29-09-15 The good news

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29-09-15 The good news

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themacnut
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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

Post by themacnut »

Yeah, like I said last thread, I really wonder whether working closely together is going to be good for Amber and Ruby, or will it just mean Amber gets to learn just how much Ruby really dislikes her? And I know Ruby doesn't normally go in for physical violence, but I also wonder whether Dillon might not be in for a Dope Slap or two from Ruby for getting her into this mess.
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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

Post by Storm-forge mystique »

Do I have a dirty mind, or is the first panel an... unfortunate pose? Just it almost looks less like a hug and more like Amber is nibbling her ear.

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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

Post by Don Alexander »

And so the bimbofication of Amber ensues...
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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

Post by themacnut »

Storm-forge mystique wrote:Do I have a dirty mind, or is the first panel an... unfortunate pose? Just it almost looks less like a hug and more like Amber is nibbling her ear.
Your mind is totally in the gutter. Move over, you're crowding me. ;)
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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

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themacnut wrote:I really wonder whether working closely together is going to be good for Amber and Ruby, or will it just mean Amber gets to learn just how much Ruby really dislikes her?
Amber is seeming remarkably oblivious at this point (not helped by Ruby playing the nerd vocabulary card, of course). Actually, we know that she's noticed that Ruby is often angry, and I suspect that she's realised, in her heart of hearts, that the anger is directed at her, for some reason. She doesn't understand why, but she wants to solve the problem. So getting close to Ruby this way actually looks like a solution to her, not a problem, and putting up with Ruby's "initial" irritation would just count as a price she has to pay.
themacnut wrote:And I know Ruby doesn't normally go in for physical violence, but I also wonder whether Dillon might not be in for a Dope Slap or two from Ruby for getting her into this mess.
I think at this point the lack of physical violence - even at the comedy dope slap level - has become a crucial part of Ruby's characterisation. She works very, very hard to be cerebral; all superego. I'm not saying that she'll never hit anybody, but if she does, it'll either be a significant turning-point for her character, or a sign that she's been pushed way beyond her limits, by someone who's more than merely irritating. Dillon simply hasn't done enough to make her blow her nerd cool at this point. Remember, it takes either displays of extreme stupidity or someone stamping on her personal berserk button (Amber) to make her even raise her voice much.

Oh yeah, talking of nerd cool and the vocabulary card... Here we see something that's been hinted at before, but not illustrated much; Ruby's nerd-sibling instinct to emphasise that she is at least smarter than her older, prettier, more outgoing, more popular sister, in this case by throwing in the odd four-syllable word - which annoyingly just bounced off her stupid, stupid target. Oh god, been there, done that, on a smaller and much less angry scale.

Anyhow, we also see what may be the big plot development spinning off this scene; dinner with the parents. If this happens and is played out on screen, well, there's all sorts of stuff that could ensue - not least, the secret of Amber's career finally being blown to those oblivious twits. Though the idea of actually seeing someone's parents on-screen in an Ma3-universe comic is so strange that I barely believe it could happen.
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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

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Perhaps this is for the best. If Amber is this bad about managing her personal affairs then she would be easy pickings for an unscrupulous personal assistant. As previously stated Ruby might actually find that her sister is not getting paid enough for previous works.

And while I agree that Ruby is too cerebral to resort to dope slaps she is little by little coming to terms with her libido and perhaps BDSM might be a part of the package. Although that would make her too similar to Tatiana.

I give the LaRose parents the benefit of the doubt until we actually meet them. Maybe they know about Amber's past and accept it much as Lavali's parent's know she is a lesbian or maybe they are oblivious to Amber's porn past because no one told them. Keep in mind if someone tells them Amber did pornographic films that would expose them as a viewer so other people might know, but stay silent for the sake of their own reputation.

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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

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brasca wrote:Perhaps this is for the best. If Amber is this bad about managing her personal affairs then she would be easy pickings for an unscrupulous personal assistant. As previously stated Ruby might actually find that her sister is not getting paid enough for previous works.
We have no evidence that Amber is bad at managing her affairs, and a fair amount of evidence that she's quite a shrewd cookie. The last panel in this strip looks to me like her getting a bit over-excited at getting a PA and jumping on the first opportunity to enjoy this new facility, without thinking about what is possible this soon. Or it's, you know, a joke.
brasca wrote:And while I agree that Ruby is too cerebral to resort to dope slaps she is little by little coming to terms with her libido and perhaps BDSM might be a part of the package. Although that would make her too similar to Tatiana.
Oh, when Ruby eventually lets her libido off the leash, she's going to be a lot of fun for some lucky guy, and very possibly a bit kinky. But she's orderly and moral enough that anything she gets into will be acceptably consensual, and introverted and so shy enough that it'll happen strictly behind closed doors (modulo the traditional problem in Ma3-Montreal of keeping doors locked and closed).
brasca wrote:I give the LaRose parents the benefit of the doubt until we actually meet them. Maybe they know about Amber's past and accept it much as Lavali's parent's know she is a lesbian or maybe they are oblivious to Amber's porn past because no one told them. Keep in mind if someone tells them Amber did pornographic films that would expose them as a viewer so other people might know, but stay silent for the sake of their own reputation.
If they know about Amber's porn work, they've treated Ruby abominably, one way or another. But that idea just doesn't work when you think about it in detail - we've been over this several times before, you must remember - so I'll be very annoyed at the writing if it tries to pull out this old comedy cliche.

And yes, it's perfectly possible that they don't know, assuming that they don't look at porn themselves and nobody who did know was willing or able to tell them. However, in that case, I'm still highly unimpressed with their parenting skills. They've raised one sex worker and one neurotic, they apparently never asked what Amber was doing in all the years that she was in porn, and they sent Ruby to live with Amber without checking properly that this was okay with Amber. "Oblivious twits" is the nicest term I can find for them.
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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

Post by brasca »

Spidrift wrote:
brasca wrote:I give the LaRose parents the benefit of the doubt until we actually meet them. Maybe they know about Amber's past and accept it much as Lavali's parent's know she is a lesbian or maybe they are oblivious to Amber's porn past because no one told them. Keep in mind if someone tells them Amber did pornographic films that would expose them as a viewer so other people might know, but stay silent for the sake of their own reputation.
If they know about Amber's porn work, they've treated Ruby abominably, one way or another. But that idea just doesn't work when you think about it in detail - we've been over this several times before, you must remember - so I'll be very annoyed at the writing if it tries to pull out this old comedy cliche.

And yes, it's perfectly possible that they don't know, assuming that they don't look at porn themselves and nobody who did know was willing or able to tell them. However, in that case, I'm still highly unimpressed with their parenting skills. They've raised one sex worker and one neurotic, they apparently never asked what Amber was doing in all the years that she was in porn, and they sent Ruby to live with Amber without checking properly that this was okay with Amber. "Oblivious twits" is the nicest term I can find for them.
How have they treated Ruby abominably? If they knew the big secret they might think it would be traumatizing to tell Ruby so they kept it a secret even though she knew all along. While all of what you write may be possible we have no way of knowing until we actually meet them. Perhaps Ruby's perception that Amber is the favorite is just in her head. Siblings tend to think that way. Seeing as how the LaRose family did not forbid their daughters to go into any line of work that was not doctor, lawyer, or any respectable profession they seem to be easy going and is it their fault if Amber does not communicate with them on a regular basis? Ruby said Amber never answered here emails. In the few times that she did contact them she probably told them she was fine and they did not interfere or meddle since they wanted to give her space. A lot of people wish they had parents that would let them be and not constantly nag them about how to live. And as much as I love Ruby a lot of her neuroses are of her own making so I find this indictment of the LaRoses to be highly baseless.

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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

Post by Cortez »

It's completely based actually, for the reasons Spidrift has explained several times.

Everything points to the LaRoses being crappy parents.

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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

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Spidrift has explained this several times, but absence of any evidence it is all just speculation so the jury is still out on the LaRoses.

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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

Post by Spidrift »

Sigh. Okay, detailed explanation. One more time, this time with feeling...

Calling what the senior Laroses (lower-case "r", by the way) may have done "abominable" is ultimately a subjective matter, but I'll stick by my strong subjective opinion that, if they know about Amber's career, what they've done to Ruby is despicable.

If they know, then either they think that Ruby knows too, or they don't. In the former case, they must realise that she's been trying to keep it a secret from them. But if they know their own daughter at all, they should realise that Ruby hates lying, and that this has meant several years of pain for her. Therefore, they've treated her feelings with callous disregard, for years. Plus, when it does come out that they knew, Ruby will be humiliated, adding insult to injury.

If they don't think that Ruby knows, then they sent their prudish, inexperienced daughter to live with a porn actress and her unknown friends and flatmates in the big city, with no warning or guidance. They can't think that Amber would be able to keep this a secret; Ruby is naive, but she isn't stupid. This would also once again set Ruby up for humiliation.

Either way, they didn't make sufficient effort to warn Amber the porn actress that her naive kid sister was coming to stay. That's rough on Amber as well as on Ruby. For that matter, they don't seem to have done anything to relieve Amber from the trouble of keeping a secret from them.

No, the only way that they can pass as merely oblivious idiots, rather than brain-dead sadists, would be if they don't know about Amber's career. In my opinion.

But I suspect that the truth may come out at this upcoming dinner. Bonus points if Amber has told them that Ruby has a boyfriend by then, so they insist that she brings Andy to watch the car crash. Double bonus points to Ruby if she is offered the chance to come home but turns it down.

We may also find out what they think Amber has been doing all these years, which I do wonder about. Giving your kid space is great, but not having a clue how she makes her living is just careless. And we might find out if they do favour Amber, as Ruby thinks; my pet theory on that is that they don't want either daughter to get "big-headed", so they praise Amber's beauty to Ruby and Ruby's brains to Amber, screwing that up too by making each daughter think that the other is their favourite. It's about their level if sense.
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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

Post by Dr. Jamming »

Spidrift wrote: Though the idea of actually
Spidrift wrote:sex w
seeing someone's parents on-screen in an Ma3-universe comic is so strange that I barely believe it could happen.
Come to think of it, the only ones I can remember are Yuki's father and Vindicator's mother. Gary's, Richie's and Jacob's phoning in almost makes it seem like a convention. It is a bit odd. It'll be confirmed if the dinner is drawn only in angles that keep them out of frame, similar to Nile's wife Maris on Frasier. I'd get a giggle out of it.
Spidrift wrote: They've raised one sex worker and one neurotic, they apparently never asked what Amber was doing in all the years that she was in porn, and they sent Ruby to live with Amber without checking properly that this was okay with Amber. "Oblivious twits" is the nicest term I can find for them.
There's nothing wrong with being a sex worker. Amber seems very happy and well adjusted, by real life or fictional standards. She's yet to find true love, but that's pretty normal. Committed, long-term relationships aren't easy to come by, and she's only just started looking. 50% is a common enough average for parenting success, and the Laroses should probably be given much more credit than that considering how well Ruby has turned out in the non-social aspects of her personality. It's even possible that they hope a bit of amber will rub off on Ruby before she ends up a shut-in spinster with a house full of cats... as she has shown signs of doing.

I do wonder which of the Larose sisters inherited her sexual mores from their parent's and which discovered them on her own though. Considering the secrecy, it's almost certain that the family is at least superficially vanilla or even conservative, but, if they were laissez-faire, it would be interesting to see the extent to which Ruby's outlook is an outgrowth of teenage anti-rebellion.

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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

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Re: 29-09-15 The good news

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Dr. Jamming wrote:Come to think of it, the only ones I can remember are Yuki's father and Vindicator's mother. Gary's, Richie's and Jacob's phoning in almost makes it seem like a convention. It is a bit odd.
And even Yuki's dad, who looked set up to become a moderately significant guest character, wandered off after a few strips and was never seen again.

The Pixietrix comics are very much inspired by classic high school comics, which tend to keep parents off-screen to an implausible extent because they just spoil the fun. This should be easier when you're writing about twentysomethings living independently in the big city, but things still get weird from time to time. Giz and Dave really don't seem to feel able to write parents in the Ma3 world - which is weird, because on the odd occasion when we see middle-aged minor characters, they generally do a perfectly decent job of it.

I'll be fascinated to see whether we do actually see this dinner, or whether this is a throwaway line that leads to nothing.
Dr. Jamming wrote:There's nothing wrong with being a sex worker.
I'm not convinced that it can be terribly good for someone's long-term emotional health. Even in the Ma3 universe, where no one has to worry much about seriously abusive power relationships or social diseases, working as a porn actress means that a self-assured woman like Amber is unable to communicate fully with her parents, accidentally damages her relationship with her kid sister, and feels unable to contact her oldest and closest friend to say hello; not surprisingly, she's clearly become eager to get out of the business. She wants something better. Likewise, Tracy, who's friends with a bunch of porn actresses, is quick to deny being one herself, and feels she has to keep her sex-related second job secret from her colleagues.
Dr. Jamming wrote:50% is a common enough average for parenting success, and the Laroses should probably be given much more credit than that considering how well Ruby has turned out in the non-social aspects of her personality.
That's a big caveat at the end there. Ruby has determinedly pushed through to pick up some decent academic qualifications, but she had no social life to speak of before the comic began, and she flies off the handle much too easily. Even nerds can have friends; better parents could have helped Ruby achieve a bit more balance before now. Encouraging her to nothing but study is a classic over-achieving parent mistake, and it's not like Ruby is such an academic success that she can afford to be asocial.

And if I'm right about another thing, and the Laroses talked up Ruby's intelligence to Amber and Amber's charm to Ruby ... they may have thought that they were encouraging Ruby to be more outgoing, but they made a total pig's ear of it.
Dr. Jamming wrote:It's even possible that they hope a bit of amber will rub off on Ruby before she ends up a shut-in spinster with a house full of cats... as she has shown signs of doing.
It's entirely possible that they sent Ruby off in the vague hopes that living with someone closer to her own age in the big city would help bring Ruby out of her shell. It would have been nice of them to discuss this with Amber first, though. (Okay, I wouldn't be too surprised if Ruby takes charge of Amber's e-mail account, opens up a bunch of e-mails from their mother, and ten seconds later goes ballistic over the feeling of being messed around.) Anyway, it's a bit late for them to be thinking about this now. Nice idea, too late, with added failure of communication.

And it's equally possible that they just wanted to get their boomerang daughter out of the way so that they can get on with banging each other on the lounge sofa at two in the afternoon.
Dr. Jamming wrote:I do wonder which of the Larose sisters inherited her sexual mores from their parent's and which discovered them on her own though. Considering the secrecy, it's almost certain that the family is at least superficially vanilla or even conservative, but, if they were laissez-faire, it would be interesting to see the extent to which Ruby's outlook is an outgrowth of teenage anti-rebellion.
I'm not sure that morality is genetic, and parents have a lot of trouble transmitting attitudes to sex across the generations; hormones keep getting in the way. One has to assume that they're not wildly liberal, in that Amber didn't feel able to tell them about her job, and Ruby didn't think they'd be happy about it either, but that's not saying much; I'm sure that a lot of people would hesitate to tell their parents about their jobs in the sex industry.

Likewise, Ruby's prudishness seems to be partly a response to the very bad experience at that teenage party, and partly a more general attempt to differentiate herself from her sister; she really does keep defining herself as the Anti-Amber. On top of that, with her known difficulty in making friends, she presumably felt that she'd have had a lot of trouble getting a romantic life even if she wanted one, so she probably made a virtue out of what she saw as an inevitability. "I don't want a love life - that stuff's a waste of time - I'm glad that there's no danger."

And we also know that Ruby is afraid that her parents will just forgive Amber if they do find out about her porn work. She says that's because Amber is their favourite, but it also suggests that Ruby knows in her heart that her parents aren't all that prudish - she can imagine them accepting Amber's past. So quite likely, they're just ordinary-mildly-socially-conservative types. Just bloody awful parents.
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