I have been a long-time Pirates of the Caribbean fan, and it's still my favorite movie series (Jack Sparrow is the best!!). But my latest obsession has become Good Omens, which I only discovered when Season 2 was about to release on Prime. Since then, Aziraphale and Crowley have become MY WHOLE WORLD. I may share a thought now and then, but mostly I'll be seen reblogging the fabulous artwork, GIFs, pics and other related metas on Tumblr. And most definitely ANYTHING that is a Pirates/Good Omens crossover!
Feel free to ask me stuff (message and/or asks) - I look forward to getting to know other GO and Pirate fans like myself!!
MY MEME CREATIONS
MY ART
Also, I've dabbled in writing some Good Omens fanfics and making fanvids (a truly addictive activity). Links below - take a look if you're interested. Still learning stuff, but hopefully improving.
Unfriendly reminder that if you're displeased with a piece of fanfiction your courses of action are:
Read something else
Bitch PRIVATELY to friends
Write your own take on the premise (strongly recommend!)
All of the above
Under no circumstances should you try to "politely" critique the author who put the story up as a hobby. For free. Especially if the story in question is multiple years old. Ao3 is not Goodreads
I’m going to try not to wade too far into Discourse here, because I want my blog to be a mostly positive and safe space!
But my basic thinking about GO3 after reflecting on it for the past six weeks is that I do still wish we could have seen Aziraphale and Crowley get a happy ending in their own universe (although with the way things were written, I understand why we didn’t) but also I am going to continue to find joy and whimsy and love in the story that was told. It doesn’t make me feel any better to dwell on the things I wish were different, and I also genuinely am having fun playing in the ambiguous-ending-sandbox.
I am also going to continue to find joy and whimsy and love in the stories that weren’t told, but could have been (AUs etc.) because that’s where the real beauty of fandom is to me. I love seeing art and reading fics and swapping headcanons and doing all of that with all of you.
I’m never really one for writing a lot of meta, so I won’t do that here, and I’ve also found a lot of the discourse around the ending to be really divisive and sometimes hateful. I don’t think there is one correct read or interpretation of the finale. I hope that one day soon we can reconnect and share the things we love about this story and these characters who mean so very much to us all.
I said this in an ask to someone who has a very different interpretation of the finale than me, but I’m going to say it here as well because it bears repeating:
Good Omens is always going to be about love, I think.
The magnificent🌟Esther Mitchell (aka EstherMitchell_Author)🌟
@emfandomitewrites
“My name is Esther Mitchell. I'm a multiple award-nominated author of LGBTQ+ Romance (mostly urban Fantasy, but also some SF). I've been writing since I first used a crayon to scribble a little "story" in the family bible when I was two years old. I've been a published author since 1997. I've been a fan of Good Omens since 1993, when I found it in the library during my decade of consuming everything Terry Pratchett ever wrote. I didn't find the fandom, however, until 2020, when I discovered the Prime show while recovering from cancer surgery. I love Good Omens, and the GO fandom has become my online home.”
And we are so happy to have you in this ineffable fandom, Esther!! 💗
If you are a first-time reader of Esther’s work, or are looking for some recommended reads, here’s some suggestions from the author:
“Anyone interested in my Good Omens fanfics should check out Born of Starlight, for definite. It's my post-S2/Second Coming-and-beyond novel-length fanfic I wrote in the aftermath of S2. There's both a PG-13 version (labeled "Standard") and an NC-17 version (for those who want the smut). Also, another favorite of mine is Under Cover of Night, which is a 1941 fanfic that fills in around the events presented in the show.”
You can find these and all of Esther’s other works on AO3
You can also find more at Esther’s website
Submit any questions you have for our Spotlight Author by Sunday, July 5. We will then share all of the exciting answers on Sunday, July 12.
Please fill in your questions for the author here:
BeccEEE/Becci Barnes (she/her) has been imagining and creating since she was very young, writing her first fiction as a preteen, and evolving into a true author upon her discovery of the Marvel fandom as a young adult. After giving in to temptation and diving into the Good Omens series, Becci immediately - and ineffably - fell in love with our two sillies and hasn’t looked back. Keep reading to learn more about what drives Becci to weave such lovely tales about our favorite ethereal beings.
We asked Becci for a “brief” glimpse into her life away from Good Omens 😁
“Brief? That’s a challenge, but I’ll try.
First things first: I am based in Northern Germany’s prettiest city - Hamburg ⚓
I consider myself a Person Of Many Hobbies. Writing and reading is, of course, up there, as you would expect. I’m playing and mastering DnD and similar games, too. It’s all about telling stories with me, it seems. I play the guitar, since I’ve figured out I’m not too stupid, just left-handed. And occasionally I dabble into other crafts like crochet and sewing.
A lot of my free time, though, I spend with various sports. I am a sprint/short distance triathlete and seasoned artistic roller skater, as well. Why fail at one sport, when you can suck at several!?”
That’s quite a lot of fun and adventurous hobbies! But wait until you hear about what Becci does for a living 😯
“Additionally, my day job is something lots of you have never heard of. I sometimes call myself “professional treasure hunter” which is the greatest euphemism to say: I’m searching for buried, unexploded bombs of World War II. Yes, really. No, I’m not defusing them. I hold a masters degree in geophysics and am therefore a specialist in detecting said UXOs with scientific surveys.
I’m also an expert in time management, because, let’s be real, all of the above wouldn’t be possible otherwise.”
That is incredible!! Searching for “treasure” sounds like a dream 😌 And quite true about time management - it is a difficult skill in and of itself!! So was all this real life activity part of Becci’s great inspiration to begin writing, or were there other factors at play?
“I wish I knew. I’ve been doing it for so long that I can’t remember what brought me to it in the first place. My sisters and I used to play with dolls, and playmobil figurines, and chalk on pavement - always making up our own stories. Later, I’ve spent hours over hours in sandbox games like Sims and Minecraft. It’s always been about creating stories for me, I think.
As for deciding to write for a fandom, I believe a big part of it is loving a fictional world so much I want to explore more of it. Not just consume, but actively dive into it, shape my experience of it and find new unearthed corners. What initially sparks my creativity the most, is the inherent feeling that there is “more” underneath the source. Either an untold romance, or a hidden friendship. Or maybe a What If. Sometimes it’s a cut that makes me feel like there is a missing scene, or an object that makes me wonder how it got there. That’s the reason why I tend to start with canon-compliant/canon-divergent stories first, when I enter a new fandom. Exploring (or sometimes creating) a deeper layer to the thing I fell in love with.”
Fandom can be so very inspiring, and it’s clear that Good Omens has been a great influence for many to begin creating. Becci tells us about how the world of our two ineffables came into her life:
“I have to thank my best friend for that. I’ve known them since middle school, they introduced me to Tumblr as well, and they were a David Tennant fan long before I was. They watched Good Omens first, came sliding into my DMs and basically BEGGED me to watch it. Which I did eventually. Can’t thank them enough for it. They’re responsible for at least half of my Good Omens fics (including my best works) and we often bounce headcanons, ideas or concepts around in our chat. They’re the only one I’m sharing my unfiltered, unpolished, first draft smut with and I gifted them a NSFW Patreon membership for their birthday. Try explaining that kind of relationship to a normal person, lmao.”
Yeah - that might be difficult to explain 😂 While we’re on the topic of ideas and concepts for fics, what are some of Becci’s favorite themes and tropes when creating tales for all the fandom readers?
“That’s a tough one. I like to think I am rather versatile in my writing. As long as I find a story I deem worthy to be told, I will write it, no matter the theme or trope. As stated above, I do gravitate towards canon-compliance or canon-divergence, if that counts as tropes?! Taking canon and then twisting it to my liking is the most fun to me, and also the one thing that sets Fanfiction apart from traditional book writing.
I have a knack for angst, and yet I don’t think you’ll find my portfolio to be very angst-heavy. I also take great enjoyment out of writing Porn with Plot. People clicking on my work for the smut and then getting emotionally wrecked is pretty fun :D”
That last most intriguing theme also aligns perfectly with Becci’s favorite written work of her own 😏:
“I have to say it’s my series “Not A One Night Stand” (NAONS for short). I love the concept so much and I put so much work into making and keeping it canon-compliant, yet smutty and satisfying. Every time I sit down to write a first draft, I surprise myself with how it all falls into place even better than I had anticipated. It gives me the chance to kind of rewrite the original, by filling in the missing bits. It is canon to me, and since the source material has nothing to contradict it, it can be your canon too ;)
With 6 stories and 47k words up to this point, it’s also one of the longest works I’ve published so far. And the final wc will top anything I’ve ever done. I’m a oneshot girly, usually, and longer works tend to get abandoned (so sorry). But I keep coming back to this no matter what and I even re-read it regularly.
If we transcend to other fandoms, When It Rains It Purrs gets an honorable mention, just because of Alpine the Cat :D”
Attention all Marvel fans!! Give Becci a follow for this honorable mention!!
NAONS is not just Becci’s favorite work, as one of our followers had this question:
✨✨Loving the "through the ages" series!! Are you mostly staying with the timelines we've seen, or are you inventing some new ones? And given that there's 14 mentioned in the title of the series - will there definitely be one from 1941 (my beloved era???)
“Thank you so much!! I have some very good news for you.
I am currently working on the first of three(!) stories set in 1941, and yes, we will entirely stay in the canon timeline. I will only invent the in-betweens we haven’t seen (but we know are there).
Actually, let me drop something else, while I have the chance: The title of the series isn’t accurate anymore. Since I started writing, I’ve found more. And that was even before s3 was released… So we’ll end up closer to 20-something parts. Which is insane, now that I think about it.”
Three 1941 stories?? Three smutty 1941 stories? SQUEEEEEE! 🤗And, Becci is even giving us an early preview of this as she tells us about her current works in progress:
“What counts as a WIP? :D
I have first drafts of the next 5 installments of my NAONS series, with one of it being in third revision right now. I have 2 oneshots that have been shelved at second revision with one being another fandom. I also have a full first draft of an original I frequently choose fanfic over. And then there is my “Plot Bunny” doc filled with a bazillion other ideas. Hot contenders for a next big project are a Model AU and an Alpha Centauri Runaway fic. But don’t get your hopes up… NAONS will keep me busy for the next 5 years I guess. So you can have a little preview of the next part, but keep in mind, that it’s not fully edited and polished just yet.”
Oh YES!!! We will take it! Here’s the preview from NAONS - 1941 style:
His knuckles on the wheel were white, the fire in his veins rushing in his ears. Even Aziraphale's words just barely reached him. He was likely still thanking him. Stupid him. Stupid angel. Why would he thank him for putting them both in danger?
“Crowley!” The softness in the exclamation made Crowley’s gaze dart over.
“I said forget it,” he replied to the millionth thanking that was only uttered in Aziraphale’s puppy eyes. Aziraphale’s expression didn't react to the harsh reply. Crowley’s bruskness seemed to just slide off his casing of soft politeness.
Crowley looked away again, focussed on the tacho and hurled them around the debris of a corner building.
“What if I don’t want to forget?” Aziraphale asked and Crowley heard the shifting in his seat next to him. He gripped the steering wheel harder and remained silent. “You did so much… for me tonight.” Crowley heard the omitted “good” clearly. “I want to give you something in return.” His voice had taken on a sweet undertone Crowley knew. It caused little sparks in his veins.
“Don’t,” he said and sped through a roundabout. Aziraphale sighed but didn’t press on. For at least 10 seconds.
“Now what if,” he started again, “What if there is something I want to try, and I need your help with.”
Crowley’s foot on the throttle lifted ever so slightly and they fell just below 90mph. Aziraphale had to register that minuscule acknowledgement of his words because he continued to elaborate. “It’s a matter I need a trusted confidante for and no one would be better suited than you.”
AHHHHHH! Can’t wait for this one to be published!! If you want to keep up with all of Becci’s works, and know when the next story is available, you can subscribe to her on AO3. But inquiring minds want to know… can you find her on other socials???
“They can’t. I mostly just use Tumblr these days. My Bluesky is as good as dead and my Instagram is private. The best way to find my work is definitely either Tumblr or subscribing to me on AO3. I might occasionally post weird stuff outside of your fandom, but I will find my way back eventually.”
We will welcome you anywhere you wish to appear!! And we always ask this, but it’s probably pretty obvious at this point who Becci enjoys pairing up the most for this fandom 😇😈:
“Aziracrow all the way. I like Nina/Maggie, but Crowley and Aziraphale get my full attention. Nothing else has clicked with me the way they have. I can’t explain why… maybe it’s the whole “opposites attract”-deal they have going on, or their “black and white turning into shades of grey”. I’ve always loved flawed and morally grey characters and they just fit this mold perfectly.”
That they are, too!! 🥹 Since we are talking about our beloved duo, let’s hear from another follower who had this question for Becci:
✨✨Do you have a preference for writing either Aziraphale's or Crowley's POV? Why/Why not?
“I am leaning towards Crowley, because I love him snarky and sarcastic while being internally emotional and I think I can channel that well :D But I will not hesitate to switch POVs based on what the story needs more, or what I find more interesting in that specific situation. Sometimes it’s fun to have the reader know the POVs thoughts, sometimes it’s even more fun to have them guessing alongside the POV. I think I’m quite good at writing either by now, so not really a strong preference. But if I had to choose, it would probably be Crowley.”
You definitely write them well, Becci!! Outside of writing all these wonderful stories, does she have any other hidden talents that she shares with our fandom?
“No. Once - in a very brave moment - I shared a song, and I will not elaborate. I have very little time for fandom and I’ve decided to use that time entirely for writing and honing that one craft instead of trying to become a better artist or video cutter, too. (Kinda weird to think like that that about different disciplines of art but then go ahead and do 3 sports in a row…) I love looking at other forms of fandom art, especially fanart and fan comics, and I often think “man, that would be so cool, where can i learn?” But I’ve decided it’s not for me. I’m putting my energy into developing my writing and I hope it pays off.”
Fair enough - there are so many talented creators to support and you are high among them with your work!!! And Becci is not just a GO fanatic, as she tells us about other loves in the fandom world:
“Marvel still has my heart. It’s what made me a writer, and with so many characters I like and pairings I ship, I can find something in there for each and every Idea I might have.
I’ve also grown up with Harry Potter and I can’t shake my emotional attachment. Recently, I’ve discovered why everyone is so into the Marauders. While I’ve not (yet) written anything in that direction, I’ve been reading and loving it, and the fic inspo doc is filling up faster than is healthy.
There are a couple of fandom flings, too. Like Dead Boy Detectives, Our Flag Means Death, BBC Sherlock… probably Heated Rivalry too, if I finally get around to watching it lol.
There are also some fandoms that I love, but haven’t really interacted with yet. Six of Crows and The Hunger Games are among those.”
It’s always wonderful to hear what triggers inspiration - and we hope that Marvel and GO will keep you creating for a very long time, Becci!
Alas, it’s time to wrap up our time with Becci, and she leaves us all with these most encouraging words for those who are also looking to create their own lovely fandom works 🤗
“Over the course of last year, I happened to meet two of my favourite published authors. And I told them that I’m a writer, too. So I want to forward what they said to me, because these words really stuck with me.
”You’re the only one able to write the story you want to tell. So you have to do it.” - T.J. Klune.
”It doesn’t have to be perfect to be beautiful” - V.E. Schwab.
Plus, there is one mantra, I don’t know where I got it from so I will just sell it as mine. Whenever I doubt myself, or my skill, when I feel like the 15 Hits isn’t worth the weeks of work, this is what keeps me going: ”You might be someone’s favourite writer””
Becci, thank you so much for stepping into the Spotlight this week and giving us a peek into your world. You are a favorite, too, and we will all be looking forward to more of your stories!! ☺️❤️
“I love that you’re doing this. I love that you’re spreading fandom joy and that you created this opportunity for everyone to feel like a star. Because everyone who puts themselves out there, and shares a work where they poured their heart into, is a star. It feels like supporting and uplifting each other is now more important than ever and in a way, the essence of fandom.”
Absolutely agree!! All of this fandom’s creators are true stars 🌟
Here's some links where you can continue to follow Becci Barnes:
It's been a turbulent time with mixed feelings and horrid revelations that have definitely ruined parts of this for me but I'm glad we made it this far. They will always have a special place in my heart but I'm relieved we've reached the end so I can put them to rest. It's the strength of the community and the many friends I have made along the way that makes it all worth it. Thanks to all of you. I have grown so much as an artist when my love for all these character was at it's highest. Maybe I'll draw something, a final hurrah, depends how it goes. Thank you for sticking with me then and now into the future!!!
fr tho, if this bombs im going to pretend s2-3 didn't happen. s1 and the book, your charm from the actors, the costuming, the parts penned by Sir Pratchett, are what captured me the first time and there it will remain. just quieter
Another year - another GO-themed birthday cake 🥳😇😈 Life has been super crazy busy this month so it's a few days late - but so very pleased with the results🥲
Thanks so much to @ami-v-dragnire for the inspiration - of course, my version is nowhere NEAR as beautiful as their work😅
for all the people that are struggling to come to terms with the good omens finale and what it means for the fandom (myself included), i really really want to stress that you will not lose anything you don't want to lose because of it.
here's a list of things that are still here, that you can access anytime:
the book
the radio adaptation
season 1
season 2 (grab the bits you like and ignore the rest if necessary)
the bits of season 3 you did like (ignoring the rest may feel more difficult here but it is achievable i promise)
all the fanworks that exist already, whether they were created pre-tv adaptation, post-s1, post-s2 or post-s3
all of david and michael's interviews and other promo about the show pre-s3
the fans that are currently active in the fandom
the memories you've made in the fandom
and here's a list of things we can look forward to:
more fanworks/fanwork events, because people are still creating and will continue to do so
getting to know new good omens friends, whether they're new to the fandom or just new to you
in that vein, welcoming new fans to the fandom (it may not seem likely but new people will continue to seek us out!)
the final ineffable con and all the craziness and content that will come from that
people continuing to discover your fanworks, old and new
the moments where you'll start to feel the finale, the show in general and/or the fandom becoming easier to engage with again
most of all, aziraphale and crowley will always be there for you. i promise. i know it may feel like they're gone, but they're not, as long as we still watch them, think about them, read about them, write about them, draw them, cosplay them, talk about them... they want to be here, on earth, with all of us, and they are, i promise they are.
