2011-03-10, 00:43 | Link #21 |
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Join Date: Dec 2010
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I feel like hating myself for saying the same thing twice, but since my post got deleted...Christie's characterization was specifically good for her thrillers. It went Thrillers>Marple novels>Poirot novels about characterization.
Her characters were more interesting to me than Umineko's almost every time, but it's a matter of personal Christies' characters weren't as overblown as Ryuukishi's, which made them more real to me. Spoiler:
Sure, some of the twists Christie put did make her characters seem like liars all the time, but it made for entertaining stories. Ryu's character wasn't so much a revelation as a silly declaration. The villain revelation, while random at times(from a character development point of view, not an evidence based one), made certain novels feel much better when reading them a second time. Death on the Nile becomes very interesting once you know who the killer is. I recall having a reaction that went like this. ->Finding out who the killer is(before Poirot explained everything) ->Going "...son of a...but if that's true then..." ->Re-reading a few key scenes with him and screaming DAMN LIAAAAAAR ->Being satisfied at having cracked his lies. Also, I dare say that a killer who isn't trying to hide his true character feels much more cheap to me than the other way around. Why, the bastard can plan a locked room that can puzzle god knows how many people but can't act like a regular person? Sure, I suppose that's realistic. But it feels boring to me. To me, finding out that the creepy man who ate things that resembled human heads for his whole life is the killer isn't nearly as entertaining as being invited to a person's house, seeing how normal he is, and then finding a skeleton in his closet. That's where taste comes in. I prefer that everyone appears perfectly normal until the clues give you enough power to crack their lies, and as such I prefer Christie. If I wanted to focus on character development, I probably wouldn't like her as much. I suppose Ryu's work falls more into Chandler's style than Christie's, for the sake of comparison. |
2011-03-10, 01:09 | Link #22 | ||||
Slashy Slashy!
Join Date: Jun 2010
Location: USA
Age: 34
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From the JDC essay you showed me earlier: "The fine detective story, be it repeated, does not consist of "a" clue, It is a ladder of clues, a pattern of evidence, joined together with such cunning that even the experienced reader may be deceived: untill, in the blaze of the surprise-ending, he suddenly sees the whole design" The characters themselves, above all, should be a part of that design! You can't just write a mystery novel, and then draw a name out of the hat at the end for the culprit. But then, I am being too harsh on poor Christie. She is certainly not that bad. Her novels just frustrate me at times, is all. Quote:
In terms of writing "real" characters, Ryukishi is probably closer to Chandler. But in terms of style, Umineko is naturally more similar to Christie, of course. Last edited by naikou; 2011-03-10 at 01:22. |
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2011-03-10, 01:29 | Link #23 | |||||
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Join Date: Dec 2010
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That "twist effect" did have the weird side-effect of making her more normal novels come off as a surprise to her fans though. Quote:
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But more often than not she has the good sense to also rewrite the characters to give off hints of their true nature. Sure she isn't Van Dine(who I'd say, despite his hatred for anything that wasn't related to puzzles, was quite good at making believable characters) but her characters did come off well at times. There were times(Poirot's Christmas) when the twist felt so...twisty that I disliked the book. But she made me praise her more often than curse her(and in the case of Ackroyd, she made me do both). Quote:
His essay "the simple art of murder" is absolutely hilarious. He went on and on about how he hated both Golden Age and "the hardboiled babies" and just wrote detective fiction because it was the "only genre of fiction that wasn't pretentious." I know this sounds stupid, but Chandler was completely tsundere about the genre. He wrote mysteries, he read them, he probably liked them, then went "I hate EVERYTHING!" Quote:
The puzzle plotting does match Christie better, that is true. His characters match Chandler's ideas better, which is true as well. Shame those two ideas didn't mix that well. In theory, Chandler's complex characters and Christie's complex plots put together sounds like the day mankind invented the sandwich. But those two often get in the way of each other, as Umineko unfortunately demonstrated. |
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2011-03-10, 07:53 | Link #24 |
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Agatha Christie wrote romances under the name "Mary Westmacott". The copies I've seen (printed long after her death) all had the byline "Agatha Christie writing as Mary Westmacott"; I'm not sure whether they were originally done without her real name.
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2011-03-14, 17:38 | Link #27 | |
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Join Date: Dec 2010
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Bernkastel would show up and claim to be the witch of miracles. The JDC character would show up and say "I am so much better than all of you it hurts. I AM THE MAN WHO CAN EXPLAIN MIRACLES!" Then Bernkastel would die immediately and melt in the face of his amazing powers. But seriously though, I kind of wish that each Chiru episode had a character based on one famous ruleset. Episode 5 could be Knox, episode 6 could be Chandler, episode 7 could be Van Dine, and episode 8 could be Carr. Carr's philosophy about how rules were just prejudices would be interesting. He could even use a different colored text. His definition of rules would even fit with gold! Out of the two pieces that we do have though, I'd say Will is the best one. Dlanor is too much "appealing to loli fans despite being actually freaking tall if you look at her tip" and not enough mystery based, even if she does have her cool moments. Will on the other hand is the mystery genre incarnate so that's awesome. Also, important question: Is it just me or does it bother anyone else that Umineko refers to locked rooms as closed rooms? It's just that...I'm used to locked rooms! I don't know if it was a translating convention or if I just conditioned myself to the wrong term, but personally I've never heard "closed room" outside of Umineko. It's always "locked room." |
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2011-03-14, 19:39 | Link #28 |
Slashy Slashy!
Join Date: Jun 2010
Location: USA
Age: 34
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I've always heard it as "locked room", as well. I have heard of "closed circles" before (which Umineko also features): http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ClosedCircle
Dlanor's character design is terrible. I hated her when I first saw her... but after the tea party with Battler, Virgilia, and Dlanor, I actually kind of liked her character! Though there's no doubt Will is the better representative of mystery. ...except for the fact that he's really bad at the whole "explaining the mystery" thing at the end. D: |
2011-03-14, 20:07 | Link #29 |
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Join Date: Dec 2010
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Yeah I've heard of closed circles before. Just not closed rooms.
I thought Dlanor was a pretty annoying character at first, but she got more interesting after that tea party. Will was great, but unfortunately Ryu limited him too much. Seriously, Erika is okay and all but she got way, way too much screentime. If he wanted to make a point about the genre, he should have used Will for longer. We never got a Battler vs Will fight as well, which I found rather disappointing. Another thing I found weird is how Ryu went for basically every cliche except the dying message one. |
2011-03-14, 21:41 | Link #30 | |
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Join Date: May 2009
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"Closed room" has a very specific definition in Umineko which is supposed to differentiate it from a "locked room." Presumably one can be one, but not the other.
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Unfortunately, the dialogue in ep1-4 appears to use the terms interchangeably, including before Beatrice actually defines it (it's used in ep1 by the actual characters) so I think Ryukishi just forgot. It could also be a translation thing, I dunno.
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2011-03-15, 00:33 | Link #31 | ||
Slashy Slashy!
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So even in that sense, the terms mean the same thing. It's possible, though, that "closed room" and "locked room" have evolved as separate synonyms in Japan, now that I think about it. Quote:
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2011-03-15, 03:22 | Link #32 |
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There was that paint that was supposed to resemble blood. But rather than Ryu going for a cliche message, it was one of his characters that was going for it. Which was meant for us to understand as an attempt to fake some blood...
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2011-03-16, 14:50 | Link #34 |
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Join Date: Sep 2010
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"By the time you have read this, I will probably be dead. Please find out the truth. That's my only wish" in-a-bottle sounds a lot like the standard dying message to me... Well, at least before ep4, when things start getting complicated. Although, I think Ange was the only one to ever read that and she's not exactly a detective, so maybe it doesn't count?
Last edited by naever; 2011-03-16 at 15:33. |
2011-03-16, 19:48 | Link #36 | |
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Join Date: Jan 2011
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He closes the first chapter by challenging us to discover the truth, and then finishes the story by telling us "Yeah, about that, total waste of time." ... |
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2011-03-16, 20:26 | Link #38 | |
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Join Date: Dec 2010
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...Especially since the message bottles were written before the incidents. |
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