unrequited
Junior Member
Tormentor of the Heart, close friend of the Spleen
Posts: 74
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Post by unrequited on Aug 5, 2015 15:04:12 GMT
This is why I've stuck with Tom and Gunnerkrigg for all these years. He doesn't have 1-dimensional characters, everyone has a sympathetic side, and everyone has their demons. Tony went from being a stone cold bastard who destroyed his daughter's school life to being a sympathetic, though still stone cold, character in the span of a few weeks. Bravo Tom, bravo.
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Post by zbeeblebrox on Aug 5, 2015 15:19:37 GMT
OHHHH! Yes, those rarely heard-of "psychopomps", yes. If only Tony had known someone in his life that had easy access to such creatures, maybe he wouldn't have lost his hand searching for them.
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arzeik
Junior Member
Posts: 77 
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Post by arzeik on Aug 5, 2015 15:31:19 GMT
We all pretty much knew that Tony wasn't going to be a cardboard cut out, the question is, are his actions still inexcusable even taking into account his motives for taking them? The answer, for me, is yes. Yes. I'm not even thinking about motives. How he treated her daughter, him leaving Annie alone for years without a word when she needed him the most... Those things are real things that happened. The thing is that, for me, Renard trying to steal the body of a little girl (which would have resulted in her death), Ysengrim going full berserk and trying to kill the same girl, Annie trying to get back at Jack by pretending to be interested in him, etc. (let's just not talk about Coyote) were also some pretty fucked up (to a greater or lesser degree) things that other characters in the comic did. And that doesn't stop me from liking them now. Does that make me a horrible person? Well, I guess so, but I don't really care. So seeing in these latest comics that Anthony has some (kind of) sense of humour, is able to laugh at himself (even after something like losing an arm), and seems to feel remorse about some things, makes me think there's still hope for this character. Of course an amicable conversation with a close friend and some honesty don't just automatically turn him into an exemplary person, but I'm happy to see that kind of behaviour. So the theory about why he hates his daughter IS correct. Not that I really doubted it, but it's nice to have unambiguous confirmation for once. I don't actually read it as an unambiguous confirmation for him hating his daughter, but rather the opposite. It looks like he blames himself for Surma's death and is afraid of Annie hating him for it. |
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Post by atteSmythe on Aug 5, 2015 15:33:47 GMT
because on the other hand He doesn't have another hand, you monster. Okay, for really reals though: a) Tony's not thinking straight. When they were living together, Antimony didn't know why Surma weakened and died, just that she was sick. There was no reason that Annie would have blamed Tony. At worst, he failed to prevent something. b) Journey to the underworld is one of the requirements for a Greek tragedy, right? Tony brings his suffering old-school! |
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Post by mordekai on Aug 5, 2015 15:56:14 GMT
So...
...the guy abandoned his motherless daughter out of guilt for the death of Surma, leaving her to the care of strangers instead of taking care of her like Antimony and her late mother would have wanted...
...He went to far away places trying to learn a secret that any entity of the Guillian Forest could have told him...
...He was away from his daughter for years, looking for the mythical psicopomps that Antimony could have easily found entering any big hospital at any time...
...He is making a terrible reveal that he doesn't want Antimony to discover, only she already knows everything about it and has already made her peace with it...
...And he's probably willing to do anything to stop Antimony from suffering the same fate, when Antimony is probably a thousand times better prepared than him to solve her problems...
It would be hilarious if it weren't so sad. This guy went on years-long quest for truth that his daughter literally solved in her spare time at school. What a wasted life...
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Post by Per on Aug 5, 2015 15:56:41 GMT
I don't think anyone here believes it's about teams at all. I strongly believe it's about Team Approach-It-As-Reality-Show, with a non-negligible overlap with Team Tumblr, against Team Approach-It-As-Fiction. |
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Ammy
New Member
Posts: 14
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Post by Ammy on Aug 5, 2015 16:17:44 GMT
I was never trying to be part of any team- all I ever said was that we shouldn't rush to judgement. Virtually every character in the series has proven to have multiple layers and complex loyalties and motivations. I just didn't like that that roughly one-and-a-half panels after Tony showed up, the forums were like "RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGE!!!!". I thought that was a little quick off the mark. In all fairness, he was pretty obviously set up to be immediately loathed when the first thing he did after not seeing her for over two years was rather nastily single Annie out for her "ridiculous" makeup in front of all her classmates. |
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Post by ctso74 on Aug 5, 2015 16:23:05 GMT
I must say, Don has a very expressive line in spectacle frames. Yes. Every time I see his glasses do that, I do a double take. Though, it's better than him being a 2D stone-faced enigma. He has to show his emotions somehow. From now on, I'm going to assume that he purchases EtherLux™ frames. EtherLux™: " They're more than spectacular, they're spectral!" |
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Post by Deepbluediver on Aug 5, 2015 16:34:42 GMT
To be fair, Anthony's return seems to have derailed the whole "rescue Jeanne" thing and Coyote dialogues, along with other adventures, for the foreseeable future. On the menu is Anthony and more Anthony. While this webcomic gives us a glorious three full-color pages per week with clockwork regularity, waiting for updates does require some patience and commitment; whatever his layers are the simple fact that he's brought Antimony's free-wheeling life to a crashing halt does mean we'll have to wait even longer than otherwise for those plot aspects we've detoured from. What new character who's appearance caused such a thing wouldn't earn some fan-hate and/or nerd-rage? And leaving aside the parenting pro/con debate entirely, he came from nowhere and was/is large and in charge over established characters. ORLY? When has the storyline ever resolved anything in a timely fashion? You should know by now that if things appear to be moving in a quick and straightforward manner towards some sort of resolution that Tom is probably just trolling you. I'll concede that your post makes sense, but that it's the first time I've heard that particular argument articulated. Almost every other complaint was more along the lines of "Tony must die because he's being mean to Antimony! GRRRR I hate him so much!" They were about as intellectually stimulating as one of Red's rants. |
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Kya
New Member
Posts: 19 
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Post by Kya on Aug 5, 2015 16:35:16 GMT
Guys? I thinking I'm feeling my first pangs of sympathy for the man...damn it.
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Post by nero on Aug 5, 2015 16:41:55 GMT
So Anthony was acting cold towards Annie because he felt that Annie should hate him. Anthony feels he deserves to be hated by Annie.
If the psychopomps could help wouldn't Surma have asked them when they were right there? If Anthony understood what was going to happen wouldn't he have covered all the angles?
If the psychopomps knew something would they keep it from Annie because they wouldn't want her to lose her etheric side?
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Post by Deepbluediver on Aug 5, 2015 16:43:13 GMT
In all fairness, he was pretty obviously set up to be immediately loathed when the first thing he did after not seeing her for over two years was rather nastily single Annie out for her "ridiculous" makeup in front of all her classmates. In all fairness, wasn't like, the very first chapter in this story about how sometimes things sound bad if you don't have all the details? Ok I admit I'm stretching a bit there, but being strict with the rules or even being bad at parenting doesn't necessarily make a person evil. For example, Ysengrin has physically attacked Antimony TWICE, and he probably gets a fair amount of sympathy around these parts. When posters seemed to be jumping onto the "hate on Tony" bandwagon by the busload, I almost felt like they were falling for some sort of trap. Anway, since this whole conversation has gotten a bit dark and heavy, I want to lighten things up with my prediction for friday's update: Tony: "I found them, but they wouldn't give me the knowledge I needed. So I offered to arm-wrestle them for it. Unfortunately I didn't know that they play for keeps..." |
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Post by Trillium on Aug 5, 2015 16:45:38 GMT
Remember this chapter is called Annie and the Fire. We have found out a few things about the Fire Elemental, we've found out about how Annie got her hair cut and now we are getting background from Anthony about and Surma's situation and why they did what they did.
Don has taken a big risk inviting Annie, in secret on a very private conversation. He bet Tony would relax enough to show his humanity and that he was still the person Don knew in school. If we are lucky we are going receive more info and maybe clues on how all this ties together.
Some observations, Annie's relationship with her parents has been a mess from the get go. Annie was kept in the dark by Anthony and Surma about so many things. Both of them abandoned Annie; Surma by dying and Tony by shipping her off (instead of taking her there himself) to school and not visiting or staying in contact. Up until then Annie was probably homeschooled so she could stay in close physical contact with Surma. Tony is the only one left to explain why they did what they did. He's got some heavy lifting to do. He may not even be hoping for reconciliation but Don is working to change that. Because of Don, Annie is listening to this conversation. Now we wait for what happens next.
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Post by warrl on Aug 5, 2015 17:08:00 GMT
Ha! Sweet vindication for those of us who've remained loyal to Team Tony. I look forward to all y'all scrabbling to find new and inventive ways to demonize a guilt-stricken man with probable PTSD. I'm still withholding judgement. It hasn't escaped my notice that what Anthony thinks/thought Antimony would want (re: not living with her mother's killer) just happened to be what was wanted by and probably easiest for Anthony (not returning to the Court, as per his wishes in his own words in the previous comic, and not having to deal with Antimony). Like I said the other day, nearly everyone on the planet thinks their reasons for doing the things they do, whatever they do, are golden... at least until the consequences of those things start wandering in. Let's see how Anthony reacts if Donny suggests Antimony would've wanted a father, or otherwise critiques his actions... or if he modifies his behavior based on learning more about Antimony as a person. What will Anthony actually do? That's more interesting to me than Anthony on Anthony. There's also that "deciding what she wants without any input from her" thing. Plus... Surma probably knew Anthony wouldn't find a way to save her LONG before she died, simply because he was strictly looking for a medical explanation. In fact, since she knew him as well as almost anyone except Donald, she probably expected this outcome before she married him. And yet, SHE CHOSE to lay her life on the line to have a child. One might come to suspect that the child was extremely important to her. And, in the time of that child's greatest need for parental support, Anthony... went off by himself to wallow in his own (unjustified) guilt. |
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Post by Daedalus on Aug 5, 2015 17:12:29 GMT
So the theory about why he hates his daughter IS correct. Not that I really doubted it, but it's nice to have unambiguous confirmation for once. I don't actually read it as an unambiguous confirmation for him hating his daughter, but rather the opposite. It looks like he blames himself for Surma's death and is afraid of Annie hating him for it. Oh! Awkward... I read it too early in the morning, and somehow read Anthony's dialog in panel 3 as "How could she live with the fact that she killed her mother?"
The thing is that, for me, Renard trying to steal the body of a little girl (which would have resulted in her death), Ysengrim going full berserk and trying to kill the same girl, Annie trying to get back at Jack by pretending to be interested in him, etc. (let's just not talk about Coyote) were also some pretty fucked up (to a greater or lesser degree) things that other characters in the comic did. And that doesn't stop me from liking them now. Does that make me a horrible person? Well, I guess so, but I don't really care. Every major character in this story is very flawed. I did not sympathize with Renard until much later in the comic, when he and Antimony began to have a stronger relationship. Critically, we saw his feelings of guilt and remorse over his attempted murder, and how he was willing to sacrifice himself to save her life. Recently, Annie abused her control over him, but it seems like he's not holding it against her. Ysengrin is a different case. He too started as a very dislikable and hostile character, but it was odd how he and Annie had also become close. When we saw how Coyote was destabilizing his sanity, it all clicked into place - he was noble except when posturing to the Court, or being mind-raped by Coyote. But he too showed as much remorse as was possible for his actions (due to his swiss-cheese brain), and he has tried to support and strengthen Annie later. I still think that Annie is wary around him as of this page, so perhaps there is further to go along this arc. In contrast, I feel bad for Tony's grief and self-blame over his wife's death. But he has not yet showed any remorse over how he treated his daughter. When/if he does that, his path towards redemption – the same path that Renard and to a lesser degree Ysengrin have already taken – might begin, and their parent-child relationship may be mended. Not to mention that two semi-murderous canine demigods have so far unambiguously proved to be more of an emotional support to Annie than her own father...Kind of says something, no? Repairing the relationship between Tony and Annie will probably taken another thousand pages, if it ever happens. Think about how long it took to go from here to here, after all... |
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Post by darklingthrush on Aug 5, 2015 17:13:35 GMT
So I like Tony's character development. I really do. He's not quite entirely a soulless asshole we desperately want to be punched in the face.
But before we get on a pity train and decide he's "not that bad after all", I want to say I don't think this much excuses his actions. It doesn't excuse vanishing for three years, and it doesn't even come close to excusing his first words to his daughter being shaming and humiliation in front of her entire class. Not only is it unexcused, it's downright nonsensical.
He's still an asshole and his assholery still deserves a reckoning.
Edit: Upon rereading the thread, it seems clear that people have already said this more eloquently than I have. Yes, he's all too human and more complicated than we realized. No, this doesn't come close to fully excusing his behavior.
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Sadie
Full Member
I eat food and sleep in a horizontal position.
Posts: 146
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Post by Sadie on Aug 5, 2015 17:14:01 GMT
This guy went on years-long quest for truth that his daughter literally solved in her spare time at school. Right? This entire situation screams irony. So much avoided if only Anthony had opened up to his daughter years ago and talked to her like a person. That said, I've got doubts about what exactly his reveal is and IF is it actually something Annie already knows about herself. Because I'd been assuming that Anthony had gotten the What Happens When Fire Elementals Reproduce Talk, dismissed it as "silly fairy reasons made up by silly fairies with no good understanding of how reality or even their own silly fairy powers work", and focused his energy on finding the really real supported-by-empirical-evidence reason Surma would die post-birth. But that last panel is the face of a man about to drop a bombshell. Either he'd never known about the fire-transference deal until a psychopomp* told him, he had known but it wasn't Real to him until that moment, or he learned something completely new. *assuming he did actually succeed in finding and talking to one (which would open up the question of how and why they would even bother to talk to him, but... well, they are pretty fond of Annie and were fond of Surma. Would that be enough to inspire one of them to 'help' by making contact with an erstwhile father and husband?) |
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Post by Jelly Jellybean on Aug 5, 2015 17:30:47 GMT
Anthony and a Psychopomp musings....
I kind of wonder if Anthony mistook Zimmy for a psychopomp when Zimmy punched him etherically in Divine. Probably not, but if Anthony says the psychopomp gave him a message from his daughter, I am going to chuckle.
Or maybe Coyote pretended to be a psychopomp just to jerk Anthony's chain. Anthony would be such an easy target for anyone who knows about his failures and fears. Even Ysengrin could trick him if Ys knew him.
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Post by scottjm on Aug 5, 2015 17:37:05 GMT
Most acknowledged that he probably has reasons, that they're probably misguided, and that regardless of those, nothing excuses his abandonment of Annie, the no-consent bone laser surgery (again, if that's what it was), or his lack of explanation and further poor treatment of her upon his return. There are possibilities that could excuse his actions. though it depends on stuff we do not know about yet. If he made arrangements with the court that were not kept about annie's treatment, disappearing could be explained. It could be a case where the court was supposed to tell her more then was passed on, or other arrangements. he bone surgery depends on exactly what he was trying to do there. We do not know what the goal as, only what it looked like, and seeing as surgeons will do things like stop your heart when operating on what we saw might have been isolating the elemental temporarily while working on something it is connected to. Until he actually states what his goal was we have to hold off on judging that. His return was horrible, but if it was to spare annie from something worse that could excuse it. it could be tat the court was preparing something worse for annie, and this is what he got them to agree to instead. something lesser that might be intended to help annie more in the end depending on his goals. So the theory about why he hates his daughter IS correct. Not that I really doubted it, but it's nice to have unambiguous confirmation for once. I don't actually read it as an unambiguous confirmation for him hating his daughter, but rather the opposite. It looks like he blames himself for Surma's death and is afraid of Annie hating him for it. Causing him to react the same way Annie did when she saw Kat kissing Paz... run away for fear of loosing or driving the other person from their life. |
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Post by gunnerwf on Aug 5, 2015 17:56:59 GMT
Huh, turned out better than I expected.
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Post by gunnerwf on Aug 5, 2015 17:59:15 GMT
Is he trying to mess with the afterlife? Because if he is this won't turn out well probably.
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Post by imaginaryfriend on Aug 5, 2015 18:06:39 GMT
To be fair, Anthony's return seems to have derailed the whole "rescue Jeanne" thing and Coyote dialogues, along with other adventures, for the foreseeable future. On the menu is Anthony and more Anthony. While this webcomic gives us a glorious three full-color pages per week with clockwork regularity, waiting for updates does require some patience and commitment; whatever his layers are the simple fact that he's brought Antimony's free-wheeling life to a crashing halt does mean we'll have to wait even longer than otherwise for those plot aspects we've detoured from. What new character who's appearance caused such a thing wouldn't earn some fan-hate and/or nerd-rage? And leaving aside the parenting pro/con debate entirely, he came from nowhere and was/is large and in charge over established characters. ORLY? When has the storyline ever resolved anything in a timely fashion? You should know by now that if things appear to be moving in a quick and straightforward manner towards some sort of resolution that Tom is probably just trolling you. I'll concede that your post makes sense, but that it's the first time I've heard that particular argument articulated. Almost every other complaint was more along the lines of "Tony must die because he's being mean to Antimony! GRRRR I hate him so much!" They were about as intellectually stimulating as one of Red's rants. Sometimes things do get resolved in a reasonably linear manner (like ParSmit or who cut Antimony's hair, for example). My point was that following any webcomic requires waiting. GC has more updates than most (few do more than one full-color page per week or its equivalent) but still the fans must wait for updates. Now they are not waiting for updates on the pre-Anthony plot lines, they are waiting for their waiting to resume. And if Anthony stopped being "mean to Antimony" or died or just shut up and went away then the fanbase could go back to the regular level of waiting. That is enough reason to hate a cartoon character, I think.  |
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Post by Nnelg on Aug 5, 2015 18:37:40 GMT
In all fairness, he was pretty obviously set up to be immediately loathed When posters seemed to be jumping onto the "hate on Tony" bandwagon by the busload, I almost felt like they were falling for some sort of trap. ... Tom, you magnificent bastard. |
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Post by avurai on Aug 5, 2015 18:48:39 GMT
"Cool motive, still child abuse."
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Post by aline on Aug 5, 2015 18:57:11 GMT
If the psychopomps knew something would they keep it from Annie because they wouldn't want her to lose her etheric side? The psychopomps aren't allowed to interfere with the living and had to go quite a roundabout way just to give Annie a blinker stone. Also, to them death is simply something that happens to everyone. Would they see much point in stalling it? Would they see the difference between 40 years and 80? So Anthony was acting cold towards Annie because he felt that Annie should hate him. Anthony feels he deserves to be hated by Annie. If the psychopomps could help wouldn't Surma have asked them when they were right there? If Anthony understood what was going to happen wouldn't he have covered all the angles? Whatever Anthony found out from them, it's possibly more specific than "how do I keep her from dying". For example, some key information about the removal of a spirit without killing the subject. Hopefully we'll find out on Friday. |
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Post by darklingthrush on Aug 5, 2015 19:37:36 GMT
"Cool motive, still child abuse." /endthread. |
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Post by Daedalus on Aug 5, 2015 19:49:05 GMT
"Cool motive, still child abuse." /endthread. Heck, we still don't know what his motive was for how he acted towards Annie, or if he even had a specific one... |
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Post by pxc on Aug 5, 2015 19:49:53 GMT
Most acknowledged that he probably has reasons, that they're probably misguided, and that regardless of those, nothing excuses his abandonment of Annie, the no-consent bone laser surgery (again, if that's what it was), or his lack of explanation and further poor treatment of her upon his return. There are possibilities that could excuse his actions. though it depends on stuff we do not know about yet. If he made arrangements with the court that were not kept about annie's treatment, disappearing could be explained. It could be a case where the court was supposed to tell her more then was passed on, or other arrangements. he bone surgery depends on exactly what he was trying to do there. We do not know what the goal as, only what it looked like, and seeing as surgeons will do things like stop your heart when operating on what we saw might have been isolating the elemental temporarily while working on something it is connected to. Until he actually states what his goal was we have to hold off on judging that. His return was horrible, but if it was to spare annie from something worse that could excuse it. it could be tat the court was preparing something worse for annie, and this is what he got them to agree to instead. something lesser that might be intended to help annie more in the end depending on his goals. These seem so improbable I'm having a hard time really seriously responding. If Tom is going to tease this process out that long then it's going to be difficult to continue with this comic. I'm very hopeful this exposition session is followed quickly by some resolution. Not necessarily a full reconciliation. But enough of a bow on the situation that Annie can function again and we can see other things happening in the Court and Forest. If the surgery was what it appears to be, it doesn't matter what his intentions were. He had no right to make those decisions for her without a discussion first. There could be some nefarious court happenings that caused Tony to return. He still had the choice to contact Annie while he was away, and he had a choice in how he could treat her once he came back. Sure, there might be other possibilities. Maybe it's actually a robot version of Tony, or it's Coyote doing an impersonation. Or nanobots have taken over his brain and are forcing him to say and do these things while he screams internally, unable to do anything. But are any of these "possibilities" very likely, or worth discussing at-length? I understand not wanting to jump to conclusions. But we're months into this story arc, we have lots of evidence and material upon which to shape our thoughts. And further this isn't about conclusions, it's about establishing a baseline. "Assuming the reasons are realistic in the context, is his treatment of his daughter appropriate, or even excusable?" To me the answer is an obvious no. |
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Post by antiyonder on Aug 5, 2015 20:09:48 GMT
Look, I respect some people choosing to be more defensive of Tony, but taking a different stance doesn't make you better than the haters/critics unless your behavior is different. For example, do we let out dislike towards him blind us to any respectable traits? Maybe. But then Tony defenders tend to dismiss any legit problems on his part and are unwilling to express any criticism on the man. Even mild criticism. Heck, if Annie being a teenager means that she's old enough to be held accountable for her behavior, isn't it fair to expect the same and much more for an adult who had years of growing? Not to mention that for all of the backpatting that Tony fans are doing here, they fell into Tom's trap of thinking that Anthony was unable to express emotions until the recent weeks which we all find him smiling. Ha! Sweet vindication for those of us who've remained loyal to Team Tony. I look forward to all y'all scrabbling to find new and inventive ways to demonize a guilt-stricken man with probable PTSD. I don't need to try. This is more or less the excuse Gendo Ikari used to explain his treatment of Shinji, and that wasn't in any way justified either. Anthony quite obviously never considered that Annie might disagree, or might want him around, or would want or should have any kind of say in the matter at all. And how hard would it have been to leave a note at the hospital telling her he wasn't going to be seeing her for a couple years? We all pretty much knew that Tony wasn't going to be a cardboard cut out, the question is, are his actions still inexcusable even taking into account his motives for taking them? The answer, for me, is yes. This. Even if one is feeling guilt, it doesn't mean one is selfless. And doing something solely to ease a guilty conscience is a form of selfishness. And while there is room to feel sympathy for someone like Tony, well, look at Fire Spike. Basically Annie was downright cold to Reynard. But the following chapter has her recognizing that and seeking to make amends. The moment that Tony recognizes that his actions can't be excuse and does the right thing, then I'd be inclined to give the character more of a break. |
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Post by Draxiss on Aug 5, 2015 20:17:27 GMT
FINALLY, THANK YOU. TOM, YOU REALLY LIKE TO TAKE YOUR TIME. (I may or may not have been eating popcorn watching the reactions up until this point.)
What Tony has been doing to Antimony is still pretty bad, but now at least he's understandable. Don't know whether he can fix this and become a decent parent (or even should), but now we see what's going on in his head.
Also, is this going to turn into another "immortality is bad, dying is good" Fantastic Aesop? Because that only works if you're in a universe with a confirmed afterlife, which is exactly what is not happening here.
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