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Post by Ozymandias on May 28, 2015 16:05:51 GMT
Ok, now we're having some miscommunication, for sure. The important part, in my statement "at least some characters, were two-dimensional just at first glance", is the word "just", meaning that, of course, once you dig past the surface, the subtleties of a character, begin to be revealed. This applies to Gwen, as well as some other select characters, even from the Silver Age.
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Post by dav on May 28, 2015 21:30:34 GMT
Ok, now we're having some miscommunication, for sure. The important part, in my statement "at least some characters, were two-dimensional just at first glance", is the word "just", meaning that, of course, once you dig past the surface, the subtleties of a character, begin to be revealed. This applies to Gwen, as well as some other select characters, even from the Silver Age. Then are we in agreement that if Gwen were to be brought back some MORE depth would have to be written into her character?
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Post by Ozymandias on May 28, 2015 22:11:32 GMT
That's a different point
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Post by dav on May 29, 2015 0:52:54 GMT
Again I'm talking about her still being virtuous, but having more of a backstory to explain her motivations, the same way they did for MJ.
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Post by Ozymandias on May 29, 2015 6:32:26 GMT
Having background and having depth are two different things. You can meet a person, and quickly realize he/she has a complex personality, and you can know someone since you were a child, and know him/her to be an uncomplicated person. Gwen was complex, even without the background, MJ remained simple, even when Marvel provided one.
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Post by dav on May 29, 2015 8:55:18 GMT
Having background and having depth are two different things. You can meet a person, and quickly realize he/she has a complex personality, and you can know someone since you were a child, and know him/her to be an uncomplicated person. Gwen was complex, even without the background, MJ remained simple, even when Marvel provided one. I think we are getting our wires crossed. Gwen's basic personality is fine, but the same way more was revealed about MJ, the same needs to be done with Gwen. I see modern readers as being more sophisticated and as such the characters need to be more sophisticated as well. I guess I'm not explaining myself well. All I can say is IMHO Gwen's character needs to have more... substance, I guess, to fit in to the way major characters are written today. That's the best I can explain it and it is just my opinion. If you feel differently then we'll just have to agree to disagree.
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Post by Ozymandias on May 29, 2015 9:06:55 GMT
I doubt readers are more sophisticated, nowadays. They ask for different things in a comic, but that doesn't make them sophisticated. I guess we can agree, on them wanting more details, about the characters they read about. Whether we call that level of detail "depth", "background" or "substance" isn't relevant (besides semantics).
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Post by dav on May 29, 2015 9:39:26 GMT
I doubt readers are more sophisticated, nowadays. They ask for different things in a comic, but that doesn't make them sophisticated. I guess we can agree, on them wanting more details, about the characters they read about. Whether we call that level of detail "depth", "background" or "substance" isn't relevant (besides semantics). I think our interpretations of these words are different! I hope we can agree that compared to the way comics were written back in the Silver Age, the characters in today's comics have something MORE to them, whatever adjective(s) you want to use!
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Post by Ozymandias on May 29, 2015 10:17:55 GMT
Yes, as I said, readers want "more details", nowadays.
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Post by vixx on Jun 9, 2015 19:24:59 GMT
I never really looked at Gwen as virtuous - think she had the "halo effect" going along with getting elevated because she died - but deep down she's just a smart girl, going through her own shit while living her own life in NYC. Think most of us can remember starting out on our own, and learning lots of lessons on how the world works.
Think Peter got this - and in the process really understood her.
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Post by Ozymandias on Jun 9, 2015 19:34:56 GMT
That depends on your own conception of "virtue". As I said before, the character I'm dissecting in the Chameleonic Gwen thread, has more pros than cons (for me). In fact, I'd be hard pressed to find a defect I couldn't overlook.
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Post by vixx on Jun 9, 2015 22:38:57 GMT
To me virtuous is what she grew into in the years after TNGSD - she's kind of this goddess taken to soon, and elevated to the perfection of martyrdom so Spidey could learn a lesson . The reality was she was an attractive girl, with a solid moral compass, and raised right in a good home, affected by the people around her.
We know she was grounded - the "good" girl to Mary Jane's "party" girl. We know she was attractive and smart; and on a path to a science degree from a good school. If she never met Peter, she was destined for very good things.
On the flip side, she started out as kind of plastic, petty bitchy alpha female that ruled her high school, who grew up when she got into a bigger college pond. For a long time, it was all about her. She reached out to Peter only after appreciating his science acumen - and because he ignored her...which she wasn't used to. Things went from there, and she grew up.
Think at that age we are trying to find our selves, make mistakes, meet new people - some good and some bad...and if she lived, she'd probably look back at herself and laugh. In death, she gained more than in life.
She has many virtues and I wish they fleshed her out more, virtuous fits as long as it doesn't drive the whole just "Angel Gwen" that typically accompanies that word...
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Post by Ozymandias on Jun 9, 2015 23:25:23 GMT
Just one disagreement, I dispute the assumption, that Peter learned any lesson, at all, from TNGSD.
Ok, maybe two, "bitch" may be too much, to label her behavior, at the beginning.
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Post by vixx on Jun 10, 2015 2:08:19 GMT
I think he did learn a lesson - with or without powers, life is short and unpredictable; he had a lot more fun and was overall much more spontaneous with Mary Jane and seemed to accept there are always things out of his control.
I said bitchy I'm sure there are more flattering words to make my point, but it's good to see her high school "mean girl" persona didn't carry over through the full run
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Post by Ozymandias on Jun 10, 2015 7:44:28 GMT
The lesson I would expect to be learned, would be one about being careful, about protecting a secret that can bring death to those around you. That lesson was never learned. What you point out is, IMO, a different relationship dynamic, to the one previously seen between Gwen's and Peter's characters.
Sorry, I was writing from memory (which isn't great, as you can easily surmise). "Bitchy" is acceptable.
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