#also. keeping all 3 'finally' he says bc its funny. he has so many problems and thesa is abt to give him many more <3

[thatdeadaquarius]

*casually slides into asks*

The Creator having to be taught the language of Teyvat, except they don't realise that each country has their own seperate language and so they are just mixing and matching phrases from each of the languages and no one has any idea what they are saying

*slides back out of asks*

Hello hello my regular customer 💃

Before u slide out, have a cookie for the road! 🤲🍪

Ok but this would actually happen to me

Im partial to the headcanon that theres a trade language in Teyvat, but each country has their own native language, w/sub-dialects too (i think thats the word?)

Just like what u said basically, bc like what if they dont have the trade one 💀 it rlly is just diff languages and im just over here like 😃🗨👋

(Gif is u in the center trying to talk to other people on the sides lol)

Srry if uncreative or kinda a flop i am not a fountain of ideas as much as i wish to be😔🙏

This may be only funny to me...

But i did my bestest for you beloved regular <3

Also u didnt ask for this but u got it anyway LMAO <3

(sorry if i accidentally start callin u xiao pfp i couldnt find a name to call u by)

Ok but like?? Was anybody gonna tell you???

Or like r u so incomprehensible now bc youve mashed all their lingos together that they dont even recognize any of their languages anymore 😭😭???

Yall ever heard that meme sound that has like music playing in the background and its just a loop of a guy saying "..HuH?..HuH?...HuH?"

^^^Everyone else trying to understand you

..

...

.....?

WAIT A MINUTE ?!%

OH GOD OH NO PLEASEEDA@!?

I HAD THE WORST THOUGHTTT!!!!

DO U JUST SOUND LIKE A SIM TO THEM??!!!

😰😰😰😰🥲🥲🥲🥲🥲💀💀💀

CRYINGSOBBING

I CANNOT ESCAPE THIS INTRUSIVE THOUGHT PLEASE NOOOOO JDIOOALLFJSLAFQ

IM ACTUALLY LAUGHING ANDBCRINGING PLEASE -> GOD WALKS AROUND SOUNDING LIKE A SIM TO THE REST OF TEYVAT STOP

♧

Ok but so many people r trying so hard to teach u their language more fully so u can commit to one at least

(Off the top of head, Thoma, Tighnari but if u keep mixing them more and more even on accident he gets too frustrated and accepts it lmao, Amber, Ningguang she wants ur first teyvat lang. to be Liyuean so bad, Kazuha just wants to genuinely understand u and you understand them aw what a sweetheart, Ei once again a person who wants u to learn Inazuman first lol, Zhongli, Jean, Ganyu, Alhaitham but he'd be a terrible teacher i can see it now, Ayato, Ayaka, Gorou, Yae Miko just so u can actually read her novels abt you + have bragging right lol)

..

...Its not really working

Which makes sense tbh, at least to me, bc i sure as fuck couldnt initially hear a big difference between Portugese v. Spanish, Korean v. Japanese etc.

Until i like, kept hearing it over and over and finally got it

(it was easier to differentiate between them on paper than auditorily?? auditorally?!? aUDITORIALLY??!! GODAMMIT IS THAT EVEN A WORD)

.

But I could totally see their languages just all sounding really similar to you, or like, theres some bits and pieces from each lang. that mimic others (pantalones Spanish = pants English for example, and its like all u catch are the "pant" sound so ur like?? Ok so same language right? Hence the mix and match)

♤

So this happens on the daily these days,

U r still going and seeing people,

But nobody has managed to communicate to you that its all different languages lol 🤭

Like this below, happens all the time ⬇️

.

Ur having dinner w/ Kamisato clan bc ofc they wanna welcome u!! :D

And Thoma's there, and yall r at the Teahouse, Thoma just got out the hotpot (oh god🤢 ...wait is that you now, r u just like Venti saying oh Barbatos...?)

And they just started dinner but its already a problem w/ur ass LMAO

.

Thoma: "What do you want to drink Our God?"

You: "Ahfs kal aldsplease give me ahdhai?"

Thomas face just like "...😶🙁 oh no" HAHA

Ayaka trying to help him,

"Please repeat that Your Grace?" 😅

You, again lol: "I would dhkaied that aifjwe please :)"

U sound like a SIMMM TO THEMM 😭😭

.

Utter fail poor Ayaka is at a loss for once,

they're trying so hard to be polite and you havent even gotten a drink yet let alone the meal lmao,

Poor Thoma is struggling, hes just like,

"Um, uh, this one??" All worried bc now hes gotta point to the pitchers one by one until u either point or nod

AND THE REST OF THE DINNER IS JUST THAT SITUATION OVER AND OVER

U give up and just start nodding or pointing for food or napkins or drinks all like, "Oh wow my accent must be heavy today 😀🤷‍♂️"

Absolutely clueless, and they cant even figure out how to tell u lol

...

Oh god i dont wanna think about the chaos if ur also only understanding the basics of every language so not only do they not get all ur words, u dont get theirs 💀

Reminder :D = I have a ✨️poll for 100 follower celebration!✨️Yall get to choose what u wanna see me write about,✨️ Check it out!! :) ♡✨️

Cheers,

🌒🌧🌊Aquarius♒️🌌🌘

♡the beloveds:

@karmawonders

(Feel free to tell me if u ever dont wanna be tagged anymore i wont be mad/offended :] !! )

#absolutely GOOFY take #i love it #sagau obsessed xiao pfp asker every response of urs matters SO MUCH to me <3 #blessed be sagauobsessed may u get ur beloved 5 or 4 star in one pull 🙏 #ask box open #genshin impact #genshin sagau #genshin isekai #sagau #my asks #genshin imagines #gender neutral reader #genshin sagau ideas #genshin god reader #genshin impact sagau #genshin scenarios

[seashard]

kiriona gaia is written to be as shocking as possible.

the lead up in the novel is that pal has a clear plan. bring nona close enough and soul gravity will punt gideon back into her body and hey presto. it’s simple it makes sense. prevailing fandom theory has been that since you have her soul preserved courtesy of harrow, you have her body perfectly preserved, it’s neatly set up for her to be revived once the two are brought together.

but then they actually finally reach her corpse and there’s this awful unreality around Nona maybe ? hallucinating her opening her eyes? before she seems completely corpse-like again and nothing happens. then she does start talking but she’s so WRONG she’s callous and she’s been conscious for 6 months already and her jokes AREN’T FUNNY (her greatest sin tbh). like nothing is going as expected. so many people come out of her first scene thinking it’s an evil doppleganger or john puppet scenario bc it just seems so fake.

it’s in direct contrast to htn, where Gideon arrives at the end and brings a great sense of catharsis in “she’s finally back and she’s tearing to shreds everyone who wronged harrow over these past nine months”, but now in ntn is only adding to the confusion and pain.

when they’re in drearburgh this scene is set up so you walk in and it looks like Gideon has just killed a bunch of the ninth in cold blood, and you kinda believe it….

the deaths and resurrections in this series don’t feel cheap. in htn harrow goes through hell for the whole book to keep gideon’s soul intact. im not saying i need the characters to suffer, god knows they’ve done it enough, but you can’t expect gideon to go through everything she’s gone through and come out emotionally unscathed. other people have already talked about the difference in seeing her without her internal narration and her abandonment and loss of agency and possible ulterior harrow-saving motives etc etc (poor girl she’s got a lot going on). this is why i dont agree with theories about how harrow has the part of her soul that is her emotion and her heart or whatever. it feels like a disservice to her character to say it’s just a case of straightforward compartmentalisation and that all her problems can be solved by harrow giving her back her missing piece <3 (she also CLEARLY feels things about harrow and camilla and aiglamene)

however i am curious what is actually going on with her soul re: being restored to life/lyctorhood. TM’s comment about gideon’s happy meal soul and pyrrha’s comment would indicate that some of Gideon’s soul is still inside harrow

(Pyrrha’s knowledge tends to be pretty reliable, so I kinda believe she’s right abt this but maybe not to it’s full extent abt there being no retrieval possible whatsoever)

palamedes also gave an explanation for why a soul from harrow wouldn’t have gone back into Gideon’s body (jod’s meddling and warding to make her invincible)

if Gideon’s whole soul is restored to her body it MIGHT bring her back to life? it sounds promising but that’s what we thought about the original plan. a big part of john’s chapters is about the soul and how it’s the key element to resurrection, but then he hasn’t resurrected anyone since the main event. Unfortunately he’s very vague about the actual details of the resurrection itself 😭 so it’s unclear whether it’s a case of he can’t or he won’t. it seems like a decaying body would barely be an obstacle for him so Gideon’s not really at much of an advantage. however he’s definitely putting in extra effort for her than when she was just harrow’s cavalier she was begging him to bring back.

there’s also the question about the state of Gideon’s soul in harrow’s body. I’d say Nona still counts as being unaware of its existence and therefore not absorbing it but I’m not sure, especially since harrow did come back to consciousness in the epilogue. also the lobotomy is maybe still in effect?? but only in this one instance lol, not any of the times she actually saw gideon, but it’s a weird callback to put in.

I’d say that the most likely path is for harrow to resurrect Gideon by putting part of her own soul in gideon in an exchange like John did with alecto, but I’m not even sure if perfect lyctorhood is the endgame anymore. it’s such a controlling, sinister concept that I don’t know if it can be redeemed, but maybe like with Paul it’ll be the only option they have. idk though there are so many things answered but still so many questions 😭 like even with nona we have the vague idea that she is kind of alecto (but also she’s just. nona) but when it comes to the specifics like what are her upper and lower minds or the voice that said “fool. you’re killing her”, iunno. so i mostly just wanted to bring together some of the hints i saw. would love to know what other ideas people have!

#ntn spoilers #ntn theories #nona the ninth #locked tomb #tlt spoilers #tlt #tlt meta

[tarobytez]

disability in the Six Of Crows Duology; an analysis of Kaz Brekker, Wylan Van Eck, and the fandom’s treatment of them.

****Note: I originally wrote this for a tiktok series, which im still going to do, but i wanted to post here as well bc tumblr is major contributor to what im going to talk about

CW: ableism, filicide, abuse

In the Six of Crows duology, Leigh Bardugo delicately subverts and melds harmful disability tropes into her narrative, unpacking them in a way that I, as a disabled person, found immensely refreshing and…. just brilliant. 

But what did you all do with that? Well, you fucked it up. Instead of critically looking at the characters, y’all just chose to be ableist. 

For the next few videos paragraphs im going to unpack disability theory (largely the stuff surrounding media, for obvious reasons) and how it relates to Six Of Crows and the characterization of Kaz Brekker and Wylan Van Eck, then how, despite their brilliant writing, y’all completely overlooked the actual text and continuously revert them to ableist cariactures.

Disclaimer: 1. Shocker - i am disabled. I have also extensively researched disability theory and am very active in the disabled community. Basically, I know my shit. 2. im going to be mad in these videos this analysis. Because the way y’all have been acting has been going on for a long ass time and im fuckin sick of it. I don’t give a shit about non-disabled feelings, die mad

Firstly, I’m going to discuss Kaz, his play on the stereotypical “mean cripple” trope and how Bardugo subverts it, his cane, and disabled rage. Then, I am going to discuss Wylan, the “inspiration porn” stereotype, caregivers / parents, and the social model of disability. Finally, I will then explain the problems in the fandom from my perspective as a disabled person, largely when it comes to wylan, bc yall cant leave that boy tf alone.

Kaz Brekker

Think of a character who uses a cane (obviously not Kaz). Now, are they evil, dubiously moral, or just an asshole in general? Because nearly example I can think of is: whether it be Lots’O from Toy Story, Lucius Malfoy, or even Scrooge and Mr.Gold from Once Upon A Time all have canes (the last two even having their canes appear less and less as they become better people)

The mean/evil cripple trope is far more common than you would think. Villains with different bodies are confined to the role of “evil”. To quote TV Tropes, who I think did a brilliant job on explaining it “The first is rooted in eugenics-based ideas linking disability or other physical deformities with a "natural" predisposition towards madness, criminality, vice, etc. The Rule of Symbolism is often at work here, since a "crippled" body can be used to represent a "crippled" soul — and indeed, a disabled villain is usually put in contrast to a morally upright and physically "perfect" hero. Whether consciously on the part of the writer or not, this can reinforce cultural ideas of disability making a person inherently inferior or negative, much in the same way the Sissy Villain or Depraved Homosexual trope associate sexual and gender nonconformity with evil. ”

Our introduction to Kaz affirms this notion of him being bad or morally bankrupt, with “Kaz Brekker didn’t need a reason”, etc. This mythologized version of himself, the “bastard of the barrel” actively fed into this misconception. But, as we the audience are privy to his inner thoughts, know that he is just a teenager like every other Crow. He is complex, his disability isn’t this tragic backstory, he just fell off a roof. It’s not his main motivation, nor does he curse revenge for making him a cripple - it is just another part of who he is. 

His cane (though the shows version fills me with rage but-) is an extension of Kaz - he fights with it, but it has a purpose. Another common thing in media is for canes to be simply accessories, but while Kaz’ cane is fashionable, it has purpose.

The quote “There was no part of him that was not broken, that had not healed wrong and there was no part of him that was not stronger for having been broken.” is so fucking powerful. Kaz does not want nor need a cure - its said in Crooked Kingdom that his leg could most likely be healed, but he chooses not to. Abled-bodied people tend to dismiss this thought as Kaz being stubborn but it shows a reality of acceptance of his disability that is just, so refreshing.

In chapter 22 of SOC, we see disabled rage done right - when he is called a cripple by the Fjerdan inmate, Kaz is pissed - the important detail being that he is pissed at the Fjerdan, at society for ableism, not blaming it on being disabled or wishing he could be normal. He takes action, dislocating the asshole’s shoulder and proving to him, and to a lesser extent, himself, that he is just as capable as anyone else, not in spite of, but because he is disabled. And that is the point of Kaz, harking back to the line that “there was no part of him that was not stronger for having been broken”. 

I cried on numerous occasions while reading the SOC duology, but the parts I highlighted in this section especially so. I, as many other disabled people do, have had a long and tumultuous relationship with our disability/es, and for many still struggle. But Kaz Brekker gave me an empowered disabled character who accepts themselves, and that means the world to me. 

Keeping that in mind, I hope you can understand why it hurts so much to disabled people when you either erase Kaz’s disability (whether through cosplay or fanfiction), or portray him as a “broken boy uwu”, especially implying that he would want a cure. That flies in the face of canon and is inherently fucking ableist. (if u think im mad wait until the next section)

Next, we have Wylan.  

Oh fucking boy. 

I love Wylan so fucking much, and y’all just do not seem to understand his character? Like at all? Since this is disability-centric, I’m not going to discuss how the intersection of his queerness also contributes to these issues, but trust me when I say it’s a contributing factor to what i'm going to say.

Wylan, motherfucking Van Eck. If you ableist pricks don’t take ur fucking hands off him right now im going to fight you. I see Wylan as a subversion another, and in my opinion more insidious stereotype pf disabled people - inspiration porn.

Cara Liebowitz in a 2015 article on the blog The Body Is Not An Apology explains in greater detail how inspiration porn is impactful in real life, but media is a major contributing factor to this reality. The technical definition is “the portrayal of people with disabilities as inspirational solely or in part on the basis of their disability” - but that does not cover it fully. 

Inspiration porn does lasting damage on the disabled community as it implies that disability is a negative that you need to “overcome” or “triumph” instead of something one can feel proud of. It exploits disabled people for the development of non-disabled people, and in media often the white male protagonist. Framing disability as inherently negative perpetuates ideals of eugenics and cures - see Autism $peaks’ “I Am Autism” ad. Inspiration porn is also incredibly patronizing as it implies that we cannot take care of ourselves, or do things like non-disabled people do. Because i stg some of you tend to think that we just sit around all day wishing we weren’t disabled. 

Another important theory ideal that is necessary when thinking about Wylan is the experience of feeling like a burden simply for needing help or accommodations. This is especially true when it comes to familial relationships, and internalized ableism.

The rhetoric that Wylan’s father drilled into his head, that he is “defective”, “a mistake”, and “needs to be corrected”, that he (Jan) was “cursed with a moron for a child” is a long held belief that disabled people hear relentlessly. And while many see Van Eck’s attempted murder of Wylan as “preposturous” and overall something that you would never think happens today - filicide (a parent murdering their child) is more common than you would like to believe. Without even mentioning the countless and often unreported deaths of disabled people due to lack of / insufficient / neglectful medical care, in a study on children who died from the result of household abuse, 40 of 42 of them (95%) were diagnosed with disabilities. Van Eck is not some caricature of ableist ideals - he is a real reflection on how many people and family members view disability. 

Circling back to how Wylan unpacks the inspiration porn trope - he is 3 dimensional, he is not only used to develop the other characters, he is just *chefs kiss* Leigh, imo, put so much love and care into the creation of Wylan and his story and character growth that is representative of a larger feeling in the disabled community. 

That being said, what you non-disabled motherfuckers have done to him.

The “haha Wylan can’t read” jokes aren’t and were not funny. Y’all literally boiled down everything Wylan is to him being dyslexic. And it’s like,,,, the only thing you can say about him. You ignore every other part of him other than his disability, and then mock him for it. There’s so much you can say about Wylan - simping for Jesper, being band kid and playing the fuckin flute, literally anything else. But no, you just chose to mock his disability, excellent fucking job!

Next up on “ableds stfu” - infantilization! y’all are so fucking condescending to Wylan, and treat him like a fucking toddler. And while partly it is due to his sexuality i think a larger portion is him being disabled. Its in the same vein of people who think that Wylan and Jesper are romantically one sided, and that Jesper only kind of liked Wylan, despite the canon evidence of him loving Wylan just as much. You all view him as a “smol bean”, who needs protecting, and care, when Wylan is the opposite of that. He is a fucking demolitions expert who suggested waking up sleeping men to kill them - what about that says “uwu”. You are treating Wylan as a burden to Jesper and the other Crows when he is an immensely valuable, fully autonomous disabled person - you all just view him as damaged. 

And before I get a comment saying that “uhhh Wylan isn’t real why do you care” while Wylan may not be real, how you all view him and treat him has real fucking impacts and informs how you treat people like me. If someone called me an “uwu baby boy” they’d get a fist square in the fucking jaw. Fiction informs how we perceive the world and y’all are making it super fucking clear how you see disabled people. 

Finally, I wanted to talk about how the social model of disability is portrayed through Wylan. For those who are unaware, the social model of disability contrasts the medical model, that views the disability itself as the problem, that needs to be cured, whereas the social model essentially boils down to creating an accommodating society, where disability acceptance and pride is the goal. And we see this with Wylan - he is able to manage his father’s estate, with Jesper’s assistance to help him read documents. And this is not out of pity or charity, but an act of love. It is not portrayed as this almighty act for Jesper to play saviour, just a given, which is incredibly important to show, especially for someone who has been abused by family for his disability like Wylan, that he is accepted. 

Yet, I still see people hold up Jesper on a pedestal for “putting up with” Wylan, as if loving a disabled person deserves a fucking pat on the back. It’s genuinely exhausting trying to engage with a work I love so much with a fandom that thinks so little of me and my community. It fucking shows. 

Overall, Leigh Bardugo as a disabled person wrote two incredibly meticulous and empowered disabled characters, and due to either lack of reading comprehension, ableism, or a quirky mix of both, the fandom has ignored canon and the experiences of disabled people for…. shits and giggles i guess. And yes, there are issues with the Grishaverse and disability representation - while I haven’t finished them yet so I do not have an opinion on it, people have been discussing issues in the KOS duology with ableist ideals. This mini series was no way indicative of the entire disabled experience, nor does it represent my entire view on the representation as a whole. These things need to be met critically in our community, and talked about with disabled voices at the forefront. For example, the limited perspective we get of Wylan and Kaz being both white men, does not account for a large portion of the disabled community and the intersection of multiple identities.

All-in-all, Critique media, but do not forget to also critique fandom spaces. Alternatively, just shut the fuck up :)

happy fucking disability pride month, ig

#soc #six of crows #kaz brekker #soc kaz #kaz talk tag #kanej #grisha #grishaverse #ketterdam #leigh bardugo #bardugo #crooked kingdom #ck #wylan #wylan van sunshine #wylan supremacy #jesper x wylan #wesper #jesper fahey #shadow and bone #wylan van eck #jan van eck #ableism #ableist bullshit #ableist slurs #disability #disability pride month #i will punch you in the face #el oh el #laugh out loud

[courtney-deserved-better]

my opinion on td finalists

spoiler alert, im not a fan of most

TDI: Owen & Gwen

uh I personally don’t like either of these guys for finalists. gwen did do a lot but there were so many times where she just acted so apathetic I was like why?? are you still here?? and as for owen... I didnt like him as a character for a Long Time and he's growing on me but he just doesnt seem like finale material

I think a duncan versus leshawna finale would've been super fun to watch. especially if they teamed up to take down heather in the semifinal. those two had such a fun dynamic, especially in the triathlon episode, that I think taking it to the finale would've been fantastic. also leshawna deserved to win that season and you cannot change my mind

TDA: Duncan & Beth

duncan, while not my first choice, I can see making it through to the finale this season. but beth?? no. im sorry but shes just too much of a side character and is canonically fake nice and annoys everyone else so it doesn’t really make sense

an interesting finale would’ve been duncan versus courtney considering how volatile their relationship was this season. however, bc courtney was kinda awful to duncan, I dont think she deserves to win this season. it would be cool if there was one ending where their votes tied and they made up and decided to split the money but that just feels too tame, both for a finale and for their dynamic

harold versus duncan could be interesting, but because duncan tends to bully harold, I dont think his win would be fair in this situation. I think lindsay versus harold would be the best, as this season is about lindsay learning to take charge and come up with strategies, and while he can be off-putting and occasionally condescending, I think harold has a lot of useful skills that could really flourish in the finale

TDWT: Heather & Alejandro

while I dont ship them at all, I truly dont think there could've been a more satisfying final two. we’ve had their rivalry build up from day one, they have a ton of good songs together, it really completes heather’s arc of antagonist to antihero to protagonist. heather winning is the best ending in my mind, but I like  alejandro winning too. the only problem I have with his ending is that it only happened because heather threw in the wrong dummy-- I think it would’ve been more clever for him to have switched them or something like that

ive been thinking about some other final twos that I think would be interesting, though unable to top the canon one imo. gwen versus courtney would be really cool because of the friends turned enemies thing-- I think it would be interesting for courtney to be put in danger and gwen has a choice of saving her or going for the money and she save courtney before apologizing again (maybe dumping duncan) and the two make up and split the money. 

though I don’t really enjoy either as characters mostly due to their writing, cody and sierra would be an interesting final two. maybe cody finally stands up to sierra, or sierra struggles with wanting to be the winner of total drama or helping the boy she likes win. it definitely wouldn't be as good as the canon two but there would be a lot of clashing dynamics at play that'd be fun to explore

TDROTI: Lightning & Cameron

admittedly, I don’t remember too much from this season, but it really felt like these two kind of coasted by. I never found lightning to be a particularly compelling character and thought it weird how he suddenly went from dumb jock to evil jock in the last episode or two. cameron really felt like he was just carried through the season, similarly to beth, though I dont have as much as an issue with him winning. I dont think it was a bad finale, per se, I just think if those were the final two they should've been written better from the start

seeing as how jo really played the game and went all in, I think she would’ve been a great finalist. it would’ve been interesting to see her versus (commando?) zoey though im not the biggest zoey fan. I think a jo versus lightning finale could actually work (or brick) though if there was a jo versus cameron finale, I couldn't see him logically winning bc jo would just destroy him

TDAS: Mike & Zoey

*BIG FUCKING INHALE* no. just no. im probably not gonna say anything that’s not already been said so ill keep it short. bland, mal writing bad, have someone who's been in the game for 3 previous seasons instead of  1 make it to the ALL STARS FINALE. jfc.

you know what would’ve been an interesting finale? gwen versus courtney. they both said they wanted to reach the final two with the other one, so maybe they do! maybe they start to struggle with their friendship because of courtney’s competitive streak! maybe one of their helpers is duncan and that causes strife between them! maybe they become enemies again and don’t make up until the finale! maybe they decide to split the money! idk! it would've had a hell of a  lot more flavor than what we got

TDPI: Shawn & Sky

I don’t really have an issue with either of these characters making it to the finale. they’re compelling, worked hard, and have distinct goals. I would’ve liked to see jasmine in the finale but I'd be cool replacing either one with her: jasmine and shawn having to compete against one another would be an interesting relationship hurdle and sky versus jasmine would've been cool because they’re both very athletic and it would’ve been the first f vs f total drama finale (we've had m vs f and m vs m but no all-girl finales...)

TDRR: Surfer Dudes & Police Cadets

Again, I don’t really have an issue with this finale. I really like how Sanders and MacArthur both work hard in their own ways and have to learn how to work together (MacArthur breaking Sanders’ arm and realizing that she can negatively affect her partner and also that Sanders is super tough was a GREAT arc). I know there’s been some contention about the Surfer Dudes being eliminated and then coming back so late in the game, but it made sense to me. They chose to lose because they felt that they owed it to Devin and Carrie, and that choice paid off when Devin and Carrie called in a replacement team. I doubt the surfers expected that to happen, they were just trying to be fair, but that kindness was rewarded in a big way which I think was sweet, especially  considering how much of a hot mess this show can be. 

I gotta say, this does kinda remind me of the TDI finale, with the villain (heather/ice dancers) getting eliminated third, and their rival (gwen/police cadets) making it to the finale with the fun guy (owen/surfer dudes). The reason I like the Surfer Dudes as finalists more than Owen is that I felt they put in more effort during challenges and had more of an arc (with Josee’s mind games ending up bonding them as a team after strife, choosing to be eliminated for the sake of fairness, etc). 

Speaking of Owen, it’s kind of ironic that if I had to replace a team in the finale, I would replace the surfer dudes with the reality tv pros. they’re my favorite team and I think it wouldve been great for them to really live up to their name. I think it also would've been funny for the ice dancers to be so focused on their rivalry with the cadets that the pros just completely go under their radar until its the final three and the ice dancers are like “oh crap they’re PROS why haven't we been trying to destroy them??”

I also wouldn't mind replacing the surfer dudes with the sisters. I know emma gets a lot of hate (mostly because of nemma which I only like platonically) but I actually like her as a character (when she wasn’t being obsessive) and I think she and kitty were a great team that had a good arc of learning to work together. I also think it would be really interesting because for the final three they would all have rivalries with one another: the police cadets and the ice dancers (obvious) the ice dancers and the sisters (josee messed with them in at least 2 challenges) and the sister and the police cadets (kitty and macarthur’s game/road rage was hilarious)

#total drama #td #tdi #tda #tdwt #tdroti #roti #tdas #tdpi #tdrr #total drama island #total drama action #total drama world tour #total drama revenge of the island #revenge of the island #total drama all stars #total drama pahkitew island #pahkitew island #total drama ridonculous race #ridonculous race #total drama presents: the ridonculous race

[chuckaf]

Chuck Fic Rec List: Updated

So my fic rec post was in my notifs again the other day, and I noticed a while back that the formatting on the post has gotten all messed up and it’s also had like three reblog additions to it anyway meaning there are three versions out there lol. so, I wanted to do another list of chuck fic recs! I’ll keep the other one up still, so I’m not gonna repeat every fic here, just some I really recommend. I’m also adding the fic summaries, which I didn’t on the old post, and some more of my own opinions so, buckle up for a long post!

Chuck Versus the Steampunk Chronicles | Steampunk.Chuckster

1896. A world powered by steam, where humans and machines coexist, and airships are the fashionable mode of transport. The US Empire's deepest and darkest secrets arrive at Chuck Bartowski's doorstep. Have they fallen into the wrong hands? Or will the inventor prove his mettle, even while he's forced to hide from the very people he's protecting? AU, ongoing chronicle, Charah.

A genuinely incredible AU story, with an entire crafted world and universe, so detailed it frequently blows my mind. There is heart and family and infuriatingly brilliant slow-burn, plus a buttload of danger and super fun historical/steampunk action. Oh how I LOVE it.

Chuck vs the Charade | somedeepmystery

When computer nerd Chuck Bartowski returns home to an empty apartment and a dead girlfriend he finds himself embroiled in a deadly game of espionage and deceit. Everyone around him is playing a part to get what they want and when he starts falling for the new woman in his life, he can't help but wonder if he can trust her or if she's the one he should fear the most.

An action and twist-filled AU based on the movie Charade, which is just such a brilliant fic concept I absolutely adored it from the start.

Two Sides of the Same Coin | dettiot

When you're a spy, there's all kinds of occupational hazards when you work with another spy. For Sarah Walker, though, one mission becomes a life-changing experience. Because working with Charles Carmichael leads to protecting Chuck Bartowski.

The first time I read this fic my mind was just blown to its genius. Such a brilliant interpretation of what the Intersect and its concepts set up in the show could be, and ooooof the Chuck/Sarah interactions, my HEART. Related to it, its companion piece:

A Flip of the Coin | dettiot

What made Charles Carmichael agree to become Chuck Bartowski? Well, to start, it wasn't as much of a change as you'd think. A companion to the early chapters of Two Sides of the Same Coin from Carmichael's perspective.

Chuck vs The Butterfly Effect | n7agentbartowski

Chuck Bartowski is a normal guy who just hit rock bottom. No girlfriend, no career and no super computer stuck inside his head. It isn't until Chuck meets a gorgeous stranger on the beach that he begins to think his life is about to change for the better. An AU Chuck fic without the Intersect. "Change one thing and it changes everything."

I said it on the OG post, but this story has one of my top 5 Chuck/Sarah fic meetings. So funny, so... very Chuck. The story is a little angsty overall, but a great read.

Chuck vs the Rogue Spy | Crumby

When a rogue spy from Chuck Bartowski's past shows up to help him during his first solo mission, Chuck hopes that he'll finally find out what happened to Sarah Walker. Post-S2 AU.

There’s a lot of Season 3 fix-it fics out there, which I don’t usually read bc I actually love season 3 lol, but this one’s a good one! A twisty deviation from canon, but still feels really true to character.

Chuck Versus the Nerds Rewrite | Steampunk.Chuckster and David Carner

What happens when two nerds talk endless hours about their favorite TV show? A new take on the show you know, but with the flair, twists, and turns you've come to expect from Steampunk . Chuckster and david . carner. Somewhat canon. Charah.

As the summary says, a different take on the show, which honestly makes a couple changes I would too, but also adds a bunch of fun twists and plots that make it totally new and fresh. Seeing Chuck and Sarah’s thoughts in the more canon sections is just delicious, too.

The Trapped Assassin | SarahsSupplyCloset

After a mission goes awry, the CIA's most lethal assassin is ordered to take vacation while her superiors figure out what to do with her. But when she meets a disarming tourist, their immediate connection only adds to her disillusionment with the agency and her career. Will he be enough for her to finally take the plunge and leave the only life she's ever known? Charah AU

A warning for the very justified M rating if you don’t like that sort of thing, but this is definitely a plot-heavy fic, too. A really neat Sarah-heavy AU, with a whole lotta Chuck/Sarah fancy French vacationy goodness.

Chuck vs the Second Chance | malamoo

AU from mid-season 2 and onwards. Chuck and Sarah part ways only to be reunited years later. COMPLETE.

Literal, crying-at-my-screen angst. Not even a super happy ending. But a brilliantly written, part-reflective/flashback fic, exploring what would’ve happened if Chuck and Sarah’s relationship really was an assignment all along-- and the aftermath. It’s heartbreaking. But if you want a little heartbreak, this is your fic.

Ready at Your Hand | dettiot

In the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, a Catholic plot against the queen comes to the attention of spymaster Sir Francis Walsingham. To protect Elizabeth, he develops an unusual plan: hide the passing of intelligence between two agents by a false romance. When Lady Sarah Walker and Chuck Carmichael meet, though, their pretend flirtation becomes much more.

I love Chuck fic for the very reason that it’s inspired such adventurous and totally unique AUs. Here’s some Elizabethan fake-dating Chuck and Sarah! They have to be so Proper, it’s like that hand moment from Pride and Prejudice but Elizabethan and times a billion. The pining!!

Sarah Versus Getting Married | Steampunk.Chuckster

Sarah Walker is getting married. Canon. Charah.

I’d recommend all of SC’s fics if I had the room, and I’m already recommending a ton sksks but most of my fic recs are AUs, and this one isn’t! It’s canon, and covers some of in the gap in 4x24, with Sarah just before the wedding itself. Super sweet, heart-tugging, brilliant.

A Chuckmas Carol | Mikki13

A new twist to Dickens' beloved "A Christmas Carol". When Sarah begins to shut out the world around her, three spirits come to show her the error of her ways. Season 3 AU.

Another Season 3 AU, this one written pre-series so it definitely doesn’t fit to canon, but it’s still wonderfully rich in character depth and angst and it also made me cry. Plus, festive!

Chuck Versus Thin Ice | Steampunk.Chuckster

On the doorstep of the Olympics, top American curler Sarah Walker has lost her mixed doubles partner and her boyfriend in one fell swoop. Her coaches throw newbie Team U.S.A. curler Chuck Bartowski onto her team and thrust them into the Olympics, hanging America's curling hopes on two people who only have a short amount of time to learn to trust one another. Charah AU.

Do you like curling? Or the Winter Olympics? It doesn’t really matter because somehow this fic made me extremely invested in both of those things, as well as Chuck and Sarah and them being INSUFFERABLE. Catch me now knowing a ton about curling thanks to this fic.

Walker’s Eleven | Moonlight Pilot

Not the same plot as the movie. Sarah Walker never got out of the con game or became a spy, and now she's on her final con. What happens when true love and betrayal get added to the mix? Twists, turns, and Jeffster!

Con!Sarah always interests me, and this fic is full of her. Lotta con plot, lotta Chuck and Sarah.

The Detective and the Tech Guy | thecharleses

Sarah Walker is a Pinkerton detective. Chuck Bartowski is an electronics genius. They wouldn't have met except for a case of mistaken identity and murder. Will the detective and the tech guy solve the mystery, distracted by the riddle in their own hearts? An homage to The Thin Man film series. Formerly co-written by Steampunk . Chuckster and dettiot, now ONLY Steampunk . Chuckster.

Everyone in this fic is so damn cool. There are so many martinis. But also great heart and family and like, standing up for who you love, and later also Chuck with Baby Clara content which frankly the show robbed us of. Also, PI!Sarah!!!

Gravity | Poetic4U

AU. Sarah makes a decision that altered her life forever.

This is just a one-shot, which many of these stories are not, so a good one if you don’t fancy a big read! Just because it’s short, though, doesn’t mean it’s lacking; a really awesome what-if AU, and heavy on the Chuck and Sarah.

A Yuletie Tale | Steampunk.Chuckster

Sarah Walker was dumped the day before Christmas Eve, and her Plus One at her work’s annual Christmas Eve Soiree is now officially a Plus Zero. Her best friend Ellie Bartowski has a solution to her problem, and Sarah finds she isn’t quite as sure about it as Ellie is. AU Christmas Charah.

I’m particularly in love with this fic because, instead of beginning with a meet-cute, it involves Chuck and Sarah already two years into a friendship-- Sarah is Ellie’s best friend. And she’s been crushing harrrd on Ellie’s brother. Also Chuck is in a tux. It’s pretty.

Set, Spike, Dive! | Frea O’Scanlin

Chuck never expected to even make it to the Olympics. Everything is working against him: he's too tall for a diver, too inexperienced for a medal, too much of a wildcard to really make his mark. But an unexpected meeting at the airport, some intriguing new friends, and a whirlwind romance on the sand just might set up London 2012 as the time of Chuck Bartowski's life.

A London 2012 AU, because why not. This is just a fun Olympic-y ride!

OTP (One True Pairing) Prompts | David Carner

A series of Prompts I found online about different times and places in Chuck and Sarah's life. Mostly AU, mostly one-shots. I assume mostly fluff, but I might get deep. I doubt it, it's me. Charah...ALWAYS (It says complete, but if an idea strikes me...)

If you’re not so into long stories, this fic is perfect. Individual set-ups and stories, all Chuck and Sarah, and all super cute. You could dip in and out and just pick a scenario you enjoy.

Chuck vs The Frontier | ninjaVanish

AU: Chuck was enjoying a simple life as a 19th century watchmaker until an encounter with a beautiful Secret Service agent thrust him into a world of intrigue and adventure he never wanted. But then, with Agent Walker around, it can't be all bad, can it?

This fic gets props for being historically-set but still including the Intersect. Again, a historical AU, so the pining!! the need to be Proper!!! But besides all that, there’s a lot of action fun as well.

Chuck Versus The Crosswalk: Remastered | WvonB

Will a last minute mission help our two favorite characters finally get together? This is the remastered version of my first story.

The original version of this fic is on my first list; this is the updated version! It’s not a complete AU, instead a story that diverges from canon, so if you’re more into canon characters and setting than a new AU scenario, this is a great fic for that.

Little Girls, Paper Wreaths, and Choc Chip Cookies | DanaPAH

Very AU: Sarah Walker is a single mother whose Christmas spirit needs a boost after a tough divorce. She isn't quite ready to go looking for romance, but her little daughter's affection for their new neighbor may lure it right to her doorstep, anyway.

An incredibly sweet AU one-shot where Chuck and Sarah are new neighbours, and Sarah has a super cute little girl. So much sweetness and love and hope. I love this fic so much it literally led me to write my own neighbour-kid-AU, so, not to toot my own horn but I’ll link it here anyway.

May Your Walls Know Joy | halfachance

Looking for a fresh start after some tough times, Sarah and her three-year-old daughter move to LA. When they meet a sweet curly-haired nerd who lives next door, though, Sarah realizes they might just find more happiness than they'd ever imagined, if only her past doesn't catch up to her first. AU.

It’s what the summary says; if you wanna read, feel free!

Chuck vs the Sound of Music | quistie64

AU. Chuck, nerd extraordinaire, is a man with seven children and Sarah must protect them all from Fulcrum's evil designs. Warning: there will be singing.

I mean. Not much mystery as to the concept with that title and summary lol, but this is a super fun, soft ride with a lotta sweetness, and yes, singing.

Just Two People | David Carner

Meet Sarah Walker PhD, Psychologist, specializing in personality traits. Meet Chuck Bartowski, man who has left THE electronic company of 2020. When Burton Consultants tries to figure out what is wrong with the morale of Orion Industries, what happens when a guy named Chuck meets a woman named Sarah. I'll give you a hint, it's me writing.

David’s done something pretty special with this fic. It’s Chuck and Sarah centric, but very much an ensemble piece, too, with a lot of Team Bartowski and other familiar faces throughout.

Chuck Versus the Con Game | Steampunk.Chuckster

AU. Chuck and Sarah are partners in the con game. It's an existence wrought with danger and violence. Every day could be their last. Every mission could be the end of the line.

This is where I freak out SC and declare this fic the reason I ever got hooked on Chuck fic and then wrote Chuck fic, and the reason I still love it today but. that is true lol. Just so. so good. It’s also written with the chapters out of chronological order, which is super fun from a reading perspective. But con!Sarah AND con!Chuck?? Best. The kind of fic you will be thinking about for days (if not, y’know, years).

As you can tell by the repeats, I highly recommend just about anything by Steampunk.Chuckster, dettiot, or David Carner, but there are a TON of amazing Chuck fics and authors out there. I’ve never known a writing community so wildly creative-- there are so many unique AUs and canon explorations and story concepts that this show has manifested, and it’s all so much fun.

Most of the Chuck fic community is still over on FFN rather than AO3, so if any of these whet your appetite, feel free to have a browse there for more stories. I’m sure you’ll find something great. Personally, all the incredible writing there has also led me to write a buttload; I’m at halfachance on FFN, so if you see any of my stuff or wanna chat fic, feel free to message me there or here.

Happy reading, folks!

#chuck #fic rec #chuck fic #nbcchuck #praying if i edit this to add to it or i reblog it to add to it all the links stay and the line breaks don't disappear sksks #the old one still looks okay on desktop but it's messed up on the app and on mobile and it's just all generally messy #so i've been wanting to make this for aaages lol yay to finally doing something! woo!

[transsexualhamlet]

sherlock holmes reactions part 4 (?) ive lost count already but unsurprisingly ive grown even more attached to him

using this as the cover image because i made him a playlist. cause im awful

no legit this is gonna need a read more because it's SO LONG SHIHEWIESHEFSHIEWHF

Had three mental breakdowns this week and realized i do in fact kin sherlock motherfucking holmes. this does not bode well for anything in my life mentally I've diagnosed him with so many things

Oh boy lol you want the list I think hes autistic (undisputed honestly) plus also adhd but on top of that there's the manic depression and uhhh the bpd lmao I dont even think that's it those are just. the obvious ones

But yeah man's a fucking mess and a shit person but in the same way as me so 👍

Some highlights I thought were very funny:

watson: we are in fact going to be waltzing into a place where people are Shooting People you do not have your gun. this is a problem

sherlock: don't worry watson I have my trusty stick!

watson: visible pain

This clearly happens like every day or so with them

but yeah there were some really honestly sweet scenes with them at the apartment and why am i getting soft over the crusty man being gay

have you considered tho. have you considered them

have you considered sherlock, who usually only plays absolute garbage on his violin serenading watson to sleep when he was tired and in pain and watson being so fucking in love with the man and waxing poetic about falling asleep to his music and waking up to see him fallen asleep on the couch next to him and oh my god them

They're just really sweet together for such a completely dysfunctional couple so much of the time lol I just. Sherlock being like.

Sherlock half of the time: watson you're fucking stupid. no i won't take care of my personal needs stfu. watson get a goddamn life. watson shut up. watson no one cares about your goddamn opinion. no i need to disturb you in the middle of the night it's for science. hey watson mind if i manipulate mansplain malewife

Sherlock the other half of the time: HELLO SIR YOU ARE MY FAVORITE MAN TO EVER MAN HELLO MAY I SPEND THE REST OF MY DAYS WITH YOU HELLO I WILL DO ANYTHING FOR YOU WE ARE PERFECT MATCHES I LOVE YOU AND I NEED YOU YOURE SO MUCH BETTER THAN ME PLEASE MARRY ME

They're... they certainly are.

ALSO OH MY GOD.

THIS ONE TIME WHEN SHERLOCK WAS JUST PACING AROUND THE ROOM AT 3 AM GOING "IT DOESNT MAKE SENSE >:(((" AND HUDSON LIKE BARGED IN TO COMPLAIN AND THEN WATSON WAS LIKE DUDE YOU GOTTA STOP DOING THIS AND PROCEEDS TO SAY THE LINE "YOU ARE KNOCKING YOURSELF UP, OLD MAN"

BAHGHSFHGRHEWHEWHIFEW

BRB SOBBING

CALLING HIM AN OLD MAN???? KNOCKING HIMSELF UP?? I DONT KNOW WHATS FUNNIER

The main highlight of this part was I have now gotten to see him have a great time watching his homo homie get married

Its so fucking funny.......

I was prepared for a funny reaction by yuumori sherlock's face when he said it lol but. Damn i was really not prepared tbh

watson: I'm engaged!

sherlock: *pained groaning*

watson: do you... not like her?

sherlock: no she's fine she's great you'll be wonderful together bUT I HATE IT WHEN PEOPLE ARE HETEROSEXUAL WATSON DO I HAVE TO MARRY MYSELF THEN WATSON? ARE YOU GOING TO MAKE ME MARRY MYSELF.

watson: yeah... yeah... fair, I feel really bad because you did this whole case and I got a girlfriend out of it and all you got was me leaving you alone fuck man im sorry what are you gonna do without me

sherlock, highly sarcastic: dont worry watson I've always got my handy cocaine! *pulls it out and gets high in front of watson just as he's about to leave*

watson: *in fucking agony*

sherlock: good for you!

I DONT EVEN- THIS SCENE KILLED ME MULTIPLE TIMES OVER WHAT

ITS SO GODDAMN NONCHELANT ABOUT IT SHERLOCK IS JUST LIKE YEAH I WILL IN FACT NOT BE MENTALLY HEALTHY IF YOU ARE NOT WITH ME 24/7 BUT WHATEVER YOU DO YOU /S

I'd like to apologize to watson on sherlock's behalf lmao. man is being a bit too codependent on main

The last thing about sign of four I do need to address is yeah, there's the Horrific Amounts Of Racism in that one and the whiplash hearing it is just ridiculous because they seem to be so knowledgeable in all other areas and fairly... politically correct, taking sherlock's original misogyny as a purposeful character flaw, but then they just mention someone indigenous once and suddenly its all parrotting racist propaganda and just... really awful shit. There's no way I'm gonna speak for the group that just got absolutely hate crimed here but anyone can tell the author just has no clue what he's fucking talking about and it's physically painful.

And I don't know, it's just so bad it seems out of character? Doyle's making these motherfuckers say shit that honestly, Sherlock would know better about. And especially Watson. Come on, you cannot tell me watson is mentally capable of being prejudiced against someone. Please do not make him that way.

I'm not sure how to handle it specifically, or what's the proper way I should handle something like that in a media I otherwise like. Is it ok to say Doyle was clearly a piece of shit on the matter and separate those characters from his bias or is that insensitive?

I don't know, I was Not a fan of it and I'm glad to see they've at least finally shut up about the guy

But anyway yeah, uhhhh onto the short stories because I'm trying to read those before I get to the final problem

Scandal in Bohemia was a fucking ride, first of all, before we even get to Sherlock's girlboss arc we have to discuss how gay the whole situation was and how Doyle's attempt at making them less gay failed spectacularly

Like he's all "ah yes I need to marry off watson and uhhh make sherlock ummmm interact with a woman so they dont look gay" but he does it SO BADLY that it makes them look EVEN GAYER

cause i mean, even the conversation they had about watson getting married back in sign of four was gay af, but how Doyle handled things afterward was in no way straighter.

Cause you know, the man kind of wrote himself into a corner with the fact of Watson narrating these stories. So Watson has to be around to witness them, and to witness Sherlock's own thought process rather privately, so he has to be around sherlock at night, a lot. But trying to come up with a reason for that happening just... it didn't occur to Doyle. He just went. Ah yes this makes sense. And it's Watson just like Sleeping Over At Sherlock's like every other goddamn day and every time his wife leaves town and having them basically still live that cute domestic home life but they have absolutely no excuses for doing it anymore. It's quite funny

Like it was gay already the way they interacted when they officially lived together but it was like, a necessity for them. Now it's not, Watson just comes over because he goddamn wants to, and it's hilarious to me.

LIKE IDK I THINK THEY KIND OF BROKE UP FOR A YEAR OR SO BC OF WATSON GETTING MARRIED AND THEY LIKE DONT HAVE CONTACT WITH ONE ANOTHER BUT ONE DAY WATSON JUST INEXPLICABLY HAS THE URGE TO COME VISIT SHERLOCK ON NO NOTICE AND THEN SUDDENLY THEY ARE TOGETHER NEAR 24/7 AGAIN LIKE BARELY ANYTHING CHANGED AHIEHOEWH

SIT DOWN AND TRY TO TELL ME THOSE ARE NOT HOMOSEXUALS

Watson walks in on no fucking notice after a full year and Sherlock is just. In the middle of some experiment obviously but hes like

Sherlock, carrying around unidenfiable chemical mixtures: W A T S O N you look good you look good! i see you've gained seven pounds!!

watson: uh. thanks??? Hey lol *awkwardly waves* Uh um Wanted to Uhm sEe you

Sherlock: ABOUT gODDAMN TIME AND YES WONDERFUL LOOK LOOK SIT DOWN I HAVE THINGS TO INFODUMP ABOUT

watson: :) ok :) *turns to camera* and we were back to the old days

sherlock: makes a deduction

watson: wowwwwwwwwwwww !! so true bestie !!

sherlock: !!!!!!!!! :))) !!!!! :))) uh fuck im supposed to be smooth Its Elementary Lol

watson: *turns to camera* when i stroke his ego like this and compliment him he blushes like a girl like i just complimented his dress so i do it more because he likes it. this is a homie trait

watson: well i should probably get going! my wife will notice that i am gone my dear buddy bro homie!

sherlock: NO DONT LEAVE IM LOST WITHOUT YOU (pretty much a direct quote lol) your. wife doesn't. get back home until monday. I know this because I am smart and definitely have not been stalking you.

watson: alright :)))))

AND THEN HE FUCKING SLEEPS OVER LMAO FUCKING HOMOS

So yeah they're right back where they were before pretty much and there's a case bc of course there is

And honestly I think this short story specifically was so insane mostly just because of how absolutely fast it all went. Yuumori kind of made me believe the original Irene Adler was more of an important character than she really is? And I think that's. Honestly so funny. Motherfucker shows up for ten pages, girlbosses her way around town, and changes sherlock's entire opinion of the female gender while still keeping him gay?

LIKE NO LOL SHES NOT IN ANY WAY A LOVE INTEREST AND WATSON GOES OUT OF HIS WAY TO SPECIFY THE FACT THAT IN NO WORLD WOULD THEY HAVE BEEN ROMANTICALLY INVOLVED BECAUSE. SHERLOCK. DIDN'T DATE WOMEN.

HE WAS JUST??? SO IMPRESSED AND SHELL SHOCKED BY HER EXISTENCE HE DECIDED IT WAS TIME FOR GIRLBOSS APPRECIATION DAY TODAY AND ALL DAYS HENCEFORTH???

AND THEY HAVE LIKE O N E INTERACTION?? God, the power this woman(?) has. Watson looks at her once like. damb shawty 😳 and she's like "no<3" and he's like FUCK

Like yeah it's pretty much just the king walking up like "help girl the whore is blackmailing me" and sherlock being like "ok lol this will be easy" and then it proceeded to not in fact be easy or even possible

sherlock like... posed as a dead body and tried to get her to give up the location of the photo but she out-acted him and skipped the town the next day after doing the 'good night mr. sherlock holmes' thing with sherlock completely tricked

and she just. sends a letter like "dear sherlock holmes. you're a fucking idiot and i think it's funny that you lost. nice job tho mad respect" and sherlock just SHORT CIRCUITS

the king comes back a bit later like "hey Dude where's my Photo" and sherlock's like oh yeah uhhhhhhhhhhh about that and the king is like HOW COULD IT POSSIBLY HAVE BEEN THAT GODDAMN HARD i would have dated someone more noble if she wasn't so pretty i swear im on a whole different level from her

and then. GIRLBOSSIFIED SHERLOCK HOLMES RESPONDS "from what I have seen of the lady, she seems indeed to be on a very different level from your majesty" ABSEHHESHEFHHFES ROASTED

and the dude just LEAVES

After that I read a few more of the short stories and well the highlights I got from that pretty much were these conversations

Watson: sherlock. honey. have you. eaten anything today

Sherlock: IT DIDNT OCCUR TO ME DEAR WATSON

Watson: ITS FIVE PM

and:

Sherlock: *having one of his Moment Moments at three in the goddamn mornig* GRRRR CRIME ISNT WHAT IT USED TO BE

Watson: MY DEAR SHERCOCK WHAT IS CRIME S U P P O S E D TO BE LIKE ACCORDING TO YOU

Sherlock: no one's original anymore fucking copycats

Watson: so you want the criminals to make things harder for you specifically.

Sherlock, exasperated: yes!

I love them your honor.

#rowan's hyperfixation essays #rowan screams into the void #rowan views moriarty #sherlock holmes

[getallemeralds]

explorers of arvus: heading back / 3.11.21

zoom and enhonse

LAST TIME ON ARVUS taure passed out and we are now down a healer! also we met a disciple of halvkar, and surprisingly did not murder her. this is fine. we have instantly gotten distracted by our various carts. cats. our various cats

DID ANY OF US CATCH TAURE, SHE FELL OVER sieron tried to catch her and smacked charlie+thorne in the face (he rolled a nat1, f) BUT the catboy is to the rescue bc silje is the designated Not Incompetent of the group today

CONSULT THE CHILD hewwo yrel yrel: her mind is being consumed by the serpent of nightmares. :D charlie: HELLO?????//

so, dendar(?) the night serpent is imprisoned beneath arvus! she was formed from the nightmares of the first sentient being, and sometimes she eats people's nightmares. if she's exceptionally hungry, she'll force nightmares onto people for her to feed off their fear. yrel thinks taure will Probably wake up. there's a thing on arvus mentioned by the locals called a "sleeping sickness" where people will fall asleep for a few days, sometimes longer, but will wake up. its magical in cause, the people afflicted by it have horrific nightmares, and its just kinda. a thing. wowza

(i have gone back to spelling yrel's name as yrel bc i think it looks nice)

OH HEY SOMEONE POSTED A THEORY ON ONE OF MY STICKMOLUS ANIMATIONS man i should get back to stickmolus sometime. once dsmp releases its awful grip on me.

i keep getting distracted by seeing myself in the camera preview. i have a tooth gap! what the fuck its cute?? K I KNOW WE'RE SUPER BLURRY IN FRONT RN BUT PLEASE HELP ME STAY FOCUSED I SWEAR -leo

we're gonna build a sled! to put taure on. thorne: i have a good strength score. ....i say, out loud charlie: i am four feet tall. [cue argument between thorne & sieron about them both being horcs but sieron has a +0 bc strength is his dump stat] OH, OKAY, THORNE ROLLED A NAT20 TO CARRY TAURE. NICE

[discussion about what to tell everyone at camp vengenace] thorne: the last thing we need to do is a witch hunt charlie: --and we already hunted the witch! the witch has been hunted.

time to discuss strategy! we need to figure out how to head back to camp vengeance, eg if we want to follow the path we already took or if we wanna do some trailblazing. looks like we're gonna try and take the most direct path! which means we'll prolly risk tangoing with some undead but im willing to risk it TINY HUT STAIRCASE sorry i just remember it now and then

nyx: [meowing at his cats] thorne: uh... why is silje meowing? jorb: silje's food bowl is empty jorb: you look at silje's food bowl and there's a divot in the middle and the food is all on the sides emotionally, we must bully the catboy silje saw something interesting and started meowing

thorne: ill take first watch silje: ill also take first watch. charlie: [quietly] gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyy (but, like, extended for 15 seconds)

silje: [takes watch] [rolls a nat1 and gets distracted by looking at his crush]

THORNE HAS LOCATED A DOG the dog does not give a shit about the tiny hut. THE DOG HAS PEED ON THE TINY HUT goodbye dog

EVERYONE IS ROLLING AT LEAST 1 NAT1 thorne: wow! that sure is a dog. thorne has drawn the worst possible dog. thorne has erased the worst possible dog. we dont speak of the worst possible dog its the dog version of honse. DONSE

sieron is now on watch! MAN we are havin trouble rolling today. at least kali's here to make sure sieron doesnt stare at a rock for 50000 years sieron sees a mouse! bottom text

charlie is now on watch! kali is havin a big ol thonk. nothing meaningful has come of this

i am perceiving some deer. sieron is not perceiving some deer. silje is perceiving some deer, but better the deer are fucked up and undead! silje has gone from "we should hunt these deer for food" to "we should hunt these deer for sport"

charlie: i do not feel like being jumped by five thousand skeletons

charlie takes first watch with sieron! WHY ARE OUR ROLLS SO TERRIBLE taure is super cursed right now. that's not very pog charlie: this place sucks. thorne: to be fair, we havent-- charlie: YOU'RE ASLEEP, SHUT UP

oh hey coolname galvanic finally partied. nice.

thorne is at watch! solar: hey, is leomund's tiny hut an orb? there's a critter digging around! AH, THE CRITTER IS UNDEAD. this could be a problem

solar: hey michael, how much does the horrific sin against god dog i drew look like this creature michael: [dice roll noises] about 50%.

michael: if anyone likes, they can make a nature check-- solar: ME MEMEMEMEME ME ME ME

its a bulette! aka a land shark. problem: they are not normally undead. this one is undead.

jorb: imagine if you could tame one of those and use it as a mount. leo: IT WOULD JUST DIG UNDERGROUND AND LEAVE YOU THERE

we are just calling it a weird dog

we're going to mail a letter to the heart of arvus. HEY, CHECK OUT THIS WEIRD DOG,

JORB FOUND ART OF A BABY BULETTE. WEIRD PUPPY!

solar: hey guys, check out this sick art of a bulette i found

silje kept a lookout for the weird dog but its just fucked off. goodbye, weird dog give it up for day 3!

man there's been like, three incinerations today in blaseball. what's up with that. I SWEAR IM MOSTLY PAYING ATTENTION its just been an eventful day in blaseball. also im wearing my garages bomber rn. jaylen is home wooOOOO the wind smells stinky. this is fine.

we're actively avoiding whatever combat michael keeps nudging at us bc we're carrying around an unconscious person and i SWEAR hes gonna throw something directly at us once he's done with our shenanigans

UHH MICHAEL ASKING FOR PASSIVE PERCEPTION LOL

huh. this place used to be inhabited? we're in the woods rn but there's some like, stone ruins? like, VERY ruins. like, not really any structures standing, but enough evidence to show there Were things. WE FOUND A STATUE charlie: i want to smash my face against the lore.

used to be a circle of standing stones, but most of em fell over or got overgrown. inside of the circle has been cleared, although v roughly-- ground's torn up statue is of fjolnir! warrior holding up a spear and shield. AH, THERE ARE CORPSES, a human got REAL fucked up here. one of the corpses is straight up impaled on fjolnir's spear. n ... not pog.

i am trying so, so hard to pay attention. but i also kinda wanna take a nap.

charlie: [stares at statue] [rolls a 4] i wonder if he had a dick.

okay so something rolled in, tore up the overgrowth inside the circle, and murdered a couple dudes. and was also super tall and human-adjacent. hrm.

oh my god why are we rolling so shit today. time to stealth away and hope we dont get casually dismembered

k: jorb's hair is so long... leo: K, PLEASE,

time for a break! i am very tired but im gonan see if i can push through a little further. nyx is petting his cat why do orangatangs look like that

first watch is thorne and sieron! have they even, like, talked thorne unhabby ): thorne's worried we were tresspassing when checking out the statue, meanwhile im thinking about that one time when sieron got bit by a groundhog

(oh my god this is from late 2018)

leomund's tiny hut, aka the anti-sea bear circle we are getting SO much mileage out of the tiny hut. SILJE HUMS A SONG WITH KALI cute........... FINALLY I HAVE ROLLED ABOVE A 14 wait no i rolled a 16 twice. anyway we are not dead

nearly at camp vengenace! boy howdy i hope camp vengeance didnt get burned down. AH FUCK TAURE IS UNCONSCIOUS SO WE CANT CAST FOR DETECT POISON kaepora nearly made us all shit ourselves but its okay he just saw some bison and thought it was cool Michael Is Consulting Several Tables

WHY DOES JORB'S CAMERA ZOOM LIKE THAT why am i hungry. i have so many questions

HEY, TALL GUY [smacks sieron]

camp vengeance looks better! like, nobody's Obviously Sick anymore, the medical tents arent overfilled, we did it! we saved the dayyyyyy time to report to ryder! taure's getting dropped off at the medical tent

man remember when charlie didnt wear pants

oh man, with taure unconscious charlie is now taking point with social interaction. wild. jk im making jorb do it bc im tired HAHA NAT 20 PERSUASION BC OF ME HELPIN SIERON man ryder is such a cock. he was totally ready to keep throwing troops at heaven's brazier to die until we managed to persuade him out of it. jorb: did we tell ryder about the vision? michael: you kinda just took a look at him and went STINKY BOY!

okay yeah anything that dies on arvus will just pop back up as undead. man, arvus sucks.

ryder: alright, dismissed. charlie: seeya, soldier boy! :D hahahahaha im gonna eat his knees.

SILJE NEEDS ENRICHMENT IN HIS ENCLOSURE

charlie: ive decided he sucks. silje: we've already arrived to that, you're late!

LMAO WE WALKED IN ON INGRID AND HER CRUSH they fuckin. nice. you go, you funky lesbian

jorb: we've got the tiny hut, we could go anywhere leo: we could go to SPACE! nyx: we could not go to space. leo: WITH A TINY HUT STAIRCASE, WE CAN,

we are 320 miles away from the spaceship that exists on arvus. nice.

michael: justin sees you-- roll a strength saving throw. leo: i cant wait to die! [rolls a 3] I AM CRUSHED BY MY DOG michael: he rolled a nat20.

BOSS ENCOUNTER: CHARLIE'S DOG (the small circle next to him is one of the medical tents.)

THORNE IS PACT OF THE GUN solar: PARRY THIS, YOU FUCKING CASUAL

sieron, to ingrid: seems like youve been doing well charlie: i punch sieron. sieron: sieron: the camp, of course.

man we have no idea if the heart of arvus is actually related to the prophecy or not. theres a Lot of stuff lining up, but not enough, and its hard to say how much of it couldve been literal?

solar & michael: [discussing exposition] me: [cracking up bc penn sent me a funny dsmp joke]

prophecies are weird.

charlie is just s she is just sitting here SILJE PLAYED CARDS REALLY GOOD AT ME nyx rolled a nat20 and took all my money

oh cool we can talk to yrel telepathically! time to hoist yrel. THIS IS SO SCUFFED thorne mentioned yrel and now we're trying to explain to ingrid that we have a magic talking snake charlie: I WANT TO GO HOME. thorne: we cant go, we have a GOD-KING to kill! "i think theyre insane, theyre talking to a snake" "ingrid, druids exist" "oh. im gonna go back to getting railed by my 7 foot tall girlfriend"

#leo chirps #ttrpg #explorers of arvus #OKAY WE'RE CAUGHT UP NOW sorry abt that lmao

[justsomefluff]

Hi! May I request for a karaoke date ateez reaction? Their s/o doesn't have the best voice so they kind of act like crackheads but like fluffy at the same time? I hope that makes sense, I really like your writing!!!

Ok this is so cute... I wish karaoke was more popular in the US because it would be my fav thing to do every weekend.

Anyway I hope you like this!! <3

Hongjoong:

So, when Joong invites you to karaoke you’re kinda nervous bc

Joong can sing and his best friends are amazing singers too so like how’s he gonna react if you aren’t as good

When you get there he’s really excited and stuff and he lets you pick the first song

And you just pick one that you both know

But you pick more of a rap-style song so that you can just scream it without him judging too much lol

Even that ends up making you nervous though bc... Joong is a professional rapper

But you actually end up really enjoying yourself bc he’s being just as wild as you are

At the end of the date you don’t really understand why you had been nervous in the first place bc karaoke really is all fun and games

Plus Joongie would never dream of making you uncomfortable even if he was low-key like “I’m dating the world’s most tone-deaf person”

He’s totally blind about that stuff

Love-stricken puppy

Seonghwa:

(this was so cute I cant breathe)

Okay I feel like Seonghwa is a huge crackhead when he does karaoke

especially if it’s just you guys and he doesn’t feel pressured to be mature in front of his bandmates

I also feel like he would force you to choose only girl group songs

Let’s face it, if Ateez could turn into a girl group.... he’d do it in a heartbeat

The reason he would choose these songs is because he’s obsessed with girl group choreographies

So you wouldn’t even have time to focus on singing with him bc he’d be like

“AND STEP TO THE LEFT, SHOULDER MOVE, BABABA”

and you’re just watching him and laughing hysterically

until he tries to get you to dance with him and it’s like... dear god no

But it actually is super cute and soft bc he’s gentle and like guides your movements and stuff

So overall, I think for Seonghwa, karaoke isn’t even about the singing

Yunho:

Yunho is already insane though

So when you get to karaoke he’s already picking super difficult songs

like difficult even for him

So your nerves will melt away in seconds

Because he’ll start off with some crazy vocalists and then end up screaming for the notes he cant hit

And when it’s your turn, if he doesn't hear you being as crazy as he is he’s gonna be bitter

like “I just put my entire lungs into that song and you can’t even yell a little bit?”

Will definitely make you do a duet

And it’s a super romantic song right... not anymore

Even if it’s notes he has no problem hitting, he’s gonna do some terrible singing just for you baby ;)

Like totally off-key and dancing like an idiot just to make you smile

*insert random twerking*

But one thing about being crazy with Yunho is that you both get tired really fast and so you end up just listening to the tracks run while you slow dance and...

it’s so SOFT

Yeosang: 

He’s shy too

Don’t ask me why bc I mean the logic just isn’t there

“Yeosang, you literally sing for thousands of people...all the time... you’re nervous in front of just me though? Really?”

He’ll just nod... “it’s different. okay?”

But whatever

You’ll have to end up taking the lead even if you don't really want to

And like, you’re not that bad, you’re just a little harder on yourself

But Yeosang is just heart eyes the whole time

Big ole goofy smile

ends up finally joining in and serenading you

is actually really genuine about it until you get too shy and just start screaming the words back at him lmao

He’s totally caught off guard but also thinks its hilarious

You just spend the rest of the night screaming random lyrics at each other like you’re an up and coming metal band

Super fun but you definitely lose your voices the next morning

San:

Sannie best boy

He’s really intuitive about your feelings so when he told you he wanted to take you to karaoke he knew you were nervous about it pretty much immediately

wants to have fun with you though so he’s constantly assuring you that it’s not a big deal

says super cheesy stuff like “even if you’re the worst singer in the world and make me lose hearing in my right ear, I’ll still love you so much bb”

Him saying that actually helps though bc nothing you do could ever be as embarrassing as that lmao

Even if you are a bad singer, he’s gonna hype you the whole time

low-key coaches you too 

will randomly be like “so good, bb, just LOUDER”

But if you’re really uncomfortable he’ll get up and literally lose his mind

like he’ll become the literal definition of screeching into the void

Will not stop until you’re literally crying with laughter

then he’s gonna make you join in for the last song of the night

and you’re both screaming so thats fun

But then as you’re leaving, he’ll kiss you and tell you how much fun he always has with you

bc he’s a closet sentimental

places so much value on your time and just hopes you always enjoy yourself as much as he does :’)

Mingi:

Ok Mingi cant really sing either I mean I love him but have y'all heard him sometimes lmao

So if you go with him, I don't see how anyone could possibly be nervous bc you’re just gonna make fun of each other the whole time

like if he starts and you laugh at him he’ll be like “this is why I’m a rapper,  babe”

Will totally make fun of you just as hard though

like he’ll be calm for a little while but then all of a sudden he’ll be like “I CANT TAKE IT ANYMORE”

and literally die laughing and say stuff like “Are my ears bleeding?”

and you’ll swat at him and stuff

boom, you’re now wrestling in the room you guys rented

it’s really fun though bc you guys just feel so comfortable around each other

singing in front of someone, even if both of you suck, is really intimate I think so

karaoke night just brings you guys closer

one of your favorite memories together

Wooyoung:

Okay this child is the definition of crackhead so

he’s not gonna take any of this stuff seriously

Like if there was a soundtrack for this date, it wouldn’t be any of the songs you sang at karaoke it would just be his hyena laugh on repeat

Bc that’s pretty much all you hear the whole night lmao

his voice tends to be on the higher side so naturally he chooses songs that are really low in pitch

Just because he thinks it’ll be funny

and he’s making weird faces as he tries to get his voice down the where the song needs it to be

Will make you do the same thing for any of your songs

like if your voice is low then you have to go high and vice versa

he doesn’t give you the opportunity to even try to be good bc he’s like

“you gotta scream it or else it isn't funny”

and you both have so many videos of each other singing terribly

perfect for blackmail

like later if you’re ever play fighting or something you’ll be like “Wooyoungie, one more word and I will tweet this for all Atiny to see”

but some videos are just for you bc you want that memory to be only between you guys bc it was so special

Jongho:

(HES SO CUTE DAMMIT)

This boy, I definitely understand if you get insecure about going with him okay

he’s got the vocal range of the century okay

and if he takes you to karaoke, he’s out to impress

so he’s gonna be performing his ass off for you and you’re just like :o

like “oh, it’s serious”

and then you’re making up excuses like “just keep singing I love your voice”

which is true, but you’re really only saying that at that moment so he won’t make you sing in front of him

but he’s gonna make you, you have no choice ok

if you’re nervous he’ll do funny stuff to show you that he doesn't care

like if you pick a ballad he’ll turn on his phones flashlight and wave it around and pretend to cry

and if you pick something more upbeat he’s gonna dance and pretend to be a fan or something super cheesy and dumb

just wants his baby to be comfortable :(

so even if you were uncomfy before, he’ll sing the last song and it’ll be super slow and he’ll hit you with that back-hug while he’s singing

so if the portion of the night when you were singing was awkward for you, you forget about it in the end bc boy took your breath away with his sweetness

#ateez #Ateez hongjoong #ateez seonghwa #ateez yunho #ateez yeosang #ateez san #ateez mingi #ateez wooyoung #ateez jongho #fancfic #ateez fluff #crack #ateez reactions #reactions #imagine #ateez imagines #fluff

[rizahawkais]

I LOVED season 1 and 2 of the crown but found season 3 quite dull and difficult to get through. I'm enjoying season 4 (still havent finished bc I watch with my family and we're rarely all together) but I think that the earlier seasons were a lot better in my opinion

hi! i completely agree w you!

I AM SO SORRY FOR THE LATE REPLY! I replied to this the day you sent it but my laptop crashed and I lost everything I wrote so I put off till now!

All in all, the writing for the first two seasons were WAY better. My ranking is s2 > s1 > s4 >>>>> s3. In my opinion, season three was kind of terrible.

hahaha this is so so long.

In the first two seasons each episode’s mini story for the day was actually INTERESTING. Like, I loved where one episode was about the Mountbatten name and then the next was about the Great Smog! But, there was always an overarching plot and it always added up in the end. S1, S2 and S4 all had an overarching plot that worked! S1 was balancing family and the crown. S2 was balancing prime ministers and her husband. S4 was the downfall of Margaret Thatcher and Charles/Diana. S3 LITERALLY HAD NO PLOT! It was just a bunch of stories put together. The finale for season 3 was about the end of Margaret’s marriage! And although, it is an important event in the family’s history the fact that it was the finale episode????

Anyways, Season 3 genuinely just sucks. Season 4 is REALLY good. Yet, it still doesn’t leave as much of an affect on me like the earlier seasons. AND LIKE I KNOW BECAUSE I’VE REWATCHED THE FIRST THREE SEASONS SO MANY TIMES. I’ve only seen the fourth once because I’m too busy and it’s also too early for me to rewatch it. So, maybe my opinion of season 4 will change!

Now, because I am extra 😈😈 and crazy I will talk about every single episode IN ORDER. hehehehehehe. feel free to hate me

SEASON ONE

101 Wolferton Splash - 10/10 this episodes just sets everything up! we see how happy the marriage is and how loving king george is and we also see the FORSHADOWING!! we see lilibet and phillip making their life thinking they had time when we know they don’t and it’s just :( AN AMAZING PILOT EPISODE WITH AMAZING QUOTES!

102 Hyde Park Corner - 1000/10 this episode needs no explanation. the suspense and DRAMA right before lilibet finds out about her dad ALWAYS gets me!!

103 Windsor - 10/10 I hated this episode the first time I watched it! I didn’t understand the importance of her uncle and I didn’t understand the complexity behind the episode. I was 14 when I saw this episode for the first time! So, mind you I was quite ignorant. but, david basically represents the audience in the show for those who hate the monarchy and call them out on their hypocrisy. BUT DAVID IS A TERRIBLE PERSON! FUCK DAVID! i understand hating the monarchy and for him i know it was personal but the way he talks about his family in the letters UGHUGHGUHGUHGUHGUH this man is evil! there’s also the other story in the episode about the mountbatten name which is so brilliant!

104 Act of God - 15/10 this episode was boring on first watch but I WAS FOURTEEN! this episode took a break from the monarchy and concentrated on a british national horrific event THAT WAS IMPORTANT and i liked how it connected throughout the episode and all that and the CINEMATOGRAPHY OMGGGGG! anyways, something that pisses me off about this episode is that the crown kind of has the same kind of audience as euphoria! they only care about a hot actor or iconic character or the aesthetics AND THAT MAKES ME ANGRY! bc those are the ppl who call this episode the boring fog episode and the latest episode of euphoria a waste of time! they don’t understand the importance of what their watching. an event that killed hundreds by something that could have been avoided bc of science and for euphoria an ongoing pandemic of an ugly world and its affect on ppl not wanting to go on! IM SORRY THIS TURNED INTO A RANT but this episode is important in reminding audiences that disasters can be avoided but also once they happen anything can happen THIS WAS A SAD EPISODE OKAY AND I LOVED VENETIA SCOTT!

105 Smoke and Mirrors - 100/10 THE CORONATION EPISODE! Phillip tries to bring it to the common public and all the fighting between them just makes the coronation even more impactful when we watch it!

106 Gelignite - 8/10 I DESPISED MARGARET IN THE FIRST SEASON i saw her as a spoiled brat who wanted to marry her dad’s assistant! AND ALSO HOW DID SHE NOT REALIZE THERE WAS DEFINITE GROOMING INVOLVED! this episode is generally very good but margaret just pisses me off a lot! however, her not being able to marry peter boresend shouldn’t have been because of his divorcee status but bc he simply was a predator in anyone’s clear eyes IM SORRY IF YOU DISAGREE BUT SHE MET HIM SO YOUNG NO WAY THERE WAS NO GROOMING good episode but pissed off at margaret’s lack of critical thinking besides but I WANT HIMMMMM LIKE I WANT EVERYTHING

107 Scientia Potentia Est - 11/10 hated this when i first watched it! but now one of my favorites! lilibet feels dumb and needs a tutor! prime minister and wannabe prime minister have health problems and keep it from her! lilibet finds out by accident and they all get yelled at! I LOVE WHEN SHE YELLS AT MEN!

108 Pride & Joy - 10/10 this episode is just adds on to the overarching plot of the season: balancing the crown and family. margaret says disrespectful things to ppl who don’t deserve it in place of lilibet while she’s on the commonwealth tour fighting with her husband! then lilibet scorns margaret and we see an ugly papa loved me more argument! absolutely brilliant!

109 Assassins - 1000/10 hated it the first time but now I LOVE THIS EPISODE! it’s the painting and porchey episode and churchill leaving episode. It’s so so so good! i honestly have no words to describe the brilliance of this episode besides the acting done by almost the entire main cast CLAIRE WOW! MATT WOW! STEPHEN (THE PAINTER) WOW! JOHN WOW! HARRIET WOW! when we see the painting getting burned coincided w the downing st dinner GETS ME EVERYTIME I LOVE IT SO SO MUCH!

110 Gloriana - 100/10 the climactic fight between the crown and family! which will lilibet choose?? and the foreshadowing to suez MWAH!

SEASON TWO

201 Misadventure - 100/10 LOVE LOVE LOVE THIS EPISODE the cutesy lilibet and phillip until it all goes down WOW! and the suez stuff i love it all

202 A Company of Men - 100/10 this is where i think mike’s wife starts snooping or it’s the next episode BUT THIS IS WHERE SOMETHING BEGINS FOR SURE first of all it foreshadows the episode later in the season about philip’s childhood AND MATT’S ACTING!! it’s too good for words!

203 Lisbon - 100/10 i like it when they fight lol that’s the only way i know how to describe why i love it LILIBET WAS EXCITED TO SEE HIM AND SO WAS HE but then mike ruined it by being a disgraceful and dishonest man RUINING EVERYTHING

204 Beryl - 10/10 i start to like margaret bc i feel bad for her! she’s suffering she’s sad that her lil predator boyfriend is no longer w her but look who it is MATTHEW GOODE! he not suspicious at all but the writers are like here take 20 minutes of perfect chemistry between the actors!

205 Marionettes - 100/10 I LOVE THIS EPISODE basically someone who loves the monarchy insults the monarchy and lilibet actually goes to listen to them! w resistance of course but she still took everything he said to fix the monarchy !

206 Vergangenheit - 1000/10 one of my favorites! i didn’t know about david’s nazi past so when i watched this episode for the first time i was completely baffled! another episode where she yells at a man!!!! i’m always annoyed in this episode tho by all the talk from the priest about forgiveness bc im like why would u want to forgive david for being a nazi?? but i think it was intentional by the writers to show the importance of understanding forgiveness and the grounds for it! THIS EPISODE IS JUST PERFECT IM ANNOYED BC I DON’T WANT TO FORGIVE HIM

207 Matrimonium - 9/10 this episode is amazing BEFORE you’ve seen season three bc you root for margaret and tony! but, also throughout the episode there’s all that tony and family and his gf and bf stuff that you think is going to lead somewhere but doesn’t??? like what was the point of introducing his mother and his relationships if it was going nowhere and not even mentioned in season 3??? LIKE WHAT WAS THE POINT WHAT WAS THE REASON? but, also there’s lilibet and phillip fluff in this episode I LOVE

208 Dear Mrs. Kennedy - 10/10 this episode is fun as an american bc i think jackie kennedy and jfk are so idolized here in america it was so interesting to see this other pov! BUT I ALSO REALLY LOVED LILIBET DANCING W NKRUMAH! I THOUGHT IT WAS SO CUTE AND THE MARTIN CHARTERIS STUFF LEADING UP TO IT WAS SO FUNNY!

209 Paterfamilias - 100000/10 no words. IT WAS SO SMART TO PARALLEL PHILIP AND CHARLES this has a lower rating than the previous episode which makes no sense but only goes to prove the idolization of jackie and jfk

210 Mystery Man - 100/10 EVERYTHING FROM THE FIRST EPISODE IS ADDRESSED IN THIS EPISODE THE SEASON COMES FULL CIRCLE JUST LIKE SEASON ONE DID AND SEASON THREE DID NOT DO THAT AND SEASON FOUR DID IT TOO BUT NO WHERE AS GREATLY

every single episode of seasons two has a 9+ rating from me!

SEASON THREE (worst season)

301 Olding - 5/10 weak starter but good for introducing olivia as lilibet and harold wilson and departing churchill BUT THAT’S IT! like the whole spy thing just went bleh LIKE IT HAD POTENTIAL but it needed early seasons writing not third season writing techniques TOBIAS DID A GREAT JOB THO IN THIS EPISODE HE WAS A GREAT RECAST FOR PHILIP

302 Margaretology - 6/10 okay. just okay. margaret kind of bratty but you actually feel bad for her then she gets bratty again and then you feel bad for her again and the scenarios in the episode just didn’t feel real like the whole lyndon b johnson was so jealous of jfk that he was rude to the queen so they sent margaret JUST DIDN’T MAKE SENSE like i know this show is fictional but the fiction tends to be believable until i research the episode afterwards BUT FOR THIS it just didn’t make sense

303 Aberfan - 1000/10 ONE OF THE GOOD EPISODES OF THE SEASON! those first fifteenish minutes??? TEARS! i never knew about aberfan until this episode and seeing this episode made me cry!

304 Bubbikins - 10000/10 THIS EPISODE IS TECHNICALLY NOT AS GOOD AS THE ABERFAN EPISODE BUT THIS IS A PERSONAL PREFERENCE we meet anne and alice in this episode AND I LOVE BOTH OF THEM (erinsdoherty is my current url!) this episode is so sad and sweet at the same time and loving bc i’m a sucker for philip’s back story!

305 Coup - 8/10 this had potential I FEEL LIKE IF THEY WROTE THIS EPISODE DIFFERENTLY LIKE HOW THEY WROTE ONE OF THE SUEZ EPISODE IT WOULD HAVE BEEN SO MUCH BETTER the fact that it all went to nothing and nothing basically happened WHAT WAS THE POINT

306 Tywysog Cymru - 1000/10 this episode made me like charles! what a horrendous statement! but, like i thought his relationship w his tutor was so heartwarming and he actually seemed to care and all that and it just all in all MADE ME HAPPY like this episode isn’t sad it’s a happy episode until the last scene w lilibet BUT YEA they gave us this one good episode until we hate him which i appreciate makes the story telling better

307 Moondust - -100/10 hate this episode LIKE GENUINELY HATE IT HATE HATE HATE and tbh im generally very very nice w my opinions ANYWAYS I WAS SO EXCITED FOR THIS EPISODE BUT IT WAS SO STUPID LIKE THE ASTRONAUTS BEING ASSHOLES WAS STUPID PHILIP BEING AN ASSHOLE TO THE PRIESTS WAS STUPID LIKE PHILIP IS AN ASSHOLE BUT IT’S BEHIND PEOPLE’S BACKS AND THEN THEY KILLED ALICE OFF SCREEN I HATE THIS EPISODE

308 Dangling Man - -1000/10 HATE THIS ONE TOO this episode convinced me that the writers for the first two seasons to this season has changed all of a sudden we forget that david was basically a nazi and the charles we met two episodes ago sees him as exactly like this uncle who he swore he would be nothing like to the people of wales??? LIKE WHO WROTE THIS THEY WERE DOING CRACK WHILE WRITING THIS EPISODE and i felt NOTHING during the lilibet and david goodbye WHACK EPISODE TERRIBLE JUST BAD TERRIBLE

309 Imbroglio - 5/10 episode started off good but then just went a lil too crazy by making it seem like a whole secret spy mission going behind lilibet’s back

310 Cri de Cour - 4/10 bad just bad HBC GOOD ACTRESS AMAZING ACTRESS given bad material like NONE OF THIS FEELS CONNECTED THIS STORY IS ALL RANDOM AND WE HAD A WHOLE EPISODE ABOUT MARGARET AND TONY AND WE DON’T EVEN MENTION ANY OF THE CRAZY STUFF FROM THE LAST SEASON BUT WE CONCENTRATE ON MARGARET BEING A SUGAR MAMA MAKES SENSE YALL

once again i hate season three

SEASON FOUR

401 Gold Stick- 8/10 written weirdly but had GOOD SCENES such as meeting thatcher and diana! BUT THE SCENE STEALER WAS OBVIOUSLY MOUNTBATTEN’S DEATH AND PHILIP TELLING CHARLES THAT HE BECAME DICKIE’S SON INSTEAD OF HIM SAD STUFF so like the death was sad and dramatic and I FELT BAD but like i shouldn’t bc im south asian and mountbatten did bad stuff to us BUT IT DOESN’T CHANGE THE RIPPLE WE FELT

402 The Balmoral Test - 9/10 funny episode but needed early seasons’ writing

403 Fairytale - 9/10 good episode but needed early seasons’ writing BUT ALSO THAT SCENE BETWEEN CAMILA AND DIANA MWAH CHEF’S KISS THEY BOTH DESERVE ALL THE AWARDS but needed early seasons’ writing

404 Favourites - 7/10 this episode is good but frustrating bc u finally realize how terrible of a mother lilibet is BUT THE ANDREW STUFF WAS GOOD I AM GLAD THEY PUT THAT IN! i liked seeing thatcher’s non-existent relationship w her daughter NEEDED EARLY SEASONS’ WRITING

405 Fagan - 10/10 GOOD EPISODE I LIKE HOW WE WERE EMERSED IN FAGAN’S LIFE AND I LOVE THE ACTOR FOR FAGAN TOO AND I LIKE HOW IT WAS CONNECTED TO THATCHER AND FUELED THE OVERARCHING PLOT OF THE STORY!

406 Terra Nullius - 100/10 GOOD EPISODE CLOSEST TO EARLY SEASONS WRITING THAT’S WHAT MADE IT GOOD seeing them not get along and then get along and then not get along again through a series of montages made the episode brilliant!

407 The Hereditary Principle - 6/10 this episode. how do i explain? the material for this episode was absolutely perfect for the writers of the early seasons! POOR EXECUTION

408 48:1 - 100/10 i like the political episodes more than the family episodes SO THIS EPISODE IS SO BRILLIANT BC OF THE BACK AND FORTH AND I GOT TO SEE CLAIRE!!

409 Avalanche - 7/10 early season writers would have shown the arguing before the avalanche and diana’s reaction JUST SAYING

410 War - 9/10 THIS EPISODE HAD THE YELLING AT EACH OTHER SCENE THAT WAS SO GOOD BUT ANYWAYS THE PROBLEM W THIS EPISODE WAS THAT IT DRAGGED I FEEL LIKE THIS EPISODE AND THE ONE BEFORE SHOULD HAVE BEEN ONE EPISODE TOGETHER

ALAS, what i would like to say is that i feel that season 4 shouldn’t have been so diana centric! it was diana from the beginning of the season to the end! not, that i don’t love the whole diana story but it was dragged and i think she should have been introduced around the third/fourth episode of this season the same way tony was in season two! camilla should have arrived at the beginning of season 4 so that the intensity between camilla, charles and diana was more believable! if we season three wasn’t so spread out they could have had more brilliant episode.

OK HAHA I AM SO SORRY FOR THIS VERY LONG RANT ABOUT THE CROWN PLZ FORGIVE ME! AND IF U READ ALL THIS WOW! IDK WHAT TO SAY I THINK I TALK TOO MUCH HONESTLY :( anyways thank you for talking to me :)

#the crown #queen elizabeth #prince philip #princess margaret #princess anne #princess diana #prince charles #margaret thatcher #asks #i talk too much

[inknose]

mdzs read diary part IV, the end

It’s inspiring how much self care wwx is gonna finally get now that his husband will go along with whatever he does, so he’s gotta look out for lwj’s well being if not his own. that is emphatically the STUFF

dragging my hands down I face as I read this, after all these chapters of getting up close and personal with ghouls bleeding from every orifice, slaying ancient beasts, rebelling against the entire cultivation world, the two of them are absolutely paralyzed by middle school crush sleepover math

chicken

he actually drew kissy doodles .... he....

IDK I THINK I JUST DOCUMENTED THIS PART CUZ I WAS STILL SCREAMING you cant expect me to have very useful things to say at this point

this is torture you are both so mushy you are so GONE

This part really stood out to me, it’s an attitude I feel like wwx implies with his inner narration a few times but most clearly says here: he’s not one for allowing himself to exaggerate how bad his circumstances are/could be even a little bit - he’s already lived through some extreme low points and found a way to keep going, so he never makes sweeping statements about what he couldn’t live without (Inner JingYi: you’re supposed to say you’d be lost without him here!!!) Instead he seems to accept as a given that being alive doesn’t guarantee him any pleasantness or joy at all, and as a result his feelings toward being in TRUE LOVE are surprisingly pragmatic, but also colored with such gratitude. There are a lot of things in the novel that struck me, like this, as being just a little to the left of familiar tropes/sentiments, and were more touching for it. Whether it be the influence of culture difference as opposed to what I’m used to reading in most western romance stories, or MXTX’s unique outlook, or a combination of both, it was really refreshing and made me pause over it. Not “I can’t imagine living without you” but “I could be living without you, but instead I get to be with you and I think that’s the best thing that could happen.”

ADJFDKFJ THE UST BEING SO STRONG THAT EVEN THE VILLAIN COMMENTS ON IT IN THE MIDDLE OF EXECUTING HIS EVIL PLANS IS ONE OF THOSE THINGS THAT WILL NEVER FAIL TO MAKE ME LAUGH MY ASS OFF. hes like god damn! here I thought I had problems

it was at this moment that I realized we were doing this Now... I’m still recovering. What a scene. I am so glad I saw the most incredible fanart soon afterwards, bc the fact that someone has already drawn a perfect comic of this part means I don’t have to

I love you so much, you are so annoying, you are perfect... I like how he’s been experiencing openly requited love for all of ten minutes but he’s already figured out how to weaponize it to piss people off

doing!!! his!!! job!!!!!

ahh... it’s a really good story. JGY is a great character. One of the most interesting differences for me between drama watching vs. novel reading experience is that without an actor to bat his vulnerable doe eyes at you and smile faintly with his cute dimples, the book does not go much out of its way to try to lull the reader into a false sense of security around him or *endear* him to you the way the show does. But just by seeing events through wei wuxian’s POV, its still enough to evoke pity or understanding towards him. The overall impression is a bit more detached though, there’s less emphasis on the spectacle of how he could manipulate everyone closest to him and more of a general feeling of resigned tragedy that everyones the worst on this bitch of an earth.

I CANNOT DEAL WITH YOU FOR EVEN ONE MORE SECOND!!!!

I clearly paused to take note of less and less parts at the end & the extras due to: a) too excited to reach the end b) too spicy to photograph and c) too sleepy cuz I kept reading in the middle of the night. but I absolutely took the time for Bro We Are Teens appreciation corner:

I’d absolutely read 40 more extra chapters of their monster-of-the-week field trip antics.

god... poor Jin Ling now basically has to deal with divorced parents that talk shit about each other to him whenever he is saying with one of them. except they are both his uncles. just a disasterhood of all uncles from start to finish. AUUUGH wei wuxian and jiang cheng have fucked me up completely, I dream of them reconciling but I also REFUSE to believe it would ever be easy. let me know if theres a fanfic that absolutely tortures you for decades before they hug

HAHAHA oh no this man ain’t making it to immortality thats for damn sure. HE’S JUST GONNA TRY AS HARD AS HE CAN HIS WHOLE LIFE NOT TO LOOK AT HIM BUT THEYRE *MARRIED* SDLKFJSF ohhhh it’s too funny, like... the mundane domestic family drama IN the fantastical swords and sorcery setting is what really ratchets up these things from amusing to fucking hilarious I think

aaaa the end... final random thoughts? No not final, I would like to please keep discussing at length and exhaustively, all the time please - CQL has gotta be one of the best TV adaptations I’ve seen. ANY adaptation of anything would be lucky to be so good!! reading the novel has just made me appreciate it even more.

- I don’t think I can do justice to what I find most fascinating about comparing the two versions briefly, to do that I need to get drunk and ramble at my friends for hours but... the condensed version is something like this. Really all the significant differences between the two versions (besides the ones which can be attributed to censorship and therefore aren’t worth discussing) are a side effect of the structure of how the story is told - there’s barely anything changed arbitrarily. Aside from having a cold opening, the drama sticks to a very linear version of the story, and I think for a TV show or film, that’s probably the best way to do it. We see everything, we get shocked and tricked and betrayed and surprised along with the characters, we feel the biggest impact at the climactic scenes having experienced all the build-up. The novel on the other hand is not only much more non-linear in WHEN we learn bits and pieces of information, but that information is also obfuscated under wei wuxian’s multiple layers of Unreliable Narratoritis, which are as follows: 1) difficulty remembering things because of personality/avoiding painful memories/actual memory loss, 2) No Homo Goggles still on, and 3) a wry sense of humor that makes the reader unsure of how much they can trust his attitude toward things, especially near the beginning. The experience of reading is a puzzle the reader has to mentally piece together through all of the above listed camouflage, and the puzzle itself is a three-sided mystery: One - How Bad of a guy was Wei WuXian really, and how exactly did all the bad stuff in his life go down; Two - wangxian epic pride & prejudice gambits; Three - political murder mystery. (I love stories like this btw... though I fully admit I’m glad I watched first this time bc it might have taken me a long time to tackle otherwise.) Because of this, where the drama wants to pull you in and submerge you in all the most potent emotional parts, the novel in direct contrast deliberately side-steps around these things and asks that you hurt yourself by filling in the blanks. In fact the more intense emotions and painful memories involved, whether it be his relationship with jiang yanli, his DEATH, the darkest days of war times etc, the more the novel evasively withholds details. I actually really like both styles of storytelling but each one is obviously way better suited to its medium. ANYWAY.... THATS BASICALLY WHERE MY BRAINS AT WHILE IM READING GAY SWORD WIZARD BOOKS

- The extras are so saturated with domestic married bliss that it’s a good thing I stopped taking pictures because I’d just take a picture of every page. this is too much for me to take... I did jump the gun a few times and read a few fanfics while I was still mid-read of the book (I tried to hold out but alas I am mortal) and at one point after finishing I was like “wow what fic was it in where lwj says something cute and wwx kisses him in public but they’re in the corner of the restaurant so no one really sees... OH NO WAIT that was actually in there.” and ... and that’s the LEAST OF IT... *stares into the distance* theyre married wow

- I ofc couldn’t help but see a few vague blogs beforehand so honestly I was braced for something like, wildly ooc for the sake of porn to happen in the extras... I definitely appreciate how the incense burner porn interludes could be uhhh a lot for many people and not my personal cup of tea in terms of smut however [here follows the words of a poisonous frog who has dwelt her whole life in the rainforests of BL] the concept is also surprisingly SWEET SDFLKJF like wwx sees lan wangji’s darkest mixed-up violent teenage fantasies and he’s just like aww babe you had a crush on me!! just... good for them

- I swear I’m not gonna rehash every cute married thing they do but wei wuxian grading papers in the tub........................rEALLY GOT ME

- I want to Draw - ok thats enough if I keep going I’ll just write “wei wuxian grading papers in the tub” seven more times probably

#mdzs readthru #this obviously has many spoilers

[soveryanon]

Reviewing time for MAG158 TT_____TT

- Saying the most obvious and unspecific first: this was a very packed, very dense episode which managed to cram so much in just 20 minutes? I’ve relistened to it many times, and I still feel like I’m coming out of it breathless and reeling every time. So many things happening, about the past, about the present, about possible future implications? So many things finally exploding in our faces after having been introduced and/or kept as hanging threats since the beginning of the season, or earlier (Leitner had warned Jon that he had only trapped the Not!Them, not killed it), or later: Peter’s plans, Martin’s perception of the events, Elias’s agenda, what the tunnels had been hiding all along, Julia&Trevor attacking after their previous retreat, Daisy and the call of The Hunt, Jon’s worry for Martin…

The climax of each season had also been the occasion to take a look at who had been lost and how they had impacted characters: in season 1, Jon was explaining that he still wanted to know what had happened to Gertrude (MAG039: “And to top it all, I still don’t know what happened to Gertrude. Officially she’s still missing, but Elias is no help and the police were pretty clear that the wait to call her dead is just a formality. If I die, wormfood or… something else, whatever, I’m going to make damn sure the same doesn’t happen to me.”). In season 2, Jon was realising that Sasha had been dead all along, and given a probable culprit for Gertrude’s murder through Leitner’s mouth (MAG080: “And Sasha… The real one?” “Was that her name? I’m afraid she’s gone. Whatever it does to those it takes, they don’t come back. She’s dead. … Do you need a moment?” / “I believe it was Elias.” “What? Why?” “I assume he discovered we were planning to destroy the Archives.”). In season 3, Gertrude and Leitner(‘s bodies) came back to literally haunt Jon, puppetted by Stranger creatures during The Unknowing, after Nikola had toyed with Jon about Sasha:

(MAG119) NIKOLA: Oh, you caught me~ I’m… Sasha! ARCHIVIST: Shut up! NIKOLA: No~! Really, it’s me! Sasha– whatever her name was! Back from the dead, just like you wanted~! ARCHIVIST: Get away from me, or, or I swear I’ll… I’ll… […] GERTRUDE: This is your fault. ARCHIVIST: It is not! It’s not, I didn’t know, it’s not my fault you died! LEITNER: No, I suppose not. Me, on the other hand…

MAG158 opened hostilities right away: Peter mentioned Tim (and got immediately shut down by Martin), was using a Leitner book covered in the man’s blood, and then proceeded to free the Not!Them, who was still using its voice from the Not!Sasha time (so maybe a bit of that physical appearance, too?), while Jon, Basira and Daisy got to listen to what appeared to be a recording of Elias and Gertrude’s last interaction and the latter’s murder:

(MAG158) PETER: [INHALE] I’m sure– … what was his name? … Tim! Tim would– MARTIN: I’d really– … rather not talk about it, Peter. […] PETER: Not to mention, if they do change, well – I happen to have something that will change them back. MARTIN: … That’s a Leitner. PETER: It is! MARTIN: And the, em… the blood on it? PETER: That’s Leitner too! MARTIN: … Riiight…

[…] MARTIN: Pe–Peter? Peter, there’s a– … Peter, I think there’s something in there… PETER: Mm-mm. I’d stay quiet if I were you. [SOUND OF STONE AND BRICK SHIFTING, LOUDER] NOT!SASHA: [MUFFLED, HEAVILY DISTORTED] Jooo–ooon~! [SOUND OF STONE AND BRICK SHIFTING, LOUDER, THEN GRADUALLY STOPPING] NOT!SASHA: [HEAVILY DISTORTED] [PANTS] So you finally decided to let me out, Jon! Joooo–oooon~! … Who’s there? MARTIN: [PANICKED BREATHING]

[…] ARCHIVIST: Do you remember what happened to Sasha? BASIRA: That’s the thing that took her? ARCHIVIST: It was trapped in the tunnels, it– Martin. Something’s happening down there.

[…] GERTRUDE: I’m not really in the mood for nostalgia, Elias. You might have noticed I’m rather busy, so either shoot me or– [ONE GUNSHOT] GERTRUDE: [GASP] [BODY COLLAPSING] GERTRUDE: … Well… there it is… I thought it would hurt more… [GUN BEING PUT AWAY] ELIAS: [SIGH] Pity.

From the start, the episode was a concentration of the people who have been lost, while on the verge of losing more (Daisy losing herself to The Hunt; Martin being wooshed into The Lonely; Jon on the verge of “drowning” while pursuing Martin). This time, it was even more destabilising that we covered events from before the beginning of the series, even though they had been open questions and recurring subjects: Elias/Jonah’s relation to the Institute, the fact that the Archival staff was bound to him/it, Gertrude’s death.

And it happened when everything was going to hell at the same time: there was such a wonderful contrast between Martin and Peter (and Elias’s)’s scenes, which were slow, gave place to words (words and steps echoing over the constant wind-like constant whispers (?) of the Panopticon), and the utter chaos reigning in the Archives, the gunshots and the screams and the mess provoked in Julia, Trevor, the Not!Them and then Daisy’s wakes…

(If I have to pinpoint moments I’m holding a bit dearer than the others, outside of Elias’s laughter (I mean, yeah, that sure happened? I might have relistened to the isolated track a few dozens of time and I still can’t believe it happened), it would be Daisy’s “Promise me.” and Martin’s “Funny. Looks like I was right the first time – it’s probably still a good way to get killed.” because both broke my heart for various reasons. I’ve always been ridiculously weak to the deep background sound that we heard during Martin’s tirade (I mostly associate it to MAG081) – it always gives an atmosphere of solemnity, of gravity, and it just matched perfectly the way Martin was explaining himself, telling his own story. … Almost giving his own statement, or testament.)

OKAY, NOW, THE MEAT OF THINGS. I know, the length of this post doesn’t give it away, but… I’ll go quicker and less rambly than usual, there was simply too much and I only got a week (minus one day bc delay) *cries* (this episode was excellent, okay).

- Gertrude’s murder! Fucking finally:

(MAG043) ARCHIVIST: Part of me worries about what I might find on these tapes, but a… bigger part of me worries that I will find nothing. This uncertainty is wearing on me. And I don’t know how much more I can take.

(MAG052) ARCHIVIST: […] No luck with any of my other leads yet. At least I have another of Gertrude’s tapes. It’s always going to be a shot in the dark with them, but… hopefully an informative one. I know the secret to her death is on one of them, it must be. I just… I hope I don’t have to hear it first-hand.

(MAG066) ARCHIVIST: Gertrude’s laptop has been rather… interesting. Unfortunately, nothing along the lines of “my_murderer.avi”, and she didn’t keep any sort of diary from what I can see.

Well, “my_murderer.wav” heard first-hand counts, right?

* In the same episode, Jon had noticed previous orders made on her computer; Leitner had told Jon that she was planning to destroy the Archives and Elias had mentioned “arson”, so yep! She had indeed tried to get rid of the problem that way:

(MAG066) ARCHIVIST: There’s also the matter of the products she was ordering. There were several online orders of petrol, lighter fluid, pesticides, and high-powered torches. They are sporadic, but notable in that she did not drive, smoke or work in pest control.

(MAG080) ELIAS: What did you want from him? LEITNER: The files. The ones you took from Gertrude. ELIAS: Planning a little light arson, are we Jurgen? LEITNER: It’s not just the Institute and you know it. They had everything she had found on the Stranger.

(MAG158) [GURGLING LIQUID] [DOOR OPENS] ELIAS: Gertrude. GERTRUDE: [SIGH] … Damn… ELIAS: Did you really think I wouldn’t notice? GERTRUDE: I’d rather hoped you’d still be hampered with all The Dark’s business. […] Shame, really; I used to be able to torch a building in half the time. [SIGH] Age catches us all. […] ELIAS: What exactly were you hoping to achieve here? Why not come at me directly instead of burning everything first? GERTRUDE: I was rather hoping the fire would occupy you while I did just that.

It sounded obvious, especially given how Elias had behaved when Martin had begun to burn statements, but it hadn’t been definitely confirmed until now. Once again, was Gertrude’s fondness for fire and explosions (the old Archives in Alexandria, The Last Feast, the plan for The Unknowing) influenced by her being bound to Agnes from The Desolation…? She seemed to favour these options a lot.

* HHHHHHHHHHHH So, the trick Gertrude had pulled was: Elias was supposed to be distracted because keeping an eye on a ritual attempt (to make sure The Dark ritual derailed okay), then grabbing his attention by setting fire to the Archives, while her real plan lay elsewhere (going down in the tunnels to reach his body and kill it).

(MAG158) GERTRUDE: I’d rather hoped you’d still be hampered with all The Dark’s business. [DOOR CLOSES] It’s their… “Grand Eclipse” at the moment, isn’t it? ELIAS: [SIGH] But I think we’ve both come to the same conclusion about that. That’s why you’re here. […] So you burn the place down, use it as cover to reach my body, and then we die together.

That’s… that was the exact same plan Martin carried out: knowing that Elias would be keeping an Eye on The Unknowing, grabbing his attention by burning statements in the Archives, while the real plan was elsewhere (Melanie stealing evidence to convict him). I’m not sure if, back then, Elias had felt like déjà-vu and planned accordingly, only pretending to get fooled (we now have confirmation that he could have left prison anytime anyway), or if he fell for it twice… well. He hadn’t fallen for it with Gertrude, but knew that The Dark wouldn’t be a real threat (while The Unknowing still was… presumably).

(… But it’s also what Elias had been doing all through season 4 with Martin, The Extinction and Jon: partially keeping Martin occupied with The Extinction, distracting him with the fact that Peter & Elias had something on the line… while the actual plan was most likely to get something out of Jon through Martin.)

* I’m so so so fond of the way Gertrude was putting emphasis on the name “Elias” as soon as he entered – she wasn’t hiding that she knew about him from the start:

(MAG158) GERTRUDE: [SIGH] Age catches us all. … Well. Almost all of us, Elias. ELIAS: You were the one so… insistent on staying human.

(And it took Jonah!Elias a while to catch on to that, when she mentioned his body. Did he know that she knew, and the only reveal was that she had understood that his old body was a weak spot?)

* Goooods, sound-wise the episode was a treat, but the nonverbal “answers” through sounds (which were directly putting pictures in mind), when Gertrude flicked her lighter and we could hear Elias cocking a gun in return?

(MAG158) ELIAS: … Quite. It… was a good plan, actually. If you hadn’t been so complacent about me keeping an eye out down here, probably would have worked. [HUFF] “Gertrude’s grand retirement”…! GERTRUDE: It still might. Just needs a little [OPENING A ZIPPO] spark, and… [COCKED GUN] GERTRUDE: I see. So you’re finally getting your hands dirty. I must really have caught you off-guard.

I love that no description was needed, just sounds perfectly carrying across what was happening, a gesture leading to another, each holding their own weapon through the verbal duel.

* WHY AM I GETTING FUEL (ha) TO SHIP GERTRUDE/ELIAS A BIT MORE, I mean, there is definite Aesthetic in the way… they had been around each other for a long while (almost a fourth of Jonah’s “life”/lives?):

(MAG158) ELIAS: So you burn the place down, use it as cover to reach my body, and then we die together. [CHUCKLE] How… poetic. Doesn’t seem like your style at all. […] I suppose we both got a little complacent. Fifty years is a long time! [CHUCKLE] “End of an era”. GERTRUDE: I’m not really in the mood for nostalgia, Elias. You might have noticed I’m rather busy, so either shoot me or– [ONE GUNSHOT] GERTRUDE: [GASP] [BODY COLLAPSING] GERTRUDE: … Well… there it is… I thought it would hurt more… [GUN BEING PUT AWAY] ELIAS: [SIGH] Pity.

So familiar and intimate in a way? And, uh, Elias was still regretting her death. So somehow, she would still have been a viable option for The Watcher’s Crown, or still usable as an Eye agent, if she hadn’t tried to burn the place down? Aouch. What does it take to not be a viable option…?

* The thing about Gertrude’s age echoed Eric’s comment about it:

(MAG154) GERTRUDE: Well, it’s… good to see you, I suppose. ERIC: You too. … You got old. GERTRUDE: Better than being dead. ERIC: [HUFF] Fair enough. To be honest, I’m impressed, more than anything. Hard to get old in this business; you either die or you, er… “stay young”.

(MAG158) GERTRUDE: [SIGH] Age catches us all. … Well. Almost all of us, Elias. ELIAS: You were the one so… insistent on staying human. GERTRUDE: And no doubt that makes my death a lot less complicated.

And if Jonah had indeed been body-hopping from Head of the Institute to Head of the Institute, he was stopping at middle-age: Jon had mentioned that James Wright had been director from 1973 to 1996, so around 23 years. And we have, in parallel, Jonah’s actual body… which keeps getting older apparently:

(MAG158) MARTIN: Curren–… [QUICK FOOTSTEPS] [SHARP BREATHING] … Who is that? PETER: Jonah Magnus! His… body, at least. Sitting here; watching; binding it all together; growing ever older.

(Also, confirmation that Jon’s comment in MAG001 about Gertrude having been Head Archivist for fifty years wasn’t an exaggeration, since Jonah!Elias said the same. … Meanwhile, Jon has been Archivist for only three years and… is already reaching that level of disaster. Either Elias was really lucky circumstances-wise or regarding Jon’s personality, either he reaaaally played his cards well, holy heck.)

* That friggin’ scene:

(MAG158) GERTRUDE: I’m not really in the mood for nostalgia, Elias. You might have noticed I’m rather busy, so either shoot me or– [ONE GUNSHOT] GERTRUDE: [GASP]

To quote Melanie in MAG147: “… Famous last words.”

But also: brfehdjngfd I’m so upset about TIM, because this? This???

(MAG104) TIM: Okay – well, let me tell you what. If you want me to ignore everything that’s going on, forget my brother, and everything that’s happened over the last two years… how about you kill me? ELIAS: … I don’t want it to come to that. TIM: Well, me either. But here we are! So my proposal for you is this: either kill me, or fuck off. ELIAS: … I’ll come back– TIM: [EXPLOSIVE SIGH] ELIAS: –when you’re feeling more… reasonable.

Tim dodged a LITERAL BULLET, and what might have been Elias’s thoughts in MAG104? When the scene happened in the Archives (not sure whether it was in the same office but I’m pretty sure it was the same sound effect for the door), when Tim used the same reasoning, and when Elias just left, this time? (Did he spare Tim because Tim wasn’t an actual threat back then, more bark than bite, or because he still had use for him, or both…? I’ve always wondered if Elias hadn’t been a bit fond of Tim, in a cat-playing-with-a-mouse way, because of the way he technically gave him advice on how to handle The Eye’s binding in MAG090 and acknowledged that the Institute could be a lot for the people working there… It was definitely keeping Tim in check, sure, but Tim was just sulking in his corner and back from his fleeing attempt, it wasn’t necessary to make him feel less bad…?)

* fdsjcxnerfds I’m half mad half??? Hysterical??? That every season is still ending on a big “what truly happened to Gertrude” note because THE TAPE WE HEARD RAISED MORE QUESTIONS THAN IT ANSWERED:

-> There is the question of Gertrude’s fears. In MAG157, Adelard raised a good question about whether Gertrude was as stone-cold as we thought or was just very good at dissimulating… and she still didn’t sound that scared when Elias shot her? But Oliver had described her as looking absolutely terrorised:

(MAG011, “Antonio Blake”) “I could see none of the figure’s body beneath the flesh that enclosed them, but as I moved around I saw the face was uncovered. It was your face and the expression upon it was far more fearful than any I had seen in eight years of wandering this twilight city. That was when I awoke.”

(MAG158) [ONE GUNSHOT] GERTRUDE: [GASP] [BODY COLLAPSING] GERTRUDE: … Well… there it is… I thought it would hurt more…

She could have been dissimulating how truly afraid she was, but. Mmmm. She didn’t sound like she was afraid of Elias – just a bit annoyed at having been interrupted.

-> Their dialogue set that scene in March 2015, when The Dark was carrying out its ritual attempt.

(MAG158) GERTRUDE: I’d rather hoped you’d still be hampered with all The Dark’s business. [DOOR CLOSES] It’s their… “Grand Eclipse” at the moment, isn’t it?

Elias had told Jon that blood had been found in Gertrude’s office on March 15th, 2015, and that the police had established that it was Gertrude’s blood, and that such a blood loss led them to conclude that she was dead (MAG040). But March 15th was one day after Oliver’s statement (MAG011), whose dreams put Gertrude’s Planned End around March 22nd; it doesn’t match the peak of The Dark’s ritual (with the eclipse over Ny-Ålesund having happened on March 20th) either. ………………… and it still doesn’t explain why we have a tape of Gertrude reading a statement on April 4th, 2015 (when she should be dead-dead). The other problem with MAG087 is that Jon, in his post-statement, also behaved as if Gertrude had died in March 2016; he said it was a recording from one year prior to her death, when she said the date was 2015 and was reading a statement from October 2014 (can’t read a statement from October 2014 if the actual recording date was in April 2014 and she had accidentally pronounced the recording date wrong, right?), and when Jon himself pointed out that according to the recording, Jude Perry, mentioned by Gertrude, was still living in London two years earlier (Jon was recording in March-April 2017: if Gertrude’s tape was from 2014, that would have been three years earlier). So, I would be more willing to think that Jon didn’t catch on to the fact that Gertrude was still kicking a few weeks after her official date of death rather than accept that there were three consecutive timeline mistakes in that episode. Gertrude had also mentioned in her post-statement (officially on April 4th) that:

(MAG087) GERTRUDE: […] I had assumed Orsinov and her ilk would have spent more time searching for their precious skin, maybe even acting against me directly, before they started alternate preparations. I had hoped I’d have a chance to recover. I can still barely stand.

… she had recently been injured. Could be about the taxidermy shop, when she took the gorilla skin, but we still don’t know for sure. Even if she had been protected from a fatal injury (plain old bulletproof vest covered with blood sacks? Supernatural protection?), that would still have been enough to be severely injured, especially at her age.

-> Elias and Gertrude didn’t say it outright but implied it clearly enough:

(MAG158) ELIAS: So you burn the place down, use it as cover to reach my body, and then we die together. [CHUCKLE] How… poetic. Doesn’t seem like your style at all. GERTRUDE: I wasn’t actually planning on dying. ELIAS: And how exactly were you planning on achieving that while you’re still bound to the… ha. Oh, I see. Very clever. [CHUCKLE] I thought Eric was the only one to figure that little morsel out.

The plan for Gertrude was to reach the Panopticon, gouge her eyes out, kill Jonah’s body for real to neutralise him, and escape the fallout. Which would have meant becoming blind and cutting her connection to The Eye before moving on to neutralising The Unknowing. In October 2014, so shortly before Gerry’s death, she was still speculating that she would need someone tied to The Eye to stop The Stranger (and she had told Gerry that she had a secret storage unit; so she already had the explosives in mind, it was requiring both):

(MAG137) GERTRUDE: Doesn’t help with The Unknowing, though. [HEAVY SIGH] We still have Dekker’s back-up plan, of course, but… it’s very risky. To be sure, I–I think the detonation would need to happen from within The Unknowing, while it was going on. Gerard may have a connection to The Eye, but I’m not convinced it will be enough.

… if she had cut her own connection to The Eye, she wouldn’t have been a viable sacrifice either. So why try to neutralise Elias before The Unknowing, while sacrificing her chances at stopping the latter?

-> Biggest problem:

(MAG040) ARCHIVIST: Martin… How did Gertrude Robinson die? MARTIN: … I don’t know. Not for sure; it was so dark, and I only saw the body for a few seconds. The police were quite clear that the cause of death could be absolutely any– ARCHIVIST: Martin, how did she die? MARTIN: She was shot! Three times, that I could see. … Three shots to the chest.

(MAG158) [ONE GUNSHOT] GERTRUDE: [GASP] [BODY COLLAPSING]

Three holes vs. one gunshot. I mean, sure, I can picture Elias placing her down in the tunnels and putting two more bullets in her body “just in case” (or noticing she wasn’t dead already and correcting that. Or a few spiders making a nest in her body. Or Michael stabbing her a few times). But as long as Elias doesn’t confirm, I…………. think it might be very likely that she didn’t die in the tape we heard, but that she bluffed and went off the grid at this point, and that something else caught her later?

It’s absolutely possible that no, actually, she did die there, and some things will click in place (and/or that I’m reading things wrong) but. What would have been enough to make her so afraid, as Oliver had described…? (………… something related to The Extinction, that she had downplayed so much? Something related to Adelard, who had officially died some time before?) (And there are still some dates problems aaaaarg.)

(- We heard Gertrude’s (as of now) official demise from the past, with a tape recorder apparently clicking on on its own… So I wonder: would it be possible to hear even more sneaky tapes from the past? Jon’s hiring around 2012, or his appointment as Head Archivist? Martin’s hiring (in 2009 or earlier), or how he came to work for The Archives (we still don’t know whether Elias put him there, whether Martin volunteered, or if somehow, Martin had asked to come down with Jon)? Gertrude has also mentioned the chat she had with Elias right after he body-hopped into this body (so 1996 or before)…)

- There is still a Story behind The Dark’s ritual attempt, too!

(MAG143) MANUELA: And then… it stopped. It just… stopped. All at once, that loving embrace was stripped from us, and it began to retreat, to recede back into the place that it had come from. We were so close…! … We were so close… I heard Maxwell cry out, scrambling desperately into the Dark Sun, stopping just short of touching it. But it was too late. Whatever it was that you and your Archivist did, it clearly worked.

(MAG158) GERTRUDE: I’d rather hoped you’d still be hampered with all The Dark’s business. [DOOR CLOSES] It’s their… “Grand Eclipse” at the moment, isn’t it? ELIAS: [SIGH] But I think we’ve both come to the same conclusion about that. That’s why you’re here. GERTRUDE: Yes.

Elias and Gertrude had understood why it wouldn’t work, and I wonder if it has to do with Manuela’s statement from July 2014 (MAG135), since it was a direct challenge to the both of them? I still don’t have a clue about why it failed, but I’m assuming that it’s been right under our nose all along…

(The only thing I’ve managed to notice is that it was right around the time that Evan Lukas died; could be absolutely unrelated, but… but. It doesn’t feel like we know the full story about Evan either?)

(Also, confirmation that Elias was UTTERLY FULL OF SHIT ABOUT IT!! BASTARD KNEW!!!

(MAG135) ELIAS: I have been observing a recent increase in people and supplies being moved to the small town of Ny-Ålesund, in Svalbard. An increase which I believe may be linked to a rather desperate attempt, by the People’s Church of the Divine Host, to perform a crude ritual of their own. To bring their… “Mr. Pitch”… into the world. […] If Gertrude had a plan for this one, I haven’t found it, which is why Jon needs to be closer to The Eye. If anyone can stop what’s happening, he can. See through the darkness, etcetera.

To his credit: it doesn’t seem like Gertrude actively stopped that one, but rather that it failed on his own… so he indeed didn’t know about her potential plans (since they weren’t necessary in the end). And he did point out to Basira that the Aurora Borealis were ~lovely~ in the current season, so. The increase of people/supplies. Might. Have. Just Been. Because of the touristic season. Fucker.)

- It Is Always A Good Time to remember that Elias had once called Jon “dramatic”:

(MAG067) ELIAS: Oh, good lord, don’t be so dramatic, Jon! You know how hard it would be to replace you! ARCHIVIST: I–I don’t, actually. But… thank you. I suppose.

Mister “Making Sure My Entrance Is The Most Dramatic Entrance That Ever Entrance’d” and “Planning My Lines Ahead So I GO BACK TO TRYING TO SAY THEM, DON’T INTERRUPT ME, JON”…

(MAG158) MARTIN: [SHAKY INHALE] … Where are his eyes? ELIAS: Exactly– MARTIN: [GASP] ELIAS: –where they’ve always been, Martin. Watching over my Institute.

[…] ARCHIVIST: What is this place? ELIAS: Hm! A complicated question, and time is– ARCHIVIST: [STATIC] That’s the Panopticon… […] “But”? ELIAS: “But” for Martin? Time is very much of the essence.

… had called Jon dramatic.

Asshole had the line “time is (very much) of the essence” and desperately wanted to place it, uh.

- I’m a bit sad over the Jonah Reveal, because the idea that our “Elias” was actually truly an old lazy student and pothead turned absolute fanatical zealot (and/or the idea that other avatars kept assuming he was actually Jonah Magnus when he wasn’t) cracked me up so much! Would sure have been a different story than Your Antagonist Is Actually An Old Victorian Asshole Who Didn’t Want To Die, but it makes a lot of sense and we’ve had so, so many little things pointing out in that direction:

(MAG049) ARCHIVIST: Supplemental. Elias Bouchard is a difficult man to pin down, certainly since he became head of the Institute in 1996, taking over from James Wright, who ran the place from ‘73 until he passed away. It was a remarkably fast climb to the top, as from what I can find, it looks like he only joined the Institute five years before, in 1991, working in the Artefact Storage. Perhaps he was simply that impressive. Certainly, the Elias I know now is almost unmatched in terms of paranormal knowledge. Well. Theoretical knowledge, at least. And yet, everything I found out about his life before the Institute seems… an ill fit with the austere man I know. He apparently graduated with a Third from Christ Church’s College in PPE, and I found an old gossip column in the student newspaper that – sure well – that mentioned him. If I’m not reading too much into it, the implication seems to be that he was… something of a… pothead [CHUCKLES]. Was he… like that when he first came to work here…?

(MAG092) ELIAS: Jonah Magnus did leave him in that place, Jon. He got the letter, oh yes, and was on good terms with Mordechai Lukas. He could have interceded, perhaps even saved him, but he did not. And it was not out of malice, or because he lacked affection for Barnabas Bennett: he retrieved those bones sadly enough when the time came. Bones that you can still find in my office, if you know where to look. No, it was because he was curious. Because he had to know, to watch and see it all. That’s what this place is, Jon, never forget it. You may believe yourself to have friends, to have confidantes, but in the end, all they are, is something for you to watch, to know, and ultimately to discard. This, at least, Gertrude understood.

(MAG096) DAISY: El–Elias didn’t say. ARCHIVIST: No, he doesn’t, uh… He’s not big on micromanagement. SARAH: It’s Elias now, then? ARCHIVIST: [WHISPERING] What? DAISY: Get on with it.

(MAG101) NIKOLA: Is it… your Elias who listens? Helloooooo! […] So, Elias, can I call you Elias?, let me set the scene, as I know you can’t actually see this. […] You know Elias, can I call you Elias?, you have not raised this one very well! […] Oh, no, I’m afraid he can’t See, can you Elias?, can I call you Elias? – what’s the point of having a secret place of power if you can’t hide it from a big stupid eye?

(MAG135, Manuela Dominguez) “When you read this, I would consider it a great favour if you could share my words with the Head of your Institute. Tell him that Maxwell Rayner sends his regards and offers… sanctuary. A time of holy Darkness is at hand, when The Eye will close forever, and in the spirit of the friendship they once shared, he offers an opportunity – to surrender.”

(MAG138, Robert Smirke) “I beg you, do not pursue this goal; if only a single lesson may be gleaned from my life of long study, and longer hardship, it is that the fear of Death is natural, and to flee from it will only bring greater misery. Repent of your sins, Jonah. Seek forgiveness. I am certain the Dread Powers cannot take a soul that keeps faith in the Resurrection.”

(MAG148) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] Did he mention it at all? My, uh… BASIRA: Oh, your new diet? Nothing useful. Didn’t seem too fazed by it. ARCHIVIST: [LONG SIGH] Right. BASIRA: What? ARCHIVIST: … I–I don’t know, I mean… We still don’t really know… what Elias actually is…? I thought… Maybe if he was more like me than we realised…

So at this point: it was a popular suspicion/theory amongst viewers, but amongst characters, too – at least, Basira wasn’t fazed and seemed to take it as confirmation of a suspicion more than anything:

(MAG158) ARCHIVIST: Uh– yes. And I’d wager that Elias’s body, uh… BASIRA: Gotta be Jonah Magnus, right? ARCHIVIST: I’d say so. BASIRA: [SIGH] And he’s been body-hopping like whatever was in Rayner.

And Martin was surprised by Elias suddenly being there (who wouldn’t be?) but didn’t seem too surprised about the reveal in itself either. Same with Jon, who quickly accepted it – not as casually as Basira, and he seemed to have been shaken/startled by something, but still very smoothly.

I’m satisfied by the way it was done in this episode – Jonah’s body being discovered as Elias revealed himself and as the (last?) conversation between him and Gertrude played. And YES, his entrance and reveal was EXTREMELY DRAMATIC, but it was also so damn good and chilling. Plus, there was the surprise factor of the fact that he’s apparently body-hopping by plugging his ~eyes~ into his hosts? Which fits and is a very neat contrast to the way to escape the Institute’s binding, as Eric and Melanie demonstrated (making sure to destroy their own eyes).

- Still gonna call him “Elias” as long as we don’t know much about who Real OG Pothead Elias was, I’m not in denial over the fact it’s Jonah Magnus, right? But he was called Elias for so long that it stuck.

And I’m laughing a bit that in-series, it seems to be the same thing for Jon? He still called him “Elias”, and Gertrude and Peter did the same; only Martin corrected himself and went with “Jonah” like a good boy:

(MAG158) ARCHIVIST: But Elias put him in charge, that doesn’t make any–! […] ELIAS: Peter. PETER: Elias. […] MARTIN: Elias– … Jonah had nothing to do with it.

But nop, for Jon, still “Elias”. (Is it because part of him is in denial, or out of habit, or an attempt to still cling to some stability, or because calling him “Jonah” sounds too close to his own name?)

- I’m delighted because there are soooo many implications now:

* So, how much of a blast did Jonah have letting the letters addressed to him stay around in the Archives and be read by Jon (MAG023, MAG050, MAG127) and Martin (MAG098, MAG138)?

* When Elias finally entered the room in MAG118…

(MAG118) MARTIN: Oh sorry! Sorry, I’m not keeping you from the show, am I? Well, well you head back, I’ll keep myself busy here. Albrecht von Closen is next, I think. It’s quite an old one! Should go up very quickly. ELIAS: [EXASPERATED BREATHING] … Did Jon put you up to this?

Martin was on the verge of burning Albrecht’s letter!! Given that Jonah wasn’t unrelated to what happened to Albrecht in the end, according to MAG127…

* It was before the Institute, but the Archives contained John Flamsteed’s letter (1715), revealing that Rayner was a body-hopper; and the Archives also contained Doctor Algernon Moss’s letter from 1864 about Rayner’s powers. That was three years before Smirke’s letter to Jonah, accusing and warning him about the danger of serving The Eye. Manuela had also pointed out that ~the Head of the Institute~ and Maxwell Rayner used to be friends (unless it was taunting from the start: “the friendship they once shared”) so… Jonah probably took a page from Rayner’s personal book, though giving it an Eye touch.

(… He also borrowed from Rayner’s book re: using someone’s love and desire to save someone they care for in order to make them do atrocious thing, as what happened with Robert Montauk and his wife, but more on that later.)

* It’s extra-funny that Nikola was all “Can I call you Elias?” since Grimaldi, who was proto-Nikola… was alive during Jonah’s actual lifetime. Jonah probably saw him onstage.

* Jonah was also alive when Ruskin’s book came out – the Fear version might have popped up before or after but still, it was from Jonah’s era, and worked in the tunnels, and was even used in this episode during Peter&Martin’s progression:

(MAG080) LEITNER: An unexpurgated copy of Ruskin’s The Seven Lamps of Architecture, published in 1845. Of course, Ruskin didn’t even begin writing the book until 1846, and the text of this one varies markedly from the version that was distributed. It gives an acute sense of the walls pressing in around you, and if consumed recklessly will physically entomb the reader. Over the years I have found that it interacts with Smirke’s architecture, and those tunnels specifically, in a more predictable way. By carefully reading specific passages in certain locations I am able to exercise… a degree of control over the substance of the tunnels.

* Avatars/monsters were all so cool and fair-play about it?? Manuela didn’t call him “Jonah” (she didn’t name him), Peter always called him “Elias”, Simon didn’t mention Elias or the Head of the Institute at all… How many of them knew, and were probably thinking it was the worst secret ever kept, but still had their fun using his new host’s name? They’ve been so sportsmanlike and nice to him.

* That line in the season 3 Q&A about how ~Elias was older than he sounded~ =D

* … MAG138, Robert Smirke’s letter, was probably a hint to Martin not only about the tunnels (as he was thinking) but about Jonah still being There. Smirke had specifically mentioned Jonah’s fear of dying as he was giving himself to The Eye. Peter was actually preparing Martin to the concept that Jonah hadn’t really died (and that Martin was supposed to kill him)…………………

(MAG138, Robert Smirke) “I beg you, do not pursue this goal; if only a single lesson may be gleaned from my life of long study, and longer hardship, it is that the fear of Death is natural, and to flee from it will only bring greater misery.”

* The fact that Elias hadn’t been preoccupied by The Extinction’s emergence, while acknowledging that it might be happening… might be because he was around when The Flesh emerged? Gerry had pointed out that its “ascendance” happened during the Smirke era (MAG111: “I think it’s quite new. Only just beginning its, uh, ascendance when Smirke labelled it.”), and it indeed didn’t change the game much. Might be why Elias wasn’t that preoccupied by it, outside of the fact that he was aiming for his own ritual anyway?

* Now, think back to a lot of things that happened in the course of the series. When Mary Keay roasted Elias by describing him as “not big on action” (MAG062)? It was actually about Jonah Magnus.

This excellent dialogue?

(MAG079) TIM: […] There is something in this place, and it’s messing up our heads. It watches us all the time, it stops me quitting, I’m pretty sure it would stop Elias firing Jon even if he decided to actually try running this place for once. […] Er… Elias is probably still in his office. MARTIN: I thought you said he was a waste of a suit. TIM: Yeah, well he’s better than nothing!

… was actually about Jonah Magnus (mARTIN caLlED hIM A “wAStE oF A sUIt”…)

Jon (Master Of Redundancy) said that Jonah Magnus was a “cocky prick” in MAG096, and of “zero practical use” in MAG102.

Tim told Jonah Magnus to “fuck off” in MAG104.

Xiaoling implied that Jonah Magnus was too lazy to handle an Archivist whose mother-tongue wouldn’t be English, back in MAG105.

Peter said this

(MAG108) PETER: Oh. That doesn’t sound like the Elias I know. He killed people himself? […] Elias Bouchard, getting his hands dirty. Well-well. Must be the End Times.

about Jonah frigging Magnus.

A police officer punched Jonah Magnus in MAG120, and Basira beat him up during an extended sequence in MAG148.

I mean. It was already hilarious when about “Elias”, but replace everything with “Jonah Magnus” and or “an old Victorian body-hopper”, and suddenly, all of this becomes even more satisfying. (Especially Basira’s episode.)

- There are also a few more recent power-related things which also take on a new dimension with the Reveal:

* Martin had picked up on the fact that Elias had known about Prentiss in the tunnels for a while, which Elias didn’t deny… so it didn’t seem like the tunnels were an Absolute Blind Spot for him.

(MAG118) MARTIN: Not even close. Because… [HEAVY BREATHING] I… I’ve been thinking. It’s not like you’ve got this all-seeing thing recently. You’ve had it the whole time. I remember the way you looked at Sasha after the attack. You knew it wasn’t her. And I reckon you knew Prentiss was lurking under the Institute, too, and you did nothing. Why? [SILENCE] WHY?! [SLAMS TABLE] ELIAS: … Let’s just get this over with, shall we?

Or at least, he knew them well enough to be able to tell that Prentiss was there. (Not sure who drew Peter’s map for him: could be Helen, since he was mentioning her to Martin right before and Helen Richardson used to be good with maps; could have been Elias, since he was waiting in the Panopticon, so the tunnels weren’t as off-limit had Jon had previously assumed, and he perfectly knew the way – well, he had been alive when everything had been designed and built, so Makes sense.

What is still odd is: how come Martin was able to find Gertrude’s body down there, back in season 1…?)

* I hate him:

(MAG120) MARTIN: You didn’t just see it in me? ELIAS: Honestly, I didn’t look. For all my power, I will admit I am not immune to making the occasional lazy assumption. I presumed that I knew you thoroughly, but by the time you demonstrated otherwise… well. There was simply too much to keep watching over. I only have two eyes, after all.

“I only have two eyes after all” fuuuuuckkkkk oooooooooooooffff, oh my goooooods!!!

* erfysudhbjzreds THAT BIT!!! THAT BIT!!!

(MAG134) PETER: What does puzzle me, though, and I mean that genuinely, is… why you were piling tape recorders onto the coffin, while Jon was in there. [PAUSE] It’s a question, Martin, it’s– it’s not an accusation. MARTIN: I don’t know. And I just… felt like it might help. He’s always recording, I thought… it–it might help him… find his way out. PETER: Interesting. Were you compelled? MARTIN: [SULLEN] … I don’t know. … M–maybe? I–I, I definitely wanted to do it… PETER: But? MARTIN: I’m… I’m not sure where the idea came from. PETER: You should watch out for that. Could be something dangerous.

Peter was actually suspecting that Elias was trying to interfere, back then?! Since he was suspecting Elias of trying to do just that in MAG158:

(MAG158) MARTIN: … If I… if I do kill you… will the others survive? PETER: Elias? [FOOTSTEPS] ELIAS: Come now, Peter. It’s a valid question. […] PETER: I see. … This is your doing, is it? ELIAS: [AUDIBLE GRIN] Hardly…! […] PETER: … No. No! This isn’t fair, do you have any idea what you’ve done? You knew, he must have– MARTIN: Elias– … Jonah had nothing to do with it.

* ……………… Okay, so:

(MAG158) ELIAS: Ah, Jon. I was almost worried…! You found your way all right. ARCHIVIST: [PANTING] Yes. … Ye–yes, I did… How? ELIAS: Suffice it to say I called you.

Is something that Elias can apparently do. And there is one particular time that Jon had mentioned feeling “called” towards something.

(MAG127) BASIRA: And what was that you were doing yesterday? ARCHIVIST: … When…? BASIRA: You were sat on the floor for like four hours. ARCHIVIST: … Oh! Er, n–n–no, I was, er, I was… listening. Y’know, it’s, trying to see if any of the statements… called to me. BASIRA: And? ARCHIVIST: [FLAPPING PAPER] BASIRA: Brilliant.

… Was it actually Elias drawing him towards Jonathan Fanshawe’s statement? Towards the letter of someone who had decided to cut ties with Jonah after what he had done to Albrecht, about what The Eye could do to someone, about something that contributed to the Institute’s early days (the books stolen from the crypt)?

* Jon had wondered why he had been “chosen” back in MAG138… and if it’s really because Jonah fucking Magnus went “oh, he’s called Jonathan and he sounds a bit like Jonathan Fanshawe? Hahaha, wouldn’t it be fun”, I’m going to scream.

* ………… I have been wondering this entire season what was the thing pulling Jon towards this and that statement, and it’s something that Annabelle pointed out in MAG147, when she mentioned that there were various influences… but now, I’m getting even more worried over MAG150, a statement in which someone manages to get out from The Lonely because he was reached by someone he still loved. It sounded like such a weirdly optimistic story, compared to our usual statement? The statement-giver learned and managed to get his life more or less back together, and is working, and things are hard but he’s alright? … What if it really was a red herring, to give Jon the impression that it’s possible to pull the same trick and get out with Martin, when the circumstances are different…?

- What are the things making Elias so frighteningly efficient as an antagonist? I think we got an absolute demonstration in this episode, and it’s quite significant that this is the episode where he revealed himself as Jonah Magnus. Because, what did we know about Jonah? In respectively 1816, 1841 and 1864:

(MAG023, Albrecht von Closen) […] “I recall that during your visit last spring you mentioned your… fascination with the macabre and strange, and pressed upon me as to whether there were any such lore or legends that I myself were familiar with. Wolfgang writes me that you are acquiring quite the collection, and I feel that I now have something that belongs with it, far more than any of the fairy stories or old maids’ tales that I told you before. […] Still, I look forward to showing you the book I have acquired, and the revelations you will no doubt glean from it.”

(MAG050, Sampson Kempthorne) “Dear Jonah; it is my fondest wish that this message should find you in good health, as I have heard more than one mutual acquaintance remark on your current state of overwork. While I earnestly hope it is merely idle gossip, my knowledge of your character leads me to entreat that you allow yourself some respite, or at the very least take some further secretarial staff into your employ. Certain uncharitable quarters would have it that your life consists of little but rattling around in Edinburgh Townhouse, surrounded by piles of ghostly accounts and lunatic documentation. Piles, I am afraid to say, to which I am about to make an addition.”

(MAG098, Doctor Algernon Moss) “I come to you not to wallow in my condition, or pour out my soul like a papist in the confessional, but to request your assistance. I believe that Maxwell Rayner has at his disposal some unholy power that he has used to curse me and cause my blindness. Or, more precisely, to cause me to blind myself, for I shall not deny I did so willingly. For obvious reasons my accusations have had me laughed out of most polite society. Not quite so polite when you’re accusing someone of witchcraft, it would seem. I now ask the assistance of your Institute in the hopes that you may be able to furnish some evidence or legal precedent that may assist me in taking action against my assailant, though I will admit my expectations for the latter are limited. Maxwell Rayner is an oddity. […] So, there is my story. I’m sure you’ll agree that Maxwell Rayner is the clear architect of my misfortune. Now, how do you suppose I revenge myself upon him?”

We got glimpses of his life through Jon and Martin reading the letters addressed to him, sent by friends and intimates who indulged his passion for tales of supernatural stories. Dr. Algernon Moss was requiring his “assistance”, and at that point, by the 1860s, the Institute seemed to already be operating as in the present day (it has a reputation, people come to share their stories, they sometimes require help, and will never get it), but there was fondness in Albrecht von Closen and Sampson Kempthorne’s letters – Adelard Dekkard pointed out that The Eye’s influence was present in his last message to Gertrude (MAG156), but it didn’t sound odd to Albrecht or Sampson to write their stories (statements) willingly, as gifts to a friend.

But we also know that Jonah Magnus actively or passively caused suffering to his own friends and acquaintances, and, in the case of Barnabas, Elias himself acknowledged that it wasn’t even due to a lack of sympathy (1824, 1831, 1867):

(MAG092, Barnabas Bennett) “You must help me. If anyone is still here, it is you. I know your work brings you into contact with all sorts of fantastical terrors, so perhaps you might have it within your power to save me from this place. […] And you must help me, Jonah. If anyone knows of what might break me from this dreadful place, it is you. I know that what is done by those I cannot see might be felt here – I have found glasses broken and pages torn that were not so the night before. It is my hope that if I leave a letter here, in your institute, you might find it, you might be able to save me. I have no other hope. Please, Jonah, if you have any compassion within your heart, you will not leave me in this place. Your loyal servant; Barnabas.” ELIAS: Jonah Magnus did leave him in that place, Jon. He got the letter, oh yes, and was on good terms with Mordechai Lukas. He could have interceded, perhaps even saved him, but he did not. And it was not out of malice, or because he lacked affection for Barnabas Bennett: he retrieved those bones sadly enough when the time came.

(MAG127, Doctor Jonathan Fanshawe) “Jonah; I must first and foremost decline your generous offer of a medical position servicing Millbank Penitentiary. While the terms you’ve laid out are no doubt more than adequate, I have, over these last months, come to the unfortunate conclusion that our intimacy and friendship must cease immediately. I do not know what interest you have in the poor condemned souls within those walls, nor do I care to guess. In the light of what I have so recently witnessed, I can no longer in good conscience associate with any of your endeavours. Nor will I continue to collect or provide all those accounts of the esoteric and otherworldly, that you and your… Institute so eagerly require. Consider this the severing of our acquaintance. This cannot come as a shock to you. Surely, you must have understood what you were asking when you employed me to visit with Albrecht, and apply my… meagre skills to the illness that beset him. You must have known the nature of that illness, even if only in the most general terms. And no doubt you had some intuition as to its cause. […] Because whatever it was that did this to him, I know in my heart that it is your fault. I’ve had the body burned. Please, do not write to me again.”

(MAG138, Robert Smirke) “My dear Jonah; You will forgive me, I hope, for being so forward, but I feel I must break the silence that has characterised our acquaintance for these past decades. […] I am choosing to assume that these manifestations are unintentional, Jonah, and you have not… simply decided to implore a Dark Patron to end the life of an old man. I further find myself supposing that they may emanate from your own intrigues and preparations to culminate those plans which we agreed to abandon so many decades ago! […] The Eye has marked me for something, of this I have no doubt. My… humble hope is that it may be a swift death, an accidental effect of your own researches, which I once again implore you to abandon. It is likely too late for me, but I will not…”

I’m still not sure that Jon got the right handle of it when he took Jonathan Fanshawe’s statement as an indicator that Jonah Magnus had been evil-from-the-start, because it could also be mirroring his own downfall: falling unknowingly into The Eye’s embrace, then trying to shake out of it or to resist it, only to fall entirely later – wasn’t it what happened with Daisy and The Hunt? With Jon himself, though he’s not at the last point (yet…?), when he fed from the suffering of innocents before refraining himself, first because he was forced to (starting MAG148) and then because he was actively trying to not do what The Eye wanted him to (MAG154)? Robert Smirke mentioned that he and Jonah used to share plans before agreeing to abandon them, and that they weren’t answering to the calls of Beholding; either Jonah fooled him, either Jonah indeed fought off The Eye’s influence (after Albrecht’s death?) up until Robert Smirke’s last letter.

But, mostly, these letters told us that Jonah Magnus was far from being unappreciated. People valued him, cared for him, trusted him. And, given how Jonah made them suffer, we would want for that kind of feelings to be Jonah’s weak spot, something he wasn’t able to understand… but Elias knows about them, takes them into account as a potential motivator. At least with the current Archives team, he has constantly weaponised affection as a means of control – ensnaring both Daisy and Basira because of their feelings for each other, getting Jon to join in The Unknowing expedition because of his worry for Tim, partially banking on Martin’s feelings for Jon as a safeguard that Martin wouldn’t entirely fall into Peter’s grasp, luring Jon into the coffin (to experience The Buried and push his powers further) because Jon wanted to rescue Daisy, getting Martin cast into The Lonely because he knew that Jon would do everything to save Martin, even at the cost of himself:

(MAG092) ELIAS: Ah, of course. Er, sometimes I forget how new you all are to this. Basira is now tied to the Institute. All of you are. Like fingers on a hand. And I am the beating heart of it. Should I, or the Institute, be destroyed, you will all, unfortunately, follow suit. MELANIE: Wait, what? TIM: Yup, that sounds about right. ELIAS: And it would not be a pleasant death. DAISY: Bullshit! ELIAS: Then shoot me. Just squeeze the trigger, and watch the only person you care about die screaming. Your last connection to humanity. Do it. BASIRA: Daisy…

(MAG117) ARCHIVIST: Tim isn’t going to sit home and wait, and Elias seems pretty insistent I go along.

(MAG135) ELIAS: His performance during The Unknowing was… disappointing. I needed a way to force him to harness his ability more acutely than he had before. The coffin was a useful tool; Daisy an adequate bait.

(MAG138) MARTIN: Yeah. Well. I’m still not sure I really believe it. [EXHALE] A–and, I don’t… I–… I’m, h… ELIAS: Worried he might charge off into another coffin. [SILENCE] … Quite.

(MAG158) MARTIN: Maybe I just thought joining up with you would be a good way to get killed. And then… [SHAKILY] Jon came back, and… and suddenly, I had a reason: I had to keep your attention on me. Make you feel in control, so you didn’t take it out on him. And if that meant drifting further away… so what? I’d already grieved for him, and if it meant now saving him, it was worth it! […] ELIAS: Peter Lukas has him. Cast him into The Lonely, and with every passing moment, he gets further away from you. ARCHIVIST: How do I bring him back? ELIAS: From out here? … Impossible. ARCHIVIST: … You want me to follow him. ELIAS: No, Jon. You want you to follow him. I simply want you to know that if you do so, you are almost certainly not coming back. To go into The Lonely willingly is as good as death. ARCHIVIST: … How do I do it?

* So, Elias finally revealed that he wasn’t as trapped in prison as he had been pretending to be up until now:

(MAG158) ARCHIVIST: Gone how? DAISY: Just walked out, as far as we can tell. BASIRA: Couple of guards on duty vanished too. ARCHIVIST: “Vanished”? How? BASIRA: Just left. ARCHIVIST: [EXASPERATED SIGH] BASIRA: Best we can tell, he had some dirt on them. DAISY: Old friend at the prison let us know. ARCHIVIST: What, and no one thought of that? BASIRA: Asshole could have left at any time, but he just sat there laughing at us. ARCHIVIST: No, no, this, this can’t be a coincidence…

And indeed, why did he choose to leave now? Was it only because Peter himself had decided that Martin was ready? Is it because another threat is coming? Or had Peter and Elias agreed on a deadline from the start? Jon, back in MAG127, was suspecting that something could be coming with the Institute’s 200th anniversary, though he didn’t know the day the Institute had been founded. Was it actually September 25th or 26th…?

- Soooo, about the Panopticon’s purpose / what it might be capable of doing…

(MAG138, Robert Smirke) “I could not go easy to my grave without offering you one last plea for your restraint. What we built at Millbank should be left well enough alone, resigned to the nightmares of the reprobates and brigands contained within its walls. […] And if, as I came to believe, the Dread Powers were themselves places of a sort, then surely with the right space, the right architecture, they could be contained. Channelled. Harnessed. […] I am not a fool; I know well enough what this dream is likely to mean, and I warn you again that if you have any remaining ambitions to use our work, to try and wear The Watcher’s Crown, you must abandon them! Not simply for the sake of your own soul, but for that of the world! I have always had the utmost respect for you as a man of dignity, and learning. Do not allow yourself to fall to this madness.”

(MAG158) MARTIN: What is this place? PETER: The Panopticon of Millbank prison. Not quite as Smirke originally conceived it, of course. Jonah Magnus made certain… adjustments. MARTIN: And it’s been down here the whole time? PETER: Why do you think this was chosen as the Institute’s location, when the prison closed? It’s a significant site of power for The Beholding. From the tower in the centre of this room, you can see everything. MARTIN: But there’s nothing in the cells…! PETER: [CHUCKLING] I don’t mean the cells, Martin – I mean everything.

* Smirke gave up, Jonah didn’t and/or went back on it. So. Oops. Given how The Eye has indeed been able to feed through the other Fears’ actions (through statements or an Archivist), bad. Badbadbad.

* Did it get fuelled by prisoners’ fears…? From something concrete and tangible, to something immaterial because their feelings powered/scarred the place so much?

* It was very faint, and I LOVED the sound effect present in the tower: something between the wind whistling and very low whispers? It made the place immediately threatening and gave the impression that yeah, there were many ghosts/dead bodies/sufferings caused around it…?

- I’m still rfedubrehjd over the fact that Peter and Elias’s first live interaction was firmly anticipated (Peter had mentioned he was there to see Elias in MAG100! It was the case again in MAG108! We knew, at least from Peter, that they weren’t strangers, although Elias didn’t acknowledge Peter’s existence in return until MAG138; but it has been so long between the moment we learned that they knew each other and their first ‘onscreen’ interaction!) AND YET… managed to be Even Better than I could have dreamed of. Elias was SUCH A SHIT:

(MAG158) ELIAS: I warned you, Peter~ […] PETER: … No. No! This isn’t fair, do you have any idea what you’ve done? You knew, he must have– MARTIN: Elias– … Jonah had nothing to do with it. PETER: No! That’s not– You can’t– ELIAS: You’ve lost, Peter. Admit it. [CHUCKLE] He played you like a… like a cheap whistle. PETER: No! Shut up! ELIAS: Peter. [PAUSE] It’s time. [SILENCE] PETER: … Fine. MARTIN: Great. [VERY SHARP SQUEALS OF DISTORTION INCREASING] Now, perhaps if one of you, then, can tell me what– [SHARP SQUEALS OF DISTORTION REACHING A PEAK, BEFORE DECREASING] ELIAS: It won’t be that bad, Peter~ [CHUCKLE] You’ll see. Now: he’ll be here soon, so you can leave, or… PETER: Oh no. No. I’m not gonna make it easy on him. You haven’t won yet. ELIAS: Your choice. Just make sure to leave the door open.

Compensating much for all of Peter’s little digs, uh. They’re so… divorced…………….

Peter had told Martin right away that Elias had chosen him as interim Director, Jon had been suspecting very early that Peter&Elias were scheming together, Basira’s plural in MAG151 was implying that she was thinking the same…

(MAG120) PETER: Oh! Right, of course! Well, you’ve successfully managed to remove Elias as the Head of the Magnus Institute. So… MARTIN: Oh. Oh, god, what does that do? PETER: Oh! No, no no no! No. Not in any, hum, metaphysical sense, no, he’s still very much the… how did he insist on phrasing it… Ah yes, the “beating heart of the Institute”. But, practically speaking, he can hardly fulfil his more mundane managerial duties from a jail cell. MARTIN: … so he knew this was going to happen? PETER: Not exactly. He… anticipated that you would likely find some way to remove him. So he made alternative arrangements. MARTIN: Which would be you. PETER: Exactly! To be honest with you, Martin, I didn’t expect to be taking over the place so soon, or in such a state of disarray. But, I’ll do my best to keep the place afloat.

(MAG122) BASIRA: No, nothing. Elias isn’t the problem. ARCHIVIST: Sor– what? BASIRA: Elias is locked up. ARCHIVIST: … Wait, Martin’s plan worked? BASIRA: Yeah. A bunch of Section’d officers took him in. He made some sort of deal, I think. But… he’s not getting out anytime soon. ARCHIVIST: … Oh. Wow. O… kay, er… Great, s–so… what’s the problem? BASIRA: He appointed an “interim” director. Guy named Peter Lukas. ARCHIVIST: … Oh.

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: But honestly, it’s the internal threats I’m worried about. Peter Lukas is just… sitting up there, doing whatever the hell it is he [STATIC] and Elias have planned, and Melanie still has that bullet pumping violence into her, waiting to turn this place into another Lanncraig.

(MAG151) BASIRA: [SIGH] … Okay. You want to do whatever “grand sacrifice” you think is going to save everyone, go ahead. But you’d best be sure you’re not just playing their game. MARTIN: I know what I’m doing. BASIRA: We’ll see. [PAUSE] Don’t make me regret this.

(MAG154) MARTIN: I just… Look, I need to see this thing through with Peter to the end. If–if what he’s saying is even half true, I need to be there. ARCHIVIST: But what if you don’t? I mean…! We could just leave. I mean, whatever… their plan is for me, I am damn sure that doing that isn’t it. I could derail everything– MARTIN: [NERVOUS CHUCKLING] ARCHIVIST: –We could derail everything, and then just… leave…! MARTIN: [DRY AND HOLLOW LAUGHTER] ARCHIVIST: [BREATHY] … What…?

… and turned out that it was a bet. Well. A gamble, for both? We had learned about that aspect of Peter in MAG066 (well, in an explicit form; what happened on the Tundra in MAG033 might have been of that nature too, without the statement-giver being aware of it because… she had won), and it had been mentioned as one of Peter’s ways to navigate (ha) social interactions:

(MAG134) MARTIN: So… so what, you’re afraid of the competition? PETER: Not at all. Honestly, that’s the sort of thing I normally relish; I’ve always been a little bit of a gambler, and the higher the stakes, the better. MARTIN: So… so this is, wh–what?

(MAG151) SIMON: He is what he is, Martin. For a creature of The Lonely, the urge is always to isolate; never to communicate or connect. I suspect that’s why he’s so keen on wagers: it allows him a framework for cooperation that doesn’t risk any sort of intimacy. […] I think… [INHALE] I think Peter is taking a rather large, but calculated gamble. Not just on you, but on a lot of things. If it works, he’ll be in a very strong position. And if he fails… it won’t be all that bad. MARTIN: You don’t think it will be the end of the world? SIMON: Oh! It very well might be, but… MARTIN: [EXPLOSIVE EXHALE] SIMON: Life has continued through dozens of apocalypses already. Ice ages; pandemics; calamities; extinctions… The only reason this one feels special is because, well… it’s happening to you. And that’s the sort of solipsism that tends to come with loneliness – in my experience.

BUT I’M STILL SO MAD THAT

(MAG138) MARTIN: … What? [HUFF] That’s it? No, no monologue, no mindgames? You love manipulating people! ELIAS: That makes two of us. MARTIN: [HUFF] ELIAS: But no. This is too important for me to jeopardise with cheap “mindgames”. I simply have to trust that when the time comes, you’ll make the right choice.

(MAG158) MARTIN: Oh, I’m getting there, but if this is the final test or something? Then bad luck. The answer’s still “no”. [FOOTSTEPS] PETER: … No. No! This isn’t fair, do you have any idea what you’ve done? You knew, he must have– MARTIN: Elias– … Jonah had nothing to do with it. PETER: No! That’s not– You can’t– ELIAS: You’ve lost, Peter. Admit it.

FUCK OOOOOFF ELIAS OH MY GODS the thing about the “right choice” was really just about whether Martin would refuse to kill Jonah Magnus’s body, thus ensuring Elias’s winning the bet… and THAT was the thing “too important for me to jeopardise”, it had never been about The Extinction for Elias uh……………………

- I’m so proud of Martin for understanding that it was all mostly a “power play” between Elias and Peter, and TECHNICALLY? TECHNICALLY PETER HAD BEEN AN ABSOLUTE DUMBASS WHO HAD HIGHLIGHTED THAT THEY TENDED TO BE ~LIKE THAT~:

(MAG108) PETER: Ah, I see. I’m sorry to have disturbed you. It’s one of Elias’s little jokes. MARTIN: I don– What? PETER: Did he suggest you record a statement today? One that mentioned me? MARTIN: … yeah? Sssort of? I mean… not you specifically, but… PETER: I have a meeting with him today. He suggested… I’m sure he’s watching from his office, grinning from ear to ear. MARTIN: I… don’t… PETER: I almost thought he genuinely wanted me to meet the team! Oh well.

Peter And Elias Had Their Little Games, and Martin knew that from experience from the very first time he had met Peter.

… at the same time, Martin being “Martin out” might have been a genuine missed opportunity since… I’m glad that he didn’t go for murder even if he wanted to? And the fact that Elias was ready to risk Jonah’s original body probably meant that there was a huuuuge trick/something that could have backfired if Martin had knifed him? But Daisy had also pointed out that maybe they should have accepted to kill him at the risk of dying when they have had a chance:

(MAG142) MARTIN: I thought you believed him…! You were doing all of his dirty work. DAISY: Well, wasn’t willing to call his bluff. Not the same thing as “believing”. Just too big a risk. MARTIN: … Not for Melanie. DAISY: Well, maybe she was the only one with any sense. Even if he was telling the truth [EXHALE], if we all… died… There are worse things.

And I still really don’t want the bottom line to be that yes, they should have gone for murder? But at the same time, right now, indeed: we’re in “worse things” and heading towards ever worse things than death…

(- I’m still stuck a bit on “why Martin, when alone-wise, Tim was just there?”. Was it because amongst the assistants, Martin was the most willing to read statements before MAG108? Was it really because Martin was easily expendable, prone to fear a lot, and had a special flavour of Loneliness due to both his crush on Jon and his one-sided relationship with his mother?

…………… but given how Elias just knew that Jon would run after Martin, how getting Jon to rush into The Lonely seemed to have been his main goal, and with the recent mention that:

(MAG149) GEORGIE: You must be Martin. MARTIN: Y–yeah. Has… Melanie been talking about me? GEORGIE: Oh, hum… Jon used to go on about you a lot.

… Jon had been talking about Martin off-tape, and given how he had been flustered about “office gossip” in MAG117 and his very persistent longing in season 4… was it that Martin was chosen not exactly for himself, but because Elias had identified Martin as someone Jon would always try to save, as early as in mid-season 3…? When Jon was at Georgie’s and/or when Jon went to ~talk with Martin~ right after being back from his kidnapping in MAG102…?)

- I’m not exactly sure I understood the terms of Peter and Elias’s bet. I’m assuming that Simon was mostly right in his train of thoughts – that Peter succeeding/winning would be getting an occasion to strengthen The Lonely (killing Jonah / setting up Martin as a dual avatar instead of him, thus both ruining The Eye’s chance for its ritual during this round + getting his revenge on Gertrude for ruining Forsaken’s ritual, all the while consolidating The Lonely by stealing a place of power and mayyybe shortening the time span until their next chance at a ritual attempt)…? Or was Peter genuinely preoccupied by The Extinction, or both? At least, Martin refusing to kill Jonah’s body meant Peter ��losing”, meant that he had to cast Martin into The Lonely (and surrender his attempt on the Panopticon?); Peter didn’t even have to stay around, he’s just… probably making things hard on himself. Because hum: we saw what happened last time Jon tried to use his power (peering through the door?) to see through The Lonely at the end of MAG139; it left him a mess:

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: … If I… Knew… what his plan was; if I knew what Peter was doing; if I just– [WHISPERING] … Can I…? [LOW RUMBLING SOUND, STATIC RISES] [CRIES OF PAIN] [VERY SHARP SQUEAL OF DISTORTION STEADILY RISING] [NOISE OF SOMETHING-OR-JON FALLING] [SQUEAL OF DISTORTION DECREASES] [MUMBLING] End… E–end recording…!

(MAG140) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] Yesterday, I tried something I… [INHALE] I–I deliberately tried to… Know something, like I did in the coffin, but… there was a lot. Too much [SIGH], and I… BASIRA: What did you find out? ARCHIVIST: [SNORT] Nothing. There was “too much”. BASIRA: You don’t remember any of it? ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] You drink the whole contents of a bar in three seconds, you don’t remember what the merlot tasted like. [SIGH] It just… hurt.

… and a predatory monster: it was around that time that he absolutely traumatised Jess Tyrell, and then cornered Floyd for his statement less than two weeks later (although there had “only” been three victims in the previous three months). Whatever state Jon will be in in/after The Lonely, it won’t be pretty… and it will fall either on Peter, either on Martin, either on whoever is in Jon’s way after he comes out of it. (……………. And there is all the Institute staff up there, who just got preyed upon by two Hunters, full of fears. Does The Eye’s “protection” extend to non-Archival staff…? Because I’m also really, really worried about the survivors, given current circumstances…)

Given how Elias laughed triumphantly right after Martin was sent into The Lonely, that was the main goal/hurdle to reach – but technically, Peter had done that For Free with Brian in MAG100, and Mordechai Lukas had also very spontaneously punished Barnabas that way. Was Elias’s laugh caused by his win against Peter, then, because he’s That Petty? Why such an elaborated scheme to get Peter to do that…? Is it because Elias tends to have way more fun than strictly necessary, or was Peter personally reluctant to send Martin in there…? Or was it necessary to make it happen in the middle of the Panopticon…?

- We don’t know (yet) whether or not Peter has been around for very long at this point (though he’s expecting to live long according to MAG134: “Martin… it’s going to be decades, if not centuries, before I get another chance to bring Forsaken into this world. Your last Archivist saw to that. […] The point is that, yes, obviously, if I last that long, I’m going to try again.”), but assuming that he’s had a human-like lifespan so far, how could you Do That to a baby, Jonah. I’m still screaming over Elias’s delight:

(MAG158) PETER: No! That’s not– You can’t– ELIAS: You’ve lost, Peter. Admit it. [CHUCKLE] He played you like a… like a cheap whistle. PETER: No! Shut up!

Because it was??? Such an awful jab: * Making fun of the boatswain’s call from the Tundra.

* Shakespeare ref I think???

GUILDENSTERN: But these cannot I command to any utterance of harmony. I have not the skill. HAMLET: Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me! You would play upon me. You would seem to know my stops. You would pluck out the heart of my mystery. You would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass. And there is much music, excellent voice, in this little organ, yet cannot you make it speak? 'Sblood, do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you cannot play upon me.

(Pipe’s back.)

* nsfw call-out; rude thing to say about your (ex?)husband’s performance in bed, Elias; also that’s tmi.

- I’m gonna miss Peter if he gets obliterated like Breekon, but AOUCH, he began the episode SO HARSHLY:

(MAG158) MARTIN: … Mm. PETER: Is everything alright, Martin? MARTIN: Nah, it’s fine. … Don’t particularly like it down here. PETER: Ah, yes. Of course. Hard to trust the doors, I imagine. MARTIN: [BREATHLESS CHUCKLE] Yeah, well, everyone else seems to these days, so…! PETER: But she’s still the same corridors, I suppose. [INHALE] I’m sure– … what was his name? … Tim! Tim would– MARTIN: I’d really– … rather not talk about it, Peter. […] NOT!SASHA: Who let me out? [SILENCE] Don’t be shy. I just want to say thank you. [SILENCE] All right, have it your way. Now, if you’ll excuse me: I have some unfinished business. [MENACING SATISFIED LAUGHTER] [WEIRD SCUTTLING MOVEMENT] MARTIN: [RAGGED BREATHING] Th–th–tha–, that was, hum… PETER: Yes! MARTIN: [GULP] And it’s– it’s going to… PETER: Make sure everyone is too busy to follow us. They’ll be fine. … Probably.

Triple combo, right in Martin’s trauma. The one time he was trapped with Tim in Michael’s corridors at the end of season 2; gratuitous Tim mention that Martin didn’t want to hear; freeing the Not!Them, who had terrorised Tim&Martin even before they had learned that it had actually killed Sasha… aouch. Was Peter being shitty on purpose, to destabilise Martin, or was it really just little things that he said and did without thinking about how it could make Martin feel…? He had been very interested in Martin’s feelings recently:

(MAG156) MARTIN: Will I be coming back? PETER: You’re not going to die, if that’s what you’re asking, but… no. If all goes well, you won’t be. MARTIN: [LONG INHALE, EXHALE] PETER: How does that make you feel? MARTIN: … Nothing. [SNORT] Nothing at all…! PETER: Excellent. I’m so proud of you, Martin.

So it could have been to test his apathy…? But aouch anyway.

- I loved his voice SO DAMN MUCH at that moment:

(MAG158) MARTIN: And you need me for this? PETER: Correct! Without a connection to The Eye, any attempt to use it would likely end… very messily indeed! But thankfully, it just so happens that you hold such a connection. MARTIN: So that’s it… Both “lonely” and “watching”. PETER: You must admit you’re the perfect candidate.

Because. Yeah, it was summing him up well. Saying atrocious things with a cold cheerfulness, absolutely unconcerned.

(- I think it’s safer to assume that Peter was a sore loser there:

(MAG158) PETER: Then do it, Martin. [UNFOLDING POCKET KNIFE?] We’re the same, you and I; we don’t need anyone else. Watching from a distance, that’s always who you’ve been. Haven’t you enjoyed it, these last few months? Drifting through the Archives, unseen, unjudged? You’ll like it in there. I promise. MARTIN: … Yeah. Yeah, I think I would. […] PETER: But you do serve The Lonely. MARTIN: Oh, I’m getting there, but if this is the final test or something? Then bad luck. The answer’s still “no”. [FOOTSTEPS] PETER: … No. No! This isn’t fair, do you have any idea what you’ve done? You knew, he must have–

But I also kind of want to think that he had grown a bit fond of Martin and was genuine about wanting to share his patron / giving Martin a life that Martin would find some comfort in? >> Not good for Martin but. Somehow, it’s even sadder for Martin if Peter’s words really were just that empty, to ensure he would win a bet?)

- Hhhhh, we knew that the Not!Them was still… there, since Leitner had explained it to Jon:

(MAG080) ARCHIVIST: That thing… Is it dead? LEITNER: Unlikely. Whether something like that can actually be destroyed… It is trapped. I, I hope for a very long time.

But I really wasn’t expecting to see it again!! Somehow, Elias had told the Team that Leitner had killed it (MAG092: “It finally tried to kill John. Then Leitner killed it. Then I killed Leitner. And I believe that brings us up to date. More or less.”), so was it a conscious lie, a slip of the tongue, or was it that Elias didn’t know that it was actually still kicking back then…?

* Leitner was suspecting that the Not!Them was actually trying to find him when it was wandering in the tunnels:

(MAG080) LEITNER: The “Not!Sasha” had come down several times. I suspect it was almost as curious about me as you were. Perhaps it thought you might have better luck flushing me out.

… but UHOH. Was it actually trying to find the Panopticon, already?

* I still miss Sasha, and I’m SAD, and Martin’s shattered breath and Jon stuttering to explain what it was broke me:

(MAG158) DAISY: What the hell is that thing? […] ARCHIVIST: Do you remember what happened to Sasha? BASIRA: That’s the thing that took her? ARCHIVIST: It was trapped in the tunnels, it– Martin. Something’s happening down there.

Because… Sasha… And of course, for both Daisy and Basira, it’s just a dangerous monster, it’s not a creature who also killed a friend; they weren’t around back then, they never knew Sasha. But for Jon&Martin, it’s… a reminder of what they’ve lost…

* Vindication: the Not!Them had mocked Jon about how he wouldn’t survive to witness The Unknowing, and AHAHA.

(MAG079) NOT!SASHA: You’ll miss The Unknowing, of course, but you wouldn’t understand it anyway.

Guess who missed The Unknowing in the end. (Gertrude had mentioned that avatars tended to fade or go erratic after a ritual attempt, but given that the Not!Them hadn’t participated, will it be affected…? As we’ve seen, Jared was fine.)

* I don’t think that the Not!Them will be trapped again, unless it’s thrown into the coffin, and I don’t think that the Hunters would be enough to kill it… so either it’ll flee, taking a new victim, either Jon will destroy it like he did with the Dark Sun, maybe…?

- I’m… heartbroken about Julia:

(MAG158) ARCHIVIST: What… Daisy, are you–? BASIRA: Shh! [GUNSHOTS, MUFFLED BY THE DISTANCE] [FEMALE SCREAMS] ARCHIVIST: Oh no… BASIRA: Stay here, both of you. I’ll check it out. [MORE DISTANT GUNSHOTS] […] BASIRA: Looks like two people. An old guy– DAISY: And a woman with a scar. ARCHIVIST: Oh, God, now? Why now?! BASIRA: It’s probably not a coincidence. From what I saw, they’ve been toying with the rest of the Institute, but it won’t be long until they’re all dead or escaped. […] TREVOR: [IN THE DISTANCE] Jooooooonny boy! [CACKLES] JULIA: [IN THE DISTANCE] [CACKLES] We want to make a statement! […] JULIA: [IN THE DISTANCE] Ha! You see that, old man? TREVOR: [IN THE DISTANCE] Told ya. They’re all monsters in here.

Because she sounded absolutely gone. Trevor had pointed out that ~the lines got blurrier every day~, but Julia was younger, had been a Hunter for a shorter amount of time and… there were her life circumstances, the fact that her father had done horrible things to try to get her mother back, and had tried to protect her from all of The Dark stuff…? It’s really sadder in Julia’s case, because it gives the feeling that that cycle of violence was absolutely inescapable – that Julia’s only options were either to die as prey, killed by Darvish, or to become the mindless predator. Julia&Trevor attacked the Institute (… well: basically launched a terrorist attack against it; they had mentioned it was “full of monsters”, it was a cleansing and/or toying with innocents) and, even if “best case” scenario and there aren’t any casualties, that’s still tons of people traumatised for life. How could Julia even come back to normal after this, when she’s this far gone…?

- TT___TT Archival Team sharing information and (snappily) discussing about what to do…

(MAG158) BASIRA: So Elias left it? ARCHIVIST: Or Martin. O–or Peter, or… Annabelle! BASIRA: Fine. Whatever. Could be a distraction. ARCHIVIST: Only one way to find out. BASIRA: We don’t have time for this. DAISY: We don’t know that. We’ve no idea what sort of timeframe we’re on. I say play it. ARCHIVIST: Thank you.

… and of course, it’s when everything is going to hell and these three people probably won’t be in the same room ever again (or at least not as themselves).

(- I’M GONNA MISS THESE LITTLE thINGS SO MUCH…

(MAG158) BASIRA: Set up by the door. Try and take them when they break through it. DAISY: Right. ARCHIVIST: Do, uh… do I get a gun? BASIRA: You ever fired one? ARCHIVIST: You never taught me! BASIRA: You never asked. Besides, we’ve got problems enough without– [CRASHING SOUND]

That mix of snappiness and awkwardness and closeness in the Worst Moments…)

- We knew it was coming, but still…

(MAG158) BASIRA: This might be it. DAISY: Basira… BASIRA: Didn’t think it would end like this. [CHUCKLING] You know what, actually I think I did! [GUNSHOTS IN THE DISTANCE] NOT!SASHA: [CACKLING, IN THE DISTANCE] DAISY: [PANTING] Basira… promise me something. BASIRA: What? … No, Daisy, no. DAISY: [PANTING] Mm, Basira… When this is over, you need to find me… and kill me. Promise me. BASIRA: No. No, Daisy, we’ll figure something out! NOT!SASHA: [IN THE DISTANCE] You can’t hide forever, Jon. DAISY: [PANTING] These last months, I… it was always borrowed time. Can’t outrun it forever. BASIRA: Daisy… DAISY: [PANTING] Promise me. BASIRA: … I promise. DAISY: Thanks. [BREATHLESS] Now, run…! BASIRA: Daisy…! DAISY: [GROWLING] Run! [RUNNING FOOTSTEPS] DAISY: [GROANS] [COCKED GUN] JULIA: [LAUGH] There you are! TREVOR: All alone! [COCKED GUN] Like a pup. DAISY: [BARKS] JULIA: … Shit! [ONE GUNSHOT] [CLICK.]

I’m so heartbroken about Daisy TT___TT It… didn’t really sound like she was agreeing to sacrifice herself to save Basira, but more like The Hunt managed to catch up with her because of the violence, and she only managed to say her last will before getting completely drowned, reverting to the state she had turned into during The Unknowing (when she ripped Hope apart with her bare hands). I don’t think there will be another coffin trip; I guess there could be something because of her ties to the Institute, but I doubt it… Damnit, I was kinda hoping that The Eye would protect her a bit longer despite the threat of hearing her Blood, but no, the big eyeball was absolutely useless ;;

And gdi ;; At least, Tim got to pull the trigger and get his revenge, and Adelard had neutralised a Corruption avatar and freed people from their torment, while Daisy only got caught up (preyed) on by The Hunt without being able to strike back before that. What she was in season 4 wasn’t a waste, never (we got to meet the real Daisy, and she was fantastic!), but it feels so, so sad that The Hunt got her back when it mattered so much to her to never go back to it…

(Obligatory “archive dog!!” joke, though.)

(- Also sad because she was hoping she would be the one to kill Elias, in MAG082, and fucker REALLY has it coming at this point. Violence Is Bad, but still, please, someone, stab him.)

(- And it reaaaally doesn’t bode well for Jon, uh… Daisy had been involved in violence and supernatural stories for 16 years, though, so that’s longer. But the fact that resisting was only a momentary reprieve before being taken in again is nnnnot exactly a good sign for Jon, given how heavily Daisy and Jon had been paralleled as going into withdrawal in season 4, and how Jon was finally pushed to use his powers again in this episode…)

- Also still crying over Daisy and Basira’s goodbyes:

(MAG158) DAISY: [PANTING] Basira… promise me something. BASIRA: What? … No, Daisy, no. DAISY: [PANTING] Mm, Basira… When this is over, you need to find me… and kill me. Promise me. BASIRA: No. No, Daisy, we’ll figure something out! NOT!SASHA: [IN THE DISTANCE] You can’t hide forever, Jon. DAISY: [PANTING] These last months, I… it was always borrowed time. Can’t outrun it forever. BASIRA: Daisy… DAISY: [PANTING] Promise me. BASIRA: … I promise. DAISY: Thanks. [BREATHLESS] Now, run…!

And what it means for Basira orz Either she does it at the end of this season, either part of season 5 will be about finding and killing (the creature that took over) Daisy, uh…? I want to hope for them (since hum, we’re like, back to the end of season 3: the duo shattered, Daisy lost and dangerous) but it already happened once; the biggest difference is that Daisy had managed to get her voice back during season 4, instead of being fuelled by mindless violence like she had been in season 3.

It was also… Daisy going back to the person Basira used to admire, as a fixed point:

(MAG117) BASIRA: But at least Daisy’s coming along. I mean… I know she’s… difficult. Everything they say about her, it’s true, it’s fair. But… she’s solid. She’s a fixed point. And if she’s there, I know exactly where I stand, exactly what I’m doing relative to her. She has no doubts. […] Despite everything she’s done, she’s… she’s still the best partner I ever had.

Daisy, firm about what is happening and what has to be done – even though it’s about killing her.

(I’m also a bit sad that ;; Daisy and Basira had been around for so long, and I really wanted to think they were meant to be interpreted as a couple and/or mutually crushing? But although there are lots of indicators, it has never been made explicit, and now it would only be retroactive…)

- One Good Thing: 

(MAG158) ELIAS: I guarantee it won’t be pleasant for them, but I honestly don’t know if their ties to the Institute are quite as strong as I may have implied. You, at least, should be insulated from the fall-out by your new allegiance. Jon… might be powerful enough to weather it. Melanie’s well out of it, so that just leaves Basira and Daisy. And the rest of the Institute, of course, and you can’t tell me you care about them.

MELANIE IS OFFICIALLY FINE!! She really fled the boat before it sank, uh.

- I love that mentioning the use of Ruskin’s The Seven Lamps of Architecture tends to lead to roasting: 

(MAG080) LEITNER: By carefully reading specific passages in certain locations I am able to exercise… a degree of control over the substance of the tunnels. ARCHIVIST: I didn’t hear you say anything down there. LEITNER: I said reading. It doesn’t need to be spoken aloud.

(MAG158) PETER: Do you want to see how it works? MARTIN: Uh, n–no; no, I’d really rather you didn’t mess it up– PETER: No, I insist! Watch. [SILENCE] MARTIN: Very impressive. PETER: I’m reading. Shush.

(Had Peter actual trouble with the reading, though?)

- What was Peter trying to say re:Tim?

(MAG158) PETER: But she’s still the same corridors, I suppose. [INHALE] I’m sure– … what was his name? … Tim! Tim would– MARTIN: I’d really– … rather not talk about it, Peter.

It was thematically fitting because Tim had been down in the tunnels a lot during season 3, Smirke’s architecture was his speciality, and he had been trapped in the corridors together with Martin but…? I have no idea what Peter intended to say about him?

- fesdcujheznfds every end of the season has to star Martin with a corpse (or almost), uh. He found Gertrude’s between MAG039/MAG040; found Leitner’s together with Tim in MAG080; ~there was Jon’s~ at the end of season 3 (at least, Martin visited him before season 4, according to the trailer); and now, he got to find Jonah Magnus’s, although not really dead. Martin, you life sucks.

- ;___; Daisy had pointed out that Jon was self-destructive, and… Martin actually wasn’t really good in that regard, uh…

(MAG142) DAISY: Used to see it all the time back in the force, especially with the Section’d. Not like there’s… “normal” trauma, you know? But it’s pretty common. The most important thing becomes control, engaging on your own terms. Even when it’s stupid or dangerous. Anything to not feel helpless. MARTIN: Oh, god… DAISY: And of course, for Jon, there’s survivor’s guilt in there, too. He thinks he’s not human. Makes him very… self-destructive. MARTIN: Yeah, well. We’ve all had trauma.

(MAG158) MARTIN: It’s not him! It’s not anybody, it’s just me. Always has been! I… When I first came to you, I thought I had lost everything. Jon was dead, my mother was dead, the job I had put everything into had trapped me into spreading evil, and I… I really didn’t care what happened to me. I told myself I was trying to protect the others, but honestly? We didn’t even like each other. Maybe I just thought joining up with you would be a good way to get killed. And then… [SHAKILY] Jon came back, and… and suddenly, I had a reason: I had to keep your attention on me. Make you feel in control, so you didn’t take it out on him. And if that meant drifting further away… so what? I’d already grieved for him, and if it meant now saving him, it was worth it! […] So I… played along, waited to see what your endgame was. And here we are. … [SNORT] Funny. Looks like I was right the first time – it’s probably still a good way to get killed.

(Extra-sad re: “we didn’t even like each other” because he still had gone drinking with Basira and Melanie, and he was concerned about Melanie post-MAG106. I mean, yeah, it didn’t fundamentally mean “liking” them but… it was still something.)

* I love that Martin is SO unapologetic about his feelings for Jon, technically, even more than in season 3:

(MAG118) ELIAS: [EXASPERATED BREATHING] … Did Jon put you up to this? MARTIN: You think I’m doing this for him? ELIAS: No. It’s just the sort of half-baked scheme he’d come up with. And I’m well aware that you’ll do just about anything for him–   MARTIN: I– ELIAS: –and I don’t need to read your mind for that one. MARTIN: … Do you rea– … Is it so hard to believe that I hate you as well? ELIAS: No. It’s just hard to imagine that you would act on it.

From protesting that he wasn’t doing this for Jon, to saying that Jon was his reason.

* So. Peter was wrong when he had told Martin that

(MAG126) PETER: [CHUCKLING] I had hoped that all this time apart would have given you the space you needed, but… MARTIN: … You said he’d probably never wake up. PETER: And he beat the odds. Which is good. But it does make things more complicated. It doesn’t… actually change… anything.

Jon coming back did change something. And it’s sure not healthy on Martin’s side, but it’s also… still something indeed…? Still better than the nothing he used to (not) have…? But so sad that the way Martin describes it, the way he talked with Jon, it’s really never associated with the idea of constructing something, or a future. Those are very… Lonely feelings indeed? That he’s keeping from afar? (And gdi, I would really want Jon and Martin to finally manage to talk and share, to communicate and reach a peaceful ground? To hear and see each other? But given the circumstances… it probably won’t be now…)

I’m not even sure Jon&Martin will talk before the end of the season, actually? Or maybe not directly to each other – through tape, through written messages could be other options. But on the other hand: Jon’s worry and feelings for Martin have been a major element this season, so… there is probably a payoff coming, rather than immediate and absolutely shattering heartbreak?

- Martin once again confirmed that he has gone dual Eye/Lonely ;;

(MAG158) PETER: But you do serve The Lonely. MARTIN: Oh, I’m getting there, but if this is the final test or something? Then bad luck. The answer’s still “no”.

But I mostly want for him to get back to a state of mind where he would go back to writing poetry?! ;_; Unlikely, I know, but. (And to not harm people to feed… Has he been feeding on himself and his own loneliness, or are we in for an awful reveal about the researchers who disappeared…)

- In the list of people Martin had lost:

(MAG158) MARTIN: I… When I first came to you, I thought I had lost everything. Jon was dead, my mother was dead, the job I had put everything into had trapped me into spreading evil, and I… I really didn’t care what happened to me.

… I’m surprised that Tim wasn’t mentioned at all…? Tim had told Jon that he didn’t feel as close to Martin as he was with Sasha, but I had gotten the impression that Martin did care a lot more about him…? And it’s still a Do Not Talk About Him subject:

(MAG120) ELIAS: Hello, inspector. Martin. I’m… sorry to hear about Tim. MARTIN: Don’t. ELIAS: And Daisy, I suppose. MARTIN: Don’t. you. dare. 

(MAG138) MARTIN: I don’t know what he’s talking about when he mentions Millbank. The old prison, I guess? Tim said the tunnels under the Institute were all that was left of it, but… Jon said he’d checked them pretty thoroughly. [SILENCE] [SIGH] I’m not the one who knows all about this stuff…! I wish– … No. No, it’s fine, I’m… fine, I… [EXHALE] I can do this.

(MAG158) PETER: But she’s still the same corridors, I suppose. [INHALE] I’m sure– … what was his name? … Tim! Tim would– MARTIN: I’d really– … rather not talk about it, Peter.

(Plus, when he mentioned “the job I had put everything into had trapped me into spreading evil”, it felt like what Tim had told him back in season 3:

(MAG098) TIM: Look, it’s not that. I… [SIGH] This place is evil, Martin. And I think doing what It wants? Probably makes us evil. And It wants those things to be read. I mean, I’m not gonna stop you, but, at the same time– MARTIN: I– I get it.

So Martin did remember about that conversation, uh…)

(- We knew that the death of Martin’s mother had affected him deeply, Basira had told Jon. And he explicitly said it. But after what Elias told him (and forced him to see) in MAG118, I still would like to hear him describe his relationship to her – how he felt it, what MAG118 changed, if it changed anything…)

(Laughing and crying that Martin “my dad left my family when I was 8” suddenly got two trashdads, who are the worst, and whom he doesn’t want.)

(- Shut your mouuuuth Eliiiiaaaas

(MAG158) ELIAS: You, at least, should be insulated from the fall-out by your new allegiance. Jon… might be powerful enough to weather it. Melanie’s well out of it, so that just leaves Basira and Daisy. And the rest of the Institute, of course, and you can’t tell me you care about them. MARTIN: But of course I do! ELIAS: Do you, though? Do you really care, about any of them? Or is that worrying just simply an old reflex? [SILENCE] … Goodness. Peter has done his work well, hasn’t he? [CHUCKLE]

Who caaaares if it’s a “reflex” and done without conviction!! Doing the right thing just because you think it would be the right thing to do, even though you don’t feel much about it, is still better than doing nothing or doing something awful?? You can still define the kind of person you want to be through you deliberate actions?? Even if Martin was neutral about it, the fact that he still did his best to prevent Peter from hurting Daisy or random staff members in MAG144 matters, shut your mouuuuuth damniiiit!!)

- It’s both hilarious and heartbreaking that Martin’s reasons for getting wary of Peter were:

(MAG158) MARTIN: When you started talking about The Extinction, though… You… had me, actually, for a while. But then… [CHUCKLES] then you tried to make me the hero, tried to sell me on the idea that I was the “only one who could stop it”. And that? That never sat right with me. I mean–I mean, lo–look at me! [SNORTING] I’m, I’m not exactly a, a “Chosen One”. But, by then, I was in too deep. So I… played along, waited to see what your endgame was. 

… Because 1°) Peter, as a self-centred Lonely avatar, thought that insisting about how Martin was a Hero and Necessary would do the trick, 2°) Martin was too self-deprecative for this. It also echoed Jon’s interrogations at the end of MAG139, about why they had all been “chosen” – Jon just accepted that it had been the case, or some bad luck, while Martin… immediately questioned the idea. (And gdi, Martin!! But Jon chose you at the end of the very same episode… ;;)

- Peter!! Peter, you knew that a knife wasn’t fitting Martin:

(MAG039) MARTIN: I used to carry around a knife, but I started thinking that, well, cutting into someone laterally wasn’t really the most efficient way to get them out, and besides which, they seem to be quite slow burrowing in a straight line so, given their size, th–the corkscrew just seemed to be the better option. … Look, you guys got to go home every day, okay. I didn’t!

(MAG108) PETER: Martin, isn’t it? MARTIN: Y–you, don’t move! Em, don’t you come any closer, okay! I’ve got a, I’ve got a knife! PETER: Do you? That… that would seem widely out of character, from what I’ve been told. MARTIN: Okay, but okay, step back.

(MAG158) MARTIN: … I’ll need to kill him. PETER: Yes. Don’t worry, though. I brought a knife. […] Then do it, Martin. [UNFOLDING POCKET KNIFE?] We’re the same, you and I; we don’t need anyone else. […] PETER: Martin. What are you doing? MARTIN: I’m… saying no. I refuse! Game over. [KNIFE CLATTERING ON THE GROUND]

If you had brought him a corkscrew, maybe he would have said “yes”.

- I’m still LOVING that deception is one of Martin’s core features… 

(MAG056) ARCHIVIST: It was in the old document room, just next to where you used to sleep. Your handwriting, “If the others find out I’ve been lying”. Lying about what, Martin?! MARTIN: L– look, just forget about it, okay? Please. ARCHIVIST: I CAN’T forget it! Everyone in this place has so many goddamn secrets, and I can’t trust a word you say! Not about this, and not about Trevor! MARTIN: Jon, just– ARCHIVIST: MARTIN! MARTIN: Okay! Okay. Okay. Just… just… promise you won’t… fire me. ARCHIVIST: … fire you…? Fine! MARTIN: I… … I lied on my CV. ARCHIVIST: … What? MARTIN: I don’t have a Master’s in parapsychology, I don’t even have a degree. When I was 17, my mom, she… had… she had some problems, and I ended up dropping out of school, t– trying to support us. I tried everything, but no one was hiring. So I… I just kinda started to lie on my applications, sending them out to just about anywhere. For some reason, my lie about parapsychology got me an interview with Elias and, and then a job here. M– most of my employment details are made up, I’m only 29! ARCHIVIST: Right, I… uh… I believe you!

(MAG120) ELIAS: I must admit I’m impressed, Martin. I knew you were all planning something, of course, but I didn’t believe you specifically would have the… er, capacity for boldness that you displayed. It took me quite by surprise. MARTIN: You didn’t just see it in me? ELIAS: Honestly, I didn’t look. For all my power, I will admit I am not immune to making the occasional lazy assumption. I presumed that I knew you thoroughly, but by the time you demonstrated otherwise… well. There was simply too much to keep watching over. I only have two eyes, after all.

(MAG138) MARTIN: … What? [HUFF] That’s it? No, no monologue, no mindgames? You love manipulating people! ELIAS: That makes two of us.

(MAG158) PETER: The Extinction is coming. MARTIN: Oh, I’m sure it is! But that’s not what this is about, is it? This isn’t about “saving the world” – it’s all just some power play against him! I might not know exactly what’s going on, but I don’t think I want any part of this. However much I want to kill him… I’m out. PETER: But you said– MARTIN: Honestly… I mostly just said what I thought you wanted to hear. PETER: I see. … This is your doing, is it? ELIAS: [AUDIBLE GRIN] Hardly…! 

Not sure that it’s enough / the gist of it for Web stuff but. Still. 

(And I’m REELING that Elias sounded almost proud of Martin with that one.)

(And that their “powerplay” sounds so much like foreplay.)

- Martin was so good when spitting at those annoying disgusting old men and their weird games?? And then:

(MAG158) ELIAS: Peter. [PAUSE] It’s time. [SILENCE] PETER: … Fine. MARTIN: Great. [VERY SHARP SQUEALS OF DISTORTION INCREASING] Now, perhaps if one of you, then, can tell me what– [SHARP SQUEALS OF DISTORTION REACHING A PEAK, BEFORE DECREASING] ELIAS: It won’t be that bad, Peter~ [CHUCKLE] You’ll see. Now: he’ll be here soon, so you can leave, or… PETER: Oh no. No. I’m not gonna make it easy on him. You haven’t won yet. ELIAS: Your choice. Just make sure to leave the door open.

… that mood whiplash of Martin beginning to ask for answers and being heartlessly wooshed as if he had barely spoken since the start.

- Meanwhile: Jon has been so, soooo vulgar this season!!

(MAG131) ARCHIVIST: … Shit.

(MAG154) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] [SOFTLY BUT WITH FEELING] … Fuck.

(MAG158) ARCHIVIST: You gotta be fucking kidding m–

Next corpse coming back to life is your grandmother, putting soap in your mouth. (I do love how that last one managed to… somehow make the scene a bit lighter because Jon was losing it, it was too much.)

(On a sidenote: Daisy, of all people, has never said “fuck”, only “shit”, I think? So she can’t die or lose herself there!!!)

- Why did Jon blank out after hearing Gertrude’s tape?

(MAG158) [CLICK–] BASIRA: Right, so what does that tell us? [SILENCE] Jon? … Jon! ARCHIVIST: Uh, y–yes, sorry. Right, just, uh… uh, the Panopticon. It’s the, uh…

Was it because of the shock of hearing her murder live? Was it because he noticed something off? Was it already Elias’s ~call~? (There was no static, though.) It felt to me like he was piecing something together…

- Peter & Martin had climbed the Panopticon’s central tower fine; meanwhile, Jon…

(MAG158) ARCHIVIST: [LABOURED BREATHING] ELIAS: Ah, Jon. I was almost worried…! You found your way all right. ARCHIVIST: [PANTING] Yes. … Ye–yes, I did… How?

… was out of it. Someone has been smoking too much lately, hm? (Do you still have your lighter on you, young old man…?)

- I’m ;; worried over Jon ~appreciating~ the beauty of things made to hurt:

(MAG143) [CREAKING, SPARKLER-LIKE STATIC SATURATING THE RECORDING.] ARCHIVIST: It’s… beautiful…

(MAG158) ARCHIVIST: [STATIC] That’s the Panopticon… ELIAS: My, you have grown. Yes. A masterpiece, isn’t it? ARCHIVIST: [EXHALE] … Y–yeah. It is.

(And it feels extremely Hannigram, uh.)

(Oufttt over the fact that Jon’s powers provided him with the answer he sought right in front of Elias… Elias had told him that he had to find/get his answers himself, back in MAG092, and it’s… happening… Elias had been so glad/proud when Jon had let it slip that he Knew Gertrude and Gerry had worked together, back in MAG102, and Jon had so many moments of Knowing in season 4…)

- Still not over the fact that Jon still asked Elias questions assuming he would get answers? ;;

(MAG158) ARCHIVIST: [SEETHING] Where is he? ELIAS: Peter Lukas has him. Cast him into The Lonely, and with every passing moment, he gets further away from you. ARCHIVIST: How do I bring him back? ELIAS: From out here? … Impossible. ARCHIVIST: … You want me to follow him. […] … How do I do it?

Jon sounded absolutely unsurprised when he reached the Panopticon, so… he had probably guessed that yeah, anyway, Elias had planned things, that he was doing exactly what Elias wanted, and that it was a price worth paying as long as it was aligning with his own interests (saving Martin)… Even at the cost of opening this damn inner door:

(MAG127) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] It’s… hard. It’s like there’s a–a–a door, in my mind. And behind it, is… i–is the entire ocean. Before, I didn’t notice it, but now, I know it’s there, and I can’t forget it, and I can feel the pressure of the water on it. I, I, I can keep it closed… but sometimes, when I’m around p–people, or–or places, or… ideas, a drop or two will push through the cracks, at the edges of the door. And I’ll… know something. BASIRA: … What happens, if you open the door? [SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: I drown.

(MAG158) ELIAS: [INHALE] Wasn’t too long ago. And I’m sure traces of their passage still remain. ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] ELIAS: Just open your mind. ARCHIVIST: [EXHALE] ELIAS: Drink it all in. Know their route, [VERY SHARP SQUEALS OF DISTORTION, INCREASING] and simply… follow it. ARCHIVIST: [LOUDER BREATHING] ELIAS: Very good.

It had to come, “Jon opening it to save someone/Martin in particular” had been my first thought when Jon had described it to Basira but gdi!!! Still painful that it’s happening ;; It has been such an awful and painful string of hoping he could save people and/or refusing to allow people to die, only to have to deal with their losses…

(MAG047) MICHAEL: [DISTORTED LAUGH] Yes… Ah… Did you notice which door she left through? ARCHIVIST: Yes… It w– MICHAEL: [CHUCKLES] ARCHIVIST: … wait! No, there was– MICHAEL: There has never been a door there, Archivist, your mind plays tricks on you. ARCHIVIST: Let her go. MICHAEL: [DISTORTED LAUGH] “No”? ARCHIVIST: Get her back here! MICHAEL: Are you going to attack me?

(MAG098) MARTIN: Yeah, we talked. Not long, he– Y’know, I think he thinks that the distance keeps us safe, you know? Like, like, if he just makes sure that we’re not involved, we’re somehow fine. TIM: He’s an idiot. Look, we didn’t know what that door was, and it still trapped us. Ignorance isn’t going to save anyone. MARTIN: No, I mean, you’re right, I guess. He was… Y’know, we know about Sasha now, and… he said he doesn’t want to lose anyone else. Like, y’know, it’s his fault.

(MAG118) TIM: You knew I might not be coming back! ARCHIVIST: I knew none of us might be coming back, and I’m not gonna let anyone get killed for nothing! TIM: Oh, except for those people in there! ARCHIVIST: They’re already dead! TIM: Not all of them! ARCHIVIST: I am not losing you as well!!

(MAG158) BASIRA: … Goddamnit. Jon, go; we’ll keep them busy. ARCHIVIST: What…? No! I– BASIRA: Don’t argue, just go. NOT!SASHA: [IN THE DISTANCE] Jooo–oooon~? ARCHIVIST: … Fine. Just don’t die. DAISY: Go.

And I hatehatehatehate that Elias absolutely played on the fact it was so personal for Jon, how his feelings could be a tool to get him where he wanted… 

(MAG158) ELIAS: Peter Lukas has him. Cast him into The Lonely, and with every passing moment, he gets further away from you. ARCHIVIST: How do I bring him back? ELIAS: From out here? … Impossible. ARCHIVIST: … You want me to follow him. ELIAS: No, Jon. You want you to follow him.

That emphasis on “you”… 

(I still want to be a bit cautious before labelling Jon’s feelings as romantic, as long as it’s not confirmed-confirmed? But hhhhh yeah, no, Jon is desperate and longing and crushing awfully hard, uh…)

- There is still Helen around, and Annabelle hasn’t revealed herself either so… at this point, what is she waiting for or expecting…? Is she planning to go against Elias, is she planning to use him, or are they in this together…? If Elias indeed needed Jon to experience the Fears first-hand, The Web pushed in that direction with the coffin (leaving MAG130’s tape and leading Jon towards The Flesh, too); it was also The Web who made Oliver give Jon his statement to push him to wake up – and Jon ~made his choice~, and Jon waking up gave Martin a ~reason~ to not follow Peter entirely… It seemed like The Web and Elias’s interests got suspiciously aligned this season…? What Elias said about The Web was non-committal:

(MAG148) BASIRA: Or that we were being stalked by some freaky spider woman. Don’t tell me you didn’t know about that! ELIAS: Ah, uh, y–yes… W–well… To be honest, I’d… advise you to leave that one – well alone. BASIRA: Oh yeah? ELIAS: Uh! Look, look, look. I’ve… been doing this a long time now and, if there’s one thing I’ve learned about The Web, it’s that it plays its own game. All you can really do is… hope it doesn’t get in the way of whatever your plan is. Because the Spider usually wins…! Assuming you have a plan.

(“I’ve been doing this a long time now” fuuuuck oooooooffffff!!)

And he can’t have been unaware of Jon’s personal history with The Web, nor of all the spiders in the Institute, so…? Are they in it together, is he dual Web/Beholding, is he being made to ignore The Web, or has he taken precautions to not suffer from any interference…?

(- Other potential players: The Extinction and… the tape recorders (if they’re not Web :w). A tape turned on during Gertrude’s murder scene, and that was the first time we’ve seen it happen in Gertrude’s era. The recorders also behaved quite strangely with the Panopticon, because… there was one with Martin&Peter / we switched to Jon&co / we went back to Martin&Peter&Elias but, when Martin then Peter left, one stayed with Elias – unless Martin planted the same one that had been following him in the first part of the episode, this means one showed up in the Panopticon, on its own. We’re back to Jon’s argument to Tim in season 3:

(MAG114) ARCHIVIST: [SOFTLY] Interesting. What do you think is listening? TIM: What? […] And you know what I think. It’s that… the thing that runs the Institute, “The Watcher” or “The Eye” or whatever. ARCHIVIST: I dis… I disagree. This whole place is a temple to The Eye, Tim, I don’t think the tape recorders make any difference. TIM: [VICIOUSLY] Elias, then. ARCHIVIST: In that case, we’ll stick to talking about things he already knows.

If The Eye was behind them, why record what it’s witnessing anyway?) 

(And although Jon has listed Peter, Elias and Annabelle as potential suspects behind the last tapes that were sent to him… we still don’t have any indication of who it is.)

- On the one hand, Peter wanted Martin to be apathetic; on the other, Elias was REALLY glad about Jon being fearful:

(MAG156) PETER: How does that make you feel? MARTIN: … Nothing. [SNORT] Nothing at all…! PETER: Excellent. I’m so proud of you, Martin. MARTIN: I really don’t care. PETER: Perfect.

(MAG158) ARCHIVIST: [LOUDER BREATHING] ELIAS: Very good. Are you scared, Jon? ARCHIVIST: Yes… ELIAS: Perfect.

… It’s especially interesting re:Jon given how Gertrude had a very particular personal relation to fear, Adelard wondering if she was dissimulating or steel-like when it comes to this. Jon appears as a contrast: he fears a lot…

(MAG125) BASIRA: You ready? ARCHIVIST: [DRY HOLLOW LAUGHTER] No…? [SHAKY VOICE] You’re sure you don’t have… restraints, or… BASIRA: You think she’s gonna sleep through being tied down? I’ll try and grab her if she wakes, but… ARCHIVIST: … Okay…! Here we go…! [BREATHES DEEPLY] 

(MAG132) ARCHIVIST: I have her voice. I think that should be enough to find her, and I’m leaving my– … I’ll leave it with the tape. I should be able to find my way back to it… I think. Wish me luck…! … Although I suppose if you’re hearing this, then I… I didn’t have any. I don’t know. I’m… I’m scared. [SHORT CHUCKLE] When does the fear go away…?

(MAG136) ARCHIVIST: My– [PAUSE] [INHALE] [SIGH] My memories of the coma are not clear. But I know I made a choice; I made a choice to become… something else. Because I was afraid to die. But ever since then, I… I don’t know if I made the right decision; I–I’m stronger now, tougher, I can… … If I do die, now, or get sealed away somewhere forever… I don’t know if that’s a bad thing. And I don’t want to lose anyone else so, if I can maybe stop that happening, and [DRY CHUCKLE] the only danger is to me, I– I’ll do it in a heartbeat; worst case scenario… the universe loses another monster. DAISY: That’s messed up. ARCHIVIST: [LOW SELF-DEPRECATIVE DRY LAUGHTER] … Yeah. I suppose it is. DAISY: Did you know the coffin wouldn’t kill you? ARCHIVIST: I– guess I thought imprisonment wouldn’t… wouldn’t be as bad as it was. DAISY: [SHAKY SIGH] ARCHIVIST: And it’s a lot easier to make that choice than it is to actually… endure the result. You might have noticed when I was in there with you, I… I had regrets.

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: Why were we chosen? Agnes was created – crafted with a specific purpose so finely tuned that even a grain of uncertainty threatened the entirety of her being. [CHORTLING] But I’m so full of doubt it feels like there’s no room for anything else, and… I’m sure Martin is the same…! Is there “destiny” here? B–bloodlines and… prophecies, or did we just… stumble into this? Maybe we’re the opposite of Agnes; maybe our doubts are exactly what we need. I–if that’s the case, I’m a… an amazing chosen one. … [LONG EXHALE] Don’t know how that would work, though.

(MAG143) HELEN: … How was it? ARCHIVIST: Mm? HELEN: Looking upon The Dark. ARCHIVIST: I thought I was going to die. HELEN: You seem to think that a lot. I remember when you thought you were going to die at my threshold. ARCHIVIST: … Yeah.

(MAG150) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] It’s just… The Web can be subtle, you understand? MELANIE: And? For all you know, its plan is to paralyse you with indecision…! ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] MELANIE: Leaving you… sitting here, terrified that… everything you do is somehow all part of its Grand Plan… And who do you think that fear is gonna feed? ARCHIVIST: Yes, well. [INHALE] You are… not the first, to make that point.

(MAG152) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] … When does it stop? HELEN: What? ARCHIVIST: The guilt… The misery… All the others I’ve met, they’ve been… cold. Cruel. They’ve enjoyed what they do. When does The Eye… make me monstrous?

… and that seems to be good for Elias’s plans/Jon’s self-realisation as an Archivist…? Season 4 feels like it’s been a slow game of completing Jon’s set by giving him incentive and by fostering his worry: removing the Slaughter’s bullet from Melanie, making him contact a Flesh avatar in his search for an anchor, making him go down in the Buried coffin in the hope of saving Daisy, making him see a Dark artefact after making him think he would be stopping a ritual). Elias has never been about reassurance; quite the contrary, he always pushed Jon to fear the worst from things, and it was once again the case when he pointed out how dangerous going into The Lonely would be. There is still the question about whether it was about the physical or intellectual experiences, or both. Jon got an insight of the way the Fears worked, from the inside, and Elias had pointed out in the past that that is apparently his function:

(MAG092) ELIAS: [SIGH] What are you? ARCHIVIST: I… The Archivist. ELIAS: Precisely. It is your job to chronicle these things, to experience them, whether first-hand or through the eyes of others. To simply be told, well…

Jon has now been in contact with all the Fears except The Lonely, getting an internal view of them and how they operated:

* Corruption through Jane Prentiss’s attack (and her written statement).

* Spiral through Michael’s and then Helen’s corridors (and Michael’s live-statement).

* Desolation through Jude Perry burning his hand (and her live-statement).

* Vast through Mike dropping him (and his-statement).

* Hunt through Daisy, then Julia&Trevor, chasing him (and their live-statements).

* Stranger through the Not!Them’s deception, the experience of The Unknowing (and Breekon’s “extracted” statement).

* End through his own almost-death and unwillingness to die, becoming something else instead (and Oliver’s live-statement).

* Slaughter through Melanie’s violent urges (plus the statement she gave of her injuries?).

* Flesh through Jared taking two ribs (and Jared’s live-statement).

* Buried through his rescue attempt in the coffin (no direct avatar here, but a few written statements).

(MAG132) ARCHIVIST: I know… DAISY: Th–the way out? ARCHIVIST: No… I know where we are! There isn’t no out, not here. This is… this is forever deep below creation. Where the weight of existence bears down… This is The Buried, and we are alive… There isn’t even an up. … Oh god… What have I done! What have I done…

* Dark through directly staring into the Dark Sun (and Manuela’s live-statement).

* Web through the Leitner as a kid, and Annabelle making him doubts about influences and control (and Annabelle writing her statement for him).

(MAG147, Annabelle Caine) “Unless, of course, none of it was intentional. None of it was planned. The Mother is the fear of manipulation and lost control made manifest. So perhaps it is our fear that projects Her influence on everything that happens. Like the mind, retrospectively assigning reason to our actions, so we fit whatever occurs into the neatest pattern we can, and declare Her web both intricate… and complete. Perhaps She is no more active than Terminus – simply sitting and revelling in the inevitable cascade of paranoia, as those who hold Her in special terror cocoon themselves in red string and theory. Or perhaps I am simply telling you what you need to hear, in order to behave exactly as the Mother wishes you to.”

Still missing The Lonely both as a live-statement and/or statement from an avatar, as a live experience, and as a scar, but now… he’s getting there. (And missing The Extinction, too, which could factor in, but Jonah is probably still following Smirke’s List of Fourteen? Smirke’s architecture was based around the concept.)

But I’m especially curious about the scars in the context of Jonah body-hopping: Robert Smirke had mentioned he feared death, a lot of people had pointed out that Elias tends to avoid getting directly involved, and… that could plainly be a way to avoid the risk of dying himself? And what if what he needed was a body who had physically experienced the Fears…? I’m mostly thinking about it because:

* James Wright was Head of the Institute for 23 years (1973 to 1996); assuming that Jonah had body-hopped right when “Elias Bouchard” became the next Head, that would be 22 years in that body as of now. So might be time to get another one.

* If Jon is meant to be the next host, you Know that Jonny would have a blast voicing Jonah-in-Jon: it would a big challenge voice-acting wise (making a character we used to hear through another VA absolutely identifiable), and also probably a great deal of fun (especially making everyone upset).

* Cursed thought of Unlikely Team during season 5, consisting of Martin (who still thinks that Jon is somewhere there and can be saved), Basira (who is both tracking Daisy and uuuh trying to prevent the apocalypse) and pothead!Elias being back in control of his body (and also uuuh convicted of murders and technically escaped from prison) going after Jonah!Jon. It sounds like if The Eye is attempting its ritual, it’s coming now, but. Lovely thoughts.

(I do subscribe to the idea that the Actual Elias Bouchard might still be somewhere: being stuck and condemned to watch the atrocities committed by Jonah (… he knew about poisoned drinks) sounds like the Most Beholding Thing ever, and there is still the question of how Jonah had been feeding. What if his Fear battery was always within him?)

- Still two episodes, and everything already sounds like The Worst Possible? Martin has been whooshed into The Lonely, while being susceptible to it; Jon opened his inner door and might be drowning; Daisy fell back into The Hunt; Elias is winning and The Eye’s ritual might be on the verge of happening; the Institute has been attacked and there are 4 avatars/monsters fighting inside of it. It might be the worst for Martin to have to deal with the fact that, if Jon is getting lost, it would have been to save him (was it a nice bonus for Elias, as a punishment for Martin’s schemes at the end of season 3…? I’m wondering, because I also feel like Basira is being “punished” through Daisy in a way, and Elias could be petty enough to join utilitarianism and personal grudges: getting Trevor&Julia in at the right time to cause chaos and make Jon panic, and also to force Daisy to snap and make Basira lose her….)

- ;; Elias sounded absolutely in control, so… yeah, we might be losing Jon as we just lost Daisy – but at the same time, if it’s already happening with her, things could go differently for him…? Jon had already gotten out of The Buried, and we still don’t… really know how – we know about elements who contributed, but not how it worked exactly. Was his anchor truly his rib? Was it the statements, through the recordings? Did the fact that Martin had been the one to put them there help? Did the Web lighter help…?

- OKAY, so the knife has been explicitly mentioned, heard… and clearly dropped on the Panopticon floor:

(MAG158) MARTIN: I’m… saying no. I refuse! Game over. [KNIFE CLATTERING ON THE GROUND]

… So there is a good chance that it’s gonna be put to use: either by Elias on someone (Jon or Martin), eeeeeeeeeeither someone using it on him.

……………… and as much as Violence Is Bad, I really want to hope for Basira, there. It’s around the anniversary of her involvement with the Institute (she went for the worms in the Summer, then gave her first statement to Jon on September 19th, 2016), Elias played with her all through season 4, sending her after dead-end leads to get Jon into the coffin, then pushing her to go with Jon to ~stop The Dark~. She got Daisy back only to lose her again. Sure, she got to punch Elias (and it was a m a z i n g), but… she didn’t manage to achieve anything, to get a “victory” in any way, this season? Stabbing wouldn’t be a good answer, but Basira mostly cared about Daisy, and Daisy is now lost to The Hunt – if killing Elias and/or Jonah’s body means insta-death for all the assistants solely tied to The Eye, that… might be a price she would be ready to pay right now. Although there is still the matter of Daisy (given that she went full Hunt, would she still be killed too?).

(… Also, given how Elias has been very casually sexist/classist recently?

(MAG148) ELIAS: Ah… [HUM] I’ve… always thought that a man’s eating habits were… his own private business.

(MAG158) ELIAS: Oh, you needn’t worry. Two against one? Hm! I couldn’t stop you if I wanted to. I just wanted to be here at the end. Can a man not watch his own death?

I really really want him to get backstabbed by a female character that he would have failed to factor in as an actual threat.)

(Other option is that Elias could try to bribe her through the hope of getting Daisy back again and ;; That might be a weakness for Basira, uh…)

- Bonus for Basira: she pointed out that Jonah’s body-hopping could be like Rayner’s. And she directly witnessed Rayner’s death and the weak spot in the action – Rayner was vulnerable when he tried to get into a new body. If Jonah is precisely trying to do that… it could be the right moment to strike (for Basira, Annabelle, Helen…). Grabbing an opportunity on the moment was also her Thing, according to Daisy:

(MAG142) DAISY: When Basira and I were partners, I’d see this happen sometimes. She can read a… situation like no one I know, always seems to know the right move, but for all her research, she never wants to put a plan together. I think she just hates all the unknowns, the… variables. [SIGH] Contingencies. If she spots an advantage, she’ll… grab it, and trust herself to figure out the details as she goes.

- The summaries are usually non-canon but this one, uuuuuh, this one felt Very Specific…

“Case #0182509-A Original recording of events leading to the disappearances of Jonathan Sims, Martin Blackwood, Alice Tonner and Peter Lukas.”

* So: still in 2018 (the Institute is still in its 200th year anniversary), but in September. We broke the curse of an assistant dying every Summer, at least? Since it’s Autumn already.

* Side “A”, so next episode could be the B-side…? Or will we get it much, muuuch later…

* Alrrrrrrrrrrrrright so, Jon, Martin and Peter in the Lonely + Daisy is probably not recognisable anymore. That leaves Basira and Elias, but the summary makes it sound like it was written a bit in the future so… Are they not listed because they’re still accessible at this point in time? … Or because their corpses have been found?

Anyway. Another timeskip coming between season 4 and season 5, uh…? ;;

I Don’t Like This Title, but then, every Monday/Tuesday/first part of Wednesday is a variation around that. Could be about The Extinction, could be about Jon completing his “set” with the Lonely (scar and scare-wise); could be about Martin when having the original team in mind; could be about Basira given how we left her at the end of MAG158; could be about The Watcher’s Crown; could be about surprise!Annabelle or surprise!Helen; could be about Jonah getting another body; could be about The Lonely’s ritual; could be about Jon-and-Martin… in any case, sob. I mentioned a few but I don’t even have any conviction/feeling, Fear-wise?

#aND DONE #that's. that's a long one and?? i technically rushed??? and gave up on a few things/*tried* to go quicker?? #that episode was Like That. #long post/ #tma liveblog #mag158 #tma season 4 #the magnus archives

[eeriehowl]

halloween sequels ranking, now that i’ve watched all of them

halloween 2 (1981) : 4.5/5

very good! the plottwist is a little poorly tied in, but reasonably so because it was forcibly pushed into the script last minute, literally. so i can’t really blame them for not doing a perfect execution. otherwise, good moments throughout highlighting the characters personalities, and the jimmy bloodpool scene is priceless. it just makes me lose it every time. keeps the spirit of the original and also brings in mr sandman as a soundtrack, which is delicious.

halloween 3: season of the witch (1982): 2/5

honestly giving it points for the androids and the creepy concept with the masks alone. the masks have a fun design too, even if simple! i want one of those pumpkin ones. ✨👀 but the main character is a boring generic action hero type and doesn’t intrigue me whatsoever. and his fellow female lead doesn’t do much for me either until the very end. the buildup to the climax is boring and long, but once the climax is reached, some fun scenes ahead at least. the yellow goop out of the androids, yesss.

halloween 4: return of michael myers (1988): 2/5

mmmm. here we go down the hell that is the Jamie storyline. i’m not a fan of the addition and michael starts getting ooc in behavior starting here. i find it weird he even targets Jamie to begin with, and no, the family bond alone doesn’t feel like enough of a motivator for his character. i missed laurie. also, he pretty much lost his stalking aspect for the most part. i liked the rooftop fight, it was a fun little concept. michael’s OWO what’s this scene is probably the best thing in this movie, lmao. felt in character with his bizarre behavior. the plottwist at the end doesn’t make sense, not with context from later movies in this storyline either. 

halloween 5: revenge of michael myers: 2/5

jamie story line continues. still doesn’t intrigue or scare me. even if a child in danger is usually a scary concept, the way it is handled here is just... not scary. maybe because of that lingering feel that’s still there from the last movie. the feeling that this is an unlikely target for michael. really takes me out of it. there are some fun and spooky scenes scattered here and there though. they subtly start hinting at michael being cursed in this one, which is a dumb plottwist that takes so much away from the original narrative of evil that made michael scary. doesn’t go hard apologism like the rob zombie remake though and keeps the whole ”its a curse” aspect subtle enough. the movie after this one though..........

halloween 6: curse of michael myers (1995): No

skip this one if u know what’s good for you. google the house chase scene if u wanna see michael fall down the stairs, but otherwise, big avoid on this one. this one goes further into the whole ”michael is cursed actually” storyline, it makes me snore. some people say it is better with the producers cut, but it’s really not. i’d argue that makes it worse. bunch of additional warnings for that one. the only thing that’s okay is that loomis is having a pretty chill time.

halloween: 20 years later (1998): 4/5

after so many mediocres and shitters, it felt nice to see a movie that did the franchise justice again. it also played mister sandman in the opening, which of course has me immediately. i liked the dynamic between laurie and her child here better than the one from halloween (2018), i felt that one was not as well handled. he had more character and was a better actor than karen’s actress. michael was back to being more of a stalking predator than the ”i’ll kill anything in my way” michael that 4-6 went with. all the laurie and michael development was interesting and their final showdown was really satisfying all around. too bad the next one pops.

halloween: resurrection (2002): 1/5

it kills off laurie on-screen early on and the acting is as sloppy as can be. i gave it one point bc there are semi funny parts after laurie’s death. it’s way more of a comedy after that than a horror movie. not good comedy for most of it. idk why they included the death scene at all, it just angered me.

rob zombie’s halloween (2007): No.

michael has rats for like 1 minute in the opening. otherwise, hard pass. gives michael an intricate backstory with a bunch of sad times, making his family shit, grasping at every straw to justify his behavior with a detailed sad backstory. this movie tries to make him an anti-hero instead of a villain, basically. explains waaayy too much about him, as john carpenter already said about it. he’s supposed to be sort of like a cryptid, this really did not stay true to that. graphic rape and violence and no subtlety what so ever.

halloween (2018): 2,5/5

the more i look back at it, the more it’s flaws shine, really. i had a good time watching it last year, but a big part of that is just bc i love watching halloween movies. i was thrilled to see laurie n michael again. but the handling of it is not great. the movie does not manage to make me care about allyson and karen, and they got a lot of screentime. i found myself often longing for a laurie or michael scene. but even so, the michael scenes didn’t feel very in character either, this one fell back to making michael a generic slasher villain. he kills everything that comes into contact with him and does no stalking what so ever. laurie’s scenes are fun however n the effects on her mental health after all this horror were believable and that car scene really HURT. also, michael’s akward creepy behavior patterns are pretty much voided except for that one scene where michael let’s this teen finish talking about his love problems for no reason before killing him. the ghost sheet over the girl was just a cheap reference to the original. of which the movie speaks of too much btw. i felt the references were very tacked on for the most part, except laurie’s little disappearing act. that was a real good one. doesn’t feel good that they’re making a sequel in the sense that it’s probably not gonna be great, but feels good in the way that i get to see my fave characters some more. 👀

#😏✨ #text heavy af youve been warned #violence mention - #rape mention - #horror - #i was about to go idk why i wrote this #but i do its for me #ty for the food @ myself #death mention - #halloween (movie)

[survivormetaverse]

Episode 12 - "i'm baaaaaacckkkkk 😈" ~Jodi

An iconic moment happened today and I accidentally voted my closest ally out of the game. So Brayden got sent home and he is going to hate me when he finds out what happened. I did kind of get him out on accident I did not mean for Brayden to go I wanted Jay gone but I was blindsided by Colin and Josh and Elle AND AMY!!??]£[_[3 Omg. Im really upset that hes gone i miss him so much and I dont know how Im gonna go on without his brain. I dont trust Jay but Jared and Jay were both messaging me about how they already forgive me and stuff so thats a little crazy. I think it could be fake or they are just desperate for numbers. But I am with Josh and Amy and Colin and Elle now. I want to be with their numbers. I talked to all of them individually and they said they all were sorry for lying to me and causing me to get my friend out. I know its just a game but I just feel awful and so guilty right now. This has probably been the worst day of my life. He probably will never play another org with me again and hes the only reason i play orgs its boring without him. We are best friends increal life and I hope he can forgive me. I havent said anything to him because thats breaking the rules. But when he finds out im literally so scared of what he'll say to me. I pray he will forgive me I am literally so dumb af.

i'm baaaaaacckkkkk..................... 😈

This is literally worst case right now with jodi winning the play back like throughout the day she has won back her allies including anastasia since she swapped coins with her. Elle, colin, and josh all gave me all their coins to grab immunity before the other side to protect me but also it makes me a bigger target lol plus I gave elle some swapped to get the second thing the leftover because I THOUGHT it could give us an extra vote since that was ony menu but I was tired and drunk and it was a LOT of words and it was just the hunts which I knew didn't have any and I feel terrible bc 150 tokens and my actual alliance is going to be so mad when they realize THAT I HAVE THE LAST ONES and fucked up in suggesting it at all. First they were going for info. So now I think Jodi got all the other sides tokens and they are pooling for something idek. It's literally worst case like we were set to be up 5-2 or at least 4-3 and now it looks like it's 4-4 again hahaha neat. And it looks like colin is chatting with jodi again and they are making deals lol like tbh if she gets to the end I am voting for her to win I've said it many rounds. Turns out anastasia and brayden not only know each other irl they are besties so she mad mad. And Josh looks to be making deals and thinking about flipping so I am on borrowed time but tbh I never expected to make merge. I am glad I have immunity bc I physically couldn't do the challenge anywU here lol and I fucked that up too hahahaha. Good times all around. Like I want to tell them about my steal a vote to have official numbers but now they'd just be mad hahaha literally colin and I had every advantage except jared's idol now. Ahhhh idk what to do but it remains hilarious. I'm expecting Raffy to give my info in these in the market and that is no bueno ahahahaha. I am tempted to just give colin everything bc it's funny. Also jodi talked to me until 1am just trying to guilt me into being back with her I said I have to sleep goodnight like 5 times minimum. Her social game is so good that's why I think she has them all back with her and possibly josh. The problem is that I was keeping her close bc she had the info from others and from my game. I really never had a number one lol bc I was just vibing and I guess now colin is bc I flipped with him lol and I think it's hilarious he grew his army from 0 to 5 almost.

~

I have a suspicion colin and anastasia have actually been closely aligned this whole time and she knew everything all along. Colin sure loves giving out info haha. And apparently deals are happening all over, none of which I have made 😂

Jodi's backkkkk, wild wild wilddddd. The challenge went poorly, darn thats like 20 minutes wasted. We bought the refresh and there was nothing there 💔 that's 150 tokens wasted 😅. But! We got Amy immunity✨ and then Colin won the challenge so tbh everything's still going great lol. Wonder how we're gonna vote this round :/ we'll see how this goes! I've stopped worrying whether I'm going completely, it either happens or it doesn't 💖 xoxo, gossip girl (this is misleading I HAVE NOT SEEN THE SHOW i just know way too much about it because i have friends that did lol)

So after I voted my showmance Brayden out of the game I was left with an interesting situation. I had cried to Josh Colin and Amy that I was alone now and that my whole alliance hated me. With Jodi back in, I dont think they believe me. I literally flipped sides so I could be in their alliance because I didnt trust Jay and Jared and Jodi. But they literally lied to me about the vote and said it was nothing personal to me but they didnt tell me the plan because they wanted to see if I was lying. Which sucks for me because I then voted Brayden out :( Now that they know that im truthful they said they would work with me now. But all of them have been pretty inactive today. I talked to Amy the most and a little Colin and a little Josh. But I wasnt in their alliance. So I asked Amy if I could be added into an alliance chat since I was apperently in their alliance now. And she said sure. And they added me to a vote block. That is not an alliance group chat btw. So I was like wow thanks. But inside I was like screw this. So before this all happened, Jodi, Jay and Jared put me in a true alliance group chat. This morning I was ready to work with Colin and Josh but not anymore. Not after they put me in a vote block chat clearly saying to me that I am just a number to be used. They don't even need my vote either because Amy has an idol and Amy and Colin are safe. So I'm obviously voting with Jay, Jared, and Jodi. And I know they probably have a final three without me. They could call it something really cool like the three J's. But I called Jay and explained everything to him. (Also Jay forgave me for literally trying to get him out. He umderstands that its a game and all of my motives about not trusting him anymore.) He said he would be a hypocrite if he didnt forgive me because he told people my name in the chaos vote. So I actually think we are cool. And I told Jay that I am his number one. Which is true. He told me a lot of things about how Amy is actually really smart and stuff (I thought that girl was just a goat that I could take to the end with me) But her and colin are tight and both immune. This is bad. Basically we will go to rocks unless Elle flips to our side. Jay is giving his pitch to Elle tommarow. And maybe I will apologize to her correctly tomarow too. ALSO SPELLING THE WORD TOMARROW IS THE HARDEST THING IN MY LIFE. Also I took 62 minutes to complete a puzzle today so thats kind of emberassing. Anyways bye everyone this was so much fun to type omg.

Lol I woke up to a text from jodi asking if anyone was taking about votes yet and I said no because I went to sleep early bc I almost passed out from heat yesterday and had just woke up and she responded "ummmm lol...." 🤣🤣🤣 Sorry I sleep. She's in Colin's dms saying how I was legit her number one and now we can't even talk about votes. Like yeah girl we worked our asses off to get you out of the game sorry I'm not happy you are back. Also I'm still at disney world so I don't have the time for a million conversations. I know I'm going to be the Russell Hanz of the f3 /if/ I make it. So what's jury management lol like she was already pissed I voted her out and I plan to do it again. Anyway it looks like it's hilariously about to be a unanimous jay vote tonight but I am thinking we throw one vote somewhere else in case of an idol. But if jodi did get anastasia back we can't do that. Anyway lol I'm immune so whatever. Elle and Colin discussed like if it's on elle (which apparently jared proposed an alliance of 5 which included myself lol!) Then we could go to rocks and have only josh as a possibility and statistically he won't go if he is willing to go to rocks that it. All this to say I'm f7 and I want to keep my extra vote to f6 if possible so I can use the idol for fun at f5.

https://youtu.be/snpKevncc44

My quest has come to an end. I joined this game to be someone who could be there for Jodi. Jodi and I played survivor subrosa together and we both had rough experiences due to a player in the game who harassed jodi and tried to convince everyone I was misogynistic. As much as I love Survivor, I didn’t play this game to win. I played this game because Jodi told me she was playing it and I wanted to be her body guard. I wanted to be someone who could be there for her both as a number but also as an enforcer, anybody who ever dared to do anything to Jodi would’ve had to have dealt with me. Tonight, Amy and Colin have immunity, and either amy or josh or elle have an idol, so there’s no point in making any noise tonight and wasting Jared’s idol. None of those 4 trust me, and I doubt any of them like me. It is what it is, it’s best for Jodi, Jared, and Anastasia’s game to move forward without me, and it’s smart for Jared to keep his idol. Tonight, I will be voted out, and I am 100% at peace with it. 

Since Elle, Josh, Amy and Colin pooled their tokens for immunity and advantage refresh, it means all the advantages and disadvantages are on our side. Plan is to send Elle a disadvantage and let Colin know because honestly it’s not hard to find out anyways. Jay doesn’t mind getting booted at some point cuz he wants to stand for me on the jury, but I don’t want to boot him right now. Obviously they won’t boot Elle, so I’m going to see if Jared will propose Anastasia. The thing right now is me/Jay/Anastasia/Jared also know next round is invisible. So I want Jay or Anastasia to send Colin and Amy disadvantages because if they’re paranoid seeing me Jared/Jay/Anastasia have advantages and they have disadvantages, they might be paranoid enough to play all their idols. I also wanted to keep Jay for this round as it’d be unanimous and something everyone can settle on. Jared wanted to do me/Jared/Josh/Amy/Colin as an alliance but has concerns about the 3 of them being in top 5 in the majority snd also Colin having his ideal f3. I told him my plan has the best shot at flushing all idols and hopefully we can either get Josh to flip or at least have Amy/Colin vulnerable at 5/6. Last thing is Jared is worried he’d be blindsided this round. I told him my plan and I said even if he wanted to flush his idol this round, next round should be ok if we all vote out Jay and the rest of them flush idols. Good to be back in the game! I genuinely believe Colin wants me as a shield at least for this round, and if I can make it through, I have a game to play. 

Not everyone saying they only bought an advantage lol what about those other 70 tokens 👀👀👀 Like it must be jay unless someone is lying haha i am hoping people are just busy bc these answers I'm getting from Josh and Colin are concerning 😂 It looks like only elle and got disadvantages ☠️ I am really hoping not to be a target next round even though I know I will be haha. Next round is only 7 and I'd love to take out jodi and jared before they turn on me ☠️ especially since colin creeped on jodi's insta and it is possible they know each other from sports irl. And she was so concerned about all these pregame connections 😂 and here it was likely to deflect. Anyway I just swapped my position of having jodi do all the social work with having colin do all the social work knowing full well I'm not gonna get those end votes. I'm just trying to pull up my placement average now 😂. I hope everyone sees me as having no social game to take me to the end lol bc realistically I don't bc I don't care to put in that time this game. As I write from the pirates of the caribbean line 😂 So anyway if I'm not being lied to which I might be it looks like unanimous jay tonight but also I think the other group was talking split on jay like a 3-3-2 and I'm like wait the 2 wouldn't help. Elle are you okay with that? So I think they must have figured out I have stuff ☠️ I wonder what people REALLY bought haha okay bye

Jodi is back, not just Jodi Jodi, but player Jodi. Player Jodi thinks a LOT. When I was out, the entire time I was hoping somebody caught on that Amy flipped because they knew to put a stray vote on Colin to protect him from chaos idol, but they left Josh exposed. Why? Because Colin knew Amy was going to throw a vote on Josh. Also, Colin tied with me for closest ally and that set off an alarm too. Onto the next. So Colin won immunity, Amy bought immunity, but this could possibly be good because it means they are playing knowing they are not at risk themselves. Anastasia is voting with them this round, but she's actually working with us. She told us that the actual plan on that side is: "Jay, Jared, Jodi vote elle and Elle, Amy, Colin vote Jay and Josh and Anastasia vote Jodi" Anastasia will vote me here to continue "working" with them for the next vote. Essentially, they thought that Jay had the merge idol this whole time and Colin was weary about it, and that's why he got nervous about sending out Jay last round. That told me Colin did not have the merge idol. Josh came to me too about Jay having the merge idol. But the way they're splitting the votes this round shows me now that somebody has stepped forward to mention they have it (likely Elle) because if Jay idoled, Elle goes in this split vote plan. Therefore, somebody must've been like "ok let's just be safe and split the votes, I have the other idol". That's good and bad because now Colin has no merge idol paranoia, and they're also able to use it together. It also did confirm to me they've talked about it. Here's where things get tricky. Player Jodi is so tempted to run with it and do a 4-3-1 Josh-Jay-Jodi but it's so risky and could possibly destroy the long term social game, especially if they idol for Josh and Jay goes anyway (we are not idoling for him here). So instead, I'm going to use Jay's vote out to the best of my advantage. Hopefully flush an idol if possible, maybe a steal-a-vote, something. Knowing about next round being invisible is good info for us. Having this info is so key and usually I would think that immunity for a round is bigger than this but being able to plan ahead for a GAME-CHANGING twist is crucial here. My move here is to play the game through psychological distress. I have no advantages! Since they're out of tokens from buying immunity, me/Anastasia/Jared/Jay bought advantages for ourselves and also sent out disadvantages to Colin/Amy/Elle. Seeing that not only we have advantages but also them having disadvantages, they probably still feel like things will be ok because they'll just split votes or whatever and one of them needs to win immunity. But given this is an invisible round, I think Amy is honestly paranoid enough to just play her idol, hopefully Elle does too, and then between me and Jared, we'll idol for one of us. I also plan on bluffing an advantage coming back from Jury, and say something along the lines of having to survive one round before the advantage got activated. I'm going for the win, everyone, I know that if I get to the end with anybody, I have a solid shot at winning. I just need to get there and to do that, I must play an adaptable game – more than ever. PS I am holding onto Jared's idol right now. Power (temporary) feels amazing. Dw I'm giving it back....😈

this has been the most chill round in a while. which is really weird consider JODI IS BACK AND WE BLINDSIDED BRAYDEN LAST ROUND this round is turning out to be what I WANTED last round to be. everyone is talking with everyone, people are trying to disband the sides and all intermingle. it's really interesting how no one else was on board with this until after they lost majority. seems like people don't like playing from the bottom. weird huh now these bitches know how I felt >:( anyway. jodi is back. it's weird. she knows that amy flipped now and everyone is playing very carefully my ideal boot this round was either jay or josh, in that order. so when my gay ass WON IMMUNITY I immediately put out jay's name. we already have the numbers, but I also like said my piece to jodi and jared, this is yalls chance to prove to me that you're really with me and sides don't exist. the ball is in their court do i trust them? no. am I worried? no. i have immunity, the scariest thing rn is that I think Jay is voting Elle, and if Jared and Jodi are with him then that's scary, bc Jared has an idol. The ONLY people I would play my idol for is Amy and Elle, and Elle being in trouble means I might have to play my idol on her if Jay idols himself. We have enough to split, so I'm not worried, I just hope all goes according to plan. sorry my confessional is lame. its the weekend now so i have time uwu. I'll write more the next few days

So this whole token twist thing has really annoyed me. Because of me wanting to show my loyalty to my alliance, i gave away all my coins to Amy so that she could but immunity. And against my wishes, Elle wasted her coins on the “advantage” which turned out to be a dud. I wanted to get coins together to buy game info or better yet, trade coins with other people. But i was left with nothing, while all the people on the other side used their coins to buy advantages in the next immunity challenge making it even harder for me to secure my safety. Maybe this new 2 Gays and a Jared alliance might actually pan out but im tired of getting the short end of the stick with everything.

~~~

Edgic:

Power Rankings:

Anastasia: She is in the middle of the two sides. They both need her for the rest of this game before a side is terminated. She is the most powerful because she is in the middle.

Jodi: Has regained a lot of her footing in this game. Is being used as a shield by the people who voted her out. The decision to vote out Jay is questionable, but she still has a lot of power thanks to the knowledge Anastasia and Jared feed her.

Colin: The head of the opposing side. Seems to not know what is really going on with Anastasia. But his allies are willing to take him to the end which is good. Needs to avoid falling into a Jodi pitfall.

Amy: Her rat behavior has been exposed, but her allies are still willing to defend her. Second in command on the Colin side. She is being handed these immunities.

Jared: Jodi’s new #1. Will probably make it to the end of this game. However, he isn’t calling the shots and is in danger of being targeted as an “easy” vote or being called a goat at the end. Needs to start taking fate in his own hands.

Elle: Lost a lot of footing because of not telling Anastasia the truth. This move caused Anastasia to go back to Jodi’s side which will hurt in the coming round. Is the next target for the Jodi side.

Jay: Died on the sword for Jodi. I am confused why they didn’t just stack 4 votes somewhere else, but it is whatever. Has basically given up.

Josh: Left out of a lot of discussions. Is on the outside of his alliances and from the opposing side. Is the most in danger of getting targeted or being a casualty of an idol.

#episode #episodes

[riskeith]

hii!

manifesting xiao for you!!!!! it surely will be worth it after all that wait and all those rolls shsjdhsj <3 you’ll probably upgrade him and his weapons and talents and all that right away too, huh? spilling all your recourses on one stotic lil boy 👅 (can’t say i blame ya he deserves it) FUNNY YOU MENTION THAT when i did the guiding light seal puzzle before the stormterror battle i accidentally forgot to change kaeya’s weapon to the ones i’ve upgraded so he was stuck with the dull sword and i was like why the FUCK doesn’t he do any damage and then it hit me . yikes 😬 Lmao has that ever happened to you?

oh really? reading all of that makes it seem like we’re in the bad end of the stick dhdhdjdjfh but you made me curious to try it out tbh... now where could i get a hold on a pc..... hm

yeah omg you’ve gotten so far now i can’t imagine how bizarre it would be to revert back to giving like 10 dmg and facing level 3 villains lmao still sometimes even i find myself missing the early days things weren’t as stressful then ): do you?

school did start which is why haikyuu is perfect!! it’s been keeping me very warm and happy tbh... 🥺 you know something i noticed this time watching is that kagehina are Always around each other. i honestly don’t remember them doing that but watching now it’s like at almost every scene they are either standing next to each other or showing up to the other’s scene and it’s like??? damn???? y’all live like this? idk if that changes in future eps but right now it’s Constant. i love it.

dude i’m such a nostalgia person i’m always up for a trip to the good ol’ days bc sometimes you just gotta go back to things for your own sake. but fun Fact i started watching voltron after it ended so i missed so much of the hype while it was ongoing.. literally came into it while it was a goddamn mess. i knew that klance wouldn’t be canon but watching i couldn’t help but hope... how was it stanning while it was ongoing?

(you saying that reminds me of the what if we kissed meme..... what if we kissed in the genshin co-op mode 😳 anyway you’re at such a high level idk how much i could help you... i suppose we could just run around but yeah i do play in europe... 😭)

RED AND BLUE GAYS!!!!!! RED AND BLUE GAYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! the purple light were mega gay like hello????? especially since lance is bi and it was Him that said the line and hfjdhdhsjdjdhdj fuck ! i’m so sad now ever since we started talking about them i’ve just been missing them sooooo much it’s crazy... KEITH DESERVES THE UNIVERSE he’s so sweet and caring in his own way and he grew so much like compare s8 keith with s1 keith and see!!!! he matured so much and god . at least he’s helping the galaxy with his lesbians now

dude i wanted to say that but i was scared it was an unpopular opinion.... hunk and pidge could be so mean to him sometimes for no reason or just shoo him aside and no??? don’t do that to your friend????? it irked me sometimes bc you could see that he got upset about it but he felt like he had no one to turn to 😭😭😭😭😭 kms but keith. keith is good.

THE I LOVE YOU SCENE did it also take you sooo much by surprise like i remember watching and just going AAAAAA??????!!!??!!?? and the art???? mister anime keith kogane?????? it was so beautiful and so perfect and so sad ughhhhhhh funny how keith has 2 out of the three i love you scenes on voltron even tho he’s the stotic type .

i’m thinking but honestly all i want is some fluffy angst... a punch in the gut with some final kissing . i love fics that rewrite the sunset scene always chefs kiss... or you know how in season 7 for some reason they always called out for each other first? like when lance has his crashing scene keith yells out lance come in twice??? or when they are stuck in the galra prison and they yell out each other’s names???? idk something about that would be amazing to read???? ok i rambled idk rewritten canon klance is just Mwah... OH IM SO EXCITED TO READ THOSE SNIPPETS EEEEEEE :DDDDDD TY FOR SENDING THAT

i’m soooo glad you liked the fanart when i saw it i HAD to send it your way... it’s the little bois in their animal hats 😭😭🥺 i love them so much it’s soooooo cute 😭😭 i’ve been stalking the original tweet and there’s some other version and they’re super adorable too 😭😭😭😭😭😭

hope you had a wonderful day today + yesterday... take care <333

hey heyyyy~

actually i don’t think i have many resources to give him bc im focusing on levelling up my team for the ascension rn FJKHDSKFHSDKJFHSDK but for sure i will do it... anything for him 😩 AHAHAH nooooo but yes ! during the chalk prince dragon event i used festering desire in dragonspine but my higher levelled sword everywhere else, but sometiems i forgot to switch back and was stuck with shit damage 💀

yeah actually i see a lot of poeple complain about not being able to do missions on mobile either (or having a really hard time with it) fskjhfksj but there are for sure people who would think mobile is better so 🤷‍♀️ to each their own! ahah does anyone in your family have a windows laptop/pc? steal borrow it 🤪

i definitely miss the easier days!! it’s fun going to an area with lower level enemies bc i defeat them so easily.. but then again their drops also aren’t as good so you trade one thing for another i guess lol

ikr?!?!?? like we get it you’re inseparable omg.. it’s so cute when they go seek out asahi as well and hinata hides behind kageyama and then points and at him like he’s showing him off.. lives in my mind rent free 😌

oh i see!!! that’s so brave of you omg you knew all that and still decided to give it a shot? fshfkdsjf. it was. insane. like talking about the positives only, it was just everyone going crazy every time there was a single hint of klance is canon king and just ugh. it was all so exciting and hype and like the energy you know?? especially when there were conventions where they were revealing trailers or new info wow tumblr was buzzing.. (reminds me of when klance was top ship.......) i miss that kinda environment tbh! but also now that i’m in uni i don’t think i’d have the energy to keep up fhskfjds

(WHAT IF WE KISSED!! IN GENSHIN CO-OP!! HAHA JK... UNLESS?! that’s so funny fskdj but i wish 😔😩 makes a second reroll account just for this? HAHAAH. and noooo even if we didn’t do anything i feel like it’d be so fun just running around hfkdsjs. and maybe i could carry you w your quests it’s always been my dream to help someone out like my brother can just come into my world and one-shot enemies 😩 but maybe some day!! cross-server will happen)

:((((((((((( S1 KEITH AND S8 KEITH THE GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT 😭😭😭😭 keith went from being a lone wolf expelled from the garrison to finding his MOTHER!! AND THE BESTEST SPACE WOLF DOGGO!! AND LEADING A FKN ITNERGALACTIC ORGANISATION!~!!!eASKJDHSAFHEHFSDIUHSAZODUQWEQWYRHIASKJDNCSOUADHB. marmora!keith............. both a blessing and a curse.... but that uniform tho 🥵

i cried!!! so much watching that scene lmao!!! can’t remember how i felt at the time but i was probably also surpirsed.. and ikr? that’s poetry in its own tbh we love that keith said the most ‘expressive’ and ‘emotional’ lines the most

sunset scene... sunset scene!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! omg yeah them just calling out for each other’s names first like??? explain please?? omg also remember when keith chose lance in the quiz.. AND LANCE CALLED KEITH THE FUTURE? FUCKING EXPLAIN???????? WHAT THE FUCK!!!!! there is no heterosexual explanation. okay but now that you’ve put sunset scene in my head... either rewrite where lance was looking for keith to confess to him bc they were going back to space and he wanted to get it out or.. in the future where klance are together and lance has a dream about it and suddenly realises wait. did keith already like me back then. and then they talk about it ... hmmmmm . AND WOOOO NO PROBLEM!! HOPE YOU ENJOY <33

i def have to look at the other versions!!! honestly this meme is kinda the best thing out there rn so many cute baby renditions of charas.. blessed!! i love them all sm...

thank you!! hope yours have been great too, and school is treating you well :**

#marriage anon #wowclunaanswers #long post

[tayegi]

THEORY TIME!(more like bullshit time) so I have a few thoughts and I'd like to share them, u see, I read in the asks that when Hobi asked her if she wants her mk and hair ruined in the rain; we get two possiblities: A) could it be that he was actually worried about his own hair and mk? Like he ran his fingers through his hair right after.. Makes one think! B) her hair probably looked really like shit, seeing how Tae mentioned it later on, and HS was pointing it out? We don't know (1/?)—❄️🐰

Anonymous said:I'd also like to mention this bc I kinda don't get it, like HS said that no matter how they play in that Saturday game, they'll still advance to the finals right? So jk can't be sad bc he fucked up that game, and he talked about the recruits that will be watching and that he has to give a good impression (that he fucked obv) but idk if that's what he's really stressed about, or the fact that he might get replaced is what's stressing him I'm confused! Please deal with my stupid brain (2/?)—❄️🐰

Anonymous said:Also I'm not about to just let go on how JK couldn't get the jealousy under control today! But what I'm ABSOLUTELY not about to let slip is OC'S JEALOUSY! I might be dumb but no one is going to tell me that I'm seeing too much into the fACT THAT IT WASNT JEALOUSY WHEN OC HAD HER STOMACH FLIPPIN' WHEN SHE SAW JK TALKING TO SM GIRLS AFTER THE GAME-NOBODY SAY ITS NOT REAL! BITCH BE DEADASS HAVING SOMETHING STRANGE TYING HER TO HIM ARE YOU SERIOUS RN?! IM FUCKING LIVING (3/?)—❄️🐰

DISS TIME! Can Hyejin kindly fuck off and let JKxOC sail on my tears for fucking once? Thank. I can see her making problems already OML, cuz my babies are clearly being close to each other and the wedding is near and they already bought socks for their babies and she seriously can't ruin everything. Ok? if she wants to keep her pretty face that is. Also dID YERIN HAVE ME SHOOK! I'm like ???? What happened to this child?! but I really ship her with Tae more than yoongi idk? (3/?)—❄️🐰

Anonymous said:Also is anyone about to talk about OCs talk with Yerin? I mean I nearly fucking peed my pants at some point! JUNGKOOK WHO?! COCONUT BITCH WHERE?! I ONLY KNOW JUICY FART!! LIKE I FUCKING LOVE YOU AND HOW YOU'RE SO COMFORTABLE WRITING ABOUT LITERALLY ANYTHING!! it's like one of my favorite parts when reading your fics it's just so refreshing and funny and cute at the same time and just thank u so much for spending ur time to write, and for sharing ur works with us I truly respect u (4/4sry😅)—❄️🐰

omg i love your asks so much, dear. i srsly live for them!!! im happy about the feedback i get for new rules, but 99% of it is always the same thing-- mijoo is such a bitch in ch 2, dancing hot dog/hobi in ch 4, aw that hug in ch 5, and while it’s all lovely, i dont know how to feel about the rest of the chapter. How did the other scenes work? What did you guys think? I feel completely blind and confused. So this kind of scene by scene feedback is incredible and srsly makes me happy like you dont even know :D 

ok let me try to answer some of your questions: 

1. u will see whats up with hobi soon :) 2. ah dont forget that jk is the top scorer in the district. i doubt one poor game will get him kicked out. 3. hehehe we’ll see how the OC feels about JK next chapter :) and what happens w/ hyejin :))) 4. LOL yerin is lowkey my fave!!! she deserves to know about juicy farts!!! 

So many of your questions will be answered just next chapter, so hang on bb! :D

#❄️🐰 #new rules #anon #lu answers

[survivormontenegro]

Episode 13: “I Feel Like It’s Time for a Classic Blindside” - Mitch

okay so mo went home and im sad because he is my SON and I LOVE HIM. On a game level, sepearating Jones/Mo was crucial, but Mo was a goat, and Julia and Mo going back to back is bad news.

It kind of limits my options moving forwards, since I know I can't go to the end with Jones/Mitch, and don't think I can go to the end with Jason. I thought Tom would be a goat for literally self voting twice, but Jones is selling him like some big threat?

Anywho that means F3 has to be Me/Caeleb/Benj, which honestly... is all good in my back, they are my two faves on the tribe, so I'm down to clown with that.

also me clocking that caeleb is matt who won kuwait's boyfriend, i truly am the second coming of nancy drew

okay so morning after last night's tribal. i don't regret any decisions i made, but i am a little concerned about the narrow path I now have to FTC.

I feel like I'm playing a good game, and a game better than those that I have played in the past. However, I'm also not delusional, and I know how big of a threat Jones/Mitch/Jason are at FTC, and while I don't think Tom should be a threat, apparently he is too.

What that means, is I have to angle for a F3 of Me, Caeleb and Benj. I think its do-able, but its going to be tricky.

The best way I see it happening is next vote, siding with Caeleb/Jones to vote off Jason, so that the two 'pairs' are attacked with equal force. Its definitely risky, since it means I'll be very vulnerable, but HOPEFULLY the following round I can swing it back and get Jones out.

That would then leave a F5 (which oh my GOD final five already got to SCREAM), of Me/Mitch/Caeleb/Tom/Benj. I think I would then unfortunately need to take out Mitch at F5, because he is scary scary, and I think would be such a deserving winner. That leaves a F4 of Me, Benj, Caeleb and Tom which I think is probably best case scenario, where I would vote off Tom most likely, leaving the F3 as me, Benj and Caeleb. If its a F2, I go to the end with Benj.

I think its definitely a work-able and do-able plan, its just important to get all the stages right. Thinking about it, it could be worth swapping Jason and Tom on the plan. I think Jason is more of a threat personally, but perception is reality, and if Jones is saying Tom is a threat, I can't be seen walking to the end with him.

So... I'm cautiously optimistic. I think I'm playing a strong game, I still have TWO idols, and am on track to keeping on pushing on.

If I'm voted off at seventh place, the order I would vote for the remaining players at FTC:

Mitch > Jason > Jones > Caeleb > Benj > Tom

I knew that this could happen, and I was trying so hard to keep Mo around. I told Grandma's boys that we should vote Mitch, they said no. And then Benj let me know he was voting Mo, and since Ali and Mitch weren't responding to me anymore, I knew they were going to vote Mo instead. I told Jones to play her idol on Mo but she didn't do that either. Overall, I am sad. Because I let them tell me how I should play that round but I should've been confident in A) my gameplay and what I wanted to do, and B) my understanding of the roles in this game and who I felt was talking to who. If the last vote showed me anything it showed me that:

I have a pretty good understanding of who is running this game (Mitch and Benj)

Jones is playing a really good social game but she isn't ready to make big moves yet, or she doesn't understand which moves we should make.

Jones and I are in this together. We have to by default because I know about her idol, but also with pairs popping up everywhere its safer to have a voting buddy. Plus Jones is cool so like I could be stuck with someone I didn't like and for that I'm lucky.

Lastly, I need to be confident. I have played well, but I've lost momentum. I had it with the Alex vote, and it waned but I had it in the Jules vote. I was exposed and lost it in the Julia vote, and I was completely left out of the picture in the Mo vote. I need to regain this momentum. I know I like always make a fool of myself with my confessionals hehe because I always say I want something to happen but it never ends up happening. That's largely because so many people have their own agendas, dictating the vote is not my style. Being flexible as F*** for sure is. BUT, I will hopefully get my way next tribal. I am planning on using Jones, Me, Ali and Jason to vote Mitch. I am starting to sow the seeds in Jason and Ali, because Mitch has clearly played the best so far. He has ALWAYS voted right, and been the deciding vote for Jules, Alex, and Mo. Yet he also never was cursed. He'll win, and its my mission to vote him next. But don't keep me on my word because HELL knows things are gonna hit the fan anyways.

also i have to confess this because its funny and i will forget otherwise, but on the call before last tribal, i said tom is too straight for me to be able to work with him long term in my host chat, because he kept saying bro and chick.

LITERALLY, and I mean LITERALLY, 5 seconds later, he shows us this picture and asks us "how fake this chick's boobs are". I am NOT going to be a straight enabler, straight pride can WAIT, this is not gonna keep happening.

With that said, I wanna go F3 with Tom probably KSADF, or no maybe F4. I definitely know Jason, Mitch and Jones need to leave sooner rather than later, and I will then figure it out from there eeeek!

also LOVE MR CAELEB, LOVE him. BUT.

I would've had a 38 POINT WORD, if he didn't snatch that Z from me, he ROBBED me of quizzical, and now he can spell frazzled which ties my current best word. EEEEEK.

okay me making fun of tom for having a sheet when i have the same... love being a crackhead...

also me getting SO pressed about Caeleb winning immunity for 0.5 seconds, before realising I didn't want to vote him out anyway, and that him winning is like... fine.

I made this this morning:

I hate everyone KSKSKSKSKKS i want to just do something for myself so bad Bc I feel like such a follower and I wanna just die all the time but like ????? The last 12 times I try to plan moves it backfires so I just need like,,, to breathe a bit.idk??? I don’t even know if I want BENJ in the F2 with me like I said,,, anyways,,,

Best F3 scenario: me/Tom/benj

Best F2 scenario: me/literally one of those two men,,,, maybe preferably Tom? Like no offense to Tom but idt anytime on jury likes Tom rn JSJSJSJS but ya time to die and lose in immunity UwU

I WON IMMUNITY AHHH. It means I'm guaranteed a spot in the final six, and assuming I play my idols right, F5 and then F4. I'm potentially... one round from FTC, this is CRAZY.

This round is gonna be interesting, it needs to be one of Jones, Jason or Mitch for sure, I just need to angle it so that its definitely the right one. I am immune, and can use that safety to lead a vote... whatever happens i'm so EXCITEDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

quasiconvexity carried me through

So the game has been going well! I wanted Mo to go at F9 cuz we just didn’t have as good of connection as I do with others but that got overshadowed by Julia blowing up but we made it happen this round me Mitch and Ali wow the votes actually fell 3-3-2 exactly like we planned.

Literally 4 votes in a row now the exposed people voted wrong LOL. Anyways next up to go is Jason, we have worked together well for a few votes but him and Tom are a duo who have to be broken up now that Mo/Jones are broken. Jason has more chance to win so its got to be him.

Jones covered my vote hehe so it should go as planned we hope but idk itll prob be ruined like stuff usually is. It should be me jones mitch caeleb voting him, tom and Jason will I guess vote jones or someone, ali can vote whoever it doesn’t matter

Me and Ali have realised the Sapphire idol is more of a curse than helpful LOL so hopefully we don’t ever have to use it. We have also decided that we want to go to F4 w Tom and Caeleb, I LOVE Jones and Mitch so much but they are the biggest threats. But I wouldn’t be surprised if everyone teams up against me and Ali and realise we have lowkey been shaping the course of the game since F11 hehe.

This is one of my favourite orgs ever and Ali is one of my favourite allies ever! Ali when u see this thank u for putting up w my being cracked and listening to all my scheming and plans u make this game sm fun so just thank u sm.

Everyone left in the game are also such good people ugh it sucks to have to vote them at some point :// The hosts went off w casting…

So ya moving forward me and Ali’s goal is to make F5 and have one of us win immunity and idol the other w Budva idol and not even use the Sapphire bc apparently if its like a 3-1-1 vote they are all immune which is too scary we cant cirie ourselves out!!

Gosh I sounded so cocky just then huh... I rlly am always looking out and worried about being blindsided aswell eeeek

I PROB WILL BE!

I just have so much hope for benjali duo ;-;

okay so this vote... it needs to be one of Jones, Mitch and Jason. I've heard from Benj that there is a plan to vote Jason, of Mitch/Benj/Jones/Caeleb, here is the problem tho... I'm down with Jason going, but if I hop on to this plan, I'm just an add on and its not a move I can claim at an FTC resume.

So, I have to plan an alternative, and its either gonna be Me/Jason/Tom/Caeleb vote Mitch, or Me/Jason/Tom/Mitch vote Jones. I am leaning towards voting Jones right now, because like... she just told me she has heard nothing for the vote, when I know she is plotting and has sorted a plan to get Jason out. She clearly doesn't trust me, we've voted separately at basically every single tribal and she is a mega threat in the end.

I think I could convince Mitch to vote her, and it also detaches Caeleb, and it means he is stuck with me, which is good, since I'll need him to vote Jason potentially next round. Its tough because I want all three of Mitch/Jason/Jones out asap... hnnngh.

So I have the opportunity to make a game changing move. Im almost certain I know who has the idol and i REALLY want the person out this round. Right now they are breezing by without being targeted a single time and I feel like its time for a classic blindside. The problem is, right now that specific person is not being targeted. The risk of telling the people who are being targeted that they are the target is astronomical but if it works it just might send the person who I want gone out. It's a risky plan that I don't know if it will work or not.

okay so I think I may have already confessed this, but loving having ZERO memory. Okay so Jones is going tonight, she is definitely a major threat, has access to jury votes I couldn't even dream of getting and is SUCH an FTC risk.

I think this vote works, because then... next round we can get Mitch. I can solidify something with Caeleb and Benj, and we can then agree to get Jason at F5, that's... such smooth sailing to FTC. I'm excited.

I love voting with Mitch/Jason for a vote, and then... voting against them in literally the two votes after, loving being a mess.