I have this idea that The Slaughter and The Flesh are opposites, similar to The Buried and The Vast or The Eye and The Dark. They both would have existed in some minor way throughout all of societal history, but weren't fully realized until the industrial revolution. They both involve feelings of resentfulness, but whereas The Slaughter turns that outward into violent rage, The Flesh turns that inward into self-loathing. Also, literally the only time they directly interact is when Melanie went ham (heh) on Jared and his cohorts during the off-screen invasion of the archives.
They're both very complex fears with lots of aspects but one big difference between them would be that flesh is the fear of waiting for inevitable death for a specific purpose, the slaughter is random death for no reason. Alternatively the difference between the mass creation of life in the Flesh Vs the mass destruction of life in the slaughter. And in a more abstract sence, flesh is also associated with monotony as opposed to the slaughter's chaos.
It might just be coincidence but Flesh also seems to have a relation to organized crime with Piecemeal, Butcher's Window, and Taking Stock relating to it. It's cool because organised crime itself is a farm, slaughter house and butchery of people rather than animal, albeit metaphorically.
Technically, you're correct. In the context of this series, though, I do intend to have an entry about the Extinction, so I generally just refer to it as 15 Entities to make it easier.
@@dfastilloI feel it's kinda in between. It's prominent enough to get a domain, but not quite prominent enough to need Jon to be marked. Like the Ends bum cousin. He's there, he just doesn't pay rent.
Ok so the flesh is a wierd one for me. As in that it forced me to confront why i eat meat. And to confront the fact that i honestly couldnt care less about where food really comes from. Sure im scared of the episodes. But its meant to be scary. I am not scared of eating the meat of something else. I am not scared of being changed. In fact if i could pick an entity to serve it would be the flesh. I would pick the flesh because of my disability. I would want to change myself to be better. Plus as a transhumanist i see nothing scary about being inhuman. The human form was never seen as sacred for me. However seeing all these traits of myself reflected in a truly terrifying warped (pats self on the back) aspect of fear was brilliant. It truly made me rethink everything. It also terrified me. Great job jonny.
A snall mistake you make is thinking the mo sters and avatars are entirley the work of ONE entity. While they focus on one specific aspect, we have seen that you cannot remove the others from the wheel, so servants of the dark have a trait of beholding to them even though they loath it.
One aspect you did not touch on was how the flesh is also an animal fear. I think Gerard key mentions in Mag:111 that all the animals feel fear in the slaughter house, which is why there are often animals and animal flesh around Flesh stories. Also I think the hunt better encompasses character desires, where characters work together in season 1 to pursue a goal, but John's obsessive "hunt" for the truth leads to the team turning on eachother. The flesh works well as meta commentary on how creatives are pushed to produce more and more to produce while the audience mindlessly consumes horrible, malformed flesh. It does not matter what is given to consume just so long as there's meat.
Oh here's another question for you but also the algorithm gods. What do you think about vegans in general (at least rhe ones that do it because of factory farming and animal welfare) falling under like "unknowingly feeding/markedby the flesh"?
Hmmmmm yeah, I suppose that makes sense. It probably depends on whether that choice is driven out of fear or some other emotion. I mean, I guess that ties into (yet another idea I've had rolling around in my head for a while) how the Entities interact with emotions beyond just fear. Definitely going to have to think on this.
Thinking about it, its a bit weird that the Flesh is so young. Body dysmorphia and unattainable body standars have extisted for millenia. I dont remember if its was ever mentioned in the podcast, but I feel like Viscera also covers fear of pregnancy, puberty and sexual violence. Which are also not new. Also, I feel like you could draw a parallel between the Eye and the Christian god. Both are presented as this all knowing, all seeing higher being. Always following you, always knowing your secrets and sins. Thats supposed to be everywhere but never reacts or intervenes. Theres also parallels between giving a statement and a confession at a church. Both involving spilling your guts to a representative of the god, both requiring fear, shame or guilt to actually work, the repentance that comes afterwards.
It may have existed as an aspect of the corruption or stranger, with your body being changed by a will beyond your own, or looking wrong. This fear would've been torn from it's previous owner during the industrial revolution. This could play into Afton's idea for stranger links
Actually I have to disagree on that one. The Eye isn't actually ever presented as All Knowing... it's presented as EVER SEEKING knowledge. Having the Tools to Constantly FIND and root out knowledge, to observe and record. Also with with Pregnancy in specific might actually bounce between Flesh and Corruption based on the specific instance of the fear. One thing to always remember is how utterly intertwined every fear is... No single fear gets Everything from one action, which is part of why the rituals kept failing.
@@HimitsuHunter Taken that direction, I'd say sexual violence also falls under flesh and corruption. The grotesque mockery of intimacy, the objectification, the feeling of crawling, wrongness, and violation under your skin long after it's over... honestly, I think it kinda makes sense how often the flesh and corruption collide in matters of visceral physicality, you know?
One thing I never seen brought up when it comes to the flesh is it’s intersection with disability. As a chronically I’ll person myself I’ve had to come to terms with my body gradually beginning to betray me. And after so many visits to doctors and taking some many tests and drawing so much blood you do start seeing yourself as a pin cushion. You become flesh in your own eyes. A meat sack that doesn’t work as it should. I just think it’s really interesting. I plan on making some kind of post actually going into it at some point, but my brain is too preoccupied right now.
I never thought of the flesh-stranger parallels with the loss of identity and twisting the body bht they are definitely there! I always thought of the flesh as an offshoot of the hunt, with them both being primarily from animals and the fear of being chased and consumed being changed into unfeeling consumption as increases in technology change how the majority of animals are farmed.
Since you will make a Fear family tree video, you should check out the timeline of the Fear's birth presented in ep 200, it will probably help you out.
I think The Flesh is probably one of my favourite entities, along with The Corruption and The Buried. I'm a big fan of body horror in general, there's always been something so morbidly cathartic about it for me, and the way the more body dysmorphia/insecurity aspect of it is portrayed in the tma is really interesting. Plus, I just like how weird a lot of the flesh statements are. I don't know if there's any canonical connections between these two but personally I've always felt that The Flesh and The Corruption have a close connection. Both fears having much more grotesque physical attributes than of the others. Most obviously they both tend to have pretty heavy themes of body horrror, though different kinds of body horror. The Flesh's body horror is based around the fear that us and our bodies are nothing but electrified meat and how that meat can be mutilated, whereas The Corruption's body horror has a lot more to do with parasites and infection getting into you and... well... corrupting you. On top of the themes of body horror, the The Flesh and The Corruption are associated with themes of rot. While The Corruption definitely has more relation to rot, rotting meat is also mentioned in connection to The Flesh at times, with The Flesh's rot being distinctively connectioned again to the idea that our bodies are just meat and that they will one day spoil, because that's just what meat does. But even thematically, with their more psychological themes, The Flesh and The Corruption still tend to remind me of eachother. Both have connections to feelings of love, although again, different types of love. The Corruption is more focused on the obsessive love of other people and and things, and that need to be connected to something other than yourself, while The Flesh's more body dysmorphic themes deal with self-love and one's perception of their own body rather than anyone else. Both fears target and prey on people who are insecure and have low self-esteem in these ways. But those are just some thoughts I've had at the back of my mind for while, thought this video might be good place to finally share them. I've watched most of your entities explained videos now and they're really great. I'm relistening to the series at the moment and the context of these videos has been making me stop and consider how I view these fears and how they're presented in the show. Great video! Can't wait for the next one :]
Personally, as far as your narrative theory goes I would say it makes more sense to lean into the Flesh's fear of dehumanization. Okay, I'm going to try to explain this succintly. As you pointed out one of the core themes of the Flesh is dehumanization or being treated like a resource, being reduced to something that can be consumed or being seen as just a bag of meat. It's themes of mass production actually tie in very well to its themes of dehumanization and being scene as just a product. With this in mind I would argue that this could reflect how we see the characters. Sort of like playthings to satiate our desires. Not as people but products to be consumed and metaphorically chewed on. You could also argue that maybe this is a metaphor for creators and artists themselves and how we start comedifying either their art or the people themselves as something to be consumed in the form of content and digested. It could also represent and artist's/writer's drive for constant self improvement for themselves and their work even if it might come at the cost of their own physical well-being. I hear a lot of artists complaing about sore joints all the time. The idea of creating the perfect piece of art or find the perfect story that cannot exist.
@@FinalFantasmagorie I see it as the Flesh's whole thing of gore/body horror and living things simply being commodity (food, pets, livestock, waste disposal) or "meat is meat"
I personally think that the meat creature in Toby Carlisle apartment WAS toby, avatar-ified after his apartment shenanigans achieved whatever they were meant to. This makes sense if he’s a distant relative to Benjamin Carlisle, as him being eaten was him becoming *just meat*. I also reckon Tom Haan’s death via bolt gun was an ascension to avatar status, with him being the owner of the processing line domain. I really wish we got to see more of these characters :( I love the flesh, as an entity is the one i feel the most connected to and honestly I’d take an entire podcast just about it
Funny enough, I'm doing a relisten and I just got to MAG 18: The Man Upstairs last week, only to come to the exact same conclusion that maybe the flesh creature in his apartment was actually just Toby's new form, which would also make sense as the episode seems to be in some way connected to The Last Feast (Gertrude specifically calls out Carlisle as "esoteric fallout" in the end segment of MAG 130: Meat) Haan is weird because we don't really see him after the bolt gun incident, making it unclear what exactly happened to him. I have a theory (once again, from my relisten) that the slaughterhouse from MAG 30: Killing Floor is actually two separate manifestations, that being a Spiral manifestation in the outer corridors and a Flesh manifestation in the central room, which could account for Tom Haan's strange experience and subsequent disappearance.
To clarify the early Christian thing: Certain ancient philosophies believed that the physical world was an evil (or at least suboptimal) place they should be trying to escape for a higher, spiritual plane. The early Christian "gnostics", eventually declared heretics, adopted this view, even saying that the physical world had an evil false god keeping them captive. The Han family apparently adopted this framework but sided with (what they believed was) that false god
heh heh... as trans girl (deep in closet,but it still counts) body dysphoria is kinda (very ) scary, also kinda weird that trans character we have are Stranger adjacent, not Flesh, as i feel it could feast on us trans folk quite well. Maybe there will bit character like that in Magnus Protocole?
The internal struggle is a good fit...that and the possibility of it being the "point of view" specifically the 1st person pov since it's a very internal fear and how it warps the body that how we see ourselves kind of thing if that makes sense
I feel like Thrown Away and The Processing Line's theming around garbage adds a physicality in connection with the corruption that I find curiously understated. After all, when you mass produce, there will inevitably be waste. What is it about a tooth that is different from a doll head or a sheet of paper, aside from coming from a living being? Are our body parts really any different from inanimate objects once removed from our body? It is the peak of objectification to be disposable.
Okay think it has to be said: I really don't think any given avatar needs permission from their patron (what would that even look like?) to behave a certain way towards any other camp. I think that's another example of how this fandom likes to oversystematize. Remember: groups like the Lightless Flame and Divine Host didn't get their doctrines from on high, it is unclear whether their deities really want anything from them besides fear at the most basic level
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As someone with body dysmorphia and dysphoria, the flesh creeps me the fuck out
I have this idea that The Slaughter and The Flesh are opposites, similar to The Buried and The Vast or The Eye and The Dark. They both would have existed in some minor way throughout all of societal history, but weren't fully realized until the industrial revolution. They both involve feelings of resentfulness, but whereas The Slaughter turns that outward into violent rage, The Flesh turns that inward into self-loathing. Also, literally the only time they directly interact is when Melanie went ham (heh) on Jared and his cohorts during the off-screen invasion of the archives.
They're both very complex fears with lots of aspects but one big difference between them would be that flesh is the fear of waiting for inevitable death for a specific purpose, the slaughter is random death for no reason.
Alternatively the difference between the mass creation of life in the Flesh Vs the mass destruction of life in the slaughter.
And in a more abstract sence, flesh is also associated with monotony as opposed to the slaughter's chaos.
doing a family tree of the entities would be So Cool u 100% should
It might just be coincidence but Flesh also seems to have a relation to organized crime with Piecemeal, Butcher's Window, and Taking Stock relating to it. It's cool because organised crime itself is a farm, slaughter house and butchery of people rather than animal, albeit metaphorically.
I think technically there's only 14 fears, because if the Extinction was fully formed Jon wouldn't have been able to bring forth the Beholding
Technically, you're correct. In the context of this series, though, I do intend to have an entry about the Extinction, so I generally just refer to it as 15 Entities to make it easier.
No wait there was that domain. I forgot it’s name but if it wasn’t fully formed it wouldn’t have gotten that domain.
@@dfastilloI feel it's kinda in between. It's prominent enough to get a domain, but not quite prominent enough to need Jon to be marked. Like the Ends bum cousin. He's there, he just doesn't pay rent.
@@dfastillo jon says in the episode your refering to that it wasnt fully formed before the succesful rutual if i remember correctly
Ok so the flesh is a wierd one for me. As in that it forced me to confront why i eat meat. And to confront the fact that i honestly couldnt care less about where food really comes from. Sure im scared of the episodes. But its meant to be scary. I am not scared of eating the meat of something else. I am not scared of being changed. In fact if i could pick an entity to serve it would be the flesh. I would pick the flesh because of my disability. I would want to change myself to be better. Plus as a transhumanist i see nothing scary about being inhuman. The human form was never seen as sacred for me. However seeing all these traits of myself reflected in a truly terrifying warped (pats self on the back) aspect of fear was brilliant. It truly made me rethink everything. It also terrified me. Great job jonny.
I think the flesh is one of my favorite fears in TMA! The Gardener is like my favorite episode i listen to it wayyyy too often
for the fear family tree, i imagine that the extinction is the angsty teen son of the end and the desolation.
A snall mistake you make is thinking the mo sters and avatars are entirley the work of ONE entity.
While they focus on one specific aspect, we have seen that you cannot remove the others from the wheel, so servants of the dark have a trait of beholding to them even though they loath it.
One aspect you did not touch on was how the flesh is also an animal fear. I think Gerard key mentions in Mag:111 that all the animals feel fear in the slaughter house, which is why there are often animals and animal flesh around Flesh stories.
Also I think the hunt better encompasses character desires, where characters work together in season 1 to pursue a goal, but John's obsessive "hunt" for the truth leads to the team turning on eachother. The flesh works well as meta commentary on how creatives are pushed to produce more and more to produce while the audience mindlessly consumes horrible, malformed flesh. It does not matter what is given to consume just so long as there's meat.
I assumed the processing line was owned by the Han family, given the nephews link to meat factories
I actually have shown my mom Magnus Archives. She likes it. I am happy.
could you do the falling titan or the vast next?
I do have a preset order I'm working through, but the Vast'll be the episode after next! Definitely excited to get to that one.
@@FinalFantasmagorie going feral, thank you for telling me! ill be on the lookout
Oh here's another question for you but also the algorithm gods. What do you think about vegans in general (at least rhe ones that do it because of factory farming and animal welfare) falling under like "unknowingly feeding/markedby the flesh"?
Hmmmmm yeah, I suppose that makes sense. It probably depends on whether that choice is driven out of fear or some other emotion. I mean, I guess that ties into (yet another idea I've had rolling around in my head for a while) how the Entities interact with emotions beyond just fear. Definitely going to have to think on this.
Thinking about it, its a bit weird that the Flesh is so young. Body dysmorphia and unattainable body standars have extisted for millenia. I dont remember if its was ever mentioned in the podcast, but I feel like Viscera also covers fear of pregnancy, puberty and sexual violence. Which are also not new.
Also, I feel like you could draw a parallel between the Eye and the Christian god. Both are presented as this all knowing, all seeing higher being. Always following you, always knowing your secrets and sins. Thats supposed to be everywhere but never reacts or intervenes. Theres also parallels between giving a statement and a confession at a church. Both involving spilling your guts to a representative of the god, both requiring fear, shame or guilt to actually work, the repentance that comes afterwards.
It may have existed as an aspect of the corruption or stranger, with your body being changed by a will beyond your own, or looking wrong. This fear would've been torn from it's previous owner during the industrial revolution. This could play into Afton's idea for stranger links
Actually I have to disagree on that one.
The Eye isn't actually ever presented as All Knowing... it's presented as EVER SEEKING knowledge. Having the Tools to Constantly FIND and root out knowledge, to observe and record.
Also with with Pregnancy in specific might actually bounce between Flesh and Corruption based on the specific instance of the fear. One thing to always remember is how utterly intertwined every fear is... No single fear gets Everything from one action, which is part of why the rituals kept failing.
@@HimitsuHunter Taken that direction, I'd say sexual violence also falls under flesh and corruption. The grotesque mockery of intimacy, the objectification, the feeling of crawling, wrongness, and violation under your skin long after it's over... honestly, I think it kinda makes sense how often the flesh and corruption collide in matters of visceral physicality, you know?
One thing I never seen brought up when it comes to the flesh is it’s intersection with disability. As a chronically I’ll person myself I’ve had to come to terms with my body gradually beginning to betray me. And after so many visits to doctors and taking some many tests and drawing so much blood you do start seeing yourself as a pin cushion. You become flesh in your own eyes. A meat sack that doesn’t work as it should. I just think it’s really interesting. I plan on making some kind of post actually going into it at some point, but my brain is too preoccupied right now.
I love how the monster pig just went, “You’re my friend now, we’re having soft humans later!”
I never thought of the flesh-stranger parallels with the loss of identity and twisting the body bht they are definitely there! I always thought of the flesh as an offshoot of the hunt, with them both being primarily from animals and the fear of being chased and consumed being changed into unfeeling consumption as increases in technology change how the majority of animals are farmed.
Im DYING for more info on Agnes. Commenting for algorithm.
Also also I felt like anatomy students also had body stuff going on. HOW SHARP SHOULD KNEES BE???
Since you will make a Fear family tree video, you should check out the timeline of the Fear's birth presented in ep 200, it will probably help you out.
Oh, absolutely. The Fears' MAG 200 statement is basically the whole reason a family tree would be possible for most of the Entities.
I think The Flesh is probably one of my favourite entities, along with The Corruption and The Buried. I'm a big fan of body horror in general, there's always been something so morbidly cathartic about it for me, and the way the more body dysmorphia/insecurity aspect of it is portrayed in the tma is really interesting. Plus, I just like how weird a lot of the flesh statements are.
I don't know if there's any canonical connections between these two but personally I've always felt that The Flesh and The Corruption have a close connection. Both fears having much more grotesque physical attributes than of the others.
Most obviously they both tend to have pretty heavy themes of body horrror, though different kinds of body horror. The Flesh's body horror is based around the fear that us and our bodies are nothing but electrified meat and how that meat can be mutilated, whereas The Corruption's body horror has a lot more to do with parasites and infection getting into you and... well... corrupting you.
On top of the themes of body horror, the The Flesh and The Corruption are associated with themes of rot. While The Corruption definitely has more relation to rot, rotting meat is also mentioned in connection to The Flesh at times, with The Flesh's rot being distinctively connectioned again to the idea that our bodies are just meat and that they will one day spoil, because that's just what meat does.
But even thematically, with their more psychological themes, The Flesh and The Corruption still tend to remind me of eachother. Both have connections to feelings of love, although again, different types of love. The Corruption is more focused on the obsessive love of other people and and things, and that need to be connected to something other than yourself, while The Flesh's more body dysmorphic themes deal with self-love and one's perception of their own body rather than anyone else. Both fears target and prey on people who are insecure and have low self-esteem in these ways.
But those are just some thoughts I've had at the back of my mind for while, thought this video might be good place to finally share them. I've watched most of your entities explained videos now and they're really great. I'm relistening to the series at the moment and the context of these videos has been making me stop and consider how I view these fears and how they're presented in the show. Great video! Can't wait for the next one :]
A lot of the Fears are intertwined because they're like a part of something bigger I guess? Like how colors are connected
Still my definitive man for my niche internet horror anthology lore. Great job, keep it up.
Personally, as far as your narrative theory goes I would say it makes more sense to lean into the Flesh's fear of dehumanization. Okay, I'm going to try to explain this succintly. As you pointed out one of the core themes of the Flesh is dehumanization or being treated like a resource, being reduced to something that can be consumed or being seen as just a bag of meat. It's themes of mass production actually tie in very well to its themes of dehumanization and being scene as just a product.
With this in mind I would argue that this could reflect how we see the characters. Sort of like playthings to satiate our desires. Not as people but products to be consumed and metaphorically chewed on. You could also argue that maybe this is a metaphor for creators and artists themselves and how we start comedifying either their art or the people themselves as something to be consumed in the form of content and digested. It could also represent and artist's/writer's drive for constant self improvement for themselves and their work even if it might come at the cost of their own physical well-being. I hear a lot of artists complaing about sore joints all the time. The idea of creating the perfect piece of art or find the perfect story that cannot exist.
I'm fully convinced that the Vita Carnis themselves would be a good candidate for a Flesh manifestation
I've been considering doing a Vita Carnis breakdown video for a while now, and, gotta say, 100% agree.
@@FinalFantasmagorie I see it as the Flesh's whole thing of gore/body horror and living things simply being commodity (food, pets, livestock, waste disposal) or "meat is meat"
Omg this
And Mandela Catalogue is definitely Stranger
@@moonbunnygw8342 Another one I HAVE to talk about at some point.
I personally think that the meat creature in Toby Carlisle apartment WAS toby, avatar-ified after his apartment shenanigans achieved whatever they were meant to. This makes sense if he’s a distant relative to Benjamin Carlisle, as him being eaten was him becoming *just meat*. I also reckon Tom Haan’s death via bolt gun was an ascension to avatar status, with him being the owner of the processing line domain. I really wish we got to see more of these characters :( I love the flesh, as an entity is the one i feel the most connected to and honestly I’d take an entire podcast just about it
Funny enough, I'm doing a relisten and I just got to MAG 18: The Man Upstairs last week, only to come to the exact same conclusion that maybe the flesh creature in his apartment was actually just Toby's new form, which would also make sense as the episode seems to be in some way connected to The Last Feast (Gertrude specifically calls out Carlisle as "esoteric fallout" in the end segment of MAG 130: Meat) Haan is weird because we don't really see him after the bolt gun incident, making it unclear what exactly happened to him. I have a theory (once again, from my relisten) that the slaughterhouse from MAG 30: Killing Floor is actually two separate manifestations, that being a Spiral manifestation in the outer corridors and a Flesh manifestation in the central room, which could account for Tom Haan's strange experience and subsequent disappearance.
To clarify the early Christian thing: Certain ancient philosophies believed that the physical world was an evil (or at least suboptimal) place they should be trying to escape for a higher, spiritual plane. The early Christian "gnostics", eventually declared heretics, adopted this view, even saying that the physical world had an evil false god keeping them captive. The Han family apparently adopted this framework but sided with (what they believed was) that false god
heh heh... as trans girl (deep in closet,but it still counts) body dysphoria is kinda (very ) scary, also kinda weird that trans character we have are Stranger adjacent, not Flesh, as i feel it could feast on us trans folk quite well. Maybe there will bit character like that in Magnus Protocole?
The internal struggle is a good fit...that and the possibility of it being the "point of view" specifically the 1st person pov since it's a very internal fear and how it warps the body that how we see ourselves kind of thing if that makes sense
6:39 I think The Spiral was heavily involved too, along with maybe The Eye ,The Stranger and Desolation? It feels like an attempt at marking ngl
I got so excited to see this video!!! I’m glad that even though I just joined the fandom there are still people making videos like this
Awesome job dude.
I feel like Thrown Away and The Processing Line's theming around garbage adds a physicality in connection with the corruption that I find curiously understated. After all, when you mass produce, there will inevitably be waste. What is it about a tooth that is different from a doll head or a sheet of paper, aside from coming from a living being? Are our body parts really any different from inanimate objects once removed from our body? It is the peak of objectification to be disposable.
Okay think it has to be said: I really don't think any given avatar needs permission from their patron (what would that even look like?) to behave a certain way towards any other camp. I think that's another example of how this fandom likes to oversystematize. Remember: groups like the Lightless Flame and Divine Host didn't get their doctrines from on high, it is unclear whether their deities really want anything from them besides fear at the most basic level
cannibalistic urges! yippee!
Relatable.
Fabulous video as always, man! I ESPECIALLY love the artwork. The lighting is gorgeous. ❤ Keep up the great work!