#not as clear in gideon. but like

[ifyourereadingthisblinktwice]

every time i think about the locked tomb series i just circle back to “you can’t take loved away” and “life is short, love is long”

[zombie-bait]

I can’t believe Gideon and Harrow had like 3 weeks of something approximating fun before experiencing 2 solid years of endless suffering 😭 lemme tell you, nothing could’ve prepared me for that or the realization that post book 1 these poor fuckers just never get to spend any time together, I miss the old days of One Flesh One End Bitch!!!!! We had it so good and we didn’t even know it

[lady-harrowhark]

For me, the thing is that "confusing" just... isn't the right descriptor for my experience reading the Locked Tomb books. I wasn't "confused," I just didn't have all the pieces of the puzzle yet, and I was aware of that fact. I feel like I generally knew what I was meant to know, as a reader, at the point in the book where I was at. And for a very significant portion of the series, what the reader is meant to know is, "not much." I was less "confused" and moreso "searching for the explanation that will connect everything." This is absolutely a series on the very high end of the "unknown quantities" spectrum. They're an intellectual escape room.

But the shorthand way to convey that is just that yeah, no, these books are super confusing.

[gideonisms]

my hot take that will get me screenshotted by 2-3 ianthe bloggers is that griddlehark is actually more toxic than harrianthe. when you think about it both parties can Leave harrianthe eventually even if they'd still have to see each other. The power imbalance just isn't that severe. and I don't even think ianthe wants it to be. I think SHE thinks she wants it to be a sexy power imbalance but when it comes down to it and the moment arrives when harrow would fuck her out of desperation to be safe, ianthe turns away. She doesn't want harrow that way. She wants harrow to forget Gideon so they can be lyctors together forever. She wants to mutually maim each other. I think it's even consensual maiming. harrow broke one of gideon's ribs when gideon tried to leave her!

[folfar]

A scientific consideration of cultural preservation in Gideon the Ninth

HYPOTHESIS: the Venus de Milo is in Canaan House

REASONING: John is keen on decoration (the rest of Canaan House, the Mithraeum, his fancy baby-bone crown). John has strong opinions on preserving things he considers ‘worthy’ (the earth, his friends, Shakespeare). Why not famous art? Canaan House is filled with old and rotting portraits - they can’t ALL be of Cyrus and Valancy.

EVIDENCE:

There was a single statue at the end of the corridor where it turned left. It must have once been a person, but the head and arms had been lopped off, leaving only a torso with beseeching stumps. - GtN p130-1 (when Gideon is looking for Harrow)

beseeching stumps?? It’s simply got to be the Venus de Milo. No stumps plead more tenderly:

But she has a head! I hear you protest.

Aha! Now we come to Palamedes and Camilla doing psychometry to figure out the age of Canaan House:

"Fiat lux! If you want to talk improbable, let's talk about this"-a scrape of stone on stone-"being three thousand and some years older than this." A heavy clunk.

About 3000 years older than another part of Canaan House? Hmm! And what’s that Camilla is holding?

“Standing next to him holding a big wedge of broken sculpture and the flashlight was a tall, equally grey-wrapped figure with a scabbard outlined at her hip.”

“The cavalier narrowed her hooded eyes, fidgets gone and absolutely still; then she exploded into action. She dropped the wedge of sculpture with a clonk, drew her sword from its shabby scabbard before the wedge had bounced once, and advanced.”

SCULPTURE!

CONCLUSION: the Venus de Milo IS in Canaan House! However, it was decapitated by known practical thinker and simp Camilla Hect so that Palamedes Sextus could do his carbon dating easier without tiring out his necromancer noodle arms

SECONDARY CONCLUSION: Camilla was going to use the head of the Venus de Milo to bash open the laboratory hatch

[biracy]

Welcome to the world my third piece of tlt fanart ever. I am on FIRE

[harrowedsoup]

I am once again wondering how Wake would feel about her daughter now. Sure, when we see her spirit she is pretty clear that she saw Gideon as a bomb- one that she was very willing to set off. But that’s Wake locked emotionally in at the moment of her death. That’s her feelings about Gideon as she’s being murdered by someone she’s been having a really fucked up double affair with and all her carefully made plans turn to ash.

So I have to wonder: how would she feel about Gideon if she’d been allowed time to actually process it all and not just have her soul haunt a sword?

Like…Gideon looks almost exactly like her. Despite everything in her environment telling her otherwise she think necromancy is kinda awful and gross. She lacks any respect for God or his entire religion and she’s a warrior to the bone.

I don’t think Wake would ever be a actual good mother but man. It’s so sad for me to think about how Gideon unknowingly followed in her mother’s footsteps in a lot of little ways and Wake was incapable of ever seeing that even though she was technically with Gideon- she could only ever hate her, never processing through it because she’s dead.

[azure-clockwork]

How Does it Feel to Read Classic Sci-Fi?

Orson Scott Card: Two of the most interesting books you’ll ever read if you’re willing to look past a handful of things. And then you find the planet of Chinese people who worship having debilitating OCD. And the Mormonism. And the fact that the author is wildly homophobic and ought to read his own books.

Robert Heinlein (or at least the Wikipedia Summaries): I guess that’s a neat concept—oh, it’s a sex thing. Um. Gotcha.

Ray Bradbury: Man, I gotta read this thing for class huh. Well here’s hoping it’s good! *three hours later* oh. that’s why he’s famous. this will stick with me forever and I will never look at the phrase ‘soft rain’ the same again. christ. And then repeat 3x.

Isaac Asimov: Wow, this is such an interesting concept! I wonder how the exploration of it will influence the plot! Wait, hey, are you going to add any characters? Any of em? No like, with character traits other than ‘robot psychologist’ and ‘autistic’ and ‘woman’? None of em? No, ‘detective’ isn’t a character trait. Those are all just facts. Aaaand now I’m bored.

Ursula K. Le Guin: Hah, get a load of this guy! He’s never heard of nonbinary people before. Lol, what a riot; how dumb do you have to be to comprehend that these people aren’t men *or* women actually? Oh, wait, what’s happening. Oh shit, it was about society and love and learning to understand each other? And now I’m crying? And perhaps a better human being for it??

Andy Weir: Alright, this guy’s a really good writer. Funny, creative, knows so much engineering stuff…ooh, a new book! …I guess he can’t write women. Well, he wouldn’t be the first sci-fi writer…ooh another new book! And it’s more engineering problem solving and—wow. It’s not just women he can’t write. Please stop letting your characters talk to each other.

Lois Lowry: Oh, I remember this being fun when I was a kid! Wouldn’t it be fucked up to not see color? …upon reread, it would be fucked up to have your humanity stripped away, replaced with a tepid, beige ‘happiness’ for all time. Yeah.

Tamsyn Muir (let me have this ok): Haha, “lesbian necromancers in space” sounds fun. Lemme read this. Oh wow, yeah, this is right up my alley. OH GOD WHAT. NO. FUCK. OH SHIT WHAT IS EVEN HAPPENING AND WHY IS IT REFERENCING THE BOOK OF RUTH AND HOMESTUCK BACK TO BACK!!! AHHHHHHHHH!! Now give me more please.

[fusionsprunt]

Hunter what the FUCK-

.

[shiroikabocha]

So in Harrow the Ninth, right, after Wake-piloting-Corpsetherea strolls in and blasts Mercymorn with the shotgun, looks Gideon in the eye, and then leaves: Gideon reflects on her feelings for Cytherea and stresses to Harrowhark that “like, it’s complicated. Just saying.” And I, as a re-reader, I know that ohhhh, Gideon, honey, there’s a horrible, awful, no-good very-bad additional complication here that you aren’t aware of, and you talking about how Cytherea’s still kinda hot to you is causing me, the reader, a moment of Dramatic Irony—

and then I remembered that Gideon is Dave, and. That one time. That pesterlog where Dave is telling Rose how hot Rose’s mom is, and Rose is being snarky about the Oedipal complex, and Dave retorts that it’s fine, it’s not like she’s his mom, and the reader gets to experience a moment of Dramatic Irony, because—

Well anyway hey guys guess what I found another Homestuck parallel in the Sapphic Necromancy Catholicism Books, I get to put another sticker on my little chart

[stone-stars]

in one fell swoop that gideon art from jo made him deeply endearing to me in such a stupid way.

[mayasaura]

There's a weird kind of tension I feel being in the Locked Tomb fandom without being Christian. Especially having grown up in a heavily Christian part of the world, constantly surrounded by pressure to convert.

I don't only mean the constant low grade cultural pressure underpinning daily life, though I mean that too. I mean I get accosted in the street by missionaries. I mean I was first told I was going to hell when I was four years old, by a babysitter who would only let me watch Veggie Tales. I've had a man handing out leaflets follow me around attempting to lay his hands on my head or shoulders while reciting what I think a Catholic friend later told me was called the Sinner's Prayer, cajoling me to repeat after him. My grandfather died after being unable to find a support group that wasn't rooted in the christian faith, and didn't therefore require him to violate his religious beliefs.

Which is all taking the long way around to saying I don't really vibe heavy with the series' christian subtext. I like to enjoy the story primarily through other lenses.

But at the same time the symbolism is there, and intentional, and doing a lot of very interesting things. So I am paying attention to it. I try to consider it an interesting mythological theme, like the classical Greek references. It usually works, but maintaining that distance can be a struggle.

I don't really have a conclusion here. It's just a weird place to be. The draw of wanting to connect the dots, to appreciate the intricate symbolic art, at war with... all that, and with the creeping anxiety that whispers: how much of a philosophy can you know before you get filled up with it? Is there ever a point where you are what you know, whether you want to be or not?

[dve]

more than anything I think I want a novella from pash’s perspective. I think that’d be so fucking funny. Our Lady Of The Passion and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

[alltimewhat]

the mystery of gideon's magically disappearing feet and/or improperly hemmed pants in volume 6

[simplyender]

You have a way of finding sympathetic/kind of pathetic antagonists that are clearly neurodivergent and if given the chance, would totally be better people but never really got that chance

Fern and Hordak and Spot

[Identify my Blorbos!] (putting this at the top bc I made a really long post lol)

Anyway,

[Incorrect buzzer]

You were pretty close there till you said all of these guys would totally be better people but never were given the chance, especially when you said spto Gideon Graves. My man was SO down to do evil. At his best he's harmless and pathetic. But the dude still is pretty pro-doing-terrible-things, even if its not to Scott and Ramona in specific. Could he improve? Sure! But I'm of the belief that anyone can. It sucks that he wasn't treated nicely as a teenager but like. Dude, get help. You clearly can afford it. You just don't want it/don't think you need it.

Gideon actively chose to become the CEO of G-man records and he chose to use his vast power to make a girls life a living hell purely because he felt ENTITLED to her and her love. That's fucked up!!!! Hes' a sick shit in all versions and I truly do love him for that. He and Julie really are bitch x bastard! <3

Fern and Spot both are interesting ones, as they're both cases of "they made their own choices", only, the Finn part of Fern was doing something good (reviving Prismo), he just didn't know that meant he'd become the Finnsword, and the Emissary from Beyond is....Complicated.

Spot, however...

....Look, we can theorize as much as we want about his hypothetical past and what drove him to do it (bc I doubt anybody that works at Alchemax is fully stable), but before all this shit happened to him, he CHOSE to work at Alchemax, which was a morally dubious decision at BEST. I don't think he had bad intention in the slightest however, it's just that Spot....Seems to have a bad habit of not really caring about anything else that's going on around him as long as he's getting what he wants. Negligent is the word (Funny, considering that's what he accuses Spider-Man of being). Also nobody made him go back for the dark matter, and he could have evacuated like everybody else*

Either way, both Fern and Spots actions definitely come from a place of desperation and severe emotional distress. And they're both guys that really lost their entire lives due to something out of their control**, and just weere driven to go....Way too far. They also actively decided to be bad guys because villainy provided them with the validation they needed. Hopefully Spot won't get killed off in the end like Fern did. Haha!

Hordak is definitely what you described though, because we were literally SHOWN that through the existence of Wrong Hordak! He's from a cult and heavily indocrinated with horrible beliefs that he deeply internalized, especially because of his relationship with his disability and the way Horde Prime viewed him for it. This is also seen through Entrapta, who....Yes, helped him do evil thing too. But they were adorable. And ultimately, it was her that helped him realize his worth as a person and take the step towards good (although that was a personhood thing, not a redemption arc, lol). But through proper support, Wrong Hordak was able to grow and develop in a way that Hordak just wasn't given the opportunity to, so....Yeah.

Hordak never got the chance, and Fern kept getting screwed over by the universe and his own low self esteem. But Spot made his own choices in life. He is absolutely the most selfish person out of the three.

And also. Is, yknow, the most experienced in life/an adult. (I already talked about Gideon who is the worst but like I said he doesn't even come close). Yes what happened to him was horrible, yes he didn't deserve so much mistreatment for it, but still. The chain of events started because of his own decisions until it spiralled out of his control, from where he doubled down for a variety of reasons indicating that he really needs the intervention of a trained mental health professional.

I think I went way off course here.

Sorry. Haha.

* Yes it's likely that he felt like he had to go back and save the remains of his work, might have something to do with Olivia stealing all the credit for the collider and his desperate need to be recognized. Still a bad idea though.

** Spot may have done the physical aspects of his life going to shit to himself but I'm not blaming him for the way other people treat him for what is now out of his control. It's not like he asked to be what he is, or to be mocked and lose his livelihood for it.

You get a 1.3/4 because the description is correct up to a point but it entirely fits Hordak.

SO close!