[insert Skunk Anansie song here]
Creed of the Happy Pessimist:Always expect the worst. Then, when it happens, it was only what you expected. All else is a happy surprise.
Not as angry as the name would suggest.
I mean, I’m agreeing with everything the guy’s saying, but I’ll admit this is a lot to dump on us for something we’ve really only just hearing about.
Like, he’s cool and all, but it’s certainly a bit much to outline their civilization’s issues with racism and his stance on those issues over the course of two pages.
Just saying.
Edited by KarkatTheDalek on May 29th 2022 at 12:48:47 PM
Oh God! Natural light!
Agreed. Has any diplomat ever aired his civilization's dirty laundry like this in front of another land's delegation at their first meeting? The cockatoo shouldn't have been able to give the owl cause for it, either; even if he was just supposed to be the door guard, they shouldn't have had him anywhere near this meeting.
Jaded Techie Fox
Yeah, this is definitely a lot. And pretty irrelevant to why they're meeting in the first place. Whatever that reason was.
Trust you? The only person I can trust is myself.None of these people (save Edward) are diplomats, though Liam is doing his best. We've a researcher, a knight/bodyguard and a border guard that was sent to guard a border that roughly no one ever crosses.
Exactly what Liam's gig is has not been made clear, but he wasn't supposed to be here in the first place.
Creed of the Happy Pessimist:Always expect the worst. Then, when it happens, it was only what you expected. All else is a happy surprise.
I'm helping!
This really does feel... awkwardly soapboxy.
Trouble Cube continues to be a general-purpose forum for those who desire such a thing.
Get heckin crabbed
I feel like this exposition is going to serve a purpose at some point, especially the origin stuff (since the other side of the coin doesn't know where they came from either), but man is it awkwardly shoved in. Maybe the mind control was just a way to shunt him into this meeting.
Writer, or something. And... a button? 🖲️
Well, that and to give Elliot something to go Superpowered Evil Side on and then angst about.
Chalk me up as another who's forgotten what these characters are actually supposed to be here to meet about. This really is a ton of rushed worldbuilding awkwardly dumped in the middle of the story.
"The difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense." - Tom Clancy, paraphrasing Mark Twain.
Queen of Good Things, Honest
Yeah, the cockatoo should have been dismissed with a simple, "Back to your post, soldier," a while ago. He is not a diplomat, and he frankly doesn't seem to have anything of value to offer anyways.
The intent here seems to be detailing that uryuoms suffer similar prejudice on the Flipside or whatever it's called to what real-world minorities suffer here. In fact, Liam's position seems to be drawn more or less verbatim from how our culture perceives Thomas Jefferson, a vocal advocate of slave abolition controversial for the fact that he didn't put his money where his mouth was, and in fact owned hundreds of slaves.
The common defense of Jefferson is precisely what Liam states here: He did what he had to do to preserve his political power so that he could continue fighting the larger battle. But the implication that Liam, like Jefferson, actively participates in the very oppression he claims the enlightened position of being against, seems to have not been lost on Edward.
But dumping all of this into a diplomatic meeting between nations is super awkward.
Edited by TobiasDrake on May 31st 2022 at 9:48:43 AM
My Tumblr. Currently liveblogging Haruhi Suzumiya and revisiting Danganronpa V3.
Strap in, we're still in lecture mode. https://www.egscomics.com/comic/balance-154
Get heckin crabbed
Good for you, random character? But about that meeting though...
Writer, or something. And... a button? 🖲️
I really want Elliot or someone to interrupt and be like "We're here because there's an issue threatening both our worlds, solve your issues on your own damn time!"
I will be impressed, but also annoyed, if Dwight's epiphany turns out to be vitally important to the problem they're here to solve. Maybe he'll need to trust an Uryuom with some bit of tech that no one else can handle to unclog the magic, or something. Even though he's not the one with the authority to make that determination. I dunno.
Edited by HeraldAlberich on Jun 1st 2022 at 1:51:51 PM
Accidental insight.
Edited by Daremo on Jun 2nd 2022 at 1:38:39 AM
Creed of the Happy Pessimist:Always expect the worst. Then, when it happens, it was only what you expected. All else is a happy surprise.
![[down]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_down.png "[down]"){kind=icon}
That's right, it's not. Shutting up now.
Edited by Altris on Jun 3rd 2022 at 8:47:05 AM
So, let's hang an anchor from the sun... also my TumblrI-it's not. It's a meeting between a researcher and an alien she met while exploring their world, to exchange information about about a thing that could be a problem, but not a major one.
Edward, Grace, Liam, and Dwight were not supposed to be there and Tara is only there to keep Andrea from getting lost again(and failing).
This is not an official First Contact meeting where they draw up treaties and establish borders and consulates.
Creed of the Happy Pessimist:Always expect the worst. Then, when it happens, it was only what you expected. All else is a happy surprise.
Queen of Good Things, Honest
It kinda of is, though. Liam and Edward are here, even if they weren't supposed to be. So now this meeting includes a foreign dignitary and a member of local law enforcement, who was recently assaulted by the foreign dignitary.
Even if it wasn't supposed to be a diplomatic event, this is now politically-charged. What Edward and Liam say and do here will define how their respective cultures view each other going forward.
Edited by TobiasDrake on Jun 3rd 2022 at 8:50:16 AM
My Tumblr. Currently liveblogging Haruhi Suzumiya and revisiting Danganronpa V3.
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
More than that, Edward is a former member of local law enforcement. He's since been Kicked Upstairs to be the person who explicitly handles these sorts of meetings with nonhuman and magical creatures from other realities. (Since he was doing that anyway, so effectively that they couldn't afford to fire him for excessive force. All they could do was take his badge and wand away, but he's so personally powerful that that's meaningless too.) So, two dignitaries. It's about as official as it can get, for not being set up in advance.
Edited by HeraldAlberich on Jun 3rd 2022 at 1:21:47 PM
I feel like no one is worried enough that an unknown force tried to sabotage this not-quite-official-diplomatic-meeting and provoke a not-quite-diplomatic-incident.
It didn't as far as we currently know. The attack on Liam appears to have been entirely unrelated(a factor I personally consider irksome), he just knew that two of his subordinates were going some place where he should have been harmless.
Of course there's a chance it may have been related to this, but that's just a guess on my part.
Edited by Daremo on Jun 3rd 2022 at 3:34:49 AM
Creed of the Happy Pessimist:Always expect the worst. Then, when it happens, it was only what you expected. All else is a happy surprise.
https://www.egscomics.com/comic/balance-156
1. At least they acknowledge that yeah Liam was just mind controlled
2. And YES maybe they shouldn't have interrupted with this soapbox speech!
Jaded Techie Fox
Oh thank god we're going back to what they were originally meeting for.
Trust you? The only person I can trust is myself.
He was supposed to just be the border guard, posted on the griffin's side of the... gate(?) between wolrds. He's only interacting with the other side because of Liam's rampage.