for ElfQuest fans

[arethinn]

Do you think ElfQuest ever jumped the shark? If so, when? My opinion based on having read only up to "Hidden Years" #1 (I think it is) is that said piscine was leapt over at about "Cry from Beyond". The story starts to have a quality I recognize from roleplaying campaigns/troupes that have gone on too long with the same characters, in that you have to keep inventing more and more outrageous events and powers to keep things interesting (or maybe not have to, per se, but it becomes more and more difficult to make the subtle work). Perhaps there are even worse things in store for me if I were to read all the rest of the series (not that that stops me from wanting to do it!)?

Also, does anyone know the Wolfrider name for "summer"? Spring is "newgreen" (AFAIK), autumn is "nut-fall" and winter is "white-cold" or "death-sleep" but I haven't seen a reference for an idiosyncratic term for summer that I can recall.

Comments

[lothie.livejournal.com]

Wow, I thought it jumped the shark way back in the original series actually. But I haven't read it since the '80's so I am without a clue really.

[arethinn]

Really, where?

[lothie.livejournal.com]

IIRC I remember rolling my eyes sometime around when they returned to the castle. Or maybe it was during the battle. Somewhere in there.

[arethinn]

Right, then. Since two out of three people are of this opinion, clearly I am just an uncultured pleb whose threshold of what constitutes "jumping the shark" is a lot higher than any person with taste. Sorry I asked.

I don't understand. What's "OMG, this is so ridiculous, they're just doing this because they've run out of actual story ideas and now have to fill in with special effects" about the battle with the trolls? Or do we maybe have different definitions of shark-jumping?

[lothie.livejournal.com]

Well, please understand I'm reaching back, what, 20 years or something to try to remember my reactions.

My feeling at the time was that the storyline was not what had been originally conceived and was in fact getting more and more contrived as time went on. Honestly, I'd have to reread the whole thing to remember exactly. I just remember shaking my head and saying "what are they ON" or something like that.

But I don't see how this makes you an uncultured pleb...

[arethinn]

My feeling at the time was that the storyline was not what had been originally conceived

O.o I could be very wrong, but I thought the story of the first 20 issues was baasically a bloc, conceived and plotted all at once before it started to be actually drawn and written.

But I don't see how this makes you an uncultured pleb...

By itself no, but 67% of those polled agreed, and the other 33% kind of answered "other" (since piperdawn tied it to something outside the comic series itself - I dunno when the point is she's talking about). So it appears my opinion isn't that of the majority of intelligent critics, basically. (yes, i know this sample size is too small)

[lothie.livejournal.com]

I thought the story of the first 20 issues was baasically a bloc, conceived and plotted all at once

Well, I know that's what the Pinis said, but I don't know that I believed it. I mean, George Lucas said that about the 9 Star Wars episodes too, and I don't quite believe that either, given the plot inconsistencies between eps I-III and IV-VI.

I think that they conceived the first five, plus a hazy plotline for what might follow if the series were successful enough to continue, and met up with difficulties due to bad planning when they were most of the way through. That's what it felt like to me. *shrug* I'm kinda surprised that I have agreement; I know most fans at the time DIDN'T agree.

[razorjak.livejournal.com]

Couldn't tell you. The last Elfquest stories I read where the ones later collected in the fourth graphic novel. I lost interest when they explained the elves as alien metamorphs.

I don't know the full names of the seasons. But I remember a phrase along the lines of " ... the seasons running through their many eigths ... " ie 8 seasons. Supposedly due to the two moons.

I don't know if they ever fleshed that out. or if it was something dropped due to them not knowing how to go about it.

[arethinn]

But I remember a phrase along the lines of " ... the seasons running through their many eigths ... " ie 8 seasons.

O.o Never heard this. I'm pretty sure it's not in any of the first four collections (which I've just re-read, so could be wrong, but I feel confident). A phrase which included "seasons" and "eights" would to me indicate years, since they say things like "eight-of-days" and "eights of years" and stuff.

[razorjak.livejournal.com]

it's in the second collection ... describing the childhood of cutter and leetah's children ;-)

[arethinn]

What do you mean by "second collection"? I don't recall this in books 5-8 either. I made a point of saying I didn't think it was in 1-4 because you said that was all you'd read. *scratches head*

[razorjak.livejournal.com]

You have to remember I started reading elfquest as single issue comics. To me, the graphic novels were collections.

Book 1 - first collection, ending with the hunter elf ... whatisname ... leaving Sorrow's End.

Book 2 - second collection, ending around the time the bird-riders abduct the wolfriders.

Book 3 - third collection, yada yada yada

So I meant Book 2.

Couldn't tell you as I haven't opened those up in ... years. They're still packed.

[arethinn]

Ah, I see. Because books 1-4 contain the "original quest" series, I think of that as as "the first collection".

I just read book 2 like the day before yesterday and I don't remember this phrase in it, but now I want to go over it again to be sure!

[razorjak.livejournal.com]

It's all a matter of what format you saw Elfquest in first, I guess. I remember it from the late 70's. Damn, I'm an old fart.

Hell, I think I still have the Epic magazine that has the sidestory/first appearance of the preservers and their forest of cocoons. That story was sorta kinda retold when Cutter opens up the cocoon holding the two fugitive human lovers. (- I don't remember if that was PRE Elfquest or not. But there were no elves in the story. -)

[arethinn]

That was actually after the original series, I think, since it appears in the appendices of like the fifth or sixth book of the graphic novels. "Sidestory" is more accurate, I guess. It was a retelling of that bit for the more adult audience of that magazine (hence the nudity).

[razorjak.livejournal.com]

It may appear in the fifth or sixth book - but it definately didn't appear THAT far along in the series.

I DO know it appeared before the sequence the preservers are introduced in Elfquest. I just don't know if it appeared in Epic magazine Elfquest started. This was definately in the 70s that the story I am talking about first was published.

[arethinn]

I just don't know if it appeared in Epic magazine Elfquest started.

(reading a "before" between "magazine" and "Elfquest")

There's a blurb about it in the appendix notes of the book it's in, but without the book in front of me I don't know what they stated the pub date was. Maybe it was issued more than once?

[razorjak.livejournal.com]

Could be. I just remember it definately being the seventies as I remember reading it the kitchen table at my grandparents house.

[arethinn]

We're both kind of right. "Homespun" appears in the gallery of the sixth book (issues published 1987-1988), but was itself published in 1980 (so I was wrong about the gallery material always being roughly contemporary with the issues they accompany). I would guess the issues in book 2 would have been published in 1979, but it's possible it was 1980 by the time the same episode showed up in Elfquest, thus to have the characters predate their appearance in the series (but not the series as a whole). Meh, who knows.

Re: "eights of seasons" or something, I really don't see any phrase like that in book 2. Might be elsewhere but I seriously don't recall any reference to anything more than 4 seasons, at least not in the material you say you've read. Again, meh. this is getting stupidly picky even for me. So I turn off the faucet now.

[aki-dreaming.livejournal.com]

It's a counting convention based on the fact the elves have three fingers and a thumb. They count in base eight, rather than base ten, like we do.

[arethinn]

Yes, I know, that's what I meant.

[aki-dreaming.livejournal.com]

:D

[aki-dreaming.livejournal.com]

Elfquest jumped the shark when they became so firmly convinced they HAD to produce a movie. I don't want a movie. I want a decent comic. Wanted a decent comic. I was good up until Wendy left the art team completely. At that point, I just wasn't interested. She's integral to what I want from EQ.

From The Wolfrider's Guide to the World of Elfquest:

"There are different names for the seasons: Autumn is the season of death sleep, winter is the season of white cold, spring the season of new green. Summer, oddly, has never been named per se. The passing of the seasons is often described as, '...long sun, dying time, deep cold, snowmelt, new buds...'"

We use Long Sun at our holt and I think we're using Leaf Fall for autumn, but I'd have to go look to make sure. That makes me a BAD holt mama.