Annotated 12-11
Phil’s script:
1. The scene: The Gastonian settlement of Brookland has been laid siege to. Human, Gnome, and Shit Elf prisoners alike are being held in chains or driven towards new destinations. The main drag of town is in shambles. Establishments are either being raided, are on fire, or being raided while on fire. Some Savage Soldiers (Mostly Trolls and Savasi, focus on those, but the others are present too) maintain a stoic conduct, others are reveling in the carnage. Supplies are being made off with, fairer women are being dragged off to do God knows what. It’s bad. It’s not a massacre, in that there’s no MASS slaughter. A handful of people are being killed on-camera. But it’s a rout, plain and simple. The town had hundreds, they showed up with ten thousand. There was no contest. No struggle. Over before it started.
The Savage Races had come to Brookland. And Brookland was not prepared.
2. We see a massive Brontothrasher: Imagine a more vertically-oriented brontosaurus with a long, strong neck and a head covered in spines, horns, and other jaggy nastybits (roughly equivalent in size and stature to the Elephants in the LotR movies, these are our equivalents). Its tail is likewise weaponized. Its method of defense is swinging either end like wrecking balls. Upon the top of its back is a fairly regal-looking cabin, where the passengers ride (a platoon normally, but this one is Iver’s, and decorated as such). There are a pair of stakes embedded in the top of its neck, where it meets the shoulder and some reigns that lead to the cabin (this is the method of steering the beast as opposed to putting a bit in its mouth).
The Brontothrasher may be toppling some smaller structures such as lean-tos, wagons, shacks, wells, or just straight mowing through dudes.
If there’s space, there will be a Brontothrasher or two behind it doing similar things, but not as fancy-looking (usually kept in threes at a minimum).
3. At the top of the cabin, we can clearly see Iver standing at the edge, looking down upon all the fine work he and his pals are getting done. His clothes should be different from when we last saw him, now he’s wearing something more suited for a warlord in action than a warlord at rest. If he’s to be wearing armor, it would of course be custom-made.
He gingerly sips wine from his goblet, subtly hiding the immense satisfaction he feels over the catastrophe he has wrought.
Apato season!
Bronto season!
+10 for awesome toon reference!
Looks like Queen Daenerys was here.
Right?
John did an amazing job with this demanding page, that much is certain.
Yeah, the last panel in particular, with the shifting flames… that’s amazing.
“…subtly hiding the immense satisfaction he feels…”
Yeah, I didn’t get that at all from the picture. He looks smug as heck and doesn’t seem to care. Of course, I’m not sure anyone can see him up there, so why should he need to hide it?
Well, the way John interpreted that is that he’s not hiding it from us. We can see his smile, but anyone watching him from the ground would see only the goblet he’s sipping.
“There are a pair of stakes embedded in the top of its neck, where it meets the shoulder and some reigns that lead to the cabin” — Rein, not reign or rain or whatever other homophone there might be.
The one with a g comes from rex/regus, as seen in words like regal, regicide, regulations, etc. so it’s for kings, not for animals.
While I entirely sympathize with your comment, I think you’re fighting a lost battle. The word “rein/reins” is all but gone from the English language; nearly everyone writes it as “reign/reigns” now.
Errrr… I’m generally in favor of not fighting changes in the language too much, but “nobody writes it as ‘rein'” is a massive overstatement at best, and I suspect it’s just plain wrong. Do a quick Google News search for “rein” and you’ll find plenty of correct examples that distinguish between the real or metaphorical straps and the literal state of ruling. (I also think it’s a bit more worth holding onto an aspect of the language when it results in clearer understanding, which is why I don’t support Melville Dewey’s idea that we should have just one spelling per pronunciation.)
Typos would slip into Phil’s scripts and sometimes even into mine, and I didn’t catch them all. Presenting the original script, warts and all, seemed like the more honest approach here.
Should that not have been “Some dwarves just want to watch the world burn”?