#jon and his choices and agency is becoming a big thing for me!
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The Crow’s Funeral Snippet: Jon Gets Involved In Local Politics, Regrets It
Annabelle, of course, was standing on the other side of the door.
Slightly less obviously, she was dressed in a finely tailored suit, complete with high heels and a gorgeous dripping silver chain-link necklace. Her hair was tied up in an up-do of braids piled neatly on top of her head, and there was even a briefcase.
She looked Jon up and down critically. He was wearing sweatpants and a holey shirt.
“You forgot,” she condemned, “didn’t you?”
“No I didn’t,” Jon said reflexively. He paused. “Forgot what?”
Annabelle pinched the bridge of her nose. Jon noticed that she was even wearing her usual all-black lipstick and winged eyeliner. “The council committee for London I planned for today. Remember? The one with a representative for each Entity?” Jon stared blankly at her. “There was an invite?”
“Oh, that. I don’t check my mail.” Jon looked at Daisy, who was now pressing aggressively against Jon. “Did you open up any mail recently?” Daisy barked. Jon looked back at Annabelle. “She ate it.”
“...of course she did.”
Written for no real reason besides for the fact that I know too much about my own AU and I care about Annabelle. This story takes place both pre- and post- story: six months after Jon enters London, and six months after the events of the story. We talk about childhood/adulthood, stagnancy/growth, good/evil, and the inherent metaphor of a Nintendo DS. Sometimes...found family...is bad.
Rest under the cut.
In the third month, boiling and bubbling over, someone knocked at Jon’s door.
Not the door to his office. The door to his flat, which had a very large ‘EMPLOYEES ONLY’ sign on it, and was always locked. The employees were, granted, Jon and Daisy, but the message was conveyed. Jon saw the sign in stores and copied it, as he copied many aspects of business models. Jon didn’t quite understand how to run a business, but he had read both ‘What they teach you in Harvard Business School’ - whatever a Harvard was - and ‘What they don’t teach you in Harvard Business School’, so he figured he was set. Daisy had also grabbed him a Girl Scout book on starting your own lemonade stand, which helped more than the other two books combined. Harvard Business School could take notes.
Jon rolled off the bed, where he had been downloading knowledge of string games and trying to figure out how to do them. Omniscence was closer to reading an instruction manual than actually knowing how to do something, but at least that left Jon with plenty of time to learn skills. Even if it wasn’t necessarily his favorite activity - he was bad at a lot of them, which would frustrate him and make him wreck the craft. Daisy kept on saying he needed a hobby other than reading but what did she know, anyway -
Daisy, from where she had been sleeping at the foot of the bed, lifted her head and barked sleepily.
“I’ll get them to go away,” Jon promised. Or eat them. Maybe just eat them.
But when Daisy bristled and jumped off the bed, barking heavily, he knew who it was. Jon sighed, hastily shoving a shirt over his head, and undid the three deadbolts before unlocking the door.
Annabelle, of course, was standing on the other side. Slightly less obviously, she was dressed in a finely tailored suit, complete with high heels and a gorgeous dripping silver chain-link necklace. Her hair was tied up in an up-do of braids piled neatly on top of her head, and there was even a briefcase.
She looked Jon up and down critically. He was wearing sweatpants and a holey shirt.
“You forgot,” she condemned, “didn’t you?”
“No I didn’t,” Jon said reflexively. He paused. “Forgot what?”
Annabelle pinched the bridge of her nose. Jon noticed that she was even wearing her usual all-black lipstick and winged eyeliner. “The council committee for London I planned for today. Remember? The one with a representative for each Entity?”
Jon stared blankly at her.
“There was an invite?”
“Oh, that. I don’t check my mail.” Jon looked at Daisy, who was now pressing aggressively against Jon. “Did you open up any mail recently?” Daisy barked. Jon looked back at Annabelle. “She ate it.”
“...of course she did.” Annabelle glanced down at Daisy, whose fur was standing on end as she growled lowly. “Have you had any success?”
“You would have noticed if I did,” Jon said shortly.
“Have you tried talking to -”
“Yes,” Jon snapped, “but apparently some of us have better things to do than attend meetings and cure dogs.”
Annabelle intelligently dropped the matter, instead frowning at Jon. He crossed his arms, fighting the urge to hunch over away from her dark and perceptive stare. But instead of pushing him, she said, “Go get dressed in something a little appropriate, please. You look like you crawled out of the Buried.” Daisy barked, which Annabelle ignored. “What are you doing to your hair?”
Jon hunched defensively. It was a little matted and frizzy, but who was counting? “Daisy can’t exactly shave it anymore, and I don’t really...know what to do with it...am I doing something wrong? I bathe.”
It was very important to Daisy that he bathe and brush his teeth. Jon didn’t know what the big deal was, but if it was important to her then he did it.
Annabelle just pinched the bridge of her nose again, checking her wrist-watch. “Buzzing your hair is a crime against God, and letting your hair look like that is a crime against me. I’ll take care of this later. Just get ready in the next five minutes, or I’m filling your fridge with spiders again.”
Jon got ready in four. Annabelle didn’t joke around with that stuff.
He didn’t really know what a council committee was. He didn’t know why he had to go to one either, seeing as Jon only tended to concern himself with Daisy. Daisy had been taking up a lot of his concern lately. Then his mood had plummeted again, and in the last month they’ve both been recalcitrant to leave the flat for anything but eating, and he was capable of noticing when he was hunting a little vindictively, and - anyway.
He downloaded the knowledge, and then made a face when it didn’t really help. One of those nasty little political things. What was with his fellow Avatars and politics? Just torture anyone who bothers you. If they were one of those freaks who liked being tortured, then just smite them. Life was easy and very simple once you remembered that basic rule.
But Annabelle was really into it - she kept on saying something about ‘order’ and ‘regulation’ and ‘first dibs’ - and she tended to drag him along into these things. She thought it was ‘important’ that Jon ‘know what was going on’ or something. Jon liked Knowing things, but once you know everything you realize that some things aren’t really interesting enough to know.
When he asked Daisy if she wanted to go with, she feigned sleep. She had been hyperactive lately, compensating for her months of starvation with unbridled and frantic Hunting. Jon had taken her to one of those little pockets where people were running around and screaming all the time, and let her run wild in the rainforest for a while. It was the kind of fun bonding experience they hadn’t had in ages, and Jon had the opportunity to pluck his own grapes from the vine too.
There had been an old man who really hadn’t been happy to see Jon, which had freaked him out a bit. He had started going on a little bit about how Jon had ruined his life, but he only got a few sentences in before a giant, carnivorous plant had eaten him. That was lucky.
Jon had ripped the dimension apart as he left. Nasty little place. Nothing good there.
So Jon left the house without Daisy for the first time since she had been well enough to move around, and with Annabelle. Daisy had been waiting at the door with a rucksack packed with his favorite book and his Nintendo DS, which made Annabelle ask her where the juicebox was. Daisy tried to bite her again. Jon didn’t know why everybody couldn’t just get along.
There was a cab waiting outside, driven by another skeleton, and Annabelle quickly bundled him into it. Jon slouched in the corner and started playing WarioWare as Annabelle leafed through typewritten documents, lips pursing and making notes on the margins of each one with a red pen. She was muttering to herself, somewhat entertainingly.
“My fourth arm for a computer, I swear to Jesus. My fourth and fifth arms. My sixth arm for a computer…”
“Are those the internet machines you told me about?” Jon asked, scribbling his stylus on the screen. Ashley cheered him on. He loved Ashley. “Do council committees need the internet?”
“The internet’s for a lot more than council committees Jon,” Annabelle said tightly. “They’re for video games. Ememoharepeegees -”
“Gesundheit.”
“ - bitcoin mining, instant messaging, online dating, freaking Google Docs -”
“Do you want it back?” Jon asked, bored. “I can make you the internet.”
Annabelle’s pen froze on the paper, hovering over a bullet-point list. “The entire internet? You can just do that?”
“Yeah, sure, whatever.” Jon poked his tongue out his mouth in concentration as he pressed the monkeys in a rhythmic order. Rhythm games were his jam. “That’s, like, the pocket nightmare dimension from Tron, right? I can do that. Addictions are easy. Put people inside, trap them inside a video or something. It’d be mostly for torture but you could probably use it normally.”
Annabelle stared at him, expression blank, for so long it made Jon a little uncomfortable and defensive. What had he said wrong? Daisy was usually good at interpreting these things for him, although sometimes when people went on about ‘violence’ she was just as confused as him. Finally, she said, “No, that’s alright. I always hated Black Mirror anyway.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s a telly - never mind. I don’t want you getting any more ideas.”
***
The council committee was held in the stupidest building Jon had ever seen in his entire life. And he had been in London for six months. He knew stupid buildings.
‘London City Hall’ or whatever was this awful giant, lopsided, obloid monstrosity. All glass and windows, with nary a brick in sight, Jon hated it instantly and severely. He was immediately filled with the urge to turn to somebody and commiserate with them about shitty architecture, but there was nobody else in the cab but Annabelle - and, well, she seemed to have other things on her mind.
The neighborhood around it was filled with a mix of equally stupid buildings and perfectly respectable buildings that looked as if they had been made a long time ago. The sidewalks were relatively abandoned, and the streets were empty of everything but the endless rotation of tourist double-decker busses. Jon knew that this wasn’t one of those districts where people actually lived and roamed - instead, it was one of those business districts that people only stepped inside for work or city business. Like that silly little Palace of Westminster building that Annabelle had taken him to months ago when she was showing him the city.
That building Annabelle had especially loved. It was filled with old white men with sagging jowls and liver spots, looping in endless routines and miniature atrocities. Annabelle had asked him to take as many Statements as possible, and Jon had needed no encouraging.
That had been a strange trip. Normally people found his little monologues boring, because they were idiots with no taste, but Annabelle had listened to every single one. She had been enraptured, excited and triumphant. She had dragged him into some “Lord’s Chamber” or something and posed on the throne as Jon obediently took polaroids. Well, so long as she was happy.
Jon was already seeing that London City Hall was no better. Annabelle dragged him through it, anxiously checking and re-checking her files, as they effortlessly weaved between shambling zombies of old white men in suits. Jon tasted the ripe air of trauma from them - a similar taste to that spiralling academic building, but rather a little more tart - but Annabelle dragged him away before he could stop and eat them.
There were parts of London that were safe. Maybe even most of London - although nowhere was truly safe, not really, not every location was absolutely haunted. The grocer’s was the grocer’s; the chemist still sold your medication. Not that you really needed it anymore, but habit was habit.
But some buildings, which were entrenched so firmly in hundreds of years of evil, could not be dissuaded from their nightmares. In that respect, the safest city in the United Kingdom became the most dangerous. Some buildings had been nightmares even before the end of the world.
Jon, of course, gave very little shits about this beyond in the academic sense. Annabelle refused to let him duck out of her meeting to go snack, and she ended up dragging him in front of what looked like a smallish conference room.
Annabelle stopped in front of it, taking a second to breathe in and out and check her makeup. She seemed to be hyping herself up for it, shaking out her arms loosely. Jon slouched behind her, hands jammed in his trenchcoat pockets. Annabelle had asked him to put on a less raggedy suit, but - well, he sometimes had nicer suits, but they got raggedy very quickly. She had also asked him to leave the trenchcoat at home, but no way. It was part of his Look.
“You’re frightened,” Jon noted with interest. Annabelle was scared of less than he was, and she had much less of a reason. “What about this room scares you?”
“It’s not the people in the room,” Annabelle snapped, flashing her compact shut. “It’s what I’m trying to do. If this world’s going to last more than a few years before it devolves into fuckin’ Mad Max we need leadership. I didn’t put all of this work in just to -” At Jon’s blank look, she sighed. “Never mind. You don’t care. Just - try to trust me, Jon.”
“Of course I trust you,” Jon said, baffled. “Why wouldn’t I?”
She stared at him, expression inscrutable, for a long moment, before opening the door and pulling him in.
It was a nice conference room, all wood panelling and that specific green shade you only saw in lawyer’s offices. There was a large rectangular table in the center, and more than a dozen luxurious chairs arranged around it. There was a big pull-down screen on the far wall. Jon didn’t know what it was for, but he knew that if he downloaded the information it wouldn’t help. Omniscence was so useless.
In a move that horrified Annabelle, most of the attendees seemed to be there. They had been chatting - talking, actually, quite loudly - before Annabelle strode in and Jon slumped in after her. But in the second that they both stepped in, an abrupt hush swept the room, and every eye swiveled to them.
If Jon was honest with himself, he’d say that they didn’t quiet when Annabelle stepped in. He’d say that they quieted when Jon stepped in. That it was Jon who they were looking at.
But Jon didn’t particularly feel like engaging with that. He didn’t like being stared at by people he didn’t know, and he didn’t like being out in public with people he didn’t know. He didn’t enjoy being in buildings or meeting new people, much less going to boring meetings. Jon decided all of this instantaneously, as every eye swiveled to him.
Rooms full of humans were fine. It was just humans. Nothing even vaguely intimidating about that, unless the humans were teenage girls. But these were Avatars - Jon could taste their nature in the air, a sharp and electric tingle - and when they stared at Jon he felt something heavier in their gaze. Oh, lord. There was a teenage girl here.
Jon tried slumping to the back chair, but Annabelle grabbed his collar and dumped him in a comfortable chair to her right. Jon saw a little placard in front of it that read ‘THE BEHOLDING’. Great.
“Thank you all for coming today,” Annabelle said crisply, and suddenly every worry was gone. She was calm, poised, confident, and professional. A perfect imitation of the officials and politicians who once really walked these halls, who passed laws and rubber-stamped policies. She could have passed for an assistant or junior staff member, bright and intrepid and ready to climb her way up the ladder. “Are we all accounted for?”
It seemed so. Every chair but one was filled. When Jon peered around at the placards, he saw that each one had a different Entity on it. One of the seats had no placard, and was occupied by said teenage girl. Four were unoccupied: the Spiral, the Slaughter, the Hunt and the Extinction.
Annabelle sat down in the head chair, which seemed just a little fancier. She put her folder in front of her, eyes flickering down the room. “It seems that Helen couldn’t make it. The Hunt duo seem to have...recently met unfortunate ends. The Slaughter Avatar called ahead to say that they couldn’t make it - it was high school picture day? And...I suppose the Extinction Avatar still doesn’t exist.”
She glanced at Jon, who shook his head. “Do you want one?” Jon asked. “I can go find a climate change denier in this building and make one for you.”
That also disturbed Annabelle, as well as everyone else. Jon abruptly felt awkward, and hunched in his seat. He defensively pulled out his DS, his plans to fall asleep in the back of the room already foiled.
Above him, Annabelle continued droning. “Still, I appreciate you all coming. I know that we haven’t all gathered since a bit after the apocalypse began -” Wait, they had? Since when? “ - but I hope we can agree that further coordination is necessary. We’ve already begun having serious territory and jurisdiction disputes, and it’s best that they’re resolved sooner rather than later.” Nobody looked very impressed, but Annabelle looked seriously at them all anyway. “I want us all to have an equal voice at this table. Save the fighting for another time. And please try to keep your powers out of here. I’ve already sworn to avoid using any of my Mother’s gifts in this room, and I hope you all can do the same.”
“Yeah?” A woman drawled. She was unfamiliar to Jon, like most people in the room, but she had a teenage girl sitting next to her who seemed to be paying rapt attention to Annabelle. “How are you going to enforce that?”
Annabelle stared at him for some reason. Jon jabbed at his DS and won the Mona minigame. Nothing more was said.
“Alright, then. I’ve already collected motions from all of you prior to this meeting.” Motions? Annabelle hadn’t said anything like that. Maybe it was on the invitation Daisy ate, but somehow he doubted it. Annabelle looked down and traced her finger down to her first point. “Many of you suggested this, so I would like to introduce it as a general discussion. Territory disputes, apparently, are a point of contention between many of us.” She opened her briefcase and pulled out a large map, and if Jon looked over the top of his DS he could see that it was a map of London. She also pulled out a red marker, uncapping it. The sheet was laminated, and there were already circles and markings all over it. “We’ll go one at a time. Amherst, you’ve motioned that the Stranger is intruding within Camden.”
A foppish looking man on a dumb little top hat scowled, as the young woman sitting behind the Strange placard looked annoyed. “It is gentrification. Every apartment complex occupied by artist studios are stealing food from the plate of my insects.”
“You haven’t had Camden for a decade,” the Stranger woman said, rolling her eyes. The Omniscience informed Jon that her name was Sarah Baldwin. Vaguely familiar - had he seen her at a cafe? “Nobody lives in those rat-infested tenements anymore. Now all the rats are performance art. Which is us. Get over it.”
“What is performance art -”
“Motion for no more Avatars over the age of 40,” Sarah Baldwin said. “I hate how Amherst and Wakely are in this room.”
“I wish I could second that,” Annabelle said, to the great affront of two grimy old men, “but unfortunately we do have to deal with this. Amherst, I’ve heard several complaints from other council members that you’re infiltrating their territory.”
“I am made of bugs -”
Jon checked out after that.
Instead, he surveyed the room a bit. Nobody in it was really interesting, just a meaningless collection of self-important people. The only person in the room other than Annabelle who he recognized was Oliver, who was sitting at the very back doing his best to fall asleep. When Jon Stared at him a bit he took notice and subtly waved. Jon shyly waved back. Jon liked Oliver.
Oliver mouthed something adjacent to ‘what is wrong with your hair’, offending Jon grievously. He didn’t look that bad, did he?
He glanced to his left, then down, to ask Daisy’s opinion, but he realized too late that she hadn’t come with him. Stupid. She could have come as part of the Hunt - they didn’t have anybody, it wasn’t as if they could complain. Not to Jon, anyway.
But she wouldn’t have wanted to. Daisy hated being an Avatar, for reasons that Jon had just never understood. She tried explaining it to him a long time ago, trying to talk about how guilty it made her and how much harm she had done, but it had just confused him more. She had tried to explain up until the end, as Jon had grown more and more angry at her for her refusal. He had never understood.
She had stopped talking about it lately, though. Which was good. Jon didn’t know what he’d do if she starved herself twice. He wouldn’t have tolerated it.
Daisy had told him that the most important thing in the world was to make your own choices. So he let her make hers. No matter how much he hated it.
The others weren’t familiar at all. There was a woman with wild dark hair sitting behind the Dark placard, which confused Jon slightly until he decided that they likely hadn’t wanted to send the thirteen year old. There was this really wrinkly and gross old man for the Vast, a younger looking but older feeling man for the Buried, a deathly pale woman for the Lonely, the muscular woman and the teenager for the Desolation...why did they have two…
The teenager was staring at Jon. She had intense orange eyes, the kind that bored into you and never blinked. She looked away every few seconds, as if she was being subtle, but when her gaze drifted back to him again he met her eyes with an unimpressed stare. She squeaked and looked away firmly, hiding behind her curtain of long red hair.
Okay. Whatever. Kids were weird. Jon was glad he had never been one.
Jon swapped out WarioWare for Pokemon SoulSilver, opening back up where he left off catching another MissingNo. His entire team was full of the things. He wanted a Mareep, damn it.
Finally, Annabelle rapped the table sharply and said, “It’s agreed, then. Everybody submit specific written documentation of your territory by city block, and fax it to me by our next meeting. Please abide by the resolutions to the conflicts we discussed here. Any objections to moving onto our next order of business?”
“I have an objection to the Dark’s questionable behavior,” the Buried guy rumbled. He was dripping dirt everywhere. Why didn’t anybody complain to him about his hygiene? “In the words of the lad Brody, they are kill stealing. If they do not withdraw their nightmares from our embrace of the Earth, we will unleash retribution with extreme prejudice. The dirt is a holy place, and we will not be polluted by -”
“Oh, stick your shovel up your fat ass, Wakely,” the woman with wild black hair said. “People aren’t afraid of the fucking dirt, they’re afraid of the darkness in the tombs. Walk into a mausoleum sometime.”
“You poach the End’s territory now too, wench?”
“Please leave me out of this,” Oliver said.
“If you call me wench one more time, you’ll be watching the back of your eye sockets for eternity,” the woman said pleasantly, “so royally fuck you.”
“Um, not to interrupt, but that’s not really how it works,” the teenager said, and the death glares between the two turned on her. She hunched her shoulders, but her expression stayed firm. “The terror is going to overlap. That’s just how it is. The Buried and the Dark are not entirely...separate things, they’re gradients that overlap. If you get all finicky about what belongs to who, then you’re just going in circles…”
“The last thing we need is the coward Messiah of the Eternal Flame telling me how to worship my god,” the woman snapped.
“Watch your fucking mouth, Manuela,” the muscular woman said flatly.
Then they were glaring, and Wakely was saying something else snide, and Manuela was making another dig at the teenager as the muscular woman bitched, and Jon abruptly wanted them all to shut up.
“You’re being too loud,” Jon said.
The entire room shut up immediately. The teenager opened her mouth, but the pale woman caught her eye and shook her head.
Annabelle clapped her hands in the silence. “Onto the second motion, then! Infrastructure! Right now we are sorely missing a great deal of essential city infrastructure, and it’s becoming a huge problem. We’re still figuring out what’s mystically maintained, and what’s just being maintained because the humans haven’t figured out how to stop doing it yet, but there’s some work that’s being neglected. The Vast has motioned to reinstate the postal system.”
“Vetoed,” the Lonely woman said.
“You can’t do that,” Annabelle said blankly. “We need to vote.”
“I’d like to make an argument for the motion, dear,” the Vast man said, making Annabelle’s eye twitch. “My argument is this: Amazon Prime is so convenient!”
“We have every Amazon warehouse under our control,” the representative from the Flesh said. He was...very fleshy. “It’d be no issue to go back to production.”
“Jared has a point. The Eye’s been feeding through Amazon for years,” Annabelle said thoughtfully. The mention of the Eye piqued Jon’s attention, but then he finally ran into a Mareep and he stopped paying attention again. “We can tap into the people who are living 1984 and get them back in industry.”
“Can we begin producing again?” the Desolation woman asked, interested. “We have all these people miserable at work, but nothing’s actually being made. If we let a little reality break into the nightmares…”
“Wouldn’t that be dangerous?” the Lonely woman asked sharply. “It’ll make it easier for them to escape.”
“They all escape eventually,” Sarah Baldwin said. “They all break out in days to months. We can afford a little more permeability if we actually get things working again.”
Then conversation was off and running about something that Jon didn’t really care about, so he checked out again. He didn’t know what all of this production and infrastructure stuff meant. Going Postal meant that he had a very good understanding of a mail system, but he didn’t have a personal interest. Who he would send letters to?
Jon quickly downloaded what Amazon was. Oh, that would be useful. Wait, he could get any book delivered to his door? Without having to go out hunting for it? How would this work without the internet - a catalogue?
Everybody seemed invested in getting the internet back up, except for the two hundred year olds. Jared kept saying something about porn, whatever that was. If enough people felt like Annabelle, then maybe they would make it a priority. Jon didn’t know how he felt about that.
He didn’t know how he felt about the fact that it was impossible.
But everybody - or most people - genuinely seemed excited about it. They even seemed to be working together, intent on the same goal.
Sarah Baldwin wanted to know if we have enough people constantly under camera to have footage for television. Maybe we could get cable back up? DVDs were a lost cause, but if we could just start airing the VHS tapes…
Annabelle had a look of hook-ups (literally) in the film industry, maybe they could do something like that?
The Hahns are highly involved in production and distribution, Jared pointed out. There was no need to produce food, but if we wanted to increase access to goods it might be possible.
Why? Why did they care? This world provided them everything they needed.
For some reason, Jon felt a little defensive. What did they need all of these things for, anyway? All of this entertainment - cable and movies and internet. The world had books. What was so wrong with books? There were even old VHS tapes liberated from charity stores if you really wanted to get fancy. The most high-tech electronic Jon had ever found was the DS in his hands and a couple of games, which Salasea had given to him as an exotic artifact. Only Salasea owned these things now: trinkets and curiosities, hallmarks of an antiquated time.
What was the point of these supply lines? People didn’t need to eat or shop or consume. Nightmares provided the facsimile, and since they got a little crazy if they never ate they were provided the security of food. Buying towels and shoes and toys...it was a waste of time. People had towels. Nobody outgrew their shoes or wore them out. Children’s toys didn’t break, and anything that made happiness a little easier to come by was discouraged.
Nothing was ever subtracted. Nothing was added. The world was frozen, captured in the amber of time, and it would never move backwards and forwards.
They knew this. Didn’t they?
“We have to make this place livable for us,” Annabelle was saying. She spoke oddly intensely, with a fervor that Jon had seen in her a few times before. Annabelle didn’t like to give off the impression that she cared about things, but once you knew her it was hard to miss. “It’s easier than ever to stay powerful and feed our Forces, but that doesn’t mean we can grow complacent. We have to work together to eat sustainably. To live sustainably. If we don’t try to rebuild, at least enough to get the world moving again, then we’re sentencing ourselves to a boring and decrepit eternity in a world we will all see die within our immortal lifetimes.”
Everyone at the table was nodding. They looked determined. United. Almost...they held an expression that Jon just couldn’t name. An emotion he didn’t understand.
He had seen it in Daisy, once. She had called it hope. He hadn’t understood back then. He still didn’t.
“Liar,” Jon said, as his minigame timed out and the game over music tinkled across the tinny speakers.
Annabelle looked at him, expression inscrutable. “These problems are legitimate, Archivist. The writing’s clearly on the wall, and -”
“You’re all so stupid,” Jon complained, and Annabelle abruptly stopped talking to glare at him. Whatever. Jon had lost all patience. He closed his DS and dropped it on the table, resigning himself to talking. Jon hated public speaking, especially in front of so many people he didn’t know and, frankly, creeped him out. “You can’t build anything in this world. If you try to impose a cute little government then it’ll break down into cannibalism or something.”
“Would you know, Archivist?” Jared asked evenly.
“Jonah didn’t enact this world through myself for living,” Jon said, bored, and everybody stared at him with wide eyes. “We created it for suffering. Suffering isn’t living.”
“One might say the opposite,” the Vast man said, somehow twinkingly. “Suffering is an unavoidable side effect of living, isn’t it?”
“Is that philosophy? I don’t understand philosophy.” Jon wasn’t very good with anything that required extensive and complex thought. Which made sense - Jonah hadn’t exactly created him to think. “Humanity has clouded your minds. Makes all of you irrational and sentimental. Release your attachment to the old world. Just accept the way things are now.” Jon shrugged. “It’s not as if you can do anything about it.”
“Nobody in this room is exactly human, Jon,” Oliver pointed out placidly.
Jon snorted. “Wanting free porn back? You’re all dripping with it.” It was honestly a little sad. “The only ones in this world free of that weakness are Jonah and I. And he’s the only one who could do any of this.”
“Then where is he?” the Desolation woman snapped. She leaned forward, hands gripping the table in anger. The teenager watched her anxiously. “Why doesn’t he come on down from his high tower and explain what’s going on? We’re in the fucking dark here!”
“I’m sorry,” Jon said coldly, “who are you?”
He rubbed his bad hand. For some reason, everybody watched him do so. He stopped, self-conscious.
“Prejudiced remarks aside,” Manuela said. She had been hostile all day, but she now spoke cautiously. “Jonah Magnus needs to take responsibility for this. We don’t even know how the world ended.”
Several people glanced at Annabelle, whose lips thinned. “I shouldn’t say.”
Of course she knew. And of course she wasn’t about to tell him. Whatever. Jon didn’t care. Past was the past.
He found his hand clenching. There was a strange tension in his throat. He didn’t care. He didn’t. Rehashing the worst pain he had ever felt in his life, even now, wasn’t really worth the time or energy. He didn’t care.
“No use crying over spilled milk,” the Vast guy said lightly. “But it is a relevant question. Jonah frequently spoke of his plans, and I realize now that he had never truly shown all of his cards. But he had always held an intention to...well, rule. It’s only in this moment of his victory that he shows no interest.”
“Jonah’s busy,” Jon snapped. “Trust me, you don’t want that arse around. He never even gives me directions, and I’m his right hand.”
“Or his puppet,” Sarah Baldwin muttered.
It was fair. Probably even true. So why did an intense and burning fury shoot through Jon?
“What gives this child the right to dictate us?” Wakely demanded. Jon’s hands clenched on the table until his knuckles turned white. “What gives Jonah Magnus the right to rule us?”
“He’s not much of a ruler,” Amherst grunted. “My vote’s that we rule this world in a council.”
“Administration is important,” Annabelle said, impossibly terse, “but unless anyone here actually has the means to seize control, then there’s no use voting on it.”
“There’s only one Avatar here who has those means,” Manuela said darkly, crossing her arms and looking straight at Jon. “So why doesn’t he do anything?”
They were feeding on each other. They wouldn’t have said these - these treasonous things by themselves. But when one person spoke up, the next felt empowered, and they felt as if they outnumbered him. Jonah Magnus was hardly there to press him into obedience - why buckle under his oppressive gaze? What could he do?
The stupidest people in this world all gathered in one room. It took a special level of arrogance, pride, and stupidity to assume that one was more powerful than Jonah Magnus.
“I’m not in charge of anything,” Jon said tersely. “I don’t even have a domain. I’m just trying to live my life.”
The Desolation woman snorted. “Typical. You’re rolling over for Jonah.”
Jon’s eyes widened - not in surprise, but in anger.
The teenager seemed a little uncomfortable. “Jude,” she hissed, “I don’t think -”
“Jude,” Jon breathed. “So that’s your name.”
He was standing up. Jon didn’t remember standing up. Everybody was leaning away, their own eyes wide. Some just looked confused, slightly perturbed - Wakely, Amherst. Others looked ready to bolt - Manuela, the old man from the Vast. Jon knew, in a flash of insight that grew hotter and hotter, that he preferred to be called Simon.
“Sit down, Jon,” Annabelle said, as authoritative and no-nonsense as ever. Normally he’d listen to her, respecting that she usually knew what was going on far better than he ever did. But the words barely reached him, drowned out by the rushing in his ears. “Look, we can talk about this rationally, alright?”
“Oh, fuck off,” Jude said. She snorted, burning red eyes never leaving Jon’s. “As if I’m scared of this baby prick.”
“Maybe we can move on from Jonah Magnus,” Simon said quickly. “A discussion of airspace rights, perhaps -”
“Jon,” Oliver said, voice creased in worry, “are you okay?”
“This is the all-powerful demigod you all warned me about?” Amherst said. He was dripping with condescension, just like - just like everyone else - “He’s little more than a child.”
“Guys!” the teenager’s voice rang through the room, close to scared. “The walls are melting!”
So they were. It was as if the stone and wood was made of wax, sent guttering by a sputtering candle. Wood and finish were already pooling on the floor, melting the rolling wheel of Jared’s chair and forcing him to jump up from it.
“Jon!” Annabelle said sharply. “Don’t throw a tantr -”
The table cracked sharply. It was warping, twisting in on itself as if it was a wrung towel. Jon realized, too late to care, that his hair was rising. He knew his eyes were spinning, an eternal churning wheel.
“Fuck this, meeting adjourned.” Manuela stood up sharply, pushing her chair back into a melting bubble. The floor was beginning to bubble and warp. “See you all next month.”
“I’ll walk you out,” Simon said quickly, standing up too.
“You have two minutes,” Jon said, voice heavy with static. “Don’t bother me about this shit again.”
The signal was clear enough. Jude rose from her chair, grabbing her teenager’s elbow and pushing her out the door. The others followed in their wake, expressions carefully neutral. It was useless: Jon could taste their fear, their trepidation. Even better: their anger, barely brindled fury, and disgust.
They couldn’t do anything about it, Jon thought giddily. No matter how much they hated or were scared of him, they couldn’t do anything about it. Jon was powerful. Jon couldn’t be hurt. Jon couldn’t -
Jon couldn’t reign this in.
Before he knew it, the conference room was empty. Only two other people remained: Annabelle, expression as inscrutable as ever, and an uncomfortable Oliver. His hands were stuck in the pockets of his pea coat, and he was looking around with disaffected interest - as if he was standing in line at a Starbucks in rush hour instead of in the epicenter of a melting building.
Jon knew. The entire building was dissolving. It was teeming with humans, lost and trapped and defenseless. He didn’t want to kill them. Jon didn’t like hurting people. He heard a voice speak in his head, foreign and familiar. Bring it in, Jon.
But he couldn’t. His hair would fall back around his shoulders, and the static rushing through his ears just wouldn’t abate. It felt like everything was pouring out of him, a relentless faucet that wouldn’t stop churning out thick streams of putrid water.
Jon fisted his hands in his hair, groaning. “Where’s -”
“She’s at your flat,” Annabelle said calmly. “Do you want me to get her?”
No. No, this was too embarrassing. He was an adult, he could handle this. Jon groaned again and sank into his seat, saved from the toxic waste of glass and brick. “No. Focus on getting the humans out of here.”
“What do you care?” Oliver asked, vaguely curious. “You don’t seem that fond of humanity.”
“Just do it!” Jon snapped, instead of admitting that he didn’t know either.
Eventually, the room stopped melting. Jon didn’t even want to think about how difficult it would be to leave the building. He could probably straighten out the hallways just enough to help Annabelle and Oliver get out.
Ugh. This place had sunk straight into Helen’s domain. He could taste it in the air: any future human who wandered in would be stuck in an endless spiral of twisted, melted hallways. Probably flavored with...powerlessness and fear. Feeling very small, as someone very large loomed down on you. Tories.
At least he hadn’t sucked flattened the building into one plane again, robbing it of all spiritual and metaphysical dimensions. Jon had done that to a graveyard once. The place was putrid now. He had accidentally fallen into a grave and panicked and - anyway.
He rested his forehead on the warped and splintered conference table, waiting for his throat to open back up and the rushing in his ears to die down. Finally, after what felt like forever, his hair floated back down and he felt his eyes resume their normal shape.
Awkward silence loomed. Jon sighed. “Sorry.”
“I worked hard to arrange this, you know,” Annabelle said.
“Yeah.”
“I am not happy with you, Jon,” Annabelle said.
“Sorry,” Jon said miserably. “I didn’t mean to.”
“I mean,” Oliver said, after a beat, “that’s kind of terrifying. That you can melt a building on accident. Like, what would happen if you got really pissed at Manchester or something?”
“Goodbye, Manchester,” Annabelle muttered.
Jon lifted his head, glaring blearily at Oliver. “If you think that’s crazy, you should have been there the one time I opened up an extradimensional gate and unleashed nightmare terrors into the world, rendering all of humanity immortal and eternally trapped in endless infernal hellscapes.”
Oliver shrugged, conceding the point.
But Annabelle just looked thoughtful. Probably reworking five billion plans, knowing her. Jon didn’t want to know, because he didn’t care. Let her do whatever she wanted. None of his business. Hopefully, after this disaster, she’d keep it out of his business.
Finally, she asked, “Was that true? That there’s no moving us forward?”
Jon sighed. He really didn’t want to talk about this anymore. But if he didn’t tell her then she’d just bug him about it later, or find some way to get the information out of him that would be both convoluted and unpleasant. “I’m not saying that people can’t...live their lives. They’re obviously still going to work and typing in every digit of pi into their spreadsheets for eight hours and then going home to stare, hypnotized, into cable television. But I am saying that there’s no achieving more than that. There’s no going backwards, and there’s no going forwards. The past is closed to us, and so is the future.” He eyed her warily. “If you have any cute time travel ideas, forget it.”
“I would never,” Annabelle said innocently.
Yeah, sure. Liar. Jon scowled. “You’re all hampered by your humanity.” When Oliver opened his mouth, Jon just shook his head. “Even Avatars are still people. We’re all conduits for eldritch Forces, hollowed out to serve as a live wire for their power, but we - you all remember a human life. You care about things. You have relationships. You love. It makes you weak. Some of you don’t even like your lot in life - some part of you aching for something familiar, when you felt genuine happiness instead of the cheap facsimile induced by causing pain.” Jon looked down at his hands, reflexively picking at one of his many scars. “You should be more like me. You’d be more focused.”
“Are you capable of...changing, Jon?” Oliver asked curiously. “Or will you be this way forever?”
“Most of Annabelle’s plans hinge on that not happening,” Jon said, not even aware it was true until he said it, “so I suppose we’ll find out.”
Of course, Jon knew what Oliver had tactfully not said. He had wanted to know if Jon would ever grow up. They all thought he was a child, even Annabelle. Jon had the feeling even Daisy did, sometimes.
It was stupid and they were wrong. Child would imply adult, would imply birthday parties and learning to talk and learning geography. Jon didn’t have to learn geography. He knew geography. He didn’t age. He was born being able to talk. Jon was above all of these things. He was mature. And even if he wasn’t, who cared?
But Annabelle just smiled at Jon, a polite mask. Annabelle hadn’t made a genuine facial expression in - well, longer than Jon’s memory. Or maybe that was the wrong way to put it. Maybe it was more accurate that she never expressed an emotion that she didn’t mean to. “Well! That wasn’t entirely a disaster, was it? I think next time could go really well. Don’t worry, Jon, I won’t drag you out of bed again.” She propped her hands on her hips. “Now, the three of us are going back to your flat and doing something about your awful rat’s nest.”
Oh, lord. This was going to be terrible. “Do we have to?” Jon whined.
Annabelle smiled again, but this time it was so dangerous that Jon couldn’t help but quail. “My spiders are collecting the avocado oil and coconut oil now. My best friend in secondary had 3C hair too, I think I know what to do. Oliver, bring the buzzer, scissors, and satin wraps.”
“Three cee?” Jon asked, confused. “What’s that?”
Oliver grimaced. “Why am I involved in this?”
“Because I don’t know what to do with a guy’s hair, and you’re probably the only guy I’ve ever met who knows what to do with hair? Keep up.”
“I’m feeling pigeonholed, but fine. But we are not buzzing that hair. It’s a crime against god.” Oliver looked thoughtful for a second. “I think Jon would do a nice, loose afro. I think I still have some hair masks and vinegar rinse -”
“Why is this so complicated?” Jon asked, completely freaked out. “What are these things?”
But Annabelle just smiled sweetly at him, reaching out and squeezing his shoulder. “Don’t worry, Jon. I’ll teach you what you need to know.”
Well. It seemed easier than figuring things out for himself. Jon didn’t like responsibility. Today was his first taste of responsibility in ages, and he had already decided that it sucked. Better to let somebody who actually cared take care of it.
That way, he didn’t have to be powerful. Didn’t have to be anybody’s demigod on Earth, capable of murdering whoever he liked. He could just be Jon, Private Detective, Archivist. He could have fun. Just live. Didn’t he deserve that, despite everything?
He stood up too, summoning a shaky smile for Annabelle. “So you aren’t mad about me ruining your meeting, then?”
“Water under the bridge,” Annabelle said. “Now come on, we have to stop by the chemist’s and pick up a decent hairbrush.”
Hairbrush? What was that for?
****
Six months after time resumed its course
Jon opened his mailbox, only to find mail.
Suspicion immediately loomed. Jon didn’t get mail. Not due to any kind of impossibility, but just because he didn’t pay bills and none of the mimic junk mail was brave enough to try their luck with him. Maybe invoices, sometimes, but mostly those were dropped off in person. The invoices were scarier than the finger-biting mimics: he still didn’t quite know how they worked. Sasha kept insisting they were important, but Sasha also insisted face masks were important. She didn’t know everything. That was Jon’s job.
He grabbed the singular envelope anyway, elbowing his door back open as he inspected the envelope. Thick, rich, and creamy, it reminded Jon uncomfortably of Annabelle’s party invite from a while ago. In the front, he saw that it was addressed to...Agnes?
The living room was noisy and busy, entirely due to the recipient of the letter and her brother. They were playing Mario Kart on the Wii, and apparently disowning each other. Jon watched Agnes hit Gerry with a blue shell, slightly bemused, and saw Dry Bones spin out into the center and make a pitiful noise. Baby Peach loomed supreme.
Jon almost felt bad interrupting. An opened bag of chips scattered dust around Gerry, and Agnes had a half-empty pack of uncooked hot dogs next to her. They had both been at this for a while. “Agnes, you got a letter. And try to keep it down, Sasha’s working and Daisy’s sleeping.”
Agnes turned around, half a hot dog hanging out of her mouth like a cigar. She swallowed it quickly, holding out one hand and letting Jon give her the letter. She frowned down at the front, ignoring the way Gerry craned his head to take a look, and when she checked the back she frowned deeper. There was a wax seal, its details out of sight to Jon.
“Is it that time already?” Agnes muttered, putting her controller down and letting the parade lap on the screen continue.
Gerry frowned too as Agnes carefully broke the seal. “Is that from…?”
“Yeah. Weird, though. Guess it’s about time for the follow-up to the emergency meeting.” She pulled a letter out of the envelope, embossed on creamy paper. She scanned it quickly. “Downing street this time…”
“Are you going to go?”
“Well, it’s not as if Jude can,” Agnes said diplomatically, refolding the paper.
Jon cleared his throat, making the kids jump. They had half-forgotten he was there. Far too late, Agnes hid the invite behind her back. “Care to explain?”
“Oh, you know,” Agnes said vaguely, casually tossing the invite behind her shoulder and letting Gerry snatch it out of midair. “It’s the invite to the Avatar council meetings. I think they’re held once every three months, but since months are a theoretical concept it’s occasionally hard to tell..”
“Not these days,” Gerry said excitedly. “It’s cold! The leaves fell!”
“The leaf thing is dope,” Agnes agreed. “Anyway, I should go. I have, like, serious words. I already submitted ten motions. I want to run for Treasurer, but Jared keeps saying that anybody who isn’t old enough to open her own bank account shouldn’t be treasurer.”
“What on Earth are you talking about?” Jon asked blankly. Was this some kind of youth league? Baseball? Was this baseball?
Abruptly, Agnes looked very sketchy. “I...it’s really nothing you’d be interested in.”
“I am interested in everything,” Jon said. He was offended beyond all belief. “Don’t keep secrets!”
“Jon’s not a big fan of secrets,” Gerry stage-whispered. “Did Annabelle say that we shouldn’t tell him or did she just say not to bother him about it?”
Agnes abruptly started sweating wax. “I can’t remember.”
“Now you have to tell me,” Jon said flatly.
They gave up very quickly. Teenagers loved hiding things, but they also loved drama and spilling secrets. “It’s the Avatar council meeting thing,” Gerry said eagerly. “You know, where you guys all get together and re-enact the British empire by making government decisions and imposing made-up laws on the people you’ve conquered and are currently subjugating under your big stompy boots?”
“I’m changing the system from the inside,” Agnes said proudly.
Gerry shot her an unimpressed look. “Okay. Yeah. Sure. Because that’s a thing that makes sense in an inherently corrupt system with an inherently unethical existence that exists to be profitable at the expense of the marginalized.”
“I don’t understand anything children these days even talk about,” Jon said.
“I’m surprised you don’t remember it,” Agnes said to Jon. But she had a strange expression on her face, one hard to decipher. “It’s where we met.”
Jon stared at her blankly. “I don’t remember talking to you.”
“I was sitting next to Jude?” Agnes hinted. “Teenager? Red hair?”
Wait. Jon snapped his fingers. “Annabelle’s idiot thing! Right! Right, of course, Oliver made me sit still for five hours afterwards, it was insufferable.”
Wait. Jon abruptly remembered the rest of that day. It seemed like so long ago, even though it was probably objectively only about three years. It must have been about...yes, a few months after Daisy had gotten stuck...
He barely remembered those tepid and awful months. He had been on a bit of a hair trigger back then. It had been really tough, with Daisy leaving and his terrifying encounter with Jonah. He remembered everybody had been annoying and mean and made him feel bad…
“First time I ever remember feeling fear, honestly,” Agnes said to Gerry. “Scariest moment of my life. Remember when we first met Jon? All I could think about was that he was going to melt us like he melted that building.”
Hot shame flared in Jon’s gut. Right. Other people were real, and existed, and were probably more important than his...what had he even been upset about? He didn’t remember.
He melted a building and he didn’t even remember why.
“I’m going too,” Jon said, and both kids startled. “I’m coming with you.”
Agnes and Gerry stared at each other with wide eyes.
“Uh,” Agnes said finally, hesitant, “there’s about a 50/50 chance Annabelle said not to tell you about this, and you definitely didn’t get an invite, so statistically you probably aren’t -”
“She can’t exactly stop me from coming,” Jon said, and both kids quieted.
Power-tripping had lost all appeal for Jon - assuming role as a conduit for global and absolute power did that to you - but he couldn’t deny it was useful sometimes. The world probably could have stood a little more power-tripping from him, actually. At least, it would have been helpful if he had ever done anything helpful with it. But he had never really bothered.
But Agnes still looked perturbed, almost worried. “Annabelle’s like one of two people you used to ever listen to, so if you don’t really care what she thinks anymore -”
“I think Annnabelle knows better than to complain these days,” Jon said.
It probably was for the best that Jon didn’t listen much to Annabelle anymore.
****
Jon hadn’t really told the others about Annabelle’s worse-than-murder attempt.
It didn’t really seem like any of their business, and he had spinned a vague explanation of how the situation happened. He didn’t lie, just - withheld information.
For the first time, the truth didn’t seem so important. He had the feeling it would have just upset them. It wasn’t as if he would take revenge against Annabelle. The world needed her, and Jon was a little tired of murdering everyone who upset him. The others (Daisy) would insist on the little murder attempts if they knew, but that was probably part of why he didn’t tell them. If they never knew about the one unselfish thing he had done in his life - well, one unselfish thing didn’t make up for three years of selfishness, so there was very little point.
Martin suspected. Actually, Martin seemed to know, which terrified Jon slightly. It was impossible to get anything past Martin. Jon was deeply intimidated by the man. Sasha laughed very long and hard when he told her that, for unknown reasons.
Besides, it wasn’t as if he felt betrayed. Even if the last time he had attended one of Annabelle’s little council meetings he still trusted her, that had faded quickly in favor of complete apathy. Even then, as young as he was, he had never expected the truth from her. Just friendship. Whatever she was doing, it probably wouldn’t affect him, so there was no use in worrying. Even if Annabelle slightly terrorized every other person in the United Kingdom - well, Jon was fine, so what did it matter.
Jon couldn’t decide if he was stupid or naive. Or, even worse - if he was just lazy.
Jon didn’t listen to Annabelle anymore.
Unfortunately, he still listened to Sasha James.
Two weeks later, the date of the actual meeting, Jon was stuck explaining himself to his entire house, who doubted all of his decisions. Which was just unfair. Jon made good decisions! He had made tons of good decisions, like -
Anyway!
“I think it’s a great idea,” Sasha said, freaking out Jon. “Displaying interest in your local government’s fantastic! Did you do any research on the relevant issues?”
Jon, in the middle of pulling on his trenchcoat, started sweating. “I was just planning on showing up.”
Agnes, who was wearing a gauzy skirt and blouse as Daisy helped a whining Gerry with his court buttons, gave Sasha the thumbs up. “I’m going to propose motions and Jon’s going to say ‘yeah what she said’ and it’ll be great.”
Jon let Agnes believe that.
“Well, you’ll have to share Jon’s political weight,” Sasha said cheerfully. She was in sweatpants and one of Jon’s pilfered t-shirts again. She had recently designated herself a writer, and had joined some sort of recent artist and activist collective where they did mysterious things that Jon didn’t understand. There’s a zine involved? Jon didn’t know what a zine was and he was scared to ask.
Georgie and Melanie had spent a week teaching Jon in laborious detail what exactly the internet was - information Jon could have just downloaded, but they had been intent in their mission of creating ‘the perfect internet’ and had gone through great effort in teaching him what the ‘good’ internet was (Ravelry, Spotify, r/HobbyDrama, YouTubers but only a very specific list) and what the ‘bad’ internet was (social media, the rest of Reddit, every other YouTuber). Jon wasn’t sure if the new internet was to their specifications, and he hadn’t quite been able to avoid parts of it spiralling into nightmare dimensions and hellish breeding grounds for violence and trauma, but Melanie assured him that Twitter had always been like that.
Jon also secretly added a nightmare filter to Melanie’s screen reader, after he made sure every inch of it was accessible, after he roughly recreated screen readers. Melanie said that the voice sounded uncannily like the aunt she had hated, but that it was no big deal.
Anyway, Sasha was a blogger now. After a few meltdowns to Sasha’s computer he had to install a nightmare filter for her too, which made her complain about feeling like an old woman whose grandson had to install AdBlock on her browser. Jon was a little scared of the whole blogging thing, but everybody seemed much happier, so maybe that was the important thing.
“Wait,” Jon said, finally recognizing what Sasha said. “Share with who?”
There was a knock on the door. Jon felt intense fear.
“She’s here!” Sasha said cheerfully. “Come in!”
Jon watched in horror as Basira Hussain casually strode into her house. He knew he couldn’t stop her. She had a key to the place, because Jon had no control of his life.
“Hey honey,” Basira said, intimately.
“Hey honey,” Daisy said lovingly, releasing Gerry from her clutches.
They stared at each other, as if this was any kind of greeting whatsoever, before ignoring each other. Jon did not understand so many things.
Basira, terrifyingly, was dressed like she was about to go defend her client in court. She had a briefcase, and Jon recognized her most important looking crimson hijab. Very abruptly, Jon had a flashback to the way Annabelle had dressed when she had picked him up in his old office. They even had the same expression: determined and resolute, in a way that Jon could never understand.
Basira nodded at Jon. “Hey. Sasha invited me to this thing. She told you I was coming, right.”
“She did not.”
“Whatever. Are we going to get going? We’re going to be late.”
Jon looked at Sasha pleadingly. Cold and resolute stone, Sasha showed no mercy. She smiled brightly, giving Agnes a final hug and pushing her forward. “You kids have a great time! Terrorize the bourgeoisie!”
“I am the bourgeoisie,” Jon said blankly, but the situation had already spiraled out of his control. Agnes and Basira were already comparing lists of notes, seriously discussing the motions Agnes had raised and how she was going to help Basira.
That was it – how Agnes could help Basira. How Agnes, and the role she had in the council hall, could help Basira and the people Jon knew that she intended on representing today.
They hadn’t even looped him in. Had they assumed that he wouldn’t care? That he wouldn’t help? Agnes hadn’t even wanted him there. Only Sasha -
He felt a cool, small hand grab his arm, and he turned around to see Daisy. Gerry was already enthusiastically capturing Sasha about the concert he and Agnes were going to later, and Jon knew that they weren’t listening. Daisy’s expression was somber, her body tense. Daisy wasn’t one for facial expressions at the best of times – not even a new development – but something about this…
“I should go with you,” Daisy said.
“I already told you no,” Jon said, miffed. “I can handle this by myself.”
“I shouldn’t have let you go by yourself last time,” Daisy said. Jon could admit that things probably wouldn’t have spiraled out of control if she had been there, but that didn’t mean – “Don’t terrify yourself just because you feel guilty.”
Daisy hadn’t aged any more than the rest of the world had. As an Avatar, she likely never would. She even looked young for her mid-forties, with her short stature and broad, unlined face. Sasha had assured him that she was ‘Kristen Bell-ish’, whatever that meant. But she always seemed so old to him: larger than life and not even reaching his shoulders. Wise and world-weary even when, as Jon was beginning to see, she didn’t know what she was doing any more than the rest of them did.
It scared Jon, almost: if Daisy wasn’t the person who could swoop in and make it all better, then who could?
If Jonah wasn’t the omnipresent god, then who was the most powerful person in the world?
Jon shook her off, fighting the pull in his gut. “I’m not scared of them anymore.”
She didn’t look impressed. “You’re always scared.”
“Look at the time, going to be late, gotta go!”
He still couldn’t win an argument against her.
They took a taxi there, as Jon had cheerfully informed them that the Tube was delayed due to infernal leaves on the line (Work-from-home was the hot new thing these days). Basira was clearly on edge, tense and constantly keeping an eye on the taxi driver (a friendly skeleton) and the street. Agnes wasn’t any more relaxed, reading her notes over and over.
Jon leaned back in his plush seat, closing his eyes. What would Martin say? He would probably be cuttingly pointing out how Jon was in denial over how he really was secretly afraid of the Avatars and now it was even more dangerous because he was much more willing to power-trip.
Forget about what Jon wanted. Forget about his fear, his insecurities, and every rationale he had constructed for himself as to why Jon deserved a life free of these worries.
Jon was above politics. The Avatar with no need to defend their territory, who held no fear of death or failure, had no need. Jon could not lose the affection of his patron. His domain was the world, and it could not be attacked no matter how hard he tried. Jon was not a politician, so of course that meant he could not be manipulated by politicians -
“What’s your plan,” Jon asked, without opening his eyes.
They told him. Basira was clinical; Agnes excited. Jon didn’t say anything about it, and let the conversation die down until the taxi was rolling in front of 10 Downing Street. Didn’t the prime minister live here? Boris...something? Jon quickly downloaded the information, before he found that Boris Johnson had been the world’s most convoluted psy-op by Annabelle and had never exactly existed. Thank goodness.
Right as the taxi idled in front of the building, Jon opened his eyes. He let them flare up, an intimidating spark of toxic green. “You two follow my lead.”
“Excuse me,” Basira said flatly, as Jon waved at the driver in lieu of payment. He hadn’t found out that you were supposed to pay taxi drivers until...a few months ago. In his defense, they never asked. “This is our operation.”
Jon glanced at her, and something relaxed around the corners of her eyes. He wondered if his expression was familiar to her. He couldn’t help but smile weakly, and that softened her expression even more. “Will you trust me?”
Basira stared at him for one long beat, then two, before grimacing. “Don’t make me regret this.”
“Do I usually make you regret it?”
“Literally, every single time,” Basira said.
“Then it’s a pretty stupid decision to trust me again,” Jon pointed out. “You don’t seem the type to make stupid decisions.”
Basira stared at him for a long moment, before leaving the car.
Jon and Agnes silently watched her leave, before glancing at each other.
“And I thought you ran from your feelings,” Agnes said finally, before following her.
Jon, left with nothing else to do, followed Agnes.
10 Downing Street, Jon quickly found, was just like every other pretentious old British home. With lots of grandiose rooms with furniture shoved into corners so everybody could appreciate the gold-plated tile, or sitting rooms with the most uncomfortable places to sit Jon had ever seen. Each wall hosted gigantic portraits of famous British figures, who were all so ugly that Agnes incinerated one for fun. Jon respected her choices: he had been wearing a stupid wig.
Jon, unfortunately instinctively aware of the layout and history of this sordid place, led them through the halls. He opened his mouth, instinctively about to funnel a Statement regarding the decades of human suffering and imperialism, before forcing his mouth closed. Basira wouldn’t appreciate it. Besides, the Statements had been easier to ignore lately - like curious dogs nosing at his hands rather than insistent children demanding to be fed.
Instead, he settled on casually updating them on the choice of location. “A year ago, this location wouldn’t have been safe for Basira at all. This building was a nightmare pit of despair.” He led them up the ridiculous flights of stairs watching carefully as Agnes jumped up them. Trick steps, you know. Basira proceeded far more cautiously. “It’s...no less a nightmare pit, but like the rest of London it’s now safe to navigate. I’d keep clear of the residential rooms, however. The Prime Minister and his family haven’t escaped their nightmares since the apocalypse, and they never will.”
Basira’s eyebrows skyrocketed up. “David Cameron’s stuck in hell? No surprise there. What’s he having a nightmare about?”
“Well, there’s this pig, right, and you’ll never guess what he’s doing -”
“Never mind,” Basira said quickly. “Not interested.”
“I’m interested,” Agnes said.
“I’d rather you weren’t.”
Jon, who also wished he didn’t know this information, quickly directed them towards the conference room.
But he found himself stopping in front of the intricately carved oak double doors. The wrought golden handles were grimy and dull with dust, but Agnes and Basira did not hesitate to open the door and walk in. They didn’t hesitate; they weren’t frightened. Or, if they were, they didn’t let it stop them.
But Jon stopped. He felt like Annabelle, in that moment. Annabelle, standing in front of that conference room door so long ago, unable to admit that she felt any fear at all.
She had been desperate. Jon saw that now. Only a desperate person would have ever concocted that plan against Jon. He was the sole person capable of murder in this world, and the sole person who was so vindictive and petty that he would kill anybody who said something that he didn’t like.
Annabelle was arrogant. She thought herself the most intelligent person in every room. She was petty, manipulative, and power-hungry. She thought that the world was so broken that somebody had to fix it, and that she was the only one who could. She was desperate.
Jon didn’t particularly want to do this. But Jon really, really had to grow up.
Jon opened the door.
It was a far cry from the nice, professional conference room in City Hall. The floor was some ugly light brown hardwood color, and the walls were tudor-like and panelled. Old man ribboned curtains, an intricate rug woven from human rights abuses, and a claw-foot long conference table with an array of chairs made up an incredibly ‘antique’ room. The British found ‘antique’ and ‘wealth signalling’ to be the same thing. It made for some very ugly buildings and very uncomfortable chairs.
Nobody else had entered yet. Jon checked the time with his extradimensional psychic powers and realized that Sasha had hustled them out the door fifteen minutes earlier than necessary. She was so intelligent.
Agnes was already moving to her uncomfortable seat, and Jon tapped Basira on the arm and silently pointed to the seat with the ‘EXTINCTION’ placard. She raised an eyebrow at him, but followed his direction. Maybe that was what her trust looked like.
There was a placard stamped ‘BEHOLDING’ in big letters. Gone unoccupied since the last time Jon had been here.
He ignored it, and sat down at the head of the table. Likely where Annabelle usually sat, as director of the meetings. Historically, where the leader of Britain had once sat and directed the affairs of the country.
Jon kicked up his heels on the polished antique wood, pulling up an episode of The Twilight Zone in his brain. He identified with Rod Serling.
The other Avatars filtered in, one by one. All of their eyes widened when they saw Jon, but none of them said anything. Jon wondered what had filtered through the Avatar grapevine. They always knew all of the gossip on each other. It was impossible to miss the Earth’s paradigm shift, and Agnes mentioned that they had convened an emergency meeting on it. Doubtlessly, his name had come up. They likely knew he was the instigator. Who else could?
Annabelle was the fourth in, as fashionably on time as usual. She was the only one who stopped in her tracks when she saw Jon. A surprise, to a woman unused to surprises. Jon’s house didn’t have insect problems.
Her eyes widened. Her jaw clenched. That was all it took. And Jon Knew, in the way that he Knew things, that she was wondering if this was when he finally killed her.
She didn’t know why she was still alive. It was stressing her out. It was a move that made no sense - an unforeseen reaction. Jon was predictable. When Jon wasn’t predictable, and when Jon’s actions weren’t being very precisely controlled, then she was left with a vindictive and irreverent steam train on her hands. She hadn’t predicted his presence here.
Jon was also sitting in her chair. Scuffing the wood. Leaning back in the chair, and definitely scuffing the floor too.
He pointed to the chair at his right, with a placard that now read ‘WEB’. Annabelle sat down in it. Everybody noticed.
Everybody also noticed Basira. She was receiving some glares, or some pointedly unwelcome expressions. But Basira’s glares and unwelcome expressions were more powerful than any demon could ever offer, and one by one each Avatar looked away in shame.
Only Oliver actually talked to him. Which made sense, as Oliver feared neither life nor death. When he walked in he was just as surprised to see Jon as everyone else, but he offered Jon a smile too. Jon smiled back, which made several of the other Avatars lean back.
“Hey, Archivist. I thought you hated these things.”
“I do!” Jon said cheerfully. “I wasn’t even invited.”
Annabelle busied herself with her notes and agenda.
As usual, Helen didn’t show up. Jon waited patiently for everybody to filter in. Sarah Baldwin didn’t show up either, and Jon searched for the information before realizing that he really didn’t want to know. He saw some other new faces, as well as some faintly familiar ones. It wasn’t that strange: no position of absolute power was forever. Where was that bloke Wakely?
Wait. He was the Avatar who had talked for too long about burying people alive at a party in a ridiculous skyscraper. He had upset Daisy. Jon had seen red and lost his temper. Jon had...tossed him over the side of the roof. Let him keep falling. Left him to waste away. He was probably gone now.
The entire room had been at that party. Whoops.
Now uncomfortably reminded that Jon had murdered two people at this table, that everybody was aware of that, and that Jon had completely forgotten about one of the semi-accidental murders because, in Sasha’s words, he was “a bit of a psychopath, what the hell”.
This distressed her, because apparently Jonathan Sims had always been a “sensitive boy” with a “tender heart”. Daisy had said that he was still a sensitive boy, just prone to power-tripping. Sasha said that this was also very consistent behavior. Martin said -
Martin said that Jonathan Sims had been a good person. And, more importantly, that Jonathan Sims had wanted to be a good person. That was one thing that Jon didn’t want to change.
Who just buried people alive -
Jon waited until everyone was settled down. Nobody was chatting or talking to each other: just sitting silently, avoiding eye contact.
He could see Annabelle preparing herself to say something. Better get this ball rolling, then.
“Jonah Magnus is dead.”
The silence suddenly became oppressive.
Jon didn’t stop to savor the looks on their faces. That wasn’t the point. Enjoying this wasn’t the point. Jon had all the power he wanted and - and he didn’t want it at all. He hoped that nobody here would make him have to prove it.
Jon did not want to melt anyone. He wasn’t going to melt anyone. Life had started feeling a little valuable lately. These people, the soulless demons surrounding him, weren’t any different than he was. Humans with delusions of grandeur. Infighting and power plays weren’t going to fix it.
But Annabelle had been right, as she always was. Jon couldn’t keep ignoring this. If he could do something, he had to. Even if it was something he didn’t like doing.
Or something he hated that he enjoyed doing.
“Jonah Magnus is dead,” Jon repeated pleasantly. “The world has changed. These two events are related, of course.”
He didn’t elaborate. Jon didn’t lie, but he didn’t have to say everything.
“The chains which bind this Earth have loosened,” Jon continued. He folded his hands over his stomach, relaxed and casual. “We now exist in the third age of life. I ask that you do not resist.
“The seasons have begun to change, our eternal placid summer ripening into fall and sinking into winter. Our world turns yet again. Babies are born, grow old, and die. The apocalypse as we’ve always known was rooted in its stagnancy. Life and growth has bloomed, and will continue to subsist. Change is once again thriving, and we must adapt with it.
“You’ve noticed that your power has weakened. You will have to fight harder than ever to maintain your food supplies. What was once a conquest is now a battleground. The playing field is far from even, but the enemy and harvest now have a fighting chance.” Jon smiled brightly. “Of course, I’m sure that this was all discussed during your emergency meeting. Great job with your repeated warfare attempts against humanity during the last six months, by the way. How’s that working out for us?”
Silence loomed. Of course, their repeated attempts to quash the new human uprising had not gone very well. At the end of the day, for every one Avatar there were thousands of humans.
“You are no longer strong enough to allow these divides into factions,” Jon continued. “We must present a united front if we’re going to maintain the ground we have. We can’t continue on the way we have. And I’ve realized…” Jon glanced at Annabelle, catching her eye. “I’ve realized that I haven’t been helping the situation. There’s more I can do. That’s why Annabelle has handed over moderation of these meetings to me.”
Nobody looked impressed.
He could see it: the way Jon had become an unpredictable, dangerous nuisance towards them. Almost everyone in this room would be much happier if Jon dropped dead. Nobody had really liked him because nobody had ever felt safe around him. Only Annabelle and Oliver - the person who had nothing to fear from him and the other person who did not feel fear - called themselves his friends.
But they would have preferred it if Jon was hostile or dangerous. If he had even admitted his power. But Jon play-acted at harmlessness, unwilling and afraid to make enemies, and in that way he became a nuisance rather than an enemy. He couldn’t even pretend that it wasn’t on purpose. No matter how many Avatars brushed him off or ignored him, it was better than feeling their eyes on him. Or feeling the fear rich on their tongues.
“Also I invited a human to work with us on human affairs,” Jon said cheerfully. “Diversity hire! Any questions?”
There were a lot of questions. Basira didn’t look very pleased at his remark, either.
Simon leaned forward first, pale and watery eyes intent for the first time. “What happened to Jonah Magnus?”
“Natural causes,” Jon said cheerfully. “Next?”
“What does this mean for us?” the Lukas matriarch said. Her eyes skittered away from him. “Are we in danger?”
Jon shrugged. “Only if you’re incompetent at feeding.”
“What caused this?” Manuela demanded. “The children are running wild, we can’t control them. We’ve lost a major food source.”
Jon scratched his temples. “What caused it...sustainability efforts.” He sobered abruptly. “You could never control the children, anyway. This is the generation of the apocalypse. You’ll find that very little frightens them now.”
“Does this have to do with those humans you’ve been running around with?” Jared asked, scratching his chin as Manuela’s expression contorted in rage.
As usual, a frighteningly insightful observation from such a brute. “It is actually directly their fault!”
Everybody turned to look at Basira, who was completely unapologetic. She crossed her arms. “Don’t ask me. First I’m hearing about this too.”
“Did you kill Jonah Magnus?” Oliver asked, morbidly fascinated. “How?”
“We humans didn’t kill him. We showed up at the Panopticon to kill him, only to find Jon there and Jonah Magnus already dead.” Basira scowled as Jon and Annabelle glanced at each other. Jon subtly shook his head. Annabelle’s lips thinned. “It looked like he’d been dead for years.”
An unfamiliar young man with a thick mop of clumped black hair peered at Jon, expression contorted in grotesque interest. He was one of the Avatars who had been born in the Apocalypse, who were all recognizably weird. His name was - right, Geoff Anjou. Some French man who had made his mark in the Parisian Underground before moving to London and conquering his next terrain. A Parisian to the bone - or, a great deal of bones, as the case may be. So many bones. Jon had always meant to take Daisy to that wonderful little nightmare and let her run loose. Chase people through the tunnels. Munch bones. Perfect vacation.
“So did the Archivist kill him?” Geoff asked, in the same way you would ask who won the World Cup. “Steal his Watcher’s Crown or whatever?”
“Are you the new queen bee?” a young woman asked Jon. The new Slaughter Avatar, Henrietta Something-or-another. A Cambridge legacy college student, Annabelle had intoned, and Jon had been afraid to inquire further. She was cyberbullying someone on her mobile, which seemed to be bleeding. “Cuz, like, you don’t seem qualified.”
“I did not kill Jonah Magnus,” Jon said, for the five hundreth time in the last six months. “And I’m uninterested in filling his shoes. That’s enough questions, I think.”
“Are you as weakened as the rest of us?” Amherst demanded. “Surely this destruction has affected you worst of all.”
“He probably ate Jonah Magnus,” Henrietta said. “The Archivist’s probably god now.”
Geoff snorted. “No way. He brought a human as back-up.”
“Why is there a human?” Another woman asked, with long brown hair and a broad face. Something about her was unquestionably severe, from her bulging muscles to her incredible height. Jon had never seen her before in his life. Her name was Julia Montauk. Something about her stank of life and undeath, same as Amherst. “We can’t exactly work with the prey, here.”
“I’m proposing an emergency motion,” Amherst said suddenly, shutting up the rapidly overlapping voices. “I vote that a leader is elected democratically. And that representatives are limited towards loyal patrons of the Forces.”
“I second that motion,” Geoff said immediately. “We can’t afford a chaotic uprising in our government right now -”
“This really isn’t a vote,” Jon said.
“Isn’t this a democracy?” Henrietta asked, with the self-righteous assurance of a twenty year old. “We vote on things in a democracy. And leaders.”
“Annabelle was voted in last spring,” Julia agreed. “No reason to change things.”
Well. Basira said that she trusted him. He’d have to rely on that.
Jon pressed down.
It felt just like that: pressing down. Reaching out a hand and squashing. Sometimes it was like ripping someone into shreds, and other times it was like plunging your hand into their chest and ripping out their heart. But this was just a press: a heavy static, bearing down over your shoulders like a ten ton weight. A sight so horrible that it was too eldritch to even look at. The realization that the hideous sight was you, and that it was all you would ever be.
Some - Geoff, Amherst - gasped, as if they were choking. Others - Lukas, Henrietta - gasped at their hearts, as if they were having heart attacks. Jon carefully kept it off Oliver, Annabelle, Basira, and Agnes. He couldn’t help but remember what she had said a few weeks ago, about being so frightened -
But Basira winced anyway, clutching her temples, and Jon carefully released the static until the inhabitants of the room could breathe again. His eyes did not stop glowing, and Jon didn’t bother to turn off the light show.
Jon put his feet down on the floor and rested his elbows on the table, leaning forward. As everyone shuddered and gasped, he spoke slowly and pointedly. “This is not a democracy. It never was. It is a monarchy, and the line of succession is clear.”
Annabelle’s eyes widened, and she abruptly clenched her fists before loosening them. An uncharacteristic show of emotion from her.
“This coalition has never been a democracy,” Jon said severely. “This is a house of lords. You are uninterested in representing any needs but your own, and I know Jared failed level eight government, but I’m sure all of you know that democracy represents elected officials. Nobody here has ever lived in a true democracy, and in your human fallibility you have recreated the only system you have ever known. The seats at this table are determined by power - all of you, the most powerful conduits for your Entity. I am the inevitable consequence of this system. I am your natural disaster. All of you bought me. Now you have me. And you are no longer powerful enough to make me leave.”
Agnes’ hand was covering her mouth. Jon dearly hoped Basira was holding onto that trust. He dearly hoped that he wasn’t speaking from anger.
But he couldn’t stop. It boiled and bubbled. It was an anger and a powerlessness that had subjugated him for thirty two years of his life. It had served as the cloud hanging over his head for three more.
“If you want someone to blame for the Archivist who now moderates this meeting,” Jon said, his voice the thin lid over this boiling pot of hurt and anger, “I now know their names. Jonah Magnus. Jude Perry. Nikola Orsinov. Twice. Breekon and Hope’s coffin. Peter Lukas. Jane Prentiss. Maxwell Raynor. A strategic book.” Jon tilted his head, having effectively made his point. There were others, but he had forgiven Daisy and Melanie a long time ago. And Jared had been polite about it. “Bring up your complaints with them. Good luck with that.”
Jon clapped his hands, closing the lid on those memories. Maybe one day the pain would leech from them like a sun-bleached painting, but that day hadn’t come yet. “Now! If you have any further complaints about my position here, or if you want to continue debating political theory, feel free to stand up and tell me so. We’re all interested in you regurgitating your life story until you die. Anyone?” Crickets. Jon leaned back in his chair, making himself comfortable. “Can we go onto the motions now? Ms. Hussain first, then clockwise from her.”
As if they had planned this, with the air of a well-choreographed actress, Basira stood up and spread out her papers in front of her. “The human contingency requests neutral zones in essential areas. Maternal wards in hospitals are highly vulnerable locations, and when assaulted by parasites the mortality rate of children is very high. If you want a self-replenishing food source, you have to allocate space for safe living. The next essential zone is a daycare and a school for children -”
And she was off. Jon had nothing to say, nor was anything necessary. Raging debate sparked after she finished speaking, and Basira effectively crushed the opposition. Agnes spoke up in her defense, and to Jon’s surprise even Manuela contributed a solid understanding of the necessity of children. When the debate started spiraling in an unhelpful direction Jon cut in and shut it down, before forcing the vote.
It did not pass, obviously.
“By the way,” Jon said. “Ms. Hussain proposed five different motions today. At least two of them have to pass. This debate is about picking which two you want.”
Then that started up all over again, and Jon tried not to fall asleep.
Moderating was hard. He actually had to pay attention and focus, and he hated focusing. He was effective enough at shutting down conversations, but sometimes shutting down conversations wasn’t helpful - he just needed to steer them in a more productive conversation. And Agnes’ political theory and Basira’s almost-definitely-made-up statistics started flying so thick and fast above his head that Jon was starting to almost completely lose the plot.
Jon chose his moment as the Lukas woman was complaining extensively about how Henrietta’s digital bullying was intruding upon the Loneliness of her adherents. Henrietta had argued that social media made people more lonely. Jon was afraid that Henrietta was his fault. Maybe the Eye’s fault, holistically. Jared wanted to be friends with Henrietta and co-host Instagram events, which Jon enthusiastically supported despite Basira’s glares.
He leaned over to his right, gesturing slightly at Annabelle so she would lean in closer. She raised an eyebrow at him. Annabelle’s eyebrows were crushing.
“I don’t know what I’m doing,” Jon whispered to her, as quietly as possible.
Annabelle mouthed very clearly at him, ‘Wow, really? Shock!’.
“I was making a point,” Jon hissed. “An important point. But I don’t - I still -” Jon faltered, uncertain, as Henrietta began sneering something about Lukas’ hairdo. Finally, he weakly said, “You care. They need you.”
Annabelle stared at him for a long, silent moment, before turning away from him.
For the first time that day, she spoke to the room. “Let’s keep ad hominem attacks out of this,” she said sharply. “Madame Lukas, if you’ll make your closing remarks we can bring this to a vote.”
She really was good at it. Just like she had always wanted. She had never directly admitted it, but Annabelle had always wanted to be the kind of person in rooms like this.
A politician sitting in an uncomfortable chair at 10 Downing Street. Rich, successful, important. Powerful and respected. Back then, she had wanted to be famous. Now, she was content to be controlling famous people. A dream out of her reach in life; laughably attainable in this stagnant after-afterlife.
The dream had crippled her. In her search for a functional world, one that achieved and grew and provided a comfortable world, she had ended up recreating a world that hadn’t been functional at all. A world that was slow to change, and seemingly impossible to improve. A world passed down from the hands of the greedy and bloodthirsty into the hands of the uncaring and apathetic.
The apocalypse had been inevitable. Humans driving themselves to extinction. And Avatars, possessed of human weakness, had been eager to do the same. Just a pathetic room of sour and bitter people power-tripping.
For all that Sasha calls us bougie, Jon thought, we’re such deeply unhappy people.
There had once been a young man, desperate for attention and acknowledgement. Dreaming of importance. He would stay up late at night, planning out his life as a famous researcher and well-respected philosopher. Everyone would tell him how smart he was. He would prove it all - with a scholarship to Oxford, with a sneer and a haughty air, with a boss who said that he had so much promise, here’s a job that will let you realize your potential.
I deserve this job -
Something in Jon’s mind flared, a hot poker rammed behind his eye sockets. Jon hissed, one hand reaching unconsciously to his temple, and Annabelle glanced at him in alarm. She had - Jon had been thinking about her, and - what had he been -
Together, they managed to wrangle the meeting into something half-way productive. Most importantly, Basira had gotten three of her proposals passed, and Agnes’ arguments were stirring the other Avatars into serious discussion. Conversation itself would be stilted by his sheer presence, and they weren’t quite all working together yet, but they would.
It was really all the same to Jon if the Avatars or humans won the war. He should care a bit more than he did, so he didn’t vocalize this to the others. But this conflict sparked life, a strange and frantic energy. Experiences and growth. That was what Jon had always fed on.
It seemed that Jon’s skill at prioritizing himself over all others was as sharp as ever.
Eventually the two hours wrapped up, and the other Avatars were eager to leave. Jon waved them off cheerily.
“Meeting adjourned. Try not to do anything stupid until next time. And if any of you break the boundaries of the human safe zones, I’ll know! Annabelle, will you stay behind?”
The others filtered out quickly, uncharacteristically unwilling to see whatever carnage would be wrought. Agnes and Basira lingered.
“That went so well!” Agnes shouted, the minute the last Avatar left. The room was now empty save for Agnes, Basira, Annabelle, and - Oliver, who was leaning against the doorframe. “I can’t believe you actually did something useful!”
“Ouch,” Oliver said.
It was fair, though. Jon smiled weakly at her. “Hopefully I can help out a little more often going forward. But I’m not going to give any favoritism to you, Agnes. I’ll intervene to give humans a fair shot, but I really don’t want to be...king of a ruined world or whatever.”
“I know,” Agnes said firmly. She reached out and squeezed his arm, round and gentle face creased in determination. “You’d be terrible at it. So just be you, okay?”
Jon saluted her, before gesturing to the door. “Will you steal a historical British artifact from this garbage building for me? Daisy needs more targets to shoot.”
Agnes nodded eagerly and ran off. Jon silently hoped Basira would follow her, if also out of interest for also seeing British things destroyed, but she just looked at Jon intensely instead. Not quite a glare - just a searching, intense look, as if she was finding her own Statement from deep within him. It had always been disconcerting. Jon was still convinced she hated him.
“It’s not as if I knew you very well before we rescued you from the Panopticon,” Basira said crisply, pressing a folder to her chest, “but you’ve changed. What happened? What did Annabelle have to do with it?”
Jon and Annabelle glanced at each other. Oliver lifted an eyebrow.
“Basira -”
“Don’t ask me to trust you.”
“I didn’t betray that,” Jon asked, “did I?”
Her expression didn’t soften. “You didn’t. We’re going to continue needing your help. But an ally with inscrutable motivations who does everything on a whim is a bad ally to have.”
“I’m trying, Basira,” Jon said, impossibly exhausted and just a little disappointed. “Please be patient.”
“I’ve been patient for three years,” Basira said, before forcibly cutting herself short from whatever emotion she was about to display. “What happened?”
A phantom pain pieced Jon’s arms, like chains threaded through bone. Jon fought the urge to wince, unconsciously reaching up to rub at a spot on his forearm. Everyone noticed. “It’s...family business…”
“Did you kill Jonah Magnus?”
“Jonah Magnus killed me,” Jon snapped, far louder than he intended, “so he would have deserved it, wouldn’t he!”
He felt a little lightheaded, more than he intended. It felt like a hand was clenching inside his chest, more than he wanted. No, Basira is fragile, you can’t just - no, Agnes is a kid, Daisy said that we can’t -
“Basira Hussain,” Annabelle said, hands folded tightly in her lap, eyes serious and intent. Jon started, surprised to hear her speak again. “You should go catch up with Agnes.”
Basira stared at Annabelle for a long moment, lips thin, before she abruptly whirled on her heel and stalked out. Jon watched her go, exhausted. He waited for her heels to click down the hall, far away enough that he knew she wasn’t eavesdropping, before groaning and dropping his head down onto his desk.
“They hate me.”
“They’re scared of you,” Annabelle pointed out. She leaned back in her chair, crossing her arms. “Frankly, Basira could stand to be a little more afraid of you. She’s going to get herself in trouble one of these days.”
“She’s practically my sister in law, I’m not going to hurt her,” Jon snapped. “Your stupid plan relied on me never hurting people I love.”
“Sorry,” Oliver said pleasantly, “is anyone ever going to tell me what’s going on? I feel like an NPC in Jon’s Dungeons & Dragons game.”
“You want to be an NPC, I found you working at Taco Bell.” God, whatever. Jon could tell Oliver. He wouldn’t give a shit. Jon sighed, lifting his head to twist around and look at Oliver instead. “You remember when I was asking around after Sasha James? Annabelle had put me up to it.”
“Obviously. And then Sasha James started following you around? You terrorized Annabelle’s party again?”
“Yeah, it was this whole big thing.” Jon waved a hand expressively. “Anyway, then Annabelle tried to trap me in an eternal limbo that would shred me from inside out so I could act as purveyor of the world, and probably also use her connection with me so she could take over affairs here, and probably either nudge me into shaping the world back into order or into sinking it deeper into hell. I broke out and now I’m mad at her.”
“I had at least twenty other reasons,” Annabelle said, “but that’s the gist.”
Oliver stared at them.
They all sat in awkward silence. Jon found himself winding a finger around a stray coil of hair and letting it spring back into place. He had kept it the same the last three years, never bothering to change the style. A loose and bouncy cloud of hair, sometimes brushing against his shoulders until Annabelle kidnapped him to cut it again - him, as much as the trenchcoat was. So much as anything had ever been ‘him’.
“Well,” Oliver said diplomatically, “I see that you skipped a lot of steps there. So why are you here, then?”
Was it just to spite Annabelle? Screw her out of her work? Did Jon genuinely care? Did he want to organize the other Avatars, get them mobilized and going? Did he want to protect the humans?
Did he really only care about himself, and the people he called his friends and family? Did he really only care about himself, and those he possessed?
“There’s a person I want to be,” Jon said quietly, “but I don’t know how to be him.”
Annabelle stared at him, with dark and glittering eyes, expression as implacable as always. For a sudden, stupid, intense moment, Jon wanted to know if she cared about him. If one of the few people who had always helped him, who was always in his corner, had seen him as anything more than a tool.
Like Basira, who didn’t like him as a person, but found him too valuable to alienate. But Basira was - she was deeply good, if not always kind, and Jon had the sense that she had fought to turn herself into that good person. It was something she chose. She was trying to push Jon into making that same choice.
Jon clenched his hands in his lap, his fingernails digging into his palm. “There’s people I respect, and who I want to respect me. This person I want to be...I’m worried that I only want this because that’s what they want. They’ll deny it, but they want my power. Everybody just makes me into whoever they want. Whatever’s useful to them.” Jon’s gaze snapped to Annabelle, and he fought hard to keep the compulsion from his voice. It was difficult, when he wanted to know so badly, but - “The kind of person I used to be. That person I’m ashamed of. Is that the person who was useful to you?”
He didn’t want to force the answer from her. He wanted her to choose to say it.
Annabelle didn’t react. She didn’t show anything on her face. Much less what Jon wanted from her. She just tilted her head, one of the few unafraid to meet his eyes. “I never made you be anyone, Jon. All I ever did was put you in the right place at the right time.”
“That wasn’t my question,” Jon said, and this time he couldn’t help the static creeping into his voice. “Answer me.”
Annabelle sighed. “Of course it was useful. Is that what you wanted me to voluntarily say, Jon? I didn’t bring you to the first meeting because I thought it would be educational for you. I needed your power to keep the others in line. I needed everyone else to see that I controlled your power. That’s the only reason why any of this worked. We both got something out of it. Don’t pretend that you weren’t happy with the arrangement.”
It...it wasn’t a surprise, but…
“So that’s why you didn’t bring him to any of the other meetings,” Oliver mused. “He wasn’t as controllable as you liked, not when there’s more than ten other idiots around needling him. There’s never been anybody who can always predict when Jon’s going to lose his shit. Besides the biggie, I guess.”
The biggie, which was his past.
No wonder he had stayed so childlike, innocent, and cruel for so long. Jon took responsibility for his own laziness, but - but he had been most useful that way. Annabelle had liked him best that way.
Daisy had liked him best that way too. That cruel child - Daisy had wanted him, because he made her feel needed. Annabelle was just the same.
Everyone had liked him best that way. And if Jon became the kind of person who he wanted to be, nobody would like him at all.
“If you’re going to kill me,” Annabelle said, exhaustion seeping in through her voice, “just do it.”
Jon closed his eyes. He could feel it - Annabelle’s exhaustion, the way that she had just been waiting for him to do this. Everything she knew about Jon led towards an obvious course of action. Even though you nobody knew everything that set Jon off, certain things were pretty guaranteed that he wouldn’t forgive.
Annabelle had never accounted for Sasha. She had brought Sasha into his life, and she had no idea the effect she would have on it. Sasha, who had been the first to tell Jon that she chose to care about him for him. For a brief, hot flash, Jon was jealous. He wanted to be someone unpredictably kind.
If he only wanted that because he had found yet another person to give his wind-up key, then…
“You won, Annabelle,” Jon said finally, and he only knew it as he said it. “Congratulations. You played the perfect manipulation. You took a vulnerable, afraid man, who had been violated in the worst possible way and left to die.” He stood up, already uncomfortable with what he was about to say. “And you arranged him so that he loved you. I chose to love you. I’m making the choice never to hurt you, because I still love you. ”
He left the room. Oliver stood aside just in time, letting Jon brush by.
As Jon met up with Agnes and Basira, summoning a smile and a wave for them, he felt uncomfortably as if he had grown up.
He wasn’t sure that he liked it.
#tma#the magnus archives#my writing#tma fanfic#jonathan sims#annabelle cane#oliver banks#basira hussain#agnes montague#and a ton more#tcf was about deciding to change#and this story kind of hits at how difficult it is deciding who to change into#and how difficult it is to trust your own decisions when you've been manipulated since the second you were 'born'#jon and his choices and agency is becoming a big thing for me!
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People wanting Dany and Sansa as bff's what really wanted was a Sansa like s8 Jon. No personality, no agency, being all time "your mai kween" and "I loove you".
Someone completely subservient to her.
I truly believe people wanting Sansa and Dany to be best friends in S8 is one of the best examples of absolute hate and disrespect towards Sansakfjdlskdjflksdj. Like, dramatic? Maybe. Accurate? For sure.
I completely get someone who’s a massive Daenerys fan (specifically ones that are toxic and mean and taint the name of those who are wonderful and kind) (as is the fandom life, every fandom has those people. it blows) to want Sansa to be besties with her -- that makes complete sense to me. Sansa ending up besties with Daenerys is basically just another confirmation that everything they think about her is true and everything we (for instance) think about her is wrong. It means that Sansa Stark stood in front of Daenerys and, like those before her, was in awe of what she saw. It means Sansa’s dumb fans were wrong and dumb the whole time, because even THEIR queen sees that Daenerys is benevolent and wonderful.
Even if you’re not one of the mean spirited fans of Daenerys and are simply a nice person who loves the character, wants her to be happy, and doesn’t spend your time attacking people -- having Sansa on her side offers nothing but good things, really. It’s more good will in the eyes of Westeros to have The Lady of Winterfell cheering you on and supporting your efforts. It’s more allies for her cause. It’s more pseudo friends (and if you love a character obviously you want good things for them, so more friends is a positive -- even if those friends are all there to serve the other). It also just removes a massive potential blockade. Sansa Stark loving her, getting along with her, and having no problems, at all, that she’s invading the nation, makes for a smoother take over of the North and Westeros as a whole.
So, it just is one Big Positive, in those regards. Daenerys’ conquering of Westeros goes over with less resistance and she has another person to make her feel good about herself -- both of which provide her with happiness and success.
But, Sansa? Sansa Stark? Wanting Sansa to best friends with Daenerys? Wanting Sansa to be best friends with Daenerys is immediately asking to remove every ounce of agency, desire, and will from her blood and bones. In order for SANSA to be best friends with Dany, one of two things has to occur.
The first thing is that she has to have a personality transplant.
No matter how dumb the audience tries to pretend that she is, Sansa has long since passed wanting to love and be loved by someone for no reason other than they’re beautiful and awe inspiring, with thrilling romantic tales. (Which wasn’t dumb, anyway 🙄 but whatever). In order for S8 Sansa to willingly want to stand at Daenerys’ feet and coo and caw in pleasant small talk about how exciting it is that Daenerys is there to wage war on a war worn nation, subjugate her home and her people, put Sansa in theoretical chains once more, have total power over her family and loved ones, and strip Jon of every fiber of whatever life in his soul he has left, every single ounce of character development from Sansa needs to suddenly evaporate from her being, so that she can see anything about her as a positive. She has to become a personality-less shell, who no longer cares about her own personal agency, her love of her homeland, her desire to protect her people, or her love of her family. It’s the only way she can willingly take part in that friendship.
The second option is that she isn’t doing it willingly.
And that is self explanatory.
The second option is that Sansa isn’t bled of the core of her being through the writing, alone, to give Daenerys more of the love that she craves -- she’s, instead, actively trapped within the narrative, through the threat of life and wellbeing -- hers and her family’s and her people. She’s not willingly braiding Daenerys’ hair -- she has no choice but to sit there with the brush. Once again a prisoner, after all of the emotional and physical torment and torture and grooming she went through -- after her years long fight to stand in her home, with her family, with her sense of self. Making plaits as her own personal agency is forcibly stripped of her, once more.
And that’s some hate and disrespect, if I’ve ever seen it.
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TL;DR warning: TFATWS Ep. 6 / Finale
There’s a lot to unpack in this series finale, and I sure as hell am not the expert to do this, but I thought I’d highlight some particular issues I have. Much of this, admittedly, will be coming from the high character tenors of the previous episodes, whereas this episode is really where the “MCU kind of movie denouement” kicks in. If you can call/criticize something as “Disney formula” writing, this might be it. Did it hamper/dampen my enjoyment of this series? Not THAT much, but it really stands out and suggests it could have been better.
So let me do a few numbers.
1. PRO: A very acceptable execution of selling not only Sam’s first outing as ‘Captain America’, not only the affirmation of Bucky Barnes’ commitment to heroism, but the apotheosis long-denied to Isaiah Bradley.
I’m getting the impression much of the gushing here in Tumblr will be focusing on that--and to an extent, I am in agreement. their characters were very well fleshed out and to be honest, I wouldn’t have it any other way. There may be still other things I would recommend as a better laid-out recognition for Isaiah (something more faithful to the Truth comic miniseries), but that’s a minor quibble compared to the others below.
2. CON: Falling into the trap of a “GOT-layout” series ending
Ok, that description might be too harsh. After all, point # 1 is near perfect.
However, and this is a very big HOWEVER...
A really good show does not rely solely on giving your main characters the best ending possible. Their supporting cast deserves at least a fair amount of character development (understandable motivations, a good appreciation of their character arcs, more moments which make you empathize with them especially if you are trying to experiment with moral ambiguity on their characters). The fact that the action sequence ate up more than half of the final episode’s near-50 minute runtime really prevented any further character development moments.
How, to some extent, this became insufficient with Karli Morgenthau and John Walker become really apparent in the end.
3. CON: Under-served Character Denouements
Karli and the Flag-Smashers, in practice, were basically given the “Killmonger” treatment: they’ll have to die, but the validity of their moral argument will be recognized. As someone with a very limited set of fandoms I follow, the only other place I’ve seen this done is Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans. The protagonist cast was left to die, but the tragedy of their situation led their world to improve things for the better. (For those familiar with this fandom, many will understand that this did not go down well.) Compare this, in turn, to how Breaking Bad gives even the supporting cast and side-characters understandable character endings.
The reason of complaint here, being, that this kind of story flow robs these characters of agency not only in their tragedy--but also how they choose to go out. Sympathetic tragic characters, to an extent, are at least given some dignity in how they go out. The fact that Karli and the Flag-Smashers are practically disposed of by a) Sharon, now fully revealed as the criminal Power-Broker and b) Zemo, whose butler is no less capable in extreme action even while he was in prison further highlights how they are basically reduced into ‘plot elements’, not a fully-realized group/faction of people.
John Walker, for his part, is also given very little to do (and indeed, what little he was able to do in the entire fight sequence is laughable). Even his one spark of “good choice” (seeking to save the falling vehicle’s occupants), even if he failed, was ultimately overshadowed by Sam’s more flamboyant rescue.
One might be able to make argument, perhaps, that that is the point: Walker’s arc in this episode, perhaps, is to finally learn why exactly he can’t become Captain America: because he remains primarily a soldier, and only good at that. Witnessing Sam arguing and pontificating in front of the cameras, perhaps, is what hammers it home to him--and why perhaps his last scene in the series is him accepting his new role as U.S. Agent. If his world is going to be small and he is going to be pigeonholed into what he is good at, so be it. If he can’t be Captain America (now that he knows why exactly that symbol is powerful, and what is required of it), he’ll find his way with people who will let him be what he can be.
Notice, however, how even between these two underserved characters, John Walker has a more understandable progression. I don’t think I’ll really be able to fault ‘left-wing’ viewers of the show who will be left dissatisfied by this ending (especially those who are sympathetic to the Flag-Smashers’ demands--especially as to some extent (due to my own line of work and leanings, I’m kind of one of those).
And then there’s the reveal of Sharon as the Power-Broker--its own can of worms, but I’ll fold it in the next item.
4. MIXED BAG: How the show’s social layout closes
The fact that the MCU’s undercurrent politics remains to be “institutions are bad, mob/grassroots action will always be misguided, let media-chosen/private individuals and orgs show you the ‘right way’ of doing things”--it isn’t really as helpful as it could be. The show basically ends with Sam and Bucky’s individual arcs and moral world-views affirmed. It is definitely a happy ending for them. It is, however, pretty difficult to swallow that it ends well for them when the bigger picture is left unaddressed. (For those who may be interested in this line of critique, this video essay, “Imagining the Tyrant” by Kyle Kallgren / Brows Held High / oancitizen should be helpful.)
Nowhere is this better illustrated than in 2 instances: the setting of Walker’s rechristening as U.S. Agent, and Sharon’s “pardon” scene--now that we know she is in fact the Power Broker. Both events happen in the U.S. Senate Committee hearing hall--basically making the statement that even with a new Captain America that is more ‘home-grown’ and closer to the ground and common people (even as he literally flies high), the institutions of the U.S. government is still as impervious and clueless to its corruption and enabling of crime and injustice. Criminal elements like Valentina de Fontaine and the Power Broker foster the underground economy with impunity, and the U.S. government allows them to for a number of unbuilt/unestablished reasons.
It’s a valid/backed-up argument to make, and with historical/real life basis at that, but this is the kind of plot development difficult to credibly sell within a 6-episode miniseries already crammed with character arcs--and it shows. Compare this, for example, with how the Netflix series The Punisher built throughout its Season 1 run how exactly can black market profiteering grow under the CIA in a believable way. There, you see exactly what needs to happen for a previously-established upstanding character living in a grey environment to turn grey--even full on black (be it Frank Castle/the Punisher himself, Dinah Madani, or even Billy Russo).
I’d want to chalk this up to the possibility of merging/reintroducing that world--and by god, imagine Jon Bernthal’s Punisher returning in this kind of gray area--interacting with Captain America AND the Winter Soldier, as this series is now likely to be titled--should be very interesting.
----
These are the top points in my head after my first watch of this finale. I may be rewatching this again--who knows if I get to come back. Still, it’s been a pretty meaningful ride.
P.S. I should probably admit to my Filipino background here again, but it’s hilarious how the closing shot of this series (Sam and Bucky having a party with their family/community near the Louisiana seaside) is basically how mosts 80′s/90′s era Filipino action and comedy films end (either a beach party or a wedding/outing near a beach/swimming pool). The presence of Pinoy shout-outs in this series (”Amatz” and “Isang Tao, Isang Mundo”) really emphasize how this might not be an accident.
#tfatws#the falcon and the winter soldier#sam wilson#bucky barnes#james buchanan barnes#sharon carter#helmut zemo#marvel cinematic universe#mcu#john walker#us agent#isaiah bradley#truth red white and black#philippines#the punisher#gundam iron-blooded orphans#breaking bad#game of thrones#karli morgenthau#flag smashers#power broker#contessa valentina allegra de fontaine#erik killmonger#black panther#captain america#marvel
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Reviewing time for MAG178~!
- Notable thing this episode was the intensity of the sounds (understandable given where they were), almost covering Jon’s words at some point, and the fact that once again… we got statements-specific ones. It used to be a bit unclear whether the sounds we were hearing belonged to the scenery around Jon or if they were emanating from the statement itself: for example, the sounds of the war (MAG163) were surrounding Jon&Martin before the statement while they were immersed in the domain, same with the carousel (MAG165) or the burning building (MAG169); and likewise, the wailing of the worms (MAG166) was audible outside of the statement (surrounding Martin at the end of the episode, when he wasn’t even in earshot of Jon)… but the squelching we could hear during Jon’s statement was a manifestation of what was happening in Jon’s narration. The hooks attacking Francis (MAG172) were a bit more ambiguous: were they audible outside of the statements, and Jon was commenting on them as they were happening? (Jon himself, after all, was described as present in the audience in the statement itself.) In The Extinction domain (MAG175), were the scuttling and hisses of the creature audible anyway around Jon? Or were these sounds created by Jon’s statement?
It’s been a bit clearer with these last three episodes that Jon’s statements seem to be creating/emanating these sounds, or allowing them to be heard: we could hear the sounds of running footsteps and pants while Jon was unmoving (MAG176); we heard the clock of the room, the chair creaking or scraping, the pills getting swallowed, the altercation, the distant wailing, the peeling of Doctor David’s face… and these sounds disappeared (including the clock!) when Jon got out of his statement, while the tinny muzak reappeared (MAG177). This time, Jon was stated to be in a closet: yet, we heard the factory gates opening, the grunts of the “things”, the tools they used, the sizzling of flesh, the cutting… and same thing, they faded once Jon was done with the statement.
(MAG176) ARCHIVIST: “Feet pound, silent whisper, silent blood on lips, blood on teeth, blood-scent of hated prey flows through veins and into feet pound silent in pursuit. [IN THE BACKGROUND, CONSTANT SOUND OF A CHASE IN THE FOREST: FEET RUNNING, PANTING, SHUFFLING OF LEAVES AND BRANCHES] Teeth smile. Ready to kill. [SHUFFLING OF BRANCHES]”
(MAG177) ARCHIVIST: [SIGHING] If you say so…! [INHALE]
[STATIC RISES]
[DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES]
[FOOTSTEPS, A TELEPHONE RINGS IN THE BACKGROUND]
[CLOCK TICKING IN THE BACKGROUND]
[STATIC FADES]
ARCHIVIST: “Hi. How are we doing? You can call me Doctor David. […] Like I say: we have all the time in the world! [STATIC RISES] And good old Doctor David isn’t – going – anywhere.”
[STATIC FADES]
[SOUNDS FROM THE STATEMENT FADES]
[THE TINNY MUZAK RESUMES]
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: “The only smell… is the smell of cleaning products. The door finally opens, [RUSTY DOOR OPENS] and another thing stands there. […] Finally, he is led over to a grate on the floor. [SWIFT METALLIC NOISE] He barely even has time to register the red-hot wire cutter [SLASHING SOUND] before it is in and out of his left arm with practiced, professional ease, neatly removing a small wedge of muscle. […] [SHUFFLING, CRACKING AND ELECTRIC SAWING SOUNDS] The last thing he sees before returning to the processing line… is everything going into the garbage. There wasn’t a single, suitable cut. [ANGRY FOOTSTEPS] “Useless,” one of the butchers says. And Tyler is gone.”
[STATIC RISES]
[SOUNDS FROM THE STATEMENT FADES]
[STATIC FADES]
Is Jon “creating” them through dream-logic? Could Martin&Basira hear them, if they stayed around as Jon’s audience, or are these sounds only present on the tape we’re hearing? I’m keeping in mind that the tape recorder is not acting like an out-of-the-box machine: through Jon, it seems to be able to “interact” with the content of the domain/the stories Jon is describing, as affected as the characters…?
- Jon explaining how this domain worked was super interesting (and terrifying):
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: Uh… [EXHALE] Technically, a lot of them… actually aren’t people?
BASIRA: … Come again?
ARCHIVIST: A–a lot of them are created by this place as, uh… “set dressing”, I suppose? Th–this domain, the fear of it requires these… queues, these… this, uh, intricate hateful bureaucracy o–of hundreds of thousands of doomed souls, it needs far more than the number of people who actually ended up here.
MARTIN: Wait–wait–wait, so… so it just… makes the rest of them up?
ARCHIVIST: Er, maybe one in a hundred or so are actually real? The rest are there to make those people’s fears more acute.
MARTIN: … That’s… Ugh, that’s somehow more disturbing.
… because it felt almost like some level of consciousness was at work? Or, well. Once again, a symbiosis between the Fear and its victims, the fact that the domains are literally their fears given enough autonomy to construct that reality and hurt them even more. (I’m thinking back to Jon’s “You want to talk about psychological projection, try viewing the metaphysical world through the lens of a being that is, by its very nature, a reflection of your own obsessions and fears.” from MAG175: he was, in context, talking about his own relationship to The Eye, but that… actually applies to every victim in the domains.)
Things getting me in the statement: the implicit rules/functioning of the domain being so unpredictable and odd that Tyler couldn’t expect them (“He looks around, unable to find a pen, a pencil, anything. The thing sat behind the desk does not respond to his questions. Finally, Tyler takes his fingernail, now long and ragged from his time in the queue, and painstakingly scores the words into the paper.”), the hurt and the pain never being factored by the creatures around him, the fact that his reactions were never timed exactly right (didn’t try to flee when he could have; would like to flee later but knew it was too late in the line), the fact that trying to find a meaning in his own sacrifice was utterly denied (“Is it not better, at least, to be useful? […] The last thing he sees before returning to the processing line… is everything going into the garbage. There wasn’t a single, suitable cut. ‘Useless,’ one of the butchers says.”). There were such a range of different fears in the whole statement: the anguish coming from limited options, the idea of suffering for nothing, of being evaluated and imprisoned into categories outside of one’s control, the crushing feeling of inadequacy, of accepting sacrifices and yet being labelled as a disappointment. Jon described it as an “intricate hateful bureaucracy of hundreds of thousands of doomed souls”, and there was indeed a big aspect of it evoking modern workplace environments (… unfortunately).
Even with the description and the beginning of the statement, I was surprised that this one was a Flesh domain! I do get the “Meat is Me” aspect (the idea of being reduced to meat and value, of being stuck in an abattoir), but I reaaaally felt a Vast vibe in it (being one amongst thousands, of time and space spreading, of being meaningless) with dots of Web (being absolutely dispossessed of agency, having the “choice” to rebel and being conscious enough of the decision not to) and maybe of Lonely (disconnected from the others, lost-in-the-crowd yet unable to reach anyone). One gigantic blob of terror, I know, but it’s a nice feeling when Jon labels a domain and I got a slightly different vibe, while seeing and understanding Jon’s logic!
(- Re: time, it was also very striking in this one that Jon is not exactly describing things as they are happening, but condensing them, since this one would spread through “years”:
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: “Time has no meaning in this place – but that does nothing to lessen the certainty that Tyler has been in this line for years.”
Or. Well. That time experienced in the domain is an absolutely subjective experience, to the point that it might be possible that, actually, Jon is still telling the story as it happens although there would be no way for his words to match the rhythm of the events he describes? It’s still dream-logic, so whatever can happen.)
- ;; Once again, domains affecting victims’ abilities to remember or be conscious of anything that happened to them before the Change (or creating memories to hurt them more efficiently):
(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: “Next to him, Charlie saw Ryan, who he’d known since childhood – though the other details were hazy. Ryan gave him a thumbs-up and an encouraging smile – before his face exploded inwards to a sniper’s bullet, peppering the boat with shards of bone and gore.”
(MAG164) ARCHIVIST: “There was never a time before the disease, no matter what the old bastards tell you. It has always been in the village, always festered in the dark corners where nobody could stomach to check, where good neighbours wouldn’t dream to speculate.”
(MAG165) ARCHIVIST: “Its pace remaining as it ever was, it does not care for coming pains as you are torn. Doesn’t it know who you are? No… And soon… neither will you. […] You will be someone again, someday. […] “I’m still Hannah!” you try to scream, but are you? No. Perhaps there’s some Veronica as fragments there, or Julian, or Anya, but… no. You feel the last of names and “who” you might have been be torn away and borne towards new bodies. New pages, blank; determined to be people.”
(MAG166) ARCHIVIST: “When had the crushing pressure in his chest become literal? When had the empty promise of the horizon finally vanished completely, replaced by the pitch darkness of this “forever wall of earth”? Sam did not know. Time had no meaning here. […] His existence was static, and eternal. Immutable. “Sleep” was only a memory, because even the prospect of unconsciousness might have made his present state slightly more bearable. Food as well, he knew, must be a thing, for he could feel the hunger, but his imagination failed to picture it. The only smell he knew was the damp, and the dirt.”
(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: “How long as she lived here? How long have these cramped, dingy rooms in the back of this sprawling rundown tenement been the place her heart calls home? She cannot recall, but long enough for her to grow into love for it, to cherish every rusted appliance, every crumbling piece of plasterboard, every – flickering – lightbulb. […] Sabina cannot… picture their faces, but knows that should they wake to see the state of the place… their anger would be blistering. […] What floor was her flat on again? Surely, it can’t be this high. […] Limping and desperate, she turns to see her furniture in flames, the bookshelves full of memories, that she can’t quite place [STATIC RISES] but knows are precious to her, curl and float away as ash. The photos on the wall of her family whose faces seem indistinct but she knows that she loves, begin to blacken, as the glass pops out of the frame.”
(MAG170) MARTIN: … It’s sort of weird, isn’t it? [CREAKING] A smell can trigger memory so… powerfully. Like this one; it, it–it makes me think of… [INHALE] Hm. [INHALE] Hm. I, I don’t know. Is it a person? A place? No, no; people, people don’t smell like that. Besides, I’m all alone. … I’m, I’m all alone. [CREAKING] Why, why am I alone? I, I shouldn’t be alone! There should be people! It’s such a, such a big house, my house, there mu–, there must be other people! People who care. Unless…
(MAG174) ARCHIVIST: “When it had first covered her home, bathing the street beyond her window in unexpected shade, she had thought it an eclipse. There wasn’t supposed to be one then, she is… sure of that – although if pressed, she could not have told you what day it is today. Before the shadow fell, she is sure that the sun was shining brightly – although, if pressed, she could not have pictured it. And the humid heat of a lingering summer had left the world sleepy, and unprepared – although, if pressed, she remembers the heat, but not the season. […] Mehreen cannot quite make out their faces as she bundles them into the car, old and shuddering as it coughs into life. Does she remember having a child? A spouse? Does she remember her mother having such a cruel sneer? It doesn’t matter. They are here now, and she has to save them.”
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: “It’s faded now. He remembers aches and worries and, sometimes, something that might have been joy…! But it’s far away now, like something seen projected on a distant wall.
I still wonder if that situation will evolve, by MAG200… Jon said that the Fears would stay as long as there are people to fear them, and the current status quo is that victims are imprisoned in a loop – their fears made manifest, torturing them in turn, leading to more fear, their perceptions and memories biased to prevent them from feeling something else. We’ve seen how anchors could work as a point of focus to get out of their grasp; it’s not possible with how the world is shaped now, but if the victims could remember something else than their fears, maybe…?
- Oh! I hadn’t noticed/wondered if there was an echo of Beholding in the domain itself in a while, but:
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: “Even if he had the will to, Tyler could not have struggled: the movements of the things scrutinising him are as gently unstoppable as a piston.”
… that’s a big Eye mood.
- Same as in the Slaughter domain, it seems to be a loop of fear:
(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: “There is a rumbling in the earth around him, as a tank speeds along its unstoppable path, and Charlie is immediately pulled under its tread. He has a moment of shocked horror, before being reduced to a smear in the mud. […] Next to his bleeding corpse, Charlie wakes from what passes for sleep in this place. A sergeant is yelling at him, screaming for him to take his gun and get into the waiting transport.”
(MAG172) ARCHIVIST: “The tragedy of Francis. A comic puppet show, in all acts. Act 48067”. […] And so it will be until the curtain descends at last, and THE SPIDER resets the scene, its belly already beginning to swell once again with replacements for the creatures it so gorily birthed.
AUDIENCE (BACKGROUND): [LAUGHS]
Pause, for laughter.
AUDIENCE (BACKGROUND): [LOUD CLAPS]
And so the curtains descends.”
AUDIENCE (BACKGROUND): [LOUD CLAPS AND CHEERING]
[STATIC RISES]
ARCHIVIST: “The tragedy of Francis. A comic puppet show in all acts. Act 48068.”
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: “The last thing he sees before returning to the processing line… is everything going into the garbage. There wasn’t a single, suitable cut.”
(And I’m still dubious of Oliver’s claim that The End’s domain was better than the others and would deliver it for real! Though Jon mentioned dream-logic as the rule at work, to explain why Daisy wouldn’t be coming back if killed… so maybe enough belief in The End as an absolute ending makes it real in that world. Mm…)
- Back to Martin worrying over victims’ feelings, and being vocal about it!
(MAG163) MARTIN: … They’re not… real?
[VOICES SHOUTING IN THE DISTANCE]
ARCHIVIST: [MIRTHLESS CHUCKLING] No…! They’re real; they were… normal people before the– … Before me. But now they’re here, meat for the grinder. I just mean there’s no point… talking to them.
MARTIN: Don’t be a prick, Jon. Hey! I’m, I’m sorry about him. He’s–he’s going through a lot – well… we all are, I suppose, but well… “Hi”, I guess. [SILENCE] Hello?
ARCHIVIST: They won’t hear you, Martin, they’re all… too busy waiting to die.
MARTIN: Jon…
(MAG178) MARTIN: [HUSHED] Oh, would you both just keep it down, please?
ARCHIVIST: They’re not aware of us, Martin, I keep telling you.
MARTIN: Yeah, I know, but it’s not okay to talk as though they’re not there. They’re still people.
[…] [MARTIN JOSTLES A BODY]
MARTIN: Excuse me.
ARCHIVIST: [EXASPERATED] Martin, they can’t hear you.
MARTIN: [SHARP] I know, Jon, that’s not the point.
ARCHIVIST: … All right…!
He hadn’t been vocal about it in a long time! (And he had felt a bit disconnected about it, to me, with the worms and the carousels.)
In comparison, I do understand Jon’s pragmatism in the uselessness of trying to Know who is real and not:
(MAG178) MARTIN: Wait–wait–wait, so… so it just… makes the rest of them up?
ARCHIVIST: Er, maybe one in a hundred or so are actually real? The rest are there to make those people’s fears more acute.
MARTIN: … That’s… Ugh, that’s somehow more disturbing.
BASIRA: … How do you tell which is which?
ARCHIVIST: I mean, you could ask me, I suppose. B–but I don’t… really see the point. Would it help you to know whose suffering is real and… whose is just a… grim reflection?
[SILENCE]
BASIRA: No.
ARCHIVIST: Well, there you go then.
… but still, a bit aouch about that logic – it’s true that people in the domains are not aware of them, so taking them into account doesn’t change anything, but it still means ignoring real people. (I wonder if they will end up in a domain where victims are aware and conscious and a potential threat to them, if it’s the point of the domain?)
- I’m glad, however, that Jon was trying to make them avoid the avatar of the place, because it was contrasting a lot with Jude:
(MAG169) MARTIN: That turn…! You, you took a hard turn after the roots back there. I knew that was a thing! Why are we here?
ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] It’s just… [INHALE] When you said… [SIGH]
MARTIN: Jon, why have you taken us here?
ARCHIVIST: Jude Perry. … This is where Jude Perry rules.
(MAG178) BASIRA: So who’s in charge, here?
ARCHIVIST: Not anyone you’re familiar with. We won’t be meeting them.
MARTIN: You’re not going to… y’know? [MARTIN VOCALISES AN EXPLOSION]
ARCHIVIST: No. Even if I wanted to, he’s in the, uh… Main Processing Room, and believe me when I say that’s… not somewhere you want to be.
MARTIN: … Yeah. I guess.
(And even with Oliver: Jon had made the decision that he wouldn’t pursue Oliver, but it had been shown as a rare act of mercy in the face of Oliver’s actions. Here, it really sounded like he wanted to spare Martin and Basira more suffering, didn’t want to put them in an upsetting situation.)
… a bit worried that Martin still hasn’t let it sink in that Jon didn’t want to go Kill Bill anymore because he felt that it was detrimental to himself, but to be fair, Martin sounded like he had asked just to clear it up and wasn’t pressuring, just checking.
- OHOHOHOH about Martin’s frustration feeling extremely… meta (it’s something an audience would say):
(MAG178) MARTIN: [INHALE, EXPLOSIVE EXHALE] God, I hate all of these… loose ends…!
ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry.
MARTIN: It’s, it’s fine. [INHALE] We’ll just have to tie them all up in one go!
Both the thread imagery and the storytelling aspect are screaming a bit “Web?” (THIS IS HOW WEB!MARTIN CAN STILL W–)
- I’m still a puddle on the floor about the fact that:
(MAG178) MARTIN: … Yeah. I guess. [INHALE, EXPLOSIVE EXHALE] God, I hate all of these… loose ends…!
ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry.
MARTIN: It’s, it’s fine. [INHALE] We’ll just have to tie them all up in one go!
ARCHIVIST: Hm?
MARTIN: [SIGH] Around Elias’s neck.
ARCHIVIST: … Ah.
MartinElias. The MartinElias in season 5 is so delightful *snif*. Strangulation? That’s such an intimate way of killing… It’s what Will described as what his preferred method for killing Hannibal would be… My MartinElias rights…
I love how. Martin. Just brings up Elias so much this season.
(MAG161) MARTIN: Elias won, and there were some tapes he’d kept for himself, and he wanted to gloat. So, he sent them!
ARCHIVIST: He’s not…
MARTIN: I–I don’t see–
ARCHIVIST: … “Elias”.
MARTIN: Jonah, then. I don’t know, I find it hard to think of him as… I don’t really like to think of him!
(MAG162) MARTIN: Do you think it’ll do anything? Confronting Elias?
(MAG164) MARTIN: What about Elias?
(MAG170) MARTIN: I mean, the interview was weird, I… I don’t really remember the man who talked to me. Just his eyes. They stared at me; th–through me, and… and, I–I knew that he knew what I’d done. God, I…! I was so scared, but… but then he smiled and shook my hand…! What was his name? [CREAKING] He said I “had the job”…! [CHUCKLE] That he “looked forward to working with me”! … I was still so scared I could barely move my arm…! I was so terrified I’d let him down…!
(MAG174) MARTIN: … Hang on, you’re still down to kill Elias, right? Uh, oh, Jonah, whatever.
(MAG177) BASIRA: … So what’s your plan?
MARTIN: Long-term? Elias. He’s up in that that… “Panopticon” tower thing.
(MAG178) MARTIN: God, I hate all of these… loose ends…!
ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry.
MARTIN: It’s, it’s fine. [INHALE] We’ll just have to tie them all up in one go!
ARCHIVIST: Hm?
MARTIN: [SIGH] Around Elias’s neck.
* “I don’t really like to think of him!” said Martin Blackwood, before proceeding to mention Elias at every turn. (And still “Elias”! Jon and Martin seem to have completely given up on calling him “Jonah”. He’s still “Elias” for them, even though they know who he truly is.)
* Oh, Martin… He really seems to have decided that “killing Elias/getting revenge on Elias” was their goal, and that it would do anything good. Jon has already proven that killing avatars in domains didn’t free victims, didn’t improve their situations; that the domains just… kept going, even “unsupervised”. Even if Jonah is still around in some shape or form (in his old decaying body, in “Elias Bouchard”’s body, merged with the Panopticon, anything), and even if he is the ruler of the Panopticon (not a given, since Jon said that they were heading towards his own domain: unclear if it was the Archives, the Institute, the Panopticon, or all of them)… killing him would not fix the world. Is Martin absolutely in denial about this? Or does he need a small goal to keep going and process his feelings?
(;; And there is just a huge chance that… Martin is mostly feeling guilty about what happened, about the fact that he had the chance and opportunity to kill Elias but refused to do so, and that it led to Jon getting his last mark with The Lonely (with potential additions of not having checked the package they had received, and having chosen to leave Jon unsupervised while he would read a statement). The episode was about Basira knowing all along what was happening but trying to pretend she didn’t, and how this prevented her from reaching her goal (Daisy); I wonder if Martin will soon have to undergo the same process, to allow him and Jon to reach the Panopticon…)
- About Jon’s need for a stop:
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: Left. [INHALE] Just up ahead. [STATIC FADES] Although, uh… Hum… Actually, you might want to head through that door and… wait.
BASIRA: Again? Already?
ARCHIVIST: There’s a lot of fear in this place.
[…] MARTIN: New plan. We wait in the corridor; you go in the spike cupboard and tell your story to all the… hooks and stuff.
Once again, it’s definitely presented as Jon having to unload an excess, and I’m really interested in Martin’s lexicon. In MAG177, he called it a “statement”, and this time, presented it as “tell[ing] [his] story to all the hooks and stuff”: “story” had been how Fanshawe had described Albrecht von Closen pouring out his horrors, and Martin’s formulation took into consideration the need for an audience. Jon did introduce the tape recorder as a necessary audience in MAG163 while he was giving the domain’s statement (and he had mentioned how “pouring out” into them had helped him to understand what the cabin was doing, in MAG162), but really, I’m struck with how similar Jon sounds to how Fanshawe had described Albrecht?
(And what is happening with the tape recorder, what is Jon creating through them…)
- Uh! So it seems like Basira got Enough already, by listening to Jon last time. Not keen to reiterate the experience, uh. (Well: it’s mostly Jon who, first and foremost, took it as a given that Basira wouldn’t be listening either.)
- I’m fond of the fact that:
(MAG178) [DOOR OPENS AND METALLIC JANGLING IS HEARD]
MARTIN: [EMPHATICALLY] Nope!
BASIRA: … What the hell sort of tools are those?
ARCHIVIST: “Flesh” factory, remember?
The tools weren’t described. Some things better left to imagination, nondescript but evoked through characters’ reactions, uh?
- ;w; Is Jon still worried about Martin potentially losing himself in a domain? He really almost lost Martin in the Lonely house, and Martin had wandered away too deep in the Web one:
(MAG170) ARCHIVIST: Oh, Martin! Thank god, I, I was… I–I thought you were behind me.
[FABRIC RUSTLES]
MARTIN: I thought you’d left me behind…! Gone on without me.
(MAG172) MARTIN: No, I… Not for most of it. I just thought I heard… something. Whatever. I went exploring, all right? I don’t know why; I shouldn’t have.
ARCHIVIST: No, you–you shouldn’t have!
(MAG178) MARTIN: New plan. We wait in the corridor; you go in the spike cupboard and tell your story to all the… hooks and stuff.
ARCHIVIST: … Fine. Just don’t wander off.
… I really wonder if, at some point, Jon will try to come back to Martin&Basira, and they’ll be just… gone, because of Helen, Annabelle, or the domain’s work. (… It might be how Daisy could appear? While Jon is focusing on a statement and unaware that she reached them first?)
- Martin has his Limits and will be vocal about it:
(MAG178) MARTIN: [EMPHATICALLY] Nope! […] New plan. We wait in the corridor; you go in the spike cupboard and tell your story to all the… hooks and stuff.
… but mostly, I’m snickering so hard, because. It was.
It was.
It was Martin refusing to go into the closet. I’ve been snickering about it for a week, alright.
- … I really wonder what Martin was talking about with Basira:
(MAG178) MARTIN: –I know, I know you find it hard whe– … Done already?
ARCHIVIST: Yes. [INHALE] Talking about me?
BASIRA: … I assume that’s a rhetorical question.
ARCHIVIST: I am trying to keep my powers to myself.
BASIRA: Sure!
MARTIN: I was just… giving Basira some advice.
ARCHIVIST: [GOOD-NATURED] Avatars are from Mars and humans are from Venus, that sort of thing?
MARTIN: [TINY CHUCKLE] I mean… yeah? Sort of?
ARCHIVIST: [BRIEF CHUCKLE]
MARTIN: Well, w–we were pretty much done anyway.
… Jon’s shitty sense of humour… (Was that an allusion to the feared vs. the fearful, as Helen made the distinction? To the Jon/Martin relationship as avatar/human? x’))
Was Martin’s “advice” about how to not take what Jon was saying too badly, how to try to talk with him constructively since she and Jon had grown sour towards each other in season 4? … Or does Martin have a plan in the making, that requires Jon to not know about it? Because this episode and the previous one made a point to remind us…
(MAG177) BASIRA: … What’s it like? Being with someone who can see the inside of your head?
MARTIN: Hm? Oh! Oh no, he doesn’t. I told him not to, and so he tries to… look away?
BASIRA: And you trust him to do that.
MARTIN: [DECISIVE] Yes. I do.
… that Jon doesn’t know what is happening in Martin’s head since Martin asked him not to “know” about him…
(I’m glaaad that Martin and Basira are talking outside of Jon!!)
- I like the contrast between Jon absolutely knowing what he was doing, where he was leading Basira and Martin… and the fact that Basira didn’t know about it.
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: Next one’s through here.
BASIRA: Next one?
ARCHIVIST: Her latest victim.
[DOOR IS WRENCHED OPEN WITH A METALLIC CREAK]
MARTIN: [REELS] Oh…
[SOUNDS OF FLIES BUZZING]
Not exceptionally great from Jon, but typical from season 5 – it just highlights how much Jon knows how the world operate, what is around them, is indeed almost completely omniscient… and forgets how others aren’t.
- I really, really love how Daisy’s victims have been introduced for these past two episodes:
(MAG177) ARCHIVIST: We’re here.
[DOOR CREAKS]
MARTIN: … Oh! Jesus…
[BAG JOSTLING]
ARCHIVIST: Yes. Horrible way to go…!
BASIRA: You’re sure this is Daisy’s handiwork?
ARCHIVIST: Positive. […] I could tell you.
BASIRA: [EXHALE] Don’t bother. I know who he is.
MARTIN: What?
BASIRA: [SIGH] Noah Thomson. That… nasty piece of work. Crossed him a few times when we weren’t doing sectioned work. Last I heard, he’d dodged a GBH charge Daisy brought him in on. Blinded a guy during a robbery. I guess she didn’t forget.
MARTIN: Wait. Wait, so… so, she’s hunting down criminals? People who she… thinks got away with stuff?
BASIRA: … Sure.
ARCHIVIST: Really? As simple as that?
BASIRA: What’s your point?
ARCHIVIST: What, you think he ended up in Wonderland House at random? We’re just going to ignore it, and write him off as a “nasty piece of work”?
BASIRA: We don’t have time for this.
ARCHIVIST: Then we should make time. You want to hear how he ended up blinding that man? Because it wasn’t a robbery. He was running away from Daisy, lashing out in a panic. The court believed it. But you believed her…
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: Recognise her…
BASIRA: … No… I don’t think I do.
ARCHIVIST: That wasn’t a question. It was an instruction, we can’t… move on until you do.
MARTIN: Jon, what are you getting at?
ARCHIVIST: This isn’t just a journey through spaces.
BASIRA: … Fine, I recognise her. I don’t know her name, though.
[STATIC RISES]
ARCHIVIST: Isabelle Moran. Shoplifter, drug addict. [STATIC FADES] Daisy was certain she was dealing as well, derailed her recovery twice.
Jon asking Basira to “recognise” the victims is such a significant move? It’s about giving them some dignity back: we’re given their names and last names (which… is more than what we’re getting in the domains’ statements; it feels more real); we’re being introduced to who they were through their identity, their history, what was done to them, the wrongs done to them… both as humans actions (the hurt Daisy caused as a police officer, although influenced by The Hunt) and as monstrous actions (Daisy butchered them as a beast). It feels very striking that most of the violence inflicted upon them is… not especially the fact that they’ve been murdered in these domains (Jon implied they should respawn?), but really, about what was done to them before, and how fundamentally Daisy’s behaviour had hurt them.
I really like how Jon is pushing Basira to acknowledge all of this, to process Daisy’s responsibility (and indirectly, hers, as someone who let it happen)? There is something very empathetic, very powerful in the fact that what needs to be done is about seeing the harm, understanding how it happened, before being able to proceed to the next step and take actions?
(- Basira, serial Sayer Of Fuck And Swears:
(MAG143) BASIRA: [SIGH] So, what, this was another waste of time? What, no Church, no Dark Sun? … I’m gonna kill that son of a bitch…!
(MAG148) BASIRA: You sent us to the North fucking Pole for no goddamn reason.
ELIAS: A, a–hem… miscalculation.
(MAG177) ARCHIVIST: [DEEP EXHALATION] … Satisfied?
BASIRA: Ff… Fuck.
(MAG178) BASIRA: Don’t give me that patronising, ominous-oracle bullshit, Jon. I’m not an idiot…! […] Of course I fucking care!
Now she’s on equal ground with Jon!)
- Basira broke my heart into tiny pieces this episode, because all her prickly behaviours were bad, as she was put in that uncomfortable situation and trying to flee (while Jon relentlessly pushed her to see)… and it felt so human in its own way?
(MAG155) BASIRA: I’m trying to convince her to go after them. To, er… “Hunt” them.
ARCHIVIST: Why?
BASIRA: Because I’m not going to lose her.
ARCHIVIST: She goes Hunting again, you might anyway.
BASIRA: And if she doesn’t, she might die.
ARCHIVIST: Something you’re fine with in certain other cases. And something she’s made peace with.
BASIRA: Because of the guilt she feels over the stuff The Hunt made her do…! It’s not her fault.
ARCHIVIST: Earlier, when she was still out of it, I, uh… I “saw” some of the things she was talking about, some of the things she did, while she was police. I’m not convinced I disagree with her assessment. [PAUSE] Do you want me to tell you?
BASIRA: No. No, I don’t.
ARCHIVIST: … You knew, didn’t you? You knew the sort of things she did, and you let her.
BASIRA: No, not exactly. I thought… [PAUSE] It’s not that simple.
ARCHIVIST: It never is. But that doesn’t make it okay.[SILENCE]
BASIRA: None of us are who we were, Jon.[SILENCE]
ARCHIVIST: No. I suppose not. In many ways, it’s simpler now, isn’t it? At least now, our demons have names.
BASIRA: Mm.
(MAG178) BASIRA: Fine. Noted. Can we just move on please?
ARCHIVIST: I’m afraid not.
BASIRA: Why not?
ARCHIVIST: We aren’t finished here.
BASIRA: Is that a threat?
MARTIN: Guys, come on, don’t do this, not here.
ARCHIVIST: I told you before, we can’t hunt a monster you refuse to see.
BASIRA: Don’t give me that patronising, ominous-oracle bullshit, Jon. I’m not an idiot…!
ARCHIVIST: I never said you were.
MARTIN: Guys…
BASIRA: [ANGRY] Look, I need you to lead the way. I don’t need your advice, and certainly don’t need you stood there judging me!
MARTIN: [LOUDLY] Enough, enough! Someone has died! Show some respect. Or don’t you care?
BASIRA: [INCENSED] Of course I fucking care! … [QUIETER] That’s the problem.
MARTIN: I… I don’t understand.
BASIRA: … I just… I don’t need him laying everything out for me like I’m some kind of idiot. I know, all right? Daisy is the only person I could ever rely on and… [GETTING QUIET AND SHAKY] And she… she did things, terrible things, and I… [SIGH] I refused to see it or… said it was my duty, or whatever. I don’t know.
MARTIN: Basira…
Basira’s discomfort had to do with her feeling judged, criticised, leading her to get so defensive, all of which we’d already seen a lot in season 4! It’s a defence mechanism! And we finally could see what she was hiding, the feelings she didn’t want others to see! It was long due, and it was such an amazing pay-off!!!
I feel like it’s the equivalent of Melanie in MAG131, and Daisy in MAG132, when they explained themselves to Jon, gave him the keys to understand what was happening in their heads and why they behaved like they did, and, once again, it was such a precious, sensitive moment?
(MAG178) BASIRA: I care, I just… I don’t need to wallow in it. I need to end it. All of it.
MARTIN: … We’re here for you.
BASIRA: No. She was there for me.
ARCHIVIST: … “Cops versus robbers and monsters”…
BASIRA: I thought we were doing good. I really did…! I knew there was some bad shit, I knew Daisy was into a lot of it, but… I thought it balanced out. [WEAKLY] … I thought we were good.
ARCHIVIST: [SOFTLY] I know how that feels.
BASIRA: … I wanted to help people, you know? When I first joined. Protect people. But then I saw what some of those same people were capable of, and… something changed. I wanted to hurt them, the ones that deserved it, and it… it felt good, it felt… righteous. I thought I could feel the line, though, I really did. Eventually, though, it was… too much. [PAUSE] I was going to quit. I couldn’t… take what I saw myself becoming, but… then I got sectioned, and suddenly… suddenly it turned out there were real monsters out there, and… Well, that just made the power feel better. So things kept slipping. But… Daisy was always there for me.
MARTIN: All those innocent people…
BASIRA: Were they? Innocent?
ARCHIVIST: Some. And if not? [INHALE] What crime warrants what was done to them? Theft? Violence? Disrespect?
* Honestly, the raw vulnerability, melancholia and sadness? It was my favourite performance from Frank ever.
* I really love how it tied in with what Basira had already said about her relationship to police, that she had never really felt extremely attached to the profession (MAG117: “I don’t want to be here. But by the end, I didn’t want to be police either, so… guess I don’t really know what I do want, which… maybe that’s just as well. My options… they’ve gotten a lot narrower over the last year.”). It’s just such a sad story because, in her case, she hadn’t gone there for the power (unlike Daisy); as she explained, she had good intentions… and the structure in place tends to sour and corrupt, encourages its agents to abuse their power, won’t make them become better persons (will only make them worse), and turns out to be a threat for the vulnerable instead of protecting them. It’s even sadder that Basira thought about quitting shortly before she got sectioned because, with the timeline in mind:
(MAG043) BASIRA: Okay, well, the first time I got hit with a Section 31 was five years ago, August 2011. I’d got my badge the year before that, and was still getting used to some of the more stressful bits of the job.
It happened barely a year after she joined the police. And she was already aware that she was becoming someone she didn’t like, that she was doing terrible things, and was considering quitting because of it…
* The “I wanted to hurt them, the ones that deserved it” reminded me a bit of Melanie explaining her anger in MAG131, and I’m sad in retrospect about how… Basira and Melanie could have understood each other much better in season 4 if the circumstances had been different…
* I also like how the existence of the supernatural goes hand in hand with Daisy’s side of things: the monsters and the avatars were a pretext for Hunters to unleash their violence. It was never about protecting the population from dangerous people; it was about having easily digestible targets, which allowed them to feel good about being violent (since, after all, they were only eradicating threats, right?). As both Basira and Jon pointed out:
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: … “Cops versus robbers and monsters”…
BASIRA: I thought we were doing good. I really did…! I knew there was some bad shit, I knew Daisy was into a lot of it, but… I thought it balanced out. [WEAKLY] … I thought we were good.
It wasn’t a clear-cut situation – there were monsters out there. But we’ve also seen how so many of these monsters had initially been preyed upon by the entities, had initially been trying to survive, and how the line about their “badness”… wasn’t as easy to establish as characters would have liked. (And, in Daisy’s case: indeed, it wasn’t worth it anyway to… push struggling people deeper into misery, just because she had power over them, and Daisy, in season 4, was the first to remind people of it.)
* T__T I really love the… complexity of Basira’s situation? How would you react if the person there for you, representing a fixed point (your anchor?), turned out to be doing wrong things? In theory, it feels easy to answer that the good behaviour would be to turn your back on them, or to try to make them improve; and in practice, in Basira’s case, it meant allowing her whole system to collapse, and having to rebuild from there. I’m really fond of how she explained that she wasn’t stupid, that she was still aware of what was happening: that she still chose the pack mentality over a rejection of that system, but that she was already disillusioned with it. Basira had often felt a bit… emptier than the other characters; we only knew of a life-lesson given by her father, and the rest of her life seems to have been tied to the police force for the past few years, before she joined the Institute. It has really felt like Daisy was what brought her stability and peace. And yet: Daisy did awful things, Basira enabled her by trying to think it was for the greater good (MAG091: “But I… I always thought you just killed monsters.”), and Basira wasn’t even able to make the most of her return in season 4, when Daisy wanted to improve, since Basira was stuck on the idea that they needed a strong defence against threats… (And I wonder how much of Basira’s initial rejection of Daisy in season 4 had to do with the fact that… allowing herself to understand and hear the “new Daisy” would mean having to acknowledge that the old one had been bad and wrong; that Basira had allowed her to be monstrous, and that they both shared responsibility in those crimes.)
- Really loved Martin’s attempt, too:
(MAG178) MARTIN: … We’re here for you.
BASIRA: No. She was there for me.
Because it said so much, that Martin used a present tense while Basira answered in the past (as if, after Daisy, there couldn’t be anyone else). It also put back in my mind how Basira had tried to be a bit softer on Martin at first, after his mother died (MAG127: “But I didn’t want to push it. He was in a… bad place, what with the attack and his mum and everything, so I didn’t press it.”) but didn’t provide comfort either; and how, even earlier, Basira and Martin had tried to be there for Melanie when they learned what Elias had done to her (MAG110). There’s still a lot of ice, but I’m glad that Martin offered, and that Basira didn’t attack him on it either – she’s mourning (that past tense in “she WAS there for me”…), but not… absolutely rejecting him either.
- In the moments of small understandings, Jon’s was also noteworthy:
(MAG178) BASIRA: I thought we were doing good. I really did…! I knew there was some bad shit, I knew Daisy was into a lot of it, but… I thought it balanced out. [WEAKLY] … I thought we were good.
ARCHIVIST: [SOFTLY] I know how that feels.
Since he also had to face the reality that the Archives team hadn’t really been doing “good” either, although he had tried to cling to the idea:
(MAG150) MELANIE: Because this place is evil, Jon! And so… doing this job…
ARCHIVE: [LOUD EXHALE]
MELANIE: Helping it out… even in small ways, i–is in some way… evil too! Every time we try to use it to do good, it just seems to make everything worse, and… and I will not be a part of that anymore.
ARCHIVIST: What about The Unknowing? We, we saved the world!
MELANIE: Did we? I… I mean, I–I think it was the right thing to do, but how many people were killed to do it? We, we weren’t even a neutral party; we did it as agents of The Eye, because Elias told us to.
ARCHIVIST: An–and then you put him in jail!
MELANIE: Martin put him there. And, and–and he’s still doing harm.
(With the additional fact that Jon had indeed saved Melanie and Daisy, but had attacked five people during the season; that The Unknowing would have failed anyway; and that ultimately, a lot of Jon’s “good” actions had also marked him as a preparation to Jonah’s ritual.)
Re: Jon’s situation, it’s the same thing with Basira’s declaration about caring:
(MAG178) MARTIN: [LOUDLY] Enough, enough! Someone has died! Show some respect. Or don’t you care?
BASIRA: [INCENSED] Of course I fucking care! … [QUIETER] That’s the problem.
MARTIN: I… I don’t understand.
(MAG152) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] … When does it stop?
HELEN: What?
ARCHIVIST: The guilt… The misery… All the others I’ve met, they’ve been… cold. Cruel. They’ve enjoyed what they do. When does The Eye… make me monstrous?
It had been Jon’s “problem”, too: how he was conscious and aware of the suffering he caused, and how he had to live with it, wasn’t okay with it. I really like how it feels like, finally, after season 4, Basira is able to participate in a conversation where they’re opening up, talking in good faith, trying to understand each other and… not hurt each other anymore? How they can relate, or just listen?
- I’m back to sobbing about Jon and Daisy’s relationship in season 4 because:
(MAG178) BASIRA: [SHAKY] … You knew her. She was trying to be better…!
ARCHIVIST: She was. But she never asked me to forgive her.
BASIRA: Forgive her?
ARCHIVIST: … I’ve been scared, terrified for my life so many times these last few years, but I’ve never, not once, felt so horribly, abjectly powerless as when she… took me into that forest to kill me. I’ll never forget it.
MARTIN: … You never said.
ARCHIVIST: It’s not easy to talk about.
MARTIN: Oh, Jon…
BASIRA: … And would you have? Forgiven her?
ARCHIVIST: No… But she never asked me. She knew she had no right.
[SILENCE]
… It’s still “aouch”, but not surprising: Daisy had been terrifying in MAG091, absolutely hammering in that Jon’s life was in her hands, that she had decided who and what he was and what he deserved. It had been a very hard scene, cruel and violent, a demonstration of what Daisy could do (and had done)… and I really don’t feel like it negates the moments she and Jon shared in season 4, it mostly just casts another dimension on it? How Jon was a bit tense and awkward around her, and slowly mellowed down:
(MAG133) DAISY: You sure?
ARCHIVIST: No, uh, it’s, hum. It’s fine.
DAISY: It’s just… Basira’s busy.
ARCHIVIST: I–I understand. Ho–honestly, er, I’d actually appreciate your insights, er, for this one, just… You know, keep quiet during the statement and that.
DAISY: Sure. I, I can do quiet.
ARCHIVIST: Right. Er, oh, do you want a chair?
DAISY: No.
ARCHIVIST: Oh. Okay.
(MAG136) MELANIE: W–well, I’ve kind of got to… uhm. I’ve got somewhere to be. Do you mind if, if… she hangs around, with…
ARCHIVIST: Er… I suppose… Not at all. She’s very welcome. […] Are you alright?
DAISY: Asked me that already.
ARCHIVIST: Right. Sorry.
DAISY: I didn’t ask her. To do that.
ARCHIVIST: I–it–it’s fine.
[…] DAISY: Get over yourself! You’re always talking about choices – we all made ours. Now I’m making the choice… to get some drinks in. Coming?
ARCHIVIST: I d–… I… [SIGH] … yeah? Okay.
DAISY: Melanie’s out, but I’ll go get Basira.
ARCHIVIST: Is she… W–will she want to join us?
DAISY: If she doesn’t, I’ll rip her throat out.
ARCHIVIST: Uh…
DAISY: It’s a joke, Jon.
ARCHIVIST: … oh. Hahah…! Yes… Uh, I–I’ll get my coat.
(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: The others are doing… better, I think. Basira’s busy doing research for something secretive, unsurprisingly. But she seems to be adjusting to, uh… the new Daisy. I actually like Daisy now, which is a… really weird feeling.
(MAG153) ARCHIVIST: Are you alright?
DAISY: [BREATHLESS] Don’t touch me.
ARCHIVIST: Christ, he was right, I, I didn’t… When did you get so thin?
DAISY: I’m not, it’s fine.
ARCHIVIST: … It’s The Hunt, isn’t it? Without it–
DAISY: I’m fine. Just haven’t been hungry. I’m strong enough.
ARCHIVIST: Clearly. […] Even so, if it’s having this much of an effect on you–
DAISY: I’m not going back. I can’t let it in again.
ARCHIVIST: But it– … What if it kills you?
DAISY: [CHORTLE] Always said I was dedicated to justice…!
ARCHIVIST: Daisy! It’s not… You can’t think like that.
DAISY: Jon. Do you have any idea how much damage you can do if you’re a police officer who wants to hurt people? How much the system will protect you?
ARCHIVIST: [SHARP INHALE]
DAISY: I managed to keep most of it from Basira, but…
ARCHIVIST: That wasn’t you, that was The Hunt!
DAISY: … [SIGH] We were the same.
[SILENCE]
ARCHIVIST: … You’d never known anything different.
[SILENCE]
DAISY: Because I never wanted to. All that time trapped was good for one thing: thinking. And I did a lot of it. I’ve made my choice.
I feel like… there is a form of deep respect from Jon, when he explained how Daisy didn’t ask for forgiveness – because it proved, in a way, that Daisy was very aware that the harm she had done was too huge to be forgiven, and that she couldn’t ask that from him (and that it might be a reason why Jon accepted to get closer with her in the first place: because she wasn’t lying when she said that she now understood how terrible she had been). We’ve seen, however, how Daisy was quick to apologise:
(MAG132) DAISY: [CRIES OF PAIN] I’m, I’m sorry… I’m sorry Jon… I’m sorry…
(MAG142) MARTIN: I know. [PAUSE] Not nice being interrogated, is it?
DAISY: I… [EXHALE] Oh.
MARTIN: Yeah.
[SILENCE]
DAISY: [INHALE] I’m sorry, Martin.
MARTIN: It’s alright. Wasn’t you. [INHALE] Not really.
DAISY: No, it was. I hate… a lot of what I did back then; doesn’t mean I’m not… responsible for it, doesn’t mean it… wasn’t me.
But indeed: never asked to be forgiven. And it might strike a very personal chord for Jon, since… he knows, first-hand, how it is to not be forgiven:
(MAG119) TIM: Jon, I don’t know if you can hear me, but if you can…
ARCHIVIST: [FAINTLY AND FAR] Tim…?
TIM: I don’t forgive you. But thank you for this.
(If I remember correctly, the only time Jon had asked to be forgiven had been to the assistants through the tape recorder, when threatened by the Not!Them and panicking. But, same as Daisy: afterwards, he said “sorry”, and didn’t ask for it.)
- There is another thing, not mentioned but hard to forget if we’re talking about Daisy’s victims, including Jon: what about Jon’s? What about the statement-givers who were plagued by the nightmares, and specifically the ones he attacked knowing the harm that he would do to them? We’re exploring the harm Daisy caused to her victims, I wonder if we’re heading towards what Jon did to these people, too… (Are they waiting at the Panopstitute or the Archives, since it’s “Jon’s domain”? He used to terrorise them through the nightmare zoo, and had claimed them for Beholding: but in this new world, he doesn’t sleep anymore. It would feel logical that… they’re still trapped and victimised by The Eye as of now.)
- Early season, Jon had really felt like Virgil leading Dante (Martin) through the circles of Hell, and there is a bit of that with Basira too! Except that it’s not a didactic exploration of divine retribution/punishment, but… precisely, it is about how the “punishments” were the problems, how nobody was inherently unsalvable (or even, how everyone was plain pushed towards misery because of a biased repressive system)? There is still that idea of guiding Basira, both physically and mentally, through a terrible and hard journey, to make her able to see the reality of the world and reach her goal… (and that makes Daisy “Beatrice”. Who is… already dead TT__TT)
- From MAG163 to MAG177 (excluding MAG167, which was Jon&Martin taking a break and Jon giving the statements about the Archives during Gertrude’s tenure), we crossed through all the Fears present in Jonah’s invocation, minus Beholding itself and plus Extinction. MAG178’s was explicitly labelled as The Flesh; although it was another aspect from Jared’s garden, it’s still a “repeat”. I would infer that, either Jon&Martin’s journey has been set aside and put on hold right now (since they’re focusing on finding Daisy), and they now will be able to reach the Panopticon as soon as they’re done with this current quest… either no, going through one domain of each Fear wasn’t the point of Jon&Martin’s journey to reach the Panopticon, and it is something else. Since they left the cabin, Jon had mentioned multiple times that their journey wasn’t a purely physical one, that there was a meaning underneath it:
(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: Geography doesn’t work anymore. Space… doesn’t work.
MARTIN: … All right. So what does that mean?
ARCHIVIST: It means the journey will be the journey, regardless of how we choose to make it. […] You see that tower, way off in the distance?
MARTIN: Yeah. [PAUSE] [SIGH] It’s watching us, isn’t it? [SIGH]
ARCHIVIST: The Panopticon and the Institute. Merged into something entirely new.
MARTIN: Wha–, what? No, th–there’s, there’s no way we could see it from here. We, we must still be a hundred miles from the border, never mind London!
ARCHIVIST: You could see that tower from anywhere on Earth. And it can see you. And if you walk towards it, eventually you’ll get there. But you have to go through everything in-between.
(MAG164) MARTIN: How much further do we still need to go?
[STATIC INCREASES]
ARCHIVIST: A long way. Through many dark and awful places…
[…] MARTIN: Are we safe, traveling like this?
ARCHIVIST: Yes… Yes, sort of, we’re… I don’t know how to phrase it, we’re… something between a pilgrim and a moth. We can walk through these little worlds of terror, watching them; separate, and untouched.
(MAG165) MARTIN: But. You said we needed to go through these places. … Is that even going to work here?
ARCHIVIST: Uh… [EXHALE] We need to go through them… metaphorically.
MARTIN: Mm… !
ARCHIVIST: Psychologically, we need to… “experience” them.
(MAG177) ARCHIVIST: She was here, but the corridors of this place are… Rushing isn’t going to close the distance faster, it’s more about how we choose to move through these domains rather than our speed.
BASIRA: What does that mean?
MARTIN: I’ve been with him the whole way and I still don’t know.
ARCHIVIST: It means we’ll reach her quicker if you stop tearing off, and let me concentrate on finding a proper path through this place.
[…] BASIRA: [ANGRY] I told you not to look in my head!
ARCHIVIST: I didn’t. And I won’t. But you can’t hunt a monster that you refuse to see.
(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: That wasn’t a question. It was an instruction, we can’t… move on until you do.
MARTIN: Jon, what are you getting at?
ARCHIVIST: This isn’t just a journey through spaces. […] We aren’t finished here. […] I told you before, we can’t hunt a monster you refuse to see.
What is Jon’s and/or Martin’s journey? Basira has to learn to see/acknowledge the monster in order to hunt it; what is the mental process that Jon and/or Martin have to go through in order to be able to reach the Panopticon again? Is it about guilt, about their active responsibility (vs. what wasn’t their fault)? Is it about the line between victims and culprits not being that simple to establish, and them being unequipped to judge? Is it about their own fears?
- It felt like Basira made a lot of progress in this episode. She finally opened up and admitted how turning a blind eye had made her complicit. She implied that she had indeed tried to flee the responsibility of having to kill Daisy:
(MAG178) BASIRA: [QUIET] … I really am going to have to kill her, aren’t I?
ARCHIVIST: There’s no way to bring her back. Not any more. At this point, if I tried to take away her fear… it would destroy her anyway.
BASIRA: Am I even going to be able to?
ARCHIVIST: Yes.
BASIRA: And she stays dead?
ARCHIVIST: In this case… yes.
MARTIN: What about the powers?
ARCHIVIST: Dream logic remember? She won’t come back. Trust me.
BASIRA: … Does she want me to kill her?
ARCHIVIST: She asked you to, didn’t she?
BASIRA: No, I mean, right now. Is she suffering?
ARCHIVIST: … No. Right now, she’s… She’s happy.
MARTIN: [DEJECTED SIGH]
* Before this episode, Basira would probably have been unable to do it. Jon’s certainty contrasts with what he used to say about it:
(MAG164) MARTIN: What’s Basira going to do?
[STATIC INCREASES]
ARCHIVIST: She… thinks she’s going to kill Daisy. Like she promised. [STATIC DECREASES] But she’s conflicted.
MARTIN: And will she?
ARCHIVIST: I–I don’t know, th–the future, th–that’s… that’s not something I can see.
So it feels like he, too, thinks that she’s now ready.
* I was wondering about whether or not Jon would be able to do anything to save Daisy with his powers: I was mostly waiting for him to explain whether he could or couldn’t help, I’m fine with this explanation (which makes sense in context). It also strikes me that… he had probably been mourning her for a while during that journey:
(MAG164) MARTIN: And Daisy?
[STATIC INCREASES]
ARCHIVIST: Bestial. Brutal. [STATIC DECREASES] [INHALE] Carving her way through the domains of other Powers, following the scent of blood. … Oh, Daisy, I’m sorry…
(MAG175) ARCHIVIST: Basira and Daisy. We’re close.
MARTIN: Wait, what? Wait, really? B– Th–that’s brilliant! What are we waiting for, let’s go!
ARCHIVIST: Uh, y–yeah, i–it’s… It’s not… it’s not going to be easy, things aren’t… good.
The fact that, despite Daisy’s murder attempt and the fact that it deeply traumatised Jon, they were able to form that friendship, feels so fragile and precious at the same time? Jon didn’t want to lose her. He’s not allowing her or letting her die because it feels like a fair punishment or the only way to deal with Daisy; it really feels like… it’s to honour Daisy’s last wish, as a person who wanted to be better and who got caught up by The Hunt.
* I’m a bit more curious about Jon explaining that Daisy would stay dead because of “dream-logic”: is it because of Jon’s own feelings influencing the world (if he feels like she’s dead for real, then she is)? Is it because, as long as Basira goes through that inner journey, killing someone in these circumstances can grant a “permanent” death unlike the domains? Is it because of their connection to The Eye…?
* é_è Basira’s last questions about what Daisy currently wanted broke my heart… and Jon’s answers did, too. It really feels like “Daisy” truly died in MAG158, uh? That what matters is what Daisy wanted while she was still herself, even though the beast she turned into is “happy” in this state. (And it requires a bit of faith: who is the real Daisy, which wish should be respected? The beast happy to hunt or kill? Or the assistant who was sorry about the harm she caused, withering while trying to “listen to the quiet”?
* Martin’s dejected sigh said a lot… Until now, he was mostly optimistic about the possibility of finding their “friends” back, of helping them. I don’t think he had envisioned that… no, Jon couldn’t save Daisy, could only “help” her by helping Basira to respect her last wish. (Martin was mostly withdrawn from that last conversation, and… yeah, it might have been a lot to internalise for him, too. Jon seems to have borne that knowledge for a while; it might even have contributed to his perception that he couldn’t improve the general situation whatsoever? While Martin, who was lacking the keys, had kept hoping that they could… do something good. Killing avatars, saving the children, helping their friends, maybe getting Daisy back. I wonder if the current circumstances are making him more susceptible to reach for Annabelle or answer her call a next time, since she had offered her “help” and Martin has been realising, lately, how powerless they are…)
- This episode was a Lot of processing and of sadness, and that last note…
(MAG178) BASIRA: Killing her won’t undo any of it. But… that’s not the point.
ARCHIVIST: No one gets what they deserve. Not in this place. They just get whatever hurts them the most! … Even me.
* Killing Daisy will be hard, and indeed. It won’t even change the harm she caused, won’t change the apocalypse. It won’t even be a matter of “retribution” or “justice”; but I’m glad that Basira is aware of that already, and that “the point” lies elsewhere. In this context, it’s really about respecting Daisy’s choice and what she wanted, to allow her to escape The Hunt one last time – even if it means killing her, and to prevent what she became to cause more harm. It’s about Daisy. (Which requires, to reach her, to go through what she had done: the person she had wronged and whose story had been hidden until now.)
* … I really loved Jon’s sad insight about this world. It is an unfair world, an unfair system, quite often echoing what the old world was: Daisy’s victims were, after all, already crushed and pressured by an unfair society, already pursued by their own fears (MAG177: “it’s the worry that everything is, is awful, and it’s actually… your fault. That, that you made it up […]. What, you think he ended up in Wonderland House at random? We’re just going to ignore it, and write him off as a ‘nasty piece of work’?”; and it’s meaningful, in the same way, that in this episode, Isabelle Moran was found in this factory, where people are pressured and pushed around and ultimately labelled as “useless”).
* I still really wonder what all this means about Jonah. He was initially afraid to die, or to be subjected to a different apocalypse, so is he also a victim of “whatever hurts him the most” in this new world…? (I still really wonder how Jon will behave in front of Elias. We’ve seen, again and again, how labelling someone/something as a “monster” doesn’t cover the whole reality of it: the “criminals” were mostly dragged down by society, the cruel “avatars” had often been preyed upon when they were vulnerable… I can still dig Jonah as TheWorstTM, the selfish asshole who doomed the world for his own benefit; but I also feel like it would be very in synch with this season to… mostly have Jon spitting to his face about how pitiful and afraid he had been, and how fear had motivated his actions way more than he thought?)
* What is “what hurts Basira the most”, then? Is it to have to kill Daisy? To see and acknowledge their past actions? I wonder what will happen to her next: will she be pulled back in into a domain? Will she be spared because of Jon’s presence, or because of her connection to The Eye because she’s still an assistant? (I’m thinking again about the possibility of Jon’s victims being in the Panopticon right now: the assistants were protected from the nightmares once they had signed the contract… but Martin, Basira, Melanie and Georgie had all given their statements to Jon. Would they happen to all be journeying towards his domains in a way, because they belong there because of the statements they gave…?)
* Big question being, of course… what is “what hurts Jon the most”. Is it the guilt of having launched the apocalypse and having to benefit from it despite his disgust (he’s not hungry anymore, he’s aware that it does feel good in a way that he hates)? Is it to have to be a passive voyeur in this new world? Is it to lose his friends, first with Daisy? Is it The Web dancing around Martin? Is it something he knows about their journey or about the Panopticon, and doesn’t want to tell Martin yet…?
- You could really see Basira’s progression through the episode, as she dealt with how Jon was leading the way:
(MAG178) BASIRA: … You’re sure she came through here?
ARCHIVIST: Have I steered you wrong so far?
BASIRA: I don’t know, do I? We haven’t actually found her yet.
ARCHIVIST: We’re getting closer.
BASIRA: Great.
[…] ARCHIVIST: Great. Well, in that case, shall we move on?
BASIRA: After you.
ARCHIVIST: … Right.
[…] BASIRA: … Can we move on, now?
ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] Yes. I believe we can. This way.
From being distrustful of Jon to… being way more humble about it, and accepting that he knows what he’s doing and that it’s in her interest, too. From being suspicious and defensive, to cautious and strategic, to confiding and relying on him.
- Overall, I’m “!!” because this episode… managed to sell me on Daisy’s death, while I was really dubious about it?
I was pre-emptively a bit disappointed about the possibility of Daisy coming back as a Hunt beast just to get killed, because I felt that it was a bit pointless to make it drag for so long, while she… could have died on her terms in MAG158 instead. But here, where to reach Daisy, in order to fulfil her promise, Basira has to see, process and acknowledge the harm Daisy had caused and that she had herself enabled? It works for me! It finally unlocks Basira’s own development, that I was hoping for; it’s sad as hell; and it’s not portrayed as Daisy’s punishment or retribution. It’s about both acknowledging the harm and damage Daisy had caused (as the process to be able to catch up to her), and about respecting Daisy as an individual who was capable of growth, exercised it, was aware of the wrong she had done and firmly owned up to it, and didn’t want to return to that life – but was forced to by a power too big and crushing, and circumstances playing against her. It’s not done as an act of hate or revenge, or because Daisy’s crimes are too heavy for her to be allowed to live. It’s not a death sentence. It’s both about acknowledging Daisy’s crimes and how she had wrecked people’s lives, how she had been allowed and enabled to unleash her violence and unfairness, how Basira had willingly decided to ignore most of Daisy’s actions, and it’s because Daisy didn’t want to be a “sadistic predator” again, and asked Basira to stop her, respecting the fact that Daisy had improved as a person (to the point that she knew she couldn’t ask for “forgiveness”). So, I’m relieved about how things are heading: it’s sad as fuck, I’m going to be miserable, but so far, things sound incredibly satisfying, narratively?
(We know that The Eye might influence Jon to only see the worse or more painful side of things, so I’m not entirely ruling out that there could be a surprise, Martin doing something, or Annabelle, or Georgie&Melanie appearing with a solution? But I doubt it: I’m satisfied with the explanations given, how we’re prepared to say goodbye to Daisy, how respectful it is both of her victims and of her awareness of the harm she had caused, leading to her decision to be better… So, really, I’m fine. Crying in advance but FINE.)
MAG179’s title screams “Basira!” (but could technically apply to Annabelle or Helen, or Jon himself…). I’m not sure Daisy is getting killed this episode, but we might get a whiff of her? Or a cliff-hanger about her towards the end?
Domain-wise, mm… Could be a pause like MAG167, could be Hunt or Slaughter, Corruption? (It does feel like an anti-Lonely title, mostly!)
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Hallo. I've read ASOIAF and a lot of metas concerning the books and it seems that in TWOW Dany and Tyrion are two heroes who are going to take darker paths. Dany giving in to her dragon side and Tyrion becoming even more nihilistic than he was in ADWD. I also think that the Starks (including Jon Snow) will take darker paths in TWOW. I believe the danger they face is that they will let the cold in and all the horrors that they have suffered will cause them to become more callous 1/2
I love Dany, Tyrion and all the Starks and it will be interesting to see them grapple with and defeat their own inner monsters and I have every confidence that they will. Jon has become Lord Snow, where he forced Gilly to swap her baby and Sansa, Arya and Bran are being mentored by people who don’t seem the sort to encourage things like compassion and empathy in their protogees. Can you say what the dark paths might be for Sansa, Arya and Bran? 2/2
I would not put it as them grappling with their inner monster because monster is a loaded term that’s been used particularly with Tyrion to denote an inherent moral rot which largely feeds into Tyrion’s breakdown and spiral in ADWD because “you make me sorry that I am not the monster you would have me be”. An expectation of monstrosity as an unchangeable trait of Tyrion’s broke him down to a point that set him on the dark path he is currently on. But people don’t innately have an inner monster that they need to defeat to be good or compassionate.
That said, I do agree that we’re going to see the Big Six taking darker paths in TWoW. They are all already on their way there to varying extents but the slide is perhaps clearer in some stories than others. Bran is one of the characters who is reasonably into that part of his arc with his repeated skinchanging into Hodor. Skinchanging a human has been established as an abomination and a pretty terrible thing to do that it’s been described as akin to rape. Thistle brutalizes herself in her resistance to Varamyr’s violation of her mind, and Hodor is always quietly terrified of Bran’s intrusion that he retreats into his own mind. Yet Bran keeps skinchanging Hodor and using his body to do what he wants disregarding Hodor’s agency, consent, bodily autonomy and abject fear and hatred of what Bran is forcing on him, which will come to head with the incident of “hold the door” when Bran forces Hodor to sacrifice himself for Bran’s and Meera’s survival. That repeated violation of Hodor’s personhood and autonomy is informed by a great deal of ableism on Bran’s part since he stops treating Hodor as a person and instead turns him into a means to an end, a meat suit to ride and give back when he is done. But Hodor’s body isn’t Bran’s to use and ultimately Bran has to recognize that he has monumentally violated a person, a loyal friend who has been instrumental in Bran’s journey no less, to his grave largely because he dismissed Hodor’s personhood due to his disability.
Arya’s darker path will probably have to do with the possibility of her giving into vengeance. Her story has had motifs of vengeance and justice for the longest time, and the principles of the House of Black and White are one more stressor she has to contend with. While most of Arya’s kills have fallen on the justice side, she has killed on the kindly man’s orders, and she is set for a confrontation with the Faceless Men over her unlicensed kill of Raff the Sweetling that might push her to focus on her list as she fully reclaims the identity of Arya Stark. I think Arya returns to Westeros with the express goal of finishing off those on her list as the fine line between vengeance and justice gets really blurred. Meeting Lady Stoneheart and BwB will be the culmination of that arc in that it demonstrates the possible perils of having vengeance as a goal, how easy it is for justice and vengeance to get conflated, and how killing the people on her list won’t make her feel better. It is a return to “Joffrey was dead, but if Robb was dead too, what did it matter?” that will shift Arya’s path back to seeking out her siblings rather than trying to cross names off her list.
Sansa’s arc will probably revolve around a question of complicity. Littlefinger has put a lot of effort into making Sansa his accomplice. He made her a part of Joffrey’s murder without her knowledge but then shifted to making her a conscious accomplice in his schemes by involving her in the coverup of Lysa’s murder and framing Marillion. And despite the fact that Sansa hasn’t put it together yet, Littlefinger is fairly open about a few of his more nefarious plans with her. But she does have the necessary information to eventually deduce that he is the one behind Jon Arryn’s murder and that he is currently slowly poisoning Robert Arryn. I think Sansa reaches a point where she realizes the more egregious of Petyr’s crimes and faces the choice of keeping her silence or exposing him. I suspect that learning about Petyr’s betrayal of Ned and/or what he did to Jeyne Poole might be the tipping point in her arc.
#amaximumtastemakercollection#asoiaf#valyrianscrolls#bran stark#sansa stark#arya stark#asoiaf speculation#ask box
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1) For me, before the season started I was focused on the stuff they have in common, like their backgrounds (sexual assault, being used as toys in mens’ political games etc), their genuine care for their people, and they both love Jon. I honestly thought once Sansa saw who Dany was and that she had the North’s best interests at heart she would understand why Jon chose her as queen. I thought Sansa cared more about that than a Stark being in charge.
2) They would make such a great team I’m sad the writers chose to pit them against each other – for what? To show that Sansa is following in Cersei’s footsteps? To make us think Dany is obsessed with power for power’s sake? I thought they would bring out the best and each other and instead they bring out the worst, THAT’S where I was wrong but I don’t think I was wrong about the characters, just the way the writers chose to take them. I thought they had better taste.
Hi, anon – first, thanks for responding because I knowthings are tense in fandom right now and I really appreciate you writing thisin good faith. My thoughts on this have gotten long so I’m putting it under acut; please feel free to respond if you would like to, but no pressure – Idisagree on a number of points, but have total respect for differences ofopinion.
One thing I find interesting is that there are severalassumptions here which, if I agreed with them, would absolutely support aDany/Sansa friendship story – but I disagree on a few key ones. And I’mcertainly not saying the assumptions are without evidence – I’m sure you haveyour reasons – but I clearly haven’t interpreted the story the same way.
‘I honestly thoughtonce Sansa saw who Dany was and that she had the North’s best interests atheart she would understand why Jon chose her as queen. I thought Sansa caredmore about that than a Stark being in charge.’ Okay – so we fundamentally disagreeon who Dany is, because I think Sansa has made one of the most clear-eyed andwell-rounded assessments of her character in the show. I’ve been frustratedwith the perpetuation of this idea that Dany’s defence of the North was altruistic.I believe she cared that people would die and she had the power to save them,but following that sense of empathy into battle served the dual purpose ofprotecting the kingdom she’s trying to claim and giving herself the best shotof defeating an enemy that would ultimately become hers anyway. It was notexactly a case of head vs heart, but of both happening to line up in the samecourse of action. Dany arrived in the North having convinced Jon to bend theknee, which to Sansa means the king they chose from amongst themselves, whounderstands the North and has a vested interest in not just its safety but itsagency, has been subjugated by a foreign queen with a reputation for, among other things, great violence –who would have to manage the competing interests of Seven Kingdoms. Even ifDany represented Sansa’s ideal ruler, that in itself is in defiance of thechoice the North had made for itself – to be self-governed.
Sansa clearly sees Dany as prideful, stubborn, egotistical,manipulative, power-hungry and hot-tempered. I like Dany, and admire her, but Iwould argue that while these things are not all she is, they are certainly allaccurate adjectives. She’s also confident, determined, assertive, smart,ambitious and passionate. I think Sansa knows that, but she’s worried aboutDany’s flaws because they pose a potential threat. When a powerful person posesa threat to you, understanding their virtues is useful in predicting andinfluencing their behaviour; putting faith in them to counteract their flaws isnot.
‘For me, before theseason started I was focused on the stuff they have in common, like theirbackgrounds (sexual assault, being used as toys in mens’ political games etc),their genuine care for their people, and they both love Jon.’ In adifferent world I think these things would have bonded them – even in thisworld, if their goals weren’t contradictory. But because they are, theirsimilarities are one of the driving forces of their conflict. Dany told Jon ‘she’snot the girl you grew up with. Not after what she’s seen. Not after what they’vedone to her.’ Dany clearly knows about Sansa’s history, including Ramsay, andit’s her own experiences that make her sure that Sansa is a harder and morecynical person now. I’m sure Sansa knows about Dany’s past, and sees her ownfierceness reflected back. They do both care for their people, but theydisagree on what the best thing for them is – and they both love Jon, but wantdifferent things for and from him (the Jon of it all is a whole other thousandwords I’ll spare you from here).
‘They would make sucha great team I’m sad the writers chose to pit them against each other (youknow, sometimes I am too, but I honestly find their conflict interesting) – for what? To show that Sansa isfollowing in Cersei’s footsteps?’ Hmm, I’m not sure I follow you on that –are you drawing a parallel between Sansa and Cersei because they both dislikeDany? I’m not sure that’s fair – they have very different reasons and verydifferent ways of expressing it.
‘To make us think Danyis obsessed with power for power’s sake?’ I do think Sansa forces Dany toreveal some uncomfortable truths about herself, as does the larger North –because they don’t buy into her mythology. Dany claims to want to be queenbecause you can only effect positive change from a position of strength – and she’sright – but she has already helped defend the North, and insisting on rulingthem against their wishes is not in their best interests, but in the interestsof her power. I think Dany wants a lot of good, noble, wonderful things. I alsothink she loves power for power’s sake. The two things aren’t actually mutuallyexclusive, and they’re very human, and I think the tension between her selflessnoble side and her ego is one of the most fascinating things about her.
‘I thought they wouldbring out the best and each other and instead they bring out the worst.’ Yeah– exactly. It’s their circumstances working against them.
‘THAT’S where I waswrong but I don’t think I was wrong about the characters, just the way thewriters chose to take them. I thought they had better taste.’ That’s veryfair; I get why in this final season, a lot of people’s tastes are being disappointedbecause they have rooted for these characters for so long that to see them inconflict can feel like a loss when what we want is to see them triumph. I tendto like the more complicated, fraught character stuff and as long as it’s incharacter – which I personally think it is – then conflict can be just assatisfying as the ‘big happy family’, especially when it crystallizes who thecharacters have become the way this one does. I particularly disagree with thecommon argument that they are misogynistically ‘pitting two women against eachother.’ To me, that criticism only applies when a conflict between two women isgratuitous and not organic to the characters, but serves to play into negativestereotypes around cattiness. I don’t see that here.
#answered ask#dany vs sansa#sansa stark#daenerys critical#gabi makes words about got#daenerys targaryen
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Their father, with subdued tenderness
A wedding planner by trade, the Ottawa native is ranked fourth in the World Cup standings heading into the race Friday in Igls, Austria. 1 SPOTLIGHT: Once upon a time, newspapers took up whole buildings, the desks were full of reporters, and some of those reporters were paid to do nothing but spend months uncovering things powerful people didn want us to know. 23rd Street in Arlington, Va. The game will end when each player finds the right partner. Only us. Return to Sandakan and transfer to Hotel or Airport (suggested flight MH 3037, ETD 1850hrs). When the last of the riders had disappeared into the trees, Jon Snow rode the winch cage down with Dolorous Edd. And its Boeing 737 and Airbus Group SE and its popular A320. The shooting blinded Markham. Specialty chemicals company Grace will receive $1.9 billion in Sealed Air common stock based on Wednesday's closing share price of $47.63, $1.8 billion in convertible preferred shares and $1.2 billion in cash. Environmental Protection Agency.. The only downside is that you have to take them off if you want to navigate your smartphone touchscreen.. Returning in a short time, he left a communication respecting the transaction at the office of the Richmond Chronicle, and again departed; but had not gone far before he was overtaken by four men, who seized him, and led him to an out-of-the-way place, where they consulted as to what they should do with him. They were told that University of Brighton students that study a podiatry degree have numerous 'in house clinical placement' opportunities at Leaf Hospital to 'practice what they learn', plus they get to undertake a further twox3 week placements held externally at NHS Trusts. The mock knights were clad in mail hauberks, whilst the mock Dothraki wore no armor. Natasha says I was such an awkward gawky creature then, and that one couldn’t look at me without laughing. The Damphair might disapprove, but Aeron and his pieties were far away.. Breast Surgery Fellowship. They had dressed her in white lambswool trimmed with lace. Programs will be held in a variety of locations throughout the district, depending upon snowpack. And there was such piercing anguish, such suffering in her eyes that I saw that apart from my words her wounded heart was bleeding already. Their father, with subdued tenderness, made great efforts to soothe their tumultuous feelings, and at length partially succeeded. 'This is what I looked like for years a dead girl':. It TMs at this point that I notice something else
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[tweet from “please, mr. hunger was my father. call me jon” @jonphaedrus that says “julia and i are talking about like new fandom zealotry and its so interesting to me that a lot of new fandom puritainism has to do with the idea that if you come out of any place of darkness, you will rise in perfect light” the rest of the thread is not in the screenshot, but continues below:
like. this idea that if your life sucks, you will somehow magically come out of that just the best possible person. and it think it has to do a lot with the fact that many fandom puritains are sheltered to one aspect or another or came from places of support. when the only access that you have to darkness and horror are what you read in fiction, you will have this expectation that when things happen to real people, we will respond the same way as the avatars that live these lives in narratives, when this is rarely the case.
as frog and i were discussing the other day this gets back to the snape paradox. snape and harry come from almost the exact same background setting, and lived very similar lives, and made WILDLY differing choices. and both of their responses to that trauma are 100% accurate. but the difficulty here is that harry's response to that trauma is usually what comes /after/ snape's. the way that harry comes to deal and live with his trauma is recovery. snape is very much still living and reliving his trauma, daily. and because he isn't ever able to gain an out from that, he continues to perpetuate that violence against others. it's bad. he shouldn't.
but for many people with trauma, that is the life we have to consciously, daily, keep from reliving. and the majority of us fucking hate it and hate that our brains want that. but by erasing that narrative, by saying "if youve lived this, you must hate it" doesn't end up invalidating media reads or fandom, what it does is turn the ONE WEAPON of the marginalized back upon us—our ability to take in our experiences and find peace with them.
i'm not going to even get into the big fandom NO! messages here, so let's go with a simple one here—the reason many people write stuff about sexual assault into their porn is to deal with their own trauma and recovery by giving agency to others, not because they jack it to that.
but this desire to create something that gives a message that we ourselves need ends up being misread by others, who demand caveats and explanations for it. and then we get back into "if youve survived this, why arent you perfect like (x) is?" because often (x) takes years. because recovery is SLOW. it takes harry seven years to even be comfortable knowing his trauma exists, and that's with a caring community supporting him and a great deal of privilege otherwise. how long will it take someone without those things?
in summary: the greatest danger that fandom puritainism is presenting is not the loss of fandom culture, because on the cosmic scale doesn't matter. the danger is that it is teaching an ENTIRE GENERATION OF YOUNG ADULTS this is ok. the danger of fandom puritainism is that in ten, fifteen years we are going to have these young people in positions of power over others, and they are going to say to people who need support why they are reacting like this. what if these kids become teachers? therapists?
this zero sum game of "i don't know how to teach you to care about others" is the new fundamentalism, the new conservatism, only instead of "if poor people wanted to be rich theyd work harder" its "if you really didnt want to be traumatized, you would be perfect" i dont give a fuckshit about fandom here. what i do care about is that there is a budding idea on the internet that we can destroy people's lives just to prove that all along they *deserved it.*
slutshaming by any other name is still slutshaming. we can and should do better.
@enbynoctis asked me to crosspost this
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On why Dany should be an antagonist ( ≠ villainy villain )
Season 7 is right around the corner and I have some thoughts, opinions, speculations and theories I have to get off my chest. I will try to keep any book-specific analysis out of this discussion. This is (as much as possible) show only.
Something that always struck me as odd was the existing controversy sorrounding Daenerys’s character in the fandom. With all other characters, the audience can generally agree on where they fall on the “morality-spectrum”, so to say. Jon Snow is an unproblematic fave, if there ever was one, Joffrey and Ramsay are among the most evil characters to ever grace our TV screens, the Hound made a text-book antagonist-to-protagonist transformation (even receiving in-show absolution via Arya taking him of her kill-list) and show!Stannis - before the daughter-burning incident - was clearly planted in the middle. People liked him and even rooted for him, but no one’s arguing that he was involved in some very dubious, evil, amoral shit. Show!Cersei was ripped of most of her book-counterparts cruelty, but the fandom generally agrees that she is one of the clear antagonists / villains of the series.
The point is that the audience - minus some radical stans or antis - can generelly agree on where characters are on the good-evil, protagonist-anatgonist chart at any specific time of the story or during a particular arc. If not on the exact point, at least on the general vicinity.
But Daenerys? Her placement jumps all over from divine saviour to unreedimingly mad queen depending on who you ask, unlike any other character on the show.
In the end what’s really important isn’t to wether a character’s behaviour is 100%, 75% or 50% evil/good but wether we - the audience - root for them (protagonist), root against them (antagonist) or aren’t really sure about it.
If there are any clear protagonists, or hereos if you will, in GOT and ASOIAF it is the Starks. There is nothing they could do that would actually turn the audience against them. I know I promised to keep any book stuff out of this, but there is a reason A Promise of Spring’s original title was A Time for Wolves. The Starks are the heart of the story.
A little sidenote on starkbowl and Sansa becoming an antagonist (which I really can’t see happening): Sansa turning into a villain also comes at the cost of her being a Stark, just like Tyrion tuning into a good guy severed him from the Lannisters. When talking about “the Lannisters” you mean Cersei, Jaime and Tywin. Tyrion and his family have become two separate entities in the collective mind of the fans and show watchers. If Sansa really were to team up with Littlefinger and turn into an antagonist/villain she wouldn’t be ‘a Stark’ anymore. Even now, with her clearly being a protagonist of the series, anti’s will always fall back on the ‘she isn’t a real stark anyway’ rethoric.
A Stark simply cannot be evil. (grr martin and D&D might let me fall straight on my face with this prediction, but I’d say that its veeerrrrryyyyy unlikely.)
But Daenerys?
There is no other character in GoT who’s ultimate and inherent good-ness or evil-ness is so bitterly fought about. While misogyny definitley plays into it, I think it would be false to see it as the sole or main source or reason. Her character is set up to be ambigious. I disagree with those who accuse her of being a ruthless tyrannt, willing to do anything to achieve her goals and those who see her as a benevolent messiah who can’t do anything wrong. She is - at the same time - both of those things and neither.
To the general audience she is very much set up as a protagonist. It’s easy to root for her when she overcomes her abusive brother, fights for agency in a partriarchal world, destroys slavery or is on a subjectively honourable quest to restore her families legacy and reclaim her home.
But what happens when her goals and desires clash with those of our other protagonists? If the Starks are our heroes and her enemies/rivals, what does that make Dany to us, the audience?
But why can’t she just team up with the Starks and be a good guy ???
Two reasons: Drama and avoiding a clear good vs evil dichotomy.
Going into season 7, our main-ish characters are set up as follows:
The Protagonists / Camp “Good Guys”
Team Stark (Jon, Sansa, Arya, Bran, et al), Team Targaryen (Dany, Tyrion, Theon et al)
The Antagonists / Camp “Bad Guys”
The White Walkers, Team Lannister (Cersei, Jaime et al) & Euron, Littlefinger
Has Game of Thrones really introduced us to some of the most sympathatic villains, problematic heroes and placed almost every character somewhere in-between only to have it end with various constellations of Camp “Good Guys” batteling differing fractions of Camp “Bad Guys”? No, I don’t think so. (Unless D&D stray faaaaar from grr martins original plans and intentions, which could happen, sure....)
In order to prevent merely explicit good vs evil fights one or more characters/parties have to move towards the opposing camp. In my opinion, the most likely candidates for that are The White Walkers turning more good-ish -or less less bad-ish, if you prefer - and/or Dany expiriencing a similar shift in the opposite direction.
The show already laid the groundwork for the first option by revealing that the White Walkers originally were first men, who were turned into ice monsters by the children of the forest.
[ The Youtube-Channel “A Theory of Ice and Fire” has some really good videos on the Origin of the White Walkers and the True Colors of the Children of the Forest. I recommend everyone to watch them and his other videos. His analysis and theories are very insightful and definitly worth a watch.]
But humanizing the White Walkers can only go so far. It will be really hard, if not impossible, to make us actually feel any kind of remorse over their demise. They are such big threat to all of humankind, that any moral ambiguity about destroying them is lost and any question wether our heroes should oppose them becomes obsolete. Comparisons that come to mind are eradicting a virus or putting down a rabid dog. The dog isn’t responsible for the state it is in, but ultimalty it is for the best.
I will go into Daenerys transformation from pro- to antagonist at the end of the post.
To make for some interesting drama we also need tension and conflict between characters that are on the same side. Finding possible sources for this within Camp “Bad Guys” is pretty easy. Jaime is probably going to turn on his sister at some point and every alliance with Euron is going to be fragile at best and will turn into chaos for one or both parties at worst.
What about Drama within Camp “Good Guys” and it’s individual fractions?
Jons parentage is going to cause some tension within Team Stark, yes, but I don’t see any of the remaining stark children ‘throwing him out Winterfell’ because of it. I don’t see Jon discarding his identitiy as a Stark neither, especially after Arya and Bran come back into the picture. His relationship with sansa is so controversial that I don’t want to touch on it, but he isn’t going to go full Targaryen with his little sister and brother around. Can we at least agree on that? They will insist that he still is one of them and so will he. (I stand by my opinion that R+L=J and more importantly Jons reaction to it will cause a rift between him and Dany, not him and the starks).
The Dothraki and their way-of-life are probably going to cause some conflict within Team Targaryen. Dany isn’t as ruthless as some parts of the fandom make her out to be and she will be conflicted about bringing so much destruction to “her lands and people”. She might try to silence her conscience, because the ends justify the means, but she and her allies will have to face some really difficult choices. Tyrion might feel just a bit bad about attacking his home as well.
It’s as good as impossible to predict or speculate on Bran’s or Arya’s story line, since they are kept top-secret, but I don’t think they involve one of them turning bad.
Sure, Sansa and Littlefinger could team up and cause some drama in camp ‘Good Guys’, but they simply don’t have enough influence to put the stakes sufficiently high. Seriously, against a Jon&Dany tag-team, what could they - or anyone really - do to oppose them? What use is an antagonist if he doesn’t pose a vital threat to our protagonists?
Daenerys turning into an antagonist ( ≠ ultimate evil villain) simply makes the most sense from a storytelling-perspective. Both to cause tension between our protagonists, shake up Camp “Good Guys”, color our final conflicts in a nice shade of grey and lead us toward a bittersweet ending. Why is Dany the best character to “break bad”?
She is the most powerful human character right now. (With the threat of the White Walkers looming over everything, any secondary antagonist/”villain” will have to bring a lot to the table to form a interesting, engaging plotline. I think it’s safe to say that Dany’s help against the army of the dead will be crucial. Keeping her allegiance unstable or it coming at a great cost would be substantial enough to stand on it’s own, while still being connected to the bigger arc surrounding it.)
She is allied with some shady characters (As stated above, the Dothraki aren’t going to magically turn into peaceful people. Bringing an army whose entire culture revolves around raiding and raping and pillaging could be seen as a questionable move. Also, I do not think that her alliance with the Greyjoys is a coincidence. Yes, we all need to put our differences aside to face the White Walkers, but the Iron Born have caused so much havoc in the north, so recently, that their presence NOT causing any issue for a Dany-North alliance is hard to imagine. Specifically putting established enemies of the North - including Theon with his very complicated relationship to House Stark - on Danys side has to have some significance. As for the rest: I honestly believe that Olenna is going to kick the bucket very soon, she’s only still around because she’s so good at sassing people. I refuse to waste any more thoughts than necessary on the Sandsnakes, but murdering your family in cold blood isn’t exactly nice? Tyrion might be the only person on Team Dragon that has any kind of positive connection to the Starks. show!Tyrion, at least, does have a rather agreeable relationship with both Jon and Sansa.)
Her political goals stand in direct conflict with those of the Starks (The Seven Kingdoms vs Northern Independece - and yes northern independence is actually important to numerous characters on the show)
Jon’s parentage will cause some tension between them (some people believe that she’ll see him as a potential rival to the Iron Throne. I disagree. I believe the reason for Dany ‘turning against’ Jon won’t be him being a Targaryen, but him not wanting to be one. I am pretty sure that Jon’s initial reaction to R+L=J will be to utterly reject his Targaryen heritage, to get through this majore identity crises. And Dany will, understandebly, feel utterly betrayed by that. She won’t see him as a threat, she will try to persuade him to become ‘the man he was always meant to be’, she will want him to be a Targaryen and she will want him by her side -wether in a romantic way or not- when she takes the Seven Kingdom. And this is something that Jon will not give her. He will choose to be a Stark and that will be a hard blow for Dany. Her beloved brothers, Rhaegars son calling the “usurpers dog” his father. I don’t know who much this will influence the overall plot but it will definitely strain the relationship between Jon and Dany.)
The North, Vale and - presumably- Riverlands allience (Having the same regions rally behind Jon/House Stark “against” a Targaryen queen smells of Rebellion 2.0 ~with a twist~ this time opposing a conquerer, not the established ruler. I admit that this leaves out the Stormlands but with Gendry coming back, who knows? He has a friendly - possibly romantic, *wink* *wink* -relationship with Arya and if he’s put in any position to make such a decision he will ally with her side.)
She has shown the compasity for cruelty & violence (You can argue wether or not her opponents had it coming - yes for Kraznys mo naklos , no for the randomly crucified & burned masters of meereen, mayybe for the khals; but the fact that she’s willing to use such questionable, violant measures while having giant fire-breathing dragond at her disposal opens her up for a very dark path. Someone with nothing but swords going a bit too far wouldn’t have the same consequences as the mother of dragons stepping over the line. Speaking of dragons)
Her dragons are a ticking time bomb, she can’t properly control (At one hand they will play a crucial part in defeating the army of the dead, but on the other hand they are fucking dangerous and Danys ~varying~ inability to control them is a well established plot point. Reducing their final role to being magicals weapons bringing down the big evil would be so chliche and go against many of the problematic themes concerning them. Btw when has one person having so much power ever ended well?)
There will be no Iron Throne or Targaryen Restoration (I don’t believe that ASOIAF or GOT is about Dany restoring the Seven Kingdoms to it’s “ideal” previous state of absolute Targaryen rule. Not only would this render Roberts Rebellion meaningless, it would portray it as a mere temporal disruption of the rightful order which is just... no. The rebellion was a justified uprising against a tyrannical king, it’s the event that started the story and it should still have significance at the end of it. Sorry, not sorry, but Dany isn’t simply going to press the ‘reset button’ on Westeros. The Iron Throne is doomed, so is House Targaryen and so is Daenerys - unless she peacefully settles down as Lady of Dragonstone, which is ... rather unlikely.)
The controversy about her character is exactly what grr martin wants (This whole long-ass post started with the extraordinary discrepancy concerning Danys position on the evil-good spectrum. People can’t seem to be on the same page when it comes to her. And you know what? That’s the point. No ones objectively ‘right’ or ‘wrong’. Characters are on opposing sides for their own reasons, not because they are inherently evil or good. Everyone can either agree or disagree with those reasons and form an opinion accordingly. Having the audience “choose sides” between two fractions we both rooted for when separeted, once their stories collide would be an appropriate ending for the story.
I propose the theory that this contradiction (rooting for the Starks and Dany) and Danys role reversel when switching from her own separate to the shared storyline (from protagonist to antagonist) is already in full effect within the more obsessed part of the fandom (who loves to speculate and “think ahead”) and will hit the the casual viewer in season 7.
Last, but not least having all of our protagonists team up after meeting for the first time and descending on the evil dudes with immense force just feels so ... boring, predictable,anticlimactic, lord-of-the-ring-sy? Everyone coming together and defeating the White Walkers after having some serious beef with each other (sometime mid to end seaon 8) would be way more dramatically satisfying. I think that Daenerys will take a clear antagonistic role against the starks until the very end when she comes around to save the day.
Since I know someone is going to bring it up: I am not saying that any of this would be an impregnable obstacle for any romantic relationship with Jon. It would complicate things, yes, but also make them a lot more interesting. Neither am I saying that Dany will turn bat-shit crazy and burn down all of Westeros just because.
In the end, these are only my thoughts and opinions. Maybe I’m wrong about all this and the show will move into a completely different direction. We won’t truly know until the last episode, will we?
Thanks for sticking with me until the end, you’re a champ, and tell me what you think.
#game of thrones#got speculation#got season 7#got meta#daenerys targaryen#meta#my stuff#my opinion#got#loooong post
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Realized how much sense it makes that Deisha, the s!5 version of Jon, is the part of him that holds trauma. It's really interesting because trauma really is a weight around the neck of the characters of tma, dragging them down and twisting them into monsters--and yet Jon's trauma also is a major factor in him opening up, needing other people, and ultimately drop his cold shell in canon. His trauma is the source of his monstrosity, but also his empathy for other people, which is like one of the only things stopping him from being a complete monster in s5. No wonder Deisha is s5 jon, rather than jon--she carried the trauma for him. It's really interesting in how it's a push and pull, where trauma is a big root of the most objectively monstrous and objectively most human things about jon. Even more so how he pushes much of the monsterhood and negative effects of trauma into strizlx--brings a new meaning to "the owl made me" in his intervention.
Idk just dudddeee the number of lenses you can use to look at jon and co. in this fic...like how did you keep all of this straight when you wrote it????
(Your daemon au is living rent free in my head.)
Hey uh, this take is better than any take I have about that story, and it’s a more in-depth and astute reading than I knew about or intended, so...wow? Holy shit this is such an interesting take. I’ve never thought about this, but the text supports it.
The topic of “Jon’s trauma is what makes him a good person” is one I’ve hit upon in another story, The Crow’s Funeral. There, he basically has the power and demigod status of S5 Jon, but he’s amnesiac and he’s never experienced...trauma. So he’s an all-powerful, childish shithead. I think Jon is someone who has been constantly victimized by powerful people, relentlessly, and he knows how terrible it is. He knows how much it hurts. He hates how he’s been turned into someone with the power to victimize. And he doesn’t want to inflict that pain and hurt onto anybody else. Jon’s been hurt, so he knows how horrible it is to be hurt, so he doesn’t want to cause hurt. It’s such an important part of him.
But I also enjoy, as you said (I vibe with you very hard), how TMA is willing to have someone’s trauma just turn them into an asshole. Everyone in TMA is an asshole. I’m careful to write every character as an asshole, because they’re just little Jenga towers of trauma responses and PTSD. As I say a lot - “sometimes trauma doesn’t make you into a woobie who flinches a lot and has panic attacks, sometimes it just makes you an asshole”. And a take that I used for Jon in Hope Etc, which is a little out of character but that I just had to include because it’s what I resound with, is that feeling of...fuck you. Resentment, anger, bitterness. Why me. If you want a monster I’ll GIVE you a monster. It happens, a little. It doesn’t make him a bad person, it makes him a human person under the worst circumstances possible who makes bad choices because every human is weak. As Strix said (and this is understated, but it’s a line that is kind of essential) - “It’s hard to be a good person in the Magnus Institute”. It makes him do the worst things imaginable to people, but the reasons why are painfully human. I explore this a lot - my story Martin and the Dream Boy JUMPS out with “Jon as a supervillain who is a supervillain because his pain crushes him” - but I think this story literalizes that. This story literalizes every metaphor. That’s why I wrote it jaskldf.
So bringing this characterization into daemons - Deisha is Jon’s “emotional” self. This isn’t true for every character (Basira and Daisy as counter-examples), but it’s true for Jon. Children trauma responses are different from adult ones, in this fantasy world an in real life, but I think so much trauma as a child pre-disposed Deisha towards severe trauma responses as an adult. Also true in real life.
Jon, when traumatized, becomes kind. He also does crazy shit. So that’s Deisha. I’ve never thought about it this way, and you’re more intelligent than I am, but...yeah! It’s only briefly mentioned, but Jon’s paranoid breakdown manifested in Jon still being pretty functional, but Deisha was self-harming, having the paranoid episodes, acting aggressively and confrontationally, and just being neurotic. Which looped back into Jon and stressed him out immensely. (Jon is so upset in this fic he kind of mentally glosses over how their relationship hadn’t always been good, which I only mention in passing). So that Dark Dust swirls, and swirls, and swirls...
And eventually you end up with the person who trauma made, which is Strix. And the awful little thoughts and feelings and impulses and bitterness and resentment that trauma made, which is Strix. And you end up with the Beholding and the monstrous impulses to feed and devour, which is Strix. And you’re so weak and tired and depressed and lost that, when these thoughts become so overwhelmingly powerful, you’re too tired to resist. You don’t WANT agency. You don’t WANT choices. You “know” all of your choices just ruin your life, you never make a good choice, all you make are bad choices. You just want to have no choice. The Owl made him.
Jon’s weak. That’s kind of what I like about him.
Thanks for reading and the SUPER insightful comment!!
#me reading this ask and your previous comment: maybe they should write this story instead?#my writing
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Wednesday Roundup
The late but always reliable reviewer Rena is here today. I sat on this one for a while considering the... internet-wide discussion we all are a part of now given Marvel’s recent revelations from this particular Wednesday, and the fact that I have a Marvel comic (even if only one) on my Roundups today made me somewhat reluctant to fully get into this, but I had, personally, a good Comic Day and I would hate to waste the opportunity to share the good in comics going on right now with all of you. So we’ll see how everything stacks up, and just how I’ll be handling Roundups in the future as a result of the current... nastiness, we’ll call it.
DC’s Batwoman, Image’s Descender, Marvel’s Invincible Iron Man, DC’s Super Sons, DC’s Superman, DC’s Superwoman, DC’s Trinity
DC’s Batwoman (2017- ) #2
Marguerite Bennet, James Tynion IV, Steve Epting, Jeromy Cox
As worried as I was with the Batwoman: Rebirth issue -- and I think I laid out my concerns pretty fairly, I have to fully admit that my worries have been almost entirely subsided as we go forward starting with this issue.
I always have this concern when there’s a continued revisionist history of a character’s origins that we’re going to be falling into a Donna Troy affect -- where every author is more interested in retelling and retconning her history than actually allowing the character to be who she is and moving forward from there. A problem in comics that disproportionally affects female characters if you’re sharp enough to notice such things.
This issue really helped me to put down that worry mostly because while, yes, we are revisiting Kate’s past for the hundredth time in the last ten years, the story proper is actually pushing us and her forward rather readily while not shying away from the aspects of Kate that make her Kate.
Her loyalty, her issues with commitment, her homosexuality -- everything comes into play this issue and leaves us itching for more involving these Many Arms of Death plot overall. I’m very excited about this comic and am so glad that Maguerite Bennet is becoming such a good fit for it.
Image’s Descender (2015- ) #21
Jeff Lemire, Dustin Nguyen
So I just recently got caught up on Descender in time to review the newest issue the week it came out, so I have to give major thanks to @feministbatman for recommending this comic to me. What can I say, you know me so very well and my love for robots and sci-fi has been incredibly rewarded for it.
This issue was another brilliant one, we had Tim-22′s reveal and takeover of the ship, but we also got to see a lot more development of Andy and Effy thanks to Bandit’s little vision quest of sorts for us.
But of course the most anticipated and worrisome part of all of this is worrying for Tim-21 who is still in Psius’ hands and at the heart of the Havester plot that keeps on thickening.
It’s hard to say much else.
I will say that while I’ll always be a fan of Nguyen’s signature style, I do find at times the choice to make this entire comic watercolor rather than more inked and refined does do some disservice to certain moments I think could benefit from having stronger color and more definition to them, but that’s a general criticism I’ll probably dive more into with the wrap up of this arc.
Marvel’s Invincible Iron Man (2016- ) #6
Brian Michael Bendis, Stefano Caselli, Marte Garcia
An entirely all-female supporting cast to a female Black superheroine Ironheart with our token dude (Tony) being a computer AI. It’s the setup dreams are made of and I love how much love Riri is getting in the media and the world for her choices here.
It’s also incredibly relatable how she reacts to being in her idol’s workshop, the idea of her “using it as her base” is unfathomable and her geeky cries of “THIS IS HOLY GROUND” had me literally laughing out loud. I loved it, and I loved how much agency and voice is given to Pepper as Rescue. So often when a young new hero takes over an identity, the trailblazers before them get left out (looking at you Captain Marvel, though you did make up with it in a pretty good issue yourself).
There’s just so much to love in this comic and I’m glad that at the end of the day, even with all the Women in Science, it doesn’t diminish Riri’s single mom who works a 9-5. That relationship, you can already tell, is going to be monumental moving forward.
Great issue, great introduction to Riri. Am looking forward to seeing more of her.
DC’s Super Sons (2017- ) #3
Peter J. Tomasi, Jorge Jimenez, Alejandro Sanchez
To put things simply: This book might be one of the most amazing things that DC is putting out right now and if you have absolutely any interest in it at all, I would highly, HIGHLY recommend you pick it up because this is some a-grade fun. I adore having this book to look forward to and the antagonism as it comically plays out between Damian and Jon is easily some of the best stuff I’ve read with Damian’s character since the Robin: Son of Batman comic.
Which, if you know how much I flatly adored that comic, should obviously be taken as pretty high praise.
That being said, there’s some issues. Damian’s skin tone is not being protected enough by the editors and the whitewashing, especially compared to how good DC’s Rebirth comics have been about it in other series, is very distracting and supremely disappointing.
Jon has grown on me very quickly and while I will continue to talk about my longing for Chris Kent and my apprehensions about the continued theme of biological kids erasing the bonds of adopted kids, this is a good comic overall.
DC’s Superman (2016- ) #21
Peter J. Tomasi, Patrick Gleason, Mick Gray, John Kalisz
In this episode of “how is an evil cow taking down Batman” today, we get no such answers to no such questions, but we get a giant octopus monster fight with Superman, Superboy, and Robin and -- really -- isn’t that the content anyone really comes for in a Superman comic.
Once again, Jon’s heat vision is out of control and kills something, but rather than it being another moment of horror and reflection for him, as his father was trying desperately to save the creature’s life along with the citizenry of Hamilton, but the entire town seems to turn on Superman and praise Jon over him for “doing what is necessary.”
Now, this might be me reading too much into this (and read: it is) but this seems honestly like a huge commentary on the values of classic heroes like Superman being put in stark contrast to the blood thirsty and fear mongering of the public today. Too often we praise the most immediate and final of reactions rather than the harder and grayer solutions which Superman is supposed to be able to give us.
And considering how awkward the praise heaped on Jon feels in this issue, and the surprise revelation at the end, I’m pretty sure we’re not supposed to like that a life lost unnecessarily is being celebrated by everyone around.
Damian and Jon are still a ruckus and everything is still very intriguing. This is definitely my favorite Superman run in a long time.
DC’s Superwoman (2016- ) #9
K. Perkins, Stephen Segovia, Art Thibert, HI-FI
So here we are starting off with a new creative team and resetting my Rule of Three, which for anyone new means that I give new runs and new comics 3 issues to hook me before deciding how to handle the series moving forward. And considering that I wasn’t exactly thrilled with the last two or so issues of Jimenez’s run, I’m not completely objecting to a bit of a change up in the creative team.
This issue is dealing with the fallout of the Superman Reborn storyline and mostly about Lana dealing with once more being powerless, and how that makes her feel conflicted. I felt like this dealt with Lana’s emotions in a much more respectful and loving way that the last issue did, definitely, but mostly the issue read as filler before we get into the next arc which’ll be starting with #10.
So here we go into curiosity. I’m very interested in where this new team is deciding to take us.
DC’s Trinity (2016- ) #8
Cullen Bunn, Emanuela Lupacchino, Ray McCarthy, HI-FI
Another issue, another tie-in, another creative team change. Now, I’m going to be flat honest with you: I have absolutely no explanation for what happened in this issue. And I’m not doing that for comedic effect, it’s just honest.
This definitely felt like more filler before we get to somewhere beyond all the crossover events and can instead return to Trinity’s desperate attempt to find its own status quo. Something that positively worries me because its predecessors in spirit, Superman/Batman and Batman/Superman, never really cohesively found that groove for themselves.
For the time being this feels like after the first arc, this series has become something of a place for reactionary storytelling -- basically paid advertisements for bigger events going on in the rest of the DCU.
I desperately hope I’m wrong, I really liked the first arc and would like to see more friendship-centered adventures between DC’s Big Three, but I’m going to officially move this series to trade-wait if things don’t change by the next issue. We’ll see.
So this has been a rough week for comic fans, there’s no getting beyond that, and this Roundup was at least in part held back due to my own concerns about just how much the fallout of some truly bad decisions over at Marvel was going to play into my own feelings toward comics this week.
I feel, overall though, I had a good pull this week, and while some were a little lackluster and have gained my reservations, I overall really loved my Super Week. And of my Super Week I definitely have to give my favorite issue to Super Sons, which has just turned out to be a spectacular gem to follow and I’m very glad for it existing.
But how do you all feel about this week? Any comics I missed you think I should try out? Any disagreements with me on this week’s picks? I’d love to hear from you!
#Rena Roundups#Wednesday Spoilers#SPOILERS#Batwoman (2017 )#Descender (2015 )#Invincible Iron Man (2017 )#Super Sons (2017 )#Superman (2016 )#Superwoman (2016 )#Trinity (2016 )
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Love is the Death of Duty
That was the worst ending to the greatest show of all time. Instead of saying what I didn’t like, let me try to say what I would have changed. First and foremost, we should be looking at one more season – at least. My greatest criticism of the past two seasons, and especially this season, is that it all felt way too rushed. This was apparent last season when Gendry ran an unfathomable distance to send word to Daenerys that they needed help beyond the wall. Then, suddenly, Dany comes storming on in to save the day at the last second. This goes beyond my criticism. This is an indictment on the writers for rushing the ending to a show that deserved at least two more seasons of development and a proper ending. What kind of ending has Bran Stark, the three-eyed raven, sitting on the Iron Throne? How can David and Dan think that this was okay?
“Love is the death of duty.” Jon Snow was void of any agency this season, effectively destroying the best character in the entire show. It’s like once he found out about his parentage, he wasn’t himself anymore. He was a shell of a man, having Daenerys make all the decisions for him. It was like he lost his balls. I wish we could have seen Jon wrestle more with his love for Daenerys (undying loyalty to her) and his duty to Westeros (his parentage and right to the throne). I wish we could have seen him vie for the throne. It was not only right, but the fans wanted it. How did the writers not understand that? Having Jon be pushed around like a little bitch by Daenerys, only to have him stick her with a knife in the end proved incredibly unsatisfying. Truthfully, his parentage lent no real importance to the finale. It’s incredible because this is his story. It was always, “She is my Queen!” Give me a break.
I’m so disappointed in the finale, I can barely write. If I am rewriting this season, I am starting with The Long Night. I am extending that to three episodes. The Night King is the ultimate bad guy and is not killed halfway through the season. Instead of having the Night King at Winterfell, he flies south and burns down King’s Landing. Cersei escapes. End of episode three: “The Long Night.” Winterfell falls and pretty much everyone dies except for the major players who rush south and seek refuge at Greywater Watch with House Reed. Here, we reunite with Meera and introduce an all-important, yet forgotten by the show, character: Howland Reed. He spills the beans about Jon Snow’s parentage to him (instead of Sam) and everyone else. But there is a twist – and it’s a big one: Meera is his twin. End of episode four: “A Song of Ice and Fire.” Jon Snow one-v-one’s the Night King and is bested. On the brink of death, he plunges Longclaw into Daenerys, forging Lightbringer. He slays the Night King alongside his twin, Meera, who wields Dawn, making her the Sword of the Morning. It is a two on one battle that culminates with Dawn (which glistens with an icy blue hue) and Lightbringer simultaneously stabbing the Night King through the heart. End of episode five: “The Prince Who Was Promised.” The final episode of Game of Thrones has Jon and Meera refusing the throne, leaving Tyrion and Sansa to marry and rule together. Jon remains King in the North and Meera inherits Dragonstone.
This ending is unapologetic, fan-fiction galore. But we’re talking about a satisfying end to the greatest series of all time. Why not go all out? Some might say what’s the point of Meera being Jon’s twin? I am of the belief that Howland Reed being the only other person present at the Tower of Joy, is not some coincidence. He has a role to play. And that was to protect Meera, the twin sister of Jon. Plus, it adds a shocking twist to the story we already know to be true.
I’ve let this entry sit with me for a couple days, stewing and yearning to be published. Yes, I am disappointed in the ending, but there is still hope. GRRM can still save his series from this shite ending crafted by David and Dan. I think one of my goals for this summer, (besides applying for a new job, becoming financially stable and ultimately self-reliant, bulking up and sculpting my gym body, and reviving my social life, amongst other things…) will be to read the books. I want to know the whole story.
Let this entry be the start of a new chapter in my life. No more school. No more Game of Thrones. The only thing left to do now is to live my life. I don’t know what is on the horizon. For the first time in my life, there is no certainty. If love is the death of duty, then I must make a choice. Do I follow my heart or my ambition?
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How Bryce Harper-Phillies deal will affect Cubs moving forward
How Bryce Harper-Phillies deal will affect Cubs moving forward originally appeared on nbcsportschicago.com
Now that the dust has settled on Bryce Harper's record deal with the Philadelphia Phillies, we can now turn (most of) our attention to the season ahead.
Only a few high-profile free agents remain, but otherwise we know pretty much where everybody will spend their 2019 campaign and which teams are expecting to contend.
With that, let's take a look at how Harper's 13-year contract affects the Cubs this year and moving forward:
The Cubs' road just got tougher and 2019 just got a bit more dire
While the Cubs stayed mostly stagnant this winter, the rest of the National League around them got quite a bit better.
Harper hasn't been linked to an American League team in months, but now it's official he will remain in the NL, joining forces with J.T. Realmuto, Andrew McCutchen and Jean Segura on a much-improved Phillies team.
As a matter of fact, you could describe a bunch of NL teams as "much-improved" - on paper, at least.
The Phillies, Mets, Padres, Reds and Cardinals all got significantly better this winter while the Nationals still look every bit a contender even without Harper.
The Braves, Rockies, Brewers and Dodgers all enter 2019 with largely the same roster that earned them a trip to the playoffs a year ago, though each squad added a pretty-high profile player in free agency to improve their teams (Josh Donaldson, Daniel Murphy, Yasmani Grandal, A.J. Pollock).
Even the Pirates continue to boast an underrated roster amid their standard quiet winter.
Only the Diamondbacks got worse while the Marlins and Giants also figure to be on the outside looking in at the playoff race this year even if their roster isn't markedly worse.
Don't get me wrong - the Cubs have a great roster, too, and they have plenty of reason for optimism in the year ahead.
But don't expect the Cubs to roll through the NL this year like they did in 2016.
Their division is the hardest in baseball and it could shape up to be the toughest from top to bottom since the NL East in 2005, when the Nationals finished in last with a .500 record (81-81).
Unless the Pirates or Reds underperform expectations in 2019 (which is entirely possible), the Cubs won't get to catch their breath within the division all year and they certainly won't get a break playing against the NL East (with 4 contending teams) or West (with potentially 3 contenders).
The NL is going to be a dogfight from start to finish and the Cubs will need every bit of their internal improvement/new sense of urgency they prioritized over the winter.
The future of Kris Bryant and others
It's probably going to be tougher for the Cubs to sign star players to extensions in the future - namely Bryant and Javy Baez.
Anthony Rizzo is a special case in that he already agreed to a team-friendly extension way back when he was in pre-arbitration, so it's definitely possible he would be open to another deal to extend his time as a Cub. He'll also be 32 by the time he hits free agency (after 2021) and leaving the prime of his career, increasing the liklihood he may just opt to re-sign with the Cubs.
But Bryant will only be 30 and Baez will be 29 as the two stars head into free agency after that 2021 season.
With how long free agency dragged on this winter, we heard more and more talk about star players like Harper and Manny Machado possibly having to settle for short-term, high-value deals. Only a handful of teams were involved and even as recently as mid-February (at the start of spring training), nobody knew if Harper or Machado would even be able to get to the $300 million threshold they both desired.
This winter was largely a scary time for free agents. Many baseball players saw how difficult the process has become and decided they didn't want to hit the market, instead rethinking extensions with their current teams.
We've seen a bunch of that recently, as Nolan Arenado, Aaron Hicks, Aaron Nola, Luis Severino and Miles Mikolas all inked deals with their respective teams to avoid hitting free agency in the near future.
But with Machado netting $300 million over 10 years and Harper $330 million over 13 seasons, it was enough of a sigh of relief for select free agents - the stars.
Story continues
Free agency is still completely broken, especially for the guys in the middle of the pack. But Machado and Harper proved the game's truly elite players could still net record deals on the open market and Bryant and Baez may well still be among the game's elite when they hit free agency. They'll both still be firmly in the midst of their prime.
That likely doesn't change a whole lot at the negotiating table between the Cubs and Bryant's/Baez's respective camps now. But if Harper or Machado had been forced to take short-term deals or did not get the money they desired, it would've painted a scarier picture of free agency and given the Cubs a better hand to play in extension talks.
Are the Cubs nearing the end of the championship window?
Kyle Schwarber, Jon Lester and Mike Montgomery join Bryant, Baez and Rizzo as notable Cubs who hit the open market after that 2021 season.
Kyle Hendricks and Jose Quintana are under team control for only another two seasons.
Just about the entire bullpen is unsigned after this year and Cole Hamels and Ben Zobrist will also hit free agency in 9 months.
The farm system is ranked among the worst in the game and no stars appear to be on the cusp of hitting the big leagues.
The Cubs' championship window isn't shut by any means, but it's certainly closing. The possible end is in sight.
The Cubs already felt the need for a stronger sense of urgency in 2019, but they also are running out of time to win another ring and potentially reignite all that "dynasty" talk.
Of course, Theo Epstein's front office will continue to add to the team and build up the farm system over the next few years in an effort to keep that window of contention open longer, but this winter was a prime chance to greatly improve their roster for this season and they were instead forced to pinch pennies and only make minor additions.
Harper signing with the Phillies Thursday officially slammed the door shut for any Cubs fans who were holding out hope that all the talk of the budget woes were just to drive the price down.
And it officially eliminated any possibility of the Cubs making a huge splash before Opening Day, as Harper was essentially the last free agent that would've been a major upgrade on some area of the Cubs' roster. (Craig Kimbrel would obviously help the Cubs bullpen, but Epstein has never paid big money for a closer and the Cubs have not been linked to the right-hander at all this winter.)
So the Cubs will head to Opening Day with only Daniel Descalso, Brad Brach and possibly another bullpen arm or two as the only additions to the 25-man roster.
Who will be Cubs fans' next big target?
Now that Bryce Harper won't be available again until 2032, Cubs fans have no choice but to cross him off their free agent wish list and move on to the next name.
Will it be Anthony Rendon or Chris Sale next winter? Mike Trout, Mookie Betts or Jacob deGrom after 2020? Francisco Lindor, Carlos Correa or Clayton Kershaw after 2021?
No matter who fans rally behind, we probably won't ever see anything quite like this Harper circus again.
One thing's for certain: The next free agent crush of the fanbase won't hit the open market with a dog named "Wrigley."
Click here to download the new MyTeams App by NBC Sports! Receive comprehensive coverage of your teams and stream the Cubs easily on your device.
Source: https://sports.yahoo.com/bryce-harper-phillies-deal-affect-201514253.html?src=rss
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Donnie Darko director Richard Kelly: ‘Sometimes films need is high time to marinate’
The director of the cult favorite Donnie Darko was once hailed as the next David Lynch. Now, as fans rediscover his 2007 flop Southland Tales, he explains why patience is still a virtue and Trumps victory was a grotesque inevitability
Talking with the writer and director Richard Kelly, its easy to steer the conversation toward the end of the world. After all, Kelly developed a fervent cult following( and alienated it) through tales of prophesied apocalypse 2001 s cult curio Donnie Darko and 2007 s cult-classic-in-the-making Southland Tales. But its not the collapsing buildings or rivers of blood that fascinate Kelly; its what comes right before. The sneaking anxiety. The normalizing of madnes. The casual disregard for your neighbor. The glob in your throat that signifies your newfound understanding that this was inevitable.
If those impressions sounds familiar in our current Trump-addled dystopia, that was not Kellys intention. Southland Tales, a post-9/ 11 satire melded with a retelling of the Book of Revelation that also includes a complex theory of hour traveling, was never meant to feel like a pre-game show for the next decade of global misery.
The sprawling narrative set in an alternative 2008 in which a nuclear attack on Abilene, Texas, triggers a third world war revolves around an amnesiac action starring named Boxer Santaros( played by Dwayne The Rock Johnson) who falls in love with a porn starring/ talkshow host/ entrepreneur/ pop superstar/ psychic who goes by the professional name Krysta Now( Sarah Michelle Gellar ), who has written a screenplay about the end times.
Oh, and theres also a government agency dedicated to spying on Americans, an underground neo-Marxist cult, alternative solutions energy source that might be ripping a hole in the space-time continuum, a United States military been supported by Hustler and Bud Light, and a mind-altering medication that keeps American soldiers docile and dependent. Jon Lovitz plays a racist cop, Seann William Scott plays identical twin police officers, Amy Poehler shows up as an anarchist improv comic, Justin Timberlake plays a drug-addled war veteran and Wallace Shawn of The Princess Bride fame is the antichrist( or a reasonable fax ).
Its overwhelming to process, and reflects so much of the nervousnes of our age, even if it isnt always pleasant to watch. I actually wanted it to be something that you would get lost in and that would sustain multiple viewings, Kelly tells me over dinner in Los Angeles. When discussing the movie, his eyes widen and he projects an impish yet tentative enthusiasm as though hes feeling out whether youre going to receive his ideas without judgment. Now, that ambition can be a self-defeating prophecy, as we watched clearly.
Kelly seems wistful about the experience of making and releasing the film, which, after a disastrous Cannes screening at which the movie was booed heavily, virtually lost theatrical distribution. We were in Boston, in pre-production on[ his Southland Tales follow-up] The Box, the weekend Southland Tales opened in 50 -some theaters. The upcoming Monday was our first day of principal photography. We were scrambling for our first day. We had done the AFI Fest premiere and they rushed me back to Boston. And then, I remember that morning, were shooting Cameron[ Diaz] and Frank Langella, this really emotional scene in the Boston Public Library. Someone comes up to me and tells me per-screen medians on Southland Tales. It was such a bummer. A screening Kelly attended with the actor James Marsden was attended by only four other people. Roger Ebert likened the cinema to the third day of a pitch session on velocity. One of the rare positive reviews of the movie came from the New York Times critic Manohla Dargis, who called it funny, audacious, messy and feverishly inspired.
I definitely remain proud of the ambition of it. I feel like sometimes things just require is high time to marinate, he says. The cinema has started to find a new audience. At the time of our meeting, hes in between hosting screenings of Southland Tales thanks to a roadshow tour of the film sponsored by the Alamo Drafthouse chain of arthouse theaters. The newfound appreciation for Southland Tales by both audiences and emerging pockets of critics hasnt yet translated to tangible opportunities for Kelly. I dont ever want to feel defeated or that Ive let the system defeat me, he says.
Sarah Michelle Gellar in Southland Tales. Photograph: Publicity image from cinema company
Southland Tales discovering an audience nearly 10 years later would not mark the first time one of Kellys cinemas gained esteem upon second( or third) glance. Donnie Darko grossed a scant $517,375 when it was released a month after 9/11. When it observed a huge audience on video and DVD, Kelly became a hot commodity, an heir apparent to the surrealist tradition of directors like David Lynch. Sometimes, the wind is at your back. Sometimes, its at your front, Kelly says about the ups and downs of his career. Darko remains his greatest up, a cinema thats become a touchstone work for the generation that grew up with it. Darko was a disaster at Sundance too, he tells me. No one remembers that, but it was. Im grateful for any rosy light of hindsight. I remember it took us virtually six months to sell the movie. It nearly ran immediately to the Starz network. We had to beg them to put it in theaters. Christopher Nolan stepped in and persuaded Newmarket to put it in theaters.
After those issues, Kelly could have gone the expected route and taken on a big-budget studio tentpole. He could have directed the sequel, which he declined to do( it aimed up being terrible and running straight-out to DVD ). Instead, he choice this peculiar, dense story about the decline of American power.
President-elect Donald Trump was merely a reality show curiosity when Southland Tales was released, but his mixture of profane and pious could easily have constructed him a character in the film. I think that Donald Trump is this grotesque inevitability that has gotten this far because there was something really, really dangerous concealing beneath the surface, that has been concealing beneath the surface for many, many years. The Republican Kelly imagined in Southland Tales were the neocon religious zealots that seem almost quaint to modern eyes. They seemed like the ultimate boogeymen in 2007, but as Kelly points out , no one in the Bush family would even show up at the RNC[ Republican national convention ].
What Southland Tales conveyed better than most politically charged films of the Bush era was the sentiment that it would get worse, that something had been unleashed that could not be put back. At the time that we were building Southland Tales, it was Iraq war and Britney Spears. That dichotomy on your Tv screen. The branding and everything was happening. It seemed inevitable that everyone would start to co-opt branding. Social media hadnt actually exploded yet. To watch legislators running after each other on Twitter, its bizarre. To insure Elizabeth Warren quoting the monorail on the Simpsons. To see legislators co-opting this millennial social media branding, its a blur of the lines.
Each of his three cinemas reflects that sheepish rebellion that is part of his personality. Donnie Darko was a mostly passive protagonist struggling against both the oppressive system of high school and the levers of fate that he could only pull at the cinemas climax. Boxer Santaros is a pawn in a conflict between fascism and socialism, religion and science, and love and demise. Eventually, those characters succumb to a power greater than any on Earth, something unknowable. So does Kelly think all this is down to higher power pulling the strings?
I dont believe any of this happened by accident. Thats just depressing and absurd, in my opinion, he answers. I do think theres a design to things, and we can never hope to know it in any of our lifetimes. Proportion of the challenge is trying to make sense of it. Thats whats cathartic for me as an artist, to try to make sense of it.
Read more: www.theguardian.com
The post Donnie Darko director Richard Kelly: ‘Sometimes films need is high time to marinate’ appeared first on Top Rated Solar Panels.
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Jimmy Butler is a star. The Bulls' front office hasn't really treated him like one
A brief history of Chicago’s lack of faith in its lone All-Star.
Jimmy Butler addressed questions on Wednesday about a reported blackball scenario earlier in his career when Bulls’ management tried to force him to take a smaller contract offer.
"That s—- happened so long ago I didn't think it was a matter of anything," he said during shootaround, according to the Chicago Tribune’s K.C. Johnson and Chris Kuc.
ESPN Radio’s Ryen Russillo reported Chicago management wanted Butler to sign a four-year, $44 million rookie extension. When he and his agent scoffed, opting to test the market for maximum value, someone in the front office threatened to cut his minutes and relegate him to the bench in favor of Tony Snell — a move that would have dashed his worth in free agency.
But then-Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau ignored the front office’s ultimatum, per Russillo, riding his best player for nearly 39 minutes a night. This is one reason why Butler and Thibs were such a close-knit player-coach duo, according to Russillo.
@ryenarussillo shares incredible story on why Jimmy Butler doesn't trust the #Bulls front office. (@MikeAndMike) http://pic.twitter.com/jluFG0cmg2
— Aldo Soto (@AldoSoto21) January 31, 2017
Butler went on to earn the 2014-15 NBA Most Improved Player award after upping his averages to 20 points, 5.8 rebounds and 1.8 steals per game. Chicago had no choice but to sign their franchise cornerstone to a five-year, $92.3 million extension with a player option for the 2019-20 season.
“We went into contract negotiations,” Butler said. “I said I would play the year out. I did that, had a decent little year. We won't go into detail about what was said, what wasn't said. It's not anybody's business. We got a deal done. I thought it was a fair deal. That's that.
"To tell you the truth, I don't remember what went on. My agent was in there handling the majority of it.”
That’s not exactly an outright denial. It also reveals the tension between Butler and Bulls management that has developed over the years.
The Bulls clearly don’t see Butler as a franchise cornerstone
Butler has been the subject of never-ending trade rumors. If he was an unmovable piece to the puzzle, those buzzes would be few and far between.
In fact, Bulls general manager Gar Forman would not admit his All-Star wing player was an untradeable part of the team’s core.
“We have to explore all options,’’ Forman said during a press conference last April when asked about Butler becoming the franchise centerpiece, according to the Chicago Tribune.
Just this summer, Chicago engaged in serious trade talks with Boston regarding a deal that would have sent the two-way wing to the Celtics for a bevy of young players and draft picks.
The Bulls, according to The Vertical’s Shams Charania, nearly to deal Butler to Minnesota during the 2016 NBA Draft. The trade broke down when Chicago wanted Zach LaVine, not Ricky Rubio, along with the No. 5 overall pick, Kris Dunn
Last season, Butler publicly called for new head coach Fred Hoiberg to coach the team “a lot harder,” a stance he doubled down on earlier this season. He and Hoiberg have had their fair share of clashes, including an on-court moment where Butler seemed to defy a call his coach made from the sideline.
Thanks to @proogs1 for alerting me to this classic Fred-Jimmy moment with under a minute left. http://pic.twitter.com/K4uHcBemhc
— jon greenberg (@jon_greenberg) January 26, 2017
Butler is playing out of his mind.
He’s on pace to become one of just 15 players in NBA history to average at least 24 points, six rebounds, 4.5 assists and 1.5 steals per game, according to Basketball-Reference. The only other players to post those numbers this season is MVP candidate Russell Westbrook.
But on the latest episode of the Lowe Post, ESPN.com’s Zach Lowe used an example of Butler getting on big man Cristiano Felicio as a question of whether the Bulls trust him as a leader.
“The stuff you hear about Chicago’s internal concerns with Jimmy Butler to the degree they exist are not about (him) as a basketball player but about him as a presence,” Lowe said.
There’s also a difference of opinion on Butler in upper management. Bulls president Michael Reinsdorf has labeled the All-Star one of his favorites, per the Chicago Tribune, which also noted management has been “complimentary” of Butler’s consistent work ethic.
But Forman and vice president John Paxson, according to ESPN.com’s Nick Freidell, have not shared similar sentiments in their assessments of the All-Star forward.
“There is a split in the Bulls front office as to whether they want to build around Jimmy or not,” Freidell said on the Lowe Post podcast. “And Gar and Pax have been given multiple chances in the last year and a half to say, ‘Jimmy’s the guy, he’s the face of the franchise, he’s the guy we want here to help turn this thing around.’ And they don’t want to do it.”
So will Jimmy Butler actually be traded?
Butler was named an All-Star starter this year alongside LeBron James, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Kyrie Irving and DeMar DeRozan, and over guys like Carmelo Anthony and Paul George.
There’s no fathomable situation where the Bulls ship out their top-tier wing and get equal value back. But if Chicago is hell bent on pressing restart and moving Butler in a forward-thinking move, they’ll do so when the right offer presents itself.
Boston is the most attractive trade partner, boasting the Nets’ 2017 and 2018 first-round picks as well as a group of young players that aren’t completely necessary to its core group. If there’s any team that can put together a deal for the first-time All-Star starter, the Celtics are it.
It’s unclear if the Bulls will actually move Butler by the Feb. 23 trade deadline, but with so much smoke, there’s got to be fire somewhere. Butler’s having a season that’ll land him with the likes of guys like Dr. J, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, and Kobe Bryant.
Trading him just wouldn’t make any sense. Building around him would. But it’s unclear if the Bulls actually agree.
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🌟🌟🌟whichever you'd like!
Hope, etc because I realized looking over my really bad essays written a little drunk (GUYS YOU DESERVE BETTER...) that I didn’t talk about like 1/3 of the major themes in that story (The three main topics that I hit on were love, grief, and choice). (I talked about the love too, right? I genuinely feel as if I was very explicit with the love, and there there’s little to say. Grief is just love that has nowhere to go. Yes, I saw the Wandavision, what’s your point).
But I want him to get out. I know Martin. I don’t want him to - to wait around for me, to make sure I’m alright. He needs to save himself. It’s either maim Pell or lose him forever. It’s not even a choice.”
“You never think anything’s a choice,” the Owl said amusedly, as the lift rose and rose and rose in a faint whirring of gears. In the space of a turn of a gear Jon understood exactly how a lift operated, and found the information useless. “You’d much prefer it if you were dragged from one situation to another, and nothing you did was ever your fault. You had no choice but to gaslight those victims, you were just protecting yourself from that big mean scary eye. You had no choice but to stalk Tim and Martin, you were just protecting yourself from that big, mean, scary Barbie doll. You had no choice but to stupidly maim yourself and get kidnapped, to saunter vaguely downwards into hell, to let Tim kill himself. You had number one and two to look out for. Until you decided that only number one was important after all.
So I could have picked a LOT of different quotes, because any of them would have worked.
*aims rifle at Jon’s head* What choices have you made, Jon? Is your current situation the result of your choices? When you’re manipulated and maneuvered into a corner, and you make the only decision that makes sense at the time, was that your choice? Do you make the choice to do evil when your only choices are bad and worse? Was becoming an Avatar your choice? Were you the one who killed Deisha? Was Elias? Was it the Beholding?
A lot of questions that really don’t fucking get answered. Jon doesn’t know. I really don’t either. What I am pretty certain of is that Jon, 100% without a doubt, believes that he chose himself over Deisha. Jon views himself as someone who killed his daemon for power (which is why Strix tells him so).
This is why Jon no longer wants to make any choices. Jon views himself as someone who only makes the worst choices, and he just wants no choice in anything anymore. He wants his eating habits to be the Owl’s fault, and he hates the Owl for it. All of the shit that he’s kind of maneuvered to do in Season 2+3: he wants for it to have been entirely Elias, and he doesn’t want to accept or believe that it was any of his fault. Was it? Could he have done anything differently? I don’t know.
Agency is really big in this story, and Jon deliberately removes his own agency. He has a lot of agency removed from him, and when he kind of shifts into a more daemon role in society that also removes a lot of his agency from him. It’s a little dehumanizing, and he chooses not to care. Everybody in this story is pretty darn condescending to Jon, and he chooses not to involve himself in any of the serious situations. And every time he’s confronted on his behavior, the only thing he has to say is - it’s the Owl, it’s the Owl, it’s the Owl.
When Jon discovers that he has no choice but to stay, it’s a relief. It means that he doesn’t have to make that terrible decision. That’s the second shift into Strix as a human and Jon as more monstrous - when he recognizes that he cannot control his own life and the terrible things he has to do, and he’s happy about it.
Of course, the flip side of this is that feeling so powerless is terrible. It grinds you down into nothing. And sometimes Jon feels so powerless that he takes the power he has and uses it to hurt other people.
Jon is objectified and dehumanized by everyone and everything around him. He has very little choice in anything. And that’s his excuse for when he makes the wrong choice. It was the Owl.
Again: Jon is a weak person. But sometimes people are weak. It doesn’t make them bad people, or somebody who is undeserving of love or safety. Sometimes when your basically entire life is massively traumatizing, it doesn’t make you strong or resilient. It makes you weak. And Jon’s weak. As the author, I forgive him for that weakness, and I hope the readers do too.
I think the important thing is, at the end of the day, staying behind in the land of the dead was Deisha’s choice. It was the decision she made. And Jon has to accept that, and respect it, and choose to live in the life that she gave to him. That’s what he accepted at the end of the story, and hopefully once he realizes that he’s not personally responsible for everything terrible that has ever happened he can feel empowered to take his agency back.
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