Does this sound like an author who would have chosen a "Kill Them All And Destroy Everything To Start Anew - End" to you?
“Use your gifts and your talents to greatest possible effect while you can. Spread joy wherever possible. Laugh at jokes. Tell jokes. Make puns and bugger the embuggerances. Read books. Read my books. You might like them. You might find something else you like even more than them. Look for these things in life.
Question authority. Champion good causes. Speak out against injustice. Do not tolerate bullies or bigots or racists or anti-intellectuals or the narrow-minded. Use your education to challenge them. Broaden their perspectives. Make the world you interface with a happier place.
These are your choices. Choices you have been fortunate to have been given, so don’t waste them while you have them. Don’t look back in years to come and wish you had grasped a fleeting opportunity. Grasp it now with both hands, Live. Strive. Love.”
From A Little Advice for Life taken from ‘Terry Pratchett: from birth to death, a writer.’
—Sir Terry Pratchett; April 28, 1948 – March 12, 2015
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A reminder: Terry Pratchett's work was dark as hell
Something that I've seen in a large number of criticisms of Good Omens S3 is that Terry Pratchett wouldn't have written it that way because it's "too dark", and that Terry was lighthearted and funny, and clearly all the humour in the novel came from him and all the dark bits came from Gaiman.
This is an old misconception which has been around since the publication of the novel, and I think the people saying that possibly aren't very familiar with Terry Pratchett's work, or at least only surface level familiar. At times it can be easy to miss because of the humour, but Terry did dark better than almost any author I've ever read.
The first time I read this passage in Nation it was like being hit in the face with a brick.
Nation is a book that I've seen negative reviews of because it isn't funny, and they're correct, how could a novel which opens with almost all the inhabitants of an island being killed be funny? But it's also one of his best novels. It feels very much like a novel he wrote to house all the rage he felt after his Alzheimers diagnosis, a rage which is palpable in that quote above.
But to go back to his more humour driven works, read the section in Reaper Man where Death can't muffle the sound of the sand in his Lifetimer running out. Read Night Watch where Vimes is going through the torture chamber at Cable Street (actually the whole of Night Watch is pretty damn dark). The opening of I Shall Wear Midnight (which I won't go into because TW, but some of what happens is so horrific in a very real-world sense that I couldn't quite believe I was reading it, especially in what was intended as a series for children). The part in Thud where The Summoning Dark meets The Guarding Dark, Vimes' inner Watchman, who is there not to keep darkness out, but to keep Vimes own darkness inside. Many other instances.
Make no mistake, I still don't like how Good Omens ended. I think it highly unlikely it would have ended that way if Terry were to have had anything to do with it because he was a far better writer than that (though of course none of us know that for sure, and even if he had written it that exact way it would still be bad and absolutely gut the message of the novel/S1).
But to say Terry Pratchett didn't write dark shit does a huge disservice to one of my favourite authors of some of the darkest shit I've ever read.
Thanks for the reminder, you are right. Terry could absolutely gut the reader, but I always considered it more as a "wake up and do something" instead of "we are doomed, it's useless".
His work is sometimes dark, but at the same time features so much hope, love and always a fierce struggle to "make it better, never give up". I miss that in GO3.
Maybe this really was his intended ending, but he would have written it relatable. These 90 cramped minutes of random plotholes don't do him justice.
Isn't one of the major thematic points of the book and season 1 and 2 that Crowley and Aziracrow actually do have free will? That they have the power to make choices and be affected or affect others by the consequences of those choices? They believe they can't choose to be good or evil, that they're stuck in their natures, but then they go and do each other's miracles, and interfere with human affairs, sometimes messing up (graveyard) sometimes making better (Job) sometimes having no effect at all (first apocalypse). Aziraphale chose to go to heaven to save everything. Crowley chose to stay. Just because they're oppressed by the system doesn't mean they lack free will. Their creativity, imagination, and refusal to only do what is allowed were their greatest assets.
Wasn't one of the major thematic points the fact that no one is completely good or bad, we simply make choices, therefore the dichotomy between heaven and hell and angels and demons is an illusion? Both demons and angels suffer and are lonely under the system. Wouldn't it have made more sense to create a world where angels and demons can have the opportunity to learn and grow with humanity the way Aziraphale and Crowley did?
The finale doesn't actually address these points because they remove the problems by just starting everything over, which is in direct contradiction to everything they fought for in season 1 and with the Job minisode.
I agree that the ending should have always involved dismantling the system and creating an entirely new one. But it should have been a new system in the world they knew with the humans they'd come to love, and allowed everyone a chance at redemption. Or at least the autonomy to choose for themselves.
Crowley making one choice for the whole universe and undoing all of their work isn't thematically consistent and doesn't actually address anything that's been introduced this far. Why go through the trouble of establishing all this world building just to erase it?
How is the new human world better? What is the consequence of no heaven and hell other than Crowley and Aziraphale can be openly together (in the time period they occupy. I'm pretty certain homophobia would still exist)? Is the human experience fundamentally altered? Wasn't the whole point that humans actually do what they want regardless of heaven and hell's agenda because they're unpredictable and have imagination?
Isn't one of the themes from season 1 that the four horsemen, war famine pollution death, are actually man made concepts (well except for death)? And that one of the reasons Adam left the world as it was was because he felt humans needed to take responsibility for the earth and have the opportunity to fix their own mistakes? Isn't that why he didn't rebuild the whale population? Doesn't killing off all the humans and not letting them have a choice in making the new world really undermine that?
Isn't one of the themes that humanity is worth saving, and one of the major points demonstrating that theme being there are two nonhuman beings who still love humans despite witnessing them commit the same mistakes over and over? Isn't that nuance kind of lost when they become human themselves? Then their love for humanity is more self preservation and without the benefit of a long term view. DO they even love humanity as much when they're humans? I didn't exactly see a lot of general human love, mostly interpersonal romantic connection between them two.
Am I crazy? Am I going crazy? Did anyone in that writer's room watch more than 5 minutes of the same series I did?
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Good Omens, Trauma, LGBTQIA+ Representation, and Stories
Do not read further if you want to watch the Good Omens finale unspoiled. Do not. Go back! Retreat! Stop!
Alright, you continuing is on you.
To say the least, the finale has been divisive (as predicted, though we didn’t know it would be this bad). I think a lot of the fandom has been processing it and coming to their own acceptance or coping mechanisms. I wanted to give myself some time to digest before I dived into “but did you like it?” because truly the answer is yes, but.
Before dig in, I first want to say this: Thank you to the creators for giving us your ending. For fighting for us. For doing what you thought was best. We know that it was not easy, and we appreciate you. To my fellow fans: yelling at anyone is NOT the way to solve any of your feelings. That goes for creators AND fellow fans whose opinion differs. We are all going to have differing views, and that’s okay. After all, we now have a multiverse of sand boxes to play in (and play we shall, I am sure).
We can start with what I loved: Aziraphale saving Crowley, the crosswords level of sass, Joshua, and Harry the Fish all left me with giant smiles. I wish we had been able to see more of this. You could tell the stories were rushed, but nonetheless they were able to shine some still.
It’s also not anyone’s fault the story was rushed. We knew that was going to be the case condensing six episodes down to one. It would never be able to solve all the hanging plot lines and Chekov’s guns that were out there.
Having said that, let’s dig into the gritty of where I saw a problem (after all, I haven’t seen a single person yet say they disliked Jesus). We’re once again left with the problem of a final fifteen, but part of it started before.
Repeatedly I’ve seen posts celebrating that Aziraphale and Crowley are now able to live without their trauma. That they can live without the pain they have suffered and the fear and simply be. And yes, that is beautiful (if a bit unrealistic, given the state of the real world). And as someone with extensive trauma, a chronic illness, married to a disabled person I wonder if they understand some of the message that’s being given.
Because between the lines of this is that Aziraphale and Crowley could not be given a happy ending. They needed their trauma removed to do so. That Crowley, in his depressive state, was far too broken to be able to come out the other side. And that he should not be given time to heal from that condition in order to make a decision fully, based in his love for Earth yes but also his love for himself and for Aziraphale.
That the solution to your depression is a suicide that helps others live their best lives.
I don’t think that the writers intended this to be the message. I truly don’t. Sometimes you have to have been through the worst to see it, and to be honest I’m delighted for the portion of the fandom that doesn’t see this part of the story. I wish that for everyone.
As someone who has, relatively recently, been in Crowley’s position I am grateful no one gave me the option to sacrifice myself for the world. I’d have taken it. Now? Now I’d tell God to go fuck herself. Because despite trauma, hope and joy find a way. Because I live in a world where my marriage is often invalidated and derided. Where my spouse has to constantly face a battle I can’t quite grasp where the world tells them they shouldn’t exist. Where the two of us regularly have to face our trauma, together. And despite it find the ability to laugh so hard we’re crying. We have found connections and found family and beauty, despite it all.
And that is the ending that our Ineffables deserved. The ability to finally find themselves without needing their history to be erased. To know that every stolen moment and bit of hope was, indeed, worth the battle to get to the end. Not to be told that both they and the world were too broken to save. Best start from scratch.
I will mourn them. And in doing so it is with the added weight of the queer people who never found their way out. Who were told they were too broken for this world. Who could no longer find hope. I will mourn for my community just as my first thought yesterday when the finale was done was how to best help them. What support would a community suddenly given this message need?
I know the creators did their best, and I will not hurl hatred at them. But I will, this one time, say I think that they were irresponsible. They valued art over the community around it. It was their choice to make, and I respect what they were trying to accomplish and the beauty they were trying to create. And I know many will see that beauty and they will receive their accolades.
This post is not for those who are pleased. It’s for the rest of you. The ones in the fandom that are aching and seeing yourselves erased and tired of fighting. Please don’t give up. Hope is there. Love is real and it does not only create universes but heals the pain within us.
Maybe 97 minutes simply wasn’t enough. If Aziraphale and Crowley had been given years to heal in their garden bookshop and come to their decision, I could understand it far more. If we had time to show multiple multiverse endings, including one where our Ineffables stood at the end and smiled at what they had created when they thought they’d be sacrificing themselves, that I would have understood a bit more. Perhaps if they’d instead told God to leave their universe and let them finally figure it out, something given through the wisdom of child-Adam back in season one. Maybe they didn’t have the story time for all of these. It could simply be that we can solve the problem with only a little more time.
I do think a multiverse was intended as Aziraphale and Crowley’s choice. I think they should have been able to see it through the snow globe that now sits on their mantle in my heart. A story in which we can have all of our stories and see all the possible choices and worlds we could have inhabited.
To see what we would have been without the trauma is not a bad thing. Nor are all the stories we have created for Aziraphale and Crowley. Thousands of them! All a slightly different version. All a slightly different them. That we have watched fall in love time after time.
Yet we are still valid as we are. Broken and trying and finding hope in the ashes. Because we, and 7 billion humans, all deserve the chance to hope that we can find a better world without sacrificing ourselves to do so.
I won’t be leaving the Good Omens fandom, not by a long stretch. This hasn’t been my first time that I’ve disagreed with canon nor will it be the last, I’m sure. I hope that the rest of you that are struggling with this ending also stay. There will be AUs and fix it fics and more stories for us all to tell.
I would be remiss if I did not say this: I am sure with time I am going to love Asa and Anthony. After all, I was writing a human AU with my partner as I fell in love with them. When I saw the ending, the bit of smile I did receive was the beauty of seeing two people who are no longer young still being able to find each other and fall in love.
I have seen many takes saying that they are sad that Asa and Anthony will only get twenty years. As someone who is destined to have much the same time frame in my life with my partner who I adore more than the world itself, this feels a bit like a slap in the face. Because that is still years of joy. It has still been us waking up next to each other each day and planting our garden for our future. I would have loved to have an entire life with them, but I am so very, very happy to get the time that we will have.
I have also seen takes saying Asa and Anthony are not canon nonbinary people any longer. They’re not canon cis, either. And until we adjust our thoughts to understanding we do not know someone’s gender or sexuality unless they tell us, we will continue to be in a world in which nonbinary people feel unaccepted at heart.
I am glad we finally have some sort of closure. I look forward to diving back into the sandbox (and have many thoughts already about doing so). I do, truly, believe that Aziraphale and Crowley could not have been erased from the Book of Life nor their world from existence. They’re still out there. After all, we have not forgotten them and I know I for one never will. They have given me far too much over the years.
Stay safe, fandom. Love one another and help each other through this. Don’t be angry at others for seeing things differently to each other, we are all different and that is something to celebrate. It’s not an attack on how you see the world, truly. Because we are all flawed beings trying to find our own joy.
Yes, this is so true, thanks for this very personal take. That's exactly what bothers me, too. I cherished the story especially for its love, queerness and inclusion, but that is completely gone in S3.
Even more, it triggers trauma on many different levels. We don't talk enough about the cruel, sudden vanishing of human beins, dissolving into nothingness. While watching it I still thought it would be made right in the end, these persons would come back. But no, they stay completely erased. Even Jesus, Gods own son?! (him asking for his Mama with his big sad eyes made me tear up)
For me as someone with separaten anxiety and a severe trauma from the very sudden death of a parent this hit much too close to home. And. This. Is. Not. Ok.
Good Omens was a comedy once, and I can't imagine that Terry would have toyed with these topics that way.
So, I’ve been obsessed with Pratchett since I was 15. That’s 23 years for those keeping count. I just finished GO3 and these are my initial thoughts:
Crowley and Aziraphale becoming human: I don’t love, but you could argue that that was what he planned, and I would buy it. It does follow some of his themes.
But there is a knife’s edge that Pratchett balanced between fury and compassion. He absolutely loved humanity, but he also hated what humans did to each other out of malice, spite, or even laziness. Good Omens the novel was filled to bursting with that.
The end here lacked all of that somehow. God in S1 is unknowable, but God is S3 is just a capricious bitch who seems to have it out for Crowley specifically and through him Aziraphale. The viewer certainly gets angry at God, but the narrative seems to be that, while cold, she is doing the right thing and giving them their happy ending. And while Crowley expresses compassion for humanity, it falls on such deaf ears that the narrative doesn’t actually support that.
The closing sentiment seems to be that we can make their lives better by just erasing all their trauma and baggage. No. Sam Vimes did not pull himself out of the gutter and bodily hold himself out of it every day to be told that actually amnesia would be best. If you wanted to make them human: make them keep their memories. That would have been fine.
Terry would have Crowley and Aziraphale say “fuck you” to God and protect the earth as it was. The way they protected Job’s children. The way they did at Tadfield Airbase. Here they just throw in the towel and start a new universe. They accept their failure so quickly as to be farcical.
And you will never ever convince me that TERRY PRATCHETT would have allowed the words “a story shouldn’t live past its ending” to be spoken without the speaker being immediately eaten by a banshee.
Nope. Nope - even if I laughed at moments, and found the ending scene sweet, because how could David and Michael not be? I enjoy an AU as much as anybody, but if anyone deserves their love confession, their kiss, their happy ever after, it’s the canon characters who've been through so much together, not a pair of stand-ins.
I know the line forms to the left. Here we go anyway.
What I got from the original book – and specifically the parts that Pratchett obviously put into it, the underlying theme, the humane perspective – is that the world’s not saved by grand heroics, by the procurement of a McGuffin like the Book of Life or the killing of an Antichrist. It’s saved, little piece by little piece, through the compounding effect of small, good things, of kindnesses performed by imperfect beings and the love of random beauty and the cherishing of the day-to-day. Aziraphale and Crowley thwart the Apocalypse not because they feel the call to be heroes, but because they’ve gotten used to humanity with all its flaws; because they love a bookshop and a car and gravlax and bebop and little restaurants where they know your name. The things that multiply and intertwine in our lives, that hold us and our world together the way roots fix the soil. The shared meals and the do-you-remembers, the problems muddled through, the arguments made up; the love of a child for his home and his friends, for a familiar wood and apples stolen from a neighbor’s tree. How does it save the world if you destroy the world?
(I’m old; I was born in the Fifities, and oh, I remember the heavy irony of “we had to destroy the village In order to save it.” But that’s just what this story did.)
Saying “this is all broken and wrong, and the only thing to do is wipe it all out and start over from the beginning”: that’s been the recipe for some of the worst horrors of the world. That was the entire fucking message of the original book. The world is flawed, the systems we live under imperfect and even cruel in their origins, but it can be healed, bit by bit, if you love enough – even if you love in seemingly trivial ways. Good Omens is about mending – mending the consequences of folly, mending friendships, mending the damage people inflict on one another, like an angel mending the spine of a beloved old book. Mending the error in the assumption that sides mean more than individuals, leaving two beings like Aziraphale and Crowley free to treasure all the small things about each other, as friends or lovers or however you choose to see them. The meet-cute of their human counterparts in the remade, blind-watchmaker universe is, well, cute, but it doesn't reward the characters we came to love, who evolved along with humanity, became who they are by outgrowing the artificial opposition imposed on them, and bonded through rising above it. (And neither couple ever gets a tender kiss to cancel out the angry one that left us all ravaged in 2023; more articulate voices than mine have gone to town on the way that narrative choice dilutes the queer representation that stunned us with its promise in the original TV adaptation).
So I see the whole progress of the sequel series as misbegotten – most likely, for all the usual reasons of cupidity and vanity – leaving us with a couple of pieces of tone-deaf fan fiction that literally lost the plot. Good moments here and there, clever bits of banter and comic turns; two lead actors with dazzling chemistry that most of us would pay to hear read the phone book for ninety minutes; but all in all a disjointed story compounded of fan tropes, that did not seem to love its characters or have a point beyond churning them around for ninety minutes.
Where in this story are characters comparable to everybody that made the original so rich and endearing to begin with? The bumbling, sincere romances (Anathema and Newt, Tracy and Shadwell, even the wholesome marital bond of Lesley and Maud)? The tweenage energy and candor provided by the Them? Eleven-year-old Adam Young faced a choice and protected the world because its simple joys were enough for him; twinky Jesus Mark II goes down an elevator and survives just long enough to learn a card trick, distribute pizza, and be disintegrated without addressing any of the events unfolding around him. And where the entire hell is Agnes Nutter, and her tart wisdom?
(....Remember Agnes? Are we to accept that she wrote two books of prophecy, guiding the angel and demon who were fated to thwart Armageddon – and that her descendant burnt the second, in order to start her new life without a roadmap – only for everything to go up a few years later, not in a ball of flaming goo, but in a corny Avengers Endgame series of sfx dust devils? This story seems to be happening in an entirely different universe to the one that was built between book covers or the opening and closing credits of Season One, and it's not because God rebooted it.)
I'll leave you with a bit of shameless self-promo: an imagining of Agnes’ take on the sequels, and a version of what Aziraphale and Crowley themselves might have thought of the narrative malfeasance, as I view it, of season 2 (both written before any of the uglier reports about NG surfaced). I don't know if this was a case of an author deliberately jerking around his fandom, a case of "too many cooks spoil the broth" when the project had to be retooled for a briefer air time, or just lazy reliance on a wealth of incident and fan service as a substitute for a story worth telling. All I'm sure of is that we, as fan creators, should feel completely free to ignore anything that violates the promise, the message, and the perspective of the story we fell in love with. To mend what went wrong, piece by piece.
The Shuttered Garden: How the Good Omens Finale Betrayed its Humanistic Roots
Text: Aivelin Illustration: a-ida
The series finale of Good Omens dropped this Wednesday, leaving the fandom shaken and in absolute distress. The audience reaction was immediate, driving the Rotten Tomatoes score for Season 3 down to a disappointing 36%. The online debate grew so heated and overwhelmed with grief that numerous fan accounts faced 24-hour social media bans for their highly emotional confessions.
Viewers are highly divided. While a fraction accepts the heavy ending as a necessary evil, the overwhelming sentiment across platforms is utter bewilderment and heartbreak: "These characters do not feel like the ones we grew to love in previous seasons!"
This raises painful, critical questions: Is this sudden shift in characterization a narrative misstep? Is the tragic, suicidal ending a harsh subversion of the original book, which famously promised a comforting happily ever after?
To find the answer, one must look closely at who held the creative reins for the scripts of Seasons 2 and 3. By analyzing the writing credits, clear and undeniable patterns emerge, linking these distressing plot choices directly to Neil Gaiman’s broader, often dark and subversive, body of work.
The Solitary Vision and the Realigned Mold
While the first season captured the shared spirit of Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman’s 1990 novel, the subsequent seasons belong to Gaiman’s solitary vision. When viewed alongside his wider world of storytelling, such as The Sandman, American Gods, and Stardust, the tragic fractures in Aziraphale and Crowley’s bond lose their surprise. Gaiman’s worlds are populated by immortal beings who are deeply fractured at best and cruel at worst. In these narratives, it is almost a rule that celestial entities will take advantage of the hearts that love them, turning devotion into a tool before abandoning those souls to a devastating fate.
Crucially, Gaiman always veils this emotional cruelty behind high-minded dilemmas. The act of abandonment is never framed as simple coldness; instead, it is masked as a profound moral crisis ("We cannot be together because I am a god and you are human"), a sacrifice of monumental importance ("I must leave our future to save my kingdom"), or an unyielding divine necessity. Even when Gaiman’s romances lack outward malice, they are consistently denied peace. In Stardust, the mortal husband passes away, leaving his immortal, celestial wife to endure eternity in silent, isolated grief. By transforming Aziraphale into a colder, more emotionally distant figure who abruptly leaves Crowley for a heavenly promotion, Gaiman is merely reshaping Good Omens to fit his favorite creative blueprint.
Deeply Pessimistic Parallels
Ultimately, the ending of Good Omens Season 3 and the conclusion of The Sandman reveal deeply pessimistic parallels. The Sandman closes with its protagonist suffering the consequences of his own rigid nature, forced by higher powers into self-destruction so that his kingdom might survive. In the wake of this death, the universe offers a surrogate replacement - a new entity stripped of the original’s memories, whom the remaining characters are forced to accept despite their lingering grief.
Aziraphale’s sudden, illogical decision to leap at Heaven’s offer mirrors this exact brand of narrative cruelty. Neither Aziraphale nor Crowley deserved to have their hard-won autonomy stripped away for the sake of a grandiose self-sacrifice.
A Profound Departure from Terry Pratchett
This shift represents a profound departure from the late Terry Pratchett’s fundamental worldview. Pratchett harbored a deep-seated aversion to suicide tropes and grand, sacrificial violence in fiction. His works respected the dignity of both life and death. In his narrative, the Apocalypse is defeated not through self-sacrifice or bloodshed, but by the quiet resilience and stubborn pragmatism of ordinary people. The first season beautifully honored this philosophy, as the Antichrist and a group of children stopped the Apocalypse through sheer, down-to-earth humanity.
The subsequent seasons discard this logic entirely, altering the very cosmology of the universe. In Season 1, God was an infallible, detached observer whose ineffable plan quietly empowered the right people at the right moment to prevent ruin. By Season 3, God is reframed as a petulant, semi-malicious entity capable of erasing existence on a whim.
Furthermore, while Pratchett and Gaiman likely brainstormed the concepts of the South Downs cottage and the conflict between Heaven, Hell and Earth together, Pratchett would never have designed an intentionally suicidal and destructive endgame. In his philosophy, survival is achieved through an attachment to mundane, earthly joys. In the first season, Crowley is saved from hellfire by his love for his car and his human-like imagination, while Aziraphale survives because of his eccentric, earthly devotion to collecting rare books.
Conclusion: Fanfiction or Harsh Reality
A true thematic continuation of both authors' visions would look radically different. It would find Aziraphale and Crowley left alone in a quiet bookshop for eternity, weaving their magical memories and shared love for humanity together to rewrite every lost book back into a brand-new universe. If that choice ultimately stripped them of their divinity and left them mortal, it would be a logical, bittersweet happily-ever-after within the sanctuary of a beautiful, earthly garden.
Instead, Gaiman has opted for character regression and profound emotional devastation. To pretend that Aziraphale's betrayal of Crowley and their martyrdom makes narrative sense within the established logic of Season 1 is an exercise in denial. Audiences are left with a stark choice: either view everything past the first season as high-budget, angst-driven fanfiction, or accept a harsher reality. The original, humanistic spirit of Good Omens died with Terry Pratchett, leaving behind a cold universe engineered for heartbreak.
This is a brilliant summary of all the issues I have with Neil Gaiman‘s good omens universe. I mourn the loss of the world and the love we could’ve had with Terry Pratchett. Rest in peace, Terry. We will always love and need you ❤️
Well, this is meant to be Terry's ending? Seriously? Where is the hope, the optimism, the kindness, the humour that shines through all his work?
Spoiler GO3
I don't know, this has neither the look nor the feel of his stories anymore. To destroy really everthing in the end, the whole universe, every main and every single side character?
I get it, that Crowley and Aziraphale sacrifice themselfes for the world an humankind is very in character and a great move, but it's altogether very dark.
The short human story at the end is just a meagre consolation for me. Well, at least 'human AU' is canon now...
I'm quite depressed, I needed a funny and happy story very badly at the moment, now I have a reason more to cry over, yay.
Perhaps I will come to terms with this ending after some time. But somehow this doesn't sit right. This is much more NG than Terry, and that irks me even more. I always wondered if this promised ending he always postulated to be Terry's legacy was really that or more a PR stunt to make money from the story. Well, judge for yourselfes, but I think I've got my answer.
I guess you will find me on ao3 for the foreseeable future, please don't let us down, wonderful fic writers, we need you more than ever now! 😢❤️
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klikandtuna (she/her) is a widely known AO3 author and illustrator, who has quickly produced fanfics of many varieties since the airing of GO S2. Keep reading to learn more about all these works, as well as the story behind her unique online handle (which she now answers to as readily as her own given name😆)
Here's some background into klikandtuna's world when she’s not thinking about Good Omens (though GO has a very special place in her life):
“Hi, I’m Steph and I live in Oregon (USA) with my husband, three kids, and two cats. Writing and illustrating GO fanfic is my favorite hobby, but I also cross-stitch (including designing custom pieces for myself and others) and play an occasional DnD campaign, and if I have any time left over I’m reading weird fantasy novels.”
klikandtuna’s journey into writing started at an early age - and the rest (as they say) is history:
“When I was in the fourth grade, we had just moved from Wisconsin to North Carolina and no one really liked me (to be fair, I was and remain an acutely introverted weirdo), but one day the class held a creative-writing contest where we all took the same prompt and wrote a little story with it. My story won. And that’s my origin tale: I’d found something I both really enjoyed and was good at, and writing has been part of my life ever since. My ninth-grade English teacher once held up an essay I’d written and swore he’d see my name on the spine of a novel someday. Writing is what I’ve wanted to Do — a Writer is what I’ve wanted to be — for most of my life.”
Good Omens was not unfamiliar to klikandtuna before her discovery of the series. But the series (and two magical actors) took her love of the story to the next level:
“I read the book once ages ago, but didn’t remember much of it by the time the series rolled around. But the trailer was intriguing and I vaguely remembered liking the book, so I gave it a shot. Loved it. Love love love loved it — especially, obviously, our two leads. There’s something so healing about Good Omens, in regards to my religious trauma. I’ve since reread the book, of course, and Season 1 truly is a masterclass in book-to-screen adaptation: it drops what isn’t necessary and preserves everything that makes the story magical, while building upon the existing lore in believable and delightful ways.”
klikandtuna’s inspiration to write stories about Good Omens is probably the same for many writers in the fandom (hint: it might have had something to do with that “moment” we all obsess with over and over and over again😭):
“Season two broke my damn brain, that’s what happened. Season one was LOVELY, I adored the expanding of Crowley and Aziraphale’s roles and characterizations, and for whatever reason I was content with it. But that second season…that final fifteen… I watched it alone. ALL ALONE, Y’ALL, I didn’t even know anyone else who was into the show! I went to my online friend group like “has anyone maybe heard of this…?” and thank Bentley two of them pounced, and we were able to weep together. It was really that sense of community that sparked the obsession, I think.
It was those same two friends who read my first tiny tentative drabbles — classics like “The Broom Cupboard” and “Unforgettable” which will never be made public, and yes I’m only saying this to tease and tantalize — and they were so delighted and encouraging that it made me want to do more. I had never written fanfiction before and at first it felt odd to play with someone else’s characters, but I was having such fun and my friends enjoyed it so much that I just kept going.
Everything on my AO3 page before “In Vino Veritas” was written entirely in a vacuum — before I had any contact whatsoever with the fandom, when no one but those same two friends read my work. I hadn’t read anyone else’s work (I still don’t, or almost none), had never heard of human AUs until my friend introduced the concept and suggested I give it a try (the result was “Every Damn Day”), and was so self-conscious about it all that it took my friends six months to convince me to post my existing stories on AO3. With some trepidation, I did…and the reception has been so overwhelmingly positive that I’m full-on hooked 😄 I’ve since acquired a fabulous beta-reader by sheer luck, and I wouldn’t trade her for anything!”
Out of all her wonderful written works, is klikandtuna willing to tell us which one is her favorite? (we’ll do the apology dance for asking🥲)
“This is so mean. What a mean question. 🤣 Choose a favorite piece of my soul?? I could NEVER.
But I will give special shoutouts to a) “Naked and Afraid: Jingle Hell” (human AU, rated T, 24k complete) because the stupidest idea and a format I’d never attempted turned into something absolutely glorious (and it’s getting its own podfic, with me voicing the narrator!), and b) “When You Go” (rated E, 102k) a Reverse Omens fic that I feel I absolutely nailed the characterizations in, but is also very angsty and ends (temporarily!!!) on one heck of a cliffhanger so is largely overlooked. I could talk about WYG for hours but never get the chance!”
And does she have any interest in OTHER fandoms besides Good Omens??
“Nnnnnnope 😄 I used to be in a LiveJournal community centered on the “A Song of Ice and Fire” book series, but that’s it. I tend to enjoy things privately and not interact with the larger fandom; GO is the only exception, and therefore is receiving all of my creative energy.”
Speaking of klikandtuna’s “creative energy” - let’s dive into some of the questions submitted by our wonderful readers and followers:
✨Where does your creative energy, talents and inspiration come from? “I don’t think this has an easy answer. My creative ENERGY has yet to reach its limit; I write voraciously and there are never enough free hours in the day for it. Talent is what a person is born with, and I guess I got some of that; skill is how that person works to develop their natural talent, and no matter what level they start with they can always increase their skill. But inspiration?
Stephen King once wrote of “the pool where we all go down to drink, to swim, to catch a little fish from the edge of the shore; it's also the pool where some hardy souls go out in their flimsy wooden boats after the big ones” (this was in “Lisey’s Story”). In “Find the Light” I described it as silver threads in the dark aether — a glitter catches my eye, I pluck the thread and start to follow its path, and weave it into something that feels true. Sometimes a friend (usually my wonderful beta-reader) tosses an idea at me and I just can’t resist; sometimes I start with a topic I’m personally passionate about, like marching band. However I begin, I wait for that glitter and follow where it leads. Discovering a story like that is one of my favorite feelings in life 💛”
✨What was the inspiration behind the thematic of the pondwater in "Find the Light"? Is there a story behind that motif? (P.S: I loved every second of that motif, it is so beautiful. And the fanfic itself too, enjoyed it a lot): “I started writing “Find the Light” with no idea where I’d end up; I simply stood with Fell in his office and let things begin to unfold. When Fell turned his face to the sun and dipped briefly into memory…I saw the pond scene from his past, in its entirety. And when I wanted to write a song that was AJ’s ode to his lost love, I just…started typing. It took me maybe fifteen minutes to write the entire song. It was just THERE.
‘Pondwater’ is AJ’s own memory of those painful moments at the pond: beauty and grief and regret and passion rolled into one. I love it too, and I’m thrilled to announce that a ‘canon’ version of the song, as something you’ll actually be able to listen to and sing along with, is currently in the works!
(PS. If you love FTL but haven’t yet earned the right to read my AU crossover fic “Find Every Sky” (rated T, 48k complete), you might want to do so. AJ talks about his school-days friendship with Fell in a way that’s never fully explored in FTL!)”
✨You've written so many human AUs, so what got you into writing those in the first place? And, have you ever considered writing one where the one is human and the other isn't? “Back when I was writing in a vacuum, one of the two friends who read my work said “hey sometimes people write them as regular humans. Maybe you could give that a try?” And my little brain exploded. “Every Damn Day” is a completely pure work in that not only had I never read another human AU when I wrote it, I wasn’t even aware of the concept of human AUs until that moment. And I love my Avery and Anthony with every last bit of my heart.
When I became aware of the existence of other human AUs, it still didn’t occur to me that I could just…write another. Not until Suzy — an acquaintance of pure happenstance who had convinced me to join Tumblr and later became the best beta-reader in the business — sent me a Tumblr post that had a set of gifs and a vague prompt, and she said, “You could write this.” I laughed at first. I could NEVER write another human AU, I had already done my allotment. …Right? 🤣🤣 Thankfully I overcame that weirdness, and “Find the Light” was born, and I was off to the races.
The idea of one of them being human and the other supernatural doesn’t really sit right with me. So, no thank you ☺️”
✨A number of your stories create a more in-depth characterization for your lead pairs than the typical fan fic. Do you see yourself moving onto writing original characters? You're getting close already. “If you’re following along with my current WIP “In His Hand a Burning Coal” (human AU, rated E, updates weekly and will wrap in October), you’ll know that I can and do write OCs! The ONLY canon characters in that one are the lead pair themselves and God; the rest of the fic is populated entirely with original characters, and I adore them.
If you mean completely original fiction, well — that’s the dream! But I’m having too much fun with fanfics at the moment ☺️”
✨I absolutely love your reinterpretation of Romeo and Juliet. Is there any other media you would consider reinterpreting through a Good Omens Lens? “To be fair, I’m really not trying to reimagine the play itself with “In His Hand a Burning Coal”; I take the basic concept of lovers belonging to rival tribes and apply it to college marching band, annnnnd that’s about it. Any other parallels between the two are delightful to theorize, but not intentional on my part. I’m just writing a story 😄
But I LOVE the idea of reimagining an existing story through the lens of Good Omens and would absolutely be interested in doing so in the future. Open to suggestions!”
✨What is something one of your characters has said or done that surprised you as you were writing it? “Oh lord, they do this ALL the time! This is why I never try to fully plot out my stories in advance; it feels too restrictive, and I’d rather give my characters room to tell me their own story organically. I only write in order, never skipping ahead, and my characters surprise me often.
One instance that immediately comes to mind is the infamous Crystal Ceremony in “Sky Clear Blue” (human AU, rated E, 289k complete). Azekiel said he had a plan, annnnd I had no idea what the plan would be until I was in the middle of writing the scene. It just unfolded around me, and ended up being one of the most powerful scenes in the fic!”
✨Any news on the book printing of your absolutely fabulous epic fics FTL and SCB? “Thanks to the unending generosity and diligence of SparklyShinyMagpie, who has done all of the pretty social-media coding you’ll see in my fics, the print books are inching closer to becoming a reality! The current holdup…is me 😆 So poke me now and then to make sure I’m holding up my end of things. At the moment we’re working on “Find the Light”; SCB will take a little longer.
The books will (eventually) be sold at cost, with no profit to me.”
✨You always put in your author’s notes and the tags that you won’t spoil the end of your stories. Would you ever consider NOT giving Aziraphale and Crowley a happy ending? ““Happy” is such an UNuseful word here. Is the ending SUITABLE? Does it make sense in the context of the story and the character arcs? Does it seem inevitable in retrospect? —These are the important questions, and the things that matter more to me (as both a reader and a writer) than whether the ending falls under the WILDLY subjective definition of “happy.”
That being said…I think that Crowley and Aziraphale, no matter what reality we find them in, OUGHT to have an ending in which they’re together and at peace. Heartbreak and tragedy have their place, but these two dopes are simply meant to be and nothing else feels right.
But “#Author REFUSES to spoil the ending in the tags” is my favorite tag and isn’t going away anytime soon 😁”
These two ABSOLUTELY deserve the happiest of endings!! And klikandtuna’s last answer OBVIOUSLY answers our next question - who is your favorite GO pairing to write about?
“I mean, is anyone’s FAVORITE pairing in this fandom anything other than our Ineffables? 😄 They’re the core of everything that’s brought us all together. I’ve featured or alluded to other relationships in my stories — Gabe/Beez, Uriel/Sandalphon, Maggie/Nina, Muriel/OC demon — but Crowley and Aziraphale are why we’re all here, and they’ve touched my heart and my creativity in a way that really no other fictional pairing I’ve ever encountered can compare to. 💛”
Any writing themes that you prefer for the Ineffable Duo?
“Redemption for all (potential/offered, even if not fulfilled). The transformative power of love. How belief can shape reality. Time is a pond. Aziraphale hates puns and Crowley hates autocorrect. At Least One Of Them Is A Virtuoso Musician. Sleepovers usually sneak in somewhere. This Love Is Destiny. Etc 😁”
klikandtuna has THREE works in progress right now - here’s a preview (and also your sign to subscribe so you don’t miss a thing!!):
““In His Hand a Burning Coal” (rated E, 28/43, 311k) — this massive beast of a human AU features Ant and Azlan, college students at an American university, who are in marching band together. Humor! Drama! Pining! Daring heists! Tons of fun OCs, including an aggressively hateable antagonist! 1-2 illustrations per chapter! Basically my personal love letter to band, delivered via a beautiful story of destiny and perseverance.
“Because We Can!” (not posted yet, will be rated T or possssibly M) — a campy human AU about time cops, equal parts drama and humor. This one has been shunted to the back burner until my FTH fic is complete, but I’ve written five chapters and really love it.
“What I Never Said” (human AU, not posted yet, will be rated M) — my winning bidder in the Fandom Trumps Hate auction presented me with a MASSIVE CHALLENGE that has required extensive research, but the result is going to be beautiful. Stay tuned.”
Okay - it’s time to end all the suspense. WE NEED TO KNOW THE STORY BEHIND THE HANDLE!!! (And for the record, klikandtuna sort of begged for this question in her intro 😁🤣):
“Hoist with my own petard. I brought up how stupid the handle is, so now I’ve gotta tell the stupid story 😆 SO. In 2018 I finally wanted to join Twitter, but every handle I could think of was taken, so I had to reach back into the vault of Dumb Family Legends to find something…
June 2005. On a five-day fishing trip on a remote Canadian lake with my dad and brothers. On the final day, in preparation for leaving, we disposed of most of our leftover food.
Well, the float plane that was supposed to pick us up was late. Like, REALLY late. The window of time during which it could pick us up and make it back to civilization before dark was rapidly narrowing, and the four of us suddenly had to face the possibility of spending an extra night at this tiny cabin in the middle of nowhere with no food except the two items that couldn’t be thrown away or burned: one 8-ounce can of Starkist tuna, and one can of Klik, which is kind of a Canadian Spam and which we’d only purchased because we thought the name was funny.
The float plane DID come, thankfully, but we kept that can of Klik in the pantry for like ten years until Mom threw it away because she didn’t fully appreciate the sentimental value of it. I always keep a couple cans of Klik on my own shelves now, though, just for good luck.
“Klikandtuna,” typed 2018 Steph into the field to create a Twitter handle, just for a giggle…and lo and behold, it went through. So then I just had to live with it. Annnnd since it’s always available on any new social media platform and it’s nice to have just one handle across the board, I’ve stuck with it. Annnnd now it’s basically my name. This is my life now. I am two canned meats. Told you it was stupid.
(Sorry I don’t clicker-train cats, that would’ve been rad)”
And this wonderfully unique name is how you will always be able to find her online:
“Tumblr, BlueSky, and Instagram are where you can see my art; I’m also on Discord, and even have my own little server for “In His Hand a Burning Coal.” No matter where, I’m always klikandtuna 💛”
klikandtuna shares more with the fandom than just her beautiful artworks and fabulous tales:
“I’ve designed and completed a GO cross-stitch that I’m proud of (and which David Tennant has signed! one day I’ll complete the set, I hope), and I’ve made a set of custom “Little People” GO figures. Most of my creative energy these days goes into the fics and illustrations!”
Here are some truthful and beautiful words of encouragement from klikandtuna for others who love writing or are considering dipping into the writing pool:
“Writing is scary.
Fan art is great because even a very rough sketch can carry at least the approximation of ideas and forms and intent, and your audience can take it in at a glance and offer kind words. But with writing you have to be at least kind of objectively good at it to properly pull off the telepathy of transmitting the intent in your own head into the heads of other people. Writing can’t be taken in at a glance — you have to be good enough for readers to stick around, focus, pay attention, dedicate their time. You have to EARN it. And that’s scary because it might not work.
AO3 is such a fun platform because it encourages reader interaction in a way that traditional publishing cannot. But the kudos and comments, and even the genuine friends I’ve made via these channels, are not the reason I write. And anyone for whom that IS the primary goal might end up having a bad time.
Do you fall through the page when you’re writing, losing track of the minutes? Do you make yourself laugh? Does your heart beat faster when you find that perfect phrasing? Do your fingers itch when it’s been too long since you got to sit down and get to it? Do you stage potential scenarios for your characters while folding laundry and scribble notes to yourself before you forget? Does your heart flood with genuine affection when you think of the people you’ve created, who feel more real to you than a lot of actual people you know?
Write because you love it. Because it’s fulfilling a huge and wonderful need in your soul. Let go of the end result and embrace the joy of the process — of working at it, of TRYING, of wrestling with words and ideas until it feels just right. The only real point of creating art of any kind is the feeling it inspires in the artist themself. Write for YOU. Make yourself your own target audience. That’s the best advice I’ve got.”
Final thoughts?
“I’m deeply grateful to everyone reading this. For not letting this fandom die, for continuing to find beauty and hope here…both in this story that means so much to us all, and in the community we’ve found with each other.”
klikandtuna - we are so very grateful for YOU and all the fantastic gifts you give to this fandom. Thank you so much for sharing your story with us!!! 💝
Here's some links where you can continue to follow klikandtuna:
Ok I'm gonna go to bed soon but first I have something to get off my chest:
Am I the only one who absolutely hates the idea of the Apology Dance?
Yes I know it's silly. I know it's not serious in a comedy show. It's a shorthand moment of levity to have A&C reconcile emotionally (in their signature not-really-talking-about-their-feelings way) before they start working together again and move the plot forward.
But the way Aziraphale gets so upset recounting all the times he's performed the dance in the past. The way Crowley is so defensive about being 'made' to perform it. How he glares at Aziraphale the whole time he does it, then spits out the little "'Kay?" at the end, like Okay? Did I demean myself enough to satisfy you, the way you've demeaned yourself (at least) three times in the past to satisfy me?
It feels way more mean-spirited.
Their bickering in S1 didn't feel like that. Their bickering in S2 feels more like that at times, but there's plenty of times in S2 where their reasons for arguing or disagreeing or poking fun are entirely justified from their different perspectives. This just feels so out of left field for me.
Their S1 relationship was all about two beings who are supposed to be enemies, but secretly find common ground and are suffocating under the weight of hiding their deep love for each other. Yes there's friction, because they're two very different beings in personality and coping styles, but they find the ways they fit together, and good-naturedly rib at the rest.
I cannot see S1 Crowley from the flashbacks of S1e3, coming up with an 'apology dance' for Aziraphale to perform like a dancing monkey for his amusement. Nor can I see S1 Aziraphale secretly wanting Crowley to perform the same, and nursing a long-held resentment about it.
And the song that goes along with the dance? "You were right" repeated 3x, with an "I was wrong" thrown in there too? That is not an apology. It's debasing oneself and invalidating one's point of view. Arguments don't get solved (in a healthy way) with one party throwing themselves at the other's feet begging for pardon after what must've been 100% their fault. That's a gaslighting abuser's tactic of control, not a meaningful apology.
(One could argue that A&C's relationship isn't healthy because they weren't given the breathing space for 6000 years to figure out how to be healthy; I counterargue that they gave each other whatever secret kindnesses they could get away with during that time, and—most importantly—they quickly decided not to take personally the shit Heaven/Hell had the other one do. They both figured out fast it was just a job, that they were under the same pressures from their own Sides, and their own Sides had them do terrible things themselves. If they can keep that mostly-healthy friendship going for 6000 years having learned that vital lesson about relationships...why would Crowley suddenly turn around in 1650 and go 'yknow what, time to make my only friend degrade himself so I can win an argument'????)
The apology dance is silly, yes. But it's always felt off to me, and I've never been 100% comfortable with it ever since I first saw it. It feels more like what 1992script!Crowley would have Aziraphale do. It doesn't feel like what show!A&C would do to each other, esp following their S1 show relationship. It feels mean-spirited, out of character for the angel and demon, and tonally out of place for the show as a whole.
That's a very good point, I totally agree, especially given the point where this dance comes from. I really hope we will see more of season one's dynamic (which in more Sir Terry's?) in part 3
How very depressing that Neil Gaiman had trended not even a tiny bit for demonstrating what a fucking horrific person he is.
As a reminder, he's suing Caroline Wallner, one of his accusers, for breaking her NDA. Not for libel. He's saying she shouldn't have told anyone about it, not that she lied.
The author says Wallner broke her NDA by sharing her story with the media, including with New York Magazine.
He doesn't need the money. He's risking the Streisand effect. He is punishing Caroline, he's trying to intimidate other victims who have signed NDAs to scare them into continued silence.
He is no friend to women, to the LGBTQIA+ community, to anyone quite frankly unless he thinks they are of value to him.
Share the story. Put it on Facebook and bluesky and whatever else you're on. Make it clear what a horrifying person he is. Tell your friends. He's paying Edendale a fortune to try and cover this up. Make this hard for him. Make it cost him money.
NG (fuck NG) thought of a book plot where a demon finds himself in The Omen movie. But he screws up the baby switch. And the Antichrist grew up as a character in a Richmal Crompton novel.
He didn't know what to do with it next.
TP offered to buy the story. He changed the demon into a demon and an angel defying their bosses on the earth they both loved. He added his smart whimsy and gave the story a moral core far beyond a silly spoof.
When the story was written, queer kids saw themselves in the angel and demon based on the subtext. Because they lived in subtext.
Gender fluid and trans readers created stories about an angel and demon for whom gender was a choice depending on how or whether they decided to make an effort.
The strangeness of fitting into a planet dominated by beings the angel and demon differed from spoke to neurodivergent readers.
Religious readers found healing after years of struggling to make sense of doctrine divorced from morality.
Ace and aro readers saw the deep and meaningful relationship different from romance between a pair together over 6000 years.
And tons of horny people from all walks of life poured their hearts into smut that made the most of beings whose bodies allowed for a range of sexual practice that would never be realistic for humans.
People who felt rejected or unloved because they were "too much" or "too little", took solace from an angel who didn't mind the gruffness of the demon who couldn't bear to be cruel. And the demon who liked the angel being a little bit of a bastard. If an angel and demon could care for and accept each other for themselves, perhaps it could happen for them too?
This is why the Good Omens fandom is so special. Transformation has been baked into his story from the very beginning.
Biblical fan fiction, a collaborative story by two authors, a tv show/movie brought to life by a team of actors, designers, writers...
And now also entire worlds of fan fiction and art. Good Omens continues to transform itself and the people who love it. And it will always be ours as we continue to transform it for generations to come.
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This is random but I remembered your posts regarding The Situation with NG’s involvement in Good Omens when one of my followers on Twitter tweeted a screen cap of an old conversation on bluesky where Neil sorta confirms Amazon had pulled back his influence on production from S1 so there’s a lot of truth in what you said
Hope you’re doing great! ❤️❤️❤️❤️
Hi there! 💕 Hope you're doing great yourself. I usually offer snacks but this is a large sherry or Talisker topic so *gets the glasses*...
That's interesting info-- thank you for sharing it. Like I was saying in that original post, I don't know any of that for sure but that was definitely the impression I was getting. One of the several reasons I was getting that impression was due to other, equally unprofessional posts like the one you're talking about here that speak to already-existing conflict with Amazon long before this particular Situation became publicly known.
I'm not sure why he'd be trying to fight the studio publicly like that if there's not something happening behind the scenes. It's just unprofessional. I was shocked when I saw posts like that because it's not like he was being a whistleblower to egregious behavior or something-- he was bitching about his boss and the budgets to fans on Tumblr. It feels like he was trying to use the fanbase as a shield to keep himself from being fired, as a way of saying "you can't get rid of me-- I will tell my fans you are the issue and they will believe me and not you and I have a million of them-- just look at my little Tumblr thing. You'll lose money if you don't back me."
You know what kind of guy does shit like that? The same kind that tells young women that no one is going to believe them because he's a famous, award-winning writer and they're nobody.
If you don't mind, I'm going to use your ask here for a moment to add a bit to what I was saying about Good Omens being a through-and-through Pratchett novel because I think it's important to remember that this story has another author here. I've had some people ask me to expound on that a bit. So, for anyone interested, this is what I mean when I say that Good Omens is a Pratchett novel:
As most of you probably know, most of the posts I write about Good Omens have to do with the use of language in the story. The diction in Good Omens is extremely specific. Its quirky word choice, its "gayer than a monkey on nitrous oxide"- type of wordplay? It's funny on the surface level and it's a whole other level of funny when you dig a bit deeper. The cleverness there is familiar to Pratchett readers, as it's part of the distinctive style of his other novels. As a writer who is a bit obsessed with etymology myself, I spotted his love for it right away in his writing. It's in every. single. one. of his books that I have read and I have read quite a few.
The exact same thing is in Good Omens. It's a really specific way of writing where word-related jokes are the vehicle for the humor and etymology-based diction choices are chosen with great precision and inform the piece on every level. Pratchett's signature style of writing came from the fact that he used etymology as a tool to help him convey the messages in his writing. The thematic connections he was making were supported by the complex histories of the key words around which he was forming his stories.
For example, there's a meta one of you asked me to write about the halo in S2 and, when you look at the etymology of the word, as we're going to do in that meta, you'll see that halo comes from discus and discus is the root of discussion, the root of the word desk, and the ancient sport that is like ring toss. It was also the name of a threshing floor for oxen, which ties both to dancing and to the threshold of a door, like the bookshop entry. By the time we get through looking at this one, key word of halo, we're going to have taken this whole trip-- through other discs-- the magic ring trick, record albums, Velvet Underground cds, etc., through what it means to dance to the ox ribs to what it means to have (or not have) a desk to what it means to talk through your frozen peas to what's up with the invitations into the bookshop. Good Omens is not random. Everything is very specifically chosen to work together to serve an overall story that is structured around using the etymology of words to underpin its meaning.
This is just one example and it's the same thing in the novel and S1. Much of the S2 stuff connects back to S1 & the novel. It's a story that loves words and it's a story that is threaded together, thematically, through being told by using very specific words and their histories. Good Omens is written like a Pratchett novel and feels like a Pratchett novel because it centers word history in exactly the same way as Pratchett does in his other novels.
You know where that halo thru-line that connects everything came from?
Discworld. It comes from Terry Pratchett's Discworld.
The same, core themes in his books are being explored, just in a slightly different way, in Good Omens and, often, using the same words in the exploration.
Because that's the thing-- all of these posts I'm writing about wordplay in Good Omens? I could, if I wanted to, also be writing them about any one of Pratchett's other novels, and a lot-- and I mean a lot-- of the specific words being used in a big way in Good Omens actually overlap with Pratchett's other books.
One of you has been waiting patiently for me to write about Mrs. Sandwich and the seamstress-themed language happening in the show and, to do that? We're going to not only talk about her and what she stands for in Good Omens but we're going to talk about the etymology jokes Pratchett was making with The Seamstress Guild in Discworld. Mrs. Sandwich might have been new in S2 but seamstress language is not-- it's baked into Crowley & Aziraphale's speak back in the novel and, as you'll see, there are instances of it in S1 and the novel that only become more apparent once you know to look for them after S2.
When NG said that, back in the day, he and Pratchett decided that Aziraphale should have a halo that was like a ring toss-- no.
Pratchett decided that.
The idea comes from the wordplay that is literally *in the title* of his own book series. Aziraphale's halo is related to why Pratchett's series is the Discworld. It's the same ideas. NG has fuck all to do with it.
Think about how I was just saying that all this love of etymology that is in Good Omens is also throughout Pratchett's books and is the driver of his word choice in all of them.
Now? Ask yourself who came up with Crowley and Aziraphale's secret language. Whose idea was it that it be so punny and etymology-based?
Probably the guy who wrote all of those etymology-based, other books.
Who invented the rules for that language?
Probably the guy who wrote all of those etymology-based other books.
If Pratchett wrote basically nothing but intentionally, lovingly, word-nerdy books... and if Good Omens is, soup-to-nuts, a love letter to etymology to a point that its main characters have a secret language built around it, then Terry Pratchett is who really wrote Good Omens. He's the true author of the book.
There are even interviews that show they had much different takes on how the process for the book happened. Pratchett, in one of the ones I read, said he wrote more than 2/3rds of the books straight up on his own and that he'd have phone calls with NG before NG wrote his bits of it and something politely vague to the effective of 'editing over' when writing the next chapter. In the same paragraph where he said he wrote more than 2/3rds of the book, he also said with all that discussion happening "who can say" who really wrote what-- yeah, exactly. It sounded a bit like NG needed the phone call to be told what to write on his end and then Pratchett edited it/rewrote bits of it before he wrote the next bit.
It comes off sounding like this book was like a partnered school project where Pratchett was the diligent one who did all the work himself so it would get done and be actually good and then assigned a bit of it to NG to do that he then had to go and fix so they'd get a decent grade. I wasn't there so I don't know but that's a bit like what the Pratchett interviews about it sound like to me and I'm much more inclined to believe Pratchett's view on their process than I am NG's take.
All I know is that Good Omens was successful when it was first published and any even moderately successful book makes publishing houses jump up and say "MORE NOW" and if you were those publishing houses? And you had a popular project with two writers? And one of the writers became tragically ill? You know what you'd do?
You'd eventually ask the other writer to finish the series.
It is known that a trilogy was planned from the start, which makes sense because most books are planned that way. You actually have to rough outline the entire story arc and then divide it amongst the books first. The story already existed in full when Pratchett began to get sick. Never-- in over two decades-- did anyone ever go to NG and ask him to both honor Pratchett and make them some cash by writing the rest of the trilogy?
Not even with how popular this book is?
That seems pretty suspicious to me.
Like a 'they know NG didn't really write it' kind of suspicious.
When both the publishing houses and the tv studios seem to be doing handstands to minimize his involvement with it, I'm thinking it's not too wild to infer there that it's because he never really wrote much, if any of it, in the first place.
More to the point? They know he's incapable of emulating it.
As an old Pratchett fan who has read all discworld novels I totally agree with you, the book is very much Terry's style. But I haven't actually read some of Neil's books to compare ;-)
I remember one of Terry's readings I attended in the late 90s (yeah, 'old' fan...) when he spoke about Good Omens and how much fun he and Neil had writing it. Of course he didn't tell who wrote more of it, but he definitely said nothing about a sequel. I think that at that time there where no plans for that, the story of the book is quite round and finished in itself, there is no open end. Perhaps the plans for the sequel where discussed later.
I think it's quite significant that part 2 and 3 of the story are only realized in film, not as book. Whitout Terry's contribution the style would be remarkably different.
