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Post by Nepycros on May 14, 2014 7:02:45 GMT
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Post by Gotolei on May 14, 2014 7:04:53 GMT
MORT FUN TIME MORT FUN TIme mort... fun time? ;_; that animated background though |
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Post by adjarn on May 14, 2014 7:06:25 GMT
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime...
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.
Wilfred Owen
edit to note the obvious: 'it is good and right to die for your country' is the meaning of the phrase
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Post by foresterr on May 14, 2014 7:10:45 GMT
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Post by Chancellor on May 14, 2014 7:14:26 GMT
*Insert frames of Ronnie Filyaw speaking in sadness*
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Post by jasmijn on May 14, 2014 7:15:18 GMT
'member when we all thought Mort was a boy soldier because of that one phrase? I wonder what the point of this bonus page is. What is Tom trying to show us here? Most of the time I can work out these kinds of things myself, but this time I've got nothing. EDIT: ah, foresterr, you may have a point there. |
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Post by Angry Individual on May 14, 2014 7:17:47 GMT
Bless you.
Also boo.
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Post by keef on May 14, 2014 7:22:49 GMT
Tom, thank you for writing.
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Post by Rasselas on May 14, 2014 7:28:12 GMT
Oh god, this was the perfect ending. It just...struck me. By some weird coincidence, this is what I was listening to when I checked the new update: Poltergeist Theme |
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Post by warrl on May 14, 2014 7:58:29 GMT
'member when we all thought Mort was a boy soldier because of that one phrase? In a sense, he was. Soldiers at their best defend their homeland and people. Mort died trying to do precisely that. |
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Post by vhu9644 on May 14, 2014 7:59:48 GMT
In this silent room, unseen by eyes A sweet, but fitting ghost once lie Who for his country, has truly died Thats the meaning i got from the sequence of panels albeit in poem-ish form. Country meaning the court in a sense  |
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Post by philman on May 14, 2014 8:43:12 GMT
Perfect ending...
I'm glad Mort got the last word, but Mort Fun Time would have been far too jarring.
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Post by eightyfour on May 14, 2014 9:24:52 GMT
Here I'm on my daily round across various webcomics, minding my own business with a big fat smile on my face, since they're all so funny, when I finally come across this page. Well, talk about mood whiplash. Random trivia time: According to Wikipedia, "Dulce et Decorum est" roughly translates to "it is sweet and honorable...". Very fitting. |
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Post by philman on May 14, 2014 12:15:06 GMT
Here I'm on my daily round across various webcomics, minding my own business with a big fat smile on my face, since they're all so funny, when I finally come across this page. Well, talk about mood whiplash. Random trivia time: According to Wikipedia, "Dulce et Decorum est" roughly translates to "it is sweet and honorable...". Very fitting. It's more famous as a line from the WW1 poem quoted by adjarn above, criticising the old idea that death during wartime is anything other than nasty, bloody and violent... Both meanings of the phrase are appropriate here. |
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Post by quetzhal on May 14, 2014 12:34:03 GMT
'member when we all thought Mort was a boy soldier because of that one phrase? I wonder what the point of this bonus page is. What is Tom trying to show us here? Most of the time I can work out these kinds of things myself, but this time I've got nothing. EDIT: ah, foresterr, you may have a point there. The page emphasizes loss. "Mort is no longer around". It's a narrative device - like how people who lose someone they love often find themselves thinking "Oh man, X would love this!", or how they find themselves expecting to meet that person just around the corner. You can't help it - it's instinctual, you're just so used to that person being a part of your life. Then you remember that they're gone and get that crushing sadness in your heart again. We're being taken through that same thought process in this page; he's taking the reader through the stages of grief that Annie and Kat probably feel. All the times they walk through this corridor, all the times they peek into that room - they won't be able to help but expect Mort to pop out of nowhere, shouting "Boo!". They're going to find themselves searching for him, briefly, before they remember he isn't there anymore. They're going to feel the pain of that loss all over again before they collect themselves and move on. I think it's also to show just how much life Mort brought to that place. Without him, it's just... empty. Lifeless. Then Mort pops up in the background shouting "Boo!", presumably because he lives on in the hearts of the readers. /my thoughts |
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Post by King Mir on May 14, 2014 14:48:10 GMT
The background with Mort disappearing is a nice touch.
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Post by adjarn on May 14, 2014 15:14:02 GMT
Do also want to add that the meaning of patria here has an appealing duality. Naturally it harkens to "the old Lie" and the great wars, which Mort by circumstance died in. Can anyone say that he really recognized the danger in helping Jones? He died then an innocent civilian.
But Mort's country for the last however many years has been the Court and the ROTD. Here, he chooses to "die" for Annie's sake, so that she might have more experience. He dies - now properly - a soldier helping Annie fight her cause. Is this good and proper, sweet and honorable? Perhaps through it being a rational choice - one where Mort could not help but be aware of the finality of his decision - it was indeed honorable for him to choose. Mort, as a ghost, has been depicted throughout as a child: physically still as small as he was when he died, and potentially mentally trapped as the emotionally precocious youngster he was decades before. How much more poignant and depressing makes his choice, considering his still very innocent outlook! How much can he really understand? And yet how much did those first war soldiers understand as they were conned by "the old Lie" into service!
A very good choice of adage overall, I'll have fun thinking about this today.
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icekatze
New Member
Nothing Important
Posts: 22 
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Post by icekatze on May 14, 2014 19:50:51 GMT
hi hi
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight, he plunges at me...
I think I'm with the ROTD, some people don't get what they deserve, and deserve a second chance.
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Post by whitehawk on May 15, 2014 0:47:37 GMT
Hurrah for Wilfred Owen! Now it makes sense! (War doesn't make sense. The allusion on the wall makes more sense). I wonder whether the thing on the wall is supposed to be a memorial to people associated with the Court who died in the War. But then again, Mort died during the Blitz, which is not Wilfred Owen's war. If only Mr Owen had lived to see the Armistice...
Another possible ending image would have been a field of red poppies. QDEP.
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Post by mistrali on May 15, 2014 1:19:34 GMT
Er, I'm confused as to the actual location of the inscription(plaque)? Is it in the same room Mort used to hang out? In the RotD? Poor Mort. It makes me sad that he never really had a useful afterlife/job in the RotD.  |
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Post by Eversist on May 15, 2014 1:34:36 GMT
Er, I'm confused as to the actual location of the inscription(plaque)? Is it in the same room Mort used to hang out? In the RotD? Yes, it is near the room that Mort hung out in in the court (where Annie first came across him). This page here: |
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Post by warrl on May 15, 2014 2:17:28 GMT
If Tom wants to do a second bonus page, I have an idea for it.
We're looking past Annie at that same door with the same brickwork around it. No bookcase though.
Katrina is not in the picture.
Antimony is kneeling on the floor, burying her face in an empty hospital bed.
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Post by whitehawk on May 15, 2014 5:24:37 GMT
If Tom wants to do a second bonus page, I have an idea for it. We're looking past Annie at that same door with the same brickwork around it. No bookcase though. Katrina is not in the picture. Antimony is kneeling on the floor, burying her face in an empty hospital bed. That ship has sailed, compa'. You should draw that page if you want to see it, because this chapter was in the can at least a month ago. |
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Post by warrl on May 15, 2014 6:48:39 GMT
You should draw that page if you want to see it Me? I might be able to produce something sufficiently similar to a bed to be recognizable as a really bad drawing of a bed... but I wouldn't bet on it. |
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Post by nightwind on May 15, 2014 10:01:55 GMT
Do also want to add that the meaning of patria here has an appealing duality. Naturally it harkens to "the old Lie" and the great wars, which Mort by circumstance died in. Can anyone say that he really recognized the danger in helping Jones? He died then an innocent civilian. The only one that could have known the ghost Mort came to the court was Jones. I think she was the one who wrote the sentence on this wall, recognizing his intentions of saving her. Definitely no emotions, Jones. Right.  |
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Post by arf on May 15, 2014 11:51:17 GMT
Hurrah for Wilfred Owen! Another possible ending image would have been a field of red poppies. QDEP. Squint, and repeat in the meter of 'In Flanders Fields': "In Gunnerkrigg, the floorboards flow, between the school desks, row on row." I do think this end page strikes a very fitting mood, though. |
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Post by nero on May 15, 2014 16:02:25 GMT
I can't believe this is the last time we'll see Mort. I am glad that there was a whole chapter covering Mort's departure. Annie and Kat have grown up even more now that they have lost a friend.
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Post by shade390 on May 16, 2014 17:32:35 GMT
Yo I'm new.
For anyone wanting a translation for the page, it reads:
Panel 1: I die for my country.
Panel 4: To rest.
Panel 6: it is sweet and fitting.
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Post by keef on May 16, 2014 19:10:45 GMT
Welcome I prefer this one: Without him, it's just... empty. |
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Post by Laerthes Black on Jul 25, 2014 15:13:02 GMT
So much feelings about this strip... I'm happy for Mort because he finally goes to the Ether, but to see Annie cry like that... it just breaks my heart.
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