All Spoilers Unmarked.
Fridge Brilliance:
- It makes sense that, despite not even remembering his name nor where he is, Arthur would remember Faroe's song, and that playing it would cause him to start remembering again. There's a fair amount of research that suggests that music can be used to help with memory problems
, and music therapy is often times used to help treat Alzheimer's. - In episode 20, Kayne states that "OF COURSE IT’S A CHOICE. That’s what all of this is for, don’t you get that yet?", but then also "No no no no no no no no no. [Deep breath] It’s not your choice, or his choice…", so who's choice is it? Why, it's the patrons' choice of course!
- Why didn't The King in Yellow simply kill Arthur rather than having him thrown into the prison pits? In addition to the fact that The King is something of a sadist, it's implied that if Arthur dies, John would go back to The Dark World and be once more out of The King's reach.
- John's desire to watch a movie kind of makes sense when you remember that The King in Yellow is often associated with a play named for him, so the idea that John might have adopted an appreciation for the performing arts makes sense.
- In episode 31, why was Kellin the first voice to guide Arthur? There's a few likely reasons; 1) he was the first person Arthur killed directly. Bella and Faroe's deaths were accidents, Eddie and Parker were both killed by John, and he spared The Wraith. Kellin was the first time he directly killed another human being. 2) Arthur likely sees some of himself in Kellin, seeing as how he also hears voices visited the Hotel and had knowledge of the Dream Realm. 3) Unlike many of the other individuals he's come up against, Arthur reveals that he has quite a bit of sympathy for Kellin. He wonders if Kellin was a good man who was driven mad. Thus he may feel quite a bit more guilt over his death than the others.
Fridge Horror
- Imagine you're Parker's family. Your son/brother/uncle/cousin/etc. has taken up a career that can be fairly dangerous, and one day you're informed that he was killed. The main suspect? His depressed partner that he insisted on helping out.
- Of course, that's assuming they were even contacted, or able to be contacted. Some fans believe he might be an immigrant and that his parents might not even live in the US. They might be back home, thinking all is well with their son, maybe wondering why they haven't heard from him in a while.
- The Underground City is filled with dead bodies that appeared to pass peacefully in their sleep. Judging by various context clues, it's more than possible that members of the Cult for the King in Yellow would come to the city to die, and possibly took their own lives while there, making said cult a suicide cult.
- What was Uncle/Jack Larson doing with those people in the prisons? The implication appears to be that he plays a bit rough with them, like a toddler with a kitten, but it's never explicitly stated what exactly he does. Is he simply innocently playing? Curious about how human bodies work? Or are his actions and motives more actively sadistic...
- Additionally, there's Wallace Larson's attitude towards the whole thing. Does he simply not care about what Uncle is doing? Or does he encourage it? He does outright state that "having Uncle this agitated isn’t great", does he allow him to "play" with these people to try to let out some of his urges? Does he feel taking away his "toys" might rile him up? Did he try to stop Uncle from doing these things at one point, only to give up and just try to ignore it? Or, since he basically uses Uncle as something of an attack dog, does he want to encourage and target his violent tendencies for his own benefit?
