ENA thoughts & theory: on Theodora, the Bathroom, and Unforgiven Frank
[aka: historical events in uncanny streets, aka: I Think I Figured Out What Frank Did.]
edit: you can now also read this on my neocities! it has a cute little page themed after the dbbq menu style :) but anyway on with the post
Throughout most of chapter 1, it feels pretty heavily built up that the bathroom is some sort of force that works in direct opposition to βthe genieβ. it certainly felt malevolent to me; like it's something thatβs replaced βthe genieβ in the minds and vernacular of the people of uncanny streets; perhaps a kind of corruption or overthrowing of its genie, and usurpation of the peopleβs efforts to seek it out as a sort of reprieve or authority. once you actually get to the bathroom though, it seems that thisβ¦ isnβt actually the case?
The simple fact that theodora still exists in there and is perfectly fine and unharmed and surprisingly cordial if you manage to find her is proof enough there's not actually anything sinister about the bathroom, but the "angels" ena corrupts into when trying to mention a "genie" in prior conversations being the same things she transforms into when theodora begins to let her ascend [as well as seen during the icy ascension climb] ties the whole operation directly to theodora.
It seems that the bathroom is in fact actually theodoraβs own design, and i posit that it exists as a front to deliberately obscure her name/presence + throw people off her trail. Sheβs not exactly trying to completely close herself off from everyone, but she does seem to be βin hidingβ to some extent. this of course begs the question: why would a character whoβs basically a lesser deity be in hiding?
Well, part of it is I think she just kind of got tired of attending to everyone's "aspirations" and whatnot at a whim.
The presentation of the bathroom as a confessional and the surrounding talk of things like βwashing clean one's sinsβ seems in a pretty similar vein to what iβd assume theodoraβs more regular duties are, based on her interaction with ena; cleansing, reflection, forgiveness, rebirth, that whole usual god-type jazz. it's all pretty handily represented here, and the whole deal of her βthroneβ being a wishing well pretty directly parallels how one would typically 'wish' on a genie as well. perhaps she simply wanted people to put in their own work to solve their problems rather than continually come to her for everything.Β Interestingly though, she IS still quite willing to help directly if you just come straight to her. like, the bathroom serves its own purpose if you assume thatβs all there is, but there also seems to be a thing of "if you still remember the genie and/or have done the work to know she still exists and/or are simply diligent enough to search around to find her, you are welcomed to her benefitsβ.
Itβs a bit strange next to the whole βburying her name and presenceβ thing! If all she wanted to do was make people earn their forgiveness, she could have accomplished that just by making herself really hard to reachΒΉ. But taking those extra levels of censorship...the general populace clearly isnβt the real problem here. sheβs obscuring herself because of something else. something specific. something she would not forgive.
...so the frank spec was originally going to be a separate post, but after chasing the ideas in it far enough, i found the two wound up running right back into eachother. I am joining them unceremoniously with this block of text. He has a lot of shit to get through but i promise we will eventually wrap back around to the GΝΜΜEΝ¦ΜΏΜNΜ΅ΜΆΝ α»ΝΜ[BATHROOM]Β
Frankβ¦. Frank is an interesting case to be sure. Heβs so calm and cordial, even to ena, yet he speaks of βpast mistakesβ and having to βremain unforgiven"? Heβs the only character theodora is less willing to help out than ena too; sheβs fine with letting your excommunicated ne'er-do-well wipe the world bare, yet she draws the line at showing mercy to frank? what did this motherfucker DO? My answer is uhhhhhh colonization, probably!
Right. So assertion #1 i have about frank is that the ship you enter and leave uncanny streets through belonged to him*.
This seems like too deliberate a line to just mean "i walked through the door on there to get hereβ. he's got a history with that ship. if it belonged to him, i have to figure he was also the one who originally crashed it into uncanny streets. He does refer to both ena and himself as βtravelersβ, after all;Β i donβt think itβs just that the ship had always been lodged there and he just lived on it. ramming that giant ass thing in through the sands has already not got him off to a great start, but i mean that could have been an accident. You never know. maybe heβs just a bad pilot. No, the real problem, i think, is that after doing so he proceeded to attempt to harvest uncanny streets and/or remake it according to his vision.
frank has some very very strong and very very baffling associations with the wanderers. i don't quite want to say it's anything so simple/direct as "he created them" or "they work for him", but he has most DEFINITELY had some kind of hand [or robo-foot, as the case may be] in how they currently exist and operate. to be completely real i havenβt been able to makes heads or tails [or snakes and hippos] of all the NUMEROUS scattered clues about them in any sort of sensible or satisfying way, butβ¦ the barest overall gist is that the wanderers are something frank either designed himself or sought to harness, but doing so in the form presented here in the tapestries in his room wasβ¦.not viable. As you can see, itβs a bitβ¦ incomplete there, compared to what we see in the game.
Thisβ¦ facility? In the secret area of the gutsy maze is connected directly to frankβs room, as seen with the respective doors + same brick texture between both, and the even same music as in frankβs room will play if you approach this door. obviously this gives him a pretty big tie to the production[???] of these things!
There are a lot of individual elements to the wanderers who are up and out there flying around uncanny streets: hippo, veins, snake, diamond, eye, ribs. The thing that drives me crazy is that despite there being so many places where these elements turn up individually or in groups, none of them are exactly complete sets, or presented in consistent ways, or seem to be from the same origin. this is a bit of a ramble for making only a tangential point but bear with me. The facility hits their 3 biggest features-hippo/snake/diamond, but donβt line up with the elements in frankβs tapestries-hippo/diamond/veins---which weirdly, the veins seem to be their own sort of free beings there???? yet seem to act as a binding agent for the hippo in the functional wanderers? Thereβs also the eye and the ribcage thing, which i donβt think turn up directly anywhere, but they areβ¦ letβs say, more crude and primitive structures/organs, that i might associate with, say, a fetus. those red and blue tendril veins are also notably present in that thing, and act in a similar sort of βbindingβ manner of ena βbecoming one with [the orb]β. it's also those things binding the taxi driverβs heads but iβm gonna get too out in the weedsΒ² if i keep going on about the wanderers' elements.Β
the point of all this is to say that while frank seemed to have a partial vision/plan for what he wanted the wanderers to be, it seems to me that certain resources/elements/processes vital to them actually functioning were native to/only available in uncanny streets. And so I think he sought to take them for himself by force.
Look, the dudeβs a big king head. This alone EASILY carries vibes of conquest, but on top of that apparently his mecha legs are also pretty handily lifted from the ED-209 mech in robocop. granted, i haven't actually seen robocop so i could be way off base here, but i feel like a police gunmech isn't exactly, uh, going to be a force for everyoneβs civic benefit yknow. Not to mention the job listings refer to the wanderers as βenforcersβ. He is a guy whose associations all reek of hostile takeover.
Thinking more on the wandererβs purpose thoughβ¦the npcβs call them wanderers in a general sense, but i wonder if they βwanderβ because they are searching for something. in their dialogue they report on finding various oddities:Β Β
βA SEVERE BRAIN SIGNAL CAPABLE OF PRODUCING [UNINTELLIGIBLE] WAS LOCATED.β βA NEW PHENOMENON HAS BEEN DISCOVERED /// THE ENORMOUS EGG THAT HOLDS US ALL AS IN THE MOTHERβS WOMBβ
a severe brain and an egg/womb, huh.
β¦I have a hunch they're looking for theodora. The brain thing seems the most indicative because thereβs no other imagery or references of a brain in the game, and while the βeggβ/βfetusβ orb thing is a good bit more nebulous, it IS the most direct connection we have to theodora currently. And boy those fuckers sure do love flocking around this "new phenomenon" leading to her.
Itβs no secret that genies have massive power within and/or over the door they rule, so it would make sense for the purposes of colonizationΒ³ that heβd seek out something like that to gain access to or control, perhaps to further form the land to his liking.
Obviously, theodora isnβt going to be wild about all this. She intervened and ultimately stopped him, but not before his assault did some damage.Β
this βbroken palaceβ where the shattered theodora liesβ¦ iβd like to assert it was in fact formerly HER palace. I always did find that area weirdly serene and beautiful, in an out-of-place sort of way; itβs certainly a more natural kind of aesthetic i could associate with her were the bathroom not in play. Seems a shame to abandon it rather than rebuild, butβ¦i believe that when frank launched his attack, she feigned her own death in the process of fending him off. The wanderers, too, seem to corroborate this:
βWE HAVE ISSUED THE TIME OF DEATH AT 2:04 P.M.β
She let him believe that this attack did in fact destroy her, to set up an eternal stalemate--that, by a cruel trick of fate, in his effort to take over by force, heβd also destroyed the way to accomplish his goals. Thatβs why heβs trapped there in the lost village now. Trapped with the ruins of his ambition, trapped with a dead god that provides no way to change the land he sought to conquer.
It is certainly interesting, when ena talks to the shattered theodora, that she very deliberately highlights she βcan only keep you from returningβ despite that having no real relevance to the conversation they were having. Thatβs all that remnant of her exists to do, and itβs keen on letting you know it.Β
Meanwhile, the real and very much not actually dead theodora is far more into subterfuge and also still needs a place to live. So she simply made a new makeshift palace/hideout/base of operations, andβ¦ you guessed it. That's the bathroom babeyyyyy. Thatβs why you canβt speak of a βgenieβ in uncanny streets, and why no one there these days even knows what the genie is. she wanted something completely disconnected, unassuming, and censored so that she may evade the remaining wanderers, and so that word sheβs still alive and in power and serving her people [even if more passively now] never reaches frank; forcing him to live with his guilt + the consequences of his actions, and/or just to set an example so he doesnβt try any shit again.
And thatβs how we find things in chapter 1.
Going forwards, though⦠i do find this line interesting:
There areβ¦ certainly a number of ways to interpret this oneβ΄, but for the sake of this post, i think thereβs a fair call that this line can mean βthe pretense of theodoraβs being deadβ has been stripped away. It has got to be crazy to learn that youβve been living a lie for the past however long, but at least he doesnβt seem too pissed that sheβs been deceiving him all this time. Whatever happens, itβs nice that heβs not interested in going back to his old ways now that heβs free.
I accused frank of a lot of shit in this post, but i do really love the guy. itβs hard not to be endeared to a guy whoβs accepted his punishment, but still commits to being better even though he knows it wonβt absolve him. Itβs hard not to be endeared to one of the only people whoβs actually fucking nice to you. And of course, ena might also have her own history with him, given heβs a thing she thought of for her aspiration to theodora + how frank bafflingly uses the correct βΖNAβ spelling of her name. Thereβs a lot about his past that iβve tried to piece together here, but still quite a bit more beyond reach-at least at this this point in the game. I certainly hope we get to see more of him, and i get the suspicion thereβs a good chance we will.β΅
β¦
Alright yes iβll address the superscript numbers now. Because this was clipped together out of two separate posts that were Specifically About Frank and Specifically About Theodora initially, there are a few tangential points & observations that i removed from both broader topics to make it flow better as one throughline about uncannyβs history. Theyβre not substantial enough to merit their own posts so iβm just tacking them on down here as footnotes.
