Comic Discussion > QUESTIONABLE CONTENT

WCDT: 2878-2882 (19-23 January 2015)

<< < (59/191) > >>

BenRG:
I can more-or-less see how things are going to go and it isn't going to be nice. Faye is, despite her innumerable issues, a very strong-willed person with a strong handle on what she wants and the will to pursue it (alcoholics tend to be).

After an initial period of horrified shock, Faye is going to go on an immediate counter-offensive based on the fact she considers herself the wronged party. She's going to tell lies to Marten to make Dora seem the unreasonable one. Martin will confront Dora ('confront' in Marten terms; in other words, talk to her from a neutral perspective) and get the other side of the story. I'd say that will be 'tomorrow' in comic terms. Marten is going to think about it (Marten, remember?) and decide that Faye has a problem. He's going to clear all the alcohol out of the house, over Pintsize's objections.

Faye will have an argument with Marten over this which will devolve into a painful bit of bargaining with Faye digging deeper and deeper in an attempt to get her own way, using guilt and even attempting seduction (which is more embarrassing than anything else - she isn't good at it). I would like to see a 'now I know what it's like to kiss my brother' moment here. Eventually, Faye will seem to compromise and agree with Marten's new house rule. She'll just get drunk at bars... and smuggle booze in whilst Marten is out. Marten will find out when he catches Pintsize stealing from her stash.

In the meantime, Faye would be busily blowing up every bridge she has ever had and reacting as if it is the other party's fault.

Finally, the next shoe drops. The lease has come up for payment and Faye has drunk herself into penury. Marten has enough money to cover both sides for one month but, if Faye can't get a job, he's going to have to ask her to move out so that he can find someone who can pay. The lease's terms explicitly give him this right (indeed demands that he do so). Faye has been holding out for weeks, sure that Dora would eventually 'come crawling back to her'. In desperation, she does the crawling; Dora tells Faye straight-up that she needs to dry out before she'd think of re-hiring her; there is another argument that devolves into Faye being insultingly defensive (blaming Dora for the crisis and outright saying that she is trying to get Faye thrown out of the apartment as revenge for the failure of her relationship with Marten). This is the most recent of the bridges Faye does her level best to destroy.

In the meantime, Claire has been stewing over how embarrassing her mother is whenever Marten comes around. She talks to her and her mother suggests that she find her own space. She isn't being thrown out but at 24-25 Mrs A really thinks that her daughter is ready to spread her wings and fly off to a nest of her own. She talks to Marten about it and, after some number-crunching over Claire's tuition fund and the allowance Smif is paying her for her work at the library, they realise that Claire can more than cover the other half of Marten's lease. If Faye turns herself around, she knows of a certain someone (Momo, Marigold having moved in with Dale) who is looking for a new roomie.

So we reach the 'bottles on the bench' moment. Marten has given Faye an ultimatum and she is well aware that Claire has been all-but measuring up the apartment's curtains. She's had a horrible argument with Marten and Claire about it and it's pretty clear that she lost. She's lost her job, in her eyes, her friends have 'abandoned' her and she's about to lose her home.

She has nothing and no-one left. She doesn't even have hope. It's at that point that a passer-by makes a comment about a 'disgusting drunk'. Faye looks at her reflection and sees one looking back at her. Like thousands before her, at this darkest, lowest moment, she turns her face to the metaphorical wall, puts the gun to her head and, as Lord Havelock Vetinari put it...

Her angel appears.

Of all the things in this world he ever expected to be, Marten Reed never expected to be a guardian angel.

That is the thought process that was going through my mind when I wrote my now-infamous 'suicide post'; I compressed it into a week but it is really how I see this arc going.

FWIW, I can see the next strip after the suicide attempt being Marten calling Tai and saying he might not be in that day as Faye was sick. In the background, we can see a crying Faye being talked to by the Doc with a nurse standing by with a tray full of a real pharacopea of meds. I expect Faye to go into residential care for a while (the group therapy scene) and, when she is released, to be a very different person, both negatively (more quiet and reserved) and positive (more determined to seize life in both hands and live it rather than hide away in a comfortable little self-exile). I can see a lovely strip in my head of a very nervous Faye leaving the clinic and being engulfed in her friends' arms.

Lubricus:
Reading these last few strips, I get the feeling that Faye's father's reason for killing himself was deeply connected to alcoholism. I think about the fact that he snuck bourbon into his milkshakes without telling his wife, who did not allow to drink, and that his sudden suicide came as a complete shock to his daughters. Maybe he was in deep alcoholic trouble, but was able to hide it very well, and ended his life when he couldn't take it anymore. That would fit quite well with how Faye is acting presently - and the predilection for substance abuse is often hereditary. Does this look right to you guys?

Detachable Felix:
I gave up on the WCDT a while ago but I just want to say that this particular development makes me very sad and in need of hugs.

MrNumbers:

--- Quote from: BenRG on 20 Jan 2015, 01:47 ---*Snip*!

--- End quote ---



That's... that's brilliant. And it makes so much sense, too. All the pieces fit together so neatly...

plusorminus:
I sort of hope that if Sven is brought into this, he will harken back to that time he made a good point. That strip also establishes that Faye is aware her drinking is an issue and has made a deliberate choice to not tell Dr. Corinne because her psychiatrist might actually make her do something about it.

Yet, it's Dora who fucked up here. Mmm hmm. Okay.

ETA: Okay, I read ahead and stand corrected. She did talk to Dr. Corrinne who asked her to stop drinking and try exercise and Omega 3s. I'd like to know what happened to that program and if Faye does revisit this with Dr. C. if she will now suggest the antidepressants.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page