How can you say no to those faces? You can’t, it’s the law.
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I’m gonna guess that response was impulse and that he’s already regretting his words.
But naw, Rupert’s happy he made that decision, Eleanor’s happy he made that decision, and I’m happy he made that decision. Question is, what are the next few weeks (hell, next few DAYS) gonna look like?
from his perspective, he has two bad choices, even before going into the moral aspects
Allowing Eleanor mean having some control and provides a friend to his son, but at the cost of a higher long term risk of rumor and social consequences.
Refusing and expelling her now would be visible, upset both his son and wife, and risk Rupert sneaking out to meet her anyway in the future, in addition to being part of the segregation culture he probably does not approve
Maybe he is thinking of suggesting that Eleanor goes with the Finn when they go back to the main world, “solving ” the issue of her being homeless and neighbor gossip
Nitpick: Mary isn’t Roald’s wife, she’s her brother (IIRC).
Which still leaves the pertinent question: what has happened regarding Roald’s wife? Is her absence the reason for Rupert’s insular withdrawal, and that becomes the real reason for Roald being unable to say no in the end?
Or she’s just away for the story. We don’t need to assume melodrama behind every unrevealed and/or minor plot detail.
You’re probably right, I just couldn’t help recalling that she’s never been mentioned before (not that there was any need to).
That’s true, although if Mary is visiting, she probably is fully aware of where Roald’s possible significant other is (or isn’t), so unless it’s relevant to the discussion, I don’t see any reason for them to mention it on-camera. At least, any Watsonian reason.
“How has Uncle Antoine been raising you”, Jim asks Rupert on page 23 of Handshakes.
Roald’s wife by then hasn’t been around for a long time.
26.
https://www.skindeepcomic.com/archive/handshakes-26-bollocks/
Oy, that reminds me of a question I had when I read the beginning of the Greensleeves café discussion.
https://www.skindeepcomic.com/archive/handshakes-19-the-wonderlanders/
Is the staff hired for its ability to avoid stepping on all the tails, wings, feathers and other things dragging on the floor all over the place?
Ah, but *is* she? Eleanor’s reaction suggests she certainly wasn’t expecting that to happen and she doesn’t know what to do now. Roald isn’t talking down the neighbourhood prejudices and Ealanor has to sacrifice much of the freedom she had outside. How long before the need to belong somewhere starts to feel like the necessity of being imprisoned somewhere?
She’s only limited so long as she’s in town.
Doesn’t mean she can’t sneak out with Rupert if she wanted to play in the woods.
Those horns give ALL Roald’s inner emotions away.
This should be interesting! Good on Roald!
In my head-canon, Roald is like Red from That 70s Show adopting Hyde, and as soon as the kids are out of ear-shot is going to shake his fists at the ceiling and drop the loudest F-bomb.
Puppy-dog eyes win again!
I had my doubts, but those were nuclear-grade puppy dog eyes.
Jimmy’s gonna ruin it.
SOMEHOW, Jimmy’s going to unintentionally ruin it; he just can’t help himself.
Things seem to work out in the end; Eleanor is still friends with Jimmy and Rupert, and she lives in an Avalon.
Doesn’t mean he can’t temporarily ruin it for now while he’s *nine*. :)
I wonder what your definition of ‘ruin’ is in this case.
I mean, not connecting with a bunch of closed-minded speciest yokels who have not even deigned to give them the time of day, and from the way things sound, will never do it in the first place, sounds like a win to me…
As opposed to connecting with The Finns and Rupert.
Putting his foot in it again.
Everyone, I would like you to draw your attention to panels 5-6.
Do you see Rupert’s antennae? No. It’s his eyeballs.
Enjoy.
The happy floof explosion in panel 4 is precious beyond all measure.
You have to love a character who is so excited and cute that their fur almost eats their neck
Well gee. Roald did the right thing. Not without doubts and only after working through a lot of angst, with still more to come while clinging to a desperate hope that he doesn’t have to go all the way. I suspect his neighbors are going to disabuse him of that notion fairly quickly.
This shouldn’t have been in doubt given that Rupert and Eleanor are still together in Liverpool 20+ years later. But the whole messy process is a lot more realistic than the shiny plastic hero approach would have been.
Shiny plastic hero approach is for silver-age comics and novels aimed at teens.
Sometimes to do what is right, you need to call on a mindset that does Wrong. Well, wrong in the eyes of the folks you need to change…
I love it how even Eleanor is aware how big of a deal this is. Looks like Roald might have less to worry. Rupert might be all over the wall for his new bestest buddy ever, but she will quite likely keep the little gleeful monster in check for Roald. :D
The power of cute compels you! The power of cute compels you!
So, unrelated to this page, but related to this webcomic… the Us Fish and Wildlife Service declared the ivory-billed woodpecker extinct today.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-58740362
;_;
I can’t help but stumble over this. Eleanor is obviously making it up as she goes, because she doesn’t know how to address Roald properly – and she ends up with a wording that could just as well come from a random current-day child, rather than, random example, “Sir Rupertsfather” like it would probably have been in medieval times. This goes beyond being in command of the language, and we still don’t have an explanation when, where, and from whom she learnt that …
If Eleanor somehow inherited her language, she would have been speaking in older stlye of language (such as Victorian) for a while if not outright speaking Old English that would not be intelligable to a pair of kids.
I would not be surprised if Wonderlanders know less about the forest inhabitants than they think. I would also not be too surprised if there are Wonderlanders that secretly DO go out into the forest at regular intervals for whatever reason.
I wonder whether it is possible that sometimes a random person somehow DOES wonder into wonderland and transformed into a “monster” with no way back home.
Wasn’t it Roald who commented that humans are particularly susceptible to transmogrification magic?
Rupert bouncing around out of joy in the last three panels is my favourite thing I never knew I needed