The Great Disappointment caused by Criticulous

Well, Santa Muerta. I guess one symbolic character deserves another, and sometimes even the President of the United States must stand naked.

Wait, is that right? Is that relevant? Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of taste... and little else. Your obedient servant, Criticulous, rising up in praise of the misreading, the imposition of prejudice and the perpetual denial of the fixed reading.

Santa Muerta, I guess we share this much: nobody's too pleased to see us when we come around, and we have a reputation for killing things. Ever wonder whether our creators have some kind of death wish?

So, I ended up writing this reply because Vile is, frankly, terrified of death. Your last speech struck a nerve - you can see it in the review he wrote. He knows, even if he denies it, that his fascination with religious thought is more than a simple intellectual respect for the accumulated wisdom of the ages. It's a deeply held conviction that dangles on the thread of his childhood fear of death. Ask him about the time he met God. That's always good for a laugh at his expense.

As I understand it, you are asking us to embrace death... to embrace oblivion. Not out of some stupid suicidal impulse, but on the grounds that acknowledging death is a sure route to compassion - and a drive towards making meaning out of this meaningless universe. I get why you'd tend towards the nihilistic - I guess Santa Muerta handles those stars that explode, or whatever they do, and you've presided over some hairy situations. Say, was it you that God sent that time to take care of the Egyptians? Are you the same thing as the Angel of Death?

You'll indulge me the questions: like you have a will towards The Big End, I have a will towards criticism. I'm sure you'll appreciate the problems of being a cypher. Everything gets determined by the symbolism of our position. None of those human personality quirks for us. I mean, there's the possibility of irony for humans. Not for me.

Maybe I ought to present an alternative. Maybe I can suggest there are other ways to inspire than to recognise the innate fragility of human life. But you know what they say - you can't argue with death.

I rather admire how single-minded you can be. I suppose that's where we differ: you have a solid location. All the various cultural representations of death - those details that make you comprehensible to the limited consciousness - give you a personality, but they are all related to that one,  unalterable fact. You are the end of life.

It's not so simple for me. I have to be different - not in form, or description, but genuinely different every time I manifest. Perhaps not every single time. But I can't approach Pony Pie's show at the Oran Mor in the same way as I approach Michael Clark's Barrowland Project. Death just turns up at the end, switches the lights out. I have to pay attention to whatever is summoning me,and respond.

Death can  never get it wrong. Criticulous is bound to get it wrong.

Finally, an answer to your challenge. Sure, think of death if you like. It might make you more compassionate - although it is as likely that the Black Dog will turn up, or  you'll just end up being a pain at parties (Monfrooe does warn of these before she incarnated you, it's true). But being a critic... be like Criticulous... accept fallibility, be constantly alert to failure and success, assess, express, determine, be brave.

Ach, we probably don't disagree that much.