EGS: Ellen
May. 24th, 2014 09:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stoutfellowIt's the turn of the eighth and last of the central characters, Elliot Dunkel's twin sister Ellen.
One of the key turning points in the comic came when Elliot, seeking to remove the enchantment that had turned him into a girl, touched the Dewitchery Diamond. As Grace's reading had indicated, this stripped the enchantment from him. The enchantment, however, did not go away; it simply received a body of its own. (The Diamond was originally created to free someone from a curse of lycanthropy. Unfortunately, the touch resulted in one ex-werewolf and one large, intelligent, and nearly invulnerable wolf - one capable of inducing lycanthropy in others.) This was Ellen. Confusion followed, made worse by Tedd's jumping to the conclusion that, since the enchantment would have worn off in a month or so, Ellen herself would, um, wear off in that timespan as well. Ellen went on a rampage, then, culminating in a suicidal fight with a monster that was attacking Moperville North. (By this time, Grace had discovered that Ellen was not doomed - at least, not by the Diamond; the monster was another story.) Against the odds, she defeated and destroyed the monster, and the entire group retreated to the Verres household.
Ellen, at the beginning, was a female copy of Elliot: seventeen years old physically, with all the memories of her twin. This left her with a bit of an existential crisis, from which she was coaxed by Nanase. (This was Elliot's idea; none of the other six were right for the job, for one reason or another.) Their mutual attraction probably began at this point, although it didn't reach a head until Grace's birthday party. Ellen's identity problem was modified, possibly for the better, by the intervention of Nioi, an uryuom from another dimension, who provided Ellen with (fictitious) memories of another life, in Nioi's home dimension - these, at least, being the memories of someone female!
Ellen, like Elliot, Awakened as a result of the Diamond incident. Her fundamental power is the ability to change a man into a woman - essentially, the same as the transformation gun that started the whole mess. She has gained a few other abilities, most notably a "copy" beam, which allows her to transform herself into a copy of someone or something else in the vicinity (while retaining her own mind and abilities). By and large, though, she is not as diligent a student of magic as, say, Nanase.
Where Elliot is a stick in the mud, Ellen is a free spirit. It was her idea that she and Nanase should begin pursuing various mysteries, beginning with The Mall Goblin and continuing with a variety of others. The interaction between Elliot and Ellen is, I think, a great deal of fun; see, e.g., a parental conference or relationship advice. But there's a serious side to it; it was Ellen who pushed Elliot into thinking carefully about his feelings about Sarah and Susan. (Despite their shared memories, he's capable of surprising her; see confusion. Part of it, I think, is that she's rubbed off on him somewhat, and she doesn't quite realize it.)
Some EGS fans regard Ellen as uninteresting, since she doesn't seem to have any Problems; her existential angst and her attraction to Nanase have both been resolved, and she seems happy with her life. But I enjoy her role as a foil for both Elliot and Nanase, and the part she plays in the general Dunkel family atmosphere. (Just one more taste: "I see two cats".) She may not be a major target for emotional distress, but a lot of the story revolves around her, and I like it.
One of the key turning points in the comic came when Elliot, seeking to remove the enchantment that had turned him into a girl, touched the Dewitchery Diamond. As Grace's reading had indicated, this stripped the enchantment from him. The enchantment, however, did not go away; it simply received a body of its own. (The Diamond was originally created to free someone from a curse of lycanthropy. Unfortunately, the touch resulted in one ex-werewolf and one large, intelligent, and nearly invulnerable wolf - one capable of inducing lycanthropy in others.) This was Ellen. Confusion followed, made worse by Tedd's jumping to the conclusion that, since the enchantment would have worn off in a month or so, Ellen herself would, um, wear off in that timespan as well. Ellen went on a rampage, then, culminating in a suicidal fight with a monster that was attacking Moperville North. (By this time, Grace had discovered that Ellen was not doomed - at least, not by the Diamond; the monster was another story.) Against the odds, she defeated and destroyed the monster, and the entire group retreated to the Verres household.
Ellen, at the beginning, was a female copy of Elliot: seventeen years old physically, with all the memories of her twin. This left her with a bit of an existential crisis, from which she was coaxed by Nanase. (This was Elliot's idea; none of the other six were right for the job, for one reason or another.) Their mutual attraction probably began at this point, although it didn't reach a head until Grace's birthday party. Ellen's identity problem was modified, possibly for the better, by the intervention of Nioi, an uryuom from another dimension, who provided Ellen with (fictitious) memories of another life, in Nioi's home dimension - these, at least, being the memories of someone female!
Ellen, like Elliot, Awakened as a result of the Diamond incident. Her fundamental power is the ability to change a man into a woman - essentially, the same as the transformation gun that started the whole mess. She has gained a few other abilities, most notably a "copy" beam, which allows her to transform herself into a copy of someone or something else in the vicinity (while retaining her own mind and abilities). By and large, though, she is not as diligent a student of magic as, say, Nanase.
Where Elliot is a stick in the mud, Ellen is a free spirit. It was her idea that she and Nanase should begin pursuing various mysteries, beginning with The Mall Goblin and continuing with a variety of others. The interaction between Elliot and Ellen is, I think, a great deal of fun; see, e.g., a parental conference or relationship advice. But there's a serious side to it; it was Ellen who pushed Elliot into thinking carefully about his feelings about Sarah and Susan. (Despite their shared memories, he's capable of surprising her; see confusion. Part of it, I think, is that she's rubbed off on him somewhat, and she doesn't quite realize it.)
Some EGS fans regard Ellen as uninteresting, since she doesn't seem to have any Problems; her existential angst and her attraction to Nanase have both been resolved, and she seems happy with her life. But I enjoy her role as a foil for both Elliot and Nanase, and the part she plays in the general Dunkel family atmosphere. (Just one more taste: "I see two cats".) She may not be a major target for emotional distress, but a lot of the story revolves around her, and I like it.
