History YMMV / StandStillStaySilent

* HarsherInHindsight: The comic was launched in late 2013, a few months before the European Migrant Crisis began in earnest. The general premise of the prologue, a disease carried by refugees entering southern Europe causing the collapse of Western civilization and that the only way European countries could protect themselves was to close their borders and sink refugee boats, eerily mirrors the rhetoric used by far-right parties and politicians that came to power on platforms of xenophobia and cultural nationalism.

* ShipMates: Emil/Lalli shows up quite a lot as a pairing, and without them the generally agreed upon pool of pairable characters consists of five people, two of whom only have one frequently-seen option. Fanfics going the EveryoneIsGay route will almost universally have the Sigrun/Tuuri and Onni/Reynir combination. Tuuri/Reynir makes Sigrun/Mikkel the most plausible third pairing, as neither of the two latter have any regular interaction with Onni.

* HarsherInHindsight:
** The DistantPrologue spends most of its run pretending to be a typical disease outbreak story, making the comic join a long list of works that can be harder to read after [[UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic Covid-19 became a pandemic in 2020]]. On top of this, the Rash and Covid-19 both have a TyphoidMary phase that can last up to two weeks and possibly share means of transmission [[labelnote:note]]The Rash isn't outright stated to have a droplet transmission mode in-comic, but the ways it can be caught from infected, but non-trollified people fit with one[[/labelnote]].
** The Finland segment of the prologue in particular accidentally became a snapshot of its 2020 real-life counterpart. By that point, people are wearing face masks in public and Eino discusses a possible future ban on public gathering places. There is also a radio show host complaining about Sweden stalling the closure of its borders; during the Covid-19 pandemic, Sweden became notorious for having significantly more lax lockdown measures than the other Nordics.
** The comic was launched in late 2013, a few months before the European Migrant Crisis began in earnest. The general premise of the prologue, a disease carried by refugees entering southern Europe causing the collapse of European civilization and that the only way European countries could protect themselves was to close their borders and sink refugee boats, eerily mirrors the rhetoric used by far-right parties and politicians that came to power on platforms of xenophobia and cultural nationalism.

** If Emil is not paired with Lalli, he tends to be paired with Sigrun. This has resulted in him being overall considered to be bisexual. He's also the top pick for fics depicting one of the younger male characters as a [[{{Transgender}} trans man]].

** See the absolute example of BodyHorror in a Spider-dog-thing-shape run using ribs and legs. Run, Spiderdog, run... See Spiderdog start wheezing like broken bellows as Emil handily outstrips it, even while ATeamFiring and screaming for Sigrun. Comedy and RealityEnsues: it seems that having your ribs in the usual places and doing normal, ribby things instead of ''that'' monstrosity can be more helpful when going for speed and precision.

--> So judging from the comments yesterday a lot of people were a bit bewildered and/or dismayed by Lalli's reaction last page. An here's the shocking explanation for his behaviour: yes, Lalli is very socially and emotionally maldeveloped, and spending a week with a bunch of strangers [[RealityEnsues really isn't enough to fix whatever an extremely unconventional upbringing]] ([[AmbiguousDisorder and perhaps some underlying neural issues]]) [[RealityEnsues has shaped. In fact it is only going to force those problems to the surface.]] So if you're hoping for Lalli to just "grow up" as soon as possible I'll have to deliver the tragic news that it might be a lengthy journey towards that.

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Reynir's parents being AbusiveParents. At face value, it's easy to read them as having an extreme, but justified case of AngerBornOfWorry. However, some aspects of Reynir's interactions with them can ring alarm bells for people who had emotionally abusive parents:
** The little characterization they got during Adventure I establishes that they lied to Reynir about the extent to which he was allowed to travel internationally to keep him home, even after he had reached adulthood.

* CreepyCute: The dusklings, with their almost fluffy looking bodies. Too bad they’re trying to eat Emil and Lalli.

** The JustBeforeTheEnd DistantPrologue causes the existence of a 90 year gap to fill. The fact that no less than three couples from the prologue have an OffscreenRomance and the future wife of one guy only got a name and a face when the family tree was published doesn't help.

** The Scandinavian language Icelanders of the post-Rash era learn is Norwegian, due to Norway becoming Iceland's "closest kin" and the only other country answering to the Norse gods [[labelnote:note]]It's Danish in the present day[[/labelnote]]. This got confirmed via the Icelanders that came to pick up the crew at the end of the first story arc, though a couple of Icelandic Swedish speakers have made very brief appearances as well.

* UglyCute: The fan-nicknamed "Notoro" aka the troll species with which Emil is dealing from page 910 onwards.

* WoobieFamily: The Hotakainens, as the set of characters with the most obvious DarkAndTroubledPast so far.

** The only comment section Minna, the author, has ever had to shut down was due to the extreme toxicity. The page? [[http://sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=549 Page 549]]. In it, Emil calls the Chinese language "Ching-Chong", due to him not knowing the actual name of the language, but recognizing the calligraphy. While not completely innocent in Finland, the word is an even bigger no-no in many English speaking areas, resulting in many virulent comments. The author notes also allude to requests to remove the gag of the characters not recongnizing Chinese entirely, which Minna deemed unnecessary.

** The only comment section Minna, the author, has ever had to shut down was due to the extreme toxicity. The page? [[http://sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=549 Page 549]]. In it, Emil calls the Chinese language "Ching-Chong", due to him not knowing the actual name of the language, but recognizing the calligraphy. [[CrossCulturalKerfluffle In America, "Ching-Chong" is a very crude slur for Chinese people]], and Americans started lambasting and accusing Minna, who was in genuine confusion over what in her country was a simple joke. She eventually edited what Emil called the language to "kung fu", while admitting she didn't understand the culture difference between her country and others on that subject. The author notes reacting to the incident also allude to complaints about the very idea of making a gag out of the fact that everyone not named Mikkel doesn't know the correct name for Chinese.

** The possibility of other survivor pockets outside of the Nordics. [[http://sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=550 The characters even discuss the possibility; Sigrun claims the rest of the world didn't have adequate places to hide in, but Tuuri points out a photograph that might well be from China (considering it's surrounded by other East Asian-style decor, including a book in Chinese)]]. Countries like Russia, Canada and even the northern most states of the USA would have a cold enough climate to help with surviving Troll attacks, and island nations like Madagascar, Australia and New Zealand could have closed their borders around the same time that Iceland did.

** The possibility of other survivor pockets outside of the Nordics. [[http://sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=550 The characters even discuss the possibility; Sigrun claims the rest of the world didn't have adequate places to hide in, but Tuuri points out a photograph that might well be from China (considering it's surrounded by other East Asian-style decor, including a book in Chinese)]]. Countries like Russia, Canada and even the northern most states of the USA would also have a cold enough climate to help with surviving Troll attacks.

* NauseaFuel: The writhing maggots the kade deposits on people's arms to intimidate them. When you first see them, it's easy to mistake the person for starting to mutate into a troll.

** The DistantPrologue spends most of its run pretending to be a typical disease outbreak story, making the comic join a long list of works that can be harder to read after Covid-19 became a pandemic in 2020. On top of this, the Rash and Covid-19 both have a TyphoidMary phase that can last up to two weeks and possibly share means of transmission [[labelnote:note]]The Rash isn't outright stated to have a droplet transmission mode in-comic, but the ways it can be caught from infected, but non-trollified people fit with one[[/labelnote]].

*** The exact source of the idea that he used to be a scout, which is mentioned in some of his Character page entries, seems to have been lost. More accessible sources of WordOfGod contain nothing outright contradicting it. The fact that the "Profession" line on his title card looks like it could have been altered to be made shorter at some point doesn't help matters.

** The Finland segment of the prologue in particular accidentally became a snapshot of its 2020 real-life counterpart. By that point, people are wearing face masks in public and Eino discusses a possible future ban on public gathering places. There is also a radio show host complaining about Sweden being stubborn about closing its borders; during the Covid-19 pandemic, Sweden became notorious for having significantly more lax lockdown measures than the other Nordics.

* HarsherInHindsight: The DistantPrologue spends most of its run pretending to be a typical disease outbreak story, making the comic join a long list of works that can be harder to read after the Covid-19 2020 outbreak. On top of this, the Rash and Covid-19 both have a TyphoidMary phase that can last up to two weeks and possibly share means of transmission [[labelnote:note]]The Rash isn't outright stated to have a droplet transmission mode in-comic, but the ways it can be caught from infected, but non-trollified people fit with one[[/labelnote]]. Peoples' practice of wearing face masks and Eino's suspicion of a coming ban on public gathering places in the Finland segment might hit home for many as well.

** The possibility of other survivor pockets outside of the Nordics. [[http://sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=550 The characters even discuss the possibility; Sigrun claims the rest of the world didn't have adequate places to hide in, but Tuuri points out a photograph that might well be from China (considering it's surrounded by other East Asian-style decor, including a book in Chinese)]]. Countries like Russia and Canada would also have a cold enough climate to help with surviving Troll attacks.

* RewatchBonus: Once the reader knows what will become of each family in Year 90, some events from the DistantPrologue take on a new meaning.
** For instance, Reynir's ancestor mentions having BadDreams in his segment, but the story later reveals the mage package includes having a very specific type of dream, which leads to an AmbiguousSituation about the actual nature of the dreams.
** The existence of TheImmune is only revealed in the story's main time frame and the info page at the end of Chapter 6 heavily implies that immunity is a recessive trait. Every single cast member who's the child of a prologue character is immune, which means that Gøran, Ingrid, Saku, Aino, Veeti and Mia were either immune themselves or just happened to have a copy of the mutant gene.

* ArchivePanic: The comic was just short of 1000 online pages and a little over that number in printed pages (due to double page spreads and the like being presented as a single online page) by the time Adventure I was finished. Adventure II has passed the 200-page threshold as of this being written.

** Separate the segments of the DistantPrologue by weeks or months instead of days, and the Rash outbreak gets a narrative surprisingly close to how media corverage and public awareness of the seriousness of Covid-19 escalated between late 2019 and early 2020. On a more individual level, there is a young man getting his AfraidOfDoctors grandmother to come live with him before the disease hits their area, people losing their job because of the preventative measures, parents keeping their child out of school, discussion of where a pregnant woman will be giving birth and people self-isolating to various extents. Of course, the similarity breaks down when "turning into an UndeadAbomination" joins the list of unforseen complications of the disease in the main story...

* HoYay:
** Some of the interactions between Emil and Lalli resulted in a relatively small but vocal group of fans shipping them quite early into the comic's run. The number has only been growing ever since.
** Reynir and Onni becoming quick friends has caused a few people to ship them as well.
** There is also a comparatively small following for Lalli and Reynir, thanks to their first sort-of encounter via BoyOfMyDreams and [[BelligerentSexualTension the possible alternate interpretation]] of Lalli's hostility towards Reynir. The pair also happens to make a not completely out of nowhere PairTheSpares for those who'd rather pair Emil and/or Tuuri with someone else than them.
** The above is equally true about Tuuri and Sigrun, thanks to Tuuri clearly adoring our captain.
** On page [[https://www.sssscomic.com/comic2.php?page=156 156 of Adventure II]], Sigrun makes a gesture that could be interpreted as referring to breasts while talking about having a life to get back to.

** Thanks to the in-comic narrative itself being ambiguous enough to make this a valid intepretation, many readers believe the expedition's backers downplayed the dangers of the mission and/or otherwise tricked the members of the crew during their recruitment process. According to Minna, everyone was aware of the dangers, and the backers were rather looking for people who would do such a risky job for the very low salaries the were offering; hence they went for people who would generally care more about the experience than the pay. The situation being thus is actually reason for which there is no sign of anybody taking the backers to task over the death that happened during the expedition.

** Thanks to the in-comic narrative itself being ambiguous enough to make this a valid intepretation, many readers believe the expedition's backers downplayed the dangers of the mission and/or otherwise tricked the members of the crew during their recruitment process. According to Minna, everyone was aware of the dangers, and the backers were rather looking for people who would do such a risky job for the very low salaries the were offering; hence they went for people who would generally care more about the experience than the pay. The situation being thus is actually reason for which nobody has been shown to taking the backers to task over the death that happened during the expedition.

** Thanks to the in-comic narrative itself being ambiguous enough to make this a valid intepretation, many readers believe the expedition's backers downplayed the dangers of the mission and/or otherwise tricked the memebers of the crew during their recruitment process. According to Minna, everyone was aware of the dangers, and the backers were rather looking for people who would do such a risky job for the very low salaries the were offering; hence they went for people who would generally care more about the experience than the pay. The situation being thus is actually reason for which nobody has been shown to taking the backers to task over the death that happened during the expedition.

** Thanks to the in-comic narrative itself being ambiguous enough to make this a valid intepretation, many readers believe the expedition's backers downplayed the dangers of the mission and/or otherwise tricked the memebers of the crew during their recruitment process. According to Minna, everyone was aware of the dangers, and the backers were rather looking for people who would do such a risky job for the very low salaries the were offering. The situation being thus is actually main reason for which difficulties inherent to