|
Who the gently caress are these losers?
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 09:04
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 28, 2024 10:28 |
|
|
i hate how absolutely nothing everything is. i hate how every character that at least entertained me has one by one wandered off the script. there's no one left that anyone has any chemistry with and at this point i include annie and kat who currently only seem to be friends because that's what's in the script it doesn't even have the boldness to be disastrously bad. it's just air going out of a balloon for years
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 09:15
|
|
|
Ditocoaf posted:You're not the only one who seems to assume that the comic is nearing an ending, but the only reasons to think so are the sort of tonal and pacing cues that we should learn not to trust. GC could meander indefinitely for all we know. He did explicitly say he's ending it back in October 2022, right after the end of Chapter 86 (Confessions, AKA the one where Lana gets thrown into a wall by an angry god and then says it's okay because she loves him anyway). https://www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=2688 quote:"Some of you might notice that events in the comic are heating up, and it's true that I'm slowly turning this giant, lumbering vessel of a comic into it's final port. There is still a ways to, though, and still a lot of things to happen before it's all over." It's not clear when, but we do indeed have recent, textual confirmation from the author that he has concrete plans to end the comic, and sooner rather than later.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 09:36
|
|
|
Tiny Myers posted:Having the proverbial book close this way on the 2annie arc + Tony in general with "yeah this was actually 100% meant to be taken at face value, goodbye" led to a lot of people jumping ship, I think. It's definitely when I realised that the comic had taken a sharp downhill turn.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 09:55
|
|
|
Tiny Myers posted:He did explicitly say he's ending it back in October 2022, right after the end of Chapter 86 (Confessions, AKA the one where Lana gets thrown into a wall by an angry god and then says it's okay because she loves him anyway). Fair enough! I think that's from the period after I first gave up on the comic but hadn't returned to this thread out of morbid curiosity yet, so I guess I overlooked it. Good to know!
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 10:20
|
|
|
YaketySass posted:Let's wait and see if he goes three for three Dunno if anyone's said this yet, but imo he already has: the Back-Alley Immigrant Threat Scene was a case where the scenario, in its basic outlines, told you: "Loup/Jerrick is protecting Lana from creeps harassing her" while the art style was telling you: "Loup/Jerrick is goddamn Sephiroth burning down Nibelheim holy gently caress Lana run" Something I thought at the time and think even more strongly now with the "Tom drew this panel really well and it's not clear what is supposed to be going on" commentary is that it seems like Tom has great technical skill but does not always know how to apply it for a desired effect. (Edit: See also, "Tony's introduction as a character was apparently not meant to make us hate him for being an awful abusive parent forever, despite being expertly designed and executed to do just that") GunnerJ fucked around with this message at 12:59 on Sep 13, 2023 |
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 12:54
|
|
|
GunnerJ posted:Dunno if anyone's said this yet, but imo he already has: the Back-Alley Immigrant Threat Scene was a case where the scenario, in its basic outlines, told you: "Loup/Jerrick is protecting Lana from creeps harassing her" while the art style was telling you: "Loup/Jerrick is goddamn Sephiroth burning down Nibelheim holy gently caress Lana run" I think he mentioned in the retrospective for The Tree that he did want the readers to be upset at Tony and how he was treating Annie (or something to that effect). I suspect we were supposed to have our opinion turned around when we found out Tony's tragic supernatural social anxiety and that he felt lovely about Annie, which coincides with his character being gradually drawn with less and less harsh lines over his face. Like, "oh, he messed up but he didn't mean it! And once Annie and the readers know the real Tony we can clear up that misunderstanding!" It was supposed to be play on our expectations or something.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 14:12
|
|
|
isasphere posted:I think he mentioned in the retrospective for The Tree that he did want the readers to be upset at Tony and how he was treating Annie (or something to that effect). Yeah this is my interpretation, too. I think Tom fumbled not in how Tony's introduction went, but in how his redemption (for lack of a better word) was went. We've discussed this at length in the thread so I won't go into detail, but there was a LOT that could have been done to make Tony appear more sympathetic without changing his mental health struggles or even changing his intro, but just... None of it happened.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 14:20
|
|
|
CodfishCartographer posted:there was a LOT that could have been done ... but just... None of it happened.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 14:23
|
|
|
Actually, on that note, someone pointed something out that really horrified me and made a lot of the comic retroactively make sense in the worst way. I'm pretty sure Annie was never meant to be written in ways that parallel abuse or neglect. That sounds insane, because you thought so much of the comic is built around that, right? But the more you think about it, the more it makes a terrible amount of sense. The comic treats Annie's reactions to her father as immature and overblown. That the punishment is actually okay if you think about it. This makes sense if you think she wasn't upset about years of abandonment, neglect, and her guilt over her mother's death, but "oh my gawd my father is finally here but he's disappointed in me and humiliated me in front of class for cheating, that's so embarrassing". This isn't an abused child being overpunished by the narrative: the author sees her as a teenager who had gotten unruly and is eating a bit of humble pie and not skipping schoolworks anymore. The comic treats Tony's actions as okay and not worth apologizing for. This makes sense if Annie is not at all traumatized in any way from years of neglect and abandonment and Tony's worst sin was "being cold to Annie in front of class because she looked like his dead wife, which is understandable, and also the court made him hold her back a grade, so it's not his fault, and he has mental issues that make him cold to her, which isn't his fault either". Tony's introduction was meant to make you hate him, but that's because it's from Annie's perspective, she's a teenager and big events feel like the end of the world and adults don't make sense. The more you learn about him, the more you're supposed to ultimately go "He's just a normal if flawed dad who wants to protect his daughter, and his actions make sense if you think about it. Don't I feel stupid for treating him like a villain!!! An important lesson was learned!!!!". This is why he hands over Renard peacefully. This is why he's nice if you get to know him. This is why Kat, Annie's most staunch defender, who hated him and would most intimately witness the effects of his neglect, would ever become fast friends with him. And it explains perfectly why the entirety of The Tree was intentional. It explains all of the setup. It explains why the author was so blindsided by the negative reaction. It explains why all of the in-universe explanations fell so flat. All of this is fine and makes sense in-universe as long as you pretend parental abuse through neglect and the lasting effects of that do not exist, and Annie was never supposed to be abused. The parallels to abuse were either unintentional or deliberate misdirection, and Annie's only problem is ultimately "I'm lonely and I miss my dad  " then "my dad's kinda awkward and cold around me but not other people and I want his approval".
Tiny Myers fucked around with this message at 18:16 on Sep 13, 2023 |
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 18:09
|
|
|
Well, no wonder the retrospectives stopped right before the mind cage. There is no way for Tom to address that chapter without outright stating that Annie was never abused and the audience was wrong to think so, is there? And he knows the backlash that would generate. I have the impression that Tom is one of those people who think that abuse has to be intentional and a conscious decision in other to "count" as abuse, see what Ysengrin told Annie about how he would deal with Tony if he ever really did hurt her.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 19:08
|
|
|
isasphere posted:I have the impression that Tom is one of those people who think that abuse has to be intentional and a conscious decision in other to "count" as abuse, see what Ysengrin told Annie about how he would deal with Tony if he ever really did hurt her. See also: Jerrek smacking Lana and her brushing it off. I'm not going to speculate about what is in Tom's brain, but the material on the page has multiple worrying data points regarding abusive behavior.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 19:22
|
|
|
isasphere posted:I think he mentioned in the retrospective for The Tree that he did want the readers to be upset at Tony and how he was treating Annie (or something to that effect). Someone had a post earlier in thread about how it's clear Tom wanted readers to dislike Tony, but he went way too hard and did such a good job setting him up as a near-unforgiveable bastard that he just put himself on hard mode for any redemption arc. That's what I find most plausible: soo much sauce went into making him a bad guy and consequentially made the planned heel-face turn too difficult to land cleanly for everyone in the audience.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 19:32
|
|
|
I can't fathom what is going through Tom's head that he decided Tony's initial actions, including the public humiliation and making Annie live in an insane giant white room, were just the uncontrollable quirky result of his magical fake version of social anxiety and he should totally be absolved because he felt bad about it, guys. Tony doesn't act like he's awkward and nervous. He acts like the Hollywood version of multiple personality disorder. Or did, anyway, initially.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 19:46
|
|
|
GunnerJ posted:Someone had a post earlier in thread about how it's clear Tom wanted readers to dislike Tony, but he went way too hard and did such a good job setting him up as a near-unforgiveable bastard that he just put himself on hard mode for any redemption arc. That's what I find most plausible: soo much sauce went into making him a bad guy and consequentially made the planned heel-face turn too difficult to land cleanly for everyone in the audience. Made even worse because there is no redemption arc. Tony shares a hint of regret with other characters, but we never—not once—see him apologize or make any effort toward improving his relationship with Annie. The onus is entirely on her, which is loving buck wild. Rotten Red Rod posted:I can't fathom what is going through Tom's head that he decided Tony's initial actions, including the public humiliation and making Annie live in an insane giant white room, were just the uncontrollable quirky result of his magical fake version of social anxiety and he should totally be absolved because he felt bad about it, guys. Also this. Tony's actions were supervillain origin story-tier poo poo. I do not understand how someone could write those scenes and think their audience wouldn't hate the guy. God drat, I am still mad about that whole arc. I'm so glad the comic now is mostly just silly garbage rather than infuriating garbage.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 19:56
|
|
|
terminal case of jhonenbrain
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 19:57
|
|
|
I believe part of the explanation was 'he never told her to live in the giant psychologically crushing white room, she did it because she was freaking out (and he had one available and failed to tell her not to)' - like how he never told her to cut off her elemental side, she just did it to please him and that's definitely completely and totally different for a parent.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 20:19
|
|
|
GunnerJ posted:Someone had a post earlier in thread about how it's clear Tom wanted readers to dislike Tony, but he went way too hard and did such a good job setting him up as a near-unforgiveable bastard that he just put himself on hard mode for any redemption arc. That's what I find most plausible: soo much sauce went into making him a bad guy and consequentially made the planned heel-face turn too difficult to land cleanly for everyone in the audience. literature's full of hosed-up characters who do truly loathsome poo poo clearly presented as such and remain sympathetic or understandable due to their Circumstances, dude just entirely miscalculated that a moderate to severe case of social anxiety would be taken as this totally unheard-of cross that no mere mortal could be expected to bear rather than something millions of people and probably an exceptionally high proportion of readers of webcomics about magical girl high school would be intimately familiar with and have found ways to work around to lead healthy, non-abusive lives.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 20:20
|
|
|
Well it's lost now but in some of the blog posts on the comic, Tom supposedly said he based Tony partially off his own difficulties dealing with his own dad. And it took a lot of time before he was able to understand the kind of person his father was and come to terms with him. It's been mentioned several times before in thread but since we have a few new folks in the thread it's worth mentioning again. So if this was truly the case then this makes more sense. The problem was he pushed Tony's actions too far, and didn't really see all the implications of what he was doing with the particulars. So the tone of the comic is way off in the end. He wanted to frame the problem as Annie not understanding her father. However, the problem as depicted in the comic was that Annie was being horribly abused by her father. And Tom clearly wasn't prepared to handle that kind of story. The obvious rushing with the ending of the arc does it no favors either. With the removal of the blog we can't verify if that was his initial intent or not but it's potentially interesting context to consider anyways.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 20:25
|
|
|
A Wizard of Goatse posted:literature's full of hosed-up characters who do truly loathsome poo poo clearly presented as such and remain sympathetic or understandable due to their Circumstances, dude just entirely miscalculated that a moderate to severe case of social anxiety would be taken as this totally unheard-of cross that no mere mortal could be expected to bear rather than something millions of people and probably an exceptionally high proportion of readers of webcomics about magical girl high school would be intimately familiar with and have found ways to work around to lead healthy, non-abusive lives. What is interesting is that not everyone actually seems to see Tony's whole deal as a failure to write a redeemable character. Like, I do, most everyone in this thread does, but I keep hearing about GC readers elsewhere who are completely on board. Which is, uh, disconcerting.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 20:27
|
|
|
Something else that occurred to me, Tony literally cut off his own hand to try and resurrect his dead wife. He was literally willing to mutilate himself and try to change reality through a pact with dark forces to make that happen. But talk to his daughter about his issues? Nah. Too hard. I got this super magic shy boy brain thing for some unexplained reason that is way way worse than normal social anxiety somehow. Can't do it. Nope. Therapy? I, the literal surgeon, have never heard of it. I hope this is a result of Tom never actually going through abusive circumstances like these, because this an edgy teenager's view of mental illness and abuse. It feels like someone with no actual life experience trying to imagine what it might be like and how people would react. Rotten Red Rod fucked around with this message at 20:37 on Sep 13, 2023 |
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 20:32
|
|
|
JuniperCake posted:Well it's lost now but in some of the blog posts on the comic, Tom supposedly said he based Tony partially off his own difficulties dealing with his own dad. And it took a lot of time before he was able to understand the kind of person his father was and come to terms with him. It's been mentioned several times before in thread but since we have a few new folks in the thread it's worth mentioning again. Do you remember roughly around which chapter this was posted?
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 20:43
|
|
|
Remember when this webcomic was good
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 20:43
|
|
|
GunnerJ posted:Someone had a post earlier in thread about how it's clear Tom wanted readers to dislike Tony, but he went way too hard and did such a good job setting him up as a near-unforgiveable bastard that he just put himself on hard mode for any redemption arc. That's what I find most plausible: soo much sauce went into making him a bad guy and consequentially made the planned heel-face turn too difficult to land cleanly for everyone in the audience. I think that's the most likely explanation too, more than the hypothesis that the intent was that Tony Did Nothing Wrong. Tom wanted a dramatic turn and made it as intense as he could because that's how a teenage girl would experience it, not realizing that by going that hard he made Tony cross a line from fuckup dad to abusive one. e: coolusername posted:I think the ultimate problem with Tony is that the comic was actually too good, artistically speaking. Because Tony is a masterclass in how to introduce an incredibly loathesome villain. The pump is primed with all his prior behaviour trickled in - his neglect and how it harms Annie - while Kat acts as an audience surrogate seething over the abuse. When he finally bursts onto the scene, it is horrific and incredibly effective. YaketySass fucked around with this message at 20:56 on Sep 13, 2023 |
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 20:50
|
|
|
skaianDestiny posted:Remember when this webcomic was good do you mean when it was actually good or that phase when it wasn't good anymore but people got yelled at for proposing that idea
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 20:54
|
|
|
Both back when it first came out and right now, the "haha, my mental state?!" panel looks like Annie attempting to hide extreme distress to me, and that the intended takeaway was "everything is actually fine now!" baffles me still.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 21:55
|
|
|
RocketMermaid posted:Both back when it first came out and right now, the "haha, my mental state?!" panel looks like Annie attempting to hide extreme distress to me, and that the intended takeaway was "everything is actually fine now!" baffles me still. it's so good 
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 22:04
|
|
|
I'm the weirdo who likes Tony and the direction Tom decided to go with him but I do absolutely hate everything else that's gone down since after The Mind Cage.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 22:07
|
|
|
YaketySass posted:it's so good Haha, my mental state?  Haha, worrying about Annie's mental state is kinda cringe if you think about it, haha!  Why would the readers ever think she's anything other than fine, haha.  Haha!
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 22:56
|
|
|
RocketMermaid posted:Both back when it first came out and right now, the "haha, my mental state?!" panel looks like Annie attempting to hide extreme distress to me, and that the intended takeaway was "everything is actually fine now!" baffles me still. i was honestly willing to tox over this panel. multiple posts, reassuring other readers that this was absolutely a gun falling off the mantlepiece. i was so sure.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 23:02
|
|
|
tony is actually a great character, as a character in fiction, right up until the wet flop of a resolution like the level of broken that he is actually lines up with the terrible poo poo that he went through. it's good madness presented in a nonstandard way and then... well...
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 23:06
|
|
|
I checked out on Tony in the chapter where Annie eavesdropped on the conversation between him and Donald. His monologue didn't address at all the reason he needed to be loving over the top cruel to her, it never sat right with me.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 23:11
|
|
|
I thought the Tony stuff was really interesting because we were getting a look into an extremely flawed character that through negligence and not tempering his own mental health issues inadvertently abused his daughter. I thought that was the story we were getting. And I really thought that the mind cage chapter was going to fully dig into what that meant and start the resolution around his issues. Everything about that chapter felt set up to explore that and have Tony and Annie finally start healing. But then she straight up turned to the camera and said there's no problems here. So you're telling me literally everyone that showed concern, Annie's friends, her best friend's parents, the jilted ex that spent several years keeping an eye on Annie's life from a medium perspective, Zimmy's fists, they were all wrong and Antimony "M-Me?" Carver is right. Like she made a joke that all her father figures tried to off her at least once, but she's not abused.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 23:11
|
|
|
Patware posted:tony is actually a great character, as a character in fiction, right up until the wet flop of a resolution he peaked with his introduction and it was all downhill from there. everything about Tony from his first conversation with kat’s dad onward was that you just had to Give Him a Chance. he’s a right old bloke if you can Give Him a Chance. but the “true” Tony that showed up whenever someone Gave Him a Chance never had any personality either - at best, he was a clevin-esque introverted soft boy. his flashback chapter with surma in the jungle was the point where I started breaking away from the comic because so much ink was being spilled over this non-entity who only ever worked as the dead-eyed progenitor of his daughter’s emotional damage meanwhile he’s been banished to the misty lands for going on two years now. might as well have had a giant vaudeville hook yank him permanently off-panel
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 23:32
|
|
|
All the speculation on "what Tom must have actually meant with Tony/Annie/whatever was..." is fine and good for conversation, but it's not what we got. Maybe Annie was actually blowing things out of proportion with her punishments and humiliation, maybe Tony was trying his best to be a good father, maybe it was all just a big miscommunication and it wasn't an abusive situation at all, maybe Annie has all her problems sorted out and is in a perfect state of mental health. Maybe it will all come together eventually, but I'm not crossing my fingers. It's just not how things read. I could sit down and try to write the greatest love story of all time, but if I churned out one of those trashy romance paperbacks with a girl in a dress and a shirtless guy riding a horse airbrushed onto the cover, well that's what you got, intentions aside. (Maybe not fair, but, making a point). I'm not knocking any of the speculation, and enjoy reading about it, I guess I'm just saying that at least for me, I'm not making any excuses for what Tom may have been thinking behind-the-scenes versus how it was executed to explain away some of the baffling inconsistencies in the final product. That said, I'm still curious to see where it will all go.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 23:51
|
|
|
isasphere posted:Do you remember roughly around which chapter this was posted? Unfortunately I don't and every time it's brought up no one seems to be able to find it. Which is why I do wonder if its like a thread wide Mandela effect or what. But he did have that side blog thats no longer available so dunno.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 00:17
|
|
|
I miss when gunnerkrigg court was funny
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 01:06
|
|
|
My new theory is there is the good artist Tom and it was cut out in editing. That half is currently raging in the corner of a perfectly white room. Every now and then it screams loud enough that a panel reflects the underlying narrative horror that is Lana’s uncanny ‘romance’, or the decay of Annie’s personality, etc. but then writer Tom pokes it back up there with a broom. This is as legitimate as my prior theorising.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 02:17
|
|
|
I think I started reading gunnerkrigg court like a decade ago, then stopped after chapter 21 when other stuff grabbed my attention. I was reminded of it in February of last year when someone on a Discord mentioned how bad the Jerrek/Lana/elves scene is -- I came back at the end of chapter 86 and been riding the roller coaster since then. After catching up with the thread, I'm glad I didn't get invested in this comic because it sounds like a radical downfall.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 02:21
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 28, 2024 10:28 |
|
|
I'm starting to believe it was never good if this is the ending.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 02:41
|
|
