Well … Tina seems to think she is. And so do all of the other demons that we have encountered, including Queen Doubt. And Phix, and Tina’s gut-deep, instinctive reaction to Phix so testifies…
Maybe if you take a bunch of demons and fuse them together, they become a soul? Either way, self-discovery and self-reflection are a very human thing. Love the expression on the face of the cat and Tina’s thoughtful visage in the last panel… like she’s reading her word balloon.
Shelly accidentally fused all HER demons together, and got a conscience. I imagine if a sufficiently traumatic event happened to Tina her demons might fuse, too, and then you’d get Tina 3.0…
I think the co-op that is Tina is slowly learning through contamination how to be human, mortal, and alive. The longer she “lives” the more human she will become, maybe not fully but approaching it more and more. Heck it might be her reward for her part in all this stuff.
The demons seem to feel some things through the body’s sensations. One of Monica’s mentioned how they love pizza. How can they love pizza unless they can somehow taste it through the body of the person they “inhabit?” I’m pretty sure Dominos doesn’t deliver to the demon world. Likewise, even though the demons can’t feel pain, they may experience it indirectly via the body. Either that or we’re being prep’d for the revelation Tina is still in there somewhere, but can’t communicate or be sensed directly.
Do demons dream of Devil’s Food Cake?
You can make the argument that demons are anything from figments of our imaginations to fallen angels to minions of Lucifer etc…
If they exist, do they have their own rules or system of beliefs? Do they embody the Seven Deadly Sins, or can they apply self-determination to guide their actions?
Well, Tina is one of those rare demons (or collections thereof, technically) who got what all the others wanted. She got a fresh start, lost all her prior memories. That’s what Monica and Jin’s demons wanted during the whole calendar machine thing, although the ended up being foiled.
If she were any other demon(s), she’d not really be having that sort of crisis of identity.
Tina reminds me of a character from a project of my own. Both could technically be called undead, but you’d not think of them with the sorts of conotations which usually go along with that term.
In the case of my gal, she still has life functions, they merely no longer derive their energy from biological means. The vital processes of the body are carried out, just in new ways powered by an external energy source, rather than through cellular activity. Cell damage is repaired not organically, but synthetically. Homeostatis is not only maintained in new ways, but the very parameters of what is homestasis for her have changed. The entire mechanism of the body has been overhauled and converted to produce nearly the same end results of biological life, but via very different means.
And interestingly enough, Tina shares her development of a “pain” sense. My gal designed her new form to have a damage notification system which simply made damage obvious without the incapacitating effects of pain. Over time, however, she found her mind had acclimated to the new sensation of damage information and slowly started to read it as “pain”. To combat this, she began to charge the output, so to speak. Kinda like when you get too used to an alarm clock you’ll sleep through it, but if you switch to a new alarm sound it jars you every time?
Anywho, ain’t I supposed to be talking about Tina? She’s still one of my favorite characters in this story and I love seeing more of her. But we need some Katherine too!
Well, perhaps Tina experienced something similar: The damage occured, and “electric signals” (or some other energy) travelled along her nerves (or equivalent) to her brain (or…”nexus of consciousness,” for lack of a better term). It felt painful only because the body was meant to interpret those signals that way.
Of course, I’m probably talking out of my ass & it might be best to ignore me.
Thank Mogg for the archives. I forgot what it was that hurt… and I should mention that’s a really awesome way to present the archive strips, very conventent. Huge thanks to Pablo and Phil Hofer.
Existentialism, soul searching, possibly soul finding, .. All I know is I’m relieved to find Tina’s foray into Johnny Knoxville territory was in fact NOT a “Big Lipped Alligator Moment”
I’d like to believe that Tina’s emergence from the accident as a collection of demons was not a static state…perhaps having once been human allows for continued evolution? Perhaps “soul retrieval”?
I’m also beginning to wonder if the relationship dynamic between Jin and Alan, more than the destruction of the calerndar machine and the end of the time loop, is what is leading to her current “core” crisis? How would Tina react in a romantic relationship?
Kitty cares not about such deep, complex metaphysical questions; kitty just cares about a regular supply of food and water, and the occasional warm lap and scratch behind the ears.
I’m a long time reader of Wapsi Square but this is my first time commenting.
I just wanted to say that the sun light effect in this strip is awesome… when I saw it I could *feel* the warmth. Keep up the good work!
I’m reminded of the time Monica hypothesized that Tina has become “human”, in a way. Something about how she implied that she might be evil…but also said evil is a human trait, not a demon trait…
Is the Committee turning into a comprise/compilation/composite/fusion soul? An E Pluribus Remix Unum? Is the pussy-ignored pain a portend of perplexing problems of prodigious proportions?
Oddly enough, I know EXACTLY the way that feels, and had NEARLY that exact train of thought. Just remove the “coven of demons” part and replace it with something I don’t know the name of. …I just try not to dwell on it. It gets depressing after a while.
Oh, no – i’m not heading down that rabbit hole.
Too late.
…Perhaps Tina isn’t a collection of demons?
Well … Tina seems to think she is. And so do all of the other demons that we have encountered, including Queen Doubt. And Phix, and Tina’s gut-deep, instinctive reaction to Phix so testifies…
Maybe if you take a bunch of demons and fuse them together, they become a soul? Either way, self-discovery and self-reflection are a very human thing. Love the expression on the face of the cat and Tina’s thoughtful visage in the last panel… like she’s reading her word balloon.
Shelly accidentally fused all HER demons together, and got a conscience. I imagine if a sufficiently traumatic event happened to Tina her demons might fuse, too, and then you’d get Tina 3.0…
I REALLY like the backgrounds!
They become a conscience as Shelly showed when she did that very thing with her demons.
At least not entirely anymore.
I think the co-op that is Tina is slowly learning through contamination how to be human, mortal, and alive. The longer she “lives” the more human she will become, maybe not fully but approaching it more and more. Heck it might be her reward for her part in all this stuff.
So she doesn’t count as a soul, but she’s asymptotically approaching a soul?
So Tina is comforted because… she feels more alive… because she felt pain?
Oh.. oh god. Monica’s going to walk in on her slitting her arms or something. 🙁
Demons don’t feel pain? That’s an interesting datum.
I’m not sure I buy that, though. It really looked like Jin’s Queen Doubt was feeling some pain as she was being sucked through the portal…
I was betting on anguish…
Those demons that Tina knocked out at the Cerebus Club sure looked like they were feeling pain.
I adore the background art in the top panel.
Nice — Tina is getting in touch with herself… in a rather odd way, but still…
Ah . My favorite of the girls is back .
The demons seem to feel some things through the body’s sensations. One of Monica’s mentioned how they love pizza. How can they love pizza unless they can somehow taste it through the body of the person they “inhabit?” I’m pretty sure Dominos doesn’t deliver to the demon world. Likewise, even though the demons can’t feel pain, they may experience it indirectly via the body. Either that or we’re being prep’d for the revelation Tina is still in there somewhere, but can’t communicate or be sensed directly.
Dominoes is delivered FROM the demon world. That’s why demons are so hip on their hosts ordering other pizza – so they can have the good stuff. 🙂
I take it that we’re going to focus on a set of characters a week until we’ve gone through them all?
I’m guessing it will be Bud and Brandi next week, possibly Phix and Gregory the week after and then Shelly the week after that.
We may even have some more of Katherine, Tepoz or the dog before we get back to Monica or Amanda.
If she has a physical human body why does she have swirly eyes?
(They come and go? There’s a ‘normal’ when required?)
Poetically, eyes are the windows of the soul. If your ‘soul’ is a conglomerate of demons you’ve got to expect some oddities.
“I’ll be damned if I ever understand how all this works.”
Amen to that, kiddo.
Do demons dream of Devil’s Food Cake?
You can make the argument that demons are anything from figments of our imaginations to fallen angels to minions of Lucifer etc…
If they exist, do they have their own rules or system of beliefs? Do they embody the Seven Deadly Sins, or can they apply self-determination to guide their actions?
They do have rules. That’s why Jin’s doubt ended up sucked through the doorway.
But in this case, who’s rules apply? Demon’s or Paul’s?
Same thing.
The answer, of course, is “Yes.”
Does anyone else see any irony in a demonic collective experiencing existential angst, no matter how mild?
Well, Tina is one of those rare demons (or collections thereof, technically) who got what all the others wanted. She got a fresh start, lost all her prior memories. That’s what Monica and Jin’s demons wanted during the whole calendar machine thing, although the ended up being foiled.
If she were any other demon(s), she’d not really be having that sort of crisis of identity.
~D.
Tina reminds me of a character from a project of my own. Both could technically be called undead, but you’d not think of them with the sorts of conotations which usually go along with that term.
In the case of my gal, she still has life functions, they merely no longer derive their energy from biological means. The vital processes of the body are carried out, just in new ways powered by an external energy source, rather than through cellular activity. Cell damage is repaired not organically, but synthetically. Homeostatis is not only maintained in new ways, but the very parameters of what is homestasis for her have changed. The entire mechanism of the body has been overhauled and converted to produce nearly the same end results of biological life, but via very different means.
And interestingly enough, Tina shares her development of a “pain” sense. My gal designed her new form to have a damage notification system which simply made damage obvious without the incapacitating effects of pain. Over time, however, she found her mind had acclimated to the new sensation of damage information and slowly started to read it as “pain”. To combat this, she began to charge the output, so to speak. Kinda like when you get too used to an alarm clock you’ll sleep through it, but if you switch to a new alarm sound it jars you every time?
Anywho, ain’t I supposed to be talking about Tina? She’s still one of my favorite characters in this story and I love seeing more of her. But we need some Katherine too!
~D.
Well, perhaps Tina experienced something similar: The damage occured, and “electric signals” (or some other energy) travelled along her nerves (or equivalent) to her brain (or…”nexus of consciousness,” for lack of a better term). It felt painful only because the body was meant to interpret those signals that way.
Of course, I’m probably talking out of my ass & it might be best to ignore me.
Thank Mogg for the archives. I forgot what it was that hurt… and I should mention that’s a really awesome way to present the archive strips, very conventent. Huge thanks to Pablo and Phil Hofer.
I like Tina. <3
Existentialism, soul searching, possibly soul finding, .. All I know is I’m relieved to find Tina’s foray into Johnny Knoxville territory was in fact NOT a “Big Lipped Alligator Moment”
This is so friggin’ awesome.
I’d like to believe that Tina’s emergence from the accident as a collection of demons was not a static state…perhaps having once been human allows for continued evolution? Perhaps “soul retrieval”?
I’m also beginning to wonder if the relationship dynamic between Jin and Alan, more than the destruction of the calerndar machine and the end of the time loop, is what is leading to her current “core” crisis? How would Tina react in a romantic relationship?
Delicious questions, all…
Kitty cares not about such deep, complex metaphysical questions; kitty just cares about a regular supply of food and water, and the occasional warm lap and scratch behind the ears.
“E’s a bleedin’ cat. W’ot the ‘ell else do ya expect?!?
A Cockney cat?
Sorry, that was a quote from memory, and should have been W’ot the bleedin’ ‘ell did ‘e be ‘spectin’?
I think it was supposed to be Cockney, but never having been exposed to the real thing, I cannot testify to the veracity of the accent.
To the sentiments expressed — oh, yes.
That reminds of something from another comic.
Yep — that’s about right. To a dog — you’re family. To a cat — you’re staff.
I’m a long time reader of Wapsi Square but this is my first time commenting.
I just wanted to say that the sun light effect in this strip is awesome… when I saw it I could *feel* the warmth. Keep up the good work!
I agree; Paul keeps on pulling things from his imagination that make me say, “Ooh! Pretty!”
It gives a sense of realism to his work – even though it can be a bit jarring to see photo-realistic background behind an inked-in character at times.
I keep forgetting that Tina is just a committee of demons all living together in Tina’s body.
I’m reminded of the time Monica hypothesized that Tina has become “human”, in a way. Something about how she implied that she might be evil…but also said evil is a human trait, not a demon trait…
If that’s the case… (shudders at the thought)
Is the Committee turning into a comprise/compilation/composite/fusion soul? An E Pluribus Remix Unum? Is the pussy-ignored pain a portend of perplexing problems of prodigious proportions?
so the demons are advisors, the souls are the leaders and either should be able to feel pain…hmmmmmmmmmm
Oddly enough, I know EXACTLY the way that feels, and had NEARLY that exact train of thought. Just remove the “coven of demons” part and replace it with something I don’t know the name of. …I just try not to dwell on it. It gets depressing after a while.
…in retrospect, it’s surprising it took this long for an existential crisis to show up. Well done, Paul…
“I hurt myself today/To see if I still feel/I focus on the pain/The only thing that’s real…”
I just noticed the handling of light in the first panel. Don’t know how I missed it before. Fabulous.