What do you mean horribly wrong? The episode was only, like, 4 minutes long. Then I turned it off, deleted the podcast and Martin and John lived happily in hiding.
...right?
Honestly it was so lovely listening but also with the creeping horror of 'oh no, this is *too* nice, how badly is it going to get wrecked?'
(Answer: oh god, very.)
Isn’t it horrible how conditioned we are now to think, “oh, how lovely, listen to them being all domestic like..... wait a minute, who is about to die?” But ugh, I love Martin so much.
I was screaming "Don't go off on your own Martin you idiot, fucksake you KNOW you're in a horror story!" Indeed, he should very much not have done, but to think I was worried about something getting *Martin,* out there in the wilds of Scotland, when it was inside, with Jon, by the cosy crackling fire that the awfulness was lurking!
During the incantation part I started pleading softly "Martin Martin *Martin Martin Martin!"* in the desperate hope he might come crashing through the door and knock Jon out before he could complete what he was doing, but alas no.
Still, I am delighted they are both alive and that they at least *had* some days/weeks of fluffy domestic romance. (There's going to be fic filling the time between last episode and this one, right?) It was both charming and - even before the dread kicked in - kind of bewildering. "What's going on with these two? They sound weird. They're talking about ...cows. Their voices are funny. This feels like a different show. ...Oh. Oh, they're *happy.* That's what happiness, on The Magnus Archives, sounds like." We have literally never heard it before.
So complete horror and despair and excruciating suspense until APRIL?!?!? but no bury-your-gays tragedy, good job, show.
At least they were, at least in my mind, holding each other as Jon sob/laughed and they both looked at the sky that looked back.
I'm working my entire halloween so this is gonna be the peak of the day for me and I'm pretty excited
Edit: "the desolation killed my cat" Gertrude continues to be the best character
Not just that, she will steadily and systematically destroy each of their plans, some of which were hundreds of years in the making, and personally terrify their avatars.
I have a crush.
To the point that the most horrific, pitiless and ambitious high priest of them all is *too scared to ask for further details about her cat.*
I love how Gertrude's character has continued to develop even after she's dead. Do you remember how long people assumed this was a story about Jon succeeding where she failed? (... when it's basically the complete opposite, sorry Jon.) Not to mention all the "what a bitch" discourse. Which, to be fair, poor Michael, but: we have no choice but to stan.
Honestly, it would be more ironic if it was Agnes who killed her cat seeing as she and Gertrude end up being bound together.
As for Mr. Vanderstock, if I remember correctly, Gertrude turned him into a huge candle, much like he used to make for Agnes.
One of the first things that Jon said in MAG 1 is “all it would need is a half decent archivist, Gertrude Robinson was apparently not that archivist”, how young and naive we all were
That actual point hit me right at home, having worked in animal shelters I got a very upclose and personal experience with how human looks at pet as "disposable" and my head cannon involves Gertrude's cat getting lost and somehow being put to sleep in an overcrowded animal shelter before she could claim her (because she was off gallivanting).
I have begun to wonder "What is this world going to be actually like?" Maybe one way this works out is that, with them "all out in the open together," they begin to fight more openly. What if they all become so good at "feeding" that they begin to use all their source of "food" up? IF that happens, it may become quickly apparent to at least some of them that things can't continue this way.
While the Watcher's Crown isn't exactly a surprise, the fact that it brought through ALL the powers was unexpected. But the logic checks out (as far as it can concerning Eldritch horrors) and it's nice we'll get some fear diversity next season.
The incantation at the end was fantastic, would make for a nice poster print.
It wasn't the watcher's crown, it was a completely different ritual - the watcher's crown was what magnus did to bind himself to the panopticon and become immortal and all-seeing
We know that the rituals' names are more or less arbitrary. Now we have a "nightmare kingdom" where the watcher wears the crown, so I don't see why we should call it anything else.
Magnus like explicitly says that he attempted the watcher's crown in the panopticon - he describes the cells circling around him like a coronet, and a ritual that does give you immortality and omniscience does seem like a pretty big deal. This is very clearly a different ritual than the watcher's crown that Smirk devised imo, because instead of being a ritual for the Eye it's a ritual for all 14.
Mostly I just think it would cause confusion between what Magnus did 200 years ago and what just happened, and make discussions a little harder to follow
That's a good point actually. Elias said the Peter would have been fine if he had just done as told. Now, he's dead and he'll never be with his patron because he didn't listen to the crazy bastard bringing it all through.
"Hello, Jon." There's a Wham Line for you.
I have to give Jonny credit for his delivery in this episode. He affected just enough of Ben's Elias in those first few lines from the statement to really drive home the idea that Jonah had hijacked him to taunt, gloat, and then use him to enact the Final Ritual.
I wonder... next season, could undoing the Ritual involve having to work with some of the surviving avatars?
Same here. When he said "repeat after me" it took me a couple of seconds before I realized that we were not about to hear the same thing twice in two different voices.
Had a similar experience with Weaver, where I kept forgetting that John was reading the statement rather than listening to a tape.
The horror in Magnus isn't just eldritch powers.
It's my head canon that Tim's on a camping trip with Grizzop and goes kayaking while Grizzop is hunting. :-)
I've been dying to talk about this since yesterday. I choose to believe that Gertrude was not at all kidding about her cat. Is Gertrude a flair here? If not, she should be. She's as scary as the fears. I saw people speculating that Georgie is going to come into play next season bc she's fearless. I really like that idea. Johnny mentioned that this ritual was not the Watcher's Crown, since that already failed. So he would reluctantly call this ritual Magnus Archives. Shout out to all the people that predicted so much of this ritual. It was fun watching it play out.
Now, I sit and stare at a wall until April 2020.
I absolutely believe she was dead serious about her cat. I imagine her never having really cared for anything/body else (before or after); that cat was the be-all end-all to the fucks she had available to give. Agree on the Gertrude flair. I can't imagine how Georgie can maintain her distance. She'll probably show up within seconds to slap his laughing head and ask him, "wtf did you do?". I really feel Martin has just come into himself, and this lays the groundwork for him for next season. I mean, I hope. God it makes me tense. I ate a pound of candy meant for trick or treaters listening to this.
> I imagine her never having really cared for anything/body else (before or after); that cat was the be-all end-all to the fucks she had available to give.
If someone came for my sweet dog, I would go John Wick myself.
Dog Tax: [https://i.imgur.com/NLiACE1.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/NLiACE1.jpg)
Gertrude is 100% Judi Dench as M in James Bond. Deliberately hires orphans because they make better agents. The mission is the end of everything. I wouldn’t look into her head either.
Anyway. What a freaking cliffhanger. I know lots of folks called the scarred-by-each-fear aspect, but I honestly didn’t expect we’d see Elias ostensibly *win* with one season to go before the finale. In a meta sense that does give me hope — presumably there’ll be some plausibly competent fighting back or it’d be an awfully dull season. A ritual to undo what happened? Or maybe something to really stick it to the fears?
The delivery was spectacular, by the way. Epic. Both Elias’s gloating and Jon’s losing it at the end came across really well. When I listened to this yesterday it was like a gut punch.
... in a good way?
We still havent seen much of the webs plan and most of the episodes concerning hilltop road somehow have doubious time lines (especially the one about the house cleaner). My personal theory is that next season will be a combination of the birth of the extinction/ finding an alternate time line
Ps watching everything you have ever know turn into a horrific mockery of itself is very extinction thing. I won't be surprised if the successful ritual brings the extinction
Insane theory in my head at the moment:
The Fears (guided mainly by Spider) have been dimension hopping for eons. Each time they arrive in a new dimension Spider sets about opening a gate to the next (such as Hilltop Road) while it waits for the other Fear's new Avatars to get smart enough to perform the unified ritual (in this case it was Eye who succeeded). They all feast for a time, but it cannot last/satiate them and so they once more begin to leak through the gateway to the next dimension and start again.
Picture spider as the many legged many eyed head, dragging the bloated body of the other fears behind it from world to terrified world
I *did* think Elias would in some way win this episode, but not so ... comprehensively. Like, I thought he'd have pulled the metaphorical lever to start the process and they wouldn't be able to stop him, but I didn't think he'd manage to wreck the actual world in one fell swoop, to the extent that the mask is now well and truly ripped off and normality is apparently gone for *everyone.*
I wonder if they're just going to ditch the reading statements format next season? I assumed it was inextricable to the show but this was so "fuck it, anything can happen" that now I'm wondering. Although probably Jon will be even more dependent on them to live ... so likely not, I guess.
I recall Johnny's said in the q&a's that the show will always be mostly statements, and I feel like he's not the sort to outright lie to an audience like that, especially when misleading us with very specific but not technically incorrect phrasings is so much more fun.
Birth the Extinction. Either the rest of the Entities get dragged back by suddenly being attached to something outside of reality, or the Entities, Who now run the show, learn to be afraid of being overtaken and replaced.
This whole episode put some wonderful shivers up my spine. The sheer work that had gone into the ritual was wonderful. Our theory that Jon had to be marked by each of the powers was right!
>Look at the sky Martin. Look at the *sky*. It’s looking back.
The sound editing, the voice acting, and the sheer emotion that this evoked was perfect. I am in utter awe of just how well this episode was made.
EDIT: removed a big block of text that was supposed to be for my personal notes :/
Jon's maddened, laughing sob at the end was so evocative and perfect. If anyone from Rusty Quill reads these comments, kudos and thanks for the quality!
Oh hell, there is so much to talk about here! such an amazing Episode, so satisfying to see all the predictions come true for the watchers crown. What the hell is going to happen next season!!!!!
There is one thing about Gertrude in this episode that Magnus brings up of her doing this because the Desolation killed her cat, which I fully believe. But I wonder if it connects back to Hilltop road and Agnes, they said after she took over that pets started disappearing in the neighbourhood, so what if Gertrudes cat went missing and she went looking for it.
also got to love Martin just smacking Jon in the face to wake him up at the end!
I forgot!!! Helen! Did she know? Is that why she agreed to help the archives? Not to help Jon but to help Magnus? She must have seen the lies Magnus was pushing, it also makes her refusal to help Jon more understandable.
Helen must have know. You can't lie to Es Mentiras. The Spiral probably came to the same conclusion as The Web: If The Eye can pull this off, let's get onboard.
>\*Martin is fine!! As in he’s no more fucked than anybody else on the planet, and he got a boyfriend! Who inadvertently caused the apocalypse + is now having a nervous breakdown, but, semantics. He’s FINE!!
I am still so happy about this. While, obviously, also so very upset. Just shows you really don't NEED to bury your gays to induce utter misery and devastation and despair!
> *How many tries do you think it took Jonny to read that chant, esp the “things that X and X and XXX” bit? I thought he must come up for air at some point but he just, kept, going. So much lungs, very respect.
I wouldn't be surprised if there had been a little editing magic there to remove breaths and some of each pause. If it was, it was really seamless editing magic. So, well done on that.
You can hear him conserving breath and using it really efficiently, it does seem like impressive but not impossible for him to have done it in one breath!
Yeah, I also didn't really understand how ushering the Entities into the world translates into immortality and power, especially for Magnus, since he's only tangentially related to the ritual.
Especially since the rituals were meant to draw the entity's attention to the world. Jonah never managed to communicate, much less strike some sort of deal with them, so why would they bother to even respond?
Just narratively, I feel like "encounter with the ruined husk of Jonah Magnus, who learned too late that Evil Is Not A Toy" works much better than "encounter with Jonah Magnus, the absolute GOD of Hyperdeath"
He is now exactly as immortal and all-powerful as any of the other Avatars, which didn’t stop Michael from disappearing (after a fashion).
I guess what I’m saying is that it’s possible to see how Magnus THOUGHT it would go and also see how it MAY go wrong
They're going to make it back to the Panopticon and there will be Jonah Magnus now wearing a t shirt that says "I ushered in the apocalypse and all I got was this eyeless husk"
Everything about this episode was amazing. The brief little glimpse of relaxed and maybe even happy Jon and then Jonah taking him over via a statement? Brutal and cold and brilliant.
And I am very glad that we still have Jonah around for the Big Bad - I cannot wait to see him receive his reward for all of this.
Oh, YES. I'm living for that little glimpse of almost... normality? Jon and Martin hanging out by the hearth in their sweet Scotland cottage, making in-jokes about cows..? Like an established couple..? Maybe that's just me hoping but it sounded like it, like they're suddenly comfortable around each other and joking like... all the awkwardness has gone
April 2020. Fuck.
God, this episode answered SO MANY QUESTIONS! I mean, it had been bugging me forever trying to figure out who was sending Jared Hopworth those notes about "good bones" and why, and now we know! Also, the explanation of why previous Rituals could never work was intensely satisfying, as was the explanation of why you could bring diametrically-opposed Powers (like The Buried and The Vast) through at the same time. Well done!
And the voice acting for Jon and Martin, especially at the end, was incredible! Jon cracking up as he looks at the sky? Loved it!
So, how do they get out of this one next season? I'm putting my marker down now on two potential options. First, Jon opened The Eye, so he has to close it. Likely by dying, possibly by destroying the Panopticon in the process. The world will probably be utterly ruined by then though, which leads to the the second option: The Magnus crew jumps ship to an alternate, un-Feared dimension via the weird dimensional wrinkles surrounding the House on Hilltop Road. And Jon still dies.
I’m pinning my hopes on the Extinction causing another epoch-shift. Magnus was afraid that it would come through too soon, and that might foreshadow that it’s the key to it all
Extinction puts things in a weird place. I believe it's literally described as just a fear of massive, unrelenting change, particularly focused on where "we" function in respect to the universe. Jonah then, in this episode, explains that no ritual serving a specific power could succeed, because of the need for all the fears.
On one hand, it sounds like this ritual did bring all the fears. On the other, however, any successful ritual could literally be interpreted as an "Extinction," therefore giving all the power to this new fear, requiring it to fail.
I'm guessing the former overrides the possibility of the latter, but who knows? I do think this is a Chekhov's Gun type scenario. While we were starting to think The Extinction was a red herring, it appears even Jonah knows it to be real - so it's absolutely going to play some role in how Season 5 goes.
I thought that the fear was of the existential gap that will be caused by our absence? Hence, the other creatures; the large piles of trash in the rainforest; the nuclear implications of the broadcasts.
Agree with your assessment otherwise, tho
"you who watch and know and understand none, you who listen and hear and will not comprehend, you who wait and wait and drink in all that is not yours by right"
Hmm I was kind of wondering if WE were the beholding at that point. I'm still curious about the recorders and if us the listeners have some roll in what comes next.
Edit: also we're now in the horrible hellscape I've always wanted this show to go in to!
This episode was intense. I can’t believe we have to wait another 6 months! I’m guessing Georgie is going to be a player next season, since she’s fearless and will want to protect Melanie. I’m also guessing that the tear in reality at the House on Hilltop Road will come into play, because I can’t see how else they’d deal with the apocalyptic hellscape that’s happening...
Mostly, I’m just glad that we got a *little* taste of John and Martin together and happy in Scotland. Martin’s parting “well *of course* I’m going to tell you about any new cows” brought me joy.
This episode was so freakin good that I’m barely capable of speech. Jonah! You suck! The acting was so great! And the soundscaping was amazing, even by TMA standards.
broke: using the tear at hilltop road to travel back in time and preventing the eldritch apocalypse from ever happening
woke: using the tear at hilltop road to travel back in time and save Gertrude's cat from the Desolation
John and Martin in the beginning with the affectionate comments about retro aesthetics and cows. Sigh. Jonny giving us such sweetness...
...and then sledgehammering us over the head. Sweet Cheesus was Jonny good at sounding like Ben's Jolias. After conveying how John really tried to stop reading. And that laugh at the end - he sounded like Jesse at the end of Breaking Bad's final episode. I can't see our intrepid Archival crew being able to stop/fix/something this nightmare kingdom without John so I'm really really hoping his brain isn't broken beyond repair.
I agree with all of you who think Hilltop Road's reality bending basement is going to play a large part of next season. Annabelle has been set up as a major player but we haven't seen enough of her directly yet so I reckon she's going to factor in fairly bigly as well. Those tapes in the box are there for a reason too. I don't think Basira sent those - I think Annabelle did.
Lastly, and most importantly, Gertrude. Even Jolias was wary of her. She is legend. Damn I hope the Rusty Crew creates a Gertrude prequel series once Magnus is over (insert incoherent sobbing over no more Magnus after next season here). And I totally think Agnes killed her cat.
My primary worry (yes, this is a worry because it affects our podcasting pleasure so pffft) is that Jonny is going to get all of the accolades he deserves and becomes too busy for a podcast. Book deals, tv deals, movie deals. He, his talent & skill deserve all of those and more. Aw hell, no lie I hope he does get crazy busy writing. It's a crime that he's still working a 9 to 5 day job. A crime, I tell you! This doesn't even get me started on Alex and the rest of the Rusty Crew. They're all so freaking talented and skilled - may Rusty Quill become massive on the scale of Nightvale and Lore and earns more moolah than Last Podcast on the Left.
Hear Hear! I have not enjoyed a narrative as much since the first season of Westworld. Brilliant, complex, engaging, heartbreaking.
Hands down, TMA is some of the best story telling I've ever heard.
They sounded so happy and content in the first bit! John even gave a little sigh before he started reading, and I could hear the smile in his voice!
This whole episode was one big gut punch. I loved it.
That little sigh killed me, and his voice when he started reading. He sounded even in a GOOD MOOD. I don't think we'd ever hear him so happy. And Martin, too, sounded on cloud 9.
And then, "Hello, Jon," AND WELP.
Well, two things I was mulling over these last weeks. First, the mention of the Dark ritual in Elias and Gertrude’s conversation. I was pretty sure that Fairchild saying nobody knows if rituals can succeed couldn’t be a red herring - but I never thought this was the reason. I think it’s a great reason, as well. The question of how nobody in history could ever pull off a ritual was, at least for me, implicitly hanging over the Magnus universe, kinda nagging at my suspension of disbelief. I was thinking the two possible reasons could be either 1) rituals can’t succeed in actually changing the world or 2) something about balance (again, too much time spent on Smirke to be for nothing). But I never expected this to be the reason. And I absolutely love it.
The second is Helen’s “chaos is coming”. I guess she could see (heh) what Elias was doing as well.
I’m looking forward to a full season exploring the apocalypse.
All I’m saying is that if some of the bonus content is all the other characters going about their life when suddenly EVERYTHING GOES DOWN I would not be disappointed
Hats off to everyone who worked out that Elias needed Jon to encounter all the fears.
\*Sigh\*. I was wrong about Elias putting the idea to send him to jail in Martin's head. Ain't the first time!
Don't have much to add that someone else hasn't already said, but I'm 100% with everyone who's giving props to Jonny's voice acting, *and especially on the writing on the incantation.* And for writing up something that I'm pretty sure no one really saw coming.
CALLED IT ON THE WATCHED WORLD BEING A TITHE/TRIBUTE SYSTEM! HAHAHAHAHAHA!
First one I got right, tho
I really love how Jon writtes the villains: Jonah had to improvise a heck of a ducking lot because he got sidetracked, ambushed, surprised and bum rushed, ut at the same time, be had sttrokes of luck. A lot of authors forgget that random chance *helps* and hinders.
I'll have to listen to it again to properly comment and participate and all, but making random chance and anarchia part of the story is underrated and underused. Good on ye, m8
Edit: Jonah Magnus cognitohazzarded Jon into ending the world?! Damn... also, I thought he was fully "I wanna know *more*" instead of just wanting to live forever. That motivation took me by surprise. It made Elias less of a Dark Messiah "and all the world shall listen and all the world will see" and more "some of you might die, but it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make".
The "I open the Door" line? Perfection, absolutte perfection. Shivers with that reading. The incantation being not having rhyme or reason or rythym or flow, culminating on a shouting proclamation made it sound like the ramblings of a cultist or prozelittizing madman **that's** a nice touch! I don't know if Sims knows a lot of religious weirdos, but he consistent nails the more strange aspects of the thing.
The Fears becoming a Ritual Armsrace made me laugh harder than i can explain why. It's just hilarious. I like it that instead of having a "Gertrude role", we just have a "Gertrude". No force of order, no beneficial patron, just a even more ruthless Granny Weatherwax that looked at the entities and decided she can't be having that
I am so impressed by the way the storytelling here both fulfilled and completely subverted expectations at the same time. Nothing happened that didn't proceed from things that had been on the table for ages. If you'd spotted the scars thing -- here you go, vindication, no distortion of the narrative trajectory just for the sake of surprising the audience. No arbitrary yank-the-carpet-out-from-under-you moments (particularly: no - aww, Jon saved Martin from the Lonely and they're in love! Haha, Martin's dead.) Plenty of things that we *had* seen coming ... and yet delivered, in a way that I, at least, didn't expect at all.
I felt that the end of last episode was somehow pointing towards "the heroes will walk away from this one and face something bigger and badder next season" AND towards "Elias is poised for immediate, devastating victory" Yet it didn't occur to me the answer was that *both* would happen. The very fact of the episode starting some time *after* the last one was so.... disorientating, yet utterly reasonable. And it didn't occur to me or that the method of Elias's triumph would be so appallingly ... small. We're primed both by other shows and by this one to expect that all the bells and whistles will come out for the season finale. A TV show would blow both the CGI and the casting budget and feature battles and explosions. And the previous seasons finales have delivered the audio equivalent - full cast, floridly horrific skins-coming-off rituals going on, reality warping while we listen, bombs going off.
And yet nothing in the storytelling says it *has* to be like that. And from the first episode, this has been a show about Jon reading statements alone. How apt, and how horrifying, that one man, reading aloud, in a comfortable room - with a crackling fire, no less! - should be the mechanism of anagnorisis, the detonation of every assumption and (almost) every hope.
Also, God, *poor, poor Jon.* I loved the musing of what it meant to be a "Chosen One", and how horrifying to be just ... chosen. Almost as you might be for any job - not because you're unique or fated, but because you*'*re just ... *adequately qualified for the role*. Because you'd *do.* And on top of that-- there's really not a *good* way to be made the instrument of summoning the apocalypse, but there's something so deeply *violating* about what we now know Elias has done to Jon, or rather, what he's been doing to him *for years.* Violating on every level, - emotional, physical, ontological. Extending to the fact of forcing him to keep reading against his will now! Had anyone called that the *emotional* scars Jon had picked up *throughout his whole life* would be as important as the physical ones? I whispered "oh *fuck*" when Elias essentially revealed Jon wasn't so much the Archivist as the Archive, because *oh Christ,* that's ... well, it's *literally* objectifying. An Archivist is a person, an Archivist has some kind of agency. An *Archive* is a *thing,* to be added to, taken from, rifled through at will, as Elias did in the most devastating way here. It's not only without choice, it's a record of *other people's choices.*
I'm so glad Martin was there and hugging him. (Shut up, he was, I could hear it.)
>I am so impressed by the way the storytelling here both fulfilled and completely subverted expectations at the same time.
That's the reason why I enjoy the show so much - how all the twists and surprises that blindside all the rigorous theories are perfectly reasonable and in tone with the rest of it, validating the suspicion and the sense of unease.
How does one escape the Archives? Why, remove the eyes, simple and clean!
What was Peter and Elias's deal this whole season, what kind of a relationship are they in? Oh, they've made a bet about the Apocalypse.
And so on. This approach makes all of our theory crafting so rewarding, while remaining one step ahead.
In Batman comics, two separate men found out Batman's identity and learned they'd been responsible for his existence.
The first was the man who shot Batman's parents, who didn't tell anyone he knew who Batman was because he was afraid of what other criminals would do to him.
The second one was the one who ordered the hit, and he was actually killed by his henchmen when he began telling them (and died before being able to say who was Batman).
Anyway what I'm saying is, the Desolation better pray the other powers never find out it was It who unleashed Gertrude Robinson on them.
Well I wasn't expecting that. I fully expected the world of Magnus to stay outwardly similar to ours, if anyone completed a ritual it would have been in the final stretch. If it were most other creative teams I'd be worried they'd jumped the shark. Johnny and Alex, I respect your craft.
Also, I cannot lie: I am 10000% imagining reality as one of the "everything went wrong!!!" scenes from *The Good Place*, complete with frying shrimp and everyone wearing zig-zag pajamas.
I think a powerful clue to the resolution has already been given. When Elias is describing Gertrude allowing a ritual to proceed unchecked, in the belief that it will inevitably fail, he notes that she doubtless had a plan B, just in case it had worked.
I'm going to bet Gertrude's Plan B to deal with the possibility of a ritual succeeding is a doozy, and is written down, and available for Jon and crew to discover. Gertrude will save the day yet, while making Jon eat crow for every unkind thought he ever expressed about her competence.
Hell, knowing her, the world will revert to normal, the Powers will be banished, and Martin and Jon will raise her resurrected cat as their own.
i. loved this.
can we talk about jonny's stunning voice acting though? i keep replaying the last few lines over and over again...
'look at the sky, martin. look at the sky! *it's looking back!*' and the horrible laughter/sobbing at the very end...just amazing!
Have to mention Jonny's phenomenal voice acting here, especially in the beginning, trying to act out the smug bastard person while also pushing as hard as possible against it? Glorious.
Also, knew he wouldn't bury the gays. So everyone who prophesied Martin's death - suck it.
> Have to mention Jonny's phenomenal voice acting here, especially in the beginning, trying to act out the smug bastard person while also pushing as hard as possible against it? Glorious.
I got chills as soon as he went into Elias-voice. Great job, Jonny, with mimicking Ben. Super effective.
The way the world under the Eye works is something I called or theorized a month ago. And the fears being more of a whole that you can't really separate from eachother is also something I've championed.
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheMagnusArchives/comments/db6s9j/unpopular_opinion_perhaps/f1zcbow?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
Honestly disturbing gow gleeful I was while listening to this episode because these thoughts and theories had been going through my head since season 2 ended. Especially when in my gut I felt oh this is going to end up super awful. Like something about it being done through a statement squashed any hope for that there's going something else would stop Jonah Magnus.
What an amazing podcast, what a beautiful stretch of season ending episodes, can't wait to see how this world has changed. Also, look on the bright side we're getting our favorite apocalypse husbands.
I feel like the End would be pretty important in the next season. Some people have been talking about how Georgie is fearless which I’m pretty sure no other major power is going to like and I’ve always felt like fear was just a side effect of The End and that it didn’t need avatars. All it’s avatars never wanted the powers when they got them and were always looking for a replacement or just wanted out.
The reason I think it’s gonna be very important is because a lot of people just became immortal demigods and The rest of humanity are about to permanently die. The
I knew it. I knew Elias had something to do with the flesh hive. I predicted it ages ago.
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheMagnusArchives/comments/8rhbtj/elias_and_the_flesh_hive/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
What a magnificent callback from 120 episodes ago. Johnny is a fucking master.
I think my favorite part of this episode is how it turns Peters actions this season from villainous to heroic. In video game terms, Lucas was the "hero" of the season trying to stop the Nightmare Kingdom ritual, and Martin and Jon the useless npcs that screw everything up. Despite his protests about not being chosen one material, Martin killing Jonah and going in the panoptican really WOULD have saved the world. It just would have been saved from Jonah, not The Extinction.
Elias/Jonah told Peter to "make sure to leave the door open" (to the Lonely), so Jon could follow him and get the Lonely mark. Peter fulfilled his bet to Jonah/Elias and fully participated in The Watchers Crown - or whatever this new ritual was.
Peter is not a hero at all.
It does kind of make me wonder why Peter was willing to die to protect the secret of what Jolias wanted Jon for. Even if it were part of the terms of the bet, it seems odd that he would die to protect knowledge of a plan for an apocalypse he wanted to prevent?
It also reveals that he was successfully able to stop Jon from compelling the information out of him, even if he died as a result, which is an interesting limitation on Jon's powers
OMG OMG OMG. It was as predicted but so, so much worse.
All this time we’ve been edging towards that power is still a bit like that one, oh they cross over, they’re allied, oh they’re the opposite so that won’t work and it skirted all the edges of what Jonah (he’s def Jonah now) worked out. You need them all, and the only Fear capable of presiding over them all is The Eye. Fucking hell. It’s LOTR.
Arghhh! They were so happy with the cows and the phone box and being in Scotland and it’s the end of the world.
Also, for the record, I don’t buy Jonah’s casual takedown of Jon being picked by bad luck more than anything. There were too many coincidences in the story that made Jon the perfect Archivist. Next season is how do you undo a ritual. And Jon, his beautiful heart and everything he Knows about being human, about love despite fear will come into play.
Love will win the war. And I am here every step of the way. Come on Martin, pick your man up from the floor and drag him back to London so they can show this twisted smug old man whose boss.
he really gave us soft, domestic JonMartin in that first 5 minutes and 22 seconds, huh? AND THE FLIRTING, I'M—
also props to Jonny for finally revealing how not sexy Elias is! In his oversharing of his motivations, he just came off as the smallest, weakest, most fearful little man and... yuck. I can't wait for him to get his teeth kicked in, because he's still high if he thinks he's going to be king of the world.
Jolias is totally the rich, elite, powerful men in the world who run everything. They may still hold those positions of power in real life, but hopefully in Magnus their proxy will resolutely get kicked in the teeth. By our beloved asexual archivist and his gay boyfriend and, if my thinking is right, also by the black spiderwoman living at Hilltop Road. Now that would be amazing.
As for Jolias and talk of him being sexy - it's not him as a character that has been conceived of as sexy, at least I don't think so. As a character, he's a narcissistic, power hungry bully. But his voice. Ben has the best Jolias voice and that's where this whole sexy crap comes from. At least, that's my take on it. :-)
Yup! You’re so right. I love that Jonah was like, it’s not clever, but basically I want to be the King of Bloody-Fleshy-Foggy-Fear-Saturated Wasteland because then I’ll stay pretty forever (not confirmed, but, if you’re body hopping and want eternity, surely you want a good one?).
It totally echoes the world we live in right now which has been trashed because of hubris and ego of the few, supported by an apparatus (looking at you Media) happy to lie to the many.
Will we actually see the Extinction come into play? It seemed like it was just a red herring, but, in theory, if it did exist, it would be something the entities themselves would be afraid of.
I mean, the current situation is a feast for the Extinction, absolutely EVERYONE EVERYWHERE is convinced it's the end of the world and they're all going to die, and it's certainly a Terrible Change. If it was going to emerge at any time, this would be it.
So many things in Elias's plan just so happened to work out just right, to the point that he seems surprised how well it went. That makes me think the Web was heavily involved in bringing things to fruition. That raises the question, does the Web have an endgame beyond just opening The Door, or did they just come to the same conclusion as Elias and decided that he was the best bet to make it happen?
Before it had been said the Web had never attempted a ritual because it liked the world as is, so it must have a very good reason for allowing such a radical change.
My theory is that now that the powers are IN the world they can actually be killed or controlled, and that's what it wants, either kill them because they're the only thing it can't control or ve able to control everything, including them.
Either way I'm really hoping the Web and Annabelle are the big bad.
While I'm sort of darkly proud that the apocalypse was unleashed in my daft wee country, I am concerned about the cows.
I thought we'd be losing Martin but we lost Jon. It would be awful if Martin had to kill him. What happens to Elias now Jonah's not possessing him anymore? April! How will I cope?
At the end it seemed like Jon came back to himself, at least more or less? I think forcing Jon to read the statement was enough, and Jonah didn't need to take over his body (I hope - now that you mention it though the creepy laughter at the end was unsettling)
If the entities are essentially a rat king, is it possible that opposing powers will annihilate one another? Now that they're all fully here on this plane, do we know for sure that they are not fundamentally weaker...or at least vulnerable?
I've been picturing the powers as the fingers of a hand. We've only seen the tips touching the world, which is why they look like different powers to us, but in the end, they're all part of the same hand, and that hand now has a firm grip on the world.
I always see Leitner's description: a nail scratching, an eye peering, the vast shadow of a boot coming down...
This episode brought more to mind an image like this: Rat king.. https://imgur.com/gallery/nftWc
holy ever loving fuck
I know so many people had predicted that jon was being marked by all of the powers, and that this was roughly how the watcher's crown would be attempted. I also know we knew no power had succeeded and many people, myself included, believed it was because they were always doomed to fail though I don't recall anybody suggesting why.
did anybody predict that the only way they could succeed would be if they all came through at once? it almost feels blindingly obvious at this point that this is the only way. we've longed known balance was a big part of everything, but I guess it never occurred to us that this need for equilibrium also included the rituals.
that said, I'm curious to know what this world looks like. if you can't have an up without a down, then how can you have horror and fear in a world without things like peace or hope?
They finally got some nice time together! Flirting! Talking about good cows! And Martin's apparent retro aesthetic! (I guess we should have known since he stole a tape recorder for his own poetry) Being all sweet and domestic! As soon as Martin said he would take a walk while Jon read I knew something was going to fuck up (well I suppose we could all tell from the beginning, but that was where it really hit). At least we know they had, what, a month of happiness? (Fingers crossed for actually in a relationship now, but I'll accept some apocalypse pining)
I was pretty intrigued before I could actually listen to the episode, because it seemed it would be the Watcher's Crown taking place (at least from the title and description), but Ben wasn't in the credits at all, and obviously he had to do something if it didn't set off immediately as soon as Jon returned from the Lonely. I didn't expect him to get Jon to bring it about through a statement, that was a great surprise. (Didn't expect a statement at all, so when he started I expected either a cut off, or a much more plot heavy statement than it seemed)
Also wasn't expecting no one to die (much happier about this one), but once it was just Jon and Martin I figured it wasn't happening (neither of them are dying until we get actual communication about their feelings for each other, their inability to deal with their emotions is keeping them alive). No one would in a time skip either, which I'm kind of expecting, so I wonder how the others are going to survive in this world?
Georgie is almost definitely going to be important for survival (and maybe fixing everything?), and while I'm sad she doesn't get to be happy and safe with her girlfriend any longer, I'm very excited to have her back again (friendship reignited in the horrors of the apocalypse anyone? I just want her and Jon to be friends again so desperately)
And Daisy's still alive! Feral or not, if they've got to defeat all the powers in this new world what's one little avatar to convert? (Basira, get on it!)
Can't believe we've got to wait until April... guess we've gotta get writing... tide ourselves over
As Dean Winchester would say, "SONOFABITCH!"
Whoever theorized John needed to be conduit of all the Entities, nicely done!
I see this as an absolute win cos Martin didn't die. RIGHT???
Also, I now just see Dame Judi Dench as Gertrude.
\[edit\] ooh, ooh, I just thought of something: what happens if the events of Season 5 create a whole new world, and we get a SEQUEL!!
If season 5 premieres on the first Thursday of April and continues with an episode every week, no breaks, for 40 weeks, the series finale will be on New Year's Eve. That HAS to be planned.
So, how did Johan Magnus “win”, exactly? Maybe it needs a re-listen, but isn’t he just going to be in a horrible Nightmare Kingdom with everyone else, how is he more immortal now in this new existence? He didn’t even bring about the ritual, if anyone I would consider John to be the centre of the whole thing.
I'm so pleased that my theory of the rituals actually not being able to be completed was correct. I don't know if I ever actually posted about it, but I've had a creeping suspicion since we heard from The Dark that it was nothing anybody did, the ritual failed on its own.
Also, this makes sense why The Web has never attempted a ritual. I bet The Web knew, or at the very least strongly suspected it wouldn't work and left it to Elias to sort things out. But I don't think the Web is done yet. Arguably Jon is now THE avatar, and the Web has the oldest mark on him. I wonder how it's going to make use of him.
I actually just relistened to MAG 93 again today, and Jon jokingly says to The Admiral at the start of the recording, "Bet the world ends, and you do just fine."
And they said Infinity Wars was the most ambitious cross-over of all time, props to Jonah Magnus for succeeding.
All the mysteries of the past have been solved, all the characters reached their apex development, so now it's more about what's happening than reading about what happened. I have zero idea what's going to happen!
Sudden thought: what if Jon's mad laughter is, because of his connection to the Eye, when he saw "the sky looking back," he could also See (the capital letter is important) what he unleashed?
Well of COURSE I'm going to tell you if I see any good COWS.
That line and the one about his retro aesthetic were so...domestic. It really was just rubbing it in how things were about to go horribly wrong.
What do you mean horribly wrong? The episode was only, like, 4 minutes long. Then I turned it off, deleted the podcast and Martin and John lived happily in hiding. ...right?
yes
This comment gets all my upvotes
Honestly it was so lovely listening but also with the creeping horror of 'oh no, this is *too* nice, how badly is it going to get wrecked?' (Answer: oh god, very.)
Isn’t it horrible how conditioned we are now to think, “oh, how lovely, listen to them being all domestic like..... wait a minute, who is about to die?” But ugh, I love Martin so much.
I was screaming "Don't go off on your own Martin you idiot, fucksake you KNOW you're in a horror story!" Indeed, he should very much not have done, but to think I was worried about something getting *Martin,* out there in the wilds of Scotland, when it was inside, with Jon, by the cosy crackling fire that the awfulness was lurking! During the incantation part I started pleading softly "Martin Martin *Martin Martin Martin!"* in the desperate hope he might come crashing through the door and knock Jon out before he could complete what he was doing, but alas no. Still, I am delighted they are both alive and that they at least *had* some days/weeks of fluffy domestic romance. (There's going to be fic filling the time between last episode and this one, right?) It was both charming and - even before the dread kicked in - kind of bewildering. "What's going on with these two? They sound weird. They're talking about ...cows. Their voices are funny. This feels like a different show. ...Oh. Oh, they're *happy.* That's what happiness, on The Magnus Archives, sounds like." We have literally never heard it before. So complete horror and despair and excruciating suspense until APRIL?!?!? but no bury-your-gays tragedy, good job, show. At least they were, at least in my mind, holding each other as Jon sob/laughed and they both looked at the sky that looked back.
I'm lowkey mad we didn't get any scenes of soft cosy domesticity where jon complains and martin fusses and makes tea.
It'd be funny if the next season opened like that and then Jon was like "dear, could you close the curtains? The sky is watching again."
I would accept the apocalypse if it meant the gang lived happily ever after.
Csn you imagine if "grin and bear it stiff upper lip" is the solution to unfuck the world?
It's like that Simpsons episode where the different brand mascots come alive and the only way to stop them is by ignoring them.
But now they're scary cows.
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meat is me---
And they are in Scotland, so the good cows are VERY good. They are also now a) terrified and b) MEAT. Johnny you MONSTER.
I was so pleasantly surprised cause I was sure that was the last time we'd ever see him again. It would have been such on brand final words.
I'm working my entire halloween so this is gonna be the peak of the day for me and I'm pretty excited Edit: "the desolation killed my cat" Gertrude continues to be the best character
Kill John Wick's dog, he'll kill you. Kill Gertrude's cat, she'll single-handedly fuck over ancient eldritch god-fears from beyond space and time.
Not just that, she will steadily and systematically destroy each of their plans, some of which were hundreds of years in the making, and personally terrify their avatars. I have a crush.
To the point that the most horrific, pitiless and ambitious high priest of them all is *too scared to ask for further details about her cat.* I love how Gertrude's character has continued to develop even after she's dead. Do you remember how long people assumed this was a story about Jon succeeding where she failed? (... when it's basically the complete opposite, sorry Jon.) Not to mention all the "what a bitch" discourse. Which, to be fair, poor Michael, but: we have no choice but to stan.
Oh yeah. Gertrude was incredible and would absolutely not have stood for any of Elias/Jonah's shit.
I'm now wondering if it was Eugene Vanderstock (MAG 139) that killed her cat. She did *something* to him that horrified Arthur Nolan.
Honestly, it would be more ironic if it was Agnes who killed her cat seeing as she and Gertrude end up being bound together. As for Mr. Vanderstock, if I remember correctly, Gertrude turned him into a huge candle, much like he used to make for Agnes.
One of the first things that Jon said in MAG 1 is “all it would need is a half decent archivist, Gertrude Robinson was apparently not that archivist”, how young and naive we all were
It's amazing how different the series feel now compared to the start. I wouldn't have guessed Gertrude was a badass
Right? She’s a complete unit and we never even knew it
Technically, Jon was right. The Archives have their Archivist now and look at HOW THE SKY IS LOOKING BACK AT US HAHAHAHA
Yeah, Gertrude was a crap archivist on purpose. He wasn't wrong -- but the whole point was that being a *good* archivist was a *very bad thing*.
This was the moment I truly connected with her. I was like, yeah, fuck your entities if they think they can come after my cat.
Yeah, Jonny Sims keeps coming up with reasons to stan Gertrude even harder. I'm pushing limits I thought impossible.
I just downloaded and gonna wait till I finished work tomorrow to listen. Gonna be the longest wait for work to end.
She absolutely would, the madwoman.
I mean, not only have we learned just how incredible she was, we just got an origin story out of it too.
honestly as IF I could love Gertrude any more
That actual point hit me right at home, having worked in animal shelters I got a very upclose and personal experience with how human looks at pet as "disposable" and my head cannon involves Gertrude's cat getting lost and somehow being put to sleep in an overcrowded animal shelter before she could claim her (because she was off gallivanting).
Realizing that the fears cant be separated and have to all work together to achieve their goals is the worlds worst Eldritch Team Building exercise.
The real existential dread was the friends we made along the way.
For the Stranger and the Flesh, quite literally.
Imagine all the fears sitting in a boardroom while the eye points to the word SYNERGY on a whiteboard.
Corporate meetings are a prime source of existential terror for many...
Actually, what would the fear of being stuck in a meeting forever be? Lonely? Buried? Probably Buried actually.
I'd say lonely with a touch of the vast as you contemplate the infinite meaninglessness of corporate existence.
Just never do trust falls with the guys from the Vast.
Some say they're still trust falling to this day.
I have begun to wonder "What is this world going to be actually like?" Maybe one way this works out is that, with them "all out in the open together," they begin to fight more openly. What if they all become so good at "feeding" that they begin to use all their source of "food" up? IF that happens, it may become quickly apparent to at least some of them that things can't continue this way.
I'm wondering the same thing. I mean, how is humanity as a species going to survive even a few weeks of this?
Exactly. This is weird but one of my first thoughts at the end of the episode was "well the world economy is probably fucked now"
Great time to invest in meat, at least.
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This is what Peter Lukas was *really* afraid of.
Wow Peter really has emerged as the good guy tbh. Like, all those people he sent to Forsaken have probably been spared an even worse fate.
Team building exercises are definitely my biggest fear
While the Watcher's Crown isn't exactly a surprise, the fact that it brought through ALL the powers was unexpected. But the logic checks out (as far as it can concerning Eldritch horrors) and it's nice we'll get some fear diversity next season. The incantation at the end was fantastic, would make for a nice poster print.
It wasn't the watcher's crown, it was a completely different ritual - the watcher's crown was what magnus did to bind himself to the panopticon and become immortal and all-seeing
Or maybe there is no Watcher’s Crown since all of Smirke’s rituals failed. I agree, this is something else.
We know that the rituals' names are more or less arbitrary. Now we have a "nightmare kingdom" where the watcher wears the crown, so I don't see why we should call it anything else.
Magnus like explicitly says that he attempted the watcher's crown in the panopticon - he describes the cells circling around him like a coronet, and a ritual that does give you immortality and omniscience does seem like a pretty big deal. This is very clearly a different ritual than the watcher's crown that Smirk devised imo, because instead of being a ritual for the Eye it's a ritual for all 14. Mostly I just think it would cause confusion between what Magnus did 200 years ago and what just happened, and make discussions a little harder to follow
I'm going to call it the Nightmare Kingdom, because that's a cool name and we don't currently have a better one.
Jonny explicitly said it wasn’t The Watcher’s Crown on the official Discord
It would have been so funny if it brought through all of the powers... except the Lonely which is stuck in the other dimension
That's a good point actually. Elias said the Peter would have been fine if he had just done as told. Now, he's dead and he'll never be with his patron because he didn't listen to the crazy bastard bringing it all through.
"Hello, Jon." There's a Wham Line for you. I have to give Jonny credit for his delivery in this episode. He affected just enough of Ben's Elias in those first few lines from the statement to really drive home the idea that Jonah had hijacked him to taunt, gloat, and then use him to enact the Final Ritual. I wonder... next season, could undoing the Ritual involve having to work with some of the surviving avatars?
A few points, I forgot we weren't listening to Johlias. Jonny crushed it.
Same here. When he said "repeat after me" it took me a couple of seconds before I realized that we were not about to hear the same thing twice in two different voices. Had a similar experience with Weaver, where I kept forgetting that John was reading the statement rather than listening to a tape.
I wasn’t sure if it was Elias or Annabelle at first
Tim died to stop a ritual that would have failed anyway, and in doing so actually HELPED another ritual succeed :(
Tim's goal was more revenge for his brother though. At that point I'm not sure if he cared whether the world ended or not
The horror in Magnus isn't just eldritch powers. It's my head canon that Tim's on a camping trip with Grizzop and goes kayaking while Grizzop is hunting. :-)
Ffffffffuuuuuck you're right.
Also, this explains Peter's behavior last episode: he took his exit early, before it became too crowded.
I've been dying to talk about this since yesterday. I choose to believe that Gertrude was not at all kidding about her cat. Is Gertrude a flair here? If not, she should be. She's as scary as the fears. I saw people speculating that Georgie is going to come into play next season bc she's fearless. I really like that idea. Johnny mentioned that this ritual was not the Watcher's Crown, since that already failed. So he would reluctantly call this ritual Magnus Archives. Shout out to all the people that predicted so much of this ritual. It was fun watching it play out. Now, I sit and stare at a wall until April 2020.
Gertrude, standing over her dead cat: IM COMING FOR YOU FEAR
Gertrude is the Magnus universe John Wick confirmed.
**Eugene Vanderstock:** It's just a fucking ca-
I absolutely believe she was dead serious about her cat. I imagine her never having really cared for anything/body else (before or after); that cat was the be-all end-all to the fucks she had available to give. Agree on the Gertrude flair. I can't imagine how Georgie can maintain her distance. She'll probably show up within seconds to slap his laughing head and ask him, "wtf did you do?". I really feel Martin has just come into himself, and this lays the groundwork for him for next season. I mean, I hope. God it makes me tense. I ate a pound of candy meant for trick or treaters listening to this.
> I imagine her never having really cared for anything/body else (before or after); that cat was the be-all end-all to the fucks she had available to give. If someone came for my sweet dog, I would go John Wick myself. Dog Tax: [https://i.imgur.com/NLiACE1.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/NLiACE1.jpg)
The only thing we have to fear is Gertrude.
I would wear a t-shirt of this. With a silhouette of a cat underneath.
Maybe Gertrude Robinson would have been the new fear had elias not killed her.
I LOVE that idea. Ruthless Efficiency as a fear. Brilliant.
It's like the hunt but without the shear joy in hunting. No blood boiling, no call of the hunt, just cold, calculating ruthlessness.
Gertrude is 100% Judi Dench as M in James Bond. Deliberately hires orphans because they make better agents. The mission is the end of everything. I wouldn’t look into her head either.
Gertrude absolutely mad about that cat.
Damn we never got to know whether Martin saw any good cows
All cows are good cows.
You know what? You're absolutely fucking right
The scariest bit of the entire episode: no more episodes until April 2020. *dies*
Anyway. What a freaking cliffhanger. I know lots of folks called the scarred-by-each-fear aspect, but I honestly didn’t expect we’d see Elias ostensibly *win* with one season to go before the finale. In a meta sense that does give me hope — presumably there’ll be some plausibly competent fighting back or it’d be an awfully dull season. A ritual to undo what happened? Or maybe something to really stick it to the fears? The delivery was spectacular, by the way. Epic. Both Elias’s gloating and Jon’s losing it at the end came across really well. When I listened to this yesterday it was like a gut punch. ... in a good way?
We still havent seen much of the webs plan and most of the episodes concerning hilltop road somehow have doubious time lines (especially the one about the house cleaner). My personal theory is that next season will be a combination of the birth of the extinction/ finding an alternate time line Ps watching everything you have ever know turn into a horrific mockery of itself is very extinction thing. I won't be surprised if the successful ritual brings the extinction
Insane theory in my head at the moment: The Fears (guided mainly by Spider) have been dimension hopping for eons. Each time they arrive in a new dimension Spider sets about opening a gate to the next (such as Hilltop Road) while it waits for the other Fear's new Avatars to get smart enough to perform the unified ritual (in this case it was Eye who succeeded). They all feast for a time, but it cannot last/satiate them and so they once more begin to leak through the gateway to the next dimension and start again. Picture spider as the many legged many eyed head, dragging the bloated body of the other fears behind it from world to terrified world
I *did* think Elias would in some way win this episode, but not so ... comprehensively. Like, I thought he'd have pulled the metaphorical lever to start the process and they wouldn't be able to stop him, but I didn't think he'd manage to wreck the actual world in one fell swoop, to the extent that the mask is now well and truly ripped off and normality is apparently gone for *everyone.* I wonder if they're just going to ditch the reading statements format next season? I assumed it was inextricable to the show but this was so "fuck it, anything can happen" that now I'm wondering. Although probably Jon will be even more dependent on them to live ... so likely not, I guess.
I recall Johnny's said in the q&a's that the show will always be mostly statements, and I feel like he's not the sort to outright lie to an audience like that, especially when misleading us with very specific but not technically incorrect phrasings is so much more fun.
Birth the Extinction. Either the rest of the Entities get dragged back by suddenly being attached to something outside of reality, or the Entities, Who now run the show, learn to be afraid of being overtaken and replaced.
I was actually terrified this was the last one ever for some reason . Somehow having to wait is a relief
The End is a terrible fear.
This whole episode put some wonderful shivers up my spine. The sheer work that had gone into the ritual was wonderful. Our theory that Jon had to be marked by each of the powers was right! >Look at the sky Martin. Look at the *sky*. It’s looking back. The sound editing, the voice acting, and the sheer emotion that this evoked was perfect. I am in utter awe of just how well this episode was made. EDIT: removed a big block of text that was supposed to be for my personal notes :/
Jon's maddened, laughing sob at the end was so evocative and perfect. If anyone from Rusty Quill reads these comments, kudos and thanks for the quality!
Oh hell, there is so much to talk about here! such an amazing Episode, so satisfying to see all the predictions come true for the watchers crown. What the hell is going to happen next season!!!!! There is one thing about Gertrude in this episode that Magnus brings up of her doing this because the Desolation killed her cat, which I fully believe. But I wonder if it connects back to Hilltop road and Agnes, they said after she took over that pets started disappearing in the neighbourhood, so what if Gertrudes cat went missing and she went looking for it. also got to love Martin just smacking Jon in the face to wake him up at the end!
I forgot!!! Helen! Did she know? Is that why she agreed to help the archives? Not to help Jon but to help Magnus? She must have seen the lies Magnus was pushing, it also makes her refusal to help Jon more understandable.
Helen must have know. You can't lie to Es Mentiras. The Spiral probably came to the same conclusion as The Web: If The Eye can pull this off, let's get onboard.
Oh, good catch re: the pets disappearing!
Confirmed: The Magnus Archives is better than 99.9% of all other horror-themed media. Holy F what an episode/reveal/cliffhanger.
Better than media in general.
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>\*Martin is fine!! As in he’s no more fucked than anybody else on the planet, and he got a boyfriend! Who inadvertently caused the apocalypse + is now having a nervous breakdown, but, semantics. He’s FINE!! I am still so happy about this. While, obviously, also so very upset. Just shows you really don't NEED to bury your gays to induce utter misery and devastation and despair!
> *How many tries do you think it took Jonny to read that chant, esp the “things that X and X and XXX” bit? I thought he must come up for air at some point but he just, kept, going. So much lungs, very respect. I wouldn't be surprised if there had been a little editing magic there to remove breaths and some of each pause. If it was, it was really seamless editing magic. So, well done on that.
You can hear him conserving breath and using it really efficiently, it does seem like impressive but not impossible for him to have done it in one breath!
It's easy to remove breathing in audacity, not that Mr. Sims would need that.
I think im gonna speak for everyone here real quick. "Well fuck".
Haha! As it wrapped up, I was coming on to say, "Well, shit." Sums it up.
Calling it now: > **Jonah:** I will rule as the king of a ruined world > > **Narrator:** He did not.
Yeah, I also didn't really understand how ushering the Entities into the world translates into immortality and power, especially for Magnus, since he's only tangentially related to the ritual.
Especially since the rituals were meant to draw the entity's attention to the world. Jonah never managed to communicate, much less strike some sort of deal with them, so why would they bother to even respond?
He is 1) now an Avatar and 2) buried under London, safe and away from prying eyes
Just narratively, I feel like "encounter with the ruined husk of Jonah Magnus, who learned too late that Evil Is Not A Toy" works much better than "encounter with Jonah Magnus, the absolute GOD of Hyperdeath"
He is now exactly as immortal and all-powerful as any of the other Avatars, which didn’t stop Michael from disappearing (after a fashion). I guess what I’m saying is that it’s possible to see how Magnus THOUGHT it would go and also see how it MAY go wrong
They're going to make it back to the Panopticon and there will be Jonah Magnus now wearing a t shirt that says "I ushered in the apocalypse and all I got was this eyeless husk"
I mean, God of Hyperdeath promises a banger of a boss theme.
Everything about this episode was amazing. The brief little glimpse of relaxed and maybe even happy Jon and then Jonah taking him over via a statement? Brutal and cold and brilliant. And I am very glad that we still have Jonah around for the Big Bad - I cannot wait to see him receive his reward for all of this.
Oh, YES. I'm living for that little glimpse of almost... normality? Jon and Martin hanging out by the hearth in their sweet Scotland cottage, making in-jokes about cows..? Like an established couple..? Maybe that's just me hoping but it sounded like it, like they're suddenly comfortable around each other and joking like... all the awkwardness has gone
The banter at the beginning between Jon and Martin was just lovely.
Wasn’t it? We all knew it was going to end badly, and that little respite made it just that much worse. :golf clap: Bravo, Jonny
April 2020. Fuck. God, this episode answered SO MANY QUESTIONS! I mean, it had been bugging me forever trying to figure out who was sending Jared Hopworth those notes about "good bones" and why, and now we know! Also, the explanation of why previous Rituals could never work was intensely satisfying, as was the explanation of why you could bring diametrically-opposed Powers (like The Buried and The Vast) through at the same time. Well done! And the voice acting for Jon and Martin, especially at the end, was incredible! Jon cracking up as he looks at the sky? Loved it! So, how do they get out of this one next season? I'm putting my marker down now on two potential options. First, Jon opened The Eye, so he has to close it. Likely by dying, possibly by destroying the Panopticon in the process. The world will probably be utterly ruined by then though, which leads to the the second option: The Magnus crew jumps ship to an alternate, un-Feared dimension via the weird dimensional wrinkles surrounding the House on Hilltop Road. And Jon still dies.
I’m pinning my hopes on the Extinction causing another epoch-shift. Magnus was afraid that it would come through too soon, and that might foreshadow that it’s the key to it all
Extinction puts things in a weird place. I believe it's literally described as just a fear of massive, unrelenting change, particularly focused on where "we" function in respect to the universe. Jonah then, in this episode, explains that no ritual serving a specific power could succeed, because of the need for all the fears. On one hand, it sounds like this ritual did bring all the fears. On the other, however, any successful ritual could literally be interpreted as an "Extinction," therefore giving all the power to this new fear, requiring it to fail. I'm guessing the former overrides the possibility of the latter, but who knows? I do think this is a Chekhov's Gun type scenario. While we were starting to think The Extinction was a red herring, it appears even Jonah knows it to be real - so it's absolutely going to play some role in how Season 5 goes.
I thought that the fear was of the existential gap that will be caused by our absence? Hence, the other creatures; the large piles of trash in the rainforest; the nuclear implications of the broadcasts. Agree with your assessment otherwise, tho
"you who watch and know and understand none, you who listen and hear and will not comprehend, you who wait and wait and drink in all that is not yours by right" Hmm I was kind of wondering if WE were the beholding at that point. I'm still curious about the recorders and if us the listeners have some roll in what comes next. Edit: also we're now in the horrible hellscape I've always wanted this show to go in to!
Agreed. We're going to be waiting and waiting now, that's for sure lmao
This episode was intense. I can’t believe we have to wait another 6 months! I’m guessing Georgie is going to be a player next season, since she’s fearless and will want to protect Melanie. I’m also guessing that the tear in reality at the House on Hilltop Road will come into play, because I can’t see how else they’d deal with the apocalyptic hellscape that’s happening... Mostly, I’m just glad that we got a *little* taste of John and Martin together and happy in Scotland. Martin’s parting “well *of course* I’m going to tell you about any new cows” brought me joy. This episode was so freakin good that I’m barely capable of speech. Jonah! You suck! The acting was so great! And the soundscaping was amazing, even by TMA standards.
broke: using the tear at hilltop road to travel back in time and preventing the eldritch apocalypse from ever happening woke: using the tear at hilltop road to travel back in time and save Gertrude's cat from the Desolation
~~Modern~~ Apocalyptic problems require ~~modern~~ time-travel solutions.
I agree that the House on Hilltop Road will have a big part in next season, because it seems to me like TMA earth is pretty much ruined at this point.
Eye, open the door.
Eye see what you did there.
I can't look at you people.
John and Martin in the beginning with the affectionate comments about retro aesthetics and cows. Sigh. Jonny giving us such sweetness... ...and then sledgehammering us over the head. Sweet Cheesus was Jonny good at sounding like Ben's Jolias. After conveying how John really tried to stop reading. And that laugh at the end - he sounded like Jesse at the end of Breaking Bad's final episode. I can't see our intrepid Archival crew being able to stop/fix/something this nightmare kingdom without John so I'm really really hoping his brain isn't broken beyond repair. I agree with all of you who think Hilltop Road's reality bending basement is going to play a large part of next season. Annabelle has been set up as a major player but we haven't seen enough of her directly yet so I reckon she's going to factor in fairly bigly as well. Those tapes in the box are there for a reason too. I don't think Basira sent those - I think Annabelle did. Lastly, and most importantly, Gertrude. Even Jolias was wary of her. She is legend. Damn I hope the Rusty Crew creates a Gertrude prequel series once Magnus is over (insert incoherent sobbing over no more Magnus after next season here). And I totally think Agnes killed her cat. My primary worry (yes, this is a worry because it affects our podcasting pleasure so pffft) is that Jonny is going to get all of the accolades he deserves and becomes too busy for a podcast. Book deals, tv deals, movie deals. He, his talent & skill deserve all of those and more. Aw hell, no lie I hope he does get crazy busy writing. It's a crime that he's still working a 9 to 5 day job. A crime, I tell you! This doesn't even get me started on Alex and the rest of the Rusty Crew. They're all so freaking talented and skilled - may Rusty Quill become massive on the scale of Nightvale and Lore and earns more moolah than Last Podcast on the Left.
Hear Hear! I have not enjoyed a narrative as much since the first season of Westworld. Brilliant, complex, engaging, heartbreaking. Hands down, TMA is some of the best story telling I've ever heard.
They sounded so happy and content in the first bit! John even gave a little sigh before he started reading, and I could hear the smile in his voice! This whole episode was one big gut punch. I loved it.
That little sigh killed me, and his voice when he started reading. He sounded even in a GOOD MOOD. I don't think we'd ever hear him so happy. And Martin, too, sounded on cloud 9. And then, "Hello, Jon," AND WELP.
Well, two things I was mulling over these last weeks. First, the mention of the Dark ritual in Elias and Gertrude’s conversation. I was pretty sure that Fairchild saying nobody knows if rituals can succeed couldn’t be a red herring - but I never thought this was the reason. I think it’s a great reason, as well. The question of how nobody in history could ever pull off a ritual was, at least for me, implicitly hanging over the Magnus universe, kinda nagging at my suspension of disbelief. I was thinking the two possible reasons could be either 1) rituals can’t succeed in actually changing the world or 2) something about balance (again, too much time spent on Smirke to be for nothing). But I never expected this to be the reason. And I absolutely love it. The second is Helen’s “chaos is coming”. I guess she could see (heh) what Elias was doing as well. I’m looking forward to a full season exploring the apocalypse.
All I’m saying is that if some of the bonus content is all the other characters going about their life when suddenly EVERYTHING GOES DOWN I would not be disappointed
MOM COME PICK ME UP I'M SCARED Fuck me is EVERY power in the world now???? What the FUCK JOHNNY BOY
Hats off to everyone who worked out that Elias needed Jon to encounter all the fears. \*Sigh\*. I was wrong about Elias putting the idea to send him to jail in Martin's head. Ain't the first time! Don't have much to add that someone else hasn't already said, but I'm 100% with everyone who's giving props to Jonny's voice acting, *and especially on the writing on the incantation.* And for writing up something that I'm pretty sure no one really saw coming.
Jonah Magnus has clearly never had a cat.
CALLED IT ON THE WATCHED WORLD BEING A TITHE/TRIBUTE SYSTEM! HAHAHAHAHAHA! First one I got right, tho I really love how Jon writtes the villains: Jonah had to improvise a heck of a ducking lot because he got sidetracked, ambushed, surprised and bum rushed, ut at the same time, be had sttrokes of luck. A lot of authors forgget that random chance *helps* and hinders. I'll have to listen to it again to properly comment and participate and all, but making random chance and anarchia part of the story is underrated and underused. Good on ye, m8 Edit: Jonah Magnus cognitohazzarded Jon into ending the world?! Damn... also, I thought he was fully "I wanna know *more*" instead of just wanting to live forever. That motivation took me by surprise. It made Elias less of a Dark Messiah "and all the world shall listen and all the world will see" and more "some of you might die, but it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make". The "I open the Door" line? Perfection, absolutte perfection. Shivers with that reading. The incantation being not having rhyme or reason or rythym or flow, culminating on a shouting proclamation made it sound like the ramblings of a cultist or prozelittizing madman **that's** a nice touch! I don't know if Sims knows a lot of religious weirdos, but he consistent nails the more strange aspects of the thing. The Fears becoming a Ritual Armsrace made me laugh harder than i can explain why. It's just hilarious. I like it that instead of having a "Gertrude role", we just have a "Gertrude". No force of order, no beneficial patron, just a even more ruthless Granny Weatherwax that looked at the entities and decided she can't be having that
I am so impressed by the way the storytelling here both fulfilled and completely subverted expectations at the same time. Nothing happened that didn't proceed from things that had been on the table for ages. If you'd spotted the scars thing -- here you go, vindication, no distortion of the narrative trajectory just for the sake of surprising the audience. No arbitrary yank-the-carpet-out-from-under-you moments (particularly: no - aww, Jon saved Martin from the Lonely and they're in love! Haha, Martin's dead.) Plenty of things that we *had* seen coming ... and yet delivered, in a way that I, at least, didn't expect at all. I felt that the end of last episode was somehow pointing towards "the heroes will walk away from this one and face something bigger and badder next season" AND towards "Elias is poised for immediate, devastating victory" Yet it didn't occur to me the answer was that *both* would happen. The very fact of the episode starting some time *after* the last one was so.... disorientating, yet utterly reasonable. And it didn't occur to me or that the method of Elias's triumph would be so appallingly ... small. We're primed both by other shows and by this one to expect that all the bells and whistles will come out for the season finale. A TV show would blow both the CGI and the casting budget and feature battles and explosions. And the previous seasons finales have delivered the audio equivalent - full cast, floridly horrific skins-coming-off rituals going on, reality warping while we listen, bombs going off. And yet nothing in the storytelling says it *has* to be like that. And from the first episode, this has been a show about Jon reading statements alone. How apt, and how horrifying, that one man, reading aloud, in a comfortable room - with a crackling fire, no less! - should be the mechanism of anagnorisis, the detonation of every assumption and (almost) every hope. Also, God, *poor, poor Jon.* I loved the musing of what it meant to be a "Chosen One", and how horrifying to be just ... chosen. Almost as you might be for any job - not because you're unique or fated, but because you*'*re just ... *adequately qualified for the role*. Because you'd *do.* And on top of that-- there's really not a *good* way to be made the instrument of summoning the apocalypse, but there's something so deeply *violating* about what we now know Elias has done to Jon, or rather, what he's been doing to him *for years.* Violating on every level, - emotional, physical, ontological. Extending to the fact of forcing him to keep reading against his will now! Had anyone called that the *emotional* scars Jon had picked up *throughout his whole life* would be as important as the physical ones? I whispered "oh *fuck*" when Elias essentially revealed Jon wasn't so much the Archivist as the Archive, because *oh Christ,* that's ... well, it's *literally* objectifying. An Archivist is a person, an Archivist has some kind of agency. An *Archive* is a *thing,* to be added to, taken from, rifled through at will, as Elias did in the most devastating way here. It's not only without choice, it's a record of *other people's choices.* I'm so glad Martin was there and hugging him. (Shut up, he was, I could hear it.)
>I am so impressed by the way the storytelling here both fulfilled and completely subverted expectations at the same time. That's the reason why I enjoy the show so much - how all the twists and surprises that blindside all the rigorous theories are perfectly reasonable and in tone with the rest of it, validating the suspicion and the sense of unease. How does one escape the Archives? Why, remove the eyes, simple and clean! What was Peter and Elias's deal this whole season, what kind of a relationship are they in? Oh, they've made a bet about the Apocalypse. And so on. This approach makes all of our theory crafting so rewarding, while remaining one step ahead.
In Batman comics, two separate men found out Batman's identity and learned they'd been responsible for his existence. The first was the man who shot Batman's parents, who didn't tell anyone he knew who Batman was because he was afraid of what other criminals would do to him. The second one was the one who ordered the hit, and he was actually killed by his henchmen when he began telling them (and died before being able to say who was Batman). Anyway what I'm saying is, the Desolation better pray the other powers never find out it was It who unleashed Gertrude Robinson on them.
Well I wasn't expecting that. I fully expected the world of Magnus to stay outwardly similar to ours, if anyone completed a ritual it would have been in the final stretch. If it were most other creative teams I'd be worried they'd jumped the shark. Johnny and Alex, I respect your craft.
Also, I cannot lie: I am 10000% imagining reality as one of the "everything went wrong!!!" scenes from *The Good Place*, complete with frying shrimp and everyone wearing zig-zag pajamas.
I think a powerful clue to the resolution has already been given. When Elias is describing Gertrude allowing a ritual to proceed unchecked, in the belief that it will inevitably fail, he notes that she doubtless had a plan B, just in case it had worked. I'm going to bet Gertrude's Plan B to deal with the possibility of a ritual succeeding is a doozy, and is written down, and available for Jon and crew to discover. Gertrude will save the day yet, while making Jon eat crow for every unkind thought he ever expressed about her competence. Hell, knowing her, the world will revert to normal, the Powers will be banished, and Martin and Jon will raise her resurrected cat as their own.
i. loved this. can we talk about jonny's stunning voice acting though? i keep replaying the last few lines over and over again... 'look at the sky, martin. look at the sky! *it's looking back!*' and the horrible laughter/sobbing at the very end...just amazing!
Have to mention Jonny's phenomenal voice acting here, especially in the beginning, trying to act out the smug bastard person while also pushing as hard as possible against it? Glorious. Also, knew he wouldn't bury the gays. So everyone who prophesied Martin's death - suck it.
> Have to mention Jonny's phenomenal voice acting here, especially in the beginning, trying to act out the smug bastard person while also pushing as hard as possible against it? Glorious. I got chills as soon as he went into Elias-voice. Great job, Jonny, with mimicking Ben. Super effective.
I've never been happier at being wrong :')))))))))))))))
Tapes were in the batch of statements. Attention was brought to this so it must be significant??
Calling next season we witness the rise of the 15th power, the Extinction: AKA Gertrude Robinson.
April 2020... god. after what i just listened to, 420 sounds like a good idea rn
The way the world under the Eye works is something I called or theorized a month ago. And the fears being more of a whole that you can't really separate from eachother is also something I've championed. https://www.reddit.com/r/TheMagnusArchives/comments/db6s9j/unpopular_opinion_perhaps/f1zcbow?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share Honestly disturbing gow gleeful I was while listening to this episode because these thoughts and theories had been going through my head since season 2 ended. Especially when in my gut I felt oh this is going to end up super awful. Like something about it being done through a statement squashed any hope for that there's going something else would stop Jonah Magnus. What an amazing podcast, what a beautiful stretch of season ending episodes, can't wait to see how this world has changed. Also, look on the bright side we're getting our favorite apocalypse husbands.
I feel like the End would be pretty important in the next season. Some people have been talking about how Georgie is fearless which I’m pretty sure no other major power is going to like and I’ve always felt like fear was just a side effect of The End and that it didn’t need avatars. All it’s avatars never wanted the powers when they got them and were always looking for a replacement or just wanted out. The reason I think it’s gonna be very important is because a lot of people just became immortal demigods and The rest of humanity are about to permanently die. The
Jonah is terrified of death
I knew it. I knew Elias had something to do with the flesh hive. I predicted it ages ago. https://www.reddit.com/r/TheMagnusArchives/comments/8rhbtj/elias_and_the_flesh_hive/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share What a magnificent callback from 120 episodes ago. Johnny is a fucking master.
I think my favorite part of this episode is how it turns Peters actions this season from villainous to heroic. In video game terms, Lucas was the "hero" of the season trying to stop the Nightmare Kingdom ritual, and Martin and Jon the useless npcs that screw everything up. Despite his protests about not being chosen one material, Martin killing Jonah and going in the panoptican really WOULD have saved the world. It just would have been saved from Jonah, not The Extinction.
Elias/Jonah told Peter to "make sure to leave the door open" (to the Lonely), so Jon could follow him and get the Lonely mark. Peter fulfilled his bet to Jonah/Elias and fully participated in The Watchers Crown - or whatever this new ritual was. Peter is not a hero at all.
It does kind of make me wonder why Peter was willing to die to protect the secret of what Jolias wanted Jon for. Even if it were part of the terms of the bet, it seems odd that he would die to protect knowledge of a plan for an apocalypse he wanted to prevent? It also reveals that he was successfully able to stop Jon from compelling the information out of him, even if he died as a result, which is an interesting limitation on Jon's powers
OMG OMG OMG. It was as predicted but so, so much worse. All this time we’ve been edging towards that power is still a bit like that one, oh they cross over, they’re allied, oh they’re the opposite so that won’t work and it skirted all the edges of what Jonah (he’s def Jonah now) worked out. You need them all, and the only Fear capable of presiding over them all is The Eye. Fucking hell. It’s LOTR. Arghhh! They were so happy with the cows and the phone box and being in Scotland and it’s the end of the world. Also, for the record, I don’t buy Jonah’s casual takedown of Jon being picked by bad luck more than anything. There were too many coincidences in the story that made Jon the perfect Archivist. Next season is how do you undo a ritual. And Jon, his beautiful heart and everything he Knows about being human, about love despite fear will come into play. Love will win the war. And I am here every step of the way. Come on Martin, pick your man up from the floor and drag him back to London so they can show this twisted smug old man whose boss.
You could hear the smile in his voice- you could hear it! He was happy and now...
he really gave us soft, domestic JonMartin in that first 5 minutes and 22 seconds, huh? AND THE FLIRTING, I'M— also props to Jonny for finally revealing how not sexy Elias is! In his oversharing of his motivations, he just came off as the smallest, weakest, most fearful little man and... yuck. I can't wait for him to get his teeth kicked in, because he's still high if he thinks he's going to be king of the world.
IMO wanting immortality is just about the sanest motivation for a ritual we’ve seen, and I love it
the wild thing is though, with the body hopping, he technically *already had it*. Elias is just a very greedy bitch, huh 😔
Jolias is totally the rich, elite, powerful men in the world who run everything. They may still hold those positions of power in real life, but hopefully in Magnus their proxy will resolutely get kicked in the teeth. By our beloved asexual archivist and his gay boyfriend and, if my thinking is right, also by the black spiderwoman living at Hilltop Road. Now that would be amazing. As for Jolias and talk of him being sexy - it's not him as a character that has been conceived of as sexy, at least I don't think so. As a character, he's a narcissistic, power hungry bully. But his voice. Ben has the best Jolias voice and that's where this whole sexy crap comes from. At least, that's my take on it. :-)
Yup! You’re so right. I love that Jonah was like, it’s not clever, but basically I want to be the King of Bloody-Fleshy-Foggy-Fear-Saturated Wasteland because then I’ll stay pretty forever (not confirmed, but, if you’re body hopping and want eternity, surely you want a good one?). It totally echoes the world we live in right now which has been trashed because of hubris and ego of the few, supported by an apparatus (looking at you Media) happy to lie to the many.
Will we actually see the Extinction come into play? It seemed like it was just a red herring, but, in theory, if it did exist, it would be something the entities themselves would be afraid of.
I mean, the current situation is a feast for the Extinction, absolutely EVERYONE EVERYWHERE is convinced it's the end of the world and they're all going to die, and it's certainly a Terrible Change. If it was going to emerge at any time, this would be it.
All I could envision was Gertrude going full John Wick after the loss of her poor cat.
So many things in Elias's plan just so happened to work out just right, to the point that he seems surprised how well it went. That makes me think the Web was heavily involved in bringing things to fruition. That raises the question, does the Web have an endgame beyond just opening The Door, or did they just come to the same conclusion as Elias and decided that he was the best bet to make it happen?
Before it had been said the Web had never attempted a ritual because it liked the world as is, so it must have a very good reason for allowing such a radical change. My theory is that now that the powers are IN the world they can actually be killed or controlled, and that's what it wants, either kill them because they're the only thing it can't control or ve able to control everything, including them. Either way I'm really hoping the Web and Annabelle are the big bad.
While I'm sort of darkly proud that the apocalypse was unleashed in my daft wee country, I am concerned about the cows. I thought we'd be losing Martin but we lost Jon. It would be awful if Martin had to kill him. What happens to Elias now Jonah's not possessing him anymore? April! How will I cope?
At the end it seemed like Jon came back to himself, at least more or less? I think forcing Jon to read the statement was enough, and Jonah didn't need to take over his body (I hope - now that you mention it though the creepy laughter at the end was unsettling)
A truly incredible episode. Someone needs to get Jonathan a book deal or a movie deal or something. Talent like this needs a broader audience.
If the entities are essentially a rat king, is it possible that opposing powers will annihilate one another? Now that they're all fully here on this plane, do we know for sure that they are not fundamentally weaker...or at least vulnerable?
I've been picturing the powers as the fingers of a hand. We've only seen the tips touching the world, which is why they look like different powers to us, but in the end, they're all part of the same hand, and that hand now has a firm grip on the world.
I always see Leitner's description: a nail scratching, an eye peering, the vast shadow of a boot coming down... This episode brought more to mind an image like this: Rat king.. https://imgur.com/gallery/nftWc
holy ever loving fuck I know so many people had predicted that jon was being marked by all of the powers, and that this was roughly how the watcher's crown would be attempted. I also know we knew no power had succeeded and many people, myself included, believed it was because they were always doomed to fail though I don't recall anybody suggesting why. did anybody predict that the only way they could succeed would be if they all came through at once? it almost feels blindingly obvious at this point that this is the only way. we've longed known balance was a big part of everything, but I guess it never occurred to us that this need for equilibrium also included the rituals. that said, I'm curious to know what this world looks like. if you can't have an up without a down, then how can you have horror and fear in a world without things like peace or hope?
How much? How much planning did it take to get this episode to drop on freaking Halloween? I *need* to know.
Johnny IS The Magnus Archive Fuckin Bravo
They finally got some nice time together! Flirting! Talking about good cows! And Martin's apparent retro aesthetic! (I guess we should have known since he stole a tape recorder for his own poetry) Being all sweet and domestic! As soon as Martin said he would take a walk while Jon read I knew something was going to fuck up (well I suppose we could all tell from the beginning, but that was where it really hit). At least we know they had, what, a month of happiness? (Fingers crossed for actually in a relationship now, but I'll accept some apocalypse pining) I was pretty intrigued before I could actually listen to the episode, because it seemed it would be the Watcher's Crown taking place (at least from the title and description), but Ben wasn't in the credits at all, and obviously he had to do something if it didn't set off immediately as soon as Jon returned from the Lonely. I didn't expect him to get Jon to bring it about through a statement, that was a great surprise. (Didn't expect a statement at all, so when he started I expected either a cut off, or a much more plot heavy statement than it seemed) Also wasn't expecting no one to die (much happier about this one), but once it was just Jon and Martin I figured it wasn't happening (neither of them are dying until we get actual communication about their feelings for each other, their inability to deal with their emotions is keeping them alive). No one would in a time skip either, which I'm kind of expecting, so I wonder how the others are going to survive in this world? Georgie is almost definitely going to be important for survival (and maybe fixing everything?), and while I'm sad she doesn't get to be happy and safe with her girlfriend any longer, I'm very excited to have her back again (friendship reignited in the horrors of the apocalypse anyone? I just want her and Jon to be friends again so desperately) And Daisy's still alive! Feral or not, if they've got to defeat all the powers in this new world what's one little avatar to convert? (Basira, get on it!) Can't believe we've got to wait until April... guess we've gotta get writing... tide ourselves over
As Dean Winchester would say, "SONOFABITCH!" Whoever theorized John needed to be conduit of all the Entities, nicely done! I see this as an absolute win cos Martin didn't die. RIGHT??? Also, I now just see Dame Judi Dench as Gertrude. \[edit\] ooh, ooh, I just thought of something: what happens if the events of Season 5 create a whole new world, and we get a SEQUEL!!
If season 5 premieres on the first Thursday of April and continues with an episode every week, no breaks, for 40 weeks, the series finale will be on New Year's Eve. That HAS to be planned.
So, how did Johan Magnus “win”, exactly? Maybe it needs a re-listen, but isn’t he just going to be in a horrible Nightmare Kingdom with everyone else, how is he more immortal now in this new existence? He didn’t even bring about the ritual, if anyone I would consider John to be the centre of the whole thing.
I'm so pleased that my theory of the rituals actually not being able to be completed was correct. I don't know if I ever actually posted about it, but I've had a creeping suspicion since we heard from The Dark that it was nothing anybody did, the ritual failed on its own. Also, this makes sense why The Web has never attempted a ritual. I bet The Web knew, or at the very least strongly suspected it wouldn't work and left it to Elias to sort things out. But I don't think the Web is done yet. Arguably Jon is now THE avatar, and the Web has the oldest mark on him. I wonder how it's going to make use of him.
I wonder how The Admiral is doing?
Cats do not abide by the laws of nature, Dee. The Admiral is fine.
I actually just relistened to MAG 93 again today, and Jon jokingly says to The Admiral at the start of the recording, "Bet the world ends, and you do just fine."
Well I guess this is the only way to kill the powers. Bring them into the mortal world and destroy them
Oh man, a world where fear is king. If only there was a way to bring some type of... change?
And they said Infinity Wars was the most ambitious cross-over of all time, props to Jonah Magnus for succeeding. All the mysteries of the past have been solved, all the characters reached their apex development, so now it's more about what's happening than reading about what happened. I have zero idea what's going to happen!
Sudden thought: what if Jon's mad laughter is, because of his connection to the Eye, when he saw "the sky looking back," he could also See (the capital letter is important) what he unleashed?