darrin wrote: ↑Tue Jan 16, 2018 4:29 pm
No I mean "reliable/unreliable observer" in the technical sense, are we getting useful information out of him here (is the author using the character to convey things the author actually thinks, or on the contrary using him more for {f}red herrings)?
How could we as audience ever be able beforehand to discern what things are going to end up like, what in story is there that lets us tell. (The meta, reading the author's mind a prior, is another matter, but seems always a losing game.) My belief has usually been that whatever answers we come up with should derive from story materials only, that if it isn't in story comic somewhere, it doesn't count. (Although not that everything in story comic has meaning and importance.) The only way to really know is for story to tell us via words or images. If it hasn't, in some way, there effectively is no answer yet. Until it's in a finalized/posted story comic, it isn't there; ideas and plans can and do change even during creation, certainly before.
Whatever we want otherwise, what's in story about Analogues directly is in two places, the interrogator guy in 1271 and Ibara in 1239. That's all, except for whatever story material helps further explain those two people in the comics before and after each use of
Analogue. There is then indirectly anything else in story that might help support building a tentative definition. What that is, extensive and arguable. Simpler, does it appear that stories form themselves around Miho as she moves around. Characters and roles in situations to people in ways at times. If so, maybe that's what an Analogue is. If that's an Analogue Support Facility, and Miho was a valid "guest" there, then perhaps she's an Analogue. That's kind of what we have to work with, in the context of some 1400 to 1500 other comics aside from ~1271 and ~1239.
All we can do is try and piece it together from other materials to get a better idea, but as much as we wish it was well explained in a known authoritative manner, we don't and can't yet know if it has been. We shouldn't get rabid about it and camp her spawn point though.
Again, after reading 1240 and its neighbors, what exactly do we know about "analogues" (actual concrete stuff, not fluff like "her character became far more real than she ever was")?
That supposedly Miho is one and that it involves creating stories and emotions for audiences. Such as what happened with Erika's fans, and a number of times earlier on Miho apparently has emotions revitalize her, and the way people seem to be drawn into whatever sort of fictional orbits she creates here and there, Piro, Ping, Largo, Ed, etc.
Whichever way we determine it, if we're trying to define the term
Analogue, we only have what we have, most all of which is decidedly not concrete. How would somebody best explain imagination personified, describe what a muse does, detail the workings of a goddess, put the operation of a demon's power into words; and to do that sort of thing for people who don't know anything about it or who believe none of it even while experiencing it. How concrete then can it be to say, that observers take what they think and feel about a character and a plot, and their perceptions of what is true is more important to them than the facts are. What does one demonstrate to somebody else that proves that is true, except by building a case and investigating the available evidence to deduce or induce conclusions?
Can we actually add anything specific to the lists of things "analogues" are or aren't, or can or can't do? Anything to distinguish what he's saying from tipsy rambling?
It didn't appear all that tipsy and rambling. Even if so, it seems all we can do is add anything in story that tends to support Miho as some sort of source of stories and the things that go along with stories. To look for things in story that tend to disprove that notion, and try and come up with another tentative explanation or definition when needed. Some answer anywhere from a force of nature that creates plots and characters and situations, or some female with a few powers, some illusions, and delusions of grandeur.
As far as Ibara himself, attacking the messenger likely doesn't help in thinking about the messages, and more so, him being a snake is largely in and of itself unimportant when trying to answer the question, in defining
Analogue. Or in discussing if the term really means anything to begin with. Taking the snake part as a grain of salt, laying it aside to see what impact it has with and without it. Does he have a reason to know something about Miho, is there a reason he'd be lying about it to Junko, does what he say fit anything else we know or think we know, would he know what Miho is roughly, does any of what he says match her behaviors or what his apparent peers Ed and Dom have said and done. That all is gained only from looking at a great many other things in comic. Ed looking at a readout and freaking out. Of course that Ibara is apparently an abusive thieving lush slacker etc might have some bearing on how importantly we take his perceptions on their own. And yes, most everything we get from everyone in MT is perception, and yes, a great amount of what everyone says apparently traces back to Miho or wherever she's from somehow. So we do indeed have to be more careful the more unreliable the information, and do more correlating of all the material from such places. Miho is very inconsistent and there are huge gaps in information and she is exceedingly vague, seems no help directly. And even though all we have of the usage of the word analogue is by the interrogator and Ibara, we can if needed discard all of what both say, if none of what they said fits. It shouldn't be used if it's worthless, just because it's all there is. Toss it, and not count that anyone has called her that. Which doing so would leave us with Ed and Ibara calling her the real thing, or what Dom has said about her usefulness and import, or Ibara talking about her as a story type source.
Yet it's probably not too surprising our "insider information" about Miho is from those we've been presented with as insiders. Flawed agenda-driven insiders. If we discount it all simply because of who the material is from (Ibara looks a horrible dad and low-life sort, Dom is a violent cynical opportunist, and Ed is a violent psychopath) then that seems to leave us with Miho. Which by behavior and circumstance is a lot of what we have to figure out what an analogue/the real thing/source would be anyway. Which is in large part the situations and her explanations and "answers" at the apartment, in the gaps, at the bathhouse and at the school -- Chapter 11. And a number of things in Chapter 10, including Yuki finding her not dead at the ASF and Miho goading Yuki to take her to the Dance of the Evils. And lots of background and supporting materials in the other 10 chapters before them.
But if we do look to Ibara to begin with, we have seen Junko is at the least very predisposed to not listen to anything her father has to say. She's hostile at the school, she's angry at him for his going to the CoE. Yet she seems to accept this CoE explanation of Miho, at least as she understands that explanation in light of what she is aware of already, and however much as she accepts him as the explainer of it. As she also appears to believe him, to some extent, when she accuses him at the CoE of being hammered and he say he's not had "much". But about Miho, the questions are does Ibara have the correct information, and are his perceptions of what he's been given correct. (if we assume he's not just lying) Certainly we have some idea he should have some information, and might guess yes or no about the perceptions from what he's said and how that fits what we are aware of. Yet Ibara is an insider, and he's apparently not overcome with hatred of Miho, and he doesn't want to either ignore or destroy her. There is that. But like the interrogator doesn't appear at all aware of what Miho has been doing out in the world or Piro's large role in it over time, it could be that Ibara is very truthfully giving Junko an explanation of a little bit of wrong information that he doesn't even understand correctly, and he's extrapolating it out. That what he says is worthless. Which would have not much to do with him being a jerk or even if he wasn't. The tricky thing here is deciding which or an alternative you believe, and wait to see if the tentative conclusion turns out to be correct if we ever get an actual answer.
I don't know what exactly he's been doing in the "industry" these past few decades, but based on this bit (
EDIT again I mean 1240 and friends) I'm leaning a lot more toward "ad copy" than "user manuals".
He's been staying on the outside of the more aggressive methods and goals of Sony and Sega, and he does appear (and maybe has mentioned) he's not so much a field operative as much as an executive or something, because, Nintendo. I think also Ed and/or Dom say they scared him out of play. Which I suppose then Miho's stories brought him back out, due to high stakes and that sort of thing. That's all a kind of personification of what the games are and that the people in the companies are like that too, so it's a pretty meta sort of thing, more playing with the tropes. (Like a lot of things, maybe not to take too seriously; Meimi and her striped bowl, origami-folded too-low bail, Largo attacking ravers or having his shoes blown off.)
Although again, none of Ibara's personal failings makes him wrong about how he explains what Miho is to Junko. Even if it's vague and incomplete. The same way that even if he was beyond reproach, it would not make him right about it. And also, as far as we know we are still in the middle of the demonstration Miho wanted to give Piro about what's up with her. So a better "more official" explanation might only be a way off, and from what we see, not from what
anyone in MT explains.
cidjen wrote: ↑Wed Jan 17, 2018 4:34 am
I'd hazard a guess, this is exactly what Our Artist really subtly hints us not to do - we shouldn't try to piece Miho together, He doesn't want the story to collapse under the weight of our expectations...
we must tread carefully
Yeah, except we have behind the scenes information, and have seen a number of other MT people's viewpoints and actions, and don't have access to pictures/chats on the laptop or all of the material Junko had Ping post. We're partial insiders.