Annotated 27-15
O
h, right, this part! Shanna now has Carol pegged pretty well. When this conversation began, she thought Carol might be totally cool with the murder, but Carol’s reaction in the last page nixed that theory. So Shanna now knows that Carol does have some moral qualms and that it’s mostly her loyalty to HR that’s been keeping her in place.
Rather than go straight to “your boss is the devil and you’re a dumbass for thinking otherwise,” which would not be out of character from her, Shanna adopts a much more effective tack, using Carol’s defining trait against her while stirring up her doubts and regrets, sort of fusing them all together into a ball of “your current existence is hell, and I am the way out of hell.”
I mean, it’s still not gonna be that easy to sway Carol from the path she’s on. But it’s starting to look possible.
Panel four, Shanna doesn’t know just how prophetic she’s going to be.
It’s a shame this beautiful park scene is in monochrome. I bet those–autumn?–leaves are glorious in full color.
Re: the hovertext, I don’t think killing six dudes would really make HR “History’s greatest monster”. There’s been worse people with much higher killcounts, even when not looking in the “genocidal dictator” category which is where History’s greatest monsters are generally found.
I mean he’s still a murderous madman but he’s not, like, the people over there: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_serial_killers_by_number_of_victims
Except he was actually bridging the gap between worlds, there at the end.
He had selected the whole “Eldritch Horror” and “This world isn’t even real” narrative, and we’ve all seen that played out in every Lovec-racist fantasy.
The hovertext does not specify where he will be remembered.
This is what we know in hindsight: He’ll be responsible for loads of death and suffering in Arkarra and even was/will be a real threath to it’s very existance, with a famous book written about it by Gravedust.
He was a threat to Sepia world too, far as I can tell. He was bending both realities. Let’s be honest, he wouldn’t have stopped until he achieved the same control in Sepia that he achieved in Arkerra.
Shanna does give a darn fine and convincing speech here. Color me impressed.
Shanna doesn’t know it but she just planted a little seed that will grow and eventually help save the day.
Not all of us are glowy-bullshit mace wielders or spiritual mystics, but whatever little we are able to do can still change history even if by only a notch. Sometimes that’s all it takes.