r/FromTVShow

***Lots of spoilers so please don't read if you've not watched season 4***

Ive posted this in another reddit page too.

This is quite long so bear with!
So after a few rewatches (yes more than once because I'm curious lol), I have some rambling theory/thoughts which I feel aren't quite complete, but I wanted to get it out there now, see what others thought. It runs along the theory that FROM is fairytale-esque and folklore and how I think Iron and Liver are important.

It has been hard to organise, so I make thoughts, add quotes, then give my summary/questions/thoughts after the * symbol. Hope it makes some sense lol, a lot does link.

IRON
This came from Boyd calling his wife Iron Abby, and I remembered from reading fairy tales that in some, Iron was used to ward off evil/protection. My initial thought was, are the talismans made of iron? Not sure on that as of course they don't work all the time if someone let's them in and Sophia/MIY can touch them, but maybe they are the rules? Clara had to get the talismans for Sophia/MIY so...

I digress.

Back to iron.

ORIGIN
"Iron is the most well-known ferromagnetic metal and exhibits the strongest magnetic properties among common materials. Its atomic structure allows for a high magnetic permeability, making it highly effective in forming permanent magnets."

* Magnets are horseshoe shaped, has this to do with loop in a way? Or why people can't leave as it creates a magnetic field in FROMville? Also, horseshoes were used in folklore to ward off evil/protection.
* Called Ferromagnetism, sounds like the word FROM 🤔

HOW IRON IS MADE
"Iron is made by heating hematite or magnetite in a blast furnace along with with a form of carbon called "coke" as well as calcium carbonate (CaCO3), better known as limestone"

- "Hematite has been associated with strength, protection, and transformation throughout history, often linked to blood due to its red coloration. In ancient cultures, it was believed to have magical properties, used by warriors for courage and by Egyptians as protective amulets in tombs."
- "Magnetite: in ancient times, it was known as “lodestone” and considered a sacred stone by various cultures. It was believed to have protective qualities and was often used as a talisman or amulet.
Magnetite’s magnetic properties made it a key component in early compasses, enabling navigation across vast seas, which revolutionized exploration and trade routes. It is revered for its grounding and manifestation properties. It is used to enhance one’s personal power, attract abundance, and create a protective energy barrier. Magnetite’s energy aligns with the root chakra, helping individuals connect with the Earth’s energy, facilitating balance, and aiding in meditation and divination practices."

*Continuing with the magnetic link but also blood and red of liver (will come to this later) but also the earth and roots, like the Faraway trees? Blood also has a metallic taste.
* Also to add, iron does rust and corrode which (is also reddish in colour) and does align with the aesthetic of FROMville, with its rusting cars, derelict buildings. Rust also introduces the idea of transformation/corrosion over time.
*Water rusts Iron so which is the protector?! If the Lake of Tears is the way out, then does that mean Iron is keeping people stuck in FROMville?🤔

IRON IN FOLKLORE
I did some research and found this link, which gave some additional info into iron in folklore: Link: https://handwiki.org/wiki/Chemistry:Iron_in_folklore

"In the Lords and Ladies novel of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, the Elves are a fey and maleficent race, strongly sensitive to what a modern reader will recognize to be magnetic fields. They are powerfully averse to iron for this reason.
In Quatermass and the Pit, an iron crane is used to disperse the energy of a Martian that emerges from archeological excavations. The use of "iron and water against the devil" is cited by one of the characters who suggests and applies the theory."

* the above also mentioned "magnetic fields" which got me thinking about FROMville and why people can't leave. Are they stuck in some magnetic field? And that is protecting the outside world from FROMville?
* have not deep dived water yet but it is interesting the above mentions using iron and water against the devil. I know water is important in FROM and I know energy can manipulate water so...
* Electromagnetic induction - shake to use, need no batteries. Is this how the lights work without being plugged into anything? As in underground where Tabitha finds, that area is where this electromagnetic induction is as it is in the earth and the earth wire in a plug provides a safe path for electricity to flow to the ground if a fault occurs, preventing electric shock by keeping the appliance's metal case safe.

LIVER & REGENERATION
In Greek mythology, Prometheus's liver is repeatedly eaten by an eagle and regenerates, making the liver the focus of an endlessly repeating punishment - which feels very FROMville. 
Historically, the liver was sometimes regarded as:
• the seat of the soul
• the seat of courage
• the seat of emotion
• a source of divinatory knowledge
So symbolically:
LIVER = LIFE / SOUL / COURAGE / EMOTION / REGENERATION

* In FROM, MIY is eating liver, the creatures remove organs from victims, including liver
Liver is the life force, and has regenerative properties, helps to sustain their lives? It also creates bile which was still present in the Smiley even though it was dead, yet it did eventually regenerate.
* Liver holds strength of the soul, which is another eg of what FROMville does to it's citizens, tries to make them lose their soul in a way, become the worst of themselves, to destroy them.
* Bile from Liver is yellow, which links to MIY and his suit, but also yellow in Fatimas cardigan and Ethans raincoat. Not sure why this is important right now.

I think this is enough, i need to watch something else now 😂😂

Everybody hates Elgin (me included), but I've never seen anyone talking about how great he was at the start, like when he helped Ellis and Fatima in the middle of the night or when he was really kind to other characters. We're you guys neutral or did you hate him from the start? Tbh he was one of my favorite characters when he was introduced

I started thinking about this because of a detail in Miranda's arrival in 1978 that may have gone unnoticed.

Miranda apparently never encounters the fallen tree in the road.

In the arrivals we know, the tree is the first sign that something is wrong: the road is blocked, the crows appear, and the person is eventually forced onto the road that leads to Fromville.

Miranda's arrival seems different.

And this becomes even more interesting when we remember how Victor describes Fromville before the massacre of 1978.

The town seemed normal.

People were out on the streets, cars were driving around, there were families, people taking pictures, and everyday life seemed to be continuing normally. They weren't living in fear or hiding every night.

According to Victor's memories, the massacre is when everything changes.

Another detail really caught my attention: Miranda never paints the monsters.

Her paintings show people, children, houses, the town, the bottle tree and the lighthouse. The monsters only appear when she encounters them on the night of the massacre.

That makes me wonder if the monsters didn't exist in that version of Fromville when Miranda arrived.

Miranda also didn't arrive there by accident. After her visions, she knew she had to find and save the children. She went there with a mission, even if she didn't necessarily understand exactly what was behind the children or what was going to happen that night.

So perhaps the sequence was very different from what we assume:

Miranda arrives in a normal town.

She is there to save the children.

The inhabitants are still normal people.

The massacre happens.

Victor survives.

And maybe that is the moment when something breaks.

Maybe what we know as Fromville — the town of monsters, the fallen tree in the road, the mechanism that traps people, and that entire reality — is a consequence of what happened that night.

That would also give Victor's survival a different meaning.

He wouldn't simply be a child who survived the massacre.

He could be the piece that prevented that cycle from ending the way it was supposed to.

And maybe that's why the Fromville we see now is so different from the one Miranda entered.

I'm not saying this is the definitive explanation. What interests me is the possibility that 1978 wasn't simply another cycle, but the moment when the Fromville we know actually began to exist.

The fallen tree may be one of the first clues:

Miranda apparently arrived before it.

EDIT / CORRECTION: I need to correct one point in my original post. In S3E4, Victor explains that he and Eloise played hide-and-seek inside the houses during the day. At night, they couldn't play because there were monsters, and they didn't have talismans yet.

So the monsters already existed when Victor was a child. My original wording suggesting otherwise was incorrect.

So i started it randomly and I didn't know what it was like or what it was about. But now when i am currently on season 3 and I am getting bored so i thought, hay why not check on YouTube if i can get any answer about how long it's gonna go like this Mistry without any answer. And I only heard that it gets bad. But from my past experience i thought i should ask on reddit, at least there i will have real answers. So tell me about it, without any spoilers!

The characters don’t get a moment of respite. It’s the night monsters, MiY, dolls, kimono lady, the voices. Not one moment where we feel that humans might just make it out. Everything is working against them. No breathing space for the audience and the characters. So many creatures of different species and no answer at all. I am tired of this. It’s just disaster after disaster. Confusion after confusion. Kinda getting bored.

When Victor was left alone as a child in Fromville, why weren't other people brought to the town to fill the space? Why did he had to spend so much time alone in the town?

We have seen when someone dies, new people are brought to town to fill the count.

I have a suspicion that the Man in Yellow pulls a tooth from the people he kills—or has killed—in Fromville so he can later shapeshift into them. What do you think? Does that make sense? Could eating the liver also be part of the transformation? It’s possible he can only transform into people whose livers he has eaten and whose teeth he has kept.

Não consigo dormir passo o dia inteiro pensando em From..isso é vício ,hiperfoco transtorno psicótico maníaco ou apenas uma fã de carteirinha? Não sei falrei na terapia não podia perder tempo . Estou endoidando meu olhos doem meu braços não aguentam mais segurar o celular. Fico louca para chegar em casa e ver YouTube sobre isso , isso é beira do colapso . Assisti 10 a 20 x dark não fiquei assim. Assisti 30 a 40 x Travellers não fiquei assim. Assisti Lost , 1989, batatatinha 123 e não foi assim. E olha que nem considero from uma série ótima como as outras mas cai na armadilha deles. É tudo sobre endoidar a cabeça das pessoas. Não tem crianças para serem salvas somente nos mesmos presos na insanidade do colapso mental. Adeus.

No episódio 1 a velha finge ser avó da menina aparecendo no andar superior da casa , o mesmo acontece em outros momentos como no massacre da casa, a moça também aparece na janela superior da casa. Eu perdi algumas coisa ? Nunca vi esses monstros voando . Alguém me explica por favor ?

Tabitha saw the smile attack Miranda during the night, and Victor drew the Man in Yellow devouring Miranda during the day. Do the monsters hunt to feed the Man in Yellow? What do you think?

Am I the only one?

I can't afford a continuing subscription to MGM+. When I used the free trial, I found From. I have been able to buy seasons 1-3 on my prime video account, which my mom pays for.

I am DYING to know what happens with Julie. No spoilers please!

I was just wondering if I had to wait until the end of the year or next year. Thanks!

What if Jade is suspicious and he's becoming the next Man in Yellow? Hear me out:

Everyone knows Jade is important. But what if we're supposed to be questioning Jade himself?

Tobey

Think about Tobey. He's the ONLY person in Fromville who knew Jade before they arrived. Yet when Tobey wakes after the crash, he asks if everyone is okay but never specifically asks about Jade.

Then the voices specifically order Sara to kill Tobey and make it look like a monster attack. He dies before he can tell anyone who Jade really was, what they were doing before Fromville, or give us his side of their relationship.

We've now seen a similar move with Sophia aka MIY: remove the person who could contradict or expose what actually happened before arrival.

Jim.

Jim helps Jade realise the bottle-tree numbers are musical notes, pushing Jade's investigation forward. Shortly afterwards, the MIY personally kills Jim.

There's also that weird visual detail: the slaughtered goats were hung around the same area where Jade had previously spent a long time staring. The show emphasised that spot for quite a while.

Christopher → Jade → MIY?

Jade appears to be repeating Christopher's role: the symbol, the visions, the obsession and being drawn deeper into understanding Fromville.We're assuming this means Jade is destined to defeat the town.But what if that's backwards?

What if every cycle produces a "Jade" whose purpose isn't to destroy Fromville, but to eventually become part of it? Maybe the Man in Yellow isn't one immortal person. Maybe MIY is a position that gets passed down.

Martin

And then there's Martin.

Martin is chained in one of the deepest/weirdest places we've seen. He somehow knows things he shouldn't, including Abby's name and tells Boyd that the monsters are only the "tip of the spear."

A lot of people already suspect Martin could somehow be connected to the MIY.

But what if Martin isn't MIY? What if Martin is an OLD Jade?

Maybe Martin was another iteration of the same person/role but failed the process and ended up imprisoned instead. Christopher could be another failed iteration. Jade is simply the current one.

That could give us something like:

Martin → Christopher → Jade → ???

While the MIY represents what happens when one of these iterations actually completes whatever the town is preparing them for.

It would also explain why solving Fromville might actually be dangerous. Every symbol Jade deciphers, every vision he follows and every mystery he solves might not be bringing him closer to escaping.It might be bringing him closer to becoming what the town wants him to become.

Townspeople

We all know that "Jades" are killed by the townspeople at some point. Another thought....

Maybe previous cycles eventually figured out what the Jade/Christopher figure becomes.

The cycle could actually be:

Jade figure investigates → sees the symbol/visions → gets closer to the truth → begins changing → townspeople realise what's happening → they kill him.

But what if simply killing him doesn't work?

Maybe there's a specific ritual required to permanently end whatever the Jade figure is. If they kill him incorrectly, the role simply returns in another cycle.

That could explain Martin.

Perhaps an earlier group realised they couldn't permanently kill their Jade, so instead they imprisoned him.

Martin → imprisoned/failed iterationChristopher → killed/failed iterationJade → current iterationMIY → completed iteration?

And maybe the MIY exists because, at some point, one Jade actually completed the process before the townspeople could stop him.That would make the MIY less of a completely separate entity and more like the final form of whatever Jade and Christopher are.

It could even change how we interpret Christopher's story. What if he didn't simply "go crazy"? What if people realised what Christopher was becoming and tried to kill him first?

And suddenly all the things Jade is solving — the symbol, the children, the roots, the bottle trees (same bottle tree that was not meant to be taken down), the music, all becomes a lot more sinister.

We've assumed Jade is slowly solving the puzzle required to escape Fromville.What if he's unknowingly completing the steps of the ritual that transforms him?

And Tobey brings me back to where this started.

Why did the voices specifically want the only person who knew Jade before Fromville dead before he could tell anyone about him? Maybe Jade isn't becoming the person who destroys Fromville.

Maybe he's becoming the next person who runs it.

I rewatched From season 1, 3 episodes...and a just seeing how disarming, jolly, friendly Jade was, it just reminded me of Tellie. It reminded me of Sophia. It reminded me of a facade that the MIY always puts at the start of his shenanigans.

One of the major places this show shined was through the interpersonal relationships explored in s1. I'm on s4 e8, and that portion of the writing is close to gone. Every episode now is simply a 'wouldn't it be crazy if..'

For example, Ellis and Kenny barely interacting genuinely makes no sense to me.

In my opinion, the characters parallel each other in a lot of ways. For example, they're both Boyd's sons and have both been betrayed by boyd in some way. You could really do something with exploring a relationship like that. Especially when it's bloomed from animosity towards the mc.

The foundation is already there. S1 Ellis was characterized to be a hippie (more or less) and Kenny's this straight-laced guy, who is a reflection of Boyd. How is there no scenes of Ellis feeling replaced, which furthers his resentment towards Boyd? Or scenes built off of them bonding over feeling betrayed by boyd.

Or what about how both of their mothers' deaths were violent and connected heavily to boyd. You could branch off from there and make something interesting to watch.

This is especially because Kenny literally has no one. He's like a punching bag at this point. His parents are dead. Hie boss is an asshole and we don't even get scenes of his friendship with Kristi anymore.

On the other hand, I don't think the writers know what to do with Ellis as a character outside of his connection to fatima. Which is crazy because he's the MCs son.

Its all a Simulation created by Jade's Quantum Company.

The Simulation is used in Psychiatric clinics to treat/cure anything from Schizophrenia to PTSD.

The Simulation bugged, causing every patients simulation to merge into a single nightmare scenario. Victor's simulation being the worst situation.

Jade can't shut down the program, because like the Matrix, thier minds may be stuck. -- The software wipes your short term memory, so you don't realize you're in a Simulation. - Jade went into the "Game" to guide people out.

The source of the bugs is located in the F-ROM of the computer, this memory can't be updated or changed unless the memory is not in use.

F-ROM stands for Flash Read-Only Memory. It is a specific type of non-volatile computer storage that blends the data permanence of a traditional ROM chip with the electrical rewritability of Flash memory.

How F-ROM Works -Traditional ROM chips are permanently hardcoded during manufacturing and can never be changed. In contrast, F-ROM uses EEPROM technology (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory) organized into larger blocks. This allows the entire chip—or massive blocks of data—to be erased and rewritten electronically.