Skin Horse

By Shaenon K. Garrity & Jeffrey C. Wells
By Shaenon K. Garrity & Jeffrey C. Wells
Color by Pancha Diaz
  • About Us
  • Cast
  • Store
  • Extras
  • Original Art for Sale
  • Our Patreon
RSS
2018-10-10
‹‹ First ‹ Prev Buy! Comments(63) Next › Last ››

2018-10-10

by shaenon on October 10, 2018 at 12:01 am
Chapter: Figgs and Phantoms
Comments RSS

Discussion (63) ¬

  1. Owlmirror
    October 10, 2018, 12:05 am | # | Reply

    “knackered”; “Bloody” — Are we supposed to be inferring an English accent from Melanie? Or is she just a fan of the BBC?

    • Ogden Wernstrom
      October 10, 2018, 1:16 am | # | Reply

      By George, I believe you have founde a clew. And with that, it may not be too soon to declare that my first guess from a number of days back was half right, and the broken thing that needs fixing is related to that.

    • rinku
      October 10, 2018, 1:53 am | # | Reply

      If you read back, it’s not the first time she’s used English slang.

      Which was a quirk of Mell Kelly, as some may recall.

      • Anson
        October 10, 2018, 2:51 am | # | Reply

        I don’t recall British-isms being a quirk of Mel’s (could be, I don’t recall). But I *do* recall that making geeky, comic-book analogies *was* a quirk that Dave (and later daughter) had.

        • thevinylreviewer
          October 10, 2018, 12:47 pm | # | Reply

          It was definitely one of Mell’s less alarming quirks. She swore like a Brit, certainly, with a lot of “bloody” and so forth, but also used oddly British word choices.

          • WJS
            August 8, 2019, 9:40 am | #

            Honestly I recall her being more into weird non-swears than British swearing, such as her ‘Cheese on Toast!’ from ‘Madness’.

          • awgiedawgie
            August 8, 2019, 11:33 am | #

            Without going back and looking, I’d say it was a fairly equal balance. “Cheese on toast” was one of my favourites, but she was definitely into the British-speak.

      • Daibhid C
        October 10, 2018, 1:04 pm | # | Reply

        It was also a quirk of stupified Gavotte (regular Gavotte didn’t use any kind of slang, but did once use the phrase “spit-spot”, from which I inferred she sounded like Julie Andrews). It’s not something I noticed when Sweetheart met Pavone, though, so I’m not entirely sure what it means for my current theory.

    • BrokenEye, the True False Prophet
      October 13, 2018, 4:28 am | # | Reply

      I’m telling you, they’re in the Village

  2. Urlance Woolsbane
    October 10, 2018, 12:06 am | # | Reply

    Bwahaha

  3. Frank
    October 10, 2018, 12:12 am | # | Reply

    The equation to Anti-life, Anti- the Universe and Anti-Everything?

    • cubist
      October 10, 2018, 12:24 am | # | Reply

      No—the Anti-Life Equation really is something from Jimmy Olsen comics. Specifically, its from Jack Kirby’s Fourth World mythos, which he first put into Jimmy Olsen comics when he was plotting and drawing them.

      • Rimwolf
        October 10, 2018, 12:38 am | # | Reply

        As I just discovered, there’s even a Wikipedia page about it.

      • Urlance Woolsbane
        October 10, 2018, 2:17 am | # | Reply

        Heck, it was apparently a major part of Zack Snyder’s plans for the DCCU, before everything went belly-up.

        • cbob
          October 10, 2018, 6:29 pm | # | Reply

          And it was also a part of the New Gods storyline from I dunno when. I do remember that the equation “pieces” were hidden on Earth & that nice Mr D fellow wanted them & managed to get at least one.

      • BrokenEye, the True False Prophet
        October 13, 2018, 4:32 am | # | Reply

        Seems an unlikely title for such a goddamned dark plotpoint to make a debut

    • Stevo
      October 10, 2018, 1:49 am | # | Reply

      What do you get when you multiply six by nine? Or, I guess, anti-six by anti-nine.

      • Robert Nowall
        October 10, 2018, 9:31 am | # | Reply

        They usually refer to that as “minus six” and “minus nine.” And you get “plus 54.”

      • awgiedawgie
        October 10, 2018, 6:00 pm | # | Reply

        But if you use a base-13 number system, 6 times 9 really is 42.

        And thank you, Douglas Adams, for letting us in on that little bit of mathematical trivia.

        • BrokenEye, the True False Prophet
          October 13, 2018, 4:33 am | # | Reply

          Douglas Adams doesn’t write jokes in base 13

          • awgiedawgie
            October 13, 2018, 11:52 pm | #

            Maybe not, but it was in his own commentary on the book (sometime back in the early 80s, not long after the BBC miniseries was broadcast) where I first saw the above trivia mentioned. So he still gets credit, as far as I’m concerned.

          • Owlmirror
            October 14, 2018, 12:08 am | #

            Since I guess I can’t post links

            [ h2g2 FULL_STOP com VIRGULE edited_entry VIRGULE A19229763 ]

            The answer to this is very simple. It was a joke. It had to be a number, an ordinary, smallish number, and I chose that one. Binary representations, base thirteen, Tibetan monks are all complete nonsense. I sat at my desk, stared into the garden and thought ’42 will do’. I typed it out. End of story

            Though there has been much debate, Douglas Adams insisted there was no symbolic reason he decided to use 42. Eventually, people realised that 6×9 actually does equal 42 in base 13. Douglas said he didn’t know about this at the time, saying ‘you don’t write jokes in base 13’.

          • awgiedawgie
            October 14, 2018, 12:39 am | #

            Well, I never said that he chose the number 42 for any reason. I knew that he had plucked the number out of the air. I only said that he was the first one I had heard mention the base-13 connection.

    • thedoctor55
      October 10, 2018, 2:45 am | # | Reply

      The answer to the anti-universe is …… 24!

      • Robert Loughrey
        October 10, 2018, 9:58 am | # | Reply

        Dammit, beat me to it.

      • Shadowmehr
        October 10, 2018, 9:07 pm | # | Reply

        Very good. Now what is the actual question to the anti universe?

    • Peter M Eng
      October 10, 2018, 7:13 am | # | Reply

      As somebody on Tumblr pointed out, in Japanese the number four can be translated to “shi,” and the number two can be translated to “ni.” So there’s a subroutine on Earth that is researching whether or not the answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything is death, and constructing the question from there.

      • Schol-R-LEA ;2
        October 10, 2018, 7:18 pm | # | Reply

        Now you’re just shini-ing us on…

  4. palenoue
    October 10, 2018, 12:27 am | # | Reply

    Maybe they’re AIs planted in the system to give comic strip artists story ideas? That would explain Jeff.

    • Njall
      October 10, 2018, 7:31 am | # | Reply

      Come and see the AIs implanted in the system! Help! Help! They’re being repressed!

      • Darchangel
        October 11, 2018, 12:56 am | # | Reply

        I just want you to know I see what you did there, and I appreciate it.

  5. Clifton
    October 10, 2018, 12:54 am | # | Reply

    Going by Virginia’s face, she did indeed go cliff diving with Beatrix.

  6. Owlmirror
    October 10, 2018, 1:56 am | # | Reply

    An especially silly idea: I wonder if there’s some sort of musical rebus encoded in the places Virginia has gone?

    Beach-Beach-Beach-Arcade-Arcade-Arcade-Beach-Beach
    Astrologer(A sharp?)-Astrologer-Astrologer-Astrologer-Forest

    (I’m not sure the forest counts, but there’s a lot of F’s if so)(maybe the Barracks break the monotony?)

    Forest-Beach-Cliff(High C!)-Arcade

    • Owlmirror
      October 10, 2018, 1:57 am | # | Reply

      (the Forest and the Barracks might be flatted notes)

    • Robert Nowall
      October 10, 2018, 5:56 pm | # | Reply

      They say Phillip K. Dick plotted his stories by throwing the I-Ching. I think he had a better chance of coming up with something interesting than using this method.

  7. thedoctor55
    October 10, 2018, 2:46 am | # | Reply

    The answer is in the Walnuts!

  8. Towering Barbarian
    October 10, 2018, 7:06 am | # | Reply

    I bet she forgot to give Madam Delphi her good Yelp review! ^o^

  9. Robert Nowall
    October 10, 2018, 9:29 am | # | Reply

    Are Jimmy Olsen comics still published?

  10. Bruce A Munro
    October 10, 2018, 11:30 am | # | Reply

    “What, are you dense? Are you retarded or something? I’m the bloody Jimmy Olsen!!”

  11. Nomi
    October 10, 2018, 12:54 pm | # | Reply

    So the mayor never answered the door? Why didn’t they try to break in?

    • Shadowmehr
      October 10, 2018, 9:11 pm | # | Reply

      Dr. Lee is too polite and civilized for that. You’re thinking of U.N.I.T.Y., who wouldn’t have knocked first (without explosives).

  12. Ken
    October 10, 2018, 1:06 pm | # | Reply

    I mean, this is obviously Helen & Dave’s daughter, right?

    • thevinylreviewer
      October 10, 2018, 1:20 pm | # | Reply

      She couldn’t be that old. Narbonic was set during the years it actually ran (or maybe a year later, I forget whether that was actually canon), and we have no reason to believe that Skin Horse is any different. Since the daughter was unborn at the end of Narbonic (in 2006), she couldn’t be any more than twelve now. I have to conclude that, unless she time travelled again and was extirpated for some reason in the present, this isn’t her.

      Also, Shaenon gives lots of women bangs and glasses.

    • awgiedawgie
      October 10, 2018, 6:12 pm | # | Reply

      Age-wise, the two girls look like they could be close. However, Helen & Dave’s daughter’s name is Rosalind. And she has a different nose.

      • Anson
        October 10, 2018, 11:12 pm | # | Reply

        Assuming that the comics run approximately in “real time” and that she was conceived immediately after the end of Narbonic (not likely, but theoretically possible), Rosalind would be a bit past 11, a few years younger still than when she visited Dave (a bit past 13, given the commentary and reference to a seemingly recent birthday debacle).

        And of course, the avatar need not look like the person. Still, if this is Rosalind, I sincerely doubt she’s acting alone (which I guess would just mean it’d most likely be a family affair).

        • awgiedawgie
          October 11, 2018, 1:48 pm | # | Reply

          Well, to assume that the comics run in real time is questionable at best. There have been story arcs that lasted for several months, but only covered a few days of in-universe time. And there are time skips of indeterminate length between some of the story arcs. So it’s unknown how much time has passed – either between the end of Narbonic and the beginning of Skin Horse, or from the beginning of Skin Horse to now. Even Jeff and Shaenon won’t say what the time frame is. I know… I’ve asked.

          However, it is a fair assumption that Rosalind was indeed conceived very shortly after the end of Narbonic – less than a year after, based on the events in the story Lovers and Madmen. Unless you consider the final collage of guest strips – in which we see Dave propose to Helen, we see Rosalind being born, and then see her as a toddler and later as a (roughly) 10-12 year old girl at what appears to be Thanksgiving dinner – to be part of the end of Narbonic, in which case, her age today becomes even more uncertain.

          And while I know full well that one’s avatar need not look like them, I still find it unlikely that this is Rosalind. If they are indeed AIs as Melanie suggests, I think it’s likely that they are members of the Daughters of the Air, tampering in A-Sig’s domain.

          • Anson
            October 12, 2018, 1:24 am | #

            As I recall, Narbonic ran approximately real time. Hence why I brought it up.

          • WJS
            August 8, 2019, 9:52 am | #

            The time skips between stories are to make up for the fact stories take months for a few days action. Over long periods, the comic runs in real time. This isn’t an assumption, it’s a conclusion based on the evidence.

  13. Ogden Wernstrom
    October 10, 2018, 2:22 pm | # | Reply

    OGSXKFUG, WGP O, SJM WKL. SDFSKC SKG UBPBJFGL XASX NGKG RBKWGM OC XAG MFLKHDXFBJ BR YSQBXXG. XAG UBPBJC XASX NSL OKBTGJ WHLX OG RBKYGM SJGN.

    • Erat Faciendum
      October 10, 2018, 9:40 pm | # | Reply

      New theory: Gavotte literally fell apart. Beatrix, Mel, and Mrs. Ape are pieces. Virginia needs to ‘fix what was broken’.

      • JET73L
        October 11, 2018, 7:38 am | # | Reply

        Eret Faciendum:

        Bea – Bee

        Mel – Latin for “honey”

        Ape – Apis

        Makes sense.

    • Danny in Canada
      October 10, 2018, 9:51 pm | # | Reply

      fuck’s sake, just use Rot13 next time.

  14. awgiedawgie
    October 10, 2018, 6:18 pm | # | Reply

    I felt like a kid at Christmas when I opened up my mailbox this afternoon and discovered a rather large package from a certain Shaenon Garrity! Now I’m going to be up all night reading my new Narbonic books! (…as if I hadn’t read the e-book versions a dozen times already…)

    Thank you, Shaenon!

    • Robert Nowall
      October 10, 2018, 6:52 pm | # | Reply

      The Narbonics books enlightened many a dull time sitting there in my bathroom…

      • awgiedawgie
        October 10, 2018, 8:32 pm | # | Reply

        Might not be such a good idea… I’d end up sitting there so long my legs would fall asleep!

  15. Owlmirror
    October 10, 2018, 10:22 pm | # | Reply

    Say . . .

    It was suggested that the women are parts of Virginia’s mind, but why would one of Virginia’s mind fragments be like Mell?

    But I just remembered that Virginia has literally had part of Unity (partly based on Mell) inside her, sharing her mind (Willie Nelson posters and all).

    Could these women be fragmentary remnants of Unity’s mind? How long does Unity’s sludge persist?

    • awgiedawgie
      October 11, 2018, 9:05 pm | # | Reply

      So, wait…. Mell Kelly? Which of those characters do you think is like Mell? Melanie here is anti-social, but so is roughly 75% of the population of the USA – especially in that age group. But she doesn’t want to go around spontaneously blowing stuff up or beating people up, so I’m just not seeing any striking similarity.

      Beatrix has the attention span of a gnat, and likes to do stupid stuff without thinking, so she shares some traits with Unity, but not with Mell.

      As for how long Unity’s sludge lasts, it’s not terribly important. Since Virginia and Unity shared the same brain, they each would have retained some of the same memories and thought patterns – sludge or no sludge. Probably not enough to affect their behaviour, but enough so that they each would remember the experience.

      • Owlmirror
        October 11, 2018, 10:14 pm | # | Reply

        See the top comment thread about Mel and Melanie both being Americans using British slang. It’s not meant to be a close resemblance; indeed, it’s more faint than Unity calling Sergio “kid” and having Willie Nelson posters in her mind (while not being particularly interesting in Willie Nelson otherwise).

        Remember that the animals that Unity possessed retained enough of a connection to her that they came when she wanted them to, so if the sludge is still partially active in Virginia, there could still be some potential connection to Unity.

        • awgiedawgie
          October 11, 2018, 10:43 pm | # | Reply

          Regarding the animals… that was only a day or so after Unity had possessed them. It has now presumably been several years. It is estimated that every cell in a human body is replaced every seven years. It has never been made clear how Unity’s nanomachines replicate themselves, but logically they must to replace any that are lost through events such as dismemberment, etc. So, with a living host (such as Unity’s brain, or Virginia’s body) they could theoretically survive forever. That, of course, brings up a whole nother potential problem, if the nanomachines that may have remained in Virginia’s body decide to replicate too much. Then again, Virginia’s body may have eventually rejected any remaining nanomachines, and processed them out like any other foreign substance.

          • WJS
            August 9, 2019, 10:03 am | #

            That ‘every cell replaced every seven years’ thing is a complete myth though. Some types of tissue the cells are replaced very quickly, some types of tissue cells are never replaced.

  16. BrokenEye, the True False Prophet
    October 11, 2018, 2:00 am | # | Reply

    So did they never enter City Hall, or did the door loop back around to the arcade

    • awgiedawgie
      October 11, 2018, 9:07 pm | # | Reply

      Based on how rough Virginia looks here, I’m guessing they went cliff diving after all. Or just tumbling down the hill… whichever.

  17. jdreyfuss
    February 3, 2020, 4:31 pm | # | Reply

    Melanie is Tip’s worst qualities. Self absorbed and singularly focused on repeating a pointless task with a meaningless reward.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

More by Jeff

  • The Scrivnarium

More by Shaenon

  • Horror Every Day
  • Li'l Mell
  • Monster of the Week
  • Narbonic
  • Shaenon.com
Creative Commons License
Skin Horse by Shaenon K. Garrity & Jeffrey C. Wells is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at http://www.skin-horse.com.

©2007-2022 Skin Horse | Powered by WordPress with ComicPress | Subscribe: RSS | Back to Top ↑