[602]Oh. That guy.

She seems to be less than impressed. Maybe it was the hours-long walk, or maybe it's the lingering mutual state of awkwardness. I'm liking the mist in this one.

GOOD LORD what is her freakin deal with him anyways. GUH

It looks like Eggers is chopping wood in the second frame-- so he'd be holding an axe.

...And I'm curious what Annie's problem is... Perhaps we'll find out what happened between Eglamore & Surma this chapter.

OK, the last panel is my new favorite thing Tom has drawn. Annie's expression is hilarious.

Here's a question: what is Eglamore holding in the second panel? OK, already discussed and answered.

The face of somebody who now may have to hear how wonderful Eglamore is. For a week.

If only she knew how to keep repeating "Uh-huh" while out in the Aether.

Hot damn, look at that chest!

You could eat a full-course meal off that thing!

*ahem*

But seriously, I'm really curious to see what kind of camping activities the Court folks have planned for Annie and crew.
Something tells me the cliche 'ghost stories' just wouldn't be appropriate...

Or maybe Annie's still in a grudging mood over Eglamore's attempt to confiscate Reynardine back in Chapter Seven. (All the scenes where she seems less than fond of the guy take place after that.)

You know, I thought the art was good before, but it keeps getting better. Good for Tom for continuing to mess around and experiment with new things.

As for Annie, there's kind of a laundry list of things that Eglamore has done to annoy her. To pick a few random examples: going on about how much more awesome her mom was than her, keeping Reynardine restrained by putting an actual metal shaft /through his leg/, calling her by her mom's name when she fell off the bridge, throwing a sword through robot, and, yes, having her best friend have a crush on him even though that isn't really his fault. Now, looking at it objectively, for the most part Eglamore is doing the right thing in many of these situations (or at least what he sees as the right thing), but it isn't really right to expect Annie to look at things with complete objectivity (especially since she's a little girl).

SECONDED!

Now please excuse me while I roll on the floor laughing at "diamondcake" ;D

I've been wondering myself at the source of Annie's antagonism towards Eglamore. I wonder if someone can explain it.

The earliest meeting I found between them is in:
www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=36
www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=37

At this point, she doesn't seem to have anything against him.

Eglamore is present when Reynardine is revealed:
www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=104
www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=105
www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=109

Here, he shows some hostility to Annie's father, and Annie disapproves of the way Reynardine was imprisoned.

Next time I found, he was giving her detention for falling off the bridge:
www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=162

At this point we can fairly say that she is already hostile.

Have I missed something in the development here?

As for the list, idonotlikepeas, I think such a list is the best way to get to the bottom of it. I'd like to add my 2 cents:

1) "going on about how much more awesome her mom was than her."

I agree with this - but the first apperance I saw is in #162.

2) "keeping Reynardine restrained by putting an actual metal shaft /through his leg/,"
Some of this is evident in Panels 1-3 of #109. But it doesn't seem enough for a long-term grudge against James. After all, Reynardine did try to kill her, and James saved her life. She might not approve of this method of restraint, but it's hardly a reason to hate the man who saved her.

3) "calling her by her mom's name when she fell off the bridge, "
I think the last thing I'd notice if I was falling off a bridge was that someone who was trying to save me was calling me by the wrong name. I really wouldn't hold it against him.

4) "throwing a sword through robot, "
The robot was trying to murder her by pushing her off a bridge.

5) "and, yes, having her best friend have a crush on him"
With this I agree 100%.


So to summarize: I agree completely with points (1) and (5) on the list, and agree somewhat with (2). I think we should also add:
(6) Eglamore speaks ill of her father

Does anyone have anything else?

Altogether, this might be enough to explain it. But what troubles me is:
1) We've never heard Annie say she doesn't like him - it's always implicit.
2) We haven't seen this anger being born, only noticed it after the fact. For example, there's no shot of an angry reaction to James in #106.
3) Those events which might have caused it have strong mitigating circumstances (e.g. Eglamore saving her or trying to save her), which makes her reaction a bit surprising.

There is a parallel which should be noted: Her anger against Muut and his ilk goes unexplained for a long time, until:
www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=532
When we discover that there was a specific event which caused it, and explains it completely. I suspect that her anger towards James has a similarly convincing explanation, and either it will be revealed in the future, or maybe I just missed it.

Of course, we could say that being repeatedly indebted to someone can breed resentment towards him...

First time post, I'd love to hear what you guys think.

Jonathan

Hi Jon! Welcome to the forums!

I can see that you'll fit well with the rest of us who like to over-analyze a very good webcomic

While we're at it, why not share some things about yourself at The Introduction Thread



I tend to agree with your first suspicion, i.e., there's an explanation that we'll see. I hope soon, since this is (assumedly) a whole week with Egg.

I'd wager another flashback of Surma-and-Eglamore. In the last flashback (the one with Anja and Surma), we can intuit that Surma is romantically involved with Eglamore. What happened afterwards? Why Surma married Carver instead of Eglamore?

I think that's the key to understanding Annie's dislike of Egg.

Well, she already knew that he was watching her as of the science fair: www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=76 Not knowing why, it would come off as sort of weird. Also see his comment earlier, on this page: www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=56

If Annie noticed the comment, that sort of personal attention, with no explanation (at that point) is sort of off-putting. With Kat's having a crush on Eglamore, having him pay Annie personal attention could get weirder for her - it's not as if she can ignore the fact that Eglamore looks to her personally when Kat gushes about him. Of course later, Annie finds out that he knew her parents, which seems to clear that up at first.

Eglamore's criticism of her father probably also didn't go over well; Annie tends to justify Anthony's actions, and Eglamore isn't shy about how much he dislikes Anthony. Combining that with the fact that Annie considered Reynardine's treatment inhumane ( see: www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=109 ), and Annie is already disposed to at least have some disagreements with Eglamore.



While, as I said, Annie already has points on which she disagrees with Eglamore, I think this is when he starts to actively annoy her on a personal level. He compares her (unfavorably!) with her mother. Most people wouldn't be happy with being compared unfavorably with their parents; Annie is no different.

At this point, it just seems to go on like this - Eglamore keeps comparing Annie to Surma (or to Anthony, when she does something he doesn't like.) I can't imagine it's anything but irritating to Annie, who isn't Surma!clone or Anthony!clone - she's herself, and Eglamore has a lot of trouble recognizing it. Moreover, Eglamore persists in having Reynardine. He's certainly got good reasons for it, but given that Annie is friends with Reynardine and Rey has gotten quite protective of her, the constant dislike will rankle.

I admit that I thought their relationship might improve after the forest trip, but apparently it didn't. I'd have to look at it again to evaluate why.

As for today's strip, I think that it might just be that Annie is getting incredibly sick of being compared with her mother. (See: www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=592 ) With Eglamore on the trip, likelihood that he'll bring Surma or Anthony up tends to be high. It's not something that Annie would be looking forward to at all.

He certainly HAS if you check him out since the beginning. Several times several of us have insisted that a certain character can't be Eglamore because of how drastically different his face is. Tom has apparently gotten tired of that, so he lets us know each time when Eglamore first shows up.

Anyway. ANNIE! You're pouting, girl. Pull that lip back in, you look like you've been stung in the mouth by a bee.

Thanks for the warm welcome! I've posted a note on the introductions thread.

I would love to see a flashback of Surma and Eglamore - remember Coyote's mistake?
Coyote: "Eglamore, you hound!"
Eglamore: "Carver is the girl's father"
Coyote: "Well in that case, how embarassing! Ahahaha!"

That was great!

The only problem is this: A flashback would tell us what happened, but doesn't tell us how Annie learns about it. If she always knew about it, it would explain a pre-existing antagonism. However, if her dislike developed over the first 150 episodes, then the flashback won't be enough.

A confrontation between Annie and Eggers might yield some interesting information...

Especially since Snape Eglamore still has Lily's Surma's Patronus knife...
(http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=110)
...and knives are often used on camping trips...
...and Eglamore likes to whittle pieces of wood...
(http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=501)