Some (Queer) thoughts on Good Omens 2

THE QUEER FANBASE

“Queerbaiting is a marketing technique for fiction and entertainment in which creators hint at, but then do not depict, same-sex romance or other LGBTQ+ representation”. - Wikipedia

I do not believe Good Omens in either seasons one or two were queerbaiting- the story depicts a relationship between two characters that has spanned millennia. The pair despite being different, grew to care for each other.  A relationship such as this, between angelic and demonic entities- is unlike anything humans can experience. I think such a deep friendship could be interpreted by both audiences and the writers themselves as romantic love, because that is arguably the strongest form of connection we experience as reference.

The show undoubtedly uses shots and lines that suggest a romantic love for the characters, feeding into a fandom ‘ship’ of the two characters.

From the first series the pair have struggled with their place in their worlds, and Crowley has tried to persuade Aziraphale to run away with them.

I do not believe that Good Omens participates in queer baiting, the marketing is not misleadingly queer, and the characters do clearly have feelings for each other, I would just say they are very complicated and possibly hard to write.

Fan service is an interesting topic of discussion. In the modern age of media where people can take to the internet and share all their thoughts – as I am doing, or in smaller quips- Creators of content are faced with the response to their work in ways unlike anything in times before.

People sometimes have direct access to the authors of media or simply have enough people with common feelings to ‘boycott’ something. Demanding change.

In the world of immense information and streaming, we often receive shows in whole series instead of episodes weekly, we binge the story in one go and make a sweeping judgement, only to discuss it with peers afterwards, not during. 

I think the way we consume media has been negatively impacted by this aspect of the internet.

However, that isn’t to say fans have not been brutal and demanding of artists in the past.

Arthur Conan Doyle received numerous complaints about the death of Sherlock Holmes- he did not concede and bring the famed detective back from the dead, instead writing a story set before the events, to please the audiences with more of this character while staying true to the choice he made for the character’s journey.

I think by marketing the artist as a brand and celebrity so heavily alongside their work, it has us putting these people on a pedestal. They are seen less as people and more like robots here to serve us and create the wonderful art we want them to. Artists are allowed to make bad stuff, and they’re also allowed to make the things they like.

While we as audiences pay to see media and art- it is not a client relationship. The artist makes what they want, and producers decide that enough people will see it for them to make profit.

Fan fiction is a brilliant outlet for fans to explore the avenues characters didn’t chose or have not yet depicted in the canon content.

When I create art, I like to explore multiple ways of presenting the content, multiple endings, and different forms.

I have a story that will exist as a graphic novel taking on a more sci-fi genre, but the same story will also be a stage play with a darker political atmosphere.

Maybe in the future creators of big shows, book or film franchises can hire secondary authors to write fiction based off the canon material but tweaked to more align with fan service in whichever ways.

THE STORY

Before I start discussing the queer representation of Good Omens S2, I’m going to establish my next thoughts in some context.

Good Omens is based on a book. Written by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. The book was released in 1990 and loved by many.

According to Gaiman, the first draft of Good Omens took nine weeks. With the second taking around four months.

I can only imagine there was a longer drafting process beyond this.

Terry Pratchett sadly died in 2015.

The book has continued to be popular ever since and grew its fanbase well before the show aired in 2019.

Meaning there was still a lot riding on pleasing fans with this first instalment. However, I think the success of the first season can be credited to the fantastic source material. A book which has proven itself to be brilliantly written, born from the collaboration of two great minds.

This second season was not written based on a book.

You may have heard that Gaiman and Pratchett had talked about a sequel and plotted out much of that material.

However, Gaiman says that this would be for a hypothetical third series and the second acts as a bridge between them.

So, this was written without the influence of Terry Pratchett (Although Rob Wilkins was on set to speak for Pratchett as head of his literary estate) and written directly for TV (by writers best known for their work in books and radio)

It is my guess that this is the reason the show felt different this time around.

To me, it was a bit like a filler, or expositional series. It was all leading up to that one scene at the very end. And I question if we really needed the rest.

Could that final episode not have just been the first or second of a third season- or a individually released two part special?

I didn’t find the mystery surrounding Gabriel thrilling, I wasn’t invited to figure it out myself.

I remember being engaged in the detective story and stakes of the previous season’s plot much more.

An article by ‘Den of Geeks’ referred to that plotline as having “elements of British children’s adventure story” but I feel that, even when given clues to help solve the mystery of naked and confused Gabriel, there was little to no urgency from the characters to figure it out.

Which transfers to the audience.

Gabriel told them that something terrible would happen- there should have been much higher stakes.

Gabriel himself could’ve been a more interesting clue in this If the purple-eyed moments saw him communicating some more relevant information, instead of throwing us into a flashback that further told the audience how close Aziraphale and Crowley are, which we already knew.

However, while I saw the flashbacks as a distraction from the main plot, I do enjoy seeing them through history and think that was something carried forward from fan feedback about last season.

Speaking of flashbacks and subplots:

THE GAYS, LESBIANS AND THE STRAIGHTS

There is a scene in the first season that many fans have deemed to be the moment Aziraphale realises that either the love they have for Crowley is romantic, and/or that maybe Crowley loves them back.

The scene being Crowley revealing they have performed a small demonic miracle to save Angel’s books from being destroyed as the church got bombed.

The camera zooms in on Aziraphale’s face as Crowley walks away and Michael Sheen’s facial expression can be described as ‘heart eyes’. It’s a face Aziraphale does frequently, mainly when Crowley does something kind.

In another shot from this scene the characters stand either side of the frame, and Aziraphale has two bits of statue jutting out either side of his back- creating the image of flaming wings.

This follows the common theme that the friendship/alliance the pair share is forbidden. It is wrong in the eyes of both heaven and hell to be fraternising with the other side.

My main point when it comes to the queer representation of Good Omens is that throughout the story, it has been frowned upon for these two characters to be happy together, which in the context of it being a ‘gay’ relationship, is a rather negative depiction.

One character would be sent to Hell, and the other would have committed a wrong beyond even Hell’s standards…

In the second series there are numerous other sweet scenes of the pair which are suggestive of two people with crushes or an old married couple.

Having both these dynamics is an example of the difficulty I imagine Neil Gaiman and John Finnemore had while writing this second series. Not wanting to have too much of one, the other, or either to show they still struggle with their roles as other worldly entities.

In some ways I felt that the second series went out of its way to give the viewers these ‘heart eyes’ scenes.

The most memorable to me being when Crowley couldn’t think of the correct tense, so Aziraphale helped by saying ‘smitten’ in a very soft tone while looking literally smitten at Crowley.

All this build up making the ending of the series much more disappointing.

The largest of the side quests in this second series was the mission to make Nina fall in love with Maggie. All because Aziraphale had panicked and said they’d performed a miracle to make such a thing happen, and heaven was supposedly going to verify this. Except they put the underqualified intern on the job, so this never was verified. The angels didn’t seem bothered at all if Aziraphale was lying or not.

Maybe it’s because angels can’t lie, so why would they genuinely suspect Aziraphale of such a thing?

Well, we were told from the flashbacks of the story of Job that Aziraphale does lie, and that the higher up angels are less caring about the humans than we thought.

I’m also quite sure this had already been established in season one. So, if the angels weren’t going to care much about if Aziraphale was lying or not, why put so much effort and scenes into this storyline?

Nina is the coffee shop owner; she is an angry person because she is seemingly in a toxic relationship.

Maggie is the broke and lonely owner of the record shop who is in love with Nina.

Why is she in love with Nina?

Why is Nina in a toxic relationship?

Why are these two characters played by actors who were playing different characters in the previous season?

We do not get the answers to these questions.

I did not root for these characters just because they were lesbians.

I was confused as to their relevance, and especially confused when Maggie became some kind of hero, and the pair stayed back to fight off literal demons by throwing books at their heads.

And after all this intervention from Aziraphale and Crowley, did they end up together? No.

I do of course agree with Nina that she shouldn’t enter a new relationship after leaving a toxic one, but why I ask was it necessary for her to be in an unhappy relationship to begin with?

Nina could have been reluctant to engage with Maggie without suffering from domestic abuse.

So, these two queer characters were the partial focus of an entire series without having a gratifying ending.

Sound familiar? Oh yes, our lead characters.

Crowley has wanted to run away with Aziraphale to Alpha Centauri (or anywhere) since series one, probably longer. And in this season, not only does he once again propose this romantic getaway/adventure but tries to explain how much Aziraphale means to them, so they might refuse heaven’s offer.

“We’re a team… and we’ve spent our existence pretending that we aren’t” -Crowley.

A whole existence.

“I mean, if Gabriel and Beelzebub can do it- go off together, then so can we.” – Crowley.

This line hits hard because it reveals that Crowley wants something like a romantic relationship, but it angers me because of the entire situation with Gabriel and Beelzebub.

We have watched with bated breath all series for Aziraphale and Crowley to admit some kind of fondness for another.

We have watched as they are bullied by Heaven and Hell into rejecting each other, denying feelings, saying that it’s wrong.

How many times have queer people been told to hide feelings, been told that it’s wrong.

We have watched Aziraphale face being sent to Hell for associating with the person he likes, and Crowley be cast out for doing something so wrong even Hell doesn’t want him.

When we did finally see a kiss between our main characters Aziraphale’s response was to say, ‘I forgive you.’

What kind of message does that all send?

You may think- but they were threatened like that because they’re demon and angle, it’s not about being gay.

Then why was the male presenting Archangel and female presenting Lord of Hell able to have an entire romance montage told through flashbacks in the finale, leading to them running away together happily, with absolutely no consequences from either Heaven or Hell.

It was swept under the rug almost immediately.

Why is it when two male presenting and lowly agents of the other worlds come together, they are shunned and hunted.

My problem with representation of queer relationships in Good Omens season two is that I’ve watched twelve episodes of a gay (and nonbinary if you’d like to get into that) relationship, six episodes of a lesbian storyline- both with unhappy and unfulfilling endings.

Yet the straight couple gets a few minutes at the end of a series, going from 0-100 with a happy ending.

It doesn’t sit well with me.

I don’t believe there to have been intended malice in these choices at all, they just aren’t that positive when laid out one after the other in a finale or like I have done here.

TO END

Aside from representation and story- I would like to give a special mention to the practical techniques used in combination with CGI effects. I always prefer practical effects and think they worked very well in this series- no special effect ever felt jarring or out of place.

While I didn’t find this second instalment as entertaining as the first, I do think Good Omens is a very fun story, and there were plenty of moments in which I laughed and had a good time.

My judgement of the first series may have softened with time, I don’t want to suggest that the first was perfect. I remember having a few critiques.

As someone who studies storytelling I do tend to judge things more harshly. I enjoy picking things apart to see how they work- what I like and can bring or avoid in my own writing.

So, I do not intend to deter you from watching the series, boycott, or rewrite, I just wanted to get down my thoughts about the queer representation and story that I saw.

I will be eagerly waiting for a third series and aiming to read the original book.