#it reminded me of the scene between stede and mary in ofmd

[mikimeiko]

Bodies | 06. The World is Yours

[voidify333]

Got a lot of OFMD vibes from Good Omens s2???

BIG spoilers for both GO S2 and OFMD S1 under the cut

Like, this isn’t a situation for the copied homework meme format, I believe it’s just same braincell on a really juicy story beat to create drama in a high concept romance, but I find the similarities fascinating so I’m gonna post about them. (What’s funny is that the thing that actually got me to watch OFMD in the first place is the promise of Stede being like aziraphale and blackbonnet being like A/C…)

The main thing is how the ending of ep 6 reminded me of OFMD ep 9.

The central pair kiss for the first time— letting any remaining oblivious audience members know this isn’t just a bromance, and alienating any homophobes in the audience who weren’t already alienated by the queer supporting characters. (That last bit is actually the biggest other “ofmd vibes” thing I picked up— how the very queer supporting roster served both to let homophobes know the show isn’t for them, and to reassure the queer audience that they’re allowed to hope for the main pair being Outright Canon)

But they also enter their divorce era— specifically, what happens is this:

The sunshine bookworm has a scene with a character the audience recognises as antagonistic (completely different scenes though— Stede’s traumatic experience with the bully in the woods vs Az being emotionally manipulated by metatron into thinking coming back to heaven is a good idea)

This scene, combined with his existing insecurities, causes him to return to a life that he won’t even find fulfilling (we know this bc he stepped away from it in the first place!) but he’s been convinced that it’s The Thing He Has To Do

In the process, he abandons his black-clad true love and breaks his heart

But here (in addition to all the obvious differences in context and execution), the season cliffhanger cuts away BEFORE “episode 10” as it were.

And… I don’t think “episode 10” is going to happen immediately for Aziraphale when lights go up on s3. Like, the “love epiphany” part may come in an early episode (we saw the way he touched his lip), but he’s certainly not getting the “plan to leave” part until some time further into s3, because the life he’s mistakenly gone back to isn’t with a Mary figure who cares about him but wants him elsewhere as much as he secretly wants to be elsewhere— instead, it’s with Heaven, an abusive cult that is planning to use him to destroy Earth, and has the power to destroy him on a whim.

Aziraphale’s key insecurity is his need for authoritative reassurance that he is Doing The Right Thing. This is what allowed metatron to use the offer of heaven to manipulate Az into hurting Crowley’s feelings and then abandoning Crowley. The tone demands an eventual happy ending (my faith in this is why the ending of e6 didn’t even make me mad), but Az is going to have to work through those issues before the happy ending can take place— Nina basically spelled this out.

The next place this comparison led me was to the thought “can I connect a red string on my cork board between post s2 crowley and ep10 Ed?”

There is an important difference between them, and it’s in kind of the opposite direction as the difference between Az-when-we-cut-away and Stede-when-we-cut-away

Ed has closed himself off to vulnerability completely after his heartbreak, and lashes out horribly, and we all know the reunion in s2e1 is not going to go smoothly

Meanwhile, although Crowley is heartbroken and mad… he is ultimately like Maggie on the “I hope she’ll be there when I’m ready but there’s no guarantee—” “there is” front. Aziraphale needs to work through his issues, and the plot needs to get to a place where The Real Big One is foiled and neither of them are in imminent danger of destruction, and once Az stops being an idiot he will need to do a great many “you were wrong” dances, but once all those prerequisites are fulfilled, we’re getting our second kiss (and I’m fanning myself just thinking about that hypothetical scene hoooooboy)

Maybe there will be a period of “angel I can’t forgive you. not yet”, that would be juicy drama, but the tone of the story demands that any such moment will be temporary

However, I do have a vivid mental image now, inspired by e10 Ed, of post s2 crowley standing in the bookshop and saying to himself out loud “oh, nothing lasts forever, is that right, angel?” and then going on a bender of destroying or giving away books (I lean towards giving away as it would leave less permanent fallout for later, and also be funnier, while still being just as potent a gesture of spite in the moment)

Anyway when OFMD S2 comes out and we get a better look at the blackbonnet divorce arc I’m going to try to use it as a divination tool to predict the events of the A/C divorce arc

[ellicler]

okay absolutely the most malewife behaviour from izzy hands in ep4

‘They look like clouds, boss. Can we just focus on -’ ‘Yes, yes, they look like coulds because they are indeed clouds, but if you just put some fucking imagination into it, man!’

‘This guy is fucking fascinating.’ ‘Edward, focus. We need a plan’ ‘I’m focusing! I’m focusing on all of this brilliant stuff!’

‘A word, Captain?’ ‘You can be a real bummer sometimes, you know that?’

...the episode title is ‘discomfort in a married state’. mary & izzy narrative mirrors!! (’You ever feel trapped? Like you’re just treading water? Waiting to drown?’ ‘Yes. I very much have felt that way.’) i love that they’re so unsubtle about pushing us to notice this dynamic. it establishes the weight and depth of ed & izzy’s shared past so well. (honestly ofmd is a masterclass on effective writing. they describe their feelings and relationships with words AND they also show them off in their interactions. with a surprising narrative economy, there’s almost always *both* happening in every scene. show AND tell different things simultaneously.)

their positive dynamic has been built around the same things i think. ed loves to put on a good show, he loves a grateful audience, and izzy used to be very impressed with him. honestly they remind me of nothing so much as ACD’s holmes and watson (including holmes’ habit to hide his plans to produce a more surprising effect - and their tendency to get derailed as a result of not giving enough information to his colleagues; and also holmes’ depressive episodes in between the excitement - edward is giving off strong manic-depressive vibes). anyway. on a good day izzy used to provide structure and balance and stability to edward’s out of the box thinking. establishing thee blackbeard’s reputation was hard work AND it was fun for ed! now, though, he feels like there’s not enough challenge and excitement for him in it, unless he creates complications for himself. at the same time izzy feels ed is taking stupid risks and going on pointless flights of fancy. something had to give even without introducing stede to the equation.