Ive Been On Tumblr A Long Time And I Remember When Everyone Said “oh Don’t Romanticize Mental Illness”

Blind Dog Was Scared To Walk. So Owner Made This For Him 

(via)

Awhile ago @ouidamforeman made this post:

This shot through my brain like a chain of firecrackers, so, without derailing the original post, I have some THOUGHTS to add about why this concept is not only hilarious (because it is), but also...

It. It kind of fucks. Severely.

And in a delightfully Pratchett-y way, I'd dare to suggest.

I'll explain:

As inferred above, both Crowley AND Aziraphale have canonical Biblical counterparts. Not by name, no, but by function.

Crowley, of course, is the serpent of Eden.

(note on the serpent of Eden: In Genesis 3:1-15, at least, the serpent is not identified as anything other than a serpent, albeit one that can talk. Later, it will be variously interpreted as a traitorous agent of Hell, as a demon, as a guise of Satan himself, etc. In Good Omens --as a slinky ginger who walks funny)

Lesser known, at least so far as I can tell, is the flaming sword. It, too, appears in Genesis 3, in the very last line:

"So he drove out the man; and placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life." --Genesis 3:24, KJV

Thanks to translation ambiguity, there is some debate concerning the nature of the flaming sword --is it a divine weapon given unto one of the Cherubim (if so, why only one)? Or is it an independent entity, which takes the form of a sword (as other angelic beings take the form of wheels and such)? For our purposes, I don't think the distinction matters. The guard at the gate of Eden, whether an angel wielding the sword or an angel who IS the sword, is Aziraphale.

(note on the flaming sword: in some traditions --Eastern Orthodox, for example-- it is held that upon Christ's death and resurrection, the flaming sword gave up it's post and vanished from Eden for good. By these sensibilities, the removal of the sword signifies the redemption and salvation of man.

...Put a pin in that. We're coming back to it.)

So, we have our pair. The Serpent and the Sword, introduced at the beginning and the end (ha) of the very same chapter of Genesis.

But here's the important bit, the bit that's not immediately obvious, the bit that nonetheless encapsulates one of the central themes, if not THE central theme, of Good Omens:

The Sword was never intended to guard Eden while Adam and Eve were still in it.

Do you understand?

The Sword's function was never to protect them. It doesn't even appear until after they've already fallen. No... it was to usher Adam and Eve from the garden, and then keep them out. It was a threat. It was a punishment.

The flaming sword was given to be used against them.

So. Again. We have our pair. The Serpent and the Sword: the inception and the consequence of original sin, personified. They are the one-two punch that launches mankind from paradise, after Hell lures it to destruction and Heaven condemns it for being destroyed. Which is to say that despite being, supposedly, hereditary enemies on two different sides of a celestial cold war, they are actually unified by one purpose, one pivotal role to play in the Divine Plan: completely fucking humanity over.

That's how it's supposed to go. It is written.

...But, in Good Omens, they're not just the Serpent and the Sword.

They're Crowley and Aziraphale.

(author begins to go insane from emotion under the cut)

In Good Omens, humanity is handed it's salvation (pin!) scarcely half an hour after losing it. Instead of looming over God's empty garden, the sword protects a very sad, very scared and very pregnant girl. And no, not because a blameless martyr suffered and died for the privilege, either.

It was just that she'd had such a bad day. And there were vicious animals out there. And Aziraphale worried she would be cold.

...I need to impress upon you how much this is NOT just a matter of being careless with company property. With this one act of kindness, Aziraphale is undermining the whole entire POINT of the expulsion from Eden. God Herself confronts him about it, and he lies. To God.

And the Serpent--

(Crowley, that is, who wonders what's so bad about knowing the difference between good and evil anyway; who thinks that maybe he did a GOOD thing when he tempted Eve with the apple; who objects that God is over-reacting to a first offense; who knows what it is to fall but not what it is to be comforted after the fact...)

--just goes ahead and falls in love with him about it.

As for Crowley --I barely need to explain him, right? People have been making the 'didn't the serpent actually do us a solid?' argument for centuries. But if I'm going to quote one of them, it may as well be the one Neil Gaiman wrote ficlet about:

"If the account given in Genesis is really true, ought we not, after all, to thank this serpent? He was the first schoolmaster, the first advocate of learning, the first enemy of ignorance, the first to whisper in human ears the sacred word liberty, the creator of ambition, the author of modesty, of inquiry, of doubt, of investigation, of progress and of civilization." --Robert G. Ingersoll

The first to ask questions.

Even beyond flattering literary interpretation, we know that Crowley is, so often, discreetly running damage control on the machinations of Heaven and Hell. When he can get away with it. Occasionally, when he can't (1827).

And Aziraphale loves him for it, too. Loves him back.

And so this romance plays out over millennia, where they fall in love with each other but also the world, because of each other and because of the world. But it begins in Eden. Where, instead of acting as the first Earthly example of Divine/Diabolical collusion and callousness--

(other examples --the flood; the bet with Satan; the back channels; the exchange of Holy Water and Hellfire; and on and on...)

--they refuse. Without even necessarily knowing they're doing it, they just refuse. Refuse to trivialize human life, and refuse to hate each other.

To write a story about the Serpent and the Sword falling in love is to write a story about transgression.

Not just in the sense that they are a demon and an angel, and it's ~forbidden. That's part of it, yeah, but the greater part of it is that they are THIS demon and angel, in particular. From The Real Bible's Book of Genesis, in the chapter where man falls.

It's the sort of thing you write and laugh. And then you look at it. And you think. And then you frown, and you sit up a little straighter. And you think.

And then you keep writing.

And what emerges hits you like a goddamn truck.

(...A lot of Pratchett reads that way. I believe Gaiman when he says Pratchett would have been happy with the romance, by the way. I really really do).

It's a story about transgression, about love as transgression. They break the rules by loving each other, by loving creation, and by rejecting the hatred and hypocrisy that would have triangulated them as a unified blow against humanity, before humanity had even really got started. And yeah, hell, it's a queer romance too, just to really drive the point home (oh, that!!! THAT!!!)

...I could spend a long time wildly gesturing at this and never be satisfied. Instead of watching me do that (I'll spare you), please look at this gif:

I love this shot so much.

Look at Eve and Crowley moving, at the same time in the same direction, towards their respective wielders of the flaming sword. Adam reaches out and takes her hand; Aziraphale reaches out and covers him with a wing.

You know what a shot like that establishes? Likeness. Commonality. Kinship.

"Our side" was never just Crowley and Aziraphale. Crowley says as much at the end of season 1 ("--all of us against all of them."). From the beginning, "our side" was Crowley, Aziraphale, and every single human being. Lately that's around 8 billion, but once upon a time it was just two other people. Another couple. The primeval mother and father.

But Adam and Eve die, eventually. Humanity grows without them. It's Crowley and Aziraphale who remain, and who protect it. Who...oversee it's upbringing.

Godfathers. Sort of.

Man I know emulators are technically considered piracy I guess, and I can see why it would be an issue with newer games (not that most emulators are advanced enough for that anyway), but I just… hhhhhh the way the video game industry operates in regards to old games is so fucking stupid. It’s like

Gamers: Hey, I’m really interested in this game you made a long time ago! Can I play it? Game companies: No.  Gamers: But I’ll give you money! Game companies: We no longer manufacture, support, or distribute that game or the console it’s available on. There’s no way for you to buy it. Gamers: Well, what about this slightly-newer-but-still-outdated game that was never released in my region? Can I play that? I’ll give you money. Game companies: No. You’re only allowed to play games from your region. You can’t buy it from us. Gamers: So, you don’t provide any way for me to purchase these games from you, or to play them in any form? Game companies: Correct. We don’t care about these games anymore. They might as well not exist. Some guy on the internet: Hey, I found some old and foreign games that aren’t sold or available to play anywhere, so I fixed them up so everyone can play them now for free! Here you go! :) Game companies: ABSOLUTELY FUCKING NOT. HOW DARE YOU STEAL OUR PROFITS. PLAY THE GAMES LEGALLY OR DIE. Gamers: But you just said there’s no way to play them- Game companies: FUCK YOU

Watching my neighbors across the street having a block party during a literal time of pandemic makes me wonder if several hundred years ago there was another person looking out their window watching their neighbors congregate during the black death like verily forsooth, thou art truly ass-headed knaves.

About the pulse room on Inside

I have the theory that this pulse was a first attempt at controlling gravity that failed horribly creating that deadly pulse.

I say this because the pole machines on the pulse room’s background are similar to the pole machines that are keeping the people and the water on the room that appears later on in the game.

You know what’s some crazy $hit?

This fabulous bitch

She makes a shit ton of poses (like 16,000 or some crazy nonsense).  I used this lovely lady to draw so much as a teen.  Whether it was some nerdy pose for my Mary Sue as fuck OCs

or for full on fight sequences

or for tragic deaths of my OCs in the arms of a totally OOC main protagonist.  

this bitch hooked me up.  

And with the wildest, craziest stuff that you could see in your head but had no way or resources to reasonably draw like

or this

or this

DUDE!  INASNE SHIT!!  So I was using her for a pose reference and decided, you know what, I owe this bitch some cash.  Lemme dole it out for her.  BUT then, I looked and saw she only has 286 fucking patrons!!  This chick gives out free shit and spends countless hours arranging these shoots and setting this stuff up.  

I’ll fork up the cash, SenshiStock.  You’re worth it.  

Check out this amazing woman’s stuff, and get knowledged:  https://www.deviantart.com/senshistock

nothing is more disappointing than getting into a piece of media and finding out its not even gay

me: [listens to a new song]

my brain, upon receiving one single hit of Döpamine™: we shall listen to only this until we have wrung every last neurotransmitter out of it

i just had to draw this because i feel like screaming tbh