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to be fair trickster god
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May 22, 2023 21:52
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just kind of being done in the most fantastically boring and somehow momentum stopping way possible
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May 22, 2023 21:52
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Potato Salad posted:momentum stopping way That would require the current plot to have momentum, and it's currently trundling along on square wheels.
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May 22, 2023 21:54
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If the author really has no good ideas for how to make this work in a clever way befitting Trickster God, just zoom out to silhouettes of everyone talking tensely at first then less tense over time, and end with a banner "And so Loup talked his way out of it." at least let us pretend these are still good characters
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May 22, 2023 21:54
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With hindsight, following Jerrek's POV was detrimental because he is too stupid to be a convincing villain/antagonist like Coyote was, and too unlikeable to be able to change quickly enough to be a compelling protagonist yet. If we'd been following Annie's POV instead, then Jerrek wanting to live a peaceful life with Lana would have shocked us alongside Annie. Imagine if instead of these many chapters wasted on following Jerrek, we found out Jerrek was Loup the moment Robot confronted him, and then had us following Annie and co. as they digest the news and plan how to stop him. Them being scared of Loup and worried for Lana while at the same time feeling betrayed because they had come to see Jerrek as a friend would have been great. Then when we reach this point where they successfully cage Jerrek, we have a chapter as a flashback, where we see from Jerrek's POV his conversation with Annie about the Omega device, then his changing relationship with Lana, and we see how Jerrek has forgotten he is Loup and coming to enjoy his current life. That way there is tension in this moment because it doesn't matter that they are trying the cage thing again, the tension is no longer about whether it works this time or not, what matters is if they can or even should forgive Loup and let him be Jerrek, knowing that any day he could remember he is Loup and snap, or if maybe there is a chance being Jerrek could help Loup grow as a person and stop being a man-child god throwing violent tantrums at everything? tl;dr: Just make the reveal to the audience that Jerrek is Loup happen later and you could solve a lot of narrative problems.
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May 22, 2023 22:54
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I don't think Tom is going to be able to fix Loup to being enjoyable.
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May 22, 2023 22:59
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Annointed posted:This truly is a cliff notes Court. The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > BSS: Bisexual Super Son > Gunnerkrigg Court: Gunnerkrigg Cliff Notes
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May 22, 2023 23:31
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isasphere posted:With hindsight, following Jerrek's POV was detrimental because he is too stupid to be a convincing villain/antagonist like Coyote was, and too unlikeable to be able to change quickly enough to be a compelling protagonist yet. I think Tom felt like he had to explain the process of Loup becoming Jerrek which is why we got all this Loup POV stuff happening, and I can understand why he'd think that. It can't be known, but I can see another universe where he did it as you described and the readership was like "well this came out of nowhere! what an asspull! wish we could have seen some of this happening!" I may be the only person in this thread who feels this way, but I do actually find something compelling about Loup sucking so much and being such a failure. At first, I was annoyed by him (largely because I resented him replacing two characters I liked more) but now he's just been floundering around so helplessly I've come to feel for him. Him being legitimately changed by realizing he was thoroughly and genuinely loved by someone actually worked for me, on some level. My main issues with the story at the moment are that 1) I have no idea what's going on with Annie anymore and I valued her position as the emotional POV, 2) the Court authorities being an antagonist/source of intrigue completely fell on its face. I think that parts of this Loup nonsense could actually be interesting to me if the Court was threatening enough to take his position as antagonist. But, since their evil plan is mostly just... taking their ball and going home... it doesn't really work. It honestly could have been so primed for the Court to take Loup's role as primary antagonist while Loup has a change of heart. it's just like... since the Court isn't pulling its weight narratively, if Loup becomes a woobie failboy there's nobody to take his place. It just means there is no longer a conflict, period, just a bunch of people sort of inconveniencing each other.
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May 23, 2023 00:02
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Riot Bus posted:I think Tom felt like he had to explain the process of Loup becoming Jerrek which is why we got all this Loup POV stuff happening, and I can understand why he'd think that. It can't be known, but I can see another universe where he did it as you described and the readership was like "well this came out of nowhere! what an asspull! wish we could have seen some of this happening!" Ah, you are right, that would have been the other extreme. Maybe a happy a medium between the two, then? Don't hide the fact that Annie and co. know about Loup being Jerrek, it's a tragic slow-motion train because we have seen Jerrek's thoughts and see he is actually less destructive in this persona, while Annie and Kat still think he has some mastermind plan beyond "idk lol get close to Annie and find all the Court secrets" that got derailed because of Love and other assorted human emotions distracting him so hard he forgot he is Loup. But of course then we have the plot advancing even more slowly so I don't even know anymore. I like Jerrek intermittently, I like the idea of his apparent character arc, I just wish it wasn't at the expense of the characters I already liked. I genuinely wonder how long the concept of Loup had been brewing in Tom's mind or if he was a shoehorned-in later addition to the story.
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May 23, 2023 00:46
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we already knew loup was a vicious moron before he pulled this whole gambit, his incompetence isn't surprising or endearing. and the months of pages alternating between him doing that stupid rick & morty face and screaming bloody murder in his internal monologue were agony and the "romance" is a bad joke. it's like toddlers playing house because both participants have such underdeveloped emotional intelligence, except we're apparently going to be led to believe it's this beautiful thing that soothed the savage beast. the only thing that could make it worse is annie deciding to Give Him a Chance while using her relationship with tony as a precedent
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May 23, 2023 00:55
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What if Loup just is supposed to suck? Like maybe that’s Coyote’s whole plan: die so he can learn what it’s like to die, then have Annie kill Loup so he can somehow be reborn, and so Loup was *designed* to suck because his job is basically just to get killed so the real main character can come back
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May 23, 2023 01:23
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christmas boots posted:What if Loup just is supposed to suck? Like maybe that’s Coyote’s whole plan: die so he can learn what it’s like to die, then have Annie kill Loup so he can somehow be reborn, and so Loup was *designed* to suck because his job is basically just to get killed so the real main character can come back Then that's just making the reader suffer, unless you think you will be able to make him suck in an extremely funny way- oh my god that's what Tom intended isn't it
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May 23, 2023 01:57
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christmas boots posted:What if Loup just is supposed to suck? Like maybe that’s Coyote’s whole plan: die so he can learn what it’s like to die, then have Annie kill Loup so he can somehow be reborn, and so Loup was *designed* to suck because his job is basically just to get killed so the real main character can come back Isn't that basically what Coyote said he was doing? Well, not the rebirth part, but he basically said that he conspired to make Loup act this way so that Annie would be forced to kill him.
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May 23, 2023 02:06
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We're in the final arc so probably can't make this final arc last a decade.
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May 23, 2023 02:18
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The kindest interpretation of Loup is that he's basically a mashup of two characters who are fundamental mythical opposites, cannot understand each other, and are unable to reconcile those differences. He's a dumb aggro guy's idea of a trickster god, and the trickster god's unkindest opinion of the dimbulb he enjoys tormenting. Both lacking insight into the other, neither one interested in anything other than sabotaging the other. Too bad that's not how it's really playing out.
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May 23, 2023 02:18
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Ever since Loup first happened, my theory was that Coyote needed to become not-himself in order to die and by dying affect the Ether in some way that he couldn't otherwise. Since one of his big things was jealousy towards humans being technically-in-charge of his existence via the Ether. The part of me that still tries to tie things back to that theory would say Jerrek is somehow more human than Loup was at first, and therefore this is still part of Coyote's plan, but even if so, god drat he's been so uninteresting on the endless road to there, that I don't care.
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May 23, 2023 02:33
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Just kill Loup so we can get the mediocre payoff.
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May 23, 2023 04:08
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Oxxidation posted:the only thing that could make it worse is annie deciding to Give Him a Chance while using her relationship with tony as a precedent
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May 23, 2023 09:25
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I'm kind of torn. On the one hand, I like the idea of a character that started off as an amalgamation of two polar opposites who has a chance to "cool down" and become their own character who wants to say "gently caress off" to their original selves. On the other, we have Loup, who we either have been shown WAY too much of, or not nearly enough of to actually see that evolution, so it comes off as very rushed.
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May 23, 2023 13:35
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isasphere posted:Then that's just making the reader suffer, unless you think you will be able to make him suck in an extremely funny way- remember back to the gamer comics to see what it looks like when tom is trying to be funny and is not writing City Face
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May 23, 2023 16:19
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Riot Bus posted:I think Tom felt like he had to explain the process of Loup becoming Jerrek which is why we got all this Loup POV stuff happening, and I can understand why he'd think that. It can't be known, but I can see another universe where he did it as you described and the readership was like "well this came out of nowhere! what an asspull! wish we could have seen some of this happening!"
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May 23, 2023 17:03
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Randalor posted:I'm kind of torn. On the one hand, I like the idea of a character that started off as an amalgamation of two polar opposites who has a chance to "cool down" and become their own character who wants to say "gently caress off" to their original selves. On the other, we have Loup, who we either have been shown WAY too much of, or not nearly enough of to actually see that evolution, so it comes off as very rushed. Yeah, a lot of the major plot points aren't necessarily bad, they're just executed in a baffling way. As people mentioned, characters do things and are in convenient situations in service to The Plot, character motivations be damned. Like Jenny/Jack throwing ridiculous accusations at Annie as Annie runs away. Is that gonna come back up later to hinder Annie in some way, and thus we needed them to be suspicious of her? Or is it going to be another nothing that gets resolved immediately? And I've definitely gotten harsher and more sour about Loup and the comic in general since the Alley scene, though the end of "Find Yourself" is when I think I started personally admitting that maybe Gunnerkrigg is going off the rails lol. I know I'm beating a dead horse here, but I'm just flabbergasted that Loup doing the tough guy anime bit where he saves the helpless, ignorant young lass was treated as a positive in the comic. That's really just incredible to see in 2022 in a supposedly progressive comic.
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May 23, 2023 17:27
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i think the fundamental tension being built up with Loup's character is the conflict of wanting to be both an observer and an actor, to enjoy the spectacle of court life but be constantly tempted to participate and meddle in it
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May 23, 2023 17:34
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Loup should be a fundamentally tragic character. A cosmic joke. A being created for the sole purpose of being killed, with no hope of carving out a destiny for himself. His very existence is nothing more than the last prank of a divine trickster, and being stabbed to death is the punchline. There’s a lot to work with and that’s a shame
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May 23, 2023 19:30
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christmas boots posted:Loup should be a fundamentally tragic character. A cosmic joke. A being created for the sole purpose of being killed, with no hope of carving out a destiny for himself. His very existence is nothing more than the last prank of a divine trickster, and being stabbed to death is the punchline. There’s a lot to work with and that’s a shame
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May 23, 2023 19:38
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Splicer posted:Don't sign your posts you're*
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May 23, 2023 20:42
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Annointed posted:We're in the final arc so probably can't make this final arc last a decade. This is a webcomic we're talking about, they practically invented making the final arc of a story last longer than the main story itself.
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May 23, 2023 21:08
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christmas boots posted:you're*
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May 23, 2023 23:39
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how can a life or death confrontation between the overriding antagonist and the protagonist of a webcomic be so tedious
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May 24, 2023 08:26
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Annie and co here here are adamantly refusing to believe... what, exactly? It's all just a vague "I'm nice now," "I don't believe you". This conversation would feel a lot less bizarre if there was some specific goal of Loup's that he could claim to have a change of heart about. But the entire premise of disguising as Jerrek was never that coherent, so there's no substance to subvert.
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May 24, 2023 09:17
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"I don't lie! Pay no attention to how I've been lying to you about who I am for months!"
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May 24, 2023 10:33
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We've been following Loup's perspective for a long time now, but we still have no idea what the gently caress Loup wanted to accomplish when he attacked the Court originally. Why did he send the Elves on a mini Trail of Tears? Why did he close the Annan Waters? Why did he destroy Renard's body? What was he trying to do? All we do know is that whatever it was, he doesn't want to do it anymore because of the Power of Love.
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May 24, 2023 10:38
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DontMockMySmock posted:We've been following Loup's perspective for a long time now, but we still have no idea what the gently caress Loup wanted to accomplish when he attacked the Court originally. Why did he send the Elves on a mini Trail of Tears? Why did he close the Annan Waters? Why did he destroy Renard's body? What was he trying to do? All we do know is that whatever it was, he doesn't want to do it anymore because of the Power of Love. At least on the first point, I think it's safe to say that was more "Ysengrin with Coyote's powers" than Loup. Hell, it was right after Ysengrin ate Coyote and was talking as though it was Ysengrin chiding Coyote when he began attacking. We didn't even know he was called Loup at that point.
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May 24, 2023 11:18
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Oxxidation posted:the only thing that could make it worse is annie deciding to Give Him a Chance while using her relationship with tony as a precedent gently caress, I just heard the lathe of heaven revving up
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May 24, 2023 12:28
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My thing is that this feels...flat. For Annie, Loup has ruined countless lives in the Forest that she loved so much that she became its medium. Loup basically led to the elimination of two of her closest fatherly figures and replaced them with a mad sadist. Loup burned the body of one of her closest, dearest friends as a whimsy. She should be furious and more than willing to cut him apart mid-sentence, but she's just standing there. She has no fire, no spark, no soul. Kat has had the court upturned, hundreds of robots locked into mindless place to form a pointless shield that did nothing to stop Loup as he ravaged her home, doing untold damage to the friends and connections she's made. And that's alongside seeing a close friend being severed from their true body. She should want to crush him with that cage but she's barely even here. Renard is staring at the creature who has caused his family such pain. Who erased his two kin, and then burned his true body into ash. And all he can muster is a weak 'You Lie'. It's such a waste of emotion to try to redeem a character that no one wanted, with every decent point of goodwill thrown aside, in the name of...something. It's just bad.
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May 24, 2023 16:40
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J.A.B.C. posted:My thing is that this feels...flat. It really doesn't help that none of the three of them have been shown to be seriously affected by any of those things beyond the initial shock, except maybe Kat with her rushing into advancing her science faster and faster. Their actual lives don't appear to change from the same vague stasis they exist in day-to-day every time we switch back to see what the gang is up to, even when there are big status quo changes happening around them.
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May 24, 2023 16:52
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It feels like, instead of Loup freezing the whole forest in stasis, he should have been the impetus for its more violent denizens to launch attacks on the court. We know there's some rowdy creatures in there from when Annie and Ysengrin confronted them, so have a faction of them be all for Loup's chaotic, destructive style and add some danger to court life. It would also add urgency both to finding Loup and stopping him as well as the court's plans to leave.
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May 24, 2023 17:42
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what the hap is fuckening
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May 24, 2023 19:12
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This is a bit out of left field, but is Jerrek's design supposed to look Native American? Am I dumb for not realizing that sooner?
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May 24, 2023 19:14
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PubicMice posted:This is a bit out of left field, but is Jerrek's design supposed to look Native American? Am I dumb for not realizing that sooner? I don't really see it - he has slightly darker skin but there's less difference between him and Annie than between Lana and Annie. He has Ysengrin's hair and eye color, obviously, while the mop of hair fits his awkward teenager persona.
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