![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
/-/S'pht-Translator-Active/-/ |
![]() | Another Lovecraft reference with the W'rkncacnter | |
![]() | Posted By: UrsusArctos | Date: 3/26/22 6:49 p.m. |
![]() |
Looks to me like there are Lovecraft references in Marathon that go beyond the familiar Cthulhu mythos, in this case from the story "The Rats in the Walls". In this story the protagonist keeps hearing phantom rats in the walls and comes to a horrifying discovery about his family heritage. It ends with the protagonist incarcerated in an asylum (which is no spoiler to anyone remotely familiar with Lovecraft's work!) uttering the following classically Lovecraftian lines - They must know it was the rats; the slithering scurrying rats whose scampering will never let me sleep; the daemon rats that race behind the padding in this room and beckon me down to greater horrors than I have ever known; the rats they can never hear; the rats, the rats in the walls. This doesn't sound all too different from this sentence in Tfear's description of the W'rkncancter's assault on Aye Mak Sicur in the failed timeline, does it? But the trackless whisper chattering through
Given that the W'rkncacnter is a creature of total chaos and is associated with doubt too, that it should also cause mental madness right out of a Lovecraft story seems appropriate. Also, the association of an unearthly, buzzing voice or sound with madness comes out of Lovecraft too. There's the novella "The Whisperer in Darkness", which features choice descriptions of the voice of an extraterrestrial being, which, while not remotely as monstrous as Cthulhu or the W'rkncacnter, is nevertheless well capable of driving people mad -
Perhaps Greg K. or someone else at Bungie was into classic Lovecraft? These really don't seem to be a coincidence in light of the previous thinly-veiled allusions to Cthulhu. For the curious, both the stories I referred to are available in full at wikisource, but be warned that the name of the black cat in The Rats in the Walls (named after one of Lovecraft's own beloved cats) is monstrously offensive. https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Rats_in_the_Walls
|
![]() | |
![]() | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
|
![]() | |
![]() | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() | Replies: |
![]() | |
![]() | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
|
![]() | Problems? Suggestions? Comments? Email maintainer@bungie.org Marathon's Story Forum is maintained with WebBBS 5.12. |