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Post by Draxiss on Apr 16, 2021 23:28:22 GMT
I'm just excited to see the interaction between the two most monotone characters in this comic.
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Post by maxptc on Apr 17, 2021 0:30:14 GMT
Yeah it's almost a little strange. In a comic where so many of the characters' flaws are on full display, Donald is pretty steadily the best. It makes me wonder what his flaw is. I would argue that both the Donlan parents are kind and steadily awesome! (They'd have to be, after all, to produce someone as excellent as Kat.) Maybe it's time that we get more Anja and Donny backstory? That being said, if we look at the pattern Tom established with Annie, where her flaws are a combination of her parent's flaws, I think we could also potentially look at Kat herself to see the potential flaws of Anja and Donny. Bottling up frustration, being outwardly Okay while emotionally in turmoil—I could definitely see those reflected in either Anja or Donny. Not that its a flaw or anything, but Donald seems to share Kats extreme loyalty. For as loyal as Kat is to Annie, Donny is just as loyal to Tony and Jim, considering he is still friends with both despite the tension(or whatever you wanna call it) we know about, as well as whatever other incidents between Tony and Jim that happened off screen that we aren't privy to. |
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Post by TBeholder on Apr 17, 2021 2:12:49 GMT
Tony is hard to talk to in general but I think a direct approach might go well this time. Jones is a neutral party with no real prejudices, she's going to talk to him alone, and Tony is in a good situation right now. Also, other people who don't avoid subjects Tony avoids are on the road paved with flat rounded replies that sound like subtle mockery, leading to the point when they have to either hit him, hit the nearest wall with their heads, or storm out. While Jones can continue for another thousand years... and he knows this. |
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Post by warrl on Apr 17, 2021 2:56:25 GMT
In a comic where so many of the characters' flaws are on full display, Donald is pretty steadily the best. It makes me wonder what his flaw is. Excessive patience and tolerance? |
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Post by blazingstar on Apr 17, 2021 4:21:27 GMT
In case further evidence was needed that Don Donlan is a *genius*... I don't have a ton to say about this page, so here's some links to previous times when Donny got to show off his ridiculous fatherly wisdom and overall awesomeness: And...that's about all I can think of, at the moment. We haven't actually seen much of Donny, but his role in Microsat 5 alone really cemented him as the most likable person in the comic for me (besides Robox, of course), and since then he's only gotten more and more awesome. In a story where so many people are constantly struggling with all their biases and ignorance and flaws...Donald Donlan really is a breath of fresh air.
Donny is one of the most emotionally intelligent people in the comic imo. He's just really good with people, and his talents (despite having no etheric abilities, it's almost a power in itself) are badly needed in times like this. |
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Post by mturtle7 on Apr 17, 2021 19:15:41 GMT
I don't have a ton to say about this page, so here's some links to previous times when Donny got to show off his ridiculous fatherly wisdom and overall awesomeness: And...that's about all I can think of, at the moment. We haven't actually seen much of Donny, but his role in Microsat 5 alone really cemented him as the most likable person in the comic for me (besides Robox, of course), and since then he's only gotten more and more awesome. In a story where so many people are constantly struggling with all their biases and ignorance and flaws...Donald Donlan really is a breath of fresh air.
Yeah it's almost a little strange. In a comic where so many of the characters' flaws are on full display, Donald is pretty steadily the best. It makes me wonder what his flaw is. Haha, maybe he kicks puppies in his spare time or something. Maybe he's actually the Ultimate Villain of the whole comic!
Seriously though, we just don't know enough about him to say. There are a couple hints of stuff here and there that arguably hint at flaws in his character, though I personally don't see them that way. He was very supportive of his daughter's plan to fly down into an possibly very dangerous ravine to save Annie, once her mind was clearly set on it. That could be seen as bad parenting, although it did kind of turn out super well and may have been better than forcing her to sneak out and do it all on her own (something Donny has plenty of experience with). He also works on some very hush-hush stuff for the Court, but being hush-hush doesn't necessarily mean it's bad. |
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Post by pyradonis on Apr 17, 2021 19:26:53 GMT
I'm just excited to see the interaction between the two most monotone characters in this comic. I read "monochrome" at first... Yeah it's almost a little strange. In a comic where so many of the characters' flaws are on full display, Donald is pretty steadily the best. It makes me wonder what his flaw is. I think he writes annoyed comments under Harry Potter fanfictions that don't ship his favourite pairing. |
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Post by drmemory on Apr 17, 2021 20:21:08 GMT
Jones does know a lot of the background here - she was there for the big Tony/Jimmy blow-up and comforted Jimmy afterwards. I'm sure she's scrolling through her internal DVR and re-examining everything to do with the players involved. We've seen them interact a little - I almost feel like Donald treats Jones kind of like Kat treats her robots. Like here he assumes Jones won't mind if they borrow her phone, and runs off with Annie using his portable door. Without asking Jones if he can borrow her phone.
That being said, I'm sure he's right - Jones is unemotional, and certainly wouldn't care about a mere transient physical item.
So like almost everyone else, I'm looking forward to the Jones/Tony conversation. I'm just not as sure it will be dull and uneventful. I think she is the most likely to actually understand what's going on with Tony - she's probably already investigated and applied stimulus to him so she can evaluate his personality. I think she's just following the evidence here - everyone is pointing fingers at Tony as being a problem for Annie, so she'll talk to him. But, and this is a big but, I don't think it'll be to try and figure out what his deal is - I think she already knows that, and will be asking his opinion on Annie's mental state. I don't think it would be easy to distract Jones from her goal.
Side note - I wonder what Jones looks like in the ether? Anja seems uncomfortable around her. Annie once had a thing for her. Coyote knows all about her but didn't really say anything about her nature, other than that her watching all the time is annoying. Zimmy actually teased her! And of course, we know from what others have said that Surma couldn't stand her. So Anja and Surma are the only ones with visibly negative reactions to her. I wonder if this was because of an incident, or on what they perceived about her? /shrug
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Post by maxptc on Apr 17, 2021 21:07:41 GMT
I think he writes annoyed comments under Harry Potter fanfictions that don't ship his favourite pairing. So he is the main villain to you. Bold position, I respect it. |
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Post by Polyhymnia on Apr 17, 2021 21:47:24 GMT
Jones does know a lot of the background here - she was there for the big Tony/Jimmy blow-up and comforted Jimmy afterwards. I'm sure she's scrolling through her internal DVR and re-examining everything to do with the players involved. We've seen them interact a little - I almost feel like Donald treats Jones kind of like Kat treats her robots. Like here he assumes Jones won't mind if they borrow her phone, and runs off with Annie using his portable door. Without asking Jones if he can borrow her phone.
That being said, I'm sure he's right - Jones is unemotional, and certainly wouldn't care about a mere transient physical item.
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Post by mturtle7 on Apr 18, 2021 7:07:51 GMT
Side note - I wonder what Jones looks like in the ether? Anja seems uncomfortable around her. Annie once had a thing for her. Coyote knows all about her but didn't really say anything about her nature, other than that her watching all the time is annoying. Zimmy actually teased her! And of course, we know from what others have said that Surma couldn't stand her. So Anja and Surma are the only ones with visibly negative reactions to her. I wonder if this was because of an incident, or on what they perceived about her? /shrug
Interesting you should point out a connection between Surma and Anja...I seem to remember that besides just being best friends, those two were the ones who started their education in Chester House by mistake, and the Court only fixed the error later. Could this "incident" you're speculating about have happened sometime during that transition, where Jones was acting as a rather-too-callous ambassador from the inner Court? Although, we already know Jones can act as a mentor for Court mediums, so maybe Surma met her that way and Anja mostly just knows her through Surma...
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Post by silicondream on Apr 18, 2021 12:42:12 GMT
There are a couple hints of stuff here and there that arguably hint at flaws in his character, though I personally don't see them that way. He was very supportive of his daughter's plan to fly down into an possibly very dangerous ravine to save Annie, once her mind was clearly set on it. That could be seen as bad parenting, although it did kind of turn out super well and may have been better than forcing her to sneak out and do it all on her own (something Donny has plenty of experience with). Yeah, I like Don too, but his biggest flaw is pretty clearly a lack of protectiveness towards the kids. Letting Kat explore the Annan Waters--alone!--was the most bizarre act of parental negligence in the comic. Sure, preteen who’s crazed with worry, descend into this chasm via the experimental aircraft you assembled five minutes ago! Brave the forbidden zone so deadly that even Coyote and Ysengrin won’t cross it! Bring back your friend, or your friend’s smashed corpse, and try not to get attacked by any more robots or shadow people on the way! All the adults were pretty negligent in that chapter (why didn’t Eglamore just Hulk-jump down there and find Annie himself?) but Don was the worst. Don and Anja were also bizarrely chill with letting Annie keep Renard. I know their excuse--that removing her ownership would somehow unleash him--but that doesn’t hold water when they had previously defeated and contained him in a more powerful and entirely self-owned body. More importantly, Renard gets bound, trapped, and separated from Annie all the time without threatening her ownership rights. Heck, Anja bound him as soon as she laid eyes on him! The adults could easily have kept him sealed, added a few chains for good measure, tossed him into a safe deposit box and dropped it into the Annan Waters or something. Instead, they let an orphan wander off with her would-be killer because they couldn’t be arsed to argue with her, pretty much. Eglamore at least had the grace to feel guilty about it. Finally, while “Microsat 5” and “Annie and the Fire” were convenient info-dumps for the reader, they also showed that Don is kind of terrible about information security. He let Annie learn about the Omega device and made her an accomplice in Tony’s illicit research. He let her learn that Tony almost killed her and that she helped him maim himself, even if both were inadvertent. And he let her learn that it may be possible to revive Surma by sacrificing herself. Even on the most optimistic view of Annie’s coping skills, dumping all this on her without preparation or supervision wasn't the greatest idea. It’s slightly hilarious how Tony keeps taking all these security measures and even reminding Don directly that “we’re secret agents, you idiot, we can’t always talk about this stuff,” and Don just keeps blowing his cover. Again, Don is extremely likable and has a knack for fatherly advice, but flawless he is not. |
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Post by flowsthead on Apr 18, 2021 13:04:27 GMT
There are a couple hints of stuff here and there that arguably hint at flaws in his character, though I personally don't see them that way. He was very supportive of his daughter's plan to fly down into an possibly very dangerous ravine to save Annie, once her mind was clearly set on it. That could be seen as bad parenting, although it did kind of turn out super well and may have been better than forcing her to sneak out and do it all on her own (something Donny has plenty of experience with). Don and Anja were also bizarrely chill with letting Annie keep Renard. I know their excuse--that removing her ownership would somehow unleash him--but that doesn’t hold water when they had previously defeated and contained him in a more powerful and entirely self-owned body. More importantly, Renard gets bound, trapped, and separated from Annie all the time without threatening her ownership rights. Heck, Anja bound him as soon as she laid eyes on him! The adults could easily have kept him sealed, added a few chains for good measure, tossed him into a safe deposit box and dropped it into the Annan Waters or something. Instead, they let an orphan wander off with her would-be killer because they couldn’t be arsed to argue with her, pretty much. Eglamore at least had the grace to feel guilty about it. It's not that removing her ownership would unleash him, but it might allow him to have the ability to take someone over through their eyes again. It's already been mentioned by Coyote that the thing keeping Renard in the Court was not Anja and Eglamore, but the possibility of seeing Surma again, and as we saw when he escaped, their methods are not foolproof. So while the idea of throwing him in a box into the Annan Waters was probably proposed at some point by the Court, ultimately that would just lead to his escape and return to Coyote, which is what they least want. Lest we forget, Renard is basically a minor god. Having Annie retain ownership means he won't have access to his eye-stealing powers, which is much more foolproof than whatever Anja and Eglamore were doing before. |
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Post by hp on Apr 18, 2021 19:46:20 GMT
D*MN Idra and Don have no time for bullsh*t
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Post by silicondream on Apr 18, 2021 23:25:52 GMT
It's not that removing her ownership would unleash him, but it might allow him to have the ability to take someone over through their eyes again. Possibly, but the adults already had that issue under control with the warding symbols. (None of which they gave to Annie, you’ll notice.) We’ve never seen Renard successfully break though a ward. On the other hand, they had zero experience with controlling him via body ownership, so it’s awfully strange that they assumed that would work perfectly. Renard could have killed Annie in a heartbeat if he’d managed to interrupt her control. And, again, they wouldn’t need to revoke Annie’s ownership to confine him. He’s been forcibly separated from her on several occasions without affecting her “registration.” If anything, keeping Annie as his official owner but denying her access to him would be an even more effective security measure; then nobody could authorize him to steal a body. Which suggests an ulterior motive for letting Annie keep him--she was to be Surma’s replacement as his emotional anchor! (I’m mostly kidding here; reckless as they are, I doubt that Don and Anja would deliberately sacrifice Annie that way.) Anyways, Renard only escaped thanks to Sivo’s stolen body; he’s far easier to contain in doll/wolf form. Minor god or not, I'm pretty sure Renard wouldn't survive an escape attempt in front of Jeanne. But, if you prefer, keep him in an airtight vault in an undisclosed Court location. Or kill him by destroying the doll; so far as we know, he can’t exist without a body. After all, that’s what forced him to occupy the doll in the first place. Which leads to another possible solution: destroy Annie’s doll and force him to jump into an item owned by one of the adults. Something even less dangerous than the doll, ideally. Possibly a tennis ball with googly eyes attached. Of course, none of these tactics would work if Tom didn’t want them to. But the point is that any of them would be safer and more effective than letting the trickster demon be roomies with the child he tried to kill, with no wards on either of them, and hoping for the best. Even while under her control, Renard could easily have manipulated Annie into disaster if he felt like it, as Hetty Helpfully explained. More foolproof?? This happened on the same day they let Annie walk away with Renard. Within 24 hours she had smuggled him out of the Court, let Ysengrin’s agent snatch him, and then fallen off a bridge into the World's Worst Place and died. And Renard wasn’t even trying to escape! Their plan failed so badly it would cheer up George Custer. |
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Post by flowsthead on Apr 19, 2021 0:59:36 GMT
More foolproof?? This happened on the same day they let Annie walk away with Renard. Within 24 hours she had smuggled him out of the Court, let Ysengrin’s agent snatch him, and then fallen off a bridge into the World's Worst Place and died. And Renard wasn’t even trying to escape! Their plan failed so badly it would cheer up George Custer. There's a ton of speculation here. Anything not shown by Tom is technically possible, but I can't really address it since it's not shown. Could they? I have no idea. I'm surprised you're so certain about it. As far as that scene? Yeah that went poorly, but importantly, Renard could neither take anyone over nor did he even change form nor could he speak. Annie told him not to speak and he was forced not to. I think that's pretty definitive as far as her having control over him. And it should be noted, before any of what happened in that chapter, he almost killed Annie and wrecked the Court after he had been captured by the Court for many years. It's not like they caught him that day. |
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Post by alevice on Apr 22, 2021 19:15:03 GMT
Yeah it's almost a little strange. In a comic where so many of the characters' flaws are on full display, Donald is pretty steadily the best. It makes me wonder what his flaw is. Haha, maybe he kicks puppies in his spare time or something. Maybe he's actually the Ultimate Villain of the whole comic!
Seriously though, we just don't know enough about him to say. There are a couple hints of stuff here and there that arguably hint at flaws in his character, though I personally don't see them that way. He was very supportive of his daughter's plan to fly down into an possibly very dangerous ravine to save Annie, once her mind was clearly set on it. That could be seen as bad parenting, although it did kind of turn out super well and may have been better than forcing her to sneak out and do it all on her own (something Donny has plenty of experience with). He also works on some very hush-hush stuff for the Court, but being hush-hush doesn't necessarily mean it's bad. tbf, he literally grew up in a lethal education environment, and i dont think its an accident he forged a shield to a valkyrie, so i would expect lethality to be a regular desenstiized thing to him. it gets compensiated for being emotionally balanced tho. somehwat |
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Post by jesslc on Apr 23, 2021 4:09:39 GMT
I love Donny! He's always been my favourite minor character in GC and this page just confirms why again. And of course, we know from what others have said that Surma couldn't stand her. So Anja and Surma are the only ones with visibly negative reactions to her. I wonder if this was because of an incident, or on what they perceived about her? I have always assumed that the reason Surma couldn't stand Jones was because of her own insecurities. Surma is shown being insecure and/or fishing for compliments in a number of different flashbacks, and I think Tom even commented once that Surma's pretty insecure. Jones has always been a big part of James's life and probably always would be, given what Jones said about her living someone's life as their companion. And Jones is also an attractive woman, at least in appearance (what she actually is, who knows...?). It would take a reasonably secure person to be in a relationship with James and not feel somewhat insecure about how important Jones is to him. With what we've seen of Surma, I don't think she was ever that person. She seemed a bit better at coping with it in the flashbacks that show her as an adult (though we still see her insecurity at times), but as a teenager... it makes perfect sense to me that Surma's insecurity would manifest in part as "not being able to stand Jones". Maybe I'm treading old ground here but personally I've always seen this as a big part of the reason Surma & James breakup. Surma's tendency to be a bit insecure and James is away at training a lot (where Surma can't join him but Jones does). And then a random opportunity means Surma ends up getting to know Tony better and she realises that 1) Tony finds her attractive, 2) he's very different when it's just the two of them (which is heady stuff to someone who's always been a bit insecure and probably longs to feel special), and 3) Tony is able to just be there for her - something she wants but doesn't get from James. As to why Anja has always nervous/uncomfortable around Jones - no idea! The theories that it has something to do Anja's etheric abilities seem pretty plausible to me though. |
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