Annotated 6-20
Although it’s lightly implied, Byron’s “everything comes together” line really should accompany an actual image of Gigundus’ remaining parts falling to pieces. Still, I like how his lines here feel like callbacks to his punning in his big Chapter 1 scene.
Proposed alt texts for this page: “The clothes have no emperor./You’ve been hit by a smooth criminal.”
ICYMI, Scarlett’s middle balloon is “How could you understand?”
The fact that Scarlett essentially impersonates a man to retain power may give her something subtly in common with Frigg, who wears armor that would be considered at least gender neutral on our world and, from what we’ve seen, on hers. She even briefly disguises her gender in Chapter 2, just to rub it in her opponents’ faces once it’s revealed.
We’ve seen Scarlett go to great lengths to perpetuate the presence of Priestlord Gigundus.
But I have to wonder, before this whole “Weekend at Bernie’s” debacle at their tabernacle…
How exactly DID Gigundus pass away?
Auto-erotic asphyxiation. That’s the real reason they had to pretend he was still alive.
I don’t think there ever was a real one…
Scarlet just said that he died to soon.
Granted she could be lying to keep up a less useful facade of “okay this Gigundus wasn’t real, but there was a real one” but personally I don’t recall seeing anything that would make me think that.
If it was this easy to dismantle Gigundus, then Ardaic could just have shoved him down a flight of stairs or something; he didn’t need to manipulate the Peacemakers to deal with it.
Did he want them to do this? Or did he just wing it after it was fait accompli?
Ardaic told Scarlett where to find Frigg. Or maybe not Ardaic, but someone working for the Heads of Houses. I mean, when Syr’Nj became a Head of House, His Grace Whatshisname rubbed her face pretty hard in the fact that they had orchestrated the whole thing.
Plausible deniability. If crap hit the fan because of Gigundus’s death, the House could simply blame it on the Peacemakers. Especially since they did it of their own accord.
But also, Ardaic couldn’t just simply take out Gigundus. He also had to take out the Sister Scarlett. Ideally, at the same time. That way Scarlett couldn’t bottle up in her temple and army of nuns. Would of been an annoying issue for the House to deal with.
Come to think of it, we never found out what the real Gigundus looked like under the armor. And maybe that was for the best.
Also: this strip was originally published the year before Skyrim was released. Guilded Age, ahead of its time. ^_^
We do see him briefly in a flashback in Chapter 38, Page 20.
Oh dang, forgot all about that!
No one likes a ventriliquiter.
Um… Just for the record, armor pretty well is gender neutral in the real world. The typical design of female breastplates in fantasy is idiotic. Rather than deflecting blows away from vital organs the custom shaping ends up redirecting a significant portion of incoming strikes right to the center of the chest.
Real female warriors have armor that looks just like mens’ armor. If there’s any adjustment to be done it’s in the padding on the inside.