Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m delighted to be returning to The Big O, where the assumptions that define Roger’s world are collapsing with terrifying rapidity. More and more, it’s seeming like the entire city of Paradigm is some vast fabrication, a dream of a city more than the genuine article. As last episode quotes from Hobbes, “Imagination and memory are but one thing, which for diverse considerations hath diverse names.” What we don’t know or remember, we fill in with creations that feel just as substantive as our true memories. And in a city without memory, who is to stop a man like Rosewater from painting our collective consciousness in the hues of his dream?
In a city that’s already seeming like cardboard facades on wooden struts, Roger feels like the greatest fabrication of all. He’s already learned he’s a product of Rosewater’s conditioning, specifically bred and brainwashed to pilot the Megadeus. Given that knowledge, how could he possibly believe he’s acting of his own volition, rather than simply playing out some minor thread in Rosewater’s grand opera? Given the profound incuriosity of Paradigm’s general population, perhaps Roger’s desire for the truth was also premeditated – perhaps Rosewater, having already claimed everything else, now desires an observer to witness his ascension. Did Rosewater intend for all of this, and to ultimately claim Roger as his chosen son? Let’s find out!