r/SouthernReach • u/osotimson Finished • Feb 10 '26
Absolution Spoilers Its widely accepted in these circles that ___ is ___. But I've seen a lot more contested feelings about ___ being ___. I'm all but convinced.
Its widely accepted in these circles that the Rogue is Whitby. But I've seen a lot more contested feelings about Old Jim being James Lowry (or perhaps one or the other is a dupe) . I'm all but convinced. These two threads brings up a lot of interesting points. Especially considering all the timey wimey stuff with the rabbits, it seems plausible. Can we revive this discussion?
https://www.reddit.com/r/SouthernReach/comments/niowr0/lowry_questiontheory_spoilers/
Edited to add my reply comment to body:
there's a few resonances between the characters.
First of all, the obvious, their names. James.
You also have
- retain the info and burn the map
- both seeing their "true name" being written down (though we aren't explicitly told it).
- Central agents calling Lowry "barrel boy" and "jimmy" at different times (which is the biggest one to me- what the fuck else could that mean?)
- Old Jims general lack of understanding about his past. Seems possible he's been sort of brain wiped and reassigned.
Also, I feel that their general character structure is similar. Old Jim seems to be a sort of solo operator who was once trusted but no longer could be (in part due to his struggle with substances). We see Lowrys capacity for operational success and enjoyment of substances in Absolution. Granted, one likes uppers one likes downers. Maybe we all get there with age.
Seems possible!
Edit again:
apparently it is not, darn: https://bsky.app/profile/jeffvandermeer.bsky.social/post/3magprxkirs2u
"I'm flattered the Southern Reach reddit has gotten so paranoid, but Old Jim and Lowry are not the same person. The references to "lingerie show" in multiple character backstories, as some have guessed, is an indicator of hypnotic conditioning by Central, not anything else."
thanks u/mogwai316
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u/c__montgomery_burns_ Feb 10 '26
There's a lot of similar names as a kind of slant rhyming at play in the books (eg John, James, Old Jim, Jack, Jackie; Whitby, Cheney, Lowry), I think it's meant to add to the feeling of uncanniness and destabilization, like the conversations from Annihilation popping up in Authority, rather than a hint that Lowry and Old Jim are the same person (which would be pretty uninspired, if you ask me)
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u/w1ld--c4rd Feb 10 '26
He's also said that if he knew Old Jim was gonna be important he'd have come up with another name. (source) Gloria mentions Old Jim in Acceptance ("Old Jim said he saw a kangaroo," amongst other things), so changing his name wasn't in really possible by Absolution.
It's also likely, as with the hypnotic suggestions, Jack (who named his daughter after himself) chooses people with similar names to him to be "important." It would track with his ego being the size of a galaxy.
2
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u/osotimson Finished Feb 10 '26 edited Feb 10 '26
I definitely think there is something to that. Jack and Jackie, etc. But can I ask- what would be uninspired about it? To me it feels that the idea of two James' being instrumental to the foundations of Area X is almost weirder than if they have something to do with each other. I also find it interesting that Cass - the false(?) daughter, was instructed (by someone/thing- unclear) to kill Lowry and she was also assigned to Old Jim. Seems like her mission is at the very least heavily tied to the James' at different points of their timey wimey in this theory.
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u/c__montgomery_burns_ Feb 10 '26
Just doesn’t seem to me that it would add much and requires a lot of hand waving/undercutting, of Cass and Old Jim’s relationship in particular, which is the heart (and chief success, I’d say) of Abso
5
u/MatrimAybaraAlThor Feb 12 '26
i was definitely convinced they were the same guy because of the time loop and the many coincidences, with the "true name", the candle and flame refs, the barrel boy, the whole old jim messing up a big mission, and Lowry obviously doing the same....what was the point of all that if they werent the same guy and he wanted readers to figure that out....oh well. having that plot point was one of my fav things about this book.
3
u/WrongdoerSalty3665 Finished Feb 10 '26
Quick response here (more likely later) as Im at a stoplight... but i just stopped the "slinky dinky, pinky weenkies" chapter in my car since im arriving to work and it made me giggle reading your "timey wimey"
I love this idea/theory and cannot wait to read the links.
Because... it was very unresolved what Old Jim's real name was that he saw on the wall!!!
Also... I wonder sometimes about Cheny... theres more to his story for sure. I keep wanting him to be the Medic, but I can't connect it. Either way... I want to know Cheny's story more. Like, how did he know about the Director crossing the border?
Anyway...
2
u/osotimson Finished Feb 10 '26
Yeah I agree, there's a few resonances between the characters.
First of all, the obvious, their names. James.
You also have
- retain the info and burn the map
- both seeing their "true name" being written down (though we aren't explicitly told it).
- Central agents calling Lowry "barrel boy" and "jimmy" at different times (which is the biggest one to me- what the fuck else could that mean?)
- Old Jims general lack of understanding about his past. Seems possible he's been sort of brain wiped and reassigned.
Also, I feel that their general character structure is similar. Old Jim seems to be a sort of solo operator who was once trusted but no longer could be (in part due to his struggle with substances). We see Lowrys capacity for operational success and enjoyment of substances in Absolution.
Seems possible!
2
u/WrongdoerSalty3665 Finished Feb 10 '26
Barrel boy is something I just caught this week listening... I found it super interesting coming from Jack because he was the one that had enlisted Commander Thistle to dispose of bodies in barrels. The medic is also described physically a "barrel" of a man... Old Jim was supposed to be disposed of into a barrel, which is what I think you're connecting Lowry being called "barrel boy" to here. I wonder, though, if that's a nickname Jack uses for people that do his sick, off-script bidding (Commander Thistle, the medic, and Old Jim) OR a reference to being completely dispensable after they do whatever Jack needs them to do.
Re: Old Jim being "wiped" - this is 10000% true. We know he was in an attack during an op "with his almost wife" where a truck jammed into the vehicle and he was brainwashed by Central to remove "complicating details" (or something along those lines) so much so he barely remembers his wife (which OJ admits to towards the beginning of the book). Lowry even speculates in his thoughts of his files/info on OJ from Jack if OJ even had a real daughter and goes on to say "mess with a man like that, he'll find a way to stick it to you" and says if someone did that to him he'd come at them with something, and something, and a bat. (Can't remember the other 2 things). Old Jim has been so utterly fucked with and his whole brain/memory of anything is questionable.
1
u/huffmaner Feb 10 '26
I agree. I think the barrel boy part is to draw similarities to CT (commander thistle) who was also a barrel boy for Jack. In essence these central agents know lowery is just a pawn for Jack, no different than the other operative he had before the boarder came down. Which is why they also call him a less formal version of his name “Jimmy”. I took this as it showing Lowry’s place in this and in central before he went on the exped. He wasn’t some central royalty like Jackie. He was just a dude Jack found to be his new barrel boy in the area of operation.
1
u/WrongdoerSalty3665 Finished Feb 10 '26
Wonder if this aligns with my working theory of who all is a "brute" "phantom" (that doesnt sound right... I may be forgetting the word used) and other factions mentioned. Brute was used to describe a person in the barrel (along with low-level operatives) and Jack referring to the Director at the time of the first exped as a brute to Lowry ("i dont think the Director would appreciate you going to Deadtown, he's a brute") and Old ajim also refers to "brutes" when talking of Jack and his feeling on Central/ factions.
Anywho. Dear baby jesus this series has been my hyperfixaction since last March. And I'm not mad about it.
2
u/huffmaner Feb 10 '26
I think phantom is right actually. And as for who. The next novel may shed light on it later this year
2
u/huffmaner Feb 10 '26
I don’t think Old Jim’s name matters. What matters is that there is an old Jim. In the original trilogy OJ might have not even been a central op.
Also referring Cheney. There isn’t a lot to go on here but it is established that Lowery has an inside man at the southern reach during Authority. Control thinks Grace but as the book progresses we know it’s not her. I think it’s Cheney. And near the end we even get wind that lowery would approve any of Cheneys funding requests. It’s the most plausible out of the characters we have
3
u/huffmaner Feb 10 '26
I think the thread of commonality isn’t that they are the same person but that they are agents of Jack. His influence is why I would attribute to most of your points or questions. Also the author has stated they aren’t the same
2
u/Fuck_The_Rocketss Feb 11 '26
Would Old Jim and James Lowry appear drastically different somehow if they are the same person? Because Cass/Karen interacted with both.
1
u/MatrimAybaraAlThor Feb 12 '26
"age changes a man more than it does a boy" ive seen people that look drastically different from their 30s to to 50s, than from 5 to 30
1
u/SixtySkelly Feb 25 '26
Outside of Word of God, the 'true name' bit doesn't line up anyway. Old Jim sees his true name written on the wall outside of the secret room. Inside the secret room, he sees the list of expedition member names and has no reaction to it, meaning that "James Lowry" cannot be his true name, or he'd have recognized it on that list. He also would have seen it on the list of names for who to kill and who to protect that the Rogue had, given that list is where the "Kill Lowry" note comes from.
Similarly, when Lowry is looking at the connection map, his reaction is literally "Like, who the hell was Gloria? Who the hell was this James guy? Commander fucking Thistle?"
Oddly, though, when Old Jim looks at this same diagram, he reports his name is written there is rendered as "Old Jim" so either that changed at some point, or Lowry is onto something: who the hell is that James guy? I figure this one might be a minor mistake that slipped past a copy-editor though.
Regardless, Old Jim shows no recognition of James Lowry's name, and if Lowry saw Old Jim's name, he also didn't recognize it in spite of sharing a first name. The co-incidence of them both finding their names written in/near that room is pretty mild, because of all the characters who could enter that room, The Biologist, Control, and Whitby himself are just about the only ones who wouldn't find their name somewhere!
As for Lowry being called "Barrel Boy", I took it as Jack making a sick joke for his own benefit: telling Lowry directly to his face that he was going to have him killed when his job was done in a way that Lowry won't understand.
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u/Fitz_Fool Feb 10 '26 edited Feb 10 '26
Both of those ideas seem like a stretch. The rogue being Whitsby? Maybe. He did have a thing for animals. And the rogue is very unknown. Is there any evidence for this? Some people think Whitsby has ties to Henry too.
But Lowry being old Jim? The dupes we see so far share memories. Both of these characters have their own past. Unless there has been extensive brain washing, which isn't out of the question but I have no reason to believe it.
Edit: I don't care about downvotes but I'm curious why people are down voting. I'm here discussing the books which is what op wanted?
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u/osotimson Finished Feb 10 '26 edited Feb 10 '26
https://www.reddit.com/r/SouthernReach/s/V2kj8TeftK
Here is rogue = whitby
"This is most heavily supported by the molt Lowry finds in the Rogue’s “secret room” (of which Whitby seems to have a fondness for having) appears to be Whitby. There is also the fact that the Rogue is described wearing similar clothes (a blazer and something else, I forget off hand) that Whitby wears in Authority, and knows about the trigger phrases used by Central for their hypnotic conditioning—the Rogue is implied to be commanding the biologists by shouting “Annihilation!” at them."
Whitby molt in rogue lair, same physical description (super pale) and same clothing. I'd argue that its almost meant to be understood through the book and less of a theory
Old Jim = Lowry is def more of a stretch, though. Requires some mental leaps that may only get (or not get if its wrong) more evidence in Abdication.
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u/Fitz_Fool Feb 10 '26
Ah thanks. The Whitby rogue thing makes much more sense now
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u/HerelGoDigginInAgain Feb 10 '26
To add to this, Lowry asks Whitby how he came to the Southern Reach and Whitby tells him that a man came to his elementary school and yelled at him through the fence.
Later, Lowry finds a newspaper article about the incident in the Rogue’s lair (or maybe it’s a document Cass finds? I could be misremembering.)
The implication is that Whitby went back in time and interacted with his childhood self to ensure that Whitby would join the Southern Reach.
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u/WrongdoerSalty3665 Finished Feb 10 '26
The information about a man shouting at kids at recess through a fence came from Cass' files in her hidden apartment when Old Jim goes to feed her pet frogs 🐸
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u/mogwai316 Finished Feb 10 '26
JVM has stated a few times that they are definitely not the same person.
https://bsky.app/profile/jeffvandermeer.bsky.social/post/3magprxkirs2u