theaterguy105-blog replied to your post “Can I trust you?”
I absolutely adore this post! The dynamics of the characters in the hotel are so interesting! One thing I will say is that I believe Danvers is supernatural. She resurrects Duncan in the crypt before Moonlight Becomes You. She also appears to cast some sort of spell or curse on the Macduff flat when she resets it toward the end of the loop. I also believe that Danvers is loyal to Lady Macbeth first and foremost as you say! She's torn between love for Duncan and Lady M.
Thank you so much! Neither of us has followed Danvers for a full loop, only bits and pieces here and there. We both keep adding her to the top of our list of characters to follow and going in with grand plans then getting sidetracked every time. Do you mind weighing in on a couple of other things?
You say she’s loyal to Lady Macbeth, do you think she is working under her own free will or from specific instructions from Lady M? In other words, is it Lady Macbeth’s will that Danvers poisons and messes with Lady Macduff?
What do you make of the fact that Danvers sets up the pillows in the canopy for Duncan’s murder? Is she aware of what she is organizing or is she just generally tidying up and inadvertently sets the scene? Or has she chosen Lady Macbeth at that point at the expense of Duncan?
Do you think she experiences regret at any point during the show?
And because of her supernatural-ness, do you think she’s aware of the loops or is she under that spell like everyone else?
Thanks again for engaging. We’re both really excited about it!
Hello again! The first topic we wanted to discuss was Hecate and how everyone in the hotel relates to the seemingly gravitational pull around her. We will also discuss the tools of Hecate’s machinations briefly. As we were writing this, we kept being tempted to go off on tangents of other things but that’s the brilliance of this show and doing a deep dive like this: there are still so many elements left to be discussed.
In case you missed it, here is an explanation of what we’re attempting to do with this blog.
These opinions are entirely on our own and based on specific observations. We do not claim this to be a definitive reading of Hecate or the hotel in relation to her. Some of these things are also based on choices made by specific residents so significance can change based on that. Our hope is that this post will spur a discussion, even if you flat out disagree with us. We truly look forward to your thoughts!
Significant spoilers under the cut… It is our belief that the hotel is best experienced if you are able to go in blindly and would therefore encourage everyone who is newer to the hotel not read this. We will not be gatekeepers, however. The choice is entirely yours.
First, this entire train of thought makes the assumption that Hecate is controlling and manipulating all of the events in the hotel to her bidding. We think there’s a debate to be had about whether she has some goal or if her goal is just general chaos and eternal purgatory for the pawns in her story.
Let’s unpack Hecate controlling things more: It is our belief that this is the case. There appear to be two clearly defined teams within the hotel: (1) Team Hecate and (2) Team Lab Rats but there is also a third team of characters that appear to be either outside of her scope slightly in a gray area. We’ll call them Team Gray haha. There also has to be a discussion about how wittingly all of these people are participating, which we will also touch on below.
Team Hecate, in our minds, consists of Hecate at the top, the three witches (Boy, Sexy and Bald), Speakeasy, Taxidermist and Porter.
Team Lab Rats consists of Macbeth, Macduff, Lady Macduff, Malcolm, Duncan, Banquo and Agnes.
Team Gray consists of Lady Macbeth, Danvers, Fulton, Nurse Christian and Matron.
The Witches
The witches at first glance appear to be willing participants in Hecate’s plot. However, cracks appear at various points in each of their stories. All three of the witches appear to break down and reveal their true natures underneath the manipulative exteriors. The concurrent time for this is after the rave:
Boy Witch breaks down in the shower
Bald Witch, in some portrayals we’ve seen of the character, appears to be a wounded animal as she bathes herself in the apothecary. On the flip side, we’ve also seen interpretations where even in this moment, Bald Witch is manipulative and in control so there could be an argument that she is the only true believer of the three witches.
Sexy Witch appears to be in turmoil after the rave. Lennox saw Sexy Witches reach out to a White Mask for support with pain in her eyes only to be snatched back by Hecate.
Boy Witch also appears to let the mask drop in two other instances. The first is after he taunts the Porter in the phone booth dance in the lobby. During that sequence, Boy Witch lures Porter to him, flirting with him but then ultimately literally throwing him away and leaving him. Boy Witch then runs up to the Speakeasy, where he writhes emotionally on the pool table like he’s having a fit and also lashes out at a White Mask standing nearby claiming that “This is all your fault.”
The final moment where Boy Witch appears to let the mask drop is during his 1:1. After he lip syncs to Peggy Lee’s rendition of “Is That All There Is?” he has a White Mask wipe away his tears, taunting Porter who tried to do that himself. Boy Witch then pulls that White Mask into one of the phone booths, wraps the phone booth curtain around the pair of them and whispers some variation of “Last night, I woke with your name on my lips.” He kisses the White Mask on the cheek and walks out of the phone booth, going the mirror and collecting himself. We believe there’s an argument to be made here that he could just be manipulating the White Mask but that also feels like it could be down to how the performer plays the moment. Some feel genuine, others feel manipulative. We prefer the genuine moment because it makes his following actions that much more tragic when the hard shell comes back on after leaving the phone booth. He’s a tortured soul and that makes him a tragic anti-hero.
Speakeasy & Taxidermist
Speaks and Taxi can feel like the most on team Hecate out of everyone. In other words, they tend to feel like the most active participants in her plot.
We believe that they are also aware of the loops. One of the purposes that Speakeasy serves is to reset props. We like to ascribe the meaning to this that he is aware of what is happening and is encouraging those things to happen by resetting the props. He’s literally setting up the tools of the characters’ demise and there’s something very sinister about that.
The other quality of Speaks is that he seems consistently aware of the audience. This manifests in the moments when Speaks interacts with White Masks, i.e. the shot game and escorting people to the rave, but also the fact that Speaks doesn’t seem to look through White Masks as much as other characters do (we’ll get into this more below when talking about the lab rats). It seems to be a consistent thing that Speaks makes eye contact and seem to be aware that he has an audience.
Taxi has similar tendencies as well. Taxi seems to be the most thoroughly evil of Hecate’s helpers. This is brought into stark reality in his 1:1. His lines are taken from the murderers in Macbeth in the moment when Macbeth instructs them to kill Banquo. Others have written in more depth about the significance of Taxidermist as a murderer, including how it’s likely he murdered the Macduff child whose blood-stained bed you can see through the mirror on the third floor and maybe we’ll dive into that more in a future post. For now, we think it’s worth mentioning how Taxidermist also seems to be the most willing participant in Hecate’s game. Like Speaks, he never appears to have a moment of wavering in his support of Hecate. He also escorts White Masks to the rave and is particularly focused on either messing with or recruiting Fulton to the cause.
Both Speaks and Taxis’ 1:1s also bear the significance that they are recruiting the White Mask to Team Hecate. Where others attempt to protect people from Hecate, Speaks and Taxi appear to be actively in pursuit of more servants for Hecate. Both of their 1:1s include the White Mask ingesting something, in Speaks’ case a shot of whisky, in Taxi’s case a dyed-blue gum drop. In both cases, the characters also partake in the items and often “cheers” the White Mask beforehand. There is feeling that you are “joining the team” in these 1:1s.
The Porter
The Porter appears to be the most conflicted of the team Hecate members. He attempts to reject Hecate’s requests and also tries to save Lady Macduff but then he also does seem to enjoy messing with Agnes Naismith. Let’s dive into the moments.
One of the Porter’s most prevalent drives is his love for Boy Witch. The nature of their relationship is unclear but there do seem to be indications that they had a prior relationship of some kind. As we said above, Boy Witch seems to feel bad occasionally about his treatment of the Porter. After Boy Witch tempts then rejects Porter at the phone booths, Porter pulls a White Mask in for his 1:1. This 1:1 happens concurrently to Boy Witch’s fit on the pool table in the speakeasy so the significance of that can’t be understated.
Within Porter’s 1:1, he ashamedly and nervously puts on lipstick and then a wig. It’s debatable if this is a reference to Hecate or a nod to his sexuality. What do others think about this moment? He then clutches the White Mask, crying, kisses them on the cheek and thanks them, escorting them back to the lobby. The action clearly pains him. It is a haunting, tragic moment to experience.
In another moment in his back office, Porter draws out a diagram on a piece of paper. This happens during the first prophecy happening in the lobby. There is a reference to the forest, “her” and “her bar”, a ring and then most importantly “The Boy”, which he circles multiple times. This suggests to us that while he’s been conscripted into Hecate’s war, everything he does is ultimately for Boy Witch. We like to think that Porter joined Team Hecate to be closer Boy Witch or maybe even to save him. While in her employ, however, he regrets the things that he has to do. He’s made a deal with the devil. Is it worth it or not is the ultimate question.
One of Hecate’s 1:1s sends the White Mask on a mission with a letter to the Porter. The letter is asking Porter to find her ring, to which he writes a reply that he is unable to complete the quest, which he then instructs that person to bring back to Hecate. (More on Hecate’s ring later) He appears to be actively resisting her in this moment.
That fact makes his treatment of Agnes all the more confusing. He seems to regale in the opportunity to mess with her. He gleefully tips her suitcase onto the floor and taunts her openly. These moments feel incongruous to the rest of his actions and personality. Is this him temporarily giving in to Hecate’s power over him or is there another, darker reason for his treatment of Agnes?
There is also some discourse out there that Porter has ties to Norman Bates. His 1:1 has a Psycho-ish quality to it when viewed through that lens. The Porter’s job is also obviously reminiscent to Norman’s job in the film. Others have written about how there is a reference to a missing girl in his office, the indication then being that he murdered her, a la Norman Bates. We have not seen this news clipping but felt that it was worth mentioning. This reading of him adds another level to his story and we love it.
He does attempt to save Lady Macduff. He tries to stop Danvers from poisoning her with the blue milk. But, he is tragically unsuccessful in saving her. He is distracted by the White Mask bringing Hecate’s letter about finding her ring and is writing the letter back to Hecate. By the time he is finished, Lady Macduff is dead. Despite his best intentions to be good, Hecate thwarts him once again.
He is ultimately all the more tragic for that reason.
Tears in Relation to Hecate’s Power
Tears seem to be particularly significant to Hecate’s control over her subordinates. There is a sequence of events where tears seem to be the main focus. It begins with Agnes coming to the rep bar after being sent there by the Porter. Agnes comes to the rep bar and timidly sits at the table with Hecate. After a series of manipulations, Agnes begins to cry and Hecate harvests her tears into a small vial. Agnes then storms out of the rep bar, leaving Hecate apparently gleeful at her success with Agnes.
This has clearly been Hecate’s intention all along so what exactly does Hecate gain by harvesting Agnes’s tears? Clearly, she is gaining control over Agnes but we are unclear in what way. This moment happens at the end of the narrative loop so is it Hecate’s way of keeping everyone stuck in this never-ending, ever-repeating hell-scape?
Hecate then feeds Agnes’s tears to Speaks, and also gives him the necklace to reset. Hecate then pulls a White Mask in for a 1:1. This 1:1 is the letter to the Porter asking him to bring her her ring. At the beginning of the 1:1, Hecate fees the White Mask a vial of tears (really likely salt water) that is identical to the one she fed to Speaks. She then asks if she can trust you, smiles when you nod yes and gives you the letter to the Porter. She also tells you to hurry back.
Therefore, the question becomes what is the significance of tears to Hecate’s power? Clearly they have something to do with working for Hecate. Also, whose tears does she feed the White Mask in the 1:1? Can they be anyone’s tears? Or should we assume that they are Porter’s because you are about it to manipulate him?
As I said, this sequence of events happens at the very end of the narrative loop. Speaks does have an interaction with Agnes toward the beginning of the loop. It happens right before Boy Witch storms in for his fit on the pool table after taunting the porter. Boy Witch screams at Agnes to get out as he walks in. But before that, the interaction between Agnes and Speaks is tame. He offers her a drink and not much else happens. Therefore, there’s no pay off to Hecate feeding Speaks Agnes’s tears. Unless we are missing something and someone can illuminate us on this. Possibly, Speaks was about to manipulate Agnes further but Boy Witch interrupted that with his outburst?
Hecate also appears to fake tears during her lip sync to Tony Bennett’s rendition of “If That’s All There Is?” that happens concurrently to Boy Witch’s lip sync in the lobby. There is an argument to be made that Hecate is acting out the lip sync as a marionette for Boy Witch. He cries, though the tears appear to be fake, perhaps because she cries. If Hecate is controlling Boy Witch, in this moment, the only person it could be to manipulate is Porter, who watches longingly and tragically from a distance. This feeds into the idea that the way Hecate keeps Porter’s loyalty is through Boy Witch.
Regarding the tears, Hecate’s tears appear to be fake and Boy Witch’s are as well. He does cry real tears, encouraged by something Porter wipes under Boy Witch’s eyes before the start of the lip sync (Vicks Vaporub?). But after the lip sync, Boy Witch uses the tears to manipulate Porter when he selects a White Mask to wipe them off instead of allowing Porter to do it.
There is discourse that witches can’t cry, which adds another level to all of this. There is something intrinsically human about crying so the fact that Hecate uses tears to manipulate both her servants and the people she is torturing makes it feel that by accepting the tears, you are signing a deal with the devil.
We also think it’s worth discussing salt, bible verses, holy water and mirrors in relation to magical powers but feel like that would be going on too much of a tangent in this post.
Hecate’s Ring
Hecate’s lost ring is a big motif in the story. As mentioned above, Hecate implores Porter to find her ring, to which he replies that he cannot. Hecate’s third 1:1 is her telling the White Mask to find her ring. In the past, the ring did actually exist. The ring is no longer a prop to be found and returned to her. When the ring did exist and could be found, people reported if they returned the ring to her it would unlock significant interactions for future trips but no one has said publicly what those were.
We have two questions about this ring: what is the significance of the ring to Hecate and what is the significance of the fact that the ring is something that can never be found?
Is the ring something that Hecate genuinely cares about? Or, is it just another thing she is using to manipulate people? Has she just sent Porter and the White Masks who get her 1:1 on a wild goose chase, essentially perpetuating their existence in purgatory, knowing that the ring doesn’t exist? Or, does she still believe the ring is out there and genuinely want someone to find it?
We don’t have answers to these questions. We’d love to hear others’ thoughts about them.
Next, let’s look at Team Lab Rats.
Team Lab Rats
There is a sense that the Macbeth characters excluding the witches are Hecate’s toys that she is playing with. What is her goal? Is it just straight chaos? Or is there some deeper meaning to what she is doing?
Whatever the goal, it is clear that she rejoices in the downfalls of the characters. It is Hecate’s design that the witches manipulate everyone. Macbeth is the clearest victim of this but let’s look at the other characters as well. The significance can’t be lost that each witch dances with another one of these characters at the ball:
Bald Witch dances with Banquo, implanting the first seed that leads Banquo astray
Sexy Witch dances with Macduff, distracting him so that he doesn’t notice Lady Macduff being poisoned by Danvers
Boy Witch dances with Malcolm, seemingly poisoning him so that he has to run up to the detective agency to give himself the antidote, therefore missing Lady Macbeth poisoning Duncan so that he falls into a deep sleep in the canopy bed, making it easier for Macbeth to murder him. Malcolm, in his 1:1 talks about seeing signs that Duncan will die but Boy Witch’s distraction causes him to arrive too late.
The witches continue to manipulate Banquo after the ball as well. All three follow him up to the lobby, where he receives a letter from Porter. Sexy Witch then seduces him, eventually kissing him, sending him into a deep sleep, from which is woken by Bald Witch shortly after. He never truly recovers from that, however, making him easier prey for Macbeth’s aggression.
Macbeth’s downfall is obvious. The witches give him two prophecies: the first in the lobby telling him that he will be Thane of Cawdor and eventually king. The second is the rave in the rep bar, predicting his demise when Birnam Wood comes to Dunsinane.
Macbeth’s downfall is also encouraged by Lady Macbeth, a point we will discuss below.
As we’ve already discussed, Agnes is also manipulated by Hecate. Agnes has come to Gallow Green looking for her missing sister, Grace. She is then sent on a wild goose chase to find her. One stop is see Malcolm, the detective, who appears to have already been tasked with finding Grace by some other unknown person. Is this another of Hecate’s machinations, perhaps carried out by one of her surrogates or by herself before the events that take place in the show? Or is there another unknown person looking for Grace for some unknown reason? Does anyone have thoughts about this?
In the middle of this interaction between Agnes and Malcolm, an obvious spell takes hold of them, making them seemingly fall in love with each other. It’s all clearly a ruse cooked up by Hecate, however, and is meant to distract both of them from their quests and Malcolm from realizing that Duncan is about to be murdered.
Agnes does seem to have some resistance left over to resist Hecate as she breaks free from the spell and runs away from Malcolm. She also attempts to protect those she brings into 1:1 by giving them a locket that contains a bible verse. This small resistance makes her capitulation towards the end of the loop all the more tragic.
Macduff and Lady Macduff are, in our opinion, the most tragic characters in the hotel. How many times have we said tragic in this post? We don’t follow them often, mainly because we find them too depressing. We already discussed earlier how they are all manipulated by witches. We discuss later on how Danvers torments Lady Macduff but here we’ll mentioned that Lady Macduff seems to foresee her own death so her connection to supernatural comes into the focus there.
We could do a whole discussion of the loops, and probably will, but the consensus is that the narrative loop begins after the Hitchcock Suite ends. So, if you’re looking at the Macduffs, in that moment, Lady Macduff has just made her way up to the Macduff apartment and climbs up onto the bookshelf, apparently in a distraught trance. Macduff also “wakes up” alone at the beginning of his loop literally under the door and makes his way to Lady Macduff to try to comfort her and tell that it was all a dream and that she shouldn’t worry. They both appear to have just woken up from a nightmare but the tragedy is that their nightmare is just beginning again.
In our opinion, you could either choose to believe that for some reason the Macduffs begin their loop far later than every other character - i.e. halfway through the end of their follow dance on the couches of their living room - or you can choose to look at it with the view that Lady Macduff begins with her waking up from her own murder, as though she waking up from the prediction of her own murder. The beginning of her loop, therefore is her distraught over the horror that is to come. She allows herself to forget about it momentarily when soothed by Macduff but is plunged into despair quickly again when she is poisoned at the ball.
She also predicts her own murder in her 1:1 and, like a few other characters, attempts to protect the person in her 1:1 with the packet of salt wrapped in a bible verse. Again, it will be significant to discuss the effectiveness of these items at a later date.
Team Gray
This is the group of characters that don’t clearly fit into either of the above categories. Let’s take them one by one.
Lady Macbeth is in this gray area for us because the reasons behind her actions seem to be slightly gray. We can see the argument that she is team Hecate and we could also see the argument that she is acting on her own accord with a nefarious goal.
There does appear to be a consensus that Lady Macbeth was formerly a patient at the King James Sanatorium. There are patient files for her on the 5th floor and it makes sense that she would choose to go back to the sanatorium when she’s lost everything at the end of her loop; it’s the only place she has left.
She also appears to be connected to the supernatural. We think it’s debatable whether she is being controlled by Hecate or acting of her own volition. Does anyone have strong opinions either way? We do also think that is an argument to be made if she is a witch herself or not. This particularly comes into question when she appears to summon the witches to her to start the ball. She kneels down before the music starts and motions like she’s conjuring the ball. The three witches then descend on her. She will then generally kiss all three in turn.
The fact she also works to convince Macbeth to kill Duncan could suggest that she is working with Hecate as well.
However, despite all of these signs, it still feels to us like she still has her own agency and can therefore makes her own choices in a way a lot of the other team Hecate characters appear not to. What do you all think about this?
Mrs Danvers also falls into a similar category as Lady Macbeth for us. She is definitely working toward similar goals as Hecate - poisoning Lady Macduff and helping Lady Macbeth poison Duncan - but she also feels completely in control of her own actions. If Danvers is working for anyone, the assumption must be that it is Lady Macbeth since Danvers gives Lady Macbeth the poisoned whisky for Duncan. Danvers, unlike Lady Macbeth, does not feel to us like she possesses any magical ability or interact with the supernatural.
We also don’t think you can overlook the fact that neither Lady Macbeth or Danvers interact with Hecate. Despite Hecate having pull throughout the hotel, all of the other characters who are operating based on Hecate’s orders physically interact with her at some point.
Whose orders is Danvers operating under in poisoning Lady Macduff? It serves the bigger goal that Hecate has for the Macbeth characters but feels separate to the other chaos Hecate is enacting within the hotel. We will also discuss the implications of Hitchcock’s and Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca on the plot of SNM in a later post. We will mention here that there are, in our opinion, leftovers of the second Mrs de Winter’s character in Lady Macduff, particularly when it comes to Danvers’ torment of her and Lady Macbeth possesses Rebecca-like qualities in a number of ways. We’ll dig into that in a later post.
A note about a specific performance here: Ross saw one performer as Lady Macbeth act very annoyed when Lady Macduff interrupted her with Duncan. That performer then motioned to Danvers, who was bringing her the poisoned whisky as though to say “Deal with that.” That could be one interpretation, that that is the moment when Danvers chooses to zone in on Lady Macduff.
We believe based on all of this that while Lady Macbeth and Danvers are acting upon their individual goals.
It bears mentioning that Danvers also has a relationship with Duncan. There appears to be a Mrs Danvers/Maxim de Winter-style relationship going on. We believe that Danvers is in love with Duncan and Lady Macbeth, similar to how Mrs Danvers acts in Rebecca. The romantic feelings for Duncan do appear to be one-sided. We like to believe that the druggy, slowed-down version of “Moonlight Becomes You” by Bing Crosby to which Danvers and Duncan dance is a daydream of Danvers’. We could also see the argument that it is a machination of Hecate’s, in the same style as the interaction between Malcolm and Agnes. However, we like the interpretation more that Danvers is daydreaming this moment with Duncan.
Fulton falls into a similar category to Agnes but he still feels slightly outside of the actions happening within the hotel. On a logistical basis, Fulton’s primary function seems to be as an observer of the carnage in order to direct audience members to the big moments, in a similar way to Speakeasy resetting props. For example, Fulton observes the rave, the Macbeth fight in their bedroom and Banquo’s ghost walking down High Street. His presence draws an audience after him and therefore directs them to not miss those moments.
This also serves a story purpose, however. Fulton is a pious man attempting to cleanse the town of sinister forces, while also inadvertently accidentally falling into them. These moments are, for example, when he finds Sexy Witch in the mortuary, when Taxidermist targets him and when he goes for a drink in the Speakeasy. He continuously attempts to resist and, like Agnes, gives the White Mask who gets his 1:1 a talisman that he says is to protect them from the evil in the hotel, but despite his best intentions, he does get swept up in the goings on in Gallow Green.
Fun story: Lennox had Fulton’s 1:1 one time wearing a mask that had a Hecate kiss on it. That Fulton performer didn’t seem to notice the kiss until after he’d pulled Lennox into the room. He grabbed the holy water, turned around and only then did he notice the kiss. He jumped back and then flung the holy water at Lennox. It was hilarious. Poor Fulton.
We’ve placed him in the gray category because it doesn’t feel like Hecate knows about him or is targeting him like she is the other dolls in her playhouse. It is our opinion that Taxidermist’s targeting of Futon is Taxidermist’s choice and not part of some bigger plot. We could see it being the case that Taxidermist is trying to recruit Fulton - even though he is going about in an extremely poor way, if that’s the case. We don’t know about you guys, but we don’t try to beat up the people we would like to be friends with.
We will look into the Paisley Witch Trials in a later discussion post but the implications but I did want to mention here briefly that Margaret Fulton was the name of one of the women accused of witchcraft in those trials and that could have significance to Fulton’s role within the story. This is already so long that it doesn’t suit anyone for us to discuss that here.
Finally, let’s look at the people on the fifth floor in how they related to Hecate: Nurse Christian and Matron. It’s also possible to discuss this in relation to King James Sanatorium being outside of Hecate’s purview or not. We’re not going to pretend to be experts on the fifth floor. We honestly don’t spend too much time there but we’ll touch on things briefly. We look forward to hearing others’ thoughts about these characters in relation to Hecate.
Nurse Christian Shaw is also a character based on one of the participants in the Paisley Witch trials. We will get into that in more detail in a later post but for now, we’ll just say that Christian Shaw was a young girl who was the first to accuse the women in Paisley of being witches. She also suffered from “fits”. You can see these character traits in the SNM version of Christian Shaw. She experiences multiple fits throughout the loop. In the case of SNM, she definitely appears to be supernatural in some way.
She is also connected to Lady Macbeth. The assumption is that Nurse Christian and Lady Macbeth were patients at the sanatorium together. They were likely friends and Nurse Christian is still keeping watch over Lady Macbeth. She occasionally appears in important moments in Lady Macbeth’s loop, such as Lady Macbeth’s bath on the fifth floor and she watches over the banquet from the mezzanine before pulling a White Mask into the room off of the mezzanine where she implores them to look after Lady Macbeth. She also resets Lady Macbeth’s clothing after the bath.
For these reasons and the fact that she doesn’t appear to have any connection to Hecate, we’ve placed her in Team Gray.
Matron is another interesting case. She is also named after Margaret Lang, another participant in the Paisley Witch Trials who was hanged for witchcraft.
Sleep No More’s Matron used to be the Matron of the King James sanatorium. She has now retreated and locked herself away in her hut in the corner. We love the idea that Matron stops the loops repeating by finally agreeing to leave the forest with Nurse. We think that we could spend another (couch) 5,000 words talking about the loops and peoples’ places in them and what breaks the repeating cycle and we probably will at some point. All that we’re going to say here is that Matron seems to have retreated into the hut to protect herself.
Matron is supernatural-sensitive. She likely has visions, based on the fit she has in her 1:1, and appears to want to protect the White Mask from the horrors happening in the hotel. It is a brave act that she chooses to step out of the hut and that is why we like the idea that she somehow prompts a break in the repeating loops. This is also encouraged by the fact that she looks all around her as she is walking downstairs, horrified by the destruction, almost like she is waking up from a nightmare.
In Conclusion
We need to get a life... Just kidding… Well sorta not…
But we are really intrigued by everything we’ve discussed above. We hope that others will join in on the discussion because we think this could add more to the fandom beyond just cast lists and whispered questions. Truly, no opinions are unwelcome. You can submit them to us privately, reply here or send us asks (anonymous or otherwise) and we’ll post them.
We’re curious. For people who plan out their trips in advance, how do you decide what you’re going to do? Is it always just characters or do you ever plan “themed” nights? We’ve considered doing a “murder mystery night” with Duncan, Malcolm and Banquo. We’ve also thought about structuring them around seeing all sides of a particular character’s story. An Agnes night, for example, would focus on Agnes, Hecate, Fulton and Porter.
We’re just wondering if anyone else thinks like this.
We are Ross and Lennox, two dudes* (*We are not dudes) who have been lurking for a while and just really want to add something to the conversation finally.
In all seriousness, though, we see this being a discussion blog! We would really love to do a deeper dive into the complex levels of content and meaning Sleep No More has to offer. We really love going back through the backlogs of old discourse and would love to try to bring that back. We have the itch to discuss the deeper meanings and we hope others are interested as well. We’ve been screaming into the void of our texts to each other about all of these things for a long time and would love to hear other opinions and readings of the things we’re interested in.
We really want this blog to be an inclusive and shared experience. We are not experts and, let’s be honest, we don’t think it’s possible for anyone to be entirely an expert of the show. It’s the most complex onion and as you pull back each layer it only raises more questions. We have created a list of topics we’re interested in discussing and will create posts to prompt those topics and really hope that you all will feel motivated to jump in with your own experiences and opinions. You can do that by replying to the post, sendings us messages (anon or otherwise) or chatting us.
We would also love to encourage people to either submit topics to us or create their own posts. Don’t feel like you have to write an essay like we’ve done. We just really hope this is either and outlet or a catalyst for further discussions.
Now for a few disclaimers: we will get into spoiler territory. Anything that is a spoiler, we will post under a cut. We acknowledge that the tumblr fandom has a definite anti-spoiler stance and we’re aware that we might ruffle some feathers. The reality is that all of this information exists somewhere on the internet and if people are motivated enough they can find anything out there. We’re actually both staunch believers that everyone should go into the show as blind as possible and just experience things first hand without trying to puzzle it out before you experience them because that’s how we experienced the show and feel like every experience we’ve had has been made that much more poignant because we didn’t know what to expect. That being said, we don’t want to be the gatekeepers of anyone’s choices and will leave it up to individuals to decide how they want to experience the show. We also feel like there is a desire among even the long-time attendees to discuss these things and we shouldn’t limit our discussions because we don’t want to spoil others. If you send us spoilery asks, we will screenshot them and post them under a cut.
We have only been to the NYC show so we should also say that this will be NYC-focused. We’re happy to post other peoples’ Shanghai topics. We just won’t have anything to add on that front. Hopefully one day!
Some things you won’t see on this blog: we will not be discussing 1:1s in the context of how to get them or when/where they happen. We will touch on the meaning behind 1:1s only in how it relates to that character’s overall story. We also don’t have a desire to post photos of props or quote 1:1s word for word. Again, we’re not interested in being gatekeepers. We just don’t have the desire to be that kind of blog.
The final and most important thing that we’d like to say is that implore everyone to be respectful of everyone’s opinions and be kind to each other. We aren’t all going to agree all the time but that is actually the thing we are most excited about. We have had completely different opinions sometimes as we’ve been discussing and we are anticipating that to be the case with these blogs but on a larger scale. If we agreed all the time, that would be boring! There’s no need to be dismissive or mean and if we see any of that happening, we will attempt to moderate it.
With all that said, we really hope there’s a desire for this type of discourse. We’ve really enjoyed writing the posts we’ve already started and hope people will engage with them.
First up, we’re going to discuss the mysterious lady in red on the fourth floor… Look out for that soon!
