NEMESIS!!!!!
Jokes aside people focus a lot on how mean Nem is and yeah!! She's mean and clearly covets Mel's job but also if you look at her life philosophy it all makes sense.
Cause as Retribution Incarnate, Nemesis's whole deal is that you reap what you sow. If you experienced consequences, you did something to invoke them. Hence why she argues with Moros over the Fates and their influence vs. one's autonomy in that one conversation. It's also why she resents Mel having the job to save the House of Hades so much.
Mel never did anything to deserve this job. She's going out there, with the weight of everyone's expectations, worked up af, dying a billion times cause she was told she ought to. She didn't fail like Hecate did, it's not her official reason to exist like Nemesis herself. The only "crime" Mel did to deserve such a "fate" was being born to Persephone and Hades. Which is why Nem says the job isn't "personal" for Mel - Mel has done nothing (for good or bad) that warrants such a punishment - the scrutiny, the bloodshed, the agony etc.
It contextualizes the animosity between her and Hecate so much. We know Hecate failed as handmaiden to warn Nyx (or so Nemesis accuses her of) and we know Hecate couldn't save the House other than take Mel, Hypnos, and the unfinished family portrait (her own admission). From Nem's perspective, Hecate's the one who deserves punishment more, yet she's fostering the responsibility onto Mel.
It also contextualizes why Nem is so self-loathing about the whole arrangement too. If by her admission, one reaps what they sought re: consequences, what does it mean then, that she herself is stuck in the Crossroads on guard duty? What has she done to reap this? It's probably why she accepts the job even though she hates it. Sidenote: after the Nem + Hecate fight, Mel would have a conversation with Nemesis about it. She asks what did she get for her "insubordination" and Nem's like "heh. more guard duty." but not particularly mad about it. She knew what she did, what the consequences would be. Cause of course she knows.
Anyways, this whole thing is a long ramble to say - Nemesis has a lot of hidden depths besides her asshole-ishness. I do think all her insults and jabs at Mel are thinly veiled concern for her situation (I mean, she's constantly pointing out where Mel is lacking - scrawny, not personal, not deserving of it, etc. and being like "does anyone else think this is fucked up??") while also thinking it should be her responsibility instead. I mean, does Nemesis carry guilt about not being there to stop Chronos I wonder?
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For @sansebastinae and @boisinnot, my fellow saint seb truthers :)
+ the usual
Yayyyy finished a drawing! Haha only took me...2 weeks. I kept going back and forth on whether I could finish it tonight, and I really wasn't going to. But then I looked at the unfinished version on a different screen and was like oh? Not too bad actually?? So I finished it :) First of all, ofc, here is the process. Kinda weird seeing it for smth like this, it makes me feel like I'm the painter in rennaisance au, not Mark dhjfkf
Ah I was gonna draw a silly renaissance au comic to accompany this(read: lighten the mood), but it's 5 am and I've still not really drafted it well, so! I'd like to finish it at some point bcs I wanna draw more chibi comics, but when I finish smth, I can't help but immediately want to post it, so part 2 will have to wait. I'll show you the outline though so you can at least imagine 😭
^ So many renaissance and beyond paintings of Saint Sebastian are always the most horny thing ever. Like pre/early rennaisance, yeah he was naked and all that, but they were pretty chaste, and uhhhhh suffering?? Well the newer paintings are suffering, but in a different way, if you know what I mean.
So I feel like Mark's the type to be overly pedantic about it, and refuses to make borderline porn of a saint, I mean, god forbid, Seb!!! But then he just. Does anyways. Because he can't control his lust for Seb even when drawing him half dead. I just imagine him holding the paintbrush in a death grip like "must not be horny. Must not draw him sexy. Must make him chaste." And then he ends up with the one seen above. Seb is all smug about it. "Wow you'd wanna fuck me even while I'm all bloody and dying? 🥺"
Mark: "oh I'll make you bloody, alright."
But god so funny to imagine Seb doing all these different slutty poses, like arching his back as much as possible, the cloth nearly falling off at all times, etc etc. And Mark finally lands on this pose bcs he hopes the suffering will outweigh the horny. It doesn't. Also Seb is genuinely serious once he actually gets into the pose, focus mode on. And honestly that's even worse for Mark, bcs it's so much more arousing to see Seb in his element, focused. Tbf I think Seb could be drinking water, and Mark would still find some way to sexualize it. Don't look at his sketches!! They're just filled with Seb doing all kinds of random activities.
Also! Here is the painting I referenced this off of, must give credit where credit is due ofc
The Dying St. Sebastian by François Fabre
Also this isn't really relevant in the context of this drawing specifically. But I looked thru a bunch of Saint Sebastian paintings while trying to find one I could reference, and I came across this middle ages one that actually looks so much like boy king seb 😭 I guess it really is meant to be!
St Sebastian between St Roch and St Peter by Pietro Perugino
Lmao but do you see the difference between early rennaisance and later work???
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dramaturgy; celebrity manhunt, pre-london -- im going to make it easy on myself and skim through pre-london first, as the most divergence in this AU happens during and after the fact. part of pre-london is the pre-season itself, the celebrity manhunt special.
so action comes and goes, noah gets out of the season and remains as chris’ PA for the year break. in that time, months before it actually happens, chris finds out about the new season (with producer word both pushing for ‘more drama/engagement’ or smth along those lines, and *noahs actual involvement this time).
while something something contracts might prevent him from just outright telling noah, i’d imagine that he’d all but say there’s going to be a new season and heavily imply that noah wont be able to get out of it this time. not only that but he also implies that maybe noah should give opening up to people on the show a chance,, cause, yk, hes about to be stuck on a jet with them,, for weeks,,
of course, noah is pissed at first. but in so many weeks or whatever he begrudgingly accepts it and just resolves to throw it like usual. as for the ‘opening up to people’, he lands on owen.
owen was nice enough, genuine to a fault and the person least likely to use any of noahs bare slivers of vulnerability against him. hes safe.
[*noahs involvement within the show as something that the viewers are very interested in. he could be ratings gold and they know it.]
now im a little bit torn over the whole ‘chris’ assistant’ bit; similar to the awakeathon i would imagine it might just be missing entirely and he would be fired before the fact. or it could happen, as a way to give his on-screen character some information. as a ‘look everyone, i have Depth. stop prying into my life please’
either way, whatever. *total drama dirtbags show up, chris locks them out of the venue, they dont win any awards, bus chase etc.
^ note here, per usual noah comes off as his usual uncanny self around the cast. sierra is there as well, im sure thats Something for her. however he does take notice of one (1) alejandro burromuerto, recognizing him and focusing on him. < this comes back during introductions, where he notes his behavior towards the cast.
[*total drama dirtbags existed as the original ‘new TD season’ that noah found out about and worked on for a little bit before he finds out that it was not in fact a real show and a coverup for something else (a grab for an extra contestant for WT) < hence, he knows josé from interviews/auditions he helped with, but doesn’t know alejandro since he decided one brother was Enough]
^ and just for extra clarity on the TDD thing bc ive kind of muddled it, say noah finds out about dirtbags, helps out whatever. and then the news breaks that its a fake phish for a new contestant for an actual show — fine enough, he’s already behind the cameras, so he can just stay there, right?
no, actually. its kinda just slung at him that he has to be part of the cast (smth smth his job is threatened under ‘contractual obligation’ like its not wildly unconscionable). and he is soooo pissed off, so incredibly angry at the circumstances he’s landed himself in somehow.
< but he is aware that he cant just bottle everything up because it will spill over; chris said he needs something to his character, so maybe he can funnel his anger into playing the game a little more. as the most outlet he’ll get before he can throw it and just be done with the show entirely.
^ and then,,, alejandro.
while the actual events of pre-london remain largely unchanged, his dynamics are changed with the presence of four different variables: alejandro, izzy, owen, and sierra.
alejandro i’ll get into more later with a longer post detailing what they think of each other mutually, but im gna touch on alejandro a little; with picking off team victory and believing heather is the only person who’s noticed his facade, he just,, doesnt really distinguish noah as a threat worthy of focusing on.
^ throughout the game and the events of, he does single noah out as the most tolerable of all his teammates but doesnt offer much intrigue beyond that until *new york. (to note, he’s a lot more comfortable with [oblivious to??] noahs detachedness than the rest of the cast since that empty demeanor is p common among whatever diplomatic events hes been a part of)
izzy is someone who’s character i established mostly in the long post i had about her?? but it is worth mentioning now though that she does stick very close by to noah throughout her time on the show, and routinely interacts with him where most of the cast had given up trying altogether.
^ it builds,, a kind of rapport between her and noah?? in some way after the fact he’d recognize it as a nice, ‘i-want-to-know-more-about-you-and-also-befriend-you’ thing, but during he reacts more like a yowling cat tbh. he’s built up this reputation and facade that make people stay away from him, and now izzy wants to stick around him and threaten his defense mechanism? no thanks. (< further reasoning for why he belays insults towards her during WT under the guise of his own facade)
owen is a special case — in the bus chase before the season, noah took the time to sit by him and build up the proper beginnings of a friendship, which owen is thrilled about < during his time on island, owen was really fond of noahs quips and ‘just wished he would open up a bit more!!’,, he thinks some friends would b good for him and hes right
^ and again, owen is noahs safest option to 'endear' himself to the audience with a friend. hes so genuine and understanding of where noahs projected character falls flat, and like izzy keeps interacting and wants to interact with him where the rest of the cast gave up (and noah the person becomes very fond of owen and the reprieve their friendship offers him very quickly)
and finally,,, sierra. i actually want to talk more about the Audience as an entity in this AU in a later post and sierra ties into that heavily. as established, noah is the one cast member she just doesn't know anything about. of each blog she runs dedicated to each member of the show, his is the emptiest; the most baseless. being in proximity with the man of mystery is exciting!
^ noah still comes off as very uncanny valley to sierra and his detachedness is immediately clear. but the key difference to her and and cast is that she has the Audience perspective --- he's intriguing moreso than offputting. (and also theres definitely Something there about the meta-analysis of panopticon as an in-universe topic and how sierra would relate/connect that once it becomes clear to the cast why noah acts as he does)
[*new york (same time space as the aftermath?) as the moment when sierra prattles off information about the cast but comes up with nothing on noah that his own interest is piqued just a liitle bit, and he starts building a proper relationship up with noah as the straightmen to the cast. < also come after london is something he looks back on as a Hmm. moment wondering what noah knows about himself.
^ alejandro does believe their rapport is one-sided bc of his own facade, which i want to mention simply bc he's wrong. it is no-sided. both of them r faking.]
now getting to the episodes themselves -- minor changes/additions:
in the yukon, he doesn't try to cuddle bridgette
^ also in the yukon, he shivers less visibly than the cast (think when in cold weather you get those microtremors that really fucking hurt after a few seconds). this is only because it feeds into the android joke-turned-conspiracy for the folks watching on the aftermath set
in new york, he was not actually asleep in the carriage nor did he explicitly pretend to be. he just Kept Quiet when heather did her thing
in germany, he doesn't go up to alejandro when he falls off the platform, but he does prompt owen to ask something along a similar line [to his canon ones]
in the amazon, he's the one to point out owens absence
in paris, the line of 'this totally works on my dog' he changes to smth like 'totally works on dogs',, for his own exercise of privacy really
in the space of the jamaica aftermath, he again disappears from the rest of the cast à la playa des losers save for owen. owen gets a hello during mealtimes and hes the only one.
and finally, the episodes of 'significant' development with noahs intrigue in alejandro:
beginning before any real events of the show during introductions
^ kicked off in germany similarly to canon, emphasized by newfoundland and the grab for DJ's alliance
and cemented completely [his interest in unmasking him] in jamaica, continuing onward with london around when he discovers that alejandro is acting skittery towards him because of his own suspicions
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