me talking about Jonah: well, what does evil really mean?
so you see, a lot of people view evil as an intrinsic trait that informs your decisions/choices. and while it may be true for some characters, it's not the case for Jonah. he comes to the rational conclusion that the only way to not be victimised is to victimize everyone else, that the only way to not be powerless is to be the one with all the power thus the ritual. while he does enjoy causing people to suffer (and obviously observe it) he only really does it when necessary (push Daisy into hunting Jon, stop Melanie's murder attempts, revenge for the burnt statements) and it's not the driving force behind his actions. he is a cruel man but it's not cruelty or evil that drives him but calculated choices aimed at self-preservation
and even with the ritual, Jonah mentions trying prevention first and how it didn't work. there was always a chance of someone else doing a ritual and getting it right and he couldn't risk it. victimize or be victimized etc etc
also back to my original point of how people view evil as an intrinsic trait. this is why so many tma fans can't stand it when you point out the similarities between Jon and Jonah. because well, Jon isn't evil! but does it matter when his choices too cause harm? does it help his victims that he feels guilty about it?
People will be like "what if there's this New Fear that was missed by Smirkes fourteen?" the whole point is that the fears can't be categorized. The whole point is Smirke's fourteen is a very flimsy way of categorizing something that can never be separated. The final ritual that started the end of the world worked because the fears were treated as one. Inventing a new microlabel for a *very specific* kind of fear is pointless, because you can just keep dividing and slicing it into smaller and smaller pieces until you won't even know what you're talking about. The fears bleed into each other!! Every time you divide the fears based on a single difference, there will be another similarity that joins them back together!!
I hate hate hate how the fandom oversimplification did not only affect the characters, but also the Fears themselves. The Eye is being a stalker and a nerd. The Lonely is being quiet and antisocial. The Slaughter is anger issues. The Desolation is arson. The Hunt is being feral. The Stranger is uncanny valley. The Web is spiders and lying. Etc etc.
The whole point is that these fears cannot be fully and separately defined. I understand that having objects and motifs you can tie to a Fear makes it more marketable and allows you to cover your clothes with eyes and spiders and stuff to show you are A Fan. But the whole point is everyone experiences fear differently and the entities are intertwined, and I loved that. It made the whole thing interesting.
This fandom is allergic to critical thinking and analysis. Fanfic tropes can be a substitute for everything apparently
It's no coincidence that a large chunk of the fanon oc-ified inaccurate jon designs make him dress like a teenage lesbian. I see the long flowy skirt puffy blouse multiple necklaces ratty old cardigan and messenger bag. YOU🫵 are morphing the character into a reflection of the self
I hate green beholdinggggg ughh make it something else!!!! In my own beautiful world the beholding is gold.... think of a world with a hazel eyed jon in it..... his eyes would shine so pretty in the sun......whatever
hey chat am i allowed to be a hater for a sec. I think my biggest issue with jmart as a ship (and the tma fandom as a whole tbh) is the insistence on love being the solution for everything. I always see takes like “it was love that was Jon’s last sliver of humanity!!” or “love pulled Martin out of the Lonely!!” or “the only good thing during the eyepocalpse was love!!” and it’s just like. do you guys hear yourselves. you sound like my alloromantic ass mom who’s about to tell me that I’ll find someone eventually
even the “y’know he doesn’t” line for jon was Only interpreted as him being asexual. like yay I love asexual rep as much as the next person but that line could mean anything. he doesn’t do romantic relationships or he doesn’t do relationships period. but any other interpretation besides asexual is shot down so that yall can get your jmart hurt/comfort fluff one shot moments!!1!!
I think what made people feel the need to create "new" fear categories that the Smirke's fourteen "missed" was the fact that they themselves narrowed the original categories down to just a few (mostly aesthetic) traits. "I came up with a New and Completely Separate fear that doesn't fit in Smirke's fourteen" open your mindddd Smirke's categorization is just a collection of colorful umbrella terms you can fit whatever you want under there
Additionally the categories aren't even able to exist in a manner that completely separates one fear from another. They not only can but NEED to be mixed
I'm basically directly quoting canon here but the Fears really do oppose each other in the same way colours oppose each other. Smirke was really out there saying "red and green are sworn enemies" with absolute certainty
random tma opinions+thoughts+headcannons (warning: spoilers)
don't come after me for that, i can have a discussion but don't attack me pls i'm scared of fandom discourse
Keep reading
i don't really like season 5, the vibe was so different from the earlier seasons and the mystery was gone and i don't ship jmart...
no offence to the people who like jmart (most of the fandom it seems to me), but it felt a bit random? maybe i just didn't notice the transition, but Jon went from not liking Martin to suddenly being in love and i was like?? what?? you suddenly care?? maybe if i relisten i'll like them as a pair, but for now i just. don't care about them really? again, no offence to the people who like them.
tma is actually very depressing and not because of the main characters dying. Gerry's whole life and death. Agnes Montague's whole life and death. Basira talking to the tape recorder for the last time, being alone, having to live in a post-apocalyptic world. Gertrude sacrificing Michael to stop a ritual that would fail anyway. Tim sacrificing himself to stop a ritual that would fail anyway. Saha's death. the list goes on. it's the individual tragedies of all those people who didn't ask for this. no matter what you do, you'll suffer.
people have different opinions on Gerry's orientation, but dare i say he himself doesn't really know/care? look at his life, do you think he had time for romance? for me he's kind of like that meme: "i'm probably nonbinary but i have a job so idrc about that right now". (i also lowkey hc him as aroace)
despite being a huge fan of Gerry, i like Gertrude Robinson. what she did to Michael and Gerry was awful but i can't really hate her for that. idk what to say more. i've seen an analysis that maybe Gertrude binding Gerry to the book was her trying to save her last tie to humanity and that she left him behind because she felt ashamed of what she did, and i agree.
after seeing some amazing fanart i like jongerry BUT i see them as strictly platonic. they could be best friends if it were possible.
Elias is very funny. horrible human being but he's too funny for me to really hate him.
i've seen some voices that Gerry is a metalhead insted of goth, but i think he could be both + i don't think he'd really care about labels, he just listens to what he likes, dresses as cool as it is possible with his way of living and hunts leitners.
lost in the crows trurly show how inherently good Gerry Keay was. sure, he complained that his vacation is ruined, but he saved Andrea's life. he could ignore her, and probably wanted to, but he was too good to not help her and it breaks my heart.
Honestly my biggest issue with fanon Gerry isn't even that I think he wouldn't be goth it's that I don't think he'd be the type to wear trad goth makeup. That man might be goth or a metalhead in spirit but he would notttt gaf about specific subculture aesthetics
(That and I think a trad goth full face with a white base would be a higher priority trait to mention in a statement than badly dyed hair)
Jonathan Archivist Sims's descent into avatarhood as a metaphor for being disabled is out. Jonathan Archivist Sims's whole life as a metaphor for being disabled is in
the thing about fanon lonelyeyes is that they care too much for my taste. both of them. neither Peter nor Jonah are really interested in love and they have greater loves. for Peter it's the Lonely and for Jonah it's the academia and the bureaucracy (he loves scheduling) and also himself. their relationship is so casual that most people wouldn't even call it a situationship. acquaintances with benefits
should i post my tma character tit headcannons or is the world not ready for that yet.. is that too weird...
martin: sombre tit.
Keep reading
these are notably solitary (Lonely) birds, and they're pretty easy to overlook. they can be territorial with a mate (he's jealous...), and are relatively bold due to their size. they have "elaborate courtship rituals", such as getting stuck in The Lonely because of your evil boss and needing your non-evil boss to get you out. they're classed as least concern (martin's lowkey doing the best out of all of them the whole time.)
tim: cinereous tit.
these are loud and vocal birds, and they're typically social and active and alert and sometimes aggressive. (s3 tim. tho he was kinda valid) they were previously defined as subspecies of great tits (tim being defined by danny and then subsequently danny's death)
sasha: willow tit.
they face pretty extreme population decline (like sasha...) due to habitat loss (like sasha having to run back to her original 'habitat' of artifact storage and going 'extinct' for it. they're one of the few to excavate their own tree holes for a nest. (remember this...) they're quiet, often overlooked birds
not!sasha: marsh tit.
these are kinda hard to tell apart from willow tits (were assumed to be the same species for ages) and are also more common, in the same way that the not!sasha gets more frequent lines in the podcast than sasha herself, and that while sasha herself is irreplaceable the entity has like duplicates or those like it - therefore being more common in the world.
they habitate pre-existing tree holes rather than creating smth of their own. (like those that were created by willow tits... 🤫 like exploiting everything sasha had set up and built for herself....🤫)
Let me turn this around actually no more "Jon's so mean to Martin in s1 when that's his future boyfriend haha he's such an idiot" let's start with "why is the living chronicle of terror dating his lame ass coworker"
This app can't go a day without shoving some bullshit in my face. Untagged ship that I hate. A painfully overused joke. Not even an original post just a reblog that wouldn't have even shown up in the fandom tag if I was deliberately searching for it. What even made you think I wanted to see that
I love that Jon is a huge bitch sometimes. I love that trauma didn't make him kind and patient and I love that he tried to be anyway. I love that Jon was slowly losing his connection to humanity and he still tried so hard to fight and to resist. his attempts mattered, even if he didn't really succeed, it mattered that he tried even if the people around him didn't see it that way
my hot take about Peter Lukas is that no, his situation is kind of different from Agnes'. for one he wasn't born with intention of starting a ritual for the entity his parents serve. and also he actually wasn't raised with the knowledge about the Lonely? sure, they kept everyone isolated even more so than regular rich old families but Peter also mentions having four siblings who didn't turn out like that. he mentions them trying to make friends and go against the rules. Peter just loves the Lonely. he only ever learns about it as an entity after causing a man to disappear/disappearing himself (Peter himself isn't sure which one is more right) and after that his other family that he only saw at funerals showed up to explain him things. and he describes himself as being happy then. important that this was a statement and Jon is powerful enough that he wouldn't have been able to lie to him
Thinking about how Jon's suffering is never seen as noble. His struggles stripped of any sort of greatness or dignity, instead regarded as proof of him being weak and inferior. Insinuating that he chose to be like this. Placing the blame on him.
Jonathan Sims did not die a saint or a martyr. He died a monster, and together with that monster died the memory of the man he once was. All that was lost in the panopticon's destruction and all that remained in peoples minds was just another monster. And he was aware of that </3
i will never ever forgive the magnus archives fandom for . well a lot of things actually. i do enjoy tma but trying to interact with anyone who liked it post s4/during s5 was and is still a nightmare and i genuinely believe it changed the audiodrama sphere for the worse. anyways. i will never forgive them for what they did about Jon and his asexuality because like for me when they first talked about it i nearly cried i was so fucking happy that like. finally. someone like me . someone who didnt want to have sex and that was fine and it wasnt an issue and he was happy and like. sound in that. as a sex-repluse asexual kid it was like. i dont know it was so cool that the protag of one of the most popular podcasts was in fact. asexual. and then for all these people to go ☝️some asexuals ! 😁do have sex actuall y. and its fine and heres my 20k jmartin smut fic was like. so awful and disheartening. BECAUSE ITS LIKE. YES. THATS TRUE. there are asexuals who have and enjoy sex but none of the people writing these or talking about it were actually examining his asexuality from that angle. no one was actually willing to discuss the nuances and fluidity and spectrum of asexuality it all just felt like an excuse to write smut . which like Whatever i guess it do what you want but do you understand how upsetting and frustrating that was for me and other people like me. there is a discussion to be had about, again, the nuances and how sexuality differs for everyone and thats a beautiful thing but again. no one was actually talking about this . is it not enough that they love eachother. you're pushing this idea that sex needs to be involved for a relationship to mean anything and thats simply not fucking true. i dont know.
and its the same way and same issue with like. malevolent in that everyone is so so so fucking obsessed with jarthur, where its been specifically said in podcast iirc that arthur is kind of implied to be aro and or ace in some way, and people are still trying to like. push this. its so frustrating because genuinely not to sound like a jackass here is it Not Enough that they are friends. is it not enough that they care about eachother and love eachother in a way that does not involve romance. can two people just care about eachother is that not enough. i dont know. its so so frustrating and im unfortunately not the most articulate but it makes me so . upset and tired trying to interact with the audiodrama sphere anymore. i dont know. whataver
Thinking about how Jon's suffering is never seen as noble. His struggles stripped of any sort of greatness or dignity, instead regarded as proof of him being weak and inferior. Insinuating that he chose to be like this. Placing the blame on him.
Jonathan Sims did not die a saint or a martyr. He died a monster, and together with that monster died the memory of the man he once was. All that was lost in the panopticon's destruction and all that remained in peoples minds was just another monster. And he was aware of that </3
JON WASN'T GRIEVED IN ANY WAY THAT MATTERS........
With the Martin being human and Jon being an avatar arc there are no positive conclusions drawn from it. There is no "love makes you a better person". It's just Martin berating Jon for who he has become but also saying that he cares about him (?)
It's not love that made Jon come back to his senses when he was getting too close to the powers. It was the occasional act of physical violence (slapping/shaking) and I doubt that those particular actions were prompted by love and adoration, rather than Martin's momentary fear and disgust of fear-influenced Jon. What I'm saying is that any other person could've done that, had they been travelling with Jon. Love didn't play a significant role. We witnessed that others despised Jon for being an avatar as well, and I think it's safe to assume that they too would do everything in their power to stop Jon from feeding or hurting innconents - but that's because they hated him and/or perceived avatarhood as violent and monstrous.
Martin's supposed affection for Jon only resurfaces when Jon tries to go across with his own plan in the last episode, and that one singularact prompted by Martin's love caused Jon to go with the Web's plan last minute. The only thing love did for Jon was to strip him of any agency regarding his own life whatsoever. He had to throw away the only decision he could've made for himself to appease Martin. His love lost him. His love made him go against everything he believed in.
Love doesn't fix you, it smashes you into pieces until there is nothing left for you to pick up. The Magnus Archives is not a tragic love story, it isn't a love story at all. Among many other themes, it is a story about one's loss of agency. But somehow the narrative completely overlooked that, and instead all that everyone picked up from it was "well they might've ended up somewhere else so maybe they're fine!". But that is not horror. There is no conclusion drawn it just ends vaguely and hopefully and not at all horror-esque despite it being a horror podcast.
the love was there. it didnt change anything and it wasnt even thematically relevant and honestly it kinda got annoying to the point where i wished for hatred and malice instead and it ruined the whole thing for me
Something that will always get me about MAG 92 is the fact that Jon gets dragged back to the archives visibly worse for wear. His clothes are ripped, he’s covered in dirt, his hair is tousled and knotted, he reeks of ozone, damp earth, and blood. He is clutching a horrifically burnt hand and his neck wound is still open and sluggishly dripping blood onto the collar of (Georgie’s) shirt. All of this, and only one single person bothers to ask if he’s ok, bothers to ask what happened. (“Goodness Jon, whatever happened to your hand? And your neck-”)
Then that very same person goes on to confess to two murders in front of you and all your co-workers. Not even Martin asks if Jon is ok. And then every single one of Jon’s assistants leave him bleeding, weak, and vulnerable in the hands of a literal murderer. Despite this, Jon can’t help but trust Elias, to need him, to ask him the most vulnerable questions because Elias is the only one to actively praise him. The only one to tell him he’s doing well, to make sure he’s ok, to care for him.
ok i will be honest and keep in mind i often do hold the haters spirit as pretentious as i am but i do not care for jonmartin myself as it presents in canon, which is to say i do not think it is compelling. i dont think they ever built up the structure *in the story itself* for their relationship, and instead relied too heavily on the preconceptions of the fan base at the time. like, by banking off the fact that people already shipped them, they failed to add substance themselves within the story to support the idea that these two characters would be romantically involved. because, ultimately, by the time the relationship is suddenly established — it’s just like. oh okay. well. you didn’t build up to this essentially at all and these characters, independently and within the pure context of the story, have no real chemistry. like ok we got martin crushing on jon. but it was never really reciprocated. and then suddenly, they’re boyfriends…! like ok. well i simply do not care. you didn’t make me care. you relied on the idea that i already cared. which is not a strong writing choice toooo be honest like as the writer it is your job to convince me to care by adding elements to your story that preclude and support a given development. which makes season 5 so so so so uninteresting imo. boyfriends with no chemistry trot through the fear-wasteland. and then the individual plots of the episodes aren’t even as interesting as the prior seasons. sigh.
this is also what bothers me with fan portrayals of jonmartin, have it be in fanfiction, fanart, or analysis…. like the way they are characterized and discussed by fans is often so radically divorced from their in-podcast interactions and characterization that it’s nearly incomprehensible as the same thing. they’re not all cutesy and loving. martin strikes jon in-show and is wholly intolerant of his avatarhood, a major aspect of his self, because he sees it as fully contradictory to jon’s humanity. YET he regularly uses jon as an attack dog, or at the least goads him towards the role — taking advantage of his status as an avatar. like, if you enjoy jonmartin, why ignore this? these are interesting scraps of development that the two have, and some of the only development the two have. low keyyyyyy. and these pieces were NOT even acknowledged to their full extent in-show, which is another reason i find the canon of them uninteresting. it was as if there was no confidence in the writing room for these elements to be explored, despite their existence and explicitness. they had no consequence, or were exempt from consequence.
i also don’t like how wishy-washy the team was when commenting on jon and martins relationship and jon’s sexuality in their talk episode. like girl we can telllll you weren’t committed to it even without you saying it’s ’up to interpretation’ or whatever. just a bit cowardly imo. either have a romance between the two, or don’t. you can also really tell here (in s5) that they didn’t like the characters they were playing. which sucks!
but ultimately, the canon of jonmartin is one thing (underdeveloped) and the fanon is another (detached, disappointing in its own right). and it sucks because it could have been good if handled appropriately and with better characterization and dynamics, and better…. writing? relevancy? jon and martin being boyfriends could be excluded from the plot and not only would there be no major overall impact, it would be better overall as far as cohesiveness of character and plot direction goes. sighs. like, even if they wanted to keep the romance element in their horror podcast, something which they originally didn’t even want to have iirc, they could have set up ANYONE ELSE. grabs you. why jon and martin? and don’t answer with fanon interpretation. realistically the more logical and thematically interesting choice would have been jon & jonah/elias but i digress. rips my eyes outttttt
anyway to dispel anyone who might just box this as overt no-nuance haterism, i think it should be said that i am so deeply critical of tma because i loveeeeeee it its my favorite podcast. i love to rip apart my shows. im like a dachshund with their favorite toy. i believe in all of the things i said though do not get it twisted. i am a hater. i loathe my show. but i love my show. ok? duality and nuance? ok. 🌈☮️🌻
Lowkey if Martin Blackwood canonically had some sort of disability I would forgive all of his season 5 assholery and "I guess I deserve it:))" behaviour. Living your childhood and ur teens as a kid whos visibly disabled is its own kind of hell. And on top of that having to take care of your mother who HATES you? I would get him 100%
are you the one who was talking about the lack of variety in character design (in tma)? I wanted to say that I genuinely always imagined Jon as a korean-english man. mostly because I'm half. it was the first thing I thought and stuck with me hard, and I really can't let it go. I don't even think the way I imagine him is very 'Jonathan Sims, The Archivist,' but it feels so right to me. I've written about his relationship with his grandmother and how it would stay the same + change if she was a korean woman hhmm. I don't know. it means a lot to me, very much a shame that I feel like I would get hit over the head in this fandom for sharing these headcanons like
I did make a bunch of posts complaining that the vast majority of Jon designs look the same so sure maybe it's me
I get you. I get it. + projecting ur own traits and experiences onto fictional characters is awesome and I am also guilty of doing it. I love finding arguments for why my own experience fits his character actually and is 100% implied in the text if you look at it from the right angle #DisabledJonSupremacy
But the way this fandom treats any interpretation that doesn't adhere to widely accepted fanon is just awful. Don't know if it's still like that (I don't really look at fanart anymore) but I remember a while ago whenever anyone made a character design that didn't match with the opinion of the majority they got booed. I mean if someone had a Jon design (let's go with him why not) that wasn't some variation of "scrawny brown twink with emerald green eyes" they would get flooded by comments like "ummm that's not MY Jon....😣" as though the fanon design isn't also just a bunch of headcanons (happened to me as well)(more often on tiktok than on here but still. I didn't make this up I swear)
Anyway. I get you. Your headcanon is awesome and this fandom sucks
hello tma fandom. before you is a tablet pen and screen, or depending on your medium of choice a keyboard, notepad, pencil, paints, etc, and before you is every episode of the podcast containing either sasha or not!sasha. You must draw, or write, your interpretation of these ladies without making not!sasha skimpier, more feminized, paler, more conventionally attractive, or otherwise [cis/white/het/allo/etc] compared to her [trans/woc/bi/aro/etc] counterpart. You must give both designs care outside of these traits and express their individual personalities and the brilliance of this podcast’s characters in a meaningful way. If you fail to do so, or if the thought of making a piece of “tim/not!sasha friendzoning angst” work crosses your mind even once during this exercise, the small bombs surgically implanted in your torso will explode, thus leaving you with the dreaded hourglass figure you use to express that a woman is evil. Let the games begin.
Ok so the Distortion is the Spiral but the Spiral is not the Distortion in the same way all squares are rectangles but not all rectangles are squares. Or am I wrong
I just opened tumblr for a five minute break from The Paper (tm), and the first thing I saw was the ginormous Jon-supportive rant in the tags of that Magnus Archives post and I wanna thank you for putting that on my timeline <3
haha you're very welcome!! what can I say I don't think I'm even halfway through s5 yet and already I want to get up on my soapbox to defend Jon
because like. what do you mean he genuinely says "thank you for not hitting me this time." like no we are not here acting like martin not being physically abusive this time when he's already being icky about the whole statement thing is him doing you a favour. even if we wanted to say that avatars have a high pain threshold etc (which we haven't even seen with Eye avatars, or at least with Jon, he just heals), it still doesn't make it right.
there are some allowances for the intense amounts of trauma everyone has been going through and particularly how associations between the Eye and Jonah would extend to Jon with the whole feeling of being trapped and used and things like that. but Jon is visibly trying to cling onto whatever remains of his humanity and that is being used against him?? because it's incredibly human to want revenge on the ones like Jude Perry that not only hurt you but also marked you in a way that made you become this, and then be torn about whether the smiting rule applies to all avatars. Oliver Banks didn't hurt Jon, and while he technically did mark him, he still brought Jon back. Simon Fairchild wasn't the one who Vast-marked Jon, that was Mike Crew. And all he really did to Martin was act on Peter's behalf to tell him about the Extinction. But Jon isn't allowed to show that humanity, and he isn't allowed to be a 'monster' (record the overspills of a boiling pot of an entire earth of fear) either. Yet again, just like so many instances in his life, (dare I say ever since being Web marked at eight), he doesn't have a choice. Perhaps the only choice he truly gets to make is right at the end.
Still baffles me that out of all the jonships available they chose the one with the least chemistry to become canon. We could've had something truly beautiful but instead we got your parents who hate each other yet don't want to get a divorce
So when jonelias shippers make art and fics depicting the two leading a domestic blissful life it means they're ignoring the true nature of the ship and they need to be reminded that it is not like that in canon but when jmart shippers do the same it's cool and wholesome and it's "giving you the fluff you needed after the ending". I really don't like either of those but what's with the double standard. If I made a post saying "guys making domestic aus of jonmartin is fine and all but you have to remember in canon they're inherently incompatible and are generally Not Good For Each Other" I would get crucified at the town square
Still baffles me that out of all the jonships available they chose the one with the least chemistry to become canon. We could've had something truly beautiful but instead we got your parents who hate each other yet don't want to get a divorce
I've been considering writing a longfic of tma as canon compliant as I could make it, but with jonelias. and maybe mike crew doesn't die because I'm still not over them sniping him as soon as we finally meet him. Nothing else changes. just more jonelias
Very cool of you to want to contribute to the fandom in an interesting and actually compelling way instead of writing yet another domestic au established relationship jmart smutfic
Also rip mike crew you were gone too soon (didn't even register him dying when I first listened💔)
unpopular opinion but i think a ship that's not canon but both halves are canonically insane about each other is infinitely better than a ship that's canon and boring
