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Post by flowsthead on Apr 14, 2021 17:36:57 GMT
While I wouldn't call Annie spoiled she does have what I could best describe as Protagonist Syndrome, which is what Idra most likely is referring to.
Throughout her stay in Gunnerkrigg Court Annie has been treated as special, or possibly even unique. Of course that's in part because she is unusual, half fire elemental with innate etheric empathy and on speaking terms with the psychopomps. And then she developed a very close bond with both Coyote (basically the god of the forest) and Ysengrin.
The result is that, as much as Annie attracts trouble, she also seems to assume that she's involved in any situation and that it's up to her to resolve them. She breaks the rules without thinking twice, for the longest time she had extreme difficulty relying on any adults no matter how helpful they might've been in the past, and until her father returned and (rather cruelly and unfairly) reminded her of her position only Jones really put effort into trying to restrain her.
When Idra calls Annie spoiled I think it's less "I'm entitled to everything" and more "The world revolves around me". And even if Idra doesn't know everything about Annie she must've formed an image based on what Annie was like in the forest and what she's heard from Eglamore.
I kind of agree with this, but that's less about Annie having Protagonist Syndrome than it is about the comic only showing us her perspective. For all we know there are a million things going on that she hasn't involved herself with. For example, the Renard and Hetty episode in Chapter 43: Quicksilver is a good example of something that happened without Annie's knowledge at all, and that's still a character that we ostensibly follow. And really, Annie has only purposefully involved herself with the Jeanne situation, and how could she not? Everyone initially wanted her to get involved with Coyote. Jones was practically pushing for it. Once she got involved more than they wanted, that's when they started trying to stop her from continuing. Good points. One I might add; other characters have frequently resolved matters far more often than Annie herself has done, despite her efforts; she often gets rescued by someone else (like Kat or Eglamore) rather than rescuing herself, for example. It was Zimmy, rather than Annie, who solved the "spider possessing Jack" problem. And we got a mention, in the last chapter, that it will be Kat who guides the Court in a better direction (which will presumably also solve the Court vs. Forest conflict, since the root of that is the Court's insistence on meddling with the Ether; presumably, once Kat steers the Court in a new direction, peace between the two groups will become achievable). Annie might have a small role to play in that, but it might be largely Kat's achievement with Annie mostly watching from the sidelines. (Not to mention that some of Annie's accomplishments have backfired. Sending Robot across the bridge to return Shadow2 home, for example; she unwittingly escalated the tension between the Court and the Forest that way, and on top of it all, Shadow2 wound up returning to the Court and staying there after all.) Is it possible that Annie may turn out to be the protagonist in the sense of "viewpoint character/person who does much learning and growing" sense, but not in the sense of "protagonist-as-hero", and that one of her biggest lessons will be learning that she's not the one who saves the day (that role going to other characters like Kat, Zimmy, etc.)? Yeah I agree with this generally, but I'm not sure what the point is. I don't think this is a comic about having "protagonist-as-hero". Eglamore's job is to rescue her when she gets in trouble. And Kat rescuing her from the Annan Waters is because no one else did anything. Zimmy helping Jack is what she needed to do anyway since it wasn't Annie that caused that situation. If Annie never gets anything done for the rest of her life, helping Jeanne is enough. I think accomplishing something that has been a problem since about however long the Court has been around that multiple psychopomps couldn't is enough for anyone. And Kat is a whole can of worms. She is inadvertently fueling Robot's cult which is sure to cause many problems. If Kat solves that herself then that's good because she essentially created that problem too, with this logic. |
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Post by dramastix on Apr 14, 2021 17:51:02 GMT
One of the things I like about Tom's writing is that none of the characters are infallible. Yes, Idra's making some good points and it's probably good for Eglamore to hear pushback on his unrelenting hatred of Tony from someone other than Donny. Doesn't mean she understands the whole picture or is even right in her assessment (as others have pointed out, "spoiled" is a loaded term here).
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Post by Gemminie on Apr 14, 2021 18:00:14 GMT
So, hmm, my impressions of this page:
The conversation on the previous page had wandered into the topic of how children are raised in the Court, thanks to Idra, with James reminding her that the Court and the tree people just do things differently, that's all.
But trust James to bring the topic back to Tony, because the Court wants its kids to be independent, but Tony was way more absent than most kids' parents are. Annie wasn't happy about that.
Idra calls him on an inconsistency in what James is saying about Tony: should he stay or should he go? (guitar riff) James is simultaneously saying that Tony's being absent was bad for Annie and that his being present is bad for Annie. Well, which is it, Jimmy Jims?
Er, both! Um, so Annie's in bad shape no matter where Tony is. But James thinks maybe Tony should never have come back. Because Annie was doing fine! Actually things weren't too bad. She'd been making progress as Forest medium and fostering good Forest-Court relations (which the Court had to put a stop to fast, apparently). Idra thinks James is being pretty harsh.
Jones brings the subject back to Annie, saying there were times when she "seemed a little unruly" (understatement of the academic year, in which we don't know where we are, because Loup destroyed large chunks of the school buildings and classes were suspended) just before Tony's return, specifically directing this at Anja, interestingly. I'd think this is a remark on some way in which Anja was helping Annie be a delinquent before Tony returned, but actually Anja was barely in the comic for a long time before Tony returned. She appeared in chapter 41, but just to be surprised when Annie wasn't named Court medium. Her previous appearance was in chapter 37, but she didn't do much besides be concerned for Annie when Tony "called" her. (He didn't use a phone. And the message went to Jones' phone somehow.) And the time before that was chapter 31, where she was offering to let Annie come with the Donlan family on summer vacation. Why would Jones be directing this question to Anja? And Anja seems very flustered, as if this was the reaction Jones intended her to have, but again, why? I mean, we see her right after Tony comes back, in chapter 52, when the Donlans invite the Carvers over for a very uncomfortable dinner, and we learn from Kat that not even Don and Anja knew Tony was coming back. I don't buy the arguments that "Jones just makes Anja nervous," because Anja's been fine up to now with Jones right there. I have several theories now, but the most likely one is that Anja's been acting as the closest thing to a mom that Annie has, and she didn't do much to even try to rein her in. I think Jones is insinuating that Anja encouraged Annie to explore without laying down any rules, and that this has caused a number of problems (references: the entire comic).
(Other possible speculations: Jones may be implying that Anja actually knew Tony was back, perhaps by magical/etheric means, but didn't say anything at the time. Or Jones may be implying that Anja had more of a hand in giving Annie free rein than we were previously aware; it happened off-camera. Or Anja may be flustered because of past events that haven't been seen in flashbacks – such as the reason why Surma reportedly couldn't stand Jones. ... Or Anja may just have to go to the bathroom suddenly.)
And then Idra. She's either been told a lot of information off camera, or she's making a lot of guesses and inferences from what people are saying, or she's got some other source of information. So, in what way did Annie have "all the attention of your Court?" I suppose she got some special treatment while she was a medium candidate, being able to go into the Forest basically whenever she wanted, and then the Court tried to cut that off by choosing Smitty to be the Court medium instead (Llanwellyn went so far as to say that Annie should go back to her studies and forget about the Forest), but then Coyote made her Forest medium, so the Court had to keep its attention on her, but how does Idra know about all of this? I'd buy that she knows all about the Forest side of things, what with Annie's Coyote-mandated stay with the tree elves and her actions as Forest medium.
Anyway, I really want to know what's got Anja so flustered in panel 4, and I really want to know how Idra's gotten copies of Volumes 1-5 of the comic to read. But of course what I really want to know is whom Jones is going to talk to next.
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Post by maxptc on Apr 14, 2021 18:45:34 GMT
So, in what way did Annie have "all the attention of your Court?" I suppose she got some special treatment while she was a medium candidate, being able to go into the Forest basically whenever she wanted, and then the Court tried to cut that off by choosing Smitty to be the Court medium instead (Llanwellyn went so far as to say that Annie should go back to her studies and forget about the Forest), but then Coyote made her Forest medium, so the Court had to keep its attention on her, but how does Idra know about all of this? I'd buy that she knows all about the Forest side of things, what with Annie's Coyote-mandated stay with the tree elves and her actions as Forest medium. Is this not a common phrase everywhere? I don't think "all the attention" means "extra special attention". It's like the saying "all the time in the world", just means a lot of time. All the attention of the Court just means how much attention the Court pays to people within it, which is a whole lot compared to any outside force the elfs dealt with before, what with the constant mointering. Idra doesn't have to make any assumptions or have any specific Annie knowledge to be like "oh dealing with this place and Coyote and no family, no wonder". |
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Post by todd on Apr 15, 2021 1:48:14 GMT
Yeah I agree with this generally, but I'm not sure what the point is. I don't think this is a comic about having "protagonist-as-hero". Eglamore's job is to rescue her when she gets in trouble. And Kat rescuing her from the Annan Waters is because no one else did anything. Zimmy helping Jack is what she needed to do anyway since it wasn't Annie that caused that situation. If Annie never gets anything done for the rest of her life, helping Jeanne is enough. I think accomplishing something that has been a problem since about however long the Court has been around that multiple psychopomps couldn't is enough for anyone. And Kat is a whole can of worms. She is inadvertently fueling Robot's cult which is sure to cause many problems. If Kat solves that herself then that's good because she essentially created that problem too, with this logic. Yes, I left out a couple of points by mistake. The roots of Annie's outlook may lie before she came to Gunnerkrigg. In the hospital where she spent the first eleven/twelve years of her life, she and Surma were the only people who could see the Guides; the rest of the hospital staff could not. And Annie, while still very young, was assigned by the Guides to solve the Martin situation, which she did, on her own. Consequently, she comes to the Court under the impression (presumably) that she alone (with Surma gone) can deal with the etheric - and tries to single-handedly solve the problems she encounters, unaware that: a) a lot of the adults at the Court (unlike those at the hospital) have some experience with these kinds of situations and b) they're not all related to "Guide work" as Martin had been. Perhaps much of her "recklessness" in her attempts to solve unusual problems by herself (mostly) stems from that. |
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jocobo
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Post by jocobo on Apr 15, 2021 4:36:52 GMT
Idra feels a bit too much like a soapbox or a mouthpiece here.
She's presenting incredibly strong opinions for someone who....literally doesn't know Tony, has no investment in Antimony or Tony, or any business inside their lives regarding events she wasn't even there for. Her statements go similarly unexamined or rebuffed, no one, not even Eglamore who is supposed to be extremely biased in his hatred of Tony or Don, who is Tony's best friend, seems to be matching her in conviction of her statements.
Unless we find out later Idra has daddy issue of her own and is projecting this just feels....way too strong a reaction and way too pointed an argumentation for what the comic is pretending is a neutral outsider.
The comic is framed as if she's just asking questions from a wholly neutral perspective but she isn't. She's clearly taking a side.
I feel this would have been much better presented as Eggs and Don arguing with Idra asking pointed questions at both of them to get the reader to consider different perspectives. Even if the end result was still favored Tony, it'd at least be a conversation. But no.
As it stands it just feels like a character we barely know and who barely knows the characters involved wagging their finger at anyone in the audience for daring to dislike Tony.
This is maybe the 3rd of 4th time the comic has done this and it's always the same conversation. Any one in comic who dislikes Tony is either biased (Eggers) or just mistaken and is forced to recant and never say anything bad about him again(Kat/Reynard). Even Ysengren of all people basically took the stance of "Well he hasn't actually done anything wrong Annie/People who dislike Tony are over-reacting/Annie deserved everything that happened" while Annie completely fail to articulate that the way in which he returned was needlessly cruel and distressing for her.
At the very least I'm tired of the comic pretending there's a debate about Tony's character in the narrative when the narrative itself has so clearly made up it's mind.
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Post by TBeholder on Apr 15, 2021 7:09:26 GMT
they stare at each other for a few panels, then Tony just goes about his day, as if she's not there. How many pages could that go on for? Well… …and then Tony just goes about his day, as if nothing happened. Panel 4 gives a good reason to believe Jones had invited herself. She probably invites herself all the time. After all, people rarely invite her and even more rarely object. Idra's great at telling it like it is. She's a no-nonsense elf. Gah. I now can't stop to imagine a variant of that awful image macro ("advice dog" snowclone), with Idra cutting through all sorts of doubletalk. Didn't even visit the imageboards all that much. |
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Post by aline on Apr 15, 2021 12:40:10 GMT
While I wouldn't call Annie spoiled she does have what I could best describe as Protagonist Syndrome, which is what Idra most likely is referring to. Idra likely is simply extrapolating on rumors and what Jones just said. But Jones is talking specifically about Annie's "rules don't apply to me" phase, best summed up by this page: www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=874There was a sense that she was too special for things like detention to apply to her. And, as Eglamore put it, "walking around [the Forest] like she owned the place". www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=1086I don't think "spoiled" is the best word but certainly there was a sense that she felt nothing could touch her because she was special. An excess of self-confidence that led her to overlook how both the Court and the Forest could, in fact, harm her. The point both Jones and Idra are making isn't that Annie is "bad", but she would have needed a parent around that time in her life, not just friends and a couple of well-meaning teachers. Someone to keep her grounded, keep an eye on her schoolwork, look out for her when she was too reckless. She was acting like a perfectly normal teenage girl in her situation, she just wasn't ready to be left alone in charge of her own life. |
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Post by blahzor on Apr 15, 2021 12:47:41 GMT
Idra speaking her mind with far less information than say Paz
<sets clock to when the hate for her shows up>
<91 billion years later>
almost there
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Post by migrantworker on Apr 15, 2021 12:50:36 GMT
Idra feels a bit too much like a soapbox or a mouthpiece here. She's presenting incredibly strong opinions for someone who....literally doesn't know Tony, has no investment in Antimony or Tony, or any business inside their lives regarding events she wasn't even there for. Her statements go similarly unexamined or rebuffed, no one, not even Eglamore who is supposed to be extremely biased in his hatred of Tony or Don, who is Tony's best friend, seems to be matching her in conviction of her statements. Unless we find out later Idra has daddy issue of her own and is projecting this just feels....way too strong a reaction and way too pointed an argumentation for what the comic is pretending is a neutral outsider. The comic is framed as if she's just asking questions from a wholly neutral perspective but she isn't. She's clearly taking a side. I don't know about you, but Idra strikes me as somebody either used to, or feeling entitled to, a position of command. Her own kin does not seem to object much, including this scene where she shows no deference whatsoever to a known matriarch of a respectable family. Even her crazy theatricals can be interpreted as an attempt to put everyone on the back foot. (And that's exactly how they worked.) I would not expect neutrality from her, unless she happens to not care either way; but if she does have an opinion then she will make sure everybody else knows it and keeps quiet, which is how I interpret the conversation over the last few pages. |
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Post by flowsthead on Apr 15, 2021 14:29:06 GMT
While I wouldn't call Annie spoiled she does have what I could best describe as Protagonist Syndrome, which is what Idra most likely is referring to. Idra likely is simply extrapolating on rumors and what Jones just said. But Jones is talking specifically about Annie's "rules don't apply to me" phase, best summed up by this page: www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=874There was a sense that she was too special for things like detention to apply to her. And, as Eglamore put it, "walking around [the Forest] like she owned the place". www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=1086I don't think "spoiled" is the best word but certainly there was a sense that she felt nothing could touch her because she was special. An excess of self-confidence that led her to overlook how both the Court and the Forest could, in fact, harm her. The point both Jones and Idra are making isn't that Annie is "bad", but she would have needed a parent around that time in her life, not just friends and a couple of well-meaning teachers. Someone to keep her grounded, keep an eye on her schoolwork, look out for her when she was too reckless. She was acting like a perfectly normal teenage girl in her situation, she just wasn't ready to be left alone in charge of her own life. I don't think the situation was helped by Eglamore establishing that he doesn't care about the rules. www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=160 |
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Post by jda on Apr 15, 2021 15:32:01 GMT
Is this the first time we've seen Anja interact with Jones? She seems almost scared of her Well, I'd be scared of someone I knew since my childhood that unexplainedly looks exactly the same, not even taking into account whatever void Anja can "un-feel" etherically from Jones. |
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Post by Gemminie on Apr 15, 2021 16:51:21 GMT
So, in what way did Annie have "all the attention of your Court?" I suppose she got some special treatment while she was a medium candidate, being able to go into the Forest basically whenever she wanted, and then the Court tried to cut that off by choosing Smitty to be the Court medium instead (Llanwellyn went so far as to say that Annie should go back to her studies and forget about the Forest), but then Coyote made her Forest medium, so the Court had to keep its attention on her, but how does Idra know about all of this? I'd buy that she knows all about the Forest side of things, what with Annie's Coyote-mandated stay with the tree elves and her actions as Forest medium. Is this not a common phrase everywhere? I don't think "all the attention" means "extra special attention". It's like the saying "all the time in the world", just means a lot of time. All the attention of the Court just means how much attention the Court pays to people within it, which is a whole lot compared to any outside force the elfs dealt with before, what with the constant mointering. Idra doesn't have to make any assumptions or have any specific Annie knowledge to be like "oh dealing with this place and Coyote and no family, no wonder". If she'd said "all the attention from your Court," or even better, "all that attention from your Court," I'd have interpreted it as "a lot of attention from your Court." But "all the attention of your Court" reads like "all of your Court's attention" to me. She sounds like she's saying that Annie had the Court's full attention, or at least a great deal of it, not just that she had some of it. |
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Post by jda on Apr 15, 2021 17:13:18 GMT
Of course Idra would think Annie as spoiled.
As far as she knows, Coyote brought her to the Forest and declared her as his pet human. Then, General Ysengrin is assigned as babysitter to her. Fast forward, she just stormed into the Forest unannounced, Coyote allows it and threatens the Forest Elves people to take care of her, or else. Her first(?) night there, she got drunk and some ruckus was originated between Elves bc of that. She gets now a new babysitter for days until she recovers for a small bit of achewater.
("Wimp!", I almost can hear Idra think. I picture Idra as a strong drinker, now that I think about it).
THEN, she gets and catalyzes (?) creation of Loup, with all the problems involved. Gets out easy, makes Loup angy again, and what does she do when returning?
Makes Loup estrange all Forest people to the Court!
And now all adults and children are concerned about her dad situation.
That would give me a "spoiled brat" impression, sure, from her perspective.
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Post by ysenfrown on Apr 15, 2021 18:18:11 GMT
("Wimp!", I almost can hear Idra think. I picture Idra as a strong drinker, now that I think about it). Wow, I would pay to see Idra drinking Eglamore under the table |
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Post by maxptc on Apr 15, 2021 18:37:30 GMT
Is this not a common phrase everywhere? I don't think "all the attention" means "extra special attention". It's like the saying "all the time in the world", just means a lot of time. All the attention of the Court just means how much attention the Court pays to people within it, which is a whole lot compared to any outside force the elfs dealt with before, what with the constant mointering. Idra doesn't have to make any assumptions or have any specific Annie knowledge to be like "oh dealing with this place and Coyote and no family, no wonder". If she'd said "all the attention from your Court," or even better, "all that attention from your Court," I'd have interpreted it as "a lot of attention from your Court." But "all the attention of your Court" reads like "all of your Court's attention" to me. She sounds like she's saying that Annie had the Court's full attention, or at least a great deal of it, not just that she had some of it. Yeah I agree, but that's something she could easily say to anyone, and it make sense. It just doesn't seem like it requires subtext or Idra having special knowledge for it to fit. |
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Post by Ahakarin on Apr 15, 2021 22:10:43 GMT
Eh, hard to call someone who's been through as much as Annie has "spoiled", not that Idra's aware of that.
Annie has had given to her a vast array of advantages, sure, but weighed against all the gaping fundamental absences and equally undeserved hardships in her life, that term is uncalled for.
Besides, a lot of her "privileges" could be argued to be more for the benefit of those who bestowed them, rather than the one to whom they were given. Annie wasn't made Forest Medium for her benefit - she was given that role because Coyote had no more effective way of blowing raspberries at the Court. Her special position in the program to become the Court Medium was, again, not for her benefit, but for the Court. A medium without any form of authoritative influence other than their own, who was completely and utterly dependent on them in every way, shape and form? Again, Annie wasn't given that role because Annie's so cool - she was given that form because it would be cool to have an Annie puppet to use in matters of forest diplomacy.
But again, what does Idra know? ... not any of that. She just sees the Court-spawned Forest Medium. So, the epithet "spoiled" gets dumped on her. That said, while Idra can't be blamed for the scope of her knowledge, so casually dumping someone in the brat column speaks more to the failings of her character than of Annie's.
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Post by mordekai on Apr 15, 2021 23:22:45 GMT
Not that Annie hasn't acted spoiled before, she absolutely has, but what does Idra know about it? That feels...weird to me. It feels like she makes a lot of quick judgements based on little evidence. "All the attention of the Court and Coyote" makes it sound like Annie had a happy fun time with everyone fawning over her. Even if we take as given that Annie is spoiled (although really, compared to who?), I don't think Idra's perspective is justified. I suspect Idra is a bit... jealous...? defensive? She has perceived that Coyote's-and-Ysengrim's-Favourite-Wonder-Child Annie has a crush on her man Eglamore, and she probably knows Eglamore has some unresolved emotional issues related to Annie of his own... (I doubt Eglamre has told her about Annie's mom...). So Idra knows there is something going on there, but she doesn't know exactly what it is... and remember, she doesn't know much about human customs... does she realize how taboo would be for Eglamore to pursue Annie, or the opposite...? So she has a tendency so look at Annie in a bad light... |
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Post by ysenfrown on Apr 15, 2021 23:59:24 GMT
I suspect Idra is a bit... jealous...? defensive? She has perceived that Coyote's-and-Ysengrim's-Favourite-Wonder-Child Annie has a crush on her man Eglamore, and she probably knows Eglamore has some unresolved emotional issues related to Annie of his own... (I doubt Eglamre has told her about Annie's mom...). So Idra knows there is something going on there, but she doesn't know exactly what it is... and remember, she doesn't know much about human customs... does she realize how taboo would be for Eglamore to pursue Annie, or the opposite...? So she has a tendency so look at Annie in a bad light... Hmm.. jealous seems like a stretch—granted, we don't know everything about the forest, but from what we can tell about the whole Kamlen fiasco seems to indicate a culture where someone admiring yo man is really just reflective on how fine your man is, and not any cause for concern or jealousy. Seeing what we have of Idra's character, she doesn't seem the type to be super possessive, unlike Zimmy or Renard. |
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Post by flowsthead on Apr 16, 2021 2:11:44 GMT
I suspect Idra is a bit... jealous...? defensive? She has perceived that Coyote's-and-Ysengrim's-Favourite-Wonder-Child Annie has a crush on her man Eglamore, and she probably knows Eglamore has some unresolved emotional issues related to Annie of his own... (I doubt Eglamre has told her about Annie's mom...). So Idra knows there is something going on there, but she doesn't know exactly what it is... and remember, she doesn't know much about human customs... does she realize how taboo would be for Eglamore to pursue Annie, or the opposite...? So she has a tendency so look at Annie in a bad light... Hmm.. jealous seems like a stretch—granted, we don't know everything about the forest, but from what we can tell about the whole Kamlen fiasco seems to indicate a culture where someone admiring yo man is really just reflective on how fine your man is, and not any cause for concern or jealousy. Seeing what we have of Idra's character, she doesn't seem the type to be super possessive, unlike Zimmy or Renard. I don't know that we can assume that about Forest culture from one couple example, but it is something to keep in mind. |
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Post by Runningflame on Apr 16, 2021 2:47:35 GMT
Annie wasn't made Forest Medium for her benefit - she was given that role because Coyote had no more effective way of blowing raspberries at the Court.  |
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Post by silicondream on Apr 16, 2021 13:24:15 GMT
Her attitude was certainly one of rebelliousness, but it's not particularly greater than any of the other kids, who shirk the rules when they can (it wasn't just Annie who reprogrammed the laser cows on the camping trip, for example). Jack and Kat have both done whatever they wanted with seemingly little interruption. The laser cow thing was barely against the rules, though. It was just a counter to the adults’ own prank, and the staff were fine with it (if rueful). The whole thing was meant to test the students’ resourcefulness, and they performed as expected. Jack and Kat are both way more careful about concealing their activities than Annie is, and the Court tolerates a lot of shenanigans as long as you keep them private. In public, Kat is a model student. She’s also a court VIP because of her inventions and ability to work with the robots, and she has some plausible deniability because the robots aren’t directly under her control. Annie’s issue is open defiance. She skips out on detention, shouts at the Headmaster mid-ceremony, and charges into the Wood while setting off twenty-foot plumes of psychic fire at the Court’s front door. No other student does stuff like that; even Zimmy tries to be more circumspect. I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t arrange for other kids to meet the Norns, or tolerate another kid keeping Reynard. James in particular is notoriously overprotective of Annie and covers for her when she gets in trouble with the Court--plus, you know, the “SURRMAAAA!” thing. Idra’s a tree elf, and the elves were uniformly furious with Annie for “meddlin’ with Coyote” and getting them exiled from the forest. Idra also knows James, who witnessed most of Annie’s most defiant moments, and is himself Exhibit A in staff members treating Annie specially. Idra knows enough to have an opinion. I don’t think that’s true at all. Virtually all the Court kids we’ve met are employed, usually in something difficult and/or dangerous. Paz works in an animal lab, Parley fights monsters, Smitty’s a medium, Kat and Jack are tech researchers, Jenny’s a witch in training. Gamma is Zimmy’s caregiver/psychic lightning rod. John and Margo are, like, itinerant musical exorcists or something. All the kids in Foley House are fairies or former animals who literally died to enroll, and now work 365 days a year as human computers. We don’t know what Winsbury and Janet actually do on the side, but considering that Janet’s the headmaster’s daughter and they both have superhero-level archery skills, it’s probably something important. Annie has exceptionally challenging family issues, but her actual Court responsibilities are not unusually demanding. I’m not sure the Court has anything we’d recognize as a formal counseling system, but several adults in her life certainly tried to intervene with her in the aftermath. And they failed mostly because, well, Annie stonewalled them and they let her get away with it. Which probably wasn’t the best thing for Annie, but that only supports Idra’s position. The latter, surely? Homework is a boring necessity, and dating in the Court is so disciplined it’s almost Victorian. The other students are doing exactly what’s expected of model Court citizens. OTOH, hanging out in the forest is fun and exciting--if occasionally terrifying--and Annie’s initial motivations were interest in Coyote and suspicion of Court authority. The Court never supported her as a forest medium; as far as they were concerned, she was just out there irresponsibly LARPing Princess Mononoke. And as Aata pointed out recently, the consequences have been highly unsatisfactory from the Court’s perspective. |
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Post by phantaskippy on Apr 16, 2021 13:39:23 GMT
While I wouldn't call Annie spoiled she does have what I could best describe as Protagonist Syndrome, which is what Idra most likely is referring to. Throughout her stay in Gunnerkrigg Court Annie has been treated as special, or possibly even unique. Of course that's in part because she is unusual, half fire elemental with innate etheric empathy and on speaking terms with the psychopomps. And then she developed a very close bond with both Coyote (basically the god of the forest) and Ysengrin. The result is that, as much as Annie attracts trouble, she also seems to assume that she's involved in any situation and that it's up to her to resolve them. She breaks the rules without thinking twice, for the longest time she had extreme difficulty relying on any adults no matter how helpful they might've been in the past, and until her father returned and (rather cruelly and unfairly) reminded her of her position only Jones really put effort into trying to restrain her. When Idra calls Annie spoiled I think it's less "I'm entitled to everything" and more "The world revolves around me". And even if Idra doesn't know everything about Annie she must've formed an image based on what Annie was like in the forest and what she's heard from Eglamore.
Good points. One I might add; other characters have frequently resolved matters far more often than Annie herself has done, despite her efforts; she often gets rescued by someone else (like Kat or Eglamore) rather than rescuing herself, for example. It was Zimmy, rather than Annie, who solved the "spider possessing Jack" problem. And we got a mention, in the last chapter, that it will be Kat who guides the Court in a better direction (which will presumably also solve the Court vs. Forest conflict, since the root of that is the Court's insistence on meddling with the Ether; presumably, once Kat steers the Court in a new direction, peace between the two groups will become achievable). Annie might have a small role to play in that, but it might be largely Kat's achievement with Annie mostly watching from the sidelines. (Not to mention that some of Annie's accomplishments have backfired. Sending Robot across the bridge to return Shadow2 home, for example; she unwittingly escalated the tension between the Court and the Forest that way, and on top of it all, Shadow2 wound up returning to the Court and staying there after all.) Is it possible that Annie may turn out to be the protagonist in the sense of "viewpoint character/person who does much learning and growing" sense, but not in the sense of "protagonist-as-hero", and that one of her biggest lessons will be learning that she's not the one who saves the day (that role going to other characters like Kat, Zimmy, etc.)? Annie is the one that makes connections, and leads the team. Everyone else does the heavy lifting, but without Annie, what actually happens? It may seem like she lucks her way into and out of situations, but most of the time she notices something, or cares about something that other people take for granted or ignore. That's a valuable trait in itself. |
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Post by aline on Apr 16, 2021 14:45:09 GMT
Even 1st year student Annie knew that's not what a proper adult is supposed to say  |
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Post by pyradonis on Apr 16, 2021 16:09:08 GMT
John and Margo are, like, itinerant musical exorcists or something. I am pretty sure they just stumbled into that situation by accident, not because the Court employs them to cleanse cursed musical instruments.
I haven't really seen any signs of racism or classism from the students, no homophobia, no physical abuse from any of the teachers. I don't know what kind of -ism it falls under, but the Chester students seem to be looked down upon badly, being avoided, being called weirdos, freaks, cu- *WHUD*
One I might add; other characters have frequently resolved matters far more often than Annie herself has done, despite her efforts; she often gets rescued by someone else (like Kat or Eglamore) rather than rescuing herself, for example. It was Zimmy, rather than Annie, who solved the "spider possessing Jack" problem. And we got a mention, in the last chapter, that it will be Kat who guides the Court in a better direction (which will presumably also solve the Court vs. Forest conflict, since the root of that is the Court's insistence on meddling with the Ether; presumably, once Kat steers the Court in a new direction, peace between the two groups will become achievable). Annie might have a small role to play in that, but it might be largely Kat's achievement with Annie mostly watching from the sidelines. (Not to mention that some of Annie's accomplishments have backfired. Sending Robot across the bridge to return Shadow2 home, for example; she unwittingly escalated the tension between the Court and the Forest that way, and on top of it all, Shadow2 wound up returning to the Court and staying there after all.) Is it possible that Annie may turn out to be the protagonist in the sense of "viewpoint character/person who does much learning and growing" sense, but not in the sense of "protagonist-as-hero", and that one of her biggest lessons will be learning that she's not the one who saves the day (that role going to other characters like Kat, Zimmy, etc.)? Annie freed Jeanne (with the help from others, but she was the one to put the team together in the first place), managed to calm down Martin so he could be brought into the Ether, helped Mort become scary, vitally contributed to solving the Torn Sea crisis (both through fighting ability and getting the message out to Renard), defeated a whole horde of monsters in Fun City (saving mighty Ysengrin in the process), figured out what was going on with Aly and gave him and Kat the possibility to say goodbye, got out of the overgrown tunnels below the Court defeating an ashray on the way, seems to regularly slice and dice invading Forest creatures like wisps and Bound Dogs since she figured out that laser beam power and brought Mort into the Ether.
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Post by drmemory on Apr 16, 2021 17:07:44 GMT
Let's not forget, Annie is also the only one who has a growing mythology surrounding her. See Tall Tales. She even has her own "put the stars in the sky" myth! Not only a protagonist, but a budding etheric god. Power-wise, we've only really seen her use her flames and a bit of telepathy and telekinesis, but I've long believed that there is a reason Coyote treats her as a friend (in addition to her making him laugh). She can already access and use the ether without a blinker stone. Who knows how far she can grow? Oh, yes, she also has the powers of a psychopomp, whatever those are. We've seen her take people into the ether. I wonder if she can already appear/disappear and teleport where needed like they do? Coyote once told her she'd be able to fly (by picking up her own body from the ether) but this seems like a different sort of thing.
Tom has laid a lot of groundwork here, and I have faith that we'll be told what he wants us to know about all this when the time comes.
The only other character with her own mythology is Kat, and I just don't know if robots count for that. I talk about that a bit in my robot questions thread. Are they sentient? Will the neobots be picked up by psychopomps when they die? Can their thoughts help the world to keep spinning, to shape the ether, and to create gods? In short, do they have souls? Which isn't directly Annie-as-protagonist-related, sorry. Just a pet topic.  |
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Post by flowsthead on Apr 16, 2021 17:42:45 GMT
The laser cow thing was barely against the rules, though. It was just a counter to the adults’ own prank, and the staff were fine with it (if rueful). The whole thing was meant to test the students’ resourcefulness, and they performed as expected. Jack and Kat are both way more careful about concealing their activities than Annie is, and the Court tolerates a lot of shenanigans as long as you keep them private. In public, Kat is a model student. She’s also a court VIP because of her inventions and ability to work with the robots, and she has some plausible deniability because the robots aren’t directly under her control. Annie’s issue is open defiance. She skips out on detention, shouts at the Headmaster mid-ceremony, and charges into the Wood while setting off twenty-foot plumes of psychic fire at the Court’s front door. No other student does stuff like that; even Zimmy tries to be more circumspect. Fair enough about the laser cow, but I think you're really underestimating what Kat has been up to. No way they ignore the Torn Sea because Kat is a model student. I'd still consider a lot of Jack was doing as open defiance as well, but alright, we can say that Annie's is a lot more obvious. I'll give up on this point. This is missing a ton of contexts. They specifically let Annie keep Renard because she has power over the object(wolf doll) and it would be better for everyone for Renard to be under her control. Anja specifically talks to Annie about keeping Renard in the Court. And this is not a matter of protagonists, her daughter accomplished something with time travel and Annie is involved. Bringing Annie and Kat to the Norns is not a show of preference for Annie as much as it is the obvious thing to do in the situation. And yes, Eglamore is overprotective of Annie, probably because she's the only one regular interacting with gods, but also probably because of Surma. I don't think that is unusual. Most people would be overprotective of their dead friend's daughter. I guess we disagree on what the word "enough" means in this context. Frankly, I don't think Eglamore knows enough to have an opinion, and whatever Idra knows from Eglamore, I doubt it's the full story from his perspective, let alone the full story period. Parley and Andrew are specifically working in the medium field like Annie. If we're saying that Annie is spoiled despite her medium work then that would apply to Parley and Andrew. I don't think it applies, but that is argument I was working with. It's a little weird for you to take my argument completely out of the context in which I was putting it in. And how is Annie's responsibility not demanding? I'm pretty sure taking a friend through the ether is really emotionally demanding, not to mention the fighting that Annie was doing with Ysengrin. The rest of them do what they do out of personal choice and conviction, not because they need to. They're not poor, they don't work at a convenience store because they will eventually need the money for college. Paz works in the animal lab because she cares for animals. Kat and Jack work with tech because they like tech, and those aren't really jobs. And Gamma is Zimmy's lover/friend, that is also not a job. John and Margo I agree with pyradonis, that was pure chance, not their jobs. The Foley House doesn't count as they're not really Court kids to begin with. If they're letting a teenager stonewall them from giving her counseling over her possible death, then that's still on the adults around her. Why are we holding a child responsible for the reaction of the adults? I think that's absurd. And I also don't remember them offering any kind of formal counseling to her. It's way different to talk to a therapist specifically and talk to her friends parents who she already knows about these things. This is insane logic to me. When Annie first went into the Forest post-Loup she went in with the real chance that she might die. That's not fun and exciting stuff. I have no idea how we're reading the same comic at all. I don't know how you can compare doing homework to inter-species diplomacy. Annie's responsibility is much, much higher than the students around her. Even if part of it is enjoyable for her, and I think you're vastly overstating this, that doesn't make the situation spoiled, it just means she was suited for taking on that responsibility. And I don't know why we care about the Court's perspective at all. My post was not from the perspective of the Court but from the readers. It doesn't matter if Annie's time in the Forest was unsatisfactory for the Court. Annie saving Jeanne was probably also unsatisfactory for the Court, but to that I say fuck the Court. They're morally compromised at best. |
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Post by warrl on Apr 16, 2021 17:55:32 GMT
I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t arrange for other kids to meet the Norns, Anja arranged for Kat to meet the Norns, for Kat's reasons. Annie just happened to be there (also for Kat's reasons) and got to go along for the ride. They had a choice of letting Annie keep Reynard, or losing all control of him again. Or persuading - not coercing - Annie to transfer ownership, which was definitely looking improbable; lacking true parental authority, a coerced transfer would have been void. They could have coerced physical transfer without transfer of ownership, but then they couldn't do anything to or with Reynard without Annie's consent. Leaving him with her, he might prove useful. And they were watching both. (Also, taking physical possession without claiming ownership would mean that at some point, under some conditions, they would have to give him back - and by then he, and probably Annie, would be extremely annoyed at them. So when would they want that to happen?) |
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Post by 0o0f on Apr 16, 2021 19:31:28 GMT
I think it's less a matter of "Annie's not the actual hero of the comic," so much as the world of Gunnerkrigg is too large and complex for there to be one hero like that. Even someone who is special in some way is still one person.
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ffkonoko
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Post by ffkonoko on Apr 16, 2021 21:27:56 GMT
Oh boy. Not that Annie hasn't acted spoiled before, she absolutely has, but what does Idra know about it? That feels...weird to me. It feels like she makes a lot of quick judgements based on little evidence. "All the attention of the Court and Coyote" makes it sound like Annie had a happy fun time with everyone fawning over her. Even if we take as given that Annie is spoiled (although really, compared to who?), I don't think Idra's perspective is justified. She absolutely knows that Annie has been the forest medium, after nearly being the court medium, after hanging out with a literal God, her dragon slayer boyfriend talking about her, etc... and we do not know just how much more evidence Indra has. We know that there have been conversations off panel, and there has been the passage of time. And even just the basics of "hangs around with nigh-godlike beings of the forest and we ended up hosting her", that is already grounds to consider someone having been potentially "spoilt" in some metrics. That does NOT mean that her entire life was sunshine and rainbows. The word is loaded, and often used to an extreme, but you can be spoiled in specific subsets. Such as getting used to not needing to care about schoolwork. That is not a positive thing. And I know that the readers perspective is different, but...from Idras perspective, it is not an unreasonable thing to say. It is a vague statement with clearly known and obvious causes, so I don't hold it against her that she's unexpectedly accurate for having so little obviously shown knowledge. "So she got a bit spoilt and rowdy for a bit" is pretty solidly what she did, with the "ha ha, they can't stop me" phase. It isn't even really a judgement of anyone. This feels very much like Red dressing Annie down for endangering her friends when literally everyone involved knew how dangerous Jeanne was and volunteered. Fairly unjustified an out of left field. Almost like Tom is trying to lead the reader somewhere specific and not organically. Yes, they knew how dangerous Jeanne was. And Antimony knows how important names are for the fairies, so using that to lead Reds friend into a nearly deadly encounter was, and is, kinda a dick move and it was always justified that Red would be upset about it. It is in fact, extremely normal. It just isn't a traditional narrative convention, because stories generally tacitly accept that everyones friends will randomly risk their lives for each other, or out of general obligations like making a ghost feel upset, or setting you up with your boyfriend. I'd agree that the story is leading somewhere that some people don't want it to go. Is Tony a flawed human being who has made terrible mistakes? Yep. Is he still her dad? Yep. Do some characters and readers think he should be cut out of her life? Yeah. Is it their call? No. Should annie make that call? Is annie a flawed human being who has made terrible mistakes? Do you think it would make sense for annie to decide she'd rather be an orphan? Because I think it's more that it would feel narratively satisfying. In a "bad guy gets destroyed" kind of way. Idra feels a bit too much like a soapbox or a mouthpiece here. She's presenting incredibly strong opinions for someone who....literally doesn't know Tony, has no investment in Antimony or Tony, or any business inside their lives regarding events she wasn't even there for. Idra is presenting views, not specific to knowing Tony, but of "parents are still important". That's a common and broad perspective, so seems pretty simple why she'd have it as a default starting stance, even without the note that she's used to growing up in big family groups. And that the other characters(and certain readers) basically swapped between "It sucks that he wasn't around, he should be" and "he shouldn't be around" is pretty surface level easy to question, I'm glad she did. That she has no direct investment is probably exactly WHY she can make some simple and straightforward comments, though.. |
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