#the illusion of living book

[inky-lacuna-numinous]

Today is a GREAT day to be a batim fan!

Happy Halloween

#bendy and the ink machine #batim #batdr #bendy and the dark revival #batim audrey #batdr audrey #audrey drew #cosplay #costume #happy Halloween #the illusion of living book #the illusion of living #tiol #fav

[archer-kacey]

Problems with erasing Bendy Book canon:

With the FNAF books, we were told they were canon-divergent fairly early on. For Bendy, this was never specified, leading many to believe this was all just straight-up canon information that they were running with for theorycrafting. For a long time.

Why the hell would you de-canonize the ENTIRE origin story of Boris? He's a central character to Bendy and the Ink Machine.

You're going to throw out THE ENTIRE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF YOUR MAIN VILLAIN? THAT'S.......NOT A GOOD IDEA!

(And before it's pointed out, no, we don't "need" Illusion of Living for "gay evidence." The point here is y'all released an autobiography for one of your two main characters and you're saying it's not canon. That's ludicrous.)

Things that were explained/brought up in the novels that apparently "aren't canon anymore": how Sammy got infected, Thomas's conflicting feelings about the machine he created, the origin of Boris the wolf, several instances of Joey's gaslighting and manipulative behavior and his slow descent into madness after Henry's departure, a look into Gent technology and the Gent experiments that took place after they switched over to "research", Abby Lambert (who SHOULD be in the mainline games all things considered), Joey Drew's ENTIRE AUTOBIOGRAPHY including his PHILOSOPHIES AND REAL ASS LIFE, ANDDD the themes of classism, racism, and sexism that were VERY present at that time in history. Among other things.

You're taking out several new characters for no reason. I'm not saying they all need to return, but it makes zero sense to introduce a bunch of new guys and then immediately abandon them...only to introduce a bunch of OTHER new guys.

I've seen a few comments in response to Mike that go along the lines of "oh thank goodness now I don't need to read the books to understand the lore!" No disrespect, but I think that's a fundamental misunderstanding of what the books do. They enhance your understanding of all the background plot. You don't need to read the books to understand the games. But that shouldn't mean erasing the existing information's canonicity because not everyone wants to read it.

Bendy isn't FNAF. Bendy has a much more streamlined plot. Not everything fits perfectly of course, but to take out such a large chunk of what we THOUGHT was the plot (or plot-adjacent) is headscratching to me. You claim to care about the plot, characters and worldbuilding and then you decide that some of the BEST written interpretations of these characters and their world just aren't "legitimate" now? .......All of a sudden?

I want to punch something

#I'm starting to get really irritated at M+M downplaying the books. no sir they aren't fun extras that's just the actual plot you threw out #this decision would also erase the books' minority and women characters. which I don't think is the intention at all but that's the result #people who are really into bendy are gonna want more canon lore...we should really leave the canon-divergence to fanfics at this point #bendy books #i'm dying #dreams come to life #the lost ones #bendy fade to black #illusion of living #joey drew #adrienne kress #mike mood #themeatly #bendy and the ink machine #bendy and the dark revival

[mickeys-malarkey]

Pt. 3/3: My BATDR Timeline & Plot Twist Theories!

First, I think both BATIM and BATDR take place sometime between 1978 and 1991. I already suspected BATDR was happening in the ‘80s based on the fact that card readers – which have featured in many of the environment screenshots we've seen – were invented in 1979...

…and Audrey's clothes and hairstyle look very 1980s.

Then they released the images of Audrey's office, where her chair and desk lamps also look very 1980s, and the wallpaper and flooring looks pretty 1970s…

…and @inkdemonapologist pointed out that the type of bankruptcy we see documents for in Joey's apartment didn't exist until 1978…

…and I remembered that Joey's apartment also had a newspaper whose headline took place in the future— Princess Diana's 30th birthday which, as TetraBitGaming on YouTube pointed out, would be in 1991 since Princess Diana was born in 1961. She should be two years old if BATIM were really taking place in 1963!

Maybe, at the time, they didn't mean for these two to be clues, since they seem to have rolled the date backwards a bit from the newspaper one; but at this point it feels pretty clear when BATDR takes place, to me. And I'm even more certain than I already was, after finding out that this image from the JDS website…

…is titled “museum” (good work yoinking it, @halfusek /gen 👍🏻), that we know the ink dimension's new home: Nathan Arch Sr.'s private Joey Drew Studios museum that he mentioned he was curating in TIOL (meaning it's existed since around 1972).

“Over the years, I have collected every single piece of the studio memorabilia I could find to restore it to its former glory, to create, in a sense, a private museum that gleamed with the true vision of Joey Drew…” ~ Nathan Arch, The Illusion of Living, pg. 2

Also, besides the fact the museum image has clearly aged, here's some more evidence that at least a few years have probably passed since Bendy was purchased: it generally takes a fair bit more time (years!!) to make movies/documentaries, as Archgate Pictures seems to have made about Joey, than it does to make shorts.

As for BATIM, I think that time has been moving as normal outside of the loop, we were just seeing a repeat of that significant day in 1963; Henry and Joey have been trapped in the ink dimension for somewhere between twenty and thirty years, and the bankruptcy paperwork and Princess Diana newspaper were pieces of the real world leaking into the memory. This explains how there seems to be evidence of Audrey in BATIM and how BATDR is still supposedly neither sequel nor prequel to BATIM despite all the evidence that it takes place long after 1963! They're happening at the same time!! I wonder if Audrey is the daughter of the little girl we hear at the end of BATIM? So, Henry's (great-)granddaughter or Joey's (great-)great-niece?

Now, onto my big theory: the plot twist.

If they handle it right, it would be really, really cool if “break the cycle” really doesn't just mean “end the time loop” but also “break the cycle of abuse/trauma” and a lot of the huge cast of not-so-innocent characters wind up with the potential to get redemption arcs. I have an idea of exactly how they might be planning on even providing the opportunity for Joey.

Victor McKnight commented this on his Artistic Hallowing music video and pinned it:

Those last two sentences. “Make sure you're watching every second! You don't want to miss any vital information. 😉” Does that not sound to anyone else like he's got insider information? Now, I want y'all to watch these music videos that either Victor himself or his brother Noah were suspiciously involved in all of (and one of which is supposedly a BATDS song but for some reason involves Audrey) and tell me if you notice any patterns.

This one seems to be a duet between Sammy and the Ink Demon, both singing to Audrey. Sammy mostly sings in the default sepiatone, asking us things like “Can you see me? Can you feel me?” (that feels so… sad… and desperate…) and telling us things like “make sense of the consequence we witnessed on that day” (Excuse me, you're telling me that there was a consequence for something on a specific, significant day that we witnessed?? 👀) The demon, on the other hand, mostly sings when the grayscale effect is on, and seems to just be playing a stereotypical villain roll until you notice “be forced to believe what I see” (why would we even give a crap about what you're seeing /srs? How the actual heck would we see what you're seeing /gen? You don't even have eyeballs, bro /j) and “be damned in this evil received” (how do you receive evil that damns you? Maybe by being abused and becoming an abuser in response?).

Two apparently-separate characters singing with the same voice but very different tones and outlooks on the situation, still both singing to Audrey, in this one. One mostly sings in the default sepiatone, again, at first seeming more hopeful, helpful, and friendly until you start noticing ominous comments like “you've made mistakes, accept the change. You will be punished too” (*incoherent noises* 🚨🚨) and “welcome to my dream . . . you still think you are safe in my dream.” The other mostly sings when the grayscale effect is on, again, and seems much more aggressive and seductive until you start noticing comments like “take up your weapons, just leave my friends be” (why is this stereotypically evil-seeming character both telling us to take up weapons, not just letting us have them, and asking us to leave his friends alone with them?).

More hints that the demon who will rise and presumably is most important to the story is linked to grayscale, in this one.

And, in this one, Sammy's asking if the grayscale-linked demon is the one who will set him free (as he claims to be in the first two videos).

Across all four of these first videos, there seems to be an overall “things change when we switch from the default sepiatone to grayscale” and “grayscale is dangerous and seems hopeless but it's important and linked to truth and freedom” theme…

…You're telling me that Sammy and his followers' past (BATIM?) selves were worshipping an imposter demon…? And the truth will be revealed in BATDR…?

Hum, hum, hum… fascinating. I'd noticed the sepiatone vs. grayscale split and imposter vs. true savior thing long before I read the books; for the longest time, I thought it meant we would be dealing with a Henry-Bendy and a Joey-Bendy, as I've been seeing people theorizing. But then I read TIOL, and discovered what I think is evidence that this info is indeed canon and was not left on the cutting room floor while BATDR was in development limbo.

Nathan makes a very strange note on Joey's story about the Sparkle Unicorn speakeasy…

“…I remember this night well. Though I remember it being at the Bee Room, gold and black, not silver as the main design aesthetic. Doesn't really make much of a difference though, I suppose.” ~ Nathan Arch, The Illusion of Living, pg. 44 (emphasis added)

Nathan remembers that night in sepiatone, Joey remembers it in grayscale.

Now, I've seen all kinds of theories all over about how Wilson actually “banished/killed the ink demon…” “Wilson took advantage of some sort of blip in Bendy's existence that happened when Joey died,” “Wilson got rid of him by purifying him and turning him into Dapper Bendy,” “Wilson got rid of him by fusing him with either Henry or Joey,” “Wilson got rid of him by trapping him in Henry's loop,” “he didn't, Wilson's just another liar manipulating everyone,” etc…

What if we're looking at this from the wrong angle? What if the point is that, whatever happened, neither of the BATDR Bendys is the original soulless monster we see in BATIM and the books? What if, whether they share a body or are separate, there are two human souls involved here? What if one of those souls is the “new evil” in the ink dimension, not Wilson, who may have been meddling in ink dimension affairs since 1963?

Going back to the time frame I propose BATDR is happening in… Joey was born in 1901, which means that if Nathan was 18 or 19 when Joey was just turning 16, then he was born in 1899 or 1898. So, in 1978, Nathan would've been 79 or 80, and in 1991 he would've been 92 or 93. Especially considering the clues that point towards Nathan having been a smoker, it wouldn't surprise me if he's straight-up already dead in BATDR. Mayhaps for 211 days? During Loop 414…? Could this be why the BATIM loop is different, with Henry apparently not remembering anything that previous versions of himself could? The now-previous owner of their prison has died of old age and/or lung cancer? And could that be why the JDS museum has fallen into bankruptcy? Has Nathan Jr. taken over and isn't as ruthless a businessman as his father?

Itsjustjord on YouTube pointed this out in his trailer reaction, which when he said it set my Clue Radar off so that I went to the trailer again to get a closer look. And… well… *clears throat*

…Do y'all see this weird effect over Dapper Bendy? Compared to every other character we see in the trailer as well as the environment around him, does it not look as if we're seeing him, specifically, through some sort of cartoony filter? Maybe it'll only be in circumstances like this (far away in weird lighting) that the edges of the illusion will fray in-game, based on the other teaser image we have of him, but it definitely looks off to me.

Especially with what I now suspect Allison and Susie's situations were in relation to Nathan, I think that the ink creatures’ perfection vs. imperfection has nothing to do with how pure/good vs. impure/evil their hearts are as we've been lead to believe/is the conventional surface-level reading, but instead how intact vs. broken their hearts are. I think that the more horrific the ink being's appearance, the more the soul inside was abused while it was alive. Allison isn't a perfect Alice because she's a better person, it's because she obeyed Nathan and wasn't made to suffer as severely as Susie, who Nathan chose to be his next Isabel. So, why is one new Bendy (apparently created after Joey lost everything, I suspect even being made to watch his Shoulder Angel's murder before being murdered himself) so much scarier than the original (created before Joey lost everything) and the other so goshdarn perfect, proportions and all?

Maybe the banning of everything related to Sammy's demon cult and Henry under Wilson's rule has to do with his decades-old mission to keep the Creators from joining forces, as well as everyone including himself feeling like they're finally free from The Great Puppet Master?

I love Dapper Bendy's design as much as everyone else!! He's positively adorable, and it would also be a nice outcome if the baby boy is exactly what he seems and just a precious lil friend to love forever; but I theorize that Dapper Bendy is the perfectly sane, untraumatized, and truly evil one, that (assuming we actually get choices in BATDR, unlike in BATIM) his route, no matter how things seem in the moment, is the wrong one, that he's Nathan. And I think Freaky Teeth Bendy (that's been my nickname for him since we first saw him and I'm sticking to it lolol) is the damaged as heck but able to be saved one, that his route is the correct one, that he's Joey. I also think that we won't get to see either demon for what they really are – won't be able to get the True, Broken Cycle, “Joey's Redeemed & Nathan Faces Justice” Ending – unless we somehow unlock Grayscale Mode like we could in BATIM and gain the ability to see Joey's truth. Until then, we'll be seeing the demons the way Nathan wants us to see them. Through Nathan's tainted, gaslighting, sepiatone filter.

If I'm right, the fact that they did choose these color palettes is so perfectly poetic~! Sepiatone is what happens when black-and-white images have been chemically altered for preservation purposes; Nathan's altered our perception of himself, Joey, and all the events surrounding them, and his version of events is much more resilient. Meanwhile, Joey's would be more pure and unaltered but easily destroyed— including by himself, with his Illusion of Living coping mechanism… The only thing that could make it more perfect is if not only do we get to see Henry in BATDR, but when we do he's an angelic toon… *Vibrates with excitement*

Please, please, please, JDS, let me be right about where you're going with this!! Cause this would genuinely be so freaking cool…!! 🙏🏻 I hope that we eventually get to “rejoice with our founders,” as Artistic Hallowing says, when they're reunited.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk, rofl. Congratulations on making it through the ramblings of a hyped AuDHD fangirl (though, I guess we already knew you were capable, if you've read TIOL. I could do a whole nother rant on evidence that Joey's basically confirmed canonically ADHD(+?), my freaking gosh). 😝

Read the Rest of the Original Analysis/Theory: Part One • Part Two • Unexpected Part Four

BATDR Analysis/Post-Playthrough Theory Revision: Part One • Part Two • Part Three • Part Four

#long post #spoiler warning #book analysis #game analysis #book theory #game theory #bendy and the ink machine #batim #dreams come to life #dctl #the illusion of living #tiol #crack up comics #bendy: the lost ones #bendy: tlo #bendy and the dark revival #batdr #batdr trailer #batdr theory #joey drew #nathan arch #henry stein #allison pendle #thomas connor #wally franks #bertrum piedmont #sammy lawrence #tw: abuse

[multi-level-shipper]

Just to avoid reblog chaining/ bendysplaining on lucky-dreamfisher's post, I'm gonna throw this Tweet up here and talk about it.

Here's the thing, Meatly has labeled the all the books as "fun extras." All the books, meaning the Employee Handbook, Illusion of Living, Crack-Up-Comics, DCTL, TLO, and Fade to Black.

And yes, they are bonus content. You do not need to read them to understand the base games. It's just odd to me that they're being treated as if they have no connection or impact on the "canon" of the games. It just feels a little disingenuous.

Illusion of Living is Joey's autobiography. Yes, it is completely fair to expect people NOT to read it, because how well it holds your attention largely hinges on how much you like Joey, and Joey talking about Joey. But you CAN'T ignore the fact that this is a giant life story dump from one of the most integral characters to the plot.

And then we have Buddy from DCTL being HEAVILY implied to be our Boris. It was never confirmed from what I remember, but the timing of the transformation lined up with BATDS. So we could argue that even DCTL still has SOME lore relevancy as far as the games go.

Even the Employee Handbook has notes and other details from the lives of the JDS employees (on top of being an actual game guide lol.)

I guess the main thing that confuses me is this; if you are going to have books that tie into Bendy's canon, why call them "fun extras"? Why separate them?

I'm all for the authors having their creative freedom, (I've said before how much I love Adrienne Kress's work and how much she breathes a soul into these characters,) but specifically pointing out how the authors "make things their own" in the context of this Tweet seems to mean it separates the books from canon entirely.

Maybe I'm reading the tone of the Tweet as too dismissive. I am biased. I do not like Meatly. It's frustrating to see him as the creator of this franchise twirl his hair and go "well...actually the books are kind of the authors' thing idk..." when, hilariously, the books are just echoing the game's characters and lore nearly down to a tee.

TL;DR The Bendy books are plot relevant, why are we (TheMeatly) just now deciding to separate them from canon?

#i hope this makes sense #my main gripe is with “the books dont mean anything teehee” yes they do you little shit #bendy books #illusion of living #dreams come to life bendy #themeatly #batim #batdr

[holygroundgone]

just absolutely fucking obsessed with the 0.5 evil marriage bad end deep in love deep in suffering of it all, everything that could've possibly went wrong went wrong and they're in it together

#truescholar.txt #the way that from the beginning of the book mo ran absolutely portrays it as him one sidedly tormenting chu wanning out of hate #but slowly it unfolds the realization of the sheer degree of intimacy and 'you would not be fucking doing that if you just hated his ass' #it's strongly been my conviction that once chu fei realized what was going on and 2.0 chu wanning inherited his souls and memory #thus meaningfully continuing his existence on (and i want to think it's a more complete continuation unlike soma level memory self shit) #that his perception of their years together in taxian jun's palace would completely change #and that he would almost treasure the time they had together even if during it was the most painful and agonizing time of his life #toxic trauma bond moments but they were in it together #and mo ran would've never done this to him in this way (ie the illusion of not loving him deeply in body heart and soul) #2ha is definitely not a moral tale nor an 'example of what you should or can do in a relationship' #but instead the story of how two deeply mentally ill and traumatized people fought their hardest to find their way home together #over two lifetimes #over many lives lost and regained #it truly only works because it's them and because they have the exact same kind of madness for each other

[spotlightstudios]

Ah yes, marking Joey Drew's memoir w/ his greatest sin right in the front cover 👌

Had a great time w/ this one, since the front inside cover is yellow. It gave me the perfect canvas to work in reverse on! (And waste by black ink markers, but eh...) I'm gonna add some wips here along w/ the finished version too:

#light's spot #my art #bendy #bendy and the dark revival #batdr #batim #the illusion of living #book #the ink machine #ink machine #bendy and the ink machine #gods this was so fun!!! #brought me back to the days of drawing on my ipad w/ the yellow/black colors only #trying to replicate the style #I think i'm pretty proud all things considered #also #this is 100% heavily inspired by the end credits of batim #felt like mentioning it again #cuz like #there's nothing better than putting in references #better than doodling something completely irrelevant at least #i wannatrick people into thinking it's supposed to be there- #the Sammy in the back cover is up next! #though I doubt I'll even work on it today #that's just the plan ^^ #adding some extra tags-> #Joey Drew #art #traditional art #there we go 👌

[angelofthepage]

Hey Bendy fans, so Joe from ChairThatSpins hosted a really fun AMA with Adrienne Kress this afternoon! Fans of the Bendy novels had a lot of great questions, and Adrienne had a lot of great answers! Joe has very kindly uploaded a vod of the event up on his YouTube channel. Wanna know if one of your burning Bendy questions was answered? Consider giving it a watch! (WARNING: This video does contain spoilers for all the Bendy books, most notably Fade to Black.)

It was so much fun to be there live for this, what a fun way to spend a Saturday. XD I will continue to not be normal about some of the things we discussed.

#bendy books #bendy novels #bendy and the dark revival #bendy fade to black #bendy fade to black spoilers #bendy ftb spoilers #bendy dctl #bendy dreams come to life #dctl #tlo #bendy tlo #bendy the lost ones #bendy tiol #tiol #the illusion of living #bendy the illusion of living #adrienne kress #ama #Youtube

[gensokiyoo]

Wait a sec I'm confused- the books aren't canon??? To me it's obvious they are...???

#help??? #I'm confused #bendy and the ink machine #bendy and the dark revival #bendy dreams come to life #bendy fade to black #the illusion of living #bendy books #Heeeeellllllppppp

[toaster-ay]

Alright folks. This is something I've wanted to talk about for a while now, but just now I decided to actually write it all down and hopefully make sense of myself.

Long ass ramble about BATIM and some lore from official books.

So far I've got my hands on two Bendy books, that is The Illusion of Living and Dreams come to life (I also have the Employee's Handbook but that one isn't lore important). I plan on getting the rest of the book in the future but let's look at these two for now.

The Illusion of Living is Joey Drew's memoir, written all by himself. In this book we get to know quite a lot about Joey, more or less his whole life.

We get to know that he comes from a family of shoe makers, that he lied about his age at 13 so he could join the war. Or that he likes to dress and look fancy long time before he actually is fancy, just because it makes him feel better and gives the illusion that he's someone important. We even get to know that he once joined a Detective when he was investigating murder. And that he can appreciate good art while also drawing slightly himself.

What I want to look deeper into though, is the way he and Henry met. Thanks to the game (and even fandom), most people assume they were best friends for a long time. That they would go to hell and back for each other. But that wasn't actually the case??

Joey and Henry met through a mutual friend, Abby Lambert, and he actually didn't like Henry at first. Joey didn't like the cartoon artstyle, which is what Henry mainly drew. So they didn't have anything in common.

That was until Joey got the idea for Joey Drew studios, and asked Abby for help to come up with the main character, since she could draw better than Joey. Well, Abby tried, but it didn't end up as they wanted. And then Abby took Henry for help and went to Joey together, and let me tell you, Joey actually wasn't really thrilled for Henry to come with her.

But, after a few tries, Henry was able to come up with the right design for Bendy. Joey and Henry decided to work together after that, but Henry left the studio not that long after. It's said that Abby started to work in the studio three years later, but it's also said that Abby and Henry never ended up working together. And Joey didn't really seem to care for Henry.

He acknowledges him, but isn't mad at him.

It's just so interesting, why is Joey so angry at Henry in game, if he didn't seem to actually care about him in the book? Could've been a mistake from the writer, or I don't know.

This is just something I've wanted to point out for a while, and I'm super open to starting a conversation with someone about this!

Now let's look at Dreams comes to life

This book is written from the point of view of Daniel Lewek, also known as 'Buddy', who is also the character that ends up being the Boris we all know and love in game.

I love how this book is written, since it's written after Buddy is corrupted by the ink, and he's slowly forgetting all of this, so he's writing it down so there's something left. So the truth is known.

Buddy is hired by Joey to be a delivery boy after a quick meeting when he's delivering him a new suit, but later gets promoted to an artist after Abby Lambert (who is now in the head of the Art Department) sees a drawing that Buddy's grampa actually did, but Buddy ends up lying, since being an animator is something he actually wants to do.

Buddy befriends Dot, who works in the Story telling Department, and she's a really noisy and sneaky character.

Now, something I think is interesting is that, Sammy Lawrence is probably the first character to get corrupted by the Ink machine. Buddy's first meeting with him actually traumatises him slightly, because Sammy jumps at him covered in ink after a pump bursts right above him. Throughout the book, Sammy is depicted to be really interested in ink, while also drinking some from the ink bottles.

Then Buddy has the luck to meet the Ink Demon himself, accidentally even letting him out from the room he was locked in.

And then, Sammy goes missing. That's when even Dot has the pleasure of meeting the Ink Demon, since she and Buddy went to the studio when it was shut down to see what other weird stuff they can find.

When we meet Sammy again, he's already The Prophet that we've seen in the game. And he even already made some sacrifices, Buddy and Dot (and Richie, Buddy's animation coworker) were meant to be part of them too but they were lucky enough to escape. But Buddy's coworker, Jacob, didn't. And when Buddy and Dot find him attached to the Ink machine cowered in ink (they are able to save him actually), they also find already dead bodies of Dave (another Buddy's coworker) and Norman Polk ("Of course no one would notice he was missing. Of everyone in the building. He watched everyone, but no one really saw him" – I'm sorry I had to add this, I absolutely love it)

Dot and Buddy end up having a small fight with the Ink Demon until they get rid of him. Or so they thought, because he ends up grabbing Buddy and pulling him into the ink with him.

When Buddy wakes up after, he's already in the body of Boris. Joey Drew standing above him, absolutely thrilled that they got a perfect cartoon after such a fail with Bendy.

Even if Dreams comes to life was mainly focused on Buddy, it feels like we've got so much lore for all the other characters. Joey shows how much of an asshole he can actually be. Norman shows up a few times, always unannounced and with some information no one else except him knows. Sammy and his grumpy ass that was slowly getting corrupted by ink. Hell, we even got Tom and Joey argument about the Ink machine (and Allison was with Tom!! Holding his hand!!).

These books are really worth reading, and I'm excited when I finally get my hands on the rest of the books.

Alas, that is the end of my ramble. If anyone read it all, here's a cookie for you 🍪

And I'm also super open to have a conversation with anyone about all of this!!

#bendy and the ink machine #batim #the Illusion of living #joey drew #henry stein #buddy lewek #sammy lawrence #norman polk #bendy and the dark revival #batdr #i love these books so much #and this game #its my everything fr #i also love overanalysing shit #did you notice #dreams come to life

[cwritesfiction]

That, I think, is what I like about her—not her disregard for the principle of water displacement, but the fact that she has a big heart.

severely underrated under no illusions line

#under no illusions #this book is killing me #in fairness i keep thinking it's dead and then it gets resurrected #cats have 9 lives - under no illusions has 23 i guess

[skemford]

FINALLY GOT POOLS

Absolutely 100% important question trust me

#batim #bendy and the ink machine #batdr #bendy and the dark revival #bendy #henry stein #audrey drew #joey drew #buddy lewek #buddy boris #(I won't tag book protags) #(ONLY because I'm not sure if people use their tags.) #bendy dctl #bendy tlo #bendy dreams come to life #bendy the lost ones #bendy the illusion of living #audrey batdr

[inky-lacuna-numinous]

A college project I’ve been working on for the past week or two. One of the requirements was that it be a narration of a book of choice…

So of course I picked The Illusion of living, Enjoy!

The voice of Mr. Arch was provided by the amazing @jekyllreads !

#bendy and the ink machine #batim #i dont know what the hell im doing #bendy and the dark revival #nathan arch #batim audrey #batdr audrey #joey drew #audio #YouTube #video #batdr #the illusion of living #the illusion of living book

[archer-kacey]

Nathan Arch's Foreward [The Illusion of Living]

Notes

The Illusion of Living was originally released in 1942, then later again in 1972.

Nathan believed that Joey was a positive influence and optimist, and cited readers being "deeply invested in stories about the horrors of the world" as the primary reason why Joey's message wasn't well-received, and why TIOL didn't sell.

Nathan created a private museum filled with as much studio memorabilia as he could get his hands on in an effort to restore Joey's name. (We see this later in BATDR.)

Analysis

Nathan believes Joey was cheated out of success, attempting to rationalize this by...er...blaming the general populace I guess, and their gravitation towards violence and drama when it comes to entertainment. He expresses frustration that Joey was unappreciated and misunderstood until the very end. Arch does everything in his power to clear Joey's name in death, and finally give Joey the recognition he feels he deserves, even going so far as to re-release his autobiography and added any pertinent context via footnotes.

"...some untruths have come to the surface, some rumors and backlash. The fact that the studio collapsed in such an unceremonious fashion, I have no doubt, contributed to the suspicions that Joey Drew was not the genius he truly was."

"My goal is to restore the name of Joey Drew to the history books as one of the greatest contributors to animation the world has ever known."

Nathan also sees Joey's fake-it-'til-you-make-it philosophy as an overall positive message.

"I hope that we can share the positivity of his philosophy and truly make, at long last, Joey Drew's dream come true."

He also hammers home just how important Bendy was to Joey, likening him to being Joey's own child. From everything we know about Joey, this isn't hyperbole, and Nathan Sr. seems to be strangely aware of this fact.

"Bendy was Joey's child, and he felt just as strongly about Bendy as I feel about my flesh-and-blood son."

Nathan also seems to have deeply cared about Wilson, (at least, according to him.) This means that Wilson is most likely a hater

#the illusion of living #bendy books #nathan arch #wilson arch #joey drew

[mickeys-malarkey]

I can't hold my Bendy theories in anymore!!

I've only got a few people to infodump to about Bendy IRL, I'm just so excited after watching the BATDR trailer and reading all the new theories that I can barely sleep or get any work done, and now that we have an official release date they can't chicken out if my theories are correct rofl. So, here I go!

Fair Warning: There's no way to avoid it, this is gonna have so many spoilers for all the current Bendy games and books (well, except BINR. But there's also not really a story in that one) that I'm just gonna have to assume that if you're still reading past this point, you've either already played/read the entire series (obviously minus BATDR) or you don't care about spoilers!

Pt. 1/3: Expanding (Mostly) On My TIOL Thoughts

As I said in my thought summaries here and on Twitter, I hate Nathan Arch. Dude literally sets off every single alarm bell I have, I don't understand why nobody else seems freaked the heck out by him… *shudders* I'm convinced that he's the answer to theMeatly's question.

To start off, I'd like to point out that… Nathan says his notes exist to “provide context for the contemporary reader,” which sounds like he's just gonna be stating general historical facts every reader would've known when the book was originally published but might not know when it was republished and are necessary to understanding what Joey's saying. But that's not what the notes are like at all? They actually consist of very personal information that readers at the time of original publication couldn't possibly have known and definitely aren't necessary to understanding what Joey's saying; and the vast majority seem to specifically be either 1: flip-flopping between singing Joey's praises and making remarks he really shouldn't be making if he were actually trying to dispel the negative rumors around the man as he claims, or 2: confirming or denying descriptions of himself?? 🚨

It feels like he's trying to manipulate us into seeing Joey as a genius and saint whose inventions we should accept with open arms whilst simultaneously positioning the guy as a scapegoat to take all blame in case we don't, and into seeing Nathan himself as an intelligent and kind man who definitely respected and admired Joey and, of course, would never, ever mistreat him, preemptively discrediting any rumors about him being an abusive friend that might crop up. Even when Joey makes comments that in no way cast him in a bad light— Joey be like “oh Nathan loved creative people and even though he would never understand us wanted to be us” and Nathan be like “actually no I like myself fine, and also no I dislike creatives in general, they're boring and too self-indulgent. It's specifically Joey that I admired, and therefore I admired his creativity specifically by extension. Isn't it just like Joey not to see the compliment—?” Um, no?? No, Nathan, that sounds absolutely nothing like Joey; he's literally been enraptured by every statement or action that could possibly be construed as complimenting him in this book. Did you just indirectly end your relationships with every other creative you've ever met so that nobody would believe anyone who claims that you looked down upon Joey? 🚨🚨

Let me get into some of the more unique notes from Nathan.

“The first time I read this [Elves and the Shoemaker] story it meant a great deal to me. Joey, as he said in his introduction, was never one to talk about his past. He never spoke about his parents. I certainly never met them. I don't even remember how I learned his father made shoes. So to get a glimpse back at this part of his life, for an old friend, it was very special. I remember telling Joey all this after I read the manuscript back in ‘41. He just smiled.” ~ Nathan Arch, The Illusion of Living, pg. 23

With the way this note happens right before Joey practically spells out that he trusts nobody and denies everyone even the most innocuous information out of self-preservation in the very next story, it does not feel like Nathan's sharing a heartwarming moment between friends. It feels like he's bragging about his position and accomplishments in their predator-and-prey relationship; like he's proud of himself for slowly breaking Joey down and eventually getting him to divulge info he'd been denying him. If your parents lived nearby and were perfectly lovely people, why do you think that you would neither talk about them with nor introduce them to someone who was supposedly one of your closest friends? I'll get into why I think he finally gave the info up in a bit.

In the Lottie story, if Nathan had only said that he wasn't sure the letter exchange had actually happened, I would've been like “yeah sure, we all know Joey's a liar. 🤷🏻‍♀️” But no, he specifically eases us from confirmation of Eckhart and Donaldson's existences even though he claims to have only briefly met them, to claiming Joey was such a good storyteller he could make you think you personally met someone who never existed even if he'd literally just told you that they were imaginary, to casting doubt on the very existence of a girl he was described as having been known by name to outside of the letter exchange.

“I met Joey the following year at the lab and only briefly had the chance to meet [Private Donaldson and Private Eckhart]. They were every bit the characters Joey describes them to be.” ~ Nathan Arch, The Illusion of Living, pg. 27

“When I first read this I forgot, despite Joey saying as much, that this was fiction, and spent far too much time racking my brain over who this James [who Joey says he told Lottie he met when he came by the lab to say hi to me] was. Joey is so good with his storytelling that even when he tells you it's not real, you can forget a moment later.” ~ Nathan Arch, The Illusion of Living, pg. 37 (emphasis added)

“I have gone through every piece of correspondence Joey ever saved as part of my work preserving his memory and documenting his life, and I must confess I was looking forward to reading Lottie's letters in person, having been moved to tears reading this part of the manuscript thirty years ago. Unfortunately, I have not been able to find them. It is possible they were lost to time, and I do deep down hope that to be true. However, even if this story is revealed to be one of Joey's excellent fictions, I think it doesn't really matter. Joey would, of course, call it another example of his illusion. I think the message in the story is meaningful regardless whether it really happened or not. And regardless if Lottie actually herself existed or not, she is a fine embodiment of the brave women who served our country in war.” ~ Nathan Arch, The Illusion of Living, pg. 41 (emphasis added)

I absolutely do not think this is a reality check, I think Nathan's trying to erase Lottie's existence – even gaslighting anyone who knew her in real life into thinking they'd imagined her – to throw us off the “Joey's Illusion of Living ‘philosophy’ is literally just the coping mechanism of an extremely traumatized man” scent; I wonder if Lottie actually fell victim to suicide shortly after writing to Joey that she was spiraling into a deep, dark depression, and Joey made up everything that happened after that specific letter in order to cope with the loss – pretend that “my dear friend isn't dead despite being sent somewhere there was no actual fighting where I thought she'd be safe; I saved her life and she's living a Happily Ever After overseas, married to a handsome young British soldier” – rather than just the goodbye letter to wrap her story up in a neat bow… Maybe Nathan even helped him pretend she was still alive in order to endear himself to this literal kid who was destroyed with grief?

Speaking of which, does nobody find the circumstances under which Nathan and Joey met… concerning? Nathan says “we knew each other since we were teenagers,” which sounds fine until you realize they met because Joey lied about his age and joined the army while still a minor, where he was bullied and pressured into things like underage drinking by grown-@$$ legal adults, multiple of which were also of higher rank. And not only was Nathan one of those grown-@$$ legal adults of higher rank and definitely bullying him just like the others (“I swear I definitely didn't join the other guys in giving him that Real Man™ complex of his like he says—” yeah, sure, Nathan, I totally believe you /s. 🙄), but clearly his horrifying apparent hobby that I'll explain next was already established at the time, seeing as Joey saw the photo of Ivan Newsome dying in agony with his own eyeballs when Nathan introduced him to Walter Richmond… 😬🚩

I'm convinced that Walter, Arthur, and Isabel were three of Nathan's previous victims, and they mirror the relationships he has with Joey, Allison, and Susie.

Walter looking at Nathan “as if asking permission to speak” before engaging Joey in conversation (Nathan nudges us towards believing they had no prior relationship by stating that he was flattered by Joey's observation that he had a way of introducing anyone so that it felt like they were his guest even if he'd just met them… but technically neither confirms nor denies anything 👀) has creepily similar vibes to how Joey “just smiled” in response to Nathan's gushing over the info on his parents; I feel like Joey gave up the info because he had to jump through hoops in order for Nathan to give him permission to publish his book— to be able to get the thing out the door without tripping any of Nathan's “Joey's disobeying and must be punished” alarms. Also, notice how Walter mysteriously had “a lot of people who knew him, but nobody who wanted to claim the title of ‘Walter's friend…’” and how the only people Joey's apparently still in contact with in BATIM are A: one of Nathan's (confirmed) employees, B: a janitor who didn't even realize Joey would remember him so definitely doesn't have enough of a relationship with Joey for Nathan to consider him a threat, and C: a shady veterinarian (wouldn't be surprised if he works for Nathan, as well). It's a classic abuser's tactic to isolate and villainize their victim so that they have no choice but to rely on the abuser; I'll get into more reasons I think that was happening in a bit.

I find it suspicious how Arthur not only personally delivers Ivan's effects to his sister Isabel, just tells her what happened which you'd expect someone with such fresh and debilitatingly severe PTSD to be very reluctant to do, and sticks around to befriend her, but also attends her art show showcasing Walter's war photos— it feels like someone was forcing Arthur to do all of this behind-the-scenes, and maybe the firecracker scene wasn't just about Isabel punishing the rich people for their morbid fascinations, but also Nathan punishing Arthur for being difficult about the situation behind-the-scenes. Meanwhile, Joey just happens to hire this random voice actress to replace Susie who we know just happens to be working for Nathan by the time BATIM happens, the memo that she had been hired specifically marked “don't deliver to Susie” just happens to make it into Susie's possession (seeing as she paraphrases it to Henry), Allison seems to know full well that Joey can't fire her when he tries to in DCTL, and then, by TLO, something has apparently happened to where Tom's been rehired which neither he nor Joey had any choice in and he doesn't wanna talk to anyone about (I doubt it was just all the deaths in DCTL, especially considering Joey went from his furious “I never want to see you again” attitude to begging Tom to come back. We've only heard him beg once before, which I'll get into later), and Tom and Allison have bizarrely switched opinions on the situation and machine (Allison changing from “your invention is amazing, Tom! Why are you stuck on the bad parts of the situation?” in DCTL to “I don't understand why you accepted this job back” in TLO, and Tom changing from “horrible things happened because of my machine, I wish I'd never been ensnared by this place” in DCTL to “why doesn't Ally understand? You don't just abandon a miracle” in TLO)—? It seems to me like Allison was never truly Joey's employee, she was Nathan's employee the whole time (which puts Joey's refusal to attend her and Tom's wedding in a whole new light), and Joey wasn't the only one punished for his failures and attempts to override the steel tycoon's authority.

To reiterate, since I saw some people being confused about the massive change: even with the memory loss issue, Allison's opinion in BATDR is just a natural progression from when the something happened between DCTL and TLO. 😛😬

Anyways, I get the distinct impression that creating situations like these to turn people into murder puppets without anyone being the wiser he was even involved is a hobby of Nathan's.

“…I am glad that he wrote [the murder mystery story] down this one time. It helps me to remember Joey at his most charming and sharp. Later years he became too fixated on things he might have gotten wrong, there was too much guilt and worry, too much fear. It didn't feel like the same man at the end, that's for sure.” ~ Nathan Arch, The Illusion of Living, pg. 98

You can't tell me that doesn't sound like he gets off on seeing how absolutely ruthless he can make his victims whilst still having them believe they're in the right and he's bitter as heck that one of his favorite pet projects came to his senses and was haunted by his conscience later in life— he literally just admitted he preferred a Joey who admired a murderer and thought that allowing people to die and getting murdered himself must've been worth it for Walter because now he has the immortality of being in a fascinating story instead of having lived in mediocrity over a Joey who felt guilt.

On that note, I absolutely do not believe Nathan's note on Henry's story was him trying to get the truth out about Henry being a despicable person. This is actually the chapter that first clued me in on Nathan's creepiness when I did my ADHD “skim the whole book except reading all the way through anything that looks especially interesting before properly reading” thing I do.

“Joey has always been a professional person, far more so in many ways than me. That is why this section of the book is so forgiving of the man who abandoned the studio he helped create. Joey can't help but see the good in people. That being said, as a good friend of Joey's, I know that Henry's departure was a great upheaval for him and a great personal betrayal. Joey never truly forgave Henry, and I don't think he should have felt obligated to. The fact that Joey is so gracious in this part of the book is a reflection of his incredible generosity in allowing Henry Stein to be stainless in the eyes of history. I think, had he lived longer, Joey might have in later years called it his greatest illusion.” ~ Nathan Arch, The Illusion Of Living, pg. 155

At first I found his saltiness funny, but then I read Joey's actual descriptions and… he's very clearly trying and failing to put down an amazing person, not build up a horrible one. I wondered why Nathan would be claiming the opposite and I realized— it sounds like he's admitting to being Dead Sea Level salty that Joey got terminally ill specifically because he's certain that, if he hadn't, he would've eventually been able to fully convince Joey that Henry was the villain rather than himself and therefore Joey wouldn't have reached out to the animator towards the end of his life in BATIM. Which leads me to my next observation:

I think Joey's play, “The Angel and The Devil,” was about Henry and Nathan.

I don't care that the Shoulder Angel is played by Abby and the Shoulder Devil is played by Joey, lol; that doesn't matter when you look at the actual content. I want you to read this excerpt:

Angel: [Empathy] is a wonderful talent that also leads [humans] down dark paths. Devil: Thank goodness for dark paths, they lead all great artists to their greatest creations. Angel: Empathy is your provenance then? Devil: We share it— for you it leads men to reach out and help, build hospitals, begin charities… Angel: For you it allows men to achieve their greatness through manipulation and fear. Devil: Is it not wonderful?

Going back to the murder mystery story, Walter and Isabel's thought processes perfectly match what the Shoulder Devil in Joey's play is described as using empathy to inspire humanity to do:

Walter was inspired to let Ivan die so that his photo – his art – would have a more compelling story that tugs at the heartstrings.

Isabel was inspired to kill Walter for the crime of letting Ivan die, masterfully manipulating her confession so that it technically wasn't a confession, instilling fear of herself in everyone present with the fact that if she did do it then she was untouchable legally thanks to her money, and finally, she was fully convinced that she would also be untouchable socially— even be better off, because people would see her as a hero for delivering justice to a monster like Walter.

Going back to BATIM, Joey literally says this to our faces:

“The truth is, you were always so good at pushing, Henry… Pushing me to do the right thing. You should've pushed a little harder.” ~ Joey Drew, Bendy and the Ink Machine, ch. 5

Does that not sound like Henry was good at using empathy to inspire kindness/etc. the way the Shoulder Angel is described as doing (Joey's actually very right that empathy is a morally neutral phenomenon that can be used for good or evil! *Spoken with hyper-empathetic autistic/low-to-no-empathy autistic solidarity*)?

The Angel and Devil also say that whichever of them the man they were assigned to doesn't choose will have to leave. This tells me that the ending of Joey's play – where it's implied the man the angel and devil were assigned to chose the angel – was read rather than acted out (with the excuse that they for some reason couldn't pick a random person to play him out of the crowd like they did for the Hatcheck Girl) in order to symbolize how Joey wanted to choose his true friend and make the toxic one leave, but he had that choice taken away from him when Henry was driven away despite his best efforts. In other words, I think both his version of the friend breakup story and Henry's version have elements of truth and deception to them.

Anybody notice that it seems like Wally and Tom seemed to have been being pitted against and told lies about each other as well as having their work sabotaged by an unknown third party?

“So here's my beef with this whole Gent thing. I went to school, yeah that's right— me! Star Student at Brickmore High. I know my potatoes! So where's this ‘Mr. Connor’ fella get off telling me what to do? These college boys. They can tell ya what's wrong but if you try to fix it on ‘em. They're outta here!” ~ Wally Franks, Boris and the Dark Survival

“Not all of us are well connected, son. Not all of us have chances. Especially to get a job as an engineer when I ain't had no proper education and training.” ~ Thomas Connor, Dreams Come to Life, pg. 252

“If there's one loose bolt around here we're gonna have a whole mess of trouble. And wouldn't you know it, that Wally guy is one loose bolt! He keeps the floors clean he says, he didn't sign on for no science project. All I know is someone needs to keep these pipes maintained. And he can't be a slacker.” ~ Thomas Connor, Boris and the Dark Survival

Wally thinks he's being looked down upon for not having gone to college like Tom (who didn't go to college) and his efforts to help out are not just unappreciated but met with unreasonable emotional response. Meanwhile, Tom thinks Wally's being selfish and lazy and leaving all the work to be done by him. Sound familiar?

“…Henry left for his own reasons, and the correspondence between us became less and less. To be honest, it almost felt like a weight off when he left. He had grown more sensitive as the studio became more successful and giving him pep talks had become exhausting for me. All the good qualities he brought, the hard work and diligence, were being undermined by a restless need for something different. Something that wasn't Bendy. I'll never understand that drive. Bendy was and is perfection.” ~ Joey Drew, The Illusion of Living, pg. 176-177

“Only two weeks into this project and already it's gotten interesting. Joey is a man of ideas… And only ideas. When I agreed to start this whole thing with him I thought there would be a little more give and take. Instead I give, and he takes. I haven't seen Linda for days now. Still, someone has to make this happen. When in doubt, just keep drawing Henry. On the plus side, I've got a new character I think people are gonna love.” ~ Henry Stein, Bendy and the Ink Machine, ch. 3

Joey thinks that Henry was being unreasonably emotional and looking down upon Bendy as not good enough (when he obviously loved the character/cartoons), and that his efforts to help were unappreciated. Meanwhile, Henry thinks Joey was being a selfish, lazy leech and leaving all the work to be done by him.

Is it really a stretch at all to wonder if Henry and Joey were similarly being pitted against and told lies about each other as well as having their work sabotaged by an unknown third party? Maybe the exact same third party?

This makes me very suspicious about who was really behind the worrying newspaper in Joey's apartment; something tells me that Joey's Shoulder Devil successfully pushed his Shoulder Angel off that right shoulder. Twice. I can see Nathan thinking “fine, if you won't give up on this stupid animator, I'll use this opportunity to remove him from the picture permanently and poetically…”

Is Joey's being so touched by the memory of Isabel “angelically” helping Arthur during his war flashbacks an “I wish my Shoulder Angel would come save me?” And is his horror at the descriptions of Shell Shock (PTSD) as basically a time loop foreshadowing that he ends up trapped in a real time loop, himself, by Nathan's sadistic design? I think it's likely, especially after reading @dreamfisher-nux's posts speculating on Wilson's identity. If he's the Gent worker who stole Shaun's tool belt in BATDS and “somebody” who stole Tom's invention in Allison's BATIM Chapter 5 letter, and that invention was the seeing tool, so Wilson's the one that's been tampering with Henry's invisible messages, and he potentially murdered Henry and Joey when Henry returned at Joey's request… How much of this and how much more might he have been doing under Nathan's influence? Is he another one of Nathan's Murder Puppets? 👀

I think all the Henry stuff also explains why Joey claims that Sammy, Jack, and Norman were hired after Mr. Animator left despite the evidence in BATIM and DCTL that Sammy and Norman knew him personally. The only two versions of events he's being allowed to hear are “Henry leaving is your fault and your feelings about the situation are unreasonable” and “Henry was an awful person, you should be glad he's gone.” Nathan would never allow him to hear “it's Nathan's fault and your feelings about the situation are valid,” so he's gotta choose between believing two very painful other options; why wouldn't he try to discredit the most painful one?

While we're adding to the list of people who Nathan seems to have made disappear Mafia Boss-style, it sure seems awfully convenient that the two main Crack-Up Comics artists’ names “appear to have been lost to time” after they wrote a comic where Bendy (Joey) was literally sweating over how Boswell (Nathan) was the richest cat in the world and could crush him like a bug if he didn't perform his job to satisfaction…

…Sounds to me like Nathan did something to shut these two people up so that word of the true nature of his and Joey's relationship wouldn't get out.

Also, interesting how the disappearances of not only a reporter-in-training and the sister of two well-known entertainers but also the only son of the richest, most influential and most dangerous man in Atlantic City didn't get Mr. Joey “Bankrupt From Impulsive Spending Who Apparently Doesn't Even Have The Power To Fire His Own Employees (and ‘Employees’) Nor The Respect Of Enough People To Not Be Giggled At And Whispered About During His Own Speech At His Own Party” Drew and all of his employees arrested or worse… In fact, from the new teaser and archive images that came out, we now know the studio survived for almost two years afterwards before filing bankruptcy and closing forever…

…at which point Joey was mysteriously missing for a while. This is pretty much pure speculation, but I wonder if it could be that Joey's need for a wheelchair stems from an injury sustained in this time? Mr. Mafia Boss decided he needed his kneecaps busted or something?? At any rate, it sounds to me like Joey had someone richer, more influential, and more dangerous than Mr. Chambers “on his side…” until he failed too many times, and needed to be punished more severely? 👀

“Again I shook my head. Didn't [Constance] understand that this was not how it worked? She hadn't lived in my world. Any company that could afford such a machine, that could hide it, that had such dark huge secrets, they had to be protected by something huge as well.” ~ Bill Chambers, Bendy: The Lost Ones, pg. 191

Then, ink machine things continued at Gent… until the year Allison and Tom got married.

Sounds to me like Gent might've been condemned in order to punish Allison and Tom either for the very fact that they got married (making them more-difficult-to-control puppets) or because they failed to get Joey to come to their wedding where Nathan could access him in-person again…

This archive entry sounds as if Joey had to go into hiding, perhaps to escape Nathan and/or people like Bill's dad who were waiting for Nathan to rescind his protection? Also, as an animation history nerd, it sounds to me like the Bendy cartoons were picked up by other studios besides Archgate in attempt to reboot them after JDS kicked the bucket (as has happened to countless cartoons whose original studios kicked the bucket in real life, e.g., the Fleischer cartoons, the Hanna-Barbera cartoons, the Veggie Tales cartoons, etc.), and it wouldn't surprise me if these “minor attempts to rekindle the magic” were Joey's feeble attempts at keeping what was left of Bendy out of Nathan's claws. Remember, Nathan didn't say in Crack-Up Comics that he “inherited” the Bendy IP from Joey's estate, he said he bought it, as further confirmed in the final archive entry.

This means Joey did not leave Bendy to Nathan in his will. In fact, it sounds like he either didn't have a will at all or it was destroyed when he died… Anyone notice that Joey's secret BATDS recording, where he asks Nathan for money, is the only time we've heard him sound audibly nervous?

Strange how, in DCTL, Joey calls Bertrum “Bertrum” when introducing him to the most uncomfortable person at his party, who respects him as his boss; it's not until the people who hold financial power over him start whispering and giggling that he introduces him as “Bertie,” as if he wasn't specifically trying to slight Bertrum as the man in question assumed, but instead was trying to assert to all the hungry cats in the room that he was also a cat, rather than a tasty lil mouse for them to devour… Nathan is worse than them? He's able to break Joey's facade of confidence that this crowd of investors could only make him reinforce? What's worse, the investors he tries to persuade like he does everyone else, convince that they should give him money because everything's great… but Nathan, who's supposedly his friend, he begs for money, saying that the one-and-only reason he's asking this is because the situation is dire (implying he has no choice). That's… worrisome.

Funny how, across DCTL, TIOL, and TLO, Joey consistently pulls or feels the urge to pull his cruel pranks on people anytime a new person seems to be hiding things from him or trying to take advantage of him. Buddy after being caught stealing art supplies? Bill after being caught lying about not having knowledge of the ink machine? Sammy when he suspected his deadpan-&-monotone-ness was an act and that he didn't respect him? Almost seems like the pranks are actually the survival mechanism of someone who's had a whole lotta really bad experiences with betrayal, having things hidden from him, getting taken advantage of, etc. rather than just the product of a twisted sense of humor, hm…?

“…inside I was feeling a little angry now. I don't do well when people are disloyal, and this was something I'd expected to be kept between me and Abby. Then I stopped and controlled myself (I have excellent control over my emotions) and realized I had never actually told her there was anything secret about this. I'd have to be more careful in the future. Believe you me, I have been since. A contract is a fine thing to have between colleagues, even finer at times between friends.” ~ Joey Drew, The Illusion of Living, pg. 170-171

“[Sammy] leaned back on both elbows on the stone wall. Beneath him Fifth Avenue roared and certain death would come to anyone who toppled over the edge down onto it. The man definitely had confidence in that wall. I had a sudden urge to give him a shove. Not push him over, but just to see his reaction. This might sound strange, but I needed to see a human moment from him, I needed to see the man he was hiding from me. That's the trouble when you're interested in recreating the illusion of the world. You want to see the truth of it as much as possible.” ~ Joey Drew, The Illusion of Living, pg. 188-189 (emphasis added)

Also, it's weird that, when talking about reuniting with Nathan at the Sparkling Unicorn, Joey claims not to have known Nathan very well in the army but to always have liked his personality… after having claimed to be close enough friends with him that he helped him write fake letters from a fictional character to Lottie, just a few pages earlier. Either Joey's not nearly as good a liar as he's supposed to be… or this discrepancy was created on purpose in an attempt to tell us that Joey only liked Nathan's personality back when they were in the army because he didn't actually know him as well as he thought he did. 👀

This all together…

…really makes one wonder if Joey's little intro to TIOL wasn't him humble-bragging, but genuinely explaining that the reason he took so long to write it was because A: he's been being gaslit to heck and back for decades and genuinely doesn't know what reality is as a result, and B: refusing to write this book was one of the few ways he was able to assert real control over his own life for a very long time…

“Looking back is awkward. Looking back, you can trip yourself up. I've never been a fan of it. Which is why I never had a desire to tell my story. No matter how many book deals were offered, no matter how many dinners were thrown for me. I am a man who makes up my own mind. You can't buy me. No one buys Joey Drew.” ~ Joey Drew, The Illusion of Living, pg. 3

Speaking of the intro, interesting how, as much as Joey tries to claim that his surprise at Simmons remembering his “philosophy” is because Simmons isn't the brightest bulb in the factory, he still gets noticeably hung up on the fact that his words had stuck with someone; it's almost as if the vast majority of people he knew either openly viewed him as a talentless idiot or genuinely were trying to manipulate him as he was so seemingly paranoid about, and he was beyond desperate for any scrap of genuine praise anyone would give him, no…? *Stares at basically every audio log, literally every Nathan note, and every scene where Joey reacted unsubtly ecstatically to compliments and/or irate at any hint someone was looking down on him*

Anyone notice how, throughout his whole memoir, Joey sings the praises of anyone he clearly wants to be like and drags anyone who resembles what he's actually like through the mud? “Omigosh, Sammy is just so talented and powerful and automatically respected and praised by everyone! He's so awesome! 🤩” “Yuck, Detective Sinclair wears a persona to hide how useless and powerless he is and is just so desperate for validation! I hate him! 😤 Btw, this stuff is not what my philosophy is about, I'm actually changing reality here (whatever makes you feel better, Joey /hj).” I guess this leads me into the next section…

Continued in Part Two: Expanding (Mostly) On My DCTL & TLO Thoughts

#long post #spoiler warning #book analysis #game analysis #book theory #game theory #bendy and the ink machine #batim #dreams come to life #dctl #crack up comics #the illusion of living #tiol #tiol theory #bendy: the lost ones #bendy: tlo #bendy and the dark revival #batdr #batdr trailer #batdr theory #joey drew #henry stein #nathan arch #sammy lawrence #detective sinclair #tw: abuse #tw: suicide

[multi-level-shipper]

#re-reading the sammy chapters in illusion of living thinking like... am I interrupting something... #honestly though? very real to meet sammy and 5 seconds later give him everything he wants #i might just be joey drew #joey drew #sammy lawrence #illusion of living #bendy books #batim #batdr #archer art

[wynandcore]

I wish I could reverse, reverse

And stop the hourglass

Because the earth is spinning ‘round the sun too fast.

#Reverse by Jhariah is such a song for them #I love the parallels you could make between the cartoon trio and these three. it makes me so violently ill #can you tell that I just read TIOL… yeah #Abby lambert #henry stein #joey drew #I need more fanart of those three ‼️‼️ they make me so sad‼️‼️ #batdr #batim #bendy and the ink machine #bendy books #the illusion of living #tiol #batim henry #batim joey drew #the poses are kinda awkward but tbf I referenced them off of the original drawing Henry made blame him 🚶‍♂️