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Post by madjack on Jan 12, 2022 10:24:11 GMT
I don't know whether that is necessarily the case. I've been thinking about whether all manifestations of "power" that we see are actually Ether-derived per se. The wards, in particular, seem to be something that Parley and Eglamore share with "other teachers", who may or may not be "inside" the Etheric boundary. Tony traveled widely, including places he thinks weren't "real places", and it's an unfounded assumption that all of the places he's been are "inside" the Ether, as well. Certainly at least a couple of people at Court have been "outside" the Etheric boundaries, or they would not be considering a wholesale move. The ether is stated to be the sum of human history and imagination, so I'm not sure anywhere on earth is technically 'away' from it. Etheric 'powers' work fine outside of the Court (where Paz has talked to animals), though the jury is out on whether wholly etheric creatures could survive in the real world, not counting hybrids like the fire elemental lineage. The speculation I made was based on the assumption that where the Court is going has to be either another world entirely or a location on earth that they've found or created that allows this ether free re-location to be practical.
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Post by imaginaryfriend on Jan 12, 2022 13:20:51 GMT
Not sure what the Court is planning (because with effectively unlimited resources plus a god-tier etheric power charge you could do nearly anything or go literally anywhere/anywhen in a universe with layered reality and time travel) and while I could see the Court potentially abandoning some people a number of important people in it have etheric abilities or ancestry and I don't think they're the sort to easily let go of anything useful. That either means that they intend to keep using those people somehow or that whatever they're intending on doing/wherever they're going those people will be useless (or a liability) to them afterward.
The Court (as a physical location) is currently in a state of disorder compared to what it was before; they may be merely planning on making one last really big score and then absconding to a more orderly location in the normal world with their loot, and continuing their research there in style. What's left could be like a prison colony where the etheric-ability haves would be both guards and inmates, holding the line against the creatures and keeping the rest of the world orderly from behind the curtain. The Court (the institution) might even continue to send kids with strange powers there.
Maybe they're planning on abandoning reality entirely by traveling (through the ether) to an alternate reality that operates on purely "scientific" principles, in which case they might need the mojo to open the door there or create the place, pacify current inhabitants, or for an emergency return-ticket home in case things don't work out. If that's the case then ethereally-abled people may not be able to exist there without upsetting the applecart. They might infect everything or just die on arrival, or somewhere in-between. Not sure that would work out because as long as they're humans they'd still generate ether from their subjectivity but maybe they can borrow Kat's newman tech and become something more robot-like. Then maybe it'd work. From the perspective of everyone in the main GCU they'd effectively cease to exist, but in their own stories they'd enjoy a perfectly predictable material existence.
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Post by pyradonis on Jan 12, 2022 17:20:43 GMT
Putting my theory on where they plan to go here:
More seriously, mostly the implication derives from the fact that you cannot travel far enough on Earth to simply escape the reach of powerful enough Etheric beings. [...] Then maybe the place they are planning to move to isn't on Earth at all. Remember the previous generation of Court kids already built rockets to transport satellites into orbit. And are those huge habitats where plants are grown inside buildings really only for decontamination purposes, or also to test how to build artificial environments?
Further possible hints noticed by mochakimono and lurkerbot: Huh! That's a really intriguing point. Maybe those old chapters with the training sims IN SPAAAAACE were a lot more on-the-nose in their intended purpose than initially assumed? Wrap your low-grav obstacle courses in an air of silly old cinema camp, and kids might miss the part where they're being prepared to jump around in low-grav...
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Post by speedwell on Jan 12, 2022 23:37:54 GMT
It strikes me that Coyote's then-enigmatic statement, that the Court was man's attempt to become God, turns out to be shockingly precise. After all, we may now assume from the evidence that the Court believes that all of the mystical beings and mystical abilities in their universe are Etheric, and that those beings and powers don't exist outside or without the Ether.
I speculate that the Court hasn't adequately explored whether they are correct in that belief. I predict the comic won't go that far (it makes better plotting sense to me for the Court's effort to somehow come to nothing), but it would be amusing to find that non-Etheric mysticism does exist, but in a different form. There's enough ties in this comic to alchemical concepts to suggest at least one such form. (Edit: Anya said she believed that alchemy is an old form of what is at present called Etheric sciences, but I think she is actually mistaken since the powers of Forest and Court have no particular resemblance to alchemical works. She's probably just repeating the fairly common view that alchemists were just crude and fumbling ancient scientists.)
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Post by batsugars on Jan 16, 2022 6:41:50 GMT
Putting my theory on where they plan to go here:
More seriously, mostly the implication derives from the fact that you cannot travel far enough on Earth to simply escape the reach of powerful enough Etheric beings. [...] Then maybe the place they are planning to move to isn't on Earth at all. Remember the previous generation of Court kids already built rockets to transport satellites into orbit. And are those huge habitats where plants are grown inside buildings really only for decontamination purposes, or also to test how to build artificial environments?
Further possible hints noticed by mochakimono and lurkerbot: Huh! That's a really intriguing point. Maybe those old chapters with the training sims IN SPAAAAACE were a lot more on-the-nose in their intended purpose than initially assumed? Wrap your low-grav obstacle courses in an air of silly old cinema camp, and kids might miss the part where they're being prepared to jump around in low-grav... Oh wow, that's fantastic. If the court is heading to the moon, does that mean Annie putting her fingerprint on the moon was all part of Coyote's amazing plan!? "Surprise, fellas, THE ETHER'S ALREADY UP HERE."
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Post by batsugars on Jan 16, 2022 7:03:29 GMT
Also, with respect to Friday's page, I would guess that Kat will be loathe to leave her etheric friends behind. So I wonder if Kat's decision in the original timeline was different? It seems likely now that Annie's death at the hands of the forest pushed Kat to hate* the ether, and so she would've eventually left with the court. It lines well with Gamma's comment that Annie put Kat on a better path and is helping the court be better too, and with the Norns' evasiveness when Kat asked "why are you helping me?" (I imagine that an anti-ether Kat could have broken time all on her own, and in other timelines Kat can just ask the Norns. "Why? Because we reaally prefer ether-friendly Kat to the alternative!") *I think "hate" is fitting. At the very least, we can safely say that Annie's death would've robbed Kat of her greatest positive connection to the ether. Aside from her mom, but iirc, Anja was only prompted to discuss the ether because of Annie.
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Post by blahzor on Jan 18, 2022 8:58:00 GMT
I don't believe this but getting it out there because I thought of it.
Omega Device was something the court made or evolution of the seed bismuth and sometime in the future Kat absorbs it making her the Mecha Angel. Getting posers in The future gives powers in the past because same reason Jones exist
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Post by blahzor on Jan 22, 2022 12:43:19 GMT
New idea. That isn't Shell but Lupe
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Post by Alkazar on Jan 22, 2022 14:10:53 GMT
New idea. That isn't Shell but Lupe That would be devious. I like it.
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Post by blahzor on Jan 22, 2022 16:37:46 GMT
New idea. That isn't Shell but Lupe That would be devious. I like it. Would explain why she knows things but not really
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Post by maxptc on Jan 22, 2022 23:20:47 GMT
Would my thinking Shell and maybe even Atta are trust worthy at this point be considered wild spec? Feels kinda like wild spec.
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Post by drmemory on Jan 24, 2022 0:39:36 GMT
I've been thinking about one of the most interesting characters that we've never heard speak.
I refer, of course, to Becky Ground.
Could the woman on this page possibly be her mother? She has a somewhat similar appearance, and about the same kind of dialog!
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Post by batsugars on Jan 25, 2022 19:17:03 GMT
drmemory made this observation in a different thread: [This post] was all triggered by current events, where I noted that Loup is suddenly comfortable with robots and technology, as well as capable of more subtle activities than previously believed. ...and I suddenly had a thought that was quite unrelated! What if Loup is also Idra? Or, perhaps more reasonably, Idra is working for Loup? Khepi once shrewdly pointed out that Idra was the only elf unaffected by what was going on. I found the comment peculiar at the time, because there wasn't any reason why Idra being an exception would matter. Until now, where we see Loup being very good at being sneaky. Maybe he kept aware of the court's goings-on through super spy femme fatale Idra?
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Post by maxptc on Jan 26, 2022 2:34:58 GMT
Is the arrow technology, after being altered by the first timelines Kat, part of the omega device been suggested as speculation? I dunno how she would get it without the gang, but a trapped soul being part of Omega seems possible to me.
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Post by Druplesnubb on Jan 26, 2022 9:31:29 GMT
No, but that is a pretty good idea. I could see her finding out about it while investigating the ravine where Annie died or something.
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Post by madjack on Jan 26, 2022 10:50:39 GMT
What if Loup is also Idra? Or, perhaps more reasonably, Idra is working for Loup? Khepi once shrewdly pointed out that Idra was the only elf unaffected by what was going on. I found the comment peculiar at the time, because there wasn't any reason why Idra being an exception would matter. Until now, where we see Loup being very good at being sneaky. Maybe he kept aware of the court's goings-on through super spy femme fatale Idra? If anything, im putting odds of her being an agent of Coyote, as a wildcard to help his plan along should Annie need some quiet help after he's gone. Coyote knew Ysengrin wouldn't be able to control Gillitie, so he pre-positions her deep in the Forest so she can avoid the collapse, with instructions that if X ever happens then do Y or else. Is the arrow technology, after being altered by the first timelines Kat, part of the omega device been suggested as speculation? I dunno how she would get it without the gang, but a trapped soul being part of Omega seems possible to me. Shell mentioning the Omega project making everything possible.. " Until recently" is making me wonder how long recently is, and if it could have started malfunctioning when the arrow was released to free Jeanne and Elf Dude. IF the device is, as some have speculated, to be some kind of prediction engine, the contract-breaking and error-inducing arrow might bend enough etheric rules that just having the potential that that represents not tied down in a known state could throw it all out of whack. Hell, it even might have been the creation of the fresh contract for the New People as something the Court doesn't even know to account for that's doing it.
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Post by blahzor on Jan 26, 2022 11:56:00 GMT
drmemory made this observation in a different thread: [This post] was all triggered by current events, where I noted that Loup is suddenly comfortable with robots and technology, as well as capable of more subtle activities than previously believed. ...and I suddenly had a thought that was quite unrelated! What if Loup is also Idra? Or, perhaps more reasonably, Idra is working for Loup? Khepi once shrewdly pointed out that Idra was the only elf unaffected by what was going on. I found the comment peculiar at the time, because there wasn't any reason why Idra being an exception would matter. Until now, where we see Loup being very good at being sneaky. Maybe he kept aware of the court's goings-on through super spy femme fatale Idra? Dam Loup really wanted to bang James
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Post by pyradonis on Jan 27, 2022 22:36:43 GMT
What if Loup is also Idra? Which would mean he tricked James into sleeping with him... While not exactly unheard of from Gods I hope it's not the case here.
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Post by drmemory on Jan 28, 2022 15:53:29 GMT
I was about to write up a theory on the new chapter, about Omega, but all this discussion of Loup and who else he may have been hiding as stopped me for a moment. What about Boxbot? I doubt if Boxbot is Loup, but he could be a long-term agent of Coyote. More importantly, he may have something to do with Omega's motivations. What better example of a robot treated badly by humans? Overall, it seems like the humans in the Court power structure basically ignore the robots or at least take them for granted, treating them as tools, but even our heroes treat Boxbot pretty shabbily! Or he could just be a spy drone for Omega, of course, which would just make it worse...
I'm pretty sure "Boxbot is terrible" is meant to be just a running joke, but WHAT IF he is terrible because he's trying to learn things and figure out how stuff works, with no prior experience? Think of the stuff he's destroyed and the places he's turned up in terms of a little kid AI!
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Post by mturtle7 on Jan 28, 2022 17:20:14 GMT
I've been thinking about one of the most interesting characters that we've never heard speak.
I refer, of course, to Becky Ground.
Could the woman on this page possibly be her mother? She has a somewhat similar appearance, and about the same kind of dialog! Bit late to the party here, but I am LOVING this expanding upon Becky Ground's epic backstory. First we had the introduction of Becky's friend, now we're getting to know her mom, who's apparently an agent of the Shadow Men...if it keeps going like this, she'll have a full-fledged supporting cast!
And now I'm trying to think of a good pun for Becky's mom's name. Flora Ground, maybe?
Edit: Yes. that's definitely her name. Also, the guy who Flora is sharing a look with in panel 4 of that page is Becky's dad, Sid Ground.
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Post by blahzor on Feb 4, 2022 7:02:39 GMT
Maybe a (very nerdy!) Math/Physics/Engineering analogy will work: If personalities are thought of as multi-component vectors, combining them is best thought of mathematically as not a dot product, but a *cross* product. Meaning, their combination is more complex than simply adding together the components - and not restricted to the plane that the two of them define, but rather is free to head off in an entirely new and different direction. Combining Ys and Coyote is more than just adding their personality traits together - their combination can interact in complex ways to produce something quite new - and can head of into rather different, even surprising directions. Think torque.... and apologies for the nerd-out! No worries, quite liked it! I'm quite sure Ysengrin isn't good at physics. Wasn't. Whatever. So I still have to wonder, usually to myself, what he thought was going to happen. Would he have done what he did if he had realized he would be replaced or superseded by Loup?
I have to imagine he was expecting something like "Ysengrin + extra power" to result, rather than "Loup". I feel like Ysengrin had a plan that went awry. One of the things that went wrong was the rage-inspiring discovery about how Coyote had been stealing so many of his memories for so long, while taunting him. Until that point, Ysengrin loved Coyote and intended to take his power so he could kill all the humans. I mean, even here I was still thinking we were seeing Ysengrin with Coyote's powers added. It wasn't until Loup announced himself that we knew that we weren't seeing Ysengrin with Coyote contained inside him and his hair repaired. Then here, we see confirmation that Ysengrin thought he was just stealing Coyote's power and knowledge. Then, on the next page, he says "... Loup took control ...". So that's what I'm poking at here - what is Loup, and where did he come from? Unexpected byproduct (cross product?) of what Ysengrin did? Something created by or caused by Coyote? Related question: When Ysengrin said "Something is... missing..." and was chomped for his trouble, what was he talking about? Ysengrin + Coyote - <something> = Loup???
I wonder if maybe Loup isn't entirely a result of Ysengrin killing and consuming Coyote, but rather something else. What if he was an entity kept captive inside Coyote, released as part of all of this? Sorry, that one is totally wildspec. Moved this quote out of thread and here for a reply What if that missing thing is what the Omega Device ran off of. And by removing Coyote in his state ruins the Omega Device and now that it doesn't work like it did The Court is now moving because it's useless to them. Coyote would know this and is doing all of this to stop the court and keep his controlled chaos of life at gunnerkrigg
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Post by blahzor on Feb 4, 2022 9:44:48 GMT
Galaxy brain wild spec
The computer Kat is using to give them NP bodies is also collecting and merging all of the robots minds into 1 and this is going to go directly into Kat's brain/Mecha Angel form increasing her intelligence to a unheard of level
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Post by Druplesnubb on Feb 4, 2022 11:05:29 GMT
I think the missing parts could be the pieces of Coyote that he gave away.
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Post by DonDueed on Feb 14, 2022 16:39:17 GMT
Really wildspec:
Anja has some tree elf in her ancestry. It's in the eyes...
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Post by abbomeister on Feb 15, 2022 4:54:29 GMT
Just some thoughts I was having, with all the talk of New People and Glass-Eyed-Men.
Muut the Psychopomp had to go retrieve the 'soul' of the GEM possessing Robot near the beginning of the comic. It's been said by Loup that the NP have 'a form of life' similar to the GEM. Under that reasoning, what happens when a New Person is killed? Do any psychopomps show up to take their mind/soul/ energy/something to the Ether, or have they not yet evolved enough to affect the Ether like that? Would the Ether from their deaths go to Kat, as she's the one they worship (like the stories about Ysengrin and Reynardine causing them to manifest in reality)?
Some of these questions will probably be brought up in the next few chapters, but I'm really curious and I can't stop thinking about it! XD
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Post by blahzor on Feb 15, 2022 7:45:01 GMT
The wildest spec
Everyone in the comic that has every appeared is Coyote except Jones, Annie, Kat, the norns, the arbiter + translator and ... Robot
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Post by speedwell on Feb 15, 2022 19:11:16 GMT
Really wildspec:
Anja has some tree elf in her ancestry. It's in the eyes...
If I wasn't perfectly sure this was not the case, I would say that from the way they talk, act, and name themselves, all of the tree elves are intended to come from rural areas of the British Isles particularly associated with the Fae, such as Ballymote in south County Sligo, Fintona in County Tyrone, the Conwy River in Wales, and some rather neglected spots in the inner cities of England. There are a couple of them that made me blink because I could swear I saw them at my local Asda in Strabane.
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Post by warrl on Feb 16, 2022 2:53:47 GMT
There is nothing inherently contradictory about the notion that Anja has some tree-elf ancestry and her being Romany and herself an immigrant from somewhere outside Britain (as indicated by her accent).
In fact, if tree elves and humans are fully cross-fertile with each other and the hybrids have approximately normal human life-cycles, then statistically everyone with European ancestry has some tree-elf ancestry.
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Post by crater on Feb 16, 2022 6:01:54 GMT
Tea is Robot
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Post by speedwell on Feb 16, 2022 22:19:28 GMT
There is nothing inherently contradictory about the notion that Anja has some tree-elf ancestry and her being Romany and herself an immigrant from somewhere outside Britain (as indicated by her accent). In fact, if tree elves and humans are fully cross-fertile with each other and the hybrids have approximately normal human life-cycles, then statistically everyone with European ancestry has some tree-elf ancestry. Oh, of course not. However I was thinking more that some of the tree elves could have come from immigrants to those rural locations from places like Eastern Europe. There are plenty of them, after all.
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