I have been a devotee of Good Omens for the majority of my life. It is among my favorite books… ever? I’m going with ever. I was deeply entrenched in the fandom in college, and never miss an excuse to drag out my copy and read bits aloud. And in all the time I’ve been enamored, there have been rumors about this and that adaptation. Films and treatments and whispers and actors ranging from Robin Williams to Johnny Depp and beyond. The eventual audio drama. And then, finally, after years of waiting, we received what we deserved.
It’s the end of the world, my dears. And who could have predicted how delightful it would turn out to be?
As a translation of the book to television, the show works gorgeously. Finding that middle ground between being too slavish to the original or driving off the map entirely is a hard ground to find in every project of this scope, but Neil Gaiman’s scripts, Douglas Mackinnon’s direction, and a some superb casting have done right by the book (and the late, demonstrably great Terry Pratchett, who coauthored the book with Gaiman). What’s more, the show maintains the spirit of the story, which is perhaps the hardest thing to do when adapting between mediums—even moreso when the originating material has a very fixed and unique sense of humor.
Add in a delightful score from David Arnold, and a refusal to pad out the narrative beyond reason (the show clocks in at a lean, mean six episodes, which is just the right amount to ensure that you miss it the instant it’s gone), and you have a perfect weekend’s worth of binge-watching. Whether you’re a fan of the book who enjoys the opportunity to see characters come to life, or you’ve never gotten around to cracking it open and have been wondering what all the fuss is about, Good Omens is just damn good fun all the way around.
There are a few pieces from the book that feel a tiny bit undersold in the show, and it’s hard not to wonder if that’s down to not having Pratchett with us any longer. While the book was cowritten in such a way that much of story had both authors hands in it, they did admit from time to time that they each favored certain portions. One of those bits that Pratchett admitted to favoring was Adam and his gang, the Them, who are a little underwritten and underused overall in the series. (Of course, this might also have to do with needing to use the kids less for the sake of shooting schedule laws, which are far more complicated when it comes to child actors.) While we get the basics of the Antichrist’s story, some of the nuance gets lost in the translation, particularly as it relates to his friends and their history prior to the main events of the show.
Of course, the characters who get much more of the spotlight are unarguably the most adored by Good Omens fans—the demon Crowley (played to hissing, sashaying perfection by David Tennant) and his angel co-conspirator Aziraphale (an utterly cherubic Michael Sheen). Having said that, the execution of the duo’s story was something of a shock for a fan like me, who will freely admit to shipping the heck out of the pair for ages, and even reading and writing fanfic to that end. A bunch of it. And also to dressing up as Crowley and Aziraphale for Halloween with my partner. It’s well known that Crowley/Aziraphale shippers are a sizable contingent of the Good Omens fandom, to the point where both Gaiman and Pratchett had made note that they were aware of it, with Gaiman recently noting that fanfiction and its ilk is also Making Stuff Up, which is the same as all writing—though they did say that making the duo a couple was not their intent when they wrote the book.
Which is fascinating because this miniseries is emphatically a love story.
[SPOILERS for the entire series below]
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Magic for Liars
I know, I know: They say they’re friends, what’s wrong with friendship, you friend-hating fiend. But there are endless stories dedicated to platonic friendships between two male friends. (Or male-seeming in this case, as they are truly an angel and a demon, which then ultimately begs the question of whether conventional sexuality or gender should even apply for the two of them, and it likely shouldn’t, but that’s a fairly long digression…) While modern fiction seems to have a hard time understanding that it’s possible for men and women to “just be very good friends”, the precise opposite can be said for queer people. We’re always presumed to be “just very good friends” and nothing besides. Having said that, it is entirely possible for people of the same (or similar) gender to go from being true best friends to being in a relationship of some sort. It is also possible to say “you’re my best friend” and actually mean “I love you” or even “I’m in love with you.”
Exhibit A, when Crowley is making his way to Aziraphale’s flaming bookshop (he doesn’t know about the fire yet), the Bentley is playing Queen’s “You’re My Best Friend”—which is not an ode to frienship in general, but in fact a love song written by Queen’s bassist for his wife. Immediately thereafter, Crowley arrives and opens the doors to the bookshop, and being unable find the angel, promptly has a complete breakdown over the what he assumes to be Aziraphale’s death. It’s not the shock or disbelief over losing a friend that we can see in Crowley’s face, but utter desolation. “Somebody killed my best friend!” he screams, slumped on the floor in anguish. (Again, I remind you, John Deacon’s friend in the song that served as the cue for this whole scene was his spouse.) Crowley then immediately goes to a pub to get trashed, forgetting his plans to escape the Earth before the true Final Countdown because he’s just lost the most important person in all of creation to him… wait sorry, that’s Creation with a capital ‘C’.
The point is (as Crowley would say, drunkenly, before beginning a long-winded aside about dolphins), the entirety of the Good Omens miniseries unfolds with all the beats you’d expect of a romantic comedy/epic, and that is very much the hinge on which its enjoyability swings. It’s not just the song selection—“Somebody to Love” starts playing when Crowley exits the bookshop, believing that he’s lost Aziraphale; violins swell when the demon reveals to the angel that he has saved his beloved books from a bombing during the London Blitz in 1941—but the entirety of the plot. These alterations to the story seem to reach some sort of zenith during the deep dive into Crowley and Azirapahle’s “Arrangement” in episode three. The opening half hour of the episode works hard to create greater context for their six-thousand-year partnership, tracking them through the ages, and finally closes out in 1967 with the angel handing over a thermos of holy water to his dear friend, saying sadly “You go too fast for me, Crowley.”
He’s talking about Crowley’s driving. But of course he isn’t, because there is no context on this earth in which the words “you go too fast for me” are about being in a car, friends.
This is the part where the usual suspects roll their eyes because culture has endlessly enforced the idea that queerness is conditional and that “slash goggles” (i.e. viewing not-canonically-comfirmed characters as queer) should be derided and that the only person who should get a say in the sexuality of characters is the author—unless the author flat-out says their characters are queer, in which case, they should have made it more obvious if they expected anyone to believe that.
But this pairing is pretty damned (sorry, blessedly) obvious. It’s obvious in the way the Aziraphale bats his eyelashes at Crowley and grumps about the fact that his pristine old jacket now has paint on it, then smiles beatifically when the demon vanishes the stain by blowing gently on his shoulder—both of them knowing full well that Aziraphale can remove the stain himself with angelic will. It’s obvious in how angry Crowley gets when Aziraphale claims he’s “nice”, and Crowley shoves him up against a wall in a standard intimidation tactic that the angel barely registers as fury. It’s obvious in the way that Crowley sits across Aziraphale with a drink every time they’re out, and simply watches the angel indulge in rich foods. It’s right there even at the start, when the Angel of the Eastern Gate shelters the Serpent of Eden from the world’s very first rainstorm with one of his wings, through they both have a perfectly functional set to themselves.
We’re at a point in time where more and more writers and creators are perfectly aware that fans will see characters as queer whether they are written explicitly that way or not. Being aware of this—and not having anything against queer people—many of them say something to the tune of “you can view this relationship however you like, we’re cool with that”. It’s very nice. To some extent, it’s even incredibly helpful, because being okay with the queering of characters goes a long way in telling homophobic people that their vitriol toward queerness isn’t welcome. But when a huge swath of a fandom is queer, and certain characters are commonly rendered as queer to most of those fans, and then we are given a version of the story in which interpreting those characters as just great buddies is honestly taxing to one’s logical faculties… well, it’s hard not to wonder at what point the “straight” view of said characters is likely destined to become a minority interpretation one day.
Which is precisely where I found myself while watching Good Omens.
This clarity kept turning up and tuning in, even in the terms of their dear Arrangement; after Crowley suggests that they start doing work on each other’s behalves during a run-in in the 6th century, another meeting at The Globe in Shakespeare’s day sees Crowley bringing it up again, only to have Aziraphale try and shoot the idea down. “We’ve done it before… dozens of times now,” the demon wheedles, and he might as well be saying “But we’ve made out a lot lately, I think it’s time to accept that you like hanging out with me.” To make up for sending Aziraphale to Edinburgh, he agrees to infernally intervene to ensure that the Bard’s latest play (Hamlet) is a rousing success—and again, the angel offers up that ethereal smile and Crowley takes it as his compensation, as though it’s all he ever wanted in the world.
People may cry, stop shoving your sexuality in other people’s faces! (They always do, like a reliable clock striking the hour with a very irritating chime that you can’t seem to turn off.) But that’s hardly the point, is it? Because I didn’t say anything about sex, I said they were in love. And I’m having a very hard time finding any evidence to the contrary.
Critics and most of the internet have noticed how romantic the show is. The actors did as well, and talked endlessly of it in interviews. The series gives us longing glances and a messy breakup and drunken mourning and a canonical bodyswap (the stuff of fanfic dreams, my lovelies) where Aziraphale strips Crowley’s body down to its undergarments for the purpose of taunting Hell. At the point when everything threatens to blow up in their faces, Crowley asks—sorry no, he begs—Aziraphale to run away with him. And then when it’s all over, he invites the angel to spend the night at his place, and Aziraphale’s response is “I don’t think my side would like that” which is basically divine-speak for “I came out to my family and they’re not cool with it, so I’m not sure this is gonna work.” This has all the markings of the sort of Shakespeare play that Crowley appreciates: the funny ones where no one dies. And it ends on our couple having a lovely lunch in a fancy locale while a swoony love standard plays on in the background.
It’s odd to think that the fact that it took over two decades to produce a Good Omens series is part of the reason why the romantic aspect seems more unabashed than ever; in the book, plenty of people think Aziraphale is gay and that the angel and demon are a couple, but it’s done with that wink and nudge that was common around the turn of the century. These days, teasing at the idea that your core duo might seem a little gay to onlookers doesn’t constitute a ready joke because there’s nothing particularly funny about that suggestion when queer folks are fighting so hard to be seen and represented. And the lack of those winky moments, the way the story simply takes their codependency as a sweet given, makes Aziraphale and Crowley read even more genuinely as a pair. But if you had told me this was the version of Good Omens that I’d see in 2019, I’d have never believed a word. I was ready for extra background, more story, different jokes, but not this. Not confirmation that there are other angels and demons exchanging information and working together in Crowley and Aziraphale’s reality, but Heaven and Hell have a specific problem with their partnership because they clearly love each other too much.
And sure, you can read the story differently. You can choose to ignore those cues and enjoy a story about two very good friends who help to avert the apocalypse. I’m sure for some, that’s a more enjoyable take. But I’m more curious about whether or not, in twenty or thirty years time, people will think of the Good Omens series as anything but the story of an angel and a demon who spent six millennia figuring out that they should probably buy that cottage on the South Downs together.
Emmet Asher-Perrin really needed that dazzling display of love right in time for Pride Month. You can bug him on Twitter, and read more of her work here and elsewhere.
Michael Sheen at least has said that he also saw it as a love story, and furthermore defined the moment that Aziraphale fell in love with Crowley as being the moment he not only saved him from the Nazis during the war, but remembered to save the documents as well.
While I agree that this is clearly a love story (it comes across as romantic but ace to me), when it comes to your specific examples – I just can’t see that Hamlet bit as anything other than a joke about David Tennant.
i’ve seen the previews a few times, anxious to see![.](//s04.flagcounter.com/mini/Jkzv/bg_FFFFFF/txt_DEDEDE/border_FFFFFF/flags_0/" width="1"/>)
I have to admit, I only saw platos and agape, but no romantic love. Two friends who are closer than family, sure. Doing things for each other, sure. But romance, even ace? I didn’t see it. Maybe because I’ve had one or two of those friendships myself. It does explain the comments I would get from other people about those friendships, though.
This is going to sound weird, coming from a queer guy like me, but I preferred the Aziraphael/Crowley pairing as a buddy story, without the overt, on-the-nosey homoerotic overtones.
That said, Sheen and Tennant were for me the true joy of the series, which I found very hit and miss. Sort of like the book, which to this day remains my least favorite Gaiman, and the only Gaiman I have never revisited.
THIS EXACTLY. I was blown away by how obviously and wholly in love they were. I’ve seen some people call it “queerbaiting” because they don’t kiss or anything like that, but, to me, it’s so, so apparent they love each other in the face of heaven or hell or the end of the world. It’s 2019 and the subtext is text and my little queer heart is full to bursting.
I’m gonna have to re-read this. It’s been a while, but I don’t recall any romantic ideas between the two of them from the book. I always looked at them more like Walter Matthau and Herbert Lom as Kendig and Yaskov in the amusing spy movie “Hopscotch” – two old agents on opposing sides who have more in common with each other than with their respective superiors.
It’s possible that I missed the subtext.
I’m not a fan of adaptations turning subtext into text, but I *am* looking forward to seeing this adaptation … after I re-read the original.
I am not queer but I support every word of this. Sheen and Tennant play their relationship as so clearly in love with each other that I have a hard time reading it as anything else. And it’s delightful.
As for the lack of sex, well, hard to imagine an angel having sex anyway. At least not this particular angel. I’m on the fence about Crowley.
I have not read the book but enjoyed the series tremendously. In my view, it’s a love story between two angels though it’s hard to say it’s only platonic. Felt very much like the flirtation going on between Sergeant and Jezebel (forgot her real name in the story) only hotter? :)
Gaiman’s angels are all asexual — he’s consistent in Good Omens, Sandman, and even his short story “Murder Mysteries.” Gaiman’s angels have no sex and can take on any outward appearance they prefer. (“Murder Mysteries” is an interesting counterpoint to this version of Good Omens, in which two angels begin experimenting with the idea of “love” that the Creator created for human, with disastrous consequences.)
Having said, that, Crowley and Aziraphael clearly love each other, and I very much enjoyed the series.
From the start, I saw that they were clearly making the bromance a bigger factor between the two. And I thought it was great. Much like how when Mel Brooks wrote the stage version of the Producers, he realized that it was a love story between the two, and it made a great movie even better. A hard feat to do.
Just because somethings a love story, doesn’t mean it’s always a sexual love story.
Also, in all of Heaven and Hell, these two have experienced something no other Angel or Demon has. They have been there, with Humanity, experiencing it, from the start. They have come to love Humanity, for reasons that come directly from who they are. Aziraphale for the beauty and greatness humans can achieve, and Crowley, because they can be far more evil and destructive than he could ever come up with. In short, for both sides, humanity has the capacity to out do anything Heaven and Hell can.
And they only have each other as someone that can understand what they see. So naturally they are drawn to each other. So often their conversations are about that. Which are humans? Good or Evil? Both of course.
There’s no one else they can talk to about this.
I got Amazon Prime just to watch this … and as soon as I saw episode one I came running into the lounge shouting at my poor husband “I’m in love! I’m in love with an angel and a devil!” And of COURSE they love each other. They aren’t quite human, so god (or perhaps the devil) only knows what form their love takes, but they are sooooo the old married couple who have grown into each others counterpart so completely it’s a joy to see. Any time either one of these is “on stage” the show lifts from good to very good. Anytime they are both on screen the show becomes pure magic.
Are they gay, do their bodies work like humans, do they have sex, are they actually male or something else? It doesn’t bloody matter. They are them, and they are magnificent.
@&: “I always looked at them more like Walter Matthau and Herbert Lom as Kendig and Yaskov in the amusing spy movie “Hopscotch” – two old agents on opposing sides who have more in common with each other than with their respective superiors.”
I have not seen Hopscotch, but this is what I got from the book. The series definitely takes it a step beyond, though without any explicit sexual overtones.
Oh yes. It was a pretty plain subtext in the book that even I a straight dude in small town 90s Illinois picked up immediately, but the show foregoes subtext for just plain ol’ text and it’s awesome.
I strongly suspect that, yes, these two are meant to be queer – but also that, no, homosexuality isn’t the main part of it. Queering is about disrupting binaries, and we often think of gender but it’s far more than that. As Emily said, these two are an angel and a demon, and physical gender has little meaning for them. (Which isn’t to say that it isn’t part of it, of course! These two present as male, which must have meaning.)
The binary they’re queering is Good-Evil far more than it’s male-female. That’s what the whole story’s about, IMO.
I love this article and feel exactly the same way. thank you for writing this.
As someone who hadn’t read Good Omens before watching the mini-series, I don’t have the novel to compare the context of Aziraphale’s and Crowley’s relationship with each other. But their relationship is *absolutely* the highlight of the series for me, and I simply loved their hesitant, stormy chemistry. Watching it through, it felt like the angel and demon had the kind of bond formed by kindred spirits who only have one another for true understanding; their shared love of humanity and its civilization was the bedrock everything else is built on.
But THIS reading — of their asexual but unquestionably romantic pairing — feels like subtext that I hadn’t allowed myself to see before. And it unquestionably makes the miniseries so much better. I’m a gay man from a minority background, and I never developed the habit of shipping the stories I loved to make them more queer. After seeing how much it can enrich your enjoyment of the story, I feel like I’ve been missing out.
BRB, making everybody in the X-Men gay. <3 Thanks for sharing, Emily. Your perspective means a lot to me. :)
Hissing, sashaying perfection exactly!
I’m surprised no one has yet mentioned Aziraphael learning to dance the gavotte in a “discreet gentlemen’s club.”
In the book? Eh, not so queer to my admittedly cis-het eyes. In the mini-series, queer as hell (or heaven) and I’m just fine with that. Chemistry like that should not be wasted.
@19, or the fact that he makes a point of collecting Oscar Wilde first editions…
I’ve “shipped” Aziraphale and Crowley for a long time and enjoyed the series a lot, but the fact that the series ramped up the subtext to truly rom-com levels and still refused to actually, textually commit except for the one sneering joke about “your boyfriend in the dark glasses” even though Gaiman added a whole new ending bit for the two of them rankled some. Especially since the show kept the Newt/Anathema and Shadwell/Tracy “I’m male, you’re female, we might as well get paired off” endings, which felt just as perfunctory in the show as in the book (particularly Newt/Anathema) and never came anywhere near the chemistry between Aziraphale and Crowley. Reading into subtext is a glorious tradition, but it’s still a tease, not text.
Having not read the book (and, honestly, how is that possible I wonder now) I had no preconceived notions. But I enjoyed the first episode so much I ended up binging the entire series on Friday evening. And somewhere in the 4th or 5th episode, I turned to my friend and said “Oh!! It’s a LOVE story!!!”
Because of course it is.
Absolutely agree with this assessment! I have never read the books but this was all I could think as I watched the show. And honestly, Michael Sheen and David Tennant definitely ham it up. The moments you’re citing spoke to me as well. Great piece!
Anathema Device (in the book) mistook them for a gay couple when they ran her off the road on their visit to Lower Tadfield.
Aziraphale isn’t gay … or straight. He’s an angel, and therefore appears to be mostly bemused by the whole Sex thing. Unlike Crowley, who’d undoubtedly give anything a go.
But him regularly being mistaken for gay also makes perfect sense in general, because his *not* being a red blooded sex charged male would be commented on as well. Presumably he’s just *extremely* hard to get ;)
And yes, I totally agree about the in-love thing – they’ve gone past friendship a thousand years ago. Now they’re firmly family.
I don’t think they actually needed to do much to make the queerness real. Both actors were so magnificent and had such good chemistry together they did most of the work themselves. David played Crowley with a louche sensuality that just oozed sex appeal, and Michael played Aziraphale as someone who just adored the world and wanted to experience all the joys it can offer whilst downplaying the more fussy aspects of the character in the book. I think Crowley loved Aziraphale from the beginning, it took a lot longer for Aziraphale to feel more than a friendship. You can see from the way Crowley turned up to help that he adored being with Aziraphale. Aziraphale on the other hand found it confusing and just a little suspicious. The way Crowley looks at Aziraphale you can see he adores him and Aziraphale barely notices. Eventually the penny drops and the protestations become meaningless. “I don’t even like you”…..”you doooooo!!” Made me laugh. The rakish demon and the prim angel, like a married couple. Arguing about silly things but closing ranks when it’s important.
I have read this book, many, many times since it came out. It literally changed my life.
And I got Amazon Prime just to watch it, all at once. And i loved it.
And I am wondering if there is a way to suggest that this is a relationship between an Angel and a Demon, over the course over six thousand odd years. So, putting human labels of it are going to be imprecise, at best?
We (as humans) don’t really have a good hole for that particular peg, and insisting that they are one thing or another to the exclusion of all of permutations of relationship variations requires ignoring some of the canon (or the text or the show or both). I think their relationship is unique, which is why the story works so well.
Or maybe that’s just my biases and filters.
Quoth Em: “It’s odd to think that the fact that it took over two decades to produce a Good Omens series is part of the reason why the romantic aspect seems more unabashed than ever; in the book, plenty of people think Aziraphale is gay and that the angel and demon are a couple, but it’s done with that wink and nudge that was common around the turn of the century.”
More like thirty years, and not quite turn-of-the-century — Good Omens was published in 1990.
Fuck, I feel old……….
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
I always loved the book. Now I love the series. Must reread now!
I was always slightly bemused that Gaiman and Pratchett both said they didn’t intend to write the angel and the demon as a couple, because in the novel – from first interaction to the nightingales singing in Berkeley Square – it is quite obvious that they are.
That certain night, the night we met,
There was magic abroad in the air,
There were angels dining at the Ritz
And A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square.
Now of course, as is made canonically clear in the text, what that means – in terms of what I as a human would call sex/sexuality – is obscure and probably ineffable. But they’re a couple, and they’re in love, and they love the world so much they saved it from Armageddon, and that is awesome.
I enjoyed the series relationship more than the book one, precisely because it was slightly romantic whereas the book not so much.
But is anyone else finding the series to be more of a miss than a hit? It just seems badly written for a TV show, too bookish with too much narration, as if someone is too in love with the words on the page to stop speaking them to the audience and start showing them things.
I thought it brilliantly acted but that it needed someone other than the original author to write the screenplay. Didn’t we all learn that lesson from Stephen King?
@19 – That bit about the discreet gentlemen’s club, like so much of the series, is lifted nearly verbatim from the book.
To rephrase what I said above, it is astounding me that anyone could read the book or watch this show and not view Crowley and Aziraphale as romantic partners.
@28
I feel you there. I was catching up on Cobra Kai not that long ago, and all the 80s references in it made me both nostalgic and feel very old indeed. Where did all the time go, so very quickly?
@@@@@ 31 Kate: “But is anyone else finding the series to be more of a miss than a hit? It just seems badly written for a TV show, too bookish with too much narration, as if someone is too in love with the words on the page to stop speaking them to the audience and start showing them things.
I thought it brilliantly acted but that it needed someone other than the original author to write the screenplay. Didn’t we all learn that lesson from Stephen King?”
YES. You are not alone, Kate.
On top of this, I did find the whole thing too BBC-ish, in the stuffy, old-timey sense. Like watching one of those old, slavish, word-by-word Henry James adaptations, though with a little humor thrown in and better sets. The humor also felt a little forced, with a self-congratulatory, winky-winky smugness I did not care for.
I watched a Neil Gaiman interview about how they long were looking for the perfect Satan, and how Benedict Cumberbatch turned out to be perfect, blah, blah, blah. So I was eagerly looking forward to that. And once we get to the scene, all we get on screen is five blink-and-miss seconds of Plastic Satan. He could have been voiced by my mother and no one would have noticed.
@@@@@ 15 John Pettigrew: “I strongly suspect that, yes, these two are meant to be queer – but also that, no, homosexuality isn’t the main part of it. Queering is about disrupting binaries, and we often think of gender but it’s far more than that. As Emily said, these two are an angel and a demon, and physical gender has little meaning for them. (Which isn’t to say that it isn’t part of it, of course! These two present as male, which must have meaning.)
The binary they’re queering is Good-Evil far more than it’s male-female. That’s what the whole story’s about, IMO.”
I missed your comment before, and I’m sorry, because I find it amazingly apt.
Loved the book so many years ago. Besotted with the series, with the love story.
Now, will somebody please adapt ‘The Wee Free Men”and show those Harry Potter people how it’s done?
@17 Jackalope Jones: Welcome to the X-Men party ;)
Honestly, as someone who was maybe interested in seeing this series…..meh. I’m tired of series that STRONGLY HINT at a gay relationship–or that even have two main characters pretty much act as a couple “in all but name”–without actually going there. Especially since there seem to still be heterosexual pairings in this show.
Like, why CAN’T it be more than subtext for once? Why can’t they eventually kiss and either realize how much they love each other or realize that maybe a romantic relationship isn’t the best for them? I feel like if one of these characters were a woman, there’d be no question that this would happen at some point in the story.
This to me seems like yet another case of queerness by and for straight people: sure, their gayness “seems” obvious, but it’s not actually there, and squeamish straight viewers don’t actually have to worry about seeing two men kissing or anything actually gay like that.
I’ve always loved the book, and thought the series was a pretty great adaptation. From the book perspective, I only ever viewed Aziraphale and Crowley as colleagues in an “Us against Management” sense, however I have no problems with the depiction in the series either. The “I don’t even like you!” “Oh you DO!” moment was pretty great.
@31, 34: The voiceover was an interesting choice. In the book God is effectively silent throughout, and the sorts of things that are commented upon by the narrators Gaiman and Pratchett are done through the prose and footnotes. Choosing the voiceover to represent God (in a feminine voice by Frances McDormand — great choice I thought) was an interesting way to get at the narrator commentary without bringing authors into it. I absolutely didn’t mind the commentary because all those little narrator bits in a Pratchett book are part of the joy of the prose and it gave it a chance to put those bits in.
That said, voiceover work is an older stylistic choice (see any number of discussions of Blade Runner with and without the Harrison Ford voiceover) so perhaps that made it feel a little dated.
Again, I was mentally reciting along with a lot of Ms. McDormand’s script, so clearly my brain was filling in a lot of the gaps that might have been strange if you first came to the series.
I did miss the OTHER riders of the apocalypse but also accept that it would have drawn out the end sequence a lot more than would have been good for the show.
A bit I loved- Crowley saying ‘I love you’ by offering a ride in his car.
I didnt get that at all. I thought it was a beautiful tale of two best friends, but I never saw it as lovers and as far as I can tell, they’re not meant to be. I guess we see what we want.
I agree with everything EA-P said. Thank you for saying it.
@38 I believe your comment goes to the heart of why we’ve never seen a Pern series. No conceivable way could they get around the sexuality of dragonriders!
There seems little doubt that the Good Omens screen adaptation was a love story. That it left us with so many question marks seems part of the beauty, to me.
There was a time when I would be criticized for seeing gay-ness everywhere. I feel okay it about it with this book, except that I know that these characters are without gender, really. The book talks about Aziraphel being confused for a gay man and then points out that he can’t be one because he is an angel and has no sexual parts. I don’t remember if this is specifically said about Crowley. But it does seem a criticism of those who attribute being gay to behaving or acting or looking a certain way–in other words, to stereotyping people. So I am hesitant to go there.
I do see the book as a love story primarily with two creatures who have come to love humanity and each other. They appear to us to be males, even though they aren’t. This device lets us consider the work as one featuring two men who love each other and consider how we feel about that. But to me, the biggest ideas in the book are on the hypocrisy of religion. I mean, there are so many times in the book that they ask whose work was whose? The Reign of Terror? World War I? The Spanish Inquisition? They don’t even remember. And they, like us, don’t understand what the purpose of all the early violence is? And then there’s Heaven and Hell, who are both looking forward to another war.
Really enjoyed the love between these two, incorporeal though I think it is.
Descriptions of them as an old married couple remind me of the Babylon 5 maintenance man who watches Londo and G’Kar for a couple of minutes and remarks, “How long have they been married?” (I thought for a moment that that was Neil Gaiman’s season 5 script, but it was Harlan Ellison’s.)
A love story? I never thought of it that way, but I think you’ve nailed it. However, I believe that while so far as the story is concerned, the love interests are the two celestial beings, at the higher level, it’s a menage a trois. There is not only Gaiman paying homage to Pratchett in the script, but in the novel and the mini-series, there is a huge amount of homage to Douglas Adams, from dialogue quips to the inclusion of dolphins and restaurants. It comes through in the novel (I’m just re-reading it for the third time) to the radio series to the TV miniseries, there is a huge amount of Adams’ sense of dialogue and humor (particularly the narration attributed to God) in evidence.
Thanks for the fine article, and of course, thanks for all the fish.
I am now flipping through the rewatch skipping everything that’s not Crowley and Aziraphale. Love it, love it. Thanks, Emily, for a great article.
I somehow never read the book this way, but watching the series last week I definitely felt there was a deeper relationship between the two than just a good friendship (and what do you expect really, after 6000 years?). I loved the dynamic in he show!
Because I am not queer myself, I’m maybe less likely to read queer relationships into stories. Often my experience of a story lines up with my own experience in life and that makes me feel sceptical when someone claims two characters are actually queer – not this time! From the very beginning of watching this show I felt there was more to their relationship, they cared more deeply about each other than you would expect from two friends. And then there were the date-like dinners, the break-up… The dynamic was perfect to me and I thought it was just the cutest :D
For the first time ever reading an article like this, I wholeheartedly agree! I finally saw it too haha :D Of course, that’s also because it was quite a lot more obvious than some of the other examples I’ve come across, but I’d say that’s a good thing. We could do with more obvious queerness in mainstream media!
I also liked the diversity of the show, and the gender swaps for some of the characters who would traditionally have been male (god, beelzebub, and wasn’t pollution actually male in the book? I don’t quite remember!) and the fact that this mattered nothing for how those characters were addressed. Beelzebub was still a lord and not suddenly a lady!
As an aro/ace person, I have to say that Crowley and Aziraphel’s relationship feels like the representation I’ve been craving. They’re clearly so in love, but not in the way that leads to steamy sex scenes or copious making out. They’re in love the way that I love someone – just wanting to bask in that other person’s company, to just be comfortable with them and intimate in a way that doesn’t involve smashing genitalia and other sensitive bits together. To me, it’s just the right amount of everything with them (except maybe screentime) and I adore it. I appreciate that other queer people feel the two should be explicitly gay with all the physicality that includes, but I can’t think of a more ace thing to say than “You’re moving too fast” of a relationship LITERALLY thousands of years in the making. And for what it’s worth, I ship this ace relationship with every fiber of my being.
This article blessed my family and watered my crops. Literally the whole time my friend and I were watching Good Omens, we were screaming at each other, “THEY’RE IN LOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE!” And they are. I can’t remember such happiness.
This article is such a delight, really well written and highly relatable. It’s also just making me remember all the moments from the show that brought such a smile to my face.
I’m also enjoying reading the comments and seeing all the people who don’t normally read into gay subtext acknowledge the very clear romance present in the show.
I love this article and agree with every word! I am rewatching the series now, replaying every delicious scene they have together, and it’s utterly delightful. There are so many scenes that, to me, are clearly romantic. I melt a little every time Crowley calls Aziraphale “angel”. And the music, especially, is something to note. The last words to be heard in the show are actually this stanza of “A Nightingale in Berkely Square”: “The streets of town were paved with stars / It was such a romantic affair / And as we kissed and said goodnight / A nightingale sang in Berkeley square.” – Then the series ends with the words “For Terry” and I couldn’t love it more. I like to imagine that their dinner at the Ritz ended just as the song suggests. But I should stop gushing – just want to add that I first read the book when I was still a young teenager, and even then I immediately interpreted the relationship as explicitly romantic. I hope that the show will be remembered for this extraordinary love story. And I appreciate Michael Sheen so, so much for acknowledging it so openly! I hope that in a few decades, these things will be made more explicit. Until then, I will remain in love with this series, and their story, which is a love story in any way you might interpret it.
By the way, I need to add: I also totally love the idea of this as an ace love story. They are celestial beings and genderless by definition – there doesn’t necessarily need to be a sexual component for it to be a deeply loving relationship. And I think this is also what the writers (especially Neil, because he is now answering questions about their relationship with the mindset of 2019 instead of the early 90s) mean when they say that the relationship is not “gay” or “romantic” per se. It’s not gay or sexual in any way, but it’s love all right. I think we can all agree that the relationship between Crowley and Aziraphale transcends the usual meaning of friendship – maybe best represented by the meaning behind Queen’s “You’re my best friend”, as the article says as well. They’re best friends in the sense that they absolutely belong together, like spouses would. And this deep love, to me, is much more than the premise of a “buddy comedy”. But it’s all about the feeling, and there doesn’t need to be anything sexual about it. I could go on talking about this for hours… I am so in love with this series and the characters. It’s so nice to see that other people enjoy and love it so much as well.
@53,
I did the same.
I agree with KG @50: As an aro-ace viewer, Good Omens felt incredibly validating and important.
It was the first time I saw a relationship that’s somewhat similar to my own. Of course my husband and I are nothing like Aziraphale and Crowley, but we have a relationship that’s not sexual, not traditionally romantic, and nonetheless it’s love. A & C share a love that defies allocishet norms, and that, in my view, makes it fundamentally queer. I’m very glad to have such a relationship depicted in a mainstream TV series. I didn’t know how much I needed to see it until I finally saw it.
Something I noticed- Aziraphale says Crowley is a demon, but always calls him.by name. Crowley often calls Aziraphale ‘Angel.’ It serves as a definable pet name.
“Many people, meeting Aziraphale for the first time, formed three impressions: that he was English, that he was intelligent, and that he was gayer than a tree full of monkeys on nitrous oxide. Two of these were wrong; Heaven is not in England, whatever certain poets may have thought, and angels are sexless unless they really want to make an effort”
Meaning it’s already in the book that Aziraphale is supposed to appear to be gay, and that he is not, as he has neither gender nor sexuality. But the love between those two has always been obvious (as for the exact nature of that love, well, anyone can see what they prefer in a relationship between an angel and a demon. In the show it definitely appeared romantic).
@47: All those mentions of the ineffable, and never do they stop to ask whether they may not eff it after all…
They are so obviously in love, and I LOVE it. It is by far the best and cutest queer love story I have ever seen and I wish there were more like it. I don’t think the term gay really quite applies to them simply because I don’t think they are technically sexual beings, but the absolute all encompassing romantic love just sizzles. And there is just never anything platonic about the stunning David Tennant. Such a fantastic show and casting.
I thought the ending was one of the most romantic I’ve ever see. Also I can’t stop playing A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square, which is a bad side-effect, as well as wanting to watch the whole series again. And again. And again.
I just wish they had put Pigbog and the other four bikers of the repocalypse in there…
“People covered in fish…” lol
–Frank
I have not read the book, but I got the feeling from the series that Aziraphale was gay but Crowley was not. However, they really did seem like a married couple to me.
OP: “Because I didn’t say anything about sex, I said they were in love.” That’s certainly the vibe I kept getting, and it was really touching to watch.
I like the “ace ineffable husbands” reading but Crowley sounds like he was going to do Burbage backstage the moment the play was over.
@64,
I just spit tea all over my tablet.
My thought was that this was their love story in its own way. It is deeper than friendship but not really a familial love. I think that if they were human they would absolutely be a couple but that since they’re an angel and a demon, they’re not going to correspond to the human ideas of love and coupledom. The easiest way to put it is that they’re just simply each other’s better half.
To me, it’s the best of both worlds. I never shipped them in the book and was actually frustrated with the lack of non-shippy fanfic. I still don’t ship them in the book, there’s just not enough material there for me to see them as anything other than hesitant friends (at least hesitant on Aziraphale’s part.) There just isn’t enough tenderness or emotional frankness there.
But the TV show ‘verse is very specifically romantic and I ship the hell out of them. The TV show has tenderness and emotional honesty (and dishonesty) in spades. I thought I’d never see them work as a couple and still be true to themselves, but the show bridged the gap and made me see it. I only wish they’d held hands at the end of the world there, or hugged. I’d have been up for a kiss but Neil didn’t want to contradict the book. The book does have them shake hands and never does specify if they let go, so it’s a pity Neil didn’t use that to have them hold hands while sticking up for Adam against Gabriel and Beelzebub.
They’re separate versions of the same characters; a different take, a different angle on the same story. So while I ship TV-verse, I’ll probably never see them that way in the book. Aziraphale in particular is just too different.
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@@@@@ 67: IMHO, you’re right on the money. I never expected to see their friendship queered up, but enjoyed it immensely in the show.
I do wish Miranda Richardson was given more screen time, as I adore her, but it is what it is.
@50/54
I’m cis-het and Crowley/Aziraphale are TOTALLY my ace OTP. It’s how I always read it, too.