#tma paranoia arc

[just-an-enby-lemon]

I think a lot about how badly the "I lied on my CV" scene would go with Archivist Sasha. A LOT. Now this is based on some things:

a) The paranoia

• A lot of Archivist Sasha AUs act as if she would be imune to the paranoia arc and here is why I disagree:

1. By being the Archivist and feeding the eye you are automatically dealing with an extended feeling of being watched all the time. Not to mention the Eye is literally a paranoia entity (between it's other areas).

2. While Sasha doesn't appear to have Jon's trust issues she has a need to know at least equal to him and a tendency of theorizing. She was of course right when assuming Gertrude kept the archieves messy on purpose but that also shows that between being very smart she is very doubtifull of any behavior outside the person's normal.

3. In that same conversation ahe mentions how everyone has a mask and says to Tim, likely her best friend, that he is as honest to her as he is to Jon it is just different masks. She is fine with this. She is okay with the masks. But that is before things go wrong.

4. She KNEW Gertrude. That means solving her murder is more personal.

b) Sasha knows her shit way to well

• This one is the real fascinsting thing: Sasha is a master in figuring out people's secrets and keeping them for herself. She knew from the start Jon lied about his age and that Martin lied on his CV. To the point that for her this knowledge about Martin is a fun fact and irrelevant, a thing she keeps from because she knows he would be anxious if he knew she knows. The thing is that translating to the "I lied in my CV confession" we have:

• Paranoid Sasha found Martin's letter to his mother (likely writen as a diary with no intencion to actually send it) and thinks that Martin lied about Trevor being dead.

• She knows Martin lied on his CV and it's meaningless to her to the point she might suspect he knows she knows.

• She knows Martin has a complicated relationship with his mother and that means she would assume it to be very unlikely he would ever write this personal of a letter to her.

Conclusion:

Sasha would probably think Martin is using the fsct he lied on his CV as a diversion and truly has an awfull secret. She would also likely tell to his face she knows it isn't it because Martin's mum would never read or care about his feelings or letters and Martin should know this enough to not even bother to write "so this is likely a codename".

[rice-n-honey]

Jon: my team is concerned about and against my spying on them in their homes. All of them are even more suspicious now. Living in their walls is my prerogative.

[asyipyip]

hold on everyone shut up im getting super emotional about jonathan sims

[pavlovianbells]

listening to the. funny archivist podcast. Johnathan is harecoded and that's all I'm gonna say.

[abyssal-cryptid]

Pictured: two people who had TMA as a special interest and met because of it when one is listening to it again

[the-character-is-proud-of-you]

then im feeling more of them still. so he takes this huge fucking straw and STABS ME WITH IT IN THE SHOULDER and he starts SUCKING THE WORMS OUT OF ME WITH A FUCKING STRAW

how about i tell you guys something funny actually

[myquietsafehaven]

Need me a season 2 TMA au where Jon still goes through his paranoia arc but instead of holding everyone at arms length decides to trust one of his assistants. To bad he chooses Sasha.

[valiantsilver]

jon’s character arc across the five seasons of tma reflects the five stages of the kubler-ross model of grief:

Denial

Paranoia

Moving back in with your ex

Depression

Depression 2

[hrhoffman]

So I finished binging The Magnus Archives

and I genuinely have so many thoughts that I can't even put into words

Spoilers for TMA as a whole, I guess

I'll start with Sasha because I want to do every point that hit heavy for me and if I don't do it in order I'll forget something

The idea of being replaced and forgotten, just, my God. And really, how little of the real Sasha we even got from the whole podcast is tragic. We got so little of her, liked her when we first heard her encounter with Michael, and then, boom, she's gone. Replaced. And as listeners, we Know Something will happen, but you just get that building dread every episode, what will Not!Sasha do? Is there a chance real Sasha could come back?

And by the end, we forget about Sasha because of everything else happening.

Tim was worse for me because as soon as his new arc was building up, I knew immediately there was ever going to be one ending for him. His building anger, his loss of his previous self, the information on his past and how it related to the next big fight they were going to. It was obvious he was going to get blown up as soon as the explosives were introduced.

And we don't get much mourning for Tim, because Jon is in a coma, Daisy is trapped, and Martin is losing himself.

I could go on a whole side tangent about the Lonely, make a list of all those hard hitting lines Martin said.

I'm not enough on my own. Can't get it out of my head.

The finale hurts. I can't stop myself from crying. I keep going back and forth about Jon's character

We watch him make questionable decisions for the entire podcast. His whole conspiracy fueled paranoia and just driving everyone away as if it's going to keep them safe. His final choice to take over instead of Elias

It's selfish, because ok, fuck lemme try to get this in words

Jon and Martin are opposites the whole time, I think

Martin's big speech to Peter and Elias where he says, "I'm not a chosen one" always stood out to me. Because there's times where Jon seems to believe HE needs to fix everything, that HE needs to keep his friends safe, that HE needs to save the world because he is SO SO guilty.

And Martin thinks so little of himself, but he puts so much love in others. It's so sad to see his change in S4 with the Lonely, because it's so distinctly not Martin.

He never stops hating himself, never stops loving Jon. Everything he does is for Jon. He had nothing to live for when Jon was gone.

They are each other's reasons. But Martin could be anywhere with Jon and be happy.

Jon needs to fix his wrongs to make them both happy. Whether that is true or not doesn't matter, because it is wholeheartedly what Jon believes.

And so he believes sacrificing himself to try to fix things will be better for Martin, but he never asked Martin what would actually make him happy.

Martin just wants to be by Jon's side.

And back to the selfish thing, I don't mean it in a negative way. I mean that Jon felt he literally needed to give himself up to atone. Like he had lost all self worth. Like he didn't care about himself.

He puts Martin in the worst possible position.

And I cried so hard at the ending, because I knew that they weren't Somewhere Else. They were dead. It mirrored Gertrude and her assistants, the foreshadowing of their deaths as Sasha and Tim dropped one by one.

There was no happy ending for us. There was no fixed world after what traumatic experience had been unleashed. Jon had to pay for his mistakes, but love caused Martin to go with him. (I think about those last few moments of Martin. Alive. Looking down at Jon's bleeding corpse. The panopticon crumbling around him. Martin knows he will die, but he's just had to kill his only Reason to live anyways)

I can't even say they're happy together in the fucking afterlife because the End or whatever exists and claims everyone. I always interpreted that as Hell existing for everyone after death.

And don't even get me started on the themes of finding happiness and love in the middle of the apocalypse

They just wanted to fix things man. It wasn't even Jon's fucking fault, AND OKAY THIS IS ANOTHER THING

I SWEAR Elias has to be Web aligned I fucking swear the strings he pulled throughout the whole fucking series dude. I think the Eye and Web are pretty close anyways but that Manipulating Bastard FUCK HIM

Jon believes he's done everything wrong, because he refuses to blame Dickhead McGee. Doesn't help that everyone is on his ass the whole podcast, and like, yeah, Jon does some stupid shit but come the fuck on why did the foreshadowing of his slowly worse decisions have to end like this man I can't stop thinking about it

[rainedroptalks]

hello tma fandom i wanna see something

[initial-lime]

I miss the season 2 dynamic of TMA? I still adore the later seasons but idk, Jon’s paranoia arc and how the others at least for a while still seem like friends rather than hostages in proximity

[withoutatrace-pkmn]

Hi!!

✨ - what inspired your character? 👥 - why did you join pokeblr? 💫 - how has your character developed in a way you didnt expect?

ooc: hey!! Tysm for the ask!!

✨: personality-wise, trace is very much based off of myself lmao. In other aspects, they’re heavily inspired by uh… some of my favourite media. Their character and arc has themes of seeking forbidden knowledge, constant curiosity and a need to understand even to their own detriment, as well as some themes of spiritual anxiety and fear of judgement - these themes are ripped straight from Fullmetal Alchemist and The Magnus Archives, with some of the spiritual anxiety stuff coming right from me (catholic high school lol). In terms of character design (what little I have of that), it again takes inspiration from some fanart I’ve seen for TMA which is… all I’ll reveal about their canon appearance for now.

👥: kind of a cop out answer but I joined pokeblr because it honestly seemed like fun! I’d always wanted to do a kind of role play thing so being able to combine that with an interest in Pokémon was really cool!

💫: when I first started this blog I knew Trace was gonna be Fucked Up. the paranoia and religious undertones were a surprise tho. again, rc high school. guess I wasn’t coping with that as well as I thought lmao.

Again, thank you so much for your ask!!💖💖

[best-magnus-archives-character]

Why do you think voting for Jon means being ok with how he treated Tim?

(major tma spoilers ahead)

i think the podcast does a very good job explaining that Jon distrusts and stalks his coworkers because 1. he just found out his predecessor was killed by someone In The Institute, not a monster like he had expected and 2. The presence of the NotThem literally gives him paranoia. like idk if maybe i misunderstood smth but to me it was clear the NotThem was a huge influence on his mental state at the time. Now is that an excuse? No, nor am i saying it is. In fact Jon himself feels guilt when he realizes what he did (or at least it seems to me like he does). And about the work power imbalance- I don't see how tumblr being "the pro worker website" would affect how individuals see a fictional character, but I do think its a disservice to your own point when you point out work dynamics when clearly the main problem was the betrayal of trust due to their friendship. You should google what gaslighting means, by the way. They are coworkers, yes, but they are also friends, maybe that's a wild concept to you but it happens in real life too. And that's what Tim's pissed about. Yes, Jon was able to do what he did because he's their boss, but the problem is the betrayal, and the "cause" for Tim's depression is the PTSD after the Jane Prentiss situation, not Jon. Jon adds salt to the wound, because the person who went through the worst of it with him and should understand how Tim feels doesn't trust him for similarly no good reason. Then he's depressed because of Sasha, and he doesnt have his friends anymore because Jon betrayed his trust and Martin is, from Tim's perspective, taking Jon's side. He's not depressed because of Jon although I'll happily admit Jon did not help at all.

That said, Tim lived a good life before what happened to Danny. He was even fine again for a bit before joining the Archives. His depression arc is painful, but he's not the only one struggling, and I don't think that's enough to say he's more mistreated. Tim gets the ending he wants, and it's as heartbreaking as it is cathartic. He suffers, yes. And it's fine if you think he has it worse than Jon, but to get mad at people for voting Jon because you think Jon is the monster who made Tim suffer seems like taking this a bit too seriously to me???

I mean just look at the whole story. I'd argue that anyone who lives ends up suffering more than the characters who die, simply because they're present for more bad things.

Jon's parents died when he was a child and he was raised by a grandma that mostly tolerated him. Then we have the Mr. Spider incident (whether that's worse than what happened to Tim and Danny is entirely up to personal opinion, I think the way Tim lost Danny is a much sadder story, but Jon seeing that as a child might've left a deeper scar)

It also marked him in a very literal sense, that his entire life from then on was controlled both by The Web and, while he works for the institute, by Jonah. His choices mean nothing in the end and everything he does ends badly. They all go through the Prentiss situation. Tim suffers from Jon's betrayal, and Jon suffers with his paranoia and the constant certainty that he will be killed by his own friends. They all suffer the loss of Sasha, Jon tries to make it right by breaking the table and almost dies. He leaves the man who saved him alone in a room for a moment and the guy dies, he comes back to a corpse. He gets kidnapped multiple times, goes into a coma, comes back into the whole situation that is season 4, where everybody hates him because he's slowly turning into a monster even if it's not a conscious choice (did he ever have one?). The one person who doesn't hate him is avoiding him (Martin). He saves Daisy and even that doesn't make Basira trust him again. He finds a friend in Daisy, someone who literally tried to kill him before, and then Post-Change he has to witness what she's become, and she doesn't even recognize him, only Basira (which makes perfect sense, but I find the scene in which he confesses that made him sad to be heartbreaking). He's also constantly Seeing everyone suffer through an apocalypse he was forced to cause, including the children in Callum's domain.

Then he finds out his whole life he was a puppet, and when he tries to break free of the strings and do what he thinks is right (there was no right answer in the finale, whether you agree with Jon or not, the whole point is that there's no right answer) that's immediately taken away from him and we all know how that ended for him and Martin.

And then, there's people in the fandom who constantly demonize him for his mistakes, while as far as I've seen Tim is a widely beloved character, I'm sure there's Tim haters out there too, you seem to have encountered some from the way you said people blame Tim, I personally never encountered any. So maybe our perspectives on this one will just be opposites because of personal experience, I guess.

Anyway, I genuinely think Jon checks the boxes for both mistreated by the narrative and mistreated by the fandom. And maybe Tim does too! This isn't even Jon propaganda honestly. I'd be fine with either of them moving forward. They both suffer a lot and it's heartbreaking. This Tim propaganda just really rubbed me the wrong way and I wanted to say something. The fact that Jon does carry some responsibility to Tim's pain doesn't exclude Jon's own suffering, so I don't really get your point. And I don't see what you gain by acting like its a moral mistake to vote Jon?

Then again maybe I'm the one who took it too seriously, I don't know.

(sorry for rambling on your post, op)

Round 1: Right Side - Jonathan Sims (The Magnus Archives) vs. Tim Stoker (The Magnus Archives)

[phantomrose96]

"I know how much they've suffered because of this place... because of me."

"I'm making a decision: I trust them. All of them."

[ladynecropolis]

i love season 2 jon every episode ends like ‘ *tape recorder clicks back on* supplemental. today martin told me hes getting worried about my mental health. based on this i have concluded he is going to poison me’

[welcometogrouchland]

Was thinking of who the not-them could replace in the spiral!Sasha au, and came to the realisation that the worst thing you could do was give the not-them A GUN. So, I present to you the horror that is: not!daisy (you can go through the tags for Lore™)

[ID: a digital drawing of two women. One stands in front of the other. The one in the front has a question mark for a face, one hand being her back and is rasing a finger to her lips, with onomatopoeia indicating a "shh" noise is being made. She has long red hair in a low ponytail and wears police garb with a high-vis vest. The second woman stands behind her holding a gun with both hands. Her face is covered in a glitch effect. She has dark hair in a high ponytail and wears police garb with a tactical vest. The two women are coloured with tones of red, orange and white, and an ominous red shadow is drawn across the woman in the front. The background is bright red and has the text "you don't remember what she looks like?" Written in white block letters, with white wiggly lines filling up the rest of the space on the canvas. End ID]

Bonus under the cut: some au related doodles!

[ID: a series of doodles depicting au versions of characters from the Magnus archives. From left to right:

-Basira Hussain holding a gun, saying "where the hell is daisy?!". Her name is written beneath her in yellow block letters and the note "got a trauma haircut" with an arrow pointing to her hair is written next to her.

-a comic panel of Sasha James. Dialogue from someone off-panel reads "Sasha...that's what detective Tonner's always looked like? Are you feeling well? Sasha?". Sasha looks on in confusion, saying "wha...". Her hair morphs into spirals, breaking out of the panel, and a face in profile can be seen leering in the top right corner.

-a doodle of a scene labeled "mag 119: the spiral Sasha remix". Scene depicts Tim stoker covered in flames during the unknowing as Sasha's hand from offscreen pulls him away by his collar. The scene has the note "that's gonna leave a mark" written next to it with an arrow pointing to the fire.

- a doodle from the bust up of not-daisy, a white woman with red hair in a ponytail smiling. Her name is written underneath her with the note "she somehow sucks worse than regular season 3 daisy"

-a drawing of Tim and Sasha from the Magnus archives labeled "season 4 Tim+Sasha". Tim's hair is messy and the left half of his body is covered in burns. Sasha's hair is longer and curling into spirals, and a pink overlay of long fingers is put over Sasha's hand. Neither of them look happy.

-small doodle of Helen interacting with Sasha. Helen says "hello!" With a cheerful expression and Sasha responds "I wish you were dead" while looking fed up.

-a doodle labeled "post buried Basira". She's depicted with longer, more lank brown hair and is wearing a red turtleneck. Lonely clouds sit behind her.

The background is made up of varying shades of red. End ID]