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the magnus archives 165
Thoughts on TMA 165, "Revolutions," including one possibly unpopular opinion, .
I think Jonny is good at prose, including sometimes quite poetic prose. Actual poetry . . . maybe not so much. (But I ought to admit, here, that I think the height of poetry in English was the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. My tastes are perhaps a little old-fashioned.)
Plus, we've encountered the Stranger enough that this statement, unlike the ones for the Slaughter and the Corruption, didn't feel like it was shedding new light on a less-explored Fear. The freshest element was that of an endlessly repeating and repeatable cycle, and even that we've seen before in "In the Trenches."
I almost wish TMA would abandon the statement structure. Not that I don't enjoy them at all--sometimes they're very powerful--but they increasingly feel like something I get through in order to experience the real story around them.
So, moving on to the meta-story:
Jon destroying not!Sasha was cool, and also terrifying, because Jon deliberately invoking the Ceaseless Watcher and using its power seems . . . dangerous. He needs to keep as much of himself intact as possible and avoid being drawn in any closer.
It seems like the Fears are not as unfettered as they would like to be, because the Beholding is . . . first among equals? Or at least, is able to observe them all, which bothers some of their avatars more than others. Regardless, there are still rivalries among the Fears that can be exploited.
I've been thinking about the lack of death in this world, or its lack at least of inevitable death. It does seem possible to die--people in the Sick Village die--but people can also be kept alive to suffer endlessly. And that made me think of the ending of the Mechanisms album Ulysses Dies at Dawn, which I listened to recently. [SPOILERS] The ending--the happy ending--of that album is death. Ulysses gets to die and lie next to his beloved in the one patch of uncorrupted world; he gets to escape eternal conscious servitude in the brain-machine-thing whose name I forget.
I've long since accepted that a happy ending for Jon and Martin probably means their death. But listening to "Revolutions" and thinking about UDAD, it occurred to me for the first time that a happy ending for the whole world may mean death. Everyone's death, because being dead is better than suffering without end. ( . . . maybe? the End is the Fear we know the least about, and we do know that being trapped eternally near death is bad. We don't know, and perhaps can't know, whether death is a release or just an eternity in the cold and the dark.)
So, have another prediction for where this is going: They'll get to Elias, and defeat him (probably with help from Basira, Melanie, Georgie, etc.) in a big boss fight. (Thanks, Jonny, we see what you did there.) And nothing will change, because the Fears' anchor in this world isn't Jonalias, it's Jon. (And, ooh, I just noticed Jonah-->Jon, and I don't know if it's significant or not.) Jon will certainly have to die, but possibly he will have to take the rest of the world with him in one big mercy killing. (I don't think that's a direction the narrative is super likely to go in, because it is basically a giant trigger for suicide and other mental health issues, but at the current state of what we know, it is an ending that would make a horrible kind of sense.)
And have a quite different line of speculation, based on something Jonny said in the Patreon-only S4 Q&A. I have used ROT13 due to potential spoilers; click on the link to decipher.
Fbzrbar unq nfxrq ubj Zrynavr jnf noyr gb jevgr n erfvtangvba yrggre orsber oyvaqvat urefrys. Wbaal fnvq gung Zrynavr univat znqr naq npprcgrq gur qrpvfvba serrq ure rabhtu gb jevgr gur yrggre, naq gura obgu ur naq Nyrk fgnegrq urfvgngvat nobhg fnlvat zber qhr gb cbffvoyr F5 fcbvyref. Wbaal fnvq whfg bar zber guvat, juvpu frrzrq gb or nobhg ubj qrpvfvbaf pna unir pbafrdhraprf *onpxjneqf* nf jryy nf sbejneqf va gur Zntahf-irefr, naq gura Nyrk onfvpnyyl fuhg uvz hc.
Guvatf pna or haqbar. Fbzr guvatf, gb fbzr qrterr, guebhtu zrgubqf haxabja ohg cebonoyl cnvashy naq qnzntvat gb gur crefba jub znxrf gung pubvpr.
Gur zbfg erprag cbvag bs jbeyq-punatvat pubvpr vf jura Znegva pubfr abg gb xvyy Ryvnf (ynetryl orpnhfr bs Wba), naq Wba pubfr gb tb vagb gur Ybaryl gb erfphr Znegva, guhf rafhevat gung ur jbhyq or znexrq ol gur svany Srne.
Bu ab. Bu qrne.
V bapr jebgr n Ohsslirefr fgbel va juvpu gur punva bs riragf yrnqvat gb gur Jvfuirefr (n pnabavpny qlfgbcvna NH va juvpu Ohssl arire pbzrf gb Fhaalqnyr, naq fb gur inzcverf jva) ortvaf jvgu Tvyrf yrnivat gur Jngpuref gb or jvgu Rguna. Yngre, ng gur zbzrag va pnaba jura Tvyrf qrfgeblf n zntvpny negvsnpg naq chgf gur jbeyq onpx vagb cynpr, gvzr hajvaqf onpx gb gung zbzrag; Tvyrf erwrpgf Rguna, fgnlf jvgu gur Jngpuref, naq fnirf gur jbeyq ng gur pbfg bs uvf bja unccvarff. Ur'f abg njner bs gur pnhfngvba naq fb abg njner ur'f znxvat n pubvpr, ohg V gubhtug vg jnf qnza jryy fnq rabhtu. Vs Wba naq Znegva unir gb qb fbzrguvat fvzvyne, va shyy njnerarff bs gur pbafrdhraprf, V fjrne gb tbq V jvyy fraq Wbaal naq Nyrk gur ovyy sbe zl gurencl.
A few lighter things to end on: Martin's obvious admiration for Jon killing not!Sasha was both sweet and kind of scary. The great revelation of Jon not liking poetry is funny, and for me explains how he could possibly have described Martin's poetic style as imitative of Keats (i.e. Keats is the only poet whose name he can remember, and it's all basically the same, right?).
And Jon liking merry-go-rounds is fucking adorable.
I think Jonny is good at prose, including sometimes quite poetic prose. Actual poetry . . . maybe not so much. (But I ought to admit, here, that I think the height of poetry in English was the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. My tastes are perhaps a little old-fashioned.)
Plus, we've encountered the Stranger enough that this statement, unlike the ones for the Slaughter and the Corruption, didn't feel like it was shedding new light on a less-explored Fear. The freshest element was that of an endlessly repeating and repeatable cycle, and even that we've seen before in "In the Trenches."
I almost wish TMA would abandon the statement structure. Not that I don't enjoy them at all--sometimes they're very powerful--but they increasingly feel like something I get through in order to experience the real story around them.
So, moving on to the meta-story:
Jon destroying not!Sasha was cool, and also terrifying, because Jon deliberately invoking the Ceaseless Watcher and using its power seems . . . dangerous. He needs to keep as much of himself intact as possible and avoid being drawn in any closer.
It seems like the Fears are not as unfettered as they would like to be, because the Beholding is . . . first among equals? Or at least, is able to observe them all, which bothers some of their avatars more than others. Regardless, there are still rivalries among the Fears that can be exploited.
I've been thinking about the lack of death in this world, or its lack at least of inevitable death. It does seem possible to die--people in the Sick Village die--but people can also be kept alive to suffer endlessly. And that made me think of the ending of the Mechanisms album Ulysses Dies at Dawn, which I listened to recently. [SPOILERS] The ending--the happy ending--of that album is death. Ulysses gets to die and lie next to his beloved in the one patch of uncorrupted world; he gets to escape eternal conscious servitude in the brain-machine-thing whose name I forget.
I've long since accepted that a happy ending for Jon and Martin probably means their death. But listening to "Revolutions" and thinking about UDAD, it occurred to me for the first time that a happy ending for the whole world may mean death. Everyone's death, because being dead is better than suffering without end. ( . . . maybe? the End is the Fear we know the least about, and we do know that being trapped eternally near death is bad. We don't know, and perhaps can't know, whether death is a release or just an eternity in the cold and the dark.)
So, have another prediction for where this is going: They'll get to Elias, and defeat him (probably with help from Basira, Melanie, Georgie, etc.) in a big boss fight. (Thanks, Jonny, we see what you did there.) And nothing will change, because the Fears' anchor in this world isn't Jonalias, it's Jon. (And, ooh, I just noticed Jonah-->Jon, and I don't know if it's significant or not.) Jon will certainly have to die, but possibly he will have to take the rest of the world with him in one big mercy killing. (I don't think that's a direction the narrative is super likely to go in, because it is basically a giant trigger for suicide and other mental health issues, but at the current state of what we know, it is an ending that would make a horrible kind of sense.)
And have a quite different line of speculation, based on something Jonny said in the Patreon-only S4 Q&A. I have used ROT13 due to potential spoilers; click on the link to decipher.
Fbzrbar unq nfxrq ubj Zrynavr jnf noyr gb jevgr n erfvtangvba yrggre orsber oyvaqvat urefrys. Wbaal fnvq gung Zrynavr univat znqr naq npprcgrq gur qrpvfvba serrq ure rabhtu gb jevgr gur yrggre, naq gura obgu ur naq Nyrk fgnegrq urfvgngvat nobhg fnlvat zber qhr gb cbffvoyr F5 fcbvyref. Wbaal fnvq whfg bar zber guvat, juvpu frrzrq gb or nobhg ubj qrpvfvbaf pna unir pbafrdhraprf *onpxjneqf* nf jryy nf sbejneqf va gur Zntahf-irefr, naq gura Nyrk onfvpnyyl fuhg uvz hc.
Guvatf pna or haqbar. Fbzr guvatf, gb fbzr qrterr, guebhtu zrgubqf haxabja ohg cebonoyl cnvashy naq qnzntvat gb gur crefba jub znxrf gung pubvpr.
Gur zbfg erprag cbvag bs jbeyq-punatvat pubvpr vf jura Znegva pubfr abg gb xvyy Ryvnf (ynetryl orpnhfr bs Wba), naq Wba pubfr gb tb vagb gur Ybaryl gb erfphr Znegva, guhf rafhevat gung ur jbhyq or znexrq ol gur svany Srne.
Bu ab. Bu qrne.
V bapr jebgr n Ohsslirefr fgbel va juvpu gur punva bs riragf yrnqvat gb gur Jvfuirefr (n pnabavpny qlfgbcvna NH va juvpu Ohssl arire pbzrf gb Fhaalqnyr, naq fb gur inzcverf jva) ortvaf jvgu Tvyrf yrnivat gur Jngpuref gb or jvgu Rguna. Yngre, ng gur zbzrag va pnaba jura Tvyrf qrfgeblf n zntvpny negvsnpg naq chgf gur jbeyq onpx vagb cynpr, gvzr hajvaqf onpx gb gung zbzrag; Tvyrf erwrpgf Rguna, fgnlf jvgu gur Jngpuref, naq fnirf gur jbeyq ng gur pbfg bs uvf bja unccvarff. Ur'f abg njner bs gur pnhfngvba naq fb abg njner ur'f znxvat n pubvpr, ohg V gubhtug vg jnf qnza jryy fnq rabhtu. Vs Wba naq Znegva unir gb qb fbzrguvat fvzvyne, va shyy njnerarff bs gur pbafrdhraprf, V fjrne gb tbq V jvyy fraq Wbaal naq Nyrk gur ovyy sbe zl gurencl.
A few lighter things to end on: Martin's obvious admiration for Jon killing not!Sasha was both sweet and kind of scary. The great revelation of Jon not liking poetry is funny, and for me explains how he could possibly have described Martin's poetic style as imitative of Keats (i.e. Keats is the only poet whose name he can remember, and it's all basically the same, right?).
And Jon liking merry-go-rounds is fucking adorable.