Order of the Stick
I've been contemplating on what to talik about for the first review of the New Year. But while there were some truly unexpected plot twists for Girl Genius and an absolutely fantastic ending for 2013 for Something Positive, I have to admit that inertia and laziness was keeping me from writing something new. Well, today's Order of the Stick has not only managed to kick this stone to rolling once more, but it ends a storyline I felt had gone on for far too long... with an ending far too good not to talk about.
This isn't the first time I've been tempted to write about OotS, mind you. Back when Elan and crew escaped Tarquin, I was happy to call it a wrap. So was Elan and crew. Needless to say, the pointless idiocy of having Tarquin once more appear to inflict more tedium as he sought to punish his surviving son for daring to live his own life instead of indulging in a father's narcisism had me about ready to update Tangents before the New Year and rage about the Plot that Refused to Die.
Fortunately, I listened to my friends who urged caution (and who weren't as annoyed at Tarquin's refusal to accept the story wasn't about him) and let sleeping dogs lie. And at the end the readers got the ending that was needed: the airship sailing off into the distance while an impotent and irate Tarquin raged about how things weren't going his way. It is the ending that Tarquin deserved, the ending I wanted to see (only I wanted it a dozen or so updates earlier).
That said, this ending was needed at this point, not earlier. For this was ultimately the point where Elan finishes his character arc and grows as a person, as he stood over his father, clinging to the ship, and reflected on how this was similar to his first meeting with Nale. Except he's not a twin anymore. Tarquin's not the real villain. And Elan has realized that sometimes, just sometimes, the right thing to do is not the "noble" thing to do.
This isn't the first time I've been tempted to write about OotS, mind you. Back when Elan and crew escaped Tarquin, I was happy to call it a wrap. So was Elan and crew. Needless to say, the pointless idiocy of having Tarquin once more appear to inflict more tedium as he sought to punish his surviving son for daring to live his own life instead of indulging in a father's narcisism had me about ready to update Tangents before the New Year and rage about the Plot that Refused to Die.
Fortunately, I listened to my friends who urged caution (and who weren't as annoyed at Tarquin's refusal to accept the story wasn't about him) and let sleeping dogs lie. And at the end the readers got the ending that was needed: the airship sailing off into the distance while an impotent and irate Tarquin raged about how things weren't going his way. It is the ending that Tarquin deserved, the ending I wanted to see (only I wanted it a dozen or so updates earlier).
That said, this ending was needed at this point, not earlier. For this was ultimately the point where Elan finishes his character arc and grows as a person, as he stood over his father, clinging to the ship, and reflected on how this was similar to his first meeting with Nale. Except he's not a twin anymore. Tarquin's not the real villain. And Elan has realized that sometimes, just sometimes, the right thing to do is not the "noble" thing to do.