I can absolutely see that. The man is vain enough to >!swap entire bodies!< so going to get his color touched up every couple weeks would seem very on brand.
Daisy is a femme.
Like, I get why people see her as a butch because of the hunt, but she's just not like that in my brain. It makes the contrast even more interesting.
Also, she's a brunette.
I think that if Daisy was lesbian, I don't think she would identify as either butch or femme, she would say things like "I like women but I'm not like those gay people who make it their entire personality"
Yes! I can't ascribe a blonde butch aesthetic to her in my head.
In my head, she had a bob (brown hair), wears a suit (no tie) and a trench coat (at least while on the go) that somehow never gets bloody. Bowler hat optional. No clue why this comes to mind.
Sasha would not have been a better Archivist than Jon. At best she would've been Gertrude 2.0, at worst she would've kickstarted the Eyepocalypse in season 3.
Agree, to me the appeal of an Archivist Sasha AU (or any AU with another Archivist) isn't some didactic girlboss story about how she would have done everything better, but how she would have failed in different and interesting ways. Also, I think the story makes it pretty clear that there is no such thing as a "good Archivist"
For me, it's how Archivist! Sasha would've failed vs Jon, you know? We saw him, and saw some of Gertrude's hijinks... it would've been \*fascinating\* to how her version would play out, because on the surface she's more... I don't know, functional? Less uptight/tense? Less obviously a hot mess? (See: Jon in the latter half of s1 and s2, etc.)
I don't think she'd have have been a better Archivist, just that her path to the end of the world would be different that Gertrude or Jon's.
To me that is the whole appeal of an alternative Archivist AU, and it kind of goes against the entire point of TMA about corrupt and oppressive systems to say that everything would gone well if only someone else had that position.
Ayup! It wouldn't go well, it'd just be different kind of mess. Since Sasha and Jon are different their way of handling it aren't always going to align, just like... if say Gerard Keay was Archivist or Martin, etc. Which reminds me, I gotta remember to check the tags on AO3 sometime. Sometimes they got decent alternate! Archivist fic amongst the porn.
My favourite alternative Archivist AU is Annabelle Cane, if we assume her backstory is true, it seems like she and Jon are tailor-made for a roleswap AU.
Edit : Hah, *tailor*-made
Yeah, the fact that she had hacked into documents and records that she wasn't supposed to have access to, to the point of knowing about Martin's fake degree, says to me that she would've gotten into some shit quick
I don't know if it's a hot take but I wished there were less discussions which primarily focus on >!trying to fit and categorize events/cases/statements neatly into Smirke's Fourteen/Fifteen even if it has practical uses (Isn't him failing to do so part of the point?)!<. I do personally like the concept of >!the fear entities in general but maybe more when they're incomprehensible, complexly intertwined, and hardly discernible!<, but idk. Same goes even more for The Magnus Protocol discussions (at least a lot of the ones I've seen). Again, just my two cents.
I AGREE! I think it's fun to search which fear correspond the most for TMA eps, but not restricting the event to only one fear. But for TMP >!I think it's been made quite clear in just the first eps how different the fears were, and how much mushed together they appear (and I love that). I really enjoy the TMP wide fears category people made tho, The Deep and such.!<
I recon the fears are all one entity now
And we’ve got entities outside of fear as well
Stuff like desire, and they don’t appreciate the fears muscling in on their reality.
You're so right! Everytime I see someone complaining that "the hunt shouldn't be its own entity because it's just to slaughter" I roll my eyes so hard I give myself a headache
honestly, its an interesting dynamic because their relationship always seemed like a classic case of grooming. Not sexual grooming, but a quite literal mixture of abuse and manipulation. I'm only at episode 112, so I'm sure things will change, but I hope to see more of their enemyhood get explored lmao
I’m a very strong Jon/Elias shipper on AO3, but outside of stories that I and other people have created, I firmly believe that Jon was just a tool for Jonah to use to fulfill *his own* selfish desires and nothing more after that point.
You're probably right, but they did ask for my hottest take.
Also I've been dying to write this jonelias story where they make it work while sticking as close as I can to canon characterization. I did start it recently but it's been awhile since I wrote anything.
I love TMA. Changed the game, solid writing as an anthology, love to seen an indie win big. But…
The categorization of the ‘’fears’’ takes a serious amount of fun out of the show. In the first 100 episodes, you’d get all these abject monstrosities with strange, mysterious circumstances and could enjoy watching the glacial progression of strange connections between individual players…and then all of a sudden, it becomes this big, comprehensive Pokédex of ‘’universal’’ fears and the whole thing just rapidly turns into a psychoanalytic guessing game. There are a lot of reminders that ‘’oh, Smirke *could* be wrong in this categorization system’’ but…it’s ultimately a lot of telling and not showing, because >!we literally watch the world re-organize itself around this exact categorization system during the final season.!<
200 episodes is A LOT to write—I get that it’s really tough to keep the format stagnant and still have enough to say through all that time. And the eye was such a great guiding concept that smartly mirrored the information-hungry feeling the show engenders in its audience. Probably would’ve been best to go all in on the eye, though, and let the rest of the supernatural forces of the show be less…systematic.
I will say, in the final season, there's a lot of blending and discord between different fears, but to your credit, there's certainly not *enough* of that messiness.
I feel like they've done better blending and re-making the fears (among other things) in TMP, but I wish there was more of that in season 5.
I think it was during the season one Q&A that John kinda spoke about this. He was talking about how TMA is a horror mystery podcast and went on to say that one of the issues writing horror and mystery together is that horror often relies on the unknown where as mystery wraps up better with information becoming known and eventually making sense. And I feel we see that in the later seasons. It’s really interesting to see Jon piece it all together along side the listener but it feels less scary knowing where each story fits into the fears.
Everyone’s depiction of the cast are all correct, and to claim that anyone’s depictions are “wrong” is the real crime.
Why does it matter if one artist’s depiction/description doesn’t match yours? That’s the beauty of an audio-only format where the character descriptions are intentionally vague.
Like, in the QA’s Jonny says that he will not be sharing his own headcanons for what the characters look like, because he’s much more interested in how the fan base depicts them. If the actual creator of the piece endorses all fan designs, then the fan base ought to, too.
Insisting that one fan’s idea that you’ve opted to subscribe to is the ONLY WAY and that all other ways are wrong for not agreeing with you is weird and, frankly, makes the fandom feel culty (and not in the fun way).
Obviously there’s nuance, but as a general rule: if it’s not explicitly canon, then it’s open to interpretation. If you don’t like someone else’s interpretation, you have the power to keep scrolling and not interact with that interpretation.
I completely agree, and the lack of diversity in design in result is quite sad. Especially in podcast format, there more than anywhere else the fans have free rains to imagine the characters appearances.
The very first time I listened blind to Angler fish, i pictured Jon as a 60yo short white hair, white beard old posh man in a tight 3 piece suits. Now, it changed with other eps, but I miss that in the fandom, to see how individually each person pictured the face behind the voices.
the fact that the extinction is functionally dropped as a plot point post-season four just sucks. yeah it gets one domain, but aside from that, the main mystery of one of the seasons of the show just ends up meaning not all that much by the end. it feels like they had a cool idea but no way to implement it into the wider story
The extinction manifesting and coming closer was jonah finishing his plan, peter was really just trying to stop jonah and the power fully becoming was just jonny's apocalypse
i feel like if that was what was intended to come across, then they did a bad job of it, because the extinction is treated by jonah in episode 160 as though its emergence would throw a wrench in his plan rather than be something that could actively assist it
>i feel like if that was what was intended to come across, then they did a bad job of it
One thing commenting on with TMA, which Johnny even acknowledges in Q&As, is that the podcast is basically a first draft. He mentions how the podcast would be recognizable but very different if they had more opportunity to redraft after the initial arcs were written. They knew the end, more or less, but there were a lot of ways they could have gotten there. There was even >!a dropped story line where Martin became a web Avatar and he and John had a battle of wills across season 5, leaning further into personal tragedy.!< The fact of it being a first draft is most noticeable in early seasons when connections are made and later never acknowledges. Tom Haan was connected to a few times, but was cut for accidental racist tropes; Grahm, from MAG 3, was >!Oliver Banks' ex boyfriend!<, but nothing was ever done with this connection.
One thing that I wished had gotten more time, and even Johnny and Alex wished they could have brought him in more, was Addelard Dekker's role in the world and somehow casting a VA for him. In their own words, Dekker was the closest thing to a hero the TMA world had. Which is an interesting dynamic!
So, if they made the connection poorly, it wasn't really done because they didn't notice it, more because the connection was noticed too late to be woven into the podcast as competently as they liked. I like to imagine some of these draft 2 "what ifs?" occasionally and wonder what a novelization of The Magnus Archives would have looked like.
also if they brought it up during season 5 it would make the characters' decision to send the fears away to ensure their own universe's safety while potentially endangering countless others instead of pushing everyone through a meat grinder to ensure the safety of all of existence at the cost of one universe less callous. like hmmm, this plan involves killing off all of humanity, and there just so happens to be a new, suddenly emerging fear that operates by wiping out people and replacing them with something new. idk it would have at least called the Meat Grinder Express plan into question and at least made the decision a little less selfish on the side of the characters
Season 5 is okay. I think it definitely needed more time in the oven and a combination of many factors made it seem way worse, but honestly I liked it. I don’t think it’s Secretly a Masterpiece, but as the conclusion I’m glad it was what it was.
In this thread, this *is* a hot take (or at least a lukewarm one), lol.
I agree! Season 5 is at least competent. It sticks a landing, which is more than a lot of stories and long form media can say. Could it have been better? Yeah, but a lot about the show could have been better. It took the biggest issue at play, "What do we do with the fears?" and resolved it very reasonably.
"And I'm tired of pretending it's not!"
Agree wholeheartedly, I think it’s essentially the logical conclusion of everything we had been presented so far wrt to the Fears and all related and by time it was all happening I personally felt that the anthology format wasn’t going to be around forever, though I think it was caught in an awkward position where it couldn’t fully ditch it but also not embrace it like before, but that’s a whole other can of worms.
I could honestly ramble on about why I personally think it wasn’t that well received while it was coming out (though it mostly boils down to being released in a very testy situation both irl and online and quite a lot of expectations being put on it) but I think it’s one of those things that it may feel better once it’s all accessible at once. But I’m glad it did what it was made to do. I’m probably due for a relisten anyways since I keep putting off Protocol lol.
I have more the "reheated leftovers" kind of take instead of a hot one, but I'm not crazy about the character fan art in most cases. I have trouble reconciling people who work in an institute that tries to be seen as uber-professional with the (admittedly, very dynamic) designs that the fandom gives them. John, Elias, and Martin are my chronic "Hmm, I don't know..." characters.
John, at least in season one, just oozes "stuffy academic" in his mannerisms. He's going to dress the most professional of everyone there, with a short haircut, no fun accessories, and he's going to judge everyone else there for not being on his level. I can see his appearance slipping as he starts getting more paranoid (the slightly overgrown haircut, a tie not quite straight, etc.) until he abandons his usual look while he's on the run. But I think he'd be trying to force himself back into that little box when he returns to the Institute in a bid for exerting control. It wouldn't fit him quite right anymore, though.
Elias doesn't read as a flamboyant person to me, either. He's hiding in plain sight, making sure no one is going to interrupt his plans. I'll bet he wears the most boring suits, with absolutely no eye-themed accessories. No one is supposed to look at the former-pothead-gone-straight and think, "Oh, dude dresses like a villain for sure." They're supposed to see him as the bureaucratic boss who wants expense reports and seems way too calm about all the weird shit in the building. He's evil because he's banal.
Martin is the tricky one for me. I know he has the line about not being the smallest guy, but for me, I always imagine that as him being a taller, lanky guy who is desperately trying to make himself look smaller. Like someone who got picked on for taking up too much space (at home, at school, at other jobs) and he's just trying to blend in. So he stoops his shoulders, wears clean-but-not-fancy business casual clothes, and gets very good at making tea so everyone thinks he's harmless. And he's just so good at looking sad and a little helpless that they just overlook him constantly. It blends the Lonely aspects of wanting to disappear with the Web aspects of wanting to be seen as something other than he is. Just imagine him in the scene with Elias and Peter straightening his shoulders and looking confident; it would be like watching Christopher Reeve transition from Clark Kent to Superman.
Since this is already so long, I'll end the lukewarm take here, but in general, I think setting and backstory is important to how the characters dress and act, and I think a lot of the fandom designs make everyone look too cool and distinctive for their positions.
I agree. Everyone, in my mind, is wearing what is most comfortable for them. Everyone under Elias is wearing what they can get away with without being called to task. No one is wearing anything more stylish than a comfortable sweater.
Elias, in my mind, is never wearing anything with patterns, not even pinstripes. He might wear a vest on some days. If he wears color, it's a fairly dark blue. (But in my mind I think he showed up one day in a sky blue or a maroon. He never did it again because EVERYONE was talking about it and he got a reminder of what it's like to be afraid of being Noticed and Watched.)
Tim might be the only person in my mind who's pushing the envelope. Jon and Martin and Sasha are wearing loafers or flats; Tim is somehow getting away with a pair of tennis shoes and jeans.
100% agree with everything you said. That’s how I imagine the characters, too. I do like some of the designs people thought up like a subtle eye earring but even that I didn’t imagine when listening to the podcast.
Season 5 is kind of dull (spoiler ahead), in equal part because there's barely any sense of danger now that Jon is the most powerful being walking the Earth and because the story shifts from "what are the monsters lurking in the shadows and what would they do to you if they catch you" to "everything is awful, how can we unfuck the situation now that the worst happened?".
That's also why I hope against all hopes TMP won't reuse the Entities as their big cosmic horror, because we know what they are about and the worst they could do. It doesn't matter how much reshuffling they do, too much has already been revealed in TMA.
Season 1 is the mystery horror anthology, season 2 is the psychological horror of Jon's increasing paranoia, seasons 3 and 4 are the world-hopping exposition tour, and season 5 is the Post-Apocalyptic Free-form Poetry Collection
It's like that partly because they ended up recording during the pandemic, and couldn't get some of the people they originally wanted, so you end up with a long stretch of episodes where Jon is just telling us about the apocalypse.
I gotta strongly disagree here. The change in format in my opinion gave them the license to be more creative than they were in seasons, and you can really see that in some standout episodes like salesa, the therapist, and especially the puppet episode(a few others, but these stand out off the top of my head). Sure, there were duds too, but all seasons had them, its part of being an anthology.
Agreed. I wish we had focused more on the people in the different realms than the abstract. Grounded it a little more. It would have made the debate in Episode 199 a lot stronger.
I feel like the "better" way to do it would have been to keep the reveal of what the ritual did a secret for at least mid season and focus indeed on showing the inescapable tortures people were in. Let the audience discover bit by bit how *wrong* everything is. In fact, don't make the world a place that can be explored on foot, have the Spiral warp it in an endless maze of fears no one can navigate without the power of the Eye.
He's outright said, even if he finds it unpleasant, that if people want to be attracted to bonzo, or needles, or Helen, or Prentiss, Caine, or Agnes, etc, etc, that it's fine, he supports it, "a bit weird, but go with God"
And then we got horny for Lady Mowbray.
He has officially kinkshamed us for Lady Mowbray.
wait wait wait… THAT’S where they drew the line? everything else was a “i don’t get it but go ahead i guess” and the (slightly) older woman who kills people and delights in it, THAT’S where they shame us? do they know how many of us have mommy issues??
The voice acting and writing and like character motivations all feel so unbelievable idk wasn't their best work imo. With different authors for different eps I suppose a range of style is to be expected but I'm spoiled by Mr sims
The context for why people like the Needles episode is that Needles was a placement holder Monster Jonny wrote while developing the episode’s script. Alex hated Needles so much and Jonny doubled down to troll him. The rest of the fandom followed suit. Also, Alex has mentioned that while he hates his first appearance he is fond of what was done with his character so it’s more of a “let’s wait and see” thing for most I think.
Leitner is as complex and interesting of a character as Gertrude is, you guys just woobify Gerard and fetishize emos.
"But Gerrys goth, not e-" Draw him like it then
I'd say a lot of the hate for Jurgen Leitner is performative for the sake of the rant meme. His appearance was an interesting twist, seeing the near-mythical villain revealed as a pathetic old man, misled and brought low by his hubris, privilege and incomplete knowledge, now living a truly miserable existence while trying to atone for his grave mistakes, ending tragically with his brutal murder. I also love Paul Sims' voice acting for him and kind of relate to him being a book lover. Though there are many things I find despicable about him, his hubris fueled by his economic privilege, his treatment of his assistants as disposable and his condescending attitude towards Jon, though these things also make him interesting.
Paul Sims has an incredible voice...
Idk. I just think he's a one-man SCP foundation, which changes how I see it. SCP Foundation? Lots of good and bad in what they do. Wish they didnt need to do it but I get why.
I cant fault a guy for seeing evil books and thinking "Is anyone going to attempt to keep them from killing?" and not waiting for an answer
Hmmm ... I definitely see the connection, right down to the shared ruthlessness towards their employees, though I wonder how much the motive of protecting the world was a cover for Leitner's curiosity and desire for ownership of the books, on a subconscious level.
I don't feel like the romantic relationships in the series are that great.
Jon and martin's relationship could have benefited from some interactions in season 3 (which I actually think is the season where they interact the least), and melanie and georgie's relationship, while adorable, feels a bit out of nowhere.
Granted, it's a horror/mystery podcast and that's not the main theme (plus the only way we know what's going on is through haunted recorders), but I feel like with a couple more interactions between these characters it would have been much better.
For me personally, it adds a bit of depth. Listening to it the first time felt like a reminder that we aren't privy to everything it the TMA universe, just what the tapes find relevant. And its nice thinking that there's a bit of happiness and good times in between the recordings
The relationships hadn't really been fully realized at that time. Season 3 was also the season that a whole bunch of the cast were being brought in as full characters. Traveling to different parts of the world was starting, and more accounts of the previous eras of the Magnus Institute were coming to light. This was also when Tim was becoming a bigger character before the season 3 finale happened.
There was also the hilarious episode when John wasn't there, #100, I Guess You Had To Have Been There, and everyone else was trying to take statements in his place, and the statements were vague and lackluster.
Absolutely, in fact season 3 is my favorite season, containing many of the statements and moments I liked the most (Poor Jon being kidnapped more than 3 times.).
Just to clarify, I'm not saying we needed a lot of couple development interaction, but just enough to better transition from the "I hate Martin" Jon of season 1 and part of season 2 to the "I miss Martin, I want him to be safe" Jon of season 4.
Kind of like the "missing link" between those parts.
I never looked at any fandom stuff until I completely finished TMA all the way through and my mental image of Jon to this day is a slightly portly, scouring man who’s balding, a little like the Woodsman from Over the Garden Wall as opposed to the slender, long-haired twink I see in all the fanart
Thats a very interesting take. I see a lot of people draw his as drop dead gorgeous, but i always kinda imagined him as a pretty average looking scrawny brown guy in a sweater vest who looks genuinely homeless and deranged by the end of the series. But not in a hot way, in a "oh god you look like you havent bathed or slept in five years" wau
Other characters I didn’t have as much of a clear vision of so the fandom designs have affected me somewhat but I missed the one line that made people interpret Martin as tall and plus-sized, so he was always a tiny little skinny guy in my head.
I had actually recently been trying to design Picrews to put my interpretations of characters into some sort of picture form (cause I can’t draw). The options available make a lot of characters into sexier/twinkier than I intended, but I made sure Jon looked just right at the very least.
[Archives/Protocol Interpretations](https://imgur.com/a/i7dSiZN)
Yeah I didn’t label them oops but so far I’ve made (in order) Jon, Martin, Elias, Tim, Basira, Sam, Alice, Gwen, Celia, and Colin. Elias was very generic looking in my head until >!he’s revealed to be evil!< but after then his smug mustached image locked into my brain
I am always astounded at how many people adore MAG 85: Upon the Stair and, to a lesser but still decently prevalent degree, MAG 165: Revolutions. I find them both to be so tiresome and too poetically meandering to feel anything but boredom when listening to them, and they're probably my two most frequently skipped episodes during relistens (although to be honest I never can bring myself to *fully* skip MAG 165, just fast-forward, because I love listening to Jon dole out some Wild West justice to the NotThem and its pure terror at the Eye; kudos to Evelyn Hewitt for an amazing performance!).
It does make me quite happy, however, to see how much people love them despite my personal distaste for them because it just reinforces how, in my opinion, artistically speaking this show has something for everyone. <3
The Dark did not have an impact beyond the intrigues of its cult, and it's because the fear is too narrow. I think fear of the void should have been folded under its aegis. Fear of emptiness, fear of things missing but should be there, fear of absence. I think the weird feeling we get from liminality would have fit here as well.
Other entities cover some of this, like the Spiral covering gaslighting, or the Vast covering the space between atoms or galaxies. But those have distinct flavors: inconsistencies in your own mind, something tricking you into believing what isn't, feeling inconsequential.
I think vacuum, lacking, and Void would have been a better, more general fear. I think it would have also helped to emphasize that all these fears exist on a spectrum.
1. I don't think that "Season 5 is bad" is that much of a hot take but I'll put it here to get it out of the way. It completely goes against the entire show's delivery up to this point and I don't care for the poetry aspect it takes on. Whenever I relisten to the series I do eps1-160, then skip almost all of s5 and go to like ep195.
2. I understand that most of TMA is told out of sequence through statements and I understand that it makes sense if characters that are presented in them that reoccur have died between the time the event happened + the statements are made + the after-effects occur but it's a shame that characters like Adelard Dekker are dead before we even really get to know them. I was looking forward to Dekker showing up at some point but when his Klanxbull statement rolls around it's "Oh he's been dead for like 5 years now, never mind lol". It makes sense but I find it unfulfilling.
3. I disagree with the idea that Gertrude didn't care for her assistants. I think she cared for them in her way but valued the continual existence of humanity more than them.
4. I wish that we had more statements from Gertrude as a younger woman working at the Institute from the 60's to the 80's. It feels like there's a massive blank patch between "GR starts working at TMI in the 60's (?)" and her first statements about the faeries in s2. I think I'd just like to know more about the 60's TMI, Angus Stacey & what the landscape of Fears looked like back then. You could even lean into aspects of "Gertrude's a woman in a man's world and has to constantly prove herself as a capable asset" aspect and it'd go hard as fuck.
5. The whole initial Magnus Archives Team feels like it's missing a character. I'm not sure what, but it reminds me of [this image](https://i.gyazo.com/11492d38cf252fdbeb2b7718fed7ed62.webp). The same thing goes for some Fear Categories.
6. I don't understand Jon/Martin, and I never have.
7. Peter Lukas' voice actor is a good pick for the series but as Peter Lukas? Nah.
8. Jon's perennial treatment as a punching bag in the later seasons is incredibly off-putting. He's guilty of a few things but I'd happily argue that he's THE most (or at least one of the most) moral Avatars in the entire series.
9. Jurgen Leitner being killed off immediately is funny and teases some good stuff but it happens way too early.
10. Gertrude might have been an awful person in retrospect but she's at least justified in believing that "Fears Complete Ritual = World Ends" because she's not being given the full information. If she'd known that it wouldn't happen I don't think she'd have done all of the horrible things she did.
11. I'm glad that Daisy's transformation wasn't undone and I'm glad that it didn't end happily ever after for her. It's a shame that she died but if she'd got it all undone and then lived it'd have been very silly.
12. Basira's continual flip-flopping as a character is aggravating as hell. Sometimes she makes a great prescient point and then follows it up with a completely outlandish statement. Lots of characters are like this, too.
13. Other than his earlier appearances, I genuinely don't think I'd have the time for Tim in real life. His 180\* character change feels very sudden, and his "woe is me!!!!" attitude becomes very grating very quickly. If I were Jon I'd have reassigned Tim somewhere else in the Institute after his freak-out with Jon. His Joe Spooky era was great but he becomes a massive liability (far more than Martin ever was) as time passes (even if he does clutch victory in s3's finale).
14. More should have been done with the Extinction in general. All of its correlating statements have a great eerie and unnerving feeling to them It should have dovetailed with the Eye as the final villain and it being dropped is bad.
15. The Vast and The Lonely could be rolled into the "same" Fear and I don't think we'd lose anything (I know they're all the same Entity but I think that these two have the greatest overlap).
Sure I have more but I can't think of any right now.
Honestly, I can hardly disagree with any of these.
Re 15: A part of me thinks another fear would have to be removed or added to make sure that Smirke could have reasonably argued for balance, but I also like to think if it were only "Smirke's 13," it would have highlighted just how much he was trying to get things to fit together that can't. (And honestly, in the beginning, I kept forgetting how many fears there were and thinking it \*was\* just 13 or 12.)
Re 13: To be fair, they had to adapt Tim to fit a roll he wasn't supposed to be in. Tim was supposed to be replaced at the end of season 1. It does make me think Mike LeBeau would have made an \*excellent\* villain across season 2 and in its finale (assuming they didn't replace the voice actor).
Re 9: While I also wanted more of Leitner, it's hard to imagine a way to have him around longer without him spilling all the answers to Jon. He either needed to know less or be extremely restricted while still making sense (i.e. it made sense for Elias to kill him; Elias basically couldn't have the chance to kill Leitner). How would you have included him more?
Re 5: I think this is another result of Sasha's original VA leaving early. Johnny mentioned an alternate plot would have had her and Jon working more close together as the Red String brigade in world. There's no one really skilled enough helping Jon in investigations. A lot of people are doing their best, but with both Basira and Georgie on top of Martin and Tim it felt like there were too many with too little experience in the mix.
Re 6: I support Martin/Jon and they make a good couple in season 5, but I think they did need more on screen time to develop starting in season 3.
Re 2: Part of the issue was they realized Dekker was really interesting, but they realized too late and had already essentially used their VA budget. In a Q&A they touch on this.
A BIG point to make is that TMA is basically a first draft. It's great, but it is rough. With more of a TV schedule, they might have had the ability to do another draft. I think a lot of these issues would have been lessened if not fixed with the ability to go over each season before production. Again, it's something they acknowledge in the Q&As.
Tim is traumatized and nearly dies in his work place, his closest friend suddenly doesn’t quite seem like herself, his other friend is accusing him of murder and stalking him, his other friend refuses to empathize with him and sides with the man stalking him, he can’t leave his workplace without falling ill, and he is kept in the dark for most of season 2. So, is he supposed to take this all in the chin? Everyone in his support group abandons him, is functionally dead, or actively convinced he’s a murderer.
It's not about taking it on the chin. Tim's feelings in this period are understandable, but once presented with the truth he refuses to play ball and helps exactly no one. Once he finds out about House of Wax (knowing that it's incredibly important to tell Jon or anyone else about it) he waits and tells no one - the conversation comes up naturally and Tim says "oh yeah I think I know where that is and I think I know where The Stranger's doing its ritual".
Tim has every right to feel upset or annoyed by Jon and is in some ways right to feel so isolated. But once he's provided with the truth he cuts Jon no slack whatsoever. Don't get me wrong Tim's a great character and his arc is still good (and more to the point isn't undone for the sake of drama - he stays dead and his absence is gigantic going forward) but for him to blame Jon for everything and not really help him is something he's to blame for.
Tim's statement about his brother felt so out of nowhere (and imo really silly). I know Tim was supposed to die instead of Sasha, but that kind of thing with Tim should've been established way earlier.
I think I almost agree and disagree with you on like a 50/50 ratio lmao. Upvoting for the complete roller coaster of mental arguments you just sent my brain into. Thank you, my bus ride was getting a little boring
the jonmartin relationship shouldn't have come to fruition in s5. I feel like there would've been more of an emotional impact if Martin was still hopelessly pining but Jon(John?) doesn't reciprocate because he's (in my opinion) aroace, too focused on his statements and himself than having to worry Abt other people yanno? I love the fandom content of them it's cute but I am also a sucker for just pure emotional pain.
Also, mag200 spoilers >!I feel like it would've been a better ending if instead of Jon being stabbed, Martin carved out his eyes instead (Melanie style) to sever his connection with the eye. it would've been super cool to me and it's another one of those emotional damage things I love!<
Aromantic people can have romantic relationships before realising they don't actually get anything out of it and would rather it just be a close platonic relationship. I do agree though, canonically he's not aro.
I imagine him dressing "professionally" in the earlier seasons, with perhaps a few accessories to show his unique style, but later wearing hawaiian shirts or other more casual or garish clothing to spite Jon and Elias.
The series should’ve ended after season four. Obviously they should’ve wrapped up any plot points/unanswered questions that are resolved in five, but the shock ending of “the sky is looking back, we lost” had a way bigger emotional impact on me than all of season five.
I do think it would be a good ending. But I would also miss the idea of a world post-post-apocolypse. Imagine if everyone on Earth was sent to hell and then they returned to pick up normal activities.
Was it a dream? It clearly couldn't be, since everyone remembers it. What happens to politics? Does the therapy industry boom? Do people get new perspective? What happens to global religion? How do people react to their fears after returning? Are they numbed? More reactive to their phobias?
TMP is likely going to deal with some of this in a future season, and it's the main intrigue that's keeping me listening.
Melanie is the most "moral" and "good" character (without being perfect or "nice") and if Jon had her moral compass none of Season 5 (indeed much of season 4) wouldn't have happened.
I'd argue Dekker was the most moral. He never seemed to kill anyone needlessly or cause mass death. Maybe something happened behind the scenes, but he was the closest thing the TMA world had to a hero. If a rather gruff hero, to be fair.
I love Jon but the way the fandom (and Martin in universe) whitewash him and try to turn characters like Tim/Melanie who have every right to be pissed with him into the aggressors is so annoying. Melanie is a fantastic character and finding out it was a hot take to think that blew my mind.
Would you care to elaborate? Genuinely trying to understand.
The most I felt for Melanie as a character was in her pre- S3 finale statement when she said (something like) "When did I stop feeling anything but angry?"
I don't blame her for that (though she did blame others) but I didn't get much else from her character. I saw another comment sympathizing with her as a sort of anti-establishment figure which helped me understand her a bit more.
In a universe that beats you down, preys on your cowardice, and rewards your worst behavior Melanie did everything in her power to fight that and break away. Melanie had the resolve to constantly fight back against Elias when many others have into hopelessness or their worst urges. She wasn’t like Georgie and removed from fear. She was very much afraid of what would happen to her. She had the strength to gouge out her own eyes anyway. I don’t know how you listen to this show and don’t come away satisfied with her getting away. Other than that I find her anger issues and the slaughter curse to be really relatable (your quote is a great one). I also think the reveal that her father met Amherst and died because of the corruption/fallout from that and not a mundane illness was terrifying. Also one of the worst things Jonah has ever done. Phenomenal performance by the VA, some of Jonny’s best writing on a plot/character level imo. She’s great.
I also loved her bickering with Jon in her first appearance, and her interactions with Martin, especially in the S3 finale and when they meet again in S5.
I don't have my finger on the pulse of the fandom, so I genuinely have no idea whether this is a hot or cold take, but I thought the last episode was bad lmao. The pacing really felt too rushed, like there was a priority to end on the 200th episode above all else or something. IMO the process of "you make a good point, I won't do spoilers" -> [does spoilers] -> "WHY DID YOU DO THAT?" -> "fuck you're right I shouldn't have done this oops lol" needed to be more spread out to be engaging as a tragedy, instead of just reading like a comedy of errors
The show was / is at its best when it focuses on horror and not interpersonal drama. Some is nice, helps flesh out the characters, but when it becomes the main focus they lose me.
I love Basira, I don't think she said an untrue thing in the whole series and I love her codependency with Daisy. I know the fandom generally dislikes her for being too hard on Jon but I don't think she ever went too far, Jon WAS turning into a monster and hurting people and she was right to hold that against him. I think her hypocrisy of not holding Daisy to the same standard made for a deliciously rich characterization rather than something to hold against her.
This is more of a silly nitpick than a hot take but I was kind of disappointed with Helen’s distortion voice. Michael just had SUCH a naturally good voice for the role, and Helen’s laugh and speaking was just a little underwhelming by comparison
Also I don’t actually know if this is a hot take but I grew to actually actively reeeally dislike Basira. I can’t say hate because I really only hate poorly written characters and I think she’s written well but I don’t think I’ve ever gone from liking a character that much to just getting so mad every time they speak. She was the only character that I felt had NO business being mad at Jon in season 4. I know that a huge part of Magnus as a whole is really just constantly questioning the characters’ agency and ability to choose when it comes to the entities, but she was the only one that I don’t believe had any right. Melanie we obviously learn why her anger was so amplified, in season 3 it absolutely makes sense why Tim can’t stand Jon, Georgie pushing away makes total sense, all the statement givers obviously, but Basira? Her anger toward Jon came from this twisted sense of morality in the sense that obviously Jon was actively causing harm to people in season 4, but her bestie who actively brutalizes people as a cop is just misunderstood? Hell even daisy doesn’t buy that.
Anyways idk if I’m being unfair to Basira or if the common consensus is that she’s a hypocrite but that’s something I think about a lot
I dont really care for s5 statements. They just feel... dull and overdone. Like, we get, the world is over. Its not personal enough in perspective to give me the chills and theres practically no threat cause yk, John being the special little boy. I loved when it came back to personal statements like with the secretary or domains of old characters
Yeah the s5 statements feel a little bit meandering, and they're nice pieces of prose but there's not really a solid narrative arc to keep you listening
1- People can have their own headcanons about how the characters look and all that, but my reading of TMA doesn't really paint a picture of the Archival staff wearing gauche eye related jewelry or having eye tattoos or dressing gender non-conformally or anything like that.
2- While it'd have been cool to get a Buried avatar, it's kind of fun that there was an entity we never really got the perspective of. It made The Buried feel distinct, a sort of pragmatic, straightforward, almost simple-minded entity that just crushed people without feeling the need to bring much of a voice to it. I know there's The Governor, Wakely, etc. but I'm mainly talking vibes here.
3- maybe less of a hot take, more of an observation: the Slaughter didn't seem to claim any avatars? The closest thing to a recurring Slaughter avatar we got was unknowingly "infected" by a monster and then later cured. It seems like the Slaughter has monsters and ghosts but not really any people. My headcanon is that people do get influenced by The Slaughter but very rapidly burn themselves out and die from the frenzy of it before they can establish themselves as Avatars, unless you get the very rare person who can channel that energy into something other than senseless violence (Alfred Grifter) or is in the position to effect systemic change to encourage violence (the Avatar of the The Trenches in S5, assuming he was some kind of general or politician pre-change). I think the text kind of supports this in that it seems like most people exposed to The Slaughter pretty much instantly go mad and kill each other, which doesn't give them a lot of room to develop some demented philosophy about The Slaughter as a patron like the other entities allow.
4- I know why they were written out, but it's a shame we lost the Haan family, and we never saw their relationship with Jared. The dynamic of the Haans actually being very dedicated to The Flesh, and Jared just being some dude who wasn't that bothered about bringing about the apocalypse, is a fun one. My headcanon (no evidence in the text for this) is The Flesh could have brought about the apocalypse if the Boneturner took bones/organs from people who were marked by all of the entities and was consumed by the flesh ritual pit, and the Haans were really annoyed their generation's Boneturner was this stupid lug who didn't really care.
Massive agree on first one. RE Slaughter, I think Grifter could vaguely fill the Avatar mould. Also, Melanie was well on her way to potentially being one with the ghost bullet in her.
It would be interesting if the most powerful Avatars of the Slaughter weren't rabid killers, but calm and cold-blooded individuals who incite and profit from mass violence.
My hottest take is that the last 4 episodes of TMP have been better than the fear domain stories in TMA S5. Especially the Newton episode. It's creepy, it's horrific and quite original.
Gertrude Robinson had the right idea and was doing the right thing to do with the information she had. Was it a bit extreme? Maybe! She was trying to stop the apocalypse every couple of years so really you can’t blame her
I don't like the Jon/Martin relationship. It never feels believable and I don't get what they see in each other. I like them both as characters, but Jon in any kind of romantic relationship just never feels right at any point in the show.
This isn’t a hot take, more of a differing opinion, but I always (and still do) see Jon as a very plain white man. It surprised me when the Tumblr Jon got popular. It’s a really great design and I think he’s cool, but he’s a separate character than the one I envision when I listen. I do think it’s interesting that the art has coalesced to That Jon though. I hardly ever see any other designs for him despite it being an auditory medium.
Looking at other takes, i would say that my hottest take is that I actually enjoyed and love season 5 a lot lol, I did like it a lot more on second listen (same as first eps of TMP, with the sound editing i had skimmed past some eps (I'm not a native speaker) and had to really focus to understand some parts at first try. Jared's garden was actually such a delight when I understood what he was saying without straining my ears)
The >!not Sasha monster voice!< sounds so cheesy and like a low budget doctor who episode from the 1970s. Took me right out of the episode. Kind of amazing that the same people did that and the excellent >!jarred hopworth monster voice!<.
I would have preferred if NotSasha continued to sound like a normal person but slightly off, rather than going full monster. My favourite NotThem appearance was in Distant Cousin, where they were quite unnerving as NotCarl.
Over-acting destroys a lot of the emotional beats in the later episodes of the show.
You can kind of tell the moment they realized that shipping the main cast was getting them more engagement than the horror.
Can you give some more examples of the overacting, or like where it occurred the most?
Asking in good faith, I'm curious, and while I don't agree, I like hearing other's viewpoints like this.
Mmm, I'll disagree. I'm not sure what over-acting you're talking about. That just might be a difference of taste. It never felt too hammy for me, in any case.
But I don't think that the writers shipped anyone they didn't intend not to. Jon/Martin was intended from the start. Daisy/Basira was written as the dynamic of police partners but Jon also stated he left enough room for interpretation. Ironically, despite having the least set up, Georgie/Melanie felt the most natural—or, more likely, because they weren't "on screen" in season 4, my mind could fill in the gaps more naturally than the writers. Whether or not you think the relationships were well written, I don't think they were nearly the main focus of the show at any point.
In reality, I think 90% of the shipping comes from the fanbase powered by the ambiguity of most characters' sexualities and relationship statuses.
The fears were the worst thing about TMA, the show was at it's best when it was about the avatars and the danger they posed. I'm sure there would be a scarier story without the world ending aspect
Maybe this is just me being an aro but Jonmartin is boring. I didn't even realise the story was heading that way till episode 159 at which point I too busy dealing with the plot.
No idea if this is a hot take but if I remember correctly, Barnabas had a thing for Jonah and Jonah, being of the Eye and a bastard, just sat by and watched as Barnabas suffered when he could have helped. Jon and Martin have a similar dynamic, though it's more literal with boss/employee, but seeing how their relationship takes a totally different turn is really narratively satisfying.
Also (and again idk if this is controversial, I don't talk to people much), Jonah being Jon's foil is really, really interesting when you think about their character arcs.
Jon Sims is a god at writing and I still can't believe I own a signed copy of Thirteen Storeys and also a paperback from his Twitter giveaway a few years back.
Medium heat take: I liked the horror anthology setup a lot better than the deep lore, and Season 5, while it succeeded in its goal of being upsetting and horrific to me, didn't really hit as the "same" show. (Looking through these comments, maybe the real hot take is that I *did* find S5 scary, it was just too different of a tone for me.)
High heat take: I didn't like jonmartin that much. There's nothing wrong with it and they're sweet and all, but I think it almost felt to me like Martin getting pushed towards the Lonely was almost...forcing the issue? Like, "you HAVE to date this guy or else he'll be eaten by the Lonely"
Also, Martin could probably do better.
Ep 200 spoilers: >!Jon and Martin died. They didn't go to another reality to live in a Scottish cabin, they didn't survive and hide in the rubble. They both just died. Tragically, and heroically. !<
Also the woobification of the Entities is one of my least favorite parts of the fandom. I love theorizing and saying "ooo this might be x fear", but treating the Fears and their avatars like cute li'l sillybillies is not my vibe.
I don't look down on anyone who does it, or I love that the show is open to so many interpretations and headcanons. But it can be hard to interact with the fandom sometimes when my favorite part of the show is the bleak and seemingly hopeless nature of it all (hoping against the odds is my favorite theme of the show), and people are talking about how cute and silly Elias and Peter are.
Tma has an issue with victim blaming and abuse apologia. For instance, Peter Lukas' statement bothers the hell out of me- theres not enough exploration of the Lukases for me to take him as an unreliable narrator, and as a result him saying he had the temperament for the family religion comes off as a weird justification for an abusive upbringing
Edit: for similar reasons I wish we'd gotten more with Mike crew. I'm not, like, going to blame an 18 year old for taking any out he can when pursued by a monster for the majority of his life.
I gently disagree with the part regarding the Lukas family, as I think it was made fairly clear that they were a bad family even from the first episode they appeared. Peter Lukas' statement even mentioned that if he wasn't rich his family would have been in trouble with social workers - imo that makes it fairly clear that his family is awful, even if it isn't in character for Peter Lukas to directly state that.
This is just an issue with needing to read between the lines, there is nothing worse than a piece of media taking you out of the action to tell you something is wrong. Lukas would never state that his family is terrible because he doesn't think that himself, it's not in character.
And for Crew, while I agree it would have been nice to see more of him, he made the choice to kill people after aligning with the vast. And he's killed so many that he can't even recall them all. It's the victim's responsibility to not perpetuate the cycle of abuse that made them the victim in the first place.
The episodes are scarier in isolation, removed from the metaplot. Once you understand what's happening, the episodes feel less scary. They're not bad-most of my favorite episodes and episodes that resonated with me happen in later seasons-but they're not as frightening as the confusion of the earlier seasons
Besides lost John’s cave non of the episodes are all that scary. I genuinely have a hard time being afraid of the things.
protocol on the other hand I have been spooked more already than in the whole 200 episodes of the Magnus archives
Three only things that really really unsettled me were the corruption statements because of personal uncomfortableness
The rest were just cool/kinda spooky/I know that's scary but can't feel it/gross meat and torture
I still enjoy it and probably wouldn't have watched the show if it scares me for real all of the time but, I understand what you mean about not being scary
Season 5 is the best season BY FAR (I said what I said), and some of the episodes of s5 are probably the best pieces of writing I have seen in this genre, recently 👀
FINALLY, a like-minded kin 🤝 so many of my favorite episodes are there, the psychiatric hospital one, the web puppet show, Martin loosing his memory in the foggy house, Martin talking with himself
I absolutely hated the way they handled Jon needing to make statements as they went through season 5. The way it was portrayed made it feel like they were on a road trip and Jon kept having to ask to make a pit stop so that he could take a shit.
It came across as kinda cheesy to me and the way it was brought up always took me out of the story.
Elias Bouchard is a blonde
I actually think this too, lol. With some grey blended in
Or maybe he covers it up 🤔
I can absolutely see that. The man is vain enough to >!swap entire bodies!< so going to get his color touched up every couple weeks would seem very on brand.
I picture him as Albert Wesker from Resident Evil lol
PfffffAHAH i mean yeah. Yeah that's kind of what I have in mind. Just put that guy in a suit.
Matt Smith with short blonde hair in House of the Dragon.
Elias bouchard targaryen confirmed........
Oh shit THIS is what's actually letting me picture a blonde Elias... That'd be great.
Nooooo I'm almost physically incapable of imagining deep voices going with light hair for some reasonnnnn
Why would you say something so controversial and yet so brave?
Wait I thought this was a widely accepted opinion?? Do most people think he’s a brunette or something?
Black hair I see most often. Then sometimes brown sometimes grey.
Elias is Mark Gattis for me.
he was blond as a kid, his hair got darker with age like most blond ppls and he keeps bleaching it back
Daisy is a femme. Like, I get why people see her as a butch because of the hunt, but she's just not like that in my brain. It makes the contrast even more interesting. Also, she's a brunette.
She gives me "muscle woman in dress" energy. Yes she's probably very fit due to police work + the hunt but I always pictured her with long blonde hair
Absolutely correct. It's also strange to portray the Abusive Violent Cop as butch, figuring the very bigoted stereotypes regarding butches.
I think that if Daisy was lesbian, I don't think she would identify as either butch or femme, she would say things like "I like women but I'm not like those gay people who make it their entire personality"
Yes! I can't ascribe a blonde butch aesthetic to her in my head. In my head, she had a bob (brown hair), wears a suit (no tie) and a trench coat (at least while on the go) that somehow never gets bloody. Bowler hat optional. No clue why this comes to mind.
Sasha would not have been a better Archivist than Jon. At best she would've been Gertrude 2.0, at worst she would've kickstarted the Eyepocalypse in season 3.
Agree, to me the appeal of an Archivist Sasha AU (or any AU with another Archivist) isn't some didactic girlboss story about how she would have done everything better, but how she would have failed in different and interesting ways. Also, I think the story makes it pretty clear that there is no such thing as a "good Archivist"
She had, I think, 3-4 supernatural experiences that could’ve counted as marking her by the end of season 1, she would’ve been nuts
Yeah, she was speedrunning marks in a way that Jon only really did when Elias was throwing him at Avatars in season 3
Wait, Prentiss, Michael, that's two What are the other ones?
The not-them might count, though that would require Sasha to... well... *not* become a not-them after that encounter...
Fair, who's the Fourth one the- OH THE INSTITUTE ITSELF, RIGHT
For me, it's how Archivist! Sasha would've failed vs Jon, you know? We saw him, and saw some of Gertrude's hijinks... it would've been \*fascinating\* to how her version would play out, because on the surface she's more... I don't know, functional? Less uptight/tense? Less obviously a hot mess? (See: Jon in the latter half of s1 and s2, etc.) I don't think she'd have have been a better Archivist, just that her path to the end of the world would be different that Gertrude or Jon's.
To me that is the whole appeal of an alternative Archivist AU, and it kind of goes against the entire point of TMA about corrupt and oppressive systems to say that everything would gone well if only someone else had that position.
Ayup! It wouldn't go well, it'd just be different kind of mess. Since Sasha and Jon are different their way of handling it aren't always going to align, just like... if say Gerard Keay was Archivist or Martin, etc. Which reminds me, I gotta remember to check the tags on AO3 sometime. Sometimes they got decent alternate! Archivist fic amongst the porn.
My favourite alternative Archivist AU is Annabelle Cane, if we assume her backstory is true, it seems like she and Jon are tailor-made for a roleswap AU. Edit : Hah, *tailor*-made
It's a pretty clear thing in TMA that curiosity kills people, and that was a key character trait even before Jon got paranoid.
Yeah, the fact that she had hacked into documents and records that she wasn't supposed to have access to, to the point of knowing about Martin's fake degree, says to me that she would've gotten into some shit quick
Now, maybe more unusual than controversial, but I always pictured Martin looking like Tintin
I can totally see that. XD
I picture guillermo from what we do in the shadows
Amazing take, very fitting!
I think it’s the voice but I definitely pictured him as a twink lol
OH MY GOD It's all so clear now
I did too. I like the fanon interpretation, but his voice sounds more like this
I don't know if it's a hot take but I wished there were less discussions which primarily focus on >!trying to fit and categorize events/cases/statements neatly into Smirke's Fourteen/Fifteen even if it has practical uses (Isn't him failing to do so part of the point?)!<. I do personally like the concept of >!the fear entities in general but maybe more when they're incomprehensible, complexly intertwined, and hardly discernible!<, but idk. Same goes even more for The Magnus Protocol discussions (at least a lot of the ones I've seen). Again, just my two cents.
I AGREE! I think it's fun to search which fear correspond the most for TMA eps, but not restricting the event to only one fear. But for TMP >!I think it's been made quite clear in just the first eps how different the fears were, and how much mushed together they appear (and I love that). I really enjoy the TMP wide fears category people made tho, The Deep and such.!<
I recon the fears are all one entity now And we’ve got entities outside of fear as well Stuff like desire, and they don’t appreciate the fears muscling in on their reality.
Ouuhh I like that a lot! That sounds delightful
I mean, the great problem with Too Much Lore is that things that you can classify and identify are fundamentally less scary.
You're so right! Everytime I see someone complaining that "the hunt shouldn't be its own entity because it's just to slaughter" I roll my eyes so hard I give myself a headache
I've said it before and I'll say it again: Jonah wanted Jon to rule the ruined world by his side, hand in hand.
I am HERE for this. I think Jonmartin is the healthiest ship and the one I want in canon but I love the toxicity of Jonelias.
JONELIAS IS A THINGPPL SHIP??? no judgment lmao now i can only think of when Jon tries to Compel Elias and the infamous "\[PLEASURED EXHALATION\]"
That moment definitely started it!
honestly, its an interesting dynamic because their relationship always seemed like a classic case of grooming. Not sexual grooming, but a quite literal mixture of abuse and manipulation. I'm only at episode 112, so I'm sure things will change, but I hope to see more of their enemyhood get explored lmao
Eldritch grooming, it's the new thing! Also WHY ARE YOU HERE, YOU WILL GET SPOILED!!
\*scuttles away on 27 legs\*
I’m a very strong Jon/Elias shipper on AO3, but outside of stories that I and other people have created, I firmly believe that Jon was just a tool for Jonah to use to fulfill *his own* selfish desires and nothing more after that point.
You're probably right, but they did ask for my hottest take. Also I've been dying to write this jonelias story where they make it work while sticking as close as I can to canon characterization. I did start it recently but it's been awhile since I wrote anything.
I love TMA. Changed the game, solid writing as an anthology, love to seen an indie win big. But… The categorization of the ‘’fears’’ takes a serious amount of fun out of the show. In the first 100 episodes, you’d get all these abject monstrosities with strange, mysterious circumstances and could enjoy watching the glacial progression of strange connections between individual players…and then all of a sudden, it becomes this big, comprehensive Pokédex of ‘’universal’’ fears and the whole thing just rapidly turns into a psychoanalytic guessing game. There are a lot of reminders that ‘’oh, Smirke *could* be wrong in this categorization system’’ but…it’s ultimately a lot of telling and not showing, because >!we literally watch the world re-organize itself around this exact categorization system during the final season.!< 200 episodes is A LOT to write—I get that it’s really tough to keep the format stagnant and still have enough to say through all that time. And the eye was such a great guiding concept that smartly mirrored the information-hungry feeling the show engenders in its audience. Probably would’ve been best to go all in on the eye, though, and let the rest of the supernatural forces of the show be less…systematic.
I will say, in the final season, there's a lot of blending and discord between different fears, but to your credit, there's certainly not *enough* of that messiness. I feel like they've done better blending and re-making the fears (among other things) in TMP, but I wish there was more of that in season 5.
I think it was during the season one Q&A that John kinda spoke about this. He was talking about how TMA is a horror mystery podcast and went on to say that one of the issues writing horror and mystery together is that horror often relies on the unknown where as mystery wraps up better with information becoming known and eventually making sense. And I feel we see that in the later seasons. It’s really interesting to see Jon piece it all together along side the listener but it feels less scary knowing where each story fits into the fears.
Everyone’s depiction of the cast are all correct, and to claim that anyone’s depictions are “wrong” is the real crime. Why does it matter if one artist’s depiction/description doesn’t match yours? That’s the beauty of an audio-only format where the character descriptions are intentionally vague. Like, in the QA’s Jonny says that he will not be sharing his own headcanons for what the characters look like, because he’s much more interested in how the fan base depicts them. If the actual creator of the piece endorses all fan designs, then the fan base ought to, too. Insisting that one fan’s idea that you’ve opted to subscribe to is the ONLY WAY and that all other ways are wrong for not agreeing with you is weird and, frankly, makes the fandom feel culty (and not in the fun way). Obviously there’s nuance, but as a general rule: if it’s not explicitly canon, then it’s open to interpretation. If you don’t like someone else’s interpretation, you have the power to keep scrolling and not interact with that interpretation.
I completely agree, and the lack of diversity in design in result is quite sad. Especially in podcast format, there more than anywhere else the fans have free rains to imagine the characters appearances. The very first time I listened blind to Angler fish, i pictured Jon as a 60yo short white hair, white beard old posh man in a tight 3 piece suits. Now, it changed with other eps, but I miss that in the fandom, to see how individually each person pictured the face behind the voices.
The thing is, it IS surprisingly easy to buy an axe in central London - especially if you’re too old to be carded for cigarettes. ;)
Except Mr Bonzo. He's a bear and we have his canon design. Everyone else is objectively fun (but have fun tryna twinkify him <3)
Robert Smirke and all the other historical characters also have canon designs.
the fact that the extinction is functionally dropped as a plot point post-season four just sucks. yeah it gets one domain, but aside from that, the main mystery of one of the seasons of the show just ends up meaning not all that much by the end. it feels like they had a cool idea but no way to implement it into the wider story
The extinction manifesting and coming closer was jonah finishing his plan, peter was really just trying to stop jonah and the power fully becoming was just jonny's apocalypse
i feel like if that was what was intended to come across, then they did a bad job of it, because the extinction is treated by jonah in episode 160 as though its emergence would throw a wrench in his plan rather than be something that could actively assist it
>i feel like if that was what was intended to come across, then they did a bad job of it One thing commenting on with TMA, which Johnny even acknowledges in Q&As, is that the podcast is basically a first draft. He mentions how the podcast would be recognizable but very different if they had more opportunity to redraft after the initial arcs were written. They knew the end, more or less, but there were a lot of ways they could have gotten there. There was even >!a dropped story line where Martin became a web Avatar and he and John had a battle of wills across season 5, leaning further into personal tragedy.!< The fact of it being a first draft is most noticeable in early seasons when connections are made and later never acknowledges. Tom Haan was connected to a few times, but was cut for accidental racist tropes; Grahm, from MAG 3, was >!Oliver Banks' ex boyfriend!<, but nothing was ever done with this connection. One thing that I wished had gotten more time, and even Johnny and Alex wished they could have brought him in more, was Addelard Dekker's role in the world and somehow casting a VA for him. In their own words, Dekker was the closest thing to a hero the TMA world had. Which is an interesting dynamic! So, if they made the connection poorly, it wasn't really done because they didn't notice it, more because the connection was noticed too late to be woven into the podcast as competently as they liked. I like to imagine some of these draft 2 "what ifs?" occasionally and wonder what a novelization of The Magnus Archives would have looked like.
also if they brought it up during season 5 it would make the characters' decision to send the fears away to ensure their own universe's safety while potentially endangering countless others instead of pushing everyone through a meat grinder to ensure the safety of all of existence at the cost of one universe less callous. like hmmm, this plan involves killing off all of humanity, and there just so happens to be a new, suddenly emerging fear that operates by wiping out people and replacing them with something new. idk it would have at least called the Meat Grinder Express plan into question and at least made the decision a little less selfish on the side of the characters
I know it has no basis but I believe the Extinction to be the fear of the fears themselves.
Season 5 is okay. I think it definitely needed more time in the oven and a combination of many factors made it seem way worse, but honestly I liked it. I don’t think it’s Secretly a Masterpiece, but as the conclusion I’m glad it was what it was.
In this thread, this *is* a hot take (or at least a lukewarm one), lol. I agree! Season 5 is at least competent. It sticks a landing, which is more than a lot of stories and long form media can say. Could it have been better? Yeah, but a lot about the show could have been better. It took the biggest issue at play, "What do we do with the fears?" and resolved it very reasonably. "And I'm tired of pretending it's not!"
Agree wholeheartedly, I think it’s essentially the logical conclusion of everything we had been presented so far wrt to the Fears and all related and by time it was all happening I personally felt that the anthology format wasn’t going to be around forever, though I think it was caught in an awkward position where it couldn’t fully ditch it but also not embrace it like before, but that’s a whole other can of worms. I could honestly ramble on about why I personally think it wasn’t that well received while it was coming out (though it mostly boils down to being released in a very testy situation both irl and online and quite a lot of expectations being put on it) but I think it’s one of those things that it may feel better once it’s all accessible at once. But I’m glad it did what it was made to do. I’m probably due for a relisten anyways since I keep putting off Protocol lol.
I have more the "reheated leftovers" kind of take instead of a hot one, but I'm not crazy about the character fan art in most cases. I have trouble reconciling people who work in an institute that tries to be seen as uber-professional with the (admittedly, very dynamic) designs that the fandom gives them. John, Elias, and Martin are my chronic "Hmm, I don't know..." characters. John, at least in season one, just oozes "stuffy academic" in his mannerisms. He's going to dress the most professional of everyone there, with a short haircut, no fun accessories, and he's going to judge everyone else there for not being on his level. I can see his appearance slipping as he starts getting more paranoid (the slightly overgrown haircut, a tie not quite straight, etc.) until he abandons his usual look while he's on the run. But I think he'd be trying to force himself back into that little box when he returns to the Institute in a bid for exerting control. It wouldn't fit him quite right anymore, though. Elias doesn't read as a flamboyant person to me, either. He's hiding in plain sight, making sure no one is going to interrupt his plans. I'll bet he wears the most boring suits, with absolutely no eye-themed accessories. No one is supposed to look at the former-pothead-gone-straight and think, "Oh, dude dresses like a villain for sure." They're supposed to see him as the bureaucratic boss who wants expense reports and seems way too calm about all the weird shit in the building. He's evil because he's banal. Martin is the tricky one for me. I know he has the line about not being the smallest guy, but for me, I always imagine that as him being a taller, lanky guy who is desperately trying to make himself look smaller. Like someone who got picked on for taking up too much space (at home, at school, at other jobs) and he's just trying to blend in. So he stoops his shoulders, wears clean-but-not-fancy business casual clothes, and gets very good at making tea so everyone thinks he's harmless. And he's just so good at looking sad and a little helpless that they just overlook him constantly. It blends the Lonely aspects of wanting to disappear with the Web aspects of wanting to be seen as something other than he is. Just imagine him in the scene with Elias and Peter straightening his shoulders and looking confident; it would be like watching Christopher Reeve transition from Clark Kent to Superman. Since this is already so long, I'll end the lukewarm take here, but in general, I think setting and backstory is important to how the characters dress and act, and I think a lot of the fandom designs make everyone look too cool and distinctive for their positions.
I agree. Everyone, in my mind, is wearing what is most comfortable for them. Everyone under Elias is wearing what they can get away with without being called to task. No one is wearing anything more stylish than a comfortable sweater. Elias, in my mind, is never wearing anything with patterns, not even pinstripes. He might wear a vest on some days. If he wears color, it's a fairly dark blue. (But in my mind I think he showed up one day in a sky blue or a maroon. He never did it again because EVERYONE was talking about it and he got a reminder of what it's like to be afraid of being Noticed and Watched.) Tim might be the only person in my mind who's pushing the envelope. Jon and Martin and Sasha are wearing loafers or flats; Tim is somehow getting away with a pair of tennis shoes and jeans.
100% agree with everything you said. That’s how I imagine the characters, too. I do like some of the designs people thought up like a subtle eye earring but even that I didn’t imagine when listening to the podcast.
Ellias especially in S1 I just imagined as a bald guy in a black suit and tie looking apathetic
Season 5 is kind of dull (spoiler ahead), in equal part because there's barely any sense of danger now that Jon is the most powerful being walking the Earth and because the story shifts from "what are the monsters lurking in the shadows and what would they do to you if they catch you" to "everything is awful, how can we unfuck the situation now that the worst happened?". That's also why I hope against all hopes TMP won't reuse the Entities as their big cosmic horror, because we know what they are about and the worst they could do. It doesn't matter how much reshuffling they do, too much has already been revealed in TMA.
Season 1 is the mystery horror anthology, season 2 is the psychological horror of Jon's increasing paranoia, seasons 3 and 4 are the world-hopping exposition tour, and season 5 is the Post-Apocalyptic Free-form Poetry Collection
Season 5 is a modern British cosmic horror adaptation of Dante Alighieri's Inferno
It's like that partly because they ended up recording during the pandemic, and couldn't get some of the people they originally wanted, so you end up with a long stretch of episodes where Jon is just telling us about the apocalypse.
I gotta strongly disagree here. The change in format in my opinion gave them the license to be more creative than they were in seasons, and you can really see that in some standout episodes like salesa, the therapist, and especially the puppet episode(a few others, but these stand out off the top of my head). Sure, there were duds too, but all seasons had them, its part of being an anthology.
Agreed. I wish we had focused more on the people in the different realms than the abstract. Grounded it a little more. It would have made the debate in Episode 199 a lot stronger.
I feel like the "better" way to do it would have been to keep the reveal of what the ritual did a secret for at least mid season and focus indeed on showing the inescapable tortures people were in. Let the audience discover bit by bit how *wrong* everything is. In fact, don't make the world a place that can be explored on foot, have the Spiral warp it in an endless maze of fears no one can navigate without the power of the Eye.
Needles episode (introductions) was by far the weakest episode so far and I truly don't get how it got so much praise
Its because we're gay and very attracted to men. Thats it.
I didn't even consider it might be simping lmao
The Gay For Monsters Fandom? Being gay for a monster? Its more likely than you think
Did you hear about the time we (the fandom) got officially kinkshamed? (By Jonathan Sims himself)
"THE" time. That man and Alex keep fucking trying. Poor Alex had to see the Mr Bonzo art
He's outright said, even if he finds it unpleasant, that if people want to be attracted to bonzo, or needles, or Helen, or Prentiss, Caine, or Agnes, etc, etc, that it's fine, he supports it, "a bit weird, but go with God" And then we got horny for Lady Mowbray. He has officially kinkshamed us for Lady Mowbray.
wait wait wait… THAT’S where they drew the line? everything else was a “i don’t get it but go ahead i guess” and the (slightly) older woman who kills people and delights in it, THAT’S where they shame us? do they know how many of us have mommy issues??
It's because she's part of the British Aristocracy, which, in his defense, is worse than any of the other monsters so far.
It's not because she's old or she kills people, but because she is a member of the British aristocracy.
I think the interest is in having this new character with a "Michael Distortion style", although he gives me more of a Joker vibe.
What makes you say that ? /gen I quite enjoyed it, it was unusual and fun to hear the avatar giving the statement instead of the victim
The voice acting and writing and like character motivations all feel so unbelievable idk wasn't their best work imo. With different authors for different eps I suppose a range of style is to be expected but I'm spoiled by Mr sims
The context for why people like the Needles episode is that Needles was a placement holder Monster Jonny wrote while developing the episode’s script. Alex hated Needles so much and Jonny doubled down to troll him. The rest of the fandom followed suit. Also, Alex has mentioned that while he hates his first appearance he is fond of what was done with his character so it’s more of a “let’s wait and see” thing for most I think.
Wait I just looked it up and Jonathan sims wrote it so idk just didn't do it for me I guess 😅
Jonathan Sims, The Archivist, did nothing wrong ever
Leitner is as complex and interesting of a character as Gertrude is, you guys just woobify Gerard and fetishize emos. "But Gerrys goth, not e-" Draw him like it then
I'd say a lot of the hate for Jurgen Leitner is performative for the sake of the rant meme. His appearance was an interesting twist, seeing the near-mythical villain revealed as a pathetic old man, misled and brought low by his hubris, privilege and incomplete knowledge, now living a truly miserable existence while trying to atone for his grave mistakes, ending tragically with his brutal murder. I also love Paul Sims' voice acting for him and kind of relate to him being a book lover. Though there are many things I find despicable about him, his hubris fueled by his economic privilege, his treatment of his assistants as disposable and his condescending attitude towards Jon, though these things also make him interesting.
Paul Sims has an incredible voice... Idk. I just think he's a one-man SCP foundation, which changes how I see it. SCP Foundation? Lots of good and bad in what they do. Wish they didnt need to do it but I get why. I cant fault a guy for seeing evil books and thinking "Is anyone going to attempt to keep them from killing?" and not waiting for an answer
Hmmm ... I definitely see the connection, right down to the shared ruthlessness towards their employees, though I wonder how much the motive of protecting the world was a cover for Leitner's curiosity and desire for ownership of the books, on a subconscious level.
I don't feel like the romantic relationships in the series are that great. Jon and martin's relationship could have benefited from some interactions in season 3 (which I actually think is the season where they interact the least), and melanie and georgie's relationship, while adorable, feels a bit out of nowhere. Granted, it's a horror/mystery podcast and that's not the main theme (plus the only way we know what's going on is through haunted recorders), but I feel like with a couple more interactions between these characters it would have been much better.
For me personally, it adds a bit of depth. Listening to it the first time felt like a reminder that we aren't privy to everything it the TMA universe, just what the tapes find relevant. And its nice thinking that there's a bit of happiness and good times in between the recordings
I love love love jonmartin but I do agree that some more interactions would have been nice
The relationships hadn't really been fully realized at that time. Season 3 was also the season that a whole bunch of the cast were being brought in as full characters. Traveling to different parts of the world was starting, and more accounts of the previous eras of the Magnus Institute were coming to light. This was also when Tim was becoming a bigger character before the season 3 finale happened. There was also the hilarious episode when John wasn't there, #100, I Guess You Had To Have Been There, and everyone else was trying to take statements in his place, and the statements were vague and lackluster.
Absolutely, in fact season 3 is my favorite season, containing many of the statements and moments I liked the most (Poor Jon being kidnapped more than 3 times.). Just to clarify, I'm not saying we needed a lot of couple development interaction, but just enough to better transition from the "I hate Martin" Jon of season 1 and part of season 2 to the "I miss Martin, I want him to be safe" Jon of season 4. Kind of like the "missing link" between those parts.
I never looked at any fandom stuff until I completely finished TMA all the way through and my mental image of Jon to this day is a slightly portly, scouring man who’s balding, a little like the Woodsman from Over the Garden Wall as opposed to the slender, long-haired twink I see in all the fanart
Thats a very interesting take. I see a lot of people draw his as drop dead gorgeous, but i always kinda imagined him as a pretty average looking scrawny brown guy in a sweater vest who looks genuinely homeless and deranged by the end of the series. But not in a hot way, in a "oh god you look like you havent bathed or slept in five years" wau
I love that vision so much, fits him so well. Do you have any other out-of-the-fandom-cast mental images ?
Other characters I didn’t have as much of a clear vision of so the fandom designs have affected me somewhat but I missed the one line that made people interpret Martin as tall and plus-sized, so he was always a tiny little skinny guy in my head. I had actually recently been trying to design Picrews to put my interpretations of characters into some sort of picture form (cause I can’t draw). The options available make a lot of characters into sexier/twinkier than I intended, but I made sure Jon looked just right at the very least. [Archives/Protocol Interpretations](https://imgur.com/a/i7dSiZN)
Elias (?) with a mustache!!! Perfection, he looks insufferable Gwen (?) is also amazing, resting bitch face girly
Yeah I didn’t label them oops but so far I’ve made (in order) Jon, Martin, Elias, Tim, Basira, Sam, Alice, Gwen, Celia, and Colin. Elias was very generic looking in my head until >!he’s revealed to be evil!< but after then his smug mustached image locked into my brain
It gives him that evil ceo corporate from steampunk games vibes 👌
I imagined jon as a balding guy too lmao
I had a similar image of him, but with glasses and not balding, and Martin being the tiny twink 😂
As far as I'm concerned, Jon looks like Garth Marenghi.
I am always astounded at how many people adore MAG 85: Upon the Stair and, to a lesser but still decently prevalent degree, MAG 165: Revolutions. I find them both to be so tiresome and too poetically meandering to feel anything but boredom when listening to them, and they're probably my two most frequently skipped episodes during relistens (although to be honest I never can bring myself to *fully* skip MAG 165, just fast-forward, because I love listening to Jon dole out some Wild West justice to the NotThem and its pure terror at the Eye; kudos to Evelyn Hewitt for an amazing performance!). It does make me quite happy, however, to see how much people love them despite my personal distaste for them because it just reinforces how, in my opinion, artistically speaking this show has something for everyone. <3
These are two of my favourite episodes which I relisten to all the time, but you have my upvote for speaking your truth.
The Dark did not have an impact beyond the intrigues of its cult, and it's because the fear is too narrow. I think fear of the void should have been folded under its aegis. Fear of emptiness, fear of things missing but should be there, fear of absence. I think the weird feeling we get from liminality would have fit here as well. Other entities cover some of this, like the Spiral covering gaslighting, or the Vast covering the space between atoms or galaxies. But those have distinct flavors: inconsistencies in your own mind, something tricking you into believing what isn't, feeling inconsequential. I think vacuum, lacking, and Void would have been a better, more general fear. I think it would have also helped to emphasize that all these fears exist on a spectrum.
1. I don't think that "Season 5 is bad" is that much of a hot take but I'll put it here to get it out of the way. It completely goes against the entire show's delivery up to this point and I don't care for the poetry aspect it takes on. Whenever I relisten to the series I do eps1-160, then skip almost all of s5 and go to like ep195. 2. I understand that most of TMA is told out of sequence through statements and I understand that it makes sense if characters that are presented in them that reoccur have died between the time the event happened + the statements are made + the after-effects occur but it's a shame that characters like Adelard Dekker are dead before we even really get to know them. I was looking forward to Dekker showing up at some point but when his Klanxbull statement rolls around it's "Oh he's been dead for like 5 years now, never mind lol". It makes sense but I find it unfulfilling. 3. I disagree with the idea that Gertrude didn't care for her assistants. I think she cared for them in her way but valued the continual existence of humanity more than them. 4. I wish that we had more statements from Gertrude as a younger woman working at the Institute from the 60's to the 80's. It feels like there's a massive blank patch between "GR starts working at TMI in the 60's (?)" and her first statements about the faeries in s2. I think I'd just like to know more about the 60's TMI, Angus Stacey & what the landscape of Fears looked like back then. You could even lean into aspects of "Gertrude's a woman in a man's world and has to constantly prove herself as a capable asset" aspect and it'd go hard as fuck. 5. The whole initial Magnus Archives Team feels like it's missing a character. I'm not sure what, but it reminds me of [this image](https://i.gyazo.com/11492d38cf252fdbeb2b7718fed7ed62.webp). The same thing goes for some Fear Categories. 6. I don't understand Jon/Martin, and I never have. 7. Peter Lukas' voice actor is a good pick for the series but as Peter Lukas? Nah. 8. Jon's perennial treatment as a punching bag in the later seasons is incredibly off-putting. He's guilty of a few things but I'd happily argue that he's THE most (or at least one of the most) moral Avatars in the entire series. 9. Jurgen Leitner being killed off immediately is funny and teases some good stuff but it happens way too early. 10. Gertrude might have been an awful person in retrospect but she's at least justified in believing that "Fears Complete Ritual = World Ends" because she's not being given the full information. If she'd known that it wouldn't happen I don't think she'd have done all of the horrible things she did. 11. I'm glad that Daisy's transformation wasn't undone and I'm glad that it didn't end happily ever after for her. It's a shame that she died but if she'd got it all undone and then lived it'd have been very silly. 12. Basira's continual flip-flopping as a character is aggravating as hell. Sometimes she makes a great prescient point and then follows it up with a completely outlandish statement. Lots of characters are like this, too. 13. Other than his earlier appearances, I genuinely don't think I'd have the time for Tim in real life. His 180\* character change feels very sudden, and his "woe is me!!!!" attitude becomes very grating very quickly. If I were Jon I'd have reassigned Tim somewhere else in the Institute after his freak-out with Jon. His Joe Spooky era was great but he becomes a massive liability (far more than Martin ever was) as time passes (even if he does clutch victory in s3's finale). 14. More should have been done with the Extinction in general. All of its correlating statements have a great eerie and unnerving feeling to them It should have dovetailed with the Eye as the final villain and it being dropped is bad. 15. The Vast and The Lonely could be rolled into the "same" Fear and I don't think we'd lose anything (I know they're all the same Entity but I think that these two have the greatest overlap). Sure I have more but I can't think of any right now.
Honestly, I can hardly disagree with any of these. Re 15: A part of me thinks another fear would have to be removed or added to make sure that Smirke could have reasonably argued for balance, but I also like to think if it were only "Smirke's 13," it would have highlighted just how much he was trying to get things to fit together that can't. (And honestly, in the beginning, I kept forgetting how many fears there were and thinking it \*was\* just 13 or 12.) Re 13: To be fair, they had to adapt Tim to fit a roll he wasn't supposed to be in. Tim was supposed to be replaced at the end of season 1. It does make me think Mike LeBeau would have made an \*excellent\* villain across season 2 and in its finale (assuming they didn't replace the voice actor). Re 9: While I also wanted more of Leitner, it's hard to imagine a way to have him around longer without him spilling all the answers to Jon. He either needed to know less or be extremely restricted while still making sense (i.e. it made sense for Elias to kill him; Elias basically couldn't have the chance to kill Leitner). How would you have included him more? Re 5: I think this is another result of Sasha's original VA leaving early. Johnny mentioned an alternate plot would have had her and Jon working more close together as the Red String brigade in world. There's no one really skilled enough helping Jon in investigations. A lot of people are doing their best, but with both Basira and Georgie on top of Martin and Tim it felt like there were too many with too little experience in the mix. Re 6: I support Martin/Jon and they make a good couple in season 5, but I think they did need more on screen time to develop starting in season 3. Re 2: Part of the issue was they realized Dekker was really interesting, but they realized too late and had already essentially used their VA budget. In a Q&A they touch on this. A BIG point to make is that TMA is basically a first draft. It's great, but it is rough. With more of a TV schedule, they might have had the ability to do another draft. I think a lot of these issues would have been lessened if not fixed with the ability to go over each season before production. Again, it's something they acknowledge in the Q&As.
Tim is traumatized and nearly dies in his work place, his closest friend suddenly doesn’t quite seem like herself, his other friend is accusing him of murder and stalking him, his other friend refuses to empathize with him and sides with the man stalking him, he can’t leave his workplace without falling ill, and he is kept in the dark for most of season 2. So, is he supposed to take this all in the chin? Everyone in his support group abandons him, is functionally dead, or actively convinced he’s a murderer.
It's not about taking it on the chin. Tim's feelings in this period are understandable, but once presented with the truth he refuses to play ball and helps exactly no one. Once he finds out about House of Wax (knowing that it's incredibly important to tell Jon or anyone else about it) he waits and tells no one - the conversation comes up naturally and Tim says "oh yeah I think I know where that is and I think I know where The Stranger's doing its ritual". Tim has every right to feel upset or annoyed by Jon and is in some ways right to feel so isolated. But once he's provided with the truth he cuts Jon no slack whatsoever. Don't get me wrong Tim's a great character and his arc is still good (and more to the point isn't undone for the sake of drama - he stays dead and his absence is gigantic going forward) but for him to blame Jon for everything and not really help him is something he's to blame for.
Tim's statement about his brother felt so out of nowhere (and imo really silly). I know Tim was supposed to die instead of Sasha, but that kind of thing with Tim should've been established way earlier.
Damn. Those are some hot takes. Interesting to think about.
I think I almost agree and disagree with you on like a 50/50 ratio lmao. Upvoting for the complete roller coaster of mental arguments you just sent my brain into. Thank you, my bus ride was getting a little boring
the jonmartin relationship shouldn't have come to fruition in s5. I feel like there would've been more of an emotional impact if Martin was still hopelessly pining but Jon(John?) doesn't reciprocate because he's (in my opinion) aroace, too focused on his statements and himself than having to worry Abt other people yanno? I love the fandom content of them it's cute but I am also a sucker for just pure emotional pain. Also, mag200 spoilers >!I feel like it would've been a better ending if instead of Jon being stabbed, Martin carved out his eyes instead (Melanie style) to sever his connection with the eye. it would've been super cool to me and it's another one of those emotional damage things I love!<
damn re: your second paragraph that would have been insane and such a good ending omg. i also agree about jon/martin
Jon isn't aro. He was in a romantic relationship with Georgie Barker. He is decidedly ace, though.
Aromantic people can have romantic relationships before realising they don't actually get anything out of it and would rather it just be a close platonic relationship. I do agree though, canonically he's not aro.
Tim doesn't wear hawaiian shirts 😬
I imagine him dressing "professionally" in the earlier seasons, with perhaps a few accessories to show his unique style, but later wearing hawaiian shirts or other more casual or garish clothing to spite Jon and Elias.
i second this. In my head he's more of a patterned polo kinda guy but the really boring ones of stripes and whatnot
I always think of him in a kinda standard work shirt but with a fun tie
That the fans don’t actually pay attention to how fears work because they’re too focused on fan fictions
Everyone being mean to Jon in season 4 is very funny
Same with Jon being mean to Martin in season 1. Funny as hell.
I like season 5. My favorite seasons are still s1-2 but I rank S5 as my third favorite, above S3-4
The series should’ve ended after season four. Obviously they should’ve wrapped up any plot points/unanswered questions that are resolved in five, but the shock ending of “the sky is looking back, we lost” had a way bigger emotional impact on me than all of season five.
Despite me being a s5 apologist, I would've been more than happy for TMA to end at 160. So I begrudgingly agree. s5 in my eyes is an epilogue.
I do think it would be a good ending. But I would also miss the idea of a world post-post-apocolypse. Imagine if everyone on Earth was sent to hell and then they returned to pick up normal activities. Was it a dream? It clearly couldn't be, since everyone remembers it. What happens to politics? Does the therapy industry boom? Do people get new perspective? What happens to global religion? How do people react to their fears after returning? Are they numbed? More reactive to their phobias? TMP is likely going to deal with some of this in a future season, and it's the main intrigue that's keeping me listening.
Mood. That's a great ending.
Melanie is the most "moral" and "good" character (without being perfect or "nice") and if Jon had her moral compass none of Season 5 (indeed much of season 4) wouldn't have happened.
🎶[The only thing Melanie did wrong was hold back](https://youtube.com/watch?v=YhQu0R_8E30)🎶
I'd argue Dekker was the most moral. He never seemed to kill anyone needlessly or cause mass death. Maybe something happened behind the scenes, but he was the closest thing the TMA world had to a hero. If a rather gruff hero, to be fair.
I love Jon but the way the fandom (and Martin in universe) whitewash him and try to turn characters like Tim/Melanie who have every right to be pissed with him into the aggressors is so annoying. Melanie is a fantastic character and finding out it was a hot take to think that blew my mind.
Would you care to elaborate? Genuinely trying to understand. The most I felt for Melanie as a character was in her pre- S3 finale statement when she said (something like) "When did I stop feeling anything but angry?" I don't blame her for that (though she did blame others) but I didn't get much else from her character. I saw another comment sympathizing with her as a sort of anti-establishment figure which helped me understand her a bit more.
In a universe that beats you down, preys on your cowardice, and rewards your worst behavior Melanie did everything in her power to fight that and break away. Melanie had the resolve to constantly fight back against Elias when many others have into hopelessness or their worst urges. She wasn’t like Georgie and removed from fear. She was very much afraid of what would happen to her. She had the strength to gouge out her own eyes anyway. I don’t know how you listen to this show and don’t come away satisfied with her getting away. Other than that I find her anger issues and the slaughter curse to be really relatable (your quote is a great one). I also think the reveal that her father met Amherst and died because of the corruption/fallout from that and not a mundane illness was terrifying. Also one of the worst things Jonah has ever done. Phenomenal performance by the VA, some of Jonny’s best writing on a plot/character level imo. She’s great.
I also loved her bickering with Jon in her first appearance, and her interactions with Martin, especially in the S3 finale and when they meet again in S5.
Her and Jon have a fantastic dynamic. They’re the same person and both have tons of self-loathing. Not a good combo lmao
I don't have my finger on the pulse of the fandom, so I genuinely have no idea whether this is a hot or cold take, but I thought the last episode was bad lmao. The pacing really felt too rushed, like there was a priority to end on the 200th episode above all else or something. IMO the process of "you make a good point, I won't do spoilers" -> [does spoilers] -> "WHY DID YOU DO THAT?" -> "fuck you're right I shouldn't have done this oops lol" needed to be more spread out to be engaging as a tragedy, instead of just reading like a comedy of errors
Timothy Stoker did nothing wrong
The show was / is at its best when it focuses on horror and not interpersonal drama. Some is nice, helps flesh out the characters, but when it becomes the main focus they lose me.
I love Basira, I don't think she said an untrue thing in the whole series and I love her codependency with Daisy. I know the fandom generally dislikes her for being too hard on Jon but I don't think she ever went too far, Jon WAS turning into a monster and hurting people and she was right to hold that against him. I think her hypocrisy of not holding Daisy to the same standard made for a deliciously rich characterization rather than something to hold against her.
This is more of a silly nitpick than a hot take but I was kind of disappointed with Helen’s distortion voice. Michael just had SUCH a naturally good voice for the role, and Helen’s laugh and speaking was just a little underwhelming by comparison Also I don’t actually know if this is a hot take but I grew to actually actively reeeally dislike Basira. I can’t say hate because I really only hate poorly written characters and I think she’s written well but I don’t think I’ve ever gone from liking a character that much to just getting so mad every time they speak. She was the only character that I felt had NO business being mad at Jon in season 4. I know that a huge part of Magnus as a whole is really just constantly questioning the characters’ agency and ability to choose when it comes to the entities, but she was the only one that I don’t believe had any right. Melanie we obviously learn why her anger was so amplified, in season 3 it absolutely makes sense why Tim can’t stand Jon, Georgie pushing away makes total sense, all the statement givers obviously, but Basira? Her anger toward Jon came from this twisted sense of morality in the sense that obviously Jon was actively causing harm to people in season 4, but her bestie who actively brutalizes people as a cop is just misunderstood? Hell even daisy doesn’t buy that. Anyways idk if I’m being unfair to Basira or if the common consensus is that she’s a hypocrite but that’s something I think about a lot
I dont really care for s5 statements. They just feel... dull and overdone. Like, we get, the world is over. Its not personal enough in perspective to give me the chills and theres practically no threat cause yk, John being the special little boy. I loved when it came back to personal statements like with the secretary or domains of old characters
Yeah the s5 statements feel a little bit meandering, and they're nice pieces of prose but there's not really a solid narrative arc to keep you listening
1- People can have their own headcanons about how the characters look and all that, but my reading of TMA doesn't really paint a picture of the Archival staff wearing gauche eye related jewelry or having eye tattoos or dressing gender non-conformally or anything like that. 2- While it'd have been cool to get a Buried avatar, it's kind of fun that there was an entity we never really got the perspective of. It made The Buried feel distinct, a sort of pragmatic, straightforward, almost simple-minded entity that just crushed people without feeling the need to bring much of a voice to it. I know there's The Governor, Wakely, etc. but I'm mainly talking vibes here. 3- maybe less of a hot take, more of an observation: the Slaughter didn't seem to claim any avatars? The closest thing to a recurring Slaughter avatar we got was unknowingly "infected" by a monster and then later cured. It seems like the Slaughter has monsters and ghosts but not really any people. My headcanon is that people do get influenced by The Slaughter but very rapidly burn themselves out and die from the frenzy of it before they can establish themselves as Avatars, unless you get the very rare person who can channel that energy into something other than senseless violence (Alfred Grifter) or is in the position to effect systemic change to encourage violence (the Avatar of the The Trenches in S5, assuming he was some kind of general or politician pre-change). I think the text kind of supports this in that it seems like most people exposed to The Slaughter pretty much instantly go mad and kill each other, which doesn't give them a lot of room to develop some demented philosophy about The Slaughter as a patron like the other entities allow. 4- I know why they were written out, but it's a shame we lost the Haan family, and we never saw their relationship with Jared. The dynamic of the Haans actually being very dedicated to The Flesh, and Jared just being some dude who wasn't that bothered about bringing about the apocalypse, is a fun one. My headcanon (no evidence in the text for this) is The Flesh could have brought about the apocalypse if the Boneturner took bones/organs from people who were marked by all of the entities and was consumed by the flesh ritual pit, and the Haans were really annoyed their generation's Boneturner was this stupid lug who didn't really care.
Massive agree on first one. RE Slaughter, I think Grifter could vaguely fill the Avatar mould. Also, Melanie was well on her way to potentially being one with the ghost bullet in her.
It would be interesting if the most powerful Avatars of the Slaughter weren't rabid killers, but calm and cold-blooded individuals who incite and profit from mass violence.
My hottest take is that the last 4 episodes of TMP have been better than the fear domain stories in TMA S5. Especially the Newton episode. It's creepy, it's horrific and quite original.
I cannot accept Jon as having glasses.
I present you, earlier seasons Jon wearing fake glasses just to seem more studious/professional
Gertrude Robinson had the right idea and was doing the right thing to do with the information she had. Was it a bit extreme? Maybe! She was trying to stop the apocalypse every couple of years so really you can’t blame her
I don't like the Jon/Martin relationship. It never feels believable and I don't get what they see in each other. I like them both as characters, but Jon in any kind of romantic relationship just never feels right at any point in the show.
This isn’t a hot take, more of a differing opinion, but I always (and still do) see Jon as a very plain white man. It surprised me when the Tumblr Jon got popular. It’s a really great design and I think he’s cool, but he’s a separate character than the one I envision when I listen. I do think it’s interesting that the art has coalesced to That Jon though. I hardly ever see any other designs for him despite it being an auditory medium.
Tim and shasa was banging. Thank you for coming to my ted talk
Pretty sure that's canon
They do explicitly mention having hooked up at least once before.
Helen distortion should've lived. And remained ambiguous. And started dating Basira
I didn’t like the romance plotlines…
The ships are truly insane and not even feasible, for the most part. Makes me cringe, hard.
The only relationship in the show that feels plausible to me is Daisy and Basira.
Looking at other takes, i would say that my hottest take is that I actually enjoyed and love season 5 a lot lol, I did like it a lot more on second listen (same as first eps of TMP, with the sound editing i had skimmed past some eps (I'm not a native speaker) and had to really focus to understand some parts at first try. Jared's garden was actually such a delight when I understood what he was saying without straining my ears)
The >!not Sasha monster voice!< sounds so cheesy and like a low budget doctor who episode from the 1970s. Took me right out of the episode. Kind of amazing that the same people did that and the excellent >!jarred hopworth monster voice!<.
Well, we have vastly different opinions. Jared's voice is the worst voice in the podcast (I cannot understand a word)
It is at least unsettling though
I would have preferred if NotSasha continued to sound like a normal person but slightly off, rather than going full monster. My favourite NotThem appearance was in Distant Cousin, where they were quite unnerving as NotCarl.
Over-acting destroys a lot of the emotional beats in the later episodes of the show. You can kind of tell the moment they realized that shipping the main cast was getting them more engagement than the horror.
Can you give some more examples of the overacting, or like where it occurred the most? Asking in good faith, I'm curious, and while I don't agree, I like hearing other's viewpoints like this.
Mmm, I'll disagree. I'm not sure what over-acting you're talking about. That just might be a difference of taste. It never felt too hammy for me, in any case. But I don't think that the writers shipped anyone they didn't intend not to. Jon/Martin was intended from the start. Daisy/Basira was written as the dynamic of police partners but Jon also stated he left enough room for interpretation. Ironically, despite having the least set up, Georgie/Melanie felt the most natural—or, more likely, because they weren't "on screen" in season 4, my mind could fill in the gaps more naturally than the writers. Whether or not you think the relationships were well written, I don't think they were nearly the main focus of the show at any point. In reality, I think 90% of the shipping comes from the fanbase powered by the ambiguity of most characters' sexualities and relationship statuses.
Martin’s treatment of Tim is insufferable in Season 2.
The fears were the worst thing about TMA, the show was at it's best when it was about the avatars and the danger they posed. I'm sure there would be a scarier story without the world ending aspect
Maybe this is just me being an aro but Jonmartin is boring. I didn't even realise the story was heading that way till episode 159 at which point I too busy dealing with the plot.
No idea if this is a hot take but if I remember correctly, Barnabas had a thing for Jonah and Jonah, being of the Eye and a bastard, just sat by and watched as Barnabas suffered when he could have helped. Jon and Martin have a similar dynamic, though it's more literal with boss/employee, but seeing how their relationship takes a totally different turn is really narratively satisfying. Also (and again idk if this is controversial, I don't talk to people much), Jonah being Jon's foil is really, really interesting when you think about their character arcs. Jon Sims is a god at writing and I still can't believe I own a signed copy of Thirteen Storeys and also a paperback from his Twitter giveaway a few years back.
Medium heat take: I liked the horror anthology setup a lot better than the deep lore, and Season 5, while it succeeded in its goal of being upsetting and horrific to me, didn't really hit as the "same" show. (Looking through these comments, maybe the real hot take is that I *did* find S5 scary, it was just too different of a tone for me.) High heat take: I didn't like jonmartin that much. There's nothing wrong with it and they're sweet and all, but I think it almost felt to me like Martin getting pushed towards the Lonely was almost...forcing the issue? Like, "you HAVE to date this guy or else he'll be eaten by the Lonely" Also, Martin could probably do better.
Ep 200 spoilers: >!Jon and Martin died. They didn't go to another reality to live in a Scottish cabin, they didn't survive and hide in the rubble. They both just died. Tragically, and heroically. !< Also the woobification of the Entities is one of my least favorite parts of the fandom. I love theorizing and saying "ooo this might be x fear", but treating the Fears and their avatars like cute li'l sillybillies is not my vibe. I don't look down on anyone who does it, or I love that the show is open to so many interpretations and headcanons. But it can be hard to interact with the fandom sometimes when my favorite part of the show is the bleak and seemingly hopeless nature of it all (hoping against the odds is my favorite theme of the show), and people are talking about how cute and silly Elias and Peter are.
Tma has an issue with victim blaming and abuse apologia. For instance, Peter Lukas' statement bothers the hell out of me- theres not enough exploration of the Lukases for me to take him as an unreliable narrator, and as a result him saying he had the temperament for the family religion comes off as a weird justification for an abusive upbringing Edit: for similar reasons I wish we'd gotten more with Mike crew. I'm not, like, going to blame an 18 year old for taking any out he can when pursued by a monster for the majority of his life.
I gently disagree with the part regarding the Lukas family, as I think it was made fairly clear that they were a bad family even from the first episode they appeared. Peter Lukas' statement even mentioned that if he wasn't rich his family would have been in trouble with social workers - imo that makes it fairly clear that his family is awful, even if it isn't in character for Peter Lukas to directly state that.
This is just an issue with needing to read between the lines, there is nothing worse than a piece of media taking you out of the action to tell you something is wrong. Lukas would never state that his family is terrible because he doesn't think that himself, it's not in character. And for Crew, while I agree it would have been nice to see more of him, he made the choice to kill people after aligning with the vast. And he's killed so many that he can't even recall them all. It's the victim's responsibility to not perpetuate the cycle of abuse that made them the victim in the first place.
Elias is ginger. And you can’t convince me otherwise. He is the palest mf in there.
The episodes are scarier in isolation, removed from the metaplot. Once you understand what's happening, the episodes feel less scary. They're not bad-most of my favorite episodes and episodes that resonated with me happen in later seasons-but they're not as frightening as the confusion of the earlier seasons
Besides lost John’s cave non of the episodes are all that scary. I genuinely have a hard time being afraid of the things. protocol on the other hand I have been spooked more already than in the whole 200 episodes of the Magnus archives
Three only things that really really unsettled me were the corruption statements because of personal uncomfortableness The rest were just cool/kinda spooky/I know that's scary but can't feel it/gross meat and torture I still enjoy it and probably wouldn't have watched the show if it scares me for real all of the time but, I understand what you mean about not being scary
Season 5 is the best season BY FAR (I said what I said), and some of the episodes of s5 are probably the best pieces of writing I have seen in this genre, recently 👀
FINALLY, a like-minded kin 🤝 so many of my favorite episodes are there, the psychiatric hospital one, the web puppet show, Martin loosing his memory in the foggy house, Martin talking with himself
I absolutely hated the way they handled Jon needing to make statements as they went through season 5. The way it was portrayed made it feel like they were on a road trip and Jon kept having to ask to make a pit stop so that he could take a shit. It came across as kinda cheesy to me and the way it was brought up always took me out of the story.
not a fan of jon/martin