Mind Control Comics Forum

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I have to say, I like Astrid's style.

So that's:

Miel and Patrick.
Réka and Weston.
Astrid and Coates.

And I suppose Adrian and Erin. And perhaps Mallory and Marliese?

And maybe John and Polly: "Dispense your charms widely." (140)

I have serious reservations about Reka and Weston.

Maybe if we see more explanation, I might let up on Coates.  However, I still say he should go out and start randomly buying lottery tickets.  He'd probably win Powerball in 15 minutes.

ETA--Also, something about the way Coates has conducted himself smells sour.  I mean, maybe...maybe he took up with Imani with Astrid's blessing on the understanding that they get to share her when Astrid gets back from her research (which was where?).  But, shouldn't the pitch have been "Imani and I have been seeing each other for months...my wife loves to play" not "Imani's my girlfriend, my wife is away on a research trip?"  Unless Astrid's reaction would have been Helen's from Sliding Doors absent the activation of the belltower?

ETA--Astrid's style?  You mean her interpersonal style?  Yeah, she seems to fit right in around here.  Her look?  Honestly, I'm on the fence so far.

I was talking more about her way of comporting herself:  Just flew in, don't stress about things, let's fuck.  Obviously she's dressed for day-to-day and not to impress at the moment.

My take on all this is that, from a metatextual standpoint, Daphne is clearly extremely ok with the poly/swinger lifestyle, so I just take what people say about non-standard relationship arrangements at face value. 

Again, I don't have a problem with the concept of open relationships in this storyline, but it seems that Weston and Coates woo for themselves; their own amusement and have a hard time remembering they have partners.  This sort of attitude strikes me as Derek behavior (or worse).  I...remain unconvinced.

See, I don't get that.  Weston and Reka both got a shot at Pearl, and Astrid is seducing Hitomi right now.  Both open relationships look like partnerships to me.  What we aren't seeing is Reka or Astrid sleeping with other guys, but I chalk that up to SJI being an md/mf/ff comic.

As I said, I remain unconvinced, but I'm willing to be convinced.

1. When we met Weston the first time, he was pursuing Erin on his own (apparently for himself because Reka though there didn't factor in at all) with almost complete self-assurance.  Plus, he has stank of Destiny Dice Roll #1 on him:  dystopian soul-crushing future.  It'll take a counterbalance that.

With regard to Pearl, yes it seems like a partnership, but I'm still confused as to why he was even at practice for that scene.

As for Coates--again, if this is legit and he's looking for play partners with his wife, his entire approach should have been different.  Imani self-identifies as his girlfriend and the note about his wife is that she won't care, not that she'll be a part of their play.  That's Alec Baldwin "Marrying Man" cowflop.  Or Howard Prescott in The Secret of My Success telling his subordinate that "My wife and I have an understanding."  It's just indefensible, arrogant, selfish stupidity.  And if he really is looking for playmates for his wife to share--it's still unbelievably moronic, because he could be much more open, honest, and inclusive.  And, in the context of Kearsage, being honest about the situation is probably even sexier.  He's choosing the worst possible approach because....why? >:( ???

It doesn't appear that Astrid minds in the least that her husband is in bed with two women. And she only needs to be introduced to Hitomi; the naked Imani casually greets her by name. "She always gets an earlier flight, and he's always surprised." This seems like their game to me. If you're assuming Astrid spent her field trip repeating to herself the mantra "I have a partner" then... why?

Weston enjoyed a longer kiss with Erin at rehearsal than the play demanded. Maybe she should have let him pull away sooner, what with Réka not being there and all but, then, neither was Adrian there, and maybe Erin was enjoying it too much to care. I mean, she's tongued a twat or two before and enjoyed it. The next night Erin encouraged Réka to kiss her too - but that was OK because Weston was there. Although, again, Adrian wasn't. And Weston was there when Réka invited Miriam back to their place, so I guess that amounts to teamwork.

It's all a matter of perspective, but we don't actually know that Erin is a less faithful partner than Weston or Coates. For all we know she's told Adrian about both Réka and Weston. And maybe she's intending to bring Weston back to share him with Adrian, which, obviously, would make it OK. (Christ it was a struggle to type that last bit.)

It may also be worth noting that the gender ratio in Kearsage is heavily skewed: 70/30 female-to-male.  In other words, there are more than two women per man.  In real life, colleges with gender ratios less unbalanced than that have major hookup cultures.  Insistence on monogamy is a poor mating strategy in that kind of environment, and that's without putting mind control into the mix.

Have we actually seen a single monogamous relationship in this comic at any point?  If not, then it seems bizarre to single out Weston and Coates as particularly bad.  Vik, for one, strikes me as obviously worse and he doesn't get a fraction of the hate.

I think every time we've assumed we were looking at one it has turned out we weren't. Raven obviously knows she's sharing Erin with Adrian. I wonder if she'd contemplate being "unfaithful" - whatever that means at this point. By the by, there wasn't much time for Astrid and Imani to have got so acquainted after Erin did whatever she did to the bell tower equipment.

That old idea of Adrian's dad directing him towards Kearsarge after his break-up with Echo seems more credible right now. Or at least it would do if we didn't suspect that Adrian was led here by Rain leaving a trail of magical things - or possibly condoms - for him to follow.

EDIT:


Ah, but we knew Vik when he was likeable. I mean, yes, he's blotted his copybook recently. But first impressions count for an awful lot. It seems.

On the other hand, we still don't know what happened in that one crucial conversation with Rain and Adrian.  So for all we know Adrian went to Kearsarge because it was a good place to pick up the trail as far as mind control goes, and he's been playing dumb this whole time. 

He does do that one thing really, really well though.

His girlfriend Echo (echo) and her room-mate Claudia were both taken into Jakob's harem. So of course he comes to Kearsarge and moves in with Dani. It's entirely possible he's playing dumb.

On the other hand, the world of SJI certainly allows for 'destiny,' so maybe that's part of it and it isn't Adrian doing something specifically. 

I'm going to overlook the difficulty of reconciling destiny with the at least three outcomes and modify my assertion:

It's entirely possible he's playing dumb. Or he isn't.

Yeah, well, show me a fictional work like that that's *entirely* internally consistent. 

We are still wrestling with issues of determinism in the real world, let alone fictional ones.

Well, destiny isn't necessarily predestination...

Also, the destiny could have already been fulfilled, then bad stuff could happen later.

Except, not so much.  Erin can't be dead from the struggle with the Watchmaking family, and Adrian widowed and prematurely aged and struggling with old wounds and then a decade later, they're married (comfortably, openly, and in perfect health) with a young adult daughter who takes after both of them.

Those aren't consistent with one another, to say nothing of the first possible window where Adrian is three shades above destitute, stuck with Echo (indicating that the struggle with the Kuplers is over) and Erin is off acting with Weston.  Those three outcomes are mutually exclusive.  That's why several folks have taken to viewing them as windows into possible futures.  For the record, I'm hoping for possibility #3 (married, financially comfortable, and frisky) as a minimum.  This is an American and Canadian story, not an Irish, Japanese, or Chinese one.

I know they're mutually exclusive.  My point was, rather, that the 'destiny' could have already been fulfilled with what's already happened at the present point, and that once that's happened a variety of things could happen, as per those three outcomes (and possibly more!  I have the sneaking suspicion that what's going to actually happen in the comic is not going to be precisely any of those.)

I'm well outside my comfort zone, which is really what I meant by the difficulties I was overlooking...

Looking up destiny in various places, I'm seeing pre-determined, unavoidable, and necessary (not all in the same definition). I don't have a problem with believing that things work that way. But I struggle with the notion that you can pick and choose: it was my destiny to be standing at the drinks machine but now I get to choose coffee or orange juice (and one way lies certain immediate death, inevitably). How is anyone supposed to know what was destiny and what wasn't?

Plus, in a universe that allows for mind control and magic, it's pretty hard from where I'm sitting to say that every single thing we've seen happen didn't happen simply because one person willed it to. I know we've had the "Fates" cover, but beyond that how can we be certain that the SJI universe allows for destiny?

Personally I'm quite happy with the idea that Adrian may have put Echo behind him and moved into Dani's house by sheer chance. It would appear to be a remarkable coincidence, though.

(I also still contend that in a universe that allows for magic, we have no reason to believe the three outcomes are necessarily mutually exclusive.)

In the end, though, you know that Adrian's going to meet Echo again.  Eventually, there will be a reckoning with Claudia in one way or another. 

The polaroids suggest Dani inducted Claudia though, right? So he could settle that score right here, right now.

Was Echo taken specifically because she was Adrian's girlfriend? That's not asked in expectation of an answer, but it's an interesting question in terms of Adrian's Destiny and The Promise and whatever's going on with Jakob and Rain.

That's a good point.  I assumed she was a random casualty, so to speak, but now that we know of Adrian's connection to Kearsarge, that seems less likely. 

Doesn't that assume that this is a binary struggle, though?  The Kuplers vs. Rain with Adrian and the girls caught in the middle?  That seems a little simplistic, doesn't it?  We know that Dani was a critical target for both Claudia and the Kuplers (though to what extent we're not sure because we don't know how much of each narrative is truth, how much is carefully constructed half-truth, and how much is self-serving bull...).  There seem to be helpings of all three coming from Rain, The Kuplers, Claudia, and Dani, Q, and Cherry so far.  Although I'm most inclined to give Rain the greatest leeway and faith so far because she seems benevolent and Cherry and the Kuplers seem like selfish festering monsters, we still don't have anything close to a full picture.

Well, Echo being taken because she was Adrian's girlfriend would only necessitate one party taking one action; it doesn't tell us anything about the number of active parties in the story.

We're not sure where the Kuplers actually fit here except as the supposed source of The Watch when all the craziness begins in the SJI.  It's not clear how or why they'd have heard of Erin (if even a sliver of what Cherry's spouting is to be believed).  It's unclear how they controlled Dani to begin with if she made The Watch for them.  In order for Adrian to be a target, they have to have run across the Cavanaughs somehow before.  Maybe that would be explained if "The Gig" were extended, but not so far.  It seems like Dani and Erin are the hinges and targets for the Kuplers because Dani is the source of their power and...perhaps...Erin with her Wicca connections could be the key to expanding and adding different layers to it.  I don't think Adrian fits at all.  It would be interesting to find out exactly why Adrian went to his parents' alma mater to salve his broken heart if he's never heard his parents' old college stories (as seems likely from his reactions early in the comic).

ETA--One possibility I hadn't considered just dropped on me.  Perhaps Big Pappa Kupler partially funded the Belltower Mating Experiment in '83, one of the results of which was Patrick & Miel coupling up.  Or, one of the sons could have been involved in research gathering and tabulation for the experiment.  I got the sense that they would have been the wrong age (too old) to feasibly be subjects themselves.

I have a random question.  Does Adrian have any siblings?  He seems to have been conceived right around the time of "The Gig."  Did the experiment directly result in the conception of a slightly older Cavanaugh sibling?  Neither Patrick nor Miel seem especially burdened by public perception of them, but we know very little about their families.  Might the experiment have forced their wedding early because their families didn't believe in single parenthood?

The note that came with the clock sent to Rain was signed "J". We're by no means certain who that is but the gift was not well received and that would appear to have been the intention. It looked like a taunt. The likelihood is that Rain knows who "J" is. If it happens to be Jakob then it may have been notice that he is still alive. But even if it isn't he then it would still seem fair to say that Rain has an adversary. Maybe it's just a rival music teacher (they can be quite moody, some of them), but since Rain has a battle on the horizon that she hopes Adrian is up to, I'm guessing it's something to do with that. But there's plenty of assumptions and sheer guesses in all of that.

Speculation - I think Jakob Kuppler has a direct connection with Wilmot. Possibly he was part of the same intake as Patrick.

I think I've suggested before that Adrian has six older brothers, as did Patrick. But I got the impression that the recent guest pages were set in July 1986 - and I didn't spot any sign that Patrick and Miel were already parents by then.

Except, based on what evidence we've seen, I'd say Jakob and his elder brother are both a minimum of five years older than Patrick.  Which makes them what?  Grad students or Pauley Shore-type RAs during the initial phase of the experiment?

I like the idea of a Adrian as a double-seven too, but evidence would seem to argue against that intriguing possibility.

Do we have any information pertaining to Jakob's age? I don't think we do but I may have forgotten something.

Well... we have our theories about Miriam/Pearl, don't we?

Such theories exist.

Yes, variations of such theories exist.  However, I thought that our fearless author tromped on them pretty hard when they first sprang up.  She confirmed that Patrick and Miel are still together and happy and that Mr. Cantor...er Kantor??? is Pearl's biological father.  I think.???

No such undertaking has been received. Not on that specific point anyway, I think. The Dramatis Personae thread gives Miriam's parentage as we have always understood it - but "father" in that sort of context wouldn't necessarily mean biological. Adrian and Miriam are more or less the same age but what Daphne did confirm would seem to make it pretty unlikely they're twins. But Miriam could be Adrian's half-sister, courtesy of Patrick. And he appears to have been very courteous around that time. Also, there are magical elements to the story.