#linling

So I sent these photos of my tarot book to my lovely friend who got me into this show (shoutout @knightmikaza! also screw u T-T) and we were talking abt TBHX and i went back to look at this picture I took and I'm rereading the definition and it hits me:

X is the Hierophant

I think we could all glean from the finale is that X has a larger part to play in this narrative, that there is a bigger threat out there and X is here to act as a warning sign, a final canary in the coal mine for some larger force. It's my personal opinion that X exists as a radical figure outside the hero commission but also as a massive fuck you to what the landscape of heroes has become. Over and over through season 1 we have seen what becomes of "old heroes" from the burnout to the anguish to the being thrown aside. We see this in Smile crying because he misses his wife and kids, firm man being forced to retire by the very figure who made him into a hero, to Old E-Soul going through the motions of being hero when you can tell his hearts just not in it anymore.

And then here comes some random guy. who takes the title of X and holds it for four years straight. He has no connections, and he has this larger perspective that the other heroes don't seem to get. I think context is important here and specifically the context of who has context and who doesn't . We the audience have the context of the hero agencies' awful behaviour, the public in the show Does Not. X is acting as a sort of spotlight to the fact things aren't working as they should in a truly altruistic sense or either in a capitalist hellscape it was always going to turn into this sense.

Going back to the definition of the hierophant, I think from this and the songs which represent the thoughts of X, we can kinda glean the vibe that X has old-school-hero type beliefs. He is one of the few truly altruistic heroes left in a way. Many of the top ten heroes we see in the show start with altruistic motivations and get beaten down and jaded by the churning of the hero industry. Through this we can assume that X represents the ideas of old altruistic heroes, thus protecting the traditions of the original ideas of heroism.

Then moving on to the point about guidance, let's talk about episode 24, and the talk X and Ahu have. X is very plainly and blatantly laying out the reality of the hero agencies to Ahu. Many of these revelations or truths were likely handed to him by the girl in the ending who I will be calling "Tarot Girl" since we don't know her identity. In this sense Tarot Girl entrusted these truths to X to share with the world through him becoming a hero. Because X's existence speaks to the original idea that anyone can be a hero as we see LinLing state in episode one. X represents the purest form of a hero, unchained from all the business that most heroes have to deal with from the agencies.

With this X clearly represents the beliefs of what it means to be a hero from a truly altruistic view, the pure ideal of a hero held in the hearts and minds of the public compared to the dirty reality hidden from them. X is the link between those cherished beliefs and those beliefs in practice. His whole existence asks heroes the question: Why are you doing this? It forced them to reckon with what they wanted versus what they have become. Someone who was able to become so powerful circumventing the entire monster that the hero industry has become.

By standing apart and separated from everything heroes have become, X asks simply: Are you truly living by your beliefs? Are you still doing this to save people?

And yes some people aren't doing this to save people (cough cough lucky cyan but thats a topic for another day honestly i find her existence as a hero fascinating and I have many thoughts about how from a truly altruistic and intrinsic motivational view she is Not a good hero but again, another time) but many of them started out with a simple goal. Again going back to the stories of LinLing, Loli, YangCheng, Ahu and Queen (technically).

Would these people be able to stick to their morals without the interference of the agencies? I'm not sure, but X is forcing them to look at it like that. X is an entity all his own. LinLing was thrown into the hero industry and immediately forced to face the ugliness that pushed him around and forced him to fit into the persona of nice.

X is the hierophant.

X is the warning sign, the advisor asking these heroes to consider their original convictions and by revealing himself to be just Some Guy, immediately brings into question the need for the parasitic agencies at all. Are they really bringing order? We the audience understand that to be mostly no, but by standing as himself apart from all the glitz glamour and glory, X is forcing that question into the heroes minds.

Here is another explanation from Queer Tarot deck that I also felt fit this argument.