God. I. I absolutely cannot sleep. And it’s nearly morning.
GOD.
Aziraphale, no.
Aziraphale. You are being manipulated. You are being showered with praise and acceptance that you have never received before, not like this. You are being told that you did extremely well, that you are the best of the best. This is *deliberate*. Metatron has never been on your side, he is telling you exactly what you want to hear. What you’ve been craving for the last four years, and for the six thousand years prior.
But they have plans for you, Aziraphale. They want you Upstairs so that you could do exactly what they need.
Aziraphale, stop.
(I’ll have to rewatch this. Have to collect the instances where Aziraphale is looking for approval. Fiercely hoping for approval. Throughout history, yes, and recently, too: those telephone calls after the Armageddon’t where he wanted Crowley to witness the good he’d s been doing. That burning need to tell someone that he did well and to hear it acknowledged.
Oh, Aziraphale is not at all taking his retirement from Heaven well.)
GOD.
You know what, I think Aziraphale is absolutely coming undone by the end. That process is certainly in full swing by the ball.
Because seriously.
The ball. The absolute fabulous madness of it. The drapery. The chandelier. Aziraphale going all-out with the miracles, retreating to the safety of Jane Austen where things go right and love prevails.
(Inviting Crowley to dance, too. Pulling him by the hand.)
Notice, too, Aziraphale’s desperate insistence that things cannot possibly be as bad as Crowley thinks they are. What a level of denial. Everything is fine, he is telling himself. Everything will be fine. I’m setting everything up perfectly to explain the big miracle, to avoid the existential threat we are both facing. We will be fine, nothing will really have to change, and I will still have Crowley.
(Oh, the vehemence. Close your eyes and pretend you are in another century. Don’t open them. Do not open them. Everything is fine.)
And—
Aziraphale is not handling retirement from Heaven well, but that’s only one of the things that are happening, isn’t it.
The danger to both of them is real. Crowley, too, is under existential threat (which Shax has helpfully reminds Aziraphale of, of course she does). They are not safe; they will never be safe while they are exiles, while Heaven and Hell can threaten both of them on a whim, while shining archangels can drop by at any point.
So what Metatron is offering at the very end is the power to do good and be appreciated, but also safety. You can be safe, he promises, your demon can be safe. You can even be with him, just as you are now—except you won’t be powerless against the rest of the world.
You won’t have to be fugitives, not any more. Not like you are now.
(It’s a lie. We know it’s a lie.
And Metatron must know full well that Crowley would never accept the terms as stated.)
They witness another thing, of course. Gabe and Beez. Their happily-ever-after.
There in the moment, Crowley is probably looking at them and thinking: we could do this. We could go off together. Yes?
Except this kind of a happy ending, Gabe and Beez being left alone but exiled, wouldn’t be a happy ending for Aziraphale and Crowley.
They’ve been in this exact place before. “We can go off together!”
And as before, this won’t work.
They have the Earth. They care about the Earth a lot, both of them. Aziraphale wants to win approval, yes, but he also very sincerely wants to make things better, to do what’s right, to be the change. And he wants, too, to win safety for him and Crowley. Wants them to be together, side by side; wants that to be allowed.
Wants them to do the right thing together. To have the power to do the right thing.
And everything they have built together falls apart.
(Angel.
Fucking Hell.
Stop the elevator between the floors. Get out. Get the fuck out. Get back.
Angel. You haven’t even seen what Crowley has seen in Heaven. What they were planning. What they need you for.
Angel.
NOT. LIKE. THAT.)