And here we see that Jin has always been on the bloody-minded way of doing things. No pun intended. She was that way even before becoming part of the Chimera.
The guards are finding out they don’t have the stomach for this. They’d rather live and let liver. Trouble is, how are they gonna e-spleen it to the captain?
At this point, she was still human, so she must have been superb at knife-hand strikes and similar piercing attacks in whatever style she had studied.
Unless she was somehow a Golem from the previous cycle and had returned Prior to the Bud/Brandi murders trying to “fix” those. I think not, because that doesn’t fit the time line. Or does it?
Even more insanity production, in that Jin would had to suffer her own death/murder 56 times to set up dealing with the Calendar Machine!!
She was also skilled at magic, thanks to her mother. Many new, interesing, and unnatural ways to kill.
Some are interesting, others are unintestining…..
I always got the impression that the Calendar Machines loop started after the girls were Chimera-ized and separated. Meaning only going through the process one time.
Dear God, at least I hope so.
I thought that one reason for the creation of the calendar machine – May’s secret agenda, as it were – was to “fix” Jin, who was presumably still human at the time…
Jin designs and helps build the Calendar Machine
It’s turned on, creating the immortals, including Jin and May
YEARS later the Lanthan priests were trying to fool with the CM to expand their power
May Teaches them how to make Golem and is the grand experiment on that
She steals the Calendar Machine and takes it to what will be Central America
Lanthan priests use the golem formula on Bud, Brandi and Jin
The Chimera is separated
May tries to fix and/or destroy the Calendar Machine
But we also know that Jin was in the room when the Calendar Machine was broken and sucked her mom into the Demon Realm. She remembers seeing that happen. Would that have been pre-or post-Golum making then?
So, this means the calendar machine startup was well before this and Jin was already immortal, yet could be killed. Same for May. How long had Jin been alive at this point? We need a timeline chart.
But that would mean she simply abandoned her daughter. The daughter for whom she was doing all this. Seems to me she would have taken her too or come back for her soon. Something just doesn’t jive here. I guess Jin was trying to pass for a male at this point, thus the bindings. But then, why the really long hair? Doesn’t make sense. All of it could have been avoided by May taking Jin along.
No more abandoning her than a parent going off to doing errands. May had things to do, people to see. She felt that Jin was safe or she wouldn’t have left her. It would have been better to take her sure, but everything is easier to plan after it happens.
Don’t know. Her errands must have taken weeks or even months. It would have taken quite a while for all this to happen. Her life was in danger. That’s why she had to pass for a boy. Seems May could have poited back and forth often.
Still, it could be Jin was supposed to remain behind to try to keep the priests from making more golems. But even that seems to be taking way too big a chance with the life of the daughter for whom you have literally moved heaven and earth to cure. Maya could have poited in anytime, several times a day if needed, to keep an eye on her.
Now that I think about it again, It could be Jin had not been thrown into the pit at this point and she did sneak in via the secret door, perhaps to rescue the girls.
I believe that the original purpose of the portal cloth was for someone to take it to the new world and set up a base there. Once someone that can teleport went through the cloth they could teleport back and forth at will. Personally, I would have waited until I had that base before stealing the Calendar Machine and running for the hills.
As for why she didn’t, we’ll have to wait until we hear Mayahuel’s tale to see what she was doing at the time.
We don’t know how powerful May is. I don’t recall seeing her even poit, let alone exhibit abilities on the level of the GGG. Theirs were the result of the priests’ Chimera creation; May, having become a golem through an earlier process, may be nothing more than indestructible. If that.
That’s the way I understood it also.. The mishap with the calender-machine was after the the girls became the (thanx to Jin somewhat hampered)chimera. From that moment on stuff started to loop. With the immortalitry of the GG a constant line to today, when the calender-machine finally gave the ghost.
Meh..To be honest, I am no stickler for continuity. If it doesn’t wreck the flow of the story, It’s good enough for me. Mebbe that’s why I still like X-men. Marvel wrecked continuity sooo many times, they single-handedly re-defined ‘retcon’. I just shrugged thinking “alternate Universe” …. abba..abbra..abba..cadabraa.. Tadaa! Problem solved.
Until now, only the Tina sleeping/not sleeping has been mildly headscratch-inducing. The rest of the story and it’s backgrounds remain pretty solid.
10-years of web-comic is a looong time. Retconning becomes almost inevitable.
Yes, the timeline is not clear. We’ve been told the Chimera wrecked the world over 10,000 years ago and the calendar machine was fired up about 1450 years ago. I’m not sure if what we know works out without time travel somewhere, but I’m content to let Pablo tell the story in his own time.
The Calendar Machine’s loop started 1450 years ago. Bud and Brandi are 12,000 years old, and are the young ‘uns in the golem set. May and Jin were immortalized MANY years before that.
Well, it’s one thing to want to be rescued from a situation that hellish. And quite another to watch someone come in and disassemble people, splashing you with viscera in the process…
That’s a good point. Not looking is just a way to avoid responsibility for your actions. Brandi seemed to think her prayers may have had something to do with Jin’s arrival and this killing, but she is not willing to suffer the consequences of her actions by witnessing the result. She wants to be avenged and the priests to be punished, but is removing herself from the dirty work involved.
She stopped being the “sensitive” one and Ms. Goodytwoshoes the moment she wished for this. Clearly, it wasn’t her wish that caused it to happen, but that is her mental process here. It’s like those calling for the death penalty or going to war, yet not willing to get their hands bloody to make it happen. Not willing to live with the personal, emotional consequences of what it takes to do it. What she did by avoiding looking was cowardice, not sensitivity.
I would say to her … This is what you wanted, girl. Look upon it and KNOW what that means!
You must consider that she’s starving, repeatedly raped, and tortured. What would you wish in the quiet moments? I’ve had hangovers that made wish that I would die to make the pain stop. Spurious and clearly not logical, but heartfelt none the less. Did I really want to die? Certainly not, but the mental energy of those thoughts were put out there. Brandi may blame herself for ‘calling’ Jin for her rescue, but that doesn’t mean she wanted to see the horror of what she’s doing.
I’m not blaming her for wishing this, just for not taking whatever comes of it. She had the presence of mind to look away, so she was not just out of it like Bud. Bud’s horrified, not gleeful. Brandi lost any semblence of innocence when she allowed herself to wish this. She crossed that line. She didn’t just wish for rescue or that the priest would be simply rendered unconscious. She wanted him dead. She wanted her “angel” to do this to him. She got her wish and she was glad of it. I don’t blame her, but wanting to absolve herself of the consequences by looking away is something else entirely.
People have to accept the consequences of their actions.
Somehow, i cannot bring myself to consider the deaths of multiple murdering, torturing rapists as particularly negative, and even less so torture as they die.
Though i oppose the death penalty under most circumstances – mostly because of how often it has been demonstrably imposed by the courts – in clear-cut cases of multiple murder, i sometimes regret that the killer can’t be executed once for each victim.
And in the case of slime like Timothy McVeigh (or that Real IRA character who killed twenty-seven schoolchildren with his bomb), by rectally-inserted explosives.
With a thirty-second delay fuze, with a Big Honking Display counting down the seconds in front of his eyes…
The problem with that is it turns you into a monster as well. Regardless of what the guilty party has done, doing the same or worse to them, makes you pretty much the same as they. When you do it, they will be helpless and you will be torturing them. You may feel jistified, but it darkens your soul.
Not only just the way their expressions are drawn, but the directional lighting is really setting up the scene!
I had interpreted their expressions with an added sense of twist/horror… These guys are practically in their boxers. Might be normal dress for guards I guess, but why wouldn’t they take weapons in? Might be low level priests, but they’d probably have religious articles if they were going to deal with the girls. One way or another, these guys weren’t expecting resistance, and weren’t fully clothed. I think Jin just “surprised” the rape squad. GO, JIN!
Okay, I was holding this from yesterday because I felt it wasn’t in the spirit of the strip, but seeing the humor being posted today…
Golems of Wapsi
With apologies to Warren Zevon
I saw a Golem Girl with a coffee menu in her hand
Walking through Wapsi Square on the main
She was looking for a place called Mucho Mocha
Going to get a big cup of souchong lapsang
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
If you hear them prowling around your bedroom door
Better not let them in
Pixie Girl got silly-stringed late last night
Golems of Wapsi again
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
She’s the golden-eyed girl that could destroy the world
They say she’s been crazy forever
Better stay away from her
Takes a lot to make her purr
I’d like to date her mother
Ah-hooo
Golem’s of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
Well, I saw Paul Taylor walking with the girl
Doing the Golems of Wapsi
I saw Pablo Taylor walking with the girl
Doing the Golems of Wapsi
I saw a golem drinking a Manhattan at the Cerberus Club
Her body was perfect
Dhep!
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
Yes, but then we wouldn’t have known the tune to sing it to. That’s why most of my songs are written to scan with American Folk tunes… Like “Camptown Races” for a song I wrote about the Clinton impeachment trial.
As I think about the plot, it seems to me that Mayahuel is ultimately responsible for everything. She is the root bad-guy in the whole horrific mess. Her fanatical quest to fix Jin led to the slaughter of thousands.
She helped build and then screwed up the calendar machine by trying to use it to fix Jin (as was her purpose for getting it built in the first place). This resulted in the earth being in a time loop for 85,000 years, in turn, resulting in man’s progress being held back for all that time. Not to mention the changing of what would have been for millions had she not done it. Worst of all, she left the secret of chimera making behind, knowing full well they would use it in some way. She just didn’t care. She could have cleaned up that loose end first. She clearly had zero aversion to outright bloody multiple murders to further her plans. The priests learned from her case to break the victims first so the torture was, in effect, her fault as well. In any event, this all lead to the near extinction of her people. I call that bad, regardless of the intentions.
Either that, or she was so single-minded it never occured to her that these things would go so very wrong…which doesn’t make her a bad or evil person…just flawed à la heroes of Greek Tragedies.
I could see that were it not for two things. Her killings for one. That alone instantly takes her from tragic hero to murderous villian. Second, she was obviously cunning, cold, calculating and brilliant. There is no way she would not have thought about what would be the result of her actions. She just didn’t care what happened to others. Again, no would-be hero. Closer to a psychopath.
As Forrest would say, evil is as evil does. People have known this for millenia … “By his deeds shall a man be known” … “Ye shall know them by their fruits.” And of course, especially applicable here, “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Oh yes, and “Life is like a box of evil,” or something like that.
Ah, but heroes in the old days were usually not far removed from psychopaths. Hercules killed his wife and kids in a fit of rage, Odysseus (aka Ulysses) crippled a beggar for no reason except putting on a show, Egil Skallagrimsson was a stone-cold killer, extortionist and general bastard, at one time he poked out the eye of his host and vomited in his face because of sheer paranoia (he got so drunk he figured the host had poisoned the beer), but he was still Iceland’s greatest hero and one of its best poets. People weren’t squeemish back then. An example of the emotions manslaughter would excite in a medieval hero: Glum is described like this in an Icelandic saga, The Story Of Viga-Glum: “Glum went home, and then a fit of laughter came upon him, and affected him in such a manner that he turned quite pale, and tears burst from his eyes, just like large hailstones. He was often afterwards taken in this way when the appetite for killing some one came upon him”.
Today we expect better from our heroes, and, to be sure, Jin has changed with the times. I think it’s obvious that she has bettered herself a lot over the span of her long life.
If that’s how it is, then you gotta cut the priests some slack as well. What they did was just the way things were done back then. Not being evil to their way of thinking, just doing their jobs. Breaking the girls as they were ordered.
Yes, SoWhyMe, you’re absolutely right. Breaking the bodies and spirits of men and women was done all the time in societies built on slave labour. It was all in a day’s work for the guards, I suppose. And I think the priests must have thought they were acting out the will of their god(s). It’s a bit surprising that Jin should even care what happened to two girls who were neither friends nor relatives. She must have had an unusually strong sense of justice for her era.
(I couldn’t click “reply” on your post, so I answer like this instead).
I agree with all this, except I’m suspending judgement on her carelessness with golem tech. We haven’t seen the circumstances, she may have reserved a crucial step she thought the priests would never figure out on their own. Or she may HAVE killed everyone she thought could duplicate the process, but the priests were smart and secretly took notes on what Maya did. Or she may have been arrogant and thought they’d never be able to make more golems without her, OR go further and create the Chimera. We need more information to tell how badly she screwed up on this, if at all.
Well, there you go. Even if she did kill those involved, etc. that would still make her evil. Use people to get what you want then cover your tracks by murdering them. After all what’s a few more bodies to someone who has already taken several lives so effortlessly? And since they all seem to be male lives, well, who cares, right?
Maybe responsible, but not necessarily evil. Her single mindedness is probably a result of trying to help her daughter.
Much like Jin cursing the world to be burned back to the stone age to try and help two innocent girls that were dropped into the pits of hell.
When appointing blame to this whole mess we do open a huge can of worms. Such as why Jin let folk like Napolean or Hitler ever do anything when she knew exactly where to stop them before they did their damage. Jin surely had a fairly stable understanding of what was going to occur and could have made the world a different place. After so many lives couldn’t she have improved things even a little… or is this the improved version? I am surprised that question didn’t come up by now… Actually sounds like a pretty cool story loop there… Just saying… (que Jin flashback)
We’ve got no evidence that Jin didn’t stop Hitler dozens of times. Remember that after a few cycles she’s going to know that history will be reset, and all the evils of the previous cycle undone. She probably messed around with history a lot, watching various outcomes – which implies that our history is where she decided ‘Meh. Good enough.’
Another consideration is what worse might happen if you change things for the better.
The best example is probably the Titanic.
If I recall my history right, the Titanic cost the lives of hundreds, but led to the monitoring and dynamiting of dangerous icebergs. The fitting of all ships with sufficient lifeboats to take everyone off, the standard of having a double hull for ships, thus reducing the risk of sinking further, AND supposedly the elimination of a developing class system in the US. The “Unsinkable Molly Brown” was “new money”.
Now, cruise ships are even larger. What would the death rate have been on a later vessel, or series of vessels, if the Titanic had been saved?
If Hitler were assassinated as a child, what monster would rise up to replace him? Would this new monster be savvier, more successful?
Good points. My thought is that it would be interesting to hear her tell it… Like that one time when she offed Hitler only to have Elvis become dictator of the world… the options are limitless and slightly silly if pushed. Heil Elvis!
Interesting commentary today…but IIRC, Jin committed suicide inside the pit after she was thrown in, at first making her appear weak to the others, but she had the higher purpose in mind all along, and I think this arc will hopefully explain that more clearly.
BTW, I love the “Oh GNARLEY!” look on the face of the guy on the left in the middle panel. He should prolly look more panicked at this point, tho…
Looking at the Guards, I think a likely scenario is that the Jin was lock-in with the girls by the frighted guards. She couldn’t get out or the girls out… So she become a martyr, hoping to take control of the Chimera…It didn’t work.
I’m hoping Paul is not about to succumb to the all too popular fetish of showing a female kill several males (usually bloodily). Unfortunately, they all seem to go that route sooner or later so chances are all too good. If he does, I will have lost all respect for him and it will be my last Wapsi. Not that my participation matters, of course.
Jin’s mother did, and with less reason than we know for Jin. (I don’t count the Chimera Apocalypse as being the girls’ fault, of course.) Is your objection to the killing because Jin is female or the priests are male? Or just that this trope is over-played?
Oh yes, it IS way overplayed. Still, the story is almost always written such that men are the bad guys and the ones slaughtered. This is deliberate. Notice, even here, ALL the characters who actually do something are females. Yet, as usual, all those shown graphically murdered are males. Some in full color. The lone exception to this is the girl disintegrated by the plasma wall. Tina wasn’t outright killed by someone. That was an accident. And it looks as if it’s about to break into a massacre here.
I mean, Paul could have written this about a cult of priestesses. It would have made sense since he makes all the powerful characters women in this story, even the demons, so why not on the other side as well? But that’s my point, they never do. No matter how many females are involved, the ones killed are pretty much always males. Especially if the killing involves numbers of the “bad-guys.” Remember this is fiction. he could have written it any number of ways, but, like all the others, he wrote it the same old tired way.
As I see it, Wapsi is about to hit a new low with this same old song. I really hope I’m wrong, but I doubt it.
Rather than address the entire body of recent fiction, I will note that in this specific scene we know that these guys are involved in the premeditated murder of (at first) two innocent girls. Only one priest has died so far. We also know that all three women involved are going to die; we don’t yet know how many men will be killed before that happens.
Damn, SoWhyMe, give it up already and quit reading my comic. Just go away if you dislike everything that I’m doing. I’m so sick of everything that you spout when you come in here. Stop reading my comic and go away.
We, also, do not have a confirmation of a body count for Jin in this skirmish. We have only one confirmed kill. The two other priests or guards there are big burly guys. Even with an expert level of Kung-Fu, Jin has the body of an 18 yo girl. If the the burlies have a modicum of fighting skill, they can capture her. Which we know happens.
Of course, we have to remember the usual comic book outcome of this sort of thing is the girl can, somehow, kill an entire platoon of big burly males, even with guns, without so much as breaking a nail or having a gun herself. Not even be winded.
Well, the trope of minions with bad aim is more than just girls vs boys. How many heroes wade through the ‘spear carriers’ as a warm up to the boss fight?
Hell, it could be a trap. insert admiral ackbar joke here She was betrayed by her boyfriend, brought up by Indilee. We haven’t seen any evidence of it the past two strips. Could be these guys are magic-ed up to take her down.
I didn’t realize it was a popular fetish. I mean, I enjoy watching females kick ass, but not bloodily…and my amusement is more with the “teeny person takes out the muscle-bound gorilla” aspect, and less to do with gender.
Aaaand that probably explains why I love watching Scott Pilgrim so much. That dude looks way too scrawny to be able to fight worth a lick.
It’s very popular, especially in Manga and super hero comics. Movies too. The latest Resident Evil movie clearly illustrated this fetish. There have been several movies devoted to this of late.
I wish I were better at analysis and synthesis like some of the folks here. Interesting suppositions and hypotheses being tossed around. Today’s artwork is gripping.
Jin’s eyes in the last panel make me suspect she’s not quite human at this moment in time, but I can’t be sure. Paul rarely draws something haphazardly.
Good observation. Why does she have slits for eyeballs if she is still human at this point? Maybe she and May never were human? Aliens? It could explain May’s inordinate knowledge of “magical” things.
May had reptile eyes when she did the slice-n-dice audition for the Lanthan priest. he was immortal from the Calendar Machine start-up, but not a golem yet…
Aliens? What about “demons”?? What if demons were constantly in the background, manipulating all to get the bloodiest outcome, just for their amusement.
They do not know time ,so having a world restart again and again, and hopefully leading them to forget, gets them the constant re-newed joy of watching carnage unfold.
It’s basically what the rogue demon implicated when trying to manipulate Monica shortly before “fixing” the calendar-machine. Only problem was that Monica, smart cookie that she is, saw through them.
Paul, I think you aah… I think you switched the two guys…
cause the guy with the stocky neck is to the left of the fire in the third frame, but in the forth he would be to the right… I know its not a huge deal, since they’re about to die, but it’s bothering me…
As a completely irrelevant aside, I’m traveling to Wisconsin tomorrow…and I just realized that the weather there is still only getting to highs in the 30s. I’ve already stowed my winter clothes since we’ve been getting highs in the 80s. *shakes head* Crazy Northern Weather.
Now that’s a sort of evil we need more of. Maybe if more bad guys got eviscerated by hand, we wouldn’t have an expanding crime problem. We’d have to start at the top though.
“Oh, uh . . . hey there! Um, you want some intestine, too?”
Epic caption!
Heh, I first read your post as “Eric Clapton”.
It takes real guts to do that!
I was more like : “How do I do that Sailor’s trumpet-knot again?”
See, me, I was just reminded of that old Carly Simon song…
“Evisceration!
iiiis making me late….
Keeping me waaaaiting….”
No guts, no gory… errr, glory.
Is… is that a lasso???
Oh, wait. Ewww…
Makes one wonder what her bandages are actually mage off…….urp!
*made off* $%^& keyboard-gremlins on the loose again.
*made of
Sorry, couldn’t resist
*made of* ohh.I see.. something learned again.
Heeheehee!!
Ah, my daily LOL… XD
Nice new garters, there, Jin…
Heh. Good one…..
And here we see that Jin has always been on the bloody-minded way of doing things. No pun intended. She was that way even before becoming part of the Chimera.
But, she did what she did to stop the chimera…
Even so, I wonder how much of her rage molded it…
Jin, if you’re going to break your toys like that, you won’t get new ones… ^_^
The guards are finding out they don’t have the stomach for this. They’d rather live and let liver. Trouble is, how are they gonna e-spleen it to the captain?
Eye don’t think that’s humerus enough for my funny bone
Lucy… you got some spleenin’ to do…
That took some guts to post that.
Hey, cut her a break! She’s got heart!
Which reminds me: what’s the fastest way to a man’s heart?
Through his sternum with a sharp obsidian blade.
Actually, “The fastest way to a man’s heart is through his stomach” was attributed to the first proctologist to perform heart surgery.
LOL! (BTW, was that Vlad the Impaler?)
So does Jin have special powers at this point, or is just really good at killing?
Just really good at killing, is my guess.
You’ll be amazed what damage sharp, well-maintained long fingernails can inflict….
At this point, she was still human, so she must have been superb at knife-hand strikes and similar piercing attacks in whatever style she had studied.
Unless she was somehow a Golem from the previous cycle and had returned Prior to the Bud/Brandi murders trying to “fix” those. I think not, because that doesn’t fit the time line. Or does it?
Even more insanity production, in that Jin would had to suffer her own death/murder 56 times to set up dealing with the Calendar Machine!!
Commence speculation….
Whatever she’s doing, she learnt it/inherited it from mommy.
Remember the julienned guard?
why does everyone think that was her mum?
i always thought it was jin.
did i miss an explination?
I’m pretty sure Paul has said it was May.
Yep, that was May.
She was also skilled at magic, thanks to her mother. Many new, interesing, and unnatural ways to kill.
Some are interesting, others are unintestining…..
Oh Noes!! More Gut-Wrenchingly bad intestine jokes …wait…eeeeeeeek..they’re becoming procreating memes…
That requires both guts AND balls – THWAP – ow, I was just shot by a girl with a slingshot………
NotDilbert- you forgot the ‘high pitched voice’ tags!!!!
I always got the impression that the Calendar Machines loop started after the girls were Chimera-ized and separated. Meaning only going through the process one time.
Dear God, at least I hope so.
I thought that one reason for the creation of the calendar machine – May’s secret agenda, as it were – was to “fix” Jin, who was presumably still human at the time…
My perception of it is like this -
Jin designs and helps build the Calendar Machine
It’s turned on, creating the immortals, including Jin and May
YEARS later the Lanthan priests were trying to fool with the CM to expand their power
May Teaches them how to make Golem and is the grand experiment on that
She steals the Calendar Machine and takes it to what will be Central America
Lanthan priests use the golem formula on Bud, Brandi and Jin
The Chimera is separated
May tries to fix and/or destroy the Calendar Machine
But that’s just my take on it…
But we also know that Jin was in the room when the Calendar Machine was broken and sucked her mom into the Demon Realm. She remembers seeing that happen. Would that have been pre-or post-Golum making then?
Post, I think.
The separated golems were sent to Central America to get them out of the way. That was the given reason, anyway.
Jabberwonky is correct and May was sucked into the demon realm after the golems were separated and in South America. =)
So, this means the calendar machine startup was well before this and Jin was already immortal, yet could be killed. Same for May. How long had Jin been alive at this point? We need a timeline chart.
Oh wait, no, not May. She was already a golem by now. So why didn’t she save her daughter and the others?
My first guess would be that she didn’t know. She was half a world away trying to set up the Calendar Machine in a safe place.
But that would mean she simply abandoned her daughter. The daughter for whom she was doing all this. Seems to me she would have taken her too or come back for her soon. Something just doesn’t jive here. I guess Jin was trying to pass for a male at this point, thus the bindings. But then, why the really long hair? Doesn’t make sense. All of it could have been avoided by May taking Jin along.
No more abandoning her than a parent going off to doing errands. May had things to do, people to see. She felt that Jin was safe or she wouldn’t have left her. It would have been better to take her sure, but everything is easier to plan after it happens.
Doh! Wrong email addy…
Don’t know. Her errands must have taken weeks or even months. It would have taken quite a while for all this to happen. Her life was in danger. That’s why she had to pass for a boy. Seems May could have poited back and forth often.
Still, it could be Jin was supposed to remain behind to try to keep the priests from making more golems. But even that seems to be taking way too big a chance with the life of the daughter for whom you have literally moved heaven and earth to cure. Maya could have poited in anytime, several times a day if needed, to keep an eye on her.
Now that I think about it again, It could be Jin had not been thrown into the pit at this point and she did sneak in via the secret door, perhaps to rescue the girls.
I believe that the original purpose of the portal cloth was for someone to take it to the new world and set up a base there. Once someone that can teleport went through the cloth they could teleport back and forth at will. Personally, I would have waited until I had that base before stealing the Calendar Machine and running for the hills.
As for why she didn’t, we’ll have to wait until we hear Mayahuel’s tale to see what she was doing at the time.
Why May didn’t port back and forth to check on Jin.
We don’t know how powerful May is. I don’t recall seeing her even poit, let alone exhibit abilities on the level of the GGG. Theirs were the result of the priests’ Chimera creation; May, having become a golem through an earlier process, may be nothing more than indestructible. If that.
That’s the way I understood it also.. The mishap with the calender-machine was after the the girls became the (thanx to Jin somewhat hampered)chimera. From that moment on stuff started to loop. With the immortalitry of the GG a constant line to today, when the calender-machine finally gave the ghost.
Meh..To be honest, I am no stickler for continuity. If it doesn’t wreck the flow of the story, It’s good enough for me. Mebbe that’s why I still like X-men. Marvel wrecked continuity sooo many times, they single-handedly re-defined ‘retcon’. I just shrugged thinking “alternate Universe” …. abba..abbra..abba..cadabraa.. Tadaa! Problem solved.
Until now, only the Tina sleeping/not sleeping has been mildly headscratch-inducing. The rest of the story and it’s backgrounds remain pretty solid.
10-years of web-comic is a looong time. Retconning becomes almost inevitable.
Yes, the timeline is not clear. We’ve been told the Chimera wrecked the world over 10,000 years ago and the calendar machine was fired up about 1450 years ago. I’m not sure if what we know works out without time travel somewhere, but I’m content to let Pablo tell the story in his own time.
The Calendar Machine’s loop started 1450 years ago. Bud and Brandi are 12,000 years old, and are the young ‘uns in the golem set. May and Jin were immortalized MANY years before that.
Ah, good point; the Calendar Machine’s reset point was 1450 years ago.
It always happens that way. Just when you get to the fun part, you get interrupted….
nah
she just gets more people to ‘play’ with.
Be careful what you pray for…
http://www.asofterworld.com/index.php?id=582
heh i thought that
Ooh..I have to say this: I just love the way Paul draws frizzy hair. He’s on of the very few that gets it right…
On the eviscerating:……eeep…and, eeeeewwww…
I was noticing that myself…nice to know I’m not the only one that locks onto weird details…
So this is what you mean with this “Blood n’ guts” thing?
All gut-puns aside: Intrigueing that Brandi apparently feels guilty about wishing death on the priests.
She is truly the most,/i>sensitive of the bunch, and not afraid to aknowledge that.
That takes courage, and also places her as the most balanced of the Wapsi-crew, i.e. the only one without a screw loose somewhere, imho.
not sure if avoiding looking at what you wanted is balanced though…
I am comparing her to the rest of the clown-car, not the general concensus on “normal”
For a clay golem she’s pretty sane, and the least anxty..
Well, it’s one thing to want to be rescued from a situation that hellish. And quite another to watch someone come in and disassemble people, splashing you with viscera in the process…
That’s a good point. Not looking is just a way to avoid responsibility for your actions. Brandi seemed to think her prayers may have had something to do with Jin’s arrival and this killing, but she is not willing to suffer the consequences of her actions by witnessing the result. She wants to be avenged and the priests to be punished, but is removing herself from the dirty work involved.
She stopped being the “sensitive” one and Ms. Goodytwoshoes the moment she wished for this. Clearly, it wasn’t her wish that caused it to happen, but that is her mental process here. It’s like those calling for the death penalty or going to war, yet not willing to get their hands bloody to make it happen. Not willing to live with the personal, emotional consequences of what it takes to do it. What she did by avoiding looking was cowardice, not sensitivity.
I would say to her … This is what you wanted, girl. Look upon it and KNOW what that means!
You must consider that she’s starving, repeatedly raped, and tortured. What would you wish in the quiet moments? I’ve had hangovers that made wish that I would die to make the pain stop. Spurious and clearly not logical, but heartfelt none the less. Did I really want to die? Certainly not, but the mental energy of those thoughts were put out there. Brandi may blame herself for ‘calling’ Jin for her rescue, but that doesn’t mean she wanted to see the horror of what she’s doing.
I’m not blaming her for wishing this, just for not taking whatever comes of it. She had the presence of mind to look away, so she was not just out of it like Bud. Bud’s horrified, not gleeful. Brandi lost any semblence of innocence when she allowed herself to wish this. She crossed that line. She didn’t just wish for rescue or that the priest would be simply rendered unconscious. She wanted him dead. She wanted her “angel” to do this to him. She got her wish and she was glad of it. I don’t blame her, but wanting to absolve herself of the consequences by looking away is something else entirely.
People have to accept the consequences of their actions.
Somehow, i cannot bring myself to consider the deaths of multiple murdering, torturing rapists as particularly negative, and even less so torture as they die.
Though i oppose the death penalty under most circumstances – mostly because of how often it has been demonstrably imposed by the courts – in clear-cut cases of multiple murder, i sometimes regret that the killer can’t be executed once for each victim.
And in the case of slime like Timothy McVeigh (or that Real IRA character who killed twenty-seven schoolchildren with his bomb), by rectally-inserted explosives.
With a thirty-second delay fuze, with a Big Honking Display counting down the seconds in front of his eyes…
The problem with that is it turns you into a monster as well. Regardless of what the guilty party has done, doing the same or worse to them, makes you pretty much the same as they. When you do it, they will be helpless and you will be torturing them. You may feel jistified, but it darkens your soul.
While the others have a screw loose, I’m better Brandi has two.
While the others have a screw loose, I’m betting Brandi has two.
panel 3
the utter shock on the guards/priests faces.
wonderful
To be honest, I’d be moderately upset too ,watching a woman taking “guts for garters” literal…
DANG!!! Another Gut-Joke wormed it’s way in a comment…they’re like tribbles..
Not only just the way their expressions are drawn, but the directional lighting is really setting up the scene!
I had interpreted their expressions with an added sense of twist/horror… These guys are practically in their boxers. Might be normal dress for guards I guess, but why wouldn’t they take weapons in? Might be low level priests, but they’d probably have religious articles if they were going to deal with the girls. One way or another, these guys weren’t expecting resistance, and weren’t fully clothed. I think Jin just “surprised” the rape squad. GO, JIN!
Okay, I was holding this from yesterday because I felt it wasn’t in the spirit of the strip, but seeing the humor being posted today…
Golems of Wapsi
With apologies to Warren Zevon
I saw a Golem Girl with a coffee menu in her hand
Walking through Wapsi Square on the main
She was looking for a place called Mucho Mocha
Going to get a big cup of souchong lapsang
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
If you hear them prowling around your bedroom door
Better not let them in
Pixie Girl got silly-stringed late last night
Golems of Wapsi again
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
She’s the golden-eyed girl that could destroy the world
They say she’s been crazy forever
Better stay away from her
Takes a lot to make her purr
I’d like to date her mother
Ah-hooo
Golem’s of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
Well, I saw Paul Taylor walking with the girl
Doing the Golems of Wapsi
I saw Pablo Taylor walking with the girl
Doing the Golems of Wapsi
I saw a golem drinking a Manhattan at the Cerberus Club
Her body was perfect
Dhep!
Ah-hooo
Golems of Wapsi
Ah-hooo
Bravo!
You could have created an original rather than spoofing off Werewolfs in London.
Yes, but then we wouldn’t have known the tune to sing it to. That’s why most of my songs are written to scan with American Folk tunes… Like “Camptown Races” for a song I wrote about the Clinton impeachment trial.
True. I’ve also written some flic songs of my own for cons. But I still prefer original tunes.
Following in the tradition of The Capitol Steps…
*sigh*
im gonna be singing those words next time i hear the song…
As I think about the plot, it seems to me that Mayahuel is ultimately responsible for everything. She is the root bad-guy in the whole horrific mess. Her fanatical quest to fix Jin led to the slaughter of thousands.
She helped build and then screwed up the calendar machine by trying to use it to fix Jin (as was her purpose for getting it built in the first place). This resulted in the earth being in a time loop for 85,000 years, in turn, resulting in man’s progress being held back for all that time. Not to mention the changing of what would have been for millions had she not done it. Worst of all, she left the secret of chimera making behind, knowing full well they would use it in some way. She just didn’t care. She could have cleaned up that loose end first. She clearly had zero aversion to outright bloody multiple murders to further her plans. The priests learned from her case to break the victims first so the torture was, in effect, her fault as well. In any event, this all lead to the near extinction of her people. I call that bad, regardless of the intentions.
Either that, or she was so single-minded it never occured to her that these things would go so very wrong…which doesn’t make her a bad or evil person…just flawed à la heroes of Greek Tragedies.
I could see that were it not for two things. Her killings for one. That alone instantly takes her from tragic hero to murderous villian. Second, she was obviously cunning, cold, calculating and brilliant. There is no way she would not have thought about what would be the result of her actions. She just didn’t care what happened to others. Again, no would-be hero. Closer to a psychopath.
As Forrest would say, evil is as evil does. People have known this for millenia … “By his deeds shall a man be known” … “Ye shall know them by their fruits.” And of course, especially applicable here, “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Oh yes, and “Life is like a box of evil,” or something like that.
Ah, but heroes in the old days were usually not far removed from psychopaths. Hercules killed his wife and kids in a fit of rage, Odysseus (aka Ulysses) crippled a beggar for no reason except putting on a show, Egil Skallagrimsson was a stone-cold killer, extortionist and general bastard, at one time he poked out the eye of his host and vomited in his face because of sheer paranoia (he got so drunk he figured the host had poisoned the beer), but he was still Iceland’s greatest hero and one of its best poets. People weren’t squeemish back then. An example of the emotions manslaughter would excite in a medieval hero: Glum is described like this in an Icelandic saga, The Story Of Viga-Glum: “Glum went home, and then a fit of laughter came upon him, and affected him in such a manner that he turned quite pale, and tears burst from his eyes, just like large hailstones. He was often afterwards taken in this way when the appetite for killing some one came upon him”.
Today we expect better from our heroes, and, to be sure, Jin has changed with the times. I think it’s obvious that she has bettered herself a lot over the span of her long life.
If that’s how it is, then you gotta cut the priests some slack as well. What they did was just the way things were done back then. Not being evil to their way of thinking, just doing their jobs. Breaking the girls as they were ordered.
Yes, SoWhyMe, you’re absolutely right. Breaking the bodies and spirits of men and women was done all the time in societies built on slave labour. It was all in a day’s work for the guards, I suppose. And I think the priests must have thought they were acting out the will of their god(s). It’s a bit surprising that Jin should even care what happened to two girls who were neither friends nor relatives. She must have had an unusually strong sense of justice for her era.
(I couldn’t click “reply” on your post, so I answer like this instead).
I agree with all this, except I’m suspending judgement on her carelessness with golem tech. We haven’t seen the circumstances, she may have reserved a crucial step she thought the priests would never figure out on their own. Or she may HAVE killed everyone she thought could duplicate the process, but the priests were smart and secretly took notes on what Maya did. Or she may have been arrogant and thought they’d never be able to make more golems without her, OR go further and create the Chimera. We need more information to tell how badly she screwed up on this, if at all.
Well, there you go. Even if she did kill those involved, etc. that would still make her evil. Use people to get what you want then cover your tracks by murdering them. After all what’s a few more bodies to someone who has already taken several lives so effortlessly? And since they all seem to be male lives, well, who cares, right?
scoff scoff
Maybe responsible, but not necessarily evil. Her single mindedness is probably a result of trying to help her daughter.
Much like Jin cursing the world to be burned back to the stone age to try and help two innocent girls that were dropped into the pits of hell.
When appointing blame to this whole mess we do open a huge can of worms. Such as why Jin let folk like Napolean or Hitler ever do anything when she knew exactly where to stop them before they did their damage. Jin surely had a fairly stable understanding of what was going to occur and could have made the world a different place. After so many lives couldn’t she have improved things even a little… or is this the improved version? I am surprised that question didn’t come up by now… Actually sounds like a pretty cool story loop there… Just saying… (que Jin flashback)
We’ve got no evidence that Jin didn’t stop Hitler dozens of times. Remember that after a few cycles she’s going to know that history will be reset, and all the evils of the previous cycle undone. She probably messed around with history a lot, watching various outcomes – which implies that our history is where she decided ‘Meh. Good enough.’
Another consideration is what worse might happen if you change things for the better.
The best example is probably the Titanic.
If I recall my history right, the Titanic cost the lives of hundreds, but led to the monitoring and dynamiting of dangerous icebergs. The fitting of all ships with sufficient lifeboats to take everyone off, the standard of having a double hull for ships, thus reducing the risk of sinking further, AND supposedly the elimination of a developing class system in the US. The “Unsinkable Molly Brown” was “new money”.
Now, cruise ships are even larger. What would the death rate have been on a later vessel, or series of vessels, if the Titanic had been saved?
If Hitler were assassinated as a child, what monster would rise up to replace him? Would this new monster be savvier, more successful?
Good points. My thought is that it would be interesting to hear her tell it… Like that one time when she offed Hitler only to have Elvis become dictator of the world… the options are limitless and slightly silly if pushed. Heil Elvis!
http://comics.com/frank&ernest/#152d38dded4509b766f3a955ec68ae5d
Interesting commentary today…but IIRC, Jin committed suicide inside the pit after she was thrown in, at first making her appear weak to the others, but she had the higher purpose in mind all along, and I think this arc will hopefully explain that more clearly.
BTW, I love the “Oh GNARLEY!” look on the face of the guy on the left in the middle panel. He should prolly look more panicked at this point, tho…
Looking at the Guards, I think a likely scenario is that the Jin was lock-in with the girls by the frighted guards. She couldn’t get out or the girls out… So she become a martyr, hoping to take control of the Chimera…It didn’t work.
PBH
I’m hoping Paul is not about to succumb to the all too popular fetish of showing a female kill several males (usually bloodily). Unfortunately, they all seem to go that route sooner or later so chances are all too good. If he does, I will have lost all respect for him and it will be my last Wapsi. Not that my participation matters, of course.
Jin’s mother did, and with less reason than we know for Jin. (I don’t count the Chimera Apocalypse as being the girls’ fault, of course.) Is your objection to the killing because Jin is female or the priests are male? Or just that this trope is over-played?
Yes.
SWM (quite reasonably from what he’s told us of his background) has Issues with women.
I don’t recall sharing the particulars of why I feel the way I do. Did I? I shouldn’t have if I did.
Oh yes, it IS way overplayed. Still, the story is almost always written such that men are the bad guys and the ones slaughtered. This is deliberate. Notice, even here, ALL the characters who actually do something are females. Yet, as usual, all those shown graphically murdered are males. Some in full color. The lone exception to this is the girl disintegrated by the plasma wall. Tina wasn’t outright killed by someone. That was an accident. And it looks as if it’s about to break into a massacre here.
I mean, Paul could have written this about a cult of priestesses. It would have made sense since he makes all the powerful characters women in this story, even the demons, so why not on the other side as well? But that’s my point, they never do. No matter how many females are involved, the ones killed are pretty much always males. Especially if the killing involves numbers of the “bad-guys.” Remember this is fiction. he could have written it any number of ways, but, like all the others, he wrote it the same old tired way.
As I see it, Wapsi is about to hit a new low with this same old song. I really hope I’m wrong, but I doubt it.
Rather than address the entire body of recent fiction, I will note that in this specific scene we know that these guys are involved in the premeditated murder of (at first) two innocent girls. Only one priest has died so far. We also know that all three women involved are going to die; we don’t yet know how many men will be killed before that happens.
Damn, SoWhyMe, give it up already and quit reading my comic. Just go away if you dislike everything that I’m doing. I’m so sick of everything that you spout when you come in here. Stop reading my comic and go away.
If I disliked everything, I would have been gone long ago. It’s just this one point.
We, also, do not have a confirmation of a body count for Jin in this skirmish. We have only one confirmed kill. The two other priests or guards there are big burly guys. Even with an expert level of Kung-Fu, Jin has the body of an 18 yo girl. If the the burlies have a modicum of fighting skill, they can capture her. Which we know happens.
That’s what I’m hoping will happen. I’ll be a happy camper if it does. An absent camper if it doesn’t.
Of course, we have to remember the usual comic book outcome of this sort of thing is the girl can, somehow, kill an entire platoon of big burly males, even with guns, without so much as breaking a nail or having a gun herself. Not even be winded.
Well, the trope of minions with bad aim is more than just girls vs boys. How many heroes wade through the ‘spear carriers’ as a warm up to the boss fight?
Right. But how often have you seen it the other way around. Let me guess … never?
What sort of story would you have if the hero was wiped out by the minions?
No I mean the minions are females instead of males.
Hell, it could be a trap. insert admiral ackbar joke here She was betrayed by her boyfriend, brought up by Indilee. We haven’t seen any evidence of it the past two strips. Could be these guys are magic-ed up to take her down.
I didn’t realize it was a popular fetish. I mean, I enjoy watching females kick ass, but not bloodily…and my amusement is more with the “teeny person takes out the muscle-bound gorilla” aspect, and less to do with gender.
Aaaand that probably explains why I love watching Scott Pilgrim so much. That dude looks way too scrawny to be able to fight worth a lick.
It’s very popular, especially in Manga and super hero comics. Movies too. The latest Resident Evil movie clearly illustrated this fetish. There have been several movies devoted to this of late.
I wish I were better at analysis and synthesis like some of the folks here. Interesting suppositions and hypotheses being tossed around. Today’s artwork is gripping.
Jin’s eyes in the last panel make me suspect she’s not quite human at this moment in time, but I can’t be sure. Paul rarely draws something haphazardly.
Good observation. Why does she have slits for eyeballs if she is still human at this point? Maybe she and May never were human? Aliens? It could explain May’s inordinate knowledge of “magical” things.
May had reptile eyes when she did the slice-n-dice audition for the Lanthan priest. he was immortal from the Calendar Machine start-up, but not a golem yet…
Gawdammit. She was immortal..
Yah..gremlins are rife today..
made me even muck-up a correction…
Aliens? What about “demons”?? What if demons were constantly in the background, manipulating all to get the bloodiest outcome, just for their amusement.
They do not know time ,so having a world restart again and again, and hopefully leading them to forget, gets them the constant re-newed joy of watching carnage unfold.
It’s basically what the rogue demon implicated when trying to manipulate Monica shortly before “fixing” the calendar-machine. Only problem was that Monica, smart cookie that she is, saw through them.
Demons remember all the resets – Tina’s Collective are the only ones who don’t.
We saw Jin’s snake eyes and fangs five years ago when Jin remembered this event. So it’s not a continuity error.
I don’t think there’s concern about continuity. I think everyone’s more puzzled by the implications of such a detail.
snake eyes and fanged teeth seem to be a representation of pure anger/rage at this time.
least i always read it as thus.
most comic drawers seem to make their characters spout fangs when they’re angry
These… Pipes…. ARE CLEAN!!
ROFL. I can hear that insane little voice now…
I hear insane little voices all the time. You get used to it.
Paul, I think you aah… I think you switched the two guys…
cause the guy with the stocky neck is to the left of the fire in the third frame, but in the forth he would be to the right… I know its not a huge deal, since they’re about to die, but it’s bothering me…
…is anyone else vaguely creeped out that the guy she’s about to stab semi-looks like the same face shape as her current boyfriend?
Add some hair and it kind of looks like him. Or I might be reading too much into this.
As a completely irrelevant aside, I’m traveling to Wisconsin tomorrow…and I just realized that the weather there is still only getting to highs in the 30s. I’ve already stowed my winter clothes since we’ve been getting highs in the 80s. *shakes head* Crazy Northern Weather.
That’s a high price to pay for fresh cheese…
Now that’s a sort of evil we need more of. Maybe if more bad guys got eviscerated by hand, we wouldn’t have an expanding crime problem. We’d have to start at the top though.
Chittlins for everybody!