I love Ren presumably using "we" and "us" because he's acting as if both his and Tango's souls are still present as he is possessing Tango, but also like lore-wise. Just considering it in lore is like.
I'm reading this whole thing as Ren taking over Tango when his character didn't really need to have a sub. In Pearl's case during Limited Life, she was taken out because she didn't have enough time to recover from how much Double Life affected her and Cleo just. Idk needed a break from their messy family drama or something. However with Tango and Ren, Ren was acknowledging Tango kore than Lizzie or Gem addressed Pearl and Cleo. Ren even explicitly says that he feels like something inside him (as much as that sounded. Horrible in the moment. Goddammit he can't escape the innuendoes, can he?).
Idk I've just been....thinking about. I'm not the smartest when it comes to this #Lore stuff, and idek if this is coherent but MAN. The idea of Tango vaguely knowing something is up, but not really being able to do anything about it is just.
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I want Fyodor to come back all beaten and broken and crazier than ever. Like he didn't have many normal person morals to begin with but I want him to throw all of that away for his cause. He's scarred and burned and has lost an arm, which he promptly switched for a metal one but he's alive. The decay of the angel doesn't exist anymore and neither do the rats in the house of dead. It's just Fyodor and Nikolai now and they're both equally insane.
I want Fyodor to be driven by hate and vengefulness. I want him to stop at nothing to see Dazai dead. I want him to be wrapped in bandages from the crash and I want Dazai to realise just how much he looks like his own past self. Fyodor is the worst version of what Dazai could've been, now more than ever.
Fyodor wants to compare his return to the resurrection of Jesus Christ but the truth is that he's nothing like him, fuelled by hate rather than love for the people. He is everything he never wanted to be but that thought doesn't even cross his mind.
He will cleanse the world of sin at all cost, starting with those who made him this way.
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Interesting Bits from Midnight Mass’s scripts
So I mentioned being a nerd who actually compared the final episodes with the available scripts for Midnight Mass episodes (episodes 3, 4, 5, and 7). One point that jumped out at me was how it more obvious that Riley wasn’t just tolerating Father Paul’s company in AA meetings in the original scripts.
That through line IS still there in the final product, I just think it’s not as obvious and many walk out of the series thinking Riley is only tolerating him or dislikes him the whole time. (deep sigh)
The two cut/altered scenes I have to point to for that are from episode 3.
This first scene survives in an altered form, as the scene we IMMEDIATELY cut to after Hassan brings up his concerns about bibles in school to Bev and everyone, and Bev manages to regain control of the whole situation and is even applauded for wanting to help the children understand miracles.
... like, really kind of strange of Riley, a staunch atheist and someone critical of the church and organized religion, to leap so fast to Paul’s defense against the childhood friend he’s reconnecting with/potentially falling back in love with. Unless we assume that yes, he’s come to like and trust Paul as a person.
(my guess is this scene was trimmed down because we are kind of being TOLD what to think about Paul, versus drawing our own conclusions about him).
Then there’s later in the episode, where the script has Riley speak more casually to Father Paul as he walks in for the meeting than in the episode, where he enters the rec center silently.
A certain level of comfort with Paul is being projected there. A vibe of “You have got to hear the latest shit that Bev is pulling now.” Gossipy housewives the both of them.
There’s also the brief, blink-and-you-miss it mention in this scene that Riley has been talking to Paul more than once a week during AA when Paul urges him to not give such a pat answer to Joe (this part is in the finished episode, I just find it easier to screencap the script).
Speaking of... this bit was cut from the AA trio scene after Riley tells Joe it’s enough he showed up:
From context, it reads very much that Paul is saying he and Riley are friends, rather than suggesting that Riley and Joe will be/are friends. Like you could read that into it and I think it is a part of it (Paul just wants Riley to be surrounded with friends, guys), but it reads more to me that Paul is saying he wanted to push for and challenge Riley to be his best self as a friend with his “that’s bullshit” speech.
But I think the most obvious moment of “Oh, Riley isn’t just talking with Father Paul to fulfill a parole requirement and is hesitant to speak with him otherwise” that survived to the final cut is in episode 4, after Riley’s spent a while comforting Erin about her abortion and Joe’s death has more or less been handled.
Like... he didn’t have to ask that question. He could have just talked about his feelings surrounding this event or not even brought up Erin’s miscarriage at all in the meeting. It’s a very personal thing to share, even with a priest acting as a therapist.
He’s not doing this for Erin’s sake, it’s not a roundabout way to get the priest to go comfort his religious friend as he’s quick to dissuade Paul from that. Riley brought up this topic to get his own emotions about it out.
And he wanted to hear what Paul thought you should do in that situation. He trusted that perhaps, he might have a better idea than Riley himself did.
And of course, it’s a twist of the knife that not long after this emotional honesty, he catches Paul in a pretty significant lie.
(Also, the sheer number of points I can gesture to as evidence that Paul ALSO very much cared about Riley could really be its own series of posts... and it might need to be, since it does seem to get missed/overlooked as an element of his character. It’s a twisted bromance and I love it so.)
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sorry! but i am never going to be okay with the covert unless it is reformed significantly. maybe it doesn’t fit the ‘technical definition’ of a cult but it is nonetheless a harmful creed. the person being baptized in 3x01 was a child no older than 16. if you are being asked to follow the way or leave, sure- you’re given agency. but if it’s the only community you know? you’re staying. for din, especially pre-grogu, it wasn’t a choice. if he took off his helmet and became an apostate, he would lose the only family he has ever known. do you not see how fucked up that is?
it’s unfair to compare it to a religion which requires full covering at all times, because even those religions allow you to be unclothed in private, among your family members, and in emergency scenarios such as a life-threatening head injury. there is no inaccessible repentance process if you do not abide by those rules. whereas the creed requires the helmet to remain on at all times (in s1, din said it could not be removed in front of a living creature, but that exception wasn’t specified in the armorer’s questioning in bobf or in the baptism from 3x01). bathing in the living waters isn’t like going to confessional or praying. it is something that was considered impossible by the members of the covert. redemption for apostates was not a reality until din proved them wrong.
the covert also reminds me too much of mormonism to ever feel comfortable defending it. i felt sick watching the first episodes of s3 when din kept talking about how he was an apostate who needed to be redeemed. a fucking apostate. for taking off his helmet to save the life of his child. for letting his child see his face. for that, they were prepared to exile him from the covert, knowing full well it is the only community he has ever known. you know what’s so scary about leaving the mormon church? if you’ve grown up in it, most of the time your social network is comprised only of other church members. you’re encouraged to avoid making friends with people who may lead you astray—because they drink coffee or alcohol, smoke, swear (i’m not kidding). you remain in this small bubble, and after you are baptized at age 8 (which is the age they decide you have agency and are capable of sinning), you second-guess every choice you make. i cried because i could never remember to say my prayers or read my scriptures and i knew i needed to repent for my sins. and when i started questioning my beliefs, i was so terrified of facing the truth because i thought my mom would no longer want me in her life. i distanced myself from many friends to avoid their judgement. i knew if i left, there was no going back. i would be inserting a wedge between me and the other people of my faith with whom i had grown.
for much of his life, din has known only the covert. he was brought up as a foundling and he knew only of the creed. he was taught that the mandalorian armor belonged only to those who followed the creed and rejected the idea that there could be a mandalorian who may not hold the same beliefs. we know he was a very lonely person before grogu. the covert was the only family he ever had. how is it a choice, then? “you may leave at any time you wish,” but if he takes off his helmet, he is an apostate and he must find a new home, a new family, a new belief system. he would have no one. what kind of a choice is that? in what world would he ever want to take off his helmet?
so yeah, the covert is not just a religious sect hiding from persecution. they are, at best, a high-demand religion, where allowing your child to see your face is an unfathomable act that necessitates redemption. if din djarin remains part of the covert as it stands, that’s extremely disappointing.
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