(CW: Neil Gaiman mention.) It seems that GO 3 co-writer Michael Marshall Smith has just published an article on Substack (a conversation with horror writer Lisa Morton) in which his work on Good Omens was mentioned.
The full article does not directly relate to Good Omens, but Morton asked MMS at one point about writing for/condensing the finale, and this was his response:
It is now abundantly clear that we (the audience/fans) were deliberately misled about Neil's involvement with the finale in terms of what happened following his "removal" from the project after the allegations against him came out.
MMS states above that all of them (he, NG, and Peter Atkins) have known each other for 30 years, and we know they have worked together previously. So despite Neil being "firewalled" (a turn of phrase that frames NG as a victim of the situation and seems entirely dismissive given the circumstances that led to his removal in the first place) from the production, it is more than reasonable to believe that his interests and what he wanted to have happen were being represented by these writers.
I'm particularly galled by the sentence above, "It was seeking--against a strong headwind--closure for beloved characters." Because Aziraphale and Crowley are beloved queer characters, and yet three straight men set to work removing every scrap of visible affection from them, acting as if the chemistry and attraction between them never existed, and denying them any chance at meaningful communication.
I can also think of nothing that embodies stunted emotional development more than deciding that "Better to erase all of history and everyone in it than to talk about our feelings" is an optimal form of closure. The question then becomes, closure for whom, exactly? This is something MMS conveniently left out of the article above, as his comments sharply contradict the sentiments coming from so much of the fandom. So if it wasn't closure for the characters (I'd say not) and if it wasn't closure for the fans (which it sure as hell wasn't), then who was it for?
Because here we are all, two months later, still trying to reckon with what we were given. Still trying to work our way through confusion, disappointment, through an ocean of duplicitous double-talk and seeking--against a strong headwind--some scrap of understanding about both everything that we saw on screen and what we were told by those in the know.
Yet the one thing I understand more now is that this finale was never for us, or for Michael and David, or anyone who was so invested in Aziraphale and Crowley. And what closure we have been left to find will not ever come from the finale writers. It has to come from ourselves...
