Grrl Power #454 – Monster shock
Sydney might not be quite so haranguey if Maxima wasn’t standing there. Yes, she’s essentially firing spitballs from over Superman’s shoulder, but hey, they’re all friends, right? Friends can tease each other about fatal weaknesses and allergies, right?
Harangue in a good word. It’s one of those words where if the first time you encounter it is in a novel and you’ve never heard it spoken it out loud, you might not quite guess how it’s pronounced right then and there, so you come up with a ‘close enough’ version in your head and make sure you don’t say it outloud until you have a chance to look it up. The same thing happened with me and ‘macabre’ though my ‘close enough’ version was ‘mac-a-bare.’ Fantasy novels are especially bad about this since they have so many made up words. I’m pretty sure I have a handle on how to pronounce Menzoberranzan, but still basically no idea on Drizzt’s cat, Guenhwyvar. In my head it’s ‘GWEN-e-var’ or ‘GWEN-hwy-var.’ Please tell me other people do this.
Well Sydney’s starting to ask a significant question there, but, well you know how she is. To be fair I’d probably stumble too if something that looked like Chorius started talking like Frasier.
Chorius is the representative for the Miscellaneous category, the races that don’t have enough of a significant population to have their own seat. In some ways his job is the hardest one on the council because he’s usually speaking for the most diverse bunch. Chorius is considered a “Monster,” but not in a pejorative sense. Monsters are themselves a diverse group, and can be hard to define. Usually when describing one, people tend to start with a movie reference. “It was like the thing from that movie The Relic / Outlander / Hellboy / any of those things in Pacific Rim / etc.” They tend to be darkly colored, but sometimes have glowey bits, chitinous or otherwise armored, claws, spikes, fangs. Basically if you throw a blanked over them while they’re sleeping, they’re sure to ruin it in short order. There is debate as to whether Kaiju and Monsters are the same thing. Monsters are “large” which is to say the size of a large human up to the size of a large horse, maybe even a large horse with a fat, lizardy tail on it (which you can bet probably has spikes) but they’re not “enormous.” They just look similar, but the debate may be pointless because there certainly aren’t any Kaiju on council and in fact, giant sea monsters are almost unknown, even to some of the longest lived council members.
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Also, since Khal Barrack brought up the idea that Chorius is voiced by Kelsey Grammer, who do you folks have voicing the various members of Grrl Power? I’ve only really got a few:
Xuriel: Jessica Nigri (well, specifically, Jessica Nigri as Cinder)
Vehemence: Clancy Brown
General Faulk: Dan Hedaya (which seems to have been the intent)
Gwen: Jennifer Aniston (entirely because her “Oh my God — ew” response in the ballroom reminded me of a scene from an episode of “Friends”, and the voice just stuck)
I don’t know how I didn’t notice this, but remembering an older comic, I realized that I have another voice picked out in my head:
Anvil: Gina Torres
Oh Yes. Sign her up for the movie at once! (second choice Alex Kingston. She can make anything sound sexy and flirtatious if she wants)
Wasn’t the General modeled on Peter “Colombo” Falk?
Nope, Dan Hedaya
You and Joe speak truth, Ignoble speaks false!
I knew Peter Falk had been mentioned way back in the Ballroom interview scene, but you’re right in that the General wasn’t modeled on him – just named after him.
No, wouldn’t say you speak false, just made an error (Faulk does resemble Colombo, vaguely, so can see where you made the mistake)
I believe that Mr. Hedaya is still alive. So if you did a CGI or 2D animation he could voice that character if he would want. That creature from Relic is best represented in the movie of the same name.Called the Kathoga in the film of the same name and is made up of a variety of animals by an ancient Mbwn virus including a human as the Omega Predator. It comes into existence to stamp out another species out of control. We are the ones out of control. It eats brains to get the hypothalamus that its body craves. When we are gone the Kathoga is too. The Callisto Effect in action. A hidden part of Evolution. Really a high concept idea for a nightmare scenario. Not your normal monster idea.
How would Chorius sound with the same voice as Sideshow Bob,another character that Kelsey Grammer voiced on The Simpsons?
Or his brother in Hellboy?
Actually, I sort of have Vehemence as being voiced by Kelsey Grammer. Chorius had more of a Stephen Fry vibe to me. Though now that I think about it, you could reverse the two and it would still work. It’d be different sure, but it’d still work. Sign them both up for the inevitable movie!
Mark Hamil could voice half the cast. He’s very versitile, and has been doing voice over work since Ralph Bakshi’s “Wizards” at least.
If Mark Hamill voiced half the cast, then Troy Baker would voice the rest.
Even the women. Troy Baker is just that good a voice actor.
Nah, Tress McNeil for most of the women, with a token role to Tara Strong.
Actually I’d use the voice of Christopher Walken for the intellectual sounding Chorius, don’t get me wrong after all Kelsey Grammer is a great choice, however in a few of the Walken movies he has actually played Chorius so I already picture him in that place because of it.
OK, if you want to hear Christopher Walken, in Grrl Power the Movie, perhaps we should have a Texan actress do the voice-over for Sydney? How about Amber Heard, as she tops IMDB’s list of ‘most popular Texan actresses’?
You can even hear them together, if you want.
Amber, no need for any commission, if I land you the role. A nice dinner, and a movie, would do fine. :-)
Oh! She’s the one that got the divorce from Depp because of spousal abuse (Depp was the one who was abused)
Checking out her her Wikipedia entry entry, it would appear to be the other way around. With photographic evidence purported to have backed up her claims. Depp’s entry looks to be practically identical, on that subject. With no suggestion that it was actually her being the abuser.
The rest of the her details do though indicate that she is both into girls and loves dogs. So we have things in common!
*wags tail hopefully*
Personally don’t trust Wiki pages, as they can be edited by basically anyone, the news at the time indicated that she was the abusive party (and no, we don’t have Faux news or any of that sort of bollocks down here)
Incorrect. When an article is about a specific named person, there are tight controls. Celebrities, of her and Depp’s level, do not have to put up with incorrect data regarding them. * If it was false, they can and would have it taken down, and Wikipedia is committed to supporting that process..
This is why I compared it to Depp’s version. If they had conflicting accounts, then I would have less faith in it. You will notice that there is a mention of one contrary account, which resulted in the person making those allegations being sued.
Not that I would expect everything we see in Wikipedia to be the absolute truth. But, for individual people’s entries, in particular, there are strong protections against potential abuse. Logically, if you think about it, otherwise they would continually be filled with trolling comments (especially when involving an acrimonious break-up with a popular celebrity).
* Lesser mortals might not think to check their Wiki entry (or be too clueless to realise that one could be set up without them knowing about it). So the less well known a person is, the greater the possibility of there being bogus data.
Conversely, the more famous they are, the more likely someone else will spot a false claim, and challenge it.
Note that Wikipedia are not obliged to take down truthful statements about people, even when they are unfavourable. Which is why even rich and powerful people can, and do, have sections entitled “controversy”. But they are entitled to edit them, if the facts have not been stated truthfully. If they can prove that.
I should point out that I was not commenting as regards news reporting. Purely about the Wikipedia entry. I do not follow celebrity news, nor have any interest in it, under most circumstances.
All I can say though is that if there were any substantiated conflicting accounts, such as if a court case had gone against her, for domestic abuse, then you would reasonably expect that to appear on Depp’s entry. It did not.
I ignore gossip and hearsay, in my local community, and do likewise at a global level. I do pay attention to direct claims though “I saw this” or “I was present when…”. But those you judge, on a case by case basis, and do not just assume that “where there is smoke, there is fire”. Mostly I just wait to see how courts resolve it, as it does not interest me, unless I have a specific need-to-know.
Understood, normally don’t follow CelebNews (haven’t watched “Entertainment Tonight” since it stopped being “Entertainment This Week” with Leeza Gibbons) but it was part of the regular news
Would Chorius need more cowbell?
I actually see Clancy Brown as Deus. Just listen to him voicing Lex Luthor and you’ll see what I mean.
Maxima: Kate. Mulgrew. ‘Nuff said.
Jennifer Hale for Maxima. Seriously-play Mass Effect, imagine her FemShep delivery with a superheroine-there you go.
I can only Picture Steve Blum as vehemence. Though I have been playing a lot of DoW lately.
I wonder if anyone else will get the Cinder ref.
I would think at least a few. I found Grrl Power when someone in the RWBY fandom linked to the comic where Deus is showing off his collection of “replicas — yes”, which included Crescent Rose. Thought the comic looked great, wound around to the beginning, read the whole thing (repeatedly, at this point), became a fan. Seems somewhat unlikely that I’m the *only* person who did that.
My own thought on the matter is James Earl Jones voicing Chorius.
The word that gave me troubles until was able to link the written word to the spoken name was ‘Aloisius’. When I first read it, my brain first came up with alloy-see-us. I have sympathy for other groups trying to learn English. Not only do we have lots of words where letters that are there are not pronounced, we have words where letters that are NOT there ARE pronounced. A simple example is ‘one’. How would someone intuit from reading it that it is pronounced ‘whun’? And don’t even get me started on trying to explain words ending in ‘ough’.
Michael Jackson said in an interview that since he could not easily go out in public he spent a lot of time reading. He admitted he tried to tell a friend of his about a philosophy book he read by a guy named ‘So-crates’ and got a blank stare.
Reminds me of Bill and Ted saying “Beeth-oven.”
They also called Socrates “So-Crates”
Yeah but those Greek philosophers and other names of Greek mythology are so fun to try and pronounce though….
Sophocles – Sof-oh-cleez
Heracles – Hera-cleez or Hera-culls
Testicles – Testa-cleez…
Imagine Sydney with that last one… and Max busting up into laughter as a result… or all the Harem, if even one were with them… they’d all get the joke…
Testicles… wouldn’t happen to be related to the Greek god of replication, by any chance?
You know who I’m talking about. I think they call him Xerox.
(ba dum tssh)
Sounds like you are taking the silent “p” in “swimming pool”.
Nope. Just having a flashback to an episode of Whose Line Is It Anyway?
Colin: “Who do you think I am… Xerox, god of replication?”
Aesir salute you, I Thor what you did there. Like “Ikea, goddess of craftsmanship”. Mind you, I did the first time round, I was Nott Sleipnir on the job. With the gods help you can make quite a Saga, of such a sketch.
Because the humour can be Loki, the applause might be a mild Mimir, at first, but, as the audience catches on, it can rise to Odin! Friggin Hell,Idun think you can Holler too loud, at that show!
Personally have trouble pronouncing ‘one’ (don’t start, it was probably due to falling head as a baby and biting tongue off: yeah, just imagine the force of impact that took, for a baby with barely any teeth to leave the tongue hanging on by a thread of flesh)
Colonel
Yea, that is odd, we got the word from Middle French, where there were two versions of it. Pedantic writers stuck to using the older form, but daily spoken use opted for the newer. So we ended up with yet another non-phonetic word, in the English language.
One of the things I like about Bulgarian is that it is phonetic (not completely but a heck of a lot more than in English). So on my bus I pronounce my village name, in full. Yet if you get a new bus driver, for some reason most of them will drop the second “o”. Which is really irritating, as the locals say it in full.
The next time one of them looks at me blankly, after I repeat the correct word,* I will just pick up the board, from their windscreen, and point at the final destination!
* Everyone in the countryside says it in full, and understands the word without ever needing it repeated. So I find it strange that well-educated folks are the ones dropping vowels. Whereas, in the UK, you expect it to be regional accents, which do that.
When your first language’s spelling is roughly phonetic, you tend to have much easier time pronouncing made-up names in English fantasy: it appears they’re mostly meant to be pronounced as if they were Latin words anyway.
It’s rather funny to observe an English speaker studying foreign language as he realises that he can pronounce any wriiten word and only mess up the stress position.
I have two responses to this. First: the actress Saoirse Ronan has a great bit about Gaelic names just look for her conversation with Stephen Colbert on the youtube. Actually anything Gaelic is just wrong in that regards (although the weatherman that gets the Welsh town name correct is pretty amazing – another youtube lookup).
Second, I have a friend that takes great pleasure in carrying on conversations with people in which he frequently “places the M-fa-sis on the wrong SIL-a-byl”. Drives people nuts, but he loves it.
In panel three, am I the only one who thinks it kinda looks like Sydney has her face pressed into Ingsol’s chest . . . or maybe armpit.
Why do you think her face looks like it does? ☺☻
I thought that was an intimidation move. Being short as a child I got a lot of chests pushed into my face.
Intimidation!? The silly vampire should have learned his lesson by now, remembering how she reacted when she first met him and Barkly!
She called the floofy werewoof Barkly and hugged the stuffin outta him…
☺
I wouldn’t mind that so much as long as they were female chests….
OK, here is one, and here is another.
Actually, Kaiju is Japanese for monster.
Thanks to movies and the like though, Kaiju is now a gigantic monster.
It used to be that daikaiju was giant monster and kaiju was more monsters in general, but the last decade has eroded that in America. Kaiju basically translates as “strange beast” and the prefix dai basically means “big/giant”. So it goes.
Wait… Sydney actually had a train of thought?
It’s more of a bumper car.
☺
Bumper cars can still be disasterously derailed.
Of course they can! And it is funnier when they do since bumper cars very rarely carry chlorine gas as cargo, usually just chili dog gas.
What happened to Ingsols accent in panel 4/5? Was he faking?
Only has an accent in panel one actually
yeah but the only one I was sure of was the W in walked.
This, I mean zis, is not ze first time ve have seen such a problem!
The females of the Igor clan suffer from it as well.
Does this make it a trope?
We don’t want to contribute to that site. Keep your wig on.
Bah, you just ruined it! I thought that Chorius was demonstrating exactly how he managed to not attract attention while walking down a busy street, via his confusion aura or whatever.
So, words are funny. I have been a voracious reader since childhood, and that has led to some interesting mispronunciations. In grade school, I think maybe ~4th grade, I pronounced ‘puny’ as pun-y. As in a pun, just with a ‘y’ at the end, rhymes with funny. And Daedalus was, in my mind, “Day Dallas” until a college class where the professor actually said the name.
I had a friend who was similarly afflicted. A couple years after high school he pronounced ‘adobe’ just as you might if you were following the English rule of long vowel and silent ‘e.’ Ah-dobe. The mockery he was subjected to was fairly unwarranted, IMO.
Also, those wacky French! Always leaving off on pronouncing letters here and there.
The first time I asked for Lillet at my local wine shop I pronounced it with the ‘t.’ The person assisting me corrected my pronunciation, and I said something like “Right. French, of course it’s Lille.” Makes a good martini, regardless of how you pronounce it.
Other dropped pronunciations:
Cabernet
Merlot
Pinot (noir, another fun one)
Claret
Ha, gotcha! That last one is English, you say the ‘t.’
No one ever said things were going to be easy, did they?
Thank you for claretifying that.
That mead not have been his intent, but it certainly has meritage. Please don’t be a barbaresco and punch me though, as I am just being beaujolais.
“Exemplarification”? New one for me, and for the interweb, as well.
I think that I’m going to challenge (as in Scrabble) that word.
It’s not in the dictionary unfortunately. Probably should be though.
exemplar-ification
As a general rule, he is used to being used as a typical example.
That would makes sense since he’s the monster representative that he’d be used as an example for them :)
My 1996 Unabridged Websters Dictionary did not have it, either.
I am pretty sure no dictionary in the world has it. Note though words existed before dictionaries did. And that is still true for new words in use. Every year the publication of the new words added to the Oxford English Dictionary is reported on by the BBC, for example.
However it will not be reporting on the addition of adding “exemplarification” on account of it already being in there, in its base form. I.e. “exemplar”. The full form can be found by adding the conjugation “-ification”.
Thus you fine the word, in the Mirriam Webster dictionary, as follows:
Exemplar + ification
1) How does one fine a word? =OP
2) Mainly, I wanted to point out that’s a very Shakespearean solution. If I remember my History of the English Language class correctly, the Bard of Avon (or whoever wrote his plays) is believed to have created more English words than anyone else. So, let’s not fight over it, since it appears that DaveB is in good company
1) Funny that your link included ‘pedantic’. :-D
2) No chance of fighting, as your link was broken, on the last.
As for the first link, I didn’t realise that one of our regular commentators had been created by Shakespeare. Well, not that one anyhow. She must be a lot older than I thought!
1) Actually, it only includes “pedant”, not “pendatic”. :OD (Does that make this an exemplarification?)
2) Here, try this one: fight.
3) Which commentator?
Pander.
Why, I never! If you don’t want to tell me, that’s fine, but I can’t believe you expect me to do that just to get an answer. =OP
I wonder if he (or she, as the case may be) is aware of the word’s dated meaning
Or simply, he was the first one to write them all down and use them in a sentence :P
Before then, very few of the ‘common folke’ could write, let alone read what they just wrote
Just ask Blackadder, with a guest appearance from our very own Yorp
A portmanteau of ‘exempt’ and ‘clarification’, possible meaning he is ‘very good at not being seen’
Never mind. I used the wrong roots. Dave said he meant ‘good at being used as an example’.
Then it’s probably meant to be “Exemplification”
Googling “Exemplarification” gets this comic and then stuff in other languages.
Most of the foreign language ones are French. A couple in Afrikaans. Which, on the whole, appeared to be misspellings of “exemplification”, seeing as they were referring to Exemplification Theory, by Zillmann.
I did though get three English language hits. One of which was a misspelling. But two were clearly used in the correct context, and obviously derived from the same root word, as in the comic.
If it is based off of the word “exemplary”, then it would mean to be set as a highly exceptional example.
“Exemplar”, as per WoG, below. But my right mouse button is broken, so presently I can only link you to the top of the relevant thread.
I would suggest that the most pertinent definitions are as follows:
1. Something fit to be imitated; see ideal and model.
2. A role model.
Although this could also apply:
3. Something typical or representative of a class.
“there certainly aren’t any Kaiju on council and in fact, giant sea monsters are almost unknown, even to some of the longest lived council members.”
The current absence of aquatic council members goes back to the time there was a mixup with the catering order for a meeting. The chef was asked ‘to serve the Kraken ambassador’ and misunderstood the request. This lead to ‘The great calamari incident of 1729″.
Bravo sir. Bravo
:’-(
I don’t actually try to figure out how to pronounce weird names in novels- I just recognize the shape of the letters and my brain makes the connection whenever they come up- “Oh it’s talking about THAT person”.
The first time I heard Hermione’s name pronounced out load I was so confused.
I can imagine…
Herm-ee-one…
I do that too, I find it breaks me out of the story less if I don’t have to stop and sound out a new word.
It really messes me up when writing, I often have no idea how to spell even my own character’s names.
Yea, I do much the same. It is how I can read novels so fast, despite having a serious problem remembering (spoken) names. I just see the initial letter, and the shape of the word, as a thing in its own right. Like recognising a ship, from its silhouette.
Obviously if you get two very similar names “Harry” and “Henry”, then that slows things down or runs the risk of mixing them up. But that is fairly rare, and just requires paying more attention to context, in the rare instances where such similar names feature, frequently throughout a work. If one is in the army, and the other a doctor, you can just pick out medical or military terminology, or settings, by glancing at the rest of the paragraph,and back to the dubious name.
Until they get into situations where even that blurs. Then you have to slow to snail reading, when either name crops up.
I still see that name as ‘her-me-own’ even though I know it’s ‘her-mine-ee’. Arabic and Asian names make more sense to me than Celtic and Gaelic ones. How does Seamus sound like ‘shay-mus’?! or Siobahn sound like ‘shih-von’?!?! To quote Clark Griswold, “This is crazy! This is crazy! This is crazy!” XD
Yeah, Linus’ technique: https://www.gocomics.com/peanuts/2011/11/02
I had the same experience as you about Hermione, I was all “the what?”
As a kid, I just used to make up my own pronunciations for names in fantasy novels, whether people or places. I figures if they could make up names using alphabet soup, I could use my own pronunciation. I stuck with that, for the most part, even after I learned that some of those names were real, not the author trying to come up with the most unpronounceable names they could think of.
The only time vampires should sparkle in sunlight is the split-instant before they burst into flame.
Or if you electrocute them.
It doesn’t help that they sweat nitroglycerin.
You keep using that word. I’m not sure it means what you think it means.
From Google:
Harangue
noun
1. a lengthy and aggressive speech.
verb
1. lecture (someone) at length in an aggressive and critical manner.
Neither of these actually seem to be what Sydney is doing. What she’s doing seems more like goading.
Or maybe Maxi meant ‘harassing’ (if Chori can get a word wrong, so too can Maxi)
I mean, from the definition of harangue I’m picturing that guy who wears the “Porsche is a two syllable word” t-shirt and angrily corrects complete strangers on it. As for the idea that Maxima herself just used the word wrong…possible but it just seems really out of character. Maxima just hasn’t seemed like the kind of person who keeps a word of the day calendar and then tries to sneak those words into conversation.
I do totally get where Dave B. is coming from on the “words you’ve read but don’t actually know how to pronounce” issue. However, I’ve also often run into a similar issue. I’d come across a word I didn’t know the meaning of but could figure it out from context. Later, I’d try to use the word myself only for someone to call me on it because the semantics of the definition made it the wrong word for what I was trying to say. This has happened to me often enough that I am now super paranoid about making sure I know the definition of a word before I try to use it myself.
On the other hand:
1: a scolding or a long or intense verbal attack; diatribe.
2: a long, passionate, and vehement speech, especially one delivered before a public gathering.
3: any long, pompous speech or writing of a tediously hortatory or didactic nature; sermonizing lecture or discourse.
Sydney is being aggressively antagonistic here, if not exactly critical. By a slight stretch of the definition, it could be deemed haranguing in all but length, which could make it merely hyperbole on Maxima’s part.
Immediately on meeting Ingsol, Sydney aggressively flashed him. But, despite his protests that it was unpleasantly bright, and requests not to do so, continued to repeat this aggressive behaviour against the fluffy Barkley.
Further Sydney also criticized Ingsol, by made fun of his accent. Now has chosen to mock a life-threatening disability!
Whilst ‘goading’ does fit well, it does fail on one important aspect. Sydney has been smiling, throughout, and behaving in a friendly and disarming manner. As this comes across as being genuine, it does seem to be intended to be cheeky, rather than for the purpose of provoking a violent response.
As no one word neatly fits this pattern of behaviour, ‘haranguing’ is a reasonable match to use. Certainly good enough for an urgent verbal rebuke! Albeit one having a light-hearted aspect to it, given that Dave, confirms that ‘ancient’ can be complimentary to vampires (logically enough, given their increasing power).
That’s why I’ve always felt sorry for lemons. The things some of them have to go through in order to be made into a pie. =OD
Ummm – dunno if anyone’s pointed this out yet (though with this many comments someone likely HAS) – but “Guenhwyvar” is an alternate spelling of the name we usually hear as “Guinevere” these days:
Yeah, was mentioned (several times) on the first page, including how “Jennifer” is a (modern) variation
I don’t mean this as negative as it sounds, but I am too tired to come up with a better way to phrase it. I feel like this comic spends more time wandering off to introduce new characters and new concepts than actually allowing us to enjoy the robust world/characters already established. And it just feels like such a tone shift from “trainee of a military super hero organization” to “suddenly mythical creature council”.
It makes me more hesitant to get invested in anyone, because who knows what the next new thing is going to be.
Still love the world and love the characters, and will obviously keep reading forever.
It never really was about ‘junior super hero’ though. It’s about ‘nerdy girl suddenly finds herself in a world of superpowers and magic’
And that is exactly what is happening here, Sydney finding out about a whole new world.
And I get that, its just yet ANOTHER whole new world just as the other one was starting to get interesting. We keep getting all this infodumping about facets of this world but then we move on to the next just as the previous one was getting interesting.
Maybe it will all fit together seamlessly in the end, obviously I have faith or I wouldn’t be here. It just seems to me like we jump from one shiny infodump to the next without really getting time to SEE the facets we are exploring in play. We keep getting “hey here is this new thing/person and this are its powers” NEXT so its hard to be as interested as I was when the ARC crew was introduced and I thought we were going to be seeing a lot more of how that already large cast interacted with each other.
All I’m hearing is “Why is Dave treating us like we’re Sydney?”, a question easily answered by looking back at past commentary and realising that, while by no means identical, much of Sydney’s character is drawn from Dave’s own.
All reasonable points. There is a good underlying reason though. Traditional storytelling requires following a formula. Such as: “Beginning, middle and end.” With the elements meant to fit together to meet that formula. So we get used to the same patterns.
Some people find breaking that mold to be disturbing. Others consider it refreshing.
What Dave is doing, instead, is looking at how the world would change, with the underlying differences he has envisaged. Then following that to see what happens. Sensibly doing so mostly from the point of view of one naive individual, with little more knowledge, of the hidden world, than the readers.
That there would be an extensive reveal of supers, and super powers, was obvious from the outset. But it is equally sensible that, for the Grrl Power Verse to outwardly resemble our own, all the non-human races must be hidden. And hidden well. Although, vitally, the key protagonist has a way to see through that.
Thus allowing Dave to have her discover this side of the world pretty early. We are only a few days into her career, after all, at this point. Further, to prevent folks from feeling that they will have this happening repeatedly, he has collectively introduced these hidden races, and a number of the key players, all in one location.
So he is being mindful of the issues you are concerned with. The hidden stuff had to be concealed at first, but is now being shown, as quickly as is practical.
Dave is following a very logical path that someone in Halo’s position would likely take, given the other elements present in the world. Each of the major comic franchises have non-humans, of various sorts, in their settings, so this is not contrary to the supers genre, by any means!
Dave has just provided a clever means for justifying how, such a vast variety of beasties could keep their secrets. If they have been collaborating to do so, and pooling their considerable resources, it becomes a lot more credible.
Contrast that to having to individually explain how many non-stealthy races and factions, could also pull the trick off, over most of the course of human history! This way, it can be far more believable that, whilst there were leaks, the cover-ups have been successful, enough that we have consigned them to legend.
You are forgetting (or ignoring) that so far, this is, primarily, Sydney’s journey into a World of the Unknown
I get what you mean. Introducing a massive glut of new characters can be seen as an author who is VERY interested in world-building or setting up something clever much later on. … Or as an author desperate for plot but good at making characters, so is stalling until they can get more plot together.
Very clearly the former. Let me give you some clues, otherwise known as subtle foreshadowing, which Dave has done:
• Page 2, I repeat page 2, a discussion on whether forcefields can protect a vampire from being frazzled in daylight. This is a conversation which will take place some months from now. Yet Sydney is highly conversant in the mechanics.
• Vance indicates he is a colony of super-spiders in a Vance suit. You may have thought he was kidding but… maybe not.
• At the press conference, Arianna outright states that legendary monsters are probably actually real! Albeit that she attributes this to being people with super powers. But clearly Archon are not yet ready to dump all this on the public, in one go. First they must ensure that the public gain confidence that Archon can protect them, before causing undue panic. This shows that the politics have also been given very careful consideration.
• Sydney interrupts a high-level meeting between world leaders. Which confirms that Arianna was telling the truth, in the press-conference, that world-wide national negotiations are underway. And revealing that aspects of it are being conducted quietly, behind closed doors!
• Flying over the Grand Canyon, Halo unmasks a random member of the crowd as being both supernaturally hidden and very likely non-human (having blue skin and white hair). Finding abnormalities in Archon, a place that has concentrated them together, would be expected. Going to a remote spot, and happening to stumble across such an individual?
If he were unique that would be a 1 in 7,000,000,000 chance. If such beings are relatively common, it shows well-thought out world-building.
• At the disco, Sydney starts spotting more of the hidden world, before she has been briefed.
There are other points too, but I feel the post is long enough to more than corroborate my claim. World-wide the plot is advancing at break-neck speed. If you lived in it, you would not feel this was slow-paced. But Sydney is just seeing her part of it, as she gets to it. Fortunately it is a key, and interesting part!
Can you all please stop being so intelligent and well educated please? I am felling a bit stupid in this company. On the other hand life has taught me that things get more interesting if someone says stupid things now and then.
*hangs head, in shame*
You forgot the 1st appearance of Vehemence, where he and other ne’er-do-wells are promising to take up the challenge that Maxima laid down at her news conference.
Not forgot, that fell under “other points too”, and was not listed as it was an overt, rather than subtle, foreshadowing. But it certainly was worth mentioning, true enough. It proves, incontrovertibly, that Dave does have various plot lines in hand. However he is just coming to them as they arrive.
Those schemers are up to their plots, but they have not scheduled them to ensure that Halo has a super villain to defeat, every week!
How inconsiderate of the Super Villains, not checking with Halo’s schedule to make sure they don’t double-book :P
Yea, look at the trouble that causes when it happens in MegaTokyo.
I think the giant sea monsters are more my department…
Giving a shout out to the Kaiju!
I’ve always pronounced it as GOO-en-HWY-var, myself, though I’m almost certainly wrong. However, I’ll still keep pronouncing it that way, just to tick off the “Drizzit” fans.
I totally to the name thing. I don’t even like to talk about books with lots of weird words in them if I don’t know how to pronounce them. Also, I use “GWEN-hy-varr” :)
Also also: I LOVE the comic, keep it up!
I don’t mean to be nit-picky, but the who’s who for Chorius has a small word form error. You’re using the noun form ‘sesquipedalian’ as an adjective; I would recommend changing it to the adjective form ‘sesquipedantic’ in order to better jive with its current usage.
Again I don’t want to sound nit-picky, but I notice these sorts of things, and just wanted to bring it to your attention.
Maybe he actually has seven feet. We haven’t seen his legs yet.
That would be a septa-pedilian.
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SesquipedalianLoquaciousness disagrees with you.
For some strange reason when I picture the voice of Halo I hear Sandra Bullock. Especially if your using the same voice she used in Miss Congeniality. Especially if your talking about that whole nerd snort she does in that movie.
For those of you that claimed this meeting place had to be underground I taunt you and reassert my original claim.
My original pick was Prospect Park in NYC. https://www.mappery.com/maps/Prospect-Park-Map-2.jpg
It has open spaces to avoid prying eyes. It is near the water where Max & Sydney flew in. It has woodlands with streetlights where they met the guards. It is near a cemetery for the post-living crowd. It has its own zoo to hide the coming and going of the were-folk. And most importantly, the administrative office is an old spooky mansion named ‘Litchfield Villa’ for use as the council meeting hall. This building name is obvious even by Scooby-level standards. The mansion is also located on a busy street as stated by Ingsol. And lastly, the NY public library at the edge of the park is located in the Ingersoll building. Coincidence?
https://www.nycgo.com/venues/prospect-park-litchfield-villa
I’ve heard their is a whole underground area there too. They can get in and out of the area totally unseen.
by underground I mean a sewer system connection to move through the city area.
Nah the underground area is inhabited by people who for one reason or another cannot live in the city. Except for an area behind and under a tailor’s shop in the upper east 40’s which is occupied by a clandestine international Law Enforcement organization.
Adolescent genetically modified militant terrapins! (or was that being sesquipedalian?)
Nope the United Network Command for Law and Enforcement. And the other people have a protector who looks like a humanoid Lion.
That would makes sense since he’s the monster representative that he’d be used as an example for them :)
I’ve been reading this comic for years now, and it just keeps getting funnier and funnier. Sydney is now my official hero! I’m certainly going to have to remember to harangue the next ancient wampire that my business leads me to cross paths with!!
Oh, as for voicing the characters in the comics, I really don’t have any concrete ideas, but, if I may make a request… could you work Warren Zevon (yes, yes, I know that he’s dead) in there somewhere. I’m pretty sure he’d get a laugh out of it if he were still with us.
I love your recent trend to almost cut Sydney out of the panel in order to show all the giant monsters. It’s super cute watching the top half of her head bop around.
VOTE PEOPLE !!
I didn’t even realize that People was running for office.
Could be worse. In 1967, in a small Ecuadorian town by the name of Picoazà (population 4000), they were having a vote for mayor.
A firm that makes foot deodorant decided to use the slogan: “Vote for any candidate, but if you want well-being and hygiene, vote for Pulvapies.”
On the eve of the election, the company distributed a leaflet the same size and color as official voting papers, saying: “For Mayor: Honorable Pulvapies.”
Guess who won. That’s right, a foot powder was elected mayor by a clear majority. Unfortunately, no U.S. newspapers carried reports of how Ecuadorian officials ultimately resolved their electoral snafu.
Presumably the foot powder is out of office by now. If it did a good job, maybe we could get it to run for President of the US? It could only be a vast improvement on the people we have running now . . .
My fellow Americans, vote Pulvapies in 2016!!
To heck with that. I wish Palin and Voldemort would run for office in 2016. Why vote for the lesser of two evils? Vote for ALL the evil!
Ooh, no, no! Even better! Cthulhu 2016!
And if all else fails, we can ask Megatron. Or maybe not… I’m not sure even he would want to inherit the current mess.
All indications are he is actually running. With a wealth of promotional material, thanks to a heavily-funded campaign. Even if he is falling behind in the polls, he does yet have a good chance of pulling it off.
Speaking of fictional presidents, that brings up (at least IMHO) an interesting debate: who would you rather have running the country: Norman Osborn or Lex Luthor?
Luthor
Luthor
A population of 4000? There is no way they ‘accidentally’ vote for the one candidate, which makes you wonder: just how bad were the legitimate candidates? :eek:
You are likely correct.* However it is not unique, as such things have been done before, typically as protest votes, as you correctly imply.
* Although it could be a case of misdirection. Sometimes candidates with famous-sounding names (similar to a national politician) will win through just through name-recognition, even though the actual person standing is someone completely different. In this case it could be brand-recognition having a similar effect. The other candidates simply not having done enough to promote themselves adequately.
You would still be correct though as, if that was the case, it was a deliberate ploy, by the company, rather than due to accidental causes. They were very cunning, in leaving their final push until the last day. As this would not give the opponents time to debunk the move, and ensure the misinformation was drawn to everyone’s attention.
Yeah, but in a population of only 4000, it is more likely that everyone knows everyone else, and the majority getting it wrong (unless it’s the center of the world Village Idiot production) just does not compute
I do recall that several political candidates threatened the company that makes Pulvapies with lawsuits. They did, after all, distribute their leaflets on paper the same size and color as official voting papers. I have no idea if any of those lawsuits actually occurred, and I do know that *somehow* they resolved the problem (probably by holding another election).
It may not even have been a protest vote. It may simply have been that a lot of people were in favor of health and hygiene, and thought that “Pulvapies”… whoever he was… was focusing on the sanitation infrastructure as part of his campaign.
Can understand that if it was a population of, say, 40 thousand, but 4 thousand? No
Yeah, I know. I was reaching. You’re absolutely right… just how bad were the other candidates?
By the way, compliments to Dave for remembering all Sydney’s details today: the nose tape, hand bandage, wrist comm, battle damage on said device, and ‘utility belt’. Did she ever decide what to pack? Based on her conversation I would suggest at least including sun screen.
When told about Sydney’s powers, Vale said that virtually no one on this planet were an illusionist and Deus did not disagree.
Now we have several communities of non-humans, some of them using magical camouflage. Does Deus really not know what’s going on or doesn’t he want to show it in front of Vale and Harem?
This whole discussion reminds me that I never actually checked how to pronounce “Vehemence.”
Personally pronounce it: Veh-heh-mence (or maybe Vee-heh-mence)
Why am I suddenly reading Sydney’s text in Chiana’s voice from Farscape?
Why am I suddenly reading Sydney’s text in Chiana’s voice from Farscape?
Possibly I am giving him more credit than he is due. But there are at least a couple of ways of interpreting his comment as good English. So let us wait and see.
It is good English, just may not be proper English (or is it the other way around? o_O)
Sorry to be a bother, but Maxima is technically using the word “haranguing” incorrectly. Which may be the reason the “ancient” vampire questions her comprehension of word definitions?
A key quality of haranguing someone its lengthy aspect (besides being scolding, vehement, etc). “Needling, pestering, teasing, or annoying” would be more appropriate descriptors here.
Anyway… yeah words are super hard to figure out pronunciation just by looking at spelling. Especially since English words seem to have no consistent rule… Take “Worcestershire”. You’d think “War-cest-er-shy-er”? Right? Since “shire” is just “shy-er”? NOPPPPEEEE. It’s “Woo-ster-sure”…
Use of the word “haranguing” could simply be temporal hyperbole or a subtle jab at how two to three pannels is a long time for Sydney to stay on a single topic.
Wait, you pronounce it “Woo-ster-sure”? Have always pronounced it “Wis-ter” (do not pronounce the ‘shire’), same with Gloucestershire , it’s pronounced “Glos-ter” (even the famous Cathedral)
Gloucester is a place within Gloucestershire though and the same goes for Worcester.
Pretty sure Worcestershire is pronounced Wuh-ster-shuh though.
Not the sauce, the sauce is spelt “Worcestershire Sauce”, but pronounced “Wis-ter Sauce”
Have actually visited the Gloucester Cathedral in Gloucestershire
Check this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4fNFo2nsNw
Maybe you heard people giving up and using an abbreviation :P
Or they were dropping the “sauce” and not the “shire”.
3..2..1..
It is very commonly abbreviated, the way Guesticus says. I am used to hearing, and using, that interchangeably, with the full name. For the latter, Spicefreak‘s way of saying it pretty much matches mine.
Note that the video gives the American English pronunciation. Which is close enough, to the English pronunciation that it would not cause confusion, in the UK. However her attempt at saying “shire” (in the context of a county) made me laugh, given that she claimed it is the ‘British English’. Whilst she is (loosely) correct on how it sounds, when appended to a shire name, as a stand-alone word (such as in this sentence) it does not sound the way she pronounced it.
Take for example a Shire Horse. The first vowel should not be converted into a “u” sound, it remains an “i”. ʃaɪə(ɹ)
Ok, but an abbreviation is a nickname, like “Pat” for “Patrick” or “Taumata” for “Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu” (actual name), a custom people have. Guesticus claimed it was the way you pronounce the name, which is a different thing.
Thanks for the heads up on the video, always good to know how much to trust an Internet guru :)
It looks to me like an example of Linguistic Drift (not to be confused with Tokyo Drift). In cultures where language is mostly passed on verbally and not written-ly, pronunciation tends to change over time. Longer words tend to get shortened and harder consonants like ‘t’ tend to get replaced with softer consonants like ‘d’. Place names like Something Town gets shortened to Somethington.
Occasionally, people can add letters. Mischievous has recently turned into ‘mischievious’.
https://theweek.com/articles/542820/10-words-weve-forgotten-how-pronounce
Have always pronounced it “mischievious” :(
OK, by this reasoning, we could, in theory, expect Kaiju attacks at anytime in the story.
Ought to be interesting, combining supers, nonterrestials, and ‘monsters’ fighting against potentially mindless city crushing creatures.
(Unless, of course, if the Kaiju turn out to be intelligent and helpful. That could be interesting!)
One of those banners in the background looks like a..video game type of cheat code in the last panel.
It’s a minor variation on the “Konami Code”, the most prevalent single cheat code in all of video game history.
Countless others have commented on it.
But well done on having spotted it, none-the-less.
Consider yourself to have +1 to spot, but -1 to research, skills.
It also appears to be Sailor Moon above it
If it is Sailor Moon, shouldn’t the werewolves be howling?
(Oh, right. We covered that already.)
No, they would probably still be howling as she is hot, and Tex Avery knows how wolves react to hot girls ☺
hate to be “that guy,” but it’s gonna bother me forever if I don’t mention that “exemplarification” is not in the dictionary. “Exemplification,” however, is a word, and it’s the word Chorius is supposed to be using in that panel.
Incorrect. You’re correct that “exemplarification” is not a word that is in the dictionary. BUT…
“Exemplar” means “a person or thing serving as a typical example”. What Chorius is saying is that he is used to being used as an example. “Exemplarification” is the kind of word Bugs Bunny might make up, or something Sir Roderick Ponce Von Fontlebottom the Magnificent Bastard (a character in Jade Empire, if you’ve ever played that game) might say.
So while it is a made-up word, it is exactly the word Chorius intended to use.
English doesn’t have an official set of words and anything else isn’t a real word. That’s not how English works. English is a language where not only do new words get made up every day, but it also has a kind of word construction kit, with which you can construct new words that nobody’s ever thought of, and still be able to be understood. “Exmplarification” is such a word. It’s made with the word construction kit built right into English.
I find it fun to try to deconstruct a word. Like the word “overwhelm” for instance. Obviously it’s constructed with “over” as an intensifying prefix, so “whelm” is the root here. What’s interesting about this is that whelm and overwhelm have essentially the same definition, but underwhelm does not.
Basically when I say “deconstruction” of a word, I mean removing all the prefixes and suffixes… I guess “deconstruction” might be a good example… Remove the de- prefix and we get construction. Remove the -ion suffix and we get construct… remove the con- prefix and we get “struct”.
In the context of how those prefixes are used, “struct” should technically be a noun in the English language… It does not, however appear in any dictionary. Though “structure” with the -ure suffix does yield a noun found in the dictionary, but in context, “struct” should have the same meaning as “structure”.
We do however find “struct” in computer programming jargon, though it is unclear if it was created by someone like me, who deconstructs words, or if it was just an abbreviation of “structure”
Note also that “construct” can be a noun, meaning roughly the same as structure.
“Monster” originally comes from the Latin monstere – “to show” – and originally referred to things that were sent by gods and other higher powers as messages. Often the message involved violence and suffering, sometimes over an extended period and/or area, as a display of divine displeasure. Sometimes, though, the monster would just deliver a simple and clear message or warning and then leave. Of course, the inflicters of violence and suffering tended to be more memorable, and so we end up with the definition of “monster” that we have today.
I read Chorius’s lines with the voice of Satan from Animaniacs episode, Hot Bothered and Bedeviled.
For anyone who hasn’t heard that voice, you can watch that part of the episode here. According to IMDB, the part was played by Ron Perlman of Hellboy fame.
Note the nod to Hellboy at around the 4:12 mark ☺
Sorry, but it was the other way around. The cartoon came out in 1993 and Hellboy came out in 2004!
The movie of Hellboy? Or the original comic? o_O
The first movie starring Mr.Perlman, of course ☺.
According to Wikipedia, the comic first appeared in March of 1993, while the cartoon first aired in October of 1993.
I withdraw my objection! ☺
Ah! Finally! Getting to the important questions!
So Halo’s first question: how? How did they stay so secretive…
The answer is… they didn’t. Clearly, since there’s so much lore (books, movies, webcomics, etc.) around each and every cryptid/monster/other, that they haven’t been secretive enough.
But nobody seems to really care. This is a world where, ever so occasionally, extraordinary people fly through the skies, maidens made of marble stop bank robberies, and a crazy golden soldier sets off a nuke in the desert to make a threat against the whole world.
Ahem.
When superheroes and supervillains truly do exist, confirmed, and are flying around the skies, then it’s not a stretch to come to the conclusion that the door is open for anything to exist.
So, yeah. I’m guessing the general public suspects that vampires, aliens, and werewolves exist, but not enough people care to push back against the blatant censorship and conspiracies that are withholding this information form the public.
So that’s the how: an apathetic public living in an Orwellian nightmare. Not enough people care, and anyone who cares enough are likely censored, ridiculed, or are otherwise silenced.
However, it is important to point out that, no matter how minuscule any cover-ups or censorship the US government (in this story) is engaging in is absolutely corrupt, horrid, and disgusting.
My next question isn’t “how” or “why,” but instead this: when does Halo, Sydney, realize she’s working for the bad guys?
The best way to hide something, is to make it very boring. Like a random building in a crowded street. Or a dirty phonebooth in down town London.
Also, for a brief second, I thought Sydney was going to ask to be turned into a vampire.
Its understandable that she lost her line of thougt. She/He has that type of face cute with jaws of deadly fangs and slimy cuddly monser of the black lagun.
Joke a side wonder that sydney did not scream in fear.
She’s been in the room for some time now and has seen him sitting there. I think she just did not expect him to be so eloquent.
No one expected the monster from the black lagune to sudenly jump out of the dark water and say ,do you have a cup of tea, when they offered coffe she got pissed
I say, old boy. No darjeeling? Earl gray? Bollocks.
More like that Sydney’s train of thought had just derailed! ;)
Did Sydneys ADHD powered thought train ever bother with things like rails?
Hover trains can still be de-railed, even if they technically don’t travel on rails
But then the term “derailed” would be wrong. Dehovered perhaps?
Well, since today’s “hovertrains” are actually maglev trains that hover a fraction of an inch above a magnetic rail, “derailed” actually IS the correct word. (It is very, very difficult and because of the way it’s designed, would actually require a break in the rail.)
Now, if you were talking about science fiction hover trains that really are hover vehicles (air cushion)… then I’d agree with you, “derailed” is the wrong term.