well i can share custom designs now so here’s some discovery service waistcoat fashion! this is technically a game about exploring uninhabited islands after all
now that i’m through with the whole thing i’ve been thinking a lot about the dynamics that exist in this extreme vacuum of (male-centric) humanity. hickey, by sheer force of will, has perhaps the strongest pull of the lot. he’s proactive in an environment that often appears to leave you with very few choices. the loophole here is to do what’s necessary, to focus on “practicals.” if nature (and the world at large) is unforgiving, then you’d best follow suit, forget morality and opt for ruthlessness as strong as you can muster.
despite the importance given to the hickey/crozier relationship, and despite hickey’s sense of betrayal from one he saw as an equal, his true counterpoint is not, in fact, francis, but goodsir. after all, even francis is aware of the boatload of sins he committed on the expedition. but francis sees that goodsir is clean. goodsir, whose distress it was up to the very end that lady silence had formed a bad opinion of england from the white men who trespassed into her home, killed her friends, and did just as badly to each other. yes, it reads naive, but his is the code of the scholarly gentleman, of a man with a deep respect for life. “practicals” leave out beauty and wonder, decency and honor. hickey, meanwhile, knows there are no decent men. only dead men, or live men.
ultimately, it’s goodsir who makes the definitive play, goodsir who goes toe to toe with hickey, albeit posthumously. and in the middle of these two opposites is tuunbaq, a creature meant to balance the scales. francis crozier is not the hero of the story, though by awareness of his guilt, he certainly exhibits heroism in an attempt to atone for his mistakes. we can’t forget that this is a story about colonialism. hickey does not die because he is evil, he dies because he was presumptuous enough to try to claim something to which he had no right. francis is not the indomitable force of self-interest that hickey was, nor is he, like goodsir, an example of the equally powerful, equally human desire to wonder at the unknown. he is not like sir john or fitzjames either, who are men of the empire through and through, in it because they have something to prove to a “Society” that is often petty and cruel (fitzjames lives long enough to recognize it as vanity).
francis’s role is to witness. he is a deeply flawed man, but he knows it, and he takes responsibility for it. he kills tuunbaq, and he recognizes that he has killed something important and irreplaceable. i think he stays behind to remember, no matter how painful the remembrance is. and silna is out there too somewhere, remembering, the only other person who knows what happened, who could possibly understand. they are the series’ memory.
francis’s misdirection at the end of the episode will buy some time, but we know, and he knows, of the boundlessness of greed and the curiosity of men.
and tuunbaq, the equalizer, is dead—dead because francis killed it.
it’s only a matter of time before many other important and irreplaceable things are discovered, misunderstood, exploited, killed. there is a helplessness in francis and silna’s situations, a loneliness that comes at the end of a story full of isolation and impending doom. but there has also been friendship, and courage, and brotherhood… along with hubris and cold-blooded cruelty. francis and silna have the strength to acknowledge both sides equally, and in the end, i think we’re meant to as well.
last batch of #theterrortober doodles from twitter! context for the first one: jared harris supports man utd, matthew mcnulty supports man city. yet another way for little to fall short
as always you can also catch me on my dedicated terror twit, @sizeofacherry!
Super excited to finally reveal the Blanky/Macca piece I did for @theterrorzine! I had a lot of fun drawing My Favorite Oldmans and I’m even more thrilled that other people wanted to see them too :“)))
If you missed out on the initial order and you’d like to order a zine or merch, leftover sales are available HERE!There are only a limited number of physical copies available, so make sure to hurry over! In the meantime, you can also take a look at some of the great fic and art on offer here!
second-to-last batch of @terrebus-fcdoodles for #theterrortober event on twitter! as always you can also find these on my dedicated terror twitter @sizeofacherry
more assorted @terrebus-fc doodles from #theterrortober event over on twitter! i’m posting these in batches, but if you’d like to see these pop up in real time you can check out my terror twitter @sizeofacherry, where i can be usually be found waxing lyrical about alexander mcdonald’s forelock.
over on twitter i’ve been participating in @themothfindergeneral’s month-long terror art fest, #theterrortober! the theme i’ve chosen for myself is @terrebus-fc, so here’s an assortment of doodles from the first week!
Post-Arctic. Blanky is back in his pub in Whitby, dealing with his leg and without his former crew as best he can, when one Harry Goodsir unexpectedly shows up.
A story about the different ways lingering trauma manifests, about feeling lost in yourself and in the world despite having been much more lost only a year previous, and the importance of finding an anchor while landbound.
here’s my art for this year’s @theterrorbigbang! i had a delightful time illustrating it, and please do go read the fic: it’s quiet and heartwarming and sweet in all the right ways!
