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Post by imaginaryfriend on Nov 30, 2022 8:11:54 GMT
Why Renard didn't notice anything odd about the ocean on that cruise. Kat so far hasn't speculated if he was specifically excluded or if they were reducing it to avoid effecting the kids or what. Don't forget they were also testing the affect on the students.
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Post by Ophel on Nov 30, 2022 8:17:51 GMT
And I'm sure Zimmy was just seasick back then. After all, how often does Zimmy get on boats?
I guess they really were talking about the thing where the ocean needing to eat Coyote to work.
Still weird on the Court's side but ok.
...
Maybe not ok. Not ok, Court.
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Post by rafk on Nov 30, 2022 8:45:04 GMT
Let me guess, now it's calibrated to ultimately suck all the ether off Earth like an inexorable black hole.
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Post by basser on Nov 30, 2022 8:50:48 GMT
Yo they recalibrated it to use Zimmy cause Coyote is a big dumb nerd now.
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Post by blahzor on Nov 30, 2022 10:07:04 GMT
The court can't be that stupid to change the energy profile from Coyote to Zimmy?
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Post by silicondream on Nov 30, 2022 10:18:40 GMT
They'll try to make Zimmy the new Jeanne, then? The one girl it's ok to sacrifice because they're really desperate and she was never really a good citizen anyway, and as long as they're hacking everyone's memories they can make sure she's forgotten even better than Jeanne was?
Centuries older, nothing learned.
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Post by csj on Nov 30, 2022 12:07:45 GMT
Etheric bugzapper
Charming
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Post by csj on Nov 30, 2022 12:14:30 GMT
And I'm sure Zimmy was just seasick back then. After all, how often does Zimmy get on boats? I guess they really were talking about the thing where the ocean needing to eat Coyote to work. Still weird on the Court's side but ok. ... Maybe not ok. Not ok, Court. It seems implied then that the station and rain are part of maintaining the ocean, 'venting' the ether? Hence Zimmy's behaviour during the rain. E: Implication being that although zimmy is affected by its operation it wouldn't manifest the same way as she herself isn't the same as etheric beings. Think of how renard has commented about her. A void existing inside a larger void would certainly have problems. |
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Post by todd on Nov 30, 2022 12:48:15 GMT
Annie's response in the first panel indicates that Kat's "off the hook" remark puzzled her at first just as much as it puzzled many of the readers, before Kat explained it on this page. (Though I got the impression from a few of the comments on the last page that some of it might have also stemmed from unfamiliarity with the phrase "off the hook".)
On the Court having learned nothing from Jeanne - given that they hushed up all memory of her existence, presumably extending to their successors as Court leaders - that wouldn't be surprising. You can't learn from your mistakes if you forget them.
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Post by storyteller on Nov 30, 2022 13:37:44 GMT
They'll try to make Zimmy the new Jeanne, then? The one girl it's ok to sacrifice because they're really desperate and she was never really a good citizen anyway, and as long as they're hacking everyone's memories they can make sure she's forgotten even better than Jeanne was? Centuries older, nothing learned. Honestly I think it's managed to be a worse plan because at least Jeanne was... She wasn't expecting it. She wasn't happy about it as a spirit but leaving it was a surprise. And probably lower energy in regards to the amount of havoc to be caused if things go wrong. If this is indeed what is in the plan - Zimmy is expecting it. And I can't decide if her comment earlier was that the Court higher ups will not like what she does because there's an unspoken implication that they missed that she wasn't trying to hurt them and was as helpful as she could be in their prior investigations. So you know Zimmy lack of understanding leading to problems. Or her saying she's going to put up a fight because yeah. Jeanne replacement duty is something you fight tooth and nail even if you won't win in the end. |
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Post by Igniz on Nov 30, 2022 14:23:14 GMT
I feel it's safe to assume the system has been reconfigured... for Zimmy.
—> Plot twist: it has been reconfigured to avoid Loup going crazy and Lana is the bait (either willingly or not). <—
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Post by ctso74 on Nov 30, 2022 14:51:12 GMT
Technically speaking, the use of Jeanne was successful. I mean it's powered by a forsaken child, but I get the feeling the Court won't really care about that, if they decide to use Zimmy. I wonder if all the tests through the years, has filled them with confidence, that they can control the results. Such confidence might be accurate given the Court's resources, or jaw-droppingly disastrous given Zimmy. Since the gang helped Jeanne, and they're relations with Zimmy, they'd clearly try to intervene. Where does that leave Loup? |
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Post by Gemminie on Nov 30, 2022 17:23:38 GMT
After Kat says that Loup's off the hook, Annie asks what she means, which we're all asking too. Kat references "The Torn Sea" and says that although the star ocean is able to absorb Ether from any source, it didn't harm Renard because until just recently it had been set to affect only Coyote. (That's also probably why it didn't harm Renard when he and Annie met Kat at the seaside more recently.) And this is why Loup doesn't seem to have made a beeline for the star ocean.
But Kat then goes on to say that the whole system has been reconfigured now, though she doesn't explain how yet (perhaps the Coyote restriction has been removed, and it now absorbs Ether from anything nearby?). This may be the change that Zimmy sensed, then, rather than Loup in Love. The chapter title, or a form of it, has now officially appeared in the chapter.
What is panel 6? Some notional depiction of what might have happened had Loup attempted to go to the star ocean while it was configured to suck Coyote's power out of him?
If the star ocean sucks Ether out of anything nearby now, well, the Carver home is very near the shore, so why isn't Renard being affected right now? Why isn't Annie? Maybe that isn't the change that's been made. I guess we'll have to wait for Kat to explain it to us.
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Post by novia on Nov 30, 2022 19:33:49 GMT
in which we pave over plotholes
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Post by ophidiophile on Nov 30, 2022 20:10:30 GMT
What about Kat's Etheric form? It's only been shown twice, but it's bigger and more bizarre than Coyote or Loup, and so very different from Kat herself. Plus, she wasn't affected by the Star Ocean either.
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Post by blahzor on Nov 30, 2022 20:28:35 GMT
What about Kat's Etheric form? It's only been shown twice, but it's bigger and more bizarre than Coyote or Loup, and so very different from Kat herself. Plus, she wasn't affected by the Star Ocean either. I put it in wild spec but im starting to think Kat's form isnt etheric we are just seeing how it looks in the ether to etheric beings |
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Post by mturtle7 on Nov 30, 2022 21:05:36 GMT
Wow!!! Ok, I'll admit, I wasn't really expecting Tom to go back and actually address the question of why Renard & the other students didn't feel anything on the Star Ocean like Loup and Zimmy did. It's, uh, still not exactly clear why it affected Zimmy, though...but hey, maybe they'll still address that in the next few pages.
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Post by drmemory on Nov 30, 2022 21:29:07 GMT
A lot depends on just when it was reconfigured! It clearly affected Loup when he got close to it on the train. Maglev? You know what I mean.  So if it wasn't reconfigured until after Loup's Big Adventure (LBA), then this might be the clue that blows Jerrek's cover, allowing Annie to figure out where Loup is hiding. In that case, it might also be that those thinking it is reconfigured for Zimmy are correct. If it was reconfigured before the train ride, then the reconfiguration didn't do what Kat thinks, and Loup is not off the hook. I assume people are thinking it was reconfigured for Zimmy because she noticed something changed. We saw that just after LBA but there is timey wimey stuff sometimes and we don't know for sure that's the order things happened in, nor how long passed in between. At the time, I kinda thought she sensed the change in Loup for some reason, but I guess this makes more sense - Zimmy would care more about things that directly affected her or Gamma. I'm inclined to take what Kat said at face value - either it's true or it's what she really believes. Still. Did the court reps tell her that the ocean was configured to suck Coyote dry, or did she deduce that? Did they tell her about the reconfiguration? If so, what specifically did they say? Heck, do we really know that Renard has a lot of etheric power? We really haven't seen him do that much! His body-changing-through-eyes power came from Coyote and we have no reason to believe it takes a lot of power to use, and we've always been told he doesn't care about power and is more of a sneaky prankster type. He can enter the ether and act there but we really have no reason to believe he's carrying around a big glob of ether, like Coyote. What I'm poking at here is that what she says could be true but she may not be correct about every part of it, due to just not knowing. Even if the court reps specifically told her the ocean was previously configured to suck Coyote's power and had been reconfigured, that doesn't mean they are telling the truth, but it also could be true and still not contradict the ocean affecting Zimmy and not Renard, depending on their real innate power levels. We know Zimmy gathers up ether but can't generally do anything with it, like a broken power station, but we don't know anything about Renard's relationship to the ether. |
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Post by ophidiophile on Nov 30, 2022 23:12:10 GMT
What about Kat's Etheric form? It's only been shown twice, but it's bigger and more bizarre than Coyote or Loup, and so very different from Kat herself. Plus, she wasn't affected by the Star Ocean either. Correction: 3 times Zimmy 1048,1049 Paz 1443 Annie 1740, 1754, 1755
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Post by Isildur on Nov 30, 2022 23:39:01 GMT
I feel it's safe to assume the system has been reconfigured... for Zimmy. —> Plot twist: it has been reconfigured to avoid Loup going crazy and Lana is the bait (either willingly or not). <— The non-hidden text has been my (and many others') guess, except if Kat knows it's Zimmy, I would have thought this conversation would be far less calm -- something more like Kat bursting in in a horrified panic and saying "We have to save Zimmy!" Or Kat not wasting time to talk to anyone else and instead whipping something together all on her own to transport Zimmy to safety. |
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Post by todd on Nov 30, 2022 23:56:46 GMT
If Zimmy really is the Court's target, I can think of one other difference from what the Court did to Jeanne. While the Court's official motivation for Jeanne was a wish to protect the Court from the Forest, there was a pettier motive mixed in with it - Diego wanting revenge on her for rejecting him. There's no sign that the Court has personal reasons for wanting to drain Zimmy (if that's whom it's planning to target). It seems to be purely "amoral pragmatism".
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Post by storyteller on Dec 1, 2022 1:34:08 GMT
I feel it's safe to assume the system has been reconfigured... for Zimmy. —> Plot twist: it has been reconfigured to avoid Loup going crazy and Lana is the bait (either willingly or not). <— The non-hidden text has been my (and many others') guess, except if Kat knows it's Zimmy, I would have thought this conversation would be far less calm -- something more like Kat bursting in in a horrified panic and saying "We have to save Zimmy!" Or Kat not wasting time to talk to anyone else and instead whipping something together all on her own to transport Zimmy to safety.
I think this is coming down to the fact that Zimmy has been an extremely good Chevock's Gun for well over a decade at this point. And the fact of the matter is that the audience has been convinced that Zimmyham is dangerous. Not Zimmy herself but that when the wheels come off things can go horribly horribly wrong very quickly. And that sense of danger has remained despite the multiple trips the audience has seen of Zimmyham over the years.
Which is honestly impressive writing given that Zimmy and Gamma were introduced in Chapter 5 and Zimmyham has appeared multiple times.
Zimmy and Gamma have also been in the ramp up. We've been seeing a lot of them recently.
Chapter 5: Two Strange Girls (Book 1)
Chapter 11: Dobranoc, Gamma (Zimmyham introduced as a concept. Set up for the Whitelegs as well at the end) (Book 1)
Chapter 19: Power Station (Zimmyham again) (Book 2)
Chapter 28 & 29: Spring Heeled 1 & 2 (Dangers of Zimmyham and Zimmyham itself) (Book 3)
Chapter 38: Divine (Not really Zimmyham proper but reminder of why Gamma is needed) (Book 4)
Chapter 49:Torn Sea (The BIG Zimmyham Danger episode) (Book 5)
Chapter 74: Moving (Book 8)
Chapter 78: Behind It All (Zimmy finding out about the Omega thing) (Eventual Book 9)
Chapter 79: Find Yourself (Zimmyham Again) (Book 9)
Chapter 87: Reconfiguration
Not listed is the times that Zimmy comes up because of the Shadow man and other occurrences. Like her popping up with the Tictocs in Chapter 77 because they kept bothering her.
And... well Zimmy and Gamma have been around since Chapter 5. They're honestly one of the longest running threads in the comic and got introduced early. Earlier than Jeanne and just a chapter after Mort.
And narratively Zimmy and Gamma's prevalence has never been explained. Zimmy is wonderful for getting information to the audience see Divine and the Torn Sea, also Two Strange Girls (forced a certain fox out of hiding) and even Dobranoc Gamma with the reveal of Antimony's cut to the audience.
For a comic this size? Appearing in over 10% of the chapters is impressive.
Zimmy has a ton of set up, has been stressed again and again that stuff happens around her. Is called out to be a power sink.
And the story has never explained what the Court was researching with her. Because they do not like crazy ether stuff and Zimmy causes crazy ether stuff. They invited that into the Court.
So narrative level - Zimmy is set up for things to get interesting and has been for an extremely long time. Especially with Kat Angel also being a thing and the Cult around that being very very ominous at this point and has not been back tracked.
Zimmy has collected a lot of weight narratively at this point but while still having questions unanswered. The story can explain a lot with Zimmyham as a power source at this point as long as it doesn't break the rules. And the thing is the rules are such that it would be harder to have it be boring and non destructive. Things have also never gone fully to hell. It came close with the Torn Sea. But it has never truly gone to everything wrecked like Loup causing devastation or even the close calls with death for the cast when saving Jeanne.
And I think the audience feels that, that tension in the coil wound and wound. Especially with the warnings about the Court going to be looking for a different power source. And... Zimmy and Gamma were girls off the street. Thematically given all the harms and ways that the Court will use people... There's a reason why everyone can smell the story potential.
The inner workings of the court are not accepting of the different. It's been called out that ethics and morality are formed over time and that throwing away imagination and things changing is declaring the belief that there's no more goodness and ethics to develop. Throw in a character that the audience is fond of? Who while rough and bitter is a decent enough person when the chips are down in the right frame of mind? (Really the one time I can think of where Zimmy actively messed up/malicious behavior was Power Station which was with the lying to Gamma bit which does seem to have stopped over time, and not helping Jack immediately with the White Legs.)
Everyone's looking at Zimmy here because it sets up so well for when things go down. The Inner Workings of the Court would think no one cares. Going against that would be going up against the Court directly at last. Antimony once asked if freeing Jeanne was the right thing. And the isolation and trying to make everyone the same? And forcing someone else to pay the price for that isolation? Sounds just like the Court. Zimmy has both the power for the plot line to make sense and the lack of control for it to not run into the problem of Bullying A Dragon or trying to enslave Superman. Unlike Loup she's a lot less able to fight back and can't turn it off either.
And has years of setup time for things being dangerous and weird when it gets bad.
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Post by jda on Dec 1, 2022 6:06:47 GMT
/wildspec We all have seen that Zimmy is ashamed and remorseful, to the point of self-flagelation, of SOMETHING BAD, AWFUL that she did in her past.
What if that SOMETHING is to happen yet on this timeline?
I mean, maybe The Court tries to drain her, but damaging Gamma, so she kicks on Barbarian Rage/Unconscious Death Goddess mode, and kills all the Court staff that already was on the Ether Sea and beyond.
That would be a reason to feel ashamed of her future/our past.
Remember that once Zimmy expressed her love of Gamma in the terms "I would kill all the world and then myself if she wanted it!", or so.
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Post by guntherkrieg on Dec 1, 2022 16:47:32 GMT
We're deep in magical technobabble land and it's dull AF.
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Post by guntherkrieg on Dec 1, 2022 16:48:34 GMT
The court can't be that stupid to change the energy profile from Coyote to Zimmy? Stupid like a fox! |
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Post by hnau on Dec 1, 2022 19:44:45 GMT
Or they recalibrated from Forest God to Techno Goddess?
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Post by warrl on Dec 1, 2022 22:47:37 GMT
It isn't the Court's system that has been recalibrated - it's the system in which the Court exists. Coyote/Loup is different, and he's etherically massive enough that the local area alters to conform to him to some extent.
And the Court may or may not have caught on to that change - even if they have, they probably haven't had time to adjust to it yet.
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Post by maxptc on Dec 2, 2022 2:45:44 GMT
Honestly, I'm pretty worried because Zimmy was the only one who felt really sick back on the boat. She has been a back up plan all along, the Court hedged its bets. Despite Omega and the predictions of success with Coyote, the Court had a failsafe. Maybe at the suggestion of Omega or maybe just because "don't put all your eggs in one basket".
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Post by zbeeblebrox on Dec 2, 2022 4:34:26 GMT
in which we pave over plotholes Paving is for old holes. If you're filling them as you create them, you use spackle |
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Post by blahzor on Dec 2, 2022 8:34:33 GMT
Wow!!! Ok, I'll admit, I wasn't really expecting Tom to go back and actually address the question of why Renard & the other students didn't feel anything on the Star Ocean like Loup and Zimmy did. It's, uh, still not exactly clear why it affected Zimmy, though...but hey, maybe they'll still address that in the next few pages. If you're trying to test stealing Coyotes power you need something as powerful or close to test it on and that's Zimmy. Since she can wrap reality and is basically a energy sponge |
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