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Post by beatriceblake on Oct 20, 2006 19:16:00 GMT -5
I don't know if I agree. I can accept the fortune as a macguffin because it makes sense that Olaf would go to a lot of trouble to get it. He is greedy and wants to be rich and devising schemes is easier than holding down a job. However it doesn't make sense for the sugar bowl to be driving the plot if it is stuffed with something that can be obtained as easily as horseradish can. It is easier to find horseradish than to scheme, kill and set fires in order to obtain a specific sugar bowl full of horseradish.
If however the sugar bowl did contain a recording device or evidence that would prove certain characters committed certain crimes then it makes sense for people to go to a lot of trouble to get it.
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Post by descartes on Oct 20, 2006 19:42:48 GMT -5
What everyone is forgetting is that the ASOUE universe is not ours. Isn't it possible that there is a shortage of horseradish, and that because there as so few people who know about wasabi and the apples, that the last of the horseradish is very valueable? Actually there are a few things about that don't make a lot of sense, but a lot of things don't make sense.
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Post by Jacques the Environmentalist on Oct 20, 2006 21:46:27 GMT -5
It's very very difficult to believe that something as simple as horseradish or something containing it (applesauce) would be the sugarbowl secret. Perhaps it's extra strong horseradish that can more easily destroy the fungus? But it makes sense. Dewey told Olaf that he wouldn't dare release the mycelium while Dewey had the sugar bowl. If the sugar bowl contained the antidote to the mycelium then that would explain it: If Olaf released the mycelium Dewey would be able to destroy it and cure everyone infected with the sugarbowl, and then where would Olaf be? Perhaps there is more than one sugarbowl and they all contain horseradish. Or perhaps the villains are after the hybrid apple/horseradish technology the baudelaire parents used. That way, if the mycelium were used on THEM, they'd have a surefire cure. (Interesting how the mycelium has never yet been cured with actual horseradish)
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Post by hogwartsrebel on Oct 21, 2006 13:22:16 GMT -5
Exactly, and that's what a macguffin is in storytelling. It drives the plot but could be anything when it comes down to it. All that matters is that it sets the story into motion and gets thing rolling. An example is the byzanium in the novel (and movie) Raise The Titanic. It could have been anything else, but that's not the point. All that's important is that it gets the characters on the ball towards searching for the wreckage of the Titanic and then subsequently raising it. It's very very difficult to believe that something as simple as horseradish or something containing it (applesauce) would be the sugarbowl secret. Perhaps it's extra strong horseradish that can more easily destroy the fungus? But it makes sense. Dewey told Olaf that he wouldn't dare release the mycelium while Dewey had the sugar bowl. If the sugar bowl contained the antidote to the mycelium then that would explain it: If Olaf released the mycelium Dewey would be able to destroy it and cure everyone infected with the sugarbowl, and then where would Olaf be? Perhaps there is more than one sugarbowl and they all contain horseradish. Or perhaps the villains are after the hybrid apple/horseradish technology the baudelaire parents used. That way, if the mycelium were used on THEM, they'd have a surefire cure. (Interesting how the mycelium has never yet been cured with actual horseradish) Maybe we're making too much out of the "what's in the sugar bowl" debate. Maybe, like I've said before, it's simply a macguffin like the briefcase in Pulp Fiction. You need to understand that in a macguffin, it's not important in anyway what's inside or what it is in general. It's importance lies in its importance to the characters because it sets the ball rolling. We know both sides are after it. It's driving the plot, but when it comes down to it...what does it matter. They could have both been after a Very Filthy Dog or a Variably Fluctuating Degree. ;-) All that matters is that they want or need it and everything is moving as a result of their need for finding it.
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Post by beatricesank on Oct 22, 2006 12:01:24 GMT -5
^^^"In fact, if he WAS doing it by the book, then his motivation for writing down the Baudelaire case in the first place becomes obscure, because he wouldn't have known young Beatrice Baudelaire at the start, and he wouldn't have known that his sister was dead. Perhaps it was out of loyalty to the Baudelaire Mum? "
ASOUE was a dedicatiion to the Baudulaire's mom becuase:
1) Every book is dedicated to her
2) In TUA, it says that RW writes LS that "Beatruce, of couse, is far past complaining about lost possesions- the very reason, i am certain, that you have dedicated your life to researching the lives of those three poor children" (26).
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Post by beatriceblake on Oct 22, 2006 18:54:59 GMT -5
It matters if it makes no sense for the characters to want the sugar bowl. We know Olaf and Esme are reasonably intelligent. We also know that there is a big horseradish factory on Lousy Lane, that Wasabi and Eutrema can also be used as substitues for horseradish. Therefore it makes no sense for them to pursue the sugar bowl if the one they are after merely contains horseradish.
I like the multiple sugar bowls theory. There are two Beatrices, a plethora of people with the initials J.S and people who have similar stories. So the fact more than one person used a sugar bowl to hide something makes sense.
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Post by fidesxaeterna on Oct 26, 2006 23:25:28 GMT -5
I understand all the talk about macguffuns, and it makes perfect sense. Obviously, not knowing what was in the sugar bowl didn't destroy the story. It actually might have made it more interesting. But I'd still like to know what was in it. Just out of curiosity.
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cyrus
Reptile Researcher
Posts: 38
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Post by cyrus on Oct 29, 2006 10:24:42 GMT -5
The sugar bowl can contain horseradish - but NOT ONLY!
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Post by thedoctororwell on Oct 29, 2006 10:47:18 GMT -5
My personal thought is that the VFDers use to put important things on sugarbowl : it can be a microphone (like in LSUA) or horseradish, as the Baudelaire parents did. It's just that what was inside The TPP sugarbowl could have given enough power to the bad VFDers to get rid of the good VFDers. It could have been a kind of weapon, but I don't think it was a piece of evidence : it's too small, and the Snicket File was "the ONLY file that could put ALL of us in jail." (dixit Esmé) Furthermore, Dewey's secret librairy would have been FAR more efficient than any piece of evidence hidden in the sugar bowl. By the way, I found a proof that the sugarbowl can't contain horseradish, or bitter apples, or wasabi. Of course, it would make sense with what Jérôme said ("he won't unleash the Mycelium until he found the sugar bowl") and with Olaf's attitude after the laundry room's fiasco. But in TSS, Olaf didn't know that he could get his hands on the Mycelium, and indeed no one had put his hands on the Mycelium before the children brought it on the submarine : Olaf was surprised to see that he had captured the Mycelium when Fernald revealed it. And, in TSS, he knows what's inside the sugar bowl, and he actively looks for it : so that can't be horseradish, what would be the use of an antidote if you couldn't get the hands on the poison anyway ?
(sorry for my abysmal grammar skills... I'm a frenchie.)
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Post by Dante on Oct 29, 2006 11:16:17 GMT -5
“I think you’ll want that helmet for yourself, boss,” the henchman said.
“I prefer a smaller, lighter hat,” Count Olaf said, “but I appreciate the gesture.”
“What my brother means,” Fiona explained, “is that inside this helmet is the Medusoid Mycelium.”
The Baudelaires gasped and looked at one another in horror, as Count Olaf peered through the helmet’s tiny window, his eyes wide beneath his eyebrow. “The Medusoid Mycelium,” he murmured, and ran his tongue thoughtfully along his teeth. “Could it be?”
“Impossible,” Esmé Squalor said. “That fungus was destroyed long ago.”
“They brought it with them,” the hook-handed man said. “That’s why the baby was so sick.”
“This is marvelous,” Olaf said, his voice as raspy and wheezy as if he were poisoned himself. “As soon as you Baudelaires are in the brig, I'm going to open this helmet and toss it inside! You'll suffer as I've always wanted you to suffer.”
TGG - p296-297
“But think of the fortunes we can steal!” Esmé said. “Think of the people we can boss around! With the Medusoid Mycelium in our grasp, who can stop us now?”
“No one!” Cout Olaf cackled in triumph.
TGG - p297
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Post by thedoctororwell on Oct 29, 2006 11:55:18 GMT -5
I don't understand your answer, Dante... That's what I said : the discovery of the Myceliem was an unexpected surprise for Olaf. He never made a scheme to get his hands on it... So if he was searching the sugar bowl in TSS, that neceserraly means that the sugar bowl can't contain an antidote to the Mycelium, because at this time it would have been useless to Olaf.
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Post by queequegcaptain on Oct 29, 2006 12:00:54 GMT -5
the taxi driver did not get it. Dewey Denoumont had it in his hand when he died. The sugar bowl is in the pond!!!
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Post by Dante on Oct 29, 2006 12:21:24 GMT -5
I don't understand your answer, Dante... I was posting back-up evidence; the comment from Esmé about believing the fungus had been destroyed a long time ago was particularly telling, although not coming from Olaf makes it easier to work around. My general view is that some past evidence works for the sugar bowl to contain horseradish, but some other evidence doesn't at all; worse than that, I consider it to be an uninteresting conclusion. the taxi driver did not get it. Dewey Denoumont had it in his hand when he died. The sugar bowl is in the pond!!! How could he have been holding it in his hand for two and a half chapters without anybody noticing? Particularly as Klaus and Sunny actually grabbed his hands as he was sinking into the pond?
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Post by beatriceblake on Oct 29, 2006 19:58:09 GMT -5
If Handler wanted to be deep it could have been found empty.
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cyrus
Reptile Researcher
Posts: 38
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Post by cyrus on Nov 1, 2006 11:21:18 GMT -5
I think it might contain something like microphone, or something else(I'll mark it "X") AND horseradish. But we don't know WHAT EXACTLY is "X"!
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