RECAP/REVIEW: The Infinite Loop #3 – “Break the Infinite Loop”
This is the issue where things get a little intense. Even the cover this time had me worried.
We dive straight in again with Teddy and Ano making a soft landing after they fell off the cliff in the previous issue. They’ve arrived in Teddy’s special cubby hole which lies outside of space and time, safe from their pursuers for now. Teddy was the one who created the place and is free to manipulate it as she wishes. It’s super idyllic: there’s a house at the end of a yellow brick road, straight out of The Wizard of Oz.
Teddy’s ready to be completely practical but Ano tells Teddy to trust her and so they have sex instead–on the grass (that cannot be comfortable). What follows is a quite an explicit sex scene so warnings for that. I’m not going to call it random, because there was a build up to it. I’ve just never been a fan of the whole ‘let’s-have-a romantic-moment-when-there-could-be-danger’ trope.
This is the first of many scenes with Teddy and Ano (TeddAno) enjoying their time as a couple (none of them are as explicit as the first, mind you.) There’s a very literal countdown to the end of their happiness however. The counter which appears every few pages counts down the days until Ulysses appears, acting as a very real and more than rude reminder of reality – but more on that later.
Ulysses acts as Teddy’s contact in the outside world. On Teddy’s second call with him he tells her how the other Erasers are refusing to kill the human anomalies that have been popping up. Ironically enough, Teddy responds by saying that it’s awful people don’t want to kill the human anomalies—what about the effect on the space-time continuum? (she says, living with a human anomaly in a place where space and time won’t be affected.)
Ulysses’ report is interrupted by the sight of Ano snuggling up to Teddy. In a surge of jealous rage, he calls Teddy a hypocrite; she promptly hangs up after seeing his reaction. I’m not a fan of the love triangle that’s set up between Teddy, Ano and Ulysses. It’s like his jealousy is meant to excuse the fact that he disapproves of TeddAno. I’m not sure if we’re supposed to straight-up hate Ulysses, or feel sorry for him because he’s been ‘friend zoned’ by the woman he likes. I mean, there was no obvious attraction between them anyway—she tried to contact him while fighting a dinosaur and he was off making tea.
I’m not sure whether it’s because of the above conversation, but Ano starts to believe that hiding isn’t the best option. She wants them to fight back, using the story of Aung San Suu Kyi as a way to convince Teddy. There’s also a part where she quotes from a philosophy book, but that comes as more confusing than inspiring. First off: Hooray! Ano finally has some agency! And a personality! Second thing: How did she find out about Aung San Suu Kyi? The books she read can’t have come from Teddy’s time, because everything deemed ‘too extreme’ has been banned. That must mean Teddy got those books from a different time period. But if time is so sensitive, wouldn’t taking even a small thing like a book result in an anomaly…? It seems like the more we dig into this comic, the more plot holes we find.
Teddy isn’t interested in a rebellion. She just wants to live out the rest of her days in her safe space with Ano. She even goes as far to say that her time travels have taught her that to be ignorant is to be happy. *Record Scratch* Wait, what? Ignorance has been a HUGE factor in the oppression of people of colour, women, disabled and LGBTQ+ people since…well since ever. Considering the only reason Teddy is hiding in her cubby hole is because the outside world doesn’t want her to be with Ano, then the whole ‘ignorance is bliss’ theory kind of doesn’t apply here. Ano wants to save the other human anomalies, but she doesn’t want to risk losing Teddy. So she drops the subject. I know that Ano loves Teddy, but I also get the sense that she’s clinging to her because she’s the first person who saw her as something other than an anomaly.
The day finally arrives where Ulysses appears in the in the space time nest. Ulysses is fully prepared to erase Ano. Teddy tries to stop him but gets slapped across the room (seriously??? This is the same woman who took down a freaking dinosaur, and now a slap can send her flying? Gonna put it down to emotional attachment to Ulysses.) He hesitates and gives another person just enough time to finish the job.
Here’s where it gets a bit trippy. The person who erased Ano was a Teddy from an alternate timeline. The Forgers (the people who the Erasers were fighting against) are a group of Teddys from alternate timelines who gathered together to break the infinite loop. In all their realities Ulysses killed Ano and they all gave up. They wanted to change that for this version of Teddy. Which apparently meant they had to erase Ano to get Teddy to act. Why? If they were in a reality where Ano survives, wouldn’t it be better to work together with Ano to save the other Anos? Apparently if this Ano is left alive, others will die because Teddy won’t leave the safe space…but they were dying anyway? On a side note, did we have to go down the ‘lover gets killed to motivate the main character’ route? Ano was finally starting to get a character arc. Killing Ano apparently works because Teddy is ready to fight back.
Well, looks like things are only getting more action-packed from here. I found the cover a little misleading; to me it makes Ulysses look like the main villain, or it looks like he’s secretly controlling everything. Maybe it’s meant to be a reference to Ulysses being angry at TeddAno’s happiness? Next issue—Teddy led rebellion? See you then!
