Girl Genius

Pink Stuff is blooded but unbowed. Let's not count our chickens before they are hatched.

Hmm: Gil has a knife. I wonder if or when that will come into play.

adam 850, There would be a certain sense to having Gil be the one to finally be the one to take Pinky down, seeing as until recent events (the Lu-ification of Zola and the discarding of Obfuscating Stupidity) Gil's sort of been an apologist for Zola. That would be a good way to show that he's realized that she was evil all along, although I can't imagine that would do good things to his psyche.

I'm struck by Zola's I hate to waste a nice-looking boy. It has two interesting echoes. First is that Higgs is hardly a boy. To someone of Zola's apparent age, he would be of about her age. (We know he's much older, of course.) So we might conclude that Zola is much older than she looks. Second, her hate to waste attitude is very much like Lu's own: males are to be seduced, used, subjugated, etc.

As to nice-looking, she may just be trying to flatter Higgs. It doesn't work, of course.

But if she's Demonica's daughter and Lu's niece, how can she be much older? Unless she's absorbing more of Lu than she believes, or she is really Violetta's grandmother in a younger body. If Lu was willing to use her daughter, why wouldn't someone else be similarly willing? In which case, perhaps the Zola Gil knew is a broken fraction of this Zola.

If the Higgs Reveal is the real point of the whole Third Act, he has to change the story. Perhaps Agatha is NOT The Heterodyne. Perhaps Bill and Barry never were, either.

edited 19th Oct '10 9:22:49 PM by GreybeardFan

Greybeard, I suppose that's possible, but I interpreted that more as just slang. It's not uncommon for people to use "boy" or "girl" when referring to adults, for some reason even less so in a romantic context. Furthermore, I would say the usage does indicate a view of the referred person being naive, inexperienced, or just more stereotypically (in this case) "boyish". In my recollection, Zola wouldn't know how old Higgs was, and, as long as he looked good and about her age, wouldn't care. Here I think it's just a turn of phrase which suits her, and esp. Lu-in-her. As a matter of fact, I was thinking with Friday's comic that Zola's manner was slightly more like Lucrezia than formerly, although since she had been acting before it's difficult to say.

As a funny side note, I was just writing a short jazz song the other day (not something I do at all frequently but it got oddly stuck in my head), and used "boy" and "girl" in a somewhat similar context. I still feel like I have not explained the situational usage of the terms well enough to satisfy myself. I also realize that it is likely you knew of the usage so I hope I don't come off badly—it's just in my nature to explain things in these types of situations. Basically, I don't think the Prof. F are dropping hints with that line, although I have been wrong before :)

How much of Higgs has Zola seen? She has some of Lu's memories of him in the GMC. Otherwise she's seen him for the first time this scene. And his physiognomy in that last panel of Monday's page is no bland visage. It is Menace; it is Threat; it is the glare of Doom breaking over the horizon.

It's possible that she's just making a Zolaesque excuse, temporizing before the scram. But even so, it seems curious.

Here's a thought: Could Higgs be the son of Mama Gkika? It would explain his Heterodyne history as well as his appearance in the family rathskeller. And if men find attractive women who look like their mothers, Zeetha's hair might remind him of Mama.

edited 19th Oct '10 9:58:42 PM by GreybeardFan

Certainly, Gkika is our best example so far of an ancient, scary-powerful Jager who still looks pretty close to human.

Hadn't thought of that. It would explain why the Jaegers allowed him in there - and allowed to to take Battledraught, given that they don't do that for just anyone - especially if he and Gritka are both extremely old and thus could have been doing their thing for centuries. It'd also explain the accent without him necessarily needing to be a Jaeger,

We already had good reason to believe Zola liked keeping young men as malleable resources. Not only were the many sparks she got tangled with in Paris great examples, but Gil was himself a nicely hoarded resource. Further we have seen her technique for manipulating them...she's very skilled. Assuming that the comment about not wasting boys is Lu speaking flies in the face of pretty much all our accumulated evidence regarding Zola, her attitudes, and her MO. Even if she is fond of Gil, one suspects that it would never occur to her not to continue to use him, any more than it would occur to most subsistence farmers not to slaughter the pig once it's up to weight, or to sell the calf and milk the cow regardless. Not just an opportunistic feeder, but into a primitive form of herd maintenance.

Would like to know what Violetta is up to...freeing Gil, waiting to get a shot in, or something completely different?

My bet remains on Zola surviving this, though I would NOT be surprised if the Fs provided a "presumed dead" ending for this volume. Even a limp corpse that, under the effect of augmentations and moveit, slowly revives in the first pages of the next volume, or other similar routine. It's even in keeping for the pulp genre assumptions, where the apparent death of heroes and villains is never reliably final. Yes, you TOO can hurtle over Reichenbach Falls, or come crawling back out of the swamp that swallowed you.... I really trust the moment will come when someone chants, "She's baaaaaa-aaaaaack!"

No real new info on Higgs yet. We knew he was big, we knew he was bad, we knew he kicked butt, we knew he could beat Bang when already injured. This tells us more about Pinky's ability to absorb punishment than anything. But, hey...it satisfies a lot of blood-lust out here in Reader-Land.

Hey, I just had a thought about Higgs! What other (formerly) blond man, with a tendency toward sideburns, do we know who's habitually laid back, knows lots about the old Heterodyne days, and spent lots of time around Jagers? Carson! Look at the image of the link and compare it tothis.

Hypothesis : Vanamonde's father really died during the attack on der Kastle. But as we know, death is a poor excuse for a servant of the Heterodyne, so he got revived using some variant of the jagerdraught.

So far only two characters have kept coming back when they should have been dead: The Other and Othar Trygvassen. Adam and Lilith were revived, but that's a one-time thing.

...and Klaus: Missing, presumed dead. And Selnikov, the horseless head-man.

It would explain a lot though. How he knew about the maps, the tunnels, the older Heterodynes, and the Dyne, and why the Castle knows him and describes him as not "my" lackey.

Revival of Vanamonde's father, OR Klaus Barry:

Unless Carson was a) wrong about who the corpses are, or b) lying to Agatha about the details of what happened, then c) while both could be cloned, neither could be revived. A HUGE stone block larger than your entire body landing on top of you on a solid stone floor tends to leave very little brain to work with. Puree, yes. Brain, as such, no.... Higgs could be a clone of either (though he seems too old for that in more ways than one) but he couldn't be a resurrectee.

Selnikov hardly counts, since they would almost certainly not revive him to continue his life, and we were never told that Klaus was dead, only that he disappeared (and we were told how and why).

Yes, Son-of-Carson would answer the questions—maybe. It depends on whether Carson's son was old enough to really remember Old Igneous. Of course, that might have been a legend, and it's possible too that Igneous was the father of Bill and Barry and that his demise was managed by an overdose of Dyne water.

For the most part, our guesses have been built around the idea that Higgs is older that Bill and Barry by at least one generation. Carson's son would seem to be of the same generation, given Carson's age and given that Vanamonde was an infant at the time. (And it would be just like the Foglios to build a key to the story around Vanamonde-the-infant.)

What if Higgs is a construct, or a repaired person, with the memories/mind of someone else? or possibly a slew of someone elses?

Also, can't remember if I've commented on this before, but, Please, not Zeetha.

Well, from the way I read this panel, the block came down on Carson's son below the shoulderblades...

Possible, but my eye still reads it as an arm reaching — and the arm being the only thing that escaped the falling block.

The drawing is not conclusive. Here's what I see:

There is a palm up left hand. Palm up strongly suggests face up, but it's not certain. The buttons on the sleeve are on the thumb side, which is the opposite of normal and suggests that the arm is twisted with the body face down. If the body is face up, the head is deeply under the block; if the body is face down, the head is at the bottom of the page and might have escaped full crushing.

Hippogrif, you are better qualified than I am to comment on the accuracy of Phil's clothing. He did study fashion design; that is established fact.

If Carson were to learn that his absence as Seneschal were what made the whole thing possible, it might kill him—unless Agatha were there to give orders.

Before the death of Lars, we spent some time with him, learned of his relationship with Abner and his interest in Agatha. Then we followed him on the rescue mission, and then ... he was dead. And Maxim gave him a hat.

Before this scene, Zeetha had slowly been moved into a position of importance, the Fairy Godmother, so to speak. And now she is at least mostly dead, and she may be most irreparably dead. The only reason to think not is that she has more strands in the plot web than Lars ever did—and that the Foglios must surely know that we have developed a deep affection for her. Or a fascination with her. Or an infatuation. Or .... And, if you like, you can add that there is nobody there to give her a hat—though we'll see what Higgs does.

edited 20th Oct '10 12:25:07 AM by GreybeardFan

How many blows to the head do you think it would take to stop the neural prison working? Never mind the trilobytes, I'm thinking brain damage.

Who knows? We have no idea how it all works to begin with, nor whether Zola is augmented in other ways, or what Moveit #11 does. Your guess is as good as mine.

Greybeard, he's good at costuming, but it's like all his other work. He's fast, expressive, and sometimes twists things up by mistake on top of that. So...I always figured the baby might be visible, but that Carson's son was not.

Oh, another REALLY obvious "presumed dead." One where the narrative was even structured to leave the readers unsure for a bit.

Agatha. Olga. Crab clanks. Apparent death...unchallenged until AFTER Gil and Bang have gone away, Gil grieving. Yes, we all suspected she would live, because, well... D'oh. Title character? But, still, it's part of the way the game is played in pulp-land. Dead is always a bit uncertain, and resolutions are only as good as this episode as often as not.

Pinky,Talk to the Fist,'cos the Higgs don't wanna hear.

I think they really should have worked on Higgs in the third-to-last panel more. I know it's supposed to signify that he got knocked out of his super-speed movement suddenly from the wound, but it makes his proportions look all out of wack.

Also, if he has this super speed thing, wouldn't it have come in useful when trying to save the Baron?

Recall that we've heard of Higgs prior adventure third hand, at best. And, according to Dr Sun's account, originally the story was recounted by a somewhat inebriated Higgs. I suspect Higgs story of being ... creatively edited, at least.