Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

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dmra
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by dmra »

They're exactly the parents the story needs. At least Lance got a good reason for being away a lot and got to come back for a while but the poor mother only appeared in three pages before disappearing out of her kids life without any real explanation.

It's efficient writing since it's not her or Lance's story but it's not particularly good writing since it leaves too many big questions hanging. It really wouldn't have hurt to give it a bit more thought before sending her out of the story

Gotoh
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by Gotoh »

dmra wrote:
Sun Mar 03, 2019 1:18 am
I didn't say it was a certainty that Lance had had affairs just that it was a possibility. I also said that even if he hadn't that wouldn't necessarily mean it was a happy marriage.
There's nothing sugtesting it was bad marriage either. All we know is, Teddy's parents divorced because of Chloe's meddling. But their mom didn't seem troubled until she heard about her husband's affair. Anything beyond that is speculation.
dmra wrote:
Sun Mar 03, 2019 1:18 am
Somehow I doubt that any responsible parent would allow their son to invite a succubus who was sent to have sex with him and then kill him into their house. I also doubt that they would just sit back and let said son and succubus make their own plans to sort out the problems including letting the son - now seemingly a daughter - have serial liaisons with half of the schools jocks, etc.
Wanna bet? 'cuz I've seen parents allow their kids to do stranger things in anime, manga, and television.

Ever see 'My Bride is a Mermaid'? Here's a brief summary: Nagasumi and his parents are humans, who end up becoming in-laws with a clan of merpeople, due Nagasumi accidentally getting hitched to Sun. The dads on both sides aren't much help, but both moms are reasonably level-headed. None of it prevents Nagasumi and Sun from frequently ending up in outlandish situations.

Example 1 out of many. EC and MC included.

dmra
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by dmra »

And were the merpeople planning to kill the son?

Let's just imagine the conversation.

Teddy: Hi Mum this is Chloe. I met her last night when I went out to burgle the museum.

Mum: Burgle the museum!

Teddy: The thing is I somehow ended up selling my soul for a girlfriend and she came to have sex with me before killing me and taking my damned soul to Hell.

Mum: Sorry! What? Be serious!

Teddy: I am being serious. Anyway she doesn't want to kill me any more but instead wants to help me find a human girlfriend so can she come to live with us?

Mum: Of course. Why would I not say yes? Oh wait before I let her in I think I'd better give the local churches a call to see if they know anything we can do about breaking that stupid contract.

Not to mention Mum would have to be OK with Pandora moving in, Chloe tearing the house to shreds trying to get to Teddy at night and the whole Teddy turning into a girl thing. Not to mention Teddi auditioning the jocks as potential partners for Chloe.

Speaking of which that's another great conversation.

Mum: so Teddi that was the tenth boy in two weeks I saw you with. What's going on?

Teddy: Oh I need to find a legendary man who can survive having sex with a feral succubus.

Mum: And you think the boys in our local high school football team are legendary? What kind of moron are you? I really am sorry that I dropped you on your head that time when you were a baby but you could at least try to think things through sometimes. Especially before sending a young boy to almost certain death.

So not quite the story as we know it.

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Cortez
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by Cortez »

Gotoh wrote:
Sun Mar 03, 2019 2:49 am


There's nothing sugtesting it was bad marriage either. All we know is, Teddy's parents divorced because of Chloe's meddling. But their mom didn't seem troubled until she heard about her husband's affair. Anything beyond that is speculation.

And he cheated on her with her sister, so that probably made it worse for her and likely destroyed that relationship as well.

We never heard what happened to Aunt Vera either, she clearly didn't stay with Lance.
dmra wrote:
Sun Mar 03, 2019 3:11 am


Not to mention Mum would have to be OK with Pandora moving in, Chloe tearing the house to shreds trying to get to Teddy at night and the whole Teddy turning into a girl thing. Not to mention Teddi auditioning the jocks as potential partners for Chloe.

You forget about their pheromones. If it was Teddy's mom instead of his dad, they would probably use the same tricks on her.

Gotoh
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by Gotoh »

dmra wrote:
Sun Mar 03, 2019 3:11 am
And were the merpeople planning to kill the son?
Yes. All the time. That's why I used that example and included the link.

The accidental marriage was discussed in the very first episode. It was either Nagasumi marry Sun, or her father would kill him for seeing her mermaid form. Nagasumi's parents chose to go through with having their son marry Sun to save his life.

Sun's dad didn't care, he wasn't gonna let his daughter marry a human, so he and his buddies decided Nagasumi had to go. Nagasumi's parents knew about the murder attempts, but couldn't do anything about it. The only help he had were Sun and her mom, who frequently had to keep her husband in check (Ren wears the pants in their marriage).

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Lokitsu
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by Lokitsu »

The Archie comics, which were apparently the inspiration for the C-Verse, have quite a number of adults appearing regularly and interacting with the main cast. The big difference between the C-Verse and the Archie-verse however, is the "wacky hi-jinks" in the C-verse are actually pretty freaking dark. I can't see Mr Andrews sitting down to explain to Archie why its wrong to sleep with the football team, not without the comic going into full-blown Moral Orel-style black humor. No sane and halfway competent parental figure would stand by and allow Teddy, Abby and Pandora to do what they've done over the course of this comic, so all the adults had to be written out, except for Slash-Stab who you can write off as a villain and kinda-sorta crazy.

I'm not sure if Dave and Giz ever thought this premise all the way through. It does seem like they figured the manga/anime trope of kids living by themselves while going to school would cover the plot hole, but clearly a lot of the readers didn't go for it. I've read a lot of manga where the parents are never even mentioned during the entire series; but those are stories written by Japanese cartoonists for Japanese readers. I'm not even sure that the missing DeCarlos (and Chloe's mom) are even the biggest oversight/plot hole in this series.

dmra
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by dmra »

@Cortez

I didn't forget about the pheromones. I said that if there had been a live in parent they would probably have to be charmed to allow Chloe to live there. Whether that was chemical means using pheromones or magical it would still cast the comic in a very dark light for no real narrative gain.

@Gotoh

Apologies for not noticing the reference was a link. That's what I get for posting at 3am.

And thanks for ignoring all but one line of my post.

And even then you said "Nagasumi's parents knew about the murder attempts, but couldn't do anything about it." So they were basically useless to the son. Now I've not read that particular series so they may still have served some dramatic purpose but I don't see how it would have added at all to DC to have the DeCarlo parents there if all they were going to do was be ineffectual and just go along with everything Teddy or Chloe told them to.

And if they didn't just go along with it then, as I said, we would have had a very different story.


@Lokitsu

Entirely agree on the first paragraph. The parents would either need to be charmed or absent for the story to proceed as it has done.

On the second paragraph there have been enough people complaining about some of the plot points that I think it's safe to say that - while it has had some very good moments - DC has not been the writer's greatest hour.

Gotoh
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by Gotoh »

dmra wrote:
Sun Mar 03, 2019 6:33 am
thanks for ignoring all but one line of my post.

And even then you said "Nagasumi's parents knew about the murder attempts, but couldn't do anything about it." So they were basically useless to the son. Now I've not read that particular series so they may still have served some dramatic purpose but I don't see how it would have added at all to DC to have the DeCarlo parents there if all they were going to do was be ineffectual and just go along with everything Teddy or Chloe told them to.

And if they didn't just go along with it then, as I said, we would have had a very different story.
I specifically mentioned that there were two sets of parents, not one.

Nagasumi's parents couldn't help him because Sun's family were Yukuza. They had already proven that they could get rid of someone and get away with it, which is how Sun's father and his buddies infiltrated Nagasumi's school: by abducting several of the teachers and taking their place. Nagasumi's parents weren't stupid. They got the message loud and clear, it was a warning not to f**k with them.

That's why Nagasumi was lucky to have Sun's mom protecting him, because she was the only one her husband was afraid of. If Ren told him to back off, he knew he'd better do it, or there'd be hell to pay. So Sun's dad resorted to trying to find ways to kill Nagasumi without his wife finding out about it (she usually did).

However, all of that is beside the point. You said a story like DC couldn't work if there were any responsible adults around. I offered EC, MC, and My Bride is a Mermaid as proof to the contrary. Each of them had several responsible adults and wacky hijinks ensued regardless of their presence.

dmra
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by dmra »

No I said that the DC story as it existed wouldn't work with a responsible adult in the home. And gave examples why which you chose to ignore. Because no responsible adult would simply take Chloe into the home and then sit back and do nothing about the situation with her and Teddy. Or allow Teddi to go on a streak of seducing jocks in the entirely futile hope of finding if one of them was "legendary" enough to survive having sex with Chloe.

So the point I was making was that for the DC story to be written as it was written adults have to be invisible. So no mum for Teddy or Abby and Chloe has to forget Adora exists.

Which isn't to say that I don't think there was a story which could have been written with the same characters and responsible competent adults added into the mix but it would in no way resemble the one the creators wanted to write. So they simply weren't written into the story.

Whether that is a good or a bad thing is another question altogether.

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Cortez
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by Cortez »

Lokitsu wrote:
Sun Mar 03, 2019 5:56 am


I'm not sure if Dave and Giz ever thought this premise all the way through. It does seem like they figured the manga/anime trope of kids living by themselves while going to school would cover the plot hole, but clearly a lot of the readers didn't go for it. I've read a lot of manga where the parents are never even mentioned during the entire series; but those are stories written by Japanese cartoonists for Japanese readers. I'm not even sure that the missing DeCarlos (and Chloe's mom) are even the biggest oversight/plot hole in this series.
Plus being set in Canada, most would think it's messed up how Lance leaves Teddy and Abby with no supervision.

There is literally no guardian at the house. How hasn't he gotten in trouble for this?

Gotoh
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by Gotoh »

Cortez wrote:
Sun Mar 03, 2019 8:09 am
Plus being set in Canada, most would think it's messed up how Lance leaves Teddy and Abby with no supervision.

There is literally no guardian at the house. How hasn't he gotten in trouble for this?
For many families, that's considered normal. It's common for an older sibling to be left in charge of the younger ones while their parents are at work, or travelling abroad. I was usually in charge of watching my two younger brothers, while our mom was at work, or out of state on business. Our neighbors knew and no one thought anything of it and I was only 17 at the time. I was also babysitting at that age and made a respectible sum of money at it. Others have actually raised their siblings, some while they're still in highschool.

It's even more common in fiction and even has its own trope. See also: Parental Substitute and Promotion to Parent.

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Cortez
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by Cortez »

It's not normal when the parents are gone for long periods of time, to the point of never being around at all.

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Error of Logic
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by Error of Logic »

It is not ideal. It is not to be recommended. It will lead to resentment and pain, even if only subconsciously. Unfortunately, at times it really is "normal". Circumstances are betimes less than optimal.

dmra
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by dmra »

This is admittedly getting a bit real worldy compared to talking about comics but this is why many countries have parental negligence laws. And there is a big difference between leaving a child or young adult alone while you pop out to the shops or for a couple of hours until you get home from work and leaving them on their own for weeks or months. Especially as it doesn't look like Lance is short of money so he could surely be expected (IRL) to make some kind of appropriate caring arrangements.

But again we are talking about a comic and not real life so I doubt DC should be taken as an endorsement of Lance (in)actions or reflecting the creators own views.

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Cortez
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Re: Dangerously Chloe 28-02-19 Final Chapter Whatever Happened to Teddy Decarlo

Post by Cortez »

And we did see that Teddy has some resentment towards Lance because of it.

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