#archive theory

[f0restpunk]

[tadfools]

You guys are commenting on the fics you read right? You’re at least leaving kudos on the Astarion smut and the pairs that have less than 20 fics for them too? You’re bookmarking stories you really like that are still being updated and ones that haven’t been touched in over a year right?

You know that even the smallest interactions are like cocaine to fic writers right? You understand how important a string of emoji hearts left behind on a chapter at three am is right?? Right????

You’re treating AO3 like a community and not a content factory….right?

[shitty-tmagp-theories]

It‘s notable to me how many externals rely on reputation in tmagp. Almost all of them feed on stories and anticipation rather than the act itself.

• Ink5oul is an influencer

• alongside his TV show Mr Bonzo has a theme tune and cards that preceded his arrival

• Heinrich Unheimlich very blatantly states that it’s the stories spread by children that fuel his power.

They all feed on the idea. Even Needles phones the emergency services to make sure someone hears what he’s doing. They WANT to be perceived

[my-nida]

Hearing that line my mind thought of this…

[noodlesewp]

Gerry and gertrude being fine and dandy means my crack theory from before protocol started can still happen

They may be computers or jonny could be fucking with us

[the-butterbun]

"There's something familiar in the figures i paint. I don't know what it is. They are so impossible in their shape and yet i feel like they all had names at some point. Like this one, Micheal, I think."

[1nk20ul]

Jonathan Sims ALIVE?? I Believe I Have Proof.

(Spoilers for The Magnus Protocol!)

You heard that right. And if you've listened to TMP 39 - Dependents, you've heard it too. Not only can I prove without the shadow of a doubt that not one, but two Archivists are roaming TMA's London, but I can also prove with spectrogram + phonetical analysis exactly what Jon is saying.

Let me prove it to you.

First, let's start with an unedited audio sample, taken at 16:30:

Did you catch it? If you didn't, I don't blame you. There's a lot happening here. Let's check the official transcript for more context about what we're hearing.

So, what we're hearing is definitely the Archivist. It's evident that it's whispering something, but the specifics are currently hidden under layers of reverb, static, and tape winding. Let's clean it up a bit to get a better listen. I pitched the audio down 30%, reduced the background noise, and ran it through a few frequency filters to make the speech more prominent.

Oh.

Oh, shit.

Yeah, that's definitely Jon.

At the very least, we know this is obviously not Beth Eyre, who voices [ERROR]. Since the transcript states that this audio has to come from an Archivist, that really only leaves us with one other possibility.

But let's assume you still don't believe me. I took the liberty of isolating the vocals entirely and running them through a linguistics analysis programme called Praat (which is fantastic + free by the way!). This way, we can analyse the speech all the way down to the position of the Archivist's mouth when speaking.

Here's the new sample we're working with:

I admit, the speech is a tad more muffled in this version. However, the lack of background noise makes the spectrogram much easier to read, which is what we are aiming for here. We're far past the point of just using our ears.

Behold the Spectrogram:

Looking at this diagram, we can conclude that there are four words being spoken here. (The second word is the gap in the middle part. Note the density shift at around 1000Hz. We know this word must be free of any sharp consonants.) More importantly, the formants provided can be compared to samples of Jon's RP dialect to determine if there's a match. If the frequencies match, it's the same voice. If we get the wavelengths to match, it's the same word.

Let's start with the first word. I'll skip the specifics, as explaining every minute detail would take forever and bore everyone to death. The left image was extracted from the spectrogram above. The right photo? That's Jon saying the word "this."

Note how both waveforms are split into two halves, low then high. Note how the high half trails off at the end. Take into account the similar placement of the red formants. This is the same word, pronounced in the exact same dialect, with the exact same frequency. It is Jon.

Let's do that again with the second word.

Again, the formants line up in the exact same order. The audio on the right is a bit louder, which is why the waveforms have a higher contrast.

What did this word happen to be? World.

Here is the original spectrogram in Audacity. The two bright spots on the right-hand side are easy. It's the same sound as the end of the first word as well. (Notice the frequencies are the same.) These are an easy Letter S. I then fact-checked this using methods like before.

Finally, we have clear, undeniable proof:

"This world isn’t yours."

Edit: thank you to @thestrangepoet for correcting “is” to “isn’t!” The presence of the letter T was a bit inconclusive, but it makes so much more sense in this context.

Now, what does that actually mean? Well, he’s likely referring to Sam. The extent of what he actually knows I’m uncertain of. Feel free to theorise and let me know! I have an idea about how this affects the overall story, but that's a post for another day.

I furthermore checked every single instance [ERROR] spoke for occurrences like this, and what did I find? Nothing. There was a bit of whispering in TMP 10 that I couldn't manage to isolate, but the voice was definitely Beth Eyre's. The only other time an Archivist audibly appeared in this fashion was... Oh, Hello. The TMP series teaser with Jon and Martin. Brilliant.

Now I just have to hope that nothing gets debunked by tomorrow. I'm crossing my fingers, TMP 40.

Thank you to Rusty Quill for sending me down this rabbit hole! The details added to all corners of the production bring so much life to the Magnus mystery. I'm glad I could dig deep and analyse this - We love you!

[cookie-lore-keeper]

I genuinely think that Hollyberry Cookie always talked so lightly and cheerfully about her clear addiction to Berry juice (they call it juice, but we all know it's alcohol) is because, if she's lighthearted and treats it as "just a way she's having fun and letting loose", her friends and other cookies won't worry about her, and then she could ignore that she actually has a problem.

Hollyberry Cookie has MAJOR avoidance and coping issues. She only became an alcoholic after one of her closest friends died, and it also gave us the scene where people who weren't insane about analyzing her went "Oh shit, this is actually a problem", where she was continously drinking and her son was trying to get her to stop. I didn't grow up in an alcoholic household, but I know that scene must've resonsted with a lot of people. But, she turned to alcohol because she had no other way to cope.

She couldn't handle dealing with queenly stuff, so she passed on the kingdom to Royal Berry while she went off to Beast-Yeast to avoid her issues. Even when she heard that one of her granddaughter's was taken by a dragon, she didn't go back, even though she was heartbroken, because in her mind, the best way to cope is to avoid it and distract yourself.

Even now in the game, she still chooses to avoid and drink. It's become a joke on how much Wildberry has to stop her from drinking, but he really must be worried about her. She took him in when he was young, right? Do you ever think he had a moment similar to Royal Berry? Where he had to watch his caretaker get blackout drunk instead of dealing with her issues? But, she doesn't pay any mind to this because, to her, "It isn't a big deal."

Tldr; Hollyberry doesn't take her drinking problem seriously bcuz that would mean admitting she actually has a problem, and she doesn't want her friends and family to worry.

[cult-of-the-eye]

I love the idea of digital leitners especially with the concept of terms and conditions and accepting cookies on websites I feel like they could do SO MUCH with that

[viscerally-tired]

No but seriously have we considered whimsigoth Gerry?... I don't wanna get involved in discourse, but I do wanna throw that out there cause I haven't seen anyone else say it

like

It's free, comfy, has pops of colour, and can be taken in sososososo many directions

[vertigala]

*Grabs you by the throat* Listen to me you TMAGP-loving freaks. Listen to me right now. RedCanary might be the host for this universe's Jonah Magnus.

This is under the assumption that TMAGP takes place in a parallel universe that may or may not have already had the fears in it prior to Jon releasing them at the end of TMA.

RedCanary goes to explore the Magnus Institute ruins. They become paranoid because the Eye is watching them. They pick up a wooden box with strange symbols carved into it. They go to put it back. Next we hear from them, they post an image of gouged out eyes with the caption "Canaries should stay above ground."

They found the tunnels, hence that caption. Then they found Jonah Magnus's body sitting down there, waiting for a new host.

In this universe, the Magnus Institute burned down in 1999. Maybe in this universe Gertrude went through with her original plan of burning the place to the ground after finding out Elias was actually Jonah in 1997. Either way, let's say Jonah's original body is down there, maybe with Elias's body and his eyes and all that, and with his plans foiled, he's just chilling down there waiting for an opportunity which RedCanary then gives him. This is my going theory due to the specificity of the caption "canaries should stay above ground" (referring to the tunnels, and also it being in third-person) and the fact that RedCanary themselves would be pretty unlikely to be able to post that picture of THEIR OWN EYES GOUGED OUT unless it was Magnus assuming their body and identity and being a freak about it.

But there's more.

Narratively speaking, it makes sense for the third voice in the computer to be Jonah Magnus, right? If Jon and Martin ended up in this universe as voices in a computer, the only other person sharing their fate would have to be Magnus, given how TMA ended. Recall, also, the boot-up sequence in the trailer of TMAGP.

[id: a screenshot of the text from the TMAGP teaser, which says “initializing J.01… OK/initializing M.01… OK/initializing J.02… OK”. end id.]

Jonathan, Martin, and Jonah, right? Unless Augustus is gonna be a new J name or this is just an unrelated easter egg but like. It's Jonah right?? Right??? And he's watching the O.I.R.A through the systems like a good little voyeur, and Colin knows it!

So now we possibly have TWO Jonah Magnuses in this universe!! That's absurd!! One from the TMAGP universe now loose and running around in RedCanary's body, and one from the TMA universe trapped in a computer. But if this is true...doesn't that mean there would be two Jons and Martins too?

And listen...I'm thinking about what Jonny and Alex said during that liveshow panel about this story's themes regarding "what makes a human." If we dare to hope that Jon and Martin (and Jonah, if it's his voice in the computer) are going to gain consciousness and once again become proper characters...then, are they going to simply stay in the computer? Or are they going to "manifest" physically? Are they going to UPLOAD themselves into THEIR OWN TMAGP UNIVERSE BODIES?

@doomatix and I have been going crazy over these theories and they were the one that initially considered RedCanary's new identity as Jonah Magnus. Are our facts wrong? Does any of this even make sense? We haven't seen anyone else posting about this particular theory. Someone help us we are rotting. And don't even get me started on how GWEN would fit into this--

[f0restpunk]

[my-brain-is-rotting]

Please accept this horrible meme I made 🤲 (it's 5 am and I forgot the meaning of the word sleep)

[shitty-tmagp-theories]

Jon and Martin chose to eat and keep Colin because they’re just huge fans of Scotland

[gammija]

So... why tape recorders?

After hearing about the [ERROR]chivist from Sam, Georgie obviously immediately starts thinking the same thing that anyone familiar with the events of tma is: In what way is this related to Jon? Sam literally quotes the 'all eyes' line, this Archivist feeds off of people's Fear, makes people tell them stories about their trauma, and tape recorders keep following them around! All Jon powers, or at the very least Archivist powers!

...Except, as we learn in s5, while the tape recorders follow Jon and Martin around, despite them being such an Archivist motif from the audiences POV, the tapes are not of Jon, they're not of the Archivist.

In MAG196 and MAG197, it's revealed that the tapes have all along been part of the plan of the Web, to use them, Jon and the Eyepocalypse to spin a web and spread to other dimensions:

So if the tapes aren't and never were an Archivist power, why do they show up for the [ERROR]chivist?

Is it the Web spinning a new plan? It can't be ruled out, but the [ERROR]chivist seems a poor candidate for a new rituals lynchpin. Not to mention that the Fears don't seem to exist in those same categories in tmagp in the first place, or that doing the same thing twice seems kinda basic from a meta perspective.

Really, there is something the [ERROR]chivist is reminiscent of, more than anything else. Not Jon, or Getrude, nor any one character or person from either universe.

With their tape recorders, their gender ambiguity and cloaked form, their most identifiable feature being their eyes, All Eyes, being able to compel statements without even saying a word, making victims relive their trauma not just in spirit, but in body, what the [ERROR]chivist is, most of all, is the idea of the Archivist.

The [ERROR]chivist is the Archivist, insofar as he would exist to the minds of the people in the ruins of tma's post-apocalypse. A vague, watching creature, always tailed by tape recorders, making you spill your guts figuratively and literally before moving on, and those eyes, those eyes, the only feature you remember. It's a role without an actor.

[tanoraqui]

Kaladin Return posit: a whole book, #6 or maybe #7 depending on series pacing, wherein its slowly increasingly obvious that the Heralds have returned - or at least, they should have, but no one can find them. People are looking for them, either to ally with them or to kill them. (Those who are immortal know, but those who aren't, don't, that this is actually normal - it takes a few days for even a Herald to re-orient themselves to being alive. And they don't necessarily all reappear together, and only Jezrien and Nale ever had fast-travel options!) Some Herald gets an Interlude POV eventually, so we do know they're out there, pulling themselves together for the fight...

Then meanwhile, there's some battle that goes poorly and ends with a megalomaniac Fused, or maybe an Unmade, standing high and lecturing a bunch of people about how their resistance was doomed from the start, the righteous shall now inherit the whole Roshar, Retribution reigns and Honor is dead--

"People keep saying that," a familiar voice complains, and everyone turns in shock and there he is: Kaladin Stormblessed, floating in midair with the wind whipping at his hair and blue cloak that he picked up somewhere on the road from Shinovar. Not glowing, dark-eyed, but aloft nonetheless, with a silver spear in his hand and Sylphrena full-size at his side.

"I'm still alive," Syl replies, arms crossed. She, too, wears Bridge Four blue, and she has lighting in her eyes and a rainstorm in her hair (which she tosses in proud irritation). "And I'm a solid chunk of Honor, you know. I'm very respectable about it these days."

And then it's epic and Kaladin really gets a cult this time, to his immense dismay.