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Tiny Myers posted:Yeah Tom seems to have never been angling for Annie to have been actually abused at all and seems to have drastically underestimated how much emotional trauma would have been done to Annie by something like her father loving off into the wilderness for years right after her mom died, leaving her to be raised by an unfeeling Court. Even if you wanted to agree with the comic's bizarre moral that Annie became a wild child that needed her wings clipped, that's a massive unaddressed issue: the severe child neglect and traumatization through chronic absence. Remember when Jimmy Jims' elf girlfriend addressed that and was like "lol so should he be in her life or not, wow he can't win!" Extremely cool stuff.
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Feb 8, 2024 15:24
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GunnerJ posted:Remember when Jimmy Jims' elf girlfriend addressed that and was like "lol so should he be in her life or not, wow he can't win!" Extremely cool stuff.  it's like he wrote strawmen in for every position so he could have Annie say "gently caress da haters hehe"
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Feb 8, 2024 16:25
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Oxxidation posted:the justification was “I lock up when I’m with more then one person and Annie reminds me of my wife so I think she’s two people” which is absolutely cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs Not to mention it immediately opens everyone going “How about doing X?” Because it’s such a ridiculous excuse. At least if it was a magical curse or the like, people could accept it a bit as fantasy. But “my social anxiety is so bad I can’t deal with two people at once, so I abandoned my child” instantly becomes a Greek chorus of “Get therapy? Send a letter? A text? Communicate via the many people you’re seen talking to, which include adults with direct contact and (ignored) responsibility for her health and weirdly also her best friend after an off-screen montage? Draw stick figures holding hands on the wall? Get a magical solution from the literal, actual wizards?“
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Feb 8, 2024 18:06
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You guys are forgetting that the main reason Annie is okay with it is that she did get to experience friendship with Tony... through one of her duplicates (I think it was Forest Annie?). Entirely off-panel. They got along so well and had many touching father-daughter moments. And that was integrated into the memories of the reunited Annie, even though she can never experience it again because being recombined broke the loophole that allowed Tony to interact with her normally. Writing it out, it's such a bizarre turn the story took. Both situating all of that off-panel and also resolving it in such a quick and unceremonious way. It's like when Annie was rejoined, she experienced enlightenment and is no longer relatable to the reader. That's when we really broke from her perspective entirely, and were left in the weird plotless void that the comic is still stuck in.
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Feb 8, 2024 18:43
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...Do you think duplicates Annies were hastily written in to resolve the Tony-Annie conflict?
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Feb 8, 2024 18:47
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my impression was that the split was always planned but like half or more of the character development pre-reconciliation got scrapped
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Feb 8, 2024 19:12
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Begemot posted:You guys are forgetting that the main reason Annie is okay with it is that she did get to experience friendship with Tony... through one of her duplicates (I think it was Forest Annie?). Entirely off-panel. They got along so well and had many touching father-daughter moments. And that was integrated into the memories of the reunited Annie, even though she can never experience it again because being recombined broke the loophole that allowed Tony to interact with her normally. I'm not. I just don't think it matters. He still did the awful things he did. I don't buy that Annie is ok with it because she still experienced that abuse. Well, I should rephrase that - I'm not objecting to the possibility of a victim deciding to forgive and love their abuser, as that's obviously a thing that's happened. I'm objecting to Tom presenting it a good thing, and a desired outcome. With no pushback from any character except Elgamore. isasphere posted:...Do you think duplicates Annies were hastily written in to resolve the Tony-Annie conflict? Man, I really don't know anymore. I honestly thought it was the new status quo and the comic was now about Annie as a set of sisters. Which was a really exciting dynamic, and we'd just gotten to the point where they had reconciled their situation and accepted each other... And then Zimmy merging them together, and Annie saying "thank you" with no further explanation, it was a real loving kick in the teeth. Rotten Red Rod fucked around with this message at 19:19 on Feb 8, 2024 |
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Feb 8, 2024 19:17
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I've said before I think I love when one character is two characters and two Annies was like the new high point of the comic it allowed for so many good scenes and dynamics and then they were merged together like they were a bad thing that needed to be fixed and they were fixed in like an afterthought of a dreamy hallucination chapter with no explanation and it was like. oh. ok. and then Paz left and Shadow disappeared and all the good characters vanished so new characters could come in and exposit and take over and now it's all farting noises
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Feb 8, 2024 20:12
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Cavelcade posted:Honestly I'd be fine with that if the conclusion from Annie was more "this sucks and hurts but I've decided I want him in my life and so I'll live with it, even though I wish he would change" rather than "this is good, actually, completely fine". When I first read it, I thought he was going for something like "growing up means seeing and accepting your parents for who they are, and sometimes that means acknowledging that they were working with certain limitations or struggles." Like, for example, if someone were to look back on their childhood with the realization that their parent was struggling with depression or something, and even if it doesn't excuse certain things, it at least explains them or casts them in a different light. Obviously it didn't quite land though. E: I'm surprised people thought the double Annie thing would stick though
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Feb 8, 2024 20:56
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christmas boots posted:E: I'm surprised people thought the double Annie thing would stick though I'm always surprised when I see other people have this reaction - I thought it was the most interesting twist in the story for a very long time, and that it created really interesting drama and opportunity for Annie to self-reflect (rimshot) in a way she couldn't do before. And once they had self-actualized and accepted each other, seeing them be not only good friends, but SISTERS was an incredible development. I was looking forward to the rest of the comic being about the adventures of Annie, Antimony, and their friend Kat, and I actually praised Tom for being brave enough to change the status quo enough to make that stick. The chapter where they were merged was a HUGE bummer for me, and it marked the start of my opinion sliding for this comic (and itdidn't help that Mind Cage is the next chapter). Anyway, not saying those who didn't like the two Annies are wrong, I'm just surprised by it.
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Feb 8, 2024 21:43
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Knowing the internet at large, I just imagine someone asked Tom if the two Annie's having sex would count as maturbation or incest and he ended that story arc as quickly as possible.
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Feb 8, 2024 21:50
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Rotten Red Rod posted:I'm always surprised when I see other people have this reaction - I thought it was the most interesting twist in the story for a very long time, and that it created really interesting drama and opportunity for Annie to self-reflect (rimshot) in a way she couldn't do before. And once they had self-actualized and accepted each other, seeing them be not only good friends, but SISTERS was an incredible development. I was looking forward to the rest of the comic being about the adventures of Annie, Antimony, and their friend Kat, and I actually praised Tom for being brave enough to change the status quo enough to make that stick. The chapter where they were merged was a HUGE bummer for me, and it marked the start of my opinion sliding for this comic (and itdidn't help that Mind Cage is the next chapter). Oh likewise, I'm not at all saying that people were wrong to like the two Annies. It just always read to me as something that was going to be "resolved" at some point. I was expecting it to be a bigger deal when it was though.
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Feb 8, 2024 21:50
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Well, whether we disagree on whether it seemed like it was going to be permanent, I definitely agree it was resolved with a huge thud. I remember seeing the page where her clothes were merged, and my heart dropped. And then she said "thank you" and I got angry.
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Feb 8, 2024 21:54
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Rotten Red Rod posted:Well, whether we disagree on whether it seemed like it was going to be permanent, I definitely agree it was resolved with a huge thud. I remember seeing the page where her clothes were merged, and my heart dropped. It's like they killed off one of the main characters and the intended reaction from the audience was, for some reason, cheering.
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Feb 8, 2024 22:38
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Rotten Red Rod posted:I'm always surprised when I see other people have this reaction - I thought it was the most interesting twist in the story for a very long time, and that it created really interesting drama and opportunity for Annie to self-reflect (rimshot) in a way she couldn't do before. And once they had self-actualized and accepted each other, seeing them be not only good friends, but SISTERS was an incredible development. I was looking forward to the rest of the comic being about the adventures of Annie, Antimony, and their friend Kat, and I actually praised Tom for being brave enough to change the status quo enough to make that stick. The chapter where they were merged was a HUGE bummer for me, and it marked the start of my opinion sliding for this comic (and itdidn't help that Mind Cage is the next chapter). Yeah this. It was cool and I liked seeing their relationship grow, and it's always interesting to present a character with a reflection of themselves and see how how they react, and how they grow from that. Then the merge happened and it was all reverted, and apparently they merged together despite them both being real people just from different dimensions? and it was all in all quite disappointing.
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Feb 8, 2024 22:46
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they even had them ask in-universe "which one of you is gonna go and which one is gonna stay" and had them look unsettled by that, just to turn around and go "lmao just kidding zimmytime, good thing that will never be an issue ever"
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Feb 8, 2024 22:53
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Nettle Soup posted:Then the merge happened and it was all reverted, and apparently they merged together despite them both being real people just from different dimensions? and it was all in all quite disappointing. I mean we're not even really quite sure that's what happened, since Annie refused to listen to Rey's explanation.
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Feb 8, 2024 23:32
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I thought it was some kind of time duplication thing. They were the same individual, then got forked into two identical copies that proceeded to have different experiences and then got mashed back together.
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Feb 8, 2024 23:56
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I was hoping that at least, if we webt back to one Annie, it would be because of a decision that one or both of the Annies made.
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Feb 9, 2024 01:41
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maltesh posted:I was hoping that at least, if we webt back to one Annie, it would be because of a decision that one or both of the Annies made. "A hosed up resolution that everyone involved is fine with, actually, maybe you're the person with the bad opinion for yelling at the screen about it being hosed up  " seems to be the actual message of the comic as a whole, so
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Feb 9, 2024 01:57
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Personally, I couldn't imagine a story adding and keeping another main character with the exact same name and essentially the same appearance and personality for longer than an arc or two, so it wasn't surprising to see that resolved. What was surprising was how badly it was resolved.
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Feb 9, 2024 03:01
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It was already starting to implement a solution to the challenges of having two characters with the same appearance and personality, by having them diverge more visibly due to differing experiences.
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Feb 9, 2024 05:40
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The two Annies thing which let her experience things from different perspectives wasn't the worst thing. Though the non-resolution of just having zimmy smash them together whatever sucked and felt completely unearned. Like a lot of things, if it was actually handled with care and some nuance, it could have been fine or even good. But unfortunately as we've seen with this comic, we're never gonna get that. So the plot and characterization is just gonna be awful, boring and alltogether disappointing no matter what happens. Even if we get the occasional neat page with cool imagery in isolation. Which of course will be immediately undermined and made worse in retrospect by the next few talking head pages that follow it anyways JuniperCake fucked around with this message at 06:12 on Feb 9, 2024 |
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Feb 9, 2024 06:09
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No tom I pretty sure satan already robbed the story of any gravitas and quality
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Feb 9, 2024 09:23
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... I know that the title is in reference to a saying, but has Christianity come up ever in the comic? I don't know why, but that REALLY pisses me off for some reason. No, gently caress you, the Devil is not in this comic, you have clearly shown that there is no Hell for him to reign over, what gods there are play a direct role in the world and are cruel and capricious and care not for the wellbeing of the people of the world. Judeo-Christian religion has been shown to be outright wrong in this setting, do not suddenly start evoking it. If Tom turns out to have pulled a CS Lewis partway through all of this and became a devout born-again Christian, that may explain so much.
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Feb 9, 2024 13:04
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Wrong comic. The born-again Christian cult author that made a conversion swerve in the middle of writing their mythology-based and mystery-solving comic, a comic which also had a redheaded main character who acted as a psychopomp and who travelled with a protective magical dog — that comic was stand still, stay silent. And weirdly enough, even with all the author suddenly blogging about needing to end it so they could start making a proper Jesus-respecting series? they still made the effort to stick the landing better than mind cage did.
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Feb 9, 2024 13:38
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coolusername posted:And weirdly enough, even with all the author suddenly blogging about needing to end it so they could start making a proper Jesus-respecting series? they still made the effort to stick the landing better than mind cage did. Oh that's interesting, I may have to check it out to see how it ended then.
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Feb 9, 2024 14:41
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That kind of arc reminds me of several comics I read by Earthworm Jim designer Doug TenNapel before I knew what an awful bigot he is. He had a tendency to write what seemed like a pretty normal sci-fi story with lots of creative ideas and weird imagery, and then partway through it would get revealed that the plot is actually about the Christian faith and the religious imagery would turn up to 11. I think Creature Tech ends with the main character praying in front of a cross or something similar.
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Feb 9, 2024 16:42
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Probably the most egregious example of this, to me anyway, is when the B.C. comic does an Easter special, like this: https://www.facebook.com/BCcomic/photos/a.290221004977/10151634350259978/ Like buddy... what does "B.C." stand for, you are undermining the very integrity of your whole deal!
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Feb 9, 2024 16:45
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GunnerJ posted:Probably the most egregious example of this, to me anyway, is when the B.C. comic does an Easter special, like this: https://www.facebook.com/BCcomic/photos/a.290221004977/10151634350259978/ "Well, akshewally, B.C. takes place in the far future after an Apocalypse reduced the world back to a primitive stone age. Wait, I don't wanna get another swirly before being shoved into the locker."  The only time I can recall a comic went and introduced biblical elements partway through that actually stuck the landing was SCUD The Disposable Assassin and that was the revelation that the world was the dystopia that it was because Satan was a no-show for the final battle in Revelations, God didn't want to throw the first punch, the angels overthrew God and sealed him away, and the monster SCUD was hired to assassinate at the start was one of the four horsemen. It ends with SCUD and friends freeing God and rampaging through Heaven. Fun!
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Feb 9, 2024 17:04
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I went and looked up the final page of Creature Tech, and it's nearly as bad as I remember: Big "Sonic praying in front of the cross meme" energy, but from 2002 there.
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Feb 9, 2024 17:55
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Mock thread outrage is all well and fun but I think you're reading a hell of a lot into one use of a common expression. "Give the devil his due" has a very familiar secular meaning, basically that even someone with a lot of bad qualities should get credit when they do something good or useful. Cervantes and Shakespeare both used it in this sense. The concept of a devil is not exclusive to Christianity, nor is the word "devil" itself, which traces back to the ancient Greek, diabolos or 'slanderer.' Hell, it's not even the first sideways reference to Christian topics in existing comic mythology. The foolish and greedy Ysengrim of fable was often styled as a Roman Catholic monk, as a satire of their corruption and greed. Like yeah the comic is bad now, but calling it a born-again Christian comic now because the word 'devil' was used in one chapter title is one hell of a stretch.
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Feb 9, 2024 18:35
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Yeah i don't think Tom is gonna do an evangelical heel turn or anything - the closest to any of that we've seen is Robot's avatar looking a lot like pre-fall Lucifer. But, like, who KNOWS what we're gonna get with the way things have going lately.
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Feb 9, 2024 18:38
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I think y'all are getting carried away, like, uh, it's probably either about them having to face consequences with Annie being a psychopomp or Kat facing consequences for being a god, going by the cover art? Please bring back consequences and things of consequence and become good again.
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Feb 9, 2024 18:50
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ONE person got annoyed with the use of Judeo-Christian terminology, and the rest of us were just talking about how that came up in other comics. No one's getting carried away, we're just talking about an interesting topic.
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Feb 9, 2024 18:56
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And I even said I don't know why it pissed me off (though we did have a bout of nasty weather where I live, so it may have just been pent up stress venting over the first minor thing).
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Feb 9, 2024 19:07
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feetnotes posted:Mock thread outrage is all well and fun but I think you're reading a hell of a lot into one use of a common expression. The occasional weird posting is part of this thread's charm 
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Feb 9, 2024 19:11
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Given that a lot of us have been drawn to Gunnerkrigg because of its use of other established mythology it's a pretty fair bet though that most of us have yelled "THAT'S NOT HOW [X] WORKS THAT'S CHRISTIANITY F UUUUUUUUUU!" at least once in our lives. It's probably just a common phrase tying into the god theme but it certainly feels like we're being set up for a Kat/Zimmy duality. The themes are all in place and once upon a time it might have been a neat turn where the comic acknowledges that you can have opposites who are not opposed but I'm almost hoping for a wet fart on this one.
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Feb 9, 2024 19:13
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I ain't reading this thread for the comic I'll tell ya
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Feb 9, 2024 19:13
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It's a consequence of the comic losing so much good will at this point. We're all jumpy and our pattern recognition for other comic decay signs is overreacting so we get false positives.
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Feb 9, 2024 19:14
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