#file 68

[thehypocritewith5names]

“omg this episode was so lore packed”

“aww sydney and jed were so cute!!”

ok cool whens elijah coming back

[rowansinjune]

SPOILERS FOR CHNT FILE 68

So first of all, holy shit

Second of all, I have some fucking theories cooking and have convinced myself that I solved

1. How did Jeddy bring Sydney back

2. How did this action break the world exactly

3. How this season will end and what S3 will be about

Now fair warning, I do not follow Chnt lore closely and I imagine there's a lot of insights on these topics that I straight up have missed somewhere, so I'm working with what I have. This is also gonna be more of a sleep deprived ramble than clearly structured argument so bear with me

I do not think Jedidiah brought Sydney back to life

Well, not exactly

It's clear there was a ritual and that Jedidiah has particular thoughts and knowledge on necromancy, and these things likely contribute to restarting Sydney's heart

But I think this was only a temporary measure, and that why Sydney is still 'alive', is because Jedidiah stopped time

He's surrounded by clocks, he's called the clockmaker by Elijah, and we know he can mess with time, he fixed the flow of it in the camp in an earlier episode.

But what led me to this was Sydney's suicide, as I saw direct parallels between the situation and much of the show; Sydney, caught in this transitory state between life and death, alone and seeking Jedidiah's attention while he ignores and avoids him, working on a project he'll never complete. So much of Sydney's experience in the show is reflection of that moment, as if captured in a moment in time

Jeddy's project is maintaining this stasis, making sure that time doesn't progress Sydneys decomposition. This breaking of causality, perhaps targeted only onto Syd, is of course the breaking point of the world.

Jeddy's fear surrounding trains would make sense symbolically as trains move forward, they progress. They are the arrow of time in this case, and I think the goal of the agents, who are tied to trains, is of course to fix things

But I think it's catching up, it's getting harder to maintain. The storm is this buildup of backed up time, time is moving on Sydney, even if slowly, hence why fungus does sprout from him

And with Jeddy's confession, as seen in the episode description, the agents are ecstatic. His confession is what they needed, and I am certain this season will end with them coming for him, and s3 will be where we learn what has been happening behind the scenes

I hope that made some sense. I know damn well there's a lot of holes and it almost certainly isn't true, both logistically and cuz I am half asleep typing it but idk it's been Bouncing around my head since the episode dropped

[banana-can-do-art]

I was so scared for a minute at the end of that episode post credits because I thought that Jedidiah had erased Sydney’s memories of finding out the truth to protect him and because he decided to be a chicken who couldn’t handle the change in their dynamic, but I think it’s actually just a flashback to when he originally brought Sydney back to life. So, still sad, but at the very least that hopefully means Jedidiah learned his lesson and isn’t trying to keep secrets from Sydney anymore

[laurenyyyyyyyyy]

*Has a headache* OH. MY. GOD. IS THAT A CAMP HERE AND THERE FILE 68 REFERENCE-

[whimsical-laboratory-tragedy]

He's not like other girls

[mars-bars06]

THOUGHTS ON FILE 68

i fear i may be transfem jedidiah

[izzynstuffz]

EP 68 SPOILERS!!!!

wait……. so did jedidiah not? bring him back to life? or did he try to? and just not expect it to work after so long? the end got me a little confused……..

ok so. please treat me like im stupid and explain it to me if im wrong but…. Adam was explaining all of the stuff that happened and it was all true right? or else jedidiah wouldn’t have reacted that way. he would’ve just fully denied everything…. Adam’s whole goal was to get sydney to kill himself right? um excuse me but. WHY? just like a power trip? there has to be more to it than that…. maybe because sydney was brought back to life? and that makes him powerful or some sort of .. like. conduit? for like the ceremony with the storm? im not sure if im missing something or if there are still like. gaps that havent been filled by the narrative

IM SO HAPPY THEY TALKED!!!!!!!!! i loved the dialogue. how you could tell they were both trying so hard but struggling with articulating their thoughts UGHHHHHHH!!!!!!! i am such a SUCKER for awkward dialogue that is my JAM!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i listened to half of this episode getting ready for school and the other half before/during my first period. i was fuckign TWEAAAKING OUTTTT. i was SHAKING and fuckign rocking back and forth oh. my god. this episode put me through it. AND THE ENDING WITH WHEN SOMEBODY NEEDS YOU PLAYING HOLY SHIT I NEARLY CRIED I NEVER GET THIS EMOTIONAL AAAAAAAAAAAAA

uhh yeah!!

[ratskullwithasideofmushrooms]

Rant about CHNT episode 68 [spoilers for episode 68; mentioning somewhat sensitive topics mentioned within the episode! Please don’t proceed unless you have listened to episode 68 because otherwise you will run into huge spoilers]

Before I begin, I would like to just tell you one more time that there will be mentions of topics including suicide, death, etc. So please be cautious if you aren’t comfortable with those being discussed! If you have decided to proceed, here we go!:

Let’s first go through a summary of the events of the episode!

Sydney and Jedidiah are in the room with Up and Adam (presumably in Camp Here and There, not Camp Overwhere)

Up and Adam is manipulating Sydney under the veil of acting like he cares for Sydney

Up and Adam has an imagination exercise, when he begins Jedidiah gets nervous and begs for them to stop doing this

The exercise talks of the high school prom that Jedidiah and Sydney attended; it mentions everyone’s reactions to how Sydney looked at the time, it also mentions how Lucille and Jedidiah took Sydney to get ice cream after the prom!

Hearing this causes Sydney to have a headache (likely due to the fact that its a pre-limn memory)

Up and Adam proceeds to describe how dismissive Jedidiah was of Sydney in college

Jedidiah upon hearing this recounted starts freaking out more and begging for Sydney to get Up and Adam to stop

Up and Adam doesn’t stop; he describes how Sydney was driven to a suicide attempt

Up and Adam describes how Sydney tried to commit suicide and how he almost died; and how it effected Jedidiah

Jedidiah took Sydney to the hospital when he found Sydney after the suicide attempt; the doctors tried to help Sydney but he was in a (implied) permanent coma

After a while Jedidiah stole Sydney from the hospital (because he was tired of waiting for the call when they told him Sydney was dead) to either end the waiting one way or another

He brings Sydney to Camp Here and There; and he drowns Sydney, while comforting him

He then watches Sydney decaying a while and leaves

Up and Adam finishes his exercise, Jedidiah is now weeping, Sydney’s headache is worse

Sydney laughs at Up and Adam telling him it was just an exercise, and tries to comfort Jedidiah

Up and Adam tries to convince Sydney to continue his self destructive behaviors; Sydney realizes that he needs to help Jedidiah and not let Up and Adam manipulate him

Sydney banishes Up and Adam from Camp Here and There (one of my favorite parts of the episode; other than the post credits scene)

Sydney comforts Jedidiah, and Jedidiah comforts Sydney

They start fixing their relationship, though it will still be rocky for quite a while 

Credits :D

The post credits scene where we hear Sydney after being resurrected

He is calling Jedidiah from Lucille’s phone, its Sydney’s birthday

Sydney woke up in the forest on the outskirts of Camp 3 months after Jedidiah left him there

Jedidiah sounds scared, he then says he will be there in 5 hours

The episode ends

Now that we have gone through the events of the episode, time for random theories + notes!!! PLEASE GIVE ME ANY CRITICISM YOU HAVE FOR THEM (I want to know any holes in my theories I haven’t seen, so if you notice any feel free to let me know!)

First of all, let’s just get this over with. A crazy theory I don’t believe in the slightest (just because I am saying this it will end up being true or something) is that perhaps in the parade that Adam is hosting, perhaps Elijah will appear just so that he can be in the parade or something. But to be honest I don’t think this will happen because if Elijah were to appear I believe it would be in a different much more monumental way; though I don’t believe it would be any time soon.

I think that it was important for the story for it to go the way it did, for many reasons; because it obviously pushes the characters to develop more and grow into who they’ll eventually be, but it also gives us an understanding of many of their flaws (which we had a basic idea of before), but what they might do later on. This is because we already know that Sydney tends to sacrifice himself and his health for others to feel loved, which I don’t think will be immediately fixed or even fully gone magically, because to get better with that you need to grow and learn, and to do that he needs stability and real relationships that are not transactional. We also know that Jedidiah tends to isolate himself, which we have known for a while, he does this (yes) because of the guilt he feels; but also because what he’s done he knows was morally wrong (but his religious background makes him feel like what he’s done is unforgivable; and that within itself is complicated) and as you might expect he has some withstanding trauma he needs to work through. To be able to get through it, I think that he (in particular) needs to be able to talk to someone that he doesn’t fear will die from hearing it, to process all of it; and yeah it would suck and be very hard to get through. Even after processing his trauma it will still haunt him, but over time we can hope he will find a way to cope with it and surround himself not with isolation but with friends who care for him. Rowan is likely to try and find any way to keep those he knows safe, from anything that he knows of. But now later in the season we see that he’s learned to be a bit more relaxed about it, and think rationally about how to get everything done in a way he can keep people safe. So these are just a few examples, but if you really think about it you can start to see the patterns of how these characters tend to act or lean towards doing when given decisions.

Up and Adam was able to witness everything that happened to Sydney, which begs the question of whether he saw Sydney’s resurrection or not (I believe he likely did), and I don’t just mean when he was killed, because we know that for a fact, but rather when Sydney woke up in the forest. Because if so I wonder how we can think of how it may have influenced the ways Adam acts. 

I believe that Up and Adam likely indirectly helped to push Sydney to the point in college where he did what he did. Because we’ve seen Adam do this before, trying to seem friendly and helpful while trying to push him to reinforce his self-destructive tendencies. While Adam acts as if he’s done nothing wrong, the reason why I think this, is because when he is trying desperately to say that Jedidiah is guilty, no matter what else it could mean something; could mean genuinely nothing about his guilt, or as I prefer to theorize, (maybe just because I hope he has at least some morality) that some of what he’s saying to and about Jedidiah is him projecting some pent up guilt for what he’s done that he’s tried to ignore thinking it would go away, but instead he’s let it fester to this point, but won’t admit he feels guilty, not to himself, not to anyone.

Is it just me or in the post credits scene, does Jedidiah seem almost scared at first (or am I just reading that wrong)? Because that makes me think that perhaps he didn’t actually believe that bringing Sydney back would work, or it was different and took longer than he thought (perhaps different from the experiment he did with the pig that he brought back), perhaps he’d waited to see if it would work for a few days but ended up giving up? Because if Sydney died on halloween and came back on his birthday (reborn in a way?) thats what 3 months??? I think it was Jedidiah’s final hope for getting Sydney back (because otherwise he wouldn’t have likely killed him), and even then he didn’t know for sure what would happen because it as minimally tested. 

I can draw connections from Sydney and Jedidiah’s relationship to some of the other relationship dynamics in the series; for example Fennel and Soren they are one I could say parallel Sydney and Jedidiah in a way, Soren and Sydney both want autonomy which they’ve both rarely ever had, and they bth want to feel love and would do anything to get it (sending both of them down dangerous paths that could get them killed; which to an extent they both know). While Fennel and Jedidiah both want to protect those they love through whatever means necessary even if it doesn’t give them a choice, and they both are scared of what would happen if they lost those who they love. But also I can find parallels with Soren (again) and Rowan, what I already said with Soren is still true here. With Rowan he much like Jedidiah trying to protect Sydney, is trying to protect Soren, at first through any means necessary, but over time he realizes (as I believe jedidiah now has or will) that he can’t force people to stay safe, he can only try to help Soren and give him a friend to talk to. Or even Juniper and Soren where we see a contrast to Sydney and Jedidiah’s relationship And to an extent Marisol and Salem’s relationship (though to say definitively I need to know more about them) we see similar characteristics in some ways, with Salem being worried for everyone that she loves (much like Jedidiah in a way), and Marisol who wants everyone to take her seriously and to help. I could even try to bring out connections with Joshua and Yvonne’s friendship, but I am not going that far right now (maybe at some point though) But really my point here is that this store seems to be full of parallels to try to teach us something, and I’ve seen a lot of people try to say that only one of the relationships can parallel Sydney and Jedidiah’s, but in my humble opinion, there can be more than one that parallels it. At least open up your mind to the theory and think of what that could entail.

Up and Adam never stopped manipulating Sydney, he has always been doing it, throughout their entire time knowing each other, even if only pulling the strings in the background. He hungers for suffering and blood, he always has, but he’s also not that shallow of a character for that to be his only motive. As we’ve seen in the other episodes featuring, while he delights in suffering, he’s more of a petulant child who just has to get his way through whatever means.

Sydney’s memories of a time before are selectively blocked, as we’ve seen through out the entire series, including when he tells a story of his childhood, we can see the types of things he still remembers, and his dreams give us an idea of some of the stuff he might have blocked out (including up and Adam related things). I think that he blocked things out for a mixture of reasons, for one thing trauma, which he has a great deal of for many reasons; but also the ritual to get him back, these things always have a price (more than one in this case), and part of it caused holes in his memory blocked out, it wasn’t going to bring him back unscathed and I believe Jedidiah knew that but he thought it was better than nothing. Anything surrounding the ritual and any of Sydney’s memories from around the time before he was hospitalized and leading up to it were likely very traumatic so his brain used its self defense mechanisms to block the memories, and recalling anything from that time had an immense toll upon him for obvious reasons!

From death comes life…thats why Jedidiah had to kill Sydney to bring him back. Had to let him decay, to become something new, something made from the old, carrying on the memory of what was before. 

Jedidiah wants Sydney to be cared for, and to care for him, but he just can’t do it, not really. He tries to give him what he needs for survival but to balance it out Sydney needs to have a balance of what he needs and what he wants (not too much of either but not too little). A requirement we’ve seen Jedidiah is too busy to meet, right now at least.

If Sydney was drowned, does that not bring some question to what Elijah said in season 1? Did Sydney in a way experience two deaths? A death of his own creation, and a death done unto him? Did Elijah meant the death Sydney brought upon himself that sent him to the hospital? I am probably just overthinking this way to much.

Just a weird way of describing something, but notice how at the time when Sydney wakes up outside of camp based on Jedidiah’s remarks about Lucille it would seem that Jedidiah and Lucille are somewhat estranged, but now if anything they are in a liminal state estrangement and familial relationship… while inside the limn???? 

I wonder does the way someone dies affect how they come back in this?

Sydney and Jedidiah’s relationship is seriously messed up, but I think that they are going to start working towards fixing it as much as they can; though there will almost certainly be setbacks on both of their parts. Because everything they’ve each been through is not stuff you immediately get over or change, some of it I think they will continue to struggle with for a long time. I am going to have to write another post about the connections to the beloved story Frankenstein by Mary Shelly (as well as symbolism for CHNT), because it’s even more than I thought. So, yeah there’s going to be that (at some point, it will take a while). But those are a few theories and notes for episode 68, I am dreading what will happen in the season finale! Thank you for reading this, and as usual you are free to point out any weak points in my theories/add your own/or discuss anything. Or if you have any suggestions for things that I should write a post about you can let me know and I will most likely try to do it at some point!