My headcanon about Michael Shelley and Gerard Keay’s gender is that Michael is very well-read on gender studies. He’s very well educated on the topic and if you asked him about his pronouns he’d go into a long conversation about his gender identify and what it means to him in specific.

Then if you ask Gerard his gender identity it would just be this conversation:

Jon: “And your pronouns are?”

Gerard: “Wherever the wind takes you.”

Jon:

Jon: “Would you like to elaborate?”

Gerard: “That’s all I’ve got.”

Which Role The Magnus Archive Characters Would Have In A Murder Mystery

Gertrude - Gertrude is the detective who’s taken it on herself to investigate the case. She won’t stop until it’s solved.

Gerard - Gerard is the detective’s assistant who’s helping Gertrude investigate the crime. He is mostly there to be witty but he will point out something that rolled under a bed/couch/chair at some point and a say “What’s that?” while Gertrude goes to pick it up.

Elias - Elias is the culprit of this case. He really just can’t help himself.

Peter - Peter is the one who Elias tries to frame for the crime. After Elias lost one too many bets to him, he decided the only way to get him back was to frame him for murder. It almost worked too. If it weren’t for those meddling Institute workers.

Michael Shelley - Michael is the victim. He is doomed by the narrative even in a Tumblr post. He was killed because he walked in on Elias trying to steal a Leitner tome from Gertrude’s purse.

Georgie - Georgie is the party host. She didn’t want to be involved with a murder. She just wanted to have her friends over and eat a cheese board, which is far too much to ask for when you’re in the middle of the murder mystery genre.

Jon - Jon is the red-herring that everyone is initially suspicious of. The last time anyone saw him before the murder he was going to look for Michael to ask him for help clarifying something about a statement. Which made him the prime suspect for a period of time.

Sasha - Sasha is the vital eye-witness. She see’s Jon on the porch at the time of the time crime (he decided to smoke a cigarette before talking to Michael) and therefore she’s able to clear his name.

Basira and Daisy - Basira and Daisy are the cops that show up near the end with extremely relevant information about the past that is somehow very relevant to the present case. In this AU let’s say they’ve confronted Elias before on suspicion of stealing a Leitner, but nothing ever came of it.

Melanie King - Melanie is the one who saves the day. She tapes Elias giving a heated confession to Gertrude and that end’s up being the prime evidence of the case. Or she just like…jumps him. IDK go with your preferred interpretation.

Martin - Martin is a house party version of the butler. He just wanted to bring everyone tea and snacks and he ends up wrapped up in a murder mystery. This time the butler didn’t do it.

Tim - Tim personality guest. He is just there to be entertaining and fill in a chair, but then he gets super into it and ends up having a pretty good moment where he confronts the killer.

I think the most mundane thing that will tell you so much about a person is who they play in Mario Kart. So here’s me applying that thought to the Magnus Archive characters:

Gerard Keay plays as Dry Bones.

Jonathan Sims plays as Daisy.

Basira Hussain plays as Metal Mario.

Peter Lucas plays as Ice Mario.

Elias Bouchard plays as King Boo.

Daisy Tonner plays as Baby Peach. (Small Elaboration: Much how she enjoys the irony of her nickname, she also enjoys the irony of absolutely wiping the floor with her coworkers while playing as a baby.)

Tim Stoker plays as Funky Kong.

Michael Shelley plays as Lakitu.

Sasha James plays as Lugi.

Martin Blackwood plays as Toad.

Melanie King plays as Roy.

Gertrude Robinson plays as Cat Toad.

Georgie Barker plays as Yoshi.

I love that a huge chunk of the Magnus Archives fandom saw a ship between a goth guy and a door that never interacted in canon and went “What the hell, sure.”

My favorite character interpretation for both Jonathan Sims and pre distortion Michael Shelley is that they’re a little odd in general even without all the fear entity stuff.

Jon stares just a little too long when makes conversation. Michael moves in a sudden jerky way that would remind most people of a spider moving its legs. Jon always looks a little too…stiff. Like he’s a porcelain doll sat against the chair instead of a man. Michael never walks flat on feet, he noticeably puts his weight on either on his heels or his toes.

Jon’s eye, hair, and clothing colors always look a bit dull somehow. Like someone drew him and then turned the contrast down. Michael’s fingers and toes are noticeably long and quite a few people have told him that he has the longest fingers/toes they’ve ever seen.

I could pretend this headcanon is profound commentary on their humanity, but honestly I’m just very fond of viewing Jon and Michael as cryptid adjacent.

I went on a five hour road-trip today and in those five hours I listened to “Another Twist” about five times.