On Liz Patterson and perspective failure

Having had an excess of time to consider the issue, it seems to me that the single most upsetting thing about the pathetic and stupid way in which Lizardbreath handled her life after Anthony Caine first became a part of it is that it’s very likely that if she were to see a different cast of characters going through the same disturbing motions, she’d probably correctly identify who the idiot characters were and what their sordid and silly motives were. Contrasting this with the obvious fact that she’s oblivious as to what moved Anthony and Therese and how her own actions might be perceived and it’s distressingly clear that she’s too close to the issue to think clearly and honestly about her past.

I would tend to blame not only her not ever reacting all that well to the idea that someone she knows is ‘allowed’ to have a friend who isn’t her because of her deep-seated belief that people require permission to be friends with people but also her dolt love interest Anthony’s attempt to ‘help’ people by saying the wrong damned thing at the wrong damned time. A person with a brain in his head would keep his damned mouth shut about why exactly it is that Therese thought that the passive and clueless nitwit Elizabeth was plotting her ruin but Anthony is as smart as he is handsome and ambitious. This means that he’d want to help everyone out by explaining to Liz what Therese thought she was doing at the Christmas party with a view to forcing them to get along. Liz might have almost accepted the idea that Anthony was allowed to move on even without her express permission but the idea that she’s thought of as a problem or antagonist made her morals and brains go out the window. She can’t think straight because she never liked the idea of being accused of anything and will probably die moaning about the cruelty of being judged for someone else’s sins despite that being pretty much what always happens in the real world. 

The realest dope about the Settlepocalypse.

Of course, the real problem that I have with the stupid bloody soap opera Lynn thought would improve the last years of the strip is that it did no such thing. Now, Lynn might think that her audience would have been very pleased indeed with the "redemption of Elizabeth" nonsense we were subjected to but it seems to me that had Liz and Anthony not been the stars of a cheesy, sleazy romance comic but instead two more people who get sort of treacly and smug about how faithful they were during University and how they had a tidy little marriage without jolts, shock or drama, they'd be more bearable people than the monsters we wound up with.

The problem, though, is that Lynn had herself a damned itch to scratch and it led her to something far outside her competence zone. Just as Batiuk should have left serious business aside and stuck to doing a down-beat and wan copy of Archie, Lynn's talents lie in the recording and playback of the dirt-ordinary behaviour of tidy little people who try to avoid trouble. Simply put, Pattersons and Patterson-like people are not meant to experience what Liz and Anthony did. They are meant to stand on the sidelines and make ill-informed and superior comments about people who are.