I have explained in my previous posts in “The Stray Dog Boss-battle Mystery” series that there are many things that we see in the Stray Dog boss-battle that I suspect don’t accurately reflect what actually happened during the actual orphanage massacre that occurred in Jennifer’s forgotten past.
Another scene associated with the Stray Dog boss-battle that I find suspicious is the one where the front door of the orphanage opens and Jennifer sees Wendy-dressed-as-Joshua, and Gregory—on all fours and on a leash—as Stray Dog. Wendy-dressed-as-Joshua points at Jennifer and says “Go.” The other orphans have just been murdered by Gregory-Stray-Dog, so it is apparent that Jennifer is intended, by Wendy-dressed-as-Joshua, to be the next one to be murdered.
You can view this scene on You Tube: Joshua sics Stray Dog on Jennifer.
Are there good reasons to be suspicious of this scene?
The “Stray Dog and the Lying Princess” storybook depicts Wendy as trying in vain to warn the orphans that Stray Dog is coming. See my post “‘The Stray Dog and the Lying Princess’ Storybook Mystery (Part 1)“. This seems to be an account of the orphanage massacre that is at odds with the vision of Wendy siccing Stray Dog on Jennifer. Could it be a more accurate account?
The scene that we see in the Rule of Rose game seems nightmarish in quality to me. On the one hand, Gregory is walking on all fours like a dog towards Jennifer with the purpose of killing her. On the other hand, he is reciting the beginning of a story to Jennifer, like the Gregory that she has affection for. This seems to me to be the sort of discordant mixing of opposites that I can recall from some of my own nightmares.
Another thing that I wonder about is, why would Wendy think that she could succeed at training Gregory to kill Jennifer? Jennifer survived living with Gregory for nine months, during which time they bonded to the extent that Jennifer writes to Wendy:
16 November
Dear Wendy, my visitor in the window,
Thank you so much for writing to me. The man calls me Joshua, but my name is Jennifer. I’ve been in this room ever since he saved me.
He’s a nice person… but he won’t let me leave.
(“Once Upon a Time”, Sickroom, by the lamp)
and
10 December
From J to W
Thank you Wendy.
I want to fly away from this room and run with you in the fields…
But the man is so lonely, so sad. I can’t just leave him alone.
(“Once Upon a Time”, Sickroom, by the lamp)
In a previous post, “The Spontaneity of the Massacre” I pointed out that there is evidence suggesting that the orphanage massacre followed almost immediately after Jennifer’s slapping of Wendy. This doesn’t leave much time to brainwash Gregory to the point where he would now be willing to kill Jennifer.
And although Wendy had been training Gregory like a dog prior to the slapping incident, it follows from this that Wendy was clearly doing this training prior to being deposed as Princess (again, see my post “The Spontaneity of the Massacre“), so there really isn’t much reason to believe that the training of Gregory by Wendy was with the design of killing either the orphans or Jennifer.
In tomorrow’s post, I’ll present a hypothesis about the reason why Wendy was training Gregory to act like a dog.
Related posts:
The Stray Dog Boss-battle Mystery (Part 1)
The Stray Dog Boss-battle Mystery (Part 2)
The Stray Dog Boss-battle Mystery (Part 3)
The Stray Dog Boss-battle Mystery (Part 4)
Tags: bossbattle, Gregory, Joshua, StrayDog, Wendy
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I told elyonum that something would be coming in Part 5 of this series. Instead it will be coming in Part 6 (which should appear shortly).
If this scene is much more of a nightmare than reality (other than the fact they all died and Gregory commits suicide), then it begs the question of just how warped the rest of the chapters are. For such a short chapter, the stray dog battle sure does bring a lot of questions.
There was proof through out the game that Wendy had been more or less training Gregory but I do belive that it was for a backup to her stories about Stray Dog. And when the confrontation with Jennifer came around, she fell back on what she had been doing with Gregory as a spurt of the moment thing. It was a nice convience of payback for her.
As I stated in other posts it’s possible Wendy only warned the orphans as a way to gain back they’re affection and title. By that I mean she protects them or gives them a choice make her princess again or stray dog will come and punish them. That failed so she got angry and tells Gregory to punish them for breaking the rules and being bad children.
Training Gregory as a dog does not = training Gregory to kill. Even though in Jennifer’s (warped, as everything she remembers is) memory Gregory attacks them all like a dog, the newspaper says he shot them, doesn’t it? So far almost every boss battle or event of Jennifer’s has been contradicted by real tangible evidence such as Hoffman’s diary. She remembers killing him, the diary says he scolded her for letting Peter out of his cage and bullying Olivia (trying to steal her butterfly?). She remembers Clara hanging from the ceiling vomiting acid, we know this is pretty unlikely especially considering Jennifer says Clara and Martha left later on.
The goat sisters were dolls, so I don’t think anyone needs to argue on that battle. Why would the newspaper, something that is meant to be sensational, not mention that Gregory tore the orphans apart? That makes the massacre much more newsworthy than a shooting spree. Not to mention Wendy in boys clothes. If the fight in the attic just happened, how would Wendy get into Joshua’s clothing? And why would she bother since she visits him without them anyway?
My own opinion is that Wendy either a) ran to Gregory as a father figure because there were no other adults and well, Jennifer just beat the crap out of her! b) ran to Gregory, discovered he was crazier than usual and tried to warn the other orphans a la the storybook.
nakedfish wrote:
—Training Gregory as a dog does not = training Gregory to kill.—
I definitely agree with this statement, and the hypothesis that I intend to present later today will be a reason for training Gregory that doesn’t involve killing.
—the newspaper says he shot them, doesn’t it?—
No. It just says that he shot himself:
Oh, my mistake. I still would have thought the newspaper would mention how brutally he murdered them all, but this is English newspapers we’re talking about here.
I just wanted to ask you know at the beginning of the game i guess the intro. Jeniffer is sitting on a bench in the park and it goes through all the scenes is this all part of her dream too. Because at the end of the intro you see her hugging brown or a dog that looks like brown and the huge Zeplin flies over head.
Oh and another thing i forgot what i was on but it was like the kids said something like when stray dog gets you you are forever confined to the airship in the sky even in death or something like that.
They didn’t say that. Joshua said, “If you don’t, I’ll kill you! ^_^-” In referring to the game they play… but it had nothing to do with stray dog…
“Stray dog gives us sweets.”
“Stray dog kidnaps kids.”
Those are the two “Truths” their beliefs on stray dog circle around.
Couldn’t this be a memory of Gregory attacking Jennifer after seeing Wendy and Jennifer at the same time? Like, he got freaked out at there being two Joshuas and attacked? Then maybe ridden with guilt he went on a rampage hence the killing of himself?
On second thought, this does seem far fetched.
When saying “i’m sorry joshua”, i feel more like gregory is apologising toward jennifer, still considering her as joshua.
I also agree that wendy training greg like a dog wouldn’t be training him to kill. After J disapearing, what else than playing with the neigborhood kids could he have done ? he missed a child. More likely, as jennifer was having fun with a dog, she was having fun with another one.
Also, we mostly assume that greg obey wendy because he thinks she’s joshua (as she is wearing a wig and the same clothes). But, really, unless being really blind, (could also be, he don’t seem to be really sure when moving) he can see that she’s not him or her (joshua-jennifer).
The fact that wendy is in disguise during the game serves to lure jennifer far more than greg. And the only time we actually have a chance to look closely at “his” face is when we can see the blond hair under the wig before it’s took off.
In fact, even if he is weird and mentally really fragile, doesn’t he seem like a nice guy, ready to play with any kid who would ask ? It freaked out martha that he was playing with wendy being her dog, but at the time martha was worried,
no kid seemed to be armed, and the officer dolittle didn’t saw any threat either.
My point in all this : wendy and greg were just playing, and he may have known she wasn’t his joshua (jennifer).
By an unclear mean but for a known reason, wendy made greg “become” stray dog. The fact that she didn’t intended the things to end in a slaugther, in my opinion, is a regret from ghost wendy, not the one from the time of stray dog.
Then, stray dog did his job, intended by past wendy, regreted by ghost wendy. When attacking jennifer outside (during the inside fight, i think it’s only jennifer dreaming that her doog could have saved her and been stronger than stray dog. After all, we can’t beat stray dog before brown come back at all, so in a sense, it’s only brown that beats stray dog there.)
Outside stray dog acts strangely because he seem to want to apologise and hurt. The duality stray dog / greg is nice, but the important idea for me is that if wendy didn’t suicide by hanging, she was indeed killed by stray dog. Maybe she intended to die that way with jennifer also, kill and suicide is quite common in love. The weapon being stray dog.
If wendy was indeed tricking him as believing she was joshua, the sight of jennifer (her precious joshua) could have made him realise the other one was a false, a lying princess, and after a warming up killing spree, her death was easy
Greg is sorry toward joshua. The reasons can be quite a long list, assuming wich joshua he is speaking to. In any case, i think the easyest idea, is that he is sorry for the killing spree.
About where the gun came from, in the past ; i don’t have any reason better than any other else, but i have a new one. As jennifer became the new princess, she was granted access to the prince and princess private quarters. I thought of that place as one were jennifer and wendy would play at first, but now i think it was more indeed a hidden, and locked, secret area, in wich only the prince and princess had right to go. That’s where the gun was hidden, assuming the same place in the aircraft and the same gun we found are ; as i think, a dream version that jennifer found the gun Before the time she became princess.
So the new idea (i think it’s new ?) is that jennifer becoming princess had the right to go in this quarter, and found the dangerous thing herself. (or knew it was there and went to find it during the blood bath)
Giving it back to greg means also she allow him to die, as a human during past, and as an everlasting ghost of memory during the game, in either case, he needed it to end it all. that’s not brown at all that could end the thing.
I hope all that, that i just wrote will have any meaning, and maybe some good ones. Please forgive me if i stated too much wrong or ununderstandable things.
That is a good theory.
Interesting theory guys, but this is what I think:
I think that yes, Wendy really did give the gun to Jennifer. Let’s hear what I have to say
1. After Wendy orders Stray Dog to murder the children, she leads the beast to Jennifer.
2. Wendy orders him to do likewise to Jennifer, but she escapes (somehow — bear with me)
3. While watching Jennifer’s struggle to free herself from Stray Dog, Wendy realizes her faults.
4. Jennifer escapes out of the school and while Stray Dog is distracted, Wendy comes to Jennifer
revealing herself and handing the gun to Jennifer helplessly after confessing her faults without
knowing how to stop Stray Dog at this point
(she possibly have tried ordering him to stop, but Stray Dog might have gotten way too berserk
past the line of being able to take anymore orders from her).
5. Stray Dog sees Wendy’s true self without the wig and murders her.’
(Wendy possibly had ordered Stray Dog to murder everyone except her — that is, Joshua)
6. Stray Dog chases Jennifer again, but this time he starts to realize just what he has done; He
collapses asking Jennifer to hand over the gun to him in a desperate manner — so that he could
commit suicide.
7. Stray Dog commits suicide.
Rest is history.
This is my theory but I still think it to be very accurate
let me know what you think,
This is an awesome site!!! Kudos!
Welcome, SnowTiger!
All you have done, it seems to me, is to re-state what we see when playing the game, without addressing any of the huge problems with that version of events, and the evidence given in the game that things didn’t actually happen the way we are shown, such as I have pointed out throughout parts 1-5 of this series of blog-posts.
Thanks for the reply!
I re-read your posts, this time a bit slowly
Good points! I came to agree with your points,
I still see the possibility of some or most of the events that happened in the
boss battle to be very close to actual events on these following unanswered questions:
1. Why was Wendy murdered by Gregory if she is the one who trained him and still resembled his son?
My answer would be: Probably because something close to what we see in the final battle occurred.
2. Why did Gregory start killing the children in the first place when all Wendy wanted was Jennifer?
My answer would be: Probably because Wendy wanted to kill the children – for a revenge (although,
she might have wanted him to stop at some point – I definitely think that it could be possible in the
fictional world of RoR. Wendy is the one who will go as far as wreck her loved one’s life due to the
feelings of rejection. Also being a total schizophrenic and attempts of torturing Jennifer via her notes
as the leader of the Aristocrats and appear fragile and needy until the ‘funeral’ chapter.
She definitely has the capacity to murder the other kids when faced with emotional
catastrophe — Although it is possible that Wendy was not the leader that ordered to harass Jennifer
with Aristocrats, but eh, that’s unlikely for various literary reasons – one is that would be the story won’t be
complete and make much sense without her being the leader from the beginning of the game).
3. If the final boss battle events were mostly imaginations, is there a possibility of Jennifer ever meeting
up with Wendy before Wendy was killed? – if so, what would they have conversed about, if they did at all?
My answer would be: I think there is a very good possibility of Jennifer seeing and conversing with Wendy
based on the semi lengthy monologue Wendy spoke in the last battle. Jennifer encounters Wendy ordering Gregory
to kill her, she encounters Wendy again outside of school, then Wendy gets taken away by Gregory.
Jennifer at least probably saw Wendy before her death.
If they have indeed met then what would they have talked about if the events we see were not the actual events?
If Wendy was still enraged at Jennifer due to her jealousy, I definitely think that the style of the dialogue
with Wendy in the final battle would have been in a very negative tone.
Something like – Wendy: “I hope you die because you rejected me! blah blah..” — but no, the tone was very
different – Wendy was apologetic and even hands over something that could even back fire against her to
her biggest “enemy”. Then gets helplessly taken away by Gregory.
If nothing at all, Wendy definitely apologized to Jennifer before she died.
4. What about the gun Gregory used?:
My answer: First, he shot himself – on his own will most likely.
Second, Jennifer is the sole survivor. Third, Jennifer heard Gregory apologizing to her calling her
“Joshua” before his death. The third point might be another false imagination but I’d like to doubt that.
I believe Jennifer was in a pretty close proximity to Gregory before his suicide. Jennifer might
have shouted “stop dad!” and maybe that awakened Gregory. Well, no one will ever know.
But again, the semi lengthy scene of Gregory’s dialogue and the final actions — the detail of it,
suggests that something close to what we saw happened and happened around Jennifer.
Just the fact that Wendy and Gregory left such Strong before death impression to Jennifer,
it is very hard for me to accept that huge percentage of the event was simply Jennifer sorting out what is
true and what is false. That would just be a waste of the most climactic event in the story in literary standards.
Not that any evidence denies it except that her deceased dog came to her aid and I think the memory of
Brown only strengthened and gave Jennifer the Gut to carry out what will be her most brave action in her life.
Well, what do you think?
edit: I totally agree that when Wendy said “I brought you here because…” was referring to the dream world
that Jennifer was in at the moment. But I still think that is not a big enough evidence to dismiss the final
battle events as falsehoods… – I’d love your opinion!!
@ SnowTiger
Point #1. You haven’t accounted for the “Stray Dog and the Lying Princess” storybook, which gives an alternate version of the massacre:
This fits with what is written on the chalkboard right before the massacre: “STRAY DOG LEGEND / THAT IS JUST WENDY’S LIE”.
Ask yourself, why would Wendy be elevated above Diana in their aristocrat society? Diana is older and larger than Wendy, and has a very dominating personality. Would it not be likely that Wendy was elevated to the top due to her promises that only she could protect the orphans from Stray Dog? Then it would fit that Wendy was deposed as princess when the other orphans decided that the Stray Dog Legend was a lie. Her reason to be elevated to princess was gone.
If so, then it would make sense that Wendy would send Gregory to the orphanage, not to kill the orphans, but to prove that Stray Dog was not a lie. Then, Wendy, getting to the orphanage ahead of Gregory, would be playing the part of a hero, warning the orphans that Stray Dog was really coming right now (as the storybook describes), showing that the legend was not a lie, saving the orphans in a way that all could see, and thereby re-gaining her status as princess. But the plan backfired. The orphans didn’t believe Wendy’s warning. Stray Dog started killing them.
Wendy either had the gun already, or would have gone to get the gun. Why would bold Wendy, who was the one who wanted Gregory’s gun in the first place, hand over that gun to timid Jennifer rather than clean up her mess herself? It may even be that Wendy originally intended to scare Gregory away with the gun as a back up plan if need be to protect the orphans. I think that Gregory most likely got the gun when he killed Wendy, and when his sanity started to return a bit, committed suicide with it.
@ SnowTiger
Point #2. You haven’t accounted for Bucket Knight telling Jennifer, at the beginning of the chapter: “Do not be ruled by falsehood. That’s your only clue.”
My theory takes this clue into account, arguing that Jennifer will show us a falsehood after falsehood built out of both her survivor-guilt fears (Jennifer’s guilt-fear that the massacre of the orphans occurred because she made Wendy hate her so much that Wendy insanely killed everybody… and Jennifer’s guilt-fear that even Gregory—whom she felt warm emotions about and who had rescued her after the airship crash—came to the point of being willing to kill her) and her wish-fullfillment desires (She wished that Wendy apologized before she died and had come to accept Brown who was alive again (!), and Jennifer was a brave fighter, etc.).
Point #3. You haven’t accounted for why Wendy would make reference to Brown as if he were alive rather than dead.
Point #4. You haven’t accounted for the game references to the fairy-tale “The Wolf and the Seven Kids” in which there is a massacre with only one survivor… and that survivor hid and did not fight. This makes sense as a solution to the next problem that you haven’t accounted for…
Point #5. You haven’t accounted for how tiny Jennifer (not as big as she looks, remember) could possibly battle large strong Gregory.
I could go on. But the fact is that the story is rather un-clever, and poorly written, if it happened the way you propose, and I prefer to think that the story is very clever and demanding to solve, but that the clues guide us if we examine them thoughtfully.