Deciphering Good Omens

Based on the novel by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, the Amazon Prime series, Good Omens, quickly gained a cult following after debuting in May of 2019. Contained in this story of looming Armageddon are explorations of grief, friendship, good and evil, the Bible, Milton, God and what it means to be human. This book provides thirteen essays that center on various aspects of the show, including theology, fan culture, female gaze, textual elements and more. Also examining Gaiman’s sense of obligation to Pratchett, as well as the relationship between Good Omens and the hit series Supernatural, these essays provide a critical analysis of the show and its prominent themes.

Erin Giannini served as an editor and contributor at PopMatters, and has written numerous articles about topics from corporate culture in genre television to production-level shifts and their effects on television texts. She lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Amanda Taylor works at California State University, San Bernardino. Her research interests include Supernatural, Futurama, science fiction, and posthuman theory. She lives in Southern California.

Edited by Erin Giannini and Amanda Taylor
Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 193
Bibliographic Info: notes, bibliographies, index
Copyright Date: 2023
pISBN: 978-1-4766-8164-1
eISBN: 978-1-4766-4988-7
Imprint: McFarland

Acknowledgments v
In the Beginning: Nice and Accurate Analyses of Good Omens
Erin Giannini and Amanda Taylor 1
Good Omens and Adaptation
Avoiding a Contemporary Apocalypse: Examining the Effects of Shifting Good Omens from Its Cold War Context
Rhian Waller 11
God Is a Woman: Good Omens, Voice-Over, and the Female Gaze
Julia Vanessa Pauss 30
Ways of Mourning: Reading Grief as Friendship in Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman’s Good Omens (1990)
Pavan Mano 46
Good Omens and Fan Culture
“Okay, Crowley, Junior”: Subversions and Transformations of Good Omens in Supernatural and Its Fandom
Cait Coker 61
Fan Desire and Normative Masculinities in Good Omens Gift Exchanges
Mary Ingram-Waters 74
The Theology of Good Omens
“In the beginning, it was a nice day”: Aziraphale and the Subversive Miltonian Angelology of Good Omens
Melissa D. Aaron 87
Eschatological Ambiguity in Good Omens: How Concerns for Survival Blur the Lines Between Good and Evil
Morgan Shipley 104
Sola Fide: Ineffability, Good Omens, and the Reformation
Philip Goldfarb Styrt 120
“This Angel, who is now become a Devil, is my particular friend”: Romantic Satanism and Loving Opposition in Good Omens (2019)
Alex Tankard 133
Naming, Artifacts, and Texts in Good Omens
Adam’s Task: Naming and ­Sub-creation in Good Omens
Janet Brennan Croft 151
The Book as Character: Tracing Textual Elements of Good Omens Across the Novel and Miniseries
Tara Prescott-Johnson 163
“Welcome to the end times”: A Conclusion
Amanda Taylor and Erin Giannini 177
About the Contributors 179
Index 183

“Solidly researched articles that should interest both media scholars and fans.”—Medienwissenschaft