Walking Lizzie
In today’s For Better or For Worse, we see little Lizzie trying to walk once again. She failed to do it for Elly. She fails to do it for Mike. I suppose she might be successful for John; but I have a different prediction to make. Little Lizzie will be successful in walking for the first time in order to get to Farley. Only time will tell if we get to see it happen.
As for kid strips, this one shows the usual flaws in Lynn Johnston’s story-telling when it comes to kids:
1. Kids have adult dialogue. Michael’s dialogue is more like a parent talking to a child learning to walk than a 6-year-old. The phrase “good girl” sticks out in particular.
2. Kids have unkidlike behaviour. The humour depends on the idea that little Lizzie will only attempt to walk rarely, so that Michael’s yelling to spoil it is humourous. It is almost as if Michael is trying to cook the perfect soufflé and by yelling causes it to drop. In real life Lizzie would get up and try again almost immediately.
3. Kids don’t look like kids. This is especially true in the case of little Lizzie, whose head size in proportion to the rest of her body changes in almost every panel.
I can pretty much repeat these comments for any strip Lynn Johnston does with children in it these days. However, I can’t see Lynn repeating a strip story about Lizzie learning to walk unless it is leading somewhere. Obviously we know that Lizzie did learn to walk, and then crawled back to Milborough to marry Anthony Caine. The only other unresolved storyline involves the acquisition of Farley, so I think the two will be meshed together.
As for kid strips, this one shows the usual flaws in Lynn Johnston’s story-telling when it comes to kids:
1. Kids have adult dialogue. Michael’s dialogue is more like a parent talking to a child learning to walk than a 6-year-old. The phrase “good girl” sticks out in particular.
2. Kids have unkidlike behaviour. The humour depends on the idea that little Lizzie will only attempt to walk rarely, so that Michael’s yelling to spoil it is humourous. It is almost as if Michael is trying to cook the perfect soufflé and by yelling causes it to drop. In real life Lizzie would get up and try again almost immediately.
3. Kids don’t look like kids. This is especially true in the case of little Lizzie, whose head size in proportion to the rest of her body changes in almost every panel.
I can pretty much repeat these comments for any strip Lynn Johnston does with children in it these days. However, I can’t see Lynn repeating a strip story about Lizzie learning to walk unless it is leading somewhere. Obviously we know that Lizzie did learn to walk, and then crawled back to Milborough to marry Anthony Caine. The only other unresolved storyline involves the acquisition of Farley, so I think the two will be meshed together.
posted by howard at 11:18 PM
6 Comments:
howard,
The three problem areas of her depiction of children have the one cause: a refusal to see that kids aren't tiny adults and shouldn't be expected to act as if they were. I've noticed tha when they do behave like kids,Patterson women can't handle it and yell at them to stop. What's more, we are told to side with the crazy woman who frets and gets gobsmacked when faced with the horrible vision of normal behavior.
As for nothing spectacular happening last weekend, all we had were two more examples of unrealistic behavior and dialog from alleged kids.
dreadedcandiru2,
It is difficult to pattern real children's behaviour and to match speech patterns with a child's age. The only reason Lynn Johnston had any success with this in the past, was that she had small children in her house whose behaviour she could model. As for the crazy woman who couldn't handle it, I could easily see that being a realistic depiction of young Lynn herself. Of course we have covered this ground many times before. Certainly if Lynn Johnston was unwilling to take the time to figure these things out before the new-runs, when she was supposedly researching, she certainly will not take the time now, when she is intentionally not researching.
howard,
Certainly if Lynn Johnston was unwilling to take the time to figure these things out before the new-runs, when she was supposedly researching, she certainly will not take the time now, when she is intentionally not researching.
This points out the other advantage; she doesn't have to bother with consistent characterization. The Foobs are who she needs them to be at any given time. When Mike is supposed to be so clean, we could eat off him, he's like he was Saturday. When he's supposed to be a monster, he'll be a monster.
The only thing I noticed about this strip was how poorly Lizzie is drawn. Not only are her proportions wrong, but she looks nothing like Baby Lizzie as drawn in previous strips. Mike's features look different too. I don't think Lynn can handle doing this strip all on her own.
dreadedcandiru2,
The Foobs are who she needs them to be at any given time.
This is consistent with the way she was handling the kids in the modern era also. Robin was the kid who ate dirt. Francie handled all the step-mom angst. Merrie was the kid who handled the kid-misunderstood wordplay. Now little Michael has to handle anything verbal, monster or clean. Lynn thinks of the story and then picks the kid to fit.
qnjones,
The only thing I noticed about this strip was how poorly Lizzie is drawn. Not only are her proportions wrong, but she looks nothing like Baby Lizzie as drawn in previous strips.
I agree. Her head size in proportion to her body size changes in every panel. In panel 3 in particular, she looks more like a young Anne Nichols than little Lizzie.
I don't think Lynn can handle doing this strip all on her own.
I can't really judge this based on her art. I have been observing her drawing closely for the better part of 3 years, and observed her drawing whenever there has been a video example. The main issue appears to be that Lynn likes to do things the first time and not correct. She hates to use an eraser. The art has suffered from characters with eyes, mouth and ears wandering over their heads for a long time now. Lynn has stopped caring about the quality of her art for awhile now, and even when she had a staff, they did not correct those kinds of errors.
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