Jackie's brainrot corner

20. They/Them :D {♤♡♤♡♤}

[eggedcadaver]

Good Omens 3 Thoughts (Complaints)

HEAVY SPOILER WARNING FOR EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENS IN THE ENTIRE SHOW

I feel like a lot of people hated the finale because of how it handled aziraphale and crowleys relationship, and rightly so, it was objectively bad, the finale handled their relationship so poorly it almost looks intentional, but I hated most of the episode, not just the very end, and theres a couple of things I haven't heard other people talk about yet, so I made an itemised list of problems to cope;

1. THE HUMAN THEORY, THE MOST OBNOXIOUS AND MOST UNIVERSALLY HATED THEORY OF THE WHOLE ENTIRE SHOW, WAS PROVEN CORRECT. And it was done in the worst way too, instead of turning them into humans with little to no memory of their past, the finale just makes brand new humans to replace them

2. Jesus had less than 10 seconds of screen time, no arc, no personality, no purpose, and then he just dies again. Nothing jesus-like happens, basically everything we see him do in the trailer is everything he does

3. THEY KILLED CROWLEY AND AZIRAPHALE AT THE END AND REPLACED THEM WITH LOOKALIKES

4. They had such little time and they wasted so much of it in the beginning with that ridiculous “Bentley gone to a gangster" subplot that nobody cared about

5. It was so rushed it makes the finale of the owl house look like one piece. It makes the second season of arcane look like the odyssey (Sidenote: i know why it was rushed it know why we only got one episode, but we dont need to bring up he who shall not be named and we dont need to forgive the production studio either)

6. Plot holes, plot holes, plot holes for days, How was crowley able to get them to the bookshop at the end of time if he couldnt do miracles? Why were the “murdered” archangels turned into paintings? How did Gabriel steal the book of life if she was with Muriel? If the entire book was burnt except the page of the bookshop that crowley saved why were crowley and aziraphale not deleted from existence? Why did crowley not just sleep in the bookshop after losing his car instead of the street? Why was whickber street closing down? Why did everyone leave? What “construction” was going on? Where are NINA AND MAGGIE?!?!? Why do they keep retconning aziraphale and crowleys first meeting by going back further and further? It doesnt make sense to say they met each other during the war and were on good terms when we know their first meeting (as angel and demon, not both as angels) was in the garden,

Where was Adam when the entire world was deleting itself?! He should've been able to sense jesus’ presence on earth immediately? He only lives like a couple miles away!! Its not even a problem of actor scheduling because he was in the ending, so his character was around the whole time? Why couldnt aziraphale sense him the same way Crowley could with Adam? They walked past the cafe he was in and just kept going, but we know auras are canon, and we know aziraphale should've been able to sense jesus’ heavenly aura EVEN IN A HUMAN BODY 

7. THEY DIDN'T EVEN KISS

8. Obtuse, lazy and downright negligent use of time travel 

9. THEY HAD A BOOKSHOP FULL OF THOUSANDS OF BOOKS WHERE ANYTHING WRITTEN IN THEM WOULD BECOME TRUE AND INFINITE TIME AND RESOURCES AND YET THEY CHOSE TO LEAVE EVERYTHING TO GOD AND RESTART THE UNIVERSE

10. They did worse than just restarting the universe, they invalidated every season that came before and the book by fucking with the longstanding presumption that the bible was accurate. They retconned the ENTIRE show

11. They found jesus (and resolved the massive overarching mystery that should keep you on the edge of your seat and on your toes for the whole show, the one that they put in the teaser, the equivalent to ‘where is the antichrist’ and ‘where is gabriel’) BY CASUALLY WALKING PAST HIM ON THE STREETS OF SOHO BECAUSE HE NEVER FUCKING LEFT OF COURSE HE NEVER LEFT HE HAS TWO LEGS AND DIED BEFORE THE INVENTION OF CARS OF COURSE HE ISNT IN FUCKING CHINA; or, put more delicately, they made the characters phenomenally stupid to enable the plot

12. It was painfully blatant that they needed more time. The first half was so obviously written by he who must not be named that it was a bit comical. Almost like they yanked him away from his laptop mid sentence. It felt EXACTLY like season 2. Then the story kept developing and the plot kept growing and the major story beats were still there, but they kept getting skipped over because there wasnt enough time and they had to establish the next thing. The style of good omens is artfully dense and they decided to keep that style and cut out all the time that was necessary to make it all pay off.

The story had 7 major plot points; the book of life is missing, jesus is missing, crowley and aziraphale have a complicated relationship left over from the previous season, the world is ending, heaven and hell want to go to war again, the human mob is tied up in the snafu because of crowleys drunken actions, and the overarching question of what is the ineffable/great plan?

(Honestly I wouldve been fine without an answer to that last one, I think the point is that we don't know and we will never know, not that, god is having fun watching it or god is making it up as she goes like the finale implied).

They resolve at least 4 of these in the most slam you over the head with a frying pan scene set in a Chinese restaurant that seems like they got an intern that was still really really into he who shall not be named to write it. It isnt resolved so much as you're given one sentence answers to all those questions rapid fire; the book of life is with michael, jesus is in soho, crowley and aziraphale are fine all it took was Chinese food, michael is deleting the world with the book of life because reasons, heaven and hell aren't going to war theres too little time and even less actors, aziraphale hypnotises the mob daughter into leaving them alone and god is just having a good time.

And again most of this happens in the span of 12 minutes IN A CHINESE RESTAURANT. Of what relevance is that location? Why not the RITZ FOR JESUS’ SAKE!

13. 6000 year situationship resolved with what the french call good morning

14. Nobody talks about this but crowley and aziraphales characters are completely stagnant after s2, they dont learn anything new, they dont change in any way, all that happens is that crowley forgives him for not staying on earth.

At the beginning of season 1, crowley is a solitary but free spirited morally grey demon that loves humanity, and at the ending he learns to open himself up to the company others, to be vulnerable and let people into his life and appreciate the companionship he has, especially aziraphale; aziraphale on the other hand, is a strict, by the book, black and white, everyone should just be nice to each other angel, and he learns that the world is more complicated than that, and he learns to be morally grey, and he learns that sometimes you have to do the wrong thing and get your hands dirty for the greater good.

In season 2, crowley starts having appreciated aziraphale as his oldest and best friend and realising hes in love with the angel, resolves to bury his feelings, hide his true self and not say a word about it so that he doesnt scare aziraphale away and so he can keep him in his life, (aziraphale has a track record of running away when crowley shocks him or as the show itself puts it, “goes too fast for him”) by the ending through beelezebub and Gabriel, crowley has learned that its worth it to put yourself on the line for love and confesses to aziraphale in spectacular fashion. Aziraphale starts off living the life of a newly freed angel, no more heaven and no more hell means he can be whoever he wants and he can do good however he wants, in whatever way the word good means to him (see the scene in s2 where crowley mentions aziraphale constantly calling to report his good deeds to him instead of heaven). And he ends the season choosing to go back to heaven and fix the broken system for everyone, to keep humans safe from meddling by angels and demons and ensure that armageddon doesnt happen again, even though he has to sacrifice his relationship with crowley for it.

In season 3… crowley is depressed from losing aziraphale… and he loses his car… he helps aziraphale anyway… and he…chooses to delete himself and aziraphale from existence to save humanity??? Aziraphale on the other hand is… overwhelmed with trying to good in a broken system that is heaven… goes to crowley for help… and says that all he wants is to spend eternity with crowley but allows him to delete them both even though its not what he wants because crowley gets to choose???? How did we get from 2 + 2 to akara? Their characters were subject to the situation around them but they learnt nothing from it and did not change at all, did not evolve in any way, if anything, they both switched motivations and then regressed.

I don't believe for one second that little Mr. Anthony “RUN AWAY WITH ME SPEND THE REST OF YOUR LIFE WITH ME PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE ID DO ANYTHING PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE JUST ONE CHANCE” Crowley would ever in his life say that he wants to erase the two of them for everyone else or that aziraphale would say something like, ‘nothing else matters but the two of us lets spend eternity together but only if you want’. Its just ridiculous

15. The ending felt like it was written by someone who has never watched or read good omens in any medium outside of a03. No offense to a03 (im also an addict), im just saying it felt derivative. (And thats definitely where the inspiration for the south downs human theory ending came from.)

16. I really wish they hadn't added God, a big part of the original source material was that God never responded, never answered, and was mysterious and all powerful and couldnt be ever represented properly in the form of an actor no matter who they were. Its bad enough that they threw that concept out the window, couldnt they at least have made sure it was the same actor? Why not use the narrator of the voice of god from the previous seasons?!!! She narrated s1, she was there for s2 in the job flashback, then in season 3 they replaced her with an actor in an oversized bathrobe. (slightly unrelated, but the second i saw her the first thing that came to mind was “met god shes black’” from miku binder thomas jefferson)

17. The book of life, according to the bible is not a magical record of all of reality in alphabetical form, it doesnt make any sense for the universe, or even like, a building to be in there, the book of life is a list of living beings, aka humans, aka things with a soul- that are *getting into* heaven. Its a naughty and nice list that God has, its not the embodiment of everything that exists, its just a list of those who will not go to hell when the second coming happens. Whoever wrote this shit, clearly has never opened a bible before, and clearly was not raised religious

18. It was trope-y. They resolved the plot with the most ridiculous deus ex machina ever, god literally comes down and fixes everything.

[inhonoredglory]

So about free will, oppressive systems, and the ending of Good Omens 3...

OK let's talk thematics.

Because one of the reasons Good Omens resonated with so many of us is that Crowley and Aziraphale were like us, people who've been traumatized by oppressive systems that forced us into corners and destroyed our sense of self, ability to love, our free will, everything about us.

Good Omens taught us that we can find healing and bravery to overcome that trauma by bonding with other traumatized souls and DEFYING those systems of oppression.

Adam in GO1 wanted to destroy the world to remake it better, but that's not an option for us, is it? We can't eliminate homophobia or transphobia, we can't eliminate the abusers in our lives, we can't eliminate corporations that pollute our environment and we can't eliminate religious institutions or political corruption or fascism or racism and every other awful thing out there.

But we CAN take their power away from controlling us, by banding together and declaring NO. YOU will not define me. That is what Aziraphale and Crowley represent.

As angels and demons, they represent revolting against the systems that birthed them and telling those systems that they REJECT the identity foisted upon them.

That is why Good Omens 3 doesn't make sense thematically. Because it takes this metaphor and says instead that the only solution is to eliminate the entire system and start again. Something that is virtually impossible to do without mass destruction on a global scale (for example, an extinction event that takes us back to before civilization and the patriarchy began). This is exactly what Adam thought:

Adam: “We'll get rid of everything stupid and start all over again.”

But Good Omens 1 tells us that this thinking is wrong. It is wrong to nuke the world to forge a better one, because individual lives matter and we can try to fix it.

Brian: “You're going to burn all this away. Why? Because some adults mucked things up? That's a reason to fix it, not destroy it.”

Good Omens was always optimistic about how, despite the fact that humans can destroy the world, we can also make it better.

Everyone in Good Omens 1 made choices, created their own free will, by defying god. Not eliminating god. Defying god. Adam, by rejecting his birth and parentage. Anathema, by rejecting her inherited role. Crowley and Aziraphale, by choosing to love one another (and what a queer metaphor that is, to choose to love as your form of rebellion 🏳️‍🌈).

This works beautifully as a metaphor because we in the real world can also choose to make our own free will, despite the oppressive systems we live under. Even if it's difficult, even if maybe we need therapy and support to do so, we can choose to reject the abusive systems in our lives and forge our own identities outside of them.

So when Good Omens 3 comes along saying the only solution is to remake the world entirely because apparently there is no hope under ANY oppressive system?? It's basically a pessimistic outlook. It's saying, no matter how much support and love we find, we will never have freedom from those abusive systems. (and maybe that's true on a social level, but on an individual level?)

Saying the only solution is to remake the world entirely removes the power WE have to do something within the broken systems we live under.

I get how Good Omens 3 works (sorta) from an atheistic perspective, and I fully believe it's the ending Terry would have wanted, but it just does not work from a Good Omens (or a realistic) perspective.

About the atheistic POV, just to say briefly: Does removing god actually fix all the problems in the world? Well, Good Omens already told us that humans are the primary drivers of evil. So god wasn't even responsible for that. And plus, it is humans who created god, and what we imagine god wants, and why we fight religious wars.

It's not god's existence that ruins society, it's the idea of god, and that's all humanity's creation.

So, no, eliminating god does not create a perfect world.

But!! Having free will to defy the oppressive systems that will invariably plague humanity is how you find freedom. Not a perfect world but free will, and the ability to act on it, is still how you define Who you are, that is how you defeat everything society wants you to be, how you CHOOSE who YOU want to be.

That is why Good Omens is so inspiring, because it speaks to all of us who feel oppressed and traumatized. It tells us there is hope despite what happened (and is happening) to us.

Good Omens 3 does not share that theme though, and that to me is the primary reason I can't get behind the ending.

[obsessivelollipoplalala]

I will say this, though: it's very clear that season 1 of gomens was intended to be the only version of the story when it aired. Gaiman may have had other vague ideas for a continuation in the back of his mind, but gomens was originally greenlit by Amazon for a single season with the assumption that this was all it was going to be. Therefore, season 1's ending of the world being saved and Aziraphale and Crowley having forever was written to be canonical. The fact that this idiot retconned things years later doesn't change that, when he did write in all those extra scenes of Aziraphale and Crowley throughout the millennia, they were written with the intention to matter. In the s1 universe, their time together mattered and never got erased.

I think it's hard to ignore official episodes for a lot of people (including me lol), but you can honestly say the happy ending of s1 can be considered the true ending and everything else can be disregarded, if you want. After all, the book was considered to be a standalone work for decades, and that ended happily

[eggedcadaver]

Institutions drill into your head that if you do every single thing they tell you to, and exactly when they tell you to do it, and nothing else, they can guarantee you happiness; a feat no other organisation or endeavour can accomplish; but the truth is that they guarantee you only a very specific type of hapiness, and one of the rules to being happy, is to desire the kind of happiness they offer you. "How are you ever going to be happy if you won't accept the happiness you're given?" But isn't doing the exact opposite the entire point of moana? They make it sound like what they have is all that there will ever be, I'd argue, as a genshin player, that a guarantee of dogshit isnt better than a chance at the lottery; and the entire operation is exceedingly cult-like to me, and all this rambling can be summarized by saying I don't like chapel seminar

[eggedcadaver]

Back in 2020 I used to listen to cavetown like an addict. A transgender addict, yes but still an addict. It's nice to revisit him now, his music is still just as good. Is that because I no longer think I'm a trans man, or because my gender is still ambiguous?

[eggedcadaver]

Procedural law is straightforward but it makes me feel stupid as fuck. Especially moments like right now at 1 am trying to cram for a quiz in a blackout. R would be so disappointed in me. But then again who isn't?

[eggedcadaver]

Tumblr is for shitposting right? Right? Am I doing this properly? Am I tumbling acceptably? I really have no idea, and sometimes I feel bad cuz It feels like I use this app as a private twitter account, but this is the only social media I have where no one knows me irl and I can just yell into the void

[eggedcadaver]

Dream blunt rotation but it's just me and no one else, please somebody give me some fucking weed

[necromancelena]

princess "complex"? hmph. I suppose it would seem rather complex to a commoner

[eggedcadaver]

[my-random--thoughts-deactivated]

[casgirl]

Starting a collection

[vintagefud]

[muffuletadiver]

[gayandasleep]

[robotmango]

when i forget to log into ao3 and i have to click proceed to see an adult fic, i actually get a kick out of it. like i am an old timey queen and my bard is apologetic: “gentle lady, dicks doth touch in this next ballad. would you prefer another?” and i give him a gesture of command like, “nay, you may proceed, minstrel. bring forth the tale of dicks”

[georgiasbrainstuff]

Anyone else blush when their fave ao3 authors interact with their posts? Just me? Cool, cool.

[eggedcadaver]

Hot take eggpreg >>> mpreg

[msunitedstatesjames]

Every Natasha Pulley book ever:

Bulky Man is unintentionally bulky, he's just sort of stronger than everyone because that's the nature of his life. Everyone assumes Bulky Man is violent because of his girth, but he actually hates violence and is really just the nicest little dude inside.

Fragile Dude is little and/or easily breakable. Fragile Dude is brilliant and/or powerful. He too is pretty nice, but he's probably had to use his intellect and/or power to commit some kind of atrocity in the past that he will be attempting to keep secret over the course of the story. This will be revealed 3/4 of the way through the book, but the circumstances surrounding the atrocity will be so horrible that everyone will agree it was probably justified.

Bulky Man and Fragile Dude are both dissatisfied with their lives to some extent.

Bulky Man and Fragile Dude meet through a series of unlikely and often unfortunate events.

Bulky Man and Fragile Dude are forced to work together in some capacity.

Bulky Man and Fragile Dude are both a little bit afraid of the other, but there's also some quality that they really like or respect in the other nonetheless.

Bulky Man and Fragile Dude continue to work together, but now they're starting to reluctantly take a liking to the other. Neither of them realize that the other actually likes them though.

Bulky Man and Fragile Dude have had to help each other out of some sticky situations by now. They're clearly head over heels in love these days, but circumstance and/or society is keeping them from acknowledging it. People have started to hint to Bulky Man that Fragile Dude is actually super shady, so you better watch your back. Bulky Man doesn't really care that much at this point, but he's like, I guess I better look into these accusations.

(Some kind of cute but unusually intelligent animal is usually involved with the plot and/or their relationship by this point. Also, there's at least one loveable child character that usually helps the characters bond.)

Bulky Man and Fragile Dude have a nice, cheerful break from all of the traumatic events they've been experiencing, which inevitably ends in a romantic encounter.

Because of communication issues or societal issues, both chraracters still don't actually believe the other character loves them, and they both act like it was just a one off thing and an accident and that everything is totally fine.

Things are awkward between Bulky Man and Fragile Dude, but the traumatic events have really fired up again so they still have to work together. Plus, they're both just that desperate to be together, even though they think the other character hates them now.

Bulky Man finds out Fragile Dude's secret, but usually he doesn't get it quite right or he's missing some essential information. Bulky Man is temporarily horrified of Fragile Dude. Bulky Man chides himself for being so desperate for affection that he fell in love with some kind of psycho.

At this point, either Bulky Man makes a stupid mistake while being horrified or circumstances just happen to suddenly get a lot worse or both. Bulky Man and Fragile Dude are physically separated, often by force and some kind of authority. At some point in here, Bulky Man realizes he was wrong about Fragile Dude.

A slapdash plot is hatched to save the stolen love interest. Usually Bulky Man has to save Fragile Dude, but occassionally the script is flipped.

Ultimately, the stolen love interest is rescued, though it was a real close thing at some point. The Day is saved, usually through murder/s, caused by a combination of Bulky Man reluctantly bashing some heads in and Fragile Dude using his wits and/or power to get the right people killed. Often, our protagonists are then forced to straight up run away from the Bad Times, leaving their lives and families behind. (The loveable child from earlier will either be tragically left behind or adopted by the now happy couple.)

Bulky Man and Fragile Dude are a little bit sad at the things they've lost along the way, but mostly they're going to live happily ever after.

[waltzingbi]

*me, literally sick with want* whatever