the cover illustration reminds me of a hypnosis pendulum. the drawing on the pendulum depicts a birdcage? one of the strings attached to the pendulum is wrapped around connor's arm and the other looks cut, the end of it is ruffled in a way that happens when you sloppily cut the thread, "cutting off ties"
name of the voice drama is "the son of man" which is name of a painting
[x] About the painting, Magritte said:
At least it hides the face partly well, so you have the apparent face, the apple, hiding the visible but hidden, the face of the person. It's something that happens constantly. Everything we see hides another thing, we always want to see what is hidden by what we see. There is an interest in that which is hidden and which the visible does not show us. This interest can take the form of a quite intense feeling, a sort of conflict, one might say, between the visible that is hidden and the visible that is present.
"son of man" is also a phrase that is used in the bible & i'm quite sure the painting is referencing it too bc there's also apples and all... this could be connected to connor's feeling of being dehumanized
[x] At a surface level, the Christological perspective on Son of man ("man" referring to Adam) has been seen as a possible counterpart to that of Son of God and just as Son of God affirms the divinity of Jesus, in a number of cases Son of man affirms his humanity.
In thirty-two cases, the phrase appears in intermediate plural form "sons of men", i.e. human beings.
connor presents his crime as killing someone who wanted to hurt his friend and who he hated deeply for this, but i think connor killed his friend
what i found interesting is that connor asks "someone is trying to kill A dear friend" (not your, my, etc.) - which made me think that he means "you see that someone is killing their friend" - but the warden interprets it "i see someone killing my friend" and they continue the conversation with this assumption
connor is depicted with who most likely is his friend being semi-transparent, like a ghost
the crime scene is a room - connor & his friend were roommates
connor's memories are formatted like captcha, he doesn't feel human and is used to acting robotic, choosing what would be acceptable
i'll try to go through every separate captcha
in the "how are you", the only acceptable moods are calm smiles (3rd and the last one). negative or too strong emotions are not acceptable
in "what did you do this weekend?", anything is acceptable except for a black square. he's not allowed to do nothing. the pictures stand for games with friends, homework, going outside, cleaning the house, painting, writing (something that connor mentioned as his hobby), watching tv? (it's so small and old...), and working a job
in "where do you see yourself in ten years?", the unacceptable answers are a black square, a coffin, and a "?". other options are a museum (being a famous artist?), a doctor, a business meeting, a family, universe (again maybe something related to being famous?), and mathematical formulas on blackboard
in "what are you thinking about right now?", the only acceptable option is a picture that depicts how a butterfly is getting developed after chrysalis stage, so i guess it means "development". i feel like other pictures are becoming more and more confusing i will not even try to decipher them, but i want to note that one of the pictures is a chrysalis and it's considered a fail - he's expected to be at a Particular stage of development at the current moment, not just developing in general
in "what kind of girl you like?" anything is acceptable except for the black square but we know what connor is
"what kind of music you like?" has text: "just whatever happens on the radio"
"would you sacrifice yourself for the sake of others?" - the only acceptable option is "yes"
"what do you have to offer the world" - WHAT the fuck is going on here. i don't know but the only acceptable options are lamps which i suppose mean "ideas". raven on a tree without leaves could symbolize death since its a common symbol for cemeteries? i don't know what are these red pictures they scare me
the next one is another text. "don't think that i had a sad life" is also something that connor says in the voice drama
in "what would you rid the world of if you had the choice?", the unacceptable options are connor, his friend and black square. the other options are bullying, a fox (diseases?), pollution, broken heart, murder, trolley problem
"what part of yourself could you go without?" depicts a jigsaw puzzle of connor, the only acceptable option is a drawing of a heart. feelings/attachments?
the last one is a text again - what is interesting is that the font changes, implying that this question is not out of the same row as all the previous ones. all the previous questions were like an exam on being a proper person, but this one asks connor what does He want, something that people in his daily life aren't interested in. anyway the button that leads further is "forgive"
i could only see it because i was enlargening the page to see captcha images more properly so i'm not sure where it's placed... but there's a line at the bottom of the last page saying "if not me then yourself"
connor says that the person who he killed was killing his friend in a metaphorical sense, and that the friend is grateful and is currently moving on with his life in the outside world. i think that connor killed his friend but aside from just Making Up Stuff i'm not sure what he's implying, i suppose he could do this because his friend was doing something that made connor think he's losing him? & although from the context they mean "other world" as "outside world", it doesn't neccessarily mean this, and it wouldn't be the first time that connor is saying something with an ambiguous meaning and then going along with how the other person interprets it (the "someone is killing a friend" conversation)
i also found it interesting that connor talks rather coldly about aubrey but i'm not sure what to make out of this, maybe he's staying on a distance because his previous friendship failed
i'm gonna vote aubrey guilty and connor inno because i think it's funnier this way