Annotated 23-15
I dunno, Bandit, Byron seems to be doing a lot of distracting all by himself. But I guess he’s no longer a predictable factor.
Now this page, Phil was pretty much on board with, except maybe for the lingering intensity of Byron’s reaction in panels 1 and 2. The serious side of Sundar is that the dude is fully aware of his sins and desperate for some kind of redemption. I think he knows, on some level, that he’s never going to get an unforced version of that cheer he’s trying to start in panel 1. But still, he has gotten a nation to follow him, if a bit reluctantly, and of course he’s gonna get angry and scared if Byron jeopardizes that. And his fears may not be unfounded: Rabbit at least seems on the verge of turning on him in panels 3 and 4, and Tamara is hard to read.
Also, we just kinda casually slip in there that Byron knows about Brunhilde. Her deeds left an impression, even in a community of adventurers. But as we’ll see, he doesn’t know her full story.
Byron, of all people, should know better than to assume somebody who’s fucked up in the past can’t have bettered themselves and try to make things better.
Byron should also know better than to let his guard down, Sunder landed that sucker easy.
When did Byron A.) ever actually make a moral mistake that caused other people the kind of harm Sundar did and B.) forgive himself for what he actually did, which was not a moral failing but a horrible accident, thus enabling him to understand the concept of redemption for someone like Sundar?
I just have to say that the combination of the flat (though shaded) cartoonish characters in the foreground, in combination with the naturalistic/blurry background, makes for a really cool effect on this page in particular.
I really like panels 1 and 3 in particular.
They weren’t just pirates –
they were CAVE-DWELLING pirates!