Important bits from the retrospectives

[V]

I would like to make this topic a shared collection of important pieces of information that were explained in the video retrospectives, even though they were or may have been unclear from the comic alone. These things pop up from time to time so it would be nice to have a central repository for future reference, or for other readers' convenience.

I'll start with two:

1. The creatures Tony met in Annie and the Fire are not psychopomps.

From Chapter 53 retrospective, 5:40:

Magnolia – And these creatures definitely aren't psychopomps, right?
Tom – No, they're not. They're probably not even physical creatures.
[...]
Magnolia – I sort of assumed they were like creatures that prey on grief or something like that...
Tom – That could be one way of describing them, yeah. I kept the details of them extremely vague because not even Tony would be sure what they are or who they are [...]

2. The opening page of Memories of the Worthless explained

To me it wasn't clear at all whether Coyote's peeking into Ysengrin's mind, scratching out memories of events, fuelling the hatred, or what. But as heard in the beginning of Chapter 66 retrospective:

Tom – In this first page I kind of wanted to convey the idea that Coyote's fingers were coming in here, placing images of Annie into Ysengrin's mind over his feelings of hatred [...]

I'm sure there's more as I haven't even watched all the videos yet. So, any contributions welcome.

[jda]

Jun 16, 2021 16:31:48 GMT V said:

I would like to make this topic a shared collection of important pieces of information that were explained in the video retrospectives, even though they were or may have been unclear from the comic alone. These things pop up from time to time so it would be nice to have a central repository for future reference, or for other readers' convenience.

I'll start with two:

1. The creatures Tony met in Annie and the Fire are not psychopomps.

From Chapter 53 retrospective, 5:40:

Magnolia – And these creatures definitely aren't psychopomps, right?
Tom – No, they're not. They're probably not even physical creatures.
[...]
Magnolia – I sort of assumed they were like creatures that prey on grief or something like that...
Tom – That could be one way of describing them, yeah. I kept the details of them extremely vague because not even Tony would be sure what they are or who they are [...]

2. The opening page of Memories of the Worthless explained

To me it wasn't clear at all whether Coyote's peeking into Ysengrin's mind, scratching out memories of events, fuelling the hatred, or what. But as heard in the beginning of Chapter 66 retrospective:

Tom – In this first page I kind of wanted to convey the idea that Coyote's fingers were coming in here, placing images of Annie into Ysengrin's mind over his feelings of hatred [...]

I'm sure there's more as I haven't even watched all the videos yet. So, any contributions welcome.

Fascinating. Thanks, this gets very helpful, as I for one cannot always watch the videos, nor understand completely what is said (non English native here)

[todd]

So Magnolia's been taking part in the retrospectives, alongside Tom? (I stopped watching them when my computer lost its sound.) I hadn't known that. (By coincidence, I recently started reading her webcomic "Monster Pulse" - it's just ended, but I've been going through the archives, one chapter at a time. It's quite good.)

[pyradonis]

Wow, great idea, V! I usually lack the patience to watch the videos, so I am looking forward to whatever will be collected here.^^°

[V]

3. You can be pushed into the ether unknowingly

I mean, even if you know the stuff and can enter it at your will. This happened to Annie in Crash Course with the wisp claiming to be the Bismuth Seed. We knew it was an etheric scene because of her scar appearing (between panels) but I guess the transition was so smooth that she did not notice?

From Chapter 44 retrospective:

Tom – We also see Annie's being pushed into the ether without really knowing it and we get the sense that there's something not quite right going on here...

[arf]

A useful thread to start.
Come to think of it, Tom hasn't done a retrospective for nearly a year now (his last one being Chapter 74: Moving).
I had thought he was intending to get to the end of volume 8 before giving it a rest.

[V]

Today I learned something unusual about Jones but I don't think it's too important given what we know by now. Listing here unnumbered.

From Ch. 36 retrospective, 7:26:

Tom – This is in the age of touchscreen phones but for whatever reason, Jones has an old flip phone, which is kind of a small hint. And I guess it's not a huge spoiler if I just mention that the reason why she uses a button phone is because she simply cannot use a capacitive touch screen, they don't seem to react to her in any way.

[Gemminie]

Jun 21, 2021 7:25:03 GMT arf said:

A useful thread to start.
Come to think of it, Tom hasn't done a retrospective for nearly a year now (his last one being Chapter 74: Moving).
I had thought he was intending to get to the end of volume 8 before giving it a rest.

I miss the retrospectives. I hope he does more.

Also, why hasn't he given this current volume, Volume 9, a name? Doesn't he usually name the volumes? My guess is that a volume name would be spoilery. Maybe he's holding off until it's over before revealing the name. And maybe retrospectives could be spoilery too, so he's waiting a bit before doing a batch of them.

[pyradonis]

Jun 21, 2021 16:03:07 GMT Gemminie said:

Jun 21, 2021 7:25:03 GMT arf said:

A useful thread to start.
Come to think of it, Tom hasn't done a retrospective for nearly a year now (his last one being Chapter 74: Moving).
I had thought he was intending to get to the end of volume 8 before giving it a rest.

I miss the retrospectives. I hope he does more.

Also, why hasn't he given this current volume, Volume 9, a name? Doesn't he usually name the volumes? My guess is that a volume name would be spoilery. Maybe he's holding off until it's over before revealing the name. And maybe retrospectives could be spoilery too, so he's waiting a bit before doing a batch of them.

I thought the names were always only revealed towards the end, or when the cover was revealed as well.

[philman]

Jun 21, 2021 7:25:03 GMT arf said:

A useful thread to start.
Come to think of it, Tom hasn't done a retrospective for nearly a year now (his last one being Chapter 74: Moving).
I had thought he was intending to get to the end of volume 8 before giving it a rest.

In the past he has had gaps in the retrospectives and then done a load at once after some big event or major reveal has happened, and then he has been able to talk about foreshadowing events without spoiling the big reveal later on. It wouldn't surprise me if this happens again after the next big world changing event.

[blazingstar]

I haven't kept up with the Retrospectives (watching long YouTube videos is very taxing to me) but I love the idea of keeping a set of forum notes about what we learn from them!

Commenting so this thread will be bumped to the top and followed.

[alevice]

Thank you for this trhead. I am also taxed on time so watching videos is not feasible for me, so this notes are great!

[pyradonis]

About chapter 77: The Thousand Eyes

Brinnie is ageless and even though she looked as if she was the same age as the other kids at school, she was probably really much older.

The place where the Norns are met is outside of time, i.e. time did not pass while Annie, Kat, Anja and Brinnie visited them.

Tom guesses Kat and Annie are 17 years old at the time of this chapter.

[todd]

Nov 22, 2021 12:27:16 GMT pyradonis said:

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Tom guesses Kat and Annie are 17 years old at the time of this chapter.

[/quote]

I was surprised at that at first, since I didn't think that much internal time had passed in the story, but then remembered the "six extra months" due to Loup's interference.

[mturtle7]

Oh I completely forgot about this thread! I was recently commenting on another thread, though, about a thing which should probably go here.

About chapter 48: Tall Tales

The pink frog-fish monster featured in this chapter is actually a "Canvey Monster", an obscure folktale from Southeast England.

Not mentioned in the video, but I also found a little more information on this thing for those who are curious: cryptidz.fandom.com/wiki/Canvey_Island_Monster

[V]

From 79 – Find Yourself, 7:23:

This is where Gamma was the whole time!


(#2413 - #2414, then made explicit in #2415, but I never made the connection!)

A few seconds later on:
Tom – To everyone else she's lost, but that's because she's just floating behind the panels in this sort of black space.

[ysenfrown]

Dec 19, 2021 19:34:19 GMT V said:

From 79 – Find Yourself, 7:23:

This is where Gamma was the whole time!
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(#2413 - #2414, then made explicit in #2415, but I never made the connection!)

A few seconds later on:
Tom – To everyone else she's lost, but that's because she's just floating behind the panels in this sort of black space.

oh that's VERY cool. thanks for the share!!

[maxptc]

Dec 19, 2021 19:34:19 GMT V said:

From 79 – Find Yourself, 7:23:

This is where Gamma was the whole time!
View Attachment
View Attachment
(#2413 - #2414, then made explicit in #2415, but I never made the connection!)

A few seconds later on:
Tom – To everyone else she's lost, but that's because she's just floating behind the panels in this sort of black space.

Lots of important information. So as I now understand it, whatever Loup did to split Annie was a type of messing with reality, and the chaos processer that is Zimmy + Gamma undid it, just by interacting as it did with such chaos. I understand the flow Tom was going for, but I do think some clarification would have helped.

[blazingstar]

Chapter 54: Meetings and Re-Meetings - Tom confirms that no one was killed when Coyote knocked over one of the Court's little buildings. It wouldn't have served him to kill humans at that point, and it would have defeated his argument that "Annie is safe in the forest".

No mass casualties seen in-comic yet. We'll see if that trend continues when we get to the Retrospective of Chapter 81/82.

[todd]

Jan 3, 2022 20:36:11 GMT blazingstar said:

Chapter 54: Meetings and Re-Meetings - Tom confirms that no one was killed when Coyote knocked over one of the Court's little buildings. It wouldn't have served him to kill humans at that point, and it would have defeated his argument that "Annie is safe in the forest".

And, from a storytelling point of view, it would be too disturbing to have people get killed in the collapse and then ignore them and move to the consequences for Annie.

[blahzor]

Jan 3, 2022 20:36:11 GMT blazingstar said:

Chapter 54: Meetings and Re-Meetings - Tom confirms that no one was killed when Coyote knocked over one of the Court's little buildings. It wouldn't have served him to kill humans at that point, and it would have defeated his argument that "Annie is safe in the forest".

No mass casualties seen in-comic yet. We'll see if that trend continues when we get to the Retrospective of Chapter 81/82.

The court just makes buildings to be possibly destroyed. There's way more abandoned places than there are people like they build them ahead of any possible population influx. Or have been moving people to the new place for decades that's why builds are now empty

[Eversist]

Jan 4, 2022 1:53:14 GMT blahzor said:

Jan 3, 2022 20:36:11 GMT blazingstar said:

Chapter 54: Meetings and Re-Meetings - Tom confirms that no one was killed when Coyote knocked over one of the Court's little buildings. It wouldn't have served him to kill humans at that point, and it would have defeated his argument that "Annie is safe in the forest".

No mass casualties seen in-comic yet. We'll see if that trend continues when we get to the Retrospective of Chapter 81/82.

The court just makes buildings to be possibly destroyed. There's way more abandoned places than there are people like they build them ahead of any possible population influx. Or have been moving people to the new place for decades that's why builds are now empty

I guess that’s possible, but I think the prevailing theory is that the Court literally grew/grows from the Bismuth Seed that’s been mentioned multiple times, which was somehow etheric. I personally feel like it's no longer purposeful or controlled. There’s just a seemingly supernatural amount of buildings represented. It may also be partially why Coyote created the trench between the two, to slow the encroaching growth of the Court into the forest (and supposedly vice versa).

I wonder if this question will ever be outright answered.

[warrl]

Jan 4, 2022 1:53:14 GMT blahzor said:

Or have been moving people to the new place for decades that's why builds are now empty

They could not plausibly have moved even a tenth of that many people out, and kept it secret. Those buildings have never been mostly-occupied. (It's possible that any given building has previously been occupied at some time, and that MOST buildings have been occupied at one time or another, but not most of them at the same time.)

[Druplesnubb]

Chapter 77: We will come back to how the first kat convinced the norns to let her meddle with time in a future chapter (11:11-11:28).