Tumgik
#but nope it's our dear fucked up darling angel Paige
misstrashchan · 9 months
Text
We talk about "show don't tell" in stories, but in podcasts it's impressive when they can do that through the audio format specifically, and one example of this that always sticks with me is in the Silt Verses S1 EP7, It Carries Few It Drowns Many. We're introduced to Paige Duplass describing her daily routine in a life that is seemingly perfect, that she's incredibly lucky and priveliged to have ended up where she is, considering she never thought she would make it this far, and how harsh and hostile the world of the Silt Verses we've seen can be up to this point, for Paige everything seems normal and accepted, with their safe and sanitized gods that are kept as much removed from people's sight as possible.
She has a successful job that pays well, a nice apartment with a beautiful view, etc. This is all undercut with her following up with "this is how you make things worse" referring to her dad messaging and calling her every day asking for money, seemingly the one black spot in this perfect life Paige has built for herself.
One part of her day we do not ever hear her describe however is her drinking heavily after coming home from work each day. But she does. She's opening a bottle every day after work, we hear the popping of the cork and her pouring a glass for herself. It's something conveyed to us only through the audio. This in tandem with her contemplating that despite this life she's built up for herself, the kind of life that one should be content and happy with, it still feels hollow and devoid of purpose, and she's left wondering if this is what happiness and fulfillment is supposed to be.
It gets worse over the course of the next few days when she learns people are going to be let go and sacrificed as the company she works for rebrands and switches from the Bronze Savant to a new god, Crawling in Ecstasy, which includes her friend Vaghn, and she becomes more and more distressed with each passing day, and trying to reason that none of this can really be happening, that it's too crude, that they'd surely do something more elegant, that the company that she works for that's giving her the means for this comfortable life and nice car and free pastries and wellbeing workshops wouldn't do something like this, and if they do it'd only be to the people who really deserved it, the worst of the worst, and they'd do it out of sight, and if it's out of sight they can ignore it, because it's not really happening. (Paige is also drinking before any of this occurs to when she comes home from work each day though)
It's clear that the drinking is part of Paige trying to numb and distance herself from the realities of what this life and the world she lives in is built upon, because it's accepted and considered "normal", and is also a filling of the void and guilt she feels of having all this comfort in spite of this.
And after watching her friend Vaghn be sacrificed and transfigured into a Saint for the Crawling In Ecstasy and immediately killed, she comes home to her apartment, and we hear her popping open another bottle. A pause. And then the smashing of a bottle, the breaking point to which Paige can no longer numb herself to the cruelties and indifferences of this world and her life, that she can't continue on as she is now, as the world is now, and it's so fucking satisfying.
Again, very small part of storytelling in the series for one character in one episode, but I love it nonetheless.
339 notes · View notes