I am currently obsessed with Good Omens. Here’s the thing: I listened to the audiobook way back in 2010. It was one of the first audiobooks I’d ever tried, and I enjoyed it immensely, but I didn’t get obsessed. I also clearly missed a hell of a lot of subtext, and forgot lots of important details, because when the miniseries came out in 2019, I could’ve sworn that, while it was a good adaptation, there were a lot of embellishments and changes. It was a good show, and my whole family enjoyed it. Like many good shows, I watched it twice in a row. I meant to get around to rereading the book because it had been so long, yet never did. Then came season two.
I enjoyed the book. I liked the show a lot. But season two? That was something entirely new and different and it took over my brain completely. My tiktok fyp is filled with nothing but the ineffable husbands at this point, heh. I watched those six episodes, rewatched the sixth, rewatched the entire season twice more, rewatched the first season, went back to the last two episodes of season two again, and finally got around to rereading the book. I’m dreaming about it. I have the urge to write fanfiction, which I’ve never had the urge to do before. Actually, I’m excited about potentially starting to write something at all, for the first time in nearly a decade. I thought I’d forever lost this love and excitement about writing after the traumas of my year in Boston, but here I am. Maybe this is what I needed. Just a few more times watching through the show first, especially the second season. And pining for season three, which won’t be here for years. Sigh.
So when I say that I’m obsessed, I very strongly mean it. And that obsession finally got me to pick up the book again. It’s been 13 years since my last read, and while I was planning to listen to the original audiobook, I learned that there was a full cast version. Normally, I really dislike full cast audiobooks, but this one had Michael Sheen and David Tennant, and I couldn’t not listen to it.
Things I learned, on second read: The miniseries followed the book far more closely than I remembered. Yeah, there were some differences, but a lot of what I thought was made up or added or embellished was actually there in the book. Second, I either completely missed or purposely forgot about some of the really cringy language that marked the book as being published in 1990. (F-slurs and R-slurs and fatphobia and cultural stereotyping – many of which were presented to be just as horrid as they are, but some of which were just there, accepted and acceptable.) And weirdly, I didn’t remember much of the queer-baiting from the book (the slurs and descriptions, yes, but not the actual Azira-Crow undertext), probably because I was 31 and still trying to break free from of my very heteronormative upbringing. The book was both better and worse than I remembered, and honestly, at this point, I think I like the TV version better. I know that’s pretty blasphemous for a book person to say, but it’s true. The book suffers from some of the drawbacks of its time, like any media.
So now it’s time to go back to the show and obsess over micro-expressions and put together theories for the future and cry a little bit more over that ending. J and L are surely getting exhausted of me talking about Good Omens, but at least I know I’m not the only person obsessed out there. If that means my sister and friends and I are texting each other memes and TT vids and theories, so be it! And if you haven’t 1) read this book or 2) watched this show, both are highly recommended!
This is a novella-sized addition (3.5) to the Greta Helsing series. I’ve read the first three, with the fourth coming out later this year. Honestly, it’s been long enough since the third (2019) that I barely remember the previous installments. However, it wasn’t difficult to get into this one.
The Zen Leaf 