vidavalor

Below are the posts that get into the idea of how the Clues all lead towards how S2/S3, minus the Crowley & Aziraphale flashbacks, was literally Aziraphale's worst nightmare-- and why. I will be updating this as I go. Thanks again for all the kind words & I'm glad many of you have been enjoying these posts.

You can read these posts in any order but the first two below provide a general overview of the theory so I'd start there.

Eternal Life on Earth as Zombies? Not Granted General overview of theory. This post is the also the one that also has the detailed look at the final shot of S3, whereas...

The Nightmare of The Rubber Duck World ...this one also outlines the theory but is a bit more detailed as to what the function of the nightmare is in the story.

Sleep A look at how sleep is used in S2 & S3 to convey that it's a dream, as well as a look at Adam's cameo and how that factors into things, and how S1's more limited use of sleep was done to foreshadow the nightmare of S2/S3.

Nina A look at how the character of Nina is a major dream Clue, as Crowley's recognition of Sister Mary in S1 being a plot point then helps to set up how the character of Nina in S2-- whom neither Aziraphale nor Crowley see as looking like Mary-- has a storyline and plot points derived from Aziraphale having met Mary in S1.

The Dreamy Opening of S3 A look at how the opening shots of S3 help to convey that it's a dream. I'll be doing more posts about how other shots throughout S2 & S3 do this but here's one to start with.

Squiffy A look at the use of the word squiffy being put into the end of S3 in the Asa & Anthony world to help show the sense of non-reality.

Open Thine Eyes A look at how Agnes Nutter prophesized this ending.

Sandwich and chips... aka...

...a packet of crisps...

You're very right that you cannot go wrong with the menu at The Pack, Aziraphale. They serve nothing but classic, satisfying comfort food here.

Great White: a type of shark. White Lie: a harmless and, often, even beneficial untruth or deception. Fishy business: suspicious happenings.

Hi there 💕 Thanks for the question. The word decision comes from roots meaning to cut off, the result of which is often bringing something to an end, which, as we know, is what's going on, plot-wise, at that point in Aziraphale's dream. The surface level is obviously not the funny part, as it's about them deciding that their relationship and their lives have reached this end point. The humorous innuendo level that makes them both laugh, though?

That comes from how a bunch of different scenes in Good Omens contain innuendo around Crowley and Aziraphale enjoying edging one another to oblivion. That is to say: enjoying cutting off one another's ability to come to make for a more heightened end when they finally do. This creates Aziraphale's double entendre here, which is what you hear in his tone of voice, too: "we've come to a decision."

They've come to the decision as to what to tell The Concept of God in this part of the dream but the humor is in how, over the course of their millenniums-long love affair, they've also come quite a lot to various decisions. [And the show itself narratively edged the audience with its decision to end with Aziraphale beginning to wake up from the nightmare but cutting off the story just shy of him fully doing so.]

But, then, there's also the sweetness of "I believe"-- what else that means and why Aziraphale said it here and has at other times, too, in reality and in the dream, like here:

"The pits": A place or situation that is terrible and depressing.

Pit: grave; natural or man-made depression in the ground or water. Also: Pit: "the abode of the evil spirits"; Hell.

The Dung Pits; the (Misty's words) "shithole bookshop"; the pit of The Even Further Downstairs; the South Downs Cottage' patio being in a pit below its observation deck... The orchestra pit visible near the end of every S2 opening credits sequence, just before we went over a bridge above it and through the screen...

To be pitted (against): to be placed into a pit and forced to fight. Perhaps over control of a fire pit... a place where people also often burn aspects of their life to start over...

The Angel of The Bottomless Pit mentioned in Revelations but just as relevant is that a bottomless pit is someone who is always hungry-- someone experiencing any form of Famine, whose presence is all over Aziraphale's Nightmare. And, finally, there's...

Pit: hard seed, typically found at the center of fruit. Like the pit that Dagon, with a handwave, made briefly appears in Jesus' beer.

...or Peter Max, for that matter...

This prophecy has always been more than just the amusingly accurate advice to not invest in Betamax, the company that got rapidly overrun by VHS. Like many things in Good Omens, though, it has multiple layers of meaning, and applies in different ways to each round of the story. What could it mean in S3 that we should not buy betamax and what does it have to do with story's ending?

Beta: Second-best, second in a sequence, inferior to alpha (to, in this case, "going to Alpha Centauri."). Max: the greatest. The betamax = the second-rate option; not the thing you really want. *laughs* Not at all relevant to the end of S3 or anything...

Do not buy betamax = Don't believe you have to settle for a second-rate option, and don't believe that second-rate option is even real. Don't sell yourself short, is the warning, but, on a meta-level...? The prophecy here tells us that there will come a betamax in this story and a question of whether or not we should buy it-- as in, whether or not we should believe it.

It seems very evident that Professor Anthony & Asa Fell are a betamax-- a second-rate choice. The ending no one wants to be true because we all want the original Crowley & Aziraphale to go to Alpha Centauri. The story warned us back in the very-key-to-everything 1941, though, not to buy any betamax-- not to believe this ending. But how else might we know that this ending is, indeed, a betamax that we should not believe?

I think that they gave us a Clue in Glozier's mishearing of the prophecy and his question of who is Peter Max?

The word beta here flips to the word Peter, indicating that a betamax is a story that involves some element of the word peter. The word itself reappeared as part of the answer to one of the two, key Clues to everything in S3's Competitive Crossword Solving scene.

The word peter has multiple meanings but the one most relevant here is how the crossword Clue about St. Peter's Basilica also references the idea of "the gates of St. Peter's" aka "The Pearly Gates"-- the entrance after death to the kingdom of Heaven... in a story in which Crowley and Aziraphale supposedly die (the Peter Max part of it) and then are "reborn" as the subpar Asa & Anthony (the Betamax part).

The message seems to me to be: Peter Max = Betamax, and do not buy betamax/Peter Max... do not believe Crowley and Aziraphale are dead. Do not believe the Asa & Anthony ending. It's all about as real as this wise-but-totally-fake Agnes prophecy that Aziraphale made up to fool the Nazis. 😉

...of what will be true... but isn't true yet. Now, there's a thought, very meta Dream!Crowley! That all this non-reality in the story could make some lose track and not find the lady. You say that it's a story that shows us things that will be true but just are not true *yet*... A non-reality that leads to making bits of it happen and making them real. Sounds like you're on board with Aziraphale's Nightmare Theory 😉...

Hi there 💕 Well, my love, thank you for the most niche dream observation to date! *giggles* I agree with you. I think, between the Shax moment you're talking about and Aziraphale eyeing up the fabulous gams of the The Ladies of Camelot in 1941, we can go ahead and note as canon that Aziraphale's a leg non-binary person. After all, his lovely beloved spouse is a legs-for-days flamingo. With snakey hips.

Even setting aside the plaid pattern of Asa's bathrobe (not tartan!... so purposefully, deliciously wrong! lol)... the professor's evening wear is not plain black. It has a red herringbone pattern...

He's not the first to be a character literally wearing a visual pun on red herring, either-- on the phrase meaning a deliberate bit of misdirection/distraction away from the true story. Satan's dark grey herringbone jacket with a pop of red was the same thing.

Ephemera: collected and cherished documents or trinkets of everyday life; often paper items, such as cards, notes, tickets, postcards, newspaper & magazine clippings, stickers, bookmarks, etc..

Ephemeral: from ephemera. Meaning: transitory, short-lived.

Ephemera: originally a medical term, from Medieval Latin ephemera (febris) "(fever)* lasting a day," from fem. of ephemerus, from Greek ephemeros "lasting or living only one day, short-lived." Sense extended 17c. to short-lived insects (Modern Latin ephemera musca) and flowers; general sense of "thing of transitory existence" by 1751. Compare Greek ephemeroi: "creatures of a day."

*Fever dream: another name for a nightmare. One of the books by Derek in the bookshop is Fevered Star, when stars = people in Good Omens and Crowley & Aziraphale made some when they first met. "Asa" also gets the shivers, a by-product of both fever and terror, in the brief moment when Professor Crowley turns into an Evil Eye-casting, talon-fingered goblin of sorts on their way into the ephemera room.

The wordplay show making a whole feature wall of ephemera in the world of Derek's Bookshop is a great Clue to how it's not real. It's emphasizing that it's a transitory part of the story.

A whole wall devoted to a beautiful word related to the everyday with an etymological root meaning of "not lasting more than a day"? That is a fun way to emphasize that all of this horrible world is transitory and will fade the moment that Aziraphale wakes up. Shivers fade and fevers break and nightmares are ephemeral experiences, even if the impact of them can last at least as long as all the other memories you collect.

I long to destroy the blameless children of blameless Job the way I destroyed his blameless goats...

...which is to not have actually destroyed them at all.

Yeah, it is, and it looked nice and all but that it's a side part, though, and with a bit on the side...? 😂 After Aziraphale had parted from Crowley by this part of his nightmare and "Asa" was now kinda-sorta cheating on Crowley with a diluted, pale ale, imitation, Frankenstein'd clone of him?

"I have all I've ever wanted," says the poor, passionless Professor, still pining after 20 years of marriage because he knows his spouse isn't in love with him. He knows Asa loves him but isn't in love with him, and it kills him... and it's killing Asa, too. Together twenty years and Asa can't bring himself to say something in return and we know why-- because that's Aziraphale and he doesn't have all he's ever wanted. All he's ever wanted is to openly be with *his* Crowley...

If you want to laugh, though, just think about how the real Crowley is going to be a gem in the wake of this nightmare, of course, but then also never miss an opportunity to tease Aziraphale about the professor. He just sprinkles him into conversation periodically to drive Aziraphale bonkers lol. Angel, tell me that Other Me had good hair, at least?... Hold on, Other Me drove a *wot*?!... Bet Other Me never made you a seafood risotto like that, baby.