#this is also me just procrastinating on finishing my claudia character analysis meta lol

[luniviravosshipper]

Okay, I was initially going to include some of my thoughts in the tags but I did a quick google search on the symbolism of this flower and it ended up not being that quick so I’m just going to share my findings here.

So, morning glory flowers as symbols have been most prevalent in Mesoamerican, Victorian, Japanese, and Chinese cultures throughout history. I’m not going to go through each because from what I found I feel like if the cultural background of the symbolism of this flower is relevant in any way it’s through the Mesoamerican cultures (also because the specific flower used looks most like the Mexican morning glory to me, which I’ll talk about in a minute.)

Like what was already said, these flowers can represent the cycle of death and rebirth and that’s especially true for some of the Mesoamericana cultures. But additionally, I also found in a few they also can be a symbol of penance and sacrifice.

Which, you know, fitting for Viren.

Also, they were used as a way to induce visions, which again, is pretty fitting for Viren.

Outside of cultural significance, morning glory flowers and their symbolism oftentimes hinges on their colors too.

Blue morning glories for example, like what was shown in the series, are associated with connection, loyalty, and trust. (And I definitely think some things could be said about that and how it relates to Viren and Claudia’s relationship, and what happened after his dream sequence and catatonic episode.)

There’s even some stuff I found that hinted at the blue morning glory in particular being associated with the water element in some cultures, which would be really interesting if true because season 5 was all about the ocean primal and there were definitely connections made between that primal (specifically its arcanum centering around the ideas of control and freedom) and Viren’s arc.

(Unfortunately I couldn’t find any other sources that delved deeper into the supposed connection made between the water element and this flower, and maybe this source was just talking about the separate symbolism of the color blue and how that could be applied to this flower, but it’s still interesting and I wanted to point it out.)

Anyways but to actually get to the point. I thought the ones shown in the series look most like the Mexican morning glory which is actually a perennial flower unlike most other morning glories, but they’re still pretty common. They’re also known as heavenly blue morning glories.

Now, this part might be a stretch ‘cause I don’t think the flowers shown in the series looked exactly like these, but I did discover a specific type of Mexican morning glory that had an interesting name and could maybe relate to the series’ usage of this flower symbol. Particularly, a flower called a blue star or otherwise referred to as a glacier star morning glory.

Hmmm…

Hmmmmmmm…

(I mean, the fact that was the scene where we first saw her with the flower.)

And you know, thinking about how this specific flower is actually perennial…

And how Claudia was holding this in Viren's dream who had to literally die in order to be reborn… When it seems possibly representative of another character who cannot permanently die…

Also, apparently despite being used for medicinal purposes in many cultures throughout history, the seeds of these flowers are known to have some similar chemical makeup to LSD.

Which, well, could also explain Viren’s connection to the flowers through his dark magic dream. (Also kind of recontextualizes what the other source said about the flowers being used to induce “visions” as a medicine. I found this too, although I’m not sure how credible it is, that talked in more detail about how these flowers were specifically used to as psychedelics.)

Also, another fun fact. They're highly invasive. So if we're talking about Aaravos's connection to the flower symbol (which, again, I recognize is a bit of a stretch)...

would also like to point out that the flower Terry picks for Claudia and she has in Viren's dream

bears more than a passing resemblance to a Morning Glory 👀

a plant where each individual flower blooms only once, and dies on the same day 👀👀

frequently a symbol of death and rebirth 👀👀👀