#hello anon u have activated my trap card: i write essays abt narrative theory & literary criticism at the DROP of a HAT

[equalseleventhirds]

Hey. Re: the Jon having agency argument, I think I might be the person who kickstarted that one, and I want to say my argument was nothing like that other anon framed it. I never brought up him being neurodivergent coded, or disabled, or anything of the sort, because my argument wasn't about whether he was more marginalised than the rest of the cast - it was about whether it makes sense to frame his decisions as the primary driving force of the narrative. And my point about the ending wasn't that he was talked over, it was that what happened still aligned with what everyone else chose, not what he did, so it still doesn't make sense to frame his actions as a driving force of narrative rather than a failed struggle against the conclusion.

there are absolutely moments throughout the series when jon has his agency taken from him, by the narrative at large, the fears, and other people in positions of power (cough cough elias). that isn't negated by the fact that he's not written as a poc, and in fact given that s5 could be read as an exploration and criticism of white privilege, there's room for a reading wrt 'white people who believe the universe itself is giving them control are wrong and no not even you, white person, will be safe', which imo is one of the stronger messages a white person can give to other white ppl, and which some of jonny's writing does touch on

wrt the finale in particular, i think you and the other anon may be having two different conversations? bcos like, listen, i definitely did see some ppl saying that in 199 it was unfair to jon that he was outvoted (altho i did not see anything in the context of his identity, which was absolutely buck wild to me when the other anon brought that up) and that the martin, georgie, melanie, and basira, jon's allies, people who had less power than him and with whom he voluntarily discussed & debated the plan, were somehow stripping him of his agency by not agreeing with him. i avoided most of that, but i do vaguely recall someone actually doing an analysis of 199 and finding that jon spoke more than any other character and thus had his fair say, altho i would not be able to find the post bcos i did avoid... all of that. so if it is about other characters talking over him/taking his agency in the finale, i think that is kinda... not a thing, even putting aside questions of race and other identity stuff.

now, if it is about the narrative and whether or not jon's wishes and decisions controlled the narrative/were a driving force, that is a whole different kettle of meta! how much agency do characters have in narrative, when a writer is controlling them? how much agency do any of our characters in tma have, when the fears and the web in particular were controlling their fates?

realistically, i don't think any character at any point really had their desires as a driving force of the narrative, at least not as like... conscious control/creating the ending they desired? one of the BIG themes of tma in generals is that while we can make the best decision with the information we have, our intentions and wishes for the outcome of our decisions has absolutely no bearing on the actual outcome. in this way, every decision anyone makes is a 'driving force' in that it does in fact push the narrative towards one conclusion or another; but it is not a 'driving force' in that it pushes the narrative towards the conclusion they wanted.

everything jon and the other characters do is a struggle against the narrative, not against an inevitable end that will come for them no matter what, but against an end they cannot foresee and thus cannot reliably influence. jon's choice in mag 200 is a 'driving force' in that it drives the others to speed up their timeline, it drives martin to come find him, it eventually leads to jon getting stabbed and both of them dying in the panopticon. this wouldn't have happened without his choices! but what the others chose in mag 199 was also a driving force, that made jon feel like he could not change their minds and like they did not understand the true horror of what they were unleashing, and so he chose to go up to the panopticon alone.

neither of them really got what they wanted (bcos the others! didn't really want a world where jon and martin died/disappeared!) because neither of them really had full control over the results. but they did, in spite of not having control, influence those results.

...........and that got weirdly philosophical and really does have v little to do with race in tma, but i think i can be forgiven for going on a very long tangent abt narrative and choices and what precisely a 'driving force' is when we talk abt a story, bcos! narrative theory is very much an interest of mine!!

#long post #fandom wank #i guess??? #hello anon u have activated my trap card: i write essays abt narrative theory & literary criticism at the DROP of a HAT #my special interests revolve around media but in like. not particularly normal fandom ways. #............also fandom tends to misuse literary terms so uh