#Hahaha anyone else have an audhd hyperfixation??
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Oh my god this got so long. I swore to myself that I was going to be normal about this and not just dump all of my headcanon immediately but like
Do you ever think about the fact that in the 1950s & 1960s there just were not that many nuclear weapons blueprints out there (and most of the document stealing was done by long term plants, not high risk guys like Curt & Owen)
If you were a spy during the Cold War you were most likely doing regime change. You were arming, training, and supplying coups. You were helping set the stage for American or UK capital to set up shop and repress and enslave Indigenous populations and export every drop of wealth possible from the global south. You were fighting a proxy war against "communism" (which often just meant workers striking for better conditions, at least intially) all across the globe.
With that context I think a lot about the coup in Guatemala in 1954, where the CIA trained and armed the coup and overthrew the democratically elected president of Guatemala (Jacobo Árbenz Guzmán) at the behest of the United Fruit Company. Árbenz was left of center, and he had land reforms planned that would compensate UFCO for their land, appropriate it, and redistribute it to workers. Guatemala offered to pay the value listed on UFCO tax documents (1.2 million), but UFCO demanded 16 million
If I start talking about this I'll never stop, but long story short UFCO had spent 50+ years gobbling up all the land in Guatemala, grew Bananas and exported them for massive profits, and terrorized or outright massacred Indigenous workers to keep them in line. The 1954 coup and the subsequent I think its 36 years of civil war in Guatemala is all down to the CIA doing a coup because the head of the CIA (Allen Dulles) was on the board of United Fruit and they wanted that blood money baby. It was a genocide.
Hard swerve back into it here: I don't know about Owen, but at least Agent Curt Mega had a *very* good chance of participating in the 1954 coup. In creating a literal Banana Republic (a puppet government controlled by US interests). I tend to think Owen was there too because it's more interesting that way. I think it's a mistake to focus exclusively on the Russian cat vs mouse and ignore the larger geopolitical context of the cold war.
Owen "dies" because of Curt's hubris- not just the drinking and talking him into risks he isn't comfortable with, but with his job at A.S.S., because someone else points and Curt shoots. In my headcanon Curt helped to create a banana republic that harmed and killed an incredible number of people, and he is just as careless when he leaves his banana peel on the stairs and "kills" Owen. Curt is absolutely firm in the belief that he is one of the good guys. And I think Owen was prolly the same way- until his body got wrecked and he got abandoned by the man he loved and he had a long, long time to think about the foreign policy of his government and what he and Curt really *did* on their fun lil spy jaunts.
If Owen was in Honduras (where they staged the Guatemala coup), then he has to reckon with the fact that he "died" due to *his own* hubris as well. He has to process that he joined the intelligence game because he grew up during the Blitz, during WWII, but that post WWII Britain was doing the same imperialist bullshit the US was. That Owen wasn't saving the world, he was destroying it. He was crushing half the planet under the thumb of British power. He was enacting the very genocides he joined up to prevent. That's why he wants a world with "no more agencies, no more spies, no more secrets."
So when Chimera offers Owen the chance to undermine US & UK interests, to take the power out of their hands by using and discarding a ridiculous n*zi, Owen just goes for it. I don't subscribe to the Chimera brainwashing theory, I like to think Owen joined Chimera because post-banana he became ideologically aligned with Chimera.
I imagine Chimera pulled him out of the rubble and got him back on his feet, and whispered in his ear about US/UK imperialism. We can argue about whether the ends justify the means, whether he goes too far, whether Chimera has pure intentions (doubt), but Owen isn't just some nightmare monster. He tells Curt "you've been blind" and "no one's innocent." He calls Curt a "caveman" and what is it, an "arrogant brute?" He has a rationale. He believes he is right. He's kind of a dick about it, but he has radicalized in a way Curt hasn't.
I think Owen sees Curt as clinging to cool guy spy shit (and the macho straight guy facade) instead of seeing the world for what it is. I think he probably also thinks about Alan Turing, about the UK arresting gay men- men who had previously been considered national heroes- for doing what Owen does (loving a man). I think he thinks about the US doing an elaborate and very public witchhunt of communists and gay people and anyone else who doesn't conform to good ol American capitalism. I think he insults Curt because he has been through a lot of shit that has changed his perspective, and he cannot believe that Curt *still doesn't see it*
I know there's the whole "DMA killed 1147 people, mostly girls from ages 14 to 22" kickstarter joke, but I'm sorry as much as I love Cynthia it'll be a cold day in hell before I believe anything the US state department says.
I don't think Agent Curt Mega is a perfect adorable babygirl who has never done anything wrong, I don't think Owen is (and has always been) a cruel and sadistic comic book villain. I think these are two men who loved each other in a time where it was very difficult, in a profession where they are literally the property of their respective governments. Where they could be arrested and forced into conversion therapy if they were discovered.
I think they were flawed (Curt cocky and careless, Owen condescending) but loved and respected each other as best they could, and when a massive trauma hits them they break different ways. Curt remains the lawful good, but Owen reframes his sense of right and wrong. I tend to think he did legit torture a lot of people, and even enjoyed it, but I think it was people related to these proxy wars, people related to these coups. People who could advance Chimera's objectives
I think Owen tortures Curt because he hates him, and he doesn't kill Curt (despite having soooo many chances) because he loves him. Owen has so much hesitation in the staircase scene. When Curt brings up their relationship he wavers and his face softens and his gun drops. He brings the gun back up, but despite having Curt at gunpoint for like 3 minutes he doesn't kill him. He hates him, but he loves him. If Curt takes the chance to talk to Owen, then maybe...
But Curt is convinced he is the good guy, which makes Owen the bad guy. And bad guys get put down like dogs. The ideological split is something Curt can't handle, so he shoots and kills his unarmed ex-lover. He just needs a win. He needs it to be over.
I don't have anything against anyone else's headcanon, I think it's a testament to how good Spies Are Forever really is that nearly 8 years later so many people still spend so much time taking apart this comedy musical about gay spies. But for me, it's more compelling if Owen is traumatized and flawed and ideologically opposed to the heroes of our story. I think it's more interesting that Curt kills the man he spent 4 years pining for because he can't accept the possibility that he could be the baddie.
Oh god I have to stop this is too much. But yeah. I've got feelings.
#spies are forever#curtwen#agent curt mega#owen carvour#tin can bros#Hahaha anyone else have an audhd hyperfixation??
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