Grrl Power #1100 – Mystery, Suspense, Intrigue!
I hope this page makes sense to everyone. It seems fairly straightforward to me, but then, I wrote it, so it’s hard for me to judge.
Anvil isn’t covering her head out of a sense of honoring the dominant religion in the country, there are christians living in Senegal, and Anvil was raised Southern Baptist. She attends church on more than just Easter and Christmas, but it’s more of a social thing for her than a weekly reminder of all the hellfire and brimstone awaiting the sinners. No, she’s wearing the head wrap, because while she isn’t quite as visually distinct as Maxima or Dabbler, she’s still an internationally famous superheroine. She’s 6′ 7″ which draws the eye all by itself, but when you add the red hair, it’s kind of a slam dunk that she’ll be recognized. They were ostensibly trying to not draw attention to the fact that several members of Arc-SWAT were wandering around a market while Dabbler was trying to pull a honey-money trap a few streets over. “Sydney” was in the same boat, sort of. By her lonesome, she’s not so memorable, although in a country that’s 95% black, she’ll obviously stand out quite a bit more. But stashing her orbs in a massive purse and tucking away those bangs, and she’s more or less good to go.
But of course, their goal wasn’t not to be seen, but to appear to be making a reasonable attempt at it.
If it seems there are a lot of Lionesses, keep in mind that Senegal has a population of 17 million, and the occurrence of Supers among humans, once thought to be one in a million, is probably closer to one in 100,000. Although it varies regionally and seems to be more prevalent in more industrialized nations, it’s a safe bet that Sengal has 80-160 (?) Supers. Or at least, that’s how many were born there in the last few generations. If you’ve got super powers and you want to work and live elsewhere, you’ve definitely got more options than the average person. The Lionesses are Senegal’s Arc-SWAT. Are there any Lions, you might ask? That… will eventually come up.
The October Vote Incentive is still up!
The November one will be up with the Monday comic.
So I have enough “Blue Babes” to do a theme. Eventually I’ll be able to fill in the whole rainbow of my own characters. I did a rainbow lineup previously for those who hadn’t seen it. I’d love to revisit that one of these days.
Enjoy variant outfits and lack thereof over at Patreon.
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Relax Sydney. The whole point of this exercise is to give you a chance to recharge. Granted I think they could have done better than a janitorial supply closet…
given the reputation they also could have done much worse. also given the nature of the side quest Anvil owes the full 5. and something vegetarian and zippy
Yes but if the bad guys open the door trying to find her, she can jump out and yell “Supplies!”
verr nice
Even in low-power mode, she’ll mop the floor with them.
I approve. can we get fanart?
I’m on the fence about if this is a pun or just a joke. I’ll go with just a joke, because I’m a little strapped for cash this time of year and would rather spend the money on presents for my friends and family rather than on too many ninja hit squads.
Guys, I think we’re winning: Pander is finally running out of steam.
Only towards the end of the year when my ninja hit squad budget is slightly lower due to buying friends, family and assorted loved ones presents.
pander plays computer games. thus she has steam.
I so want to send ninjas for that but that particular pun had good context so I will be merciful.
Plus the holidays are coming up and my ninja budget is a bit lower this time of year. Have to save money for the truly egregious crimes against humor (ie, bad puns) that you and others do.
Your ninja hit squads would be best advised to stay out of supplies closets though
https://youtu.be/GHS_GQLgqtM
Hopefully, the orbs do not need sunlight to recharge. Stuck in a dark room will limit their ability to re-energize.
I’m going to suggest they need stuffed bunny rabbits. because they keep going and going.
Not much going at the moment.
Where is the furry thing coming from if it’s not the tailbone?
The clothing do not seem to change when the glamor/disguise field/whatever that is is lifted. So she’s actually wearing these pants that don’t have a tail hole. I guess the tail goes all the way down a pant leg and then back up. It’s gotta be quite a long tail…
You can see that it comes from the bottom of the panel rather than her coccyx, so it being a super long tail is a solid idea.
Not important.
The “furry thing” seems to be a tail.
It probably comes from a hole down the trousers instead of breaking them from the tailbone area.
There could be a hole cut in one of the pockets or a seam that was tampered with. Given there is an illusion being dispelled there might be a new tail hole that wasn’t visible before.
Got to love the little bit of foreshadowing in Panel 2
Are you really sure that the Halo body double is actually wearing pants? The clothes could be part of the glamour.
A) despite what years of catgirl hentai research has taught you, your tailbone goes all the way down between you butt cheeks. It is probably just offscreen.
B) Some aspects of the glamor haven’t dropped yet, so as far as that guy can see that tail might not look like it is attached to *anything*
Are they suggesting that Sydney is not conspicuously attractive? Tsk tsk.
Quite the opposite. Clearly she *is* someone who can be impersonated.
I feel like he could still shoot her. Just me?
It appears to me that the tail / living hair braid has wrapped itself around the gun such that it’s holding the hammer back.
The thug may be able to pull the trgiger, but the hammer can’t fall forward.
Her tail is not just wrapped around the gun, but is lying in the space between the hammer and the firing pin. If he pulls the trigger, the hammer will fall maybe a quarter of an inch, and stop because the tail is in the way. She will get her tail pinched but she will not get shot.
And anybody familiar with cats will tell you that as far as they are concerned, somebody mistreating their tail that way means justifiable homicide. Even if they’re the one who put their tail in a position to be pinched ^^”
Her tail is blocking the hammer from releasing, therefore it can’t fire.
I appreciate the de-tail in the art.
Dave did wrap up the loose end nicely.
My first thought too, but she wrapped her tail around his pistol in a way that she blocked the hammer from dropping. Quite clever, from both her and DaveB.
tails blocking the hammer so she should be good as long as its got the grip strength to stop him from yanking it away.
She is a super. For all you know she’s immune to bullets.
technically, Dabbler isn’t a super. Supers are an earth phenomenon only. Dabbler is, however, an adventurer who uses magic, so she probably has access to spells that do the same thing (since i’m pretty sure it was established at some point that ‘super powers’ are humanity tapping in to the thaumion field in an unconscious way).
That’s not Dabbler, though
That’s… not Dabbles
Check the last strip, that’s the short Lioness from the right side of group that was cloaked watching from the street when Dabs headed out. She’s clearly more cat-like than the rest, or at least that we’ve seen so far. Maybe they all have a natural “glamor” that lets them seem more human or it’s just the one lady.
No, no it’s not, this one is a different Lioness (you expect us to believe, Catspaw managed to get from watching Dabbles in the market from above, and into position with Anvil in a matter of seconds?)
Actually, Deus claimed that ‘super powers’ are humanity tapping into the superion field in an unconscious way. Though exactly how that differs from the thaumion field was not really clarified apart from the assertion that they were distinct.
Well, in theory the way it differs is that the superion field is artificial, specifically designed to enable super powers. Humans can tap it because some of them are genetically engineered to interface with it.
In practice, maybe the thaumion field was just somebody’s earlier attempt at the same idea, since a physical field that responds to symbols seems kind of dubious otherwise.
Probably yes, but I would venture a guess she can shrug the bullet off. If not, she could have a solid bullet-resistant vest under that disguise.
Someone jammed their tail between the hammer and the slide. He can pull the trigger all day long it will hurt Dabbler’s tail but not much else. You can do the same thing with the skin between your thumb and index finger hurts like hell but once you do it the weapon is useless.
This isn’t Dabbler. It is one of local supers. Maybe a shape-shifter, like the lady who is on a ride to the Ascension offices/holding cell, or an illusionist, like Dabbles, or maybe something else.
look again, tail is in between the firing pin and the gun. No click, no bang.
No, he tail wrapped it’s to block the hammer.
Look again; the tail is between the hammer and the gun. No click, no bang.
With the percutor blocked is gonna be difficult.
No, not just you. He even had his finger on the trigger, you’d think that move would have just resulted in him pulling it by reflex.
I’d want some darned good body armor before I’d try anything like that.
He could try. On the other hand, the shock factor of realizing he just got played, and the sheer intimidation factor of realizing he just threatened a Lioness with nothing but a pistol, probably gives his target a window of opportunity.
And he only has the speed of a non-super. Which means it’s a big window.
Good luck to him.
Next, Anvil grabs him under the jaw and lifts him up and the other lady removes the firearm from his grip and disables it. Then the little lady starts asking him questions the rest of the Golden Boys do not want him to answer.
Why are we assuming he’s a baseline human and not a super? Even with powers, still good policy to lead with a gun, as Max demonstrated early on.
Or his superpower could not be related to speed, strength, or weaponry, he could be a phaser or some other non-combat super.
Maybe he has a superpower related to guns.
Fairly impressive to wrap your tail into the hammer of a gun without seeing it.
The classic double bluff, gets them every time.
We have Kansas City Shuffle lads! XD
If you are keeping in theme, there should be one lion to every group. Or pride, rather. :P
Yeah, and that lion will be lazing around while the females do most of the work, and then just wander in to claim (and get) the credit
Plot twist! Also tail twist.
Maybe this super cat-lady is known as Plot? Or would it be Copy-Cat?
Im sure theres a tail behind her name what ever it is.
Image link broken. It’s apparently something Monty Python related by the url?
Dave forgot to remove the tracking crud from the end of the URL https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/montypython/images/7/74/Anfscd_1.jpg
I believe that that is the Monty Python sketch “How not to be seen”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VokGd5zhGJ4
Not gonna lie. By now I would have asked our space pirate friend for four extra arms and a bit of a brain tweak to use them.
Halo would be so much more powerful if she wasn’t limited to two.
Unless the orbs decided she’d been altered enough that she wasn’t the person they were associated with anymore. Which is a bit of a risk. Remember, they don’t know that the orbs didn’t pick her for a reason, and they don’t know exactly on what basis the orbs identify her as their user.
Or, for that matter, if they would decide she was a viable user again if it was an issue and they undid the procedure.
No, I have no idea how one would undo such a brain tweak.
Odds are that the creators had more arms, though. There’s no reason to install the ‘hand’ limitation when there are more orbs than hands. Especially due to the fact that they’ve been compared to a spaceship. You don’t pilot 1/3 of a vehicle.
vehicles that move in 3 dimensions often have more controls than can be immediately operated with all limbs; sometimes you have to flip a switch or w/e; a car only needs steering wheel and brake/gas/maybe clutch but it’s limited to the ground
Large complex vehicles have multiple operators, maybe the orbs are intended for multiple users and Sydney’s just been running in standalone mode the whole time. We’ve seen people bonked by the orbs, and that they orbited Varia, but afaik no one else has ever actually laid hands on them.
Sydney’s orbs aren’t functioning properly, so it’s for the best if she plays defensively.
Ideally she’ll still get XP and maybe be anle to fix it with an upgrade.
It’s possible she has enough XP for an upgrade right now anyway and just hasn’t checked. I mean, there was a fair amount of orb usage to get into the situation she’s in now.
It’s also possible that she did check but level up only happens if there’s x% energy in the reserve and she was below that value when she checked. But I suspect that they have established a protocol where she doesn’t check for a skill upgrade off base since the last upgrade.
There’s also the fact that the upgrade tree is considered classified, so she’s not allowed to check *right now* unless something comes up that would warrant an upgrade right away.
Seems like trying to open the skill tree should’ve been the first thing she did after they landed off the coast to assess and call Max. And definitely before they headed into populated areas, let alone monitored facilities.
Sydney would seriously benefit from knowing the Blink spell.
I suspect the orbs will block her from using magic since both Dabs and the gal in Archon couldn’t even detect the nature of the orbs plus when Vari tried to “use” Sydney’s DNA to trigger a gestalt power nothing happened other than the orbs orbited her as well.
I’d say the orbs orbiting Vari was hinting at a fairly OP gestalt power.
That said, agreed. The orbs probably include tapping into their user’s psion, thaumion, and superion fields among their power sources, which basically means that Sydney won’t be able to tap into any of them on her own. Still, the orbs are a net advantage, as they’re enough to make Sydney more powerful than most people who tap into just one or two of those.
What’s happening in this page seems mostly pretty straightforward to me, too. In the first row of panels, we’re given to assume that Kenya and Sydney are exploring the markets while Dabbler does her thing. In the second row, we’re given a twist; the police station had spies in it, so the bad guys know about the bust and are attempting to take Sydney hostage. In the third row of panels, it’s revealed that “Sydney” was actually another character in disguise (although I don’t know who it’s meant to be, if that was meant to be obvious), because the bust was actually planned around the probability of a spy, while the real Sydney waits somewhere out of the way.
Considering her size, skin color, eyes, and cat ears, she’s the lion/cat girl on the far right in the scene in the previous page.
Nope, completely different kitten
It’s the Lioness we saw in the last panel of the previous installment.
The Sydney sized one with a tail.
Problem with that theory: where is her gloves and her headphones?
Also, how did she get down there and into position when she had been looking at Dabbles on the last page?
Considering the amount of time gap between the last page and this one, I do not see your last objection as a factor at all.
Regarding your first two objections: I take it you’re one of those people who would not recognize a Tedd without her glasses? There’s enough of a wardrobe change here to have the lack of gloves and headphones be the least of the potential possession related quibbles. Still, there has been time.
… What time gap?
Wait, you mean because Anvil wonders if Dabbles had been caught yet? She’s probably thinking Dabbles would have been ‘gotted’ the minute she stepped into the market
… she took them off as part of disguising herself?
Or, it’s a different Lioness and Catspaw is still on the roof with the others
Seems like a bad outfit if her powers revolve around disguise.
The first row also has a good clue. That remake from “Sydney” feels very out of place, it’s not something she would say about Dabbler. Which turns out to indeed be out of place, because it’s not Sydney.
Agreed, pretty easy to follow and 2 good twists on the way justifying a re-read once you’re up to speed on the situation. From a narrative perspective, this is one of the best written pages in a while even though it’s not ‘splashy’.
The dialogue at the top of the page just seems slightly off… and then makes so much more sense once you get to the bottom of the page. Cleverly written, Dave.
Thinking they could kidnap her so easily shows how arrogant they were.
No it doesn’t, we know how Sydney feels about big-busted beautiful women, and she’s still salty with Dabbles for that stunt with the ‘re-heat’ spell
Man did he get fooled quickly.
People tend to forget that there’s all types of acknowledge Beauty in the world. Nerd chic is not an imaginary thing
This lioness woman is already my favorite. XD Such a beautiful smile!
I guess now we know why she wore those adorable mittens on the previous page.
I wonder if on the next page her whiskers will show up, too.
Now we know that wasn’t a Neko-suit the short one was wearing, the gloves were to protect everything else from her claws! Same with the glasses, I’m sure with eyes like her’s (which weren’t changed, I see a trend here) sunglasses are to help her see during the daylight. Cat eyes are pretty light-sensitive, anyone that has a cat knows how much their pupils close up in sun light. It seriously effects how well they can see.
Technically, the lionesses would be stronger with the reputed eyesight of cats, rather than the actual eyesight of cats.
To be clear: A cat’s eyesight is pretty lousy at the best of times. Where cats really shine vision-wise is their quality of vision barely goes down at all in low light conditions until somewhere past the point most humans are completely blind from lack of light.
As a cat subject, I started to suspect that was the case even before I saw the study that determined that, as our cats don’t seem to be able to visually recognize food from more than a few paces. But then I saw the study, which basically did an analysis of cat eyes to determine what cat vision actually looks like.
A natural consequence of having a reflective layer under the retina, so that the light sensitive cells get two cracks at the light, not just one. (The reason cat’s eyes shine in the dark.) It has the side effect of compromising resolution.
It’s not the same lioness!!!!
An excellent use of tell to both immobilize and disarm the gun at once. Though I have to admit no clue what the name of this particular lion would be though the fact that there’s a lying and Motif on the shirt was a giveaway before she even started dropping her camouflage. Also don’t bash nerd chic. Plenty of people are attracted to girls like Sydney her being genuine just makes it even more of a slam dunk for the genre
The old Kansas City Shuffle. Make them think the trap is so obvious that it’s easy to avoid when the REAL ploy is hidden just off to the side.
My favorite con in fiction XD
For al we know, that isn’t Anvil either.
Apparently she knows that he knows that she knows that that tail also
somehow can prevent him from shooting her.
Disintegrate the gun and the hand if he doesn’t play along?
Pretty hard to discharge a gun when the hammer is blocked, my man.
Anvil’s got some goofy cross eye in the second panel there.
She’s looking at something fairly close to her face. People’s eyes do tend to cross a fair amount in that situation. It’s one of the reasons looking at something really close up is painful for most people.
The tail is coiled between the hammer and the back of the gun, so he can press the trigger but all it’ll do is pinch the tail, not shoot. Granted, it probably hurts if that tail is actually a part of her body and not some magical or cybernetical prosthesis thing, but it’s not gonna be lethal.
Meh, I’ve pinched my thumb in the hammer before on a couple different guns, it’s not pleasant but not that bad. Certainly not enough to throw an experienced fighter off their game.
On the other paw, it may well be enough to make a kitty homicidal ^^”
My, Sydney, what big teeth you have.
It’s to better grin at you when you get caugh BOI!
What is it with the primitive architecture in the background? David, please take a look at street pics of Dakar on Google maps. It looks much more urban and Western.
It is part of their tourist industry. Like Disney has their Frontier Land, here they have their Medeival Market. Nearby they have their Afro-futurism exhibit called Timbuktu The Future.
Sydney in the supply closet?!? How did she even GET there????
Through the door, presumably.
The real question is how they managed to make her stay there.
I like the Puma shirt on the fake Sidney.
It stands to reason that the Lionesses would help them out with some clothing that would allow them to blend in better, rather than having them wear their American clothing to the market. It also stands to reason that the Lionesses would have some branded clothing and said branded clothing would be popular enough in a city kept safe by the Lionesses to be useful for blending in despite the apparent association with the super cops. It’s possible it’s even mostly something worn by the affluent (both local and tourist, but probably with a bias towards being worn by tourists) that it’s generally more of a “hey, I probably have stuff you want to steal” flag than a “don’t mess with me, I’m friendly with the cops” flag.
I thought Halo was acting uncharacteristically like a normal human being in the first panel-good thing the locals dont know the real one is like a hyperactive fraggle on crack when trying to be normal XD.
LOL! I was expecting something like this! Not that the smallish lioness could disguise herself like that just that she’d fake being Sydney to get the real attention of the mobsters. Or the articulated tail for that matter… Anvil is VERY hard to shoot since she can absorb the kinetic energy and maybe get a bad bruise… oh and VERY pissed off!! lol. It would take something a lot heavier than a hand gun.
Anvil is easy to shoot (big target); your bullets just won’t do what you think they will.
When you try and mug someone and then realize that body doubles are a thing… And you picked the worst body double to mug.
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MuggingTheMonster
(Warning: TVTROPES links can lead to endless rabbitholing of vast amounts of your free time!)
If Sydney ever meets up with the whole lioness team and finds out they can do disguises, she will want to make them do a group Thundercats cosplay.
She’s not wrong to want that either.
Sydney, “So which one of you is Sheba, which one is Elsa, and which one is Cheetara? Or did Dabbler already find her? Does your pride’s male have a six or twelve pack? Need to see for myself and science…also to show a certain pink panther back home. She’ll be so jelly. That reminds me, I’m famished. Got any good spicy food around here?”
Lioness just stare at Halo. Unsure how to react, until she pulls out a soft bristle brush.
“Who wants brushies?”
Pink jaguar, not that the joke will ever be easy to get past. And I suspect the Lionesses would react equally well to Sydney’s grooming offer.
One of the reasons I believe there are more supers in the US and other first world nations compared to the third world is that if you had powers and wanted to live a more luxurious and fame endowed life style, you would want to move to a first world nation (rather than there was some higher prevalence of supers in more modern parts of the world).
This probably also favors Galytn fairly heavily as well. I seem to recall Deus’ takeover there was something like a couple of decades ago, and he’s been intentionally making Galytn favorable to supers who are willing to work for him and play by his rules that whole time. It’s probably debatable whether Galytn is considered a first world nation, but there’s also a lot to be said for being one of the super privileged in a country as well.
To be clear, I do not like how our privilege works in this country. I feel like most of the racist whites are doing their damnedest to ensure that minorities feel compelled to replace them, despite how vocal they are about not wanting to be replaced. But I have the impression that Galytn’s one of those fantasy countries where the privileged class aren’t seen as keeping the underclass under foot, due to both the fact it is a fantasy country and the fact that Deus is raising everybody’s standard of living above the average African standard of living.
” I feel like most of the racist whites are doing their damnedest to ensure that minorities feel compelled to replace them, despite how vocal they are about not wanting to be replaced.”
To quote Steve Hofstetter: “What the fuck kind of job do you have that you’re worried [minorities] are comin’ for ya? We don’t wanna work at Hobby Lobby.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cw_7RzD_0sM
My thought on the reason that we would have more supers in the developed world is the need for extra resources that a super needs. If appropriate food (high-protein, fancy minerals, etc.) is scarce or too expensive when growing up, your powers would most likely be impeded. For most of the rest of people, it will reduce growth and may lead to long-term health problems, but for supers, it shuts down the extraordinary abilities.
Southern Baptist seems an unlikely background for Anvil unless she was fostered or adopted. Baptist, sure. But *Southern* Baptist is very much a “white” church…
Yeah, you get “Southern Baptists”, people whose churches subscribe to the Southern Baptist Convention versus people who were raised attending a Baptist Church in the Southern United States. It’s easy to conflate the two if you aren’t being specific. I think in this case saying that Anvil was raised in a Southern Baptist family is just shorthand for saying that she was raised in a conservative Protestant Christian family in the Southern United States.
Eh, I live in the South these days, and have a Southern Baptist friend. They might average “whiter” than the Protestants, but they’re hardly lily white. According to Pew, about 8% are black.
Her height is a lot less likely than being a black Southern Baptist.
Her eyes, in panel seven, makes it OBVIOUS why she’s wearing the shades
Will we get to see stats on these Lionesses?
Fingers still crossed for cast page updates and Grrliverse trading cards.
never mind trading cards, let’s make it a game!
“I untap my Orbs Of Power System to ‘cast’ mini-meteor swarm, take 20 direct damage”
‘Wait, do you realize that spells ‘oops?’
“Well I do now, so I trip over my own feet and skip my next turn”
Congratulations Dave on getting Idris Elba to do a cameo appearance in today’s comic.
If this character’s name isn’t Copycat, we riot.
What if it isn’t, but Sydney SUGGESTS “Copycat” and she likes it, like that flying guy in Gaytlyn?
No, because the pun only works in English, and DaveB knows better than to overuse a trope.
You might be there a while, Sydney. Don’t forget to plug in your phone.
Also, that is probably NOT the kitten from the previous page, who looked more like a tech hero.
Okay, I understand that this is a very niche reference that maybe won’t land in this community, and that I’m deliberately misinterpreting the given statistic for the sake of a joke, but I feel the need to say this anyway…
…80-160 Lionesses is A Lot Of Lionesses.
All right, I’m done, you may proceed.
Come on DaveB!
I know you’re not going to pass on the pun.
They aren’t Arc-SWAT, they’re the Pride of Sengal.
Having someone who won’t shut up and is completely oblivious of their situation can actually be great for espionage if you have someone who can impersonate them very well.
tbh, syd can just use her telepresence orb for these shenanigans as long as she doesn’t actually try to touch anything
Her telepresence is supposed to be one of her confidential powers though, so might not be a good idea to flaunt it. We also don’t know the max range, and in a crowded market it is hard to prevent someone phasing through her, as well as the orb being on display because she has to keep touching it.
Not to forget she is supposed to be on ‘orb rest’ to give them time to recharge.
Except I think that’s still classified? Especially the place-swapping skill. Blowing that cover on a minor side quest would not be worth the tradeoff.