Grrl Power #414 – The O.G.s (Origin of the Gold stuff)
So yeah, turns out, Max’s trajectory to superdom was a little different than usual. This gets expanded on a little in the next page, but basically all that Deus knew was one year Max came back from summer break gold, and given there are no other gold skinned supers as far as anyone knows, he thought it might be worth looking into.
I guess Max’s family is the sort that visits museums at 9am on a Tuesday. I wasn’t being lazy by not drawing other people, there actually wasn’t anyone there to witness what happened to her. Not that the event seems significant on its own, she just got splashed with “geode” “water.” She even told her parents when she found them, but by then it had all “evaporated.” She was like “I just got a mouthful of geode water.” And her dad was all “So I guess you don’t want your 7up?” But like I said, more info on the next page.
As for why baroque art is right by the geology exhibit, uh… the museum is remodeling the baroque wing? Cause, you know, it needed fixing?
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‘One of my men just had an origin’ – Damage Control, a great comic
Oh, dude… I got a story since you mentioned that title: I recently bought a TPB Damage Control collection. It was on a whim; I was actually looking for this other comic and had a gift certificate but I didn’t want the leftover credit to go to waste so I picked up Damage Control as well. I actually didn’t like the book I’d hunted but absolutely loved Damage Control. Damage Control written by Dwayne McDuffie was witty, funny, quirky, charming, and skillfully done. I highly recommend it.
So she wasn’t born a super. She got her powers by accident then. Interesting.. wonder if Dues didn’t try looking for the other half to see if he could replicate her powers perhaps.
Or, she had powers and this boosted/turbocharged them?
Similar origin as Sydney
It wasn’t the geode that created the GEOD, but the geode juice
Maybe what he’s got IS the other half…
Who says he hasn’t got the other half? who is to say he hasn’t tried? just need to look around Dues’s staff for someone who is a tiny bit gold and a little bit of a super…
Maybe SHE has the other half. Or the US Government does.
Now what I’m wondering is, did the geode water give her powers or was she going to develop them anyway?
I’m sure the former. In panel 7, you can see that the water doesn’t just splash on her but also gets in her mouth.
That could still simply trigger her dormant abilities, like people taking contaminated fish-oil turn into Inhumans
Have to wonder if her thinking of a mustard and relish hot dog at that specific moment may have also been a factor.
Nonsense. It was obviously the ambient air temperature. Or maybe the amount of ambient EM radiation. :)
Well at least it wasn’t catsup. People who put catsup on a hotdog become supervillains. Always. Because that is both evil and stupid.
Well. You have found me out. Now you must be silenced.
Catsup and Ketchup are two different things. Ketchup is fine.
There is no difference except in the spelling of the name. Sure, different brands may use a slightly different recipe, or use one or the other of the spellings of the name, but they are essentially the same.
so what your saying is that ketchup and catsup have been using guile, trickery, and twin gambits to derail this thread’s train of thought away from the Greater evil in all this. One who comes just after hotdogs, topping the treats that tantalize tastebuds that we call “dessert” and turning people into supervillains. One whose evil is reflected off its flunkeys that fullheartedly take the fall,in that it appears to be sweet like the sugared ketchup while actually being as unsweetened as catsup. I am of course referring to the condiment known as:
SUGARFREE CARAMEL!!!!!
I have to agree with Oberon on this.
The way I heard it was that the stuff originally came to us from China. We have different ways of spelling catsup today because it was written differently in the various provinces.
Indeed, in the past ketchup or catsup has been made from things as diverse as fish brine (the China origin) and mushrooms (England’s version). But today it has fairly well settled down into being a tomato paste with sugar, salt, and a few other spices added depending on recipe.
It is in the general class of things knows as table sauce, including HP Sauce, A1, and several others.
Sooo, alien parasite?
Divine gift?
Radioactive waste?
I’m betting symbiotic organism.
Ooh I love this one for a theory.
That theory reminds me of Whilce Portacio’s comic “Wetworks”.
Great art, great concept, great plots…
Meh dialogue and plot execution. Really wanted to like it and just couldn’t for some vague and incohate reason. Made me feel bad that I couldn’t enjoy it more.
Alien DNA mixed with splicing goo?
whould explain ears elf ears not exactly in normal human range..
Demon lord blood, remember that scene with Dabbler flashing back.
Or that was the yolk from the egg it was supposed to be reborn from :D
I’m more of the “radioactive waste” theory. I don’t actually think it was radioactive waste- the kind you and I know from the real world- but I think that “water” was definitely some out-of-this-world substance that changed Max.
Best guess, the gold liquid from the geode had some sort of special nutrients in it. Once absorbed, the body began to process it and that is when it caused the change. Slowly changing everything Max was into what we know about Maxima now.
I really hope it isn’t radioactive waste, but rather “alien” waste. Meaning there’s something out there that’s just crap’n these things out. Maybe with a millennial long digestive tract.
So Maxima drank the alien equivalent of civet coffee?
Only I’m imagining the being as sentient and grossed out that someone would touch its waste.
I predict it was a colloidal suspension of alien nanobots. The “geode” has edges that are too regular, so it’s a mechanism rather than a natural object. So, alien crystal nanobots that provide the equivalent of an alien mech-suit. Those aren’t pointed ears, they’re antennae for the command system. If the aliens come back, they’ll pick up her suit telemetry and think one of their people got lost and pick her up.
Oh, and it’s probably not meant to be opened and poured on/drunk by the recipient. The aliens are probably silicon-based and 4 meters tall, made of crystal, and those are chewable capsules for them.
So, Tholians then?
What kind of tangled Web are you trying to weave there, by mentioning Tholians?…
;)
Variation on the Wild Cards series is also a possibility – Engineered retrovirus.
Naturally occuring retrovirus is less likely since some of the spray *must* have gotten on her brother, but a virus activated by stomach acid (plus or minus the food added shortly thereafter) is a real possibility.
Or DaveB could be pulling the coicidental “trauma” gambit. She may only think the geode gave her powers because her powers happened to activate at the same moment she swallowed some sludge. The sludge is inert but she got scared and the fear caused her powers to activate to deal with the non-threat by which she was threatened.
But plotwise, it’s better if the sludge does, in fact, cause powers… Sometimes. Not always, though. More fun if Deus keeps failing to duplicate Max’s powers.
Not necessarily. You saw how fast it ‘evaporated’, right?
Hmm my guess is trigger for latent ability, geodes are not something you can open by hand….
Plus why would any of it hae gotten onto her brother – he had already run off for hot dogs.
and parasite eve games/movie gets a reference in the comments as max’s origin
So her skin, or at least the “outer layer” of it, is an artifact that gives her superpowers?
If you mean “artifact” in the same was as Sydney’s orbs- giving her access to superpowers without said powers originating from herself but from the orbs- then I’d say no. I’d say whatever that gold stuff is changed Max herself both outside and in. Max’s powers are truly her own after contact with that stuff and it working on her.
No, DaveB said all her cells have it. So at the very least it’s infused with her entire body
I have to wonder whether Max’s geode and Sydney’s orbs have a common origin. Precursor artifacts, maybe?
Probably not. It would be kind of dumb if they were related at all. Although I think a funny way of connecting Max’s powers to Sydney is if Sydney’s dad was a geologist who found something similar but never actually touched the gold stuff.
It wouldn’t be dumb if Supers in general were all a part of the same group’s plan to do … something.
Like THAT hasn’t been done before…
Given the sheer variety of supers and super-ish people out there, I think a common origin for all would be grossly unrealistic, to put it nicely
Thing is, the Variety is itself a flag for it to be a non-natural origin. Do you really think that humans would spontaneously develop Lighting powers, or teleportation, or “Nemesis” abilities, do you? Boosted physical or mental capability, yes. Speedsters or those with super-endurance, yes. Blulk’s powers, most definitely (and honestly, most probably)- those are all things that relate to the human body and its environment- even things like psychic abilities are related to the idea of humans as thinking organisms. But we don’t produce or use bio-electricity for attack and defense like eels do, or manipulate hear or explosions like bombardier beetles, or use water streams to hunt like archer fish. So why would a natural ‘further evolution’ take any of those routes?
That’s honestly the biggest issue I’ve always had with the X-Men- evolution just doesn’t work that way. Beast, Wolverine, the psychics- maybe those guys. But Darwin or the Summers or Pyro? Nah man.
Unless, of course, you’re one of the camp that says that all Superpowers are just different implementations of Psychic abilities- TK and PK and Psy-powers, manipulating different materials or energies, with mental blocks being the reason for the variety of different effects.
The only ’cause’ of superpowers that really makes sense (so far, in major works) is Worm’s.
Aren’t Mutant superpowers in the Marvel universe specifically the result of meddling by the Celestials in the past that were activated by the raides level of background radiation of a technological society?
Marvels’ “our powers are from genetic mutations” allowed them to give a diverse super team a common origin and play with themes of racism. It is not particularly realistic but … oh look, super powers.
“We tie realism to a chair and fly around taunting it with eye lasers.”
It has already been established that supers are known to have been around for a long long while, just that there has been an upward spike in known supers in recent times. My thought here is, has there REALLY been an upward spike, or is it simply that a lot more supers than was thought were simply “below the radar” before now?
As has been said, ‘Absence of evidence is not the same as evidence of absence‘.
In the recent Big Fight, much surprise was expressed that the Other Side had SO MANY supers, and that ARC’s intel estimates of super numbers were obviouasly w-a-y-y-y wrong. If they were that wrong then, then it follows that prior sources COULD have under-estimated the number of active supers at least as badly.
Has he figured out where the geode originated, so he can search for more?
I feel like the top left painting is an image from SSBB. If not, I’ve just seen it somewhere before, but it certainly looks like it’s from a video game. I know I’ve seen the top right before in a textbook, though.
Did max accidentally a philosopher’s stone?
From the descriptions of how a PS is supposed to work, seems like it.
Wait, Maxi was originally made out of lead? o_O
A philosopher’s stone is meant to be a fragment of the quintessence, the metaphysically pure substance from which the fundament of reality was constructed. It doesn’t simply transmute lead into gold, it “purifies” all base substances into more rarefied forms- base lead can be turned into gold, for example, while humans can be cleansed of the flaws that make them mortal through the Elixir Vitae that the philosopher’s stone produces.
However, this would raise a few questions, not the least of which is “wait, alchemy is real?!“
Not real per se, but like all myths, based on a grain of truth.
Or, should I say, a drop of truth. Truth juice?
Dabbler’s half succubus, 1/3rd alien and 1/6th cyborg (or something like that). Pretty safe to say that the entire kitchen sink of possible power origins is available in the GP-verse.
the irony being that dabbler’s not actually superpowered (for her species that is), yeah she’s heavily augmented via magical and alien/technological means, but all her sex-powers are succubi based and intrinsic to the whole species, ditto for probably all or at least most of her innate powers not the product of her or that alien overlord race tampering with her. And since she’s not the best at any One thing that she can do, we know that whatever she can do, there exist others that could do the same… not counting some of the more creative combinations she pulls off by cross-class shenanigans.
That said- Hold the phone… okay, we know there’s a mysterious and poorly understood cause for supers popping up all over the planet And we know that there are alien life forms living secretly on the planet.. as tourists, transients or even permanent residents. . . Meeeeebeh the interbreeding that has no doubt occured over the years is why some people have powers?
It fits rather well, we know that powers have been around for a long time.. just very, very rare and largely dismissed as legends and tall tales as a result but they are becoming more common.
This is likely what you’d see if alien genetics being slowly filtered into the species over multiple generations mixing it up with a relatively tiny alien population (made smaller still by how many are actually compatible to the point where traits can be transfered to human mates or any children that may result.
We know also that the occurence of supers seems to be more frequent in countries with a tech level and infrastructure developed to a certain point, this also makes a lot of sense given that a larger fraction of any alien visitors would probably want to hang out on parts of the earth where the tech level is as far away from the stone age as possible, more creature comforts and so on.
(not all obviously, which is why you still get supers in less developed countries, but its a sensible cause for why some places are more popular and therefore populated by resulting supers than others).
So.. yeah, I’m calling it, the majority of supers are the result of humanity mixing it up with aliens (which for purposes of this includes things like extradimensional entities, demons et cetera, basically non-human life forms).
Obviously, an argument against this is that if all the people who had kids with an alien resulted in super-humans, surely Some of those aliens would come clean about things with their partner and/or child? Not necessarily, for one the powers might take a few generations to show up or require the pairing of genes inherited from multiple alien species. So by the time any of the aliens figured out that They where causing humans to be born with atypical powers, the actual parents where long gone and naturally any aliens who have paired with humans since either dont care about the fate of any potential offspring, have informed their partner ahead of time and/or gotten sworn in on the same pact of secrecy that apparently keeps the existence of the alien presence on earth an internationally kept secret.
Naturally its very possible that not All powers have this origin, Halo’s clearly do not, but as a theory I think it fits the facts we know of in the comic remarkably well. Thoughts?
Well magic certainly happens to exist in the gp universe.
That does nicely match with the specifically D&D description of a philosopher’s stone, although I don’t think the elixir vitae within it is supposed to do this.
And from this we can also deduce that Maxima did not have pointy ears before the geode.
He’s had that for God alone knows HOW long and we’re talking about the “lex luthor” of this universe
I’m betting he’s had it HEAVILY analyzed and has ways of either removing her powers or rendering them moot……………………………
Looks like your kryptonite has just been discovered Max
Or better yet, he wants to create a Max that would be loyal to him. More than one, prefferably.
On the other hand, if that was the case, he probably wouldn’t have it displayed in his office for everyone, Max included, to see.
Or, he’s trying to get it to work on himself. It’s entirely possible he’s actually truly in love with her (though being crazy) and so thinks that the only way he can really be with her is to become equal.
If anyone believes that Deus’ scientists haven’t been all over that geode, I have a bridge to sell them. But now Deus is going to give it back to Maxima, to create an implied and unspoken but genuine obligation. Why would he even let her see it otherwise?
To be fair, Max ISN’T stupid, and having “dated” this guy means she knows him, if only a little……………
She’s going to let Archon know he’s got it and can possibly take her out of the picture, perhaps permanently
Thing is, when you’re dealing with a “Lex Luthor”, that may be EXACTLY what he WANTS……….
I imagine it’s much more likely that she’s going to walk away with that geode right now.
Well, there is a second half. Deus is nothing if not thorough.
Perhaps Max’s reaction is because the half Deus has IS the second half.
I bet Maxima’s brother is training a Geodude on his original Game Boy. The time frame fits. Were the cartridges coloured in the US?
Yes, they were, but that is clearly NOT an original game boy….it is hinged, rather than big, rectangular, and clunky-looking. It actually looks a lot like my old GBA SP, albeit at a funky angle that makes it look more like a small DS, which would not fit the time frame.
That’s an old slide phone. He’s texting. You know, the kind that slid up to reveal a keyboard underneath?
… At least, I think it is. Its size and shape aren’t right for any handheld consoles I know of.
Umm, did they have those phones in the 90’s? o_O
Yes, it is not big enough for a Game Boy. And now I think it’s to early for Pokemon, if the Comic still takes place in 2011. Just a Generic Handheld Console™.
Most of it got on her chest. That explains a lot.
At least the build up was worth it. I was wondering where you were going, seemed a little too drawn out, but I like the close here.
I’m thinking we can be pretty sure the geode doesn’t have any of the “water” left at all, or Deus would be gold too. I’m not sure he could resist that temptation.
Also, Max’s origin seems a lot like something that would happen to Sydney as well. “Oh that’s weird, what happens if I shake it?”
well, she did admit she was a nerd before
Or it did and he’s wearing a full-body fakeskin suit or something ridiculous.
That would explain the ‘X’ on the forehead. It is the zipper.
Which might actually explain the ‘X’. It is the result of a failed lab experiment when his research team tried to use what was left of the geode to give Deus super powers.
It merely left him 6 foot 4 and full of muscles. (Has he mentioned being from Australia?)
I think you mean Brussels.
But he came from a land down under…
::smiles and hands you a Vegamite sandwich::
The ‘x’ on his face is the mark of a knidling.
If it was six or seven centuries ago and you messed up in certain places, you had to cut your hair. Short hair was essentially a warning to everybody that you couldn’t be trusted, and until it grew back your life would be horrible because nobody would do anything with or for you. Different crimes would leave you with different lengths of remaining hair. But hair grows back, and a year or so later, even if you’d done something horrid like stealing someone’s horse or raping his wife and gotten your hair shaved off, your time in the penalty box is over.
But if you’d done something truly horrible – something like murdering an entire family, for example – then you became a knidling. They’d carve a big ol’ X on your face to prevent anyone, ever, for the rest of your life, mistaking you for a person who could be trusted, and then they’d turn you loose to endure all the suffering anyone could inflict on you, forever.
But, you know, that’s centuries ago. The people who know what that mark meant are either students of obscure history, or dead. Or, possibly, Deus.
Ooh! Origins! I do like a little backstory (so long as it isn’t done to death like batman, spiderman, fantastic four movies etc…)
A great origin story should create more questions than it answers, good job!
And thus the mystery guy from strip #122 is revealed.
Dave said it was her brother then.
Found it.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/720/comment-page-1#comment-30373
Note while he was snarky about it he did say it was so in an answer in that string.
And also, DaveB’s art has dramatically improved over the years. Always nice to see a talent getting better with practice.
Nevertheless, thank you, yuffiek for that reference. I remembered that scene and was going to try looking for it. You made it so much easier for me. Again, thank you.
Makes me wonder if Max and Sydney’s powers share some common origin. That could be cool. As long as they aren’t misplaced super-weapons from civilizations engaged in some cosmos spanning war of annihilation with a somewhat iffy IFF system. That might be bad.
the same thought occurred to me as well.
If Sydney or worse, Dabbler,learn the real truth about Maxima…..!
Oh well,so much for Maxima having a lookalike cousin from Quebec – unless something similar happened to said cousin?!?!
And here I thought because of her blood colour, she was either an alien or genetically engineered….by aliens.
Well, it’s possible that that ‘geode’ ‘water’ genetically modified her
That’s… out there with Sydney’s origin story.
Seriously I think about 90% of superpowers are either born with or recieved by touching stuff that just fell out of the sky one day.
Npr. meteorites (usually radioactive or single use magic zap), omnitrix, fallen stars (Howl), superman (being the said object), starlight beams, weird secret satelites, alien ships/pods, Mysterious (glowing) orbs, magical swords, etc…
Biotech symbionts: Guyver, Scarab.
Given also that we have “a” origin story from Sydney, but it is obvious that, at minimum, her story omits details that may be extremely important.
First question that comes to mind is whether that geode water would have that effect on anyone, or if this a flash type situation where only her certain genetic makeup caused the effect.
Still, this is a potential boon for the team, since if slash when they fight an otherworldly being slash reality Warner that can turn off powers, Max and Halo would be safe. And in theory math, but I have doubts about him…
Of course, the question in my mind is whether there is a world of people like her out there, or if some other dimension lost their super soldier formula.
That was my consideration as well
Somehow I think Max is a mutant and like Juggernaut, it took the influence of this particular “Gem of Cytorak” to activate her latent abilities………………
Juggs ain’t a mutant, never was
Technically no but genetically he did have the X-gene but unlike his half brother it was inactive.
Similarly Robert Bruce Banner was born with an inactive X-gene.
There’s a difference between Mutants & Mutates in the Marvel Universe; Mutants are born with the weird DNA & it manifests on it’s own, whereas Mutates (AKA: Altered Human) have their DNA altered by some external catalyst.
From your examples, Prof. X is a Mutant, Juggernaut (Marko Cain) would be a Mutate. Other examples of Mutates would be the Fantastic Four, Bruce Banner & even Spider-Man.
Here’s how I’d classify
Empowered human: Dr Strange
Empowered human with latent X-gene:Juggernaut
Regular mutates: Fantastic Four, Daredevil, Spider-man, Captain America, Red Skull
Mutates with latent X-gene: Hulk
Mutants (Active X-gene): Majority of X-Men, Brotherhood of Evil Mutants Etc.
Mutant Mutates: Apocalypse, Cable, Archangel, Dr Sinister, Deadpool
Also part of the the issue with the Sentinel Program leading to Days of the Future Past was there were regular humans with latent X-genes regardless of their parents having them or not, and the children of mutants & mutates tend to be born with the X-Gene.
Dunno if this world has ‘mutants’, it just has ‘supers’, which aren’t the result of genetic mutation, as far as anyone knows.
It may be that she was a prepubescent super, and that being exposed to the ‘geode juice’ made her into a ‘super-super’.
Side track: I highly doubt people are ‘born’ supers, seeing as how most of the traits of supers – height, muscularity, exaggerated secondary sexual characteristics – are traits that develop with puberty. Max got exposed to this stuff as her body was changing, which only enhanced her already developing powers.
Not dismissing your theory about Max having just the right genetics/situation/person (quite possible), but I’m sure what’s more special and important is the liquid contained in the geode (as in it’s not water or just water). I’m honestly more of theory that had someone else been exposed to that liquid- particularly ingesting it besides skin contact as in panel 7- they could also have been transformed and gotten Max’s powers.
I mean, it’s not like cracking open any geode, finding water inside, drinking it and drenching yourself with it will turn anyone into a superhero. I’m sure there was something particularly special about Max’s geode.
You know, maybe it’s just me, but I really dislike the “right genetic conditions” explanation. It’s always struck me as thinking about things too hard. I’d rather just accept the idea “in this universe, being hit by lightning can give you powers.”
…I should mention my suspension of disbelief is incredibly elastic, even by comic fan standards.
I’d rather just accept the idea “in this universe, being hit by lightning can give you powers.”
Heh! In the real world, lighting could turn you into a Crisp. Behold the newest superhero! Crispy Critter!
Speaking of right conditions and elastic, anyone in the DCU could get stretching powers by drinking large quantities of gingo fruit extract. It’s just that Ralph “Elongated Man” Dibny is one of the scant few people who wouldn’t die of anaphylactic shock before getting that far.
Gold Maxima is still best Maxima.
So I am guessing that Max actually bought and kept the one half of the thing. Wonder how long it took her to figure how this was her Origin?
Not all that versed in Geology, so I have to ask is Geode Water a thing?
She didn’t, at least during this visit to the museum. Based here, she probably left both halves in the museum. In panel 8, she discards one half; in panel 9, the other. If she’d taken one home, we wouldn’t see both being dropped.
However, she could have returned to retrieve it later, after her transformation, realizing it did something to her.
Ya sure? Because I think that is the same half of the geode in panels 7 and 8 being dropped in.
Oh… You’re right. I didn’t notice panel 8’s drop was a bounce off the top of the side of the bin, while panel 9 was it coming to rest on the sand inside.
She had to have kept the other half, else I’d have to call shenanigans, because there’s no way a young teen girl (assuming 11-12-ish?), distracted by the embarrassment of having her clothes soaked, with discolored liquid, in a public place, would remember EXACTLY what the inside of the geode looked like, different from any other geode, enough to identify it 20+ years later at a glance.
The technical term is fluid inclusion and yes it’s a thing.
Yes. the geode starts as a hollow space, which then fills with water (with lots of minerals dissolved in it). the minerals crystallize out all over the surface of the hollow, forming pretty or not so pretty crystals, lining the geode. Sometimes the crystals completely seal the geode, and water remains inside (now with less minerals). Sometimes they don’t, and the water leaks out.
Eserchie, I want to thank you. I want to thank you for the opportunity you just gave me to correct a misconception.
Many many years ago when I was a boy scout we discovered a geode and our scout leader suggested we open it with a hammer & chisel. Once that was done our fearless know-it-all told us how the crystals has formed inside it. However what he described was (I now know) not a geode but a volcanic bomb and not having more than a passing interest in the subject I had no reason to fact-check him when we got back to civilization a week later. Can you imagine, all these years I’ve been led to believe those crystals had formed quickly, while the rock was still in flight, out of the “mineral rich steam” trapped inside it?
Looking back I realize this isn’t the first of his YEC ideas I’ve had to remove from my head but I think it may be the last.
Thank you.
Teenage Maxima looks like a cute kid
Really cute.
I was just figuring it was at a Renaissance fair or something. Somewhere they have an excuse to have baroque artwork because of theme… but cheap enough to have peddlers with things like geodes, or similairly ‘niche’ or… oh I forget the word for it. Trinket-ey? Similairly Trinket-ey wares.
Maybe the museum didn’t have enough money to add a whole Geology wing to the building…Notice that there’s far more artwork present than there is geology-related exhibits. Maybe they were just too baroque to afford it?
:P
or when they re-orged the displays the solid built into the floor geode bowl was to much trouble to rip out and move with the rest so now it’s surrounded by the art and relics that got moved into that space.
I’m still surprised no one mentioned, she got her powers in a golden rain accident
I think the term is “golden shower.”
Ick . . .
This pun “rocks.”
Oh, come on, play gneiss…
This pun the the schist.
(and so, it begins…)
Ah, yes. I college my room mate and I both took geology. And thus began the saying “If you don’t take geology, you don’t know schist!”
OPABOMQM
For that joke, you should be arrested for basalt & punnery.
There is indeed a terrible crime here, but not the one you think! How do I know?
Sedimentary my dear Watson!
A schist is, in fact, a metamorphic rock. To arrest this man for basalt is an outrageous discourtesy to igneous rocks!
So Max has origins. Are they contagious?
Implies there are other unusual geodes with unusual liquids in them out there. It’s possible. If so then, in a sense, yes, “contagious”.
Hmm… It took me a bit to realize that the last panel is in the present, Deus handing the half of the geode to Max. Which means that we still don’t know how long it took for Max to become golden with violet hair, we only see that it didn’t happen instantly. Which in turn emphasizes(?) the question how anybody knew about it.
Hmm…
Like with Sydney, there may be an unknown factor contributing… genetics, alien radioactive waste parasites, and/or whatnot. Or all of them.
At a certain point, she was fully golden-skinned and her dirty blonde hair hard turned purple. In #122, we see her as such in her younger years but it seems that she still had not yet joined the armed forces. And we know she had and used her powers in the military based on the mosque story General Falk mentions and her flashback where she chugs beer with Peggy and her unit. But I’m sure her identity as a metahuman was not hidden, particularly as part of the armed forces. For a man of Deus’ intelligence and resources, tracking down the history of this particularly powerful metahuman shouldn’t be hard, up to and including any museums she visited wherein something unusual happened.
Maybe not instantly, but it seems to be pretty fast. Unless my vision is going, her upper left arm and neck appear to be turning gold in panel 8 already….
It looks like that but thought that was caused by the yellow/golden “geode water”. As in, just a bit of color on her skin. Alas, if you’re right, that would explain a thing or two…
I’m not sure I would consider her origin “a little different than usual” seems pretty standard fare (and there’s nothing wrong with that).
I agree. Not that different from, say, Peter Parker getting bitten by a radioactive (or genetically engineered, to expand the idea) spider, or by someone being exposed to the Terrigen Mists. Or what about being shocked by a lightning bolt while handling lab chemicals? Or ingesting a formula for 1 hour’s worth of superpowers?
It’s different from the usual in a world where people are normally born into super powers if they have them.
I don’t actually recall it being explained that that was the case in the Grrlpower universe. Are they usually born with the powers?
Also, the comment section didn’t seem to imply “just in this universe” and I thusly obviously read it as “unusual in the comic book universes” :p
It’s not that easy to split a geode.
https://www.wikihow.com/Crack-Open-a-Geode
That’s not a geode.
Yeah, look at the inside structure , it’s too regular. The ‘geode’ is some kind of manufactured object, which is why I wondered if it came from the same place as Syd’s orbs.
It fits with her ears changing as well. Some sort of device made to change whatever it found into a specific form/function, rather than a random ‘magical/radioactive geode accident’.
Ah…no, you don’t KNOW that. Crystalline structure of many minerals could in theory create that shape inside, given a good, long cooling period. Off the top of my head, I don’t know which of the minerals that tend towards hexagonal form would match that color – but even if none do, the color could be altered by more minerals in the ‘water’ coating it. There is nothing in that geode that is obviously or inherently unnatural, from what we’ve seen. Uncommon, yes; unnatural, no.
If it is natural, probably just the usual Quartz that’s inside most all Geodes. Amethyst is purple quartz, due to certain inclusions- that’s what gives those really nice purple geodes their color. And quartz does tend towards hexagons.
Natural doesn’t pop open like a plastic easter egg of follow the edges of the inner matrix so precisely. Also while the crystalline structure of quartz tends to form hexagonal rods the ends are generally hexagonal pyramids not flat faces.
Honestly it seems some sort of geodesic dome with a rock covering. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/G%C3%A9ode_V_3_1_duale.gif
well, it’s not a space station…
It’s no moon!
Which perhaps is another indicator that Max handled something very unusual.
I think that’s a given.
That would depend on the theory being followed. Some people in the previous comments are looking at the geode’s fluid as simply a trigger for her metahuman powers, powers which she already had but dormant. In that theory, the water inside- and the geode by extension- would either be minimally “unusual” or not at all.
There seems to have been an upward spike in the number of “outed” or “go-public” supers in recent times. But we have no real clue as to how many supers have been dormant or simply “under the radar” prior to recent events. Or throughout history.
Was reminded of this –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KMQZSQ1qxk
So… I hope you guys picked up the phone, because i fricking called it. It wasn’t hard though, seeing as i just pointed out which one she reacted to. And there were only really 5 options and i took the middle row, two leftmost. But still! Called it!
Here’s another reason why the Baroque art is next to the geodes: it’s a small museum.
which is conveniently located in Stardew Valley, right?… that was the first thing that popped into my mind with the Geode Cracking, and the reason the place is so empty…
Except the Stardew Valley museum doesn’t have paintings at all, just minerals and artifacts XD
Meh… picky picky… :D but yeah, i’m pretty sure it ISN’T, but it would be cool if it were, right?!
So, one question that I have that I haven’t archive-dove to check, has anyone but Sydney ever touched the orbs? And I wonder what would happen if Maxima touched one?
Sort of. Dabbler got bopped in the head by one and Sydney punched Math in the face with another.
True, but since they’re only activated by holding in Sydney’s hand, I was wondering if anyone else tried to hold one in their hand. Also i think Dabbler did some wibbly-wobbly analysis hand-waving around them, but didn’t actually try to hold one. I wonder what Dave says…
Don’t forget the guy whose nuts she crushed with an orb hammer and anvil combo.
Funny you should mention that “Hammer & Anvil” combo; Sydney clearly demonstrated at that time that she didn’t want to take him as The Prisoner…
Did anyone notice that when Varia touched Sydney, the orbs spread out to encompass her in their orbit as well? I bet Varia is able to use the orbs when touching Sydney.
Yes. Pretty much every reader has noticed, and commented on it back when Varia tested things out with Sydney, and various times since.
Huh. That’d actually be kind of interesting- if the Orbs ‘attune’ to anyone who properly grabs them.
In that case, I’d imagine that Syd would stay on the team not because she’s the only person who can use the orbs, but because she’s the Best person to use the Orbs.
Well … except you currently can’t take the orbs far from Sydney even if she’s not holding them. Not only you, MAX can’t take the orbs away. I don’t think the orbs will accept another holder as long as Sydney is alive …
Big fan of the series. Finally glad we’re getting into Maxima’s origin. Make me wonder what became of her family ?
Still please do keep up the good work on this great series.
OH. MY. GOD.
I made a guess on the last page and it turns out that I was sort of very nearly almost kind of right! I’m never right in my guesses so this is a big deal for me, as you might expect. I said that the object that had Maxima so riled up had something to do with her brother and – as we see here – it does! On the other hand, I was still wrong since I was thinking it was something that had belonged to him personally.
I hereby claim a score of 50%. :D
Any More of those just lying around. Freakin golden egg indeed!
So, you’re saying that Maxima got “goosed” by the Golden Egg?
;)
Hmm a thought, what if that geode wasn’t a geode? But it was something else entirely? I mean the substance changed her, from a normal human to what she is now. Maybe it wasn’t a geode but instead the medication to a god or something sorta like liquid gel caps or something?
Well the inside of the “geode” isn’t like any I’ve ever see, as it looks to be made of hexagonal plates of no determinate color, I’d say it’s more likely a storage device from “somewhere else”
i definitely thought on those same lines as well, just because of A) how EASY it was to open. nd B) look at the inside surface and the edge having those very flat, precisely angled, almost machined surfaces… granted, IRL crystals can be just as flat and angular, but i don’t think they would be that similar in size and shape, at the very minimum due to gravity keeping the “geode water” only on one side of it, therefore making that sides crystals stay in contact with the water for longer, thus altering their growth rate, but these crystals are all the same size no matter which side they are on.. Also, look at the outside, it looks a lot like the plasma burns that a meteor gets during it’s travel through the atmosphere, thus implying an Alien origin as well.
Hmm point made, but how someone would mistake something from space with a geode from the ground is kinda hard to figure out.
Depends on when it arrived. If it fell to earth recently then it might have been easy, but if it was a couple of thousand or even millions of years ago then it might be harder to see. If it was found where geodes are reasonably common no one might have thought of the possibility that it was anything but another geode.
If it is extraterrestrial then it’s likely that it’s artificial or possibly magical, and that it was easily cracked once a suitable host/recipient was detected. Before Max picked it up it might have been extremely tough, to the degree that it might have been practically indestructible.
So that “water” might have been something like nanobots in a solution, an artificial virus, a symbiont, or magic infused water. That it wasn’t ordinary water is quite obvious as Dave wrote “Pro tip Max. It’s not evaporating.” suggesting that it was being absorbed into her body.
Hmm a very good point, I might go with nanobots or a symbiont on that because I don’t see Max doing anything the virus would want. I might go with the magic infused water since I know in some games there is a spell that makes your skin like gold but not make you a statue.
I was thinking a virus designed to splice genetic materials to the DNA in her living cells. The idea of a virus with a will of it’s own never occurred to me.
Thinking on the same level but was thinking alien egg. Since the change was so drastic, she might be a new species.
So a Apotheosis Egg just *happens* to end up in a museum and trigger a suite of A-List superpowers in someone who would *not* use them to take over a country. I suspect an Invisible Hand somewhere…
If you take over a country you have to run it. What fun is there to that?
Country? Pfft. Dr Doom took over the world once. Discovered having is not the same as wanting. When the ragtag group of heroes were about to dethrone him, and he could have wiped them out with the push of a button.. didn’t, as it got him out of the position without saying he didn’t want it anymore.
Ask Deus. He did just that and seems quite happy about it.
No different than an all-powerful alien baby crash landing on Earth and being found by the two most decent people on the face of the planet, or any other number of super-hero origins. It’s just a part of the genre that so many good people get powers.