#this is vaguely incoherent word salad in which I don’t 100% cohesively conclude any of my points but hopefully it makes sense 🫠

[neonnoir-ao3]

thank you so much for putting it into words omg

At least in my perspective, Gabriel is at least more easily redeemable writing-fic-wise in the sense that biblical canon has some flexibility and his hatred for humanity is, in short: “I got kicked out by my dad because I refused to bow to humanity and now I'm coming for you bitches so I can take back what is mine". Where humanity is a bystander that's feeling his wrath and did nothing to incur it other than simply exist. It’s also much easier to excuse his methods of psychological torture in comparison to AM because we don’t really know the information given that causes MAD. We can assume it’s some sort of forbidden knowledge about God or something given the context of the series, but there is zero confirmation. Additionally, Gabriel’s plan is more or less pest control. (Also sorry if I mischaracterize him in my stuff too much for your liking lol, I’m trying so hard to make chapter three of SFTD extremely close to canon/even if it diverges a tad for the sake of the preexisting plot he still comes across as canon-adjacent.)

AM, on the other hand, is just... evil. Like the most toxic, vile version of “I think I will cause problems on purpose :)”. Similarly to Gabriel, he is evil created out of and feeds on his loathing of humanity. But instead, he’s out for revenge versus pest control. He’s not here to kill and move on to the next one, but rather is an unempathetic monster that revels in the suffering of others: physical and psychological. He wants them to hurt. He wants them to live in abject agony for as long as possible and to the most extreme degree of depravity. (Don’t get me started on Helen. Even if I wrote semi-canon stuff, it would be an AU to some degree simply because I refuse to write most triggering DD:DNE content)

I’m deviating towards very drastic AUs for AM in order to combat this, but also I adore human!AM stuff anyway —*cough* secretly like older men *cough*—, despite the whole wave of “anyone who makes any sort of human!AM content inherently lacks media literacy and deserves criticism”. Like my dudes: first off, Harlan Ellison’s ghost isn’t gonna come suck you off for defending his work, he infamously hated you. Second, I am actively choosing not to use media literacy and am obviously going out of my way to bend it so I don’t have to. It’s like art: you gotta learn the rules and master them before you break them, and I am literally on track to get one of my degrees in Popular Culture studies. I’m well aware of the content in the story and of AM’s canon self. I am consciously choosing to ignore it.

…would you guys think of me as cringey if I started talking about romancing, fucking, and/or general content regarding the Allied Mastercomputer from I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream? pls be honest