Some thoughts on Annie

[Aspen d'Grey]

mrw said:

Interesting she know so many languages...

She probably learned their languages while she was with the Guides. I get the impression that that last night is 'timeless', so what could have seemed like hours to Annie could have taken almost no-time at all. I also see her sort of falling asleep, as young children do, and the patient smiling and slipping off, and then the Guide taking Annie back to wherever she is supposed to be.

[rastarogue]

aspengrey said:

mrw said:

Interesting she know so many languages...

She probably learned their languages while she was with the Guides. I get the impression that that last night is 'timeless', so what could have seemed like hours to Annie could have taken almost no-time at all. I also see her sort of falling asleep, as young children do, and the patient smiling and slipping off, and then the Guide taking Annie back to wherever she is supposed to be.

Annie recieved her education before GC from her Mother, maybe her mother taught her all of those languages? Though that raises the question of how did her mother learn so many languages?

[La Poire]

mrw said:

Interesting she know so many languages...

I think perhaps the Guides taught her. She says something about it: "I learned about their homes, their lives, their languages."

Edit: Whoops, didn't see there were three pages to this thread.

[La Poire]

rastarogue said:

aspengrey said:

She probably learned their languages while she was with the Guides. I get the impression that that last night is 'timeless', so what could have seemed like hours to Annie could have taken almost no-time at all. I also see her sort of falling asleep, as young children do, and the patient smiling and slipping off, and then the Guide taking Annie back to wherever she is supposed to be.

Annie recieved her education before GC from her Mother, maybe her mother taught her all of those languages? Though that raises the question of how did her mother learn so many languages?

Annie's parents really intrigue me. We know almost nothing about them, except that they managed to produce Antimony, a feat in itself.

[owl]

So here's a thought: Does it ever say that Surma doesn't know about Muut and the others? If she does, everyone could be right. Surma could have learned it from the Guides, then passed them on to Annie. Annie, being the calm, collected soul she is, would have seen that Surma was "not ready" (for whatever reason) to explain where she knew the languages from, and so would not have asked. Perhaps Surma thought Annie should meet the guides with no expectations, but know how to greet them?

Of course, all of this is pure speculation, as most of my posts are.
I'd especially like to know more about Anthony. As little as we know about Surma, we know next to nothing about him. I mean, we saw that picture, and we know that Eglamore dislikes him, but...

EDIT: Actually, why are we even discussing wh she knows languanges?
Comic 157

[rastarogue]

I think her parents are really intriguing, mainly because they are such a huge mystery, we know more about Zimmy than about them.

[owl]

Well...mostly we have more specific questions about Zimmy than we do about Annie's parents. But that's about as close as you can get to "knowing more about" a character in GC...the more specific the questions we have are, the "more we know".

[Aspen d'Grey]

In Broken Glass & Other Things Annie says that her mother could see them as well, and that Antimony should not be afraid of them

[mrw]

Annie sure doesn't ask a lot of questions. How does any child hold curiosity in check like that? After all that just happened with Zimmy and Gamma - and she doesn't ask anything. That is being TOO polite.
But at this rate, she'll be everybody's confidant.

[todd]

I think that Annie has a fair amount of curiosity - she wants to know what the link is between Reynardine and her mother, and the only reason why she hasn't found that out yet is because Reynardine's stubborn -- but I doubt that she believes in prying too much into the lives of her fellow students. And maybe she felt that it was not the best time to be asking Zimmy and Gamma a lot of questions, too.

Though I don't know whether she'd be *everybody's* confidant. (I certainly doubt that Janet and Winsbury would want even someone as discreet as Annie to find out about their relationship, for one.)

[julieth]

Annie certainly does keep things inside. I think that's really irregular for a kid her age, but then again, this whole thread is about how odd she is...

[aoeniac]

My contribution to this thread can be summed up as:




That's pretty much my favorite frame of the entire comic.

[fjodor]

I think she has spent the greater part of her life in the Good Hope hospital. And straight after her mom died, she gets sent to boarding school, with no one from staff volunteering to help her find her way, and on top of all that, her dad vanishes. My guess is that Annie is really pretty messed up. I know I would be.

[La Poire]

aoeniac said:

Hahahaha, yes. I really liked that one. It shows more than anything else – even the crying in A Handful of Dirt, I think – that Annie is also just human. I mean, she's offended by being called fat. That's a petty deep crack in her armor right there – although she handles it with care and apparent understanding as always. Plus it's amazing how well the feeling of restrained anger and annoyance is being portrayed.

[todd]

Speaking of that scene, I've got the uneasy feeling that if those two fairies ever make it to Gunnerkrigg Court, they're going to be hopelessly anorexic (as long as it doesn't become "A Very Special Gunnerkrigg Court Chapter" - though I doubt that Tom would do that).

[La Poire]

Nah, they'll probably have forgotten all about it by then. Perhaps they won't even remember evr being faeries. They probably won't start untill next year anyway, coming in one class below Annie & co, so they'll already be smaller than her.

[julieth]

Those suicide fairies are all kinds of messed up, aren't they?

[La Poire]

That's why we love them so. I'm really anticipating their return.

[todd]

fjodor said:

I think she has spent the greater part of her life in the Good Hope hospital. And straight after her mom died, she gets sent to boarding school, with no one from staff volunteering to help her find her way, and on top of all that, her dad vanishes. My guess is that Annie is really pretty messed up. I know I would be.

I'll give this for her; if, when I'd been around 11 or 12, my mother had just died, my father had gone off somewhere without giving a reason why or saying where he was going, and I'd been dumped into a boarding school just like that, I might well have been so glum about it all that I wouldn't have even paid that much attention to sprouting a second shadow, let alone made the effort to find out about it and search for a way of helping it get back home. It says something about Annie that she's been so willing to help those around her (Shadow2, Mort, Zimmy and Gamma, and of course, Kat) and taking an active interest in her surroundings (not just the bizarre ones, but even being the only student who's awake and alert in Mythology class; even Kat is sound asleep during that one). She's got a strong sense of character (and based on what we know of her parents, I'd say that she got it from her mother; really, so far, I'd say that Surma's come across as a much more positive figure than Anthony).

[rastarogue]

todd said:

fjodor said:

I think she has spent the greater part of her life in the Good Hope hospital. And straight after her mom died, she gets sent to boarding school, with no one from staff volunteering to help her find her way, and on top of all that, her dad vanishes. My guess is that Annie is really pretty messed up. I know I would be.

I'll give this for her; if, when I'd been around 11 or 12, my mother had just died, my father had gone off somewhere without giving a reason why or saying where he was going, and I'd been dumped into a boarding school just like that, I might well have been so glum about it all that I wouldn't have even paid that much attention to sprouting a second shadow, let alone made the effort to find out about it and search for a way of helping it get back home. It says something about Annie that she's been so willing to help those around her (Shadow2, Mort, Zimmy and Gamma, and of course, Kat) and taking an active interest in her surroundings (not just the bizarre ones, but even being the only student who's awake and alert in Mythology class; even Kat is sound asleep during that one). She's got a strong sense of character (and based on what we know of her parents, I'd say that she got it from her mother; really, so far, I'd say that Surma's come across as a much more positive figure than Anthony).

She could just be trying to be so active, and participate in so many things that she does not have time to think about her parents.

[todd]

Yes, that's probably partly it.

[Aspen d'Grey]

People handle grief in different ways... We've only seen Annie break down once (A Handful of Dirt) and even then it was for a pretty short time, it would seem. Frankly, I wouldn't be able to handle it nearly as well as she has... Amazing strength, but, as Muut said, I'd bet theres a raging fire of anger under her shell. I bet we'll see it come out one of these days, and she'll probably hurt someone she loves. (Bets on Kat or Eglamore)

[julieth]

I dunno, she seems to rational to do something like that. She thinks very clearly...plus you have to remember that she's still a kid. Hurting someone like that seems like something an adult would do, somehow...

[mrw]

It would probably be unintentional. People can say or do hurtful things when they're upset, even though they generally know better.

[owl]

Facades are usually self-inflicted, and take work to keep up. You might egt usedd to it so that the work just fades...but if you get comfortabnle enough in a situation you start to do less work, start to spend less time hiding what you feel. I think this is what is happeneing to Annie. At the beginning she was ENTIRELY self-contained, but we've seen some cracks, some places where she hasn't been keeping up too well with maintenance. Over time we'll see more, until finally the facade falls to peices.

[julieth]

Mostly, though, the changes seem to be positive (she's becoming more expressive, smiling more, etc.), so I figure the inner Annie can't be all that bad.
We've been saying that she's erected this facade to help cope with her abandonment, but I think part of it is also joining a new school. She's not sure what she's doing just yet, she's in a new situation, and she's playing it cool until she becomes more comfortable. This fits with Owl's theory, I think...

[La Poire]

Annie has spent most of her life in the company of only her dying mother, grim reapers and hospital staff (including her father). It seems only now she has had the opportunity of being around people her own age, something she has had no previous experience of. Perhaps it is only now she is getting used to being a child among other children?

[owl]

That's probably true. If you've grown up among only adults, you mold yourself, or are molded, to be like an adult. But if you grow up with other children, you are a child yourself. That's onereason it's good to have people your own age around; that way you don't mature too fast or too slow.

[mrw]

Any one else notice there have just been some slight changes to the Cast page? Annie seems to be slightly more, uh, outspoken. (see Reynardine...)


(I posted in this thread because the Cast page is presented from Annie's point of view. )

[todd]

Well, she was technically quoting Kat (I doubt that Annie would use Kat's precise turn of phrase; she's much more formal).

I notice that Robot's entry has not been updated to fit in with the events of Chapters Seven and Nine, though. Pity.