Can we talk about Aziraphale’s rebellion? I want to talk about Aziraphale’s rebellion.
Like, obviously Aziraphale rebelling against Heaven started with giving away the sword. We all know this. He took his stand six thousand years ago and has, in his own quiet way, been defending his choice ever since. In the miniseries, we don’t see as much of how Aziraphale actually conducts his work on Earth as we do of Crowley’s half-hearted attempts at Being Bad, aside from that one line during the drunken bookshop scene about how he tries to influence humans to do the actual thwarting, but I think a lot about the line from the script book that was cut for time, about how he was hoping to influence Nero by getting him interested in music. Which… hoooooo boy is thata lot to unpack, but I digress.
Crowley gave humanity the opportunity to choose, and has continued to do so, allowing mankind to choose their fates. And Aziraphale? Aziraphale is doing just as he did in giving Adam and Eve his sword: giving humanity the tools with which to enact their own destiny, whatever that may be. Aziraphale’s methodology is a consistent defense of his original rebellion, but he still tries for six thousand years to tread the fine line of loyalty to Heaven, even as he makes it oh so very clear, with his misprint Bibles and his love of human culture and his clear discomfort in the face of Heaven’s other messengers, that he doesn’t like their ways or their attitude.
But that isn’t what I want to talk about. What I want to talk about is the moment that Aziraphale goes full loose cannon.
When Aziraphale first gets poofed back to Heaven, he starts out this confrontation with the Quartermaster with the same fumbling, almost unctious behavior he shows to the Archangels (feat. Sandalphon) up until this point. He doesn’t like these people, he barely evenrespects these people, but he feels he owes them his loyalty so he speaks courteously and very nearly obsequiously (but with a twinkle in his eye that says “I am mentally eviscerating every stupidass word out of your idiot mouth” the whole time). He makes light of having been discorporated because he knows he’s in trouble and he’s so in the habit of trying to downplay his slip ups, his tiny rebellions, and dress them up in humor, that it’s his go-to reaction when he suddenly finds himself bodiless and stuck in the absolute last place he wants to be.
But then the Quartermaster starts giving him a dressing down, and at first we see Aziraphale kind of wilting under his ire, shrinking back into himself (which is an amazing bit of physicality from Mr. Sheen, seriously, go rewatch, the body language he uses in this whole scene is amazing) and trying to compress himself down under Heaven’s rage… but then the final blow is delivered:
“You pathetic excuse for an angel!”
And Aziraphale just kind of goes still and absorbs this. He thinks it over. He straightens up. And he makes his choice.
“Well, I suppose I am, really.”
He knows what he is. He’s known from the beginning. His rebellion began six thousand years ago, and all these years with humanity and with Crowley, pushing and pulling at him and making him think and evaluate and question everything, has made him ready to own up to it.
Up until this point, Aziraphale’s rebellion— his misprint Bibles and his little white lies and his overindulgence in human things and the questions he keeps to himself for fear of Falling— has been so quiet. It’s been whispers behind closed doors and a hush-hush Arrangement with an Adversary he shouldn’t even speak to let alone have cozy dinners with. It’s all under lock and key and oh so very discrete.
Until now. Now Aziraphale is pissed.
He’s spent six thousand years teaching humans how to solve their own problems, giving them the tools they need to fight their own battles and actually make use of that power of choice Crowley gave them, even if he doesn’t actually realize that’s what he’s been doing all these years. He’s put literally all the Time there has ever been into guiding and caring for the Earth, and under absolutely no fucking circumstances is he going to let it all be blown to bits so Heaven and Hell can have their stupid pissing contest all over it.
And suddenly all that servile obedience to Heaven, all that soft-spoken pandering, just evaporates. Suddenly it’s “I have nointention of fighting in any war!” Suddenly it’s “Idemand to be returned [to Earth]!” Suddenly Aziraphale has absolutely run out of fucks to give and he’s ready to scream out everything that’s been coming to a slow boil inside him over the course of so many centuries. And he doesn’t know yet, he doesn’t yet understand that all the work he and Crowley have been doing for six thousand years has already given Adam and the Them everything they need to make their choice and defend it. As far as Aziraphale is concerned, he and probably Crowley are the only thing standing between the Earth and its imminent destruction, and he absolutely will not just stand back and let it happen.
It doesn’t matter that his Quartermaster is berating him. It doesn’t matter that that whole line of angels has suddenly turned in eerie, perfect unison to stare him down with blank-eyed dispassion and unfeeling Judgment. It doesn’t matter that this is treason in Heaven’s eyes, that there’s a damn good chance he’s going to Fall for this. He’s chosen his side, and he’s making a stand.
And then the thought occurs to him that, well, why can’t he just go back to Earth? Why can’t he just possess a convenient human host? Demons can do that, and what are demons but fallen angels? Why can’the do what a demon can do? He knows damn well and good that angels and demons aren’t really all that far apart— he has six millennia worth of love and an Arrangement spanning nearly a thousand years to prove it. We talk about Crowley and his imagination and creativity, but Aziraphale is no slouch when it comes to thinking outside the box either. So once Aziraphale starts asking questions, reallyasking them and not just thinking them quietly to himself and then locking them up tight where no one is likely to see, he instantly becomes this unstoppable cannonball of chaotic energy. It’s the loudest, most brazen Rebellion since Lucifer himself, and it’s done in the service of Humanity, because Aziraphale’s defining character trait is his radical kindness.
Basically, Aziraphale backflips out of Heaven with both middle fingers in the air, and frankly I think it’s amazing.
So in all that cringing away from the Quartermaster, I see Aziraphale’s eternity of being slowly chipped away by the emotional abuse of Heaven. He might question what’s right, he might question whether he even respects his superiors as he should, but deep down he is an angel and he WANTS so very much to be a good angel. He wants to be acknowledged. He wants to be told that his rebellions are ok because they’re done for the Right Reason (at the same time that he does NOT want to be found out).
And then…they push him too far. Hell is after Crowley (Who may or may not be leaving for ever) earth is about to be destroyed, humanity is going to be wiped out, NO ONE CARES, and now all his failures are laid bare and
And Aziraphale decides he just does not give a single care, s**t or f**k anymore.
It’s like, he hits rock bottom, and realizes in that second that he can actually stand on his own two feet.
