Dark Greetings, Moisture Boy

Eric Chapman: an outsider to the closed-off world of Piffling with a mysterious past. By the end of S4, he freely admits that he was putting up a front and almost no one really understands him. He needs everyone to like him so much all the time and is willing to go to great lengths to maintain this. Sets up a whole wildly successful business centered around avoiding processing any of his negative emotions, and, as pointed out by wormpiratesblog, only romantically pursues women that are completely emotionally unavailable to him despite his obvious connection with Antigone

Howl Pendragon (aka Howell Jenkins): an outsider to the world of Ingary with mysterious origins. Constantly attempting to make himself out to be worse than he is, mostly in the interest of avoiding responsibility. Primary attribute is his ability to slither out of any situation that makes him uncomfortable. Can only do heroic things if he convinces himself that he is not doing them. Has a habit of flirting with pretty much any available woman in his visual range but tends to slither out of any resulting relationships.

Antigone Funn: For many years, focused completely on the family business and basically never left her mortuary. Had a strong relationship with Rudyard and Georgie and basically no one else. Decides in S2 that Rudyard has been domineering the business for years and she should stand up for herself. Spent a lot of time locked into her self-perceptions and the expectations placed on her by others, often leading to insecurity and anxiety around being Perceived despite her desperately wanting this. The shadows protect her. Genuinely a very talented mortician with a dedication to helping ease other’s pain and processing the passing of their loved ones, but few people understand this.

Sophie Hatter: For quite a while, focused completely on the family business and rarely leaves the hat shop where she works. Has strong relationships with her sisters but few outside friends or acquaintances at the beginning of the story. Is convinced by Martha that her stepmother is exploiting her and, once given “permission” to leave by being cursed into a 90-year old woman, immediately does so. Believes strongly in her life being determined by the roles she has been placed into and the seeming natural laws of her fairy-tale world. Constantly suppressing her own desires and aspects of her personality to better fit these and feels most comfortable in disguise for much of the story, leading to her maintaining her own curse. An extremely powerful witch, and almost anyone with any degree of magical ability can see this– except for herself.

Do you see my vision.

In addition, an oft-discussed theme of Howl’s Moving castle is disguise vs. perception. Howl and Sophie both want to project very specific images of themselves, but the other sees right through it. They also mirror each other and thus experience a lot of Self-Perception Through The Other (derogatory [affectionate]). Similar themes also crop up often in Wooden Overcoats, specifically in S4. Antigone has one of her big culminating thematic moments with “In the Buff,” which is really the last episode before the final arc, where Eric is forced to reckon with his past being exposed, and includes him referencing Antigone in the dream sequence as “someone who understands” and, of course, Rudyard as the only person on the island to see him for what he is– “a charade of a sham of a con of a joke of a travesty of a human being” (directly from Eric’s own dialogue in the script btw). There’s less deliberate disguise involved, but the whole point of chaptigone is that he SEES her and is maybe the only character to do so through the whole show!

Another strong element of Howl’s Moving Castle is homes, specifically as they represent characters, and I would argue that one of the main themes of Wooden Overcoats is finding home, specifically in other people. Other people are all there is, after all. They’re not quite so focused on physical buildings, but the entire conflict of the finale is about whether Eric is really willing to make a home on Piffling or not.

As you can see, I feel there’s a lot to work with here.

As for the actual plot of an AU along these lines, I think there’s two major ways we could play this. One is more in-line with the roles of characters in Howl’s Moving Castle, and the other more aligned with those in Wooden Overcoats. In both, Antigone would be placed in Sophie’s role and Eric in Howl’s; Georgie would probably have to pull double duty with aspects of Lettie and Martha’s roles (but don’t worry, she’s great at filling multiple character roles). Also, crucially, and this is the tricky part because this is a big role but we know literally nothing about him, I think Brett has to be Calcifer. And I don’t think we can get the true happily ever after of HMC because ultimately Eric is going to have to learn to let him go. Brett is not going to get to move back into the hearth at the end.

The big divergence lies in where we put Rudyard. The option that’s more in line with HMC is that Zoe Adeyinka takes the role of Ben Sullivan/Wizard Suliman, as someone from Eric’s “world” who has minimal connection to Antigone. She disappears while evaluating whether Piffling could make the transition from village to town (the scale and stakes here are also going to be much lower than HMC lol), Agatha Doyle goes looking for her and also disappears, and Mayor Desmond asks Eric to find them both. I actually don’t know exactly where we would put Rudyard in this version.

In the option that’s more in line with WO, Rudyard and Eric are competing wizards (necromancers, perhaps 👀). Rudyard makes the initial attempt to defeat the Witch of the Waste in a bid to one-up Eric, but accordingly disappears while on the job. Agatha Doyle goes to investigate, disappears, and Eric gets sent after them. For me, there are a few big appeals for this one, including it making the story feel more original, the way it would center Rudyard and Antigone’s sibling relationship/dynamic, and, of course, the inclusion of Rudyard’s mandolin in place of Ben’s guitar. In this version I think we could also have the Witch of the Waste curse her mish-mash cast-off person into a mouse rather than a dog and that can be “Madeleine.” 

In either version, Eric does pretty much the opposite of Howl, putting on a big show of investigating in such a way that it allows him to avoid doing anything substantial while still garnering the adoration of everyone in town. 

For other major roles, I was thinking Lady Templar as the Witch of the Waste, either Marjorie or Jerry as Angorian, Mayor Desmond Desmond as a kind of combination of Mrs. Fairfax and the king (alongside Rev. Wavering, of course), and Agatha Doyle as kinda-sorta Prince Justin (I don’t think she needs to be related to Mayor Desmond or anything, I just think they want their only detective/quasi-law enforcement back). I have no grand plans for any of the other characters. 

You may notice that I have not included anyone as Michael. I was initially turning this over in my head and trying to figure out who could fill that role, but, ultimately, I don’t think anyone can. Michael knows Howl too well! Having anyone in that role for Eric would disrupt the “most popular man on the island doesn’t have a single real friend” aspect of his character. Probably the closest we would get is Jennifer Delacroix as a love interest for Georgie, corresponding with Michael as a love interest for Martha. 

Am I going to write this fic? Probably not! I would want to revisit both HMC and WO before then, and that’s quite the time commitment (moreso WO than HMC tbh). I also have a Silmarillion fic to finish up first and the initial draft of that is shaping up to be well over 100k words lol.