Sunday Universe
The standard line with the Sunday colour strips of For Better or For Worse is that they exist in their own separate universe. I have made jokes in the past about the mismatch in continuity between the dailies and the Sunday strips. For example:
In the Sunday strips, John and Elly Patterson have a good time with each other and go to parties.
In the Sunday strips, Meredith goes to Grandpa Jim and Iris’ apartment to spend time with them.
In the Sunday strips, April has friends who are not members of her band.
In the Sunday strips, Elizabeth has a life outside of her love life.
In the Sunday strips, Elly is an environmentalist.
In the Sunday strips, Elly works out, and is active in the school and the community.
We have never seen those situations in the daily strips. When it comes to Anthony and Elizabeth’s wedding, in the dailies we have see the following situation:
Before the wedding:
a. The kids are at Deanna’s house with Deanna and Mira Sobinski.
b. Elly, John, the bridal party, Carleen Stein and Josef Weeder are at Elly’s house
c. Gordon Mayes and Anthony Caine are in transit somewhere
d. Michael and Lawrence Poirier are at the wedding ceremony location.
Wedding ceremony: An outdoor area with folding chairs.
Reception: The Empire Hotel with Anne Nichols as the catering manager, the table decorations done by Beatrice Alfarero and Moira Kinney, the cake done by Anthony’s mom
In today’s Sunday colour strip, the only way the sequence of events could work is if the wedding ceremony, the place to prepare for the ceremony, and the reception were all in the same place:
Why are we close to the reception area?
a. April carries a message from Annie Nichols to Elly about vegetarian nibbles and dips.
b. Aunt Georgia wants to know where to put the gifts, traditionally brought to the reception.
c. Anthony’s mom wants a picture of the cake, she made for the reception.
Why are we close to the wedding ceremony?
a. The musicians have arrived and Deanna wants to know when they should start.
b. Meredith has her flower basket in hand and wants to know when she gets started.
Why are we preparing for the wedding ceremony?
a. Mira Sobinski has gotten the flower girls dressed but can’t find their baskets.
b. Deanna has found a missing cufflink.
c. Robin wants to know who gets to go in the first limousine.
d. Mira Sobinski asks about a hair brush.
e. John Patterson is still fiddling with his bow tie.
Why do we know that this is a Patterson wedding?
a. Anthony and Elizabeth are nowhere in sight.
b. Elly Patterson is running the show, finding those flower girl baskets, taking those presents from Aunt Georgia, and answering everyone’s questions.
c. John Patterson does wordplay with the word “simple”, standing by the now inert Elly.
What is the real reason for the disconnect between today’s Sunday colour strip and the dailies?
The answer is that the Sunday colour strips are due to the syndicate before the dailies. In order for them to match, Lynn Johnston would have to plot out the dailies before they were due, and make them match the Sunday strips. She did it for Michael and Deanna’s wedding back in 2001, but that was a long time ago and whole different Lynn Johnston. Today's Lynn Johnston is too lazy to plot strips in advance and/or too lazy to remember the details of a Sunday strip she has already done and submitted to the syndicate.
In the Sunday strips, John and Elly Patterson have a good time with each other and go to parties.
In the Sunday strips, Meredith goes to Grandpa Jim and Iris’ apartment to spend time with them.
In the Sunday strips, April has friends who are not members of her band.
In the Sunday strips, Elizabeth has a life outside of her love life.
In the Sunday strips, Elly is an environmentalist.
In the Sunday strips, Elly works out, and is active in the school and the community.
We have never seen those situations in the daily strips. When it comes to Anthony and Elizabeth’s wedding, in the dailies we have see the following situation:
Before the wedding:
a. The kids are at Deanna’s house with Deanna and Mira Sobinski.
b. Elly, John, the bridal party, Carleen Stein and Josef Weeder are at Elly’s house
c. Gordon Mayes and Anthony Caine are in transit somewhere
d. Michael and Lawrence Poirier are at the wedding ceremony location.
Wedding ceremony: An outdoor area with folding chairs.
Reception: The Empire Hotel with Anne Nichols as the catering manager, the table decorations done by Beatrice Alfarero and Moira Kinney, the cake done by Anthony’s mom
In today’s Sunday colour strip, the only way the sequence of events could work is if the wedding ceremony, the place to prepare for the ceremony, and the reception were all in the same place:
Why are we close to the reception area?
a. April carries a message from Annie Nichols to Elly about vegetarian nibbles and dips.
b. Aunt Georgia wants to know where to put the gifts, traditionally brought to the reception.
c. Anthony’s mom wants a picture of the cake, she made for the reception.
Why are we close to the wedding ceremony?
a. The musicians have arrived and Deanna wants to know when they should start.
b. Meredith has her flower basket in hand and wants to know when she gets started.
Why are we preparing for the wedding ceremony?
a. Mira Sobinski has gotten the flower girls dressed but can’t find their baskets.
b. Deanna has found a missing cufflink.
c. Robin wants to know who gets to go in the first limousine.
d. Mira Sobinski asks about a hair brush.
e. John Patterson is still fiddling with his bow tie.
Why do we know that this is a Patterson wedding?
a. Anthony and Elizabeth are nowhere in sight.
b. Elly Patterson is running the show, finding those flower girl baskets, taking those presents from Aunt Georgia, and answering everyone’s questions.
c. John Patterson does wordplay with the word “simple”, standing by the now inert Elly.
What is the real reason for the disconnect between today’s Sunday colour strip and the dailies?
The answer is that the Sunday colour strips are due to the syndicate before the dailies. In order for them to match, Lynn Johnston would have to plot out the dailies before they were due, and make them match the Sunday strips. She did it for Michael and Deanna’s wedding back in 2001, but that was a long time ago and whole different Lynn Johnston. Today's Lynn Johnston is too lazy to plot strips in advance and/or too lazy to remember the details of a Sunday strip she has already done and submitted to the syndicate.
posted by howard at 10:57 PM
5 Comments:
howard,
Today's Lynn Johnston is too lazy to plot strips in advance and/or too lazy to remember the details of a Sunday strip she has already done and submitted to the syndicate.
This is, of course, why we might not even see any indication that Jim is sick until next Sunday. If she weren't just phoning it in, it would have occurred to her that today would have been the ideal time to launch the Deathbedpoclaypse. We could have had Elly bombarded by stupid questions yesterday only to get a phone call that left her gobsmacked which would have been the perfect lead-in to the next week of strips.
Dreadedcandiru2,
This is, of course, why we might not even see any indication that Jim is sick until next Sunday.
I don't know how she is going to work it, with no lead-in at all for the Sunday only readers. That's a lot of ground to cover (Jim sick. Relocated wedding. Perform wedding.) The guy over at the comics curmudgeon said this week ends on a "meta" note, and perhaps Lynn does not even address Jim being sick for the wedding.
Yup. If someone in a normal person's family had a heart attack on the day of the wedding, people would not be cheerfully running around doing wedding chores and talking about vegetable nibbles and punning in their minds. They'd be upset about their relative. So, either the Pattersons are heartless, or this is an alternate universe. I see evidence for both.
qnjones,
So, either the Pattersons are heartless, or this is an alternate universe. I see evidence for both.
I've always thought that Lynn was chronicling the lives of two sets of Pattersons. The weekday people are the heartless jerks and the Sunday people less so. Heck, since it's the Sundayverse Foobs, Jim might even be there.
What I find interesting is this almost completely different style of writing for the Sunday strips. With the dailies, Lynn seems to be in a rut, repeating jokes we have seen before and variations on storylines we have seen before. But on Sundays, we have all these other things the Pattersons are doing. Why is it that Elly can't conserve energy in a daily strip, for example?
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