Funny Book Forensics 356 Starlite Spotlight

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:00:03] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Best. Yeah. Best. Yeah. Start up. Yeah. A yeah. Podcast. Yeah. Ever. [00:00:11] Speaker A: Ever. Yeah. [00:00:15] Speaker B: That's how we. That's how we do it here on funny book forensics. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. [00:00:22] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:00:23] Speaker B: Well, if you're still listening. [00:00:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:00:26] Speaker B: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Is that what you're trying to do? Yeah. Yeah. Were you doing the macho man or the Kool Aid Man? [00:00:34] Speaker A: I was doing both. It came out as I was a little bit like macho man because, like, we're in, out of. We're an elder species, and space is the police, but I was busting through a wall at the same time, so, you know, I feel like the capital. [00:00:47] Speaker B: Kool Aid man fits better with this issue. [00:00:50] Speaker A: Maybe. [00:00:52] Speaker B: But. Or the capital e man. I don't know. Anyway, we're here. [00:00:59] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:01:00] Speaker B: We are also on Project Dash nerd.com, your source for everything politics. [00:01:06] Speaker A: No, everything. [00:01:11] Speaker B: Your source for Trump news coverage, trial coverage, 24/7 God, dude, what are you. [00:01:17] Speaker A: Are you trying to get us off. [00:01:19] Speaker B: Of a network that's like podcast Nerd Politics 24/7 no, Dan. Project nerd. [00:01:28] Speaker A: No. [00:01:29] Speaker B: Project dash nerd.com. [00:01:31] Speaker A: What are you doing? [00:01:32] Speaker B: You're your source. [00:01:34] Speaker A: Your source for memes and fun all day long to get away from all that stuff. [00:01:41] Speaker B: Wow. Oh, is that what. Yes. I thought those memes were, like, political. Like, I was looking at some memes. [00:01:46] Speaker A: And you're way off point, my friend. [00:01:48] Speaker B: Are you sure? Yes, yes. I mean, if I go to their Facebook page, I see all sorts of memes. Like, you know, and it's crazy. What you're saying is I'm wrong. I thought there were all sorts of. Okay, I think we should discuss some of these memes, right? They're very, extremely political. Right. [00:02:07] Speaker A: What? Like, April 25 is the best date because. [00:02:11] Speaker B: Well. Well, first off. Okay, if I go here. First off, Facebook sucks. So, you know, I can't get anything in chronological order anymore. [00:02:20] Speaker A: Ask meta AI for help. [00:02:23] Speaker B: Yeah, thanks. That just makes it worse. [00:02:28] Speaker A: The chat bot will help you. [00:02:30] Speaker B: Okay, well, the first post I get seems extremely political. I've got a bunch of Disney princesses, and it says, who would win in a mortal kombat tournament, so. [00:02:40] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. That's. [00:02:40] Speaker B: Seems to be speaking to feminism and all sorts of things. I'm not even gonna look at this TikTok thing here. I don't see that these are actually project nerd posts, though, so let's. Let's, uh. Cause I was in project nerd, the group. Okay? That's the problem. [00:02:55] Speaker A: That's the problem. [00:02:57] Speaker B: Uh, let's see, I've got. Got Disney princesses. I've got something I can't. Of course, nothing again, like, every time you change any, you know, this is the most exciting radio ever. Me looking at Danny's. [00:03:13] Speaker A: Dan is doing good. Yes, he's. Good job. Good job. So proud of you. [00:03:20] Speaker B: This is. [00:03:21] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:03:21] Speaker B: Hey, here's a good one. This one about funny book forensics. [00:03:24] Speaker A: Oh, see, and that probably won't last too long because you. [00:03:29] Speaker B: That doesn't seem political at all. That doesn't seem too political at all. I mean, that does make sense. Project Dash, nerd.com original series, project Nerd podcast network, GFL Publishing and more. That's what it says. And, yeah, it does talk about. Oh, yeah. Like, look, this is so political. It's got beauty pageants. You're right. Signs of whether or not you're a werewolf. I believe, like, the Twilight fans would get very upset about that. [00:04:06] Speaker A: They would be up in arms because. Yes. You know, are you a sparkly vampire? Are you a werewolf? Yes. [00:04:14] Speaker B: Oh, here's a meta. Godzilla Barney. Also political, especially in light of the most recent Godzilla movie. So we are now taking something that's a very serious matter of japanese reconciliation, and we're inserting Barney in there. Yeah. And curious George. I mean, this is extremely political. [00:04:38] Speaker A: Oh, Dan. [00:04:39] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, you said it wasn't, and then, you know, I look at, like, half the tweets, and then we got the Disney princesses. Again, extremely political. Yeah, this is. I've got this angry cat who looks like they're driving. It looks like it's a commentary on Karen's in today's society. Yeah, I mean, I don't know what you're saying. Like, how are you saying I'm going to get us kicked off the network when clearly half of these posts are very political? [00:05:09] Speaker A: I mean, I I could see. I could see your side of it, but I can also see where there's fun and. [00:05:21] Speaker B: Uh, oh, hey, we've cut the piece from Fallout where they tell the dude that he lacks enthusiasm for every job he's been assigned to you. I think that's another commentary on the role of capitalism in America. [00:05:33] Speaker A: I wonder who supplied that. [00:05:36] Speaker B: I don't know, but I'm just saying, like. I'm just saying, like, you probably Mike Tanner, your co author on Junior Braves, and, of course, absolute zero's camp launchpad, because he loves fallout so much. [00:05:49] Speaker A: Yes, he does. [00:05:50] Speaker B: So it's. Anyway, yeah, I'm just saying, clearly, a political site. So if you want good political news, you can go to project dashner.com. You can also find our podcast there. Funny book forensics. [00:06:04] Speaker A: Oh, my goodness. Oh, wow. [00:06:11] Speaker B: Okay. And so we have a book to cover today. [00:06:14] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:06:16] Speaker B: Yeah. So while the legion of superheroes face Darkseid in one. Question mark. [00:06:23] Speaker A: Question mark. [00:06:24] Speaker B: And we're done with that for now. We've been asked, and we may be doing it next week, but we're going to discuss it first because it's really bad. [00:06:33] Speaker A: Okay. [00:06:34] Speaker B: Just fair warning. Okay. Well, I asked, you asked me to find a backup for today in case we didn't have this book yet. And so jiu jitsu lawyer Paul Boudreau suggested terror Titans from 2008, which he's never read because it was the first appearance of static in the DC proper universe, not the milestone universe. [00:06:56] Speaker A: Okay. [00:06:57] Speaker B: But not in issue one. [00:06:59] Speaker A: I see. [00:07:00] Speaker B: That's not in for a couple issues. And it's got a lot of obscure Teen Titans or teen superhero characters in it. And it was kind of a book that was meant to pop Ravager out of Teen Titans at the time. It was also about the time that DC was really losing me on Teen Titans because the writing had kind of gone off a cliff. I guess I kept. I know I kept collecting because I had the Legion lost. Not the good Legion lost, mind you, but the Legion Lost series in the early 2000 or 2000 teens was a crossover. So I know I kept buying this book for, like, five more years, probably, but they had. Geoff Johns relaunched the Teen Titans, and it was actually pretty good because, you know Geoff Johns, right, when he bothers writing, he's usually pretty good at it. Sometimes he just doesn't write for a while and then you get issues every two, three months, whatever. And then he blames the artists for being slow, but it's. Yeah, that. Well, I mean, we can look at it. I honestly think, just as a heads up, if we do that mini series at six issues, we need to do two issues of podcast. [00:08:12] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:08:12] Speaker B: Because there's not a lot of text and it's not very good. So I want to get through it. I want to get through it as quickly, as evenly possible. [00:08:20] Speaker A: You're like, it's not very good. Well, it sounds on par with some of the things that we cover here at funny book forensics. [00:08:26] Speaker B: Yeah. So we recommend you read it, of course. Yeah. Because we want you to be as sad and as shocked as I am at the appalling writing. [00:08:33] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:08:34] Speaker B: That takes place in those issues. [00:08:35] Speaker A: And then you go to Project Nerd and you say, hey, project nerd why do you have these guys on your network and plugging these great comics? [00:08:44] Speaker B: However, there is a guest appearance by the persuader, but not the one you're thinking of after we just read the legion. [00:08:51] Speaker A: Okay. Different persuaders. [00:08:53] Speaker B: It's like a. It's very strange. Like, it's his female ancestor who happens to have the atomic acts from the 31st century. Interesting, right? Okay, well, sometimes legion characters are cool, and since they don't write legion books, then they like to take legion characters and then put them other places. Like apparently the Emerald Empress is showing up in another comic book next month in the 20th century. [00:09:20] Speaker A: Okay. [00:09:22] Speaker B: Like, remember the eye? The eye? You know, the eyes? [00:09:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:09:25] Speaker B: Yeah. Cause we read about them in l e G I o n. But it made sense there. Cause they didn't, like, just take the character from the legion and then make them. They used it for different reasons. Yeah. In this case, this character just randomly shows up. But technically, the emerald emperors could be multiple people throughout time since the eye corrupts the people. So, I mean, I guess it could be. I guess I'll have to read it and find out. But anyway, I guess the point is, I guess there is technically a legion connection in this teen Titans book that's called Terror Titans Terror. Technically a Teen Titans connection as they're trying to spin the book off and give a feature to Ravager, who, if you are unaware, is Deathstroke's daughter. What? Yeah, it's one of those other kind of weird things where DC will take like, a popular male character and then, like, make the female version of that character and then. So you have Ravager. They did it with crush. Like Lobo and Crush. I don't know that that's my favorite writing tactic either. But, you know, hey, we'll take a. [00:10:35] Speaker A: Look see for what it is. [00:10:38] Speaker B: It doesn't mean it's always bad. I don't want to condemn the practice as always being bad. Sometimes it can work out. It's kind of like wrestling plot lines. If you do the same plot line over and over again, it kind of gets burned out, you know, and at some point I start to get grumpy, old man Dan. Well, you should just create, oh, if you want to create a great female character, you should just create a great female character, which we're about to read about one. So. I think. I think so. I mean. I mean, we get a lot of context for it anyway, but, yeah, I mean, I think you wonder who wrote it. [00:11:15] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:16] Speaker B: And, well, we'll find out here. Cool. We told them last week that we're going to cover Starlight issue six. So we are here, and I, this morning, got. Not this morning when we released the podcast, but this morning when we recorded the podcast. Got the PDF, though. I don't have my hard copy issue yet, which was making me sad, because I know Mister Travis Webb has sent them out. I was hoping I would have my nice hold in my hands version before we did this. [00:11:44] Speaker A: I'm sorry. [00:11:45] Speaker B: It was running a marathon. [00:11:46] Speaker A: Okay. Marathon. [00:11:48] Speaker B: Well, the important thing. [00:11:49] Speaker A: And running a marathon, he was doing the important task. Again, multitasker. [00:11:55] Speaker B: The important thing for you to remember as a creator is that me, an esteemed member of the comics, with media, with over a hundred podcasts under my belt. [00:12:04] Speaker A: Yes. [00:12:05] Speaker B: Should probably get these things far in advance so I could review them to, say, promote things. But. But we're here. Yes, we like to read it this morning. [00:12:16] Speaker A: Well, let me tell you, over at overcast comics, we like to do things on our own schedule. We like to do things, you know, the way that we do them. We like to do them and get them out, you know, on our own time. If our production. If our production schedule is a little delayed, that is, from the printer, we just get things out when we get them out. [00:12:41] Speaker B: Well, in this case, I mean, I'm not mad that I had to wait on the book because you got a bunch of books that were damaged. That was not my. I was just hoping to have the thing before we. Because we had set this into our schedule. Right. Like, we knew when Legion was gonna wrap up, and then, you know, we had this on the book. So I think the release. [00:13:00] Speaker A: Sending out the digital copies. Yeah, we could have. We probably could have sent them out sooner, but I think part of the reason why he didn't want to send. [00:13:07] Speaker B: Them out, well, we haven't sent them out yet. [00:13:09] Speaker A: I know. Is that he wanted to. He wanted to make sure everything was good before he sent out the digitals. It's a thing. It's a process. [00:13:18] Speaker B: But you will. But you will have these digital copies out if you ordered the book before this podcast drops. So when this podcast drops, they'll be out there, read a lot. I'll also put a link, I also put a link to where you can get the digital copies if you want them. And I'll also link to the Kickstarter anticipation page. I don't know what to call it. The NEA page Kickstarter. Save a link. It'll notify you. Yeah. So it'll notify you when they release issue seven. So you can follow along on the book. Yeah. So we've got starlight number six, says Webb, Smith and Waddelli. I don't know who any of those people are. [00:13:56] Speaker A: No. You never. Never hung out with any of us? Never eaten dinner? Never gone to a convention? [00:14:02] Speaker B: Well, it feels like. I really don't. Again, like when you're an esteemed member of the comic books media and you just kind of get pushed aside, you know, it's all good. But that's neither here nor there. We've got. We've got Sarah on the COVID if you're not familiar, and we'll give you a little catch up because it's been a few months since we did this, but we've got Sarah on the COVID and she looks angry. [00:14:35] Speaker A: She does. [00:14:38] Speaker B: We've got not Kirby crackle. Can we call it Brett Crackle? Yeah, Brett crackle. I don't know. That doesn't come off the tongue as much as Kirby Crackle does, though. Would it be like Brett? What would. Wait, so we call it Kirby. So it's got to be Wadeli something. Not Bret something. [00:14:56] Speaker A: Waddelli wows. [00:14:59] Speaker B: Waddelli wows. Yeah. [00:15:00] Speaker A: Wadeli wows in there. [00:15:02] Speaker B: We got some wedeli wows in the background to make Sarah stand out on the COVID And Sarah looks irritated, to say the least. I mean, she did just watch her, well, watch her brother die. So. Yeah. Can do it. [00:15:18] Speaker A: Spoilers for those who haven't read already. [00:15:21] Speaker B: Well, sorry, we did cover issue five already, so we did let people know we were talking about issue six. So. Well, anyway, we've got starlight, issue six, black holes and revelations and. Yeah, there were some revelations writers Travis Webb and Greg Smith. Letterer Tom. Say it. Greg Orzowski, who has lettered things like spawn and stuff, unimportant books, so many things. [00:15:50] Speaker A: He is a world renowned and Guinness World Book world record holder of lettering. [00:15:57] Speaker B: And you've helped him build on that record. So we've got artist, especially with the words in this book. We've got artist Bret Wendelli, and we've got some. There's a couple other cover artists, if you have b and c cover. We also have a copy editor, La Fritus, and special consultant doctor Teresa Rojas. And special thanks to Sabrina Taylor and Carl Christopher Tremblay. So, yeah, I bet in the next book there might even be a special thanks to Dan. That'd be me, because I helped with the Kickstarter page for issue seven. You know, it might happen. I'll be excited. I've never had my name as a special thank you before special thank you. [00:16:42] Speaker A: Maybe. [00:16:44] Speaker B: But it's possible. Or Travis will forget later, and then it won't be there. But that's okay either way. I don't need to have my name on your book, because I'm not a corporation who takes credit for other people's work that they were doing in their corporation. [00:17:00] Speaker A: Is your name in the back of the book? Your name should be in the back of the book. [00:17:03] Speaker B: It's not funny. Book forensics is in the back of this one. My name is not in the back of it because I used MySpace on my hard earned dollars from the back of your book to promote this podcast, because that's the kind of guy I am. [00:17:20] Speaker A: Well, you got the podcast name out there. [00:17:23] Speaker B: I did. I got it out there. I mean, after all, I got it in the back of a book that you were the author in, and you put it in the. You know, you put it in your, like, bio for the big book that, like, lots of people actually read. So, you know, I don't know. I'm doing my part. [00:17:45] Speaker A: Hey, and it's. And funny book forensics, actually, in the bio. In my bio on the heshet media, like, I clicked on. [00:17:55] Speaker B: Yeah, that. That's. That's what I was saying. It's wild. [00:17:58] Speaker A: I clicked on that because I sent off her some. Some convention, and they're like, oh, we need your bio from wherever you're published. And I was like, oh, here you go. And I looked at it. I was like, oh, my gosh. It's on this thing. [00:18:10] Speaker B: It's there. [00:18:12] Speaker A: That's wild to me. [00:18:13] Speaker B: Well, as we had. We had a. We had a mutual friend who. We have a mutual friend who used to say that her husband brought home the bacon, and she brought home the bacon bits, and with her adjuncting jobs. And so I think in the world of advertising, you bring home the bacon, and I bring home the bacon bits. I do what I can, but that's okay. We probably shouldn't talk about advertising. Funny book forensics, and we probably should focus on starlight number six. [00:18:52] Speaker A: Yeah, starlight number six. I will say, before we get into the book, I know in previous issues, we've had the trigger warning on the previous issues on this page. I'm surprised our editor did not put that on this page, because this book should have it. So people reading this after they. If you read this book along with the podcast or prior to the podcast or after the podcast, this book should have. It slipped. [00:19:27] Speaker B: Yeah, well, I. Yeah. You also have a claim that. Well, anyway, we're not gonna get into that right now. So I want to get into the story here. [00:19:39] Speaker A: Okay. [00:19:40] Speaker B: And we've got pirate space cats. Yes. Again, they're back. [00:19:44] Speaker A: They're back. [00:19:46] Speaker B: And this was. I did not expect the issue to start out with pirate space cat family. [00:19:52] Speaker A: You did not? [00:19:54] Speaker B: No, I didn't. I really didn't. I expected the issue to start out with, like, Sarah blowing things up. [00:19:59] Speaker A: So it's a different feel for you. [00:20:04] Speaker B: Yeah, I feel like at the end of issue five, like, Sarah was going to destroy everything. [00:20:10] Speaker A: But alas, here we are. Pirate space cats. [00:20:13] Speaker B: Yeah, we are here. I mean, I'm just, I was, it was a little jarring. I was like, what? Okay, not, not what Dan was expecting at all. Just fine. It doesn't mean it's bad. Just not what I was expecting. I was like, oh, okay, got a letter. [00:20:30] Speaker A: I mean, I got a letter saying we need more pirate space cats. [00:20:34] Speaker B: You got a lot of letters. Did you? [00:20:35] Speaker A: Yeah. Could you put more pirate space cats in the book? I want a whole. [00:20:39] Speaker B: How do you get letters for your book and where do you publish them? Are they in the back in the letters column? What would the letters column for this book be called? [00:20:46] Speaker A: We have a live journal set up and people can go to the Travis's livejournal and just post on that. [00:20:53] Speaker B: That's not that I quite, I really want to know what you'd call the letter columns for this book. [00:20:58] Speaker A: The letter column. That's a good question. [00:21:02] Speaker B: Would it be core comments? [00:21:07] Speaker A: Yeah, core comments. That's the letters page. And people would just send in, we get a lot of, we want more space cats. We'd get a lot of interesting, you know, like, oh, where can I get this hat? Oh, you should have backed us on issue one. Could have got a hat. I got one. [00:21:29] Speaker B: Well, anyway, at the end of, in last issue, we learned that some people died. [00:21:35] Speaker A: Yes. [00:21:37] Speaker B: Well, Papa Cat was already dead. [00:21:39] Speaker A: Papa cat? Yes. [00:21:41] Speaker B: Brother Cat died last issue. [00:21:43] Speaker A: Yes. [00:21:44] Speaker B: Brother human died last issue. So we were, so we get back and we've got surprisingly, you opened the first page and there's the cat family. And I'm like, oh, okay, flashback. Okay. And not. I feel like you've burnt me on flashbacks before and made me really sad. So here we had a flashback and I was like, oh, fantastic. A flashback. I can't wait. Who are they going to kill off panel during this flashback? [00:22:11] Speaker A: Oh, no, I'm sorry. Yeah. [00:22:18] Speaker B: But that's okay. You don't. So that's good. But anyway, we don't. It's actually, we get a little half page, like, a couple page history of the space pirate cats and what they do, and basically papa cat went and captured a vehicle from the saloon. [00:22:40] Speaker A: Yeah, that's it. [00:22:42] Speaker B: And we get an encyclopedia Galactica entry down at the bottom sloon, a notorious race of aliens with wide bodies in the. I have no idea. Barineau Galaxy. [00:22:57] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:22:57] Speaker B: Known for their unique. You wrote the words, you probably can pronounce it, right? Unique. [00:23:02] Speaker A: Well. [00:23:02] Speaker B: Or Travis did. So. Travis, that word. I don't know. But you have at least seen it before. Yes. Known for their unique spacecraft and music. Best described as heavy metal. Disco with butterflies. [00:23:13] Speaker A: Yes. [00:23:17] Speaker B: It does sound very asian, at least when translated to English here, like, when you'll get like a. I think, like, they've made, like a. Somebody's made a new pro wrestling federation in Japan for women, and it's something. Something marigold in all capital letters. Um, I I don't intend on watching this at all, for obvious reasons, but it's like, uh, I'm not really sure what marigolds have to do with professional wrestling or butterflies have to do with heavy metal, but. Okay. Yeah, I mean, cool. Uh, so, and then you jump off. [00:23:59] Speaker A: And you, and you say you wrote the words, or maybe Travis. And maybe you've seen them. I'm going to say. I'm going to start off the episode issue. This is a very Travis heavy issue as we're working on this one. This is very Travis driven issue. So my inputs, my writing and stuff like that in this one was a lot of, like, you know, script working, but a lot of the ideas, a lot of the story plot and other stuff like that was, was very trappist, so. [00:24:41] Speaker B: Oh, I see. So this is when I, like, work on a paper at work with my boss, and then she changes a bunch of it. But then when it comes down to actually presenting it to our director, if the director doesn't like it, she can just blame it all on me. [00:24:54] Speaker A: No, that's. It's. I mean, I can understand where you're. I could see. I could see where, where you're, you're coming to that conclusion. I'm not saying, I'm not taking credit for. [00:25:06] Speaker B: I was for the listeners. I am just teasing. Great. [00:25:10] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I just know there's a lot of stuff in here that, that, like, when I read, read this a few times, I was like, wow, I don't recall this or wow, I thought we changed that, you know? [00:25:27] Speaker B: Well, and I just. Just a quick aside before we get back into this, too, for months, the lawn people have been coming on Thursdays and they're. And we are recording this on a Friday, and we record another thing on a Friday. And for those two Fridays, they both showed up in the middle of us recording a podcast, because that's how the world works now transitioning back to the book. So if we do get lawnmower noises in the background, you will know what's going on. [00:25:57] Speaker A: That was like when we recorded last time. The other time we recorded, and my neighbor never, never does lawn stuff. And I was like, oh, there's lawn stuff happening. [00:26:07] Speaker B: Yeah, I've seen their lawn. They don't do lawn stuff. That's factual. Well, anyway, they got a letter. We find out about the name of their ship, the star runner. It looks cool. Yeah, it's pretty epic. [00:26:24] Speaker A: Brett draws an awesome starship. [00:26:27] Speaker B: Yeah. The star runner was the most feared ship of all the space pirate cat races. Ships. That's cool. [00:26:37] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:26:38] Speaker B: And. But then we have a sad moment where Mama cat. Was Mama cat ever named, maybe? No. [00:26:51] Speaker A: Oh, that's the dad. I'm trying to remember that. [00:26:55] Speaker B: Well, anyway, it's okay. She calls the daughter earn Eern and says she will carry the maber's legacy when this is over because obviously her brother died fighting the. The keep the no mess up there. Divine keep. The vine. Yeah, the vine. The vine, but the vine keep. Yeah, because there's vine seekers, too. [00:27:21] Speaker A: Vine seekers. Yeah, they're the tall ones and the vine. The vine keeper. The other ones. [00:27:26] Speaker B: Yeah, all the. The wizard space trans dimensional spiders. [00:27:30] Speaker A: Yes. [00:27:30] Speaker B: For those aren't keeping up. Okay. [00:27:32] Speaker A: The large and the small. Yeah. [00:27:34] Speaker B: Yeah. So then we get to a second page, and now we get to Sarah. And Sarah is looking very sad and is not communicating as the mom describes basically what's happening with their life. Their belief system says a prayer, and basically what you want to get out of the prayer is based on their pirate culture. Right. They know death a lot, and they've been. We find out their planet was taken over. Right. And they basically had to live in exile and go from ship to ship. And that's the way they're maintaining us, their small piece of the galaxy, and they have to barter with people just to maintain their own existence. And then when they don't like the barter or they protest that barter that country, I mean, space group tries to exterminate them. It has nothing. There's nothing like what's going on in the world right now. [00:28:38] Speaker A: Nothing. [00:28:41] Speaker B: Because this was written before that happened. [00:28:43] Speaker A: Yeah, but I mean, historically accurate to prior events that have happened past on past on past. [00:28:50] Speaker B: Yes. And we find out that the vine is very much like they were, I guess, benevolent sharers of their technology as they went from place to place. And then they, like, end up destroying culture. [00:29:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:29:08] Speaker B: By giving people their technology. But we'll get into that, too, because that's in the next couple pages. I jumped ahead. So, anyway, after this prayer happens, Roger interrupts it and is like, that is the most wrong thing I've ever heard. Talk about somebody judging somebody else's culture. And the mama mama cat turns and is like, this is what my matron told me, and this is what we believe. And the angry face here in the. And even says, angry this time. And the angry emoji. And Roger's like, how on earth is saying that being selfish is the lesson we should take from death? And mama cat and Roger are about to fight, and Sarah breaks it up, and Sarah says, everything we usually want Roger to do is she says, roger, just stop talking. You have no right to tell them how to interpret their prayer. Just leave it. Sarah being, once again, the voice of reason here, especially since Sarah has come down from her high. [00:30:17] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:30:21] Speaker B: Right. Now, though, as you'll recall, too, Sarah hasn't been able to use her powers at all. [00:30:25] Speaker A: No. [00:30:27] Speaker B: And here comes some more of the vine. These are the vine keep, right? [00:30:33] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:30:35] Speaker B: These are not the seekers. [00:30:36] Speaker A: Right. Yeah. [00:30:38] Speaker B: But they're coming after them again. There's lots of little spiders. Yeah, it's terrifying. It's spiders with big teeth. I mean, how you get me to read this book is. [00:30:49] Speaker A: Think, like, I. [00:30:50] Speaker B: Mean, for people, but basically Roger, like, pulls them all aside. Yeah, yeah. Anyway, they all start running again, and they're like. And Sarah's like, my powers don't work. Please, just work so I can save them. And they basically all agree over the next couple pages. They run, they find a place to regroup, and as they pause for a short rest in a secluded area so we can get some. We can get some hit points back. We get. Sarah looks back up, and Aaron, the daughter cat, looks and says, your eyes are injured. They've gone dark. And she's like, oh, I'm missing my contacts because her eyes have changed color, because she's wearing contacts. And. And. But I think it's more than that because the daughter cat says, the eyes have been this way for a while now. So she may be referring that they were dilated. Right. [00:32:01] Speaker A: They're, well, between them being dilated, and she's also missing a contact lens at one point. And with all the crying and other things like that and rubbing her eyes, she lost a contact in between the last two books. [00:32:16] Speaker B: Yeah, but it seems to, like the daughter is more empathic, and she seems to be realizing that something's wrong beyond just missing a contact. Right. It doesn't seem to just be that. And she starts talking to Sarah and she's like, well, I loved my brother very much, but this is the life we lead, right. Because of this existence in our culture, we've had to accept loss and death. And, you know, it is. I mean, it's with world events that are going on right now, too. You have to, like, wonder, right? Like our generations just accepting, like, the notion that death at the hands of others is normal and that we have to accept that. And the book here is sort of presenting, putting, throwing. I mean, it's through space alien cats, but we're throwing, like, real world events right at off the page, which good Sci-Fi does. [00:33:18] Speaker A: Yeah, we definitely, like, that was one of the things, like, we're trying to do is like, how do you, how do you tell real stuff? And sometimes you have to do that through things that are not real. [00:33:41] Speaker B: Juan, it's also interesting here. I think this is a great moment because there's so much emphasis in today's society on introductions and sharing. Hi, I'm Dan. My pronouns are he and him, and I'm a da da da. And this is the first time we're in issue six. Everything has been so chaotic. They're not in a world where they can focus on introductions and pronouns. They are in a world where they are just trying to survive. And this is the first time that Sarah, I'm not saying, like, introductions or pronouns are wrong. I just want to make that really clear to the audience. What I'm saying is they're not in a world where they're not in a situation where that has been important. [00:34:18] Speaker A: Yeah, it's been. Right. [00:34:20] Speaker B: They'll be running for their lives. [00:34:21] Speaker A: Yeah. They have from the jump, just been trying to survive. And this is the first time they've gotten to actually sit down and talk to each other and, and have a moment where they're like, oh, hi, I'm I'm Sarah. I'm earn. [00:34:40] Speaker B: Yeah. And they have in, you know, kind of a second to discover what they're, what they have in common. And then Sarah starts pulling out a whole bunch of things from somewhere. I guess her, her pants, but the, her pants do have a lot of pockets, so. Yeah, she have a lot of pockets. [00:34:58] Speaker A: It's as if she was drawn by some nineties guy. [00:35:01] Speaker B: Yeah, well, she has. Well, at least she doesn't. And she doesn't have shoulder pads or, like. And she doesn't have pouches. Yeah, I guess she has pockets, but she doesn't have pouches, like, around her waist. Anyway, she's starts looking for stuff, and Roger, of course, immediately gets Snoopy. And she's like, pills, water, makeup, anything. I can't see without both contacts. And Roger goes, more beans. And he's like, beans, x, bombs, e, Molly, whatever. And she's like, I don't know, I just have aspirin. And the person that had been condemning her for her lifestyle earlier is now like, hey, could you take that? So you can save my life, right? He's such a jerk. [00:35:48] Speaker A: He is. [00:35:52] Speaker B: He's. But he does transition the story for us. And he's like, well, maybe you can tell us what this has to do with your powers. So now we get. Now we had the space pirate cat story, and now we're gonna get some of Sarah's background in Sarah's story after we had flashbacks to Chris's life last week. So we get a flashback page where Chris and Sarah as mighty boy and the melter are fighting doctor destruction. I love this. Art is so cool. [00:36:27] Speaker A: Anyway, he did a great job with the art. It's very. It feels like something else so much. [00:36:37] Speaker B: But. Well, and they look like little kids, right? He doesn't draw them like grown ups, which is. [00:36:42] Speaker A: Yeah, because they're supposed to be like that. Like, you know, eight and ten year old kid. [00:36:48] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, I mean, I just, like, I do think that is an art and of itself, though, right? Some. Some artists don't draw kids well. Yeah, they draw everything like an adult. And in this case, even with the way the suits fit and everything. So the suits even here fit, I think more like pajamas in the way they fit, which is how they would fit, but anyway. And Chris was confident that she could destroy the machine until he wasn't, and she pushed him away from this doctor destruction's machine. It doesn't really matter what the machine did, because they don't understand it, but she's like, it rewrote my matter, and her suit merged with her, and her powers became a part of her. And so we find out, like, well, she couldn't. Like, she basically couldn't speak and she couldn't use her power. She couldn't explain any of it. And just like another kid superhero team, their family moves them to Washington state. [00:37:54] Speaker A: Yep. [00:37:55] Speaker B: For their later adventures. And so. But unlike that superhero team, they don't have later adventures in Washington state. They just become kids. [00:38:03] Speaker A: They just become kids. [00:38:05] Speaker B: Yeah. And Chris lost his powers. I. Now this is. Well, anyway, I guess it hasn't technically been revealed yet. My assumption is Chris doesn't have his powers because the suit. He doesn't wear the suit anymore, and it quit working. So. Because all the power of that, that was explained before all the power went into Sarah. [00:38:23] Speaker A: Yeah, all the power. [00:38:23] Speaker B: It's implied that. That. It's implied that that was. I don't know if it's explicit, but it's implied. [00:38:28] Speaker A: Yeah. His. His suit lost his power, so he does not have his power anymore. [00:38:33] Speaker B: So, yeah, so it's like there was two greatest american hero suits, but then one greatest american hero had their suit merged with them, and it sucked all the power from the other greatest american hero suit. [00:38:45] Speaker A: And then they were powerless. Yeah. [00:38:48] Speaker B: Yeah. And then that other person said, I can't believe it myself. [00:38:52] Speaker A: Exactly. Then they started walking on air. [00:38:56] Speaker B: No, no. Then they went on top of the world. [00:38:58] Speaker A: On top of the world. [00:38:59] Speaker B: It could have been somebody else. [00:39:00] Speaker A: It could have been somebody else. [00:39:00] Speaker B: Da da da da da da da da da da da. Then it goes, believe it or not. So I just, you know, if you're gonna mess up the lyrics, that's fine, but this is one of my strong points, is bad eighties syndicated tv show lyrics, song lyrics. So, you know. Cause, like, you know, I could jump a fallen building and I could roll a brand new car. [00:39:20] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:39:21] Speaker B: But I'm the unknown stuntman. Yeah. So, anyway, as long as we're going back here, that's gonna be a movie. Why? Why did somebody think that a fall guy movie now was a good idea? [00:39:35] Speaker A: You know? That's a good question. I don't know. [00:39:38] Speaker B: Oh, good. And there's two of them. And there's two lawn care people today. And usually they start off on the nurse's yard, but today, since there's two of them, they're gonna work on both the same time, which means we're gonna get a lawnmower right now. [00:39:50] Speaker A: Right now. [00:39:51] Speaker B: So, anyway, I have to just pause. [00:39:53] Speaker A: At the bottom of this page. You'll see they're moving into a house, and that house is Travis's old house when he lived in Washington. [00:40:03] Speaker B: Oh. [00:40:04] Speaker A: And I, Brett did such a great job in capturing the old house. It's so great. [00:40:10] Speaker B: There we go. Okay, so. Well, and trees and everything and. [00:40:16] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:40:16] Speaker B: So presumably they live in Bremerton. [00:40:19] Speaker A: Correct. [00:40:19] Speaker B: Do you know who else lives in Bremerton? [00:40:22] Speaker A: Who else lives in Bremerton? [00:40:23] Speaker B: Well, if you buy a copy of Camp watchpad or absolute zeros Camp watch pad hardback version, of course you will get a CD made by Bremerton zone MxPx. [00:40:41] Speaker A: Oh, my God. [00:40:43] Speaker B: So it's good to know. It's good to know. It's good to know where that they lived in Bremerton. It also explains why they couldn't find a psychiatrist worth their weight, because there's nobody on that side of the water that probably could help Sarah out. [00:40:58] Speaker A: Yeah, this. [00:41:01] Speaker B: But Sarah. Yeah. Well, they go through a sequence where Sarah is explaining that she couldn't talk anymore, she couldn't tell anyone, and finally she starts talking to puppets, and presumably even with different psychiatrists, but she didn't really care about the puppets. And she shares that. He beat up my brother, and I was alone, so I took my suit full power, placed my hands on him, and then I pulled his life force from him, devoured his past hopes and dreams like pea soup, pee soup. And they're all like, what? The doctor is like, terrified. [00:41:43] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:41:44] Speaker B: And she's like, now I'm in special ed just for missing a year. And then we find out after this revelation, and she looks kind of maniacal when she tells that part of the story, too. [00:41:56] Speaker A: Right? [00:41:58] Speaker B: And then we find out as she gets older, she now actually has a group of friends. She's hanging out, and she discovers her powers are just a part of her, and they were no longer a big deal. She just wanted to be a girl with her friends. And then her friends started meeting some dj's, and they met this guy named guy who started giving them ecstasy. Fantastic guy. Looks like that weird high school hanger on her that shows up at high school parties but should be away somewhere else. [00:42:41] Speaker A: Yep. [00:42:43] Speaker B: And he starts dating Christy. So. And this is. We're close to where Greg said the trigger warning should be. So I'll just let everybody know as we talk about the next couple of things. There's going to be some stalking violence and stalking violence. Language, potentially inappropriate relationship, though ages aren't named here. And some choice language used by the perpetrator. Right. So it's heads up. And you were mentioning before I get into the next, that this is even. This is obviously, you have the disclaimer at the front of the book that, you know, anything related to real life events is coincidental. Yeah, but you did mention before we started podcasting, too, just to give the readers a heads up as they go through here, too, some of the language that was chosen was because of a real life event. But this is not the same as that real life event. [00:43:49] Speaker A: It's not. This is not the same. It's. Everything that takes place in the book is not the same as the real life event. But there was a very similar situation that happened back in, and the wording. [00:44:03] Speaker B: And language choices were intentionally chosen to replicate that event and convey the feelings that happen in that event, basically to show, like, the hatred characters can have. Right? Yeah. So anyway, what we find out is guy starts controlling Christy, won't let her go anywhere, won't let her do anything, attacks her when he loses things. Like, apparently somebody smokes some of his cigarettes, and he's like, did you give these away to your little crackhead friend who he was supplying with the ecstasy? So, yeah, what a great dude. And then Sarah mentions that she was trying to get away from all their drama. So when Christy called to ask her to hang out, she just told him to get away from that immature asshole. And she did leave. And the next picture we see is guy at a party with a gun and Christie's face on the ground with blood at her head. So we can presume that she was shot and it wasn't just a shooting. He stalked her, tracked her down, and murdered her in front of her friends. And Sarah is witnessing all this, and we're starting to get to understand the trauma that Sarah has. Right. And potentially what's linking her to the use of ecstasy. To use her powers. Right. Because it's linked to this time. And it's almost like, due to the trauma, again, for the second time in her life, once from accidentally. Accidentally killing someone and then having a suit merged with her. And now she's seeing her friend, presumably best friend, right, dead on the ground in front of her. And then that happened when. [00:46:06] Speaker A: I mean, like, the situation happened because she wasn't there. And she felt like if she was there, she could have stopped it by using her powers, but because she wasn't there. [00:46:16] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, yeah, she. Sorry, she wasn't there. You're correct. [00:46:20] Speaker A: And if she was there, if she was there, she could have prevented it from happening, but she wasn't there. And now she's feeling conflicted because she feels like the powers are useless in her because she's not able to use them and if she just couldn't. [00:46:38] Speaker B: And then guy uses some choice words that I would not have used in a book personally to call out. So just warning when you read that page. However, while I would not have used the words in the book personally, I understand the author's choice here to illustrate, like, just how evil and terrible the person is, because controlling and is willing to use any word to get to convey that other people are terrible people. And he is the good person. So he's calling, labeling people, calling them names. And then that's when he is shot by the police. And that's when. And just like you said, sarah mentions, as the narrator, what good are superpowers if you can't save your friends? And then she hugs Roger and conveys that she couldn't do anything to stop, you know, to save Chris either. And she's like, I can see it all in my head playing over and over again. Even though I wasn't there. I keep seeing him dead over and over. It doesn't matter if my eyes are closed or open. I just keep seeing it. And, you know, the interesting thing, too, is I based on the story, and I think she knows this. And this is why she feels powerless, right? [00:47:58] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:47:59] Speaker B: There was nothing she could do to stop Chris. Chris ran in, same as cat space, cat pirate brother. Right. They just ran in thinking they were gonna save everyone. And in the other case, too, she's powerless, right. You can't control. You can't control a guy who is mentally ill and is going to act, right. Like, whether this happened to her friend or somebody else, based on this guy's mental psyche and makeup, he was going to do something like this to somebody at some point unless he had mental health treatment, right? So. But in the relationship now, she's now powerless against one man tried to overwhelm her, right, in a fight, and she accidentally killed him. Another man, like, another man, tries to overwhelm her friend and she's not there. She feels powerless in the situation. And now another man, Chris, her brother, runs off into the situation and basically tells her she is the only person that can. He's going to save her, right. And doesn't give her an option, assuming she's weak. And that leaves Sarah with the pure notion that she is now powerless in the situation and that she's going to get everybody killed because she's powerless. When in reality, when you're looking at the situation, right. We're looking at deep societal gender roles that have placed her in this situation. And you're looking at a situation where we have literally trained Sarah to think this way. So as we get back into the book now, Sarah experiencing serious amounts of trauma, being completely reliant on, being completely reliant on ecstasy at the time to use her powers. She's now stuck in a situation where she's going to have to figure out how she can tap into, she can move through that trauma. While Sarah is experiencing that trauma, we get back into the story, and we find out what's happening with Roger's background. Because Roger also, outside of being, like, a national Enquirer type journalist and just popping into things, Roger has never sat down. And Roger's never sat down at all and actually told Sarah what he think, who he is because they haven't sat down. Sarah's perception is this. He's just this jerk journalist who popped up in their life and sort of ruined their life. And I don't. But at least at this point, I think Sarah realizes that they weren't kidnapped because of Roger. But here is this jerk that's on this journey with them, and that's when she finally shares with Sarah. He shares with Sarah? Well, he shares that he has a son, a special needs daughter. He's a prejudiced asshole. He's married to an african american woman, and that she knew all that and still loved him. And he said, if I told my 30 year old self I was going to marry a black woman, I have a special need child and be happy. The happiest I was ever going to be, I'd think you were picking a fight with me. And he's like, and I love them both. And he shares that, and Sarah just looks at him. And I love the page here because after Sarah is recounting all this trauma she had in her life, right. And I appreciate Roger sharing, I think, in a way. But Sarah's just looking at him like, yeah, great. You have a special needs kid, and you married somebody that you're prejudiced against. I've had to murder someone, had my friend shot, and now my brother's died. I've had multiple men in my life, basically make me feel powerless and below men and, like, had to tap into drugs to use my powers and had a very traumatic life. And here you're like, oh, man, my life was traumatic too, because I had to marry a black woman. Like, wow, okay, thanks, Roger. Right? And it's interesting because typical mansplainer. Well, and it's like, I don't think. I mean, yeah, it's like he's trying to in a way, but then he tries in such a terrible way. It's just like one again, you're right. It's a mansplainer. Now it's just one more man trying to equate his pain or his trauma with hers. And there's there's zero comparison. I think probably the last thing she needed in that moment was another man sort of trying to take power from her and take that moment of the story that she's sharing. [00:52:46] Speaker A: It's, I think when. When Travis and I were working out this character of Roger, because honestly, like, and Travis has said it before, numerous times. When. When we had. When he had Roger on the page, his. He was really, like, one dimensional, just this guy. And we worked him out to give him this type of depth in a sense that he's this kind of character that you're. That you could really like. Before, he was just this. He's an interviewer that you don't like. Like a, like a, you know, like a, like a very tabloid kind of guy. Now, he is the kind of person that once you, once you see this. This side of him, you're like, oh, I know this person. I work with this type of person. I see this person. I know this person because they live in my neighborhood, because I've had this conversation with this person. You know, this is, this is. [00:53:50] Speaker B: Yeah, you know, Roger does remind me of somebody I worked with, though. [00:53:54] Speaker A: And we wanted to make able to people, not just some guy that you've seen on. [00:54:00] Speaker B: I mean, I get that. I get that. But everything is focused on his happiness. [00:54:06] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:54:08] Speaker B: And I'm not saying you wrote the character wrong. No, like, I like how you wrote the character. Yeah, right. But you said, like, I can compare him. I mean, I used to work with someone that would never in their lifetime listen to this podcast who used to brag about foster children they had at home. But then we go to work and treat everybody like shit. [00:54:29] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:54:30] Speaker B: And bully them and tell them how to behave and tell them how to act and tell them what values and attitudes. So, yeah, I'm with you. Like Roger, I can completely see Roger right next to me. That's why you do that. [00:54:41] Speaker A: And that's because of that experience that you've had with that person in real life. That's why you cannot, like, that's why you can read this book and say for that reason, when you get to this panel, in this book, you're, like, looking at Sarah and you can see yourself in Sarah. She's looking at Roger saying, wtf, dude? Like, yeah, like, why did you. Why. Why are you still like this? [00:55:08] Speaker B: Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. Like, at one point, he would have learned to be a little bit more tolerant of people with all these life lessons he learned. But again, you know, and I should turn the critique to myself too, right? Like, I feel like I should be more tolerant of other people's beliefs and how their feelings and how their approach to work and life is. But I do too. Like, in my brain, I get, oh, this is the right way to do things, so I'm gonna do it this way and everybody else be damned, right? Like, I. I know this is the right way to do things and I need to get stuff done. So sometimes I think I could learn from this too, personally. But I like how the character is built in here. And I love, I mean, the art, Brett is so good because Sarah's expression right there speaks. It's not just, it's Sarah, but I think you made a good point. It's also the reader. Like, seriously, I think that's one of. [00:55:57] Speaker A: The joy of comics and of different types of media in that sense, is that you yourself, you might know those. Those things that you should know. But sometimes it takes a book or like a, like a book you're reading, be it a comic or a prose book or a movie or a tv show you're watching, to actually turn that lesson back around and say, oh, wow, maybe I need to do that. It gives you that introspective and that actual actualization that you had been looking for, but you didn't know you needed it, that realization and you yourself, that maybe you need to make that change, turn that corner, whatever it is. And maybe, hopefully, we can be that for somebody if they need it or that. [00:56:46] Speaker B: Yeah. Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you. I'm going to lighten the mood for 1 second and just tell the listeners that I could tell you the page number that this beautiful face of Sarah was on, if this book actually had page numbers. But unfortunately, the authors of this book choose not to have page numbers. And thus, I cannot tell you what page this is on. What I can tell you, though, to bring it back to the serious conversation we were just having, is to drive home sort of more of that gender gap. Right, too. The space pirate cats also express that they aren't the strategist and they weren't the negotiators, they're just the mates. And continually it builds one more connection between Earn and Sarah. Where is it? Earn or earn, how would you say it? Okay. And builds one more link. Right. Is they both are expressing in life how they've been powerless with men and in their life and only looked at as one thing. And so as they have that discussion, Sarah expresses that she just can't stop thinking about the brothers in that room, and she can't stop her emotion long enough to plan and, like, she's linked to that emotion and what happened in the battle. And earn chimes in and just like, yeah, when this happens, happens in battle, we are taught to realize we can come back. The fallen. We do become fallen ourselves confidently, because in their culture, with the cats culture, they're used to, again, death, whereas Sarah isn't. And, you know, it's more traumatizing to her. But I would make the argument it's traumatizing to earn as well. It's just the trauma is just looked at differently because the way they experience their culture and if you look at different parts of the world right now, like I was saying, like, there are certain cultures that are going to be used to that, and experiencing this, where somebody, again, living in a different situation, is going to interpret those experiences differently. It doesn't mean those interpretations are right or wrong. You're just trying to interpret the world based off your lived experiences. [00:59:10] Speaker A: Some people definitely, they can compartmentalize and move forward, and some people mourn for a lot longer. It just. It's. It's different in different cultures. And the cat pirate, space cat pirates compartmentalize. And Sarah is still in mourning. Shock. [00:59:33] Speaker B: Well, and then continuing this power dynamic, because we do get it. So finally, it's directly referenced in the text. We get, urn, says, divine is only interested in the starcore. They're not interested in either of you. We can negotiate the return of their power for our lives. And Sarah says from the background, their power. And she's like, we didn't get these powers from some spiders. We got them from little dying alien dudes. And earn just looks at Sarah like, what? That doesn't make any sense because Abe and Sur fell into the earth and gave her a ring. But now we get a little bit of the history of the vine that I was jumping to earlier, and earn narrates this and basically says, summarizing this, the vine were a culture that. That were more technologically advanced than a lot of the cultures around them. This is the whole Star Trek is always talking about the prime directive, and basically, they give technology to new races, but those races take that technology and use it for violence in war. And then the vine feel bad, and so then they turn to violence in war to take their technology back, but they also sort of sit back and sort of make themselves, like, the pseudo God power of the universe, right? Like they're going to determine which technologies are shared and which aren't, and they're going to remove, like, said technology back from the. They're going to try to put the genie back in the bottle, so to speak, with their more advanced culture and earn shares. Your power is their technology, and they want to take your power back. So I like how the power dynamic is then continued. So we discussed the power men had over Sarah. Boom, boom, boom. And now another group. It's not necessarily, but a very masculine group that's deterministic. First they interfere with other cultures. It doesn't sound like that. They were necessarily initially. They weren't initially like, colonizers taking over other cultures. Colonizing. Right. But now they're more of, like, the moral compass of the universe. They've made themselves, like, the. The moral compass of the universe to determine who should have what power. And they want their toys back. [01:02:12] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:02:13] Speaker B: And they're coming after Sarah. And so now her destiny is controlled by another very masculine power structure, which she's now, later in this part of the book happened to cope with. And Mama cat is like, earn, silence. You're saying too much. And Earn defends herself and stands up against the power structure of the pirate group. [01:02:38] Speaker A: Right. [01:02:38] Speaker B: And says, no, I'm not. I'm in charge now. I'm not saying too much. These are things we need to discuss. So I like this whole list, the whole, like, generational speak notion where earn is helping Sarah confront power structures. And, boy, I can't wait till Travis listen to this one because he's going to be like, I know he's not going to think that I was going to spend the entire time talking about power structures and masculine and feminine power, but here we are. And it's an I think you know when you know. Again, I. I want to get into the next page. [01:03:17] Speaker A: Well, you can. [01:03:18] Speaker B: I'm not a fan of some of the language that used on the page a couple pages ago, but I do understand why. Yeah, it was used, but I do think that would be my criticism. My compliment is that I think, like, assuming you said you gave Travis a lot of the credit for the layout and writing in this one, I do think Travis gives us a good understanding of what's happened to Sarah and the trauma that Sarah faced right. In her life and dealing with power structures and a much better right. By now, in this part of the book, I have a much better understanding about why Sarah's brain will not let her use her power unless she releases it through drug induced means. Right. To me. Now she's using the ecstasy in the past to work through the trauma. Right. And it releases her from that trauma. So she's not dwelling or focusing on that, because just the psychological trigger of feeling powerless is what's keeping her from literally using her power. So now we get the literal interpretation, and that's actually. I think that's good writing. Right. And you leave us with that all the way through the first five issues until we get to here before we start explaining that. And I think that's okay because we get to live her learned experiences. Right. And see how she coped with not being able to use her power versus using her power and how freeing it was when she did and how trapped she is when she can't. And now we learn that, obviously, it's due to the influence of others, so it's not her. But we learn that she's trapped in her own head because of the mistreatment by other people in her life and even her brother, who tried to help her. [01:05:04] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:05:05] Speaker B: And even learning. If I wanted to take one more thought there, even if I want to take it one more step. Okay. Cause you pointed this out in the last issue, and I almost missed it. Right. Assuming her brother was a closeted homosexual male, too. Like, he may. He may not be as tapped into the struggles of feminine power structure because he was trapped into his own struggle with the power structure. [01:05:33] Speaker A: Correct. [01:05:33] Speaker B: Right. So he might have empathy for it, but he would have less of an understanding for it. So when he steps over her and tries to protect her, tries to save her, tries to be masculine, because he's trying to hide his own, like, struggles with his own sexuality. Right. As we saw throughout the book, then that puts him in a position to actually subjugate his sister even more. Right inside of a masculine feminine power structure. And I like how this is being brought out now. Right. And it's not just all of a sudden either. Right. Like, we build up to it. So this is not a surprise. Right? It's a surprise, but it's not because you're seeing it happen. So when this is written, it doesn't feel like, okay, I just wrote issue six out of left field, threw a curveball in here, and all of a sudden, ta da, here's the Macguffin. Oh, like Sarah had these abusive things happen to her. No. We saw the fights in previous issues when she was a kid. We saw how she was afraid to go into battle. We saw that it was mostly masculine figures. We saw that it was a very silver age or bronze age like type battling right. Where the power structure was there. We saw all that. So when this gets here, and then she feels powerless against another male villain in her life that she perceives as a villain. I can see how that would double down on the trauma. Right. Like, so I appreciate that as a reader, that you don't just hit me with something like, okay, here's some bad guy that's gonna come in and shoot his girlfriend. Right? Okay, I. Yeah, it's here. I I don't know if it's my favorite thing. I'm gonna lie. I don't know if it's my favorite thing. But it fits with Sarah's story arc in the sense of she felt powerless against the villain, and the villains just take different forms. And even in a sense, Chris sort of becomes the villain because he's the one protecting her, but he almost becomes, like, the villain as far as, like, accessing her brain or accessing her powers. Right. He's always trying to protect her, which doesn't help her grow. [01:07:34] Speaker A: Exactly. [01:07:34] Speaker B: Or go through. Get. [01:07:36] Speaker A: Get through that trauma, get to the next step. I have to. I have to. One. I thank you for the kind words about the development of the story, but I also have to give credit where credit's due, as you can see. And you noted when we are doing the introductions for the book, as you saw in the previous book and in this book, we credit Doctor Rojas. She came onto the book to help with formulating and giving us some notes, some of the different aspects that Travis and I might not be as equipped in writing and being able to do as males and be able to do writing a young woman from a mexican american background and having those types of social structures and being a young woman. So she was instrumental in helping us with the guidance in creating this type of story and making sure it hit those types of beats and marks. [01:08:52] Speaker B: Yeah. So you did research. [01:08:55] Speaker A: Yeah. So what I think happens sometimes is when. When writers think they're good, they throw out everything and they say, we're good to go. And I think when writers want to be great, we go and we talk to experts, and we want to make sure that we're doing a good job. [01:09:18] Speaker B: Yeah, man. [01:09:18] Speaker A: Sweet Christmas sweet Christmas one of my biggest fears is, I hope at least. [01:09:27] Speaker B: Three people got the sweet Christmas reference, by the way. I hope. But anyway, go ahead. [01:09:35] Speaker A: I think one of my biggest fears in writing is getting it wrong, and that's why you go and you talk to the people who can help you get it right. And each and every time I've written something that I'm not 100% about, I go and talk to the people that can help me do that and get those people to buy into it. [01:09:59] Speaker B: I think it's the evolution of comic book writing, too, right? Like, okay, I can make fun of sweet Christmas all day, but the fact that, like, it's. It's. It's one of those weird things, because it's like, the fact that there actually was an african american superhero in the Marvel universe in the seventies all of a sudden. Besides. Besides the black panther. Yeah, right? Like, it was probably a good thing, but, man, was it stupid to have a white writer have him say sweet Christmas, however, some people would say, but that was a good evolutionary step. Now, we're to the point, right, where we're being very conscious about what we're writing, and we're getting research and consulting people, and we're making sure that when you're writing something, you're representing cultures in a way that is appropriate. Well, appropriate. I think appropriate is the right word. I don't want to say right or wrong, because there's lots of right or wrong ways to do things right. So I don't want to say it's done in the right way, but from somebody else's lens, who you're consulting with, they would view this as an appropriate representation of the culture. So it doesn't make it right. Wrong, indifferent, yes. No. And for all the anti woke advocates out there, you know, you're pretty much idiots if you think that's a bad thing. Right? Like, to go to somebody and say, hey, is this an appropriate way to represent your culture? Isn't woke. It's common fucking courtesy. [01:11:32] Speaker A: Yeah. And I mean, like, for the people out there that listen to this podcast, and they're like, oh, like what? You know, why. Why would this guy want to write this? I have. I have two brazilian american cousins, and I want to write something that they can read and say, oh, wow. You know, it's. It's kind of my culture. I can. I can understand it. Right. You know? [01:11:57] Speaker B: Well, and, I mean, I think, too, like, sometimes you just put together a good story, and this is the folks that are in it, and you seek out for help to make sure there's appropriate representation in the story. Like, I appreciate you a lot for writing this for your cousins and making sure this inclusive of that, but I also think, like, you and Travis are trapping into the fact that, like, the rave scene and things like that was not a homogeneous culture. Right, right. And you wouldn't, like, I think from Trav, I would love to speak. I would love to ask Travis now. So I don't want to speak for him, but I. Because now I was talking about speaking for others. Right. Here I go. Speaking for Travis as a reader, my perception. Right. So I want to make sure, you know, I'm not speaking for Travis as a reader. My perception is Travis is also trying to represent the uniquenesses of that culture. And, like, the fact of the matter is, it wasn't just a bunch of white people in the room. [01:12:54] Speaker A: Right. [01:12:56] Speaker B: And I think you need to do that in writing, too. You have to. So sometimes you have to step out and say, well, I have to write it this way because I can't represent an entire group of people through my lens. And. And that's why. And, of course that's why you said you went and got help, right? [01:13:16] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:13:16] Speaker B: Like, that's why you add a consultant. So, yeah, I think. I think that's brilliant, you know, and I think some stories should be written for your lens. I'm working on writing. Well, working on one. I always say that, but sometime from now, after, like, seven years of writing, someday I'll have something put together. It's going to be completely through my lens. [01:13:35] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:13:36] Speaker B: And that's okay, too, because of the nature of that story. Right. But they don't always have to be directly through the author's lens. Right. You need sometimes, though, to expand that. [01:13:46] Speaker A: Sometimes you need to tell your story because it's a story that someone else might need to see. So, I mean, there's always, you know, every story needs to get told. [01:14:00] Speaker B: I also think this issue does a good job then, you know, I know I was making fun of Roger telling his story, but this issue does a good job of giving you three different stories through three different perspectives and then tying them together here at the end. [01:14:13] Speaker A: It'S like we knew what we were doing. [01:14:16] Speaker B: Wow. Damn. Hey, Mike. Dropping a mic drop over there. [01:14:22] Speaker A: Just figuring. [01:14:23] Speaker B: Okay, I'm done. Okay, so, you know, with that said, let me get back into the story. [01:14:28] Speaker A: You've known me for how long? Like, I mean, like, most of my life. I very rarely ever get cocky like that. [01:14:36] Speaker B: Wow. Well, anyway, earn wraps up the story about the vine saying there's vine seekers, right? The seekers are seeking the missing technology. And she mentions the keep, right. I think at this point, or. No, she doesn't. But anyway, she's. They're wrapped up because the seeker is out to get them. And so they are so powerful, it's important for them. But if this is really powerful and they want it back and they're in fear of it, earn thinks they should face them and negotiate with them instead of trying to fight them over it. And, you know, interesting perspective, because she's. Now, I feel like she's tapping into her pirate culture a little bit, but we'll see how this works out. And Roger's like, I get it. If we run and fight, we'll play on their fears of losing it again. Sarah has been silent in all this, right? Which is interesting, because I really am waiting to hear Sarah's perspective. So Sarah has been silent in the discussion. They do go and try to find a little space pod looking thing, and they get in there, and Sarah. Sarah's gonna ride on top because space hasn't affected her since her matter powers have taken over, assumingly, because she is probably immune to that because she can trans. Probably subconsciously transmit a bubble around her, which you see the light that Brett draws as they go into space and probably give herself oxygen since she can transmute matter. So there we go. And she does it all subconsciously, which is really cool. But they fly off to do the negotiation, and Roger keeps talking, and he's like, she's gonna be all right, okay, right, right. And earn's like, yeah, she's loving it. Like, leave her alone. And then Roger's like, we end the story with. We end issue six, not the story, because we got one more issue. We see a spaceship with a whole bunch of spiders on it, and Roger's like, I've got a bad feeling about this. And there we go. And then we get to the thank you pages. And of course, on the first thank you page, you can find funny bug forensics right there. There's also somebody named lsh Bear, which I can only presume of Legion of superheroes bear. I probably should meet this person. So anyway, well, yeah, and yeah, that's the only reason. So Project Nerd thanked them too, so. [01:17:23] Speaker A: Oh, hey, that's cool. [01:17:25] Speaker B: And yeah, and yeah, so the art is amazing, as always. I didn't talk about as much about the art this time because we were really focused on the, like, power structures and the story and the lots of words. But Brett's art is beautiful, as usual. You can also always, if you want something by Brett, you can go to bretwodeli.com and buy a print or reach out to Brett, and he'll be happy to paint something or draw something, and you can request different things from him. I think he'll still paint it for you, but if not, he'll paint it on his. His iPad, and it will look beautiful. So either way, you get it. But, yeah, reach out to Brett if you want something. We probably have a couple of. I want to get Greg's before I start plugging other stuff. Greg, do you have any final thoughts on the book that we didn't cover here? [01:18:19] Speaker A: I. It's a. It's. It's a. I just like anybody reading this book, it's a. I'll just say I I can. If. If it was a tough book to. For you to read, it's a tough book for me to reread. It's a tough book to. It was a tough book to write as well. I mean, if you reading this think is a tough book to read, imagine working with Travis on this book for a few years and knowing that, like, every time we worked on this one, I'll just say there's a lot of stuff that. It's a very personal book for he and I, in a sense, as, like you said with the disclaimer, there's a lot of stuff that I think for Travis, it was a lot of closure for me, again, the two different races, the space pirate cats and Sarah, dealing with things differently, compartmentalizing and moving on and just still holding space like Sarah is. I think that this book definitely. It is a very heavy book in that sense, and it is one that when Travis and I had been even going through and re editing and rewording a lot of things, there was a lot of discussion talk. I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna lie. When we. When we were. Every time we pick this thing up, there's a lot of tears. So, I mean, it's just. It's a hard book. It's a hard book. So. [01:20:23] Speaker B: Yeah, and that's because you're writing from a personal space. And I did not have a lot of tears in this one. I think I had more of a reaction to. It is different, and I think that's good, too. I think readers are gonna have a reaction to it, and we appreciate the passion that you put into it. [01:20:39] Speaker A: And I know that if I started getting into stuff, it's just. Just gonna be a band aid, so. But if, you know, Travis and I, and, you know, the. The scenes that we've been involved in, in our. In our youths in the early two thousands and stuff like that, like this. A lot of stuff. So, I mean, even though. And we've said this on other shows and other podcasts, like, Travis and I have circuled each other in time for the last, like, 20 years, even though we never. We just met in the last, like, ten years. But, like, we've. We've been around each other in the same circles, and it's. It's very. It's very odd how life is like that. And it's just kind of like it was. It's like life will just continually pull people closer and closer. And it's. It's very interesting because there's. There's a moment in which we were both right there and not right there at the same time. [01:21:51] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:21:55] Speaker A: Anyways. Yeah. The overall, the outside of that, like I said before, the book itself, like, it definitely is a very. As you can see, like, the. As you're reading through the book, and Dan has said it in shows before, when we've covered other issues, you can tell when Travis is writing, where Greg is writing sometimes. And if you're reading this one, you know, it's a very Travis book because there's not a lot of Greg. And that's. And that's, from my standpoint, a lot of it was just making sure that the heavy stuff in some of these big dialogue dumps was tight. You know, I really wanted to make sure that it wasn't just bricks of text and making sure that the story of the space cat pirate people was written well, but not so heavy and, like a page of pages of pages of stuff. Yeah, no, I know that the next book, when. When y'all get a chance to get that one, I'm excited about that. So I've been excited about seeing what Brett's been drawing. [01:23:27] Speaker B: So I have this feeling based off Sarah's silence, that based off Sarah's silence going into the situation, that she gave tacit agreement to what they were about to do, but didn't agree. So maybe in the next situation. This is my guess. I have no idea what's happening. Greg and I have not talked about it. As the reader, I'm expecting Sarah maybe not to just go along with this whole, like, Kumbaya negotiation plan, but you will see. [01:23:57] Speaker A: Only time I'll tell. [01:23:59] Speaker B: It could happen. I mean, but it also couldn't happen. [01:24:02] Speaker A: So, I mean, it's only gonna. You're only gonna find out if people back the book. [01:24:07] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:24:09] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, we would hate to have another issue, too. [01:24:11] Speaker B: Well, there you go. So. Well, you can back this on Kickstarter as soon as it goes live. It should be going live in May. We will have a link to the page so you can get notified as soon as it goes live. I actually will visit Travis on May. I think this comes out before I visit Travis. I think it comes out the day before I visit Travis, actually. So I'll be visiting Travis. Travis on May 9, very briefly. We'll probably just be having dinner, but. So I will try to dig everything I can out of Travis to get the scoop. Greg never tells me anything. [01:24:52] Speaker A: He's gonna be tight like a clam. I told him I already paid him off. Don't tell Dan a thing. [01:24:59] Speaker B: Uh huh. I feel like I can get Travis talking in the right circumstances. He may tell me things. He might tell you stuff. [01:25:05] Speaker A: He might. He's, you know, he. He's. He's super excited. He will tell you. He's like a. He's. He's like a little kid with a secret. [01:25:17] Speaker B: Well, on that note, I think we should probably wrap this one up. We'll plug a couple of things next week. I already mentioned we'll be covering terror titans hash one and two. [01:25:27] Speaker A: Oh, boy. [01:25:28] Speaker B: Cause we're gonna read. We're gonna read two books at a time. Cause it's a six issue mini series. And much like things that you wanted us to read, like Cap Wolf or us one, which we read one of this. I don't want this series to hang around with you or us. So we're going to read two issues at a time. So we'll cover it in three separate podcasts. Like I said, it's a time when they were trying to feature Ravager. And we get references to all sorts of teen heroes you think you've heard of or never have heard of. In fact, we get, it's like a mashup of young justice and young justice the cartoon, young justice the television or young justice the comic. Some teen titans mashup. We get characters that appeared in Freaking Kingdom come. [01:26:19] Speaker A: Oh, wow. [01:26:21] Speaker B: Well, offspring does show up in other comics, too. Offspring is the kingdom come son of the band, plastic man the band. No. Um, no, no. But in this comic, what you're going to find out is some people don't know where their kids are. [01:26:36] Speaker A: Oh, well, that's not good. Did they call me and the kids? [01:26:41] Speaker B: The kids are not all right. [01:26:42] Speaker A: The kids are not all right. [01:26:44] Speaker B: No. [01:26:45] Speaker A: Oh, no. It's not good. [01:26:47] Speaker B: No, they did not call McGruff the cram dog. Probably good that they. I don't know that McGruff the crime dog would have been of much use, but anyway. Jail. Yeah. Wow. So it's true. [01:27:01] Speaker A: It's true. Google it. [01:27:04] Speaker B: Well, you can also. I will google it later. Maybe now you can also find Greg at the retro Emporium on Meeker street. In Kent, Washington, from time to time. [01:27:15] Speaker A: Yeah, from time to time. [01:27:16] Speaker B: He has never been employee of the month, but often the squattro man is. [01:27:20] Speaker A: The squat show man is. [01:27:22] Speaker B: It's also, you can also get absolute Zero's camp launchpad. [01:27:31] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:27:31] Speaker B: And stuff. And of course, you can find us on project Dash nerd.com, your source for political commentary and news. [01:27:39] Speaker A: No. Oh, my God. Why? [01:27:48] Speaker B: Well, anyway, so I think that's about a wrap. So I think that's about as good a plugs for all the people we work with as we can possibly give. [01:27:54] Speaker A: And jujitsu lawyer Paul, oh, I sorry. [01:27:59] Speaker B: I mentioned him at the beginning of the podcast. Yes, jujutsu lawyer Paul does not get any plugs today because he is the one that's forcing us to read terror titans and. Yeah, but if you want to train with somebody who clearly enjoyed watching static shock as a kid because who didn't? Yeah, you can go see Paul at on Jackson and, well, I guess Bridgeport, but Bridgeport slash Jackson and 27th in Tacoma, you can hit up certified martial arts slash certified jiu jitsu. And you can go train with jiu jitsu lawyer Paul Boudreau. If you have ever thought, hey, I might want to learn to choke other people out or break their limbs or break their ankles, which he will teach you not to do any of those things. In fact, he will teach you to do it in a fine, controlled way, but very effectively. Take care of yourself. And so, and he just got done. In the last two years, he did 9600 rounds of Jujitsu, which is like. Yeah. So he just wrapped up. His goal was 10,000. He hit 9600 and had COVID twice during that time. Wow. Yeah. Still hit 9600 rounds. So he's also competed at ADCC trials a couple of times. So this is a guy that if you want to learn, honestly, if you want to learn Jiu Jitsu, I can't think of anybody better in the area for you to go to. So he's the guy. Go try it out. And of course, if you're coming from out of state, you could always drop by the gym on his open mats on Sunday and hang out. So there you go. I know tons of our, like, all three men's reviewers of our audience are super interested in Jujitsu. So, you know, that long plug for that was very, very welcoming. [01:29:54] Speaker A: But he's got a Dragon Ball Z painting. So, I mean, he does. [01:29:58] Speaker B: And he dressed up as Spider man for Halloween. I mean, like, you know, he's this, he's, he's as far as fandom is concerned, he's not your typical. Well, I don't know what the typical jiu jitsu person is, but to me, he is. He's also a fan. He also loves geekdom and nerdom and all sorts of stuff like that, so. And he's really serious about jujitsu, so. Wow. 16 years in prison. What the hell? He just googled the crime dog 1000. Oh, it's for pots. Oh, that's lame. [01:30:34] Speaker A: Oh. [01:30:35] Speaker B: Oh, hold up. No, it's not just for pies, okay? 27 weapons, including a grenade launcher or launcher and 9000 rounds of ammunition. [01:30:44] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:30:44] Speaker B: What in the hell? Yeah, well, take a bite out of crime. I think he was gonna do it on his own. [01:30:53] Speaker A: He was taking a bite out of somebody's. Some. Somebody's hustle. [01:31:01] Speaker B: Well, that's, uh. Wow. [01:31:04] Speaker A: Well, that's. [01:31:05] Speaker B: That's something. [01:31:06] Speaker A: Well, kids, stay off of his block. Well. [01:31:09] Speaker B: Well, kids at school. Well, kids at school, remember, don't do drugs unless they're mine. And here you go, buddy. You know, I think that means McGruff was probably planting a lot of evidence over the years. [01:31:23] Speaker A: I don't know. [01:31:25] Speaker B: That's. You know, that's what he was holding in that giant trench coat, maybe. [01:31:30] Speaker A: Or the grenade launcher. Geez. [01:31:33] Speaker B: Yeah, that's entirely possible, too. [01:31:35] Speaker A: Some scary stuff. [01:31:36] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, this looks more realistic. Here we've got McGruff the crime dog next to Brian from Family Guy. Now, that I feel like that's not real. That's got to be made up, but. Yeah, that's. Or it's from Family Guy cartoon, but I like that. Now, that's. That's a. A fascinating time. [01:31:56] Speaker A: It's the same. It's not the same person, but wait. [01:32:01] Speaker B: Well, anyway. Okay, well, yeah, I think we're done, so we're probably out of here. And. Yeah, this was fun, this funny book, forensics fun. It always is fun on funny bug forensics. Come back next week for some terror titans terror type. Unless I change. Unless I change my mind. Oh, I might. [01:32:23] Speaker A: No, you won't. I might. [01:32:26] Speaker B: But anyway. All right. We are good. Thanks. I'm out. Bye.