September 2025

For some reason my brain is really on birds today so here’s the bird symbolism I would assign to some of the Magnus Archive characters.

Jonathan Sims could be symbolized by an owl. Owl’s tend to symbolize wisdom, hidden truths, higher knowledge, guidance, and transformation. They can also be symbols of death in some cultures, while in other cultures they’re symbols of protection. Pretty fitting for someone who both ended and saved the world. (Bonus fun fact: Owl’s also eat spiders.)

Elias Bouchard could be symbolized by a cuckoo bird. Cuckoo bird’s are notorious for their song, and they often represent the power of the voice. They symbolize new beginnings, transformation, mystery, and fate. Though they’re also often connected with betrayal because they don’t tend to build their own nests. They steal the nests from other birds instead.

Gertrude Robinson could be symbolized by a hawk. Hawk’s represent clear vision, intuition, swift action, determination, protection, wisdom, focus, strength, and nobility. Honestly I don’t have a lot to say about this one because it just fits her that well.

Peter Lucas could be symbolized by the raven. Raven’s tend to symbolize transformation, trickery, insight, knowledge, death, mystery, and magic. They can also represent betrayal in certain contexts. As well as loneliness in connection to the famous poem “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Poe.

Distortion Michael could be symbolized by a crow. Crows represent transformation, change, death, adaptability, and destiny. Interestingly, two crows can represent balance and partnership between opposing forces. Such as light and dark or evil and good or a nice human man and a monster that have been forced together.

Basira Hussain could be symbolized by a duck. Yes, really. Ducks symbolize adaptability, balance, community, emotional navigation, growth, intuition, and new beginnings. Ducks are also associated with teamwork because of how they fly in formation during migration.

Daisy Tonner could be symbolized by the Loggerhead Shrike. These birds are also called the “Butcher Bird” because they impale their prey due to their lack of talons. These birds are known for their hunting abilities and symbolize precision, focus, adaptability, intuition, karmic justice, punishment, and retribution.

Tim Stocker could be symbolized by a rooster. Rooster’s represent aggression and pride. However, they also represent protection, attachment, bravery, courage, vigilance, and honesty. As well as masculinity and attraction.

Melanie King could be symbolized by the Martial Eagle. These birds symbolize strength, power, freedom, bravery, and protection. They’re also often associated with warfare due to their hunting style, and they’re even named after the Roman God of war, Mars.

Georgie Barker could be symbolized by the chicken. Chicken’s represent prosperity, courage, vigilance, new beginnings, loyalty, simplicity, and protection. Chickens are also usually associated with nurturing, which I think fits Georgie since she takes Jon in without question and is also the only character to have a pet.

Sasha James could be symbolized by a blue jay. Blue jays represent, resourcefulness, intelligence, confidence, loyalty, and boldness. They often represent good luck, but they also represent trickery. Which doesn’t fit Sasha herself, but it does fit “her” role in season 2……..

Martin Blackwood could be symbolized by a penguin. Penguin’s represent perseverance, endurance, loyalty, unity, patience, maintaining balance, emotional strength, and transformation.

Gerard Keay could be symbolized by a Shikra. Shikra’s are falcons that are known to symbolize perception, intelligence, bravery, hunting, tenacity, facing adversity, and adaptability due to their ability to thrive in many environments. Which is fitting symbolism for a guy who was so well traveled.

Anabelle Cane could be symbolized by a Fork-tailed Drongo. These birds are known for mimicking the warning sounds of prey animals so that said prey animals will flee and drop their food, leaving it for the taking. These birds represent intelligence, cunning, manipulation, adaptation, and vigilance.

It’s crazy how many headcanon’s I have about this alone:

First off, some of the the crew were way more fine not hanging out much outside of work than others.

Jon never had any real desire to see anyone outside of work. He really wanted to appear professional, and to him that meant not inviting his collages into his personal life. Tim was the same. He liked everyone well enough but he’s a “keep work and life separate” type of guy. Well, for the most part. He did wish he spent more time with Sasha outside of work, but other than that he liked boundaries.

Sasha would have been open to hanging out outside of work, but she never really made plans or anything like that on account of always being busy with something. Martin DID try to make plans since he wanted the workplace to be a friendly space (*cough* And he wanted he to get to know Jon better *cough*) but he always got turned down even though he must have asked at least fifty times. Sasha was always busy, Tim was too though he also didn’t really want to give a weekend /afternoon to work, and Jon just straight up declined out of “I don’t want too.”

As for the curry nights around Christmas: Jon never actually participated much in them. He’d bring a curry then go back to his office and get testy with anyone who dared to speak to him while he was doing some extra work. Tim thought it was hilarious to wear one of those mistletoe hats, though he obviously didn’t expect anyone to kiss him, and the best he ever got from that was a very brief cheek kiss from Sasha.

Martin was fantastic at making curry and he honestly held curry night on his back. He was so good at it that Tim and Sasha would totally have had him cater if they ever had a curry night outside of work. Sasha would usually be in charge of the decorations because she could be a bit of a mirco manager about stuff like that, so she’d spend a lot of the party playfully pointing out the work she put in and making sure it was appreciated.

She would also bring games and one time she brought a dart board that turned into a pretty high stakes competition that even Jon got in on for a bit. Turn’s out Sasha and Martin are amazing at darts. Tim’s fine at them, and Jon is just straight up bad. Sasha ended up winning but it was close between her and Martin.

That’s it for the headcanon’s! Something about reading about the curry night’s set a bomb off in my brain and I couldn’t stop thinking about the concept until I wrote 200 headcanon’s.

Jon and Tim’s dynamic is great because it’s kind of like the miscommunication trope, but eviler.

I went through my pin collection and obviously I had to drag TMA into it so here’s the pins in my pin collection that I think certain Magnus Archives characters would like. Part 1 because of mobile app limitations:

Jon -

Martin -

More Undercut

Tim -

Sasha -

Georgie -

Basira -

Peter -

Gertrude -

Gerard -

Michael Shelley -

Tim saying “Honestly, I hope that John learned something from her” (“her” in reference to Gertrude) is crushing in the context I think he means that in.

Tim wouldn’t be happy if Jon took notes from Gertrude’s playbook. We see that in The Unknowing when Tim gets upset that Jon and the rest of the crew want to focus on blowing up the building instead of trying to save the dancers who have already been skinned, which is exactly what Gertrude would have done if she were in the situation.

So Tim doesn’t actually want a Gertrude version of Jon. He doesn’t actually want him to put stopping the fears over having humanity for the people around him.

Except in one case. He does want Jon to be strong as Gertrude when it comes to sacrificing one person.

And that’s himself.

He wants Jon to have the strength to use him to pull the trigger because he’s done, and needs Jon to have a strong resolve in order to see that through. That’s what his speech really boils down to. Tim is saying that he wants Jon to be cold enough to sacrifice him. Not the dancers who were innocent people caught in a nightmare, and not the humanity that went with them.