Thursday, June 14, 2007

The Plotting of Anthony

I have been trying to get my head around Anthony’s actions at the Shawna-Marie Verano wedding. By his own admission, he presumed that Elizabeth Patterson would be taking Warren Blackwood to the wedding, and in fact, had Warren Blackwood not bailed on his date with Elizabeth to work in Yellowknife, that is exactly what would have happened. Elizabeth took Warren to the family function with Mike’s party, which is not a casual date, and that would have and should have sent a message she was serious about Warren. Warren certainly took it as a signal, however, not so much a signal that he would give up his job in Yellowknife to meet his dating commitment to Elizabeth. The cad!

Anthony believes Elizabeth is going to be there with Warren, so he decides he needs to bring a date to the wedding also. In Milborough, this could be some kind of requirement, since they seemed to be so obsessed with pairing Elizabeth off. However, considering Warren is the amazing helicopter pilot, Anthony knows he is less than Warren in Elizabeth’s eyes. Therefore, a choice of women to invite leaves Anthony with a few options:

a. He invites a woman to compete with Warren, ideally one more accomplished, better-looking, and more intelligent than Elizabeth.

Why didn’t he do that? The problem with this choice is that this is essentially what Anthony had with Thérèse. Despite her hooked nose, I always thought Thérèse was a more attractive woman and a better dresser than Elizabeth. She was painted as jealous, and then as obsessed with her career, and during her baby shower, she was also painted as crass for asking for money gifts. Nevertheless, there was no doubt in my mind she would be able to kick Elizabeth’s butt around the field in a contest of accomplishments and intelligence. Moreover, during the baby shower, she came off as gracious to April, which is more than I can say for Elizabeth in today’s strip.

It seems unlikely that Anthony could attract another Thérèse these days, considering he was moved from accounting an empire of Gordon Mayes businesses to becoming a convenience store manager and is also saddled with a baby girl. I have always felt that Thérèse would have been attracted to Anthony’s potential, considering she worked for his father, who appeared to be successful in business.

Not only that, but Elizabeth’s reaction to Thérèse, to seek opportunities to show off in front of Anthony with other men in revenge, only served to alienate her more from him and not bring them together. In a certain respect, Elizabeth’s move to Mtigwaki, was an admission of defeat and a desire not to have to deal with superiour Thérèse on a regular basis. Then Anthony was stuck with Thérèse, whom he was not able to force to be Elizabeth, no matter how pregnant he got her.

b. He goes alone.

Why didn’t he do that? It could have been the Milborough requirement, but more likely Anthony did not want to appear that he was continuing to wait for Elizabeth to finally get through dating other men and come to him. Also, he probably would have wanted someone with him to take his focus off looking at Elizabeth and Warren canoodling away. Ironically, he would have ended up with Elizabeth as his date at the wedding had he made this choice, but he got huge points from her when she found out that he had not waited. Those points, however, were eliminated once Elizabeth met his date, Julia.

c. He invites a woman to not to compete, ideally one less accomplished, worse-looking, and less intelligent than Elizabeth.

Why didn’t he do that? While Julia may be less physically attractive than Elizabeth, she is still more accomplished and more intelligent and better-mannered than Elizabeth. Once you take away Elizabeth’s marginal good looks and slender figure, there is nothing by which you can recommend her. She’s rude, temperamental, a poor school teacher at best, doesn’t get along with her family, barely has any friends, and not very good with small children or animals, if her cat or her niece and nephew are examples. Unless Anthony was willing to take Kortney Krelbutz, he is going to be hard-pressed to find someone truly worse than Elizabeth.

Anthony settles for coworker Julia and knows that simply based on her appearance, Elizabeth should not consider her a threat. If Elizabeth had been with Warren, she could still consider Anthony as a potential suitor as if Julia was not even there. The result is that Anthony lost whatever points he got for already having a date when she asked him to the wedding, and he doesn’t get the competitive impulses from Elizabeth he did when he was with Thérèse. If Elizabeth walked away with known-only-one-day Mason, not saying a word as if she considered both Anthony and Julia to be beneath her; she would have been even worse with Warren Blackwood, with whom she has some history.

Moral of the story: If Anthony wants to show Elizabeth that he is just as good as any of the other men with whom she has been running about, he must date a Thérèse-like girl. However, if he is smart, he should stick with Julia, who is one of the most likeable characters Lynn Johnston has put in the strip in years.

11 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Bravo! Perfect analysis and character description of the horror that Liz has become in For Better or For Worse.


DebJyn

2:21 PM  
Blogger howard said...

debjyn,

Thanks. I keep looking for something nice Elizabeth does, but Lynn Johnston isn't playing that game.

Even at one of her formerly close friend's weddings, a person with whom she used to have all kinds of sisterly bonding, she is an inattentive bridesmaid. We should have seen Elizabeth socializing with her old friends and remembering old times and talking with Shawna-Marie about how her life is going to change, and Shawna-Marie gushing over how much in love she is, and how she can't wait for Dawn and Elizabeth to get married so they can be just as happy as she is. I can't believe Lynn Johnston skipped the bachelorette party, of all things.

Dawn pays more attention to Shawna-Marie than Liz. Even lusty Mason pays better attention to what's going on. Lynn Johnston is so busy trying to make her point that big weddings where the mother runs things are bad, she fails to recognize that she has turned Elizabeth into a catty, unpleasant woman. Where there should be rejoicing, Elizabeth is levying her negative opinion on everything and everybody.

5:28 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

" a poor school teacher at best"
I disagree. I think Elizabeth is an excellent teacher who has a wonderful relationship with her young students. Although she is insecure about her skill, she has an innate talent for teaching. I have always enjoyed the strips that show Liz in the classroom.

6:57 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"While Julia may be less physically attractive than Elizabeth, she is still more accomplished and more intelligent and better-mannered than Elizabeth."

?????????????????

7:10 PM  
Blogger howard said...

Anonymous,

The Liz teaching strips. The students in those strips are always enthusiastic about Liz, and she always seems enthusiastic when she teaches, and the kids seem to have learned something in the process. You can’t argue with success. From this perspective, I can agree with your position completely.

Unfortunately, the enthusiasm of her students seems to me unearned based on the teaching methods shown in the strip. The usual complaints about Liz’s teaching have to with:

a. Jumping from subject to subject in her lessons as in this strip.
b. Allowing and encouraging the funny student (Dylan, Jesse Mukwa) to constantly interrupt class and making that student the focus of almost constant individual attention
c. Occasional inappropriate touching as in this strip.

Then there are dozens of other little things which I could list, but it would require more researching.

As for Julia, now that I think about it, since she works for Gordon Mayes, and Liz has been teaching in Mtigwaki, she probably is not as accomplished as Liz; and intelligence is a difficult thing to measure in comic strip characters. All I can say for certain is that she is better-mannered, since she politely tells Liz she has heard all about her when she is introduced, while all Liz can manage to say to Julia is “Really?” before she leaves with Mason without even a good-bye or "Nice to have met you."

8:11 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Truth, like beauty, is in the eyes of the beholder.

- I don’t see the jumping in the grammar lesson. But even if it were true, remember that teaching is spontaneous, not scripted. I know that the best teachers I had, those who truly inspired me, went on tangents. It’s that spontaneity –or the appearance of spontaneity - that often made the lessons exciting.
- I don’t see a problem with touching a young child. It would certainly be different if the student were a teenager or if the touching were in certain parts of the body. (Try changing a diaper without touching.) We know that Liz is not a child predator, so this touching is to reassure, not to excite.
- The most highly praised classroom movies focus on a handful of students, the heroes/villains, and the rest are ignored because (a) some students stand out more than others (b) it would be very difficult to follow the storyline if too many characters were involved. In fact, I remember reading that Charles Schultz (who you mentioned recently) advised Lynn to reduce the number of characters in her strip. Peanuts always had the same characters. I am not aware of any other comic strip (aside from political cartoons) that includes so many people.

I will concede that Liz does not come across as friendly while Julia (who in yesterday’s strip looks old enough to be Anthony’s mother) is a kindhearted blabber-mouth.

11:58 AM  
Blogger howard said...

Anonymous,

I guess that makes one point on which we agree.

jumping in the grammar lesson - As a point of explanation, usually the practice with young children is to teach one grammar rule and then focus the exercises on that grammar rule until they have gotten it. However, the point of the strip was to show a series of grammar rules taught, so that Liz could later make the point that the rapper on the radio violated most of those rules. Showing a series of different grammar rules was effective for that purpose, but not really effective for the purpose of showing the quality of Liz’s teaching practice.

I will agree that Liz is not a sexual predator.

As for highly praised classroom movies, I agree they focus on a handful of students and the rest are ignored. I found it very interesting that even though Jesse Mukwa was the focus for Liz over 2 years, instead of being an example of Liz's teaching changing someone's life, he ended up being described by his aunt as a good student when he bothered to go to school and as it turned out, he had turned into a thief. Lynn Johnston must not gotten to the part of the movie where the young person changes for the better thanks to the teaching.

I have heard that Charles Schultz advised Lynn to reduce the number of characters in her strip, however it would be incorrect to say that Peanuts always had the same characters. I remember when Woodstock, and Pigpen, and Rerun were introduced. I would agree that there was much less variation. Charles Schultz would not have introduced a Julia or a Mason into his strip in its last 3 months, for example.

There are other comic strips that include a lot of people, but they also include a very tight focus on one or two people to carry the story. The difference with For Better or For Worse is that every member of the Patterson family has their own storyline going and because the plots jump from person-to-person before they are completed, I think Charles Schultz had a good point. Some of the storylines recently resolved have run on for 1-2 years and would require some devotion to be able to follow them. If you were a casual reader, it would be difficult to read and understand this strip.

1:20 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

“Showing a series of different grammar rules was effective for that purpose, but not really effective for the purpose of showing the quality of Liz’s teaching practice.”
On the contrary, I think it does show the quality of her teaching. She is able to present information in a clear and interesting way. The punch line is powerful; in a single panel Lynn has shown why children have such a difficult time learning proper grammar and why it is so difficult for disadvantaged kids to escape their ghettos.

“and as it turned out, he turned into a thief.” I would only describe Jesse as a thief if he habitually steals. Lynn’s story is more realistic than the feel good movies. There are many issues that contribute to Jesse’s behavior. A great teacher will influence a child but will rarely be able to erase a child’s sense of abandonment. Wasn’t it the fear of abandonment that drove Jesse to take the harmonica?

"If you were a casual reader, it would be difficult to read and understand this strip."
I agree. To try and compensate for this, each strip ends with a punch line. For obsessed readers (like me) this style has become trite, but I do understand the reason.

4:07 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

“Showing a series of different grammar rules was effective for that purpose, but not really effective for the purpose of showing the quality of Liz’s teaching practice.”
On the contrary, I think it does show the quality of her teaching. She is able to present information in a clear and interesting way. The punch line is powerful; in a single panel Lynn has shown why children have such a difficult time learning proper grammar and why it is so difficult for disadvantaged kids to escape their ghettos.

“and as it turned out, he turned into a thief.” I would only describe Jesse as a thief if he habitually steals. Lynn’s story is more realistic than the feel good movies. There are many issues that contribute to Jesse’s behavior. A great teacher will influence a child but will rarely be able to erase a child’s sense of abandonment. Wasn’t it the fear of abandonment that drove Jesse to take the harmonica?

"If you were a casual reader, it would be difficult to read and understand this strip."
I agree. To try and compensate for this, each strip ends with a punch line. For obsessed readers (like me) this style has become trite, but I do understand the reason.

4:45 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Sorry about the double post. My wireless service was playing games!

4:47 PM  
Blogger howard said...

As for grammar, typically teachers don’t like to mix a series of different grammar rules in succession for fear of confusing the kids.

As for Jesse’s thievery, in the strip in question, Jesse tells Liz he took the harmonica because he “wanted something of yours…to keep.” His story is he just wanted a Liz souvenir without asking Liz if he could have one. Fear of abandonment is a possible motivation, particularly considering his behaviour as she was about to leave Mtigwaki both times. Small item easy to filch mentioned by his aunt to Liz, so Jesse knows he’s been caught and decides to make up a story to save himself is another possibility. Either way, it is definitely not the ending of a feel-good movie, so I give Lynn credit for that.

5:43 PM  

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