Elly Patterson: Soap Opera Addict
A quick use of AMU Reprints to check over all the For Better or For Worse strips from 1996 to the present has revealed what I suspected to be true. The word “opera” as in “soap opera” yields no occurrences until today’s reprint. The word “soap” got 7 references and as you would expect for this strip, they were all for the soap that you use for cleaning. Honestly, if Elly is supposed to be a woman who spends so much time taking care of her kids and cleaning that she doesn’t have time to read a newspaper, it is difficult to believe that this same woman would be a soap opera addict.
Who are our soap opera watchers in AMU reprints? In other words, from whom would Lynn Johnston have stolen this strip?
Adam and Nick in Adam@Home have the most occurrences. Tia Carmen in Baldo is in second place. And we have a 3-way tie between Calvin in Calvin & Hobbes, Daisy in Gaucho Ronaldinho and Ziggy in Ziggy. The joke seems to be very much like a Cathy joke (i.e. 3 panels of rational thought followed by 1 panel of irrational behaviour), but Cathy is a working woman and does not have time to become addicted to soap operas. In fact, AMU reprints include Cathy as a choice and she also has no references to soap operas in her strip.
As proof that Lynn does not know anything about soap operas, the title of the series is “Sudden Illness”. Checking the wikipedia list of soap opera names by country, I find there are none with the word “sudden” or “illness” in the title. Instead, Canadian soap operas around 1980 were called things like Street Legal, Time of Your Life, Loving Friends and Perfect Couples, Country Joy and High Hopes. “Sudden Illness” is not very close to any of those names.
The other unrealistic aspect of the strip is Elly’s declaration that she is willingly going to miss her soap opera for the first time in 2 years. And this is as she is pushing a baby stroller with Lizzie, who is less than 2 years old. That’s some dedication to a soap opera if Elly managed to watch it even during the time when Lizzie was in her first few days of life. However, more mysterious than this is the reason why Elly is trying to withdraw from watching her soap opera. Lynn Johnston has given us no clue for Elly's motivation. She only shows that Elly is too addicted to stop. If she were addicted to drugs, cigarettes, coffee, amphetamines, crack cocaine or something like that, we could interpret her motivation. However, with something as benign as soap operas, there is no guessing.
The only thing which works in the strip is the horrified look on Lizzie’s face as her mother starts speeding with her to make it to the TV set. The only question is whether or not she is horrified that her mother is pushing her so quickly, or if she is horrified at how far out-of-character Lynn had to take Elly in order to make this joke.
Who are our soap opera watchers in AMU reprints? In other words, from whom would Lynn Johnston have stolen this strip?
Adam and Nick in Adam@Home have the most occurrences. Tia Carmen in Baldo is in second place. And we have a 3-way tie between Calvin in Calvin & Hobbes, Daisy in Gaucho Ronaldinho and Ziggy in Ziggy. The joke seems to be very much like a Cathy joke (i.e. 3 panels of rational thought followed by 1 panel of irrational behaviour), but Cathy is a working woman and does not have time to become addicted to soap operas. In fact, AMU reprints include Cathy as a choice and she also has no references to soap operas in her strip.
As proof that Lynn does not know anything about soap operas, the title of the series is “Sudden Illness”. Checking the wikipedia list of soap opera names by country, I find there are none with the word “sudden” or “illness” in the title. Instead, Canadian soap operas around 1980 were called things like Street Legal, Time of Your Life, Loving Friends and Perfect Couples, Country Joy and High Hopes. “Sudden Illness” is not very close to any of those names.
The other unrealistic aspect of the strip is Elly’s declaration that she is willingly going to miss her soap opera for the first time in 2 years. And this is as she is pushing a baby stroller with Lizzie, who is less than 2 years old. That’s some dedication to a soap opera if Elly managed to watch it even during the time when Lizzie was in her first few days of life. However, more mysterious than this is the reason why Elly is trying to withdraw from watching her soap opera. Lynn Johnston has given us no clue for Elly's motivation. She only shows that Elly is too addicted to stop. If she were addicted to drugs, cigarettes, coffee, amphetamines, crack cocaine or something like that, we could interpret her motivation. However, with something as benign as soap operas, there is no guessing.
The only thing which works in the strip is the horrified look on Lizzie’s face as her mother starts speeding with her to make it to the TV set. The only question is whether or not she is horrified that her mother is pushing her so quickly, or if she is horrified at how far out-of-character Lynn had to take Elly in order to make this joke.
posted by howard at 10:17 PM
5 Comments:
howard,
The only thing which works in the strip is the horrified look on Lizzie’s face as her mother starts speeding with her to make it to the TV set. The only question is whether or not she is horrified that her mother is pushing her so quickly, or if she is horrified at how far out-of-character Lynn had to take Elly in order to make this joke.
I'd say it was an equal measure of both; I know that April_Patterson probably regards this as prime material for deconstruction in an upcoming FOOBAR because it's so out of left field; the Elly we all know is too busy being a hero to watch some generic American soap.
Street Legal wasn't a soap, really. It was an evening drama, more akin to L.A. Law, but set in (I think) Toronto. Dunno about most of the others; the people I knew who watched soaps back then watched the American ones.
I think we can safely assume that "Sudden Illness" is like "Whiffex," i.e., a made-up name that comes close enough to wittiness that it leaves fingernail grooves on its edge.
Also, it's interesting to note that, according to this strip, Elizabeth + Extreme Velocity and Terror = Sally Brown.
Maybe MikeTake2 will sneer at the stupid shows his mom watches, thinking about how productive he could be if only he could get out of the room instead of watching this silly crap.
Oh wait, what am I thinking? Elly will not have the slightest idea what any of her kids are doing while she's watching her story.
BTW, I agree with what so many people are posting here and on other blogs- Lynn is really bending reality to show Elly as a fan of something so Un-Martyrlike as Soap Operas. Another fail for Lynn, who could just as easily drawn one of Elly's friends pulling Elly and Liz along at a high speed because she HAS to get home for her show. That could have lead to a strip in which Elly is thought-bubbling what an unenlightened, dim fool her "friend" is for wasting time like that.
"Sudden Illness" is probably a riff on "General Hospital" and the like.
The thing is, this was original, and fairly early. A toss-off gag before Elly's martyr arc was either established (or entrenched in the interpolquels). Heck, I don't think Elly's character was much established then - she could have been developed into a character devoted to soaps. Maybe she could have wanted ot be a ascriptwriter.
So: disconnect with the future character - bad reprint idea.
Even worse: There were original strips with Elly moaning over housework that never ended, but there wasn't a strip where she didn't have time for coffee. Heck, she went over and visited Anne or Connie and had coffee. Interpolated strips that contradict stuff you will use ... OK, we already knew LJ has no problem with far more egregious examples than *this*
Lynn is really bending reality to show Elly as a fan of something so Un-Martyrlike as Soap Operas.
Nahhh, I don't think so. Elly is a fan of soaps because that's the cliche for housewives of her generation. That is, they were both completely desperate and gullible, which ties in to Elly's personality perfectly.
(Bonus comforting male assumptions that the 'little women' was in fact incapable of concentration on anything serious optional.)
Post a Comment
<< Home