Favorite little self-indulgent AU of mine is transmasc Jon naming himself after Jonah. Like idk maybe a few months after Mr. Spider Jon’s grandmother found some book by an obscure occultist from the 1800s. And maybe Jon was a little fascinated by the theories and ideas and the way it was written. And maybe a few years later when he needs a new name it’s only natural that his mind drifts to the intelligent, curious man whose book he read at a very vulnerable, formative time, whose research institute he dreams of working at. And maybe he’s a little too ashamed to ACTUALLY name himself after Jonah Magnus the georgian occultist, or maybe something about “Jonathan” just speaks to him more. Idk. And Elias being Very Charmed about it of course.
I’m sure someone’s pointed out by now but it always gets me how much Jon genuinely looked up to Elias. Even when he revealed his hand in The Coming Storm, Jon still stops to ask… Elias, am I still human? Such a vulnerable question. To someone who just told him that he was a captive. And earlier in the series, how Jon’s demeanor changed whenever Elias walked in, becoming more professional, more nervous, eager to please. His words in episode 1, the first thing he did after introducing himself was say that Elias had given him this position. How Jon remembered his schedule and habits, how they had the same coffee preferences, how Jon went to him for advice and insight. He admired Elias.
Maybe through all his little tests in season 3, a little part of Jon was still trying to impress. The frustration built up, yes, but maybe there was a part of him that was pleased by the validation from his mentor. It must have been confusing to have those emotions in such conflict – the hatred and the craving.
It’s really interesting to consider how much Jon and Elias are foils, two sides of the same coin. Their drive, their obsession. They orbit each other. It’s perfectly evident how obsessed Elias is with Jon, but it’s fun to remember that it really goes both ways.
if we assume that giving a statement to Jonah Magnus causes nightmares too (which I do), then it means that after Jonathan Fanshawe sent his break-up letter, he suffered from nightmares caused by Jonah until he died. that’s so beautiful to me. and adds to Jonathan’s attempt of severing his connection to Jonah
idgaf i will never get tired of the dog motif. it will never be cliche it will never be trite it will never not hit hard. i see a dog coded character crawl back to their owner even after being kicked and the inside of my brain looks like this
i love writing porn and i wont feel bad about it. understanding the eroticism of a character is character analysis if u are enlightened.
i love you porn i love you smut i love you intricacies of human sexuality i love erotica i love you freak nasty walls of texts i love you analyzing the subconscious through the lens of sexuality i love you bdsm i love you weird fetishes . u move me
kind of a chad move for tma’s thesis on humanity vs monstrosity to be that there’s nothing more human than deciding to be a monster. kindness is plenty human, too, sure, but being driven to do something terrible out of fear and desperation is about as fundamentally human as it gets.
What if I told you that something like that happened in real life?
I don’t know how much you guys know about German poetry, but the names Goethe and Schiller might ring a bell.
Anyway, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Friedrich Schiller werebest friends for a really long time with Goethe having been the older one. Schiller got sick with pretty much everything at some point, however, and died, leaving Goethe devastated.
So what did Goethe do? Keep Schiller’s skull in his office. You know, like friends do… On a blue velvet cushion because why not (He even wrote a poem in 1826 called Bei Betrachtung von Schiller’s Schädel [While looking at Schiller’s skull] like any totally normal person would)
The funny part is that until this day no one knows where the original skull is because it got lost at some point.
But I can’t stop thinking about the implications of keeping someone’s bones near you. There’s absolutely no way you do this when you don’t love someone. Like, you’re literally keeping a very visual reminder of that person. Of their death especially. It almost seems desperate. Grief, loss, and love entwined for eternity. It’s a constant memento mori and that’s what makes it so tragic. With pictures you’re reminded of who a person was but with this there’s nothing but the need for acceptance that they’re gone for good. There’s no lying to yourself.
You loved and you lost and you have to live with that.
big fan of romance horror. big fan of terrible people still being loved. big fan of bending morality and turning the grotesque into something beautiful.
I’ve got to say, I think that one huge aspect of Jon and Elias’ relationship is that Elias sees himself in Jon. He sees a scared young man just barely learning about the Fears, but already inextricably intertwined with them. A man with an insatiable thirst for knowledge, a need to know, to understand. Someone who is deeply afraid. Someone who is hated or feared by his associates; surrounded by those he cares about who will die because of him. Someone who basks in the gaze of the Beholding, however unwillingly.
My favorite relationship dynamic in fiction is a worshipper and their God. Not a literal God, but their God. The only thing in the whole world that matters to them. I will live for you, I would die for you, I would kill for you. My only moral compass is You. You can do no wrong in my eyes and I will never stray from your side. I was born to meet you and to love you. You are the only being I pray to. Your life isn’t just my passion, it’s my religion. You don’t think you’re anything special but you don’t see what I see. You don’t see that you’re the only person who’s ever made me feel this way. You don’t understand how beautiful you are to me and I will devote my entire life to making you understand and accept it.
Thinking about it, the line “Oh don’t be so dramatic Jon, you know how hard it would be to replace you” is SO funny because “you know how hard it would be to replace you” IS JUST AS DRAMATIC A STATEMENT AS JON’S PREVIOUS ONE
Jon is like “if you won’t give me the key you might as well GET RID OF ME” and Elias is like “jon, please cool down, YOU ARE UNVALUABLE TO ME”
Give statement to magnus archives. Magnus archives archivist good place for statement. Statement safe in archivist. No problems ever for statements because archivist tape recorder good shape for statements. Inside magnus archives very safe for statement. Statement can be trusted with archivist. Nothing bad ever happen to statements in magnus archives because can trust archivist to give good recording to statement. Friend archivist
“jon turned into the monster that destroyed his childhood” close. jon turned into the book that destroyed his childhood. he functionally became a leitner. jon’s not just any devouring monster, he’s an archive of stories, he’s the frame device of the podcast (Because you do not administer and preserve the records of fear, Jon. You are a record of fear—MAG 160), he eats his victims the way those books did. every leitner has a story to tell, and often its victims end up trapped inside it, becoming a part of the tale—this is exactly what jon does as the archivist, when he reads/takes/compels (eats) a statement he is re-experiencing and storing within him the subject’s fear, each new victim is then incorporated into his mental collection of nightmares (You are a chronicle of terror). elias’s murder of leitner then has another layer of narrative meaning to it. it’s a marking of territory, of course, because jurgen is about to reveal important information to jon which will presumably ruin elias’s plans for him.
mag 80 - “librarian” / mag 160 - “the eye opens”
but it’s also about the transition from a world with artefacts as a source of isolated horror consuming and transforming individuals, which leitner and his books are symbolic of, to one where one being - the archive (jonah magnus’s archive), which has been marked by every fear and therefore holds within it the essence of every fear—devours and reshapes the entire world.
Forget about torturing your blorbos, putting them through the wringer. I’m putting my blorbo in perfectly ordinary, pleasant situations. Their tortured personality will cause them anguish anyway, making an absolutely mundane scene into the most dramatic, agony filled affair as though the world is ending and it’s all their fault
in small fandoms you need to be grateful to the person who only accidentally hit you twice with a frying pan while trying to make you breakfast. in big fandoms you can block people for wearing a shirt you don’t like
“I should have known that something was wrong. I did know that something was wrong, but it didn’t matter. I had no fight left within me, so when he told me that it was time for Mass, I simply nodded and followed.”
speaking of eating metaphors. statements are food. statements are knowledge. elias is a satanic seducer figure to jon. therefore. his offer of the position of head archivist to jon is analogous to that of satan offering the fruit of knowledge to eve—knowledge in the form of something that can be consumed, knowledge that leads to jon’s Fall. but elias is also god, he’s his maker. jon isn’t being driven out of paradise, he’s being welcomed into elias’s version of it in 160 - “don’t worry jon, you’ll get used to it here”!
asks/dms open, and I enjoy when people add something to my posts. don’t be afraid to talk to me if you have anything to say
about this blog:
I mostly post about Jonah Magnus (or people that have direct relations to him). that includes a lot of jonelias and regency era pairings: my favorite one at the moment is magshawe (Jonah Magnus/Jonathan Fanshawe), but I do post about other ships too
my posts/reblogs/my writing may include suggestive or explicit things. mute #nsft if you don’t want to see it
tagging system:
#mine – for my posts
#additions – for reblogs with commentary, both to my own posts and other people’s
#regency era tma – I try to tag all posts and reblogs that have something to do with tma characters of the regency era, but I often forget to do that. oops
#jonelias heritage post – je posts that had a lot of influence on me. this tag doesn’t actually work like those heritage posts blogs. I don’t use it that often because I forget to
#fics – for the obvious
I try to tag potentially triggering content as #cw [trigger], but, again, I can forget to do that. ask me to tag specific triggers if you need it
nothing special about my character/ship tags. ask me if something is unclear?
Jonah Magnus/Jonathan Fanshawe | Explicit (for a description of self-injury) | 2297 words
“Any proper gentleman is supposed to marry, is he not?”
Jonathan pauses, lost at Jonah’s seemingly serious question. He is so difficult to read, at times, even though Jonathan has known him for years. It is something he’s deeply ashamed of, but something that he has learned to mitigate. Somewhat.
“No proper gentleman is a friend of yours, Jonah. Besides, I cannot marry – you are aware of it. I’m afraid you’ll have to find someone else to help you bring revenge to Mordechai.”
Jonah tilts his head in confusion. “I am not aware of any such limitation, no. Your ring finger is intact – what else do you need to be able to marry?”
Jonah Magnus/Jonathan Fanshawe | Explicit (for a description of self-injury) | 2297 words
“Any proper gentleman is supposed to marry, is he not?”
Jonathan pauses, lost at Jonah’s seemingly serious question. He is so difficult to read, at times, even though Jonathan has known him for years. It is something he’s deeply ashamed of, but something that he has learned to mitigate. Somewhat.
“No proper gentleman is a friend of yours, Jonah. Besides, I cannot marry – you are aware of it. I’m afraid you’ll have to find someone else to help you bring revenge to Mordechai.”
Jonah tilts his head in confusion. “I am not aware of any such limitation, no. Your ring finger is intact – what else do you need to be able to marry?”
Jonah Magnus/Jonathan Fanshawe | Explicit (for a description of self-injury) | 2297 words
“Any proper gentleman is supposed to marry, is he not?”
Jonathan pauses, lost at Jonah’s seemingly serious question. He is so difficult to read, at times, even though Jonathan has known him for years. It is something he’s deeply ashamed of, but something that he has learned to mitigate. Somewhat.
“No proper gentleman is a friend of yours, Jonah. Besides, I cannot marry – you are aware of it. I’m afraid you’ll have to find someone else to help you bring revenge to Mordechai.”
Jonah tilts his head in confusion. “I am not aware of any such limitation, no. Your ring finger is intact – what else do you need to be able to marry?”
once again there’s a spider statement immediately followed by a leitner statement (mag 16 - “arachnophobia” -> mag 17 “the boneturner’s tale”). elias probably considers this enrichment. the archivist is getting a little too comfortable in his fake skepticism, time to remind him of his childhood trauma. he was scheduling those weekly reminders the way he did his budgeting.
thought some more about mag 16 - “arachnophobia”, it’sthe first proper web-only statement and spins a story which deliberately mirrors jon’s own life, even outside the fear of spiders and that fear originating from an unfortunate childhood memory—carlos vittery is described as a smoker and works as a data analyst at an online betting company, which. is probably a job that functions and exists on the exploitation of other people, similar to jon’s own position of head archivist at the magnus institute. he also keeps a cat. which feels like an inconsequential detail but in this case likely isn’t. the statement obviously stands out because it’s about something which jon too fears deeply—for once he’s not experiencing someone else’s fear, but being reminded of his own. which is why i feel the opening of “i hate spiders.” which then leads up to mr vittery’s inevitable end, can be read as an early example of jon’s voice being appropriated for the beginning of a narrative he’s in apparent control of and in agreement with (jon hates spiders), but the ending is all wrong. the ending is unacceptable. it can’t be him (which is all analogous to season five, right - the web taking jon’s voice, an act which begins with his voluntary choice to record statements and ends in a plan he wants no part of). the statementisn’t a simple reminder of a guest for mr spider, it doubles as a pointed scare. here is someone so very much like you and the spider eventually ate him. it will eat you too.
my problem with getting a grip on elias’s characterization is that I always forget the fact that he’s sillay. like sure he’s evil and sadistic and manipulative and britain’s next top victim blamer but also he says things like “yes, if you die, I’m afraid you probably won’t be able to claim your expenses.” he gets punched in the stomach while being arrested and doubles over in pain and wheezes “ah. I see :)”
I think he decided to make Those death sounds on purpose
I want to play little mind games with him. I want to see him whimper. NO. I MEANT I want to test his chivalric nature and see if he will meet his fate with bravery and honor…and whimpering.
