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kindkitSome reactions and thoughts about the newest Magnus. I'm putting even the title under the cut, not because of spoilers but because it has unexpected resonance with current events.
So, "The Sick Village." I was braced, having seen the title in advance on Patreon, and honestly I wasn't expecting to be all that affected. But by a minute in, at the first mention of masks and people carefully not touching, I had to stop and breathe. (I was listening during my morning walk, which is still allowed where I live.)
The fear, the shame, the xenophobia and reactionary celebration of tradition and purity all felt horribly prescient--presumably because Jonny has done his research, and knows how people have historically reacted to epidemics. The Brexit subtext made this episode probably as close as Jonny has come to allegory, a genre of which I am not usually a fan, but in this nightmare landscape of overlapping fears, it worked for me. It wouldn't have been pure allegory in any case: the infection doesn't "stand for" nationalism and xenophobia, it's a real literal thing that entwines with nationalism and xenophobia. Just as vicious nationalism, racist speech, and racist attacks have increased in concert with COVID-19, encouraged in the US case by the president.
It all rang very very very true, and it was hard to listen to. A couple of times I almost had to stop.
It was a good choice, structurally, to have the comparatively lighter Martin-and-Jon stuff at the end. And Jonny's other big storytelling choice here, which amounts to "screw all the mysteries except the big one, have all the information: Basira and Daisy are alive and here's what they're doing, Elias is alive and in the Panopticon, Georgie and Melanie are alive but not quite detectable, the phone call was probably from Annabelle Cane, Helen's around but Jon and Martin can't use the doors to short-cut their trip, and yes there is a way to undo the Fears' manifestation but Jon can't See how yet" interests me. Jonny's not milking the little mysteries for all the suspense he can; therefore he's got something else planned for us all.
It was . . . nice? to encounter Helen again. She's simultaneously more Michael-ish now (the laugh!) and less human, and yet also crueler in a pettily human way as she tries to get Jon to blame himself some more, and to doubt his friends, and (I think) to doubt his relationship with Martin. Her repeated comments on how adorable etc. they are were meant to foster paranoia (if a monster approves, could this relationship be tainted, could Martin be tainted/influenced?) and to induce shame (how can I deserve to be happy in any way when the world has ended and it's my fault?). Nevertheless, Martin's not wrong that he and Jon may need her.
On a more meta level, Helen's comments were Jonny stomping one more time on the "Jon and Martin are Just Good Friends Who Say 'I Love You' And Cuddle Like Good Friends Do" thing with his big stompy boots of text. Couple, couple, couple: Helen says it repeatedly, and while Jon denies being adorable, he doesn't deny that he and Martin are a couple. *hearts Jonny and his big stompy boots of text*
As for the future: the Fears can't be sent back where they came from, so they need to go somewhere else. Like, oh, the scar in reality on Hill Top Road? I keep remembering the rather oddball episode 114, "Cracked Foundation," the one with the statement from the woman who cleaned the house on Hill Top Road after the builders finished. The one where maybe she was actually from a slightly different version of reality, and got pulled through the crack in the house's foundations into the reality of the Magnus-verse, where her favorite coffee shop doesn't exist and none of her friends seem to know her well and also the Magnus Institute exists where it didn't before? (Maybe. Those effects could be caused by the Distortion and the Lonely, and all the Fears seem to be involved in some way at Hill Top Road.) It would, of course, be wrong to send the Fears into a different universe full of people just to get them out of "our" world, but it might be a choice Jon's confronted with. Or he and Martin might have to choose whether to try escaping into Anya Vilette's world, the one without a Magnus Institute, the one where the Fears have less of a purchase and they could be free, or to do whatever awful thing will need doing to save their own world.
Regardless of how it's done, I think any attempt to rescue the world will involve Jon dying, because he is at the very least the Fears' anchor into the world. Jon will have to die, and I greatly fear that Martin will have to kill him. Somehow, because how can Jon even be killed? Unless, perhaps, by pulling him into the Spiral, like combining matter and anti-matter and thus destroying both.
Why yes, I love this show that is making my heart break a little more every week.
So, "The Sick Village." I was braced, having seen the title in advance on Patreon, and honestly I wasn't expecting to be all that affected. But by a minute in, at the first mention of masks and people carefully not touching, I had to stop and breathe. (I was listening during my morning walk, which is still allowed where I live.)
The fear, the shame, the xenophobia and reactionary celebration of tradition and purity all felt horribly prescient--presumably because Jonny has done his research, and knows how people have historically reacted to epidemics. The Brexit subtext made this episode probably as close as Jonny has come to allegory, a genre of which I am not usually a fan, but in this nightmare landscape of overlapping fears, it worked for me. It wouldn't have been pure allegory in any case: the infection doesn't "stand for" nationalism and xenophobia, it's a real literal thing that entwines with nationalism and xenophobia. Just as vicious nationalism, racist speech, and racist attacks have increased in concert with COVID-19, encouraged in the US case by the president.
It all rang very very very true, and it was hard to listen to. A couple of times I almost had to stop.
It was a good choice, structurally, to have the comparatively lighter Martin-and-Jon stuff at the end. And Jonny's other big storytelling choice here, which amounts to "screw all the mysteries except the big one, have all the information: Basira and Daisy are alive and here's what they're doing, Elias is alive and in the Panopticon, Georgie and Melanie are alive but not quite detectable, the phone call was probably from Annabelle Cane, Helen's around but Jon and Martin can't use the doors to short-cut their trip, and yes there is a way to undo the Fears' manifestation but Jon can't See how yet" interests me. Jonny's not milking the little mysteries for all the suspense he can; therefore he's got something else planned for us all.
It was . . . nice? to encounter Helen again. She's simultaneously more Michael-ish now (the laugh!) and less human, and yet also crueler in a pettily human way as she tries to get Jon to blame himself some more, and to doubt his friends, and (I think) to doubt his relationship with Martin. Her repeated comments on how adorable etc. they are were meant to foster paranoia (if a monster approves, could this relationship be tainted, could Martin be tainted/influenced?) and to induce shame (how can I deserve to be happy in any way when the world has ended and it's my fault?). Nevertheless, Martin's not wrong that he and Jon may need her.
On a more meta level, Helen's comments were Jonny stomping one more time on the "Jon and Martin are Just Good Friends Who Say 'I Love You' And Cuddle Like Good Friends Do" thing with his big stompy boots of text. Couple, couple, couple: Helen says it repeatedly, and while Jon denies being adorable, he doesn't deny that he and Martin are a couple. *hearts Jonny and his big stompy boots of text*
As for the future: the Fears can't be sent back where they came from, so they need to go somewhere else. Like, oh, the scar in reality on Hill Top Road? I keep remembering the rather oddball episode 114, "Cracked Foundation," the one with the statement from the woman who cleaned the house on Hill Top Road after the builders finished. The one where maybe she was actually from a slightly different version of reality, and got pulled through the crack in the house's foundations into the reality of the Magnus-verse, where her favorite coffee shop doesn't exist and none of her friends seem to know her well and also the Magnus Institute exists where it didn't before? (Maybe. Those effects could be caused by the Distortion and the Lonely, and all the Fears seem to be involved in some way at Hill Top Road.) It would, of course, be wrong to send the Fears into a different universe full of people just to get them out of "our" world, but it might be a choice Jon's confronted with. Or he and Martin might have to choose whether to try escaping into Anya Vilette's world, the one without a Magnus Institute, the one where the Fears have less of a purchase and they could be free, or to do whatever awful thing will need doing to save their own world.
Regardless of how it's done, I think any attempt to rescue the world will involve Jon dying, because he is at the very least the Fears' anchor into the world. Jon will have to die, and I greatly fear that Martin will have to kill him. Somehow, because how can Jon even be killed? Unless, perhaps, by pulling him into the Spiral, like combining matter and anti-matter and thus destroying both.
Why yes, I love this show that is making my heart break a little more every week.
WILDLY OFF-TOPIC
Date: 2020-04-24 09:41 pm (UTC)Re: WILDLY OFF-TOPIC
Date: 2020-04-24 09:48 pm (UTC)Re: WILDLY OFF-TOPIC
Date: 2020-04-24 09:56 pm (UTC)You're welcome! I am not on Tumblr at all, but I have friends who curate good stuff, and I thought instantly of you.