#a specific type of harm is done to them (melanie it's being attacked violently and jon it's being watched voyeuristically)

[welcometogrouchland]

[image ID: a digital illustration showing six scenes from the magnus archives, divided up like comic panels in a 2 by 3 grid. The first panel shows Melanie being stabbed in the shoulder with a scalpel by a ghost. She recoils in pain with teary eyes and a look of terror, blood sprouting from her shoulder. Next panel shows Melanie stabbing Jon, the images mirroring each other in composition. Next panel shows Jon stalking Jess Tyrell.

Jon is depicted as a shadowy being with eyes all over him. Jess faces away from Jon, glancing behind her, looking terrified. The next panel again parallels the previous panel in composition, showing early seasons Jon being watched by many eyes, looking back with the same expression as Jess Tyrell. The final two panels show Melanie after the bullet removal surgery, and Jon in the episode Scrutiny after being confronted. Both face us head on. Melanie is covered in blood and looks horrified and dazed. Jon has eyes floating around him and looks guilty. Both are in shadow.

The characters are coloured in black and white, with all panels on the left having a red background, and all panels on the right having a green background. End ID]

Hi I made a post earlier about Jon and Melanie's arcs in the context of cycles, specifically cycles of violence, but words weren't expressing me right, so I made this instead

#the magnus archives #tma #jonathan sims #melanie king #it's 'unwell abt Jon and Melanie'' hours lads!!!! #idk I'm still not. super able to put my thoughts in words #I'm sure it'll come to me when i finally relisten to season 4 (IT'S GONNA HAPPEN I'M GONNA START OVER CHRISTMAS BREAK) #but the main gist of it is like. how jon and melanie have parallel arcs in the specific sense that #a specific type of harm is done to them (melanie it's being attacked violently and jon it's being watched voyeuristically) #and this then becomes the type of harm they begin to replicate (jon w/ feeding and melanie w/ giving in to the slaughter and attacking ppl) #and how they try to steer themselves off this path specifically after realizing they're specifically replicating the harm done to them #w/ melanie the parallel is she stabs jon the same place she was stabbed #and after the bullet was removed she reevaluates her life and decides to start trying to get better #Jon's is less of a clear parallel but i remember how tumblr user @red-archivist made a post about how #jon says in 111 that he enjoys compelling ppl- which is obviously not a good thing #but is understandable in the context of him developing this ability #after having to fend for himself the past two years with so little understanding of what was happening to him #and how he's constantly tempted into Knowing via the prospect of using that knowledge to protect ppl #which is heart wrenching in the context of things like him not realizing sasha had been replaced #and how this is all a very intentional manipulation done to jon to make sure he would lean into these powers and Become™ faster #i do think that for the most part jon and melanie have very different arcs #Melanie's arc is about trauma harm and healing whereas Jon's is more existential and moral and ends in tragedy #but i think this is a very interesting intersection for them to have?? #it's interesting that the one thing they have in common is their own destructive patterns- #-(in the sense of it being cyclical. like i said melanie is more about violence whereas jon is voyeurism)- #-when their dynamic is commonly described as seeing the things you hate abt yourself in someone elsw #*else #idk! food for thought! rip the dimensions on this piece