Annotated 37-4
All dialogue here is Flo’s, and what a wonderful piece it is. She really captured the profound mixed emotions running through Gravedust right now. He misses Byron too, and he’d love to ease Syr’Nj’s pain: “Our friend. Our brother.” He even puts in a nod to Syr’Nj’s argument: “A defier of death.” And yet…death should be death, isn’t that what a mystic should believe? There’s also the notion that more life for Byron might not even be a mercy, not after all that happened in Pardo’s village. “Must he fight on?”
The direction on the visuals and the quiet at the end, though, is me. I feel like the awkward soundlessness of the funeral parlor is more powerful here than any response the powers could’ve given.
Note that Byron is the only one of these many corpses to have been mummified, preserving his body as much as possible. It’s very likely Syr’Nj did this herself in order to increase the chances of reviving Byron, but it could also be the younger sky elves, volunteering their people’s techniques to aid Syr’Nj’s purpose. Hollister and Clair don’t seem particularly bothered when they meet an alive Byron later, so they’re probably not too skittish about resurrection spells. (Spoilers?)
I’ve been curious why the last chapter is the only one titled “BBWTE PageNumber” while this returns to form of ChapterNumber-PageNumber”.
Also dang Waltrip doing Gravy dirty giving him the horns when that man’s a saint.
The simple answer is that “Breaking Bread with the Enemy” was an “extra” story like the Axemas specials and “Mental Health Day.” We set it off that way because (1) it was shorter than a regular chapter and we didn’t want you to expect it to go on as long, (2) it was the bonus tale specifically promised to our Kickstarter backers, and (3) it was the kind of awkward compromise you got when two writers increasingly disagreed about an outline: “#37 should be the team dealing with the emotional fallout back in Asallah En-Qu’Lara, Flo. That’s how we PLANNED it, and I’m tired of procrastinating story beats just because–” “But bruv, we need to get the aftermath with the Champions in there!” “Do we really? I mean, can’t a lot of that be taken as read? Hammerhead seemed to make his position pretty clear–” “Here, let me use my bonus story on this, you won’t regret it.” (And I didn’t.)
Oh goodness yes, I believe you mentioned it was intended as an extra story in your annotations. I should’ve connected the dots. Sorry!
It really does feel like a proper piece of the story that fits perfectly where it is.
That was my experience, too. All other “extra” stories looked like they were not in-continuity until the main story acknowledged them (different style, tone, setting, time…), but in this case, I didn’t notice anything different — and it’d be weird to imagine the whole thing without it.
About the Gravedust horns, supposing it was an intentional artistic choice and not an accident, it could be how he sees himself in this instant. After all, bringing people back from the dead is a big no no to the mystics, yet Gravedust has done it before, and here he is trying to do it again. That would effect anyone’s self perception especially with all the other dead people who aren’t being asked to be revived
What horns??? ;- /
The torch behind him in panel three make him look like he has burns and his head is on fire. It made me do a double-take as well
Horns* not burns stupid phone
Oh, THOSE horns. Well that’s just a fortunate (or UNfortunate) coincidence, you might say. The way I designed the room and set up the shot for that panel, with the torches being placed about twenty feet apart and about six feet high, things just sort of got lined up that way. I did try to defuse them with some “distance coloring”, but… yeah, they do look like horns, don’t they. ;-D
Good thing I decided not to post my 20-page dissertation on the overall neutrality of the cosmos and its implications for good and evil.
Twas a bit silly.
Really…?Looking at panel 4, it seems as if that torch was significantly taller than Gravedust and not far behind him, but in panel 3 it’s either just a little taller (perspective is up, but only just so), or much further behind. Almost as if someone shrunk it down a little for panel 3…
Although I suspect that Gravedust wouldn’t have looked much better if they’d been just a bit taller…
Well, it could be a matter of perspective. Panel 3 appears to be from a viewpoint around the level of Gravedust’s waist, whereas the last two panels have a viewpoint well above him, which would cause him to appear foreshortened. Panel 2 is more straight-on, so it probably shows the most accurate comparison of the relative heights of Gravedust and brazier.
The alt text reminds me of this:
https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0007.html