A character-driven, long format online comic that updates three times a week. Comedy! Drama! Revolutionary Communists, runaways, creative taxidermy and more.
Chapter 5: Lit, page 118.
How dare you admit you are mortal.
How dare you.
37 thoughts on “Chapter 5: Lit, page 118.”
Now I feel compelled to find the earlier page about the Rec rally and check if Hypathia was in the crowd… I’m also wondering if the thing Patti is trying to wear in last panel isn’t a wig of some sort? It looks like blonde hair.
It could be. The same person looks like the only woman on the next page. It’s kind of hard to tell with the bulky clothing. It looks like their may be some brown hair peaking out from under the white hair.
It’s like the off-center hat is part of the wig, but what she’s pulling down today looks like a lighter color. Did cleaning it fade it? And what is it? Is it a regular wig worn inside out?
I think that’s it. Wearing those disposable respiratory masks wouldn’t be enough to cover the whole thing.
(looking at the middle panel of that next page) The goggles could certainly fit her round glasses underneath. And since that would mean she was part of the main group that got paint-shot from close range, the wig cleaning on this page would fit.
I’ve been conflicted about Patti – she’s adorable, but reminds me of my exes. Now I’m not so conflicted – people who try to burn other people are generally not good people.
They didn’t really set anyone on fire, they just did enough to create chaos. The rest of the damage was incurred by the crowd itself. They’re making a statement- they don’t seem to hate people, but just groups of them. Individuals are much smarter than herds.
Furthermore, have you seen that page linked above?
The way they’re positioned, that big canister of gas – burning, at that – is landing awfully close to the people beneath for it not to be an attempt at causing harm.
Guess they don’t think much of the right of assembly.
It’s official. Hypatia’s cute, but she’s still on my Minus List.
Hmm. You have a point- they coulda hurt a bunch of people. But I don’t think negatively of them because of it. They seem like nice people. You could make the argument that hurting people precludes niceness, but it doesn’t in my book.
Basically Patti is awesome and Bill is pretty awesome.
“I just wanted to, y’know, burn this city to th’ fuckin’ ground.”
Because there’s no way that can be taken negatively, right?
Why does Cook have such a hate-on for Templar? It seems to go well above and beyond your Powerful Spirit Of Anarchy to burn an entire city to the ground. Is his answer to “Why?”, “Why Not?”
i find it funny that extreme sociopolitical groups like rec and cooks and all of them find it hard to believe there are those that are just trying to figure their own lives out, and dont really care what they are doing or their cause.
It happens to any group that coalesces around a charismatic leader or an urgent cause. Fundamentalist Baptist preachers can tell their congregations that they are changing the world and they’ll believe it. Then they’ll visit the neighboring county and find out that nobody has ever heard of their church. And everything anybody says to them or does in their presence has to be A Statement for or against their particular set of beliefs, even if the other person doesn’t even know they’re there. The idea that they are irrelevant to anyone is just unpossible!
I find it a little unfair that whenever any number of young people and minorities have so much as a tea party with a paid permit the police knock their heads, give them road rash, arrest everyone they can fit in the van and let them go 48 hours later with no charges, but when the 40-somethings in the actual republican Tea Party go around setting shit on fire and yelling at people with no permit, nothing happens to them at all.
The real world version of the cooks are people the police pay to find the riot inciters in radical groups, who invariably incite riot just to get their commission. They did it in the 70s and with the RNC in 2008 they did it again. Sometimes I think to myself that it would be justice to throw stones and infiltrate the political marches of the other demographics beyond transient twenty-somethings on bicycles, just on the principle of fairness and equality in the police application of excessive force. So I guess I’m a Templar Cook at heart. (‘that’s just them being dicks’.)
The use of agents provacateurs to disrupt organized protests can be traced back to at least the industrial revolution. They were regularly used to instigate violence which in turn was publicised to discredit the progressive socialist workers’ rights movements, the ones who brought such concessions as the 8 hr. day, 40 hr. workweek, overtime pay and paid vacation time. Not that any of that stuff has much relevance in our day and age…even less in Templar?
Nope, nope, this actually makes Patti _more_ stable, not less: I’d submit that kicking flaming cylinders off rooftops and getting shot at by cops must be marvelously effective for putting pathological crushes into perspective.
This doesn’t mean that her obsession with Ben and others of his profile is faked, just that the degree to which it incapacitates her is deliberately amplified for the sake of cover, sort of Scarlet Pimpernel-style. Preparing and executing tactically-calculated acts of public sabotage is hard work, which she must feel earns her the indulgence of a little abject-if-advantageous fangirling.
The Cooks undoubtedly Have Their Reasons (whose public discussion they gave up on long ago), but until Spike chooses to favor us with their exposition (and/or, indeed, any coherent glimpse of TAZ regional history) we readers are just projecting our RL assumptions through the 4th wall. This makes the judgements of them that we propose no less premature and irrelevant that those of, say… a handful of mouthbreathers on a tailgate drunkenly debating the presence of “terrorists” within a culture they couldn’t describe, with a spoken language they couldn’t name, in a distant country they couldn’t pronounce much less find on a globe. Ya feel me?
My money says Patti will act physically as Ben’s guardian angel *at least* once, but may come to regret it.
Now I feel compelled to find the earlier page about the Rec rally and check if Hypathia was in the crowd… I’m also wondering if the thing Patti is trying to wear in last panel isn’t a wig of some sort? It looks like blonde hair.
Wondering if the one kicking the flaming liquid gas container off the roof isn’t Hypathia in disguise: http://templaraz.com/?p=346
Hah, saw your comment after mine went up — totally.
This is exactly what I checked for as soon as I saw that last panel. I think you’re right.
It could be. The same person looks like the only woman on the next page. It’s kind of hard to tell with the bulky clothing. It looks like their may be some brown hair peaking out from under the white hair.
It’s like the off-center hat is part of the wig, but what she’s pulling down today looks like a lighter color. Did cleaning it fade it? And what is it? Is it a regular wig worn inside out?
I think the hat is pulled down to hide her identifying birthmark!
I think that’s it. Wearing those disposable respiratory masks wouldn’t be enough to cover the whole thing.
(looking at the middle panel of that next page) The goggles could certainly fit her round glasses underneath. And since that would mean she was part of the main group that got paint-shot from close range, the wig cleaning on this page would fit.
http://templaraz.com/?p=346 Bam.
I’ve been conflicted about Patti – she’s adorable, but reminds me of my exes. Now I’m not so conflicted – people who try to burn other people are generally not good people.
They didn’t really set anyone on fire, they just did enough to create chaos. The rest of the damage was incurred by the crowd itself. They’re making a statement- they don’t seem to hate people, but just groups of them. Individuals are much smarter than herds.
So, um, you’re saying that they caused people to panic?
That’s better… how, exactly? That’s still a very large potential for harm and injury.
Furthermore, have you seen that page linked above?
The way they’re positioned, that big canister of gas – burning, at that – is landing awfully close to the people beneath for it not to be an attempt at causing harm.
Guess they don’t think much of the right of assembly.
It’s official. Hypatia’s cute, but she’s still on my Minus List.
Hmm. You have a point- they coulda hurt a bunch of people. But I don’t think negatively of them because of it. They seem like nice people. You could make the argument that hurting people precludes niceness, but it doesn’t in my book.
Basically Patti is awesome and Bill is pretty awesome.
“I just wanted to, y’know, burn this city to th’ fuckin’ ground.”
Because there’s no way that can be taken negatively, right?
But don’t you see
They’re just trolls
doing it for the lulz
ughughughughugh
Just what Barney John said – ignore the trolls, they’ll go away.
Spike would start updating on a regular basis the week I have to move…
Ug. Poor Ben. Patty is most certainly not the type of person you want obsessed with you.
heh, from the sounds of this guy, she may well save him. Although, she ALSO alerted him to Ben… so there’s that.
Is it just me, or is the text much bigger on this page?
I can’t get over how fucking good this story is. YOU ARE AMAZING, SPIKE.
Why does Cook have such a hate-on for Templar? It seems to go well above and beyond your Powerful Spirit Of Anarchy to burn an entire city to the ground. Is his answer to “Why?”, “Why Not?”
The Cook family strike me as the “for its own sake” type of people. Chaos is an end in itself.
When are we going to find out what the Cooks exist for?
i find it funny that extreme sociopolitical groups like rec and cooks and all of them find it hard to believe there are those that are just trying to figure their own lives out, and dont really care what they are doing or their cause.
It happens to any group that coalesces around a charismatic leader or an urgent cause. Fundamentalist Baptist preachers can tell their congregations that they are changing the world and they’ll believe it. Then they’ll visit the neighboring county and find out that nobody has ever heard of their church. And everything anybody says to them or does in their presence has to be A Statement for or against their particular set of beliefs, even if the other person doesn’t even know they’re there. The idea that they are irrelevant to anyone is just unpossible!
You know what I think the Cooks are?
ACTUAL fucking old-school “smash the foundations and screw em all” anarchists. Which is kind of refreshing.
I find it a little unfair that whenever any number of young people and minorities have so much as a tea party with a paid permit the police knock their heads, give them road rash, arrest everyone they can fit in the van and let them go 48 hours later with no charges, but when the 40-somethings in the actual republican Tea Party go around setting shit on fire and yelling at people with no permit, nothing happens to them at all.
The real world version of the cooks are people the police pay to find the riot inciters in radical groups, who invariably incite riot just to get their commission. They did it in the 70s and with the RNC in 2008 they did it again. Sometimes I think to myself that it would be justice to throw stones and infiltrate the political marches of the other demographics beyond transient twenty-somethings on bicycles, just on the principle of fairness and equality in the police application of excessive force. So I guess I’m a Templar Cook at heart. (‘that’s just them being dicks’.)
+1
:D That works, too.
The use of agents provacateurs to disrupt organized protests can be traced back to at least the industrial revolution. They were regularly used to instigate violence which in turn was publicised to discredit the progressive socialist workers’ rights movements, the ones who brought such concessions as the 8 hr. day, 40 hr. workweek, overtime pay and paid vacation time. Not that any of that stuff has much relevance in our day and age…even less in Templar?
It took me forever to see Patti’s text on the first panel, so I thought that was just a face she was making.
Also, yesss to what Sarah said.
Oh shit. Oh shit oh shit oh shit.
Spike, you evil genius. It’s been right in front of us this whole time.
THEY’RE CALLED THE COOKS
I know, Spike is BRILLIANT.
Nope, nope, this actually makes Patti _more_ stable, not less: I’d submit that kicking flaming cylinders off rooftops and getting shot at by cops must be marvelously effective for putting pathological crushes into perspective.
This doesn’t mean that her obsession with Ben and others of his profile is faked, just that the degree to which it incapacitates her is deliberately amplified for the sake of cover, sort of Scarlet Pimpernel-style. Preparing and executing tactically-calculated acts of public sabotage is hard work, which she must feel earns her the indulgence of a little abject-if-advantageous fangirling.
The Cooks undoubtedly Have Their Reasons (whose public discussion they gave up on long ago), but until Spike chooses to favor us with their exposition (and/or, indeed, any coherent glimpse of TAZ regional history) we readers are just projecting our RL assumptions through the 4th wall. This makes the judgements of them that we propose no less premature and irrelevant that those of, say… a handful of mouthbreathers on a tailgate drunkenly debating the presence of “terrorists” within a culture they couldn’t describe, with a spoken language they couldn’t name, in a distant country they couldn’t pronounce much less find on a globe. Ya feel me?
My money says Patti will act physically as Ben’s guardian angel *at least* once, but may come to regret it.