Adventure Time and Fionna and Cake Theory: The Victimhood of Simon + How the Series Might End
Prerequisite Watching for this Theory:
Adventure Time: Temple of Mars, Betty, Come Along With Me, Broke His Crown, I Remember You, Holly Jolly Secrets Part II
Gonna start this loaded theory with a bit of a hot take. I’ve never liked how Simon and Betty’s stories concluded in Come Along With Me.
For Simon, I’ve always had trouble considering Simon and the Ice King as the same person. Holly Jolly Secrets and I Remember You, the pinnacle of depicting the dichotomy of the two characters is built on us seeing Simon as suffering irreversible memory loss and how his loved ones can grow to accept that. The context is most apt when viewed as a metaphor for dementia, Alzheimer’s, or simply old age.
The scenes in which Ice King reacts so superfluously to characters desperately wishing for his old self to return are striking because of the cruel finality of his condition. Alternatively, the ones in which his loved ones hang around with him despite his condition are sweet in their own right.
One of my favorite Ice King scenes is in Broke His Crown where Marceline invites her girlfriend to meet her surrogate father.
Ice King: It's a present, to bribe you for coming over!
Marceline: You don't have to bribe us silly, we're here because we WANT to hang out with you.
Ice King: No one has ever said that to me before.
Ice King: You didn't say no takebacks.
There was a real poignancy to depicting an old man with memory-loss slowly having people come to accept him and realize that he’s still a swell guy to hang around. It may be depressing to see this good person who was once so unconditionally caring into a buffoon who could forget your name so easily and turn on you in the flip of a coin.
But even he deserved love from others. And in time, as a result of that love, he did improve.
Which is why, even in Fionna and Cake, I find myself still disturbed seeing Simon in his normal state and Ice King completely erased from Ooo. It kills me that Betty and in extension, the show itself could not accept Ice King as he was and felt that his best course was to undo it all.
All of his experiences for 1000+ years all of a sudden no longer matter, and the acceptance of his peers no longer mattered as well. He's just back to who he used to be in a world where everything he's known is gone.
Even worse, however, is remembering the wish that allowed Simon to be cured. The person who sacrificed her individuality to get that good person back, because she couldn’t accept reality as it was.
And I’m going to put a second hot take. A spicy one. Simon needs to take the fault in Betty's fate and Fionna and Cake (the show not the characters) seems aware of this.
Throughout Adventure Time, Simon Petrikov was never developed as a character. As far as the audience and the characters within Adventure Time knew, the only traits about Simon that mattered were: that he was intelligent, he was a kind man, and he loved Betty.
This wouldn’t really be a compelling character on its own, but when juxtaposed with the Ice King it’s a tragedy that he lost these traits. The compelling part of Simon was his victimhood to the ice crown and not really him as a person.
It’s why Obsidian’s version of Simon feels somewhat empty, he’s back to his intelligent, kind self but there’s no real hints to how he’s mentally adjusting other than that brief glimpse in Ice King’s robes again.
And he looks really weird in this special too.
Color me surprised when Simon Petrikov reads out the problems I've had for years about his ending while also making Simon into his own person. In many ways it just completely redos what we see of him in Obsidian.
He's still a kind man but even he can't handle being so maladjusted to a world so beyond his time. He's still intelligent but his passions aren't reciprocated, and that seems to have always been the case even in the past. Rather than a guy who doesn't take shit from guys like Marceline's ex or a first responder to his daughter's problems, he's a normal guy unable to handle the threats of Ooo's world even after 12 years of living in it. Rather than singing to large communities in bliss, he's a lonely alcoholic who can't even relate to his fellow humans anymore. He loves his adopted daughter but there are even some days he can't muster the courage to be honest with her. And most importantly, he doesn't seem to know how to live beyond his curse or his loneliness.
His mutual obsession with Betty is the only character trait of his that's ever had some distinct flaw and with this new show, the writers must have finally found a way to tackle the subject further.
Betty is ultimately a greater victim than Simon. She ends up in a far worse fate than Simon has ever been in. Perhaps more disturbingly, she willingly chose to strip herself of her individuality.
Fionna and Cake brings a contradiction to light about Simon and Betty’s seemingly perfect relationship. Simon and Betty's love is real and they do make each other happy. But there does exist a co-dependency that has worsened throughout the series as a result of their insecurity of letting a bad memory conclude their relationship.
Betty's patterns are pretty clear throughout her tenure as Magic Woman but not too much with Simon. Not until now.
In Jerry, Simon stops Betty from pursuing her dreams because he didn’t want her goodbye to be his last memory with her.
In Betty, Simon rewrites history and inadvertently summons her to Ooo because he didn’t want Betty’s look of contempt to be his last memory of her.
And through all of Fionna and Cake, Simon has turned into a suicidal man willing to resummon GOLBetty regardless of the reasons she can’t see him again. All because he didn’t want her sacrifice to be his last memory of her. Despite the fact that Betty’s final wish was to keep Simon safe.
There's also this uneven power dynamic between the two. Simon was far more accomplished as a professor with PhDs even if no one took him seriously. Betty was just a student offering some help, knowing she wouldn't take any credit for helping.
I’ll preface that Betty is a consenting adult in the relationship and made many self-determined rash choices that Simon would never approve of with full context. We’ve enough scenes to show that Simon actively refuses Betty’s help if it means endangering her.
However, Simon’s perception of Betty and his own inadequacy did influence her personality for the worse. Fionna questions Simon on two occasions about how strange it was for “someone she just met to drop everything to go with you”. Even within the flashbacks Betty verbally describes her internal conflict between her individuality vs. her infatuation with Simon and the guy never picks up on it.
Whether he’s aware of it or not, Simon always ends up becoming the center of attention during Betty’s greatest life-changing events because he’s always suffering in some way. And sadly in-character, Betty always prioritizes him first because of how sorry she feels for him.
Simon: Just hold my hand to your face, this will be my… last sensation.
Betty: Don’t be a wimp, Simon!
I don’t want to be too hard on Simon, his suffering is cosmologically depressing. An undeniable tragedy that no one deserves to be alone on. It would be unfair to say he’s being dramatic about something most if not any human would ever go through. He’s not a leech for desiring help, especially from his significant other.
But I do think it’s important to point out that he does have a major flaw in not reflecting on the consequences of Betty’s choices.
Fionna: Damn, that’s romantic. So, you got on the bus with her?
Simon: Yup. Uh what? No. No. Why would I-
This is the reason this post exists. This is the show explicitly telling us that Simon has never really thought about what Betty lost because he thinks his love was greater than the passion Betty once had.
Let's go back to Betty once again for what is honestly the most justifiable takedown you could make of Simon's character prior to the miniseries.
As stated earlier, Simon opens a portal to ask for Betty's forgiveness with a few seconds on the clock. And in that time, he essentially just unloads a giant drama bomb, trauma dump of his suffering leading Betty to ask what she can even do without him. And if the plan went as it was, Simon would've just left her a hundred questions that she'd never have answered for the rest of her life.
Simon: Just know that I love you and I forgive you for leaving me.
Author's Note: I dunno, isn't there something a bit off about how he worded this?
Now Simon didn't ask for Betty to jump into the portal, but he certainly was asking for it subconsciously. How else would he have expected a person who loves him dearly to act after this?
Taking any measures necessary and finding a way back together obviously. That's what he's doing too!
And reiterating again, this is the reason why Betty goes on her ego-suicidal quest. This is Simon's greatest mistake, his greatest moral failing as a person and he doesn't seem aware of this.
He’s not wrong that Betty lived happily with him. In spite of losing her dreams, Betty and Simon did love each other unconditionally. But he’s missing the bigger picture about how he could’ve been self-centered in deciding Betty’s fate for himself.
And maybe to stretch somewhat, I think even the quest to become Ice King again is somewhat motivated by his inability to live as anything more than a victim. Some of it is because the citizens of Ooo were being a bit inconsiderate about how much they liked Ice King yes, but Simon should be perfectly aware that Marceline, Betty, and now Fionna would be extremely concerned about him for doing this. Yet, he doesn’t really consider their feelings too much on the matter. He’s too used to the suffering.
Please have one scene with Marceline, I'd be sad if we don't get to see at least one.
This leads me to how I believe Fionna and Cake may rewrite Simon’s ending.
The key is in the episode Temple of Mars.
Upon rewatching the episode, I’m convinced that the Adventure Time cast had a greater plan with the Betty and Simon arc that just never came to be due to production constraints. A lot of Betty’s history and the deconstruction of her relationship with Simon in Jerry are surprisingly details that have already been told.
I thought it was an animation error that Betty’s glasses were different in Jerry but it turns out the continuity director is just that good.
The trip in six months, Simon stopping her, and the realization that Simon superseded her identity. Seeking independence from Simon is the lesson that Normal Man was trying failed to teach her.
Betty: I’ve spent so much time dedicated on Simon that I’m not even sure if there’s any “me” left anymore.
But the most telling detail is how Betty passes Normal Man’s test.
Finn: Even if you are a lost cause, she is not!
Betty: No, Finn’s right. You’ll thank me for this later past Betty.
In an alternate pocket reality, she changes her trip to the day before, preventing Simon from stopping her. And I think Simon will have to change fate once again to do the same.
If Simon comes to realize that he was the one who set Betty to her terrible fate, that all this time his rose-colored lens of their relationship had been detrimental then he could give her identity back. But it can’t be as simple as changing the moment Betty turns into GOLB or Magic Woman or even bringing her through the portal in Betty.
He needs to let Betty go on the bus. Alone.
It’s the only way for Betty to have her life back. If not for his Betty, maybe at least to save one in the multiverse doomed to the same fate.
They both need to cherish their time on the Enchiridion trip back when it wasn’t too late for Betty to go on the trip. Back when they were both equals and not tied to Simon’s needs.
Jerry is absolutely setting up something big with Simon and Betty’s relationship for next week and now that we’re going to the GOLB dimension, we’ll see how he remembers these moments again.
Personally, as someone who has been skeptical about Simon's peace for years, Fionna and Cake's second episode was like a sigh of relief. Simon hasn't found his ending yet, and my hope is that this epilogue will help me see the man happy without having to relive Betty's sacrifice for the rest of his life. Just like the rest of Adventure Time, it'll have to end with him cherishing the time he had with Betty regardless of the inevitability of losing that relationship.
PS. Isn’t quite strange that at one point in time, Simon sought after magic objects that ostracized him from the normal world and now, he lives in a house full of 1980s-1990s objects that ostracized him from the magical world? Maybe he was never really satisfied with where he was in the present.
PSS. I really wanted to write something on Fionna for the Ep 3-6 releases, and I still have the idea, but I couldn’t make it coherent due to how much my brain overthinks everything to the point of cognitive collapse. If there’s enough interest, I’ll go back to write it again.
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