Sunday, August 30, 2015
Residual Feelings
Abnesti was super excited when he found out that ED289/290 didn't have any lingering side effects. And by side effects, he meant no lasting feelings of affection or love. However, the drug is not free from side effects. The drug left Jeff feeling "jerked around" as he put it. And while he has no remaining feelings for Heather and Rachel, Jeff does have feelings of contempt for the other men who also had sex with Heather and Rachel. Once Jeff found out that Keith was part of the same experiment as himself, Jeff mentions that Keith's teeth suddenly had a leering quality" to them. I think it's ironic that Abnesti was so excited about the drug's lack of side effects and then these unacknowledged effects caused Jeff to Darkenfloxx himself and ultimately ruin the experiment for Abnesti.
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I think this is such a cool interpretation and I completely agree. I was wondering why Jeff's death would be an explanation for why Abnesti's research would be ruined.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking a similar thing while reading "Escape from Spiderhead." Just the fact that Jeff remembered the experience and could remember the feelings he had, even though he was no longer feeling them, is enough to prove that the drug does have some residual effects even if it's just a memory. And I think that people would definitely feel messed with if they could remember all these times a drug had effected their feelings of love and desire the same way Jeff did. He admitted feeling vulnerable afterwards and awkward since he knew what happened but felt no connection to the experience anymore.
ReplyDeleteIt seems as if Abnesti was so caught up in the idea of them being subjects he completely forgot that they were humans. They may not have had complete control over themselves and their actions but they still had complex emotions.
ReplyDeleteI think the idea behind that is that people will never completely be able to control others' emotions because the human body, the soul, is bigger than a brain with chemicals. The whole philosophy behind these drugs was that humans were only 'brains with chemicals' and that is why the story ends with Jeff's death- because Jeff would rather die than be reduced to that.
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