#like the trumpets of the apocalypse

[burntpink]

at 10am today someone in the neighborhood was blasting axé music full volume, so i stick my head outside my window trying to understand what's going on outside, just to find a single mechanic from the nearby workshop dancing beside his car's audio system like he was on a micareta. alone, on a sunday morning. and that's when it hit me: it's february.

when carnaval approaches, nothing will be said - but there will be signs.

[mdddante]

SO UHHH IA GANG.... HOW WE FEELING ABOUT THIS

[janus-cadet]

Did I just spend days working on a single tarot card? Yes. Yes I did. I never drew that many people on a single drawing, and hey, to be honest, I basically drew every characters of the movie this is inspired from.

Yes. It means that it's yet another set of characters, for a deck that is going to be very, very multifandoms. And this time, it's The Judgement, with the characters of the recent movie Knock at the Cabin.

Well, I can't really explain that one, because it would spoil basically all of the movie. But, but, as you can see, the four visitors are waiting for the family's judgement. No archangel in that one, sorry, Gabriel.

So, that card, upright, means that you've got a life-changing decision to make. You might need to look to your past and life lessons to guide you. Reversed, it indicates self-doubt, inner critic, and could mean that you are somewhat ignoring the call. Which are, if you saw the movie, some important characters struggle in the plotline.

I loved this movie, but, to be perfectly honest with you, I do tend to love a lot of Shyamalan's work. I did not read the book, but I'm aware of the change made in the story. I don't think it's a bad thing: an adaptation is a retelling of a story, and each person is free to see something different in it. To talk about the themes that most matter to them. And the choices made in this movie really worked for me.

And damn. Were the actors great, in this. They basically carried the movie from finish to end, all of them. Special mention to Leonard, who might be my favorite character.

[mist-the-wannabe-linguist]

To the why the french would breed that question you could always go with the time and true answer of trying to have Aesthetic War Machines because some wars are won with who has the most razzmatazz

very true!

[letarasstuff]

Female Rage

(A/N): Initially, I wanted to end this one on a hopeful note. But fighting the war of equality and equity can be pretty hopeless. I tried to be as inclusive as possible, but it's came out in a very binary way. I'm sorry for that and I'm readyto change anything.

Summary: Spencer learns from his daughter how much the patriarchy really sucks.

Word count: 1.3k

Warnings: the utter feeling of hopelessness in today's patriarchy, unwanted advances, some men suck

✨Masterlist✨

_________________________

“Hey, what’s with you today?” Spencer asks after hearing his daughter slamming the front door shut.

Her stomping feet bring her towards the living room, where he sits on the couch with a book in his hands, deciding whether or not he’ll include it in his next class. Looking up from the written words, he instantly spots all the emotion running over (Y/N)’s face.

Now, being a father to a 16 year old teenager wasn’t always easy and especially since puberty started it’s becoming increasingly difficult to decipher his child, but Spencer knows right away what kind of emotional cocktail is playing here: Anger, hurt, a pinch of shock and layered under all of this is a certain type of fear. Which one is up to (Y/N) telling him.

“What’s with me today?” She asks him in an incredulous tone. “With me? What about you? Or your entire gender. No, seriously. How can you men go around, trumpeting how you are the stronger, the smarter, the better, the most superior gender? And mean that? Even going as far as to believe that bullshit”

(Y/N) stops, taking in a deep breath. Her father looks at her with waiting eyes, thinking that she now will calmly explain to him what her whole tirade is about. But it seems that this was just the prologue. Because she continues with even more vigour in her voice than she started with.

“For real, what makes you even think that? Stronger than a person, who was assigned female at birth? Just because you are able to build muscles faster than we? Or lose weight faster than us? You know what I call that? An evolutionary problem, because while I got emergency fat to feed off in the case of, I don’t know, an apocalypse, you will freeze to death.

“Our bodies are, for the most part, able to grow an entire functioning human being. We literally take a breakfast bar and build fingers with that energy.

“And for the smarter part? No, absolutely not. So many findings in history have been stolen from women by men, who greedily put their name on it and call it a day of science. Without women, cars probably would still drive around with windshield wipers. Mary Anderson has been laughed at for that idea, despite being one of the first women to hold a patent. And as soon as it expired, suddenly wipers were installed in all cars. Out of nowhere, it stopped being a dumb idea? Just because you weren’t able to attribute it to a woman?!

“But what more to expect from a gender that made protective gear for their testicles in hockey mandatory a hundred years before doing the same thing with a helmet. Who would have thought that brain cells need protection, too? A woman definitely.

I don’t wanna say one gender is better than the other or that there should be a particular fight between any gender at all, but men make it out like that. Damn it, they make women compete with each other to garner their attention. All those “pick me” girls you make fun of? They are the product of internalised misogyny.

“The baseline is wanting to be different from the “typical girl”, right? Well, what is a typical girl, who defined her and why is it so bad to be typical. Who do I want to be different for? Who is mad that I’m dressing up, putting makeup on or having good friendships with other girls?

“Men apparently, because they don’t want a different girl. They don’t want a well dressed, put together woman for the sake of love or so. They want someone easy. Nothing complicated, not someone, who asks them if these pants do look better with that shirt or this blouse. They don’t want to be confronted with problems. That’s why they made up a narrative of how a woman is supposed to be, solely for their own interest.

“And this whole thing eradicates the beautiful experiences you can have as a woman. I don’t talk about these silly and partly belittling things like girl dinner or girl maths. I’m talking about hyping each other up. Bathrooms in a club are fun, because there are a bunch of strangers, talking another stranger up to shoot their shot. Or down from texting their ex. There is unity.

“So where do men get their audacity?!”

Ending her whole rant with this question, (Y/N) stands in front of her father, seething and looking like she is about to overthrow the patriarchy with her own two hands. Right here, right now.

Meanwhile Spencer has started to shrink into the sofa and looks as physically small as possible.

“Uhm, the audacity for what, Sweetheart?” He asks hesitantly, scared for her reaction, but also knowing that this is something his daughter needs to get out of her system.

“TO WALK UP TO ME AND TRYING TO GET SOMETHING ON WITH ME WHILE HE CLEARLY HAS BEEN TRYING TO DESTROY MY WHOLE PRESENTATION! TO FLIRT WITH A MINOR WHILE HE CLEAR AS DAY IS IN HIS MID TO LATE TWENTIES!”

(Y/N) falls down on the sofa face first, next to her father. He rubs her arm up and down in a soothing manner, trying to take the fall after her burst of warranted female rage.

“I apologise. I know, there is nothing I can do against all of what you just said. I also know, like you, that we are talking about a structural problem. It’s nothing that can be solved by a few words. It sucks, knowing that your right to vote is younger than the patent on the first motorised vehicle. It’s not right that you always have to stick up for your rights, while mine will never be threatened.

“Nothing about all of this is fair. That I have to raise you in a way to remind you that any man out there could hurt you. It’s not fair that you have to go tell other men making advances at you about an imaginary boyfriend, because they rather believe in the legitimation of a fake male than your no. That you have to say no more than once, just because someone wants to “make sure you really mean it”.

“I can’t do anything right now that will satisfy you.

“But I can promise you that I will always listen to you. Listen to what makes you mad about this system. I will listen to other people, telling me how the patriarchy failed them. I promise to uplift the women in my life, give credit where it’s due and try to be the best feminist I can be.

But you need to promise me to tell me how I can support you the best in a world that wants to diminish your opinion, your rights and you. Can we do that?”

A short moment of silence gives Spencer the opportunity to think about instances, where he had to endure how (Y/N) being born female made her life more difficult. May it be boys pulling your hair on the playground and the teacher saying that they show love in this abusive way. May it be being called emotional or being told to stop being dramatic while talking about her problems. May it be in simply enjoying stereotypical girly things and being called basic because of that.

“Yes, I promise, I’ll keep you in check. And if you start rambling about how men are superior, I’ll ship you off to the worst retirement home I can find,” (Y/N) says, voice a bit muffled by the couch pillows.

The family continues sitting in silence, the feeling of deep and utter unfairness seeping into their bones.

If you have come this far, please consider a reblog or a comment. Not holding you at gunpoint or anything, but it would be pretty neat.

All works:

@venomsvl @kneelforloki @ssa-uglywhore27 @bibissparkles

Criminal Minds:

@averyhotchner @herecomesthewriterwitch @ash19871962 @ellyhotchner

General Spencer Reid:

@mayoanddelight (sunny, you seriously need to tell me when you change your url, this list had such an old one in it)

[actual-changeling]

I have written many meta posts and s3-theories, and read even more, but I got hit by an idea I have not seen before. (If there is another post, please link it!)

After vibrating for an hour and losing my mind in my dms, I have no scraped together enough brain cells to present what is probably my first actual 'main-plot meta'.

Welcome to another edition of Alex's unhinged meta corner, today with a title to honour Crowley's James Bond obsession and the possibility of another heaven heist.

I give you:

From Jesus with Love - You Will Live Twice

Now, let's get right into it.

I think Neil might have told us more about the main s3 plotline in the announcement article than we previously thought. We all got stuck on 'they're not talking'—for good reason—but it is the part before that which has been bugging me ever since then.

The plans are going wrong—and this time that is a problem for earth and humanity. Turning that around, it means that whatever that plan consists of would be the way to go and beneficial for everyone, the opposite of the main plot of s1.

"They need to prevent the Second Coming (SC)" is pretty much the only and most popular idea I have seen, hundreds of fics and metas and whatnot have been written about it, but I think there's a good chance we're wrong. If we're not, well, I will honestly just be happy to be watching season 3.

Whatever the Metatron is planning will have negative consequences for everyone, or as Michael puts it: "And so… it ends. Everything ends. Time and the world is over, and we begin Eternity… forever and ever."

It sounds very much like Apocalypse #1 - Same Old Plan, same expected result, yet if we look at different interpretations of scripture we find that the SC is not entirely about complete destruction and death for all of humanity—it is about creating a new world/migrating to the kingdom of God.

This is taken from the Wikipedia article about the SC

Resurrection and life in a world to come are a direct contradiction to the result Michael is explaining—total annihilation of humanity.

Now, I am neither religious in any way nor have I ever received any sort of biblical education. Luckily, Christians seem to love talking about the bible because there are dozens of bible website to wade through. If I get anything wrong, please point it out, I have never touched a bible in my life.

So, after reading many, many quotes by a bunch of different guys, I tried to create a somewhat coherent picture of what the SC might look like based on the assumption that the end result is positive. I will talk about how they can be interpreted more in-depth later, otherwise this would turn into a string-net very fast.

Additionally, we can also see where these points overlap with the statement Jimbriel gave in the bookshop in episode three.

What is Jesus' job description?

only God knows when and how exactly it will begin/happen, no one else does, including Jesus and the Metatron

a lot of different catastrophes are mentioned or quoted as something Jesus said, like earthquakes and storms -> Jimbriel mentioned a tempest and great storms

there is also the line "All these are the beginning of birth pains." Birth pains dictate that there will be a birth—birth of the world to come perhaps?

dead people will be resurrected/leave their graves so that they too can be judged (I'd say participate in it but that sounds like the Second Coming is a summer camp activity)

there are also mentions of stars and the heavens in general falling from the sky and the sun going dark -> Jimbriel also mentions darkness as one of the signs

great lamentations, as Jimbriel says, are also a part of many different passages, with humans mourning the world as it was

the Lord will descent with the voice of an Archangel and the sound of a trumpet/the trumpet of God; the grammatical structure of that sentence seems to be interpreted differently depending on who you ask, but the voices of angels/an Archangel and some sort of trumpet are common terms

once everyone is in heaven/wherever the 'main even' will take place, a judgement call will be made for every single person in relation to the book of life, which decides whether they will be punished forever or not (one passage talks about a lake of fire and mentions it several times in a row)

And this is where it gets tricky. To figure out what the SC looks like, we first need to understand a) what the Metatron's capabilities are, b) what he has to lose, and c) what exactly would be a threat to him.

If you ask me, all of this comes down to the Metatron wanting to stay and be in power for eternity with full control over angels so he can do as he please, aka keeping the system running as it is.

We know the book of life (bol) is a thing in the Good Omens universe, whether it does what Michael said is an entirely different question. So far, we have also only got confirmation that hell collects and tortures souls—in such large amounts that they are understaffed—while heaven looks completely empty.

The Metatron runs heaven as an institution, he seems to be the highest power any of the angels have access to and the one they defer to. He refers to himself as the voice of God and combines judge, jury and executioner, making him one great celestial dictator.

From what we know of hell, they do things a lot more democratically, having different councils, dukes, and ranks that are responsible for different levels of command.

We also know that that the Metatron wants the world to end, his goals can probably be summarized as the statement Michael makes, which would leave him in charge without any opposing forces.

We also also know that he sees Crowley and Aziraphale as a threat—why exactly remains a mystery for now—and that the success of his plan hinges on having a Supreme Archangel (SA) he can control. Gabriel decided to become princess of hell and Beez' sugar baby, so he was out of the equation, and after the Armageddon disaster, I don't think he wants to risk failing because of an unfamiliarity with earth (plus, y'know, getting our two idiots away from the plan).

It's interesting to me that right at the end, he says to Aziraphale "We call it the Second Coming"—call, not it is or it will be, CALL. We know that nothing Neil writes is a coincidence, definitely not with such an important line.

Just because you CALL something a specific name doesn't mean it IS what you call it, e.g. Aziraphale calls Crowley a foul fiend when we know he very much isn't.

The Metatron is selling his plan as part of the "Great/Ineffable Plan", so any questions can be blocked by saying it's God's will, it's ineffable. Whatever his plan is, he hides it behind the concept of the Second Coming, which angels know just enough about to understand the basics without having in-depth knowledge of what exactly it entails.

It is a good fucking strategy, I'll give him that, and it WORKS because angels—even if they have doubts—do not question. They simply don't; fear of punishment and millennia of conditioning have left them in a horrible place. When they encounter something unknown, their response is "I already knew that" as to not ask questions.

Crowley questions, we know that, and Aziraphale, ohhhhh, Aziraphale ALSO questions, but he does it in a less dangerous and obvious way. The Metatron is vastly underprepared for that.

(Side note: That alone would be its own meta post, but the gist is that he questions heaven's plans and then adjusts his assumptions of what God might want to what he WANTS God to want, e.g. Job, the Arch)

To summarize everything I just said, the Metatron wants to do what Armageddon failed to do—destroy earth and the universe—so he can be supreme dictator of all remaining celestial beings and gorge himself on power.

But instead of calling it his Big Evil Plan, he calls it the Second Coming, making everyone play along without resistance.

We cycle aaaaall the way back to the sentence I quoted—the ACTUAL plans are going wrong since the Metatron's would mean total destruction.

But what is the SC supposed to be if not the Apocalypse 2.0?

When I look at all the different aspects of the SC and assume a positive outcome, then the end result to me would be a new world that is pretty much like the old world, or maybe even literally the old world but with any destruction reversed. Heaven and hell get dissolved since now that everyone has been "judged", they as institutions are no longer needed, they have fulfilled their purpose.

No more judgement means there is no reason to keep track anymore, so why do you need to run celestial corporations whose only job is doing exactly that? You don't—and THAT is what I believe is the biggest perceived threat to the Metatron, losing full control over everyone and everything, losing his position, his title, and whatever else he has.

On top of that, Good Omens has told us again and again that God doesn't seem to give a fuck about good and evil anymore, and that without heaven and hell being all wrapped up in it, humanity would have 100% free will without any consequences.

Maybe the BoL is empty, maybe it isn't real, maybe Jesus stole it to straighten a wobbly table, who knows. There is a chance it is what Michael says, but I would admittedly find that a bit. too obvious and boring since it would boil the plot down to "they save their own asses again" and not "they save humanity at all cost".

Regarding Crowley and Aziraphale's role in this—I have Thoughts TM but those definitely need their own post. In short, they have to get the SC back on track, the real one.

-

If you have made it this far, thank you for working through what I hope are more or less coherent rambles. Any spelling or grammar mistakes are my own.

Questions? Thoughts? Corrections? Expansions and additions?

Feel free to add to this post however you like (and I can't believe I have to mentions this but if you clown on my post or behave like an asshole you will be blocked).

[chulacola]

A little headcanon.

Spamton playing the trumpet. The dude likes to be loud, and be heard.

There's also the idiom " blowing his own trumpet" a.k.a boasting his ego and such. Along with the whole angel announcing the apocalypse by blowing a horn.

[chaifootsteps]

I’ve been wondering this for a year but why do so many people keep bringing up Stolas and the apocalypse? Was that established in the show?

You Will Be Okay, especially the full version, is full of references to Revelations and the end of days, when the trumpet sounds and the stars crash and Heaven comes down to smite all the demons in Hell. The implication is that this will mean the end of Stolas's immortal life, but Octavia will somehow be spared.

It never comes up again because Viv saw a picture she liked of Stolas and Blitz as kids and hard pivoted to that.

[blackmetalbats]

guys! guys! i LOVE shitposting and making memes about malevolent, but! we need to talk about two things from the last ep

1

this is probably a minor thing? but i loved all the allusions to giving birth. we have arhtur mpreg from last episode (lmao) we have the title of the episode (deliverance) we have arthur "being born again", or being resurrected from the dead and we have the scene of them going underwater, and then resurfacing "outside". i really liked it and it might come up again idk

2

DIES IRAE??????

Yorick calls the "combined force" of John and Arthur as Dies Irae. that is a medieval latin sequence that describes judgment day (i.e. the last day of the apocalypse in the christian scriptures). and it particularly describes the trumpets of god separating the saved and the unsaved.

the saved will be delivered (sounds familiar?) and the unsaved will be cast into eternal flames (the dark world?)

im so intrigued and i want to see where this is going to go, but i have a feeling that it is going to be resolved in season 6, as like the finale of the whole series, and Harlan is just mentioning it now to spread some seeds that he can collect later

i am so gonna make another post about this

[blueberryarchive]

─୨MISS PEACHES '57୧─

(18+)//tw: drinking, pranking, cursing, light stuff//part 1

The horse trotted to the rhythm of the drums, the festival rumbled in the middle of the dusty nothingness, and the lights illuminated the stadium that seemed to be swallowed by the darkness of the warm night. The moon was hidden by the black clouds that threatened to break, lightning illuminated the mountains in violet, and the smell of a storm was approaching.

Jungkook encouraged the animal to go faster, clicking loudly. Jimin was behind him, with one arm he held onto the younger man's chest, and with the other, he took a long drink of the stolen whiskey.

The night called for things to fall into their hands, the purpose being to create a scandal and wake up that city girl who comes to Rivermouth thinking that she can devour them.

The apple of the Bell Ranch's eye, the star child, the one who left Rivermouth at nine to bring home a crown every couple of months.

The apple of Rivermouth's eye is back, wearing the brightest crown she's ever had. And the Hillside brothers plan to enjoy the show tonight.

With a spontaneous brake, both boys jumped off the horse, pushing people in the audience. Alcohol immunizing insults and judging looks.

"C'mon, Jimin. Hurry up!"

"Fuck off. I told you to bring something gross, ain't you working on Millie's butcher shop?" Jimin opened the lid. 

"Ain't your dad a fucking shepherd?" Jungkook spat, tongue heavy with only a few sips.

"What should I bring? Wool? You fucking idiot." The blonde laughed, grabbing the last drink ready on his strap.

The crowd started getting busier, the lights fading. 

The music started out of nowhere like the first trumpet of the apocalypse, announcing your arrival on stage.

And indeed, there was no prettier girl in all of Rivermouth.

With your pearly smile, high voluminous hair, perfect hands, and the sweetest smile Jimin had ever seen. Not even his mother looked so beautiful, nor did the statue of the Virgin Mary in the church. You were divine, a torment, taken from the same city hell.

"Take more." He heard himself say. Jungkook put his hand into the jelly jar that Jimin was carrying in his trembling hands.

Park's rebellious heart fell into his stomach as he saw you emerge completely from the curtains, materializing from the yellow dust that rose from the arid floor like a Las Vegas show. With smoke and lights and the Bell Ranch's girl dressed as a coquettish sailor. The lights are brighter than before, the sparkling shine of your glitter bow, your freshly painted nails, the sash around your body: MISS PEACHES 1957. Everyone applauded when they saw your hands rise and jump elegantly across the creaky floor.

Jungkook held the slimy mass in his fingers, gaping and wondering.

"Are you sure that's the right girl, Park?" 

"Sure as hell." Jimin licked his lips, feeling a sudden thirst. 

Thunder exploded in his ears just as your smile caught a glimpse of him. Like a sign from the Lord of your arrival, he was sure as hell that you were the right girl. "Why, are you scared, little church boy?" Teased, Jungkook clicked his tongue. 

Was that what girls were like outside of Rivermouth? With long legs and an apotheotic smile?

"Aim..." Jungkook murmured coming out of his stupor, raising his arm, the reddish juice dripping down his wrist and onto his shirt.

It's not that Park felt hungry or wanted to go to the bathroom, nor that he has a fever. He wasn't nervous either, of course not, the alcohol helped him with that. But the southern heat was so strong from your presence that he felt like he could faint if he blinked and missed one of your steps, steps, steps, turn, one, two, one, two, three, four, CLACK! LIGHT! THUNDER!

Jelly spilled from Jimin's fingers, and his heart drummed to the sound of your patent leather shoes.

If he had known that the Bell Ranch girl was going to be you, maybe he wouldn't have stolen his mother's jam, maybe he wouldn't have called Jungkook that night. But it was already late, and his fingers were tickling, his nose was beginning to despise the smell of strawberries that filled his space.

"FIRE!" Jimin yelled as the clack of your feet made his throat burst.

The sweet rained down until it reached your beautiful face, your delicate costume. 

A collective gasp landed Jimin on his feet, at what he had caused. Your smile was gone, your long eyelashes raised above the red. Both boys remained static, confused; as if they had desecrated a religious image.

"Oh, fuck. Fuck! We have to go." Jungkook mumbled hands into fists, eyes on the prize. 

Jimin's eyes were bright, the corners of his lips tremblingly raised as he watched you cry in the center of the stage, the unbearable white lights made your translucent tears shine, and the sweaty makeup made you look like a ruined wax figure. The women who surrounded you to protect you from so much shame. Oh, it was a sight.

If your father wasn't screaming, if Jungkook hadn't grabbed his arm, and if his mother hadn't screamed his name from afar. Jimin would have stayed until his feet swelled just to see you, to admire you until he grew weary.

It wasn't the first time he had made a girl cry, but making Miss Peaches '57 cry had been the greatest achievement for 18-year-old Jimin. Best of all, he didn't even have to move, yell at you, or even pull one of your perfect curls.

The mere fact that he came close to you caused tornado damage to such a wildflower.

They had to run through the blue night, ride through the cold drizzle, and disappear for hours until the festival and you were an intelligible echo behind their cruel, childish laughter.

Jungkook licked his sticky fingers while he looked back. Looking for your silhouette coming down the stairs, defeated in the worst way for a girl: when she thinks she looks her best.

That night, both boys slept in the hayfield of an old cabin, drunk and sticky. They both dreamed of the same girl, and both woke up with goosebumps from the dew of a wet morning and a mischievous smile.

One of them dreamed of stealing a kiss from you, the other of making you cry again.

[thetattersoftheking]

idk if people are talking enough about yorick's title for the boys; the Dies irae. when i looked it up, wikipedia says it means 'day of wrath'

"It is a medieval Latin poem characterized by its accentual stress and rhymed lines. The poem describes the Last Judgment, the trumpet summoning souls before the throne of God, where the saved will be delivered and the unsaved cast into eternal flames."

It is a religious hymn.... and considering poetry and religion as themes have come up at multiple occasions, it is certainly likely that this is a reference to what is essentially 'judgement day?' So....from this I'm going to make a guess that Jarther has a pretty big role to play in a potential impending apocalypse? or maybe it is more literal....the wrath of day/day of wrath in that their force combined is like the wrath of a god? i wonder just how literal it all is~

[pinkeoni]

What Exactly Do I Mean When I Say "Will is Jesus Christ?"

(or Why Will is the Chosen One)

Do I mean that Will is actually the second coming of Christ? Well, no, at least not in a literal sense. All I mean to say by this is that—

Will is the chosen one, and he is the hero of the story who is meant to save the world from the apocalypse.

Apocalypse imagery and references to Revelations is all over the place in season 4. The four victims representing the four horsemen of the apocalypse, Henry "One" effectively being a God-like figure, references to Revelations 1:8 regarding Henry, hell I'll go as far to say that Robin playing the trumpet at the beginning of the season is a nod to the sound of trumpets that is meant to signal the beginning of the apocalypse.

The important thing about Revelations being that at the end of the day, the second coming of Jesus Christ, the chosen one, saves the day.

This really robust old post that I made, which was also one of my first theory posts, goes into detail on how Will fits the criteria of a Christ-figure, or a figure in literature or media that is allegorical to Jesus Christ. Will's biggest piece of evidence being his full on burial and resurrection in the first season.

If I'm talking about Christ-figures in the show then I should probably talk about El, who admittedly has much more in your face Christ-coding than Will does. Walking on water, performance of miracles, the mother who got pregnant out of strange circumstances, along with her own resurrection and so-on.

So then, if El clearly has more Christ-coding than Will, why am I placing the title of Jesus onto Will? Is it just because I like him more than El? Is it because I see Will as a more important character than El?

Just as a general disclaimer, I will admit that I do have a major Will bias, anyone who follows me knows that. He's been my favorite character since I first watched the show. Although, my labeling of him as the chosen one has nothing to do a dislike of El or a belief that she is not an important character. I love El, and it's plain to everyone that watches the show how important she is. However, I just don't believe that the chosen one who saves the day is what her arc is building towards.

They've been building up El's chosen one status while also quietly breaking it down in the background, in the same way that they've quietly been leaving bread crumbs pointing toward Will's Christ status while also seemingly suggesting that he isn't that important of a character. Why have a character tell El that she's "the cure," then make a point that she loses against Henry at the end of the season? Why sideline Will for the past two seasons, but throw in lines of dialogue pointing toward his involvement with the Upside Down?

What I believe they are going for is a classic bait-and-switch to subvert expectations in the final season. Lead the audience to believe one thing, while still leaving clues to suggest the other so that when the twist is revealed it doesn't come out of nowhere.

So what is El's arc actually about? I won't deny El's role in the final battle of the show, it's not like she's going to be completely sidelined, but I don't think that her saving the world on her own while everyone else watches is what her arc is building towards. The real core of her arc is El discovering who she is as a girl, rather than becoming a superhero.

I actually made a post awhile ago talking about El’s monster/superhero dichotomy, and it’s actually incredibly important to my argument. The post itself is more in depth, but tl:dr: El believes that she can either be a superhero or a monster, and bases her worth on her ability to save the world and others, an unfair expectation to place onto one girl.

If at the end of the season, El single-handedly saves the entire world, wouldn’t it feel counterintuitive to her arc? She needs to learn that her self worth doesn’t rely on her ability to save the world, and if she ends the show this way, it wouldn’t create a solution for her cyclical train of thought.

Furthermore, wouldn’t this ending be a bit expected, and even boring? This is what El has been doing for the past four seasons of the show. Continuing that pattern would only feel anticlimactic. From a writer’s pov, if you wanted the ending of you show to be dynamic and interesting, you would want to do something new.

So why do I think that Will is the chosen one?

It’s not like I’m pulling the chosen-one-Jesus-Christ label out of my ass just because I like Will. I actually do have many reasons to believe this.

The first one is the confirmation that Will is going to be a big part and focus for next season. It’s been theorized that this means Will is going to become a villian, and while I do love a good Will villian AU, there are many reasons I could list off as to why he wouldn’t become a villian. Without going into it all right now, let’s just say that it would not only go against what Will stands for, but also what the show itself stands for.

Even in show, we have signs pointing toward Will’s chosen status. Let’s start with the fact that Will is the one who kicks the entire show off in the first place, when he is taken by who we later learn to be Henry. Now, this could have just been wrong-place-wrong-time kind of thing, but given how much has been revealed has actually been part of a larger plan constructed by Henry, I highly doubt that mere coincidence is the case.

Let’s look at some more evidence within the fourth season. Let’s talk about the fact that, despite not even being present in Hawkins and gone for much of the supernatural action, Will is still being brought up by name and even implicated in the strangeness of the Upside Down.

Do I think Will is gonna solo-kill Vecna in the climax of the show? Chosen one doesn’t mean only one. No, despite all my rambling about El not being the hero, I’m not gonna deny her importance to the supernatural plot. I think something else the show keeps building upon is the importance of support from friends and family— saving the world is likely gonna be a group effort. I do think, however, that Will possesses some kind of unique ability that is going to be crucial to winning.

What would being the hero mean for Will’s arc? Well, it would give him a sense of control that he hasn’t had before. Will has had a lot of agency and autonomy ripped from him in past seasons, and this would be his way of reclaiming that. It would be the perfect subversion of expectations as well. The character that everyone expects to be just the helpless victim, or hell even the villian, is the one who rises to become the hero who saves the day in his own way.

[andromeda4004]

Thoughts about Season 3 (and why Season 2 exists at all)

That makes it sound like i didn't enjoy S2 - I did, even the ending, once I'd recovered. But I had some thoughts which might be interesting for people who haven't read the original GO book, or who read it after seeing S1, because I think some of the differences might be easier to miss like that. [Spoilers below, obviously]

Neil said when he started talking about S2 that it would exist to bridge the gap between where GO the book ended and the sequel would have begun, had they ever written it. And this is interesting, because why would the TV series need to tell 6 episodes worth of bridging story when the books didn't? Certainly there are story details that can be told better or more efficiently in narrative or on screen, because they're very different media, but I don't think that accounts for a whole series.

The thing is, the book and S1 end in very different places. In S1, we get the dramatic trials, the triumphant reunion, the confidence that our boys are on their own side now. In the book, our boys never quit their jobs. The whole exchange from the book (which Neil replaced with the trials for dramatic effect) reads like this:

Crowley gave him a sideways look.

‘Your people been in touch?’ he said.

‘No. Yours?’

‘No.’

‘I think they’re pretending it didn’t happen.’

‘Mine too, I suppose. That’s bureaucracy for you.’

That's it; the boys suffer no consequences for their actions (possibly because their actions were a bit less effective in the book, they show up to try to avert the apocalypse and put together one distracting conversation, but Adam and the humans do the actual work). More importantly, they haven't quit and they haven't been fired; there's no reason to think they won't continue to receive assignments once Heaven and Hell get to grips with the continued existence of the world. There is no "our side". So if S3 is to follow what the book's sequel was going to cover, S2 had to get us back to where the book left off, with our boys on opposite sides, so that Aziraphale can be tasked with organising the Second Coming (and hopefully screw it up as badly as Crowley did the baby swap).

So my view is that, in giving us the trials as a very satisfying ending to a stand-alone series, Neil actually painted himself into an awkward corner when it came to the sequel, and had to use S2 to get the characters back where they needed to be.

All that said, here are some things I'm hoping for in S3. Some of these might be mutually exclusive but that's fine, any assortment is good:

Crowley reads some Jane Austen, and learns how humans work through arguments (i.e. through meaningful apology and personal growth, not by sleeping for 80 years).

Aziraphale has a series of increasingly disappointing experiences in Heaven, which lead him to finally resolve his persistent difficulty with the concept of "good" not lining up with his personal morality of what is "right". Perhaps he has a chat with Jesus about it, I'm guessing he would have an interesting perspective on this.

Metatron had to get Aziraphale back on side because he is the angel Israfil, who in Islamic tradition is the one who sounds the final trumpet (there's a fantastic meta post about this somewhere on here and I would love that to be true).

Crowley goes back to Hell. I know this one's controversial, but we've never seen Crowley actually lean into his demonic nature, and there's a vacancy Below too, right? And it would really add some weight to the inevitable love confession if Aziraphale has to admit that he loves Crowley warts and scales and horns and all, not because he's clinging to the memory of an angel who doesn't exist.

One of the residents of Soho is revealed as having been an undercover demon watching the bookshop. There's just too many slightly odd moments in S2 that feel like they're foreshadowing something.

Anyway, there's my assorted thoughts; I'd love to hear yours.

[nicosraf]

I wake up in the morning and keep thinking of Michael x Lucifer, help Rafa....

Please tell me they won't hate each other forever, I beg u. I think my poor little heart won't survive the pain of their hate-desire for each other *drops dramatically to the floor*

Anyways, super excited for A&M! <3

Eternity is a long time, and I think even if their hate was deeper, they would eventually get tired of their anger and fall back into each other.

They were in love before they even met. They were made for each other (or maybe they remade each other). I think their love will change and develop and go through every stage of grief, but at the end of time, when they have nothing left to lose, I think they might try to dance a little to the trumpets of the apocalypse, like they danced when they visited Earth together for the first time... Lucifer will ask Michael if he still remembers how to sing and dance how he taught him, and Michael will say he does. Michael will ask if Lucifer still remembers how to fight, and maybe Lucifer will tell him he doesn't how to stop fighting anymore

I think they'll find the heart to cuddle again some day... some day....

Thank u for the ask... I hope you'll like A&M !!

[wttt-dirus-work]

m-may I request hc’s for the bestest boy (loui)? 👁️👁️

*DON’T FEEL RUSHED OR FORCED TO ANSWER THI-[gets gunned down by marine corps]*

First of all, I am so sorry it took me this long to asnwer it! But yes you may! *[rushing with medic to save you]*

Okay so Louisiana...

Buddy got ADHD (almost wrote in french lmaooo) and is the mom friend. He'll know the second you try to lie to him (Flo doesnt even try anymore unless it's for *science*), always got some food on him and bandaid (come on his bestfriend is Florida, he's gotto be ready for anything), and is the most chill person alive.

He's the one you wanna have in a zombie apocalypse; he knows how to survive in his environnment (but is absolutely useless in the north) and can kill anything. He got his voodoo magic, can see ghost (like Kurt in The Umbrella Academy) and if you make him angry, that's the last thing you'll ever do.

Louisiana is kind, because he knows what it's like to not have someone kind to him, and sometime help balance Florida's chaos (i say sometime because most of the time he's the one encouraging him).

He can play any Jazz instrument but loves trumpet (btw why do we call him Louie and not Louis, like Louis Armstrong???), is a phenomenal cook and bartender, and loves to spook tourist who don't respect his state.

That's all i got for now, so yeah.

[shores-of-oblivion]

God how do I even start this.

So I'm doing my yearly rewatch of Evangelion as one depressed artist does, and I noticed some similarities in the concept of the Human Instamentality project and the Artifact ending.

The Human Instamentality project is, as simply as I can manage because Eva is dense and Like That, a plan to kick-start the next phase of evolution and combine all of humanity into a single god-like entity. The shadowy organization of Seele wants to do this to ascend humanity into a perfect, content being, while Gendo Ikari, the main characters father, wants to do this so he can be reunited with his wife. While I am loathe to compare the two on account of Elster being a perfect sweet angel who I adore and Gendo being just the fucking worst, both are willing to perform an esoteric/biblical rite involving death and the sacrifice of oneself, as well as ushering in the apocalypse, all so they can see their loved one again.

The description of the Key of Sacrifice, one of three needed to unlock the artifact ending, has these incredibly biblical descriptions/quotes on it that sort of started me down this absurd rabbit hole. And I mean that very literally, it reads like something right out of Revelations. A third of all life in the sea dies, a star falls to the sea and thunder like the trumpet of angels sounds. This doesn't paint a happy picture to me, but one full of death and doom and the end times. It feels apocalyptic.

And, when the Instrumentality project is finally started, everyone turns into Sunny D and becomes a single entity, something which is also described in Signalis but with a flesh theme. Everyone breaks down and becomes one with each other while our main character struggles with their identity while confronting horrors both divine and man-made. In Eva it takes a more introspective look with Shinji, and in Signalis it's eldritch horror.

The other two keys are Love and Eternity. Love is Ariane speaking of teaching Elster to dance and falling in love with her, and Eternity openly tells us that we will never have all the answers. Only heartbreak awaits us. Maybe I'm just being a depressed artist, I'll gladly wear that crown, but my current thoughts are that while the Artifact ending does see Elster and Ariane dance together again, it comes at such an incredible cost. All three keys together paint a depressing picture for me.

And as a further note of comparison between Signalis and Eva, the Rebuild series is all about retelling the story of Neon Genesis Evangelion with some minor differences at the start before wildly diverging with a different ending and outcome for the world and the characters while using a bunch of reoccuring imagery and playing with the idea that this story has happened multiple times. And every telling of the story is big on themes of identity and personhood and figuring out who you are. Which, y'know, plays a big part in Elsters journey. And I don't think this is me reaching, the false ending directly references episode 26 of NGE and Shinjis struggle with his own identity as an individual, and the steam page credits Hideaki Annos work as a source of inspiration.

ALSO both use dream sequences and feature sad queer characters having a rough fucking time on trains, both use horror imagery with the main artificial humanoids around the 2/3 mark, both have endings which feature a beach, I'm loosing my mind.

You watch one messy mecha anime as a teenager and it fucking ruins your life. I need to go lie down.