We were told the ending of S2 had to happen like that but it DIDN'T.
TL;DR: It was done like that to lay blame for their separation on Aziraphale, making him look like a fool and an asshole for not wanting to be an 'us' but 'choosing' Heaven. When no 'us' was possible anyway.
If S3 was gonna prove Crowley right in that nothing can change and Heaven and Hell are toxic and beyond repair - than what was all this weird, let's be us monologue about? It was never possible. Heaven and Hell would never leave them in peace.
Lets be us where? Crowley knew Second Coming was planned. Which would mean the end of Universe and Time and which would end up with him and all demons stripped of power and spending eternity in a burning lake or something. While Aziraphale'd have to watch The Sound of Music and think about birds flying to a mountain far far away for eternity.
Aziraphale could have been shown to make a conscious decision to go because he believed there was still a chance for a change. There didn't need to be all these menacing convoluted vibes from Metatron. Crowley could still have refused because he believed the system couldn't be changed.
The disagreement would remain exactly the same.
We'd still be arguing about whether change is possible. And who made the right choice. Which many of us did - but most of the discourse was not about that. It was about whether Aziraphale still believes in Heaven's "message". He didn't. We saw he was trying to stop Second Coming against ALL OF THEM. (Where was 'all of us against all of them' btw??)
We might have been spared three years of posts treating Aziraphale as gullible, manipulated, backsliding, choosing Heaven over Crowley, betraying Crowley, begging to be taken back; requirements for him to be hurt, to be taught a lesson, being proven wrong and so on and on.
The tragedy could have been two beings making different decisions under impossible circumstances. (With me backing the wrong one apparently because change is impossible and everything had to be destroyed.)
Instead, a huge amount of fandom discussion became about whether Aziraphale was an idiot.
If the ending was always going to validate that Heaven and Hell were beyond saving anyway, why was all that necessary??
TW: I'll never forgive that fucking asshole for that. And the whole fucking finale.
