|
"Waaay more" is a bit of an exaggeration. We've gotten a similar amount so far, thought there might be a page or two more of it. This issue has given insight into a bunch of different hero's personal philosophies. Brad, Pintsize, Murder Girl, and now Paladin.
|
#
¿
Nov 19, 2014 09:01
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 22, 2024 14:11 |
|
|
Advising an independent project isn't quite the same as teaching, either. I think Paladin would be good at helping Alison figure out how to use her powers to make an actual difference in the world.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 26, 2014 01:28
|
|
|
If the AI is baked into the hardware, it might make it very difficult to duplicate itself and very easy to kill.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 6, 2014 07:14
|
|
|
Panel four is pretty glorious. "I..."guess I have been working hard to create an intelligent servant. Awkward.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 9, 2014 11:32
|
|
|
Oracle posted:To serve man as in danceoff (remember she programs in a sense of humor). Haha. Not so impossible to predict after all.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 12, 2014 09:38
|
|
|
MikeJF posted:I hope Clevin is an excellent public relations consultant and publicist. Isn't Clevin the dude who tried to hit on her at the party?
|
|
#
¿
Jan 6, 2015 15:12
|
|
|
Even with the full context of the dude absolutely being a would be rapist, her use of extreme force was questionable. That's what this thread's discussion really boiled down to. Without that context, it looks pretty drat bad for Alison.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 6, 2015 19:08
|
|
|
thespaceinvader posted:Extreme force? I think you may have subtly missed the point of her big speech to Cleaver about extreme force. That was INCREDIBLY mild force for someone who can throw building-sized robots through building-sized buildings. It was the equivalent of a police officer sticking their gun in a suspect's mouth. That's extreme force for that situation. The situation in no way demanded putting that guy in the position where a stray impulse from Alison would end their life. I think you very unsubtly got the point of her talk with Cleaver completely wrong. The point wasn't that her holding back from using force justified whatever force she does use. It was that violence was tempting, easy, and satisfying for her to use, but it doesn't actually solve problems. Then on that roof, she was tempted to use force, used it casually, and surprise surprise, it wasn't a very good solution.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 7, 2015 21:59
|
|
|
Tarezax posted:My first thought was suicide, for some reason. I'd completely forgotten about Moonshadow as a possible factor here. Me too. But since slitting your throat is really hard and Moonshadow kills with a knife, it kind of makes sense if she did it. If she did do it, I wonder why. Were there other victims, or did she just want to hijack the viral video of Alison to more effectively spread her message about rapists being murdered horribly.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 9, 2015 15:14
|
|
|
ronya posted:recognizing an invisibility superpower is clearly something they trained Allison for - she immediately moved to that conclusion rather than "the killer already got away" or "the killer jumped out of the window" or "the killer is hiding in the closet or under the bed" Well, there's been an invisible slasher cutting rapist's throats as well. Alison has definitely seen that in the news. She may have been trained in how to handle invisible people, but it's also possible she just connected the dots.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 16, 2015 10:48
|
|
|
In the previous page, she was looking at old pictures of Moonshadow. To me, that suggests she knows that it's Moonshadow but she doesn't want to believe it.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 27, 2015 09:57
|
|
|
Mr.Pibbleton posted:Turns out she's actually protected by g-g-g-g-dead guys! Fixed that for you.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 4, 2015 03:33
|
|
|
The alt text often comes a fair bit after the comic itself updates. I'm not sure why. I've even seen the alt text change from one thing to another.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 20, 2015 10:16
|
|
|
jsoh posted:worm is like three million words long and only the first quarter is any good. It's a little over one and a half million words, and it's very good overall. The beginning is a little weak, and there's a really bad section preceding the very strong ending. It's a first draft that was written remarkably quickly, and that shows in places. Still, its' absolutely worth reading if you have any interest in superheroes at all.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 10, 2015 04:34
|
|
|
His face often seems to display genuine emotion around Alison, even when she can't see it. When he turns her romantic advances down hard in the hotel, for example, he seems sad. I think he really likes Alison. I think he's probably completely genuine in wanting to figure out the conspiracy and change the world. He is also manipulative and almost certainly doing Bad Stuff.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 13, 2015 14:19
|
|
|
reignonyourparade posted:
I think he really cares about Alison, and her emotional suspicion or even outright rejection of him is really hurting him, I think.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 17, 2015 10:59
|
|
Starting to feel like this whole thing might have triggered a nervous breakdown in Patrick.
|
ChairMaster posted:Well if you guys are really dedicated to this particular stupid thing to argue about he did say one of the bloodies governments in modern history, and being 4th out of 196 qualifies pretty well for that. I don't know. Patrick is using it as a strong rhetorical point to justify his actions. Exactly how much he is exaggerating is worth considering. Even if you take him as not exaggerating at all, I'm not sure his point holds up. He said Nagasaki and Hiroshima puts his death toll to shame, so let's assume that means something like twice as many deaths as he caused. Which would put him at 100,000 deaths caused. That doesn't seem unreasonable since his actions caused the US to adopt martial law, necessitated total evacuations of cities, and who knows what else. That's way less than the 500,000 Iraqi deaths on America's hands, and America has done plenty of other bad poo poo besides Iraq. But America represents 300 million people. How many people were in Patrick's organization? 1,000? 10,000? Given his heavy use of robots and super powered individuals, I bet it was less. In terms of murders per member, Patrick's organization is probably near the top in the annals of history. I don't say this trying to excuse America's crimes. I just think Patrick's self righteousness is a bit laughable. Implying he's considered really bad because more of his victims were white and English speaking definitely plays to Alison's social justice cultural leanings, but come on. When you have to compare what you've done to the nuking of Japan to make yourself look good, you've done some seriously lovely things.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 20, 2015 17:16
|
|
|
Many people in this thread have expressed the exact same sentiment.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 21, 2015 11:10
|
|
|
Didn't Alison demand this meeting? It is pretty telling of how shallow Patrick's worldview is that he would be gobsmacked by Alison's question. Not 30 seconds after a gleefully unrepentant rant about why he thinks him being a mass murderer is hunky dory.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 24, 2015 16:51
|
|
|
Fried Chicken posted:We are down at like E or F plot now. I don't think the muddling of plots really matters. This chapter has become a series of conversations between Alison and various people about the use of power. Mary is killing her starfish. Alison's roommate ignores the bad stuff in front of her in favor of the safe and self-satisfying pursuit of righting big, distant wrongs. Brad is trying to form community. Pintsize clings to the moral authority of government. Paladin optimistically seeks to build a better world via technology. And now Patrick with his moral nihilism. It's an interesting idea for a chapter, and having Mary's blatant use of force function as a trigger for these conversations is OK. Alison is trying to figure out how she wants to use the power she has. I think the problem is that this chapter is way too drat long. 108 pages already, and the lack of a plot structure mean it's hard to tell if we're even getting close to the end. None of the individual scenes have been sluggish, but stacking them one on top of another has created the feeling of a 100 page vignette.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 25, 2015 02:48
|
|
|
Mikl posted:Good god, Patrick, are you suicidial or something? Remember what she did to that poor defenseless vending machine the last time Patrick rejected her? RIP Patrick. Regardless, it feels like Patrick has serious emotional problems. He knows everybody to their very bones, but how many people know Patrick? Alison might come the closest, there are many hints that he has feelings for her, but now he's pushing her away as hard as he can.
|
|
#
¿
May 1, 2015 11:04
|
|
|
So, uh, I guess it wasn't exactly a backhand.
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2015 09:19
|
|
|
She did say her anomaly was getting worse. It's nice to see a payoff for that.
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2015 11:41
|
|
|
The doctor mentioned her scar was rejecting absolutely everything. If her anomaly can reject uv light, I think it can reject poison. I really doubt poison gas would work. She might need oxygen, so strangulation is possible. But how are you going to keep her from oxygen for the several minutes it would take her to pass out? As soon as she starts feeling short of breath, she just super leaps to safety. Perhaps an elaborate trap could snare her, but it would be tough.
|
|
#
¿
May 7, 2015 08:53
|
|
|
Yeah, I like Alison.
|
|
#
¿
May 8, 2015 09:45
|
|
|
I just noticed the colors behind Alison's text bubble in panel five. Even when she's offscreen, her presence is completely dominating Patrick. I think him falling for her makes sense, though there is surely something else besides. He's up to something, something he knows she wouldn't approve of. But yeah, his facial expressions over the course of the comic make me think he has feelings for Alison. He could just be a great actor, but that's boring. It makes sense that he would be scared of emotional intimacy. Knowing everything about everyone around you is pretty much the opposite of intimacy. There's no trust. There's no exposing yourself to emotional risk.
|
|
#
¿
May 8, 2015 13:25
|
|
|
I don't think she's a a mega genius. I think she's a run of the mill, top percentile smart young woman. That's enough to explain school being easy, but it's a far cry from inventing AI as a side project or becoming an expert on time travel in a few hours.
|
|
#
¿
May 9, 2015 02:28
|
|
|
She can also just be right. Patrick is smart and his rationalizations are elaborate. The substance of what he's saying is bullshit. Alison doesn't have to be smarter than Patrick. She just has to be smart enough to realize it's bullshit.
|
|
#
¿
May 9, 2015 04:27
|
|
|
Uh, it's not that his power has limits. It's that she always assumed he understood himself, but now she how much he has deluded himself.
|
|
#
¿
May 12, 2015 13:29
|
|
|
akulanization posted:Well, in the past it has been a lot easier to see how Allison might have made the mistake. Or she took a step back from the edge. Like with the anti-metahuman mob, decent people had just died to prevent someone from helping others. Or with the rapist she at least restrained herself from permanent damage. Often she was in a situation where action was required and while her actions might not have been appropriate, or the best course, it could at least be justified as a response from a person who has a toolbox consisting almost solely of violence who wanted to do the right thing. This time, the only provocation was her mind reader crush saying everything he could to make her as furious as possible.  The point of the Cleaver conversation wasn't that Alison was better than Cleaver in some way. It was that she was lucky enough to have the kind of support and guidance where she could channel her unbelievable capacity for violence into constructive means. She straight up admits to fantasizing about mass murder in that conversation. Your tut-tut what a bully moral scolding is entirely missing a big point of the comic. Alison isn't supposed to be some superman-ish inhuman paragon of virtue. Everyone has to deal with the temptation of violence on some level, and for Alison, it's just greatly exaggerated in magnitude. Violence is a direct path to getting what you want, and it's an assertion of power in a very visceral way. Alison has grappled with it the whole comic. Interrogating the ratman. Both her conversations with Cleaver. Beating up the vending machine when Patrick rejects her. Yelling at the crowd in front of the hospital. Wrapping her I-beam crushing hands around a civilian's throat. And now, bouncing a box off Patrick's face. Has she crossed the line? I don't really think so, but she certainly hasn't crossed the line so hard it retroactively changes everything about how you should view her.
|
|
#
¿
May 16, 2015 19:56
|
|
|
Wow. Patrick is a sad sad man.
|
|
#
¿
May 19, 2015 09:38
|
|
|
Man, I just noticed the blood on Patrick's hand. I do like that we get an explanation for Alison's shock so soon. She thought he'd duck, which makes total sense. .
|
|
#
¿
May 19, 2015 16:58
|
|
|
Somebody said the mug would be a good candidate for kintsugi, the Japanese art of repairing pottery with gold. But they said at the same time that it would be cultural appropriation to do so. It's always striking to me that some people fervently believe that you aren't morally allowed to do certain kinds of art unless you're a certain race.
|
|
#
¿
May 20, 2015 15:30
|
|
|
Not helped by the fact that this chapter has been going on for over a year. People get antsy. I think every individual scene has been fine. Everything has been relevant to the comic's themes and interesting. I guess it goes to show the importance of having a narrative arc.
|
|
#
¿
May 27, 2015 07:38
|
|
|
Also, he kinda threatened violence against anyone who dared accuse someone of rape.
|
|
#
¿
May 31, 2015 06:15
|
|
|
Who has she ranted at? She vented at Patrick, the unrepentant mass murder who had just finished monologuing about how human life is meaningless. Other than that, she's been listening or having conversations with people. It's come up before, but I still don't get this criticism of Alison for trying to listen to other viewpoints and get a handle of how she wants to go about saving the world. She spent her adolescence as a government aimed weapon. She's idealistic, but she's taking some time to temper that with education and other people's viewpoints before she jumps into action. This seems to me incredibly smart. Whatever Alison ends up doing, it's going to have huge repercussions. Putting off action forever would be silly, but taking some time to think through what she wants to do is wise. As for Furnace, he is a prick. But there are plenty of racist, violent pricks who do heroic stuff.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 2, 2015 11:15
|
|
|
I don't get people calling him a strawman. To the best of my memory, he hasn't held any opinions that I haven't seen MRA's and the like espouse with 100% sincerity. Strawmanning involves simplifying an opposing position to make it easier to tear down. If the opposing position really is that simple (at least some of the time), does it count?
|
|
#
¿
Jun 15, 2015 06:42
|
|
|
New page link.Cat Mattress posted:A story in which you show ordinary people going on with committing atrocities pretty much just because that's where they've been led to and they're just following orders will have a very different tone from one where you show a bunch of hiveminded mustache-twirling clones committing the same atrocities while laughing evilly about how evil they are, bwahahah. What about a story where Nazis are Nazis? They're people who sincerely believe the horrible things that define Nazism, but they're people nonetheless. This is the closest Nazi based analogy to what SFP is doing with Furnace. I kind of hope Alison shows up at Moonshadow's house in time to save Furnace. Having to fight a former teammate with a worldview just a little tilted from hers in order to save a raging rear end in a top hat could be interesting.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 16, 2015 14:16
|
|
|
Uh, we already know why Mary is killing people and it's not because she thinks it'll fix contemporary American culture. Remember the starfish speech? This baboon thing is real though. I could see Mary knowing about it and finding it interesting.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 26, 2015 10:54
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 22, 2024 14:11 |
|
|
Gorilla Salad posted:Incredibly dumb thing I can't believe I just noticed in the large centre panel in the current comic. Light bulbs do not work that way. Er, yeah they do. Have you never been in a room with a single too weak light bulb? It'll only fully light a small area around it, and the rest of the room will be in shadow. The comic is simplifying that to only two light levels when in reality i would be more of a gradient, but I'm not seeing how that simplification is weird or wrong.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 6, 2015 09:14
|
|