#wtnv 106 | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

go-to-the-mirror · 8 months

Text

Every Time Mirrors are Mentioned in Welcome to Night Vale that is Halfway Relevant

[Plain text: "Every Time Mirrors are Mentioned in Welcome to Night Vale that is Halfway Relevant"]

Unabridged

Episodes featured: 19A, 26, 30, 33, 67, 87, 106, 108, 120, 122, 137, 148, 149, 160, 171, 209

Liveshows featured: "The Librarian," "The Investigators,"

CECIL: And now, a look at financial news. A fallow wheat field, grey sky, cut by black Vs of black birds. There is a child dragging a hatchet. His eyes cast down. His eyes tight. His eyes white and red and superfluous. He know not what he sees, but he knows what is there. A single black-wingéd beast, beak cracked, feathers rotting, alights roughly on the child's shoulder. They stop. The bird picks at the cartilage of the boy's ear, as if biting secrets into it. The boy groans, not unpleasantly. Heavy, slow clouds roll and rise, starkly contrasted against the flickering daguerreotype hills, which stoically keep the poisonous rains at bay. A sudden little river, partially walled by palsied shafts of grain, rolls by. The boy walks to it. He bends forward. His blank eyes stare into his reflection. Neither he nor his mirror knows the other is there. But the bird. The bird knows. The bird cackles. Or perhaps cries. Even the bird is uncertain. The boy takes a palm full of the dark water. Most of it runs out through his long, zig-zagging fingers. He licks the remainder from his dusty skin. A sound. Like thunder. Like drums. Like steps. The boy turns and hurls his hatchet behind him. The bird flies up and away. There is a hideous thump. The boy knows not what he has hit, but that it has been wounded. He waits for its retort. This has been financial news.

(Episode 19A - The Sandstorm)

CECIL: Maybe you should try paying more attention when you're at home. Or better yet, destroy all of your mirrors. As my mother used to tell me: "Someone's going to kill you one day, Cecil, and it will involve a mirror. Mark my words, child." and then she would stare absently through my eyes until I giggled. I miss her so much.

(Episode 26 - Faceless Old Woman)

CECIL: McDonald’s wants to remind you that the most important meal of the day is Breakfast. So why would you let a morning go by without staring deeply into the mirror until you no longer recognize the face staring back at you, mimicking your every gesture, mocking your every movement.

(Episode 30 - Dana)

TEENAGE CECIL: My mom seems really proud of me too. She hid from me for three days, the longest ever! And she’s covered all the mirrors in my house. I’m not sure why, but I think it must be because of pride. Being proud does all sorts of things to a...person. Uh, sorry, got distracted. That weird movement is back. It’s closer now.

TEENAGE CECIL: Interning is going great! Mom is gone. Leonard is super nice to me. My brother is gone too. Family, right? I think I’m learning a lot at the station. All of the mirrors in my house are uncovered now. Not sure who did that. I’m standing in front of the hall mirror right now. Am I changed? Am I becoming an adult? I look more grown, I think, more professional. Leonard said if I work hard, maybe I’ll be a radio presenter myself some day. Leonard said he once was smaller too, but that he is larger now, that everything is larger, that everything in the universe is growing to towering sizes, but all at once, all in unison, so no one notices and it is all the same relative to itself. Leonard lolls his tongue out of his thick purple lips. Leonard hisses. Being an intern is great. That flickering movement is everywhere now. Especially looking in this mirror. I see the flickering movement and I know. I know it. I think the radio station is fun. I think the radio station is hidden. I think the radio station is like a dark planet, lit by no sun. I think, therefore I soon won’t be. I’m looking in a mirror. The mirror is not covered. The flickering movement is just behind me. I- [He screams. There is gurgling. A body falls to the floor. Tape hiss continues. The tape shuts off. End teenage voice]

CECIL: No matter! I’m taking the tape, just now and I’m [GRUNTS] crushing it into little pieces. None of us have to think about it again. I’ll just double check that the mirror in the station bathroom is covered as usual and then that will be that. Done. Forgotten.

(Episode 33 - Cassette)

CECIL: The City Council warned that the mess left from Leonard Burton’s death is likely to draw Street Cleaners and that we should all take shelter. Cover your mirrors. Shade your eyes. Stay indoors and mourn. Stay indoors and mourn.

(Episode 67 - [Best Of?])

CECIL: Item: Big Ricos Pizza is looking for a new cashier. Must have retail experience and be good at not talking if they know what’s good for them. No funny business. No secret wheat speakeasies. Why would you even bring that up? Who have you been talking to? To apply, look at yourself in the mirror for a long time, until your face no longer seems to be your own.

(Episode 87 - The Trial of Hiram McDaniels)

CECIL: I was so frightened, but still I looked into the washroom. He was standing in front of a mirror, looking right at himself. I never look into those things. Or at least I haven't in a long long time. "I think the radio station is fun," he said. "I think the radio station is hidden. I think the radio station is like a dark planet, lit by no sun. I think, therefore I soon won’t be," he said. I wanted to cry out to warn him. My mother told me to stay away from mirrors. And I knew he was in danger. I opened my mouth and tried to step into the room, but I could not speak, could not move forward. "I’m looking in a mirror," he said. "The mirror is not covered," he said. "Stop. Don't look into the mirror," I tried to say. But nothing came out of my mouth, only spit and inaudible wheeze. Tears stung my eyes. I waved frantically, trying to catch his attention. "The flickering movement is just behind me," he said. And then he looked right at me in the mirror. His eyes grew wide and wet. He said "I-. He said again "I-" and then he choked. Then he screamed. Then I screamed, only again no sound came out. He fell to the floor, and for a moment I remembered. I remembered blue lights and blood in my throat and a dark planet lit by no sun. And then I forgot it, or at least what it looked like, only that it was. Or never was. Or still is. His wallet was no longer in my studio. His...my driver’s license was no longer in my hand. My familiar teenage intern was no longer lying on the ground. The mirror he was looking into is now shattered into thousands of intersecting cracks like parched desert dirt. I approached the mirror, hoping to see a face I knew. A young man's face I just barely remember. But I only saw a multiplicity of me, a man divided, unrecognizably, under razor sharp lines. And behind me a glowing slash in the bathroom wall.

(Episode 106 - Filings)

CECIL: "Better not look in the mirror," Cal said as he nervously simulated the sound of laughter. A dribble of blood ran down his chin and onto his chest.

(Episode 108 - Cal)

KEVIN: Jason and Falisha wanted their friends to know they were happy, so they began to practice smiling in the mirror, but even they couldn't see a change in their faces. Plus, mirrors were upsetting because of all the people who would gather behind them in the reflection but that weren't actually there when they turned around to face them.

KEVIN: Their long house was a long pit. And every single mirror in their home was gone, along with the ghastly figures who gathered in the reflections.

(Episode 120 - All Smiles' Eve)

CECIL: Nazr did not see Barks Ennui. But he was not without his own troubles. He would find, some evenings, that when he looked in the mirror there were two of him. One of him sitting behind the other. He would stand and the second reflection would stand too. It would follow all of his movements from behind his primary reflection. This went on for days. Then, one night, he looked in the mirror and there was only one of him. He sighed, feeling some relief to the tension that had been with him so long as to become his new normal. And that is when, in the mirror, his second reflection stepped into the room, followed by Frances Donaldson. Nazr whirled. The room he was in was empty. He looked back in the mirror. There was his own face, terrified. And behind that, on the bed, there was himself again, with Frances. The two of them were kissing, passionately. He watched himself kiss. And then his reflection and the Frances in the mirror stopped kissing and looked up at him, with startled faces. They stayed frozen that way, and he stayed frozen too. After several moments, the mirror couple smiled. Their smiles got wider and wider, and then they were both dead, blood covered and sprawling at irregular angles. And then they were alive again and smiling at him. He shouted and stumbled back from the mirror. From then on, he took to covering his mirrors, and that worked for a few days, but then one day he came home to find himself in his bedroom, already sitting in front of the covered bedroom mirror. The him that was in his bedroom looked up at him who had just entered with wide eyes and a yawning mouth, and Nazr (who believed himself to be the real Nazr) turned and walked out his house. He checked into a motel and decided to stay there for awhile.

(Episode 122 - A Story of Love and Horror, Part 2: "Spire")

LAUREN: These shadows don't even have faces. We cannot discern their intentions or feelings. They move around in quick jerks and starts, flickering in and out of our vision, sometimes standing just behind us while slowly tilting their heads. And unless you're looking in a mirror, there's no way you can even see that.

(Episode 137 - The Mudstone Abyss, Part 3)

LEONARD BURTON: Let me describe to you the shape of Cecil Palmer. He is a line of leafless mesquite trees. He is a glass factory. He is golf ball-sized hail. He has a voice like distant highway traffic. He loves coffee and handshakes. He wears tight clothing and has never once worked with modeling clay. He covers mirrors with cloth and has an irrational fear of glowing lights beneath locked doors in dark hallways. You cannot know any of this because Cecil is my vision, not yours. He is real, all the same. He is to be my replacement when I retire. But he does not exist. So I can never retire. I am your permanent host.

(Episode 148 - The Broadcaster)

CECIL: I can see myself in their reflective face. I... I do not like this. I do not like this at all. Please go. Please leave. I cannot. I... I am covering this window with a sheet. I do not like this mirror. I do not like it one bit. No.

(Episode 149 - The General)

CECIL: ... [somber] and *that* is what I saw in the mirror that day, and why I do not like to go near mirrors ever.

(Episode 160 - The Weather)

CECIL: Do you ever stare at yourself for so long in the mirror that you no longer understand what you look like? Is this the same effect as thinking about someone you miss so much that you forget the shape of their face? Why would you do that? Why would you refuse to maintain order? Are you refusing? Or are you a victim of your own mind? Do brain cells dictate souls? Is thought matter? Does thought matter? Who can say? Can the person looking back at you from the mirror tell you the answer? Just because you can see a person, does that mean that person exists? Is it you you are looking at? Or is it someone else?

CECIL: Basically, why do I know I am me? How many times have I seen myself in the mirror? Is it bad that the answer is rarely? Shouldn’t we all be afraid of mirrors? Or is it just me? How many times, in a fit of dissociation, do we see someone else behind us? Are you, too, too afraid to turn around? Do you really want to challenge the veracity of your eyes? Do you think disbelief in death will make it disappear? Are awareness and manifestation one and the same? So, what did I see in the mirror today? Don’t we all see the same thing? Isn’t it a person who looks exactly like ourselves? And weren’t they making the same physical gestures? And behind that person, in the reflection, did you not also see, just over your shoulder, a pair of eyes? The curve of a head? And did you notice how that head was human in shape but maybe only a third the size?

CECIL: Who is behind you in the mirror? Or what is behind you? Should I speak in present or past tense? Is the face there? Or is the face gone now? Are you no longer at the mirror? Do you feel safer? Why do you assume that because you aren’t looking in the mirror right now that the tiny face and spiny digits are not still behind you?

CECIL: Are you thinking about it? Are you starting to forget exactly what it looks like? Do you want to go to the mirror again? Do you want to stare and stare at it until you can comprehend what it is?

CECIL: What if we went to the mirror together? If we don’t feel alone in our feelings, could we conquer our fears? Are we in agreement, you and I? What are you even looking at? Is your focus drifting to your shoulder? Can you not do that? Can you resist the urge? What will staring directly into your terror accomplish?

CECIL: When was the last time you saw your mother? It’s been since childhood, hasn’t it? Didn’t she warn you about mirrors? Didn’t she tell you they would be your demise? Or was that just a popular bedtime story?

CECIL: What did your mother tell you about swing sets? What did she say to you when you yelled to her for help? Did she lean over your sobbing face and ask you: “Why are you crying when you don’t even exist?” Did she tell you again about the mirror?

CECIL: Did you figure it out? Could you see past your own mental inventions? Who out there looked beyond the long, gape-jawed figure and its inexplicable whines? Did you see the table? There in the mirror image of your house, did you see the table? You hadn’t noticed the table before, had you?

CECIL: Why was the table only in the mirror? Why isn’t it real?

CECIL: What’s inside the drawer of the rickety table in the mirror? What other uncanny discoveries await you if you could just break through? Is it as simple as breaking through?

CECIL: Do you want to know what’s in the drawer below the table? Shouldn’t it be as easy to obtain as a lightweight, wool button up coat, all black? But nothing easy ever is, is it? How do you get to a table that’s right in front of you, but only visible in a mirror?

CECIL: Are you only concentrating on the table now? And you’re sure it only exists in the mirror? You double checked? Do you want to know what’s inside the drawer on the front of that table? Are you willing to break something? Are you willing to break the mirror, yes, but so much more? Are you willing to go to a place from which you cannot return? Are you willing to learn things you cannot unlearn? Do you have a hammer? Or if not, can you find something heavy that you can lift? Will you smash the mirror? Will you do it quickly? Why are you hesitating? Have you let your comfortability lapse into carelessness? Why did you take your eyes off the creature on your neck? Did you see the blood or feel the pain first? Is it tearing into your flesh? Is that why you’re screaming? Can you still break the mirror? Are you losing consciousness? Are you? Are you? Are you?

CECIL: If you look into the mirror you just smashed do you see that the creature is gone? Cool, right? But isn’t it strange that all about you on the floor are shards of the mirror you shattered, yet in front of you, the mirror remains, fully intact? Strange? Or scary? Wouldn’t you think that the mirror being simultaneously broken and unbroken is strange, while the fact that you have no reflection is scary? Is that true though? Do you have a reflection? Do you see yourself? On the floor of the mirror’s world? Is your body crumpled on the floor like a wet towel? Is your lower jaw hanging open because you died screaming, or because of gravity? Do you have a blanket of some sort? Why don’t you cover that mirror up? Why don’t you cover all the mirrors, in fact? While you are walking about your home, do you notice the antique table by the door, with its tarnished, yet ornate, brass bulb knob? Was that table always there? Did you enter the mirror world? Or were you always in the mirror world? What else is different around you?

CECIL: Now what? Will you cover the mirrors and sweep the floor and pretend it never happened? Will this prevent it from happening again? Are awareness and manifestation one and the same?

(Episode 171 - Go to the Mirror?)

CECIL: Whatever the Distant Prince keeps behind the Narrow Place has left me hollow and shambling. Less and less of me. This time quite literally. When I looked again, I did not have a nose. It is quite upsetting to see your own face but without a nose. Think about this now. Think about looking in the mirror and seeing your face, but the nose is gone. So you will understand why I vomited in the street. And this other me, he vomited too, for exactly the same amount of time, stopping precisely when I did.

(Episode 209 - The Black Coat)

FACELESS OLD WOMAN: I am less good at being seen, but I am working on that using a system of whistles and mirrors. CECIL: Huh. Mirrors.

("The Librarian")

EARL HARLAN: Oh yes! Yes, I will wake up that morning, and I will stare at myself in the mirror repeating, “You can do this, Earl. You can do this, Earl. You can do this, Earl.” Until my reflection says, “You’re right.” And then we’ll brush each others’ teeth, and trim each others’ mustaches, and comb each others’ hair… CECIL: Awwww! EARL HARLAN: …and then step through the mirror and once again switch places in each others’ mirrored world for the day.

("The Investigators")

JEFFREY: Yeah, yeah. Yeah turns out most people are afraid of what they are, so now I’m also terrified of mirrors and reflective surfaces, so…

("ALL HAIL")

6 notes · View notes

srslybusiness · 2 years

Text

OK Some thoughts bc I just finished ep 171 and I feel like ep 33, 106, and 171 might be related to each other? 171 feels like another different perspective of 33 just like that scene in 106. This ended up being long so I apologize in advance but my brain is Full right now 🤡

My first gut feeling is that 171 Cecil is talking to 106 and 33 Cecil. Like maybe not directly and more to...question-narrating??? I’m not sure yet about the... being he’s talking about here bc at first I thought like “third the size? like a child?” but then the description goes on and it became less human and I’m not sure? Though to keep in mind Cecil is an unreliable narrative and this might not mean literally

EP 171 Do you still see the flickering creature climbing up your back? Is the little hand reaching up again? Do you notice it wears black rings? Are those talons? And what is it opening its mouth to say? Do you see how it rises up behind you? How long is its torso? Is it some kind of snake but with human skin? Why does it have so many teeth? How long can a tongue be? What is it doing? Why is it crying? Is it a child? What unholy monster cries like a child? What does it want? Why won’t it stop?

The last part esp makes me think about how 33 Cecil getting more and more scared by the flickering he sees? It makes me think if this scene in 33 happened at the same time as 106. The figure 33 Cecil sees is actually 106 Cecil. In that scene 33 Cecil is recapping his first internship day but I don’t think it’s clear whether he’s still in the radio station or at home? Or if these 2 perspectives happening at 2 different location depending whose POV we’re listening to.

Ep 33 Hello? Hello? I am Cecil. Cecil Gershwin Palmer. And you cannot scare me. You cannot. You cannot!

…hello?

EP 106 So I just sent my new intern to go pick up some lunch...

...He didn't say yes, nor did he ever seem to see or hear me. But he did look really frightened and ran from the room crying... ...Dresses kind of weird though, so early 80s with his double-windsor striped tie, polyester coat, and aviator goggles, just like we all wore back in the day.

NOW all above are just incoherent speculations (33 Cecil that 106 Cecil sees wearing 80s fashion seems in line with the 1983 reality split) but I can’t help but think they’re relevant to each other. The scene below though is literally the same scene from a different perspectives.

Ep 33 Leonard said if I work hard, maybe I’ll be a radio presenter myself some day. Leonard said he once was smaller too...

...That flickering movement is everywhere now. Especially looking in this mirror. I see the flickering movement and I know. I know it.

I think the radio station is fun. I think the radio station is hidden. I think the radio station is like a dark planet, lit by no sun. I think, therefore I soon won’t be.

I’m looking in a mirror. The mirror is not covered. The flickering movement is just behind me. I-

[He screams. There is gurgling. A body falls to the floor. Tape hiss continues. The tape shuts off. End teenage voice]

Ep 106 I found him in the restroom. The door was cracked slightly, and the light was on. I heard a voice. A familiar, young voice.

"Leonard said if I work hard, maybe I’ll be a radio presenter myself some day" said the voice.

I was so frightened, but still I looked into the washroom. He was standing in front of a mirror, looking right at himself. I never look into those things. Or at least I haven't in a long long time.

"I think the radio station is fun," he said. "I think the radio station is hidden. I think the radio station is like a dark planet, lit by no sun. I think, therefore I soon won’t be," he said.

I wanted to cry out to warn him. My mother told me to stay away from mirrors. And I knew he was in danger. I opened my mouth and tried to step into the room, but I could not speak, could not move forward.

"I’m looking in a mirror," he said.

"The mirror is not covered," he said.

"Stop. Don't look into the mirror," I tried to say. But nothing came out of my mouth, only spit and inaudible wheeze. Tears stung my eyes. I waved frantically, trying to catch his attention.

"The flickering movement is just behind me," he said. And then he looked right at me in the mirror. His eyes grew wide and wet. He said "I-.

He said again "I-" and then he choked. Then he screamed. Then I screamed, only again no sound came out. He fell to the floor, and for a moment I remembered. I remembered blue lights and blood in my throat and a dark planet lit by no sun. And then I forgot it, or at least what it looked like, only that it was. Or never was. Or still is.

The way 33 Cecil say “The flickering movement is just behind me” AND 106 Cecil giving more context with “And then he looked right at me in the mirror. His eyes grew wide and wet.” Makes me think of 2 possibilities: 1) It’s 106 Cecil he sees in the background which possible but there’s also possibility 2) That the flickering is 171 Cecil. And 33 Cecil looking at 106 Cecil is by chance. Another possibility is the flickering is a whole different being or it can both be 171 and 106 Cecil depending on the where 33 Cecil sees it.

Ep 106 ...My familiar teenage intern was no longer lying on the ground. The mirror he was looking into is now shattered into thousands of intersecting cracks like parched desert dirt. I approached the mirror, hoping to see a face I knew. A young man's face I just barely remember. But I only saw a multiplicity of me, a man divided, unrecognizably, under razor sharp lines. And behind me a glowing slash in the bathroom wall.

When I turned, the hole in reality was gone, only plain gray subway tiles.

Ep 171 Are you willing to break something? Are you willing to break the mirror, yes, but so much more? Are you willing to go to a place from which you cannot return? Are you willing to learn things you cannot unlearn?

Do you have a hammer? Or if not, can you find something heavy that you can lift? Will you smash the mirror? Will you do it quickly? Why are you hesitating?

Have you let your comfortability lapse into carelessness? Why did you take your eyes off the creature on your neck? Did you see the blood or feel the pain first? Is it tearing into your flesh? Is that why you’re screaming? Can you still break the mirror? Are you losing consciousness? Are you? Are you? Are you?

Now I think the relation of 106 and 171 especially is strong in the later part of above scene; after 33 Cecil was (most likely) strangled. While the first half it seems like 171 Cecil is taunting? or just possibly narrating and questioning 33 Cecil.

“Have you let your comfortability lapse into carelessness?” Feels like 171 Cecil questioning 33 Cecil for looking at the mirror esp after the countless of time he’s asking the “you” in this story if they remember their(his) mother and her warning (tale?) about mirrors. And referencing Ep 106, we know that the mirror is broken but it’s not clear which one of them broke it. We only know that it shattered.

“Are you willing to go to a place from which you cannot return? Are you willing to learn things you cannot unlearn?“ Is also interesting considering 106 Cecil saw a hole in reality for a moment on the bathroom wall. Did one of them jumped through realities via the mirror? Cecil’s mother said that his death will involved mirror, is it this one? Did one of the Cecils killed a version of himself?

Ep 171 If you look into the mirror you just smashed do you see that the creature is gone?

Cool, right?

Could the creature he talk about here himself (33 Cecil)? Or the flickering creature that could possibly a whole different thing?

But isn’t it strange that all about you on the floor are shards of the mirror you shattered, yet in front of you, the mirror remains, fully intact?

Strange? Or scary?

Wouldn’t you think that the mirror being simultaneously broken and unbroken is strange, while the fact that you have no reflection is scary?

Is that true though? Do you have a reflection? Do you see yourself? On the floor of the mirror’s world? Is your body crumpled on the floor like a wet towel? Is your lower jaw hanging open because you died screaming, or because of gravity?

And this last part seems like he’s narrating 106 Cecil who’s looking at the broken mirror glass. Which then seems like fixed when the hole in reality disappear? “Do you have a reflection? Do you see yourself? On the floor of the mirror’s world?“ This seems to be directly calling this scene back too “ I approached the mirror, hoping to see a face I knew. A young man's face I just barely remember. But I only saw a multiplicity of me, a man divided, unrecognizably, under razor sharp lines.“

And of course there’s also the whole the body of his younger self (33 Cecil) is no longer there thing.

This last feels also like, 171 Cecil is referencing 33 Adult Cecil’s action after he finished listening to the tape

Ep 171 Now what? Will you cover the mirrors and sweep the floor and pretend it never happened? Will this prevent it from happening again? Are awareness and manifestation one and the same?

Ep 33 I’ll just double check that the mirror in the station bathroom is covered as usual and then that will be that. Done. Forgotten.

I guess TL;DR in my head it goes like this?? Mirrors are often depicted as a door to a different world/reality in stories so why the heck not right

ANYWAY hope this is coherent enough I’m honestly just the “I’m connecting the two dots” meme right now 🥴

#saphthings #wtnv liveblogging #wtnv spoilers #wtnv #long post #theres still lots of episodes to go so who knows this will probably get jossed sdjhfbhjsd #but hey that's the fun part of theorizing!#i can't imagine how it felt like if i was caught up instead of catching up and can easily go to next episode #idk why but it'd actually be... creepier?? scarier??? if it's our cecil (the one that we hear in 106) instead of a different one #bc he sound so scared there #FORGOR TO ADD LONG POST LMAO

0 notes