#god plays an ineffable game of cards

[sighed-the-snake]

This is a partly formed thought, so bear with me here.

God is shown as playing a game of cards with the universe.

Is God playing euchre?

Something about playing with opposing teams and people having to trust their partners because they can't share their cards.

And Agnes Nutter referring to Aziraphale and Crowley as "the Two Powers" and euchre has two bowers, which are two Jacks.

And there being a situation where a Jack of Clubs is actually a Jack of Spades (hidden in plain sight sort of stuff).

And the two Joker cards were invented because of the game euchre.

And each play being called a trick. Euchre is a game of tricks.

And in British rules there is a play called Playing Policemen. Muriel comes to mind.

There is also a play called Going Alone, the ultimate flex in a euchre game. It’s a high-risk, high-reward move in euchre where a player is confident they can play and win all five tricks in a hand without the help of their partner. Sort of like Aziraphale going it alone in Heaven to stop the Second Coming.

And the game being described as sort of chaotic and hard to understand.

I don't entirely understand this game, but enough details seem to relate to the show that I wonder. Maybe someone with more experience with euchre could add to this.

[nadsdraws]

God does not play dice with the universe... but Metatron does

[wistfulnightingale]

Mini-Meta Musing (#3)

"Angel, what if the Almighty planned it like this, all along?"

God was absent in S2. Yet, S1 opens with The Ineffable Game of Her Own Devising, that's "like playing poker in a pitch dark room, for infinite stakes, with a dealer who won't tell you the rules, and smiles all the time."

I think the cards were still in play in S2. For a lot of reasons. But let's start with this one:

Without This Moment --

Would Our Ineffables have reached

This Moment ?

What If, and I know this could just be me, but it seems quite possible... What if God knew Crowley wouldn't kill the kids, especially the children, and set up the entire Job scenario to nudge our Ineffables onto the path of friendship she wanted them on?

Their confrontation and time together in Job's cellar built tremendous trust between the two. If the Job bet hadn't happened, Aziraphale and Crowley might not have been a team in helping to prevent the first Apocalypse -- It was The Great Plan, but not the Ineffable one.

[qtj]

Yesterday was one of my favorite discord server’s anniversary!

A 666 prompt was given to me: God playing an ineffable game of her own devising using playing cards.

God, she’s always watching…

[ao3cassandraic]

Angels, demons, language, and culture: part 3

(Part 1 and Part 2 for those interested.)

"I play an ineffable game of my own devising. For everyone else, it’s like playing poker in a pitch dark room with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a dealer who won’t tell you the rules and who smiles all the time." --God, Good Omens

This is just. Creepy and awful and so, so wrong for a quasi-omnipotent being. Ugh. Good Omens!God is an abject horror.

But if you're one of the poker players at that table, what do you do? You try to figure out the rules and mark the cards, naturally. Especially if leaving the table only happens via swan dives into burning sulphur, or getting kicked out of the only home you've known into a hostile desert with lions in it. While pregnant, yet.

So, I did a Bat Mitzvah back in the day, as it happens, and my Torah portion was from Deuteronomy. Which is, as I am hardly the first to notice, chockablock full of rules. Good Omens definitely leveraged (rather than inventing) the idea of trying to figure out Her rules and codify them in writing! Note, however, that the Bible per Word of Gaiman is a human thing. Codifying divine rules? Therefore also a human thing, minus I suppose the Ten Commandments -- though I can certainly envision a Good Omens in which Moses was, um, not exactly telling the truth about the source of the tablets; we only really have his word for it.

Angels and demons, who have a low opinion of literacy and just generally don't seem to be very good at it, never did this. We see that Aziraphale, Before the Beginning, has intuitively figured a few rules out: don't question Her, don't comment on (much less critique) Her decisions or designs, don't ever ever piss Her off. The Starmaker hasn't gotten this far, tragically, and our Crowley remains confused throughout the show as to what rule he can possibly have broken that earned him the identity-changing torture She inflicted on him.

Fundamentally, Crowley doesn't want to -- perhaps can't -- believe that She is capricious and cruel. He thinks there are rules, "don't test to destruction" being a major one. We know he's wrong, however. She straight-up told us so, in the quote at the top of this post! Aziraphale, too, knows, though he buries this knowledge as deep under the words "ineffable" and "Great Plan" (there is no Great Plan, She told us so, it's all a game to Her) as he possibly can -- I think as a coping mechanism -- and does his best to avoid drawing Her attention again after the Sword Incident.

But we see angelic and demonic confusion about the rules of Her game again and again. It's at the root of Aziraphale's successful Great Plan/Ineffable Plan hairsplitting at the airbase. It's why Aziraphale has to (with Muriel's help) dig through the contract for Job, and why Gabriel and Michael can't even be arsed to, even revising Job's reward on the fly. They're guessing! They're guessing about the rules based on what they've seen of Her caprices! She likes sevens!

It's how Crowley rules-lawyers the demons into letting the Whickber Street tradespeople go. If there are actual rules of Heaven-Hell engagement -- and there may not be! Crowley's pulled plausible-sounding lies out of his arse before! -- I'll bet you anything you like practically nobody in Heaven or Hell has actually read them. (My top picks for rules-of-engagement authors, if those rules actually do exist, would be Satan and the Metatron.)

And it's why Uriel has to ask the Metatron, as unsure and afraid as Uriel has ever looked in the entire series, whether the remaining archangels have done something wrong. The Metatron's response refuses to clarify what's at issue -- he, like Her, won't tell anybody the rules. If I'm feeling extremely cynical, I think She and he refuse to explain the rules because they're more powerful if there's no rulebook that rank-and-file angels can use to contest them with.

It makes me so sad. The legions of Heaven would assuredly have followed Her rules, if they only knew what those rules were! Fanart of the just-fallen Starmaker routinely breaks my susceptible heart, not least because the commonest expressions on his face are agony, sorrow -- and confusion. It's just all so damn unfair.

Same with Job, and Peter Davison sells it beautifully. Poor Job assumes he must have broken Her rules somehow, and blames himself for not even knowing how. That's totally on Her, though! If Her rules aren't clear enough for righteous Job to be able to trust his own righteousness under a horrible test, that's Her fault, not his!

The closest that Heaven and Hell -- and humanity, for that matter -- have to Her rules is prophecy. I probably don't need to spill many pixels on how vague and confusing prophecy is, how often it's counterfeited, and how pointless it is to try to live your life by (or trying to avoid) true prophecies; prophecies will invariably gotcha you. Good Omens is hardly the first work of literature to point this out. (Try the story of Oedipus. That's a good one. Yeesh. Or, if we want to be all Biblical about it, Moses again.) Agnes Nutter may well be the only genuinely well-meaning prophet in the entire history of prophets! Even so, her book is incredibly bewildering! Generations of her descendants try to figure it out, and mostly they fail -- look at the annotations we see on Anathema's index cards.

So when @thundercrackfic asks me what Aziraphale gets out of books, my first (though not only) answer is "rules for living." Not just rules for living as safely as possible around Her, though -- rules for living among humans, too. I headcanon (and posited in "Endgame") that Aziraphale has been collecting human etiquette manuals as long as humans have been writing etiquette manuals. Codified rules, like the ones in Deuteronomy, likely help him feel more secure.

I think this is also why Muriel characterizes books as portable people. Muriel is trying their sweet adorable best to figure out the Earth rules on the fly, since nobody Upstairs told them (or indeed knows, the Metatron aside) what those rules are. They do have Aziraphale to help them along -- Aziraphale is so much better than Upstairs! he doesn't condescend or insult, he just gently instructs -- but Aziraphale can't teach full-time, he has other things on his plate. So Muriel the scrivener, one of the few angels who would have a clue about literacy due to the nature of their job, gravitates to books and discovers that they too can be gentle and compassionate teachers.

The final question outstanding is how well Aziraphale understands and assimilates human books, especially fiction, especially especially non-literal figures of speech. It's an excellent and complicated question, and I don't think I have The Answer to it, but I'll see what I can do.

[ineffablyruined]

Of Poker, Blank Cards, and Smiling Dealers

Let's talk God's Game for a minute.

God is playing complex poker in a dark room with blank cards and a Dealer who keeps smiling. But let's be real. It's God. Is She playing or is She actually the Dealer? I think it's both.

God's true purpose is the Dealer, shuffling the cards, handing out winning and losing hands. That's right up God's alley.

But, She's also playing for humanity because who else could? Humans are Hers, after all.

And this is where it gets interesting. Because, there are other Players. But who are they? My guess:

1. Heaven (Player: The Metatron)

2. Hell (Player: Satan)

3. Humanity (Player: God)

And God is playing AND dealing. And the Dealer has to deal, has to give a playable hand, otherwise there's no game. It doesn't have to be the winning hand, but each player needs cards regardless. But, God created the cards, and She knows every card that is going to be drawn into each Player's hand.

My theory is God's Stacking the Deck in favor of humanity, in favor of her little pet project that She's created to keep Herself entertained.

Now, let's talk the Blank Cards.

The cards themselves are every other being in this Ineffable game. Each angel, demon, and human is a card in Heaven's, Hell's, or Humanity's hand. The Four Horsemen? Hell's. Michael? Probably Heaven's from what we've seen so far. Anathema Device? Humanity, definitely. Saraqael? Muriel? I don't think we've seen, but I've got some ideas.

But, why blank? Well, how else do we account for free will? The cards are blank because that's the fun part of the game. The complex part. Just because you've got the card, doesn't mean you know how it will be played, what choices it will make. What other cards it will come into contact with.

Except, if you created the cards, then maybe you have an edge. A tiny edge over the other players. Just enough to stack the deck in your favor.

And this is where Crowley & Aziraphale come in. They're Her trump cards (if you'll allow me to mix card game metaphors for a minute - it is, after all, complex poker).

She created them. She knows them. She can't control them, but She can make predictions about what they will do. And She knows that they are a group of the two of them, that if She puts them together on that tiny little planet, they will do everything they can to protect it together, because that's how She created them.

So yes, they get to make their own choices. Crowley can help save a gravedigger's life and get taken off the table by Hell for a bit because of it. Aziraphale can choose to go back to Heaven as Supreme Archangel and get removed from the table by Heaven for now

But, when push comes to shove, both of those cards are squarely in Humanity's hand, just as God dealt. They are there together. And once they both come back onto the table, Humanity can't do anything other than come out on top.

And if my hand had those two, I'd be smiling, too.

[alwaysgodownwiththeship]

I've spent some time thinking over why God tolerated Aziraphale lying to her face and all of his later numerous defiances to her will. I think I've finally got it.

Aziraphale and Crowley are God's two favorite Game Pieces.

Crowley is an obstacle and Aziraphale is a wild card.

It all comes down to the fact that the Good Omens Gods is an all-powerful, presumably omniscient entity, playing an ineffable game.

And the thing is, when you're all powerful, presumably omniscient entity, holding all the cards, any game you play will be pretty damn boring.

And that is where Aziraphale and Crowley come in.

You can't just create a universe, run it for a few thousand years, and then stop.

Crowley does a lot of things. But his main role in God's game is to serve as an obstacle, an obstruction to the plans of both Heaven and Hell; her plans. From the beginning of the show, even when he's messing up the basic delivery of Antichrist, he's essentially performing this function. However, Crowley's obstruction is not random, he becomes an obstacle for specific and predictable reasons, as we've seen throughout the show. What's unpredictable is the outcomes that result from his interference in God's plans. He often takes upon himself to defy God.

Age does not wither, nor custom stale his infinite variety.

Translation from the words that inspired Shakespeare: He's unpredictable! (another reason he is forever compelling to Crowley)

Ever since Aziraphale "Prometheus"-ed away his flaming sword to Adam and Eve, God was probably satisfied to label him as a wild card and left him alone to do his thing. Narratively, he's served that function. He's tied and pulled in many directions, to the point where it was uncertain where he would fall in season 1. He lied to both Micheal then Crowley over where Adam was, he possessed a human like a demon, and yet his decision allowed both him and Crowley to be there in Tadfield to influence Adam when the time came. That's not touching on his mad choices/interferences in season 2. He often takes upon himself to correct God depending on how he interprets Heaven's commands.

Together, Aziraphale and Crowley make the game much more entertaining for God. Hell, she might even ship it. I'm positive the God's real game in the Job episode actually revolved around Aziraphale's and Crowley's actions, not her bet with Satan (if that even happened).

(The real question is if God has started a new game or is continuing her old one.

[secretdiaryofcrowley]

Trying to talk to Maggie and to Muriel – Attempt Nr.2

Hi Maggie, please tell Muriel to come over to the record shop, so that I need to say this only once: Stop trying to talk to me, the both of you. Stop sending me notes, stop trying to call me, just stop doing anything about me. I am not your friend and never will be.

There, you have it. Nice and short.

The only problem is, if I put it like that, Maggie will probably cry and Nina will give me her angry face again. And Muriel will look at me with those big brown eyes and think it’s their fault. And perhaps cry, too.

Enough! No more crying. I’m sick of blowing my nose all the time. It gets all red and blotchy. Why do noses always have to run when you cry! Major design flaw if you ask me. But I forgot, you are not asking, @the-almighty-god. You’re just playing your ineffable game. Next time, please play Dungeons & Dragons with us. At least that one has uhm…. dungeons and dragons and elves and Bags of Holding in it. I would quite like a Bag of Holding, then I could’ve kept all of my plants when Hell kicked me out of my flat.

Okay, next try: Hi Maggie and Muriel. I can’t be your friend because I don’t do friendships. Bye.

That one’s so short, I could actually write it on a card. Maybe I should, then I don’t have to talk to them. But Nina was very specific about this one. If you don’t want friends, you have to tell people to go away and you have to do it in person. Writing will not do, texting will not do, and simply going away until they forget about you will not do either. That one least of all.

Nina says, the truth is painful, but at least they’ll have a clean cut and they can start to heal. They can’t when I just leave them hanging. No closure.

Hi Maggie and Muriel. I don’t want to be your friend because I’m scared. Scared that I’ll get hurt when I open up to someone. Scared that you’ll get hurt, when Heaven and Hell start doing their thing again and we all get caught in the crossfire.

No, by ‘the truth’ I didn’t mean ‘that much truth’.

Just the clean cut. The one we never got to have. First, I walked out, then he walked away. We never sorted anything out. Did he leave because he chose Heaven over me? Did he leave because he chose Heaven for me? Did we break up? How can we break up if we aren’t even together? Are we still friends, or is everything over for good?

What does he want with Heaven? Does he truly believe, he can make a difference? Was it just an excuse to get away? Why did he kiss me back and then told me, he forgives me? Did he even listen to anything I said?

Why suddenly dance with me at the ball when he refused to dance with me back in 1941 when I asked him to? Why does he want me to be an angel again? Am I not okay for him the way I am? Does he even want to be “an us”, or did he at least want it before everything went down the drain? Does he still think about me as he is up there, doing God knows what?

Is he thinking of me right now? Perhaps this very moment?

I slam on the brakes and let the Bentley spin to the right, so the car behind me passes by without hitting me. The driver yells something rude, but I’m not listening to him. My mind is full of questions and I can’t answer a single one of them.  

No closure. No clean cut. Just pain.

I can’t heal because I’m left hanging. I can’t move on with my life because I don’t know what’s there to move on to and what there isn't. Is he still a part of this life or is he gone for good?

I’m on hold. I’m on hold like a human on a phone who doesn’t know if they should hang up or if they should wait for the conversation to continue. When Beelzebub came to talk to me about Gabriel, I understood immediately what was going on with them. Why can I not understand what is going on with us?

Again Nina’s words: “But then, other people’s love lives always seem so much more straightforward than our own.”

I start the Bentley’s engine again, but before I can bring my foot down, I freeze.

“Hello, traitor.”

 No literal freezing. Just a jumpscare.

“I was going to pull you down to my new office, as it seems befitting for my new position. But you’re so miserable already, I didn’t want to drag you out of your safe space. Besides, Hell doesn’t need to know about our little talk, do they?”

~*~

More Diary Parts

1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 15 / 16 / 17 / 18 / 19

@aziraphalesdiaries @muriel-not-the-dim-one

[agoodomenssideblogiguess]

"God does not play dice with the universe; He plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players [i.e. everybody], to being involved in an obscure and complex variant of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won’t tell you the rules...

... and who smiles all the time."

[gennsoup]

God does not play dice with the universe; He plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players (ie., everybody), to being involved in an obscure and complex version of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won't tell you the rules, and who smiles all the time.

Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman, Good Omens

[giantmushyfriend]

The Ineffable Husbands are ABBA coded (I went overboard on this one) (S2 SPOILERS) (I’m not sorry)

I see your “the ineffable husbands are so Hozier coded,” and your “they’re so Taylor Swift coded,” and I raise you a “the ineffable husbands are incredibly ABBA coded.” 

Listen, I know we all know about Aziraphale’s playlist having Angeleyes on it, which makes perfect sense given where Series 2 left us. I mean, come on; 

“Look into his angel eyes

One look and you’re hypnotized. 

He’ll take your heart and you must pray the price” 

And

“Sometimes when I’m lonely, I sit and think about him 

And it hurts to remember all the good times 

When I thought I could never live without him 

And I wonder, does it have to be the same

Every time? When I see him, will it bring back all the pain? 

How can I forget that name?” 

It’s obvious that this song, from a post-Series 2 standpoint is Aziraphale (and also Crowley) analyzing their relationship. It’s them admitting to themselves that although the other caused them pain, they still miss and love each other, even if they aren’t willing to admit it yet. 

However, this isn’t where the ABBA train ends. We can see Aziraphale and Crowley’s relationship, both the highs and lows, in several different ABBA songs. Do you want to talk about how Crowley is probably feeling after the finale? And how he’ll probably be feeling when we get our AziraCrow reunion in S3? Let’s look at The Winner Takes It All. The entire song relates to how Crowley see’s the split and different aspects of their relationship. 

“I’ve played all my cards

And that’s what you’ve done too

Nothing more to say

No more ace to play

The Winner takes it all

The loser’s standing small” 

Tell me this is not his confession scene. Crowley laid it all out there, and it wasn’t enough. They both have laid out what they think is best, and neither of them was pursued (mostly because of the bad communication). Heaven’s influence on Aziraphale and his inherent want to do good won out, the cards were never in Crowley’s favor in this situation. He’s left with essentially nothing when Aziraphale leaves, his one constant, his one tether to this world, is gone. 

“I was in your arms

Thinking I belonged there

I figured it made sense

Building me a fence

Building me a home

Thinking I’d be strong there

But I was a fool

Playing by the rules”

Talking about how Crowley built a home within his relationship with Aziraphale, and how he feels like a fool for relying on it after its been stripped away. 

“The gods may throw a dice

Their minds as cold as ice

And someone way down here

Loses someone dear” 

In reference to God’s ineffable plan, if Aziraphale leaving him and choosing Heaven is really a part of it. To God, this separation is just a smaller part of a larger scheme, insignificant, but to Crowley, it is life-changing. He’s lost his best friend, seemingly for good, all in the name of “the greater good.” 

“Somewhere deep inside

You must know I miss you

But what can I say?

Rules must be obeyed

The judges will decide

The likes of me abide”

COME ON. Crowley doesn’t believe that Aziraphale could ever love him, he’s a demon, and to the rest of the world, he is inherently below Aziraphale. Those are the “rules” of the world, and this is a dejected Crowley saying that maybe they can’t rewrite them. This is him, in his darkest moment, telling himself and Aziraphale that there is nothing they can do, rules in the end have to be obeyed and the likes of him have to abide by them eventually. 

To an extent, Aziraphale is the “winner” in this split. He’s the one that gets to leave, seemingly unbothered by the pain he is causing Crowley. We as the audience know differently, but Crowley doesn’t. In his perspective, Aziraphale has won the game. 

And their reunion in (hopefully) S3?

“And I understand

You’ve come to shake my hand”. 

Admitting defeat. Good game. 

You want Aziraphale to reflect on his mistake of leaving Crowley, which he inevitably will? Look at One of Us. 

“My picture clear

Everything seemed so easy

And so I dealt you the blow

One of us had to go”

Aziraphale is obviously still working through his toxic relationship with Heaven as an institution. In his eyes, with his belief in the greater good, everything seems easy. He can go to Heaven, make it worthy of beings like Crowley, and make it better. But when Crowley says he doesn’t want to go with him, Aziraphale knows he has to make the choice. And because of his inherent belief that Heaven can and is good, he chooses them, dealing the blow to Crowley with that final “I forgive you.” 

“One of us is crying, one of us is lying 

In a lonely bed

Staring at the ceiling

Wishing she was

somewhere else instead

One of us is lonely, and one of us is only

Waiting for a call

Sorry for herself, feeling 

stupid, feeling small

Wishing she had never left at all”

The entire chorus is Aziraphale wishing he could take back what happened that day. It’s him wishing that he was back on Earth, in his bookshop with Crowley. It’s him wishing that Crowley would come back to him. It’s him completely enveloped in regret. 

“I saw myself 

As a concealed attraction. 

I felt you kept me away 

From the heath and the action. 

Just like a child 

Stubborn and misconceiving

That’s how I started the show 

One of us had to go 

Now I’m changed and I want you to know” 

As we’ve already discussed, Aziraphale believes that Heaven is inherently good and thus must just need a push in the right direction. To him, he could be that push. When Crowley stands firm in his belief that Heaven won’t change, a part of Aziraphale had to have taken offense to that, because he’s partially hearing “Heaven won’t change, let alone for you”. Aziraphale, for his entire existence, has been told his efforts aren’t enough. So when he’s given the chance to make an impact, to finally do what he thinks is right, he jumps for it. He’s stubborn in his core beliefs that there is an inherently good and inherent evil, which we as the audience have come to learn isn’t true. To us, and probably to future Aziraphale, his past self was misconceiving. This is both present and future Aziraphale admitting that he made a mistake choosing Heaven over Crowley. This is Aziraphale pinning for the life he could have had with Crowley, for the life he gave away for what he thought was right. 

You want both of them to look back on the good times of them traveling the world throughout time before all of this Second Coming shit went down? Look at Our Last Summer. 

“I was so happy we had met

It was the age of no regret” 

“We took the chance

Like we were dancing our last dance 

I can still recall our last summer

I still see it all

In the tourist jam

Round the Notre Dame

Our Last summer

Walking hand in hand

Paris restaurants

Our last summer

Morning croissants

Living for the day 

Worries far away

Our last summer

We could laugh and play”

Do you want some angst where they both are looking back at what went wrong? Look no further, SOS has got you covered! 

“I try to reach for you, but

you have closed your mind. 

Whatever happened to our love? I wish I understood”’

That’s literally their final argument before Aziraphale leaves with Metatron. It’s them reaching for each other, both of them saying “Stay with me” but the lack of communication has shut down all hope. 

“When you’re gone, how 

can I even try to go on?”

“You made me feel alive,

but something died, I fear

I really tried to make it up

I wish I understood” 

Crowley in his last stitched attempt to make Aziraphale stay: the kiss. He tried to make it up, but it didn’t work and he doesn’t understand why it really didn’t. 

Oh, are you tired of angst? Do you want some happy ineffable husbands? ABBA beat us to it! You better believe that Crowley jams to Take a Chance on Me at least once a day. 

“Gonna do my very best 

and it ain’t no lie

If you put me to the test, if 

you let me try

Take a chance on me” 

“‘Cause you know I’ve got

So much that I wanna do 

When I dream I’m alone 

with you, it’s magic

You want me to leave it

there

Afraid of a love affair

But I think you know

That I can’t let go” 

“Oh, you can take your time baby

I’m in no hurry

Know I’m gonna get you” 

The entire song is Crowley asking Aziraphale to just give him a chance. To let him prove how much he loves him. 

Do you want them talking about that first Doomsday where they turned against their respective sides for each other? Fernando. 

“There was something in 

the air that night

The stars were bright, 

Fernando

They were shining there 

for you and me

For liberty, Fernando

Though we never thought 

that we could lose

There’s no regret

If I had to do the same

again

I would, my friend, 

Fernando” 

How about them talking about how much they love each other? I’ve Been Waiting For You, Waterloo, Super Trouper, and Lay Your Love On Me sums it up perfectly. 

I’ve Been Waiting For You:

“You’re something I’d been

pleading for

I love you, I adore you

I lay my life before you

I’ll have you want me more

and more

And finally, it seems 

my lonely days are through

I’ve been waiting for you” 

Waterloo:

“Waterloo

Promise to love you

forevermore

Waterloo

Couldn’t escape if I

wanted to

Waterloo

Knowing my fate is to be

with you”

“And how could I ever refuse

I feel like I win when I lose”

Super Trouper:

“So I’ll be there when you

arrive

The sight of you will prove 

to me I’m 

Still alive, and when you

take me in your arms

And hold me tight

I know it’s gonna mean so much tonight” 

Lay  All Your Love On Me

“It was like shooting a 

sitting duck

A little small talk, a smile

and baby I was stuck

I still don’t know what

you’ve done with me

A grown-up woman

should never fall so easily

I feel a kind of fear

When I don’t have you

near

Unsatisfied, I skip my pride

I beg you dear”

“I used to think that was sensible

It makes the truth even

more incomprehensible 

‘Cause everything is new

And everything is you

And all I’ve learned has

overturned

What can I do?” 

In conclusion, the ineffable husbands are probably the most ABBA-coded thing I’ve seen in a while. And no one talks about it! Absolutely no one! I think part of it comes from the fact that Series 2 of Our Flag Means Death has already been lumped with ABBA, but they both can be ABBA coded! Aziraphale and Crowley inspired all of the songs on the Mamma Mia set list, and you can pry that fact from my cold, dead hands. 

[certifiablyinsanez]

In the opening of season 1 of Good Omens, God says that she does not play dice. That she plays an ineffable game of her own choosing, like playing poker. Dice is a game of luck and change, of hoping that you’ll win big but having no control unless you cheat, which is reckless. Poker on the other hand, also involves chance, but mostly involves skill. Even with a garbage hand you can still win. In this essay I will explain how I believe Crowley and Aziraphale are the most important cards in this ineffable game-

[postsforposting]

Colors in GO

Dec 23: updated purple

Dec 25: fixed blue, forgot to rewrite it before posting

I think the symbolism of blue and green are wrong? They don't mean heaven and hell. They can be associated with heaven and hell, but they don't solely mean that. Orange and white also seem to overlap, being associated with god, but so is blue which has been said to be divinity. I realized these were all entangled when writing various meta and trying to figure out what was going on in several scenes. Surely they do not all mean the same thing! Lo and behold, they do not.

Now that we all art here, let us recount the deeds of the dyes:

Brown: choice, free will/fate

White: playing by the rules

Black: Deceit

Blue: life/death

Gold: God's presence/watching

Green: god's game, the ineffable plan

Orange: agents of god's will

Red: passion

Yellow: defiance

Purple: power

Note: The shade of each color can mean something different. For example, say pink means love, then bright pink means love, and dark red would be absence of love or a negative/bad connotation. The way colors are combined also matters for context, what's on top or the placement on clothing vs how much of a color there is, what's the "core" color, etc. I am not sure, but I think in scenes where a tint is dominating the other colors, and makes a color look different, then the changed color is supposed to look different: so if in shadow gray looks black, then I think it's meant to be read as black.

There are other things that colors can stand for too, such as red being for blood or love. Those are the traditional symbolism, not the *main* usage in GO. I think some colors also aren't commenting on what is happening in a scene itself, but are foreshadowing future actions or telling us about hidden intent.

Also, I have been wrong about the colors before, this is merely the latest iteration on what I think they mean. I belabored it this time though, so I am pretty confident in these.

Opening montage=very beginning of s1e1 before Eden; intro=sequence we see with the theme music every episode.

Brown: choice, freewill vs fate

Basket the antichrist was delivered in, Hastur's and Aziraphale's clothes. Sandalphon's clothes. Obviously the ground and Adam's forest, seats in the bentley in s1 are dark brown. Lots of dark wood at the satanic hospital. Metatron's clothes. Jesus on the cross symbol, the cross itself. Furnishings and draperies at the Ritz are tan/cream. Desert of War's sword delivery, War's sword has dark brown on it, and half the clothing of the woman who demands to sign first. The summoner's clothes and every box he delivers. The witchfinders who burn Agnes wear dark brown, as does Agnes and the villagers. Floor of modern Anathema's house and the box holding the prophecy cards are dark brown, plus the cards themselves are tan/cream.

It can't be just earth alignment because Sandalphon isn't.

Brown is choice; light brown is free will and darker is more fate. It's associated with humanity but it's not solely humanity. Darker brown is less of a choice, pressured choice, and/or fate, like Anathema's family had with the prophecies: you don't have much of a choice when the world is on the line. They could have chosen not to follow the book though. Sandalphon has latitude in how he conducts himself and treats humans: he does not have to act as he does. Aziraphale's waistcoat gets lighter and worn as he develops his own beliefs rather than rigidly relying on heaven's demands, as he makes his own choices. He adds more lighter brown over time as he makes his own choices instead of being railroaded by fate.

Particularly, humanity was cut off from the light sandy desert while walled into Eden. When Crowley stops time, they all stand on light sand. The bentley having dark brown seats means it's got choice, but not much of one since it's tied to Crowley; also it was part of fate. Creating the antichrist was a choice, was also possibly a forced choice on Satan's part.

When Azi is discorporated to heaven and we meet the heavenly soldiers, he is dressed in a white shirt and tan coat and pants: he's got a choice to make, to go to war or not. The soldiers too all are making a choice to go to war, only pushed along a little bit by fate: the darker brown in their kilts. Except Azi has a white shirt, while the soldiers are button up fully in their choice, with white earpieces.

White: playing by the rules

White can't be specifically heaven or god, since we see it on Adam and we see bits of it on Crowley at some points. Aziraphale is not all white when he's discorporated in heaven as he defies heaven and talks to Crowley as a ghost: he's a white shirt and tan pants and coat. The outfit Adam has for s1, changing only the coat:

That is not heavenly, he's the antichrist. Can't be heaven's watching either.

Can't be strictly heavenly, because when Satan gives Crowley instructions it's white mist. It can't be autonomy, because that isn't the angels, isn't heaven, and Crowley would have some white as a demon. There has to be a reason why it's on Adam's core instead of on the surface like the coat. Playing by the rules? Yes--just like the "shades of gray", there's multiple ways to bend that just like god does, and you can play by the rules for your own ends, which fits why it's associated with heaven and god, and also why black is all over Crowley because he makes his own rules. Crowley also plays by the rules in the arrangement sometimes, respecting Aziraphale and the system, so that could be why it shows up on him sometimes. The new "ye saga continues" that Anathema burns at the end of s1 is cream, ie true but somewhat obscure as prophecies are wont to be.

The first time we see white is in the opening montage, where it's the color of the correct statements. That would appear to be truth, but it's god's truth, and Adam certainly isn't in line with that. And that truth here is malleable, because Adam's truth isn't the world's truth, he can remake it as he wants. So this isn't so much "truth" or reality as it is playing by the rules: what god says is true, but god can also lie, and those correct statements are backed with black. If white is playing by the rules, then black is lawlessness and deceit, so god's lying. This is why angels used to be white, and why Azi was white as an angel but in modern times is gaining light brown as his waistcoat wears out: he's gaining not "clarity" or truth but choice, freewill as he develops his own beliefs. This would explain why it's Adam's core, and why Azi gets a whole shirt of it which allows him to make a different choice than everyone else in heaven, who only get helmets and earpieces of white aka it's pounded into their heads: everything Azi does while in heaven is playing by the rules, the Metatron said he could finish what he was doing and that's what he's claiming to do.

Interestingly, the lightning used by both heaven and hell is white. White tends to be associated with heaven, but it's not exclusive. Pollution is smokey/champagne, so white can't be truth--but pollution is playing by the rules, as they themselves say. White can be truth, a filter, to remove deceit, but it's not strictly truth.

This is part of the parody: white is usually truth, but here it's a twisted version of "being in the light" that makes god look like a double dealing salesman.

Black: deceit, duplicity

Opposite to white, it's deceit, as when Aziraphale wears black to do his magic act: all the rules are out the window, nothing is as it seems. It's associated with hell, but not solely satanic, cf the angels' suits again. This also means that Satan and Beez were hiding things all the way back from s1.

Interestingly, the Ritz is white marble with tan/cream fabric. Sleeve on the dealer in the baby swap card game. The opening montage shades between navy and black for the color of "space": god's lying.

Silver is between black and white, and it depends on context: the angels lose their white robes over time, which matters because they are moving away from strict rule abiding to double talking for many of them to get away with things they shouldn't--or possibly so the system doesn't catch their disapproval of it. This is shades of gray used in a negative way as opposed to the way Crowley and Aziraphale use "shades of gray" to do things better. Same reason why Crowley's wings as an angel started darkening in before the beginning when he found out his stars were going to be destroyed, because he was going to do whatever it took to save them, rules and authority be damned. Here is where the parody of traditional apocalypse fiction comes in: black is traditionally bad, but here it's not necessarily because you can use deceit to do good when in a corrupt system, as Crowley and Aziraphale do, and using it to do bad is negative. Puts Satan's black in a whole new light, eh?

The difference between playing by the book and outright deceit is whether what you're doing is acceptable: Adam's "you are not my father" took the latitude he was given, while the archangels gleefully move line markers and lie about it.

The silver chain Crowley loses in s2 represents hell's authority over him: hell is lawless as the sham trial Crowley got shows, but its denizens are expected to follow the rules. Silver chain of hell, silver suits for heaven: not so different after all.

Blue: life/death

This doesn't mean heaven. I think people got this idea because of the light blue blanket in the baby swap alongside the white and red one that people took to mean hell, but that's not what that means: red doesn't mean hell; only one of the two babies is Jesus, and we don't know which one yet.

The first blue we see is the navy on the TV screen in the opening scene, I think space might be navy and obviously the earth's blue water that shows up thrice. A large neon blue and black eye as god tells us the fossilized dinosaurs are a joke the scientists haven't caught on to yet. Black means deceit, so god's lying about the dinosaurs. The libra symbol is white and light blue. Water in the middle of Eden is dark blue and possibly dark green, the sky is light blue. Jesus in s2 is shown with a neon blue sash.

Light blue is life, dark blue is death.

Leaving Eden was leaving death to seek life: leaving dark blue water to enter light blue sky and sand.

Warlock and Mr Dowling wear light blue shirts, Adam has a faded blue jean jacket. Light blue and white lights on the ambulance that brings the Dowlings to the hospital. Aziraphale wears a light bluegreen shirt, but often it does appear white or light blue. Water in the park, where the ineffables know they're being watched, is actually dark green, not blue. Some of the accessories of the people where War gets her sword delivery are navy, including light blue bulletproof vests, who all die. Outside of the coffee shop is dark blue with a light blue awning and patio fence in s1: life, death and liberty are intertwined, but we never go in to get any liberty ie coffee.

The first time we see the Ritz as they discuss the apocalypse in s1e1, there's a light blue set of windows and a white chandelier framed in the center between the ineffables: life is restricted by the rules, keeping them apart. Aziraphale's tie is light blue and white as the gardener. Light blue lights in Warlock's room, plus a light blue globe. Dark blue water on globe in heaven: heaven is death. The clothing shop next to the bookshop is dark blue. S1e2 starts in the light blue sky with white clouds and dark blue river: life by the rules inevitably leads to death. Light blue pool at Anathema's house and she's in a light blue dress. Newt's car is neon blue. Dark blue recycle bin at Newt's work, the witchfinder ad is circled in dark blue.

Tracey's bra is bright neon blue under a neon orange slip.

The other boys in Them have blue jeans, and Pepper has blue overalls. Adam has one outfit and two/three coats; one is blue, one is the green/blue shown above. Bright blue paint on Aziraphale at the paintball mansion, and light blue paint used by the yellow team, who are wearing white and one of whom has pearls on.

Light blue shirt on the staff at the cafe after the paintball fight. When Aziraphale makes Tracy's scooter fly, the miracle power is light blue: perhaps Aziraphale has the power of life.

Youngs have light blue, some dark blue stripes, when they're in bed. Adam has navy stripes with white on pjs. Light blue fractured lit windows around Azi's head when he finds Agnes's book in the car: the book has given him the ability to preserve life.

Blue in Azi's Shakespeare costume. Juliet, selling oranges, may have a blue costume? Single navy stripe in France's executioner's costume and the center of the flower decoration, which becomes Azi's costume. Beginning of 1941 memory tinted navy outside, so is inside the church, except the nazi space which is yellow. Crowley's dark blue 1941 shirt in both seasons. Adam's aura is yellow outside, then green/blue, red, white. The couple on the bench have a blue aura. Witchfinder manual is blue. Blue and white curtain behind Arthur Young as Adam reads witch magazine. Bandstand top is faded blue. Delivery man's bedsheets are faded blue. Witchfinder candle is light blue. The lights in the electrons Crowley runs through with Hastur are red, light blue, white, and gold. Blue ribbons on Beez s1, navy and light blue.

Neon blue is the last color in the memory tunnel Gabriel experiences getting his memories back, and blue is the tint of the graveyard scene in the last memory he meets Beez to look at his statue.

Gold: god's presence/watching

Gold is not yellow. I am not sure if brass is meant to be gold. I think the antenna on Beez's s1 hat may be copper/rose gold? Dark gold? Not sure. Could be glitter orange.

The first gold we see is a the 14 billion number as the age of the earth, gold shading to white. Then a gravity drawing around the planets to the sun, there are planets in gold, cards, and dealer's hands as god explains her game is like a dealer in a dark room. The libra earth horoscope is gold. Crowley's snake eye appears to be light gold--the show can do yellow, it would look yellow if that's what they meant. Dark gold/brown lion that tries to kill Adam and Eve.

This was extremely difficult to figure out, but I am pretty sure it's god's presence. I don't think there is a "dark" meaning for gold (though gold can be combined with other colors), because there is brass on the witchfinders that burn Agnes, and Agnes's daughter and husband are surrounded by what appears to be a lot of brass instruments. I don't think that scene would make sense if brass meant god's absence or disapproval. Brass could mean dark yellow though, or yellow and black, in which case that scene belongs to another color and not here. I also don't think gold denotes god's approval.

There are what seem to be gold chandeliers in the satanic hospital as they discuss the instructions for the baby swap.

The decoration on some of the angels' faces, and their rings. But when they're threatening Aziraphale in s1, they no longer have the face paint--does this mean the angels know what the paint does, or does the paint move on its own? This absence is why I think missing gold where it ought to be may mean "not ordained", because traditionally people would claim things like that in god's name. Sandalphon may still have the silver upper tooth decoration but he does not have the gold bottom ones in that scene. Michael has the gold when presenting the earth files on Crowley and when tattling to hell. The angels also cover their rings a lot--given they're in silver suits, this would fit a "hiding from god's sight" type of thing. The gold on their faces does not come back until they try to execute the ineffables, both Uriel and Micheal have it again.

I'm not sure if Michael has silver and orange or gold and orange paint the first time we see them in s1e1. I can't tell if there's gold or silver when they present the earth observation files. Given how obviously gold the gold on Uriel is, I think it's likely silver.

This would make sense why there is more gold in the s2 Job flashback: god is nosing in to see what happens with Job. Perhaps the robes change by will of god, they aren't something the angels choose to change, ditto the face paint.

Tracey's room is decorated in a lot of gold. Crowley's thrones and some other furniture. Edges of angel clothing before modern times. Aziraphale's desk chair. Number 4 delivery room, the Dowlings', in the satanic hospital was glowing gold or maybe yellow/orange, ditto #3 room. Cuff of the dealer in baby swap card game. Some decorative edging on the marble walls at the Ritz. Decoration on the sheathe of War's sword. Decoration on Agnes's book and gilt edging on pages. The color of the miracle dust when Crowley checks if it worked. Gold items on Aziraphale's desk and throughout the shop, the ring on Nanny's umbrella. Aziraphale's fob watch on his waistcoat, his waistcoat during his magic act in s1, and the merry go round at Warlock's bday in s1. Pepper's crown she's holding when the hellhound shows up. Aziraphale's mail slot on the shop. Brass buttons on Adultery Pulsifer and his "assistant"? Several medals on Shadwell's coat when we meet him preaching on the street. Gold on the edge of the red witchfinder patch.

All the prophecies in gold lettering on the screen as Azi reads them. Holy bible title in gold letter above the cocoa that doth grow cold. Buttons on the sleeve cuff of the sweater Azi wears to read Agnes's book.

Gold chain in the bartender's hair in Rome, her gold shoulder accessories, Azi's too. Gold on the columns at the Globe, in Shakespeare's costume, and on Hamlet's: god's watching Shakespeare. Gold on the top of Crowley's cane in 1862. Candle holders on left side in nazi church are gold. Gold closures on the bookbag Crowley saves. Gold rims on Crowley's 1967 glasses. Gold around the striptease sign. Gold ring visible as Azi calls Shadwell, and Shadwell's shoulder emblem is gold. Famine's companion is dressed in gold bolero, thick gold chain in diner scene and tons of gold accessories. Atlantean people have tons of gold. Gold street performer statue in the park. The lights in the electrons Crowley runs through with Hastur are red, blue, white, and gold. Newt's socks are red and gold during armageddon, gold shirt. Mostly gold/red credenza blocking off Azi's desk during Metatron summoning, gold candle holders. Gold all around Metatron head in s1, and Shadwell uses gold key to pick bookshop lock. Gold on the heavenly quartermaster and soldiers.

God's been around a lot of Crowley and Azi's dates. Really fascinated with the strippers too, though that's biblical.

Green: god's game/ineffable plan

NOT HELL, not evil. In s2 green is all over hell like a toxic gas. But in s1, green is not in hell except to tint hell's escalator. I don't think it's supposed to mean "just hell" in s2 either.

The first large "green" thing in s1 is the dark green chalkboards with the dates on them, and then a huge black and neon green CORRECT stamp in the montage talking about James Ussher's theories on the creation of the universe. This green is a neon version of the green we see in s2 hell and on s1 hell's escalator. Then we have a large dinosaur arm in the same "hell" neon shot with black, just as god is telling us about the dinosaurs being a joke people haven't understood yet. Black is deceit, so god is lying about the dinosaurs. We are already playing her game.

This is followed by a bunch of decorative looking things, astrology and writing of various greens, the giant eye starts out that neon green before going navy, along with dark green poker chips and neon green math. As in, a game. The s1 intro is almost completely hell green, and specifically there's a dark green street sign. One person in the Jesus scene has some dark green on. In the dealer's baby swap game, the third child isn't blue, he's dark green: this is the baby with the light blue blanket, Warlock. Satan's game is the baby swap, that's what he planned; God's game is the dealer's card game, we know because there's gold on the dealer's cuff. The backdrop to Satan's card game in the baby swap is dark green, and both hospital beds have bright green blankets over white.

Eden is tons of greens that look dark from far away, and dark blue water. Adam and Eve's clothes are dark green. The Youngs' clothes are heavily if not always greens, as are their bedding--again, they aren't agents of chaos themselves. The hospital itself has dark green and white alternating walls. Water in the spy park is actually not blue but dark green.

The forest Adam plays in is green and brown, and there's lots of the parks shown in the show. Anathema's coats are dark green and black or green and purple, and her house is surrounded by bushes and trees, a lot of her clothes are dark green. Tracey's clothing is various greens. The head of the cane/umbrella Crowley uses as Nanny is bright green. Agnes's book is dark green and gold. Crowley's plants are dark green. Ennon's clothes are darker green, he turns into an orange gecko.

The green gas choking Soho during the demon attack in s2, and the lights turning the same green in the bookshop during the demon attack. When Beez disappears to tattle to Satan at the end of s1, the color of the pop smoke is bright green, the same color as hell green, and I would assume all demons have the same color. The angel phones glow the same green of s2 hell. The statue of liberty figure in the coffee shop in s2 is the same green--but Eden was green too so it can't be liberty or freedom, or chaos.

I think the Great Plan is something all the angels were told and was recorded/was written, but the ineffable plan is god's game, and that is what green represents. Change IS the game, so darker green is more change, like Agnes's book, like Adam and Eve's clothes.

These are not agents of god's will as they act independently. This means Agnes and her book was part of god's game; the baby swap was part of the plan and the game. Eden was both plan and game: will they take the apple; Adam and Eve became part of the game once they did.

In s2, the blue and dark green coffee shop whose coffee represents liberty has dark brown chairs outside, and blue and the green of hell inside. I think this can be interpreted as this is a piece of god's game, life and death are a choice within which is god's game, and discovering that leads to freedom.

If there is a plan and a game, then bright green is more "plan" than game. Darker is less part of the plan. That's why the the CORRECT stamp in the montage is neon, because you are supposed to know that's wrong, and why Nanny's cane is bright green and s1 demon pops are bright green, but Agnes's book is dark green. Demon pops in s1 are bright green, I think because the fall was planned, just as the baby swaps and births were planned. The pops change in s2 to purple, perhaps because everything we see is interfering with their own kind rather than humans.

Are the angel phones green because they connect to hell? I don't think so, because the phones must do things besides that. Every time the phones were used they were green, so at the least talking to hell generates change in heaven. I think they have the phones turn off by blowing on them so that they don't have to touch them, because touching would be "dirty" and contaminating--can't be having angels get infected with hell, can't have the angels directly touching "change".

Anathema's shirt is light blue checking in to the UK, her bike is aqua--the bike appears to match Azi's shirt. Aqua, I think, is blue plus green: life plus game aka gambling with life. Anathema and Azi are pieces in the game of life. In s2e1, Aziraphale is a shooting star that's blue, and they're on a background of black and dark green. God's been gaming since, well, always. I think Azi's blue shooting star also means he was the one who made people, and perhaps the earth.

Orange: agent of god/god's will

The first orange we see is, I think, in the opening montage on some of the monks who got the dates of the creation of the earth wrong--they're in a ROYG rainbow. Then on James Ussher's clothing, the guy who got the creation of the earth slightly wrong, who is red, black and light orange (shades from gold to orange, I think) with a roman numeral clock behind him, various oranges. Dealer hands go from gold to orange as god explains her game.

Sash on Beelzebub in s1. Shakespeare's columns are red/orange. Tracey's hair/clothing is bright orange and Crowley's snake belly is dark, his hair looks dark orange too in s1. The fire Agnes Nutter burned in, and the candle flame in her house. Maude's shirt, the wife of the delivery man of the four horsemen. Holy fire on Aziraphale's sword, hellfire, fire that announces demonic arrival. Number 3 delivery room, the Youngs', glowed orange on fire, but it may have yellow/gold in it too. Job's and Jemimah's clothes, columns in his house, most of the color of the TV show that Hastur and Ligur take over to talk to Crowley. The record shop and accessories Maggie wears. The Jesus picture in Crowley's flat is entirely light orange and white. Juliet in the Shakespeare flashback is selling oranges. Orange and white cone in the paintball manor. Dark orange seat belts in the summoner's delivery truck.

Not all fire is orange. Some is yellow or white.

Originally I had this as god's presence, but I think gold fits more with that. This one thus is agents of god--god isn't there, but these are acting out god's will.

Crowley's hair throughout time:

Bright orange: BTB, Job, Tracey, Edinburgh, 1967

Dark orange: s1 present, 2008, nanny, noah?, jesus, rome, shakespeare, paris is brown?, 1862,

dark red: 1941, s2,

I think bright orange is agents for positive change, and dark orange are agents of "negatives". Crowley may not do much negatives himself, but Beez has that dark orange sash. Negative can also mean "throw a wrench in the works" like stopping the apocalypse.

Jemimah has orange clothes and becomes a neon blue gecko.

Red: passion

I think brighter reds are negative, and darker is positive/love. I think pink is fake negative, fake threat: we see it on Mrs Sandwich and in Tracey's bedroom.

Dark red bookshop, dark red backing on the thundergun: Azi loves his shop and Shadwell loves hunting witches. Tracey's apartment is dark red with aqua in the outer room: she helps people, and helps Shadwell a lot, and has knowledge of god's plan.

The big black and neon red "incorrect" stamp in the montage as god says some creationists are wrong, and the black and red "WARning": fake warning, god's lying about the dates, and god feels angry about it. Telephone Crowley calls from to tell Az about apocalypse: fear and anger. Shakespeare in dark red and gold outfit: god's in the audience, he loves his work and so does god. I'm not actually sure if Satan himself is dark red or bright red, he appears to be both, which is fascinating. Several buses shown are bright red while the ineffables are working out how to find the lost antichrist. There are several more buses when Crowley's racing to the bookshop after Aziraphale drops the phone when Shadwell breaks in, and more bright red firetrucks at the shop while it's on fire. Crowley's table he uses to plan running away is dark red; he loves his stars. Pepper's shoes are bright red and her raincoat is dark red: she's got anger but mostly motivated by love. Anathema's pencil when she's hunting for Adam is bright red, she's frustrated. The voicemail counter on Crowley's player that traps Hastur is red, as is the holy water bucket.

The apple in Eden is both bright and dark red, topped with yellow: love isn't possible without anger and fear, and in fact the point of the tree wasn't damnation but a test since it's covered in dark green and dark brown too? Shax's dress is dark red, as is her battle corset: she loves her job, and possibly Crowley too. It's the color of the bottom of the antichrist's baby basket and blanket; the baby itself can't really be passion or devotion, but it does inspire fear and it's a threat. Adam wears a red/brown/white checked coat during the witch hunting game, and has a dark red popsicle later. his eyes turn a core of bright red, ringed in dark red, edged in black: his intentions are to fix the world, but he's doing it through destruction and anger.

Crowley also gets contacts through his car radio, which is bright red.

Crowley's hair in s2 is also dark red. In 1941, his hair is also dark red.

Tracey's bedroom is pink, gold, and red; the flogger is pink and silver. I think this lines up with her "intimate relaxation for the discerning gentleman": she's a fake threat in the bedroom. And god's watching. Her slip as she thinks Newt wants an appointment is orange.

Red has some clear examples of other meanings than "passion": in s1 there's a large red drape of fabric in the Jesus scene, it also stands for blood, though technically war and negative emotion would tend to drag blood in with it; in s2 the tomatoes as Gabriel walks to the bookshop are both invoking the apocalypse (spilled blood) that Gabriel nixed and perhaps also the passion of Christ, as Jim is also a Christ figure.

Yellow: defiance

Not the same as gold. This has been proposed to be fear, which does fit a lot of the appearances of yellow, but then Gabriel lights his own statue with yellow light in s2e6 and the bar he meets Beez in right after is bright yellow. I don't think they're fearful there.

The first time we see yellow is the opening montage, in the text shot with black addressed to kids to not attempt armageddon at home. Which we see the Adam doing. As god says if the universe "didn't just start, unofficially", and we see a red explosion with yellow in the middle. The people claiming it's 14B are shaded in bright yellow, as is the incorrect age of the earth. One of the parade of rainbow wrong monks is yellow. Lots of the latter montage comes out of the yellow sun. Adam and Eve leave Eden into the light yellow sun: more evidence that the apple business wasn't exactly a sin, so where did the angels and heaven get that idea? Did god tell them a lie as she lied to us all through the opening montage? Light yellow lights in sushi place: eating as an angel is frowned upon but not massively disapproved of.

Aziraphale's hair is sometimes blonde, and it seems to do that when he's under stress--both the good and bad kinds, which fits with defiance as that would cause him stress. Job's basement is dirty yellow walls: deceit plus defiance at their orders. Crowley's eyes are yellow, except his snake eyes which seem more gold. The back room of the bookshop is a bright yellow, but most of the front shop is a dark yellow or brown, I think? A lot of the sores on hell's denizens are light yellow. I think brass counts for yellow, it's dark yellow, or maybe it belongs with gold. Perhaps the confusion is deliberate. One of the paintball teams is denoted by yellow flags, and we know that scene is meant to be an echo of the war in heaven (obviously I don't agree with the color analysis in there). The yellow team uses blue paint, the red team uses red paint.

The bentley's headlights when they hit Anathema are yellow: neither of them are supposed to help her because she's working against armageddon. Az's halo is yellow and white when he throws it.

Saturated yellow is defiance, and faded/lighter shades are less so. That lighter shades are more white is deliberate: white is playing by the rules, conformity.

Thaddeus Dowling isn't with his wife while she's giving birth, and his video screen is framed with the yellow and red of the ambulance: he's defying her demands to be there, and it's painted as being out of fear or anger. She is in super dark red jacket over a peach dress, with a bright orange object above her head and pearls on her neck: she's in love and the ambulance is god's rep on earth, but all colors paint her baby as Jesus, wrapped in the white blanket of playing by the rules.

Purple: power

Gabriel's tie, which he does not have during s1e6 armageddon, and the purple color of his eyes which he loses for most of s2. Interestingly, his tie gets super purple in heaven and more dull on earth; I think his eyes do too but that's harder to see. See this post for analysis of Gabriel's eyes, which mean omnipresence, the "power of sight".

Very purple tie when we see him on earth in s1e2, as he flexes his position over Aziraphale. The color of the miracle plume in s2, the color of angelic dust left behind when they pop away as when Gabriel leaves to tattle to Satan after the notapocalypse, and in s2 the color of everyone's arrival and departure pop dust. RP Tyler's weenie has a dark purple aura. Famine's companion has a lavender air bubble appetizer in the fancy restaurant that is framed as snobbery. One of Anathema's coats is purple and green. There are purple math equations in the opening narration: science is explicitly framed by god as humans thinking they know better, when really god is lying and science is the path to learning and mastering god's game.

It's the color of the words "miracle blocker" and a splash of color from it when Furfur engages the card. Keziah's clothes are purple, maroon, and gold, and she becomes a dark brown or yellow gecko with black spots.

This is power. More saturated/neon shades are more power; duller or lighter shades are less power. Where the purple is can denote what kind of power, as with Gabriel's eyes.

The reason only an archangel could have made that plume in s2 is because they're the ones with that level of power. What color were miracles for everyone else? In s1, Azirahpale's were blue. Though if everyone now has purple pop dust, and that's retroactive through history, could anyone do it? Does everyone have archangel power now after Adam's reboot? If so, why was the dust Crowley poked gold?

[searching4sarahtonin]

Good Omens and Sleight Of Hand / The Shell Game

This keeps itching at the back of my mind and I am not entirely sure I've figured it out out yet but here goes…

The shell game theme is explicitly laid out from the very beginning in S1, as far as the baby swap is concerned. But even before that, God describes her/their "ineffable game" as playing poker in the dark with an inscrutable dealer and no confirmation of what the rules might be. 🤔 sounds less like an actual card game and more like 3-card monty…. aka The Shell Game.

We see that 3-moving-parts pattern again at the apex of the action when we've got 3 different teams simultaneously but separately trying to avert Armageddon, not sure which, if any, will succeed. Then in the denouement when A and C "choose their faces wisely" we see a 2-card version of this same misdirection technique. Sleight of hand, the truth hidden in plain sight yet again. In S2 the game continues, becoming ineffably subtle as it goes along. Gabriel is hidden in plain sight as Jim, A&C performing what they think is a "surreptitious" miracle (a little sleight of hand) … of course the magnitude of what they do is far beyond what they're aware of. (Sort of like all the times Aziraphale bungles his magic tricks when he's too excited or nervous.) And three parallel couples spiral toward only one happily ever after.

Then the minisodes!

The Job example is the most obvious, Crowley hides the goats and children in plain sight by transforming them. (Am I the only one who was squealing "She turned me into a newt!....I got better." ? The Monty Python references are too good! ) then Aziraphale and he performed another illusion when they brought them back as "new" children right under the Archangels' noses.

And of course there’s 1941 and the magic act. But there are blink-and-you’ll-miss-it clues here too. Aziraphale claims to have fooled Nefertiti with the shell game. He hilariously mangles the rings and several other magic tricks when Crowley is the audience to be "fooled" by the trick, but flawlessly performs the picture swap and the bullet catch when he isn’t trying to show off to Crowley. He’s actually quite good at deception/misdirection when he’s focused on it. (and who among us can focus with Antony J Crowly looking like he did in 1941?! Is it hot in here? anyway…)

Aziraphale might have a glass face, but he’s got steady hands. One might even argue that his flustered, anxious demeanor in front of Head Office Personnel helps conceal his courage and determination. We certainly get to see that come out when the chips are down, don’t we?! See also his badassery in the face of the demon Thriller flashmob, taking control of the arguing factions in episode 6, and in S1 there's his standing up to Gabriel & Belzebub in the end, to Crowley( "we can't give up now"), his interactions with Adam that follow. Principality and Guardian of the Eastern Gate indeed. Those aren’t jobs for a pushover. And I’m fairly sure Crowley sees this about him from the start.

BUT! What about Angel-Crowley? What was that about beyond the obvious meet-cute and giving context to the Metajerk's offer/threat? It shows us Crowley's true nature in its unguarded form, how he was before all his trauma and disillusionment. What he hides in plain sight ALL THE TIME (only Aziraphale sees through his masks and calls him out on it over and over again.)

The most puzzling part of S2 for me was the Edinburgh excursion. It doesn't work as a meaningful part to Aziraphale investigating the mystery, because Aziraphale doesn't really find anything useful out. Of course Gabriel was in the pub, they already suspected that. But there are Clues! (pardon me for pronouncing the capital letter) the bit about the Masons was a blink-and- you'll-miss-it moment, and the story moves on so quickly to the minisode we don't get a chance to consider it. Sounds a bit like the shell game again doesn't it? Admittedly, I know next to nothing about freemasonry other than it is a very old organization, it is notoriously secretive, and has both Christian and Occult associations insofar as it's imagery goes. A quick Google search also turned up Edinburgh as a historically significant chapter of Masonry and involved in an ideological/practical schism within the group. I don't have the bandwidth to research this fully, but I'll be damned 😉 if there isn't something going on with this. A secret society that operates in plain sight of the general public.

Similarly with the references to The Book of Life / Extreme Sanctions. Brought up in brief, vaguely ominous ways, but always the action moves on very fast afterward as if to draw attention away…

Then there's the flashback to 1827. This one is Peculiar. It’s the only time we get a flashback narrated from a specific point of view, it’s straight out of Aziraphale’s diary. This is another blink-and-you'll-miss-it clue. Why use this narrative device now, when it’s never cropped up before? What does it change about how we should be looking at the minisode? At a guess, it at least indicates that we aren’t getting a full, unabridged account of what really happened. The nonchalance of Elspeth and Morag in the face of these Odd Beings abruptly inserting themselves into their lives, getting a tour of their squalid living situation, and doing Odd and Supernatural Things is another giveaway. (Maggie and Nina directly comment on their odd behavior including forgiving a massive debt, asking strange questions, etc as does Amathema in S1 when they give her a ride and the tough-looking man does in S2 when Aziraphale borros and then fixes his phone). Obviously I can't say what Aziraphale left out, or what he might have embellished upon, but that seems significant. What is being hidden in plain sight?? 🤔 We certainly don't know what happened to Crowley when he got dragged to hell, and I doubt very much Aziraphale would have just shrugged his shoulders and went back to London as if he wasn't desperately worried about his boyfriend.

Aziraphale notoriously and consistently lies or omits important details when communicating with others, usually when trying to protect somebody. (I seriously can't list them all here, it would take all day).

And in a parallel blink-and-you'll-miss-it clue, we don't get a direct in-real-time observation of Metajerk's conversion with Aziraphale. We get Aziraphale recounting it to Crowley. Like the dairy, we have no way to be certain what really transpired. Now granted he does seem genuinely happily excited when he interrupts Crowley to tell him about it, but that doesn't mean he isn't leaving *dangerous details* out to protect Crowley. I think that conversation was more sinister and the threats less veiled than he lets on, and he's trying to spin it as a good thing so Crowley doesn't go get himself annihilated trying to protect him.

This leads me to *the breakup*. Much more going on here than meets the eye.

Aziraphale is at first desperately trying to keep Crowley from leaving to keep him under his protection. Then, after the kiss he's clearly THINKING A LOT very rapidly and settles on his sure-fire distancing mechanism. "I forgive you" is what he used in S1 when trying to send Crowley off to safety on his own instead of running away together while he took on the dangerous work of confronting heaven on his own. He knows Crowley and he knows which buttons to push. It conceals his actual feelings by distracting Crowley via angering him. That's why "don't bother" hits different. Crowley knows this move well by now. Aziraphale’s doing it again. That kiss was certainly earth-shattering for him (and all of us!). But It's not just Crowley trying to get him to run away together again (he already tried that).

It also makes it clear they won't be safe together in heaven after all. Not in a place that abhors individuality and earthly pleasures. Snogging with his ex-demon lover wouldn't be any less "irregular" than being friends with a demon was in the eyes of Metajerk. (And both Crowley and he know just how impossible it is for him to withstand that sort of temptation. HE ABSOLUTELY KISSED BACK. tried not to but couldn't resist). So he pushes down his first dozen reactions (somebody give Michael Sheen an award already!) And pushes Crowley away for his own safety. He's struggling and suffering as he does it. He nearly backs out several times. (! Michael effing Sheen's acting is breathtaking!) But two things happen that make him follow through (motivation hidden in plain sight) : Crowley is still there. He can't jeopardize him. And the Metatron names The Second Coming. You see him immediately stiffen. The only thing he has demonstrated - at every turn -that he is more protective over than Crowley is humanity itself. Guardian and Principality.

Which brings me to The Song and The Smile. (OK, so I've been pondering GOS2 for an unhealthy amount of time at this point…but what the hell, I love a good puzzle)

*Their Song* - referenced by Crowley just minutes before - is playing when Crowley starts the Bently. Not playing from the beginning, as if he had the CD in and ready to play. (We see Crowley freeze and take a moment to process what he's hearing, clearly not expecting to hear that.) It starts in the middle AT THE CRITICAL LINES of the refrain. (I'm not even sure it's the first refrain, but we'll save that for someone else to tackle.) So why would this be what Crowley first hears?

Well….as we saw way back on the road-trip to Edinburgh, The Bently plays whatever Aziraphale asks it to (its sentience or lackthereof being interestingly but entirely beside the point.) Now why feature this not once but twice if it isn't significant? Hiding a Clue in plain sight again. You noticed the first and second times it obeyed his music request, but what about the THIRD?! Three card Monty / The Shell Game again! Aziraphale is sending Crowley a message. Hidden in plain sight, when the chips are down and he can't risk tipping his hand to The Metatron. What does he mean by this? Again, probably a lot more than I could speculate, but it's easily read as a reassurance. A statement of love required and a silent "Trust Me", just like he mouthed during the bullet catch. A promise to return.

And finally The Smile.

If you didn't watch Aziraphale's face all the way through the end credits, you'll have missed this clue. Hiding, once again, in plain sight after the episode is technically over. (Michael Effing Sheen people!!) His expressions once again go through a series of changes ending finally in an unsettling, un-Aziraphale-like smile. He's heading into battle, formulating a plan and pouring his mask on to conceal it. To lie to their faces and hide his agenda (and his courage and strength) in plain sight.

Whew, this got a lot longer than I expected. 😅

[tybaltsjuliet]

If it's ok, would you mind explaining how Good Omens isn't as subversive as it sells iself as? I mostly hear endless praise about it, so a more critical opinion would be refreshing!

sure! this is about the book; i only watched S1 of the show when it first came out and do not remember whether it handles things differently or has different points to make.

my chief point of contention is that, for a story so preoccupied with humankind, it has a HEAVY investment in assuring us that god has everything under control. i am thinking of lines like this:

“God does not play dice with the universe; He plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players [i.e. everybody], to being involved in an obscure and complex variant of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won't tell you the rules, and who smiles all the time.”

it is the same beef i have with dogma. it is not really subversive to say, yeah, we cannot hope to understand god, but that is okay, the big guy has it all under control. likewise with the business of, what if demons are *good* sometimes, and angels are *bad* sometimes? what if things are not even good or bad, and people are just *people*? crazy! - first off, a concept that has not been particularly groundbreaking since paradise lost, and it really loses its teeth when everything turns out fine in the end, actually, because god does not play dice! be not afraid!

- and, okay, i know i said this was not about the show, but, UGH. the crucifixion scene in the show bothers me! it is not profound and radical to say, jesus said ~be kind~, and leave it there. jesus of nazareth was a complicated historical figure who said A LOT OF THINGS and whose legacy is one of both great good done in his name and great harm done in his name.

[0owhatsamsays]

I just thought about this today:

This quote: "God does not play dice with the universe; He plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players [i.e. everybody], to being involved in an obscure and complex variant of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won't tell you the rules, and who smiles all the time."

I don't say anything, but... Could these things be related somehow? I don't know...