bitter jonmartin makes me a little bit insane actually. despite everything, all the anger and fear and betrayal, still together, not by fate but by choice
The craziest things in TMA that gets looked over a lot is Jon saying that it’s crazy he’s not a vegetarian yet considering all the meat statements, but that he’ll take the small pleasures in life (like eating a hamburge) where he can, even if it delights a meat God.
Not only is crazy for Jon to say “c’est la vie” to serving The Flesh, but the implication that everyone who has ever eaten meat in The Magnus Archive universe, and our universe considering the end of the series, has canonically served The Flesh, is also insane.
As someone who had a chicken sandwich for lunch, I don’t know how I feel about that.
Jon and martins loneliness is so interesting because Martin’s the one touched by the lonely and confirmed to relish in it, even though plenty of people like him and he’s actually relatively personable of a guy if not pathetic. But Jon is so utterly alone in the world (dead parents he doesn’t remember, a grandmother he claims never liked him much, no close friends, no anyone) and he’s so naturally prickly that it seems he’s almost keeping it that way on purpose. Not to revel in it like Martin does, but because it’s right. Because it’s always been that way and he deserves it.
To Jon it’s ‘I am alone because I deserve to be and I will make anyone who doesn’t see that see me for the fuck up I am even though it hurts. I am awful, but I am not a liar’ and that’s so interesting
Sasha hides her true self and puts up fronts, knowing everything about you without giving much back turning focus off herself and back to you with ease in a very Spiral Way.
Tim puts on different faces and personalities to fit what others want from him/he wants from others, never showing his true self in a very Strager Way.
Martin puts on a happy front and plays to everyone’s desires and tries to just blend in with the backdrop, never being known so he can never be disliked in a very Lonely Way.
Jon keeps his cards close to his chest, telling blatant untruths and giving different answers when asked personal questions, keeping himself to himself because he can’t be Known in a very Watcher Way.
I hate Basira. I HATE HER. I been not liking her attitude for a couple of episodes in season 4 but MAG 146 was the last string. I loved her character so much at beginning, why is she turning into such a big hypocrite.
She’s able to excuse police brutality and even murderers, but she constantly judges Jon—who, at worst, gave people nightmares just to survive. It’s incredibly disappointing to watch her twist the moral high ground like that.
And honestly, why is everyone so hostile toward Jon? Why is everything suddenly his fault? Melanie joined the Institute when Jon wasn’t even there. Basira was the one who approached him. He didn’t drag any of them into this—they made their own choices. It’s so unfair how they act like he’s to blame for everything, when all he’s ever done is try to survive and protect people, even at the cost of himself.
Why does Jon have to put up with their crap and just quietly accept all their jabs? He literally just woke up from a coma—after being trapped in a looping nightmare. He went through hell, and instead of giving him space or support, they treat him like everything is his fault. It’s exhausting watching him carry the weight of everyone else’s trauma while they act like he’s some kind of monster for surviving.
And then they had the audacity to say he was better off dead. After everything he’s been through—after all the pain, the sacrifice, the literal torment—that’s what he gets? Not concern. Not understanding. Just cruelty. Jon didn’t ask for any of this, and yet he’s the one who keeps fighting, who keeps trying to do the right thing. And somehow, they still treat him like he’s the villain.
Being human isn’t about weakness. It’s about compassion. About surviving what should have broken you—and choosing to keep going anyway. That’s real strength.
i thought martin’s reasoning for being the one to kill elias sounded weird and didn’t really make sense, so i went back and read the transcript of mag 193 and i can confirm it’s dumb because
1)
Text ID:
ARCHIVIST
I could kill his body, sever the link, break The Eye’s power, and Jonah Magnus would die.
MARTIN
Okay, that sounds good but…?
ARCHIVIST
But, that wouldn’t actually harm The Eye itself. And with him gone it would… it would choose a suitable replacement.
“With him gone” / “If we kill Jonah Magnus” : there is no indication that it’s jon killing jonah that will make him take his place, in fact it seems pretty clear that it’s more about jonah being dead and leaving a void that needs to be filled
2)
Text ID:
ARCHIVIST
His body is vulnerable. At least to me.
“At least to me” : the probabilities are high that jon is literally the only one who can kill jonah? i honestly don’t think martin could do it and as they need to be perfectly coordinated they really can’t afford to take that risk
And finally
4)
Text ID:
MARTIN
You’re not listening. I mean, if he kills Jonah, then knowing our luck he’s just going to end up taking his place in the Panopticon, isn’t he?
GEORGIE
[Sighs] Good point.
MARTIN
He can come up with me, but when it actually comes to Jonah…
BASIRA
You’ll have to be the one to do it.
MARTIN
Yeah.
ARCHIVIST
Martin… I don’t –
BASIRA
Have you got this? We can trade if you don’t think you can do it.
jon immediately raises an objection, but i guess we will never know what it was because everyone just ~looves~ ignoring his imput on decisions that directly affect him :))))
sometimes i think about the tma fandom and get genuinely furious like y'all really let the predominant interpretation of these characters be “jon (a character overwhelmingly portrayed as a moc) is a feral dirty man who’s constantly messing up and needs to be straightened out by his female coworkers (who we’ve flattened out into two dimensional caricatures who are the Reasonable Onestm with no flaws of their own and also hi did we mention one of them is a literal cop who was complicit in excusing her partner’s police brutality? no? we’re just ignoring that cuz she’s canonically a woc so we have to flatten her into the one with the braincell? okay) and his boyfriend (who is overwhelmingly portrayed as white and who can do no wrong in the fandom’s eyes despite showing classic signs of emotional abuse in the final season AND whose trauma constantly gets treated as More Valid than jon’s, especially regarding their upbringings)”
and tbh canon did very little to dispel these interpretations either especially with that weird framing of the main moral dilemma in the final few episodes and that makes me furious too lmao
thinking about jonathan sims and how he’s called the anti-christ, but really the imagery and allusions that are attributed to Jon make him Christ and the true anti-christ is jonah/elias :-)
I was like “hehe if Jon was in Date Everything, he’d be a tape recorder. … wait a second” I then proceeded to draw and render Jonathan Sims in the game’s art style for ten hours.
tessa winters this joshua gellespie that…. what about karolina górka. my absolute favorite statement giver of all time. homegirl got trapped on a weird ghost train version of the london underground, almost suffocated, made it out, and nonchalantly shared it and was like “cool can i go now”. my indifferent icon.
jon was literally ?????? for the entire post statement convo because someone out-autism’d him by not giving a flying fuck about any of it.
“yea i probably fell asleep lol. yes i still take the train i live in london silly. great don’t bother sharing follow up idc bye”
jon being silly-goofy for so much of season 5 (“methinks the spider doth protest too much,” playing I spy, etc) but it’s because the eye is in full power and pumping him with so much dopamine that he actually has the energy to goof around. he’s full of energy and endorphins but it’s all because he’s powered by everyone else’s suffering. makes you think.
Oh my god it’s been years why is this fandom repeating itself why are you still reheating jokes and things that have been told a million times already. Yes I get it Dev Patel is fancast Jon and Harvey Guillen is fancast Martin. Haha omg guysss this podcast has scary doors haha we are shipping a door and a book it’s hilariousss the people outside this fandom think we’re degenerates. The NotThem is racist bc I headcanon Sasha as black and the NotThem as white. Jurgen Leitner stupid idiot motherfucking Jurgen Leitner amirite. Jon has negative rizz my sopping wet kitten old man he’s such a paranoid dumbass why is he so mean to my sweetie Martin. My beloved Martin deserves a gun he deserves to kill everyone who’s ever been mean to him. For the love of god can you think of something different. It’s not even about repeating things that are in the podcast you guys are endlessly parroting fanmade content too. If you have nothing to say then just don’t say anything it’s okay
See, my issue personally with people going “asexual people can still have sex” about Jonathan Archivist Sims is that… sure. Asexual people can have sex. However, John is quite explicitly written in a way that practically states that he, as an individual, does Not engage in sex
This is the one instance when we hear about Johns asexuality outside of the qnas, and its explicitly stated that John doesn’t have sex. At all.
I understand the wish to see yourself represented in media, particularly as an asexual person myself. And this is not intended as a callout for anyone in particular. However, it does create great frustations within me because it reads as just reinforcing this standard that centers sex in relationships in a wider societal context. A denial of individuals who simply wish to wholeheartedly not engage with it overall
Im not going to try and stop anyone from headcanoning what they want, drawing what they want or writing what they want. However, I do implore you to consider the canon information, the scarcity of ace rep, and how this errasure of his identity may be upsetting. I also invite you to explore asexuality in the cases of other tma characters who are left to much interpretation, like Tim, Martin, Georgie, Melsnie, Basira, Daisy, Sasha- hell, make them all ace in all flavours of ace, have your fun. I just implore you allow John to remain sexless, as he deserves
So many people bend over backwards, making the wildest leaps and stretches of logic to justify why they can interpret what singular canon piece of information we have of Jon being ace as not being true, that it HAS to be malicious and I kinda wish he hadn’t been ‘confirmed’ as ace to begin with. And at this point I’m having a hard time not viewing it being canon as less about it being just a trait they gave him and more about it being something to also dehumanize him about.
I am actively trying to not crash out rn cause they once again implied in podcast that Jon could have not become the Archivist prior to, like, season 3, and it’s so hard. I am fighting so many battles rn.
Also let’s talk about how they flat out said that Melanie was ‘protected’ during the Eyepocalypse because of her employment at the Institute.
It’s giving ‘I mean they did also kill jesus she did quit working at the institute. that was a pretty significant thing that happened. like i understand where you’re coming from here but they very much did kill jesus she very much did quit working at the institute.’
Far be it from me to criticize how illogical the whole Eyepocalypse situation was vis a vis Georgie and Melanie (which is a lot. a lot a lot) but. C’mon now.
Fanfic writers Jonathan Sims wouldn’t say “I’m a biromantic asexual which means I don’t have sex but I like everyone”
Jonathan Sims would hold Georgie’s hand in uni and ask a stiff and quiet “is this okay?” in a soft voice Jonathan Sims would pull Martin into a fierce hug and silently pray he wouldn’t disappear Jonathan Sims would go blank faced and stare if asked why he hadn’t fucked since high school and he would give a hasty “I don’t–do–that.”
Jon the type of guy to lie about his eye color if he could get away with it. Type of guy to think you’re being too personal if you ask his height. Type of guy to like that he’s going gray early because it means people can confuse his hair as being salt and pepper instead of naturally brown. Type of guy to not tell his girlfriend his grandmother died until a month later. And she still doesn’t know he’s an orphan.
Oh? People actually think Jonathan Sims started out cruel and uncaring and mean and it was only through violence and loss that he grew to care? Are we talking about the same guy? The one who has been suffering from immense survivor’s guilt since he was 8 years old? It’s because of all that empathy that he acts like he does. He’s all tangled up in fear and a desperate need to be taken seriously, and he leans into the skeptic so so hard in a misguided attempt to protect himself, but I think he does it to protect others as well. He feels like he’s being watched all the time, especially when he reads the statements, and if he admits they’re real out loud, it could put these people in even more danger. And he’s not entirely wrong, denial is one of the main ways people escape the entities. If you’re too deep in denial to be afraid, the Fears lose interest. But yes, he lashes out, he can be cruel, but it’s all in a misguided attempt to protect himself and others. He isn’t cruel by nature, just look at his relationship with Georgie, they wouldn’t have been friends if he had. Maybe he could be worse if the circumstances were different, but I don’t believe he can ever truly lose that empathy. It’s the entire reason the Web chose him. Why would it have bothered to choose someone who didn’t want to try to save the world? He doesn’t know how to handle anything, but he tries, he tries so hard, and that’s the point.
I hate the Web’s “actually you ARE the chosen one!!” bullshit so so much like not only is it Nonsense but I keep seeing posts of people like?? Trying to reverse-engineer a way to make it true??
Like projecting all sorts of bad qualities onto EIGHT-YEAR-OLD JON for why he could be assessed as “the person most likely to end the world” when Jonah could have used pretty much anyone for his fear punchcard as long as he kept them ignorant enough. There didn’t need to be anything special about Jonah’s victim–it was just “someone he chose”
And yet I have seen *multiple* posts saying it’s because EIGHT-YEAR-OLD JON “clearly didn’t care about anyone but himself” and “doesn’t care about other people” when:
- He was able to sense his grandmother’s resentment for raising him and feel guilt for burdening her
- He was regularly physically and verbally abused and stolen from by a GROWN MAN and still ended up feeling survivor’s guilt over his death? and felt that he should have done something to help?? and said “some people deserve to be remembered”????
- He grew up to care about people to a self-destructive degree, no matter how much he pretended otherwise
- He’s EIGHT YEARS OLD?! Give me a break!! Like even if eight-year-old Jon was selfish or mostly cared about himself–which we didn’t really get any evidence of–that’s kind of?? How kids are???
Like why are people so eager to justify the words of an evil spider god that they’re not only flat-out inventing up bad traits for its victim, but signing up for the “you can predict what a person will grow up to do from what they’re like as a child” school of thought.
After thinking about it a bit I think that for me this was actually the most horrifying episode in the entire series. Despite the lack of blood and gore this is the one that disturbed me the most. The tragic horror of Jon’s complete victimization, dehumanization, and loss of agency is so profoundly and upsettingly felt here.
The way Martin decided in his domain to ask Jon to kill him so he wouldn’t have to keep existing like this, even though that would leave Jon alone forever, but then in this episode he won’t even entertain the idea of allowing Jon the freedom to make a similar choice. The way Jon is basically begging to die and they are all denying him that choice while talking over his head about what fate they will choose for him, even though he has said he prefers death to some of the options being discussed, all the while speaking dismissively like he is a child who can’t make his own choices and needs others to control his life for his own good.
Jon already feels responsible for having destroyed one world. He can’t bear the thought of potentially being the instrument of destruction for countless more. But it’s not up to him. His fate isn’t his own. It hasn’t been for a long time.
And this is where we leave him. Because even if he doesn’t physically die in the end, the person he is now almost certainly will; if he does survive it will be in some unrecognizable and diminished form.
Jon has been systematically dehumanized throughout his life and he’s spending some of his last time alive and as himself literally begging for death while the people closest to him discuss plans to use him as a tool to bring harm to other worlds, not even feigning interest in what he wants, and silencing his introjections into their conversation. And Jon has been so beaten down that he just accepts it.
The understated quiet of Jon’s broken acceptance of his place in the world as a tool to be used, whose strings are always going to be pulled by the hands of others, makes it all the more chilling.
Everyone: We have to consider that one option is to just leave things as they are and watch as everyone suffers horrifically for thousands of years before dying.
Jon: If we go with that I could at least speed things up and give everyone a quick death so they don’t suffer as much.
Everyone: WTF is wrong with you??! How dare you suggest that?! What a monstrously cruel thing to suggest modifying our idea to let the whole world die an agonizingly slow death so that the whole world instead dies a quicker and more painless death. This is why we don’t let you have input in our discussions or make decisions.
Thinking about Blaseball and TMA cause they’re intertwined due to them being how I survived 2020-21 and listening to Deicide and got to ‘Jaylen Hotdogfingers Settles The Score’ and these lyrics are so goddamn Jon in MAG 200 coded its no wonder I wrote this.
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Like. Are you picking up what I’m putting down??? Breathe if yes.
also actually like litterally why is fanon martin a fucking uwu mashmallow baby when we never see him be nice to anyone really 😭 'martins so kind and loving' when??? to who??? by making tea??? babe thats the basic british hosting instinct hes still a rude cunt
literally oh my godddd like yeah ok he makes tea for people ?? ok? i make tea for my mum too doesn’t mean i like her it’s just the polite thing to do 😨
like literally you’re so right we get TOLD martin’s a sweetheart cutiepie or whatever but like ?? Is he ever actually nice? … like at all?
I do think it’s interesting how the archives gang went from being victims of the system during most of the show to becoming the system and victimizing billions of others in the end by passing on the fears
OH ALSO when everyone was like “we survived the fears for hundreds of years before” i really kind of expected jon to be like “no we fucking didn’t you as an individual just got lucky. you didn’t have to listen to the tapes of hundreds who’ve lost lives and sanity and family like I did” but he. Didn’t really bring it up? Despite the fact those archival tapes are a good 3/4 of tma’s content so you’d think it’d have meant a bit more considering how the whole “all we hear is what’s recorded on the tapes” meta is stressed to the audience :/
If you seriously unironically think Martin is a monsterfucker then you must’ve listened to the podcast with your ears plugged or something. His disdain for the inhumane couldn’t have been expressed any clearer than it already is
Let’s say, hypothetically, that Martin really did love Jon. How interesting that would be then, to have a man look at his beloved, notice all the traits he passionately despises and considers them morally wrong, and keep loving him anyway. Seeing past the morally dubious parts of him and straight into the person Jon truly is, under all the traits that were forced onto him against his own will. This could’ve been really beautiful and heartwarming if they actually had any meaningful conversations in canon aside from either arguing or bantering. Whatever my point is you don’t have to add random traits to Martin to make their relationship unique or enticing. You don’t have to ignore canon you don’t have to fit jmart into the “monster x monsterfucker” box I’m begging you stop doing that and use what’s already there please
Kinda obsessed with the way that Jon (<- guy who literally probably couldn’t have done anything differently bc his whole life was orchestrated by an eldritch horror manifestation of the actual fear of being manipulated) blames himself for everything that ever happened actually and Martin (<- guy who was the reason behind so many big decisions, honestly was the one making the choices that really mattered pretty often, who almost became an avatar of the aforementioned fear of being manipulated and i struggle to recall a moment when he himself would seem like he was in fact being manipulated by it to a similar degree as Jon, therefore leaving me to believe that the Web just. Let him do his thing. And trusted that he would have enough of an influence on the world for its plan to work) genuinely believes that he’s not important. like. at all. They’re so neat I think.
Jon after doubting Tim and Martin to the point it causes a rift in their relationship: “Wow. It sure is hurtful that someone I thought was an ally was actually suspecting me.”
No but I think this moment is a really interesting one for both Jon’s character.
For Jon this moment is one where he has all the suspicion he’s been eager to give to other people thrown back at his face, and instead of having any take away’s from it, he rationalizes Basira’s motivations instead of truly acknowledging the hurt he feels. He justifies what she did by saying that he hasn’t been stable in the last few months. Then even uses word “bit” to lesson the impact on his emotional state, but it’s clear that it got to him.
I think Jon’s reaction to Basira’s deception shows that he’s rationalized suspicion so much he can’t even break free from that mindset when he’s confronted head on with how hurtful it can be. He’s just that far gone down a rabbit hole of distrust, and it’s very sad watching him rationalize a thing that’s hurt him because he’s hurting others and rationalizing it in the same way.
Season 2 Jon will always be one of the most frustrating yet tragic characters to me. He’s just so well-written.
People constantly forget that Oliver killed the captain of the ship and actually ensured that the people on the ship would die as well as him. Like. He’s not actually as passive in his being a part of the End as y’all act.
I think y’all mistake politeness and geniality with being ‘sane’ and ‘good.’ Which is an issue.
if there was ever a tv adaptation of the magnus archives i think sasha should be played by the same person as notsasha the whole time.
there are perhaps a few polaroids shown briefly in the background with someone you don’t recognize during s1, but they disappear in s2.
in the end, the viewer doesn’t remember the ‘real’ sasha either, because she was never acting in the show. all you have is memories of notsasha.
the first time we actually see the actor in the pictures from s1 is in the flashbacks at the beginning of s5; sasha and tim talking, jon’s birthday, sweet memories that just- don’t seem quite right, even though you know this is the true version.
They’re both just ideas with some random bits of prose written right now that I would create actual plots for beyond ‘Jon and his plus one end up in these universes as the elsewhere’, much like how I did with my Supernatural one. Which I still kinda wish I’d done more with.
The People’s Church Of The Divine host, as an exploration of the sacrilegious relationship of the dark to Christianity in the magnus archives.
fuck it, another essay about the dark. I’ve talked about Manuela Dominguez, and how she’s implied to be queer. but now we’re going to go into the relationship of the dark to Christianity in the peoples church of the divine host…..
The Dark as an entity relies on an absence of light and the fear of the unknown. Historically, Christianity as a religious group kept from the knowledge of the masses, the Bible only being written in Latin so only the clergy could access it and a historical obstruction of the presence of science by the church. The devout often viewed science as unnatural or “against god” preventing scientific development and human understanding out of fear. The dark specifically is mostly shown in the series through the lens of The People’s Church Of The Divine Host, a cult, that often uses allusions in traditions to create a mockery of specifically Christian customs, however it does share similar if not the same rebuke for scientific practices as well as the hatred of which they do not understand. These two forces; the light of god and darkness are highly interconnected with each-other, in opposition of science/knowledge and have a deep complex relationship.
Manuela Dominguez, the “scientist” that birthed the dark star, grew up with an interest in science, and ultra religious parents who disliked that interest. They believed in the light of god and holy salvation yet they were hateful, spiteful people. When Manuela returned to her parents as they were dying, the fear in their eyes of their own god was obvious. Manuela grew to study physics becoming interested in dark matter, when she met Maxwell Rayner. He then taught her about the people’s church. In the statement about her “unconventional religious beliefs” mag 135 - dark matter , she says “If the words of my parents hold any truth, then God is the true monster, and “let there be light” the most evil words ever spoken.” This sentence is likely sacrilegious to Christians, being both a mockery of god and an opposition of him. She often uses words related to Christian contexts doing so in both mag 135, and mag 143. Words such as “gospel” “holy” and “sermon” are being used by her in a recontextualization of Christianity that opposes it’s original themes of light and goodness specifically in the context of god himself. This recontextualization of Christianity, while following opposing beliefs which mock and change the messages of religious rituals, inexplicably interlinks the dark with Christianity and god.
The ritual of The Dark is a butchery of Christian customs as well as the scientific process, warping and twisting (pun intended) the nature of them. The scientific aspect comes with Manuela creating a botched physics experiment, to create an “an aping mockery of science” or the dark star, a ball of dark matter that was to consume the sun. Manuela states “Scientifically, it was nonsense, of course…… What mattered was that it felt like science, and that was all I needed.” The mockery of said science and the use of a lack of information to create a concept that fully and utterly ignores the knowledge and laws of the known universe, altering the natural state of the world. in extreme Christian sects, altering god’s creation is commonly seen as unholy or a sin. This star, the center of their ritual, already opposes the belief that god’s creation is perfect and the rest of the ritual continues this theme.
In this ritual preparation of abandoned and shut up churches occurs first. Then for seven days, the church feasts. They slay the still and lightless beast, a thing of darkness. They drink it’s blood, which is a mockery of the catholic custom of drinking wine as the blood of Christ. They then submerged sacrifices in brackish water, blessed by the beast. Which is a twisting of the tradition of the cleansing and blessing properties of water as well as the tradition of baptism. Again the ritual twists Christianity using brackish, unclean water and drowning victims instead of lightly using clean blessed water to bless a child. They sung as the ritual went on, as is common in churches and other religious customs, and exalted until the eclipse started. Then as the world of darkness starts to form, Manuela says “The scream was mine, and it was joined by uncounted voices in fearful song.” Another allude to church choirs, however fueled in an amount of fear rather than love. Manuela also describes the attitude of those present involuntarily “the hysterical whimpering and fruitless prayers of the sacrifices” which indicates that the victims are praying, presumably to god, that they’ll be saved from the dark. This further opposes Christianity as their sacrifices are praying to god, and are being destroyed to bring about his opposite. Despite the negative relationship of Christianity and The People’s Church Of The Divine Host, there is a certain thing they share. A cruelty, a hatred, to that which they see as unnatural; either the force of god or the force of light.
First I must disclaim the fact that I do not dislike people who are Christian, your religious beliefs are so so valid <3. However, some Christians are capable of immense cruelty and hatred to those they cannot understand, such as many minority groups (queer people, people of colour, the poor, the disabled, other religious groups, transgender people). The fear of not understanding is human nature, and yet those who claim to follow a religion centered around light and kindness are cruel to those they cannot comprehend. The People’s Church Of The Divine Host mimics this in it’s repeated actions of cruelty to nyctophobes, and those who do believe in the Christian god, repetitively torturing them and wishing for their suffering. As Manuela visits her parents as they are dying, a pair of extreme Christians who also demonstrated a cruelty to others, she wishes that “they might die with the fear of darkness on their lips.” As much she despised her parents she became just as cruel as they are, hating the people they do not understand. She does not care that her parents are dying, she only wants her parents to suffer as they feared her god, much as she likely had in her own childhood.
She continues to exercise a cruelty to those who fear the dark, and is completely apathetic to the “unlucky” nyctophobe who was used as her battery to create the dark star. She drowns sacrifices in the name of her god. She has become the person who destroys and hates that which she cannot understand, just like her parents had. They worshipped opposite powers, and yet still fell to the same fear.
Other church members such as Natalie Ennis had been participants in Christianity, before leaving to join The People’s Church. In Natalie and Manuela’s cases, the uncertainty of life after death and their parents who are presumably Christian dying partially drove them to The People’s Church. Maxwell Rayner was a scientist in an age with an absence of knowledge, as well as a heavy Christian presence in England, which in some cases rebuked science. His path was likely similar to Manuela’s in the scientific aspect.
The relationship of the People’s Church and Christianity and it’s traditions are extremely complex, however their connections can be found throughout many of it’s statements, particularly in mag 135 - dark matter, statement of Manuela Dominguez about her unconventional religious beliefs, mag 143 - heart of darkness, statement regarding the fall of the church of the divine host, mag 9- a fathers love, statement of Julia Montauk regarding the murders of Robert Montauk, and mag 140 - Statement of John Flamsteed regarding the entity known as Maxwell Rayner. If you’re interested after this, I very much recommend Manuela’s statements, which in particular have high amounts of religious allegory.
long ass post. hope if anyones read all of this that they enjoyed it!!!!! i have problems and perhaps religious trauma….. uh….. if you wanna chat about this literally dm me or reblog i wanna hear yalls opinons!!
in a story where fear and love are so closely entwined, I don’t think Georgie should have gotten away so untouched by her ‘can’t feel fear’ gimmick. her relationship with Melanie should have been much more contentious, not for lack of compassion but simply because Georgie is missing something fundamental to the experience of being alive; her lack of fear should have been a loss felt more consistently.
my preferred interpretation is that she hasn’t lost her fear, necessarily, but that she is living past the usable part of her life. basically, a more literal sense of foreshortened future. she’s already faced death, she knows it intimately, and now she remains detached from life.
she too is trapped in her own domain. she is witness to others’ experiences and suffering, but unaffected in the same way. she’s able to help, but only to a limited degree. and unlike pre-apocalypse, where she played arbitor of who was deserving of help as a way to wash her hands of the responsibility to get involved (as opposed to choosing her battles, which is what she said that she was doing), Georgie now has absolutely no escape from the consequences of her actions (or inactions.) all while still lacking the power to meaningfully change anything.
So, I have spoken a bit about this before, but I’ve decided to do a full scale tangent about this.
I want to talk about Jon’s asexuality, how much it means to me as a sex repulsed asexual person myself, and why I’m sick of people writing Jon smut.
This is my personal opinion, and I just want people to please consider what I have to say. You do not have to agree with me, and please know this is not an attack on anyone or anything like that, I just want to talk about this and why I am frustrated.
So, I believe people can write what they want, however as a writer you have to remember if you publish your work, even if it is fanfic, you can still cause harm.
I think we can all agree that if you took a canonically gay character and put them in a straight relationship, that would be homophobic. Why doesn’t the same thing go for putting Jon, a canonically ace character, in smut? Now, I am not fully against putting Jon in sexual situations, I think there are things you can explore there, but when he is put in erotic situations it makes me so uncomfortable. I do not see how this is not acephobic.
Asexuality it a real identity. My lack of sexual attraction is real and is not a defect that will be fixed. I have not, and never intend, to have sex.
I have seen people deny Jon’s asexuality because we got the information from Melanie, and that argument does not make any sense. Please tell me when at any point in the story it would make sense for Jon himself to say he is asexual? Where? Jonny found a way to write it into the story, and it may be breif and second hand, but it cements it in the story itself, and he later confirmed it in a q&a. From a writing perspective, this was the simplest and a relatively smooth way for it to be put in the story where it was clear and didn’t take up much space. It was short and didn’t need to be brought up again, but the fact it was brought up at all in the first place is wonderful.
For anyone saying Melanie wasn’t reliable because she hates Jon or whatever. Why would she lie? What would spreading the rumour Jon is ace do for her? Also, Georgie and Melanie are very close with each other even before they start dating, so it is reasonable for Georgie to have mentioned it. “Maybe she was mistaken” THEN WHY WOULD IT NOT BE BROUGHT UP AGAIN THEN?
PLEASE. Please take a moment to think about this from a writing perspective. Jonny wanted to confirm Jon as asexual in the text itself, so had to figure out a way to do so that did not disrupt the flow of the story and felt natural. It would have been difficult to do that with Jon confirming he’s ace himself, as there’s not really a point where it would be brought up, but in a scene where Melanie and Basira are gossiping, yeah that makes sense. It does lead to the fact Melanie technically outs Jon, which isn’t the best, but also at least an effort was made and Jon being sex repulsed is confirmed in that scene in the story itself which is very rare in fiction. If Melanie for whatever reason had been wrong, there would have been a future scene correcting her. There’s not really a point where Jon would bring up his asexuality himself, and while I personally would be interested in how he experiences asexuality, that also has nothing to do with the plot of the story at all and considering how much TMA had going on (and the fact it is a horror podcast), I would never have expected it to go in depth.
Is it a perfect way to have the fact Jon is ace confirmed in the text? No, but it serves it’s purpose and the fact a character is confirmed to be sex repulsed in the story itself and not just randomly confirmed in a tweet is great.
I think the reason I have such an issue with this is that y’all can write smut with every other TMA character. Literally no other character is confirmed to be ace. I think it is a little different when sex positive aces project themselves onto Jon and do stuff with that, but even then, I think there are so many other characters you could explore that with. I personally headcannon Martin on the ace spectrum for example. There’s just so much you can do without erasing a character’s identity which is rarely represented anyway. I do really want to write a fic with Jon and Martin discussing Jon’s asexuality since it means the world to me that Jon being ace is canon, not just a headcannon I have, and how I can project my own experiences of being ace onto him.
Again, I bring up how if a gay character was written in a fic to end up in a heterosexual relationship, it would be called out for being homophobic and I think the fact so many people don’t see an issue with Jon being put in smut fics despite being canonically a sex repulsed asexual shows how ignored asexuality is. I just think it sucks since TMA is so diverse and headcanons of those characters are too, but the one canon sexuality Jon has, which happens to be the fact he’s asexual, is purposefully ignored over and over again.
I can’t say I’ve ever read any of these smut fics because it will make me feel sick and deeply uncomfortable, but from tags and descriptions of a lot of them I know someone just thought it would be fun to make Jon have sex and honestly it’s quite upsetting because as usual asexuality is treated like it isn’t real. I am aware Jon is a fictional character, but that’s also why I’m frustrated because there is every other character in TMA. None of the other characters in the show are canonically a sex repulsed asexual so why do you have to write smut with him specifically? Seriously, why? Because all you’re doing is showing yet another example of the fact asexuality is not treated like an actual valid identity and so you choose to ignore it.
You wouldn’t make a gay character straight, so why make an asexual character allosexual?
I hope all of that made sense. Sorry if its rambly or confusing at points. There’s probably more I could say, and maybe I will in the future, but I think this will do for now.
ok not to be a hater or anything but there’s this one episode of the magnus archives that drives me up the wall because the premise is based on just… a complete misunderstanding of how mosquitos work
mosquitos, like most winged insects that consume mammalian blood, don’t primarily eat blood
(examples of insects that do primarily subsist on blood are bed bugs, fleas, ticks or lice. insects that consume blood but not as their primary source of nutrition: horse flies, black flies, mosquitoes etc)
mosquitos are pollinators. they eat nectar. only female mosquitos drink blood and they only do so when they are laying eggs
they don’t even prefer human blood—any mammalian blood will do. they use the proteins in mammalian blood to develop their eggs
so no lab has ever tried to develop a blood substitute to alter mosquito feeding habits as a means of disease prevention because (a) that’s insane and (b) it wouldn’t work
if you put a whole swarm of mosquitos in a cage and offered them only blood (or a blood substitute) to drink they would die. that’s all that would happen. a day later your entire population of mosquitos would be dead
mosquitos don’t eat blood any more than humans eat prenatal vitamins
oh, also, john says at the end of the episode “any solution to the issue of malaria that doesn’t concentrate on wiping them out is not one i have much time for”
which like… isn’t a bone i have to pick with the episode. obviously Jonathan Simms, head archivist at the Magnus Archives is entitled to his stupid and misinformed idea
but like. getting rid of mosquitoes entirely would collapse whole ecosystems (and it annoys the fuck out of me when people talk about exterminating them for this reason)
anyways if i was going to propose a scientific study to find a solution to viruses and parasites carried by mosquitoes i would try to find a way to genetically modify mosquitoes in a lab so that they were resistant to being pathogenic carriers and then release them into targeted local areas where the rate of transmission was highest so they would interbreed with wild populations and transmit the “no malaria, west nile, etc” genes to future mosquitoes
alternatively you could try to develop a substrate that would be the most attractive place for mosquitoes to lay their eggs and then cull a population with a high rate of disease carrying at that stage before the eggs hatch
(this would be a reasonable project for a lab like the one in this particular statement to be conducting—especially because supplying a “hemoglobish” that would help mosquitoes develop their eggs would make sense in this context)
I’ve already said on here multiple times how Martin’s season 5 development was all over the place. But now that I think about it, Jon was also underdeveloped.
Some time ago I’ve said that it felt like Martin was needed in s5 so that Jon, as an all-seeing being, could explain things that he knew to him and the audience. But besides the fact that he’s all-seeing and barfing up horrors and it feels even more awful than reading the statements, there isn’t much said about how it impacts him as a person. We don’t know exactly what is it that he sees, all we get is brief glimpses of horror that he describes aloud when overloaded with information.
The audience stays in the dark in regards to Jon and his thought process. He doesn’t talk to the tapes about anything other than the horror surrounding them which is only needed so that the audience knows where the episode is meant to play out. and it doesn’t really have any importance to the plot other than to set a scene. Plus since Martin actively shuts him up whenever he tries to say something about the Fears themselves, we can’t even know any of the more basic info that Jon is said to be aware of. The audience is just suddenly locked out of Jon’s pov and instead we got the Jon-Martin relationship treating them as a singular entity, with Jon only filling the role of the “inhuman” partner.
It’s like. Up to this point, the audience got to consistently witness Jon’s development. When we met him, he was putting up the skeptic act. Then we saw his fear-induced paranoia. Then he was staying over at an ex-girlfriends house and frantically searching for clues. Then was the whole operation to stop the Unknowing. After that there was Jon’s coma, and the audience got to see him be slowly consumed by his patron and be abandoned and hated by nearly all his coworkers. We got first row seats to whatever he was going through at the moment.
But for the majority of season 5 all that we are presented with is the JonMartin apocalyptic hike, Jon slaying some of the avatars they come across, and Martin complaining about how scary it all is and how the avatars are evil. Maybe I’m wrong, but the only few moments the audience got to actually see Jon’s point of view and the self-hatred that being the one who started the apocalypse have forced upon him was when he got repeatedly ignored during the discussion regarding his life and the fate of the universe.
Idk maybe I’m wrong. Maybe that’s just because I dislike the way season 5 was written. But I feel like in most of the episodes JonMartin were reduced to just being a couple.
ALT
