I disagree with absolutely nothing in this post! But... if I can provide a kind of... side argument? I'm never sure about the etiquette of doing this on Dreamwidth, but I desperately want to talk about The Magicians about 100% of the time, so if it's okay—

Right now, my biggest problem with the Josh/Margo storyline is that I just kind of don't think Margo wants a romantic partner; and that's—gonna be a problem. That's definitely book canon getting in my way to an extent, since (as I recall, it's been a while) it's explicit book canon that Janet doesn't want a boyfriend; but we've also literally never seen indications from Margo (until she kind of sort of indicates she might be open to it with Josh, but—I have some notes, below) that a romantic connection was a goal, or important to her. And, I mean—it's not, for everyone! We've actually seen plenty of indications, in fact, that that kind of connection is affirmatively unwanted, when it comes to Margo.

Margo doesn't get Eliot wanting a boyfriend; it doesn't make sense to her, and why would it? She's sure as hell never seemed to want one. And her jealousy of Eliot's partners is explicitly limited to ones where the relationship muscles in on their friendship: she's jealous of Mike, because Eliot wants to, like, date him, and she's jealous of Fen, because he's going to marry her, and he's never been married before: what's that going to mean for them? She's not jealous of Idri, and she's surprisingly okay with Quentin, if what we're talking about is what people think of when they hear the word "jealousy." But they have literal years of Eliot's whole Thing for Quentin not getting in the way of his and Margo's friendship: why should it bother her? I know that there's a sort of medium-popular "Margo is pining for Eliot" read, but—I think it's just both simpler and more complex than that. I think Margo is Eliot's best friend, occasionally somewhat sexily. She wants that to be the most important relationship in their lives—because it already is, for her. What's threatening to her is stuff that threatens the emotional and practical centrality of that friendship for Eliot. [As an aside: I'm really curious to know what Margo knows about the mosaic timeline, and how she'd feel if Eliot and Quentin actually did date, but—I digress.]

This is a little—tricky for me to talk about in a fandom context, because I am myself aromantic, and also shacked up life partners-style with my best friend, with whom I have an incredibly close and loving but not romantic relationship. Eliot and Margo's friendship feels really, really familiar to me, and yeah, this thing about how I don't think Margo wants a boyfriend does fit in against my personal experience, but I'm trying really hard to avoid the like—"I'm aromantic, so I want Margo to be aromantic because representation" fannish argument? Like, there's nothing wrong with that argument in the abstract, it's just not what I'm saying. I'm just saying: on a character level, on a narrative level, I think they've given us a lot of data suggesting that Margo doesn't want a boyfriend—and I think Josh, who absolutely under different circumstances could be her person, even conceivably her person the way my partner is my person, does want Margo to be his girlfriend. And it's going to be super, super painful for him every time something underscores that that's not what she wants from him.

Whomp whomp.

I like Josh a ton, and I even like him with Margo, but—I think Margo's grieving, and cripplingly lonely, and yeah, she can say she doesn't want a partner in crime, but I think that's an open (and like—agonizing) question for her to even look at head on right now. She found her person; she thinks he's dead. They were maybe not ever boyfriend and girlfriend but he was still her person—what does she do now?? And Josh is there, and he needs a friend, and he needs a friend with whom there can be some kind of complicated sexual dynamics, and that dynamic is a dynamic that I think Margo is going to find appealing, whether or not she's totally fucked up over Eliot, and whether or not she can really pull apart in the moment why this is a thing that she instinctively wants. But I don't think that right now she can like.... sit back and thoughtfully analyze what Josh is asking from her, to see if it's something she wants to give.

But if True Love isn't something she wants, then Josh wanting it with her is going to be A Problem. If they can get past that, then I'd be all over it, but if Josh is going to hanging around wanting things from Margo that Margo is just flat-out not interested in giving—conceivably things that she might not be able to give him, but—I kind of don't care about whether this is a choice or something in Margo's natural makeup? Like, consent is really important on the show, and it's obviously pretty central as a value to Josh, so if Josh wants a Relationship™ and Margo doesn't, especially if untangling her grief-loneliness-stillnotwantingaboyfriend feelings is difficult for her while Josh thinks they're getting something started, whether or not Margo is aromantic, or thinks of herself as aromantic, this seems like something that is going to be a major obstacle between them, and not something that either of them is going to particularly enjoy figuring out.

:/

[sadist!viewer!me: yaaaaas bring it on break EVERYONE'S HEARTS ~ ~]