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Alarice Blog Entry |
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February 3, 2023, 3:00:34 AM May 29, 2023, 2:01:04 AM 2/3/23: r/SketchDaily theme, "Free Draw Friday." This week's character from my anthro WWII storyline is simply named Alarice (no last name given). She's not currently an important character at all; she was intended to be, but fell on the back burner for now. (Truth is I'm trying to get some less important characters out of the way to catch up updating my art blog since I get carried away writing entries.) She may develop more of a role as time goes on, though. There'll be more about her later in my art Tumblr and Toyhou.se. Regarding her design, she's not any specific breed, though as I was drawing her my brain suddenly went, "Borzoi," so I gave her a very vaguely borzoi look. She may not be a pure borzoi, unsure. I had trouble drawing rose ears so rather gave up. TUMBLR EDIT: This I believe has been my highest-rated SketchDaily character portrait so far, with about seven upvotes. Which is just bizarre to me, I don't know why this particular portrait garnered such attention; contrast with Sophie Sommer, who got downvoted twice, though that may have been because I originally used the word "mistress" in her caption. 🙄 I'm pretty sure it's a fluke, albeit an odd one. Anyway. I've never mentioned Alarice in any of these entries, I don't think. Already I'm confused as to her origins. My brain FEELS like she dates to the circa 2000 reboot, but she's not on the character list dating to back then--I also seem to recall she was specifically created to be a member of the Diamond Network, which dates to the current reboot. And that's where my brain does a double take--it feels like I've been mulling over the Diamond Network for YEARS when, in fact, neither it nor Josef Diamant existed prior to late 2021. Which is...just so weird. They feel a lot older! I've been brainstorming these new plot developments so much that they simply feel like they've existed for years. So I have to assume Alarice, too, dates to circa 2021, since I seem to recall she was created earlier than the characters who ended up becoming the core of the Diamond Network (Josef Diamant, Lukas Mettbach, Gret Dannecker, and Arno Spiegel--toss in Andreas Cranz and Trudi Detzer to be a bit more inclusive). You can see from my entries that, for some reason, this never happened; Alarice dropped out of character development along with fellow character "Rehn." Both were intended to be characters Diamant found still dwelling in an abandoned psychiatric facility--mental patients. They were meant to join the Diamond Network and accompany the others around the city; I have a mental scene of Rehn pressing himself against a wall as a Nazi sleepwalks by, though I think Lukas has since replaced him. Alarice appears in an imaginary musical scenario running into Adelina Dobermann when she ends up lost in a ghettolike area--this may in fact be the ghetto I introduced in Isaak Schindel's entry, abandoned to poorer, non-Jewish city residents following its clearing out--unsure. I guess I just got so hung up on Diamant, Lukas, and Gret (I've rather neglected poor Arno 😔 ) that the "mental patient" part of the plot fell by the wayside. Senta Werner's plot, with her mentally unbalanced mother, may have also contributed to this; Frau Werner and Alarice have some personality traits in common. So I've spent no time, really, developing Alarice's character, and she hasn't stepped forward to offer anything. Yet she's still appeared in a mental scenario or two, so she's still there; I figured I should offer a drawing. I clearly pictured her as being pale (white fur) with long, dark, lank hair; I changed the color from black to dark brown to keep her from looking too much like Inga Dobermann (Alarice's hair isn't as pretty as Inga's, just that I suck at drawing lank hair, I guess!). As I said, the image of a borzoi with its long sloping nose popped into my head as I was drawing, so I modified her a bit; she doesn't look quite like a borzoi to me because their noses are so goofily caricaturish, and I have to admit here, I want to be careful to avoid what might be racist stereotypes--Alarice isn't Jewish, but you can see why I'd want to be careful. Mirjam Zweifel is a better example--I pictured her as an Afghan hound, another breed known for its long nose, so I felt uncomfortable drawing her that way, due to a common antisemitic stereotype. There's also the fact that most of the "Aryan" characters are purebred German breeds (the canine characters, at least) whereas the non-Aryan characters, Jews and non-Jews alike, are more frequently indeterminate breeds. This is intentional, based on the Nazis' unscientific view of the "superior races"--of course those characters, to fit the Nazi trope (hey, I don't mind stereotyping my racist characters ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ), would be purebreds, whereas there's more room for "racial" (breed) diversity among the non-Aryans. What I DIDN'T intend with this choice is the implication that non-Aryans are "mutts/mongrels." 😕 That is genuinely not my implication. It's just kind of impossible to avoid when your characters are literal dogs. So, there, I've gotten that out of the way, in case anyone wondered if that was on purpose--it was, and it wasn't. Anyway. Alarice didn't end up quite as borzoi-ish as I'd preferred, though I guess it doesn't matter so much as I didn't intend her to necessarily be a borzoi--she might be crossbred. I know almost nothing about her and Rehn's histories, though this could of course change at any time. This is how Alarice is described in the more recent character list: Alarice: Last name unknown. "Mentally defective" woman Josef Diamant finds left behind in a bombed/abandoned psychiatric institution; erratic behavior, unknown mental disorder. He recruits her into the Diamond Network. So, yeah...that's not much. Based on the scattered mental scenarios of her, uh...well, I really am not sure what her diagnosis would be. Abnormal psychology is one of my interests so usually I can clarify these things but Alarice is an odd case, she doesn't seem to fit a particular mental disorder but rather displays stereotyped traits that may be intentional; i. e., she's definitely mentally ill, but I suspect she may be exaggerating her own symptoms for dramatic effect. She strikes me as highly manipulative and cunning--her symptoms more closely match some sort of personality disorder rather than psychosis. She COULD be paranoid, but she's not outright delusional, and she doesn't hallucinate--she's in touch with reality and very self-aware. I think she uses her status as a "mental defective" (Nazi terminology, not mine) to disguise how closely she observes the world and people around her. She's not nearly as unbalanced as she presents herself, and is very, very clever. Her "crazy" actions are intentional. Alarice and Rehn, a male patient, were intended to be discovered by Diamant in the remains of a psychiatric facility which wasn't systematically cleared out before the staff fled. He recruits them for the Network, even though he's unsure how helpful they can be, considering; they might even be a liability. For this reason, I may modify this part of the plot so they're merely rescuees rather than Network members. Rehn's role in the plot is even murkier than Alarice's, so I can't add more about him now. I already mentioned a "musical" (shut up 😒 ) scene featuring Alarice meeting Addy Dobermann as she wanders a derelict area of the city. Alarice perhaps seeks shelter here with some other "dregs of society," and although not hostile, she does rather warn Addy that it isn't safe for her to be there. (The song I imagine here actually says no such thing, but Alarice's exaggerated actions are intended to spook Addy away. Earlier in the plot, Addy's family friend and informal father figure, Lt. Gunter Hesse, had lost his SS cap; Alarice wears this while talking/singing to Addy and also hints that she faces danger closer to home. The cap is returned to Addy at the end of the imaginary musical number.) Addy starts getting a clearer picture of the darker side of society that the Nazis have been working hard to hide. The other main mental scene I have of Alarice is another musical number, go figure. In this one she appears at a formal SS gathering and dances wildly around the room as the SS orchestra plays (yes, they have an orchestra--mine is a fictional version although I've seen photos of SS musicians, yet can't figure out the right Google search terms to bring one up) (EDIT, okay I sucked it up and Googled "Schutzstaffel orchestra" and eventually got to the Musikkorps der Leibstandarte-SS, and here's a pic, urgh I feel skeezy now) with some attendees assuming she's part of the evening's performances. The reactions of the various attendees are vastly different: Rupprecht Heidenreich is aghast, his wife Eva is disgusted, Dr. Mengele is vaguely confused but intrigued, Erich Arzt is amused (both by Alarice's routine, and by the reactions of those who like the Heidenreichs are scandalized by it), etc. Lt. Hesse is especially perplexed; I think he's the one who ends up trying to resume control of the situation by subduing Alarice and shuttling her out of there, but she probably eludes him. I don't yet know the point of this scene or if it indeed takes place, though it may be some sort of distraction tactic on Alarice's part while the Diamond Network or somebody else does something. Hesse's reaction to Alarice is the detail that's gaining the most ground. While he's certainly racist, antisemitic, and homophobic like most of his fellows, he doesn't share the Nazis' view of the mentally ill and addicts. This is likely due to his personal experience with the issue; Hesse struggled for a time with morphine addiction following the Great War, and he knows also how addiction can feed into mental difficulties (his loneliness and isolation contributed to his addiction as much as his physical pain did, plus he nearly relapsed while in a deep depression). He feels empathy and pity for the mentally ill, not disdain, and suspects that at least some of them are capable of rehabilitation. In one scene, while he's talking with another SS officer in the other's home, he notices the guy's odd reactions and dismisses the officers who'd accompanied him so he can talk to the guy privately; once they're alone he slams the guy against the wall and demands to know, "Where is it?--You know exactly what I'm talking about," he adds when the guy expresses confusion. Guy guiltily nods toward a cabinet; Hesse digs around, finds the guy's works (drug kit), stomps it under his boot and tosses it. "Where's the other one?" he then says; the guy feigns ignorance for all of a few seconds before caving in and pointing out another hiding place. He moans when Hesse destroys his backup kit so Hesse can tell that's all he has; he threatens the guy to "clean up" or he'll report him to his superiors. Yeah, this seems pretty cruel and insensitive, especially regarding Hesse's own former addiction, but in truth he's giving the guy a lot more leeway than most of his fellow officers would, as well as endangering his own position in the SS by not reporting the guy's misbehavior--he's helping him out the only way he knows how, under the circumstances. Hesse is usually a stickler for SS rules, so the rare occasions when he does break them--for example, not turning in Tobias Schäfer, a Jewish doctor, or the Dobermanns, who illegally employ him--are special circumstances indeed. So the way he reacts toward addicts and the mentally ill is very unusual for someone in his position. Hesse gets a good look at Alarice at that SS party--Heidenreich orders him to restrain and get her out of there, but he's a lot more circumspect, guiding her outside instead. I'm not sure what occurs afterward, presumably she eludes him but he runs into her again once or twice, and his interactions with her are always respectful--he wants her to get some sort of help. Alarice laughs at his suggestion: "Oh, I know very well what your people mean by help. I want to leave one of your hospitals, I leave through the chimney, ja?" Hesse insists he knows people and can ensure she's helped rather than harmed--this much is likely true--but of course she doesn't believe him, and avoids his attempts to get her aid. I get a strong feeling she ends up playing him somehow because of this, though I'm not sure how or for what. Just seems it'd be like her to manipulate his weakness for her own ends, if I could figure out what her own ends are. So this is still very much a developing plot point. You'll notice I deliberately avoided naming the two songs included in the imaginary scenarios described above. This is because one lyrically has very little to do with the plot, while the other is goofily anachronistic. I imagine plenty of anachronistic music in this series--I have a tentative Spotify playlist I've been noodling around with--yet I try not to get WAY out there, plus I imagine some of these are more like "music video/trailer/inspired by" music. Still, here they are; just imagine the first is in German rather than Italian/Spanish, and the other is more orchestral/big band without such a silly title, and you're almost there. "Ghetto" scene (actually, now that I translate the lyrics, they're not as off topic as I'd thought) SS party/dancing scene Alarice will likely have more to come, given that my brain hasn't completely given up on her, though it may not be for a while yet. [Alarice 2023 [Friday, February 3, 2023, 3:00:34 AM]] 5/29/23: r/SketchDaily theme, "Expressions." Was a long day so I decided to try some rough character sketch practice. Would be nice to draw them in different poses. These aren't technically expression practice though a few have one (Schäfer has his lovely deer-caught-in-headlights look). I'd just like to get better at this. (You can see the first effort really sucked. Seems a boxy shape is better than a round one.) They were done sans reference so some details are off. I drew different expressions exactly a year ago, it turns out. Didn't realize it'd been so long. [Rough Character Sketches 2023 2 [Monday, May 29, 2023, 2:01:04 AM]] |