#all of these ars great additions

charlottemadison42:

theniceandaccurategoodomensblog:

goodomenshastakenovermylife:

theniceandaccurategoodomensblog:

krakensdottir:

whispsofwind:

on-stardust-wings:

Does anyone else think about Satan calling Crowley “darling” in the car “radio call”? Because it creeps me out. It creeped me out the first time and still creeps me out now…

Add to that the mind rape vibe of the entire downloading information into Crowley’s brain thing (which almost gets him discorporated by lorry) and it’s even worse.

Nah, that creeped me out as well.

Now, to be fair, I think the “darling” is there to mimic Freddie Mercury’s speech pattern.

But it’s the words, the fact that Satan is speaking them, the general mind-rapey vibes of the scene, and the fact that Crowley says “They love me down there” coupled with the fact that he’s also terrified of Satan.

It was even creepier in the TV show script, in the final version they cut this bit:

CROWLEY The M25. Yes. Well, glad it went down so well. Yup. Leave it to me.

SATAN (V.O.) That is what we are doing, Crowley. But if anything goes wrong, then those involved will suffer greatly. Even you, Crowley. Especially you.

Crowley nods. He’s terrified.

That’s… an interesting choice of words.

Plus, the song. Beware, this is overreaching so far my arms may fall off, but. While there are many interpretations of Bohemian Rhapsody, the show specifically chooses to play this bit immediately after Satan speaks:

I see a little silhouetto of a man

Scaramouche scaramouche will you do the fandango

Thunderbolt and lightning- very very frightening me

The Scaramouche is a character in Italian Commedia dell'Arte. He’s a clown dressed in black, and he’s either a sort of wily evil gentleman or an fiendish, boisterous but funny character. The fandango is obviously a dance.

You could therefore stretch the lyrics and the context enough to say that Satan, through Queen, is inviting Crowley to dance with the Devil.

There, I officially grasped at too many straws, someone please take the Internet away from me.

(But also the following part of the song they quote in the book literally goes “we will not let you go - let me go!” and those two are the only parts in a 5 minutes song referenced in the book. So maybe I’m not crazy after all.)

Oh yes. Ohhh yes. I’ve been wanting to dig into this for a while now, but I really wasn’t sure how to go about it. But now that it’s come up…

Of course this is all wild speculation since the only interaction we actually see with them is a brief conversation over the radio, and the airbase, where Satan is very much not focused on Crowley. Through the power of extrapolation, though, you can draw some very unsettling conclusions. There’s often a downside to being the head honcho’s ‘favorite’, after all. Especially if your boss is literally Satan.

Very interesting! There’s not enough in canon, of course, for set conclusions. But it very much seems that, at the very least—

Crowley doesn’t have any officially powerful position in Hell.

And yet, he is somewhat of a favourite with Satan.

Personally, I tend to attribute it to Crowley’s imagination. Satan saw that in Crowley and deliberately recruited him. He ensured that Crowley did not and would not ever obtain an official position of power in Hell because Satan saw all that imagination as a potential threat. Yet, he wanted to make use of it too. So stick him up on Earth where it could be useful. Keep him close and favoured. But also frightened and powerless.

Yet… there’s so much we don’t know. Plenty of room for interpretation.

Something big that stood out to me about all of this is the way people rarely seem to acknowledge how petrified Crowley is of Hell. 

Satan is obvious, I mean look at the scene at the airbase. The second Crowley feels that the literal Devil is coming he falls to his knees and cries out. Most have concluded that was because he was in pain, and I think that was certainly apart of it, but I think a big part of it was also fear. I mean, Anathama felt him too and while it makes sense she wouldn’t feel it as much since she’s human, she didn’t even seem to be half as effected as Crowley. I think that’s because Crowley wasn’t only doubling over in pain, but because he was panicking and tried to curl up into himself. 

Another thing to note is Beelzebub. When they show up at the airbase Crowley is a lot less snarky than he usually is. He seems to sort of give up until Aziraphale takes the lead. He’s practically shaking when he bows down to them and I think that bow was also a way to give an excuse to avert his eyes. 

I appreciate @whispsofwind sharing that note from the Script Book too. In the car, when Hell is talking to Crowley over the radio, it specifically notes that Crowley is terrified. And there’s a lot of little notes like that in the book too. 

So yeah. I think Crowley played cool and unbothered not only as a way to look seductive to the humans (and Aziraphale) but also as a sort of coping mechanism to bury the fear he was constantly dealing with all the time. 

Oh yes!! In a nasty place like Hell is portrayed to be— all violence and mob rule— the last thing you want to do is show your fear. You have to play it cool to survive. But he is terrified.

I enjoy fics in which his early success in the Garden has guaranteed his notoriety in Hell forever – but in a bit of a target-on-your-back way. Like, he’s just another run-of-the-mill demon, but because he made the right trouble early on, everybody knows his name and Satan thinks he’s terrific. So he takes credit for things he didn’t do and comes up with flashy presentations to keep them thinking he’s their very best on earth.

But it’s not exactly fun to get a lot of attention in Hell.

Best to stay topside, where his reputation can be a thing of legend down below and he rarely has to interact with his fellow demons, which might make them (like Hastur and Ligur) start to suspect he’s not all that.