My Problem With This Implication That Crowley Is The Selfish One™ For Panicking And Wanting To Run

My problem with this implication that Crowley is the Selfish One™ for panicking and wanting to run instead of going with Aziraphale to Heaven and Aziraphale being a supposed saint that wants to save humanity (or fix Heaven just for love of Crowley, which is quite reductive and I will to that in a minute) is that it just acts as ir Aziraphale knew that the Second Coming was happening all along (which he didn't) and that once again just ignores that 1) he was pretty excited at the idea of coming back there, 2) that he did imply he misses reporting to Heaven AKA he is struggling to be part of The Company™ - Michael Sheen also mentioned this before the season started - and 3) Aziraphale was spiraling and in denial of the situations happening around him all season.

There are some points I disagree with so much and they are just... Not in the show?

'That Aziraphale didn't know that Heaven tried to kill him.' Yes, he did, he didn't know the whole dialogue word for word, but Crowley says in the first episode that Gabriel tried to cast him into hellfire.

'That Heaven has good angels and that's why Aziraphale was doing the right thing by going.' Okay, I hate this point with passion. Heaven having nice, innocent angels like Muriel doesn't make it less of a cult/totalitarian environment/dystopia/you pick your metaphor. Just because some angels are good doesn't mean the system is not broken. In any case, those angels deserve to get the fuck out too.

Crowley can't let go of his hate of Heaven and that's bad for some reason. This point is so... victim blamy. Why in the hell should Crowley feel anything but hate for Heaven or God by the matter? Huh?!

The point that argues that Aziraphale only wanted to go back to Heaven because of Crowley and to keep him safe deserves a paragraph of his own because I think it's such a 'reduce into shipping' reading. Aziraphale has been struggling with letting go of Heaven, he hasn't been eating, he is playing humans like fiddles during that ball and denying the danger around him, he accepted Gabriel in his home when anyone with some self-preservation would have thrown him out of in the street. All of this, plus his line in Season 1 when he still hesitated about 'his side' not liking him staying with Crowley, all of this is a build up that goes up to the moment where he presents Metatron's offer to Crowley.

Because as much as I ship them and I do think Crowley going was a mayor factor on making him accept, I don't think it's only about Crowley, it's about Aziraphale's inability to let go of his perception of Heaven as the side of goodness.

Crowley going back to Heaven is how Aziraphale thinks he can have his cake and eat it. Crowley is safe from Hell (because he thinks in terms of Hell being more harmful to Crowley than Heaven) and Aziraphale gets to 'fix' Heaven and never, ever confront the fact that Heaven is not the side of good, most importantly, never confront the fact that God is not a force of good.

Aziraphale's acceptance of the offer is not just doing Good and Save Earth™ (because remember he didn't know about the Second Coming when he accepted), it's him regressing (in the psychological term, not in the character term) and not wanting to accept real change, which sort of goes with his character being the sort of slow and frozen previous eras (contrasting with Crowley 'going too fast'). It's the same thing with him just believing Crowley is a good person because he is fundamentally an angel Deep Down™, and not because he developed his own moral compass.

Like, I'm sorry, but I don't think him accepting that offer had anything to do with some super mega selfless impulse to save Earth. He doesn't mention Earth in his whole speech. He goes around how Heaven is 'the side of truth, of light, of good' and he looks at Crowley confused as if he doesn't get why Crowley wouldn't want to go back to The Side of Truth, Light and Good™. I don't see Earth and humans mentioned there. It's not about them and deep down is not even about Crowley.

It's about Aziraphale and Heaven. It's about how he, as much as he loves Crowley, he still wants Heaven, he still wants their praise, he wants to be needed by them and how he can't and (in that moment) doesn't want to accept what they truly are.

This is why he will fail in Season 3. There won't be growth if he suddenly manages to change an unchangeable system. He needs to fail, he needs to have this view of them and God broken or he will never grow out of it.