#his name is Magnus btw :)

[driedlillies]

What do we think about Gerry instead of going for the beholding aligning himself with the spiral to hide/get away from Mary?? Traditionally it would probably be easier with the lonely, because of the invisibility, but the thing is, if he’s running away from Mary, abandoning her, he loses the closest thing he has to an anchor, and he doesn’t trust himself to pull himself out in time, so spiral it is.

The tattoos are spirals of course, he draws them on with sharpie the first time and they just don’t go away after that😭 also they change placements all the time.

He runs away successfully before she kills herself with the catalogue and still hunts leitners. Spiral likes him more than beholding does in canon but he still doesn’t give himself to it fully, it’s very much balancing on a fine line

He never gets accused of murdering Mary, so he doesn’t have any reason to start working with Gertrude, he’s very much a solo act. He focuses on burning the books and helping people, as much as he can. It’s harder without the eye, but he’s been doing this for a long time. I’m sure Mary is aware he’s somewhere out there — he’s certainly a popular gossip topic amongst avatars, but she can never get a trail on him, and neither can anyone she sends

He’s not a fully realized avatar, but his powers aren’t half bad — he’s confusing to look at, it’s basically impossible to pin down his eye color, and his flat is full of abstract paintings that make you dizzy when you look at them.

Eventually someone catches wind of his skills, so he sometimes gets commissions from avatars. It pays for the food, at least.

He meets michael in a library — for once, he’s not hunting anything down, and he likes to read fiction; if for nothing else but the reminder that books aren’t inherently evil. A door appears in the fantasy isle, between the bookcases, and out steps the distortion. They’ve never been introduced, but Gerry would have to be stupid or ignorant not to know about them. Nobody can ever agree is the Distortion is an avatar or something else, but the fact remains it’s one for the entities you don’t want to get on the bad side of.

They play for the same field, but Gerry has been known to play by his own rules, so he immediately gets ready to run — would that do anything to a being that can open doors anywhere they want? — but Michael doesn’t attack or even seem displeased with him.

“Hello, bookburner,” they say, smiling. “Would you like to come in?” they gesture towards the yellow door that wasn’t there when Gerry came in.

Gerry would have to be a fool to agree. Sure, the infamous hallways would most likely be harmless to him, perhaps even make him a bit stronger, but it doesn’t mean he would be able to come out on his own.

“At least take me to dinner first.”

“Would coffee be satisfactory?”

So, they go for coffee.

(Months later, Gerry would ask if that was meant to be a date, and Michael would just laugh.)

[potatowithahat]

When anyone talks about Elias Bouchard this is who I think of btw

[1nt3rnalpu7ref4ct10n]

s4e13

[iseeyoujon]

Thanks to the deluxe transcripts, my new pointless headcanon is that Jon doesn't know how to take a screenshot.

[quiggel]

Look. Here me out. I have a magpod thought and I can’t decide if it’s stupid or not so please let me know.

I like coming up with AUs in my brain that I don’t really share with people. And currently I’m making up ideas for like. What if TMA but with the main Protocol cast and vice-versa. And I have this particular idea for something. And I don’t know if I’ve struck gold or am just pulling shit out of my ass.

Celia Ripley: Head of the Magnus Institute

[chaosbungone]

MR BONZO HAS A REAL LIFE COUNTERPART???? HELLO???

I can’t believe my UK friends wouldn’t tell me this :(

[bornetoblood]

this is a PETER LUKAS stan blog

[ellascreams]

You know I frequently think about what Magnus Archive entities different characters from things would be warlocks for but I don’t think I’ve ever really talked about any of my thoughts on it before. Maybe I should start doing that, just for fun. Someone might find it interesting. This one is for IEYTD because I don’t expect this hyperfixation to die very soon. Spoilers for all the games. Oh and if you want to use this as inspiration for some weird crossovers you can, but please tell me if you do, because I wanna see it.

Agent Phoenix: The End This one is especially fitting if you think of the time loops as being in universe, stuck dying again and again, but it works even without that. Constantly close to death, feeling the fear of death, but never actually dying. Causing others fear because their friends have to deal with grief and their enemies have to be terrified every time they survive something they shouldn’t have. You could make an argument for The Beholding, you can for most protagonists, but it doesn’t make as much sense to me.

Handler: The Beholding He watches his agents do such dangerous things and can’t do much more than watch. He can help in someways but not too many. I imagine it would also be uncomfortable for Zoraxis agents to know they’re being watched by someone who they can’t see, someone other than the agent in front of them. Alternatively, he could be The Web. (“A mere puppeteer, they only enslave you,”) I just don’t think that works as well since he also has to answer to The Agency and he doesn’t have any malicious intent with his manipulations.

Dr. Zor: The Web Constantly orchestrating schemes from the shadows, has no loyalty to anyone and will kill their highest ranks without remorse if they interfere with their plans, too clever to ever be caught, and knows what Phoenix will do well enough to leave messages for them. Could also make arguments for The Stranger, The Beholding, The End, and The Extinction, but I think all of those connect back to their plotting and masterminding.

Daniel Sans: The Corruption Very minor character but I felt like adding him here. He made a super virus. That’s it that’s all I’ve got.

Zoraxis AI: The Buried Specifically the one in the escape pod. Does this even count as a character? No idea, but you can’t tell me that escape pod doesn’t sound like it would be the subject of someone’s statement if they got out of it alive.

Hivemind: The Corruption He’s literally just bees. Like, a bunch of bees. His name is Hivemind. What else can I even say?

Solaris: Uh The Vast Maybe? Because space? I’ll be honest I’m not really sure about this one, if anyone has any ideas I’d love to hear them.

The Fabricator: The Desolation She seems to enjoy the pain she causes with her inventions, whereas some of the scientists in game seem more like they’re just hurting people for the sake of their science. I’d also definitely accept The End for her since death traps are kind of her main thing.

John Juniper: The Stranger He’s got the masks, the acting and lying, he impersonates people, it seems like a perfect fit honestly. I guess he could maybe work for The Spiral but that’s mostly because it’s so similar to The Stranger.

Gibson: The Beholding Ok this one might sound a bit weird but hear me out. Phoenix pretends to be Gibson for a reason, his radio allows him to eavesdrop and he probably does eavesdrop just so he won’t miss Juniper’s commands. Gibson is just a butler, but he hears all about these worldwide conspiracies and gets caught in the crossfire, and there really isn’t much he can do about it. Except threatening to share the things that he’s heard, which is very affective, because he’s heard a lot of important secrets.

Shawn in HR: The Beholding Honestly he really does give me archive assistant or object storage vibes. Just doing his job hearing about and sorting the horrors. The big difference is that the horrors in this situation are corporate espionage and conspiracies.

Dr. Prism: The Extinction Ok once again, this may seem a bit weird, but hear me out. Her main goal in game is to replace the agents with robots and there is an element of humanity being replaced to The Extinction, not just everyone dying. Then there’s Zor’s betrayal destroying all her robots at once. Then she helps Phoenix save all the agents in the world from death. Even if it’s never an extinction of humanity she certainly has experience with extinctions. An alternate might be The Hunt because of her obsession with revenge and killing Phoenix or Zor, and the Agency trying to track her down.

Robutler: The Stranger or The Spiral He just seems so friendly and happy to talk to you while he attempts to kill you.

Ollie: The Lonely I swear this isn’t just because Ollie’s voice reminds me of Alexander J Newall’s. The poor guy just got abandoned in the ocean for like at least a month. His coworkers and bosses seem to be pretty mean to him too.

Director Morales: The Web He really is just running The Agency behind the scenes. We really don’t hear much about him orchestrating anything but maybe that’s just because he’s really good at it. Out of all these characters, he would probably be the creepiest to me if he was actually a warlock for an entity.

The Phantom: The Web We really don’t know much about them but they manage to leave coins for Phoenix to find everywhere they go knowing that they’ll find them. Very Web like behavior. Maybe The Hunt. The coin thing is kinda like a scavenger hunt and they do have to track down Phoenix to leave those clues.

[eiders]

bear paw succulent

[watchful-crown]

went to a coffeeshop close to Victoria Station to really get that sasha james when she first met michael vibe and told them my name was sasha so they could call it when the drink was ready

then I sat there drinking my chai latte and listening to mag 26: a distortion

tl;dr I'm a fucking nerd /pos

- Elias (🦷) he/it/eye

[kosher-salt]

Day 849 of drawing this around the Aviation Brigade

[sugaroto]

The personality of my current dnd character is based mainly on Neil Josten 👍😀

~bad choices~

Tho-

I'm not really lying as Neil, but Tristan's(my character) moral compass is probably the same as Neil's?

I think?

Like, yeah sure we can kill everyone in the village if it'll help us but don't fucking burn the village with fire Felix(my teammate) cause I have ptsd

Also- ffs Felix wanted to burn the mayor's house cause he was like a racist Karen and I was like No. Fire bad. And then we meet a Demon and he's like burn the village so I'll let you live and Felix just stared at me like 🔥👄🔥

[fandom-geek]

btw, the violinist in tmp 4? he's probably james smithson, of "founder of the smithsonian institute" fame

so what do we know about our violinist? he grew up in alnwick abbey, he was illegitimate and had legitimate full siblings, a father "certain of his celestial significance", and he has a nephew to whom he leaves his violin

and smithson? well, his father restored alnwick abbey in the 1750s, which was in ruins up until then. smithson was the only illegitimate child of any of the dukes there in the 1700s, which is when the statement is set

smithson also left his estate to his nephew after his death, with the condition that his fortune would establish the smithsonian institute if his nephew died without any children.

here's a point of divergence, however. in our timeline, smithson was a chemist and mineralogist. in tmagp's timeline, he was a violinist. however, as u/New_Helicopter836 pointed out to me on reddit, when smithson's body was disinterred by andrew graham bell, his right little finger was such that it suggests he played "the harpsichord, the piano, or a stringed instrument such as a violin"

looking at smithson's life, he left for university in 1782, so it's likely that tmagp 4 is set around the same time. it might be a bit earlier since the royal court orchestra moved from mannheim to munich in 1778 (putting smithson at about 13), it might be another point of divergence, or smithson is describing it this way to call back to its earlier significance. i'm not sure, but it's weird either way.

all that said, i'm not terribly sure why smithson describes his father (sir hugh smithson/percy, duke of northumberland) as "certain of his celestial significance", especially when the only other time he says celestial is to describe the violin's music. the user i mentioned before found that sir hugh, a major patron of architectural projects, had an observatory built, but i find smithson's language too specific. is his father an avatar too? mannheim is only a bit north of schwartzwald, after all, and this is about thirty years before tmag 23 where albrecht writes to jonah magnus.

let's look a little at smithson's bequest to found the smithsonian institute in the first place. smithson asked for it to be "an establishment for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men". the magnus institute, notably, is described in the arg as a place of education, and it was founded in 1818. although smithson died in 1829 and his nephew in 1835, the original smithsonian (the columbian institute) was granted a charter by the us government in 1818.

the letter is strangely absent of any names for the violinist or his family, and i can't help but wonder if this is why. and if it is because this is smithson - is this related to why the magnus institute exists instead of the magnus archives? the smithsonian, before it was renamed, was originally granted a charter by the us govt in 1818 - the same year that the magnus institute was founded in tmagp.

this is set 30 years before we know anything of jonah magnus, at least in tmag, so is it possible that he persuaded smithson to fund his educational institute focusing on the supernatural? the changed course of smithson's life from scientist to supernatural violinist would certainly be conducive for that, not least to mention the strange absence of his fortune from his letter to his nephew.

[rayssion]

Random scene that just popped up in my head,

Annabeth and the Argo 2 crew lost Percy in a crowd.

Piper: what are we going to do?

Annabeth: don't worry I got this.

Annabeth, screams at the top of her voice: BLUE IS THE UGLIEST COLOUR!!

Everyone: waits for Percy to show up.

Random person, screams back: HEL YEAH TELL THEM!!

Annabeth: Magnus?

Magnus: Annabeth? what are you doing here?

Annabeth: we were—

Percy: screaming from the distance, cutting her off, just screaming btw no context at all.

Percy, finally standing next to them: who the Hades just insulted blue?

Annabeth: it was me, I was trying to—

Magnus: I did it, are you implying that you are defending the ugliest colour in existence?

Percy, eyes narrowed: who's this gremlin?

Magnus: I'm nearly as tall as you, who are you calling gremlin you dimwit?

Percy: you better watch you mouth, pretty boy.

Annabeth: Percy, stop.

Magnus, also narrowing his eyes: or what, what would you do?

Percy: oh, you won't like the answer, sweetheart.

Magnus, taking a step closer to Annabeth: why are you calling me pet names? You alright, bro?

Percy, winks: oh honey, I'm perfectly fine.

Magnus: ok I'm scared, Annabeth tell your friend to stop.

Annabeth: Percy, stop flirting with my cousin!

Percy: I'm not flirting!

Magnus, speaking just before Annabeth: you know what, nice seeing you again Annabeth, I kinda have to go back to my group, hearth starts to worry when I'm late, see you around, I guess.

Poor boy just disappeares into the crowd again, traumatized probably.

Annabeth: sighs.

Percy: now before you say anything! I'll explain!!

Annabeth: Take your time. Explain.

Percy: so, yeah... umm....

Annabeth:

Percy:

Annabeth:

Percy:

Hazel, whispers in the background: what did I just witness...?

Leo, whispers back: I don't know, but the dude was cute though.

[lastflowerofyourhouse]

i fucking love the stuff with the ghosts in htn btw.

abigail and magnus get to be 3-dimensional and interesting and they get to use their skills to help people. they're first act shock value deaths but they were so so smart and in this one they get to be useful like they never got to be before. they get to do what they would've done, given the chance, and hold the group together. they get to actually solve the problem and offer harrow a truly healthy relationship with adults. they get to show her real guidance.

marta dyas, a one-note character who dies off page, completely freaks out when sock puppet judith dies. she's distressed, she's confused, but abigail convinces her so easily to stay and help harrow, a girl she's barely spoken to. she doesn't just get to demonstrate her genuine resolve and skill when fighting commander wake, but she also gets to be a good person, and she gets to be afraid.

dulcinea septimus. fucking dulcinea septimus. the woman on the sidelines whose name means sugar, the romantic interest who you were delusional for believing in, the unseen recipient of letters, is sick of roses and horny for revenge. she's jilted, she's angry, she's been cooped up and bored for a long long time and she's going to help you kill a ghost because what does she have left to loose.

and ortus nigenad, my beloved. talk about a one-note character who dies off page. a generally unpleasant poet who almost none of the characters respect. and he gets to be the hero. his genuine passion and love for something no one else gives a shit about is enough to warp reality and save everyone. harrow goes to him genuinely contrite and ashamed of herself, and he doesn't just forgive her, he apologizes for not doing more to protect her. he gives her a hug. he makes her feel seen and safe and real. and then. and then this is a story in which the power of love genuinely does save the day and ortus's ardent love for his mattias nonius verse fanfiction is the love that makes up the difference.

even protesilaus writes poetry. he has a family. he cultivates roses in his free time. and his relationship with dulcie is complicated. he genuinely cares for her but he isn't always what's best for her. and he, too, stays to help harrow. with no ulterior motives, no self interest, despite having never met her before, he stays to help harrow.

it just offers so much agency and depth to these characters who are so easy to write off in the first book. like, it sucks what happens to ortus, but no one was crying about him. we feel kinda sad about dulcinea for palamedes's sake, but not for her own. but then harrow the ninth comes out and suddenly they're all people. selfless, brave, intelligent, angry people banding together to help this unpleasant but desperate seventeen-year-old and i love them all so much. harrow the ninth is such a good fucking book.

[sasha-n-james]

TMAGP THEORY

HUGE theory about The Magnus Institute, Sam, Alice, the whole shebang. I feel like I'm really onto something here... Possible spoilers under cut!

In reading the list of children experimented on by The Magnus Institute before it burnt down, we know that Sam was on this list. The list gives information about the tests he was given, and even his birthday (he's 34 btw).

And we know that Gerry was also on this list, as Sam found him and tracked him down to ask him questions, but Gerry didn't remember much.

There's one other name that stands out in this list: Connor Dyer. Born 1989, would be 35. While Gerry and Sam received high scores, Connor did not, and didn't seem to pass.

A Dyer. Maybe a relative of Alice. Maybe a brother.

Or maybe, that is Alice, as a small child. We know Alice is transgender, Alex actually went out of his way to confirm that she's trans, something that wasn't necessary unless it was relevant for canon. It would make sense for her and Sam to be around the same age, as they went to school together when they dated. And it's highly likely that Alice's name hasn't been Alice her whole life. Maybe this kid IS Alice.

Maybe that's why Alice is so averse to the whole Institute thing. She isn't just worried for Sam, she knows something, she was affected by it. Maybe she remembers something that Sam and Gerry don't.

Sam said he had found "a list of a few of the other kids." Maybe it's not a complete list, and he didn't receive the name "Connor." Maybe he only got the names of the highest-performing kids or something.

I feel like I'm onto something huge here though!!!!!!!!!! I feel like a genius.