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Post by blahzor on Jul 17, 2024 18:08:11 GMT
bud has tiny red eyes technically
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Post by drmemory on Jul 17, 2024 18:16:05 GMT
Well I certainly have no evidence to the contrary! I was just thinking that she obviously loved Charles, and would have wanted to do things with him if she was able.
On the other hand, that was almost certainly a family portrait and it did NOT include any children. So maybe she is a more distant relative, or maybe something else happened - despite my joke of Zimmy sharpening her teeth, I think they are probably natural (for her) and that she is not fully human. Which doesn't rule out the possibility of some sort of... etheric inheritance?
I like the idea of an etheric inheritance. Omega and Zimmy have no blood relation but the ether (somehow) chose them to be part of a "family line" of etheric attunements. To be fair though, their powers aren't really similar to each other and the only real connection id that they are both dark haired, red-eyed, and overwhelmed by their connection without outside help. Which taken altogether seems like it could mean something but dark hair is common, and red-eyes could just be a visible indicator of etheric attunement and there are any number of red-eyed etherics that the court hasn't found who have no connection to Omega or Zeta. Both of which are names bestowed by the court and not of their own choosing if you ask me. I'm not quite sure where I'm going with the etheric inheritance thing. I guess I'm sort of thinking in terms of archetypes. Their more obvious powers are different; Zimmy can make spatial distortions and Omega can see everything. But they also each have extra abilities, which are not fully explained.
Zimmy was able to merge the Annies, overriding something a god had done. We've also seen her hanging out in a sort of null-space, not in her distortion but not in realspace either, though we don't know for sure how much of that was her and how much Gamma. She definitely seems to have some mental abilities aside from the distortions - Gamma said something about them sometimes being able to get a glimpse at what is going on in people's minds, or something similar.
Omega was able to talk through animals (not just understand them, like Paz). It seemed more like mind control of lesser minds than a ventriloquist act. She is even now possessing the body of an NP, or something similar to an NP that she created herself. And, of course, she can port within the distortion.
Anyway, they are both powerful, and their abilities both have strong mental aspects. It feels like there is a link there, though it may not be genetic.
There is something going on with the court too - the Seraphs knew Zimmy could create distortions and understood the process well enough to give them classes! Either they got that info from Omega, or they learned it by watching someone ELSE create distortions at some point. Someone under the control of the court. I really hope the court doesn't have a prison or zoo full of entities that they do experiments on.  |
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Post by silicondream on Jul 17, 2024 23:53:53 GMT
Meg, Bud and Hetty, no one else Damn, I forgot Hetty. Bud though? The merostomatozons' non-stalked eyes are red as well. (Or maybe they're the not-eyes, I can't really tell.) Or time changed the world around her. You can be a perfectly nice person by the standards of 19th-century Britain, without accepting 21st-century norms for civil liberties and social services. "Zeta's had enough of a handout and it's time for her to give back to society, willingly or not" or would be a fairly normal attitude for a Victorian. (Perhaps this is what Renard's warning to Kat about the need for continual moral evolution foreshadowed.) Also, people are complex. Ysengrin had his three aspects. Aata is simultaneously a Boddhisattva, a staunch human supremacist and a loving partner to Shell. Tony was incredibly devoted to Surma and correspondingly neglectful of Annie. Omega could be caring and supportive toward lots of people without being that way toward Zimmy, especially because Zimmy very rarely inspires those feelings in anyone. Also also, I'm not sure Omega ever presented as "nice." Charles seems nice. Omega seems idealistic and driven, which is great if you agree with her values and not so great if you don't. It certainly didn't seem like Charles was always comfortable with her plans for cyborgification. |
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Post by silicondream on Jul 18, 2024 0:52:33 GMT
I'm not quite sure where I'm going with the etheric inheritance thing. I guess I'm sort of thinking in terms of archetypes. Their more obvious powers are different; Zimmy can make spatial distortions and Omega can see everything. But they also each have extra abilities, which are not fully explained. Zimmy was able to merge the Annies, overriding something a god had done. We've also seen her hanging out in a sort of null-space, not in her distortion but not in realspace either, though we don't know for sure how much of that was her and how much Gamma. She definitely seems to have some mental abilities aside from the distortions - Gamma said something about them sometimes being able to get a glimpse at what is going on in people's minds, or something similar. I'd say they're both clairvoyant and precognitive; it's just that Omega's tuned to perceive the material world and Zimmy's tuned to perceive the etheric one. (Annie's dueling scar from Jeanne, Renard's first meeting with Annie, Kat's repressed sexual orientation and Machine Angel potential, etc.) Zimmy's awareness is more distorted by her current mental state, which could either be a symptom of her illness or just a reflection of the ether's inherent subjectivity. Zimmy's distortion ability could be analogous to the way Omega uses extrapolation to predict the future and/or past. They've both got simulated worlds inside their heads; Zimmy just has more power to make her simulation affect reality. |
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Post by Hatredman on Jul 19, 2024 0:25:07 GMT
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Post by drmemory on Jul 19, 2024 1:41:35 GMT
I was really thinking Tom was going for the daguerreotype look. That type of image tends to be fairly small and framed. Check out the Smithsonian page here for a few examples, but plenty may be found other places. I like that page because it also includes some examples of the men's clothing worn in the mid-18th century, which seems consistent with Miss Omega's backstory and with the picture. Another daguerreotype showing women's clothing not too dissimilar to what Miss Omega is wearing for her sitting...
Apparently daguerreotypes were pretty touchy - you couldn't make them very large, and if you didn't view them from a fairly narrow range of angles, they just looked like little mirrors. I think that may be at least part of why the ones that have survived were in those little frames - to protect them and to aid in viewing.
They were also most definitely monochrome. In my humble opinion, the red eyes were probably added by Tom for artistic reasons.
Also, the clothing and this page in particular help to orient the Omega/Charles events to a timeframe - probably mid-1800s. Charles' monocle and the glasses some wear on other pages are also consistent with this. I know that the timeline isn't really the point, but I'm fascinated and impressed by Tom's world.
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Post by Igniz on Jul 20, 2024 23:27:31 GMT
Just for reference here's a photo of Italian opera star Natalina "Lina" Cavalieri. Not sure when it was taken, without looking into it I'll guess circa 1910. January 1, 1909, to be exact. Besides the example you provided, the original has at least one other hand-colored variant:  |
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Post by imaginaryfriend on Jul 21, 2024 2:19:59 GMT
January 1, 1909, to be exact. c1910 wasn't bad for a WAG if I do say so myself. I just chose it because it was the first one in the search results I liked. That and I had heard of her before. Besides the example you provided, the original has at least one other hand-colored variant There's something going on with the tiara on that one. It may have been graffiti'd but... maybe not. Not sure if the blue color on the dress in the right corner wore off from handling or if was just a bad coloring job from the start. Probably what happened was that these were run off by the dozens if not the hundreds at a time. The best results from the process were given gold leaf and/or platinum highlights, then special attention with the hand-coloring. Those premium ones were likely sold with gilt frames. The rest were handed over in batches to apprentices for coloring. Some may have been sold with cheap frames, many others not. There was probably a lot of variation with the colors, depending on what colors were handy, and some bored apprentices probably played around with different techniques and effects. Something I think both the posh and the pleb versions had in common were that the colors used probably had little relation to whatever the colors the dress and jewels actually were. To be fair, it was probably not economically possible to replicate the colors effectively and aesthetically; the (costume?) jewelry probably had several tones and multiple colors... though perhaps there's a super-premium version out there somewhere that has high quality full coloring. |
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Post by Storel on Jul 21, 2024 2:51:17 GMT
The eye contact she makes with us isn't some proof that she sees us; it's her expressing to us— making it clear to us, in case we don't realize at first— that she sees us, and always will. She'll be watching you. Every smile you fake Every claim you stake She'll be watching you... |
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