Grrl Power #74 – Adrenaline junkie…?
So not a whole lot happening on this page really. I just wanted to establish the new setting, at least the exterior. It’s too bad I’m miserable at architecture though. I think the basic exterior looks ok, but everything surrounding it is massively underdeveloped. That’s ok, cause I put in a shitty looking crane on the edge so you can tell it’s still under construction sort of. Hopefully they’re still working on a lot of the trim around the lower parts. Also I realized I put landing pads on the roof but there’s nowhere doors. We’ll just say there’s stairways that are flush with the roof. Only, you can see the skylight, and we know what the room underneath that looks like. Oh well. Honestly constructing this building was the first thing I’ve done in Sketchup in more than a year, I’m surprised it came out as good as it did. Don’t be too surprised if this page receives a few stealth tweaks as I build a more refined model.
The team doesn’t occupy the whole building, they have some garage and basement space, and the top few floors along with the roof, and some offices somewhere below that. At least, this is where the bulk of the intelligence gathering and the command structure is, and where the main team deploys from. Floor 1, 2 and -1 is basically a mini mall, and there is retail offices space throughout the rest of the building. The areas the team occupies is physically separated from all that though, separate elevators, garage space, entrances/exits, all that.
Why is the team in a high rise instead of some… fort? Well, they’re really small at the moment. Less than 100 people including intelligence and all the other office people, and… I don’t know, that’s just how I always imagined it. Hopefully I’ll be able to justify it at some point, cause I imagine it’ll come up in the comic.
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What’s it say on the side of the building?
AAAAAAAAACHON, apparently.
;) Whatever ARC-SWAT was being called LAST month.
Zingah!!!! THAT is almost funnier than the comic!
Nice looking office building by the way. Got that whole pentagon thing going at the base of the building, and after that it looks like a well desined industrual complex/ office building.
By the way, what’s the crane on the side of the building there for? Are they still building it?
Just read the excerpt. Still under construction. Great idea to put it in that kind of building by the way. New orginization, small budget, ect.
Great comic … but …. Okay, a nit to pick even though you admitted to being horrible at drawing architecture ….. the base of the crane is behind the building yet the the boom assembly is in front of the tower and parallel to the face…
If at first you don’t succeed … Field Trip … and take some pictures and eat ice cream. If its good enough for the the guys making big bucks on “Art”.
He was in a hurry, and is probably not in construction.
It might be artwork issues, or we might soon meet a new member of the team, codename Escher.
It’s actually a hexagon. Hard to tell from this angle I know. I had to push the FOV thingy in Sketchup fairly hard to get the effect I wanted on the panel, but the building itself, when viewed from the top, and the base (it’s not floating on columns, there’s a bit of a recess under that lip) are hexes.
Well, at this point, we just need an impressive looking building and it does fine. As mentioned, it will likely need some alterations if we ever have to look in detail. Now the hints… That needs a lot of reconsideration.
The lack of doors on the roof is fairly easy to deal with. The entire landing pad is a big elevator, designed to launch some sort of bat-plane. While there are stairs/elevators near by for foot traffic, the planing [wise or not] is to load everything in downstairs and then raise to launch.
The idea of mixing retail and military and hoping for any kind of security is insane [which may make it a quite superior “system” for our story]. There are just too many potential leaks to plug, which is made worse by having 3 stores of stores [which is not a mini-mall by the way] and a mass of barely controlled super heroes. They will punch lots of holes [possibly literally] in that security system any time they feel an urge to go shopping.
Now from a story view, this can be great. We can have various security freaks trying to patch things while the heroes punch new holes and we can have all sort of intruders, innocent or not, to keep things lively. [A perfect system is dull, dull, dull.]
Now to explain the whole mess… A big construction company got caught by the recent downturn and was stuck with a mostly empty building. However, they got wind of our group looking for a base and by offering a “great deal” and a good deal of political pull, they persuaded them to move in. This too can add in a few well-known comic types such as a corrupt congressman and the landlord, who will be complaining about all the problems the supers cause, while of course skimping on services.
David Argall, You must work for the government! :0 That sounds waaaay to real. I have actually seen ‘Mil’ contracts like that.
This proves it, DaveB, you have .Gov. types reading your comic. ;)
just to note syd hid the corner of the roof with the yell and that would be a perfectly logical place for the stairs, the mall idea is not bad for a unit with other jobs concept like max as a painter / art dealer in on the side. also the pentagon contracts space to McDonalds to cover expences and help feed personel that have trouble getting to the DFac due to work requirements, this unit probly needs those funds to balance the budget, also makes it easier to contact phone or clothing resources for emergencys and contracts when unit needs something. the security issue would match a basis of does the person have clearance papers / authorisation on ID for this level if yes elevator allows stop if no refused to move with one or two guards at elevator door / reception area to redirect people who end up at the wrong point or don’t know what floor they need. higher security areas need person to submit ID clearance to reader to open door out of elevator reception room similar to needing clearance to enter base and further proof to enter more secure areas of base.
Make the restaurant into a Wendy’s and I’d agree with you wholeheartedly.
yep, Navy and Marines have Mcd’s, Airforce has Wendy’s,and i’m not sure but i think the Army has BK?… i’m pretty sure it’s some form of Anti-Monopoly fair-play kinda thing going on…
more regional east coast McD mid west arby west hardees overseas BK and I been in bases in each sector to conferm no arby on the coasts or hardee east of nevada. at least on army posts.
Hoo-boy! I’d hate to think of what my bladder control would be like.
She was having FUN?! If Maxima wasn’t buletproof she would have a black eye and several bruises on her face right now.
lol,,, lovd maxima’s face in here,,, and doesnt she know its more fun when you scream,,, you try it,, rollercoaster or anything else,, one ride dont scream,, the next one scream,, you’ll see its more fun
just had a tought,,,, what will sidney’s neck band be like,,, harem already has a H,, with bars on each sides,,,
H, with a ring around the band would be my guess. The colors are likely to be different as well.
agreed, since Brooke/Heatwave’s is an H without the bands. I assume Harem’s bands are to signify duplicates so a ring would be fitting
I was thinking a biohazard symbol to be honest.
I actualy thought the H stylized to resemble angel wings would be suggested by now.
A bio-hazard sign with angel wings!!!
Somehow, angelic and Sydney don’t seem to go together in my mind.
similar to the irony of an elite trained alien special forces super ranger / covert ops soldier with the life span to master whole science fields humans must specialize in to develop any level of skill at as dabbler. I personaly wouldn’t find it odd to have it a HaLo ( high altitude low open) parachut with the rigging as the H as she is random enough for the obliqe connection to work.
also,,, dave,, did you put images of max’s face on top banner that havent appeared onb the comic,,, cause thats 2 i see and dont remember seing in the comic
I might have used some old pinup art I did of her.
At least she got her hat back.
Love Max’s eyes in panel 5, she’s actually surprised.
The more I look at this page, the funnier it gets. Every time I switch between panels 5 and 6 now, I just burst out laughing because I can just see the whole transition between them.
Poor Maxima,trying to figure out what Sydney is going to do next is going to drive her mad.
she’s full bird. if she isn’t insane thats a new super power for the list (read the manual o-4+ insanity is prerequisit and encouraged at e-4+ o-2+)
Navy: “Something bad must happen to a person’s mind when they reach Flag Rank”
I have this partially resistible urge to make a rendering of that building.
Do it. then make a posting of it.
I’ll share my sketchup model if you want to iterate on it a little. I’d welcome a little design input. In fact here you go. I think this is the most current version. Can’t check it at work.
When I tried to look at it, all I got was some crap that wanted to add their stuff to my computer.
I tried to open the file but it couldn’t locate the program for it to do so.
It’s for Google Sketchup.
A little feedback:
Obviously built as an office/gym complex. Perhaps living quarters too. It does not appear built to deal with events such as an attack. presumably the people inside are expected to do that.
Like the helipads on the roof. Question: How do people get from the choppers into the building? We’ve seen the interior below the skylight. You’ll want some way of getting in besides jumping in through the skylight and hoping to land on the couch. A building like this would have elevators. One of them just needs to go to the roof.
Or you move the helipads to a lower level where they have a door.
Presumably the blue stuff back by the crane is a pool? It looks cool, but water is heavy, which is why some apartment buildings tell you that you can’t have a waterbed. It could go through the floor.
Is the place still under construction?
It would be very unsafe to put helipads on lower roof sections, because of the way wind becomes turbulent around buildings. The effect will be least noticeable on the highest portion of a building, because any existing wind patterns around the building are least disrupted there.
Since we’ve only seen one viewpoint of this building, there could be rooftop access that’s hidden by what appears to be a raised skylight structure.
What appears to be a dining area seems out of scale to the rest of the building (second highest rooftop section), given the apparent size of the crane structure, and the apparent height of the steps as seen from above rooftop level.
We’ve seen part of the building below the skylight. I’m pretty sure a mixed use office/retail/secret lair building will be bigger than one break room. Also there is an elevator/stairway off of the roof conveniently hidden behind Sydney’s speech bubble in panel 2. <..> ;)
It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve seen a raised landing pad with doors/stairs under it. Or for that matter a horizontal roof hatch with stairs that ended flush with the roof.
Securing a place like this isn’t hard either, you just have to get out of the military mindset and think in terms of executive protection.
Fire wells can have extra doors added between landings to keep people from going up past certain levels.
Elevators don’t have to access all of the floors in the first place. You see this alot on multi-tenant high rises. not for the added security, which in the case would be a bonus, but someone going to floor 20 doesn’t want to have to stop on every floor in the building.
Even ID readers of some kind wouldn’t look out of place next to the elevator panels in a shared building.
Even armed security and plain clothes officers aren’t unheard of in shopping malls.
The private sector is very good at making high security installations out of “normal” business parks. Why wouldn’t the goverment be able to do the same?
that is SOOO going to be made into a model when my Printerbot 3D printer gets delivered to me in March…
I made some revisions to it tonight, just around the base. I’ll keep the most current one posted somewhere.
cool, i’ll send a link once i figure it out… if you don’t mind, i’ll probably post it at thingiverse.com once i get it printed.
So basicly Arcswat is located above a civilian shoppingmall thingy?
That’s a damnsmart place to hide a topsecret militairy project, I like it
Yeah, and those places can have some pretty high class security put in place and no one will raise a eyebrow. Ecinomical and low key injust the right fashon.
Pfft AHAHAHA @ tiny text
Oh goodness gracious me, Flying by screaming and flapping arms :D
well banshee in marvel could only fly while screaming
Not quite the same tho.
Perhaps flapping is the wrong word, flailing comes to mind.
‘What if Sydney is actually carrying Maxima and that’s just how she flies?’
:D *Snork!*
Sydney seems to be the only person able to make maxima switch that quickly between annoyance and concern. Looks to be a good way to get out of trouble.
As for whats on the side of the building….Archon? first thing that sprang to mind lol.
ummm…where’s the poster tube after panel 1?
Don’t worry, DaveB will get to it as soon as he gets some rest.
This page was done in a much compressed timeframe, as much of the weekend was spent redoing the house’s master shower, hence all the cut and pasting… which doesn’t save quite as much time as you’d think cause each panel is still a little different. Like I said this page will probably receive a little touch up.
I understand. When you said you were working on a bathroom by yourself this weekend I knew that you wouldn’t have much time to work on the comic. It’s still a good page by the way. So you do what you need to and just keep on posting those webcomics we all love.
Well not by myself, I was helping the wife, but she’s previously sprained her wrist on this project and can’t handle the 50lb bags of mortar or twist her hand around too well.
actualy with some layout set and the common room already drawn in a couple angle I would suggest go easy on yourself 1-3 views each of the generals office and a couple other regularly seen rooms of low detail then for a little while do like you did for the roof (reuse same background with activity all in foreground) and spend the extra time pampering your princess or maintaining your castle.
I think Max was wearing it. Panel 3 looks like she’s taking it off as she puts Sydney down, then she must have either dropped it on the ground or moved it to her right hand.
No, the tube is still in her left hand, but as that hand is BELOW the edge of the frame for the next 3 panels, we just can’t see it… until she grabs her hat back in the last panel.
I added it to the last panel last night. :)
Sneaky stealth fixes :P
I already thought there was something different on that pannel
I laughed so hard. Then I started to wonder at the state of Maxima’s mind. Most people would have at least tried to catch Sydney. Reflexively.
She had just been knocked on by Sydneys flaying arm’s. Shure she barley felt it but it was annoying. And it was just plain funny.
… AND she finally got her hat back.
Great stuff. I see that Sydney handled the flight and landing with her usual dignity.
Sydney sure is a weirdness magnet. I have a theory regarding her orbs. They’re alien artifacts of great power – and they’re easily bored. Her antics probably give them giggle fits.
If it/they start talking to Sydney it’s going to drive the rest of the team nuts, especially if Sydney is the only one to hear the voice(s).
I don’t think Sydney is that far gone in the head. Yet….
Oh. Are you talking about the magical artifacts in the tube? In that case I agree. It would be like the first time I ever saw somebody using a bluetooth, at first I thought he was schitzophrenic, then he turned around and I saw this thing attatched to his head. A few years later I saw this guy who was actualy schitzophrenic and at first I thought he had a bluetooth. I wanted to advise him to put something on his head, but he was on a call with Satan at the time, so I let him be.
and when they start coming out with IMPLANTS then you won’t even be able to tell the difference anymore!! ’cause there won’t be a visible “thing” in the guys ear.
or he could be a real medium doing negotiations for soul access and insuring the wrong kind of eatheric don’t show up in this world got to many to begin with.
and most of them are in politics
The building looks fine. The stairs could be behind the skylight and thus just be out of sight.
The heavy equipment elevator could be a flat platform that is even with the roof when it is up and otherwise hidden when not in use.
Personally, I’m going to go for elevating helipads, similar to the way aircraft carriers get aircraft from the hangar decks to the flight deck. That way, you can load up your VTOL in the high security of the enclosed hangar and only have it visible – and therefore vulnerable, even if only to attracting attention – for a limited time. Your maintenance crews would also be able to work on the VTOL without the weather being a factor, as well as allowing you to load up any sensitive cargo away from prying eyes.
Ooh, I like that. I’ll have to rethink how much of the building they occupy if they have 2 Osprey hangers in there though.
The Osprey hangars could be ground level and outside the establishing shot if you like. You would need a secure method of getting in and out tho. Nothing says they have to be housed on the roof.
As a matter of fact, while the Osprey hangars “could” be on ground level, or even below, that would quite frankly be an almost insane design, as that would mean the hangar elevator would use up extreme amounts of volume in the building for no good reason. The hangar elevator should not go further down than the roof-height of the hangar itself, and for an Osprey I doubt more than 15 meters would be usefull, and more likely 10 meters. That equates to between 3 and 5 ordinary floors, and the machinery for the pushing elevators would probably take no more than 35 to 50 cubic meters ov volume per elevator. If the elevator went all the way down to ground level, the space wasted for the elevators would be around 2250 cubic meters per floor traversed (not counting the hangar, of course), and the machinery for such an elevator would have to be very hefty indeed. A push elevator requires a much more powerfull machinery than a counterweight cage-lifting elevator as found as personal transport elevator in almost every tall building in the world.
But I am sure DaveB will be having his hangars right underneath the roof of the building…or having some really strange transportation-method for the Ospreys, like magic teleportation circles built into the helipads, teleporting them to and from the hangars. Personally, I think they’ll be right under the roof.
And while it’s kind of silly to comment on ones own comment, I still have to point out (to myself too) that the Ospreys could be based and serviced at a nearby airforce base (or similar) and just be on call for the team.
*ring…ring* Unknown private: Bugswatter base, how may I help you?
Colonel Maxima: Get me Osprey 1, on the roof, ASAP!
U p: Certainly, mam. Osprey 1 will scramble as soon as possible.
That’s how it worked for the PSS-9 in “The Ghost In The Shell” until their tilt-rotor was shot down.Then they used helicopters flown in from a nearby base to take them to where ever they needed to go. But I can see the V-22 landing and then folding the wings and being lowered into the building. And who says that ARC SWAT has only a few floors? The building would be owned as a front by they US gov’t or some branch of it. Like the CIA an DoD use. The whole building could be staffed by agents of various agencies, some in fast food or chiropractor garb but really there to back up ARC SWAT from infiltration on the ground level by agents of …? I can see plenty of people who can look upon supers as demons or angels.
I’m not talking about how many floors Arcswat has of the building, I am talking about how the architect that designs a house that wastes 750 square meters (8000 square feet) per floor on every single floor, deserves to be sacked. Or shot. And I mean seriously… wasting the space. The space that an elevator traverses cannot be used for anything else.
like hidden on the far side of the building from this view at street level. would waste the pads on the roofs purpose sounds government.
BOING // WHUD is going to be the best part of my day.
The rest of it is underground (All media with lairs), there is a hive like complex under it (Resident Evil), it’s at the base of a mountain and the building is just the entrence to the rest which is under/in the mountain, or a command center that also functions as a diversion, focuses attention on itself (Stargate SG1, Fallout, that movie where Morgan Freeman’s president and there’s an asteroid headed for Earth, don’t know of any others, lord of the rings), that is the correct size but at the same time not through the use of interdimensional portals (Ben 10 whatever current part is called, Pokemon I guess, I came up with everything else someone else can come up with an example if they don’t like it), it’s a single base and/or outpost because they are spread over the nation and/or world, and since they are top secret they wouldn’t be all clumped together exposed (See how that turns out for the humans in any of the Alien, Predator, Alien Vs Predator movies), magic, or because their superheroes and they want to and if you have a problem with it you can take it up with them (Hancock, or was it Hitchcock?)
um.. I speak for all sane persons when i say “Wut?’
I think he had a brain-spazem.
I THINK he was suggesting that key parts of the base could be sited deep underground (like Cheyenne Mountain in ‘Stargate SG-1’;, etc.). Also that there might be a number of bases scattered all over the country, rather than putting all one’s super-powered eggs in one basket, so to speak.
But don’t hold me to that.
Yeah, basically. It was the result of boredom and 32 hours of no sleep.
I dance on your sanity, and insanity is the spice of life.
nah that cranes not for construction its for highdiving seeing as its above the pool lol
oh by the way where did the canister wander off to shes carrying it right up to the point where she lands then i asume that its off screen in here hand in the next panel or so but then when she pick up her hat with the same hand she was carrying it in its gone did she drop it on the ground then
Maybe it’s one of Dave’s touch-ups, but it’s back now…
They should probably have a fence around that pool.
Probably not that deep. Water is really heavy. Mainly because you have to deal with a cubic weight. consider that humans float because they are less dense than water. A deep pool would require a LOT of support and containment.
The building already has to be built to stronger standards if it can handle the weight of two Ospreys (and they’re most likely to be the Marine version with the folding rotors) on the roof pads.
But there is a lot of empty space in an Osprey If it was completely sealed it would float. The problem isn’t just weight it is distribution and containment. I live in a cold northern state and every winter some roofs collapse from the weight of snow which is far less dense than water.
On pannel one part of Maximas arm lost it’s golden sheen, and looks like white skin showing.
Nah, that’s something white reflecting off her, either the building or the runway. You can see it on her chin too.
Good think Max is strong or Sydney might have panicked her way out of ther first flight.
Well thats one way to get your hat back!
Somehow I think Maxima was sparing her colleagues from Sidney’s latest bouts of expletives, maybe one of them was keeping count planning to update the wikipedia equivalent of known expletives to see how many of them she invented or has added since the first issue!
Hmm, I wonder… Maxima is wearing the poster tube here, and we’ve seen that no matter her great strength, she can’t move it away from Sydney. Yet we’ve seen it hold Sydney back if it was stuck behind something.
So if Max were to accidentally drop Sydney, would Sydney float below Max, or drag Max down to the ground?
Neither. Actually the strap would probably break but if it didn’t, then Max would find it impossible to leave the max range with the tube and Sydney would find it impossible to fall further than the max range. They’d just float there until Max started moving toward Sydney again.
Is it just me or is her tube missing in all the frames. I don’t even see the shoulder strap.
look over max’s shoulder as she’s flying and landing.
Maxima has it in the 1st and 3rd panels, it’s completely hidden (if it was still in the same spot as 3rd) in 4 and 5, and it disappears in 6 and 7. It should be over her left shoulder.
This page was a tad rushed, I’ll fix it up a little tonight or tomorrow as I’m able.
Awww. Max didn’t even try to catch her. I suspect that after that flight her patience buffer was tapped out.
Building looks fine… Just goes to show that you’ve read too much Fantastic Four over the years, LOL
Just curious, is there some law that allowed Maxima to essentially kidnap Sydney?
yeah, the one that says do you want to be the one to tell her she can’t do something?
In rereading the comic today I saw that in a small voice Sydney says she “might have peed herself” after being put down an going super happy. (I wonder if the artifact(s) [or alien or super science of the prehistoric past] can turn invisible to normal human sight if needed?)
You know there is no ‘magic’ just technology so advanced it just seems so to our primitive minds.
I like it idea of a hexagonal designed building and of the ultra mundane hidden within the mundane. Like Cobra is in “G.I. Joe” and in “Resident Evil.”
I must tell you DaveB that in most other comics I read if the artist/writer had to do such a thing as working on their house the comic would have either been delayed or give us an unfinished one. Thanx for what you do. We’re with you all the way on this journey.
I think there’s an overabundance of “had to shampoo my dog, comic will be late” in webcomics. I’m not saying it’ll never happen, but I’ll do what I can to avoid missing an update.
Your efforts are appreciated. Dave. Just so you know.
Amen to that!
Ditto!
ok,, just reread the comic from first page,,, and WOW,,, i hadnt realised just how much the art had improved,,, specialy sidney :)
The first time I ever did rapelling ,I screamed the whole way down. Granted, it was half a happy scream, but part of the scream was to get me over the terror of jumping off a tower and trusting the blasted equipment. (I think I might have peed a little.)
And I too, immediately ran back to the top to go again. The second time my scream was nearly ALL happy.
Actually that makes a lot of sense something of this level and public scrutiny would have a HUGE budget. And buildings like those are used for high profile assignments. Lowered enlisted get buildings that should have been condemned 20 years ago that were built in the 50’s. They are updating everything now but its a slow process. Not to mention these types of buildings are actually MORE secure than most give them credit for. Stair access is limited on the first few floors or guarded by the lobby. Contrary to Die Hard and similar movies the security on high rises and the like is on par or better than many secret military facilities.
Like I said earlier, you can put a whole bunch of high end security in place and no one will raise a eyebrow. Expecialy if it’s out of plain sight like a eighties secret headquarters.
What I can’t figure out tho is why the headquarters of this military unit are not actually on a military base somewhere. Almost by definition anything actually inside an established and defended perimeter is more secure than something outside said perimeter… so why does the building and the surrounding area look distinctly civilian?
Well, like I said, I had always just pictured them in some kind of nice digs, so I’m not sure I can justify it. But allowing for that, let me take a shot at it. “Secure” is a relative term. Yeah, an army base with a perimeter fence and a checkpoint or two is going to slow down a jeep full of drunk yokels, and a proper fort with actual walls and guard towers can probably defend itself against a serious assault, but given that their likely enemies will be supers, someone with even half of Maxima’s power could ignore all of that. The bulk of the defense will come from the occupants of the base, as they’re the only ones that could meet a super powered assault, so it kind of doesn’t matter where you put the base… unless you go crazy with it and bury it under a mountain like NORAD. Even then, what if the base is attacked by “The Earthquaker” or “Guy Who can Summon Earth Elementals from Nearby Rock” or “Inconvenient Magma Man”
In comes Arianna. She’s concerned about “mutie hunting” a la X-Men and whatever other witch hunts people dream up. So thanks largely to her, they decided to just put the base front and center. Humanize them, make them accessible. We’ll see more of that later in the story though.
So yeah… that seems… reasonable. I may cull some of that for the comic actually.
The government must own that building then. Can you imagine what having supers move in upstairs does to your insurance rates?
Really lower them because you basically eliminate the threat of thieves, burglars, and other nonwelcome people, throw in the plus of good publicity for the insurance company, and the threat of a discrimination lawsuit
OTOH, take what happens to the Baxter Building (or the X academy, Logan just re-opened and it got trashed during the inspection…).
The goverment dosn’t have to own the building. The owner of the building might have connections in Washington lease the top floors out to the goverment for a very good profit. (remember the million dollar toilet seats) Plus he probably has it VERY heavily insured with provisions for terriost and supervillian attacks. Remember the Baxter building? Always getting attacked.
The more I learn about Arianna, the more interesting her character becomes to me. She’s clearly very passionate about her cause (protecting supers), and apparently has much more power in this organization than would seem warranted for a simple Legal Counsel and PR Specialist…
But when you’re talking in terms of Empowered, it’s almost certain that at some point one will come along who can bypass baseline-Human security as easily as you or I would bypass a couple of kids with water pistols. At which point, do you want to be in a isolated base which virtually screams “ARC-SWAT BASE OVER HERE, GUYS!”, or would you rather be in an anonymous tower very similar to a couple of hundred others in the area?
Yeah, if I were thinking about attacking a goverment base, and there were just soldiers around there would be no hesitation. They know the dangers involved when they sighned up to work there. BUT if that base is located above a shopping mall/ office complex with civilians as collateral damage I would think about public backlash. It’s one thing to have the cops and milatary after you, there’s ways to hide, but to have John Q. Public after you ass, then there’s no place you can hide.
Very funny. I was expecting some thing like the top panel. Poor Max, had to put up with the screaming.
I would be more annoyed by the flailing arms myself. Even if it didn’t hurt it would be like a big bug landing on your face and you can’t stop it from doing it again. And that is probably the reason she didn’t catch her.
the front of the skylight doesn’t seem to be parallel with the front of the building.
It’s pointy on both ends, not flat.
You know, you *could* simply put the roof access behind the speech (well, scream) bubble, and then later say it was there all along, just hidden by the bubble… :)
Btw, just to pick a small nit I noticed – the crane seems to be missing the lines for its far side, which should be visible through the openings between lines for the near side just like the background is…
Now if the gov’t had a hand in designing an construction I would expect special items in it that no ordinary building would possess. Like hidden entryways ans escape bolt holes etc.
Technically, isn’t Maxima committing a kidnapping here? Just askin’.
As for heights, I always liked P. J. O’Rourke’s quote which strongly applies to me: “Given my own reaction to heights, it’s clear my ancestors evolved in the back seat of a Chevy.” Especially when heights are suddenly and unexpectedly applied, and more so completely out in the open, there’s a lot of BIOS-level brain wiring that just gets unhappy real fast. I was reminded of this when seeing a sneak preview of MAN ON A LEDGE a couple of weeks ago. I also sat through Harold Lloyd’s SAFETY LAST (1923) – the one with the famous hanging off a clock scene – and spent the last half hour of the movie trying not to hurl. To think he did all those stunts with no right thumb or index finger, which he’d lost in a studio accident some years earlier.
Actually Sydney knew she would have to go in for questioning about the tube, so no it isn’t a kidnapping as she is willing to go, if at least to meet other supers.
Probably not, unless she gets a really hostile judge. From our previous example, Max presumably did a gentle rise up to about 100 feet, and then zoomed, which was the point where our lass started screaming. Since she had “consented” to the voyage in the first place, she does not get a right to change that consent in midair, when it may not be practical to get her back to the ground.
Now if Max just grabbed her and started flying, she has more legal problems. However we are assuming some simi-draft system where the unit can order any super to join, and since the lass is linked to a clearly powerful artifact, Max would be acting legally in taking her in for questioning.
your are forgetting the precedent set by the rulling of do you want to be the one to tell her that?
No, a kidnapping is when you take someone against their will someone for a ransom. Abduction,/b> is just taking a person. But in our country it is called rendition. When they abduct you from somewhere else it is extraordinary rendition. Perfectly legal in an empire, not in a republic.
artist’s mistake?: where is the tube?
Max has it, it’s in panels that are prime and not multiples of 5.
In before ninjas
I am a bit curious, and I’m certain others are as well (at least in the back of their minds) about one thing.
What would have happened if Maxima had landed closer to the edge of the nearby drop-off with Sydney attempting to jump into her arms with Maxima not catching her? Considering the effect of the tube on Sydney I would think the possibilities for hilarity would be rampant. For example, Sydney being dangled in midair at the end of the tube’s tether effect (cue crazed Sydney reaction upon realizing there’s nothing between her and the ground). Maxima wouldn’t even need to carry Sydney then, just the tube, with Sydney flying through the air after them solely based on that effect (perfect situation for crazed Sydney reaction).
Its should be fairly obvious I’m hinting for more crazed Sydney reactions, like when she went crazy at the bank and tongue flipped the ‘robber.’ Those always make me laugh hysterically.
In one word ….. YOING!
no,, as we have seen earlier sidney cant be moved by moving the tube,, so such a situation would either shock sidney in using her own flying power,,, or require max to latch the tube somewhere and then go rescue sidney