idk i'm kinda obsessed with Monty. And Will.
Willtresor is something special. it's actually like a kind of drug to me, which might sound concerning but i've never been happier so i'm content in my
addiction :)).
I belieeeeve i discovered Nevermore in late '23,
when i clicked on a random episode during the manor arc and loved it and just had to go back to the
start of the comic and read the rest ✨.
i took that sweet sweet hit of nevermore and i never looked back
TLDR - basically Nevermore has taken over my lifeand it haunts my every
waking moment ~ ✍(◔◡◔)
also as of 22/09/2025 i'm a Gary Barkovitch fan okay bye
yea so i genuinely think that this little doll was a third of the (poppet and dolly group of whatever they are) and she was like the head of housekeeping
It's never going to not amuse me that Eulalie is Montresor's Number 1 Hater.
Because it's not like there's a shortage of Montresor Haters. Everybody in this place, except Will and possibly Ada (status uncertain while she is comatose but their last interaction wasn't good), is a Montresor Hater. I'm convinced that even Montresor is a Montresor Hater; I don't think that man likes himself at all.
And, with all that competition, it's Eulalie—kind, caring, gentle Eulalie—who will fly off the handle at this man at the slightest possible provocation. Entirely willing to square up at all times. Probably the sweetest soul in this place, and you've got her out for your blood. You done fucked up bad, dude
I've seen a few different people talking about Annabel's insistence on being called Mrs/missus, from an indignant sort of angle, and it's made me realise that we may have vastly different interpretations of Annabel's view on marriage, so I figured I'd throw my two cents in.
The arguments I've seen seem to be that Annabel shouldn't be wanting to be identified as "someone's wife." My counter-argument is twofold.
First and foremost, I say: it's not just about being someone's wife, it's about being Lenore's wife, very specifically. Annabel has demonstrated (and outright stated) time and time again that Lenore is the only thing that matters to her. Do I think that this is necessarily healthy? No, I think she needs some real friendships very badly, but that's beside the point. Every piece of Lenore, and of their relationship, is precious to her, as exhibited by her willingness to run back into danger to find her engagement ring in ep 138. Being addressed as Mrs. is a part of that. It's the only piece of her relationship with Lenore that she can lay claim to publicly, and wear proudly and openly, without giving up their secret. Therefore, wear it proudly she does.
My second point is about the way I interpreted Annabel's objection to marriage in the first place. The impression I got from the posts I saw was that it seemed people didn't think she would want to be identified as a wife. But, from where I'm sitting, that was never the problem. Her objections to marriage were entirely about how it would restrict her life, and change what she was and wasn't able to do (and what she would have to do). It was never about identity, it was about freedom. She never even implied that she cared whether people saw her as a wife, she cared about the practical consequences; the restrictions on what she would be able to do. Her relationship with Lenore is entirely free of those restrictions, therefore she has no reservations about being proud of it.
In conclusion, Annabel's desire to be referred to as "missus" makes perfect sense to me, and is entirely consistent with her character as I interpret it. She reads, as she always has—at least to me—as a woman desperately in love with Lenore, and desperately proud of that relationship, who will do everything she can to lay claim to it, so long as she doesn't perceive that claim as putting them in danger.
Because there is something special about Lenore. And I don't think it's a family curse, like she thinks it is.
No, babygirl, you said the curse followed you here. The raven didn't know the cause of the Hunt's interest, you just assumed it was the curse.
And the Hunt is the big, obvious question mark here. Why were they after her, specifically? I've seen the "the stag is Theo" theory floating around, and I also had that thought upon seeing it again after learning of Theo's existence, but, at least for me, that's a vibes-based thing entirely. I don't know if the theory has any real legs. Even if it does, there's absolutely something else happening too.
Because it isn't just the Hunt. All the way back in episode one, we were getting hints that there's something special about Lenore.
"Not you." And they could potentially be talking to either of them, or both of them, but they sure do seem to be focusing on Lenore there.
And then there's the vision she has upon entering the academy, where she catches a glimpse of the eldritch nature of the deans. Annabel doesn't see it. Doesn't seem to have noticed anything amiss at all.
She could be lying, of course, but I don't think she has a reason to do that. She was just chased by a hell monster and a bunch of talking, glowing orbs. I don't think she has a reason to hide seeing an eldritch entity, especially not when Lenore is talking about having also seen it.
And the deans also feel that happen.
And it's definitely that that they're reacting to, not just to the fact that someone arrived. They comment on it in Dreamland.
So what the fuck is up with Lenore?
I don't really have a solid theory on anything, I'm just raising the question. The only real hint that we have to potential answers are the raven's suggestions.
Of the three, Lenore being a returnee seems the most likely option (by virtue of being the simplest), but there's no evidence at all for any of those options as yet. All we really know is, something is up. And I for one can't wait to find out what
remember her picture in the deans book had long hair, so it would suggest she's been there in some way before. I'm guessing she may have gone there with Theo when he died but because she was only injured instead of actually dead she was sent back.
I'm back on the spectre analysis train again. I've done Ada, Will, and Lenore and Annabel, now it's time for Nevermore's Number One Hot Mess (a high bar, considering everyone here is a mess), Montresor.
As ever, please take this with as many grains of salt as you like. I'm gonna be picking at scraps and building whatever I can from them.
Monty's spectre has religious trauma written all over it. Like, we know he has religious trauma thanks to the fear hallucination, but by god it is screaming in his spectre design.
First off, he's literally a devil. That's not tied to his spectre category, either; dybbuks in real world folklore, as far as I can tell, are intangible spirits with no particular special appearance. I've mentioned before that it seems to me that a spectre's appearance is influenced by the way they view themselves, and we have strong evidence of that here; Monty's banshee hallucination featured his mother telling him he's had the devil inside him since the day he was born. It features him literally spewing up said devil. He's been told that he's intrinsically wicked, and he's internalised that. He's internalised that he's a devil child, thus, as a spectre, a devil child he becomes.
Even more specifically, his manifestation type is titled Son of Belial. Belial is the name of a demon, of course—specifically a powerful king of hell, with the power to induce sin in a person. The ultimate bad influence. And he is certainly being evoked in Monty's appearance; those facial markings he has are the sigil of Belial. But (if google has informed me correctly), "belial" is also an old Hebrew word meaning "wickedness" or "worthlessness". The phrase "son of belial" was (again according to google) a Hebrew idiom referring to a man defined by worthlessness. It appears in the Old Testament and, in more modern versions, it is often translated directly as "worthless man". You can already tell Monty has self-worth issues from the way he responds to insults to his character, and from the fear hallucination, but this is a clear indicator of just how deep those feelings run. How many times in his childhood do you think Monty was told he was a worthless sinner who would drag others down with him?
But he's accepted it. We can see that in the way he responds to being called the devil in the present day. Just a simple "yep". He's accepted that this thing he's been told must be true, that he can't change it. So instead he leans into it. Wears it like a badge of honour (even if deep down he still wants to be good, but we'll get to that in a bit). Thus, the chains on his spectre form. Now, they might also be a symbol of how he died; we haven't directly seen his death, but our most likely candidate is that he was tied to train tracks and run over. Thus, chains. But, as we've seen with Lenore and Annabel, features of a spectre's appearance can pull double-duty as both signifiers of a physical event and as symbolism of something else. Montresor wears his golden chains thrown around his shoulders like a cape; the thing intended to confine him and hold him down instead turned into an accessory, worn proudly. They accent the actual cape he wears, and in fact overshadow it in most shots; the cape is relatively subtle and unobtrusive, but the chains are always catching the eye.
The aspect of his design I find most interesting, though, are the ragged stubs of wings on his back. Because those say to me that Monty believes that he was good once. Or at least had the potential to be. You could argue that the wings are there because Belial was a fallen angel, but that doesn't necessarily mean a son of Belial would be, based on that alone. No, I think Monty sees himself as something fallen. Something that was once good, or at least better, and now has fallen to evil and had his wings ripped away. This, I think, is the manifestation of that part of him that protested during the fear hallucination. The wounded, pleading man who insisted that he wasn't gluttonous or stupid, that he didn't earn his misery. The son who asked his mother for help to pray. The part of him that wanted to be good, but was condemned anyway.
Now, there is one aspect of his character design that I can't quite pinpoint the significance of; the gold. It's all over his spectre: in his chains and his piercings and his markings, capping the tips of his horns and the ends of his wing stumps like dried blood. And it could be that it's supposed to be representative of holy ichor, especially in the horns and the wings, but i don't think that's all there is to it. I think gold has some sort of significance to Montresor that we haven't seen yet, perhaps in connection to how he got that gold tooth. It is significant, clearly, but I don't know exactly how.
So, to sum up the conclusions drawn here: Monty's been told he's worthless and a bad influence so many times that he's come to believe it. But he hates it still, despite appearances to the contrary. Despite trying to take the harsh judgements thrown at him and wear them like armour, there's still a part of him that mourns what he thinks he's lost, and what he could have been. All conclusions that could have been drawn from the fear hallucination, honestly; the spectre is just additional evidence that drives home how deep they run.
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