Father Thomas - Accidentally Creepy

[Ansible]

I am just really starting to get into this community after a couple of years of playing TLD solo. So I finished what exists of Wintermute a LONG time ago and wasn't around the community to post any of my thoughts on it. FANTASTIC story overall, it does an amazing job of telling the story of the slow descent of the world into ruin. Depressing, melancholy.... it's just art. I make sure to watch the opening theme EVERY time I restart a Wintermute chapter, because it is perfection itself.

But. (There's always a but)

Father Thomas creeps me the HECK out. The whole first time I was playing Episode 3 I expected him at some point to turn evil, and... I don't know... turn into some David Lynch - type eldritch monster. There is just something about him that's... unsettling to me. It could be the way he's always looking down all the time... or the way he's always got his hands down in front of him like he's playing with his crotch on the down-low...

...or maybe it's his "baby talk" type of voice that I don't think I've ever heard anyone use except when making fun of other people.

Something about him just CREEPS ME THE HECK OUT. I mean, going through the rest of the story, I realize he's an innocent... I mean, I THINK he is... but I even try to avoid replaying Episode 3 many times just because his affectations creep me out so much. He just seems so out of place compared to all of the other characters in the story. Hell, even Mathis acts more like a "normal" human being than he does, as insane and evil as he is.

Am I the only one??

[Leeanda]

There's a new rumour that he might be rudiger and is in hiding to avoid vigilantes.. 😅.     For all I know he could be mathiss father ..

I think he's out of place because he seems a gentle soul while everyone else has a darkness about them...  The stance is a sign of either meekness or penetrance I think.. 

Edited January 17 by Leeanda

[Dan_]

It is already canon that you can't get into the community center basement because it's his dungeon. I think you can fill in the blanks as to what type of dungeon it is. 

 

[twyn1]

I don't find him creepy; I think he's rather sad, actually. Like he's having a crisis of faith, what with everything that's happening, and really just wants to get the heck out, but he feels responsible for the people in the center (& the lost souls).  I also sort of wonder if he's a repentant ex-con, making restitution in the cold wilds of Bear Island ???

[ManicManiac]

I think that generally speaking, in a lot of fiction the hyper-religious types frequently tend feel unsettling as their character tries to make sense out of things from a "metaphysical and supernatural" frame of mind... this usually takes shape of the "crisis of faith" trope (as was mentioned by another), or they may snap and double down in a warped form of extreme zealotry (like Mrs. Carmody in Steven King's The Mist).

What's different in Wintermute is that unlike most religious types who tend to have to take time to reevaluate everything... instead Father Thomas displays a level of pure acceptance of whatever miserable circumstance the people of Great Bear Island (including himself) have visited upon them.  I think it was smart of the writers to pen it that way... it implies that people like Will and Astrid are still more or less trying to come to terms with things, Father Thomas has been living through more than 10 years of the constant escalating hardship and suffering of the community he most likely grew up in.

For us (or Will and Astrid since we inhabit their point of view)... the first flare was our first taste of the quiet apocalypse... for the people like Father Thomas who have been living on Great Bear Island... they've been living in what is essentially an apocalypse since the Great Collapse.

So... I'd posit that Father Thomas' placid acceptance may at first feel off to some... I think it's pitch perfect for this character.

 

And of course, then on the other side of the spectrum from Father Thomas... we have Molly.
The two sides of the coin (so to speak)... one an "angel of mercy," the other an "angel of death." 

[PilgrimReaper]

Sad clown look = automatically creepy.

[past caring]

On 1/17/2024 at 2:26 PM, Ansible said:

.......But. (There's always a but)

Father Thomas creeps me the HECK out.......

Am I the only one??

Could be the doppelganger for the guy in your profile pic?

 

[Ansible]

That's me, so. Ummmmmm... thanks?

[hozz1235]

😆