"to the world". and that's the entire point isn't it. the sentence around which all of season 1, the actual story, revolves. their imperfect little world in which they live somewhat selfishly, dangerously outside of the rules. precious, peaceful, fragile existence. and they loved it so much. endless little things they grew to adore. the fussy little human habits. the food and drink they didn't need. the people. the people! even aziraphale, who tended to interact with them less, knew everyone in his little corner of soho. the world that they spend the entire story, in their own little incompetent ways, trying to save. multiple prophecies about war and apocalypse but they claw and blunder their way to success, and the earth keeps turning.
and now you look me in the eye and tell me they would be willing to let go of that world and each other so easily. that either of them would say yes, it's fine if they all die, it's fine if the love of my life dies. i want it all to end. maybe someone else will get a happy ending.
For a moment I thought they were going to spend eternity together in the cosmic bookshop writing the whole universe back in existence in the blank books...
ābury your gays?ā no we will do you one better, they said. ādestroy their entire plane of existence so they and their experiences and their history and their love for each other will never have been realā. get fucked actually
Some thoughts on why Good Omens S3 felt so disappointing from a queer theory perspective; major spoilers below the cut:
I wanted to organize my many scattered thoughts after watching the new season today, and try to put my finger on just what made the finale so disappointing as a queer story.
I find Aziraphale and Crowley to be queer in four major ways:
1. Most obviously, they are both male-presenting beings in love with each other.
2. They are magical/incorporeal beings that canonically lack human gender.
3. They actively work to counter the dominant systems in control of their lives to forge their own way forward (especially Crowley).
4. Their story spans countless times and places, weaving through different eras of history and prehistory and defying linear time.
In order to explain points 3 and 4, I'm going to perform the classic trick of pulling out Jose Esteban MuƱozās Cruising Utopia. Part of Cruising Utopia examines the concept of queer time, which MuƱoz characterizes as a time that is never fully arrived at due to its constant diversion from the status quo (which, of course, changes throughout time, rendering the queer experience ever-striving). Queer time is a continual process with no possible end, but one that is nonetheless carried out with hope and care despite its impossibility. It dovetails neatly with the philosophy of positive absurdism where, despite the chaos and cruelty of a random universe, the best thing to do is live anyway with all the love and kindness you can. This is a theme that is incredibly prevalent in Terry Pratchettās parts of the Good Omens book, specifically the storyline of Adam coming into his powers as the Antichrist.
Adam is constantly cajoled by a thrum of deep voices goading him to start the world afresh. The world is rotten and falling apart, they tell him. The only thing to do is destroy it all and rebuild it in your own image. Itās a selfish outlook, and one that is incredibly easy to fall into as humans with limited time on Earth. Thereās no shame in having this outlook as far as Heaven and Hell are concerned. But Adam resists with Aziraphale and Crowleyās help, insisting that the connections he has with his friends and family and the inherent messiness and complexity of humanity is precisely why the world should remain the way it is. Itās a really beautiful sentiment (and a very Pratchett one). If we all gave in to apathy about changing the world and loving those around us, then we wouldnāt be living much of a life at all. In encouraging Adam to make his own human choices, regardless of what Heaven and Hell (the status quo) want, Aziraphale and Crowley demonstrate a queer ethos and an alignment with queer time. They may never see humanity fully at peace, but they can do their best to shepherd them on that quest.
When God gives them the āchoiceā to remake the world in S3, it doesnāt feel like much of a choice at all. Throughout the book and the previous two seasons, Heaven and Hell are depicted as overstuffed, underperforming bureaucracies who often arenāt aware of their own goals due to the indecipherable power structures. All they seem to be concerned with is sticking it to The Enemy. There are some occasional scenes where they are seen punishing humanity, but never on a scale strong enough to show that theyāre actually good at their job of policing human morality (and itās almost always to prove their cruelty to each other, like when the story of Job ends up being a bet between the two organizations to see whoās truly the best. Humans are just collateral in this eternal beef). When Aziraphale and Crowley opt to āremakeā the world without Heaven and Hell dictating human actions, it feels like a foolās errand. Heaven and Hell were never effective in policing humanity previously, and so it doesnāt change much when they are erased at the end of S3.
Additionally, by doing this, Aziraphale and Crowley abandon their pursuit of queer time, no longer fighting against the status quo and essentially giving themselves up as sacrificial lambs. Itās admirable that theyāre willing to be on each otherās side so much that they will cease to exist, but it also means that their millennia-long pursuit of shepherding and loving humanity comes to an end. Itās a really hard pill to swallow for me, personally, and I feel like I canāt pass informed judgement on it with how short the scene was and with how out of character they both acted. (Itās extra heartbreaking to have them decide to do this under an apple tree and then never delve into the significance of that.)
The issue of there being no kiss is a really nuanced one. As someone on both the aro and ace spectrums, Iām all for different expressions and explorations of what love can be. Aziraphale and Crowley are really interesting characters for this since they arenāt human, and have been confirmed to be asexual/sexless beings. I enjoyed the novelty of the finger kiss, especially since Aziraphale has so many Victorian dandy-esque tendencies that could understandably lend themselves to such a gesture of affection. However, it felt incredibly flat and narratively unfulfilling for a few reasons.
Firstly, while there was potential for exploration of how an angel and demon might show their affection for each other in contrast to two humans, that was sadly never shown. Their love story was intentionally paralleled with a human one (Nina and Maggie in S2), so there was every reason to expect that they would mimic human social customs after living among them for so long.
Secondly, it perfectly encapsulates a major issue I have with the finale, which is that it is clearly a well-meaning story made by allies, but one that lacks any true queer substance. The finger kiss and hand holding happened without Aziraphale ever apologizing for his patronizing attitude towards Crowley and without him ever explicitly telling Crowley that he loved him. God states that They were always amused by Aziraphaleās love for Crowley ever since the Beginning. Aziraphale states that with Crowley, he was complete, but that that was taken away from him after Crowleyās Fall. All of this dialogue is clearly meant to be unassailable proof of their love for each other, especially when combined with the millennia of acts of service for each other. However, it doesnāt actually delve into the heart of their love, and fails to give it proper substance. The screenplay is content to let the audience know that Aziraphale and Crowley love each other without actually showing us a moment where the two explicitly verbally confirm it. Again, this could be interesting if the angle of a queer connection outside of human customs was explored, but since that isnāt delved into, the confirmation of their love ends up feeling rushed and unsure (and it never comes straight from their own mouths, which feels incredibly disappointing). Itās yet another instance of an issue that has cropped up in recent years now that queer media is more mainstream, which I like to call Being Gay Is Fine As Long As You Donāt Do Any of That Kissing Stuff.
Rachel Talalay, the director of this season, said in an interview that she, Michael Sheen, and David Tennant felt that showing another mouth-to-mouth kiss would have āthe same or lessā impact as the one in the S2 finale. Complete mismatch of stakes aside, this quote shows a fundamental misinterpretation of how to depict queer intimacy. Talalay says in the same interview that āthey [the fandom] desperately want [a kiss], and they can write their whole sex scenes in fanfic.ā In doing so, she equates showing a queer kiss or makeout scene with sexual activity, and subconsciously reveals that she feels that such queer intimacy is too āon the nose.ā This feels to me like a clear watering down of queer desire in the service of what allies feel to be āmore meaningfulā ā aka These People Really Love Each Other (We Promise!) But Not Enough To Kiss Onscreen (Donāt Be Ridiculous). Itās a sort of unintentional infantilization and refusal to let queer couples stand on common ground with straight ones. (You never hear this kind of thing being said about cishetero couples.) This stings even more because she, Sheen, and Tennant are demonstrably great allies to the queer community, but this interview shows the fundamental disconnect between well-meaning allyship and true, firsthand queer experience (whatās that Crowley said about the road to Hell?). Iām in no way saying that anyone on this show had malicious intent, but the subtext of the season and cast/crew interviews is still very telling of the storytellersā biases.
This is carried even further by choosing to reincarnate Aziraphale and Crowley as humans. In gaining corporeal, human forms, the queer significance of their nonbinary, magical forms is stolen away from them. The millennia of queer time they spent arguing and questioning and striving and laughing together is erased, and they are sentenced to a few linear decades of marriage, looking feebly up at stars they once created. I wonāt lie and say that it wasnāt touching to see an older gay couple have a meet-cute resulting in marriage onscreen. Itās true that thereās a beauty in the fact that theyāll find each other in every universe ā but we only see two of those universes, and they wonāt get to live in the one they helped create and cherish together. If thatās the case, then whatās the point? (And fuck that nightingale!!)
If you got this far, thank you so much for reading! I definitely have many more thoughts about the finale, but those are all the ones that pertain to specifically queer theory and queer themes throughout the show. Iād love to hear what others have to say, whether you agree with my points or not! (But of course please be civil. I donāt pretend to speak for every queer person. Variety is what makes us so beautiful after all!) Iām really bummed that this is how the show ended after years of waiting, but it does provide interesting insight into how queerness is portrayed in pop culture and viewed by society at large, for better or for worse.
This is an EXCELLENT analysis. Especially the point about allyship vs actual queer experience. I got so infuriated by that interview with Talalay and you've hit the nail right on the head of why that was so frustrating - not only does it demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding of the kiss in s2, imo, and of what a romantic story requires in pay off terms (any romance that has a 3rd act break up with an angry kiss absolutely needs a loving kiss to provide proper catharsis/resolution to the audience, just speaking purely in narrative/genre terms), it also seems to say that fans are perverts for wanting to see these characters kiss. And I didn't think of it myself so very much appreciate your point that it basically falls into the trap of seeing an expression of love that is very much an accepted mainstream part of het couples becomes seen as inherently sexualised when it is queer.
And whilst I can see the IDEA of it being beautiful that they find each other in every universe, one of my biggest problems is that this wasn't THEM, it was two people who vaguely looked like them and share one or two common interests. Their personalities, memories, experiences all gone, turning them into inherently different people. And yes, nice to see some older gay men who look sort of like characters I loved get together, but it had none of the resonance that the creators clearly intended.
And fundamentally, their failure to outright proclaim their love for each other, to articulate and make undeniable that they LOVED each other, and to address the ways in which they had previously let each other down/rejected each other/failed to understand each other - was just an absolute slap in the face.
Thanks very much for sharing that interesting analysis (and I've never heard of the queer time concept, will have to go explore that further!)
I wanted to like the ending of Good Omens 3. I really did. It ends ā as it began ā in a garden, there was a nightingale, there was a cottage in the South Downs, and before the universe got rebooted, Aziraphale praised Crowley as āthe best of usā to Godās face. I could go into issues of pacing, seeing the seeds of storylines that could have flourished given a whole season, and other factors at play.
But at the end of the day, the fact remains that Crowley and Aziraphale *died*. Without having time to fully reconcile, heal, and have joy together afterward. We are meant to take Asa Fell and Professor Anthony Crowley as the two characters weāve loved ā with all their shared history, memories, arguments, romance, sacrifice, silliness, and yearning ā as these two humans who found each other later in life and got a happy ending. And donāt get me wrong, Iām happy for Asa and Anthony, but thatās not Aziraphale and Crowley. You know why?
Because it feels the same as this conversation about Jobās children:
Michael: Those ones will be dead.
Aziraphale: Weāre notā¦ bringing the old ones back?
Gabriel: Of course not. But weāre giving them new ones.
the more i think about the finale the more upset i become realizing everything thatās wrong, hello what even happened today guys and how did i not see it coming
on some real shit, iāve put so much of my energy into good omens over the years and even though iām unsure how to feel about how it ended, iām at least glad there was an actual ending. it could have gone so much worse, or it could have been cancelled altogether, and i donāt know what the hell i wouldāve done if that happened and we didnāt get any closure. i have no clue what to do with myself now that itās over though. am i supposed to justā¦ what? live my life? go to work? pay my taxes? yeah idk about all that. donāt expect me to return as a functioning member of society for the next 30-50 business years while i process my feelings on this matter, thank you and good day
amandla
stormborns
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