Doylist analysis on LC fix timing

[lt_murgen]

Going back to the Doylist idea and looking at the writer's reasons, rather than character reasons, I believe such an analysis lends credence to the idea of a time-travelling Harry.

Consider the knowledge of time travel to be a Chekov's gun.  It was placed in Proved Guilty as a interesting side note, but not critical to that plot.  However, once seen, it can be called upon when it is critical to the plot later.

Consider this:  For whatever reason, Harry has to change something in the past, around the time of Proven Guilty.  He knows when he will be gone, so he goes back to his apartment to use LC.  He runs into Thomas and pretends to be current Harry, in a hurry.  He fixed LC and gets the info he needs.  But on his way out, he lets something slip that sets Thomas on edge.  Thus Thomas greets Harry with suspicion later on in PG.

As far as a reaons, well, this was the book that showed the aftermath of someone's attack on Arctis Tor- another big event that occurred "off camera".  Perhaps not forever...

[knnn]

He runs into Thomas and pretends to be current Harry, in a hurry.  He fixed LC and gets the info he needs.  But on his way out, he lets something slip that sets Thomas on edge.  Thus Thomas greets Harry with suspicion later on in PG.

I like this explanation.  It also covers why Thomas is not knowledgeable about LC in "Backup".

[Ms Duck]

your doylist explanation needs more doylist explanations 

1-if it was future harry, why does he need thomas to let him in?

2- the discussion about time was not about time travel; it was about predicting the future. its about how someone who can see the future, must act in twisty turny methods if they wish to change it.

2b- thus, if your assumption is corect, a person fore saw that harry would not be there then, and that thomas would be, and then had to talk thomas into letting them in, (since its not future harry, he would not need that coincidence) and its not Eb (he was busy). So how did the gatekeeper talk his way past thomas, a person he had never met before? (and a whampire as well?)

2c- youre ignoring the car hit at the begining of the book. by doylist analysis, that must be crucial as well.

3- does not explain: the incidents with LC in turn coat, or his headaches in TC

3b- this is important because at some point jim needs to solve most of these mysteries. the list is now long enough that either many of them have one single solution, or hes is going to have a similliarion of his own attached to book 20.

3c- while a 700 page 'mysteries solved' would be awesome, i dont see it selling well. 


simpler doylist explanation: Mab. the time travel discussion is about how she foresaw the future, and why she needs to use very twisty methods ( bring molly to AT, to bring harry, etc..) to change it.

doylist within the doylist: unless LC was fixed, mab's plan would not work. ergo, she , prior to implementing her plan, made sure all parts were operational.

DwD2- this explains the exact wording she used in her bargian with harry in sk.

- also the clues given in TC, SmF, C, and GS

(I dont mind doylist analysis. I just think if youre going to do it, you need to to do it on all the books as one piece. too many of the mysteries depend on clues in prior or later books.)

- the quacker.

[knnn]

your doylist explanation needs more doylist explanations 

1-if it was future harry, why does he need thomas to let him in?

If you look at the original post, nobody is saying it must be Time-travelling Harry.  Any sort of "Thomas let them in" is possible.

2c- youre ignoring the car hit at the begining of the book. by doylist analysis, that must be crucial as well.

A Doyle explanation for the cab ride does not need to explain every other point in the book.  (e.g. fixing little Chicago does not necessarily have to do with the assault on AT)

3- does not explain: the incidents with LC in turn coat, or his headaches in TC

It certainly doesn't need to explain things in other books.  There can certainly be other (Doyalist or otherwise) explanations for those things (e.g. Demonreach making its presence known).

3b- this is important because at some point jim needs to solve most of these mysteries. the list is now long enough that either many of them have one single solution, or hes is going to have a similliarion of his own attached to book 20.

Some of the outstanding questions in the books may have combined solutions, but to reject this theory just because it doesn't fit 3 specific incidents that you decided *must* be connected is a little harsh IMO.

simpler doylist explanation: Mab. the time travel discussion is about how she foresaw the future, and why she needs to use very twisty methods ( bring molly to AT, to bring harry, etc..) to change it.

(I dont mind doylist analysis. I just think if youre going to do it, you need to to do it on all the books as one piece. too many of the mysteries depend on clues in prior or later books.)

- the quacker.

Sorry, but this theory isn't really "Doyalist" in that it doesn't really address the orignal Doyalist issue at all.  Namely:

Why did Jim have Harry to go back to his apartment (in Murphy's car) only to take a cab to the convention?

[synobal]

You are forgetting LC itself.

Ya the similarities between little chicago and

(click to show/hide)

and how Alera was formed

always struck me, but I doubt anything will ever come of it. It was presumably destroyed after all.

[Ms Duck]

@knn-

no, because I think thats just filler. it does however, adress other issues:

- why did JIM have Mab steal the rod and mess with his memmories? it wasnt for plot or tension, having mab say "you are being traced by your fire magic; therefore, you may cast no evocations" would have done that better and easier.

- why the long discussion- not on time travel, btw, but on precognition- and the rather extreme lenghts you would have to go to change a propechy? - Because Mab is the one changing time.

- why the refences in TC to a tarp? or a headache caused by 'two icicles shoved in my brain?'

-thomas let someone in does not buy it for me. who? and why would he let them in? Thomas is a whampire lord- they dont get much more paranoid than that. I cant see gatekeeper coming up with some explanation thomas would accept. About the only person wed let in would be Justine, and she wasnt doing much at the moment.

-any future harry, thomas, or maggie jr would not need to be let in.

-Jim has mentioned that one of the reasons not to do a story from Mouses' pov is that he knows toom much. what, exactly? How about what the person who did it smelled like?

-and yes, i do think you need to consider the books as a whole, Take the belts for example- the clues about the erlking were not until much later. and it still is not resolved as to WHY ek may have done it. hence the other clues about marcone, hendricks, and odin.

-perhaps thomas let someone in. who? why? how did they get past? what clues have been dropped? were all the clues in PG? Somehow I doubt the last one.

- the quacker

who thinks mab did it, not for personal reasons, but because of the wieght of evidence.

[prince lotore]

what if it is future Thomas that tomas let in.  Thomas uses an amulet to get in and it probably stopped working after harrys place burns down.  so who ever sends him back tells him how to fix lc but he needs his younger self to get in.  thats why thomas is so broken up after harrys death.  his future self came back to save harry once where is he this time

[Ms Duck]

if 'lord thomas raith' from the future needs someone to let him in, hes not a good enough wizard to fix the darn thing.

also goes for maggie jr,etc,etc..

the PG story was rewritten, i believe, because its out of order- it was supposed to be before dead beat, but the editor wanted the trex for the first hard back. cant say i blame her.

 

thus, it may be a story artifact. or filler, for a scene that was cut. or backstory- perhaps its part of the thomas become a hairdresser joke.

by itself, it doesnt answer any questions- whoever went in would still have to:

-know about the LC
-know how to fix it
-know about mab's plans
-foresee the future
-want to risk changing a prophecy to do so
-get past thomas now, instead of harry's wards, which in many ways, beign dumb, are easier to get past

- that still leaves us with two real options:
Mab
Gatekeeper

of all of these, I think Mab walking in the hidden door in the basement is a lot more likely. In  whcih case, your analysis is just the time she did so, and has nothing to do with thomas at all.

[prince lotore]

but what if future thomas goes back with future bob.  they meet thomas there because they need him for what ever else they go back for.

[knnn]

no, because I think thats just filler.

Nevertheless, this was point that started this whole thread.  Saying "nah, it's just filler" is kinda anti-doyle IMHO.

- why did JIM have Mab steal the rod and mess with his memmories? it wasnt for plot or tension, having mab say "you are being traced by your fire magic; therefore, you may cast no evocations" would have done that better and easier.

One could say the same thing for Mab fixing LC - why not simply tell Harry?

- why the long discussion- not on time travel, btw, but on precognition- and the rather extreme lenghts you would have to go to change a propechy? - Because Mab is the one changing time.

1) At the risk of repeating myself, the OP was just about seeing Thomas.

2) You seem to be contradicting yourself - it can't be about time travel because the conversation is about precog, but then Mab changed time?

- why the refences in TC to a tarp? or a headache caused by 'two icicles shoved in my brain?'

Tarp - simpler way of saying "I tried using LC but it didn't work".  Same way he mentions "that clear shelf with a skull and steamy novels" every time he goes down to the lab.

Mouse-Headache - Someone controlling his brain.  Remember, he had been having those headaches for the last couple of months.  If you want to say it's Mab, you'll have explain why he had the headache the morning before Morgan dropped in on him.

-thomas let someone in does not buy it for me. who? and why would he let them in? Thomas is a whampire lord- they dont get much more paranoid than that. I cant see gatekeeper coming up with some explanation thomas would accept. About the only person wed let in would be Justine, and she wasnt doing much at the moment.

Thomas letting someone in is one explanation for the scene.  The Doyle part doesn't say anything more than "meeting Thomas at the front door is important". 

Other possibilities:

- As pointed out, Future Harry might have fooled Thomas long enough.
- Murhpy - Thomas knows her.  She could vouch for someone else (say Molly?)
- Heck, Future Thomas could have showed up with someone in tow.

-any future harry, thomas, or maggie jr would not need to be let in.

True, but all we're trying to solve is why that scene with Thomas was written.  If e.g. Future Harry meets Thomas, (on the way out), and we read about it in some later book, then this scene makes sense (first foreshadowing of future encounter).

-Jim has mentioned that one of the reasons not to do a story from Mouses' pov is that he knows toom much. what, exactly? How about what the person who did it smelled like?

I believe that's stretching it.  You're are really saying that the only reason Jim couldn't write a Mouse POV story is because Mouse happened to have smelled who came in to fix LC?  I think it would be simple for Jim to simply not have that specific memory/thought come up during the course of the story.

More likely, it's that Mouse is clued in to any number of important facts, and it would be hard to write something from Mouse's POV without bringing up any of those.

-and yes, i do think you need to consider the books as a whole, Take the belts for example- the clues about the erlking were not until much later. and it still is not resolved as to WHY ek may have done it. hence the other clues about marcone, hendricks, and odin.

First of all, many - maybe even most of the books have multiple little-connected plots running through them (e.g. Ortega and Nic).  Not everything has to connect.

Secondly, I personally don't give much credit to the Erlking == hexunbelts theory.  The only thing going for it is the NN-proximity of the local FBI building to Erl's domain, something that can be explained by congruence.  Against this you've got:

- Erlking doesn't really seem the type to use these sneaky types of plans.
- Someone explicitly warned the FBI agents about the White Council, and about shifting the blame to Loupy.  I simply don't see the Erlking caring.
- Hexunwulf are black magic type items.  While it wouldn't surprise me much if the Erlking
could make such a belt, his magic seems "natural" - i.e. just like the fear generated by the Fetches - I don't think it's black magic.  Furthermore, they tap into demons for control.  It doesn't feel correct.

-perhaps thomas let someone in. who? why? how did they get past? what clues have been dropped? were all the clues in PG? Somehow I doubt the last one.

Not sure what you're saying here.  I also doubt the clues were all in PG.  Same as for your theories - the clues are spread out over the books.

[knnn]

-want to risk changing a prophecy to do so

What prophecy are you talking about?

[Serack]

Going back to the Doylist idea and looking at the writer's reasons, rather than character reasons, I believe such an analysis lends credence to the idea of a time-travelling Harry.

Consider the knowledge of time travel to be a Chekov's gun.  It was placed in Proved Guilty as a interesting side note, but not critical to that plot.  However, once seen, it can be called upon when it is critical to the plot later.

Consider this:  For whatever reason, Harry has to change something in the past, around the time of Proven Guilty.  He knows when he will be gone, so he goes back to his apartment to use LC.  He runs into Thomas and pretends to be current Harry, in a hurry.  He fixed LC and gets the info he needs.  But on his way out, he lets something slip that sets Thomas on edge.  Thus Thomas greets Harry with suspicion later on in PG.

As far as a reaons, well, this was the book that showed the aftermath of someone's attack on Arctis Tor- another big event that occurred "off camera".  Perhaps not forever...

Addressing this first then knnn and Duck's responses

Overall I like your ideas, however in TC Harry got a pretty impressive facial scar that would make it hard to pass himself off as his PG past self.

[Serack]

your doylist explanation needs more doylist explanations 

1-if it was future harry, why does he need thomas to let him in?

The doylist point isn't necessarily that whoever did the fixing needed Thomas to let him in, although that was said to be a possible conclusion.  The doylist point is that Jim needed Thomas in the appt when the fixing was done.

2- the discussion about time was not about time travel; it was about predicting the future. its about how someone who can see the future, must act in twisty turny methods if they wish to change it.

So maybe it's a Chekov's temporal hand grenade rather than a Chekov's laser sighted sniper rifle.

2b- thus, if your assumption is corect, a person fore saw that harry would not be there then, and that thomas would be, and then had to talk thomas into letting them in, (since its not future harry, he would not need that coincidence) and its not Eb (he was busy). So how did the gatekeeper talk his way past thomas, a person he had never met before? (and a whampire as well?)

Good point about Eb.  As for your point about the GK, that's why I pointed out that whoever it was had to already be comfortable with Thomas living there, or know the reason.  And as to how he talked Thomas into letting him past the threshold (because that would be the point of Thomas being there for the GK) I'm not going to tell Jim that that's theoretically impossible.  It would take some doing to make it work, but it's Jim, and this is all theory craft at the moment.

2c- youre ignoring the car hit at the begining of the book. by doylist analysis, that must be crucial as well.

I haven't got a good answer for that.  I didn't know it was crucial to explain that one detail to maintain the rest of the analysis.  Look a rabbit!  Ok now the rest of your analysis doesn't work!  I don't think so.

3- does not explain: the incidents with LC in turn coat, or his headaches in TC

Although I am not going to pin down a definitive reason for this as I don't know for sure how relevant the timing of the fix is to these, I can say that if lt_murgen's tie-in his time travel Harry theory with the Arctis Tor raid is a good idea, then it's easy to see how there could be another tie in with Mab messing with Harry's head and such to keep him from breaching that temporal anomaly.

3b- this is important because at some point jim needs to solve most of these mysteries. the list is now long enough that either many of them have one single solution, or hes is going to have a similliarion of his own attached to book 20.

3c- while a 700 page 'mysteries solved' would be awesome, i dont see it selling well. 


simpler doylist explanation: Mab. the time travel discussion is about how she foresaw the future, and why she needs to use very twisty methods ( bring molly to AT, to bring harry, etc..) to change it.

doylist within the doylist: unless LC was fixed, mab's plan would not work. ergo, she , prior to implementing her plan, made sure all parts were operational.

DwD2- this explains the exact wording she used in her bargian with harry in sk.

- also the clues given in TC, SmF, C, and GS

(I dont mind doylist analysis. I just think if youre going to do it, you need to to do it on all the books as one piece. too many of the mysteries depend on clues in prior or later books.)

- the quacker.

I am going to have to heartily disagree with you here.  Each time I make a supposition based off of another supposition, to explain another detail that Jim fleshed out 3 years later, I am risking following further down a possibly wrong trail.  I can still use doyalist analysis to gently thread down different small parts of theory to attempt to get meaningful explanations for partially isolated issues before I attempt to fit them into the grand scheme.

Even if it ends up that these few "puzzle pieces" don't fit together in this manor, I might glean some insight on the overall puzzle by this close scrutiny of the relationships between those pieces even without getting them to fit together on this attempt.   So summary dismissal of the technique is... preemptive.

Edit:  I'll have to step away for a bit before I decide if I want to address further arguments like this one.

[Electric MacButters]

Ms Duck,

I have read your stipulations, and the only rebuttal I have to your conclusion that Mab is the only possible choice is the fact that the theory I posted earlier in the thread fits all of your stipulations and does not conclude that Mab had to do it.  I will allow the possibility that Mab may have done it, but based on your own requirements, there are multiple possible perpitrators who could have done the deed including (but not limited to) Mab, time traveling Harry, time traveling Molly, the Gatekeeper, Lara Raith, any member of the Oblivion War vouchsafed by Lara, Michael Carpenter acting under orders from the archangels, the Burger King after offering Thomas a post-coital breakfast sandwich, Mister, Mac, or any mage talented enough with glamours to confuse Thomas.

I am concerned that you may be insisting that this particular conspiracy ties in with other conspiracies because it reinforces your theories regarding the other conspiracies if it is true, not because of any evidence that the conspiracies are related.

[ReturnToOne]

So then by this logic who ever it was that fixed lc needed someone to let them either past the wards and/or past the threshold (at least so they could use magic while in harry's apartment) AND was either someone Thomas trusted or could fool him into letting them in.

Oddly enough it makes Mab (or Lea) more likely than future Harry baring some special rule about time travelers and thresholds. but it also means any witch or wizard who are decent at illusions or transformation would have been capable, notable examples being Elain or Joe (or if your in need of a time travel fix future molly ). however the pool of people thomas would have trusted AND would be capable(ability and knowledge) and interested in fixing it is remarkable small.