Exploring Eva Part II or Trashing Becky Part I
In today’s For Better or For Worse, Eva sets the stage for the big Becky comeuppance storyline, for which we have been waiting, literally since Becky quit 4-Evah at the grade 8 grad over a year ago. Loyal readers will appreciate that the story is finally going to be concluded, but may not like the way it is headed. I, for one, was certain that what was going to happen was Becky would get caught cheating from the people handing her the school work they had done for her, then in the aftermath, they would be shown not to be Becky’s true friends by deserting her, and then April would show she was really Becky’s true friend, by supporting her in her time of need.
Much to my surprise, the comeuppance appears to be the beginning of a bizarre sequence where April negotiates a comeuppance by refusing help to Becky until she admits what a heel she has been. The people doing the strip have miscalculated by playing Becky as meek and vulnerable in asking for help and taking so long from the offending Becky event in the strip for April to get her revenge. Meek and vulnerable only work, when the reader has a chance to see the character abusing their power and then be taken down as a result. It has been so long since Becky quit 4-Evah, or for that matter insulting April’s previously pimpled state, even a collection of strips will not be able to contain the appropriate strips to carry this story to its finish. The effect is, instead of seeing Becky taken down, the strip is making the lead character into an insufferable ass. This is happening so often now with the lead characters in this strip, we have reached an odd point where the most sympathetic lead character is one who previously held the insufferable ass award, the leering Grandpa Jim. He has had so many abuses heaped on him by Iris for the sake of old person humour, I am beginning to wonder how long it will be before Grandpa Jim ranks as a villain along with Howard Bunt, Becky McGuire and the Kelpfroths.
As for April’s Real Blog today, I took great delight in having Shannon Lake notice that Eva has replaced her in the role of April sympathizer. I am very curious as to whether Lynn will put Shannon in this sequence, since we are having a Becky McGuire smackdown, and by all rights, Shannon should be involved.
Michael Patterson was relegated to the role of pointing out to aprilp_katje that April was acting perfectly normal…for a Patterson, which I also enjoyed, because I get such good reactions out of aprilp_katje when Mike makes April realize her fate is to be an insufferable ass.
Howard Bunt had to finish off the badminton story suggested by aprilp_katje yesterday. I decided to play it as if there were no way Howard could win public approval if he won, lost, or ran away. I think that will be a metaphor for how his trial will go.
With Constable Paul Wright, I had originally considered having both Elizabeth and Susan Dokis make snide remarks about Paul’s interest in the other, using native humour; but I got sidetracked when I realized some of the comments I was writing were accidentally similar to my favourite scene from the movie When Harry Met Sally. So, I just went ahead and adapted that scene to Paul and Liz, except with the genders reverse and “sex” became “having a girlfriend”.
I am beginning to fear that Jeremy Jones is not going to make an appearance, even though Becky is in this story sequence. Jeremy Jones was linked to Becky last year as her sound man, and then from the July monthly letter as her sound and light man on her tour, but in this series of strips involving Becky’s admirer friends, I find it very interesting that Jeremy is not shown to be hanging around Becky. I suspect it is because the impact of Becky ignoring April carries more weight if Becky is not hanging around any known characters.
Tomorrow’s strip: April says to Becky, “Acknowledge my existence.” I note the total number of strips since the grade 8 grad, where April was the one to approach Becky, instead of the other way around. That total number is 0. Sorry, April. You don’t have a foot to stand on. Face facts, the writers of this strip are bound and determined to make us hate you, and they are succeeding, brilliantly.
Much to my surprise, the comeuppance appears to be the beginning of a bizarre sequence where April negotiates a comeuppance by refusing help to Becky until she admits what a heel she has been. The people doing the strip have miscalculated by playing Becky as meek and vulnerable in asking for help and taking so long from the offending Becky event in the strip for April to get her revenge. Meek and vulnerable only work, when the reader has a chance to see the character abusing their power and then be taken down as a result. It has been so long since Becky quit 4-Evah, or for that matter insulting April’s previously pimpled state, even a collection of strips will not be able to contain the appropriate strips to carry this story to its finish. The effect is, instead of seeing Becky taken down, the strip is making the lead character into an insufferable ass. This is happening so often now with the lead characters in this strip, we have reached an odd point where the most sympathetic lead character is one who previously held the insufferable ass award, the leering Grandpa Jim. He has had so many abuses heaped on him by Iris for the sake of old person humour, I am beginning to wonder how long it will be before Grandpa Jim ranks as a villain along with Howard Bunt, Becky McGuire and the Kelpfroths.
As for April’s Real Blog today, I took great delight in having Shannon Lake notice that Eva has replaced her in the role of April sympathizer. I am very curious as to whether Lynn will put Shannon in this sequence, since we are having a Becky McGuire smackdown, and by all rights, Shannon should be involved.
Michael Patterson was relegated to the role of pointing out to aprilp_katje that April was acting perfectly normal…for a Patterson, which I also enjoyed, because I get such good reactions out of aprilp_katje when Mike makes April realize her fate is to be an insufferable ass.
Howard Bunt had to finish off the badminton story suggested by aprilp_katje yesterday. I decided to play it as if there were no way Howard could win public approval if he won, lost, or ran away. I think that will be a metaphor for how his trial will go.
With Constable Paul Wright, I had originally considered having both Elizabeth and Susan Dokis make snide remarks about Paul’s interest in the other, using native humour; but I got sidetracked when I realized some of the comments I was writing were accidentally similar to my favourite scene from the movie When Harry Met Sally. So, I just went ahead and adapted that scene to Paul and Liz, except with the genders reverse and “sex” became “having a girlfriend”.
I am beginning to fear that Jeremy Jones is not going to make an appearance, even though Becky is in this story sequence. Jeremy Jones was linked to Becky last year as her sound man, and then from the July monthly letter as her sound and light man on her tour, but in this series of strips involving Becky’s admirer friends, I find it very interesting that Jeremy is not shown to be hanging around Becky. I suspect it is because the impact of Becky ignoring April carries more weight if Becky is not hanging around any known characters.
Tomorrow’s strip: April says to Becky, “Acknowledge my existence.” I note the total number of strips since the grade 8 grad, where April was the one to approach Becky, instead of the other way around. That total number is 0. Sorry, April. You don’t have a foot to stand on. Face facts, the writers of this strip are bound and determined to make us hate you, and they are succeeding, brilliantly.
posted by howard at 11:27 PM
4 Comments:
::sob::
And ARB April can only hate herself! :(
That is true. This week will really test your skills to make ARB April a loveable character.
Ugh, if that's even possible now. :(
Everything is possible for the continuity goddess. Just acknowledge the existence of the loveable April. If you write it, she will come.
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