#and tumblr is my only place to put them

[metannoyuhhh]

I just saw a TikTok about the fears and motivations of TMAGP and I don’t think I can sleep until I get this out.

So the main big bad(s) of The Magnus Archives was the fears and their entities and artifacts. All the main characters and statement givers, if not the rest of the world, were effected by them. Motivated by them even.

Even if someone wasn’t experiencing one of the fears firsthand, a connection to someone who has or even just a read through of a particular statement could motivate one to do so much.

Jon had The Web first. He experienced Mr. Spider at such a young age and his fear of spiders carries on for as long as he does. Then it was The Eye, the position he presumably worked so hard for turned out to be far more sinister. He was trapped and he was paranoid and he was surrounded solely by other paranoid victims. And yet, this fear did nothing but push Jon to do more research, to find what was going on, and to fix it. He was scared and he was tearing himself and his relationships apart but he saved the world, at least once.

Martin was Lonely for a long time, making him a perfect candidate to be taken under Peters Lukas’ wing. He was isolated from the beginning, watching his family and friends drop one by one like flies. Close to the end he felt he had no choice but to give in. He probably knew it was wrong to give himself up to The Lonely but if that meant saving what was left that he cared for, he’d do it every time.

Tim was such a doting big brother who lost his other half in such a devastating and horrific way. His brother was picked off by The Stranger when his curiosity got the better of him and his best friend was murdered and replaced and he didn’t even notice for months. His fear turned to aggression and his aggression turned to vigor to research and fight to do his damn best to stop The Unknowing, and he did.

In The Magnus Archives, fear and trauma is what motivates people. It’s the rush of adrenaline that gets people moving and fighting. And while sometimes it’s also to get something they want (a better world, to save someone, revenge) there is always trauma that comes first. You cannot have the motivation and obsession shown in TMA without having experienced the fears in one way or another.

I think The Magnus Protocol is going to flip this on it’s head. Instead of fear fueling motivation, it’s going to be motivation that leads to the fear and trauma.

Gwen is a perfect example of this. She’s so dedicated to her job and so obsessed with filing things accurately so that she can work her way up to the managers role. And I think her precision and dedication to the statements and the knowledge they hold will put her straight into The Eye’s influence, or maybe even The Web.

Sam is a similar case, his curiosity about the files is going to lead him to something unsavory that he won’t be able to get out of.

In The Magnus Protocol everyone wants something. Gwen wants power, Sam wants knowledge, Colin wants to get ahold of this strange computer system, and I think Chester and Norris most all want each other.

I think Jon and Martins love for each other, their wanting to be together and still sacrificing that in hopes of bringing the world back fundamentally changed the way this world operates. They wanted to be together so they came back in the form of our little text to speech bots, they will always be together now, even if that means being trapped in a desktop from the 90’s.

The Magnus protocol is going to be about wants, and I think that is going to be apparent very soon as Colin works on the app more and as Sam dives deeper into the files and as Gwen works her way up the corporate ladder.

It may even be that these characters become entities because of their wants. Like the woman in episode two who wanted to perfect her art and herself at the cost of her physical appearance and relationships. It really wouldn’t even shock me if my the end of this all of our main characters will have succumbed to a fear in some way, except for maybe Alyce.