Grrl Power #720 – Beat the press… to the parking lot
Aren’t most news sources these days “The Daily Panicker”?
Arianna chose her job, not because it was easy, but because it was hard. She didn’t count on Sydney, whose presence adds a minimum of three standard deviations to… well, pretty much anything she’s involved in. The amount of spice she likes in food (that’s like, +10 SDs), knowledge of pop-culture trivia, chance of spontaneous distractibility, and of course, ease of doing public relations involving her.
Although for height, she’s actually only like -1.5 standard deviations, weirdly enough. That assumes the average woman in the US is 5′ 4″, which seems short to me. Maybe because most women wear some sort of heel all the time, but they seem taller to me. I would guess 5′ 5″ or 5′ 6″ honestly. This is from the same source that says the average male height is only 5′ 9″, which again, seems short to me. I probably have some sort of observation bias for tall people.
But much like Sydney, I digress.
Arianna’s been playing her deadly game with the press, and after Sydney made huge and repeated splashes with the press, any absence is sure to be noticed.
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oops spoke a few seconds to soon….
Well, she did not say where she was training.
This is a good point. Dont think the Reporters will see it that way, hopefully someone had the foresight to write a training report just in case of this kinda thing…maybe some cute reality manipulator could get on that.
Well sydney can just explain she fell into a portal while training and hitchhiked her way home.
People can actually believe that if they can see Sydney stepping off of the ship with her towel in hand.
if she walks off the ship towel in hand i will both believe her and praise her awareness of opportunities to pay tribute to classics
Reporters: tell us the tru-
Sydney: i hitchhiked across the galaxy see *holds up Towel*
Reporters….Carry on we will accept this.
Arianna:*stunned silence*
*places towel over head*
…every single reporter (other than Suzie) “whoa, where’d she go???”
[Suzie]: she’s..right….^thought bubble {solo interview opportunity!} >motions Sydney to the side<
With aliens whose existence has been explicitly obscured? Out of the frying pan, into the fire?
Correct. They could easily spin this to being:
“We used our various contacts to have her train out in a neighboring system devoid of life. We wanted to see how powerful her abilities are, as well as a simple rundown for a later test involving Maxima’s blast power. Which I’m sure many would appreciate us doing it in another place instead of here in our Solar System. More information on these tests may be released as a later date.”
Excessive headache in 3… 2… 1…
Lying ALREADY!
Nice to see it’s business as usual in the media!
It’s not technically, a lie.
This is the reason you always say no comment….
Unless it’s your job to talk to the press. Which for Arianna it is.
That’s the best kind of lie
She did not say where Sydney was sequestered. So what if it was aboard an alien star-ship that they did not know about before?
Halo: Thanks for the lift, Cora! I can’t wait to show Maxima how fast I can oof! … can’t breathe!
Max: Sorry. [ Releases her big hug on Sydney ]
Halo: Yeah, I missed you too. My ears are ringing from that. Did you break the sound barrier?
Max: Just under. [ Looks around at the reporters; gets serious ] Come with me to my office; I need to debrief you on your field exercise.
[ Halo & Max fly off to the roof of the Archon building. ]
More likely scenario:
Halo: Thanks for the lift Cora! I can’t wait to show Maxima how fast I … [ Notices all the reporters staring at her ] Heh, heh. [ Sees Ariana slowly shaking her head while staring a hole in Halo ] Oops, my bad. Sorry about interrupting. Carry on. [ Sydney grabs the blue orb and flies up to the top of the Archon building, at about 20 m/s ]
Ariana: [ Sigh of relief ] Now, where was I? Oh yes. As you can see, Recruit Scoville is alive and well, but she still has lots of training to go before graduating and becoming part of a regular deployment.
*instant vomit due to lack of Halo holding the florb*
Ahh, the Daily Panic. I prefer the Hysterical Herald though, it is far better at providing the facts in just scary enough.
And if anyone here likes the Terrifying Tribune you are Dead to me. DEAD.
My go-to is the Calming Chronicle, I follow alternative media.
I tend to find the Sunday Screams best, they take longer to gather all the information they can THEN pass it onto the public in the most panic-inducing way possible. Their conspiracy theorist editors do a great job…
I follow Panic Press on twitter, because they have an amazing response time, even if it’s not very accurate.
I wonder if they are associated with Advanced Aliteration Affiliates?
When I am feeling strong, I will sometimes read the Endov Times, but I pay the Lying Literatie to actually not publish. It is a blackmail scheme, I know, but worth it not to have to watch it.
I’ve found that if I ignore the Big Time Corporate Rumormills & look around at smaller, more independant sources, I find that our world lives more harmoniously than those scare-mongers are willing to admit. They push fear for a reason & it doesn’t have any of the public interests in mind.
So yeah, I’m more likely to be reading the Calming Chronicles with CptNerd than to even bother with plugging my TV back into the wall socket again. When they go to report facts, they actually try to re-establish that severed link between “investigative” & “reporting.”
Agreed. If you get the real facts and stop letting the ratings-chasing sensationalists scare you to death, life is much more enjoyable.
I only read it for the comics…
True dat Jason; and the crossword puzzles are delightfully challenging.
They DID have a nice Weekly Conspiracy Extra, but that were before the mixup with the tinfoil hat scematics and the scematics for an high voltage anti-listening device. People did not get their hair back for weeks. Weeks. And the smell…
Actuall, the current ‘design’ for tinfoil hats must have been made by the CIA or whatever 3letter organisation is experimenting with mind-control rays these days.
Measure the width of your head, from temple to temple, and push that number through a wavelength to frequency calculator. Because the current ‘tinfoil covering the top of the skull and temple, but leve the face open’ is pretty much a resonance chamber designed to amplify a signal on one specific frequency. Or its a microwave killbox… (JUst amp up the transmitter.. )
Mere RAGS! RAGS I say. The Daily Apocalypse is my go to newspaper. Mostly because their motto “Yesterday was the Apocalypse, today we have REAL problems” and the insightful and concise reporting, acerbic pity editorials. Well that and they have Zippy in the comics section.
I’m curious to know just how many of the press are aliens in disguise. And asking some of the harder questions, knowing just how much Archon is having to obfuscate the answers.
Why would aliens want to sabotage their own reveal?
Well, as we’ve seen so far, aliens seem to share many human traits, so I have to assume thee are alien trolls out there as well. Plus some may want to force the government to reveal they aren’t alone in the galaxy, but don’t want to risk their visa by blowing their cover themselves.
Aliens are on the news, you don’t get any more “not being alone in the galaxy” then that
Only on the Terran news channels though, my cousin Asgaborfthxz’s pet care blog has more views than those backwater human media groups.
Some aliens share many human traits. Not all. Megasquids of Death definitely do not, at least for what we’ve seen of them so far.
We have no certain knowledge of whether or not the Alari provoked a response in kind.
From what we do know of the Alari, it is entirely possible that the squids come from an offshoot of some civilization that the Alari wiped out centuries ago . After spending centuries plotting their revenge, they suddenly appeared and visited a response in kind on the homeworld of the beings who did the same to them back in the past.
What goes around comes around, and Karma is a bitch.
They’re fairly common human traits to invade places, wipe out enemies, and/or shoot first and ask questions later.
Aliens would never want to sabotage their own reveal. Sabotage other aliens’ reveals, yes, but their own? Never.
If the people of Earth start becoming aware of aliens, the Veil isn’t going to be able to hide them anymore (like it can’t hide supers anymore). There’s a BIG difference between learning that aliens exist Out There Somewhere, and learning that they’ve been living next door to you for the last ten years. Humans, as it’s been pointed out, have a Small Xenophobia Problem.
Oh Jeeze.
The’re may now be general knowledge about the existence of aliens, but the lnowlege that other aliens exist and THE GOVERNMENT ALREADY KNEW is still secret.
Some tact would have gone a long way. Like, leaving the ship in orbit and Syd bringing just a few down in her bubble (I assume Cora is in Linn be for some interaction with the others)
Well, those two male journos do have unusual forehead bumps.
Average male height of 5’9″.. I always knew I was destined to be Super Average…
The overall average is irrelevant to your circumstance though, if you are surrounded by people above or below the mean.
In my years serving with the military 5’9 was short.
Sydney Sydney Sydney you just got up and make things difficult for the public relations agent don’t you? Even so I found that this was going to be in the inevitable
I think Arianna is soon to replace Max’s #12 spot on her hate list with Sydney as the source of her headache problems…
Depends on the direction this reveal takes. Arianna may be displeased that knowledge of the existence of additional aliens broke without her having total control of the event, but her anger will turn to joy if she manages to sign Cora and her crew to exclusive marketing contracts. Think of all the toys and action figures that will be this Christmas’ must buys.
That joy may be rather tempered when she realises what sort of toy Cora and co favour.
As good as the art style is now, I miss the older styles more. They were a lot more expressive. I mean the 3 panels on this page of people talking have them all doing basically the same expression. Then you look up at the banner at the top of the page and everyone is so expressive!
I have to agree. How many people get into comics for the ‘realism’? I can go outside and see real people. They’re boring and uninteresting, I see them every day. The expressiveness of the older art was both charming and inviting. We’re also getting into some uncanny valley here at times.
Still, the story’s amazing and I love the characters.
And all men have the same big noses and chins. :D
I think that DaveB is still developing this art style. Let´s give him another couple of years to figure out how to improve. ;)
+1
Going to agree with this as well. While the art upgrades are impressive I miss some of the older comically exaggerations in people’s expressions, or them being more expressive in general, even the one-off characters.
Speaking of standard deviations, it looks like all the people in the universe have suddenly skewed to either playboy models or extras in a Rambo movie. Is the Veil on the fritz? What I want to know is who is this Fritz anyway, and how can we get him to fix it?
Those horrible atrocity-filled vermin! Those despicable animal warmongers! They’ve killed Fritz!
Max! Max, I’m okay! I’m okay max. Just a scratch. Look I’m all right.
If you mean the reporters & news anchors all look too beautiful, you forget that these people professionally have to be on camera, and are often selected by HR to suit the beauty standards of the day so as to be a little more appealing to viewers.
If you work in radio, you can afford to “have a face to match”…and even show up in sweats and a teeshirt, so long as your voice sounds fabulous…but if you work on television, the networks will expect you to invest in hairstyles, clothes, makeup, grooming, etc, all to look visually acceptable (appealing).
Has the expressiveness of the art style taken a nose dive just lately? Back when Dave started the new style the characters were more expressive than they are now. Is he too busy?
Seeing as how people know about aliens I have to say I could have expected that to happen within the story. Arianna just can’t have a simple day at her job dealing with simple interviews and calm press, wonder how is she going to talk her way out of this one xD
And Arianna is the newest art drift victim!
Only because she was the most recent character to be shown ;)
Turns out she’s a vampire, and the Veil is struggling with all her press interactions.
And now we get to see Arianna scramble to explain that Sydney’s “intensive training” was offworld and overseen by Cora and her buff crew.
Well, she did train intensively, and it was offworld. Cora and crew just provided transport back from the training site…
Sydney was training but got sucked into a portal to another planet
That was the training site! Look at how much she levelled up.
I would imagine the normally rather short Latinos and Asians do reduce the average a bit. Also old people are a bit shorter as well.
Also you notice the tall people more. Think about it when did you go last “This guy is really tall.” and “This guy is really short?”
I don’t really notice tall people unless they are taller then me
In my case, that is almost everyone else. 5′ 3 1/2″
Well that depends on HOW short? Are we talking Hervé Villechaize short, or Mini-Me short?
Averages are stupid. Cause one outlier screws it all up. I work construction. I’d say I see anywhere from 12 to 50 men every day. They are usually between 5’10” and 6’2″. Except this one guy that works the same company as I do. Jamie. He is 4’9″. His small stature skewers the average to 5’8″. And I hen there is this one project manager who’s nickname is “Big Giant Carl”. Carl is 6’10”. He is called “Big Giant Carl” cause his company has a slightly more senior employee that is called “Giant Karl” who is 6’5″. They skew the average in a drastic other direction. With them the average goes to 6’3″.
Averages are stupid.
Those averages also have other problems. One they have been increasing about an inch per decade. Two they very by race/ country/ sex. From what I understand the current average for male white Americans in Highschool is about 6′ 3″ – 6′ 4″. When I was in Highschool in the 80’s it was 6′ to 6′ 1″.
It sounds like those averages are either old or are for a smaller country/ race.
There are not only white people in the US. The average is of cause over the population. However that seems excessively tall. I found some data from Norway. There the conscripts are 179.7 cm (5’10.5″) on average. The total male population has the same values. There is not much indication that the population is getting much taller in developed countries. I think the Highschoolers you remember are just the tall ones.
LOL, 6’3 average? No way. First, Americans are no longer gaining height, and are possibly even shrinking because of bad healthcare and poor nutrition.
The tallest first world nation is one of the nordic ones, I think the Netherlands. The men average 6.1
No, that’s just silly. The average senior male in Dallas private schools, which tend to be taller than the national average due to a couple of factors, is still under 6′. Even if you wanted to pretend that the changing racial balance of the public schools would account for an increase in height, you’d be up against the fact that the average heights for Blacks and non-Hispanic Whites are both roughly equivalent, and the average heights for Hispanics and Asians are lower than that, so the decreasing percentage of whites is likely **decreasing** the average height. There’s just no support in the scientific or health literature for the idea that there is any significant increase in the average height of boys. (“Significant” meaning “measurable in inches rather than fractions of an inch”.)
when you have 12 people of them are 11 176.4(5’10”) and one of them 143,64(4’9″) the average is 173.67 ( a little under 5’9″). If you have people over 176 that gets it up complacently.
On top of which you need to consider your sample population – construction probably isn’t going to attract folks who don’t have the physical frame to support that kind of labor.
Now they are going to ask about Elvis. :)
“Elvis is not dead, he just went home.” MIB
Other probable famous aliens:
Michael Jackson
Jay Leno
Jaques Cousteau
Donald Trump
All the Kardashians
Edward Snowden
Elizabeth Holmes
Lady Gaga
Not to mention
Merlin
Krishna
Most of the Egyptian Deities (We actually saw one of these in the description of Earth as a “Sex Tourism” destination)
Heck, just about every being humans have seen as a deity that isn’t actually a local monster type like a werewolf or something
She’s not even quite back yet and she’s already fucking things up for Arianna, Syd is on form today.
And she’s even got more refugees right behind her…
Arianna: Sydney, you couldn’t call ahead?
Sydney: Oh, right. I’ll remember that for next time.
Arianna: You’re expecting to bring another spaceship full of alien refugees?
Sydney: [Looks at reporters before turning back to Arianna.] I’ll cover that in my report.
Are you kidding? Have you seen the long-distance charges that interstellar calls rack up? No matter what the phone company says, it’s NOT the “next best thing to being there.”
Arianna: “Sydney… you have your coms device, or as you like to call it, Your ‘Pip-Boy’… you could have used that!”
Sydney: “… Oh… Yeah… yeah, i guess i could have… OOPS!, Sorry!…”
Any kind of battery that they could fit into it couldn’t generate enough power to push a readable signal (up to Earth-orbiting satelittes, at best) far enough for Sydney to “phone home.” Normally speaking, as it goes with “cellular communications,” the pipboy has enough range to link into a system of cellular towers locally, which would have enough power to transmit to satelittes.
Sydney may have been able to manually jack into Cora’s ship communications systems to relay data and/or recordings to Earth, but the pipboy on its own just doesn’t have the “juice.” As it was, Cora called ahead to Dabbler without using Sydney’s pipboy. Sydney was gone off-Earth long enough for the pipboy battery to drain anyway, but she might have been able to recharge it while she was on Cora’s ship.
Arianna looks quite different in this strip. I am not artist enough to figure out why – maybe the highlighting or coloring?
“Just here to repair their ship” Yeah right. Deus is going to figure out some was to seriously profit from that.
Duplicating the alien tools….and the ship also I suppose.
Who do you think RUNS that wee African country with all the forward thinking, opportunity minded folks? Turn on the schmooze boys there are marks …ahem… customers to service. A line of credit, of course!
This explains his shopping trip.
how about being the first person in the world with (legaly obtained) alien money?
I still have some quatloos I picked up some time ago. But they are only legal tender in certain sports betting parlors.
Deus already got alien tech, he smuggled some with private portail
he just has to disguise them as “human tech” and *bling* Earth upgraded to interstellar worthy civilization that can officially start business in the galaxy, get space internet, all that stuff
Huh, 5’9″? That’s what the NCHS says all right, but that is a few inches shorter than the 6′ I was told growing up.
I’m wondering if the Marketing Dept. will be weeping or celebrating the new Syd bareface look. All those action figs with glasses will be so last year…
Her glasses were just being repaired. She might have them back now.
No no, you never build the accessories into the base model, you make an infinite variety of options to sell as add-ons – just ask Barbie.
Replacement action figure Halo glasses are $4 each and are designed to get lost easily.
And you have to have both the “intact” glasses and the “broken while fighting space squidwards” glasses. Your collection just isn’t complete without all the variants.
I just think that Barking Boyfriend might just have taken it on himself while healing her up… “Yeah, I fixed that eye thing. That must have been a bother.”
Well, the pussy is really out of the cloth now…
Next scene: Dabbler going: “Squeeee!!! Cora!!” followed by hugging (Read: sloppy kisses and groping).
Even the dimmest of the press will realize. “She knows that alien? She has that battle form… Ohhhh….”
Secret? Which secret…
If no-one has caught on yet, there really is an archaic english language direct version of that idiom, which I assume Dave B. is aware of.
“She’s (or You’ve depending on context) already been flipping her (or your) skirt, no need to be coy.
Read old bodice rippers.
Awwwww!
The public missed having TMH around!
Hey Sydney…. Phone the parents that you’re back!
TMH? Too Much Halo?
TMH = The Mighty Halo.
She’s My-tay Mightay, you know.
Arianna thinking to herself: -FUCK!-
or…. “Oh, at last, new questions.”
Lots of new questions when she shares a farewell kiss with a certain medical Woof!
This wasn’t in the script!
If it wasn’t because she had such a great time on Cora’s boat, I’d almost imagine Sydney jumping down and literally hugging the ground yelling “Oh yes, yes sweet mother Earth how I’ve missed you so!”
Been awhile since we saw Arianna…
What will mean to both her and Archon when Sydney tells all of her time in that other dimensional world!?
Otherdimensional? It was just an alien planet.
“DAMMIT Sydney!” /fires up the Spinmaster Mark XII
^ Precisely this. Nothing ruins a day for the head of PR like a controversial figure crashing their press conference with unmistakable evidence that she’s been lying through her teeth about every single question.
Men generally lie about an inch or two taller than they are. This is particularly bad in pro sports. I met RG3 once. Dude ain’t 6’2″. Closer to 5’11”. Theres a weird hangup about it. Don’t know why. 5’8″ to 5’10” is optimal for lifespan and health. Taller people register more time in the hospital, have higher rates of cancer and die sooner. Use to be taller = healthier, but only because it was a sign of food access. These days, a lot of people have gotten designer dog too tall.
I’m thrilled to be 5’8″ – general trends are going my way.
Haven’t we seen the redhead reporter before?
She usually wears a yellow jumpsuit, right?
Yes, this is Suzie’s rival, Pinkie
it’s interesting this talk of heights. The Median is 5.9 in Canada for males (5.3 for Females) but the mode of heights in Canada is 6.0 for males) that means the median is skewed down by many values under 5.9 but not in a bell shaped curve.
Two thoughts…
One, Halo should have called in using her choker now that she’s within range.
Two, this may be the first full page with only normal humans on it, no supers, aliens, supernatural beings, or other powered types.
Sydney probably did.
Maxima was informed of her impending arrival two pages back.
Perhaps nobody considered that this could be important to relay to the public relations specialist immediately.
Maxima to Sidney probably:
“Hey go see Arianna right away, she is holding a ceremony for the recently deceased Halo, she will be thrilled”
Sidney:
“WHAT!? I MUST DO AN ANGELS DESCEND FROM THE HEAVENS ENTRANCE”
AND she’s ALMOST got the correct wings to do it RIGHT!!!
Timing is everything! You have to know how to make an entrance.
Maybe Sydney should fly in wearing her fairy wings.
Seconded!
My first suggestion was to have her use the True-Sight Orb to teleport – in this case, INTO the Archon building – then have her walk out like she’s been there all along.
She wouldn’t use the teleport function of the TSO outside of an emergency, because she knows she’s under strict orders to hide most of what it can do, such as see through every known illusion or invisibility spell, etc. (notice I said “known” o pedantically minded peeps)
Wait just how long was Sydney gone? There were a few time skips sure but I thought she was only gone for like a day at most. Just how long was she fighting those titans before she left? And how long did she spend getting lunch before she got picked up? Is there some sort Interstellar style time dilation from moving through gravity wells of various strength?
No, your guess is about right about her space adventure. The time travel part is portal to Alari world – it wasn’t finished properly, so it led to correct place, but incorrect time. Rest of the crew returned through the same portal back to correct time, Sydny… took a detour.
Oh Thaaaaat’s why Harem said there were “Too many of her.” I thought she was in an alternate reality or something because of that.
To be fair none of that is confirmed but yeah that’s the leading theory by far.
Really, really looking forward to the next few strips clearing some of this up now that we’re back on Earth.
Unstable wormhole. Sydney blasted the Animus Mannequin thing before the blood portal was finished, causing it to destabilize. It took them to the right location but wormholes being how they are (portal through time and space) jumped them ahead an undetermined *but clearly nothing extreme like years, possibly just days to weeks*, amount of time.
Sydney should either figure it out, its a common trope. At least its not some (welcome to the year 5000, going on a quest to find a time portal back to your own time level of unstable wormhole); no need to *find a portal back home* when all you missed was a short coma’s worth of time. Just shrug and move on.
Ok, I think the time-travel theory is pretty much confirmed. Press wouldn’t notice her disappearance if it was just a day or two (my guesstimate how long the space adventure was in Sydney-time). Couple of weeks or months earth-time.
If there were two or three public team missions…fixing that bridge for example…and everyone *EXCEPT* Halo was seen…then it might only be a week or so until people noticed her absence.
“As we have repeatedly told you…” kinda implies more than one week of QUESTIONS from press. And some time before that for press to notice the absence.
Actually I’ve seen live news conferences after major events where the speaker either answers a question, or says I can’t answer that right now. Then the next 7 questions asked are all variations of the same thing that was just asked. American news reporters will keep repeating a question until they get the answer they want.
As far as them asking about the missing Sydney, it could easily be less than a day or two since the last time the news media has seen Halo. Somebody who attracts the spotlight like Sydney does will be missed pretty damned quick. And if the media smells something fishy about what they were told when they first asked about her they will assume there is a bigger story that is being covered up.
And as they often never get the answer which matches their pre-conceived notions, American reporters throw embarrassing tantrums a lot.
Bloggers and small online publishers generally produce more rational reporting than today’s newspapers and sensationalist press conglomerates.
I remember when this wasn’t so, and the editors and publishers of my youth would be aghast of what the industry has turned into.
Ya’ know, I think you have something there…DaveB’s said that the first few pages of the comic is more of a “flash-forward,” rather than everything after that being a “flashback.” Have you stumbled upon DaveB’s literary device that would get us mostly caught back up to the actual “present time” when the comic actually started?
Yes, I think you have.
;)
Ooooh, what will Sydney blurt out in front of the press? Especially since the Alari are probably already stealing cable.
I wanna ask Heath “Hey pal! Why the long face?”
Sequestered, huh? Nobody puts Sydney in the corner. Oh, and nice to see you again, Ari. Always a pleasure.
So how long before Arianna becomes a closet super-villain out of sheer frustration with her charges?
I wouldn’t expect her actually go against Archon, but making the supers suffer? She could bring on the Updated Public Relations and Apropriate Discourse Guidelines Training Course (required; weekend remedial extended; multiple exams). And thanks Halo publically for giving her the justification.
I love Arianna’s expression in the last panel, of Arianna thinking,
“I will kill Sydney someday.”
Eye Spy an “April O’neil, Channel 4 News”?
It’s Suzie’s rival, Pinkie, we saw her during the initial Press Conference
oh god oh god oh god, please sydney do a super hero landing, or a loki entrance from ragnarok!!!
Unless one of your posers happens to be Invulnerability, never do a superhero landing…because SCIENCE!
“The Daily Panicker”
That had me rolling, mostly because it’s pretty representative of news in general.
Why do the guys have such ugly faces? Are they disguised supernaturals or something?
She knows. As soon as it happened, she knew who just arrived.
Notice how she is the only one whose eyes aren’t closed?
Of course she knew, she’s been on the edge of her seat waiting for that shoe to drop at the worst possible moment. Sydney just being herself is her PR arch-nemesis, and this was undoubtedly the best possible moment to reappear and generate maximium chaos in Arianna’s life.
Not necessarily… I assume that whenever Dabbler told Maxima, she also told Arianna either first, or very shortly thereafter that they were arriving and when. Then, possibly this particular press conference was called KNOWING that Cora’s ship is on the way, and Arianna and General Faulk/Maxima are in on it…
That said, I’m pretty sure that they were NOT expecting her to arrive in QUITE the fashion that she is, but who knows? maybe it’s planned? just like how they used the Bank Robbery to reveal the rushed intro of Archon, here the powers-that-be realized that the Good Ol’ USA can’t let some pipsqueak nation ‘over there’ (Galytn) get ALL the credit for hosting the first Aliens around, and are now playing catch-up… so now, they are using the buzz about Halo’s “disappearance” and her coming BACK as the buzz-worthy intro for an “Aliens Are Real… And They’re HERE on Earth!!”intro for Cora… with the higher-ups currently Maybe / Maybe-not yet knowing that they have 37 other Alari refugees onboard as well as Halo “returning from her training”…