Comic Geekery

It had seemed so simple. The climbing roses at the top of the trellis looked tangled and in need of a quick prune. So, naturally, Crowley climbed the trellis with secateurs in hand. Was it his fault that hidden dry rot had made it unstable at the very top? Surely not.

In any event, just as he’d reached the offending flowers, he heard an ominous crack and found himself tumbling back down. He braced for impact only to feel instead a great whoosh of air as Aziraphale flung himself between Crowley and the ground to break his fall, knocking the wind clear out of himself in the process.

In retrospect, it was a poor time for a joke.

Aziraphale first yelled at his ‘careless, reckless Husband,’ and then burst into rib cracking sobs and fled inside. Crowley was so shocked, it was all he could do to hold his Husband and wait for his sobs to abate to the point where speech was possible.

Aziraphale, most agitated, made several undeniably persuasive points:

1. Now that they were officially retired, discorporation was a far from trivial matter. Who knew what it would take to be issued a body if they lost these now?

2. There had been too many times over the last 6000 years that Aziraphale had faced the prospect of an eternity without his demon. His nerves were shot and he very much needed his Husband to take that and his own safety seriously.

3. Their miracles weren’t monitored anymore, nor could they be seen in their garden. Why didn’t he just fly up to see to the blasted things?!

Crowley’s heart ached to see his Husband so distressed, and knowing he was the cause of it was a special kind of torture not seen in even the deepest pits of hell. He had known as an abstract matter that they both had some long simmering pains to address, but it was quite a thing to slam face first into one of his Husband’s greatest fears.

So, plans changed for the day.

Today Crowley made copious amounts of tea, apologized profusely, dispensed myriad kisses and nuzzles, and spent hours discussing what would reassure his Husband—what he could do to avoid scaring him so terribly in the future. He also promised to consider what things Aziraphale could do to reassure him, too.

Eventually, they ended up on the couch with a fire, wine, and Mrs. H providing her own feline comfort. Not much later Aziraphale was relaxed enough to be delighted by her antics, and Crowley decided he could stand down a bit.

It would take some time to really internalize the fact that, in order to best care for his Husband, he’d have to start caring for his own wellbeing more diligently. He’d figure it out, though.

Also! If you have been wondering “why didn’t Crowley and Aziraphale disappear when the BoL was destroyed that seems like a pretty major plot element” don’t worry you’re not alone because at least one of the three writers also doesn’t know!

They’re not even trying to hide the bad writing. They are being very open about it actually which I think is interesting.

Both groups simply wanted the characters we love to be happy, yet they have different ways of coping with the emotional overload the finale delivered. That’s why I can understand why some people loathe even looking at Asa/Anthony without seeing them as usurpers, while others try to find some redeeming quality in them that helps make the loss bearable. Both ways of coping are understandable.

No matter what your thoughts on the matter, I imagine we all wanted a happy ending for Aziraphale and Crowley. Indisputably. And now, each in their own state of disarray, in own way, tries to find a way to move forward.

Personally, I felt more devastated by the fandom's sadness than the finale itself. I discovered Good Omens months after Season 2 was released, and people were already terribly divided over that 'final 15', split into "Team Crowley" or "Team Aziraphale", and having to experience that was really unpleasant for me. This kind of argue didn't seem to exist before; people loved both of them equally, and that situation arose on S2 solely to sow discord. I had hoped the finale might finally bring us back together, so seeing how it continued to divide people was even more painful and distressing; it actually made me stop liking both Season 2 and the finale as much as I used to.

...Aziraphale, especially, was a character who deserved more love. It is absolutely devastating that he wasn't well-developed in the narrative, that his pain and trauma were overlooked, and that he received so much hate, both after Season 2 and after the finale. Both. the character and his fans, deserved a more respectful and understanding portrayal, which never came, and that aspect of both, Season 2 and the Finale, is an outrage.

Overall, regarding the Finale itself, I never had very high expectations, considering everything that happened with the SA allegations against NG. Basically, I was prepared to resign myself whatever came out of this Finale, good or bad, because, whatever it turned out to be, it was all I was going to get to wrap up the story. Right now, I feel quite ambivalent about it, but I’m good at compartmentalizing; putting the things I love in one box and the things I hate in another, and dealing with each separately; so I can watch Season 2 and the Finale, at times only to hating the bad aspects, and at others only to appreciating the parts I liked.

Still, it deeply saddens and distresses me to know that this Finale caused pain for so many fans, to the point where they can't even bear to remember it exists, nor can they stand hearing anything about it.

On the other hand, now that nearly two months have passed, I feel like people are healing, or at least trying to find a path that feels less harrowing, whatever that looks like. And that makes me feel a little less sad.

Ultimately, the beautiful thing, both, among the cast members and within the fandom, is the meaningful bonds that have been formed. Also, Tennant and Sheen seem to have poured their hearts and souls into their performances in Good Omens, whether in Season 1, Season 2, or the Finale, and the rest of the cast did the same. Meanwhile, fans pour their hearts into fandom things at all. I love all of that and the dedication it represents.

After spending nearly two months upset over how this Finale divided the fandom yet again, today I can see how everyone is striving to bring some light into the shadows, in whatever way can.

Some have chosen to step away, while others are dedicating time to the aspects of GO they still enjoy. Whatever the case, everyone is trying to find a safe space again. I hope each of you succeeds.

Am I really the only one who finds this strange?

I remember that either someone from the team responsible for making Season 3 said this, or it was mentioned in one of the articles, I honestly can't remember which, but there was information saying that the kiss wasn't in the movie because Neil simply hadn't bothered to write it into the original script, so they didn't add it.

But how does that even fit with what Rachel said here?

I know she apologized for those comments, but she's essentially saying that they could have included a proper kiss. They just decided it "would be the same or less," for fuck's sake.

How could they watch all of seasons 1 and 2, watch that kiss at the end of season 2, and come to the conclusion that a second kiss, one that wasn't filled with pain and despair this time, wouldn't have had an even greater emotional impact on the fans than the first one?

I'm sure a lot of people would agree with me: if we'd gotten a second kiss without the pain and despair, we all would've been squealing, screaming, jumping around the room with happiness, and celebrating like little kids.

That kiss was a PROMISE to the fans that there would be a second kiss, one that would heal the wound left by the first. That's how good writing is supposed to work. Especially in a show where parallels are the primary language it uses to communicate with its audience.

So make up your minds already. Was Neil a complete fucking idiot (which I'm not denying, he absolutely is a complete fucking asshole) who couldn't be bothered to write another kiss into the original script, or was it your decision not to include one because it would've been "the same or less"?

The ending of S3, among all the other sins and attrocities commited, feels like a really nasty appropriation of fan culture to me. I don't know how else to phrase it.

You see, I am a massive human AU enjoyer. I love it with all my being. I read it and I write it and I dream it.

But the fact that we now have a CANONIC HUMAN AU... it just feels so wrong! It makes me sick and it makes me angry!

I can't even say if it's a decent human AU or not, because I haven't actually seen S3. Perhaps it could be fine on its own. But I just can't look at those characters!

The mere fact that this human AU exists as something attached to the end of the show just doubles the feeling that I am looking at some monstrosity wearing a corpse of my loved ones... Because it's both the corpses of beautiful original characters, and the concept of human AU that I love so much...

I know there's people who really love the human ending and the implied multiverse of the end credits. They see it as all our fanfiction being made canon and see that as beautiful. I'm glad for those people. If they can be happy with the finale then they should be.

But to me it's grating. It feels like theft. Like a lazy absence of a proper conclusion with a cheerful "Do it yourself! 😀" slapped on.

We wrote those human AUs because we LOVED the source material. That never meant we wanted any of them to be real. It's a fun way to play with characters in scenarios that would never happen in canon. The ending at best shows a well-meaning ignorance of how fan culture works. Fanfiction, no matter how much it deviates from the source material, is always in conversation with canon. Agreeing, disagreeing, wearing different hats. But it's always meant to derive from the original. Putting fanfiction IN canon turns canon into a meaningless echo.

But the bookshop in my brain is still open. Only on weekends, or the occasional open stint on a quiet midweek day or two, but Whickber Street still bustles around it. It still exists, and is still tended to by a fussy, soft bookseller and his angular, hot headed, but incredibly loving husband. No one was invited to the wedding, needless to say. They just kind of showed up wearing rings one day, and no one had ever thought to ask when they tied the knot, or in fact if they ever even did.

And within its walls are a stock room, still painted yellow; a bedroom, now shared by a snoozing demon and a reading angel, on the weekend and those hazy midweek days; and a desk which never gets dusty or messy.

There’s also a cottage in the South Downs, with a large green house and vegetable plots which miraculously never deplete, and roses which bloom year round; there’s an armchair which has a worn down left arm cushion, from where a demon drapes himself over his angel more often than he sits on the matching chair across from it; a bedroom, shared, again; and the sounds of two lives well lived, infinite happiness and love beyond measure echoing within its floral, wallpapered walls.

Gift art of a scene from my first Good Omens fic:

Unfallen

A very dear, old friend, who was a tremendous encouragement throughout the insane writing process for this story, surprised me with this commissioned art by @beelzeebub.

What if the children go to schools unafraid of tear gas and bullets?

What if the birds come back, and the bees are healed, and every species moves from endangered, to threatened, to thriving?

What if the rainforest ADVANCES?

What if every parking lot had solar panels? What if every structure had solar panels? What if we built climbing gyms and terraced gardens in the skeletons of old coal power plants?

What if you baked your neighbor bread, and they shared their home-grown blackberries?

What if every person who needed a home, had one? What if every person who needed healing was healed?

What if every body was treasured for what it was, not what it should be?

What if every trans child's parents attended their graduation, their wedding, their new-name-day?

What if every warehouse became a closed-circle repair station? Goods flowing out, and back, and out again? What if landfills started to SHRINK?

What if the water and air were clean? What if there was enough public transit that the cars dwindled, leaving the streets safe for kids on bikes, evening deer, midnight cats and foxes?

What if we win?

The condors are back. The whales are saved. The sea turtles are no longer endangered. The cranes are back. The bees are recovering. The air in LA and Tokyo and London is clean again. The aquifers in the LA Basin are refilling.

Children are kinder than previous generations. Parents are stopping the abuse cycle. Being trans and queer is more acceptable than ever on a ground level.

It's hard to see if you're young, if you don't know how to step back from social media and the news. But remember--bad news sells, and the algorithm knows despair keeps you scrolling. It's a skewed lens.

We are fighting and we are winning against this adminstration's bullying. We are coming together against the bullies and they are running away scared because they don't understand that we will do that.

People are working hard every day to find ways to make sure fewer animals get hit by cars and planes and rockets.

Maker spaces are more common than ever. Solar and wind are more common than ever. Coal plants are shutting down every day.

Unprecedented numbers of acres are being bought back or given back to their rightful stewards, and the world heals because of it. People are working hard every day to learn how to help a forest recover faster.

We are not at zero. We are at decades of effort to heal the world. We've come SO far.

In 1982 there were only 22 California Condors left in the world. In 1992, when the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), with its public and private partners, began reintroducing captive-bred condors to the wild. In 2001 the first wild nesting occurred in Grand Canyon National Park since re-introduction. In 2002 there were only 8 pairs of wild nesting birds population-wide. In 2008, for the first time since the program began, more California condors were flying free in the wild than in captivity. Today there are nearly 500 – more than half of them flying free in Arizona, Utah, California, and Baja Mexico.

When I was born, there were no condors in the wild. I'm 37 now, and there are over 250 condors flying free.

When my mom was born in 1955, there were days when she wasn't allowed to go outside to play, because of the air pollution. When I was born, that never happened anymore.

When I was born, humpback whales were critically endangered, and people thought they were going to go extinct. Today, they've recovered to exceed their recorded numbers. Other whales too!

We fixed it.

Since 1990 extreme poverty has decreased worldwide by over HALF.

He knew that he was probably going too fast for his Husband, pushing him too far and too quickly.

It was just that he knew what his Husband wanted, and he so, so wanted to give it to him.

One of Aziraphale’s greatest prides was how his demon, normally incapable of being still, could relax and be calm around him. Oh, he so loved Crowley’s energy, his verve and his downright aggressive approach to life at times. But at the same time, he knew that some of that dynamism was rooted in fear and anxiety — in the knowledge that he could never fully relax with Hell and Heaven’s agents on the prowl.

He also knew that Crowley found the stillness he both craved and feared far easier to attain when be was either near Aziraphale or inhabiting his snake form.

Surely both at once would be even better? Surely. It must be. All it would take to find out would be one warm afternoon in their library with Aziraphale at the desk and Crowley curled up in the basket atop it.

Running the feathers against his cheek, Aziraphale arrived at a decision and tucked them both away in his desk drawer. Crowley wasn’t ready yet, and Aziraphale had taken this temptation as far as he was comfortable.