnedthatfromethepizzaman

You had been thinking on Sherlock’s deductions.

Not intentionally, mind you. Rather, you couldn’t get them out of your head.

More than that, though, you were stuck on his question. The past week and a half since you moved to London had been spent trying, and failing, to find something you were passionate about. You wanted to help people, to be someone that did good in the world.

Instead, you were stuck pacing your apartment with your curly-haired neighbor stubbornly refusing to leave your thoughts.

Three days prior, you’d invited him, along with Mrs. Hudson and John, over for dinner in the hopes that you could make friends with them. Instead, he’d interrogated you the entire time. Still, you couldn’t find it in yourself to dislike them. They were a bit odd, but you were a friggin angel living in London after you ran from your adoptive father, who was actually your brother, who just so happened to be the Devil.

So, on the odd meter of your life, they barely passed an LA morning. 

The shrill ring of your phone interrupted your inner monologue, bringing a frown to your face as you read the name.

Not Today, Satan.

There was a little devil emoji by the contact name you’d chosen for your father the day you discovered the long string of memes regarding that particular phrase.

You knew it wasn’t fair to ignore his call, as you had been doing since you left LA, but you still needed time to acclimate. At least, that’s what you told yourself. Truthfully, you were afraid. Your father had kept you with him in Hell until he decided he wanted to take a little vacation to Earth. It wasn’t like you’d never been apart from him, but he had never been this far away, and you’d never so blatantly ignored him.

Three texts from him lit up your phone immediately following the ignored call. Another buzzed a second later, though this one was from the contact rightly labeled Nancy Drew.

Knowing your father wasn’t always the easiest to deal with at the best of times, you opened Chloe’s text instead.

Nancy Drew: Just checking in. Lucifer is worried sick, let him know you’re okay. I know he’s overbearing at times, but he cares about you.

A smile tugged at your lips. Whether your father was ready to admit it or not, Chloe was good for him. She was so very human in all of the best ways, and was genuinely good. He’d known her for the whole of just over a year and already she was positively influencing him.

Realizing it was unavoidable, you opened your father’s texts as you walked to the door. You just had to reply, then you could get all of the fresh air you could need. Maybe, you’d ask John if he wanted to go for a walk too. You could really use the help navigating the streets.

Not Today, Satan: What’s the bloody point of having a phone if you never answer it?

Not Today, Satan: It’s been over a week. Why are you in London?

Not Today, Satan: If you don’t answer, you’ll be Maze’s next bounty. She doesn’t play nice.

An eye roll was inevitable. He really didn’t know how to speak to you like you were normal. Which, yeah, you weren’t, but still, it would be nice to have a good family dynamic at some point in your life.

Y/N: Spending some time away. I’ll be back eventually.

Your reply was quick and offered very little in the information department. It didn’t seem to satisfy Lucifer, as a series of dings signaled his many replies. You didn’t bother looking at them, pocketing your phone and exiting your new apartment.

At first, you made your way down the street, before reconsidering the idea of being alone. Surely, it wouldn’t hurt to ask John.

A short bit of backtracking brought you to 221B Baker Street, only for you to be momentarily surprised at the lack of a closed door. When John mentioned his door was always open for you, you were expecting support, not an actual opened door. For a moment, you debated on whether you should enter. Curiosity eventually got the best of you, especially when hushed voices descended the familiar steps.

Something wasn’t quite right, and the feeling had your back straightening. Your wings fluttered from their position, still hidden to the eyes of others. The conversation that took place above you was tense, and you found yourself holding your breath and placing one foot cautiously in front of the other.

You were slow to climb the stairs, which seemed far larger than normal. As the scene came into view, you noticed that Sherlock looked far too confident for a very human man with a gun pointed at his head. John, on the other hand, was barely keeping a lid on his boiling anger. The gunman’s back was to you, though he was far closer to your position than either of the men occupying the room.

One misplaced step was all it took before a creak, which would otherwise be barely noticeable, but to the quiet of the room sounded more like a gunshot, resonated throughout the inhabitants. Sherlock and John didn’t move an inch, but their eyes moved to you immediately. The gunman was quick, far quicker than you were expecting, and had set his sights on you.

You blinked, shooting the two Baker residents a sheepish smile.

“I, uh, was going to ask if you could be my tour guide for a bit, John, but it seems you’ve got your hands full.”

John’s responding chuckle was tense.

“Your timing is impeccable,” Sherlock commented dryly.

Sighing to yourself, you took a step towards the gunman, only to stop briefly when he shoved the gun even closer, as if to emphasize the weapon in his hand.

“Stop moving!” He warned.

You ran your tongue along your teeth, examining the man from top to bottom. He looked collected, like he was professionally trained, though there was a hint of something manic in his eyes. His hands didn’t shake, so clearly he had killed before, and doing so again wasn’t a bother for him. A fresh pressed suit adorned his body, and by the looks of it, the sudden intrusion on John and Sherlock hadn’t been planned initially. They must’ve done something to piss him off.

“You don’t want to kill me,” you told him, flashing that sultry smile that oozed of a devilish charm you most certainly possessed.

“You don’t know that,” he countered, his eyes narrowing a fraction.

Briefly, you flicked your gaze to John, and then to Sherlock, hoping that you were relaying a message of pure confidence.

“You’re right,” you conceded, taking a tense step. “So tell me then, what is it you truly desire?”

The question bounced around in his mind, the power of the divine wrestling with the promise of free will in his expression, until eventually, divinity won out.

“I…”

He licked his lips.

“I want to be rich… to have whatever I could ever hope for.”

His eyes glazed over as you chanced a few more steps, closing in on his position.

“Greed, then,” you conversed, just barely out of reach. If you could just move forward another step, you could snatch his gun. “Of course it’s greed.”

“Money is power,” he insisted, so focused on his own musings he didn’t take notice of your new location.

“No,” you argued, just registering the brief flicker of surprise as you wrestled the gun out of his unsuspecting hands. You turned it on him, just as quickly, clicking your tongue when he tried to lunge forward. “Power is power.”

Whatever retort he’d been about to say was cut short when John swung his fist at him, knocking him out cold with a force to his temple.

“You’re not even frightened,” Sherlock observed, sparing the man on the ground barely a glance before his eyes found you again. Between the two, he found you infinitely more intriguing. “It’s not the first time you’ve had a gun pointed at you.”

John stepped away for just a moment, grumbling about phoning the police while he did so. You’d smiled pleasantly at him before turning your attention to his roommate.

“You’re not the only civilian consultant in the world, you know?”

He didn’t outwardly express anything at your statement, but you’d gotten considerably good at picking up on the smallest changes in expressions, and there was a curiosity growing in the man.

“My father helps an LAPD detective on her cases,” you explained.

Speak of the devil…

Your phone dinged again, and you didn’t even have to check to know it was your father once more. Probably using Maze to threaten you again. You wondered idly how long it would take him to realize that Maze was, and had been since you were a baby, utterly wrapped around your finger. You were her protege, in a way, and she’d been a close confidant. For all of his efforts spent on reminding you how scary she could be, Mazikeen would never hurt you.

“He’s also had people wanting to kill him since the dawn of time,” you shrugged, adding a gentle “literally” under your breath.

“What was that?” John had returned, and was gesturing vaguely to the area around your face. “With the ‘desire’ stuff?”

“An old trick,” you waved it off, not wanting to, nor knowing how to, explain it any further. John wasn’t satisfied by your answer, and he was fully intent on getting more of an explanation before Sherlock interrupted him.

“You are entirely unexpected,” he claimed, his eyes moving rapidly about your character, looking for some sort of answer only he could see.

“Yeah, well, I was here for John, actually.”

The man in question perked up, taking a step towards you. Clearly, he wasn’t going to let what just happened go so quickly, but he was also wondering what you could’ve possibly needed him for.

“You were?”

“I was hoping you could show me around,” you shrugged, rocking on your heels.

“I can-” he cleared his throat, and in the distance you heard police sirens racing towards your location. “Yeah, I can do that.”

“It’s settled then,” Sherlock smiled, clapping his hands together. There was a certain flatness to it, and it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “We’re going for a little tour.”

“Not what I was going for,” you muttered, shooting a look at the man still slumped over on the ground. 

“The police will be here in one and a half- no, two- minutes,” Sherlock informed you distractedly, slipping on his dark coat with practised ease. “They’re getting slow.”

“Back to insulting, are we?” John grumbled under his breath, keeping a close watch on the man on the floor. It was clear, despite the aggressive hit he’d placed on the recent invader, he was still worried about him waking back up and going on the attack once more.

“Might as well help them, then,” you suggested, noting the tension John sported as you leaned down towards the unconscious man. Though he didn’t make moves to stop you, he did move in closer, to intervene should a situation arise.

“Maybe you shou-”

John stopped his sentence halfway through when you hoisted the man over your shoulder as if he were nothing more than a sack of potatoes. Even Sherlock looked perplexed at your lack of struggling. To be fair, you didn’t look like you could sling a man his size with no issue. 

“I’m just bringing him to the door,” you told them, hiding a smirk at their astonishment. So maybe you had inherited the need for theatrics from Lucifer. 

“Sure you don’t need any,” John paused, his mouth open as he watched you jog down the steps without any problems.

“Help,” he finished lamely, sharing a look with Sherlock.

At first, he thought Sherlock’s confusion with you stemmed from some hidden attraction his friend couldn’t understand. Now, though, he could see the merit of it. There were definitely some oddities about you.

“This your guy?” You called back up to the two men who had still yet to move. They were frozen in a state somewhere between confusion and awe.

That pulled Sherlock out of the stupor, and subsequently drew John down the stairs too. You were just standing there, your head vaguely gesturing towards the police car coming to a sudden stop outside. Sherlock couldn’t help the little laugh that crawled up his throat at the sight of someone of your stature carrying someone of this man’s stature with such ease.

“Uh, yeah,” John answered when Sherlock was clearly not going to. “That’s Lestrade.”

The Detective Inspector was making his way towards where you stood, doing a comical double take when he noticed the man balanced precariously over your shoulder.

“Cavalry's here,” the silver-haired detective muttered, laughing to himself. “You must be the new neighbor?”

It was a question directed towards you, despite his eyes still stuck on the man you were holding.

“(Y/N),” you introduced, “Morningstar. I’m guessing this is the person you’re looking for.”

“Uh,” he coughed awkwardly, his eyes stuck on you.

There it was again, that little flicker of desire- the allure of divinity. You breathed out a sigh, walking the man to the so-dubbed ‘Lestrade’s’ car. He was quick to follow you, opening the door and slapping cuffs on the unconscious man in one fell swoop. He shut the gunman in, still looking a bit dazed from your initial meeting as he did so.

“Talk about an exciting morning,” you enthused, running your tongue along your teeth when you felt the telltale vibration of a notification.

“You’ve been ignoring your text messages,” Sherlock commented, a challenging brow raised.

“I’ve been busy,” you shot back, turning to face the Detective Inspector. “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”

His eyes widened, and he briefly held a hand to his chest, as if to ask if you were speaking to him.

“I’m Greg,” he smiled then caught himself. “Greg Lestrade, the Detective Inspector.”

Each word was released quicker than the last, like he couldn’t believe he had let his introduction go unsaid in the first place. Your replying smirk was genuine, a friendly answer to his words.

“Don’t you have an arrest to make?” Sherlock cut in, startling you. Was being rude a personality trait? Because he certainly had it down.

“Always a pleasure seeing you,” Greg drawled sarcastically, though the eye roll was done goodnaturedly. “It was nice meeting you, (Y/N) Morningstar.”

You nodded, giving him a friendly wave. He didn’t linger long, returning to his car quickly to arrest the man in the back without so much as a question of how he came to be like that. Clearly, he’d dealt with Sherlock for quite some time.

“The tour,” Sherlock reminded you, surprisingly pleasantly. “Shall we?”

John shrugged, an expression that told you just to go with it, as he always had. At the very least, you didn’t have anything to lose.

And-

Another text came through.

Everything to ignore, apparently.

“We shall,” you nodded, letting him lead the way.

[charlie-minion]

The biggest bad to ever bad

Supernatural 14x20 is going to be marked in my head as one of the best season finales of television ever! It’s not because of the quality of the production, though; it’s because of the potential it opened for a fantastic final season of such a long-lasting show. There are so many things I want to talk about (God & the Winchesters, Castiel and Destiel), but I think I will have to write separate posts for each because I don’t want this to get extremely long.

Let’s talk about God and the Winchesters first, shall we?

After 14x20, everything seems to indicate that God is the big bad for season 15, right? In fact, we might even say that God has been the big bad ALL ALONG. Right? RIGHT? Yeah, well… about that…

NO, my dear friends, God is not the big bad on Supernatural, and I’m gonna tell you why that is my opinion.

Disclaimer: This post will include a lot of life philosophies that may or may not resonate with what you believe in. If you think I’m talking bullshit, that’s fine! Just please don’t waste time attacking me or my post in any way because I won’t engage in any type of hateful behavior.  

With that being said, I need to emphasize the beauty orchestrated by Andrew Dabb (showrunner and writer of the finale). He turned the Supernatural universe into a huge metaphor for our own very real world (nothing new if you really think about it). BUT, he also made Chuck the manifestation of the God many people believe exists IRL.

“None of this would have happened without you”, Dean tells John Winchester at the start of the recap. Those words feel ominous now, considering Dean said them to his father but they could as easily be directed to the father of all creation, God himself (or Chuck, as he prefers to be called).  

None of what has happened in 14 years of Supernatural would have happened without Chuck. That’s an undeniable truth, but that doesn’t mean everything has been entirely his fault.

He’s a writer, and writers lie. We were told that in 14x20, but I think Chuck was telling the truth about something in particular:

“You guys know me. I’m hands-off. I built the sandbox… you play in it. You want to fight Leviathans? Cool. You got that. You want to go up against the… What was it? The ‘British Men of Letters’? Okay. Little weak, but okay.”

Chuck created this world with everything in it, and then he “left”. Although, he never truly left. From the beginning he’s been “everywhere and nowhere, to the edge of the universe and beyond”. The thing is that he’s most of the times HANDS-OFF.

He didn’t create other beings to be inferior. “Existence is all about balance”, he said when trying to explain why the Equalizer didn’t have any bullets.

“This doesn’t so much fire bullets as it sends a wave of multi-dimensional energy across a perfectly balanced quantum link between whoever’s shooting it and whoever they’re shooting at.”

Why is that line relevant? Ohhhh because if we read a little about quantum physics, we’ll know that we humans are energy. We all are. Actually, everything that exists in this world is energy. There are some philosophies where the concept of God goes beyond what religion offers. Some people don’t use the word “God”, but they prefer to use the word “Source” because there is a source of energy, and we all are interconnected through that energy that we all share. In a way, we are extensions of Source Energy, and that’s why we all can be considered divine.

If we dig a little into that philosophy, we find out that the human journey in a lifetime is to ascend in consciousness. We have a conscious and subconscious mind, and there’s science to back up that our subconscious runs the show most of the time. (Watch this video if you’re at all interested). It’s thanks to it that we make quick decisions during times of crisis and emergency, and it’s thanks to both our conscious and subconscious mind that we create our own reality. Unfortunately, we are EXTREMELY UNAWARE OF THE PROGRAMMING IN OUR SUBCONSCIOUS MIND, so the reality that we observe is not exactly pretty, because we tend to create that which we fear the most. We keep repeating patterns over and over until we become aware of what’s going on (or we die and never become aware, too bad).   

In real life, the God that many people believe in certainly built the sandbox and left us to play in it and do whatever we want. That God or Source is HANDS-OFF for real, because we are made of the same energy, so we have creative power, too, whether we understand/believe it or not. The less aware we are, the more likely we are to believe THINGS HAPPEN TO US.

There’s always a villain outside of ourselves: our parents, our partners, our friends, our coworkers or classmates, our neighbors, that random person who stole from us or who said nasty things about us. We all have our own Leviathans, Michaels, Lucifers, and some villains in our life just as pathetic as Asmodeus or the British Men of Letters. The point is that when we are NOT aware of OUR OWN POWER OF CREATION, we are at the mercy of our subconscious, thinking that terrible things will continue to happen, over and over.

So, going back to Supernatural, Chuck came back in 14x20 with a special gun, and one of the names he gave to it was EQUALIZER. Seriously??!! Later in the ep, when Sam shot God with that gun, he shot himself. THAT’S SO SYMBOLIC I CAN’T EVEN! Don’t you see this? If we keep talking about Source of energy (instead of “god”) and understand that all beings are made of energy even if we have a material body, we get to understand the metaphor found in the Bible that states we should love God and we should love our neighbors as we love ourselves. WE ARE ALL ONE. I mean, I can plug two or three appliances into one same outlet and even though each appliance serves a different purpose, the energy that keeps them “alive” is the same.

We build an ego to create a false sense of self, but we’re all one. While we’re unaware of this, we think of God as that powerful being, outside of ourselves, who controls everything and we think that we’re at his mercy. We pray and we think that when things go well, God is blessing us, but when things go wrong, he’s punishing us or he has abandoned us. When truth be told, we have been creating our own reality ALL ALONG thanks to our stupid programming.

The Winchesters have been repeating the same mistakes over and over. Their programming is filled with “GOOD THINGS NEVER HAPPEN. I DON’T DESERVE GOOD THINGS”. That’s been the case for all of them. They have claimed that everything they’ve done has been out of love, to protect their family, but that’s just crap. The love they have felt has NEVER been healthy; it’s been rooted in the fear of loss. Mary made a deal because she couldn’t bear to lose John. John made a deal because he couldn’t lose Dean. Dean made a deal because he couldn’t lose Sam. And their codependent love brought all sorts of fucked-up consequences. Don’t even get me started on the way John raised his children as a result of not being able to accept the loss of his wife. Or don’t get me started on the programming running in Mary’s head as a result of the way she was raised in the hunting life. I mean, we could spend hours and hours discussing why Mary was desperate for a “normal life”, but probably thought that she didn’t deserve it; that she was being selfish for wanting happiness when the world needed saving. How ironic that her two sons inherited the same fears, the same subconscious programming!

So, NO… God is NOT the villain. THE VILLAIN HAS ALWAYS BEEN THE WINCHESTERS THEMSELVES. (Just as in our life, we are the main character and the villain in our own story). Thinking that God is the villain is the easy way out. That’s putting responsibility for the good and the bad outside of ourselves, and that’s bullshit. The toxicity has been part of Dean and Sam’s lives since forever and they need to be aware of it. They have always had a choice, but they were unable to make the healthiest one at the time. ‘Shoot first, ask questions later’, ‘Kill all the monsters’, ‘We do what we always do, we fight to bring our loved ones back’.

That’s not love. That’s not growth. And in writing, that’s not character development.

Next season, the Winchesters will try to fight God, of course. They will most likely try to kill him. But I can tell you now, one day after the season 14 finale, that they won’t be able to. What they will understand at the end of season 15 is that they always had a choice; that the Earth will never be completely saved because it doesn’t want to be saved (each person creates their own reality, so how can they save people who are unconsciously sabotaging/destroying themselves?). It’s NOT THEIR RESPONSIBILITY TO SAVE EVERYONE. IT NEVER HAS BEEN. That’s something they have taken upon themselves and it’s insane, unrealistic, and extremely arrogant of them.

Chuck himself had to show up to push the Winchesters enough to realize that they have been repeating patterns for a long time and that it’ll end when they decide it’s time to end. When they become aware of the toxic beliefs that took them to where they are now. When they realize that the only thing they need to get their happy ending is to admit they want that (not a blaze of glory style ending) and to stop being afraid of it or guilty about wanting it.

Good things do happen. What’s the matter? You don’t think you deserve to be saved?

Chuck is just a mirror for the Winchesters. If our boys think that Chuck is the villain, then sooner or later they will realize how responsible they have been, too. I’ll be looking forward to season 15 and, most of all, to the series finale. For now, I’m gonna be in my corner, feeling confident that our boys will have the ending they deserve –the one they’ll get once they allow themselves to follow their heart.  

[kierongillen]

Writer Notes: the Wicked + the Divine 455

Spoilers, obv.

The specials have been quite the time, having several ways to stress everyone the hell out. The amount of work that goes into a special is far more than any single script can justify in cold commercial terms. It's lucky that I'm only choosing periods that I'm interested in researching to death.

I suspect (or at least hope) that in terms of background reading, 455 is the most. 1831 was hard, but is a relatively tight period I looked at in depth. 455 basically involved researching the whole of the Western Roman Empire. This means the work was a much broader sweep. In the same way I suspected the 1831 story would be about Frankenstein, I knew this would probably be about what happened at one of the sacks of Rome. Not definitely – I've always got room to change tack if something more profitable turns up in the research – but likely.

As I started work, I realised the main advantage of the sack near the end of the Western Roman Empire is that it means you can do a swan song for the whole thing. Everything has already happened, so you can use it all. Thus we've got something which feels a little like a Roman Greatest Hits story.

Simultaneously, there's the awareness that while I think a lot of this is relatively well known, even the most basic facts aren't. Early readers made me aware that even basic ideas like Julius Caesar being dead for 500 years by this period can't be assumed – a level of historical literacy equivalent of not blinking if Joan of Arc turned up in a WW2 story. That's just audiences, and the vague sense of “Rome stuff” fills about 1000 years of people's imagination. As such, that our story is acounter-history required the introduction of what the real history actually was.

As I knew this was coming along way off, the research was a slow boil. I knew Rome, in various periods, relatively well. From the Punic Wars to Augustus is stuff I've read about many times – Carthage is something I've always wanted to do a story about. What I was looking for is a long sweep across the whole thing, to live with it a while, and let me think along the way. The actual device I used was The History Of Rome podcast by Mike Duncan, which goes from legendary prehistory to about 20 years after 455. It's about 60 hours of stuff, by my rough match, which I worked into my listening routine – which is mainly when working out, running, travelling or doing the dishes. I listen to my podcasts at 1.5x.

That was for most of 2016. After that, it was digging down into specific texts, the majority which happened in December/January. Trying to play with various theories about the decline of the Roman Empire was paramount. Everyone has one, and be suspicious of anyone who gives you one reason. The book which generally was most influential in terms of how I chose to present Rome was The Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History by Peter Heather, which basically forwards the idea that Rome fell due to trade across their borders creating increased population density of Barbarian tribes which (as opposed to earlier periods) the Romans were unwilling to integrate into the fabric of the Empire.

I went with my own counter-theory, of course, which was that an Old Lady Did It.

(The Old Lady Did It is a Roman Trope of long standing. I'm a proud owner of a Livia Did It T-shirt.)

Anyway – too much research, and I'll try and drop some things I'd wanted to use but didn't as we go through it. Suffice to say, there's nothing comforting about reading about Rome in the current political climate.

Anyway – Andre! I'd first encountered his work in Avengers AI, written by my friend Sam Humphries. That weird, neon-infused Cyberpunk vibe was a big part of the book's appeal for me, so I started following him. I believe we started talking properly around the time of his own Man Plus, which was is a Otomo-does-Akira-In-Portugal kick, and was another thing which made me file Andre in my “Sci-fi artist file.”

However, after we got talking, he showed me some of his other in-development pitches, which included historical and fantasy work. Which made me go “Hmm.” He's got a mass of gifts, but I had one image that I knew I needed for 455 – the Roman Triumph, with a God in the chariot. That demanded a certain sort of artist, namely one who was happy to actually draw a triumph in all its ludicrous glory. Andre, someone whose work had more than its fair share of city-scapes and crowds, seemed like someone who'd nail that – plus the confluence of European and Manga influences in the work would gel interestingly. We'd get Rome as a place, and that's what we needed.

He was working on Generation Gone with Ales Kot, but they talked, and Andre took as month off the preparation for that to do the special. Thanks, guys.

Colours are provided by Matt “Eisner For Matt” Wilson, and seeing how the two of them worked together was definitely one of the more intriguing parts of the process.

Andre's Cover

Done early, before the script was actually completed, which meant we were more conservative with the choice. The Laurel reef being lowered by elderly hands, the arrogance of it. A call back to the head-shots of the first year of WicDiv too. Also, compare and contrast Matt's colouring choices here with his ones in the issue. This is a much more subdued, chalkier mode. Or that's wot I think anyway.

Jamie's Cover| We were originally talking about statues of multiple gods, but as the script was still in process we didn't want to tie down any of the cast bar Lucifer. Equally, we leaned symbolic on the cover – the flames of Rome, the statue, the grafitti's Chi-Ro in paint (or blood)? Symbolic is good. We like Symbolic.

The Chi-Ro is an old Christian symbol. It's what they say Constantine had his soldiers paint on his shields to ensure victory. My fave thing of Constantine from the research was that while he was more responsible than any for the Christianization of the Empire, he didn't convert until just before his death. I enjoy the theory that it's because the idea that baptizing may have been a one-time “clear all your sins” opportunity. The idea of confession and absolution wasn't around as much. So if you convert and then commit a mortal sin, you're off to hell. But if you commit a mortal sin and then convert, you're fine. So Constantine may have just been gaming Christianity to ensure the best chance of a good afterlife.

IFC

Oh god. Looking at the last paragraph makes me think this could be eternally long if I just keep on stopping and telling you fun anecdotes from memory. Also, factually dubious, as they're from memory, and my memory cannot be trusted.

Jamie designed the icons, and had to work out what vibe to give it. I suspect he was grateful to me for having most the cast already being dead so saving him work.

The Inverted Chi-Ro isn't a real symbol anyone used, but our best way to make a Lucifer. The biggest historical cheat in the series is using any Lucifer figure like this in the period – as far as I'm aware, the idea of a singular satanic adversary in this mode simply wasn't around. But it dovetails with our mythology.

I get asked whether any special will happen earlier in the cycle. The tendency to lean towards the ends is basically the same urge which pushed towards a Roman Special at the fall. Ends let you write about the whole thing. It's only at the end where you can say with any hope of being correct what was really happening, and even then it's only a hope.

But the 1920s special is a little earlier than the end, if only because we've seen the actual end in issue 1.

(More on the 1920s special soon – there's been a few changes in my planning on that.)

The text on the page is the standard WicDiv one, but the final two lines, briefly explaining the history of the Vandal sack in 455 were added at lettering to provide the necessary context to a reader.

Page 1-2

Steady angle shot, three panels on each page. The issue has been compare to Uber by several readers, primarily for the volume of the violence and the detail of the historical focus. It's also a little like it in its storytelling like this – this lingering attempt to make a scene very normal. We don't see the battle against the Vandals – instead, we observe from a distance. We try and make it documentary, with us an observer.

The animal being gutted is a goat.

An example of an earlier tweak, the shepherd's first line was “Wh...who in god's name are you meant to be?” This could read as that our Lucifer actually is Julius. Changing it to “Dressed up as?” brings the artifice closer to the surface. While the nature of lucifer/Julius is explained in a few pages time, it's not meant to be a mystery. Creating a false uninteresting question is just a distraction for the reader.

I kind of laugh at the idea of Lucifer wandering around near Rome, trying to find an army.

Ave Atque Vale! Is a quote from Catallus, related to death. Originally was Ave in my first draft, which of course means “Hello!” so makes no sense to say when he's heading away to the shepherd. If you were generous, you could say he was greeting the Vandals.

The first pages which Matt coloured were these, and when I saw them, I knew it was going to be something special.

Yes, panicked sheep in the second panel of page 2 is a star.

Page 3-4

WicDiv is about many things, but “The fucking obvious” certainly rates highly. Triumphs are one of the big core Roman rituals we think of, when a general is given a personal parade. They're rare and hugely important. The slave whispering “remember you are only a man” to warn against hubris is the detail which everyone loves. Clearly, in WicDiv, the resonances are all kinds of fun.

In terms of how comics panels are not one moment in time, have a nose at the last panel. You read the line, then the Oh!, and then the response of the slave seeing something, and then you look at the miracle, the smug, painted face, of Lucifer, and his Heh.  That's a little journey.

The red face paint is ceremonial, to be akin to Jupiter. Bear that in mind for later, obv.

The big triumph is the first issue money shot – after 3 pages of very low atmosphere, we have the sprawl of Rome. Choosing the direction of the march was key – I gave Andre the best guess route of the triumph, and he chose his angle. By luck, he would enter via the gate here Lucifer is dragged out at the end of the issue. The triumph also ends at the temple of Jupiter, which is yet more fun subtext for those who really like digging into it.

We tweaked the colouring on the crowds, to try and get more of the cosmopolitan nature of Rome. The majority of legionnaires are white, but that's because most were Germanic in this period.

The triumph was originally planned for a spread, but I decided I needed another page later in the comic.

Page 5

Title drop, and a bleak laugh. The idea of calling a story IMPERIAL PHASE which isn't in the actual Imperial Phase trade came from thinking of Julian Cope having his single World Shut Your Mouth not on the album World Shut Your Mouth, an idea he in turn got from some sixties band I haven't time to look up.

The date was tricky to decide exactly, due to the timeline of real world events I wanted to get in. Clearly, for full trash-Roman pulp, I'd have pushed this story March, so I could Ides of March it, but alas, no dice.

Page 6

Nice atmosphere in the first panel, in terms of going from the chaos of the Triumph to something a little more contemplative.

Enter Dionysus/Bacchus. Flashback colours and... one of the thoughts of Matt was that the SFX budget for God Stuff would be lower back here. So the god powers aren't quite as SFX-y as they are in the present day. Not that there's much here, but I'm reminded by how low-key this is. The intent here is that he's done his god thing on stage and come off... but he could just be an actor, which is about as close as WicDiv gets to a 1:1 thing.

The nature of art in Rome (or “Rome”) is key here, and talked throughout. Actors were the underclass. To act was to be disreputable. The “actress as sexworker” trope arrives in Rome, I believe. I reference Lou Reed in the panel descriptions, in terms of these being a Walk On The Wild Side Romans.

Falerian is a type of fine wine. Mithras is presumably one of the other gods – Scythia being a place.

The nature of Imperial Phase has been about women involved with women, which has nagged. Having the humanising part of the story be a love story between men felt timely. It was a place we could do it, so we should. Though more on that later, in terms of the specifics.

There was the obvious worry of doing it, of course – where Lucifer ends up. Lucifer is not good representation. I haven't seen anyone pick up on that angle. We spend a lot of time worrying about stuff no-one picks up on, which is why we spend all that time worrying about it.

The word “play” is, of course, loaded, as are the name changes. Story about identity, we are in it.

Page 7

The best thing about the specials is definitely getting a chance to write Ananke again. She is a fun time.

If I had more space, I'd have almost certainly done more with Lucifer's adventures during the day. It's worth stressing that by this point, I believe Gladiatorial fights were no longer actually happening in Rome, due to Christianisation. My research has went straight on from Western Rome and barged into Byzantine Rome, and the story of the chariot races there is a delight.

Page 7-8

These scenes are very much me getting my I, Claudius on. Very limited set, two actors going off at one another. Of course, all of this will resonate with anyone who's been following the main series.

Panels 3 and 4 on page 7 are the bit of tight acting I like most from Andre here – it's all about the actions, and the space, with us positioned a little back from it.

I smile at Lucifer referencing something that was said of 2014-Lucifer in the first arc. Ananke has been doing this for a very long time.

A quick buzz through various other gods' fates in the first panel on page 8. There's a lot of historical reference packed in there to unpack for those who wish.

The Inanna/Attila The Hun panel is, I think, the largest panel description in the issue. Well... not true. The Rome Triumph one is much longer, but that's a splash. This one included a potted history of a bunch of Hun-related information for Andre to play with, in terms of deciding the looks, etc.

It was also the most discussed panel at the stage of pencils – avoiding objectifying Inanna here was key.

Attila The Hun died on (one of his) wedding night in the real life.

The “As I understand” is pretty key in the captions, as is other distancing effects. Lucifer would not have been a god when Inanna did this. It is very early in this pantheon's time.

I think this may be a place to have a word about Pantheon times through history. 455 doesn't seem to fit in one of these 90 years, if you follow that strictly.

The short version is, as seen in the first scene of WicDiv which ends the 1920s pantheon at Dec 31st 2013 and we start our story about 6 months into the new Pantheon on January 1st 2014, the question of where the 90 years is measured for has to be (to some degree) flexible. Gods appear over a period of a year or so in our 2014, and die at their own rates. You can assume that the “true” length of a pantheon can wiggle a little – some would be less than a year, some could theoretically stretch across 4 calendar years. As such, it's hard to predict exactly on which year any given recurrence could occur – even from the data we have from 1831, 1923 and 2014, we know that.

I suspect before the end I may give hard dates for every Pantheon. I suspect, anyway. I know where it would appear.

Page 9-11

You know, I suspect Page 9 – for an action scene – is one of the most story-beat laden of the issue, in terms. Lots of great Andre stuff here – the casual-ness of both the burning and the brutal-ness of the kick. Matt goes to town on the colours too, the reds taking over. Obviously the fire is a key thing with Lucifer, and his flame grows and ebbs as we progress.

There's some difficult hard cuts here – page 10 to 11, for example. We just have the “Ananke leaving” beat there, then moving to Dio and Lucifer in bed.

There is a tendency when discussing the ancients to be a bit blasé in terms of writing about their sexual habits. This normally is based around us mapping our readings of sexuality onto the past, while erasing their own social mores. I've ran with some of the information on page 11 before, when doing THREE, specifically the politics of different sexual roles. Relevantly, the status elements Lucifer alludes to here – in terms of being a bottom is always dishonourable. I could ramble at this at length, but I'll spare you.

Lots and lots of stuff here, in terms of trying to set up thematic elements here, but let's just say none of it would matter at all if Matt and Andre hadn't nailed the last panel.

Page 12-13

Lots of historical bits and bobs here. Perhaps the implicit question we don't answer is “what happened to the last Emperor?” He was cut to pieces a few days before this and thrown in the river, because he'd pissed off the Vandals enough to have them invade.

You may notice how thin the senate is populated. That's because the majority of the population of Rome have fucked off to hide. Rome's population is artificially lower during this point in history, which is a thing which tries to lend a little credulity to the Ananke/Geiseric cover-up.

The main tweaks here was making sure the exact nature of Lucifer's slip was tricky. Someone getting mixed up in the time-line requires making sure the reader understands the timeline. I half wonder why I went with Crassus rather than Pompey.

Anyway, let's hope that Lucifer manages to keep on the straight and narrow.

Page 13-14

Well, that escalated quickly.

When planning the issue, you start doing maps of time and space, and I rapidly realised with 25 pages, and so many other essential scenes, there was no possible way to show a slow descent.

The story's structure immediately suggested itself.

While the Triumph was the image we needed to enter the world, this is the one that will be remembered. People reference my Crossed work here – which is true, to some degree, in that it was also about turning flesh into art. I suspect I was more thinking of Banks, and a certain beat involving a certain object of furniture. I say, dancing around spoilers.

The influence here which gets kind of buried is Domitian, who threw the most goth parties of all time. Have a nose at this here, in terms of Things Emperors Got Up To.

Page 15-16

We've already namechecked Caligula and here comes Nero, the other of the most famous Roman Bad Emperors. The elements about Nero here were the closest thing the research unveiled which made me want to reposition the story to a different period – Nero interacting with the gods would have been fascinating, for all the reasons described here.

We had a reader question the direction of Imperial Phase, in that the insanity-leading-to-murder trope that appeared to be coming and the inherent ableism in that. It was a usefully timed question, as it made me dig more sharply into the exact choices we were making in explaining the idea. This isn't about going mad. This is – as Dionysus puts it – about excess. I'm thinking of Bowie living off cocaine and peppers. We lean into it pretty heavily in this issue, and hopefully it delineates the aim.

Just looking at my script, and found the anecdote about the time I threw up a handful of blood slipped in there. I'd forgotten that this page was autobiographical. Comics, eh?

Look at what Matt's doing with the colours here – the whole panel is bloodshot as we progress.

Page 17-20

In terms of buried research in the comic, that a hole was knocked in the roof of the Temple of Jupiter during this sack of Rome is the one which makes me laugh. Behold! Let team WicDiv present the true story of how the temple of Jupiter got a dirty great hole in it.

(I also like that this makes the sack of Rome much more efficient for the Vandals.)

This is an actor making a soliloquy scene, perhaps obviously, recalling both the stage and the Passion. While this issue is heavily in the research, it's also doing ahistorical work. Shakespeare's fingerprints is all over this, to state another obvious thing.

The “Emerge like an Eagle” thing is very much Roman Pagan belief.

I mentioned Nero, Caligulia and Julius. The other Roman Emperor who is in the mix with Lucifer was Julian the Apostate who was the last Pagan Roman emperor, and tried to revive Pagan Rome before dying early. A “What if Julian had lived?” is a counter-factual history which is always a fun one to swill around your mouth. He's the one we don't reference, but much of Lucifer's thought comes from mashing Julian with someone of lower birth and more melodramatic tendencies.

This is the sequence which I cut the page from the Triumph earlier to expand. Clearly this could happen quicker, but we need to let the death sequence come out, in all its horror. Also, the collapse on the page turn seems essential.

I'm almost surprise Et Tu Jupiter reached the final page. We were always wondering whether it was too funny. In the end, it was decided it was, but in juxtaposition with the art, sufficiently bleakly to not break the mood. Especially before the collapse on the next page, which is very much human stripped by the divine.

Clearly this plot beat, is the biggest one for close followers of the book. I suspect at this point of the story, there would be strong suspicions that the “you die in two years” isn't true. Unless this sequence is deeply deceptive, it is true. You die in two years, by yourself. We place the specials pretty carefully, in terms of what they reveal, so this being half way through Imperial Phase underlines what could await our cast.

In terms of craft, going silent for a page after the monologuing seemed key. I mean, Ananke's fundamental disrespect in terms of how she's carrying Lucifer says everything.

Page 21-25

Out the gate towards the Tiber. The names listed are famous Romans whose bodies were thrown in the Tiber so that they could have no honourable end – and in the case of Marius, that there was no place for his followers to gather. The man who did that was Sulla, btw. Marius was dead, he dug them up.

The “Pagan burial, but a shit one” is very much Ananke at peak “I will tell you the truth, but you really have to pay attention to the details” mode.

And here's Geiseric! Looking good. The Vandals have been in Carthage for 20 years, but we decided to have him be kind of pallid so as not to confuse people. Stories like THREE were all about the pure-historical aspect and risked (and often did) lose people by doing things in line with the best research rather than common belief. WicDiv has a slightly different set of priorities, especially on secondary aspects like tanned Vandals.

Heh. Story starts with butchery of a goat, and ends with butchery of Lucifer. WicDiv is a very subtle comic.

Sulla's an interesting dude, and I think the use by Ananke here seems pretty fair. The future she's pointing towards never happens – the marriage is there. Germanic hands ended up ruling what came after the Empire, but that's not really what is going. Of course, Geiseric is also entirely right in recognising he's being manipulated.

They're a fun pair, actually, in terms of the fencing. I kind of realise this is the sort of conversation which is going to be key in Spangly New Thing, which makes me excited about writing it again.

I smile at the Vandal line. People have wondered why I didn't do the earlier sack, so I could have had the goths. Well, it didn't really work for the story, which is about the end of an era. But also it would have been perhaps too much. I did have a joke take, where Ananke is debating which Germanic tribe to manipulate into invading Rome. “The Goths again? No. No More Goths.”

But 455 isn't that kind of book.

The final image! Lovely, in its bleak and awful way.

Page 26

City of God being Augustine's book, written primarily in response to the crisis of faith in the Empire over the 410 sack of Rome by the aforementioned Goths.

Anyway – thanks for reading, and thanks for Andre for joining us on this beast. We're back (eek) tomorrow, with Imperial Phase II. Onwards, etc.