Annihilation (6 Points)

 

            There were moments in Annihilation where I felt like I was breaking out of a cult. Especially early on, when the biologist started to become aware of the extent of the psychologist’s hypnosis, it felt like suddenly seeing that the life you were living was a lie and that the truth was so much more horrifying. Or, perhaps, it was more like having a religious experience. Like being blessed and cursed with knowledge, the ability to see how the world really worked and how those in charge want to suppress that truth. It felt like I was reading the journal of someone slowly, but still suddenly, being radicalized. Whatever you want to compare it to, Annihilation recreates that sense of discovery in a very real way, focusing on the horror and confusion over the sense of wonder other stories may focus on. But it doesn’t quite ignore that sense of wonder either, it just ties it to the horror. That sense that the world you’ve known your whole life is completely different that you were led to believe and the combination of fear with a tinge of pride you feel. The fact the tower is revealed to be organic mirrors realizing how connected everything and everyone really are, how we’re all made up of the same stuff. It almost played out like a detective story to me, every revelation leaving me either speechless and making my imagination run wild.

 

            It’s interesting that the protagonist is an introverted scientist, because it makes Area X a double-edged sword for her. On one hand, she eventually gets free reign to explore whole new ecosystems by herself, which is what she already loved doing. On the other hand, the path there was littered with death and betrayal, and the discoveries she makes are scary and confusing. She’s able to witness her husband start to finally understand her, but it’s through a journal read after his death. Under different circumstances, this scenario would’ve been a dream come true for the biologist, but instead it’s a nightmare. And what a horrifically beautiful nightmare it is.

 

Artistic body horror, abstract creatures, and living words really make Area X feel grounded while also like something we can’t begin to understand. The fact that fungus is so prominent is interesting, because even real fungus feels almost unreal to me. It’s a category of being somewhere between plant and animal, yet completely different from both, some of it being deadly to us. The fungus is both personified and yet so far beyond human makes it feel like it’s just out of grasp, making the confusion it sparks in both the reader and the characters more bewildering.

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