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celosiaa · 4 years ago

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the truth is like blood underneath your fingernails (chapter 1)

Summary: Love, Hunger, pain, anxiety.

Jon feels it all at once in the wake of statement withdrawal, and can hardly bear it.

CW: use of exercise as a form of self injury, fighting, self-hatred, alcohol use, language

this is for a prompt sent in by the lovely @transcendentalbf, who requested a statement withdrawal fic. I'm not going to lie, this one got pretty heavy, even for me--and I don't usually skimp on the angst. be mindful of the tags and the content warnings! there will also be a second chapter!

Faster. Faster. Faster.

Heart pounding, pulse racing, Jon flies through the Highland countryside, hair streaming behind him from where his ponytail has come undone. There is no feeling quite like this—the shaking of effort in every corner of his body, every nerve alight, lungs heaving and overburdened. No matter the hurt, no matter the discomfort, Jon has yet to find anything so wonderfully distracting as running.

Even so, the constant static of Hunger still hums in the background, buzzing somewhere between his skull and his spine. He’s learned over the weeks of refusing it statements that he cannot run into town, cannot risk looking anyone in the eyes without being overcome by Want. The Beholding is not pleased with him, and Jon knows it—feels it in the way that his every action has been poisoned by the relentless desire to Eat and to Know.

Martin has undoubtedly gotten the worst of it. When Jon had first announced that he was going to be running in the afternoons, he was elated—chuffed at the idea of doing something together other than their routine of cooking, eating, sleeping day in and day out. Jon had even let him come on his run that day, and knows that he would have loved it, were he not prevented from applying his usual method of quite literally running himself into the ground. Their average pace was not nearly enough to distract him, or even to burn out the anxiety that’s taken hold of his chest, and so Jon had told Martin he’d prefer to be alone.

Poor choice of words.

This had caused somewhat of a row, with Jon’s sudden inability to articulate exactly what he meant providing most of the fodder. Martin was upset, thought that he had done something wrong, thought that Jon didn’t want to be with him anymore—all things that Jon knows are the fragments of the Lonely still residing in him, still marked by the faded white of his naturally dark curls. With difficulty, Jon had managed to break through, explaining that he had always liked to have some time alone. That he needed a few moments just to think and process and enjoy the peacefulness on his own.

This wasn’t entirely a lie—but it wasn’t the truth either, and it left a foul taste in his mouth all the same.

Martin had believed him, of course. He’d even apologized the next day by going down to the village and buying him a phone holster he could strap onto his arm while he runs. With a plastered-on smile, Jon had accepted the gift. He will never tell Martin that he can’t bear the way it sticks to his skin, or that playing music is completely out of the question. He will never tell him that none of this is about health or exercise—it’s about the hurt, it’s about the distraction, it’s about the punishment that Jon knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that he deserves.

He’s thirty minutes into the run now, and he’s reached the point at which singular thoughts can no longer filter across his mind. Pushing constantly further, faster, harder strips all of this away, and he’s left with the blessed silence of a clear mind.

That is, until his foot lands a bit funny on a rock, and it sends shooting pains through his knee—old injury reignited in an instant.

Fuck.

He stumbles, hands reaching forward as he begins to lose his balance. Through luck, or skill, or perhaps sheer determination, he manages to stay upright and moving forward, knee throbbing in protest at every step. But he cannot afford to stop now—refuses to give in to the building static.

Breathe through it. Just breathe through it, a kind teacher had once told him in the wake of losing his parents. He does his best to follow that advice now, the pain at least giving him something to focus on, pushing the Hunger to the back of his mind. Even so, the incessant pulling at his injury is enough to plant a permanent wince on his face.

Martin is not going to be pleased with me.

---

Upon entering their little home, Jon’s senses are immediately overcome with powerful-smelling spices, floating through each and every dust-laden corner. From where he stands, he can see just a bit of Martin standing at the kitchen counter, carefully chopping an onion using the knife skills Jon had so recently taught him. In spite of himself, Jon’s chest swells with pride, pulling the corners of his mouth into a small smile, before the reality of his situation overtakes him again.

Perhaps I can sneak past, get in the shower before he notices.

Setting out to do just that, Jon silently pulls of his trainers and begins to cross the room—heel-toe, heel-toe, ever so careful of the creaking floorboards of their kitchen. But of course, Martin would choose to glance over his shoulder at this very moment.

Of course.

“Oh there you are! How was it?” he asks, voice light and jovial as he stirs something in a large pot.

“Good, good,” Jon replies hurriedly, trying to take advantage of Martin’s distraction and hobble as quickly as he can toward the shower.

“Wait, wait, before you go—come taste this and see what you think.”

Damn it.

With steps as measured and careful as he can manage, Jon walks toward him, keeping a smile firmly plastered on his face. Of course, his efforts are in vain—the second Jon begins crossing the room, Martin’s face falls.

“You’re limping. Why are you limping?” he asks, brows knitting together in concern.

“Erm—got a little carried away. I’m fine, it’ll loosen up in the shower,” Jon assures, dropping his eyes, and attempting to walk away.

Martin grabs him by his forearm—with no real force, but the pressure on his overly-sensitive skin is enough to send lightning bolts of agitation through him. Static begins to rise.

“That doesn’t look fine. Here, why don’t you sit down—”

“I’m fine, Martin—”

“Just put some ice on it for a bit—”

“I said, I’m FINE, for god’s sake!”

Jon’s words bend and twist into a seething shout as he yanks his forearm from Martin’s gentle grasp, the static flaring from him like a beacon. The eyes that meet his are no longer the loving concern of a just a few moments ago—turning hard and angry at this undeserved outburst. Staring at him coldly for a moment, Martin simply pivots on his heel and begins heatedly stirring at the large pot, head bowed.

Seeing Martin this way dissolves the fire of anger in Jon’s belly at once, replaced instead with the cold bitterness of shame.

God, what is wrong with me?

“I-I’m sorry, Martin, you didn’t…you didn’t deserve that,” he mumbles, running a hand over his wan face.

“No, I didn’t.”

“I’m sorry.”

Martin does not turn around, continuing to stir agitatedly at his pot, and Jon can hear him taking deep breaths in through his nose, out through his mouth. He hates that he’s the cause of this; hates that Martin has to resort to these things just to deal with the frustration he brings to the table.

And the Eye drinks it all in.

…I can’t let it.

Resolved to at least try to make things better, Jon moves slowly around the kitchen table and to the freezer, taking Martin’s advice and grabbing a bag of frozen vegetables. Sinking down painfully into a chair, he undoes the Velcro straps of his brace and plops the pack down onto the swollen wreckage of his knee. Admittedly, Martin had been right—the coolness immediately begins to pull some of the pulsing, swelling ache from his limb, drawing a long sigh from somewhere deep in his chest.

“You need to prop it up too, here—”

Martin has turned back to him at last, reaching around behind Jon to grab a pillow from the sofa and set it on the chair in front of him. As Jon begins to lift his leg up and onto it, he cannot quite bite back a groan of pain, nor hide the wince that floods his face. Concernedly, Martin watches him, hands on his hips in consternation.

“You really did a number on yourself, didn’t you?” he mutters softly, brows knitting together.

Jon cannot bring himself to answer, too ashamed even to look up.

Don’t worry about me, he wants desperately to say. I’m not worth it.

I’m not worth the hurt that I cause.

When Martin turns away again without a word, Jon’s chest aches in a way it hasn’t in quite some time. Certainly not since he heard those devastating words in the Lonely, from Martin’s own mouth—

“I really loved you, you know?”

Perhaps the same is true now.

“Loved.”

Jon squeezes his eyes shut against the rising tide of emotions, threatening to burst from him when—

Martin kneels in front of him, placing a second frozen bag beneath his knee before carefully wrapping an ace bandage around both, holding them together around the joint with a wonderfully relieving pressure. At once, Jon’s eyes begin to sting.

I don’t deserve this.

“Thank you,” he whispers, full of shame. “I’m sorry.”

From where he kneels in front of him, Martin lifts his head to search Jon’s eyes for a moment, worrying at his bottom lip in consideration. At last, he stands to his full height, taking a deep breath before removing the dish towel from where he’s draped it across one broad shoulder. He swipes it gently over the beads of sweat that are still rolling down Jon’s face, and to his utter surprise—kisses him tenderly over the temple.

Jon’s cheeks flare with heat at this, warmth immediately pooling in his stomach.

He is utterly, hopelessly smitten with the man in front of him.

God help him.

“It’s alright, Jon,” Martin says at last, voice returning to something approaching his normal volume.

“Look, I’m really proud of you for running, alright? It’s good for you. But not when your hurt yourself like this,” he continues, tapping lightly at the packs encasing Jon’s knee, forcing Jon to meet his eyes with the intensity of his stare.

“It’s not worth that. Okay?” he ends in a whisper.

Jon merely nods, overwhelmed and embarrassed by the entire situation. Martin, gentle as always, reaches a hand up toward his hair, pushing down the frizzled locks that had been blown wild by the Highland winds.

“Alright, then,” he adds simply, turning back to their dinner with a lopsided smile.

---

The next day, Jon finds himself scarcely able to bear this particular combination of pain and Hunger.

Martin had made him promise the previous evening that he would take the day off from running, allowing his knee at least the chance to heal up a bit before he began abusing it again. While he knows Martin is right, knows he’s trying to look after him—Jon cannot bear the roiling anxiety of inactivity, his body screaming at him to run run run just to escape his own mind.

Once again, Martin bears the brunt of it all.

He knows he’s being impossible; knows that Martin is nearly at his wits end, yet the relentless static fuzzes out whatever words he’s snapping at him now—and for what reason, Jon is no longer sure. The anger tumbles out of him like ink over parchment, pulling all his pain, frustration, and Hunger from his shaking form and placing it on Martin’s shoulders.

And Martin is beyond overwrought.

Turning toward him sharply, Martin bears down on him with cold gaze.

“You know what? I’ve had enough! I’ve had enough,” he shouts, voice melting into a laugh that holds no humor.

Jon’s mouth snaps shut at once, the static fading to nothing now that it’s work has been done.

“I consider myself a patient person, Jon, I really do—but this has pushed me quite to my limit, so congratulations,” he spits, grabbing his keys from the table.

No no no no no

“I’m going to the village. Don’t wait up,” he mutters with finality, striding across the room and out the door with a BANG.

Oh god oh god oh god

Left alone now in the quiet emptiness of their—of Daisy’s house, Jon stumbles backwards, burying his face in his hands.

Why did you do this why did you do this why did you do this

He begs the Eye to answer him, beating his palm into his own chest, and cannot hold back the flood of Knowledge seeping across his mind.

His love, leaning against the side of the cottage, chest heaving with sobs.

His love, striding angrily down toward the pub, tears still streaming down his face as it begins to rain.

His love, getting sloppy-drunk alone, all alone—with no one to walk him home, to make sure he’s safe—

Please.

I can’t bear it.

Please.

Jon folds forward over his legs, sick at the thought that he caused this, that he’s the one who so severely hurt him—and promptly falls to the floor in a wave of dizziness.

God, Martin.

I’m so sorry, my love.

Even now, he cannot bring his tears to the surface, simply lying on the floor until his chest no longer feels as though it’s been pinned to the earth’s core. At last, he forces himself to get up, to move forward—shirking the thought of dinner and moving directly up the stairs toward their bed.

Daisy’s bed, he corrects himself internally.

God knows if he’ll ever come back to make it ours.

---

Jon cannot bring himself to any semblance of sleep until he knows Martin has returned.

The Eye constantly pulls at him to look, to see where he’s gone and what he’s doing now, but Jon refuses. He will not invade Martin’s privacy like that—not if he can ever help it.

Please come home.

Please.

Lying silent and still beneath the covers, the room around him is illuminated only by the light of the moon peeking in through the window. Even in the stillness there remains the static, though pushed down considerably now by the weight of Jon’s own sadness. Of his regret.

Drink it. Drink it all, if that will satisfy you, Jon thinks bitterly, wishing to god that it would be enough.

At last, he hears the unlocking of the front door below—a bit clumsy and heavy-handed, telling Jon immediately that he’s still a bit drunk. Relief floods him at the sound all the same, and he turns away from the bedroom door to feign sleep, wanting to give Martin some privacy.

Though his movements are somewhat sloppy with alcohol, Martin does his best to tiptoe quietly around the room, undressing to his boxers and replacing his jumper and binder with a t-shirt. Slowly, ever so slowly, he crawls into bed, making every effort not to disturb Jon at the other side. Jon feels as though he could cry with the obvious love he pours into every gentle motion, before—

He can sense Martin’s arms reaching for him, hovering over his back to pull him close, as always—before dropping them.

God.

He settles instead for pulling the blanket further over Jon’s shoulders, muttering as he does so, words slurring—

“Don’ understand. Jus’ don’ understand.”

Oh, Martin.

Jon’s heart crumbles to pieces.

He cannot bear to leave this the way things are—not tonight, nor any other. Flipping around at once to face him, Martin’s eyes snap back open—wide with concern and anxiety.

“I know you don’t, Martin. I know, and I’m so sorry,” Jon whispers, cupping his cheek with one scarred hand, tears still burning painfully in his throat.

Martin’s tears seem to have no trouble reaching the surface, spilling over at once in rivulets down his face and off the tip of his nose.

“I don’t understand, Jon, I don’t understand,” he sobs, clapping a hand over his mouth in an attempt to stem the flow, inhaling shakily behind it.

Look what you’ve done look what you’ve done

“I’m so sorry, darling, none of this is your fault, I’m so sorry” Jon murmurs over and over, pulling Martin into his chest—an invitation for him to let go of all his anger and sadness in the crook of his shoulder.

Martin does so, clutching at Jon’s back until the drink-induced drowsiness pulls him under at last.

Jon lies awake—still in the silence, still in the rising static.

I’m sorry, my love.

I’m so sorry.

(chapter 2 here)

#tma #the magnus archives #tma fic #jonmartin #hurt/comfort #angst #whump #injury #alcohol #fighting #unhealthy coping mechanisms #trans martin

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soveryanon · 5 years ago

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Four weeks later, reviewing time for MAG139 /o/

-I’m still crying over how the first time Tim ever spoke on tape, he pointed out so many mistakes/typos/misreadings from statements that were faaar from being one-liner but actually… Big Mysteries that are still relevant now. Amongst those:

(MAG033) TIM: Um… oh, and here, in Miss Montauk’s statement about her father’s killings. You refer to case, um, 9220611 as case, um, 1106922. Oh, and don’t get me started on the other case numbers around the Hill Top hauntings, they’re a mess! […] So, in case 8163103… it isn’t clear if Albrecht’s wife is called “Clara” or “Carla”, ‘cause you keep switching back and forth…

Aaaand it was in that episode that we heard about “Peter Lukas” for the first time ever. I miss Tim and gdi, he had a good nose…

- I want to say a word about Jon’s reading of the statement in itself: “Jon, what the FUCK.” Part of why it was so sneakily terrifying was… how much Jon was into it? He totally ran with the sheer glee and cruelty, especially, I felt, in these moments:

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “It’s hard to say how much I’ve got left in me; how much longer my sacrifices can buy me. But when I go… you better believe I’m going big – and it is going to hurt. […] And I hurt so very many people… A building fire is a dreadful thing – but so much more dreadful when it’s shining out into that night. It was the first of my crimes, but not the last, and arson has always been my thing. It’s such a simple way to destroy everything someone has built, both literally, and figuratively. […] I was to secure her sacrifices. I would spare you the details, but I do not wish to~”

Presumably, the dramatic reading is still a Jon Thing and not intrinsically spooky, but w o w Jon, you didn’t have to take that edge for a sadistic serial killer.

- YEAH OKAY, and Eugene was terrifying per se. Why are all Desolation people Like That. And Eugene started… very young:

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “So, me? I was born in ’36 […]. But now, staggering through the ruins of his life, the look I saw on his face… it woke something in me. Something… truly awful… Anyone who talks about “the Blitz spirit” wasn’t there, or wants to paper over their fear with nostalgia. Terrible things happened in the Blackout, and we hurt each other just as much as the Germans hurt us. And I hurt so very many people…”

He… wasn’t even ten, back then…

;; Aaaand once again, demonstration that spooks tend to go for the easy, vulnerable targets:

Gerry had commented about the fact that the world becoming a Factory Farm for a Fear God would mean being able to snatch everything (MAG111: “right now all the entities have to act like a hunter, they pick off the weak ones around the edges, the ones that wander too close, and the rest of the time they have to just graze on whatever fear we all passively give away.”) but it’s always upsetting when we get Spooks describing their preferred targets… ;;

Eugene said that he was already seventy, he’s now eighty, Jon had found hints that he was probably still active (MAG139, Jon: “looking at the details for the British Steel Plant in Scunthorpe, it does seem like Eugene is still around. So I can only assume… some sort of equilibrium was found. Given what happened when I met Jude Perry, I’m not in any rush to track him or… any of them down myself.”), but given how Eugene had promised that he would be “going big” at the end of his life, it… probably won’t be pretty.

(And I totally understand that Jon feels like it’s not his own battle! But at every little concession, my heart breaks a bit. There are still people in the coffin; Eugene is probably still taking foreign workers even after Agnes’s death, for his own sacrifices… and it’s true that it’s not the Archive team’s role to save them, that they have bigger things to focus on? But they know what is happening, and that still means that innocents are getting killed and/or consumed and they… let it happen. It feels so Beholding, to know and to allow it, feeding from the scraps of the surviving witnesses’ tales…? They’re not actively allowing these terrible things to happen but they take advantage of that whole system…)

Eugene also highlighted how in the end, the cults/clusters/congregations of people worshipping the same concept are… human-made. There doesn’t seem to be any special instructions or a divine revelation about how they should proceed; they scramble and try things out, but it’s mostly coming from punctual decisions, in the same way that Robert Smirke made arbitrary decisions regarding his Architecture of the Fears.

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “I found my God through my own path, served It in my own way; and when Arthur and Diego found me, told me there were others that shared my devotion… Well, I can’t say it doesn’t feel nice to belong. Even if we do have our… little disagreements. […] But a longing… is not the same thing as an instruction. We’d all been touched and warped by proximity to the holy Burning Fire, but none of us had any special knowledge, no matter what Diego claims he might have read. […] Some objected, said that unless the child was conceived of the Flame, it could never be a true incarnation. But they had no idea of how such a conception could possibly even work, so it was decided that it would have to be enough to birth the child by fire. […] There was some… division amongst us as to the best course of action, something that will surely not surprise you at this stage.”

It’s kind of impressive that the Lightless Flame managed to be a small cult, that Rayner attracted people around his own “religion”, and that the Magnus Institute apparently managed to establish itself around something its people shared (given that there are the international canals, the Usher Foundation and the Pu Songling Research Centre, who knew about the Archivist’s powers, and Jon was identified in Beijing, Elias was clearly familiar to Xiaolin, etc.). It makes sense, in that regard, that even when feeling like they “belong” and are worshipping the same concept, spooks tend to give their same patrons so many different names – like different aspects of it. I wonder if there are also divisions amongst the Beholding people about their ritual and how they should try to go about it? Outside of the fact that some (Jon…? Please, Jon, confirm that you still don’t want That.) might refuse to partake in it altogether because they’re satisfied with the world as is, like Jared demonstrated in MAG131 in his refusal to join in The Last Feast.

- I wonder to which extent we’re going to hear about the history of the Lightless Flame again, because… it sounds like there are still so many mysteries (even more than before this episode?) and I have no idea if they’ll fall into the left-in-the-air-for-us-to-guess/wonder category (Jonny did promise that we won’t get spoon-fed all the answers, iirc?), or if this will all get cleared up later.

* First, everything around Diego Molina (Malina? Not the first time his name has popped up, but each of his episodes are floating in the no-official-transcript void):

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “We all felt the calling, the dreams, pulling us ever closer to a world of fire and loss, a place of burning, and agony, when we remade the world in the image of the Lightless Flame, the one Diego called “Asag”. […] none of us had any special knowledge, no matter what Diego claims he might have read. […] Arthur has told us not to harm you yet, but this whole thing has really rather weakened his authority, and many of us are now looking towards Diego for leadership. But we shall see, I suppose.”

[…] ARCHIVIST: “Diego”, I assume to be Diego Molina, who Basira crossed paths with back in her Section’d days, and “Arthur”… could be Arthur Nolan – though, going from… the head of a cult to watching over Jane Prentiss as a landlord… does seem like something of a demotion. … God knows. It’s not like I don’t have my own office politics to keep track of.

Jon remembered Basira’s account of her encounter with Diego (when she had been able to tell his name), from MAG043, which gave us an official description of him. He had been involved in the case which got her to sign her first Section 31 form, regarding a fire near Clapham in August 2011, and resulting in the death of a fellow (racist) officer:

(MAG043) BASIRA: He was… a Hispanic male. Probably mid to late forties, heavyset with a completely shaved head. […] I realised for the first time the bald guy’s saying something. Not loud, but intensely. I mean, this was years ago so I don’t remember exactly what he was saying, but it definitely involved the words “cleansing fire”, “all shall be ash”, and the name “Asag”? Which, I later learned, is some kind of Sumerian demon. So that’s fun. […] Our arsonist’s name was Diego Molina. He was assistant curator at some Mexican museum, come over with a loan to the Natural History Museum, but… they hadn’t heard from him for a few weeks. […] The only thing Diego Molina had on him, when we brought him in, was a small book, bound in red leather. They caught Spencer in storage, trying to destroy it with a zippo lighter. […] They told me he killed himself when he got home. Apparently, he’d somehow filled the bath full of boiling water and just… just got in. Official story was he’d somehow done it using a kettle, which… that’s, that’s just about the weakest cover-up I ever heard.

And the description she gave, and the focus on “Asag”, is of course putting to mind the mysterious man from MAG012 who was transported to Lesere Saraki’s service on the night of the 23rd December of 2011 (so six months after Basira’s case), and who had apparently been fighting with Gerry Keay, before Gerry killed him for good in the hospital:

(MAG012, Lesere Saraki) “Apparently the fire brigade had responded to reports of a blaze in a building site near St Mary’s churchyard, and had turned up to find the two men lying unconscious. There had been no fire, although the ground they lay on showed several burn marks and a metal bar that had been lying nearby appeared to have bent slightly as if from great heat. […] the more I heard, the more it sounded like most of them weren’t in English. The first sounded like “Asak” or “Asag”, then “Veepalach” and finally in English “The Lightless Flame”. The last part was very clear, and I assumed he was talking about whatever burned him, but he said it with such intensity that the words made me feel quite uncomfortable.”

[…] ARCHIVIST: As far as the mystery man’s chanting goes, if it was indeed “Asag” that he was saying, then that’s quite interesting. Asag is the name of a demon in Sumerian mythology associated with disease and corruption, which doesn’t really seem to have much relevance to this statement except that it was also fabled that Asag was able to boil fish alive in their rivers. Admittedly in Sumerian myth this was because he was monstrously ugly but a curious coincidence nonetheless. “Veepalach” might also be a mishearing of the Polish word “wypalać”, according to Martin, which means to cauterize or brand. Admittedly, if Martin speaks Polish in the same way he “speaks Latin” then he might be talking nonsense again, but I’ve looked it up and it appears to check out.

* Tangent about Gerry but mMMmm, there is one item I had absolutely forgotten about that was mentioned in this episode?

(MAG012, Lesere Saraki) “He was in almost identical shape to the first, except for the fact that the burns seemed to stop at his neck, along a clear line. It was as though he’d been wearing a choker that the damage couldn’t get above but his neck was bare. […] Like the first, he was completely covered in almost uniform second-degree burns, except for what at first I thought were small black scorch marks. Looking closer, I saw that they were eyes. Small, tattooed eyes on every one of his joints: his knees, his elbows and even his knuckles, as well as just over his heart. I would have expected the burns to have almost destroyed tattoos that small but instead they were unblemished and the skin about a centimetre around each one also didn’t seem to have been affected. […] After a few seconds of awkward silence, Gerard spoke. He asked me if the paramedics had brought any items in with them. Specifically, he was after a small book bound in red leather and a brass pendant he had been wearing. He didn’t say what design had been on the pendant but I guessed it had been an eye. I told him that neither of those things had been brought in with him, and he was quiet for a long time.”

With the descriptions of his wounds and how the Eyes had apparently protected him from the burning, and how there was specifically a clear delimitation after his neck, and how he had lost a pendant… it looks like he had a(n Eye?) pendant acting as a protection, which was pretty efficient? Given Gerry’s reaction, was it actually… from Eric’s…? (I doubt he would have been apparently stunned into silence like this if it had just been something from Mary?)

Plus, I’m not sure about a few things but they’re quite interesting to think about: Why had Gerry apparently been fighting against Diego? In MAG111, he mainly described his activities around Leitner books at the time, and we spotted him casually saving or giving hints to a few statement-givers here and there, helping them to survive, but this was the only time we heard of him him… actively fighting and killing a Spook. Had they been fighting over the “small book bound in red leather”? Given how Eugene mentioned Diego’s reading in MAG139, that Basira remembered they had retrieved a book on him in MAG043, and that Gerry was after one that matched its description in MAG012, he was tied to at least that one, so… I would say it was either a (proto)Leitner, either a Smirke book covering some thoughts about the rituals? Did Diego become a Spook thanks to it, à la Mike Crew and Jared Hopworth? (Though in their cases, they got rid of their own books once they acquired their powers…)

(Given Gertrude’s personal history with the Lightless Flame, I first thought, very excitedly, that Gerry had tried to neutralise someone who was threatening direct harm to Gertrude. Technically, unless small retcon, it can’t be the case: Mary Keay was stated to have died in September 2008 (MAG004), Gerry explained that she had “haunted” him for five years after that (MAG111) until Gertrude found him and got rid of Mary, and that Gerry had only begun working with her after that. There is a very small discrepancy here (that would mean that Gertrude made Mary disappear in 2013 and Gerry said he then proceeded to work with her “for a few years”… but he died in late 2014) but, technically, with the information we’ve got, Mary was still haunting Gerry at the time of his hospitalisation in 2011… and sadly, was probably indeed the person who came to fetch Gerry (MAG012, Lesere Saraki: “Gerard Keay was treated for a further four days in the hospital before being discharged into the care of his mother.”). When Jon had highlighted how he had the feeling that Gertrude drew a sick pleasure from pretending to be Gerry’s mom (MAG107), my first instinct was to scream “gERTRUDE…” about MAG012… but nop, doesn’t appear to work. Damnit.)

* Anyway, back to Diego: he was apparently the Scholar-like of the group (was the one calling their god “Asag”, was the one to tell the others that their ideal world was called “The Scoured Earth”), and he was definitely tied to that book in red leather, and Basira did mention that John Spencer hadn’t managed to burn it, and HUUUU, I remembered having thought, with “They caught Spencer in storage, trying to destroy it with a zippo lighter.” (MAG043) that there were lots of lighters involved (Gerry’s, Jon’s…) but… specifically there, given the Very Tense relationship between The Web and The Desolation, I wonder if this might have in fact been the same one with the web design that would later end up in Jon’s hands – the Web trying to use someone to get rid of a Desolation-related item, to put another dent into the Lightless Flame’s activities, a few years after Agnes’s death?

* It’s REALLY interesting that Diego was obsessed with calling their god “Asag”, given how Jon highlighted that it was more linked to “corruption” (MAG012: “Asag is the name of a demon in Sumerian mythology associated with disease and corruption, which doesn’t really seem to have much relevance to this statement except that it was also fabled that Asag was able to boil fish alive in their rivers.”)… and how Arthur Nolan was apparently punished, or cast away, stuck with the Hive:

(MAG032, Jane Prentiss) “I don’t know how long the nest has been there. It’s not even my house, I just live there. Some sweaty old man thinks he owns it, taking money for my presence as though it will save him. […] Now I know that whatever the old man thinks, as he passes about the house with brow crinkled and mouth puckered in disapproval, it is not his. It has a thousand truer owners who shift and live and sing within the very walls of the building. He does not even know about the wasps’ nest. I wonder how long he has not known. How many years it has been there. Have you ever heard of the filarial worm? Mosquitoes gift it with their kiss and it grows and grows. It stops water moving round the human body right, makes limbs and bellies swell and sag with fluid. Now, when I look at that fat, sweaty sack, I think about it, and the voice sings of showing him what a real parasite can do.”

(MAG055) JORDAN: […] a couple of years ago, I was called in to deal with a wasps’ nest. […] The landlord’s name was Arthur Nolan. He was a short man with a constant scowl, thinning white hair and a well-chewed cigar. It looked like his denim shirt once contained quite an athletic build, but it long since settled. […] After he hit me with a look of disappointment, he nodded and began to walk down the hall. I followed him, desperate for answers, but he ignored my questions about what the hell was going on and kept walking down the stairs towards his flat. At one point, he shook his head and mumbled something about hoping it wouldn’t get this far, but he didn’t seem to be saying it to me.”

(Jane Prentiss gave her statement on February 23rd 2014, and Jordan Kennedy mentioned that he had met Arthur shortly after, in February or March 2014.)

Was there a prior “architecture” of the Fears where the Desolation and Corruption might have been lumped in together, through the name “Asag”…? The Hive, at least, sounded very, uh, eager to show how Special it was (to Arthur, in the same way that it was hissing at Beholding in Jane’s statement). Was Arthur tied to The Hive, given how he immolated himself right after Jordan “killed” the nest…? (Jon mentioned that they found Arthur’s body after the fire, in MAG032’s post-statement.) Was he supposed to be punished by getting consummated by it, and tried to throw Jane to it as fodder instead…? Given how there was apparently that Diego-Arthur rivalry and how Arthur (unlike Eugene) knew what had happened to Agnes at Hill Top Road, I wouldn’t be surprised if we end up finding a statement left by Arthur somewhere, when he was “demoted”…?

- Alright, so we got official confirmation that Hill Top Road initially belonged to The Web:

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “The compromise we came to… was Hill Top Road. We knew it was a stronghold of The Web, full of other children Agnes’s age […], though if we’d known exactly how powerful The Web was in that place, perhaps we would have reconsidered. […] it seems the fight scarred the place in a way far deeper than simple fire. A scar in reality, that I believe has since been compounded by the interferences of other powers.”

Sarah Baldwin had described the taxidermy shop as a “place of power” for The Stranger, Breekon had referred to the Institute as The Eye’s “pedestal”, Elias pointed out Ny-Ålesund as a “stronghold” of The Dark.

(MAG096) ARCHIVIST: There are, er… there, there are dozens of deliveries recorded here by Breekon and Hope. What were they delivering? What is the significance of this place? SARAH: Nothing, except what people give it. But they give it a lot, make it a place of power for us. Enough to keep certain items here.

(MAG128, Breekon) “That was the first time we saw what would become this place, The Eye’s Pedestal.”

(MAG135) ELIAS: I don’t know the details. Ny-Ålesund is a stronghold of The Dark, meaning I can’t see inside.

(Plus, potentially: somewhere in the sea and/or the graveyard Naomi encountered in MAG013 for The Lonely, given Carter Chilcott’s dreams in MAG057; Point Nemo for The End?; the remains of The Maria Fairchild encountered in MAG051 for The Vast?)

Interestingly, Eugene used “stronghold” and Elias referred to Ny-Ålesund for The Dark in the same way, so it seems to be the Right Word to describe the concept, no need to beat around the bush. Hill Top Road used to be Web, and, as we got a glimpse in MAG008, at least The Desolation (the glimpses of Agnes’s ghost, the burning) and most likely The Spiral (through Ivo Lensik, Father Edwin Burroughs, and/or Anya Villette) have been around that place – is it still powerful, but too chaotic to be definitely claimed…? Jon had said that he didn’t think it would be wise to go there (MAG114: “I’ve half a mind to just go down and have a look at it myself, but… I don’t know. Ever since it first came up I’ve felt like it would be… just a very bad idea.”), but. Was that genuine concern because he Learned From Poking Into Danger (which sounds ludicrous, it’s Jon we’re talking about), or the spiders nudging him to not go because ~obviously, he doesn’t want to go, he’s absolutely not being held by strings, what do you mean~.

- You fucked up a perfectly simple place, is what you did, Agnes. Look. You gave it reality bending.

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “I was… not one of those assigned to watch our chosen one, so I can’t say much about exactly what happened within the walls of that house, but it seems the fight scarred the place in a way far deeper than simple fire. A scar in reality, that I believe has since been compounded by the interferences of other powers.”

Since then, there had been at least, uuh… Desolation and Spiral which have been spotted there (MAG008) + some timeline problems, with Ray and Agnes’s ghosts appearing. Anya Villette (MAG114) seemed to say that The Web might possibly be re-emerging? And there is the problem of Anya Villette herself – was the reality-getting-messed-up-around-her an effect of The Spiral, did she come from a parallel dimension, did she ever exist at all, etc.

- There is something fundamentally hilarious about the fact that the cultists of the Lightless Flame tried to guess how to raise Agnes and failed utterly, because she was… a child. No, wait, it was sad and heartbreaking.

But the fact that they sent her to Hill Top Road because it “was a stronghold of The Web, full of other children Agnes’s age” when they were late teenagers, and she was ten-to-eleven? What a bunch of idiots, holy Mew. (I’m sad for Agnes but also covering my face snickering at these idiots trying to raise a Messiah and having no idea how to deal with a child. No wonder she was “prone to fits of violent rage”, you weren’t giving her the environment she needed……………)

- Iiiiii don’t know what to think about Jack Barnabas. On the one hand:

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “That stupid coffeeshop twit. I honestly don’t know why Arthur allowed it, or why Jude didn’t step in – she’s usually so jealous! But Agnes… [SIGH] Maybe Agnes asked them to leave him alone…! Or maybe they were just surprised by her interest in this… boring, unremarkable fool. […] We have allowed Jude free rein on what happens to the coffeeshop boy, though Agnes asked her… not to interfere. She has not yet harmed him, but I cannot imagine what is going through her mind. The misery, and pain, he has brought upon himself. For all her anger, she is not rash, and I fear her quiet consideration far more than I worry about her temper. It may be he lives the remainder of his natural life – but she will make sure he is never happy, and never without pain.”

Eugene was sure that he would be getting hell. And it is indeed what Jack lived… for a while, right after the events (March 2007):

(MAG067, Jack Barnabas) “I lost almost everything after that. I never had much to begin with, and after I was let go at the café, I couldn’t afford to keep my home. They didn’t even try to pretend it wasn’t because my burned face would scare away customers. I’ve ended up living with my father again, who has been… understanding about the situation though… even he can’t bring himself to meet my eye most days.”

But Jon had also mentioned in his post-statement (January 2017) that his situation had gotten much better:

(MAG067) ARCHIVIST: […] Martin has been able to make contact with Mr. Barnabas by email. He’s apparently been doing much better in the years since his statement, having received some reasonably successful plastic surgery.

;; I had assumed it was a genuine improvement, I really hope it is… and not, like, a small respite before Jude comes after him again to strip him of what he managed to get back.

- Eugene was probably That One Guy With The Candles spotted by Jack Barnabas the night of Agnes’s death:

(MAG067, Jack Barnabas) “They were all dressed in rough work clothes and wore severe expressions. One of them, a big guy with a shaved head, was holding an unlit lantern, and speaking to the others that I think was Spanish or Portuguese. Another held a bag that seemed to be full of candles, while a third had a clear plastic container filled with hundred of tiny spiders. None of them paid me any attention, and I was rapidly feeling like I was falling into something that I really didn’t want to.”

Diego Molina, Eugene Vanderstock and… probably Arthur Nolan with the spiders? Jon had identified Arthur in the group but without tangential proof (though MAG055 had associated him with burning and fire):

(MAG067) ARCHIVIST: […] If the bald man with the lantern is as I suspect Diego Molina, it would indicate a link between his notable obsession with burning, and… Agnes, who apparently had not inconsiderable abilities in that area. I can’t help but wonder if Arthur Nolan, The Hive’s landlord, was one of the other members of that little group.

* Small fuuuunny thing: there had been a few mentions here and there that Agnes didn’t eat regular food, before Eugene confirmed that she needed another kind of sustenance:

(MAG059, Ronald Sinclair) “She never came to church, though; never sat around the dinner table when it was uncovered.”

(MAG067, Jack Barnabas) “She never actually put any milk in it. She never even drank it. […] What was her life, that every Tuesday at 3’ in the afternoon, she came into the same café, and didn’t drink a black coffee? […] We went to the park a couple more times; had a meal in an Italian restaurant where she didn’t eat anything; we even went to see a film.”

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “I took foreign workers, mostly. Those with the fewest immediate connections to complicate matters, and the most hopeful dreams of what their life might be. They were the ones that provided Agnes the most satisfying nourishment. […] Agnes would take them to her small, empty flat, lay them on the floor and light them. Over the many hours these candles burned, she would crane over them, so Arthur tells me, inhaling all the agony, suffering, and loss from which they were created. Or he could’ve been lying to me, just keeping me busy with torture and murder so I didn’t get in the way of anything. I don’t think I’d have minded that, actually. At least, I felt useful.”

- HEY, YOU KNOW WHAT WAS ABSOLUTELY ABSENT OF EUGENE’S STATEMENT REGARDING AGNES’S DEATH? SPIDERS. Probably-Arthur had been bringing some on the night of her death. There were SPIDERS in Jack’s flat (that Agnes’s presence burned):

(MAG067, Jack Barnabas) “It was as I was doing this, I noticed kind of an odd smell? Like when you turn on an electric heater for the first time in a while and you get a whiff of all the burning dust. I looked up, and noticed within the corner of the room, where there had been a spider’s web this morning, there was just a faint wisp of smoke. It was weird, but I had more important things on my mind.”

And also, THE FUCKING TREE at Hill Top Road, which prompted Agnes’s death on November 23rd 2006. Eugene made it sound like Agnes had slowly come to the conclusion that she couldn’t carry out the ritual because of her “doubt” but… we know that her death was tied to the tree at Hill Top Road, the night Ivo Lensik was compelled to unroot it (and to free spiders):

(MAG067, Jack Barnabas) “[…] I heard Agnes gasp. I turned to see her gripping her chest as though in sudden pain, and she told me we had to go. I followed her as she… staggered out of the park and over to a phone booth where she made a panicked call. She said something about a tree falling, and that they… had to finish something. Then she hung up. She leaned on my arm as we walked back to her flat. […] Agnes turned to me and apologized, told me goodbye, and thank you. There was such a sense of finality to it that I felt like my heart stopped.”

Eugene knew that Hill Top Road had been a stronghold of The Web, but I’m not sure that he understood how much The Web might have possibly been still hanging around? It had struck me, in MAG067, how Jack… had suddenly decided to go talk to Agnes, and how he had described her:

(MAG067, Jack Barnabas) “But she was so beautiful, she… she was tall, with long straight auburn hair, and these eyes that… when they looked at you, it didn’t feel like she was seeing you so much as… was trapping you. […] I was… drawn to her in a way I can’t… even explain. […] That was the moment I decided to try and talk to Agnes. Seeing her interact with someone else, even in such a weird way, unblocked something in my mind. The following Tuesday, when she came in and ordered her coffee, I asked her name. She looked at me in surprise and, for a second, I felt like I’d made a terrible mistake, but then she… told me, very matter-of-factly. And then I asked her out on a date. I don’t know how it happened, it just… tumbled out of my mouth before I could stop it. […] I worried I was boring her, but every time I looked over, she had that same expression on, which… by then I was pretty sure was a smile. I’d catch her eye and that feeling would flood though me – I… I still don’t know quite how to describe it, but whatever it was, it was powerful. […] I… I don’t know if I would have had it in me to resist. I just couldn’t avoid being drawn in, like a moth to the flame.”

Except for that last image, the way Agnes was attracting him… sounds super Webby to me? And as mentioned above, we know there were spiders in Jack’s flat. I don’t think that his crush was Web-induced, but his decision to go talk to her could perhaps have been due to a string…? (I’m really not sure but one my personal takes would be: The Web’s presence at Hill Top Road was diminished because of the tree, but it eroded over time and/or something made the seal weaken; the spiders used Jack’s crush and pushed him to confess, humouring Agnes and/or giving her a pretext to officialise that she wouldn’t do the ritual (making it sound like she couldn’t, rather than admitting that she didn’t want to); the spiders got Ivo Lensik to “kill” the tree, freeing The Web’s influence… and it was back as a contender for the ownership of the place. Possibly: it’s also what allowed Annabelle to be born as an avatar, a few years later, as Raymond Fielding had been dead for a long while and Neil Lagorio was growing old and incapacitated?)

- Regarding Agnes’s timeline, some bits are now a bit clearer, others still blurry:

* Agnes was sent to Hill Top Road to deal with The Web sometime around 1965, when Ronald Sinclair was turning 18 (he said he was born in the late 40s). Agnes was described as “younger than the other kids, maybe ten or eleven years old, and didn’t talk much”. She (playfully) freed Ronald from Raymond Fielding’s influence. (MAG059)

* The house got slowly depopulated until only Agnes and Raymond remained; Raymond disappeared when Agnes “must have been 18 or 19”, Agnes claiming that “he had gone away and that the house was hers” (Ivo Lensik, MAG008).

* In 1974, a five-year-old boy goes missing in the area. People are suspicious of Agnes, the house burns, Ray’s body is found, missing his right hand, and there is no sign of Agnes. (MAG008)

* Agnes apparently got stuck in the place (MAG139: “As far as we could tell, she had destroyed the place utterly. And yet, she remained bound to it, tied to it in some vital way. I knew, when Arthur told she had kept Raymond Fielding’s hand, that he was worried.”)

* In 1989, Jude met Agnes and the others. (MAG089)

* Gertrude did something tying Agnes to the place (MAG139, Eugene: “Jude simply flies into a rage when it’s brought up. I assume it’s why we were waiting, biding our time for decades, unable to bring our designs to any culmination. Jude had only just joined at the time”), Agnes kept Ray’s hand.

* Agnes began to frequent the Canyon Café in the 90s as, by November 2006, she had been visiting for “a decade and a half” (MAG067). She waited, they all waited.

* In autumn 2006, Jack Barnabas confessed to Agnes and they went on a few dates. (MAG067)

* On November 23rd 2006, Ivo Lensik uprooted the tree at Hill Top Road, freeing spiders from the apple buried under it; Agnes felt it, said that she had to finish something, gathered the members of the cult, and at her request, they hanged her, with Ray’s hand tied to her waist. (MAG008/MAG067/MAG139)

The Web binds and traps, so it might have been its way to get back at Agnes, before Gertrude did… something, fifteen years later? I would have assumed that Gertrude had struck around the time of Ray’s death, but no, Eugene said that it was around the time Jude had joined them, and Jude was absolutely crystal clear that she joined in 1989.

- … I’m still side-eying (ha) a loooot Agnes’s stance on the candles, given that Eugene never actually saw her inhaling them (it was more of a Jude thing, to like incense?), and that Arthur was the one to say she was using them. It sounds like there is room for her to… not have used them at all. And, actually, to not have been that much into serving the Desolation in the first place.

It’s impressive how much Agnes herself still remains a Mystery, despite the fact that we’ve now learned about her birth and how she was raised. Interestingly (and I really doubt it was a coincidence), all the titbits we got about her were people who were either infatuated with her (Jude, Jack), either barely knew her and were unable to decipher her (Ronald), either saw her as a symbol more than a person (Eugene). The only time we heard about what she might have thought or felt was through Jack, and very briefly:

(MAG067, Jack Barnabas) “She was talking about… some sort of job, and whether Agnes was going to be able to do it. At first, I thought it was a job interview, and… then she started talking about Agnes being released from something. Agnes just… said something softly, and shook her head. She looked sad, an expression I’d never seen on her face before. The other woman sighed, clearly unhappy with the answer, and stood up to leave. Before she went, she took out a brown paper envelope and handed it over; said that she’d give it to her now so she didn’t forget later. She called it “a collection”, and it looked like the envelope might have been full of money. Agnes put it in her jacket and returned to staring out the window, as her intimidating companion left with a frustrated expression.”

(And we still don’t know what was in that envelope! You could technically put small candles in an envelope but they would still be too big for a jacket…? (Were there spiders inside of it.) Was the other woman Jude, since it was “a collection” and Eugene mentioned she might come “to collect” after Gertrude…? Perhaps he wasn’t being metaphorical.)

(MAG067, Jack Barnabas) “We sat on a bench as the sun went down, watching the sky redden, and Agnes asked me a question. It was the first time she’d said anything more than a few words since we left my flat. [STATIC:] She asked me if I had a destiny. [/STATIC] I don’t need to tell you the question caught me off-guard. I don’t know if I’ve given the impression clearly enough yet, being a single guy in my early thirties still working the tiller to Sheffield Café, but I don’t really see myself as having much of a destiny. Hell, I’m not even sure I believe in destiny. I certainly don’t believe in God, and I feel that’s… kind of linked. So I told her this. She looked at me with the same sadness I had seen on her face before. “That must be nice,” she said, and went back to staring into the sunset.”

It sounds like Agnes might have been much more reluctant about The Lightless Flame’s ritual than Eugene wanted to believe…? Whether or not we get a statement left by Arthur, I’m pretty confident that we might have one left by Agnes herself – or possibly a recording of her talking with Gertrude. There have been lots of people talking about Agnes without us getting to hear Agnes’s voice and intentions directly, and I doubt that this has been a coincidence? Eugene explicitly said that Gertrude did something to Agnes – is it possible that they agreed on something together, with Agnes more or less trying to spare her extended family’s feelings while ensuring that she couldn’t get used by them…?

(It would sound super positive for the series, which tends to give characters darker sides too, but… Agnes’s story has sounded very tragic so far? Just like Gerry – being programmed to be Something by their own mother, getting involved with spooks and fundamentally twisted, unable to escape, until they would reach their bitter end?)

(- There is something very poetic in the idea that… we’ll see about it, but maybe Agnes, whose whole life was programmed, who had a “Destiny” inflicted to her, actually gained agency for the first time in the house of the Web, which is known for its mind-control?)

- … Okay, so the Fears/Dread Powers/Outer Gods definitely are able to touch people more easily through their dreams.

Jane mentioned her “crawling and many-legged” dreams (MAG032), Annabelle had reported “several unsettling dreams about spiders” (MAG069); there were Oliver’s dreams (MAG011, MAG121); Adelard mentioned his own nightmares (MAG113); Lucia was pursued by some (MAG130); it’s unclear how Garland Hillier got his “revelations” but it could have happened through his dreams (MAG134); Robert Smirke had seen the Fears, and ultimately Beholding, in his dreams (MAG138); and of course, there are Jon’s dreams, which… seem more active than most of the others (given that Daisy confirmed that she was seeing him back, and that the way Elias described them in MAG120, Jon was inflicting anguish on the victims and was identified as the cause of their suffering).

- Regarding how the Lightless Flame proceeded and how Manuela designed The Dark’s ritual… the overall guidelines seem to be to Believe In It Very Hard, And It Will Happen?

(MAG135, Manuela Dominguez) “Scientifically, it was nonsense of course. Dark energy and the like don’t work like that, not even remotely. But that wasn’t important. What mattered was that it felt like science, and that was all I needed. To do my work, to create the Black Star would need a parody, an aping mockery of science. But it would also need the deepest of darknesses. When I told Maxwell what I actually needed, he told me such a thing was impossible, but I insisted. And so he began his work on the Daedalus. […] My experiments continued largely uninterrupted, pushing the boundaries of light, darkness and fear. It was dangerous work and more than once, I got too close to the light and it almost destroyed me. But it didn’t. I could regale you with the technical terms or scientific disciplines I played with and rendered meaningless, but in the end all you actually need to know is that I succeeded. A tiny, terrible sun of the pitchest black, shining beautiful Darkness all around it.”

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “But a longing… is not the same thing as an instruction. We’d all been touched and warped by proximity to the holy Burning Fire, but none of us had any special knowledge, no matter what Diego claims he might have read. He wanted a Grand Inferno, a ritual of apocalyptic burning that would make the firebombing of Dresden look like a sparkler. Which sounded… amazing! […] And that’s when Arthur proposed his own plan: a Chosen One. We would create a messiah, the Flame Incarnate, one who could usher in this new world and lead us in what Diego called “The Scoured Earth”. […] Some objected, said that unless the child was conceived of the Flame, it could never be a true incarnation. But they had no idea of how such a conception could possibly even work, so it was decided that it would have to be enough to birth the child by fire. […] And in the centre of the pyre, a hollow, where Eileen was to lay. We prayed, and sacrificed, and anointed her body with holy oil and a crown of kindling. I protested the last one, felt we could do better than to ape the Christians, but I was shouted down.”

It looks like The Lightless Flame improvised… basically everything, by picking here and there symbols and ritualistic gestures that belonged to other cults – so the baffling thing is that it worked, and it’s probably because they thought/hoped/believed it would.

- Whiiiich directly raises the question of The Rite of the Watcher’s Crown, as Jon implicitly seemed to think – or, at least, he has been shown voicing some interrogations about why he was there.

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: Why were we chosen? Agnes was created – crafted with a specific purpose so finely tuned that even a grain of uncertainty threatened the entirety of her being. [CHORTLING] But I’m so full of doubt it feels like there’s no room for anything else, and… I’m sure Martin is the same…! Is there “destiny” here? B–bloodlines and… prophecies, or did we just… stumble into this? Maybe we’re the opposite of Agnes; maybe our doubts are exactly what we need. I–if that’s the case, I’m a… an amazing chosen one. … [LONG EXHALE] Don’t know how that would work, though.

And indeed: how is this ritual meant to work, if the Archivists tend to not be so keen to see the world warped…? Elias pointed out in MAG092 how fitting Jon is for the role and, indeed, his personality matches his powers, which seem to be… compensating for things he is lacking: compulsion means getting the truth out of people (while Jon is prone to paranoia), Knowing comes in handy given that he has so many questions, being able to get formatted statements help to satiate his curiosity… And precisely, because Jon is prone to doubt, he’ll push forward to know. But that doesn’t mean that he would be ready to doom the world and inflict fears on people, especially when Elias pushed him to stop another apocalypse (MAG102, “I should have thought preventing the horrific transformation of our world is not solely my concern!” YEAH, DEFINE WHAT IS AND ISN’T “HORRIFIC”, ELIAS). So what is it Elias saw in Jon that led him to think that Jon might be up for it, if his plans are indeed to carry out The Watcher’s Crown…?

I’m surprised that Jon would mention “bloodlines” in the list of potential reasons for them to be here, given how… it hasn’t been the case for any of the characters we’ve met so far, except Gerry – who, precisely, told Jon that blood didn’t matter (except if you’re a Lukas and use family structure as a tool to shape more believers)?

Overall, there is a non-systematic but still notable trend, amongst the Archival staff, to have encountered Spooks before joining the Institute in order to try and find out more about it:

(* Michael Shelley: lost a friend to The Spiral when he was young, which pushed him to join the Institute to understand what had happened, according to MAG101.)

* Jon had met The Web as a kid, probably never truly got away from it even though he did not die right away. Georgie highlighted how, personality-wise, he was perfect for the job:

(MAG093) GEORGIE: That does at least explain why he picked you. ARCHIVIST: Uh? GEORGIE: If your job is asking questions, I mean. You were always the one who pushed too far, and asked smart-arse, awkward questions. I always was surprised you never got punched.

* We heard Melanie’s recruitment live, though the reasons are still a bit unclear:

(MAG084) ELIAS: Do you want the job, Melanie? MELANIE: Oh… Um, I…Well, it’s, it’s rather sudden, but… er, I mean, sure. Yes. Yes, I do.

(MAG106) MELANIE: Threaten, then. I’ve got nothing. ELIAS: That’s… almost true. Your life is indeed shockingly absent of any meaningful connections. That’s actually one of the reasons I chose you for this job.

(Melanie had had various Spooky encounters at this point: she witnessed a fight between agents of the Stranger and of the… Flesh? Slaughter? (MAG028), got wounded on the shoulder by a Slaughter ghost (MAG076), and was already infected by a bullet from another Slaugher ghost (MAG117) when Elias recruited her. Static was even heard when he was talking to her, so he definitely did something, whether it was… seeing the bullet, or compelling her to think about the reasons for accepting? But why did he want her in the team – was it because she was leaning towards Beholding, in her quest for seeing things that could destroy her/being a witness overall/working with cameras and recording supernatural events? Was it because of the Slaughter wounds, set-up for Jon?)

* Same for Basira and Daisy: officially, Elias needed to neutralise Daisy and to be able to use her “competences” in dealing with Spooks, hence the trapping of Basira as blackmail material. Both had large amounts of Spooky encounters beforehand, as Section 31-signee officers (including the showdown with Rayner). Given recent development, it’s possible that Elias mostly just wanted Basira in the team, but her being good at investigating and “suit[ing] the academic life” (MAG102) might also just have been a happy coincidence – unlike the other Beholding folks, Basira has demonstrated that she’s able to call things quit when she is done with them, such as with her quitting the police.

* It’s unclear whether Jon had personally asked Sasha to be transferred to the Archives when he was appointed as Head Archivist (he liked Sasha a lot! She was getting a free pass on everything!). He did mention that “her working here seems the natural progression of her lifelong interest in the paranormal (MAG048), but it’s unclear whether that bit was Sasha-Sasha… or something rewritten by the Not!Them ;; (Since from what we knew it season 1, Sasha was pretty short on money and even hated Artefact Storage when she was working there but “couldn’t afford to quit”… so it might be that the real Sasha had just been desperate for a job, like Martin.)

* We know, however, quite a lot about Tim: he followed Danny and became an unwilling spectator to Grimaldi/Nikola’s skinning and dancing; he joined the Institute shortly afterwards in order to try and track down the Circus and get answers about what had happened to his brother (he even became a Smirke specialist in just two years!). We know that Jon specifically asked him to come with him to the Archives:

(MAG065) TIM: No. No, you listen for once. I was fine in research, happy. Then you asked me to be transferred here, and suddenly it’s all monsters and killers and secret passages, oh my!

(Plus, the whole thing with how he hadn’t managed to move but only watch in the Covent Garden theatre (MAG104) sounded verrryy much like Jon watching his bully disappear behind the door. Watching until the end, unable to do anything to stop events – but not closing their eyes either. Beholding-compatible.)

* AND MARTIN IS STILL OUR BIG MYSTERY, but of all things, we know that Elias was the one to interview him when he was applied with a fake CV, which UHOH.

(MAG056) MARTIN: I… … I lied on my CV. ARCHIVIST: … What? MARTIN: I don’t have a Master’s in parapsychology, I don’t even have a degree. […] So I… I just kinda started to lie on my applications, sending them out to just about anywhere. For some reason, my lie about parapsychology got me an interview with Elias and, and then a job here. M–most of my employment details are made up, I’m only 29!

(Unclear whether this happened when Martin was 17 or a little later, but he was at any rate already employed at the Institute in 2009, at age 22.) More specifically about working in the Archives, it doesn’t sound like Jon asked Martin to follow him there – firstly, Jon was super dismissive of him in season 1, and secondly, there was Martin’s awkward silence when he and Tim discussed that:

(MAG098) MARTIN: […] [Jon] said he doesn’t want to lose anyone else. Like, y’know, it’s his fault. TIM: Isn’t it? MARTIN: No! No, it isn’t! I mean, you heard Elias… We never really stood a chance. TIM: Yeah. Maybe. But Elias wasn’t actually the one who offered me the job down here. MARTIN: No, I– Sure. …

So either he volunteered, either he might have been sent down there by Elias… which just raises another “why”. It was a bit weird how Jon, in MAG139, immediately segued from Martin to the question of why they had been “chosen” to be there (why did thinking about Martin prompt that?), but on the other hand, it’s still an enigma why Elias hired Martin. Could be that everything was absolutely accidental, could be the Spiders at work, could be that Elias did have specific plans about Martin (because Elias didn’t especially like Martin…? He’s always very casually talking him down), who knows.

*SHAKES ELIAS AGAIN, SPIT WHAT YOU KNOW YOU INSUFFERABLE GRINNING EX-HEAD*

(Other option of why they were chosen: their isolation. Jon’s parents died when he was a kid, and his grandmother died around the time he began working at the Institute, in 2012; Tim’s only family member mentioned was his brother, who had died before he joined the Institute; Martin’s only family member mentioned around him was his mother, and given that he had to care for her when he was only 17, it is implied that he might not have had many family members around or close; Basira only mentioned her father, and in past tense; Melanie’s parents are both dead and Elias pointed out she didn’t have any real anchor anymore; Daisy’s “last connection to humanity” was stated to be Basira. Could be Elias being a vulture, or a bit of classism, targeting people in need/from poor upbringings, assuming that they would be more influenceable and easy to handle?)

- À propos of Martin, this episode also reminded of One Big Important Question:

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “And that’s when Arthur proposed his own plan: a Chosen One. We would create a messiah, the Flame Incarnate […]. When we finally decided, it was Eileen Montague who came forward as a volunteer. She was five months pregnant at the time, and had already taken care of the father in the usual manner of our little congregation. […] We baptized her with the boiling water of Asag and named her… “Agnes”, as had been her mother’s final request.”

IS THERE A SINGLE GOOD MOTHER IN TMA. I’m snorting and weeping over the fact that:

(MAG067) ARCHIVIST: […] [Jack Barnabas] was unable to provide much more information on the above but, upon Martin’s asking if Agnes had mentioned her childhood at all, he did recall her briefly alluding to being adopted.

L-O-L YES, SHE WAS ADOPTED… by so many different people. By the cult of the Lightless Flame after her birth, and then by Raymond Fielding (kind of) when they sent her off to fight the Spiders as a kid.

We don’t have Stellar Parenting overall, very true, but I can still think of a few fathers who sacrificed themselves to save a child – Jason North was implied to have immolated himself to save his son from his own curse in MAG037, and YEAH OKAY, ROBERT MONTAUK WAS A SERIAL KILLER but he was also good towards Julia in MAG009 (and we will probably hear a bit more about their family’s story, about Julia’s mother… but I had gotten the feeling that Robert probably did what he did in order to avenge his wife and/or to protect Julia from the same fate?). Plus, Gerry mentioned that he thinks that his father might have wanted to help raise, him before Mary decided to get rid of the problem. Not role models, sure, but not-failing-as-parents. Meanwhile, almost every time we see a mother or hear about her feelings (ie, excluding for example Andrea Nunis’s mother, who was an anchor to her, but who wasn’t a character in herself), it’s Bad News. As MAG139 demonstrated, Agnes’s mother imposed the Destiny on her daughter before she was even born. See also: Mary friggin’ Keay to Gerry, and not-his-mother-but-was-apparently-getting-a-kick-out-of-being-mistaken-for-it Gertrude. Do I need to mention Martin’s mother.

It’s a great subversion of the idea that mothers are inherently nurturing and kind but they’re also… the Rarest Species in this series, uh.

- Hey hey hey, alright, I deserve tomatoes to be thrown at me, but on the subject of Martin Lukas Keay von Closen Son Of Puppets Blackwood. So. Martin and spiders have a loving relationship, but this episode also reminded me that another of his loves is also…

(MAG117) MARTIN: This way I finally get to do something. It’s gonna hurt, but… I’m ready. And I want to. Also, I get to burn some stuff, so that cool!

(MAG118) ELIAS: Tell me what you’re doing, and why. MARTIN: I just thought I’d, y’know, drop a couple of ideas in the old suggestion box! Turns out my suggestion is… fire! [LIGHTER ON]

… arson, so on the list of “what the heck is Martin Blackwood”, what about Unholy Grandchild of Web and Desolation or something through his dad.)

- Gertrude’s death was sneakily pushed back to the forefront again:

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “And he’s probably right. Just as well you are not here. Smart move on your part. But they always are, aren’t they? Smart moves. Someday, you’re gonna push your luck too far, and when you do… Well, you just better hope it isn’t Jude who comes to collect. […] As for you… Whatever you did, and whatever protection it might have afforded you is severed, with Agnes’s death. Arthur has told us not to harm you yet, but this whole thing has really rather weakened his authority, and many of us are now looking towards Diego for leadership. But we shall see, I suppose. I hope, when it is time, we may burn you forever, Gertrude.

[…] ARCHIVIST: […] Nice to see Gertrude [EXHALE] also used to get a lot of threats. So far it doesn’t seem that any went… desperately well. Except for Elias, of course. But he didn’t threaten, did he? He just… did it.

And I still feel like we might be missing a few things about the circumstances surrounding it – if Gertrude was pursued by so many people and so cautious about it, how come Elias managed to get rid of her in the end…? Is it because he was kind of a blind spot (ha) and she had been underestimating him…? Is it because, so focused on Spooks, she didn’t consider mundane means…? But she was well-aware of the power of regular, non-paranormal weapons! She used so many explosives…

I wonder if the Reminder that Gertrude had a long list of would-be killers, that she had managed to avoid for so long until Elias got to her, is supposed to mean that we’ll hear more about the Elias-Gertrude relationship… Oliver had mentioned that she had many things going after her, in MAG121; Peter mentioned that he wouldn’t have been against offing her himself in MAG134; and now, again, we’re getting another mention in MAG139…

- Jon is still gathering information about past rituals and we can add another name for the Desolation: “The Scoured Earth”, which should have been carried out by Agnes… and was left on standby and/or cancelled entirely for this round. We’re only missing the name and description for The Lonely (though we know from MAG134 that Gertrude successfully derailed it already), The Corruption (was it whatever Jane tried against the Institute?), and everything about The Vast. Jon didn’t say how and where and why he found Eugene’s statement in particular: whether he was drawn to this one, or found it cobwebs-wrapped, or Knew he had to read it?

(And The Corruption still hasn’t had any statement in season 4! Oh worms.)

- Jon gave us updates on the Archival staff, and it is various shades of sob. Chronologically, by order of mentions:

* Basira still hasn’t spilled the beannnns ;_;

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: The others are doing… better, I think. Basira’s busy doing research for something secretive, unsurprisingly. But she seems to be adjusting to, uh… the new Daisy.

So, on the one hand: Basira is still Hiding Everything from Jon… but on the other hand, it sounds like it’s going better between her and Daisy? … but WELP, if their relationship is pacifying, it means that it’s becoming Something That Could Be Taken Away from us and from them / it’s giving Jonny an opportunity to hurt us a whole lot if one of them dies. Let me be happy about them, gdi?!

* I Have Reclamations To Make About Jon’s mentions of Daisy:

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: I actually like Daisy now, which is a… really weird feeling. [INHALE]

Like, on the one hand, I get that becoming kind of bff with Daisy is throwing you off, Jon, but don’t you dare lie to Us/The Tape Recorder: you liked Daisy and sharing your fantastic shitty sense of humour with her, I Have Receipts:

(MAG096) DAISY: Come on. Before the Met get here. ARCHIVIST: Whatever you say~ DAISY: And wipe that grin off your face.

Plus, you’ve been listening to THE ARCHERS in her company, probably to indulge her, and you went out for drinks with her; there are limits to pity, you’ve been way into Friendship territory for a while now, don’t try to bluff!! :w

Also, a bit saddened that he’s describing her as “the new Daisy” because… it doesn’t really seem accurate? According to Daisy, this was her all along/her true self, and we indeed could see glimpses of it in season 3, like how she gladly accepted the nickname “Daisy” (MAG082, Elias: “Everyone calls me Daisy. I like that because it sounds so gentle […] It makes me feel strong, to know that the soft nickname everyone calls me comes from a bloody wound.”) (But at the same time… ;; It’s very easy to picture Elias waltzing in at some point to highlight that ahah, but the rabid dog was the real you all along, too…)

* Melanie is “quiet”.

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: Melanie’s quiet, but I think therapy’s helping.

And given that the identity of her therapist is still undetermined, I’m filled with dread… The Web is known for making people come off as “quiet”……………

(MAG059, Ronald Sinclair) “The other kids living there were the same – at least, I think they were. I remember them being kind of dull, not that they were… boring, exactly, […] but there was something about them, as though… there were some things that they said and did without anything behind them. Occasionally there would be flashes of something. […] mostly they were quiet, almost placid. I’m sure they’d have said the same things about me, but at the time, nothing seemed amiss. I did what I did because it was what I was supposed to do, and it never struck me to question it. I’m not sure I really recognise who I became while living at that house.”

Please, be just fine and healing, Melanie…? ;;

* Helen is… *LOUD SOB*

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: Haven’t seen Helen much. The door is… sometimes there, sometimes not. … I haven’t knocked. I’m never going to trust it. Trust… her. … Trust it. [DRY EXHALE] And I shouldn’t. Whatever its relationship to the person who was or is Helen… assuming that I can ever know its motivations is a mistake.

Damniiiiiiiiiiiiiit… Extra-aouch that Helen directly told Jon that she wasn’t super-fond of the “it” in MAG131 (and given how Melanie, who seems to be the closest to Helen?, used “she”), and that Jon is… very pointedly choosing to still using “It” anyway after some hesitation (reflex to call The Distortion “it”, then remembering his discussion with Helen and going for “she”, then reaffirming his distrust with “it”?).

I’m really not surprised that Jon is having trouble with her door (Jon has a History of doors that should stay closed, and specifically got bad experiences with Michael’s), I’m saddened that he is choosing to not trust Helen, although… I can imagine why. But is it through an intrinsically personal decision (The Distortion is supposed to lie and deceive; maybe it’s currently trustworthy only because of his lack of trust? Is it because he still feels guilty over what happened to the human Helen Richardson, who got snatched right before him? Is it because he still resents Michael?), or is it also because of the Beholding in him – pushing him to not trust what he can’t know…?

I wonder how Helen being around will end up causing harm (because surely, it will): will it be because Jon will finally decide to trust her because he has no choice left, and immediately be given reason to regret? Is it because Jon will adamantly refuse to trust her when she could be preventing another disaster…?

* And theeeeeeeeeeeeen…

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: And that just leaves Martin, which…

[SAD PAUSE OF ARCHIVIST DESPERATELY PINING] Jon, p l z. If you’re beginning to reach Martin Level of concern/pining/worrying, then Oh No.

(MAG117) MARTIN: I suppose you can get used to anything, but… [PAUSE] It feels different. I need them to be safe. I need him to be okay. … So–sorry, hum. I–I’m not afraid for me, though. Isn’t that weird…? […] I just… really hope everyone makes it back. … And I want to win on my own. Oh, and I hope the world doesn’t end. Obviously. [SIGH] Just… [SIGH] Just don't die, Jon. … O–or Tim, or Basira, or… Daisy, I guess. Just… just everyone please, make it back home…?

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: … [SIGH] I’m just worried about Martin. … Christ… Every other Avatar gets to have their feelings… burned right out of them, but me? I’ve… just got to sit in mine. … I know he said he had everything under control. I need… to trust him; whatever he’s doing with Peter, he’s… he knows what he’s doing. Probably. I just– … [VERY FAST] I need him to be okay. I just do.

(I’m still not sure whether the “I need him to be okay” was a conscious reference to MAG117 from him, or just a coincidence to convey that these two tragic idiots are reaching the same point independently. We have clues that Jon had heard Tim’s testament from that episode, potentially Melanie’s as well since she gave her statement about the Ghost Bullet; but they weren’t dated from the same day, and not on the same tapes if the official description (“A-F”) is any indication, so…)

Anyway. Please, Jon, don’t wish for your feelings to disappear. There is something very delicious and entertaining about Jon complaining that he has FEELINGS, URK, IT SUCKS, but at the same time, This Is That Kind Of Series. Please, enjoy your sad pining and your concern and your worrying, Jon. (;wwwwwwwww; for Jon still trying to put some reason in his own mind; explaining what is the problem, and at the same time still holding to his decision to trust Martin…)

(- There was something very… “SO WHO IS HAVING A CRUSH, NOW, UH.” with that Martin mention, given that Eugene’s statement referred to Jack Barnabas and… back in MAG067, Jon hadn’t been fundamentally kind towards the latter’s story:

(MAG067) ARCHIVIST: Statement of Jack Barnabas, regarding a short-lived courtship with Agnes Montague in the autumn of 2006. […] A rather different perspective on the woman known as Agnes Montague or… Agnes Fielding, depending on who you ask. Although hardly a reliable account, steeped as it is in messy obsessions and confusion.

HEY JON, WHAT’S GOOD, and who is the one pining, now.

(Although of course, more seriously: there is kind of an echo between Jack and Agnes, and Martin and Jon…? Someone Normal harbouring feelings for an avatar who was Chosen and burdened with a specific role in their little society and who had met The Web in their youth, and after a while, the avatar growing fondness in return – though the nature of their feelings is unclear. In Jon’s case, not sure whether his worries and concern for Martin are derailing anything Beholding-related or… just part of the Bigger Plan. Though Jack&Agnes, and Martin&Jon, could also all be… part of The Web’s plans overall. Too many spiders.))

(Following: bits typed down before MAG140 was released:)

- Big question is what happened at the end of the episode exactly?

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: … If I… Knew… what his plan was… If I knew what Peter was doing, if I just– [WHISPERING] … Can I…? [LOW RUMBLING SOUND, STATIC RISES] [CRIES OF PAIN] [VERY SHARP SQUEAL OF DISTORTION STEADILY RISING] [NOISE OF SOMETHING-OR-JON FALLING] [SQUEAL OF DISTORTION DECREASES] [MUMBLING] End… E–end recording…! [CLICK.]

1°) See, Jon: assuming you’re on a first name basis with “Peter” is a bad idea, and karma went right back at you.

2°) Re: the noise of something falling. Was it Jon falling off his chair AGAIN, JON, YOU ALREADY DID THAT IN MAG128. Did Jon manage to get a concussion by trying to Know too hard. Does it count as his Lonely scar. Is Elias laughing hysterically in his cell because Jon is such an Embarrassment.

3°) Okay, so, unlike the other times Jon got to Know about something or purposely used that power… there was, on top of the usual static, Peter’s trademark “squeal of distortion” (I am using the way the official transcript introduced it, in MAG100, and it’s been the same sound surrounding Peter’s appearances since then). So, whatever happened was definitely Lonely-related, but: was it because Jon can’t pierce through the Lonely, in the same way he didn’t manage to peak through The Dark in MAG135? Was it Peter hiding himself a bit deeper in reaction to Jon’s attempt, feeling (or SEEING, if he was… right in the room with Jon) what Jon was trying to do? … Another possibility is that it was that Jon couldn’t access Martin because of MARTIN himself (ie: he’s a bit too much into the Lonely, or worse… is beginning to use Lonely powers), but I’m leaning towards Peter here. With The Dark and now The Lonely, that makes a lot of Power Walls that Jon isn’t yet able to bypass…

4°) Did Jon manage to Know something through the experience, or… not at all? I got the impression that he had just hit the wall of squealing sounds, bounced back, and… didn’t get anything at all.

5°) Obligatory “JON used Beholding powers! JON’s attack missed. JON hurt himself in his confusion. JON fainted!” joke here.

Speculation for MAG140 based on the title (20/05/19):

A PRETTY ONE, and uuuuh, smells of… alchemy? JOHN FLAMSTEED? So either about another way of interpreting the powers before Smirke, in general (Gerry had put them on the same level in MAG111), either, more specifically… about The Dark, and its previous ritual attempt (and then, could also be about Edmond Halley, since Basira had linked the two in MAG108)? Or could be about The Vast? Second meaning… could be about a ~sky~, so Basira explaining her current activities/researches…? Will she finally tell Jon about the fact that The Dark is potentially planning something in Svalbard…?

(17/06/19: AHAHAHA sob.)

#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #tma liveblog #tma season 4 #the magnus archives #mag139 #long post/#tma spoilers/

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aliterarywitch · 6 years ago

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Can someone genuinely explain to me Varys and Tyrion’s point of view on the whole ‘Dany is the mad queen she’s like her father’ thing? Because as far as I have seen, ever since she set foot in Westeros she has taken their council every single time and shown restrain instead of directly going to burn down KL and Cersei. Right up to the end of episode 4, where she goes to parley with a small number of soldiers at her back. While I love Daenerys as a character and think she’s the most iconic character in the ASOIAF/ GOT world, one of the main reasons I love her is because she’s not a clear cut hero/ villain and more ambiguous. She has the most amount of sheer power in a female character I have ever read about or watched on screen, and that has more to do with Why I like her, not because I think she’s an unscrupulous ‘good guy’, really no one in GOT is.

But Daenerys had several chances to be more ruthless or ‘evil’ in the last two seasons and each and every single time, she wasn’t. She could have attacked Kings Landing immediately upon arrival. Instead she listened to Tyrion’s plans, which failed every single time. Yet she still listened to him. After losing the Iron fleet and Dorne, she did nothing. After losing Highgarden she still didn’t attack innocents. She attacked soldiers who had attacked, robbed and betrayed her and her allies in the reach. She met them on the battlefield with only one of her dragons. It was War, was she supposed to just sit back and do nothing yet again cuz tyrion has strangely complicated feelings about Cersei?

The next time she even gets on a dragon is to go save Jon & co. Beyond the wall, again against Tyrion’s advice, because she has feelings for Jon but also because it’s the right thing to do. She loses a dragon, her child, to save several other characters.

And then she goes to Winterfell with the entire force of her armies to help with the WWs. She trusts Tyrion’s word that Cersei will also make the same decision she did. She doesn’t openly say a word when Sansa and the Northmen are distrustful of her. Instead she speaks to Sansa and Jon in private about the throne and Cersei.

She finds out that the man she loves is not only related to her, but also has a better claim to the throne she’s dedicated her life to and has no time to process this. Then the battle of Winterfell happens and again, if it wasn’t for Dany’s dragons and her armies they wouldn’t have survived five seconds. She burned thousands of wights, saved Jon even though a real ‘mad queen’ would have probably let him die, and when cornered even picked up a sword to defend herself with no training. She lost Jorah, her friend and most trusted advisor, someone she has known and loved for almost a decade.

And then when it’s time to turn her attention to Cersei, Rhaegal is attacked and killed and Missandei, her best friend captured by a real mad woman, and Tyrion and Varys yet again advise against burning down kings landing and she LISTENS.

But now they know she has a more pliable and respectful male relative with the claim to the throne, they begin to conspire against her. As far as I can see Daenerys’ biggest mistake the entire time was trusting Tyrion. She listens to him every time and lost.

Obviously burning down half a million innocents in kings landing is a bad thing to do. But this is war. Innocents die. Its like everyone has forgotten the state of the Riverlands when Robb was at war against the lannisters. Or that Stannis attacked kings landing during the battle of Blackwater to take the throne that was his by right and would have likely killed thousands of people too. And that during Roberts rebellion that is exactly what the Lannister army did on behalf of Robert to overthrow the Targaryens, and everyone hailed Robert king and the good guy/ liberator anyway. Maybe it’s just the dragons, but if you HAVE dragons obviously you’re going to use them. The dragons are still largely seen as ‘good’ in GOT even though dragons have traditionally been villains and obstacles in the fantasy genre.

I just don’t understand the logic. The writing is so bad and this need to judge Daenerys on her words instead of her actions really doesn’t come across right. She’s listened to council every single time she’s wanted to do something impulsive. If you judged every person for the terrible things they said behind closed doors than they’d all be mad kings and queens. From Varys and Tyrion’s perspective, is it really just about having a monarch they can control? Do they realize they’d have died in the crypts if Daenerys wasn’t powerful and ruthless? Possibly before that since Cersei was sending people to assassinate Tyrion after he ran away from KL? Tyrion and Varys have both been absolutely useless to her and she’s still given them respect and listened to their council.

The writers have really committed themselves to destroying Daenerys’ entire arc because this last episode just made no sense. If they had bothered to show a more gradual descent into insanity I might have accepted it but this is just a really horrible way to handle a character. They made her lose everything she ever loved or earned in the span of 5-6 episode just for the sake of drama, and I frankly think it’s an insult to the audience and any person especially any woman who has ever admired or identified with Daenerys and her story.

#game of thrones #got spoilers #daenerys targaryen #got s8 #tyrion lannister #cersei lannister #varys #got discussion #i am ride or die for daenerys at this point and i dont even consider myself a stan #daenerys targaryen defense squad

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moonlitgleek · 7 years ago

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Say Cersei does marry Rhaegar. I assume the bloom comes off the rose with the marriage to a Sadsack prince in the court of his mad father. Does Cersei still convince Jaime to go for the Kingsguard? Would Jaime be seduced to cuckolding the prince he admires? What does Tywin do?

Putting aside the contradictory character motivation that would lead Aerys to simultaneously make Tywin’s daughter a princess but also spite him by depriving him of his heir, while giving Rhaegar everything he needs to plot Aerys’ own dethroning with Tywin’s help…. yes, Cersei probably would still convince Jaime to join the Kingsguard.

But when [Jaime] made a brief call at King’s Landing on his way back to Casterly Rock, chiefly to see his sister, Cersei took him aside and whispered that Lord Tywin meant to marry him to Lysa Tully, had gone so far as to invite Lord Hoster to the city to discuss dower. But if Jaime took the white, he could be near her always.

That sense of possessiveness that drove Cersei to talk Jaime into joining the Kingsguard so that he could only be hers does not go away if she marries Rhaegar. After all, it has made itself known when she was all of ten in what she did to Melara Hetherspoon, at a time when Cersei still thought she would wed Rhaegar

You stupid girl, the queen thought, angry even now. Jaime does not even know you are alive. Back then her brother lived only for swords and dogs and horses… and for her, his twin.

Note the present tense Cersei uses here. She is still bristling two decades after killing Melara just because Melara had a crush on Jaime. Cersei was ten. She was enamored with the thought of marrying Rhaegar but her thoughts and actions still bespoke her possessiveness towards Jaime. The thing about Cersei’s relationship with Jaime is that Cersei saw it as something that transcends any other relationship. They were two halves of a whole. Jaime was her mirror image, a part of her. There was no contradiction in her head between her “love” for Rhaegar and her connection to Jaime. So I don’t see how wedding Rhaegar would have deterred Cersei from sabotaging Jaime’s betrothal to Lysa so she could keep him herself.

Of course, wedding Rhaegar also has nothing to do with Cersei’s other motivation in talking Jaime into joining the Kingsguard. This is where Cersei’s resentment over how different she and Jaime were treated and over Tywin’s rampant misogyny towards her manifest as well. Cersei deliberately took Tywin’s chosen golden heir from him, the heir she thinks this of.

“You are not your father. And Tywin always regarded Jaime as his rightful heir.”

“Jaime … Jaime has taken vows. Jaime never thinks, he laughs at everything and everyone and says whatever comes into his head. Jaime is a handsome fool.”

That’s the heir Tywin favored over Cersei, Cersei who sees herself as the only true son Tywin ever had and who resents that he never recognized it. Talking Jaime into joining the Kingsguard wasn’t just about Cersei’s possessiveness of Jaime, it was also about punishing Tywin.

As for the question about Jaime cuckolding Rhaegar, that’s an interesting question. Jaime did admire Rhaegar so “horning” him might not come to him as easily as it did with Robert. However, OTL!Jaime’s idealization of Rhaegar was shaped by a few factors: it was a byproduct of Jaime’s idolization of Ser Arthur Dayne who held Rhaegar in high esteem himself, but it’s Jaime’s time in court with Aerys that really highlighted the contrast between the Mad King and his chivalrous heir who, at the time, had Tywin’s regard as well. The glaring difference between Aerys and Rhaegar could only endear the prince to everyone around who saw him as a definitive improvement on his unstable father. Jaime’s idealization is further exacerbated in current time by his deep sense of guilt over failing Rhaegar in not preventing Elia and the children’s deaths, and by his overwhelming hatred of Robert. But the truth of the matter is that Jaime didn’t really spend that much time with Rhaegar personally to really know him. Jaime was indoctrinated into the Kingsguard at Harrenhal, mere months before Rhaegar took off with Lyanna, and even those months were mostly spent with Jaime in King’s Landing, and Rhaegar on Dragonstone. In reality, Jaime idealized the idea of Rhaegar he had in his head rather than the actual man who he did not know.

But the idea of Rhaegar would fail in Jaime’s eyes just as it would in Cersei’s in this AU. His twin’s involvement would force a necessary divide between Jaime and Rhaegar, not just in the jealousy Jaime would inherently feel towards whoever married Cersei, but also in how Rhaegar’s treatment of Cersei would heavily influence Jaime’s opinion of him (because I don’t think that the mess at Harrenhal and Rhaegar’s subsequent disappearance with Lyanna would be prevented simply if Rhaegar married Cersei instead, because Rhaegar’s actions weren’t simply about Elia not being able to have a third kid in OTL. Call me a contrarian but I’m a strong proponent of the narrative not validating Cersei’s delusional claims that Rhaegar wouldn’t have needed Lyanna if he’d only married her instead of Elia, which smacks of a great deal of ableism, racism and victim-blaming. No, thank you). The tourney at Harrenhal would have a great influence on Jaime’s opinion of the crown prince. Jaime had no horse in the race at Harrenha in OTLl; he had no reason to care about Elia Martell, and usual Westerosi ableism and racism made it far easier to scapegoat Elia than to hold Rhaegar accountable for his actions whether at Harrenhal or after, hence Cersei, JonCon, Viserys and even Dany doing exactly that. Elia was collectively thought of as lacking in the eyes of many and thus received a great deal of the blame for what Rhaegar had done (it’s not for nothing that we keep hearing “if only Rhaegar had married X, he wouldn’t have needed Lyanna”. X sometimes being Dany and sometimes being Cersei but the he implication remain the same - that the cause of the problem was Elia and her inability to provide something that Rhaegar needed rather than Rhaegar himself).

But when it’s his beloved sister and his family getting publicly humiliated in front of all of Westeros, don’t expect Jaime Lannister to still smell roses off Rhaegar after the latter publicly spurns his sister, the Light of the West and the most beautiful woman in Westeros in Jaime’s eyes, in favor of the “wild thing” that is Lyanna Stark. Jaime’s disillusionment in the court of the Mad King would absolutely include the silver prince in that context. In an unfortunate parallel, the tourney at Harrenhal would repeat history in having another Targaryen publicly shaming a Lannister lady (at even a wider scale than what Aerys did to Joanna considering the sheer number of nobles present in Harrenhal) and another insult added to the list of insults Tywin suffered. While Jaime might not care about the Lannister name the way Tywin did, Cersei’s shame, heartbreak and fury would certainly matter to him in light of how much he loved Cersei and was protective of her. And Cersei would be murderous with the insult, which is personal and political. For a woman who coveted power since she was little, having her political standing so publicly undermined would be intolerable, which is made worse by the risk of being set aside for Lyanna (especially if Cersei and Rhaegar are not yet wed by the time of the tourney) or having Lyanna formally installed as a royal mistress.

How the changes would affect the aftermath of the rebellion is a bit complicated and is heavily dependent on whether Rhaegar and Cersei were already married or not. But ultimately, if Rhaegar survives the rebellion and wins (that’s a very big if), his very public actions with Lyanna and how he handles Jon’s existence might lead to some variation of this.

It did not take [Robert] long to start playing with [his widowed cousin] again. As soon as Cersei closed her eyes, the king would steal off to console the poor lonely creature. One night she had Jaime follow him, to confirm her suspicions. When her brother returned he asked her if she wanted Robert dead. “No,” she had replied, “I want him horned.”

#asoiaf #asoiaf meta #cersei lannister #jaime lannister #rhaegar targaryen #elia martell #tywin lannister #melara hetherspoon #what ifs #the tourney at harrenhal #the lannister incest #ask box #Anon asks

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human-resourccs · 7 years ago

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He Just Likes The Rush - Ch. 3

In which Scarecrows are born and it gets sorta gay for like a second there

~1300 words

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Looking back on it, Jonathan struggled to remember exactly how long it took after that first visit to his home that his research…. Escalated. He'd been well aware of his declining mental state - on some level, he had. But the warnings, the concern, the thoughts of slowing down; all of those rational things he should've been thinking had been getting locked away in the back of his mind as he redoubled his efforts on his life's work.

It had started out fairly well, to be fair. Having already become desensitized to the Riddler's…. disposition, it became fairly easy to hold a conversation when he was in a decent mood. The first thing he'd found out was that his new acquaintance's name was actually Edward Nigma - 'Common knowledge, Jonathan! Pick up a newspaper once in a while! Mister Riddler, really?' - and barely batted an eyelid at the oddity of it. Honestly, it was one of the less excessive things he'd done for his aesthetic.

The arrangement had been thusly; the Riddler had provided him with the contacts he'd been looking for, put him in a position where he could now reliably access the more shady dealings of Gotham’s underground; and in return Edward would typically bother him - either in person or over the phone - whenever it took his fancy. It was mutually agreed that this arrangement would be promptly broken with no harboured grudges if it ended up they both found each other absolutely intolerable. They both had some small amount to gain from either eventuality. For Edward, his curiosity would be at rest and an interesting addition made to the criminal scene in Gotham; for Jonathan, he would maintain his contacts regardless and end up with more time to dedicate to research.

All in all, it really wasn't a bad deal. Especially since they had found one another mutually agreeable; on good days, they'd debate various scientific, sociological, and literary-based topics. Sometimes, these discussions even became quite heated; especially where the fields of psychology were broached. Sometimes Jonathan would swear that his acquaintance was trying to goad him into throttling him.

"All I'm saying, Jon, is that- technically- technically! the ancient Greeks weren't as far off as they thought they were with regards to the humours of the body."

"That is objectively absurd. "

"Well - what are the causes of most psychiatric disorders, if not an imbalance of chemicals in the brain? Riddle me that! Sure, they undershot the number of chemicals a little, and wildly misinterpreted their identities and locations - but the core concept still stands, now, doesn't it?"

Edward, of course, knew exactly what he was doing - he just delighted in getting a rise from him.

"Edward, I am warning you..."

"Is that a begrudging admission of defeat I see through those gritted teeth?"

Neither of them were sure how that one didn't end without a trip to the emergency ward.

Though the raising of hackles was not entirely one-sided, of course. Jonathan also took great pleasure in his petty tortures.

"Jesus, Jon, how long have those dishes been there?"

"Mh? Dunno. Couple weeks, maybe. Lost count. I'll do them when I run out of clean ones."

Sometimes it took all his effort not to break the deadpan tone in his voice when the inevitable exclamations of horror from Edward soon followed.

"I think I'm going to be sick."

"Throw up in the corner; the mould's getting hungry."

The sight of the sheer speed with which the Riddler's face blanched - speedily exiting the room so the rogue might regain his composure - finally broke the stony expression he'd been trying to maintain; that was the first time Edward heard Jonathan laugh, and really laugh. Low and hearty, head thrown back, laughing until he was pink in the cheeks.

For some reason, Edward wasn't able to muster up the energy to be mad at the sight.

And on bad days, the Riddler would simply rant about whatever had slighted him or taken his interest in that particular instance, waving his hands in grand gestures and even getting up from where he was seated on a few occasions; Jonathan would half-listen and nod emphatically now and then. The background noise served to make it slightly easier to concentrate when he was thinking.

It was an odd arrangement, but they were odd people.

It was after that - if he concentrated, it must've been about a month, a little less - that things went sideways, as they always do. Edward seemed to have sensed the change, the slight shift in his personality - he didn't say anything. Perhaps it was out of some sense of respect, or perhaps it was for fear of the reaction. Hell - maybe he just wanted to see what would happen. Jonathan couldn't say he blamed him because that would've made him a massive, massive hypocrite; he'd have done the exact same thing, were the roles reversed.

Their talks became restricted to just phone contact; then became less frequent; then stopped altogether as the situation came to a head.

The situation. He kept dancing around the topic in his head, never thinking about it - was it because he struggled to sort through the hazy memory, or because he was scared - scared of admitting that Jonathan Crane, sanest man in the room, might've been more of a madman than he thought?

The preceding few nights, the lack of Edward's - of anyone's - presence, and his stock of resources had allowed him to work feverishly through the twilight hours until the sun came up, broken up only by his obligations as a lecturer.

It did not take a psychology doctorate to see the clear issue with this, and yet somehow Jonathan remained oblivious. Something had to give.

It had been innocent enough, such a small thing. Jonathan was no stranger to the habits of the students that his class was comprised of; they were young adults, a demographic that was always going to be known for their perceived lack of respect and general rowdiness. But for some reason, that day, they had just been so much louder than usual, he thought. So much louder - look, there, those four aren't even facing the front - and she's eating in the middle of the lecture- is that little brat napping in my class? How dare he? How dare any of them? He was here, teaching-

Oh, he would teach them, alright. It all happened so fast; nobody was really sure what Professor Crane had actually done to the boy who'd been sleeping at his desk. He just stopped, mid-sentence. He had this... weird look on his face. Walked over to the desk. Planted his hands on either side of it. Leaned in, whispering something with heated fervour; such a dark, dark expression on his face.

The boy just…. Started screaming. flailing around like a madman. Didn't stop until the paramedics showed up and sedated the poor bastard. They didn't find any drugs in his system - they weren't to know that the chemicals had long since been metabolised - no history of mental illness, nothing. Of course, though nobody could prove that Jonathan had actually done anything to him, action still had to be taken. There were furious parents, friends of friends, all directing their anger at the university that something be done about this!

And so, Jonathan Crane, at least on paper, willingly resigned from his position at the University. This, of course, left him with a great deal of extra time on his hands. He wasn't even angry - the opposite, he was pleased, now that he could dedicate so much more time to his work.

Within the week, everyone who had been in attendance of the class that day began to have strange, inexplicable mental breakdowns. One by one - no explanation. Screaming about monsters and spiders and fire and drowning; none of them ever recovered. Not fully.

Within the month, vendetta sated, fear had closed its cruel, icy fingers around the hearts of Gotham's inhabitants - and with that fear, the first appearance of the Scarecrow, and subsequent capture after a long arduous pursuit on the part of the GCPD and the batman.

But the damage was done. No time for regrets, nor doubts - this was the path Jonathan had set himself down and he intended to walk it to its conclusion.

His short stint in Arkham would prove to be most interesting.

#jonathan crane #scarecrow #edward nygma #the riddler #edward nigma #danny writes

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pomegranate-salad · 7 years ago

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Seeds of thought : Wicdiv #32 & #33

Work work work work work. I’ve never worked so much in my life. The college student easy life is a lie, kids. So I’m doing a 2-in-1 type of thing on the last two issues. I didn’t have much material on issue 32 alone anyway and I think these two issues make more sense as a two-parter finale, so I guess it works well. Thoughts and opinions under the cut, spoilers of course. And fuck Woden.

THE LAST LAUGH

“Well this looks ridiculous”

This was my - and I assume an unneglectable number of people’s – first reaction to the last page of issue #33 in which we see the severed heads of Lucifer, Inanna and Tara displayed on an altar. This scene was probably effective on some, but for me it immediately called back to Disney’s Haunted Mansion and Futurama, and I was effectively done for : there was no way I could take this visual seriously.

There’s no two ways around it : this scene is silly. First we have what should be one of the biggest reveal of the entire series casually thrown at us by a character who’s not even looking at the audience, Then the camera cuts to this grotesque display of living heads, and the scene is complete with a classic Luci one-liner that seems aware of how out-of-place this entire sequence is. Really, all that’s missing is the laugh track.

You could say anticlimactic ; but really should it be called that when it’s the creators themselves who intentionally destroy the dramatic potential of their own scene ? If you’re not convinced this was intentional, try a little thought experiment and imagine rewriting this scene to amplify its dramatic intensity. By doing so, my conclusion is that this ending had every chance of being a huge finisher like the ones we saw in Fandemonium and Rising Action, but every writing and artistic decision was deliberately made to be as wrong as possible, to ruin every emotional weight this scene could have had.

This is not an anomaly : in these last two issues, the creators seem to have engaged in the systematic destruction of every dramatic beat by way of grotesque and ridicule. It’s an undercurrent that ran through the entire second part of Imperial Phase, but only reached its full potential toward the end.

It started on the very first page of issue #32, trivializing Amaterasu’s death when the issue before that still gave it all the gravity fitting to the first death of a Wicdiv arc. Then Dio’s last moments of bravery reveal themselves to be a total waste, on top of ruining One More Time forever. Even Woden’s bad guy monologue is sort of too shitty to really muster the kind of epic hatred you’d want to direct at this character. Then we have Sakhmet’s death, caused not by her lover or her sort-of-nemesis Baal, but by a thirteen year old on her first kill. And that’s not even touching on the awful reminder of her fate we get at the end of issue #33. Then there’s of course the beep machine, and issue #32’s hilarious finish, which I think call for no commentary. Issue #33 is divided in two big reveals, the first one forcing on the us the awful visual of David Blake’s head on Woden’s suit and one of the most fist-curling yet somehow pathetic bad guy monologues in history, and the second one being that ridiculous finish scene. The two are even separated by an intimate scene between Cass and Laura that literally gets cut because there’s a stranger tied up two feet from them.

So if these issues somewhat feel like they’re played all wrong, we know where it comes from. They feel like a multipart climax that got flipped on its head, so not a punch would land or beat would work. That’s not to say there aren’t some really impressive character moments in there ; but for each of them, there’s an inversely proportionally bad joke or ironic twist sweeping right in to undercut the whole thing.

And that’s something worth examining, not as a mistake but as a creative direction. Humour used to be a respite in Wicdiv, a welcome break from all the bleakness and emotional scorching of the characters. Each of them had their own wit, from Luci’s cool girl referencing to Baphomet’s failed swagger, to even Cass’ dry deliveries. But now, humour is just another weapon to hurt us. It prevents us from caring about our characters, from connecting with their emotions, from taking the story seriously. As I was reading through what I knew were Dio’s last moments, all I could focus on was Woden’s villain’s speech and the fact that he was right, and that Dio’s death was probably going to be a complete waste, because that’s how Wicdiv works now. Just compare the weight of Amaterasu’s and Dio’s respective death scenes : they’re not even separated by a full issue, yet the light that’s shone on them is completely different. No matter how much dignity went into crafting Dio’s last scene, it doesn’t matter when it’s put back to back with the textual affirmation of its uselessness, the fact that we don’t even get to give him a proper goodbye, and even after that, Laura’s awful line about his life support. In 2017, I don’t think I need to explain anyone the power of humour in trivializing the most terrible situations and undercutting people’s empathy for each other. This is what Wicdiv has been doing to us these past two issues, against our will. Stopping us from caring. Keeping us at bay even when we’re trying to connect and get involved in the story and characters.

What does this change in the use of humour mean ? Personally, I link it to the change of our purported hopes as an audience. At the beginning of the comic and up until Imperial phase, we were still allowed to believe, like Luci, that a solution could be found, that the 2-year sentence wasn’t real, nor was the great Darkness. That it was going to be okay. But right at the moment when the characters allowed themselves to think that there could indeed be a solution, we, as an audience, started to know better : there was no loophole, no escape, no way to prevent the inevitable, whatever that was. We could no longer hope that things were going to be okay. So what do you hope for when things cannot be okay ? You hope that they’ll be worth it. If you have to die, let it be a worthy death. A beautiful one. If you have to go, go in a blaze of glory. If you have to fail, let it be at the hand of a worthy foe. Let it be worth it.

But it isn’t. And that’s what humour’s there to prove. When our hopes were that things would be okay, the comic responded with tragedy ; now that we simply want them to be worth it, its weapon of choice is ridicule. As such, it’s definitely not a coincidence that the 455AD special preceded Imperial Phase part II, as it sets the tone for the entire arc, up to its back quote : when it’s clear Lucifer won’t be able to outlive his death sentence, all he want is to be allowed to burn. But he won’t be. He will bleed out and his body will be dragged across and city and cut to pieces by an old lady then fed to the river. Such is the fate that awaits our character. Pathetic and grotesque in equal parts, useless unless it serves someone else’s purpose, following rules you do not understand.

If Imperial Phase is the arc in which the gods are allowed to think themselves kings and queens, then the creators are the King’s fools, the ones allowed to tell them their real value because they do it through jokes and flip-overs.

This arc is a constant battle between the story the characters wish they were in and the one they’re actually in. That’s why it would be wrong, for example, to think of the beep machine as a McGuffin : its thematic utility goes beyond a plot device. When just last arc, it was the subject of a joke to relieve the tension between two characters, now it knocks them back to their actual scope. Something so small and silly is the kind of device they deserve. The big, ugly, scary machine ? It does nothing. Did you think you’d be handed a huge plot revelation as the crowning achievement of this arc ? Of course not. Instead, what we get is a sad, banal story of parental abuse from a man who’s not over leaving his youth behind.

Yes, even the David/Jon Blake storyline, arguably the one preserving most of its dramatic intensity over these two issues, cannot help but feel like a sad joke when you consider that David Blake’s motivations are basically the evil queen from Snow White’s. This is what caused all this. This, an old wrinkled lady, and a thirteen year old on a mission from God. Those are our villains, everybody. As for dying a worthy death, our heroes’ options are a pool of blood or a mounted head on an altar.

None of this is worth it. At this point, it’s even hard remember why “this” sounded so appealing in the first place. And all this goes to contextualize even more Laura’s breakdown speech halfway through issue #33 : she wanted everything they had, and she’d have given anything for it. For power, for glamour, for this. For this joke of a fate that’s not even that funny. That’s what cost her the death of her family, multiple friends, and the rest of her life.

It’s also fitting that Jon finally voices something that has been on my mind for a long time : just how little do you have to think of yourself to think two years of superpowers would be worthier than a fully-lived life ? Through this character who, just like the other gods, is too good for this deal, but unlike them, seems to realize it, it’s yet again the sheer impossibility to make this deal worth it that’s shown to us. Because what becomes clear after this reveal is that if Ananke allowed you to become a god, it’s so she could see that you’d waste away your potential. House always wins, and when you burn the House down, another opens up next door.

So this is where we are : our hopes of seeing any of it be worth it have been ridiculed, and all that’s left to uncover is precisely which joke our heroes have been the butt of. Cruel ? Maybe. But if fiction so often serves as a way to quench our thirst for grand emotions and epic stories, it’s precisely because outside of it, it feels much more often like one big joke than a sweeping tragedy. After all, Henri Bergson said it best : comedy is much truer to real life than drama.

WHAT I THOUGHT OF THE ISSUES

I KNEW IT IT WAS ME I FIGURED IT OUT I KNEW IT WAS DAVID BLAKE I AM THE GODDESS OF FATE BOW TO ME MERE MORTALS !

Alright, I’ll stop.

But while seeing yourself being right is immensely satisfying, it cannot help but damage your read a little ; like I said many times before, I want writers to be smarter than me, to be able to take me by surprise. So if I’ve managed to guess something, that’s great for my ego, but it also makes me a bit sad : that’s just another plotpoint that won’t reach full impact with me because I had so much time interiorizing its potential.

And that’s sort of my problem with these two issues : they revolve around two kinds of plotpoints, some that didn’t surprise me (Dio and Sakhmet’s death, Woden’s identity, the reason for Laura’s attitude) and other that were impossible to guess (the beep machine, Minerva’s “identity”, the talking heads). Meaning that while reading those, I was pretty much letting the plot carry me without being able to pause and care. As I’ve said above, part of it is intentional, but it also means that there aren’t many punches in these issues that landed for me. I’ll definitely count Laura and Sakhmet’s last conversation as well as Cass and Laura’s fight as a success, but the “big” intimate moment of issue #33, the conversation between Cass and Laura, didn’t do much for me, probably because it seems to me that anyone with a functioning brain and ears knew exactly why Laura wasn’t her best self since she had become Persephone. I understand why Cass didn’t see it – as we’re discussed before, she is a factual thinker, meaning she can’t grasp with Laura’s guilt when it is so obviously unfounded – but I still don’t understand the decision to make this a big character moment when literally every sentence Laura had pronounced since the beginning of Imperial Phase revealed what she was going through. There’s nothing more infuriating that being fed information you already think of as canon. If you ask me, this moment is much more important and interesting for what it isn’t, that’s to say a romantic scene, than for what it is. Seeing Laura being rejected by Cass, and therefore breaking the pattern of dragging people in her self-destroying orbit, is much more defining than her whole speech on guilt.

The problem is that most of the work these issues do is retrospective : if the Jon/David scene on its own has limited impact, the new depth it gives to all the Woden scenes we’ve already been through is vertiginous. Like I said, I did consider what the meaning of David Blake being Woden would be, but that’s another thing to be confronted with the actual fact. When you consider that David is talking to his decapitated, imprisoned son when he’s pouring out his thoughts make issue #14 go from merely quite repulsive to one of the most skin-crawlingly nauseating pieces of media ever written. I can’t imagine what the creators went through crafting this issue while knowing the entire story.

As for the rest of the reveals, it’s a little hard to weigh on them without devolving into hardcore theorizing. We’re basically at the last stop before the comic has to lay out its hand ; it already managed to delay it through two entire arcs whose very point was to see how long they could get this blind game going. But for me as a reader, it also means I’m at the point in the story that’s the least interesting to me : the one where I have no choice than to follow the train as it’s well on its tracks, without any possibility to pause or jump ahead. I have to wait for the full story to know whether any of these twists paid out or not ; at this stage, I have both too much and too little to really be able to do something with it emotionally or intellectually.

So as a final verdict because I have to go back to cramming for administrative litigation, I’d say these are two issues I’ll have to revisit once the comic is over, because I suspect they’ll be a lot better with the full story in hand. Most of its impact is on the issues before them and in the groundwork they lay out for the final year. So as a stop point, they may not hold much interest, but I can definitely see them be one of the comic’s most astute cogs once it’s done and over. As a two-parter finale, I like it more than the Imperial Phase (part I) finale : it’s more coherent in its construction and doesn’t try to bite off more than it can chew. It’s mostly plotpoints and twists, meaning it’s my least favourite kind of read, but once I’m able to put that aside to see it instead as a character work thread in a bigger design, it’ll probably hold my interest much more. But as of right now, I can at least commend it for how much it makes me want to reread everything from the beginning. Which I definitely do not have the time for right now. Damn you. Damn you all.

#wicdiv #seeds of thought #suprise fellow fans i bet you thought you'd seen the last of me

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lesmotsincompris · 7 years ago

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Thoughts on GoT S07E06

Since everybody was discussing the leaks, I decided to watch the leaked episode and almost forgot to post my thoughts here as usual.

Anyway: that was terrible, y’all. That was a whole new level of terrible.

The show was awful long before this, of course, but I think this episode perfectly encapsulates how poorly written it can be. Every scene has a lot to tear apart, but let’s try to keep it short:

Winterfell

Oh boy, did that hurt. What D&D have done to Arya isn’t simply character assassination; they murdered her character, shat on the corpse, set the poop on fire, and put the fire out with vomit.

Arya’s lines during this episode seem to come from an anti-Sansa thread on Reddit. It’s so viciously misogynystic and victim-blaming that I’m losing all respect for fans that buy this kind of bullshit reasoning (and I’ve seen them with my own eyes).

Again knitting is brought in a negative context. Again Sansa is called stupid. Again Sansa is portrayed as an ambitious bitch because she didn’t act as the ideal victim is supposed to act. Again Sansa’s forced marriages are used against her. Again we have another reminder that Sansa was raped, because gods forbid we forget it. This isn’t dealing with trauma, this is rubbing in the audience’s faces one of the most hated scenes of this show.

It’s ridiculously out of continuity too. Everything Arya herself did to survive is ignored (hanging out with Tywin on season 2, anyone?). Also she couldn’t possibly think her sister helped the Lannisters get rid of Ned, she was fucking there. If she saw Sansa’s pretty hair and dress, she must have seen her crying and screaming in despair. Watch your own damn show, D&D!

Once more I must ask: what is Littlefinger still doing in this story? He’s trying to put Arya against Sansa, but why? What does he gain with that? Why is Sansa still listening to him? You can’t give me Sansa being snarky at him in one episode and fully trusting him in another, it just doesn’t make sense.

Sansa was rude to Brienne for no reason, and sent her away purely because D&D needed Sansa alone and unprotected in Winterfell again. It’s so forced it hurts.

Apparently Jon didn’t give any news in weeks. Great job, Jon. But hey, couldn’t they use their fucking omniscient robot brother to see what stupidity Jon was up to this time?

I was giggling during the entire briefcase scene, not even The Room can aspire to be this bad.

Dragonstone

“Heroes do stupid things and they die” is the supreme maxim of Grimdark™. It’s also clearly not what GRRM is going for in the books.

We had a scene with the sole purpose of delivering exposition that Jon is in love with Dany. Is he? Why would he be? What evidence have we seen of this? Oh no, but it’s a lot easier to have a character established as "clever" saying "he loves you" than actually showing the process of two people falling in love.

For all their speech abut sparing the innocent, Tyrion says they’ll burn King’s Landing if anyone touches Dany. See, the smallfolk are only important if they bend the knee, otherwise they can die. So much for wheel-breaking.

(we still don’t know what that means, btw)

Again Tyrion tells Dany what to do and how to act; I’m gonna stab with a knitting needle anyone that calls this show feminist. I don’t think Tyrion is wrong in everything he says, but having him mansplaining Dany constantly is annoying. If he “believes” her, why doesn’t he let her to think on her own? If he doesn’t trust her to do it, then why does he follow her?

I can’t blame Dany for being hostile to the whole succession talk. Yes, it’s an important matter, and one book!Dany still has to address, but it came very suddenly and when they had other more important matters to deal with.

Tyrion doesn’t want Dany to go and she goes, and again the narrative will prove Dany wrong for not listening to a man. Fuck this show.

Beyond the Wall

Aaah, le crap de le crap. Don’t get me wrong, Winterfell stuff made me roll my eyes so hard I could watch my own brain cells dying. But Winterfell was filler, while this is supposed to be the big moment, the “go go go, shock shock shock” we’ve been told about, the core of the wham episode of this season.

And it sucks.

Tormund says that smart people don’t go looking for the dead, and I have to agree with him. The whole plan of capturing a wight and touring it around Westeros was incredibly stupid to begin with, so it’s hard to feel bad for the characters when things go inevitably wrong.

Less than five minutes into this episode they were already joking about Gendry being assaulted by Melisandre. Fuck this show.

Gendry being sold to Melisandre, much like Tyrion killing Davos’ son with wildfire, becomes a “look, those characters know each other” gag. This is a very poor choice and ignores the fact that those characters met under traumatic circumstances that deserve a stronger reaction than that.

Of course you don’t hear Beric “bitching” about being killed six times, that would mean death and trauma carry any weight and in this show they don’t. Not anymore.

I’ve been complaining for a while that the show seems to have forgotten why Jorah was exiled, so they answered me with him admitting Ned was right. That’s great, it would have been a significant character development… if we had actually seen it. Character development is a character going from point A to point B, not suddenly being on point B with no indication of how they got there.

Then Jon says he’s glad Ned didn’t catch Jorah. Why? Does Jon knows that Jorah was exiled for selling people? Is Jon okay with that? Since when? He barely knows Jorah and no relationship was portrayed on screen before this moment, why this sudden concern with him?

Sandor says he hates gingers, which is another nail in the SanSan coffin for the show. We already that’s D&D’s NOTP, but the petty ways they find to demonstrate it always amuse me.

I joked about this being the Ultimate Bro Trip - All the Extras Edition, but boy I was right. There’s everything one could expect from this sort of event: sexual assault played for laughs, dick jokes, the most disgusting reference to Tormund x Brienne, heavy-handed hints of R+L=J, lots of walking for nothing, lots of shitting all over GRRM’s careful worldbuilding, lots of dudes bonding over stuff that makes me hate them as characters, poorly executed action with no real stakes. A true winner!

There are small things that worked for me. I kinda like Beric’s speech to Jon, or Sandor turning around when they burn Thoros’ wound. It’s a simple but effective way to remind the viewer of Sandor’s trauma. It doesn’t cost much in terms of dialogue or screentime, and keeps the character consistent and fleshed-out. But those were isolated moments, and isolated moments are not enough to save us from this torture of a scene.

I like the surprise element of the bear attack, but it was too shaky and confusing for my taste. Gendry says the bear has blue eyes, but I could hardly see the bear itself? And how can I care about characters dying if I can’t even see who’s dying? After some point it was The Revenant - Westeros edition, and still not the silliest scene in the episode.

The white walkers now die like vampires from Buffy and one stab is enough to finish them. Worse, they’re following the route of 'kill the boss, every minion dies’. I hate this trope, I’m sure there’s a name for it. It’s particularly bad in this case because now the white walkers’ impressive numbers don’t mean anything; just kill the extra blue dude with a vaguely Japanese armor and presto! Also, you know, it contradicts what we’ve seen so far including in this very episode.

Despite them walking for ages, Gendry goes back to Eastwatch pretty fast. The white walkers are kind enough to wait for no fucking reason while Gendry sends a raven, the raven reaches Dragonstone, Dany gets ready, and Dany flies to the Wall and beyond. This should have taken weeks, but apparently it happens over a day or so.

Look, when people talk about ‘teleportation’ in this show, we don’t mean that the writers must depict every beat of the trip. We mean that the trip needs to make sense considering everything we know about the setting and the resources available in that world. It doesn’t have to be super accurate either, just not physically impossible like this was.

The white walkers not attacking the group makes the previous Plot Armor evolve to a Plot AT Field from Evangelion. If there was going to be battle anyway, why the waiting? You’re already bending space and time for Daenerys to arrive, so I’m sure there would be better ways to have the ice dragon scene without all this contrivance.

The dragon saving scene would have been awesome if not for all the implausibility that led to it. It’s hard to be invested when you’re already angry and disappointed. The contrivances don’t stop there, and Jon takes two levels in stupidity and keeps fighting all macho when everybody else is safe on dragon back. Also Daenerys loves him for some reason.

That spear throwing was the funniest thing. Congrats to whoever did the dragon animations and noises, though, that was a great job. Emilia Clarke’s nearly-crying face would have been a great start for one of Daenerys’ more emotional moments in the show, watching the death of one of her children. Too bad this is basically all the reaction she’s allowed to have.

Jon got Viserion killed out of sheer stupidity and stubbornness, but somehow Dany loves him even more for that! She wants to wait for him, even if that endangers her other dragons. Back at the Wall, she waits for his return, not perhaps a sign of Viserion. When he apologizes for being the worst, she’s not remotely angry at him. It was “good” that her dragon died, because now she understands. Now she knows that in this show men are always right and women pay a dear price for not listening to them.

Can’t see the narrative goal of leaving Jon behind or him falling in the water. Nobody actually expected him to die, even if he should have. Then you have Uncle Benjen Ex Machina holding thousands of White Walkers on his own, as if that somehow prevents a few of them from going after Jon. This whole scene accomplished nothing but stretching our suspension of disbelief further, as if there was any left at this point.

The walkers somehow put chains on the dragon to pull it. Why not just make the dragon fall on land? Viserion returning could have been cool if: a) it wasn’t a product of a conga line of plot contrivances; b) they didn’t take four years to show us his eyes opening, as if this wasn’t ridiculously obvious.

Daenerys can’t mourn her fucking dragon, she’s too busy finding the Ultimate Man to Listen To. What prompts Jon to decide that Dany is now his queen? Why does he call her Dany? How does Dany know the Night’s King name?

More importantly, why do I still care to ask about all this questions when the answer is “D&D are fucking dumb and they’re hoping we are too”?

Extra notes

Should we start printing Euron’s picture in milk boxes? And what happened to Theon?

Fuck this show, fuckindammit, that was a lot of time and energy wasted just to get angry.

#got negativity #got criticism #antigot #anti got #personal: watching things

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weetiebel · 8 years ago

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GOOD NIGHT CALLS- CHAPTER 8

By @johnlockedslashprincess and @weetiebel

Jon got given a bed to sleep on in the hospital, it was a white pull out one. He had brought his Nintendo DS. Yeah, he was a grown man sat in checkered pajamas next to another man playing on a 3DS, but he didn't care. He wanted to be with Ryan when he woke up. To tell him everything was okay. And while doing this he needed to occupy his thoughts with something, he would go crazy from over thinking otherwise.

Before he fell to sleep that night he held Ryan's hand that was dangling slightly off of the bed and stared. He wasn't lying about being scared, scared Ryan wouldn't wake up, scared that if he did he wouldn't be the same. Maybe he wouldn't remember him at all? He shook his head to make the thoughts disappear, he didn’t need this now, the one and only thing for now was believing. Everything else was something to deal with once the waiting was going to be over.

Jon's phone started to go off, causing him to jump from his compromising position. He turned the sound off quickly from sheer reflex but then remembered it couldn’t wake anyone up.

It was Luke. He picked up after staring at the screen for a few seconds. Was he ready to talk about it?

“Hey Jon, I just heard about the whole Ohm thing.” There was a long silence. The sound of Luke's heavy breathing on the other end made Jon nervous. “Evan told me you had gone to see him. Is he, ya know, okay?”

Jon paused, trying to calm his breathing, his eyes itching as they held back tears. “No,” was all Jon could manage before he heard the raspy strain in his own voice.

“What can I do to help, Jo? Ohm’s my friend too.”

“Tell the guys, please. Ask them if they can spare anything towards anything. God, I don't know Luke.” Jon replied frustrated for no reason. Luke was silent down the other end. Thinking.

“I will, Jon. Don't you worry. He'll get better. It's Ohm.”

“But what if he doesn't? What if he doesn't even remember me and all the shit I've done to him? I want Ryan to be Ryan when he wakes up. I want him to slap me for being a bitch, I want him to kick me for not talking to him till now, I want, I want him to kiss me… I… I want him to kiss me because he likes me. Fuck sakes.” Jon could feel the hot burn of the tears as they rolled down his pale face. God, he wanted Ohm to wake up.

He wasn't religious but he started to mentally prey to all the Gods he could think of that Ryan would be okay.

Luke huffed on the other side of the phone. Jon knew he was desperately trying to find something to make him feel better, but in this very moment there was nothing he could do.

“Do you want me to stay awake with you?”

“Nah, it's okay, just please, ask everyone tomorrow for help. Okay?”

Luke hummed in response.

“Call me if you need anything, I'm here.”

“Gotcha, bye.”

Jon sat there for a minute with his phone in his lap, tears forming in the corners of his eyes.

He was never going to get to sleep.

Three weeks passed by with no change to Ohm’s health.

Susan and Alex came in everyday after school and work to see him, staying for an hour or so, then leaving again.

“Hey, Jo, do you want anything? Clothes? How about you come back with us for a little bit?” Susan mumbled as she got up to leave. Alex was by her side hugging onto her teddy.

“I can't, say if he wakes up?”

Susan looked down at him with defeat in her eyes. “It's been three weeks, and you look as sick as he does,” she commented, not holding anything back. “Just come, have a shower and a meal and then you can come back. It doesn't matter if you're not here when he wakes up, as long as he wakes up it'll be a glorious moment.”

Jon sighed, coming to join them. She was right, he hadn't had a proper shower, meal and was wearing them same clothing he had come in, which was not even a week's worth of stuff.

Susan wondered over to Ryan, kissed his forehead and letting Alex do the same, barely reaching as she stood on tiptoes. “Bye Ry-ry. See you later.”

Jon came over to them, he too planting a kiss on Ohm’s forehead. He didn't want to leave him. He held the kiss longer than the others had, bringing his head only slight back to talk.

“I'll see you tonight. Take care.”

They arrived at Susan's small apartment, it was cleaner than he had expected.

“Uncie, come see my room, it's soooo cool!” Alex screamed with excitement, grabbing onto Jon's top.

“Alex-”

“It's okay,” Jon muttered, his voice strained. Susan frown before letting them go, going to the kitchen to cook. He was so relieved that at least Alex kept being herself after the terrible stuff that happened, it was so amazing to see. And he wouldn’t be lying if he said he needed this like he needed to breathe. To do the normal everyday living like everyone else, to let the little one be excited while he and Sue were losing all of their hopes.

Alex opened the door for a small old dog to come bouncing out.

“This is Buddy, he's Uncle’s dog-dog. I get to look after him.”

Jon smiled, coming to cuddle the soft dog in his arms to comfort himself. “Are you taking good care of him?”

“Of course! Right, Buddy?”

Jon began to snicker as Alex put on an accent, agreeing with herself as she pretended to be Buddy.

She grinned at Jon, coming to hug him unexpectedly.

“Uncie will get better, yeah?”

Jon couldn't quite make out if it was a question or a statement but agreed anyway.

“Ryan's strong, he'll be okay.”

Alex nodded in his arms, staying put as she continued to hug him.

There was a silence as she snuggled into him, the long day at her new school starting to catch up with her. It was almost 10pm, so there was no surprise that she was tired.

Jon lifted her up, as well as Buddy who was still squished in between them, popping her onto her little bed and coming to sit next to her.

She already had he pj's on after coming in them to see Ohm.

She lazily grabbed hold of Jon's hand, cuddling against him, despite them both being on her bed.

“When Uncie comes out, do you think you'll get married?”

Jon snorted, surprised by the random question.

“Can I be the person that gives you the ring thing? I saw one when mama’s friend was getting married.”

Jon started to laugh, the small, barely conscious girl next to him ambition made him happy.

“Sure, you can be the ring girl,” he said cautiously without answering question number one.

“I'll be the bestest one ever.” She looked up towards him.

He was wearing a now sad expression as the thoughts of Ohm never waking up haunted him. God, he needed him to wake up so badly. He still didn’t know what would happen if Ryan wouldn’t make it through. It was almost unbearable to deal with these thoughts.

“Here,” Alex mumbled against him, handing her teddy to Jon. “Delly will make you feel better.”

Jon smiled at her, the innocence of her actions and words bringing him almost to tears in his vulnerable state. “Thanks, baby.”

“Your dinner’s ready Jo, sorry it's only leftovers from ours but…”

“That's okay. Thanks.”

He left Alex asleep, snuggled next to Buddy in her bed.

“I'm going to Ryan's to get you some clothes, if you could just keep an eye on Alex.”

“Sure, thanks for all of this, you know.”

“No, thank you.” Susan mumbled, “I don't know what I would do without the money you're giving us and the help and keeping Alex so happy-”

“You think I'm keeping her happy? You should see how happy I am because of her, she gives me hope that he'll...”

“I know.” Susan came over towards him, unexpectedly hugging him. She sighed, holding him tightly.

“Ryan's always been there for me. Always. When our parents split up and we went to live with our dad he was always like the other parent. Dad and him were so similar. The same kindness. The same smartness. Dad would be so proud of him for looking out for me, for everything.”

Jon stood in shock. Susan wasn't one to show emotion, but when she did it was deep.

“Ryan has always been there to protect me, and here's me who can't do a single thing for him. Since our dad passed away-”

“You're dad?”

“Has Ryan never told you anything?”

“No…” Jon sighed, Ryan never told him anything, keeping everything secret.

“Well I guess he never had a reason to. Our mum and dad split up due to mum cheating and going off with another man. Dad looked after us until we all got into a car accident that killed him. I only had physical injuries, luckily, but Ryan was traumatised by the whole experience that he couldn't even sit in a car for ages, and he almost has a panic attack when anything loud bangs.”

“Like thunder?”

Susan nodded in response, pulling away from the hug they were still In.

She sighed heavily, watching Jon's tired expression.

“Anyway.” She grumbled, her hard guard coming back up. “I better get going, else we’ll be here forever. By the times you eat and have a shower I'll be back, I left a clean towel for you.”

“Thanks..”

“No probl-”

“For everything.”

His deep blue eyes looked at her forcefully. She nodded in response and understanding before leaving him alone in the kitchen.

Susan was right about how long she was going to take. She knocked on the door of the bathroom, being let in by Jon who still stood there in a towel.

“Here, they're Ry-ry’s so they might be a bit big.”

Jon nodded in response, feeling a lot better after his meal and shower. “Thanks, when are we going back?”

“I'll have to pop Alex in the car and you have to get changed, so afterwards?”

Susan didn't seem fazed by Jon as he started to slip his clothing on, towel still hung at his waist.

“I'll get Alex.”

He changed into Ryan’s clothes, his heart aching a bit more with the scent of him all around. He sighed and left.

Delirious felt a ping in his heart when there was no change to Ohm’s condition. He had hoped that he would come back to find Ohm awake and himself and feel the relief of finally seeing him okay. But no, Ohm still laid there, monitors beeping away and a stone expression planted on his face.

“We’ll see you tomorrow.” Susan mumbled, grabbing hold of Jon's arm. “Take good care of my brother.”

He nodded, unable to find strength to do anything else.

Jon sat awake, staring at Ohm’s chest slowly rising and falling. He had got bored of Animal Crossing and Zelda and now sat in silence, watching, as he inhaled the smell of Ohm’s warm clothing that blocked out the smell of the hospital.

He wanted to tell him everything he felt, everything he was thinking. So he decided to write it down, as he knew how shit he was at speaking his mind and feelings.

First, he started like a letter, addressing it to Ryan. This was for him after all. Then wrote down the situation. How because of his crash he had missed Evan’s wedding and flown across the country to be here, how he didn't have to make that choice between if he was coming and how he was glad he had. He then put about the feelings, like how he felt so stupid for everything, how Luke had told him off, how he wanted him to wake up, be alright, how he has never been so scared in his life for somebody else's future and how he didn't know what he'd do if he was gone. How Ryan was his scapegoat and how he had used him, how sorry he felt for it, for banging on about Evan when really he felt so strongly for Ryan. How Susan and Alex were the best people in the world and how Alex had said she wanted them to marry. How Ryan had saved him from being a sad mess by making him so happy and how he hoped he made Ryan happy too.

And how he wanted him to wake up so he could tell him how much he loved him.

He wanted him to wake up so much.

Find the rest of the story on my Tumblr or here on AO3: http://archiveofourown.org/works/7530958?view_full_work=true

#good night calls #GNC #ohmlirious #chapter 8 #FINALLY

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wokethesleepers · 8 years ago

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drown the silence | jon & dany

By the time the sun was rising, filling the east with the pale gold that only the morose North could bask in, Jon wished he would have given it at least one more day. It was a trip which held too much importance for all preparations to fall within the span of a single clock, but it was also a major urgency. There were no guarantees how many of the Free Folk were currently at Hardhome and they all needed to meet face to face with as many of them as possible to increase their chances of success through the sheer power of numbers. There was also the fact that Stannis Baratheon’s return was imminent and Jon was unsure of what kind of victories and demands he’d bring along. If he were to desire his ships back, they would be left with no means of transportation. Many things occurred during the hours that succeeded the establishing of the plot in his Lord Commander study. He’d supervised the return of some rangers, concluding that Castle Black had lost yet another life during the expedition into the heart of harsh winter. Then, he needed to assemble a meeting, to inform the rest of the black brothers of his intentions, and to announce the vacancy for people to join them. Naturally, he was met with avid protests, even more vapid than everything he’d seen before. But, surprisingly, little of it actually got under Jon’s skin. He blamed it on the fact that there were too many things to do in such a short time and, thus, that his mind was simply too preoccupied to become aware of the immense importance of this switch in the balance. He did, however, notice the blood rising to the tips of Thorne’s ears, the bewilderment in the eyes of some of the brothers Jon even considered friends, and he definitely heard all of the claims that he was mad, that was dishonoring the Watch, that they needed a new Lord Commander. In the end, there were around seven more men who agreed to board the ships to Hardhome, Dolorous Edd and Grenn being two of them, putting Jon’s mind to ease. Of course, there was also Sam, who was very vehement in journeying together with Gilly, mayhaps she’d have an input that could only come from one Wildling to another. As much as Jon knew he would have rejoiced in Sam’s presence, however, he knew his friend served best as a voice of reason at Castle Black. There was also the fact that he remained virtually useless with a sword in his hand, leaving him open and vulnerable should any fits of violence break out. Too open and vulnerable. In the end, Sam was forced to resign and admit to defeat, which wasn’t something to be taken lightly seeing how the man had grown to be almost as stubborn as Jon himself in certain instances. With that out of the way, all that was left was a bunch of administrative issues. He had to establish some duties, to pass on the temporary mantle to Thorne, and, of course, to listen to the protests of those he held close, who deemed the action unwise in the lightest words. Despite their differences, Jon couldn’t deny that Thorne was the most able man to task with the weight of leadership in his absence. The man did spew a lot of venom and verbalized his disagreements at every step, but he’s never done anything to disobey Jon’s orders regardless. It was a gamble, but it was his best gamble for now.

The moon was high in the sky by the time he limped to his quarters, weary and with a head that buzzed and whirled endlessly. He collected the remainder of his strength to messily stuff some supplies into a rucksack. His biggest luck was the massiveness of this journey and that he wouldn’t need to rely on his skills of survival in the wilderness throughout. There were merely four hours left before sunrise when he collapsed onto his bed and drifted off to sleep. Despite his tiredness, the agitation that broke through his walls from the courtyard managed to lug him out of his slumber. Satin brought him breakfast straight to his chambers without him even saying a word on his intentions to save time by skipping on a visit to the hall. The boy was definitely skilled in squiring for how mindful he was of tiny details, no matter what some of the other cranky black brothers said. After barely touching his meal, he headed straight for the courtyard, where some of the brothers awaited, Tormund next to them, bindless and surprisingly docile. He hadn’t even put up a fight when Jon had informed him the day prior that the other two Wildling hostages wouldn’t join them because it would simply be an overkill. Coming to a halt next to his prepared horse, he reached a gloved hand upward, gently stroking at the neck of the animal and noticing the way small snowflakes clung to the black leather donning his fingers. He scanned his surrounding, observing that there were four watchmen around, when his eyes picked up the distant sight of a moving, white shadow which rapidly grew closer. After giving Tormund a curious sniff, to which the Wildling responded with a large grin, Ghost silently stepped behind Jon, whose head sank toward the direwolf. “No, Ghost,” he spoke gingerly, running a hand through the fur on his back, glancing into the scarlet eyes that carefully read into every crease of his face. “You stay here, alright? Sam’ll take care of you, boy.” After a moment, he decided to get a start ahead of the rest of the group. In that very moment, his gaze scattered toward the Lord Commander’s tower, almost as if it could pierce through the frozen walls and into the chamber of the woman fostered inside of it.

“We shall ride ahead,” Jon announced to his companions, twisting the horse’s rein between his fingers. “I need to parley with Cotter Pyke and it would do us well to not waste this time idling by in Castle Black’s courtyard.” He climbed up into the saddle, the frost-covered black cloak warmly draping over the back of the horse. The rest of the men followed, Tormund included, who proudly straightened himself in his own saddle. “Edd, you stay behind and lead the others. Try not to make any camps if you will. We should be at Eastwatch as early as the day after.” Edd didn’t hesitate when he gave a nod and Jon responded with one of his own, his orderly expression crumbling and making room to a meek curl of his lips, filled with gratitude.

“Ride well, Jon,” said Dolorous Edd. And with that, Jon set his horse in motion, followed by Tormund Giantsbane and three other men of the Night’s Watch.

Just as intended, Jon and his party didn’t make any pitstops on their eastward journey. Luckily, they weren’t in need of any either, seeing how the weather was tame and relatively warm, helping them to stack up on stamina. They arrived to Eastwatch-by-the-Sea hours after the raven he’d instructed Sam to send had delivered the announcement of their visit into Cotter Pyke’s hands. As for the conversation Jon wished to have, it was as dry as it was important. Mostly talks of manning the other castles of the Wall, of collaborating for better security, some information sharing regarding Wildling activity… Stannis Baratheon had provided several tens of ships, enough to host a few thousands of Wildlings. Despite Jon’s bubbling pessimism, as he stared down at the gentle moving sea, he couldn’t help but wonder whether there was enough of them to house all of the Wildlings they’d bring back from Hardhome. They didn’t spend more than a few hours stationed at Eastwatch. It was mostly them regaining energy after relentless riding, sharing some mead and meat, and Jon rekindling with some old faces from his training days. It was a refreshing company, to say so at least. There were some who were blissfully unaware of all of the controversies he’d managed to surround himself with and shared enthusiastic, warm conversations with him, some he couldn’t even share with Sam these days, seeing how what he mostly did was worry. On the other hand, there were others who did hear of all his ‘mighty’ needs and, without a much-needed context, did little to hide their distaste. Despite Cotter Pyke’s insistences that Eastwatch was empty enough to provide some beds to all of them, there was an unanimous agreement to keep moving instead. Jon boarded a ship separately from the other watchmen, who insisted on keeping an eye on Tormund Giantsbane on their own. At the very least, Jon knew that the man who had joined him weren’t interested in starting petty fights with the Wildling. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have tagged along on a mission that was essentially an abandonment of the Watch’s strongest beliefs. The ship he was on was clearly better adorned and embellished than the others. It was the one that typically housed Stannis Baratheon, he wagered. Because of that, he also determined it was the appropriate location for Daenerys since there were several separate chambers that could adjust someone quite comfortably.

As he idly inspected the various old coins and empty cups scattered throughout his chamber, he finally allowed for his mind to be stolen by thoughts of the Targaryen girl. After this intense race against time, it was the first time he was deflating and occupying his head with something other than their mission at hand. He wondered if she was still coming, after all. No, he contradicted himself stupidly, of course she was coming. A woman as stubborn as that? She wouldn’t go back on her word, not even if she finally did realize what a terrible idea it was. His warm breath smoked clouds into the air. He was now wondering whether she was feeling cold. She ought to be, the East was even crueler than Castle Black, especially so close to the sea. And it would only grow more frigid as they’d venture further into the heart of the North. Numbly, his fingers unlatched themselves from the dusty pendant that he’d found abandoned on a nearby drawer, feeling a small sting of guilt. Perhaps he shouldn’t he rushed his departure so eagerly. She probably figured out on her own that this journey would require warm attire, but was she aware of how much? The more worries he dismissed, the more bloomed in their stead. No matter what he did, he found himself overtaken by concerns and fleeting thoughts. The floor swayed gently underneath his feet, carried by the tender dances of the sea, but the amalgam of steps sounding from above, coming from the crew that was frantically preparing for departure, created a balance that helped him sink into a moment of tranquility without disconnecting himself too much from reality. It was the first time since that moment in his study when he was fully processing the extent of his words. Yet, strangely, he felt no shadows of regret or awe dawning on him. He hadn’t fallen victim to impulses or reckless thoughts. It was his conscious choice, made in full clarity of the mind, and not even looking back on it could persuade him into wishing he would have done otherwise. No matter the consequences or implications, it was nothing more than a token of honesty that he’d felt he owed Daenerys after his flurry of confused emotions had most likely bitten sharply into her flesh. Compared to the time when bewilderment had ushered him out of the library after her lips met his, he couldn’t find it in him to fear the next time their eyes would find each other. Although, perhaps… perhaps that in itself was truly the thing he needed to fear most.

#( thread: daenerys. )#( thread: 06. )

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makerkenzie · 8 years ago

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Don’t start none, won’t be none.

For anyone who’s wondering why there are certain factions of fandom who seem determined to fault the Starks for making decisions that didn’t turn out so well, while also applying the most sympathetic interpretation to the actions of certain Lannisters, here’s the thing. I can’t speak for everyone, but my angle is not to argue that the Starks didn’t have their reasons or the Lannisters have done nothing wrong. I’m pushing back against the assumption of a clear line of Good vs. Evil in ASOIAF with the Starks on the side labeled “good” and the Lannisters with the possible exception of Tyrion designated “bad.” The Starks are not as blameless as they may think. The Lannisters are not a monolith of antagonism, and even the worst of them have their reasons.

For example:

Every shitty thing the Lannisters did to the Starks in AGOT, was reactive, not pre-emptive.

I’ll try to keep this in chronological order.

Bran climbed up to the Broken Tower and discovered the twins fucking. Jaime tossed him out the window, leading to his paralysis and near death. Of course it was horrible, and it was a reaction to the danger of their affair being discovered. The twins did not go after Bran. They did not expect him to show up at that window. They chose that part of the castle for their tryst precisely because they thought no one would find them. Bran’s arrival put them and their children in mortal danger, and they had to do something.

Cersei ordered the slaughter of Lady the direwolf. Was it inappropriate? Of course. Was it disproportionate? Probably. Was it without provocation? From Cersei’s side, her son had been injured by a big aggressive animal, and she needed to make sure it didn’t happen again. If Arya’s direwolf could take a chunk out of Joffrey’s arm, what might Sansa’s wolf do to him later? Especially considering Sansa was the one who’d be spending more time around Joffrey, and thus her wolf would also have more proximity to the prince. It sucks that Lady had to die after she did nothing wrong, but, realistically? It was an effective way to make sure Joffrey didn’t suffer another, more serious injury by a direwolf.

Jaime and his goons ambushed Ned Stark and his peeps on the way back from the brothel. That was a reaction to Catelyn arresting Tyrion. It was also a chance for Ned to admit Catelyn had made a grave mistake, and offer to get her to release Tyrion. Rather than de-escalate the situation, though, Ned doubled down. Because he doubled down, Jaime ordered his goons to kill Ned’s men.

Now here’s the problem I have with the Starks’ decisions at this stage of the story: no matter how you look at it, Catelyn’s arresting Tyrion at the inn was a terrible idea and she should have known better. Not that she should have known Tyrion was innocent; I actually don’t blame her for trusting Littlefinger at that stage. She should’ve known that treating Tyrion like a criminal, without first getting Lord Tywin under control, would have led to retaliation. Ned should have known that. If you want to pick a fight with the Lannisters, you need to do it right. In that case it was the Starks picking a fight with the Lannisters, not the other way around, and they went about it the wrong way.

Therefore, it should not have been a surprise when Tywin Lannister sent the Mountain and his goons to fuck up the Riverlands. Was it disproportionate? Absolutely. Was it unpredictable? Not in the least. This is the same Tywin Lannister who massacred the Reynes and Tarbecks down to literally nothing because they disrespected the Lannisters. In a just society, Tywin would have been executed for war crimes, but that didn’t happen. Jaeherys II did nothing, Aerys II made him Hand of the King, Lord Tytos died, and Lord Tywin became arguably the most powerful man in the Seven Kingdoms after Aerys. Following the rebellion, Jon Arryn gave the Lannisters another advantage by advising Robert to choose Cersei as his queen, and Robert further stacked up Tywin’s leverage against the crown by borrowing millions in gold from him. None of that is Ned’s fault, but we’re not talking about fault here. It’s part of Ned and Cat’s responsibilities, as a Lord and Lady Paramount, to know how to deal with people like Tywin Lannister. I’m not saying they should have just rolled over and let him get away with shit. I’m saying you need to get a cage around that lion before you poke him in the eye. They didn’t do that.

When Tywin ordered the Mountain & Co. to drive a wrecking ball through the Riverlands, it was a reaction to Catelyn’s arrest of Tyrion, and Ned’s refusal to de-escalate. Was it a disproportionate reaction? Absolutely. Even from Catelyn’s perspective, it shouldn’t have been the least bit surprising. From Tywin’s perspective, his dwarf son was abducted by another Lord Paramount’s wife and hauled off for a “trial” at her notoriously volatile sister’s near-impenetrable fortress at the other side of the realm, and Tywin had no idea why. From his perspective, the Starks were attacking his family for no apparent reason. Were there better ways for him to respond? Of course there were, but, again, Lord Now-the-Rains-Weep-O’er-His-Halls has already gotten away with enacting the most disproportionate punishment on anyone who insults his family. He’s not an unknown quantity.

Shit keeps going pear-shaped, and eventually Ned figures out Cersei’s kids are inbred bastards. He asks her to join him in the godswood for a little talk. That, alone, was a bad call on Ned’s part: he thinks “the Lannisters” (including Cersei) were behind Jon Arryn’s death (they weren’t), so why does he think it’s a good idea to show her his cards? Even when Ned tells Cersei he’s got her number, she tries to de-escalate. Notice how she tries to seduce him. It’s absolutely right of Ned not to accept her advances, but it should be a signal to him that Cersei doesn’t necessarily want Ned to be her enemy. She’s open to negotiation. Rather than negotiate and de-escalate, Ned tells her he fully intends to tell Robert the kids aren’t his. The conversation doesn’t end well.

This is where I need to say: Why, Ned? Why in Seven Hells would you do a thing like that? This woman has cuckolded the king with her brother, she was involved in your son Bran’s “accident,” you believe she helped to murder Jon Arryn, and Varys suggested Cersei was trying to goad Robert into fighting in the melee because she was plotting his death. How do you think she’ll react to you telling her time’s up? You think she’ll just sit down and take it? You think you can frighten this woman into compliance by sheer force of personality? No, Ned, that was never going to work. You don’t get people like Cersei Lannister in line with mere righteousness. It takes swords.

It’s hardly a coincidence when Robert doesn’t make it back from his hunt in one piece. Cersei knew she needed Robert dead eventually, but she had to do it sooner rather than later so Ned wouldn’t have the chance to pull the rug out from under her. Having Robert killed as soon as she did was a reaction to Ned telling her about his plans against her. It was a perfectly unsurprising reaction.

So Robert died, Joffrey took the throne, and Ned somehow thought it was a good idea to put his life in Littlefinger’s hands. Cersei tore up Robert’s will, yet, once again, she didn’t want to attack Ned outright. She gave him one last chance to back off and go home to his family. Did he do that? No, he did not; he doubled down again, thinking he had the City Watch on his side, and...time was up for Ned. Cersei’s having him arrested was, again, a reaction to his refusal to back down from the fight.

Then you might ask: but what about Joffrey? What was he “reacting” to when he hired the hit on Bran, and ordered Ned’s execution after promising him mercy? The answer to that is: I don’t count Joffrey as a Lannister. He carries the name Baratheon, he thinks he’s Robert’s son, Robert thinks he’s his son, everyone else tells him he’s Robert’s son, and as such, he makes decisions as a Baratheon. No one in his mother’s family told him to hire a hitman to finish Bran off. No one in his mother’s family told him to renege on his plea agreement with Ned Stark. Even Cersei didn’t want Ned executed. Somebody else told him to get rid of Ned Stark even with his false confession and oath of fealty. It wasn’t in the Lannisters’ interest to execute Ned, and they knew it.

The war got started because of, in this order:

1. Littlefinger and Lysa’s deception,

2. Ned and Cat’s poor judgment, and

3. The Lannisters’ aggression.

#littlefucker started the war #lysa arryn helped #house stark #house lannister #when good characters make bad decisions

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jaydofmo · 7 years ago

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Comic Book TV season opening reviews

Had a good summer? I didn't. I mean, I still had to work and all. Summers mean less post-30. Except for OzCon. That was awesome. I'm not going to be doing these blogs weekly like last year. Instead, I'll write reviews when I wish. Most likely if there's anything I want to say in the midseason finale. I'll certainly be reviewing more than one episode of The Flash this year over at my new blog, Dibny Diaries. The Defenders - The culmination of the Netflix and Marvel shows sees Luke Cage, Jessica Jones, Matt Murdock and Danny Rand unite to defend New York City from the machinations of The Hand. The eight-episode format nearly makes this one of the better Netflix and Marvel shows, except for the sheer number of characters included. Not only do we have the four main characters, but their supporting casts also showing up and getting involved, and while this is done well, it can be a bit much on first time viewing. The plot is not the same high-stakes adventure that we saw in The Avengers, the first live action Marvel team up property. A good reason for this is right in the titles: The Defenders. Defense is preventative, while avenging means something bad has already happened. When viewed that way, the series is more satisfying. DuckTales - Disney XD revives the classic 80s show for the 21st century with a new voice cast (except for Donald Duck, who is still voiced by Tony Anselmo), a new look, and a brand new continuity. The original DuckTales was inspired by the comic book stories of Carl Barks, and while the new version is still proud of the original series, it takes a lot of inspiration from the Barks comics. The double-length season/series opener features Donald Duck leaving his nephews Huey, Dewey and Louie with his Uncle Scrooge McDuck while he has a job interview. Meeting Webby Vanderquack—granddaughter of Mrs. Beakley, Scrooge's housekeeper—the boys get into trouble with Scrooge's treasures, which Scrooge helps them set right, reawakening his sense of adventure. After an adventure in Atlantis, Scrooge invites Donald and the boys to move in with him. The new series so far has introduced many elements of DuckTales lore around fun and exciting plots that are written so well that adults without kids should enjoy it as well. As of the fifth episode aired, we have Flintheart Glomgold, the Number One Dime, the Beagle Boys, Gyro Gearloose and his helper robot, and Magica DeSpell. New to the series is a running plot addressing what happened to the mother of Huey, Dewey and Louie, Della Duck. Fans of fun adventure of all ages should find quite a bit to like about this new DuckTales, so I recommend it. Inhumans - Marvel's third show for ABC was a collaboration between them and IMAX theaters, who ran an edited down version of the first two episodes in theaters for a couple weeks in early September. Now the first five episodes have finished airing. Running into a coup on the moon by his brother Maximus, Black Bolt and the other members of the royal family are forced to flee the city of Atillan to Hawaii, where they must reunite before returning to take back the throne from Maximus. The royal Inhumans can be compelling characters, but their in-character snobbery can make them off-putting. In the comics, the royal family was introduced in the pages of Fantastic Four, allowing a familiar and likeable team to be the conduit to meeting these characters. Inhumans doesn't have this luxury, with the Agents of SHIELD no longer on Earth and no other teams at the TV department's disposal. The series attempts to find ways to make them appealing, but considering this show is only going to have eight episodes and we've finished three and have only five left, this might be asking a lot from the audience to stick with it. Inhumans was originally announced to be a film before it was quietly pushed back indefinitely. This series was announced, and the television budget, despite being high thanks to funding from IMAX, begins to show, particularly on Atillan. Nowhere does it feel majestic or imposing. Lockjaw, the giant telepathic teleporting bulldog looks great, but the budget means we only get a few scenes with him. Inhumans seems doomed to get only one season at the moment. Aside from Lockjaw, there's not a lot that I'm excited about for it. The "give it a few episodes" advice doesn't help when we're looking at a small number of episodes. If you wanted the royal Inhumans in live action, check it out. Otherwise, take it as you will. The Gifted - The Strucker family discovers that their children are mutants. In a world where the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants have vanished, the only chance they have is to join with a desperate band of on the run mutants. The pilot sets up a lot and while fine, doesn't quite have enough time to make us totally get into the multiple protagonists. Thankfully, the second and third episodes gives us more of an idea where the showis going and gives us a much better idea of this world. Perhaps this isn't going to be quite as well crafted as Legion, but this seems to be a worthy X-Men TV series so far. Gotham - This season finds young Bruce Wayne beginning to master the double life of playboy socialite and vigilante he will become famous for in his years as Batman as the villains continue to rise. Gotham finally feels on track as "the Batman show without Batman" finally has Batman. Lucifer - Discovering that his wings have come back, Lucifer tries to remove them permanently while continuing to assist (loosely) with detective Chloe Decker's investigations. Tom Welling joins the cast as Lieutenant Marcus Pierce, who seems to be hiding a few things. Supergirl - While Kara misses Mon-El, life continues in National City, for her, Lena Luthor who has bought Cat Co., and Alex and Maggie who are getting married. Reports are that this season will introduce this generation of superhero TV's Legion of Super-Heroes. The Flash - Cisco manages to break Barry out of the Speed Force, revealing him to now be faster than ever before. Caitlin—hiding her Killer Frost identity—rejoins Team Flash as Cisco and Gypsy work on their relationship, as do Barry and Iris as they prepare to get married. Meanwhile, a new villain—the Thinker—watches the pieces of his plot come into place. Legends of Tomorrow - Finding various anomalies through time, the Legends have the Waverider taken from them by Rip Hunter's new time correction force. After getting it back from him, they convince him that they can help him correct anomalies through time. Meanwhile, a mysterious threat rises. Arrow - With Thea in a coma and Oliver now having to care for his son, things take a turn as a photo revealing Oliver as the Green Arrow is exposed to public, putting him under the eye of the FBI. Riverdale - As Archie's dad recovers from being shot at Pop's, the killer begins to target other people in Archie's life. That's what we've been able to tell from the shows so far. Frankly, I'm enjoying this season. Even Inhumans, though I'd say it's quite the weakest show. Here's some quick reviews of comic book movies that came out since the last blog. Wonder Woman - The first truly impressive DCEU movie features the story of Wonder Woman as depicted by Gal Gadot as Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) arrives on the island of Themyscira and tells the Amazons about World War I. Diana returns with him to find and defeat Ares, the God of War. Wonder Woman finally gives the DCEU an inspirational hero. Henry Cavill's Superman and Ben Affleck's Batman are promising, but their outings so far have rendered them as flawed without really having a victory without a major downside. In Man of Steel, while saving the world, about half of Metropolis is destroyed. In Batman v Superman, Batman makes the wrong judgement call and Superman is killed. Diana sets out to destroy Ares and even though she makes mistakes, she learns and emerges victorious. And it's done with a very good pace and amazing visuals. And furthermore, the message the movie makes is pretty welcome. Spider-Man: Homecoming - The first MCU Spider-Man solo film embraces the high school setting of Peter Parker's (Tom Holland) early years in his career as Spider-Man, being secretly assisted/monitored by Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau). Peter comes across the weapons-running gang of the Vulture (Michael Keaton). Tony and Happy tell him to let someone else handle it, but Peter wants to prove himself. Just he needs to do that and balance his school life, especially if he wants to impress Liz (Laura Harrier). Homecoming is a lot of fun, but also uses some good intrigue to the proceedings with a worthy plot twist. The film clearly links to the larger MCU, but manages to create a world specifically for Spider-Man to exist in on the streets and neighborhoods of Queens. Giving Spider-Man a benefactor and a confidant (who is not a romantic interest) gives us something new that we haven't seen in any of the five previous Spider-Man films from the past twenty years. For once, Spider-Man feels like a young kid. He screws up, but he gets up and tries again. That's really what the character is about and Homecoming nails it. Batman and Harley Quinn - One of this year's DC animated movies finds Batman (Kevin Conroy) and Nightwing (Loren Lester) teaming up with a reformed Harley Quinn (Melissa Rauch) to foil the plots of Poison Ivy (Padget Brewster) and the Floronic Man (Kevin Michael Richardson). It goes for a bit more of a comedic take on Batman mythos while not betraying the characterizations. Some of the humor is a bit more raunchy, including a scene where Nightwing and Harley have sex. Overall, I had fun, but some fans have expressed displeasure. Batman vs. Two-Face - The follow up to The Return of the Caped Crusaders finds Harvey Dent (William Shatner) entering the world of the Batman 1966 TV show. After an attempt to drain Gotham's worst of their evil goes awry, Harvey is transformed into the villainous Two-Face, with Batman (Adam West) and Robin (Burt Ward) going after him. Both Julie Newmar and Lee Meriweather do voice work for the movie as well. Although still campy, the film feels a bit more serious than the old TV show, but it's all right as the audience for the show has changed and is more open to it. It has a good story, fairly good animation (it's still direct to video), and a spectacular voice cast. http://dlvr.it/Pwxkyj

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njawaidofficial · 7 years ago

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How the 'Game of Thrones' Premiere Answered the Show's Most Iconic Moment

http://styleveryday.com/2017/07/17/how-the-game-of-thrones-premiere-answered-the-shows-most-iconic-moment/

How the 'Game of Thrones' Premiere Answered the Show's Most Iconic Moment

[Warning: this story contains spoilers for the season seven premiere of HBO’s Game of Thrones, “Dragonstone.”]

Heading into season seven, all eyes were aimed at a House Stark family reunion. But how many people were considering the ramifications of a House Frey family reunion?

Red Wedding retribution was already on the menu last season, as Lord Walder Frey (David Bradley) suffered an unglamorous and lonely death at the hands of Arya Stark (Maisie Williams) in the season six finale. But Arya’s Red Wedding revenge tour didn’t end there. Game of Thrones returned this year with an opening sequence that serves as a final answer to the show’s most brutal and iconic sequence, an instant all-timer of a scene that’s sure to go down as one of the most satisfying moments in Thrones lore, due in large part to its surprising book connections.

The episode, called “Dragonstone,” begins in the great hall of the Twins, the same spot where the Starks were slaughtered. A very much alive Lord Frey sneers down at his gathered family members, all of whom are drinking and eating and otherwise causing a ruckus. Frey loudly taps his table twice in order to get his fellows’ attention, a move that harkens back to how the original Red Wedding launched.

“You’re wondering why I brought you all here,” says Frey. “After all, we’ve just had a feast. Since when does Old Walder give us two feasts in a single fortnight?”

The old man reveals that he’s “gathered every Frey who means a damn thing so I can tell you my plans for this great house now that winter has come,” and in a certain reading of those words, he’s not lying. But first, a toast. Frey makes all of the gathered members of the family drink a glass of Arbor Gold, a highly valued white wine grown in the south of Westeros. “Proper wine for proper heroes,” he bellows.

When they set down their cups, Frey praises his family as “the men who helped me slaughter the Starks at the Red Wedding.” They cheer uproariously, and Frey quickly quiets them down, greatly changing the temperature in the room.

“Yes, yes… cheer. Brave men, all of you,” he snarls. “Butchered a woman, pregnant with a baby. Cut the throat of a mother of five. Slaughtered your guests after inviting them into your home.”

Frey’s vivid description of how Talia (Oona Chaplin) and Catelyn (Michelle Fairley) died sends a chill through the room. Soon, the chill is replaced with choking, as the various Freys begin gagging and gasping for air.

“But you didn’t slaughter every one of the Starks,” Frey continues. “No, no, no. That was your mistake. You should have ripped them all out, root and stem. Leave one wolf alive, and the sheep are never safe.”

Within seconds, every single Frey hits the floor, dead or rapidly dying from drinking poisoned wine. Frey then reveals he’s not Frey at all, as he rips off his own face and reveals the true killer beneath: Arya. She turns to the lone survivor — Walder’s youngest and latest wife — and tells her to deliver a message to the crown.

“Tell them the North remembers,” says Arya. “Tell them winter came for House Frey.”

And with that that, the episode cuts to the main title sequence, just enough time to process the gravity of Arya’s actions. When the season seven premiere screened in Los Angeles last week, audience members burst out in uncomfortable laughter and cries of excitement throughout the twisting-and-turning scene, and it’s easy to understand why: in an instant, Arya singlehandedly wiped out House Frey, one of the two central families responsible for the most vicious and most memorable mass murder in Game of Thrones. There are still people in Westeros who played a role in the Red Wedding, but in terms of sheer percentages, Arya just carved out a huge portion of the perpetrators. “Winter is here,” indeed.

House Frey’s fall is an exciting prospect on a number of levels, not the least of which is that it blends a couple of key storylines from George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series on which Thrones is based. In the books, there are two major players seeking active vengeance for the Red Wedding. The first is Lord Wyman Manderly of White Harbor, the head of a great Northern house who lost a son during the Red Wedding. He’s since played a politically clean game with the Lannisters, Boltons and Freys, cooking up revenge in secret — literally cooking, too, as he has members of House Frey killed, baked into pies, and served up as delicious pastries to their unknowing relatives.

“The best pie you have ever tasted, my lords,” Manderly tells the Freys at one point in A Dance with Dragons. “Wash it down with Arbor Gold and savor every bite. I know I shall.”

In season six’s finale, Arya served Walder Frey a slice of Frey pie before slitting his throat. Now, as of the season seven premiere, Arya completed the Manderly sequence by poisoning the Frey family with Arbor Gold. Given that it’s a white wine, and given that winter is here, perhaps it’s worth referring to the Red Wedding response as the White Wedding? Certainly comes with a catchy theme song.

Beyond Manderly, Arya is channeling another character from Martin’s novels: Lady Stoneheart, the resurrected form of Catelyn Stark. In the books, the Brotherhood Without Banners discovers Catelyn’s corpse three days after the Red Wedding. Beric Dondarrion (Richard Dormer) sacrifices his final life in order to revive Catelyn, but the person who returns is not the person who died at the Twins. Taking on the moniker of “Lady Stoneheart,” the monstrous Catelyn takes over the Brotherhood and rededicates their mission: rather than helping out small folk, they will instead focus all efforts on wiping out every single living Frey in the Riverlands, as well as anyone with even the slightest affiliation to the Red Wedding.

Lady Stoneheart even hangs Brienne of Tarth (Gwendoline Christie) and Podrick Payne (Daniel Portman) at the end of the fourth book, A Feast for Crows. She demands that they find Jaime Lannister (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) and bring him back for retribution, but Brienne refuses, at least initially. The events of the fifth book heavily suggest that Brienne has had a change of heart, and is now on the verge of putting Jaime on Lady Stoneheart’s vengeful path.

Of course, this version of Catelyn Stark never arrived on the show, and at this point, she never will. Her debut was initially expected at the end of season three, then again at the end of season four, and when it didn’t happen at the end of season five, most fans agreed it would never happen at all. Recently, Martin confirmed the show has no Lady Stoneheart plans; it’s likely that Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss wanted to save its big resurrection surprise for Jon Snow (Kit Harington) conquering death in season six. (We now believe Beric’s role in Stoneheart’s creation could factor into a major Jon moment later this season.)

While Game of Thrones deprived book readers of Lady Stoneheart and Wyman Manderly, both of those beloved characters and their insatiable desire to avenge the Red Wedding live on through the unexpected yet completely worthy avatar of Arya Stark. The North remembers both Stoneheart and Manderly, but even without them, and with Arya in place, winter is very much here.

Now, how much further will Arya’s vengeance tour take her? Will she bring the blizzard all the way down to King’s Landing, as she tells the Lannister soldiers in this episode? Will she decide that it’s time for a proper family reunion, and instead head north toward her siblings at Winterfell? Only six more episodes this year and twelve installments overall left to find out.

Watch the video below for more on the great battles still to come.

Follow THR.com/GameOfThrones for more deep dives, news, interviews and theories all season long.

Game of Thrones

#Answered #Game #Iconic #Moment #Premiere #Shows #Thrones

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bewarethewolfarmy · 8 years ago

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literally.. you missed out the entire meaning of the post dear. i played a whole damn lot of original characters and canon characters, i seen a lot. generally, if an oc has a faceclaim that it's over-used, they are 'bonkers; or 'only copying other ocs with that face' but if some canon character uses the same fancast all over again it's ok. if a canon character becomes canon divergent, it is a good thing, but if an oc changes something in their bio they are deemed 'not stable characterization'

(First thanks for telling me XD It’s always good to know what people honestly mean when they write something and I prefer to not make asumptions but it can be hard. Also this topic is one I think about a lot and getting different opinions is important to get a stronger view of it.

Based on my own personal experience as an online roleplayer for thirteen years, this is my point of view and why I disagree with the assessment in your post. Read-more for length:

-“ generally, if an oc has a faceclaim that it's over-used, they are 'bonkers; or 'only copying other ocs with that face' but if some canon character uses the same fancast all over again it's ok.” While there are some faceclaims that are used very often, primarily based off of the popularity of the faceclaim themselves, the actual hate I at least have seen those muns get over their faceclaims is not based off of being “bonkers” or “only copying others”. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone be called crazy for having a faceclaim; if you have then a) I am so sorry you have had to deal with that and b) it might be important to recognize that not all fandoms are created alike. While MANY are full of assholes (ex-Classic Who fandomer and watcher of the madhouse that is Gotham fandom), many also do not go into a screaming fit about a faceclaim. As long as they are live action if a live action fandom/animated if it’s an animated fandom; now THAT, considering my primary muse had an anime based faceclaim because of an unique aspect of hers, is something I know that fandoms do in shades and will scream about for ocs while also accepting a canon who happens to use an animated faceclaim because they happen to BE Animated (Shalka Master/Doctor was a huge example; I as a DW-primary oc got a lot of hate and dismissal and advice to “change my faceclaim” because my fc was Kanra from Durarara, meanwhile Shalka Doctor was accepted and still loved though because it’s a short ANIMATED episode set has to have animated icons (despite being heavily physically based on his voice actor Richard E. Grant and thus under the same laws should have been made to use his face instead)). I have since changed my fc because I got tired of being hated on for being “a cartoon”. But once more, I really have never seen any oc in any of the massive amount of fandoms I follow (I highlight because I recognize that I do not follow all and I do not see all and there might be many accounts of it; I simply talk on the level of what I see and know of as a roleplayer) and interact with (being a temporal/dimensional traveler is always useful for making new friends) be hated on for being a popular/over-used fc. In addition I’d like to point out that canons do get hurt by using the same faceclaim because that goes into the idea that “all canons are alike” and thus can make the roleplayer feel replaceable because they are for instance an Oswald Cobblepot using Robin’s face but there’s like ten or fifteen others and they are suddenly not special enough to pay much attention to

-”if a canon character becomes canon divergent, it is a good thing, but if an oc changes something in their bio they are deemed 'not stable characterization'“ I would like to bring up once again my canon character Robert James Finn also known as RJ and the argument I still have to have about him being a druggie. I don’t know why I have to do this but I have to constantly remind people that no, RJ does not smoke weed, he is not high, my headcanon for him is as someone who is naturally a bit loopy and immensely intelligent; he admits himself that he often talks the way he does to confuse his enemies which denotes to me someone who recognizes the usefulness of acting a part and his part is the man who no one suspects. Now I don’t get straight hate but does everyone respect my choice in having RJ not do drugs and make sure to actually keep that in mind talking to him? No. And in general “canon divergence” is a very weird term; canon by nature is highly about interpretation. For example: The Doctor and Master. There is many interactions between them since the introduction of Delgado!Master back during Jon Pertwee’s era and especially then the relationship is shown to be a very give and take. There is many points, then and throughout time, where you could say that the Master at the very least is in love with the Doctor and even argue that the Doctor does share this feeling; the famous Mind of Evil “You were within an inch of dying” scene is one of the best examples of evidence for this. BUT similarly there are other interpretations to this; the Master could simply be a sociopath not wishing to lose his best “toy” for example. Which is canon? I have most of my muses as non-hetero, Merrick Baliton being the biggest example; Merrick canonically has never shown interest in boys, only being in love with the princess Shayla, yet mine has fallen in love with and been with multiple males, primarily males at this point. Merrick would be canon divergent and I have no doubt that there are multiple people who dislike my Merrick, my Dillon, my RJ, my Riley, my Bigby (who goes completely against his canon love for Snow by not having her be his True Love like in the comics), my Karone/Astronema, my Sarah or any of my companions’ own interpretations of their muses; people may not be as vocal about it but the fact of the matter is that it does happen. (added while writing the oc portion after this) I can name at least one very good example of an canon who is HIGHLY divergent and has not been allowed to get away scotfree over it; the mun plays an underaged muse from a certain Disney movie involving superheroes and plays them in an incredibly sexualized and discomforting way, to the point that my talking about canon divergence being interpretative? Yeah that doesn’t apply to this guy. His muse regularly from others I have seen gets called out on the disgusting behavior the mun has him engage in and is not dismissed as okay and while there are those who do roleplay with them, I would note that while following them (because I rarely unfollow) I have never seen any of the other muses from his fandom so much as come near him. He is a pariah in his own fandom.

As for ocs being seen as not having stable characterisation, this I can understand but once more I debate the idea that it is so much more rampant than with canons. There are cases in which a mun might change things because they decided they found an easier or simplier way to explain it or because of pressure because of a variety of things (Mary Sue accusations, peer pressure, trigger issues, further education that ended up contradicting something, or simply because their muse did not agree with the mun’s interpretation and they didn’t find out until during a roleplay which has happened to me a lot and is fucking annoying, muses, stop it); these I think are generally accepted, primarily because the change makes sense or the mun explains what they did and why. Now once more fandom-may-vary but even within the DW fandom (which is my go-to “WHAT THE FUCK” fandom in terms of treatment of members by members) a change when it fits well with the character is seen with a grain of salt but does not cause an explosive blowup. On the other hand there are incidents in which yes, there is bad or unstable characterisation; it is almost always bad roleplayers who are creating characters without care to actually making them something to roleplay with. You know the type and no, it’s very rarely the ones who actually get called out about it; it’s weird but they almost always also get away with it because they find people who don’t really care and just want to roleplay with them. They constantly change their muses and while occasional change is something we expect (all muses and all mun change with time), the sheer number of changing is often the bigger issue. Having a character that you cannot keep track of what their past is, not because they have none but because the mun every day or so is changing something, can make for problem in interacting, especially when you are trying to discuss important points about the muse and work through issues and grief but the traumas keep changing or disappearing completely. Stable characterisation in general tends to be a difficult thing to do at times and if someone does throw around the term “unstable characterisation” at an oc, then it’s perfectly right to throw back at them two words: “the Joker”. Then move on because that clown should and can shut down ANY argument about bio changes and characterisation. Just say your oc is the Joker and laugh your head off.

In closing, basically: I do believe OCs have it inherently worse than canons. There are prejudices against them, ranging from not liking the wording of the about page to disliking a specific faceclaim because it’s a person you hate/animated/too attractive/not attractive enough to fearing a pre-established relationship if their about does include mentionings of your muse to not feeling comfortable with certain genders/sexualities to just plain not liking ocs. OCs by nature do have to work harder to get seen and to get people to want to roleplay with them since they don’t have the “advantage” of brand recognition that most canons do. But canons have it tough too, having to deal with whether or not they have the right headcanons, whether or not they are one of a million or one of a kind, whether their primary fandom is tiny or large, whether or not they ship the right ships and hate the ones others hate, whether their faceclaim is okay to use or not, whether they are too divergent or just divergent enough. Canons have to make themselves seen too especially when there are a lot of the same ones. Canons have to work on their bios to explain who they are, why they are the way they are, fill in the gaps and explain the nuances so that they can shine as a character of their own instead of just “Cersei Lannister” or “Newt Scamander” or “Heckyl of Sentai Six” or “Jan Kandou”. All the things you bring up, while I haven’t witnessed any of that sort of stuff, I have no doubt is not just oc problems when I see canons on a regular basis being bashed because their Loki isn’t “right” or their Ivy and Jervis are in a relationship and it goes against the other person’s perception of those characters or their Kimberly is a little too open with her love or their Dean is too out there or because they have a muse that is traditionally straight but in their version is not.)

#long post #about ocs and canons #all the semi-specific examples I gave are real ones I have seen #ones I have witnessed and watched unfold #honestly though #I do appreciate the commentary and addition of other experiences #I just wanted to debate it based on what I myself have experienced and witnessed and feel #lionsire

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goldbergjonblog · 8 years ago

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The Karma Bitch

Karma is a bitch. It's the more realistic, unforgiving twin sister of Mother Nature. It shows no mercy. Karma doesn't live on our same timeline. She will wait you out and get you at any point. In fact I think Karma waited twenty years to get me and, unfortunately, some others had to suffer for my actions as well.

I am somewhat superstitious, teetering on OCD behavior. When I was in my teens I had this internal obsession with the number three. I needed to count in threes, step in threes, make choices based on threes. It got a bit out of control but not to the point where anyone but me knew about it, hence my parents are saying right now as they are reading this for the first time, "I didn't know that about Jon, did you know that about Jon?". My superstitions revolved mostly around sports. Nothing out of the ordinary for any sports nut. Thinking that what I ate, wore, sat in, where I watched and who I watched with had an impact on the outcome of games. My most powerful sports superstition was shared with my Dad and it had to be shared because it took two people to activate the winning formula. We called it "The Noozh" (sounds like you are saying noodge but towards the end of it you start saying the beginning of Jacques Cousteau's first name). My Dad has a very proud and prominent proboscis and when we really need it he'll lean into me and say "noozh" and I will, no questions asked, give it a rub like I'm summoning a genie out of a lamp. Whether it was an Islanders game in overtime, a big possession for the Knicks or the last out for Mariano Rivera, that Noozh has come through countless times. We weren't frivolous or reckless with it, we knew it could not be taken lightly or disrespected. For it to work we both had to agree that this was a moment that needed it and if it were overused it would lose its powers (see Yankees-Red Sox 2004).

Am I a master of the "dark arts"? Debatable. I have a healthy respect for whatever is going on in that world and I generally don't like to mess with it. But where do practical jokes fall into this 4th dimension? I mean there are the innocuous ones like going on someone's email when they aren't at their desk and begin sending a message to the head of the company that just says "fuck you" on it. I would then put the cursor right on the send button. The person would return, sit down, look at the screen, get confused, reach for the mouse and then just freeze. They couldn't move for five seconds for fear of detonating the bomb. Someone would eventually have to help that person move the cursor with the mouse as if it weighed a thousand pounds, essentially cutting the green wire. That is fairly safe but sometimes you get into the mean spirited kind of practical jokes. The ones that got out of control. The ones you still feel bad about. The ones that generally happen when someone named Nathan is involved.

Three things you need to know before I tell you this. I was thirteen, at camp and Nathan was an asshole from Westchester. Just a prick. Okay I was a prick too and I enjoyed pissing him off. He and I had an escalating practical joke war. It started small - food fights, water balloons - kids stuff. But then I upped the ante and decided, with some accomplices, to put his entire bed on the roof of our bunk, which took him an entire day to find and get down. His revenge went too far and broke the rules of impersonal, ephemeral pranking. What I'm saying is he asked for it. While I was off, probably shooting 100 free throws or some insane obsessive activity, he erased about ten of my cassettes. That's right, cassettes. Things you can’t get back when deleted. Paul McCartney & Wings, James Taylor, Eagles and AC/DC (I'm sure plenty of people are thinking good riddance). Not cool. I was pissed. He took this to a new level where it was going to end in tears, either from laughter or pain, hopefully both.

It took me a day or two of scheming like a Bond villain. I wanted something nuclear. I was going to end it once and for all. To basically let Nathan know that you don't want to screw with me. I felt that my pranks were well thought out, sophisticated. Like the bank robber who takes six months to plan the heist, traveling around the world to put together the perfect team; the tech guy, the comms guy, explosives expert, the guy on the inside and the fence who puts up the money. I liked the details of a prank. The bed on top of the roof was not a one man job and neither was what we'll call "spreading the jam". Nathan's prank was thought out like a caveman. "Me erase Jon Genesis tape. Duh." I just don't respect that. There is an art to pranking. Oh and we are talking early Genesis: The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, although I did have a dalliance with Abacab.

Warning: what you are about to read is disgusting, cruel and comes directly from the mind of a thirteen year-old boy who was furious about not having Hotel California on cassette anymore. So beware, skip ahead, go to the next story, hide the kids, but don't judge me, judge the thirteen year-old me.

I put my Goldfinger thinking cap on because Nathan was going to pay. As Nathan was off working on his mediocre tennis game, so he could get back to Scarsdale in the fall and take his junior high school by storm, I looked at his stuff like a serial killer on a scout. Scouring through his bathroom kit, his shoes and his clothes. My good friends/minions, Jon and Patrick were making suggestions that weren't worthy of my ire.

Jon - “Put Tiger Balm in his underwear?”

Me - “Too much of a chance he'll smell them before he puts them on…worse.”

Jon - “Foot powder in his toothpaste?”

Me - “Not bad but I want to haunt him…worse.”

Patrick - “Put dog shit in his shoes?”

Me - “Maybe but...(dramatic pause, maybe the lights even flickered) the dog....what if…?”

And the wheels went in motion. When a dog is in heat, they have certain....secretions and I think the only recognizable one would be blood, but it is a gooey sticky mess when they get excited. We looked over at Birdy, our counselor’s currently in heat golden retriever, as she was curled up in the corner. She was not allowed on anyone's bed due to "her state". I went into psycho mode and walked over to Nathan's bed. I sat on it and started to pat the pillow with enthusiasm. "Birdy, come on girl." My accomplices got exactly where I was going. It was the unspoken language of 13 year-old boys...cruelty. They both joined in, encouraging Birdy. Birdy perked up and scampered over to me. She jumped up on the pillow and settled in for a petting. Then I looked at the horror on Jon and Pat's faces, as they backed away a few steps, which just confirmed to me that this was the right thing to do. All I did was start rubbing Birdy's back, which started the ignition, her leg started moving, she rolled over on to her back. I started rubbing her belly and then things... started... to...happen....on Nathan's pillow, as I placed it on the dog's belly. After about forty seconds, I gave Jon the signal to call Birdy. When she hopped off the three of us looked down on the pillow and, like a dramatic scene from ET or The Goonies where the kids see something spectacular, the camera looking up as their eyes widen and finally resting above their heads, peering down at the alien/creature/body/treasure, we were entranced. This was definitely an alien, because smeared all over Nathan's pillow was something akin to raspberry jam mixed with vaseline (I warned you). We looked at each other and, as adolescent boys do, we celebrated our genius. I calmly turned the pillow over and we left the bunk and went about our business.

That night, at light's out, the twelve campers settled into their beds, the three of us giddy and buzzing with expectation - quick glances at each other with our flashlights to acknowledge the moment. It didn't take long for all hell to break loose. It started with Nathan loudly asking a question to the entire bunk. "What's that smell? Does anyone smell that?" I'm sure someone probably said "your momma”, but that was ruining the moment for us. Then Nathan's flashlight went on and the sheer horror on his face when he turned his pillow over was unimaginable. Think of Mia Farrow when she saw what Rosemary's Baby looked like or the Hollywood producer in The Godfather when he discovered his beloved horse's decapitated head. Nathan jumped up out of his bed and tossed his pillow. The lights came on as our counselor went to investigate. Nathan's eyes immediately went to me. I was calmly sitting up in my bed giving him a "that's what happens when you fuck with me" look. He realized he couldn't play up to my level, he had lost. Eventually the bunk quieted down and everyone fell asleep to Nathan's sniffles and my chuckles. Game over Nathan.

Now that was a bad practical joke in every way possible. But the results and ramifications were minimal. I just had an enemy and a reputation for six weeks at camp. But that was not the worst practical joke, because no one really had to pay. Although I don't really know how Nathan turned out. I have some assumptions - a wealthy upper east side lawyer - okay a very specific assumption.

But did the Nathan practical joke wake up some karmic spirit, who kept an eye on me and basically said "no more”? Did the entity decide to wait twenty years to put me in my place and turn a prank into an international incident? Well, yes. Yes it did.

Twenty years later

I was working on my dream "advertising" job (quotations to be used as a qualifier). I was about to shoot some very cool tv commercials for hockey on ESPN. I was a huge fan and the spots were written from an insiders perspective, so I could get all poetic and shit. In fact, Susan Sarandon agreed to do the voiceover for the spots because she loved hockey and, as she told me, the writing reminded her of Carlos Castaneda. So after beaming from the compliment I immediately looked up Carlos Castaneda.

The shoot had us traveling around the northeast and midwest to work with some of the best players in the game. It was one of those "I can't believe we get paid for this" moments, which in advertising could mean a lot depending on how you deliver the word "this". But this was a positive "this". One of the stops for the shoot was Detroit, as the Red Wings were a dynasty at the time and we were going to shoot during practice and an exhibition game. My partner/accomplice was the nicest, sweetest British woman. Kate was a fantastic art director with impeccable taste and absolutely no knowledge of hockey, which was perfect. I kept it realistic and she made it look nice. Our producer/target, Brian, was perfectly set up for a prank. He was in full business mode, trying to put this big production together. There was very little precedent set for practical jokes during the job, which probably worked in our favor. Detroit, as you may know, borders on Canada and across the river is lovely Windsor, Ontario. Basically an extension of Detroit with less blight and less Kid Rock. Unbeknownst to us, not that it would ever be knownst because we used a travel agent, when booking our travel it became apparent that there were no hotel rooms available in Detroit, which begged the question - are there hotels in Detroit? But there were plenty of room across the river in Windsor, in another country. Passports necessary (foreshadow #1...dun,dun,dun).

In the days leading up to the shoot we had to shuttle back and forth through the Windsor tunnel to and from Detroit. The first couple of times no one paid attention to Kate, who on the initial crossing said, "funny, my passport's expired. I just hope they don't notice" (insert echo effect - notice, otice, ce - foreshadow #2). She actually said this but since this was 1999, we weren't as vigilant or attentive to these facts. Because each time you crossed over you had to show a passport. Sometimes the border guard looked and sometimes they didn't. But each time Kate got a little more nervous. After the third time she mentioned to Brian, "I just wish we had stayed in Detroit. What would they do to me if they noticed the passport was expired?"

"Throw you in jail. Exportation. Firing squad.”

Hahaha. Isn't that funny? (and there's our foreshadowing hat trick).

On the morning of our first shoot day Kate and I had to work at the hotel and drive in later to meet up with Brian and the crew. On our way in to Detroit, after another safe but nervous encounter with the border patrol, we decided to play a joke on Brian. When we got to the arena we called him from the parking lot.

Me (deadly serious) - “Hey Brian, so we have a bit of a situation. It's kind of fucked up”.

Brian - “Umm, okay. Sergei Federov is running late so we're good on time…what?”

Me - “No no no. Kate didn't make it through. They caught her passport, saw it was expired. So...they have her.”

Brian - “.....what? Shut up.”

Me - “What can I tell you? She got caught. They detained her.”

Probably the first time I ever used the word detained. It felt so dire and perfect for the prank. I think Kate even nodded at the word choice. There was a slight pause from Brian but he wasn't biting completely.

Brian - “Bullshit.”

Me - “Look. I'm on my way in, we can talk about it there but they took her passport and they're going to deport her. She's back at the hotel trying to get help from the agency.”

Brian - “Oh fuck. Fucking Windsor.”

And we got him. I am covering the phone and cracking up, nodding back to Kate.

Brian - “So...you're coming in? Can I call anyone? Oh fuck.”

Me - “I know. We couldn't find one hotel room in Detroit?”

Brian - “It's my fault...why didn't she tell me when we booked the rooms? She didn't tell me.”

Me - “Don't beat yourself up. She screwed up. Maybe you could have pushed a bit harder but how could you know. Let's just get through the shoot and try to keep her from getting deported.”

Brian - “Is she okay?”

Me - “Uhh...she's a little freaked out. Look I'll be there shortly and we'll figure it out.”

Brian - “Okay...umm...see you.”

This must be when the Karma Bitch was awoken. A giant alarm clock blaring, her not wanting to wake up but knowing that she can't ignore it because someone was laughing at her, tempting her and they had to pay. So she groggily slams her hand down on the fate tempting alarm. She puts her feet down on the floor, stretches, let's out a morning fart and pulls up her daily log. She sees right at the top that some ad geeks are giving her the middle finger. And then she notices one of those geeks has a record. The Nathan stunt. She stands up and gets ready to go to work.

I hung up completely satisfied that Brian was shell shocked. Kate and I walked towards the arena just imagining the frenzy going through Brian's head. As we approached the ice where the crew was setting up, Kate hid in the entryway. Brian turned and saw me, just milking and cementing the joke a bit. After a few shuffles on the ice he saw Kate step out from the runway and onto the ice. His face went through shock, anger and relief in about two seconds.

Brian - “You fucker.”

The whole crew, aware of the situation, witnessed and appreciated the punking. We made up and went on with our shoot. From this point on you will question this and say "come on, it must have been a different shoot, at least a different day, not the next day. It couldn't have happened". Oh it happened and it freaks me out, and it makes me have huge, universal thoughts. It was as if we went through dress rehearsal the day before. But the next day is when the Karma Bitch looked at the transcript and just said, "Fuck 'em, it's showtime, we'll do it exactly like they said, perfect. Don't change a thing."

We set out for the shoot the next morning, again Kate and I driving in on our own. As we approached the toll/checkpoint, we actually joked about the joke, "wouldn't it be funny if", "what if we...", "Brian would kill us." We did our usual maneuver where I showed my passport and while the guard focused on mine, we slipped Kate's over to him. The theory being they would study mine intently and assume she was with me. We were 9 for 9 up to then. But something must have happened or maybe it's the 9 out of 10 thing, this was the dentist that wasn't choosing Crest. Kate maybe showed some doubt because this particular guard looked a little too close and we saw his eyebrows ruffle and he caught it.

Guard - “You know you're passport's expired?”

Kate - “Yeah, I'm in the process -.”

Guard - “Miss I can't let you through with an expired passport.”

We looked at each other like, no fucking way this is happening. Did Brian do this?

Guard - “You'll have to pull into the station lot and they'll help you out in the office.”

He pointed with Kate's passport to a square brick building across the three lanes. Okay I thought, so they'll help us out. That doesn't sound too bad. We were overdramatizing our prank. How could helping be bad? But honestly all we were really thinking was that we were so totally fucked.

We pulled into the parking area just off to the side of the toll plaza. We were speechless as this was going from ironic to concerning very fast. Cut to the Karma Bitch doing her payback dance/chant - "that's right, who's got the last laugh, who? Who? I can't hear you. Not so fucking funny now motherfuckers". I guess I've cast either Melissa McCarthy or a nemesis from a Pam Grier blaxploitation film as the Karma Bitch.

We walked into the station which looked like a DMV. Just a room with a bunch of people in cubicles behind a long bar. It was fairly empty but there was an air of gravitas to the place. It was silent and sterile. Kate approached and showed her passport. She started to explain herself when the woman stopped her with a look up and a hand giving a stop signal.

Woman (this is where the gravitas comes from) - “You're passport is expired.”

Kate - “I know, we just…"

Kate was losing it as she looked towards me. I took that as an invitation and I stepped over the yellow line.

Me - “I can help out, you see we were -.”

Woman - “Sir step behind the line and don't speak or you will be held as an accomplice.”

And that's what I did (that's the potentially getting shot post 9/11 moment). Accomplice? To what? I wasn't driving a getaway car. But we knew it was serious. The woman told Kate what she had to do. She could not cross the border without a passport, if she tried again she would go to jail. She had 24 hours to arrange her deportation. I'm sorry...her what?. She had to stay in her hotel room until her "arrangements" were made. She had to go back to England and could not return to the US or Canada until she had a valid passport. Fuck Canada. We had spots to shoot and edit in the US. Kate asked a couple of questions but was accepting her fate. We slowly moved back to the car. They escorted us across the lanes so we could turn around and head back to the hotel, the tunnel and the U.S. in our rearview mirror. The line of cars going into the tunnel looked like a tongue sticking out at us in a flash mob like raspberry.

On the ride back to the hotel the conversation was mostly about why she had waited so long and why the hell did we have to stay in Windsor. The blame going back and forth between Kate and the travel agent. But what we didn't talk about was the Deja Vu we had created and that there was an entire crew waiting for us. No blame was thrown my way for awakening the Karma Bitch.

When we got to the hotel we knew we had to call Brian. Since Kate was off calling our office, trying to get help in staying in the states, I had to call him. Now how the hell was I going to do this? This was impossible. You think it's hard to pull of a realistic prank. Try pulling off a realistic scenario based off of a prank the very next day. I called from my room.

Brian - “Hello.”

Me - “Umm…You’re not gonna believe this. They got Kate.”

Brian - “Shut the hell up. We're ready to roll.”

Me - “No. I'm serious this time. They really caught her today. We had to go into the border office -.”

Brian - “And they deported her?”

Me - “I know, I know. But yes, that's exactly right. Well not yet. She has to stay in the hotel and has twenty four hours to get on a plane to London. No bullshit.”

Brian - “Seriously dude. Get to the shoot.”

Me - “I don't know what else to tell you and it's really fucked up but it happened exactly the way we said. She's gotta go. I'm coming to the shoot but she won't be there.”

Brian - “Wait, what? You're not bullshitting.”

Me - “No bullshit. I wouldn't pull the same prank two days in a row. I'm better than that.”

I heard him cup the phone as he spoke muffled, “Prhumpf ssport Kate ghhmskut, ported”. And then there was laughter. Brian was telling our client and our account person what happened, they started to laugh but apparently his face said it all as they abruptly stopped. I could feel the moment over the phone. Brian got back to me.

Brian - “Get down here. Yzerman is ready. This is fucked.”

Me - “As soon as I calm Kate down.”

I might have hung up on him as he was mentioning thousands of dollars and hockey stars and impatient clients and crew but I had to. I went to Kate's cell/hotel room, and had a few un-encouraging words for her. There was a lot of uncomfortable silence. She spoke to the office and the travel agent. The story was that she was booked on a flight the next morning from Windsor to Toronto with a connecting flight to London. She would have the deportation stamp on her as the accompanying paperwork would explain. Then she would have at least three weeks of "dealing with her situation" to try and get back. She'd still be there if this were two years later.

I gave her a hug and headed off to the shoot. As I approached the toll, I had flashes of recreating the scene. I should have distracted the guard more, told some jokes, talked hockey, mentioned that we were about to meer Sergei Federov and Steve Yzerman. It was Canada for crying out loud. Hockey talk is like the go fetch ball to Canadians right? I also thought like a criminal. I could have put her in the trunk, gotten her across and those Canadian bastards could eat our dust. I could've done more. I could've done more. But I had to pay, pay for Nathan.

As I stepped onto the ice and started my long shuffle to where the crew was set up, the silence was palpable. Remember, I am walking across ninety feet of ice in the middle of a completely empty twenty thousand seat Joe Louis Arena, except for a a film crew on the other end of the ice. All thirty people on the crew were staring at me, including all-star and team captain Steve Yzerman, as the story had now found it's way throughout the arena. They were giving me the "here's the asshole" look. And as the Ad guy you're already an asshole from the start, because you're telling them what to do different or can we try this or that. It was truly a walk of shame. It was like the end of a buddy cop movie, where one of the buddies doesn't make it, yet it lacked the heroics. Their eyes were angry, like why is this guy wasting my time angry. Or there were those who liked Kate better and I was the one who lost her. Some looked past me, waiting for Kate to appear behind me, but it didn't happen. There was some elbow nudging, as if there were bets made. If this were a movie, Brian would meet me half way with a smile and then a solid punch to the nose. I would fall hard to the ice and then the blood from the back of my head would pool across the white surface. A truly beautiful shot, maybe from above, as the crew applauded. But that didn't happen. I had to face them all and as I got close enough I just said, "I don't want to talk about it. Let's just start shooting." I guess everyone was relieved that something was said, so that's what happened. It was like I pushed a button. The crew set in motion and we were shooting within ten minutes.

During the shoot the lineup of problem solvers started. Random crew members had some thoughts like -

Sound guy - “I can drive over and get her in my trunk, there's plenty of room.”

Assistant Camera Guy - “I have a friend that works in the immigration office.”

Director (whispering) - “So I was talking to some of the crew and there's a guy who has a boat.”

Now that's a sentence that can never come from a place of legality. If the line was "my buddy has a boat," that's different but "there's a guy who has a boat" can never end in a fishing trip or a nice sail around Lake Michigan. There's trouble written all over it.

Director - “They do it all the time. Wait until around 10pm, hardly anyone's on the water. It takes 15 minutes to get across. We're working on it now. Where to pick her up and all of that.”

I felt like I was in an episode of Hogan's Heroes. Then the client came up to me.

Client - “I may be able to resolve Kate's situation. I...I kinda know Al Gore.”

After the shoot we all gathered at the hotel for dinner with Kate the immigrant. The client was working the Al Gore angle, making some calls, and Kate called off any maritime border crossing or trunk stuffing. Even with the Vice President potentially getting involved, there was a sense of dread. That Kate had fucked up and she had to deal with it. She was handling that end of it. Calling the travel agent and booking her flight home. Ultimately, Gore could not help. Surprising that the Veep, who was about to lose a gut wrenching Presidential campaign couldn't get involved in helping out a British art director with an expired passport. Now if she was caught driving an electric car across the border maybe we had an angle, but this was of no interest to his people. Having run out of options, and time, we said goodnight, some said goodbye to Kate as we were going to drive her to the airport first thing in the morning.

On the long, rainy drive to the airport there was nothing to say. Brian, Kate and I tried to talk about the job, things she wanted us to get on the rest of the shoot, but it really was of no use. For the last half hour of the ride we were silent. We pulled up to the curb and Kate started to laugh/cry as she hugged us. She walked through the doors and we waved as she disappeared into the river of travelers/deportees. As soon as we got in the car, Brian let me have it and I just listened, taking it, because I knew he was right.

Brian - “So you lost our art director? What the fuck were you thinking? Do you have any sense of karma? You don't fuck with karma. Karma is a bitch. Karma will wait you out and win, always.”

We finished the shoot, edited the spots and we waited on word of when Kate would return. Eventually she sorted things out and was ready to come back six weeks later. We ended up loading her desk, actually decorating it, with Canadian items - flags, bacon, postcards, pictures of moose, toys, t-shirts. When she showed up, she cried again. It was traumatic for me so I can't imagine how she felt.

So what did we learn? Don't mess with Karma, because she’s real and she’s a bitch. Don't let anyone convince you to stay in Windsor. Hold out for that room in Detroit. But just in case you do get in trouble at the border, I know a guy, who knows a guy, with a boat.

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