The point is... the point is... the point is—!
Great big S3 discussion below:
Free will! That's m'point!
Making this post to fully summarize my thoughts on and problems with S3. I got quite a lot of my opinions out there in my last few posts when I was fresh from finishing the finale and still feeling heated about it, but this will be an attempt to dive a bit deeper. Spurred on by a few of the arguments I've heard since voicing said opinions.
I'll be reiterating a lot of what I said in this post, as well as adding to it. So if some this sounds familiar, that would be why.
Lets start with the three biggest changes I feel that S3 made to the fundamental message of Good Omens.
These being its depiction of god, the logistics of free will, and the relationship between the two.
The topic of free will is brought up constantly in the book. Specifically in reference to the idea that demons and angels don't have it.
"But there was no getting out of it. You couldn't be a demon and have free will."
"And just when you'd think they (humans) were more malignant than ever Hell could be, they could occasionally show more grace than Heaven ever dreamed of. Often the same individual was involved. It was this free-will thing, of course. It was a bugger.
Aziraphale had tried to explain it to him once. The whole point, he'd said-this was somewhere around 1020, when they'd first reached their little Arrangement-the whole point was that when a human was good or bad it was because they wanted to be. Whereas people like Crowley and, of course, himself, were set in their ways right from the start."
From the very beginning this idea is presented to us, I believe, with the expectation that we're supposed to sniff out pretty quickly that it's bologna, and is even pretty quickly followed by the many examples of Aziraphale and Crowley utilizing the free will they supposedly don't have.
It's a constant truth and a heavy thematic device throughout the story in the book, S1 and S2. For the longest time, even Aziraphale and Crowley are in just as much denial of their own free will as they are of their relationship with each other.
Then S2 rolls around to mirror and reinforce this theme with Gabriel and Beelzebub. The Supreme Archangel and The Lead Demon of Hell's forces make the choice to abandon their 'purposes" and face no actual consequences besides those attempting to be enforced by their immediate peers/coworkers.
Like, what was the point of going out of their way to show us that Aziraphale and Crowley were NOT outliers in their independence if not to give us another example of the free will that angels and demons continue to deny.
Then you have Adam and Anathema. The entirety of Adam's story exists as an ode to free will in the GO universe. It's repeated to him over and over again that he doesn't have a choice, only for him to choose what he wanted to do anyway. That's the point of his story. Making your own side.
Someone had the gall to say that the existence of the first and second book of prophecies was proof that free will was non-existent, and never would be if people's actions could be predicted. They said this in reference to the second book especially insisting it acted as proof that S1 had changed nothing and the great plan was still in motion. They said that, when the entire point of the second book showing up and its subsequent burning was to allow Anathema to break the cycle her family was trapped in.
You can make the argument that just burning it wasn't enough, even by the laws of their universe, to really make any kind of change, but that doesn't change the fact that symbolically that was the whole point of the scene! Free will! She chose to live her life on her terms from then onward.
A similar argument was made in defense of S3's take on god and her relationship with free will. That the idea of omniscience as a whole cancels out free will on its own. That free will cannot exist simultaneously with an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent god.
This is where my opinion gets a bit harsh, specifically in response to some very rude DMs I received on reddit after reposting some of my initial thoughts over there. (My fault for sharing anything on reddit though...)
But please, read all the way through because I get to my point a bit slowly.
I think there are some people that have let their personal distaste for Christian theology influence their bias for this flip in the GO god's character, this new bleak outlook on free will and apparently the "only" way they think it can be achieved.
But the Good Omens universe has never been 100% accurate to Christian theology, has it?
The GO univeres is one where angels can do bad, demons can love, krakens exist and pins shoot themselves from their place on the wall because they want no part in the place they'd been pinned too.
It's a universe, based on and critiquing organized religion, yes, but also one where the antichrist can decide he doesn't want to be the antichrist anymore.
So why now are we defending so vehemently the idea that, no, yeah, free will never actually existed in the first place because of the stringent real-life theories of pre-ordainment under an omniscient god.
I've seen plenty of people make excellent arguments here on Tumblr as to why they support the ending that weren't just "durrr, god bad and free will not real", like the very outspoken few that sparked me to put together this post .
I'd also like to put it out there that I've never been this defensive in regards to any other piece of media I adore, even those that have also disappointed me. My gripes with the finale have very little to do with whether or not I liked it.
When S3 was finally announced, I was prepared from the get-go to potentially dislike how things would go. That's always a possibility with the series we love, especially when they fall into the hands of new writers for better or for worse.
There's a timeline out there where I even would have accepted a similar ending. Not liked it, but accepted it. IF the context leading up to it hadn't been such an uncharacteristic disregard of the story's original message.
In a world and story written to counteract the message of biblical fate and preordainment, how did it make sense to suddenly do a 180° and just follow the rules of it instead?
They should have kept god a mostly passive force in the story like they had been.
Because we never actually hear what the almighty thinks of any of what's going on, do we?
• Not when Aziraphale lies about his sword. (I'd like to think it even made her smile.)
• Not when Adam stops the war.
• Not when Aziraphale and Crowley dodge their executions. (Which I like to think she hadn't even ordered. That was definitely just the archangels doing their thing.)
• Not when the bet with Job is falsely won.
• To this day, we don't even see any proof of her being the one that fell the demons. We see the opposite, actually. We see an angel lie to her face and find out that she, and I quote, "never brought it up again."
Instead, everyone always speaks for her.
Which I think left the angels and the Metatron as an excellent parallel to humans who do hateful things in the name of religion and claim the moral high ground because they're just "following the will of a higher power".
All as a result of abusing their free will in the same way that humans do.
But instead, we got an arrogant, dismissive, nihilistic antagonist of an almighty.
And don't even get me started on the character assassination that took place in having Anthony "Don't test them to destruction" Crowley be the one to pull the trigger and decide that their world wasn't worth saving.
Not that the sytem needed to change. Not even that all the problems regarding free will that were introduced in S3 needed to be fixed. That it Wasn't. Worth. Saving. That it had to be scrapped and started over. The very concept of which Adam's story in S1 enforces is a bad thing.
Setting aside how things could have ended for Aziraphale and Crowley, whether they end up as humans, or had gotten an eternity together, the message behind how they got there being so backwards from what the series had been showing us so far is my (and many others) biggest issue with it.
It's okay to like the turn that the S3 finale took if you were one of the people who did, but it seems dishonest to embrace it as anything but just that. A turn, from the heart of season 1, 2 and the book.
