Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

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Error of Logic
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Error of Logic »

That is a matter of perspective.
Many people apparently feel that Charlie's actions in 2.5 Men are hilarious, but I found the majority of them boorish and repulsive.

You believe that what Gabrielle is doing is more innocent, or at least more excusable than others do. You find excuses for her actions, and that is well enough because you like her.
I, however, do not.

I doubt Abbot would have reason to restrain Gabrielle from inflicting torture or comment on how messy it gets if Gabrielle had not at some point made a mess and demonstrated her willingness to inflict torture.
Remember from the fight against the girls who were beating up Teddi that she is at least confident enough in her use of those needles to use them as melee weapons.
Remember that her immediate response to learning that Melissa and Jackie were witches was "Burn them!", when the other Artemis girls had a far more measured response.
Consider that even among blood-siblings, snogging someone on your sibling's bed is a severe invasion of privacy, even if it is played for comedy. Add to this the fact that she stated outright she was interested in stealing away Naomi's crush when she believed she had one, and seduced that same crush on Naomi's bed.
Tandy's apparent belief that this was the kind of bullying done to express romantic interest does not change the fact that it was a calculated cruelty.

If you can find humour in all this and that overshadows all else, then more power to you. The context presented in MC and DC is light enough that a case can be made that Gabrielle is only meant to be (darkly) humorous.
However, that same context can be interpreted to show that Gabrielle is interested in tormenting people, regardless her reasons or techniques. We can not prove she inflicts physical torture, true. But we can observe she enjoys inflicting emotional pain when she has the chance. She goes for the pain and she likes taking control (as demonstrated when she teamed up with Tandy to interrogate Melissa).

Regardless who started the conflict between Gabrielle and Naomi, it seems evident that Gabrielle is keen to win it, and is doing so by causing Naomi emotional anguish. Tandy's responses to Gabrielle's scheme to steal Naomi's crush indicates that Gabrielle has been running a campaign against Naomi for some time, or at least long enough that it annoys Tandy.

Naomi might not be the queen of self-control, but as has been noted in this very thread, attacking someone with a sword and vowing to kill them is an extreme response. On the one hand, it could be anime violence, as has also been mentioned. On the other, it could the kind of response that can be evoked by a prolonged series of small and large harassments in her very home, where she should be safe: an emotional breakdown.
Gabrielle's glee at observing said emotional breakdown and humiliating Naomi further just drives home, to me, that she is enjoying Naomi's pain. Further supporting evidence of her love of inflicting torture, and that she has been doing so against Naomi for a prolonged period, whatever her actual motivations may be.

The example you gave of Ross and Monica is an incident. It is not part of a prolonged campaign aimed at breaking a person's emotional control for personal enjoyment. By her own admission, Gabrielle has been doing just that to Naomi. No, I can not prove that she is not lying or exaggerating 'because it's fun to her'. But even if she is being 'playful', it is more akin to a cat 'playing' with a mouse than to a sibling teasing another for fun.
Again, if it's fun for you, that's fine. Me, I always try to take the mouse away and pitch it out the front door.

Gotoh
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Gotoh »

Before I reply, I wanna clarify that I read your post in its entirety and, while it was articulate, there was one part I spotted right away that's at the heart of this discussion:
Error of Logic wrote:You believe that what Gabrielle is doing is more innocent, or at least more excusable than others do. You find excuses for her actions, and that is well enough because you like her.
No I haven't made excuses for her, nor am I condoning any of what she's done.

My stance has been (and still is) that you and others are making a mountain out of a molehill by insisting on treating a comical situation seriously.

It'd be like someone writing an essay about Tom & Jerry being dysfunctional, despite the show being slapstick (someone actually did that btw). It utterly misses the point by making it something that it isn't intended to be.

Is Gabrielle a jerk? Yes, I've said that multiple times now. But it's possible for a character to be a jerk and still be funny, while you wait for them to get their comeuppance.
___________________________________
Aside from that, my only other stance has been that people automatically assume Naomi's parents are terrible people because of one line. One scene.

If movie audiences were as quick to jump to conclusions, the Buellers also would've been written off as terrible parents simply because Jeanie's dad joked with her mom that they should shoot her. But thankfully, there was ample context that proved otherwise.

We have yet to be given any context with Naomi's parents, but they've already been condemned.

GKNolan
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by GKNolan »

I guess the problem is even in slapstick (which this is) it's hard to not form emotional attachments to characters.
We're supposed to laugh it off as ridiculous, and maybe we should. But if people can root for Wile E Coyote to catch the Roadrunner then it isn't surprising that we can feel empathy towards a high school girl getting bullied.

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Lokitsu
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Lokitsu »

Gotoh wrote:
Error of Logic wrote:Gabrielle's love of torturing others and boyfriend-poaching were established as far back as MC.
She's in love with the idea of torturing others, except she's always denied the opportunity. There was a KAOS agent (from 'Get Smart!') that used the same schtick. Every time he asked his boss if he could torture Max and 99, his boss would tell him "no", then he'd walk offscreen and sulk.

Each time Gabrielle's had the chance, it ends the same way: she gets denied and she sulks.
Yes, there's a term for Gaby: sadistic sociopath. Thank you for providing proof of it, so the rest of us don't have to. Face it Gotoh, Gaby is a bully and one of the series' villains. She might be an amusing villain, but she's still a villain. I like my bad guys to be fun, after all the story is boring without them. Still, I hope she will get her comeuppance in the end.

*Edit: I removed some comments that in retrospect felt too much like the start of a flame war. If someone read them, please do not repost. This is just a comic and we are all here because we enjoy reading it.

Gotoh
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Gotoh »

Lokitsu wrote:Yes, there's a term for Gaby: sadistic sociopath.
I'd say comedic sociopath.
Lokitsu wrote:Face it Gotoh, Gaby is a villain. She might be an amusing villain, but she's still a villain.
Only where Naomi's concerned, since we still don't know what started it.
Lokitsu wrote:Dave (or someone) seems to think consequences would make the C-verse comics too heavy handed.
Multiple characters have suffered the consequences of their actions in the *C-verse:
  • Doompantied Chloe got humiliated twice, by Layla, for trying to blackmail her and steal her fiancé. And Layla put a stop to her for good by using Blair to steal the Doompanties from her. After she returned to her senses, she decided to transfer to Tartarus to gain control of her power. Hence, why she has her own comic. That's a whole bunch of consequence right there.
  • Layla hasn't been exempt either. She's had her fair share of comeuppance, which is noted on the character page at TV Tropes under 'Laser-Guided Karma'.
  • Ash nearly got himself killed by picking a fight with Brooke, then provoking her, despite noting she was holding back on him.
  • And Tia got hers from Laura (who nearly made her fade from existence) and Cessily and her sisters, who make her do chores around the house whenever she loses to them at 'Mario Kart'. Not to mention, falling victim to her own spell at Nina's birthday party.
And those are just off the top of my head, 'cuz there was also the time Layla decked Kade for two-timing her. And the time he wound up stuck as a girl for coming onto to girl-Ace. So there's been plenty to go around.
Lokitsu wrote:Cerise was an attempted murderer and got off scott-free.
Agreed here.
Lokitsu wrote:Faith should have been expelled for what she did to her fellow students.
Disagreed here, since that was done involuntarily and without her knowledge.
Lokitsu wrote:Gaby needs serious therapy before she becomes a serial killer.
I doubt it'll ever happen, since cryptids are her targets and she's been taught that they're evil. AA is said to be a school for heroines, not murderers.

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Error of Logic
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Error of Logic »

But she is also using her skills on Naomi, a fully human bystander. Psychopaths and sociopaths tend to .... escalate.

Gotoh
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Gotoh »

Error of Logic: Except she isn't fighting Naomi. All she's really done is dodge, minus flicking the bucket on her head.

All things considered, I'd say that's reasonable, given Naomi was attacking her with a sword. If it weren't for Gabrielle's agility, Naomi would have to explain why she butchered her foster sister. So it's ironic that Gabrielle's being called the psychopath.

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Error of Logic
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Error of Logic »

By skills, I was not referring to combat skills, but her torture skills - which have driven Naomi to this point.
Psychological torture still hurts, especially when inflicted over an increasing time period.

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tau neutrino
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by tau neutrino »

Gotoh wrote:
tau neutrino wrote:Drugging someone with truth serum to humiliate her and seducing what she thinks is her crush on Naomi's own bed is definitely not par for siblings even in soap operas. It establishes someone as the villain even there.
Not without context. That exact same situation in a comedy becomes just that: comical. Whereas in a drama or a thriller, it'd be presented as anything but.
No, it would make him or her a comical villain or antagonist.
Gotoh wrote:The stunts Gabrielle has pulled are no worse than what's been done by other sitcom sibling duos. One of my favorites was when Ross tricked his sister, Monica, into thinking she had a phone call from her boyfriend. She takes the phone and asks if she left her diaphragm at his apartment, only to realize seconds later, that it was their mom on the other end. It ends with Ross doing a troll dance while Monica chucks fruit at him.

Did that make Ross a villain? No. Ross loved his sister, but he wasn't above trrolling her and the audience cracked up when he did it.
To quote The Princess Bride, you keep using that word [trolling], but I don't think you know what it means.
You can't see the difference between that and using drugs for public humiliation? Did Ross ever try to destroy his sister's romantic prospects for fun? As I've said before, in a sitcom, before a sibling or a friend gets to that point they almost always see the error of their ways and exhibit remorse. Usually it's a long-standing antagonist who gets the tables turned or a one-shot one that gets shipped off at the end of the episode.

Naomi is getting the same treatment as the Hartley's in Vampire Cheerleaders, where the vampyre fanboys tried to claim they were abusive parents who deserved what they got. Here we have theories that Naomi was a spoiled only child who started it by hazing Gabrielle. That doesn't make sense when you consider Prudence. Despite her troubles with one foster student already, Naomi gets Prudence into hers. On the other hand, Gabrielle immediately uses truth serum on her.

Gotoh
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Gotoh »

tau neutrino wrote:No, it would make him or her a comical villain or antagonist.
Not necessarily (see: 'the gadfly'). Everything from the last sentence of the opening paragraph, to the entirety of the second one is a dead-on description of Gabrielle.

You seem to think in terms of two extremes, without any sense of "middleground".
tau neutrino wrote:you keep using that word [trolling], but I don't think you know what it means.
I'm beginning to wonder the same thing about you.
tau neutrino wrote:You can't see the difference between that and using drugs for public humiliation?
Revealing a secret crush to the class is somehow worse than being humiliated in front of one's parents, by being tricked into divulging details about your sex life? Is that what you're suggesting? :-\

If so, we'll have to disagree. Having a crush doesn't mean anything happened. It's just telling people who you think is cute. But your sex life is a different matter. That's telling people who you were with, and what you've been doing. And Monica told her mom without realizing it was her on the phone, until it was too late.

Ross didn't need truth serum, all he had to do was make his sister think she was talking to her boyfriend - and it worked. She embarrassed herself in front of their mother, for his amusement.
tau neutrino wrote:Did Ross ever try to destroy his sister's romantic prospects for fun?
Neither has Gabrielle. Teddi isn't Naomi's boyfriend, he reciprocated when Gabrielle came onto him and only stopped for Chloe's sake. Not Naomi's.
tau neutrino wrote:Naomi is getting the same treatment as the Hartley's in Vampire Cheerleaders, where the vampyre fanboys tried to claim they were abusive parents who deserved what they got. Here we have theories that Naomi was a spoiled only child who started it by hazing Gabrielle.
No one is villainizing Naomi. All that's been said is, we don't know what started this.

It's like walking in on the middle of an argument. We don't what started it, because we weren't there to see it. So picking a side, regardless how it may seem, is jumping to conclusions. The sensible approach is to start by finding out what happened.

I'm not saying Naomi's the bad guy, I'm giving Gabrielle the benefit of a doubt.

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wiseguy
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by wiseguy »

whether she is evil and/or enjoys being manipulative is open to interpretations

but it is a given that she enjoys people revealing the truth by any means, and does not care what are the consequences to that person when that truth is revealed.

and it does not matter if she reveals "just who they have a crush on" or their actual sex life, the harm is in what "people think"

many girls reputation has been ruined just because they went to starbucks with a guy that needed help tutoring, and that guy starts talk at the locker room that "he was lucky" when nothing ever happened.


he becomes the "lucky guy that knows how to makes moves". and she becomes the "easy girl" even when she has never even held hands with anyone ever.
ImageImage

Gotoh
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Gotoh »

@wiseguy: Naomi looked like a gradeschooler in that flashback. At that age, I seriously doubt that any of her classmates had those kinds of thoughts about her.

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Cortez
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Cortez »

GKNolan wrote:I guess the problem is even in slapstick (which this is) it's hard to not form emotional attachments to characters.
We're supposed to laugh it off as ridiculous, and maybe we should. But if people can root for Wile E Coyote to catch the Roadrunner then it isn't surprising that we can feel empathy towards a high school girl getting bullied.
Hell, you'll even find a lot of people that view Jerry as the bad guy in those shorts, since Jerry usually was the one instigating their fights l, even in the shorts where they start as friends.

In the case of Wile.E, that was always intentional. One of the rules back then was that the sympathy should always be on Wile.E Coyote. It's why the Roadrunner never got much focus in the original shorts.
Gotoh wrote:
I'm beginning to wonder the same thing about you.
Nah, they have it right.
I'm not saying Naomi's the bad guy, .
It seems like you are though. It's coming off like you are victim blaming and saying Naomi somehow deserves to be bullied.
The stunts Gabrielle has pulled are no worse than what's been done by other sitcom sibling duos.
Not only is that bull, that's hardly justification for bullying, nor does it excuse it.
Neither has Gabrielle. Teddi isn't Naomi's boyfriend, he reciprocated when Gabrielle came onto him and only stopped for Chloe's sake. Not Naomi's.
Doesn't really change the fact that she only went after Teddi because she wanted to hurt Naomi, does it? You seem to be ignoring that rather important fact.

It's not a case of Naomi and Gabby liking the same person and Gabby was the only one that made a move. No, Gabby was only interested in Teddi as another tool in her plans to torture Naomi.
Error of Logic wrote:On the other, it could the kind of response that can be evoked by a prolonged series of small and large harassments in her very home, where she should be safe: an emotional breakdown.
Gabrielle's glee at observing said emotional breakdown and humiliating Naomi further just drives home, to me, that she is enjoying Naomi's pain. Further supporting evidence of her love of inflicting torture, and that she has been doing so against Naomi for a prolonged period, whatever her actual motivations may be.
In fact, it's a pretty common consequence of real life bullying. Which is why Gabby's actions aren't funny.

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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Gotoh »

Cortez wrote:It seems like you are though. It's coming off like you are victim blaming and saying Naomi somehow deserves to be bullied.
So you're back to making assumptions? 'cuz giving Gabrielle the benefit of a doubt hardly means I'm blaming Naomi. That's waiting to get the full story so we'll know why their relationship is the way it is.
Cortez wrote:Not only is that bull, that's hardly justification for bullying, nor does it excuse it.
Actually it is and it does in this instance. There's several tropes that cover exactly that sort of thing. In any case, you're only proving my point. Not only are you still making assumptions, but you're determined to take a comical situation seriously.
Cortez wrote:Doesn't really change the fact that she only went after Teddi because she wanted to hurt Naomi, does it? You seem to be ignoring that rather important fact.
What matters here is, Teddy has free agency, which you're choosing to overlook. The most Naomi can complain about, is the fact that Gaby did it on her bed. Beyond that, Naomi doesn't have a leg to stand on.

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Error of Logic
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 23-02-17 Making My Life Miserable

Post by Error of Logic »

The fact that Naomi does not know Gabrielle pursued Teddi just to hurt her and the fact that Teddi has 'free agency' do not change the fact that we know Gabrielle only started pursuing Teddi to hurt Naomi.

Naomi has grounds to be angry about the egregious invasion of her privacy. We know she has even more grounds for complaint.
Cortez wrote:
Error of Logic wrote:On the other, it could the kind of response that can be evoked by a prolonged series of small and large harassments in her very home, where she should be safe: an emotional breakdown.
Gabrielle's glee at observing said emotional breakdown and humiliating Naomi further just drives home, to me, that she is enjoying Naomi's pain. Further supporting evidence of her love of inflicting torture, and that she has been doing so against Naomi for a prolonged period, whatever her actual motivations may be.
In fact, it's a pretty common consequence of real life bullying. Which is why Gabby's actions aren't funny.
Well, I concur.

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