Grrl Power #805 – Catapult
This is a weird page, because it’s mostly just showing Pixel and Specs bridging an alley. I thought it would be kind of neat to show that Arc-LIGHT has some field chops. It’s not really much of surprise though, considering many of their field agents could rotate out with Arc-SWAT.
Also, I like how Pixel is developing into someone who is aggravated with Sydney’s aloofness. Really she’s more annoyed with Maxima’s indulgence of Sydney’s quirks. Pixel doesn’t dislike Sydney, and she knows that Sydney’s only had like… oh, geeze, two weeks of training? One week? I’ve honestly lost track. It’s possible the next day we see in the comic will start with “several days later…”
Anyway, Pixel knows Sydney isn’t exactly an elite special forces op, and they weren’t even geared up for action tonight, but still, keeping your coms open shouldn’t be too hard to manage. Sydney’s coms are open, she’s just too busy drooling so she can’t reply. Hence the neon skywriting.
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So what are the chances that Aranea is both quiet enough and quick enough to take out Pixel? She’s unlikely to get more than one shot at this. Will her anesthetic injector even work against a were metabolism? I’m betting that she’s probably going to find herself hopelessly out classed here. Laser claws would make short work of most opponents.
Considering her….venom?…only had the ability to paralyze Sydney and not actually affect her thought processes, I doubt the effect is very strong at all…also considering the amount of damage she had to take to be only knocked unconscious last fight means that shes not likely to be in any danger…
Specs on the other hand. Very much so in danger of whatever this spidey is about to do.
On another note I am kinda curious about one thing. Sydney has been noted to physically react to using her orbs, namely her lighthook like when she was trying to lift the multi-ton freeway beams. I wonder if this is just a means of increasing her focus on the orbs to try to make them work harder, or if she actually needed physical movement in the first place. These pages are making the idea that she doesn’t need them at all, but it makes you wonder if her powers might be “weaker” because she can’t act on them, or if she “SHOULD” be weaker or possibly even unusable but the author messed it up. I guess it would all come down to if it required physical movement, or mental focus, and if it is mental focus, how much has Sydney relied on physical movement to cause her focus.
Believe it’s more a ‘psychological’ aspect of using the MolestOrb, or maybe simply feeling the resistance of gravity to give up its hold (remember, Maxi was able to guestimate Sydney’s lifting strength just from holding it while Sydney tried to lift her)
If anything, like with zombies, Sydney might become temporarily stronger due to the lack of connection between her physical body and the MolestOrb
It may not even be _actual_ psychology, and merely Sydney’s propensity for over-acting… i.e. she’s not actually feeling any physical strain from lifting things, but doesn’t find it very satisfying to not show any strain. Because, Sydney.
Nah, Sydney doesn’t have secret hidden strength: what you see is what there is (or lack thereof)
Except when she needed air the orb instantly went to her hand… so perhaps the green orb will medic alert and help out again?
It would have by now if it were going to.
Only if the right node has been selected.
There are so many potential powers on Sydney level up menu.
She will have to level up more to find out what they are.
Unless Krona can decipher them. And even then she has to level up to access them.
And we still don’t know for sure that there are no abilities that don’t even show on the leveling diagram at all because so many prerequisites need to be met first.
It didn’t instantly go to her hand – it sat in formation until she flailed around for a bit and was reaching very, very close to it for her regulator and thinking “and now grab my air supply.” Somewhere between being almost in hand already and matching a fairly specific thought pattern, she managed to trigger it, but it did not act on its own.
We’ve only ever seen Sydney need physical movement with the lighthook when it’s hit it upper limit so it seems likely to me that the lighthook can move freely when she’s still but it’s starting point can’t. I don’t think it’s a means of focus increase as much as her trying to leverage extra strength out of the poor thing, like how Vehemence threw her when he was entangled in it it’s just a starting location link.
I know a lot of people who move the controller when playing Mario Kart even though they aren’t using motion controls. You know anybody like that? I’m sure you do. If such a person suddenly stopped doing that, do you think it would make their kart in the game less responsive? No…
Just because Sydney normally does a thing doesn’t mean she needs to do that thing. The orbs are quite clearly mentally linked to her movement wise. She shouldn’t even really need to touch them to use them. Heck, I suspect that she’s actually upgraded to being ability to use 3 during the last bit of upgrading and hasn’t even realized it yet.
No, that’s very unlikely: The limitation to two orbs at a time is a plot device to keep her from becoming absurdly powerful. As she upgrades her orbs, that becomes more, not less, necessary.
You’re trying to trick the characters into breaking the fourth wall again, aren’t you?
That would suggest she didn’t got that upgrade yet, however it still may be somewhere in the tree – she just conveniently won’t select it until end of comics.
You seem to be referencing something that already happened, but I can’t find it. Please esplain?
The orbs leveling tech tree was displayed way back when she blew up the tank with the power of the sun! Oh and Krona declared it “the universe laid bare” and such. We don’t know what kind of upgrades she can get.
Yes, but people are referencing a mysterious ability to control 3 orbs. Buuut I don’t remember there ever being any evidence that such a thing would be possible, regardless of the number of upgrades.
I believe that people are simply speculating that somewhere along the upgrade paths is a node which will allow Sydney the use of more than two obs at the same time.
I mean, if dropping a point in the flight orb enabled a light-years distance warp capability*, then a simple increase of number of orbs concurrently in use would seem to be a trivial thing in comparison.
.
.
.
* This also begs the question of why warp capacity was not already enabled. We know that the prior (or at least a prior user had this capability, because the orb had the warp jump logs to prove it. So why was this not still enabled? Do the orbs lose some skill points when they transfer owners? Do they reset entirely to some base configuration? All we know for certain is that there is some means for the orbs to lose points, because we know that a prior user could warp jump, and we also know that Sydney had to invest skill points to re-activate that capability.
only if it happen before then end of the story.
its very possible that Sydney could use all the orbs it would just mean its the last power up of the skill tree used in the last fight.
No, actually, it makes sense. I’ve discussed it in the past.
First of all, the upgrade screen showed 2 circles out of 5 were lit up, and it was in a location that’s not specific to any one sphere.
Sydney put an upgrade light into one of the 3 remaining slots, meaning there are now 2 in that group.
Sydney only tried to use more than 2 BEFORE placing a light in that upgrade slot.
Therefore if I’m right, the plot device is now that she only assumes she can only use two currently.
As for needing to use her hands, that could be psychological. The orbs actually show every sign of being a physical part of her body except for the fact that you can pass objects between them and her body… Pull on the orbs and you pull on Sydney as if you were pulling on her limbs.
They’re connected to her brain much like a limb. She moves them around with the motor cortex of her brain, like you would a limb. The thing is, she’s viewing them as tools and not extensions of her body. Humans generally use tools with their hands. As such, she could have a psychological hang up over using more than 3 at this point even if she were to try.
If I’m right, she needs to realize the orbs are now a part of her body and not just alien artifacts that pull her around. At that point she can learn to flex the orbs powers much in the same way flexing fingers on hands.
@Shadowhawk
FYI: There are venoms/toxins/drugs that have the ability to paralyze without affecting thought process; they’re called paralytics or “muscle relaxants”.
Muscle relaxants are commonly used in the world of anesthesia (and I suppose hunting Native Amazonians). Because they work on they tend to be affected by the blood-brain barrier, they tend not to cause seizures or disrupt thought processes while being highly effective paralytics.
If the drug being used on Sydney is a drug that is used in our world and not a supernatural substance (which it could very well be), the symptoms being exhibited by Sydney seem to indicate a depolarizing paralytic, most likely succinylcholine; she has increased drooling, is experiencing muscle fasiculations “feeling all wibbly”, and it is a very rapid onset.
The only thing that might not fit and suggest another culprit is that intramuscular succinylcholine takes 45-60 seconds for onset; Sydney collapsed in less than 10; suggesting that either succinylcholine is not the paralytic being used or her attacker got lucky and managed to deliver the drug intravascularly.
Oh. And paralytics tend to also paralyze breathing. So probably a supernatural substance as otherwise Sydney would be slowly asphyxiating here.
There are paralytics that suppress conscious movement but not autonomic muscles.
Example?
Because seriously, if you have a paralytic (not sedation, mind you) that doesn’t cause respiratory depression, you could help a lot of patients avoid intubation and mechanical ventilation.
I want to point to the story of a guy who got bit by a snake and survived, because it’s got a relevant bit near the ende…
… but I can’t find it.
He’s out in wilderness by himself… Gets bit by a deadly snake. He knows his stuff and knows how to identify the snake, it’s a killer, and he’s got a death sentence, basically. On his way towards help he runs into a couple with a car, and while they drive him to a hospital he tells them “I was bit by a XYZ snake.” (I want to say ‘Black Mamba’ but the details this many years later are fuzzy). He’s unresponsive when they get him to the hospital. The Hospital looks at him. “He was bit by a snake. He isn’t dead, so it’s not an XYZ snake (um, yes it was). We don’t know what it was, so we can’t administer anti-venom. We’ll treat his symptoms and hope for the best.”
He got to spend the night in the hospital, completely paralyzed and on a respirator, waiting for the venom to wear off. Conscious.
Different venoms do different things.
Paralyze (Black Mamba) Digest(Rattlesnake), etc. Some toxins even affect one group of muscles (say, voluntary muscles) and ignore others (say, involuntary muscles like the heart). Kids, know your toxins. If you get an unwanted dose of them, knowing how they work may help save your life.
I know the story you are talking about. It was a “Black Mamba”, in Australia as I recall.
A Black Mamba is an African snake and does not live in Australia.
Just checked with an old African, and, unless the anti-venom is administered immediately, Black Mamba bites are not survivable (so if they had managed to get to help, and then pass out before getting to a hospital, if it was a Black Mamba, they would have been DOA)
The Black Mamba is also called “The African Two-Step” because, by the time you have taken two steps, you are dead (give or take a step or two depending on constitution)
I think I remember hearing this story. IIRC, it was a Taipan. A snake native to Australia that is of the same general snake family as the Black Mamba, but it’s bite much, much deadlier. Like, a bite from a Black Mamba could potentially kill 20 grown men. A bite from a Taipan could potentially kill 100 grown men.
I believe 8 or 9 of the world’s deadliest snakes all live in Australia.
Australia is also the tongue-in-cheek home of the individual known across the galaxy as the Human Disaster.
(Deathworlders Salavage series)
Considering that Cat (the weredirehare (probably not dire? Just seems more amusing to me somehow) had zero resistance to the murder manikin venom (and they apparently passed the recipe on to Aranea since they seem to operate exactly the same), and only the weredirehoneybadger didn’t give a fuck about the venom, I’m gonna guess that Pixil is just as vulnerable to Aranea’s venom as was Sydney.
I think the key thing to remember here is that Spider lady sees herself as one of the good guys. While she will use paralytics against people to get them out of her way, she’s not going to maim or kill people, if she can help it.
That is going to strongly affect how she fights and her efficacy against heroes like ARCHON.
She began a torture of Tamatha, she is not a “good guy” no matter how she may view herself. And before the pedants chime in and claim that hurting Tamatha’s wing “just a little bit” isn’t torture, keep in mind that it is legally assault and battery, and that we can’t know what she was going to follow up with had Tamatha not had the means to defend herself.
A cop who did that to a bound and helpless prisoner would be subject to disciplinary action by the book, regardless of how often in real life that these things actually take place and are ignored by the cop’s superiors.
Nothing in what she did is at all out of line for Batman; she likely sees herself in a similar vein.
Batman would isolate a low level thug to find a high level thug. Not skip the high level thug to get the low level thug to talk about what the high level thug knows.
Batman doesn’t generally beat up tweens
Tamatha isn’t human and Aranea has no standard to judge the age of members of her species against on just by appearance. She’s also out of her tweens and into her teens. Next year she will get her learner’s permit and start learning to drive.
You’re making excuses for a criminal based on the appearance of her victim?
The standard is “looking at her.” If Aranea can see the wing, she can also see the kid.
Torturing a kid makes Aranea a Bad Guy™
Kidnapping a kid makes Aranea a Bad Guy™
Aranea is a Bad Guy™
Really?
In precise and detailed terms what characteristics indicate youth for
1. An elf?
2. A halfling?
3. A dryad?
4. An ent?
5. A Succubus.
6. The Chamorro people of Guam and the Marrianas? (I have Chamorro friends whose skin was so smooth and wrinkle free they looked like kids until they were nearly thirty even though I have known a fair number of Chamorro over the years. How is that likely to work for someone who has never met any? They are generally smaller than Philippinos. Yet the Chamorro are just an ethnic group not a separate species altogether.
And
We never saw Tamatha tortured.
We did see Tamatha captured.
Aranea views herself as fighting a hostile war against invading Demons.
And to be fair, until the Twilight Council which Aranea is unaware of brutally enforced their rules for several millennia that might indeed have been an accurate description of what went on. Again, Aranea doesn’t know how old Tamatha is.
Lies. Aranea tortured Tamatha. How could you miss it? Oh, I know, you probably thing it was “just a little torture” and so it doesn’t count, right?
But just like you can’t be “a little pregnant” you also can’t be just a little bit of a torturer. Once the line is crossed it is crossed, and Aranea crossed it.
She pinched her wing, how is that ‘torture’? You probably think a ‘purple nurple’ is torture, or a ‘wet willy’
And she only pinched the wing to show she’s not fooled by the “It is just a cosplay outfit” excuse
That’s Tamatha crying out in pain because of torture being inflicted on her while the is already bound and presumably helpless.
And of course I already knew that idiots would rush to the defense of the torturer, claiming that it wasn’t much torture, or that some amount of torture is justified, or any number of other idiot justifications for torture. Why am I then not surprised that you’re the first one to walk down the indefensible path of defending a torturer? It’s because you’re such a special kind of idiot that you, to paraphrase Carroll, do as many as six idiot things before breakfast.
Assuming you are correct, Batman should be locked up for his crimes.
Batman knows this… He doesn’t call himself a vigilante for nothing.
Why do you THINK Commissioner Gordon was trying to lock him up for the first few decades of Batman continuity? The modern detente/cooperation is a recent thing, the current “now”, but it wasn’t always and won’t always be.
What torture? She had Tammy strung upside down and waved a knife around
So, if someone punched you (deservedly) in the face, that would be torture? o_O
Oh yes, because asking a criminal politely to stop being a criminal and to give up their friends always works out
Well, she did pinch Tammy’s wing.
And we’ve seen Dabbler pinch Maxima’s ass. Well, several people’s asses.
Pinching may be a Grrlverse trend.
Perhaps DaveB is reliving second grade.
Most importantly, it’s not important what YOU think about her. Important is what SHE things about herself. If SHE views herself as “good guy”, it may limit her no matter how illogical YOU consider her limits to be.
I think the wing pinch was more of a “Who’s just an ordinary little girl?” tweak than actual torture.
Yes, meant to add that to the above post: the wing pinch was simply to state “i know these are real, stop pretending”
We never saw any indication that Aranea was going to hurt Tammy, she simply wanted answers (not saying she wasn’t going to start using that knife, butt nothing we saw indicated she was)
“Torture” is (loosely) defined as deliberately causing discomfort to another, antithetical to that person’s welfare.
Waving a knife around is more accurately described as a threat: with a deadly weapon, this is punishable almost everywhere.
Stringing Tamatha upside down–especially after abducting her–in a darkened environment, that’s torture. Pinching the wing at this stage, that’s torture.
On the hypothetical side, a person who punches you (deservedly) in the face is possibly not torturing you. For example, if you are free to leave before the punch happens, or you have attacked your would-be puncher. OTOH, the puncher *could* be charged with assault, depending who is up for affray…
And asking a criminal politely to stop being a criminal etc is almost always viewed by at least one person as a stupid waste of time. Telling criminals to stop being nasty is the Court’s job, and in many cases it works. Sooner or later.
Pinching asses? Be vewy vewy cair full. Some intolerant vipers Do. Not. Approve of this liberty with their bodies. This behaviour will almost certainly come back to haunt you like a Cape Buffalo (Bos bos) lining up it’s predator from ambush.
That wiil teach me–once again–to read before Posting… AAAARRRRGHHHHHH! :@
Aranea is a misguided vigilante and a zealot as well. She’s not seeking justice, she’s seeking retribution, and that is what separates her from Batman, et al. Her tweaking Tamatha’s wing is rough curiosity and not torture, yet. That was coming until Tamatha acted. Comparing Aranea’s activities to police officers is disingenuous and inciting to riot.
Guesticus: Really?
Really what? o_O
Fastball special…
Not quite.
A Fastball special is an actual throw, this is merely “adding to a jump”.
No, the “fastball special” was a move worked out between Colossus and Wolverine, where Colossus would throw Wolverine at the foe, so that he could close much faster than under his own power.
It also involved collision…
The action of Pixel throwing Specs without talking, just one fluid motion is very cool.
Agreed, this is actually some of the best insight we’ve had into the ArcLight world in a while. This is clearly a well-practiced move with 2 people who’ve worked together a lot. Throwing someone at a full run across a big drop like that takes a lot of trust, for both parties.
And Specs nailing the roll and popping up in fighting stance moves her up several notches in my estimation, I thought she was just a desk analyst and some comic relief, but is turning out to be pretty good in the field.
The default perfect physical body supers have and the mandatory physical exercise program archon has probably makes it a much more “arc light can do field ops, but arc swat is just better at them” case than would be normal for organizations like fbi
You just maaaaaaaaaaaaaaay want to look behind you. Maybe……………….
Yeah, Pixel will understand once she sees that Sydney is unable to speak. Which can happen, I’d be surprised if Dabbler doesn’t have a silence spell somewhere.
I mean, Sydney will probably get a slight talk about getting jumped by the bad guy. But it wasn’t like she was on full alert, go in guns blazing. It was just ‘search for missing kid’.
PLEASE VOTE ,MOVE GRRL POWER TO #1.
Done all I can, buddy.
How fast can Sydney make the lighthook say ‘LOOK BEHIND YOU!’?
Probably longer than it would for her to form a glove and punch Aranea in the face
The end of the hook shooting between the two, and hopefully impacting the bad guy, would be pretty quick.
Even if it was instant, the time needed to read and react would make it moot.
Not for specs, technically.
and all of that depends on if her face is looking that way.
It is hard to hit what you can’t see, and If she is swinging the Molestorb around behind her she could hit her friends.
Unsure what Pixel is thinking, but surely even she would know that Sydney wouldn’t be using the Lighthook to communicate something that the “bag guy” could see so clearly unless there was some sort of issue. Seeing this should have been a “what has happened to Halo” and “threat in vicinity, be more cautious” than a “got to complain about lack of discipline” reaction.
That signage indicates that Sydney is in some sort of trouble preventing communications with her team through normal means. Pixel, being a member of ARC-Light, should have understood that something has gone wrong.
the difference is pixel likely doesn’t respect or trust Sydney that much. after all she hasn’t seen Sydney in action much (the one time Sydney went saved her life got reset in time) and more knows her as the annoying loud mouth rookie. while max for all she frustration she has about Syd she still respects her and trusts her .
so instead of “what happened to Halo” pixel thinks ” what is this Know nothing fool doing”
which is jarring to the viewer because we see everything Sydney has done
Sorry, not buying that. If someone is going wildly off protocol after just saying “Hey, something’s not right”, anyone actually competent should be immediately suspecting trouble going down rather than larking about.
But she wasn’t larking about? She immediately jumped over to investigate.
To be fair we only know Sydney has toxic level resistance to spicy stuff. We do not know about the drinking quota.
That was confusing to me as well.
If your recruit says something about something interesting, and then suddenly goes silent, it means go investigate ASAP, not “such poor discipline”.
She might of course complain about that anyway, but it should be clear that Pixel is the one showing poor discipline, not Sydney. Sydney called it as soon as she had something to call in and stayed in contact for as long as she was able.
In this scene, Sydney’s discipline was excellent.
I think Pixel has some decent reasons to be upset. Sydney was being reluctant to shift into professional mode and join the search effectively, then said something vague about “something interesting” into her mic. Instead of following that up with something like “hey someone just fell from the roof, I’m 3 buildings over and going to investigate”, she stayed incommunicado and started babbling to the prime suspect, then got taken down.
If she’d bothered to update the team in any meaningful way, or had less of a track history of being completely unprofessional on the job, Pixel could reasonably realize something’s up instead of just seeing more non-protocol behavior that gives her nothing to work with.
You mean, like Pixelicious informing Beth and Kronachrome? Oh wait, that didn’t happen
Kind of funny that Pixel complains about Sydney’s coms discipline, and then forgets to notify Krona or Elspbeth(?) of the situation over coms.
Just call her ‘Beth’ :P
Butt yeah, you would think a disciplined veteran like Pixelicious would do a quick “Sydney may be in trouble, checking it out! Stand by!”
Kind of embarrassing that a disciplined veteran like Corporal Pixel would forget that Syd has been part of the crew for “oh, geeze, two weeks of training?” AND has been in battle combat for, oh, every second day, with no debrief and very little counselling…
Not to mention being sent on a scouting mission with no pair… While she’s possibly ever so slightly intoxicated…
And bitches about unit discipline?
Guesticus picks this up very neatly down at 5:48 am.
I think you’d expect most inexperienced people to be shouting and hollering, so seeing this creative use of the light-hook really does make it look like she’s just showing off since there’s otherwise no immediate indication she’s been rendered unable to fight.
“… no immediate indication she’s been rendered unable to fight.”
You DID read the previous strip, panel 2? Or maybe the one before that (#803), panels 4-10? And don’t forget the commentary in these forums?
Yes, we know that, Pixelicious and Specs don’t know that
Sometimes it pays to take a step back and look at things from the characters point of view, and what they are expected to know
For example, everyone (including the panda lawyer) in the comments knows that SmugD is a self-serving arsehole, butt only a handful (or less) in-world know that, and they either work for him, or are considered Enemy of the State (with a KOS order against them) and wouldn’t be trusted to say Maxi has screwy gold-coloured skin
There’s something else. ARC-Swat itself is relatively new and still shaking down in a manner of speaking. especially since while right now most of it’s members are Military, but as it’s numbers grow as other Supers join, most will be Civilians like Sydney and/or Ex-Cons like Jabberwocky. The fact that Syd could end up being a Planet Cracker as she evolves will make it an additional challenge.
What I don’t understand is why she would criticize Sydney’s conduct, but STILL hasn’t called into ARCHON for backup?
Shouldn’t that have been the first thing they did as soon as they suspected foul play on one of their party?
Technically, Tammy is a civilian, who may or may not have just wandered off after dropping her phone (probably without realising it), maybe met a ‘friend’ who dared her to go up into the rafters with them
Or were you meaning after seeing the Brat-signal in panel two?
Butt yes, Pixelicious (the veteran) should have contacted Kronachrome and Beth that “Something may be up, or it’s just Sydney being ‘Sydney’, stand by for further instruction.”
Out of curiosity, why do you always misspell ‘But’ as ‘Butt’? Is it an autocorrect issues, are you trying to be funny, do you not know the difference, or what?
It’s designed to piss off anal-retentive jerk-arses, most people are intelligent enough to ignore it
Ah… If only our language had a word for people who make comments expressly for the purpose of pissing other people off.
;-)
I am sure there is some word out there.
Only certain people, not every person
Author: Hey, is anal-retentive hyphena–
Copyeditor: Yesifit’sanadjectivenoifit’sanoun!
(That one works better out loud.)
Anyway, cool. It didn’t piss me off but it did confuse me. You seem to have a pretty good grasp of English so I wasn’t sure about going with “ignorant” but you also were using it consistently and not in a funny way, so “ignorant” started to seem more probable.
Let’s just go with ‘deliberate’ :D
Is that spinneret
… Was going to say something, butt…
Fuck it, will say it anyway: READ THE LAST FUCKING THREE PAGES!!! And not just the comic itself, the comments as well
And it’s Spinnerette
Realistically speaking, if Specs isn’t also tougher than normal, that throw would most likely get her at least a sprained ankle or two, given the amount of force necessary to throw a full grown woman that high and that far. But that’s probably too much realism, right? ;)
Note her tuck-and-roll action in panel seven
Paying attention to the art is too much expectation, right?
Well, she IS a Super as far as we know. It’s entirely possible there’s a baseline “tougher than normal” kinda like One Punch Man. Even Class C Heroes in that are a hell of a lot tougher than normal humans.
Nah, she’s got no inherent toughness as part of her powers. Her powers can help her avoid or reduce injury in a situation like this one, though.
I’d like to introduce you to the concept of Parkour.
Regular (very well trained) humans in our own universe make such jumps regularly.
30 feet horizontal towards a higher landing spot than the initial spot?
Believe RobK was referring to the landing, not the leap itself
Higher landing spot?
Looks very much like “across the street” on roughly the same level to me.
Sure, I can do that easily. It’ll hurt my back as I roll across the stones, but no more than that.
The tricky part is making the distance, not the landing. Anyone that knows martial arts can stick that landing.
Doesn’t even have to be martial arts, simple gymnastics will do
Higher landing than launching means an easier landing than if it were a level or downwards jump. All that energy that’s just gone into raising her against gravity hasn’t had a chance to reconvert into kinetic energy as she drops back. Safely losing the horizontal speed will take some training, of course.
Generally, a human has to exert the force necessary to jump over a rather short distance. The same force exerted over the distance a Pixel sized arm can move while throwing would impart quite a bit more momentum.
The landing is the real issue, Specs would have to land rolling, or manage a very iffy slide.
On the plus side, Specs does benefit from the “all supers have athletic builds” bonus, which puts her in at least the 95th percentile without additional training.
Fortunately, Specs does land rolling
I like how Pixel and Specs pulled off that manoeuvre to get Specs across the gap.
Shows they’ve been working together long enough to just do something like that.
I’d love to see what happens if someone calls Pixel a Pink Panther. Especially as she’s obviously a Were-Clouded Leopard
They were introduced together, so it’s probable they have spent time together, including out in the field
And… Pixelicious did comment about the not-a-pink-panther when she first were’d out in front of Sydney (she wasn’t happy about it)
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-493-misidentification/
The text on the bottom of that page gives us a hint of pixel’s reaction to pink panther stuff :p
That was the page was thinking of, thank you :D
Who wants to make a bet that more than one person has the Pink Panther Theme set as Pixelicious ring-tone (and that she has caught them at least once)? :D
I am always amazed that an animated character used for the opening credits of a movie became a cultural icon, but almost nobody remembers the movie.
Pink Panther Opening Credits
Does your monkey bite?
“But that’s a priceless Steinway!”
“…not any more.”
Clouseau: Does your dog bite?
Hotel Clerk: No.
Clouseau pets dog, gets bitten
Clouseau: I thought your said your dog did not bite?
Hotel Clerk: That is not my dog.
“The character’s popularity spawned a spin-off franchise of theatrical shorts, television cartoons and merchandise. He starred in 124 short films, 10 TV shows and 4 TV specials.”
So, hardly surprising the Pink Panther is remembered. I do remember the film, too, but only as a rerun; It’s theatrical run was the year before I hit kindergarten.
In the region where I grew up, the Pink Panther movies were a staple of Saturday matinees in the seventies. I often got to watch several of them back and spend time in a blissfully airconditioned building. Helped one get through the summer.
the Pink Panther was a cartoon long before it was made into a live action film. That is where it got it’s “cultural icon” status from. By the time they decided to make the film, the cartoon was hitting the nostalgia button already. It’s like the flinstones or the jetsons for people today.
Fun fact the Pink Panther film you are talking about is one of the first films that tried to turn cartoons into live action.
google it if you want to —The Pink Panther Show 1969 ‧ Cartoon ‧ 10 seasons —
Not exactly. “The Pink Panther” (1963) with Peter Sellers was a movie that had a title sequence with an animated anthropomorphic pink panther. People liked that so much they made an animated series. The “Pink Panther” in the movie was a very large diamond.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pink_Panther_(1963_film)
Was hoping you were linking to the movie, instead, it was to one of the cartoon shorts
The cartoon shorts have been on Saturday Morning Cartoons since about 1964 (or so). I remember watching those as a kid (Yes, I’m that old). Theme music written & performed by Harry Mancini & he conceived the music based from seeing a single cell-painting of the character as it would appear in the movie’s intro sequence.
…And there’s our little history lesson for the day…
I wouldn’t call her the Pink Panther but I might play this on my phone when she was next to me. https://youtu.be/lp6z3s1Gig0
And expect a Pink Death Glare as soon as she figures out where the sound is coming from :P
Hey, she has a ringtone that lets me know who’s calling me via the ring alone. Now do Maxima’s phone.
Use to have a phone that did that, and for text messages as well, now they only do it if the person actually calls
Well, she might like this one better:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSEWJesRZKQ
The lyrics are:
Pinker than all
C’est une sorte de gros matou [It’s a kind of big kitty]
Avec un pelage rose [With a pink pelt]
Avec des putains de poils rose [With fucking pink hair]
Elle t’effraie quand elle rugit [She scares you when she roars]
Mais elle est super cool [But she’s super cool]
Les gens l’appellent la panthère rose [People call her the Pink Panther]
Pink power
Can’t her Holographic projection speak despite the original being paralysed?
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-89-badgers-apparently-terrifying/
Possibly take too long to activate, and all previous appearances, Holo-Halo has mimicked the Real Deal, so… probably not
Only saw Sydney from one angle, but it’s possible that she only had one hand free to touch an orb. I would give Sydney points for collapsing in such a way as to leave at least one hand exposed and facing upward. Others might have collapsed with their hands downward, like you do when you are trying to land on your hands instead of your face, or fallen with their hands under their body.
A close (zoomed-in) look at previous strip shows both hands palm up. Judging by the drool, probably Syd has as much on her hand as she can competently (?) handle.
No but if she wanted a different angle she could see through it without he head moving, also teleport.
Her holographic projection can not touch anything. She can use the lighthook to attack Aranea.
Please, at a later date (after this little episode is ended), have Pixelicious apologize to Sydney, in public, for thinking bad of her, and then apologize to Maxi, also in public, for doubting her leadership skills
Sydney having the wherewithal to use her Lightwhip to indicate her position once she knew that Pixelicious was paying attention shows a high level of situational awareness for a raw recruit (some higher level operatives would be hard pressed to have done the same thing)
And speaking of situational awareness… panel eight, Ms Hyper-Hearing just got caught unaware (at least she’s not in her underwear… this time :P )
Why would Pixel do that?
Because she assumed Sydney was goofing off, and lacked discipline, instead of assuming that Sydney, right after mentioning “something else worth investigating”, went comms-silent and that maybe there was a reason for it, like maybe getting knocked out, or something happening to her comms or any number of valid reasons
It might require an apology if she had actually said something to Sydney or anyone, but muttering to yourself (I guess maybe Specs heard her) hardly requires a full public apology.
If the comms are OPEN, then she was not muttering to herself, and may in fact have Max come looking for a dressing down in the other direction.
Is Max even there?
to be fair, based on experience, Sydney is much more likely to be distracted by something shiny than to be in peril and requiring rescue.
Although on further reflection, Sydney NOT talking is reason to believe she has been incapacitated, because she would TOTALLY be talking about the shiny thing.
That’s hardly a reason for a public apology.
We all know Sydney is distraction prone.
the “biff, bam, boom, etc.” Pixel is hearing in panel 1 was also a big clue that something untoward is going on instead of “poor discipline” and adds to the need to apologize. Pixel definitely has no excuse.
She is brilliant, but seems she’s going by tentacle-palpation and limited view and forgetting she can see through the telepresence orb. (or at least it wasn’t shown)
Still, Sydney gets mad props for:
a.) Communicating effectively , despite being unable to speak or text, giving her location, announcing an enemy, and indicating a single enemy.
b.) Fighting effectively, despite being paralysed!
As for Corporal Pixel, sending a raw recruit, no matter how powerful (well armed?), on patrol solo; that kind of thing could cost her her stripes.
Don’t you mean, cost her her spot on the team? >.>
I spotted an albino Dalmatian the other day. It was the least I could do. ;)
Boooo!
…Even if it was the least you could have done, it was still more than you should have done…
Funny how Sydney thinks more of her Tentacle option than her safe get away options.
I would have at the very least activated her shield and maybe her lightning hook for teleporting
Yes, funny how Sydney thinks more about trying to prevent the bad guy from getting away, even while incapacitated, than her own safety
Almost like a real Super Hero
She would have to be able to physically get an orb into both nonmovable hands. She’s limited by her exact position.
Both her hands are open and palm up, but if she grabbed the flight orb they’d hang down and the orbs would fall out.
She could still use the light bee (I assume that’s what Zanquis meant by “lightning hook”) to teleport but as Guesticus said she’s not the type to let a baddy get away and she’s not the type to retreat even when she should.
We haven’t seen Sydney since Aranea managed to Spiderman out of the Lighthook. We therefore don’t know that she hasn’t raised the Shield, now that she’s no longer got the only known adversary occupied.
It’s the Brat Signal.
(Sorry)
Prediction: Sydney has created a makeshift battle-suit out of her light hook that can move her even when she is paralyzed.
After this who can imagine what Pixel will say to Maxima about Sydney’s lack of discipline?????
The Sydney should be commended, because Pixelicious was wrong and disrespectful
And if Comms were still open when she criticized Sydney and, by extension, Maxima…
Nah.
Sydney is a recruit and If she were the sort who couldn’t endure unfair haranguing then she wouldn’t be suitable for Arc-Swat and she would not have survived the Alari graveworld. Nobody’s gonna be bawling Pixel out for hurting Sydney’s little feelings with mean old words.
Life isn’t fair.
Suck it up.
When Sydney gets back from this and the dock checks her out she will be back to running in the morning with Peggy or Anvil dogging her.
Arc Swat ain’t no damned day spa to make the super ladies all purty.
And what about Pixelicious’ comment about Maxi?
She. Was. Still. Wrong. And not just about Sydney, butt Maxi’s leadership, that way leads to mutiny and insurrection “I can do a better job, they should have put me in charge!”
You’re really overreacting to mild criticism aimed at the protagonist.
And you have not problem with false criticism toward her? And not just towards Sydney, butt towards Maxi and her entire chain of command as well?
you’re confusing arc swat with the military
Sydney isn’t lowly high school drop out that had little hope but to sell themselves to get access collage and health care. Sydney’s a rock star she could say fu&K it and leave to find a job with better pay and less work. or simply tour around the universe with her own power.
that “life isn’t fair” trash when the character has the power of a god!
1. Nobody is confusing Arc Swat with the military because DaveB made Archon a branch of the military complete with a seal to match the seals of the other branches.
2. Your Idea that people join the military because they have no other options is bizarre, and entirely discounts concepts such as duty, honor, or simply proving one’s self.
3. The harsh treatment in bootcamp is designed to mentally toughen the recruits and to begin a process of continually toughening them in a mental pressure cooker over time until they are ready for combat. It is also meant to break those who would break in combat so that the troops who would break don’t get themselves or anyone else killed due to mental breakdown. Bootcamp isn’t like that as some sort of stupid hazing. It has a designed purpose.
1) military in name only
2) I get my idea directly from the US militarizes own data on why people sign up. 80% of people who join the military join because they have no other hope of getting access to money for collage and health care. then other 20 % is made up of family tradition, a feeling of duty and the obligatory 5% that gave no reason. the answer of “duty” only spikes after a major even like 9/11 but that spike only lasts a few years and then its back to norm.
3) nice lie but still a lie, you are right that it has a purpose your just wrong on what that purpose is. the harsh treatment is to sociologically brake down the subjects preexisting moral and cultural beliefs and rebuild them to better serve the army.
its the same thing cults and gangs do.
this isn’t a secret I mean there are literal studies on how to do it better by the government.
1. Since it’s fiction that is a given.
2. I was in for three tours. You didn’t even list the reason many of the people who I knew went in. They certainly were not making such a database when I was in, nor did the troops I knew who were nearing retirement mention any such thing. I sit (five days a week) and have coffee at the VFW. Two of the men I sit with fought in the second world war. Many of them also went in for reasons not listed.
Also, it is reasonable to note that until the mid 1980s nobody went in for economic reasons. Because civilian employment paid not just slightly better…it paid significantly better.
With hours worked a basic Private E1 made what worked out to be fifty-nine cents an hour during the Carter administration. At the end of the Carter administration minimum wage was three dollars and ten cents an hour. The military damned sure wasn’t a place to seek economic advancement.
3. Not a lie. If you are uneducated in military history then don’t make that lack of education so Obvious.
Start with a comprehensive history on this and read some biographies of “Blackjack” Pershing. Or take the damned suite of Marine Corps Professional Advancement courses.
The bootcamp system and methodology didn’t just happen, it was created to fill a lack over a hundred years ago. And one hell of a lot of planning went into it.
What does the Lightroom sound like? And really, none of these guys have any discipline at com’s, teamwork or chain of command. Superheroes never do.
To a point, you are correct. Most militaries count swashbuckling civilians (sometimes include reserve militia) as second only to enemy 5th column in creating catastrophe from well-thought plans.
Allied High Command in WWII went to extreme lengths to keep the French Resistance far away from the Front simply because they were operating outside the Chain of Command AND spoke a different language…
The problem with Supers is accountability. From memory, only Supes had built-in accountability, once DC woke up. At this distance I cannot remember any other Super who could be brought to heel by a 28.4g lump of Kryptonite equivalent. If you cannot be held accountable, why would you want to bother about minor details like military discipline? (I’m looking at The Boys TV series here–which we gave up following because so boring. And The Avengers fought a Civil War over the problem.)
Butt. ARC-Swat performed brilliantly and with distinction at the Sinking of the Fel. Comms were properly commed, and the enemy troops tromped with discipline and strategy.
I did not see or hear Pixel let Max know a rescue party for Tamatha was being formed. But it looks very much like Max knows nothing about it ATM. And since she was involved with the night out, perhaps she should have been told: We ARE in the Army now, and we ARE professional soldiers EVEN if we are only recruits…
We need an Edit button.
… enemy troops were tromped…
Oh boy, a battle next? Wonder if we’ll get to see Specs flex, or if this is an ambush situation.
You tell us: how good is Specs in physical combat?
Obviously you can’t tell DaveB how to write his story, butt maybe if he knows Specs’ competency he might… ‘adjust’ things a little :D
Actually, I think this is the part where the villain gets away, so the team can spend the next page or two debriefing the victim and speculating on what their 8-limbed nemesis has in mind. If they just *catch* her, the fun is over…
You mean… the villain that dropped down behind Specs and Pixelicious? o_O
Yeah, she doesn’t look like she’s going anywhere
This is where Pixel back hand punches the bad girl without even turning around. Being a real bad ass like Arnold.
Has the power of a god and gets taken out by tranquilizers.
Should be obvious coms are open when she immediately responded with the light hook. Bad Pixel.
Since Sydney’s tentacle orb works, then her flight orb works. she doesn’t have to be lying in a puddle of her drool. She could be upright, flying about, with drool dripping down on to her shirt. Much cooler.
Now I wonder how the flight orb works in such a case…
And her head dropping onto her chest, only being able to see downwards …
Simple remedy: Sydney flies on her back, to add to her ‘flying annoyingly’ style :P
Or upside down
I really really hope the next slide will show us that: a creepy corpse-like flying paralyzed Sydney. That would be super awesome. :)
If her hands can’t grip then if she flies the orbs will fall out of her hands. Right now with them being supported by the ground palms up is the only way she can use her orbs. She could still use her light-bee to teleport if she was the type to retreat.
In #87 she spins around with the flight orb and clearly doesn’t need to hold herself relative to the orb, just keep grasping it. Since she can control the position of the orb with her mind and evidently doesn’t need to be able to grab it to activate them there’s little reason she wouldn’t be able to fly in her state.
She can control the Orbs well enough to knee smash Math (who we haven’t seen in forever) in spar.
Having the Flight orb active and causing it to mover with her hand is no big thing, but honestly I would expect her to bring the forcefield up around herself, then use the other ‘spare’ orbs to flip her inside of the forcefield, even go so far as having one or more go back in the bag and lift her up by it.
Actually, she knee-smashed herself and landed in Kenya (well, Kenya’s lap anyway)
What IS the maximum length of the lighthook, anyhow? (other than “what the plot needs it to be”)
If there is one we haven’t seen a limit yet (and as far as I can find Dave hasn’t said anything in the comments either). It does have all the same strength regardless of length though.
Maxima estimated sixteen tons in the bridge rebuilding scene.
Yep, length has varied, strength variations have not been noted, IIRC.
I think it’s funny that a cat is annoyed at someone ELSE being aloof.
‘Professional’ jealousy :P
I find it highly amusing that pixel is assuming that Sidney is screwing around instead of figuring that Sidney is unable to talk…
If Pixel has any cat-like reflexes we are about to see a record standind high jump! At least that’s how every cat I know reacts to a surprise from behind.
“Sigh” standing
Blame it on my ADD.
Don’t forget the spitting and hissing :D
And all claws out!
And bushy-tailed :D
Which would lead nicely to that image of Sydney brushing Pixelicious’ fur ;)
It’s not just domestic kitties that do this, snow leopards do the launching up in the sky when surprised too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPZ02DGfMlU
And look at that tail floof :D
Shouldn’t Tamatha be getting free by now? Ol’ Sixarms might be facing a really pissed off succubus (ette?) Along with Arc-Swat and all female. Hmmm…
You shouldn’t lose track. You should have this written down. All of the time between comics should be known to you, even if it isn’t communicated to the readers. That way, when Pixel complains to Maxima about Maxima’s indulgence of Sydney’s quirks, Maxima doesn’t have to reply with “Well, Sydney’s only had like… oh, geeze, two weeks of training? One week? I’ve honestly lost track.”
We know that story isn’t your strong suit* as a content creator, but doing the bare minimum of keeping track of the timeline of the story you’re writing shouldn’t be a task that is utterly beyond you.
.
.
.
.
* Ok, I know this, and you should know this. Whether anyone else knows this is up to their own personal perceptiveness. Guesticus, for example, couldn’t possibly know this even if you told him directly, reinforced it a few times over the next several weeks, got him to repeat it after you, and then asked him about it a day later.
You’re… Kind on an ass, aren’t you?
If being “kind on an ass” means being unafraid to address the elephant in the room, than yes, you are correct.
‘Cat’apult… I see what you did there… LOL I think Pixel will be a little more understanding of Sydney’s choice of communication methods once she understands why she used the lighthook (molestorb)
Let’s hope there is no cat-ass-trophy like Pixel and Specs getting drugged as well. ( pun courtesy of Ogre Ogre byPiers Anthony)
I have to wonder what the reach is on that lighthook for it to make a sign that big and that far away from herself.
That’s not why this is a weird page. This is a weird page, because it shows Aranea dropping in behind Spacs and Pixel, and when we last saw her she was about to be grabbed by the Lighthook. Anyone who has such fine control as to be able to write in cursive with Lighthook can’t possibly be unable to create less-than-human-body-size separated loops such that no amount of “spidermanning” is capable of getting you out of them before you’re caught.
Also, Lighthook is being shown to be a lot longer in this and the prior page than we’ve seen before. And I don’t recall Sydney leveling up Lighthook.
Let’s see you try and lasso something jumping around behind you without moving your head
Com require a wrist bracelet and/or a communications choker.
Note that Sydney COULD move. Presumably the Fly Orb would still work, and she could use the lightbee to teleport.
Nope. She needs to be able to manually select options to use different modes, which is hard to do when paralyzed.
Lost the first attempt at this. I expect Sydney to activate the forcefield orb to protect herself, then fly the remaining orbs around herself (she can control them without touching, see the Math spar/fight waay back when Math still appeared in the comic –hint, hint). She could put one or more back in the handbag to lift her to flip over and still keep the orbs ‘in hand’ in her flopping hands by flying them at her palms. At least then she can be lying on the forcefield itself and rotate to see the action.
What happens if Sydney teleports with the lighthook out?
In all the effort to figure out what Sydney SHOULD have done, I think everyone has overlooked she just did the first thing that came to mind. It is easy to determine the correct action when one has the time to sit back and consider the situation soberly. However, when one is attacked, one has to react quickly and does not have the time to pnder all the options, one goes with what one thinks of first.
Zack Tilly, and, for a raw recruit, Sydney handled herself commendably, specially after being rendered immobile
Now, let me get this straight. In panel 2, Pixel and Specs are looking across the alley at a building that is at least 2 stories taller than the one they are on. In panel 6, they are jumping across the same alley to a building that is the same height as the one they started on. In panel 8, Aranea is dropping down from above even though there is no higher place to drop down from. Did I miss something?
They are jumping to a roof space in between the two taller buildings. which is level to where they were. Notice the lighthook is coming from between the two buildings.
It is a little unclear, but compare panel 5. The lighter parapet wall in panel 2 (behind Pixel’s head and Specs’ waist) is part of the building across the street, not part of the roof they’re on or the sidewalk as I first imagined. They’re crossing to the space below Sydney’s skywriting, not the top of the building hidden by the panel 1 inset.
This multi-armed woman would be really good at using Sydney’s orbs.
They’ve never shown us what happens when someone else tries to hold one. It probably wouldn’t be pleasant.
Well other people have touched them.
Maxima couldn’t move them, and their movement is strong enough to shatter Troll-Sciona’s bones.
I imagine that it would be like grabbing onto the trailer hitch of a military truck when it takes off down a tank trail.
Max grabbed Tubey, we haven’t seen her touch the orbs themselves. Everyone else who has been in contact with them was being smacked with them, with the possible exception of Math contacting one with 1 fingertip. We haven’t seen anyone but Sydney actually grasp/hold an orb yet.
Sydney was blocking Math with the orbs, and he tried but was unable to push them aside.
But when Varia touched Sydney the orbs drifted over toward Varia. My guess is if she toches Sydney she can use the orbs. And it seems it doesn’t have to be by hand. Jiggiwatt hugged her to give her Maneto powers.
The lighthook is impassable, sort of. Make it into a big sphere with spidertwit inside. Doodles that were not quite overlapping circles were standard training when I learned penmanship.
She has to try and ensnare ‘spidertwit’ first
Ever tried to lasso a grasshopper with a length of string? o_O
The Tholian Web almost worked… did in alternate universes.
Tholian Webs were difficult to utility in Starfleet Battles.
A challenge for advanced players.
Almost worked
And how much time and effort was put into it’s implementation? Did they do it ‘on the fly’ with no prior thought or planning? Did they do it while they couldn’t even see their target? Was their target moving in random patterns, actively avoiding capture?