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VampireMeerkat In reply to supergal12000 [2015-10-04 17:34:22 +0000 UTC]

Fat Marie/Larie is not a design choice I made; the original creator once showed a deleted scene where the Kankers were senile, and Marie was shown to be overweight.
While deleted, I consider the scene to be important, so that's the only reason why Marie and Larie look the way they do. I don't think I'm clever enough to make the most attractive Kanker decrease in looks, after all, I'm almost completely certain I had already designed the "slender" adult version of her before I saw mentioned scene, so that should say enough. To fix my early mistake, I came up with the logic that Marie gets fat as result of her pregnancy. Of course, that doesn't work for Larie, but I came up with a good enough cause, I think.

Anyway, by reading your message you expect a backstory or reason from me to make sense out of the relationship Ann and Larie have, especially since I made a love statement using these two characters, which makes sense, but I always find it funny that I have to prove and show more than the original creator of the series ever had to. I put way more personality in the Kankers than he ever did, because he had one purpose for them, so he didn't have to. Unfair, yo.
But I don't mind, I'll take the time to explain.

You pretty much already figured out how the story with Tee and Anny goes, and what kind of person Jay is, but I hope you've also noticed how different these love stories and these boys are, because I was pretty much going for a "three different examples" scenario with these characters and their story arcs. Because two people just going out for dinner, where one goes down on the knees with a ring in hand is hardly a story, and why should anyone care for it. Nor did I want anything even slightly similar for all three couples, which can be easy to do, as many see the Kankers as one. Same case with the Eds.
At this point I've mainly focussed on Tee and Anny and not many know how Jay and An or Larie and Ann end up falling for each other, but I'm planning to release comics someday. Of course, you can also go to the "Ed, Edd n Eddy Working" page at the Edfanon Wikia to get the gist of it, but I'll try to put some effort in my reply and tell you something that's not already written down.

Tee and Anny's relationship is a story about a girl with less confidence than she lets out, and the only guy who makes her feel good happens to be someone she doesn't want to be seen with in a million years. Tee started off much like Larie; loud and smacking people on the head, but he grows up to be more of a caring, but still a funny guy. Also still rough-looking, but not quite a trouble maker.
I put him in a position where he can't get a job or a place of his own, because he's taking care of his ill father. Which is pretty much the depressing part of his life, but the other half is him breaking into Anny's company and greeting her angry face in her office. Tee is the playful light in Anny's stressful, success-driven life.

Jay and An's relationship is a story about a boy who gets misunderstood for years, and he's the only Kanker who actually gives up on his crush. Jay becomes a horror movie actor and the unknown idol of An, and the roles almost get reversed where An ends up being the one craving for his attention.
In the past, Jay has always been more romantic and made a couple of real attempts to swoon An, but he is just too clumsy and emotional. If he's not crying, he's raging, but as an adult I wrote him to be completely normal and reasonable. He's the example of a problem child who turned out completely fine.

Larie and Ann's story is just pure insanity. I'm sure it won't appeal to the majority of fans, but like I mentioned earlier, their relationship is one of those examples I wanted to portray. We've had two fairly normal and likeable stories, now we have one extreme.
Both Ann and Larie's liking for each other is hugely based on mere lust, because really, many relationships start out just because we like someone's butt. Ann officially started liking Larie when they were teenagers, because she found him and his mannerisms more attractive than she wanted to admit to herself. And that's it. I guess you can say that deep in her heart she likes men who are dominant, hairy-chested, and blunt in their way of charming her, and that Nate was merely something she was raised to like and preferred to show off with to the outside world. Not that I don't think Edd never liked Nazz, but a preference that's the opposite of the well-groomed Nazz could've been hidden inside of him, it's not that unlikable. We hear enough examples in real life about the educated doctor with a hidden wild side. And preference doesn't always need a reason. You simply like beards or you simply like green eyes. Ann simply likes what she doesn't like.
With any other character this whole deal wouldn't be an issue, but it's made an issue because it's Ann; she's too proper to want someone this improper, it's one Hell of a conflict. So here Ann is basically digusted to be a mammal, thus she doesn't answer to Larie's flirting and doesn't make anyone wiser about her views on him.
So, really, this whole chapter is pointless, as Ann doesn't talk about it nor collects photographs like Anny.

Now, you can ask me why Larie likes Ann, but then we need to ask ourselves why Marie likes Edd. I don't remember Marie ever revealing why she likes him in the show, but I guess she just fancies polite guys she can dominate. To add to that, I did make Larie a bit blind to Ann's appearance, as he's honestly convinced she has big breasts and junk in the trunk, thus finds her flat bodyframe to be appealing. She is flawless to him.
I wrote Larie to bother her at work with fake illnesses and the routine of undressing himself for her, so imagine the person you feel physically attracted to doing that nonsense every day. Ann becomes annoyed and tired of it, because he keeps confronting her with her own desires and doesn't want to date him for the same reason.
By reading your comment, it looks like you fear, or at least dislike unreformable characters. I don't quite see a problem with characters that are terrible human beings, and it so happens to be the case I turned Larie into a "unreformable" mob boss. Most fans always expect the Kankers to end up in the gutter, one way or the other, and I added a type of gutter no one's written about yet. Maybe some think the Kankers will end up as petty thieves, but I haven't heard any thoughts about Marie becoming the ruthless leader of organized crime with blood on her hands. Or that hidden eye of hers being scarred as part of the story.
I've written Larie to be exactly what you just told me you don't want him to be. He is a psychopath that doesn't deserve anything good in life, and when looking at the fanart of a certain loyal fan that often draws Ann and Larie, it's almost like this artist agrees with that. She likes to draw my characters, but she's written Larie to be an art teacher, loving with children, still skinny, pretty much everything I didn't set up for him. A few other fans who've drawn them also didn't bother with any of that, so it makes me assume not many people are into, or will be into this story arc. Perhaps it is a bad story, but I think something insane needs to happen in the Ed, Edd n Eddy world at all times. Larie needs to be that example of the problem child gone worse.
He has no respect for people and is hard to please, but all the attributes that define him a mafia boss are not present when he's with Ann. He's dangerously two-faced, but he considers Ann to be someone he needs to impress. So Ann only gets to meet the perverted joker every day, for years she didn't know about his second life and she still doesn't entirely know that other side of his personality.
Ann gets attacked by his gang one night, but the disguised Larie recognized her on time and let her go, but soon after their first "alright, but then you need to sod off"-date she recognizes him as the leader of that gang, but both decide to stay silent about it. Ann, because she had already openly fallen for him, never mind that they've been seeing each other every day for 15 years, and Larie, mainly because she decided not to mention it. He was ashamed. Ann pretty much insinuated in their following conversation that it would've been best if he left his criminal past behind, and Larie did so for no other reason but to finally have a relationship with her. But well, since Ann never fully trusted him, she's the one who fattened him up and turned him into a lazy, spoiled bum, in order to reduce the chance he'd sneak away to go back to his old life. Which he never planned on doing, anyway.

Well, I saved myself by adding that "beauty is in the eye of the beholder", which means that a person can be total trash and still be loved by someone. And using these two characters still best brings out the message, in my opinion.
Despite all of the above, Larie is loyal and dependable, with an eternal sense of humor and optimism. He's that silly addition to Ann's genuine nature, and it's her that calms down his aggressive thoughts. So while unreformable, Ann did reform him.
Since they've met each other daily for 15 years, they've already sort of became awkward friends, even though Ann never wanted him inside her home or go out with him. While he was never really welcome during her shifts, either, I guess you could describe Larie to be that one guy who always shows up to waste your time, but at the end of the visit you can't help but smirk about how stupid that visit just was. He gives flavour to a normal working day.

Did any of this make sense to you.

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supergal12000 In reply to VampireMeerkat [2015-10-04 19:20:12 +0000 UTC]

Oh no it did, I'm really grateful for the thorough response . Don't get me wrong Im completely fine with the prospect that characters can simply be downhill or not the status quo, that wasn't my issue of that at all. I was simply curious for her reasoning, I didn't mind if it was bad. There's doesn't need to be a happy ending, I was just honestly wondering what you'd come up with for them. I'm honestly already grateful for the interesting designs and character development you've given the Kankers that make them have more dimension, I couldn't be more happier even to get such a full response to be honest! I thought I'd ask because you come up with themes and realities that a lot of artists avoid to simply get pure joy out of a fanciful "and they lived happily ever after". Thank you for taking the time to reply to me, I honestly hope I haven't misinterpreted or misrepresented my views. I just love a good story and you've always delivered in my opinion. Thanks again

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