there's a series of scenes that stood out to me most in the recent animation "Forgone". even if we got maxlie marriage im going to look past that and explain why Maxwell & Charlie are miserable.
the first scene to make the connection is with Metheus looming behind Charlie and disappearing the second Williamaxwell enters the room. That in itself can be "turning a blind eye" to the problems of the shadows and their cost-consequences. The other is a brief connection to the William Carter puzzles (YES IM GOING TO BRING IT UP EACH TIME. (in my defense we have William here))
specifically the part where Maxwell takes care of the shadows that are, again, behind Charlie and haunting her in their own way. I'm going to leave both interpretations because i'm going to debunk this one. Following that scene William starts/ignites a fire and that said fire turns into shadows. they envelope the room in darkness where Maxwell stands before taking him with them.
Its missable but you can see the second the shadows coming from the portal turn to Maxwell to envelope him as well. that in on itself is another continuation of William Carter's life, puzzle. William was the one that ignited the fire and burnt the bridge for a future. In other senses, fire can be represented as the sun or vice versa and how Maxwell flew too close to the sun.
Either way, William started it, Maxwell paid the price and he did nothing to stop it. or maybe couldn't. He stands beaten down and resigned waiting for the shadows to claim him. At that point it doesn't matter, it's better to not fight them. All of those are completed by Maxwell's own words at the throne:
"I don't know what they want. They... they just watch." / "Unless you get too close... Then..."
"They'll show you terrible, beautiful things." / "It's best not to fight it."
At the end of it we see the same gateway that took Maxwell but the shadows are not to be seen. The portal is in Charlie's point of view AND NOTICE HOW the shadows as seen by the following scenes are missing. She can't see the shadows lest she turns against them.
She knows what they did, she's the one that saw Metheus behind her and how it went away with Maxwilliam's presence & she saw them take Maxwell as well. She knows, she understands that, hence why she looks irritated as to why they don't show themselves to her.
In a darker aspect, the shadows DO show themselves. They are as hungry and as agitated as the shadows that took Maxwell and you can see them aiming for Charlie. It is possible that they are going to corrupt her™ and she takes the figure of the boss-like Charlie entity we see in the Video.
We kill Charlie, she dies. Then both her & Wagstaff would be dead and equal. This game doesn't shy away from death and killing character's on screen. If that happens, its most like the end of "From beyond" Arc with both secondary antagonists dead (The primary being Alter and Tenebrous).
And after that? Who knows.
