Alrighty. Last night I watched the Good Omens finale and I have Thoughts on it that I’m going to try to put down here. Now I'm not too good at the whole writing concisely thing so be warned it's kind of long.
And yeah spoilers under the cut.
To preface my own opinion on the finale, before S3 came out I wasn’t opposed to an ending with them as humans, which I think put me in the minority. And after watching I’m still very conflicted about the finale as a whole and especially the ending, but I think overall I liked it more than I didn’t like it. And I’m still so glad it came out instead of nothing. There is still always post season 1 and post season 2 fanfiction after all.
That all being said I do have a bunch of criticisms of the way some of the most important themes in the show, especially around free will, were handled in S3.
So my first point is, dolphins. No actually not dolphins sorry, free will.
Starting with Crowley’s decision to create the whole new universe without him and Aziraphale. Now, I think it’s 100% in character that if Aziraphale and Crowley did have to make a choice between their own happiness and having their own side, and being able to exist and stay together, versus humanity being able to have free will, they would choose humanity. Absolutely from the beginning of the story Aziraphale and Crowley’s attempts to prevent Armageddon are partly selfish because they sure do like living on Earth with all the art and music and food it has to offer, in fact they can be very selfish at times. They’re people after all. But the reason they love the Earth and want to keep it in the first place is because they love humanity and the things they create. So that’s not at all where my criticism of Crowley’s decision comes from.
The thing is I really don’t see how creating the new universe ‘solves’ the issue of humans not having free will. First of all, especially in the book and S1 of the show, one of the most important themes from the get go has been that humans have free will despite Heaven and Hell’s attempts to decide for them what they should and shouldn’t do. Sure Crowley and Aziraphale have been stationed on Earth to tamper with their affairs, but it is literally stated again and again that all their little attempts to stir humanity to be evil or good are literally pointless in the grand scheme of what humanity is capable of doing on its own. It’s literally a recurring joke. Even with the original Apocalypse that Heaven and Hell desperately want, Adam’s humanity ultimately stops it from happening because again FREE WILL.
Also Jesus is literally an example of God and Heaven tampering with human affairs and that’s literally portrayed as a good thing in the show. So the messaging doesn’t even make sense.
The humans literally don’t need this gesture, they just need the Earth to not be destroyed after 6000 years so they can continue exercising free will as they always have been (which Crowley and Aziraphale could make happen without completely remaking everything). I mean the arguably most important part of the whole Good Omens story is how people constantly exercise free will even if their entire circumstances set them up to not do that. With Adam deciding not to destroy the world, with Anathema deciding to live without Agnes’s second set of prophecies, with Aziraphale and Crowley being Aziraphale and Crowley. Literally the core of the story. It’s insane that despite Crowley and Aziraphale’s whole ‘purpose for existence’ being to serve the interests of Heaven and Hell it doesn’t stop them from using their own free will to do what they think is right and what makes them happy, that is so cool of them. I mean I wasn’t opposed to the human ending before watching the show. Because for one it would allow them to be completely independent from Heaven and Hell in a way that they haven’t been before. (That doesn’t mean they didn’t have free will before, it just meant they were having to live in constant terror as the cost of it.) And additionally they’ve spent so much time on Earth among people, so coming to terms with mortality like everyone else after all their time spent being immortal would be really interesting to see. Although whenever I thought about a human ending before it was in the context of them as they were before, 6000-year-old beings, becoming human, with all their memories, and I’m not actually sure how I feel about the fact that it’s not how it happened here, I’m actually not sure at all.
Now, what I would understand, is if the show focused less on the idea that “Heaven and Hell’s unsuccessful tampering with human affairs somehow contradicts with them having free will” and instead focused more on the idea that if humans are punished in the afterlife based on on some ineffable criteria nobody understands, then they are not truly free to make decisions, as long as those actions are being weighed on some arbitrary scale that decides what the rest of eternity is like for them. That makes more sense to me as a legitimate reason why Crowley would want to get rid of Heaven and Hell, but it’s pretty clear from the show that that’s not how it was intended, given that in this particular narrative the concept that people who are undeserving sometimes go to hell, and vice versa with heaven, isn’t really ever discussed. So either way I can’t really see why free will and Heaven and Hell are so incompatible to the point where it’s supposed to be the final grand reason Crowley and Aziraphale as we know them die(?). Anyway I assume Christianity still exists as it always has in this new universe considering it isn’t staggeringly different from ours so I assume people would be controlling one another with religion anyway.
Anyway all that being said the people who most of all need Heaven and Hell to stop bothering them to be able to freely use their own free will are the angels and demons themselves, i.e. Aziraphale and Crowley.
Ok I understand it might sound a bit ridiculous that after I complained about how stupid the reasoning for the human ending is for however many words I complained about it, that I still liked the finale. And frankly the more I think about it the more critical I get, I think I liked it more before I started actually writing this down, but anyway. See, before watching it I actually kind of liked the idea of them being human and growing old together, even if it means then dying together. Maybe even the version of the human ending that happens where they never were their original selves. I mean obviously I feel like shit about the 6000 years of seeing each other throughout history and being friends and carving out a space for themselves, their own side, a nation of two. The historical minisodes might be my favourite part of the show really, I love the Companion to Owls minisode so so much. I would go on a really long rant about that scene where they’re looking out at the water right here right now, it is very hard to refrain. All I’m trying to say is I am so attached to Aziraphale and Crowley as they were. That being said, maybe it’s just because I’m a bit of a masochist but point is despite that I have always sort of liked the human ending as a poetic end to their story and as a way for them to be independent from Heaven and Hell. Not because of the implication that they don’t have ‘real’ free will if Heaven and Hell exist (it’s so important that Aziraphale and Crowley manage to have free will despite not being created for it), but simply for the fact that they can live on their own unbothered. So overall I like the human ending even if I can’t fully articulate why. And I do have some complaints with the way it’s done (probably will go over those in another thing) but also a lot of the scenes with them as humans made me cry in a good way and not a bad way, and I genuinely liked it. I like the human ending (I think?), I just hate the way they GOT to the human ending in that on the surface it seems perfectly in character with everything Crowley and Aziraphale care about but if you go beyond that it just doesn’t make sense and contradicts the most important themes of Good Omens.
well. you already know my thoughts on this but heres your reblog because I AGREE SO MUCH...
yes i share much of the same sentiment, I do really like the human thing and I think that thats so sweet, and YES on a surface level, in these conditions, I do believe that for the most part this is what Aziraphale and Crowley would choose to do- the issue is, WHAT ARE THESE CONDITIONS
It's framed as if it's all about free will when that hasn't really been an issue for the humans at all as you said, and also Why does God suddenly care??? Thematically ALso as you mentioned this doesn't align with all the stuff that's been shown in the past two seasons about how humanity and them but okay okay yes youve mentioned all that IM GOING INSANE RED..... FFFGGGRHRHHHHH ....
A large part of why I liked the human ending is cause yeah, I don't think the systems of heaven and hell can be fixed cause it's really clear that they are VERY flawed, but wHAT ??? I feel like a lot what makes the finale rough to me is God and how She acts, cause it feels completely just to push this particular plot without considering the themes and content shown before.
Anyhow that being said, i like them becoming human. I just wish it was actually them, with their experiences, making the choice to grow old together, having that special appreciation of aging and all these human experiences after what they've been through. [My personal alternate S3 in my head is one where God doesn't show up or intervene and they do some writing in the blank book they use to summon her to essentially do an uno reverse and THEN do the whole human thing]
okay id be going in circles and just parroting you if i went on any longer but agh. ngk.
Yeah EXACTLY. I mean you also already know my opinion on this because I've ranted about it but as you mentioned it really bothers me the way God is done here, in how her portrayal really really differs from S1 and the book. I mean I would've been happy if they got pretty much essentially the same ending except the way they got there felt really off.
So yeah, God. Like I mean I just really like the idea that Aziraphale and Crowley are these two random people who don't matter all that much to the grand scheme of things, who are able to choose a life for themselves that other angels and demons don't have despite not being inherently special. This is kind of unrelated to the God bit but it also kind of is because the idea that God has been specially watching out for these two guys and confirms it to them just kind of goes against that. This might be more of a personal preference thing and less of a writing criticism thing but also I feel like the themes of the story just make more sense this way
I've also talked to you about it a lot before so I'll not say as much but just the whole decision to represent God as a person, with flaws, characterized almost like one of the angels or the Metatron would be. Rather than someone who's an intangible idea no one can reach, and the subjective interpretation of that idea leads to the flaws in people's thinking. Just the whole struggle of not knowing what God wanted from you (does she want you to do what feels like the right thing or go along with what people tell you God wants from you?) or if she even cared or even watched was such an important part of Crowley and Aziraphale's whole thing, especially Crowley I would say, and I think it would have made more sense for them to work through the whoel not knowing over the course of their lives and not just have them meet God like this
Alrighty. Last night I watched the Good Omens finale and I have Thoughts on it that I’m going to try to put down here. Now I'm not too good at the whole writing concisely thing so be warned it's kind of long.
And yeah spoilers under the cut.
To preface my own opinion on the finale, before S3 came out I wasn’t opposed to an ending with them as humans, which I think put me in the minority. And after watching I’m still very conflicted about the finale as a whole and especially the ending, but I think overall I liked it more than I didn’t like it. And I’m still so glad it came out instead of nothing. There is still always post season 1 and post season 2 fanfiction after all.
That all being said I do have a bunch of criticisms of the way some of the most important themes in the show, especially around free will, were handled in S3.
So my first point is, dolphins. No actually not dolphins sorry, free will.
Starting with Crowley’s decision to create the whole new universe without him and Aziraphale. Now, I think it’s 100% in character that if Aziraphale and Crowley did have to make a choice between their own happiness and having their own side, and being able to exist and stay together, versus humanity being able to have free will, they would choose humanity. Absolutely from the beginning of the story Aziraphale and Crowley’s attempts to prevent Armageddon are partly selfish because they sure do like living on Earth with all the art and music and food it has to offer, in fact they can be very selfish at times. They’re people after all. But the reason they love the Earth and want to keep it in the first place is because they love humanity and the things they create. So that’s not at all where my criticism of Crowley’s decision comes from.
The thing is I really don’t see how creating the new universe ‘solves’ the issue of humans not having free will. First of all, especially in the book and S1 of the show, one of the most important themes from the get go has been that humans have free will despite Heaven and Hell’s attempts to decide for them what they should and shouldn’t do. Sure Crowley and Aziraphale have been stationed on Earth to tamper with their affairs, but it is literally stated again and again that all their little attempts to stir humanity to be evil or good are literally pointless in the grand scheme of what humanity is capable of doing on its own. It’s literally a recurring joke. Even with the original Apocalypse that Heaven and Hell desperately want, Adam’s humanity ultimately stops it from happening because again FREE WILL.
Also Jesus is literally an example of God and Heaven tampering with human affairs and that’s literally portrayed as a good thing in the show. So the messaging doesn’t even make sense.
The humans literally don’t need this gesture, they just need the Earth to not be destroyed after 6000 years so they can continue exercising free will as they always have been (which Crowley and Aziraphale could make happen without completely remaking everything). I mean the arguably most important part of the whole Good Omens story is how people constantly exercise free will even if their entire circumstances set them up to not do that. With Adam deciding not to destroy the world, with Anathema deciding to live without Agnes’s second set of prophecies, with Aziraphale and Crowley being Aziraphale and Crowley. Literally the core of the story. It’s insane that despite Crowley and Aziraphale’s whole ‘purpose for existence’ being to serve the interests of Heaven and Hell it doesn’t stop them from using their own free will to do what they think is right and what makes them happy, that is so cool of them. I mean I wasn’t opposed to the human ending before watching the show. Because for one it would allow them to be completely independent from Heaven and Hell in a way that they haven’t been before. (That doesn’t mean they didn’t have free will before, it just meant they were having to live in constant terror as the cost of it.) And additionally they’ve spent so much time on Earth among people, so coming to terms with mortality like everyone else after all their time spent being immortal would be really interesting to see. Although whenever I thought about a human ending before it was in the context of them as they were before, 6000-year-old beings, becoming human, with all their memories, and I’m not actually sure how I feel about the fact that it’s not how it happened here, I’m actually not sure at all.
Now, what I would understand, is if the show focused less on the idea that “Heaven and Hell’s unsuccessful tampering with human affairs somehow contradicts with them having free will” and instead focused more on the idea that if humans are punished in the afterlife based on on some ineffable criteria nobody understands, then they are not truly free to make decisions, as long as those actions are being weighed on some arbitrary scale that decides what the rest of eternity is like for them. That makes more sense to me as a legitimate reason why Crowley would want to get rid of Heaven and Hell, but it’s pretty clear from the show that that’s not how it was intended, given that in this particular narrative the concept that people who are undeserving sometimes go to hell, and vice versa with heaven, isn’t really ever discussed. So either way I can’t really see why free will and Heaven and Hell are so incompatible to the point where it’s supposed to be the final grand reason Crowley and Aziraphale as we know them die(?). Anyway I assume Christianity still exists as it always has in this new universe considering it isn’t staggeringly different from ours so I assume people would be controlling one another with religion anyway.
Anyway all that being said the people who most of all need Heaven and Hell to stop bothering them to be able to freely use their own free will are the angels and demons themselves, i.e. Aziraphale and Crowley.
Ok I understand it might sound a bit ridiculous that after I complained about how stupid the reasoning for the human ending is for however many words I complained about it, that I still liked the finale. And frankly the more I think about it the more critical I get, I think I liked it more before I started actually writing this down, but anyway. See, before watching it I actually kind of liked the idea of them being human and growing old together, even if it means then dying together. Maybe even the version of the human ending that happens where they never were their original selves. I mean obviously I feel like shit about the 6000 years of seeing each other throughout history and being friends and carving out a space for themselves, their own side, a nation of two. The historical minisodes might be my favourite part of the show really, I love the Companion to Owls minisode so so much. I would go on a really long rant about that scene where they’re looking out at the water right here right now, it is very hard to refrain. All I’m trying to say is I am so attached to Aziraphale and Crowley as they were. That being said, maybe it’s just because I’m a bit of a masochist but point is despite that I have always sort of liked the human ending as a poetic end to their story and as a way for them to be independent from Heaven and Hell. Not because of the implication that they don’t have ‘real’ free will if Heaven and Hell exist (it’s so important that Aziraphale and Crowley manage to have free will despite not being created for it), but simply for the fact that they can live on their own unbothered. So overall I like the human ending even if I can’t fully articulate why. And I do have some complaints with the way it’s done (probably will go over those in another thing) but also a lot of the scenes with them as humans made me cry in a good way and not a bad way, and I genuinely liked it. I like the human ending (I think?), I just hate the way they GOT to the human ending in that on the surface it seems perfectly in character with everything Crowley and Aziraphale care about but if you go beyond that it just doesn’t make sense and contradicts the most important themes of Good Omens.
I can't for the life of me believe that there is more Good Omens canon content coming out, and this is really the end, so hard to wrap my head around. But anyhow I've wanted to draw this specific fanart for the past two years ever since I first finished season 2 and now with the Season 3 movie being released in a literal hour I've finally gotten around to it. Cheers everybody :)
I got pretty invested in The Stanley Parable in the last few days and drew some fanart... still figuring out how exactly I would like to draw Stanley and the Narrator but here is my first thing of them :)
I could . not. put. this down for 48 hours - stayed up too late, had weird dreams about it, woke up early, and played it while I was supposed to be doing other things. the last several dozen items took a lot of googling, which I do not even begrudge it.
and then. My partner started it. And the SAME THING happened to him.
surprisingly compelling. start when you have free time. like, yanno, a snow day.
kianamaiart
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