patrokla

CW for extended discussion of suicide, suicidal ideation, hospitalization, and syfy’s the magicians.

recently i’ve had a lot of time on my hands, and so obviously i’ve been thinking about a comment i saw a few months ago on a magicians instagram post. the comment, which was left in response to an ongoing debate about the season 4 finale of the magicians (and liked by executive producer of the show chris fisher), argued that mentally ill people shouldn’t watch shows in which bad things happen to mentally ill characters because they might confuse it with real life and be triggered by it. the implication of this comment was that criticism of the show by mentally ill people is not worth listening and responding to because it’s unreasonable - because we have, in some way, confused the show with real life, and taken to heart the events that happened in it too deeply. furthermore, it implies that the solution to this is for mentally ill people to avoid being a part of the audience of the magicians.

this is an interesting argument to make given that quentin, one of the main characters in the show, is canonically depressed - very seriously so, at points. if we assume that the comment’s argument is correct, the question has to be asked: who is quentin for, and who is meant to relate to him, if not mentally ill viewers? of course, we also have to ask if this argument is correct in the first place. the answer is that it clearly isn’t, but it seemed to me to be worth some consideration - after all, i spent two or three days after watching the season 4 finale deeply depressed and barely functional, and that’s a reaction i’m eager to avoid having ever again.

so, some thoughts on the magicians, portrayals of mental illness and suicide in media, and criticism of those portrayals:

while thinking about this, i’ve realized that an awful lot of the media most important to me (e.g. flowers, the fall, please like me, wolf in white van, the goldfinch) involves bad things happening to mentally ill characters - including said characters trying or even succeeding in killing themselves. one of the assumptions that the comment’s argument makes is that all approaches to depicting mental illness are equal. but i’d be remiss if i didn’t note that none of these books, shows, or movies sent me spiraling into a depressive episode when i first encountered them, and that they all remain dear to me. i have rewatched/read and enjoyed all them several times, and often felt gratified to see my experiences with mental illness and suicidal ideation reflected in them. to me, this proves that there are responsible, non-triggering ways to portray these difficult, horrible, isolating experiences. (which is not to say that my experience with any of this is universal, but the fallout from the magicians‘ handling of suicide has been much more widespread and longlasting than i’ve seen with any other media concerning similar topics).

up until the season 4 finale, i counted the magicians as one of those shows i could watch to feel less alone. i was especially grateful to see a depressed character who has a difficult history with hospitalization and medication, something i strongly relate to. quentin is a character who makes it through almost four seasons of television by the skin of his teeth, without ever Solving The Problem of his depression, because on some levels it’s unsolvable, but learning and growing and loving all the same. i watched all of this, and thought it was good, and right, and important.

and then the season finale happened, and the magicians amply and unexpectedly demonstrated that there are also terrible, irresponsible ways to write about mental illness and suicide. the morning after the s4 finale i wrote:

i think i’m so upset because every part of quentin’s struggle with depression has been deeply resonant with my own experiences, up to and including his death, and that is not how i want to feel about someone who kills himself! i would like to see differences. i would like to see noticeable and appreciable differences!

and i keep thinking about that comment. wondering if along the way i did confuse something fictional with real life, if i made the same mistake quentin makes in relying too heavily on stories that let him down and make him try to be things he’s not.

but then i think, yknow, quentin is meant to be a character you see yourself in. the magicians was a show that purposefully appealed to people like q - people like me. he’s the audience surrogate, the depressed everyman, the person whose relationship with fiction is meant to reflect our own. he’s the guy who starts the show in a mental hospital. who in the world was meant to relate to quentin if not the people who have also sat on the other side of a desk from a doctor and told lies to try and get out of a hospital ward?

and the writers must’ve been aware of that. i say that not out of optimism, which i absolutely don’t have when it comes to this show, but because as late as the episode prior to the finale, they acknowledged that quentin was a character who was representative of a kind of relationship with fiction that is somewhat maladaptive, but also sometimes absolutely vital to survival. quentin says, in episode 4x12,

the idea of fillory is what saved my life. this promise that people like me, people like me, can somehow find an escape.

it should go without saying that you don’t make that kind of character kill himself  - or, if you prefer, ‘sacrifice himself in a premeditated act that guaranteed his death, after ensuring he wouldn’t be rescued, and after spending a season with serious ongoing trauma he was unable to process.’ you don’t spin his death into something heroic. and you don’t spend a season afterwards having everyone he cared about talk about how trying to save him would be disrespecting how much his death meant for them, as though his life meant less. as though his life didn’t mean anything to him. it feels really obvious, as i type this, that you shouldn’t do that. and i don’t mean that in a moralizing way - we have studies that suggest portraying suicides like this can lead to a spike in copycat suicides. writers discussing these topics have a very real duty to doing so responsibly, carefully, and preferably in consultation with organizations or people who can provide feedback. to the best of my knowledge, the writers of the magicians did not do this.

i’ve become very aware in the last year that there are right ways and wrong ways to write about these topics. and so i find it hard to buy the argument that i’m still so deeply unhappy about the magicians because i’m someone who can’t be trusted to decide something as simple as what media to engage with. i’m capable of being discerning, and i go out of my way to avoid things i think i can’t handle. the magicians didn’t slip through because i thought it’d be fun to add ‘suicidally depressed’ back onto my resume. it slipped through because it started out telling a story in a way that felt right, and then it took an abrupt, awful turn.

likewise, i find it hard to believe that i should be barred from criticizing the magicians because i was hurt too deeply by it - or that my criticism, my unreasonable, illegitimate criticism, is the reason why the show was canceled. there are people who can reasonably be blamed for how and why the magicians ended, and people who can’t be. something else that should go without saying: the actors and the audience are not in that first category. my recognition that the show’s treatment of quentin’s death is a seriously cautionary tale on a number of levels is not a problem. writing that story in the first place, and continuing to defend it in the face of any and all criticism is.

"The Long Winter, as Eliot remembers it, and as Tick still insists on explaining twice that day, is exactly as it sounds: a long fucking winter."

Or, the one where Eliot, Margo, and Quentin get snowed in at Castle Whitespire.

"The Long Winter, as Eliot remembers it, and as Tick still insists on explaining twice that day, is exactly as it sounds: a long fucking winter."

Or, the one where Eliot, Margo, and Quentin get snowed in at Castle Whitespire.

Eliot has never seen the sun.