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sonnetnumber23 · 1 year ago

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Good Omens 2 Re-watch. Episode 5.

“You leave me with no alternative” – says Aziraphale to the musician preparing to promise to give him a book for free.

[Love the Doctor Who theme playing in the background, hehe]

“Nina and Maggie are depending on me. They just don’t know it yet.”

First of all, all those jokes about Aziraphale organizing a ball to dance with Crowley are actually very true. And I don’t think he’s doing it just to hold Crowley’s hand – he really wants to see Nina falling in love with Maggie so that he himself could believe that Crowley might open up to him someday at last. Again: he wants to have control over something; he wants to feel that he is capable to make someone happy, and to deal with his own problems himself too.

Secondly, Aziraphale could have just as well made all those people come to the ball – after all he made those men in suits leave his bookshop and never return – but he chooses to negotiate with them, manipulate them, but let them come on their own free will. He’s basically tempting them all, but “They don’t have to say yes,” as Crowley once put it. And Crowley is following him around watching this.

***

I love speeches they do in Hell. :D Dagon in the first season, now Shax. :D No wonder, Crowley was the one to record the greeting message. XD

***

Nina talking to Crowley is so much gentler than when she’s with anybody else. Both here and later when she tells his about Lindsay leaving. You just see how she feels him and relates to him. It’s like it’s easier for her to talk to someone for whom everything is harder than for most of other people. She’s all prickly with Maggie and Aziraphale because quite often they act like the world is a happy place made of rainbows and unicorns with kind people all around you. Compared to that Crowley must seem kind of more real to her, or at least less annoying, huh.

And God, oh God, Crowley’s face after that conversation. How can a person show so much emotion with their dark glasses on?

***

The scene on the terrace of the French restaurant leaves me with a whole bunch of complicated feelings. They’ve probably all been described already, but if I try to lay them out for myself…

The first time I watched I didn’t even pay that much attention to the “smitten” joke, because I was a bit disturbed by how little attention Aziraphale pays to Crowley’s concerns. “You’re being silly” is not the way you should calm down your demon, Aziraphale!

But, as I looked through the gifs later, and now during the re-watch, I came to realize that this moment also shows me that side of Aziraphale that I’ve been trying to feel and describe in these posts.

Now, we’ve got this “smitten” joke, which everyone likes to mention, and it’s great because it’s just in the middle of two POV’s, so to speak.

When Crowley starts talking, he’s damn serious. Though he doesn’t talk directly about all his concerns, he’s still very much in the state where he wants Aziraphale to listen to him, to hear his worries. “I spent last night worrying… He could smite me…” I wonder if little part of Crowley wishes in this moment that Aziraphale would think of the danger he’s putting Crowley in and give in, and give up his stupid idea to hide Gabriel further – at least for Crowley’s sake, and this way Crowley might keep him safe.

But then Crowley happens to stumble upon this unserious linguistic matter – “smote… smited?” – and his whole rant is compromised, as if he is too afraid himself to sound too pleading too desperate. Remember, he did completely the same when he was going to ask Aziraphale for holy water. “Walls have ear… trees have ears… ducks have ears. Do ducks have ears?” – absolutely the same. Poor boy, he just can’t speak seriously about his own fears, the danger he is in. :’( Too nervous, too afraid to ask… T_T

Crowley is known for talking a lot about how he is selfish and values his own existence above all, and yet he is always the first to take huge risks to save others. Like in every single historical minisode this season, and several times in the first season too.

And here he suddenly bares his fears to Aziraphale hoping that the angel would see that if Crowley is afraid then it’s serious and he should be afraid too.

But the thing is that he gets a completely opposite effect.

Aziraphale suddenly feels more confident. He feels responsible, and therefore he feels the strength he needs to carry out this responsibility. We’ve already seen him like this: when he tries to snap Crowley out of his panic after Warlock’s birthday and come up with a plan, at the end of the world in season 1 starting with the refusal to fight the war and further; we’ll see it later, when he “does the thing with the halo” because nothing else and no one else is helping.

And he enjoys it. You can clearly see it while he’s convincing Crowley that he has nothing to fear. It’s not because Aziraphale is oblivious of the danger or doesn’t care about Crowley’s safety. He does, he’s just met Shax after all. He just can’t help and enjoy the feeling of being brave and sure and ready to act and protect – for once. He wants it so much – to feel capable, to feel competent. I wrote in the previous rewatch posts why.

We’re so used to the (head)canon that Aziraphale loves playing damsel in distress and letting Crowley save him. But this season states it quite clearly – if partly as a joke – that he does it for Crowley more than for himself. “Saving me makes him so happy.” That’s a joke, because Aziraphale knows perfectly well that most of those times he did need saving. But whether he does or doesn’t need saving, Aziraphale is always ready to admit that Crowley has done something wonderful. He knows Crowley loves it. And Aziraphale knows he would love it too. “There must be something I could do for you.”

So yeah, maybe he is a bit intoxicated by this feeling, maybe he is too sure and optimistic about Gabriel, maybe his plan is a bit rubbish (though let’s admit – the ball plan worked better than Crowley’s rain plan), but his motives are pure.

[Oh God, I wish so much to finally see a situation where Crowley would have to rely on Aziraphale for something big and Aziraphale will be capable enough to save the day and Crowley…]

***

Should we or do we even have to talk about all the moments where people call Crowley nice in this season? Apart from Aziraphale, there’s Jim and Mrs Sandwich and really Nina would do so too if she wasn’t Nina. It’s so… On one hand, it’s for fans and all, and it works – I do a little delighted noise every time Crowley can’t help being nice and someone mentions it.

[My theory is that there wasn’t enough nice and deep Crowley in S1, so now we’re getting what they owed us.]

On the other hand, doesn’t it sound a bit like foreshadowing to you? Or, like the things we ought to pay attention to. Crowley doing good just because “why not” and because “I do what I please”, kind of proves Aziraphale’s point which is: Crowley hasn’t ever been bad, he deserves Heaven as much as (if not more than) other angels do.

***

I’m really not a fan of Aziraphale messing with people’s emotions. I know he means well, but making people feel fine and even happy while they have all reasons to be upset looks far too much as robbing them of their free will.

That’s a bit like the thing he does with Crowley at the end, isn’t it – thinking he can make him happy even if Crowley doesn’t want it, thinking he knows better what’s best for him.

And this is such a striking contrast with the beginning of the episode where Aziraphale goes to great lengths to get people come to the party on their own free will.

Again, I think this comes from the notion that this time round he’s responsible, he has an idea, and he is so excited to see it work, to be able to save the day. For once. He enjoys being in charge so much, he even asks Crowley to go out so that he can surprise him with the new bookshop look later.

The same comes for the ending where Aziraphale is so happy to be the savior that he doesn’t even listen to the person he’s trying to save.

I can understand him, I know how easy it is to cross this line and not even notice it, especially when you’re feeling euphoric about something.

But of course it was wrong both times. It even reminds of that horrible moment in S1 when Adam makes his friends smile while they’re crying.

***

The whole atmosphere of the ball surrounded by demons is so NeilGaimany, it suddenly feels as if the stakes are higher than you expected. At least for a moment. I must say I like it that in the end it turned out that no humans were hurt after all.

Crowley throwing himself between Maggie and the demons is a moment that makes me jump a little. It’s not Aziraphale, Aziraphale isn’t even around to be impressed, and Crowley doesn’t know yet who those ominous creatures are – and his instinct is to defend the human and to stop something bad from happening.

And oh how much I love the fact that Crowley talks to those demons as someone of a higher rank! :D I love being reminded that Crowley was cool and actually very high-up in Hell. And he still has a lot more power than average demons or angels.

[I really suspect that one of the reasons I liked this season so much on the first watch was because it gave me all my favourite things about Crowley, lol.]

***

Aziraphale looking at Maggie while she and Nina are dancing – there’s so much gentleness and hope, and longing in that face! He wants the same for himself so much. And he hopes for it.

At the same time Crowley is worrying crazy, the whole weight of all these people’s fates on his shoulders. And Aziraphale isn’t listening to him. There’s already a lot of great heartbreaking meta about the way they keep things from each other and then not listening when the other one tries to talk.

I just want to stress how brilliantly the POV in this scene is done: with Aziraphale, we desperately want Crowley to take his hand and dance and talk and appreciate the beautiful thing he’s created to solve their problem (because as Aziraphale sees it, if they fool Heavens, Gabriel won’t be discovered – he doesn’t know yet that Shax has already acted on her threat). And with Crowley, we get frustrated with Aziraphale for not listening, for acting recklessly and putting them all in danger. And at the same time both of them just want to hold hands. XD

And then it’s Aziraphale who puts himself between Shax and the humans (and Crowley). He is confident and I like it just as much as I like cool and bossy Crowley. And when Gabriel volunteers to go out Aziraphale says he will protect him because he promised, and he’s still doing it with his confident, guardian-angel voice, which even sounds a little bit lower than his usual voice. He has it in him – the Aziraphale he wants to be: brave, competent, true to his word. And it comes naturally to him, even though he doesn’t always have resources to keep fighting.

There’s such sad irony that we’ve heard him be like that when he defends the Earth, humans, Gabriel. But we’ve never heard or seen him defending Crowley, have we? We’ve actually seen him defending other things and people from Crowley. Which is just… Uuuugh! Again, it’s all so natural: he sees Crowley as equal, even as someone stronger, cleverer, cooler – so Crowley doesn’t need, can’t need Aziraphale’s protection, not in this way, surely?

I hope so much that we’re yet to see Aziraphale putting Crowley above all else and defending him with all he has. I’m sure Crowley’s going to explode. Or at least I will.

***

[On a side not: I wonder whose clothes were the suit and the furry coat the Gabriel is wearing at the party? :D Did Aziraphale just have them in the bookshop?? Why?? XD]

***

Ahaha, hellish bureaucracy and Crowley’s bluff is just so Good Omens, I love it.

But he isn’t listening to Aziraphale just as Aziraphale didn’t listen to him. :( Well, he’s absolutely got his reasons: Aziraphale has put them all in danger, and after all demons are Crowley’s field of expertise. But still. It leaves Aziraphale again feeling his failure, feeling that he’s just been put back in his place.

I think the joke “saving me makes him so happy” is both a joke and Aziraphale’s little attempt to get back some of his self-esteem before the inevitable battle and after he’s just been put down by Nina. It’s interesting how Nina’s words echo in Shax’s line later in E6 “…Crowley’s moral support angel”.

Earlier I wrote about Aziraphale robbing humans and Crowley of their own free will. So here we kind of see the reason why he doesn’t see how wrong this is: people keep pointing out that he has no will of his own. And it’s a sore spot. Because on one hand he’s spent his whole eternity being told that his opinion and actions don’t matter. And on the other, he keeps relying on Crowley, because he doesn’t find it bad to rely on someone he loves and trusts. Just like he wishes he could rely on God. And that’s why he can’t see his error: he’s doing what’s in these people’s interests, he’s saving them, surely they’ll be happy to entrust their lives and will to someone who loves them?? Aziraphale would be. He always is.

I know some of these conclusions contradict each other but that’s because the characters’ feelings are so conflicted. They feel so much at every given second, and they have so much background that is not easy to shake off.

#good omens 2 #long post #good omens 2 meta #good omens 2 rewatch #they keep getting longer and longer #well at least maybe the 6th won't be that long as i've already said most of the things earlier

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aroaceleovaldez · 3 months ago

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the dynamic of demigods thinking which other demigod is the most powerful is always amusing to me because. like, we know the big 3 kids are all the most powerful. That's just a fact of their universe. And then we know nearly every character views Percy as the strongest demigod, and most people are very rightfully intimidated by him.

and you look at the powers of the Big 3 kids and there's Percy, but then you realize Nico is just kind of objectively more powerful than him but simply chooses to hang out in Percy's shadow like he's Percy's scary dog privileges. Like, the two of them are pretty equally capable of causing multiple different apocalypses. Nico just also has like four different instakill powers and it's not like he doesn't use them. He very much uses them! Not infrequently, even! And they don't seem to take a significant amount of energy from him! And other demigods are pretty intimidated by both of them! But Nico makes a conscious point to keep his cards close to his chest and not let on exactly how dangerous and scary he can be if he wants to. People are already scared enough of him without knowing anything about him and he doesn't like that. Percy doesn't think about that nearly as much, and so usually just goes in guns blazing and that's part of why he's considered a wildcard. And then Nico himself puts Percy on a pedestal, so those who do know more about Nico's abilities then presume Nico knows something they don't about Percy that implies Percy is even stronger than him.

And even on a meta level Nico's narrative role requires him to be functionally more powerful than Percy, because he very often serves the purpose of getting Percy out of situations he can't handle on his own. That's just part of his function as a character! But also narratively he can't overshadow Percy so he just takes a backseat of his own accord and that's very amusing to me.