An Act Of Rebellion

"Men would come. Men would threaten. Aziraphale would nod and smile and say that he’d think about [their suggestions]. And then they’d go away. And they’d never come back. Just because you’re an angel doesn’t mean you have to be a fool.”

Masterpost here.

Crowley here.

Book!Aziraphale was the one to suggest killing Adam. He did not bother reviving the dead dove in his sleeve, so Crowley did. He does have some inner conflict regarding his beliefs, but more subtle. Regularly spends evenings talking human nature, God, Divine Plan with Crowley. He is practical to the point of cruelty.

TV!Aziraphale always seemed softer, more manipulative than direct, and more nervous. He looks so soft and smitten towards Crowley, or thirsty af, that the image of softness stays. But what is there really? Besides that visceral feeling when he did not restrain himself, and devoured an ox.

We got stern Aziraphale when he made Crowley dance for him. And like shown at the top of this post. His demeanor opposing Furfur was a bit nervous at times, but he refused to back down even a little.

He was willing to protect Gabriel the Asshole. I wouldn't have blamed him if he had shoved Gabriel in the trunk and dumped him somewhere. But Aziraphale is a Guardian.

He is not close with humans. He couldn't give a shit about the people in the shops around him on a personal level. He'll protect them, but only really socialises with them when he has to. Or needs them as set dressing during an Eldritch Ball. I love that about him, he protects because it is the right thing to do.

He is more direct. Season 1 he'd play coy so Crowley would miracle away paint stains. Now he claims the Bentley for a roadtrip. I can't find a good gif, but we see him having trouble restraining himself at times when he's standing between the humans inside and the demons outside.

The Job minisode showed us he's been having doubts for a very long time. Not only about Heaven, about God. "I don't think God wants you to do this." Only to later hear God give a demeaning lecture to Job. Those seeds of doubt will blossom in Heaven.

We see Crowley taking pride in seeing his angel silencing a room of angels and demons. We see Crowley impressed when he heard Aziraphale did the thing with the halo. We saw how he looked when Aziraphale was gorging on flesh unrestrained.

How will he look when he sees Aziraphale, standing between Heaven/Hell and humanity? Determined fury in his eyes and blade in hand. Aziraphale guarding his world. His bookshop. His demon.

Crowley seeing his angel, completely prepared to kill God if that's what it takes to keep them safe.

i just need to grow my hair out -> i just need to cut my hair -> i just need to grow my hair out -> j just need to cut my hair

insanely beautiful how dean asked cas not to change, fully convinced a change for the worst would be his fault, and still castiel changed and he told dean it was because of him and before dean could feel any guilt about it he made sure dean understood the changes he went through were for the best because being able to experience a love like the one castiel has for dean could never be considered anything but something wonderful and full of joy

drunk and thinking about Eddie Diaz and how he’s such a good dad and how he loves everyone in his life like it’s the easiest thing to do. how he loves like he breathes - it’s natural, it’s just what he does to live. how it broke him to learn that everyone he’d saved had died, because all he’s ever wanted to do was make sure those he cared about were okay. how he’s devoted his entire LIFE to the lives of others. how he ballroom danced as a child and loved it and felt free until his parents sucked all the joy from it. how he was scared to be a dad but did it anyway and would do anything for his son a thousand times over. how he’s so righteous and cares so fiercely and once he’s made his mind up that’s IT. how he loves like his life depends on it, because let’s face it, it does. how Eddie Diaz is made of love and that’s all he ever wants to give back to people.

Let's talk about Shax and Furfur

I don't see a lot of discussion about them, but I think these two are worth paying attention to.

Shax is one of those demons who is not inherently evel, she is more of a "make the best of the current situation" person, she is trying to make a career not by stepping on others, but by forming alliances. She offers a mutually beneficial alliance to Crowley, a traitor hunted by hell, but she's like, that's fine, I can try and work with him, I have a lot to learn from him. Formally, Crowley does not agree to an information exchange with Shax, but nonetheless he is talking to her: helping her fix the boiler, telling a bit more about the Earth, telling her that they'll work on her sarcasm recognition skills next time. They are not friends, but Shax tries to keep it as civil as it can possibly be.

And then there is Furfur, with whom Shax is at least a friendly colleague, but more likely they know each other well and are actually friends. This alliance is formed in the same way of doing favours (and we know who else formed their alliance at least in part based on favours). Note, she never actually breaks her promise to Furfur, and she tries to pull him along where she can: she promises to get him an audience with the Dark Council and she does, she is sympathetic when it does not go well. He shows up in the bookshop, so he did get a bit higher in the hierarchy, but also note how it is Furfur pointing out the opportunity for Shax, while Dagon (who you would think would be the one to be promoted by Beelzebbub) just stands there.

If Shax takes over the throne, with Furfur as her close alliance, this opens a good setup for Crowley to come in and influence them. He might bring in the news that Heaven is planning a war to erase them from the book of life, or that if there is a second coming the amount of soul-processing workload might increase exponentially! The point is, both Shax (already offered him beneficial alliance) and Furfur ("We've done loads together!") would be open to Crowley's influence, and they might indeed want to let Earth continue its existence.

I suppose we shall have to wait and see, but I think we will yet see more of these two

Okay i might be a little pissed off. Expect typos, im on my phone.

A character does not need a specific label, have a gender, nor have sex/romantic physical gestures in order to be queer rep

Aziraphale and Crowley are not gay men.

They are played by male actors. They present male most of the time. But that means nothing, because gender presentation =/= gender identity or sex.

Neil has said multiple times that angels and demons are sexless. It's on the book. It's on several of his tweets and answers to asks. This implies that angels and demons are non-binary by default. Gabriel isn't a man, Michael isn't a woman, Beelzebub isn't a woman, Furfur isn't a man.

And now, you could argue that a genderless creature isn't necessarily queer and I agree! Several animals are genderless irl.

But here's what makes them queer: it's not that they don't have a gender, it's that they don't give a fuck about it. Crowley presents female i believe up to three times in the show, Neil was planning a minisode where both he and Aziraphale are fem-presenting in the 60s; Michael is a male angel name and he's played by an actress and (At least in the portuguese dub? Correct me if im wrong) still called "he". Same for Beelzebub, who I think is also reffered to with they/them in english. Hell, God has a female voice and is still called God (the male version of the word!!!) and even Her pronouns are a bit flexible in certain dubs.

What makes them queer is that their genderless aspect isn't just biological, it's their identity, too. These characters are all non-binary, they know it, and they don't mind it.

"But they present male and call each other 'he'!"

As I said, gender presentation does not equal identity and neither does pronouns. It's words: words that get often associated with a certain gender but are, in the end, just words.

Not only that, but this argument also comes from the expectation that non-binary people cannot present themselves in a binary way, which is an absurd thing to expect. People irl have all kinds of different hormonal balances and many enby folk may be hypermasculine or hyperfeminine due to high testosterone or estrogen respectively. And you know what? They might not want to change that, and that is completely fine.

Non binary people do not owe you androginy.

Being trans isn't about appearances, isn't about transitioning, it's about identity. Thinking otherwise is borderline transmedicalist ideology.

Good Omens breaks gender norms all the fucking time in both seasons, something many shows are afraid to do, and it's not just for comedy reasons, which tends to be the norm when shows do it. They do it because it's fun, it's fine, and because they acknowledge that gender norms are stupid.

That's queer as hell.

My second point, no need for labels. Just like angels and demons don't need gender labels, they don't need sexuality labels. At all. Especially since they're often intertwined.

Just because two characters don't have their specific labels revealed doens't mean they aren't queer or, fuck's sake, don't love each other.

In A League Of Their Own, no characters get specific labels, what they are is simply implied. Greta is very implied to be lesbian but they never say the exact word. Does that mean she isn't queer?

In The Song Of Achilles, no characters get specific labels because hell, the labels didn't exist at the time the story takes place in. Both main characters are implied to be bi/pansexual but it's obviously never told in the text. Does that mean they aren't queer?

In Undertale and Deltarune, no characters get specific labels, but in both games the main protagonist is nonbinary (and is in both cases a human being!) and both games have several mlm and wlw couples and several more nonbinary characters across the storyline, but it's never specifically labeled. Does that mean it doesn't have queer rep?

Neil has said several times that Good Omens is a love story, that Aziraphale and Crowley love each other, that even if they're not 'gay male humans' they still feel love for one another. That's the entire point of season two.

And now, I get it, okay? I don't like authors tip-toeing around labeling their characters either, especially since in most places we are past the age of having to code characters instead of just make them openly queer. I get the fear and uncertainty that often came from some sort of trauma from bbc's Sherlock, I felt it too. I get that for some it may seem as if it's queerbaiting, or pink money, or simply being too scared to say a character is queer.

But that's just not the case with Good Omens. The point is not to avoid labels because they're scary. The point is that, for Good Omens, and aziracrow, labels are useless. They're not humans, they don't have a gender, they don't need the labels.

And you know what?

That's also queer as hell.

Society has to put people into boxes, has to separate folk, has to label everyone. No one can be different, and id you are you need to fit this specific box of different. If you go out, you're too much, you're too rebellious, you're a freak. If they just let people do whatever they wanted it would be hard to marginalize them and keep the system going.

A quote I once heard feels important for this occasion:

"To define yourself is to restrain yourself."

When you define something in strict terms you're putting rules to it. Rules that can be broken. Rules that should be broken. And the rulebreakers get insulted, hated, violated, killed.

Aziraphale and Crowley are breaking these rules by 'existing' as who they are. They're not gay men, they're not lesbian women, they're not bisexual agenders, but at the same time they are all of those things at the same time, whenever they want to, whenever YOU want them to, as Neil himself put it. Because fuck labels. And you're hating them for it, hating them because they're refusing to enter those boxes.

Humans are weird and complex. Let the angels and demons be weird and complex too.

Lastly, queer relationships don't need sex - nor kisses.

There's this expectation that romantic love is only true love if they kiss, if they live together, if they sleep on the same bed, if they go on dates, if they marry, if they have kids, if they have sex. Break one of these and people will raise an eyebrow. Break two and they look at you weird. Break three and everyone judges you. Break all of them and, suddenly, you and your partner have been declared "just friends" by outsiders who don't know you in the slightest.

Welcome to amatonormativity.

Or, better saying, another stupid box, another set of rules.

There's this headcanon that Crowley kisses Aziraphale as a last resort not because it's a gesture if love (even Neil said it wasn't out of love) but because he's seen it in human movies and, in movies, kissing someone in despair is a cliché that often ends in the other person not leaving.

This wasn't a love kiss. But Crowley still loves Aziraphale. Do you know why?

Because angels and demons, most likely, do not need human gestures to show love. They, most likely, comprehend love in an entirely different light.

Maybe Aziraphale is touchy with Crowley because he likes it and that is a good enough reason, but it's an individual reason, just like a person irl might be more fond of hugging their partner than kissing them, and that's fine. Nothing wrong with it. There's no right or wrong way to have a relationship. Acting like there is is reinforcing the rules set by amatonormativity, and it is also completely disregarding the experiences of asexual and aromantic folk. The entire spectrums btw.

Now think about the rules I mentioned earlier. Must kiss, must fuck, must marry etc.

Aziracrow also breaks almost all of them.

That's also queer as hell!!!

Being queer and celebrating pride isn't about having labels. It's about breaking societal norms: heteronormativity, cisnormativity, mononormativity, amatonormativity, etc. Norms that are used to opress us, to put us in boxes, to separate us, to marginalize us, and to kill us.

A show that gives the middle finger to all of these and just tells its story however way it likes, not caring about labeling the characters or having a long monologue about homophobia or showing a explicit sex scene between the two characters or following any of those stupid rules imposed by society, a society ran by cishet folk, is as queer as a show can ever be.

To deny that is to reinforce a narrative that is literally used to opress us.

That's all, bye.

Also, some of you guys are giving "I call beez she/her because of the actress" and that's cringe, but not surprising, ngl.

the mortal human life and body are so fucking restricting it's driving me insane. i want to be anything and everything. i want to experience it all. but i fucking can't AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Why did we stop talking about the manson girl outfit? The manson girl outfit made so many of the other outfits make sense to me. I wanna talk about the manson girl outfit.

Good morning, you have to be the thing that saves you