Girl Genius -- 12/1/06
glas...@gmail.com
Robert A. Woodward
<1164951277.7...@n67g2000cwd.googlegroups.com>,
glas...@gmail.com wrote:
> http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061201
>
> GG just jumped the shark.
? Why did you say that?
--
Robert Woodward <robe...@drizzle.com>
<http://www.drizzle.com/~robertaw>
Dorothy J Heydt
Robert A. Woodward <robe...@drizzle.com> wrote:
>In article
><1164951277.7...@n67g2000cwd.googlegroups.com>,
> glas...@gmail.com wrote:
>
>> http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061201
>>
>> GG just jumped the shark.
>
>? Why did you say that?
Well, it looks as though Agatha/Lucrezia is about to kill Klaus.
Though I suspect something else will happen instead.
It would certainly be bad if Klaus were to be killed. I rather
like the old bastard.
Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com
Wayne Throop
: Well, it looks as though Agatha/Lucrezia is about to kill Klaus.
: Though I suspect something else will happen instead.
Huh? I thought it looked like she was using
the slaver-wasp on him. So she'll "help" him, he'll "recover",
thank her profusely, elevate her to some rule-from-advisor-position
post, and so on and on. Bleah. I hate plots like that. Sigh.
Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw
Jordan
I was utterly horrified when I saw that page -- I think it would be a
disaster for that world if Klaus died. On the other hand, I can think
of at least three or four ways that Klaus can get out of this, and
without killing Agatha -- want me to list my guesses?
- Jordan
Robert Sneddon
writes
>: djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt)
>: Well, it looks as though Agatha/Lucrezia is about to kill Klaus.
>: Though I suspect something else will happen instead.
>
>Huh? I thought it looked like she was using
>the slaver-wasp on him.
Remember Gil got Agatha to do something to the Spark-slaverwasp
container in:
http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061106
Pushing the red button probably disabled the wasp in some way.
Other-Agatha doesn't know that, of course.
I find it interesting that the wasp didn't go straight for Other-Agatha
as she is definitely a Spark herself and the nearest "target". There's
no way the wasp would be able to detect the Other in Agatha.
--
To reply, my gmail address is nojay1 Robert Sneddon
David Goldfarb
Dorothy J Heydt <djh...@kithrup.com> wrote:
>Well, it looks as though Agatha/Lucrezia is about to kill Klaus.
>Though I suspect something else will happen instead.
>
>It would certainly be bad if Klaus were to be killed. I rather
>like the old bastard.
Kill him? She doesn't want to kill him, she wants to *enslave* him.
And my guess is that she's going to get exactly what she wants.
Take another look at
<http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20060324>.
I've posted before a guess that Klaus was going to wind up with the
Other in his head and sent back in time. I'm still backing that
theory -- okay, not with the Other herself, but Other-by-proxy via wasp.
--
David Goldfarb |"Do you know what Freud said about dreams of flying?
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu | It means you're really dreaming about having sex."
gold...@csua.berkeley.edu | "Indeed. Tell me, then, what does it mean when
| you dream about having sex?" -- _Sandman_ #15
Aaron Denney
No way? That's a rather strong assertion.
Even assuming it couldn't, "nearest Spark non-holder of controller"
would be a reasonable default command.
--
Aaron Denney
-><-
Random832
Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
> In article <robertaw-CB97AF...@individual.net>,
> Robert A. Woodward <robe...@drizzle.com> wrote:
>>In article
>><1164951277.7...@n67g2000cwd.googlegroups.com>,
>> glas...@gmail.com wrote:
>>
>>> http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061201
>>>
>>> GG just jumped the shark.
>>
>>? Why did you say that?
>
> Well, it looks as though Agatha/Lucrezia is about to kill Klaus.
> Though I suspect something else will happen instead.
I suspect the Battle Circus will be unleashed "any minute now".
glas...@gmail.com
> ? Why did you say that?
For the past several months the Other has had lucky break piled on top
of fortunate coincidence piled on top of lucky break, and every time
anybody's tried to stop her, they fall in a pit or get lost in a sewer
or get distracted by a passing Skifanderian or have the message tape
edited or anything else.
It got quite tiresome.
And now, simply by opening a box, she's managed to take out the Baron.
Oh, and all of Agatha's friends, and 20 soldiers, have managed to
entirely fail to notice a frickin' Slaver Wasp flying down the Baron's
throat, when such things are normally visible.
At the rate the universe has been falling all over itself to help out
the Other, I halfway expect a meteor to land on the guy holding the
slaver-detecting-weasel Monday.
Seriously, this is reading like an RPG session where the DM is a
sadistic railroader. Where nothing the heroes do, however valorous or
well-planned out or vigorously pursued, works, where coincidences
always break against them, and where the villains have all the luck in
the universe. Or worse yet, where everything the heroes do only plays
further into the villain's hands! And any time that fails, the
villain hauls out an unstoppable plot device weapon and rolls a natural
20 with it!
I've /played/ in that game. It wasn't fun. And now, its like I'm
reading it.
>From the Foglios, I did not expect that.
--
Chuckg
Damien Sullivan
> Remember Gil got Agatha to do something to the Spark-slaverwasp
>container in:
Tarvek.
>http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061106
>
> Pushing the red button probably disabled the wasp in some way.
I figured he just had her stop it from releasing the wasp.
> I find it interesting that the wasp didn't go straight for Other-Agatha
>as she is definitely a Spark herself and the nearest "target". There's
>no way the wasp would be able to detect the Other in Agatha.
And you know that how?
Conversely, being able to detect the Spark would be a neat trick. I
suspect the wasp flies where aimed.
Besides, it can smell the Lucrezianess in her genes, perhaps. The big
Hive Engine released a single wasp, aimed at Gil.
-xx- Damien X-)
Damien Sullivan
>http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061201
>
>GG just jumped the shark.
It got depressing (for this page, at least; I suspect this whole
storyline would be more tolerable if read properly, not at 3 pages a
week) and most of us are $&#* tired of Lucrezia, but it hardly seems
like shark-jumping. Klaus getting wasped has been foreshadowed for a
while -- not compulsively so, but it's not out of the blue, either.
-xx- Damien X-)
glas...@gmail.com
> I was utterly horrified when I saw that page -- I think it would be a
> disaster for that world if Klaus died. On the other hand, I can think
> of at least three or four ways that Klaus can get out of this, and
> without killing Agatha -- want me to list my guesses?
Here's mine:
1) Klaus, as a construct, is immune.
2) Klaus escapes infection due to the fact this is an untested
prototype.
3) Next panel, Klaus spits a chewed-up slaver wasp out of this throat,
smiles at the Other, and goes 'Gave yourself away there, didn't you?'
4) Klaus punches a hole in his own lung, rips the wasp out of his chest
like a Xenomorph embryo in reverse, and then staggers to his feet
anyway because he's just that badass.
Oh, I can think of several ways for Klaus to escape this too.
I just have lost all faith that the Foglios are actually going to let
him *have* one. I mean, goodness, that might cut into
Lucrezia/Agatha's marysue time.
'EEEEEEEEEEE! We're going to WIN!' indeed. As soon as those words
left your mouths, Lucrezias, and the universe *didn't* karmically smack
you one, I began to fear very very much. Genre convention is that as
soon as the Evil Overlord proclaims her invulnerability, *wham*, the
plot smacks her straight in the teeth. And yet, nothing did. AAMOF,
your streak of good luck *really* got going after that.
The settings on this plot are all out of whack. They seem to be
treating Klaus as the antagonist and Lucrezia as the protagonist. And
have been for months.
Ow, my head.
--
Chuckg
Sea Wasp
> http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061201
>
> GG just jumped the shark.
Not sure about THAT, but what just happened is definitely Not Good.
--
Sea Wasp
/^\
;;;
Live Journal: http://www.livejournal.com/users/seawasp/
glas...@gmail.com
> No way? That's a rather strong assertion.
>
> Even assuming it couldn't, "nearest Spark non-holder of controller"
> would be a reasonable default command.
And so would "Don't infect the person holding the launch capsule".
For that matter, the thing /has/ to have the ability to pick Sparks out
of a crowd, and telling a Spark from a non-Spark at range would require
some ability to sense differences in brain waves or brain tissue. If
you can do that, its not too far to going to being able to ID a
specific Spark.
--
Chuckg
Dorothy J Heydt
For one thing, the one remaining dingbot with the unaltered
message was last seen following Wooster to the Circus. We
haven't seen it since, but assuming it's still around there, if
it suddenly shows up and plays its message, it's going to put
some kind of spoke in Lucrezia's wheel.
And, if it were to start singing ....
norrin
glas...@gmail.com wrote:
> Oh, I can think of several ways for Klaus to escape this too.
>
> I just have lost all faith that the Foglios are actually going to let
> him *have* one. I mean, goodness, that might cut into
> Lucrezia/Agatha's marysue time.
>
> 'EEEEEEEEEEE! We're going to WIN!' indeed. As soon as those words
> left your mouths, Lucrezias, and the universe *didn't* karmically smack
> you one, I began to fear very very much. Genre convention is that as
> soon as the Evil Overlord proclaims her invulnerability, *wham*, the
> plot smacks her straight in the teeth. And yet, nothing did. AAMOF,
> your streak of good luck *really* got going after that.
I find it interesting that multiple copies of Lucrezia are able to
coexist
with one another and with the original. Lucrezia has no problem with
killing her chief henchman.
> The settings on this plot are all out of whack. They seem to be
> treating Klaus as the antagonist and Lucrezia as the protagonist. And
> have been for months.
Even if Lucrezia takes down Klaus, she still has to worry about Gil,
and her own split personality. A message from the future suggests
that Gil will switch to her side, but it could be a disguise.
> Ow, my head.
The voice doesn't work on you, but it slows you down.
glas...@gmail.com
> Even if Lucrezia takes down Klaus, she still has to worry about Gil,
> and her own split personality. A message from the future suggests
> that Gil will switch to her side, but it could be a disguise.
To quote from a post on the Girl Genius mailing list...
========================
['Elyse Grasso' said]
When I remember how obsessed I was with the comic just a few months
ago, I
feel very sad. This storyline has become a chore rather than a pleasure
to
read.
It needs some hope that isn't immediately betrayed. Something nice
happening
to the sympathetic characters that isn't immediately overridden by
worse
things.
========================
The strip where they entered Balan's Gap came out October 12th, *2005*.
For over a year we have had the problem Elyse outlines above... that
any time something went right for the good guys, the next twist in the
plot showed us that instead what we thought was going right was
actually leading to somewhere very very wrong. As she said, there has
been no hope given us that wasn't then immediately betrayed.
Having been slapped in the face with such for almost fourteen months
straight, I have by now lost all hope that any corners are going to be
turned. I look forward with resigned dread to Gilgamesh getting to be
hosed over by the script just as thoroughly as his father has.
--
Chuckg
Jordan
glas...@gmail.com wrote:
> Jordan wrote:
>
> > I was utterly horrified when I saw that page -- I think it would be a
> > disaster for that world if Klaus died. On the other hand, I can think
> > of at least three or four ways that Klaus can get out of this, and
> > without killing Agatha -- want me to list my guesses?
>
> Here's mine:
>
> 1) Klaus, as a construct, is immune.
>
> 2) Klaus escapes infection due to the fact this is an untested
> prototype.
>
> 3) Next panel, Klaus spits a chewed-up slaver wasp out of this throat,
> smiles at the Other, and goes 'Gave yourself away there, didn't you?'
>
> 4) Klaus punches a hole in his own lung, rips the wasp out of his chest
> like a Xenomorph embryo in reverse, and then staggers to his feet
> anyway because he's just that badass.
>
> Oh, I can think of several ways for Klaus to escape this too.
I'll add that, in general, Lucrezia seems not to have read the Evil
Overlord list, and has already shown a tendency to _gloat_. And how
can she _not_ gloat, when she is about to kill or enslave the man who
is not only her arch-enemy, but her former lover? And gloating to the
Baron, a man who clearly _has_ read the Evil Overlord list (*), is not
a bright idea.
> I just have lost all faith that the Foglios are actually going to let
> him *have* one. I mean, goodness, that might cut into
> Lucrezia/Agatha's marysue time.
I don't think that Lucrezia is a Mary Sue. Agatha, maybe -- she does
have the Gifts of Most of the Graces, and is the Destined Heir to Power
to boot -- but the whole point of this "possession" storyline is the
utter horror of seeing a character we've come to really like helplessly
under the control of someone who is in many ways her opposite.
I've seen a _lot_ of
> 'EEEEEEEEEEE! We're going to WIN!' indeed. As soon as those words
> left your mouths, Lucrezias, and the universe *didn't* karmically smack
> you one, I began to fear very very much. Genre convention is that as
> soon as the Evil Overlord proclaims her invulnerability, *wham*, the
> plot smacks her straight in the teeth. And yet, nothing did. AAMOF,
> your streak of good luck *really* got going after that.
>
> The settings on this plot are all out of whack. They seem to be
> treating Klaus as the antagonist and Lucrezia as the protagonist. And
> have been for months.
>
> Ow, my head.
I think the Foglios are just setting Lucrezia up for a greater fall.
And _Girl Genius_ violates genre expectations in a number of ways, if
you haven't noticed.
Sincerely Yours,
Jordan
(*) He tends to act more mercifully than a real Evil Overlord, but
that's because the Baron is not so much "evil" as "ruthless." There's
a difference, as Worsel of Velantia would point out to Kimball Kinnison.
Jordan
norrin wrote:
> I find it interesting that multiple copies of Lucrezia are able to coexist
> with one another and with the original. Lucrezia has no problem with
> killing her chief henchman.
I remember noticing that and thinking to myself: "How _long_ will the
two Lucrezias be able to tolerate one another?"
> Even if Lucrezia takes down Klaus, she still has to worry about Gil,
> and her own split personality. A message from the future suggests
> that Gil will switch to her side, but it could be a disguise.
Another way of interpreting that is that Agatha regains control of her
body at some point: for _Agatha_ to get Gil's cooperation would be
easier than for Lucrezia to do so.
On the _other_ hand, Agatha probably wouldn't be willing to seduce Gil
to turn him against his father; Lucrezia would do so gleefully, the
more so because of the perversity of the situation.
- Jordan
Konrad Gaertner
>
> Robert Sneddon <fr...@nospam.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > Remember Gil got Agatha to do something to the Spark-slaverwasp
> >container in:
>
> Tarvek.
>
> >http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061106
> >
> > Pushing the red button probably disabled the wasp in some way.
>
> I figured he just had her stop it from releasing the wasp.
That was my understanding too.
> > I find it interesting that the wasp didn't go straight for Other-Agatha
> >as she is definitely a Spark herself and the nearest "target". There's
> >no way the wasp would be able to detect the Other in Agatha.
>
> And you know that how?
>
> Conversely, being able to detect the Spark would be a neat trick.
And something Klaus hasn't managed to do yet.
> I suspect the wasp flies where aimed.
>
> Besides, it can smell the Lucrezianess in her genes, perhaps. The big
> Hive Engine released a single wasp, aimed at Gil.
That's what I was going to say. Here's the page:
http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/gg101.cgi?date=20060929
--
Konrad Gaertner - - - - - - - - - - - - - - email: gae...@aol.com
http://kgbooklog.livejournal.com/
"I don't mind hidden depths but I insist that there be a surface."
-- James Nicoll
Konrad Gaertner
>
> Jordan wrote:
>
> > I was utterly horrified when I saw that page -- I think it would be a
> > disaster for that world if Klaus died. On the other hand, I can think
> > of at least three or four ways that Klaus can get out of this, and
> > without killing Agatha -- want me to list my guesses?
I don't think killing Agatha would help much.
> Here's mine:
>
> 1) Klaus, as a construct, is immune.
Are they? Jagerkin are, but I don't know about other constructs.
It may be that the mind has to be artificial to be immune (though
we don't even know if that's true for Jagers).
> 2) Klaus escapes infection due to the fact this is an untested
> prototype.
Or dies or goes insane. Or maybe he figured out a cure on the trip
to Sturmhalten.
> 'EEEEEEEEEEE! We're going to WIN!' indeed. As soon as those words
> left your mouths, Lucrezias, and the universe *didn't* karmically smack
> you one, I began to fear very very much. Genre convention is that as
> soon as the Evil Overlord proclaims her invulnerability, *wham*, the
> plot smacks her straight in the teeth. And yet, nothing did. AAMOF,
> your streak of good luck *really* got going after that.
Lucrezia did not want to risk using this wasp on Klaus until she
could study and improve it. She did not want to confront Klaus's
questor herself, much less Klaus. She just killed her two best
human allies. She does not know about the weasels, the messages
(both of them), the dingbots, nor the battle circus. Yes, she's
been lucky, but it's not all good luck.
Wayne Throop
:: would be a reasonable default command.
: And so would "Don't infect the person holding the launch capsule".
Or even, "The Spark I'm aiming the case-end at".
I dunno, I got the idea it's directional, even though it
doesn't look like a traditional directional weapon, but still.
That would allow the weilder many more options on how to deploy.
Dorothy J Heydt
Konrad Gaertner <gae...@aol.com> wrote:
>glas...@gmail.com wrote:
>>
>> 1) Klaus, as a construct, is immune.
>
>Are they? Jagerkin are, but I don't know about other constructs.
>It may be that the mind has to be artificial to be immune (though
>we don't even know if that's true for Jagers).
And I don't think it's established that Klaus is a construct. He
has nearly as many stitch marks as Punch, but those could easily
be left over from having been severely wounded, rather than put
together from scratch.
Konrad Gaertner
The card game names him as such. But then, the card game also
shows Lord Selnikov as a head-in-a-jar.
Sea Wasp
aving been slapped in the face with such for almost fourteen months
> straight, I have by now lost all hope that any corners are going to be
> turned. I look forward with resigned dread to Gilgamesh getting to be
> hosed over by the script just as thoroughly as his father has.
That's an exaggerated view of The Pain, though. It's caused by being
a junkie watching it One Little Drop At A Time.
I tend to read them several at once -- and were they not mentioned
here frequently, I'd let them pile up for two or three months.
And it takes about eight to ten minutes to read a couple months of
strips. If that. Lessee, less than a hundred words per strip-day, on
average. Three months, four weeks each month, three strips per week,
so that's 3x4x3x100 or 3600 words. Over a year and two months, about
18,000 words. Short story.
Would you complain so vehemently about a book which spent a few dozen
-- or even a few hundred -- pages with evil winning and good getting
screwed?
Hell, if we look at this as an epic and apply a x10 multiply factor
to the wordage (because there are pictures which convey a lot of
info), you're basically looking at one long book. And about one books'
worth of a typical fantasy trilogy WOULD be, essentially, Screw the
Heroes. And keep screwing them until you can't figure out any more
ways to make it worse, then remove any external hope they have.
This is the STANDARD way to go, and Phil's not spending inordinate
time on it. It just SEEMS like a long time, because you're getting the
story at a rate of less than a chapter per week.
This is the reason I prefer not to watch series that have story arcs
AS they come out. I wait until they're done. For example, I didn't
start watching Fullmetal Alchemist until it was done. I didn't start
watching Buffy until whole seasons were available.
glas...@gmail.com
> Would you complain so vehemently about a book which spent a few dozen
> -- or even a few hundred -- pages with evil winning and good getting
> screwed?
If it was written the way this storyline had been, yes.
It's not /just that good is getting screwed and evil is winning. It's
that *everything* has been going evil's way. Every little last damn
thing.
Even things that originally looked like evil finally getting a setback
('Crap! The Baron's here with his whole army!') have instead fallen
all over themselves to actually work out in the bad girl's favor ('But
this means that the edited broadcast can spook out his whole army,
*and* he'll walk right into my Slaver Wasp!').
Or stuff that gets us all a-hopin' that the good guys are gonna regroup
('Whoohoo! Da Boyz and the Circus are a-ridin' to the rescue!')
instead turn out to be ('Oh hell! Da Boyz are going to rescue
/Lucrezia/ from the /Baron/!')
Etc, etc, etc.
I would complain about any story, in any format, with any wordcount,
that was just so blatantly kicking me, the reader, in the face with
false hope over and over and over and over again, without the slightest
trace of letup.
Once? Once is the minimum for any story with any dramatic tension at
all. Twice? This is a complex story. Several times beyond twice?
This is an epic.
But to the point where I literally can't count them all even if I sit
down and try? With no accomplishments of any other kind to break up
an otherwise unbroken series of 'gotcha!' and 'fooled you!' and
'sucker!'?
... feh.
--
Chuckg
Stephen Graham
> glas...@gmail.com wrote:
>> Jordan wrote:
>>
>>> I was utterly horrified when I saw that page -- I think it would be a
>>> disaster for that world if Klaus died. On the other hand, I can think
>>> of at least three or four ways that Klaus can get out of this, and
>>> without killing Agatha -- want me to list my guesses?
>
> I don't think killing Agatha would help much.
>
>> Here's mine:
>>
>> 1) Klaus, as a construct, is immune.
>
> Are they? Jagerkin are, but I don't know about other constructs.
> It may be that the mind has to be artificial to be immune (though
> we don't even know if that's true for Jagers).
If "The Heterodyne Boys and the Dragon from Mars" story has any basis in
reality, Klaus has already been a revenant, and thus not immune to the
slaver wasps.
http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/gg101.cgi?date=20051121
Sea Wasp
> Sea Wasp wrote:
>
>
>>Would you complain so vehemently about a book which spent a few dozen
>>-- or even a few hundred -- pages with evil winning and good getting
>>screwed?
>
>
> If it was written the way this storyline had been, yes.
>
> It's not /just that good is getting screwed and evil is winning. It's
> that *everything* has been going evil's way. Every little last damn
> thing.
I still say you're refusing to see the fact that this is NORMAL for
many epics. You can't win for the losing. You think you're gonna get
ahead, instead what you do is actually making things worse.
This means that when the good guys FINALLY get their innings, the
asskicking is just that much more satisfying.
Robert Sneddon
<seawasp...@sgeobviousinc.com> writes
> I still say you're refusing to see the fact that this is NORMAL
>for many epics. You can't win for the losing. You think you're gonna
>get ahead, instead what you do is actually making things worse.
I fully expect the Other personality in Agatha to be obliterated at
some point, probably in the near future (story-time future that is). The
reason I think this is that there's another version of her, in her own
mechanical body courtesy of Tarvek so the Good Guys can win this battle
but the threat of the Other still exists. She's still a real threat to
everybody, INCLUDING Agatha-Other. She doesn't seem to be the type that
would be content to share mastery of the world, even with her
clone-twin-entity. For one thing, she knows for certain the other
version of herself is as devious, ambitious and untrustworthy as she is
herself.
glas...@gmail.com
> I still say you're refusing to see the fact that this is NORMAL for
> many epics. You can't win for the losing. You think you're gonna get
> ahead, instead what you do is actually making things worse.
How odd, then, that I don't recall feeling this same way after having
read most epics. Even those that were webcomics that updated on a
M-W-F schedule.
More peculiarly, I don't recall feeling this way after having read Girl
Genius, in the story arcs *before* Lucrezia came onstage.
Dude, this latest section of the comic don't look good even when I hold
it up against GG 101, let alone anything else.
> This means that when the good guys FINALLY get their innings, the
> asskicking is just that much more satisfying.
Not always. Sometimes the 'you can't win for the losing' stage is
dragged out too long. Sometimes the author goes back to the well too
many times. Sometimes the plot contrivances are stacked so high that
the contriving just hits the limit.
At that point, at least some readers speak the Eight Deadly Words, and
once that's happened, no amount of good guys getting in their final
asskicking can be satisfying, because you don't give a shit about these
people anymore.
There's also the fact that I fully expect that the heroes have yet to
finish being hosed, and for the plot to keep on twisting uselessly for
quite a while to come. The Other seems to barely be getting warmed up
here. Likewise the Foglios.
--
Chuckg
Sea Wasp
> Sea Wasp wrote:
>
>
>>I still say you're refusing to see the fact that this is NORMAL for
>>many epics. You can't win for the losing. You think you're gonna get
>>ahead, instead what you do is actually making things worse.
>
>
> How odd, then, that I don't recall feeling this same way after having
> read most epics. Even those that were webcomics that updated on a
> M-W-F schedule.
>
*shrug* I can't judge without knowing the others you refer to, but I
don't find this particular story arc unusual. I'll be disappointed if
Klaus is permanently taken out of action, but for him to be
temporarily out is fine.
Mark Blunden
That seems to have been Joss Whedon's thinking in Buffy seasons 5-7. It
didn't work out that well.
In anything episodic, whether it's TV or a webcomic, too much unremitting
defeat will get people down and get them switching off. There need to be
genuine victories along the way, or people will stop believing in the
heroes.
--
Mark Blunden.
John Schilling
>Jordan wrote:
>> I was utterly horrified when I saw that page -- I think it would be a
>> disaster for that world if Klaus died. On the other hand, I can think
>> of at least three or four ways that Klaus can get out of this, and
>> without killing Agatha -- want me to list my guesses?
>Here's mine:
[...]
>I just have lost all faith that the Foglios are actually going to let
>him *have* one. I mean, goodness, that might cut into
>Lucrezia/Agatha's marysue time.
>'EEEEEEEEEEE! We're going to WIN!' indeed. As soon as those words
>left your mouths, Lucrezias, and the universe *didn't* karmically smack
>you one, I began to fear very very much.
Umm, two pages after that, the cavalry came over the hill. Or rather
down from the coulds in Giant Zeppelins, but same deal. Maybe four
pages later, in the Lucrezia/Agatha timeline, Lucrezia gets booted from
Agatha's head.
You don't consider those to be appropriate karmic smackdowns for an
overconfident villain?
They do not represent Lucrezia's ultimate defeat, no, but if the only
appropriate response you will accept to, "We're going to WIN!", is for
Lucrezia to be utterly defeated and Agatha (or Wulfenbach) to WIN, then
the story would have to be pretty much over by now.
I'm confident you can imagine a suitably neat resolution to the tale
and start looking for a new story.
>Genre convention is that as soon as the Evil Overlord proclaims her
>invulnerability, *wham*, the plot smacks her straight in the teeth.
Genre convention is to produce 90% crap, so I for one am not going
to insist on its being slavishly adhered to. But I think that the
convention you are adhering to, mostly applies to the *hero*. The
Evil Overlord usually gets a full act after explaining his plan to
Mr. Bond, before being finally brought low.
>And yet, nothing did. AAMOF, your streak of good luck *really* got
>going after that.
Well, except for the Giant Zeppelin Armada and the Magic Heterodyne
Music Box.
>The settings on this plot are all out of whack. They seem to be
>treating Klaus as the antagonist and Lucrezia as the protagonist.
They're treating Lucrezia as the *winner*. That's not the same
thing. Genre convention, heck, dramatic convention across many
genres, is for the villain to be in the lead approaching climax,
with the hero playing catchup and being frustrated by unexpected
obstacles.
It's rather difficult to make the story interesting, if you do it
the other way round, with the Good Guys in the lead all the way
through and nothing going right for the villain. There are, e.g.,
relatively popular war movies about Midway and Pearl Harbor, but
not Leyte Gulf or Phillipine Sea. And the most highly regarded
"Star Wars" movie is *not* "Return of the Jedi".
I don't particularly like the mind-swap storyline, though I can't
really give you a good reason why. But given that it is the story,
I can't fault the structure or pacing since. What's the alternative?
Months of Mary Sue Agatha thwarting Lucrezia's every scheme? A quick
wrap-up and then no more Girl Genius?
--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
*Chief Scientist & General Partner * -13th Rule of Acquisition *
*White Elephant Research, LLC * "There is no substitute *
*schi...@spock.usc.edu * for success" *
*661-951-9107 or 661-275-6795 * -58th Rule of Acquisition *
glas...@gmail.com
> >'EEEEEEEEEEE! We're going to WIN!' indeed. As soon as those words
> >left your mouths, Lucrezias, and the universe *didn't* karmically smack
> >you one, I began to fear very very much.
>
> Umm, two pages after that, the cavalry came over the hill. Or rather
> down from the coulds in Giant Zeppelins, but same deal.
Yup. The cavalry came over the hill... and was a perfect audience to
the giant holographic broadcast designed to sow chaos and discord.
And the Baron rode in just in time to walk straight into a slaver wasp.
See what I mean about 'no hope that wasn't then betrayed'? Even when
things apparently go right for the heroes, the next twist in the plot
is all about how it works out for the villain!
> Maybe four pages later, in the Lucrezia/Agatha timeline, Lucrezia gets booted from
> Agatha's head.
Yup. And Agatha uses this opportunity to make a recording...
... that is available for Tarvek to later then edit, whereupon
everybody in fifteen miles now has heard 'The Baron is the Other!'
broadcast.
Again, see what I mean about how things always working out for her?
> You don't consider those to be appropriate karmic smackdowns for an
> overconfident villain?
Hell no. Both occasions ultimately worked out for her *benefit*.
The universe fell right into her lap.
[snip]
> I don't particularly like the mind-swap storyline, though I can't
> really give you a good reason why. But given that it is the story,
> I can't fault the structure or pacing since. What's the alternative?
At least some of the protagonists to make at least some type of
achievement that does not then immediately turn around and work for the
advantage of the Other.
Seriously, there's 'heroes are behind, must race desperately to keep
up!', and then there's 'heroes are desperately racing to keep up,
entirely not knowing that they are rushing the next plot point to
exactly where the villain needs it to be!'. This story has had way
too much of the latter, and ever since we got to Balan's Gap, like
*none* of the former.
> Months of Mary Sue Agatha thwarting Lucrezia's every scheme? A quick
> wrap-up and then no more Girl Genius?
That would be the mirror image of what we're getting now, and be
equally as wrongheaded. Key word, 'equally'.
A plot with somewhat more balance, otoh...
--
Chuckg
glas...@gmail.com
> At least some of the protagonists to make at least some type of
> achievement that does not then immediately turn around and work for the
> advantage of the Other.
For one possible example of such, the Baron could *not* have gotten
caught out by the Slaver Wasp, and captured Agatha-Other.
*This would leave Anevka-Other still out there*, Agatha still
possessed, and a horrendous raging fight between Zeetha and Bang
(Zeetha /is/ the Skifanderian who wiped out Bang's pirate gang, compare
their backstories) to explain why the Circus and Wooster had to
disengage before the Baron could explain to them, and Da Boyz, that
he's really the good guy here and Agatha's actually possessed.
Meanwhile, as the restrained and unconscious Other-Agatha is being
hauled onto the Castle, Gil and Punch & Judy...
You see? Even up until as recently as last week, there was still a
chance for this plot.
But now? The Baron's either insane, dead, or a revenant. And
despite her truly pitiful acting skill, Agatha-Other appears to have
convinced all parties present (who were also mysteriously blind to a
slaver wasp flying right down the Baron's throat, when those things are
normally visible, dontcha know) that she's on the side of the angels...
Barring one helluva left turn next Monday, which I do not expect to see
at all (and I admit I will be embarassed if we /do/ see it, having bet
on the opposite outcome this publicly), we're kinda hosed here.
--
Chuckg
Konrad Gaertner
I'd bet on "unconscious".
> And
> despite her truly pitiful acting skill, Agatha-Other appears to have
> convinced all parties present (who were also mysteriously blind to a
> slaver wasp flying right down the Baron's throat, when those things are
> normally visible, dontcha know) that she's on the side of the angels...
Lucrezia and Zeetha were the only people looking at Klaus. Everyone
else was looking at Zeetha.
> Barring one helluva left turn next Monday, which I do not expect to see
> at all (and I admit I will be embarassed if we /do/ see it, having bet
> on the opposite outcome this publicly), we're kinda hosed here.
Zeetha should speak up: she must have seen *something* fly into
Klaus' mouth. And there's a weasel guy nearby. And if we're
lucky, Lucrezia will accidently admit to understanding the
Skifrandian language.
Konrad Gaertner
>
> Sea Wasp wrote:
>
> > I still say you're refusing to see the fact that this is NORMAL for
> > many epics. You can't win for the losing. You think you're gonna get
> > ahead, instead what you do is actually making things worse.
>
> How odd, then, that I don't recall feeling this same way after having
> read most epics.
You don't read Robert Jordan, GRRM, Robin Hobb, Jim Butcher, or
Steven Erikson?
> Even those that were webcomics that updated on a
> M-W-F schedule.
In "Order of the Stick", one main character has been speaking in
cryptograms since November 18th... of last year. And the key
changes with each strip.
glas...@gmail.com
> You don't read Robert Jordan, GRRM, Robin Hobb, Jim Butcher, or
> Steven Erikson?
I've read Jordan and Hobb.
You do not do the Foglios any defense by comparing them to Jordan and
Hobb.
I haven't read GRRM, but from what I've been told by friends who have,
even he doesn't deny his protagonists *all* accomplishment, and twist
*everything* they do into playing into the villains' hands. He just
continually beats the hell out of them straight-up.
> > Even those that were webcomics that updated on a
> > M-W-F schedule.
>
> In "Order of the Stick", one main character has been speaking in
> cryptograms since November 18th... of last year. And the key
> changes with each strip.
One, Hayley's verbal dyslexia ain't the main plot, two, the decoder
thread gives translations fast enough anyway, and three, I stopped
reading OOTS right after they left Azure City anyway. :P
--
Chuckg
Joe Bednorz
<<4570E5DC...@worldnet.att.net>>:
>glas...@gmail.com wrote:
>>
>> Sea Wasp wrote:
>>
>> > I still say you're refusing to see the fact that this is NORMAL for
>> > many epics. You can't win for the losing. You think you're gonna get
>> > ahead, instead what you do is actually making things worse.
>>
>> How odd, then, that I don't recall feeling this same way after having
>> read most epics.
>
>You don't read Robert Jordan, GRRM, Robin Hobb, Jim Butcher, or
>Steven Erikson?
Or even the Lord of the Rings.
>
>> Even those that were webcomics that updated on a
>> M-W-F schedule.
>
>In "Order of the Stick", one main character has been speaking in
>cryptograms since November 18th... of last year. And the key
>changes with each strip.
That was very annoying, until I found this Online Cryptogram Solver:
<http://www.ics.uci.edu/~eppstein/cryptogram/>
--
Index to free SF: <http://www.mindspring.com/~jbednorz/Free/>. The
Thunder Child's SF links to Project Gutenberg, Baen Free Library and
CDs, the Sci-Fi Channel's archive of classic & original SF & more.
All the best, Joe Bednorz
Robert A. Woodward
glas...@gmail.com wrote:
> Robert A. Woodward wrote:
>
> > ? Why did you say that?
>
> For the past several months the Other has had lucky break piled on top
> of fortunate coincidence piled on top of lucky break, and every time
> anybody's tried to stop her, they fall in a pit or get lost in a sewer
> or get distracted by a passing Skifanderian or have the message tape
> edited or anything else.
>
She has seen upsets to her plans in the period. First, most of
Europe wasn't disorganized prey to a new offensive; it was
controlled by an empire with a very powerful military. Second,
right after she has sent all of her forces away to another location
and was about to relocate herself, an overwhelming powerful task
force of said empire invests the town. Third, right after wasping
(or so, she believes) the ruler of that empire ... (see Monday).
> It got quite tiresome.
>
I think she has found a number of interferences to her plans to be
very tiresome.
> And now, simply by opening a box, she's managed to take out the Baron.
> Oh, and all of Agatha's friends, and 20 soldiers, have managed to
> entirely fail to notice a frickin' Slaver Wasp flying down the Baron's
> throat, when such things are normally visible.
>
It is much smaller than the standard breed, see
<http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/gg101.cgi?date=20060929>
> At the rate the universe has been falling all over itself to help out
> the Other, I halfway expect a meteor to land on the guy holding the
> slaver-detecting-weasel Monday.
>
She was able to fight all the Great Houses, destroying several
completely, 18-19 years ago. Nobody, other than close allies, knows
that she is BACK.
> Seriously, this is reading like an RPG session where the DM is a
> sadistic railroader.
No, it is a RPG session where the player party (whether out of
stupidity or bad luck) find themselves attacking the stronghold of
a evil cleric that is 20 encounter levels above their weight class.
The GM has to administer a whipping.
--
Robert Woodward <robe...@drizzle.com>
<http://www.drizzle.com/~robertaw>
Paul Colquhoun
If that was cannon reality, then there would be no need for the special
wasps to control Sparks.
--
Reverend Paul Colquhoun, ULC. http://andor.dropbear.id.au/~paulcol
Asking for technical help in newsgroups? Read this first:
http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html#intro
David Goldfarb
Stephen Graham <gra...@speakeasy.net> wrote:
>If "The Heterodyne Boys and the Dragon from Mars" story has any basis in
>reality, Klaus has already been a revenant, and thus not immune to the
>slaver wasps.
>
>http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/gg101.cgi?date=20051121
"Stories are for fun. Do not mistake them for *facts*."
<http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/gg101.cgi?date=20051226>
--
David Goldfarb |"In the fifties, people responded well to
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu | authoritative disembodied voices."
gold...@csua.berkeley.edu | -- MST3K
Damien Sullivan
>And I don't think it's established that Klaus is a construct. He
>has nearly as many stitch marks as Punch, but those could easily
>be left over from having been severely wounded, rather than put
>together from scratch.
Not on page, yet, but both the card game and Kaja herself have said he's
a construct, probably in the sense of being an amalgam of himself and
his two bothers, courtesy of their parents. Also a construct in that he
can punch out a Jaeger.
-xx- Damien X-)
Damien Sullivan
>John Schilling wrote:
>
>> >'EEEEEEEEEEE! We're going to WIN!' indeed. As soon as those words
>> >left your mouths, Lucrezias, and the universe *didn't* karmically smack
>> >you one, I began to fear very very much.
>>
>> Umm, two pages after that, the cavalry came over the hill. Or rather
>> down from the coulds in Giant Zeppelins, but same deal.
>
>Yup. The cavalry came over the hill... and was a perfect audience to
>the giant holographic broadcast designed to sow chaos and discord.
Which it's mostly failed to do, so far. The troops still obey orders,
Dimo still wants to tell the Baron about the hive engines which the
Baron should already know about if Dimo believed the message.
Lucrezia thought she'd killed Tarvek, but probably hasn't. She might
not have killed Vrin either, if Vrin felt betrayed by a kill order and
tried to resist.
-xx- Damien X-)
Martin Kaletsch
> http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061201
>
> GG just jumped the shark.
Interesting to see that I'm not the only one being annoyed by the current
storryline.
And just last night I dreamed about the upcomming mondays comic:
Klaus kills the wasp, rips his skin of and we see he acutally is a robot
with red glowing eyes!
Yeah, I would have prefered to dream about naked young women, but my dreams
are strangely realistic lately...
--
Martin Kaletsch
Sea Wasp
> glas...@gmail.com wrote:
>
>
>>http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061201
>>
>>GG just jumped the shark.
>
>
> Interesting to see that I'm not the only one being annoyed by the current
> storryline.
>
> And just last night I dreamed about the upcomming mondays comic:
>
> Klaus kills the wasp, rips his skin of and we see he acutally is a robot
> with red glowing eyes!
"YOU ARE THE OTHER. YOU WILL BE ... TERMINATED."
glas...@gmail.com
> >Yup. The cavalry came over the hill... and was a perfect audience to
> >the giant holographic broadcast designed to sow chaos and discord.
>
> Which it's mostly failed to do, so far. The troops still obey orders,
And now, so will the Baron. So, the troops who still obey orders?
The Other's. The troops who won't? Also the Other's.
Don't forget also that it isn't just the troops, it's anybody within
miles and miles of Sturmhalten. The word will get out, unless
somebody puts under house arrest (or shoots) every traveller on the
road for at least a dozen miles in either direction. And remember,
this place is a bottleneck on a major trade route.
> Dimo still wants to tell the Baron about the hive engines which the
> Baron should already know about if Dimo believed the message.
Dimo, having been around since well before the first Other War, isn't
exactly the intended target audience for this thing. I just love how
the message's effects on the general population are being entirely
handwaved away.
> Lucrezia thought she'd killed Tarvek, but probably hasn't.
And now *that's* going to work out *for* her, most likely -- Tarvek
will still be alive to corroborate 'Agatha's' bullshit to any
doubters... and given that he has the personal integrity and survival
instincts of Gaius Baltar, he most likely *will*, even though she just
shot him a while back. After all, she could always just blame *him*
for the hive engines, and he knows it.
Right now they believe she's Agatha, remember. The Other would hardly
be allowed to attempt first aid on the Baron.
> She might not have killed Vrin either, if Vrin felt betrayed by a kill order and
> tried to resist.
Vrin only resisted Agatha because Agatha was /not/ the Other.
Lucrezia /is/ the Other. And If Vrin gets captured and interrogated,
the Other's plans fail. Given that the Geisterdamen are suicidal
fanatics?
All of what you've listed above are very low-probability hopes.
--
Chuckg
Random832
Robert A. Woodward wrote:
> I think she has found a number of interferences to her plans to be
> very tiresome.
So basically, she's been having to think on her feet this whole time,
and while she's made a pretty good show of it in general so far, she's
every bit as fatigued as Agatha, has had less mental "sleep", and Agatha
has what we have been assuming will be her breakthrough waiting in the
wings. (plus Agatha's done her best work while asleep, so if the body
"crashes"...)
Jordan
David Goldfarb wrote:
> In article <KvSdna6Vs7IDKe3Y...@speakeasy.net>,
> Stephen Graham <gra...@speakeasy.net> wrote:
> >If "The Heterodyne Boys and the Dragon from Mars" story has any basis in
> >reality, Klaus has already been a revenant, and thus not immune to the
> >slaver wasps.
> >
> >http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/gg101.cgi?date=20051121
>
> "Stories are for fun. Do not mistake them for *facts*."
> <http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/gg101.cgi?date=20051226>
I think that story did have _some_ kernels of truth in it, but I'm not
sure which ones. I do think it's possible that Klaus has a defense
against Slaver Wasps, even ones especially designed to work on Sparks,
that other people don't know about. After all, The Other has been his
nightmare nemesis for a _long_ time now.
I have to wonder just what the source of Lucrezia's power is, and why
she turned to evil again. I would assume that _Klaus_'s flashback
(from the published series, not yet online), regarding her is accurate
(why would Klaus lie to _himself_?). This implies that Lucrezia was
_not_ a nice person even when she had the Heterodynes very convinced
that she had abandoned her evil ways.
Maybe the Foglios are deliberately turning the old cliche of the
Arch-Enemy's Beautiful Daughter who Falls for the Hero on its head, and
pointing out that she's still _evil_, and her "love" can't really ever
be taken on face value? Lucrezia might have been intending to betray
_everyone_ all along: the explanation she gave Klaus may have _also_
been a lie.
- Jordan
Jordan
We don't know that. He's only been attacked for less than half a
minute, story-time. Klaus von Wolfenbach may have many resources.
> And
> despite her truly pitiful acting skill, Agatha-Other appears to have
> convinced all parties present (who were also mysteriously blind to a
> slaver wasp flying right down the Baron's throat, when those things are
> normally visible, dontcha know) that she's on the side of the angels...
Keep in mind that nobody involved _knows_ that Lucrezia has possessed
Agatha; what they do know is that Agatha has probably been through a
_lot_ over the last few days. If Agatha's acting weird, the obvious
explanation is stress, rather than possession. Even in the _GG_ world,
stress is more common!
We also get to see a lot more than any witnesses in the story are
getting to see. Lucrezia _killed_ the people who saw her personality
changes before -- the Circus and the Baron and his immediate entourage
just ran into her again. In particular, her nastiest expressions are
_not_ being directed at the witnesses.
By the way, _Krosp_ did not look convinced to me. Krosp, remember, has
felid senses: Agatha may be sounding and even _smelling_ wrong in a
lot of ways (*). Plus, Krosp is no dim bulb, and he knows Agatha
better than does anyone alive save for Punch and Judy.
It's possible that the special version of the Slaver Wasp that can take
over Sparks is also extra-fast. After all, Sparks often have
super-scientific defenses, and so it's important not to give them time
to use such defenses against the Wasp.
> Barring one helluva left turn next Monday, which I do not expect to see
> at all (and I admit I will be embarassed if we /do/ see it, having bet
> on the opposite outcome this publicly), we're kinda hosed here.
I think that there _will_ be "one helluva left turn."
- Jordan
(*) Voice tones are affected by emotions, not just by the shape of the
larynx and throat; while a lot of scent is genetic, some is also
governed by emotional states. Lucrezia's emotional affect is _very_
alien to Agatha's, which is being visually rendered by her expressions.
Dorothy J Heydt
And ... I think I said already ... there's that one remaining
dingbot hanging around the Circus somewhere, which contains the
complete recording, and if the recording contains the sound of
the other dingbots singing ....
Dorothy J. Heydt
Albany, California
djh...@kithrup.com
Dorothy J Heydt
Jordan <JSBass...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> Barring one helluva left turn next Monday, which I do not expect to see
>> at all (and I admit I will be embarassed if we /do/ see it, having bet
>> on the opposite outcome this publicly), we're kinda hosed here.
>
>I think that there _will_ be "one helluva left turn."
Though maybe not as soon as Monday.
Wayne Throop
: I have to wonder just what the source of Lucrezia's power is, and why
: she turned to evil again. I would assume that _Klaus_'s flashback
: (from the published series, not yet online), regarding her is accurate
: (why would Klaus lie to _himself_?).
Oh yeah. People lying to themselves, and remembering things differently
than they actually happened, viewing people they know non-objectively...
unheard of!
Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw
Konrad Gaertner
>
> She was able to fight all the Great Houses, destroying several
> completely, 18-19 years ago. Nobody, other than close allies, knows
> that she is BACK.
Of course, no one knew it was her then either. And being married to
Bill probably helped in lots of ways.
Konrad Gaertner
>
> Don't forget also that it isn't just the troops, it's anybody within
> miles and miles of Sturmhalten. The word will get out, unless
> somebody puts under house arrest (or shoots) every traveller on the
> road for at least a dozen miles in either direction. And remember,
> this place is a bottleneck on a major trade route.
It's also already been quarantined by Wulfenbach forces.
glas...@gmail.com
> It's also already been quarantined by Wulfenbach forces.
The /town/, yes. Anybody living within sound and sight range of the
giant holographic broadcast, or on the road within range of it, but not
/in/ the town? Not so much.
But hey, everybody who's been saying that yes, things *could* take a
sudden left turn Monday are right, as far as it goes. There are
indeed possible ways this plot could finally unscrew our heroes, after
having spent all this time and effort to repeatedly screw them.
I just have given up hope that its actually gonna *happen*. Like the
gentleman said earlier, Joss Whedon made this same mistake once -- he
dragged out the 'heroes get beaten on' period just a little too long,
and by the time he got to the 'heroes finally resurge' period, the
patience of a lot of the audience had long since been exhausted.
Which mine has been. Some of y'all haven't been and, well...
*shrugs*.
Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Monday will leave me with a giant egg on my
face. Or maybe it'll leave The Other yet again standing there having
fallen into an outhouse and come up smelling like perfume with a
diamond necklace in her teeth.
We'll see.
--
Chuckg
Jordan
Wayne Throop wrote:
> : "Jordan" <JSBass...@yahoo.com>
> : I have to wonder just what the source of Lucrezia's power is, and why
> : she turned to evil again. I would assume that _Klaus_'s flashback
> : (from the published series, not yet online), regarding her is accurate
> : (why would Klaus lie to _himself_?).
>
> Oh yeah. People lying to themselves, and remembering things differently
> than they actually happened, viewing people they know non-objectively...
> unheard of!
Well, first of all Klaus doesn't strike me as the sort of man who lies
to himself in general -- he's ferociously intelligent and tremendously
cynical. Secondly, unless someone has actively messed with his
memories (possible, in the _GG_ universe), Lucrezia was his lover and
slipped him a mickey to avoid the complications: the dialogue from
that memory is a little bit too dramatic to be a fuzzily-remembered
re-edit by his own subconscious, IMO.
Sincerely Yours,
Jordan
Robert A. Woodward
djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt) wrote:
I am sure it has the complete sound track (why wouldn't it?). The
threads are converging and that one could resolve the situation:
dingbot starts message (with music), Agatha wakes up, realizes that
Klaus is choking, tells one of the Jagers to hit him on the back,
out comes the wasp, ala "The HB and the Dragon from Mars", fast
talking ensues. Of course, that leaves the problem of how to
cleanse Agatha of the Other download (my guess is the Heterodyne
Locket, aka The Golden Trilobyte, with Barry's device repaired).
Dorothy J Heydt
Well, so it might. Now, the last time we saw the locket, Klaus
had it. Yes, he could have had it repaired, or done something
else in the way of an Other-Be-Gone to it.
We'll see.
David Goldfarb
Dorothy J Heydt <djh...@kithrup.com> wrote:
>Well, so it might. Now, the last time we saw the locket, Klaus
>had it. Yes, he could have had it repaired, or done something
>else in the way of an Other-Be-Gone to it.
Better yet would be Agatha finding it and reverse-engineering it
so that it goes from a Spark-suppressor to an Other-suppressor.
(I really feel that Agatha hasn't done enough in this storyline.
Although I hasten to add that I'm nowhere near dropping the comic,
as some are! And she *has* done stuff when she's had the chance;
she just has been unconscious too much.)
--
David Goldfarb |"Hello, this is Leslie Down with the daily home
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu | astrology report.
gold...@csua.berkeley.edu | TAURUS: Contemplate domestic turmoil.
| AQUARIUS: Abandon hope for future plans." -- TMBG
John Schilling
wrote:
>In article <slrnen3ftv...@rlaptop.random.yi.org>,
Not only that; the dingbots were at one point set up to play the music
themselves. Of course, the music only postpones the inevitable...
...at least when played when dingbots. I wonder what happens when the
music is played by, what was it, the finest musical instrument this
side of the Carpathians?
But no, the Foglios have obviously decided to make Lucrezia the winner,
so that could never happen.
--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
*Chief Scientist & General Partner * -13th Rule of Acquisition *
*White Elephant Research, LLC * "There is no substitute *
*schi...@spock.usc.edu * for success" *
*661-718-0955 or 661-275-6795 * -58th Rule of Acquisition *
Robert A. Woodward
"Jordan" <JSBass...@yahoo.com> wrote:
OTOH, much of what Lucrezia said in that flashback was probably a
lie.
Dorothy J Heydt
John Schilling <schi...@spock.usc.edu> wrote:
>On Sat, 2 Dec 2006 18:51:52 GMT, djh...@kithrup.com (Dorothy J Heydt)
>wrote:
>
>>In article <slrnen3ftv...@rlaptop.random.yi.org>,
>>Random832 <rand...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>2006-12-02 <robertaw-69BD42...@individual.net>,
>>>Robert A. Woodward wrote:
>
>>>> I think she has found a number of interferences to her plans to be
>>>> very tiresome.
>
>>>So basically, she's been having to think on her feet this whole time,
>>>and while she's made a pretty good show of it in general so far, she's
>>>every bit as fatigued as Agatha, has had less mental "sleep", and Agatha
>>>has what we have been assuming will be her breakthrough waiting in the
>>>wings. (plus Agatha's done her best work while asleep, so if the body
>>>"crashes"...)
>
>>And ... I think I said already ... there's that one remaining
>>dingbot hanging around the Circus somewhere, which contains the
>>complete recording, and if the recording contains the sound of
>>the other dingbots singing ....
>
>Not only that; the dingbots were at one point set up to play the music
>themselves. Of course, the music only postpones the inevitable...
>
>...at least when played when dingbots. I wonder what happens when the
>music is played by, what was it, the finest musical instrument this
>side of the Carpathians?
The Silverodeon. Yes. Hm.
>
>But no, the Foglios have obviously decided to make Lucrezia the winner,
>so that could never happen.
If your tongue were any further into your cheek, it would be
wriggling out your ear.
Konrad Gaertner
> >Well, so it might. Now, the last time we saw the locket, Klaus
> >had it. Yes, he could have had it repaired, or done something
> >else in the way of an Other-Be-Gone to it.
>
> Better yet would be Agatha finding it and reverse-engineering it
> so that it goes from a Spark-suppressor to an Other-suppressor.
According to volume 5, volume 6 will be titled _Agatha Heterodyne
and the Golden Trilobite_, which is odd since we haven't seen the
locket yet in this collection (and it didn't appear in the previous
one either).
> (I really feel that Agatha hasn't done enough in this storyline.
> Although I hasten to add that I'm nowhere near dropping the comic,
> as some are! And she *has* done stuff when she's had the chance;
> she just has been unconscious too much.)
I just counted, and Agatha herself only appears in 17 pages.
Jordan
Oh, yes, that's quite possible. I simply meant that I didn't think
that Klaus' _memory of what she said and did_ was inaccurate.
- Jordan
Damien Sullivan
>Konrad Gaertner wrote:
>
>> It's also already been quarantined by Wulfenbach forces.
>
>The /town/, yes. Anybody living within sound and sight range of the
>giant holographic broadcast, or on the road within range of it, but not
Probably not so many people living within sound and sight range. Urban
sprawl and medievial milieu with lots of monsters don't go together
well. Travelers, maybe. But maybe even ordinary people can tell
there's something wrong with the message; after all, it wasn't meant to
go off now, and Tarvek might have still been working on it. The main
effect has been to bring Agatha back briefly and to prevent her own
message from getting out.
-xx- Damien X-)
Damien Sullivan
>"Robert A. Woodward" wrote:
>>
>> She was able to fight all the Great Houses, destroying several
>> completely, 18-19 years ago. Nobody, other than close allies, knows
>> that she is BACK.
>
>Of course, no one knew it was her then either. And being married to
>Bill probably helped in lots of ways.
One wacky idea I had was that the Lucrezia->Other change happened when
she got access to the vault of Old Heterodyne secrets, kept secret
because (a) you don't show all your cards and (b) mind-controlling the
populace isn't nearly as fun as terrorizing them. That or the
Heterodynes have ways to boost the Spark, which is why they've lasted so
long.
All of this is pure speculation; no evidence of such a vault exists.
-xx- Damien X-)
Wayne Throop
: Oh, yes, that's quite possible. I simply meant that I didn't think
: that Klaus' _memory of what she said and did_ was inaccurate.
My objction elsethread was to the notion that he'd have no *motive* to
gloss his memory, as opposed to the notion that he'd be *unlikely* to do
it because of his habits of thought and general ... cognitive style.
Dorothy J Heydt
We can count on much (most? all?) of what Lucrezia said being a
lie. But Klaus's memory of it is likely to be fairly accurate.
glas...@gmail.com
> Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Monday will leave me with a giant egg on my
> face. Or maybe it'll leave The Other yet again standing there having
> fallen into an outhouse and come up smelling like perfume with a
> diamond necklace in her teeth.
http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061204
So far, we're not getting that left turn yet... *sigh*
--
Chuckg
Damien Sullivan
Or we're being set up for two turns at once. The Golden Trilobite seems
to have appeared, and I doubt "Who are you?" is the usual revenant
response -- perhaps an unaffected Klaus wondering what's with her
behavior, or an amnesiac Klaus. Which sucks for him and us, but
wouldn't be good for taking over the Empire.
-xx- Damien X-)
Dorothy J Heydt
However:
(1) the Trilobite has appeared.
(2) I don't think the wasp has had the effect on Klaus that
Lucrezia had hoped for.
In fact, I think the left turn light is signaling even as we
speak.
"Tri - L - O - B - I - T - E!
At the bottom of the sea!
T - R - I - L - O - B - ite!
Curl up! Uncurl! Fight! Fight! Fight!"
--- Jane Robinson
Robert A. Woodward
pho...@ofb.net (Damien Sullivan) wrote:
I am of the opinion that Lucrezia Mongfish, the beautiful daughter
of Dr. Mongfish, mad Scientist and Evil Overlord in waiting;
Lucrezia Mongfish, wife of Bill Herterodyne; and Lucrezia Mongfish,
aka Other, are all the same charming psychopath. The only weak spot
in this interpretation is why she disappeared Klaus rather than
kill him. My guess is that she wasn't certain she could do it
without being detected (a dead Klaus would have given the game
away, a drugged one could be explained away - she was being tidy).
Martin Kaletsch
I think this is the turn! To me Klaus seems to be in Full Spark Mode (the
form of the speech bubble and the lettering) now and just recognises that
he is not confronting Agatha. If he was controlled by the wasp he would
never rect like that!
I'm happy again! :-)
--
Martin Kaletsch
Sea Wasp
Oh? Somehow I don't think "Who ARE you?" is the normal revenant reaction.
--
Sea Wasp
/^\
;;;
Live Journal: http://www.livejournal.com/users/seawasp/
glas...@gmail.com
> Oh? Somehow I don't think "Who ARE you?" is the normal revenant reaction.
Revenants retain normal behavior unless commanded, remember -- and the
Other hasn't given Klaus any orders yet.
--
Chuckg
Mark Blunden
But on the Other hand, they recognise her voice instinctively. Klaus
shouldn't need to ask.
--
Mark Blunden.
Jordan
Martin Kaletsch wrote:
> Damien Sullivan wrote:
>
> > Or we're being set up for two turns at once. The Golden Trilobite seems
> > to have appeared, and I doubt "Who are you?" is the usual revenant
> > response -- perhaps an unaffected Klaus wondering what's with her
> > behavior, or an amnesiac Klaus. Which sucks for him and us, but
> > wouldn't be good for taking over the Empire.
>
> I think this is the turn! To me Klaus seems to be in Full Spark Mode (the
> form of the speech bubble and the lettering) now and just recognises that
> he is not confronting Agatha. If he was controlled by the wasp he would
> never rect like that!
>
> I'm happy again! :-)
What was sweet -- and rather sad, considering the realties of the
situation -- was Lucrezia's reaction when she looked inside. Or am I
assuming too much about the contents? I think, though, that while
Lucrezia is definitely evil, she's not _completely_ heartless -- she
still cares for Klaus.
- Jordan
glas...@gmail.com
> But on the Other hand, they recognise her voice instinctively.
They instinctively recognize her as 'The Other' or 'The Mistress', yes.
They don't get 'Lucrezia Mongfish'. For that matter, there's some
doubt as to whether the Other /is/ Lucrezia Mongfish, see below.
> Klaus shouldn't need to ask.
Remember, Klaus has at least *two* suspects for who The Other is --
Lucrezia, and/or Time-Travelling Agatha.
He's asking which one of his theories is correct.
--
Chuckg
Random832
And he assumes whatever answer he gets will be true?
Wayne Throop
:: Lucrezia, and/or Time-Travelling Agatha.
::
:: He's asking which one of his theories is correct.
Which is moderately good evidence right there that he's not enrevenanted.
A revenant wouldn't particularly care; once you know the person you
are talking to is The Other, everything else is irrelevant.
Or at least... most of them we've seen haven't cared, and just
fall all over each other obeying without question. The fact that
he raises a question seems diagnostic.
Of course, this could also be accounted for by the anomalousness
of the wasp, or the unusual nature of a Spark revenant compared
to others. So it may not indicate a wasp failure. But it seems
a very good possibility.
Konrad Gaertner
>
> glas...@gmail.com wrote:
> > glas...@gmail.com wrote:
> >
> >
> >>Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Monday will leave me with a giant egg on my
> >>face. Or maybe it'll leave The Other yet again standing there having
> >>fallen into an outhouse and come up smelling like perfume with a
> >>diamond necklace in her teeth.
> >
> > http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061204
> >
> > So far, we're not getting that left turn yet... *sigh*
>
> Oh? Somehow I don't think "Who ARE you?" is the normal revenant reaction.
More importantly, it's not the normal reaction of a choking victim.
Having Klaus go amnesiac at the same time Lucrezia is pretending to
be an amnesiac Agatha should have interesting results.
Wanna bet that box contains a repaired locket? We were told it
used to be hers (probably a wedding gift from Bill or Barry), and
Klaus was expecting to confront a rogue Agatha and/or the Other.
glas...@gmail.com
> And he assumes whatever answer he gets will be true?
Goodness, you act like the idea of a hero enticing a villain to
monologue (and thus give away useful information) is something new. :P
--
Chuckg
Sea Wasp
"... about how FEEEBLE I am compared to him, how INEEEEVITABLE is my
defeat, how the WORLD will Soon be HIS!"
That tactic might work. The Other, for all Her cleverness, does seem
to have a Syndrome-like streak that might very well be prodded into
monologuing at the wrong moment.
Wayne Throop
:: monologue (and thus give away useful information) is something new.
:: :P
: Sea Wasp <seawasp...@sgeobviousinc.com>
:
: "... about how FEEEBLE I am compared to him, how INEEEEVITABLE is my
: defeat, how the WORLD will Soon be HIS!"
:
: That tactic might work. The Other, for all Her cleverness, does seem
: to have a Syndrome-like streak that might very well be prodded into
: monologuing at the wrong moment.
Sort of person who'd like to wear a cape, you think?
Unfortunately, her cape is Agatha's cape, sigh.
David McMillan
Call me naive, but I always kinda figured that Lucrezia was being
pretty straight with Klaus in that little flashback, just before she
drugged him and shipped him off to wherever -- honest about loving Bill,
and retaining enough affection for Klaus to exile him rather than kill
him (which would have been the smart thing for an Evil Overlady to do).
She seemed certain that Klaus wouldn't return from where she sent him,
so why not be honest with him in their last conversation, for old times'
sake?
Of course, that doesn't preclude her being Evil -- witness her complete
lack of any apparent remorse over stealing her own daughter's body.
David McMillan
> Sea Wasp wrote:
>> glas...@gmail.com wrote:
>>> glas...@gmail.com wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Monday will leave me with a giant egg on my
>>>> face. Or maybe it'll leave The Other yet again standing there having
>>>> fallen into an outhouse and come up smelling like perfume with a
>>>> diamond necklace in her teeth.
>>> http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/cgi-bin/ggmain.cgi?date=20061204
>>>
>>> So far, we're not getting that left turn yet... *sigh*
>> Oh? Somehow I don't think "Who ARE you?" is the normal revenant reaction.
>
> More importantly, it's not the normal reaction of a choking victim.
> Having Klaus go amnesiac at the same time Lucrezia is pretending to
> be an amnesiac Agatha should have interesting results.
I took it that Klaus had finally clued in that this girl in front of
him isn't who he thought she was -- after all, she's called him "Klaus"
twice now in the past three strips, and if he caught any of her
monologue, it would be pretty obvious that this is a person who's
familiar with him *personally.* Not to mention that she's acting
totally different than when she was aboard Castle Wulfenbach (no, they
didn't interact much at all, but if Klaus doesn't have a near-perfect
memory, I'll eat my GG Vol One). He may not have leaped to the concept
of bodysnatching quite yet, but I suspect he's figured out that "Agatha"
is an imposter of *some* sort. Hence "Who ARE you?", in a tone I'll bet
is a close prelude to Klaus doing Something Drastic.
glas...@gmail.com
> I took it that Klaus had finally clued in that this girl in front of
> him isn't who he thought she was [...] Hence "Who ARE you?", in a tone I'll bet
> is a close prelude to Klaus doing Something Drastic.
Sadly, Wednesday's strip shows that while Klaus has twigged to who she
really is now, he won't be doing anything drastic -- as its confirmed,
he's a revenant, and she's got the strings.
Granted, she's about to put on the locket, but... we don't know yet
that it's repaired, or turned on, or that Lucrezia won't notice
something wrong with it the instant it starts frying her head.
OTOH, whether it does or not, *Klaus is clearly a revenant*. Dammit!
--
Chuckg
Dorothy J Heydt
Unless his system rejects the (admittedly experimental) wasp.
Meantime, I want to see what The Locket does to Lucrezia when she
puts it on.
Robert A. Woodward
> David McMillan wrote:
>
> > I took it that Klaus had finally clued in that this girl in front of
> > him isn't who he thought she was [...] Hence "Who ARE you?", in a tone
> > I'll bet
> > is a close prelude to Klaus doing Something Drastic.
>
> Sadly, Wednesday's strip shows that while Klaus has twigged to who she
> really is now, he won't be doing anything drastic -- as its confirmed,
> he's a revenant, and she's got the strings.
>
> Granted, she's about to put on the locket, but... we don't know yet
> that it's repaired, or turned on, or that Lucrezia won't notice
> something wrong with it the instant it starts frying her head.
>
I think the locket is live. For that reason, it is copterbot's
final cue. Agatha has to set up the conditions for the locket being
put on (bound and gagged come to mind).
> OTOH, whether it does or not, *Klaus is clearly a revenant*. Dammit!
Assign Gil the task of solving the revenant problem (otherwise, HE
gets stuck with running the Wolfenbach Empire, no time for
research, no time for building airplanes, no time to building
mechanical orchestras, no time to ...).
Martin Kaletsch
> I think this is the turn! To me Klaus seems to be in Full Spark Mode (the
> form of the speech bubble and the lettering) now and just recognises that
> he is not confronting Agatha. If he was controlled by the wasp he would
> never rect like that!
>
> I'm happy again! :-)
Or not! It seems we're in for another round. I'm getting bored with this
storyline. Or not, as I already was for some time...
--
Martin Kaletsch
David Goldfarb
<glas...@gmail.com> wrote:
>'EEEEEEEEEEE! We're going to WIN!' indeed. As soon as those words
>left your mouths, Lucrezias, and the universe *didn't* karmically smack
>you one, I began to fear very very much. Genre convention is that as
>soon as the Evil Overlord proclaims her invulnerability, *wham*, the
>plot smacks her straight in the teeth. And yet, nothing did.
As others have said, Klaus's arrival constitutes that smack. Now,
said smack then became the departure point for several more twists
and turns.
But on *today's* page (12/6/06) we see the *big* smack coming.
This volume is called "Agatha Heterodyne and the Golden Trilobite"...
and at last the trilobite makes its entrance. And LUCREZIA DOESN'T
KNOW WHAT IT DOES. I expect the next couple of pages to give us
some excellent schadenfreude-fodder.
--
David Goldfarb |"We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and
gold...@ocf.berkeley.edu | uncertainty!"
gold...@csua.berkeley.edu | -- Douglas Adams, _The Hitchhiker's
| Guide to the Galaxy_
sw
Yeah, no kidding. It's like, yeah. We get it. The Other. Woo. Can we
have the title character back now? Maybe now? Okay, how about now? Okay,
this time /for sure/...
--
--- An' thou dost not get caught, do as thou wilt shall be the law ---
"Religion disperses like a fog, kingdoms perish, but the works of
scholars remain for an eternity." - Ulughbek
Jordan
David McMillan wrote:
> Jordan wrote:
> > What was sweet -- and rather sad, considering the realties of the
> > situation -- was Lucrezia's reaction when she looked inside. Or am I
> > assuming too much about the contents? I think, though, that while
> > Lucrezia is definitely evil, she's not _completely_ heartless -- she
> > still cares for Klaus.
>
> Call me naive, but I always kinda figured that Lucrezia was being
> pretty straight with Klaus in that little flashback, just before she
> drugged him and shipped him off to wherever -- honest about loving Bill,
> and retaining enough affection for Klaus to exile him rather than kill
> him (which would have been the smart thing for an Evil Overlady to do).
That's a good point -- and insufficient ruthlessness isn't Lucrezia's
normal failing.
> She seemed certain that Klaus wouldn't return from where she sent him,
> so why not be honest with him in their last conversation, for old times'
> sake?
> Of course, that doesn't preclude her being Evil -- witness her complete
> lack of any apparent remorse over stealing her own daughter's body.
Oh yes. And remember that the way the transfer was _supposed_ to work
would have meant suppressing Agatha _forever_, or even erasing her.
Now admittedly Lucrezia didn't _know_ Agatha before she decided to do
this -- but it's still her _daughter_. Which makes it a very cold
thing for her to do.
I wonder what Lucrezia would think of Agatha if she ever got to know
her? She'd certainly approve of Agatha's creativity, intelligence, and
spirit -- I suspect that she would consider Agatha hopelessly naive,
sentimental, and scrupulous.
On the other hand, if she really loved Bill, she must have been quite
familiar with (and at one point accepting of) such attributes.
Which of course raises a major unanswered question, which I suspect
will be answered at some point in the next big episode or two ...
What happened to Bill and Barry Heterodyne?
Sincerely Yours,
Jordan
Konrad Gaertner
>
> Yeah, no kidding. It's like, yeah. We get it. The Other. Woo. Can we
> have the title character back now? Maybe now? Okay, how about now? Okay,
> this time /for sure/...
Agatha will be back on Friday. Happy now?
Dorothy J Heydt
Jordan <JSBass...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>Which of course raises a major unanswered question, which I suspect
>will be answered at some point in the next big episode or two ...
>
>What happened to Bill and Barry Heterodyne?
Well: Barry came back.
Dorothy J Heydt
Konrad Gaertner <gae...@aol.com> wrote:
>sw wrote:
>>
>> Yeah, no kidding. It's like, yeah. We get it. The Other. Woo. Can we
>> have the title character back now? Maybe now? Okay, how about now? Okay,
>> this time /for sure/...
>
>Agatha will be back on Friday. Happy now?
I will be, if you're right.
Lawrence Watt-Evans
wrote:
>In article <1165428598.1...@j72g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>,
>Jordan <JSBass...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>>Which of course raises a major unanswered question, which I suspect
>>will be answered at some point in the next big episode or two ...
>>
>>What happened to Bill and Barry Heterodyne?
>
>Well: Barry came back.
But then he left again!
--
My webpage is at http://www.watt-evans.com
The second issue of Helix is at http://www.helixsf.com
A new Ethshar novel is being serialized at http://www.ethshar.com/thevondishambassador1.html
sw
> sw wrote:
>> Yeah, no kidding. It's like, yeah. We get it. The Other. Woo. Can we
>> have the title character back now? Maybe now? Okay, how about now? Okay,
>> this time /for sure/...
>
> Agatha will be back on Friday. Happy now?
Depends on wether she goes away again soon after.