Grrl Power #110 – Superheroes are like Vegans…
This page was prompted by the idea that superheroes would probably be very excitable by the fact that they actually had powers. I mean if you could lift a car with your mind or could shoot green lightning from your eyes, it seems like it’s likely you’d find a way to work it into a conversation – assuming you didn’t live in some world where such talk would get you hunted or whatever. Peggy, being a highly skilled human thrust into a group of supers has obviously formed some opinions here.
If you think about it, this actually does happen all the time in super hero comics. How often does Wolverine remind people that he’s got unbreakable bones, or Rogue caution people not to touch her skin? Of course, that’s entirely an editorial decision for the benefit of new readers. I know the very first issue of X-men I ever read, Wolvie was trapsing around thinking to himself “good thing I have unbreakable bones and a healing factor” and I was up to speed. Long time readers are supposed to politely ignore these bits of dialog, but I think it’s funny to imagine that Rogue actually reminds everyone on her team not to touch her skin at least once a week. I’d love to see the issue where Wolverine finally snaps at her. “Bitch I’ve known you for 17 years! Do you think I have a concussion or something!? Stop telling me!” To be fair to Rogue though, every superhero gets concussed about 4 times an issue. They’d all have that boxer palsy by the time issue 60 rolled around.
SuperheroThey're super, thanks for asking!
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Dongs Ahoy!Full frontal and backal. Lots of skin, sex on some or all pages, explicit or otherwise.
That sudden jump in the last panel made me laugh out loud.
It’s the “thump” that really sells it.
;-)
The thump and Peggy reaching for her sidearm.
DOES THIS ORB SMELL LIKE FEAR TO YOU?!
your page post about boxers palsy concerning the super heroes has me laughing my head off XD
It probably wouldn’t be an issue for Wolverine, but if you get knocked out, that mean you got a concussion. Think about how many times Cyclops has been knocked out. He wouldn’t be able to read any more much less sit up on his own.
maybe his solar powered optic blasts that defy several laws of physics also fix his brain? and have driven him insane over the years.
PS: As of the most recent Avengers vs X-men…the X-men comics are dead to me. I will pay no more future attention to the X-titles *except for X-23 who has been moved over to the Avengers titles anyway*. If the writers are going to keep up this death stuff like this and treat the main cannon like they do the Ultimates titles then Marvel can just shove it. It was bad enough they killed Nightcrawler (and then replaced him with a more “bad-ass” Age of Apocalypse version…and killed Sabertooth and replaced him with several alt-versions…..
Yeah the nonsense continuity and constant continuity reboots are what’s really killed my interest in mainstream comics. I like a running story that is consistently written from beginning to end, which is why I’m attracted to (a limited amount of) manga and Gold Digger/Empowered etc.
Blame that on DC and Marvel, etc mistreating the authors and continuously having to get new ones who then get thrown onto the project without having sufficient time to learn, let alone understand the material. They really fubared Superman for a while after the “Death of Superman” arc, because 4 different authors had 4 different candidates for “successor” and the audience liked NONE of them, and the author for the “original” superman was already gone.
Marvel’s latest SNAFU
They killed Charles Xavier
The time I quit buying goes back to the Claremont years. Five different mutant titles was enough for me to finally realize that mainstream comics are a product and the owners of said product will do anything to keep you buying as many titles as possible regardless of cannon, continuity, or creative integrity.
@Rhuen. What? AGAIN?
It was bound to happen, Cyclops did it while all Dark Phoenix
By the way Lylandra was assasinated some time ago, Nightcrawler was killed by a Sentinel, Drax was nuked into nothingness…and yet with out explination was alive in again in “Avengers Assemble” which was a massive insult to Guardians of the Galaxy as they went from this team of seasoned soldiers to looking incompitent next to the Avengers.
I could go on with a list of deaths over the last ten years.
Biggest death/Deus Ex Machina
Oh, also the Phoenix Force is dead. Yep, its energy has been completly disbursed and used to bring back the powers of the Mutants and create new ones.
They all will be back at some point. Especially that last. Guaranteed.
I gave up on the X-Men (and Marvel) a long while back, Can still remember when they kept insisting that Jean Grey was dead and would stay dead. It made sense – a noble self-sacrifice to save her world and the people she loved. Great stuff. Very moving. Now, it’s like the run-up to a bad joke – how many times has she died and come back so far?
(That last is a rhetorical question – I REALLY don’t want an answer.)
One character I actually feel sorry for is Scott ‘Cyclops’ Summers. Seems like every single time the poor b##t###d has a shot at being happy or even just getting his life in order, something horrific happens. The women he gets into serious relationsips with all die, Merge With Powers Beyond Human Comprehension, go psycho / evil, turn out out to be clones / imposters / reincarnations / whatever of Jean G, or, very often, all the above all at once. …. And let’s not go into all the problems that the Summers family and associates thereof have anyhow.
I sometimes wonder if a petition should be taken up asking that Cyclops be permanently put out of his misery or even simply out to pasture. The poor guy is the ‘Mister Bill’ of the Marvel Universe – Peter Parker’s angst and general problems are lightweight by comparison.
Allow me to join in the Marvel/DC hate. The basic universes are screwed up, and Marvel also completely screwed up the Ultimates universe. The movies animated series for the various titles and the sadly-canceled Marvel Adventures imprint have been the only way to enjoy Marvel and DC for over a decade now.
The Sonic the Hedgehog universe makes much more sense and doesn’t insult its readers as much. How screwed up is that?
Whateley Academy https://www.crystalhall.org/ completely new story lines. and new technobable and sufficiently explained magic
i think yhey can squeeze about 2.7 more Jean Grey deaths in before the end of the year… if they can get the pasta machine away from the Red Hulk then it’ll be 3. I think this establishes a trope of sorts. unless there already a trope similar to it, or already named The Grey Death syndrome…
Not so much Marvvel / DC hate on my part as WTH are these guys doing to themselves?
Pretty common trope in fiction. Especially first-person narratives like noir mysteries. The main character gets his butt handed to him and a friend/loved one kidnapped, often with first contact with the story’s antagonist, because there are only so many ways the rivals of a story can come into hostile contact with one another and both walk away alive without third party involvement. The main character being rendered unconscious is useful for storytelling, but less so for his health. Thankfully, the viewer or reader doesn’t consider that the protagonist’s brain should be much by now until well after the movie/book is over. I can’t count how many times Mike Hammer was knocked out and came round with someone being kidnapped.
The big thing about Rogue is that she really doesn’t want people forgetting, because somebody might die.
Nan, Nan… I have super powers!
And just when you thought she wasn’t going to tell you, Peggy.
Also, did nobody warn her about Sydney’s ADHD? XD
Wonderful comic!
All they told Peggy was that she was to keep a eye on her and take her out to dinner.
Unrestricted use of the Colonel’s expense card should have warned her “this is NOT a normal assignment”/
Especially since a Black card has a Limit in the mid-to-high 6 digits?
I’m actually guessing Maxima’s “Black Card” is an American Express Centurion card. Officially, that card has no limit (Although you’ll hear stories about people having purchases declined)
Sadly at AUD$4500 annually, I can’t bring myself to get one :(
Yeah it’s a Black Amex. Presumably she won’t be buying another Osprey with it, but I can imagine a situation where she may need a few hundred thousand on the spot. She still has to fill out an expense report though.
I can just imagine the receipts attached.
Wonderful comic. I find myself looking forward to the updates.
“Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars?!?! WHAT DID YOU DO COLONEL?!”
“Welll you know that car I had to use like a bludgeon? Turns out it was a Lamb-origami Diabolical or something.”
Expense report:
-eight kilos of different extra spicy sauces
-flatware replacement (they were damaged by how spicy it was)
-the expense card itself (it has the smell of chemical weapons now for some reason)
-one roof (‘oops wrong orb’ is sooo Sydney)
-cleaning bill for a USAF uniform
-prosthesis replacement
-pink hair dye
-17 pairs of shoes (no, it’s NOT what you think, and activating both mystery orbs is as evil as crossing the streams)
-A penguin (don’t ask, please)
-274 bullets shot, also one ammo clip is unaccounted for
-8 clams, as well as the property damage they did while trying to eat the waiter
-7 bribes for silence
-a giant glass rectangle Sydney ran into while getting out of the restaurant, as well as medical bills for the nudists who did their annual ‘run naked out of the blue’ thing and walked over the glass
-all cages in an exotic pet shop, who was supposed to get the glass
-various pet catcher fees and antipoisons
-two fire extinguisher who caught fire for no adequately explored reason
-a ninja costume with an eye patch. Yarr!
-duct tape
-cleaner for taking out duct tape leftovers off Sydney’s lips
-several fines for making a mess
-a chocolate bar, 18000$ (that a giant cake shaped like a bar complete with chocolate bottle full of real alcohol for another of the customer’s wedding)
-engoing translator fees for the unknown nationality peasant who teleported in when Sydney crossed the streams, er, ORBS. We’re not even sure he’s from EARTH
-a cat toy (it was less expensive than the harpoon Sydney wanted)
-2 kilos of dry noodles
-147$ USD of coffee
-The actual meal
…and the last item on the list shouldn’t be on an expense report for national security reasons (we DON’T want national security to know about this, let’s keep this between supers so it’s not misused)
Thanks!
To get back to the elevator panel…
1, The building was way to tall to just have 18 floors, unless enach floor was 12 feet high or more.
2, With the posible 4 columns of buttons I would assume that the 2 buttons beside the 1 and 2 buttons are B2 B1 or B G. Here in Canada we have some building that have have both a ground floor and first floor. The hospital near me has that. B G 1 2 3 and so on.
3, It is possible that there is more then 1 elevator and special evelators only go to certain floors. Some of the buildings in downtown Toronto are like that. 3 elevators service the floors 1 to 20 and 3 elevators that service floors 20 and up. then there were 3 in another hallway that only service the basement floors. If you were on the 12th floor and needed to get something to someone on the 32nd floor you have to take the elevator all the way down and then get in the other set.
I think there are special elevators that go to all the basement floors and only the basement floors.
ooh, oo. Dont forget the fornt and rear dor buttons too. The panel could go BR B 1 2.
grrr. ….
FRONT and rear DOOR. Sometimes my fingers ty0pe faster then my brain can keep up. :P
I notice that at one school and one hospital I visited, most elevators don’t go to the top floors (since that’s not where students go, and the building was made taller over time respectively)
You’d expect need-to-know-basis organisation to do the same. Especially since some members can teleport between floors, fly in/out, make portals, or just get a lift off the ones that can bring someone with them using those methods.
I also expect they have a resident mad scientist (muahahaha!) with a private few floors for his labs… or perhaps the top few floors are a giant ‘danger room’ for training…
…or maybe a supercomputer is taking up so much space…
In any case, there are also mundane explanations but they’re much less fun.
I believe we have allready met the ‘resident mad scientist’ in that previous chunk of story. The lab is probably in the basement, and underwater a few hundred yards off-shore.
If you want a messed up elevator arrangement ther is an elevator that bridges the gap between 2 separate structures in my hometown, an older parking garage and a relatively new multistory movie theater. To make it more interesting, the floor levels do not line up between the structures and the floor labels on the control panel is quite confusing since there are 2 ground floors, 2 1st floors, etc… I have frequently ended up on the wrong floor when trying to navigate between the buildings.
Don’t forget the Pentagon, where you have to take different elevators to get to different floors and different sections. It’s designed that way for security.
I just assumed that this building was the same. Only access for floors 1-18, no basement or subbasement access, no upper floors, no roof, no helipad. It’s probably low to medium security.
Yeah I should have designed this elevator like that. I got excited when making buttons in Illustrator. I assume there are other elevators in the building like that, and this elevator opens into a high security checkpoint on the security floors. Still it’s a bad design. I may need to redo that panel.
If you had to keep something cool a total secret all day, every day. This is what happens when you finally get to talk about it.
Like the guy who has the world record for squirting milk out of under his eye, due to a tiny, tiny hole between that and his mouth?
His wife was nonplussed about it.
whether or not you tell anyone about your “cool” powers does depends on how common super heroes are and how old your are.
if you live in an environment like academy city (とある科学の超電磁砲（レールガン (A Certain Scientific Rail gun )) , then being able to shoot lasers out of your eyes will be nothing new. Where as an environment where any magic, psychic, metahuman or anything else deemed “not normal” would get viewed with suspicion or even judged to be a threat, then being able to shoot lasers out of your eyes could get you killed.
As for age, well a kid is more likely to want to show of their “cool powers” then an adult.
Question: why would anyone want to be a super hero? the hours are long (your on call 24/7), the pay sucks (hence the secret identity to go to work get earn money which could course a few problems)
https://superredundant.com/comics/2012-10-04-Strip-173.jpg
then there’s all the bureaucracy, red tape and laws (does Wonder woman even have a pilots license to fly her invisible jet?)
what branch of the services is Captain America a Captain in?
and so on, and so forth
Wonder Woman is an ambassador of Paradise Island, her lisence would be through her own nation.
Captain America is a captain in the United States Department of Defense, namely the army given he was appointed the rank in WWII. His actual rank I believe is higher now, but the name stays as part of the uniform.
Marvel’s Civil War was big on the whole vigilante, rank, military/private sector stuff.
DC has never been very good at it though, Smallville was embarrassing with the knock-off (anti-vigilante laws)
which is stupid…because vigilantism is already illegal, regardless if you are wearing a costume or have powers.
I had a vision last night of a comic just a little bit down the road…
Peggy has finally gotten Sydney to sit down and eat in the cafeteria, when lo and behold someone announces to the room that the press conference is about to start. The TV on the wall is tuned to the correct channel and everything is going swimmingly until…
Just after the studio director says ‘at least the crazy swearing girl isn’t there’…
Someone in the audience makes a comment that Sydney takes wrong, and…
POP!
“I HEARD THAT!”
(Which gets even more deliciously confusing because Sydney forgot they were on a thirty second time delay and nobody knows to what she is referring.)
Sydney is fun. I may have to steal her if I ever run a superhero game again.
She’s a little hard to build with most game systems. The powers she has are pretty powerful, the major disadvantage is of course that she can only use two at a time, but I don’t remember a specific disadvantage like that detailed in any superhero RPGs I’m familiar with. You may have to get a little creative with the rules to build her.
Gurps- easy to do or add onto big eyes, small mouth, 2nd edition, just custom class it and work out powers from there
Simple enough:
ADHD disavantage: you have an obligation to make the gamemaster smile every 10 rounds, and laugh every 100 rounds, or else he/she will make you act stupid or STUPID respectively and make your power orbs inactive for one round after the moment they are needed.
Indy plan disavantage: you cannot think of a plan with more than 2 steps and actually apply it. Make a wisdom roll to apply a 2 step plan. This disavantage applies even if you’re not aware of the plan and someone is tricking/ordering you into it. No effect if trying to order you NOT to do something.
anti-chessmaster advantage: no evil chessmaster can make a plan predicting your actions unless he’s a master class speed chessmaster working one round ahead only, and any oracle peering into your possibilities will go into a coma for a week and come out with an irreversible stackable penalty of 25 to wisdom unless a mind-wipe is applied TWICE.
Dunno if it was already spoken about, but did a certain someone forget Peggy´s scar in the third pannel?
I may have found an “Easter Egg”…
…if you compare the horizontal scar in Panel_9 to all the other times you can see it on this page, then it’s pointed at the lowest tip of the vertical scar, rather than towards a higher point, closer to the bottom-edge of the left eye, as it usually is.
On a different note, has anyone else noticed that DaveB’s “Fingerprint Scanner” is wired only to Floors 7-through-14? It looks as though only those 8 floors rate the extra-high security measures. Personally, I’d limit the access for “Supers” to only Floors 9-though-12. This would maintain a distance of 2 floors each above-&-below their living-area, as an additional measure of “Sound Buffer”, on top of the standard physical noise-muffling technologies.
Hey, DaveB, can you answer a question about the PPO?
Are the markings on it cracks? Stripes? Something inside? I’m working on the 3D Sydney in my avatar, and I’d rather not guess if I don’t have to.
Wow, Gravatar really compresses the hell of the pictures you upload. That looks like crap.
I wasn’t gonna say anything but since you did, yeah, she kinda fugly in that pic.
Haven’t detailed her up yet. Just got the basic shapes down.
Also, 3D base models look like creepy corpses. They need to be posed or animated to look appealing.
Also, that’s a flat coloring. Haven’t worked up the skin tones and the normal maps yet.
So, yeah. It’s a Work-In-Progress. 3D looks like crap until you are about 95% of the way done, then suddenly everything snaps together.
I think the skin tone should be lightened. How about rotating on a vertical plane, like when she first demonstrated the power of the orbs (“Wheeee!”)? or have the orbs move in an orbit around her head? That should up the challenge for 3D effects.
Skin tone is currently a beige I grabbed at random because I haven’t started all the fine detail work yet. Final skin will be a sub-surface-scattering shader with pores and fine lines and realistic undertones showing the variations of skin tone.
Again, model in avatar is just a work-in-progress. Just like a pencil sketch is not a final comic. Rough modeling is done from head to shoes. Detail sculpting and real color mapping come next. After that, I get to sculpt morph targets for the face, rig all the bones, and paint on skin weights. That’ll take a while, since rigging is not my strongest area. Then I get to animate.
This is going to take a while, as I am currently working crazy long hours at a start-up company, and only get to tinker with my 3D projects here and there.
i hear you, i’m much the same way. i’m strong on modeling but UVs are tricky when maya crashes every other move.
Grah!!! ART SCIENCE!! One of my many weaknesses!!!
It’s supposed to be lightning, which is for some reason red. I might have been thinking of Diablos “Fire Lightning (from Diablo 2) when I was drawing it. The orb would look like one of those shock globes with clouds in it and a red film pulled over it.
So the PPO is like a plasma globe, except redder and more lightningy with a few clouds. I assume then that contents of the orb are dynamic–that is, that the lightning is sporadically discharging and the clouds are roiling about?
And in the tentacle orb, is the little squiggle in there also slithering about in mid-air? And it looks like in the shield orb that there’s a spherical force field just inside the orb, yes? Is the cendy center of the telepresence orb semi-transparent or opaque? And the flight orb seems to be just a blue orb, while the two unknowns seem to have a glowing fuzzy center, is that right?
Are there any other dynamic effects, color shiftings, or other visual specials that we should be aware of? (For example, do they glow in the dark?)
Thanks so very much for replying, by the way. First-hand references are always the best references.
Yeah the tentacle orb has a mini tentacle slithering around in it. They’re all internally animated. Nothing spastic, they’re probably a little hypnotic to stare at.
if i had the power to shoot lasers from my nipples i would use that power to become the worlds most awesome super-villainess.
I’m wondering what would happen if anyone else were to come into contact with the orbs either intentionally or by accident. Do they actively avoid 3rd party contact?
To judge by #104… they get a mild headache.
I had completely forgotten about that, and it was so recent too. So if they stay in a certain range(about 10′ from the tube toss at the bank), but orbit her head in a halo when not in use. Conceivably Sidney has an unlimited number of missiles she can fire at close in enemies as the orbs eventually return to her when they are thrown. I wonder if a third party were to attempt to move an orb which force would win out? This could be a potential weakness of their use. We also haven’t seen what happens if she attempts to grab more than 2 at once, I’m thinking the same way anyone would carry 3+ oranges. Oh the anticipation.
Actually it’s been said that she can only use 1 per hand when using their powers. If she was holding 3+ then she probably wouldn’t be able to use any of the the powers in that hand at all. And why would she need to hold them? She can control where they float (limited) and they follow her around so she really only needs to hold them when using them. If she putting them away in the tube then she would just direct them there mentally.
1 orb per hand limit, plus the “bonk!” capacity for the remaining orbs which can be handy making a distraction, but certainly not very powerful.
I’m not sure if anyone pointed it out, but in the top right panel, Peggy is missing the scar across her nose.
That is all.
I mentioned it first. You would have known that if you would have read and at this late date you should.
I JUST realized that Peggy has her hand on her pistol in the last panel.
whats with the red lipstick in panel 4
That’s her tongue you’re seeing, though I can see why you might think she’s doing pouty lips.
Funny, of course, but you’re missing the nose-scar I’m the second panel. :)
Sydney! Stop being not cool! What did you and Peggy just get done talking about?! Geez…
Reading the subtext, I see what you did there.
this particular comic is VERY interesting considering stuff we learn later
Yes, the very subtle foreshadowing of things to come.
Oh god the hindsight just hit me hard, the foreshadowing went completely over my head the first time I read this page. Sydney has super powers and she got them during her vacation, and both were referenced here in the elevator. Sydney is a vegan, which is foreshadowed here, and in the same page so is pregnancy.
Vegetarian, not vegan.