16-10-15 What a surprise

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Spidrift
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Joined: Fri Jan 27, 2012 6:11 pm

Re: 16-10-15 What a surprise

Post by Spidrift »

Characters in these comics tend to have very high levels of loyalty to their friends, and especially to their old friends. Which isn't actually a vice as such, and tends to show up a lot in these sorts of stories, because (a) it gives groups of rather disparate characters without much in common a reason to hang out together and have stories happen to them, and (b) characters who treat their friends badly tend to be seen as really shitty and horrible by readers. Witness, for example, the (understandable) fan hate directed at Matt over his recent treatment of Gary.

(This effect is actually much worse in some kinds of more violent adventure stories, particularly those with very long-running plots. A character can commit crimes up to and including genocide - literally, in some cases - and be forgiven by the fans, but God help their friends if they hold such naughtiness against them.)

So Jerzy may genuinely have thought that he was doing the right thing by an old friend while trying to keep a new lover happy. (We don't know Jerzy's full history with Angel yet, actually. My head-canon says that they grew up together in a small town, and came to see themselves as a pair of misfits - the only two kids who were out as sexually unconventional - who everyone else saw as freaks.) However, to the readers, who perceive Dillon as an in-group protagonist and Angel as an out-group interloper, this can just look wrong. Plus, Jerzy ended up lying, which usually leads to good intentions being punished.
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Spidrift
"Brevior vita est quam pro futumentibus negotium agendo."
-- Motto of Hogshead Publishing of fond memory, and wise words to set your Foes List by.
Avatar misappropriated from the wonderful XKCD.

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